I ignored the officiating Elder shouting behind me and headed straight back to the suffocating Alpha mansion.

The first thing I did upon entering was rip off the elaborate gown—the one meant to symbolize my status as the "Luna-to-be"—and tossed it into the trash.

In my past life, I wasn’t just Ethan’s mate; I was his most loyal assistant, the sharpest weapon the Silver Moon Pack possessed.

To help him secure his Alpha status, I had rejected recruitment offers from countless top-tier packs. He had told me that running a pack was heavy work and he needed a partner who could stand beside him on the battlefield.

So, to match his pace, I clipped my own wings. I forced myself from a free-spirited ranger into a micro-managing administrator.

I remembered the breaking point in my previous life. Ethan had promised to take me to the Frozen Tundra to see the Aurora Borealis—a reward for a year of grueling work.

But on the day we were set to leave, Ivy sniffled and said she was afraid of the cold. He canceled the trip immediately. Instead, he took her to a warm southern valley for "convalescence," leaving me behind to guard the territory.

When a rival pack raided our borders, I was alone. I took three broken ribs and nearly froze to death in the snow defending his land while he played nursemaid to her.

I was done being the fool who burned herself to keep others warm.

Leaving Ethan was Step One.

I dug into the bottom of the safe and pulled out an invitation I’d buried a year ago.

It was from the "Winterborn Pack," the most powerful pack in the North. They had offered me the Gamma position—the lead warrior role—with authority second only to the Alpha.

I signed the document without hesitation and shoved it into my tactical rucksack.

Just as I clicked the final buckle shut, the bedroom door was blasted open by a wave of aggressive energy.

Ethan stormed in, his Alpha pheromones rolling off him in suffocating waves of rage.

When he saw me dressed in my tactical combat gear, the anger in his eyes looked ready to consume me. He rushed forward, snatched my backpack, and slammed it against the wall.

"Selena, is this your new strategy?"

"Humiliating me at the altar wasn't enough? Now you're playing the 'runaway mate' card?"

He sneered, glancing at the papers spilling out of the bag. "You think waving around some fake invitation from a rogue pack will make me panic? You think I'll beg you to stay?"

Ethan tugged at his tie, arrogance written all over his face.

"Did you forget? Without my scent to ground you, a dominant female like you won't survive your next Heat."

I looked at my scattered gear and asked calmly, "Who told you I was acting?"

Him and Ivy. One was a narcissist, the other a parasite. They didn't just suck my blood; in my last life, they took my life.

I had fought hard to be reborn. I had my combat strength back. Why the hell would I stay here and play nanny?

Ethan let out a cold laugh and opened his mouth to mock me further, but he was interrupted.

Ivy stepped out from behind him, carefully balancing a steaming tray.

The air instantly filled with the sickly-sweet scent of white tea and the bitterness of medicinal herbs.

"Ethan, please don't be angry," she said softly. "Selena is probably just emotional because of the failed ceremony. Her hormones must be imbalanced."

She looked at me with wide, teary eyes. "Selena, I asked the Pack Healer to brew this Calming Draught for you. I know I’m weak and I have no right to be Luna, but I just want everyone to be happy..."

Her voice trembled, perfect for a victim who was being oh-so-brave.

Ethan’s expression softened immediately. When he turned back to me, his face was ice-cold.

"Learn from Ivy. She’s frail, yet she’s dragging herself out here to make medicine for you. And you? You’re just being a brat."

I looked at the dark, murky liquid and felt a wave of nausea.

In my past life, she had brought me this same soup. It was laced with wolfsbane and suppressants to slowly drain my wolf’s strength, leaving me weak enough to be easily drowned in the sea.

I looked her in the eye. "I’m not drinking that. Get it out of here."

A flash of malice darted through Ivy’s eyes.

She stepped forward with the scalding bowl, acting as if she were trying to hand it to me, but she deliberately positioned her body to block Ethan’s line of sight.

"Selena, please, just one sip..."

Just as I moved to step around her, she flicked her wrist, splashing the boiling liquid all over her own chest.

