Chapter Text
The smell of smoke and sweet flower pollen was the first thing that woke you up. Your eyes shot open as you quickly sat up as if you had a terrible nightmare that you just woke up from. Your heartbeat and breathing was quick and erratic and sweat started to form from your forehead, but what really could have made you feel that stressed out. You weren’t really sure right at this moment, so you instead decided to look around to gather information about your surroundings. This place… was definitely unfamiliar to you and it was certainly unlike anywhere you have ever seen. It seemed magical, and unbelievably evocative. Many of the plants or vegetation had red colors of different hues. Some of the trees had glowed red veins that ran through their muddy brown bark that stretched up to their leaves giving them a more lively glow that looked hot to the touch.
They were so tall that they nearly blocked out all of the sunlight that shined down on you. Their massive mahogany trunks and branches served as mighty and durable pillars that could withhold just about any weight. You also noticed various vines that twisted around them making use of their great height to reach more sunlight. You could tell that these vines were different plants since their leaves were instead much larger and seemed cup shaped. They also looked stout enough for you to stand on yourself and use them as a stairway up the gargantuan jungle trees. Bright red grasses decorated the ground that you were lying in and there were some flowers of an interesting color and shape that grew between them. They had an indigo center with many petals that were purple that stretched outwards from them. Their stems and leaves held a surprisingly healthy green color which is contrary to all the other plants here.
As your breathing calmed down, your confusion also lowered as a result. A big butterfly, about the size of your hand, flapped into your view which surprised you. You caught a glimpse of how it looked: a mostly black body with some red markings on its wings and long antennae with bright orange ends. It flew around your head a bit before standing on the top of your head. For some reason, your hair felt very sensitive to the bug landing on you and you flinched in response. You could feel the slightest sensation of its tiny feet perching on top of your head. Its wingbeats were also surprisingly loud to you, for a butterfly at least since they were normally quiet types of bugs unlike flies or mosquitos.
The mysterious insect flew away soon after as if it wanted to get a closer inspection of how you looked. The second thing you noticed when you woke up was how incredibly hot it was. You’d rather believe that the sweat that collected on your forehead was from this terrible heat instead of some bad dream. It felt like it was about 100° out here, it was practically a sauna!
You started to air out your T-shirt to help cool yourself down, but it wasn’t really working too well. The first thing you had to do was to find some shade or escape this heat in some other way. After lifting yourself off the ground, you stumbled a bit and almost fell back down because there was a sudden sore and aching feeling in your legs. It was like you haven’t used them in years, but luckily it was easy to recover from it and managed to walk around this foreign place.
Despite the sweltering weather, it was still admittedly a very nice scene of nature where the amount of bright colors from the plants gives a more lively feeling without coming off as too radiant or obnoxious. As you continued walking through, the high-pitched sounds of various insects started to become more obvious to hear with your ears. Another sound pierced through the bugs’ chirping that was much deeper in pitch and through the thickets and vibrant trees you noticed a more barren patch of wilderness where the bright red grasses became less frequent. You looked up and saw a bird covered in colorful feathers with an incredibly lengthy tail that was longer than its own body. It was mostly green, but there was a large spot of red feathers over its belly. A few vibrant blue feathers stuck out from the top of its head that formed a shape resembling a mohawk. It quickly flew away as soon as it saw you walking closer to it.
The tall jungle trees that towered over you were now gone, and instead much shorter dark brown trees with rugged and rough looking bark were more common to see. Their leaves were much smaller too compared to the gigantic sized ones from the jungle trees you saw before. Their leaves had a blander red color too and didn't stand out as much as the other ones. However, there were pretty little flowers that bloomed in between the leaves that bundled up into small clusters. They each had five pink petals with red near the center and had bright yellow stamens. You heard the sound of rushing water, so that meant a river was nearby. Out of your curiosity, you looked around the cork-bark trees to locate where the sound was coming from and headed toward it. There was, in fact, a small creek that was creating the sound and divided the open forest in two. The water was light blue and looked clean enough to drink, but you still felt a bit hesitant. But perhaps one sip couldn't hurt? Although You felt pretty thirsty after all, and the water didn't look THAT dirty. So maybe it'll be fine to drink from it?
You knelt down near the river banks and your bare knees touched the soft green grass that was growing near it. You made a makeshift cup with both of your hands and scooped the river water into your mouth and greedily drank from it. The cooling feeling of the cold water immediately gave a refreshing feeling that helped cool you off. Well, you weren't immediately feeling any horrible stomach pains immediately so that was a good sign.
"Hah…" You sighed. "Where the hell am I?" You thought to yourself. You wanted to continue looking around, but the heat was distracting you. The water did help you get used to it, so you continued to drink from it against your better judgment.
As you knelt down for another drink, you noticed something surprising in the water.
It was your face, but there's big (favorite color) cat ears on the top of your head?!
"Huh?!" You gasped in shock, immediately shooting your hands up to feel the top of your head. You hoped it was just the intense weather that was giving you wild hallucinations! Just like how a water deprived traveler would imagine an oasis in the middle of a desert.
You patted the top of your head to check, but unfortunately to your chagrin you felt something soft and fluffy. There really were cat ears on you! You tried to pull them off just to make sure they were fake and, Yeow!!! … Ok they're real.
