~Chapter 46~

Minho and the Peacekeepers

Minho’s POV~

            It’s been a month since Taemin was gifted to me. He only responds when I talk to him or when he asks if I need any help. He helps me get ready in the morning by washing my face, dressing me, and even cooking food for me. Taemin was a terrible cook back in the day…Anyway, Taemin has been great company. When I practice sparring, he would watch over me and even help me train. Just like the good old days. “Minho hyung, would you like it if I fed you?” Taemin looks at me and raises a few slices of cooked meat with chopsticks and brings it to my mouth. Taemin would eat all the food and even ask for my portion back then. I open my mouth and munch on the food. “Almost forgot,” he says and pulls out a bag of herbs. “I collected these on my hunt. You should use them to get stronger.” Taemin would’ve lost that bag long ago. ‘Magic hands’ as he used to call it.

            “I love it, thank you,” I smile and tuck the pouch away. Taemin also wouldn’t care about my strength, but just my happiness.

            “Ah, I’m running out,” he says monotonously and swallows down a few monster beads. The Peacekeepers told me that we would need monster beads to replenish him. Taemin can’t move around if he runs out of the energy from the monster beads. Taemin wouldn’t want to survive by the cost of others’ lives. “All better.”

            “That’s good,” I say and take a hold of his cold hand. “I’m glad you’re here.” I feel so much frustration, yet this Taemin doesn’t seem to notice. As much as he looks like him, I can’t help but to see the obvious differences. If only the White Masked Hero was here, he’d know what to say. He’d also enjoy these dishes with me as well. If only he was here, I wouldn’t feel so lost.

Joon’s POV~

            A month is up, and we depart tomorrow. I check over the staff and equipment, making sure everything is in order. I take a brush and cross off the list. One month ago, His Majesty gave me a book written by Jong Kook hyungnim on ways to combat the Peacekeepers. It still surprises me to think Jong Kook hyungnim has a way to counteract their formations. He also gave me a pouch with a secret item that I should use if anything were to happen during the trip. As I continue to review, Onew sits next to me, keeping me company. He knows I prefer peace and quiet when I go over tactics, so he remains still and quiet. I glimpse at him and notice his face has a hint of impatience in it, almost like wants some attention himself. I smile to myself and put my left hand down, letting him hold it. To my surprise, Onew takes my hand and starts scribbling on it with his finger. He’s writing down everything he wants to tell me on my palm, so he can feel better and not disturb me by talking. He occasionally does this when I read. Arrows, he writes. He must be restless since I made him take a break from making weapons. Hungry? he asks me. He must be worried about my health. I shake my head and smile at him warmly. He nods back and continues playing around with my hand. I sigh and put down my book after hearing his stomach grumble lightly. He must have been hungry waiting for me. Tomorrow we will start our long trip and I do not know if we will run into any trouble along the way. I need to make sure he is well fed so he can travel comfortably. “Let’s make some fried chicken,” I offer and take his hand. “Follow me.”

Minho’s POV~

            “I, Choi Minho, humbly greet the leader of the Peacekeepers,” I say while bowing down. Finally, I am able to meet the notorious ‘hyungnim.’ “Thank you for your kindness the past few months.” I grip onto my flute and await a response. Suddenly, a booming laugher echoes through the air, the strong energy so powerful that I had to take a step back. This man sure has a strong force of energy. Even his voice is able to push me back. He definitely is a formidable foe. If anything, even with my teammates, we might not be able to take him down.

            “What is with the serious tone? We are all family here. Quick, let me see your face,” he says. I bow once more and lift my face to him. My eyes search around for a bit in confusion as the voice I heard earlier seems to not match the face in front of me. The man sitting on the chair high above is marked with old age. His hair is plainly white and neatly tied up in a bun with not even a streak of gray or black hair to tarnish it. His face is wrinkled and tanned from being in the sun for too long, yet his skin is still radiating. His voice gave me the impression that he was at most in his fifties, yet the person in front of me looks at least in his seventies. I don’t recall ever meeting him as a child. His lips curve up as he laughs happily, standing up.