"Ahhh!"

The bowl shattered on the floor.

Ivy collapsed into the shards, her chest instantly blistering red. She wailed, "Selena! If you didn't want it, fine! But why did you throw it at me... it burns... Ethan, save me!"

Ethan whipped around. Seeing the burns on her skin, his eyes bled crimson with killing intent.

He shoved me hard against the wall and scooped the screaming Ivy into his arms, roaring at me:

"Selena! What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Accompanying the roar was the crushing weight of an Alpha’s Command. Ethan unleashed his spiritual pressure without holding anything back.

The force hit my chest like a sledgehammer. I couldn’t even put up a defense before I was blasted backward, my body flung like a kite with a cut string, smashing directly into the solid oak staircase.

Bang.

My spine collided with the sharp edge of the steps. A sweet, metallic taste surged up my throat, and I spat out a mouthful of blood.

Ethan didn't stop. He stood at the top of the stairs, cradling the "unconscious" Ivy, looking down at me with unmasked disgust.

"How can you be so venomous? Ivy is a fragile Omega—your power could have killed her!"

"It makes me sick just breathing the same air as you."

I wiped the blood from the corner of my lips. My insides felt like they had been rearranged, screaming in agony. I didn't try to explain. I just looked at him cold, dead eyes.

"If I make you sick, then I have good news."

"I’ll file a formal request with the Council for Severance. I’ll clear out and leave this place for good."

Ethan paused, clearly surprised that I was the one bringing up leaving the pack. But the shock quickly turned into a sneer.

"You better keep your word. Don't be like last time—running to the border only to come crawling back in tears."

With that, he didn't spare me another glance. He turned and rushed Ivy to the infirmary, his back turned to me in finality.

I slumped against the cold floor, looking at the mess around me. For some reason, my mind drifted back twenty years.

We had just gone through our first shift.

During our first hunting trial, I had been reckless, chasing glory, and got cornered by a mutated grizzly bear.

It was Ethan who had charged in without hesitation. He used his small, juvenile wolf body to take a fatal claw strike meant for me.

Back then, covered in blood, he had comforted me: "Don't be scared, Selena. As long as I’m alive, no one will ever hurt you."

But now? That boy who swore to protect me was dead. In his place stood a man who used his Alpha Command to crush my internal organs for the sake of another woman.

I tried to stand, but the pain made me stumble.

Letting out a self-deprecating laugh, I leaned against the wall and inched my way out of the villa.

I didn't go to the Pack Hospital. That place was crawling with Ethan’s spies.

Dragging my broken body, I went to the underground black market, to an unlicensed clinic run by a Rogue witch doctor.

The doctor inspected my injuries and whistled. "Ruthless. He was aiming for your Wolf’s Essence. If you’d come thirty minutes later, your S-rank strength would have been permanently crippled."

I lay on a musty cot for two days.

On the third day, I returned to the villa.

I waited until Ethan was in a Council meeting. I didn't pack any clothes or jewelry. Instead, I took my tactical daggers, the strategic defense maps I had drawn over the years, and the black card containing all my bounty earnings.

I moved everything to a safe house I had rented in the black market—a place shielded from tracking signals.

Five days. That’s all I needed. Once the emissary from the Winterborn Pack arrived and I signed the Blood Pact, I would cut ties with the Silver Moon Pack forever.

Night fell on the third day.

I was cleaning the blood grooves of my dagger when my phone rang. It was a number I didn't recognize—the one I had blocked was obviously no longer working for him.

I picked up. The background noise was heavy metal music and the howling of drunk wolves. He was at a club.

Ethan’s voice was slurred with alcohol and thick with his usual entitlement.

"Where are you? Get your ass to the Full Moon Club."

I frowned, continuing to polish the blade. "Ethan, we’re done. I have nothing to say to you."

There was a second of silence on the line, followed by the clinking of glass. Ethan sounded agitated, clearly provoked by my indifference.

"Done? Selena, are you finished playing hard to get?"

