fsgahdfaghdfah GODDAMN DESERT

Character: Ookami
Town: Sen'nahat Desert
Stage: 1
Challenge: 1, Arrival

Hetherev

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Darkness closed itself around her head like a vice, as she felt herself sinking deeper and deeper. He lungs burned and she swiped her claws blindly upwards in a vain attempt to somehow return to the surface. She gave one last desperate hack as her lungs attempted to violently eject the dark liquid intent on suffocating her, when suddenly she found herself no longer surrounded by darkness, and instead looking down on a wide expanse yellow desert sand. She had a brief moment of absolute surprise and bafflement at the dramatic change of both angle and landscape before said yellow sand got incredibly close; incredibly fast.

Her first impact against the ground hurt, resulting in a painful 'oof' which was lost among the sand as she tumbled, limbs flailing haphazardly. She skidded to a halt, various small particles sticking to every available surface and crawling into her nose, mouth and ears. With a flail of her limbs she managed to dislodge herself from the dune she had planted in and she choked and spat out the sand that was clogging up her throat. Her tongue thick and heavy in her mouth, she sucked in greedy gulps of air and vainly attempted to clear her eyes of grit.

"Guuuh--- grruuuh--", she grunted and cleared her throat with difficulty, spitting out multiple clumps of god-awful sand (she suddenly decided she never wanted it in her mouth ever again) and squinting around blindly. Her eyes stung as she blinked them repeatedly in an attempt to see anything that wasn't a yellow dune. Groaning she tucked her head down against her chest and scrubbed her claws over her muzzle, feeling sand lift off and wiggle its way under her nails instead.

Ugh.

She sat dejectedly upon the uncomfortable and slightly-too-hot ground she had landed on, working at scrubbing away the gritty particles that were causing her immense irritation. She paused from her scrub when her claws snagged on a clumped up strip of cloth wound around her neck. (How had she not noticed this before?) Frowning at the offending fabric, she attempted to loosen it slightly, the water rapidly drying from the material--Wait why was it wet?

She leapt to her feet startled, her tail curling and uncurling nervously behind herself, as she took stock of her condition and the items she had on her. She had... a dirt incrusted scarf.. and what was that a knife?? Sword? She felt over the hilt of her knife-sword that was secured firmly in its scabbard which hung from her waist with complete and utter unfamiliarity. 

She twitched on the spot, frantically wracking her brain as to how these items came into her possession and where the heck she was in the first place and what happened and-- Oh gods I can't remember anything.

No wait, that wasn't quite true. Slowly, like a spool of thread unravelling, thoughts came floating back to her; not everything, in fact, hardly anything at all, but she guessed it was a start. 
What was her name-- it was-- 

--Ookami. Thats it. Thats my name.

She was-- yes she remembered what she was-- and vague details about her...homeworld? Other than that, there was glaring and obvious gaps. She felt as if she had lost something important, which only added to her overall sense of confusion and disgruntlement at the predicament she had found herself in as she couldn't remember for the life of her what that important something was.

Huffing through her nose, she turned in a slow circle, seeing nothing but sand extend in all directions through the grit still irritating her eyes. Wherever she was, it was not her home (she knew that much), although she didn't recall precisely what events led up to her arrival. Her stomach decided to make itself known then, making a low growling noise in hunger and startling her out of her stupor.

With a heavy and resigned sigh she started walking.

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Whats this??? Some semblance of a background??? oh god 

SO after poking at this picture for months, I finally got the kick in the butt to finish it. (Honestly Im totally sick of looking at it by now so after some more adjusting I'm calling it done)

I...am actually quite proud of this despite that?? I mean the background took an obscene amount of time but it turned out pretty okay in my opinion 

quietly chuffed 

_{the original file is so huge it took forever to save every time and i sweated thinking i was gonna lose my latest progress haha}

Sand texture can be found here
Reference for background can be found here