As Selkirk had expected, this was indeed a "garden" filled with the fragrance of flowers, but now the flowers had wilted and the garden lay in ruins.
The succubus wore nothing, and a blade had been thrust into her chest. Blood had become her new clothing.
The dead succubus no longer had the stunning beauty of her disguise. Horns grew from her head, and her feet were cloven hooves. She looked like a demon with a human face.
"My goddess!" Selkirk exclaimed, whether in shock at the bloody corpse before him or at the shattering of his fantasies.
Witt walked over to the succubus's body and examined the wound. "She probably died just yesterday."
"We're too late?" Selkirk found it somewhat hard to believe. He felt a hollow sense of loss.
"That's right." Witt searched through the cave, hoping to find some clues.
It was an exquisitely furnished cave. The floor was covered in either hay or carpets, with flowers covering the remaining spaces and candles filling the outcroppings of rock.
The stone bed beneath the succubus had been polished perfectly smooth. Though the soft bedding on it was now soaked in blood, its fine craftsmanship was still apparent. It looked like something from the Sodden region in the south. Such things were rare in bitterly cold Kaedwen and would fetch at least several dozen crowns.
Beside the bed, a waist-high stone table held a dressing mirror, various perfumes and pieces of jewelry, and even a few items meant to spice things up.
Everything showed that someone had furnished this place as a home and lived here.
Had he not known about everything that had happened here, Witt might have thought it was the dwelling of an elven or dryad girl. It was full of signs of everyday life and had once sheltered a vibrant life.
Selkirk steeled himself and took another look at the succubus's gruesome remains. A sadness slowly took root in his heart, and he asked Witt, "Witt, do you know what happened here?"
Witt nodded. "Actually, that's precisely why I came. More specifically, I'm investigating why those people outside went missing."
This was nothing new. Selkirk's caravan had heard the news the day it arrived in Blackwater Village.
Having approached the corpse to examine it, Selkirk had already seen signs of intercourse on the succubus's lower body. Though he had spent his life being raised in the royal palace, he was no innocent, ignorant virgin.
The sadness in his heart suddenly turned into an inexplicable anger. To Selkirk, lovemaking was a tacitly understood form of communication between a man and a woman who trusted each other, an ark that carried them to the other shore, a remedy that cleansed the soul.
Yet someone had brutally murdered their partner in the midst of lovemaking. That was what he found most intolerable.
"Can you tell me who did this? I'll kill him!" Selkirk did not seem to realize that a trace of anger had entered his voice.
"Calm down, Your Highness."
Since the witcher already knew his true identity, his men simply returned to the form of address they knew best. "Your Highness, we're in Kaedwen now. If Her Majesty the Queen finds out..."
"Shut up! If my father hadn't died of illness three years ago, he would certainly agree with what I'm doing," Selkirk retorted angrily.
Hearing Selkirk say this, his men dared not utter another word. Matters within the royal palace were not theirs to comment on, after all.
Meanwhile, Witt could not help feeling a little awkward. He had invented the identity of "Witt of Lyria" to imitate Geralt and make himself sound a little more acceptable to ordinary people. He had never expected it to backfire by bringing him face-to-face with the real thing.
There was only one human on this continent who could be called queen: Meve, Queen of Lyria and Rivia, also known as the White Queen.
Unless he was mistaken, "Selkirk" was one of Queen Meve's sons. As for which one, or what his name was, Witt had no idea.
"I'll tell you who did it, but first, let's take care of the aftermath," Witt said.
Then, under Witt's direction, several of Selkirk's men carried the dozen or so bodies outside into the cave one by one. They piled them together with the body of the succubus Filarey, and Witt set them alight with an Igni Sign.
Witt did not want to harvest the succubus's heart as a trophy. To him, these intelligent monsters who knew how to follow rules were really no different from people. Besides, humans often did far crueler things than they did.
Only after the bodies had burned completely to ash did they leave the cave.
Before leaving, Witt searched the entire cave once more and discovered that an intricate magic circle had been carved into the rubble previously blown away by the Aard Sign.
This certainly was not the work of a succubus who cast spells through her innate monstrous abilities. Only a mage could have done it.
"What exactly happened? Who did all this?" Selkirk kept asking along the way.
Witt was also pondering what had happened. Events had unfolded a little faster than he had expected.
He had only accepted this commission from Lady Sabrina yesterday. This morning, he had noticed something wrong with Hector and begun to suspect him, leading him to investigate Blackwater Village.
Witt had thought things would proceed with him negotiating with the succubus, then exposing Hector's true nature. He had not expected the succubus to be dead already.
As expected, the missing people had probably been killed by Hector too, but what was his purpose in doing so? And what was the magic circle at the cave entrance for?
After a brief silence, Witt gave Selkirk a simple introduction to Hector, the mage's apprentice, and shared his deductions. "Unless I'm mistaken, Hector did all of this. As for why he did these things, we don't know yet. It may have been jealousy over the succubus sleeping with other people. Given that the missing people included mage's apprentices, taking the opportunity for revenge was probably part of it too."
"Then why kill the succubus?"
"My guess is that Hector intended to turn the succubus into the perfect scapegoat from the start. If we hadn't arrived in Ban Ard three days ago, this would probably have ended with Lady Sabrina coming in person to get rid of the succubus."
"And what was the magic circle at the entrance for?"
"Possibly to imprison the succubus. We'll know the exact reason once we get back to Ban Ard. My witcher companion is watching Hector in the city. He's much more experienced than I am."
After saying this, Witt stopped answering and quickened his pace toward Ban Ard. Selkirk and the others followed in silence, their thoughts unknown.
But when they left the forest and returned to Blackwater Village, they discovered that fierce flames had suddenly erupted in distant Ban Ard. The towering blaze lit up the night sky.
"Damn!" Witt frowned, an ominous feeling rising in his heart. He dared not linger for even a moment and prepared to continue toward Ban Ard.
"Hey! Witt!" Selkirk called out to stop him, unhitching a black horse from the wagon and handing it over.
"Thank you," Witt said gratefully as he took the reins.
"With something this serious happening in Ban Ard, I can't stay here any longer as a prince of another country. Otherwise, it could lead to unimaginable consequences. I'll leave the succubus's killer to you!"
Having said this, Selkirk called for the rest of his men, who had been waiting anxiously in the tavern. They hurriedly packed their belongings and leaped onto their horses, ready to leave.
"Selkirk, tell me your real name. I'll go to Lyria to pay for this horse."
Sitting on his horse, "Selkirk" smiled and tore off the false beard stuck to his face, revealing his rather young, handsome features.
"Heh, Witt of Lyria? I've never heard of you. Come to the city of Lyria when you have time and tell the people there my name, Anseis. You'll have all the drinks you want!"
With that, Anseis waved to Witt, gave the reins a sharp tug, and led the caravan south toward the Pontar River.
"Anseis, Prince of Lyria and Rivia? I'll remember you, my friend."
Witt spurred his horse into a gallop toward Ban Ard.