By the end of the story, Adeline cried. Her tears dripped down her face, but she didn't acknowledge it, and neither did I.

From what I've learned about that man in the very short snippets Adeline added as commentary, he had been well-loved. The kind of guy everyone got along with and looked to as friend, leader, and brother.

Each new comment was a twist of the knife. They may have brought her some joy to cope with her grief that built as the story continued, but it murdered me inside. This man, the supposedly amazing hunter, sacrificed himself for me.

I already knew I would hurl if I had to explain this to all the other hunters I saw. Public speaking never scared me; if anything, I learned to deal with social skills decently well throughout all of high school.

But this? The expectations of some grand telling, a deliverance of reasoning, a divine explanation as to why I lived and Elias died? I couldn't handle that. Not if everyone reacted the same way Adeline had. And the more tears that streamed down her face, the knife twisted even deeper.

At the end, where I explained how he laughed in the face of the Granny and delivered a one-liner fit for cinema, Adeline cracked and excused herself to stare at the glowing pool of blue water in the corner of the room.

I glanced at the stone chair she had summoned from the ground. It had claw marks so deep I could push my fingers up to the second knuckle.

That could have been my flesh.

The thought chilled me to my core in a way completely different from the demons' soul-draining fear. These people, these hunters that looked human, were not. They were monsters in human skin, the same way the Granny was.

Packmate, acceptance, they are kin.

And the even more terrifying reality that bothered me made me instinctively run my tongue against my sharpened canines.

I'm one of those monsters.

My thoughts on that fact left me unsettled, so it helped to not actively think about it unless I had to.

Eventually, Adeline returned, and she stared at me silently for a minute before finally speaking. "I… I want to be angry at you. Looking at your perfectly healthy body, without a scratch on you while Elias looked…" her voice cracked, but she worked her jaw and visibly reigned in her emotions. "I don't blame you, kid, and most others won't. Certainly not the older hunters. With that said? A lot will look at you and feel the same anger I feel, probably more."

She delivered her words in a way to soften the blow, but the reality of the statement spelled things out clearly. The others of the pack will look at me with emotions running high and fire in their veins.

I gripped the edges of my cloak tighter and clenched my jaw. When I looked up, I met her stare with a glare of my own. "Screw that, all of them. They took me out of my home and threw me into a cage. Some creepy little demon child petted me like a dog while she played with me like a psychopath to a cat. Screw that, screw you! I didn't do anything. The only thing running through my mind was how I would die!"

I don't know when it happened, but I stood up at some point through my rant and found myself snarling. That realization made me pause and clamp a hand over my mouth.

What the…

Adeline stood up, but rather than lash out as I expected, she slowly placed a hand on my chest and guided me back to the couch. After planting my butt on the rugged cushions, I waited for her to speak. Her gentle guidance to sit dissolved my previous anger, and now I wasn't sure what to feel.

"I'm sorry."

My eyes shot up, surprised and shocked in equal measure. "What?"

She sighed and stared at the ceiling. "I owe you an apology. However valid I am in feeling angry, I can't blame you. This was probably the worst night you've ever experienced, and I threw the blame at your feet."

"I… uhm, thanks?"

Rather than answer again, she bowed her head, her blonde hair cascading over her face, covering it. "Thank you for going back when you did. To face something like that as a normal mortal could not have been easy. I'm glad he offered the choice to you, pup, even if he broke some rules to do it."

I had many questions, but they didn't seem appropriate.

After the awkward transition from an emotional rollercoaster to a calm chill, I explained what happened after Elias bit me.

After my explanation, Adeline was back to staring at me in silence. I couldn't even tell what expression she was making since she seemed to be looking past me. Eventually, she came out of her thoughts and said something in a foreign language. It sounded angry, and the fist pound against the stone chair reinforced the impression.

Stolen novel; please report.

"Pup, promise me something."

"Uh, sure? What's up."

"When the others ask, don't tell them the details of what the system said. Don't mention anything other than the first kill details, along with your skill. That's fine, but keep the stuff about the lore strain and the message at the end to yourself." She leaned forward, her eyes showing a hint of red that glowed pink with the room's blue tone. "Swear that you'll only reveal it to Devon or someone higher-up."

What's wrong?

"Can you tell me why?"

"No."

Oookay. This is getting weird.

"I swear I won't reveal it to anyone else. Except who you mentioned."

Seemingly satisfied with my promise to keep mum, she leaned back and closed her eyes. There were even more questions I wanted to ask, but I decided to hold my tongue and enjoy the temporary peace.

----------------------------------------

There was a knock that echoed inside the room, and Devon walked through the stone wall after it temporarily faded.

Adeline glanced his way but went back to resting her eyes and ignored him.

