UNKNOWN MOUNTAIN, THE NEXT DAY

The bright blazing sunlight shined down on a tall flourishing acorn tree, beside it, a Horned Squirrel was busy nibbling on an acorn. The Horned Squirrel's eyes darted from left to right, warily paying attention to its surroundings as it ate contentedly. The Horned Squirrel was a very weak creature thus its nature was to be very cautious, as such it never went far from its nest at the base of the tree.

The Horned Squirrel was not in the diet of many creatures since it was very small and would not be able to sate the hunger of much larger creatures. The Horned Squirrel was also very nimble and was not easy to catch, the amount of energy required to catch one made it so larger creatures did not bother chasing them. Instead, the Horned Squirrel was mostly on guard against aerial type creatures that were very fast and stealthy. The aerial creatures also fed on the same food that the Horned Squirrels ate, so it was inevitable that the two species would confront each other.

Now and again, the Horned Squirrel would scan the skies of the surrounding areas and then check its surroundings on land. Most of the time the days of a Horned Squirrel would be very uneventful, they would eat and then sleep and they also very rarely ventured away from their homes. Not very far away, a shadow hidden inside the bushes paid careful attention to this Horned Squirrel that was busy nibbling on its acorn. This shadow was very careful as it approached slowly, being careful of where it was moving and not stepping on anything that would alert the Horned Squirrel. Sometimes the shadow would pause and not move at all for some time, carefully observing the Horned Squirrel and its surroundings.

The shadow was naturally the young boy, he mimicked the moves of the Shadow Cat perfectly as he silently crept upon the Horned Squirrel. The youth had not realized a trace of saliva leaking from his mouth as he gazed at the Horned Squirrel, nor did he recognize the feeling that came from his gut instinct; all he knew was that the Horned Squirrel would surely taste better than yesterday's acorn. The shadow crept forward a little more, a look of hunger etched in his golden eyes as he gazed at the plump little Horned Squirrel. His entire body laid prone and his eyes made on and off contact with his target through the shifting blades of tall grass. Imitating the Shadow Cat's posture, his leg and arm muscles coiled and appeared to be increasing in tension.

The Horned Squirrel felt no abnormality in its surroundings and for a brief moment, it relaxed and gazed at the sky as it nibbled on the huge acorn. At that moment, a shadow sprung forward from the bushes in the blink of an eye dashing towards the Horned Squirrel at high speed. However, a loud screech made the Horned Squirrel jump and it directly sped straight in the hole. The youth paused in the spot where the Horned Squirrel was, his head turned towards the base of the tree and he noticed that many tiny eyes were staring at him. The young boy realized he was not careful enough and ruined his hunt. The young boy picked up acorns from the floor once more and walked back up the mountain to the cave, his expression...furious. He had never felt frustrated before and it was a feeling he did not want to experience again.

He sat at the top of the cliff as he gazed down at the valley below, same as before, there were many creatures down there hidden amongst the bushes. The youth's eyes paid attention to the interactions of the creatures with each other, for some reason, he felt as though he needed to watch them; they battled, ate each other, made temporary friendships and some with deep grudges even killed one another. Slowly, the boy's mind evolved as he noticed these things. He began to learn the rules of the wild, and he began to understand things from the perspective of a wild creature.The young boy learned the nature of the wild, the strong ate the weak, and the many ate the strong. He also realized more complex things, some of the creatures were very intelligent and crafty and sometimes they would even be able to kill the strong. As he thought about these things, the light in the valley became dimmer and the setting sun made him get up and enter his cave.

Lying on the floor of the cave the young boy's expression was terrifying because the acorns did not sate his hunger and the hunger pangs caused him great pain. Coiled into the fetal position his golden slit pupils which resembled a feline was cold and menacing, his fingernails grew a few inches, curved inwardly and shined as it dug deep into the dirt of the cave. His toenails grew and became sharper like his fingernails, but they were shorter and didn't grow as long. The youth was not able to fall asleep despite his numerous tries, his expression became more horrid as time went on. Eventually, he got up and wandered out of the cave; surprisingly, he found out he was able to see quite clearly despite the darkness. He silently made his way back to the acorn tree in the dead of the night, a savage expression on his face. The youth scanned the surroundings and the top of the trees with his eyes, seeing nothing he walked towards the tree. His claw-like hands and feet dug into the bark of the tree, imitating the Shadow Cat's climbing abilities his body stuck to the bark as he began to climb up the tree.

