c h a p t e r - e i g h t y o n e
"Jaemin.." You mumbled, eyes quivering while looking at the very same person you used to roll your eyes with is now tying some glowing chains on your wrist.
You have no idea what's with the mystical bolts but you won't bother finding out.
Wishing that you can actually use your abilities and make your way out right now while there are no guards and another opponent, you had learned your lesson. Impulsive acting leads you to nowhere. Sometimes, in even more danger. You have to act thoroughly.
And perhaps let this alone time with Jaemin be the way you can change.
"There," Jaemin heaved as he tightened the chain. All your pride behind to act tough, it felt hot in your skin. It was painful. His thumb caressed it gently and it provided an unnecessary feeling of serenity. You hated it. "Does it hurt?"
You scoffed with the mixture of annoyance and sarcasm, staying still and reading his next moves.
Surprisingly, he just sat on the ground near you.
"You don't seem to be replying any time." Jaemin sighed while he dusted his knees off. "You're quite a fast runner. You could've join some sports in our school. Why didn't you approached me? Or.. why didn't I see your speed? You know, I have a lot of colleagues in there and I could've listed your name in varsity."
"Cut your shit out." You spat, glaring at him.
Obediently, he just sat on the ground silently while his feet tap. You didn't want to ask what's gonna happen now. You sure as hell everyone will be in danger anyway.
While looking at Jaemin, you can't help but feel nostalgic.
You realized how he actually played some part in your life.
Jaemin used to have a crush on you on your first year high school days. You remember rejecting his loads of chocolate-childish gift, as you call it, at Valentine's Day wherein no one even knows you two are communicating since both of you are extremely quiet that time as recall.
During your school years, you were oblivious that his extreme good looks caught the campus' attention that made him become one of the famous people in that place.
He is also famous for being a big flirt, by the way. He casually buy chocolates for random ladies cause he's bored.
Although his popularity rate is rising, you had completely forgotten who he was especially that he was in another school section through the years.
You can't even remember all your classmates' name in your section, what more to your batchmates from different sections?
Reflecting while you're at the current dangerous situation, you realized that it must be funny for him to see you not remember him when he asked for your number, which you responded by giving Jeno's contact.
But he doesn't seem to care at all though. You bet he also forgot about you while he was in his own study place with his own classmates.
Overall, it just reminds you of how Jaemin is originally a human being.
And now, you feel sad.
What happened to him?
How could the man you were definitely sure is an innocent and clean human who grow up studying be the same man tying you up in this endless dungeon?
You frowned.
Can you bring back him?
The real Jaemin who are far from this? The Jaemin who's a human experiencing the rollercoaster feeling being in school years?
"You kept staring at my face. Is there something you want to say? Is this kind of face your style?" He chuckled.
Suddenly, you felt some sort of connection somewhere in this place.
Could it be Jungwoo, an Empathy, thinking the same?
It's not impossible that you can feel connected to him the most. Both you and Jungwoo found the peace from being uncontrolled with the help of each other's presence.
It sparked hope from you.
Using your pulsating empathy, you felt his emotions inside. There was a mixture of various emotions.
The most evident is rage.
"Jaemin, why are you mad? Won't you tell me anything?"
His smile dropped and he looked definitely irritated.
"Are you reading my mind right now?" He hissed coldly. "You have no right to do so."
You leaned at him and flinched when the burning chain clawed on your flesh. But still, you continued with your objective.
"I'll help you out here. Let's get out." You furrowed your brows, mistaken tears slipping out of your passion to make everything alright. "You once told me you like dancing.."
"Oh yeah. I remember that when I sat beside you cause I really liked you. So, you were actually paying attention to what I'm saying?" He giggled, annoying you.
Still, you sticked with your plan.
The thing is.. you actually have no idea about what he likes to do aside from that because you both barely talk and those times he approached you, you were not really listening.
Okay. Whatever. Just make this bad shit turn into a softie. You told yourself.
