The big doors of what seemingly was a throne room were pushed open by a rather small, fragile looking woman with long dark blue hair, which matched her midnight-blue cloak and complimented her sky-blue eyes.

She marched into the throne room like she owned the place, pretending like there were no fighting noises in the background or that two male vampires were charging at her with swords in their hands. A chuckle left her beautiful pink lips, when she simply raised a hand to throw the vampires against a wall with an immense force. An unhealthy crack was heard along with the vampires gasping before they fell to the ground limply.

"Even those guards are no match for me", the woman sneered, continuing to walk gracefully towards the two thrones in the middle of the gigantic throne room. A wicked smiled could be seen on her pretty face when she caressed the golden armrests.

"The vampires really know how to make a throne fit for royalty", she mused to herself and sat down on the queen's throne, looking at the damage she had caused.

Her wicked smile grew when she saw through the wide open door of the thrown room, how a vampire was stabbed through the heart with a sword made of pure silver by a certain masked hunter with a red crystal dangling around his neck. The vampire coughed up blood, which turned from dark red to a sickening silver tone before he fell limply to the ground not moving a muscle anymore.

"Bravo, Reinhard", the woman calmly cheered and clapped, gaining the hunter's attention. The man walked calmly into the throne room, towards the woman without any sort of worry or hesitation. He was dressed completely in black with face-mask and hood up, which made him look like an assassin, who was used to hiding in the shadows. The red crystal around his neck was the only thing that stood out from his dark outfit.

The woman noticed the sword made of silver, the hunter still carried in his right hand. It was dunked in silver vampire blood which made her wicked smile even wider.

"You killed some vampires, I see?", the woman asked in interest. "Only the ones, who were too hard to catch", Reinhard answered, glancing at his sword with the silver blood dripping down from it. The woman smiled like something pleasant had happened, despite it being obvious that a murderer stood in front of her.

"I did give the permission this time. We just need a bunch of vampires along with their king and queen of course", she said, leaning back into the soft cushion of the queen's throne. Her plan was working perfectly until now.

The man shook his head lightly. "You are a mystery to me, my queen", Reinhard stated, letting the smile on the woman's face turned into an amused grin. "I am impossible to read, is what a certain someone used to say to me but that's not the point now", she said, standing up from the throne and walking away from it with Reinhard following her suit.

"Other creatures are on their way here. My barriers can't hold them off for too long. They have skilled magic users within their rows, so we need to find Seo Shiwon and Seo Ahri as fast as possible, capture or kill the remaining residents of the palace and then evacuate all hunters", the woman continued while walking out of the throne room, not caring at all when she stepped over the bodies of a few dead vampires.

"What about the vampire crown prince, Seo Changbin?", Reinhard asked, looking at his queen in question. The woman didn't look back at the hunter and just continued walking. "He is a child and means no harm to us or our plan", the woman answered in a neutral tone. The eyes of the hunter with the red crystal narrowed themselves while he watched the woman walk away.

"Even you don't know where he is, do you?", Reinhard asked in a monotone voice. The woman halted, slowly turning around to the hunter with no emotion being visible on her face. "His parents have hidden him well. Even I couldn't figure out how he looks while doing my research but one of the captured vampires will know it, so it is no obstacle for us", the female with the blue hair answered.

Reinhard hummed in response, not questioning his queen any further and just walking by her side but the woman seemed to be slightly irritated by that despite the hunter not doing anything.

"Don't worry about this vampire you let get away. He was only a child and didn't get much information from the Sky Clan's female leader", she stated, like she had read the hunter beside her while rolling her eyes a little. "Wait, are they still calling themselves Sky Clan? Doesn't matter anymore. We have all of them locked away", the woman added after a short pause almost like she was talking to herself.

"We don't have all of them", Reinhard said, still using a monotone voice. He looked at the woman beside him with unreadable eyes. The female only scrunched up her nose in displeasure.

"Two little cat hybrids won't do much either. Why are you questioning me so much today, Reinhard?", the blue-haired woman asked, pronouncing the hunter's name slower and with a bit of an accents. She stopped walking and turned around, so she could stand in front of the hunter with the red crystal.

