Back in the olden days, I worked at McDonald’s and there was a guy who would throw the garbage area rats into the used grease tank out there. I said it sounded like a hard way to go, and he said, “Nah, to them it’s like drowning in chocolate!”
There’s no point to this anecdote, I was just reminded of it.
OK, rats are not some kind of mindless automata; they are intelligent— think of a cat or a chimp or what have you, when contemplating torturing them to death versus even unleashing a rat terrier or shotgun or something quick. Seriously, I would just drive the 5 miles… but the root of the problem seems to be that there is some unsecured food supply at the neighbour’s, which you have to address otherwise it will not matter how many rats you personally dispatch.