Nakimono Gakuzento

[nakimono]

.__{{T H E Writer
.Name. Shatan (See Amadeus’s Profile)
.Age.
.Activity.
.Experience.
.Contact Info.

.__{{T H E Character
.Name. Nakimono Gakuzento, Dead Person in Terror
.Nickname. Naki
.Age. As a spider demon, Nakimono is eternal, meaning that she will not die of age, though disease, wounds, great falls, or any other such thing could kill her. As such, Nakimono will not physically age past twenty years, despite the fact that she is actually fifty years old, a decent age for her kind due to the fact that most are destroyed before they reach ten years old, when they are most vulnerable. Even those who make it past ten are still not guaranteed to survive, and while none truly receive that sort of guarantee, those who reach a century old generally make it for quite a few more centuries; Nakimono is old enough to have some experience, but she still has not reached that ‘safe’ age.
.Birthday. Age is not the most important thing to a Nashiningenmi, though most keep up with at least a vague idea of how many years they have made it, treating each decade as though an accomplishment. Few actually care to know their exact birthday, and Nakimono is not one of those few; she knows she hatched in late autumn, and that is enough for her.
Race: Nashiningenmi; the Nashiningenmi are a race of spider demons who are said to have originated from the demoness Kijo who sought to put a superior race at the top of the food chain, above humans and any similar races. Her attempts led to the Nashiningenmi, whose prey are humans, elves, druid, shade; all ‘intelligent’ races are welcome as a meal for a Nashiningenmi. These spider demons are exactly what the description would imply: they are spiders of demonic size with a human torso, head, and arms in place of a spider’s head. Spider body alone is the size of a large horse, though size and height vary with the type of spider most resembled, while their human half, in contrast, is slight of frame, smaller than the equivalent parts of a normal human. The Nashiningenmi can be of any shade of any color, their human body being a lighter shade than the spider part, though hair will always be either white or black, or somewhere in between. They are hunters and ambush predators, as varied in their means of killing as spiders, and while all are capable of spinning webs, not all choose to use that ability. They are solitary by nature, coming together only for mating, but they are not violent towards their own kind; a strict code of respect governs their kind: females always have dominance over males, greater hunters always more respected than poorer hunters. A Nashiningenmi’s skill at hunting is determined by the size of their prey; skulls of prey are carefully saved, and the two largest are displayed somewhere on the body, so that when two Nashiningenmi of the same gender meet, the one with the largest skulls has the control. As demons and hunters of humans, the Nashiningenmi are killed whenever it is possible, and this code helps to preserve their kind. Also as such hunters, the Nashiningenmi don’t often associate with humans or other such races, but there are certain cases in which a Nashiningenmi will strike a deal with one race against another in order to benefit themselves, and in doing so they show themselves to the general public.
Allegiance: King Osirus
Profession/Rank: She is a hunter by her race, but she has recently begun to seek a deal with the humans and King Osirus against all other races, and thus hopes to gain herself a rank on his side of the war.

.Hair. Nakimono’s hair is on the lighter side of the spectrum of Nashiningenmi hair colors: hers is merely a few shades away from solid white, being of a pallid gray hue. It is long and falls naturally straight, though Naki has to assist it in remaining straight by combing it regularly; even the hair of a demon requires upkeep and lots of it.
.Eyes. Naki’s eyes are of the pupil-lacking kind common in her species; a light lavender in color that is only slightly lighter than the color of her skin, they give quite an eerie effect as it is difficult to tell exactly in what direction she is looking at any given time.
.Physical Description. A description; what truly is it? It can be defined as a ‘picture in words’ or perhaps as an ‘account that describes’, but what is there truly behind a description? To describe someone is to capture their image in words, but can such a thing truly be done? Can even the greatest description truly and fully capture someone? Surely not, for surely even the greatest description would miss even the slightest detail, the tiniest thing, and that would be enough. But there are those who believe that if there was not a detail missed, that the perfect description would give the writer, the describer, power of the one described; it is thus that the Nashiningenmi wear clothes which they remove only when they must replace them, and the replacing of their clothes is never to be done in the presence of another living thing.

