Someone suddenly stepped forward and stopped the blade before Taehyung buried it too deeply and deadly into his abdomen.

Taehyung looked up, but realized it wasn't Jungkook. He growled:

"Let go of my arm." 

"You can't do that," Hoseok said simply, pulling the blade to his side while Taehyung pulled it towards himself. But the samurai was so weak at that moment that ended up letting it go. 

Without hesitation, Hoseok put it back in his captain's scabbard which hadn't moved. Namjoon was impressed by his bravery, he had never seen Hoseok act other than like a fearful man in a confrontation that he always preferred to observe from afar. He was even more impressed when Hoseok added with a serious look: 

"No one is asking you to die, no one will gain anything from the sacrifice of your life, so what's the point?"

Taehyung didn't answer, he turned to ungkook, waiting for his reaction which didn't come. But one thing had definitely been done: he hadn't stopped him from cutting his stomach. The very man who had saved his life fifteen years earlier had now agreed to let him die.

"Captain, by any chance, wouldn't you have gone crazy?" Jimin suddenly asked with a sincerity that scared Namjoon.

The Joseon peddler immediately put a hand over Jimin's mouth to stop him from saying any more stupid things that could get them all killed.

"Captain, what he means is that maybe it's the fever that's making you talk," he corrected, tensed. "You look very sick this morning, you know?"

"Yes, it wouldn't be abnormal: when I have a fever, I always talk nonsense," Hoseok added with a kind smile that was meant to be indulgent, but earning Namjoon's appalled look.

His face was indeed pale and sweaty as Jungkook slowly turned towards them, but there was no trace of weakness. He looked at them with such a dark look that they backed away, in a gesture of survival. 

"Oh, so you think I'm crazy?" Jungkook asked in an icy voice, looking at them one after the other to see who would have the audacity to repeat that.

The three stuttered an unintelligible response. 

"You're not crazy," a hoarse voice replied in their place.

All heads turned to Yoongi, who was just awake. The once fearsome proud Ming soldier looked horribly weak. His severely cut hands had been bandaged and now seemed incapable of gripping the hilt of a sword to kill anyone. His torso was also entirely covered with poultice and bandages, his numerous wounds having been carefully stitched up by the doctor. He lay motionless on his futon and even his head couldn't turn towards them.

"Yoongi," Jungkook said in his icy voice that the sight of his waking man had not managed to warm at all.

The doctor corked the vial that had allowed him to wake Yoongi. The Ming soldier closed his eyes again, weakened and enduring pain that was reduced by poppy that the doctor had made him consume. The consequence of this was that his mind was completely wandering.

 Zijing gathered his equipment in his bag and left Yoongi's bedside, heading towards Jungkook.

"Captain, the Ming medicine is powerful but not miraculous, don't go too hard on him, or he won't survive his injuries," he said. "Whoever did this to him is probably a beast, not a man."

He bowed and was about to leave when Jungkook grabbed his forearm forcefully, to hold him back. 

"And who do you think this beast is, Zijing?" he asked.

Namjoon's gaze begged Zijing not to say anything but the Ming wasn't looking at him.

"If you ask me, Captain, I'll tell you it's that Joseon admiral, again and again," Zijing said contemptuously. "First he kills our men while we are busy fighting our enemies on the open sea, then he flees with our loot which we are forced to sink to the bottom of the sea. And now, he goes after Yoongi and leaves him for dead. Everyone is wondering why you spared him and had him here as you guest and now that he almost killed one of ours in our home, everyone is going to want you to explain your decis- aah!"

He cried out in pain when Jungkook squeezed his arm even harder, only barely stopping before breaking it.

"Explain my decision, uh?" Jungkook repeated.

The Ming turned pale when he realized he had made a mistake. His captain's gaze was cold as death and his grip around his arm was like a deadly vice.

"You know, I broke my arm when I was younger, in a duel against one of my father's men," Jungkook said suddenly. Everyone listened carefully, because no one had ever heard this story; a story where it was their captain who was wounded and not his enemies. "I remember suffering of course but the suffering was temporary. In any case I believe it because that's not what I remember most. Do you no what I rememer the most, Zijing?"

"No, I don't know, please, capt-" the Ming pleaded. 