You sat down and sighed in frustration still trying to grasp the reality of the situation you found yourself in. Being off lost and alone in some kind of forest in the middle of complete nowhere that didn't look like any other place you've seen before wasn't really a good way to start the day. The stress was starting to build to an almost unhealthy amount in your system, but your attention was taken away by the sounds of something swishing on the ground, like a broom that was sweeping up dirt off the floor. You looked behind you and saw a fluffy (F/C) tail swaying side to side sending the brown dirt from the ground into the air. It looks like you also came packaged with a cat tail too and not just the extra ears. At this point, you didn't even care. It was interesting though how you didn't feel that much from having your tail move agitatedly when you were stressed, maybe there are less nerves on it?
Your stomach suddenly grumbled in need of something to eat to go along with that river water you drank earlier. Thinking about your new ears and tail can wait once you've had your fill first.
After walking through the serene brown and red grasslands, you still couldn't find a piece of anything to eat. You followed along the side of the river in the hopes that a plant that bears food would be more likely to grow closer. Your stomach kept growling and complaining at you for hours on end, and you'd wish it would just shut up already. It also didn't help that your feet and legs were starting to also get a bit sore from the constant walking. You were trying your hardest and it's bad enough you had to endure the high temperature while you were at it.
The dried yellow grasses crunched beneath your shoes with each tired step. You did find some other little creatures along your way. Little orange and brown lizards would speedily run away whenever you walked near them, and light blue frogs leaped around in the tiny ponds. Those birds that you saw back at the jungle with the very long tail feathers were here again and screeched at you whenever you came near them, or they would otherwise fly away in a rapid hurry as if to escape your presence. You knew you looked like a cat, but they were being a bit over dramatic in your opinion.
After more minutes of walking, you still failed to find a bite to eat in this forsaken grassland. Your stomach was growling louder than ever. But finally, to your relief, you finally spotted something in the distance that was worth a morsel.
It was a tree with dark purple bark located on the other side of the river that held bright orange and red, pear-shaped fruit on its branches that looked tasty to eat. Now there was something that looked promising! Unfortunately, the tree seemed to be behind some kind of campground of some sort. There were fences made out of large spikes of wood and tanned leather and some torches with alit fires in them. There was also a large tent made of wood that had totems piercing out of the ceiling. Also, it seems that some strange inhabitants have settled into it. It was almost like they were camping around the fruit tree as a source of food. They looked somewhat humanoid, they wore minimal clothing and they wore a simple painted mask that had horns on it. But they were unlike anything you've ever seen before. One of them that was shorter than the rest had a mask that was shaped like a lizard’s face and had one glowing red circle shining through it. They were also carrying a large staff that had three skulls with horns tied on it with various ropes. What made you find them strange is that their bodies looked hunched over and they had black feathers growing out from under the mask giving them a kind of fluffy collar. You wondered if they would also be overheating themselves in this kind of weather.
In this situation, you thought it would be best to find a way to sneak around the odd creatures so you could pilfer the fruit without them noticing. You could hopefully avoid any unnecessary conflict. You carefully dashed behind a conveniently placed thorny bush near the campsite and started to wait for your next move. You observed the creatures' motions to find a blindspot so you won't be noticed stealing the fruit. Some of them were hitting training dummies made of fabric stuffed with dried grass with wooden clubs. The small one with the staff shouted something that sounded gibberish to you which got the attention of all the others. They rushed toward him to see what he had to say.
Perfect! Now you could easily sneak your way to the fruit tree without them noticing. You carefully tip-toed your way around the messy floor making sure to not make any noise. It was all going smoothly until…
CRAAAACK!
The loudest sound of a tree branch being broken you've ever heard in your life came from under your sneaker. "Ah sh*t…" you thought to yourself, that definitely must have gotten the attention of all of them.
The creatures all turned toward your direction after having their conversation abruptly interrupted. They noticed the human with the cat-like features intruding into their base. Their postures immediately shifted and their stances widened.
"Ika yaaa!" They exclaimed, and started to rush toward you with their weapons ready. They stomped the brown grasses flat underneath their sharply toed feet in a hurry. The first one that came close to you slammed its club on the ground a couple of times kicking up some dust into the air.
You held your arms out with your palms facing the humanoid-looking creatures to get them to hopefully stop. It seemed to work for now, because they paused their advances.
“Woah… h-h-hold on guys…” You started, “I don’t want any trouble, okay? I’m just really hungry right now, is it alright if I took some of those fruits over there?” You pointed to the fruit tree in their base that you were eyeing earlier. Hopefully these… things are able to understand English.
They seemed to blatantly ignore you and instead hissed out incomprehensible noises and words back at you. A second creature with a club made of stone and a gray mask ran up to you. It had a much stockier build and wore more reinforced armor made of thicker leather. It quickly slammed the ground beneath you with its massive club, and created rocky stalagmites and knocked you back. The sharp rocks have dug into the legs a bit and left some deep cuts.
You came crashing down onto the ground after the impact. You gritted your teeth from the severe pain from not only being launched, but also the cuts. That hurt like hell! You laid on the floor on your right side in a defeated position.
You remained curled on the ground and let out a pathetic whimper. The monsters approached you aggressively with their weapons raised and ready to strike. Their snarls and grunts were giving you further worry that started to speed up your heart rate. Another one of them leaped and quickly slammed down a normal wooden club on your left side.You gasped out in shock, as more burning pain shook throughout your body and tears started to spill from your eyes. You wanted to cry, and you were hoping someone would come save you. You couldn’t take much more of this physical torment from the monsters with your weakened body.
