After that pointless gift-giving trip, it was already dusk.

Damien glanced at the sky and coolly asked if I wanted to eat anything.

I had no appetite for any of his "offerings," so he decided on his own to find a clearing by a stream, light a bonfire, and prepare a simple "mate's" dinner.

He then added, seemingly casually, "Lyra just told me through a wind-whisper stone that she happens to be nearby collecting night-glow grass, so I asked her to join us."

The northern forests were so vast, yet we just happened to run into her here.

Whether it was a coincidence or if he just couldn't wait to be with Lyra, I didn't know, and I didn't want to bother finding out anymore.

I just said, "Mm," and went to sit on a large rock by the stream, closing my eyes to rest, not wanting to look at his hypocritical face any longer.

About fifteen minutes later, Damien arrived with Lyra.

Lyra, still acting all innocent and worldly, chirped happily as soon as she saw me, linking her arm through mine affectionately, as if there had never been any bad blood between us. "Selena," she blinked her pure, innocent eyes, "I let Damien take you out to cheer you up. Was he good to you today? Did he get you any prey or crystals you liked?"

Only then did I realize that Damien's strange behavior today had all been approved by Lyra.

The few, precious warm moments I'd had in the past three years were actually Lyra's handouts to me.

How ridiculous!

I lowered my head, unwilling to respond.

This so-called mate's dinner, I ate it like I was chewing wax, mechanically putting the half-cooked roasted meat into my mouth.

Although Lyra was constantly chatting with Damien about interesting pack gossip, sometimes giggling at Damien's "wit," sometimes playfully complaining that Damien had been neglecting her lately due to "busy pack affairs," she kept glancing at me, sharply noticing my extremely low spirits.

So, when the bonfire started to die down, she insisted on pulling me along to a nearby hot spring to "relax."

"Selena, wasn't Damien's hunting and patrol trip with you today fun? Or were the gifts he picked out not to your liking, so you've been so down?"

She said this in a "wise older sister" tone while helping me undress.

"Don't mind Damien, he's usually so serious, but when he's with us she-wolves, sometimes he's really... really clumsy."

"Let me tell you," she leaned closer, lowering her voice as if sharing a huge secret, "a long, long time ago, I just casually mentioned I wanted to taste the legendary starlight fruit, which only grows in the Moon Goddess's garden. And he actually snuck into the forbidden area, only accessible to past Alphas, risked being torn aby guardian beasts, and brought back a whole basket for me! And guess what? After the elders found out, he was punished by having to soak in the ice lake for three days and nights. At that time, a few she-wolves from other affiliated packs who had crushes on him came to visit, wanting to taste the precious starlight fruit too. He wouldn't give them a single piece, even saying defiantly, 'I risked my life to get these, so naturally, they only belong to Lyra!' That story, our Blood Moon Pack members have been telling it as a joke for years! Don't you think he's been that bossy since he was little?"

She giggled as she spoke, her full chest bouncing, looking alluring in the moonlight.

I quietly watched the undisguised pride and happiness in her eyes.

I wanted to laugh, but I couldn't.

Yeah, only someone who knows they're favored, cherished, would be so bold, right?

An indescribable sourness and sadness welled up in my heart.

I didn't want Lyra to see how I was feeling, so I made an excuse to go into the nearby woods.

But I'd barely left the hot spring area, before I could even calm myself, when I heard horrifying roars from the sky not far away.

Then, thick black smoke, reeking of strong corrosion, spread rapidly from the direction of the stream we’d just left, towards the entire pack territory!

The surrounding trees, upon contact with the black smoke, withered and rotted at a visible speed, turning into disgusting pools of black pus.

The air filled with the pungent smell of sulfur and death.

"It's... it's the 'Shadow Plague'! Run!"

"Oh gods! How did those shadow creatures sealed in the 'Abyss of Despair' suddenly get out!"

Screams and cries for help, filled with terror and despair, came from all directions.

My first thought was Lyra, still at the hot spring, unaware of the danger!

So even though I knew that if I touched that terrifying "Shadow Plague," I'd be corroded like those withered trees, not even bones would be left, I still, without hesitation, ran against the tide of panicking, fleeing pack members, towards the hot spring!

Just as I reached the edge of the hot spring area, I saw Damien tightly shielding a disheveled Lyra in his arms, struggling to fend off the encroaching black smoke, preparing to break through to safety with her.

