The next morning, Cyrus said goodbye only to Andrew, who was his room mate. He left and separated from the group from Mayfair and headed directly towards the tent of the Abominable Abyss was. He noticed Jemima wasn’t among the group leaving the hotel at the same time.
As he arrived, he found that he was not the only student who joined Abominable Abyss. There were 7 other teenagers there beside him. As they gathered they introduced themselves to each other.
There were the 2 girls, Annabelle and Aribeth. They were all had a talent level of 6 and were twin sisters. Unlike the others who were nobles, they actually came from a family of mages. They were quite pretty but emotionally cold, and although very beautiful, there was something unearthly about them.
There was a boy who stood apart from everyone else named Damien. He was a level 8 talent and was considered the top recruit of this year for the school.
Besides Cyrus who was supposedly a level 5 talent and considered so-so, the others had a talent of 4 and below. Most likely they were recruited for experiment fodder, but they either knew this and risked it in hopes of becoming real mages, or were ignorant of this fact.
As the other 3 were aloof, Cyrus joined the other 4 people. One of the boys rushed over to greet him.
“Hi, my name is Jason. This is my friend James, and these other two are Melissa and Jamie” he said, introducing the others.
Melissa and Jamie were actually quite pretty, and James and Jason looked like proper noble men. So it was strange that they would join this guild.
They all came from different regions of Misteria. Although they knew that they were low level talents and might end up experiment fodder, they decided that they still wanted to join Abominable Abyss because of their chances of becoming truly powerful mages.
If they joined other schools, they would be bullied and neglected. But even as experimental fodder, if they are lucky, the experiments might imbue power into their bodies, which was why most of the experiments performed in the Abominable Abyss were banned.
As they were all there, the same lone female teacher gathered them all and led them to a open area.
They found that waiting there was a group of 20 people, dressed in rags and chained together. Cyrus immediately realized that they were slaves!
In Misteria, it was not uncommon to buy and sell slaves at the market. They were usually captured during war time or were sold to pay for debts. From the looks of these slaves, they were already hypnotized and had blank looks on their faces.
Surprisingly, Cyrus found that all the slaves were young, fit and reasonably good looking. They all looked between 16 and 40 years old.
The teacher lifted her hand and cast a spell. Suddenly, the ground shuddered and a large bone dragon appeared from the ground. On its back were a carriage in front, and a large cage at the back.
The slaves were immediately ushered to the back. Then the teachers ordered Damien, Annabelle and Aribeth to sit in front in the carriage.
“The rest of you, enter the cage!” ordered the teacher.
“What do you mean? What about us? We are not slaves! We are students!” argued James indignantly as he showed his token.
The teacher looked at him and the token shot electricity that covered James’ body. In an instant, his eyes went blank and he looked just like the other slaves.
“Get into the cage you talentless scum!” commanded the teacher.
The others shivered and knew that they were trapped. They reluctantly followed the mindless James and entered the cage, Cyrus followed them silently.
While all this happened, Cyrus watched in silence. As he entered the cage, the cage slammed shut and the bone dragon took off.
From a distance, Cyrus could see the other schools moving out as well through the cage bars. Some of them were seated on giant eagles, or rocs, or pulled in carriages by Pegasus or griffins. They all went separate directions and soon disappeared from each other’s view.
Cyrus sat quietly next to Jason, Jamie and Melissa. The girls were crying and it was clear that Jason was also regretting his choice in joining the Abominable Abyss.
James stood next to the other slaves, not moving like a statue.
The trip took 4 days and they didn’t bother to stop at all. The students couldn’t go to the toilet and had to do it in the cage like an animal.
Luckily the bottom of the cage was also metal bars and their waste fell directly through the bones of the bone dragon to the ground below.
They were very thirsty and hungry and had to huddle together for warmth as the dragon was flying so high in the air.
Cyrus randomly chose Jamie and Jason and Melissa paired up to warm each other up with body heat.
Cyrus also noticed that one of the slave girls was lactating. She probably had recently given birth. Cyrus didn’t hesitate and hungrily suckled on her breasts.
This kept his spirits up and his stomach full. However, the other 3 refused to follow suit and stayed hungry.
Finally they noticed the bone dragon descending from the sky. They were somewhere in the North of Misteria in a cold and gloomy land that was covered in mist and was dark and dreary.
He could see barren farms and forests all around. Eventually they approached a gigantic cemetery surrounded by a forest with dead trees.
The bone dragon landed and the female teacher and the 3 chosen acolytes stepped out looking very comfortable.
The teacher opened the cage and all the slaves including James walked out. The other 3 acolytes also walked out looking miserable. Cyrus walked down after them, looking no worse from wear.
The teacher was surprised when she looked at Cyrus who simply ignored her stare and looked like a tourist looking around in amazement.
The bone dragon disappeared into the ground and they stood silently and looked around at the tombs surrounding them.
In the minds of Jason, Melissa and Jamie, there probably isn’t a more miserable place in Misteria right now.
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