Chapter 1

The night Chloe, the adopted daughter, turned eighteen and completed her first shift, my mother, Grace, stripped me of my family identity right in front of the entire pack.

My brother, Caleb, slapped me across the face so hard that my vision went blurry.

“Listen to me loud and clear. From today on, this family only has one daughter, and I only have one sister.”

I stared at Chloe standing in the very center of the crowd. Mom held her tightly in her arms while Chloe sobbed like a fragile porcelain doll, but her eyes landed on me with chilling precision.

The wolf inside me went quiet. It wasn’t a whimper, but something much deeper. I felt the string—the pack bond—that once tied me to this family snap and vanish.

I finally understood one thing: to this werewolf family, I had never been part of them. So, I left. Captain Vance had been inviting me to join the Vanguard Legion’s closed training camp for months anyway, and that very night, I signed my name on the agreement.

Mom and Caleb thought I was just throwing a temper tantrum. They waited for me to come crawling back, tail between my legs, begging for forgiveness. However, a month later, when a thick layer of dust had settled in my bedroom, they finally went looking for me at the Werewolf Preparatory Academy.

The academy told them that my file had been sealed and destroyed by the Werewolf Council. It was classified, and there was no way to access it.

Sitting in the backseat of Captain Vance’s bulletproof car, I was in agonizing pain as I severed that final bond with my own hands. At that exact moment, panic finally set in for them.

Chapter 1

“Aurora, have you thought this through? Once Vanguard Legion’s closed training begins, you’ll be cut off from all contact with the outside world, not temporarily but permanently. No phone calls, no messages, and no pack bond. This is no joke,” Captain Vance reminded me solemnly.

I didn’t hesitate at all.

“Captain, train me to be your best soldier. I won’t let you go into that program alone.”

He looked at me for a long time, and something in his eyes softened—it was the kind of pride and clarity that came from having seen too much.

He stood up and placed his hand on my shoulder.

“That’s my soldier,” he said, letting out a breath of relief. “But you need to understand what this means. Vanguard Legion requires you to be with them for a minimum of five years, and the training there is brutal enough to break even an Alpha-level werewolf. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”

My father, Arthur, had said the same thing to me years ago. I was ready back then, and I was even more ready now.

“My dad made it through,” I said. “And so will I.”

The muscle in his jaw tightened. He reacted like that every single time my father was mentioned. They used to be comrades-in-arms in the same trench, so he knew better than anyone why I chose this path, and he had never once tried to discourage me.

He fell silent for a moment before asking the question I had long been expecting. “Does Grace know? Does Caleb know?”

Two faces came to my mind—the way Mom’s eyes immediately turned dull whenever she looked at me, and the way Caleb always looked right through me, never actually seeing me.

The wolf inside me let out a low rumble. It was not a whimper, but more so a final farewell.

“They won’t care,” I said. “Honestly? They’ll probably pop a bottle of champagne to celebrate.”

Captain Vance stared at me for a long time with a complicated look in his eyes. It was an expression he only showed on rare occasions, filled half with guilt and half with helplessness.

Then, I picked up the classified non-disclosure agreement and signed my name on it.

“Go back and pack your bags,” he said. “At three in the afternoon tomorrow, I’ll send a car to pick you up.”

When I stepped onto the lawn of that villa, laughter drifted out from the windows—the kind of relaxed, carefree laughter that only happened when people forget anyone existed outside their inner circle.

I bit my lip and pushed open the door. As soon as I walked in, the laughter died instantly. Three pairs of eyes landed on me at the same time.

Caleb put down the apple pie he was slicing. He glared at me, as if he had declared me guilty long before I could say anything.

“Apologize to Chloe right now. You ruined her coming-of-age ceremony. The whole thing was blown because of you. And running off without a word after causing a scene? What on earth did you even learn out in human society?”

My hands, hanging at my sides, quietly clenched into fists.

I knew they wouldn’t believe me. They never did. Yet, something inside me that hadn’t entirely vanished made me say it one last time.

“I didn’t push her.”

Those words lit a fuse inside Caleb. His eyes turned a deep shade of red that only appeared when an Alpha lost control, and his presence immediately became intimidating.

“We all saw it with our own eyes–”

Mom turned to Chloe first, her voice filled with tenderness as she tucked a strand of hair behind Chloe’s ear.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. I will make her apologize.”

Then, those eyes turned toward me, and the warmth in them disappeared.

“Bad luck follows you everywhere, and so do lies. I witnessed it with my own eyes. How dare you make excuses? Good God, I truly don’t know how I ended up with a daughter like you.”

Chapter 2

The winter night wind seeped in through the window frame, turning the entire room into an icebox. After three years as a ‘jinx’, I was now getting a new title.

The wolf inside me curled up even more, burying her nose into her tail. She hadn’t whimpered in a long time. After all, there was nothing left to grieve about.

No one remembered that it was also my eighteenth birthday today, and no one believed that I had never touched Chloe.

On the sofa, Chloe reached out and gently patted Mom’s shoulder, acting the part of a deeply understanding angel.

