TRIGGER WARNING: There are talks of suicide in this chapter, and mentionings of it in a few of the next chapters.

*Daehyun’s POV*

I held my breath, quickly skidding though the hall to a stop, finding an entrance to the air vent. I jumped on the wall, gripping the tiny bars of the vent closing.

The alarms vibrated my ear drum, forcing me to rip open the vent cover, instead of picking out the screws. It honestly didn’t matter, I was probably caught by the cameras anyway. And considering that everyone was called down for some ‘inspection’, they won’t notice for a while, giving me probably a good 20 minutes to do what I have to do.

The vent was an inch wider than my actual shoulder width, giving me limited wiggle room. But the vent was high enough for me to sit on my knees.

I quickly crawled through the extended maze, being careful not to stay in one place for too long, in fear that it wasn’t stable enough to hold my weight.

I made quick turns, peered out every opening and continued on. I honestly had no idea where I was going, I was pretty much following my instincts.

Minutes went by and I still had no lead. It was starting to get frustrating. The longer I stayed, the higher risk of me getting caught became…and I had to keep my promise to Jae.

I had to. For his safety.

If I went missing, he’d come for me, and I don’t want that. He’d be killed, especially if he bumped into Sooyoung.

I bit my lip, picking up the pace. The thought fueling the urgency to make it out. I peered out of one of the openings which so happened to be Sooyoung’s office!

A hex hunter quickly entered the room. “Everyone is down at the gymnasium ma’am.” She reported, her tone shaky with uneasiness. “Good. I’m coming now.” Sooyoung said, following the girl towards the door, but then she suddenly paused.

“Oh! And turn up the heat.” She ordered. “All the way.”

“Excuse me?” The girl questioned.

“There are pests in the vents. I want to get rid of them.” Sooyoung simply said.

“But all the way ma’am? That’s humanly dangerous.” The girl said. “Then let’s hope that nobody is in the vents.” Sooyoung said, her eyes never leaving me.

The girl was hesitant, but obeyed taking out her walkie talkie and gave the order. Once that was done the two left the room.

I could instantly feel the temperature begin to raise, but I waited a good five minutes to be sure that they were gone. The heat rose quickly, sweat beginning to perspire everywhere.

By the time the coast was clear my hands were too slippery to push the vent cover open. I was forced to change my position, the metal burning my skin in the process. I then slammed the cover with my foot, popping it across the room and jumped out. The room was pretty warm now, but way better than the vent.

“I wonder if she has it.” I thought aloud as I scrambled though papers, files, books, and furniture with great haste and thoroughness.

I didn’t bother to clean up the mess I made. There wasn’t time. There were plenty of cameras in the room anyway, and Sooyoung knew I was here. So the only thing at stake was time.

Something caught my attention on the bookshelf. I noticed a red, dull, raggedy old book. It was larger than the others and it was definitely something you couldn’t find in just any library or book store.

I carefully slid the book off the shelf and a folded piece of paper fell out of it, without me even opening it. My instincts went crazy as I bent down to pick up the paper, resting the book back in its place.

The paper looked much fresher, and younger than the ancient parchment of the book. In fact, it looked as if it were printed not too long ago. I unfolded the paper entirely.

My eyes widened in disbelief at its full revelation. “I found it! I knew it would be here!” I cheered triumphantly.

The celebration quickly ended as I looked around the large office, hearing the sound of crescendoing footsteps. How am I going to get out of here?

*Bang’s POV*

Everything was a blur. I slowly opened my eyes only to be met by a blaring light. I flinched, squinting and blinking until my eyes finally adjusted.

I scanned around, noticing that we were in an unfamiliar dark room. The walls were a deep red (although the paint was chipped) and had nothing on them except for a large black X that floated on the wall in front of us.

We were sat at a long brown wooden table, each of our hands tied behind our backs behind the wooden seats. “Is this rope?” I said confused as to why such a breakable material was sued to tie us up. It was thick rope, but any demon could break from it.

“Look who finally woke up.” Chantelle greeted.

“What’s going on?” I asked. The other two shrugged, not knowing as well.

“Shouldn’t we break free and get out of here?” I questioned.

“I want to see what’s going on.” Chantelle simply said.

“Aren’t these the hex hunters?” Junhyung said.

“Um no. If they were, we’d either be tortured or dead by now. And something tells me whoever kidnapped us are on our side.” She said as if it were obvious.

Junhyung and I looked at each other, then back at her, both thinking the same thing. This girl is crazy.

Just then the single black wooden door creaked open.

A small man with deep red hair entered the room. He sat down in the middle chair (of the five chairs) across from us. “What is up with them and the color red?” Hakyeon whispered in my ear.

I just looked at his own red hair. He noticed and just smiled, “I admit, red is a nice color.” He sing-songed.

The little man wore dark circular shades and didn’t look very friendly. He examined each of us, not saying a single word. Minutes later four more men entered the room. Each with different hair colors, filling in the remaining seats.

“Oooh~, you’re cute. How come I’ve never met you before?” Chantelle said to the platinum blonde one. “I was about to say the same thing.” He said quite flattered.

