A hideous cracking of bones, tearing of flesh, and ripping of muscle interrupts Sivly's muttered healing. Jaeger and Troy, having been healed back to relative health, stand and turn toward the noise, weapons in hand. Jaeger wonders if Kadrin has another transformation in store, perhaps one that will outsmart death itself.
Kadrin's body has been moved onto its stomach and Emilia is behind it, holding its brutalized lump of a head in her hands. She tightens her grip on the head, hands cupping both sides, and begins to pull violently. The disturbing sounds are from the body's supernatural durability resisting Emilia's preternatural strength. Stopping for a second, Emilia delivers a powerful blow to Kadrin's neck, breaking it, then grabs the Emissary's head again and begins to pull with all her might. With a loud grunt, she manages to rip his head off, heavy breathing replacing the disturbing sounds, until she tosses the head to the side with a huff and flips the body over.
“What was that, Emilia?” Troy asked in shock, or awe.
“Two things. Vengeance and surety.” She replied as she knelt on Kadrin's chest.
“Vengeance I get, not only did he beat us like children, but he also sold out to the Decayed Ones, but surety?”
Emilia thrust her hand deep into the open chest hole and pulled out the flaccid, desiccated heart. Then she turned to the group and frowned.
“I had not planned to speak of this until your party, the outsiders, were of a higher rank. In light of what has happened, I have an important lesson to impart to you all. I am not your advisor, Bounty Hunter Jaeger, but considering your profession, I suggest you take heed as well.” Emilia took a seat on the corpse before continuing. “This bandit leader turned Emissary of Decay may have been pretending to be dead. The experience gained could have been a race or class skill. This may seem impossible, but in my life of adventuring I have seen many outrageous things. Skills that feign death, racial skills that create inner worlds, delayed resurrection skills, even the abomination that is Kaleo. I have seen creatures survive blows that would topple any mortal, only to fall when decapitated. So I took his head.”
For Jaeger, this information was eye-opening. In his old world, enough blows were enough to kill a man; even the alchemical abominations of the Charmed Ones could be felled with black powder. Now he found out that the same was not true here; not only was there no black powder in this world, but some things could only be hurt in certain ways.
“Does decapitation work on anything, or are their things immune to it?” Jaeger asked, a heavy feeling washing over him.
“If you have a magic weapon of sufficient power to make contact and pierce their flesh, then yes. Your axe is powerful enough for most things, if you are worried inquire with a blacksmith and find out your weapon’s capabilities. Otherwise so long as it has a head attached to its body decapitation will work. Do be careful though, some beings are only balancing their heads atop their bodies and for those it will not.”
“I'm glad you're our advisor, Emilia.” Troy said as he sat back down.
“I appreciate the information.” Jaeger said with a tip of his hat as he also sat back down.
Emilia simply nodded, walked over to the group and handed Jaeger the heart. Jaeger took it and fished around in his stash for a sack. Pulling it out, he places the heart inside and sighs.
“I have to go back to the camp. I have to collect the rest of the heads and hearts.”
With that, he begins to stride towards the camp.
“Wait, my friend.”
Brad shouts, getting to his feet despite Sivly's protests.
“I will join you.”
“Brad, I haven't finished healing your wounds, if you move too much they'll open up again.”
He turns and smiles down at her.
“Then I guess you had best come too.”
With a roll of her eyes, she collects her staff.
“Fine, but only because if I don't, one or both of you will find a way to ruin my healing.”
“We should move as a group, give me a moment to put out this campfire and I'll join you.” Emilia said, putting out the hastily made fire.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“I'm coming too, in case that was a question. I just have to grab something.” Troy said as he disappeared into the shadows. He was gone for a few moments before reappearing with a flutter from the shadows, walking up to Jaeger and handing him a bloody bundled shirt. “I forgot where I put this, I was in a hurry when I traveled through my shadow star. While we were fighting the bandits, I used a skill that has a chance to rip out hearts, so the few times it worked, I kept them for you. I didn't want to put it in my backpack, so I used a spare shirt.”
Jaeger unrolled the shirt and found four hearts.
“Thanks Troy.”
“No problem.” Troy said with a smile as he looked at the others.
Dropping the new hearts into his sack, Jaeger straps it to his belt and leads the others back to the bandits' camp. As they approach it, they pass by the fallen Treants, and Emilia takes Troy with her to loot the corrupted remains.
