Opal huffed in disbelief. "Well, you are old, and that means you had many opportunities! Maybe you're just not good enough for a name!" Ok, getting meaner - maybe too mean for its own good. Not that she knew that yet, but maybe she'd learn that now if Nidhogg felt, and maybe that would be best for it.
Or y'know, he could just eat him like he had originally planned.

"I catch and kill things too - and I EAT them. Bet I've eaten more than you." The bottom face hissed: It was NOT stupid! He was!

But the competition was forgotten, maybe permanently, with a new idea. Her head bobbed along to his suggestion. Yes, their combined power... Three heads are better than two. "Okayokayokay. Something big? Not a rat?"

@Nidhogg

"Of course I'm good enough for a name! I earned it too! ...Dumb!" he added, as an insult, for good measure. "Dumb" was not a noun, but Nidhogg decided that today it would be.

He was, despite his element, a being of pure chaos, after all.

And he didn't seem all that offended; if anything, Opal-One's jab appeared to make him puff up in pride. "I earned it by doing war! Against a big snake, bigger than me. Bigger than anything! I bit it!"

Storytime over--no elaboration required--he turned and looked around. Like a shot he was off into the voidlit shadows, sniffing for prey. "There's never anything big here. But there's bats! AND I can climb! We can kill them and EAT them!" he decided, snuffling across the rock loudly.

Of course, they could always go hunt in Pegasus--usually everyone was allowed to do that, at least, for food. He didn't think of it as kidnapping; he thought of it as... creative babysitting.

"Okay--this way," he hissed, voice quieter now, lurching into a low and quiet scramble. "They'll be up high, probably!"

@V-Opal-One

"Oh."It seems she had been mistaken - she assumed that Nidhogg hadn't earned his name yet, and had simply come across it and adopted it as his own, regardless of what the Overseer had proclaimed. Upsetting, because now he had given concrete proof of his value to the Forge, and V-Opal-One could not offer anything in return. She could not win this competition, so it was time to move the goal posts. "Bootlicker." It mumbled, its attention already split between their argument and the hunt proposed.

He charged off suddenly, and she met his speed as best as she could. Climbing was something she wasn't built for, but running? He was... alright at, as long as he payed attention to where he put his weight. Two heads were better than one, but three chests was overkill. Still, he managed, as he always did.

"Okayy!" Its whisper was still rather loud. "Oh, is it bats? I love bats! I never get to catch any, 'coz I can't fly. I think that's unfair. You scare them, I bite them?" She called the shadows to her, in a subconscious attempt to be as sneaky as possible. Unfortunately, the shadows were uninterested in cooperating today - but that wasn't too much of an issue, to the Opal at least.

@Nidhogg

Nidhogg hadn't ever heard that word, so all 'bootlicker' earned was a blank glance back. "Why would I lick boots?" he asked, in a low hiss.

Apparently, he had heard of boots, before. Somehow.

"Yes! Bats! -Don't be so loud," he added, also quietly. "I can't scare them toward you they'd FLY AWAY." Then he was off like a shot toward the bats, scrambling along the wall. A moment later there was a loud shriek--and a Dragonbat, wing torn and broken, was lobbed haphazardly in Opal-One's direction.

From the hissing, snarling and shrieking that ensued, Nidhogg was too busy fighting off the rest of them to bother supervising the child's kill.

@V-Opal-One

"Because you think they are tasty, obviously - but they're NOT and you would be an IDIOT for thinking that." It handily explained. What use was an insult if the other party didn't understand it?

She kept her neck craned, squinting. That was a lot of bats - an irregular thought popped in their head. Maybe, this was a bad idea. Those bats looked big, bigger than anything he had killed so far. It disappeared with a dog-like shake - just nerves. he had this. "No, becaused they'd be scared of YOU first. They cant be scared of two things at oah-" Bat jumpscare!!!!

The two collided with a scrabble of limbs and an explosion of hissing and screeching - Opal was not fully grown, but still slightly bigger than its opponent. She had been wise enough to open her mouth before the collision, and as the two were sent rolling back with the impact he had gotten a solid grip on its shoulder- its claws scrabbled for purchase on its smooth chitin. He was both unaware and unconcerned of the not-so distant chorus from where Nidhogg had been. He was, understandably, quite preoccupied.

