Kuartam the Toad

It was said that a legendary toad called Kuartam lived deep in the Ecuadorian rainforest. He was no ordinary toad. Despite looking like all the others, he possessed an extraordinary power. Whenever someone made fun of him or bothered him, Kuartam would turn into a jaguar!

This was a really really old tale, though — none of the local tribespeople had actually ever seen such a toad. The youngest didn’t even believe it ever existed in the first place. There was, however, a part of the rainforest where, from time to time, you could hear a terrible, gut-wrenching roar.

One night, when one of the young hunters was getting ready to go for a hunt, a strange feeling came over his wife. All of a sudden, she remembered the old legend about the toad and said to her husband: “Be careful out there! Whatever you do, don’t provoke Kuartam, or heaven forbid, make fun of him! Don’t you dare!”

But her husband just laughed. He didn’t believe those old folktales. Still, he promised her he would not bother any toads. He assured her he was just going hunting, and that when one is hunting, there’s no time for joking. They said goodbye to each other, and the young man headed deep into the jungle.

In the moonlight, he hacked his way through the dense undergrowth with a machete, looking for animals to kill so that he could eat something other than fruit the next day. So far, he had only come across a snake — which quickly slithered into the thicket and disappeared. There were a few little mice scurrying under his feet, but nothing else. Nothing worth his time, at least.

The man wandered through the jungle wearily. When he stumbled on…