The Witcher: Wolf School's Hunting Notes

The next day.

"Don't bring your damn magical trinkets near the magical materials I purchased!"

A loud-voiced dwarf was yelling at the sturdy stone gates of Vergen, forcing guards equipped with magical emblems to back off and allowing a caravan to quickly enter the city.

This was Houghton Qui-Gon, the lord of Vergen—a dwarven master blacksmith who had been lured to Aedirn by King Demavend II due to his forging skills.

Perhaps knowing that witchers disliked getting involved in the conflicts between nations, Houghton did not alert the knights sent by King Demavend specifically to request that the witchers take care of the griffon problem.

He had come to Vergen's gates early, noticing that Vesemir and Allen both carried the standard mercenary look with their swords at their waists. He concocted an excuse to let the caravan pass through the heavily guarded checkpoint.

Otherwise, with all the magical detection devices in the guards' hands, the witchers might not have made it through undetected.

"Houghton Master, every caravan entering or leaving Aedirn must be checked. This is the regulation set by—"

"I don't care about your damned regulations! Who knows if these little trinkets made by mages will ruin the purity and structure of my materials! This is all for that cunning little brat, Demavend II..."

A small dwarf, with a big voice.

Houghton Qui-Gon, whose mouth had no filter, berated the armored guard captain to the point that he retreated step by step. In the end, the captain had no choice but to let the caravan through.

"Alright, alright, Master Houghton. Stop talking. We'll let them in, we'll let them in!"

"Smart choice," the dwarf said, crossing his arms in satisfaction. He then turned to a pudgy merchant and barked, "Get in here and deliver everything to the lord's residence! My child can't wait to be born!"

The merchant named Charles looked momentarily confused.

He had no idea what this hot-tempered, bearded dwarf had ordered from him. However, years of experience in business and observing people told him something as he noticed the dwarf's gaze flicking toward the group behind him.

"Y-yes, Master Houghton," he stammered, then called out to his assistants and coachman, whipping the mules to pull the wagon into the city.

"Houghton is apologizing!" Vesemir remarked, leading his horse and hiding behind one of the wagons. As they passed the grumpy-looking dwarf, Vesemir tipped his wide-brimmed black hat subtly as a gesture.

"Houghton rarely meddles in Vergen's affairs, let alone intervenes at the gates, where guards sent by the king inspect for spies and caravans."

Though Houghton Qui-Gon bore the title of lord of Vergen, in practice, it was only a formality bestowed by Demavend II. The real work was carried out by humans appointed by the king.

At this moment, the guard captain, who had been berated into silence, was carefully observing the caravan with his magical detection device. His wary gaze shifted between the people in the caravan and the seemingly flustered dwarf. Clearly, he was suspicious of Houghton.

"Dwarves are like that. They never apologize outright but will find ways to make up for their mistakes," Vesemir said with a helpless smile.

"Will Houghton be alright?" Allen glanced at the captain out of the corner of his eye.

The captain had called over a few subordinates, quietly instructing them to send a message to the checkpoints ahead and to the king.

"Demavend II values him highly; he should be fine," Vesemir replied. "Besides, once we deal with the griffon, the king will be even less likely to hold this against him."

After a pause, Vesemir lowered his voice, saying, "Allen, once the griffon is gone, even if no one sees us do it, someone in Aedirn is bound to suspect us. Are you sure... this won't cause problems?"

"As long as we're not caught, it's fine," Allen said, leading his horse with a slight smirk. "Griffons aren't common monsters. If one suddenly appears and then disappears, it's entirely normal."

"As long as we don't announce it ourselves, no one can be sure it was us who hunted the griffon."

Vesemir nodded but still seemed uneasy.

Allen didn't try to convince him further. Vesemir, going against centuries of neutrality to hunt the griffon based on his advice, was already more than Allen had expected.

Of course, Allen had a more compelling reason, though it wasn't something he could easily explain to the witcher master.

As long as they weren't discovered—or even if they were—so long as they didn't admit to it themselves, the chances of Vesemir's imagined troubles arising were slim to none.

After all…

Who would imagine, or even believe, that the famously upright and neutral School of the Wolf would secretly risk their lives to kill a griffon just to prevent a bloody war from ending too soon?

------------------

Since the caravan had drawn suspicion, after unloading parts of the ghoul carcasses at Houghton Qui-Gon's stone house, Charles sought Vesemir and Allen's opinion before leaving Vergen immediately.

On the way out, the witchers separated from the caravan, letting Charles and the men from Lyenn draw the guards' attention away.

Even if Aedirn's men found out about the witchers' presence, it wouldn't be a big deal.

