Vic generally leaves people with the impression that he's unreliable, so I didn't actually realize he was a real extrozoologist until the day he came to live on the Colossus. On the very first day, he brought countless wondrous beasts onto the Colossus. They were flying frantically in the air, crawling all over the ground, and swimming about wherever they could... Most of them were species we had never even seen before! Many of the Aurorians on the Colossus came to watch curiously, causing quite a stir. However, finding a place for so many wondrous beasts was no easy problem. After a lot of time and effort, %s and I cleared out three empty rooms for these wondrous beasts. When we returned to find Vic, he had already gone back to his room to sleep!
—Vice

It's not that I don't want to teach my two apprentices everything I know, but studying wondrous beasts is all about spontaneous active research. For example, when I was young, I didn't have someone like me to write books for me to study conscientiously. I love wondrous beasts, so I spent all my time taking care of them while learning all about them at the same time. It took me several years to form a profound understanding of them. Of course, that's not to say that this process was a cakewalk—surely you've noticed that I only have half of this wing left, and I still have a wondrous beast scar on my back! Thanks to one of your kin, a Caelestite girl who helped me communicate with wondrous beasts, I managed to overcome this horrible experience... Huh? Why did that wondrous beast attack me? Sigh, it's probably because my family used to be in the wondrous beast trade, so all the wondrous beasts I met back then were afraid of me... What's that look on your face for? Whose childhood doesn't hold at least one unspeakably lamentable tale?

Yes, I wasn't born to be an extrozoologist, but everything in this world happens for a reason. Children are innocent—naturally, whatever my parents told me, I took to be infallible. As a child, I simply thought of wondrous beast trading as a way of surviving in this world, but later on, I had to make a choice. I escaped from that place stained with the stench of blood and came to live alone in the forest. I gradually became familiar with these animals. Sometimes I couldn't afford food from town, so I had to resort to steal... Er, I mean—these wondrous beasts took it upon themselves to pick wild fruit for me and keep my belly full, so I survived! Hahaha...
Ashamed? What do I have to be ashamed of!? In this line of work, we call it mutualistic symbiosis—mother nature's wisdom utilized for the sake of survival! If Little Furball's hair keeps growing, eventually, it will shed it sooner or later, but if I shear it and gather it up, I can exchange it for alcohol and food. This not only saves Little Furball the hassle of having excessively long hair and the energy required to shed it, but it also improves the quality of my life—so why not?

Let me just say in advance that I've never forced Little Furball to let me shave it! But maybe the reason it stays with me is actually out of gratitude. I found it one snowy night—it was lying on the snow, its hind leg broken and caught in a trap. I couldn't bear seeing it like that, delirious and close to death, so I saved it. I took it home with me and nursed it for two days, but I never thought that when it regained consciousness, its first reaction would be to puff itself up and pounce on me! It went straight for my throat! Fortunately, I reacted fairly quickly, and Little Furball was still rather weak, so I lived to see another day... What are you embarrassed about? Isn't that exactly what you did, Little Furball? Well, I don't hold it against you. Because of you, I've been able to see so many wonderful things, and I finished writing "1,001 Fantastical Creatures"! It's all thanks to you that life is so good right now!

How can you call me lazy? Didn't I train two promising successors...? Alright, don't look at me like that. I'm just taking a well-deserved break right now after a bit of success... Sooner or later, I'll continue my journey—for my new book—and reveal all the mysteries of my exhilarating experiences. Speaking of which, when I gazed in the mirror the other day, I felt like I looked relatively more rejuvenated than before—the wrinkles around my eyes had retreated! I don't know whether it's because my newly-developed beast mucus skin care regimen is having some kind of miraculous effect on me or whether I've finally entered a reverse growth phase like the Ouroboros... Maybe I'll just keep getting younger and younger from now on. If I eventually do revert to a childlike state, please, %s, make sure Fia doesn't bully me... Am I scared of growing old? Maybe a little, or I wouldn't be searching for ways to stay young. But isn't that part of the fun of life, facing the unknown day after day?