Chapter 13: ANATOMY READ AND THE ARACHAS
Henryk's messenger arrived at dusk with three words: "It's happening again."
The third livestock loss in a week from the same field, same time of night, no visible tracks. The pattern suggested ambush predation from something that didn't need to walk to its kills.
I found Gervin at the north wall, running through his evening patrol checks.
"Night work," I said. "Something's taking livestock from Henryk's west field. Underground approach, no surface sign."
His expression didn't change, but his hand moved to his sword hilt with the automatic readiness of experience.
"Arachas?"
"Most likely."
"They're W2. You've never fought one."
"No." I started toward the equipment shed where I kept my field gear. "But I have the diagram."
The west field was two miles out, past the boundary markers I'd established with Pip's help, into territory where the monster ecology followed more predictable patterns. The Arachas — if that's what it was — had claimed hunting ground at the edge of the swamp margin, using the soft soil to burrow and ambush.
Henryk met us at the field's edge with a torch and the tight-wound tension of a man who had watched three of his animals disappear into the dark.
"Same corner every time," he said, pointing toward the northwest section where the pasture met the tree line. "Drag marks go about ten feet and then just... stop. Like it pulled them underground."
I activated Anatomy Read and scanned the area.
[WILDS REGISTRY — SIGNATURE DETECTED]
[SPECIES: ARACHAS (BURROWING VARIANT) — W2]
[DEPTH: 2m BELOW SURFACE | STATUS: RESTING]
[PHASE 2 PRIORITY POINTS: 3 IDENTIFIED]
The overlay painted the ground in diagnostic lines — heat signatures, density variations, the outline of something large and multi-legged coiled in a burrow chamber three meters from where Henryk was standing. The Phase 2 upgrade I'd unlocked after documenting ten species now showed me exactly where to strike: the articulated joint between thorax plates, the sensory cluster beneath the forward mandible, the respiratory inlet behind the left secondary appendage.
Three targets. Three opportunities to end the encounter quickly.
"Gervin. Left flank, ten meters out. Don't let it escape toward the deeper burrows if it runs."
He moved without questions, positioning himself to cover the angle I'd indicated. Henryk stepped back, torch held high, providing light without getting in the way.
I drew my sword and approached the burrow entrance.
The ground erupted.
The Arachas was larger than I'd expected — eight-legged, armored, mandibles spread wide as it lunged at the prey that had walked directly into its territory. The games had shown these creatures as challenging opponents that required preparation and careful positioning.
The Anatomy Read overlay showed me something else: a surgical target.
I stepped left, letting the initial lunge pass, and drove my sword into the articulated joint between the first and second thorax plates. The priority point flashed amber as the blade connected — confirmation that I'd hit the mark.
The Arachas screamed and pivoted, one set of legs collapsing under the damaged joint.
Strike two: the sensory cluster beneath the forward mandible. I ducked under the sweeping secondary appendages and thrust upward, feeling the blade punch through chitin into something softer beneath.
The creature's coordination shattered. Its movements became erratic, defensive, blind.
Strike three: the respiratory inlet behind the left secondary appendage. I circled to the side while it thrashed, found the marked point, and finished the encounter.
Two minutes. Three strikes. A W2 creature that should have required a prepared Witcher to handle, reduced to a clinical procedure by three precisely targeted attacks.
[COMBAT COMPLETE — ARACHAS (BURROWING VARIANT)]
[WILDS REGISTRY ENTRY: 11/25]
[RECIPE COMPONENT UNLOCKED: CHITIN EXTRACT — STONEWALL DOSE]
I stood over the corpse, breathing harder than the short fight warranted, and felt the adrenaline surge that always followed combat settle into something manageable.
Gervin approached from his position, sword still drawn, expression carefully neutral.
"That was the cleanest W2 kill I've ever seen from a non-Witcher," he said.
"I had good positioning."
"You had more than positioning." His eyes tracked across the Arachas body, noting the three wound locations. "You hit the same spots a Witcher would hit. The joints. The sensors. The breathing. But you've never trained with anyone who knows those targets."
The observation was accurate. Too accurate for comfort.
"I study the creatures I hunt," I said, kneeling to begin the harvest. "Anatomy diagrams. Behavioral patterns. When you know how something is built, you know where it breaks."
"Diagrams don't move like that." But he let the subject drop, sheathing his sword and moving to help with the specimen collection.
Henryk approached cautiously once the corpse was clearly dead, his torch illuminating the massive form with flickering orange light.
"It's really dead?"
"It's really dead." I separated the thorax plate with a salvaged cutting tool, exposing the internal structures I needed for Marta's research. "There may be secondary burrows in the field. I'd recommend avoiding this corner for a few weeks while I confirm the nest structure is cleared."
"How much do I owe you?"
The question carried weight — the weight of a man who had dealt with lords before and learned that nothing came free.
"Continue reporting to me. What you see, what the other farmers see, anything unusual in this region." I set aside the sensory cluster sample. "Information has value. Monster clearing has value. The exchange doesn't require coin."
He studied my face with the expression of someone deciding whether to trust something too good to be real.
"The other lords took coin," he said finally. "When they bothered to help at all."
"The other lords aren't here anymore."
The Arachas harvest yielded three useful samples — chitin for the Stonewall Dose recipe, the sensory cluster for Anatomy Read calibration data, and a section of mandible that Brokk might find interesting once the Dwarf family arrived and established their workshop.
The thought surprised me. I was already planning around people who hadn't arrived yet, integration milestones that existed only in projection.
[CP TRAJECTORY UPDATE]
[CURRENT: 50 CP | NEXT MILESTONE: SPECIES 15 (+15 CP) | PROJECTED: 65 CP]
[ITHLINNE'S CODEX: 450 CP REMAINING | ESTIMATED TIME: 6-8 MONTHS]
Six to eight months. The number felt both impossibly distant and surprisingly achievable.
We walked back to the manor as the night deepened, the Arachas samples wrapped in treated cloth, the encounter already being filed in my memory as data points for future analysis.
Gervin was quiet for most of the walk. Then, as the forge light came into view:
"The way you fight. The way you look at things twice before you move. The sound you made with the Nekkers that first patrol."
I said nothing.
"I'm not asking what it is," he continued. "I'm telling you I've noticed. And I'm telling you it doesn't change anything, as long as it keeps working."
"What would change things?"
"If it stopped working. If it put people at risk instead of saving them." He met my eyes directly. "You've killed more monsters in two months than the last lord killed in his entire tenure. You've built walls, cleared fields, given farmers something they haven't had in years. Whatever you're doing, it's producing results."
"And if someone asks you about the way I fight?"
"Then I tell them you're a careful planner who studies his targets before he engages. Which is true." A pause. "The rest is your business."
The work was cleaner than I'd expected. The diagram was more reliable than I'd had any right to hope.
Both of those facts felt like something I could build on.
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