"YOU HAVE to run. Run and don't ever stop, okay?" It was like the past has been written again as his present. Joaquin stood unmoving, his gaze never leaving Penelope's bloody face. Her red-rimmed eyes was full of sincerity and hope.

Hope that at least one of the two of them can survive.


"You can't disappear, Joaquin. Your existence means something for the shifter species. Get help from the shifter committee and help those who are treated unjustly by this unfair class system." Her fingers wouldn't quit shaking. Touching Joaquin's face didn't help. It only worsened the pain she felt. "You... looked the same, my love. When I first met you, you look exactly like this. Except your eyes, now you can see me clearly."

'I do not wish to end it like this.' Blood gushed out of Joaquin's stomach. His eyes started to blacken but his will to see Penelope gained him time.

It was like this when he's a kid. During the time he was being hunted down, a lot of people sacrificed themselves to keep him safe.


It never changed.

They said that blue wolves were born to help the nature balance the peace between species?


Why does it seems like Joaquin couldn't do anything right?

'Why did everyone has to leave me behind in the end?' Joaquin thought about Lance and wept. He sniffed loudly. "Pen... Lance is gone again. Will he come back?"

Penelope let a moist air out of her mouth. Her tears started to pour. "I'm sorry I couldn't save him."

'Why are you telling me this?' Joaquin was supposedly the one to assure her that everything is going to be alright. He should be the one carrying the burden of the world for her.

'I'm the one who should hurt instead of you.'

"Pen, let's run together."

Penelope smiled before avoiding his hands. "They will keep up in no time. Let me distract them while you escape. Do it now before they get to us."

Joaquin opened his mouth. "I can't let you do that. You think I'm going to be okay with your decision?"

"You have no choice!"

"Pen, if you're thinking of killing yourself in order to save me, it's like sentencing me to death as well." He cried, "Everyone leaves me behind. You're going to give up too?"

"How am I going to have the will to live when the reason why I want to survive are all gone?"

"What do you want to do then?" Penelope hardened her voice. "Do you think you can handle them yourself?"

'You can't.'

Joaquin can hear his father's voice in his head. 'You can't do that alone, Joaquin.'

'What do you want me to do?' The man's identity was now clear to him. He knew that he can be trusted. He had no one he can call out for help now but him.

Joachim is not another version of him but his own father. Adarmus better had an explanation for him.

'Stop thinking about Adarmus. That man can't do anything good.'

'There was one thing you never tried to do when you were hunted down. You were too scared— too weak to consider yourself a fighter.'

'Joaquin, you are a son of a blue wolf. You are the heir of the underworld. If you are not going to fight for your own life, no one is going to do it for you.'

'The fates are watching from above, waiting for you to make a mistake and take you as a payment for Adarmus' atrocities in the past. Fight for your own right to live.'

Joaquin knew that if he asked for his blue wolf to be brought back, he had to give up his ability to see again. 'How am I going to fight if my wolf form couldn't see?'

Adarmus wanted to separate Joaquin's wolf from Joachim's dark power. The ghost king's power rooted from malice. And because he never wanted Joaquin to be able to fuse the two as one inside him, he could only choose which one to use at a time.

'I am with you. I will be your eyes.'

'Your mate is waiting for you to rise under this mess, my son. You both need to survive. I have to see my granddaughter in flesh.'

Joaquin gasped and looked at Penelope's startled expression. It looks like she can hear his father's voice too.

'Only you can change your destiny, Joaquin. You can always try, if you have the will to make it through.'

Joaquin cried himself senseless with Penelope still holding his hand in support.

He realized how lucky was he to have the most courageous woman in the world as his mate.

'I shouldn't waste your trust in me.'

The time he has spent running away was regrettable. He should have tried to understand himself more than just hating how he became useless.

If only he had tried to discover his origin more, he could have developed himself into a stronger person.

He could have stopped Adarmus from trapping him inside a cabin in the middle of nowhere.

Joaquin's bones started to crack and twitch. Penelope recognized the change in him and stepped back.

He let the entire shift happen and realized that it took him a great while. He never liked shifting into his blue wolf back then.

This was his first time of doing it voluntarily.

Just as he expected, he couldn't see anything. But his other senses were sharp and excellent.

'I need to fight for Pen. I need to see if what father told me about having a daughter is true.'

Penelope sat on the dried leaves to get close to him.

"Joaquin, are you sure about this?"

He huffed and rubbed his fur to her face. Joaquin can hear her trying to calm her breath. "For Lance, for Irlan and for Grace."

'For the two of us.'

Hurried footsteps came behind Penelope. Joaquin felt the rage inside him bubbling, threatening to burst out of his chest.

"Joaquin..."

Joaquin felt his body became lightweight. He can feel his mind clearing up and the chaos in his heart stabilized instantly.

He knew it was his father's help.

"Joaquin, there's a black mist all over you."

He used to think that darkness was all about evil and wrong. Joaquin now personally felt how peaceful can it get.

"Tsk, tsk. Running away, Penelope?" Beatrix mocked. "Are you sure about protecting that imbecile behind you? Such a waste. You were my greatest Beta after all."

"Is that it?" Penelope answered without breaking her voice. "I think the alpha is wrong. If I was your greatest Beta, you wouldn't have ordered me and my men be slaughtered on our way home."

Beatrix went silent. In the end she murmured, "You were so great that I just have to kill you so I can finally sleep peacefully at night."

A series of loud growl made Joaquin's head spun from left to right. 'There were a lot of them.'

"Kill both of them. Don't forget to deliver that Beta's head on my doorstep tonight."

Penelope fumed. "What did I ever do to you?! Why do you hate me so much?! You killed everyone close to me!"

Penelope tried her best to be useful in the pack. She never felt wanted in her family before that's why upon transferring to the Crystal lake, she ensured that she would get everyone to approve of her. She succeeded. She even thought that Beatrix may had trusted her somehow.

It seems like the alpha never thought of her as important.

"You just have to excell so much, Penelope." Beatrix flicked her hand. "I hate those people who were naturally born great. You're taking so much attention that I have to wonder if one day you're going to take my position forcefully from me."

"You make me feel like your Beta status has nothing to do with your will to lead. Betas were born inferior to the Alphas but why do I feel like I was the one who feels useless whenever I see you?"

"You just have to die, Penelope. There's no other reason for it. There's no sense of me leading a pack when you're still alive. One of us must die."