If someone had told me yesterday that I'd be witnessing my underwear-stealing cat transform into a mythical beast and battle a monster from a nightmare, I would have suggested they cut back on the late-night anime.
Yet here I was, pressed against cold stone, watching exactly that unfold.
Loki met the charge of the scorpion-boar with surprising strategy. Instead of colliding head-on, he veered at the last second, raking massive claws across the creature's side as he passed. The monster roared in fury, spinning with unexpected agility for something so large. Its stinger lashed out, missing Loki by inches as the panther leaped away.
They circled each other now, predators assessing one another. Blood dripped from gashes in the monster's hide, but they didn't seem deep enough to slow it down.
"You can do this, Loki," I cheered quietly, though I wasn't entirely convinced. The scorpion-boar was twice his size, even with Loki's transformation. And that stinger... one hit from that, and I suspected the fight would be over.
Loki growled as if he'd heard my uncertainty, the sound more annoyed than fearful.
Then, to my shock, he glanced back at me with an expression that I swear conveyed a single thought: Stay put, stupid human.
His attention returned to the monster just as it charged again. This time, instead of dodging, Loki met it head-on—but at the last moment, he dropped and slid beneath the creature's belly, claws extended upward to rake its vulnerable underside.
The scorpion-boar screamed, a sound that made my teeth vibrate and my skin crawl. It thrashed wildly, trying to stomp on Loki with its sharp hooves, but he was already rolling out from beneath it, coming up on its blind side.
"Behind you!" I shouted uselessly, as the stinger whipped around.
Loki was already moving, ducking under the strike and lunging for the base of the tail. His jaws closed around the segmented appendage, teeth sinking deep. With a violent shake of his head, he tore through tissue and what passed for the monster's equivalent of bone.
The stinger separated from the body, spraying yellow ichor across the ground. The scorpion-boar's scream rose in pitch, now clearly one of pain rather than rage.
Loki spat out the severed stinger and roared, the sound so powerful it seemed to make the air itself tremble.
For the first time, I saw something new in the monster's clustered eyes—fear.
It backed away, hooves scrabbling at the ground. Then, with a final bellow that sounded almost like a whimper, it turned and crashed back into the forest, leaving a trail of ichor in its wake.
Silence fell on the clearing as the sounds of the retreating monster faded. Loki stood still, muscles tensed, head cocked as if listening for any sign of its return.
After a full minute, he relaxed, turning toward me with what I could only describe as a smug expression.
"Holy shit," I whispered, my legs finally giving out once again as I slid down the cave wall to sit heavily on the ground. "Holy. Shit."
Loki padded over, his massive form moving with the same grace he'd always had, just scaled up and, you know, accessorized with horns and supernatural strength. He sat in front of me, tail curling around his paws exactly the way he did on our living room couch.
"So," I said, my voice shaking with leftover adrenaline.
"You're a badass monster-hunter now. That's... that's new."
He made that familiar chirping sound that always meant "obviously" in normal cat circumstances.
I reached out a trembling hand, hesitating before touching him. "Is it still you in there? I mean, completely you? Not some... possessed version or something?"
Loki huffed and pushed his head against my hand impatiently, the gesture so unmistakably him that I laughed despite everything.
"Okay, okay. Still my jerk cat, just supersized with steroids." I scratched behind his ears, and the rumbling purr that resulted was like a small engine.
"You know, if you could do this all along, you could have at least helped with carrying groceries."
The purring stopped, replaced by a look that clearly said, Don't push it, human.
Now that the immediate danger had passed, I took my first good look at Loki's transformed state.
He was magnificent, honestly. His black fur seemed to absorb the sunlight, giving him a shadowy quality even in the bright clearing. The horns curved elegantly from his forehead, reminiscent of a gazelle's but with wickedly sharp tips. His eyes were still the same yellow, but they glowed with inner light and intelligence that seemed... enhanced.
"What now?" I asked, more to myself than to Loki. "We're stuck in monster land, I have no idea how to get home, and apparently my blood is some kind of monster catnip." I touched my upper lip, finding it crusty with dried blood.
At least my nose had stopped bleeding.
Loki stood and walked a few paces away, looking over his shoulder expectantly.
"You want to keep moving?" I asked, pushing myself to my feet with effort. Every muscle protested.
Being thrown into a nightmare world apparently took a physical toll. "I guess staying here isn't smart if my blood attracted one monster already."
I looked around the clearing, trying to get my bearings.
The alien forest stretched in every direction, no sign of civilization or anything remotely helpful. The sun—at least I assumed it was a sun—was high overhead, suggesting we had several hours of daylight left.
"Pick a direction, I guess," I sighed, spreading my arms. "You're the one with the super senses now."
