Baby System: I'm the Beast World's Only Hope!-Chapter 97: Episode : Her flesh for Stew!

Nala’s jaw was aching from the force of Roxy’s grip, but the Tiger noble refused to show fear.

She looked into the human woman’s eyes and saw anger, yes, but she also saw humanity. Soft skin. No claws. No fangs. A creature that bled easily.

Nala scoffed, a wet, gargling sound in her throat. Her fear morphed into indignation. Who was this weakling to touch her?

"Unhand me," Nala lisped, her voice dripping with scorn despite her precarious position. She flicked her eyes toward the throne. "My King! Will you allow this? She is a guest! A weak, hairless ape threatening a noble of the Citadel! If you let her harm me, the council will riot!"

She smirked, confident in her political immunity. Torian might desire the human, but he was a King. He wouldn’t let a savage murder a high-born lady in the middle of the Great Hall. It wasn’t civilized.

"She cannot hurt me," Nala sneered, looking back at Roxy. "She doesn’t have the stomach for it. Look at her. She’s shaking."

Roxy was shaking. But it wasn’t from fear. It was from the rage of a mother who had just realized how close her baby came to dying.

Roxy didn’t look at Nala. She looked past her, locking eyes with Torian on the throne.

"Torian," Roxy said calmly.

Torian leaned back in his ivory seat, resting his chin on his fist. He looked at Nala—broken, whining, and annoying—and then at Roxy—fierce, protective, and radiating a lethal aura that made his Tiger instincts purr.

"She is yours, my love," Torian drawled lazily, waving a hand as if dismissing a servant. "Do what you wish. Break her. Kill her. Paint the floor. I will pay for the cleaning."

Nala’s smirk froze. "My... My King?"

"You bored me, Nala," Torian said coldly. "And then you threatened a child. You are no longer a noble. You can go ahead and die."

Nala gasped, her eyes widening. She opened her mouth to scream, to beg, to hurl another insult.

She never got the chance.

Roxy didn’t wait for a weapon. She reached down to the floor where Nala’s dropped dagger lay—the same dagger Nala had brought to the nursery.

Roxy grabbed the hilt.

In one fluid motion, she forced Nala’s jaw open with her left hand and jammed the blade into the Tiger’s mouth with her right.

She didn’t stab the throat. She hooked the blade sideways.

In one wet motion, a piece of pink flesh flopped onto the marble floor.

Nala’s eyes bulged. She tried to scream, but all that came out was a horrific, gurgling choked noise. Blood sprayed from her mouth, coating Roxy’s hand and the front of her blue dress.

Roxy stood up, looking down at the severed tongue on the gold floor. She kicked it aside with her shoe.

"That," Roxy said, her voice devoid of any emotion, "is for spitting words at me."

[System Notification: Ruthlessness +50. Reputation: "The Butcher Queen" Unlocked.]

[God of War: YES! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!]

[TheSassyGoddess: Okay, damn. I was expecting a slap, not a glossectomy. Go off, Queen.] 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

The court was silent. The nobles covered their mouths in horror.

Nala, blinded by pain and humiliated rage, lost her mind. The Tiger beast inside her snapped. She roared—a gargled, wet sound—and lunged.

She ignored her broken leg. She ignored the pain. She launched herself at Roxy, claws extending, aiming for the throat.

Roxy didn’t flinch. She didn’t even raise her hands to defend herself.

She didn’t have to.

Two blurs of motion intercepted the Tiger mid-air.

Zarek caught Nala’s left arm. Kaelen caught her right.

With a sickening crunch, they slammed her face-first into the marble floor, pinning her limbs behind her back. Nala thrashed, spitting blood, but she was helpless against the strength of a Dragon and a Wolf King.

Kaelen growled, his eyes fixed on Roxy with a mixture of awe and terror. He had never seen his gentle wife look so... cold.

She hated when they touched her children even on earth, she could die for her kids.

Roxy walked forward. She twirled Nala’s dagger in her hand. She looked at the struggling Tiger female, whose eyes were now filled with absolute, primal panic.

Roxy knelt down near Nala’s shoulder.

"You wanted to cut my daughter," Roxy whispered. "You wanted to silence my son."

She raised the dagger.

She didn’t aim for the heart. That was too quick. She aimed for the shoulder joint, right where the nerve cluster sat.

She drove the blade down..

She buried it to the hilt, pinning Nala’s shoulder to the floor.

Nala’s scream was muffled by the blood in her mouth, her body arching in agony against Zarek’s grip.

Roxy didn’t pull the knife out. She let go of the hilt, stood up, and wiped her bloody hands on Nala’s silk robes, cleaning her fingers with meticulous, chilling slowness.

"And that," Roxy said, looking down at the writhing woman, "was for you thinking you could even hurt my children."

She stepped back.

The Great Hall was frozen. The guards griped their spears, terrified. The nobles looked at Roxy as if she were a demon summoned from the abyss.

Even Zarek and Kaelen exchanged a glance. She was the predator not them.

Roxy turned her back on Nala. She walked toward the throne, her footsteps echoing in the silence. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked up at Torian.

Torian was staring at her. His pupils were blown wide, his breathing shallow. He looked aroused. He looked impressed. He looked completely captivated.

"Magnificent," Torian breathed. "You are truly an Empress. You have the heart of a killer."

He stood up, descending one step, offering his hand.

"Accept the crown, Roxy. Rule with me. With fire like that, we could conquer the world."

Roxy looked at his hand. Then she looked at his face.

"I will not be your Empress," Roxy said clearly.

The court gasped. Torian’s smile faltered.

"I don’t join packs, Torian," Roxy continued, her voice ringing with authority. "And I don’t become a pet in a cage. I have a home. I have a family."

She gestured to Zarek, Kaelen, and her children.

"But," Roxy said, tilting her head. "You are strong. You are rich. And you have... certain skills."

Torian blinked. "Skills?"

"I am not staying here," Roxy declared. "We are leaving. We are going back to the Iron-Wood."

She took a step closer to him.

"But you can come with me."

Torian froze. "Come... with you?"

"Be my mate," Roxy said.

The words hit the room like a bomb.

"I am not asking you to rule me," Roxy said, her eyes flashing. "I am asking you to join my Pack. To serve me. To protect my children."

She looked him up and down, echoing the way he had looked at her the night before.

"You said you wanted to honor the Mother. Well, here is your chance. Leave your throne. Leave your soft pillows. Come live in the dirt with the ’beasts’. Come prove you are worthy of me every single day."

Torian stared at her. His mouth opened slightly.

She was asking a King to abandon his kingdom to be a husband in a harem. It was insulting. It was madness.

And yet... looking at her, standing there with blood on her hands and the coldness in her eyes, Torian felt a thrill he had never felt in his life. The challenge. The chase.

Zarek groaned loudly. "Great. Another mouth to feed."

Kaelen pinched the bridge of his nose. "We are going to need a bigger bed."

Torian looked at his throne. Then he looked at Roxy.

But before he could answer, before he could accept or reject the wildest offer ever made in the Beast World, Roxy turned her head slightly, looking back at the guards who were hovering over the whimpering, bleeding Nala.

Roxy’s expression was flat. Cold. Practical.

"Also," Roxy added, her voice dropping to a casual, domestic tone that was infinitely more terrifying than her shouting.

She pointed a bloody finger at Nala.

"Give me this female. I will use her skin for clothes and her flesh for stew."

A/N: Mass Release as promised! Happy happy happy!