"It's not this one!" Bang Chan whispered as he ran up beside Minho after desperately looking around the first tent. "He's not here!"
Minho's eyes narrowed and he nodded. "Then... we need someone to be disguised and to go search for him."
"Someone who's face isn't known," Bang Chan agreed. "So none of the royals, and not Changbin. That leaves General Jeon, Captain Jeon, or... me?"
"I can go," General Jeon offered and his brother nodded. "We can go together. We have some experience with that."
"Good. Then we need the same armor that the guards are wearing."
"You mean like the guards that we shot?" Min-hyung pointed out, nodding to outside the backside of the tent where they had collected the bodies. "Those should work, right?"
Minho nodded and went outside once more, making sure to be silent so the other five guards were not alerted.
A few of the young men quietly took the uniforms of the fallen guards and handed them inside so that the others could dress in them.
Minho looked down at the blood stain on his uniform's arm sleeve. "I really hope it's too dark for them to see," he muttered as he shook his head, looking over at where Changbin was also changing into the uniform of the southern soldiers. "Not bad. I think Yongbok would like that."
"You think so?" Changbin joked, trying to thaw the frozen and anxious mood that was taking over. If they messed this up... it could be disastrous.
"We have to go-"
"What do you think you're doing in here?" the footsteps of southern soldiers outside and the light of torches lit up, spooking Minho who quickly unsheathed his sword and was ready to spring at whoever entered the tent.
"Wait!" Bang Chan cried as he jumped forward and gripped Minho's arm. "That's-"
"Chan?" two familiar heads poked into the tent. "Is that you?"
"What?" Min-hyung cried as he peered forward. "What are you two doing here?"
Young Masters Hwang Hyunjin and Kim Seung-min stood in front of them dressed like true southern soldiers with wide grins on their faces.
"It is you!" Hyunjin ran into the tent and hugged Chan right around his shoulders before he bowed to Minho. "Your Highness!" he grinned.
"Oh, come here!" Minho pulled him into a hug. "What the hell are you doing here? It's dangerous!"
"We've been in here for six months!" Hyunjin answered. "We were sent in as spies six months ago, and we've been undercover all this time waiting for you guys and gathering knowledge."
"Well sorry for keeping you waiting," Minho pulled away. "More importantly, do you know where the Han King is being kept?"
Hyunjin and Seung-min shared a look. "We do, and you guys are way off. It's on the other left side of the camp, not the back!" he shook his head. "But it's insanely guarded. There's no way that you'd be able to sneak in."
"Then... we should just replace the soldiers that are on guard right now with ourselves. We're dressed like them as well, so we should be fine."
Kim Seung-min looked thoughtful. "There's a new rotation in about ten minutes and I know who's going to be on it. If you can sneak in and take them out before they go to their shift then you'll be able to take their spots. And only one of you can go inside and give him his food. That's when you can untie him and get out."
"Have they actually been feeding him?"
Hyunjin nodded. "Very well, considering he's a prisoner. They clearly don't want him to die very soon. They need him alive."
Minho lowered his voice as he realized they had gotten louder. "Of course they need him alive! They need to bait us here and once they beat us, they'll slaughter not only my husband but my brother and my friend as well. We need to hurry before any of those things happen."
"I completely agree," Changbin growled as he unsheathed his sword. He had spotted a passing lantern that belonged to a Southern soldier. "What's going on in there?"
Hyunjin poked his head out. "Oh, sir! We were about to go release the guards on duty guarding the prime prisoner."
"Yes, well then call Dong-woo and hurry up!"
"Yes, sir!" Hyunjin saluted before he rushed back inside the tent.
"Dong-woo?" Minho raised an eyebrow and glanced over at Seung-min, who shrugged. "He's Changmin. I'm Dong-woo, you want to make fun of our names?"
"Yes, but now is not that time," Minho nodded for Hyunjin to lead the way. Hyunjin took the lead and made the gathered young men form a southern marching formation as he let Seung-min walk them forward, taking the rear.
Which meant that Minho and Seung-min were the two in the front who had to make sure they were accurate with their information.
"Halt!" called the troop leader who stuck out his arm as Minho and Seung-min were marching by. "State your purpose!"
"Reporting to relieve you of your duty sir!" Seung-min puffed out his chest like a true soldier as he said this and the troop leader nodded to his men to follow after him. "He already ate. Don't be afraid to ruff him up a bit," he slapped Minho's shoulder, making him flinched.
"Those bastards..." Minho hissed once the other guards were out of hearing range. "What the hell did they do to him? He's been gone all of a day!"
"You'd be surprised at what assholes they are," Seung-min murmured under his breath as he took a spot right outside the tent entrance. "Hyunjin and I will stand guard outside here, so you go ahead and get him out! He has to be the first priority."
Minho paused before he nodded to his friend and lead Changbin and Bang Chan as well as Min-hyung and the general inside as Hyunjin stood across from Seung-min.
It was very dark inside, and Minho couldn't make out a single thing in the space. "Torch."
"On it," General Jeon muttered quietly as he poked around for something to light.
And out of nowhere, a fish bone came hurling through the air, hitting Minho across the forehead. "Ouch!"
Everyone was suddenly on high alert, their arrows and swords drawn. "What is it, Your Highness?" Changbin was at his side.
General Jeon had managed to find a club of some kind and lit it on fire, illuminating their faces in dim light.