Loki considered for a moment, then started walking confidently toward what seemed like an arbitrary section of forest. Having no better options, I followed.
"You know," I said conversationally as we entered the trees, trying to distract myself from the absurdity and terror of our situation, "this reminds me of that fantasy novel Grandma used to read to us. The one with the talking animals and the kids who fell through a wardrobe? Except you're not talking, but you can understand—and there's no magical lion giving cryptic advice, just monsters trying to eat us."
Loki gave me a sideways glance that somehow managed to convey extreme patience with my babbling.
"Sorry," I muttered. "Coping mechanism. Talk when nervous. You know this."
We walked in silence for a while after that. I kept close to Loki, watching our surroundings with paranoid attention.
Every rustle of those too-large leaves, every shadow between trees, could be another monster waiting to attack.
The forest gradually changed as we progressed. The trees grew taller, their trunks thicker, their colors more subdued. The glowing moss gave way to normal-looking undergrowth, though the plants were still unlike anything I'd seen before. Occasionally we'd pass what looked like flowers, except they would shift positions to follow our movement, like botanical spectators.
"I don't suppose you have any idea where we are?" I asked Loki after we'd been walking for what felt like an hour. "Or what happened to us? That... void thing. The earthquake. Any theories?"
Loki, unsurprisingly, did not offer any theories.
"Right. Still a cat. Super-powered battle cat, but still a cat." I kicked at a stone, watching it skitter along the path we were following. "I just keep thinking about Grandma and Grandpa. If that earthquake hit our house..." I couldn't finish the thought. The image of them trapped, injured, with no one to help them, was too painful.
Loki paused, looking back at me with an expression that seemed almost sympathetic. He butted his head against my leg gently.
"Thanks, buddy," I said, scratching under his chin. "At least we're stuck in this together, right?"
The moment of bonding was interrupted by a low, rumbling sound from deeper in the forest. Different from the scorpion-boar's roar, this was more like... laughter? Multiple voices? It had an unsettlingly intelligent quality to it.
Loki's ears flattened against his head, and he crouched lower, motioning with his muzzle for me to get down as well.
I dropped to a crouch behind a large tree root, heart hammering. "What is it?" I whispered nervously.
For answer, Loki simply stared intently through the trees ahead. Following his gaze, I caught glimpses of movement—humanoid figures moving between the trunks. Tall, thin figures with skin in unnatural hues of blue and purple.
"Are those... people?" I breathed, hope and fear battling in my chest.
As they drew closer, that hope evaporated. They weren't human, not even close.
Their proportions were wrong—limbs too long, joints bending in ways that human anatomy didn't allow. Their faces were smooth, with only suggestions of features, like sculptures left unfinished. And they were armed with crude spears and clubs that looked like they were made from the bones of very large creatures.
"Monsters," I whispered, shrinking back behind the root.
"More monsters. Awesome."
There were six of them that I could see, moving with disturbing coordination. They seemed to be following a trail, heads low, occasionally touching the ground with their too-long fingers.
With a sinking feeling, I realized what they were tracking.
"They're following my blood," I said, voice barely audible. "From my nosebleed."
Loki's muscles tensed, his claws extending silently into the soft earth. I could tell he was assessing the threat, calculating whether to fight or flee.
"Can you take them?" I asked, not at all confident in the answer.
The scorpion-boar had been one opponent. Six of these humanoid things, armed and clearly intelligent enough for coordinated hunting, was a different scenario entirely.
Loki's hesitation told me everything I needed to know.
"We need to run," I whispered, already scanning for an escape route. "Quietly, before they—"
One of the creatures suddenly straightened, its featureless face turning directly toward our hiding spot. It made a high, chittering sound that raised the hair on my arms.
The others immediately responded, all six now focused on our position.
"They found us," I hissed, panic rising. "Loki, what do we—"
Before I could finish, Loki sprang from his crouch, charging toward the creatures with a roar that shook leaves from the branches above. The suddenness of his attack caught them off guard, and he managed to take down one immediately, massive paws crushing its chest.
But the others recovered quickly, spreading out in a practiced formation that spoke of experienced group hunting. Three moved to surround Loki while two broke off, heading straight for me.
"Oh crap," I scrambled to my feet, looking desperately for a weapon. My hands closed around a fallen branch—not ideal, but better than nothing.
The creatures approaching me moved with unnatural speed, covering ground in loping strides that ate the distance between us.
I could hear Loki fighting behind me, snarls and screams indicating a brutal battle, but I couldn't spare a glance his way. The two monsters racing toward me were all I could focus on.
I braced myself, branch held like a baseball bat. "Stay back!" I shouted, the command laughably ineffective.
