Oh, Rats.

The strange being smiled at John after greeting him, speaking with a deep and rich voice with a slight sour hint in some of the inflections. Like chocolate that was just off in some way that you couldn’t quite place. “I must say, I was honestly betting on my children to beat you in that last round with the rat ogre, but you managed to impress me yet again.”

“... Y… You’re the god of the skaven, aren’t you?” John asked, backing up as he looked at the nightmarish creature.

The being nodded. “And so intelligent too. My, my, my… I suppose Gaia really can choose her champions well.” It raised a hand, and the bones next to John quickly shifted and formed into a chair of bones. “Care to have a seat while we talk?”

“I’ll stand, thanks,” John said, his breathing beginning to increase in speed as the… thing walked closer.

“Suit yourself,” it said, flicking its other hand and forming a chair, no, throne out of bone for itself to sit on. As it sat down, John noticed that its tails would seem to flicker in and out of existence as well as just snaking their way through the smoke. The being then held its hand out, to which a goblet made from a green glowing stone appeared in its hand and filled with red liquid.

“Is… that blood?” John asked nervously.

The being looked at him before chuckling. “No, no. Despite the bones you see scattered about, I am not one for drinking the blood of lesser beings. No, this is Lafite Rothschild 1929. A very fine vintage, and honestly one of the best ideas I had for my children a while ago.”

“Wait, skaven make wine?”

The being laughed, the sound making John shudder as it echoed through the cave. “Goodness no! If they made wine, there would be far too many dead skavenslaves in the batch to enjoy the subtle notes of the vintage. No, I whispered in the ear of a grey seer that an offering should be made of an entire ship of human liquors. Got all of that sent straight to me when they burnt the ship down in my name with warpfire, and now I have an extensive collection of wonderful liquors.” It took a slow sip before letting out a sigh of satisfaction. “If there is one thing I can appreciate about you humans, it's that you all know how to make some delectable foods.”

“Well, I’m glad you appreciate that…” John said, feeling a touch awkward. “But… I assume you didn’t bring me here to just talk about wine?”

“Astute observation,” the being said. “Especially since if I wanted to talk wine, I would demand you have a glass with me to share. But I have a feeling your soul self would have great difficulty in enjoying such a fine vintage. Perhaps when I see your mortal shell walking around, I will pull you aside and we can enjoy a glass.”

“I… uh… don’t drink,” John remarked.

“Give it time. If you grow to be powerful enough that age becomes nothing to you, I doubt your abstinence will continue into your 300s.” The being took another sip before looking right at John. “Speaking of power, I am here to make you an offer-”

“And I will probably decline it,” John said.

The being looked surprised, or at least as surprised as a monstrous rat skull could look. “You haven’t even heard my offer yet.”

“Yeah, but I also did this bit with a couple of other beings and I learned my lesson, especially with Lifthrasir. At this point, if anyone remotely shady offers me a deal, I am going to assume that they have my worst in mind and just say no.”

The being gave a sage nod. “A wise choice. But I would recommend you listen to the deal before outright denying. It makes me, the offerer, feel at least a bit better about pulling all the strings to get your soul to visit me.”

“Yeah, that was going to be one of my questions. Assuming you want to answer questions.”

The being waved a hand dismissively. “Oh, go ahead. But only if you let me make my offer to you.”

“I’ll still deny it.”

“I’ll let the offer sit for a while. You can deny it now, but if you need it later, perhaps then we can talk a bit more.”

John sighed. “Fine. Do I get to ask my questions first, or do I have to wait till you make me my Godfather offer that I can’t refuse first?”

The being smiled a bit. “Why don’t you go ahead and ask your questions?”

“Fine. I’ll start with the big one, what and who the hell even are you?”

The being slowly stood up on its feet, bringing itself back up to its full height and even then some as its body seemed to grow taller and taller. It spread its arms out, and its tail seemed to come fully back into reality as it curled around its legs. “I, Jonathan Benjamin Newman, am the Horned Rat. God of the Skaven, Lord of the World Below, the Great Horned One, the Underfather, et cetera, et cetera, so on and so forth. I have a lot of names that my followers know me by, some of which are secret to them and only them.”

It flexes its fingers a bit, the smoke curling around its hand and forming a sigil made of three lines in the shape of an upside down triangle, with some overlap on the lines to make it look a bit like the head of a rat. “As for the what, besides being a god of the skaven, I am a chaos god.”

“I assume that means you’re different to someone like Odin or Surtr?”

“Indeed,” the Horned Rat said. “Simply put, I exist in the chaotic soup of everything that manages to find form. I am strong enough to hold my essence together and not be torn apart into the chaos that surrounds me. I exist outside of your reality, but also within it as my body is orderly chaos, which is all that your reality is.”

“So… Gaia didn’t create you?” John asked while crossing his arms. “I was told she was the originator of everything. Even the Nordic gods.”

