"I, Alpha-"
A voice, deep, commanding, and ridiculously dramatic, boomed somewhere near her ear.
Azura's head throbbed with the force of a thousand hangovers. Was this what the afterlife sounded like? A bad audiobook narrated by a guy with a deep voice?
Murmurs in what she vaguely recognized as English rippled around her.
Oh, fantastic. I've died and ended up in the international wing of the spirit realm. Did the dumplings give me a one-way ticket to Babel? Is this some kind of cosmic punishment for skipping language class?
She staggered, eyes squeezed shut, hand clutching her pounding head. The deep-voiced man stopped his speech mid-syllable, and suddenly a strong arm shot out to steady her, wrapping firmly around her waist.
"Azura, are you okay?"
Wait. He knew her name. And that was English. Her panic level shot from 'mildly concerned' to 'full-blown social anxiety attack'.
A stranger. A handsome-sounding stranger was touching her. And he expected her to talk back. In English.
Her reading comprehension was top-tier, thank you very much. She could devour a 500-page novel in a night. But speaking? Speaking was a whole different hell. Her tongue felt like a clumsy, overcooked sausage in her mouth whenever she tried.
With a surge of adrenaline-fueled awkwardness, she shoved weakly at the solid wall of muscle she assumed was his chest. Her eyes fluttered open to a blurry world of shapes and colors.
"Sorry, I don't speak English," she mumbled, her voice a pathetic squeak.
A collective gasp rippled through the room, as if she'd just declared the moon was made of cheese. The man holding her tightened his grip, his voice laced with a confusion so thick she could practically taste it.
"Azura, what the hell are you talking about?"
Her blurry vision finally snapped into focus, revealing the face of a man who looked like he'd been sculpted by a very horny god. Handsome, with a jawline that could cut glass and soft brown hair.
Azura's reaction, however, wasn't to swoon. It was to go into full-on threat-assessment mode. Was this heaven? He was too muscular for an angel. Hell? Too well-dressed for a demon.
"Who are you?! Angel? Devil? The Grim Reaper? Or are you the manager of this... this afterlife reception area, who handles the paperwork for ridiculous deaths caused by frozen dumplings?!"
The man's handsome face scrunched up in confusion.
"Are you kidding me, or did you actually hit your head?"
"How did you know?!" she gasped, pointing a shaky finger at her own skull. "I got whacked in the head by a box of frozen dumplings and—"
Azura froze mid-sentence. The words had tumbled out of her mouth, smooth, fluent, and perfectly accented English.
Wait. What?
Did getting concussed by frozen food magically unlock her language skills? Were her mom's dumplings not just delicious, but also... sacred artifacts of linguistic power?!
"I CAN SPEAK ENGLISH! OH MY GOD, I'M A GENIUS!"
Azura threw her head back and cackled, a sound of pure, unadulterated triumph. She didn't give a damn that she was still cradled in the arms of Mr. Handsome-And-Confused, nor did she notice the collective gasp of the crowd, who were now staring at her like she'd just started sprouting feathers.
The stunned silence finally broke, erupting into a wave of hushed, frantic whispers.
"Oh my goddess, what's wrong with Azura? Is her brain broken?"
"I mean, she wasn't the one who just got publicly rejected, so why is she acting like a mate who's gone feral after a mating bond snapped?"
Azura's laughter died in her throat. Wait. She could understand them. Every single word. Not just the main guy's perfect, narrator-esque English, but the gossipy, background-chatter English too.
Her listening skills, previously on par with a brick's, had apparently been upgraded to military-grade sonar.
But as her linguistic euphoria faded, the sheer, mind-bending weirdness of her situation finally crashed down on her.
For the first time, she actually looked.
They were outside. Under a vast, starry night sky.
This wasn't the afterlife; it was a ridiculously fancy outdoor party, complete with a stage, tables groaning under the weight of gourmet food, and enough twinkle lights to blind a small aircraft.
Everyone was dressed to the nines, a sea of beautiful, confused foreigners all staring at her like she was the main event at a freak show. Her gaze drifted back to the man still holding her, his expression a cocktail of concern and utter bewilderment.
Then her eyes landed on the stage behind him, where a massive banner hung, its elegant script spelling out words that made her blood run cold.
It said something about the "Ascension of the New Alpha."
Azura's brain, which had just been celebrating its newfound linguistic prowess, promptly blue-screened. A wave of ice-cold dread washed over her. She tried to deny it, she really did.
She mentally screamed, 'No, no, no, anything but this!' But her brain, now a supercomputer of cliché recognition, connected the dots with horrifying speed.
Oh. My. God.
She hadn't just died. She'd transmigrated.
Into a werewolf story.
Not because of a noble truck-kun, not because of a heroic sacrifice, but because of a goddamn box of frozen dumplings.
The sheer, unmitigated absurdity of it all was so immense it was almost impressive.
As her brain short-circuited with a thousand existential questions, a pathetic whimper cut through the air.
Azura's eyes, wide with horror, finally landed on the source: a stunningly beautiful girl with long silver hair, collapsed on the ground in a heap of despair. She was crying, her gaze locked on the man holding Azura like he was the last lifeboat on the Titanic.
And the wardrobe! While everyone else looked like they were attending a Met Gala, this poor girl was rocking a shabby, ripped maid outfit that screamed "I exist solely for angst and plot convenience."
The girl sniffled, her voice trembling with the force of a thousand soap operas.
"Alpha Adrian, please don't reject me... my wolf is very weak right now... if you reject me—"
"SHUT UP, SELENA!" the man roared, his voice vibrating right through Azura's skull. "An omega with a weak wolf like you isn't fit to be a luna! And don't forget you're a sinner!"
Azura flinched.
Jeez, buddy, use your indoor voice.
"Besides..." he continued, his tone shifting from rage to a smug, possessive declaration. He yanked Azura even tighter, smashing her cheek against his rock-hard pectoral muscle.
"Buhh??!!"
"The person I like is your sister, Azura. She's strong, beautiful, kind—so different from a jinx like you."
"....?!!!!!"
Azura's brain, already operating at maximum 'what-the-hell' capacity, promptly exploded into a supernova of disbelief. Not only had she been isekai'd by frozen dumplings into a werewolf romance—a genre she actively despised—but she'd also landed smack-dab in the middle of a love triangle, apparently ruining a fated mate bond in the process.
Magical dumpling...
Tears of sheer cosmic injustice pricking her eyes
Couldn't you have at least made me a potted plant? Or a trust fund baby?!