Rise of the Nightmare Crestmaster

Aldrich hurriedly stopped the bleeding of the bandit with bandages. He could not allow him to die before guiding them to the nest to get rid of the remaining two Ravenfolk.

The others were checking up on Emma and Aldrich was join them after he finished tying the bandit properly when he was suddenly assaulted with a familiar feeling of hunger.

'Wha?… no'

But before he could stop himself he put his hand on one of the dead bandits and absorbed two red essence orbs.

"No, no, what??" Aldrich was so spooked that he spoke out loud. But the hunger wouldn't go away he unwillingly walked over to the next dead bandit and took the essence.

'No… I don't want this."

Aldrich had lost control of his body he was overcome with the hunger and although there was a part of him that resisted he was just too hungry, he had to get that essence.

But he killed humans before, why didn't this happen back then? Come to think of it, he always spent short amounts of time close to the corpses.

The intense hunger was not immediate, it took some time to come over him but once it did he would feel like a completely different person.

One bandit after another, he went through the entire camp when he suddenly found himself close to the cage of the captives. For some reason the captives looked at him with fear.

"H-hey Aldrich, what are you doing?" Cole asked.

Oh, Aldrich didn't notice him come so close, "uh, I'm just making sure that, um, none of the bandits are playing dead…"

"Aha, I didn't think of that, guess that's why you're the leader."

"Y-yeah," Aldrich replied feeling guilty, "by the way, there should be seventeen bandits here right?"

"We killed six in Bodger's group and one outside so, yeah there should be seventeen here. Why is someone missing?"

Cole's calculations lined up with his but, "yeah, one of them is missing."

"E-excuse me sir."

Aldrich looked over, it was one of the captives, a man who had pressed himself to the wooden poles of the cage.

"The one you're looking for is right here! It's that man he snuck in during the chaos!"

The man pointed at another one in the cage and the rest of the captives scrambled away from his finger until he could see one man who was not in chains and curled up in the corner.

"D-damn you! You dare!" The bandit lunged at the captive who ratted him out and Aldrich pushed open the cage door, it was unlocked.

He caught the bandit and snapped his neck. It was that effortless for him to kill an ordinary man. Then he dragged the body out and got two orbs in the process.

"Sir-sir, can we go out now?" That man asked again.

"Hmm," Aldrich was surprised that they were smart enough not to go out during the chaos in an attempt to escape even when the cage was unlocked.

"Uh, yeah I guess. I assume someone here knows the way to Lockwood?"

"Yeah, yeah, some of us are from Lockwood."

"Well go on then and when you get there look for the Knights of Last Sustar guild assistant in the Dewclaws inn and tell her to get here to check up on the quest, can do that?"

"Of course, of course, this is the least we can do to repay you great adventurers."

"Great, and be careful in the woods."

Aldrich watched as the captives scrambled out of the destroyed bandit camp and finally he got his hand on the demi-human and his reward was ten red orbs.

Over all he got forty two essence orbs from this quest and it wasn't over yet, next was the attack on the demi-humans nest.

This attack had to be done even faster than this one, even when out numbered the Ravenfolk were level three even if he could take care of one the others must use their superior numbers to take down the other one and they must not be allowed to fly away.

"Aldrich Emma is in no shape to fight," Frank cam over and explained.

Aldrich could see that Emma was in terrible shape, she would need a few hours to get back into fighting shape which was not ideal. But that required time which they didn't have.

If they waited around here who knew whether the two demi-humans might come here out of impatience, naturally once they took a look at the state of the hideout it was obvious that something was not right.

"We will have to leave her here, after we finish off the two remaining demi-humans we will take her back to Lockwood where all of us will get a good rest."

Aldrich explained his plan to the party and then walked over to the bandit leader, who was now tied up and sweating. He removed the cloth they used to block his mouth.

"Listen, we will let you go if you take us to the demi-humans nest, how about that?"

The bandit spit on the ground, "I ain't got nothing to say to you. I don't believe a word you say! You're adventurers you're here to kill us all aren't you."

'Hmm, a seemingly intelligent bandit, ugh so annoying.'

"No, no, we're here to kill the demi-humans not you guys, the guild got news about demi-humans lurking around here so… if you take us there we'll let you go and nobody has to know anything."

"Fat chance kid, if what you said is true then why did you kill all of my men?!"

"You guys were eating and drinking with the demi-human we thought you guys were together… but you're not, right?"

The bandit looked like he was struck with a sudden thought and then smiled like a fox, "oh, yeah we're not together, he just came down all of a sudden, he's much stronger than us and brutal savage being a demi-human."

"So I assume we have a deal?"

The bandit nodded.