RPAGF #471 - The Demon Hunters also have a hard time.
#471 - The Demon Hunters also have a hard time.
In truth, Favarelli was quite annoyed by Aigaron's actions.
Unlike other witchers, Favarelli, since becoming the head of the human labor gang, had basically been the middleman through whom farmers took on jobs.
Due to his black market status, Favarelli couldn't go too far, which actually made many laborers feel he was fairer.
Although it was just a small amount of power in allocation and dispatch, he still received flattery and compliments from the laborers.
This made Favarelli, who was usually in a state of being despised, feel a little giddy.
However, he was still sober enough to know that what had happened had happened and couldn't be undone.
Despite his reluctance to give up his current life, they ultimately had to work for the noble lords, and this was, after all, the territory of devils and heretics.
"Alright, have you forgotten what you're here to do?" Favarelli coldly interrupted the other witchers' complaints.
"Boss Favarelli, we were doing so well, but because of these two, our income will be at least halved."
Favarelli stood up, his cold gaze sweeping over everyone: "Do you know who you're working for? Do you want to lose your heads? Are you really planning to keep working until the New Year Festival?"
Several old witchers fell silent. Unless they stayed on Autumn's End Island forever, the consequence of defying the Church was that they would have nowhere to stand in the entire empire.
Thinking of this, the old witchers felt a little sad.
The kind of monster hunting, wandering around taking on jobs like the witchers in story collections, would no longer exist in this advanced 15th century.
With the increase in the number of witchers and the cooperation with the Church, nobles, and officials, something similar to a witcher guild gradually emerged.
At the Council of 1355, under the leadership of the then Pope Innocent (actually Joan), the Witcher Castle was established.
Since then, each province would have one or two Witcher Castles, each castle with dozens to hundreds of witchers, subsidized by the local archbishop.
Whenever a monster incident occurred somewhere, if the local lord couldn't solve it independently, they could report it to the local church.
These "orders" were collected by the church and sent to the Witcher Castle, with the church and nobles jointly paying the witchers to hunt the monsters.
Of course, if monsters were hunted, the monster's materials, such as meat, blood, bones, and even brain crystals, had to be divided with the church according to a certain ratio.
But by Favarelli's time, it had become waiting after monsters appeared, waiting until a certain number had accumulated, and then sending a batch of witchers to hunt them down.
The first reason was for efficiency, and the second was to give the monsters a chance to grow, reproduce, and be born.
If the monsters were all cleared out at once, what would they eat and drink in the future?
Or if the monsters were killed before they grew up, wouldn't the loot from the materials be much less?
As for the commoners harmed by the monsters, it could only be said that it was their fate to be bitten to death, and they couldn't blame anyone else.
Under this model, organizations like witcher teams that collectively took on tasks appeared, and specialized monster order contractors within the church also emerged.
Due to the decrease in the number of monsters and the increase in efficiency, the success rate of missions was higher, and the witcher mortality rate was lower.
As a result, the number of witchers couldn't keep up with the number of orders, so they had to start wining and dining, undercutting each other, and even delaying final payments.
Being a witcher was a high-risk profession, and maybe the person owed wages would die while waiting?
So, the down-and-out witchers had to take on assassination, espionage, stealing recipes, and trading information to make a living.
The deterioration of the witcher's reputation began from that time.
Although witchers used to do this kind of thing, the number was small and the price was very high.
Favarelli's team was considered relatively good; at least they still had monster hunting orders to take on every year.
They only had an income of about 10 gold pounds a year, and if there were no monster hunting orders, the income would be even less.
And often, the final payment for an order would take ten or twenty years to arrive; they only had 10 gold pounds on paper.
In reality, the total income they received in a year was only 7 or 8 gold pounds, unless they were hired as bodyguards by other nobles.
But that was the patent of the Lion School witchers, because the Lion School witchers only accepted nobles' younger sons and illegitimate children as witchers.
The Lion School witchers and these Wolf School and Snake School witchers were not the same.
If they were a laborer on Autumn's End Island, they wouldn't need to fight to the death, wouldn't need to lick blood from their blades, and wouldn't need to pay the price of sterilization and pain.