Naki’s choice of clothing is hardly practical, but it covers enough to protect herself from the perfect description ever capturing her full image. The clothing, as with most of her kind, is only upon her human parts—the only exception being a large belt which falls around her waist where human meets spider, but more on that later—Naki’s clothing is quite, shall we say, revealing in a way. Her shoulders and the majority of her arms are covered, but the coverings only conceal about half of a normally very discreet part of the female anatomy in the area of the chest; as I said, quite revealing. The coverings on her shoulders are thin plates that are made especially to fit tightly to her form, and the material stretches down to the covering on her chest, holding it in place just as the band of material that stretches around her back. A break below each shoulder leaves a swatch of skin on each arm showing, but only perhaps an inch of space separates shoulder and the coverings that stretch from there to her wrists. These arm bands are form fitting like the rest of her clothing, made of the same thick material, with three small spikes of human bone worked into the material, evenly spaced from wrist to elbow.

Now to the material of these coverings. You know it is thin, form-fitting, and tough; no, it is not leather. Rather, it is the treated hide of Nashiningenmi long passed; the Nashiningenmi do not waste even the bodies of their own kind, and certain members of the race are quite skilled in taking the bodies of the fallen and turning them to the coverings so important to their race. This material, while tough and capable of offering protection, is never worn as armor; the Nashiningenmi do not often wear enough of it to offer any protective value. Rather, it is worn because of its durability; the hide of the spider demons is quite hardy material, and when treated at the hands of other Nashiningenmi can last for many years against the pull of wear and tear, causing most members of the race to only have to replace their clothing a handful of times throughout their lives, though longer lived, better skilled Nashiningenmi may require the services of the clothes makers many times..

Made also of this material is a thick but loose belt, decorated by bars of bone worked into the material and by two large skulls, bigger than Naki’s own skull, which hang from the belt by a carefully formed hole in each temple of both skulls. This belt is the token which determines Naki’s rank among her kind. Should she meet with another female of her kind, it is the size of these two skulls, and the size of the skulls the other demon carries, which will determine who the dominant being is. Nakimono’s skulls are certainly not the largest ever gathered by one of her kind; while they are larger than her own skull, she is of a kind that have skulls comparatively smaller than most human skulls, thus it is not so impressive a thing that they are larger than her skull. The largest of the two skulls is that of a teenage male, relatively large but not a big as it could be; the other is a fully grown woman, of average size for women of that race. Naki is an accomplished hunter, but she is certainly not the best; her skulls would be enough to gather respect from the majority of her kind, but there are certainly many others who could easily demand her respect.

But what is there beyond the clothing? We know the Nashiningenmi never reveal what is beneath it, but there is plenty left that is not so covered. Nakimono is, like her kind, a mixture of spider and human, with the spider’s body being enormous compared to regular spiders, while the human part is comparatively smaller than humans. Hers is the form of a tarantula, with thick, oblong body and thick legs which carry her so that her body is carried low to the ground on legs bent so that the joints come above the body. Unlike a tarantula, however, unlike a tarantula, she is not covered with the tick ‘fur’ that those spiders are so known for. Rather, only her legs are covered with a thin, almost imperceptible layer of hairs that allow her the traction on any surface, even hanging from web, that spider have.

Speaking of web, Nakimono is quite capable of spinning one, possessing the spinnerets present on all spiders. Nashiningenmi web is incredibly strong, capable of holding the weight of both predator and prey, and it is also quite durable and, for lack of a better term, sticky. It holds the same properties of spider web, it is merely magnified to a much greater degree. However, you won’t catch Nakimono hanging from a web; she has decided against waiting for her prey; she’s far too impatient for that, and would rather go and find her prey.

Nakimono’s human part resembles a striking woman, beautiful as nearly all females of her kind are, just as nearly all males are strikingly handsome. Most of the fat from her meals goes to the spider half, leaving her human side very skinny, and her active hunting leaves her muscles nicely toned, especially those in her arms, which are used to wield a finely crafted dual-headed spear. Her hands, left free of any coverings, are smooth and dainty—at least, they are when she isn’t trying to kill someone with them. Her face is thin with a small forehead and chiseled, small chin. Her full lips are dark, nearly the same dark shade as her spider body, deceiving in that they hide sharp, grotesque fangs. Nose is thin and long, protruding only slightly from her face, and positioned directly between her pupil-less eyes. Said eyes are a more pallid color of lavender than her skin, and have an eerie effect, due to the lack of pupils so that one can never truly tell where she is looking. Naki’s hair is long and straight, well kempt for the most part, and of a very light shade of gray.

