Grix grunted in annoyance as the healer applied a healing unguent to the hole in his shoulder. The wound was not particularly bad, and not worth using a healing spell on. He listened in as the third official of the evening grilled Vee over the details of what had happened in the forest. He wasn’t sure, but he thought this one might be from the Mercenary Guild, the guild typically responsible for security, bounty hunting, and bandit eradication.

Vee gave detailed descriptions of the bandits whose faces she saw, and answered the numerous questions the Mercenary Guild official threw at her.

A group of mercenary scouts had been sent out a bit over an hour ago, looking for the site of the ambush, to see if they could track back from it to the bandit’s camp. This had been the first solid lead that had been received in regards to the bandits’ location, since the rumors of their presence started spreading.

The interview was interrupted by a messenger kite flitting into the office. Grix gawked at it, he’d never seen one up close before. Messenger kites were rather expensive little magical constructs that could act as messengers to carry documents between two designated people. They consisted of a small wooden tube, into which the document would be inserted, and wings made of a waxy, paper-like substance. Overall, that made it look like an overly simplistic rendition of a butterfly.

The guild official uncapped the tube, and withdrew a scroll. He quickly unrolled it and read the contents.

“Damn, I was hoping you all would be full of shit. They found the ambush site, and some of them are tracking back to the camp, while the others are still searching for the bodies. The Hunters' Guild are going to want to recover and examine them if it really was a beast.”

“It was,” Vee interrupted. “It had quills on its tail just like a wyvern’s. It took down three of them, just by hitting them with those quills.”

Grix decided to speak up at this point. “We seen wyvern quills before. A band of goblins were using them as blowgun darts in the Eastern Territories. They’d managed to capture a baby wyvern, and harvested its quills as they grew back. Sil and Sul took the brunt of it when we were clearing out their warren because the gobbos couldn’t penetrate their scales with them, but I got hit by one, couldn’t feel my left arm for weeks.”

The man grimaced. “Yes, wyvern quills are rather nasty. Luckily they’re very difficult to harvest. I know the Hunter’s Guild already covered this with you, and I’m sure they questioned it, but are you certain it wasn’t a demihuman?”

Vee looked conflicted. Grix, however, felt no such reservations. “That thing was a beast, for sure. Smart. Scary strong. And definitely a beast. The way it moved, the look in its eyes, how it chased down the ones that fled… Nothing humanoid about it.”

Trella chose to speak up as well. “I could feel its aura. It was strong, far stronger than a typical beast. If a demihuman had that strong of an aura, then they could only be some sort of magic practitioner, or a warrior strong enough to have crossed the divide, and either way, their aura would be tightly controlled and orderly. Its aura was wild, and overflowed with its emotions. Its aura was strong enough for someone with low sensitivity to pick it up, even if they wouldn’t know how to interpret it.”

“Well, I thank you all for the information you’ve provided. Our folks will finish up the investigation of the bandit camp, but if it is as you say, then the rest will be in the Hunter’s Guild hands.” The Mercenary Guild officer gave a polite bow and took his leave.

Sil spoke up with a question. “Why not tell them? It followed us for weeks. Why not say?”

Sul answered his brother’s question, “If they know, then they use us. Try to lure it out. You want to be bait? Bad idea. That thing is too strong.”

“Your brother is right. That information won’t help anyone and will only put us in a precarious position. After seeing it in action, I’d rather not do anything that might piss it off,” Vee said.

Ugh.

I feel weird.

I shouldn’t have eaten those humans.

Sure, my mind is feeling far more nimble and able than it ever has. But that odd corner of my mind has grown. Those fragmented memories are now far more complete and cohesive. I even remember his name. James Borland.

Ugh. What a stupid concept names are. If there are so many members of your species in a given area that you need to refer to each of them by nonsensical sounds with no inherent meaning of their own, then maybe your species deserves a plague or calamity or two. Fucking humans.

Without even intending to, I found myself wandering through one of James’ memories.

“Alright James, I know this is last minute, but I really need the crunchy bits of this new proposal completed by start of business on Monday. Just whip up some graphs and shit using the raw data in there, and stick them in into the presentation template.” James’ boss, Chad, tossed a USB drive onto his desk.

“But… It’s Friday and I should be going home in like fifteen minutes,” James complained, knowing he’d already lost the battle. After all, this was always the extent to which he would stick up for himself, which is to say, not at all.

“I know, I know, I’m asking a lot. But Reynard is out on sick leave due to his stomach thing, and you’re the only one here I can rely on. I mean, come on, would you trust Brad to do this?

James sighed. “No…”

Chad smiled brightly, his blatantly manipulative ploy an obvious success. “If you get this done, I’ll put in a good word with Kevin from HR when it comes time to consider moving you from contract to permanent. I know that your review is coming up soon. I definitely haven’t forgotten.”

“Yeah, yeah,” James said as he took the USB drive and plugged it in so he could examine the contents. It was going to be a long weekend.

I quickly withdrew from the memory and distanced myself mentally. That was weird. I can’t really describe it any other way. What a weird and pathetic life James lived, toiling over meaningless things in the place of another. I really can’t comprehend how his world ended up like that.

Why did I have his memories?

Admittedly, I can’t say that his memories are completely without use. Looking back on my thoughts at the time, I’d have never picked up or used my club without the influence of his memories. There was also a certain knack for problem solving there that I am fairly certain is not a normal chimera trait.

Ugh, if only I could dispose of the dross that most of his memories are made up of. So many of them consist of him staring at a brightly lit panel with moving pictures on it, or another brightly lit panel filled with rows and columns of numbers and letters which I absolutely refused to remember what they meant. His life had a lot of memories of staring at brightly lit panels, and those memories were all useless to me. What use do I have for his memories of how to play a video game or of his repeatedly failed attempts to find a life long mate through some sort of ‘web’?

However, even though I am a bit loath to admit it, his memories of the food of that world are something special. I’ve always eaten solely to gain strength, and the only time I’ve derived pleasure from the taste was with the wyverns’ meat. The food of his world seemed to mostly be made for the sake of being pleasurable. Some of it would even be passable fare for me, particularly the sushi. Perhaps, in the future, I might try experimenting with my food a bit. There’s no harm in making the act of devouring my prey a bit more pleasurable, is there? At least, as long as I consume it before its magic aura fades.

Ah, I kind of got lost in thought there. That’s certainly a new feeling. I’ve always had a fairly one track mind.

I ambled toward the mouth of the cave and checked the sky. It was early morning out, so I must have slept through the rest of the day and through the night. At the least.

I checked myself over real quick and confirmed that my form didn’t change noticeably. I shifted to my flying form to check it as well. Still the same.

Well, since I’m in this form anyways, I might as well head into the mountain valleys for a quick hunt. Maybe I can try heading to the northeast or northwest for a bit, see what else I might find to hunt. The mountain valleys directly to the north don't seem to have much else for me to hunt, and I think my little group might need some time without me around. I had a feeling that the forest would be busy with humans for a while, and I had no real reason to stick around and watch it. I could just return in a week or two and resume my language lessons to further my goal of learning to control my magic aura properly, like the furred human can.