You felt a sudden rush of incredible energy that went through your head and surged within your bones. Your blood boiled into hot magma and pumped rapidly in your veins, trying to keep the energy contained. Your mind became completely clouded with unfathomable anger and violence that you could barely contain. All of your feeling of fear and cowardice dissipated into a thin black smoke, and only rage and hunger remained.
You let out a low, feral growl that was so deep pitched it even shook the folds of flesh and skin in your chest. The monsters hesitated after hearing such an intimidating sound come out of you. The pain you felt in your sides and legs was completely forgotten about as you felt the most intense adrenaline rush in your whole life. You immediately shot off the ground and rapidly bolted toward the closest masked fiend; the one with the normal wooden club.
You threw a speedy yet powerful punch into the creature's face, feeling the rough material of its mask chip and break from the impact. Before it had any time to react, you kicked its side using the top of your foot after flattening it out so it was parallel with the rest of your leg. The monster was stunned from the fierce attack and was knocked back from your quick blows. The creature was unable to immediately recover from the ground and looked like it was immediately knocked out. The other creatures became shocked at your sudden change in mood and took a quick glance at each other nervously. The one with the staff seemed to grip onto its weapon tighter.
A flaming club swung downward at you next, but you were able to nimbly sidestep the attack with your heightened senses. Rational thought has left your head, as you swiped your nails at the creature with the dark brown and yellow mask. It was a retaliation that came out of pure instincts, but to your surprise, it seems that your nails were apparently now sharp enough to damage the monster. There were deep red gashes on its chest and face from your scratch marks as dark red blood started to ooze out. The creature staggered backwards yowling in pain. You slashed across its neck, gushing out even more dark red blood everywhere and you continued to hack away at the monster with fervor with your own bare hands. In no time at all, the monster flopped onto the ground as nothing more than a torn up mess of flesh, exposed bone, and sinew with some pieces of its mask scattered around inside of it.
The short monster with the three skulled staff became more focused and started to chant in a language you couldn't understand. Bright yellow-orange spots started to appear on the ground below and near you. A massive column of blazing hot fire erupted from the spots, one of them completely engulfing you in torturous heat.
"Graaah!!" You yelled. To any other normal person, they would have likely already been defeated from being literally burned alive. It was pretty painful, but you were able to grit through it and you dashed out of the fire. The short monster with the staff appeared to be chanting a different spell that gave the others tiny rings of circling fire around their feet. The creature with the crossbow now had their arrow tips lit on fire as well.
Taking out this pesky enchanter is probably your next highest priority since he seemed to be buffing the others' combat capabilities. You quickly dashed around avoiding the giant still fires that the mage created from earlier and the now flaming arrows that the archer was firing at you. One of the arrows grazed across your forearms making you wince. You needed to end this fight quickly because you don't think you'll be able to sustain any more damage soon.
You leapt high into the air with the enchanter in sight and poised your clawed right hand in front of you, ready to tear into it upon impact. The mage looked up at you with a worried glance because it wouldn't be able to dodge your plunging attack in time.
Your attempt was stopped abruptly, as the creature with the gray mask quickly dashed in front and blocked your claw with its stone shield, saving the little guy from what would have been certain death. You tried to pull your hand out, but it was no use. It was just jammed too hard inside. You couldn't get off the creature because your nails were stuck in its big stupid rock shield.
The gray masked creature started to swing its club at you, also wanting you to get off its shield. You were able to swiftly dodge each of its swings despite your predicament, because while the monster was strong, it was a very clumsy fighter. In your peripheral vision, you noticed that the short mage was charging up an attack that looked like it was about to fire a strong fireball at you. You also heard the sound of a crossbow being reloaded behind you. You thought quickly, and leapt off the shield and harshly yanked it closer to you from the monster’s grip on the buckle. The monster was confused by what you were doing and lost its balance. You kicked the gray masked creature into the short one, making the two of them tumble and collapse on the ground. You swung the shield around you to block the flaming arrow just in time.
Your nerves are still on edge; the adrenaline rush has yet to subside and let you relax. You feel your blood pump hot into your head creating a dulling heat in your mind. You quickly dashed over to the archer and leaped into the air. You smashed the rock shield into its head with such a strong enough force that the shield your hand was stuck in broke into pieces finally freeing it. The monster collapsed on the ground with a big dent in its skull.
You shook off the remaining dust and pebbles off your fingers and looked back at the last two monsters. It seems like the one with the gray mask was their strongest member because it still hasn't given up yet in the fight. It got its bearings straight soon after you freed your hand from the shield and jumped up. It yelled back at you hoarsely and started to charge after you with its stone club raised in the air, ready to bash your head in. The smaller monster was still lying on the dirty ground and looked unresponsive.
You weren’t sure what your next course of action should be right now. After looking up and seeing some conveniently surrounding trees, you came up with an idea that would hopefully work. The creature was still charging at you head on, dashing as quick as its monstrously grotesque feet can let it. You braced yourself and started to wait for the right moment.
