Miles turned his gaze towards the two thieves, who had apparently been staring at him rather strangely for the last few minutes.

‘Ah. Almost forgot they would find me staring into the empty air quite weird. Oh well, I sincerely doubt that they’ll be able to guess I was staring at a system quest screen.’

So with a clap, rather similar to the one he had first entered the room with, Miles declared, “Something just came up. We can continue our discussion once it’s over and done with. See you later, folks,” and turned around to leave.

Luther seemed to disprove as he hurriedly pushed himself up on the bed, “Wait! How long do we have to wait here then?”

Stopping for a moment, Miles shrugged, “A few hours at best, a day or two at the most? But I doubt it’ll take that long.”

“Huh?! You don’t know how long we’ll be here? And it might even be days? What the f*ck?! Is that how you treat people you want to work for you?!”

Miles’s eyes narrowed into a frown, “Regardless of the offer, one which I didn’t actually finish making, you, are, thieves. Ones who would’ve killed us given the chance. That never changed.”

Noticing Jimmy preparing to say something, Miles raised an index finger, signaling him to be silent, “I don’t give a sh*t about the specifics Jimmy. All that matters is you did. Two days of being stuck in a room is already far too lenient for what you have done.

Now tell me, are there any more complaints?”

Luther scowled but ultimately remained silent.

“Yeah, I thought so,” Miles spat back with a grin.

But just as he opened the door and prepared to step out, Jimmy called out as well, “And w-what if I don’t want to work for you?”

Miles raised an eyebrow, “You’d be an idiot to not accept my offer. And I don’t believe you are. An idiot, I mean.”

But the straw-haired youth seemed adamant in finding out, “But what if I didn’t?”

Miles revealed a merciless smile, “Do you really have to ask? You know already, what thieves get. So for your sake, I hope you choose differently,” and finally stepped out, the door closing behind him.

Jimmy gulped nervously.

Yes, he knew what happened. Which also meant they wouldn’t have a lot of choice in the matter.

But the man responsible for the deal had already left.

The gears whirred as the steel door locked itself with an audible clunk, almost as if to emphasize their current situation. They were prisoners, sealed within a room, one that now also had a hole containing a skewered rat corpse.

Falling back onto the bed, Luther cursed with an scowl, “F*ck! What a sanctimonious assh*le! He’s the blood-sucking demon here, not us! Rich monster c*nt! How I wish I could wipe that smug grin off his face!”

Jimmy heaved a sigh, and asked slowly, “Luther, are you sure we shouldn’t have told him? He didn’t seem to know, and it didn’t seem like he’d stop either…”

Luther seemed confused for a moment, “What are you talking about--?” until Jimmy pointed at the hole in the wall and the rat corpse.

“Oh that. Yeah of course. We can’t just let him know out of the goodness of our hearts, now can we? Besides, it may end up being a good thing. If he keeps that up, the rats will definitely end up taking revenge. Or if we're really lucky, he might even end up angering the piper of legend! Might just end up being our chance to escape!” the scarred man answered with a smile.

But his smile dissipated instantly, "Who am I kidding. The f*cker obviously didn't leave to kill rats. So it doesn't matter if he knows or not. We're screwed."

Jimmy heaved another sigh. On that, he agreed.

***

Miles walked into the kitchen. Simple, but well equipped with any and all amenities one would need to prepare a good meal.

Unfortunately, what was supposed to be a place for delicious aromas and delectable food, smelled like a rotting carcass, filled with purplish-black smoke that set his nostrils one fire. It might have actually been worse than the air outside.

And at the very center of this strange smoke was Zhan Shen, wrapped in what seemed to be a white apron, but charred with soot and god knows what else, as he stirred a small pot over the cooker.

Having sensed his arrival, the old butler called out with a laugh, “Master Miles! You should stay a bit away. This might only be rat poison, but it still isn’t meant to be inhaled by humans and maybe even... you.”

Miles raised an eyebrow. If the fumes were unhealthy even for undead Kindred, how the hell was an old man standing right in the middle? Spiritual Stream f*ckery?

Either way, he heeded his guardian's warning and stopped. Miles hadn’t even entered the kitchen yet, but the strong smell, further enhanced by his kindred senses, was already giving him a headache.

He called out from a distance, “I’m afraid just that might not be enough, old Zhan. We need to talk. Now.”

Zhan Shen turned around, preparing to disagree when he noticed that his ward was being absolutely serious.

Instantly, the old butler acted. He flipped off the cooker, closed the boiling pot with a lid, and threw what remained of his apron onto the floor. Clapping his hands clean, he quickly walked over.

With a worried frown, Zhan Shen questioned, “What’s wrong, Master Miles?”

