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Chapter 2

Author: Hyacinth
I had just finished washing my face when Rhett began sending one video call after another.

[Little shadow, answer the call. I want to see you.] When I continued to ignore him, another message appeared. [Everyone's at our usual place. Come now. I'll send a driver.]

He meant the bar where we often gathered after returning from the academy. In the past, no matter how tired I was, I would have gone the moment Rhett said he wanted to see me. This time, I replied: [I'm tired. I don't want to go out.]

[Are you sick? I'll come over.]

[I'm not sick. I just need a quiet evening, Rhett.]

A message from Blaire appeared in our smaller group chat.

[Avery, I'm sorry.] [I was the one who asked Rhett to stay with everyone. I didn't know you would refuse to come because of me.] [If my presence makes you uncomfortable, I'll leave right now. As long as you and Rhett don't fight because of me, I don't care what happens to me.]

Every word looked like an apology, yet every sentence reminded anyone reading it that I was the one who could not tolerate her.

Before I could respond, people in the smaller group chat began tagging me repeatedly.

[Avery, Blaire is already offering to leave. What else do you want from her?] [Her old pack just dissolved. Can't you show a little compassion?] [If the future Luna is this petty, how will she ever manage Northwood?]

My first instinct was to explain, but Rhett's message arrived before I could type anything.

[I invited Blaire.] [If you're angry with me, tell me directly. There was no need to humiliate her.]

Several photographs from the gathering appeared in the chat. Blaire was sitting beside Rhett with his jacket draped around her shoulders. Someone captioned one of them: [Dinner tastes much better without the scent of jealousy.]

I stared at the screen for several seconds, left the group, then deleted and blocked Rhett. No matter how badly we had argued in the past, he had always remained at the top of my contact list.

There was no reason for that anymore.

When Blaire first transferred to Northwood Werewolf Academy, I had been the first person she approached.

She came from a declining pack and always wore oversized old sweaters and heavy black-framed glasses. She was too nervous to attend group training alone.

So I kept inviting her to gatherings, introducing her to people, and helping her find her place.

At the welcome bonfire, Blaire began turning to Rhett whenever she needed help.

Thanks to the connections I had helped her make, he introduced her to his friends and started bringing her along to training sessions reserved for core pack members. Soon, she was appearing in public wearing his clothes.

Whenever I questioned how close they had become, someone reminded me that she had no family to look after her.

Once, I finally asked Rhett outright, "If you like her, tell me. I'll step aside."

For the first time, his eyes had turned red in front of me. He held me tightly and repeated, "You're the one I care about. Blaire has no pack and no family. I only feel sorry for her. I want to help her. Isn't that how you see it too?"

I believed him.

But his idea of helping her had gradually lost all boundaries. Now he had changed our plans for her, too.

The next afternoon, my mother returned from Pack Hall.

She told me Rhett had stopped by not long before. "He asked if you blocked him and wanted me to tell you to undo it." I only said I understood. I did not explain.

That evening, an instructor sent a notice requiring all graduating students to return to the academy for one final review of their applications.

When I entered the confirmation room, the seat beside Rhett was still empty. For twelve years, that seat had always been mine. The moment Blaire saw me, she picked up her application tablet and sat there instead. Rhett did not stop her.

He even took the bag she handed him and placed it beside his chair with easy familiarity.He looked up at me, then glanced at the space beside his chair.

I did not pause. I crossed to the other side of the room and sat beside Nolan Mercer.

At the front of the room, the instructor reminded us, "The portal closes at midnight. Your last saved academy choice will become final. For students studying outside Northwood, final admission will also confirm your travel permit. No changes will be accepted afterward for this academic year."

Nolan happened to glance at my application page and lifted one eyebrow. "Asterfall?" He turned his own tablet toward me. The same academy crest shone on his screen. "What a coincidence. I applied for an external territory permit too."

