Sehki struggled to shake off the shock of hearing his brother was alive, forcing his cousin and shadow to push and shield him being surrounded by the garbs of Snake, Monkey, Goat, and Horse, who were recording them.

Worse, other students were behind him, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Dango, Tenshia, Rubin, and Meng."

"He knows who we are?"

"Focus."

"It doesn't matter, we have the numbers."

"D, he already knows our Zodiacs."

Wali scowled. "What right do you have to interrupt and attack us?!"

Tenshia pointed a club at her. "Why did you make Queen Hinata cry?"

"I wanted her advice on something."

Rubin's camera was aimed at him. "Why were you asking about Princess Qian? Did you kidnap and lose track of him?"

"Newsflash goat, I was at Celestial when Qian went missing in Fenghaung's capital. Your culprit's whoever was near the castle! "

"Stay away from our ruler's wife!"

"Do not berate my cousin, Goat! Take your herd and leave us if you have nothing to contribute!"

"If you won't tell us the location of our ruler's daughter, we'll interrogate every bone and asset inside your body" having their followers surround the two of them in a circle.

Rubin's clones launched at him, who whacked them all away. Sehki dashed to deflect Tenshia's spear, spinning to cover his cousin's back, counting the number of adversaries surrounding them.

"Can you handle two vs eight?"

"Is it free for all? Yeah. Here? Not sure!"

"Let's show him our full power," Rubin claimed. "Goat Evolution!"

Dango hesitated, tightening her grip around two whips. "Snake Evolution!"

Tenshia sighed, twisting the staff. "Monkey Evolution!"

"Ugh, fine," gripping a blade. "Horse Evolution!"

The four of them gained different shades of fur and accessories: Rubin's horns spread to create an offensive sharp armor of fur scales beneath him.

Dango's whips collided around her now green hands with tails surrounding her. Tenshia's Carina skeleton spread out to make two pairs of limbs. Meng just gained a plate of armor, a sword, and a shield.

Sehki stretched his shadow too late as the four behind the Rising Twelve activated their own Switches, filling themselves up with physical excitement despite leaking hints of pain.

Wali jumped on it to swing at the followers.

"How dare you use such a power built on malice!"

Having to plant and use his tongue to swing off the living battering rams Rubin sent after them, he blocked Tenshia's staff with the summon of his tail, clashing against her. Dango dived to attack the cousin when the prince's silhouette blocked her snakes.

Meng released the power of a fire horse and his sword at all of them. Wali winded back his tongue, launching it with a burning strike to match. Sehki let Dango's snakes hit him to stop the quartet of students from interfering, flipping and sliding underneath their spells.

"Wali, catch!" He extended his shadow for his tongue to reach, who pulled himself to knock the other student's away when the main four were lunging at them.

"Chameleon Art: Python Forger!" His tongue continuously swapped directions at the four of them, knocking all of them away but Tenshia smashing the staff with all six arms.

"Go!"

Dango punched the ground and snakes protruded from across and Sehki's attempts to blow them all away led Meng using the wind against him with a fire shaped horse growing and smacking into him. Rubin's clones put themselves on Wali's tongue.

"Take down the Chameleon first!"

Tenshia and Meng charged at Wali, constantly blocking their attacks with his tail. Sehki attempted to help him shake it off, but Dango jumped off larger snakes blocking his path as a platform she jumped from, commanding ones below to blast a hurricane of poison mist.

They crumbled the control of his legs into dust. He couldn't bring himself to hurt one that looked like the one who licked him as she covered his mouth.

"Sorry, but we take the queen's health seriously," easing his head after listening to his mumbles. "They won't petrify you, just feed off your own magic. Something tells me that wouldn't work on you."

The queen?

"If she feels any sort of negative energy, she can project more Voids. When she returns from interrogation, bringing up Qian in any capacity does this to her. We've been trying to find her too."

Dango, with all due respect, you should've started with that! I promised her to find him, but I can't trust anyone trying to jump us out of the blue. Wait, why are you all targeting Wali?

"He pretended to be you while you had disappeared and then became that Void. Every now, the same Void with that pattern was approaching and infiltrating the castle. If anyone should know where Qian is, it should be him."

Tenshia slammed a giant flail onto Wali, growling as the other members of the Society of Voids approached him with what Sehki dubbed the Scope Switch."

Falling to the floor, his shadow grazed most of them off, but he called for Ophiuchus to fuel him back up, struggling to get up, regaining his ability to speak. Against the celerity of his fluctuating nervous system, he watched his relative struggle to fight the other three.

"You're going to turn him back into a Void? No, I can't lose my family!"

Wali headbutted Tenshia. "Then be the change you wish to be!"

Sehki lunged at him, spreading a dark wave as Wali reached out. Dango spread multiple snakes to try and drown out the shadows, but as a Switch was about to reach his cousin, Sehki grabbed his cousin's shadow and smacked them away with it.

"Onyx Merge with it!!"

Too concerned to answer any more questions, Sehki combined Wali's shadow into his flowing aura, crossing his hands along his chest as he garnered a stave, tongue, and tail.

Sehki looked at his new form: heavy, drained, but blasting the tongue into Rubin, freeing his cousin.