Chapter 3: A Very Unfair Food Chain

Seraya was furious. Even though she screamed at the top of her lungs, the tribal warriors acted as if they had gone completely deaf.

They had abandoned her and the half-conscious girl to their fate, bound like slaughtered cattle in the middle of this primeval wilderness.

"A pack of brainless apes with zero survival instinct! Evolutionary dead ends, the lot of you!" she shouted toward the thicket, her voice echoing among the rocks. "I helped you take down that horned monster, and you thank me by dumping me in the brush?! I hope someone slams a door on your tails, you ungrateful savages!"

With every shout, her chest heaved. Her thin, sweat-soaked shirt clung to her skin like a second layer. Each time she strained against the bindings, the fabric rubbed across her hardened nipples, sending a stinging shiver into her lower belly. To make matters worse, thick coils of rattan bit into her arms and thighs, cinching right beside her altered anatomy. The shaft in her tight panties was pinned flat, throbbing with dull discomfort at every twitch of her hips.

After a string of curses, her throat went bone dry. She rolled onto her side with an effort, glanced at the tribal girl lying beside her, and rasped:

"Come on, sister... tell me I'm wrong. What kind of backwater manners are these?!"

Even if the pretty native understood a single word of Seraya’s vocabulary, she wouldn't have been able to respond. Having lived in this brutal world since birth, she knew all too well what being abandoned in this specific spot meant.

"Hey, kid... you cold? Why are you shaking so much? Having convulsions or something?" Seraya asked, arching an eyebrow in genuine confusion.

The girl still didn't answer.

Seraya wasn't expecting a fluent conversation - she had already realized the locals communicated mostly in guttural barks - but the girl could at least squeak or groan. Yet the petite beauty lying in the grass made no sound at all. Her slender, bare-waisted frame shivered as if seized by hypothermia; fluffy rabbit ears pressed flat against her skull, and her tiny tail tucked tight under her belly.

Seraya frowned. She opened her mouth to toss out another sarcastic remark, when a roar rolled out from the forest depths, shaking the canopy of the ancient trees.

ROOOAAAR!

The deep, vibrating shockwave hit Seraya's chest like a battering ram, raising the hair on her arms and neck.

A gust of wind swept through the trees, carrying the scent of blood, musk, and raw meat. From behind a thick trunk sprang a massive, tawny shadow, landing in the clearing with a heavy thud and kicking up clouds of dry dirt.

"Holy fucking shit..." Seraya choked out, her heart stopping in her chest.

The beast emerging from the dust was a prehistoric nightmare made flesh. It stretched over seven feet long and stood more than three feet high at the shoulder.

Beneath spotted, reddish-gold fur rippled chords of muscle thick as knotted oak roots. A short, muscular tail twitched, and paws the size of dinner plates bristled with curved claws like butcher hooks. Most terrifying of all was the maw - protruding from the upper jaw were two flattened saber-fangs at least six inches long, slick with saliva.

"A s-saber-toothed tiger..." Seraya's lips trembled.

She recognized it instantly - an apex predator, a machairodont feline that terrorized everything walking the earth.

Color drained from her face. If fighting the snake had been panic, this felt like being dropped naked into a cactus patch.

Only now did the pieces fall into place. She understood why the natives had bolted in such a frenzy. Those cunning bastards knew exactly whose territory they were crossing. They had dumped her and the girl as a damn toll fee! A bloody distraction thrown to the monster to buy themselves time to run!

And they call themselves warriors?!

Fucking cowards!

Tucked tail and ran like sheep!

As much as she cursed them inwardly, she knew sudden movements meant instant death. Swallowing hard, she tried for the most soothing tone she could muster:

"Lady tiger... let's talk this out, okay? Don't drool on me like that. Look at me objectively: I'm skinny, all tough muscle and gristle, zero fat, and I reek of swamp water and dead snake blood. You'll get indigestion, I guarantee it!"

The big cat had no interest in negotiating. It circled with a slow, coiled stalk, belly skimming the grass. Golden-yellow eyes locked onto Seraya, measuring her like an easy meal.

Beside her, the rabbit-eared girl succumbed to the sheer pressure and fainted, slumping limp onto the moss.

Seraya wasn't doing much better. Had she not already emptied her bladder during the fight with the python, she would have pissed her pants on the spot.

GRRR-WAAAR!

The tigress froze. Dropping its center of gravity, it planted its massive paws and locked its gaze on Seraya's chest.

"Are you shitting me?! There are two courses lying here, why pick on me?!" Seraya screamed at the top of her lungs, panic taking the wheel.

Even with her wrists and ankles bound in thick rattan, she had no intention of waiting around to get her throat ripped out. In her previous life, she had read plenty of web novels about transmigration, but she had never heard of a protagonist crossing dimensions just to serve as free takeout for the local wildlife!

The beast let out a low snarl.

Less than thirty feet separated them - plenty of room for an eight-hundred-pound killing machine to build momentum. A single pounce from such a beast could snap the neck of a woolly rhino. Seraya’s body, toned as it was, would turn to mince under that kind of impact.