As the monster came just a few feet in front of you and started to force its club down on you, you quickly rolled out of the way of the large stone club and crouched down a bit before springing up high to the tree. You perched yourself on one of the thicker branches without making a sound and watched the oblivious monster below you. You were so quick with your little trick that the creature did not notice where you went. It looked around trying to find where you went but to no avail. You pretty much vanished into thin air in its eyes.
In one swift motion, you springboarded off of the tree branch to make yourself airborne above the creature with your sharp claws at the ready. The branch shook a bit in place like a flicked door stopper. “Haaah!” you shouted, as you slashed down on the creature’s unguarded back, with a lot more strength and feeling put into it this time.
There were some strange dark shadows that trailed behind your nails when you slashed down on the creature. It felt cooling, and it covered the tips of your fingers and it felt like it was helping you deliver a more powerful attack. You weren’t sure what exactly was the cause of it, but you were thankful nonetheless because it seemed to harm the monster greatly based on how it staggered a bit after you slashed its back. There were deep gashes left in its flesh as its dark red blood started to seep out of it. There also seemed to be a lingering misty aura of some kind surrounding the creature. It was like a cloud of dark mist had suddenly surrounded it after your more special claw slash attack. How strange… Did that also happen because of you?
Your larger ears started to twitch a little, you heard the noises of rusting and some incoherent grunting behind you. Guess these things also gave you enhanced hearing capabilities aside from making you look a bit ridiculous. You snapped your head back to look behind you and noticed that the smaller mage creature has noticeably recovered after you slashed the gray masked one with your attack. It had just finished preparing its fireball attack and launched it straight at you by swinging its oversized staff. It whizzed through the air straight in your direction.
You just barely dodged out of the way of the flying deathball in time and skid across the ground. The monster that you slashed before was behind you and had its exposed back blasted by its own friend’s fireball. The torn open flesh marks that you made with your nails immediately cauterized, but the creature exploded into a dark red bonfire with black colored air erupting in every direction. It screamed loudly in intense pain while enduring the black and red storm and then immediately went limp and fell to the ground with a loud *THUMP*. You could also hear faint but deep chuckling after the creature was burned alive. But what even happened to that monster after the fireball had hit him? It seemed that it reacted in some way with the dark mist that your slash attack left behind, and it did something else to the creature.
You looked back to the miniature mage and saw that it looked puzzled after seeing the reaction too. It glared back at you with intense hatred brewing in its eye(?), probably finally having enough of you and wanting to finish you off for killing all of its teammates. It started to chant something again in another language until…
The creature's head and entire body was slashed straight down the middle with one fell slice of a large scythe. Its eye widened momentarily, before also falling on the ground just like its other friend. Its body cracked and dissipated into some kind of dust before fading away entirely into nothing… Then there was some kind of spirit or ghastly object that arose from it.
Everything started to feel like it was winding down. The adrenaline you were high on finally started to fade away. Your stomach started growling at you again. Oh right, you were hungry after all, as your body just loved reminding you. But wait! That fruit tree! You can finally go and get them safely!
You tried to find where that tree was once again, and found it a little while away from the unmoving body of the monster with a gray mask. You walked around it and looked up to the hanging fruit from the tree. You climbed up it, while your sharp cat nails helped you stick onto the tree bark, and wrapped your legs on a thick tree branch to help steady yourself. One of the fruits was within arm's reach of you, and it looked plump and juicy ready to be picked off the branch and be eaten. You wasted no time and quickly snatched it, taking it into your greedy hands and took a huge chomp out of it.
The flavor was very sweet, but not so much so where it was unpalatable. It tasted quite good actually, so you sunk your teeth again into the fruit's flesh to take another bite. "I should definitely take a couple more of these!" You thought, and so you swiped at some more of the fruits on the branches. You let them fall onto the ground rather harshly, but you were too hungry to care about the fruit getting bruised.
You stuck the remaining fruit in your mouth and carefully slid off the tree to get back on the ground. After finishing off the first fruit and tossing the seed core away, you reach down to pick up one of the ones you cut off. You were about to grab it until you felt a sudden intensely hot sensation on your tongue. It was starting to spread everywhere in your mouth and you swear you could even feel it in your teeth from how hot it was.
"Mmmpppph!!!!" You mumbled, keeping your mouth closed and teeth clenched from how painful the sensation was. These fruits… are WAAAY too spicy! They just seemed to taste sweet at first, but after a while they suddenly became spicy! How terribly deceptive!
Tiny tears were shed from your eyes from how spicy it was. You started to sweat profusely and your body felt overheated. You almost felt tempted to start drinking water, but then you remembered that it only makes the pain worse. You would have to sit and endure it until it went away.
After what seemed like several hours, but probably wasn't, the spicy sensation finally subsided. Your tongue was out, and you were panting like a dog. You were still hungry, but that horrible spice meltdown distracted you from your hunger pangs. You couldn't eat another one of those, they were completely uneatable.
There was a new delicious aroma that caught your attention, it smelled similar to grilled beef. You let your nose guide your eyes and saw that same corpse of the gray masked creature. What? Was that where that smell was coming from?
You approached the unmoving body and knelt down. You smelled that same enticing scent again from it, perhaps it was radiating off of the monster’s carcass? You wondered what could have caused this to happen. Perhaps that reaction from the dark aura caused by your attack and the fireball that collided into it created enough heat inside it to cook its insides? Since it was lying there for a little bit, it must have been cooking long enough for this smell to arise from it.
