Another 5 months had passed, and I was finally graduated from baby to toddler. My life got so much better these past months, that it’s hard not to look back and be happy that I endured it all to get here.

I made tons of discoveries about this world and myself in the meantime. Firstly, I finally saw how I looked. I got insomnia one time and decided to go to the river during daytime, when I would usually sleep. I didn’t enjoy trading days for nights, but wolves are nocturnal predators, so I didn’t have much choice, I was used to it anyway. When I got to the river, I finally saw my reflection, so much time had passed without a mirror that my mental image was stuck being a generic stock image baby.

Reality was a little more interesting, however. My hair was naturally green, straight, and almost past my ears in length. I was a little shocked at first but considering that one of the first things I saw when I came to this world was a half wolf baby with white hair, it wasn’t that much of a surprise. It had a jade looking color that was pretty nice, way different than the green hair you would usually see some lesbians use back in Brazil.  

What most caught my attention though, was my body. I was expecting a nice tan, being active all-day hunting and fishing, but I was ghostly pale. At least my muscles were already showing which was nice. All in all, I was a generic stock image baby with a slightly buff body and green hair.

Why black eyes though? It doesn’t fit the aesthetic. With black eyes comes black straight hair, a tanned and fit body, a nice red facial paint, curvy hips and perky breasts… Wait, isn’t it too soon to be thinking about this? Whatever, I want a cute teen tribal gf and I want her now.[1]

Armed with a renewed sense of self, I started training my body more and more every day. After these 5 months, I could already manage full pushups and pullups with ease, pulling my bow didn’t even count as a workout anymore, and I could ride wolves while sitting upright.

Armed with a new bow and fishing rod, all courtesy of Toba’s hair, I also started hunting every day. I caught an incredible variety of fish, all from that same river, which made me appreciate just how diverse the fauna and flora of this world truly was.

There were all kinds of different plants and mushrooms in the forest, at every spot you looked, you would see some color, even at night. Fishes also weren’t the only diverse species, just from the rabbits you could get 20 or 30 different kinds, some with horns, some with prolonged teeth, and they all had slightly different furs.

I won’t risk eating any of the plants though, If I eat a poisonous one it might be game over for me.

Toba still followed me all the time, and he was way stronger than me, so when he started hunting too, we had plenty of food, which we now ate cooked. That first rabbit was not so bad, but if I’m going to eat something raw, I prefer fish. Toba was also getting stronger and stronger, ever since he started imitating my training regiment he’d been growing in size and strength at an incredible pace.

I felt a little bad before, seeing him do so many half-pushups, and that’s what motivated me to start trying harder exercises, so he could be at his full potential. Who could’ve guessed that I would have to die in order to finally get a training partner?

We would also ride wolves almost everywhere now. Ever since we started hunting our own food and giving the excess to the pack, they would let us ride them anytime. Two small filthy creatures ridding wolves reminded me of the goblins in D&D, I hope there aren’t any adventurers around.

Life was cozy now; it was a nice enough routine. I do miss talking, but I had Toba to keep me company and it was fun riding around and hunting with him. All that talk some people had back on earth about how hunting, eating good food and living on nature was the path to happiness started to make sense. If I wanted to really live in this world though, I couldn’t stay like this forever.

I’m pretty sure they don’t speak Portuguese or English, wherever this is, so I need to learn this world’s language at the very least.

And so, I decided to set out with Toba on an adventure and explore a little more of the forest, to see if I could find traces of civilization. Hopefully we wouldn’t be attacked on sight, I even took a longer bath and made Toba look less ghoulish.

We set out early in the night, two naked 1 year-olds on top of wolves, riding in search of adventure. One with a green head like seaweed, the other with animal ears and a tail.

When did I grow accustomed to this? Shit’s getting weirder by the minute

We rode all night and then set out a little camp. It was nice that everyone obeyed me, but Toba was curious to say the least. He had no idea what we were doing, and was staring at me trying to figure it out. I could see cogs turning in his head and smoke coming out of his ears. We hadn’t reached uncharted territory yet, but we were about to.