            “Why you grew up so handsomely. A true man,” the leader says and descends the stairs. I flinch slightly as his raises his large hands only to be surprised by it gently patting my shoulders. “What a fine young man, full of potential. With a few more years of fine training, you will fit to rule the country!” My heart tightens as his comment rips away any hopes of trusting him. Don’t forget, the Peacekeepers need you to be their pawn, so they can rule the country. The officials will not go against the royal bloodline, so I am the perfect puppet for them. With me, they will have the easiest transition. “Look at him,” he talks to the other Peacekeepers, “am I that scary? He’s not even smiling back. Don’t be so stiff,” he pats my back.

            “Don’t upset hyungnim,” one of them says, “Come on, give him a little smile.”

            “Yeah, don’t act so distant. We are all family here!” Another one adds

            “Frowning so much is no fun!” The leader lifts his hands up and they all quickly fall silent.

            “Don’t force him; after living with us for a while more, he will warm up,” he states confidently. He takes his hand off my shoulder and makes his way back to his seat. He gestures for me to sit down as well and I find my way to an empty spot next to the other important Peacekeepers. The long tables are set in rows lavished with food and alcohol. Despite being with them for three months, this is the first time I see their underlings. Unlike the dark clans where their underlings are basically a unified army, the Peacekeepers have them all sitting along with them. Even with such low ranks compared to the leader and his dongsaengs, they are able to sit merely a few rows behind them. The amount of food and drinks are also surprisingly equal between all the tables. They really are pushing this family thing, aren’t they? I internally roll my eyes. The people are all suffering from monster attacks and lack of harvest, yet these Peacekeepers are dining nicely with their so-called ‘family.’ “You know, the damn king and his officials do not eat any less than us. Their meals are even more extravagant than this,” he says. I internally gasp, how did he know what I was thinking? “Don’t be shy, eat up.”

            After a nice long meal with many conversations revolving monsters, music, and gossip, they finally talk about a topic that captures my full attention— the emperor and his party are going to pass by the Peacekeepers’ lair. The warriors from Heroes’ Rebellion are also accompanying His Majesty along with the crown prince and the princess. Is the king crazy? How can he come along with the crown prince when there are dark clans and monsters lurking around? If they conspire to hunt them down, this will be a re-make of the banquet that took place months ago, only this time the people of the royal palace are like fish out of water. Without the mass number of soldiers and weapons, they will be taken down even with heroes protecting them. No, the king is not an idiot…his trip is no secret…he must be doing this on purpose! He is openly challenging the dark clans. “Correct, the king and his men are on a trip to examine the lives of the people. After years of hiding inside the palace and ignoring the cries of his people, the king is finally taking action. This can none other be a challenge to us and our allies who wish to dethrone him.” Why is it that whenever the leader talks, I feel as if he is directly answering my thoughts?

            “Then let’s get him! How strong can they be? If we have our allies surround them and control countless monsters to attack them, they will fall apart even before we step in. The throne will be ours!” One of the underlings shout, while most of them cheer him on. The leader calmly raises his hand and they quiet down.

            “Be mindful of what you say,” one of the female Peacekeepers say. “The throne is not for us.”

            “R-right, please forgive me. I meant that if we quickly take him down, we can take back the thrown for our crown prince.” Again, another explosion of cheers engulfs the dining hall as the underlings cheer me on. Who are they acting for? There’s no one else to witness what they say. Why don’t they just say they want the throne and move on? I scoff to myself. It’s not like they really want me to take the throne. Once again, the leader signals for them to quiet down.

            “Minho-ah, since you are our future king, if there are any requests you may have or suggestions, please do tell us,” one of the Peacekeepers say. “Like make sure your friends don’t die, or keep your sister safe, or whatever it may be, we will listen.” I bite down my tongue to hold back a bitter laugh. I can’t believe they are trying to trick me into thinking that I am their true leader. They really think I am dumb, don’t they?

