We Hunt Monsters 3, page 13
One of the vampires moved forward at a gesture from the man and cracked Cayla across one of her tied hands, eliciting a scream from the woman.
“Are we going now?” Bob asked.
“Not yet,” Keith replied.
They wanted her alive, so the worst they would do was hurt her a bit. He needed the perfect moment to strike and knew it was coming. He just had to be patient for a little longer. Several more cracks sounded, followed by a scream from Cayla. She didn’t say anything though, just glared at the man who’d betrayed her.
“Come now, dear,” Rinor said, crouching in front of her and pinching her face between his fingers. “This is very unbeco-”
A boot slammed into the back of his head, driving him face-first into the floor. The vampire’s nose shattered, the concussive force of the blow knocking him out cold before he could utter so much as a single word.
In the same motion, two of the vampires slammed into the shop walls, screaming in agony as they were engulfed in red and purple fire, while massive cracks opened in their skin, gushing blood onto the shop floor.
“What took you so long?” Cayla asked, craning her neck sideways to get a good look at him.
“Sorry,” Keith said, catching his returning hammers. “I was waiting for the perfect moment.”
21
The vampires dropped their clubs, drawing knives and covering them with vials of acid-green liquid. Clearly, despite their surprise, they were well-trained. That didn’t matter to Keith, who threw his hammers once more, finishing off the two screaming vampires and eliminating two enemies.
Vrok dies!
+398 XP
Geronimo dies!
+312 XP
Six remained, and they fanned out around him, holding their knives in a way that showed they knew how to use them. Keith raised his hands, fingers loosely curled, leaving the hammers where they lay.
One of them lunged, knife slashing out toward his throat. Keith easily side-stepped, catching the man’s arm as he passed and wrenching it up and back, stabbing him in the face.
-744, Massive critical, Acid burn, Poison
Stumpy dies!
+366 XP
The vampire went down without so much as a peep, body hitting the floor like a sack. Keith barely noticed, bobbing beneath a knife and rising with a powerful uppercut that cracked the vampire’s jaw, then ripped it clean off as the effect of his equipped sword dealt extra damage.
He howled as he staggered back, blood gushing from his missing jaw. Keith turned, throwing an arm up and deflecting an incoming knife strike, then snagged the vampire’s arm and kicked to the side. His boot drilled into another’s stomach, knocking him back. His head swayed to one side as the captive vampire tried to gouge his eyes, and Keith wrenched his arm once more, this time slicing into the vampire’s neck.
It wasn’t a deep cut. It didn’t have to be. Poison frothed and bubbled at the wound, and the vampire howled, dropping to his knees and fumbling for an antidote. Keith recalled one of his hammers, the weapon scraping along the floor before leaping to him.
It crashed into the back of the screaming vampire’s head, knocking him forward and onto his face. Keith caught the hammer, turning with the weapon’s momentum and crushing the second vampire’s hand.
Blood and splintered bone rained as the hand was turned to pulp. Keith ignored the notification of another death and experience gain, leaping over Cayla and striking a vampire’s neck as he moved to grab her. The man staggered back, clutching at his throat, and Keith brained him with his hammer.
The weapon then jumped from his hand, striking a vampire who was running for the door. He then returned his attention to the vampire with the shattered hand. A quick blow to the throat severed the vampire’s head, two ether bolts shimmering in the stump of the neck for a moment before vanishing.
Keith took a moment to look around. Only one vampire remained, the one who’d been trying to run away. He calmly walked over to the vampire, lifted his foot, and drove his heel into the back of his skull, where it met the spine.
Lil Bobby dies!
+402 XP
Wow! You’re a stone-cold murderer, aren’t you?
Despite the system’s words, he had still gotten experience for every kill he’d made in here. Doing a quick check, he saw that he’d gained around three thousand XP from the battle, which wasn’t bad at all, considering how fast it had been.
“Thanks for the save,” Cayla said with a wince as Keith untied her.
“It was the least I could do after you refused to tell them where I was,” Keith said, helping her up.
“Wait, how long were you up there?”
“Let’s see if we can get this lowlife to talk,” Keith said, grabbing the still unconscious Rinor by the collar and dragging him upright.
“We already know what he wanted,” Cayla said, drinking a potion. “He was working for my monster of a mother to get me back to her.”
“He also has around two-hundred pounds of shimmerdust up in his attic,” Keith said. “I think I’d like to know where he got hold of it, wouldn’t you?”
Cayla’s jaw all but dropped at that proclamation.
“I’ll take that as a yes then,” Keith said, shoving the man up against the wall and slapping his face.
He looked like a mess. His face was starting to bruise, and his splattered nose looked even worse up close. Slowly, the man began to come to as Keith continued smacking him.
“You know, there are probably better ways of bringing him back around,” Bob said.
“Keep slapping him,” Cayla said.
Keith obliged. It didn’t take too much longer for the man’s brain to realize how much pain he was in, and Rinor howled, bucking against Keith’s grip. A red-edged scythe pressed into his neck, and Rinor stopped moving, his eyes going up to the pair who now held him captive.
