Valtr and Vengarl returned briefly to their campsite to pack it in, and then they set out in a southeasterly direction with Redmane, the trio walking along casually under the noontime sun. Or what passed for it in Midva Forest. Even at its apex the light didn’t quite make it through the thick canopies of the trees, instead shining down on the grass and shrubs in scattered, concentrated rays, leaving the rest in hazy darkness.

On their way, Redmane noticed a small clearing where five moss and vine covered statues, facing one another in a circle, saluted each other with weapons raised. As if the site commemorated an important event, where they had sworn an oath to each other or somesuch. The statues were too old and covered in plant growth to make out their features clearly. But all the same, Redmane found the five heroes vaguely familiar.

“So a Monster took Communion,” Valtr shook his head. “No offense friend, but the System must be desperate. Monsters are supposed to be the enemy.”

Redmane shrugged. “I know not why, but it happened all the same.”

“Who gave it to ya?” asked Vengarl.

“I don’t take your meaning.”

The Hunter brothers exchanged a puzzled look.

“It would have been a Tutelary Magister who gave you Astral Communion,” said Valtr. “At a church or a chapel of the Nine. It’s quite the affair, people travel from far and wide for a chance to become Imbued.”

“Ah. I think I’ve been asked this before,” said Redmane.

Then he explained what had happened to him.

They looked increasingly astonished as the brief story went along.

“What kind of a body…” Valtr’s voice trailed off.

“Divine Flesh, straight from the source!” Vengarl crowed. “But what manner of God did they feed ya? And you said it was dead, had claw marks on it? So it was Divine but not unkillable, fancy that.”

Redmane frowned and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t understand it. All I know is what happened.”

The words of Lord Abrahm Morholt came back to him then.

You don’t understand any of this, do you.

Unsettling, but true. It made him wonder what Lord Morholt knew that he didn’t.

Perhaps there would be a clue among his possessions.

He made a mental note to search through the Lord’s apartments as soon as he returned to the castle. The way Morholt talked made it seem as though Little Redcap’s captivity there was something more than simple sadism. He made it sound like it was something put upon him, an unwanted duty of some kind.

As the three Hunters walked, their conversation meandered to other things. Speculation about the Blight, the activities of other Imbued in the area, where and how they might be able to make contact. New Factions would form in the face of something so widespread. By the time all was clear, however long it took, the old regimes of the land would be long gone and new powers would stand in their place.

Redmane quietly resolved to be one of those.

“You two could join my Faction if you wish,” said Redmane.

“Well what are your plans?” said Valtr.

“Conquer as much territory as I can, as quickly as I can. If other Factions come to challenge me, I’ll crush them.”

He chuckled. “You make it sound easy.”

“Perhaps not easy,” said Redmane. “But simple. And I prefer simplicity. Simple things endure, they’re less breakable.”

Valtr looked at Vengarl questioningly, and the stouter of the two brothers shrugged his shoulders.

“We’re not exactly overwhelmed with options at the moment, are we,” said Vengarl. “This one seems like he’s on the level. And strong. So what if he’s a little weird?”

“No offense,” he added.

“None taken,” said Redmane.

Redmane didn’t press them for an answer. For a short while they walked in silence, before Vengarl brought up something else to talk about. Stories from their travels in a place called Carovia, where a Blight had drawn Imbued adventurers from across the continent. At first they believed it to be a scattered outbreak of Dungeons, until one Imbued, a solo Justiciar with a knack for dungeon delving, discovered that all the various Dungeon entrances on the map were connected to each other, and led down to a singular Lair deep underground.

Redmane half listened, but there was much on his mind already.

The preoccupation ate up the time, and as the sun began to descend downward into afternoon, the three Hunters found themselves at the edge of a large encampment.

The System reminded him of his Task here.

Slay Dragunov, Brigand Chief

Tasks Complete: 1/3

Redmane, Valtr and Vengarl crouched down at the edge of a grassy ridge, overlooking the sprawling brigand camp below them. It was quite the fortress. The ridge they stood upon dropped down sharply into a ravine that enclosed the encampment as securely as castle walls. There was only one way in on ground level, a twisting canyon which stretched off to the east under the cover of the trees, dotted all over with archer’s nests high up in their branches.

