19. Diligence

Castus spent the next two months in despair. The guards never figured out how Castus had snuck the file into the cell and no matter how much prodding they attempted they never got an answer. They did as a precautionary measure have a guard stationed in the hallway of the cell, preventing any further attempts to break out. They also regularly searched the cell and Castus. This made crafting another tool to gain his escape impossible. As much as the movies made escape and adventure look easy and fluent, reality was much harsher. Guards were just as smart and vigilant as regular people and took their jobs seriously.

The promised day finally came, and light came back into Castus' dull green eyes. Sure he had been chained to the wall and he outwardly appeared disheveled and depressed but he had never given up hope. His situation in this cell was impossible to escape, but with the higher ups of the church coming he could look for other opportunities to turn his situation around. In the meantime Castus had focused on himself. Everyday he would do pushups till his arms burned to train strength, agility exercises to train dexterity, and push himself to his limits to build his vitality up. He had managed to finally get his physical attributes up to four in both vitality and dexterity and four and a half in strength. Not only that, he had finally found the mana within himself as Reid's last lesson had taught him. Reid never told him how to train his mana or circulate it, but after finding his mana he had slowly learned how to revolve it through his body and by doing this, had pushed his mana capacity up to 60. Stamina had increased by a measly 5, but Castus didn't expect much. Training intelligence was the only attribute that Castus was still struggling to understand. Vitality and stamina seemed intrinsically linked whereby pushing Castus to his limits he was training both, but by training mana he had made no progress in his intelligence leaving him without a way to train that for the time being.

At first the guards had scoffed at Castus running himself ragged and seemingly meditating for hours, but by the fourth week they had to give Castus a modicum of respect. His diligence was nothing to laugh at. They did wonder where he got all of his energy as they had only fed Castus the absolute minimum amounts of food and water but even now he seemed far from emancipated. What they didn't know is that Castus had learned he was able to create bread and water from his analyzed materials directly into his mouth. He thanked his past self to analyzing such a stupid material as it came in handy with his training. Castus had been depressed when his escape attempt had failed, but with it Castus had to settle for a new goal. Personal strength. While he had no opportunity to escape currently, he needed to be as strong as he could be so when the chance came, he could seize it. Every day he thought of his parents, and he promised them to find Erin and Aria and take care of them.

That wasn't all Castus had done though as the ample time between resting and exercising had led him to remember something about his status screen that had eluded his focus all this time.

Race: Set to appear as [Human]

The verbiage bothered Castus as it hinted at him being something else besides entirely human. The night he had remembered that he spent a long time looked at his body and his reflection in the dim glow of the prison lights trying to find something off, but he never did. His only clue was those pink irises his father had. Nothing about that color screamed natural to Castus. As far as he was aware though everyone who looked at him believed him to be human. The fact that the status screen also said 'set to appear as' made him wonder if it was something it had never seen or if something externally was forcing him into the appearance he had. His mind drifted to the soul transplantation corporation once again. He promised himself to look into it following his escape and once he could make sure Erin and Aria were safe.

Castus was once again completing his daily training regimen as the sound of a bolt sliding open stirred him out of his concentration. The door to the hallway of the cell opened revealing the loathsome archbishop and a new face. The archbishop pushed the door open and stepped into the damp hallway grimacing. The smell in the cell block reeked of sweat and body odor due to Castus being unbathed for the last two months and constantly working out. His face didn't take long to snap back into a grin though as he turned and bowed respectfully for the man behind him. A rather ordinary looking man walked in behind the archbishop. He wore plain clothes, had short auburn hair, brown eyes, and overall was just ordinary.

Castus' eyebrows raised at the utterly plain looking man that came closer to the bars that separated Castus from freedom. As his face pulled closer, unfazed by the stench, Castus noticed on single thing that made the man stand out. Around the man's neck was a circular scar that wrapped the full circumference of his neck. It was an old scar that had faded with time but when he drew close to Castus it became noticeable.

"Archbishop, this is the orphan with a blessing we have never seen?" The man's voice was gravely, and the tone seemed to warble unnaturally, most likely due to that scar on his neck.

The archbishop walked up beside the man responding as politely as he could. "Yes, Sacred Flame Darius. I found this orphan after his family's home burnt to the ground. They failed to report to the church when he was born, as such, I have no record of him before this. When we analyzed him after picking him up off the streets, we found he has the blessing of creation. That's all we know right now." The archbishop heavily emphasized the 'I' in his words, clearly trying to claim every ounce of credit for "finding" Castus.

The man wordlessly bent down gazing at Castus. Castus felt brazen from behind the bars of his cell and spit at the man. The glob of spit hit the cheek of the man and slid down his face. Darius didn't flinch at all. He let it slide down his face before arching his back and standing tall.

"Ungrateful heathen. The Church of Sol graciously takes you into its arms and this is what you do it?"