72 First Lives Taken (1/2)

Some moments before the wolves noticed an intruder.

Laune rolled around in the dirt to mask her scent from the wolves, a lot of spirit beasts have their own enhanced senses.

Wolves in particular have a much higher sense of smell compared to most beasts, in previous battles Shadow and the others made use of various herbs when hunting while others rolled around in the grass and dirt to cover their scent.

Afterwards she looked upon the valley, on both sides there was a large rocky area which made it difficult to climb on thanks to some parts which had previously fallen down into the valley. [1]

Thanks to her smaller body compared to those of her clan she climbed through the fallen debris and hid behind the larger rocks.

Making her way through the valley under the cover of the fallen debris she carefully and silently approached the middle of the valley.

She peeked around the large rock she hid behind and saw the wolves on guard, careful to quickly move into the next sign of cover when they are not looking her way.

Closer and closer she noticed one of them was beginning to slack off, the other wolf was distracted by their ally and began to scold the sleepy wolf.

Noticing one wolf with his back to her and the other which had its eyes half closed she stepped out from the rocks and entered the middle of the valley.

Her steps silent, her body low as she stalked her prey.

Closer and closer, her breathing became calm and her eyesight focussed on the wolfs back.

Her heartbeat became quicker as she finally reached behind her target, this would be her first kill. 'Calm... keep calm... first deal with the two, if I fail I will have to face all of the wolves if they call for help.'

”Careful!” She heard the sleepy wolf call out but it was already too late.

She jumped towards the back of the wolf, her jaws firmly held onto the wolfs neck quickly crushing it.

The wolf let out a shriek before dying, his companion silently gasped in shock at the sudden wake up call he had recieved.

Trying to pull his body up from his resting position, he could hear his allies final breaths.

Pushing his body up, he lifted his head and saw a pair of amber eyes looking at him very seriously.

The wolf paused suddenly as he gazed at the eyes of the tiger, the enemy had already killed his companion and as he was able to stand the enemy had already arrived before him.

During his pause the tiger lowered its body and pounced onto the wolf.

Her teeth bit into the wolfs throat, the wolf tried to resist by raising their front legs to scratch the tiger.

Unfortunately their actions were too late to have any effect on the battle, the tigers jaws gripped tighter crushing the wolfs throat.