They were well concealed. It was the sort of thing one wouldn’t see unless they knew what they were looking for. If you didn’t know, it would be too late by the time you were close enough.

Upon the canyon floor lay a narrow but well-trodden road which ended in a dirt cul-de-sac, surrounded by cabins and longhouses constructed of Midva’s native dark wood. A tall chapel stood at the head of the cluster of buildings, as if the structure itself were their shepherd.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Behind the chapel lay a makeshift complex of cages. Big ones. But there were no villagers inside them. The cages were occupied by Wargs, who sat sullenly gazing out at the beastmen who had captured them. And some weren’t so sullen. Those ones growled and snapped out at their captors whenever they came too close.

Nearby, flies buzzed around a pile of Warg carcasses. There were a few dead beastmen on the pile as well, ones who had clearly suffered vicious maulings.

“What in the hells,” Valtr muttered.

“Think they’re tryin to train em?” asked Vengarl.

“If they are, they ain’t doin a good job.”

As for the mighty trees surrounding the courtyard, each featured ladders and stairs carved out of their bark, leading up to a second level of dwellings and lookouts, all connected to each other by suspension bridges made of planks and rope. Some of the trees had been hollowed out in places, providing living or storage space right inside their trunks.

Valtr let out a low whistle.

“This is a brigand camp?” asked Vengarl.

“Looks like they were preparin’ for a war,” said Valtr.

It looked that way to Redmane too. The fighting men of the camp patrolled with weapons at the ready, wearing the familiar snarl and red-eyed glare of the beastmen he’d already encountered. These ones were on high alert already, perhaps because of the Gruu, or some other threat they didn’t yet know about.

Redmane focused on one nearby, who paced across a rope bridge with his bow in hand.

Beastman Brigand

Monster Type: Corrupted

Level 26

Strange. At that level, they could have claimed Häerz Castle if they had a mind to do so.

But perhaps that wasn’t the case anymore.

Whatever curse had swept over these people on the day of the Blight certainly changed them. Perhaps it also confined them to these Zones. Or perhaps the System did that itself, by some hidden mechanism.

He shook his head to clear it. Too many questions and no answers.

The Task before him was simple enough, he’d stick to that for now.

“Any thoughts?” said Valtr, his voice low.

“I say we wait till dark,” said Vengarl, in an equally hushed tone. “Pick em off one by one and close in till we’re in the center.”

“We’d be pickin off brigands all night. There’s a whole damn army of em.”

Vengarl hummed, rubbed his chin. “Which one of those buildings do you reckon they’re keepin the townsfolk in.”

Redmane blinked. Realized something.

“I might be able to find out,” he said.

The other two Hunters looked over at him quizzically.

Redmane laid down his axe and held his palm out in front of him. He concentrated on it, felt his flesh ripple strangely. As if every tiny scrap of his physical being had a volition of its own, which he could shape and control.

Spawn

Corpus: 1218

His palm rippled visibly then, like water struck by a pebble. Valtr and Vengarl flinched from it, looking equally aghast and intrigued.

Redmane closed his eyes and shaped the creature with his mind. Grandmother Gruu possessed the physical qualities of every creature who dwelt in this forest, great and small. And now he did too.

He felt his palm distend, the skin stretching out and ballooning like a blister. Then it ripped open.

What emerged resembled a baby weasel. Four legged, with a pointed face and a long, bushy tail. It looked up at its master with the same golden yellow eyes. Its fur matched Redmane’s hair color perfectly.

When Redmane opened his own eyes, he felt a strange sense of recognition. He was looking at himself. He had two minds now, one great and one small, and two bodies.

He closed his eyes again, and found that he could look up at himself through the eyes of the Spawn. Now he gazed at his own face with its eyes closed. Then he looked at Valtr and Vengarl.

The Hunters stared, open mouthed. Their shocked expressions made Redmane chuckle, but since he was possessed of the mind and body of his Spawn, it chittered its best impression of a human laugh.