Lyra, like a frightened little bird, clung tightly to Damien's arm, her anxious voice, broken and intermittent, carried through the thick, suffocating black smoke. "Damien! Selena... Selena is still out in the woods! She... she doesn't know about the 'Shadow Plague' here! You... you go save her first! I... I can find a way to get out myself!"

"Forget about her for now! You leave this contaminated area with me first!"

Damien's voice was still steady, firm, and unyielding.

But Lyra stubbornly tried to push him away, wanting him to save me first.

"I'll be fine! Damien, go save Selena! She... she's your Luna in name, after all! If anything happens to her today because of us... what... what will you do? The council... the council won't let us off either!"

"Lyra! Listen to me!" Damien suddenly roared, cutting her off, holding Lyra even tighter in his arms. "I don't care what happens to her! I just want you to be safe! If she can escape on her own, that's her luck; if she can't... that has nothing to do with us either! In my world, there's only you. Nothing else matters!"

Every word, like a sharp blade, stabbed viciously into my heart.

I bit my lip so hard, the rich taste of blood instantly filled my mouth, the pain almost suffocating me.

Damien, tightly protecting Lyra in his arms, turned and quickly broke away in the opposite direction from me.

At the same time, the other pack members, completely crazed with fear, surged like a tide towards any seemingly safe exit.

I was pushed down in the chaos, falling heavily to the ground. My body was trampled black and blue by the stampeding pack members, my bones feeling like they were about to break.

I trembled violently from the pain, cold sweat drenching my clothes in an instant.

The black smoke from the "Shadow Plague" grew thicker, reaching my feet, starting to corrode my exposed skin.

I couldn't help but let out a pained groan.

Driven by the instinct to survive, I gritted my teeth against the intense pain, got up from the ground, and, leaning on a tree trunk already half-corroded, stumbled step by step towards what I remembered as a relatively safe area.

####CHAPTER-NAME:

Luckily, I managed to save myself.

Alone back in my hut, I saw dozens of fake messages of concern from Lyra through our mental link. It just made me sick.

I replied with the shortest possible message: "I'm fine, don't worry."

Then, without hesitation, I unilaterally cut off all mental links with her.

From now on, we were done.

As for Damien...

I instinctively tried to sense the faint mental connection between us, the one from our fated bond.

Dead silence.

Not a single message of greeting, not a single thought of concern had come through.

It seemed he really, as he’d said, didn't care if I lived or died.

For the next full week, Damien didn't show up.

I didn't ask where he went or who he was with.

None of it mattered anymore.

I just quietly performed the final ritual to sever the fated bond.

The Moonstone, having absorbed my heart's blood and Damien's "agreement to separate" energy, was placed in the center of my hut, within an ancient ritual circle drawn with moon-grass and stardust.

I sat cross-legged, channeling all my remaining lunar energy, chanting over and over the forbidden spell from the ancient wolf chronicles to break a fated bond.

Every chant felt like a sharp blade cutting into my soul.

The pain, bone-deep, almost made me pass out.

But I gritted my teeth and endured.

Because I knew, only then could I completely escape this fate.

Occasionally, during breaks in the ritual, I'd subconsciously see Lyra and Damien's sweet interactions through the pack's internal wind-whisper stones.

Like Damien peeling a whole plate of her favorite flame shrimp for her.

Like Damien grooming Lyra's soft fur under the moonlight, like a true mate.

Like Lyra drawing two cuddling wolf cubs in the snow with her claws, carving her and Damien's names beside them...

My heart was already a still lake, no ripples disturbed its surface.

Days passed.

The Moonstone in the ritual circle, continuously absorbing my lunar energy and my will to separate, grew dimmer and dimmer, the cracks more numerous and deeper.

Finally, when I had almost exhausted the last of my lunar energy, the pack's wise woman contacted me through a mental link.

"Miss Selena, today is the last day before your fated bond with Alpha Damien breaks. According to ancient wolf law and the intentions both of you previously infused into the Moonstone, as long as you cast this Moonstone into the Blood Moon Pack's 'Abyss of Severed Fates' before moonrise tonight, the fated bond between you will be completely broken. Are you ready?"

I had waited too long for this day.

I immediately got up, picked up the nearly shattered Moonstone, and walked towards the pack's forbidden land—the Abyss of Severed Fates.

Returning from the forbidden land, I felt incredibly weak, yet an unprecedented lightness filled me.

Just as I was about to pack my last few belongings and leave this heartbreaking place for good, I unexpectedly received an urgent mental message from one of Damien's subordinates.

