Mated to A Rival Alpha-Chapter 264: The New Cycle of Violence
[JIHOON]
Left alone with the love of his life, Park Jihoon was at a loss.
He hated how things had happened between them, but he also was glad that he had learned of the truth sooner than he could have. He finally had a lot of insights into some of the cruel decisions that Rania had made. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂
He wished that she had done them differently but with her anger and justified pain, Jihoon knew it was a miracle that he himself had made it out of her fur alive.
Well, he was still her prisoner, though that no longer bothered him. So in silence, he sat and watched her pace around the house, cursing her friends for leaving her and even Jihoon who she was sure was in Incayon.
’I died by Eunbi’s blade, Odelia,’ Rania suddenly heard as a wave of anger and disappointment hit her.
She had been trying to find something to keep her busy, but hearing Oshita’s voice so defeated and broken, wasn’t what she had expected. It was so strange, hearing him so frail in her ears.
For that moment, Kim Rania wished that what she had heard was wrong. She sat in silence as she waited for her friends to come back. But then the mindlinks were suddenly cut, even her links to Kaia.
It was like she was suddenly blocked from listening to their banters as they ran around or even their annoying voice as they bickered over what they were supposed to carry back home.
Rania was in complete and utter silence, with nothing but the words of her dear friend echoing in her head like a mantra. This wasn’t happening for real, right? There was so much at stake, so much that could happen and the silence was not comforting either.
"No, no way. This isn’t real," Rania muttered under her breath as she paced around the room. There was just no way in hell that this was happening to her, and her people. But the longer she paced, the longer she remained in denial, and the louder the voice was heard in her ears.
’I died by Eunbi’s blade, Odelia.’
As Kaia, Chang Wook, and Dalrae walked through the doors of Yanna’s house, Kim Rania created a fucking portal and went through it. And all that they could manage this time, was simply an "oh shit. It’s really happening.’
*****
[OBREN PALACE]
The stench of smoke filled the Obren air, as the palace burnt down to ashes. It was something that no one had ever imagined would ever be possible.
For many, it was an impossibility, and the fact that most of the acts were a good distance from the palace meant that no one was going to help the king, at least until two days ago.
The King stood in the burning palace, watching as everything he had brought to life disappeared and as all his life’s work went down the drain.
He watched helplessly as his one good friend shackled him, his wife, his son, and even Yanna, to the deepest and darkest section of the Obren dungeons.
It was a terrible place and with no one to come for them, and no one who knew where they were, the king was alone, with his family in the dungeons.
Of course, he had been shocked when he had seen Yanna in the prisons, but that didn’t elicit the shock when Raqeeb, the hybrid leader cast a spell on the door so that not even Yanna’s abilities would ever be able to get them out.
The kingdom had fallen, and soon enough the whole realm would know of it.
"Are you okay?" Raqeeb asked Paloma, once they had managed to bring down every security aspect of the people’s palace.
The gates had been molten into tiny balls that rolled sound.
The warriors who had been tripled were all just food for the vultures who were waiting for the fires to burn out so they could feed on whatever was left.
The dogs that lived in the palace had long scattered, not even waiting to see what could be done to them. The palace is empty, the kind of empty that this lace had never seen since the time it was set up.
It was all just a shit show, and the impossible had come to life.
"Yes. I am okay," Paloma said even though her heart was breaking into pieces again.
This right here had been her mission with Oshita and yet as she and her warriors walked away from the palace and headed towards Incayon, Paloma couldn’t help but feel the emptiness strike so harshly at her.
She missed her enforcer and best warrior.
She wished that he would have been here with them but then it was unfortunate that she had lost him. And that too in the hands of Jeon Jungwoo, the prince who had gone from having the whole kingdom, to the prince who literally had nothing.
Jungwoo had sent his mate away with the first batch of wolves that had been rescued. Dong Moonbin had tried to tell his mate that he couldn’t be armed by Paloma, but then Jungwoo just wasn’t having it.
He didn’t want to put his mate in a position where he would come between the sins of the past and the present that were trying to be fixed. It just wouldn’t be fair for him and he couldn’t handle that, not when he had just been mated.
"Alright. This is where we part ways," Raqeeb said and Plaoma looked at him like there was me he needed to explain, and Raqeeb’s pain.
"While the palace is a shitshow and no one will enter for a while, we have to stay here and guard the prisoners. Master Kaia wouldn’t want to see them dead, especially now that Yanna is in the mix.
"We have to make sure no one tries to save them and make sure to keep the rest of the kingdom safe from the prisoners," Raqeeb said and Paloma considered trying to convince him, but she knew that it would be pointless.
When it came to Kaia’s command, Raqeeb was never going to win. He was always a soldier, one that’s always going to listen to his master, always, regardless of how fucked up the situation was.
"Alright. Careful out there then. It might get lonely," Paloma said with a defeated laugh.
If Oshita had been alive with them, he could have already started making jokes about how the world would be better or even how everything would get fixed. But then that was an unfortunate state, one that didn’t care whatever they were to do.
Maybe, just maybe they would get what they wanted, and maybe the king and his family would have to dance to the music that was headed their way because this was certain.
Someone would have the last laugh, and it didn’t seem like the werewolf king was going to be that someone anyway.
"You too, Your Majesty," Raqeeb said as he bowed to Paloma, an act that all the warriors including the rogues and the hybrids did in unison.
This was a tough day for Paloma and they had to admit that she had handled herself way better than any of them could have imagined. Maybe they just needed to give her more time, right?
As Raqeeb and his team went back to the Palace and Paloma went to Incayon with hers, the skies finally opened, and from that, came a long rain. It was heavy as hell and even then, Paloma didn’t try to seek shelter.
She believed that the universe was finally giving her the chance to mourn. She had lost someone so dear to her and no amount of apologies and explanations would ever make her feel any better.
She didn’t like how everything turned out and if it hadn’t been for Chang Wook’s vengeance on the king, Paloma could have ordered Raqeeb to burn the man alive. She was in so much pain it was messing with her mind.
And so the long walk of loneliness went on, with the rain hitting them and swallowing their tears. This was a terrible day.
For hours on end, the rain didn’t stop, not even after Paloma and her warriors had reached the Incayon gates. Kylian was shocked to see the woman there, and he wanted to ask questions but then he noticed that one of them was missing.
Kylian had no clue that Oshita had been portaled to Incayon earlier, but he assumed that something had happened to the rogues to make them dejected.
"Queen Paloma?" Kylian asked, as he looked at the warriors and their queen. He didn’t even need to ask what they were doing there because he just opened the Incayon gates far and wide for them to walk through.
Paloma didn’t say a word to Kylian who was still reeling from the shock of seeing the rogues dejected. Granted, these rogues were once members of their home, but goddamn, they looked like they had taken the worst of hits.
"Thank you," one of the rogue warriors said as they followed their queen.
Kylian just nodded in response because frankly, he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say about this. It seemed so unexpected, no, it was unexpected and the sooner they get to what had happened maybe they would be able to get more answers.
Soon enough, the bells in Incayon began ringing.
The Incayon pack had different meanings for every ring that was heard from the bells and the time, the bell ranger rang the bell five times, a sign that one of their warriors had fallen.
And it was then that Incayon knew of the tragedy that had befallen the wolves of Altunia.