“She did and didn’t,” the Horned Rat explained. “Think of it as… she left a program running on the background of her computer just flickering through random scenarios. I am something that the program created and decided was good enough to not delete.”

“Are you the kind of god that has some evil malicious plan to destroy all of reality?” John asked with a raised eyebrow.

The Horned Rat grinned. “I have no intention of destroying reality any time soon or in the near future. If the opportunity arises, perhaps. But only if it were to be advantageous to me and secure myself a better place in the new reality that would inevitably form.”

“Cool, so I can’t trust you,” John remarked. “You just admitted you would be willing to destroy reality for your own benefit.”

“And that makes me different from any other god how?” the Horned Rat remarked. “Do you think that none of the other gods, if they thought it would lead to a better outcome, wouldn’t destroy Yggdrasil and wait for a new reality to sprout forth? I am honest about my intentions to supplant myself in reality in a stronger position, unlike the gods of order.”

“Wait, if you aren’t in reality, how are the skaven in there? Hell, you mentioned seeing me in my body, how would you do that if you aren’t ‘in reality?’” John asked, forming air quotes at the final words of his statement.

“I am in reality but not fully integrated,” the Horned Rat explained. “I am more akin to… a nail in the side of a tree. I have managed to insert myself and have an influence, but not nearly as far reaching of an effect as something that was in the tree from its planting.”

‘Or a parasite trying to burrow into a body,’ John thought to himself, but kept his mouth shut. No need to piss off the chaos god that could probably rip his soul asunder if it got pissed. “So your skaven are there to integrate your presence into reality more. And I am guessing you want my help in that regard?”

“Only slightly,” the Horned Rat said with a grin. “Your involvement would only involve using a rune or two of mine. That will allow my influence to spread much like how Surtr intends for his influence to spread. Unlike the fiery Jotun, however, my influence does not need you to destroy and burn the realms to the ground. A simple use of my runes gives me a foot in the door, to which I will take over on my plans after that. All you need to do is use the weapon I give you.”

“No way,” John said, shaking his head. “Your skaven have given me enough trouble as is; I am not going to allow you to use me to get even MORE skaven involved in this.”

“And I can assure you that what I need my skaven to do is not intended to give you nor any of your companions trouble,” the Horned Rat replied. “You may not believe me, but I have no desire to see reality be destroyed any time soon. I would prefer to just have my place in reality as it exists, and my influence needs to be in different realms for that to happen. You using my runes would secure that.”

“Which I am not going to do,” John said defiantly. “I already regret relying on Surtr, but his rune is one of my more powerful and controllable offensive runes. Plus, what is done is done, and the deal was already struck with him. Not using Kenaz would only make myself weaker at this point. But if I can say no to you, then I will.”

“Not even in exchange for some needed information?” the Horned Rat asked with a small smirk. “Because I can tell you quite a few things that you need to-”

“Nope. Lemme stop you right there,” John interrupted, holding a hand up. “I don’t wanna hear about any carrots you are dangling in front of me or anything you are trying to use to sweeten the deal. I don’t want to help you nor make any deals with you. So if you can just send me home, that would be great.”

“Ah, but you agreed to at least hear my deal out. That was a deal we struck in exchange for my answering your questions.”

“That wasn’t a deal!” John shouted indignantly.

“It was enough of one,” the Horned Rat chided. “Now be a good runic mage and hear out my deal.”

John let out a sigh before leaning back against the cavern’s wall. “Fine. But my answer is still going to be no.”

“Oh, I have no doubt that it will be no for now. But circumstances change, and people run out of options.” The Horned Rat leaned back in its chair with a satisfied smirk on its boney face. “I have no doubt that someday you will have to come back to me and accept a deal. But I don’t want to wait till the apocalypse for that time, so I will make sure our deal is equally advantageous for the two of us.”

“And that deal is?”

“All you will have to do is utilize one of my runes in combat.” The Horned rat extended its hand, and again the upside down triangle appeared above its palm. “This is a rune of decay. It will cause your opponents to become weaker and their weapons to deteriorate. If placed directly on a surface, it can even eat away at it through the power of rust and aging. All you would need to do is use this rune in combat and create a few runestones that you scatter around during your journey.”

“It’s a rune of decay?” John asked, wanting clarification. “Wait, what happens if you put it on flesh then?”

The Horned Rat just grinned at John, and John instantly felt sick to his stomach imagining the possibilities.

“In exchange for this rune, and other runes if you manage to do well enough with my decay rune, I would offer information about your target, Lifthrasir. As well as information about anything else you might need to complete your little quest against him.”

“And how the hell did you manage to get this info?”

The Horned Rat gestured to a wall nearby, and after a moment or two, the rock started to crumble away to reveal a pair of small rats scurrying through a tunnel. “My rats are everywhere in the realms. Even if they don’t exert much of my influence, I can always listen to their chittering and learn secrets that others don’t realize they are sharing with me.”

“Except in Alberta,” John said.

