No one was calm after hearing the bells. The reaction was expected, of course, but at the same time, it made the reality of the situation that much harder to accept. People were running out in the street, children were wailing, the students were running around in chaos to get their teams set up.

Teams were also set up in ranking order, and as I was least in rank, it so happened that I didn’t have a team at all. So, as everyone ran off to find their partners, I simply pulled my pistols out and checked to see if they were ready to go.

Weapons weren’t given to us; rather, we chose the weapons that we bonded with among seeing them. The dual pistols I chose weren’t wanted by anyone else, simply because they were older than most weapons and didn’t seem to do much damage. My heart yearned for those things, as I knew how it felt to be unwanted better than anyone, and they became my weapons.

I called them “Angels’ Wings”, because they had ornaments attached to them and resembled angel wings, and I’d been training with them since I first started at the Academy. They had magic bullets; and because of that, I wouldn’t have to constantly change ammunition while battling.

My first instincts were to run to the castle so I could make sure everyone there was alright; but of course, that’s what everyone wanted to do, and that was what we couldn’t afford to do. Everyone in our town knows combat skills, so they would have to defend themselves; as younger fighters, only we could go head on against those things.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw senior Lee Jinki run past the room with the rest of his group- codenamed SHINee- following close after. His group of fighters were brilliant in all sense of the word, and along with SNSD and a few other groups, they would always be the first to be called into action.

Of course, it wasn’t like we had a choice; everyone had to fight in order to save themselves.

No one had bothered looking back at me to ask me if I’d be okay, or to even invite me to join in their group, and I knew that they all believed that being with me would only drag everyone else down, and it left me to think of how cruel people tended to be towards the people that weren’t “of use” to them.

I was upset at being treated like that, but that was what I would have to live with, I realized, as I walked to one of the emergency supplies chest and opened it to pull out one of the survival packs. At first, I had thought about joining all of the fighters to help them protect our town, but after being reminded about how weak and useless I was, I decided that it wasn’t worth it.

Instead, I was going to find that ring; and I would destroy anyone that got in between.

It wasn’t like I was in search of the ring for the power it was radiating in. I wouldn’t need that power, and I wouldn’t want it either. I did want to keep myself alive, however, and just knowing I had a reason to keep fighting, I would do so.

The town would be fine, and so would the people in it. We had built an underground town in case they ever decided to come after us, and while people ran around as distractions for the combat specialists and trainers, the castles will let everyone in and lead them to the underground.

We weren’t so sure if they would be fooled by us, but the town decided not to take any chances; they were going to save whoever they could.

That’s why I didn’t look back when I started off towards the forests. I knew it was dangerous to go off on my own, but it wasn’t like anyone was going to go with me and try to back me up; and no one would believe my story either. I was on my own again, and I would be just fine on my own.

I moved along the walls of the buildings, knowing that people wouldn’t think I was up to anything suspicious, but to somehow sneak up on them. I had walked into an alleyway, and as I was looking to see if I could get past the alleyway, I ended up being bumped into by another student and turned back to see the scowl on Amber Liu’s face. Amber was another skilled fighter who belonged to F(x), who often teamed up with SHINee; all of whom were present in their group and looking utterly annoyed by my presence.

“What are you doing here?” Amber scoffed, pulling me back into the alley with a warning tone, “Stay here where you’ll be out of everyone’s way.”

I yanked my arm back and again walked to the mouth of the alleyway, “This is Code Red, everyone who has a weapon fights.”

“We don’t need you here.” Kim Jonghyun was a very skilled fighter, though he was outspoken and tended to get on my nerves. I didn’t know many of the members of either group, though my eyes did dart over to senior Lee Jinki for a brief moment.

Jinki had been a friend of mine since childhood, and had raised me like his own little sister, even protecting me from bullying until he was called to lead SHINee. When I had told him of my crush on him, he’d been sincerely sorry that he didn’t return my feelings, but we hadn’t had many interactions since that.

“Let me talk to her.” Jinki announced, and with hesitant glances, the rest of the group had walked off to do their own duties. I looked at senior Lee Jinki for another moment and turned around to walk away, but his hand clasped onto my arm, pulling me to a halt, “What are you doing out here? You know it’ll be dangerous.”

“There’s something out there, calling out to me.” Jinki knew me best, but I knew he was overprotective and wouldn’t let me go no matter what I said to him.

“What are you talking about?” Jinki’s eyebrows furrowed, and a moment later, he shook his head, “There’s nothing out there important enough for you to risk your life. You aren’t strong enough to face those creatures.”

That hurt, and he knew it did. I had always looked up to senior Lee Jinki because he was kinder on me and encouraged me to do my best despite my obvious disadvantage in skill. To hear him say those things, of all people, my heart had felt like breaking in half.

“There is something out there, and I won’t be able to rest until I find it.” I answered back shortly, pulling my arm out of his reach and turning back to the road.

