Teen Wolf: Second Howl Chapter 7 7 Viral Truths

I am 15 chapters ahead on my patreón, check it out if you are interested.

spatréon/emperordragon

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Chapter Seven: Viral Truths

The forest had fallen into a silence so absolute, it felt unnatural—like the earth itself was holding its breath. The only sound was the crunch of leaves beneath Richard's boots as he knelt beside the enormous corpse of the bear. Its body lay twisted among the underbrush, still radiating heat in the chilly morning air, its bulk defying logic, its presence staining the natural world around it.

Richard moved with calm precision, as if this were just another item on a long to-do list. He reached into the pocket of his weathered jacket and retrieved a small, tallic object. A tag. Smooth and clean. He clipped it onto the creature's ear with a practiced hand, the quiet click of tal on flesh sounding absurdly mundane after the chaos we'd just survived.

Everything was too still now. The birds had stopped singing. The wind had stilled. The forest, usually full of hidden life, now felt hollow, like a room after soone scread inside it.

I took a slow breath and broke the silence, though my voice ca out lower and rougher than usual, still raw from adrenaline and disbelief. "Why the tag?"

Richard didn't look up right away. When he did, his eyes held none of the awe or horror that churned in my gut. Just tired understanding. "Local wildlife office's got a bounty on this one," he said with a shrug, like he was explaining a parking ticket. "Thousand bucks if you bring proof of kill. Tag makes it official."

He stood up, brushing dirt and pine needles from his jeans, casual as ever. It struck how easily he could move on from what had just happened. As if fighting a creature like this was routine for him.

It felt jarring—this return to normalcy. But maybe that was his armor. Pretending this was normal made it easier to carry.

He pulled out his phone and dialed a number without a second thought. While I was still trying to wrap my head around the sheer wrongness of what we'd encountered, Richard calmly reported the bear's coordinates like he was giving directions to a pizza place. His voice was steady, almost bored. When he was done, he tucked the phone away and turned his attention back to the forest, the call already forgotten.

I stared at the massive corpse. Its size alone bent the rules of biology. No ordinary bear was built like that. Its limbs were too long, its muscles unnaturally dense, like sothing had stretched it from the inside. And its eyes—those wild, lifeless eyes—still seed to glimr with a madness that hadn't yet faded.

"So…" I began slowly, still processing, still shaken. "How does sothing like this even happen? How does a normal animal turn into… that?"

Richard didn't respond imdiately. His eyes were fixed on the body, as if weighing not just the question, but the consequences of the answer. When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet. asured.

"A few centuries back," he said, "people thought it was hell. Thought these things ca from so kind of eternal punishnt. Fire and brimstone. Demons crawling up from the depths."

I nodded slowly. That tracked. It had felt like hell.

"But that's not it?" I asked.

He gave a short, humorless laugh. "Nope. Turns out hell's just a taphor with good PR. The truth? It's weirder. Way weirder. The real explanation ca from people most folks don't listen to—supernatural researchers, fringe scientists, ancient druids… that whole crowd."

He turned toward , his eyes reflecting sothing darker. "They figured it out. There's another dinsion. Right next to ours. Not above, not below—just... overlapping. Like two sheets of paper pressed together."

"Parallel worlds?" I guessed.

"Sort of," he said. "But not a mirror of ours. It's not Earth with different choices or tilines. It's more like… a dumping ground. A cesspool of raw, chaotic energy. And that filth leaks through. Slowly. Constantly."

My stomach turned. "Leaking what exactly?"

"Energy," he said simply. "Not the kind you plug into a wall. Think of it as… cosmic sewage. Raw, unstable power. Most of it stays contained thanks to the natural barriers between our world and whatever that place is. But sotis—just sotis—it seeps through."

I looked down at the beast again, its bloody mouth frozen in a permanent snarl. "And when it does… it infects things."

Richard nodded. "Exactly. Not all at once. It's subtle. Starts small. The infected get stronger. Faster. More aggressive. It's like pumping them full of steroids forged in a nightmare."

"But it cos at a price," I said quietly.

He nudged the body with his boot, the massive carcass shifting slightly. "Yeah. Sanity. At first, it's just a little voice in the back of the mind. A whisper. Then it gets louder. Until there's nothing left but instinct and rage. The thing in front of you isn't a bear anymore. It's hunger. It's violence given flesh."

I swallowed, a chill sliding down my spine. "So… anything could be infected? Anyone?"

"In theory," he said. "But it's rare. The barriers between dinsions are strong. Nature's got defenses. Only way it breaks through is if there's already a crack—sothing broken, or weak. Or… sothing on the other side actively pushing."

I raised an eyebrow. "Nature has defenses?"

He looked at then, and for the first ti, I saw sothing fierce flicker in his expression—like pride wrapped in purpose. "Yeah. We're not alone in this fight. Earth's not helpless. When sothing unnatural shows up, nature sends out an immune response."

"Hunters?" I asked.

Richard smiled. It wasn't smug, just sure. "Hunters. Werewolves. Shapeshifters. People like . People like… maybe you. We're nature's white blood cells. Her last line of defense."

I blinked at him. That idea—so insane, so impossible—should've made laugh. But it didn't. Because deep down, I felt it. That strange certainty stirring in my chest. The kind that didn't co from logic, but from instinct.

This wasn't myth.

This was biology.

And I was part of it.

I looked back at the bear—its blood now cooling, steaming faintly in the crisp air. Its jaw hung open, teeth yellow and cracked. The violence was over, but the echo of it still pulsed through the forest.

"So what now?" I asked.

Richard exhaled, scanning the treetops like he could sense sothing still watching. He slung his bow over his shoulder and turned toward the deeper woods.

"Now?" he said, voice low and ready. "Now we make sure there aren't more."

And for the first ti in my life, I didn't feel like a bystander.

I didn't feel like a kid.

I felt like a weapon.