I WILL NOT FORGET YOU || STRYKER'S FUNERAL

[ninazu]

BURN
BRIGHT

Ninazu stood before the sea. The harsh winter breeze rolled off the waves and stung her eyes, but the lioness breathed in the cold and loved its sting for anchoring her in the moment. The guru—no, the Kingpin—stared out to the harsh surf beneath the towering cliffs, refusing to look back at Stryker’s body on the tall wooden funeral pyre behind her.

The Coalition gathered before his headless corpse. Their murmurs reached her ears, but she listened to the ocean crash upon the rocks below. She’d put out the word at sunrise the previous morning, but twenty-four hours wasn’t enough to prepare her for what needed to be said, what needed to be burned. No time, no matter how long, was enough for a lover to grieve.

She let go of the hope he would return, and embraced the fear of living on without him. Ninazu accepted the possibility of her death; she would gladly die and battle through the void to return to her children, her friends, and the Coalition, as she had done before. She assumed he would return as she had, and this belief carried her for a while, allowed her to face the Coalition’s sneering enemies in the monthly neutral meeting, but she couldn’t delude herself forever.

In the seven days following the Typhoon’s successful revolt, Ninazu fluttered between denial and rage. His headless corpse, buried in the snow, mocked her as much as the mountain’s blizzards. He had not returned to her, as she had to him. And the new home they’d won refused to thaw enough to bury what remained of her husband.

Ninazu cradled Stryker’s chain earring between her paws. The flames in her mane burned down to embers, then died in a puff of grey smoke. Gritting her teeth, the lioness closed her eyes and held the earring to her forehead, fighting both the desire to sob and the will to burn a firestorm over the whole world. She inhaled.

The lioness turned to the gathered crowd. Her mane flared, dripping green flames down her shoulders and pulsing against her neck. Stryker’s chain earring sparkled in her palm, matching the one worn on her own ear.

“Stryker is dead.” Ninazu searched for their children in the crowd, but maintained eye contact with the group, looking between those gathered. These animals weren’t only Stryker’s followers and friends—they were hers, too.

“He would’ve returned by now, if he weren’t, and it is time for the Coalition—and myself—to accept his passing. He was our Kingpin, the mind behind our successful empire, and the reason why we survived the destruction of our home.” She smiled to herself. “How things change. When I first met him, when we were both nobodies in the Pitt, he had been the brutal one and I the strategist. But, in time, we learned from the other and grew into the conquerors we became.”

She chuckled softly and shook her head. “He never did learn a lick of healing from me, however.” The Kingpin lifted her chin and rubbed an eye with the back of her paw.

“The Coalition will never be the same. Everyone who knew him has changed because of his impact on this world. Our enemies will never forget the days he crushed them under the Coalition’s paws and ruled them, make no mistake. And we will never forget how he led our struggling band to victory after victory.

“For those of you that knew him personally, let’s not forget the time I thwacked you all with flaming coconuts. Him included! That was the sort of leader he was: fearless in battle, a scourge to our enemies, but a friend to everyone on the island.

“I will never be the same. No longer am I your guru, your healer, your unofficial second in command. Today, I will lead you. Just as Stryker and I learned together, I will continue to learn from our successes and failures.

“We may never become the empire we were under his leadership, but, under mine, we will enter a new age. None will dare attack our icy home, and we will be free to take what we need from the world. Why should we care what any of those fools think? We beat them all, and we survived to rub it in their fucking faces.

“Stryker would want us to endure. I want us to endure. For we are the same as the plants we brought with us. Does it boggle anyone else’s mind that our carnivorous plants thrive in colder weather? Make no mistake—they, like us, are adaptable to any environment.

“We can, and we will thrive.”

Ninazu bared her fangs and dipped her head. The green flames leaped from her mane to the funeral pyre, crackling into a roaring bonfire in seconds. The heat rushed from the pyre, but Ninazu stood unmoving next to where Stryker’s head should’ve been. She curled her paw tighter around his earring.

“If anyone else has words to share… now is the time.”

© MADI

[SirDio]

BRUTEI TSUNE

Stryker. Dead. God, it was a whirl of thoughts that spurred in the ice demon's mind. If Ninazu was able to return - hell, if Brutei was able to return, why couldn't Stryker rewrite the laws of fate? What twisted soul decided to leave the Coalition with one less strong and smart man. An influencer.

He had gathered with the crowd, grey scarf wrapped tightly around his neck. Her words struck him, strengthened him. A man he considered a friend was no more, the man he told his secret to had died. He couldn't hold back the mournful huff he let out.

When silence filled the crowd, he was the one to step up and speak. "He was a lion I considered a friend. I told him things I wouldn't normally tell anyone. He, along with all of you, welcomed me into the Coalition. To him, I owe some of my life." He held his head high. "He was a great leader, powerful enough to capture all the island. He lead us into greatness, and I know you will lead us into greatness as well, Ninazu."

If I could choose, I would rather have stayed dead so Stryker could have lived.

MORTAL KINGS ARE RULING CASTLES,
WELCOME TO MY WORLD OF FUN!

