Disclaimer: This is the first time I'm putting an A/N in the beginning of the chapter but this chapter will be very very fast paced. Just a warning. 

“They’re here.” Suho had said and I stood up from beside Sehun, alert at the one pair of footsteps that were leading towards us. I expected to see a bunch of kids, but I saw only Rumpelstiltskin, my forehead creasing as I frowned at the lack of people. Where were my brothers? Where were Haechan and Mark? I was about to demand where they were when Rumpelstiltskin dropped what seemed like a bag and he yelled out for Haechan to come out.

Sometimes I forgot what his power was, but at this moment I was so happy that he could fit people into a bag. Much to my awe, I saw Haechan climb out and before I knew it, he had stuck his hand into the pouch and began to pull people out. The first three people were my two brothers and Ahjumma—to whom I ran over and hugged because I missed them so much. My arms wrapped around all three of them and Ahjumma patted my cheek, telling me that it was all going to be okay.

“How’re you feeling? What happened?” Wooseung asked worriedly and I knew I had to explain everything… from the beginning to all of them. All at once. So I told him I’d tell him but we had to make sure every one was ready to listen.

“Senior!” Two voices yelled out and I was attacked by two younger males who had hugged me and I did my best to handle both their weights as they clung to my body. “Oh, Senior. You’re alive!”

“We thought you were dead! If you ever died, we’d totally pay for your funeral because you’re broke!” Mark exclaimed and I turned red with embarrassment. Wooseung turned to look at me questioningly and I repeated that I’d tell him later. I looked over Mark’s shoulders when Rumpelstiltskin told Haechan to continue pulling people out and much to my shock, I saw that they had more students than I thought.

“H-how many people are there in NCT?” I asked Seungwoo who pushed his glasses up his nose.

“A lot,” he replied. “A lot.”

And a lot there really was. They all looked very young and curious, in exception to a few of them—One of them I would presume was Doyoung because Jaehyun stepped forward to give him a hug. It was a reunion between EXO and NCT and I watched all of them yap about what had happened and while some of them were quiet, a lot of them were loud. I waved to a familiar face who walked closer to me, bowing deeply.

“Hey, Yuta,” I said and he smiled a smile that made me wish I could return. “I’m happy they didn’t get to burn your body.” I remembered Haechan wailing about how they almost burned Yuta’s body through the Sier and he nodded, telling me it was a close call.

“Finally! It’s off!” I heard Kai yell in the background and when I looked over Yuta’s shoulder, I saw that another guy had taken Kai’s cuff off, the male being engulfed into a huge hug from the older mage. “Thanks, Kun!”

“Who’s that?” I asked Yuta, the male turning to look at the scene behind me.

“That’s Kun. NCT—”

“I mean, what does his power do?” I asked and Yuta explained that Kun’s power was a passive and it could unlock every lock with just a touch. Recently, he had been training on magical items and he once took out Sehun’s cuff when he was cuffed by Eunhyuk when we both were kidnapped and I remembered that very clearly. I didn’t know Kun was the one who took the cuff off, I reckoned it was taken off by someone in the Order of Royals.

“Can he try to take off a ring?” I asked, watching as Kai tell Kun something when Yuta shrugged, saying he didn’t know but he could ask his classmate for me.

“Hey, Kun!” he said, motioning the guy over and he looked at me and blushed. “Senior Harin wants to ask something.”

“Y-yes,” he stuttered, approaching both of us and suddenly the room became quiet, everyone curious as to what I wanted to ask him. I pointed to Sehun’s ring that was in his pinky finger, telling him if he could try to take the ring out. Kun responded that he’ll try, the male dropping down as his hand glowed. He closed his eyes and I could hear his teeth grind against each other when he let out a grunt.

“I can’t, Senior,” he murmured and I let out a sigh. Of course, it can’t be that easy. It was never meant to be that easy. I heard Kris clap his hands before telling everyone to sit down and before I knew it, our atmosphere was similar to a classroom. Everyone looking up to Kris as he began to explain what was happening from the beginning. I listened as he explained everything from what happened to the party to the war, and how the Royal Messenger was still alive.

“It has also come to light that our current Royal Headmaster started the war between us and Euren,” Kris continued and gasps filled the room. “He tried to control Harin with the Gemini ring but Sehun put it on instead and now we can’t get it off. Each and every one of you is in danger.”

“We believe that the Royal Headmaster is now trying to find all of us to get rid of us because we are all uncharmed and we realize that there are a lot of things he has done in the past that doesn’t make sense,” Lay said, crossing his hands over his chest. “And now that you are all here, we believe he will try to kill everyone who sides with Sehun and who has stood up to him.”

