Chapter 1: The Body

The lead guard shrugs. "You have until the cart from the morgue arrives. After that, the body is in the hands of the officials."

Lunori makes a fairly thorough search but finds nothing unusual. Anyone else may make another check if desired before I bring in the morgue wagon.

Breg, now that you have time for a proper examination, you notice a couple of things:

1) He suffered many bites, all appear to be from wild dogs. One particularly nasty bite is on the victim’s neck. Strangely, there is no bruising about the bites, suggesting they occurred post-mortem.

2) He is missing a molar from the top left side of his mouth. The nature of his torn gums suggests the tooth was removed post-mortem. In addition, you discover the image of a cracked skull branded behind his left ear.

3) You find a small, triangular puncture wound on the victim’s back. Swelling and bruising around the grievous punctures suggest a sharp object slipped through his ribs and pierced his heart. This wound, not the animal attacks, seems to be his likely cause of death.

4) He wears a leather thong necklace.

Curiously, the necklace is just a plain leather cord, with no jewelry. It does not bear any patterns. Close examination reveals a broken clasp, indicating there was once something hanging from the thong, likely some sort of pendant, locket, or medallion that was violently torn off probably before the man’s death.

The guardsman writes down everything that you have discovered. "We'll look into it further, there's no reason to trouble yourselves or to worry about it."

It is about this time that the morgue wagon pulls up. You watch as two gruff-looking men hoist the victim’s disheveled corpse onto a litter. The litter, in turn, is loaded onto a covered wagon bearing the name "Grang’s Crematorium" painted on the side. As the wagon pulls away, the army officials continue to clean up around the area. Grang is a well-known public figure, highly regarded throughout the city. Folks appreciate his timeliness and his kindness when dealing with those grieving over the loss of a loved one, earning him exceptional word-of-mouth advertising.