Nearly a month passed. During his solitary journey, he witnessed countless animals and birds, some similar to those of his world, others far greater in size or utterly alien. He began to wonder what world this was. Had he fallen into some primordial, dangerous fairy tale? I don't read any books though.

  The feather and the mysterious cylinder box were his only clues, heavy in his pocket and his thoughts.

  Lost in reflection, Karl felt the air turn brutal as a fierce snowstorm rapidly descended. He spotted a giant dead tree with a hollowed-out base and immediately took shelter, covering the entrance with leaves and sticks. After successfully building a fire to keep warm, the lighter was helpful. He took a quick, risky walk nearby to find more sticks to keep the precious flame going against the rising tempest.

  The snowfall thickened as Karl searched for fuel, each flake sharp as a needle against his face. The wind howled through the hollow of the great tree, its eerie whistle punctuated by the crackling of his fire. The tree itself was massive—ancient and gnarled, its hollow large enough to accommodate several people. As he gathered wood, his thoughts wandered to the cylinder box in his pocket, its surface now cracked and worn from his travels. It was a mystery without answers.

  While picking through the snow for fallen branches, a terrifying sight seized him, sending shivers deep into his bones. A massive creature, the size of a normal house, dragged the carcass of a giant, deer-like beast that sported a single, massive horn with a spiral design, the other horn broken off near the base.

  The predator, a monstrosity that defied conventional understanding of a bear, dwarfed the surrounding pines. Its hide was a shifting patchwork of white and black fur that seemed to move with unnatural, undulating patterns. As it dragged its kill, Karl noticed something horrifying: the beast wasn't pulling the deer by its legs. Its massive jaws, a vice of sharpened bone, were sunk deep into the deer's neck, puncturing through the windpipe with a sound like an axe cleaving rotten wood. A geyser of blood erupted, drenching the ground. The creature's desperate trail through the dirt was no more than a scarlet river, painting the earth a dark, gruesome red.

  The sound of cracking ice and earth beneath the creature's immense weight reached Karl even through the wind and snow. It was moving with purpose, heading toward a nearby cave he had noticed earlier, the one he had deliberately avoided.

  Suddenly, a profound chill, unrelated to the weather, washed over him. He snapped his head toward the monster. Its terrifying eyes, pits of frozen malice, were looking down straight at him. With a guttural sound, it let the deer carcass drop, fixing its gaze entirely on its next prey.

  Karl felt a terror he never thought possible. A seasoned soldier, he had killed hundreds, perhaps thousands of foes; he didn't count. He had fought deadlier men and wrestled with apex predators from his own world—lions and bears that had felt like nothing more than obstacles. This feeling was new. Terrifying.

  But thrilling nonetheless. His heart hammered against his ribs as the creature lowered its massive head, its hot breath curling in the freezing air. Those eyes—yellow and unblinking—pierced straight through him. They were not the dull, mindless gaze of a beast; there was an intelligence in them that chilled him more than the cold ever could. This thing saw him. It understood what he was. And it was deciding whether he was worth the effort.

  He froze, his body locked in place by something deeper than survival instinct. The bear's snout twitched as it inhaled, tasting his fear on the wind. A low, rumbling growl vibrated through the air—not an aggressive sound, but something worse. His instinct kicked in, analyzing whether he could take the bear out. He had left his gun at the shelter; he remembered it had one shot left. One shot, maybe, but he could work with it.

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  Option one: run toward the shelter, avoiding the beast by masking himself in snow, grab the gun, and form a plan.

  Option two: “Option one” my foot. The bear would tear me apart before I reached the shelter.

  “Ahhhhhh,” he let out a deep sigh. There were no options. He had to fight here and now.

  He let out a smile. “So, how about—am I going to kill you?”

  The bear's lips peeled back, revealing rows of teeth the size of daggers. His words echoed strangely in the hollow silence, bouncing off the ancient bark. Then something unexpected happened—the creature tilted its massive head, studying him with an almost curious expression. For a moment, it seemed to consider his challenge, as if it had been waiting for this exact moment. Karl realized the truth: this wasn't just any bear. This thing was something else entirely—an apex predator that didn't fear death because it knew it couldn't die. Its very existence defied the natural order, which explained why it moved through the forest with such purpose and confidence. The intelligence in its gaze suddenly made perfect sense.

  He analyzed his surroundings to come up with a decent plan. Oh alrighty then. Challenge accepted. He suddenly started sprinting, circling the bear, hiding behind the giant trees and the snowstorm. He began picking up stones, heavy in weight, throwing them upward to reach the sky itself in wide circles. The bear was intelligent, but the weather was on Karl's side. The severe storm limited the giant's vision.

  When the bear started to move, the stones began to rain down one by one, striking the bear. Because the stones were heavy and had momentum in the fall, the bear felt the impact and was distracted enough to give Karl time. He made a move to the long-horned deer carcass.

  The deer had one horn broken and one intact, the remaining horn facing the ground. He took out his bayonet, sharp enough to cut the head of the deer. The neck was already bitten and torn, so separating the head was easy. He started to turn the intact horn side upward, thinking it would be heavy, but he felt the giant deer's head heavy but not heavy enough. “Doesn't the dead weigh more?” he muttered. After he finished turning the head, he started to sprint, repeating his previous movements, preparing for his next plan.

  The massive bear lumbered after him, its movements surprisingly agile for its size. Each impact of its paws sent a tremor through the frozen ground. Karl evaded the blows; barely one of the blows caught his coat, tearing the side. He narrowly escaped and hid behind the massive tree, relaxing his breathing again. He darted between trees, throwing stones as he ran, each one striking with bone-crushing force at the same place the stones hit before. The first stone caught the beast on its shoulder, sending a dull thud through the air. It didn't roar in pain; it only snorted, unimpressed. But it was distracted. The second stone smashed against its back leg, forcing a grunt as it stumbled.

  Then he threw a sharp stone, aiming for the eyes like throwing a grenade. He threw the stone with his full strength. The stone flew like a dart, striking the bear's right eye, making it jerk in pain and confusion.

  He ran straight to the bear, pulling out the bayonet. He reached the creature's massive paw and started using his full strength and force, trying to cut the nerve through the thick skin; the skin tore in a single swipe, with boiling blood spraying all over. Even Karl was shocked by how easy it was; he thought it would take many strikes before he reached the radial nerve. The bear felt a pain it had never felt before, jerking upward, towering over Karl, glaring straight into his soul where he stood still and calm, a slight grin on his face as he waited for the play to end. In that moment, the giant bear felt something it never had: fear, maybe?

  Furious, the giant used its full force to crush him in anger, not seeing the trap he had made. The hand bearing sharp nails came crashing down. He took small steps to dodge. The hand crushed the land. The bear felt harrowing pain; the severed nerve gushed blood. It couldn't stand. Its head crashed downward, impaling itself on the ready deer horn. The horn screwed into the bear's head, gushing blood that bathed Karl. The battle was over.

  Blood spattered across his face as the massive bear's head thudded against the ground, its yellow eyes now dull and lifeless. The beast's final breath rattled from its throat before silence settled over the forest again. Around him, the snow continued to fall, each flake now tinged pink with blood. The deer horn stood upright from the creature's skull like some grotesque monument to his victory.

  “You should've minded your own business by eating your kill and curling up in your den. They say being greedy is never a—since when did I become a philosopher?” he mumbled to himself. “And why am I talking to the dead?”