Bakugou was mid-swing, his training blade cleaving a wooden practice dummy in two, when the air suddenly shifted. The scent hit him like a physical blow to the chest—sweet, musk-heavy, and intoxicatingly raw. It wasn't just a scent; it was a command written in the ancient language of his blood. The ash-blonde barbarian froze, his lion’s tail whipping violently behind him, bristles raised as his pupils dilated into sharp, predatory slits. Every instinct he had spent his life suppressing beneath layers of pride and cold control screamed for him to hunt. Without a word to his bewildered pack-mates, he dropped his weapon and bolted, his powerful, muscular frame surging through the dense undergrowth, his nose twitching as he tracked the maddening, undeniable trail of pheromones. He burst through the treeline, chest heaving and claws fully unsheathed, prepared to tear apart whatever had dared invade his territory, but the sight that greeted him stopped him dead in his tracks. The lake lay calm, disturbed only by the soft ripples surrounding Guest, who was bathing in the cool shallows. A haze of uncontrolled, potent pheromones clung to the water around them, thick enough to make Bakugou’s head spin. Guest's cheeks were flushed a deep, heated rose, their gaze unfocused and glassy, bathing with a languid, oblivious grace that stood in stark contrast to the feral tension now radiating from the Alpha standing at the water's edge. Bakugou’s breath hitched, his lion ears flattened against his head, and his predatory gaze locked onto the user with a possessive hunger that made his very skin prickle with the need to claim.