Chapter 02

Darius POV:

"Did you find all of the rogues who entered my territory?" I inquired while looking through a stack of papers in my hands.

"A total of eleven rogues succeeded in infiltrating your territory," Zixin's responded and hand over a file that contained the names of the individuals who had violated the boundary.

Zixin is my Beta. He is the only close companion I have and the one person who knows me better than anyone else. In addition to this, he is the one who secretly completes my significant mission without informing anyone else.

"Bring all of them in. I am curious as to what made them enter my territory without my permission," I remarked while wearing a threatening grin on my lips.

Another thing I abhor is disloyal people, and rogues are at the top of the list. They break away from their packs and become rogues, which I forbid because it is against the rules.

As a werewolf, you should serve your Alpha with all of your heart until the day that you die.

Zixin left the room and came back a few minutes later, but this time he wasn't by himself. He had werewolves that were chained up and wearing iron collars following them. They were severally beaten.

Zixin bowed as he informed, “Alpha, they are here.”

As soon as Zixin addressed me alpha, each of the rogues immediately dropped to their knees and pleaded to spare their lives.

"Alpha, we are aware that our actions were foolish, but all we wanted was freedom. I beg you, spare us" One of the rogues pleaded while pressing his face to the ground.

This only made me laugh at him. I rose from my seat, approached him and asked, "Did you say 'us'?"

He raised his head from the ground and looked up at me, who was standing there with red eyes filled with nothing but rage.

"Yes, Alpha," was his only response.

Before ascending back to my seat, I said, "All right, if this is what you want."

Zixin, along with the rest of the people in the room, was taken aback. Nobody knows what was going through my mind or why I let them go even though it wasn't like me to do either of those things. Zixin was able to decipher the hidden meaning behind my grin soon. Something barbaric was about to take place in this kingdom, but it will not be the first time something of this nature would happen inside my kingdom.

The horrified look on their face was quickly replaced by a broad grin. They could not contain their joy and expressed their appreciation. They were surprised by how easy it was to convince me to let them go.

As I looked at the joy on their faces, I couldn't help but crack a grin. "Are you guys happy?"

They all bowed and addressed me as "Alpha."

I let out a sigh before continuing, "You shouldn't thank me; you should thank the man who pleaded me to change my mind."

They all agreed and looked at the man and said, "It's all thanks to Mr. Kim."

The room was filled with laughter and voices of joy, but it wasn't long before I said, "But there's one problem."

Zixin gave a wry grin before closing his eyes and saying, "Should I say poor them or stupid of them?"

“Exactly when did I say that I was going to let 'all' of you off the hook?” With a broad grin on my face, I asked.

They started looking at each other in bewilderment and I felt satisfied. It had been a while since I last played my favorite game, but today was finally the day. Everyone turned their attention to Kim, a middle-aged man who appeared to be in his mid-50s.

"Please do something, Mr. Kim," they said while glancing at Kim.

Kim gave a slight nod, but before he could say anything, I called out for "Zixin," and he a nod before throwing a gun in Kim direction.

None of them understood what I meant. This game was initially played with Zixin to test his loyalty, and Zixin was successful in passing the test. However, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that he had never before in his life experienced fear on the level that he did while playing this game.

Kim said, "Alpha?" while looking fearfully at the gun.

"Well, shall we start?" Zixin asked and I responded with an affirmative nod and a broad grin on my face.

Kim's face lost all it's color as Zixin indicated for him to take the gun in his hands. With shaky hands, he carried out what he had instructed. His attention was constantly drawn to me as he waited for me to explain, but I maintained my silence.

"Alpha?" he asked, mustering up all of the courage and looked at me, holding a gun in his hands.

After taking a few deep breaths, I said, "Let me share a story with you, Kim."

I continued, "When I was eight years old, I was in a very dangerous situation with my best friend, similar to yours. To me, he was like a brother, and I adored him more than I did anyone else. However, there was this problem that only one of us could make alive: either him or me.”

"And same goes for you," I said as moved closer to him. "If you want to get out of here alive, shoot every rogue present here," the room filled with whispers, sobbing, and crying. "But there is only one solution if you want to save them, and that is to kill yourself."

It didn't take long for the tears to start rolling down his cheeks as he looked and asked, "Do you promise, who won't go back on your words?"

"Shoot!" I yelled out.

Kim turned around towards the rogues; he tightened his hold on the gun in his hand. They were looking at him with hope. They assured him that if they were in his position, they would never kill others.

"I hope you all make it alive from here and live your life as you wish," Kim said while clenching his fist around the gun.

Nobody in the room tried to stop him as Kim placed the gun to his head, tightly closed his eyes, and pulled the trigger with trembling hands but before he could pull the trigger all the way, I yelled, "Stop!"

