Suho would have kept going but his horse was tired. It had already made the journey during the day. And even though suho made sure to keep it well rested, he couldn't force the poor beast to slave for him during the night too. So he decided to stop on the side of the road for a few hours before starting the journey again. Well, it was more like the horse had started slowing down by itself and Suho didn't notice until he realized that he hadn't moved for some time now... and that the horse was busy grazing under a tree.

Suho got off the horse and took the saddles off of it. He figured that the horse was too tired and there was no point in making the beast suffer with himself. He put the saddles on the ground, and proceeded to mindlessly groom it before sitting down under the tree near the horse who was dozing off by now.

Suho tried to think, tried to make sense of the situation but his mind was blank. 

In fact, he was so vacuous that he didn't even notice the multitude of footsteps getting closer and stopping some distance away. Nor did he notice the sound of a blade being drawn....he just sat there, numb.

He was drawn back to earth when he heard people walking up to him, right behind his tree. He just slowly turned his head in the direction to see 5 thugs sneering at him.

"Look at what we have here? A rich looking lad. Such pretty features too. Got lost beauty? We will give you directions in return for all of your stuff. hmmm?", one of them, probably the leader, spoke.

Suho sighed before standing up and facing the 5 men. "I didn't know that there were people stupid enough to try and be thugs in Exo-L. I heard that security was pretty good here."

"HA HA HA! What? Scared now? We heard that this place had been thugless for too long, so who would guess that we are here? It's not like we leave evidence behind."

"But you said you will give me directions...?" Suho said cocking his head to the right.

The leader just stared, "Who let a gullible idiot like you roam by yourself. We...."

He was cut off by Suho, "I actually do need directions. See I am really lost. I lost something very important to me today and I don't know how to get it back, or if I should even try getting it back. I fear I might be acting too optimistically when I should back off."

"I asked for your belongings laddie, not your problems. keep this up and I will have to take your pretty tongue away."

"See, what I lost is someone's trust, and their lov...." Suho couldn't finish since the thugs all lunged at him at once.

He drew his own blade in the blink of an eye and clashed it with those of the thugs. The ice in his veins was replaces with hot scalding lava, and he wanted to get it out. Get rid of it even if meant cutting.

Suho had actually been pretty good with his sword, not that people noticed since there were bigger things to care about, such as prepping the next king, his brother, and catering to his needs.

The thugs soon realized that they were fighting a losing battle, but the leader managed to get an upper hand when he spoke, "I see the