Roy let go of Gwyhyr.
The beggar simply snorted, as if he were unafraid of anything because he was going to die anyway.
“Do you think I can’t do anything to you if you don’t say anything?” Roy looked at the beggar, and his eyes turned dark, his iris slowly moving upward as he slowly lost consciousness.
“Nivellen… Vizima outskirts… a robber’s manor…”
How did he end up like this? To the point where he was worse off than a normal man?
He entered another witcher’s story.
“Nivellen…”
“You know me, witcher?”
“Not only do I know you, but I also know a white-haired witcher. Geralt of Rivia.”
The moment the beggar heard his name, he immediately stood up straight from the ground.
“What?! Bring me to him now! That white-haired bastard took my happy life away from me! I looked for him for nine whole years!” the beggar said as he ground his teeth, as if Geralt were a sworn enemy of his.
“Then you have to tell me the reason you freed our horses, and the source of your hatred. If I remember correctly, Geralt had helped you…”
Roy was referring to a story from many years ago called “A Grain of Truth.”
“Help?” Nivellen’s wrinkled face had a bitter smile on it. He was only around the age of thirty-seven, but he had the face of a fifty, sixty years old. The agony of life had left too many blemishes on him.
“I thought so too at first, and then… As for why I freed your horses, it’s simple. I hate that white-haired man, and so I hate all the witchers. I can see the confusion in your eyes. You too want to know the truth just like that man? I can fulfill your thirst for knowledge, but please bring me to him. Find Geralt of Rivera.”
“If it’s alright, tell me your story.” Roy already knew what his history was, but Letho was still in the dark.
The beggar cleared his throat and couldn’t wait to begin telling his story. Perhaps, deep in his heart, he had always been waiting for someone to listen to it.
He had kept it deep within him for a very long time. But almost everyone thought that he was simply making up the story. They would at most listen to the beginning.
But witchers were no doubt all listeners with great patience.
“Do you want to listen to the short or detailed one? If you want to listen to the latter, then I must start from the very beginning.”
Nivellen looked at the two witchers who were ready to listen. He then had his back against the heap of garbage, and began to explain.
“Sixteen years ago, my grandfather, father and I lived in a lavish manor in the northern outskirts of Vizima. Our family never had anyone famous, and we weren’t aristocrats. Our family became rich through robbing others.
“My elders would always stop the merchants and rob them blind. We would also sometimes bring the gang to the villages to extort them for some protection money. We lived a good life, and we had gathered a vast amount of health.
“Unfortunately, I’ve been sickly since I was little. I coughed a lot, always had runny noses, and because of my shyness, I would always be harassed by the servants in the manor. When father was still around, they wouldn’t go overboard. But after my father was killed by a swordsman when he tried to rob a carriage, the servants began to harass me even more. As for my grandfather, his head had been hit by a morningstar when he was younger. So he couldn’t protect me either.”
Nevellen’s voice stopped.
“One day, the gang brought me to Mirt in Redania, where we robbed a temple. Afterward, the white-haired man told me the temple was used to worship the Coram Agh Tera, the Lionheaded Spider.
“They kidnapped a priestess, and coerced me to use her to lose my virginity. And that was how I became a man. Just when I was still becoming a man, the priestess spat at me and used foul language to curse me!
“She cursed at me, saying I was a man in a monster’s skin, and I would soon become a monster in a monster’s skin. A short while later, she killed herself out of shame and anger.
“I ran. And on the second day, I reached home, and I realized the priestess’s curse had become a reality. I became a beast with a powerful body, a horrendous head, and a mouthful of sharp fangs.
“Overtaken by fear and anger, I was dominated by my instincts. I butchered the entire manor. Everyone died.” Nivellen let out a satisfied laugh.
However, the faces of the witchers darkened. They remembered Alan, the captain of the Sea Scorpion Troupe that they had encountered not long ago.
Both Alan and Nivellen had been cursed by the priests of the Cult of the Lionheaded Spider.
“Then how were you restored to your human form?” Letho asked.
“That happened later. Please be patient.”
Perhaps he was enjoying himself. There was somewhat less hatred in his voice.
“I stayed alone in the huge manor and lost myself for a long time. Can you imagine? A normal man suddenly becomes a terrifyingly powerful monster? How scary is that?
“Until one day, I caught a ‘thief’ that tried to steal from my manor. I then chatted with him in patience and excitement.
“He was a merchant. He understood that I had amassed great wealth in my manor and that I was a ‘kind beast’ that he could converse safely with. And then, I suddenly remembered a fairy tale when we were speaking. Could true love break this strange curse on me?
“And so, I suggested we start a business. He would bring me young men, good wine and food. In return, I would give him the gold and jewels in my manor’s basement as a reward.
“My business expanded very quickly. Even the leather tanner and the shoemaker became frequent guests of mine.
“I had much wealth, and my strength was not something to be underestimated. Those who dared to offend me had all died to my hands.
“And I was immune to diseases, and full of energy from morning to night.”
Roy’s expression was hard to describe. After seeing what happened to Alan and Nivellen, he wondered if the curse from the Cult of the Lionheaded Spider was a punishment or blessing.
Other than becoming ugly and losing one’s mind, the cursed ones became the holders of many abilities that were beyond the reach of mortals, such as great martial power.
Then, was there anyone in this world researching… the path to power for the accursed?