"Ivy has a scar from the burn. Regular medicine isn't working."

"You’re a Healer-Warrior. Your blood and energy can remove scars. Get over here and heal her. Now."

Listening to his righteous demands, I stared at my own cold reflection in the steel of the blade.

He hadn't called because he noticed I was missing. He called because his precious darling needed my blood as an ointment.

"I told you, I moved out," I said calmly. "Besides, my blood is expensive. She can't afford it."

Ethan’s breathing grew heavy. I could feel his rage vibrating through the speaker.

"Moved out? You're addicted to running away from home, aren't you?"

"Fine! If you have so much backbone, then get the hell out of Silver Moon territory! Go become a Rogue! Let everyone hunt you down!"

"And don't expect me to collect your corpse when you die out there!"

"If you don't get back here and fix Ivy's skin, don't you ever dream of having a Marking Ceremony with me!"

I glanced at the packed tactical bag on the table and the Winterborn entry contract beside it.

The corner of my mouth hooked into a mocking smile.

"Deal, Ethan."

"I'll get lost. Far away. I promise I won't be an eyesore for you two anymore."

Before he could react, I hung up.

I pulled the SIM card out of the phone and dropped it into a glass of high-proof spirits in front of me.

Fizz.

The chip fried instantly.

Just like the last remaining shred of love I had for him. Gone up in smoke.

In the fireplace of the safe house, flames greedily devoured a pile of old memories.

There was the amulet I had spent three years carving from the fang of a Dire Wolf to protect Ethan.

There was the dried Moonflower he had plucked for me the first time he took me hunting in the forest.

And there was the battle journal where I had meticulously recorded every one of his dietary preferences and combat habits.

I watched them turn to ash, and my heart remained perfectly still.

The phone on the table buzzed. It was an encrypted email.

It was from the Alpha of the Winterborn Pack himself: "Welcome to the pack, Commander Selena. The extraction team will arrive at the border at midnight."

A new home. Since my rebirth, this was the only thing I had looked forward to.

I stared at the firelight, checking my gear one last time, ready to embrace my new life.

But my peace was once again interrupted.

I suddenly received a message from Ethan’s parents. Alright, they were back from their diplomatic patrol, and that so-called family dinner required my attendance.

Fine—let it be my farewell to everyone.

It was evening when I arrived at the Pack House.

Ethan’s parents—Elders I had grown up respecting—sat at the head of the long table.

Ethan sat on the left. But right next to him, in a chair that shouldn't have been there, sat a trembling Ivy.

The expression on everyone's face was grim.

I could only imagine the pillow talk Ivy had been whispering while I was away.

I walked in without changing my expression.

Ethan’s gaze swept over me coldly. He seemed annoyed by my indifference. Suddenly, he threw his dining knife onto the table with a loud clatter.

"Looking at that funeral face... I’ve lost my appetite."

He stood up and headed for the study upstairs.

Ivy, acting like a frightened little rabbit, immediately scrambled up to chase after him. "Ethan, please don't be angry... "

I ignored them and sat down .

The old couple awkwardly tried to make excuses for their son, even putting food on my plate.

I looked earnestly at these two elders who had once treated me like their own daughter.

In my past life, they had tried to stop Ethan’s tyranny. In return, he had locked them away in the back mountains claiming they were "senile," and they eventually died of grief.

In this life, I didn't blame them. I only blamed myself for being blind enough to mistake a rock for a diamond.

I set down my wine glass and spoke softly, but my voice was made of steel.

"I have been thinking for a long time."

"Perhaps the Moon Goddess did not bless Ethan and me. Our bond is incomplete; our wolves do not resonate."

"For the future of the Silver Moon Pack, and to end this mutual suffering..."

"I, Selena, reject Ethan as my mate. I also resign from my position as Lead Enforcer."

The fork dropped from the former Luna’s hand. Her face went pale, and tears welled in her eyes.

"Selena, child... has it really come to this? Is that boy bullying you?"

I nodded firmly.

