I fell back onto the bed after finishing the last number.
Thud.
The thin mattress barely softened the impact.
My chest rose and fell heavily as I stared at the ceiling, my breathing uneven but slowly calming.
For a while, I just lay there, listening to the sound of my own breathing and the distant noise of the corridor outside the cell.
Footsteps.
Voices too far away to understand.
When my heartbeat finally slowed, I forced myself to move.
Not my body.
My mind.
My thoughts.
I hadn't been myself for months.
Ever since the trial.
Since everything fell apart.
I had only survived.
Reacted.
Endured.
But—
Now I needed to think.
To organize what little information I had.
To understand where I stood.
And what options I had.
First—
Escape isn't possible.
That conclusion came without hesitation.
I didn't know the exact difference in strength between adults and teens in this world, but I had already seen enough to understand one thing clearly.
They were built differently.
Not just stronger, the way adults were stronger than children on Earth.
This was something else.
That scene after we arrived on Drakoria, where the slave was running away, trying to escape.
I saw it.
I watched him run with my own eyes, and I blinked.
It was just a moment.
Not even longer than a breath, and it was gone.
His head severed cleanly from his body, rolling across the stone floor while a guard stood beside him, unmoving.
They weren't just faster.
They weren't just stronger.
They were overwhelming.
Like they weren't human anymore.
I already knew it.
The moment I tried to escape, I would die.
Or worse.
My stomach tightened at the thought.
Caught and tortured.
Again.
I shook my head at the thought.
No.
I can't go through that again.
Never.
I clenched my jaw and forced the thought away.
An escape plan based on speed or strength wouldn't work.
And I wasn't arrogant enough to believe I could out-think an entire organization that had been trading slaves for who knows how long.
I didn't know enough about them.
No.
I didn't know enough about this world.
And planning with missing information was the fastest way to die.
Which led me to the second truth.
I don't understand this world.
You would think that twelve years of memories would give me at least some information about it.
But they didn't.
What would a child even know about the world?
A child's focus was on completely different things.
I know nothing about this world.
And the knowledge I had from Earth couldn't be applied here.
The best example would be...
Mana.
A surreal force that had no equivalent on Earth.
There was nothing even close to it.
Mana strengthened bodies, fueled machines, lit cities.
So what was it?
Energy?
Fuel?
A force?
Something else entirely?
I didn't understand it.
No.
I couldn't.
And it wasn't just mana.
It was this world.
At first glance, everything looked medieval—swords, slaves, carriages, empires, nobles.
But that was an illusion.
If you paid attention, you noticed the cracks.
The ship we traveled on hadn't used sails.
It had propellers.
Then there were the lightstones.
No electricity.
No wires.
Just mana.
I lifted my arm slightly, chains clinking softly as my gaze fell on the shackles around my wrists.
These shackles tightened when I resisted.
They reacted as if they were alive.
I couldn't think of any technology on Earth capable of doing that in such a small, self-contained object.
And those were just three examples.
Three pieces of technology.
How many more might be out there?
There was only one conclusion I could reach.
This world wasn't medieval.
It wasn't modern either.
Was it something between the two?
Or something completely different?
I wasn't sure.
I didn't have enough information.
This world followed rules I didn't understand.
And I couldn't afford to plan long-term in a world whose foundations I couldn't even grasp.
Which meant—
For now, there was only one viable path forward.
Survival.
Just like Lisa said.
'Survive until tomorrow.'
That was the only thing I could do right now.
And maybe—if I survived long enough—I could find a way to regain my freedom.
But even that raised questions.
How long would it take?
How many tomorrows?
How many fights would I be forced into?
If they continued with these death battles—one against fifteen—I wouldn't last forever.
One mistake would be enough.
Enough to end everything.
Even if I had awakened mana, I wasn't the only one.
Others could use mana too.
And I wasn't even strong.
As far as I could tell, I was one of the youngest here.
But—
It can't continue like this.
I raised a hand and brushed it across my forehead, an old habit when I needed to think clearly.
There couldn't be enough teens for them to keep sacrificing fifteen in a single fight.
Not if this place was meant to run long-term.
And not if profit was their goal.
Slaves couldn't be cheap.
Killing fifteen to keep one wasn't profitable.
Which meant the battles would change.
Sooner or later...
A change had to happen.
My thoughts drifted back to the arena.
The arena.
The high walls.
John's voice.
The roar of the crowd.
A colosseum.
Like the Roman ones from old movies back on Earth.
Slaves fighting to entertain the crowd.
Just like Gladiators.
I didn't know much, and most of what I knew came from movies.
But—
Gladiators.
Slaves bought to fight and entertain.
Some of them gained fame.
Some gained wealth.
And some—
Some had even earned their freedom.
If this place followed the same logic…
Then it wasn't just about surviving until tomorrow.
I clenched my hand slowly.
If I survived long enough…
If I became valuable enough…
Freedom might not be impossible.
My next goal became clear.
I will survive the colosseum.
Until I earn my freedom.
But—
Surviving itself wasn't as simple as it sounded.
To survive...
I needed strength.