My Hockey Alpha

Chapter 236: The Search for the Dark Princess

Nina

With one last teary-eyed look at my friends, Enzo took my hand and we stepped through the portal together.

When we came out on the other side, we were in a different place than before. I still hadn’t perfected my portal skills, and so I had no way of knowing where exactly a portal that I made would open to. This time, we weren’t even in the forest.

In fact, as I looked around with confusion, I saw that we seemed to be on the outskirts of a town.

“Where are we?” I asked, glancing around at our surroundings with my eyebrows scrunched together. “This isn’t the forest.”

Enzo looked around as well. “I know this town,” he said. “But… It’s several hours away from the Alpha King’s mansion. Even longer on foot.”

I felt anger begin to bubble up inside of me, and I cursed annoyedly. This was supposed to be simple. I was supposed to get as close to the Alpha King’s mansion as possible so I could get all of this over with quickly, but now we were stranded far away from the mansion with no vehicle. The town was small, too, and appeared to be in the middle of nowhere. In fact, the town was hardly even a town at all; it was more of a roadside pit stop than anything. All I could see was a gas station, a general store, a bar, and a few houses. Mountainview was tiny, but this place made it look huge.

“It’s alright,” Enzo said, although I wondered if he truly meant that or if he was just trying to make me feel better. “Let’s go and ask around. Maybe we can find a ride.”

I didn’t think that anyone from such a small town would be so willing to give two strangers a ride to the Alpha King’s mansion, but it was too late. Enzo was already pulling me toward the gas station.

the middle of the desert. The energy was the same, however. It was so quiet that I could have heard

the old man looked at us through the window made me

strangers,” I said nervously as he pulled me

replied matter-of-factly.

made me feel worse. Before, I was worried about getting blasted off the face of the planet by a shotgun,

had

surprise, the sign indicated that the

by the smell of booze and cigarettes. It was an unexpected smell for the inside of a gas station, and I had to resist the urge to pull my shirt up over my nose. There was an attendant behind the counter — a middle-aged woman with a ponytail and too many wrinkles, probably from all of the smoking — who just stared at us warily as we entered. Enzo, clearly not wanting to raise any alarms, led me over to one of the coolers. He grabbed two bottles of

slowly, never breaking eye contact with us. The intense smell of cigarettes was definitely coming from her. It was so strong now that it almost made me gag, and

voice hoarse and gravelly. Enzo handed her a twenty

from beneath the counter and began shoving our things in it. Enzo cleared his throat. “Erm… You happen to

slowly sliding up to look at Enzo. She let out

a place to rent a

then turned to glare at me. She looked me up and down, chewing a bit of tobacco in her mouth, and made another face.

“Listen,” he said, somewhat sternly, “we really need

she looked at me. She looked like she was about to tell us to fuck off, but then a gruff voice suddenly spoke up