BloodMoon: Captivated by the Forbidden Lycan Alpha
Chapter 151: STUMBLED ON A ROGOURAU

Chapter 151: STUMBLED ON A ROGOURAU

{ "What if after all this time, it wasn’t the beast in the dungeon I needed to fear, but the beauty who lived in the castle above him}

The cold bit into my skin, and no amount of comfort could burn away the frustration clawing at my chest. My hands were still shaking from adrenaline, from barely scraping past another death trap in this cursed mountain. I clenched my fists, willing the tremor away. Dante sat across from me, dragging his dagger through the dirt, sketching gods-know-what while I tried to figure out how we weren’t dead yet. His face was smeared with dust, his curls a mess, and yet he had the nerve to look calm.

"We should be dead," I muttered, shoving a boot against a loose rock and sending it tumbling. "That’s what should’ve happened back there."

Dante snorted, not even looking up. "Yeah, well, if you’d rather go back and try again."

I shot him a glare. "Not the point." My shoulders ached, my legs were screaming, and my patience was hanging by a thread. "This whole place is designed to kill. Every step forward, something else is waiting to take us out. What’s next? The ground swallowed us whole?"

Dante sighed, finally setting his dagger down. "Freyr, you do know that we need to go back safe and sound. I listened as you promised To and too much is at stake. Your mother felt that once we find what is happening and conquer the evil beast, you should take over the Paradise Coven leadership. This should have been what you should have done before, but we were busy mourning Dunc.o"

"No." I bit back the rest of that sentence because I did not want leadership, rather I just wanted to spend time with Tor.

Dante wiped his hands on his already-ruined clothes. "So, what do you want to do? Your father had so much expectation from you, and that is why he gave you the Kayne stone. He must have known he was in danger that fateful day. "

I exhaled sharply, running a hand down my face. "I just—" I shook my head and diverted from the topic of taking over Paradise Coven leadership. "I need a plan. Something better than ’walk into the next death trap and hope for the best.’"

Dante tilted his head. "Fine. I know you don’t want to discuss this matter, and I will let it slide for now. But your mother will not let you.ff "I picked up a pebble and threw it at him. He swatted it away with a smirk, but it faded just as fast. "Alright," he said, rubbing at his temples. "We rest. And then we go in with our heads screwed on straight. We’re too pissed off to think right now."

I scoffed but didn’t argue. He wasn’t wrong. My nerves were raw, my thoughts jagged. If I walked into another trap like this, I’d probably end up skewered. Fine. A few hours. Then we’d deal with whatever fresh hell Bloodstone Mountain had waiting. But if this place wanted us dead, it was going to have to try harder.

My body ached, exhaustion dragging me into sleep despite the cold bite of Bloodstone Mountain’s wind. Dante had rolled onto his side, his slow, steady breathing the only sound in the stillness. For the first time in hours, there were no shifting stones, no snapping traps, no near-death moments, just the weight of fatigue pressing down on me like a boulder.

Then I heard it, a deep, guttural grunt. Low, pained. Something shifting, dragging, scraping far beneath the mountain’s surface. My eyes snapped open, my pulse slamming into my ribs. At first, I thought I’d imagined it as some cruel trick of my half-sleeping mind. But then it came again. A growl, raw and strained, rising into a howl that clawed its way up through the rock, distant but unmistakable.

I sat up so fast my vision blurred. My hand found the hilt of my sword on instinct. Dante stirred, mumbling something incoherent before cracking an eye open. "What the hell, Freyr?" His voice was thick with sleep.

"Did you hear that?" I whispered, my throat suddenly dry.

He frowned, propping himself up on an elbow. "Hear what?"

Another grunt echoed up from the depths, longer this time, more labored. My stomach twisted. I knew that sound. I’d only heard it once before, years ago, when a village was torn apart in the dead of night.

"Rogourau," I breathed, barely able to force the word out.

Dante sat up fully now, all traces of sleep gone. "You’re sure?"