“What is it, at least?” Jinki asked, heaving a sigh as he walked up to me, put both hands on my shoulders, and turned me to look up at him.

“Last night, I had a dream about a velvet box. I don’t know why, but I feel like it was calling me.” The words came out without me thinking about them, and for a moment, senior Lee Jinki’s facial features froze, and he shook his head again rapidly.

“You must’ve been imagining things.” Jinki’s fingers were shaking on my shoulders, as was his voice as he spoke.

“Hyung, hurry. We have an enemy approaching.” That was Lee Taemin’s voice calling. Lee Taemin was only a couple of years older than me, though his skills far surpassed mine; no wonder he was part of SHINee.

Senior Lee Jinki’s gaze snapped over to Taemin before he turned back to me and took deep breaths to calm himself, “I can’t let you go looking for that box, Kim Yun Seung, it’s far more dangerous than you could imagine.”

“What do you mean?” I couldn’t help but ask, pulling his shaking fingers off of me. He in turn squeezed my fingers in a motion that said he wouldn’t let me go, “What do you know about the box that I don’t?”

He would have spoken, had it not been for Jonghyun, who came back and clasped a hand on senior Lee Jinki’s shoulder, “We have to get going. I’ll send one of the back-up troop members with her.”

I couldn’t listen to them any longer. They didn’t seem to understand how desperately I wanted to get to that box. At least, that’s what it looked like as I looked back to senior Lee Jinki, just hoping he wouldn’t send me back.

He glanced down at me and then let go of another heavy sigh, “Alright, you can go.” Kim Jonghyun took in a sharp breath and would have protested, but Jinki held a hand up to stop him, “Just be careful, the outside world isn’t anything like what you’re used to.”

Gratefully, I squeezed senior Lee Jinki’s hands and let go of them; and then I was on my way to the box. I didn’t glance back at Lee Jinki as I ran, but I knew that one day I’d have to go back and thank him repeatedly for letting me go through with this.

If I made it back alive, that is.

But I didn’t want to make the situation seem any darker than it was as I ran for the cover of the forests. There were blasts, screams, blood splatters, and dead bodies littering the path as I ran, but I didn’t want to think about any of them. I didn’t want to imagine anyone losing their lives- but it was inevitable and I knew it.

Still, I didn’t want to think of it, and cleared my mind as I entered the forests. I didn’t know much about the landscape, but I just knew there would be a cave nearby. The only problem was that the forests seemed to be infested with those things that were bent on attacking our town.

I came to a stop as soon as I heard footsteps that obviously weren’t human. Along with the footsteps, I could hear the hissing of whatever creature was walking over to me, and in a slight panic, I drew my dual pistols and aimed for the direction in which the sounds were coming from.

Without thinking much of it, I shot twice in that direction and ran in the opposite direction, further into the forests. It was dangerous to run into it when the creature could call in reinforcements, but I kept going because I was terrified enough to do so.

Of course, panicking in a situation like this would never be a great idea, and I learned that when I tripped over some tree’s root and landed flat on my face, groaning at the pain of the impact before I threw a glance over my shoulder.

The creature, whatever it was, was following me, and it was close enough for me to hear its hiss. I knew I hadn’t killed it with only two shots, so I wasn’t too surprised when I knew it was coming after me again. What did alert me, however, was that it was no longer alone. There were several footsteps now, and I quickly got back onto my feet, my pistols aimed at whatever they were.

I shot again, though this time; I’d shot repeatedly and rapidly in my panic. I didn’t want whatever they were to get closer to me, but it seemed like that was another hopeless dream as I was backed up against a tree and they walked into my view. There were three of those things; large creatures that had a reptile-like long body, thick elephant-like ankles, beady rat-like eyes, snake-like fangs, and spotted cheetah-like fur covering their entire frames.

I pressed on the pistols’ triggers and kept shooting at those things. Even if I couldn’t kill them, and knew I couldn’t kill them, I could at least do my best to slow them down until I had the opportunity to run away.

The one I had sensed earlier and shot was the closest to me and swung at my head. Had I not ducked in time, I probably would have lost my entire head. I shot at its head in return and sighed in relief when its head exploded and blood splattered everywhere.

That sight was both pleasuring and disgusting, and I had to stop myself from hurling as I focused on the other two creatures, who were certainly surprised that one of their lives had been lost when fighting a measly human like myself.

While they were distracted with the dead body of their brethren, I turned and ran once more. I never expected myself to be able to kill one of those things, and I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do that again for a long time. As I ran, I couldn’t help but fear falling on my face again, because I knew that was what got me the first time.

But of course, thinking negatively ended up being the downfall of me, as I hadn’t seen the little cliff ahead of me as I ran. When I did see it, however, it was too late, and I rolled down the side of the cliff, banging my head into several things on the way to a pool of water.

I must have lost consciousness from the rough traveling, because the next thing I knew, I was in the place of my dreams.

I had found the cave without even meaning to.