It was amazing how humans and twilight creatures had learnt not just to co-exist, but to communicate with each other. More and more often, non-humans could be seen serving in various power structures.

Their essences were ideally suited for such work. The harpies, for example, had a bird's eye view of what was going on, working in reconnaissance. Sirens, mermen and mermaids were suited to work as lifeguards, often fending off sharks and sea creatures.

Land creatures were also plentiful. Vampires, ghouls, kitsune, djinn, fairies, and many others whose enumeration could take dozens of hours. The human world was now crowded and diverse.

Given your work in the military structure and your involvement with OTG-141, whose membership was diverse, you knew the strengths of the Twilight creatures as well as the weaknesses, so that in the hour of need you could, if not defeat, then put up sufficient resistance to survive.

However, what you could not foresee was that during one of the missions to pursue high-ranking officers of the PMC Connie, you will be separated from your team, and you will be forced to wander through the forest in search of a way out.

With each passing second you felt more and more like someone was following you. Someone's gaze was constantly drilling into your back, and every time you turned around, you could only see a dark figure or red lights darting among the tall bushes.

And now, turning round sharply at the sound of a breaking branch, you catch the movement with the edge of your eye. With a shake of your head, you take a step forward and sharply hit something huge and hard. With a startled gasp, you raise your head to meet the bright red eyes of the werewolf in its full transformation. Adding even more terror is the fact that his form seems familiar to you....

"In a hurry to get somewhere?" The growling voice makes you recoil in a futile attempt to increase your distance with the man, in whom you easily recognise Makarov.