Joel's experience after the reopening—and subsequent closure—of the emotional barrier in his mind was anything but mild. If the first one had unleashed an avalanche of impulses, rash decisions, and an overwhelming empathy that pushed him to act without considering the consequences, the act of resealing it was by no means without consequences. On the contrary, the effect was quite brutal.

  For the first few hours, Joel was reduced to a mechanical version of himself. A body breathing on autopilot, walking and observing the world with a blank stare. Emotions had completely vanished, leaving behind only the most basic impulses necessary for survival.

  Fortunately, the effect occurred while he was in his room, and there he remained for an indeterminate amount of time, sitting or standing without remembering how he had gotten into each position, until he gradually regained the ability to think coherently. The minimum functionality to operate as a human being.

  For those who saw him in that state, the experience was disturbing. Hardened mercenaries and slaves accustomed to the worst the world had to offer… more than one felt a chill run down their spine upon encountering this version of Joel. A man alive, conscious, yet completely detached. Yet, he didn't care. For the simple reason that he couldn't care. His only thought was simple and obsessive: to return to the shelter and put an end to a journey that, in retrospect, should never have happened.

  In his mind, everything that had happened that week was meaningless.

  Not even when he was alone with the slaves did he hesitate for a single moment. Without drama or explanation, he prepared a soup laced with powerful sleeping pills and gave it to everyone. Women and children fell asleep in a matter of minutes, without resistance or suspicion.

  Then the transfer began. A task that took him all night. Dozens of trips between the resting point and the refuge, carrying unconscious bodies on his shoulders, usually two at a time. He didn't even stop to count how many times he repeated the journey. There was no emotional exhaustion to slow him down, only an inhuman efficiency.

  Clearly, everyone at the refuge was surprised by the unexpected guests Joel brought. He had brought children before; that, at least, didn't surprise anyone. But the presence of five adult women, all beautiful and clearly trained, aroused more than one suspicious glance. Unspoken questions hung in the air, along with a tense, expectant atmosphere.

  Joel, still under the effects of the emotional barrier he'd created, paid no attention to any of it. Without pausing to explain, he left all the slaves under Nana's strict supervision, issuing clear and concise orders, and then turned away without looking back. He locked himself in his room, closing the door behind him as if he needed to isolate himself not only from the shelter… but from the entire world.

  Although the shelter had grown considerably in recent months, the sudden arrival of over sixty children, in addition to the five adult women, made the place feel cramped, almost suffocating. Hallways that had once seemed spacious were now filled with voices, small footsteps, and curious glances. The common areas were quickly overwhelmed, forcing Nana to intervene without delay.

  With her characteristic efficiency, she began creating new rooms and expanding several existing areas. The dining room was a top priority, transforming in a matter of hours into a much larger space, capable of accommodating everyone without chaos taking over.

  The children, despite their large number, didn't pose a real problem. The adults at the shelter were already accustomed to unexpected arrivals, and many of them had experience caring for children who had been through difficult times. The real enigma was the five women, not only because of their bearing and evident training, but also because they were all slaves, a fact that created a palpable, unspoken tension.

  Fortunately, once they awoke, communication flowed smoothly. Liam, Alicia, and Ariel were all able to speak with them with relative ease, thanks to their fluency in Greek. All the slaves, despite coming from different places, were proficient in Dirmistanal's language, a basic requirement before being put up for sale, as they themselves explained.

  For the inhabitants of the shelter, this was their first direct encounter with people born on Gaea… and, even more so, with members of other races.

  Arien and Alicia were completely fascinated by the demihumans' animalistic features. They spent hours interacting with the children, observing their ears, playing with their tails, and asking them innocent questions, as if it were an extraordinary discovery. Laughter soon filled the place.

  Liam, in contrast, remained more reserved and stoic, observing the scene with his arms crossed. Even so, his gaze drifted more than once toward the five women, silently assessing them with the inevitable curiosity of someone trying to understand their place within this strange equilibrium.

  Thanks, in large part, to the training they had all received before being sold, none of the slaves showed excessive discomfort with the situation. They knew how to behave, how to observe, and when to remain silent. With the exception of Nana—whose mere presence intimidated several of the newcomers, especially the eldest of the werewolves—the initial coexistence among them all proved surprisingly peaceful.

  However, if there was a moment that dispelled any potential tension, it was mealtime.

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  The dishes that appeared on the tables were simple, but incredibly delicious. The aroma alone was enough to completely change the group's mood. The children were the most impressed, especially when Ariel began handing out sweets, taken without the slightest hesitation from the kitchen's emergency supplies. For many of them, it was the first time they had ever tasted anything like it.

  Although the overall atmosphere was surprisingly harmonious—especially between the newly arrived children and those who had been at the shelter longer—communication among the adults was scarce. It was limited to polite greetings, basic questions, and prudent silences. No one had a complete picture of what was happening, and no one wanted to make decisions without Joel's direct approval.

  There was also a tension that was hard to ignore. The five enslaved women seemed deeply disturbed by something they didn't dare to verbalize. It wasn't a constant fear, but a latent one, which intensified every time they sensed Nana's presence. The mere sight of her entering a room was enough to make their bodies tense, as if they were awaiting an order, a punishment, or something worse. This reaction did not go unnoticed, but no one dared to pressure them.

  This strange calm, heavy with uncertainty, lingered for several days. Until, finally, Joel emerged from his room.