"Our last mission was a success but we let four teenagers get away and Emily was captured by one of the supernatural creature we tried to avoid", the man answered without any sort of emotion in his voice. His black eyes stared directly into the sky blue orbs of the woman. The woman huffed and turned around again to continue walking but Reinhard stayed where he was.

"It was Emily's own fault that she got captured by Lee Taeyong. She should have been more careful", the female said with a little bit of annoyance in her tone. She didn't notice the hunter not following her and even if she did she ignored it.

"Zendala", Reinhard spoke the woman's name with a little bit of badly hidden anger in his voice. "She is one of us. She is a huntress. We should at least try to save her and not just continue our plan like nothing happen", the man said, while pulling down his face-mask, revealing multiple claw-like scars which went from his left cheek over his mouth to the right side of his jawline.

Zendala whipped her head around to look at the hunter again. Irritation was glimmering in her sky blue eyes but she stayed collected. "Right now we don't have time for discussions like that. We need to finish our current mission and then we can talk about Emily", Zendala said in a serious tone matching Reinhard's intense gaze.

"We want to reach our goal, don't we?", the woman asked, already knowing the answer. "For that we have to trust each other blindly which means tell me about this young, blue-haired warlock we aren't allowed to lay a hand on", Reinhard insisted.

The blue-haired woman released a breath, letting her gaze drop for a short moment, so she could rub her temples. "I will tell you about him but not now", she said and then just continued walking without waiting for the hunter anymore.

"We have a tight schedule if you can remember. Our next target is the Moon pack along with it's three associated wolf hybrid packs but before we can attack them we need to do some research and let our troops recover from this battle. We managed to catch the vampires off guard but they still put up a fight", Zendala added. Reinhard followed the woman like he had beforehand but this time it seemed more like he wanted to follow her. 

The two hurriedly walked down the gigantic corridors of the vampire palace, which were covered in blood and bodies of both vampire and hunters but neither Reinhard nor Zendala cared. They had a goal they planed on reaching, even when they had to massacre an entire specie for it.

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Seungmin couldn't really tell how long it took for the majority of the NCT members and Day6 to return to the headquarter without a scratch. He had been too caught up in his head, trying to think of a kind of solution for this situation. Of course Seungmin wasn't someone with unlimited knowledge, who always knew what to do but there was no denying that his demonic self had immense power as well as access to important knowledge through his parents.

The redhead had told Byungho, Samuel and Woosu to hold their current position a little longer thanks to his demon voice like Wonpil wanted, even though he had wished for his older brother to not go into the dangerous zone the palace of the vampires had apparently become through the attack of the hunters.

The waiting for the older NCT members and the whole Day6 group had been filled with tension even though Jeno and Jaemin, who had joined the five worried teenagers had tried to distract them to the best of their abilities.

Seungmin didn't need to be fully aware of his surroundings to know Changbin was filled to the brim with worry and anxiety even though he tried to hide it. It was understandable since his people were attacked as well as his parents and he couldn't do anything to help them.

Felix had been crying in Minho's arms for a while but ultimately calmed down and dozed off with his head on his brother's lap after they had settled onto the couch in the headquarter's living room. They were lead there by Jeno and Jaemin since the two thought it would be great to watch a movie to distract everyone.

Minho and Jisung were probably the only ones along with the two NCT members, who actually paid attention to the movie. Seungmin couldn't even recall what type of movie it was which they were watching. He had just sat at the end of the couch with Changbin on his left side, thinking about the current situation from every angle he could think of. What did the hunters want to achieve? What was there ultimate goal and how did they want to get there? How did they managed to attack two targets within just 24 hours?

The redhead had only been ripped out of these kind of thoughts when Changbin shot up beside him, looking at the door of the room where Jae stood along with his group members as well as Taeyong and Johnny. Seungmin's gaze immediately fell onto his older brother, who appeared besides Jae. Wonpil had a rather neutral expression but Seungmin knew him well enough to know that there must be a storm of emotions behind it. Still, the redhead couldn't deny he was relived to see that everyone at least seemed fine.