Don’t worry dear brother, this journey’s purpose is to grant us the gift of language, and we shall be able to understand each other with it. Our days of ignorance will be no more.

Everything went fine so far, but there was one thing I was really worried about. The forest seemed to be divided into territories, and neither I nor Toba had ever left the wolves’ area yet. One time, however, we witnessed the wolves get extremely agitated, like they were trying to drive away something hidden between the short trees of the forest, and I am almost sure I briefly saw a tiger’s tail, before the creature retreated into his part of the forest.

A tiger wandering away from its turf and into ours is one thing, but if I accidentally bumped onto him in his own grounds, I would be dead for sure. There were only two wolves with us, after all, and I don’t know if they’re fast enough to run away.

What was worse is I didn’t have any clue about where his territory was, or even what other predators resided in the forest, so all I could do was move about very carefully. I was really scared, but I also couldn’t simply stay all my life hidden in a cave. I had a feeling that if I chickened out now, I would stay a coward forever.

With that thought, I grilled some rabbit meat for me and Toba, and gave a fish to each of our mounts. I slept peacefully despite my worries, maybe I was overthinking it.

I was in a new world now, and no doubt it was filled with things to be explored, enjoyed, and feared. I couldn’t let myself be ruled by any one emotion. I had to be cautious, but I couldn’t become paralyzed by fear, I had to be brave, but I couldn't make stupid mistakes.

After I woke up and removed the leaf protecting my face from the sun, we set out into the night again. As we were riding, I finally managed to get a glimpse of the source of the weird cricket sounds. It was an insect the size of a tennis ball, and it had an aggressive red color that I could notice even in the moonlight. Its shape was similar to a regular cricket, only a lot wider, and it made no attempt to hide from me, which scared me a little and made me retreat. Toba was also cautious of it, due to instincts, I guess.

If it’s this big and red in color, it almost certainly is poisonous, otherwise it would be easy prey. I’ll have to test this out later.

We rode for a couple of hours, and I stayed on alert the whole time, eyeing everything in my surroundings. We were outside our home now, we had to be polite guests so as not to anger the hosts, and by polite, I mean unnoticed.

After some time though, I relaxed a little bit, it seemed we had not intruded anywhere too dangerous. It’s a big forest after all, there’s room for all of us.

We stopped by a little waterfall, since I was thirsty, but the main reason I wanted to rest there was how pretty it looked. The waning crescent moon was reflecting on the water, and plants grew close enough to the river shore to partly hover above it. This was an excellent place to relax, and with nature being my main source of entertainment, I couldn’t pass on the opportunity.

The company wasn’t the best, but it was what I had for today, the wolves were laying on the ground after drinking their fill, and Toba was moving in a very weird way. I guess he didn’t want to fully stand after having crawled on all fours for so long, but he didn’t want to get left behind by me who was walking upright all the time either, so he was moving about with an overly hunched back, almost like a murloc[2], and occasionally he would use his hands to get a boost. Truly hideous.

Now I’m certain of it, if a human spots us we’ll be killed on sight.

As I was thinking that, I noticed my wolf suddenly stood up. I tried getting on top of him so he could show me what was wrong, but he didn’t budge, he was completely still. I looked to my right to see if Toba had done something, and I saw a terrified expression instead of his normally curious one. He didn’t return the look, he just stood there like he saw a ghost. His wolf had also stood up and was acting the same way.

Oh shit, we’re fucked, aren’t we?

Just as I noticed something serious was going on, I heard the most terrifying sound. It was a slow roar, capable of making even the toughest man completely paralyzed, it was almost like my entire body was programed to be unquestionably afraid of it. There was no doubt about it, this waterfall was the tiger’s territory, and if I wasn’t completely terrified, I would think this guy had great tastes.