Standing on his own palm, he sensed that he still had a physical connection to his Spawn and could continue to shape it. He spent the extra Corpus to give it a Skill, Stalk. in case something down there had especially keen eyes. He also gave it a small store of Gnosis with which to use the Skill, and checked what he had left for himself.

Corpus: 1168

Gnosis: 100

Acceptable.

He lowered his palm to the grass, eyes closed, and took over the body of his little Spawn.

Redmane found that it was a simple thing to scurry down the side of the steep ravine. There were perches and landings aplenty for a creature this size, and even when he slipped and tumbled he was so lightweight that the fall didn’t hurt him beyond a bump here and a scrape there. Within moments he’d landed on the floor of the ravine, at the edge of the encampment.

He flew through the grass toward the nearest building, a dark wood cabin, scrambled up its wall to take a peek in the window. It was a home for a family of three or four.

The next two were the same, simple dwellings. The longhouse was arranged like a barracks inside, with rows of bunk beds and a common area in the middle.

There was a storehouse, a small armory, a tool shed, a fletcher’s hut, and a hut for smoking meat and fish.

Evading the beastmen wasn’t especially difficult. But once, a patrolling brigand spotted him in the grass and blinked, apparently uncertain of what he was seeing. Blood red weasels with golden eyes were rare, after all.

Finally came the chapel.

He called upon the Gnosis in his tiny form to cloak him.

Stalk

Redmane clambered up the short staircase and slipped beneath the gap in the chapel’s double doors. It was roomier inside than it looked, and the dark wood gave it a somber character. All of the pews had been pushed against the sides of the room, and two men who did not look like brigands were busy painting some manner of ritual circle on the floor.

They wore red robes, and crudely fashioned holy symbols around their necks.

Beastman Cultist

Monster Type: Corrupted

Level 29

Redmane realized the emblems they wore matched the effigy that had been placed up on high, behind the lectern.

It was made of animal pelts wrapped around twigs bound together into a suggestion of limbs, all of it soaked in red paint. A bestial figure, resembling a cross between a bear and a wolf. Its arms reached outward, face held skyward in a silent roar. The beast was also cyclopean, it had one huge red eye at the center of its brow.

Beneath it, on the back wall of the chapel, the cultists had painted a mural of a trio of scenes.

The first depicted an old woman consulting a king on his throne.

The second depicted the king and his hunters in a forest, standing over the carcass of a slain beast.

The third depicted a royal banquet. The king and all his guests looked especially bloodthirsty as they stared at the meat on the table.

Over the top of the three scenes, the effigy of the cultists’ god loomed.

One of the cultists stood up, hands on his hips, looking down at the circle he’d been painting on the floor.

“It is done,” he said, in a guttural voice. “All is prepared.”

The other sat back on his heels and surveyed their work, nodding. “Aye. Glory to Kraal.”

“Glory to Kraal.”

Kraal. Redmane had heard that name before somewhere, he thought.

He crept by the two cultists slowly, even with Stalk to conceal him.

Behind the cultists stood an alter made of logs. Its construction was unusually sturdy. Upon the altar sat a broad bladed knife. Redmane supposed he knew what the altar and knife would be for.

The villagers.

In the corner of the room he found a staircase going down, into what he presumed would be a basement. Redmane hopped down those stairs and peered into the darkness.

And there he found the hostages.

They sat bound and gagged, thirty people or more, perhaps fifty. Men, women and children of all ages. Their heads were downcast and for the most part their eyes shone with either defeat or abject fear.

A little girl noticed him. He could see her eyes focusing on him, squinting in the dark. He ran over to her and stood on her knee, looking back up at her.

He’d like to have said, “Don’t be afraid, help is coming soon.”

But this form lacked such powers of speech. It came out as some chittering, before he scampered back into the dark.

Which is when Redmane opened his real eyes, and they shifted in Valtr and Vengarl’s direction.

The brothers looked unsettled by Redmane’s gaze, but equally curious.

“Well?”

“They’re under the chapel,” he said.