“What does that mean for our parents? For us?” a young mage said, looking stricken at the information.

“We have to find a place to camp out and we’ll talk about that in a while. First, we must find a way to take the ring off Sehun.” Suho said softly. “His soul and his twin’s soul are in a soul-flower right now and we need to get the ring off and put the soul back into his body. Without Sehun, I feel like we’re fighting a losing battle.”

“Have you tried cutting it out?” Doyoung asked and Suho shook his head. “I know it’s deity magic and all but you mentioned at the start that one of the Dreamweavers said there were nine fingers and it doesn’t hurt to try.”

Whoever Doyoung was, I realized that he made sense. I watched as Suho looked over to me as if he was asking my permission and I nodded. Even Kyungsoo wanted to try it, the male holding both flowers and putting them down softly before motioning for Johnny to help him with Sehun’s body.

Johnny grabbed Sehun’s body and placed him in the middle of the circle, the body laying still and his handsome face still lifeless. I chewed on the bottom of my lip as Wooseung gave up his sword, asking who would want to try to cut off Sehun’s finger.

“I’ll try to do it,” Lay replied and he stepped forward, grabbing the sword. He let out a small breath and he pressed the blade down onto Sehun’s little pinky before trying to slice down onto the skin. We all watched and all parts of me wanted it to work but as Lay pushed down hard, and tried to separate the pinky from the hand, I heard gasps from those who were closer and who could see clearer.

“What’s happening?” I asked Seungwoo who was beside me.

“The magic—it’s not allowing the finger to be cut,” Seungwoo replied and just as he said, Lay was trying to pull Sehun’s pinky away from strings of gold that could be seen glittering. It his pinky back and as hard as Lay tried to pull, it was to no avail. Blood still pooled onto the floor and Lay tried one more time, this time slamming the edge of the sword onto Sehun’s hand. The blade stuck on Sehun’s hand and I watched as blood spurted out from his skin, Wooseung going to Sehun’s body and also trying to pull his whole hand apart from his arm.

“We can’t,” Lay said, the sword making a clang as it dropped onto the ground. Blood was everywhere but Sehun’s arm and pinky seemed untouched, no bruise, no cut, no nothing.

I saw Suho let out a defeated sigh when a scream and struggling could be heard from the top of the stairs. All of us looking up, we all could make out a figure getting held by another figure and we all tried to make out who it was when we saw that it was Bora with a Royal Guard behind her. He had a sword held against .

“Bora!” I heard Baekhyun yell and Bora’s eyes filled with tears as the Royal Guard pushed her closer and she walked down the stairs under his orders.

“T-They’re here. They are in the portal room,” she said, both of her hands raised up in the air as a sign of surrender. “They have Mom and Dad, Baekhyun… They came and decided to question us. When they saw me, one person said they remembered me from the engagement party so they… They are holding Mom and Dad hostage right now.”

“Finally, we have found you,” the Royal Guard said, a smirk on his face. I wondered how he could be so stupid, to walk into a room full of mages on his own and expect to survive… But then again, Oh Shin’s Royal Guards were all brawn and no brain. He, on his own was hardly a threat even if he had a blade close to Bora’s neck and Kai, having his powers back, teleported behind him with Wooseung’s sword in hand.

We didn’t have to know how that ended up, Kai inserting the sword sideways, the sword going through the Royal Guard’s body like a kebab and I blinked as his lifeless body let go of the sword, freeing Bora. I heard someone mutter “how stupid” and I found myself agreeing to it before turning to all of them.

“We need to find a way to get out of here,” I said and Suho nodded. “Haechan, I want all of NCT back in the pouch. We need to keep all of you safe. Bring in Sehun’s body too as well as the two flowers. Bora and Ahjumma, you too. You have to go into the pouch.”

Bora nodded, going beside Haechan who put her in first before moving to Sehun’s body.

“But we want to fight too!” a NCT member said and I shook my head.

“Not today,” I said to them and told him to bring everyone into the pouch. “EXO members will fight… except maybe Tao.”

“My body is still tired from rewinding time at the party,” Tao told me and I sighed. Since we had come back from the party, Tao was exhausted and he could hardly lift up his head. I knew it was because his powers had clashed with the powers of the Gemini ring and in front of me, I saw Haechan grab him and put him in the pouch alongside NCT—ushering them into his pouch.

When it was him left, he looked at me with his big eyes. “You promise you will tell us if you need us?” Haechan said and before I promised he told me that he would send Mark up to scream if we ever needed NCT’s help.