They would have children, a family, and a wife, and they could have four or five gold pounds a year.
And they had to pay so much for just 3 more gold pounds. Was it really worth it?
"This time, the order is from the Osla family." Favarelli saw that everyone else had calmed down, then sat on the log and poked at the fire with a stick. "The Duke pays very generously; we can get the rest of the money when we get back. We don't need to work for Autumn's End Island."
The other witchers were silent.
This sounded good, but the problem was that things weren't that easy.
The Osla family's request was to show the Salvation Army a lesson, to let them know the consequences of killing an Osla family member, and to let them know that this was just interest.
The Church's side hoped that they would also collect some intelligence and try to undermine the unity within the Salvation Army, preferably killing a few high-ranking members to see blood.
With this amount of work, the old witchers thought they were composite witcher team members; one witcher was worth ten.
"Let's not worry about Avar for now." Picking up a burnt branch, Favarelli drew on the ground. "We have to plan a major operation before we're exposed."
"We can't get close to Horn, though. Those military police have been trained by traitors and are very familiar with our tricks." An old witcher rubbed his waist and gestured on the map.
What he said was the truth, but the reason the witchers had been able to hide until now wasn't because their disguise or infiltration techniques were so good, but because they hadn't done anything at all.
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They hadn't even killed anyone when they were fighting with the beastman laborers for territory.
"If only we had a heavy crossbow." An Eagle School witcher said in a low, hoarse voice, "With the Pope so heavily guarded, I could kill a few of those lousy elders."
"We have a few hunting crossbows, but they can't pierce chainmail." Favarelli pointed to the oilskin package hidden in the hollow of the tree.
"Or poison. My highly toxic poison has too obvious a smell, and the less toxic poison isn't potent enough."
"None."
"Do you have any holy snare balls?" Aigaron asked back. "We could kidnap an elder and take him away."
Favarelli took out a few fist-sized iron-framed leather balls from his pocket: "The Church gave us some holy water grenades, but they say they have little effect on these devils..."
"Holy water is useless against these devil's lackeys? Are they even devils then?"
"They're heretics; it's normal for holy water to be useless."
"We don't have this, we don't have that. Isn't this an order from the Osla family? Why are they so stingy? They don't give us anything?" A witcher angrily threw a few pebbles into the fire.
"I also got the order from old Fowman, but I'm sure we're not the only ones. That's the Osla family; it's not a small order. It's just that by the time it gets to us, there's only 50 gold pounds left."
"50 gold pounds? Wait!" Aigaron suddenly raised his head. "You gave us 5 gold pounds each, 10 gold pounds for yourself, that's 35 gold pounds. What about the other 15 gold pounds?"
Having let it slip, Favarelli didn't panic at all: "Don't you have to grease the wheels? You blockhead. Me taking 30% is already being conscientious; I might even have to pay out of my own pocket."
Aigaron suddenly understood, but he accepted it. However, the other witchers' gazes were becoming more and more strange.
Favarelli gave them a look of resignation, which prevented the other witchers from exposing him.
"As for intelligence, we discovered a new witch in the Salvation Army, and then we can make up some abilities for the witch and fool them.
As for the assassination, we'll kill two beastmen and take them away, saying they're high-ranking beastmen who cooperated with the heretics. Anyway, their king has a bunch of them."
The experienced old witcher broke down the task and then asked Favarelli: "Finally, there's the matter of undermining internal unity..."
"How about this?" Favarelli seemed to have made up his mind. "Everyone pack your luggage in advance, take one dead and one alive beastman and send them to the cave. I heard that recently, the Kush noble youth from Goldriver Township is coming to Autumn's End Island. We'll shoot three arrows; that'll count as undermining the relationship between the Kush nobles of Goldriver Township and the Salvation Army, and we'll be worthy of the Bishop... How does that sound?"
"Alright, we'll spend a little more money to smooth things over and muddle through one day at a time."
With the matter settled, the old witchers slowly stood up, looking at the moon in the sky with a mixture of resentment and nostalgia, gradually disappearing into the forest.