Remarkably, the Ratkin are more similar to us than many of the other races. For one, we share an insatiable greed which causes us to strive ever higher. For another, we place a significance on family which many others find baffling. For a third, our most horrific atrocities have been against ourselves. These similarities can be used to partially explain why some of us defected at a later date.

Suko Ryo - Interspecial Expert - Humanity and the Other Races

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Shivers tittered, beady eyes gleaming as he imagined his future. Although he was currently in the fifth buck division, he could see himself as a skitterstaff in a few years, just like his third uncle, cracking skulls and snapping bones. At ten years of age, he was younger than the other bucks here, and he could only imagine their faces when he rose above them.

“Shivers, focus!” Munter said in his shrill voice, “The last party got wiped out!” Munter Smalltail was a dusty-brown ratkin as young as Shivers but almost a head taller, far bulkier, and (ironically) with a longer tail. Despite this, he was somehow also a coward who would undoubtedly run at first notice.

“They only had three shieldrats - we’ve got twenty! We’ll destroy them, destroy them!” Shivers replied, growing excited. If he proved himself in this battle, perhaps he would get promoted immediately.

The taller ratman shook his head, his nervous eyes watery. “You’ve heard about the warrens disappearing over the last few days, right? What if it’s a monster doing that?” He lowered his voice until he was whispering in Shivers’s ear. “What if that monster’s here?”

A chill ran through Shiver’s spine, and he swatted Munter away. “Bah!” While he had no idea why or how the warrens had disappeared, he highly doubted they were due to monster attacks - there was no way a planet like this had such force. “Stop worrying. You’re always worrying, making me worry.”

Munter’s eyes widened with shock. “You worry? But you’re always so…” The taller rat was lost for words, his whiskers quivering.

“Yes, even I worry,” Shivers said while looking away. When he became a skitterstaff, he would recommend Munter as well; although the bigger rat was a coward and frequently got on his nerves, he had always had his back, at least when he wasn’t running away. “But we don’t need to worry here. No worry because it will be easy!”

There was a loud grunt from further on the column and the fifth buck division came to a halt. Pushing onto his tip-toes, Shivers looked over the field of groomed whiskers and abysmal hairdos to see their target village in the distance. It was apparently populated by humans, these fur-less ratkin who lacked magic ability, although he couldn’t spot any of them right now. Could they have run? He felt a pang of disappointment at the thought - how could he prove himself when his enemies were more craven than Munter?

At the front of their division, Tshik was speaking with a shieldrat, giving the higher-ranked ratkin considerable respect despite only being less than a head shorter. Shivers figured he would also recommend Tshik when he became a skitterstaff, because while the division leader could be dour and humourless, he had given Shivers preferential treatment on account of his uncle.

“There. You will go, and you will break it down,” the shieldrat said, nose wrinkled in distaste.

“What if the hu-man hasn’t run? What if they’re hiding?” Tshik replied, squinting into the distance. He was a paranoid ratkin who always thought about what-ifs (like Munter, Shivers realised) but it was evidently a trait that had served him well as he had grey fur and droopy whiskers.

The shieldrat shrugged, dirty armour catching light. “Survive.” His contempt was almost palpable.

Grunting, Tshik followed the order after some hesitation, leading his rabble over the well-trodden ground, claws sinking into the mud. They made it over quickly, reaching the cobbled streets, unmanned barricades, and laughably primitive traps. His nose twitched as he sniffed the ground and shiftily surveyed the nearby looming buildings and dark corners.

Shivers copied the actions and frowned at the encompassing smell - it was strange but not particularly unpleasant. He wondered if all humans lived above ground in these harsh-looking buildings or whether there was more to be seen underground - individual ratkin had their preferences, but he definitely preferred the dim, musty tunnels.

Clicking his tongue several times, Tshik said, “Not this way, no, no, no. If the hu-man jumps us, we’ll be caught between these.” He patted one of the wood and metal constructs. “We’ll go that way instead.” He pointed towards a different entrance to the village with fewer barricades.

“But the shieldrat—” said a buck at the front, supported by many protesting sounds from his mates.

Tshik sneered. “Stupid, stupid rat.” This silenced the division, for a moment, before discussion broke out even louder as they followed him down the alternative path. Their claws clicked across the stone, click, click, click, and they advanced. Careful ratkin like Tshik were far and few between, and even they failed to notice the moving shadows and the distant, hushed voices.

They were crossing a nondescript street onto a bridge when a group of humans appeared on the other side, carrying large, ungainly shields as if that would save them from death. Excitement and energy coursed through the division, and although Tshik tried to hold them back, Shivers surged with the others onto the thin bridge, crashing into the pink, hairless beings.

Suddenly, the windows of the houses behind them snapped open, and arrows swished through the air. Shivers ducked in time, jolting back as the ratman beside him collapsed over, an arrow through his eye. Glancing over at the human archers, he saw his chance, his opportunity! Hastened by adrenaline, the ratman bolted towards the nearest house, fists clenched around his axe.

