The scream that followed the wolves wasn't singular. It was a choir. It rose from every corner of the courtyard, from the walkways, from behind the dorms, from the trees beyond campus where the lights refused to reach. Panic traveled faster than any monster, faster than any rule, and it spread through the students like fire through dry paper. Dorian kept his feet planted. The alpha stood across from him, blood still wet on its muzzle, its pale eyes fixed with a focus that felt personal. It wasn't simply looking at him. It was judging him. Measuring him. Helena's breath hitched behind Dorian's shoulder. Then the System spoke again. Not with sound, not with voice, but with that invasive pressure behind his eyes, that unignorable presence that made reality feel like a document being edited in real time. A translucent screen flared into existence in front of Dorian, brighter than the dying courtyard lights.
[QUEST INITIATED]
SURVIVE THE GAUNTLET [IF YOU CAN]
WAVE: 1 OF 30
OBJECTIVE: SURVIVE
FAILURE CONDITION: DEATH
No reward, explanation or comfort. The message faded, leaving afterimages in his vision like burned film. Around them, the pack broke apart as if it had been waiting for a signal. Wolves scattered across the courtyard, splitting into smaller hunting units. Two rushed toward the dorm entrance where students were pounding uselessly on locked glass. Three sprinted toward the bike racks where a boy had tripped and was trying to crawl backward. Another pair vanished into the shadows along the path leading toward the academic buildings, drawn by screams. The System hadn't spawned one fight.
It had spawned a slaughter. Dorian's eyes flicked once across the chaos, cataloging it without letting it pull him away. He could hear it, the tearing, the wet snaps, the high thin cries that ended too abruptly. People were dying. Fast. Not because they were weak, but because they were slow to understand what mattered. The alpha didn't join the hunt. It stayed. It stayed with him. The air around it crackled, faint at first, like the static before a storm. Dorian tasted copper at the back of his tongue. He felt the hairs on his arms lift beneath his sleeves. Lightning.
His grip tightened on the dagger. He didn't remember drawing it, but it was in his hand, real and weighty, the hilt warm where his palm met it. The blade's edge caught what little light remained and held it like a secret. Helena's fingers brushed his back, trembling. "What do we do?" she whispered. Dorian didn't turn, but he lowered his voice, keeping it steady on purpose. If he sounded afraid, she would become afraid in a way that could get her killed.
"What class did you pick?" he asked. A pause. A swallow. "Hexbinder," Helena whispered back. Dorian's jaw tightened. Dark mana. Curses. Debuffs. It fit her more than any other option. Helena had always been the kind of person who if someone harmed her she would get them back two fold. She always treated him with nothing but warmth but she didn't take any shit from anyone. He loved that about her and knew if he was ever hurt by someone there would be Hell to pay for the poor soul. "Check your bag," he said. "There has to be something in your inventory."
Helena hesitated, then her hands moved, patting her coat, her pockets, as if expecting to find a zipper that hadn't existed before. She made a small sound when her fingers found something rigid at her hip, a shape pressed against her like it had always belonged there. "I have…" Her voice wavered. "I have a bag." She pulled it forward. It was small, black, and plain, like a cheap satchel, except the strap felt too smooth, too cold. Her fingers fumbled with the clasp. When she opened it, the air above the bag shimmered faintly, as if the space inside was deeper than it should be. Helena's hand dipped in and withdrew holding a wand.
It was black, matte, and clean, no decorative carvings, no gemstone, no fantasy flourish. It looked like a tool meant for work, not a relic meant for stories. Even from here, Dorian could see her knuckles whitening around it. She raised it uncertainly. "Now what?" she asked, voice thin. Dorian let out a short laugh that wasn't humor. It was the sound of disbelief trying to escape his throat. "We must have skills," he said. "This is like a game, right?" He hated the word game the moment it left his mouth. The alpha's growl deepened. Its muscles bunched. Static crawled across its claws, faint blue-white threads running along bone and nail. The courtyard lights above them flickered once, then went out completely, leaving the world lit only by moonlight and the occasional flash of lightning in the wolf's limbs. The beast lunged. It moved like a thing that didn't weigh what it looked like it weighed. Its body became a blur of shadow and muscle, and the lightning on its claws snapped outward like a whip.
Dorian barely had time to raise his dagger. The first strike hit him anyway. Electricity slammed into his side as the alpha's claw grazed his ribs, and pain detonated through his torso. It wasn't like being punched. It was like his muscles were being forced to clench all at once, like his body was being hijacked from the inside. He staggered. His knees buckled. For half a second his lungs forgot how to work. Helena cried out behind him. Dorian forced air back into his chest and moved, because standing still meant dying. The wolf's jaws snapped for his throat. Dorian pivoted and drove the dagger toward the side of its neck, a quick, brutal stab meant to end it fast. The alpha turned its head mid-motion. Its teeth clamped down on the blade.
