Kin's trembling fingers wouldn't stop pressing Vixen's number. Call after call. Seventeen times already. His voice cracked as he whispered into the silence, "Please, love… please pick up. We're in danger… we need you…"
But there was no answer. On the other side, the phone lay abandoned, vibrating helplessly on the table.
Tears streamed down Kin's face. His lips quivered as he pressed his palms together. "Oh God, please… help us… someone, please…"
Outside, Zemura was no longer just a village—it was a cursed battlefield. Black magic coiled around the streets, swallowing the moonlight whole. The thick darkness pressed in on Vixen from every side, and for the first time in his life, the Alpha's confidence cracked. His senses blurred, his breath hitched, his mind blanked. He had forgotten his own power.
The possessed villagers closed in, their eyes gleaming like empty voids. From behind, one lunged and clawed at Vixen's collar, hurling him backwards. Another lashed out with a strike that should have crushed his ribs, but the blow landed with an unnatural weightless force, as if the attacker wasn't alive at all.
When Vixen's gaze locked on them, his chest constricted. Their faces looked like rotting corpses, reanimated from shallow graves, grinning as they clawed toward him.
The mob surged. Dozens of them at once. They swarmed Vixen and Zavrion, their skeletal fingers digging, choking, squeezing.
Vixen gasped—one of them stomped on his throat, pressing him into the dirt, stealing his breath. His vision darkened. Death wrapped around his neck.
"Dad!" Zavrion roared, his voice tearing the night. "Hold on—I'm coming!"
Fueled by desperation, Zavrion ripped the corpses off his father, fists flying, kicks cracking bones. Bodies scattered across the ground. But every time he knocked them down, they rose again—grinning, twitching, laughing.
One climbed onto Zavrion's back, another dug its teeth into his shoulder. Vixen's choking grew harsher, his eyes fluttering shut.
And then—Zavrion snapped.
"ENOUGH!" His voice cracked like thunder.
In that instant, he unleashed his Enigma pheromone power.
The night itself split open. A blinding golden aura erupted around him, radiating heat and raw fury. The ground trembled. A divine fragrance, sandalwood and musk, burst into the air, slicing through the stink of death.
The possessed shrieked. One by one, they collapsed, writhing in torment, clutching their heads. Black souls screamed as they tore free from human vessels, dissolving into ash against the golden storm. The entire village shook with their agony.
The sky cleared. The suffocating winds vanished. The full moon broke through the dark clouds, flooding Zemura with silver light.
The villagers—who moments ago were snarling monsters—now lay unconscious on the ground. Slowly, groggily, they blinked awake, confused, whispering to each other in hushed, frightened tones.
"Why… why are we outside…?"
"What just happened…?"
Their voices trembled, suspicion and fear etched across their faces.
Vixen, exhausted, collapsed to his knees. His chest rose and fell heavily, his skin drenched in sweat. He tried to steady himself, but his body gave in, forcing him to sit slumped against the cold ground.
Beside him, Zavrion's phone vibrated. He pulled it out with shaky hands.
Seventeen missed calls. Dad.
He answered immediately.
The sound that reached him froze his blood. It was Kin—his voice broken, choked with sobs. "Please… answer me… Kenny—Kenny needs to be taken to the hospital immediately… please, hurry…"
Zavrion's heart lurched. Without a second thought, he grabbed Vixen, pulling him up. "We're going home. Now."
And together, they sprinted into the night, leaving the stunned, half-awake villagers behind as Zemura trembled in the aftershock of Enigma's wrath.
To be Continued....