System of the Beast Slayer [litrpg Adventure]
Copyright© 1999 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 285: Shadows in the Dim Tavern
After receiving Vlodimir’s orders, Barrel Punk took several of his sharpest underlings to keep watch outside Oxenfurt Academy Island.
Not long after noon, they saw their targets. Three Witchers walked out through the Philosopher’s Gate. One wore a hood, another had a headband wrapped around his head and an expressionless face, and the last was a bald man built like a beast.
They were the Orin brothers and Letho, who had gone out to gather information on the Wild Boar Army.
Punk left one man behind to continue watching the Academy gate, then took two others and followed. Having heard plenty of strange rumors about Witchers, they did not dare get too close. They merely trailed the three men from far behind, all the way from Oxenfurt Academy to a tavern in the eastern district, the Dean’s House.
About five minutes after the Witchers entered the tavern, Punk and his two men went in, split into two groups.
It was daytime, and the hall of the Dean’s House was lit only by sunlight through the windows, leaving the place slightly dim.
At this hour, most Oxenfurt Academy residents were busy at work and would only come out to amuse themselves after evening. Thus the hall held only a scattered five or six tables of guests.
The tavernkeeper, who was also a bard, sat on the stage plucking a lute, playing a slow, drowsy melody.
The three Witchers sat not far from the liquor cabinet. The table before them was covered with drink and several large plates of meat. They chatted casually, their voices especially loud, with crude words like “arse,” “cock,” and “tits” constantly spilling from their mouths.
Punk and one brother sat in a corner of the hall, at a table half buried in shadow. Unlike the free-spending Witchers, they ordered only two cups of the cheapest Dwarven spirit, borrowed a Gwent board from the owner, and began pretending to play.
The other brother sat alone by the window, dressed like a merchant whose business had failed and who had fallen into poverty. His acting was excellent, his face full of sorrow as he gazed at the passersby outside.
“Big brother, if you ask me, these three fellows don’t seem to have any other purpose. Their drinking addiction just came calling.”
The skinny monkey Popolov threw out a card at random, swallowed, and withdrew the gaze with which he had been secretly watching.
“Why bother thinking so much? Just do your part.” Barrel Punk was also faintly surprised. He had thought the Witchers had entered the tavern to gather information, but those three fellows had done nothing except order a table full of strong liquor from the tavern hand. They had not spoken to anyone else at all.
“Focus on the cards. Stop looking over there. Mutants have sharp eyes.” Barrel Punk tossed out a Gwent card at random, looked at the card face, then smiled.
“Fifty-four to thirty-five, Popolov. You lose.”
With that, under the other man’s envious gaze, Barrel Punk eagerly drank a cup of cloudy liquor.
The faint sourness made him frown, but he still wasted not a drop, swallowing every bit of liquor into his belly and licking the bottom of the cup clean before letting out a comfortable breath.
In truth, the cost of these two cups had come from half a day’s work as a porter at the Oxenfurt docks.
The third-in-command of the grand Redanian Wild Boar Army had fallen to such shabby poverty. Barrel Punk could not help feeling sour at heart.
Back when the von Everec family had been flourishing, his cousins Olgierd and Vlodimir von Everec would often rent out an entire tavern, letting the brothers of the Redanian Wild Boar Army drink to their hearts’ content. They would also invite the hottest women in Oxenfurt, letting the brothers enjoy themselves as much as they liked.
Yet in no more than ten years, the von Everec family had declined completely. Not only was business getting worse by the day, their investments had brought one disaster after another, losing money every day.
They also had to pay extra to support the brothers in the gang, since most of the forty-odd members of the Wild Boar Army were practically vagrants, and none of them wished to farm.
It was no exaggeration to say the von Everec family was buried in debt, at the edge of life and death.
“Once big brother Olgierd finishes the business at hand, the gang will have money. We absolutely cannot let these Witchers who barged in halfway ruin the deal.”
A cold glint leaked from the narrowed slits of Barrel Punk’s fat face.
...
“Mate, remember when we tracked that royal griffin in the Amell Mountains?” Orin wiped the beer foam from the corner of his mouth and winked at his brother.
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