Swordsmeister of Rome - Chapter 145: Encounter

[Mature Content]I was born a bastard to the Archduke of Beloria, scorned because of my odd-looking hair and sickly body, maltreated by my stepmother and sister.And my father? He never looked my way. I was the reminder of a mistake he could never accept.My entire life should've been trying to live through my days as a labeled whores daughter and the taint to the noble house but everything changed when my marriage to the Lycan Monarch was announced.Lycans are apex predators, superior beings, beastmen, and originators of those horror stories your parents told you about to make you behave. My father saw fit to throw me to the beasts as a means to reclaim the lost lands.I was the bargain for a better future for the last human kingdom, but I felt more cursed than blessed. Forced into training to please a beast and ensure I was fit to be his wife.I dreaded the day I'd wed the Monarch and be treated no less than human meat. I've heard stories about him, and they are far worse than any combined. They call him a mindless beast, merciless, the ultimate feared being in the entire realm, and the terror that bested the vampires in war and ended it under his rule.My future was bleak.But when the day arrived and I set my gaze on the beast I'm meant to marry... I realized Drevon Balthar was unlike the rumors; they didn't tell the whole story.

In a world where Lycans and werewolves are sworn enemies, Eve Valmont is a werewolf cursed by a prophecy and framed. Betrayed by her own pack and imprisoned for years, her fate takes a darker twist when she is offered to the Lycan King, Hades Stavros—a ruler feared for his ruthless conquests and deadly prowess. Bound by an ancient prophecy and haunted by the ghosts of her past, Eve is now at the mercy of the one being she should hate and fear the most—The Hand of Death himself.Hades, a king carved from blood and his own soul's decay, determined to avenge his family's slaughter and rid his people of the werewolves. He believes Eve is the key to his victory. To him, she is nothing but weapon foretold by prophecy, a tool he will wield to destroy the opposing forces threatening his pack. Yet, he finds himself craving this powerful yet broken woman. Leaving him questioning if she is truly his weapon or the one destined to unravel his carefully laid plans.***He stalked toward me, a predator closing in on its prey, his eyes dark and unreadable. “So, you laugh?” His voice was low, dangerously soft, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.I swallowed hard, suddenly aware of how difficult it had become to breathe. “Hades, I—”“But you only laugh at other men's jokes,” he interrupted, his gaze piercing, devoid of any humor. “Not your husband's.” The accusation in his tone was sharp, slicing through the air between us.A nervous chuckle escaped me. “You can't be serious... He’s your beta, for Goddess’ sake.”In an instant, he closed the distance between us, so fast it left me breathless. His hands gripped my waist, pulling me flush against his body, the heat of him making my skin tingle. I gasped, but before I could say a word, his lips crashed onto mine, claiming my mouth with a force that sent shockwaves through me. The kiss was punishing, hungry—I couldn't breathe, couldn't think.When he finally pulled back, I was trembling, my chest heaving as I struggled to regain my breath. His eyes, dark and stormy, searched mine with a possessive intensity. “You can’t laugh at my jokes...” he whispered, his voice a dangerous rasp as his fingers trailed lower, sending a shiver down my spine, “but you’ll come with my fingers.”I shivered, heat pooling low in my belly at his words, his touch. The world around us blurred, fading into nothing as his hand slipped lower, drawing a ragged gasp from my lips. The look in his eyes told me he knew exactly what he was doing to me, and there was no denying the primal connection between us in that moment.“I don’t need your laughter,” he murmured against my skin, his breath hot on my neck. “I’ll have every other part of you instead.”

Sixty years after the global catastrophe, the Little Freeze Period ended, and the governments of the living regions began to collect land in the anarchic areas to be planned on a large scale, reorganized resources, and entered the recovery stage in an all-round way. These two decades are also called “golden Twenty years”.

This is a bright era in which new regions are rising one after another, politics is set up, capital is acting, careerists are everywhere, heroes are powerful, villains and grassroots are rising together! A young man rises up in troubled times with a full stomach of strategy, hides a tiger in his chest, and measures the world.

- Description from novelbuddy

Some exist with pride, others struggle with pride, some compete with pride, and there are those who fail with pride, but very few can walk away with pride.Congratulations, for as you read these lines, you have witnessed the whole lives of many great basketball players.This pronunciation was embodied when Stephen Curry, after facing defeat in 2021, claimed that no one would want to face them the following season; When Tim Duncan was convinced before the start of the 2014 Finals that they would not mess up; When Kobe Bryant promised at Old Buss's memorial to take the Lakers to the playoffs; When Nowitzki, shedding his label as a soft player, retreated to the locker room in tears at night; When Kevin Garnett let out a skyward howl after holding the championship trophy; When the 2004 Detroit Pistons won and the F4 Lakers lost…Our story begins in an era when pride still mattered.