Psionic Ascension Starting with The Witcher

"50 Oren."

The village chief's expression changed from initial enthusiasm to cold indifference and disgust in just one sentence.

"It's time to pay them," Effensor said.

But when he glanced at the money bag the village chief handed him, his years of experience dealing with troublemakers made him realize at a glance that the weight of the money bag was wrong.

"Is this correct?"

"What's wrong?"

The village chief was still playing dumb, constantly trying to stuff the money bag into Effensor's arms, as if accepting it would seal the deal. But his unnatural expression betrayed him.

"What did you put in there? Silver coins? Copper coins?"

"Still pebbles? But definitely not Oren."

Effensor stretched out his hand and looked calmly at the village chief. His cat-like eyes, with their cold, vertical pupils, gave the village chief goosebumps.

The village chief shuddered involuntarily. Realizing he had been exposed, he spat on the ground, muttered curses, and pulled out a few dirty, clipped Oren coins from his pocket, slapping them into Effensor's outstretched hand.

"Get out of here, you freak."

The village chief waved his hands repeatedly, completely tearing off that mask of hypocrisy. Or rather, he had never pretended at all.

When the witcher arrived, his fear and his pleas were genuine. The village chief prepared the most sumptuous food he could offer, which was also from the bottom of his heart.

But once the threat was gone, his disgust and contempt were equally genuine. Everything before was merely a survival instinct, so he temporarily set aside his discrimination.

Effensor was not surprised at all; since leaving Kaer Morhen fifteen years ago, he had gradually become familiar with everything on this land.

With his current mental fortitude, he doesn't care as long as the village chief doesn't spit on him.

So he ignored the village chief and simply turned around, led his horse, and left the village.

……

This is the wilderness of Velen. Although it is not as sparsely populated, teeming with bandits, and teeming with monsters as it will be ten years later, it is not a peaceful place either.

The soldiers of Temeria were summoned and then dismissed, but those who had killed people were unwilling to go back to farming, and so the bandits who roamed Velen came to be.

So more soldiers were sent to patrol and protect the trade route. But seeing the wealthy merchants passing by, it was hard for these soldiers not to set up roadblocks and extort tolls. In more serious cases, they would even disguise themselves as bandits and personally rob people with knives.

Although the overall order in the Velen region remains relatively stable, such isolated incidents occur from time to time, forcing travelers wanting to pass through Velen—such as Affenso—to be on high alert.

Effensor was traveling from Vigema in the south towards Novigrad because he had heard from a merchant employer that there was a large order in Novigrad worth eight hundred crowns.

This was a lot of money, worth the trip. There weren't many good bounties left near Vizima; most of the remaining ones were for water ghosts, ghouls, Anglai, and the like. If he had arrived late, these kinds of bounties might have already been taken care of by the local villagers.

Knowing there were huge bounties elsewhere, Effensor had no reason to run around in Vijma's farmland, sewers, and stinking streets.

However, the road ahead for Willen was much more difficult than he had imagined.

The rapidly rising prices forced him to stop and find other sources of income so he could afford to buy supplies. The exact reason for this situation remains unclear to Affenzo.

The merchants who came and went spoke vaguely about it, only having a partial understanding, but it seemed that the whole of the northern kingdom was like this.

However, Effensor vaguely sensed something was amiss and guessed that war might be brewing.

In order to raise funds for military operations, manufacture weapons, and coordinate logistics, the kings began to control the outflow of goods, which hindered trade. As a result, prices fluctuated.

I just don't know where the war is going to take place.

As Effensor sat on his horse, deep in thought, a drop of water landed on the tip of his nose. The cold touch made him look up at the sky.

Just minutes ago, the sky was sunny and bright, but now it was covered by dark clouds. The heavy clouds pressed down, accompanied by gusts of wind.

Willen’s unpredictable weather once again made its presence felt, as a downpour began before Effinso could even take out his raincoat, soaking his clothes that he had painstakingly dried.

"Damn it." Effensor grabbed a corner of the raincoat from the saddlebag, yanked it out, and then put it on.

It's called a raincoat, but it's actually just a thick piece of leather that has been treated to be waterproof. It was originally a material that a shoemaker prepared for making shoes for nobles, but after being bought by Effensor, it was simply modified into a raincoat.

The raindrops pattered on the raincoat, the sound growing louder and louder.

