[center][h1][b][color=DE33FF][b]M E L A N T H A[/b][/color][/b][/h1][/center][hr][hr]The night sky shimmered with the flickering light of stars. The sound of the wind whispering through the trees, coupled with the occasional calling of nocturnal birds gave the coniferous forests of Kalgrun a peculiar but beautiful ambience that could very well be dubbed “nature’s singing voice”.

It was this gentle voice that slowly brought to wakefulness the unconscious form that had so suddenly appeared amidst the trees and bushes of the island in the middle of Hunter’s Eye. The being shifted and moved as it lay there on the cold and lumpy soil. Its long, black hair was damp and clinging to its body, which upon a closer inspection identified the being as female.

And then her eyelids, which until this time were drooping and leaden with sleep, suddenly snapped open, followed by a deep inhalation somewhat akin to a drowning person desperately clutching for air to breathe. Her eyes darted around from tree to bush to rock and back, never staying on one thing for more than a few seconds. She suddenly felt an intense urge to run away, but soon realized, to her dread, that her body would not obey her commands. Her muscles felt stiff and unresponsive, and her head pounded with the most unbearable of headaches. She moaned in pain as she forcefully willed her body to turn around from where she lay.

Now on her stomach, she slowly brought her arms forward, one at a time, and started dragging herself towards a closeby tree. Even with crawling as she was, she could not help but stop multiple times in order to catch her breath and recollect herself, the pain dangerously threatening to overwhelm her.

After what seemed an eternity to her, she managed to sit up by the tree, her back leaning on it for support. She had to look twice to make sure she didn’t carry two logs instead of arms, that’s how heavy they felt to her. The woman sat there, gasping for air, the only thing she could realistically do without feeling much pain. She looked around, taking in her surroundings. The forest canopy emerged as a towering beast above her, a beast with countless twisted and squiggly branches for arms and thick roots for feet. She stayed quiet for the most part as she tried to grasp the situation she had found herself in.

In the distance, a low, pained howl could be heard, drowning out all other sounds. It went on for quite some time, and when it stopped, the forest was completely silent. The woman’s head snapped towards the direction of the howl’s origin, while her heart started beating faster. The first thought that came to her mind was to get up and run away as far away as possible, but that would be unrealistic; she reckoned she could barely stand up as she was, much less run.
But then the howl emerged in her mind once more, and the woman was subconsciously moved by its uniqueness. As if it was calling out to her, somewhere inside of her she could weirdly identify with the being that would let out such a sound, for both of them were wounded, both of them were in pain.

After a few moments of consideration, the woman gritted her teeth and, whilst clutching the tree behind her, slowly pushed herself up into a standing position. When she let go of the tree, she teetered dangerously but soon found her balance. With shaky steps, the woman started to slowly walk towards the direction the howl had come from.

The forest began to thin as she neared the destination until finally, she stepped out of it completely. In front of her was a beach, and at the far end of that beach lay a beast hundreds of times her size. It was a massive wolf, with dark fur. Slowly, it lifted its head and turned toward her. One of its eyes was missing, the surrounding flesh was torn and scratched, blood dripping from the empty socket. The wolf tried to growl, but instead, the growl turned into a high pitched whine, and it set its head back down.

It wouldn’t be an understatement to say that she would be abjectly terrified by the sheer size of the thing if it wasn’t for the fact that its current appearance was equally as pitiful as it was intimidating. What could possibly injure such a beast? The woman audibly gulped before she hesitantly started walking towards the giant wolf.

The wolf’s remaining eye watched her every step with wariness, and the beast let out another whine, but it did not move an inch. Perhaps it recognized that she was not a threat, or perhaps there was simply no fight left in it.

It was only when she’d finally reached the wolf’s location that she was able to really gauge its size. It was, well, huge. From afar when she first saw it, it did look large but not as large as it looked from up close. Its head was almost the size of a large boulder with how tall it was. The woman looked at the wolf’s uninjured eye for any signs of aggression but there were none. Feeling an inexplicable boost of confidence, she reached out and gave the beast a shaky pet on its head.

The wolf’s fur felt soft to the touch and the more she petted it, the more she felt like rubbing herself all over it. She slowly descended with her hands towards the front of the wolf’s head, petting behind its ears, or what parts she could realistically reach from where she was standing. She refrained from touching the injured parts of its face, the gruesome wound coupled with the beasts warning growl when her hands strayed a little too close for comfort sending a good enough message to her to stay away from that specific place.