"The thing I remember the most," Jungkook cut, without letting him go, "was the lesson this suffering taught me: before you face someone stronger than you, make sure you're not a weakling."

Everyone around was silent, watching the scene in amazement and wondering how far their captain would be able to go. He was calm but that made his threats even more frightening. They had never seen him behave in this way with his men, because the respect he was inspiring them was originally not born of fear. 

"P-Please, Captain," the doctor stammered, holding his arm close to Jungkook's hand, not daring to try to remove it himself, "I beg your pardon, I will learn this lesson, so don't break my arm, please!"

"What lesson?"

"I- I'm weak and I was disrespectful towards you, but I wasn't planning on confronting you, I swear!"

Jungkook let go of him and he hurried away, without daring to go out, waiting for his permission.

"Good. You will send me all those who demand explanations from me about my decisions, so that I can answer them in person, am I clear?"

"Yes, very clear," the Ming said quickly, too relieved to escape unscathed to have anything to complain about.

"Now, go tell everyone to get ready, we have a hunt to do," Jungkook said. 

He didn't need to specify that it was to find the admiral, everyone understood.

"Even those who aren't Japanese?" Zijing asked, unsure. He was surprised, because usually the Ming and Joseon from the crew were not allowed to go out unless it was time to go back to sea.

"I need everyone," Jungkook affirmed. "Go now, I have something to finish here before joining you, it will be quick."

He said that, turning to Yoongi whose eyes kept opening and closing slowly at irregular intervals, as if he were in the middle of a dream. Zijing didn't need to be asked and hurriedly left the room, holding his painful arm.

Jungkook got up from where he had sat chatting with Taehyung, without giving a single glance to the samurai who had almost killed himself for him, and approached Yoongi who was still lying down, unable to get up.

"Yoongi..." he said in a slow voice, sitting down next to him. "What have you done?" 

Yoongi forced himself to keep his foggy mind focused on Jungkook and, in a slurred, hoarse voice, he said to him:

"You can kill me if it pleases you. At least it will spare me the memory of the shame I suffered in front of this Joseon."

He tried to get up to face death with dignity but he was overcome by a pain that made him fall back on the futon, shaken by a spasm of pain. Jungkook observed Yoongi's bandaged chest which was reddening with blood from his reopened wounds. The bandages likely covered serious injuries that could have cost him his life. However, far from being moved, he replied:

"Don't die yet, first I want you to tell me what you did."

This lack of humanity was chilling. The other men watched the scene attentively, wondering if his narrative of fact would mean the end of Yoongi, but also of the captain they had always known and whom they were no longer able to understand at that moment. Indeed, Yoongi and Taehyung were his closest companions, it was with them that he formed his crew and began sailing the eastern seas. And now, watching them die didn't do anything to him? 

"I didn't get a chance to do much," Yoongi finally revealed, a hand on his burning forehead. "I went to that annoying Joseon to offer him my help in escaping."

"You wanted to help him escape?!" Taehyung wondered. "Not kill him?"

"You're not very wise for a samurai, have I ever told you that? Yeah I probably did," Yoongi replied with a strange laugh that everyone attributed to drugs because Yoongi was not a man to laugh so easily. "I bet you told everyone I tried to kill you." 

"Why didn't you do it?" the samurai questioned. "Why did you stop my bleeding?"

"For the same reason I didn't kill that Joseon when I really wanted to," Yoongi growled, avoiding Jungkook's gaze.

Taehyung understood.

"Did you do it for Jungkook?"

"Jungkook?" Namjoon, Jimin and Hoseok repeated in unison, without understanding who Jungkook was.

"That's my name," Jungkook said in a neutral voice without any explanation, as if it was obvious that they could have figured it out on their own.

"But-" Namjoon started.

"That's my name, and that's what you'll call me from now on, don't ask any questions," Jungkook cut in, ending the brief exchange. "Yoongi, even though you didn't go to kill him, you went against my orders. Why?"

"Because he has nothing to do here, and I bet you know it very well. He hates-"

He was suddenly seized by a coughing fit which prevented him from continuing because of his dry throat whose trachea was filled with dry blood. Jimin decided the man was in enough trouble already to die of dehydration and went to pour him a bowl of water and offered it to him. Seeing that he did not take it out of pride, he made him drink it himself, rejecting his weak gesture which tried to push him away, and slightly lifting his head to prevent him from choking on the drink.

