"There you are! Where did you run off to, we couldn't find you?!" exclaimed Natalie as she rushed over to Grant.
Grant snorted, while Dain followed Natalie shortly thereafter, with a worried look on his face.
"You shouldn't have picked a fight with the guards you know, they could make trouble with you when you come in and out of the city."
Grant chuckled. "I don't need to be on good terms with a murderer child."
Dain's face scrunched up as he thought about it. "How did you know? You've told us this is your first time here." Asked Dain. It wasn't as if Grant hadn't done impossible things up to this point.
Shrug. "If it weren't for my handy-dandy mind reading abilities, the hidden killing intent just leaking off the guy would've been more than enough, in conjunction with all the grudge energy building up around him it's pretty obvious he's a serial killer. Either that, or an extremely experienced soldier, but that's not very likely."
"Mind reading abilities? You have mind reading abilities? That's so cool!" Exclaimed Natalie.
"What have you been reading?" Dain worriedly asked.
Grant chuckled. "Why Dain? Got something to hide recently. Any visual thoughts you've been having recently. I mean, certainly you've been having some rather interesting thoughts recently, like all those things you'd do to Natalie like-"
"All right, alright I got it! Please stop!" Exclaimed Dain as his face blossomed a fresh red.
"-Like hand holding."
Dain couldn't even speak anymore, just quietly covering his face in embarrassment, while Natalie didn't even bother hiding her hungry face. Yikes Dain, better learn those Houdini techniques, because that innocence isn't going to keep you safe much longer.
Having finished his daily dose of ribbing Dain, Grant went over to the adventurer's guild in order to turn in a few things now that he was here, as well as claim the miniscule reward for the ride.
As they walked though, Dain snapped out of his embarrassment as he realized something.
"Hey, he never said what'd he do about the murderer!"
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Frankly, Grant wasn't getting paid much for the escort mission, but Grant wasn't interested in the pay in the first place, joining the escort to have company on the trip. Money was just a nice little extra.
The adventurer's guild was just about the same as the guild he'd first encountered, though there was one small difference.
If one paid attention they could see a divide amongst the people there, between the humans and the beastmen, with elves and dwarves mixed amongst both. The guild was a lot more tense than the previous guild.
Grant didn't care, as that wouldn't be his problem for now. And hopefully it wouldn't be.
Joining the line, Grant waited a few minutes, having to deal with the tension in the line, causing him to sigh. He even saw people trying to judge what he was under the mask.
Eventually the line ends and Grant finds himself face to face with a young woman, early 20s?
"I'd like to submit proof of hunt."
The guild employee nodded.
So, Grant started emptying his bag.
Not everything of course. Just:
50 goblin ears
40 orc heads,
30 gust raptor wings
20 slime cores
10 plant cores
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The guild employee nodded, clearly nonplussed, and so was Grant.
"Your card please." the employee requested, hand outstretched, which Grant complied, handing over his card.
Holding his card over the crystal, her eyebrows raised a little as she read the pop-up info.
"Oh, you just joined the guild?" she asked.
Grant chuckled. "Used to be a hunter out on the fringes. Decided to move here and try my hand at adventuring. "
She nodded in understanding. Unsurprising in a world where becoming an adventurer is something of a fantasy, even for nobles.
"Well, your rank has increased from f to d rank, by sheer number of conquests you have made. Orcs are considered d level monsters after all."
Grant nodded, satisfied, before seemingly remembering something. "I uh, happened to find these while scavenging in the forest." Grant pulled more out of his spatial pocket, a pile of shining scales, which caused the guild worker's eyes to widen.
"You found these? Where did you find them?" asked the employee, clearly a little worried.
If Grant understood their world correctly, wyverns would probably be considered b rank, maybe a rank? So finding wyvern scales would be quite a shock to them. So, he decided to lie to them and claim he found them, only offering a handful of scales. Of course, Grant kept the five whole wyverns worth of ingredients to himself. Maybe he'd sell them under the same pretense, perhaps he'd just keep them and raise an army of spartoi and wyverns. Whatever he was feeling.