But, would you really want to eat this thing? You had conflicted feelings about this as a whole. Not morally, of course, but just concerns for your health. Is the flesh even safe to eat?
You flipped the carcass over to have it lie on its back. The skin of the creature seemed to look charred and burnt. There was yet another surge of instincts that came over you, but they were much more primal and base this time. Your hunger didn’t let you think too long about whether or not you should even eat this thing. You immediately tore into the monster’s belly with your bare hands, utilizing your sharp fingernails to cut through the flesh. The hot steam of boiled flesh and blood blasted out of it. Your nostrils were bathed in a very strange, yet delicious scent. The primitive senses in your brain screamed in delight.
You grasped chunks of the torn up skin and flesh from its torn up belly and shoved it into your mouth. Warm juices squirted out of the corners of your mouth like a crushed tomato; you couldn’t care less for the bloody mess you were making on yourself. You slid your tongue over the unusual charred meat, coating it in your saliva and interested to find out what it tastes like. It had a taste that was actually quite similar to beef, but a little gamey. Not that you really minded it. As long as you were filling your belly with food that didn’t feel like it was melting your tongue off, you were golden. Some of the monster’s meat juices were dribbling down your chin and started to soak a bit into your shirt. It left streaks of dark red blood as you continued to chew and gobble down the meat.
You next ripped up its intestines, liver, and other internal organs. You shoveled the mess of torn up organs into your mouth by the handful and quickly chewed and swallowed them down. Some pieces of the ripped up organs splashed everywhere because you overestimated how much you could fit into your mouth. Some of it flew onto the ground, your clothes, and even back onto the creature’s unmoving corpse. It was nothing more than a hollowed out body at this point with just about its skeleton remaining inside. The taste was even more gamey and rancid than the flesh you were eating before.
You still swallowed it all down, too hungry to even care about the poor taste. The next course you will eat are its limbs. You grabbed a hold of its left arm, and after struggling a little bit, you snapped it off of the shoulder joint creating a sickening sound of a bone breaking in the air. That only fueled your hunger further. Blood was squirting out of the opening you made by ripping its arm off and started to soak the dirt dark red.
You chewed on the severed arm like a chicken drumstick and kept chewing and swallowing down the broken up flesh. The taste was much less gamey than the meatball you ate earlier, in fact you liked eating this part of the corpse the most! You even chewed off pieces of the bone from its forearm and crushed it between your molars. You could feel the liquid bone marrow being squeezed out of the bone as you crunched on it like hard candy. Bone marrow has some nutritional value to it, doesn’t it? The monster’s meaty fingers were also eaten up like french fries. You then wondered how all of this would taste raw as opposed to being cooked.
To help keep the food down, you stuck your head back into the cavity you made in the corpse’s front and slurped up the boiled blood that was starting to pool inside after you tore out its internal organs. The second arm was eaten up just as quickly as the first. Now all that was left was the pitiful remains of its torso, its head, and finally its legs. The legs would be the next go-to meal since you had just eaten its arms.
The legs were giving you more trouble to take off compared to its arms, although this was probably because they were larger and had more weight. You then had an idea to try twisting it in one direction, like picking an apple off a branch. You picked up its right leg and started to turn it clockwise. *Crrk, crrk* More sounds of bones and joints being dislocated were made. *POP!* The leg came right off with even more blood spilling out from the empty joint hole. Some was dripping out of the opening in the leg too.
You ate it the same way as you did with the arms, and it has a similar taste too. You felt like you could keep eating this monster for hours on end, and keep enjoying its delicious taste. There were plenty of other monster corpses littered around the area after the battle, so it was practically an all you can eat buffet just for you.
“Hmph… Those fools should be done with that assignment I gave them Yesterday by now.” A short, but fluffy creature announced to itself as it was levitating through the sparse forest by the river. “I am aware that they all are complete dolts, but even a task so simple as this could be completed by them. Once I’ve finished rounding up all of my troops, that city will be done for!”
It swatted away a couple of bugs that were flying in its face while roaming through the forest. “Ugh… I hate this region of Teyvat the most. Too many damn annoying insects everywhere. And it’s hot every single day outside! How can anyone put up with this kind of heat?! I wish I had been assigned to somewhere like Mondstadt or Liyue instead. Well, there’s no use complaining about it by yourself…”
The short figure brushed off some of the fallen brown leaves off of its robes using its small black hands. After it rounded a corner of the tall forest trees, it stopped suddenly from the strange site in front of it. Ripped up corpses of his minions were littered everywhere, with their insides torn open and some with their limbs ripped off. Large bones were thrown about, some broken up like they were nibbled off or were licked clean. Bits of flesh and tissue are messily splattered everywhere. Some of them were on wooden crates that were full of supplies, totems, and even the tents. The fluids that seeped out of them stained and dripped through the supplies and tents, ruining them. There was also a horrible smell that was lingering in the air. It was a hellish horror show of gore and murder. Who could have done such an abominable act of violence?
The figure raised its long rabbit-like ears and turned to the sounds of chewing and slobbering. It saw a hunched over human with cat-like features. The boy had {your hair color} hair and was wearing very basic clothing. Just a simple shirt and shorts and nothing else. He was wearing a pair of shoes that it has never seen before. It seemed cat-like because of the big triangle shaped ears on the top of its head and the long fluffy tail that stuck out from its shorts. It was excitedly swishing side to side. There was a trail of blood behind him and he appeared to be eating something. Was he the culprit?
