“We’ve seen a lot of weird beasts since we disembarked on the expedition. Some very large and dangerous boars, who seemingly ate pretty much everything they could find, but proved no competition for our hires. Interesting bone structure, but nothing to write about really.

  The birds, the birds are totally different beasts.

  I’ve counted more than 55 different genera in those seven days alone, and each one of them shows some unique characteristics, a wondrous spectacle, and a puzzling dilemma for any student of the arts if I may say so.

  They also all seem to have evolved a complex communication system based on gestures, and my efforts have recently started to bear fruit as I’ve successfully managed contact with the bird population residing in the cliffs!”

  Excerpt from the diary of an anonymous ecologist, page 7 of 15.

  Every unnecessary thought fled Omri’s head, years of training, rote repetition, and lethal efficiency answering his call in an instant.

  His hands reached for his weapon, and as he steadied the spear on the large tree trunk below him, adrenaline flooded the youth's veins, a raging river boiling with purpose.

  In the few heartbeats that the animal’s leap took to reach him, every muscle in his body tensed, an instrument perfectly tuned to the battle, an orchestra playing a lethal melody.

  His eyes locked with the beast’s, and then, it was upon him.

  The force behind the panther was massive, and as feline and spear collided, time seemed to stop. The creature’s bronze eyes went wide with shock, and his deadly claws, curved daggers of razor-sharp keratin, cut the air inches short of the target.

  The “pointy bamboo stick”, unable to withstand the force of the clash, instantly started to bend.

  The shaft snapped in a cloud of wooden shrapnels, a whip lashing into still air, loud in the forest’s silence.

  And then the moment was over, the wooden tip lodging into the beast's left collarbone, the sudden release of tension bowling the massive form over the edge of the branch, a primal roar of fear and confusion leaving it, as it released its first cry since the start of their encounter.

  Omri’s situation was not rosy either, as the impact with the creature knocked him back all the way to the tree trunk, his breath leaving him when he crashed his spine into the hardwood, the hit also enough to topple him over.

  Thus, gravity claimed them both.

  Branches tore at Omri’s flesh as they plummeted, each scathing whip of plant matter a bittersweet wound, as they slowed his fall enough that he managed to slam his knife into the meaty bark of the tree.

  The blade shrieked as it carved a jagged scar, and Omri screamed with it, his shoulder crying in pain as the tendons of his back strained like frayed ropes.

  Twisting towards the tree, the boy managed to pin his legs to the trunk, until a knot in his way decided to explosively interrupt his drop, almost shattering his tailbone in the process.

  A near thud on the ground below let him know the panther wasn’t as lucky.

  The animal struck the earth like a sack of wet gravel, its feline instinct not preparing it enough for a 60-foot freefall.

  A hint of bloodlust boiled inside him as he glanced above his shoulder, trying to get a good look at the fallen creature.

  It was clearly hurt, the right hind leg bent at a nauseating angle with a bone protruding through the blood-soaked fur, the tip of his spear still firmly stuck into the left shoulder collarbone. A low, broken growl rumbled from its throat.

  The sight steeled the youth’s determination.

  Now, he was the predator.

  Man and beast got up on their feet, ready for the confrontation.

  Both got back down, one howling in pain as it tried and failed to support itself on a broken leg, and one yelling imprecations, as the simple act of rising sent a sharp jolt of pain through his lower back.

  It seemed they were at a standstill.

  They spent a couple of minutes just staring at each other, a surreal scene happening in the middle of the forest, and as the pain dulled more and more, he tried once again to finish his descent, reaching the ground at the same time the panther managed to stand.

  Seeing the beast so near in all its ragged glory should have struck fear in the heart of the kid, the massive cat's dark brown fur sleek with blood, its top-heavy body still ready to pounce, only held back by the shattered hind paw trailing uselessly on the ground.

  Slitted pupils stared at him from the triangular head of the animal, a low, intimidating growl escaping its gnarled lips, each tooth a dagger maliciously shown to the world in challenge.

  And yet, Omri felt cold. As cold as that night in the sea.

  And in that coldness, a burning ember of purpose.

  The boy cautiously approached the beast and, throwing his knife into his left hand, circled the unsteady form like a cunning bipedal wolf.

  “I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you, skin you, and use you. I’ll probably eat you, sneaky bastard of an overgrown litter runt”, murmured the young warrior.

  It snarled at him, responding to the challenge, and started to move counterclockwise, matching his approach, before its front paws suddenly tensed, gripping the heart in a shockingly fast sprint.

  The youth’s litany was cut short as he threw himself to the ground in a springing somersault, the beast's body clearing the air above him.

  As he got up and turned, he saw the panther bite deep into the soil with its claws, those slitted eyes still tracking him.

  He was dodging even before the panther leaped, the second jump also missing him by inches, and this time, Omri's arm flashed to score a shallow cut on the still-recovering creature, which yelped before roaring its rage, chasing him with its three-legged gait.

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  The next few minutes were spent in a lethal dance, in which the feline kept almost killing the weird primate, who was always outside the range of its claws, always just a few hairbreadths away from certain death.

  But the dance could not go on forever, so the sound of claws scraping the ground, the grunts of effort and pain, quickly ended, giving way to labored breath and tired growling.

  At this moment, looking into the strange monkey's glinting eyes, the beast realized something.

  Omri smiled, a vicious, predatorial snarl mimicking the one on the panther's maws.

  “You’re fucked, pretty kitty”.

  He resumed his walk, now a vulture circling a carcass.

  “You’re just dead, and you know it”.

  The animal’s snake-like eyes never left the boy’s figure, an unsettling gaze that still beamed with rage and hatred, but a new tint was making way in the hunter, as a trickle of fear showed in its hesitant movement, knowing that it went too far, bled too much.

