CHAPTER 219: _LET THERE BE CHAOS

Marcellus’ POV

*****

"What exactly would you all want to discuss with the Alpha King anyway?" He asked curiously, folding his arms in front of his chest and scanning his gaze through all their faces.

Men, women, and teenagers who probably only cared about having a stable WiFi before now. They were all banded together because of one cause.

Fear.

Marcellus could literally smell it coming off them like a miasma. People fear what they don’t understand and this little mob of gathered protesters were a perfect example of that.

"Odessa Pierce or whatever she calls herself should leave our pack and go back to where she came from!" A woman standing beside the leader of the protesters yelled out angrily.

But then the leader placed his hand in front of her, signalling her to leave the talking to him.

How smart.

"We simply ask to speak to the Alpha King," Timothy remarked, tilting his head. "Or is that too much to ask, Beta?"

There it is...

A small smirk tugged at the corner of Marcellus’ lips as he shook his head. "Not really. But then when you’re carrying around signs like these in the name of protesting..."

Marcellus gestured at the signs the protesters carried.

One had an art illustration of a witch being burned at the stake. He pointed directly at that one, which was being held by a young male wolf.

The lad shrank a little when he saw Marcellus’ finger on him, but he didn’t back down. He stood firm, clutching the sign tighter.

Interesting...

"You," Marcellus called the lad directly, gesturing at him. "That sign in your hands. Do you really believe it? Do you really feel like witches deserve to burn? That they’re nothing but bringers of chaos?"

As he asked that, he took a few steps forward, tilting his head. The crowd probably still saw it as him trying to calm things and be a voice of reason.

But in reality, Marcellus was slowly planting a seed.

The young ones were usually the easiest to manipulate.

This lad might seem strong-willed, but his fierce spirit was perfect for Marcellus.

"Yes!" The lad yelled back in response to Marcellus’ questions, lowering the sign and stepping forward as well as he stretched out his arms. "Witches have plagued this world for millennia before the war. They parade themselves as protectors of nature, but in reality, they’re pests!"

Marcellus felt the need to chuckle but he didn’t. Instead, he muttered a simple spell word.

It was the first seal in his long game of manipulating the lad. He watched as he blinked, probably confused about what had just happened.

But Marcellus’ magic was already slowly taking root in his mind.

"And what makes you think wolves are any different?" Marcellus asked, raising his arms cluelessly. "Everything from our toxic pack hierarchies to how different packs have fought each other over territories. The Alpha Kings have kept the balance for generations."

"Balance?!" Another person, a young girl yelled out with amusement. "What balance? Where was the Alpha King’s balance when people were murdered under his nose in the pack? Where was his balance when wolves in Mexico were captured by humans? Is that balance?!"

Power to the youth!

Marcellus sighed lightly, trying to play off the amusement he felt in this situation. He raised his hands slowly, trying to seem like he was "calming them".

But under the sleeves of his robes, runes that glowed with a dark green light began burning, activating the second layer of his manipulation spell.

"About the situation in Mexico..." Marcellus paused, clasping his hands together. "I wasn’t supposed to say anything but the Alpha King and his wife, Odessa, went on a mission to Mexico. They’ll free our brethren and solve the problem with the humans."

That single word... "Problem".

He made it seem diplomatic but he said it on purpose. It easily painted a bad image despite all the good things he said about Kaelos and Odessa just now.

And the people ate it up like bait... Especially the teenage lad holding the "burn the witches" sign.

"The only solution to that ’problem’ is for every human involved to get killed." The lad brushed past the crowd and stepped forward, causing Timothy, who had been standing silently all this while, to glance at him with confusion.

"Calm down..." Timothy placed his hand in front of the lad but the latter brushed it off as he kept on walking forward.

Perfect.

"Hey!" One of the guards behind Marcellus yelled out. "Stay back! The Beta is speaking peacefully with you and the bare minimum is for you to grant him that same courtesy."

Marcellus glanced over his shoulder and saw that Alaric was the one who made that order.

He smirked subtly as he slowly turned his gaze back to the lad.

"I think you should listen to what he said," Marcellus said but then the boy snapped.

"No! I think YOU should listen to us!" He seemed like he was seconds away from snapping and his eyes glowed faintly.

Anger.

The third layer of his manipulation spell took root in the boy’s head, using his anger as a thread that connected Marcellus to his mind.

All Marcellus needed now was a trigger.

"My father, a pack doctor who was assigned to treat you after the Alpha King beat you close to death..." The boy continued, his voice shaking. "He’s missing! Probably got killed by that hybrid filth following the Alpha King around."

Oh... Oh wow. Awkward.

Marcellus smiled awkwardly when he remembered the old pack doctor he had killed at his residence. He just saw him as a random target and told Cullen to get rid of the body.

’I keep forgetting that these people actually place some emotional significance on each other.’ He thought to himself at the same moment that the lad snarled.

"Enough is enough! Tell the Alpha King to come back here and face us!" The lad was unrelenting even though Timothy kept trying to hold him back.

Marcellus smirked slightly. Only the lad noticed the smirk... Because that was the trigger of the spell.

Just one final move from him to make the lad realise how insignificant he is. And since he’s supposed to be representing Kaelos now...

"Again... Stand down!" Alaric yelled as the other guards raised their guns in preparation.

Werewolves using silver bullets against other werewolves. Ironic.

"Farak! Come back and stop escalating things!" Timothy yelled at the boy but the latter glanced back at him coldly.

"Things have already escalated."

Without warning, the boy turned and ran forward, roaring out as he slowly began shifting. But the guards fired at him, bringing him down mid shift.

Marcellus watched with cold satisfaction as the boy’s lifeless body plopped to the ground like a rag doll, his pained whimpers an unintentional fuel to the other wolves who stared at him with shock.

"He was just a boy! He only just turned eighteen!" An elderly woman finally yelled out.

"Hold!" Timothy said with a shaky voice to the other protesters but even he seemed uncertain.

Without warning, a young girl screamed. "This is not diplomacy! It’s tyranny. We’re being silenced!"

Suddenly, she stepped forward and yelled. "We won’t let you silence us!"

And with that, just that single sentence riled up the others to charge forward, many shifting into their wolf forms with their sights set on the guards.

Marcellus smirked, stealthily backing away into the compound as the guards stepped forward, gunshots firing and howls tearing through the air.

"Let there be chaos..." Marcellus whispered as he watched.