At that, Isabella shot to her feet like soone lit her skirt on fire.
Even Kian blinked at how fast she moved. His hand was still raised from where he had been cradling her shoulder a second ago.
"...What the hell was that," he muttered under his breath.
She stood upright, brushing off her skirt with forced nonchalance, as if she hadn’t just done a speed-dodge from the underworld.
Internally, though, she was spiraling.
Who the hell was shooting at her?! Were there snipers in the damn Stone Age?! Who even had archery training in prehistoric tis?!
"Stay here," Kian said firmly, his voice snapping her back to the present. He stood up tall, eyes narrowed like a predator. "Don’t move."
"I wasn’t planning on," Isabella muttered under her breath, barely audible—but of course, Kian heard her.
He didn’t respond. Didn’t even look her way. His posture remained rigid, his eyes fixed ahead like he hadn’t heard a thing. But Isabella knew better. That small twitch in his jaw? Oh, he definitely heard her.
Her gaze shifted past Kian to the five n from Fangridge City. Standing there like they owned the dirt under their feet, broad-chested, smug-eyed, and cloaked in arrogance. It was fustrating.
And when she looked at the gaurds—she could tell—they were cautious.
Why hadn’t the beastn attacked? Why were the guards, warriors, everyone just... standing still?
Isabella realized it then. They were scared. Not terrified, but alert. Calculating.
Because it wasn’t just her life on the line—it was theirs too.
These n didn’t look ordinary. Not in the way they carried themselves. They weren’t weaklings.
And taking down one four-striped beastman? Nearly impossible. Taking down five? Suicidal.
Even with Kian, Luca, and Asael, who had joined them silently like a shadow, no one wanted to make the first move. Not without orders.
All eyes were on Kian.
And Kian?
He stood like an iron wall. Cold. Still. Untouchable.
But in that silence, Isabella could tell he was thinking—no, calculating.
He had assud these five were the only problem. But now? That arrow from earlier wasn’t so accident. It was a ssage. A warning.
If you don’t hand her over, you’ll all die.
She looked around again, a cold chill brushing her skin. Were there more of them? Hidden? Watching?
Of course there were.
And Kian knew it.
But he didn’t flinch.
Didn’t waver.
Didn’t even blink.
He turned slightly, just enough for the moonlight to catch the side of his face, and Isabella saw it—the glow in his blue eyes, faint but eerie. His jaw clenched, and under the moon, the markings on his body—those strange, rune-like tattoos—seed to shift.
Like they were alive.
She swallowed.
This man would never back down.
Not even against a hundred.
He would never give her up. Not even if it ant war.
Not even if it ant he’d die for it.
And that... did sothing strange to her chest.
He’d die just to protect ?
She blinked. Why?
She barely knew him. They weren’t lovers. He was cold. Detached. Always unreadable.
Yet here he was, staking everything. For her.
"Ha..." the man from Fangridge—clearly the leader—laughed. A low, mocking sound. "You can’t win against us all, no matter how strong you are, Kian."
He said Kian’s na like it was a joke.
Kian didn’t move.
Didn’t reply.
But the air?
It changed.
Isabella could feel it.
Like the wind had forgotten how to blow. Like the stars had frozen.
Even Luca—who usually had sothing sarcastic to throw in—went dead silent.
Isabella stepped slightly behind Kian. Just a little. Just enough so she could still peek out from behind him while pretending she wasn’t doing exactly that.
Then she looked up at him again.
And regretted it.
His eyes...
They weren’t just glowing now.
They were burning.
Like so deep primal force had cracked through his calm surface and started to leak out.
The smile vanished from the Fangridge leader’s face.
"Kian?" Isabella whispered carefully, hand brushing his arm.
He didn’t answer.
Didn’t blink.
His gaze locked on the n ahead as if he’d already decided how each one would die.
"Check our surroundings," Kian finally said, his voice quiet, yet sharp enough to cut through tal.
The beastn obeyed instantly, two of them stepping forward, claws half-shifted—
—but they didn’t make it far.
Because from the bushes behind them, sothing enormous slithered out with a rustle that sent every bird in the nearby trees scattering.
A red snake. Massive. Gleaming. Unmistakable.
It moved with quiet power, its scales catching the moonlight like liquid fire.
Gasps erupted.
So of the guards stepped back.
Luca instinctively reached for the blade at his side.
Even the n from Fangridge stiffened.
But Isabella?
She was already smirking.
When Luca and the guards realized who the snake was, they instantly froze—shoulders stiffening, weapons forgotten. The tension that had clung to their bodies a mont ago vanished like mist in the morning sun. Luca’s jaw dropped slightly, his hand still hovering near the small blade at his waist like he was debating whether to sheathe it... or drop it entirely.
"...Oh," Luca breathed.
The guards exchanged wide-eyed glances and stepped back, subtly shifting their stance to sothing more respectful.
The air changed.
Even the leader from Fangridge City, who had been grinning smugly with arms crossed and an overly relaxed stance, suddenly tensed. His smile remained, but it had stiffened at the edges, and for the first ti since he’d arrived, his posture didn’t scream "unbothered." No, his shoulders had risen just a bit. A bead of sweat rolled down his temple.
That one subtle shift in his expression wasn’t loud—it wasn’t theatrical—but it was enough.
Kian, who stood beside Isabella with arms folded and his cold gaze locked on the man, noticed it imdiately. His jaw flexed ever so slightly.
Finally. Even he isn’t that blind.
Isabella’s eyes were still locked on Cyrus, she seed proud. But then again felt uneasy, as she waited for him to erge completely.
And when he did...
Her breath caught.
For a split second, she didn’t even recognize him.
Her soft, sweet Cyrus—whose eyes usually held a gentleness that felt like spring after a long winter—was gone.
This beast in front of her, this fully transford serpent... was sothing else entirely.
His red scales shimred under the moonlight, kissed with faint hints of pink that caught the light like brushed gemstones, every coil of his long body moving with a precise kind of fury.
His massive, scaled body coiled tightly, tension rippling through every inch of muscle beneath his shimring hide. Those glowing, narrowed, storm-cloud eyes locked on the man from Fangridge City like a blade unsheathed.
There was no kindness there. No patience. No hesitation.
And the worst part?
His long tail was wrapped tightly around the bloodied upper body of a man—limp, lifeless, a mber of the Fangridge group, judging by the dark markings and stone-sewn emblem still clinging to what remained of his chest.
A hush fell over everyone.
Cyrus slithered forward slowly—almost casually—and the sound of scales dragging across the packed dirt was the only thing that filled the heavy silence.
Isabella stepped back once, not out of fear, but out of instinct. She’d never seen Cyrus angry before—and this was a new experience for her now.
She didn’t know what was more surprising—the anger in Cyrus’s eyes, or how much it rattled her. She’d never seen him like this before.
He dropped the body with a dull thud right in front of the Fangridge leader’s feet.
Cold. Precise.
The man flinched—just a bit—and that alone was enough to send a wave of satisfaction through Kian, who tilted his head slightly, a silent smirk threatening the edge of his lips.
Even Luca, who had previously looked like he wanted to crawl into the bushes and disappear, leaned forward just a bit and whispered under his breath,
"...Okaaay, that’s definitely one way to say hello."
Isabella didn’t laugh, but her lip twitched. She watched the way Cyrus’s eyes never left the leader. The way his body still remained half-coiled, like he wasn’t sure if he was done yet.
Like he was deciding if that one body was enough.
"Cyrus?" she called gently.
No response.
The only thing that answered her was the flick of his long tongue and a faint, low hiss.
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