Metal screamed. Lightning surged through the dagger into Dorian's arm like a live wire. His fingers spasmed. His grip nearly failed. The shock crawled up to his shoulder and into his chest, and he tasted blood where his teeth bit his tongue. For a heartbeat, they were locked. Dorian and the alpha, connected by steel and current. He could see its eyes clearly now. Pale, dead, and utterly calm. The thing wasn't panicking. It was learning how to fight him. Dorian snarled and kicked. His boot slammed into the wolf's ribs, hard enough to jar the impact up his leg. The alpha released the blade with a guttural sound and skidded sideways, claws scraping the stone. Dorian stumbled back, his arm shaking, smoke rising faintly from the sleeve where the lightning had kissed him. His fingers tingled violently, half numb, half on fire. The alpha circled.
Its right claws glowed brighter, the lightning concentrating, gathering, as if it was charging something. Dorian's mind went cold, the way it always did when his father was about to beat him. Growing up in the Hellhole that was his childhood home he became a master at reading tells like body language. Where his fathers eyes looked right before a right hook was coming. His senses became so sharpened he learned how to block an attack enough to get hurt but not too hurt. That way his father would leave me alone after a few hits and not go until he blacked out. He had to keep his rage in check his whole life but now? No, not anymore. He knew the beast was going to slash.
He adjusted his stance, shifting weight, trying to anticipate the angle. The alpha struck. Its claws swept through the air with a crack of thunder. Lightning trailed behind the slash, a bright arc that carved the night. Dorian dodged, but not far enough. The attack raked across his shoulder. Electricity bit into flesh, ripping heat through muscle. He heard himself make a sound, sharp and involuntary, as his arm seized and went numb down to his fingertips. He clenched through it, refusing to drop the dagger. He lunged in close, jamming the blade into the wolf's side, twisting hard, trying to gut it the way he'd seen hunters gut deer on television. Blood spilled, dark and thick, steaming in the cold. The alpha howled. But it didn't fall. It turned its head and slammed its skull into Dorian's chest. The impact knocked the breath from him like a punch from a giant. He flew backward, weightless for a heartbeat, then hit the ground hard enough to rattle his teeth.
Stone scraped his palms. His vision flashed white at the edges. He landed on his back in front of Helena. Helena's face was pale, eyes wild. She looked at him like she was watching him die. "Dor," she gasped, voice cracking. "I have a skill. It says, Beginner Dark Curse."
"Use it," Dorian rasped. Helena lifted the wand with both hands. It shook so badly that Dorian didn't know how she aimed at all. A dark cloud erupted from the ground beneath the alpha. Not smoke. Not mist. Dark mana, thick and heavy, spilling upward like oil pouring into water. It wrapped around the wolf's legs, clung to its fur, seeped into its wounds. The alpha snarled and shook its head violently. The lightning on its claws flickered, unstable, sputtering as if the curse had interfered with its energy. It slowed. Just a fraction.
But in a fight like this, a fraction was the difference between life and death. Dorian rolled to one knee and pushed himself up. His shoulder screamed. His chest ached. His arm hung half-dead at his side, fingers refusing to fully close. The alpha charged again. It was angry now. Not frantic, but furious, as if being delayed by a human was an insult. Dorian understood something in that moment with perfect clarity. He could not out-speed it. He could not out-power it. He could not keep dodging lightning forever. If he kept retreating, it would corner him. It would kill Helena. It would kill him. He needed an opening that the beast could not take back. His eyes met the wolf's. He made the decision before his body caught up. He stepped forward. He didn't dodge. Helena screamed his name, but the sound felt far away. The alpha leapt. Its jaws clamped down on Dorian's upper shoulder blade.
Teeth punched through fabric, through skin, into meat. Pain exploded, white and vicious. The wolf's lightning surged at the same time, flooding his body from the bite, ripping through nerves and muscle until his vision blurred and his jaw clenched so hard he thought his teeth might crack. Dorian screamed. And held it there anyway. He locked his stance, braced his legs, and grabbed the wolf's fur with his free hand, anchoring it to him like a man clinging to a sinking ship. The alpha thrashed, trying to tear away. Dorian didn't let it. Helena's wand flashed again, her voice breaking as she tried to cast a second time. Dark mana erupted, thicker, more desperate. It struck the alpha. And Dorian.
The curse splashed across his shoulder, seeped into the bite wound, mixed with blood, mixed with the wolf's blood, crawling under his skin like something alive. The alpha convulsed violently. Dorian felt the lightning and the dark mana collide inside him. He felt something enter him through the wound, cold and ancient, sliding into his veins as if it had been waiting for an invitation. The world narrowed to pain and shadow. And the alpha's teeth tightened. The alpha's jaws tightened. Lightning surged again, a violent pulse that ripped through Dorian's shoulder and down his spine.
