All Chapters of My Alpha is a Lunatic: Chapter 41 - Chapter 46

The last of the dissolving vines writhed at our feet, the clearing finally, violently quiet. The three of us collapsed, not together, but scattered like debris from an explosion. We sat on the damp earth, gulping air, each a separate island of exhaustion and suspicion.A good ten feet of space separated us. A prudent distance. After what we’d just seen, trusting your own eyes was a luxury. The person breathing heavily across from you could be a perfect copy, waiting for your guard to drop.I broke the silence first, my voice rough. “Why are you here?”Liam didn’t even look up, just wiped a smear of plant-sap from his cheek. “You’re my teammate. Letting you wander into a sentient jungle alone seemed like poor strategy.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Lost you, then lost Spark. Then the fog came.”Spark—Luna—hugged her knees, her earlier bravado gone, replaced by a raw, awkward shame. “My… my partner is gone. I needed a new anchor. The buzzcut guy, Locke… h

The power that surged up my arm wasn't a thought. It was a reflex, a deep, forgotten instinct screaming to be used. As the idol’s stone head loomed, I didn'tt swing my fist. I unleashed the coiled thing inside me.My knuckles connected with the center of its grotesque face. Not with a crack, but with a deep, resonant BOOM that felt like the world itself had been struck.The recoil was brutal. It tore me from the statue’s side and hurled me through the air. I hit the bone-littered ground hard, skidding, the breath knocked from my lungs. But my eyes were locked on the point of impact.The stone head didn’t just crack. It exploded. Fractures spider-webbed out from my fist-print at a sickening, impossible speed, consuming the entire side of the idol in a heartbeat. The stone limbs connected to that half shattered in a chain reaction, crumbling into gravel and dust.Spark, who had been trapped in their grasp a second before, dropped to the ground in a heap of torn clothes and stunned silen

The path ahead finally brightened, the oppressive void dissolving into the familiar, humid air of the jungle’s edge. The candle in my hand sputtered and died, its wax cool against my skin.I looked at the stub, less than a third left. A damn shame. A good artifact, but a finite one. Every use brought me closer to losing it. I tucked the remnant away, the loss a quiet sting.We were out. Behind us, the bone-path lay quiet and still, looking utterly, deceptively normal under the moonlight.“We’re out,” Spark breathed, the tension sloughing off her shoulders. “I thought we were trapped there forever.” She looked like she wanted to collapse.I didn’t answer. My eyes scanned the perimeter. Night had fallen here, too. I’d half-hoped the darkness in that pocket dimension was just an illusion, or that time moved differently. No such luck. The island’s real night was here, thick and hungry.“Don’t celebrate yet,” I said, my voice cutting through her relief. “Move. Get to your huts. This place