When the moonlight was dyed iron-gray by the shredded clouds, Alyssa's taming whip was stuck in the throat of the third corpse. The blood of the ambushers splashed on Cain's carriage emblem - the silver wolf totem with a crown of thorns, which was absorbing the blood plasma and glowing an evil red light.
"Be frugal with the burning," Cain kicked open the car door with the tip of his black iron boot, "Your fireworks are more valuable than these trash." The tip of his scepter lifted the corpse's mask, revealing the tattoo of Lucien's personal guard - a wolf's head wrapped in thorns, which perfectly matched the outline of the birthmark on Alyssa's left shoulder.
The tenth poisoned arrow flew through the air. Alyssa spun to avoid it, her whip wrapped around the shaft chain and swung into the air. The flames of the eclipse surged in her palm, the blue-green flames licked the shadows in the forest, and illuminated the priests of the Wailing Wall who were forming a formation thirty steps away - the blood-colored formation under their feet was absorbing the resentment of the dead, turning the entire fir forest into an amplifier.
"Trouble." She spat out the blood foam in her mouth, and the thorn birthmark suddenly twitched. When the flames engulfed the nearest priest, the screams were transformed into babies crying by the formation, and countless weeping human face reliefs emerged from the ground, opening their mouths to devour the out-of-control eclipse flames.
Kane's scepter slammed into the ground. Black thorns broke through the soil and entangled the carriage, wrapping the carriage into a thorny fortress. The moment Alyssa jumped onto the roof, she caught a glimpse of the lord's torn cloak. The thorns at the heart were growing rapidly, and the spikes penetrated the brocade robe and oozed glowing blue blood.
"Left!" Kane suddenly shouted. Alyssa instinctively whipped her whip across, and the silver spikes on the whip pierced into the wolf-shaped black shadow that was rushing towards her - it was a blood-fed Moon Howler Wolf, with a soul-controlling crystal from a priest of the Wailing Wall inserted in its eye socket. The beast's exploded brain splashed onto the car window, condensing into a miniature crown pattern on the glass surface.
The sound of the ambusher's bone flute suddenly changed. The burning pain in Alyssa's birthmark intensified, and the flames of the eclipse surged uncontrollably. When she burned the fifth node of the Weeping Wall formation, the flames suddenly turned to devour her right arm - the uncontrolled energy flowed back through her blood vessels, reflecting Kane's cold gaze in her pupils.
"The ashes of the chess piece..." The lord suddenly grasped her burning wrist, and black thorns emerged from his palm, wrapped in flames, "...should be scattered somewhere more interesting."
The severe pain made Alyssa kneel on one knee. The tip of Cain's scepter pierced the ground, and black thorns grew along the lines of the blood-feeding formation, turning the entire forest into a huge meat grinder. The screams of the ambushers were absorbed by the Wailing Wall, converted into energy and flowed back to the carriage emblem, and the crown totem became more and more scarlet and dazzling.
Lucien's cold emerald light flashed through the forest. Alyssa's taming whip wrapped around the swaying light spot, but what she pulled out was a poisonous snake with a marriage bell tied to it. The moment the snake's fangs pierced her palm, the birthmark suddenly froze, and the flames of the eclipse flowed back to her heart - where the shadow of a miniature crown of thorns was emerging.
"Did you see clearly?" Cain's scepter lifted her chin, and black thorns penetrated into the blood vessels through the wound. "You and I are both people who fiddle with ashes." His cloak was lifted by the night wind, and Alyssa saw under the skin of the lord's back - countless thorn roots were climbing up the skull along the spine, forming a complete network with the heart parasitized by the crown.
The carriage suddenly overturned. Alyssa rolled into the bushes holding Cain, and the sharp teeth of the Moon Howler grazed the lord's throat. When she was forced to use her body to block the second beast, the flames of the eclipse suddenly protected her and burned the wolf's body into gray bone residue.
"Good instinct." Cain's breath sprayed behind her bleeding ear. Alyssa's birthmark began to absorb the ashes of the wolf corpse, and the thorn pattern spread new branches to the shoulder blade. She saw the crystal fragments flickering in the ashes - they were made of Lucien's soul-controlling crystal, and at this moment they were resonating with the eclipse flame in her body.
The sound of bone flutes shattering could be heard in the forest. The last priest of the Wailing Wall exploded into blood mist, and the energy of the formation was fully injected into the carriage emblem. The tip of Cain's scepter suddenly blossomed, and the black thorns bloomed with poisonous stamens, solidifying the blood mist into an amber curse carrier.
"A little gift for you." The lord pressed the amber into the center of her birthmark. Alyssa's vision suddenly split - her left eye saw Lucien grinning in the depths of the jungle, and her right eye saw the thorn network in Cain's heart spreading all over his body. The flames of the eclipse boiled in her blood vessels, but it could no longer hurt the man in front of her.
When the moonlight pierced through the clouds, only the charred relief of the Wailing Wall remained at the ambush site. Alyssa's taming whip was wrapped around a half-broken jade fragment, which was stained with Lucian's blood. When she tried to burn the fragment, the flames suddenly revealed a scene from three hundred years ago - the first generation of Silver Wolf King pressed the twins on the altar, and the spikes of the crown pierced the hearts of both of them at the same time.
The tip of Kane's scepter suddenly softened and turned into a crown of thorns, which was placed on her head. "Do you understand now? The most beautiful flowers can only grow from ashes."
There was a sound of chain breaking from the direction of the carriage wreckage. Alyssa's birthmark suddenly shrank, and the thorn pattern retreated back to below the collarbone. She kicked away the crystal fragments at her feet and found that each fragment reflected a different future - one in which she wore the crown and burned Cain, one in which Lucian stabbed the crown into her eye socket, and one in which only ashes were left floating in the wind.
When the bloody moonlight enveloped the forest again, Cain had already returned to the carriage. Alyssa clutched the emerald fragment, feeling the remaining blood of Lucien in her palms. Her eclipse flame moved under her skin, and the fragments of the silver wolf nursery rhyme came from deep in her birthmark: "...When the ashes soak into the twin soil, the throne of thorns will bloom with a new master..."
The shadows of the trees in the dark suddenly twisted. Alyssa's taming whip sprang out instinctively, but it caught the raven with the faded engagement bell tied to it. When the bell spontaneously combusted in the moonlight, Lucian's handwriting emerged from the ashes: **Burn it more cleanly next time**.