The woman moved closer to the wolf, coming to kneel beside it. With one hand on top of its snout, she looked at its sole, uninjured eye. [color=DE33FF]“Seems like you and me both have seen better days, haven’t we?”[/color]

[color=orange]“Have you?”[/color] a gruff voice interjected.

The suddenness of the voice nearly gave the woman a heart attack. She miraculously jumped up like a spring despite her body being exhausted as it was and scurried a few meters away forward before dropping back down, her tired body catching up with her racing heart. Turning her head around, she laid her eyes upon the origin of the unannounced voice.

Standing behind her was a blond-haired man with a thick moustache, dressed in animal pelts with a cloak of black fur. One hand gripped a bow, while the other was empty. He eyed her warily. [color=orange]“The Goddess of Darkness,”[/color] he observed.

[color=DE33FF]“W-wha-who?”[/color] She subconsciously let out as she moved closer to the wolf, figuring that the size of the beast would be enough of a deterrent for the man to not approach her further.

[color=orange]“I’ve been meaning to speak with you,”[/color] the man said, his brow furrowing. [color=orange]“I am Kalmar. The God of The Hunt,”[/color] he introduced himself with a nod.

The woman processed his words in her brain for a few moments, repeating his name. [color=DE33FF]“[i]Kalamar, Kalar,[/i] [b]Kalmar,[/b]”[/color] she muttered a few times as she memorized the name of the person in front of her. [color=DE33FF]“Kalmar,”[/color] she said once again, with more confidence this time, yet still keeping a guarded stance.

[color=DE33FF]“Okay,”[/color] she called out at him. [color=DE33FF]“It would be best you didn’t come closer, Kalmar. This beast here is injured and deadly. I would suggest you slowly left this area and went back to where you came from, else who knows what might happen to you,”[/color] she told him after some thought. 

Kalmar gave her an amused smirk. [color=orange]“Melantha, you’re more of a threat to me than he is. I’m the one who created him.”[/color] The smirk faded. [color=orange]“Why are you here?”[/color]

Now that was a shocking revelation. That man was the one responsible for the creation of this gigantic beast? She felt conflicted as her brain and her body told her two different things.

Her brain urged her to move away from the wolf, since if the man told the truth it could mean he could order it to attack her at any moment, yet at the same time her body did not want to leave its vicinity; she had practically hidden herself inside the wolf’s thick fur, with her head being the only thing revealing where she was. [color=DE33FF]“Who is Melantha?”[/color] she asked him in the end. [color=DE33FF]“I assure you I am not a threat to you or your little friend here if what you are saying about creating him is true after all…”[/color]

Kalmar frowned, his expression shifting to disapproval. [color=orange]“Is this an act? You are Melantha. We were all given an understanding of each other when we were first brought to this world. I know who you are, and you know who I am.”[/color]

[color=DE33FF]“No, I don’t know who you or ‘we’ are. I woke up in this forest, alone and hurt. I heard this beast howling from afar and so I came here to see what was happening. I didn’t expect to find something like this, however…”[/color] She replied, her expression softening a little as she remembered the wolf’s wound and the pain it conveyed with its howls.

Kalmar’s frown deepened. [color=orange]“You woke up in the forest… where were you before that?”[/color] he asked curiously.

[color=DE33FF]”Before? Before that I was… I was…”[/color] The woman tried to remember, but alas she could not. At that moment, the splitting headache from before that had by now abated came back with a vengeance. She moaned in pain and clutched her head with her hands, curling up into a ball and rolling out of the wolf’s fur. She writhed there as she lay on the ground, unable to make the headache stop.

One second and a few steps later, Kalmar was kneeling beside her, an expression of what seemed to be concern on his face. For a moment, he only watched, uncertain. Then, he removed his cloak and wrapped it around her.[hr][hr]The bout of headache lasted for close to an hour in real time before alleviating, and it left the woman completely and utterly drained. She was from head to toe drenched in sweat, her breath shallow and ragged. Her eyes wandered around aimlessly as she tried to regain her senses. The first thing she felt as she stirred was something thick but soft covering her whole body. She slowly brought her arms out of the cover and over it and shifted to the right where she found herself face to face with a campfire. The dancing flames of the fire helped her focus, allowing her to sort her thoughts.

