CHAPTER 175: CHAPTER 175: THE LEADER

Lorraine’s POV

I froze where I stood, my breath coming ragged, uneven. One second, it was just Adrian, the soldiers, and me. The next, this towering figure seemed to materialize out of the shadows, and the air itself bent around him like he owned it.

Every single warrior around me fell to their knees. Heads bowed. The kind of reverence that was carved into bone, not just muscle.

But me? I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. All I could do was stare at the massive stranger striding toward me like the earth itself belonged to his footsteps. He was tall, too tall, broad shouldered, cloaked in darkness like it wrapped around him willingly. His presence sucked all the air from the dawn

And then he stopped in front of me.

Before I could take a step back, his hand shot out and clamped my cheek, fingers digging into my skin with a predator’s possession. His eyes burned down into mine, not like a man looking at another living being, but like a beast appraising a prize.

"I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment," he murmured, his voice low and venom laced, and then he laughed. A slow, deep, sinister sound that slithered down my spine like cold steel.

My heart thundered in my chest, confusion ripping through me. Who the hell was this man? Why were they all bowing? Why was he touching me like I was already his kill?

I jerked my head back, wrenching my face from his grip. My skin burned where his fingers had pressed. "And just who the hell are you?" I spat, my voice breaking through the suffocating silence. "You crazy psycho man."

The sound of my words cracked through the soldiers like a whip. Gasps. Wide eyes. Some even flinched.

And then....

The captain had his sword out in a heartbeat, its edge pressing against my throat before I could blink. His eyes were fire, promising to slit me open for daring to speak.

Adrian’s voice cut through the tension, tight with something that chilled me more than the blade at my neck.

"Lorraine..." He shook his head slowly, his expression caught somewhere between pity and horror. "He is our Leader. The Leader of the Crimson Hunt."

My blood turned to ice in my veins.

The Leader.

The yard felt like it shrank around me. My lungs struggled to breathe as my eyes locked onto the man Adrian called The Leader of the Crimson Hunt

Is this really him?

The face behind the Crimson Hunt. The butcher of thousands. The phantom whispered about in hushed tones by packs across the kingdom. The man whose shadow stretched long enough to make even Lycans wary.

And he was standing right in front of me, smirking like a wolf who had cornered a lamb.

My mind reeled. This was the man who raised Adrian? The one who twisted him into a betrayer, a killer? My stomach churned violently at the thought. Not in my worst nightmares had I ever imagined coming face to face with the devil himself the moment I set foot past the academy gates.

His gaze cut through me, sharp, hungry, terrifyingly amused. There was no warmth in his expression, only the patient delight of a predator circling prey.

"I’ve seen you long before you even came here, Lorraine Anderson," he said, voice low, deep, thrumming with an authority that made the warriors in the yard bow their heads further. His eyes gleamed with that unnatural hunger as he stepped closer. "I arrived earlier at the academy, waiting for just when you would arrive."

My throat tightened. What?

"I don’t understand," I forced out, my voice breaking into the silence. "What do you mean?"

The Leader’s lips curled upward, but it wasn’t a smile, it was a snarl of delight, as though he were savoring my fear.

"Oh, don’t you worry, Anderson." His voice wrapped around my name like a chain. "You will soon understand. You..." He leaned forward, his eyes boring into mine with feverish intensity. "...you are the key to all my problems."

My body went still like ice was poured all over me. My knees wanted to buckle, but I stood rooted, glaring at him despite the storm raging inside me.

He didn’t wait for my response. Turning with the ease of someone in complete command, he flicked his gaze toward the Captain. "Get me my Jade sword."

The Captain’s head bowed instantly. "Yes, my Leader." He barked an order, and tge soldier disappeared out of sight immediately

Panic surged through me. My body screamed run, but I was hemmed in by warriors, every one of them with a hand on their blades.

Adrian suddenly moved, stepping between us, his arm outstretched in desperate defiance.

"Please!" His voice cracked, carrying a rawness I hadn’t heard from him before. "Don’t kill her. Lorraine isn’t stupid enough to walk in here like this. She works with the Lycans. There must be a reason why she’s here. Let us hear her out first before deciding her fate, please!"

