As a tradition of Beastfolk civilization, gladiatorial combat often had an enormous impact on a tribe's morale.
The tribes of the Great Desert rarely cared much for leadership. To the savage Green skins, the strongest member of the tribe naturally ought to be its leader.
Thus, when a chieftain lost in gladiatorial combat, the entire tribe would often collapse into disarray and become lambs awaiting slaughter beneath the axe.
Tumor knew full well that this was his chance to reverse their disadvantage. He swung his spiked club so fiercely that it howled through the air, the gale it stirred resembling a pack of charging wolves. With every tearing whistle, filthy blood splattered from the bone spikes of his weapon—the blood was foul yellow and scorching hot, mixed with pus flowing from the sores in his palms and reeking of rotting corpses. When it dripped onto the ground,
it scorched the gray earth beneath his feet black, as though it had been corroded by acid.
This was his blood.
Every member of the [Poison Wolf] tribe had, to a greater or lesser degree, soaked in that emerald poison pool.
It was an underground cavern discovered by the tribe's ancestors, as well as the home on which the Poison Wolves depended for survival.
No one cared why the pool within that cavern was filled with lethal venom. They only knew that, when they had first arrived at the cavern, they found countless spider corpses—and the spiders soaked in the poison pool could even coat their silk with deadly toxins.
Perhaps it had been an artificial poison pool? But as long as they could use it, who the fuck cared?
The seers and chieftains of every generation began calling it the "Gift of Gruush." From then on, every adult tribesman would enter that