"Selena... uh, Miss Selena! The Alpha... the Alpha got drunk at the feast celebrating the successful hunt of a thousand-year-old Shadow Demon Wolf! He's very unstable right now. Would you be able to bring him back to the Alpha's cave?"

I asked for the location of the feast, hesitated for a moment, but eventually went.

Not because I still harbored any illusions about him, but because I didn't want him to become a laughingstock among other pack members while drunk and disorderly.

Reaching the entrance of the huge cave where the leaders gathered, I was about to lift the heavy curtain and go in when I heard Damien's drunken voice.

"Those few days hunting with Lyra in the Moon-shadow Valley... were the happiest time since I became Alpha... no, the happiest time of my entire life. Only she was by my side. We didn't have to care about those damn laws; we could express our desire and love for each other freely. I wish time could have frozen at that moment... Lyra could have been mine alone, forever..."

The bone-deep pain in his voice made the other Beta wolves in the cave, who were usually close to him, look uncomfortable.

"Alpha, please don't talk such drunken nonsense. Miss Selena might be here soon. She'd be heartbroken if she heard you say that. She loves you so much, she even cut ties with her own pack to stay with our Blood Moon Pack for you... She only has you now, you can't let her down," a young Beta wolf said, mustering his courage.

"Yeah, Alpha! Miss Selena even gave up the precious opportunity to awaken stronger lunar energy at the Moon Goddess's temple just to be with you! All these years, whenever you returned late from a hunt, she'd light a moonstone at the cave entrance waiting for you; when you were injured in battles with rival packs, she stayed up day and night, using her pure lunar energy to heal you, guarding you for a whole month; when you were patrolling the territory and accidentally ate poisonous berries, writhing in pain, she found out and immediately, regardless of the danger, crossed the entire forest to find an antidote for you..." another older Beta wolf couldn't help adding.

"We know you've only ever had Miss Lyra in your heart. But... but you and Miss Lyra, after all, aren't the mates originally designated by the Moon Goddess. Miss Selena, she's the mate the Moon Goddess gave you, the one who should truly belong to you. You'll regret hurting her!"

Hearing their advice, Damien chuckled self-deprecatingly.

"Regret? I've only ever regretted one thing in my life."

"Three years ago, I shouldn't have, in a moment of weakness, accepted this damn fated bond!"

"If, back then, I hadn't bonded with Selena... then, would Lyra and I still have had a chance to be together?"

####CHAPTER-NAME:

My chest felt like it had been slammed by a giant rock, so tight I could barely breathe.

But strangely, it didn't hurt with that tearing, heart-wrenching pain like before.

I closed my eyes and took a long, slow breath.

When I opened them again, all the turmoil in my eyes had calmed.

I hitched the small bag on my shoulder, the one holding all my belongings, a little higher, then raised my hand and gently pushed open the heavy fur curtain.

The Beta wolves, supporting an almost-collapsing Damien, came out of the cave.

When they saw me, their faces showed a mix of embarrassment and pity.

After a few brief pleasantries, they clumsily helped get the dead-drunk Damien onto the back of my gentle moon-deer mount.

Then, they bowed to me and quickly left.

I silently led the moon-deer, carrying the unconscious Damien, slowly towards the Alpha's cave.

Along the way, the moonlight was bright, the night wind cool.

Only Damien's intermittent mumbles echoed in the quiet night sky.

"Lyra... Lyra... My Lyra..."

Finally, we reached the Alpha's cave, a place that once filled me with longing, but now only held despair.

It took all my strength to get him off the moon-deer and onto the huge stone bed in the center of the cave.

He was so incredibly drunk, his body as heavy as a rock. The moment he touched the bed, he couldn't hold himself up anymore, collapsing downwards and pulling me down with him.

Then, like an octopus, he wrapped his arms tightly around me, his aggressive male scent instantly enveloping me.

His face was buried in the crook of my neck, his hot breath on my skin sending unsettling shivers down my spine.

Like a child who’d done something wrong, he kept calling Lyra's name in that deeply affectionate tone.

"Lyra, my precious Lyra. Don't be angry with me, I know I was wrong. I shouldn't have drunk so much, shouldn't have let them see me so vulnerable. But... but I really feel awful. I think about you every day. I crave to hold you, to possess you fiercely, every single moment. Lyra, don't leave me..."

His arms tightened, almost crushing my bones.

I tried to break free from his suffocating embrace, my voice carrying a stubbornness I hadn't even realized I possessed.