"You were meant to be in the path you really wanted to, Jaemin. You were meant to enjoy your human life. Of course, not only enjoy but experience pain." You gulped, his eyes shooting at you. "I-I mean everyone does. Everyone experience that thing. And that's beautiful, Jaemin. That's more worth experiencing that being in a locked dungeon here, being a.. well.. bad person. You have dreams, I know, and you should be working hard to achieve it than being here."
Your Empathy rushed in and you could feel something in his chest, in his emotions.
He was sad.
Perhaps, it's working.
You looked up to take a look in his face and his confident gaze that intimidates you is now shattered. His eyes are starting to show regret. Jaemin visibly gulped, knowing well you can see right through him.
"Jaemin," Your eyes shone every bit of sympathy, feeling worried for him as well. "Let's stop this, hmm?"
There must be a big reason why he let this happen.
He was silent for a moment before he bowed down, his face couldn't be seen.
Slowly, he looked up at you again, and a devil's smile filled his facial expression this time .
Shivers run down on your figure while watching Jaemin grin lowly. His emotions are suddenly playing from amused to sadness.
"You really thought you can play with me?" He leaned at you as well which made you immediately scoot back. Jaemin touched your chin anyway with his index finger, looking at you in the eye. "Stupid."
Your hopes shattered hearing those words from him. He did not even hid the excitement growing in his chest and all the emotions you were feeling turned hazy, your mind going blank to label his emotions. First you sensed him scared, then happy, then sad, then mad.
Now, you get it. He can manipulate his own emotions and is trying to mess up with your ability right now, which made you eventually stop reading his emotions.
And that fact actually scared you even more like.. how is that even possible?
Despite all of it, something was bothering you though.
You were sure his emotions were real earlier.
Because if you were fooled, you wouldn't find the difference between manipulated and non-manipulated emotions from him.
Everything is just messy. You are not sure about your own capability.
He sighed and stood up, dusting himself from sitting at the dusty place with a serious look. "I know what you're trying to do. It won't work on me. I've chose this path, Y/N-ah. But I can say you're good at it. The thing is, your choices fail."
"Touch me one more time and I'll break your finger." You whispered once you saw his hand landing at the top of your head once again.
Jaemin only pretended to be surprised before scrunching his nose in a cute way, mockingly pulling his arm back.
"It would've work if it was Jeno Lee." He scratched the tip of his lips and smiled. "He's just the victim, as I can say. He was persuaded. Jeno was completely a sane person but look at him now, he fell for it too. I can't blame him, he have reasons."
Your brows knitted while your heart started pumping aggresively in nervousness. "What did you do to Jeno?! You're corrupting everyone's mind! You're just the same as Renjun!"
"Blah blah." He rolled his eyes.
You breathed heavily, thinking of Hendery. There must be something going on right now, at this moment. And that's probably by turning Hendery's minds upside down. They are trying to make him join them — which is possible.
They might be targetting Kun's group. Of course, they can't do it towards Taeyong's circle.
If they don't succeed as a whole group, atleast they have Hendery. It was painful enough to fight against your own brother, right?
In no time, your eyes turned pitch black and you gritted your teeth. It was such a wonder how you suddenly could switch into your other self. You didn't have to focus so hard to call out the dark side of yours.
But then again, you are partly failing and partly succeeding to control it.
It didn't become a problem to you anyway. You wanted it to take over and finish Jaemin if necessary.
With a low growl, you snapped your limbs off and the chain created a snapping sound. You didn't managed to break the two of them tying your both wrists but it was enough to pull your right arm that was freed.
You smirked while you balled your hand into a fist, the structures of the wall at the right side suddenly breaking into a series of rocks.
To add up the damage, you tilted your head once and it made all the floating rocks flame up. Jaemin flinched with the sudden change in his surroundings.
"Nana, you shouldn't have." You whispered, gesturing your arm towards Jaemin's direction and it made the small rocks be in sync in your movement.
You were expecting to hit it right in his frail figure and make it burn, enough to make him weak and eventually, have your time to break the other chain.
However, he surprisingly blocked it.
Jaemin was just simply raising his palm and all the rocks are failing to his direction. He's not even trying too hard.