Miles didn’t answer immediately. His blood vision had revealed that while there weren’t many, there were still some rats in the kitchen.

It was entirely possible that the rats couldn’t make sense of what they said and could only remember what they heard, transferring it to the mysterious ‘owner’ later on.

Considering that he and Zhan Shen had been planning on poisoning out the rats for a while now, and the fact the horde hadn’t reacted to that, either by attempting to fight back or escape, Miles felt this was a reasonable conclusion.

Unfortunately, he didn’t know enough about familiars or the extent of control the owner had over them.

It was entirely possible that the owner or perhaps even someone else, could listen through the rats. Or the rats might be sensitive to particular keywords. There were just too many possibilities, and Miles simply couldn’t know for sure.

So instead of answering the question, he asked while keeping his voice as low as possible, “Old Zhan, do you maybe have telepathy? Or a spiritual conversation ability, or something? We could send messages through the network, but last time we did that, you ended up dialing every singer user in a 50-mile radius, so...”

Zhan Shen raised an eyebrow at the latter comment, but he seemed to understand the gist of the situation. “Can they see?” he asked vaguely.

Miles paused before answering, “No, no, they cannot.”

Zhan Shen smiled, “In that case, no need to think so far, when we can use some good old paper.”

Miles couldn't help but be surprised, finally laughing. ‘Paper, eh? Why didn’t I think of that? Simple, but efficient.’

The old butler gestured Miles towards the dining table, and swiftly brought over a few sheets of paper from a cabinet nearby, along with a simple pen, which he handed over with a smile of his own. 

Taking a deep breath, Miles began to write down.

***

Miles exhaled, feeling slightly nervous.

It had already been around 10 hours since he had first spoken to Zhan Shen in the kitchen. It should already be noon, probably with the mid-day sun blasting everywhere in heat and light.

Why was he uncertain about this?

Well, it was because Miles couldn’t see the outside, from inside a dark and musty room without even a single window.

And technically speaking, this wasn’t exactly a room either.

It was… more of a basement, with unpainted walls revealing concrete and cracked floors. It was also extremely dark, but with his kindred night vision, Miles could see as clear as day.

The random clutter, empty boxes, and old furniture had already been pushed into a corner, clearing the area for the soon to arrive guests.

However, a single wooden box about 1 meter or so in height remained by the side. This was where Miles currently was, crouched upon the wooden lid.

Taking a deep breath, he steeled himself. It was time.

Bringing the Lykaon ring closer to his face, he spoke, “Alright old Zhan, do it. Release the gas.”

The ring crackled as a familiar voice rang out from the other side, “Good luck, Master Miles. Releasing in 3, 2, 1…”

Boom!

Miles could feel vague tremors through the walls, as old Zhan’s bombs exploded, releasing the gas into the walls.

Immediately, his eyes flashed red as Blood Vision activated, revealing the rats within the walls. They didn’t seem to have realized what was coming, but they would soon enough, and by then, they would have no paths for escape.

Except for the one before him, of course.

Clearly visible to his eyes even in the pitch-black darkness, a small hole, not too different from a crack, was placed at a discrete corner of the wall.

Miles tapped the ring, causing a transparent blue screen to pop up, lighting the area with vague azure light. It clearly depicted a house plan of sorts, uncannily identical to the placement of the walls in property #8.

This was a map, one that clearly marked all the paths available for the rat horde.

Miles had not slacked off in the last few hours.

While Zhan Shen had worked on his concoctions, he had been analyzing the walls and mapping down all the paths available, with some help from the Lykaon network’s artificial intelligence of course.

While the sensors couldn’t detect the rats for some unknown reason, they could detect structural anomalies within the house, specifically aberrant spaces inside the walls.

And now that he knew all the paths used by the horde, Miles also knew all the exits. Those were exactly the places where old Zhan had placed the gas bombs that had just exploded.

Just to be clear, this gas was not poison. But more of a… repellant?

The old butler had assured him that no monster or beast would stick around once they smelled it, with the horde rats being no exception.

But Zhan Shen had not agreed to this immediately.

More than once, he had asked, “The rat poison I was making might not be enough, but I can easily make something stronger. So why can’t I just poison them all to death?"

It was obvious to anyone that directly poisoning the rats would be the most efficient. Miles had thought so himself. But upon reflection, he had realized a few problems.

If it was the poison that killed the rat, how would he get blood points?

That last system message had said something about the rat blood being ‘insufficient’. Which could only mean that if he got more, it would eventually become sufficient, giving him additional attribute points or maybe even better rewards.

Not to mention the fact that these horde rats might give him experience, allowing him to level up further.

All that would’ve been wasted, had he been lazy and used the poison.

