A Friend

Back when the eagle was fighting the giant blue alligator.

A small gap in the ancient wooden wall had opened up, what came out of it was a squirrel. Its gray fur was sharp like barb wire and its size was that of a medium-sized dog, clearly not a normal squirrel.

Right after coming out of the wall, the squirrel hid and watched the battle in the sky with great focus.

When the eagle was hit by one of the water balls and had some of its feathers scatter, the squirrel focused on the falling feathers and ignored the battle.

It immediately moved to where the feathers are. It jumped off the island, into the water and quickly swam towards the feathers. Once it managed to take a few, it swam deeper and into the water, away from the battle before the alligator returned to the swamp.

A few hours of swimming later, the squirrel checked to see if it was out of range of the alligator. Once it confirmed it was safe, it climbed one of the giant trees near it and settled on a branch.

Holding out its hand, the violet feathers of the eagle could be seen. The squirrel looked at them in contemplation for a while as if it was hesitating. Then, it put the feathers in its mouth and chewed.

Slowly, the squirrel began to metamorphosis. Its fur grew broader and softer, its mouth elongated and sharpened, two wings sprouted out of its back as its legs elongated and its feet stretched.

It had turned into the same form as the eagle.

The "eagle" had a happy expression on its face. It started to flap its wings to fly and jumped of the tree branch.

Only… instead of flying, it fell back into the water with a splash.

The fake eagle was surprised at the sudden turn of events, it tried to swim back to the surface to no avail. It kept sinking deeper and deeper until it hit the floor of the swamp.

Even though its body had turned into that of the eagle's, the materials and substances forming its body were not similar to the eagle. They were much heavier, besides, the eagle's body itself was much bigger than a squirrel's. Therefore, the fake eagle couldn't swim either.

Although it wouldn't die from drowning because of it special body composition, it also wouldn't be able to swim. It could barely climb the trees with great difficulty since its hind legs weren't able to hold on to anything. But in contrast to the eagle, this "eagle" had feathers that were much sharper than usual, it could also move its wings in very awkward directions.

Therefore, whenever it wanted to climb a tree, it would us both its front feet and its wings to hold on to the tree. The front legs would move normally, while its wings could dig into a tree's body and allow the fake eagle to hold on to the tree without actually holding on with its legs.

But climbing the trees wasn't helpful in its current situation since it wanted to move out of the swamp, all it could do was sink to the bottom of the swamp and walk to shore.

It was only after a few days that it finally emerged out of the water, exhausted. It attempted to move further inland before resting among the trees.

However, on its way further inland, it was met with the bloody looking eagle.

**

The fake eagle immediately tried to run once it noticed the real eagle. But how could it surpass the eagle's speed?

In a flash, the eagle caught up with its clone. However, it didn't know that the "eagle" in front of it wasn't a real one. It was doubtful whether or not it would've cared regardless of the authenticity of this "eagle".

It gave a low cry as if it wanted to introduce itself to its new friend. Since it had found this "eagle", it wouldn't leave it alone unless it found more of its kind, which was very improbable.

The fake eagle was confused by the behavior of the real eagle. Its intelligence was much higher than normal animals and it was even capable of complex thoughts and emotions. It had a guess about the real eagle's identity when it saw it battling the alligator. But the eagle's behavior threw its preconceived notions out of the window.

The fake eagle bowed its head as a form of courtesy. If it didn't appear subservient to the eagle, it could be killed needlessly.

The real eagle was confused by the other's behavior as well but that didn't matter as long as they became "friends". The eagle started to walk back to the luminescent forest and tour the place with its new friend, it would show it the delicacies in this place.

It gave the "eagle" another low cry, telling it to follow.

Unknowingly, the eagle's intelligence was also changing as its body kept changing. Normally, an eagle wouldn't just invite others into their territories. But the eagle could reason that inviting this "eagle" into its territories was harmless and also provided it with the desired companionship that it wanted.

As the other "eagle" looked at the back of the eagle, it understood that the eagle wanted it to follow. Since it feared for its life at this moment, it did as the eagle wanted.

And thus began the fake eagle's hell.

**

The eagle went back in search of a hare to feed its friend. As soon as it found one, it fired a fireball from its mouth, frying the poor hare's body before it could even react.

The fake eagle, who was struggling just to keep up at this moment, was horrified at this scene. Its eyes widened even more as it saw the eagle gulping down half the meat off the still steaming hare carcass in a jiffy. It then took the remaining carcass and offered it to the fake eagle.

However, the fake eagle's body wasn't the type that could eat meat. In fact, it couldn't even process the meat.

The real eagle looked at it expectedly, it wanted to show its friend how great the food in its territory was.

But the fake eagle just kept looking at the meat while hesitating, it couldn't eat this meat and it also didn't want to displease the eagle. It looked at the eagle, whose piercing gaze made it shiver… and slowly started to reach for the meat in front of it and ate.

The eagle was looking smug as it saw its friend eat the delicious meat and without waiting for the fake eagle to finish eating, it headed for the area with the slimes to make the fake eagle enjoy another delicious treat.

The fake eagle stayed behind and threw up all the meat it ate before following behind the eagle unwillingly.

Thankfully, the slime was easier to digest for the fake eagle. Although it wouldn't call it a delicacy, it could at least eat it. They stuck around in the slime area for a while until the eagle got tired of eating.

They went back near the muddy area for the eagle to rest. With its body gaining size, the eagle couldn't sleep on normal branches as before, instead, it had to look for thick branches on big trees so that it could sleep soundly on them. And trees of that size could only be found near the march.

They took their time going there, mostly because the fake eagle couldn't fly. That made the eagle confused because its friend wouldn't fly after it no matter what. It wasn't a problem for the eagle however, since all it had to do was walk beside it, it wouldn't leave behind the fake eagle just because it wouldn't fly. It wouldn't leave behind the fake eagle… ever.

**

Over time, the fake eagle recognized that the eagle wouldn't bring it any harm. It felt like it was a dog owner looking after the world's deadliest dog.

That also made it feel extremely stupid for obeying its every command.

On their journey of "eating delicacies". The fake eagle searched every nook and cranny of the cave while accompanied by the eagle for a way out of the cave.

It soon realized that there was no way out of this place from this area. In fact, it had also confirmed the dreadful truth that the only way out of this place was to go deeper… deeper even than the place where it had come from.

Therefore, once they reached the muddy area near the swamp, the fake eagle had decided to head back into the wall, past the alligator. It would use the eagle as a diversion to slip past it into the island and again into the wall.

Since this stupid eagle wouldn't leave it alone, it might as well put it to good use.

All of this was unknown to the eagle who was sleeping peacefully on the tree branch, glad that it had made a new friend.

***

Skills:

- Vise Grip lv10

- Pierce lv6

- Slime Manipulation lv5

- Water Manipulation lv3

- Fire Manipulation lv4

- Fireball lv4

- Slime Limb lv2

Extra Parts:

- Slime Organ

- Hare Legs