Anyone who has played any Monster Hunter game will have probably noticed at some point that the ways these so called "monsters" act are strangely familiar, with their behavior being more animalistic than monstrous. This is without a doubt the thing...
A deafening crash resonates across the ancestral steppe. A bolt of lightning strikes the earth, the light it emits ripping through the early morning's darkness, and momentarily illuminating the area. As the bolts of electricity disappear as suddenly as they appeared, a plume of smoke begins to rise from the spot that was hit, a small orange glow soon follows it.
It doesn't take long before the glow starts spreading across the fields of yellow grass, their bodies consumed by increasing heat; what began as a single spark soon transforms into a wildfire. The dry temperatures of the region have made these lands susceptible to this kind of phenomenon, and soon enough, a large portion of this mosaic of grasslands, deciduous forests, rocky outcrops, cave systems, mountains, and long forgotten ruins are engulfed in a raging inferno.
Whilst the blaze continues rolling over the landscape, the smoke coming from it quickly blots out the sky. The only thing capable of breaking through this curtain is the occasional lightning bolt. With the temperatures rising to unbearable levels, any species which possesses some way of moving quickly begins redirecting their course away from the flames.
Despite the devastation brought by the wildfire, many of the animals remain calm, most having no problem escaping the flames. As a herd of Aptonoths begins quickening its pace while crossing the burning fields, the air is soon filled with the deafening drone of millions of fleeing invertebrates, their bodies merging into a singular collective mass resembling a living cloud.
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Unlike the larger grazers, many of the invertebrates and other small creatures aren't big enough to keep themselves well ahead of the fire, making them much more desperate to escape. While many take to the air or flee on foot, some are simply incapable of outrunning the flames, and for many of the Konchus at ground level, it seems like they're doomed to be incinerated.
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However, as the blaze keeps getting closer, the small neopterons begin burying themselves in the dirt and curl up into balls, their hard exoskeletons providing them with some protection against the increasing heat. As the wildfire passes over, the Konchus keep hunkering down in their hastily dug burrows, hoping that they're deep enough to not be burned to a crisp.