This wasn't Kaedwen, where they had to constantly guard against sorcerers and nobles trying to use the chaos of war to eliminate them.

In Aedirn, the most extreme thing Demavend II could do would be to force them into hunting the griffon. Of course, it was better to stay unnoticed.

Descending the mountain, they arrived at a fork in the road. Vesemir was trying to discern their direction.

Tipping his black hat, Vesemir said, "There's a village not far ahead. We can rest there for a day before moving on."

"What do you think?"

Allen had no objections.

They were deep inside Aedirn's territory now, so there was no need to keep traveling day and night as before.

Would the sorcerers from Ban Ard really pursue them into enemy territory?

If one were foolish enough to follow them into Aedirn, the roles of hunter and prey might very well reverse.

"Sure, let's rest for a day and recuperate," Allen agreed.

The moment Allen spoke, the weary younger witchers burst into cheers.

"Finally! This mountain life isn't for witchers. I haven't bathed in ten days!"

"Same here! The blisters on my thighs just keep popping and coming back. It's agony!"

"Riding every day is torture..."

"All this meditating—I haven't had a good night's sleep in days..."

Vesemir's brows furrowed deeper and deeper. Hearing the last complaint, he couldn't help but rebuke: "Even if we find a place to rest, meditation must not stop! As long as we're not in Kaer Morhen, you must replace sleep with meditation."

"Didn't I tell you all before? Many witchers from the School of the Wolf have died because they let their guard down in the wild..."

"Erik was killed by the swamp crones at night in Gors Velen. Tranmere lost his soul to a banshee in Redania's Monte Calvo. Iramus even had his throat torn out by a pack of wolves..."

On and on he went, lecturing them.

The young witchers groaned and gave accusing looks to the one who had mentioned meditation.

"You wanted to sleep? You could've done it quietly. Why bring it up?"

The village of Dolay wasn't far, and amidst their chatter and complaints, they arrived at an inn in the village by noon.

After lunch, Allen didn't rest immediately. Instead, he visited the village herbalist and bought a few vials of dog tallow and some white myrtle.

Hybrid Oil wasn't a commonly used type of blade oil. When Allen first obtained the formula, he brewed a few bottles, but not enough to supply all nine witchers.

Of course, the Royal Griffin was a large flying monster, second only to dragons among flying creatures. Allen and Vesemir didn't intend to bring the other witchers along; it was too dangerous.

However, they still had to prepare for the possibility of an accidental encounter with the griffin to avoid being completely defenseless.

Preparing thoroughly before a hunt was a virtue all witchers should uphold.

Unfortunately, he hadn't yet unlocked the beehive bomb recipe. Otherwise, he could have gathered all three of the griffin's official weaknesses from the game: beehive bombs, Hybrid Oil, and the Aard sign.

The production of Hybrid Oil was neither difficult nor demanding.

Unwilling to be inconvenienced, Allen spent a few copper coins borrowing a cauldron and brewed all the blade oil in the herbalist's hut before returning to the inn.

"Bang~"

The wooden door was gently shut.

The room's soundproofing wasn't great, and voices filtered through the walls.

"Ice, Hughes, Claral… tsk tsk... Looks like Ice is about to get unlucky again." Allen listened for a few seconds, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

After briefly cleaning himself to wash away the fatigue of recent days, the witcher focused his thoughts and opened the Witcher's Journal.

[Loot Acquired: Greater Ghoul Heart Extract x1, Ghoul Heart Extract x37, Rotfiend Heart Extract x8, Experience Orbs x12, Greater Ghoul Treasure Chests x5, Ghoul Treasure Chests x5, Rotfiend Treasure Chests x5]

The previous day, after saving Charles's caravan from corpse monsters at the old battlefield, Allen had only glanced at the hunting evaluation. He spent 1,500 achievement points to upgrade the Quen signs of three young witchers—except for Erni and Claral—to Level 3.

The rest of the spoils hadn't been reviewed yet, as outsiders were present at the time.

"Rotfiend Heart Extract?"

When Allen opened the system notification and saw this, his gaze froze for a moment.

During the hunting evaluation, he hadn't noticed that rotfiends could even drop heart extract.

"This is absurd. The rotfiend self-destructed in the end; how was heart extract even obtained?"

Allen found it incomprehensible.

Heart extracts and purified spirits weren't conjured from thin air; they were always derived from the monster's physical body.

He had tested this before.

Purified spirits were generated immediately upon slaying specter-type monsters by some unknown means.

Heart extracts, on the other hand, were derived from the creature's heart only after the hunt was settled.

