Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 438: Hunger

Dax didn’t use the injector this time. Instead, he channeled the surrounding moisture into a thin, invisible blade of water, sharpened it with his will, and flicked his wrist. The blade of pressurized water cut through the beast’s neck in a silent, clean arc. The head toppled, and the body collapsed with a heavy, wet thud.

Silence fell, heavy and complete. The air was thick with the coppery tang of blood and the lingering, unpleasant odor of the beasts’ pheromones.

Rowan kept his rifle trained on the bodies, his breathing controlled but heavy. "That’s three."

Otto nudged the headless corpse with his boot, his face grim. He knelt, his gloved hands probing the weeping gray flesh around the creature’s jaw. He pried the mouth open wider, exposing the rows of needle-like teeth and the unnervingly human-like structure of the palate and throat. He ran a thumb over the gums, then stood.

"Human origin," Otto stated, his voice flat and certain. "The bone structure is human. The musculature is warped, but the blueprint is there. This was a person. Or it started as one."

Rowan lowered his rifle slightly, a flicker of revulsion crossing his face. "A mutation, then."

"A weapon," Dax corrected, his gaze sweeping the barren, debris-covered plaza. He looked past the carnage, his senses drawn to the oppressive silence. "Someone wanted a disposable soldier that couldn’t be reasoned with."

"Disposable and infectious," Rowan added, kicking a piece of broken concrete. "A plague with claws."

Before Dax could reply, Otto’s head snapped up. His eyes narrowed, focusing on the shadowed mouth of an alleyway between two crumbling apartment blocks. "More."

Dax felt a change in density, as if the air had thickened slightly and decided to sit heavier on his lungs. The sweet-sour odor of the beasts’ pheromones sharpened, transitioning from lingering rot to something new. Hungrier.

Rowan’s rifle rose a fraction higher, muzzle steady. "How many?"

Otto didn’t take his eyes off the shadows. "Enough."

Dax’s gaze swept across the plaza, taking in lines of sight, broken covers, overturned cars, and barricade debris before returning to the alley mouth. The previous three lay in pieces behind them, bleeding into the stone like a useless warning to a disease.

The alley was a black throat between buildings.

And then it moved.

A shape slid forward, low to the ground.

Then another.

Then... another five.

They appeared in a loose spill, moving with the same purpose as a flood seeking a crack: forward, toward warmth, breath, and living skin.

These weren’t the same bulky, clumsy brutes.

These were leaner and quicker. Their limbs looked wrong: too long at the forearms, joints bending like they’d been rebuilt without regard for human anatomy. Their skin was the same mottled grey, still wet-looking, but tighter over muscle, less swollen, more efficient. Their eyes glowed a sickly yellow, unblinking.

They didn’t roar.

They hissed, chittering and clicking, as if their throats had lost the ability to produce anything noble.

Rowan exhaled through his nose. "Lovely."

One of the Alamina guards behind them shifted, grip tightening. His breath stuttered audibly through his filter.

Dax didn’t look back, but his voice cut over his shoulder like a blade. "Hold the line. Do not engage."

The guard froze.

Obeyed.

Otto stepped a half pace forward, dominance rising. The air around him compressed like pressure before a storm.

The lead beast flinched—

Then kept coming.

Otto’s eyes narrowed. "They’re less responsive."

"Or less human," Rowan muttered.

Dax watched the lead creature’s movement patterns: how it tested footing, how it adjusted to rubble without slowing, how its head angled as if it could taste breath even through filters.

It wasn’t clever. It was optimized.

A mutation that had stopped wasting energy on intimidation and had started spending it on speed.

"Rowan," Dax said calmly, "legs."

Rowan didn’t answer. He fired.

The silenced shots sounded like dull punches, each one placed with clinical intent. Knees shattered. Ankles exploded. A shinbone snapped and punched through skin. One beast dropped hard and kept crawling anyway, dragging its ruined lower body behind it, claws scraping stone, mouth opening and closing like it could already feel teeth in flesh.

Otto surged in.

He met the first intact beast mid-lunge, caught it by the throat, and slammed it down so hard its spine jolted. It convulsed, jaws snapping at air.

Otto didn’t give it time.

He drove his boot down onto its skull.

The crack was wet and absolute.

Two more hit the edge of Rowan’s firing lane, trying to flank.

Rowan pivoted smoothly, tracking them and firing again - one round into a shoulder joint, converting an arm into useless meat; another into a hip, knocking the creature sideways. It shrieked, high and broken, and tried to crawl anyway.

The fourth beast reached the plaza center and finally released a wave of pheromone pressure. A sudden burst of dominance that rolled out like a slap.

The Alamina guard behind them staggered.

Rowan’s jaw tightened. "They’re pushing pheromones harder."

"Because it works," Otto said, voice low. "On humans."

Dax’s expression stayed cold.

He took a step forward and allowed his own presence to expand, not the full weight of a king’s dominance but enough to stabilize the atmosphere. Enough to blunt the psychic shove so it couldn’t hook into the guards’ instincts and force submission.

The wave hit Dax and died.

The beast hissed, confused, and lunged at him.

Dax moved aside with the smallest shift, almost lazy.

He reached out with his will and yanked the moisture from the creature’s skin, causing thin, brutal dehydration in an instant. The beast’s weeping grey flesh tightened and cracked along its ribs, like paper drying too quickly. It screamed and spasmed as its own fluids betrayed it.

Otto finished it with a fast, hard strike to the throat.

The fifth beast, smaller and faster, went after the downed Alamina guard.

Rowan’s rifle snapped up.

The shot took it through the eye.

Its head whipped back, skull bursting, yellow light winking out as it collapsed in a twitching heap.

Blood sprayed across the stone.

The guard behind them gagged.

"Back," Rowan barked. "Move!"

Otto grabbed the guard’s collar and hauled him behind cover with one brutal jerk, like dragging a child away from a fire.

Dax’s gaze stayed locked on the remaining beasts.

Two were still functional.

One crawling.

One dragging itself with a broken pelvis, teeth clicking, eyes still fixed on living bodies, like pain was irrelevant.

They didn’t retreat.

They didn’t hesitate.

They only adjusted.

"See?" Rowan said under his breath, breathing hard in his filter. "No brains. Just hunger."

Dax’s voice was quiet. "Hunger is enough."