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Background

You'll trigger this quest by reading the "Contract: Beast in the Oxenfurt Forest" note on the notice board in Oxenfurt in Velen North (#1).


Walkthrough

The note won't tell you much. It'll just mention that there's a monster somewhere in the forest near Oxenfurt. To find out what's going on, you'll need to talk to the "world-famous soldier of fortune" Hans of Cidaris, who you'll find in a mercenary camp to the east (#2). He'll tell you that the creature has been feeding on livestock in the area, and that it also killed two of his men.

To learn more about the beast, you'll need to go to the attack site (#3) and turn on your witcher senses. In the middle of the area you'll find lots of blood on the ground plus one of the corpses. Then slightly to the northeast you'll find the arm of the other corpse, and you'll decide that the creature must be a flyer, and that it dropped bits of the corpse as it was returning to its nest.

To find the creature, you'll need to follow the trail of blood and bits left behind by the second corpse. This trail will lead you to the east, where you'll eventually come to a group of crows feeding on some entrails (#4). You won't see any more bits past that point, but you'll detect more crows to the east. As you head in that direction, you might detect some large feathers on the ground (#5), which will reveal that the creature is an archgriffin. This discovery will earn you 25 xp.

A little to the east of the feathers you'll find the archgriffin's nest (#6). If it's daytime when you arrive, then the archgriffin won't be there, and you'll have to return at night. Still, when you examine the nest, you'll find more bits from the second corpse, including a Mercenary Contract, which will indicate that Cidaris and his men were hired to kill the archgriffin, and that they've already been paid more than they offered you.

At night, you'll encounter Opinicus the archgriffin at the nest. He's big and tough, and he'll hit you for a lot of damage -- which will include an acid effect that might kill you all by itself. The bestiary entry for Opinicus lists Aard as the sign of choice for him, but we had much better luck using Quen (which will negate his big attack plus the acid effect). Then you can cast Quen, wait for Opinicus to land, attack him until he hits you and removes Quen, and then dodge around until you can repeat the process. Slowly but surely, you should be able to wear him down and eventually defeat him. When Opinicus dies, he'll drop an Archgriffin Mutagen, a Griffin Trophy, a leveled version of Zireael Armor, and more.

When you return to Cidaris, you'll have two choices. You can simply accept your reward. This will net you your negotiated fee plus 300 xp. But if you found the Mercenary Contract, then you can demand the amount Cidaris got paid by Oxenfurt. This will net you 510 crowns and 300 xp.


1 - Oxenfurt Notice Board


2 - Mercenary Camp


3 - Attack Site


4 - Crows


5 - Feathers


6 - Nest