Mirage!

Three people, inclusive of our human, reached the peak. The male hiker brought his wife who hikes occasionally.

After resting a while, his wife pointed and exclaimed, "monitor lizard!"

The man and our human jumped up immediately, turned to look at where her finger was pointed.

The man who has a laid-back character sauntered towards it.

Wanting to snap its photo, our human quickly whispered audibly not to frighten it. The man stopped in his tracks.

Not to spook that creature, our human started to approach cautiously moving sideways like a "crab" trying to hide and blend in with the adjacent tree trunks, ready to flee the second that creature moved.

Monitor lizards can run really fast!

A few minutes passed; it did not move. Our human and friends exchanged perplexed glances.

Decided to find out, our human and male hiker carefully crept towards it. Nearing it and upon realising what it was, both let out hearty laughs. He then told his wife, who was some distance away, that the monitor lizard's body was an exposed tree root above ground and its tail was a broken small branch brought down from the previous day's thunderstorm that fell on the right spot!

His wife laughed; the three laughed heartily together.

PS: This happened on Wednesday morning. It is good that we could laugh at our own silliness and it is better to be safe than sorry, always.