There was a rageful scream that paralyzed Aera's thinking.

Jiah roared, the sound much more animalistic than what was humanly normal. Yoongi stepped away, the shadows consuming him.

Another ear-splitting shout of agony left the redhead's mouth as she tore the dagger from her back.

"Nice try," she breathed, tossing the blood-covered weapon to the ground, and grinned excitedly. "But it takes a lot more than a pointy stick to kill me."

Then something made Aera's blood freeze in her veins. From behind the hill emerged a large group of men, tall and heavily built. They were at least a dozen, if not even more. She instantly recognized her brother's dogs. And there in the front stood Hyukjae himself, his pale silver orbs soulless and bloodthirsty.

"It's not very nice to betray your friends, Yoongi!" he laughed mockingly once he and his entourage came closer, and raised a hand casually to signal them to halt. "I thought you'd pick your allies more carefully. You're not as half as smart as I thought you were, joining the losing side. And all of this for this lowly whore my sister." His lips grinned into a vicious grin.

And then Yoongi did something Aera had never seen him do in all those years she had known him.

He became angry.

And punched someone.

In the face.

Hyukjae's head reeled back with the force of the blow. He toppled backwards. It took him by surprise. He grabbed his jaw. A grimace pulled on his swelling lips, his arrogance and excitement extinguished by the icy wave of cold-blooded hatred that washed over his body.

Then he pulled out a blade and lunged towards Yoongi. He was aiming for his chest. The black-haired man twisted away swiftly. But not quickly enough. The knife plunged in his biceps and he grunted in pain.

"Now!" Hyukjae yelled and his loyal dogs descended upon Yoongi.

***

Screams broke out. Everyone rushed forward. Aera realized they were fatally outnumbered. An icy shiver ran down her spine.

"I won't let anyone hurt you." Jimin husked next to her. With a nod she stepped back.

He hoisted himself up to stand in front of her right as Jiah charged at him with a mighty cry. Agile, Jimin dodged her hit in one fluid motion. Her menacing eyes were a blazing red, gleaming in the darkness.

Heavy rain started to pelt down like a shower of bullets. Jiah swiveled in Jimin's direction again but this time he was faster to thrust forward and seize her. Had she been an ordinary human, he'd easily be able to lift her up and toss her over the cliff. But Jiah was stronger, much stronger than any other human being. Her strength was a fair rival to Jimin's superhuman one. With renewed vigor, she gripped at his arms and trashed against him. Aera gasped as she saw Jimin slightly stumble backwards and lose his balance for a second.

He refocused, apparently shocked and confused. Perhaps he had underestimated the fox woman. His muscles bulged underneath the material of his black shirt. Refusing to be overpowered, he pushed against Jiah's tiny frame and sent her flying backwards.

"Haven't you heard..." she breathed heavily, scrambling on the ground before she quickly jumped back up. Her glossy scarlet hair was covered in dirt but her eyes were unforgiving, burning with vengeance. "That it's bad manners to attack a lady?"

"You're no lady," Jimin ground out, chest heaving with effort and eyebrows furrowed. "You're a despicable monster."

"It's a shame I have to kill you," Jiah stalked towards him, sharp tongue gliding across her pearly whites. "You could be useful to me if you weren't too pussywhipped for that little slut over there." She shot a disgusted glare at Aera.

Infuriated, Jimin sucked in a breath. With a menacing growl, he ran towards Jiah.

***

With a fierce grimace on his face, Taehyung swung the baseball bat at one of Hyukjae's hulked gorillas. He was three times his size, if not more. The wooden weapon clocked him in the temple but he didn't even blink. Instead he towered over Taehyung, who staggered backwards helplessly, landing another sloppy hit in the process.

"Ugh! Why won't you die already!" Taehyung shouted, swinging the bat at the man's abdomen to no avail. He aimed for the head a second time. The baseball bat exploded in tiny splinters, leaving Taehyung unarmed.