When Yoongi finished drinking, which had obviously done him the greatest good, he roughly pushed Jimin away with irritation but grimaced in pain as he brought back his wounded hand that Taehyung's katana had sliced.

"I didn't ask you anything," he said Jimin fiercely. "I don't need your pity!" 

Jimin shrugged.

"Yet you have no idea how much you look like a poor defenseless cat right now," he said with a mocking smile  before finishing the water that Yoongi had only drunk a few sips, downing the water in one gulp. "Poor Yoongi! But I like cats, you're lucky. Should I feed you in addition to watering you?"

Yoongi was going to shout insanities to Jimin but Jungkook prevented him.

 "Jimin, shut up. Yoongi, I'm waiting," his impatient voice said. "Finish what you were saying, so I know what to do with you."

The Ming soldier frowned, having difficulty remembering what he wanted to say, then, when he did, he continued:

"Yeah, I was saying the admiral he has nothing to do here because he hates wakos, it's a truth you can't deny, especially considering he spit it in your face yesterday. And with that, he also makes you completely vulnerable. By granting him all the rights under the pretext that you feel guilty towards him, he would have ended up killing you and you would have held your throat out for him to slit, I am convinced of it." 

At these words, a glint of rage crossed Jungkook's eyes and his hand wrapped around Yoongi's throat who began to suffocate.

"Were you not afraid for your own throat, when you made this decision?" 

Yoongi managed to give him a wild grin.

"Maybe... I trusted... your legendary mastery of emotion... a little... too much," he said with difficulty while trying to breathe, "after all... it was you... who told me... not to let my anger cloud my judgment..."

But there was no longer any trace of control over his emotions. He gave free rein to everything bad in him, tightened his grip on Yoongi's throat so tightly that he was no longer able to utter a single word or suck in a single breath of air. If the others who were watching him had any doubt before this, they no longer had any: he was going to kill him.

Hoseok rushed to grab Jungkook's arm. 

"Let me go, if you don't want to die too, Hoseok," Jungkook warned him, not releasing his grip around Yoongi's throat but placing his other hand on the hilt of his dagger, ready to use it against Hoseok.

"Hoseok, let go of him, he's not joking!" Namjoon said immediately, worried about both Yoongi and Hoseok but not knowing what to do for Yoongi, since it was clear that Yoongi had made nothing but bad decisions the day before and that the captain had no intention of forgiving him.

"No," Hoseok refused much to the dismay of the Joseon peddler. 

"Why?" Namjoon asked him with urgency. He had a certain affection for the always cheerful former Joseon slave but he wouldn't have thought him capable of risking his life like that. Yoongi had only ever expressed contempt for Hoseok so why? "Why are you risking your life to save Yoongi, Hoseok? Get away or you'll both die!"

As Hoseok didn't move, Jungkook, strangling Yoongi with one hand, drew his dagger with the other and pointed it at Hoseok's throat to pressure him to make the right decision.

"You can do it, captain," Hoseok assured him. Fear could be read in his nevertheless determined gaze. "But I will stop you until the end. I refuse to let my family die so stupidly."

Everyone gave him a strange look as they had never seen themselves as his family. Only Namjoon remembered the conversation Hoseok had with the admiral. It was the admiral who made Hoseok realize that this feeling of happiness he had at sea or at the Usagi house with the crew was the consequence of having found a family. And now that he had realized it, he didn't want to lose it. 

His action to save Yoongi was not just a suicidal move. He was simply protecting what he had most precious in this world and Namjoon thought it was unfair to try to stop him. So, he no longer tried.

"Captain," Jimin said suddenly, his voice full of an anger.

Jungkook turned to him his eyes filled with a murderous madness.

"If you want to die too, Jimin, all you have to do is to tell me. I have the impression that this is the request of all of you this evening. Yet, as you see, I have both hands occupied so you'll have to wait your turn."

He signaled to his two murderous hands busy giving the death of Yoongi for one and threatening Hoseok with the other. 

Faced with this, Jimin could not stand it any longer. What he did then stunned everyone, Jungkook first of all: he slapped him.