Regarding those captives, I had them sent off for training. For those that did well, they would be promoted to an official soldier in my army and lose their slave status.
Basically, this was all a grudge amounted to in this dog eat dog world. As long as you were alive, it was infinitely better than being dead.
Recently, Big 5 had been training the hellhound cavalry units while Violet Snow’s job was to search for other hellhounds and hopefully recruit them. Unfortunately, the hellhounds were a rare species in this prison and after an extensive search, Violet Snow’s pack were the only hellhounds to be found.
Thus, Violet Snow ended up being rather free recently. She would wander around with her hellhounds and help me monitor No.5’s bone grinding while at the same time monitoring Baccarel and Big 5’s training.
It was around this time that Habona and Manasha came back with their spoils, so Violet Snow came over to have a look as well. That’s when things started to take a turn for the worse. The normally calm Violet Snow suddenly erupted in a raging fit of anger.
“*Awoof*” Her unique bark that combined a wolf and a dog’s was particularly loud and clear today; especially so since it was brimming with raw, negative emotions.
Amongst the Abaddon Rodent captives, there was a larger ratman who so happened to turn around in reaction to that bark. Upon seeing the furious Violet Snow, this rat received the scare of his lifetime and immediately tried to run away with his claws wrapped around his head as if that would make him harder to spot.
Violet Snow let forth a roaring bark, and in the blink of an eye, an icy prison formed of ice spikes rose from the ground. The icey prison quickly closed in on the fleeing rat, and like a giant hand, secured it firmly to that spot.
What’s going on?
At the start, I couldn’t wrap my head around the sudden change in this little puppy, but after giving it some thought, the answer easily came to mind. Back when I first met her, she was engaged in a fight to the death with these rodents; in fact, it was then that Violet Snow and I teamed up to take on the rodents and their leader.
In other words, she had a blood feud with these rats. That dagger accessory around her neck was crafted by me from a hellhound’s skull, back then I had a lingering feeling that this was most likely her mother’s…
Thus, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that her grudge ran deep, as deep as the ocean even!
Back then, we defeated the rodent leader but accidentally let that rat escape. Don’t tell me this rat had something to do with that ratman leader?
“Do you know this rat?” Even though I was quite sure of my assumption, it was still better to confirm it.
“Mhm, he’s a subordinate of that ratman leader we fought.” Violet Snow coldly nodded her head before turning all of her attention to the trapped ratman. Eyes dripping with murderous intent, she opened her mouth: “*chit chit chiit*…”
What the sh*t…what the heck was with that [chit chit chiit]? Last I checked you were a dog…weren’t you…I mean wolf…that’s not right either…you were a wolfdog weren’t you? What’s with that chittering? Don’t think for a second that that rat would suddenly answer you just because you decided to change races, mhm!
In the midst of my usual ramblings, that frightened ratman unexpectedly fessed up obediently: “*chit chit chit*…”
The two then engaged in a back and forth that ended up taking quite a bit of time, despite it proceeding so smoothly.
Even so, those piercing *chits* really got under my skin.
“Do any of you understand what they are saying?” You two seem to be engaged in a rather important conversation there….weren’t you? How about letting me in on that?
“We don’t understand the ratman’s language either.” Manasha shook her head: “Most of the time we only treat them as our main source of food since they are so weak. The only reason I brought them back alive was because you needed fodder.”
I guess you got me there, wasn’t a snake eating a rodent the most natural thing in this world? Who would be so bored as to research the language of their dinner meal? Not like doing that made the food taste any better. If it could not be eaten, screw it!
Basically, this was what the Prison of the Dead was like, if it could not be eaten, don’t bother with it. After all, if you couldn’t even fill your stomach, why bother with such trivial matters. Like the ancients say, food and warmth begets carnal desires. If you couldn’t even fill your own stomach, let’s see how you plan on chasing after that meow meow. I bet you would end up freezing to death upon insertion.
(ED: meow meow… pee pee ……*cough*….kill me please)
Seeing as Manasha didn’t know their language, Majosha probably didn’t know it either. As for Habona and Harlow…I skipped them without a second thought.
There’s no way those muscleheads could ever produce a scholar, so don’t even think about it, hah.
Finally, their conversation ended. Her expression was noticeably better this time around; she probably managed to get the information she wanted. Even so, that chilly aura around her hadn’t dissipated one bit and seemed to have gotten even worse.
Ignoring the struggling rodent, she trotted up to me. With gritted teeth and an extremely sour expression on her face, she said: “I remember you mentioned that you were in dire need of resources like bones, souls and meat.”
“Mhm, if it’s possible, I would like some captives as well to be our fodder.”