There on the ground tied to a wooden pole slouched King Han Jisung who was glaring up at who he assumed to be Southern guards here to torment him more. His face and limbs were already covered with bright bruises and his hair hung loose from his shoulders, something a king's hair rarely ever did.
"Jisung?" Minho leaned closer to try and make out the slumped man's face. "Jisung!"
Jisung's head perked up immediately as he found his husband rushing towards him. All of a sudden, Minho was on his knees right in front of him tearing at the rope that was holding him back. "Did you just chuck a fish bone at me?"
"I didn't know it was you!" Jisung's arms were free and his threw them around Minho's shoulders, holding him tight. "What are you doing here!"
"Rescuing you, of course," Minho grinned as he pulled back and helped the king to his feet. Everyone around them bowed their heads except for Min-hyung, who just dipped his head before going up and hugging Jisung as well. "Thank goodness you're safe!"
"We have to get out of here," Changbin tossed one of his twin silver blades at Jisung who caught it mid-air. "And we need to sneak out of here and join the others in the fighting!"
"Fighting?" Jisung paused and listened to the yells that were beginning to erupt from the other side of the southern camp. "It's coming from the front?"
"We snuck in through the back," Minho clarified. "We should burn this entire place down, all their supplies before we go and join the fight."
"That's good," the generals joined the conversation, General Jeon bowing his head low as he talked. "There is a stable not far from here... I have an idea."
~oOo~
"WOOOWEEE!" the sound of loud teenage yelling alerted the southern soldiers who were standing guard all over the large camp base as nine horses burst out of their stables, the guards who had been guarding them knocked to the ground.
Lee and Han noble men and royals ran from the stables in all different directions, their torches, several in each hand, lighting their way as they galloped off and started tossing torches into tents, lighting them all on fire.
"You southern bastards!" Minho whooped as he ran past one of the storage tents, tossing two of his torches inside. This was their food supply... not any more!
Minho paused just long enough to watch the entire tent erupt in flames before he laughed out loud and reared back on his horse before heading forward.
All around the camp his brother and friends were doing the same thing, raining chaos down everywhere as they did so. Tent after tent was set on fire and before long, the entire area was up in flames.
The fighting up front had ceased for a few moments as everyone turned and stared at the beautiful red, orange and yellow dancing flames that ate the camp alive. Southern men faltered as they realized what had just happened to their base. It was gone now.
The united northern, eastern and western armies swelled with laughter and cheer as General Jeon and Captain Jeon burst out of the flames followed by Hyunjin and Seung-min, now stripped of their southern armor, followed by Minho, Jisung, Min-hyung, Changbin, and Bang Chan escaping from the fire just before it closed behind him.
Seeing their king freed and racing towards them with a sword in his hand, letting out a battle cry, his men were reassured and went back to the fighting with twice the spirit, knocking down twice the amount of men.
"Took you long enough!" King Lee shouted from where he had just knocked two men off their horses. "Did you really have to set the place on fire?"
"You'll thank us for it later when it lets you take a win!" Minho yelled back to his brother as he unsheathed his own sword and dove back into the fighting, Jisung now at his side.
Working side-by-side, their horses back to back, Minho and Jisung slashed and stabbed at man after man who ran at them, taking back the land that was their own.
They were still heavily outnumbered, but they now had a fighting chance. The final battle had arrived.
(AN: Hey guys, feel free to skip this small rant of mine, but I felt like I had to say it somewhere to get it out of my system.
I'm am so fed up of homophobic parents. I really, really am. Now to people who have homophobic parents themselves, you'll probably feel like I'm bullshitting about nothing because mine were super supportive and open to anything, but guys...
About half a year ago, one of my best friends came out as gay. He's a second generation Chinese-American with very stereotypical Chinese parents with stereotypical Chinese parent expectations. He's the only son in his family, so he's expected to carry out the "family name" bullshit. Well, that might not happen if he's gay, right?
So my group of friends love him to pieces and are all super supportive, even our religious friends (I'm actually religious myself funny enough). So then, we all had to go home because I live in California and COVID hit really hard here. For the next few months, we would not be seeing each other in person. At the time, my friend was seeking for some help so he went to the school counselor maybe once or twice a week to try and figure out what he was supposed to do about his parents, who up to this point had no idea that he might be gay since he's basically a perfect Chinese son and plays sports and is good at math and was the concert master of our orchestra last year.
Guess what? His parents thought it was weird that he kept going to counseling so they kept interrogating him about why he kept going. Well, one day he just lost it and spilled everything to them. He was gay. Period. They didn't take that too well and cut off all his connections to his friends because apparently it was his environment that was making him gay. So for the past few weeks all of my friends haven't had any connection to him. All I heard before school ended (since we had the same classes and could see each other over Zoom) was that the police had been called twice to his house because of suicidal thoughts he had shared with the school counselor. Now that freaked me out of course, since suicidal thoughts are never a good thing, right? And then school ended and I really couldn't see him anymore.
And now, I thought since we were going back to school we would at least be able to see him and make sure he's still alive, right? NOPE! It appears as though his homophobic assholes of parents might have moved him to a different school for I guess a "straighter environment". So that is why I'm so sick and tired of homophobic parents. If he actually kills himself, they're going to be guilt ridden for the rest of their lives! It's ALWAYS better to have a gay son over having no son at all!
Sorry about my rant guys... just really frustrated at the moment. Thanks for reading!)