The Beast Within – The Bloodclaw (Volume 3)

The flight was only the beginning. Yulong has turned to ash, yet from the ash grow new shadows. The Dark King has changed his face—he now wears the features of a dead man, and those who look into his eyes do not see a stranger, but the neighbor from next door. His hunger is no longer his alone. His progeny roam the night, scenting life in the veins like ripe fruit, spreading like a curse across the land. Liyen follows a small flame. A tiny light in the darkness that neither flickers nor fails—the little Qi-Flame that dances through forgotten paths and leads her deeper, down into the earth where silence breathes and memories do not die, but wait. Down there, in the gullet beneath the world, the lost one is said to be. But what lurks in the depths is no prisoner—it is an exchange: A cage of flesh in which two breaths writhe—and only one may remain. Meanwhile, strangers open a door in the night. When this band of foreign adventurers appears in the darkness, the true journey has only begun. Instead of finding refuge, they find a blood-feast and smiles that almost reach the eyes. For sometimes the greatest danger is not the monster you fear, but the friend who smiles at you—whose teeth only show when the moon loses its blood. Now stands the choice: To speak the warning and be branded mad—or to remain silent and watch with living flesh as trust turns to slaughter. (Volume 3 of The Beast Within series – The Bloodclaw—a direct sequel to "Yulong") A story about how sometimes the monster does not lurk beneath the bed, but beneath the skin—and about what price it demands to wear a face that is not your own. An OPTIONAL lore companion book is available on my WebNovel profile. TikTok.com/@jjwakawaka Copyright 2026 JJWaka & Wayne Shao. All rights reserved. This work is protected by copyright. Any reproduction, distribution, translation, adaptation, public performance, or other use—even in part—is prohibited without the express written permission of the authors. Publication of this work is reserved exclusively for the authors—regardless of platform, medium, or format. Any further publication or use by third parties, even for non-commercial purposes, is strictly prohibited. All characters, plot lines, texts, musical compositions, sound recordings, visual elements, and other creative content are the intellectual property of the authors.