The Bloodhorn Stag

Verod is the latest great ruler of the Soan Empire. And as fearful tradition dictates, he must go and sacrifice a woman who is untouched (it's asinine, yes, and there is some leeway) to the god of a great mountain. This, to avoid, uh...catastrophe? damnation? nobody really seems sure anymore. If he had it his way, he'd never answer to another god ever again. But reluctantly, he has led a party down to the Austral, a mass of forest region south of his booming empire, to retrieve the last virgin from the Apathe, a defeated people indigenous to the continent who were driven south in exile by Verod's grandfather. But virgin sacrifice is played out, right? That's why when he hears a tale told by two Apathe trackers about a legendary animal that supposedly walks the Grey Forest, a stag with blood-stained antlers, he jumps at the opportunity to offer the mountain god something a little different this time. Besides, nobody was really sure this Apathe woman was what they said she was.