“I promise,” I told him and watched as he jumped into the pouch. I looked around and saw only EXO members and Rumpelstiltskin, Johnny, and Jaehyun also in Haechan’s pocket space. Jaehyun’s powers were useless in a situation like this and it was best that if we were to get hurt, then it would be only us older mages.

“What should we do?” Luhan asked, wringing his hands as he stepped over the dead body of the Royal guard that Kai killed.

“We go there and free my parents,” Baekhyun replied before ushering us to follow him. “My sister said they are in the portal room so they are waiting for us. They sent the guard with my sister so we would find them. There would be a lot of them.”

“No ,” Kai answered and we crept up the stairs, making out the way as quietly as possible to the portal room. As we went up the stairs, Rumpelstiltskin was holding Haechan’s pouch and I knew he would be helpful with whatever skill he had.

We all headed up and as we neared the portal room, I could hear the guards talking. They were all stupid, the lot of them. They laughed and chortled and I could hear muffling from them. Baekhyun was the one to peek and his eyes grew wide. The sight of his parents bound and silenced must have pissed him off, the male yelling out suddenly.

“Mom! Dad!” he yelped.

Well, so much for being discrete. The guards looked over to us and they all brandished their swords, Baekhyun gulping. We all stood behind him and we saw that his parents were bloody and beaten up. They were on their knees in front of the portal, trying to say something to us. Oh Shin was sick. I saw Baekhyun’s eyes slide over to his parents when my own swept over the room.

There was no sign of Oh Shin. Just Royal Guards and they scattered out all over the room and I counted about thirty.

“We need to take all of you back into the Royal Castle under the orders of Royal Headmaster Oh Shin,” the person who seemed like the leader said. “Or your parents will die, Young Master.”

He didn’t say much but I saw that he was holding an orb in one hand and before Baekhyun could say anything, he had thrown the orb into the portal and pushed Baekhyun’s parents backwards. His parents disappeared into the portal and Baekhyun yelled out.

“No!”

“Come here, you son of a es!” I heard someone yell and I realized that the only thing bad about Wooseung getting his own body was that no one would be able to control him.

Before I could stop him, he had stepped forward with the bloody sword that Kai had used to kill the previous Royal guard and slashed it through the air. I felt a scream rise up my throat but Wooseung’s training seemed to have done him good, the male twirling in the air as he stabbed the guards that came for him.

“Now!” Kai hollered before grabbing me. “Harin, combo?”

“Y-yes!” I found myself stuttering and I felt myself get teleported throughout the room. I their souls out, dragging their souls into my hands and aiming towards the guards, satisfied as the souls burned a hole into their skin. Kai was amazing, and he teleported quick enough for them to not be able to catch him.

I saw Xiumin in the corner of my eye make a sword out of ice in his hand, the tip so sharp that when he sliced it against the guard, the guards howled at the pain of their skin ripping apart. Kai was breathless.

“One more time!” he said and teleported me close to a man, and I used my powers before he teleported me to the side. I began then blinding people selectively, my hands out in front of me while I concentrated. I saw each of them toppling over at their lack of sight, Seungwoo grabbing them and kicking them away.

There was a certain frenzy about Seungwoo and I felt the constant use of my power beginning to falter. Kyungsoo was beside me, making boulders and Luhan was using his powers; slamming the boulders against the guards. I saw Chen flinch when the boulder almost hit him and Luhan apologized, Chen grabbing one of the guards and electrocuting him when I heard more footsteps.

Guards began pouring out of the portal, a line of them and I watched as their numbers increased.

Kyungsoo growled from beside me, his vines coming out and he dropped boulders above the portal. His vines began to move towards the guards, wrapping around them but they got away with the help of their swords. Suho blasted out water but it wasn’t as helpful and it just pissed them off even more, Lay grabbed a boulder and swung it to them when I saw Wooseung go for it.

My brother was hollering, getting into a sword fight with the newly come guards when I saw the blade stab straight through his body.

“WOOSEUNG!” I screamed, raising a hand to blind everyone in the room as I watched him puke out blood. I could hear my heart in my ears and at the same time, Wooseung had also pushed his own sword through the guard’s body. The guard topplied forward; dead against Wooseung and I was about to run towards him when he writhed.

“KANG DANIEL!” Seungwoo could be heard yelling whilst punching a guard on the face. Wooseung arched his back, the blood that was pooling all over his body black and not red like a normal person. Much to my awe, I saw Wooseung grab the sword that had gone through him and pull it out.

