Arrival at Stormveil Mansion
The gates of Stormveil Mansion loomed ahead, barely visible through the haze of smoke and blood in the air. The weight of war clung to them, the scent of iron and burning flesh still fresh on their skin.
Sky barely felt the ground beneath his feet, his entire world reduced to the unconscious body in his arms. Nani. His blood still warm, soaking through Sky's clothes, seeping into his skin like a brand.
The moment they passed through the gates, Stormveil warriors emerged from the shadows, their eyes sharp, their stances tense. They had been ready for an attack. But the sight of Sky carrying Nani, of Pond barely keeping himself upright, of Dew unmoving in Tee's arms—it was enough to make even the most hardened warriors stiffen.
Phuwin was already waiting at the entrance, his sharp eyes scanning them like he was assessing damage on a battlefield. The second he saw Dew's ashen skin, the dark veins spreading across his throat like poison, his expression hardened.
"Get inside," Phuwin ordered, his voice snapping through the night.
No one hesitated.
Pond stumbled but forced himself forward. Win was barely standing, his hands still clenched around the weapons he had used to cover their escape. Bright kept a firm grip on his shoulder, guiding him in.
The air inside was thick with tension, the quiet only making their wounds feel deeper, heavier.
But there was no time to rest.
Because Dew was dying.
---
The moment Tee set Dew down, the healers rushed in, their faces pale but determined. They worked with swift, practiced hands, but the second they peeled back Dew's clothes, revealing the deep blackened veins crawling over his skin, they froze.
Phuwin inhaled sharply. "This—this isn't just blood loss."
Sky's stomach twisted. He knew what this was.
Wolfbane poisoning.
The one thing a werewolf's body couldn't heal on its own.
The room's energy shifted instantly—from urgency to a chilling, almost paralyzing fear. Everyone knew what wolfbane meant. Dew wasn't just injured. He was dying.
Tee knelt beside Dew, his hands pressing against his mate's ice-cold skin. His usual calm shattered, replaced by something raw and terrified.
Dew's pulse was there—but so faint it barely registered. His breaths came in shallow, ragged gasps, his chest barely rising and falling.
"No, no, no," Tee whispered. His hands trembled.
The healers exchanged frantic glances. One of them reached for a silver-tipped scalpel, ready to try and extract the infected tissue manually, but Phuwin grabbed their wrist.
"No," he snapped. "You'll make it worse."
Sky's jaw clenched. They were running out of time.
Tee wasn't breathing properly anymore. His hands shook as he pressed them against Dew's burning skin, his mind screaming at him to do something—anything— but nothing he had ever learned, no power he had ever mastered, could pull Dew back from the edge.
Dew's body convulsed suddenly, his breath hitching as if his lungs had forgotten how to work.
Tee's heart stopped.
The sound of death.
A sound he had heard countless times before.
But not this time.
Not him.
Tee gritted his teeth, his chest tightening with something too painful to name. His vision blurred.
Dew was slipping away, right there in his arms. And he was powerless.
Unless…
Tee's breath turned sharp. A dangerous, reckless thought surged into his mind. A vampire's venom could override poison. Could force new life into a failing body.
But the cost—
No. There is no cost if he's already dead.
Without warning, he turned to Sky, gripping his shoulder.
"I need your permission," Tee said, his voice barely above a growl.
Sky's head snapped toward him, eyes dark. "For what?"
Tee's fangs lengthened, his hands shaking. This was breaking him.
"To bite him."
Silence crashed over the room.
Phuwin stilled. Bright let out a sharp breath. Pond, despite his own injuries, snapped his head up, eyes wide.
Even Win flinched, his usual impassive expression breaking for the first time.
A vampire bite wasn't just a wound. It wasn't just a means of survival.
It was a claim.
A bond that would never fade.
Win exhaled through his nose, slow and measured, but his fingers dug into his palms. He understood the weight of this.
Pond, on the other hand, wasn't quiet.
"What the hell do you mean bite him?!" Pond barked, trying to push himself up despite his injuries. His voice was rough, laced with panic. "You can't just—"
"There's no time!" Tee snapped, his voice cracking. His control—his mask—was gone.
For the first time, Tee looked desperate.
His hands curled into fists, knuckles white. His entire body trembled—not with fear, but with the sheer weight of losing the one person he never thought he'd have.
"If I don't, he dies."
The words felt like glass in his throat.
Win's lips parted slightly, a rare flash of emotion in his eyes.
Pond stopped breathing.
Tee didn't beg. Didn't plead.
But the look in his eyes—that was a man on the edge of losing everything.
Sky held his gaze for a long, tense second.
Then—
"Do it."
Tee didn't hesitate.
He lowered his head to Dew's cold, sweat-drenched neck—
And bit.