She managed to hitch herself back a couple feet with her hips and heels just as the tigress launched through the air like a streak of red and gold.

"Fuuuck!"

Seeing the wall of muscle and bone hurtling toward her, Seraya arched her spine and dropped flat against the ground, bridging her body off the dirt.

The pale underbelly cleared her nose by inches, whipping her hair with a blast of wind. Her chest heaved with strain as she craned her neck back. In that split second, her eyes registered the cat's anatomy.

Right... so it really is female, was the absurd thought that flashed through her mind.

THUD!

The tigress hit the ground yards away, claws gouging trenches in the undergrowth. Her bulk skidded through the dirt before she came to a halt. The stubby tail lashed, and the broad head whipped back toward Seraya with an irritated growl.

Seraya didn't hesitate. Scrambling frantically, she hitched herself backward with her hips, elbows, and heels like a startled crustacean. Before the predator could wheel around, she had pushed herself twenty yards back. She would have kept going, but the ground dropped off behind her - she nearly rolled right over the fern-choked edge of a rocky ravine.

WAAARRR!

The tigress let out a low, gurgling snarl and stalked toward the drop-off.

Seraya knew the golden rule: turning your back on a big cat was suicide. She was backed against a wall - a predator in front, and a dark drop behind.

"Sister... come on, cut me some slack! What did I ever do to you?!" she pleaded, ditching every scrap of pride. "Look over there to the left! Fresh snack right there! Unconscious, tender, won't even kick! Eat her first, please!"

Facing death, she had no urge to play the noble knight. She’d rather the stranger die than herself.

The heavens didn't care about her pleas. The cat didn't spare a glance toward the girl under the tree. All of its focus, stoked by the missed strike, stayed glued to Seraya.

ROOOAAAR!

The cat had learned from its mistake. Instead of leaping high, it stayed low, breaking into a flat-out sprint.

Sixty feet vanished in a blink. It bore down on her like a runaway truck.

"Fuck this!"

There was nowhere left to run. With the cat's jaws gaping wide at a grotesque angle and saber fangs gleaming, survival took the wheel. At the last possible yard, Seraya dug deep into her remaining adrenaline and threw herself sideways in an ungraceful, desperate roll.

SNAP!

The fangs clapped shut millimeters from her temple, spraying hot, rank saliva across her cheek and spattering the crimson mark.

In that same instant, a startled yowl tore through the air.

Seraya lifted her head from the moss to a bizarre sight: the tigress had been running too fast to stop. Though it caught sight of the drop at the last second and dug its claws into the dirt, eight hundred pounds of momentum carried it straight over the edge. With a frantic snarl, it plunged into the void.

Watching the reddish-gold rump vanish, Seraya lay motionless, disbelieving. Only after several seconds did she release the breath trapped in her lungs. Her chest rose and fell in a shaky sigh of relief, her lips parting in a tired smirk:

"Told you, dumb kitty... should've eaten the other one. Why jump at me? Don't you know I'm the main character here?!"

ROAR! GRRR-ROAR!

Enraged roars rising from below shattered her triumph. Seraya flinched, nearly shouting in frustration. The bitch survived the fall?!

Panicking, she inched along the dirt like an earthworm, trying to put distance between herself and the ledge. But her body was spent. After barely six feet, her muscles gave out. The roars from the chasm grew louder, but another yard of crawling was all she had left. She collapsed face-first into the leaves, heaving for air.

"Fuck it!" she snapped in resignation. "Do whatever you want! I'm not taking another step! Come eat me if you've got the guts, you overgrown furball!"

True to her word, she sprawled motionless on the ground.

Twenty minutes passed. The woods remained quiet, and no tiger leaped from the cliff to finish her off. Gradually, strength returned to her resilient frame. Listening closely, she noticed the furious roars below had dwindled into strained, pathetic grunts.

"Did the beast find religion and go vegan?" she muttered.

Drawing on her restored energy, she pulled her knees to her chest and set her teeth into the coarse rattan vines binding her wrists. With her enhanced bite and jaw strength, the tough fibers gave way after a few minutes of gnawing. She freed her hands, rubbed her raw, chafed forearms with a groan of relief, and worked loose the knots at her ankles. Free at last.

Her hand went straight down to adjust her bunched, tight underwear, bringing much-needed relief to the compressed organ in her groin.

Curiosity got the better of caution.

What actually happened to the cat?

Seraya pushed onto all fours. Her loose shirt sagged forward, framing her heavy chest as she crept toward the edge of the ravine like a stalker. Parting the thick ferns, she peered down.

What she saw six feet below made her blood turn cold all over again.

Trapped on a narrow stone ledge lay the saber-toothed cat. It hadn't fallen all the way to the canyon floor - its hind leg had wedged tight into a crevice, leaving its heavy body dangling awkwardly. 

Hearing rustling above, the beast snapped its bloodied head up, bared those six-inch fangs, and fixed Seraya with hate-filled eyes, letting out a low, venomous growl.