"We did nothing wrong," the blonde little girl with sky-blue eyes, who barely reached my hip, said. "I didn't hurt you, so why are you hurting me?" The child whimpers, a dagger is embedded in the center of her chest, a red flower blooming from the wound.

"Why did you hurt mommy?" An even smaller child with short black hair, and chocolate skin says to me. "Did I do something bad? Please don't hurt mommy, please. It hurts, please make the pain go away." A red line appears across his neck, staining his skin red.

"Was our soup bad?" whispers a child from the Qaes assassin village. "I'm sorry, I'll make a new one, please don't hurt Grandpa, please forgive us." cries the child as blood flows from the wound on her stomach.

Slowly, one by one, more and more children appear, they keep begging me to stop, to make the pain go away. I am frozen, I can neither blink, move, or even raise a finger. I stand paralyzed as more children gather around m, their voices merging into one unified voice, begging.

"Please."

...

I wake up in a cold sweat, hyperventilating. Looking around I recognize the room I'm renting. The moons are visible through the window, as they shine down on me, burning hot tears stream down my face, leaving wet trails down my face. Maybe I could have saved them, maybe I could have done something.

The moment I killed everyone in the dining room, everyone outside started to turn, Qaes will never allow sheep to love without the shepard. They always inject a fail-safe pill inside of them, it wasn't demon pills, it would've been easier if it was demon pills. The pills turn their hosts into creatures of the dark fueled by dark energy.

Instead, it was some sort of rage pill. They still looked human. It looked like the only direct order they had was to kill the one responsible for the death of the shepard. Rage pills mix up the flow of blood and man, allowing even a child to rip an adult apart. The pill only lasts a few minutes, but those few minutes do enough damage to the body to crumble it to dust. One way or another, there will be no survivors. The tears stop. The wet lines are drying, itching after they disappear as a reminder.

The nightmares will never end.

There is nothing I will be able to do about it.

There is nothing I can do.

There is nothing I will do.

These things never heal, nor should they,

I do not deserve healing.

Whatever I do, now, or in the future will never change that, and it will not erase what I have done.

And in the end, I will become what I have hunted.

The sun rises and I start to prep for the day. I reached Toaan quickly, the horses ensured that. The rest of the trip was quiet, the dried meat made sure that I wouldn't need to stop to search for food.

My arrival in Toaan was just in the for the first express ship south. The first express ship is quite expensive, you have the risk of the dangers "waking up" after winter, foreign traders will to pay extra from the first fresh goods since the start of the winter, and multiply that by supply and demand, hence the astronomical price. I sold the horses and bought an express ticket, a few maps, and some supplies for the journey. I'll have to change equipment in Kamalesh, but for now it's still cold enough. The maps showed it was right in the center, between the Northen Kingdom, and Qing, and the northern most part of the Desert Alliance. From then on I will have to travel differently.

Toaan is much bigger, and far more active than Emeral, mainly because of the river Monah that flows between the Northern Kingdom, Qing, and the Desert Alliance, and is the main trade route. The only reason this river is so heavily trafficked is because the countries ensure its safety, and safety equals security, and security means more merchants.

To be frank, I should've been on the ship that left yesterday, but some "important" Lord ordered that the ship will wait for one of his carriages. A few equally important merchants demanded immediate departure, but the lord has connections to the local Duke, and so the issue rests. It doesn't matter that merchants have contracts, that there are goods that can spoil, doesn't matter if a few people lose their money and lives because of the delay. The words of the Duke are law in his territory. And anyone who protests can quickly meet the guillotine.

Strange isn't it, for one person to have absolute control. Not really, this is how it works, we're cockroaches and should eat the shit from our master's asses. The funny thing is that we were the ones who gave them the reins, believing that even if something went wrong, it would be someone else's fault if something fails. But it only created a hierarchy in which we blindly believed. And with time it became out worldview, because we believed that there could be no other way. And in their place they passed it down to their children, and from them to their children, again, and again. And with each iteration they became more ruthless, more detached from people, they started to believe that they're special, different, chosen by the gods, that a totally different blood flows through their veins. That...I should stop there.

Anyway, the other travelers and I had to book an inn and wait for the "Master's" carriage. Most of them didn't plan for that, and they had no money, so they slept outside, sure it wasn't snowing but it was still freezing cold, and some of them wouldn't wake up again.

I went down to the packed pub, and had breakfast in the corner, a few sausages, and a dried piece of bread. Some of the customers grumbled about the duke, and some about the lord, most are drinking and telling stories. How can they poison themselves so early in the morning? Unbelievable. Or maybe I'm the strange one, unused to civilian life, to peace. Right, I'm just a civilian, a traveler, nothing more.