I swallowed hard, gripping my sword tighter. "If I’m wrong, then something else is down there making the same sound a Rougarou makes when it’s wounded and pissed off. I heard the same sound when I accompanied Tor to Sagstone Mountain and met Rou for the first time."

Dante ran a hand through his hair, his face unreadable. "What the fucking hell?’

The howl came again, closer this time. The kind of sound that meant something huge was in pain and furious about it. The kind of sound that turned blood cold and made smart people run. But there was nowhere to run. Not here. Not inside Bloodstone Mountain. Dante and I locked eyes. We didn’t need words to know what the other was thinking.

"How the hell was there a Rogourau beast in Bloodstone mountain, and why had we never discovered it?" Dante whispered.

That awful, gut-wrenching grunting still rumbled beneath us, rising through the stone in waves. It wasn’t just noise it was pain. And fury. And something else I couldn’t name but felt deep in my bones. Dante was already moving, his steps cautious but steady.

"What madness is this?" I muttered.

Dante didn’t even look back. "We have to know."

I swallowed hard, forcing my feet forward. The air grew thicker the deeper we went, hot, metallic, wrong. It clung to my skin, my throat, my lungs. A scent I recognized instantly, and it was blood. Another growl rippled up from below, so raw, so inhuman that every hair on my body stood on end. My heart slammed against my ribs. "Oh shit"

We kept moving, slower now, careful not to disturb the loose stones underfoot. The tunnel twisted ahead and then opened into something vast, a cavern, barely lit by an eerie red glow. And there, at the bottom...I froze. My breath caught in my throat.

The Rougarou beast was real. Here. Right in front of me. It was enormous, even slumped against the rock, its fur matted with blood, ribs rising and falling in uneven gasps. Chains wrapped around its limbs, glowing faintly with runes that pulsed like a heartbeat. And its eyes, burned with molten gold, locked onto mine with a mixture of rage and something far worse.

The beast twitched, then lunged. The chains snapped it back with a sickening crack, but the force of its snarl nearly knocked the breath out of me. My mind struggled to catch up, to make sense of what I was seeing. This wasn’t just some mindless monster.

This was a trap. Dante exhaled a curse, his voice distant, and I couldn’t move. Couldn’t think. Because standing there, staring into the eyes of the chained beast, one horrifying truth clawed its way into my mind.

We weren’t the hunters here; we were the next ones caught. Dante stood frozen, his breathing was uneven, sharp, like he was trying to swallow down the reality in front of us. His gaze stayed locked on the chained Rogourau, but his lips moved, murmuring curses under his breath.

"This... this is insane," he muttered, barely above a whisper. His fingers twitched at his side. "I knew they were ambitious, but this? This?"

I swallowed; my thoughts tangled in disbelief. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Dante exhaled sharply, shaking his head. His jaw was clenched so tight I thought his teeth might crack. "The Paradise Coven," he spat the name like it burned his tongue. "I knew they were dabbling in things they shouldn’t, but I never thought..." He trailed off, running a hand through his already wild hair.

Another snarl rattled through the cavern, but this time, it wasn’t from the Rogourau in front of us.

The sound came from deeper, and my stomach turned to stone. "Dante." My voice was barely my own. "You’re saying there’s more than one?"

He let out a hollow laugh, bitter and sharp. "They wouldn’t have gone through all this effort just for one." His hands balled into fists. "I thought Marcel wanted power, but I didn’t think he’d—" He cut himself off, inhaling through his nose like he was trying to shove the words back down his throat. But I’d heard enough and realized what Dante was saying.

Marcel hadn’t just captured a Rogoura; He’d made this place into a prison for a beast, and the only explanation was that he was feeding the evil creature with the power of the Rogoura.u"

"Is this what they call madness?" I whispered in shock and utter disbelief.

"I bet that Rou was able to sense the evil because it feeds on the Rogourau beast’s power. "

"We are fucking screwed "I cursed out loud and in frustration.