The wolfgirl was not born a slave. She was born to the tribes. She do not remember which, she was too young to remember, but she was told she had been bought at the slave market so she knew the chances of her ever finding her tribe again was remote.

A young tribal slave in the city, the wolfgirl was given to her master’s daughter, Kyla, as a playmate and whipping girl. She was given the name “Useless” by her mistress’ parents as a constant reminder of her inferior status. The wolfgirl was always with her mistress. She learned her letters and numbers with her, but when her mistress became a mage, she was sent somewhere else.

To the people of the cities, someone from the tribes could only be a barbarian so she was sent to various masters in the city instead to learn jobs and skills to assist her mistress on her future adventures. She learned a variety of jobs like potion-making, tailoring, mercantile and others. As slavery goes, it was not a particularly harsh life, but it was not one of joy either.

Now, deep in the forest of The Kar, the wolfgirl knew what she had been missing. After her “full” change in the tunnels, the wolfmen had finally accepted her. When morning came, they had almost dragged her out of the tunnels and into the forest. They then sat down, waiting for her to change.

Sometime during the night, during her sleep, the wolfgirl had changed back to her half-human form and the wolfmen clearly wanted her to change into a full were wolf before going forward. The wolfgirl did so and found the change to be painless this time. Once she change, the wolfmen ran into the forest and the wolfgirl followed.

It was joyous!   

The pack ran with abandoned. Feeling the wind on her fur, the wolfgirl felt a freedom she had never felt before. Her sense of hearing and smell, so scary in days past, were now a joy. Running on all fours, she breezed past the trees like they weren’t even there, dodging them at a speed she could not even imagine as a human. She was no longer human; she was now something else, something more, and something better than human.

She could not remember her tribe, her mistress was never her friend, and her masters were never her family. In fact, she never had family before. Running with the pack, she knew she had one now! Running through the trees, she knew without doubt she was now with her family. A strange and joyous family! Now, she just had to find a way to be of help to them.

Even though she was keeping up with the pack, she knew the only reason for this was because the others were slowing down for her. This was something that could be easily seen. Several times, she spotted the others looking back to make sure she was still there. In a way this made sense to the wolfgirl.

Simply put, she was a human made into a human-wolf. The others were wolves turned into wolf-humans. In terms of physical ability, she just wasn’t on the same level as them. No, her skills lie elsewhere. Knowledge, especially those involving the humans, was her forte but what good were her skills and knowledge here deep in the woods?  

The wolfgirl had been mulling the question for some distance when she saw it. She slowed and took a second look. An Emperor Daisy! The wolfgirl came to a dead stop. She could not believe it. A flower that actually smaller than a regular daisy, the similar looking flower was named Emperor due to the various properties of the flower. Dried, crushed, or grinded, the flower was used as an ingredient in various potions. It was considered an extremely rare ingredient as it is small and hard to find. The wolfgirl had no woodcraft, and despite her tribal origins was really a city girl. With her enhanced sight however, she saw it. She quickly looked around and saw that there were other Emperor Daisy around the area.

Of course! The wolfgirl wanted to hit herself for her stupidity. She was deep within The Kar, where the Emperor Daisies were found. Most hunters don’t come this far into the deep forest for flowers but the tunnel of the Creator was nearby. What was rare and dangerous to humans could be simple for her. She really was a stupid useless idiot! There she was saying she was something more, but here she was still thinking like a bloody human!  

The wolfgirl stood up on her hind legs. It wasn’t the most comfortable stance for her as she hadn’t got her balance right yet but it was the only way for her to reach the Emperor Daisy growing on the trees. She then found another problem; she couldn’t grab it!

Her werewolf form had claws instead of fingers and instead of hands, it was paws. The wolfgirl wanted to slash the tree in rage! Wait a moment…the wolfgirl stopped herself ad wondered where did that came from? She blinked her eyes several times in surprise and took a deep breath. Okay, that was strange. That wasn’t like her at all.