The door flung open and a tall human calmly strode out. It had lean, muscled arms, a shaved head, and, curiously enough, no weapons. Despite this, it wore an ugly grin, one which Shivers reflected back twofold; it was just his luck that his first foe was a scatterbrain eager for death. It jabbed towards him, and he ducked, flinging his axe upwards. Its follow-up fist came out of nowhere and slammed into his chin, throwing him off his feet.

Dazed, he tumbled to the ground, head throbbing with pain as a hot slickness dribbled from his chin onto his chest. He tried to push himself up from the grass, but his legs felt like limp noodles, and he slipped back down. Ignoring the blur of colours that had replaced his vision, he groaned aloud, crying for help, crying for Munter. His groans turned to a squeak as an arrow pierced through his lungs, air escaping his body. Still, he struggled for breath, his body shivering, mind dimming.

****

Hearing the clamour of violence in the distance, Silas peeked out of the window again. The ratkin archers were close, turning towards the sounds, and there were no armoured ratkin in sight. Glancing over at Bandana Dom, he nodded and sprinted out, vaulting over the barricades into the midst of the archers.

He swept his spear and cleared several at once, then held his weapon horizontal and pushed the bodies forward. Arrows dug into the meat shields with only a few glancing off of him. The nearest ratmen were taking out melee weapons, but it was too late as he advanced forward, cutting them down like stalks of grain.

Less than thirty seconds in, he saw the archers at the back retreating, sprinting away and throwing themselves over the barricades. Cleaning up the last few on him, he gave chase and took down as many ratmen as he safely could. Dom followed him, and they eventually reached the fringes of the village, where the Squire nested his palms over his mace’s end and lowered his head onto it.

Gazing across the plains, Silas spotted a great number of ratkin running, signalling the other ambushes had succeeded. Despite this, the division of armoured ratkin, the shieldrats, were still advancing unperturbed, shields raised to block the barrage of arrows. Coming up to them were Sabine, Josh, and Elise, supported by their teams. Silas shook his head, brow wrinkling over - while they were strong, they were greatly underestimating this trained, armoured force.

Not having much of a choice anymore, he set off towards the enemies, Dom not a step behind, closing in on the rats from the left wing. Just as he was about to brace himself for impact, he spotted Faris charging over from the right wing, the Mounted Archer’s phantom horse creepily translucent in the sunlight.

Some of the shieldrats turned to face the horseman, splitting off into a turtle formation, when the Arabian man abruptly turned away and shot his nocked arrow. It caused no damage as it bounced off a shield, but this distraction had weakened the left wing in turn. Eyes shimmering with mana, Silas gazed over the field of flashing red as his Weakness Vision highlighted vulnerable spots. He thrust at the nearest shieldrat, curving the blow midway, causing the blade to streak across the cheek of the ratman beside.

His initial target dashed forward at this, but he leapt back having foreseen the movement, simultaneously sweeping across its feet. It swiftly lowered its shield, saving itself from injury while opening its torso up. He struck and took it out in one clean blow, before turning tail and creating distance between himself and the three shieldrats crowded around him.

While two faltered at seeing his speed, one kept up the chase, red-eyed through its norman helmet. He suddenly turned and stabbed it through its neck, before darting forward and taking down another with its back turned. Luckily for him, other people were taking the brunt of the shieldrats’ ferocity, so he had mostly free-rein to take down rat after rat. Ten minutes later, the last shieldrat fell to Dom, the Squire’s mace slick with gore.

Despite coming out on top, it was an ugly victory to say the least. While the ambushes had gone better than expected, tearing out gruesome chunks from the ratkin’s numbers, the fight with the shieldrats had resulted in heavy wounds and several deaths. In total, sixty had been wounded, almost twenty severely so, and thirty had died. This brought Riverside’s fighter population to just shy of thirty with only half now in fighting condition and the non-fighter population to below two hundred.

To make things worse, most of the non-fighters could no longer help with combat, either injured or heavily traumatised by what they had seen and done today. Silas knew many would simply run away before the next battle started, further straining those who stayed. It was just his luck that tomorrow would mark the second week since Riverside had been founded, just in time for the second horde…

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Waseem Bukhari, the Giant, was originally a thug from Pakistan. Soon after emerging from the hard tutorial, he fought Foltrus’s Avatar from the Order of Tyr and was promptly crushed. Regardless, he survived and on recovery sought out the nearest Order settlement and joined them, becoming the first ranker to do so. He was fervent in his beliefs and spent the following weeks proselytising a large number of humans, climbing through the Order’s ranks.

He was particularly noted for his leadership against a neighbouring human settlement. Having declined an invitation to join the Order of Tyr, the village (whose name is lost to us) was torn down by Waseem and his band of cultists. They drained blood from the corpses into a circular bathtub, placing it in the centre of the village to act as Tyr. Around it, they arranged the corpses in different poses, some on their knees in prayer, others on the ground reaching out for the bathtub of blood, and even a few strung up the telephone lines like they were ascending.

Although Waseem was initially punished for this act by his higher ups, this punishment was reversed a few weeks later as…

Stefan Sommer - the Chronicler - Heroes and Villains of the First Age