“In total, I…” Nivellen counted his fingers as a smile appeared on his ugly face. “I dated five innocent human females. Those were the most wonderful and happiest days of my life. Unfortunately, they had only stayed in my manor for one year, and then left with their bride tokens, found someone honest and got married.
“None of them were my true love, until I met the final girl. Vereena… She suddenly appeared, and had always stayed by my side. She would stay with me and we would watch the roses in my courtyard, and dance with me under the moonlight… She didn’t have the greed of the other women. She didn’t look down on me for my ugly appearance. With her by my side, I had slowly abandoned my thoughts of trying to become a man again.
“I thought my life would continue to be happy. But the white-haired man came.”
Nivellen covered his face with his hands and mumbled, “He kept telling me about the curse and the way to break the curse. We ended our conversation on bad terms. He left my manor, but came back the second day.
“And fought with my Vereena in the courtyard.”
His voice began to shake. “It was at that time that I saw Vereena reveal her true self. She was a bruxa.”
A bruxa was an extremely dangerous, low-ranked vampire. It was much more agile than an ekimmara.
Even someone like Letho would have quite the trouble with one.
“Isn’t that good?” Roy said with a straight face. “A bruxa and a human in monster’s skin… You’re made for each other, right?”
“But I was terror-struck…” Nivellen held his head in regret.
“A monster afraid of another monster… How weird.”
“I didn’t know if I had fallen under the spell of the white-haired man. I helped him kill Vereena… And my hands slipped. Vereena’s blood covered my entire body, and I returned to being a man. It was at that moment that I finally realized… She loved me… But the mistake had already been made. I lost the person I loved, and I had returned to being a man.” Nivellen sobbed.
The witchers realized what happened. Because they had gone through it themselves, they believed everything he said.
True love and blood could break the curse.
“Before I realized what had happened, the witcher simply turned around and left. After that, my nightmare had only begun. My body had returned to its sickly state. I no longer had the power to protect the wealth in my manor. Very quickly, another gang arrived and took over my manor and wealth. I was forced to escape and became a vagrant. I ended up in the outskirts of Vizima, and began my life filled with agony here.
“I was weak and sickly. Other than cheering for my companions who robbed others, I had no other skills at all. I did not know how to make a living at all. In the end, I became a beggar. Even then, I would always become the target of the other beggars.
“The life I live now does not fit a man, and I’ve been thinking for a very long time…” He raised his head and looked at the two witchers, red lights flashing in his eyes. “I realized that the cause of all my misery is that white-haired man, the witcher Geralt of Rivera. Without him, Vereena and I would still be living happily together. Do you still think I shouldn’t hate him?! Shouldn’t hate witchers?!”
Roy glanced at Letho, and he remained silent.
Geralt helped Nivellen break the curse and kill the bruxa. From the point of view of a witcher, he did nothing wrong.
But he did destroy Nivellen’s peaceful life.
Who was wrong and who was right? Roy didn’t want to be the one to make the judgment.
But all of this could not wash away the sins he had once committed as a robber.
His suffering was simply a punishment for his crimes.
“Then how did your leg end up lame…?” Roy pointed at his obviously twisted right leg.
“Another witcher called Berengar broke my leg when I tricked him.”
The young man began to think. He seemed to have heard of this witcher from somewhere.
“In Vizima?”
“It was about two years ago…”
Roy nodded.
“Your experience is quite fantastic. But all of this”—he added stress to his words—“is caused by your own doing! Think about the times you commit banditry when you wore the armor of a robber, the people you killed, the priestess you raped… How miserable could you be?” The young witcher shook his head. “Can your miserableness be compared to those who died at your hands?”
Nivellen’s head lowered, his expression darkening.
With one sentence, he had destroyed his shell of being the innocent.
“But I was forced by those evil servants! I was weak and I couldn’t fight back! Everything that had happened afterward, and how I had become this”—Nivellen extended his neck as he argued in the garbage heap—“it’s all the fault of the white-haired witcher! Now, please, tell me where that bastard is. I want to settle my score with him!”
“So what if you find Geralt?” Roy shook his head. “Will your life return to what it was like in the past after you question him? Or, perhaps, you want to once again wear the skin of a monster?”
Nivellen licked his dried lips with some fear in him.
“You transferred all the hatred you felt towards your life to the witchers but ignored your crimes! Look at everything you did all these years! All you know how to do is complain. You won’t even do what beggars do when you are one yourself! I’m not the judge, so it’s not up to me to judge you for your past crimes!”
Nivellen’s heart skipped a beat. “What… What do you want to do to me?!”
“Now, we are going to consider what you did to us on its own. You freed our horses without any valid reason…” The young man stopped as he exchanged a glance with the bald man. “You will be punished.”
Bang!
After he had finished saying that, he swung the sheathed sword directly into Nivellen’s face, who immediately fainted in the smelly garbage heap.
“Let’s go, Letho. Let’s see if we can get your ‘old pal’ back!”
“I thought you would break the other half of his leg,” Letho said half-jokingly. “Perhaps he can beg for even more money like that.”
“I’m already being generous for not forcing him to pay me money…”
Roy turned around and looked at that miserable man in the garbage heap and couldn’t help but sigh at his fate.
He lived a much better life when he was a monster than when he was a man.
Just what kind of a world was this?
