The plane smoothly landed on the ground of a historical country- China. Micha took off her headphone and stretched her stiff muscle before turning to her side to wake her childhood friend, P.O. “Yah, wake up,” Micha said in a bored tone and slung her backpack over her shoulder and pulled up her hood.

“Where are we again?” P.O stifled a yawn.

“Afterlife,” Micha stated emotionlessly and head off the plane.

“Micha!” P.O whined and scampered after her.

As they descended down the stairs, the morning ray shone on Micha’s face, warming her chilled skin and she quickly breathed in the fresh air, “Amber unnie is coming to pick us up, you should give her a call.”

“Me?” P.O’s eyes widened and he shook his head, “I will never call that demon.”

Micha sighed and then glared at P.O. “Why did I even agree to let you tag along.”

P.O made a thinking face while saying, “Well, maybe because you can’t resist my charm.”

“Shut up, twerp,” Micha swatted P.O away.

Meanwhile in Korea, Zico and Jiyong who had kept a secret about Micha leaving Korea from the other members of ‘Geomyasaeng’ clan finally decided to spill the beans. Gathered in the hospital room where Yongguk was currently getting treatment, the ‘Geomyasaeng’ clan members listened intently to Jiyong and Zico. “She left?” Yongguk stood up straight from his lying position. “That’s why I haven’t seen her around since I woke up yesterday?” Yongguk was deeply upset.

“Yes,” Jiyong solemnly replied.

“She even gave out the ‘Equal power’ order,” Zico sat on the edge of the hospital bed.

“Why?” Zelo’s lips trembled.

“To stay away from us,” Gikwang answered with his head hung low.

“Hyung-nim, what do you mean by that?” Daehyun looked at Gikwang.

Instead of Gikwang replying, TOP came in the room and explained, “By staying away from us, the rivals would target her only and not us. Killing her is the priority of the rivals. Without a leader, our clan would be vulnerable and lost. The members would start to lose faith since there would be no one to give them directions. The process of choosing a new leader would take months and anything could happen in those few months like our members betraying each other and so on.”

Jongup stared at TOP and said through gritted teeth, “Don’t talk about Micha as if she had died!”

“I didn’t mean-” TOP was saying but Jongup cut him short.

“Micha will be fine!” Jongup grabbed TOP’s collar, “Don’t talk about her like that anymore. We don’t need to find a new leader because she’ll come back to our side. Micha won’t leave us like this. She cares about us!” He roughly got off TOP and stormed out of the room.

Youngjae was about to follow after Jongup but Himchan stopped him, “I’ll go,” and with that he left the room.

“Hyung-nim, I’m deeply sorry on behalf of Jongup,” Youngjae bowed.

TOP patted Youngjae’s shoulder and said, “I understand him, so it’s alright.”

“He’s still shocked about Daesung hyung-nim,” Zelo spoke out.

“I wouldn’t blame him for still being in shock,” Hoya who was standing in the corner of the room said. “He had to carry Daesung all the way to the car and by the time he got back to the mansion, almost his whole shirt was covered in blood.”

Yongguk watched the whole scene that was occurring with an indifferent look even though he was in a wreck on the inside. There was this feeling of exhaustion buried deep in his self penetrating through his soul. Yongguk could no longer bear it as he felt his stomach and heart clenched in misery when he heard the news about Micha leaving Korea to head somewhere else to ensure their safety. He felt useless. Why must she go away? Why can’t he protect her? “I need to get out of here,” Yongguk took off the needle on his hand.

“Dude, dude,” Jiyong and Dongwoo went to Yongguk’s side, “You can’t go anywhere,” Jiyong sternly told him.

“I need to get out of here,” Yongguk staggered off the bed but Dongwoo held him back.

“You can’t go anywhere,” Youngjae scolded.

Daehyun butted in the conversation, “Hyung, where are you planning to go? You need to recover so that we can help Micha to solve all this bull that is happening.”

“I’m going to search for Jessica,” Yongguk stubbornly said.

“If you found Jessica, and then what?” Youngjae put his hands on his hips, “Are you going to tell everything to her? Saying that none of this was Micha’s fault? And tell her that her little brother actually started the fight first?” he stared at Yongguk long and hard, asking the older male to be rational for a moment.

Youngjae’s words struck Yongguk in the heart and he kept his silence.

With a sigh, Zico walked over to Yongguk’s side and squeezed his shoulder; his action was as if he was saying that he understood Yongguk. “Your idea of talking to Jessica is a good one but we have to hold an evidence to persuade her.”

“We show her the real video,” Zelo exclaimed.

“Yes, we can,” Jiyong nodded, “but… Yongguk has to recover. We’ll search for the tape and when we do found it, we’ll let you know alright? For now, you have to rest a lot. Make sure your wound heal so that you can help Micha.”

Yongguk lowered his head and replied, “Yes, hyung-nim.”