He should already be dead.

Why wasn’t he already dead?

He vomited more blood and I watched in surprise when he doubled over. We all watched him, not knowing what was happening when his hands began to dispel black mist. He turned around, a snarl on his lips when he talked, his voice deep and scary.

He reminded me of what a devil would sound like.

“STAND BACK!” he growled and before we knew it, the mist washed over the room, lifting all of the guards into the air. Each and everyone of them were begging for air as the mist lifted them up, their hands going to their throat. I saw Wooseung shoot out more mist from his fingers and the guards began to suffocate, gasping for breath.

Sweeping his hands in front of me, the neck of the guards all snapped and their eyes then began dim. Blood came out of their nose and Wooseung suddenly dropped to the ground, clutching his chest. I ran towards him, grabbing him as he vomited more black blood.

He had killed all of the guards in the room with one single-hand move.

“Haechan, get everyone in the pouch!” Rumpelstiltskin could be heard saying and I saw Haechan bounce up before stopping, appalled at the dead bodies on the floor.

“What happened to Senior Wooseung?” he asked, pushing everyone in the pouch.

“Where are we going?” I asked Rumpelstiltskin and he told me to trust him.

“We have to go. More guards might come,” he told me and I nodded. Seungwoo was beside me, holding onto a heaving Wooseung when Haechan brought us into the pouch.

The pouch was dark and I heard NCT ask me what happened. Wooseung was heating up and his hands were trembling. Haechan looked worried, and they all crowded around Wooseung, trying to hold him down as he jolted up and down.

“Where will Rumpelstiltskin take us?” Kai asked and I shook my head, saying I don’t know when I felt the pouch bounce. We all held onto each other, the pouch going up and down like a roller coaster ride. It seemed like we were traveling for a while when the bouncing stopped.

Wooseung was now calm but he was still coughing and he was so tired, he couldn’t move. Seungwoo was beside him, trying to talk to him in a soothing voice and I smiled when I heard Woosueng tell him to shut up.

“I’m not going crazy, Seungwoo,” Wooseung said and Seungwoo chuckled, patting his shoulder when Rumpelstiltskin told us to come out of the pouch. Haechan went out first and began to pull all of us out. When I came out, I saw that we were in a forest, the smell of the air familiar.

I looked around and saw the glittering of the fairies around and when I looked behind me, I saw mountains. Uncle Rumpel began to talk, his voice loud.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” he said and I saw small figured peek out from behind the trees. Squinting, I saw that they were green and had fangs. They looked like a smaller version of Shrek and they hopped towards us, tilting their heads back and forth.

“Goblins!” I heard someone say and Rumpelstiltskin nodded.

“The Royal Headmaster would certainly not think of checking this place. It’s the goblin hideout and goblins are a species of their own. They don’t like dealing with people,” Rumpel said and the goblins came closer to us as if they were sniffing us. “They owe me a favor through the years of me doing favors for them. We should make camp here.”

“The Rocky Mountains are at the left and the Forest of Isea are at our right,” Johnny suddenly said, looking up to the mountains. “We should be safe here for now. At least for the night.”

“If we go up the Rocky Mountains, it’s my mansion up on top but it’s a tiring journey,” Xiumin said and I remembered that his mansion was on the top of the mountain. “It’s better we stay here and we don’t have a chariot to bring us up.”

Rumpelstiltskin nodded and just when he was about to say something, I heard Bora’s shaking voice that was filled with panic.

“Guys… Baekhyun.” Her voice rose an octave and we all looked at her in question. “Baekhyun. He’s not here.”

I quickly counted heads, searching for Baekhyun’s familiar face when I realized that under the chaos and frenzy, I didn’t notice that he wasn’t fighting alongside us. He must have hidden and known we would be too busy to pay any attention to him.

“,” I said to myself, turning to the three Seniors who were also doing the same thing I was; searching the crowd for him. “He must have stayed back to try to save his parents.”

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

[Byun Mansion, Portal/Study Room]

Baekhyun had decided to hide. He was never close to his parents, but he knew he would never forgive himself if something ever happened to them without him trying and while everyone began to fight, he slinked away into the shadows and waited. Baekhyun was hardly ever rebellious, he just knew what he wanted to do most of the time and he also hardly ever had a plan.

And as stupid as his plan was, he was going to pledge his allegiance to the Royal Headmaster and hopefully could help Sehun’s side while he was at it. It all made sense in his head. Why would it not?

“Haechan, get everyone in the pouch!” Rumpelstiltskin had said and Baekhyun watched, a part of him grateful that no one no