His boots clacking under his foot, Silas made his way through the corridor, stopping in front of one of the many dull, numbered doors down its length. He knocked, heard sounds of shifting from within, and opened to a plain but well-lit room. There was a table to the side, its surface neatly covered with an order of paints, brushes, and chisels, in addition to several more equipment he failed to identify. In the centre, there were two chairs, one empty and the other occupied by an unconscious Retil Smallfoot, his head hanging limp and his body nude and cleaned.

Beside him were several easels displaying artworks that all captured Retil’s appearance from different angles - they were detailed to point Silas would have thought them photographs if not for the plain strokes of paint at the edges of the canvases. Standing just ahead of this was a beautiful olive-skinned woman, her dark eyes aglitter as she respectfully bowed at his entrance. Black flowing hair framed her face, and she wore a white blouse coloured with dull and bright streaks of paint and denim jeans. Curiously enough, she was barefoot.

“You must be Zita,” Silas said, walking forward with his hand outstretched. Greeting one another, he seated himself in the empty chair and tried to relax, his shoulders dropping but his head raising to the light to give her better measure of his qualities. However, she didn’t come and inspect him like he had expected, instead crossing the room to gather her equipment.

His gaze followed her, eyes widening when he saw her casually pick a chisel and hammer amongst others. “I hope you don’t mind me asking what exactly you’re going to do. I’d rather you didn’t hack away at my face if there’s any another way of doing this.”

Zita spun around and offered him a gentle, assuring smile. “Oh, you don’t need to worry about that - I’ll be working above your face.” That was enough to assuage his worries, so he let her get on with her work again. She looked back at Retil, then at her paintings, before returning to Silas. He sensed arcane from her fingers as she pinched at his face, each time pulling it out to reveal thick globs of translucent glue that stuck to his skin. Less than a minute had passed when she finished enveloping his face, at which time she began chipping away at it in focus, building his new profile.

She pinched back at it when she went too deep and used her fingers to smooth the edges, completing the mask twenty minutes later. “This’ll be the rough start. I’ll finish it after colouring,” she informed him, going back to fetch her paints. Along with a palette, she returned with a cup of red paint which she, curiously enough, poured right into his mould, tinting his vision with a murky crimson colour. Despite this, he stayed still like a fitting subject, allowing her to spread it thoroughly before taking to the exterior with a paintbrush, painting it in Retil’s colours, occasionally switching to her chisel and fingers to make further edges or smooth away the ridges.

Over an hour later, she exhaled deeply and dropped her tools. Her lips pinched and brow fell as she regarded his new face, gazing deep at all its features and comparing with Retil’s, taking hold of Silas’s chin and turning it to view it from all its angles. Satisfied, she nodded at him and broke the silence that she worked in. “Now just your body left. Your clothes, if you would.”

Silas sighed, having been informed of this earlier but still feeling somewhat embarrassed at stripping nude in front of a stranger. But work was work and his mask hid his flush while he undressed, exposing the rest of his body. Thankfully, Zita was professional in her demeanour, asking him to stand as she pinched out a mould for the rest of his body. No exceptions were made in this task, including his privates, as they weren’t taking any chances in his disguise being uncovered simply because he had to strip out of his clothes at Ratterinks for whatever reason.

The suns rose and arced and dipped before Zita finished painting this too, clapping her hands while she stepped back to regard her work. She shook her head softly in amazement, “Perfect, if I say so myself. You’re no longer Silas; from hereon you’re Retil Smallfoot.”

Silas broke his frozen posture and finally observed his new skin in full, starting with wonder and slowly drifting into an odd mixture of admiration and disgust. He had dusty grey hair all over his body, his hands and feet armed with dirty claws and his angular mouth housing hanging incisors at the front and thick molars at the back. His vision was tinted dark by the beady eyes he had to view the world with, and straw-like whiskers had sprouted around his nose. This new exterior hung off him with the same weight as his armour, making it noticeable but not quite a hassle. His feelings grew even more complicated when he looked at Retil now, seeing his reflection in the ratman who lay still with a slow trickle of saliva dribbling down his chest.

Zita went to her table and opened a bag by its foot, taking out the underclothes and dirtied armour Retil had been wearing on the time of his capture. She held it out for Silas, who dressed at once, noting immediately that his sense of touch had dulled considerably with this exterior. Afterwards, she handed him Retil’s weapons, a wooden recurve bow with a quiver of arrows, a thin spear, and a thick machete that reached long enough to be considered a shortsword.

Once he was done, Zita smiled cheekily. “You would cause a real ruckus on the streets if you went out like this.”