“HEY!!! What do you think you’re doing!” A high pitched, shrill voice called out to the boy. The boy turned your head around with cheeks puffed up like a chipmunk holding nuts in its mouth. He had handfuls of meat and intestines that was presumably from the corpse it was crouched above. The human’s appearance was completely messy and horrific. Dark red blood was smeared on his face, his hands, and splattered on his clothes. Some of the pieces of flesh and internal organs were stuck on his clothes and body also. He was evidently a messy eater. The cat boy’s eyes narrowed at it after taking in the appearance of his rude intruder on his mealtime. It was probably something the boy has never seen before judging by the look on his surprised face.
After putting the pieces together, the commander felt like he was about to throw up after looking at the boy. “W-w-wh-what the?!! You freak! Why are you eating all of my minions! Just what kind of human are you?!” It stumbled on a few of its words because it was still in disbelief after seeing what he just saw. It dealt with many human pests before, but this one seems to be more monster than man.
“You’ve just ruined everything! I’ll send you to the deepest and darkest levels of the Abyss where you belong!,” It said. The cat boy tilted his head in response, unsure about what it was talking about. The commander took out its curved, light blue ornate staff. It had a light blue crystal attached at the top of it glowing with energy. It created a light blue shield around itself.
It then started to castle spells that created energy made out of water and flung it at the kid in the form of a sphere. The cat was knocked back from the sudden blow and let go of the chunks of meat and intestines he was holding. They splattered all over the dry forest floor. This however seemed to greatly anger him, as his pupils dilated at the unknown figure and he snarled. “So, you wanna fight too?” The boy asked aggressively. He started to quickly rush over and pounced on top of the bubble-like barrier the commander created. He started to wildly punch and slam his hands down onto the shield, but to no avail. The shield was barely taking any damage from his attacks. He even tried to swipe his sharp nails at the shield, but that didn’t work either.
The commander laughed haughtily and then released a strong short-range blast of blue magical energy at the boy using his scepter. The boy yelped as he was launched a great distance backwards and became covered in water. “Those puny attacks won’t even put a scratch on my shield! You should have stayed at home with your mommy and daddy than meddle with us, brat! Hahaha!,” it said.
You looked up from the ground you were lying on and pounded your fist onto the ground. The commander wiggled its fingers and started waving its staff in a new way. Dark purple portals seemed to open up in the ground as more of the creatures that were like the ones the boy fought against previously were summoned. One of them was similar to the small mage creature you have taken care of before, but was instead brown colored and was holding a big stone staff that is taller than its own body. One of them was a lot bigger than the rest, it was hulking and held a large axe made of steel. The last two were also archers, but they looked the exact same as the one from before.
“How about now? Are you still feeling confident? Ghehehehe!” The commander laughed to himself with complete self-assuredness. There was no way you would be able to beat all five of them, especially since you were still damaged from the water magic that hit you before and you had no idea how to get through the shield.
The bigger monster has suddenly lumbered over to you and raised its axe right above you, like an executioner ready to chop your head off. It seemed like this was finally the end of the line for you…
*BANG!!*
The sound of a gun being fired rang through the air and a bullet pierced into the creature above you, causing it to stumble and lose its focus on you. More bullets were fired into the monster at its head and chest. With each bullet, it stumbled back further and further away from you.
A woman leaped down in front of you. But because of the position you were in on the ground, the first thing you saw was her bare calves and black combat boots. She was wearing black shorts, a black tank top, and a dashing brown bomber jacket was around her shoulders like a cape. There were two gun holders on each side of her hips.
“Heh… All of this just to take care of one little kid? Seems just a little bit excessive, don’t you think?” The woman remarked. She spun the pistols she was holding in her hands, swirling the smoke fuming from their barrels around in the air.. The group of monsters were stunned from the sudden entrance of the new person.
She looked down to see how you were doing. You noticed that she had tanned skin and short-length forest green hair with matching green eyes. She gave you a confident, yet reassuring smile.
“You okay? Think you can stand?” She asked you with deep concern that you could detect in her emerald eyes. She put the gun she was holding in her left hand back into its holster and offered her arm out to you. “Uh… yeah. I think I’m good now,” you replied, and took her hand. She quickly lifted you up off the ground with great ease.
“Gaaah! It doesn’t matter how much more back up I call! You two are both pests that need to be exterminated!” The commander shouted back at the woman. “Soldiers! Make yourselves useful and kill them already!” He barked at the others. Their brains finally seemed to start working again and now also re-engaged in battle.
The monster that was holding the stone staff waved it in the air a few times and summoned stone pillars for it and the two crossbow archers to be positioned on. The larger monster with the mask charged straight ahead and swung its axe horizontally in an attempt to slice both of you at once. The woman whose name you did not know deftly dodged the attack by backflipping and you just ducked low to the ground to avoid it. The girl was able to land several shots into the hulking monster whilst in the middle of a backflip, which made the beast grunt in pain. She landed on the top of a tree branch waiting for her next move.
A yellow aura appeared on the ground beneath you. You didn’t realize this quick enough, so you couldn't avoid the miniature quake of earth at your feet that burst forth. The pain stung a bit, but you felt like you could still keep fighting.
