This one was weak.
It lacked focus, instinct, and awareness, again and again stumbling into the same traps of flora and fauna of Greenpath. Each blow left it decidedly weaker, until it could barely lift its weapon, until it seemed unable to see the path drop before it.
It fell, landing limply on the stone, wounds gushing inky void and staining the cobbled ground beneath it as it went still, laying silently upon the hardened earth. For a time, Hornet considered the possibility that it had succumbed to its wounds, but no eruption of void, no Shade emerged to meet her.
Instead, the little vessel shuddered, reaching pathetically to grasp its nail, the weapon now little more than a crutch, cementing its weakness for the world to bear witness.
Casting her thread, Hornet dropped quietly to the ground behind it. Awareness seemed to return to it briefly, and it turned shakily to regard her. For a moment, an age, they looked upon each other in silence.
The vessel, like so many before it, bore a plain nail and a dull, tattered cloak. Its mask was pale, a mockery of her own, with small horns sprouting from the sides. Its form shivered with void, its lifeblood drenching the ground and dissipating into the air. It was already so close to death. Hornet clenched her needle in her hand, shaking off the unwanted emotions its pitiful form evoked. Pathetic. Weak.
The small vessel turned fully, collapsing in on itself, the nail dropping from its fingers as it fell weakly against the pillar behind it. Hornet grimaced beneath her mask, bending to lift the weapon from the darkened earth.
Her sibling - the vessel - raised shaking arms, hands reaching in her direction, pleading. A suggestion of thought brushed at her mind. Begging, asking for help, for mercy.
Weak.
The nail drove in, and its mask (so delicate, so fragile) cracked, void dribbling from the wound only to disappear beneath the soil.
Mercy was a weakness, pity a flaw, that she could not afford. After all, it was a cruel, cold world, and only the strong could survive.