big paws leapt across the trees deftly, barely shaking the branches under his delicate steps. he had been living here for almost as long has he could remember, alone--he had grown to know almost every inch of the jungle. he had lived a lax life in the trees, sleeping and eating whenever and wherever he pleased, rarely bothered by other gembounds. perhaps his magic skills weren't at their peak, but they had improved enough to grant him ample tools to tease and trick anyone who ventured below him, and that was enough.
and so when the
flagrant putrid scent of rot crept its way into his nose, rui knew someone was here, and he was really not even keen to play around with them honestly, he just wanted that awful stench to leave with them.
the jungle disposed of its waste quickly and cleanly, and this was most certainly a stranger. they had worn out their welcome the moment they had decided to stink things up.
with his keen sense of smell and direction in the jungle, it wasn't long before rui found the source of the unfamiliar rot. being up close to the scent made him want to turn away and vomit, as if he might ingest some awful disease just by breathing even this high in the branches, but this awful creature needed to leave.
the jungle cat dipped his head and let darkness shroud his body before leaping to a branch just above the source of the stench, within range for his low, crackly voice to be heard without much effort, but a safe distance up in the tree branches, camouflaged further by his spots and stripes among the leaves.
looking down, what he saw was...
revolting, to say the least. it was as if the massive creature below him was already rotting away, a walking corpse. rui wanted to spit all the vile adjectives he could use to describe the creature as if it would somehow expel it from his mind, where all its awful nooks and crannies etched their way into his memory like a scab waiting to be picked. the only thing that stopped him was the terror that joined his revulsion and froze him in place for a few moments.
he remembered suddenly the screeches of rodent distress he had heard moments before, and anger was added to the growing list of emotions rui was currently feeling. this thing was touching the rats?
after taking a moment to compose himself, rui let his throat begin to click and chatter, beginning as a crackling growl and quickly growing into something akin to the loud rumble of a motor, angry and threatening. this was different even from his regular "spooking random gembounds" growl, his anger and disgust manifesting themselves as something of a scream. it ramped up the volume of his motor-like growl, all at once a scream of anger and an otherworldly threat befitting the title of a miniature jaguar.
"vermin, plague!" yelled the ocelot from the trees, crawling back and forth across branches to displace his own voice. it helped with the spookiness, he thought.
"you are not welcome here. you have damned yourself spreading your vile germ upon my forest." it had taken a lot of practice to hone that foreboding forest spirit voice!
"i don't know what you are, but you ought to take your sickness and go. I bring you the gift of mercy; this is your warning." the growling returned then, loud, and then quieter, as he waited for a response, pacing across the branches like a caged tiger. occasionally he would jump across a branch, essentially circling in an irregular fashion the plagued horse beneath him from high above in the trees.
notes: rui is too late but still grossed out
tags: @Khloros
"speech."
others' speech.
image by emammal on flickr, edited by me.
