Oliver looked over the words he was reading several times before he fully understood them. The first several times reading through it his mind simply turned the words to gibberish when he tried to read them. The awe and disbelief made it difficult to stay focused on what he was seeing, be would space out, his eyes skimming the words but their meanings were lost to him. Of course, this meant he had to go back several times and reread to remember to understand the words.
When he finally managed to read the whole thing, he made sure to read it yet again before turning the page and making sure nothing else was written in the book. Once he was finished and fully understood what was written, Oliver allowed the Book to fade back into his soul, its energy Receding into the gate it had come from. Now that He had summoned his Tome for the first time, Oliver could sense the gate and the soul energy That had previously been hidden behind it. It would take effort and practice to summon the Tome the next time, but far less than it had taken this time. To truly master the summoning of his tome, Oliver would need to devote quite a lot of time to the process, an endeavor vital to any TomeBearer who may enter into combat, as every second that it took to summon was a second that could cost your life in a fast-moving battle.
Next, the boy sat in the corner with his eyes closed. His head was leaned back into the corner of the column as he contemplated what power he had been granted and what it could mean for his current predicament. Oliver couldn't go to the local gangs, and he couldn't go to the guards. The gangs were a No-Go because of Rawdawg being there. The guards on the other hand might seem like a good idea, but he wasn't so naive to think that they didn't have ways to discover his involvement, especially if he made himself readily available to them. instead, he needed to give the guards time to forget, Move on, and stop looking.
Oliver had nobody to turn to for refuge either, and he was running out of time to sit and think of a solution. The Guards were already halfway to the BellTower area. they were moving far faster than Oliver had thought, or maybe summoning the tome had taken longer than he thought.
Caught with no good ideas, Oliver made a decision. There was something that realm rats did when they awakened. Not all of them did it, but nearly every one of them do. There exists a Colosseum where TomeBearers fight to the death for the entertainment of the rich and powerful. Proper slavery was illegal, but loopholes existed, especially in this society, especially when the victims are the weakest members of society. The Colosseum doesn't technically have slaves. Instead, they take advantage of a loophole wherein indentured servitude is allowed, if it is a court-ordered punishment, or if the victim consents to being indentured.
The Colosseum had recruiters in every part of the outer realms, with vast resources and power at their disposal, all of it just to negotiate with Tomebearers who come to them. Some of the ones that come to them need them to pay off debts or other financial aid for themselves or their families. Others who approach the recruiters want to escape something, while some simply want help to get more powerful. Whatever it is that drives them to join, if the Colosseum has to put out resources to help them, they have the desperate TomeBearer sign a contract that forces them to stay and participate in several fights to recoup the cost. if they are injured and need healing after each fight, the Colosseum healers heal them and tack the outrageous service charges onto the contract, further extending the time they must serve.
alternatively, TomeBearers can join on a non-indentured basis and gain a share of the profit from the fight in doing so. these TomeBearers are rarely from the outer realm and are the real reason for the Colosseum, the recruits that are indentured are typically cannon fodder to allow the more valuable, talented, and privileged TomeBearers to shine.
the simple truth was, Oliver was in a desperate position. The second a guard with a detection page saw him, or that Sonic Canine got close to him, he would be arrested and maybe even beaten or killed. If Raw saw he had survived He would kill Oliver simply because Oliver was a loose end that he had betrayed. Nobody smart leaves someone alive if that person might try to kill them in the future. Mercy to your enemy is cruelty to yourself.
Not only that, but it seemed that his ability required him to kill other TomeBearers, which was particularly difficult, given that his tome hadn't provided him any combat abilities. He should be able to get the Colosseum recruiter to hide him from both the Guards and the Gangs, As well as give him access to combat ability pages. the only issue is that he had no empty pages to put those combat abilities into. the solution to this problem was also provided by the Colosseum, which would allow him to legally kill other TomeBearers until he was strong enough not to need The Colosseums' protection. That left only one flaw, How did he get the initial strength to kill even a single0 TomeBearer, so that he didn't end up dead in his first battle.
It was a "Spend coin to get coin" problem, He needed strength, but the only way to get strength was to Have strength To take the strength he needed. It was with this in mind that he stood from his spot in the corner of the belltower, and a vantage point on the edge and began to plan how he would get where he was going
Oliver peered out the open walls of the Belltower with worry creasing his brow. The recruiters' Office was on merchant street, well within the slowly expanding perimeter of guards that all searched for him. Somehow he was going to have to slip past their perimeter while they are actively on alert for exactly that. Not only was he going to have to get past them, but he was also going to have to get past their detection abilities.
As Oliver looked out over the City, Contemplating the problem facing him, he had an idea. this idea could go extremely well, or terribly wrong.