Monday morning hit like a slap.
Ronan barely had time to shake off the weekend when the whispers started.
"Did you hear?"
"Gone. Just gone."
"They said his roommate saw blood—"
"No one's allowed in the south quad now…"
A student was missing.
One of the basketball players.
The same guy who handed Ronan that invitation.
He'd walked back from the party around midnight… but never made it to his dorm.
No note. No drunken texts. Just his jacket — found torn near the wooded fence by the maintenance trail, where the campus lights didn't quite reach.
"Do they think it was an animal?" Calla asked, keeping pace beside Ronan in the hallway.
"No," Ronan said, eyes narrowing. "No one knows what it was. But they suspect it has something to do with me."
"What? That's unfair. How could they suspect you?"
"I don't know."
"Isn't it obvious? They found beast marks all over his body… You ain't a beast."
"See how they're looking at me? No one shares your logic."
People were staring.
Not in awe anymore — but sideways. Curious. Quiet. Judging.
"I can't deal with them," he muttered. "They're just dumb."
A silence hung between them before Calla asked, low:
"You think it's the leech again?"
"No," the wolf growled in his head. "Worse. This wasn't hunger. This was a message."
"No…" Ronan echoed slowly. "I don't think so either."
Meanwhile — Beneath the City
Beneath layers of old stone, candlelight flickered against the curved walls of a hidden chamber.
Seven chairs.
Seven figures.
A council that hadn't convened in years.
"It's begun," said the man in the crimson scarf — the same one who left the warning on the quad. "The blood seal's weakening. The outer wards can no longer contain what sleeps beneath this ground."
A woman in green robes leaned forward. "Then we must summon the heir."
"He's already been touched," said another. "The wolf awakened for a reason. We should not interfere—"
"We don't have time," the crimson man snapped. "The beast is testing him. This disappearance? It's the first trial."
A pause.
Then another voice, soft and cold:
"Then let's see if he survives it."
Back on Campus — That Night
Ronan felt it before it happened.
A tug behind his ribs.
A hot, sharp pull — like something underground was dragging him by the soul.
"They opened something," the wolf snarled. "I smell it."
"What is it?"
"Not leech. I don't know how to explain it. Let's just say... something older. Something that knows who you are. It can smell me. It can identify your identity."
"Agh—what's happening? I'm feeling heat in my body," Ronan hissed, gripping the edge of the desk.
"Just as I suspected," the wolf growled. "They're woofing you out. I wanted to delay this. You're not ready to moon-wolf yet... but they're forcing my hand."
"What do you mean?" Ronan asked, voice shaking.
"You'll—"
The wolf was about to explain when it happened.
Ronan's body began to harden. His fingernails elongated. His skin whitened—no, gleamed—like molten gold being poured into flesh.
"This…" Ronan groaned, his voice warping.
"The heck," the wolf cursed, pacing in his head. "They're forcing you to morph already."
And if Ronan transformed now — without balance, without training — he could lose control.
Turn into something he couldn't reel back.
A mindless killing monster.
Then — a knock. A shuffle.
His roommate stepped into the doorway, rubbing his eyes — and froze.
Ronan turned his head.
Eyes glowing like stirred gold, shoulders stretched unnaturally, bones cracking beneath skin that steamed.
The boy dropped his phone.
Terror rippled across his face. He folded into the farthest corner of the room, trembling so hard he pissed himself.
"W-what the—Ronan?!"
"Get out," the wolf ordered in Ronan's head. "Now."
"Quickly. Leave the hoste. Leave campus.
Find somewhere dark. Secluded.
We have to do something about this. We're out of time."
Ronan didn't argue.
He bolted.
Out the window. Over the railing. Into the shadows behind the east dorms — the place where campus lights died and the woods began.
The same woods where strange things always happened.
But this time, he was the strange thing.
Into the Trees
Branches whipped his face as he ran, half beast, half boy. His breath sounded like thunder. And still — the burning in his veins didn't stop.
"Wolf," Ronan gasped, stumbling over roots. "This is the first time in my life I'm hating you."
No answer.
"Tell me what's happening to me. Say it — who's woofing me out like this?"
Silence.
He could feel it — the wolf was hiding something.
Something big. Something personal.
And whatever it was… it wasn't just about survival anymore.
It was about identity.
About blood.
And about the game someone else had just begun.
Elsewhere — That Same Hour
In the archive room, Calla dug through drawers no one had touched in years.
She found it almost by accident — a folder mislabeled and stuffed into the wrong box.
Inside: a sketch of a broken seal. The same one from the lab. But its Incomplete.
And next to it:
A name.
Ronan Vale.
Her breath caught.
She stared at it for a long, long time.
"They've been trying to reach him…" she whispered. "But the letters never got to him."
She looked around the quiet, musty room.
"Someone's been hiding them here."
A cold sweat broke across her back.
Is he in danger?
For some reason, Calla couldn't shake the restlessness crawling up her spine.