My Most Precious Human

Hybrid. This one word bounced inside my mind as I tried to grasp the meaning of it. There was no reliable information about creatures being a mix of werewolf and vampire. According to the legends, there was a tiny possibility of a child of a vampire and a werewolf being born, but no records were found to prove that. To give us any information, Leo read the notes that Doctor Will Duarte provided after examining the body of one of the degenerates.

Will found many similarities between them and vampire commoners, which could suggest that the one creating the degenerates had to be a vampire noble or at least have a lot of noble genes. At the same time, their insatiable hunger could only be compared to those who were born to live with a commoner vampire's bite: the vampire degenerates. The hybrid degenerates didn't have fangs but massive jaws with sharp teeth. Their claws also resembled those of wolves rather than blade-like vampire claws. They were all at least 6.7 feet tall, with their postures slightly resembling werewolves in their wolf form, standing or two feet.

The description itself injected fear into the hearts of those who listened. I became more nervous, as I realized that my human body was more than unprepared to face those hybrids, and I would have to go far beyond my limits just to survive. I looked at Sariel and saw how restless he was. He was worried about me. He surrendered to my stubbornness, but he was more than aware that he couldn't possibly guarantee my safety during the battle. I wanted to fight to help him, not to make him worried, but at that moment, I was wondering if I truly was able to be of any help. I needed to find a quick pattern to defeat those creatures, just like I did when I fought against the wolf for the first time. I glanced at Sariel and smiled at him, trying to convince him that I was fine after hearing the news, and he smiled back at me, pretending that he believed my superficial confidence.

"There is one rule in this battle," Leo said, finishing our meeting. "We don't take prisoners. We kill. The creatures we are fighting against are monsters. Their only purposes in life are to feed and kill, and it doesn't matter if they drink the blood of a human, a wolf, or a vampire. Those who try to show mercy will be the first to die." He glanced at me meaningfully, making me uncomfortably shift in my chair.

I couldn't help that I wasn't ok with killing anyone. The fact that I knew those degenerates used to be simple humans didn't help at all. Nonetheless, I got the meaning of Leo's words, and engraved one argument in my mind: they used to be humans, but now they were monsters, and the process was irreversible.

The preparations for the upcoming battle started immediately after the meeting. I was assigned to lead three teams responsible for evacuating humans and weak wolves from the western districts. Since the degenerates were already surrounding the whole area, those people could only be moved to the center part of the town.

The town hall sent messages alerting every citizen, wolf or human, and informing them of what they should do, but we still needed to go from door to door and force people to evacuate.

"I don't understand what is urgent! What kind of crisis are we expecting? The fire? The flood? I need answers before I get my ass anywhere out of my home!" A mother of three meaningfully crossed her hands over her chest.

She was a human, who most likely had no idea of the existence of a supernatural. I struggled to tell her how important it was for her to take her kids and run the hell out of the area, which was right at the town's western border. She was making it harder for me and wasting the time that I didn't have.

"Step outside of your house and close the door for a second, if you don't want to scare your children," I demanded harshly but was convincing enough for her to obey. "Stay here and wait."

I ran towards Patrick, grabbed him by the elbow, and dragged him to the stubborn lady's porch. He looked at me questioningly, but I didn't say a word until he was standing in front of the fiercely frowning 300- pound woman with curly ginger hair. He smiled awkwardly and greeted the lady with a brief nod, before raising his brows at me.

"Show her your claws," I told him.

"Are you serious?!" Patrick's eyes widened in disbelief.

"Deadly," I confirmed, "It will make my explanation quicker."

The woman narrowed her eyes at us while Patrick hesitantly raised his hand towards her, making her focus on his palm.

As his nails turned into 6-inch blades, she screamed her lungs out, "Monster!"

I patted poor Patrick's shoulder, releasing him from this unfortunate task, and shielded him before the terrified lady thought of throwing objects at him.

"He's one of the good guys," I assured, "but, trust me, you don't want to meet the bad guys. I suggest you stop arguing and start packing the necessary things to leave in fifteen minutes."

She nodded hysterically and ran back into the house to prepare for evacuation. I turned around and bowed to Patrick, mouthing a sorry and a thank you. He winked at me in response, which made me smile. His presence there turned out to be amazingly helpful. He was good at handling people. They believed whatever he told them. I wished I could say the same about my performance...