Meanwhile, Micha was at the entrance of the airport, searching for any sign of the person who was responsible of picking her up. “Unnie, where are you?” she said while holding the cell phone against her ears.

Amber’s answer was short and simple, “Turn around.” And when Micha did as Amber had told her, she found out that her older cousin was standing only a few feet away from her with a cell phone in hand. “Hey,” Amber hugged Micha tightly and then turned to P.O to flick his forehead, “Didn’t expect you to tag along,” she snickered.

“If I knew you were going to pick us up, I wouldn’t even though of tagging along,” P.O frowned as Amber ruffled his hair making the latter flinched.

Then, Amber diverted back her focus on Micha and asked, “What is this I heard about you giving out the ‘equal power’ orders back in Korea? Don’t tell me you’re thinking of quitting,” Amber’s eyebrow was knitted together as she looked at Micha with narrowed eyes.

While they made their way towards Amber’s car, Micha started to explain, “Actually, I needed to come here to think things through. Being away from them in Korea… I can start things fresh and without any distractions and they can live safely for now. Besides, all of the documents and information that I need is kept here.”

Silently, P.O and Amber nodded.

“Unnie,” Micha looked at Amber before entering the car.

“What?” Amber fiddled around her pocket in search of the car key.

“I’ll text you an address. Ask one of our men to go there and pick up a file, code 124678001. Also, send a few people in Korea and tell them to take pictures of Kim Dongman’s houses. All of his house, inside and out. I want to know how many guards would usually be guarding his house at night and day. How many times does their shift changes, how many security cameras are inside. I want them all in two days,” Micha instructed with a serious face.

Amber nodded and replied, “Alright, boss. Anything else?”

“Call the headquarters and tell them that I request all of our members checks whether they have enough weapons. We need to prepare ourselves,” Micha sat at the backseat beside P.O while Amber went to the driver’s seat and started the engine.

From the rear view mirror, Amber saw Micha’s reflection and felt something was wrong since her expression at that moment was too serious that it baffled her. She arranged her words in her mind carefully and finally shoot out her questions, “Micha-ahh, are you hiding something from us?”

“Truthfully, I don’t know unnie,” Micha watched the scenery outside, the weather was warm and welcoming but why was she feeling incredible cold? “I wish I knew,” she whispered those words to herself and sank into the seat of the car with a frown on her face.

Yongguk sat on the chair near the window of the hospital room with a pale face. The gunshot wound was still hurting him but when he thought of Micha’s sudden departure, his heart turned numb as the wound seemed to throb more. “Why must you always do things on your own?” he rested his forehead against the window.

“Hyung,” he heard Zelo’s voice behind him.

“When did you arrive?” Yongguk stood up slowly as Zelo helped him to his bed.

“Minutes ago,” was Zelo’s only sullen reply.

“How is everything going?” Yongguk asked Zelo.

Zelo closed the curtain and sighed to himself. The plan of searching the video was going nowhere since the restaurant had closed down. Jiyong had suspected that Dongman was the culprit who had asked the owner to leave the place. He must have given a large sum of money to the owner of the restaurant for him to leave his work just like that, Jiyong’s voice resonated through Zelo’s mind.“Yah, Junhong-ahh,” Yongguk interrupted him.

“Huh?” Zelo dazedly said.

“What’s going on?” Yongguk creased his forehead, “Something went wrong?”

“No, no,” Zelo shook his head and smiled, “Nothing is going on. Jiyong hyung-nim is trying his best. Since the restaurant which had the whole scene of Jessica’s little sister assaulting Zico hyung-nim taped,  shut down a year ago, we tracked them down and found their new place,” Zelo lied, clearly concerned of Yongguk’s health.

Yongguk satisfyingly nodded and stated, “That’s good to hear then.”

To change the subject, Zelo said, “Hyung, the doctor told me that you’ll be discharge in 3 days but you won’t be able to move around much. So, he suggested that you would have to stay at home and take your painkillers for a while.”

Grunting, Yongguk lied down on the pillow, staring at the wall.

Files were scattered all over the table, Micha was sitting at the table in the office room of the house her father owned in China. She checked each and every one of the file related to Kim Dongman thoroughly, not wanting to even miss the slightest information about the sadistic man. “Killed his first wife?” Micha mumbled. She read the report that was written by one her own father as she found out that Kim Dongman had killed his first wife in order to get her money.

Kim Dongman’s first wife was the successor of a huge company which had created a wide range of product, from electrical devices to fashionable clothing and also instant foods. The woman was indeed a rich and powerful woman. Due to that, Dongman had married her and each day, he would put in a drop of glycol in her drinks.

Patiently he waited, like a leopard preying on a monkey on the tree. It has to wait until the monkey come down to a lower and sturdier branch for it to be able to strike it, unnoticed. Resembling the leopard, Dongman waited for the right moment for the substance to accumulate in her body system and take away the life of his first wife.