Much like spider, Nashiningenmi are capable of being any combination of any amount of colors, though solid, darker colors are more common than brighter colors. Nakimono is of a dark shade of violet, slightly speckled with lighter patches which match the lavender shade of her human skin. But of course, one never truly knows what color her skin may be beneath the scant clothing she dons; for all we know it could be as dark as the majority of her spider half; only Nakimono knows what lies beneath that cloth; such a disappointment that we can’t fully capture the image of such a creature.
.Picture.fc01.deviantart.com/fs15/f/2007/109/7/7/Spider_Demoness_by_namesjames.jpg

((Another one from Deviant Art, and in case you can’t see the copyright, this one ain’t mine either, lol)
.Celebrity Portrayal. The spider Daedra in Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion (lol)

.__{{T H E Thoughts
.Likes.
-Variety; a diet of humans can get boring after a while, and Nakimono likes a few new races to mix things up a bit.
-Stalking; sitting in a web just isn’t for Naki, and she’d much rather stalk her prey, to play with them for a while, before killing them.
-Hunting in general, whether it’s stalking, tracking, or killing; hunting is what she’s good at, and she enjoys it.
-Spears; sometimes the regular methods of killing used by a spider just don’t quite do a job justice. In such times, a finely crafted spear, courtesy of her brother, is the perfect solution. Such an artful method of killing, using those dual-headed spears he makes especially for her, and she just adores the gifts he sends.
-King Osirus; sure, he may be a male, which in her mind puts him beneath her no matter what, never mind the fact that he’s a human at that, but he’s got skills; Naki views the man as quite the skilled hunter, and he has earned some amount of respect from her for that. But he’s still a lowly human man.
-Collecting trinkets: skulls, weapons, armor, jewelry, you name it, and Nakimono most likely has it. She doesn’t eat all those items carried by her prey, and they have to go somewhere, so she hoards them all in her lair. Thirty five years of collecting has given her quite the impressive display, though she hardly does anything with all of it.
.Dislikes.
-Humans; in Nakimono’s good opinion, they are stupid, weak, sniveling little annoyances.
-Undead; to eat, that is. They’re no different from humans except that they taste utterly awful.
-Fire; it’s annoying, it can kill her, and she has no need for warmth or light; what good is it?
-Axes; as weapons, she sees them as crude things; she far prefers the sophistication of a good spear.
-The Order; as far as she is concerned, Osirus has the right idea, and the Order are idiots for opposing him, though you won’t catch her telling them that; she’d far rather play off their stupidity and earn herself a meal than turn them from their war path if there’s any chance for her benefit.
-Anyone skinny; she likes a lot of meat on her prey’s bones, and skinny people just aren’t enough to eat.
.Goals.
-The same as just about any Nashiningenmi, Nakimono hopes to live to see a century, because if you’ve made it a hundred years, you’re pretty much guaranteed to see many hundreds more.
-Not so much like the others, Nakimono has a personal project in the works to work out a deal with King Osirus in order to get a more prime piece of real estate; her current territory, while large, isn’t all that varied, and she is very excited at the prospect of perhaps earning a better place and a pardon to hunt there; after all, human hunters can be such a nuisance when they really try at something.
.Fears.
-For an eternal creature, the concept of death isn’t quite so bothersome as for mere mortals, but it is quite significantly more so than it is to an immortal; Nakimono fears her own death like just about any other eternal or mortal, she just doesn’t let it bother her as much as mortals do.
-Disease; of all the ways a Nashiningenmi can die, the most horrible, most humiliating one is disease.
-Fire; though this is less of a fear and more of an annoyance, as the most common human trick at trying to get rid of one of her kind is to burn out their web, and fire can be such a pain to clean up after, not to mention a pain if you get caught in the blaze of your own web.
.Personality. Ah yes, to know someone’s personality, the most important thing one can know about another. For what importance is a description except what they look like? What good is a history, when it is already said and done? By a personality tells the future, tells the present; a personality will tell what one acts like, what they do with that physical appearance, and if one knows a person well enough, they can predict what they will do, where they will go; they can predict the future concerning that person.

