The werebear lunged forward, swinging his claw at Arad's neck with a burning rage. Arad didn't even bother moving. It was as clear as day that such a weak attack wouldn't even pierce his scales. But something else happened.
Lunara's foot flew above Arad's shoulder and landed between him and the werebear, her toes digging into the stone ground as she gracefully swung her open palm forward, hitting the werebear in the stomach hard enough to send him flying with a blast.
She gently put her other foot down, looking down at her toes, ignoring the shocked gasps of her cultists.
The last thing Lunara wanted now was for one of her cultists to start a fight with Arad. It didn't matter how weak the werebear was, what mattered was the fact he was her servant and was attacking Arad, and that was bad.
Being fully aware of how sore her standing is with Arad and still feeling the burning will to get close to him hot in her heart, she knew her current goal shouldn't be getting close to him, but making sure she doesn't get even further from him.
^Even if making progress is hard, let's try not to make the situation worse. ^ She stood and turned toward Arad. Colorful words and theatrical apologies are only going to trigger Arad's distrust and suspicions even more. "Sorry about that. I won't cause you any more trouble." She looked at Arad with a straight face.
"My lady..." The werebear, now stuck to the wall, started crying, "Even you...I trusted you..." He lifted his tearful eyes, glaring at her with a hint of rage in his beastial eyes.
After a short pause, he continued. "If what that devil said is true, you're the one who betrayed us, led us to this mess...all of those people who believed in you are now dead, for what we sacrificed our lives for...for what we cut ourselves for years...only betrayal."
His tears flew like a stream, gushing down his cheeks as his skin wiggled and his eyes burned black.
The demonic magic coursing through his body started shifting, and Lunara could see it changing color. Her eyes dilated as she recognized the pattern, and she growled, "DIE!" With a powerful lung using the full power of her legs, she thrust her fist at the werebear's stomach.
The attack was so fast that none other than Arad could see her move, even with how weakened she was, she didn't spare any energy to finish the werebear.
Lunara's fist hit the empty wall, piercing a hole in it as the werebear was nowhere to be seen. Her eyes rapidly turned back, looking for the werebear but even his magic had disappeared. As she turned, her toes drew a crescent shape on the ground, [Moon Seal] trying to seal the area before the worst happened, but she was late.
For a moment, even with everything, she was hoping it was Arad who had finished the werebear, but she couldn't be more mistaken. It was only hope, but she wished nothing more than to see Arad's angry face and get punched by him in the face. Herself getting beaten down is a much happier ending than the horror she's expecting to happen. "Arad, was it..."
As she looked back, Arad was already on his knees gasping for air and clenching a fist on his chest, the hair on his body growing longer and shorter as he tried his hardest to restrain his lycanthropic metamorphosis.
Lunara's face paled as she realized her seal was indeed too late, she had once again caused another problem, and this time it was a disaster that could not be fixed.
One of the cultists, a woman who was standing beside Jack and watching suddenly started bleeding from her nose as her eyes flushed red with blood. As she lifted her shaking hands and looked at the blood dripping from her face, she pissed herself and threw up on the floor as a deep scream escaped her throat.
Her painful cry shocked everyone in the room, pulling them toward the truth of the horror beginning. This was how most interactions with demons start and end. There is no winning when dealing with demons, only loss, suffering, and misfortune.
Her arms and legs twisted and contorted as bones wiggled beneath her skin, her hair fell off and started getting replaced with fur, and her gaping mouth got decorated with one too many rows of sharp and bloodied teeth.
In front of Lunara's eyes, the woman had turned into a werehyena, giggling on the floor engulfed with madness. Half of the cultists started falling as they transformed into monsters, all consumed by the spreading lycanthropic curse.
It was already getting out of control, the curse of the moon.
"For a pathetic prey animal, it's revolting to see you basking in the moonlight." Arad said in a different voice than usual. He stood up, fully transforming into his werewolf form. He was a massive muscular werewolf with glowing golden eyes and long obsidian claws.
"Arad! What's going on?" Jack lunged toward Arad as the cultists started transforming, in this madness, Jack only trusted Arad. Sadly, his mistrust had ended way too early, it would've been better had he never relaxed. "FOOL! Run away!" Pin shouted at the top of her lungs.
CRACK! Arad smacked Jack with his fist, sending him flying to the wall with several broken ribs and a shattered arm. Bleeding rivers as Pin was flung across the room from the impact. "Give him back!" Lunara growled as she glared at Arad, her toes digging into the ground as she was ready to lung with a kick. "Alaric Lupin!" Lunara's demonic magic burned fiercely like a raging flame as she glared at Arad's monstrous form.
Alaric Lupin was the demon lord of beastial instinct and beasts, he's the patron of lycanthropes, cannibals, and primal savagery. He and Lunara fought for centuries over the power of the moon. While she was blessed by Selune to be the moon's hare, he could only gaze upon her magnificence from the ground.
Being looked down upon every time by a rabbit had burned several holes in Alaric's pride, making him a laughing stock for other demon lords. How is the demon lord of beasts getting stepped upon by a mere rabbit, it was an insult that kept him plotting for every waking second of his life.
"So, this is the man who defeated you? I could never expect such a power to be stored in this immature body." Arad {Alaric Lupin} checked his arms, sensing the incomprehensible power surging across Arad's veins.
Lunara lunged at Arad, swinging a kick at his face as hard as she could. "Wake up!"
CRACK! As she landed, her foot was still in Arad's jaw, getting munched. "Tasty, nothing beats the flesh of demon lords." He looked back at her as she healed her severed foot in an instant. For the first time, he could feel himself being stronger than her. Such a splendid
feeling gave him enough euphoria to get addicted.
"You bastard! Get out of his body!" She growled.
"The moon shall be mine once more. You're nothing more than an injured rabbit now, a prey like you should've never stood above me." He smiled, lifting his claw, "And I won't miss this chance..." He could imagine it, the bleeding white rabbit running alone across the flat hills, being chased by a pack of hungry hyenas.
But suddenly, blood gushed from his nose, and he looked shocked. "What's this?" He could sense it, something horrific rushing from deep inside Arad's body, assaulting his connection to the body. "Bitch!" He saw Doma viciously ripping his lycanthropic curse from Arad's body.
Thud! Pin landed on Lunara's shoulder, "I've cast healing magic on Jack, he should be fine." Pin said with a serious face, she was neither giggling nor biting her nails this time. "Doma says kick his ass from the outside, I'll rip him from the inside out."
"Who's Doma?" Lunara gasped, "And why are you clinging to my shoulder, who are you, devil!"
"Doma is Arad's fifth wife, she lives inside his soul. Get to work." Pin growled as she glared at the possessed Arad. "He's taking advantage of Arad's lycanthropic bloodline to control him, but he shouldn't be able to maintain this for long."
Arad alone could resist Alaric Lupin's control and reject him in about five minutes, but with both Doma and Lunara putting pressure from the outside, he should be able to kick him out in less than two minutes. A demon lord's was far too powerful, especially against someone already cursed with his power. Usually, people afflicted with the lycanthropic curse can never disobey Alaric's command, but Arad was an outlier who could fight back.
"I see...I wonder...will he break if I killed and ripped his wife with his hands?" BAM! Alaric Lupin disappeared as he jumped away. "Where is he going?!" Lunara immediately chased him but Arad's body was faster than her.
"Don't lose him, he's going to kill Eris, Arad's other wife." Pin said... "He'll have a nasty surprise awaiting him." She didn't forget that Lydia was protecting Eris, and she knew well how tough of a nut Lydia was. "But...even she probably can't stop a motivated Arad." Everyone seems to have forgotten about the werebear.