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tw: // blood n gore, tl;dr at the bottom + you don’t gotta match the post length

The old leader was dead, a new one had taken his place. Such was the cycle of life.

It had finally set in that Aurum was quite dead, and following the official announcement of Elsweyr stepping up to take her place beneath the statue, Arrow’s stress levels and emotional state finally clashed in a manner that many might call having an “mental breakdown”. But alas, there would be no obvious signs today, like a lost grip on her emotions ending in a messy display or tears or her raiding the tavern for whatever alcohol her little paws could hold, at least not yet. She was going to drink her fair share eventually. No, no, Arrow’s subsequent reaction to the realization that the kid she’d watched grow into a fine young man was going to be buried six feet under with his last chance at happiness by Moth took form in deciding to do something really, really stupid. She wasn’t sure what sparked it, maybe she wasn’t thinking right, or she was regressing back into a previous state of mind where acting without any logical thought was much more commonplace. A time where everyone was alive, see.

The tradition of Elsweyr bringing her food, even prior to returning to the land of the living, had not gone unnoticed. Arrow didn’t take well to never being able to pay back a kindness, even if she didn’t need to, or wasn’t expected to do such a thing. And with the woman taking over as Luminary of the swamp, she figured that an almost ceremonial gift was in order to celebrate, maybe not as distinguished as any of the many tribal traditions of Elsweyr’s previous homeland, but it was something. Food for food made sense in Arrow’s brain, but not just anything would do. No, no, it had to be grandiose and really scream “the swamp sends its regards”.

Now, here was the thing. Everyone who’d lived in Tanglewood long enough knew that in the heart of the swamp land it got real dangerous. The snakes and mutated animals were bad, but travel deep enough where the water began to grow deep and you’d find the most dangerous of all the wildlife. Who in their right mind would hunt down a wild gator of all things?

Arrow, that’s who.

The cheetah was stupid, but not that stupid. She knew damn well that the moment she stepped too far into the water, she was a dead man. Had she ever actually hunted an alligator? No, but she’d participated in gator raids in the past. She knew her stuff, alright? Normally she wouldn’t even think about going about it on her own, especially not since even with a much bigger body, cheetahs weren’t tigers or lions or whatever other big muscular cat was out there. She was still just a toothpick, but a big toothpick. One misstep and she was gone, a second death would await her under that dark water if she wasn’t extremely careful in her moronic suicide mission.

If there was any benefit to having the body she did, it was that she never had to relearn any new hunting skills.

The stagnant, moss covered water splashed against her legs as the waterline reached above her ankles, where the trees twisted into each other and began to block out the bright sky until all that was left to shine down on her and her target was a collection of small streams of light carved out by the edges of the leaves. There wasn’t much sound other than the birds above for a while, at least not until the charge began, mostly towards her instead of at it. Again, do not go in that water. The goal, at the very least, was to get that beast up high enough to reach where the scaled armor stopped, and where the flesh weak point began.

Splashing, snarling, teeth baring and aggression ruled the swamp for close to half an hour, each missed blow closer to being fatal than the last. It wasn’t until the beast got agitated enough at the failures to lunge straight ahead, which proved to be both a chance and a problem. Sure, she got her grip on that damn gator, but the favor was returned almost in kind, as one of the reptile’s teeth grabbed onto the first thing it brushed against, which was her ear. Too close to her face, which took a hit as the ivory colored weaponry split her lip up through her cheek on the left side. Her own teeth bit down on the pale skin over the throat, jaws aching from strain as she latched onto the lower half of the trachea itself, feeling it crush under the pressure and mold around her fangs. The weight of the alligator wasn’t kind either, and there was a crunch as its body landed on her shoulder directly, popping it out of place.

Too bad so sad, a shoulder wasn’t a windpipe.

Arrow pushed off the mutilated lizard with as much force as three functioning limbs could give her, tearing away her jaws from the ruined remnants of a throat, snapping cartilage and blood vessels, ripping her own ear in half in agonizing slow motion, tossing her own injured body back into the swamp water, holding fast to the dangling fleshy trachea and what looked to be a bit of the animal’s lung. Bubbles rose to the surface of the water after her head went under, yelling and swearing in pain, though she wasn’t sure what hurt more. She sat up, left eye squinting from the injury beside it, and pushed her shoulder back into place until the sickening crack echoed through the now quiet again wilderness.

By late afternoon, Arrow was dragging the corpse of a swamp alligator back to the town, as heavy as it was. A long trail from carved mud followed her, crossing from untameable backwoods to civilization.

She dropped the corpse, panting from the radiating pain and physical demand, the strands of dark fur hanging over her forehead plastered to her face in holy matrimony of blood and swamp water. Moss and grime slid off her spotted pelt, landing next to her and the gator. Side eyes and passing looks of concern and surprise seemed to go over her head. One thing, before she gave her gift to her lovely girlfriend. Arrow grabbed hold of the suspiciously bloody tooth and pulled it out of the large jaws like she was pulling the sword from the stone, yanking out the gator fang that successfully cut her face up, a little sad spurt of blood adding itself to the slimy concoction already there. That was hers, now. It even still had bits of her missing ear on it.

”Anyone know where Elsweyr is?”

tl;dr: Arrow went gator huntin’ and dragged it back into town, but she’s got a big cut up the left side of her face + half her left ear is just gone

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"What?" Arrow frowned, blinking once at Atbash when the savannah approached. It took her a moment, perhaps her brain gears there were waterlogged, but eventually it clicked. Her frown changed into a grin, motioning to her busted up face with a paw. Oh, oh, got it. "Right, right, Moth. For all this. This is nothin', it'll heal on its own." Was it really nothing? Probably not, but she'd been through worse, much worse. As long as her eyes were still in their sockets, and she had all four limbs, nothing would warrant a visit from the medic. At least, not in her eyes. Injuries healed, blood clotted. But perhaps that was just her personal mentality, she'd always been less afraid of injury than she should be, and being a ghost ripped away the natural fear of mortality. The cheetah raised a brow at Atbash's reaction, amused more than anything. "What's wrong, Attie? Gator got ya tongue?"

A relieved "eyyy" passed her lips subconsciously at the arrival of just the lady she was looking for, glad that dragging the heavy corpse any farther was no longer a potential problem. "I'll say, this big green fuck wasn't easy to wrestle with. But y'know, I'm just so tough and cool, it didn't stand a chance." Arrow rambled, tongue dragging over the gash over her lip and grimacing at the brutal stinging left behind. The dip in flesh was noticed, a question rising about how far it went, and if she could stick her tongue through a potential gap to scare people. A dopey little giggle erupted from deep in her chest almost immediately at Elsweyr's touch, sort of forgetting what she had meant to say originally. Proud. Of her. That sounded nice, she could get used to that. "Nahhh, it's just, y'know....ain't that impressive." Jeez, get it together.

Arrow cleared her throat in a manner that was very clearly flustered, an invisible hand grabbing her by the neck and yanking her back to reality. "Th-That reminds me! Figured this may have been real tough on you, on us all." She glanced over at Atbash again, tip of her tail curling upwards. "But for our new very lovely Luminary, I've managed to hunt down the strongest beast in the swamp to bring back, y'know, as your gift. Nothin' quite says "I rule this bitch" like eating the flesh of a gator, eh?" Her grin widened for a moment, before wincing and rubbing the injured side of her face. Ouch, got it, don't do that just yet. "And uh, hopefully this repays my debt of all that...uneaten food."