CHAPTER 378: CHAPTER 378: MOVING THROUGH RUINS

The world tilted when Christian stood. The ground felt unsteady, the air too thin. His skin stuck to the damp floor, cold seeping through every bruise. He braced a hand against the wall and waited for the room to stop spinning.

The basement was silent. Concrete walls, a broken chair, a single light flickering overhead. The air smelled of rust and decay. His own blood had dried to a dark sheen on his shirt. He pulled at the fabric until it tore free from his back.

The door was locked, but the metal had aged. He found a bent pipe near the corner and jammed it into the latch. The first push failed. The second tore the lock apart with a sharp crack that rang through the empty space. Before this he thought that his strength as an alpha was barbaric, but for once he was glad to have it.

Upstairs, the air was colder. The villa had been beautiful once, with marble floors, chandeliers, and tall windows now draped in torn fabric. Dust drifted through the light like ash. The silence pressed against his ears. No servants. No cars. Benedict was gone and for some reason, left everything almost ruined.

Then it clicked; Benedict won’t return there.

He moved carefully through the hall, eyes searching for anything useful. A faint glint on the counter caught his attention. A first aid kit sat there, its red cross faded but intact.

He crouched beside it and flipped it open. Inside lay gauze, alcohol wipes, and a few painkillers. He cleaned his wounds one by one. The antiseptic burned. He hissed between his teeth but didn’t stop. Blood turned to pink streaks that disappeared under clean bandages.

When he caught sight of himself in the window glass, the reflection startled him. Pale face. Split lip. A stranger wearing his eyes. For a moment, he almost looked like Benedict’s ghost... until the anger returned, steady and cold.

The study beyond the hall was stripped bare. Shelves stood empty, the safe door left open. Papers had been burned in the fireplace, leaving only the faint scent of smoke.

Christian pressed his palm to the desk, fingers tracing the grain of the wood. "You thought this would bury me," he muttered. His voice sounded rough, unused. "You thought wrong."

Upstairs, the air was sharp with dust and faint perfume, the kind that clung to fabric long after its wearer was gone. The corridor stretched ahead, half-lit by the gray wash of daylight pushing through the curtains. Christian’s steps echoed softly over the marble floor, careful but determined.

The first door on the left opened into a bedroom that looked lived in recently. The bed was unmade. A half-folded sweater sat on the chair beside it. A pair of boots, still muddy, stood near the window. Someone had left in a hurry.

He crossed to the dresser. Drawers hung open, filled with clothes that didn’t belong to Benedict: plain shirts, dark trousers, and a woman’s coat with the collar torn. Followers, then. The people who used to move like shadows behind the priest. All gone now, leaving behind the shell of their devotion.

He touched the sleeve of a coat. The fabric was warm enough that it couldn’t have been abandoned long. Maybe hours.

Christian moved to the next room. The smell of metal and cleaning solution grew stronger here. A portable cot, with white sheets stained rust-brown, stood near the wall. Surgical tools lay scattered on a tray: scissors, gauze, and a half-empty vial labeled in fine black ink.

He leaned closer. The handwriting was familiar.

It was Benedict’s.

The label read Compound 47 – Trial Batch E.

Christian’s pulse quickened. His throat tightened with the memory of the faint hiss before sleep, the subtle scent of mint and blood that always came before his thoughts started to fade. He turned the vial in his hand, watching the liquid inside catch the light, clear and harmless-looking. Poison disguised as medicine.

He pocketed it.

Moving on, he reached what used to be a living room. The furniture was still arranged neatly, though dust marked the empty spaces where objects had been removed. A table stood in the center, scattered with notebooks, pens, and a single cup of cold coffee. The cup was chipped, the lipstick stain still visible along its rim.

The walls felt wrong, heavy with a scent he couldn’t quite place. Not Benedict’s, but something thinner, more human. His followers, probably. Omegas, mostly, and some betas. Their pheromones lingered in the air like residue, faint traces of fear mixed with blind reverence.

He ran a hand over the back of the nearest chair, noting the indentation left by someone sitting too long. The air was still warm in places. He swallowed.

"They were here," he murmured. "All of them."

The realization sank in. Benedict hadn’t simply left, he had taken them. Every loyal body, every witness. Whatever experiment he’d started wasn’t finished.

Christian grabbed a coat from the rack near the stairs, heavy wool, military-cut, and far too large for him. It smelled faintly of antiseptic and incense. He slipped it on anyway. It was practical and warm, and he could use every layer between his body and the world outside.

In the kitchen, he found bottled water and a few ration bars, sealed and stacked in neat rows. He tore one open, forcing himself to eat. The sweetness made his throat sting, but it steadied his hands.

He rinsed the dried blood from his skin at the sink, cold water stinging like needles. When he looked up again, his reflection in the window was clearer. He looked older, sharper, less like a man crawling from a grave, and more like one climbing toward vengeance.

He turned off the tap and listened. The wind rattled the shutters. Somewhere upstairs, a door creaked softly, or maybe it was the house settling. He wasn’t sure anymore.

But the feeling in his chest had shifted. The fear had burned away, leaving only resolve.

If Benedict thought his empire of control had ended cleanly, he was wrong.

Christian would track the scent, following it through cities, through churches, through every ruined corner of the network the man had built. He would hunt him down with the precision of the predator he’d tried to create.

He stepped back into the hall, adjusting the coat collar around his throat.

The villa still smelled of him, of them, but it was fading, and Christian was ready to make it disappear completely.

He paused at the doorway, glancing once at the staircase that led down to the basement he had left behind. "Not your cage anymore," he whispered.

Then he walked out into the daylight, the chill wind cutting across his face. The gravel crunched under his boots, and the last threads of Benedict’s pheromones dissolved into the air.