Dew's body arched violently, a strangled cry tearing from his throat as raw, unfiltered power flooded his veins. The wolfbane fought back, black tendrils flaring, resisting the sudden invasion of foreign magic.
Tee held him down, his fingers digging into Dew's shoulders, fangs sinking deeper. Not to take— but to give.
To force life back into a dying body.
A surge of power rippled through the air. The scent of blood and magic thickened.
Dew gasped, back bowing in an unnatural angle—his body fighting the transformation, rejecting it.
His wolf—his very essence—was changing.
Pond shoved forward, almost collapsing. "What's happening?! What the fuck is happening?!" His voice broke.
Win reached out, grabbing him, stopping him from interfering. His grip was firm.
"Let it happen," Win murmured, voice unreadable. But his hands were tight on Pond's arms, holding him steady. Holding him up.
Tee's bite deepened, his power forcefully overriding the poison.
Dew's convulsions slowed.
His breathing—evened.
The black veins began to fade.
And then—
Dew's body went still.
Too still.
Pond froze. His chest rose and fell in sharp, quick breaths.
Win's grip on him tightened.
Tee's lips parted, his hands shaking as he pulled back, his mouth still stained with Dew's blood.
Sky watched, his own breath shallow.
The silence stretched.
Then—Dew gasped.
A sharp, shuddering inhale, his body jerking upright.
His eyes—still clouded, still unfocused—were no longer entirely wolf.
Not entirely human.
Not entirely the same.
Pond's voice cracked. "Dew?"
Dew's head turned slightly, eyes flickering—but he was still too weak to respond.
Tee didn't say a word. He just pulled Dew against him, gripping him like he'd disappear if he let go.
Like he was still afraid.
Like he still hadn't accepted that Dew was alive.
---
Pond was slumped against the couch, exhaustion weighing him down like chains. His entire left side was bandaged, deep wounds stitched up by Phuwin's quick, precise hands. The sting of antiseptic barely registered anymore—his body was too battered, too drained to care.
But his mind?
That was a different story.
He couldn't shake the image of Dew convulsing in Tee's arms, of his breath stopping, of Tee's desperate, trembling voice demanding to save him. The smell of blood and venom still clung to his senses, suffocating.
Dew had survived—but barely. And he wasn't the same.
Pond swallowed hard, forcing himself back to the present. One problem at a time.
"You're a reckless idiot," Phuwin muttered, dabbing antiseptic onto a particularly nasty cut on Pond's collarbone. His hands were quick, clinical—but his touch was careful, almost too careful.
Pond hissed at the sting but grinned through it, trying—failing—to lighten the mood. "Didn't know you cared."
Phuwin's fingers froze for half a second before continuing. His voice came quieter this time. "...I don't."
Liar.
Pond didn't call him out on it. He just chuckled, voice tired but teasing. "Whatever helps you sleep at night."
Phuwin didn't respond. He just kept working, his expression unreadable—but his hands lingered on Pond's skin. Just for a moment.
Long enough for Pond to notice.
---
Bright sat across from Win, watching him with an unreadable expression. The room was quieter now, but the weight of what had happened still hung heavy in the air.
Win hadn't spoken much since Tee bit Dew.
Since he almost lost him.
His usual composed demeanor hadn't cracked, not even once—but Bright knew him well enough to recognize the signs. The slight tension in his shoulders. The way his fingers twitched every so often, ghosting over the knives he had used. The ones still stained with blood.
Bright sighed. "You need to rest."
Win didn't look at him. "You need to stop hovering."
Bright's lips twitched. "I don't hover."
Win finally met his gaze, raising a single eyebrow.
Bright exhaled, shrugging. "…Okay, maybe a little."
Win sighed but didn't push him away.
Bright took that as a win.
For now.
---
Nani is stable, still unconscious. Dew is safe, for now.
But the scent of blood and death still clung to Sky's skin.
The rage in his chest hadn't settled. If anything, it had sharpened—crystallized into something colder, deadlier.
As he stepped out into the storm-laced night, the warriors of Stormveil were already waiting. Their golden eyes glowed under the moonlight, their bodies coiled like a pack of wolves ready to tear through flesh.
Sky didn't need to repeat himself.
"Hunt them down."
The order echoed through the link, and like shadows breaking apart, the warriors disappeared into the night.
Tonight, there would be no survivors.
A scout arrived, his uniform torn, blood streaking down his temple. He knelt before Sky, breathing hard.
Sky's golden eyes bore into him. "Report."
The words that followed turned his blood to ice.
"This wasn't just a battle," the scout rasped. "It was a coup."
Sky's claws dug into his palms.
Sky's body went still.
Too still.
The realization sunk in like a slow, lethal poison.
----
The forest was still thick with the scent of death. The bodies of the fallen hunters were already being dragged into piles, their weapons confiscated, their identities marked.
Sky strode through the wreckage, his gaze like a blade.
