The hallway outside The Den still smells like cold metal and spilled beer when I step inside the Glacier Wolves locker room. The music is off. The air is heavier than the bruises you can see.

Frostfall has just dropped another game—another parade to the penalty box, another night where the Wolves bled more than they scored. The league will call them undisciplined. The highlight reels will be merciless.

But inside this room, the story feels different.

Captain Sasha Novak is the quietest person in here, which is how you know things are bad. He sits in front of his stall, tape residue still clinging to his wrists, jaw clenched so tight the shadows on his face look carved.

“We know who we are,” he says eventually, voice low. “We don’t apologize for that.”

Around him, players move slowly—checking on each other, muttering in half-finished sentences, pulling off gear with the care of people cataloguing each bruise for later. No one is alone for more than a few seconds. A hand lands on a shoulder. A chirp cuts through the silence. Someone laughs at a joke that isn’t funny, just to prove they still can.

They’ll be called villains again in tomorrow’s headlines. But standing in the doorway, watching the way they close ranks around their own, it’s hard not to think that for all their chaos, the Wolves might be the most honest team in the league.