“That looks like it hurts,” Cayla said, motioning to his face.
“It does,” Rinor groaned.
“Good,” Cayla said, pressing the blade of her scythe to the man’s neck just a bit harder.
“Who do you work for?” Keith asked.
Rinor’s eyes flicked to Cayla. She was the one with the blade to his neck, after all.
“Answer him,” she growled.
“I…I don’t know,” he croaked. “Please, Cayla. Let’s be reasonable here, I-” He abruptly cut off as she pressed the scythe into his neck, drawing a line of blood.
“Answer the question,” she said.
“I told you, I don’t know,” he said. “And even if I did, I’d be dead if I opened my mouth.”
“I have ways of making people talk,” Keith said.
“I’m not scared of you,” Rinor said with a sneer. “What can you do to me if I don’t answer? Kill me? Ha!”
“No,” Keith said. “I’ll leave you alive. Then, I’ll call the city guards, show them what you’ve got stashed up in your attic, and tell them that you were a victim of theirs but finally decided to step forward and turn in all the shimmerdust. Now, how do you think the one you work for will react when they hear about your act of heroism?”
Keith had never suspected it would be possible for a vampire to go so pale as all the blood rushed from Rinor’s face.
“You wouldn’t do that. Cayla, you wouldn’t do that to me. We’re family!”
“Oh, this is nothing personal, Rinor. It’s just business,” Cayla repeated. “You understand.”
“Please,” the man said. “You don’t know what they’re like. You don’t know who you’re messing with!”
“Try me,” Keith said. “Either you answer now, or we get the guards. It’s your choice.”
“Fine!” Rinor snapped as Keith made to go for the door. “I’ll tell you, but you’ve gotta get me out of the city. Otherwise, no deal!”
“Fine, we’ll get you out,” Keith said, ignoring the look of outrage Cayla threw him. “Now talk.”
The man took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, his entire body shuddering.
“Her name is Jade. I can’t tell you where she is or what she looks like, only that she’s one of the four commanders working for the Glutton. That’s all I know, I swear!”
Keith screamed silently in his head as several new messages flashed before his eyes.
You have discovered a hidden quest!
You have partially completed a quest!
+3,650 XP
1 large gold bar has been added to your inventory.
Quest update: Unveiling the Generals
Guzzlarian the Glutton can’t do whatever mysterious things he does without help, right? You’ve discovered the existence of Jade, commander in charge of his shimmerdust trade. Clearly, the Glutton is not a good dude.
Difficulty: A
Objective: Discover the 4 commanders under the Glutton
Progress: 1/4 discovered
Rewards: 3,650 XP, 1 large gold bar for each commander discovered
Final Reward: +5,000 XP, Location of all commanders
“What’s happening?” Cayla exclaimed, her eyes frantically reading over a message only she could see.
“You got the Glutton quest,” Keith sighed. “Sorry about that. I didn’t think this had to do with it.”
“Wait, you knew about this quest already?”
Keith shrugged.
“You need to get me out of the city right now!” Rinor snapped. “You promised!”
“Yes, we did,” Keith said. “Hey, Bob, is it possible to put a corpse into your inventory?” Keith asked, addressing the monkey.
“You can, technically speaking, though I have no idea why you’d want to.”
“Wait,” Rinor said, looking between Keith and Cayla. “You…You promised…”
“To get you out of the city,” Keith said, stepping back. “I never promised you’d be alive when we did.”
“No! Wai-!”
The man didn’t get to finish as Cayla’s scythe connected, sliding his head clean off.
22
“That was disgusting,” Bob said, making a retching sound as the carriage streaked away from Centerville City.
After Rinor’s body had been placed in Cayla’s inventory, Keith had given the guards an anonymous tip about a bloody fight in the ore shop. He’d also left the ceiling access conspicuously open. He hadn’t stuck around, but he was sure the guards had found the crates filled with the stuff.
It probably wouldn’t do much in the long run, but it might throw a wrench in their plans for a bit. The two of them had left the city soon after, stopping only to clean off at a nearby well and grab something to eat from a stand.
“It was only a body,” Keith said. “You’ve seen much worse.”
“Yeah,” Bob admitted. “But it was all squishy and nasty.”
Keith looked at Cayla out of the corner of his eye. She’d been quiet since they’d left the city. She’d had quite the shock with someone she’d believed to be on her side. Now, she would need to come to terms with it. They continued driving well into the night this time, putting some distance between themselves and Centerville City before setting up their bunker.
It was only after they’d finished eating and had settled down that Cayla finally spoke.
“I didn’t realize my mother’s reach could spread so far,” she said. “Nor did I realize that that man wasn’t who I thought he was.”
Keith remained silent as she spoke, sure that more would come.
“How could I have been such an idiot?”
She slammed her fist on the table, staring down at it as though it held all the answers.
“How could my mother do this? Is she going to be able to track us wherever we go?”