@Nidhogg

All was a tangle of black hide and flapping wings, and in that chaos Nidhogg attempted to make good his escape. He could have fought them, maybe even killed them all, but even he didn't think that was smart. They were food. And it wasn't what he was here for. Just the one--that would be enough, he thought, to feed them both. At least for now.

He led them on a brief and winding chase around some boulders, and bounded off in one direction as the screeching bats chased the wrong way. He was back at V-Opal-One's side in a flash, jaws gaping and eyes gleaming. "IS IT DEAD? DID YOU KILL IT?" he demanded.

Nidhogg then saw that it was not, in fact, yet dead. "You have to KILL IT," he protested helpfully.

@V-Opal-One

As the two tumbled backward, the Opal was quick to learn the bat had teeth of its own - while her own grip held fast, it snapped at the side of her head, way too close to her lower sets of eyes than he liked. He squeezed the threatened ones shut, feeling fangs scrape against the side of his head, drawing blood as they did. It was not a fan of the idea of losing any of its eyes - so it attempted to respond accordingly.

She let her jaws open again, then tried to roll over so it could pin the bat under his own weight, but it didn't gain nearly enough momentum - only serving to kick the bat closer towards the area it wanted safe. Wounded and frantic, the bat took what opportunity it had. Though it had moved past the Opal's head, thus out of reach of its precious little golden eyeballs, it sunk its teeth into an equally problematic area: The side of her neck. Now it was the Opal's time to bleed.

He kicked and wriggled, trying to free himself - but with no luck, not yet at least. It was not dead. He had not killed it - he tried to communicate this to Nidhogg, but all that came out was a panicked squeal of a child in too deep.

@Nidhogg

Nidhogg shot back to Opal-One's side, snapping for the dragonbat. Unfamiliar magic bubbled up--like vomitting--and he coughed out a brief splash of what looked like... fire? It burped and then was gone, a harmless spiral of smoke.

"No, no-" he instructed, twisting this way and that to try and see. "YOU GOTTA--there!--the face-bit--bite it! BITE BITE BITE! Bite it! BITE THE FACE!"

He was backseat-driving. Or coaching. Whatever you wanted to call it. Whatever it was, it was not directly useful--but he seemed to be on Opal's side, at least.

As in--not trying to take advantage of the situation and just eat them, instead.

@V-Opal-One

gore

While it wasn't losing too much blood (yet), it reacted as if the bat had punctured an artery - this was its first time killing something that fought back, afterall. Its pain tolerance was quite low. She continued to wriggle and scream, trying desperately to tug it free with her forelimbs - it was a difficult task.

While he had been blind to most of Nidhogg's efforts to help, whether they be snapping or words of encouragement; The message to Bite The Face came through loud and clear. With one more vicious tug the bat came free with a shriek, and the Opal did the only thing it could think of, the only thing it had been told.

Just before the bat could escape, limp away from his reach - he bit it. On the face. It was not pretty.

Her lower jaw snapped closed like a mouse trap around the Dragon bat's skull. It was not built for this kind of pressure (of being bit on the face) - and with a sickening crack-then-crunch, it came apart in her teeth. The large amount of blood it had previously contained flushed out (some of its brain left too, much to the Opal's horror). He leapt to his feet, coughing and hacking, the now very dead bat sliding backwards to leak whatever it had left on the cave floor.

"I bit the face."

@Nidhogg

For once, he wasn't predatory. He didn't look at Opal and consider that now was a great time to bite their face. Or--faces, rather. Instead he shared in some sense of victory, puffing up his quills and crowing: "YOU BIT THE FACE!" in overly cheerful confirmation.

Then, with casual and utterly dishonest bragging, he nodded over his shoulder. "I chased all the rest of 'em away. You can eat this, now! Have you ever eaten before? You can eat the face!" he added, grinning at Opal-One expectantly.

He then skittered to the dragonbat, prodding it once or twice quite roughly to ensure that it was dead. At the sight of leaking brain he nodded his approval. "You did bite the face." It sounded more like praise than confirmation: it had been one hell of a crushing bite.

@V-Opal-One