Forest Cats

**Forest Cats** (森 猫, *Mori Neko*) are a species of animals. A large number of them lives around the world, and some are even taken as pets. They also live in the Lost Forest near Athelney.

## Overview

Due to their resemblance to normal cats in most aspects, including in appearance, Forest Cats are colloquially known as cats. They look like cats, though they are a little larger, with slightly bigger and sharper claws and teeth.

A mother Forest Cat usually has about 4 or 5 kittens per litter. It is also possible to breed a Forest Cat with a regular cat, though there are risks: Gaku, who claims to have done this with his male Forest Cat and female house cat, says that she almost died during the intercourse and during birth. This is probably due to the naturally savage behavior of Forest Cats and also because her body was not prepared for that; he also says that his cat was not the same since then, as she became very weak physically.

A proof of a Forest Cat's strength is that Tenders, who is only a small kitten, is able to overpower Aspen, an adult cat, and come out apparently uninjured. When he was even younger, he was said to be able to kill Callie, her brother and her mother (but only if they were extremely out of guard and alone, such as when they were sleeping) by her father, a Beast Hunter and specialist on Forest Cats.

## Behavior

When raised in the wildness, Forest Cats show a very skeptical, attentive and skittish behavior. They rely mainly on their senses when hunting for food, and catch their small preys by grabbing them with their claws and piercing their bodies, while they catch larger preys by jumping on their back and attempting to bite their throat. They are highly intelligent, as they can create effective strategies and do not persist on attacking if their prey turns out to be stronger or faster than them. Forest Cats mark their territory or property by scratching it as hard as they can; the females and males usually do this to each other after mating, and it is sometimes done on kittens by their parents after they've been born.

When they are the ones to be approached, Forest Cats try showing an intimidating behavior to keep the other animal away while they formulate a plan to escape alive. They are extremely aggressive towards humans, even when those show docile and submissive behavior, being distrustful and wary of them. However, Forest Cats can be tamed and kept as pets, which happens quite often, surprisingly; this is a much easier feat to accomplish if the Forest Cat in question is a kitten raised by humans since birth, but this can happen with adults too, being a difficult and long process. Then, they can be taught tricks and become protective of their owner, but it can still be considered dangerous to have one because of their naturally violent behavior, and they can end up severely harming or even killing people, even unintentionally.

Some Beast Hunters are trying to repopulate and breed Forest Cats in unpopulated areas, as the species is currently in danger due to some people finding them too dangerous to be alive. For example, in the Republic of Nalim, for a long time, Forest Cats were killed in the spot and their population greatly declined, but currently, they are also used as pets by the inhabitants, and even serve as animal soldiers on its war against the Republic of Sacaro; meanwhile, in the Sahiro Republic, many Forest Kittens are killed by extremist groups, and there are rarer cases of adult cats being shot or killed by Nen. Apart from the Hunters' intervention, certain people (mostly non-users) are trying to reduce their mortality by adopting and sheltering them, then getting them to reproduce among themselves or with their house cats.

The practice of breeding a male Forest Cat with a female cat is extremely dangerous. Being savage during sexual intercourse, it is not uncommon for the Forest Cat to severely injure the female cat and kill her, even if accidentally, and scratching her forcefully after the end to mark her as "property" can cause major health problems too. Also, as Forest Kittens are really strong even before birth, their kicking and moving on the womb can harm the female from inside, and maybe even hurt or kill the other kittens. During birth they are also known to be brutal and can greatly wound the mother or the other kittens; for this reason, it is rare for regular kittens to survive in a litter where there are also Forest Kittens. In fact, a study has shown that in 57% of the cases where a male Forest Cat breeds with a female cat, she ends up dying (kittens not included). Because of this, some countries deem the act of deliberately breeding the two as animal abuse, such as Sahiro Republic.

## Public Controversy

The population in the world is mostly divided in two sides when it comes to Forest Cats: the Anti Forest Cat Force (AFCF) and the Pro Forest Cat Group (PFCG). The AFCF claims that Forest Cats can be considered more dangerous than other hostile animals due to their commonness; also, due to the fact that they often get mistaken as regular cats by people who are not aware of their existence, they can pose danger to many, and thus, their population needs to be either reduced, isolated, or extinct. Meanwhile, the PFCG defends that Forest Cats deserve to live just like any other animal, and do not always exhibit aggressive behavior, only when they feel threatened or are hunting (and even so, they would avoid attacking humans due to their size and possibly strength difference).

Even inside the AFCF itself, there is a large disagreement. A part of the members of the group (about 42%) believe that house cats who have had intercourse with Forest Cats and cats who are the offspring of Forest Cats should also be eradicated. Their reasoning for this is the existence of a supposed "Forest Cat virus" that can spread to cats, causing them to turn on their owners and become violent. Experiments have shown that this is not always the cause, and if a house cat starts acting weirdly after contact with a Forest Cat, it is due to the trauma, not due to a "virus". The other part (about 58%) believe that only Forest Cats are a threat to humanity.