But how does one get to know such a solitary creature as a Nashiningenmi? How does the prey get to know the predator? Why, they don’t; one only knows what Nakimono will reveal about herself. But let this suffice for the moment; after all, one can only do so much when working with a spider who is only calm because she is well fed.

First know that Nakimono is a hunter, but she is not a patient one; she is no ambush predator, no fisher; Nakimono Gakuzento means Dead Person in Terror, the name granted her by Kijo, the demoness who is said to create the Nashiningenmi, who meticulously names each of her children by who they are and what they are. Nakimono’s tactics, if one believes in the power of a name, are so great as to leave a dead person terrorized. She stalks her prey, toying with them, making them paranoid; a noise here, a glimpse of movement there, see her now, dancing quickly out of sight only a split second later. She feeds off the fear scent of her prey, enjoying their terror, and seeks to cause as much fear as she can before the great event: feeding time. It is not that she enjoys causing pain to others; oh, by all means, she would never be cause torturing her food; after all, that would mutilate a perfectly fine meal. No, rather, Nakimono only enjoys their fear, not their pain; her kills are mercifully quick and clean; a deft slaying with spear, a clean break in the neck. She is not so very cruel, depending on how one looks at it, that is.

But never forget her impatience; she hates to wait, to sit and do nothing; she must be active, moving always, busying herself. Her fifty years have taught her to be the least bit rash she can, to plan as much as she can so that there are not any problems to deal with later, but impatience is very strong, and Nakimono can very rarely stand to sit and plan; she acts often on impulse, and though, in the barren, lonely Deadlands, she often escapes punishment for such actions, there are times that Naki finds herself paying for her imprudence. This has yet to calm her, though, and antsy, impatient, she remains; it takes many years to change the ways of an eternal creature, especially an old dog like Nakimono.

Contrary to what one may believe, Nakimono is actually also quite the optimist; after all, she has made it to fifty years, and life is quite good. Things look quite fine from where she is sitting, and she enjoys her life of stalking and killing, though the normal routine does get quite boring at times. Still, she has a bit of an optimist streak to her; things might to be the greatest now, but at least they aren’t bad, and as far as she is concerned, her life can only get better. But Nakimono can be quite fickle at times from what this humble person has learned; it is my belief that, in the face of great strife, Nakimono would swiftly change her tune to that of a pessimist, but that is only a prediction.

Just as she is not the pessimist one might think a demon should be, Naki also has no great temper, though one might think it appropriate for her to have one. She is amused more often than she is angry; after all, she thinks quite highly of herself, and does not believe these humans even have a chance at managing to hurt her. Arrogant, yes, but it saves her from crossing the line from amused annoyance at their repetitive, boring, and rather idiotic attempts to slay her, into full out anger at such things. She rarely feels anger; after the first few times of being angered by humans and making mistakes because of it, she learned, for her own sake, and with some help from her calmer brother, to be less easily angered. Now she laughs at the tiny attempts of mortals against her, and the very worse she becomes is annoyed to the point of seeking revenge, but she is not blinded by rage while she does it; she simply alters her hunting route to track a specific target, rather than going on a rampage that might put her in danger.

You should know also that Nakimono is not the most open giver of respect; rules of her kind dictate that she must respect any female of greater hunting prowess than she, and she complies with this, but apart from one of her brothers, who crafts her spears, and the old weaver, who crafts her clothes, both of whom possess skills she does not, Nakimono has no respect for the males of her kind. Nashiningenmi are a very matriarchal species; the females rule over the males without question, and no female shows respect to more than a select few males of considerable skills. Nakimono is no different, and she looks down on every male that she encounters apart from the aforementioned two. Outside her own species, she is also quite openly hateful towards the contemptible little fiends and annoyances of other races and species. She shows open scorn towards her prey as she toys with them, making them fully aware of how low she believes them to be, as though it really matters. Only one member of another race has earned any amount of respect from her, and that individual is King Osirus, who Nakimono sees as a skilled hunter, and though he is still a male, and a human at that, and thus lower and not worthy of much respect from her, the small amount she has for him is quite worthy of notice, as it is quite a feat for one of his kind to earn that respect.

