Boots lay uncomfortably on his pile of rubble.
'What is life without challenge eh?' Boots mumbled to himself.
He slowly rolled to his feet, disturbing the loose bricks and tiles around him.
'Hmm' he considered.
'Why am I standing on my rear legs? Why does this feel like the normal way to stand?'
'Why are my paws so big?'
'Oooh thumbs!'
'What are these muscles on my chest?'
'At least my white patches are still symmetrical…'
'Is it cold in here…'
'Hmmm' Boots practiced with his new body for a while, he flexed and stretched, did a few jumps. Overall, he felt rather good about it. Although he did find walking around on his rear legs a bit weird at first. He found that crawling around on all fours was rather uncomfortable, for whatever reason. As such, he adapted quickly, as a ruler should!
'What is this place I find myself in?' all this playing around had distracted him from his surroundings, one of Boots's few weaknesses was hyper-fixation, which is a fancy way of saying he got distracted quite easily. After brushing the dust off his shoulders, he surveyed the room in which he stood.
He stood in a dusty and dilapidated old shrine of some sort. It was a simple design, grey plaster was spread across wooden plank walls, cracked in many places. There was a small stone Alcove which had a life-sized statue of a cat, the head of the statue had been smashed to dust. And at the foot of the statue were three, long and thin, bundles of cloth. But the body remained, elegantly sitting on a small cushion.
'Fenix?' he wondered briefly, though it mattered little in the grand scheme of things. He decided to focus his attention elsewhere, which is when his eyes wandered to the three bundles. They were dust-free and that made them look out of place.
'Were these, only just left here?' Boots wondered as he moved over to bundles, picking one up and unfurling it.
The bundle was surprisingly heavy. And as he pulled the edge of the red cloth, a large sword rolled out onto the floor.
'Interesting' Boots said bending down and grasping the sword handle with both hands.
It was a large two-handed greatsword with intricate designs running the length of the blade. The feeling of the blade felt natural in his hand. As if it was made for him, he could feel the power in his hands, beckoning him to slice his enemies to bits.
Boots thrashed the sword around, practicing his moves.
He almost felt like he knew what he was doing, like he'd used one of these before.
'Swip-swip-slassssssh'
"Nah" he said nonchalantly, discarding the sword.
'Thunk!'
"!"
Boots paused, looking at the statue, he could have sworn it just moved.
"…"
The statue remained motionless, as a statue should be, so he opened the next bundle.
Inside it was a beautifully crafted bow and a quiver of golden arrows.
'Hmm' Boots thought, studying the device in his paws.
He played with the string.
He tried pulling it really hard.
He poked the arrows into the wall.
He got his paw stuck in the quiver.
He swung it round on his arm for a bit.
He tried everything really.
Overall, he couldn't really see the point in it.
"Useless." he said throwing the bow over his shoulder.
"Tsk!"
Boots paused. Did the statue just tut at him?
He quickly moved over to the statue, face hovering inches away from it. Staring at it unblinkingly for a long minute.
'Is this statue… nervous?' Boots thought, still staring at the statue. It was giving off some weird vibes.
'Hmmm…. whatever' Boots lost interest, there was one more bundle left.
He unrolled an exceptionally large hammer. Engraved around its hand grip were various different depictions of cats. A large, perfectly cut, rectangular cuboid of black stone was at the business end, held in place by two ornate steel arms that locked it tightly to the wooden handle. One face of the hammer had a golden paw outline on it. The opposite side was the simple face of a cat, also engraved in gold.
It also had a sling that connected from the head base down to the end of the shaft. So he could sling it over his shoulder.
'How practical!' Boots smiled to himself.
Boots held the hammer in his paws and looked around the room for something to test it on. His eyes settled on the little statue.
As he strode over a menacing grin found its way onto his face.
"Don't worry; this won't hurt, a BIT!" he said, bringing the hammer down with ferocious speed!
"Eeep!" squealed the statue!
'BOSH!!'
The statue exploded to pieces in front of him.
"Nobody likes a spy, Fenix!" Boots shouted heartily.
'This thing sure does a lot of damage' Boots thought, looking at his hammer.
'Hmmm, what's next…'
***Fiona***
A grey felinian with black stripes, and bright blue eyes, struggled with a basket.
Fiona was walking through the woods, gathering berries and mushrooms to bring back home to her mother. They were having stew tonight and she was looking forward to it! Especially after a long day helping her father in the fields.
'Crack'
"Haha! Wonderful!"
'Who on Arca could that be?' Fiona thought to herself, it was unusual to bump into people in the woods, especially this far north. As far as she knew, her family were the only ones living this far north of Fengrad. The small town in the valley. There was a road over to the west that cut through the forest.
'Maybe someone has got lost?' Fiona thought to herself.
Although, judging by the sound of things…
"Hya!"
'Crassssh!'
"Ooo!"
…they were having an awfully good time.
Fiona sighed to herself, placing the last few mushrooms into her basket and deciding to investigate the noise.
"Please don't be anyone weird." she said to herself, gathering her things and heading towards the strange sounds.
***Boots***
'Crrrrrrrraasssh!'
"Ha-ha!" Boots exclaimed as the last wall fell down. Giving him the opportunity to fully survey the destruction he had caused.
"Fantastic!" he said, taking a deep breath of the crisp spring air.
He had reduced the entire building to rubble. And was in fact, quite proud of himself.
So proud, that he decided to stand at the top of his, now much larger, pile of rubble and take a good look at the world.
He was in a clearing, of what appeared to be a large forest. He was facing downhill, the slope afforded him the chance to see above the tops of the trees into the valley below.
There was a town in the valley. Small trails of smoke lazily snaked their ways skyward from the tops of various buildings and he could see patches of farmland dotted around the outskirts of the town.
"Look at that SKY!" He roared extatically, much louder than he intended to. Boots was amazed. To think that there was this much sky! Seemingly endless and…blue? He could feel a wetness in his eyes, though he wasn't sure why. He simply wiped his face and allowed himself to get lost in the endless depths of the brilliant blue expanse laid out before him. How magnificent and beautiful it was, had it always been up there?
"Amazing." he said, composing himself.
He really started to take everything in, it was all so different here. There were no skyscrapers or cars, the air was crisp and clean. Everything seemed so green and lush. It was so quiet compared to earth. He could hear the trickle of a stream several hundred meters away. He could hear the birds calling to each other over a kilometre away!
Boots decided he liked this place, as a cool breeze ruffled his fur.
A sudden movement shook the bushes by the treeline to the right.
"Hmmm" he said, turning towards the direction of the movement and furrowing his brow.
***Fiona***
Fiona had finally made her way to the edge of the clearing that used to have a small shrine to Fenix housed within it.
A building that was currently being taken to pieces by a very tall black and white guy.
Who was having a blast, it seems.
Fiona picked up the hem of her skirt and edged closer to the clearing, crouching down behind a tree, she watched the strange man.
"Fantastic!"
'What the hell is so fantastic you oaf?! You can't just go around smashing up shrines!!' she thought bitterly to herself, paws gripping her basket tightly.
She decided she should probably leave.
"Look at the SKY!" the guy roared, massive hammer resting on his shoulder.
'What?' she snapped her head round, 'what's wrong with the sky? The sky is fine. Wait…this guy knows what sky is right?'
"Amazing."
'He totally doesn't know what sky is, I definitely need to leave…' she froze, getting a clear look at the guy for the first time.
'Oh my God!!'
She hurriedly ducks down.
"Hmmm." the guy said, turning her way.
'Why is he NAKED!?!!'