            “If you will, please do enlighten me as to what you have planned for the future,” I finally say. “I’m young, unexperienced in being a ruler, and I spent my entire life trying to run away from myself. Me as emperor?” I chuckle. “Now isn’t that a hilarious notion?”

            “You’re right, you are not perfect, but the current king is cruel and unruly. If you replace him, the dynasty will continue to exist, and you can potentially bring peace to the people. They already have your trust. Sometimes, they just need to believe in their ruler and that is enough,” one explains.

            “On the outside you claim that making me a ruler is the right thing to do because the dynasty will not fall because I am with the same royal bloodline. Quite frankly, I don’t buy what you are saying. You need me to help you justify your actions, not because you want a good ruler. Don’t make me laugh. Who are you putting an act up for?”

            “Just because we respect you doesn’t mean you can treat us like this!” An underling shouts. “If it wasn’t for your mother, would we have to go through all this trouble!?” The leader shoots him a glare and the underling kneels down. “He is so rude! I don’t want to see you treated by him badly. We are doing him a favor! He can’t talk down on us,”

            “Enough,” one of the highly ranked Peacekeepers say. “It’s just because he doesn’t understand what is happening. He grew up thinking that we were the people that made his father angry with him to the point of putting him to death. Of course, he will not oblige so easily.”   

            “I apologize for acting out of line. I will accept any punishment,” the underling says.

            “No need,” the main leader finally speaks up. “I was going to save you some pain by hiding the truth from you, but I should’ve known you would be like this. You are just like your mother,” instead of shouting at me or suppressing me for disrespecting him, he gently smiles at me.

            “You knew my mother?” I ask. I try to hold back my emotions. I can’t let my guard down just because my mother was mentioned.

            “Of course, I knew her; your late mother was my only child. Is that a good enough reason for me to want you to become king?”

Onew’s POV~

             The emperor mounts the horse-drawn carriage while the crown prince rides a horse behind him. Surprisingly, Naeun the princess is also traveling with us. The eunuchs, soldiers, and us heroes surround them on all ends, making sure that they have at least a layer of protection. Since Joon is a general, he is also allowed to follow by horse. Although some of us heroes received official titles for leading the victory with the dark clans during the banquet, only Jimin, Baekhyun, and Key are also granted horses. The rest of Joon’s underlings stayed behind in the palace and the regular soldiers are there. Although this is meant to be a fun trip, it almost feels like we are marching our way into war. I can’t shake off the uneasy feeling.

            As we continue to walk, the villagers get on their knees to greet the king, not even daring to lift their heads. Despite only walking for a short distance, the villagers shower us with drinks and snacks, all of which we had to politely turn down. Joon keeps looking at me and mouthing words like ‘are your feet tired?’ ‘want a drink?’ ‘I brought snacks if you’re hungry,’ and he even offered to ride with me. I just smile back at him and signal for him to focus. He is on duty after all. If anything, he should be caring for the crown prince, princess, and emperor, not me. “Hyung, can you stop? The other soldiers are getting distracted from your interactions~” Jonghyun whispers jokingly. I raise an eyebrow and look at him who is also exchanging some lovely interactions with Key. Key swiftly passes him a snack, which he happily nibbles on. He smiles brightly as he waves his snack at me.

            “What a hypocrite~” I . Joon finally loses it and offers me a snack, not giving up until I take it. He passes me a drumstick with a small cloth wrapped around the skinny part, so I can hold it without dirtying my hands. I smile back at him and try to not make it too obvious that I was eating. He is the general after all; I don’t want to embarrass him.

            “Psst, hyung…” the White Masked Hero nudges me. “Can I have one too?” Although I cannot see his face expression, his eyes resemble a sad puppy wanting to get a treat from its owner. I tsk back but pass him a wing. Sometimes he reminds me of Taemin because of how much he loves eating. Sometimes, I feel like in his past life he was starved so he is constantly eating now.