Nakimono is also, as is common to her kind, rather solitary, socializing only with whatever Nashiningenmi she might happen across, and even then for only short times; she does not go searching for company. She is not antisocial, however; it is just her nature to be more solitary. Should another Nashiningenmi happen by, she welcomes them to rest near or in her territory, if they require it, and any who require passage through her territory are allowed to do so; Nashiningenmi help each other in small ways such as this to ensure the survival of their kind. She is not overly helpful, however, as some of her kind are capable of being: she does not freely offer prey, and is not fond of allowing others to hunt on her land, as she is quite selfish when it comes to prey, willing to give prey only to her brother, and even then only because he sends her finely crafted spears, and live prey is the acceptable price for such items; she is not so greedy as to not pay a proper price for his work. But she is greedy enough to hoard her items, skulls, and prey from anyone other than her brother, and even he only receives items in trade.

So now take this that you know of Nakimono, and apply it. We can safely assume that she is not close with her family, other than her one brother, so that she must not have the greatest of family values. We can assume she has no scruples with killing, that she has few morals; we can assume that she does not feel guilt. But assumptions won’t get you very far, so let us end this here; we will simply have to observe now what Nakimono will do should she choose to reveal herself more to the public and to the humans. Will she choose to do so? This humble one believes so, but we will simply have to wait and see, now won’t we? After all, this personality is not so complete as to predict the future; not yet, anyways.

((Yep, another application that's way too long brought to you by Shatan, rofl. Will post the rest here in a moment...))

[nakimono]

((And here we go, the rest of my application of doom, lol))

.__{{T H E Fairytale
.Family.
.Father. Reiketsukan Soraosoroshii
.Mother. Bijin Kagyaku
.Siblings. Nashiningenmi lay eggs exactly like spiders: in large sacks full of hundreds of eggs. Nakimono was certainly not the only egg to survive in her sack, and the siblings she has are far too numerous to name them all; most likely haven’t survived to this age, anyways, and those that have survived are not at all close with Nakimono, making them irrelevant. At least, all are irrelevant except for Keito Tsukaidate, one of her brothers, who, while she isn’t close to him, is useful in that he has some amount of skill in weapon crafting, and is her spear supplier, whenever she needs a replacement.
.History. Have you ever seen a spider spin its web? Have you ever watched the intricate work put into the construction, only to be destroyed in mere days? Have you ever checked on it day after day to see what new prey has been caught, what damage has been wrought, what repairs have been made? Have you ever seen an egg sack take its place in the safest part of the web? Have you ever checked, day after day, waiting for them to hatch? Have you ever seen them hatch?

Hundreds of tiny eggs nearly simultaneous spill forth their loads: hundreds of fragile, tiny spiders, colorless and weak, clambering forth into the day. Have you ever seen such a sight? If you have, then you can imagine what it was like on the day of Nakimono’s hatching. She and hundreds of other siblings crawled their way from their eggs, exiting the cluster kept so safe in the back of the large cone web built by their mother. Hers was a wonderfully constructed web, hidden deep within a cave, and reinforced by the natural structure of rock walls. And hers was a well guarded web, as well; few mates ever stay together after the eggs have been laid and fertilized, but it is a practice becoming more and more common to ensure the survival of the eggs. Humans and others have learned to burn out any webs they can in the hopes of destroying the egg sacks and getting rid of the spider demons once and for all, but this was not to be the fate of Bijin’s eggs.

Bijin and her mate, Reiketsukan, were vigilant in guarding the eggs, neither one leaving the web, both waiting for prey to reach them, rather than going to find their own. Humans came near and tried to burn their web—oh how they tried, and tried, and tried once the location was known, once male and female were spotted there—but few humans can face even a single fully grown Nashiningenmi, let alone two; the web remained. The eggs remained. And at last, they hatched.