Before I could answer, someone struck my shoulder from behind.
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  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 10

    Three years later, I graduated first in my class from Asterfall Academy.The warning system I had designed during the training project had been upgraded and formally adopted by six territories. Before graduation, I also received an invitation from the Continental Territorial Planning Commission. I would become its youngest project leader and participate in the reconstruction of the western territories. Nolan and two other classmates agreed to establish an independent design team with me.Our office belonged to no family and answered to no Alpha.After the graduation ceremony, I saw Rhett again outside the auditorium. Three years had stripped away much of his old sharpness. Northwood had ultimately chosen another candidate to inherit the Alpha position. Rhett remained with the border patrol and started again at its lowest rank.Blaire had appealed the academy's ruling several times, but the evidence of stolen credentials and forged documents was irrefutable. No academy would admit her a

  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 9

    The Inter-Territory Defense Trial began two weeks later.Asterfall, Northwood, and five neighboring territories each sent a team to establish a temporary defense line in an abandoned industrial district. The trial simulated rogue attacks, equipment failure, and large-scale civilian evacuations. I was responsible for Asterfall's overall plan. When I entered the site, I saw a familiar structure on Northwood's defense map.It was the three-layer warning network I had designed two years earlier. The original blueprints had remained in the cloud storage Rhett and I once shared, and I had never published them. Now the design bore another name. Blaire Voss. Blaire had clearly noticed me as well. Wearing the uniform of Northwood's core team, she approached and lowered her voice."The structures only look similar. You never formally submitted your design, so you cannot prove it belongs to you." "The digital underlay preserves the serial number of the original device." I reminded her calmly."On

  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 8

    On the day Rhett arrived in Asterfall, I was adjusting sensors on the training field. He stood outside the fence, visibly thinner than he had been a month earlier, with deep shadows beneath his eyes.I looked at him once, then returned to checking the data. Rhett waited for a long time before approaching. "Avery.""This is a restricted project area. Visitors are not allowed inside." My voice was calm.He stopped outside the marked line. "I only want to talk.""If this is about the academy application, there is nothing left to discuss.""It isn't about the application." For the first time, the certainty Rhett had always carried was missing from his voice. "I made everything clear to Blaire. She no longer lives in the core residence, and she cannot use my access privileges. After the joint trial, I can apply to transfer to Asterfall.""You don't need to do that.""But you wanted me to come here with you, didn't you?""I did once."Those three words drained the color from his face.Rhett

  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 7

    Life at Asterfall was busier than I had imagined.During the first week of border training, we were assigned to redesign the warning system on the academy's northern perimeter. The area bordered an unclaimed forest. The old equipment could identify the scent of an intruder but could not distinguish between an ordinary werewolf who had lost the trail, an authorized patrol, and a rogue approaching with violent intent.I proposed combining scent recognition with changes in body temperature and movement patterns, allowing the system to assign different threat levels before an intruder reached the barrier. At first, some members of the group thought the plan was too complicated. Nolan pushed his tablet toward me. "She'll handle the overall design. I can build the operating model. Give us three days."Three days later, the system's false alarm rate had fallen by sixty percent. Professor Lane, who supervised the project, immediately decided to submit our work to the annual Inter-Territory Def

  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 6

    When my mother saw the returned ring, she finally asked what had happened between us.I hid nothing. I calmly told her how Rhett had secretly changed his application, how he had allowed Blaire to kiss him, and how he had arrived that morning with a late-admission form from an inferior academy and tried to decide my future for me.My mother remained silent for a long time. "Are you certain?""I am."She did not ask me to yield for the sake of the two families. Instead, she crossed the room and embraced me. "Then go to Asterfall. Your life should not begin with becoming someone's Luna."I packed within two days and submitted a request to the Northwood territorial council to cancel our registered courtship arrangement. Rhett and I had never completed a mate mark or entered a formal mating bond. Our future union had been nothing more than an expectation shared for years by our families and ourselves. Canceling the registration was simple.My hand did not shake when I signed my name.On the

  • No Longer Following Him   Chapter 5

    When I went downstairs the next morning, Rhett was already sitting in the living room. He had clearly not slept. His eyes were bloodshot, yet beside him sat my favorite cinnamon roll and a glass of warm milk.My mother did not know what had happened the night before. She assumed Rhett and I had simply fallen into another ordinary argument. "Talk it through calmly," she said, patting my shoulder before leaving us alone.Rhett pushed the breakfast toward me. "Eat something first. Then come to the academy with me.""Why?""To withdraw your acceptance from Asterfall." He said it so naturally, as though it were a matter of no consequence."The final portal is already closed.""I know." Rhett pulled a late-admission form from a folder. "Greyford Institute is still accepting students from within the territory. I asked an instructor to hold a place for you. They have a territorial planning program too. Its ranking is only a little lower than Asterfall's."A little lower was a generous descript

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