Glycol, a colourless and odourless liquid which could take away a life if it were to be consumed a drop a day. “Damn, he’s ing sick,” Micha shook her head and flipped through the next page, continuing on with the story of his wife.

Later on, the wife died without knowing that her own husband was the cause of it. As a matter of fact, no one did know that Dongman had killed his own wife. Even after going through an autopsy, there was no hint that the wife had been poisoned since the glycol could not be traced and it was classified that she died a natural death.

“So, Dongman got his two sons, Dongjun and Daehan when he got married to his second wife,” Micha told herself in a simpler sentence after analyzing the report, “And his second wife, which is the one living right now is the daughter of a powerful politician,” she nodded to herself.”

“But, how did dad know about this?” she scanned through the lines but her father had not jotted down any clues on how he had gotten these classified information. “How am I going to catch him without evidence?” she scratched her head with the of her pencil. “I need evidence,” she mumbled it repeatedly while scrolling through other documents but there was nothing she could find.

That was when she was reminded of the thumb drive which she had gotten from the party. “I hope this helps,” she prayed before putting in the thumb drive and searched through it but it was coded. “!” she groaned and almost slammed her head on the keyboard as she stared at the monitor. “Why must it be coded!” she huffed and punched the table.

“Yo, yo, chill,” P.O came into the room, “What’s up baby boss?”

“This stupid is coded,” Micha frowned and tried to access it again.

“Really?” P.O went behind Micha and looked at the screen.

“Can you crack into this?” Micha sighed.

“Sure, I’m an expert in these kind of stuff,” P.O smiled, “Let me get my laptop,” he ran out.

                As P.O worked on the thumb drive, Micha fully emerged herself into the documents once again. Absorbing as much as information her brain was capable of receiving. One hour passed by and not one of the two friends said a word. They were going all out with their own work and the clock seemed to tick faster.

                When the clock showed that it was nearly 9 o’clock at night, Micha finally stretched her back and yawned. Almost half of a day reviewing the reports, she was having a terrible headache. “How is it going there?” Micha asked P.O without looking up, fingers messaging her temple, eyes glued on the words that were written on the paper in front of her.

                “Almost there,” P.O slightly stuck out his tongue, a habit of his when he focuses on something.

                Micha breathed out silently and flipped through the second page of the 71th file. For a moment, she was indifferent as she was a few hours ago but then something interesting popped in front of her. It was her father’s writing and he had used a green ink. Green was his favourite colour and from Micha’s experience, anything that was left or given by her father in green colour should not be taken lightly as it indicates that the information was important.

                “What is this?” she looked at the words. It was a mix of numbers.

                “Yes! I cracked it!” P.O kissed his keyboard and brought his laptop to Micha.

                “Good work, oppa,” Micha patted his back. She watched P.O opening the only file that was inside the thumb drive. When he managed to open the particular file, Micha scanned monitor and read what was written, “October 6^th 1997, 6 heads of different clans had gathered together at the, ‘Amity’. A truce was achieved among the 6 clans as Kim Dongman was appointed the main leader.”

                P.O scratched his head, “I don’t get a word. What’s ‘Amity’ again? Isn’t it like end of war or something?”

                Micha leaned back into her chair, “Well, ‘Amity’ is the place where two or more clans gather in hope to achieve truce between them. So, Kim Dongman gathered those 6 clans and made them follow him.”

                “,” P.O’s eyes widened as he scrolled through the file, “Do you know why they gathered?” he asked but from the sound of his tone, Micha knew he had the answer, so, she just looked at P.O and gave a face which said, ‘Just tell me what you found.’ P.O turned the laptop screen towards Micha and continued, “They gathered because they want to destroy our clan!”

                The leader looked composed but she kept her silence. In her hands, she was still holding onto the report which her father had wrote in green ink and in that report, there were 6 clans which were circled. The 6 clans matched the ones inside the thumb drive. “Dad found out that there were something going on with these 6 clans but he couldn’t nail what it was about,” Micha said more to herself than to P.O.

                “Now, we know,” P.O nodded.

                Again Micha looked at the mix numbers that her father had written down. Was it some password for something? Was it- Her thoughts came to a stop as she stood up from her table and stared at the mix of numbers. She turned towards P.O and said, “It’s a coordinate of a place. Oppa, drive me there.”

                “What? Where?” P.O was bewildered.

                “I don’t know but we’re about to find out what it is. Let’s go!” Micha scurried out of the room, grabbing her backpack and jacket on the way out with P.O right behind her.

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First of all, hello my readers^__^ I apologize for the late update *90 degree bow* It had been hectic these few weeks that I thought I couldn't make it out aliveT^T This chapter might be a little dull since everyone is like scattered everywhere... But, trust me, the story would pick up on the next update:) I hope this update wasn't that too boring...

What did you think about it? Comments are loved;D