Kalmar was not far. He sat next to the fire as well, his bow resting on the ground next to him. In each hand he had a stick, and at the end of each stick was a fish. With a focused expression he held both over the fire, and the smell of cooked fish reached her nose. He looked over to her. [color=orange]“You’re awake,”[/color] he observed.

[color=DE33FF]“Yes I am, and so are you,”[/color] she replied in a cutting manner. [color=DE33FF]“Did you watch over me the whole time?”[/color] she asked, her eyes darting to the fish and back at him.

[color=orange]“Only most of it,”[/color] Kalmar shrugged. [color=orange]“I had to look away to make the fire, and to catch these,”[/color] he raised one of the sticks to indicate the fish. [color=orange]“I still need to talk to you.”[/color]

[color=DE33FF]“Ugh,”[/color] the woman shifted back to lying on her back and looked at the stars in the night sky. [color=DE33FF]“Talk, talk, talk… what is the point of talking? I can’t remember anything before my awakening in this place,”[/color] she said with a sad tone on her voice. [color=DE33FF]“And you saw what happened when I tried to recall something. There’s no way I am doing more of that anytime soon…”[/color]

Kalmar was silent. Wordlessly, he pulled the sticks away from the fire, stood up and walked over to her, offering one of them. She grabbed it wearily and muttered thanks before sinking her teeth into the fish. Then, the Hunter spoke. [color=orange]“So you remember nothing? What if, instead of remembering, I told you?”[/color] he asked.

[color=DE33FF]“Told me?”[/color] She questioned between bites. [color=DE33FF]“And how do I know that what you say to me aren’t lies?”[/color]

[color=orange]”You don’t,”[/color] came the blunt response. The woman stopped and turned her head towards him, looking at him straight in the eyes. After a few moments, she sighed and turned back to eating. [color=DE33FF]“I guess I don’t have much to lose by hearing you out. I want to learn what is going on as much as you do…”[/color]

[color=orange]“Before we came here, this land was just water,”[/color] Kalmar began, taking a bite out of his own fish. [color=orange]“Then the Architect brought us here, pulling in countless souls from elsewhere. For some reason, some of us stood out from the others, so he made us into gods. He gave us the ability to create and alter the world, and we did, but we each had a different name and a different purpose. Your name is Melantha, and you are the Goddess of Darkness.”[/color]

She listened as she ate, taking in the new information. The Architect? Souls? Gods? She did not recall anything of that sort. [color=DE33FF]“So you say my name is Melantha?”[/color] She asked absentmindedly as she repeated the name in her mind just as she did with Kalmars. [color=DE33FF][i]“Melantha, Melantha, Melantha… I like how it rolls off the tongue.”[/i][/color] Melantha thought to herself with a small smile. She finished the last of the fish and threw the bones and stick into the fire before swallowing. [color=DE33FF]“What is a god?”[/color]

[color=orange]“It is a good name,”[/color] Kalmar acknowledged, before deciding to address her more important question. [color=orange]“A god is a being that can shape the land and create life. This land that we are on now, I raised from the sea. And as I said, that wolf, Fenris,”[/color] he gestured to the massive form of the wolf, which was now fast asleep, [color=orange]“is also my creation. I made other things as well. You probably made things too, before you lost your memory, but I don’t know what.”[/color]

[color=DE33FF]“Yeah no. I doubt I can raise land out of nothing like you claim you can,”[/color] Melantha said dismissively. She then turned her head towards the sleeping form of the wolf and looked at it for a few moments before turning back. [color=DE33FF]“Show me,”[/color] she told him.

Kalmar frowned. [color=orange]“I won’t be raising another continent, if that’s what you’re expecting,”[/color] he said. [color=orange]“We have enough land already, and the last time took a lot out of me. But I can make something…”[/color] and with those words, he turned his back and stepped away from the fire. Closing his eyes, he concentrated.

The creature that materialized before him was similar one he had made before. It was half lion, half bird, and more than twice his size, but where the feathers would have normally been brown they were instead a shiny black. Perhaps that alone might have been enough to impress her, but he did not stop there. The creature began to grow, and grow, and grow until it was roughly half the size of the wolf. 

Then, it stopped, and Kalmar opened his eyes. The giant griffin looked around, expanded its wings, and let out a screech that jolted Fenris awake. The wolf immediately rose and began growling at the strange creature, but Kalmar raised a hand. [color=orange]”Down!”[/color] he ordered, and Fenris obediently laid back down.

