"It’s your choice, really. I am not going to *force* you to do anything."
The hyenas frantically shook their heads, practically in tears, their bravado completely shattered. "No, no! You are not forcing us! We swear on our names, we swear on our lives! We will tell Lord Siss exactly what you said!"
Half an hour later, the terrified hyena mercenaries were sent packing out of the cave and into the dense forest beyond. They ran as if the devil himself were chasing them, absolutely convinced that a ticking time bomb was resting comfortably in their stomachs, ready to detonate the moment they stepped out of line.
The moment the very last hyena’s frantic footsteps faded into the distance, a sudden, jarring movement broke the heavy silence in the cavern.
The Vulture subordinate—who had been lying completely dead on the cold stone floor just moments ago—suddenly sat up. He casually wiped the fake, sticky blood from his chin with the back of his sleeve, dusted the dirt off his dark clothes, and looked up with a bright, eager smile that entirely contrasted the horrific death he had just faked.
"How was it, Young Master?" he asked, looking at Veer with a desperately pleading, puppy-dog expression, incredibly hungry for praise.
Veer sighed heavily, walking over and lightly patting the subordinate on the top of his head.
"A bit overdramatic," Veer critiqued dryly, crossing his arms. "Next time, try to act a little more normal when you die. The thrashing was a bit much."
As the subordinate grinned and hurried off to wash his face, the cave finally settled into quiet. Veer turned to look at Kaya. His playful, amused demeanor was slowly slipping away, replaced by something much more serious and analytical.
"Are you sure about this?" Veer asked, his brow furrowing slightly as he leaned against the rough cavern wall. "Letting them walk away like that... aren’t you worried that leaving them alive is going to become a massive problem down the line? We just gave eyes and ears back to the enemy."
Kaya just sighed, bringing a hand up to rub her temples, feeling the slight sting of a headache coming on from the sheer adrenaline of the acting performance. "If we don’t let them go, and they simply go missing in the woods, more hyenas will eventually come looking for them. It’s a basic premise of liability. We kill them, we inherit the wrath of their entire clan. That would cause an even bigger problem. We are trying to systematically outsmart the Snake Tribe right now; I am absolutely not going to challenge an entire hyena clan on top of that just to tie up a loose end."
Veer paused, his sharp mind digesting her rigorous, step-by-step logic. It made a frustrating amount of sense. He sighed, shaking his head. "Yeah. Let’s just hope they are exactly as foolish as we think they are, and that they follow your script."
In truth, Kaya was taking a massive gamble.
It wasn’t a complicated magical theory or a political maneuver. Kaya might not have a full grasp on how beastmen society operated yet, nor did she fully understand the upper biological limits of their physical strength, but she understood the strict, undeniable rules of natural logic. She understood animals.
She treated the scenario like a puzzle of cause and effect. In the wild, hyenas were notoriously dangerous for one specific, undeniable reason: they never fought fair, and they never fought alone. They were pack hunters through and through, relying on overwhelming numbers and synchronized tactics. No animal in its right mind willingly provoked a single hyena, because fighting one meant fighting all of them. It was a guaranteed chain reaction.
Because of that deeply ingrained instinct, Kaya absolutely refused to believe that these few mercenaries had attacked her completely alone. It defied the fundamental logic of their species. They almost certainly had backup waiting nearby in the shadows, waiting for the signal to strike if the initial ambush failed. By putting on that terrifying, highly theatrical display with the fake poison and letting them run away in a blind, mindless panic, she wasn’t just saving herself from an immediate physical fight. She was ensuring they would scatter in absolute terror, fundamentally breaking their pack coordination, and take their hidden reinforcements with them back to the Snake Tribe. It was a perfect, logically sound maneuver.
She still didn’t know why this Snake Tribe—or whatever they were—wanted to kill her, capture her, or whatever nonsense they had planned. But she knew one thing for absolute certain: her enemies somehow knew she was human.
That fact alone was a massive liability.
She looked down at her hands, flexing her fingers, and then stared at her heavy leather boots. Her brow furrowed into a deep scowl. None of it made any logical sense. Humans didn’t fly. They didn’t leap thirty feet into the air with zero effort.
So, did I actually get a superpower when I crossed over into this place? she wondered, rubbing her temples. And if she did, how the hell did it work? Was it a physical mutation? Was it some ridiculous "super pheromone" nonsense like in those cheap fantasy novels she used to read? The mechanics of it were entirely a mystery. It was abundantly clear that she needed to do a lot more research on her own body and the biological rules of this universe.
However, one thing was non-negotiable: she had zero intention of staying in this primitive world any longer than strictly necessary.
As far as Kaya was concerned, this world was a giant, unsanitary nightmare. As a human from a modern society, the absolute lack of basic hygiene was driving her insane. She desperately needed a proper, modern health checkup as soon as possible.
"Damn it," she muttered under her breath, scratching at her arm. She was literally living among half-wild animals in a damp cave. God only knew how many unknown pests, ticks, and bizarre prehistoric diseases she was being exposed to on a daily basis. Surviving assassinations was one thing, but dying of a prehistoric bacterial infection? That was where she drew the line.
Veer stepped closer, his expression softening as he gently rubbed her back in a comforting gesture.
But as Kaya looked up at him, all her modern sensibilities suddenly flared up. Right now, to her, the devastatingly handsome Vulture chief didn’t look like a fierce protector or a romantic lead—he looked like a giant, walking petri dish.
Honestly, she couldn’t help it. Back in her modern time, people worried about big things: taxes, careers, the economy. But here? Kaya was suddenly agonizing over exactly how many prehistoric, alien bacteria were currently invading her immune system. Just the thought of the microscopic beast-world germs crawling on her skin sent a visceral wave of disgust rolling through her stomach.
She had literally never wished to be transmigrated into a beast world. If whatever god put her here had actually bothered to ask her preference, she would have happily chosen to wake up in a modern sci-fi setting, or even a standard ancient historical era. But a world filled with half-animal men who didn’t understand basic sanitation? Absolutely not.
She let out a long, heavy sigh, rubbing her temples.
Thump. Thump.
A massive, heavy paw gently patted her back, nearly knocking the wind out of her lungs. Kaya blinked, startled out of her germaphobic spiral, and looked up.
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