Grayson was having a great time while trying to lie to himself and sound angry. It wasn't working.

  You know I can see how happy you are right?

  Shut up.

  A series of laughing messages flashed across Grayson's vision. Despite many other messages appearing and being dismissed, one message stayed present in the corner.

  Kill 30 rats: 3/30

  I'm not saying I mind the kill tracking, but why-

  Behind you! Five O'clock!

  Grayson spun and fired a beam of light, spearing a rat as it ran out from behind the bucket it had been hiding behind. Another rat ran from behind the same bucket in another direction, getting speared as well. After the first rats had died squeaking, the rest had gone to ground and were now hiding in the farm. Grayson was sure some were in the walls.

  Kill 30 rats: 5/30

  Why thirty rats, Queuecy? How do you know it's thirty rats?

  It's always 30 rats.

  I saw the black death. It is NOT always thirty rats.

  It is in games.

  This isn't a game, Queuecy.

  You have to admit it feels like one.

  Another rat. 9 O'clock

  Grayson wasn't able to finish reading the first message before the second interrupted it. He spun to his left and launched another beam. The rat had poked it's head out from behind a bag of flour. The beam fried the rat before it could pull it's head back. Grayson walked over quietly to shift the bag of flour, spinning around to shoot another pair of beams at rats that tried to run before he could turn around. He span back around and launched a beam at the second rat behind the flour bag as it ran.

  Kill 30 rats: 9/30

  What if there are fewer than thirty rats?

  Unlikely.

  Okay, what if there are more than thirty rats?

  I'll just keep counting. You've got this.

  Grayson sighed and got back to looking around for rats. The whole situation was because of that conversation the night before. Tiber had brought up that one of the farms was currently struggling with rats and Grayson had decided to volunteer his time. Now, he was wandering around the farmer's house looking and listening for rodents. So far most of his luck had been in the pantry but he could hear scratching in the walls from time to time.

  He was still having fun. The ability to actually use some of his training in magic was exhilarating and he was genuinely enjoying wandering around shooting magic lasers from his hands. So far he'd even managed not to break anything in the farmer's house. He was worried that the novelty would wear off soon and he'd end up stomping around looking for hiding rodents all day. Grayson had briefly considered using other magic types to kill the rats, but fire or water were simply cruel, wind or earth would make too much of a mess, and any of the other four types of mana would end up being basically the same as each other... shooting lasers.

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  Grayson started changing magic types anyway, taking the chance to get practice converting mana into light, dark, magic, and anti-magic mana. He'd just considered a way to make a black hole with dark mana and was wondering if it might be worth using when Fera found him. She was holding a mug of tea.

  "How's it going?" she asked. Grayson stretched his shoulders, then stepped to the side and vaporized a rat that had been hiding amongst a bucket of potato-like roots.

  "I've found almost a dozen now," he said. He accepted the mug from Fera, then took a sip.

  "Doing well then," said Fera cheerfully. She started wandering around looking behind things. A rat tried to bite her finger when she moved the jar it was behind, but she caught it by the scruff of the neck. She pulled it out carefully, avoiding it's teeth and claws and held it up proudly. Grayson indicated a patch of floor for her to put it on and she dropped it. In mid fall it got hit by a beam of darkness and vanished.

  "Yeah, doing well. The problem's the ones in the walls. Even if we were to block up all the holes they'd chew their way out eventually. They might have to put down poison, dangerous as that would be with children around." Grayson lifted up another bucket of potatoes, causing a few more rats to scurry for cover. He fried them with lasers. Idly, he considered that he was stomping around like Godzilla or Herrikon. Wandering around the home of these creatures and obliterating them with his atomic breath or laser eyes. He didn't consider it a flattering image. Fera noticed him frown.

  "The children around here know not to eat rat poison. We spent enough time teaching them proper manners around food, including how not to poison themselves by eating random berries or powder off the ground." Fera poked around another shelf, finding another rat for Grayson to vaporize.

  Kill 30 rats: 17/30

  "Better if we can deal with it ourselves though?" asked Grayson.

  "Yep!" said Fera happily, finding another rat.

  They'd already had a conversation about relocation as opposed to slaughter. It wouldn't do anyone any good if the rats just came back. Instead they'd have to kill every rat they found. The farmer would still be putting poison down, but this made it more likely that the rats would actually be dealt with. After that, the farmer would be getting a cat. Well, not actually a cat but close enough that the translation worked.

  Grayson and Fera wandered around the house obliterating rats with lasers as they found them. Grayson's counter ticked up past fifty as they continued out across the yard and into the barn, finding most of the colony in the hay loft. The farmer agreed to some more destructive magic as the hay was mostly ruined anyway and a few lightning bolts chained through the rats hiding in the hay. A quick manipulation of fire mana kept the hay from catching fire.

  They kept looking around for another half an hour, finding a couple more rats but eventually deciding to declare the farm clear. The final total was seventy three. It was slightly past noon when they finished and headed back to the village for lunch. They ate at the church before Grayson saddled up Mink to go on a patrol around the area. Fera stayed back at the church to check on Lyn and the new priest.

  Half an hour later, Grayson and Mink were in the sky to the Northwest of the village. He looked down at the forest, looking for the disturbances that a large number of people or wagons might make. The canopy wasn't particularly thick and he had several advantages that others didn't have. He still couldn't see anything.

  We already got rid of a group working in this area. Everyone considers it pretty unlikely that there would be any more groups here, especially after the knights patrolled for a few days.

  Yeah, I just can't shake a feeling that there's something we're missing.

  Probably just regular paranoia.

  Yeah, but let's just go over everything we know before we dismiss it. First, this appears to be the first time these slavers have crossed the mountains in the fall and remained hidden until spring. Second, they operate in groups with wagons, mages, and a leader equipped with magic weapons and armor. They planned this well in advance. They didn't seem to have provision issues and managed to stay hidden until the ground had thawed. Not only that, they had supplies for the return trip.

  Nobody said these people were stupid.

  No. They are just an empire of comparable size that have been sending people across the border to kidnap citizens for long enough that there's an established protocol for how to deal with it. The Muric empire has internal issues, a worse economy, and loses trained fighters every year doing these raids.

  Alright.

  And there's at least one Goddess who absolutely wants to see the end of the empire, with several more that would be willing to help, both to let fighters exhibit themselves and to preside over a major war.

  And your point is?

  Why are they still here?