The cage holding the big man was left against the wall. Dougall and one of the other cultists walked over to the edge of the platform and took up a waiting position, facing out over the pool below. The rest continued on. The stairs continued to wind upwards beyond the platform, making another quarter-turn around the room before reaching a second platform.

“Leave the other big cage,” the woman said.

“Isn’t he the one that killed the young master?” one of the cultists asked. “You don’t want to save that one for last?”

“I’m not going to make you haul that thing all the way up for my own satisfaction.”

“Thank you, milady.”

The four cultists roughly dropped Jason’s cage up against the wall. As at the first platform, two cultists took up positions at the platform’s edge while the rest of the cultists with the remaining two cages resumed the climb. Jason watched as they made another quarter-turn ascent to the next platform, which hid them from sight.

Jason took a look around. His vision was still blurry, like looking through a stranger’s glasses, but it was slowly improving. The platform he was on looked like rough-hewn obsidian, shiny and dark. He had no idea how the massive stone platform had been shoved into the wall like a six-ton peg.

Examining the cage, he found that the bars were much thicker than the last one he had been in. Looking closer, Jason realised there even seemed to be faint traces of magical engravings on them. Oddly, Jason recognised them as reinforcing magic. The knowledge from the skill book was making itself known. It was an odd sensation, remembering something he had never learned. He was certain the silver spirit coin he used before wouldn’t be enough to break out, and he couldn’t reach the lock through the narrow bars to try his key ring.

After pulling out one of the gold ranked coins, he turned it over in his hand. Unlike the ones he got from looting monsters, this one was embossed with the profile of a sombre man on one side and some kind of crest on the other, along with the engraved word ‘Greenstone’. His hope was that the gold coin would be powerful enough.

He looked up at the two people standing at the edge of the platform. He couldn’t tell if they were men or women in their hooded robes, but neither were paying attention to him. Instead they were at the edge of the platform looking out. If he could escape the cage quickly enough, there was a chance to rush at least one of them right off the edge.