Chapter 18: The Troll Problem

Arthur went into deep thought, wondering what he should say.

"Hmm, where should I start."

Ken getting tired impatiently said

"We only need to know it's strengths and weaknesses so we can come up with a plan."

Arthur nodded his head in disagreement.

"That won't do, if it were any normal troll that type of information would most likely suffice, but this one is different from the rest."

"And what does that exactly mean?"

"If you've ever encountered an ordinary troll, even the strongest ones would be easy for a few adventurers to take on. The last group that went to take it on were a party of six, they were quite skilled from what I could see, but they never made it back..."

Zad gave a frightening look stuttering while saying.

"A party of six!?! Ken, maybe we should rethink this; I mean there's only two of us it's unlikely we'll be able to do anything against this beast!"

After coming so far to get this information, Ken knows there's no way he can give up now.

"Nothing will change my mind now Zad, we've come too far to back down. Continue explaining Arthur."

"It was about six months ago when a witch came to this village."

Zad looked clueless, but from Ken's expression, it seemed like he had already realised what occurred with the witch just from hearing the word mentioned once.

"So the troll is a summoning from the curse the witch placed on the training grounds..."

Arthur looked impressed after seeing Ken figure it out so quickly. Zad sat there thinking to himself.

"I would have been able to figure it out too if they gave me some more time!"

"The reasoning for why the witch came here is still unknown. Some villagers did try to approach her, or so I've been told."

"Is it possible if we could ask the villagers that may have encountered her?"

"The only ones that were bold enough to speak to her were found dead the next morning in their houses. The corpses were unrecognisable, and the cause of death was unknown. A few days after that the troll was spotted in the former training grounds."

Hearing about an event like that happening irritated Ken, he tightened his fist and said

"That's quite the story, to think she left no witnesses alive, or maybe she even planned to kill everyone that saw her well from the beginning... she's dangerous."

"It's good that you're able to understand that much at least, it means that one of her summonings isn't something you want to fight carelessly."

"So, we're you able to find out what it can even do?"

"Like I said, it's only ever left one survivor. When they battled with it, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but they were overpowered easily from being weaker adventurers."

"That means, it was most likely holding back against them, it must have some intelligence then. Do you think it can use magic?"

"The chances for that are great considering how much trouble it's been causing. That's all the information I'm able to provide. If I could even see it once in person, I could let you know."

Ken got up and walked towards the stairs to go rest before leaving the room he said.

"Don't bother it'll be dead by the time you have a chance to see it."

Zad and Arthur let out a smile while Ken left the room.