Vultures. They're vile creatures; they signal death, carnage, and, worst of all, gossip. Three such ingrates were discussing the recent fight between Bo and the chicks.

'Six against one? And the leveret beat them all?'

'Yes. I heard he was being experimented on by the Great Fox.'

'I see...His Time must be arriving soon.'

'Oho! He's pushed it back nearly a century. What's changed?'

'The Experiment, of course. I heard it nearly drained him!'

'Perhaps...'

The three cackled and flew off to tell their wretched brethren what they discovered. The Great Fox's Time was coming. And with it came the Change.

Blood. The sickly sweet smell, the irony taste, the warm, sticky feeling.

Bo wasn't a stranger to blood. He'd fought many things during his adventures; the beasts brought the fight to him and he never turned down experience.

But never before had he seen so much...blood.

The bullies were gone; he'd beaten them black and blue. Now he sat with Lima Bean, watching Michi slowly, very slowly heal Twig. It didn't look good.

Eventually, he let Lima Bean guide him back to the burrow where she tried to distract him with little sparks of mana. But his mind stayed on Twig's battered body.

'Lima Bean,' he said quietly, 'do you think she's gonna get better?'

She paused, looked at him sadly, and then shrugged helplessly. 'I don't know, Bo.'

'Michi's super good at healing, though, right? So won't he be able to fix Twig?'

'Well...he couldn't fix my eyes...'

'But that's because the griffin did something super bad to them, right?'

She shrugged again. 'Maybe.'

'But-'

'I don't know, Bo, any better than you do. Let's just...wait and see, alright?'

Bo didn't want to wait. He wanted results now. He wanted to help! But if Michi couldn't do anything...what could he accomplish? He was a bad best friend. He'd let those chicks hurt Twig while he just stood there. He should've protected her better. He should've done something before they got to her.

Defeated and depressed, he hid beneath the furs in shame.

Lima Bean couldn't get Bo to come out no matter how much coaxing she did, so she gave up and went back up to the surface.

She squinted hard at the surrounding area and saw a small shape being flanked by similarly small shapes up in the falcon clan's nest tree. A black blob was resting beneath its branches.

'Fox?' she called.

'Oh. It's you. Can you tell Bo that Twig's fine now? She won't be able to play for a little while longer, but he can still see her.'

'But...her wounds...'

The old fox laughed. 'Those pesky things? Sure, it took a bit of time, but they were nothing at all compared to my [Mend: Wounds] level! Not even your eyes could withstand it!'

Lima Bean frowned. 'So then why couldn't you heal them?'

'Er...well, you see, griffins have curses on their talons. [Mend: Wounds] can't fix that. So, you know, you're gonna be stuck like that for a while...'

'...You're lying, aren't you?'

The fox jumped up. 'What? Griffin curses are powerful, mouse! You would know nothing of the sort!'

'Oh? Aren't you supposed to be level 256,476?'

'Quiet, mouse! Even I have limits! If you're here to argue, scat!'

'Fine. I'll just go and find some lima beans-'

'Actually,' the fox interjected, snatching her up by the tail with surprising speed. 'We have more training to do.'

'What? But we just trained like...an hour ago!'

'Not good enough! We have to get you ready!'

Lima Bean squirmed in his iron tight grasp. 'Just give me thirty minutes!'

'No!'

'B-but I need my beans!'

'You've done just fine without them!'

'I'll do better if I have them in my system! Fox, you can't do this to me! This-this is cruel and unusual punishment!'

'Hush up and start focusing on sensing mana again...'

Groaning, Lima Bean did as she was told.