CHAPTER 351: _ WRATH

I should’ve seen it. I should’ve realized.

No, maybe I did. Maybe I had been desperately avoiding the truth that was right before me. Because I didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t want to believe that my only friend—the one person I considered my true brother—was the enemy all along.

In that single second, a thousand thoughts erupted in my head as I began to connect the dots. Everything was clear as day, yet I had somehow deluded myself into believing something else.

The sorrow, guilt, and numbness I felt transformed into something else. Something more dangerous. Wrath.

"LUIS, YOU DAMN BASTARD!" I bellowed with bloodshot eyes as I shot across the hallway. I shoved everyone who stood in my path, and they yelled in concern for me to slow down, but I couldn’t think anymore.

I didn’t care about anything anymore. All I had left in me was an unquenchable rage and the desire to rip my cousin limb from limb.

I weaved around corridors in seconds, my form slowly shifting. My claws grew longer, and my fangs flashed with malicious intent.

"Hugo!" I called.

"You don’t gotta tell me twice, mi amigo!" Hugo understood instantly. I took a giant leap down the stairs and my full werewolf form burst forth. I was a walking beast of pure, unbridled power. My thick fur swayed furiously as my hind legs created heavy thuds wherever I passed.

In less than a minute, I arrived before Luis’s room and burst right through the door without an ounce of hesitation. And, amidst the crashing, I saw him. He was seated on a wooden chair—the same one he’d sat my dead mother on—as he stared aimlessly into a full-body mirror.

His eyes, from the mirror, shifted slightly to look at me.

And he smiled.

The bastard actually smiled.

"Luis." I growled, pouring all my hate and contempt into a single sentence, "Te juro por la Diosa, if you really are who I think you are, today will be the last you breathe."

He didn’t stand up, nor turn to face me. He simply smirked and looked at me through the mirror. That devilish, mocking smirk that I recognized all too well. At that point, I didn’t need confirmation from his mouth. I could immediately tell that Luis was indeed the culprit behind my and my wife’s sorrow.

"He will not live to see tomorrow," Hugo said within me, his voice chilling and low— something that only happened when he was dead set on something.

I was the same. Now that I understood who the enemy was, I parted with all the fury in my heart and stood there in calculative silence.

Luis finally spoke. He said with a low chuckle, "Looks like the secret’s finally out, ¿eh? Not like I was trying too hard this time. Wanna know why?"

My claws tightened around my fingers as I asked, "Why?"

Luis spun his chair around, now looking directly at me. He said with a smile, "Because, recently, I went through unimaginable pain. Ay, it’s the kind of pain that makes you numb to everything else. Torment you’d never understand with that mortal head of yours."

He sighed and leaned comfortably in his chair, gazing at the ceiling. Luis clasped his hands and continued, "When I came back, I thought, ’What’s the point, no?’ What’s the point of following anyone else’s plans except my own? I’ve already suffered more than enough, so I’ll take whatever I want, consequences be damned."

I narrowed my eyes. I couldn’t understand what the hell the bastard was talking about.

Noticing the look of confusion on my face, Luis chuckled. He shrugged and said, "You wouldn’t get it. Anyway, aren’t you curious how I became this ’terrifying entity’ you fear so much?"

"You mean a demon," My fangs flashed.

Luis laughed. He covered his face with his palm and muttered, "I suppose. But we’re all demons one way or another, no?"

Then, he flashed me an unsettling smile and said, "Your father is certainly a demon—and those elders, too. Little Álvaro is a demon. Even your mother—ay, I thought she was different, but no. She was just like the rest. That’s why she had to die, Axel."

My eyes turned to slits. Rage surged through me again, and it took every bit of self-control not to tear his throat out.

Luis continued with a taunting smile, "So, you see it? You’re all demons. Except María José, of course. She’s the only pure soul in this filthy world. When I unleash my wrath, she’s the only one I’ll leave standing."

"Wrath?" I growled. "You don’t know a damn thing about wrath. But you’re about to."

"Is that a threat?" Luis laughed. "Por Dios, coming from a weakling like you, I almost feel disgusted. Anyway, after your father threw me in that chair, paralyzed and useless, I spent every day planning this moment."

"What? Did you really think I was gonna let it slide? Did you think I’d sit there and let him live happily after taking my father from me? You’re all fools. And you’re gonna pay for everything you’ve done."

He exhaled and wore that devilish smile again.

"Did you think I enjoyed listening to your dumb rants about girls or how you were too ’conflicted’ to be alpha? I hated every second. Axel, I hated you the most. You’re a spineless cabrón. And I am going to enjoy making you suffer."

He rose to his feet, and the shadows in the room stirred like something alive.

Luis declared with a smile, "I am going to condemn all of you to an eternity of suffering."

I exhaled and brandished my claws. "Only one of us is walking out of here, Luis. And trust me... It won’t be you."

Luis cackled and spread out his arms. The shadows in the room swarmed towards him like a tide and his form rapidly changed too. Instead of the figure of Luis I was familiar with, a towering demon stood in his place now. He was huge, perhaps even bigger than my full werewolf form.

His body was pitch-black and reeked of sulfur. His teeth were jagged, his eyes black like midnight. On his head, two curling horns stood menacingly.

So this is what you are... I growled as I charged forward.

Luis did the same... and then, we clashed.