— Reggan

[rhosmari]

She was angry. More angry then she had ever been in her life. A storm of ice slipping along her paws and spiking the ground with deadly icicles. Truth be told she was attempting to not fall a part, not send more snow and ice upon the lands. She was in pain and severely so because she had lost her father. She had lost a part of her that had raised her from childhood and she would never have him again. He hadn't come back and he had been defeated by a pack of gremlins that claimed themselves to be pirates. They were nothing but sea rats and she hated them for what they had done. Her gaze was clouded as she had been given the news and she had all but given up hope herself. A long week and there was nothing from her father. Nothing to make her heart spring into happiness. What even was happiness anymore. The world was just as bleak and cold as this new territory was and she supposed they deserved it. She followed the proceeding toward the pyre, eyes closing as she didn't want to see it. Her head jerked down and she didn't want to face the final farewells, the crying sobs, the moans of despair. She hated everything about this moment.

She tried to block out what her mother was saying, the finality in it too much to bare. But she had no choice but to listen to it and she forced her pastel pink eyes open. Her cracked horns seemed to glisten in the cold sunlight as she forced her gaze upon the headless corpse. Tears stinging her eyes as she breathed in hard. ''You were supposed to come back. You were supposed to rub it in their stupid faces that their revolt was fucking pointless. Instead you let that fucking bitch put the final nail in your goddamn coffin!'' She could scream right now and perhaps she already was as ice crawled up along her claws and the back of her legs. Pain pressed against her chest and she squeezed her eyes shut once more. Turning her head away she forced herself to calm down. Just think of something nicer to say but there was nothing nice to say about the situation. Her father was gone and now she was scared that she could lose her mother too.

Her body slumped down against the frigid snow and she looked up as the green fire slipped from her mother's mane to light the pyre on fire. It was not beautiful, it was ugly. It was a harsh reality that she had to face and it was probably worse for her mother. The only thing she needed to have was closure, or so they said anyway. She faced the flames, the smell of a burning body searing through the air before she simply looked up to the sky that began to fill with the ash of a smoldering corpse. ''Bye dad....I'll miss you...''

[APOSTLE]

EVEN THOUGH THE NEIGHBOURHOOD THINKS I'M TRASHY AND NO GOOD,

His father's death had been inevitable. It would have come some day, whether by the paws of another or by the hands of time itself.

Diego had never expected it to come so quickly.

Of all the things to come from this, his parents' death wasn't one he had ever saw coming. Even then, he had assumed that they would come back. He had been right about Ninazu's return, but never had he ever felt so wrong about something as when the fire-maned lioness confirmed everyone's thoughts.

His father wasn't coming back.

It started as a dull twang in his ears and quickly rose to a sharp, constant, high pitched squeal that, paired with Sojourn's frantic, angry wails, had him pressing his ears flat against his head. He watched as his mother's eyes fell on him and then his sister, though she tried to keep eye contact with the rest of the Coalition, too.

Brutei's words had all but disappeared from his head, for he had spoken before Sojourn. As it was, any coherent thought had fled his mind- all he could hear was high pitched wailing and his own voice in his head, repeating over and over: he's dead, he's really dead.

Immediately he thought back to the raid he'd just participated in, and guilt flooded through him. He'd been so preoccupied with the pretty ocelot, he hadn't been paying attention to anything else, besides various attacks coming at him. If he'd never engaged with Rosemary... maybe he'd have been able to keep his father alive.

Instead he'd been flirting with the enemy when he should have been killing her.

He felt a ball form in his throat, but he couldn't swallow it down. He found himself moving to his sister's side to press gently against her ribcage; he couldn't decide if he was seeking to give comfort or to take it.

I SUPPOSE IT COULD BE TRUE, BUT THERE ARE WORSE THINGS I COULD DO

— Reggan

[Romulus]

Romulus had been there with them. He watched as the pirate's sword swung downwards, impaling his father's flesh and successfully decapitating him. The rush of crimson, earth flying upwards, dire screeching, and victorious taunting wracked his brain daily, enabling an unknown rage that laid inside him. The lion had acted out, taken matters into his own paws, and dealt with what he could, only to be defeated in the end. Fury engulfed his mindset, only to be taken over by denial and regret, leaving acceptance to hit him last. He wasn't ready though. It was too soon.

As soft paws fidgeted with the grass below, his head bowed down to the floor. Alabaster teeth gritted together. The multicolored beast shook his head in frustration, now ripping at the weak earth beneath his claws. A ragged breath left him as he raised his head with rounded ears beginning to listen to his mother's emotional speech. With every word, the stone below subtly shook and the hellfire exerted from his paws flickered upwards. If only his father hadn't been courageous and kept under the mist's vale, he'd be alive. After all, he was 'the reason why we survived the destruction of our home.'

A growl exited Romulus. Small bouts of lava pooled underneath him, only to settle as he finished exhaling. His mother's speech finalized and the pyre was lit, but the hollow hole in his chest and regretful pain remained. When she asked for any words, his son only closed his eyes and whispered a dejected goodbye.