Given the unknown dangers ahead, having a bunch of soldiers I could toss away without a second thought would help tremendously. In fact, it would help even more if the soldiers were edible as well, given the issue of food freshness. Mhm, edible…
“I just obtained some information from that rodent over there; he mentioned that there was a giant gathering of the rats somewhere. As of now, they’ve gathered over 5,000 rodents and were planning to sweep the nearby regions in order to conquer a region for themselves. If we don’t take care of them now, we would probably end up encountering them near the exit anyway.”
“…5,000?” You’re joking, why would they be considered weak if they had so many kinsdevil? Oh wait, those rats were pretty good at reproducing and running away so I guess it’s possible.
“Not 5,000, at least 5,000.” Violet Snow emphasized that point and continued: “That rat couldn’t even be counted as one of their lesser leaders in the outer regions, so this bit of news might be outdated already. Besides, there’s no guarantee that he wasn’t lying about the numbers either.”
That’s right, he might’ve reported a larger or smaller number than what it really was.
It’s one thing if he over reported their numbers….if he underreported however…
He might’ve let out this bit of fake news to lure us to his nest. Once we arrive and find out that the enemy was actually several times larger than our own, our morale would crumble in an instant and then…
Fine, that bit of imagination was a tad excessive, but who could say that these rats weren’t so cunning, am I right?
After all, you could never be too sure in life.
“Then can you help me interrogate a few more prisoners, make sure to question them thoroughly.”
If these rats were truly out to consolidate their power, encountering them was inevitable; rather, we already encountered them, it’s just that our intelligence was full of holes that had to be filled.
“Alright, I’ll be thorough about it.” She nodded her head and accepted the mission. “However, I’m taking this lot of rodents away with me, any problem with that?”
“Go ahead, you can kill them all if you want, I just want the intelligence.”
“I can kill them all then, you said so yourself.”
“Mhm, I said so, go ahead and do what you want.” If there’s one thing I hated, it was rats. Even if I wanted to treat my prisoners fairly, this bit of kindness wouldn’t extend to these filthy creatures.
Having receiving my confirmation, she turned around to leave. Suddenly, another problem occurred to me and I hurriedly called out to her. Staring at me with those doubtful but adorable golden puppy dog eyes — so cute, I just wanted to hug you and cuddle you to death, however there’s more important matters now: “About that, how did you learn the ratman’s language.”
“You’re being too meddlesome!”
After throwing down those words, she ordered the imps in charge to lead the captured rodents away, including that rodent encased in the ice prison. Looking at that murderous silhouette, those rodents probably wouldn’t live past a few days.
To think that these rodents were actually forming a coalition, how unexpected. Thank the devil Violet Snow knew how to speak their language or we would’ve been caught completely off guard.
This kind of reminds me of a joke I heard back in China:
A rat momma and her kids were out stealing food when they encountered a kitty. After seeing the kitty, the momma immediately led her kids into a nearby rathole to hide. However, the kitty had already caught onto their scent and began camping outside the hole.
The hole only had one entrance, so if that kitty stayed there forever, they would eventually starve to death. It was then that the momma came up with a brilliant idea and began to roughly mimic a dog’s bark. Hearing the bark, the kitty scampered away in fear.
Having escaped from the kitty, the jubilant but surprised momma began teaching her kids: “See that, kitty cat was scared away by Momma’s dog barks, goes to show how important learning another language is.”
Alright, story time’s over, back to the regularly scheduled show.
“Err, is there anyone who knows the lizardman language?” If even these stupid rodents could scheme, who knew if the lizardmen could as well.
Just as I was pondering about a potential lizardman scheme, an unfamiliar voice rang out from a short distance away: “Your excellency, may I know what are your instructions?”
Tracing the voice back to its source, I found myself staring at a lizard…when did these lizards learn to speak the language of the devills?
“Please do not be alarmed, we lizardmen communicate in the devil language as well.” It was a burly lizardman who spoke up. On his right and left shoulders were particularly large scales that fanned outwards. Beneath them, were a pair of arms that were slightly bloodied as if they had been raked by claws.
“Ah, that makes things so much easier then. I was worried that we might have communication problems.” Amongst these lizardmen were the old, the young and even some mothers who were cradling a half meter long baby. Truthfully, it was a rather surreal scene. Unlike the ratmen, these weren’t healthy, strapping young lizards. In fact, it felt like there hadn’t even been a violent clash at all.
If there was actually a fight, Habona would’ve probably killed off the old and the young by now. After all, we wanted fodder, these lizards would only be baggages and a drain on our food supplies. In other words, they didn’t put much of a fight after they saw Habona’s power?
“You all surrendered?”
