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TWL Chapter 455: Blood, Steel, and Selection
🕑 Added 2025-06-14 04:21:09 +0000 UTCBright spots of light flared within the hall of Kaer Seren as Kiyan, Gaetan, and Aiden emerged from the teleportation. Gaetan and Aiden, int
Bright spots of light flared within the hall of Kaer Seren as Kiyan, Gaetan, and Aiden emerged from the teleportation.
Gaetan and Aiden, intrigued by the experience of the Teleportation skill, lit up with excitement upon realizing it didn’t cause any dizziness at all.
Kiyan stepped forward with a smile and embraced Lann.
After the mission to rescue Reinald in Novigrad, Kiyan had stayed behind in the city. On one hand, he continued his efforts to bring recognition and honor to witchers at the heart of the Northern Kingdoms. On the other, Chappelle still needed a seasoned and powerful ally by his side.
After all, Chappelle would soon be involved in some major operations.
At the same time, Lann had no intention of giving up on Novigrad—such a rich source of experience.
All Followers bound by the system could passively share experience points with Lann by defeating enemies and completing contracts. As Lann’s earliest contracted witcher follower, Kiyan had long been one of his key sources of XP.
Lann intended to keep this model going—contracting more witchers or high-combat-capable followers, assigning them to large cities, and having them complete various local contracts to keep funneling experience back to him.
Right now, this included not only Kiyan, but also Levin, who managed Brokilon; House and Milva during their downtime from escort duties—all operating under this arrangement.
It was easy to imagine a future where Lann would command an ever-growing force of followers—so much so that even while lounging in the royal palace of Cintra, he'd still be leveling up.
But today, Kiyan and the other three 'cats' had been summoned to Kaer Seren to attend a witcher-wide council.
As the doors opened, the sound of chatter instantly flooded into their ears. The Griffins, Wolves, Vipers, and Bears had already gathered, and even Kolgrim and the other two Vipers had been temporarily recalled from distant Kaedwen. With Lann representing the Lions and the arrival of the three Cats, every member of the Order had finally assembled again for the first time since its founding.
The topic of discussion: who would undergo the next round of secondary mutations?
“I’ve collected quite a few more materials recently, filling in some of the gaps,” Mousesack said with a light cough. “Taking into account the expected loss and wastage, we now have enough for three witchers to complete the secondary mutation.”
As the druid overseeing the process, Mousesack set the tone—officially kicking off the scramble for the limited slots.
Still, no matter how intense the competition, witchers were nothing if not pragmatic. Factors like seniority or age were quickly set aside. After a brief discussion, they reached a consensus:
Whoever is strongest gets priority for the mutation.
After all, the secondary mutation was meant to boost strength—so it made sense to get the most return on investment.
Jerome and Lann, the two witchers already head and shoulders above the rest, immediately withdrew. They had already undergone their own secondary mutations. In fact, it was precisely the strength they displayed that had made the others covet the process so fiercely.
After them, Vesemir, Reinald, and Keldar—the three eldest—also stepped aside, yielding their chances to the younger generation.
The remaining witchers quickly conferred, then simply moved the entire process outside to the training grounds behind the keep.
Amid wind and snow, a fiery melee broke out!
Steel clashed in a frenzy, signs flew everywhere, fire and windstorm spells collided—and every now and then, a dramatic scream rang out in the chaos.
It wasn’t hard to guess that a few of them might be using the opportunity to settle old grudges. Several had their armor slashed open, with Lambert receiving by far the worst of it.
“That doesn’t count! I’m off my game today!” Lambert shouted, wiping blood from his nose, still defiant despite the beating.
Vesemir let out a long sigh, covered his eyes, and turned to head back inside.
One round wasn’t enough? Then fight another. Keep going until the winners stood undisputed, and the losers had no choice but to accept the outcome.
This went on for several days, and when the dust finally settled—excluding Lann, Jerome, and the three elders—the younger generation had been clearly ranked:
Top tier: Gerd of the Bear School, and Letho of the Viper School.
