LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 292: Of rats
The eye creeps and crawls, pulling itself through the darkness, compressing its wet form as it squishes itself between the hair-thin cracks in the rock, traveling between the floors of the dungeon. Curious about the strange, cracking, crunching, gnawing noises that vibrate through the walls, it peeps out of the darkness, staring down at the floor below.
The rat-queen sits on a throne of rats, gnawing down the end of an old stick in agitation, as she stares down at the single rat standing before her. Her eyes twitch and her fingers squeeze down in annoyance, squishing the body of a rat, who considers himself the luckiest of them all.
“A rat-hero, huh?” asks the rat-queen, her eyes twitching as she snaps the end of the stick in her mouth off and spits it out to the side. A swarm of rats, from the edge of the sewer, run over to it, scampering to eat the spit-covered piece of wood that their queen had touched, had chewed on. “That’s not a real thing.”
The rest of the rats hiss in agitation and anger at the disturbance that has been brought to their domain. At the rat-hero, who had challenged the mighty rat-king to an honorable duel.
The rat-hero, being the clear victor of the fight, rises up on his hind legs, proud and tall as he stands victorious on top of the broken body of a thousand rats, knotted together by their tails. A broken flute at their side.
He lifts his fuzzy head high into the air. His eyes, resolute and unwavering, are filled with an impossibly bright fire which shines in the darkness of the dank sewer, as he stares unblinkingly into the rat-queen’s twitching eyes. A tattered pair of underwear is wrapped around his neck, billowing heroically behind him, as the soft wind pushes through the sewer, as the exhalation of the dungeon flows over him. The gentle breeze tousles his fur. It whispers softly into his ears. It beckons him to rise further, to climb higher. It calls him to adventure, to fulfill his heroic duty.
His eyes wander towards that distant darkness, towards that call that he feels in his soul. He can feel it, the finger of god beckoning him to escape, to run free, to save those who need to be saved. He is needed elsewhere. He is chosen. The rats outside of the dungeon need him, they need a hero. They needed someone to believe in.
The rat-queen sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose with her sharp fingers as she bites down on the stick a second time to try and calm herself. “So you want to leave?” she asks, repeating his request that he had earned the right to make through honorable combat. Her eye spasms as she gets up, rising to her feet. The throne of rats lets out a loud hissing, a screaming, as they bear their fangs at the usurper, at the one who would dare to dishonor the queen by requesting to leave her presence.
The rat-hero doesn’t move, he doesn’t flinch as his eyes return to meet those of the rat-queen. He speaks.
“Squeak,” says the rat-hero. The court erupts into a chaotic tussle, hundreds of rats squeak and shriek in agitation, in pure, unbridled disgust and anger at the single rat, at the traitor who would dare to request to leave.
The rat-queen stops, the stick in her hand breaking as she crushes it in her hand. “What did you say?!”
“Squeak,” is all that the rat-hero says, staring into her cold eyes, not giving an inch as she leans down forward, glaring at him from only a foot away.
“You ungrateful little shit!” snarls the rat-queen. “After I took such good care of you?!” She swings the stick out, it smashes against the side of the rat-hero’s face, breaking in half from the strike of the impact. The splintered wood flies off to the side.
The rat-hero doesn’t budge, not losing his footing by even an inch as the remaining half of the stick stays pressed against the side of his cracked skull. He turns his eyes to look back up at the rat-queen. Lifting a tiny rat-paw to push the stick away from his head. The screaming in the court falls into a heavy silence, broken only by the dripping of the trickle of blood that flows out of his mouth, the red droplets dripping down to the stones beside the broken-body of the rat-king.
“Squeak,” is all that the rat-hero says. The chamber is silent. The wind continues to blow, whistling and echoing around the room as it seems to rise in its intensity.
“I’ll bite your head off, you runt!” barks the rat-queen, throwing the broken stick to the floor with a loud clamber. None of the rats move this time, too fearful to get caught in her anger, as her hand wraps itself around the rat-hero’s body. “OW!” yelps the rat-queen, pulling her back and holding it up as a trickle of blood runs down her bitten finger.
The court erupts into a new indignation that doesn’t disturb him in the least. Their voices mean nothing to him. Their feelings, their dark values, born of the underground, mean nothing to the concepts of honor and dignity that fill his beating heart. “Squeak,” says the rat-hero, overpowering the thrashing noise of the crowd all around him as he spits out a mouthful of her blood. “Squeak. Squeak,” he says, looking around. The crowd only gets angrier and angrier, infuriated by his words rather than being won over by them. But he had expected that. The rat-hero turns, his cape billowing dramatically behind himself, as he leaves all by himself, shunned, an outcast. But he doesn’t care. It’s the right thing to do. He turns his head back to the furious, pale face of the rat-queen who is sucking on her hand. “Squeak,” is all that he says to her, his final words, as he leaves to follow his sacred quest.
The thrashing crowd rises and falls in waves, none daring to approach or to break the circle.
“SQUEAK!” calls a shrill voice from the mass. The thousand rats fall silent in disgusted horror, as a small rat breaks out from the ring surrounding the throne room. She runs after the rat-hero, scurrying past the rat-queen, as she catches up to the caped adventurer. “Squeak,” she says to him with a resolute nod, ready to follow him to the ends of the world, ready to give her heart and soul to this cause that he so passionately believes in.
“You! Traitor!” snarls the rat-queen. “How could you?!” she yells, barring her sharp teeth.
“Squeak,” says the small rat, giving a clear and concise answer, as the two of them leave, walking past the ring of rats which breaks open as they approach, fearful of the might of the rat-hero, as he marches towards them, proud and tall.
They set out together on their grand adventure, following the beckoning call of the distant spirit that had crowned him as the chosen of his people. A hero must serve a purpose. He’s going to do it. He’s going to fulfill that noble duty which was bestowed upon him by the purple one. He’s going to save them all. Each and every one of them, even if they hate him for it, even if they don’t know that they need him to do it.
The eye, perched above in the darkness, blinks in confusion as it watches the two of them leave. It hasn’t understood even a tiny bit of what just happened. Still, it’s excited about having seen this scene unfold and it presses itself back into the rock, eager to find something else to watch.