A short smirk appeared in his visual, "You look hot like that. Your distant in temper looked cooler with abilities."
With a whistle, the rocks you've prepared are all directed to you.
Since it's actually the first time you're fighting with someone who's fighting back in the same intensity, you failed to stop the burning rocks and hit you right in your skin.
Your dark eyes all shattered when the painful ball of flames hit your shoulder. The sizzling impact was really memorable in your ears.
Immediately, you used your healing ability as the burn marks healed and got back into your normal smooth skin.
It seemed like it triggered the stronger side of yours.
A bolt of adrenaline and unknown force caused you to put your feet at the wall where the chain's source was and kick it, making you have the strength to pull the remaining chain off. It worked— all the glowing colors faded in a snap. Your eyes were wide as you try to stand straight. You couldn't believe how poweful you felt.
Yes, you are currently having your own abilities but you definitely don't know how to handle it
Ah shit. This is like playing a video game against a pro without knowing the the controls are for!
Recklessly, before Jaemin could attack once again, you raised your arm and snap your wrist, knowing there's gonna happen with that move.
Well, there is.
But it's really irrelevant.
Green veins started entering the place and the floor shook for a moment.
You shut your eyes on your own stupidity.
This is Doyoung's ability, yes, and now you appreciated how smart he is for being able to control the whole damn nature.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk," Jaemin squinted his eyes and started taking step towards you. "Y/N-nie is still a beginner~"
He's unreadable with his next moves. He was a great fighter.
But you still managed to read it, dodging his hand that was about to grasp on your neck on time.
Mind Reading? Isn't this.. Ten's ability?
Jaemin seemed to be surprised for a moment to see you do that, making empty hand attempting to hold you by your neck into a fist.
The remaining pause from him became a chance to you. You stomped your feet and suddenly, you were in a different place — this is Taeil's teleportation.
But that didn't age well..
because you were standing right infront of Jaemin.
You literally teleported in that fucking spot of all places.
Taking the challenge, you decided to use Johnny's Strength and shoved him in his chest part. As soon as you got a grip on him and made him float from how tight you hold onto him, you raised your other arm and let Mark's ability crawl into your hands, ice peak ready to shoot in Jaemin's face.
Before you could attack, your eyes a really unbelievable reaction from him.
Even if Jaemin was gasping for air, he managed to smile mockingly.
It was enough to provoke you and made the ice spikes hit him painfully.
Jaemin shut his eyes in pain for a moment before snapping his fingers.
Uh-oh. Finger snaps means signals.
Fuck.
Your limbs felt dislocated and it harshly let go of Jaemin. Your feet were moving back on it's own and you couldnt comprehend how this feeling is really familiar.
You were forced by something inside youself to stand up in a distance.
Thinking about it, you only feel this way when Yuta does manipulation. The difference is that your muscles felt like it was being scratched into walls sharply, bruising over and over again.
Now, you want to give Yuta the biggest hug for being so careful to you that it didn't hurt when he was manipulating you.
Set aside the fact that you are simping hard at this situation, it sends shivers on your spine seeing Jaemin.
He let go of you for a moment to heal the burning ice peaks in his cheeks.
And perhaps, the veins around are actually a blessing.
You motioned your arms in a circle manner and the veins that crawled earlier got back into life. You bit the insides of your cheek and your confused face was masked with sincerity to do better.
You are the Protector, you have to do well.
You furrowed your brows and started to take a step back, the vein popping into Jaemin's ankle making him slip down. A successful smirk decorated your face.
Now, your objective is to run while making sure the veins trap him down for the meantime. You need to be familiarized of the whole place before getting back to Jaemin.
You held the walls gently, squinting your eyes to make sure no path gets out of your sight. While you were doing so, Jaemin's scream out of pain echoed. It made your heart swell because you can't believe you are actually hurting someone right now; using the abilities you can't believe you'll have.
"Lee Y/N!" He yelled in a raspy voice.
You shook your head and proceeded on your way.
But then, the whole place started to shift into an extremely different dimension.
You fell on your butt when a big wall suddenly appeared before your eyes. The path you were walking shrink into smaller size and you covered your head instinctively, overwhelmed of what was happening.