"Changbin could we talk to you for a minute?", Taeyong asked, sounding like it was a normal question. Seungmin mustered NCT's leader, trying to figure out what he was really thinking but he couldn't find anything which made his gaze shift to Jae almost automatically.

The blond vampire with the round glasses was a lot easier to read than Wonpil or Taeyong, which made Seungmin immediately pick up on the sadness in the older's eyes as well as his lightly slumped shoulders. "The hunters won again", the redhead thought to himself, immediately putting on a facade like Wonpil so nobody could see how worried or shocked he was now.

Changbin stood up from his place beside Seungmin and walked over to the older males, following them out of the room. Wonpil and Dowoon stayed back though, walking over to the couch and casually sitting down. Wonpil seated himself beside Seungmin, on Changbin's previous spot, and Dowoon sat down in front of him on the ground.

Seungmin eyed them a little. He already knew his older brother was just hiding his true emotions, which nobody else seemed to notice but Dowoon was a different story. Maybe the young demon just knew the black-haired vampire too well or it was very obvious that he was anxious, sad, angry and scared when you just observed his eyes and his nervous little movements with his fingers, which seemingly could only be calm by Wonpil putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Did something go wrong on your mission?", Jaemin asked carefully from his sitting position on the ground. He was looking at Wonpil and Dowoon like literally everyone else in the room, except Felix because he was still asleep.

"The palace of the vampires was empty when we arrived. No hunters but also no vampires", Wonpil answered in a neutral tone but Seungmin knew he was lying. It scared the young redhead even more. What did his older brother see at the vampire palace?

"But let's talk about that later, shall we?", Wonpil more said than asked with a little smile on his features. Jaemin gave him a little nod and turned his attention back to the TV where the movie was still playing, laying his head on Jeno's shoulder.

Seungmin didn't focus on the movie like seemingly everybody else. He looked down onto his lap asking himself what the hunters really wanted to achieve with probably killing and kidnapping every creature they came across.

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As soon as Changbin left the little living room he felt an warm arm lay itself onto his shoulders. He would have flinched if he didn't immediately recognize the familiar warmth of Sungjin. Without even glancing at the older male Changbin knew there was a little reassuring smile on the older's lips even though he was probably very scared and worried too. The vampire kind of needed this gesture right now.

He send a silent "thank you" to the werewolf and just continued to follow Taeyong almost blindly while also staying close to Sungjin. The young prince knew something terrible must have happened to his people, his parents because he had noticed the defeated and sad eyes of Jae, Dowoon and Younghyun as soon as they had entered the living room which had made him shoot up from the couch so quickly but for now he tried to not focus on it too much.

Taeyong lead the group back to the meeting room they had occupied before Xiaojun told them the vampire palace was under attack. The guardian waited until everyone took a seat and the door was closed. Changbin tried to not seemed like the anxious and terrified teen he was but the heir of the vampire throne even though it was hard to hide his current fears.

"At first I should clarify that everyone here is aware of Changbin's true status within the vampire hierarchy", Taeyong started, looking at Changbin who tried to sit straight and seem at least a little confident. "Which is why the things we will discuss now are important for all vampires", the guardian continued.

Changbin had a really bad feeling when Taeyong created another magical map on the table but this time it showed not forest and a few houses but the royal palace of the vampires. "Changbin I won't talk around it. When we entered the palace we were already too late. Your parents were gone and so seemed to be some other vampires but the majority was dead", the guardian reported. He looked at Changbin with empathy but behind that the vampire noticed the bit of sadness.

All eyes were on Changbin now, who sat there staring at the light blue miniature of the royal palace. The young vampire showed no reaction until a simple, almost not audible question left his lips. "How many?", he asked, not looking up. A short silence followed before Taeyong spoke up again.

"We found 76 corpses but we aren't sure those were all. The royal guards were only partly among them", Taeyong answered. He tried to make his tone sound factual but there was a hint of hopelessness behind it. The part with the royal guard caught Changbin's attention almost instantly.

