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Muinuko- Swahili for "elevated"
Born during the era of Mabaki the Terror, died during the era of Shauri the Graceful.
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A terrible drought had swept across the savanna, and prey was scarce. Cruel and unyielding, Mabaki demanded the same amount of food be brought to him regardless, and the desperate pleas of his lionesses fell on deaf ears. Lead Huntress Maua was getting on in age and deferred judgement to her apprentice Tawaza, who had no choice but to double the amount of hunting parties and increase their duration. It came to a point where all adult females of the pride were hunting from sunrise to sunset in order to keep up with Mabaki's ridiculous demands. With nearly all of the pride members so overworked, something was bound to go wrong, and it wasn't long before tragedy struck. A hunting party was on its way back to the Pridetree one evening when they stumbled across their cubs, shell-shocked and inconsolable. After much coaxing and gentle questioning, the lionesses managed to piece together what had happened.
With no adult females available, responsibility for watching the cubs had fallen to Muinuko, a young girl barely out of cubhood herself, but nevertheless the oldest. She had been taking the little ones to the dry riverbed to play when they were ambushed by a group of tall, frightening baboons riding on the back of a fearsome monster that roared and sputtered. The apes ran towards them, chattering and waving strange objects, as Muinuko screamed at the petrified cubs to run for home as fast as they could. As the cubs turned tail and fled, Muinuko got swarmed by the creatures and disappeared from view, though one claimed to have seen her limp body being dragged on top of the monster they rode.
Mabaki returned from his patrol to find the pride in an uproar, and demanded to know what was going on. Kuni, mother of Muinuko, threw herself at her king's feet and begged for permission to search for her child, but Mabaki refused, claiming that every able set of paws was needed to hunt for food. At hearing this, Kuni became completely inconsolable, and Queen Wakati stepped in before the distraught mother said something that would bring down the wrath of the king upon her. The other lionesses quietly promised her that they would do everything in their power to find the missing adolescent. Some tire tracks were discovered in the following days, but they were too faded to be of much use.
{tbc}
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