One of the things you are genuinely scared that you don't even mention it if someone asks what are you scared of is confined spaces. They felt like suffocating you.
Everyone is scared obviously to this feelings of being crashed, but yours was just in an abnormal level that it felt like you are holding for your dear life at the edge of the cliff.
For some reasons, you are traumatized by it.
Is this gonna be your end?
The terrifying sounds of the walls closing one by one stopped. Only your pant can be heard of how quiet the place is.
Suddenly, a pair of arms snaked on your waist, throwing you into their shoulder.
You wished it was one of the guys, but that is impossible as expected.
"You should've just stayed still, Y/N. I had fun anyway," It was Jaemin, again.
While feeling him take his steps, you attempted to attack him by hitting his stomach with your knee. However, he had already held both of your legs and locked it tight.
"You must surrender to Renjun." He mumbled.
You growled while wobbling aggresively. This tiring shit again. "Who the hell would like that to happen aside from your dark asses? Who would want to surrender from Renjun?"
"I did," His answer caught you off guard, but did not pay much attentuon because there is one question that's currently corrupting your mind and that is how Jaemin can easily pass through ways.
You lifted your head to see what is going on and it felt like your eyes were betraying you.
The whole way was completely clean. There were no big tiles squeezing you nor walls blocking it.
You contemplated if it could be because of the glowing chains or if there was something injected while you were unconscious for you to hallucinate, but it just doesn't match.
Perhaps..
"Jaemin.. what have you done to me?" You whispered.
He only chuckled devilishly while patting your leg. "Nothing much. Just used the mental projection and apparently found out you're scared with confined spaces!"
Hendery's ability it is.
You couldn't explain the fear starting to build. They were not kidding at all about the experiment.
It was indeed dangerous.
Having to think that you'll be facing the same creatures with the same strength as yours already makes your head hurt.
Jaemin finally arrived into a darker room, laying you ever so gently like you both didn't just aim to kill each other minutes ago.
Renjun appeared shortly after and you tiredly closed your eyes. He doesn't look like he got hurt at all earlier.
"No time for games, I guess." He mumbled, looking at his other side and Jeno soon coming out from it. "If you only listened and stay still then you would've known the whole story."
You were too tired to run, but you have to get away atleast. You attempted to sit but was harshly pinned by Renjun, making you groan in pain.
"I only say things once. Stay still." He ordered, gesturing Jeno to keep going about the injection in his grasp. "Let's get this shit done."
You smirked, although you were slowly losing hope. "What would happen once you got my abilities? I'm gonna turn back to a normal human, wouldn't it be a win thing for me?"
You know you're lying. You've grew fond in this kind of life, especially that you're not hurting anyone.
"How would it be a win thing for you if you know that you're blood and abilities destroyed the world? With a simple spread of your DNA, everyone will get wild." He smirked back, checking the tip of the injection. His hands are visibly shaking. Out of anger? Anticipation? Excitement? You don't care. You just want to stop right now. His words strucked your heart.
"I don't fucking get what is this for, Renjun. What will you get after doing this?"
"We're both angry at the world, the difference is that I'm making a move to express it." He smiled while watching Jeno and Jaemin hold both of your sides. "You won't understand even after you stay asleep, and I think that.. is beautiful."
Renjun's angelic face were right in front of you.
His sweet smile was a disaster. It was a nightmare.
You counted digits while watching him moderately approach your arms with a needle. You want to be in timing, reading their moves and using Telekinesis to slow down the injection a little more.
If you're going to die, you have to atleast try.
You're a fighter.
Three.. two..
"Get your hands of my pretty girl."
Your head snapped in the direction and saw Mark standing with his chest heaving up and down, the whole gang behind. And yes, including Kun's.
Aside from Hendery who's held hostage somewhere
Their eyes shone on your direction and it was a beautiful sight to sense their mixture of happiness and concern seeing you.
However, you are worried. They are still bruised and they fighting against creatures who are a mixture of human and supernatural.
It was late since they had started the battle.
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