  Still, the panther almost seemed surprised when Omri stepped into its range, and answered the intrusion with a fast swipe of its right claw.

  The left one now hung, with just enough strength to support its massive weight, as the spear shard had kept ravaging the limb in their previous mad chase.

  Fast, but not the quicksilver it was at the beginning of the fight, and so the youngster’s answer was ready, the steely glint of his blade leaving a cut on the still-moving paw.

  A new dance began, with the animal trying to reach the boy, who was now always feinting a strike from the left side, and the youngster answering each swipe with a new cut on his opponent's limbs.

  This time, the crescendo was even shorter, as Omri saw tension gather in the exhausted feline limbs.

  When it forced itself to make a last desperate leap, to at least kill this hateful prey, the diminutive hunter was prepared: he ducked and slashed over his head, scoring a deep cut directly on the belly of the beast, before diving on the ground in a final narrow dodge.

  The young warrior did not even try to keep his grip on the weapon, the image of being stuck under the animal’s weight briefly appearing in his mind, and with a single fluid motion, he got up from his somersault, turning towards the fallen beast.

  The result of the brief exchanges was a gruesome spectacle painting the ground, a verdant clearing covered in crimson-red brush strokes forming a pattern of death, and at its center, the canvas centerpiece laid, torn and broken, parts of his innards hanging from its stomach, knife still stuck in the freely bleeding wound.

  He approached as the animal's last labored breaths quickly left its mouth, foul-smelling ichor spilling on the ground from the gash on its stomach with each new death rattle.

  Omri fell on his knees, all tension leaving his muscles, the sweat and blood on his body mixing with tears, as his mind flashed with images of the perilous encounter.

  As the adrenaline from the battle faded away, the thousand pains he was in flared up, his shoulder screaming in protest, the entirety of his lower back almost numb from the dull, deep agony spreading from his tailbone, his inner tights, carved beyond belief by the tree fall.

  All started to pulse together in an indistinct haze, all but a single sharp thought, centering the youngster while he dry heaved, too stubborn to waste his energies on something as stupid as throwing up.

  He laid on his back, hopeful that nothing would come to finish what the panther tried to start while he was catching his breath.

  “I won… I fucking won!” he half exhaled, half yelled.

  And, sprawled on the ground, his eyes closed, his right hand shielding him from the sun's rays, a memory came, unbidden, of a long past day’s brutal training, one so rarely followed by what you could almost call a caring thought from his master.

  The towering figure of the Warmaster looked at him from above, one hand tensed in invitation.

  Omri's small hand rose, taking up the offer, and after standing up, he offered a small, pouty line, “Thank you for the lesson, master”.

  An imperceptible glint appeared in the man's gaze, and his harsh voice rose just a heartbeat later.

  “A warrior instinct cannot be taught, Boy. It can only be in there, hiding under layers of overthinking, flailing, and failings.” A small sigh escaped his lips.“It can just be unearthed and then forged, beaten into you by pain and experience. But even then, is a shallow thing, not born in the fires of battle, where you dance with death on the razor-thin edge of a blade…we can try to prepare you, Boy.” His gaze almost seemed…sad. “But one day, you will have to dance, and only then will you know if you are a warrior or a dead man.”

  Silence fell.

  In a small clearing on an unknown island, that same child, now almost a man, opened his eyes and looked at the sky.

  Aching and shaking, he got up and approached the cadaver sprawled out between the messy green ferns of the clearing.

  He began his work, and the knife’s blade parted fur from flesh in careful, practiced strokes, the teaching of Beltram’s “field butchery” escapades still as vivid as the day he had to camp inside an elk. An old, wounded elk he also had to kill and…prepare.

  The memory still haunted him, a shiver going up his spine, and he buried the thought in the task at hand.

  His well-maintained knife cut through the dense leather of the beast’s hide like scissors through paper, exposing the twisted fibers of the muscle below, already looking too tough to chew.

  He would still try.

  He opened the pelt, dripping wet with the beast's blood, before starting to meticulously take apart the rest of the panther, roughly dividing the tendons, claws, teeth, and the less tough-looking cuts of meat in different piles, before bundling everything into the glossy hide.

  Omri didn’t miss the weird coloring of the beast, its fur a mix of dark and brawns that still somehow looked on the blackish side, both in the sun and in the shadows of the treetops.

  Nor the larger upper body, the almost prehensile claws, and the knifelike teeth.

  It seemed that up to this point, everything on the island was some kind of freak apex of its species, apart maybe from those relatively fucked up monkeys, which were still some kind of weird he had yet to pinpoint.

  Still thinking about the weird creatures of the island, the primal landscapes, and the strange fruits, he looked at the tree, now starting to come back with life.

  Both primates and birds looked at him, a sort of fearful awe in the eyes of the small furry creatures and respectful approval in the volatiles.

  Omri’s gaze took everything in before turning his back to the tree, and almost limping, he started the return trip to his oh-so-comfortable hole.

  The night came quickly, and it found him comfortably sitting around a newly built campfire near a small bend he discovered in the river, just a few minutes of brisk walk from his cave.

  The crackling of embers filled the air as large cuts of panther meat sizzled on a large, flat stone he used in place of one of the grills he saw in the monastery mess hall.

  His body was a web of pain: the scraped tights spurting a pinkish liquid, his bruised ribs whispering in low notes of pain, as his shoulder sang and his tailbone screamed.

  He’d won.

  But as night crept in, Omri stared into the flames and wondered:

  “How many predators are still waiting for me in the forest depths?”

  Biting into the scalding hot meat strip, he started to chew. It went on for a while.

  “How many of those beasts will I have to kill before I can be safe?“

  He then gulped down, looking at the meat, considering the effort he needed to chow down a single piece.

  He bit down again.

  “And why does everything look so goddamn smart?”