The horse snorted uneasily and nudged Effensor with its head, unwilling to continue in the rain.

Effensor was indeed not going to proceed in the rain. The already muddy road was no longer a "road" after the rain, but a series of mud pits. Whether it was a person or a horse, there was a risk of falling on such a road.

"Let's go, let's go!"

Effensor dismounted, took the reins in one hand and patted the horse's rump with the other, and stopped under a large tree.

The tree provided just enough shade for Effensor and the horse, its lush foliage blocking most of the raindrops.

He took the sword off his back and held it in his arms. Looking at the slightly dim sky, he felt tired without realizing it, and his eyes involuntarily began to close. He then decided to take a nap.

"well……"

Another year has passed.

More than thirty years have passed since Effensor crossed over into this world.

He regained his past life memories and gained self-awareness from infancy. Therefore, he didn't forget anything; he remembered everything very clearly.

He was born on the other side of the sea, on a continent unknown to the people here. The people there also came from the intersection of the celestial spheres, but they had long ago developed a firm belief and clearly defined camps based on that belief.

The millennia-old conflicts of the Old World are being rewritten in the New World, and the rivalry between the Holy Cross and the Crescent continues unabated.

The unknown entity sent by Effensor gave him a good start: he was born as the grandson of the King of Arania and the sole heir to the kingdom.

It would be even better if this kingdom didn't end up with a territory the size of a count's domain.

This so-called Kingdom of Arrania was merely a re-establishment by the survivors of the original Kingdom of Arrania, which was built on a mountain, after it was conquered by the Crescent Moon Cult.

However, the infidels did not stop. Instead, they continued to launch holy wars. In the third month after Effortso was born, his grandfather died in battle in the Principality of Neustauck. His body was brought back and buried with Effortso’s father, who had been buried not long before.

In the fourth month, Jihad's army invaded Aranea.

In the fifth month, the castle, which had held out for a month, fell, and the Kingdom of Arania officially perished. Efenso's mother was shot with an arrow that pierced her abdomen, but she endured the excruciating pain, carrying Efenso on horseback until she handed him over to an explorer about to embark on a sea expedition. Only then did this woman, already pale from blood loss, pass away in unease, panic, and agony.

Effensor could only watch it all happen; he knew everything, but could do nothing about it.

The ocean explorer, carrying Efenso, collected his mother's body and then attempted to evade the enemy navy under the guise of an ocean expedition. However, Efenso's white hair, a trait passed down through generations of the Aranian royal family, led to his identification.

They managed to kill off all the Crescent soldiers who boarded the ship and shake off their slow-moving oarsmen, but the nautical charts, compasses, and other items were burned to ashes along with the captain's cabin.

After getting lost at sea, they drifted aimlessly for three months, barely surviving on sugared water. Finally, their ship was destroyed by a giant tentacle monster that suddenly appeared, when they were actually just a stone's throw from the Skellige Islands.

Effensor was locked in a box by the ocean explorer and drifted with the waves to the Skellige Islands.

Those strong sailors died, and the astute explorers died, but he, a fragile baby not yet a year old, miraculously survived.

The surging waves treated him with remarkable calm, as if an invisible hand gently pushed him, allowing him to reach the beach unharmed. And just when he was nearly starving to death, he was found by Vesemir, who happened to be passing by. And so, Affinso became a Witcher.

Effensor fully believed that something in the universe was watching over him, influencing him, bringing him into this world, and allowing him to survive one near-death experience after another.

Perhaps this is fate?

Effensor squinted at the dim sky over Velen, becoming increasingly convinced that fate truly existed in this world.

All coincidences are merely appearances; coincidence is simply a part of inevitability. In the deeper realm of the world, everything was already predetermined.

Fate, like the rain in Velen, falls intermittently, affecting you every moment. But it never tells you when it will appear; the rain in Velen can suddenly soak you, and fate can suddenly appear and startle you.

"Giddy up! Giddy up!"

A series of faint shouts suddenly rang out in the distance, accompanied by the vibrations of horses' hooves pounding the ground.

Effensor turned his head to look, but he couldn't see clearly through the rain. However, the group seemed well-trained and in neat formation, and should be the Temurian army.

However, speeding through Velen's muddy terrain comes at a price.

