Chapter 344: A True Test Of Wits
"Listen carefully to the rules of the second round, mortal, for this time we shall not repeat ourselves..." the middle head intoned, its voice curling through the mist like a whisper at the edge of thought.
"The second question is a test of logic, not insight. There is only one riddle, and only one correct answer."
The fog coiled tighter around the specter until its form vanished entirely, replaced by nothing but gray swirling smoke, as even its eyes were gone.
Leo could no longer see even the faintest outline of the ghost, and could hence no longer rely on the codex to help him answer this one.
It seemed like the ghost had figured out his cheat, and had slammed the door shut against him being able to use it again by completely covering its body with thick fog.
"A sellsword is placed in a chamber with three chairs.
In the first sits a king who offers him gold for protection against his enemies.
In the second, a merchant who offers twice that for silence and discretion.
And finally, in the third, a farmer who offers nothing, but weeps in fear and prays to the gods for survival."
"The door to the chamber only opens after the sellsword kills one of the three. However, if he chooses to kill none, then all four of them starve and die"
"He cannot leave without choosing. He cannot kill more than one."
"But whichever he kills, the remaining two will walk free and live long lives."
"So who does he kill, if he is both rational and kind-hearted?"
The ghost asked, as an eerie silence followed his words.
Leo narrowed his eyes.
This time, the answer would not come from observation, and he had to rely on nothing but his own wits to get to the solution, as there was no room to cheat anymore.
—------------
The words of the riddle echoed through his mind, over and over, as he let the image form fully in his head.
A king.
A merchant.
A farmer.
One offered gold for protection.
One offered more for silence.
While the last offered nothing and just trembled in fear.
Only one could die. The other two would live. And the sellsword—if rational and kind hearted—had to decide which one to kill.
"Rational and kind hearted..." Leo repeated internally, as he considered each option.
The king was a powerful man, who offered gold to be protected, likely out of fear that his enemies would assassinate him.
His survival maintained order in the world, and could serve as a greater good, for when a king died an untimely death, bloodshed usually followed.
The merchant was a greedy man, who offered more gold than the king not for protection, but for silence and discretion, an act that reeked of guilt more than fear.
However, clients like the merchant were what the sell-sword profession was made for. And it wasn’t up to the sell-sword to judge what the client did after paying them.
Finally, the farmer was a poor man, who offered nothing, not out of arrogance, but because he had nothing to give. He wept not with strategy, but with raw fear as he turned to the gods and begged for mercy.
Leo’s brow furrowed as the layers began peeling back in his mind.
"If the sellsword is only rational, he might take the highest bidder. That’s the merchant. Twice the gold. Easy."
"If he is only kind hearted, he might refuse to kill altogether... but the riddle forbids that. He has to choose. Doing nothing is not an option."
"So what choice protects the innocent and punishes the corrupt... with the least cost to the world?"
Leo wondered, as he thought long and hard about the question, before simply deciding on the answer based on what he would personally do, if placed in this situation.
He himself was an assassin, and while he did not consider himself to be ’kind-hearted’, he was not cruel or irrational.
Hence he just thought about what he would personally do if placed in this situation, and finally locked on an answer after just twenty short minutes of thinking.
"I’ve made my choice," he declared.
"Then speak," the specter replied, its voice thick with smoke and shadow.
Leo didn’t flinch.
"The sellsword kills the farmer," he said, his voice firm.
"Because the farmer has nothing to offer—no leverage, no power, not even a deal.
I know how a sellsword thinks. Gold talks. Fear doesn’t. The king pays for protection, the merchant pays more for silence, but the farmer... he only weeps. And weeping doesn’t feed steel.
The answer of the question is in the name of the profession itself..... ’SELL SWORD’.
We do what we do for money, and us being kind-hearted or cruel has no bearing on it." he declared confidently, as a stillness followed.
"...Correct," the middle head finally said, its tone unreadable, as the fog around its face finally receded, and the three heads came back into view once more.
"You live to face question three." the left head said, as without wasting any time, they immediately jumped onto the third and last question, as the spectre’s form disappeared completely from in front of Leo, and its voice began to ring out from multiple angles in Leo’s vicinity, as if hundreds were surrounding him from beyond the fog.
"Listen well, mortal. For this is not a riddle born of trickery, but one born of ache."
"There were once three brothers," the voice began, not in unison, but in overlap—three voices sharing the same breath, layering on top of each other like chords from a mournful hymn. "Three souls bound in one body... conjoined from the neck downward, trapped in flesh they did not choose."
"They had three minds. Three heads. Three dreams. But only one life. One pair of lungs. One fate."
"They learned to live together, to eat together, to fight together, but never to love together."
"For there was a woman."
"A kind woman. Gentle, strong, and radiant in a way that made all three believe she saw them..... truly saw them."
"And she did love one of us."
"But which one?"
The voice fractured, splitting fully into three separate tones now, each echoing from a different direction in the mist, as if the brothers were pacing through Leo’s surroundings, invisible yet omnipresent.
---
"I was the first to notice her smile," the left voice claimed, calm and wistful. "She laughed at my jokes, lingered on my words, and her hand would brush mine when she thought the others weren’t looking. She asked for my stories, listened to my dreams. She saw me. And when her mother fell ill, it was me she came to for comfort, not the others."
---
"I was the one she sought when her heart was heavy," said the middle voice, deeper and steadier. "She would rest her head near my shoulder, speak softly when the others had fallen asleep. She once pressed a note into our hand, but I was the one who read it first—and it was signed with my name. Not a mistake. A confession."
---
"I was the one who touched her soul," the third voice whispered, trembling. "I painted for her. She cried when I gave her a portrait of the sea—because I remembered she had never seen it. She kissed our cheek once, under the lilac tree, and I felt it burn my skin. She never looked at the others that way again."
---
"And yet," the three voices rejoined, low and heavy now, "when her end came... when the fever took her and she lay dying... she pulled us close. She whispered her heart’s truth."
"But we do not remember."
"Grief swallowed the moment. And we have fought ever since, believing it was each of us."
"But it was only one."
"And now, you must tell us—"
A sudden hush swept the air, sharp and complete.
Then, softly, the question came:
"To which brother... did she confess her love on her deathbed?"