The first creature reached me, its spear thrusting forward with precision. I managed to knock it aside with my branch, the force of the impact sending shockwaves up my arms. The second monster circled to my flank, looking for an opening.
Pure instinct took over. I swung the branch in a wide arc, forcing both creatures to jump back. It bought me a second, nothing more.
They were toying with me, I realized. These weren't mindless beasts like the scorpion-boar. These were hunters who recognized a weaker prey when they saw it.
"Loki!" I called out, backing away as the creatures advanced again. "A little help!"
A pain-filled screech from behind told me Loki had taken down another opponent, but he was still engaged with the others. He couldn't reach me in time.
The creature on my left lunged, its spear aimed at my thigh—a disabling strike, not a killing one. They wanted me alive. Somehow that was even more terrifying.
I twisted away, but not fast enough. The spear's tip sliced through my jeans, cutting a shallow line across my outer thigh. Pain flared, hot and sharp.
"Gah!" I stumbled, nearly falling. Warm blood soaked through the denim around the cut.
The second creature chittered excitedly at the smell of fresh blood. Both advanced more aggressively now, emboldened by my injury and the scent they'd been tracking all along.
I was in serious trouble. My branch felt pathetically inadequate against their weapons and unnatural speed. Loki was still fighting his own battle. There was nowhere to run.
For the second time in what couldn't have been more than a few hours, I was certain I was about to die.
As if sensing my desperation, the creatures moved in for the kill, coordinating their approach so I couldn't watch both at once.
"No," I growled, surprising myself with the ferocity in my voice. Anger surged through me, temporarily drowning out the fear. "I am not dying in this freaky forest. I have grandparents to get back to. I have a business degree to finish. I have a goddamn life!"
I swung the branch with all my strength, catching one creature across what passed for its face. It staggered back, making that disturbing chittering sound now tinged with pain.
But the victory was short-lived. The second monster used my distraction to close in from behind. I felt rather than saw it approach, spinning just in time to see its club arcing toward my head.
Time seemed to slow. I knew I couldn't dodge in time. Knew the blow would connect. Knew it would either kill me or knock me unconscious, leaving me at their mercy.
In that stretched moment, a strange calm washed over me. If this was it, at least I'd go down fighting. At least I'd given Loki a chance to escape, maybe find his way home somehow.
My last thought before the club struck was an absurd apology to my grandparents for not making it back from what was supposed to be a simple grocery run.
The club hit my upraised arm with a crack that seemed to echo through the forest. Pain exploded up to my shoulder, but it was distant somehow, secondary to the surge of... something... that rushed through my body in that same instant.
My vision blurred, the world taking on a golden tinge. Every sound became muffled as if I were underwater. And through it all, a voice—neither male nor female, neither young nor old—whispered words I couldn't quite grasp.
Then, as suddenly as it had come, the strange sensation vanished. My vision cleared to reveal the creature frozen in shock, its club splintered against my arm. An arm that should have been broken but somehow wasn't.
We stared at each other, monster and human, equally confused.
The moment broke when a black blur slammed into the creature, sending it flying into a tree trunk with bone-crushing force. Loki stood over me, panting heavily, bleeding from several wounds but very much still in the fight.
The remaining monsters—three by my count—regrouped several yards away, chittering among themselves. They seemed to be reconsidering their attack now that their numbers had been reduced.
Loki positioned himself between them and me, his stance making it clear that they would have to go through him to get to me. His growl vibrated through the ground beneath my feet.
The creatures assessed the situation for another tense moment. Then, with final chitters that sounded almost like promises to return, they melted back into the forest, dragging their wounded with them.
As the immediate danger passed, the adrenaline drained from my system, leaving me shaking and disoriented. I dropped to my knees, the branch falling from my suddenly nerveless fingers.
"What... what just happened?" I gasped, looking at my arm where the club had struck. There wasn't even a bruise, just a tear in my hoodie sleeve. "That should have broken my arm. Or my skull."
Loki turned to me, his yellow eyes studying me with what looked disconcertingly like concern. He sniffed at my arm, then at my bleeding thigh, which was now throbbing painfully.
"I'm okay," I assured him, though I was anything but. "You were amazing. Six against one, and you drove them off." I reached out to touch a gash on his shoulder. "You're hurt, though."
He shrugged away from my touch with a dismissive noise, clearly indicating his wounds were not the priority.
"We should keep moving," I agreed, forcing myself to stand despite the pain in my leg. "They might come back with friends."
I tore a strip from the bottom of my t-shirt and wrapped it around my thigh as a makeshift bandage. It would have to do until we found somewhere safer.
As we resumed our journey, this time moving with more urgency and caution, I couldn't shake the memory of that strange moment when the club connected. The golden light, the whispering voice, the impossible lack of injury.
