Marc is furious, he has this filling of failure that he hates deeply. One day late to create a police force and disaster struck. One fucking day late.
The boy doesn't care about his previous promise, today his mind is not in the right place for such amenities.
Marc opens the Shop menu.
[Detective]
Lie detector- The detective, has subconscious attention to micro-expressions, heart beating and bodily communication.
Inquisitive eyes- The detective's eyes, can draw some previous know information from his case files. Gives better night vision too.
Case files- The most powerful tool of an old Detective, noting everything is advised, Suspects, theories, locations, plants, alchemical components, anatomies, animals, rumors, if it is related to a current case, the detective inquisitive eyes will make him remember this information!
One year on the job:
Taser Hands- The detective can zap a target upon contact.
Three years on the job:
Illusion breaker- The Detective became immune to most illusions magics.
Five years on the job:
Marker- Like hunter mark, the detective can put marks up to 3 suspects and always know their location.
Ten years on the job:
Senior detective: You survived on a job that most die young, the detective has precise attacks, and subconsciously attack on weak spots. The physical and mental health of the detective improves greatly.
---
"Rupert-"
"Robert, sir" Fucking nothing similar to Rupert.
"Robert, sorry. You will be feeling different in a few moments, these are detectives blessings, as the years pass you will be felling more and more skills. But today, I will be solving this myself."
Marc was angry and bought Robert the detective class, but he would still need to wait for the detective to investigate and solve the crime. This is not fast enough for the young Lord, Marc abused the mission system again and pinned the monster. Now, at the top of his vision, he can see a little red mark, between two mountains following the forest, the culprit is there.
He looked at the soldiers that are tense looking around, they are trained men, killing people on the dungeon, but now the consequences are real, An entire family has died, they are eager to avenge them, but they also want to return home to talk to their own family.
"Five of you, go to the fort and put the whole base on alert, I want soldiers patrolling the entire city, while you're there, get equipment to scout the forest. I received a revelation of where the monster is. Robert, you will come with us."
Everyone is shocked! Has the lord managed to solve the mystery? But nobody doubts. This removes the concern of the soldiers, who return to look at the forest and warn farmers and curious people that actions to solve the problem are already being taken.
When the 5 soldiers return with the equipment for the expedition, the whole city already knows what is happening and everyone is on alert, except for a few fishermen, everyone is at home, with no schools or commerce working.
.
.
The squad enters the forest in a row, Marc is cutting the dense vegetation straight for the pin. There is a dirt road that leaves the village towards the port city, maybe if they went through it, would be faster, but Marc doesn't care, they are at a good pace and in a few hours they will be in the valley.
On the way they found a lot of birds and even a dwarf tiger. It is a tiger half the normal size, like a jaguar, but identical to a tiger. They are bird predators in general. The squad didn't mess with the monster, just watched and continued the journey. When they are an hour away from the goal, Marc decides to take a rest. The soldiers are fine, but Robert is a little tired. Even though altiors have a much better physical body and metabolism than humans, they still need constant training to maintain good performance.
At school, Robert receives a little physical training, but nothing compared to soldiers. This is a journey constantly rising to the middle of the continent, it is extremely tiring. But a 20-minute break to drink water and food is enough for Robert.
There is only an hour to go, and I still have 4 points to spend. Marc looks at the soldiers, today is no time for failure and I cannot revive them as in the dungeon. I need to take this much more seriously.
He looks for the best armor for 4 points. Gambersons with 5% mithril. 4 points is enough to buy 10 of these robes. Marc doesn't hesitate to buy.
Take the clothes out of nowhere and throw one for each member and get another one for him. Before, he refused to buy equipment for soldiers, because they lose when they die in the dungeon. But this is real, without quality equipment they will lose their lives.
"Get dressed, the monster changed its position a little bit, but we are close. In an hour and a half we are bumping into each other. Eyes open, if anything is out of order, give us a signal to re-analyze the situation." They confirm, and prepare their weapons. Two spearmen, Robert with a spear too, two infantry (ax and shield), and a bowman.
"We will hunt tonight!"
.
.
They go up the mountain, it is rocky but still has a good amount of vegetation, eventually the boys saw a glow, fire, in the same direction as the monastery. They sneak up, choosing a longer route to have the advantage of being taller.
Lying on the ground, they drag themselves to the edge and in whispers they communicate "it's a litter of monsters ... and a man, should we go back?"