Addressing the one thing that had weighed on my heart since my rebirth, I felt incredibly light, even as the tension in the room thickened.

Before leaving, I didn't go back to the bedroom filled with memories.

Instead, I went to the storage room on the third floor. I needed to retrieve my parents' relics—two white jade urns containing their ashes.

My parents had died protecting the Silver Moon Pack. These urns were the only connection I had left to them, the only things I couldn't leave behind.

But when I pushed open the door to the storage room, I froze.

Ivy was standing by the shelf, idly playing with the two urns in her hands.

Seeing me enter, her lips curled into a grotesque smile. She lowered her voice to a whisper.

"Selena, you're leaving? You want to take these dead people with you?"

"Tell me... if these jars shattered, would you die of a broken heart, too?"

My pupils constricted violently. "Ivy! Put them down!"

Ivy’s smile widened. A flash of pure malice crossed her eyes, and suddenly, she opened her hands.

"Oops. Slipped."

CRASH!

Two crisp, shattering sounds echoed through the silent hallway.

The white jade urns smashed into pieces. The gray-white ashes exploded outward, filling the air with a mournful dust before settling into a chaotic mess on the floor.

In that instant, my blood froze. My vision turned red.

A terrifying wave of S-Rank energy, fueled by pure grief and rage, exploded from my body. "IVY! YOU DESERVE TO DIE!"

BOOM!

The shockwave hit Ivy squarely in the chest.

She shrieked, her frail body thrown backward like a rag doll.

"Ahh! Selena, don't! Don't hit me!"

"My stomach... it hurts..."

Hearing the commotion, Ethan charged in.

The first thing he saw was the floor covered in jagged jade shards and gray powder.

He recognized whose ashes those were.

For a split second, the rage in his eyes stalled, replaced by a look of disbelief and genuine shock.

He looked at me, his voice trembling slightly. "Selena... are those... your parents..."

He knew how much they meant to me. Instinctively, he took a step toward me to comfort me.

"Ethan! Help me..." Ivy’s sobbing voice cut him off. She curled up on the floor, her hands protecting her lower belly.

"Selena went crazy... I was just trying to help dust the jars, and she attacked me... my stomach hurts so much..."

"Our baby... it's our baby..."

Ethan froze.

"Baby?" He frowned, a flicker of confusion crossing his panic. "What baby? As an Alpha, I would have sensed his heartbeat the moment he existed. I felt nothing from you."

Ivy trembled, clutching his hem, tears streaming down. "Because I'm too weak, Ethan... The doctor said my body is so frail that it masks the pup's aura... I wanted to surprise you once he was stable...

But now... I can't feel him anymore... Selena's power... she crushed him..."

The flicker of guilt on Ethan's face vanished instantly.

It was replaced by a rage and panic ten times stronger than before.

He didn't spare another glance at the ashes on the floor. He rushed over, shoved me hard against the wall, and then gingerly scooped Ivy into his arms.

"Selena! Are you insane?!"

He roared at me over his shoulder, looking at me as if I were a monster.

"I know you care about the ashes, but they are just dead objects! Ivy is carrying a living life! She is carrying my Heir!"

"How could you attack a pregnant woman? Has your conscience been eaten by dogs? No matter what, you shouldn't have pushed her!"

I leaned against the wall, sliding down slightly. I looked at my parents' ashes, now trampled and mixed with dirt.

Then I looked at the man who once claimed to love me, now trampling on my parents' dignity for a woman whose mouth was full of lies.

My heart finally, truly died.

I wiped the blood from the corner of my mouth and walked up to him, step by step.

Ethan thought I was coming to apologize or explain. He opened his mouth to scold me again.

SMACK!

I channeled every ounce of my S-rank strength and slapped him across the face.

The force was so great it whipped his head to the side, and blood instantly trickled from his lip.

"Did that wake you up, Ethan?"

I spat a mouthful of bloody saliva onto the floor and stared into his shocked eyes with cold indifference.

"Rest assured. As of today, I am no longer your future Luna."