His scouts knelt as he approached. One of them—a high-ranking Beta of Stormveil—stood first, his voice clipped and grim.
"The remaining hunters tried to scatter, but we cut off their routes."
"Casualties?" Sky's voice was cold, calculating.
"Minimal on our side. They weren't expecting the counterattack."
Of course they weren't.
Hunters had always seen themselves as the ones who set the traps.
Tonight, they had been the prey.
But it wasn't enough. Not yet.
Sky turned to his second-in-command, his voice as sharp as steel.
"I want them wiped from the territory. Every last one. No traces left behind."
The command sent a chill through the warriors.
----
The Truth Behind the Coup
The air inside the war room was thick with tension, the weight of loss pressing down on them like a suffocating force. Only two leaders remained.
Warut Hirunkit. Prayuth Naravit.
Sarut Jirawat was dead.
The Four Fang Alliance had stood unshaken for generations—until now.
Sky stood at the head of the table, his golden eyes sharp, scanning the weary faces before him. The two remaining leaders weren't just shaken; they were grieving. Yet they still held themselves with the unyielding presence of Alphas who had spent their entire lives leading an empire.
But even they weren't prepared for what Sky was about to reveal.
He exhaled, his voice steady, unyielding. "This wasn't just an ambush."
Warut's gaze darkened. "We know that."
"No." Sky's tone cut through the room like a blade. "You don't."
Silence fell. Heavy. Inevitable.
Then, with a measured movement, Sky tossed a bloodstained folder onto the table. The papers spilled out—documents, maps, encrypted messages. Proof of something far worse than an ambush.
"This was a systematic coup." Sky's voice was steel. "Their goal wasn't just to kill the heirs—it was to wipe the Four Fang Alliance from existence. Not just in the supernatural world." His gaze swept over them. "In the human world, too."
Prayuth's fingers curled into fists. His wolf bristled under his skin, but he refused to show weakness.
"Impossible."
Sky's golden eyes flashed. "They've been planning this for years." His voice darkened. "Decades, maybe."
Warut picked up one of the documents, scanning the coded messages. His expression was unreadable, but Sky could see the way his fingers tightened. "And you have proof of this?"
Sky didn't blink. "I had my suspicions for a while." His voice dropped lower. Deadlier. "After Blackridge made their first move, I started digging deeper. Something didn't add up."
He motioned to the battlefield map spread across the table. Blackridge forces, marked in red, had spread out too thinly. Their assault had been brutal, yes—but not nearly as coordinated as it should have been for a war of this scale.
"Blackridge is strong," Sky continued, "but they don't have the power to launch a full-scale attack on F4. Not alone."
Prayuth's eyes flashed with realization. "…So they were just a distraction."
Sky nodded. "A diversion."
Warut's grip on the paper tightened. "Then who is the real threat?"
Sky's jaw clenched. He didn't have a name—yet. But he knew one thing with absolute certainty.
"This isn't just about power." His voice was ice. "This is personal."
Someone hated the Four Fang Alliance enough to dedicate years—decades—to planning their downfall.
And now?
That plan had finally begun.
A heavy silence settled over the war room. The two leaders exchanged glances, the unspoken truth lingering in the air.
F4 wasn't just under attack.
They were being erased.
Warut exhaled slowly, then squared his shoulders. "We need to return to our territories."
Sky nodded. It wasn't a suggestion—it was an order. "You're securing your borders."
Warut's sharp eyes snapped to him. "And leave the battlefield?"
Sky's expression didn't waver. "No. You're ensuring there's a home left for your heirs to return to."
The older Alpha's jaw clenched, but he didn't argue. He knew Sky was right.
Prayuth exhaled, his expression grim. "And the heirs?"
Before Sky could answer, Warut stepped forward. His once-powerful stance was now weighted by exhaustion, his clothes still stained with the blood of those they had lost.
Yet when he met Sky's gaze, his resolve was unwavering.
"Protect them."
Sky didn't look away.
Warut wasn't just asking.
He was trusting.
Next to him, Prayuth, Pond's father, nodded. "The future of F4 lies with them." His voice was hoarse, but resolute. "And right now, you're the only one strong enough to keep them alive."
The weight of those words settled over Sky like a command carved into stone.
It wasn't just about protection anymore.
It was a transfer of responsibility.
For the first time in history, the heirs of the Four Fang Alliance weren't under their own families' command.
They were under his.
Sky's fingers curled into fists at his sides. He had never asked for this. Never wanted to be the one holding their survival in his hands.
But he wasn't going to refuse.
His golden eyes burned with quiet, unshakable resolve.
"I'll keep them safe." His voice was quieter this time, but no less firm. "You have my word."
Warut and Prayuth exchanged a glance. A silent decision.
Then, without another word, they turned and left.
And now—
It was all on Sky.