Chapter 185 CHAPTER 185

Chapter 185 CHAPTER 185

Emma's POV

The pain was a living thing. It had teeth and claws and it was tearing me apart from the inside out. Every nerve in my body was screaming, every muscle was convulsing, every breath was a knife being dragged through my lungs. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. I couldn't even scream anymore—my voice was gone, stripped raw by hours of agony that seemed to stretch into eternity.

I felt the wolf inside me, clawing at my soul, trying to tear me apart piece by piece. I felt its hatred, its rage, its desperate need to consume me. It was everything I had feared, everything I had never wanted to become.

And then everything went white.

The pain vanished. The noise vanished. The world vanished. There was nothing but white—endless, blinding, suffocating white.

I was standing. I couldn't remember when I had stood up, but I was standing. My hands were bare. The rug beneath my feet was gone. The fire, the walls, the room—all of it was gone. There was nothing but white, stretching in every direction, as far as I could see.

I looked down at myself. I was still in my underwear and bra, but the herb paste was gone. The wounds were gone. The blood was gone. I was clean, untouched, like the ritual had never happened.

"Hello?" My voice echoed in the emptiness. "Is anyone there?"

Nothing.

I started walking. My bare feet pressed against the white surface. It felt solid, but it gave slightly, like walking on a cloud that had been compressed into something hard. I moved forward, not knowing where I was going, not knowing if there was anywhere to go.

The silence was absolute. The stillness was complete. It felt like I was the only thing in the universe that was real, the only thing that was alive.

"Emma."

I stopped. The voice was soft, distant, like it was coming from somewhere far away.

"Emma, listen to me."

Elara. It was Elara's voice.

"I'm here," I said. My voice cracked. "Where are you? What's happening?"

"You are inside your own subconscious," Elara said. Her voice seemed to come from everywhere, from nowhere, from inside me. "The ritual is still in progress. The wolf spirit has entered you, and now you must face it."

I felt my stomach turn. The void pressed in around me, cold and empty. "Face it? What do you mean, face it?"

"The wolf spirit is not simply a power that enters you. It is a living thing. A consciousness. And it will not simply submit to you. You must make it."

"Make it?" I laughed, but there was no humor in it. "How am I supposed to—"

The white space began to change.

It started as a ripple, a disturbance in the perfect stillness. The white began to blur, to shift, to melt away like water being pulled in a direction. The surface beneath my feet hardened, turned cold and rough. And then the space transformed around me—walls of gray stone rising, a floor of dirt and moss, a ceiling of dark, heavy beams. It looked like a dungeon. A cage.

The air grew cold. The light dimmed. Shadows pooled in the corners, deep and hungry.

And in the center of the space, a shape began to form.

It started as a swirl of black smoke, coiling and twisting in the air like something alive. It grew larger, denser, taking shape. I watched, frozen, as the smoke converged and morphed into something solid.

A wolf.

A massive, black wolf, its fur dark as shadow, its muscles rippling beneath its skin. It was bigger than any wolf I had ever seen—bigger than Rafael in his wolf form, bigger than anything I could have imagined. Its eyes were red—burning, glowing red, like embers that had been lit on fire.

Its head was low. Its teeth were bared. Its body was coiled and ready.

And it was looking at me.

"Emma." Elara's voice was steady, but there was something underneath it. "That is the wolf spirit. It is the essence of the rogue you killed. It is filled with rage, with resentment, with hatred. It does not want to merge with you. It wants to destroy you."

I backed away. My heart was pounding. My hands were shaking. The wolf took a step toward me, its claws digging into the dirt.

"I need to—how do I—"

"You must subdue it. You must make it submit to you. If you cannot—if it kills you here—then you will die. Your body will die in the real world. There is no other way."

"You want me to fight that?" I stared at the wolf. It was huge. It was angry. It was everything I had ever feared. "I can't—I can't fight that thing."

"You have to. It is the only way to survive."

"NO!" I screamed. The words tore out of me, raw and broken. "This is wrong! I take it back! I don't want to do this anymore!"

The words hung in the air, desperate and hollow.

"Emma." Elara's voice was softer now, but it carried weight. "There is no going back. The ritual has begun. The spirit has entered you. The only way out is through."

"I can't—"

"You can. I have seen you. I have watched you. You are the daughter of the Steele family. You are a Keeper. You were raised to face dangers that would break most people. And you survived. You are still here."

The wolf took another step toward me. I scrambled backward, my bare feet slipping on the dirt. My breath was coming in short, sharp gasps.

"It is stronger than it would have been," Elara continued. "It carries the rage of the torture it endured. The hatred it felt when it was killed. But that rage can be turned. That hatred can be redirected. You can use it."

"How?" I cried. "How do I use it?"

"By taming it. By breaking it. By making it understand that you are not its enemy—that you are its master. You must dominate it. You must force it to submit."

"I can't—"

"You can. I have faith in you, Emma Steele. You are strong. You are fierce. You have a will that cannot be broken. Use it."

The wolf lunged.