“How is the language learning coming along?” She asked right away, in Elvish.
“I’m making good progress! Seven five wait… seventy-five… how do you say percent? Oh yeah, percent,” Prof. replied. He was certain, he had a heavier accent than a bodybuilder from the mountains who moonlights as an actor, but hoped it was enough for Shinead. “We have news about the… attack too. We caught a… bad person? Who was involved. He says he was hired by a… grey, no, the other grey elf. He called himself Guillermo.”
“Where is this bandit? And what is a bloodsucker doing here?”
“Prof hired me, baby. And I speak Elvish.” Mini interrupted
“Fantastic. Every time I leave you alone, you pick up a woman.”
“Honey, you shouldn''t leave your stallion alone! Or don''t be jealous afterward!”
“Girls, can we go back to the original topic?” Prof interrupted quickly. “The prisoner was placed in the barn. Sharpclaw is guarding him.”
“Sharpclaw? Did you pick up another woman?”
“Oooh! Our man is so wonderful that everyone just throws herself around his neck! Even a Kobold! Regardless, he only wants you! And I’ve tried everything!”
“You brought a Kobold to town?!” Shinead ignored everything else Mini said. She left for the barn immediately, with the others in her wake. Sharpclaw, as ordered, watched the bandit leader tied up in a commercial for hard-core bondage with her dagger in her hand.
Luckily, the Kobolds were a patient species, Mini said a restless Goblin would have gone crazy with the inactivity in half an hour. If the interrogation would have depended on Shinead, they would have learned nothing, but Mini stood behind the Elf unobtrusively and winked and waved at the bandit.
They did not learn any new information, the leader told the same story as back in the camp. Shinead only thought some after hearing the Grey Elf''s description. After the interrogation, they returned to the inn, and Shinead asked the host to get the survivors of the clan.
“Did you learn anything useful?” Asked Prof.
“Yes and no. I do not remember the name Guillermo, though it is unique enough that I should not forget. Based on the description of the person, I do have an idea about who it might be, but that person is dead. I saw with my own eyes that his throat had been cut.”
“Who was he?”
“He lived in a village in the Clan’s territory for a while, and he absolutely wanted to join the Clan. As much as we explained that as a cur, this would never happen, even if his mother was a Red Elf, he did everything so we would let him join. His existence was simply an insult to the clan, what did he think?”
“How did he die?”
“After not learning from the educational beatings and getting on the nerves of a veteran hunter, he had an accident.”
“A cut throat is an accident to you?”
“Of course! If someone intentionally walks into a bared knife multiple times with hands tied back, what else could it be called? Suicide?”
“You''re absolutely right.” - replied Prof. Accident it was. If shooting yourself in the back several times with your hands tied, then cutting off your head and throwing it through the window of your house two kilometers away, and this is considered a clear suicide by the local police and court, why not have an accident in the described way?
“I assume it was a thorough accident and he didn''t survive? Or would the bandit have recognized if it was an undead?”
“It was a very thorough accident. The severed head somehow ended up on a spike.”
“After such an accident, it is impossible for him to turn into an undead.” Mini added, “At least not into one that could be mistaken for a living person by anyone with more than three points in Perceptions and Intelligence.”
“Hmmm… If the description is correct and he is quite similar to the person who suffered the khmmm… accident, they were most likely close relatives” Foxy concluded. “What do you know about relatives?”
“I’m not interested in a cur’s relatives, and the whole thing happened a few years ago. There were no relatives in the village, if I remember correctly, which of course means nothing.”
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“Do you have any way to investigate the past and present whereabouts of this Guillermo?”
“The past is harder, at most I can ask around if he has ever shown up. The location would be perhaps simpler: if he traveled with a lot of Humans in the Domain, it would have been conspicuous. If he had visited a larger settlement, even alone, he would have had to register himself. All this assuming Guillermo is his real name, not just an alias he introduced himself as to the bandits. I doubt any of them looked at his Character Parchments. If, on the other hand, they have left the Domain…”
“Leaving the Domain reminds me of…” Prof interjected “We have accepted a task, we have to kill off some critters around here. We found another party member we’d hopefully be enough with, we were just waiting to see if you arrived and wanted to come with us. Would a departure tomorrow be OK for you?”
