Cat

* Cat
* Shieldmaiden
* Warrior

> **"I'll take it one day as a time, as I always have"** -Cat, to Novillia Dragmire
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Cat is a central character in *A Ballad of Science and Magic*. She appears in The Hyrule, Eldia and Asgard SMPs as a secondary protagonist. Cat swore an oath of silence in her days as a Shieldmaiden, and even in her new life, she only speaks when spoken to or when absolutely necessary. She was once in service of Skera of The Bloodmoon, but she was relinquished when the Goddess was banished to Midgard.

## Landfall

Cat is the only one of the main characters to have been born in Asgard, but she has no memory of her time there. She was raised by her parents in the Hilltop village of Landfall, and always had ambitions of one day becoming a Shieldmaiden so that she may serve the Goddess Skera of The Bloodmoon, the god that her village mainly worshipped. A lot of the traditions that Landfall followed was taken from Muspel Culture, even reimagining their well known tribute to Skera, The Crimson Carnival, as an annual trial of Combat and Worth called 'The Proving'. Cat hoped that competing in and winning this would help her gain recognition from Skera and become a Shieldmaiden, so she trained for the majority of her life for it.

She was a talented archer from her youth, and although most Shieldmaidens used a Sword and Shield, she planned to use her bow as her primary weapon. She was trained by the village teacher by aiming at moving targets, hanging upside-down and even blindfolded, and she accomplished these feats with ease. However, her friend, Sygryd, was very jealous of her success, and also had similar ambitions to become a Shieldmaiden. She planned to sabotage Cat in the Trial so that she may claim the Town's ceremonial Horn of Dreams, and Cat trusted her entirely up to the day of the Proving. They wee the only two that remained at the end of The Proving, and as Cat reached the horn, Sygryd pretended to get hurt, causing Cat to go back for her. However, as Cat helped her up, Sygryd pushed her off of the platform they were on and straight into Lava, killing her almost instantly. Horrified, Sygryd ran away and didn't even bother claiming the Horn for herself.

Although her presence was typically a Myth, Skera was in fact watching the trial, and revived Cat due to her bravery for going back and the fact that she would have won the Trial if it wasn't for Sygryd. She blessed The Horn of Dreams as a Divine Item, allowing Cat to not only traverse The Bifrost, but also bring people back from the Dead as one of Skera's Shieldmaidens, or Valkyries. Cat emerged Victorious from The Trial, and although people were skeptical of Sygryd's wherebouts, Cat said goodbye to her very proud parents and set off with Skera as her first Valkyrie. As a Valkyrie, she swore an Oath of Silence, and helped people freely cross between The Lands of The Living to the Lands of The Dead. Her time as Valkyrie was short lived though, as Skera soon divorced from her husband, Ferningur, and gave up her title of Godhood. This meant Cat had nobody to serve, and at the beginning of The Primordial War, Skera cast Cat down to Midgard as a mortal with no memories of either Skera or her time as a Valkyrie, meaning she also forgot Landfall and her family. Remembering only her name and the fact that she was silent about something, she set off to reinvent herself as an Archer for Hire.