Buried Alive, Reborn to Rule: The Wolfless Omega's Ruthless Revenge

Clara POV:

The jarring bump of my head against something hard dragged me from the darkness.

My lungs burned. A scream was trapped in my throat, choked off by a piece of rough, damp cloth tied tightly in my mouth. My wrists and ankles were bound.

Panic, cold and sharp, shot through me. I was in a hole. A narrow, freshly dug hole.

The scent of damp earth and rotting leaves filled my nostrils. It was suffocating. Above me, I heard a rhythmic scraping sound. Shhhk. Thump. Shhhk. Thump.

The sound of a shovel.

Someone was burying me alive.

A woman's voice, low and grumbling, drifted down from above. "Don't blame me, girl. Blame yourself for getting in Lady Annabella's way."

The name Annabella struck something buried deep inside this body. Memories burst into my mind, colliding with my own so violently that for a moment, I could no longer tell where one life ended and the other began.

They belonged to Clara Adkins, the disgraced, wolfless Omega of the Stonecrest Pack. Annabella was her stepsister, the daughter of her stepmother, Debora. Clara's memories also gave me the identity of the woman standing above the grave. Agnes. An old servant who obeyed Annabella without question.

I saw Clara's life in sharp, painful fragments. The constant sneers and whispers of the Pack. Her pathetic, all-consuming crush on an Alpha's son named Butler Gregory. The cloying sweetness of Debora and Annabella's false kindness. They had spent years breaking her spirit, preparing her to accept every humiliation without resistance.

Her final clear memory was of Debora handing her a cup of "calming tea." Clara had drunk it because some part of her still wanted to believe that someone in that house might care whether she lived or died.

She had been wrong. The original Clara Adkins was dead, and my soul had awakened inside her body. I had inherited her pain, her enemies, and the lesson she had paid for with her life: never mistake cruelty wrapped in kindness for love.

Dirt rained down on my face, stinging my eyes. The weight on my chest grew heavier, pressing the air from my lungs. This body was about to die for a second time.

Debora. Annabella. Agnes. Their names burned through the panic and left only rage behind. I would not let them kill this body again.

I forced my body to go limp, my frantic struggles ceasing. I conserved every ounce of oxygen, every flicker of strength. I had to make her think I was gone.

My bound hands scrabbled desperately in the loose dirt beneath me. My fingers, numb and clumsy, brushed against something hard and sharp.

A rock. Jagged-edged.

The instant my fingers closed around it, my old instincts snapped into place. Years of physical conditioning, Krav Maga, and self-defense training from my former life guided every calculation. This body was weak and unfamiliar, but I still knew the right angle, the force required, and exactly where to strike. This wasn't about strength. It was about precision.

The shoveling stopped. Agnes let out a tired grunt above me. "There. That should be deep enough," she muttered. "No one's going to find you out here." Her footsteps shifted closer, careless now that she believed the job was done. Then she leaned over the edge of the pit, her silhouette blocking out the sliver of moon as she checked her work.

It was my only chance.

My eyes snapped open. With a guttural roar muffled by the gag, I surged upward, using the last of my energy to slam the sharp edge of the rock against the side of her head.

Bone cracked beneath the blow.

Agnes shrieked. "You-you're alive!" The words broke apart into a thin, panicked scream as she lost her balance and tumbled into the grave with me.

I didn't hesitate. I scrambled on top of her, straddling her chest, and brought the rock down again. And again. I struck her temple, then her jaw, until she stopped struggling and my hands were slick with blood.

Silence.

My entire body trembled with the aftershock of violence, but my gaze was like ice. I used the sharp edge of the rock to saw at the ropes binding my wrists, the fibers biting into my skin until they finally snapped.

I freed my ankles, tore the gag from my mouth, and gasped in a lungful of cold, night air. It tasted like freedom.

Clawing my way out of the shallow grave, I collapsed onto the damp ground, my body screaming in protest. The moon cast a pale, unforgiving light on my hands. They were caked in mud and blood, my fingernails broken and raw.

I checked Agnes's body. No purse, no identifying marks. Just a plain servant's dress.

I couldn't leave her in the open. A body would start a hunt. A missing servant would create confusion, questions, delays. Those delays were the only thing I had.

So I dragged Agnes deeper into the grave meant for me, ignoring the hot pull of pain in my shoulders. I kicked loose earth over her body until the dark shape disappeared beneath mud and leaves. It was a crude burial, rushed and ugly, but it would keep her hidden long enough. Let them wonder where she went. Let them waste their time.

A sharp pain throbbed at the back of my skull where they must have struck me. My limbs felt heavy, my movements sluggish. The poison. Debora had been slowly poisoning this body for years.

I staggered to my feet, my legs shaking. I had to find my way back to the Pack lands, back to civilization, before I collapsed.

A cool weight against my neck caught my attention. I reached up and my fingers closed around a crescent-moon-shaped pendant. The Lunar Locket. A memory, clear and sharp, surfaced: Clara's mother, Jeannie Adkins, placing it around her neck years ago. Her only real memory of love.

I clutched it tightly. A faint, almost imperceptible warmth seeped into my skin, easing the bone-deep exhaustion just a fraction.

A distant howl echoed through the trees. I couldn't stay here.

I ripped a strip of fabric from the hem of my ruined dress and clumsily wrapped it around my bleeding hand. Leaning against a tree, I tried to get my bearings, forcing myself to put one foot in front of the other, moving towards the faint glow of lights I could see through the dense woods.

Each step was an agony, a promise.

Debora. Annabella.

The thought was a silent vow, etched into my new soul with the cold finality of a tombstone.

What you owe her, I will collect. With interest.

The trees cast long, jagged shadows across the ground as I forced myself onward. I didn't know how long I walked, only that the forest floor eventually gave way to a gravel path, and the glow of lights grew brighter.

I had almost reached the edge of the town when my knees finally buckled, my body hitting its absolute limit.