The Challenger's Return: Rebirth of the Rainbow Mage

Elmer and Manson couldn't bring themselves to nod their heads, while Gato, the slim, short man in the middle, quickly made eye contact with the other two and yelled,

"We know we were wrong to sell her! Please spare us!"

Otto quirked a brow, and cast [Agonizing Pain] on Gato this time.

Elliott looked even more nauseated as Gato's face distorted just like Uggo's (Manson's).

Otto whispered to him,

"Don't forget why we're here."

Elliott nodded and forced himself to watch.

Otto turned his head back, and brought out the picture of Mirabelle in human form.

His voice was low and dangerous, but completely devoid of emotion.

As he spoke, he pointed to her injuries one by one,

"These bruises on her limbs occur when a bone, or, in her case, wings, are broken, healed improperly, then broken again and again…these scars here can only come from slicing her skin layer by layer until they draw blood…the wounds on her stomach are burn marks which precisely match being carried over an open flame…."

His voice droned on and on in the small room as he casually listed injury after injury that Mirabelle suffered in great detail. Otto interspersed his remarks with new casts of [Dark Bind] and light casts of [Agonizing Pain].

Each sentence left the faces of the three slave traders paler and paler, until all were completely devoid of all color.

"Please be merciful! We were young and stupid and…thought she was just a dumb bird!"

"We swear! We really didn't know we were hurting anyone!"

Otto rolled his eyes and didn't respond, but Elliott felt compelled to interject.

With shaking hands and red eyes, he half spoke, half yelled,

"Would you torture a random chicken for a month? You heard her sing and you KNEW she was a sentient race. You loved every minute of torturing her. You fuc-"

Otto just shook his head then patted Elliott on the shoulder.

Otto's eyes bored into Elliott's.

"Enough."

"No! They tortured her so badly, we don't know if she will EVER even recov-"

"Elliott, that's enough. Sit. Meditate. Breathe. Then watch. Don't bother to argue. Save that anger for your actions. You'll see."

Otto stood in front of Elliott exuding a calming presence that was hard to ignore.

Elliott looked at Otto angrily, then sat down directly on the bare floor, heedless of the filth that covered it.

He began to meditate.

Otto turned back to the three and gazed at them dispassionately.

"The point is, every injury you inflicted, you will be receiving in kind. I will be merciful and simply use the old world rule without additional amplification. An eye for an eye."

He took out a pair of gloves.

"Shall we start?"

His eyes held a glint of cruelty while his mouth was ever so slightly turned upwards.

To the three slave traders, he was the epitome of the devil.

For the rest of the day, desperate cries echoed out from the large shack in the back of the hovel.

GRAPHIC TORTURE: SKIP THIS PART IF YOU NEED TO

Otto meticulously and methodically engraved every single torture onto their skin.

He first injected each of them with a solution that Mirabelle had mentioned they used on her which would enhance their sense of touch. And, by extension, their sense of pain.

He tied them on a spit roast and left them over an open flame, making sure to burn them slowly, one at a time, each in front of the other two to add an additional element of psychological torment.

He fashioned a magical (reinforced) noose and hung them right up until they gasped for air and their necks bruised, then brought them down a half second before they died, only to do it over and over again.

He painstakingly fractured each bone in their arm, then healed every bone with utmost care, only to repeat the process. Over and over. Until every inch of their arms was a mottled purplish blue that wouldn't heal no matter what he did.

He sliced their skin off layer by layer with a dull, rusty knife, and waited for it to regrow before slicing it off again.

He used a needle to open their pores before sticking tiny white hot rods inside, focusing on the areas of greatest pain, such as their genitals, face, fingers, etc.

A few times, if Otto felt it wasn't painful enough, he added a light cast of [Agonizing Pain].

His anger was seared onto their bodies every step of the way.

In some ways, Otto was hardly doing this for Mirabelle any longer. He was using this as a tool for himself to help relieve some of his own rage.

After the screams died down, the torture even started to feel cathartic.

Otto had to remind himself of the stakes again and again to keep clear headed without 'leaning in' to his victims' pain.

Elliott just sat there and did his best to keep himself from vomiting.

Every time Otto inflicted a particularly gruesome or heinous torture, he forced himself to remember that Otto was literally repeating exactly what they had already done to Mirabelle.

It was just, seeing this done to others didn't make him feel any better. If anything, he was only reminded of exactly how she had been tortured back then…

His guilt at his own weakness grew.

While he was sitting here throwing up at even the sight of this terrible abuse, Mirabelle had endured all of this in silence for a full month.

Elliott shed many tears, but also learned many things.

Regardless, he never looked away.

And finally, after Otto's knife 'accidentally' slipped into each man's jugular, the three were dead.

Though Otto couldn't be certain, there was a good chance at least one of them was dead for good, seeing as they were hiding away from something or someone on such a remote planet in the 'slums' of the Area.

Well, even if they weren't, they would live in fear of that session for the rest of their lives.

Otto was certain of it.

In a way, it was fitting.

For Mirabelle had been through the same thing.

END GRAPHIC TORTURE

Otto turned to Elliott,

"I didn't quite finish, but…I think that was enough."

Elliott could only manage a whispered,

"Yeah."

An hour later, two teenaged figures disappeared from Treinta, just like that, in silence.

