Chương 164: B3 - Prologue

A small, plum-like purple fruit arced through the air and contrasted against the gray stone before Zakar caught it in his palm. The chair beneath him balanced precariously on its back two legs as his heavy boots rested on the edge of a plain wooden desk. He tossed the fruit again, his eyes tracking its rise and fall. A few strands of long white hair slipped into his field of vision.

If not for the lack of wrinkles on his face and his solid build, that hue alone might have made people mistake him for sixty instead of thirty-six. The soft thwap of fruit against palm was the only sound in the cell block beside the faint rasp of breathing from the darkness behind him. Chains shifted with a dry clink. In the far corner, the sole prisoner of the wing slumped against the damp wall. He was held upright only by the thick, rune-etched manacles clamped around his wrists and neck.

The man was a mess; his skin was a roadmap of scars stretched tight over a starving, skeletal frame. Blood, long since dried to a crusty brown, matted his tangled black hair and beard. He wore nothing but tattered shorts, and his head was bowed in a posture of broken submission. The heavy iron door at the end of the corridor scraped open, the sound harsh against the silence. A man stepped inside. He was leaner than Zakar but carried the same intimidating presence.

His hair was cropped short, the color of rusted iron, but his eyes were identical to Zakar's: pools of metallic gold that seemed to glow with their own inner light.

"I still don't get it," the newcomer said, letting the heavy iron door slam shut. The boom rattled through the place, yet neither Zakar nor the broken prisoner in the corner flinched.

"You made the Apex Predators, Zakar, and yet your old man still forces you to do guard duties?" Zakar snatched the fruit from the air, his gaze never wavering from its purple skin.

"He has his reasons." He let his chair hit forward onto all four legs, boots dropping from the desk. The fruit rolled between his fingers.

"What do you want, Kaiser?"

"I need a second," Kaiser said, leaning against the wall. His eyes flicked briefly to the prisoner in the shadows before returning to Zakar.

"I picked up a contract. A serious one."

"So handle it."

"The target is a higher-up from the NEVAK," Kaiser answered.

"And she's on the eastern continent. If things go sideways out there, I'll have no backup. I need a partner. Someone who can help me get out, at least." Zakar tossed the fruit again before catching it with a sharp snap.

"Wait for her to rotate back. She won't stay in that shithole forever."

"She's supervising a war which hasn't even kicked off yet," Kaiser replied, his jaw tightening.

"I don't have that kind of time. The contract has a deadline." That got Zakar's attention. He finally looked up, one white eyebrow arching.

"A war? Who's fighting?"

"Two bottom-feeder nations. The Kingdom of Kastal and the Bridan Empire." Zakar snorted, a faint, cruel smile tugging at his lips.

"Kastal? Isn't that the place Volantis keeps on a leash? From what I hear, their king needs written permission just to take a piss."

"That's the one," Kaiser confirmed with a careless shrug.

"Why they're letting him play war is beyond me. But I don't get paid to understand geopolitics. The contract pays out a Seed my beast needs. That's the only thing that matters." Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Zakar went silent, and the chains of the prisoner clinked softly again.

"I'll speak to the old man," Zakar said, his eyes meeting Kaiser's.

"Might be able to see if I can shorten my sentence here by a week." Kaiser's shoulders dropped in relief, the tension bleeding out into a confident smirk.

"Good. I'll be in touch." He turned and strode out without another word. The heavy iron door boomed shut behind him, sealing the silence inside once again. Zakar remained seated, idly rolling the purple fruit across the desk's scarred wood. A few seconds later, the silver ring on his right hand pulsed with an inner light and with a ripple of aether, a beast materialized a few steps away from him. It was a massive sabertooth, its pelt a stark, snowy white slashed with midnight stripes.

The creature's fangs, long and curved like scythes, jutted down past its lower jaw. A faint crackle of aether hovered over its body, tiny arcs of blue-white lightning dancing between the strands of its pelt. The beast stretched and its claws scored deep grooves into the stone floor with a screech. It shook its massive frame, the lightning intensifying for a moment.

"We should go with him," the sabertooth rumbled in a deep aether-voice.

"And then we should slay him. Keep the Seed for ourselves. Accidents happen all the time, no?" Zakar leaned back, lazily scratching his cheek.

"We don't even know if the Seed would be great for either of us, Rai. At least enough to justify the drawback of removing one of our current ones."

"And?" Rai paced around the desk, his massive head brushing against Zakar's shoulder.

"If it is useless to us, we sell it. If he is desperate enough to ask for your help, it is clearly worth the betrayal."

"No," Zakar answered flatly, his gaze locking with the beast's electric blue stare.

"Kaiser is still useful. His connections are useful. We cannot build a new clan alone." Rai let out a soft snort, then swiveled his head toward the dark corner where the prisoner hung, a heap of bones.

"Clan means nothing. His clan didn't protect him. We should rely only on our own claws and fangs."

"He wasn't the alpha," Zakar retorted, a hint of annoyance edging his voice.

"That makes all the difference." The sabertooth gazed at the broken man for another second as the lightning in his fur continued to crackle, then tore his gaze away.

"If you say so." With a sigh, Zakar brought the purple fruit to his lips and bit down. The skin snapped with a wet crunch, flooding his mouth with a sharp, earthy tartness. He swallowed and felt the dense packet of aether dissolve in his gut before spreading through his veins to knit his bones and muscles tighter. A perfect Epic enhancer with no drawback—a treasure that would have started a war in the lower districts. For him? It barely moved the needle.

He was long past the point where a single piece of fruit could grant him a full attribute point. But it was progress. Another drop in an ocean that would eventually force the tide to rise. Zakar leaned back, the front legs of his chair leaving the floor once more, and resumed the slow, rhythmic toss of the now-half-eaten fruit. His gaze drifted past the empty corridor to the row of vacant cells beyond. His old man was probably chaining him to this place to keep him busy.

To lock him here, while his younger brother was out leading hunts, gaining attributes, and closing the gap between them. The favoritism had moved past subtle neglect into open sabotage. Zakar took another bite, the juice of the fruit running over his lips with the burn of aether. Everyone in the Bloodfangs Clan knew the truth. The old man didn't want someone like Zakar taking his place as alpha. Zakar's father thought he was too violent. Too unpredictable. Even for a Draerian. Zakar almost laughed at the thought.

It wasn't his fault weaklings couldn't move out of his way. That was the first law of the wild, and the only one that truly mattered. When a stronger predator enters a territory, the lesser creatures have two realistic options: bow or flee. Those who chose to stand their ground had only themselves to blame for being trampled. It was nature. It was a necessity. His father should never have reprimanded him for what he'd done three years ago.

"Women and children must be spared, Zakar. They are the future of the kingdom." What a sentimental fool. Draeria didn't need a future built on weakness. It needed a future forged in strength and blood. Culling the herd wasn't cruelty. Only those who could prove their worth deserved to live and breed descendants. Zakar closed his fist. The fruit's hard, pitted core shattered with a dry crack in his palm, the remaining pieces falling to the floor. His father had forgotten that fundamental truth. He had grown soft.

And for their clan—the one tasked with upholding discipline and doling out punishment in the kingdom—softness was a terminal disease. The wild has no mercy. And neither should they.