Nashiningenmi aren’t precisely big on family life; with so many hundreds of children, a mother can easily go insane if they stick around. So even Bijin, so careful she was in making sure her eggs survived, was no longer so vigilant a guardian after the hatching. Nashiningenmi are demons who naturally develop the knowledge they need to survive; not even speech must be taught to them. And mothers never take the time to make sure such things are learned. On that day, more than a hundred Nashiningenmi were hatched and then promptly kicked out.

The humans were waiting, of course, for such a day; they had hoped to kill as many as they could after the hatching, but Bijin and Reiketsukan were well aware of this stunt. They may not have been willing to keep the little tykes around, but they weren’t about to send them out of the web and into a lion’s den; the parents ventured forth with their departing children and took care of any humans they found. Sure, several of the young were lost before the humans were dealt with, but a vast majority survived.

The babies began to disperse, to separate, some going off alone, others staying in small groups. They were as yet unnamed; the Nashiningenmi receive their names at ten years; that is, if they live that long. Their names are not given by anyone, instead, they are said to simply come to the individual on the day they turn ten; their names are said to come from Kijo herself, who studies each young Nashiningenmi and names them according to who they will become. However, our story must follow Nakimono, and though she did not yet know her name, we can pick her out.

Look, there she is! Separating from the group of hundreds; she is one of the first to do so. And there follows another, a male; he will be Keito Tsukaidate when his name comes to him, though he doesn’t know his name any more than Nakimono does hers. They leave the rest of their siblings and head off south, traveling through trees at some times and underbrush at others, wherever is the safest. They don’t know where they’re going, but it feels right to them, safe, in a way, as though their instincts lead them to safety. Their journey began in a remote part of the swamps, but they soon break into the southern hills.

It is a wonderful place; the scent of prey on the air; animals for now, and humans for when they are older. And look, this copse they have found, these few trees, do you see them? They will make for a wonderful home for the two to share. Ah yes, they will share, for it is common for small groups of siblings to remain together for protection until they grow older. Settling in, they spin a web that spans three of the trees, creating a ragged triangle with a safe haven in the middle. Their web is still quite weak, but it will be enough to ward off most dangers, and even to catch small unsuspecting prey. It is now that instinct takes over, and each covers their human body with their own web, shielding themselves from each others sight; Nashiningenmi possess very superstitious instincts at times, and they believe that, should another ever be able to fully describe them, than that individual would have control over them. Not even a sibling can be trusted with such knowledge, and so they cover themselves in web to hide what they will soon begin to look like as they develop.

Unsuspecting squirrels, rabbits, and birds fall prey to the web, and each meal is hastily devoured by the two young spiders. They grow swiftly, as is the way when fed in the first months of life, and soon reach half their full size. Growth slows down at this point, and they will remain vulnerable as they continue to grow; by ten years they will be fully grown, by twenty fully aged. But for now they are still quite small, quite weak, and quite easily killed.

But fate does not hold for these two to be slain; after all, they have taken refuge near a wounded town, dragging itself back to its former glory; this village in the southern hills is not concerned by these two Nashiningenmi. They will be safe, for a time, at least. By the end of their first year they can speak, by the end of their second they have begun to hunt outside the web. By their third they have created their own webs, near by, but separate all the same. The fifth year passes, and each has grown substantially, though they still have a long way to go. At their sixth year they have separated the copse and the lands surrounding into territories so that theirs no dispute of prey. In their seventh year they see each other much less, and spend much less time socializing, and much more learning to hunt. By the end of their eighth year they have each discovered their talents: Nakimono has shown herself to be a great stalker, actively seeking her prey, while Keito has the patience of an ambush predator, remaining at his web and letting prey come to him; but this is not his only talent. While Nakimono expends all her energy hunting, her brother has become a craftsman while he awaits his meals; the wood from the trees makes fine spears, he has found, and he spends his time crafting progressively finer weapons from wood and stone.