            As we continue traveling from village to village, we would pass goods out and ask officials that are leading the area about their status. Just to confirm, we also ask a few villagers and record all of their complaints. Baekhyun has already gone through almost an entire booklet. Although it may not be obvious at first, I can see Kai massaging Baekhyun’s hand. To avoid rumors and attention, Baekhyun hides his hand under his clothing while Kai reaches under as well. As the wind blows the cloth around, I see Kai rubbing his fingers and palm. Since I do to hang out in the crown prince’s hall, I did not know that Kai was close with the crown prince’s brother. Seeing their sweet friendship makes me feel very happy for them. After Taemin died, Kai usually keeps the White Masked Hero company. It’s nice to see him branching out and making more friends. Jimin and the Crown Prince on the other hand keeps exchanging eye contact, silently checking on each other. I guess the heroes in the crown prince’s hall are getting along well. I thought that joining the palace would ‘induce a lot of stress for my friends but seeing everyone getting along well is a great reassurance.

            If only Minho were here…I say to myself solemnly. Taemin too…My two dongsaengs have such terrible luck. To love each other and not able to be together…to want to live happily but cannot even when they tried their hardest…Taemin-ah, Onew hyung didn’t treat you the best when you were alive. You left Minho on this earth, but he also has us. No matter what it takes, when we locate him, I will try my best to protect him and care for him. I look up to the sky, imagining Taemin in white with a golden aura and majestic angel wings. Please watch over us.

Minho’s POV~

            The more they explain to me their side, the more I want to run away from reality. The leader of the Peacekeepers claims to be my maternal grandfather. My mother grew up very close to the Peacekeepers who wish to serve the leader in hope of finding a good king to help the civilians live a better life. One day when my mother was wandering the forest, she found a small white fox that was heavily injured and nurtured it back to health. Eventually, the fox regained its powers and turns out it was a beautiful fox spirit. She is the current empress. My mom and the empress lived together for over a decade until an unknown warrior stumbled into their territory. The warrior wished for the Peacekeepers to lend him a hand to help him gain power and overthrow his brother the current king. The Peacekeepers never agreed, but after a lot of begging and false promises, the Peacekeepers agreed to train him if he would use his power to help the people of this country.

            Year after year, the Peacekeepers continue to train him but refuse to teach him their most powerful technique— fighting using music. As a handsome, quick-witted, and strong warrior, the man caught attention of many females in the Peacekeeper’s sect including my mother and the future empress. That man will later become the king of this country and my notorious father. After winning the heart of the leader’s daughter, they went against traditions and made love before marriage. The Peacekeepers finally decided to help him become king after my pregnant mother begged for them to help. Because they love her and because they can see his overwhelming talent, they helped him overthrow his brother. That was when things turn awry.

            The king wanted more than just a happy family and support from his in-laws. He wanted power beyond any human being. He wanted to gain powers of a monster and live forever without suffering the consequences of becoming a demon. The fox spirit at the time was not his wife but was simply a good friend of his wife. She knew many secrets and techniques regarding the spiritual realm thanks to her years of wandering around and befriending celestial beasts and kind monsters. Unfortunately for her, the young king finally saw her as a target. Although it is normal for men and especially kings to have many wives, but the condition he made with the Peacekeepers to become king was to have my mother as his only wife and his only goal is to support his people. Nonetheless, he decided to go against his promise and tricked the fox spirit into falling deeply in love with him. Before the Peacekeepers can do anything about it, the fox spirit became the empress right after my mother fell ill and passed away. “What happened between the emperor and the empress? Did he ever get to find a way to learn the techniques and secrets of the monsters from her?”

            “That, we don’t know,” the leader says. “The king banned the Peacekeepers from entering the palace thereafter. We were only able to sneak in to check on you. You were so much like your mother and you were able to easily learn our techniques. We couldn’t help but feel attached to you.”

            “You used me to hurt the empress and the princess,” I say bitterly. “She lived with you for years and the princess is her daughter. You used your grandson to hurt the people around him and when he was sentenced to death you didn’t come and take him with you.”