The wolfgirl relaxed and felt the power within her…soften. She felt her body changed. She got shorter, the shape of her face changed, and the fur on her body disappeared. About the only things that showed she was not totally human was her ears and the big bushy tail behind her. The wolfgirl plucked the Emperor Daisy from the tree and went on to pluck others. Halfway through, she noticed the other wolfmen. They must have double-backed when they notice she was not with them.

The wolfgirl smiled. Yes, this was what she could do. She would teach the others the skills and knowledge she had, and together they would make the Creator proud.

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An intruder! The hive spread its’ consciousness outwards as the fire spirits within jumped with joy. Is this a chance to finally show off their lizard? Answer was…no.

The fire spirits deflated when the hive notice the lone intruder was a small creature that had most probably flew into the tunnel by accident. Several of the spirits checked on the knowledge the hive had gained previously and they realized the creature was called a bat. However by the time the hive got the information, the bat was already in the last room of the first floor.

“Wow, this bat creature is fast.” One of the spirits exclaimed.

“Yeah,” another spirit agreed. “Looks like the ability to fly make creatures faster. It’s speed is something else.”

“So what?” a spirit said. “Look at how small the thing is! You-Who-Are-Not-Bear will tear it into pieces.”

That’s indeed true. The hive could see no way how the small bat could defeat You-Who-Are-Not-Bear. As the spirit bear appeared out of the walls, twin bars shot out of the ground at both the exit and entrance of the room. The bat was trapped and in a few moments, it would be dead!

You-Who-Are-Not-Bear opened it’s mouth to roar…or at least it was going to roar because the spirit bear saw the bat guided past the bars, flying further into the tunnels. It had totally ignored the spirit bear! Mouth gaping, the spirit that was You-Who-Are-Not-Bear noticed for the first time the bat was small enough to fly through the bars if it flew vertically.

“I/we didn’t know bats can do that!” One of the spirits said. “That’s pretty amazing.”

“It is,” another spirit agreed. “Can someone tell You-Who-Are-Not-Bear to close it’s mouth?”

“Sorry to say but don’t you all think You-Who-Are-Not-Bear is getting pretty weak?” a spirit mischievously said. “It keeps losing!”

“It didn’t lose!” a natural spirit argued. “The bat ran! Maybe we should change the bars of the bar to prevent that in the future.”

“Why waste the energy? Smoky will get it…if the bat ever reaches the end.”

The hive realized that the bat had stopped in the middle of the long tunnel of the second floor. For some reason, it was now hanging upside down from the ceiling of the tunnel. It seems to be resting, maybe even sleeping!

“Uh…the bat stopped.” one spirit said.

“Oh really? Thanks for stating the obvious!” another spirit said.

“Hey, no need to be rude!” the spirit replied. “What do we do now?”

“Let’s force the bat to move.”

“How?” most of the hive asked.

“Let’s cause the ceiling to drop!”

“How?” most of the hive asked again.

“We control everything in the tunnels right?” the spirit said. “Just drop the ceiling.”

“No,” another spirit replied quickly. “We are not collapsing the whole tunnel for one bat!”

“…okay. That might be overkill.” The spirit agreed. “How about we drop the ceiling just in the area where the bat is at?”

The hive thought that was a plan and focused its’ energy on the ceiling where the bat was hanging. Maybe it was because of the energy gathering, or maybe the bat felt something moving on the ceiling, but the bat decided to move. It flew to a different location of the tunnel and hang upside down from there. The hive gathered energy again…and the bat moved again. Over and over this happened, and after the tenth time the hive had enough.

“Forgot it!” a spirit angrily said. “This is taking too much time and energy. Let’s just let this stupid bat be!”

Since the bat had not harm the hive, and it would take too much effort to kill it, the spirits within the hive decided to just let the bat be. A few days after that, several more bats came to live within the tunnels. Thus, entirely by accident, the tunnels got its first traps and its first animal residents since the wolves.  

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