Chapter 1 As If In A Different World
He felt himself lying on the cold ground...
The moment he became conscious, a severe headache immediately began to assault Li Ang's nerves.
In a daze, the short life of a boy named "Leon" flashed through his mind.
He still cherished the joy of his father teaching him hand-to-hand how to draw a hunting bow.
Above him, the tenderness of his mother stroking his hair lingered long.
The evening glow of his childhood walks on country roads seemed like only yesterday...
Red, the color of blood, the cold light raised was the swords of mercenaries, the blades reflecting the pitiful cowardice and fear of the boy, his mother's pleas and the dying screams ignited flames within the boy's heart.
Anger and hatred finally overcame fear, but frail anger was meaningless. The boy was knocked to the ground, and just before losing the last shred of consciousness, he only heard the cruel laughter of the mercenaries mocking him.
...
......
Suddenly, he opened his eyes, and the fierce blood vessels had not yet dissipated in the boy's bloodshot eyes.
His memory gradually became clear, and Li Ang frowned, trying to dispel the residual hatred in his heart that did not belong to him.
He gasped, easing his tense body, and tried to prop himself up, but found that his hands were shackled by crude iron cuffs.
Shifting his body with difficulty, he finally managed to lean against the rough wooden fence beside him, and slowly lifted his upper body to look around.
A cage holding quite a few people surrounded by a large number of similar cages.
The people inside the cage were in similar conditions as him, men and women, but all were not old.
Most of those imprisoned were youths and teenagers, and even seven or eight-year-old children, either clad in rags with dirt and bloodstains or stripped of any clothes covering their bodies, many bearing scars from abuse.
Sporadic sobs came through as the mercenaries mocked and berated them harshly in a foreign language, the expressions of those imprisoned were either numb, fearful, or filled with hatred, and the air was permeated with a suffocating atmosphere of oppression.
Somewhere in a camp, Li Ang realized he had become a captive... a slave.
He deeply inhaled to accept this unbearable reality and then slowly exhaled, trying to calm his freshly awakened mind and organize the myriad thoughts in his head.
Who am I?... Leon?
... No.
I am Li Ang.
The turbulent memories of this body could not overshadow Li Ang's self-awareness; his consciousness easily passed through the remnants of this sixteen-year-old boy's soul, finding the information that truly belonged to him.
Li Ang, twenty-six, single, parents alive, no bad habits, physically healthy, an ordinary office worker commonly seen on Earth...
Remembering this, the headache struck again, those once familiar memories now blurry and distant, Li Ang frowned and held his forehead.
Setting aside his memories for the moment, he looked up at the dresses of the mercenary guards outside the cage.
Spears, long swords, chain armor, iron armor, crossbows... In the era of Li Ang on Earth, no matter how underdeveloped the country, such a medieval-style outfit was impossible.
And the bloody and brutal images in the dying boy's memory also clearly told him that this was definitely not a movie set.
So was it time travel? Or soul crossing, to ancient Europe or to some unfamiliar otherworld?
... One unreal question after another inevitably sprang forth.
Li Ang could not discern any reason; he did not remember having any close encounters with a cement mixer before, or even remember what happened to his conscious before entering this body.
Looking down at the iron cuffs tightly constraining his wrists, Li Ang felt somewhat bewildered.
As a modern individual who was mentally sound, he, by no means, wanted to become a slave under someone else's control over his freedom and life.
For now, disregarding the cause of his time traveling, the real pressing matter was how to escape.
He calmed himself and started to search through the memories of the boy named Leon for anything that could help him understand his present situation.
...Seryan Kingdom...Holy Sol Church...Holy Land City...Rolannar...Kantadar Kingdom's overwhelming army...war...invasion...breach of the city...looting...massacre...
Slowly picking up the memories of the body's original owner, the boy called Leon was just a child from a regular hunter family on the outskirts of Rolannar Holy Land City, living a relatively peaceful life in the forest settlement outside the Holy City until the Kantadar troops invaded from the west.
"You're still alive... I thought you had died yesterday."
A calm voice seemed to be speaking to him.
Li Ang broke free from his thoughts and looked in the direction of the voice; it was a brown-haired young boy, about fifteen or sixteen years old, although he too was in a pitiful state, his skin was still fairer than most in the cage.
Li Ang guessed that before being captured, the other boy might have come from a relatively wealthy nonworking family, otherwise ordinary commoners wouldn't maintain such fair skin even under the sun.
"Cough... who are you?..." Li Ang, suppressing the dry cough in his throat, asked.
"I who am not important, you should rather thank that lady there; had she not kindly persisted in giving you water these past two days, you might not have survived," said the fair-skinned youth without much expression, tilting his chin towards a direction.
Li Ang shifted his gaze in the direction indicated by the youth. The person referred to was a lady in her twenties. Despite her inevitably tattered clothes and haggard face in such a situation, one could still tell that she was quite gentle and outstanding in appearance.
"Thank you," Li Ang said sincerely to the lady who had taken care of him during his unconscious state, using a hoarse voice.
In such a miserable environment, willingly taking care of someone half-dead, her character was indeed respectable.
The lady managed a strained smile and nodded slightly towards him by way of response.
