Chapter 125: The Fall Of The Southern Packs

Akara

Pack Sunrise, Pack Neptune, and Pack Crest had all fallen.

Those were the major southern packs. The lesser packs had quickly folded, choosing to live under the iron regime of the new self-proclaimed king rather than face total annihilation. It was the dawn of a new, blood-soaked day across the southern plains. Only one pack remained standing, the ultimate powerhouse of the south.

Pack Sundown commanded the largest amount of fortified land in the entire region. They had massive stone walls, sprawling buildings, and heavy infrastructure. They operated like a mini-capital. And this capital fiercely refused the rogue king, choosing to stay stubbornly loyal to the kings of kings.

That loyalty would be their final mistake.

"Sister," Varek muttered, pacing near the front lines as he stared up at the towering stone walls of the Sundown pack. "We have been waiting for nearly an hour now, and this pack refuses to open their gates. I say we stomp them into the dust."

Akara stood a few paces behind him, her hands folded inside the sleeves of her dark robes. Her eyes were calm, but dangerous. "You’re right. At this point, they are just being disrespectful. We sent them letters, even emails, asking for peace and telling them to simply submit to the new rule. But they refused. So let us just slaughter them and enslave the rest. We need able-bodied labor to build our new palaces anyway."

Varek smiled, his dark eyes gleaming. "Indeed. My future queen deserves the finest palace in the world to live in."

At that, Akara finally snapped. She stopped pacing and glared at her brother. "You know... I still do not understand. Why on earth do you want to marry the Ironfang princess?"

Varek didn’t flinch. He kept his eyes locked on the stone walls. "Oh, that is simply because I have taken a fancy to her. I like her. She’s cute."

"You like her?" Akara scoffed, throwing her hands up in disbelief. "Have you completely lost your mind? She is an Ironfang princess! We are supposed to be burning their entire bloodline out of existence, and you are about to raise this girl to the throne?"

"Well, I know that," Varek replied smoothly. "And you also know that after we conquer the southern packs, we need to rebound. We need time to rest and consolidate our forces and validate my rule. Thus, I gave them this ridiculous marriage ultimatum so it doesn’t look politically suspicious when we pause our campaign to rest."

Akara narrowed her eyes, studying his face with deep suspicion. "You’re lying. I could march us straight into the northern territories right now and take them in a week. What is the true cause?"

"I told you, I like her," Varek insisted, though a slight smirk played at the corner of his mouth. "And besides, it is strategically better if we have someone from the old royal bloodline sitting on the new throne. It will help the common packs accept our rule without a fight, minimizing the blood we have to spill."

Akara eyed her brother for a long, quiet moment. He is hiding something, she thought, her instincts screaming that there was more to his obsession. But she let out a slow breath and shook her head. "You know what? Whatever."

Varek grinned, turning away from her. He raised his heavy iron sword high into the air and shouted to the mass of fighters behind him. "We march upon Pack Sundown now! By dawn today, Pack Sundown will belong to us, and the entire south will be ours!"

A deafening roar erupted from the ranks.

Watching the massive horde cheer, an outsider would have noticed something deeply disturbing. The rogue army looked ten times larger than it had when they faced the royal army just a week ago. That mathematically made zero sense, especially since thousands of rogue wolves had been slaughtered during the initial clash on the open field.

The terrifying truth was simple: not a single rogue who fell in that battle had truly died.

Akara’s dark magic had seen to that. She had caught their fleeing souls before they could cross the veil into the realm of the dead, yanking them back and stitching their spirits directly into their rotting physical bodies. Her power genuinely knew no bounds. It made people wonder where she and Varek had truly come from. They didn’t feel merely mortal; they felt like ancient, half-god deities walking the earth to tear empires down.

The moment the heavy war drums stopped beating, a dark cloud of arrows rained down from Pack Sundown’s great stone walls.

That didn’t stop the horde. They charged.

What followed was an absolute masterclass in brutal, coordinated destruction. Varek and Akara fought like a localized storm. Varek was pure, unbridled brute force; he fought like a charging whale, smashing through heavy oak gates with his bare fists, swinging his broadsword in wide, bone-crushing arcs that hurled defenders off the battlements.