I started looking around to find him, I didn’t make any brisk moves and tried moving only my eyes. I wasn’t even sure why, but I felt like it was the right move, and then, our eyes met. He was much closer than I expected, and a great shock went over my body as I saw that creature, a little less than 10 meters away. I had to remember that I was still a baby so I wouldn’t pass out, because from my perspective, wolves were the size of horses, so that tiger looked like a monster.

It truly was a terrifying sight, that thing could kill me by stepping on me. I was so full of myself exploring near the wolf’s territory, but the reality is that anything even remotely hostile in this forest can kill me in a heartbeat, and tigers aren’t your average predator. I had truly underestimated the danger, and I was about to pay the price.

He started slowly circling us, keeping up that horrifying roar, and he seemed to smell something in the air. The wolves started moving back a little bit, and I took the opportunity to slowly get closer to mine. If there was ever a situation that required Toba to imitate me, it was now.

Thankfully he did, and we were now in position to mount up at any moment. The tiger started heading towards our campfire while still looking at us, there was some leftover rabbit there, and the cooked meat smell must have piqued his interest. As soon as he stopped looking at us and turned his head down to smell the campfire, I quickly mounted up and desperately kicked the wolf with my heels.

Wolf riding wasn’t easy. Unlike a horse, they weren’t properly trained and didn’t obey very well, I didn’t have that much control over it. But I couldn’t worry about that now, I needed to escape fast, and thank God my wolf thought the same. He started running in a random direction, and Toba quickly followed. I hoped the tiger would leave us and keep inspecting the little campfire, but it was not to be.

He roared loudly and gave chase, my heart almost exploded from how fast it was beating, and there was enough adrenaline in my body to rejuvenize 10 Hollywood actors. As we ran and the wind kept blowing straight into my eyes, I desperately started looking for a way out of this. I couldn’t think of one, and that orange mass of muscle was closing in on us.

I was about to accept my death, when I saw what looked like a wooden hut, hidden between the trees. I shifted my body weight with all my strength and prayed that my mount would follow, he took a second but eventually started heading towards it. I still had no plan, but all I could do was try to get in there.

It looked like a regular abandoned shack, and it certainly would not stop a tiger, but there was nothing else in sight. As we got closer to it, however, I felt my body pass through something like an invisible membrane, like the air around it had more resistance than normal. I didn’t have time to react tough, as the tiger roared extremely close to us, and I looked back to witness my last momen- wait, it stopped? Just as I thought that, my wolf suddenly braked. I was sent flying, and lost my consciousness after hitting my back against something hard.

                                                                                      ***

I woke up facing the sky, the sun was starting to rise already, which was normally my signal for going to sleep. Being greeted by that orange sky instead of a pitch-black one was weirdly refreshing. I looked around trying to find the tiger, but he was nowhere to be seen. My bow was also completely broken, since it was on my back.

How long did I pass out for?

As I was wondering that, I got up and saw Toba sitting down leaned against a black brick wall, which on closer inspection was part of a huge black tower. It was a shocking sight; a year had passed but this was my first time seeing a building ever since I came into this world.

Wait, where’s the shack? Where am I?

I started to slowly walk towards Toba to see if he was safe before anything else, and then I noticed… he was quietly sobbing. I never saw him cry before; I didn’t even think he was capable of it. What the hell is going on?

When he saw me, he made a surprised face and immediately rushed in my direction, wiping off the tears. He stopped and waited for my next move, as always. Only there was something off about it, he was trying to hide it, but his face looked troubled.             

You were worried about me? Weren’t you?

I thought as I gave him a little pat on the head, he was taller than me, so it was weird, but he managed to calm down a little bit.

With that, I needed to quickly find out what happened here. There was this huge tower in front of us, it was straight out of a fantasy book, the sort of tower you’d expect to find a wizard inside. The tiger wasn’t around, and neither were our wolves, which meant we were out of our means of transportation.