"Which of the royal guards weren't you able to find?", Changbin wanted to know, now being more audible. He needed to know which of them could still be alive. "Park Chanyeol, Byun Baekhyun and Oh Sehun", Taeyong answered.

This statement was followed by a tense silence since Changbin had gone quiet again but then the young prince calmly stood up. Something within him had turned on the autopilot.

"Thank you for telling me this kind of information, Taeyong-ssi. I will try to figure out what to do for my people", the young prince stated like a robot in a monotone and emotionless voice. Changbin himself didn't fully realized how he managed to say that but he did. Internally the young vampire could feel his emotions swirling in his chest like a hurricane. It was like it took him the air to breath properly.

Without waiting for anyone he walked out of the meeting room. He had the feeling this room was suffocating him for a second time today, so without really knowing where he was going he just walked down the corridor.

Changbin felt like his head was empty and full with thoughts at the same time. Maybe it was just his brain desperately trying to not cause a second anxiety attack or his conscious which worked through the things he had heard not long ago.

Everything around the vampire prince began to blur together without him noticing it properly. He just walked down the corridor with fast steps, keeping his eyes glued to the ground before his feet  while his head was a battlefield.

If his parents really were kidnapped - or worse dead - Changbin would automatically become the king of all vampires until they returned, if they return. He couldn't do anything about that. He had to take this place if he wanted or not, if he was ready or not.

The young prince wanted to cry, to break down again but there was no point in that. He had to be strong now. He had to be a leader, a king, if it really came down to that. A part of him still had the hope that his parents just escaped the hunters' grip and went into hiding for the time being but it was unlikely. The pure reason the hunters attacked the vampire palace was probably for his parents.

Changbin was so out of it he didn't notice how the corridor ended, which made him walk straight into the wall. He stumbled back a little after the hard impact and like it was a reflex the young vampire prince punched the wall as hard as he could. His fist made contact with the wall, followed by a very loud cracking sound. Luckily it wasn't Changbin's hand, no, it was the wall which now had large cracks in it.

The vampire breathed heavily while staring at the cracks he created, which slowly repaired themselves. He retracted his hand after he felt the cracks being repaired under his knuckles. His hand was fine when he looked at it, no blood, not even a scratch but he noticed that his mind had cleared, had sorted itself for the moment.

"Changbin...?", he heard Jae say behind him. He turned around to look at the blond, who not only seemed defeated, tiered and sad like before but also a little scared.

"I'm sorry I ran off, hyung. I needed to clear my head. I will come back now if we need to continue the previous talk", the vampire prince said, sounding calm almost uninterested like he had when he still hung out with Ryan and Chantelle at school. Jae seemed almost a little dumbfounded.

"Y-yeah I think there are still some things to talk about", the older answered with a light stutter. He looked at Changbin like the younger had become a totally different person.

"Alright. Let's go back to the meeting room", Changbin confirmed, walking past Jae and automatically taking the lead while letting the blond vampire trail behind him until he finally caught up to the prince. Changbin started to think about the future plans for the vampires. He would need to somehow contact the remains of the vampires and get them to a safe place but he also knew that a lot of vampire would want to fight.

"You know, hyung. The hunters just declared war to all vampires in the worst way possible. I guess they didn't know that, so maybe we can make that to an advantage and surprise them with a bunch of very angry vampires", Changbin calmly stated, glancing at his hyung. Jae looked at him like he was mad.

"They are one step ahead of us. We could never take them by surprise", the blond dismissed with a shake of his head. Changbin hummed, signaling he heard that. "I still need to talk it over with Taeyong-ssi, just in case. We also need to find a new hiding place for the remaining vampires, so they don't go to Transylvania", the young prince stated in a very neutral tone.

Just now the older vampire noticed that the red glimmer in Changbin's eyes was more present than before which didn't leave room for much interpretation. The short male that was calmly walking beside him was not the wannabe bad boy who was actually a softie, not the one who sometimes jokingly called him Chicken Little and definitely not the pure, shy and cute kid he used to babysit but the vampire crown prince, the trained heir to the vampire throne.

His future king.