The Other Side

The forest gave way to a large canyon and at the bottom was a large gravel valley. I could see bright green foliage in the far distance. It would have been great If I’d been able to fly over there but that wasn’t an option. I had to stick with this form for now.

In addition, I wasn’t planning to stop until I managed to get to the forest on the other side.

3 hours later and I came to yet another edge. This valley was enormous. It reminded me of the time I visited the Great Crater in what used to be a city called Khabarovsk. Around 350 years ago an asteroid finally struck Earth killing nearly 300,000 people almost instantly and injuring another 100,000 more. This was before the implementation of the AutoTargeter which used an Advance AI to constantly monitor and destroy any non-terrestrial in-bound objects which could pose any risk to Earth or it’s inhabitants. It was a joint project spearheaded by the UN.

Of course, the impacts of the impact were still being felt even today. The amount of habitable was getting smaller with each decade and the economic effects were troublesome. I had lived in a relatively affluent area and as mentioned before, my parents were weirdly wealthy. Even after they died my brother and I never knew where it all came from, all we knew was how lucky and privileged we were.

Thinking about all this was a good way to keep myself distracted as I galloped from one cliff side to another. It seemed as though the forest was growing close so I just kept going.

Another 2 hours passed. The green glowing forest spread out below my feet. It had only taken 5 hours or so which meant it might’ve taken 12-13 if I’d been walking at a normal human pace, maybe more.

Now, the question was how do I get down? What if…

It had worked before when I was in my eel form (should I start giving them names?) so maybe it might be helpful now. I willed myself to become bipedal. I felt my front legs fold inward and my neck grew shorter. This particular cliff wasn’t as sheer as the rest, so if I had something to dampen the impact then I thought it might be possible to climb down without as much risk.

I took a look at my body though it was hard to see as my yarn like hair ran all the way to my ankles. I could feel the golden horns atop my head. I looked at my hands which now looked like cat paws with their pink paw pads; at least the paws were opposable.

I no longer had boobs, I didn’t know if that was a positive or a negative. A buck was a male deer so it would have been strange if I was a girl in this form, but I was also a little disappointed, I’d kind of gotten used to them. I decided not to look any farther down, but I could definitely feel a size difference compared to my previous life. I had a lot of questions about the logistics of how my bodies all worked and what could happen if my virginity did not remain in tact.

Not wanting to waste any more time, I began my descent. It was slow going and my hair kept getting in the way. It took around 15 minutes before my feet touched the blessed ground.

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Jiro’s home was modeled after traditional Japanese architecture. It was custom built and the only one like it in the entire area. It became something of a tourist attraction. You’d still find buildings like it in the more “tourist-y” areas but not in the middle of East Steinem, a primarily western styled suburban community at the eastern edge of Kanemochi province of Shin Nihon.

His father, Ryō, had said that his father had the house built so that they wouldn’t forget their heritage. Jiro’s grandfather’s name ironically was John Steinem (Ryō took his wife’s last name) who designed the neighborhood and personally oversaw it’s construction, this was also why such an architectural anomaly was allowed to persist.

Jiro would only acknowledge it begrudgingly but he came from old money, still there was some mystery to it. John Steinem was the child of Michael Steinem and Juliet Shindo. Juliet was a children’s author and actress, and Michael was no one. There was simply no record of him as far as Jiro had found, and yet he was abhorrently wealthy and was suddenly dating Juliet.

Setting aside all that, the money shouldn’t have lasted through so many generations. It wasn’t like they owned any businesses or anything that made them profit and yet Jiro and his brother both received around 800,000 and the family lawyer had made remarks that alluded to that not being all of it. Specifically, he said all the remaining assets would be made available to their children at the time of Jiro and Eiji’s passing. This was also one of the reasons why Jiro wasn’t on good terms with his brother’s family.

Jiro didn’t have a whole to do in his hospital room other than think about what little past he could dig up in his aged mind, and money and family was often at the forefront. He and his family had so much and yet despite all the trips and the ostentatious house, they were relatively frugal. Jiro suspected the family behaved this way because of his mother Koyori who preferred to keep things simple and cozy. Just to be clear Koyori didn’t die, Ryō and her separated when Jiro was just 4-years-old. Ryō nor Eiji ever elaborated as to why she left and Jiro never bothered to track her down, at least not that he could remember in his old age.

His step-mother Su was an African-American woman who began dating Jiro’s father about two years after Koyori left. They were very close, Su and Ryō, so Jiro figured they had known each other for some time before they got together. Usually you would expect a rich man to shower his new girlfriend with expensive jewelry and clothing, which Su would ask for on occasion, but Ryō always gently told her adding expensive things to someone that was already priceless would only lower her value.

Ryō and Su were together until they died in a plane crash 138 years ago. Whenever he thought about events and the number of years that had passed since then, it really put into perspective how long a life he’d lived.

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It was at this point I finally touched the ground. The forest was now right in front of me. It was almost neon with how brightly it glowed through my swaying hair. The strands were probably thick enough to be considered dreads.

This area was a bit more humid while still being cold. I shuffled forward into the forest. My hands were paws but my feet remained hooved, so it wasn’t like I was barefooting it, yet I remained cautious.

It was entirely possible I wasn’t the one warding off all the beasts back at the crater. It might have been an AOE sort of deal. And when I journeyed to the Charcoal Forest, that was the Eel’s domain.

I stopped there was a chittering sound to my right. I brought my arms up and curled my fists. The trees shook a bit. The atmosphere suddenly became tense. There was definitely something moving above me.

“Shit!” Something flew down at me. I dodged to he side. It landed on the ground and looked up at me. It seemed like a small, thin reptilian creature. It was green and red with a neck as thick as penne pasta. It looked at me with it’s multi-colored, flat, glossy eyes then zoomed away on tiny webbed feet. What the hell was that?

It resembled an emaciated gecko. The forest canopy continued to flutter restlessly above my head. They seemed to be running away from something.

A gut feeling told me I should run too. Just before reason took hold, a menacing growl echoed through the wood. The sound came from dead ahead but the only thing I could see was a little gecko creature balancing an extremely large egg on back.

A moment later a large green ceacher with tusks, it’s skin was like that of a crocodile and it’s many yellow teeth glinted ferociously. It’s tail swung up against a small tree breaking it into pieces. It was a very successful display of intimidation.