“Mom, please don’t talk about Aurora like that. No matter what, she’s your biological daughter, your own flesh and blood. I’m just an adopted orphan who’s been hogging yours and Caleb’s love for years. It’s only natural that she doesn’t like me. I completely understand–”

“I’m sorry,” I cut her off suddenly, my voice flat.

The house fell silent once more. Both Mom and Caleb froze for a second. Even Chloe blinked in surprise.

I sighed and repeated myself. “It’s my fault. I apologize.”

Over the past three years, scenes like this had played out countless times. Every time, I’d be too stubborn to admit fault, refusing to speak a lie, and the wolf inside me would bristle, refusing to bow to a false accusation. However, I was leaving tomorrow.

If admitting fault could bring them peace and leave me with a somewhat decent memory during my final twenty-four hours in this house, then so be it. At least when I thought of them at some Vanguard Legion training base in the future, I wouldn’t remember them for their curses and glares.

Caleb was the first to snap back to reality. He had a look of “I knew it” on his face.

“You finally said it. Fine, but you’d better not step out of line again. Chloe merely sprained her ankle this time, but if you hurt her next time, an apology won’t get you off the hook.”

I murmured in quiet agreement, offering nothing else. It would be a lie to say that my brother’s threat didn’t make me sad. However, I pushed that feeling aside and turned to go upstairs.

Chloe grabbed my wrist. Smiling, she handed me her newly replaced ID card, making sure I saw the name on it—Chloe Sol Miller.

“Sol” meant the one and only—the Miller family’s only daughter and Caleb’s only sister.

Mom’s voice drifted over from the sofa, offhand and casual.

“From now on, Chloe will be the one and only sweetheart of our family. Don’t get confused.”

Caleb nodded before he turned to Chloe and apologized to her tenderly, all because he said they had all seen it earlier and had briefly, mistakenly treated me as a person who actually existed.

Chloe giggled as she jumped up and wrapped both arms around his neck, already pushing for a limited-edition designer bag as compensation.

Noticing that I hadn’t made a sound yet, Mom slammed her mug onto the coffee table.

“Did you hear me? Are you deaf?”

I kept my head lowered, my voice barely above a whisper.

“Got it. From now on, Chloe will be the only one.”

After all, after tomorrow, I wouldn’t exist in this house anymore either.

Chapter 3

I took the stairs two at a time, but the voices downstairs went on.

“If you ask me, I think we should give the name Aurora to Chloe. Why should a wild brat raised in the orphanage deserve a name Dad picked out?”

“No, she’s used it for so long. I’m afraid Chloe would catch her bad luck. Sol is great. It means she’s the family’s only sweetheart.”

“You’re the best, Mom.”

“Oh? What about me, your brother?”

I closed my bedroom door, leaned my back against it, and slowly slid down onto the carpet.

Aurora was another name for the northern lights, the light that drove away the dark. When Dad named me all those years ago, he said he wanted me to light up the werewolf clan like the northern lights lighting up the sky. Yet now, in the eyes of Mom and Caleb, the name itself was nothing more than a source of bad luck.

The wolf inside me rested her chin on her front paws, saying nothing at all.

When I was three years old, I got lost in a human town. Mom and Dad searched for me for nearly a year to no avail.

Unable to endure the void left in them, they eventually adopted a three-year-old girl born on the same day as me from an orphanage. They named her Chloe, using her to fill the gap I left behind. What they never expected was that I would actually come back.

Even though I grew up in the human world, without a pack and with no one to teach me what I was, my werewolf nature still bled through—the fighting instincts, the tracking abilities, and a kind of speed that made human athletic coaches uneasy.

At fifteen, I got into the Werewolf Preparatory Academy on my own merit and walked right into the classroom where Dad was teaching. He was so shocked that he dropped a book in his hand onto the floor.

Later, he told me it was the scent. A werewolf’s sense of smell spoke more truth than any language, and he recognized me before his mind could process it.

He dragged me to an underground clinic for an expedited blood test. During the entire wait, he couldn’t stop pacing back and forth in the hallway, like a wolf that had found a lead but was too afraid to believe it yet.

I stood there, watching him, and a thought I had never dared to go near began to take root in my mind.

What if this was real? And what if it was real this time?

Twelve years in the orphanage had put me through too many cycles of being adopted and then returned. I knew better than anyone not to put too much hope into it.

When the results came back, Dad pulled me into his arms and cried. That was the very first time I learned what it felt like to be recognized by someone.

On the drive back to the community, he told me everything about the twelve years I had missed, including the adoption. He kept checking my reaction while solemnly promising me that he wouldn’t favor either child and that both daughters would be equally important. His heartbeat was steady, and he was being sincere.

So, I went home with him, carrying that hope inside me, not knowing that that night would be the only night we would ever have as a complete family.

Chapter 4

The moment Mom saw me, she wrapped her arms around me and burst into tears, refusing to let go for a long time.

