Chapter 31: They Alphas Step up

A crescent of violet Qi tore through the air, smashing into three hyenas and sending them tumbling across the courtyard.

Before the beasts could recover, Lothe was already among them, his spear driving forward in a continuous, rhythmic storm of strikes.

Not far away, Seana moved with clinical precision. Her Shadow Weave Cloak fluttered as she stepped between two lunging hyenas.

The Blood Moon Sword flashed twice in tight, efficient arcs, leaving two severed necks spilling dark blood onto the stone pavement.

Every movement flowed into the next—deadly and without a single wasted motion.

The sight of their advance rallied the remaining survivors.

Behind the vanguard, Oren calmly drew a green-feathered arrow from his quiver.

His breathing evened out as Qi gathered around the arrowhead, making the steel glow with a faint green light.

Thwip!

The bowstring hummed. The arrow shot forward, piercing straight through the eye socket of a charging hyena before continuing through the skull of a second beast behind it.

Without pausing, Oren drew a second arrow, then a third. Every shot found its mark, pinning beasts to the stone and pulling trapped students out of fatal angles.

"Keep moving!" Oren shouted, his eyes scanning the flanks. "Don’t let them cluster!"

On the opposite side of the line, Nyren slammed both palms onto the wet stone.

A wave of freezing Qi surged outward beneath her boots, frost racing across the floorboards to climb the legs of four charging hyenas, locking them in solid ice.

"Now!" she called out.

Daniel acted immediately.

He thrust his hands toward the frozen targets, forcing the ground beneath them to buckle.

Thick stone spikes erupted from the pavement, impaling the immobilized beasts and shattering the ice into glittering shards.

At the same time, Adrian raised his right hand.

Broken swords, steel rods, and shattered iron fittings scattered across the courtyard began to vibrate. One by one, they lifted off the ground, floating behind him in a deadly arc.

His eyes narrowed. "Go."

The metal storm launched forward, tearing through the front ranks of the pack. The flying steel pierced hides and crushed bones, forcing the surviving hyenas back under the relentless barrage.

Professor Sy stepped through the gap created by Adrian’s barrage.

His longsword glowed with a pure white aura as he entered the pack without panic.

Every strike was stripped of fluff—a simple sidestep, a clean thrust to the throat, a measured step to the next target. Years of discipline showed in every movement.

Lucan followed closely at his flank. His steel chakram spun around his forearm before flying into the pack like a silver moon.

It curved around one hyena’s lunging claw, sliced through its throat, and returned cleanly to his outstretched hand before shooting out again.

Professor Sy glanced back, a faint smile touching his weathered face. "Good. You’re beginning to feel the flow."

Watching the students coordinate their abilities, Professor Sy’s expression remained guarded.

While they were pushing the pack back, his sharp eyes noticed the signs of fatigue—the trembling knees, the ragged breathing, and the fading glow of Qi around their weapons.

They are fighting well, Professor Sy thought, his jaw tightening. But their Qi pools are shallow. If we don’t finish this quickly, their energy will dry up completely, and the counter-attack will wipe us out.

To their left, Diego roared as he swung his massive broadsword.

The two-handed blade carved through the air, slamming into a leaping hyena. Bones shattered on impact, and the beast was flung ten meters across the courtyard.

A second hyena lunged for his shoulder. Diego planted his heels into the mud, gripped his hilt with both hands, and swung upward with everything he had.

Boom!

The heavy impact split the hyena from chest to spine.

"Hahaha!" Diego bellowed, wiping blood from his forehead. "Come on! I’ll break every last one of you!"

Behind the front line, Ruth and Melody held their ground together.

Ruth darted between wounded beasts like a phantom, her silver daggers striking only when a clear opening appeared—a quick thrust to the kidney or throat before retreating behind Diego’s broadsword.

Melody nocked another arrow, her fingers no longer trembling. She exhaled, settling her sight, and released.

Puchi!

A hyena preparing to spring at Daniel stiffened, an arrow buried deep in its eye socket, before collapsing into the mud.

Daniel glanced back, grinning. "Nice shot!"

Melody flushed slightly, immediately pulling another arrow from her quiver.

Around them, the other girls maintained their defensive circle, supporting one another without breaking formation. Fear still lingered in their eyes, but none of them backed down.

For a brief, hopeful minute, the human survivors were winning. Hyena carcasses littered the courtyard, and the pressure on the perimeter eased.

"We’re pushing them back!" a student yelled in triumph.

"No..." Professor Sy warned, his voice sharp. "We’re not."

As if answering his words, every remaining hyena stopped its advance.

They backed away several meters, lowering their heads into a rigid, submissive posture.

Silence fell over the blood-stained courtyard. The survivors stood breathing heavily, confused by the sudden retreat.

Then—

Heavy, rhythmic footsteps echoed across the wet stone.

Thud... Thud... Thud...

The pack parted down the middle, opening a wide lane through the center of the square.

The two alpha hyenas stepped forward.

The jet-black alpha walked with an eerie, weightless stride, its fur swallowing the dim red light of the sky.

Beside it, the gold-striped alpha moved with deliberate, heavy steps, its amber eyes coolly analyzing the tired students before locking onto a single person.

Lothe.

The black-furred alpha’s gaze settled on Seana.

Neither beast growled. They simply walked forward like rulers entering a conquered territory.

Lothe spun the Inferno Dragon Spear once, resting the dark shaft against his shoulder.

A cold, lazy smile appeared on his face. "...So you’re done watching."

Seana raised the Blood Moon Sword, a dense layer of crimson Qi coating the dark steel.

Her eyes remained fixed on the black-furred alpha. "I’ll take the black one."

Lothe nodded.

"Then the striped one is mine."

The two alpha hyenas vanished.

BOOM!!

The stone pavement beneath the two beasts exploded into dust.

"Too fast!" Nyren’s pupils shrank. Even with her awakened vision, she could only see two blurred dark streaks cutting across the courtyard.

A violent gust of wind whipped through the square.

Lothe’s [Spatial Perception] flared with a sharp warning. Without thinking, he bent his spine backward at a sharp angle.

Whoosh!

A jet-black claw tore through the air an inch above his nose.

The sheer wind pressure split several strands of his dark hair before the strike slammed into the concrete library wall behind him.

BOOM!!

Stone masonry shattered into gravel.

Before Lothe could reset his footing, another shadow flashed in his peripheral vision—the gold-striped alpha had already closed the distance, its jaws opening to snap at his throat.​