In their ninth year, Nakimono has begun to hunt the small children of the village, while Keito has begun to craft a fine spear as a gift to her; they will part soon, after all, and as a male it is expected that he show respect to the female and be the first to leave, unless the female herself decides to leave; in either case, a gift will give him favor, as he much enjoys his current home. At last their tenth year comes, and with it the knowledge of their names. The female learns that she is Nakimono Gakuzento, her brother learns that he is Keito Tsukaidate. They meet briefly to exchange names, and Keito brings the finished spear he has crafted for his sister. She accepts the gift, elated in the fine craftsmanship it displays; she had not, of yet, learned of her brother’s talent. The spear is a finely carved, perfectly balanced one, only as thick as it needs to be for its length, and with a perfectly shaped stone head fitted securely into each end for added versatility, both ends being just as dangerous. A return gift is not required—after all, females are dominant—but she presents her brother with the smallest of her gathered skulls; the knowledge of skull collecting has come to them both, but Keito has not hunted humans, and his skulls are hardly comparable to his sister’s.

They are both fully grown by now, though their human halves will continue to mature for the next ten years, but they no longer require the protection of the other. They will soon need larger territories, more food, and will be solitary; only one may keep this land, and it is the female’s decision. Normally the male would be kicked out, forced to go elsewhere, but Nakimono is well known to the villagers now, and hunting there has become increasingly difficult; she leaves to seek better grounds.

She heads first back north, seeking the cover of the swamps she remembers only vaguely from her hatching; instinct tells her that cover will help her remain unnoticed, and thus help her hunt. But she soon find that the swamplands are occupied by many Nashiningenmi, and though she holds rank over the males she encounters, she soon finds that many have females near by, and each female she encounters is a far greater hunter than she, with larger skulls and thus the ability to demand her respect. For two years she attempts one small territory after another, and each is deemed inadequate; especially the small territory near that of her still living parents. Quite the awkward encounter ensued when she encountered the two of them; they had not changed at all, but she had changed much, and while she recognized them, they did not recognize her. Such a thing is not a rarity when children are kicked out at such an age.

After giving up on the swamp, Nashiningenmi journeyed back south, making her way slowly, allowing herself time to hunt as much as she could. She was of thirteen years by the time she crossed back through the copse and her brother’s territory; he was still there, and had flourished in her three years of absence; he did not actively stalk the villagers and so they did not hunt him as they had her, and he had no fear of being killed. He had even managed to acquire a few more skulls of impressive size; they had been traded by passing Nashiningenmi who had seen his collection of weapons. Nakimono stayed in the copse for only a short time, only long enough for her brother to make small repairs on her own spear, and then she moved on, leaving him in peace so that she did not stir more trouble with the villagers in what was now his territory.

Nakimono continued her journey south, finding herself further and further away from any sort of civilization, though there were enough travelers to sate her hunger, and she stopped only when she reached the expanse of the Deadlands. It was there, among the skeletal remains of battle and the scorched remains of fire, along that forbidding road to the south, that Nakimono claimed her territory; she was no patient ambush predator like her brother, nor was she the discreet hunter who can live safely near a thriving village; no, she was an active stalker seeking the challenge of hunting down her prey, and what better a place than this barren wasteland? Here she could claim a larger territory than any other—after all, this was not exactly desirable real estate—and here she could hunt as many humans as she so chose to, without fearing being hunted herself. Here was home.

By the age of fifteen Nakimono was fully and completely settled into her new home; there were no caves in the Deadlands, no trees and few rocks; hardly a place for a proper lair. But Nashiningenmi are adaptable creatures; Nakimono dug her own lair, a deep and imposing burrow into the grown, the entrance shielded by rocks and protected by web, though there is little more to protect than her skulls; after all, she is rarely home. Nakimono traveled the expanse of the Deadlands day in and day out, stalking her prey: anyone who needed to use the one and only road to the south. She had the market cornered on all the criminals sent to the mines, and the variety was quite nice.