His vision fractured into white shards. For a breathless instant, he thought his body might simply shut off, that whatever part of him decided to keep standing would finally fail. It didn't. The pain did not recede. It sharpened. The dark mana crawling beneath his skin flared in response, cold pushing back against heat, shadow grinding against lightning. Dorian's muscles locked, not from paralysis, but from resistance. He clenched his teeth until his jaw screamed and forced his arm to move. He stabbed. Once. The blade sank into the alpha's neck, sliding between muscle and bone with a sickening ease. The wolf convulsed, its lightning sputtering wildly, arcs snapping into the stone and burning black scars into the courtyard floor. Dorian pulled the dagger free and drove it down again. Twice. Again.
Each strike was less precise than the last, more desperate, fueled by nothing but refusal. Blood sprayed across his hands, hot and metallic, mixing with his own as the alpha thrashed against him. Helena screamed his name somewhere behind him. He heard her voice break. He did not look back. The wolf tried to tear away, but the curse had anchored it, shadow binding its limbs, dragging it down. Lightning flared one final time, a blinding flash that threw both of them into stark relief against the night.
Dorian drove the dagger into the base of the alpha's skull. He twisted. The wolf's body went rigid. Then it collapsed. The weight tore free from Dorian's shoulder as the alpha fell, crashing to the stone in a heap of twitching limbs and dissipating static. The lightning died with a sharp crack, leaving only the smell of ozone and blood behind. Dorian staggered back two steps and dropped to one knee. The dagger slipped from his fingers and clattered against the ground. For a moment, the world was very quiet. Then the System spoke. A cascade of translucent screens erupted into existence around him, stacking one over another, their cold light reflecting in Helena's wide eyes.
[KILL CONFIRMED]
TARGET: ALPHA WOLF
XP AWARDED
LEVEL UP!
LEVEL UP!
The words burned themselves into Dorian's vision before fading. Helena gasped as a similar glow washed over her, her grip tightening on the wand as she stumbled, barely keeping her footing. "I… I leveled," she whispered. "Twice." Dorian nodded weakly, though his head felt too heavy for his neck. He pushed himself upright, every movement dragging pain through his shoulder and chest. The bite wound burned, dark veins spidering outward from the torn flesh, pulsing faintly beneath his skin. Around the courtyard, the remaining wolves hesitated. They looked at the alpha's body. They looked at Dorian. Then they retreated.
One by one, they turned and fled, slipping back into the shadows between the buildings, vanishing toward the tree line as if the night itself had opened to swallow them. Their howls faded quickly, cut off and distant, leaving behind only silence and the sound of distant sobbing. Another screen appeared, larger than the rest.
[WAVE CLEARED]
SURVIVE THE GAUNTLET
WAVE 1 COMPLETE
NEXT WAVE IN: 12 HOURS
A collective, broken exhale rippled through the survivors still standing. Some collapsed where they stood. Others laughed hysterically. A few stared at the blood on their hands with hollow eyes, already changed by what they had done to stay alive. Dorian barely noticed. A final prompt materialized, its edges etched with something darker, heavier.
[TITLE EARNED]
SLAYER
AS FIRST TO SLAY AN ALPHA,
YOU INHERIT THIS PRESTIGE TITLE
MAGIC EFFECT:
PACK LEADER
ALLOWS USER TO INHERIT THE TRAITS OF THE ALPHA
The title burned, then settled somewhere deep inside him, like a weight locking into place. Helena moved to his side, her hands hovering uselessly near his injured shoulder. "Dorian," she said softly, terror threaded through her voice. "You're bleeding." He looked down. Blood soaked his hoodie, dark and thick, but beneath it something else moved. The dark veins spreading from the bite pulsed again, more pronounced now, branching outward like roots seeking soil. A sharp pressure bloomed behind his eyes. The System returned.
[STATUS UPDATE]
CONDITION: CURSED
DARK AFFLICTION DETECTED
SOURCE: UNKNOWN
[NEW QUEST AVAILABLE]
CURE THE CURSE [OR ELSE]
TIME LIMIT: 30 Days
FAILURE CONDITION: DEATH
The words hung there, merciless and exact. Helena's face crumpled. "I didn't mean to," she whispered. "I didn't know it would… Dor, I'm so sorry." Dorian met her eyes. Despite the pain, despite the shadow crawling under his skin, he managed a crooked, exhausted smile. "We survived," he said hoarsely. "That's what matters right now." The System did not contradict him. But the dark beneath his skin pulsed again, slow and patient, as if counting down the hours.