The girl settled down on her couch and flicked on the Tv, waiting for her "delivery" to arrive and watched the news for the day.

The only channel she watched nowadays was the National-Change channel, a newer channel that had started airing after the beasts had become common knowledge, they focused on new beast appearances, their changes, and how to handle them, as well as the places they were found in.

As long as it was beast-related, they would show it, for example, around two days ago they interviewed one of the online giants that had photographed over 3,000 beasts.

Today the channel focused on something else, it was focused on the first recorded mammal that had changed into a beast, the beasts until now had been bugs, insects, and smaller sea creatures.

"Today we have the first "Beastial mammal" ever found! The finder has named it the "Swift mouse", likely originating from the common field mouse, this little thing has 3* the speed of an average field mouse and has truly earned the name "Swift mouse"."

The lady speaking today gestured to a glass cage on her table, it contained a small mouse-like creature that was pacing around anxiously.

"The finder said that it was an accidental catch as he just wanted to catch a few rats that had been seen around his neighborhood, but instead he caught this little fella."

The woman cooed at the small mouse and refocused on the camera.

She then went on to explain more about the mouse and where it had been found, asking people to keep an eye out and to call the local "Beast-control" once found.

Hara zoned out and huffed, even if she were to find one such critter, she couldn't call "Beast-control" because, in such a remote seaside village, they didn't have the city "Beast-control", it was a government-sanctioned project that was counted as a subdivision of the police and a collaboration with the local exterminators that was founded solely to control the beasts that were found in the cities.

If beasts were found inside the village, she was likely among the ones to be called, that or one of the many hunters, rangers, and foresters that lived in or around the village.

Although, maybe she should speak about this during the monthly meeting, maybe suggest doing something similar, they couldn't always fumble about when larger beasts were found.

Although the topic had been talked about before, it had always been pushed back due to more prominent issues, but now that mammals and other animals had begun to start mutating into beasts as well, it was time to do something to protect them if need be.

Taking a notebook laying on the table into her hands, she wrote something down on a halfway filled page.

"Beast protection"

It was only one point among many she wanted to talk about.

The ink from her pen hadn't dried yet as the doorbell rang and Hara stood up.

She opened a door to find three people standing there, a blond man with glasses and two people that seemed to be bodyguards wearing thick gloves and holding a container hidden underneath a tarp.

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She let them in and told the men to set the tank down on a sturdy wooden shelf in her living room, she had emptied it specifically to accommodate the tank and beasts, it was in a shady spot away from the windows and would serve as the home for the beasts for as long as the student project was ongoing or until she started her trip to the mountains.

Not wanting to talk for any period of time, Hara practically threw the men out of her house with a few short "Thanks'" and "Goodbyes'".

_______

With no small amount of regret of being roped of housing beasts in her home, the brown-haired girl unveiled the tank filled with beasts and cringed.

The tank was filled with plants and vegetation, it was a big tank too, around 3 feet tall and 3 feet wide, it barely fit in her already giant bookshelf.

Hara had always wondered what she was ever going to need the giant shelf in the corner for, as it had always sat there, collecting dust, but now it had seemed to have found its use.

It looked like a miniature jungle inside and it likely already had everything the normal flower mantis needed, there had also been a divider, cutting the tank in half, likely to hold male and females separate, but, and that was the thing that let dread pool in her stomach, the divider had been taken out and not set in properly again, leading it to just flop around uselessly.

So, now the tired forester needed to fulfill the promise she made to the teacher and set the divider in again, while also separating the beasts inside, whom she read, could fly when threatened, or if they just felt like it for the males, who were smaller than the females by a large margin, making the already small animals, even smaller.

The ranger groaned and began to fish for a pair of thick gloves to begin the job.

She also fished an insect net out of her storage closet and set it up to envelop the shelf and her.

The windows were all shut, the net set up and her hands protected by gloves, it was time to get started.

She looked inside and decided that, instead of fishing the small males out, she would first see which side she found to have more males, see if she could collect the males from the scarcer side, and then fish the females out of the more male populated side and throw them into the, hopefully empty of males, other side.

She was hoping to keep as many males alive as possible by doing this.

Inside the tank were many small beasts, they were luckily easy to see as the plants inside were a sandy color, making most of the flower-like beasts easier to see.

They were beautiful, she had to admit, they were in all sorts of colours and forms, resembling many different flowers.

One especially caught her eye, a blue mantis that looked like an orchid, it was a mix between a midnight blue, a sky blue, and a stunning purple, it also seemed to possess wings.

After looking for a while, Hara decided that the right side had fewer males and began her quest.

She carefully opened the tank on one side and carefully fished the mantises out from the tank, she closed the flap and opened the other, throwing the beasts in.

They put up quite a fight and she was glad to be wearing gloves.

After relocating the male mantises, she fished the females out of the newly populated male section and threw them into the female section, she was even more careful than before, as the females were larger and more violent than the males, picking them up one by one to avoid accidents.

After a good half an hour of carefully relocation, she prepared to fish the last mantis out of the male side and put her into the female side, her gloves were battered and deep cuts littered their surface, she would need to buy new ones once she was done as these were unusable.

She grabbed the last female mantis gently and prepared to take her out, the mantis struggled in her grip, just as the others had, but this time her glove didn't protect her and she got cut in her palm.

She tensed her hand in response, it was an instinctual motion after the attack.

She ended up nearly crushing the orchid mantis, she let go, shaking her hand out as she hissed in pain, blood running down her gloves.

She momentarily felt bad for nearly killing the beast before she shook her head.

She grabbed the mantis from the floor with her other hand and quickly threw the, thankfully unharmed, mantis into the tank, closing the lid and calling it done.

She retreated but left the net where it was, rushing to the bathroom to take care of the surprisingly deep cut in her palm.

She patched herself up and grumbled as she stomped off to bed.

She was done with the day.