"Look clearly! I'm not your Lyra!"

Damien seemed startled by my voice. He slowly opened his eyes, which were hazy from alcohol, and stared at me for a long time.

Then his eyes suddenly became unusually bright. He tightened his grip, pressing me closer to his scorching chest, full of an undeniable dominance.

"I know you're my Lyra... I know you're angry with me. Because I... because I let that Selena... take the place that should have been yours..."

His lips, hot and smelling strongly of alcohol, rained down frantic, tiny kisses on my sensitive neck, earlobe, and cheek.

"I'm really not Lyra!" My voice trembled as I screamed.

But Damien seemed not to hear me at all. He gently stroked my hair.

Then, he pulled out that communication crystal, glowing with a faint bloody light, from his pouch, held it up in front of me, his tone proud, like a child eagerly showing his most precious treasure to his beloved.

"My little moon, don't be angry. Look at the surprise I prepared for you. This is a one-of-a-kind Luna gown I designed myself. It's made from the rarest starlight flower petals, which only bloom on the night of the full moon, and the tail feathers of the legendary ice phoenix. And this claw ring, it's set with the purest blood soul stone, representing eternity and loyalty."

"I've been preparing all this for you since the day we first met under the moonlight. Every time I see you, I imagine what you'd look like wearing this gown, becoming my Luna, standing by my side, receiving the worship of all the packs. When I put this claw ring on your finger, would you cry tears of joy, just like now..."

Looking at that incredibly ornate, dark red gown and that strangely shaped claw ring, I suddenly felt overwhelmingly sick.

It took all my strength to argue back, my voice choked with tears.

"You... you love her so much... then... then what am I, Selena... what am I?"

"Selena?" Damien seemed annoyed by my question. He frowned, as if talking about an object that could be casually discarded. "Her? She's nothing."

"If it weren't for the Moon Goddess's ridiculous joke... if it weren't for you, my Lyra, needing me to accept her, I wouldn't even have given her a second glance!"

After saying that, he seemed to have exhausted all his energy from the alcohol. He held me tightly, buried his face deep in my chest, and over and over again, with a heartbreaking tenderness, he kept murmuring.

"Lyra... My Lyra... I love you... I only love you..."

"Lyra... I miss you so much... I want... I want you right now..."

His body, hot and hard as iron from suppressed desire.

His hands also began to wander, roughly and urgently trying to tear off the thin layer of clothing on my body.

I laughed.

Laughed until tears streamed down my face.

So, in his heart, I wasn't even a replacement.

I was just a joke, nothing at all.

Until the first ray of dawn peeked through the cracks in the cave, illuminating the absurdity of the room.

Damien finally, from drunkenness and exhaustion, fell into a deep sleep. His even breaths rose and fell in his solid chest.

I lay perfectly still, letting him hold me tight.

I looked at him for a long time.

His handsome, almost perfect sleeping face now looked a bit pale from the hangover.

After a while, I carefully slipped out of his embrace.

Then I leaned down and placed the Moonstone, which had long since completed the severing ritual, by his pillow.

Damien, in his sleep, seemed to sense my departure.

His thick eyelashes fluttered slightly, but he didn't open his eyes, just unconsciously mumbled,

"Selena... don't go... get me... some sobering... spring water..."

This was the first time he’d called my name in his sleep.

It was also the last thing he ever said to me.

This time, I didn't humbly reply "Okay" like I used to.

Instead, I slowly stood up straight and took one last, long look at the man I had loved for seven years.

I turned and left with my baggage, without looking back.

I had no lingering attachment to this pack full of deceit and betrayal.

I walked out of the Alpha's cave, out of the Blood Moon Pack's territory.

With the last of my savings, I traded for a travel token to a distant southern human city at the border market.

They said it was spring there all year round.

Sitting in the merchant caravan's wagon, I watched the familiar forest and mountains behind me rapidly recede in the dawn light, eventually disappearing beyond the horizon.

I took out the communication crystal I’d always kept close to me and completely deleted all mental link imprints of Damien and Lyra.

When the wagon stopped before the ancient city gates of the southern city, the first ray of morning sun, warm and brilliant, fell upon me, dispelling all the gloom and cold.

I tilted my head up, took a deep breath of air filled with the scent of flowers and freedom, and took one last look in the direction I’d come from.

Goodbye, northern snow and ice.

Goodbye, Blood Moon Pack.

Goodbye, Damien.

From now on, I, Selena, will live for myself.

####CHAPTER-NAME: