I was a little concerned at the amount of joy the mages expressed when they announced they'd be taking over my town. I never voiced my concern while the mages were around, but when they went off into the other room to start planning for their takeover, I turned to the BAP warlocks and senior Lee Jinki to notice my concern was reflected on their expressions.

"You need to be careful." senior Lee Jinki mumbled, making sure his gaze was on the door the mages had exited from, "You give them too much freedom."

"Too much freedom? BAP said you let them do whatever they want." My eyebrows furrowed at his tone. He was exhausted, but his eyes were narrowed in what appeared to be suspicion, even though my mages were trying to help him.

"There's an explanation to what he means." Yongguk spoke, and I turned to him slowly, only to see him rubbing his forehead, "The EXO mages were used to take control of towns and burn them down once the sorceresses had enough of their resources."

I got it then; they were worried that my mages would revert back to the time they had destroyed because they were forced to. I wanted to believe that my mages had moved on from those days and that the most they'd want would be to distract them until we got Kris out of the castle, but then I remembered the glances they had shared. There was danger shining in their eyes and I was worried that danger would be expressed against the innocent civilians in town. 

Himchan walked forward and put a hand in my hair, and when I looked up at him, he smiled back at me gently.

"We'll do whatever we can so that they don't become what they used to be."

"But there's a problem with letting them take over the town." I looked from Himchan to Yongguk, and then finally to senior Lee Jinki, "My ancestors want them. If we're detected, they'll come for my mages. You told me before; that as long as they're in these rings, the sorceresses have complete control over them."

Yongguk's eyebrows furrowed as he pondered this, and then a smile slowly stretched across his face, "Then I guess you'll have to find the last mage before they're found."

"But how?" I asked, shaking my head, "The town's infested with those things, and I'm no match for any of them, considering my ranking and-"

"SHINee." senior Lee Jinki pulled out a communicator that he used to talk to his teammates and nodded over to me, "I'll let them know everything. We'll protect you until you find the last ring."

I wanted to say no. I wanted to stop everything from happening because a lot of people were risking their lives in order to stop my ancestors' plan from progressing any further. If SHINee got caught helping us overthrow the government, their lives would be at stake. If my mages were caught by my ancestors... who knows what could happen?

However, I couldn't say a thing. The warlocks had pushed me out of the room senior Lee Jinki was resting in so he could talk to his teammates in peace. Walking into the other room, I found Joonmyun looking at me and nodding as I came closer to them.

"We have a plan."

The dangerous gleam in their eyes was still there, but something had changed about them. Even the ones who were usually less serious were standing with their backs straight and their faces set. I didn't like the way they were acting, and I wanted to tell them not to think of it too much, but would they listen to me now?

"We're going to take over this town from the inside out." Minseok stepped forward and made gestures with his hands to explain what he meant, "Each of us will take an outer rim to keep the mutants out. If we have BAP on our side, we'll have the whole perimeter secure."

"Your plan... will a lot of people get hurt?" I know they were trying to help, but if BAP was right, that meant in the past they had done similar to this, and if what they had done caused them to go into those rings... I was terrified for their own safety.

Jongin looked at me for a moment before pulling his eyes to the ground, "This is war. Everyone's going to get hurt."

"Everyone but you." Chen added on, and I turned to him, seeing his expression morph into one of gentle reassurance, "While we work on taking over, Yun Seung, we need you to find Kris."

I didn't answer them after that, because so much could go wrong that I was frightened of even trying. Once they found Kris, what would happen? Would they not become stronger with the completion of their team? Would the sorceresses come and stop them- kill them? Would I be able to save my town without so many of my people perishing?

"You're scared." D.O.'s voice wasn't cold like it usually tended to be while he spoke to me, and when I looked into his eyes, it felt as if he saw right through me.

"What are you scared of, Yun Seung?" Baekhyun asked; and though I knew the answer, and they knew the answer, I didn't voice it out loud. 

Chanyeol pulled away from the group then, and reverted back to the goofy, caring mage I had come to know as he pulled me into his arms, "We're not going to do anything that can separate us from you."

"Our master and his team are going to help Yunseung in finding the last mage." Yongguk said with authority in his tone as he walked into the room, "Unlike you mages, we're more equipped to fight the sorceresses if they come looking for you. We'll take border patrol."

They looked like they wanted to argue, my mages did. Yet not a single one of them did; possibly because I was there, or possibly because they knew the truth even without Yongguk voicing it out loud. 

"I'll go with Yun Seung." Tao decided, but the other mages turned to him and I could see the disappointment filling his eyes, "You can't just tell me to sit back and stay in place when hyung is waiting for us! What if something happens to him?"

"You need to understand, Tao." Yixing shook his head, a frown playing his lips as he spoke to the younger mage, "Kris isn't like any of us and you know it. Once Yun Seung finds him, she's safe and so are we- but we have to make sure they aren't going to interfere."

Luhan, knowing Tao was only a moment away from bursting into tears crossed the space between them and pulled the younger mage into his arms, "He's right, Zi. If he wasn't able to take care of himself, he would have never become our leader."

Leader? My eyes dashed over to Joonmyun as Luhan said this, because I already knew Joonmyun was leader. Was Kris also a leader, like the others said? Why hadn't I known that Kris was also the leader? I mean, I should have seen it coming, since the others had only called Joonmyun one of their leaders, but why Kris? What made him so special?

While I was busy processing the information fed to me, and the mages looked between themselves as if to recalculate their plan, senior Lee Jinki walked into the room. There was a light grin on his lips as the rest of SHINee appeared behind him and I couldn't help but stare, because they certainly hadn't been there earlier.

"You went from being the least liked in town to being the one we're all counting on." Senior Kim Kibum stated, and as I bowed my head in respect, something popped in my mind.

"Wait... what about the rest of the civilians in our town? What's going to happen to them while we-"

"We've lost more than half the town." Senior Choi Minho informed me, and with a sigh, he continued, "Everyone who survived has hidden underground. It's only a matter of time before they find our passageways."

Senior Kim Jonghyun didn't look very pleased that I was standing before them, "Just so you know, I have no desire to help a nobody like you."

"Jong..." Senior Lee Jinki was sighing as he tried to get senior Kim Jonghyun's attention, but the shorter warrior ignored him blatantly and looked around at the mages who seemed to have started to dislike him.

Sehun walked over to us and pulled me further away from the SHINee warriors, his eyes narrowed at senior Kim Jonghyun, "Send him away. I don't trust him enough to include him in our fight."

"He'll fight." Senior Lee Taemin spoke up for senior Kim Jonghyun, and I looked over to him to blink, since I'd seen that face somewhere before, "We're all going to fight with you to save our town."

Jongin chose that moment to walk over to senior Lee Taemin, and I realized that senior Lee Taemin and Jongin looked similar in a sense. My mage seemed to think so too, though he smirked as he stepped away, "I'm so much better looking."

"There's no time for arguments!" Joonmyun's voice had risen a couple of octaves as I looked over to him, and his hands were clenched at his sides, "We have to move now if we want this to work."

Silence overcame us, and I barely registered the nods going around the room. After confirming plans, we had gone into the room senior Lee Jinki had come from and took the tunnel leading out into my town. We had gotten to the surface and I grimaced openly when I saw the many collapsed buildings and the smoke trails leading into the sky.

"Guk, be careful." Senior Lee Jinki nodded over at the warlocks, and after responding, BAP ran off towards the border.

"Can we trust you to keep her safe?" Minseok asked senior Lee Jinki, his gaze then moving over to a wary senior Kim Jonghyun for a moment before returning to senior Lee Jinki.

"With my life." Came senior Lee Jinki's stern answer.

Just before they could leave us to go and fight as many of them as they could, Sehun walked over to me and kissed my forehead. I blushed again, like I did every time one of the mages did something like that to me, and I left my head ducked as they began to walk away.

"Be safe."

After their footsteps faded away, I turned back to a patiently waiting SHINee, and looked beyond them to where the center of town was- and my castle.

"Where are we going?" Asked senior Choi Minho, and I pointed to the castle. Giving each other a glance, they nodded, and we were on our way to the castle.

"They have been all over our town's center." Senior Lee Taemin muttered, and I nodded as we ran off, seeing them in swarms closer to the center where my castle was sitting.

Throwing a glance at me from over his shoulder, senior Kim Jonghyun's lips curved into a frown, "Are you going to be able to keep up with us?"

As he asked, we had started to come under attack from them, and SHINee had immediately pulled their own weapons out to attack. We could have been easily out-numbered if I had normal weapons like my seniors did- but I didn't. I had first frozen time using Tao's powers, and as SHINee stood there flabbergasted, I blasted my way through them using Minseok's, Baekhyun's, and Chanyeol's powers. 

When I turned back to senior Kim Jonghyun, I couldn't help the small smirk that formed on my lips, "Are you sure you can keep up with me?"

That's it, I spent too much time with Baekhyun and Chen. That could be the only possible explanation as to how I'd suddenly gotten so sassy. It brought a smile to the warriors' lips, and I was glad they were amused and not frightened, but more of them appeared and we only had one option- to run.

So we did. We ran all the way to my castle and then stopped as if we had been frozen in time ourselves. There was smoke coming out of the windows of my castle, but that wasn't what really bothered me. My castle had started to crumble and the door was wide open; and down the hallway that was shown, I could see slime and other nasty things covering the inside of my castle.

"Are you sure you want to go in there?" Senior Kim Kibum's voice was now laced with disgust, and for a moment, I agreed with his hesitance completely. However, I remembered everything that was on the line with this mission to find Kris and save this town. For BAP, who was risking their lives to make sure my ancestors couldn't find us before it was too late. For SHINee, who was risking their lives to help me find a ring that I wasn't completely sure was in the castle. For my mages, who agreed to take over this town, and was desperate to be reunited as twelve once more.

"I have no choice but to."

However, that's when everything we planned fell apart. Because loud bangs and explosions were heard from behind us, and when I turned to find out where they'd come from, the explosions took place out by the border. Senior Lee Jinki gasped in horror and checked his glowing bracelets, but a clear voice was screaming in the air. Even through the destruction and death, I heard it perfectly.

"Fall back! The sorceresses are here!"

Don't be too excited. I'm not sure if this means daily updates again. It really just happened to me out of nowhere and I had to get it all out. Uh, well, I'm sorry I didn't go into detail about the takeover thing, but I tried my best for it. I'm actually not liking the balance right now, since I'm pretty sure every mage had said only one line- I could be wrong, though.

So, uh, there's something big happening in the next chapter that I'll start writing tomorrow, but for today this is really it. Today's question is a question I've asked before. Now that you've seen Yunseung interacting with a majority of the mages, who would you ship her with? I kind of ship her with Minseok because of the snow thing, but her and Sehun look nice, too.

As always, thanks for reading, subscribing, commenting, and over all supporting this story! It means a lot to me especially as we just passed the 700 subscribers mark and are almost at the 400 comments mark! I'm glad you're all liking this story and giving me feedback whenever you find something you do and do not like! Please enjoy this chapter and continue letting me know what you think! Have a brilliant day!