"Holy shit!" he exclaimed, wide eyes scanning the overpowered mountain man from head to toe. "Are you sure you're even human, dude?"

Hurriedly, he pulled out his pocket knife and stabbed the man in the stomach. The blade plunged in the flesh and Taehyung pulled it out, stabbing again frantically. He might as well have been poking him with a tooth stick.

"Are you a zombie?" Taehyung yelled, suspicious that he had been teleported in an episode of The Walking Dead.

The man in front of him growled, baring his yellow rotten teeth. A disgusting smell penetrated Taehyung's nostrils. The man pressed on, pushing him further back. One misstep would be all it took for Tae to tumble to the ground and be smashed by the zombie man.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Jimin was stuck fighting that maniacal psycho bitch. Yoongi's grunts and groans could be heard over the cacophony of screams and shouts. He was cornered by not one, but three of Hyukjae's men. Taehyung was fairly certain the pale vampire dude was going to be dead as a doornail in less than a minute.

Taehyung's stomach twisted in painful knots as his shoe slid on the wet ground, which resulted in him landing on his back. He hissed, squeezing his eyes shut from the pain. The back of his head felt hot and damp. Probably the blood. His eyelids fluttered open only for his eyes to see the gorilla man's fist flying towards his face.

Great, so this is how I go. At the hands of a man who hasn't brushed his teeth in over a decade.

A gunshot cracked through the air. The sound reverberated in Taehyung's ears. As if on slow motion, he watched as the zombie man fell down to the ground like a bag of cement, loud and heavy, with a conclusive thud.

Taehyung's surroundings were fuzzy as he was trying to make out where the bullet had originated from.

A desolate gun floating in the air a couple feet away from him, held by some invisible hands, announced Jungkook's arrival.

"It's the element of surprise. It's what gets them every time." the grin was almost audible in the younger man's voice even though his face couldn't be seen.

Invisible arms gripped at Taehyung's hands, pulling him and helping him stand up. He patted himself from the dirt hastily, eyes darting to register any new possible threat.

"Thanks, man." He mumbled quietly.

"Yeah, no problem, dude," Jungkook's voice said. "Now let's fuck them up."

***

If hatred and violence were visible, the sky over the graveyard would have been scarlet.

The thought took over Namjoon's mind as Jin's Jeep came to an abrupt halt, the tires screeching against the road ominously.

Without a conscious thought, he, Meisa and Jin plunged into the dark forest. The stench of blood could be sensed from a mile away. Even though the pouring rain overpowered most of the sounds, the barbaric frenzy unfolding over the cliff still dominated the air.

Fear caged Namjoon's heart as he was drowning in his thoughts of what they'd find when they get up there. Would their friends still be alive? The threesome shuffled forward, dry leaves and fallen branches cracking under their feet. The more they advanced in the forest, the darker it got. Eventually, they decided they would hold each other's hands so that they wouldn't end up getting separated.

There was a certain urgency in the air, along with a sensation of a looming danger. Without a word, they kept walking. Under the slivers of moonlight, the forest seemed even more eerie. Namjoon held his breath, nervously anticipating a ghoul or a ghost stumbling upon them any second.

Suddenly, Meisa tugged at his hand slightly and stopped in her tracks. Namjoon spun, only to see the girl's face had turned ashen.

"I think I saw something in the grass." She gulped, her voice wavering. With a nod of her head, she pointed to their right.

There was buzzing in Namjoon's head as Jin let go of Meisa's hand and lumbered to where the girl was pointing at. He bent over, worried eyes scanning the surface.

Namjoon swallowed back a gulp. Squinting his eyes, he became aware of something sparkling eerily in the blackness of the grass.

His blood stopped in his veins and he suppressed the urge to vomit. His lungs screamed for air.

It was a human hand. With a ring on one of its fingers. Layla's ring.

Namjoon froze. The rain had stopped.