

To prevent the merfolk from being slaughtered, I decided to go ashore and seduce my childhood friend Cyrus, who had become the Alpha King. He still loved me deeply, and we spent three passionate days and nights together in bed. Waking up from a haze of pleasure, I hadn't even had the chance to rejoice before a corrosive elixir was dunked over my head. Listening to my pained wails, Cyrus smirked. "So even an immortal mermaid can feel pain, too? "Well, this is just a taste of what's to come if you don't tell me where my parents are!" Yes, he was convinced that the merfolk were behind his parents' disappearance. From then on, I was forced to watch him flirt with his mistress, Emily; had to extract my mermaid pearl to help heal her body; was forced to dance barefoot to entertain Emily so that she could sleep… Cyrus hated every fiber of my being, yet always held me tenderly in his arms whenever I was on the brink of death, carefully feeding me medicine. Sometimes, he was cruel. "Do you think I'll go easy on you just because I love you? Quick, continue torturing her!" Sometimes, he was gentle. "Can't you be good and tell me where my parents are?" Silently, I endured his twisted love without a word. Soon, however, these days would come to an end, and I wouldn't have to keep that secret any longer. After all, a mermaid who did not return to the sea after three years on land… Would turn into seafoam. And now, there were only three days until my time was up.

On the day of my engagement party, my mother and I were sitting in the car waiting for the driver when my fiance's secretary suddenly sent me a video. In it, she had a middle-aged she-wolf by the hair, slapping her across the face again and again. "Selena, you gold-digging trash! Did you really think pretending to be some high-society socialite and getting engaged to Alpha Declan meant your mother could sneak into his house and steal?" Another slap landed. The woman's face was already grotesquely swollen. "Typical backwoods behavior. Always grabbing at things that don't belong to you. As Declan's secretary, I'm handling this filthy thief on his behalf." I slowly lowered my phone. Beside me, my mother was adjusting her necklace in her compact mirror. When she noticed me looking at her, she smiled and patted my hand. "Thorncrown Pack may be an absolute disaster when it comes to business, darling, but Declan is very handsome. Once the alliance is official, your father and I can help straighten things out." Frowning, I replayed the video. The sharp cheekbones. The immaculate chignon. And the mole on her ear. Oh my God. That was my future mother-in-law! I immediately called back. "Vanessa, do you have any idea what a complete idiot you are? That's Declan's mother!" She let out a vicious laugh. "Oh, please. Declan already told me all about you. Some nobody his father forced him to marry. " "He doesn't even care about you, so why would he give a damn about your relatives?"

My twin sister and I marry twin brothers from a powerful mafia family. She marries the elder, Leo Smith, a federal judge. I marry the younger, Sam Smith, a surgeon. While I'm hospitalized for a high-risk pregnancy, I'm abducted by criminals demanding ransom. They use my phone to call Sam 32 times, but every one goes unanswered. Enraged, one of the abductors beats my stomach with a baseball bat to vent his anger. I try desperately to protect my unborn child, but I lose the baby anyway. Finally, the abductor calls Sam one last time. This time, he answers, only to snap, "Annie almost miscarried. I was just taking her for a checkup. Can you stop calling and trying to get my attention?" With no ransom coming, the furious abductors tie me up and throw me into a swimming pool. Then, they leave. Just as I'm about to take my last breath, my sister arrives and pulls me out. Seeing me almost dead from the miscarriage, she calls Leo in a panic. But all she gets is a cold answer. "Currently punishing the man who nearly caused Annie Morgan's miscarriage. Do not disturb." She tries to call the police, but her phone dies. With no other option, she drives me away herself. On the way back, a sudden blizzard hits, and a landslide blocks the road. The car breaks down. We're trapped and shivering in the cold. Thankfully, a forest patrol finds us just in time. We survive. When we wake up in the hospital, the first thing that comes to us is that we have to get divorced!

On my twentieth birthday, I had to choose a husband from the six angel heirs. Everyone thought I would choose Adrian Seraphiel, the brightest golden-winged heir and the man I had loved for years. In my last life, I did. Because of me, he inherited eighty percent of House Seraphiel’s fortune and became the next ruler of the angel clan. But after our marriage, he got involved with Celeste, my adopted half-siren sister. When my dragon family cast her out of House Drakon, Adrian blamed me. From then on, he hated me. He surrounded himself with women who looked like her, humiliated me again and again, and finally replaced my life-saving medicine with slow poison. I died carrying his child, while the last of my dragon blood burned away. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on my twentieth birthday. This time, I decided to let them have each other. So in front of everyone, I chose Cassian Seraphiel, the sixth son of the angel family. Broken-winged. Mocked by everyone. No one believed he could ever inherit anything. The room burst into laughter. Adrian looked at me coldly and sneered. “Elena, are you choosing that useless cripple just to get my attention?” I ignored him. Because in my last life, after I died, this so-called useless cripple was the only one who collected my body, found the truth, and avenged me by stripping Adrian of his golden wings. But then Adrian stepped closer. His voice dropped to a whisper. “Funny,” he said. “That wasn’t who you chose in your last life.”

