MTL - Swallowed Star - Chapter 3 Jiangnan City

They took his name, stole his life, and fed on his pain. But they made one mistake—they let him live.Betrayed by his own blood and sold into slavery, Prince Oliver Von Rich lost everything—his title, his freedom, and his future. For years, his captors in the Somaran Empire bled him dry, using his Royal bloodline as fuel for their Aether.But when they sought King Solomon’s Staff—a relic said to grant any wish—Oliver rebelled. Left beaten and dying, his blood soaked the ancient artifact… and awakened it.Dragged back in time to the eve of his kingdom’s fall, Oliver is no longer a helpless prince. With the scars of his past and knowledge of what’s to come, he’ll rewrite fate—even if it means becoming a monster.To destroy the empire that broke him, Oliver must embrace the cursed power of the most vile demon known to man.

Zev prowled towards her, all shining, brutal beauty, his chin low and those incredible, piercing eyes fixed on her. He didn’t stop until they were toe-to-toe and he blocked her view of every other male in the circle.

His eyes dipped to her mouth as he leaned in, his whisper playing on her skin.

“You. Are. Mine.”

His deep voice twanged in her belly as the howls of the wolf pack rose from behind him to echo across the mountains of Thana, while the other Chimera protested his claim.

Fighting the urge to stroke his broad, bare chest with her shaking hands, Sasha forced herself to tilt her head and raise an eyebrow. “So bold for a pup who just found his fangs.”

The other males roared with laughter.

Ignoring their taunts, Zev’s eyes sparked and he leaned even closer, the scruff on his jaw tickling her cheek as he smiled. “So bold for a human who already knows the pleasure of gasping my name.”

She shivered when his teeth grazed her ear.

*****

Just days after Sasha gave herself to her childhood love, he disappeared. Five years later, on a dark city street, Zev came back—with danger on his tail.

Zev is Chimera: Half-human, half-wolf. Made in a secure research lab, his existence is a secret. But when the powerful men who created him try to kill the only woman who ever made his heart sing, Zev snaps their leash and steals her away to the brutal, hidden world of the Chimera clans.

Torn between the magnetic draw of her first love and the painful betrayal of his disappearance, Sasha tries to keep Zev at arms-length. But when they reach this mysterious world, Zev discovers that in his absence the humans took control and stole almost all the females. The Chimera are dying—and Zev isn’t Alpha anymore.

Now, Zev must fight his own people to win the right to mate his only love. Can he prove to her that his long-ago promise to protect her heart, as well as her body, was true? Or will the humans cross worlds to hunt the wolf and tear the lovers apart forever?

[Mature content, no sexual assault]

In the residence of the Duke of Zhenguo, the legitimate young miss, known for her icy demeanor, had transformed overnight.She, who usually regarded no one, woke up to confront anyone she saw with a few harsh words, using her frail body to intimidate so much that no one dared to touch her.Afterwards, this legitimate young miss began taking on retainers, nurturing powerful officials, engaging in commerce, and recruiting troops… Every act so shocking and audacious, it defied the norms and provoked fear in all who spoke of her!Yan Wanqing was seen as an enchantress and a disaster by the people, a thorn in the flesh and a nail in the eye that the ministers wanted desperately removed, an entity everyone shunned as if she were a venomous snake.Only the Crown Prince Mingyue, descending from the divine altar, in the dark, godless alleys, grasped her neck and repeatedly asked her, “Will you marry me or not?”

Hunter Cha Eui-jae, who was dispatched to seal a rift that appeared over the West Sea, was flung out as soon as he closed the rift. When he came to his senses, he was lying in a garbage dump.Starving, he was drawn like a zombie is to blood to a hangover soup restaurant, where he realized that he had fallen into South Korea, eight years in the future.In this era, disaster alerts notify people of rift openings in advance, ASMR videos of slimes gathered from dungeons were trending, and idle hunters livestream unboxings of A-rank longswords.Unlike the past, where people trembled in fear of an impending apocalypse, the future was surprisingly peaceful, leaving Cha Eui-jae feeling empty. Since things had turned out this way, why not start a second chapter of life as a part-timer at the hangover soup restaurant, rather than being a hunter?“That’s strange.”“…”“Have we met somewhere before?”Cha Eui-jae’s plan to quietly spend his remaining days as the only part-time worker at the decades-old hangover soup restaurant goes awry when he encounters a mysterious, gas-masked individual…