Luck favours the bold

Chosen option - Save the Point - 10 votes,( iron stomach had 9, close call) Can be used whenever to buy any available trait (must have more than 10 votes)

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Dawn had already broken by the time the Crow reached the oasis, the sky shifting from deep purples to pale golds. The heat was rising, sharp and sudden, the kind that made her instinctively want to find shade. If the Crow had eyebrows, they would have furrowed. Instead, her feathers ruffled in irritation as the warmth pressed against her skin, reminding her that this was no place to linger exposed.

The oasis sprawled below, a chaotic web of movement and noise. From the Crow's perspective, it wasn't a market, not in the way you might think. It was more like a battlefield. Huge, two-legged creatures moved about, wingless giants, draped in cloth and metal, shiny bits that caught the sunlight and sparkled in a way that made the Crow's heart beat faster. Trinkets. But food—food was the real prize. And there was plenty of it, carried in sacks, laid on open carts, falling in crumbs to the dust below.

The Crow didn't hover above—hovering was suicide. The air here was full of dangers: predatory birds, faster and fiercer than her, with talons that could tear her apart. Below, the ground was no safer. Gigantic beetles, hard-shelled and snapping, lumbered past. Ostrich horses with long, sharp beaks that could skewer her without a thought. And these were only the creatures she knew. There were others, shadows from her memories, monsters whose names you didn't know but whose instincts whispered death.

So she flew low, keeping close to the palm trees that lined the oasis like silent sentinels. She found a spot in one, half-hidden among the fronds, and waited. And you waited with her, watching through her single eye, feeling the tension in her small body, the hunger gnawing at both of you. You saw flashes of her past—this was the best strategy. Wait and watch. Let fortune bring sustenance.

Hours passed. The market below ebbed and flowed like a tide, creatures moving in and out. Food came and went, but never close enough for the Crow to act without risk. The sun climbed higher, the heat baking the sand, the streets growing more crowded, more dangerous. Every now and then, something flashed by—another predator, a shadow in the sky, a shape on the ground—but the Crow stayed still. Smart. Patient.

Yet nothing. No opportunity. The Crow shifted restlessly, and you felt her instincts growing more desperate. You were about to test your control, to nudge her toward a different approach, when it happened.

A loud crack—the sound of a rock hurled with precision—and then chaos. A man riding a strange creature, a mix of elephant and camel, crumpled under the blow. The rock struck his head cleanly, and the man tumbled from his perch, hitting the ground with a dull thud. His bulging sack, slung over his shoulder, fell too, spilling its contents in all directions as the man scrambled to his feet and sprinted away.

The Crow's eye gleamed, her body tensed, and before you could even process what had happened, she moved. Fast. Faster than you expected. She had seen it before you—a squashed pie, or something like it, leaking filling onto the dirt. Whatever it was, it was food, and the Crow knew it.

She dove, beak pointed down, claws extended. The wind whistled past as she closed the distance, wings cutting through the air like an arrow loosed from a bow. The ground rushed up, the pie getting closer, and you could almost taste it through her—the imagined sweetness, the rich smell, the promise of filling her empty stomach.

Her claws touched the prize. Victory.

But then—a flicker, something orange, a streak cutting through the air. It came from her blind side. In the final heartbeat before she could ascend back to safety, the predator struck.

(Cat roll - 89)

(Crow roll - 41 -10( weak, half-blind) = 31)

Time seemed to slow. The orange streak materialized into a cat, sleek and deadly, with eyes fixed on the Crow. It leapt with the grace of a born killer, muscles rippling beneath its fur as it stretched out in mid-air, claws unsheathed. The cat's trajectory was perfect, aimed right at the Crow's neck.

The Crow's body tensed in response, but it was too late. Pain exploded from her neck as the cat's teeth sank into her flesh, a hot, burning pain that radiated through her entire body. Her wings faltered, one last panicked flap as the sky she had almost touched vanished from reach. The ground, the pie, the sun—they all blurred into nothingness.

She gave a weak, broken screech, her body convulsing once as the cat's jaws tightened. And then, with a sickening snap, her consciousness blinked out like a candle in the dead of winter.

For a moment, everything froze. The world around you ceased to exist. The connection you had with the Crow, once so sharp and clear, dulled to a faint echo. You couldn't see through her eye anymore. There was no sight, no sound, only darkness.

You realized why: the Crow was dead, and your ring now lay buried inside her still body.

A wave of surprise washed over you. This wasn't how you'd imagined things would go. But then, you laughed, because what else was there to do? The turn of events had been swift, brutal, and completely outside of your control.

Such is life, you thought.

Luck favors the bold—until it doesn't.