He grinned. “Thanks for this, this is brilliant work. I hadn’t thought such an accurate bodysuit would be possible.”

She waved her hand dismissively. “No, really it’s my honour to be able to help out like this - I hadn’t thought my abilities would ever play such an important part here.” Then, her eyebrows bouncing up like recalling something she had nearly forgotten to mention, she started, “The suit will stay up for as long as you keep supplying mana to it, although it will start degrading after about a week, firstly superficially but you should leave then because its vital parts will break down not long after.”

“I see. Well, it sounds like I’ve got no time to waste, so I’ll get going now. Once again, thanks for this.”

****

Silas sat in Elise’s office, reading through the paper in his hands, the document holding all the information they had on Retil. Apparently the Smallfoots were quite a prestigious family in Ratterinks, their patriarch being a sorcerer of considerable power. At least, that was what the ratman had claimed, although it could just as be he was bluffing in the hope of being released. Either way, Retil was only one of dozens of grandchildren, and not an impressive one at that, so it was unlikely the sorcerer thought too much of him even if it was all true.

Another important point there was that Retil mostly kept to his troop, the same group that Silas had slaughtered, so there shouldn’t be many others in Ratterinks who were largely familiar with this ratman, apart from his family, of course.

“That’s why you should keep a distance from his family,” Elise said, now joined by Rolf who idly drummed the table with his sausage-fingers.

“Yes, they’re the ones with the most reason and resources to foil your disguise, so instead just wander Ratterinks to gather information. If you try for anything more, his family might notice you,” the bespectacled Strategist said. “We don’t know their culture, but I’m sure there are slouchers there too, so you shouldn’t attract attention by doing so.”

“And when I first arrive?” Silas asked. “What do I say about my absence?”

“Say a human killed your troop and tried to carry you away for unknown reasons. Make it sound like you somehow escaped and resolved to return, although it took you a few days since you were lost and quite a distance away,” Rolf said, adding, “And if they try to dig more on the human attack, act like you’re traumatised rather than giving more details. The more you give, the more they can scrutinise your account and spot the oddities about your person.”

Silas had never been the best actor but he could lie well enough and trauma wasn’t too hard for him to imagine, especially since all he had to do was summon the feelings he had felt at the start of the tutorial. As such, although he was anxious about this mission, he didn’t have frayed nerves over it just yet.

Elise frowned and said, “Your aura is dulled by the suit, so you seem similar to Retil in that aspect, but remember that your mana barrier will continue to block their scans. If these scans really can distinguish between races like we fear, then it’s best you keep it up, but there’s a chance even that will put you in a spot of bother since someone might get suspicious you’re not showing up on the scans. If such a thing happens—”

“Escape at once,” Silas finished for her, “I know. If I think my disguise is in any danger of being broken, I’ll leave right away, even if it means I haven’t got that much information. I’m not going to throw away my life so easily.”

“Good, you’re too valuable for us to lose,” Elise said, inclining her head. “You’ll find Dom outside with a few other officers. They’re going to rough you up - to make the prospect of you escaping the human more believable - then drive you out of Riverside. We don’t want anyone mistaking you for a ratkin here and attacking you on the streets.”

“That would probably not be the best start,” Silas admitted with a chuckle.

“Good luck then,” Rolf said, dipping his head.

“Godspeed, Silas,” Elise said, offering him a confident smile. “Come back safe.”

****

Returning to ratkin territory was easy enough for Silas, although he was tenser this time knowing what lay ahead of him. The biggest danger was that he would get exposed in a public spot with tens and tens of ratkin surrounding him, as such he hoped that the first ratkin he met would call him out in case his disguise wasn’t good enough.

It was for this reason that he approached the first watchtower he saw, coming from the open so he didn’t catch them off-guard. When one of the lookouts spotted him shuffling along and realised he was heading right for the watchtower, she descended the structure and met him on the ground.

“Ahoy there! What were you doing out there? Don’t you know that’s restricted territory,” called out the guard, her tone curious but not suspicious. She wielded a spear but held it loosely, clearly not thinking of him as a threat.

Silas added a little more limp to his walk and weariness to his expression, although he wasn’t sure how well it translated to his bodysuit. “I was attacked by a human, me and my troop. He tried to carry me off - kidnap me, I guess - but I managed to fight my way out. I’ve been trying to find my way back for three days now.”

In deep thought, the guard considered him for a short while, before her face lit up in recognition. “Ah, I heard of you, I did. They said some hu-man and flying monster was in our territory. There were rumours that someone was missing from one of the attacked troops - that’s you, right?”

Silas grinned, hoping it showed more relief than wry humour. “Yep, that’s me!”