"What do you mean by..." Kael blinked. "The bottom of the food chain?"
"I mean..." Ronan shook the dirt off his tail and said in a low voice, "Are demons the weakest of all the races?"
"Of course not!" Kael frowned, puffing up with a bit of pride as he snorted, "We demons are the most powerful race in the entire World of Elysium!"
Ronan thought of the mountains of corpses and then glanced at the devastation around them. He couldn't bear to argue with Kael.
The most powerful race... reduced to this sorry state?
Seeing Ronan's look of disbelief, Kael tried to explain further.
Ronan ignored him and attempted to move forward. Coordinating his four legs was quite difficult, and his stumbling made him look rather comical.
Kael didn't dare laugh and followed along in small steps.
After walking for another hundred meters, Ronan finally got used to balancing his body and started to run.
Kael easily kept pace with him, feeling relieved. "I've been so lucky," he muttered, thinking about their many near-death experiences. Especially after seeing the devastation in the forest, with the charred remains of many demonic creatures lying lifeless on the ground.
"It must be thanks to meeting you, my lord, that I've been so fortunate," Kael said earnestly, his eyes full of sincerity.
Ronan quickly adjusted to the body of the demon dog. Though its vision wasn't as good as his original eyes, the dog's ears were much sharper, allowing him to hear even the faintest noises from far away.
He no longer had the energy to ponder what exactly he had become. After running for a kilometer, his body suddenly went limp.
Kael didn't even notice at first and ran a few meters ahead before realizing something was wrong. He quickly turned back, panicked. "What's wrong, my lord?"
What's wrong?... Ronan felt the hunger even more intensely than before, and his head was spinning.
"Hunger," he replied weakly.
Kael frowned and hesitantly extended his hand. "Should I carry you, my lord?"
Ronan didn't reject the offer, and Kael, being a demon, swiftly carried him through the forest.
As Kael searched for food, Ronan's eyelids drooped, and his tongue hung out of his mouth out of habit.
"Do you want some meat, my lord?"
Ronan felt like he was about to starve to death. At this point, he thought he could eat anything—even if it was something disgusting... And just as that thought crossed his mind, a sudden, savory smell wafted through the air. Ronan's body moved faster than his brain could react, and like a flash of lightning, the demon stray dog darted out of Kael's arms.
Kael was momentarily stunned.
Ronan sprinted like mad, charging toward a steaming pile of yellow dung with his mouth wide open.
No, no, no! No!! No!!!
As the distance closed, what Ronan saw as delicious food became clearer. He could even see the green flies buzzing around the top.
Drool dripped uncontrollably from his mouth. His consciousness battled desperately against the body's remaining instincts, and just as his nose was about to touch the dung, Ronan barely managed to skid to a stop.
Kael, who had been following closely, also saw what had driven Ronan to sprint like that. His expression turned strange.
Ronan's body stiffened as he stared at the fur on his front paw. It looked like it had gotten a bit of... something on it.
Suppressing the urge to vomit, he first pulled back his front legs. His hind legs, however, seemed out of his control, and he had to push them backward.
Kael, covering his nose, silently stepped aside.
Ronan continued retreating until he was a safe distance from the pile of dung. Then, the demon dog arched its back and began gagging as if it were a person.
Since his stomach was empty, Ronan couldn't actually throw up. After snapping out of the horrifying experience of nearly eating dung, his gaze shifted to the charred remains of an unknown demonic creature nearby, and he started to drool again.
Thankfully, before he completely lost control, Kael finally found some food.
He had caught a wild rabbit, plucked its fur, and drained its blood. Ronan lowered his head to inspect the meal offered to him. His dog's face drooped. "Am I supposed to eat it raw?"
Kael looked confused. "What?"
"Don't you cook it over a fire?"
Kael scoffed in disgust. "Only humans eat cooked food. It's not fresh at all that way."
But it's also not clean enough... Ronan sighed inwardly. He knew there was no point in explaining this to a demon, and maybe it was just his new body, but the meat did smell pretty good. Then again, he had just thought dung smelled good too, so there wasn't much to complain about.
Ronan hesitantly opened his mouth and took a small bite. As he swallowed, his sagging dog face gradually returned to its usual expression.
He quickly devoured the rabbit meat, but the sight of blood on the corners of his mouth made his human self feel uneasy. The only silver lining to being stuck in a demon dog's body was that, at least, he could finally eat something.
The disaster caused by the dragon in the Black Forest wasn't over yet. In some areas, the fires still showed no sign of extinguishing. The scattered flames made it difficult for Kael to find their way.
Ronan, who had been following closely, observed something after a while. "Are you afraid of the flames?"
"I'm not afraid," Kael responded, having grown used to Ronan's strange questions. "But we demons do hate fire."
So that's why they eat their food raw?
For the next few days, Kael continued to find food for Ronan. Sometimes it was wild rabbits, other times a few birds, and occasionally they would even eat low-level demonic creatures. When Ronan asked if this wasn't some form of cannibalism, Kael explained that although both were considered part of the "demon race" by others, demonic creatures and demons weren't the same thing.