You kept your attention on the largest monster with the axe. It seemed like the largest threat out of all of them too you. You dashed the plains as fast as you could. The monster was still a bit stunned from being shot at, so now was your chance. You went behind it and dug your claws into its back and climbed up to its head. Sharp bloody indents were made into the monster’s body from your sharp nails. It turned its fat, fluffy head around in response to the sudden sharp pain and noticed that you were clinging on.
You opened your mouth as wide as you could and chomped straight into its neck with incredibly sharp teeth, and pierced the hearty flesh that was covered underneath the feathers. You weren’t exactly sure why you wanted to do that, but it feels right at the current moment. It yowled in pain and shook side to side and moved its arms behind itself to try to shake you off. The other monsters holding crossbows that were perched on the stone towers also noticed this and tried to fire at you. The idiots didn’t realize that they risked hurting their larger brethren by doing this, and missed their shots. This caused some arrows to fly into the big monster you were clinging onto instead of you. It moved around much more violently as a result and grunted in pain. However, you were completely determined to keep gripping onto him like and deranged animal and gnawed away at his thick-fleshed neck. That same dark aura that surrounded the monster you slashed with your claws appeared around the large monster again.
“Huh…..” The woman spoke to herself, somewhat confused by your style of fighting. You acted a lot more cat-like than she had expected based on your appearance. But she simply shrugged it off, not really caring all too much. This was a great opportunity for her she realized, as the monsters were all distracted and had their attention on you. She aimed the revolver’s rear sight straight at the head of the monster. She pulled the trigger, firing a quick-flying spherical bullet that pierced right through the monster’s skull, blood spurting out of the bullet wound.
The black aura immediately consolidated into the core of the large monster’s body with a new yellow-orange colored energy. A powerful shock wave of strange energy erupted from the monster through the air that blew you off of it and reached the other monsters. The stone platforms the mage and archers were standing on immediately crumbled into pebbles and knocked the monsters back into a rough hillside. The commander was also blown back from the energy blast as well, with large cracks forming in his shield. A tiny blue crystal dropped from him and fell onto the ground near him. You landed on your feet without any injuries and looked up to see that the largest monster was lying lifelessly. The other three creatures lying against the hillside appeared to be knocked out. All of them turned black and faded away as red mist.
After the commander lowered the arm it was using to shield its eyes, it saw the destruction laid before him. “What…. What on Teyvat was that? I’ve never seen anything like it.” It exclaimed, wearing an expression that was equally as shocked as the girl that was still waiting on the tree branch.
The commander was shaken out of its thoughts when the cat boy came out of nowhere and started to slash at the barrier it was protected by. He growled angrily in frustration when each of his slashes scathed across the shield, not making any real progress in breaking that ever-so impenetrable barrier. His fingers created a streak of shadows behind them again and he now scratched at the shield with the same dark power. “Foolish boy! I’ve already told you before, you’ll never break my shield that way! GhAhAha!” The commander laughed, “Now, how should I finish you off?... Oh, I know! I’ll trap you in my special bubble spell! That will put you to a stop and suffocate you to death!”
The weird looking monster waved its staff around in a circle a few times while chanting some more words that you could not understand. As the magic was about to be fired off… nothing but a small puff of smoke came out of the wand’s tip.
The boy tilted his head to the side in confusion. “That doesn’t really look like a bubble to me,” he said while putting your hands on his hips.
“Ehh? What’s going on? Why won’t the spell work?!” The commander exclaimed with panic. It tried to recast the same spell again, but to no avail. It tried again and again, but everytime only a small fart-cloud size puff of smoke would come out of its wand.
He looked around and noticed that there were some small clouds of dark blue fog around them. He scratched his chin in confusion.
The sound of a gun being fired off was heard by both of you as a bullet was fired into the shield causing it to finally break. The commander’s small body was launched back as more bullets came flying at him, knocking him back with each hit. It recoiled in pain from each blow.
“Alright, this has been fun and all, but I think it’s time to finally wrap this up,” the woman said, walking to stand next to you. “Say your prayers, if you’ve even got any.” She said as she co*cked her gun and aimed it at the commander ’s head. When her finger pulled the trigger, a small spherical rock was fired out at an incredibly fast speed flying straight through the middle of the creature’s mask. It shrieked in pain briefly before falling limply to the ground. Its body and staff faded away into nothingness.
The cat boy was relieved that all the monsters were defeated. He noticed that the blue crystal that dropped from the monster’s shield was still lying on the ground. He walked over and crouched down to pick it up. But as soon as he touched the glowing blue crystal, it popped into thin air. He recoiled back in surprise, but then saw that a blue colored transparent barrier has formed around him. He immediately felt concerned and tried to reach out and touch it. He didn’t feel anything and his hand passed right through the mysterious shield. He moved his hand back and forth through the barrier in complete fascination.
"Hmm?" The woman noticed a brown oblong shaped object on the ground that had bits of thin yellow plant tissue on it.
"A Fire Mango seed? Did they eat those things raw? You’ll get horrible stomach pains for days if you do that. And I thought Hilichurls couldn’t get any stupider,” she said. The woman tossed the seed aside and let it fall onto the ground.
She turned around to the cat boy and noticed that he was being protected by a Crystalize shield. She watched as he was still looking around at the magical bubble around him with awe, but flinced when the barrier suddenly popping and disappearing. She chuckled at his reaction.
