The Wolf God's Unwanted Luna

Chapter 129: The Eve of Vengeance

As soon as I stepped out of the room, I knew I hadn’t done a great job of hiding it from her. I’d tried, but I couldn’t fake calm not when I was this close. My vengeance was within reach, and pretending everything was normal around Vivian just didn’t feel possible.

I moved quickly through the shadows of the forest, the last stretch of night clinging desperately to the edges of the sky. The heavy clouds above thickened, dark with unshed rain. The scent of moisture and electricity lingered on the wind. A storm was coming in more ways than one.

By the time I reached the farthest edge of the island, the air was charged. Two of my men stood guard at the hidden entrance, silent and alert. I nodded once before descending into the cave system below.

Each step deeper into the earth brought me closer to the core of this operation closer to the reckoning I’d spent years planning.

When I entered the subterranean war room, the others were already there: Hogan, Albericus, Lexero, Fern, and Venom bent over the massive wooden table, its surface completely buried under tactical maps, old parchments, and intelligence reports. Their hushed voices cut off the moment I arrived. No one met my eyes directly.

Good. They understood what today meant.

"Report," I commanded, in no mood for delay. They knew the line between my tolerance and fury had worn dangerously thin over the course of this mission.

Venom stepped forward first, his voice like a low hiss through smoke. "We’ve located the door. I’ve locked it down and reinforced the parameters. We await your word, my lord."

Even after all this time, that title coming from him still felt strange.

Venom wasn’t like the others. A serpent shifter, his loyalty ran deeper than blood. He towered over most men at seven feet tall, all lean muscle and coiled menace. His white hair was slicked back, his sharp features made even sharper by golden eyes slitted like a viper’s. He had the kind of past that even I didn’t press him on.

When we first met, it took time time and a lot of blood for us to build trust. Now? He’d die for me without hesitation. Still, I’d never convinced him to drop the "my lord" bit, no matter how often I told him I didn’t rule over snakes.

Today, I wouldn’t argue. Today, I needed total loyalty. Precision. No distractions.

We were almost there. The door was found. The pieces were in place. And soon... everything that had been taken would be reclaimed.

Blood for blood. Betrayal for betrayal.

Let the storm begin.

Lexero stood before me, his posture stiff and sharp like a drawn blade, his voice steady as he delivered his report.

"The men are ready and have been preparing themselves with the dosages you ordered. Four hundred in the front line, forty thousand in the second, and another four hundred held back as reserves," he said.

He was always precise, always composed.

Lexero was an anomaly in our world a half-lion shifter, unable to fully transform. It hadn’t stopped him from clawing his way to the top, and every scar carved into his dark chest was a testament to that. His chocolate-brown skin gleamed under the warm light, taut over a frame honed by years of relentless combat. His long, dark hair was tied in a messy knot atop his head, and his mismatched eyes one black rimmed with gold, the other gold with a black ring never wavered when they met mine. Shorter than the rest of us at five-eleven, but no less formidable. His pride radiated off him, an aura as thick and heavy as my own.