If even the wolf was surprised by the appearance of the strange half-lion, half-bird beast, imagine Melantha’s surprise to see something so extraordinary happen right in front of her eyes. She never in a million years expected to be proven wrong in her assumption that Kalmar had been faking it all. And to top it all, the wolf’s obeisance to him, it staying down when ordered, also gave validity to what he said earlier about having created the beast.

Melantha was shooketh. She laid back down, trying to make sense of everything that she had experienced up until this point. From waking up alone inside a strange forest, having forgotten everything before that, to finding a giant injured wolf lying by the side of a lake, to meeting a strange man that claimed both he and her were superpowered beings with reality manipulating powers and finally finding out that all this was seemingly the truth and not some joke was a lot to take in.

She eventually stood up, fur cover and all, and walked towards Kalmar and the strange beast he had created. [color=DE33FF]“What is it? Can I pet it?”[/color] She asked him curiously.

[color=orange]“A griffin,”[/color] Kalmar answered with a smile. [color=orange]“I’ve made them before, but not this big. It needs a name...”[/color] the Hunter stroked his chin, thinking.

Melantha tentatively put her hand on the griffin’s feathered neck and slowly petted the lion-bird. She found herself especially drawn into its dark feathers and how they would shine when reflecting the light from the stars in the night sky. [color=DE33FF]“What about… Shynir?”[/color] Melantha suggested.

[color=orange]“It works,”[/color] Kalmar agreed. [color=orange]“Shynir it is…”[/color] And then his feet lifted off the ground, and he was floating. He reached out a hand to Melantha, clearly expecting her to grab on.

[color=DE33FF]“What? You can’t expect me to get on that thing now, can you?”[/color] She told him with an incredulous look on her face. [color=DE33FF]“No, I’m fine just looking at it, thank you very much.”[/color]

Kalmar frowned. [color=orange]“I could just leave without you,”[/color] he suggested with a shrug.

[color=DE33FF]“And you would leave your wolf over there all alone and wounded? That doesn’t seem like something a responsible owner would do…”[/color] Melantha replied.

[color=orange]“Fenris is far stronger than he looks,”[/color] Kalmar countered. [color=orange]“He will be back to health soon enough.”[/color]

[color=DE33FF]“Ugh, fine…”[/color] Melantha conceded in the end. Kalmar was seemingly intent on getting her to ride the griffin and she was running out of excuses to prevent it from happening. She reluctantly grabbed Kalmar’s hand and was immediately floated up and towards him. [color=DE33FF]“Whoa,”[/color] she exclaimed as she saw the ground distancing itself from where she was. 

[color=orange]“You have the power to do this yourself. I will show you later,”[/color] Kalmar informed her as they rose higher. He set her down on the griffin’s back and then sat down in front of her. [color=orange]“Hold on,”[/color] he advised.

[color=DE33FF]“Hold on from where? This thing doesn’t exactly have much to hold on to”[/color] she complained as she got herself comfortable atop the griffin.

[color=orange]“To me,”[/color] he advised, with a slight shake of his head. [color=DE33FF]“Alright,”[/color] Melantha said and put her hands on either side of Kalmar’s waist. [color=DE33FF]“I’m ready,”[/color] she informed him.

Kalmar coughed. [color=orange]“Alright,”[/color] he said after a moment, trying to remember the griffin’s name. [color=orange]“Shynir, we head west!”[/color]

The griffin let out another screech, and with a flap of its wings it took off, much to Melantha’s dismay.[hr][hr][hider=SUMMARY]
Melantha awakens on the Hunter’s Eye, in deep pain and lacking any memories. She hears a wolf howl and decides to investigate it. She finds Fenris, lying prone on a beach and missing an eye. She decides to comfort him, proceeding to pet him all over.

Kalmar interrupts the petting session and begins questioning her. When she claims she doesn’t know who she is, he asks her to remember where she was [i]before[/i] she woke up. She tries to find out it only gives her a horribly bad migraine.

While she recovers, Kalmar wraps his cloak around her, builds a fire, and cooks some fish. When they speak again, Kalmar suggests that instead of her trying to remember, he could simply tell her about the ways of the world.

It quickly becomes apparent that Melantha isn’t just unaware of her own identity. She is also unaware of her own ability and doesn’t even seem to grasp the concept of what a ‘god’ is. Kalmar tries to explain it, but she doesn’t believe him, so he creates a giant griffin in front of her.[/hider]