Chapter 96

Ajax didn’t stand on ceremony and opened the door. Though he probably didn’t realize the reason why he had started feeling a little homesick during the last few weeks. Having lived for longer than he did in his first life with his parents around him almost every day having not seen them in months had been a weird development even if he was expecting it.

As he entered the big room he saw his entire family gathered around the dinner table. His father at one end and his brother at the other each with their respective other standing to their right. To his brother’s left sat his sister with Alana next to her. They were all eating and chatting merily.

While Ajax took all of this in his eyes stayed fixed on the last person in the room. His teacher Hatchet, more specifically his left arm, or better said the space where his left arm should be. In its place he saw a heavily bandaged stump that ended a little above the elbow.

“Hatchet, what happened?” he didn’t greet anyone else and rushed forward to take a closer look at his mentor.

“Ajax!” several of the people present exclaimed.

“I’ll be fine kid, no need to worry yourself.” Hatchet was the most calm person in the room.

“Ajax where have you been?” his mother was already next to him with a speed that seemed to surpass her stats as she went to hug her son. “First Judy has to send us a letter that you were conscripted and then when your brother returns he has no idea where you are!”

Ajax could see the point his mother was trying to make but was still a little too wound up about what could have happened that not only his parents and Hatchet had come here but Hatchet had also lost an arm.

“I’m fine I just took the long way round when I came back to the city, what happened to you, is there something wrong with the village?” he asked

“About the village…” his dad trailed off.

“Best sit yourself down for this one.” Hatchet motioned to the only free chair in the middle of the table opposite Alana and beside him.

With a little more time to get over his shock Ajax finally started to calm down and his training kicked in helping slow his erratic mind to gather information and remain calm. He took the offered seat, piled a few things on his plate and took a deep breath.

“Okay, so what happened.” he asked again.

“The village is … gone.” his mother started.

“It happened about a month after you left but a big attack flattened the village.” his father continued. “If it hadn’t been for Hatchet most of us wouldn’t have made it out alive.”

“We found out what it was that had forced the kobolds to leave the mines.” Hatchet took over, clearly his parents still had trouble talking about it, the fear on their faces as they thought back coming across clearly.

“The kobolds only occupied the top levels of the caves, if you were to go a bit deeper you would run into some volcanic salamanders. Nasty pieces of work ranging from level forty all the way to fifty and they hunt with numbers.

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“But why would they only attack now, it's been five years since the kobolds got kicked out, did something come and displace them?” Ajax was still confused as this was not at all in the nature of lizard type monsters.

“Not as such, in fact the small army that went there to cleanse the kobolds in a way brought this on.” Judy said.

“How?”

“You see, when they took care of the kobolds they also went into the caves and investigated to see if there was any other threat out there that might threaten the village. When they found the salamanders they took care to look around and came to the conclusion that they were.” she paused thinking how to continue explaining.

“Because a large force was dispatched to deal with it, the report made the rounds with the city's higher ups, more as a way for the commander in charge of the unit to brag than anything else.”

“The volcanic salamanders were deemed to not be a threat because they were led by a mated pair of crystal salamanders.” Hatchet continued.

Ajax’s knowledge about different monsters had been drilled deep into him by Hatchet during the last five years so he easily understood what he meant. While volcanic lizards were normal monsters the crystal ones were actually true mana creatures like Fluffy and as such had the intelligence to lead their less evolved brethren.

He also knew that there was no way they would lead an all out assault unprovoked, not without at least sending a few scouting parties that would have alerted the village enough for a timely evacuation if not request for support.

“You see crystal salamanders spawn every year and a half. Not only that but the way they do it is very specific in that the female guards the egg without rest for months at a time not taking time to even eat.” Hatchet went on. “This makes it easy to mark how far along they are by the amount of fat on the mother as long as you can catch her while she is incubating the egg.”

Ajax suddenly had a very bad feeling about where this was going. He managed to connect to pieces without needing anymore information.

“Yes, just like you think, someone stole an egg and they were chased after. We and the other villages were collateral damage.” Hatchet finished.

“Other villages?” Ajax asked.

“Only a third of the villages remain inside the small mounting ring, all of them close enough to Lessis that the army had enough time to cover them once the news reached them.”

“Do we know who is responsible?” Ajax asked as fury started to build up.

“We can’t know for certain but it’s pretty obvious.” Alana said, she seemed much angrier than him despite having had a few months to calm down from the news. “The baron’s third son, the malformed fella, happened to be just passing by the village around the same time.”

Ajax had only had a brief run in with the pompous arrogant noble in question but that brief interaction had told him all he needed to know about the prick.

“What happened to him?” he asked.

“Nothing” his father spat outrage finally starting to come over him as well..

“WHAT?!” Ajax’s fist connected with the table so hard it left a small indentation.

“He took advantage of the little skirmish that you were dragged on. He had a few days when his brother was too busy to keep him in check but the overseer from the baron hadn’t arrived to take over management of the town.”

Ajax did remember a few letters from his sister praising the future baron when it came to ruling a city. His more recent encounters with the man as a strategist told him he should stick to managing cities.

“By the time the overseer came he was already gone and when he returned his escort was missing two people but he seemed awfully pleased.” she sighed the anger flowing out leaving only helplessness. “Sadly despite his greed and black heart the malformed gnome isn’t an idiot, he knew how it would look so he had himself arraigned the same day he returned.

Now it clicked, why everyone seemed so frustrated at the news. One of the few ways in which his new life resembled his old was the legal system. Despite the person's noble rank bearing more weight as a witness a lot of things were the same. Apparently the laws had changed very little in their base forms over the centuries. The biggest similarities being, innocent until proven guilty and ‘double jeopardy’.

This also left the nobles with a very clear way to get away with things unless there were people looking out for them trying something shady. Considering how people would have been too busy dealing with the salamander invasion the perpetrator must have gotten himself arrested and put on trial as soon as he returned, before anyone had any real time to gather some proper evidence. Without any competent prosecution he must have been found not guilty and couldn’t be retried for the same crime.

Ajax had known since his previous life that the legal system wasn’t fair but that history had come so close to repeating itself left a bad taste in his mouth. This would have been the second time that an idiot's actions would have cost him his parents lives and said the idiot would walk away with maybe a slap on the wrist.

“Calm down” Hatchet tried to sooth him some. “You can’t do anything about it, at least not right now. Best just focus on the fact that your parents made it, that and getting stronger so that not only can you protect them next time but also so you can make whoever is responsible pay.

“But what about your arm?” Ajax and Hatchet both knew he didn’t have the money to cover having the arm regrown.

“Your parents and brother so graciously offered to house me for an indeterminate amount of time. I was thinking of taking them up on it while you get your feet under you as an adventurer. Then once you’re ready I’ll join you when you go to the Capital. I have an old friend there who’ll be able to do something about it.”