The World of Beasts: She's Got Their Hearts novel Chapter 1

Analise Chamber groaned in pain and mumbled, "I can't believe I survived."

She held her throbbing head and slowly opened her eyes. "Looks like that fortune teller wasn't wrong... I really am hard to kill."

She was supposed to be on a business trip that day. Since she was short on time, she booked the earliest flight available. However, the plane malfunctioned less than 20 minutes after takeoff and started plummeting uncontrollably.

The violent drop knocked her out, and when she finally woke up, she was already here—wherever she was.

Analise shifted slightly, trying to get up. However, she realized there was something soft beneath her. She had just woken up, and her head was still spinning. So, she had not noticed anything earlier.

As she looked down, her eyes widened in shock. "Is that… a tail? Like an actual animal tail? Oh, no! Did I fall out of the sky and land on some endangered animal or something?"

Analise wondered if this would count as an involuntary killing of an endangered species. The wildlife crime podcaster Zayn Lambert did not mention whether one would be jailed for this, and she could not help but scold herself for not tuning into more of Zayn's podcasts.

"Lady, you need to run. I can barely hold myself back," a hoarse voice growled.

Analise instinctively turned around and saw Finlay Knight wearing one of those animal-ear headbands. Moreover, he was injured, too. Then, it hit her—she had passed out during the fall, but somewhere in the middle of it, she briefly regained consciousness.

She remembered being up in the sky, her heart already sinking, thinking she was done for. The wind had been so strong that she could barely keep her eyes open, but just before she hit the ground, she vaguely saw someone sprinting through the forest below. After that, everything went dark again.

She thought to herself, "Did I actually crash-land on him? I had fallen from that high up, and I weighed about 110 pounds! How is he even alive? He must be just as unkillable as I am…"

Analise was relieved that she had not landed on an endangered species. Instead, it was just a random dude running around the woods in a costume with fake wolf ears and a tail.

Analise figured she should probably apologize first and then get Finlay to a hospital, just in case he had internal bleeding or something. She said, "Hey, um—"

But before she could finish, Finlay shoved her forward with surprising gentleness. Then, he suddenly roared and transformed right in front of her.

One second, he was a man. The next, he was a massive, snarling wolf twice the size of any she had seen on nature documentaries.

Analise's eyes widened, her mind going completely blank. "What the actual hell? How did he just turn from a human into a wolf just like that? So, those ears and tail were real?"

Her instincts screamed at her to run, but her body refused to move. She was frozen in place, paralyzed by fear.

Her mind buzzed. "What the hell? What's happening? How does one just randomly shapeshift into a wolf?"

"Lady…" The wolf's growl snapped her back to reality—especially when it locked eyes with her like she was its next meal.

Maybe it was the survival instinct kicking in or the adrenaline flooding her system, but somehow she bolted. If she did not run now, she was as good as dead.

The wolf howled and immediately gave chase, barreling through the trees and knocking them over like twigs. Luckily, Analise was petite and agile. Even with the wolf right on her heels, he could not quite catch her.

Just then, she heard the chime of a bell. "This system has detected a highly compatible host. Dear Analise Chamber, would you like to bind with me? Complete the assigned tasks, and you'll be rewarded handsomely."

Still dodging branches and sprinting as fast as she could, Analise answered without hesitation, "Yes!"

She couldn't care less what the system was. Right now, she would bargain with the devil if it meant survival.

"Wow, you're surprisingly polite for a system! All the ones in novels just bind without asking!" Analise teased while weaving through the forest.

The system said, "Consent confirmed. Initiating binding sequence."