Chapter 162

OSCAR'S POV

I could still smell the blood on my hands—thick and suffocating. It wasn’t the familiar blood of animals I’d butchered to feed the royal family, nor was it my own. No, it was the blood of others. The innocent ones. The ones I had tried—and failed—to save alongside the healers. The blood of those whose lives slipped through my fingers with their dying breaths haunting me.

I had to get out. I couldn’t stay in a kingdom where lives meant so little, where we were butchered like animals. If I stayed any longer, I knew it would be my turn next. There was no escaping that reality.

The tall trees stretched high into the sky. The forest was familiar, like the back of my hand, but tonight, it felt more like a cage. I had been running for hours, leaving behind the kingdom that had become my prison.

My lungs burned. Every breath was a painful rasp as I forced my legs to keep moving. I couldn’t afford to stop. Not even for a moment. If I did, they’d find me. They always did. The Alpha