Miles knew it was never a good idea to overreach, but he just couldn’t let this opportunity go to waste.

So he had just done it, taking a leap of faith.

It was just a few rats after all. What could possibly go wrong?

Miles's eyes flashed, bringing him out of his thoughts. The rats were beginning to move erratically, probably having smelled the monster repellant.

Within a few minutes, they had begun rushing towards the many exits, only to realize that the smell only got worse the closer they got. Not to mention the fact that Zhan Shen had already sealed those exits off. They wouldn't be getting out that way.

With most paths sealed off, it didn’t take long for a lucky rat to begin making their way through the tunnel towards Miles’s location.

The pioneering rat slowly poked its head out of the hole, sniffing the air and glancing around the darkroom for any potential danger.

Thankfully, it didn’t seem to notice anything.

Miles remained calm, holding himself back. If he wished to kill the rat with blood spikes, he had a clear shot. But he didn't.

While the rats didn’t seem intelligent or capable of understanding human speech, they were intelligent in their own way.

And most importantly, they were capable of sensing the death of their fellow rats. Miles knew this for a fact.

Shortly after he had left the white room with the two thieves, a small group of rats had made it into the tunnel in the wall and homed in on the dead rat corpse.

Miles had luckily been paying attention and had continued to observe with Blood Vision.

The rat corpse had quickly become surrounded by a dozen or so horde rats. For a moment, he had been confused as to what was happening, until... the rats began to feed, to feed on the corpse of their fellow rat. Upon it's death, the rat had become nourishment to the horde, who emotionlessly gorged on it's flesh and organs in their entirety, leaving nothing but the bare skeleton. 

It was quite horrific, to say the least. But Miles couldn’t exactly judge the rats too much, when he himself had drunk human blood.

Intriguingly, Jimmy and Luther seemed to not see the gruesome sight, as they ignored the cannibalism taking place right next to them. Miles had found this interesting, but simply assumed they had seen worse having lived in the outer city.

Either way, the main point was, the horde rats could sense the deaths of their fellow comrades.

Which meant, Miles couldn’t kill the rat before him. At least not without alerting the others. So he had to stay his hand.

Meanwhile, the rat slowly made its way out of the hole, dropping onto the floor.

It almost seemed to be aware the layout of the room, as it instantly made its way towards the exit.

‘Just a bit more… Just a little to the side…’

Miles's hand twitched, holding a strange metallic ball.

With a few more steps, the rat would be out of sight to any more rat at the hole. The perfect position. But just before it moved further, its pink nose seemed to smell something in the air.

With a sudden shift of its head, the rat’s gaze instantly fell on Miles.

‘Fuck!’

With an instantaneous movement of his hand, he threw the metal ball onto the floor.

Clunk!

The ball struck the floor in between the hole and the rat, with a loud metallic clunk, successfully scaring the rat into moving further from the hole.

Hiss!

Instantly, a yellow gas, unseen in the darkness, began to leak out of the ball, quickly spreading through the room.

Miles calmly reached into his back pocket and brought out a gas mask, one which he quickly put on.

The rat had already begun to rush back towards the hole, in hopes of making it back and perhaps alerting its horde. Unfortunately, its movements were quickly becoming sluggish, until it just fell down, awake but unmoving.

Zhan Shen had not only made the monster repellant bombs. He had also made this.

An aroma-less paralyzing agent, harvested from a fae-enhanced fungi that released stun spores.

Miles released a nervous breath, as he shifted his gaze back towards the rats in the walls.

Now to see if he would make it or break it. It was the moment of truth. 

If the horde could sense the paralysis of the rat as well, he would have no other chance but to cut his losses.

But thankfully, the rats continued to scutter about, paying no special attention towards this direction.

Miles grinned in relief, ‘Paralysis gas for the win! Thank you old Zhan!’

Instantly, he brought out a small black rod, one which lengthened into a 2-meter pole with an audible click. This was a simple extendable metal pole. Before any more rats could arrive, and notice the collapsed rat, Miles pushed it away, quickly hiding the paralyzed rat in a discrete corner close to him, skilfully using the pole.

He quickly did the same for the two halves of the metal ball. 

Yes, this was his master plan!

To keep paralyzing the rats and keep hiding the evidence with the pole, until he captured all of them! In the end, he could just kill all of them in a single swoop!

The fact that they were horde rat familiars, enhanced and possessed fae abilities, didn't matter one bit!

The paralysis agent was equal before all rats and creatures of similar size!

It was a perfect plan, even if he had said so himself. 

With an expectant grin, Miles shifted his glance back towards the mouse hole.

He reached for another metal ball, twirling it in between his fingers. 

‘Well then, keep it coming!’