The woman started to walk closer and gave him eye contact. He noticed that she was around a head and a half taller than him. "Thanks for your help back there by the way!" She said, "What’s your name? I’m Zaya! It’s nice to meet you!” She said excitedly, and offered a handshake.
“Oh, uh… sure. It’s no problem,” he said nervously, taking her hand with his right hand and clasping it. Zaya gripped back with much greater force and shook excitedly. “And my name is…”
His name, it should be something that he should definitely remember. It’s something that should trail right off the tongue. But why whenever he tries to think about what his name is, nothing seems to come up in his head?
“Uhh…” the boy droned on. The cat boy raked through the deepest confines of his brain to try to find any semblance of a name that seemed like it would belong to him.
“Uhh…?” She mocked, using the same confused tone he had, “Your name is Uhh?”
“No! No! Of course not!” He shot back. The girl giggled in response. “I don’t think… I can’t remember my name,” he said.
“Oh…!” She said, genuinely surprised by your response. “Are you sure? You don’t actually remember what your name is? Try thinking a bit harder!” She curled her fists and brought them close to her face, like she was cheering you on.
The boy tried to think a bit harder, the corner of his lips curled downward and a grimace was expressed on his face. “Ugh… No, nothing.” he replied glumly.
"Oh, well… I’m sorry," she replied with a frown. She tapped her lip a couple of times with her pointer finger in deep thought, and then said, "then, how about I come up with a name for you instead? I’ll call you… Señor Meow Meow!” She grinned, putting both of her hands on the top of her head with her pointer fingers and thumbs making an L shape.
“NO.” He said, with a very unimpressed look. His lips flattened in a straight light and eyes half-closed in a pissed off glare.
“Hm? Not te gusta? Okay……. how about… Furrnando?”
“Can you maybe come up with something that isn’t a sh*tty cat pun?” You snarled back, with your arms crossed. You looked at the unknown forest path in front of you that was filled with light brown trees with gray leaves. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m just gonna leave now.” You said as you started to walk into said forest, while Zaya still had a contemplative expression on her sharp face.
“Huh?” She said surprised, “Hey Gato, where are you going?! I can come up with something else if you don't like them!” The woman exclaimed as she tried to catch up to you.
In a distant realm far away, a stone fortress of gray and gold stood formidable in a wasteland that lived in an eternal night. Inside this grand castle, footsteps echoed through the barren hallways that were sparsely decorated. A few banners with blue and indigo colors had gray symbols on them that resembled a triangle made of curved lines. There were some light brown drawers with short tables next to them that had tall white candlesticks on top of them which were already alight.
A figure with long dark colored wings was flying through the castle hallways at high speed. It wore some purple spiked armor over a tunic. It nearly bumped into the tables which would have knocked the candlesticks over. Some of the flames on the candles jolted around violently, almost being snuffed out from the sudden wind created by the flying figure.
The small figure soon arrived at a large imposing double panel door that was purple and golden. It paused for a bit, wanting to catch its breath after running for so long.
If it was still able to fly, then it would not have been forced to exert so much energy.
The figure stretched its hand out and released a type of dark blue mist with red floating symbols of an archaic language circling it.
The mist flowed into the door and caused it to shine brightly. A clicking sound was heard by the commander as if it opened by some sort of magic.
The door opened by itself, which was good because they were incredibly exhausted and doubted they would have enough energy to open it themself.
After walking inside, they noticed how the dark room was illuminated by only a few sources of light. There was a simple chandelier with eight arms made of brass metal, and also a couple of lamps posted on the walls. They held yellow-orange flames in them and had some white wax puddling underneath them.
A tall, broadly-shaped figure looked in the direction of the commander that just arrived. His posture straightened and he started to rise up from his seat behind a table with glowing holograms of a planet and
“Hagen, you’ve come 15 minutes late to the meeting. Whatever held you up better be something serious.”
“*huff, huff* My sincerest apologies sir, just give me a moment to catch my breath. I rushed here as fast as I could…” Hagen says panting. “Gah…. all of that flying………. Alright, I’ve h-had just the worst news explained to me.”
“And what exactly is this ‘news’? Start talking,” The taller figure pressed.
Hagen explained how a nearby Abyss mighty fleet of controlled hillichurls and a notable abyss mage commander was taken out by a human male with feline features and a woman with revolvers.
“Some kind of elemental power?” The tall figure interrupted, “What kind of vision did he have with him?”
“He had a… Oh, the report never said anything about seeing a vision on him at that time. I actually asked if this boy had a vision, but I was told the spy didn’t find one. But how is that possible?”
“Somebody with a newfound power you say? And without a vision no less?” butted in a third person. The two looked toward the source of the new voice. He walked closer to the two of them and showed his appearance in the dim chandelier light. His blonde braided ponytail swayed with each step he took. The boy had golden eyes and a fair skin tone. He wore a brown, short sleeved crop top that exposed his slim waist with a golden diamond shaped emblem on the front and a golden shoulder pad on his left arm. He wore a white and yellow flowing scarf that flowed down to his waist and a two-pointed cape. He wore baggy brown pants and high black boots.
“If they are as strong as you are implying, this could certainly become an unwelcome variable. We’ll have to investigate them further. Isn’t that right, Sis?”