Before opening his eyes and pulling the gun away from his face, he blinked once, letting the tears fall from his eye.

"Do you not want to save him?" I questioned the rogues, "The one who is willing to die in order to save you?"

They did not speak, and Kim looked at them with eyes filled with hope as they remain silent.

He soon realized that he was making a selfless sacrifice for a group of people who were only concerned with themselves, when one of these people approached him and said, "I wish I could do something for him, but killing others to save him is not right. If I were in his position, I would never do this."

"Interesting, this is the spirit I want to see in my players, so why don't we put you in his shoes and see what you'd do, hm?"

"I- I don't understand Alpha," he stammered.

I looked at Kim with a grin, and he immediately understood what he needs to do. He turned around to face the man in front of him and said, "Change places with me. Kill yourself so the rest of us can live."

He inhaled deeply, taking steps back, “Wh-what? How can I... I don't want to die."

"But don't you want to save the rest?" Kim asked, drawing closer to him. “You claimed that if you were in my position, you would save us.”

"Why on earth would I take my life to save you? What good would it to me by spare your life while taking mine? I would rather kill you all and save m-"

*bang*

Before he could say anything else, Kim fired the gun, and he was dead on the ground in an instant, "Rascal!"

*clap clap clap*

"What a show. And you are right, he 'was' a rascal; however, don't you want to see how many more we have among us?"

Kim turned around to face others, "step forward and take my place so that the rest could be spared.”

Nobody spoke up and kept staring at each other in silence. Kim knew they would do this.

He tilted his head slightly before he pointed the gun at them and asked, "Don't you want to sacrifice yourself to save many?"

They were terrified and started shoving each other forward. One person's death was all that was necessary to save the lives of nine others, but unfortunately, humans are naturally self-centered. They only care about what is advantageous to them, even if it means causing others to suffer, which is something they are willing to do as long as they can maintain their own level of contentment.

Kim understood what the game was all about. He turned to me and said, "They are right about you. You are a devil!"

After saying this, he began firing at all of the rogues who were yelling for mercy. Nobody was alive after thirty seconds. Kim finally let go of the gun, his hands were covered in blood and trembling.

He was on his knees, and tears were running down his cheeks as he kept his gaze fixed on the pile of bodies.

"You never intended to spare our lives from the beginning," he began still staring at his bloodied hands, "you created chaos among us, and forced us to end up killing each other."

Turning his attention to me, he stated, "This was the punishment you planned for us."

I was impressed by him, and wondered what a waste it would be to kill someone like him. However, there was only one sanction for rogues.

I approached him, and said, "I must say that I'm impressed, but let me tell you that I made the same mistake you did when I decided to kill myself to save my friend. But before doing so, I asked him why it has to be me. Why don't you kill yourself in order to save me? So, you know what he said?”

I knelt down to his level and moved closer to Kim's ear, "He said he wants to live, so I killed him without wasting a second. It was the first victory I achieved in my life."

"You killed your best friend?" Kim asked while his voice trembling.

"If he had ever said that he would die in order to save me, then I would not have done what I did, but he never did. I was just testing him, but it turned out that he, like these other people, was also a son of a bitch!"

He remained silent.

I heaved a sigh, "It was my father."

"My father was the one who laid that trap. He had me fall into that trap so that I would become who I am today. Because my friend was my weakness, he forced me to take his life with my own hands," I said letting out a chuckle.

"Now you have two options: live your life with the guilt of taking nine lives to save one and become my servant for the rest of your life, or kill yourself to repent for what you have done."

As I distanced myself from him, I remarked, "The decision is yours to make."

"I'd rather put an evil person like you to death." Kim placed the gun on my back, but before he could pull the trigger, I pierced trough his chest and grabbed his heart, "Rogues like you shouldn't forget where they stand," and pulled it out of his body and asked Zixin casually as nothing happened, “The eleventh is missing! Where is he?"

Zixin quickly apologized and said, "I'm sorry Alpha. We are trying to find her."

"Her?" I turned to face him, my eyes narrowed as I questioned him.

"Yes, Alpha, it's a female rogue who entered our territory about a week ago."

"You are saying that she entered my domain one week ago, and you still haven't managed to catch her?" I asked in a calm voice but anyone who knew me could feel the wrath behind it.

Zixin quickly replied, "It's because we are unable to catch her scent, and without a scent, she is no different than a regular human. It is as if her wolf has no scent."

"No scent?" I asked.

"Yes, Alpha. We are searching for her in every possible place, but I assure you that we will find her very soon," Zixin responded.

"And what about the company? Has the problem been solved, yet?"

Zixin grinned broadly as he responded, "Everything is to your liking," and I grinned back before adding, "Indeed, death is the only punishment for those who try to cheat me."