The guy with the black hair studied Chantelle and then smiled. Chantelle smiled back. “Long time no see.” He said. His voice deep and charismatic, almost hypnotizing.

“You guys know each other?” the blonde guy asked surprised.

“Mm hm. We had our own furniture business for a little bit. We were partners.” The deep-voiced man said.

“Ah~, I’m not surprised. Seunghyun hyung loves furniture.” The blonde said, sounding uninterested. But then he quickly perked up, his elbows now on the table, his head in his palm. “I have my own business as well. Maybe we can partner up some time.” He winked.

“Maaaybe~,” Chantelle shrugged, obviously down for the idea.

“Now down to the real business. The real reason why we brought you here.” The red head finally spoke, his voice soft and sort of nasally but authorative.

The atmosphere became serious. “We had reports of demons roaming around Seoul,” the redhead began. “And we saw you come out of the hex facility…alive and unharmed.” He folded his hands upon the table straightening up.

“I’m just going to be blunt. Do you work for the hex hunters or whoever Sooyoung works for?” He finally said.

“You wouldn’t believe us if we told you.” I said, narrowing my eyes at him.

He frowned at this.

“We don’t.” Hakyeon assured his redheaded twin.

I was right, the guy gave him an unconvinced look. “You don’t believe us. We’re not. Plus, how do we know if you guys aren’t with hex?” Junhyung questioned.

“Isn’t it obvious? We’re the Red Flag hunters.” The blonde said, pointing to the ‘X’ on the wall.

All of our eyes slightly widened, except for Chantelle’s who only smiled cheekily. “So you guys know that someone is behind this?” Hakyeon pointed out.

The pink-haired guy nodded, “But we don’t know who.”

“Oh, we have a lead on who.” Chantelle smiled.

“You do?!” The brown-haired guy said, surprised. “That’s why we snuck into the hex facility, because Dr. Youngmin was meeting with him.” Chantelle simply explained.

“So?” The redhead said impatiently.

“Oh, we’re not telling you until you let us go.” Chantelle said.

The redhead just looked at her. “You can break free.” He said as if it were obvious, though it really was. “Yeah, but I want to make sure that we’re cool.” Chantelle said.

The redhead still didn’t seem convinced.

“I know Chantelle, she would never join them. And she’s honest 99.8% of the time.” The deep voiced man named Seunghyun said.

“.8?” the pink-haired man repeated, finding this slightly amusing.

“Yes, only when I’m being deceptive.” She said plainly.

The redhead sighed. “Fine. Let’s introduce ourselves.”

“I’m Choi Seunghyun, humanitarian specialist. I research on humans and create weapons to use against them when things get out of line.” The deep voiced human introduced first.

“I’m Lee Seunghyun, werewolf and incubus hunter, but since there are two Seunghyuns you can call me Seungri.” The blonde human introduced next.

“Hi! I’m Daesung, weapons specialist. I know about every single weapon you can think of.” the brown-haired werewolf smiled.

“The name is Yongbae, but call me Taeyang. Vampire hunter.” The pink-haired human introduced.

“Name is Jiyong. I’m the leader of the Red flag hunter unit Big Bang.” The redheaded vampire introduced last in a rhythmic matter.

The four of us each introduced ourselves as well. It wasn’t a surprise that there was a combination of humans and demons within the group, considering that the Red Flag hunters served more as a police force between humans and demons.

Chantelle easily broke out of her restraints, reaching for her pocket, taking out the small digital camera. “I took pictures.” She said, handing Jiyong the device. “His initials are SMJ, but Dr. Youngmin calls him Mr. Shin. That’s pretty much all we have about his identity.”

“Maybe we can look him up using the picture.” Taeyang suggested.

At that moment a girl entered the room with short blonde hair. She was geared up and seemed ready for anything. “How’s it going in here?” She asked.

“Amber?” Hakyeon gasped.

The girl’s eyes widened at the sight of the Incubus. “N?” She sounded just as surprised. “Well, actually my name is Hakyeon.” He said, slightly embarrassed.

She laughed slightly, “what are you doing here? How’s Wonsik? How’s my brother?” She questioned with concern.

“Wonsik?” I repeated confused.

“That’s Ravi’s real name.” Hakyeon quickly informed before turning back to the Amber girl. So, she’s Ravi’s sister.

“But what are you doing here?” Hakyeon asked confused.

“Well…I kinda work for the Red Flag hunters…in a way I always had. I never believed in the Hex ideologies. But how’s Wonsik?’ She explained.

“We’ll do catch up later. Right now we have business to do. Amber, take this photo and see if you can search the identity of this photo.” Jiyong ordered. “Yessir.” Amber took the camera and left the room.

“Did you guys find anything else?” Seunghyun questioned.

“All we know is that whoever that guy is, he’s giving Dr. Youngmin those weapons, and that he’s actually part human and part vampire.” I said.

“There’s also this woman that’s supposed to be working with the shin guy, but her name and identity remain unknown to us.” Junhyung added.

“One of our guys are back there too, collecting more information.” I noted as well.

“Have you guys found anything?” Chantelle asked this time.

“Not too much. We’ve mostly been serv