The warriors gasped again at Adrian’s audacity, but I barely heard them. My entire body was still trembling under the weight of the Leader’s words.

The key to all his problems?

His words echoed like a curse, and I felt my blood run cold.

But now, his attention wasn’t even on me. He turned, slow as a predator circling, and locked his sharp gaze on Adrian.

"You are standing up for herr" The Leader’s voice was low but laced with venom, "right in front of me?"

Adrian stiffened like a soldier caught stealing bread. His head snapped down in an immediate bow. "I meant no form of insubordination, my Leader," he said quickly, the words tumbling out in a rush. "I only thought.... we could get some information from her before we finally kill her off."

The Leader tilted his head, studying Adrian as though weighing the sincerity in his voice. Then, after a beat that seemed to stretch like a noose tightening around my throat, he gave a single nod. His head swung back to me.

"And what kind of information do you have then, Anderson?" he asked, his lips curving into a half-smirk. "Are you willing to tell me what you and the Lycans, your friends, are planning?"

My chest rose and fell with a heavy sigh. That was it. The moment the noose either strangled me or slipped free.

I lifted my chin, eyes narrowing. "Those monsters are not my friends."

The words fell from my mouth like venom. Even Adrian’s head jerked up, his eyes flashing in shock.

"What do you mean?" he asked, his voics filled with disbelief

I turned to him, then to the circle of warriors who seemed to hold their breath as my voice carried through the courtyard. If there was ever a time to weave the perfect lie, it was now.

"I mean I despise them," I said, my tone steady though my heart thundered like a war drum. "I lost my arm because of Kieran Valerius Hunter, the Lycans’ precious prince. Do you know what that’s like, Adrian? To have a part of you torn away, to bleed and scream while they look at you like you’re nothing?" My voice cracked, not from acting, but from memory "He did that to me. Him. And I’ll never forgive it."

I clenched my fists, holding their gaze as the heat rose up in my throat. "I want nothing to do with the Lycans. Not their games. Not their academy. Not their empire. I came here because I want to see them burn. Every last one of them. If you’ll let me, I’ll join the Crimson Hunt. Because I don’t just hate them, I want them dead."

The words hung heavy in the air and my pulse throbbed in my ears.

Adrian just stared at me, his lips parting but no sound leaving. He looked as though I had slapped him with a words he couldn’t swallow. Shock and disbelief mingled in his eyes, like he didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified.

The Leader didn’t flinch. His face was a mask, unreadable. But then his gaze slid sideways toward Adrian.

"So," The Leader said, his tone smooth as a blade slipping from its sheath. "She is just a defector."

Adrian blinked, startled.

"If she couldn’t stay loyal to the Lycans, what is the guarantee she would stay loyal to us?" The Leader asked, his voice heavy with mockery.

A shadow moved at the edge of the yard. The captain, the same man who had leveled his sword at my throat moments ago, returned briskly. In his hands gleamed a weapon that made the air in the room tighten, his Jade Sword. Its greenish sheen glimmered like poison, sjarp and merciless.

He stepped forward and bowed low, pressing the weapon into The Leader’s waiting hands.

Without a word, The Leader examined it, then turned to Adrian. He didn’t even need to gesture, just a subtle narrowing of his eyes was enough. The captain moved swiftly, taking the sword again and carrying it toward Adrian.

He stopped right in front of him, stretching the blade out.

"Kill her," he commanded.

The silence that followed was absolute. Even my own breath caught, frozen in my chest.

Adrian’s eyes widened. "What?" His voice cracked, faint, like he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.

"Kill her." The captain’s tone carried the weight of an order that could not be refused.

Adrian’s hands trembled as they hovered near the weapon. His face drained of color, eyes flicking from me to The Leader. "But...."

The word hadn’t even left his lips fully before the steel whispered against his flesh.

The Leader himself had drawn the Jade Sword once more, this time so fast that none of us saw it until it was pressed against Adrian’s throat. The green shimmer kissed his skin, a thin line of crimson already welling where the edge bit too close.

"Kill her," The Leader repeated, his voice quiet but far more dangerous. "Or I kill you. Your choice."