It is at twenty years of age that a Nashiningenmi becomes a true adult, and it is at this age that a weaver seeks them out. Nakimono was in her burrow the day the weaver came; she was in her burrow because her instincts told her to be there, warned her that something was coming, and so she waited. But a weaver was no one to be afraid of; they are essential to the Nashiningenmi. Only a select few have the talent, and their talent is not truly weaving, but rather treating the hide of the fallen to make durable clothing. The weaver that came to Nakimono was an old male, five centuries old, who had been performing this work for four of those centuries. Reza Kurafuto was as skilled as they come, and only a week after meeting Nakimono, he had crafted a set of clothing that matched her perfectly. The clothing is sort of a coming of age symbol for the Nashiningenmi, given only to those who survive to be adults, and the day Nakimono donned her clothing for the first time was quite the big day; a day in which she could finally discard her web coverings which had to be constantly replaced. In addition to this, Reza brought word from Naki’s brother: Keito thrived still, and his weapons were becoming more and more well-known each year. He sent her a replacement spear, one even better crafted now that his skills had increased, and asked only that she send him the old one so that he might refine it. Naki did as he asked and sent Reza on his way with the old spear and a return message that she, too, thrived.

It is here in the Deadlands that the rest of our story takes place under a very dull repetition of routine of stalking, hunting, and stalking again. For the next thirty years Nakimono remained in the Deadlands, until present time, though there were a few high points of interest in this routine. After all, one’s life cannot be all boring all the time. There was this one incident, for example, of a rather robust fellow heading south with the idea in mind to free the miners. Well, he was indeed quite strong, but he was also indeed quite dead; un-dead I suppose I should say. He had gained considerable size and strength in the transition, but he had lost considerable common sense. Undead or not, the man still had a particular interest in beautiful women, and, when hidden behind rocks so as to conceal her spider half, Nakimono can be quite stunning. The poor chap never knew what hit him; he waltzed right over to his fair maiden and was promptly put down a second time. Well, he certainly won’t be rising again; his skull is safe and sound on Naki’s belt, displayed for all to see as the largest skull she possesses. And the other skulls he carries? Let’s just say one of the guards in the mine got a little too drunk one night and was easily persuaded by his colleagues to go and take out that nasty spider that had been taken out so many of their men. Drunk, stupid, and gullible hardly makes for much of a challenge. Nakimono feasted well that night, and has quite the souvenir to tell of it.

And what of the weaver, and her brother? Well here’s a more recent incident, only ten years ago, when she hit forty. The weaver returned to replace her clothing, as it had begun to wear down after twenty years of active wearing; he scolded her for putting it through such wear and tear, but she simply laughed it off; she was not, after all, about to change her life style for a male. But he did bring more word from her brother: his skills were now bringing him quite the living, as many Nashiningenmi brought him live prey to barter for his weapons, in addition to stronger materials in the hopes of a better weapon. He gifted her with another spear, this one of finer wood, more intricately carved, and fitted with two sharp metal heads. She sent word of her own success in hunting, returned her old spear, and sent also five fine skulls from her collection in thanks. She also sent word that the next time the weaver came, she would be more prepared with a proper return gift: live prey. She awaits eagerly for her sixty year mark, when the weaver will come again, planning how exactly to capture and bind the finest prey she can for her brother’s payment.

For now, however, she has little but her own business in the Deadlands to attend to, stalking and hunting and stalking some more. She hears things, however; her prey does, after all, speak. And she hears much of the war; and she knows full well who her ‘supplier’ is, who it is who sends so many to the mine: King Osirus. She has begun to consider this, and to plan. She never has been one for sitting back and letting things take their own course; she is much more actively involved. And she respects Osirus; a man he may be, but she sees him as a skilled hunter none the less, and one who may actually be of use. She has not yet decided how, or what she might do, but she plans things, and very soon may take action, to take a side in this war, as many of her kind have done in times past, in order to net herself some more prey. Perhaps even a finer home, nearer a city, with plenty of prey, little competition, and perhaps even a pardon from the King himself that she may hunt whoever and however many people she so chose. Yes, that would be quite a fine prize indeed, though she hasn’t yet figured how to achieve such a thing…

.__{{T H E End
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[Israfel Deu Ausgard]

You simply kill me with your applications! OMG! She's lovely. A beautiful application like usual. It will be a lot of fun to interact with her! ^_^ Accepted!

[Lord Nikanoru]

Once again, you have graced Alyssus with an astounding profile. Pure excellence.

Approved.