“…Thank you,” Ebel said after a second’s pause.
“I won’t let you leave!” Placido howled. “You can’t have my daughter! I’m taking her back!”
He pushed Lauretta away to protect her and leaped off the wrecked floor.
His body rapidly gained mass as he flew through the air.
The blue robe and the rest of his clothes burst off his swelling torso and limbs. His hair and face transformed as if swallowed whole by a wave of rippling, black fur, and in the instant Rock blinked, a puissant werewolf appeared. His eyes remained the same golden color, but the gaping maw of bladelike incisors and canines proved he was no longer human.
By the time his muscular legs landed with beastlike agility on the floor, Placido’s body had fully transformed into a werewolf that looked just like the other two.
“Darling!” Lauretta screamed.
Her scream was not one of fear but a warning signaling the bloody fight about to ensue.
Whether he’d heard her or not, Placido charged straight at Ebel and Rock.
“What’re you still doing here?! Go already!” Guido howled, grabbing the charging Placido before he could reach them.
The two werewolves collided head-on, and bones cracked as their fists slammed into each other. When Guido brutally slammed his fist into Placido’s face, Placido staggered and quickly regained his balance, tearing Guido’s ear with his claws.
Lauretta let out another ear-piercing scream as a small amount of blood splattered around them.
“Stop it! Just stop it!”
“Ebel!”
Rock looked up at Ebel to put a stop to it too. At this rate, no matter who won, injury to both sides was inevitable. The fight between werewolves was too brutal, unforgiving, and terrifying.
“…I know. I’m sorry.”
The werewolf face she was so familiar with tensed with determination. She heard what sounded like his fangs grinding together before he nodded.
“Stay here. I’ll put an end to this now!”
He gently placed Rock behind a toppled bench and then bounded to join the fight.
“Be careful!”
Rock crouched behind the bench and watched the muscles in his broad back ripple as he ran.
She could understand why Lauretta kept screaming. She was unbearably worried about Ebel too. But she didn’t want to see Michaela saddened by the result of this fight—and she obviously didn’t want to devastate Lauretta either.
The battlefield instantly turned in their favor, with Ebel joining the werewolf scuffle.
Not even Placido could hold his ground against two werewolves. His arms were pinned behind his back by Ebel, and when he finally shook him off, he had to contend with Guido coming at him from the front.
In the blink of an eye, Guido had Placido knocked to the ground, thrashing to get his pinned arms free.
“Let go! Let go of meeee!”
He must’ve taken a few punches to the mouth because he spat blood as he howled at them. He was breathing heavily, his body trembling with the effort.
Even Guido and Ebel’s shoulders rose and fell with their ragged breaths as they tried to hold him still, and clumps of blood had already begun to solidify in Guido’s fur.
“Are you trying to shame yourself this late in the game, Lord Alexis?!” Guido roared.
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of!” Placido spat back through shaky breaths. “I’m fighting for the people I love!”
He struggled even harder to escape but couldn’t free himself of their grip.
“Sorry, but I need you to take a little nap!” Ebel politely warned him before smashing Placido’s head into the ground.
Rock heard a loud moan and saw his wolflike jaw hit the floor.
This was entirely different from any of the fights she saw on a daily basis in the slums. Both sides had an unshakeable reason not to back down, a resolve they weren’t willing to compromise on, and so it became a fight that tragically shed blood. From the sidelines, their desperation was painful to see and too brutal and cruel to watch.
Still, Rock didn’t look away, she needed to see Ebel was okay with her own eyes from behind the wreckage.
And it was only because she kept her eyes peeled that she immediately noticed another person had entered the sanctuary.
It was the young bishop dressed in a blue robe and white mask.
They appeared with a confident, relaxed gait that belied their age, stopped in the doorway, and raised both arms as they chanted their orders.
“Lauretta Alexis! Protect your beloved husband!”
Lauretta’s head jerked up in horror at the sound of that innocent voice. Startled, she turned her eyes to the bishop, looking as if she’d just received divine orders to kill herself.
“Bishop…what do you mean…?”
“Now is the time to receive new power from the statue!” the bishop declared, pulling a small statue from their robe pocket.
It was a terrifyingly sinister werewolf statue made out of coarse, white quicklime.
Rock instantly recognized it for what it was. She stopped breathing when she saw it.
“NO!”
Rock instinctively jumped into action as she screamed.
Ebel and Guido couldn’t move. She’d no choice but to take matters into her own hands. She couldn’t let Lauretta fall under the curse.
Rock dashed as fast as she could through the rubble toward them.
Lauretta was undoubtedly drawn to the curse now. She was overcome by the desire to save her husband, and that pushed her over the edge. Rock saw her staggering on unsteady feet toward the bishop as if they were offering Lauretta their one and only hope.
The bishop waited there with obnoxious confidence that Lauretta would come to them.
“I won’t let you!”
Right in front of Rock was a piece of a bench someone had broken in half.
Half of a bench should’ve been too heavy for Rock’s slender arms to pick up. Yet, she managed to lift it up then and there. Clenching her teeth, she swung the piece of wood up and chucked it in front of Lauretta as she crept forward.
“KYAAH!”
Lauretta fell backward as the heavy object flew past her.
Rock kept running. Her next objective was the bishop. Stopping them would put an end to everything.
“Wh-What?”
The bishop seemed to notice Rock’s quick approach from under their mask. Rock heard their confused, childish squeak, but it didn’t stop her.
“GO TO HELLLL!”
Rock drew her fist all the way back and slammed it as hard as her momentum would take it into the mask.
Rock was mocked daily for how weak she appeared as a male tailor, but she was up against a much younger child. She was confident she wouldn’t lose, and she’d no intention of holding back either.
More than anything, she held onto the hope that putting a stop to this child would bring her aunt and uncle back to their senses.
With that thought propelling her, she didn’t hesitate to punch them as hard as she could.
“UGH!”
The moment her fist hit the mask, she heard the bishop moan.
Immediately after a dull pain ran up Rock’s hand, there was a crisp sound, and the bishop’s mask cracked clean in half.