Beast Slayer Online: Initialization
Copyright© 2026 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 2
The crossing of paths between Lannor and Bordon had been an accident.
Or rather, his coming to this medieval world steeped in magic had been an accident.
A university student, raised with both parents, sound in mind and body.
After passing, for no reason he could grasp, through an endless void, he arrived in a world both savage and dark. There was no sense to be made of it.
There was magic here, but it had not flourished, at least not to the point of shaping the course of society.
And so, in a backward world, human life was as cheap as grass.
In the forests of Velen, if a man dared walk a few dozen paces within, the shadow of death was already coiled around him.
Starvation, sickness, beasts or monsters, or a bite from some nameless insect that left poison in the blood, most folk of Velen had long grown numb to the deaths around them.
A modern student had only ever glimpsed such lives in a few sparse pages of history books.
He knew, setting aside magic and monsters, the lives of Velen’s people were the lives of ancient peasants.
Knowing it was one thing. Seeing that cruelty and weight, a life long removed from him, laid bare before his eyes, was another.
Death ... it was too common.
And whether it was fortune or misfortune, Lannor could not become a peasant.
He had become Bordon’s Child of Surprise.
He had been made into the same kind, a witcher.
The Law of Surprise was an unwritten rule, widely acknowledged and obeyed in this world.
Its origins were as old as human history.
Its terms were simple. One who saved another might, under the Law of Surprise, demand a reward, the first thing the rescued saw upon returning home, or something the rescued did not know they possessed, often a child gained while they were away. Such a child was called a Child of Surprise.
Even in a magical medieval world, supernatural power remained scarce.
To gain the chance to wield such power, for a modern student shaken by a brutal struggle for survival, should have been a blessing.
But...
“What is our target this time?”
Lannor’s clean, Eastern-featured face scanned the surroundings as he carefully guided the old horse around a fallen trunk, riding slightly ahead and to the side of Bordon.
The hulking man, as shaggy as a brown bear, would not tolerate him straying out of sight for long.
The thick beard parted slightly, revealing Bordon’s lips.
“Perhaps two or three Foglets gathered together, or a single one grown old enough. The spread and strength of that fog falls within that range.”
“You cannot even be sure of the number? This preparation is ... thin.”
Lannor’s body showed no outward shift, but the face Bordon could not see had drawn into a faint frown.
A witcher was stronger than an ordinary man, but in raw physical terms, he could scarcely match five men working in concert.
A witcher hunted monsters through skill, knowledge, and above all, experience.
Tracing a quarry from the faintest clues, identifying its kind and number, understanding its abilities and weaknesses, then engaging in a prepared, asymmetrical fight.
That was the witcher’s craft.
If Bordon’s preparations were truly at this level, he would never have lived long enough to grow that beard.
He would have died as a green boy, somewhere in the wilds.
Lannor already knew the answer.
A cold gaze crept up his spine, and with it came a voice just as cold.
“You take the lead. Use Quen well.”
Not a suggestion, an order.
Witchers of the School of the Bear were known to lose their emotions, and so even the pretense of softening such commands was gone.
Lannor nodded, calm.
... Had he not been reduced to expendable bait, meant to save on the cost of the hunt, he might have been grateful for these cat eyes.
And by the ridge they had passed earlier,
the farmer who had survived bowed low, obsequious, before four soldiers clad in Temerian issue armor, pointing at the bloodstain in his field.
It was all that remained of his loyal dog.
He prattled on. The soldiers grew impatient, one raising an iron-gauntleted hand as if to strike him across the face at any moment.
After a few sharp curses, the farmer finally pointed out a direction.
To read the complete story you need to be logged in:
Log In or
Register for a Free account
(Why register?)
* Allows you 3 stories to read in 24 hours.