Caleb, who was seventeen back then and already bore the broad shoulders of an Alpha, stayed by my side all night. The air was thick with the comforting pheromones he unconsciously released, low and steady.

Fifteen-year-old Chloe even held my hands with both of hers, tears rolling down her cheeks.

When Mom found out my name had been casually given to me by a human orphanage, she urged Dad to take me to the city hall that very day to change it. She wanted me to have a real name of my own, a name that belonged to the werewolf bloodline—Aurora. However, we never made it back home in the car.

On the county road, a rogue slammed into us. It was a feral stray, driven mad by blind aggression. Dad shielded me behind him, but the rogue tore his throat out before reinforcements could arrive.

By the time Mom and Caleb rushed to the scene, I was covered in blood. They looked at me, and I watched grief turn into something else inside their eyes.

“You came back, and now Arthur is gone. You’re cursed! Why did you have to come back? Why couldn’t you just stay vanished?”

Caleb’s voice cracked, sounding like something between a sob and a howl. “You’re not my sister. You’re a murderer.”

From that point on, all I had was a small room upstairs, and nothing more. All of their love was given to Chloe, who was now known as Chloe Sol Miller.

I shifted to the edge of the bed and sat down.

Fine, I thought. Let it be that way. If I died in the Vanguard Legion—and the odds of that were far from low—no one would have to suffer through the pain of loss again.

This was the last thing I could do for them, even if they would never know it, and the wolf inside me offered no counterargument.

I slept lightly that night, my dreams alternating continuously between Dad’s face and Mom’s voice. When I woke up, my pillow was wet, but my mind was made up.

I packed the few belongings I had into a black canvas bag. Even though I had lived there for three years, there wasn’t much to pack anyway.

When I arrived downstairs, Mom and Caleb were already sitting by the kitchen island, eating bacon and scrambled eggs. There was no plate for me on the table, just as it had been every day for the past three years. They had never once asked me what I liked to eat either.

So, I toasted a slice of bread in the microwave and ate it standing beside the counter. At some point, Chloe had walked up to me.

“Aurora, there’s no place for you in this family anymore. Couldn’t you tell when Mom and Caleb gave me their name? They’re never going to forgive you. Never.”

Three years. For three years, I had carried Dad’s death on my shoulders, taking their silent treatment as the punishment I deserved. I owed them that.

Ignoring the pride hidden in Chloe’s eyes, I answered her earnestly, “Then from now on, you’ll be the only one by their side. Take good care of them, Chloe.”

Chapter 5

At the breakfast table, as usual, I didn’t say a word, quietly listening to the three of them chat and laugh.

Mom suddenly looked up and asked, sounding as though she had just remembered something trivial, “You’re graduating from the preparatory academy soon, aren’t you?”

I froze for a moment before realizing she was speaking to me.

“Mom–” I caught myself and stopped immediately as her expression darkened.

Ever since Dad passed away, she no longer permitted me to call her Mom. Before leaving today, I had wanted to call her that one last time, but it clearly wasn’t meant to be.

“Yes, this year.”

I paused, recalling Captain Vance’s words. I needed to at least tell them I was leaving.

“I’m actually about to–”

“Alright,” Mom waved her hand, cutting me off impatiently. “I don’t care to hear which poor pack you’re planning to scrape by with after graduation. I’m not interested. I just want to remind you to move out of this community as soon as you graduate. You’ll only be an eyesore around here.”

Caleb nodded in agreement. “We were generous enough to give you a roof over your head for three years. You should be grateful for that.”

I was about to tell them I was leaving today and that I didn’t know when I’d ever be back. However, I decided not to.

Chloe pouted, speaking up with an overly dramatized look of innocence. “If this is how you treat Aurora, will you throw me out too when I grow up?”

Mom tapped her forehead and said, “Oh, sweetie, you’re my sweetheart. How could I ever treat you like that?”

Caleb looked at her tenderly. “Little princess, you’re teasing Mom and me again, huh? How could that girl with such weak werewolf blood compare to you?”

My knuckles turned white as I gripped my glass tight.

“I’m finished. Enjoy your meal.”

With that, I fled the dining room. In the dead of winter, I pushed open the front door, and the biting cold hit me full force.

Snow was falling. Tiny white flakes fluttered through the air, melting against my face and sliding down my cheeks. Whether they were snowflakes or tears, I could no longer tell.

I wrapped my jacket tightly around myself and walked toward the family cemetery at the edge of town.

On the day of Dad’s funeral, Mom had refused to let me attend. So, all I could do was hide in the shadows of the nearby woods, watching him being laid to rest.

Ever since then, I had been terrified that if Dad were still alive, he would hate me too. Every year on his death anniversary, I would stand outside the iron fence of the cemetery, gazing at that granite tombstone from afar. Today was the very first time I had ever walked right up to it.

I gently brushed away the accumulated snow with my fingers, revealing his name.

“Dad, I’m leaving with Captain Vance for Vanguard Legion today. Back then, when you recognized me by my scent, you told me that the purest warrior blood ran through my veins and that I would surely surpass you. Rest assured, I won’t let you down.”