The Horned Rat let out a groan, rubbing the top of its head as if willing away a headache. “Good Gaia above, don’t get me started on them. I have no idea how the very gods of war and health fail to keep me out of reality, and yet I can’t seem to invade a single providence in Canada! And it's just them! Is it the hockey or something? Do the mounties play hockey with the rats I send? I swear they must have something there protecting them because I won’t be stopped by a bunch of mundane-”

“Anyway,” John interjected, stopping the Horned Rat’s rant. “My answer is no. I won’t use your rune and I don’t want any of your information. We have a clue of how to find him, and once we crack his little code, he won’t be able to hide from us any longer.”

The Horned Rat removed his hand and grinned at John. “Oh, really now? It is going to be that easy? And I suppose you have an idea of what the code even is?”

“Well, I don’t but Naoto said she had an idea. Plus, we have the Order, and they have to have at least a couple of code breakers on salary.”

“True, but code breaking is rather difficult. And it can take quite a long time even if you know all of the parts you are supposed to be working with. And if I recall correctly, all you have is a book with dozens of highlighted phrases, a group of coded notes, and some billing information.” The Horned Rat gave a sarcastic sigh and leaned back on his throne. “I suppose you have all of what you need then to solve the code in… oh, a few years? Maybe even only two if you get lucky. But I think that Lifthrasir’s plans are going to come to fruition long before that, so… I guess you better hope that you all get really lucky with that code cracking.”

John stood there quietly, his arms crossed as he looked at the rather smug skaven god sitting in front of him. He then gave a small sigh before saying, “Fine. Maybe some information would be of use. But I am not using your rune.”

“Then I can’t give you all the information you want,” the Horned Rat replied. “But perhaps… if you were to learn my rune and take it within your skills and psyche, I could at least give you a starting point. Someone to help you figure out where to go so you maybe, maybe, have a chance of stopping Lifthrasir in time.”

“You seem to know a lot about what he is planning,” John remarked. “Is that just because of your rats, or do the two of you have an arrangement that you’re not telling me about?”

“Oh, trust me, there are a few aspects of that man I certainly can admire. His ambition would make even my own children envious,” the Horned Rat said with a chuckle. “But no. If anything, his plans go against my own, so I would prefer to see him stopped before he gets too far along.”

John stared down the rat god for a moment, wondering if it could be trusted. But if all it was asking was that John were to learn the rune, not even use it… well… a hint was better than nothing.

“Fine. I’ll learn your rune. Just tell me where to start.”

“Ah, ah, ah, not yet. Learn the rune, then I’ll give you my clue.”

“How do I know you won’t back out of it?”

The Horned Rat smiled before dragging a long sharp nail across his chest, forming an X. “Cross my heart, as you humans say. Trust me, John, I don’t want to ruin the possibility of you using my rune. It would be best if we were to be on amicable terms for now.”

John looked from the glowing X to the rat’s glowing eyes to the rune floating in his open palm. He sighed softly before staring once more at the rune and using Observe. As he did so, the knowledge of the rune flowed into his mind, filling him with images of rusting metal and ruins laid to waste by time. He could see himself, standing atop a mountain with sickly green magic pouring from his fingertips as the world around him fell to ruin and decay, with the final sounds of the world being a chilling laughter along with the chime of a bell that rang out like a **** knell to all of creation.

John shook his head violently, breaking the vision only to be greeted by the Horned Rat’s grinning bleach-white cranium. “Good job. I can feel my power resting comfortably within you.”

“Ugh, don’t say it like that,” John said with a shudder. “That makes it sound worse than it already feels.”

“Oh, calm down. I was just trying to lighten the mood,” the Horned Rat said with a chuckle. “Now, as for your hint…” it looked to its hand that still held the glowing rune, and with a quick flick of the wrist, the symbol above it started to twist and contort into a strange image. One that, as it grew more solid, filled John with worry and anger.

“You recognize her, don’t you?” the Horned Rat asked with what sounded like sadistic glee.

“You can’t be serious,” John replied. “She’s the one to help us out?! You do know what she tried to do to me when I first became a mage?”

“Oh, that was mostly Brett who channeled that sadism. She only hates you because you killed Brett.”

“Yeah, after he tried to kill me!” John exclaimed before shaking his head. “How the hell is she supposed to help us out with the code? I thought she was loyal to Lif.”

“Being left to rot in prison does terrible things to one’s loyalty, especially when she could have easily been saved by Lif before he escaped,” the Horned Rat explained. “As for how… well, she worked very closely with Lif before he betrayed her. She might know a thing or two to help you translate those little codes.”

“And how, pray tell, am I supposed to get the Order to release another prisoner?! Especially one that was actually a member of the guild!”

“I’m sure you’ll figure something out,” the Horned Rat said. As it did so, the mist in the cave began to grow thicker and more obscuring, and John felt the instinctive need to cough despite none of the smoke actually entering his lungs. “Don’t forget that if you need to learn anything else, a few runestones will earn you some answered questions. But for now…”