In the emerald depths of the Jade Jungle , where trees dripped liquid gold at dawn and vines strangled their own roots, there prowled a jaguar even the shamans feared to name.
Its coat was not spotted, but striped —vertical slashes of onyx and amber, like prison bars for something old and ravenous. The Mayantec people called it "El Que Mira Atrás" —"He Who Looks Back"—because any hunter who locked eyes with it would later find their own footprints facing the wrong way in the mud.
The beast moved through the world sideways .
Children whispered that its shadow had weight—that when it passed over a sleeping monkey, the creature would wake screaming, its fur turned snow-white. Warriors who tracked it returned with their spears splintered from the inside out , as if something had grown within the wood.
But the true horror lay in its hunting style.
When the jaguar killed, it left no marks. Tapirs would simply vanish from their herds, their last breath still hanging in the humid air. Spider monkeys would chatter one moment—then hang limp and hollow-eyed from branches, their insides neatly removed through unbroken skin.
