The settling of soot and brimstone in eerie silence was proof enough that the last servant of fiends had truly, for certain this time, fallen.

Usually this forest was calm, serene, untouched by outside influence since time immemorial, but this had all since changed in a single contest. The lively woods had echoed with a fight to the death, where pooling blood now set into the once lush, now charred earth. What was beautiful had become desolate, almost unrecognizable; a clearing pocked with now extinguished flames and seemingly lifeless silhouettes. There had been a tremendous shot of light that burned a perfect circle from where a tremendous pair of timeless marble pillars stood, yet now... nothing remained in its place. Only the absence of sound lingered and the fading of blindness.

A huge paw, as large as a man's chest was broad, stirred shakily as it flexed atop its quarry. Thick, curved knuckles grasping, the claws sunk further into motionless flesh, penetrating ever deeper through the sickly cloth that clung to it. The rest of the silhouette followed as it dragged itself forward, still reeling from the erupted swathe of planar power. Nothing else so much as moved, only the silent flight of dark feathered birds who dispersed into nothingness, leaving the trees that hedged the edge of the meadow; they became shadows, too difficult to follow in the ringing that filled ears and the haze that slowly lifted from eyes.

[i]"Har Gathun..."[/i] Jaws parted some with hard fought words, otherwise still clenched.

It swallowed with a pant, the low, snarled voice a whisper initially, speaking only to itself and too distracted to notice the subtle motions of others who had survived. Only then, still struggling to speak, the clamping of the throat relaxed and the muzzle at last withdrew. Red, fresh and lively, covered the short brown hairs that surrounded its maw and stained the pearly, blade-like teeth, which again spoke now in disbelief rather than shock.

[i]"Har Gathun e'nor..."[/i]

Standing to its fullest height, paw still atop the flayed chest of its kill, the other three remained a'rest on the vibrant blades of grass which calmly bent under its weight as though no great calamity transpired. The world paid this turn of events no mind it seemed, too simple and unspoiled to recognize what a fate befell this place. The [i]Gate[/i] was no more, not even a trace left in its wake. What had become of it? How does such a tremendous structure - one of several that connects very planes of existence together - find itself utterly obliterated? Was that so much as possible?

At first the beast remained idle in standing, too shocked that it had not only succeeded in repelling the outsiders, but that something else had happened. Whatever these robed men had done failed horrifically, had the [i]other[/i] outsiders been responsible? They had killed these evil hearts, hadn't they? That was what memory suggested, but this... how could this have happened? One moment these interlopers were meddling before the ancient structure and the next a battle ensued as a second, unrelated set led a startling ambush. Only after that had the animal joined the fray, preying upon the unsuspecting enemy who proved distracted.

Muscling itself some, the claws tore free of the flesh, having been caught within it as well as the remnants of what had been a dark robe. Carefully they too found themselves at rest as a step was at last taken, surveying the damage. The sensation of pain and injury, how portions of its pelt were now battered, was nothing compared to the feeling of loss - a sinking of emotions, as though the color of the spirit had all drained away. Again the enormous feline figure stepped, its ears drawn sleek to its skull while its emerald eyes washed over the casualties and it moved with all the subtlety of a phantasm, revealed only by the calm rays of the sun that hung above their heads and shown down on its earthy pelt.

It drew to the closest outsider, keeping a wide berth around the actually deceased, some of whom lay smoldering and others mangled, only to stand an arm and one half's length away where it peered down to them. The length of its tail moved none, but only the tip of it swayed in thought before it spoke, again in that deep, beastly voice.

[i]"Ye, ein yev thurn?"[/i]

[hider=Translation]
[i]Druidic[/i]
[i]"The Gate..."[/i]
[i]"The Gate is gone..."[/i]
[i]"You, did you do this?"[/i]
[/hider]
[@Ermine][@JBRam2002][@Landaus Five-One][@Ms Ravenwinter][@Big Dread]