Sehun sighed. "If we want to get Tao back, we can't do it while Hani is around."

"Right now, he trusts her more than any of us." Kris muttered.

"Maybe if you didn't bully him as much-" Sehun started while Kris rolled his eyes.

"Let's just focus on finding Xiumin first." Suho interrupted. "Chen, you have to lead us there."

Chen closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Well, I can tell you he isn't here for sure." He visibly stiffened as he felt a chill run through his spine. His heart physically felt like it turned to ice before it warmed up again. “I-I think I have a lead on where he is.” Chen spoke up.

Kris smiled. “Let’s go then.”

 

⚀ ⚁ ⚂ ⚁ ⚀

 

Chen stopped at the coast of an unknown place. The mysterious blue water slowly lapped against the white shore.

“Where the hell are we…” Kris muttered as he kicked the colorless grains of sand. Nobody answered Kris' comment mainly because nobody knew the answer. “Kyungsoo, you can’t tell where we are?” Kris turned to the brown-haired male.

“No, it’s like it doesn’t exist. We’re standing on blankness.” Kyungsoo admitted.

“Same with the water.” Suho interjected. “It’s as if it’s never been traveled of known of before.”

“How the hell did Chen even lead us here?” Baekhyun groaned, but Chen only ignored the comments.

“It’s there…” Chen whispered. “We need to sail the ocean.” He turned to face the other legends. “We need a boat.”

Both Chanyeol and Kyungsoo fidgeted at the thought of going on water, yet again. “Are you sure we need to?” Chanyeol pleaded. “Maybe we can like-“

“No.” Chen interrupted. “I feel like going by water is the only way.”

“How do we know if that’s true?” Chanyeol groaned, slowly turning into a mirror of the whining Baekhyun.

Lay placed a hand of Chanyeol’s back. “He already led us to this place, wherever this place is.” Lay consoled. “If he didn’t feel something, I don’t think we’d ever be brought here.”

A strong gust of wind swept over the legends. ‘Find Xiumin in 3 days or he’s gone forever.’

Everyone immediately turned to Sehun and he put his hands up in defense. “I know I did something like that before, but that wasn’t me.” He defended. “Anyways, the voice was a girl.” Sehun widened his eyes in recognition. “It was Hani. I promise you it was.”

From the murky waters, a small, yet fancy yacht appeared. ‘My present for you.’ Hani sent in the wind.

“Come on, let’s go.” Chen said before wading into the water to get to the boat.

“No way!”Kyungsoo yelled before pulling Chen back. “That was sent by our enemy. The person who has been trying to kill and separate us! We aren’t supposed to just step onto it without wishing for our deaths!”

Chen turned back showing his pure agony in his eyes. He quickly regained his composure and looked at each one of them. “We have three days to find Xiumin, my soul mate, or he’s gone forever. This is our only chance and I can tell we are supposed to go this way.”

Reluctantly, the 10 of them stepped onto the luxurious boat and Suho directed the boat to Chen’s willing. As they sailed, the waves got rougher and the wind got stronger. After hours, a light drizzle started to fall from the sky before turning into a full on thunderstorm. The waves tossed the boat and everyone clung on for dear life.

“CHEN!” Suho called over the raging winds. “WE HAVE TO TURN AROUND! IT’LL ONLY GET WORSE! I CAN FEEL IT!” Chen said nothing, but only shook his head as he looked at the horizon, ignoring the pelting rain on his face.

“WE NEED TO TURN BACK!” Sehun screamed, but his voice was muffled out by a loud crash of thunder. Everyone did everything in their power to keep the boat safe and every bolt of lightning that was aimed for the boat, Chen deflected without even thinking about it.

“We’re close… I know it.” Chen whispered as he leaned forward at the bow. The rain stopped. The wind retreated and the water turned eerily still. The only noise was the panting breaths of the legends and the gentle lapping of water against the hull.

“SUHO STOP!” Chen yelled, causing Suho to jolt the boat to a stop. The boat teetered at the egde of a waterfall, except that the whole ‘fall’ part of the water was frozen over. The ice slowly crept up the water and started to spread across the ocean.

“We got to get out of here.” Chanyeol muttered. “It’s going to freeze us over.” He quickly started melting away any ice the came closer that 3 feet to the boat.

Chen quickly looked back to his friends who were all preoccupied by the ice. He slowly stood at the bow before looking down at the foggy expanse of nothing at what seemed to be the base of the waterfall. Only he seemed to get it. Xiumin was frost. Xiumin was near. Chen closed his eyes before stepping off the boat and plummeting into the fog.

“Chen-“ Suho quickly turned around to get Chen’s opinion on what they should do, but he was gone. “Chen?”

Suho scrambled to the tip of the boat and looked over. “He’s not here…”

The other friends stared back at him speechless. “D-did he….” Chanyeol mumbled the question that everyone was wondering.

Suho nodded. “There’s no other explanation.”

“B-but he has lightning! There’s no way he could survive that fall. The water is frozen over!” Baekhyun spoke up.

Suho sighed. “Look.” He glanced up at Kris before looking around at the other legends. “Chen and Xiumin had the strongest bond out of all of us. Chen was the one that led us to where he thought Xiumin was and maybe he knew that we couldn’t travel with him any longer. I trust both of them with my life and I trust that both of them are alive and both of them will find their way back to us.”

Chanyeol was about to speak up, but Suho cut him off. “The downfall of the whole human kind is getting closer and closer and we have yet to even look into that cause. I say we find the person who started the downfall. The two will catch up later.”