In less than an hour, we managed to

move ninety percent of the population living in the danger zone into the safer town center. As the one who organized the evacuation and secured a temporary location for the evacuated people to stay, felt proud of a job well done. The worst part of it was that all humans learned about the supernaturals' existence in a harsh way. Some of them took it surprisingly well, but some of them entered a state of panic or became hysterical. As much as I was still mad at Melinda,

at least she provided tons of sedatives for those who seriously needed drugs to calm down. It

worked. We got the situation under control while humans slowly began to acknowledge that they weren't the most advanced race living on this planet.

"Lilith, there are a few houses on the western hill five miles outside the town. People living there weren't registered in the town hall and are still not aware of the danger," Rayden said, handing me their addresses.

"Shit," I cursed under my breath.

Rayden gave that list to me since he and Ari were busy providing guns and bullets with silver and aconite. It was a specially prepared mix that they were hoping would kill the hybrids. Patrick was also gone, doing other tasks, and taking care of the fortifications in the southern part of town. I took a deep breath, grabbed three quickly picked volunteers, and got into the van.

"Wait! Let me be your driver!" lan called out, running towards us.

I smiled, seeing at least one face I recognized. I agreed with a nod. He grinned, jumped in front of the wheel, and a heartbeat later, we were moving towards the western town border. Once we drove out of town, I realized the road was getting narrower until it turned into a sandy path leading straight into the forest.

The houses we were looking for were in the clearing in the middle of the woods. It took us a while to get there, but we finally saw four houses standing less than fifty meters from each other. Ian drove us to the nearest one. I got out and took a blonde she-wolf, one of the volunteers, to go and knock on the first house's door while lan and two other Moon Hill wolves went to the second house.

As we were getting closer, I felt a chill running down my spine. The air I breathed suddenly became thicker. Something was wrong. I looked at the other three houses, and the abrupt realization came: it was quiet. We were in the middle of the forest, and yet no birds were singing, there were no sounds of animals, and not even bees were flying. We were surrounded by complete silence. "Keep your eyes wide open," I told the she-wolf as we slowly approached the door.

I knocked, but nobody answered. The anxiety increased my blood pressure, generously spreading the adrenalin across my body. I knocked again, this time louder, and slightly pressed my ear to the door, hoping to hear at least someone's heartbeat. I heard nothing. I swallowed, stepped back, and then kicked the door open. The she-wolf gasped, then she took the breath in through her nostrils.

"Blood," she muttered, looking at me with fear in her eyes.

I nodded. The stink of death was vividly sensible inside the house. I exhaled slowly and took the first step in. I passed through the short corridor and saw the first corpse lying on the floor. It was a

middle-aged man with one arm net

separated from his body and his stomach cut wide open. One of his legs looked like it had been eaten. The whole view was horrifying. With a shaky breath, I stepped further into the house. Three more victims were lying in the kitchen area. As soon as the she-wolf saw them, she ran outside the house to vomit.

The middle-aged woman, with her skull ripped open and the pieces of her brain covering the floor lay in the middle of the floor. Two of her younger than teenage children had their throats mercilessly cut. Their bodies were curled up by the bathroom door as if they were trying to escape.

My whole body started to tremble. I couldn't believe that there was a creature capable of doing something like that. I covered my mouth with my hand to restrain myself from crying out loud while my tears flew down my cheeks. Yet, there was no time to become emotional. The degenerates must have been somewhere close.

Suddenly, I felt a fast movement

right behind me. I turned around. I couldn't see anyone, but I felt the enemy's presence. I ran out of the house to warn the blonde she-wolf... but it was too late. Her headless body lay right outside the threshold. I pulled out my knife and slowly moved forward, trying to sense the murderous creature lurking somewhere near me. I closed my eyes and located the faint sound.

"The roof," I muttered under my breath and threw my knife aimed at the huge wolf-like creature, standing right above me.

My knife stabbed it around its chest, making it jump down while letting out a vicious scream. It landed just a few inches away from me, furiously panting and towering over me by more than two heads.

I gulp. "Oh, fuck..."