Devon looked at her once before focusing on me. He looked haggard. His face had stresslines, and his eyes spoke of a weariness that begged for a long sleep. Even his hair looked more disheveled than the last time I saw him.

"Did anyone see you?" he asked while nudging Adeline with his boot.

"No, only Neina, and there's no avoiding her," Adeline replied.

"Good." He moved to the couch and flopped down on the other side, letting out a small groan as he did. "We have maybe an hour before they start knocking at the gates."

"Elias?"

"We'll have a funeral soon, most likely in a few weeks"

"First Moonrise?"

"Yes."

A long pause followed, and then Devon groaned and sat up. I didn't realize it at first, but he sported fresh bandages on his ribs. When he sat up, a long rip in his shirt exposed the clean bandages underneath.

"Kid, listen, there is less time than I'd like, but the others are already asking questions. I'll keep you protected. None of them would hurt you, but there are more than a few hotbloods scratching at the walls. It's unfair, and you deserve some rest, so we'll try our best to give you that. For now, explain everything you know from the very beginning. Don't leave anything out."

I swallowed and sunk into the cushion as much as possible. Retelling the story would be exhausting, but better to get it over with.

After being stopped multiple times to explain specific details, it took me nearly twenty minutes to wrap up the story.

I watched Devon's face, looking for any sign of emotion, but he was a statue. His mouth became a perpetual frown, but his eyes stayed hard and unwavering. Whenever he stopped to make me clarify things, he would keep a calm tone that cut through the heavy emotions bubbling inside.

In a way, it helped me calm down. And after thinking about it, it was most likely intentional. I may have been handling everything to the best of my abilities and felt like a wrung-out rag, but I came close to erupting when I relived my memories of running away.

My breathing turned ragged, and my heart began to squeeze. Only Devon's pillar of calm and the strange reassurance from my cloak kept me talking even when I wanted to shut down.

He reached a hand out and firmly squeezed my shoulder. "Take a breath, you're safe. The forest is behind you, and right now, you are safe on a couch relaxing."

In truth, my panic wasn't nearly as bad as it looked, but I felt thankful that he took the time to help.

Pack is stronger together; to guide the young is the older's duty.

Again, with the foreign thoughts that were mine and not at the same time. I ignored the intrusion and finished telling the rest of the story. When I got to the part about the weird system screen I saw, his face finally showed emotions, and it was grim.

"Cain, don't repeat this to anyone else."

"I already made him swear," Adeline cut in.

Devon nodded and slowly relaxed. "Good. The others don't need to know."

I finally braved a question, wanting to know the answer. "Why is it so bad if I tell the others about my weird system-thing? Was there something strange about it?"

Devon glanced at Adeline, but she kept her eyes to the ceiling with her hand over her face. He sighed and turned back to me. "Yes, but I can't explain it all to you right now. Maybe later."

"I wish I didn't know. I can't even process this right now," she interjected.

She let out another groan and tapped her foot. The taps came out like a staccato before she stopped and returned to being still.

"Why?" I asked again. The lack of information began to bother me. "What's so strange about my whatever-magical-text-thing?"

Devon sighed. "It's hard to explain."

"Try me."

He searched my eyes for something, and I didn't know what before he eventually nodded. Whether that nod was for himself or me, I couldn't tell.

"There's not much to explain at the moment, but I'll try. Do you remember what it said about your lore strain?"

"Somewhat? There was a lot going on."

"Well, the problem is that your Lore Strain does not match any of ours. In fact, it doesn't match any Grimm right now."

My eyes narrowed, and I tried to understand why that was such a big deal. "I don't follow."

Adeline leaned forward, her eyes shifted slightly to show off the red tint. "It means Elias lied to us. Every Grimm here becomes inducted through the rite and gets… infected with one of three lore strains. Every single person here I know has done it. I've watched several over the last few years. I even watched Elias' joining."

"And because he acquired something different, that is a problem; how?"

This time, an actual growl escaped her throat, and my eyes widened as she dug into the stone chair with thick claws. "The pack does not lie to each other. We are the only thing we have against everything else. And it turns out he wasn't even pack!"

She growled one more time before closing her eyes and turning away.

When she said pack, I felt it, a sense of hurt that stung deep. It didn't feel good, but a part of me wanted to defend Elias. To me, he was… pack.

That's so weird to say. This is getting strange, all of it.

I turned to Devon. "I won't claim to understand the issue. And I don't think I care right now. Is there anything else I need to watch out for?"

"Don't mention the final message you received. I'll need to talk to someone, but it's usually not a good thing if the system takes a personal interest in you."

"Alright…"

I didn't know what else to say. Everything was crazy, and not having answers made it worse.

With only a little time left before I'd be forced to meet the others whether I wanted to or not, I decided that the only thing I could do to help myself was get a little sleep.

My brain turned blank not long after I closed my eyes, the cushion behind me drawing me in.