Losing consciousness was just the start of another form of torment to me. The bloody, foolish memories I'd fought to forget surged back, tearing through me while my mind was weak.

Drevan loved bare-knuckle fights. Any territorial dispute with rival packs turned into a battle for dominance. His skill was unquestionable, and years of relentless training had left him undefeated.

There was one time when two of his ribs were broken in a fight. At that moment, I was at home waiting for him. The pain hit so suddenly that I tumbled down the stairs. I felt my chest cave in, and each inhale made me feel as though I were gulping down shards of glass.

But I didn't seek medical help. I had a condition almost unheard of among the wolves called Sympathetic Pain, where I'd take on every bit of pain my mate felt.

I was bound to Draven through this curse. Any injury dealt to him appeared on my body instead. Even healers couldn't find anything wrong with me, and they all thought I was losing my mind. The only cure was to complete the mate bond with Draven.

So naturally, I bore every blow and every wound meant for him in that fight. And yet, he was so astonished that he actually believed he was the "chosen one" who had obtained the legendary godlike body.

To test this absurd theory, he decided to prove it that very night at the victory celebration. Right in front of me, he snatched up a fruit knife and slashed it viciously across his palm.

"Don't do it!"

I lunged forward in horror, but I was a step too slow.

The blade cut through without a drop of blood, and the gash vanished the second it formed.

Drevan laughed and said, "You see that, Kyra? Nothing can hurt me."

He stared at his hand like a fanatic, completely unhinged.

"Even a knife can't hurt me. I'm the Alpha King chosen by the Moon Goddess!" he exclaimed.

I curled up on the floor, gripping my shaking hand where the pain screamed through every nerve. I couldn't utter a word.

When he finally noticed me, his euphoria curdled into irritation.

"I'm celebrating here, Kyra. What's with the waterworks? I'm completely fine, and you're down there acting like you're dying. You're killing the mood."

That was when everything changed.

With his apparent invulnerability, Drevan's ego exploded. He cut back on defensive training and abandoned finesse as he charged into battle like a brute. He began taking hits to deliver more devastating attacks.

The pack thrived under his command as they conquered one territory after another. Everyone hailed him as the "Invincible Alpha".

Only I knew the actual price of those victories. Every fight he survived out there felt like a death sentence for me at home. On more than one occasion, the agonizing pain kept me confined to bed.

I had no choice but to beg him.

"Drevan, please take better care of yourself. Stop tanking hits head-on…"

"Shut up!"

However, my concerns only annoyed him.

"When I first met you, you were a wild wolf that couldn't be tamed. How did you turn into this sickly mess? Look at you. Besides lying in bed whimpering, what else can you do?"

Eventually, that contempt affected our intimate life too. On many occasions, he came home drunk at night and was filled with a need to dominate. I always bore all the pain he should have felt in battle, which left my body so battered that even the slightest touch made me tremble.

"Ah… It hurts…"

I instinctively flinched away from his touch, and that reaction extinguished whatever desire he'd had.

"Such a killjoy!" he spat coldly, grabbing his clothes and slamming the door shut on his way out. "If you can't handle it, someone else can."

Perhaps that was when it started. He found other she-wolves outside—healthy ones who could drink and go wild with him.

When he showed off his unmarked skin, he wanted she-wolves who'd gasp in admiration, not cry from phantom wounds. My dear sister Belle was exactly that kind of person.

Drevan was cheating on me, and I had stumbled onto the truth while packing his suitcase for a business trip.

My hand brushed against something soft tucked into the pocket of his expensive, tailored suit. I pulled it out and found a pair of black lace panties. They were skimpy by design, and they weren't even my size. I stared at the red-rose embroidery on it and recalled that it was Belle's favorite design.

I confronted him with the evidence in my hand. "What is this?"

Drevan was tying his necktie at that time. He glanced at the panties without batting an eye.

"Someone probably slipped it in my suit as a prank," he replied.

"A prank?" I trembled with anger. "They smell like Belle's perfume. Do you take me for a fool?"

He finally lost his patience, snatched the panties, and tossed them into the trash.

"Kyra, it was for a business negotiation! The other party enjoys this sort of thing, so I was just playing along," he explained.

"So playing along means bringing it home?"

"That's enough!" he shouted at me. "I have my reasons. I'm doing this for the pack's interests. What would someone like you, who's only obsessed with a fairy-tale romance, understand about that?"

He impatiently pushed me aside and left for his business trip, dragging his suitcase behind him.

But getting caught didn't make Drevan tone it down one bit. If anything, it made him bolder.

One day, I received an audio file from an unknown number, and I opened it. The recording that played was filled with breathy moans that would make anyone blush, along with Belle's sultry voice.

"Ah! Drevan… Don't you think I'm much better than that blockhead Kyra…"

"Stop talking about her. You're killing the mood." Drevan's voice had a raw edge that I'd never heard before when he was in bed with me.

"But I want… Mmph… Please be gentle… Didn't she find those panties I gave you last time? I'll leave you another pair this time…"

After listening to the whole thing, I felt like pouring bleach in my ears to cleanse them.

The next day, I played the recording for him. This time, he didn't even bother with excuses.

"Since you already know about it, I won't beat around the bush anymore," he said, lighting a cigarette. Through the curling smoke, his face looked like a stranger to me.