"I found them while following a caravan escort here (which I'd also like renumeration for by the way) and happened to find at the scene of a fight, some distance away from the caravan. It looked like a big fight happened, and the wyvern seemed to have lost some scales in the battle."
The worker nodded. "Alright, I'll check you quest history and set up a quest to study the route for evidence of wyverns. Thank you for this warning. Do you plan to sell this to the guild?"
Grant nodded.
"Alright, give us a few days and we'll have your money within the week."
"Thank you."
As Grant left, he noted some eyes filled with envy, and others with darker thoughts, but he ignored them for now. He didn't have the money yet, so that was tomorrow's problem.
He needed to get himself a room at the tavern and get some of the rougher things finished up.
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"Gggh, w-w-h-y?"
Grant clicked his teeth staring at the man before him.
Before him was a rather dark sight, the former guard from earlier in the day, with a rope choking the man. Twisting the rope in his hand, while slowly pulling, the guards face became a tomato red, tinting purple at the edges as his lungs desperately sought breath.
"Let's see if this reminds you of anything." taunted Grant.
"Elliot."
"Leroy"
"Finny"
"Leah"
As Grant listed each name out, the guards face paled, almost against all odds.
"How?" said Grant, in a mocking tone. The man didn't care, but Grant did. Or he probably lacked the energy to speak.
"For a killer, you're sure foolish. Anyone with the ability to read minds could out such an undefended mind."
The man thrashed, harder than before, as he lost more and more oxygen.
Desperation and fear had long settled in stomach. He knew those names after all. He'd asked them their names.
"You know," drawled Grant, "Usually I don't bother with this kind of stuff. As one of the strongest beings on Earth, one learns to ignore the small ones like you. Another piece of sh*t, sure, but that's just how the world is. If we stepped in to kill every criminal, then people would be complacent. Every sword needs their whetstone, every beautiful statue needs a chisel to make them something greater.
Heroes need stepping stones.
But did you know?"
"I was going to spare your life at first. Save the beastman's life and turn a blind eye to your actions. Murdering people is disgusting, especially why you do it, but not uncommon. When I revealed he had a son, I watched.
Had you resolved yourself to back off; to draw a line in the sand, you would live. But no.
You were going to kill that child!
You just thought of the child as a freebie for your excitement. And that was the moment your life was forfeit."
Grant stood up, and dragged the man through the dirt, before finally arriving at the tree.
Grant clicked his tongue at the man's panicked face.
"Come now, you must've known that I was going to do this when I coerced you into writing your own suicide note? I mean, there was no way I was going to leave you any form of dignity."
Grant begun setting it all up, and he kept talking.
"You know, I enjoy this kind of stuff. Torturing people. I swear, old dog, new tricks." He said
He seemingly takes a deep breath.
"Don't you love the smell of damnation!!! The fear people have in their last few moments? "Is there a god? Oh my god I'm going to die!" Truly, like music to my ears!"
"You see, torture is a guilty pleasure for me. To watch the despair in the eyes of my foes. Of course, I can't feign weakness, but I settle with crushing them beneath my foot. Knowing that no matter which afterlife they end up at, they'll end up suffering more than I could ever make them suffer in life, in spite of my efforts."
"But there's a catch."
"I can't do it to good people. It's not that I don't fight good people. I do it all the time! I've killed plenty of good people. They didn't all deserve it."
He paused. A frown permeating his face, so he tightened the rope before getting back to working.
"It's just no fun. Not right. So, I must thank you. You've just made this day a little more fun."
Looking at the man who was dangling quietly in the air. There was no sign of life in the body.
"Oh. You already died a while ago huh."
The grotesque face had nothing to say. Only a horrendous corpse stared back at him.
Grant looked nonplussed, before remembering something. "Oh darn!" he clicked his fingers as he remembered something important.
"I forgot to register Ursa Honey as a familiar. Silly me!"
He walked away, leaving the body to be discovered.
"I can't believe I forgot something as important as that."
Yes, Grant had more important things to attend to.