"What about the people of Greenfield Town? They were innocent, but the Chaos Cult slaughtered the whole town just because I went there!"
"Innocent?"
The Deputy Chief Judge exchanged glances with the few others who knew the truth.
"Annan, do you know how much trouble we went to gathering those villains in one town?"
The Empire might be barbaric, but it wasn't the Rikaner Kingdom. How could it send its own people to their deaths?
Under their gazes, Annan felt like a complete fool, played right into the hands of these scheming adults. He should have been the star of The Truman Show. Faru Barros had nothing on him.
"What did you call me here for?" Annan's expression turned cold.
If Olin hadn't been pushing Old Ancestor's wheelchair, he would already have picked it up and hurled it at them.
The Deputy Chief Judge said, "To tell you the truth."
"Oh, well, now I know." Annan looked at Albeck, who was racked with guilt. "Turn Albeck back into a human, and I'll go home."
The dungeon fell silent for several seconds. Then the Deputy Chief Judge said, "We can't."
"You can't?"
"I'll explain," Albeck said. "To earn the High Priest's trust, I accepted the Great Horned Rat's Blood. It permanently turned my body into that of a Ratfolk. I'm less a human now than a Ratfolk with a human soul."
"Can't you turn the Many-Faced Demon back?" Annan asked the Deputy Chief Judge.
"The Great Horned Rat's Blood is more aggressive than the Many-Faced Demon."
Annan looked coldly at the Deputy Warden and the assembled ministers. "This is how you treat a man who sacrificed so much for the Empire? You make him spend the rest of his life as a rat?"
"This is how I make amends, Annan. My