====== Rats ======

{{ :creatures:rats.png?420|Rats}}

Settlement scavengers, shipboard pests, and plague-adjacent warning signs in granaries, docks, and ruins.

===== In the North =====

Rats belong wherever people store grain, sail ships, or leave refuse. In Viking-inspired play they are especially useful around docks, winter stores, and abandoned halls.

===== Myth and Folklore =====

Rats are not central to Norse myth, but they make strong practical horror. A rat swarm in a longhouse says something has gone wrong with food, sanitation, or the dead.

===== Campaign Use =====

Use rats as infestation, famine pressure, disease sign, or the first visible clue of necromancy below a settlement.

===== See Also =====

  * [[:creatures|Norse Creatures]]

===== Sources =====

  * Wildlife of Norway: https://grokipedia.com/page/Wildlife_of_Norway

===== Game Master Notes =====

DM-only encounter details, stat blocks, and running notes are kept at [[dm:creatures:rats|Rats (DM)]].