Ch 40 – What the hell happened?

"The hell!?" Ace was surprised, as well as everyone else. Not only by the fact that there was someone there, but that the person did not respond to them talking or anything like that. 

They moved slowly towards the occupied bed, only to see a head poking out from the covers, his eyes closed and thick bandages covering most of his face.

"The hell happened to him..." Ace asked herself out loud.

"We'll see." Saying so, Bid pulled the blanket covering the man, showing the extent of his wounds. There were bloody bandages and rags all over his body. Three long rips reached from his shoulder all the way to his stomach on the other side. Necro's eyes widened as she saw his state, the size and shape of his injuries were very familiar to a near-death experience she had a couple of days ago.

"This... Is it that?" She asked, staring at Bid, who looked as puzzled as everyone else.

"Yeah... Looks like that... But I'd never seen injuries like this before where the person didn't die... Either he's very lucky, or very unlucky."

"I see..."

"What are you talking about?" Mary was clueless, but she knew they were talking about something important. Especially seeing Necro's sorrowful eyes.

"Remember the wolf we fought back then? These would look like they were caused by something similar to that." Bid explained it plainly, but enough for Ace and Hal to become tense. 

"How the fuck would that thing be around here?" Hal asked. "Don't these wolves only show up around the dead forest or something?"

"That should be the case, but... This does look like one of them, or maybe the monster version." 

"Holy shit..." Ace was beyond surprised... If those monsters really left their territory, bad things would start happening pretty soon. "Necro, did you not know about this?"

"Nah... Not only that, we never even got word about bandits... The church is probably pulling some strings, like you said before."

"This... it's bad isn't it?" Ace asked once more, with a saddened face.

"It is... But there's nothing I can do so... Let's just move on."

"What about this guy?" Hal asked, changing the subject completely. "Do we leave him or what?" Bid stared at the person in the bed for a second. He was clearly unconscious and from the looks of it, wouldn't be able to do anything alone anytime soon.

"Finish him off." He said, looking Hal in the eyes, who just silently nodded and raised his sword above the man's chest. 

"WAIT! Why are we killing him?! He can't do anything to us." Mary, once again, hesitated to let them do anything. She was the most humane person of the whole group after all.

"What do you think will happen if we leave him?"

"Maybe he can recover!"

"Alone? With no one to get him food or water? With these injuries that need to be cleaned and dressed?"

"But..."

"There's no but Mary. Killing him now is called mercy. Let's not have this man suffer anymore." After lecturing her, Bid once again nodded at Hal.

His sword-tip slid straight into the man's heart. Who inspired deeply once more, before dying without a single cry.

"It's done."

With his words, Hal pulled his sword out and walked back towards the group from the side of the room. Bid started striding towards the stuff in the end of the shed. Necro and Ace averted their eyes from staring at the now depressed Mary, who walked while staring towards the rough wooden floor. 

"These seem to be preserved food." Hal said, banging onto a barrel. 

"Necro, you don't have space to store these, have you?" Bid asked her, realizing they had no way to carry them.

"Not really... I'd need a lot more space than I have right now, but I could carry it with an empty ring."

"So.. We would need to go to the town first for you to sell the stuff in it and then come back?" Hal asked, lazily stating the obvious.

"Shut up Hal, we know you don't wanna walk another day. We'll figure it out somehow." Ace jumped into the conversation too, trying to figure out what they were gonna do. 

"There's another option too... but I'm not that sure about it." Necro said, she knew it would sound quite pretentious of her to say so, but... 

"Say it." Since Bid asked her to, she took the liberty.

"We could have me and someone else guard this place while you and whomever would go to the town and get us a small cart to carry this stuff there."

"We'd still have to carry all these barrels half an hour all the way to the road though... That'd take an entire day at least." Hal protested the method. 

"It'd be more fitting if you were to go with me first to empty the ring and then come back." Bid stated the obvious shortcoming of her strategy. 

Necro clicked her tongue. For Ace, her intentions were pretty obvious. She wanted to be left behind. But thankfully the flag hadn't been raised to all present just yet, so she promptly found a way to save Necro from this peril.

"Why don't you just bring two hand-drawn carts we can carry all the way here? I'm also quite tired already and we still need to get rid of all those bodies. I highly doubt we'll make it to the town before nightfall with me and Necro anyways."

"Ace..." Bid murmured. "Okay... We'll do that. But we'll also leave Mary behind with the two of you. Try not to traumatize her too much."

"Aye!" Ace happily agreed to what Bid said. 

While he was forced to agree with this plan begrudgingly, it did sound pretty solid. He and Hal were, undoubtedly, the fastest walkers in the group and would be able to reach the town before sunset. With this, they could reclaim the rewards from the bandits today, and return by the morning since small farm-carts were easy to find and very cheap to rent for a day. Ace had managed to guarantee what Necro wanted all along while not bringing any extra attention to Necro herself... Which in turn made her very excited. After all, being alone with Necro could only mean one thing. New Magic.

"Anyhow, we better check the chest and the contents of these barrels before we go." Hal completely cut the uneasy mood by bringing up the loot, making all five of them ogle the chest with desire for its contents.