Akara moved like the deep ocean, soft, delicate, and utterly lethal. She drifted through the chaos without a single drop of blood touching her robes, whispering ancient incantations under her breath. When a royal guard raised a crossbow to shoot her in the back, a sudden, violent flock of black crows materialized from the shadows, diving blindly at his face and clawing out his eyes before he could pull the trigger.

Together, they tore the gates apart. The rogue army flooded through the breaches, spilling into the sprawling streets of the city. Citizens ran for their lives, screaming as houses were smashed and the infrastructure of the proud southern capital was reduced to rubble. The rogues cleared the streets block by block, showing no mercy, pushing relentlessly toward the center until they reached the grand estate on the hill.

The heavy double doors of the main house stood wide open. Inside the dimly lit living room, the Alpha of Pack Sundown sat alone in a high-backed leather chair, his posture rigid, waiting for them.

Heavy footsteps echoed across the marble floor as Varek and Akara walked into the room.

Varek casually tossed something heavy onto the floor in front of the Alpha’s boots. It rolled to a stop, the bloody, severed head of the Alpha’s eldest son.

"This could have all been avoided," Varek said coldly, resting his hand on the pommel of his sword, "if you had simply succumbed to the new regime. Did you honestly think the crown was going to come save you?"

The Alpha stared down at his son’s dead face, his jaw trembling with grief and fury. He slowly stood up, glaring at Varek with pure venom. "I knew the crown would not come. But I have dignity. I will never bow to a rogue commoner with delusions of grandeur."

Akara let out a sharp, melodic laugh, and Varek chuckled even harder, looking at the old wolf as if he were completely insane.

"My brother was chosen by the Goddess to rule," Akara said, stepping forward with a chilling smile. "He is the true king. Those puppet kings he slaughtered on the field were nothing more than pretenders."

"You have lost your mind, witch," the Alpha spat.

"And you have run out of time on this earth," Varek growled, his eyes flashing dangerously. "Know this, for your sheer stupidity, half your pack will be enslaved, and the other half will die in the dirt. Your selfishness has cost your people everything."

Varek lunged forward. In a flash of desperate movement, the Alpha pulled a hidden silver dagger from his pocket and thrust it straight toward Varek’s throat.

Varek didn’t even flinch. He didn’t need to.

Suddenly, the Alpha froze mid-thrust, his muscles instantly locking up as if he had been paralyzed. Thick, red veins crawled aggressively up his neck and across his temples.

Akara glided up right behind him, leaning in close to whisper in his ear. "That was stupid."

In one swift motion, Varek snatched the dagger right out of the paralyzed Alpha’s hand, spun around, and sliced it cleanly across the man’s throat.

The Alpha choked out a wet gasp, collapsing heavily onto the floor in a pool of his own blood.

Without missing a beat, Varek grabbed the dead Alpha by the hair, dragging his body all the way out of the mansion and down the stone steps into the courtyard where the fighting was still finishing up. He heaved the corpse into the center of the square.

"Your Alpha is dead!" Varek roared, holding his bloody sword aloft. "Pack Sundown has fallen!"

A deafening cheer erupted from the rogue forces. Hearing the news, the remaining Sundown defenders dropped their weapons, the last ounces of their resistance shattering completely.

Akara walked down the steps, standing beside her brother. She looked up at him with a proud, admiring gaze.

Varek looked down at the ruined city, a massive, victorious smile stretching across his face. "I want you to level this entire place to the ground, sister. And I want you to build a massive palace right here, one bigger than the royal palace in the capital. I want it huge, and I want it to represent us... but mostly me. And I want a towering bronze statue of myself erected right in the center so all of history knows who conquered this world. We will call this the Forbidden City."

Akara nodded slowly, her eyes gleaming with dark ambition. "It will be done."

Varek threw his head back and laughed, the sound echoing over the smoking ruins of the south. "Our dreams are finally coming true."

"They are indeed," Akara whispered softly, standing beside her king.