Li Ang noticed another sturdy youth leaning next to her. This youth, like a wounded wild animal, vigilantly glanced over.
He bore a resemblance to the kind-hearted lady, about six or seven points similar, possibly relatives, judging from their ages they could be siblings. The youth's physique was robust, showing signs of exercise, and his skin too showed a deeper hue from being constantly exposed to the sun. However, the swelling from the beatings of mercenaries was also clearly visible on him.
Li Ang shifted his gaze away to avoid provoking him. He understood that the unfriendly look in the young man's eyes was not out of malice; in such a chaotic and cruel situation, he just wanted to protect his remaining family.
Continuing to survey the other people in the cage, they were all similar, each looking like walking corpses, hardly any without injuries. Even the lady who had looked after him when he was unconscious bore bruises and pinch marks from abuse. Li Ang didn't want to think about what sad experiences she might have gone through.
His gaze shifted away from his fellow suffering captives. He looked at the cage behind him, very sturdy, and internal destruction was clearly impossible. Moreover, even if one could escape the prison, the weak prisoners without weapons would not be able to overcome the armored mercenaries guarding outside.
After much thought, he finally sighed helplessly. It seemed that aside from waiting, there were no other options.
Time passed slowly and torturously—each hour seemed as long as centuries. Li Ang had never experienced such excruciating torment before; his dreary and dull life as a social animal in the past now seemed like paradise by comparison, for back then, he still had his freedom.
After a long time, the sky dimmed.
(Uria Language) "You Seryan pigs! Get the hell up for food!"
The incomprehensible gibberish from the mercenaries outside interrupted Li Ang's wild thoughts.
He looked in the direction of the noise. Several Kantadar mercenaries, carrying sacks, came to each cage, shouting and cursing in a foreign language, and threw what seemed like dry food from the sacks into the cages, treating them like they were feeding livestock.
A few chunks of dry rations were also thrown into Li Ang's cage, followed by two leather water bags.
Li Ang looked at the greyish-black, dust-stained food on the ground and counted. The mercenaries had given a quantity that didn't even match the number of prisoners in the cage; it wasn't enough for one per person.
While Li Ang was still observing the reaction of others, the dark-skinned youth was the first to rush to the food. He quickly grabbed two pieces of dry rations and a water bag, then ran back to his sister's side.
Subsequently, others also came forward, picking up the rations closest to them.
The whole process was without struggle; firstly, because everyone was not yet at the point of starvation and secondly, the captives did not have much strength or will left to dispute unnecessarily.
Li Ang did not manage to reach the food in time before it was all taken. He simply sat back in the corner. Although hungry, it was still within his range of endurance.
At least there was enough water to drink. Two large water bags were passed around among everyone, leaving some leftover even after everyone had drunk their fill.
By the time it reached his hands, Li Ang endured the psychological discomfort from the mouthpiece used by everyone else. He slightly lifted the spout and poured water into his mouth, finally relieving the dryness in his throat.
In such critical times, he couldn't afford to be particular about cleanliness.
After he had his fill, Li Ang passed the water bag to the next person beside him, his gaze inadvertently looking towards the siblings. He just caught the lady who had cared for him while he was unconscious, looking back at him.
With a slightly apologetic wry smile on her face, she clutched the dry ration her brother had forcefully grabbed for her, yet hesitated to eat because she noticed Li Ang, who had just woken from unconsciousness, had not received any food.
Her expression seemed to struggle briefly, and the lady stood up intending to share her food with Li Ang, but was immediately pulled back by her brother.
"...Sis, you didn't eat enough yesterday either!" The robust youth didn't lower his voice. His tone was both firm and filled with concern, clearly objecting to his sister's over-concern for others, which was also why he had rushed to grab two portions of dry ration first.
Li Ang could clearly hear the young man raising his voice, obviously intending for him to hear, so he tactfully waved his hands.
"Thanks for your kindness, but I'm not hungry yet."
Li Ang politely declined. Even without her brother's intervention, he felt uneasy always accepting the kind lady's care.
"I'll share half with you, I'm not that hungry either," a voice suddenly interjected.
Li Ang looked over to see the fair-skinned youth who had spoken to him before, the sudden kindness catching him off-guard.
The youth sat next to him and broke half of his dry ration, handing it over.
"...Uh, thank you." Li Ang didn't refuse this time, readily accepting the food offered.
"About the question earlier, my name is Azeryan Flarell, from the Flarrell Family. And you?" The fair-skinned, brown-haired youth bit into the hard-to-swallow dry ration and then casually asked Li Ang.
Li Ang hesitated briefly but considering that his own name was phonetically similar to the original owner of the body he inhabited, he decided to stop worrying.
"My name is Leon, no surname," Li Ang chose to blend in, using the original name of the young body he inhabited.
The youth named Azeryan was briefly taken aback.
He had seen how Li Ang showed clear reluctance when using the communal water bag and thought he might be a noble's offspring who had not yet adjusted to the circumstances.
But now it didn't really matter, Azeryan thought self-deprecatingly. Whether a son of nobility or a commoner, they were now all slaves at the mercy of the Kantadar people.
After exchanging names, there was nothing much left to say, and the atmosphere once again fell into a resigned silence.
...