Part 26 - The Witcher 3 - 2nd playthrough - Death March

Off blog, I continued exploring Points of Interest in Velen, and now I'm still sidequesting. For some reason, I hadn't picked up Funeral Pyres (level 3) until this session. It was marked by a yellow exclamation point west from Mulbrydale. The barf-inducing priest of the Eternal Fire asked me to burn corpses, failing to mention one person in the graves was still alive.

There's your eternal fire, bitches!

I looted the priest's body and got 210 crowns.

Next up was returning to the guy whose name I forget who had given me the Swamp Thing contract and asked me to wait a week for my payment with interest. He paid double the agreed sum, 530 crowns, not bad!

Don't Play with the Gods is a level 15 treasure hunt. I am still level 13 and was looking forward to a bit of challenge. I know I keep saying this but Death March is way easier for me than I expected. The fight with the bunch of level 13 wraiths and one level 15 noonwraith was challenging but fun, just what I needed. The loot I got out of the quest was mostly useless - expect for maybe one recipe - but I didn't do it for the loot.

I hopped over to Skellige for the Black Pearl quest (level 13). I met Odhen in Rannvaig who gave me the Missing Son quest (skull level for now).

Speaking of skull level, while on my way to the marker where I had to dive for pearls, level 19 ekhidnas attacked me. I hid under this broken ship then ran, jumped into the sea and swam underwater, then ran again. It took a few tries before I managed to get to the other side by the destroyed bridge alive, as the ekhidnas attacked both from the air and underwater.

Enjoying the Viking vibes.

While searching for the black pearl under the sea, I was forced to kill some sirens. Feeling sort of bad about this, as they are such unique creatures, but it was out of self defense...

By the time I got back to the shore, Nidas, the quest giver, had been attacked by drowners. I saved his life, expecting a reward, but he said he had no coin and would pay me back in Novigrad.

I met him at a Novigrad inn where I found out why he had needed a black pearl... To help his sick wife gain back her memory, but it didn't work. When I learned this, I felt very sorry for him and so wished I could try helping his wife in some way, but the quest ended with the above farewell from him. I guess even witchers can't solve all problems...

Next I ran into Ronvid of the Small Marsh again and used Axii to convince him once and for all to quit stalking me.

I next completed An Elusive Thief which is a level 13 witcher contract. It involves fighting a doppler who turns into Geralt complete with all of his witcher abilities. This could have been a tough fight, but the doppler gave up halfway and agreed to leave the town.

Sylvester Amello, the merchant who had given me the task of getting rid of the doppler, was the first person in the game I heard saying "no trophy, no reward."

I actually wondered about this before, how every contract giver just pays you when you say you took care of their problems without asking for any proof. Not this guy. He paid only half the agreed reward, and I couldn't blame him.