"Belle is healthy and passionate. She gives me the satisfaction an Alpha needs. And you… You can't even last ten more minutes in bed without passing out from the pain. But I swear, the Luna position will always be yours."

Drevan flicked ash from his cigarette, all the while acting like he was doing me a favor.

"As long as you behave yourself, don't make a scene, and don't embarrass the pack by spreading this around, I'll still mark you. After all, you're the Luna my father chose for me."

Everything made sense at that moment. I should have walked away right then, but when I looked at the calendar, I realized the full moon was only three days away.

After living with this curse for 20 years, I was finally one step away from breaking free. Once I lifted the Sympathetic Pain curse, I'd recover my health and finally be able to get revenge on those two.

That was why I stayed and endured every ounce of rage and humiliation. I even turned a blind eye while Drevan and Belle carried on their affair right in front of me.

I watched how she'd deliberately show off the hickeys on her neck, and how he threw himself between her and a blade without hesitation.

I endured all of it right up until tonight's ceremony, when he stood before the entire pack and rejected me in front of everyone.

That was when it finally hit me—keeping quiet didn't earn me any respect, and backing down didn't earn me any mercy. Instead, my tolerance only gave them more confidence to walk all over me.

Since they were going to be this ruthless, they couldn't blame me for being selfish.

I opened my eyes to a familiar ceiling. Every bone in my body felt like it had been broken and reconnected. The pain was unbearable, but I was still alive, and that was all that mattered.

Even though my body was wrecked, the thought of what I was going to do next gave me a surge of adrenaline that got me out of bed.

I used to believe going through the mate bond with Drevan was my only way to survive. I had also convinced myself it was for his sake. But the truth was that there had always been a more ruthless and decisive way to break the Sympathetic Pain curse.

If my mate sincerely rejected me, I could cut my own flesh to forcibly reverse the Sympathetic Pain curse and send all that suffering back to him tenfold.

I'd always known this was possible, but I'd loved Drevan too much. The thought of causing him pain felt unbearably cruel, so I'd chosen three years of torture over letting him suffer even the slightest bit.

But at the altar, Drevan had publicly crushed whatever love I had left for him. It was replaced by cold, empty hatred.

He was just an enemy now, which meant the forbidden method I'd refused to use out of love had become my best shot at freedom. I turned away, my expression turning blank.

Just then, the door slammed open. Drevan strode in, looking down at me without a trace of concern.

"You're awake? Then stop lying there and playing dead."

He tossed a plain-looking dress onto the bed. It was something modest enough to hide my bruised and battered body.

He continued, "Put it on. You have ten minutes to change out of those filthy clothes. The guests outside are gossiping that I abused my former mate for Belle's sake.

"You're going to walk through the banquet hall and tell everyone you were just pretending to be sick and that you're perfectly fine. Remember, don't ruin Belle's and my celebration with that sickly act of yours."

I didn't argue and picked up the dress in silence.

My indifferent compliance seemed to please him.

"Now, that's more like it. Later, you'll cut the cake for everyone. Once you're done, you can finally leave the Darkmoon pack for good."

If I were cutting the cake, it would mean there would be a knife. I had to appreciate the irony of him providing both a public stage and a weapon for what I had planned.

"Got it," I agreed without hesitation.

…

The banquet hall was brightly lit and filled with the sound of clinking glasses.

I stepped inside expressionlessly while wearing the dress that hid my injuries. The hall erupted immediately into harsh murmurs.

"Can't believe she had the nerve to show up here."

"If I were her, I'd never show my face again."

"Just looking at her is depressing."

I kept my head down and walked toward the main table under everyone's gaze.

Drevan was there with his arm around Belle, both of them swirling wine in their glasses. The second Belle spotted me, she let out a giggle and slid a silk-covered box in my direction.

"Come over here, Kyra." She deliberately raised her voice. "This is a special honor Drevan prepared just for you. After all, you're my elder sister, so you should be the one to cut the last cake."

I walked over and pulled back the silk covering. Ignoring the sickly-sweet cake, I only focused on the ornate knife. It had a long handle and a slender blade polished to a mirror shine. Under the chandelier light, it gleamed with a cold brightness that I found deeply satisfying. I wrapped my fingers around the handle.

"Well? Cut it already," Drevan urged impatiently. "What are you waiting for? Cut it nicely, and don't ruin my cake."

I ignored the cake completely and slowly raised my head to look at him. The eyes that had once been filled with love were now empty and dead, boring straight into him with nothing but cold emptiness behind them.

Drevan seemed rattled by my stare, and I saw him shiver before he stammered, "Kyra, w-what are you looking at?"

"Relax," I said, my voice sending shivers down everyone's spine. "You're about to see a very memorable cutting technique."

Before anyone could react, I twisted my wrist and drove the blade straight through my left palm. The sound of steel puncturing flesh rang out clearly, and blood sprayed across the white tablecloth and onto the cake like a fountain.

Belle shrieked, and Drevan shot to his feet.

"Kyra! Have you lost your mind?" he shouted.

The hall erupted into chaos around me, but I felt perfectly calm. The pain was my liberation, and I felt an unprecedented power surge through my blood.

I stared at Drevan's terrified gaze and slowly recited the incantation. "The blood bears witness, and the heart offers a sacrifice.

"You rejected me, right?"

I pulled the blade out, splattering droplets of blood across his face.

"So now, I'm granting your wish. It's time to pay back every bit of suffering you put me through these past three years."