Trash.

Animal.

Monster.

Those were the names I heard often. But things I’ve heard never stopped at names because they also questioned my simple existence – I’ve heard often how my life wasn’t worth anything. Though that reason shouldn’t be enough to justify any kind of bad treatment, it still did in the eyes of a certain race.

It were these kinds of things that you grow to learn – 

At one point in my life, I did question why people had looked at me with such hateful eyes. 

Because you’re a Lone Werewolf.

That was their response. 

Short and simple it was.

But was it a crime to be born a Werewolf or even to be one? Were we that terrible as a race that made people look at us with such disgust and animosity? At first, I even tried to understand – to provide reasons and when I couldn’t explain why they hated us a race, I even thought that maybe I had done something that made people look at me as an individual with those detestable eyes.

But growing from a naïve little boy to a young man, I started to learn that it was just the world that I was forced to live in.

I lived in a world that didn’t need much reason to discriminate against something they didn’t understand. It didn’t matter about the morals you had or how good you lived your life – you could be the kindest person but at the end of the day, you were a Werewolf and you were labeled as such.

And when you were labeled - including the physical labeling of a chain around your neck, you carried along the characteristics that came with the label.

You are trash.

You are an animal.

You are a monster.

I also grew to know that the only feelings that I would ever receive were not ones of warmth or love but rather, hate. These feelings would never change, you couldn’t do anything to change it either – they were more permanent than anything in the world and this was the world I lived in.

So I returned the same favor. I viewed them with as much hatred that I received from them. I didn’t rely on anyone, I didn’t stay in the same spot for long, and most importantly, I didn’t try to understand them anymore. 

***

My life took a turn that fateful day. The day didn’t seem any different. Like any other day, I would try my best to avoid the towns so that I could evade the humans. 

Yet, I always felt like they surrounded me anyway.

I lived in a world that was simply infested with the horrid race. I was convinced that it wasn’t my race that were beasts, the real beasts were humans. They were the barbarians that used their power to punish us for reasons that no longer made sense – and I was sure they no longer knew why they were punishing us either.

But on that day, I was wandering in the forest when out of nowhere their presence interrupted me and I didn’t hesitate to take off running in another direction to further place more distance between us. The forest was large but I could never seem to get away and the last thing I wanted was to get caught by them since only one thing will come out of it – 

I’ll gain more marks on my body.

The further I got away, the subtler the smell of humans grew. But soon my nose was hit with another smell.

Musky?

***

And that was the last thing I remembered before waking up in the prison cell. I looked up and around, hoping to understand how I got here but the more I tried to remember, the more painful my head grew. It was also hard to think when all that consumed your mind was the pain in your joints and body. My body was littered with bruises and gashes that I had no memory of receiving.

And all I thought at that moment were, humans. 

Were they finally content after putting me through so much? Did they gain a little bit more happiness in their life after seeing me in this state?

Thankfully, my thoughts were temporarily pushed aside when my ears caught the soft noises coming from below the floor and soon, I began to distinguish the sounds as footsteps making their up the stone stairs…and there was this sweet smell of roses. 

Finally, I can get some answers.

The face that I saw took me by surprise. Was this person the one that did this to me?

“I have questions,” I quickly got to my point.

But no matter what I asked, she couldn’t provide a response or maybe she didn’t want to. Humans were sly like that. They often times acted oblivious or maybe even innocent to avoid blame and I thought she was no different.

Haewon was her name and it wasn’t long before it was revealed that I was in the hands of a royal. She would ask me if my injuries hurt, her brow would furrow as she looked at me, and she tried to make me believe that she cared for me – a Lone Werewolf.

On the contrary of feeling grateful, I only felt more hate.

Why did she need to pretend to care? Why couldn’t she just act like the others? Instead, she would go on and on, continuing her pretentious ruse of a kind human. She always had her Knight by her side, smiling that same bright smile that could simply trick anyone if they hadn’t known better. 

And I hated it.

At first, I thought she was a spoiled and a conniving human. Someone that thought the world revolved around her. I felt that she thought life was a game – a game where it was fun to pretend and to treat me like fool if I ended up believing this kind façade she created.  

It only grew worse the longer I stayed within her reaches.

Whenever she had a chance, she would continue to visit me. Always rambling on about things that I couldn’t have cared less about and it only further convinced me that this wa