“What kind of critters?”
“What was the translation? Shy… no, scare, scary nails?”
“Terrible Claw” Foxy helped out.
“Ah, those bastards. Five will probably be enough, but I would bring my surviving archer too.”
“Plus Sharpclaw and Mini’s mount” added Prof
“What should we do with a horse? The lizards would eat it for breakfast!”
“Hey! Binky is not a stupid horse! He’s a Scorpionlizard from the Bloodystone breeding grounds! He’s a Level 20 elite!’
“Why did I think you were picking up ordinary people, Prof…” Shinead shrugged resignedly. “Anyway, I ran into a little problem with the Grand Master. As it turned out, there is a requirement for a minimum number of clans, namely three. I was forced to nominate you and Foxy as a clanmate. I stirred up a big scandal with this, but at least it turned out there was no law for other species for clan members so far, everyone was convinced that the custom was based on a rule. In any case, it was quickly announced that a new clan could only be formed with Reds from now on, and if there were not enough Red Elves in a clan after a period of grace, it would be considered extinct. Fortunately, the Clan had survivors, so our future is secure. So, Prof, congratulations, you are the deputy Clan Leader and Foxy is the Clan''s chief mage.”
“Shinead, I know you''re not fond of other species, and since you have enough survivors, I’d like to resign from my position” Prof suggested. He wasn’t sure it was a good idea to lead a racist-specieist organization as a member of the race-species the organization was created against, even if it was just a legal trick. In the end, he would be forced to really lead the gang.
“There’s a small problem with that: the appointment lasts for the rest of your life, or the Clan Leader doesn’t dismiss you. In the latter case, it is mandatory to start a hunt, which leads to the first condition. In other words, if you don’t want me to cut your throat, you''ll remain the deputy.”
“All right, but I''m not thrilled.”
“Look it this way: you don’t have a lot of work to do right now, and in the future, we''ll come up with some rules for you to keep the title, but don''t have tasks, responsibilities, and rights behind it. Believe me, I''ve thought it over! Anyway, you Humans have such a short lifespan, the Clan will be able to tolerate you for a few decades.”
“WOW, Prof became an important person!” Mini began to applaud. “Can I join the clan too? Say, as the chief torturer, or as the official concubine of the deputy Clan Leader and Chief Mage?”
“NO!” Shinead snapped immediately. “I don’t want to get more non-Elves, I will only hire allies from now on!”
Mini was apparently disappointed but eventually began to grin. Prof was sure she figured out something sweet that had to do with orgies so she could do what she wanted. Perhaps it was better than a sociopath was not recruited into a speciesist organization dealing in strange accidents.
Meanwhile, the survivors of the clan also arrived, so Shinead quickly briefed them on what positions Prof and Foxy would occupy in the clan from now on. Although the survivors were visibly surprised (and a bit disgusted), there was no disagreement – whether it was because they had already accepted Prof and Foxy, or the Reds had a habit of not questioning the Clan Leader''s decisions, it was not clear.
After the introduction, Shinead conducted the bandit’s trial – Prof acknowledged the efficiency. On Earth, it was possible to prolong even the most trivial of trials for years and years, here the verdict was ready after five minutes. It helped a lot that the victim, the investigator, the accuser, and the judge were the same person, the accused confessed voluntarily and without any torture or threat, and no one involved a lawyer who would have saved the accused from the laws.
At the end of the quick trial, the verdict was not at all surprisingly harsh and bloody: a slow death. If Prof understood the conditions right, the bandit would face a full day and an hour of suffering, which Shinead entrusted to the four survivors. After the four Elves left the inn with an evil grin, Shinead also excused herself, wanting to investigate Guillermo''s past and present.
She estimated they would receive some news in about a week – about the same time the authorities'' lock on the animals would expire, so with little luck they would not have to spend money on mounts.
The next morning they were finally able to set off on the lizard hunt. Since they have already localized the territory the pack considered its own hunting ground, no special tracking and searching was needed. It took more time to actually find the pack in the hunting area, and the search wasn''t helped much by the fact that only Shinead had good [Tracking], Prof and the Elf hunter were far behind, and the others were virtually unusable.
In the end, the whole tracking and searching were for nothing, the prey found them faster.
“Oh, fuck, seriously?”