The first was a legendary witcher who once hacked his way through nearly every monster on the Isles—save for the Ice Giant—while singing and drinking beer. The second was a leader-level mentor figure who had been rallying and reorganizing the Viper School throughout the South. Both had already pulled far ahead of the rest.
Strictly speaking, though, those two weren’t exactly part of the younger generation—they were more like mid-generation veterans. That also meant they had accumulated far more combat experience and mastery over Signs. And since neither could outmatch the other without going all out, they were both ranked equally at the top.
Second tier: Geralt and Eskel from the School of the Wolf, Kiyan from the School of the Cat, and Coën from the School of the Griffin.
Geralt was destined to become a legendary witcher. Having known Lann early on, he often trained with him to sharpen his swordsmanship and protect Ciri, his Child of Surprise. By borrowing techniques from other schools, his growth had been the fastest among them all.
Kiyan’s position came as a bit of a surprise, but he had received substantial boosts from Lann’s Followers system, gaining several levels. Publicly, this was attributed to the power of Elder Blood.
Coën, on the other hand, edged out the rest not due to raw strength, but thanks to his superior Sign power—at this stage, most had similar sword skills and physical conditioning, so any unique strength gave an advantage.
Eskel stood out for his consistency. His swordplay was measured, not aggressive; his Signs weren’t overwhelming, but expertly handled. His combat intuition was keen—but he lacked a particularly standout trait, and thus ended up as the 'gatekeeper' of the second tier.
The third tier included the rest:
Lambert from the Wolf School; Aiden and Gaetan from the Cat School; and Kolgrim, Auckes, and Serrit from the Viper School.
But again—it’s hard to judge without a fight to the death. The Vipers aside from Letho were all more specialized in assassination, and struggled in open combat. Meanwhile, the Cats’ performance had always been a bit inflated—they excelled at fighting humans. If rankings were based purely on monster-hunting results, their standings would likely drop.
And so, this somewhat hastily organized and somewhat haphazardly executed first official power ranking of the Witcher Order came to an end.
No one expected there to be a second time. Witchers weren’t glory-chasers by nature. Sure, they sparred from time to time, but 'hacking at each other for several days just to make a ranking list' wasn’t something they were remotely interested in.
It was only because the secondary mutation was so incredibly tempting—and because Lann and Jerome’s overwhelming strength stood as proof of its benefits. Even if they had unique advantages—Elder Blood in one case, innate magic affinity in the other—the power boost from the mutation itself was undeniable.
In theory, after this ranking, the mutation slots should have been settled: Gerd and Letho from the first tier, and Geralt from the second.
But in the end, after a series of discussions, several of them voluntarily gave up their spots.
…
Coën pointed at himself, looking to Gerd.
“You’re giving the spot to me?”
The bear-sized man chuckled and nodded, completely unconcerned.
In truth, it all came back to the original goal: maximizing the gains.
Initially, ranking everyone by battle records should’ve been enough. But then, a new factor was introduced—one that no one had accounted for.
The Forgotten Wolf armor, brought back by Reinald.
Gerd said with a grin, “Lann will soon be heading to Thanedd Island, right? He’ll be dealing with mages, armies—and maybe even the Wild Hunt. So we need to boost our strength as fast as possible.”
“‘Forgotten Wolf’ is medium armor. If someone wears that and undergoes the secondary mutation… that’s when we’ll see the biggest combat gains.” Gerd shook his head. “But I wear heavy armor. Yoana still needs time to modify the schematics for me—there’s no way I’ll be ready before the Thanedd summit.”
Coën opened his mouth to argue, but Gerd beat him to it, clapping a massive hand on his shoulder.
"I'm not being arrogant—my strength is enough for now. But you, Coën—don’t you want revenge?" Gerd said slowly. "I heard that Vilgefortz, the one who broke your arm and leg, will be at that summit. You really don’t want to be the one to cut him down yourself?"
Coën fell silent.
On the other side, Kiyan merely shrugged and voluntarily withdrew from the competition, as a light-armor Cat. After all, by strength alone, he ranked above Coën.
And so, the final selection for the first round of secondary mutations was adjusted once more. The final three were: Letho, Geralt, and Coën.
