There was no moon tonight.
Just the dull synthetic hum of the training centre's sky dome, stretching endlessly above like a sterile imitation of the real world. Flickers of artificial starlight danced across its surface, flickering weakly over the torn, jagged battlefield below. Craters. Scorch marks. Old bones. Screams from long-forgotten matches still hung in the air like ghosts.
This place was where potential became power—or ruin. A crucible for the young and supernaturally gifted to sharpen themselves, not on theory, but on real monsters.
Mason stood at its center. Alone.
Except for the abomination facing him.
It lurched forward, its grotesque frame limping and twitching as if each step was an argument between incompatible limbs. This thing had once been a man—now barely resembled one. Its flesh was a warzone of stitches and fused metal, pulsing veins crawling under skin like serpents. One arm was too long, dragging behind it with claws like rusted meat hooks. Its face… well, it had two. One twisted and stretched vertically across its chest, screaming soundlessly. The other, sewn onto its head like a mask, was split down the middle, revealing rows of wet, jagged teeth where a nose should have been.
It gurgled something—words?—in a language that was no longer human.
Mason didn't react. Not yet. Not even a blink.
He wasn't here for the lesson. He wasn't here to earn any points. He was here because he couldn't stay in that house for another second. He was here because the only thing louder than the silence in his bedroom was the memory playing on a loop in his mind: Amy.
His girlfriend. No—ex-girlfriend. The girl who cheated on him today. On his eighteenth birthday.
He felt nothing in this moment, or at least, nothing that mattered. He didn't have the energy to think about the ongoing ethical debates outside this place—about whether these monsters deserved to be hunted. People argued endlessly: "They were once human!" cried one side. "Yes, but they were criminals—pedophiles, cannibals, killers. What's left to preserve?" shouted the other.
Mason didn't care. Not about them. Not now.
He had something else clawing at the inside of his chest.
The party had started well enough.
Amy had planned it herself. Nothing grand—just close friends, subtle decorations, soft music, his favorite cake, a few gifts wrapped in cloth paper. It was all designed to reflect him: minimal, meaningful, controlled. He thought it was perfect.
Until she disappeared.
He looked around for her, confused. It wasn't like her to vanish. Not like this.
That's when Niamh found him.
Niamh—pronounced Neev—was always near, like a persistent background hum he couldn't tune out. A strange mix of nerd and baddie, booksmart with combat medals to back it. She was in nearly all his classes—history, combat, magical theory, weaponry. He noticed her before. Of course he had. It was hard not to. But lately, she always seemed to be where he was. Close. Watching. Her vibe was off—not in a creepy way, more like a quiet storm waiting for permission to break.
She approached him awkwardly, eyes lowered, then raised as if she was weighing whether to speak.
"She's outside," she said. "But… you won't like what you'll see."
He looked at her. Thanked her. Pretended not to see the red blush rising to her cheeks as she turned and walked away.
He should've trusted his gut. He always had a strange feeling about Toby.
You know the type—joins the friend group every now and then. Says all the right things. Smiles a little too hard. The one you can't accuse without sounding like a jealous freak. That guy.
And now Mason knew why that feeling never went away.
There they were. Amy and Toby. Outside, under the dim gazebo lights. Close. Too close. Her hands clutching his shirt, their mouths tangled like they'd been at it for a while. It wasn't a drunken kiss. It wasn't a mistake. It was intentional.
He just stood there.
Amy pulled away first, eyes wide, horrified. Like she'd forgotten Mason existed. She ran to him, mascara-streaked and sobbing, already trying to spin the story.
"It wasn't what it looked like—I didn't mean to—I—he kissed me—!"
But Mason had heard enough.
He didn't scream. He didn't cry.
He punched Toby so hard he flew backward through the window, shattering glass and smashing part of the wall. The music stopped. The room went silent. Every face turned.
He didn't care.
He looked at Amy, voice calm but ice cold. "Get out of my house."
And she did.
Everyone else followed suit. Even his closest friends knew better than to argue.
Only Niamh hesitated. She stepped forward, trying to say something—maybe apologize for being the messenger, maybe to comfort him—but Mason barked at her, too. Not in hate. Just fury.
He didn't care how she felt right now. None of it mattered.
He stood at his front door for a full hour. Alone. In silence.
No alcohol. No smokes. No pills. He didn't do any of that.
He made a vow years ago—after watching his parents rot away from addiction, slowly, tragically. He remembered their hollow stares, the smell of their skin, the trembling hands. He was barely 10 when he watched them fall apart. And he never forgot it.
So he never touched a thing related to those substances.
People his age would've been getting wasted right now. Drowning the heartbreak. Dulling the pain. But Mason… Mason wasn't like the others.
He needed something else.
Something real.
He geared up, left the house, and didn't look back.
Now, here he was.
The abomination lunged.
And Mason finally moved.
Bones cracked. Muscles shifted. Fur ripped through skin. His form blurred as his werewolf body took shape—sleek, controlled, deadly. Not the wild, frothing beast of legends. This was something cleaner. Measured. Refined.
Claws met flesh. The monster shrieked as Mason ducked under its arm, slashing upward with such force it severed one of the extra mouths sprouting from its ribcage.
His mind wasn't on the fight—it was on control. The same control he forced on himself every day. The discipline. The distance. The rules.
Amy broke all of that. For what?
For someone like Toby?
He didn't want her back. That wasn't the issue.
He just wanted to stop feeling.
Another blow. Another roar.
He welcomed it.
The violence. The distraction.
Let this thing fight him. Hurt him. Try to kill him.
Because in this moment, pain was the only thing louder than heartbreak.