**************************************************

The two returned to little fanfare.

Otto flagged Ramesthes down to ask,

"Did they choose their professions?"

"Yes, and the new Talent Evaluator also came for the Precision Blacksmith. Plus, we discovered that the Precision Blacksmith also has a hidden effect: because of the nature of their craft of small things, they can work with all sorts of materials."

Otto quirked a brow.

Ramesthes seemed to sense his question,

"Mostly metals and hard things, unfortunately not things like cloth. But it is possible to work with jewels."

Otto's eyes glinted.

"That works perfectly. Perhaps in the future, she can be the team's detail Artificer, then?"

This time it was Ramesthes whose eyes widened,

"You already knew Julia would choose it?"

Otto chuckled.

"I know them better than you think. Let me guess. Jason is the confirmed Pathfinder, which, by the way, works well with his eventual summons, Jeremy got to be the Spymaster, Elliott gave in quickly and stuck to being a Chef because he wanted to hurry up and come with me, and Julia chose the Precision Blacksmith."

Ramesthes whistled.

"That's exactly right."

"Have any of them received their professions yet?"

Ramesthes rolled his eyes,

"You know it's not that quick. Oh, but did you know that every single one of them got a time domain and a stabilization suit as a reward for clearing their floors?"

"Dilation level?"

"An additional 3x, but it only lasts for two weeks."

Otto nodded.

"Nice. They'll have some more time to practice."

Otto checked the time before stating brusquely,

"Okay, time to work. I need to help Jason begin choosing a summon and pick my own third profession."

Ramesthes stood taller and saluted Otto with an expression of extreme sincerity,

"Sir, yes, sir!"

Otto rolled his eyes and flicked Ramesthes on the forehead, perhaps with a bit more force than intended,

"Asshole."

"Heh."

Otto quickly entered his mental space from the virtual pod.

He scanned through the list of his own professions.

Now that the team didn't need an enchanter, he felt slightly at a loss for what to choose for himself.

It didn't take long to narrow it down to a few choices.

[Magical Technician]

[Diviner]

[Runic Engraver]

[Spell Scribe]

[Magic Scholar]

[Herbalist]

[Ritualist]

[Occultist]

[Orator] or [Aristocrat]

[Trainer]

[Illusionist]

Each of these professions had its pros and cons.

A magical technician would be able to make and repair magical auxiliary tools that could be used to large effect inside floors. At high levels, he would be able to make some astounding creations that would be game changers in fights and for general use.

A diviner was a supportive profession that worked in an unknown branch of ancient magic allowing one to see relevant visions of the future or occasionally ask 'Time' or 'the Heavens' or 'the [Tower]' some questions about the past or present.

This profession was weak at earlier levels, but at high levels could make one nigh-omniscient with the right resources.

The runic engraver was sadly eliminated first due to its extensive overlap with the enchanting profession.

Where runic engravers shined was in creating body tattoos that would grant a person semi-permanent additional strength for use in combat.

Otto could strengthen his whole team with this profession.

Alas, if Mirabelle was walking down the path of an enchanter already, much of its bonuses (the parts related to objects) would be rendered redundant.

A spell scribe could make spell formulas, and, supposedly at very high levels, even spell tomes which could be used or sold by the masses. It also didn't have a criteria that the scribe had to 'learn' the spell in question.

But this, too, was eliminated, because although it was a very cool idea, the meat of this profession lay in making money, for which Otto currently had little need.

The magic scholar was an obscure profession; Otto wasn't quite sure how it worked other than some sort of magical research to improve spells or even magic in general.

This was on the list because at high levels, he would be called a [Sage] which was apparently one of the top profession advancements following grandmaster attainment, period.

The herbalist was a profession dedicated to recognizing, harvesting, understanding, and refining herbs for future concoction in alchemy.

Otto eliminated this next because while it would be good to have an even deeper understanding of some of the rare herbs that he currently wasn't able to recognize, it had too much overlap with [Alchemist].

The [Ritualist] and [Occultist] were both supportive professions focused on large consumption of resources for large and often very obscure effects.

These professions would have him do things like 'sacrifice 10 tons of beast blood at x time of day to purify your blood and increase your power under the blood moon.'

At high levels, he would probably be able to wipe out life on entire planets or blast himself or his allies into functional invincibility for periods of time after large rituals.

Otto next eliminated the two speaking professions, [Orator] and [Aristocrat] because if there was already a Spymaster on the team, speaking professions wouldn't be quite as necessary.

Plus, he already had the spell [Imbue Persuasion] which would in a pinch be able to help influence the thoughts of others for similar results.

The [Trainer] was more focused on providing growth to the folks he trained, so Otto also eliminated that…

Finally, the [Illusionist] which could only be obtained by a mage with access to Light element magic.

Usually, this profession was taken by healer type classes who wanted new means of defending themselves in combat.

Illusionists could use varieties of illusions to trick enemies into doing all manner of things. Their illusions were much more complicated and intricate than typical light element spells.

This was an option because at high levels, apparently it was possible to literally create entire worlds from mere illusions.

Otto sighed and pondered over his choices once more.

[Magical Technician]

[Diviner]

[Magic Scholar]

[Ritualist] or [Occultist]

[Illusionist]

He drummed his fingers on a nearby table.

Which one to pick?

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