"Something weird is happening to me," I said quietly after we'd been walking for some time. "First the nosebleed that attracts monsters, now this... whatever it was. Immunity to being clubbed in the head? Brief insanity due to terror? Magic?"
Loki didn't respond, of course, but his ears twitched backward, listening to my musings.
"And you," I continued, gesturing at his transformed state. "How is this possible? What turned my annoying house cat into a mythical panther? Is it the same thing that's happening to me?"
These questions circled my mind as we pushed deeper into the unknown forest. The sun was beginning to dip toward the horizon, the strange quality of light shifting from bright unnerving to dusky unnerving.
"We need to find shelter for the night," I said, eyeing the darkening sky with apprehension. "I don't want to know what comes out in this place after dark."
Loki seemed to agree, picking up his pace slightly. His wounds had stopped bleeding, I noticed with relief. Whatever supernatural transformation had given him this new form also seemed to include accelerated healing.
After another half hour of walking, the trees began to thin, giving way to what looked like a small clearing ahead. As we approached, I realized it wasn't just a clearing—it was the ruins of some kind of structure.
Stone blocks, weathered by time but clearly shaped by intelligent hands, formed broken walls and foundations.
"Civilization," I breathed, hope flaring in my chest. "Or at least evidence of it."
We entered the clearing cautiously, Loki sniffing the air for any sign of danger. The ruins formed a rough circle, what might have once been a small outpost or way station. In the center stood a stone dais, surprisingly intact compared to the crumbling walls around it.
"This looks promising," I said, moving closer to examine the central structure. "Maybe we can—"
I froze mid-sentence, my eyes fixed on the dais. Carved into its surface was a symbol—a spiral surrounded by what looked like rays of light. It was identical to one of the symbols I'd seen etched into the cave wall earlier.
"Loki," I whispered, pointing. "That's the same mark from the cave. The one that was glowing."
Loki approached, sniffing at the carved stone. He didn't seem alarmed, which I took as a good sign.
The dais itself was about waist-high, flat on top except for the carved symbol. It looked almost like an altar of some kind. Or...
"A safe spot," I said suddenly, the idea coming from nowhere and everywhere at once. "This is a safe spot."
Again, that strange certainty I'd felt earlier, like knowledge that wasn't mine was filtering into my thoughts. I placed my hand on the symbol, half-expecting something dramatic to happen.
Nothing did, but a sense of rightness settled over me. This place was safe, or safer at least than the open forest. The ruins still had enough structure to provide some shelter, and the stone walls, even broken, would limit approach directions for any hostile creatures.
"We'll stay here tonight," I decided, looking around for anything that might make the ruins more defensible. "Tomorrow we'll figure out... well, everything else."
Loki seemed to agree, settling himself near the dais in a position that gave him a clear view of the main entrance to the ruined structure. His posture was alert but not tense, suggesting he didn't sense any immediate threats.
I sat down heavily on a fallen stone block, the events of the day finally catching up to me. My body ached from exertion and injury. My mind reeled from the impossible reality I now found myself in. And my heart ached with worry for my grandparents, so far away in a world that seemed increasingly like a distant dream.
"I always knew cats were secretly plotting world domination," I stated quietly.
Loki's ears twitched, his eyes still scanning our surroundings.
"But this," I gestured to his transformed state, "this is a bit much, even for you. Couldn't you have just been, I don't know, part Maine Coon or something? Did you have to go full mythical beast on me?"
A soft chuff that might have been laughter escaped Loki's throat.
The sun was nearly gone now, the last rays painting the ruins in amber and deep shadow. The temperature was dropping rapidly, a chill setting in that promised an uncomfortable night.
I pulled my knees up to my chest, wrapping my arms around them for warmth. My stomach growled, reminding me that I hadn't eaten since breakfast in another world.
"Add hunger and freezing to the list of problems," I sighed. "Perfect."
As if in response to my complaint, Loki stood and padded over to me. Without ceremony, he curled his massive body around where I sat, creating a living windbreak of warm fur.
"Well, that solves one problem," I said, genuinely touched by the gesture. "Thanks, buddy."
I leaned back against his side, his rumbling purr vibrating through my spine. Despite everything—the pain, the fear, the absolute insanity of our situation—I felt my eyelids growing heavy. Exhaustion was winning over even survival instinct.
As I drifted toward uneasy sleep, cradled in the warmth of my transformed pet, those final strange moments of the battle replayed in my mind. The golden light, the whispering voice, the impossible resilience of my body.
Something was happening to me, just as something had happened to Loki. And I couldn't shake the feeling that whatever it was, it was only beginning.