  His reappearance was as abrupt as it was silent. He offered no explanations nor did he apologize for his prolonged confinement. The first thing he did was order Nana to bring the five women to his laboratory, located deep within the shelter.

  During his isolation, Joel had almost fully recovered. The emotional barrier was closed again, and his mind had returned to acceptable functionality. He felt… stable. Though not quite the same as before. Strange thoughts persisted, ideas that arose abruptly and out of place, but nothing that prevented him from reasoning clearly.

  For him, the demihuman children did not represent an immediate moral dilemma. On the contrary, they were undoubtedly a valuable long-term resource. They could be incorporated into his school's academic curriculum, educated from an early age under modern, scientific, and structured principles, very different from Gaea's archaic worldview. In time, they could become individuals capable of understanding and sustaining the kind of society Joel wished to build.

  Sometimes, that way of thinking gave him a pang of guilt. He didn't like reducing people to mere cogs in a larger plan. However, when he coldly analyzed the future most of those children would have faced had he not intervened, logic prevailed once again. Besides, the education the children were receiving at the shelter was of a standard that, even on modern Earth, would have been exorbitantly expensive. He was investing in them… and he expected results.

  The real problem was the five women. More specifically, the fact that they were all adult mystic warriors, sex slaves, and complete products of a profoundly primitive society. Although Joel had heard that elven culture was considerably more refined than that of the other races, in his eyes it was still primitive, bound by religious dogma and outdated traditions. The demihumans, for their part, lived in tribalized, fragmented societies plagued by constant internal conflict.

  None of that fit his vision. Joel didn't need slaves at the refuge. He didn't need obedient servants or mindless warriors. What he sought were individuals capable of understanding, questioning, and actively participating in a social project entirely new and radically different from anything Gaea had ever known.

  The elven woman possessed obvious utility thanks to her rare magical affinity, a variable too valuable to ignore. The other four, on the other hand… At first glance, they didn't seem to have anything that he or the refuge truly needed.

  Joel interviewed them all together, without rushing and without ever raising his voice. He had them sit in front of him, always under the white light of the spotlights that illuminated the place. He listened to their stories attentively, letting each one recount her past, her losses, and the long process that had led them to become merchandise.

  It was during these conversations that he discovered something that deeply puzzled him: languages.

  As the women spoke amongst themselves or corrected each other, Joel began to recognize patterns impossible to ignore. The demihumans used a language that, after just a few sentences, he identified without a doubt: a strikingly faithful version of Earth's Portuguese. Not a distorted or derivative dialect, but a grammatical, phonetic, and semantic structure too precise to be a coincidence.

  The elf, on the other hand, spoke Latin. A rather formal and polished, almost liturgical, Latin.

  Adding this to the Greek he had already identified, Joel found himself, unsettlingly, with three languages ??originating from Earth coexisting on Gaea. The discovery left him with more questions than answers. This couldn't be a natural phenomenon. Not on this scale. Not with such a degree of fidelity.

  Even more disturbing was the fact that he himself, thanks to his dreams, spoke these languages ??with absolute fluency. Another piece of a puzzle that, for the moment, he decided to set aside.

  He continued with the interviews, and that's when he began to notice something else. A persistent nervousness. Not the predictable fear of a slave before their new master, but a deeper, almost instinctive tension. The five women reacted particularly strongly when Nana approached, or when, on one occasion, they caught a glimpse of Connor's silhouette crossing one of the corridors.

  At first, Joel attributed it to culture shock and the stress of being in a completely unfamiliar environment. However, it was Ashoka who put words to what he still couldn't define.

  "They know who we are," the monk said with absolute certainty. "I can see it clearly in that expert mystic… Aldra. She recognized the energy Nana emits. And she realized that the others here are the same."

  Joel didn't hesitate at those words. He took Aldra by the arm and led her away from the group, guiding her to an adjoining room. The werewolf paled instantly, but offered no resistance. She walked in silence, her back straight and her hands clasped in front of her, as if she had already accepted the inevitable.

  Once alone, Joel deactivated the medallion. His aura was immediately released, expanding throughout the room like an invisible pressure. It wasn't violent, but it was unmistakable. Aldra took a step back, her expression transforming into a terror far deeper than before.

  "Do you know what I am?" Joel asked, speaking in perfect Portuguese.

  The woman stared at him, her eyes wide.

  "Y-you're a demon," she replied softly, surprised both by his presence and by the fact that he spoke her native tongue.

  “How did you know?” he insisted. “Have you ever been in the presence of someone like me before?”

  To his surprise, Aldra took a deep breath and managed to compose herself. The fear didn’t disappear, but she kept it under control with evident discipline.

  “Where I come from,” she explained, “there are high-ranking nobles who still keep prisoners from the last wars against the demons. Sometimes they display them in public. Not just as a show of power… but so that we all learn to recognize one when we see one.”

  The sincerity of her words was absolute, and Joel recognized it instantly. And that was enough for him to make a decision.

  Until that moment, he had seriously considered freeing the five women, provided they so desired. Giving them a choice, a way out. However, the instant he realized they knew exactly what kind of beings inhabited the shelter, that option vanished.

  They couldn't leave. Never.

  Somehow, Joel would find a way to integrate them into the shelter's life. He would assign them tasks. He would give them a purpose. Something that justified their presence beyond mere possession.

  But one thing was clear from that moment on. The collars would not be removed. The surveillance would not be relaxed. And their fate, at least for now, remained sealed within those walls.