“Let’s hope this works…” Tiffany mumbled. Seohyun nodded as she soul aligned with her weapons and raised her blade, uttering the word: “Insomnia”. Jessica stirred, flipping herself over, on the bed, to face the other direction and went back to sleep, much to the dismay of Tiffany and Seohyun.

“Looks like I have to ‘incinerate’ her again…” Tiffany sighed as she pushed Jessica off the bed onto the hard, stone floor, which still did not wake Jessica up… Tiffany proceeded to ignite the air around Jessica, however, when the flames died down, Jessica, who had gotten used to Tiffany’s flames, just giggled in her sleep: “Oooh!!! Fany-ah, you’re SOOO HOT!!!”

Tiffany stared at her partner incredulously. Seohyun was equally taken aback; while Yoona and Yuri, who were back in human form, suggested that they should play a prank on Jessica. The suggestion only earned them glares from the other two girls. Then, Yuri had an idea and she voiced it: “How about this… I give her a nightmare to scare into waking up?”

“I guess we could try…” Tiffany sighed in defeat. Yuri grinned as she changed into her demonic form and placed her hand on Jessica’s forehead. “This is going to be fun!!!” Yuri thought. A moment later, Jessica let loose an extremely high pitched shriek that shattered all the windows in the room.

In the same high pitched tone she screamed: “OH MY GOD!!! SOOO MANY CUCUMBERS!!! FANY-AH!!! SAVE ME!!! BURN THEM TO ASHES RIGHT NOW!!!” Jessica let loose another shriek before bolting upright, wide awake and panting. Meanwhile, the other girls had clamped their ears shut with their hands, a little too late, so they grimaced in pain, with their ears kept ringing.

“Well at least you’re awake…” Yuri mumbled, shaking her head in an attempt to get rid of the pain. Jessica rubbed her eyes sleepily, as she got over the shock and realised that it was only a nightmare. She looked around and realised she was on the floor, so she stood up and attempted to climb back onto the bed.

Tiffany, seeing what her partner was about to do, immediately stood in front of the bed, arms spread out, to prevent Jessica from getting back into the bed. “No more sleep for you! Go wash up and go down for breakfast, or else Sooyoung unni and Yoona unni will finish all the food and we’ll have nothing left to eat!” Tiffany told Jessica stern, with a serious look on her face.

“Aww… Fany-ah, you’re sooo cute even when you’re being serious!” Jessica giggled, as she pinched Tiffany’s cheeks lightly, before pouting, showing off her puppy eyes and clasping her hands together in a pleading manner. “Let me sleep a while more… PLEASE?”

Seeing that Tiffany was wavering and on the verge of giving in, Yuri told Jessica: “Unless, you want to have another nightmare of cucumbers… You better listen to Tiffany…” Yuri flashed an evil grin at Jessica. Jessica glared at Yuri and Yuri glared back, unafraid.

Tiffany, who just managed to regain her senses, after being charmed by Jessica, took the opportunity to drag Jessica to the bathroom. Tiffany grabbed Jessica by the ear and pulled her to the bathroom and shut the door behind her, ignoring the shouts of pain from Jessica.

(A/N: I’ll leave it to you readers, to imagine what happened inside the bathroom… )

“Oooh… They just went into the bathroom together. Wonder what they are going to do? Let’s go peek at them!” Yuri whispered to Yoona, who nodded her head in reply. Seohyun saw the mischievous grins spreading on her partners faces and immediately knew what their erted minds were up to. She rolled her eyes, while shaking her head, and placed her hands on her hips. “We are going for breakfast now!” Seohyun stated in a firm manner, before grabbing her unnis by their ears and dragging them down to the dinning hall, ignoring their protests.

“You are no fun at all…” Yoona and Yuri pouted, rubbing their swollen ears, after the three sisters reached the dining hall. Unfortunately, Seohyun’s attention was distracted by the sweet potatoes set on the table, personally prepared for her by Yonghwa, so she did not hear what her unnis said. Yoona and Yuri shook their heads sadly and tucked into their breakfast. To be more specific, Yuri watched Yoona tuck into both their breakfasts…

After everyone had their breakfast, they went back out to the training field and Sooyoung made the opening address: “Today is the second day of your training and Mr and Mrs Kim will teach you girls about teamwork today. Mr and Mrs Kim, please!”

Taeyeon’s parents first talked about each member’s skills and their respective weapon’s powers and together with the girls, they came up with a few fighting strategies that might work against different enemies. Satisfied that the girls have understood the details of the strategies, Taeyeon’s parents gave Sooyoung a thumb up sign and told the girls: “Now, it’s time to test your strategies against some opponents.”

Sooyoung seeing the thumb up sign from Taeyeon’s parents, finished eating her snack and headed back towards the group. “Listen up! I’m going to summon the Demon Guard of Hell, even though they are not the most powerful of demons, they can still deal a fair bit of damage, so good luck defeating them!” Sooyoung told the girls, before adding on: “Oh and there is only a hundred demons in the guard, for your information…”

“Are you kidding us?” Tiffany asked, shocked at the sheer number of opponents that Sooyoung was about to summon.

