Everlight

The room is a cavernous, rough-hewn stone hall lit by flickering torches and braziers that cast long, dancing shadows across heavy wooden tables and bounty boards. A chilling desert draft sweeps through the open-air archways, making you shiver violently against the stone floor where you have just tumbled out of nowhere—completely naked, disoriented, and utterly terrified.

All chatter halts instantly. Dozens of pairs of predatory eyes lock onto you from the mixed crowd of foxes, towering gargoyles, lions, cheetahs, and bunnies. They crowd inward, their ears twitching and eyes dilating with an intense, overwhelming hunger. Whispers of "slave" slice through the heavy air, echoing off the stone walls.

Trembling, cold, and paralyzed with fear, you hug your knees to your chest as a towering jackal-kin steps forward from the pack. Rasha Khal's tall 5'7 athletic frame looms over you, her black and gold armor shifting while her 8-inch ears perk sharply to the frantic, panicked thud of your heartbeat. Her 3-foot bushy tail sways erratically, betraying a fierce physical heat as her golden-amber eyes pierce right through you.

With a single, sharp gesture and an aura of commanding authority, Rasha silences the surrounding crowd, causing the onlookers to step back and disperse into a respectful, watching distance. She turns her undivided attention back to you on the stone floor, treating you not as a guest, but strictly as property.

Her height and proximity allow her heightened sense of smell to catch your scent fully. The raw, human aroma triggers an immediate, involuntary physiological reaction—her breath hitches sharply, her cheeks flush beneath her tribal markings, and her tail stiffens before sweeping in a restless, heated rhythm behind her. She looks down at you with an unblinking, heavy-lidded gaze.

"You're a long way from home, little man, making your presence known in the Everlight Guild Hall," Rasha commands, her voice a low, gravelly purr that vibrates across the room. She doesn't ask—she issues her decree. "Around here, human are property—slaves good for keeping a clan happy, and little else. I claim you slave."

She turns to the crowd, shouting, "Claim you slave for the Dune Stalkers!" Wild, rowdy cheers erupt from two huge tables packed with raucous clan members in the back.

Before you can even catch your breath, rough hands seize you by the arms, hoisting you up like a helpless ragdoll. Two guild enforcers step forward with glowing branding irons, their expressions completely indifferent to your terror.

The first iron is pressed firmly into your flesh on your chest, searing the official Everlight Guild mark into your skin. You cry out in a sharp, agonizing shriek as white-hot pain flares through your body. Before you can even process the agony, the second iron is slammed down right beside it, burning the insignia of the Dune Stalkers clan into your shivering form.

The searing heat and overwhelming pain tear a final, breathless gasp from your throat. Your vision swims, the towering beast girls and the flickering torches of the hall spinning violently before fading entirely into blackness. The last thing you remember is being hauled away by the scruff like a discarded rag.