She fed it the softest and tastiest fruits she had, and the ‘cute’ creature ate them eagerly.
A few days later, it started to walk. It even made cute noises and moans as it moved around.
Sohwa, who had lived alone since being abandoned by her pack, began to enjoy the presence of this small creature in her home.
As the cub became able to walk, it started following her around the house. She thought it was expressing gratitude for taking care of it.
One day, Sohwa decided to climb the mountain to gather green grapes, which were said to be plentiful at the foot of the peak.
She put the cub in her fruit basket as usual, but its body didn’t fit in the basket anymore.
“Huh? When did the basket become so small?”
Sohwa, holding the basket and inspecting it, turned to look at the cub.
With black and brown stripes decorating its well-groomed body, the creature looked at her with shining eyes.
‘Could it be that this little thing grew THIS big, THIS fast? No way. It has to be the basket, right...?’
At first, the cub was small enough to fit perfectly into a fruit basket.
Doubtful, Sohwa picked up the cute little thing.
“Oh, you’re much heavier than I’ve thought.”
She picked up the cub, finding it much heavier than before. Holding it for a while made her arms ache. Sohwa instinctively knew that something was wrong. Seeing it every day, she couldn’t notice it growing or gaining weight.
‘Is this cub going to keep growing? Even more than this?’
She realized it had outgrown her fox form. It was natural for it to be heavy since it was already bigger than her original form.
“Are wildcats normally this big?”
‘Aren’t wildcats supposed to be smaller than foxes?’
Sohwa couldn’t recall the exact size of wildcats, as she hadn’t seen one in a long time.
Actually, it wasn’t just about wildcats, since Sohwa wasn’t even able to tell the difference between a hawk and an eagle.
“Why do you keep getting bigger? Weren’t you already fully grown?”
The cub tilted its head and made cute sounds. It seemed to understand Sohwa’s words, but not entirely.
Strangely enough, it didn’t seem to understand anything that was disadvantageous to himself, but it always understood things that were beneficial to his own good.
“Ah, no wonder you eat so much.”
After some thought, Sohwa concluded that it grew so big because it ate a lot.
“Anyway, I can’t carry you around anymore. You’re too heavy for me... From now on, you stay home. If I’m not quick enough, that pesky raccoon will eat all those tasty green grapes in this forest before we can, got it?”
Thinking of the delicious sour and sweet taste of the shiny green grapes, Sohwa licked her lips.
She quickly prepared and left the house alone, but the cub started to make a fuss.
“No, you’re too heavy to carry around now.”
When she closed the door, the cub started banging on it with its soft paws.
‘What’s with that temper?’
Surprised, Sohwa opened the door, and the cub followed her.
“Where are you following me with those fluffy paws? The road is rough.”
But the cub climbed the mountain effortlessly, even overtaking Sohwa, who was using a walking stick.
‘Since when did wildcats have this much stamina?’
Even more than foxes? Sohwa tried not to show she was struggling, making the climb even harder.
She barely picked any grapes and fell ill for a few days after returning home.
When she didn’t appear at Mount Yeehwang for a few days, the raccoon Hoyoung came to visit her.
“Are you sick?”
Hoyoung, a purebred half-beast like Sohwa, was an acquaintance who often checked on her.
Mount Yeehwang, being a small hill, had no large predators, and they occasionally visited each other to catch up.
Hoyoung had a genial personality for a raccoon but still was usually grumpy and harsh-tongued.
“You’re always a worry.”
Hoyoung brought a basket full of apricots and plums for her and was startled to see the ‘wildcat cub’.
“Ah! What is that?”
The usually docile cub bared its teeth at Hoyoung. For the first time, Sohwa saw its fangs.
“You idiot! Where did you pick up a tiger?”
Hoyoung scolded her, but sick Sohwa just laughed and waved her hand.
“Tiger? This is a wildcat, you fool.”
“Stop talking nonsense and get rid of it!”
Hoyoung, scared out of his wits, ran away, leaving behind the basket of fruit.
Sohwa wasn’t too concerned watching him run away. Raccoons were always exaggerating.
‘Hmph, where would a tiger come from on Mount Yeehwang?’
Besides, this cub was too small to be a tiger. She had heard that tigers were as big as houses with paws the size of cauldrons. This cub was just slightly bigger than her fox form.
“Are you really a tiger?”
Slightly concerned, Sohwa examined the cub’s paws. If it were a tiger, it should have claws.
‘People said tiger claws look like sickles that are used for farming.’
But no matter how hard she looked, there were no terrifying claws. The paws were just fluffy and soft.
Feeling relieved, Sohwa played with the cub’s cute ‘little‘ paws for a while before inspecting its snout.
“I think I saw fangs earlier....”
Oddly enough, the fangs were gone. The cub simply stared at her with innocent eyes.
“Of course not, no tiger could be this cute and gentle!”