[open] don't close the coffin yet; any

[atrox]

hangman hooded, softly swinging; don't close the coffin yet, I'm alive

Hyaline was his.

It had not been difficult—not that he had thought it would be. The land was practically a ghost town save for those few souls who haunted its borders. There was no thriving kingdom that required him to overthrow its source of power. There was no army to face off against. In the end, it was simply him and an old friend and the sassy mouth of a young girl who was all bark and no bite. Nothing he could not handle and nothing he would not mind handling again in the future—it was just noise.

The fact that he is now left the leader of a dead land bears no real weight on him. He feels no sense of duty to grow it into something more, although the old ambition still scratches at him. Perhaps with time, it would grow. Perhaps he could feed it enough life that it would slowly rise from the ashes.

Or, perhaps, it would simply continue to serve as a place to call his own.

A place to hunt and sleep and bring the occasional woman home in peace.

Atrox was, after all, a man of simple needs (at least, he was at a cursory glance).

Today though, he leaves his lakefront home and wanders into the common lands. He doesn’t bother to shift into his feline form, although he does remain blanked by the blue-eyes sentients that he has called from the afterlife for the trip. They stand several paces behind him, silent, as he stalks forward, the heavy weight of his mane falling over both sides of his neck. He is not hungry today, although the thought passes through briefly, and the breeding season has left him content if not fully satisfied.

So he is not sure what else drives him forward if not simple boredom.

He comes to rest beside a large tree, growling lightly when the souls get too close and only ceasing when they take several steps back. When he feels he has enough space, he settles in, looking like nothing more than a stallion lazing beneath the autumn leaves—except the eyes. The sharpness always gives him away.

ATROX | THE PANTHER KING