To prevent the merfolk from being slaughtered, I decided to go ashore and seduce my childhood friend Cyrus, who had become the Alpha King. He still loved me deeply, and we spent three passionate days and nights together in bed. Waking up from a haze of pleasure, I hadn't even had the chance to rejoice before a corrosive elixir was dunked over my head. Listening to my pained wails, Cyrus smirked. "So even an immortal mermaid can feel pain, too? "Well, this is just a taste of what's to come if you don't tell me where my parents are!" Yes, he was convinced that the merfolk were behind his parents' disappearance. From then on, I was forced to watch him flirt with his mistress, Emily; had to extract my mermaid pearl to help heal her body; was forced to dance barefoot to entertain Emily so that she could sleep… Cyrus hated every fiber of my being, yet always held me tenderly in his arms whenever I was on the brink of death, carefully feeding me medicine. Sometimes, he was cruel. "Do you think I'll go easy on you just because I love you? Quick, continue torturing her!" Sometimes, he was gentle. "Can't you be good and tell me where my parents are?" Silently, I endured his twisted love without a word. Soon, however, these days would come to an end, and I wouldn't have to keep that secret any longer. After all, a mermaid who did not return to the sea after three years on land… Would turn into seafoam. And now, there were only three days until my time was up.

My younger sister and I spent ten years fighting over Rowan Vale, the Alpha of Silver Ridge Pack. In my first life, I became his mate. Everyone said he was obsessed with me. Why else would he keep me carrying litters for seven years and give Silver Ridge six heirs? When I went into labor with the seventh, I nearly bled out. Rowan sent the healers away and forced wolfsbane down my throat himself. Only then did he tell me the truth. If it were not for the fact that only a daughter of the Hart bloodline could bear pureblood Alpha heirs, he said, he never would have claimed me at all. I had been useful for one thing only: giving him heirs. Now that he had enough, I had none. I died hating him. In my second life, I handed the bond papers from Silver Ridge Pack to my sister. “Go,” I told her. “You’re the one he wants.” Five years later, she was sent back to me half-starved, shaking, and marked by restraints. Through sobs, she told me Rowan had never loved her either. He had kept her because she was still a Hart daughter, because she could give him heirs, and because her scent could calm him during rut. She died less than two months later. When I opened my eyes again, I was in my third life. The unsigned bond papers from Silver Ridge Pack lay on the table between us, and my sister and I could only stare at each other. Who, exactly, did that Alpha want?

On the fifth day after I get born into this world, my biological mother chooses to abandon me. But I'm not sure what she's thinking when she's picking out the location, for she actually abandons me at the entrance of the Bianco family. When the beautiful women of the family notice me, they are quick to frown. "Why don't we take him in?" Since then, I have 109 sisters in my family. At home, I'm the bratty ruler among my sisters. In order not to cause them any trouble, I've been leading a normal life for more than a dozen years. That is, until I've encountered bullying in high school. Giovanni Rossi, a rich student, has me cornered in the washroom with his lackeys flanking him. Not only do they dump cold water on me and tear my clothes off me, but they also use their phones to take pictures of my face. "What are you glaring at, huh? You're just a low-income student, so why are you still putting on airs around us? As if a piece of trash like you can ever get into college!" But since the beating I've received is far too brutal, so I holler at the top of my lungs as I yank Giovanni and jump off the third floor with him. When I wake up, Marcella Greco, the school's nurse, berates me angrily. "All Giovanni did is beat you up, and yet you're already planning to kill him, huh? Shouldn't you be reflecting on yourself when others scold and lay a finger on you? How dare you plot revenge against him instead! "I want you to summon your guardian here right away! If you can't do that by today, you can forget about leaving!" All of my hair stands on end as soon as I hear the command. Weakly, I ask, "Are you sure you want to meet my guardians, Ms. Greco?"

I have been bound to Ryan Hardin for nine years. He is pureblood, the Alpha of Silverfang Pack. And I… I was chosen as nothing more than a “temporary Luna,” a political pawn to steady the pack’s power. In those nine years, he betrayed me countless times. The first time, on my birthday, he announced that the celebration belonged to another she-wolf he had just met. The second time, I brewed medicine for his injuries, only to be accused by the Elders of bewitching the Alpha. He didn’t defend me—instead, he ordered me to be whipped in front of the entire pack. The third time, I was three months pregnant. He stood there, watching as his childhood sweetheart pushed me down the stone steps. I lost our pup that day. Nine years. Three thousand two hundred nights. I endured his indifference, his humiliation, his contempt. Last night, at the Silverfang Pack’s full-moon feast, he openly entwined his hand with a young Omega’s while I sat abandoned at the far end of the Alpha’s table. Every gaze cut into me—wolves whispering, mocking, savoring the spectacle. It was his 200th betrayal. When the feast ended, Ryan didn’t even look at me. His words were sharper than fangs: “Don’t forget, your Luna title is only temporary.” At dawn, he descended the Alpha’s staircase, his voice cold and commanding as if I were a servant: “Prepare the council’s tea. Now.” I met his gaze without flinching, my voice steady, stripped of all submission. “I’m sorry, Alpha. That is no longer my duty.” He seems to forget—we were never bound by a mark. Ours was an agreement, nothing more. And today marks the third-to-last day before that agreement ends. I gathered the Luna emblem, the wedding ring, and our only wedding photo—and burned them all. In three days, I’ll leave this pack. I will return to the secluded Herbal Academy, reclaim my research. And this time, when I walk away, I will never return.