Alien world

Chapter 1764, Section 397: Turning the Tables

"It's a ratman!" the ratman elder loudly corrected Annan.

"Then it should definitely not go back. If it went to you rat people, wouldn't it be bullied to death? You rat people, do you dare say you welcome Albek?"

The rat-man elder spoke up: "I welcome you..."

"You fart!"

"There are only so many rights. When traitors come, you have to divide up your own rights and interests. Welcome them? When did the rat people start talking about sacrifice and dedication?"

Annan sneered, pointing at the black monkey watching the commotion from the side: "Look at the black monkey's dark face, does it look like it's welcoming you?"

"My face is naturally dark!"

Caught in the crossfire, the black monkey had no choice but to explain, "All gray-haired rats are subjects of the big-horned rats. We are one, no rat is ostracizing you—"

"I do not believe."

Annan interrupted and questioned the beginning.

The black monkey and the rat-man elder exchanged a glance and had no choice but to temporarily join forces: "Albek, we guarantee that you will receive the same rights and resources as us in the clan."

As a race that has fought tooth and nail with humans and then made peace with them, treasure is also common among the ratmen.

Annan feigned defeat: "You'd better keep your word, or else..."

He glanced at Albek and quietly raised his hand to him, signifying a 50/50 split.

"I'll be back."

The black monkey and the rat-man elder took Albek and the others away, leaving Annan behind.

“I am an envoy, and I also want to see the High Priest!” Annan shouted.

The black monkey said that the high priest should first hold a ceremony to welcome Albek, and that the ratmen's men should take Annan to the envoy's residence.

From the outside, the Stoan rats' camp looks like the size of a small town. The demons forbid them from digging, and the ratmen really don't have much talent for building, so there are crooked and twisted stone houses everywhere, like sandcastles built by children on the beach.

Its only advantages are its sturdiness and its capacity to hold a lot.

Annan saw with his own eyes that a stone room the size of a washroom was crammed with more than twenty rat-men. If he hadn't gone in to take a look and confirmed that the rat-men were just lying on stacked shelves like bread in an oven, he would have suspected that they had secretly dug burrows.

The stone house where the "messenger" lived had no furniture, no windows, and the door was a wooden plank that had to be moved by the occupants themselves. However, compared to the surrounding bunch of non-geometric huts, it was a pretty good building—if you didn't consider that three previous owners had died there.

Annan watched the rat-men bustling about outside the doorway. The succubus queen had tasked him with gathering intelligence on the rat-men, but he had no leads yet. And the task the six-armed serpent demon had privately assigned him… was also proving difficult.

There are at least hundreds of thousands of Skaven brought in from the outposts. Finding one Skaven among hundreds of thousands is like finding a needle in a haystack, not to mention having to guard against the high probability of assassination.

……

"Albek, do you know why the rat people are so great?"

In the only building in the entire camp, the high priest of the Stoan ratmen stood before the statue of the Great Horned Rat and asked Albek, who was prostrate before him, a question.

"Reproductive capacity?"

"No, it is the evil power bestowed upon us by the Rat God."

The ratman high priest raised his forearm, which was thinning with hair and withered withered skin due to old age, and a flickering green flame rose from his folded, dry claws.

The shadow of the giant horned rat statue behind him filled the entire wall.

"Master it, and you will truly become a child of the Great Horned Rat."

“I’m ready.” Albek lowered his head, his shadow blurring and trembling in the fel energy light.

He had no choice.

……

Outside the priest's mansion, the black monkey and the rat-man elder were engaged in a fierce argument. "Olme must die!"

“It cannot die,” the black monkey said. “It’s a rare male succubus, a ratman who can breed countless succubus bloodlines for the clan!”

The rat-man elder scoffed, "It's a servant of the legion commander's monstrosities, and you presumptuously attempt to corrupt it?!"

“It wasn’t me, it was the High Priest,” the black monkey said slowly. “With the High Priest here, Olme’s good-for-nothing won’t be able to leave the clan…”

……

"What's your name?"

After surveying the entire small house, Annan finally had time to ask his two Blade Demon guards questions.

"Babuburubideonsa".

Annan slightly opened his mouth and looked at the other Blade Demon.

"Angutur Megusdala".

"Your names are so long, there must be some meaning behind them, right?"

“It’s powerful when you shout out a long name,” Babub… one of the Blade Demons replied.

"Understood... From now on I will call you Babu and Ang. You two come with me."

With two Blade Demons by his side, Annan strolled around the ratman camp.

He planned to walk around the ratmen's open-air lair first, so that Ruth could see him and at least know that he had arrived.

Passing by the priest's house, Annan was stopped at the outside by the champion rat and could only peek at it from afar.

We spent two hours exploring the not-so-large camp, with only the high priest's residence remaining unvisited.

Annan was certain that as long as Russ was in the camp, he would definitely be able to see him, but no ratmen ever came to make contact with him.

Could it be like the previous three envoys...?
Annan couldn't stand idly by, because this was a private commission from the Six-Armed Serpent Demon. Not to mention, Ruth's infiltration of the Stunn clan was his own doing…

Hmm... wouldn't you call this a despicable act of creating a predicament, then resolving it to win the heart of the six-armed serpent demon?
Annan glanced at the large house that wouldn't let them in and asked Blade Demon, "Do you know where else there are rats besides the camp?"

Asking them was asking the wrong question, so Annan had no choice but to go out and "find fault".

"Black monkey, you rat people actually broke the contract! Rat people are just rat people, only good for dirty deeds!"

The black monkey, annoyed by the inexplicable insults, retorted, "Olme, what nonsense are you spouting!"

"The number of ratmen in the camp doesn't match up. Where are the hidden ratmen? Where are they?!"

"The elite rats are all at the quarry, of course they're not at the camp. Don't you even know that?" the ratman elder mocked.

Annan suddenly realized: "Is that so? I'm sorry, I misunderstood you."

The black monkey was flattered and surprised; it even apologized to him...

Annan made an excuse to go inspect the quarry, and the two gray rats did not stop him, only the rat-man elder followed.

The quarry is located a dozen miles away from the ratman camp. The ratmen dug an open pit at the foot of the mountain to extract large quantities of stone while sheltering from the wind.

Annan walked through a quarry filled with the clanging and banging of chisels, his gaze sweeping over the busy or lazy rat-man creatures.

If Ruth were still alive, she would most likely be left here to fend for herself.

“Olme, what are you looking for?” Annan’s strange behavior caught the attention of the rat-man elder, who asked in a chilling tone.

Ignoring the rat-man elder's approach, Annan retorted, "I'm just a rat-man, but what are you guarding against, rat-man elder? Could it be..."

"What have you rat-men really done behind our demons' backs?"

(End of this chapter)