Humans: The Worst Kind Of Demon

——— Minho ———

I was looking at a certain death that stood about fifty meters away from me. It looked less intimidating from a distance than when I saw it in the classroom during the show-and-tell a few days ago, but I was sure it could smell my fear even from that distance. 

A tiger.

I would not have come to this situation if Mira got it into her thick skull that all the legends about Humans were overblown lies. 

Yes, we were evil. I knew that well. Perhaps better than most people.

Been there, done that.

I witnessed how evil a human can be, and did the evil deeds myself too. 

But that didn't mean I - a human - stood a chance against this ferocious predator in a way that Mira thought I did. 

Once I heard from Mira that a 'deal' was something that one could not back away from in this world, I knew I couldn't give up. I couldn't bear to think that Mira had to take the insult about her family, and not only that, if I lost here she would have to go through the humiliation of insulting her own family herself in front of 40 or so other students gather to witness this fight too. 

"I give you the final chance to give up now, Kimus. My Human will kill your fur ball otherwise. Without a monster, you will not be able to compete in the contest"

Mira yelled across the impromptu battlefield arena marked with four flags in each corner, probably half the size of a football pitch. 

"Ha! Fight hasn't even started and you are already trying to find a way to get away from it? You might as well now admit defeat now, pleb!", Kimus, the bully, shouted back. 

"You will regret this, fool", Mira scoffed.

"Are you two ready?", another boy from the class who stood by the side line, somewhere around the middle of the distance between the tiger and I asked and both Mira and Kimus nodded their heads. 

"After a count of five! Five!"

At this point, I had a vague idea for securing survival as obviously that was the first step to winning this impossible fight. 

"Four!, Three!"

My best bet was to make use of humans' only physical superiority over most other animals, especially against big predators like tigers. 

Humans couldn't match the speed of the big cat, but there is one thing that humans could do better than other animals, which made it possible for mankind to be successful hunters in the hostile world where most other species had super speed and strength. 

"Two! One!"

Endurance. Humans were excellent long-distance runners. 

"FIGHT BEGINS!"

With that, it looked like the tiger was released from some spell that held it back, and it started to dash toward me in a straight line. 

I was betting my life on what I saw from nature documentaries and a very simple math in my mind. 

If memory served me correctly, tigers could reach their top sprint speed at about 20 meters per second, whereas humans could do about 10 meters per second, while we were starting at a distance about 50 meters apart. That meant if I could sprint at full speed away from the impending doom I had about 5 seconds to survive before I got caught up by the creature that could do double my speed. The critical factor in my survival was that tigers could sprint for only about 10 seconds, after which it gets pretty damn tired and needs time to recover, so what I needed was 5 extra seconds to survive until the tiger could no longer sprint. We will then enter a stand-off at some distance before the predator recovers enough breath and energy to come after me again, which will be the moment where I get my few seconds of time window to summon whatever the hell I need to defeat the beast. 

So as soon as the fight started, I started to run toward one flag at the corner, which made everyone surrounding the battlefield laugh. 

"Haha! Look at him! He's running away!"

"Is he even a real human?"

"Mira lost this battle already, haha"

"That beast Kimus summoned is wicked fast!"

There was no time for me to glance and check, but I was pretty sure that Mira was already disappointed in me and starting to panic inside, realizing that I really wasn't 'all that'. 

Well, she was right. But I had no intention to just let things end at that. 

By the time I arrived at the corner flag, the tiger closed our distances to about half, and I immediately turned to run toward another flag. Of course, the tiger is a nimble big cat so it could change its direction easily, but at the same time, it was sprinting at its top speed, which was double that of mine. The tiger overshot a bit before it could stop itself to change direction, and this earned me another valuable second or so. 

As I was running toward the other corner flag, the distance was closing again. 

There was no way I could get away just by running around. With human sprint speed being roughly half that of a tiger, it was not possible to outrun it for 10 seconds when we started about 50m distance away from each other, theoretically, so now came the moment I had to take one gamble. 

After reaching my second corner flag, I put a sudden stop to my running and started to walk toward the third flag slowly. That flicked a switch for the tiger, which also stopped running and started to prowl instead. 

YES! It's working!

This was an instinctive response from a tiger that I was betting on. If I kept on running at full speed it would chase me with all it's got till the end, but a sudden stop or slow down in movement of its prey actually alarms the predator to slow down and assess the situation, and it enters the prowling mode to be followed by a pounce at a decisive moment. 

Now that I knew it worked, all I had to do was repeat the process a couple of times, alternating between full sprint runs, sudden stops, slowdowns, and unexpected changes of directions. While the tiger was continuously closing distance with me throughout the process bit by bit, at the same time, it was becoming visibly tired and less interested in a full sprint, but instead changed to a kind of smart hunting mode where it started to prowl slowly, closing angles and cornering me toward one flag. I couldn't do this forever, but now that I no longer had to run for my dear life it gave me time to summon what I needed. 

When the tiger was only about 10 meters away, I stopped completely and stared into its eyes. The beast growled, but it couldn't help but become a little confused and curious as I started to make a choking sound and regurgitate.

I managed to pull the plastic bag from my mouth and spread its contents on the ground. The confused tiger sniffed, its ears perked, and started to approach. 

I knew this trick worked even for some big cats, but not all cats. So this was the final gamble, but if it worked, I would score the most impressive victory possible for Mira. 

When the tiger finally within 1.5 meters or so distance from me. It was no longer interested in me as the prey, but rather, it started to sniff at the herbs I spilled on the ground, became extremely happy, and started to roll around like an excited big cat on…

Cat nip. 

All the spectators were confused, and Kimus started to yell out in annoyance.

"What are you doing?! Finish him!"

The tiger couldn't care less about its master's command though as it was lost in euphoria. With its nostrils filled with the catnip powder, drooling, it laid on its back showing its belly. 

Perfect. 

All cats have different reaction to catnips, but this big cat was getting relaxed rather than over excited - exactly what I needed. 

As the tiger no longer cared about me as prey or considered me as a threat, it didn't mind that I knelt next to it, and even seemed happy when I started to rub its tummy. 

"The Human has tamed the beast!"

"The monster has lost its will to fight!"

Some of the spectators shouted and Kimus was going mad, but there was nothing he could do anymore. 

I looked over to Mira and gave her a wink, and overjoyed, Mira shouted,

"Victory!"

Yes, victory for you indeed, Mira.