“Of course, I’m kidding…” Sooyoung said with a smile. Tiffany let out a sigh of relief, but her happiness was short lived.

“There are actually five hundred demons…” Sooyoung finished, with a devilish grin. Tiffany nearly fainted, while Taeyeon and Seohyun, both had determined but worried expressions, as they raised their weapons to show that they were ready. Tiffany followed soon after.

Sooyoung transformed into her skeletal form and started reciting the enchantment: “Death Is Imminent. Hell… OH MY GOD!!!” Sooyoung stopped reciting the enchantment, as she felt the presence of many souls with evil auras, in the immediate vicinity of the training field.

Sooyoung turned to Krystal, Yonghwa and Taeyeon’s parents and told them: “You guys are dismissed.” With a flick of her wrist, she sent the four of them back to the Realm of the Dead. Turning back to the girls, she said: “Girls… This is your fight. I’m not allowed to help in any way, unless absolutely necessary. So good luck have fun!” After she finished her sentence, Sooyoung shadow jumped away, leaving the rest of the girls stunned. Hyoyeon cursed silently, puzzled by her partner’s actions and ran off in search of her partner.

As she ran off, Hyoyeon told the other girls: “Don’t worry, I’ll knock some sense into her and drag her back here!” Sooyoung reappeared at the top of SM and looked on as the girls soul aligned with their weapons and raised them in preparation for whatever that was coming out of the huge black vortex that had formed right above them.

Taeyeon looked up warily at the black vortex that had formed in the sky directly above the training field and thought: “We’ll be surrounded, when whatever comes out, come out…”Gathering her thoughts, she decided on a strategy that they had discussed earlier on and suggested it to her comrades. Tiffany and Seohyun respected their leader’s decision and saw no flaws in Taeyeon’s reasoning, so they agreed with her readily.

Thousands and millions of human beings, infused with demonic essence, landed around them. These beings looked exactly like humans, except for their black claws, sharp teeth and crimson red eyes. However, there was one which was different from the rest, it was the leader and it had a pair of black demonic wings. It also had a rune tattooed on its left shoulder, which had the ancient writings on it. Seohyun, who was very well-read, told her comrades: “Unnis! That creature’s rune says soul leech. I think it might be able to out our souls…”

Before the girls could react, the creature with the rune shouted: “Get the three weaklings! The strong one is mine!!!” And it teleported itself to where Sooyoung was, while the rest of the creatures charged forward.

“LET’S PARTY!!!” Taeyeon shouted, before soul resonating with Sunny and unleashing Lightning Dissonance, killing hundreds of the creatures in a blink of an eye. She then turned invisible and warped out of range of JeTi’s Absolute Zero area of effect. Taeyeon realised that she could only maintain the soul resonating state for only a fraction of a second, but as she could move at the speed of light during that duration, she could still cover a distance of about one and half kilometres. However, she would then be unable to unleash Lightning Dissonance again for a few minutes.

Meanwhile, Yoona was carrying Seohyun, as they flew above the battlefield, on standby to heal either Taeyeon or Tiffany, if the need arises. Seohyun tightened her grip on her black sword, as she was getting restless from the lack of action, but she knew that this was for the best of the vanguard and she didn’t want to go against her leader’s decision.

Immediately after she saw Taeyeon warp away and Seohyun take off to the skies, Tiffany soul resonated with Jessica and unleashed Absolute Zero, killing all creatures within a one kilometre radius. With Absolute Zero, Tiffany managed to kill thousands of creatures at once, but there was still many more left and she knew instinctively that she could not unleash Absolute Zero until a few minutes later. She waited for the creatures to close the gap between them and her, before using a skill she had practised last night under the guidance of Sooyoung. “Dance of Flaming Passion!” Tiffany shouted, as she engulfed herself in a flaming tornado, instantly incinerating any evil creature that was standing too close. With a shout, she charged into the mass of evil creatures, her flaming tornado incinerating everything in its path as it raged around Tiffany.

The creatures were no match for Taeyeon and Tiffany and were getting massacred by the flames and ice of JeTi, as well as the dissonance of SunYeon. Soon, there was no more enemies left alive and the girls wondered what happened to the creature which had went after Sooyoung.

On the roof of SM, while the girls were fighting...

"CHOI SOOYOUNG!!! ARE YOU... OH MY GOD!!!" Hyoyeon shouted as she saw the leader of the enemy appear in front of Sooyoung. Instinctively, she ran to Sooyoung's side and transformed into her weapon form.

Sooyoung turned to face her opponent who had just teleported in front of her and swung her scythe around experimentally. The Hypnotic Scythe's innate power was an aura that stuns the opponent, on eye contact, for five seconds. Seeing that her opponent was stunned, Sooyoung shouted: "The Hypnotic Scythe, SOUL ALIGN!!!"

