Beast Slayer Online: Initialization
Copyright© 2026 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 34
“Ah ha. The bastard can’t run now!”
Phillip whooped in delight, as though catching that man-eating criminal was already within arm’s reach.
“Master, you’ll have to help us a bit more. We go together and chop this bastard apart!”
A man who could hold the rank of Sergeant was no fool.
Now that they knew the criminal’s characteristics, they would still have to search for him bit by bit. But if they brought along this Witcher, keener than a temple priestess...
They might well wrap the case up today.
Lannor gave it some thought. A job worth a total of two hundred and thirty Orens, and all he had done so far was kill two Ghouls and say a few words, which did seem a little thin.
And besides...
The young man’s cat eyes narrowed slightly, cold and sharp like a great hunting beast.
He genuinely wanted to know what it felt like to cut down a cannibal.
“Did you keep the murder scene protected?”
Lannor nodded to Phillip, then asked the question.
The Sergeant slapped his own great belly, the iron gauntlet striking his breastplate with a loud clang.
“No one’s watching the site, but don’t you fret. Since this whole business broke, the villagers nearby would like nothing better than to tear the killer apart with their bare hands, but none of them dares go near Dunham now. No one knows when the Goddess might choose to send down Her wrath.”
“Understood.”
Lannor gave a slight nod.
The murder had taken place five or six days ago. If no one had disturbed the scene in the meantime, his Witcher senses could likely pick the killer’s prints out directly.
“Then let’s move.”
“Right then, lads. Mount up!”
The whole troop of soldiers surged toward the tavern stables.
The people of Midcopse, meanwhile, all cracked their doors open by the same narrow measure.
With eyes full of fear and expectation, they watched the soldiers ride out to bring a criminal who had defiled the faith to justice.
Lannor understood those expressions.
In the Feudal Era, the line between soldiers and bandits was often hard to draw. Indeed, because they were better organized, soldiers could prove even more dangerous than brigands.
The troop splashed black mud high from the country road and rode off into the distance.
Dunham was indeed half a day from Midcopse, but that was reckoned at a farmer’s pace.
These men were cavalry. They reached it in a little over an hour.
“Your, hah, your horse is a fine one, Witcher.”
An hour and a half of hard riding left Phillip breathing unevenly after the last jolt.
They had come near the crossroads that bore the weight of so much faith.
The local folk did not dare approach, but in the heat of public fury they had still organized some of the sturdier young men, armed them with pitchforks and clubs, and set them to patrolling.
Phillip and his men, all in Temerian issue armor, won their trust at once. He crooked his head, spat, barked a few curses, and the armed farmers let them through.
But Lannor reckoned that had it been an ordinary traveling merchant passing by, he would not have gotten through so easily without handing over a few coins, or parting with some portion of his goods.
In any case, Lannor had already seen one farmer wearing a string of garlic around his neck.
Once they had passed, Phillip muttered his complaint to Lannor in a low voice.
“That’s why we ought to finish this business quick. Otherwise these armed farmers will get a taste for blocking the roads, and come the slack season they’ll be part-time bandits, you mark me. This region will have more brigands than anywhere else for the next few months.”
Lannor neither nodded nor answered. He simply rose and fell with the horse’s gait.
On matters like this, he saw even more clearly than Phillip, who could only judge by experience. But all of it was still too far beyond him for now.
The education he had received had taught him that a public order problem was never merely a public order problem.
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