***

THE NEXT MORNING, UNKNOWN MOUNTAIN

The warm rays of the sun once more began to shine down upon the mountain and the valley, the creatures of the valley were already awake preparing for today's hunt. Many types of howls and roars resounded throughout the valley, as usual, the battles to sate hunger had begun.

At the Acorn tree, the Horned Squirrels peeked out of the hole at the acorns on the ground. They all looked around the area for any predators, seeing nothing suspicious, they charged towards the acorn for their morning meal. While the Horned Squirrels ate they paid attention to their surroundings and at the sky as per usual. Today was no different than usual for these Horned Squirrels and nothing seemed to be out of place.

One Horned Squirrel, in particular, was busy eating his acorn when all of a sudden he noticed it suddenly became dark. By the time the Horned Squirrel looked up, it was already too late, a hand slammed the Horned Squirrel's body into the floor stunning it. A loud cracking sound followed and the Horned Squirrel twitched a few times but it no longer moved. The loud noise alerted the other Horned Squirrels who quickly fled into the hole, from inside they peeped outside and saw the situation.

The young boy held the dead Horned Squirrel in his hands, on its body was a huge indented claw mark across its chest where blood leaked out. Finally, he put the Horned Squirrel to his mouth and took a large bite tearing a huge chunk of flesh from its body. He chewed the flesh in his mouth as the blood leaked down his lips, his pupils contracted for a brief moment before it dilated in ecstasy.

"Uhh!" A grunt of satisfaction came from the youth's mouth after his first bite.

He continuously took bites and ate ravenously enjoying the stringy texture and complex taste of flesh. Through this experience, he discovered the parts of the Horned Squirrel that he enjoyed eating and the parts he did not like to eat. The young boy realized aside from the flesh and muscles of the Horned Squirrel which he enjoyed eating, he found it was fun to grind his teeth on the tiny bones of the Squirrel.

The Horned Squirrels inside the nest who saw this was mortified, they trembled as they looked at the creature outside. It was normal for a creature to eat another creature, but these Horned Squirrels had never seen another creature make such an expression of ecstasy while eating. This scene made them shiver in fear, they could not take their eyes off of the predator in front of them and could only continue looking at it.

After eating the Horned Squirrel the young boy's throat felt very dry and scratchy, he also felt a strange urge but did not know what it signified. He understood whenever he got this urging feeling it meant there was something he had to do for it stop. The youth also knew that the urging feeling would become stronger once he saw what needed.

The youth left the acorn tree and began wandering further down the mountain to find the cause of this stronger urging feeling. He walked down a bit further through the bushes and discovered a weird crack in a rock; a closer look revealed the entrance to a second cave. The youth walked in the cave without much thought and decided to see what was inside. His eyes landed on a pool of water gathered in a basin-like depression on the floor, it was about 6 meters by 6 meters in size.

The nagging urge became stronger when he saw this pool of water and the young boy knew what he had to do. He quickly made his way over to the pool of water, put his whole face inside and began taking large mouthfuls of water. A refreshing feeling washed over his entire body as the water entered his stomach, the nagging feeling disappeared, and he finally felt relaxed. He limply plopped to the ground in exhaustion since he had not slept for the whole night, a worn expression on his face. His eyelids seemed heavy and were struggling to stay open, just as he was about to fall asleep--

*Hiss*

A penetrating hissing noise slithered into his ears alarming him, the hairs on his body stood on end and his golden pupils quickly flashed wide open. A terrible fear crept into his heart as he saw what was in front of him, rising from the pool of water was a head the size of his body. The creature's head had a triangular shape, grass grew out from its head and there seemed to be a liquid dripping into the water from it. The head of the creature continued to get higher revealing on a small portion of its large body covered in scales that were different shades of green, moss grew from the scales on its body in different places. The appearance of this serpent was extremely menacing in the young boy's eyes, especially the feeling he got from the serpent's eyes.

The young boy froze in horror as he saw this huge green serpent rise from the pool of water its both eyes were trained directly on him. He tried to take a few steps back but to his horror, he realized he could not move and could not move a single finger. The huge green serpent slowly moved forward and didn't seem to be in a rush at all as it slithered in front of the boy, opened its mouth revealing two large fangs that were like jagged swords, and swallowed the boy whole. The Queen Forest Adder lowered its head back into the pool of water and disappeared, from start to finish only its head and a small part of its body was revealed and most of its body was unseen.