“No,” Keith said, answering her last question. “Your mother could only guess where you would go.”
“So what you’re saying is that I’m so predictable that even my mother could guess where I would be going.”
The woman let out a long sigh, dropping her face into her hands.
“Do you want to not let that happen again?” Keith asked.
Cayla looked up, fire dancing in her eyes.
“I want to be able to stay ahead of anyone trying to hunt me down, especially my mother.”
“Bob, how do I teach a skill to someone?” Keith asked.
“Just think of the skill you want to teach, designate a target when the prompt appears, and then the target just has to accept the skill,” the monkey replied.
He was currently lying on his back, rubbing an overly full belly, and belched loudly as he said this.
Cayla looked confused by the change in topic, but when Keith targeted her and offered to teach her the Tactician skill, her eyes went wide.
“This is an incredible skill,” she whispered.
She already knew that he had a master-ranked skill or two. What she didn’t know was exactly how many or how he had gotten them. The woman readily accepted the skill, and Keith immediately targeted her for another, this time, his Discerning Eye.
“Holy Spirits!” the woman exclaimed. “You’ve been running around with these as master-ranked this entire time?”
“I’ve actually got six,” Keith said. “And before you ask, I have some experience from the world I came from. Let’s just leave it at that for now.”
He could see the burning desire to know more reflected in Cayla’s eyes, but thankfully, she didn’t try to press the issue. Instead, she tried something else.
“Do you have any idea how much this will help if you want to start a guild?” she asked excitedly. “People will come in droves if you’re offering skills like this.”
“And that’s exactly why I won’t be offering them,” Keith replied. “If we do make our own guild, I don’t need people motivated by greed, coming only for the skills.”
Well, strictly speaking, he did kind of need people motivated by greed, but the right kind of greed. People who came only for the skills would find the first excuse they could to bail. He wouldn’t be stupid enough to fall for that. What he might do was teach one of his lesser skills to get a bit of money. After all, guilds did need funding to run, but he was getting ahead of himself.
“If you train those skills up, you’ll see any enemy coming from a mile away,” Keith said. “But you need to remain vigilant. Keep your senses sharp and your wits about you. Don’t let others dictate your life.”
Cayla nodded, now seeming to have regained her earlier fire. She no longer seemed too despondent or worried, which was good in a way. Keith just hoped this didn’t come back to bite him in the behind later.
The two of them spoke for a little while longer, but soon, they headed to their rooms for a good night of sleep before resuming travel the next day.
The weather grew progressively warmer over the next few days as flatlands turned to rolling hills and dense forests. They’d been forced out of the carriage several times along the route and sometimes needed to go on foot for hours on end before being able to resume travel by carriage.
All of this hiking and trekking finally got Keith’s Ranger skill above the last hurdle, and when they were just four days from Suncrow City, he got the message that it had advanced.
Skill: Ranger has advanced to master
Ranger
Level: Master - I
You have ranged far and wide. You can track, hunt, climb, and swing. Any rough terrain is no match for you.
+300% chance to find hidden trails, +65% movement speed in rough terrain, +15% climbing speed on vertical surfaces
*You may teach this skill to others
While his Rough Wagoner skill didn’t make it all the way to advanced, it did climb nicely through the intermediate ranks, making it all the way to intermediate VII before they reached a place called Jaina’s Keep, a settlement just a short drive from Suncrow City.
“I’m pretty sure this place has a branch of the Pest Control Guild,” Bob said as the carriage slowed to a stop. “Might do you some good to stop in. They might have some information on the world monster, and barring that, you might be able to convince some of them to join the hunt.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” Cayla said. “I’ve just about had it with sitting in this box all day. Let’s get out and stretch our legs for a bit. It’ll be good.”
“Fine,” Keith said, shutting off the carriage.
In truth, he was grateful to be getting out of this thing as well. It definitely beat traveling at a snail’s pace, and the fact that they’d been able to pretty much cross the continent in a bit under three weeks was proof of that. Still, three weeks was a long time, and he was feeling restless, to the point where he might even have welcomed a fight just to alleviate the boredom.
The three of them headed for the gates, which were considerably smaller than those of Centerville City or even Oster’s Keep, for that matter. Still, the guards were nice enough, letting them pass once they saw their guild tags.
“Are you sure you want to leave the guild?” Cayla asked as they entered the keep and headed toward the area designated by the guards.
“I’d sacrifice convenience for loyalty and competence any day,” Keith said in reply.
The more they spoke about it, the more the idea of leaving the Pest Control Guild and striking out on their own appealed to him. Of course, there was the one thing that might prevent them, but he didn’t want to think about that right now.
They walked through the streets of the lush and green keep, enjoying the warm sunlight streaming down through the partially cloudy sky above. It was a beautiful day by any definition of the word, and even Keith was hard-pressed not to enjoy himself.
It was only about a fifteen-minute walk for them to reach the guildhall, which appeared to be significantly smaller than the one in Oster’s Keep. It also seemed eerily empty as they approached, as though no one was home.