            “There is a barrier around the palace, do you think we can easily enter?” a Peacekeeper says. “After you were imprisoned, we were hunted down and had to make our escape.” How could the Peacekeepers possibly get locked out by a barrier? Aren’t they the most powerful spell casters? Who could possibly lock them out?

            “We didn’t want you to harm the princess or empress,” another explains. “we wanted to train you, so you can protect yourself in case you were ever bullied by them. Since they are monsters, they’ll overpower you. We also wanted to see if the king was a monster. We were going to ask you to perform for him alone one day, but we didn’t expect you to perform before you were ready.”

            “Good thing I wasn’t ready,” I say through gritted teeth. “The queen and princess would’ve died.”

            “Did the king get affected by the tune?” another Peacekeeper asks.

            “I don’t know,” I sigh. “So, what I’m getting is that you helped the emperor overthrow his brother and now you want to use me to overthrow him? Who are you going to help overthrow me then if I become king?”

            “We know we made a mistake and it’s because we trusted that damn king,” another Peacekeeper says. “We should be held responsible and that’s why we are trying to fix it. The king is a secretive man and with the outbreak of monsters, we have a feeling it has to do with him and the unbalance of good and evil.”

            “We know that if you become king, you will know what it is you should do. We used the soul fragment of Taemin to use it as bait for you to follow us and yes it was wrong—”

            “You what!?” the leader slams on the table next to him in anger and it shatters under his mighty palm. The entire room flinches and the Peacekeeper that spoke gulps his saliva before speaking. He was the one that came to me and told me to betray the king and kill Jong Kook hyungnim in return of Taemin’s life.

            “He clearly doesn’t trust us, and I needed him to join us. At this rate, the king will be even more powerful, and we won’t be able to stop him! He puts on an act and makes his people think that he is simply too weak to help them, but we know how skilled he is!”

            “Bringing Taemin back to life was supposed to be a gift for Minho, not to be used to trade over his betrayal of the king,” the quietest Peacekeeper finally talks. “I can’t believe you stooped so low to use our gift as a threat.”

            “It’s because he hates the king for stealing the fox spirit before he could,” one chuckles. “Remember how madly in love with her he was?”

            “You—”

            “Enough,” the leader finally says. “Minho, we know that we did things that were not fair to you, but all of the terrible events happened beyond what we planned. We wanted you to learn our skills, so you can protect yourself. You are a very talented young man and we wanted to make you stronger. We did plan to use you to test the king, but we did not want to harm the empress or the princess because we know that they are his pawns. After you were incarcerated and sentenced to death, we tried to come save you but in reality, we weren’t able to protect ourselves. The king sent troops to our lair and slaughtered over half of our sect. We teamed up with the dark clans because they are powerful. The goal at hand is to dethrone the king, bring you to power, and fix our past mistakes.”

            “We also need to get revenge for your mother and big brother,” a Peacekeeper adds.

            “My brother?”

            “Minho, you were quite young then, so it makes sense to why you didn’t understand what was happening,” the Peacekeeper continues. “Your brother was a great warrior and the crown prince. Unfortunately, due to his many victories and great leadership, he won the heart of many officials. The king simply did not want him to be king you see, as he wanted to reign forever with the monster abilities he was trying to obtain. He simply poisoned the soldiers and led your brother to utter defeat. In other words, the king sent his son to die due to his own greed.” My heart sinks even more as the memories of my older brother floods into my mind. He was very smart, very strong, never lost one war, yet he was send to fend off a small battle and he never came back…

            “How about this,” the quiet one says. “We attack the king on his trip and you stay disguised. We just need to you watch and listen. Maybe the king will confess to some things and you can see his true colors.”

            “Good idea,” the leader agrees. “If you can’t trust us then don’t help us just yet. Come along and see for yourself.”

            “Fine, I’ll join you and your ambush. Just know that the moment you harm those I care about, don’t be surprised when I turn on you.”

            “Very well,” the leader smiles. “The dark clans will siege the palace while we confront the king. Now, let us feast and charge up before our reunion with the king!”

~Comments are loved~