The last knight in line frantically whipped his horse's rump to catch up with his companions, but his horse accidentally stepped into a deep mud pit, slipped and fell to the ground, breaking its leg. The knight was also thrown off.

The entire group stopped and dismounted.

Effensor could only hear some indistinct sounds; the loud rain and occasional thunder interfered with his hearing.

"Damn it, Adrien, you cowboy!"

"..."

"Are you alright? Damn it, you're coughing up blood! No, no, don't close your eyes... Who has the medicine?"

"...Armor, take off your armor..."

"..."

"It's hopeless. Sir, we have to get to Yaruga right away..."

"We need a horse, otherwise Auridon and his things can't be taken with us."

"There, buy his horse..."

Effensor suddenly opened his eyes.

Did you bring me into this? Want to buy my horse?

Beneath the layers of rain, a middle-aged man dressed as a Temurian officer walked through.

He walked toward Affenso, taking out a bag as he went and counting the money inside.

When they reached the vicinity of Effensor, he said, "Hey, over there, your horse has been requisitioned by Temuria, and this bag of Oren..."

After counting the money pouches, the Temurian officer looked up and was greeted by a pair of cat-like eyes.

"Damn it, he's a witcher!"

The guy was startled, and all his prepared explanations became useless.

"Unfortunately, I still have a use for this horse," Effensor shrugged.

The officer seemed to be a worldly man; he shook his head repeatedly and hung the money pouch back on his waist.

Effensor glanced at the bag and immediately determined that there were only a few dozen orens in it, not even enough to buy a decent saddle, let alone a horse.

"What's wrong? When did the Temurian army become so reasonable?" Effensor was a little surprised; this didn't seem like the way the army usually acted.

"I was a member of the Blue Guard and have seen you Witchers." The officer looked up at Effinso's cat-like eyes, and in that instant of eye contact, Effinso read awe.

"That witcher with the same white hair as you, he can easily kill seven people. But now, I have no intention of leaving our lives here for a horse."

"A wise choice... but why are you in such a hurry? What happened?"

Effensor was a little curious, and suddenly he remembered his previous guess: "Could it be that there's a war?"

"You're quite well-informed," the officer said, somewhat surprised.

"Is it another king fighting another king? Or a duke rebelling? Or a peasant uprising?"

"Ha, neither of them. Looks like your information isn't that good. It's the Nilfgaards from the south. I've rarely heard of that name before... Anyway, they've attacked."

The officer placed his hand on his chest, covering the Temeria lily emblem, and said in a resolute tone, "King Foltest has summoned the army to defend the North! Although I have long since left the Blue Guard, I am willing to rejoin the Temeria army as a soldier, to fight for the defense of Temeria, to protect the North."

This is a person of faith.

This was Effensor's first reaction.

Compared to the vast majority of soldiers who are muddle-headed and fight for money, power, or desire, this officer is somewhat different.

That was all; the officer left a vague impression on his mind.

"Then I wish you good luck." Effensor nodded in acknowledgment, but his eyes darted toward the bag hanging from the officer's waist.

Then he pointed to the lifeless man who had fallen from his horse and said, "But if you give me that bag of Oren, I can help you transport that gentleman's body back to Novigrad and give it to his family."

The officer paused for a moment, then threw the money pouch at Affinso without hesitation.

"Here you go, Witcher. I'll ask you to bury him in the cemetery; he has no family. By the way, his name is Auridon Sterling."

"it is good."

Effensor weighed them in his hand; these Oren pills hadn't been trimmed and were quite heavy.

"Take whatever you need from that horse. We can't bring any more stuff, or the horse won't be able to run."

After saying this, the officer turned and walked away. The other soldiers, leading their horses, were slowly walking towards them.

The rain intensified, and the sky grew darker. Effensor could only see a group of shadowy soldiers gradually walking back onto the main road.

They dared not ride at full speed anymore, but instead led their horses slowly forward.

Gradually, their figures became increasingly blurred, eventually disappearing into the rain, leaving only a series of messy hoofprints and footprints on the road.

Effensor turned and led his horse, intending to travel a little further, hoping to find a house before nightfall... preferably an empty, dilapidated one. Because a house with people would never allow a witcher like himself to stay.

The dark clouds on the horizon suddenly dissipated, and a beam of orange light shone through the gaps in the clouds, illuminating the vast wilderness of Velen.