The air was warm. The wind carried the thick scent of the jungle—damp leaves, muddy earth, and somewhere distant… blood.
I flew just above the canopy, weaving between rising columns of heat and shafts of sunlight. My wings were steady, strong. I could stay airborne now for nearly twenty minutes without struggle. It was becoming second nature, this flying thing.
Below me, the jungle shifted, rustled—then parted.
A clearing.
And in it… deer.
A whole herd of them. Skull Island deer. Massive things, taller than I was, with gnarled antlers and tough hides. Their movements were sharp, alert, twitching at every bird cry or snapping twig.
I kept my distance. Even now, a frontal attack was suicide.
But then I saw her.
A smaller one. A doe. Maybe younger than the rest. Quieter. She lingered at the edge of the herd, distracted, nibbling on some overgrown moss beneath a tree.
Alone.
Vulnerable.
I circled once overhead, banking on the breeze. My fire gland buzzed in anticipation. Not for flame—but for action. For the hunt.
Then everything changed.
The ground exploded.
A Skullcrawler burst from the underbrush with a screech like splitting metal. Its pale, eel-like body whipped forward, maw gaping. The deer panicked, scattered in all directions.
The crawler lunged, snapping its jaws around the neck of a buck. Blood sprayed, hooves kicked.
And I moved.
While the predator feasted, while the herd was chaos—I dove.
Wings folded tight. Body streamlined.
The doe didn't even see me coming.
I crashed into her from above, claws digging into her spine, wings flaring to slow the fall. She kicked, thrashed, but I bit down hard, ending it fast.
Then I rose.
The Skullcrawler hadn't noticed. It was too busy tearing apart its own kill.
I beat my wings furiously, hauling the limp doe into the sky, over the trees, and back toward my home.
The flight was heavy. My muscles strained. The doe's weight nearly pulled me from the air more than once—but I refused to let go.
This was mine.
By the time I reached my den, the blood had soaked into my scales. I dropped the carcass onto the wooden floor of my hidden perch and collapsed beside it, panting.
Then I started eating.
The meat was different than fish or lizard. Earthy. Warm. It filled me in a way nothing else had before.
And as I tore into the flesh, muscles still burning from the flight, I realized something:
This wasn't luck.
This was strategy.
I had waited, watched, used the Skullcrawler's chaos to my advantage.
I wasn't just surviving anymore.
I was becoming a hunter.