Chapter 4
"Three hours? You underestimate me." Sebastian's voice was ice cold. He pulled out a clean white handkerchief from his pocket and carefully wiped the hand that had touched Evre, as if he'd touched something dirty. "If I wasn't putting on a show, I wouldn't have wasted even one second on a useless wolfless person like her."
The handkerchief was casually tossed into the air. It floated down and landed at Evre's feet.
She stood there frozen, the blood in her body turning to ice.
She stared at the man in front of her—the same boy who had patiently led her through the forest, whose smile had been as warm as sunshine. Now he looked at her like she was garbage rotting in a trash can.
"Why..." Evre's lips shook badly, her voice breaking apart.
"Why?" Veronica walked over and hooked her arm through Sebastian's, laughing smugly. "Because you're an idiot, Evre. Did you really think someone like Sebastian would be interested in a nobody like you? He's going to be the Alpha of the Silvermoon Pack. You were just tonight's joke."
Mean laughter broke out all around her.
Those mocking looks cut into her like knives, tearing away what was left of her dignity.
Sebastian didn't even look at her again.
He reached down, lifted Veronica's chin with one hand, and right there in front of everyone—with the crowd cheering—kissed her hard.
Veronica's eyes shone with victory as she leaned into the kiss, one hand resting on Sebastian's chest like she owned him.
In that moment, Evre heard the sound of her world breaking into pieces.
There was no kindness. No rescue.
Everything she had suffered through—all the shame, the humiliation, the desperate pretending—had been nothing but a carefully planned cruel joke from start to finish.
The perfect, pure Sebastian she had looked up to had never existed at all.
A violent spasm hit her stomach.
The crushing mix of heartbreak and shock destroyed the last of her mental defenses.
She lost all control over her space power. The mango juice that had been sealed in the pocket dimension in her throat broke free, flooding into her stomach.
The allergic reaction hit hard and fast.
"Cough... cough!" Evre grabbed her throat as a burning, raw pain exploded from deep inside. Her airway started swelling quickly. Red patches spread across her skin like fire, along with an unbearable itching and burning that took over her whole body.
"Oh look—the useless one is throwing a fit. Is she crying because she's so 'touched'?" The brown-haired boy's mockery cut through her pain.
Evre couldn't hear them anymore. Her vision got blurry around the edges, each breath becoming a fight, every inhale feeling like swallowing broken glass.
She had to get out of here. If she collapsed here, if she lost control and shifted in front of them—everything she'd been hiding would be exposed.
She couldn't let her mother find her. She couldn't let these people see her true form.
She spun around and stumbled into the darkness, pushing through the crowd of people watching like a crazy person, running toward the deep part of the forest.
"Don't worry about her. Just a stray dog without a wolf form." Sebastian's cold voice followed her, distant and uncaring.
Evre bit down so hard she tasted blood, tears finally streaming down her face, turning ice cold from the night wind. She ran blindly into the thickest part of the woods, thorns ripping her carefully chosen blue floral dress, branches whipping her cheeks and arms and leaving bloody marks. But she felt none of it.
Compared to the pain of her heart being torn apart, these cuts on her skin meant nothing.
She ran deeper and deeper until the sounds of people completely disappeared, replaced only by the wind moving through the trees.
"Ugh..." Evre's legs gave out. She fell onto the moss-covered ground.
She curled up, gasping for air, her body shaking violently.
The fever from her allergic reaction burned through her, her blood feeling like boiling lava under her skin.
And then—a strange, cold wind blew through the trees, pushing away the clouds above.
A huge, bright full moon appeared in the night sky, covering the forest in harsh silver-white light that broke through the trees and fell directly onto Evre's shaking body.
Evre's eyes went wide.
Tonight was the full moon!
The power of the full moon was impossible for any werewolf to resist—a call that made every primal instinct stronger. For someone with Evre's elite Alpha bloodline, it was explosive.
Normally, she worked hard to fight this instinctive pull. But now, her emotional breakdown combined with the severe allergic reaction had destroyed every bit of her rational control.
"No... stop..." Evre clawed desperately at the dirt beneath her, her nails growing into sharp claws.
Bones ground and cracked with horrible popping sounds, the feeling of violent dislocation forcing a scream of pure pain from her throat.
Her body stretched and changed under the moonlight, her pale skin sprouting thick silvery-white fur.
She came from the purest bloodline of the Hales Tribe. When her wolf form appeared, it was magnificent enough to make every werewolf at St. Aether Academy submit.
Within seconds, the girl in the torn floral dress was gone. In her place stood a massive, powerfully built silver-white she-wolf, her form sleek and deadly.
But this wasn't a clean transformation. The toxins from her allergic reaction and the raw fury of the full moon clashed violently inside her, and Evre lost all human reasoning completely.
Her eyes, once clear amber, burned a wild blood-red.
"Arooo!"
The great wolf threw back her head and let out a howl of pain and rage toward the full moon.
She felt like she was going to explode. A wildfire raged through her veins, demanding release—any release.
She needed to tear, to destroy, to unleash the chaos eating her up from inside.
And then—a breeze drifted from the direction of the river.
It carried a scent unlike anything else. An aggressive, dominant musk filled with raw power and primal authority.
Pure Alpha pheromones. Like a lightning bolt, it struck directly at the heart of Evre's broken consciousness.
The wild instinct took complete control.
The silver wolf shot forward like lightning, tearing through the bushes, following that intoxicating scent with single-minded intensity. She smashed through fallen logs in her path, crushed river rocks under her paws—her mind consumed by one single need: find him.
Breaking through the final wall of plants, the landscape opened up before her.
The river ran fast and rough, moonlight pouring freely across the churning water.
Evre skidded to a stop, red eyes locking onto the figure standing at the water's edge.
There, beside the glittering river, stood a wolf even bigger than she was.
His coat was pure black, gleaming with a dark, cold shine in the moonlight. Every muscle beneath that midnight fur rippled with devastating, coiled power.