"If the archer stays here, and we go together, they will be trapped, we can win"
"I think we can too"
Marc says more confidently "I know we can"
He looks at the archer "Wait here"
The monsters look like a mix of a salamander, a hedgehog and a feline. They are black with a shiny body and with some sharp spines on the back, their structure is agile like that of felines, but they are the size of a big dog, maybe 1.5m in length. In total, there are 8 monsters and one man in the middle. Eating a roast bird.
When Marc approaches the clearing, he feels a great threat and puts the shield up. A monster falls from the tree trying to pounce on him.
The impact is very strong, and he hears the hollow sound of the monster's mouth hitting the shield, but the claws try to cut his back which is protected by the gamberson. Marc attacks the monster with the ax, above the lower legs. The monster howls in pain and that is enough for him to push the shield away from the creature.
The entire enemy camp is standing and moving forward. The two spearmen, advance in formation to protect Marc with the infantry on the flanks. Marc looks at Robert "Be smart and stay behind them, don't leave Formation!"
The enemy cultivator is furious "How the fuck did you find me? You don't stand a chance against 4 against 10 and all my monsters already find a level of enlightenment of the soul. Get down on your knees and let me capture you without a fight, and you have a chance to live."
Marc and the soldiers have not yet started cultivating. Marc because he can't concentrate on meditation and the soldiers because they are always busy training. But still, they are far more powerful than their souls imply. "Fuck you, asshole! Who are you, and why did you attack us? Who sent you?"
"It is useless to talk to insects, attack!" the cultivator commands and the monsters obey!
The two sides collide, Marc tries to participate in whatever opening the soldiers leave. But his attention is on the cultivator. Which remains behind, initially he had a rough smile on his face. But when he saw that two monsters had succumbed the smile disappeared, and he started to get worried.
"Who are you? You sons of bitches! My monsters are worth 100 of your useless lives!"
He pulls out a saber, and enters the fight. Marc prepares to confront him. He jumps and attacks from above, Marc defends himself with the shield that bursts into various pieces of wood, no damage to his arm, but he is dragged backwards.
Marc regains his balance and dodges a fast side attack and continues to dodge. The cultivator is strong, but not very fast. Marc is only concerned because without his shield any attack he makes will leave him very exposed.
The archer finally decides to act, shooting an arrow at the cultivator's back. The arrow barely penetrate, but it leaves him spooked and distracted for the necessary moment.
Marc attacks the man's shoulder. He could go for the neck, but he wants the opportunity to get information out of him.
Axes are terrible tools to defend yourself. But they have three massive advantages. They are easy to produce, versatile as day-to-day and war tools and in war they do a lot of damage when they get it right.
And Marc got it right. The ax cuts the meat, muscles and tendons until it reaches the bone. There the energy is distributed in the calcium tissues and fragmenting its structures.
Before the cultivator could scream, Marc hit a left hook that knocked him unconscious.
The fight against the monsters lasted a few more minutes. Apart from a few scratches, the only one injured was Robert, who now has a claw scar on his face. He is unconscious on the ground too, holding tightly to his spear that is impaling a monster. He was not injured for free.
Marc turns to the cultivator, when he goes to check, there is a huge pool of blood around the man, looking more closely he appears to be dead. "FUCK! The guy died!" Marc is really frustrated ... his blow must have hit some artery and his heart pushed the blood out.
"Search everything, look from under each stone if necessary" It is dark, but Marc orders them to look anyway. He receives some points as a prize for killing the monster and avenging the family, but the bonus prize for resolving who is to blame behind it has not yet been validated.
Marc analyzes his fight against the cultivator, the man was stronger and harder, but he was a little slower. Slow enough that he didn't land any hits, except for the first hit the warrior believed in shield defense.
But still, marc needs to rethink how he wants to fight ... Shield and ax is a great combination if he has no armor and resources, with better armor maybe using a war ax or a glaive would be great.
"Sir! He is a Fargho! We fond letters that he was sending to his wife." One of my soldier says. Fargho village is in the opposite position of our village, impossible to reach directly, we would have to cross a large amount of mountains, the coast is much easier, the problem is that there is another village on the left and the port city on our right.
[ding! Mission acomplish, you now the oringin of the killer. But who is the sender?]
[+20 points]
Part 2 of the mission is finished. Now we need to plan for war.