A mountain of a man walks over to my table, huge beard, hard but warm eyes.

"Mind if we share a table? Everything else is taken."

I nod.

"Thank you."

He gestures to a boy, looked to be about twelve or thirteen who resembles him, to sit too, same dark eyes, and ginger hair. Quite a polite man, rare these days. They set their plates on the table and start eating. The boy stares at my face for several seconds with round eyes, he stops when his father pushes him with an elbow.

"Eat, please excuse him, he's still young. He didn't mean anything by it. The name's Rudolf, this is my son Tedal."

"Alan, it's not a problem, he's still young."

"I'm not a boy, I am a man."

Rudolf starts to laugh.

"You will be, take your time." I grin. "But first, you need to be able to carry your father on your shoulders."

The boy wants to say something but stops. We eat in silence, as soon as we finish the boy resumes looking at me face. I can see something brewing in him, finally he can't hold the question back anymore.

"How'd you get that scar? I've never seen anything like that. Did a beast do that?"

It'd been so long that I'd nearly forgot, nobodies mentioned it so far, so it had slipped my mind. The vertical red-black scar that runs down the right side of my face ensures that I will never forget what I've hunted before. My regeneration can heal nearly anything, even deep scars will only take a few weeks to disappear, but there are things that shouldn't exist in this world.

"Remember, the most dangerous beasts are the ones wearing human skin."

The boy's eyes fill with confusion and fear, I smile in an attempt to calm the boy.

"Be not afraid of them, fear is the weapon they use against us. Every beast bleeds, you just need to know where to stab them."

"Sorry about that. He's quite the curious one."

"Don't worry, it can be a very good quality, it may ensure that he stays alive."

Rudolf gives me a warm, bear-like smile and ruffles the boy's hair. We talked a bit more, as the sun rose the room started to warm. Suddenly there's movement outside the inn, I saw a few people running around and shouting from the window, but didn't hear anything over the chatter in the inn. The inn's door slams open and a teen screams

"The ship's leaving!"

and runs out the moment he finishes. For a few seconds absolute silence reigns, after a few seconds the inn was filled with the sounds of people rushing about preparing to leave.

Rudolf, Tedal, and I stand up and move with the group leaving the inn in the direction of the docks. A good hunter always carries the important stuff on him, we start to jog towards the ship, even from afar we could see the crew running about the ship.

"Faster Tedal."

We moved from a jog to a sprint, as we drew closer to the ship we saw half a dozen people checking papers and letting people board the ship. Not far from the ship an expensive looking carriage could be seen. If the harbour wasn't made of stone I'm positive that it would crumble under the weight of all the people trying to board the ship. The people checking documents were checking in a half-assed way so we boarded quickly. Everyone seemed to be short on time.

When nearly all the people got on the ship, men in enchanted armour came out of the ship, their every movement told of their arrogance and belief in their utter, unconditional superiority. The enchantments told that they were somewhat skilled Enforcers, high status, decent amount of money, some skill, and here you go, unstoppable killing machines. They went directly to the man who looked like the ship's captain, the one with the most expensive armour and enchantment stood in front of him.

"What are we waiting for? Depart immediately!"

A man in his fifties, with greying hair and a bottle of rum in his hand, who should be the ship's captain, looked at the Enforcer with distain,

"We're not your personal carriage, Sir. We are the first express, your late arrival delayed out schedule, and now you believe that you can give me orders?"

The moment he finished a hook flew into his face. After which the Enforcer proceeded to kick the old man laying on the ground, the other enforcers kept watch while keeping their hands close to their swords, the threat of violence hanging heavy over the ship. After nearly a dozen seconds of non-stop kicking and stomping the lead Enforcer stopped, he took a deep breath and spoke,

"Your existence, maggot, is only allowed because of the benevolence of my Master. You, your family, and everyone one you care for or now, are alive only because we allow that. You will do as I say, or I will personally skin every male in your whole family, and the females with be given to the dogs as playthings."

The captain was heavily bleeding and most likely unconscious, I doubted that he heard anything, the lead Enforcer stared at the crew members who were petrified in fear.

"What are you waiting for? Depart! NOW!"

The anchor was lifted and the ship started to move, a chubby man was running towards the ship through the harbour with several bags on his back, screaming for the ship to wait. He could barely move under the weight of the bags, but he wouldn't make it, the ship was already too far.

[So you can kill villagers and children, but standing against Enforcers is a no?]

[Pathetic.]

[Where's your righteousness now?]

[Are you really any different from those you call scum?]

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.