Chapter 3

The heroine’s arrival had thrilled the neighboring clans, especially their males.

That evening, beastfolk from three nearby tribes gathered around a bonfire to celebrate the female who had dropped into their midst from the sky.

I saw her standing on the raised platform, blushing shyly and pressing her lips together in unease.

Representatives of three clans stood before her. Tonight, she would choose which clan to join.

The tiger man gazed at her in adoration and vowed, “Join my clan. I’ll be faithful to you forever!”

The fox man cast her a tender, lingering look. “I’ll follow you. The entire Fox Clan will stand behind you.”

The serpent man was cold on the outside and secretly passionate. “The Serpent Clan will do everything in its power to support its females. I’ll support you.”

The heroine raised a trembling hand. After a long hesitation, under the eager, excited gaze of all those males, she finally pointed at the Serpent Clan.

At the edge of the bonfire, I was busily gnawing meat off skewers.

The other females thought I was eating to hide my heartbreak.

A female as beautiful as me, rejected by a male who’d taken just one look at the outsider! Anyone would have found it unbearable.

Still, none of them dared come over and talk. It wasn’t exactly something to be proud of.

Some males nearby were getting ready to try their luck with me. I noticed and shot them a vicious glare.

I was in a foul mood.

Interrupt my skewers, and I’d cut you down!

That flash of murder in my eyes deflated them instantly. They put their plans on hold.

One young-looking serpent man, however, seemed to think of something that made him blush for no apparent reason.

He darted a glance at me, sidled over bashfully, pushed some cooked skewers beside me, and hurried away again.

I stared.

Something cool, soft, and springy suddenly circled my ankle. I looked down. A black snake tail.

I followed it with my eyes. It belonged to that young man.

His cheeks were pink as he hastily tried to pull it back. But the tail appeared to have a mind of its own, pressing close to me and nuzzling insistently.

I narrowed my eyes. My red lips parted. “Get lost.”

Where had this serpent brat come from? He’d only just reached adulthood, couldn’t even fully control his tail, and had the nerve to touch me?

His eyes reddened, tears gathering in them.

He grabbed his own tail in a panic and stammered, “I-I’m sorry.”

Then he turned and fled.

Beside me, the little snake tilted her head, flicking her tail back and forth.

I understood. She wanted me to be less fierce.

I scoffed. “Stay out of it.”

I didn’t welcome advances from men younger than me. I liked the gentle, attentive, emotionally steady type who knew how to take care of someone.

After the bonfire gathering, the Serpent Clan’s chief came to see me. She repeatedly asked whether I was certain I wanted to enter the hunting contest a week from now.

The chief was an older woman, still strikingly beautiful. She worried that the tiger man’s rejection had upset me and I’d entered in a fit of anger.

The contest was no joke. I probably wouldn’t die, but one careless move could still get me hurt.

“I’m entering because I want to use the contest to choose a mate,” I lied without so much as a blush or a skipped heartbeat.

Adult females who hadn’t bonded with anyone would enter hunting contests to choose strong, powerfully built males as partners.

Those who already knew whom they wanted generally didn’t participate.

I wasn’t really entering to find a mate. I was thoroughly sick of the males eyeing me up, dreaming up ways to seduce me wherever I went so they could become mine.

After all, being a single female made me quite a catch.

I knew most of the males would be under the heroine’s spell, longing for that fragile girl. During the contest, they’d fight one another tooth and nail and forget the most fundamental thing: the prize.

They could wear each other out while I walked off with the spoils.

If I could win that fertile tract of land the city had allotted as the prize for the Serpent Clan…

Conquering the jungle would only be a matter of time!