"What?!" Pan Long could hardly believe his ears.
How could a group of people, with someone as quick-witted and cunning as Milton Ferry among them, have fallen into an ambush laid by mere lizards? Impossible!
However clever lizards might be, they were still animals—and reptiles at that. How intelligent could they be? At least ninety-nine percent of what they did was instinct. Whether the remaining one percent even counted as intelligence was another question.
How did that saying from Strange Tales go? How much wit can beasts possess? Enough only to make us laugh.
That was not prejudice against another species. They really were that stupid!
Last time, for instance, he had cut them down one or several at a stroke. It had been a one-sided mowing, yet the Lizards had shown no fear and kept rushing at him in swarms.
Later, sunlight had done them terrible harm, but they had not tried to avoid it. They had simply huddled at the mine entrance like fools.
If thousands upon thousands of them had swarmed the Ferrier Lineage's party and overwhelmed it through sheer numbers, Pan Long would not have been too surprised. Zombies could overrun the armies of a mighty world power, after all. Supernatural forces were that fierce and unreasonable.
But for the lizards to lay an ambush and defeat the Ferrier Lineage's party? That was absurd!
"What exactly happened?" he asked at once. Then he thought for a moment and added, "Tell me on the way."
As their carriage headed out of town, Joseph gave him a detailed account.
That morning, thirty or forty members of the Ferrier Lineage had set out for the valley in force, each carrying a mirror. They wanted to kill as many lizards as they could while they had the chance.
They had