Niyol always wondered about this place. Asteraia. His father didn’t like this place, his mother agreed. He was to stay away from this place or the cannibals would get him! He always took it as bad stories. After all while he HEARD of these things it never seemed like it actually happened right? Bears and cougars and whatever other bad beasties his mom and pop took down! Just like that huge black bear in the den! No one messed with Taviora. It was, probably, a result of the peaceful times they now lived in that the boy had such a carefree nature about everything. Packs were so tense up until the spring of his birth, and while he heard the stories, stories were still just stories. He was young and naive of the dangers that could possibly be out there having never seen anything like it himself. Cannibals were just a scary story to keep him from wandering too far away, he was certain!

As the scent hit his nose Niyol stopped, he had ventured to Diveen, and with Taviora and Spirane only separated by a small river, he knew the smell of a pack border nearby when he smelled one. It was then something hit him. He met a boy, it was a far flung memory now, for a child at least, he had tried to tackle him and play, but gave up when Niyol showed him his superior agility! So they didn’t stay around one another too much longer before the game ended and they parted ways. Niyol was bad with names, so he couldn't remember his, only that he smelled like a place he never been too before. Smells, now that was Niyol were Niyol excelled. Of course though he wasn’t really thinking about that boy, only that he was, apparently, from this pack of so called Cannibals. What was a cannibal anyway really? He never asked now that he thought about it.

Still this was where things had to get pretty serious! Sure Niyol had “snuck” into Diveen before, but he was caught, this time, apparently he was entering a territory that was Dangerous. Nothing was too dangerous for Niyol though! He could handle it! So as fast as he could he began diving into brush, sneaking around, with clearly honed silence and skill for one his age. The skills were forged in fire, all his trickery and escape acts from his pranks paid off in some ways. The tall grass was growing but when crouched it was still great cover, though now and then he poked his head up looking around for his next spot before continuing to creep towards the borders. There were very few trees around though, the closer he got to the growing intensity of the border’s scent the less he noticed on his sneaky forward approach, there was more bushes and brambles, there was so much open sky he couldn’t believe it. Even in his explorations of Mecor Valley even it didn’t seem as Vast as the rolling hills of the pack land before him had.

Finally with a few more final bounds, leaps and dives into bushes the pack scent was at its strongest. He was there at the border. He didn’t know how reckless he might have currently been, but he did see something that seemed climbable in the distance so he could get a better look around. Trees were his friend, but there were few trees he could climb outside of Taviora and Enocra and this pack didn’t seem like an exception to that rule. Scuttling forward with a few “nyheheh”s and other assorted laughs of triumph and glee Niyol made for the nearest rock he could. It wasn’t a tree, but it’s first flat surface was high enough off the ground an average sized wolf would have to make a pretty good leap to get up too. HIs paws quickly grabbed and slipped on the rock, but he was able to pull himself up with a few “oof”s and “ack”s at the end.

He laid almost entirely flat, elbows and legs splayed out, back legs in similar fashion so that his stomach was pressed onto the rock, something that looked like it was from a book of horrors or like all his bones got broke and his shoulders dislocated. He was fine, it was his odd thing that only he knew he could do, and what made it more odd was how he then wriggled his flat form across the rock to the edge to look around, ears flat against his head and bright blue eyes narrowed as he scrutinized the vast land before him. It didn’t seem all that bad, or tough! Clearly he was right, those stories were just that. Stories.