Chapter 209: [ - - 209]
"Do you think you can take on that Blackfang queen?" Gartok asked, as his grip tightened.
"Chieftain Kraven had a hundred men," Gartok said, spit flying into Rask’s face, "A hundred true Zarthian warriors. many of them stronger than you."
"And they were all turned into dog meat in less than an hour. You think you are tougher them all?"
Rask gagged, unable to speak, his eyes bulging.
"We are not here to fight," Gartok addressed the rest of the squad, his glare silencing the snickering snakes and the growling dogs.
"Elder Baez’s orders were very clear."
"He does not want the Usurper’s head."
"He wants intel. He wants to know how many Blackfang Bandits the boy has."
"He wants to know the patrol routes, the weak points in the town, location of the armouries, and most of them all..."
"Will the town people stand up against him?"
Gartok dropped Rask. The Lizardman splashed face-first into the human shit, coughing violently and gasping for air.
"This is a reconnaissance mission," Gartok ordered, "We get in, we get the information, and we get out. You draw a blade, you expose us. You expose us, and you will end up dead."
The squad muttered their reluctant agreements. None of them were stupid enough to challenge the Silverback.
"Good," Gartok grunted. He reached into a sealed, waterproof leather pouch strapped to his massive chest.
He pulled out nine small, black pills.
"Transformation pills," Gartok said, holding them up, "Elder Baez had the Shaman brew these specifically for this infiltration."
He began passing them out. Each beastkin took one, looking at the black pill with obvious disgust.
"Listen closely," Gartok instructed, his tone dead serious. "You swallow this, and it suppresses your beast core. For exactly three hours, you will look, sound, and smell like an ordinary, pathetic human."
Vasha looked at the pill in her scaled hand and sneered, "I have to walk around in weak, pale skin? Disgusting."
"It gets worse," Gartok warned her. "The pill suppresses your powers as well."
"You will lose your speed, your natural armour, and your strength. You will be as squishy and fragile as the peasants up above. If you get into a tavern brawl, if a guard stabs you, you will bleed out. You die."
Gartok pointed his massive finger at the squad.
"You have three hours. You go up to the surface. You find the taverns, the brothels, and the barracks. The human guards will be drunk."
"They will spill their guts if you buy them enough ale. Sila, Vasha, use your new human bodies to coax the information out of the officers. Spread your legs if you have to, just get me the information."
"We meet back at the primary drainage junction in exactly two hours and fifty minutes," Gartok finalised the plan.
"Do not be late. If the pill wears off and you transform back into a ten-foot lizard while you are balls-deep in a human whore, the entire city guard will come down on us, and the mission is blown."
The squad nodded. The plan was solid. Drunken humans were the easiest prey in the world when it came to gathering secrets.
"Swallow them," Gartok ordered.
Rask, still rubbing his bruised throat, popped the black pill into his mouth first. Sila, Vasha, and the two male snakes followed suit. Five of the beasts ingested the shaman’s magic.
The transformation was immediate, and it was horrifying.
Rask dropped to his knees in the muck, screaming as his bones violently cracked and shrank. The thick, dark green scales covering his body began to melt, sloughing off into the foul water like dead skin. His snout flattened, his jaw breaking and resetting into a blunt, human shape.
Sila and Vasha shrieked as their thick, powerful snake tails split right down the middle, the muscle and scale violently tearing apart to form two pale, human legs. Their fangs retracted, blood pouring from their gums.
Within thirty seconds, the five massive beasts were gone.
In their place stood five naked, shivering, perfectly ordinary humans.
Rask looked like a scrawny, scarred mercenary.
Sila and Vasha had transformed into stunningly beautiful, pale-skinned human women, though they were currently retching into the sewer water from the sheer agony of the shift.
"Get your clothes on," Gartok ordered, tossing them bundles of stolen human garments from his pack, "The rest of you eat the pill..."
Gartok stopped.
The two Dog Beastkin, who hadn’t taken their pills yet, had suddenly frozen stiff.
Their long, pointed ears twitched violently, swivelling towards the dark tunnel ahead.
The hackles on their grey, furry backs stood straight up, rigid as wire. They dropped to all fours, their black noses sniffing the foul air frantically as they growled.
"What is it, Rex?" Gartok asked, his hand dropping to the massive iron mace at his hip.
The Dog Beastkin bared his fangs, a low, rumbling growl building deep in his chest, "Someone is here."
Before Gartok could even turn his head, the heavy iron grate set into the ceiling thirty feet down the tunnel was violently kicked out of its mortar.
A body dropped through the opening, landing perfectly on the raised stone walkway that ran alongside the flowing sewage.
THUD!
The impact against the stone echoed through the sewers.
The landing shook the ancient brickwork, sending a cloud of dust and loose mortar raining down over the newly transformed human scouts.
They sputtered and cursed, wiping the debris from their eyes.
At the end of the tunnel, a single figure stood up on the clean stone path.
He was wearing dark, reinforced leather armour and a long coat, completely untouched by the filth flowing just a few feet away.
In the pitch-black gloom of the sewer, his eyes were glowing with a terrifying, piercing light.
DING!
[Master!]
Aiva’s voice chimed in Leo’s head, completely devoid of the tension of the moment.
[I know you currently possess 71 Charisma and a highly potent Draconic aura, but I guess your bed smell spooked the dogs.]
Leo cracked his neck, ignoring the filthy water flowing right beside him. A cruel, shark-like grin spread across his face as he looked at the nine Zarthian infiltrators.
"Shut up, Aiva," Leo muttered aloud, his voice bouncing off the brick walls. "Let’s kill some dogs."