Allen's current permissions allowed him to briefly opt out of extraction during the settlement process.

But what about the rotfiend?

Did the Witcher's Journal piece together the rotfiend's fragments and body fluids from the ground?

At this thought, Allen recalled the rotfiend's foul-smelling secretions and felt a wave of nausea.

"Forget it. No point in overthinking. The Witcher's Journal has more secrets than just this."

Shaking his head to suppress the rising disgust, Allen concentrated and consumed all the rotfiend heart extracts.

Sure enough.

The stench of the rotfiend was also present in its heart extract.

The moment the liquid touched his throat, the witcher almost gagged. It was like swallowing an old, moldy sock wrapped around a rotten egg.

After testing one portion to ensure no adverse effects, Allen gritted his teeth and downed the remaining seven extracts.

Instantly.

It felt like hundreds of rotten eggs exploded in his stomach.

The witcher quickly held his breath to fend off the overpowering nausea.

"Damn it!"

With his mouth tightly shut and breath held, he cursed inwardly. Then, focusing his thoughts, he saw the changes in his attributes.

The witcher's expression grew twisted and complicated.

[Name: Allen][Level: 50]

[Health: 100%, Stamina: 610/610, Mana: 780/780]

[Attributes: Strength 66, Agility 61, Constitution 61 (-4), Perception 75, Mysticism 78]

[Affinity: Water 15 (Magic Source: Water 5%), Earth 10 (Magic Source: Earth 0%), Wind 9, Fire 6 (+2), Space 2]

Not only had his attributes not increased, but he had also lost four points of constitution.

However!

However!

The rotfiend heart extract had increased his fire affinity!

Even though eight extracts only added two points, it was fire affinity!

Aside from purified spirits from Cyclopes or Trolls that evenly raised all four elemental affinities, no other large monster Allen had encountered could improve fire affinity.

And the rotfiend wasn't even a large monster.

For the first time, the witcher saw hope of raising all four elemental affinities above ten this year.

Who knew if something special would happen when all four elemental affinities surpassed ten...

All in all, trading four constitution points for two fire affinity points was worth it!

But now came the problem...

"Based on the normal limit of twenty attribute increases per monster type, I still need twelve more rotfiends and twelve more extracts..."

Finding rotfiends wasn't too difficult; although rare, they could still be located. But the last experience...

The lingering foul taste in his esophagus resurfaced faintly, and Allen's complexion paled slightly. He focused his thoughts.

[Use Greater Ghoul Heart Extract x1?]

The cold liquid flowed down his throat.

As it passed through his esophagus, it was absorbed by the inner lining, washing away the residual nauseating stench.

Before it reached his stomach, it transformed into a surge of heat that spread throughout his body.

[Health: 100%, Stamina: 640/640, Mana: 780/780]

[Attributes: Strength 69 (+3), Agility 61, Constitution 64 (+3), Perception 75, Mysticism 78]

[Affinity: Water 15 (Magic Source: Water 5%), Earth 11 (Magic Source: Earth 1%) (+1), Wind 9, Fire 6, Space 2]

"Phew~"

The stench left behind by the rotfiend extract was finally cleansed, and the witcher exhaled a long sigh of relief as he shifted his attention back to the loot.

"Another twelve experience orbs... That makes ninety-eight orbs now. Just two more, or..." He opened the inventory to check his stash of minor experience orbs. "...or another 120 minor orbs, and I'll have enough to unlock the next roar in the Path of Roars—Beast Roar: Whisper of Life."

"Two orbs are easier to gather," he thought. "I wonder what kind of evaluation capturing the Royal Griffin will yield..."

As for the remaining treasure chests from greater ghouls, rotfiends, and ghouls, he decided to hold onto them. Once the Royal Griffin was captured, he would fly straight to the Temple of Melitele to open them.

After taking stock of his gains, the witcher, brimming with anticipation for the next roar in the Path of Roars, stowed away the Witcher's Journal.

The room's window faced north.

The scorching summer sunlight streamed through the wooden lattice, illuminating every speck of dust in the room's air.

Allen's gaze passed through the window, focusing on the distant Blue Mountains, as a question crossed his mind.

A week had passed—had the Wild Hunt made its way to Ban Ard yet?

.....

📢20 advanced chapters on p@treaon📢

For advance chapters: [email protected]/Uchiha_Itachi007 (replace @ with a)

340. Hunting the Royal Griffin.

341. The Demon Opened Its Crimson Eyes.

342. The Disappearance of the Seven Witchers.

343. Vesemir's Anger and Astonishment.

344. The Limit of Attributes.