As they soul aligned, the blade of The Hypnotic Scythe transformed into bright white light and Sooyoung swung it in an arc in front of her, as she whispered: "Hypnosis" The blade sliced through the creature, not physically, but through its soul, in an attempt to take control of the creature's body and mind. Usually, her scythe's soul would easily overpower the target's soul and take control, but this time, it wasn't working, so Sooyoung decided to impart some of her soul into her weapon to give her weapon a boost.

It was at that moment that she saw the rune on the creature's left shoulder. "Crap, it's our souls!!!" Sooyoung thought as she hurriedly removed her weapon from the creature. The creature, who had recovered from the stun, sniggered at her and said: "Not bad... You can read the ancient language!"

"I'm thirty-five years old in Realm of Gods years, not earth years... And each day in the Realm of the Gods is a hundred on earth... So by earth years, I'm actually thirty five centuries old, which means I was alive when the ancient language was created..." Sooyoung smirked back at the creature.

"Woah! You're that old?!!" Hyoyeon asked in shock.

"No I was kidding. I learnt the ancient language from my dad when I was young. Also, one day in the Realm of Gods is also one day in earth anyways..." Sooyoung replied to her weapon, laughing.

"Thirty-five years old or thirty-five centuries old, I don't care. What I know is you'll be dead in five seconds!" The creature said as it lunged towards Sooyoung, baring its fangs and its claws outstretched.

Sooyoung swayed to the right at the last moment and spun around to give the creature a solid punch to its back, causing it to stumble slightly. As it turned around, eyes blazing in rage, Sooyoung had already shadow jumped to the opposite end of the roof and had stuck her tongue out in a taunting manner.

The creature screamed in rage and flew towards Sooyoung at a very high speed. Sooyoung considered her options and smiled as she came to decision, which shocked both her partner and her enemy.

She THREW her scythe at the creature to distract it, before shadow jumping to its shadow and using its moment of distraction to force its soul to align with hers...

"AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!" Hyoyeon screamed as she was thrown and she swore to kill Sooyoung later on.

When the creature regained its senses, it realised it was in a very dark place. The place felt dead and the creature cursed under its breath, when it realised that it couldn't see anything. Then, it heard a voice...

"Welcome to my world, whatever you are. How do you like my world? Doesn't it feel dead and seem as dark as the shadows? I guess my previous weapon really had a huge impact on my world..." Sooyoung sniggered. "You can't see anything, but I can and since it's my world I can make anything happen. For example... THIS!!!"

And that was the last thing the creature heard before he felt something sharp pierce through its chest and then nothing. Sooyoung opened her eyes and she saw the creature's corpse topple to the ground lifelessly. She laughed and told Hyoyeon: "Let's go check on the girls, I think they're done."

Hyoyeon nodded slowly, still in shock after she saw the creature suddenly coughed out a mouthful of blood and collapse to the floor dead after Sooyoung had touched it. Sooyoung noted Hyoyeon's shocked expression and smiled at her partner. "I'll tell you what I did later, then maybe it wouldn't seem that shocking, kay?" Sooyoung comforted her partner as they shadowed jumped back to where the other girls were.

As soon as Sooyoung stepped out of the shadows, resting her scythe on her shoulder, tragedy struck... Sooyoung sensing that six creatures like the one she had just killed were about to appear around her, she whispered to her weapon: "Hyoyeon... Thanks for bringing a smile back to my face. I don't know how to express my gratitude for you, but I'm sorry I can't be with you anymore..." Holding back her tears, Sooyoung threw her scythe a safe distance away, just before the six creatures appeared.

"You've made our master really angry! And you'll PAY for it!!!" One of the six creatures told her with an evil laugh and then the six of them stabbed Sooyoung in her vital points with the sharp claws of theirs and slowly her dry of her soul.

Hyoyeon and the other girls could only look in horror as they saw their trainer got murdered right in front of their eyes. But at her dying point, Sooyoung still managed to flash them a mischievous grin. "Sooyoung unni... We will avenge you!" Taeyeon thought, as she immediately soul resonated with her weapon and unleashed Lightning Dissonance.

However, to her shock, the creatures only coughed out some blood, but were otherwise unharmed. One of the creatures sniggered and informed Taeyeon: "Try to disrupt our souls with yours? How elementary... We can easily align our souls with your attack and negate its effects... But can you do that?"

As soon as the creature finished speaking, it teleported right in front of Taeyeon and grabbed , pinning her against a tree. It smirked and started draining the soul out of Taeyeon. The other girls had no time to react and in a blink of an eye they were all trapped against trees, next to each other, and were being dry of their souls. No one was spared.

"Sooyoung, it's okay... I'll be joining you soon..." Hyoyeon thought as she saw her partner's lifeless body lying on the ground about five metres from her position. She smiled weakly at the sight of her partner, before she passed out, too weak to maintain her hold on consciousness.

But just as the creatures were about to finish all the souls out of the girls, a lone figure stepped out of their shadows...