Malvick accepts the two vials of anti toxin from Li Kao with thanks but hands back the scroll after taking a quick glance at it. “I thank you, but I cannot understand this script that it is written in. I doubt I could make it work.”

After the others have left town Li Kao gets to work. First he heads off to the lumber mill, hoping to find some clues at the murder site that the others may have missed. The mill is still closed, and now, the second morning after the gruesome discovery within, the crowds are gone. The town guard has done a fairly good job of cleaning the site up – the bodies are gone and enough other people have been through the building to thoroughly disturb the telltale footprints in the sawdust-strewn floor. Li Kao is frustrated at the erasure of potentially crucial evidence, then remembers Malvick mentioning that he had followed the tracks outside the building as well. The monk walks around the perimeter of the mill until he picks up some undisturbed tracks. Just as the tracker had described they belong to a barefooted man. Li Kao gets down on his hands and knees and sniffs at the footprint. Yes, there was a faint reek of rotten meat. He clucks thoughtfully as he follows the prints down to riverbed and under the loading wharf. On a hunch he asks a local to ferry him to the other side of the river, where he quickly picks up the trail again. It leads to a spot in the marshy reeds. The plants here are crushed down as someone spent some time here, and the spot offers a very clear view of the lumber mill on the other bank. The swampy ground however has long since sucked away any additional tracks.

Li Kao’s next stop is back at the Garrison, where he inspects the bloody axe that Malvick had found at the mill, and then gets a first hand look at the victims’ remains. The axe is still smeared with blood and gore, and the rotten meat smell is still strong upon it. He body of Banny Harker is in a bad state. Again, as Malvick had noted, a thin sharp bladed weapon caused most of the wounds. It reminded Li Kao of the marks left by a surgeon’s blade – if the surgeon was a bloodthirsty psychopath. Li Kao also notes that some of the shallower wounds appeared to be claw marks. This final clue cements Li Kao’s fears.

He sits down with Sheriff Hemlock to reveal what he has confirmed. “As a priest I must understand the lore and myths of not only our gods but also of those that are an affront to them. The undead. I have studied the signs and spoor of these foul things and I can tell you with certainty that our murderer is one of them. Specifically, a ghoul, a creature that feeds on the flesh of the living and stinks of the grave. They carry a sickness in them, and those that survive their attacks often succumb to fever and rise again as a ghoul themselves. That is what must have happened to that guard that Malvick found, the one that attacked Xer’s friend Sasha. If not rooted out and eradicated, this fever can sweep through entire communities, leaving ravenous packs of ghouls in its wake.

“What I don’t understand is this: Ghouls are not mindless – they posses a crude intellect and a hunter’s cunning but are so wrought with hunger for living flesh that they rarely plan or scheme. This is how I think the murders at the lumber mill occurred. This ghoul of ours snuck into town using the river. He hid in the reeds opposite the mill for hours until he was sure that his intended victim, Mr Harker was alone in the mill, then swam across, scaled the outside of the building and overpowered Harker. He was interrupted by Miss Vinder, however. When he attacked her, she fought back, grabbing an axe and wounding him. Quite a courageous girl. Our ghoul threw her into the logsplitter in retaliation. He did not visit the same ritualistic mutilation on her as he has his other victims. Why? Our murderer is well educated, patient and focused. He is definitely executing a plan, has an agenda.”

“Sweet Desna,” Hemlock exhales, “what have we sent the others into?”

“Yes, quite.”