Rise of the Nightmare Crestmaster

*Hiss*

Frank sucked in a cold breath, "this is bad, did the guild even know about this? Should we retreat and report this to the guild?"

Aldrich shook his head, "it doesn't matter if they didn't know about it, that doesn't change the fact that we have to complete the quest."

"Hey you, let me guess. Since the Ravenfolk notified you of a target he's expecting you guys to present all the goods at midday when all of you guys gather in the hideout?"

Bodger nodded in affirmation.

"So, your plan was to take us there and watch as we get taken down by that demi-human?"

"Right, right!"

"Where do the Ravenfolk stay?" Aldrich asked.

"Uh, a little deeper in the woods, they have a nest atop a large tree, they spend most of the time going deep in the woods and we don't know what they're doing."

"Oh? You sound like you know the place, can you take us there?" Frank asked.

"No, I've been there but only a few times, I would not be able to take you guys, I swear, please believe me I really don't know."

"I believe you," Aldrich indeed was not lying, Bodger did not have the heart to lie anymore, "but someone else must know right?"

Bodger had a stupid look on his face for a moment before he joyfully nodded, "yes, yes, it's the boss, he has a skull necklace the mad man and he was a soldier in the war! He knows."

"Alright thank you Balden." Aldrich patted the bandit on the back.

"It's Bodger…"

"Whatever, anyway, you ready to go?" Aldrich asked.

Bodger once again nodded in excitement, "yeah, thank you, thank you, I will remember this favor for the rest of my life."

"Oh…" Aldrich had an awkward look on his face so he coughed a few times, "ah, listen, you really don't have to do that, since your life will end shortly."

"What?" Frank asked in confusion at the same time that Aldrich beheaded the bandit. The head flew in the air and blood splattered but Aldrich moved away from the blood splash before it landed on him.

Frank was not so lucky.

"What happened?" Frank asked in seeming confusion.

"What's wrong? I thought we got everything we needed from him, was there something you wanted to ask him?" Aldrich replied.

"What—no, I mean why did you kill him? He's already yielded, and he answered all our questions?!"

"You can't possibly have believed that I would have let him go, right?" Aldrich rolled his eyes.

"Let him go? No, but we could have taken him to the authorities, they should deal with him!"

"Calm down—"

"No, why are you so calm?! You just killed a man, take it seriously!" Frank yelled.

Aldrich somehow felt that he wasn't on the same page as Frank.

"You killed a bandit too, not even an hour ago!" Aldrich had lost control of his voice and yelled back, angered without knowing why.

"Yeah, I did. And I'd do it again!" Frank breathed out, "but that was a battle of life and death. This is different. He was tied down and couldn't defend himself, you didn't have to do that."

"Yeah I killed him so what?" Aldrich sneered, "he tried to lead us to a trap or have you forgotten that? The quest is to eliminate ALL the bandits."

"Fuck the quest! This is a man's life and this is just a stupid quest!" Frank grabbed Aldrich by his shirt's collar, "no matter the sin, so long as man is alive he can atone for it."

"There are sins that cannot be atoned for, sins that can't be forgiven." Aldrich said as he squeezed Frank's hands until he let go but even as he did he saw the look in his eyes and that he was not convinced.

"And I will remind you that I am the leader of this party until the two quests are completed, keep that in mind."

"Have you guys fought enough?" Cole said as at some point the rest of the party members had surrounded the two of them.

"This is not the time, it's almost midday, tell us what you learned and give me that bottle." Nathan said.

"Oh, thanks, and well done for understanding my trick." Aldrich handed Nathan the test tube.

"Wait, so that actually wasn't the bone melting poison?" Frank asked in surprise.

"Duh, obviously it was just a trick to get the bandit talking. The bone melting poison is not something that the likes of us could get our hands on." Helen answered.

"Only organizations like The Stained Daggers or The Hand Of Czar could have it, and it's sold in limited quantities to outsiders." Aldrich added.

​ "Oh?" Nathan leaked a voice of surprise somehow, "y-yeah, this is definitely not the bone melting poison, obviously I understood the trick you wanted to perform, obviously, for sure."

"Uh, yeah," Aldrich coughed to get everyone's attention, "first of all, I want to be extremely clear about this with all of you, my goal is to pass the exam and complete these two quests that we have left, at any cost."

"Let me tell you, in my first quest, an information gathering quest there was a 90% casualty rate, out of the five participants I was the only survivor. However despite that I passed the quest and moved on and that's why I'm here now."

"Why are you telling us this now?" Franks asked sharply.

"Because," Aldrich walked over to the last bandit alive and undid his ropes, "I want to remind all of you that this is an exam not just a quest that we can freely deal with as we like.

I would love to hand over these bandits to the authorities but… the guild only cares about the completion of the quest requirements and so we have to kill them all, we can't risk it."

"Is it so important for you that you're willing to kill an unarmed man whose not a threat anymore?" Frank asked calmly, he wasn't as irritated as earlier.

"It's not just me, Frank. All of us will fail if we allow even one bandit to live, do you want to throw away this exam, will you be responsible when we have to take the exam again next year? Even then, what if we get a similar quest?"

Frank clenched his fists and looked to be struggling, everyone was looking at him, "fine, but no more killing unarmed men, that's all I ask."

"Fine. That's a deal."