
With Temeria on one side and the Nilfgardians on the other, Velen has become a bloody No Man's Land. Both sides commit acts of exorbitant cruelty meant to keep the conquered populaces in check and the evidence is scattered across the torn land.
War makes desperate people: bandits run rampant with no one to keep them in check. The big powers are too busy fighting each other to keep the peace in conquered land.
Anyone on the road isn't safe.
Don't get involved. Vesemir's voice echoes in Geralt's head, as does Yennefer's demand that he not be a hero. He could just keep riding. None of this has anything to do with him: he has other things to worry about. They won't thank him for it.
But that isn't why he does it.
The bandits are busy looting a wagon while a woman huddles with two children under the watch of a lone guard. There's a man in the road, bleeding but not dead. Can't help him yet, if he can be helped at all.
"Hey." His flat voice gets their attention, anyway. His appearance makes them momentarily falter. "I'm gonna give you one chance to get out of here. After that, I'll kill you."
One of them laughs nervously, another sits up on the wagon, sizing him up.
"There's four of us and one of you, freak. I don't care who you are, the odds aren't good. You aren't even carrying your swords in a sensible place."
Temerian accent. They're looting their own people. He wonders if they're deserters or just taking advantage of people trying to escape.
"You're right," Geralt concedes. "The odds of any of you surviving this aren't great."
They won't hurt the woman and child, he thinks. He's the threat here. The guard is already moving closer. Two more from behind the wagon, and the apparent leader still sitting. Geralt waits for the men coming from the wagon to charge him and casts a quick sign in the air. The men are knocked back, hard, by a concussive blast. It gives him time to draw the steel sword on his back to cut into the stunned guard before he can think to take hostages.