Perspective: Alessio Leone
Alessio watched Sith run.
Literally — run like a lioness.
The movement was hypnotic.
Every stride, every leap, every twist of her body was a perfect blend of strength, speed, and grace.
The rhythm of her paws striking the dry earth mixed with the muffled roar of the wind, and the rustle of golden grass betrayed the path of her prey.
To Alessio's eyes, Sith's form moved with near-superhuman precision.
Her muscles contracted and released in flawless sequence, as if every fiber knew exactly what to do.
Her eyes — now golden and wild — were locked onto the antelope ahead, and on her face was something Alessio could only describe as pleasure.
If she were still human, he was absolutely certain:
she would be smiling.
The raw instinct that animated every part of that feline body made her almost unrecognizable.
The pragmatic woman, once guided by calculation and restraint, now moved as part of the savanna itself — a perfect predator.
It was hard to believe that only a few days ago they had both struggled simply to exist within these new bodies.
No one, no matter how adaptable, could stop being human overnight.
Alessio knew that perfectly well.
The body was new, but the mind still clung to its old identity.
The result was a constant conflict — the animal's instinct versus the man's logic.
And in the first few days, that duality had been torment.
Eating, for example, had been a nightmare.
For nearly five days, he and Sith survived on nothing but grass.
That alone was a challenge — not only because of the taste, which ranged from bitter to unbearable, but for something far more basic:
human disgust.
Even transformed, even without hands, without tools, Alessio had struggled to accept the idea of sticking his snout into the dirt and tearing something free with his teeth.
It felt… undignified.
A direct insult to everything civilization had built into him.
But hunger is a ruthless teacher.
And as the days passed, the body began to speak louder than the mind.
Weakness forced him to abandon pride.
Need taught him the meaning of instinct.
In the end, they yielded.
They left behind shame, etiquette, rationality — everything that made them human.
And then, they hunted.
It hadn't been planned.
There was no discussion, no strategy, no agreement.
It just happened.
At first, Alessio still tried to resist.
He even attempted to fashion a spear — using branches and sharp stones.
The result was pitiful.
The branch snapped, the stone slipped, and he managed only to cut his paw while trying to bind them together with vines.
When even that failed, nothing remained but the obvious.
They had been born for this.
And for the first time, Alessio understood the true meaning of that phrase — not figuratively, but literally.
Their bodies were made for the hunt.
To run.
To kill.
The first chase was clumsy — more a desperate sprint than a conscious pursuit.
But when instinct took over, everything changed.
The hunger, the scent of blood, the heat of the run — everything aligned.
And in the instant he saw Sith leap, the sunset gleaming against her golden fur, he understood.
She was no longer fighting the instinct.
She was the instinct.
Her roar sliced through the air like a blade, echoing across the plains.
The antelope staggered, stumbled, and when it fell — that was the end.
Nature had won.
Simple as that.
Alessio watched in silence — the animal's body motionless before her, her chest rising and falling with exhaustion and thrill.
The scene was both beautiful and terrifying.
He didn't know whether this was a test of courage, instinct, or acceptance.
But for some reason, he knew the real challenge hadn't yet begun.
Still, purely on instinct, Alessio couldn't help but notice something strange — and, in a way, unsettling.
Sith seemed to be adapting better than he was.
Even though he helped her during hunts — especially against larger prey that demanded strength and endurance — he always felt something was missing.
It was as if, on some deep level, he was still caught between two worlds.
Half man, half beast — belonging fully to neither.
But with her, it was different.
Sith didn't hunt just out of necessity.
She loved it.
She loved to run, to feel the wind tearing through her fur, to hear the rhythmic beat of her paws on the earth.
She loved the weight of her body colliding with her prey, the heat of the blood, the metallic taste of victory.
She was a predator in every sense of the word.
And Alessio knew it wasn't just the body the game had given her.
There was something inside her — a raw energy, a wild freedom — that both awed and unsettled him.
While he still tried to balance reason and instinct, Sith had already embraced the wild.
She moved as if she had always belonged there — as if the savanna was the real world, and all other lives — human, civilized, rational — were mere illusions.
And the more time he spent beside her, the clearer the contrast became.
Her roar was stronger.
Her stride, lighter.
Her gaze, more alive.
And though pride stopped him from admitting it aloud, he knew:
she was a better lioness than he would ever be a lion.
Yet something within him still resisted.
A fragment — perhaps the last remnant of humanity — that refused to surrender completely.
That inner conflict kept him uneasy, even in moments of rest.
Until that evening, something changed.
Sith had just brought down another prey — an antelope, long-horned and still twitching weakly on the ground.
She dragged it through the dry grass, her teeth locked around its neck, until she dropped it beside Alessio.
The sun burned the horizon in shades of red and orange.
The wind carried the scent of blood.
And that was when Alessio sensed it.
Not with his eyes.
Not with thought.
But with something much deeper.
Smell.
The scent of fresh meat filled the air — iron, salt, heat — but beneath it was another aroma.
Subtle.
Faint.
Almost imperceptible.
But unmistakable.
A wrong scent.
Something the body recognized before the mind could react.
It was the odor of hunters.
Of predators.
And it wasn't them.
The fur along Alessio's back stood on end.
A chill crawled down his spine.
Instinct moved before reason.
The wind had shifted.
The once-warm air now felt heavy — saturated with something unseen.
He slowly lifted his head, sniffing the air as the sun sank beyond the horizon.
His golden eyes swept across the savanna — and for a moment, nothing.
Only silence, and the distant whisper of swaying grass.
Then — a sound.
A crack.
Then another.
Light steps. Careful. Measured.
And the scent grew stronger.
They weren't alone.
Sith noticed it too.
She froze, teeth still sunk into the antelope's neck, and lifted her head toward him.
Her wild eyes met his — and in that instant, no words were needed.
They understood.
They weren't the only predators in this savanna.