“Corrupted Treants are full of alchemical reagents, and their heart wood is said to be great for magical blacksmithing; there is also a permanent bounty on their destruction by the Dryad Groves. I’ll going to take Troy and harvest what we can. Once we finish, we will start from this side of the camp and meet you in the middle.” Emilia said as she dragged Troy off to the destroyed arboreal abominations.
This left Jaeger, Brad, and Sivly walking to the far side of the camp. As they moved through the camp they found it still mostly intact, some of the bonfires had gone out, but enough were still burning to give the camp a welcome heat and light. In Jaeger's mind, the fighting had progressed so quickly that the camp seemed to have been destroyed. He was pleasantly surprised to find that wasn’t the case.
“If you're up for it, take both their heads and their hearts; whatever the Guardian doesn't want, I need for Melinda back in Clivetown.”
“Who?” Sivly asked as she used her trident-staff to stab and twist a bandit's head off.
“Is that the local contact for the Adventurer’s Guild?” Brad asked as he used the edge of his shield as a guillotine to cut off the heads of the bandits.
Jaeger thinks about lying. Telling them the truth about his deal could set off alarms and come back to haunt him. On the other hand, if he were caught lying later, it might call into question all the bounties he had brought in. As a Beserian bounty hunter, he'd taken contracts from everyone, the lowest peasant to the highest noble, and even from crime lords. As long as they paid, followed the code, and he was willing, he'd done the job. He saw no reason why this world should be any different. So he told the truth.
“She's a contact for the Forced Redistribution Club, and if I had to guess, not a low-ranking member either. I made a deal with her to find the location of the ex-Swords of Greenwood. Part of the deal was that I would kill those bandits. Bringing back evidence will reduce any chance of her trying to trick me.”
Sivly and Brad turned to him in shock at his admission.
“You made a deal with a member of the FRC? How could you? They kill adventurers!” Sivly shouted in anger.
“They are criminals, Jaeger; any deal you make with them is likely to drag you down into the embrace of their evil. You have a strong center, but tread lightly, my friend.” Brad said as he ripped the edge of his shield from the ground and grabbed the head that rolled off the body.
Jaeger snorted and turned to them.
“To be clear, I would never hunt another adventurer unless the Adventurer's Guild asked me to, and then only with a valid reason. My services are for sale not my code.” Jaeger said, a harsh tone in his voice. “I've worked for international mercenaries and tyrants; hell, this ain’t even the first time I've worked for crime lords. You want to know what I've learned in my time? The only difference in the jobs is how they phrase it; kings are just as petty as crime lords, they just use flowery language to make it seem better.”
Taking a breath to calm down he finished.
“That don't matter, because what matters now is that as long as the bounties pass the Guild's scruples, I'll take them. And to be clear, I didn't indebt myself to the FRC, I just told them I was open to taking jobs from them.”
“You agreed to work for them?” She screamed.
“I've agreed to be open to accepting bounty hunter jobs they send me, with the understanding that I'll still get to pick and choose.” Jaeger decided not to mention that the first job was done no questions asked, nor that it was free.
This explanation seemed to appease her.
“The information did help you find us; I don’t like it but I understand. I just, I just don’t like the idea of someone I know, and like, working for scum like that.”
The bounty hunter raised an eyebrow at that remark.
“You hardly know me; I could be just as bad as the FRC.”
This drew laughter from both Sivly and Brad.
“That is a good jest my friend.” Brad said as he got his laughter under control. “If you were a bad person you would not have risked yourself like you did for us.”
“Jaeger, you literally blocked an attack that would have killed me. Had you hesitated even a second, I would have died and no one would have blamed you.”
“I could be using you.”
“For what? Reputation? Gold? I have measured you, and you seem to be a man who cares for none of these except what is necessary to do his job.”
“I agree with Brad, but I will say this. I don't know if I'd call you a good man, you're certainly no paladin, but I trust and like you.” Sivly added as she cracked open a chest for its heart. “Frankly, I'm glad you're not a paladin, nobody likes self-righteous white knights trying to impose their views on others.”
“Like you just tried?” Jaeger asked.
“I knew you'd say that, and it's totally different.” Sivly said, gesturing with her trident staff.
“How?”
“Because unlike a paladin, you were able to change my mind.” Sivly said with a wink.
Brad laughed again and Jaeger's smile broke out as well. He'd met a few knights like that, and Sivly was right, they were more stubborn and unwilling to change than martyrs on mules. That's how Troy and Emilia found the trio, with light hearts and stories of their lives before coming to Ragaea.
