Beast Slayer Online: Initialization
Copyright© 2026 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 21
With two wet thuds, Lannor and Bernie jumped down from the boat into the sucking mud of the shallows.
“This is the outer edge of the fishing grounds. Fish are plentiful here. You’ll have no trouble finding Drowners, the beasts have grown so bold they no longer bother avoiding men.”
Lannor’s nostrils flared. The damp wind carried a tangle of scents.
The mudflats stank. Fish rot, blood, brine.
A pampered lord would have retched his breakfast up at the first breath.
Through a Witcher’s altered senses, the smells seemed to coil around him like colored halos.
After careful sorting, he singled out his target.
A foul stench, like rotting fish, shrimp, and seaweed mashed together.
That was the scent of a Drowner.
Once he fixed on it, the air carrying that odor seemed to stand out in his vision, like a ribbon marked and brightened.
The rest faded, filtered away.
Truth be told, the ease came from how often the Drowners moved through this place. The scent was too fresh, too thick.
By rights, that alone would have been enough for Lannor to track the pack.
Yet he did not move at once. Instead, he turned to Bernie, who was already slipping the bow from his back.
“Can you track them?”
Bernie shot him a look, puzzled. Isn’t that your trade?
But he said nothing of it.
“With prints this clear, and bits of Drowner scale lying about, anyone could.”
“...,” Mentos answered in his mind with a string of silent dots.
Lannor stared at the mudflat.
Black, stinking sludge, littered with a chaos of marks.
Tracks left by beasts, by drifting debris, by Drowners.
To an untrained eye, it was nothing but a churned mess.
Drowner scales and fish scales were indistinguishable, and those so-called clear prints were buried beneath the confusion.
... So being just a man is my fault now.
The corner of Lannor’s mouth twitched.
“Good. I need to adjust my combat state. I’ll leave the tracking to you.”
He offered no further explanation. Bernie did not ask for one either. To him, this work was simple enough.
The man in the long leather gauntlets stepped ahead, reading the ground as naturally as breathing, setting their course by scattered signs.
Within Lannor’s mind, Mentos followed the plan and began its work.
New Analysis Module Added, Trace Detection Skill Source, Fisherman Bernie
Information Integration and Analysis in Progress Current Progress, 1%
“Send me the results tonight. I’ve no wish to face Drowners with my head swelling like a shaken bottle of soda.”
“Understood, sir.”
Mentos responded smoothly.
The process of knowledge transfer could not be altered without proper access. The discomfort was inevitable.
But the timing of that discomfort could be chosen.
The exchange in his mind took no time at all. Bernie still bent low over the mud.
Lannor, meanwhile, could not fathom how the man read such faint traces.
A shallow scrape in the mud, a hint buried within a tangle of footprints, and Bernie would decide at once, adjusting their direction.
Those adjustments were far more precise than anything Lannor could achieve with scent alone.
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