ORIGIN - RED MOON WEEPING

The next match would begin shortly. Blood still caked the arena floor and a sapphire chrysalis sat neatly upon it. Aethril pushed up and she set Asher down on the seat next to Pollen-- "I'll be back in a moment," she assured with a smile, her voice still hoarse from shouting over the last match.

And then, click click click, she was moving on. Winding down the steps to exit the coliseum, and with this, she began her hunt.

Whatever had happened to that jaguar bothered her. Its child had shit and cried and pissed itself about death, in a Deathmatch, and for some absurd reason the jaguar decided to listen to it. For some even absurder reason, it refused to fight without Aethril taking direct action.

Unfortunately for him, he'd won. He'd be up against another screaming, blood-filled bag of meat to chew through. If he got shy about killing and eating during the next match, then what the hell would Nemean do to it? She'd kill it several times over, and although Aethril should have cared less about its fate, she had a certain bias to cats.

"Viktor," she called, her brow furrowing, padding through the forum. Where had it even gone?

@Viktor

The match had ended with blood and screams. As did much of his hope in this life as it seemed to flash before him as he was declared the victor. He would need to fight again, and yet he could still hear her. Juniper screaming for him to cease his sudden assault upon the young boar.

What had he done?

Their sapphire chrysalis sat before him, as caked blood clung to his fur and dripped from his maw and side still. The heavy taste of iron once welcomed felt- wrong and bitter as if turned black and rotting. But still, something in him stirred, fighting and wanting more. No! He needed to leave. He needed to find his daughter and leave.

So he vacated the arena, rather hastily, leaving a trail of trickling blood both his own and not as he left the scene. He felt no need to find a healer, even as his own wounds wept tiredly. He searched for her, a part of his mind not taking into account that- maybe he should clean up...Juniper shouldn't see the blood of his kill upon him like this. Especially with all of the chaotic context that had been given and not.

He didn't understand though, something in him had switched. A sudden urge and panic of boar's actions long passed taking the piglet's place. The need and hunger he felt was all too familiar- something he thought he had outgrown. The taste of another gembound...one who had signed up willingly and served themselves on a platter so unknowingly. Their ichor strong and warm, oh it was like a sire song, one that he needed more- no no he was past all that.

What the fuck happened back there!?

What was happening to him!?-

"Viktor,"

He stopped, abruptly so.

Claws digging into the ground below he steadied himself with a sliding halt. Pale gaze flickering, no that wasn't Juniper- nor...any voice he was familiar with and yet? Why did he stop?

There was a woman, so very blue and ethereal. He knew not who she was but she evidently knew him. An audience member then. He had half a mind to run, ignore her and carry on with his search. Juniper couldn't have gone too far, right?-But something in the back of his mind told him to obey this time and to listen.

There was more to her than what he could see, she was something far, far out of his league. And any predator of merit would feel and respect that. So he waited, maw slightly open and caked red as he ran his tongue over teeth in an effort to clean Porkchop's remnants free as he now had the time.

"Yes?"

"Clover Speech"
"Vicktor Speech"

@Aethril

Dappled, dark spotting and blood lingering on their jowls-- beautiful --he turned and Aethril stopped with a scrape of her heel against the cave floor. Viktor licked his teeth and the Hand found herself imitating the gesture without thinking; her tongue swiped along her incisors and lingered on an elongated canine for just a moment.

He waited. He listened.

Good.

"Viktor," she purred, lips upturning into a wire-thin smile. Her eyes narrowed-- not to give her expression sincerity, but instead to spend a moment scrutinizing the creature before her. He looked similar to Obieth; feline, black, with long canines but there was something distinctly more... Earthly about this one. He wasn't the streamlined perfection that the Valkhound was-- but he was pretty damn close. "I was sad to see you leave. You gave all of us a good show."

One step forward. The pronounced click and scrr-uff of her heel, and then no more. It was a test: would Viktor take that one step back, or would he remain where he stood? Her hands clasped in front of her gown and her eyes drank in the sight of the jaguar, waiting with nothing but anticipation to see what he would do. In the meantime, she continued, "we love to see the strong prevail over the weak. It's a tough world out there."

"I was curious, however," head tilt, "what made you stop? What made you leave?" Her weight shifted from one foot to the other idly. "I understand, of course, that your... offspring had some qualms about the fight, but surely both you and they knew what a Deathmatch would consist of?"

@Viktor