The rest of the legends struggled to decide whether Suho was being the honest leader he was or he just decided to forget about the two lost members. “How do you know they’ll find us?” Luhan asked.

“They will.” Suho replied, trying to hide his own doubt. “Trust me.”

“But the three day deadline.” Sehun mumbled. “Are we really going to let Chen try to do it on his own?”

“I feel like all of us would only hold him back.” Suho defended.

“Let’s go.” Kris announced. “Suho’s right.” Suho quietly sighed in relief. “The humans fell the first time and we aren’t going to let them fall again.”

The remaining legends sadly looked towards the edge of the frozen waterfall before returning to their positions. Even though many tried to lighten the mood, a melancholy air hung around them.

 

⚀ ⚁ ⚂ ⚁ ⚀

 

"ing Heechul." Kris cursed as he swatted another branch out of his face. Everybody except for Tao and the lost Chen and Xiumin were trudging through the forest. Roots were tangled amongst each other, causing the ground to be dangerous in itself. Chanyeol squealed as he tripped over the roots for the fifth time. Bushes and trees densely populated the grounds causing Kris to become even more on edge. "Why can't I just fly over or Kai just teleport us wherever except for here." Kris continued complaining.

Luhan rolled his eyes at Sehun before walking up to try and shut Kris up. "When did we even get into this forest? Weren't we on the boat on the beachy shore like 5 minutes ago?" 

Luhan shook Kris' arm. "Be quiet, will you? Someone might hear us."

Kris scoffed. "The trees? Well I think I'm perfectly content with annoying them." Behind them, they heard the crunching of fallen leaves underfoot. Kris shut up without another second passing. The all soundlessly prepared for the worst. Hands were up, weapons out, minds were cleared and eyes and ears open. A small bush shook too violently for it to be wind. They all stepped back to give room for a battle if needed, though the trees would surely be a hassle. No one breathed, afraid to giveaway their position of the being near the bush hadn't known of them already.

A gray path of fur was exposed from under the bush and out came a rabbit.

Kris sighed. "Seriously? I though we might finally get some action..." Nobody said anything, but they all agreed. They turned around to keep hiking towards their unclear destination, but behind them, a bone-chilling cracking noise caused them to stop.

"G-guys..." Suho squeaked causing everyone to turn back around.

The innocent bunny, wasn't as innocent as they thought. Its back arched into a wicked hump as its small body grew to be as tall as some trees. The buck teeth lengthened to be at least the height of Kyungsoo and they sharpened to be as sharp as him too. The fluffy fatness of the rabbit disappeared and was replaced by a thin, clawed, demon-like creature. 

"the we get ourselves into...." Kris whispered as he stared up at the demon bunny. The creature roared before attacking without a second's notice.

Sehun created a wind wall that saved Lay from falling into the creatures sharp claws, but its' foot swung around too quickly and powerfully for Sehun to deflect. He was thrown into a tree with an audible crack. He didn't get up after that.

Baekhyun and Chanyeol charged the monster with bright and flaming hands. The monster clawed up a tree and threw it towards their direction. Chanyeol quickly jumped, but Baekhyun got caught and flew backwards with it, catching Lay and Kris too. Chanyeol burst fire at the monster causing it to stumble backwards.

Kyungsoo stomped the ground and caused the ground under the creature to fall out before crushing it between two walls of soil. Kyungsoo slumped against a tree panting. "I don't think I prepared myself enough to do that." Luhan tried to focus on lifting the tree off of his friends, but his mind was pre-occupied by Sehun.

The ground started rumbling. Kai glanced over at Kyungsoo, but he shook his head saying it wasn't him. In a flurry of dirt and rock, the creature sprung out from the ground even angrier than before.

", CHANYEOL!" Kai yelled, but it was too late. The demon charged and scratched Chanyeol across his chest before swatting him back into Luhan, immobilizing him too. "Tao!" Kai called before remembering he wasn't here. ".' Kai started towards the being, but another rustle in the woods caught their attention. If there was another demon bunny, they weren't sure if they could make it out.

Out of the bushes, Chen came followed by Xiumin. "Look who we found!" Chen yelled, "And you guys are obviously doing well..." He glanced at all the knocked out legends. "I leave for a week and you are already in trouble."

Kris shook his head, "You were gone for like an hour... not that it makes our case any better."

Xiumin stepped forward, "I was reunited with Chen a week ago... obviously it's different for the rest of you, but we have to get past that now." The demon bunny screeched as if it was annoyed it wasn't getting the attention anymore. "You know these things are annoying." Xiumin sighed. "They're all power and show. Chen!"

Chen ordered a thunderbolt to hit the crown of the beast. Xiumin started with the feet and covered the beast in an ice casing. With a simple clench of his fists, the ice formed spears that pierced the demon's body, killing it in an instant.

"Now that I think about it" Xiumin started. "Makes sense that you only just got here. Considering how you all couldn't do ."

"Right." Kris started. "Now, we just need Tao."

Sehun sat up and rested against the tree trunk. "Um. I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of Hani and I kind of don't want to see her again. Can I try to convince Tao here? With my wind whisper?" Sehun also wasn't up for another beating after the demon bunny. Lay was still helping people recover.

Kris thought for a moment. "Last time, Tao's memory was jogged by seeing us in person, but you also did get all of us together before..."

1. Return in Person
2. Try the Wind Whisper