Changbin was letting his right leg bounce up and down anxiously while he listened to Taeyong, who stood in front of the hall on a kind of stage along with the leaders of the groups, who would participate in the rescue mission. It was weird for Changbin to see Chan up there standing beside Sungjin but it would be sight he would eventually get used to seeing.

This meeting - as it had been called not long ago - was held in the largest trainings hall of the NCT headquarter since a lot of people attended it. Those people weren't only members of the groups, who would participate in the rescue mission but also some of the rescued werwolves and wolf hybrids from the fight at the moon pack. Chan's mother and Yedam sat among those, who were rescued while Changbin was seated in one of the chair rows on the right side of the hall along with Felix, Minho and Jisung.

Jisung had silently decided to participate in the rescue mission since he never said yes or no but still followed Changbin and the Lee brothers to their current seats. Jeongin and Hyunjin, on the other hand, sat somewhere in the back of the hall along with Ms. Hwang. It was still a bit unclear if they would go on the rescue mission with them. Maybe Ms. Hwang would join it since Changbin heard some people whisper about her being a mixed blood between a siren and kitsune, which was a powerful combination in the points of illusion, deception and manipulation as well as luring people into traps. All of these points would probably be very useful in a sneak attack as well as a silent rescue mission.

Just thinking about this made Changbin violently shake his head. After all, Ms. Hwang was here to be protected from a foreseen death. Letting her take part in a mission like that would endanger her life for sure.

Suddenly Changbin was ripped out of his thoughts when he felt a hand on his right thigh. He automatically snapped his head towards the hand's owner only to look into the black orbs of Jae. The older vampire was seated on Changbin's right side and he seemed a little bit annoyed.

"Do me a favor and stop bouncing your leg up and down", Jae whispered while putting more weigh onto Changbin's thigh to make his point clear. "Sorry", Changbin mumbled as an apology. Jae let out a huff and retracted his hand from Changbin's now unmoving thigh to pay attention to Taeyong again. Younghyun, who sat on Jae's right side silently chuckled to himself, making Changbin feel not too bad about having annoyed Jae.

The young vampire followed his hyung's example and turned his attention back to NCT's leader, who had just finished explaining the events of the last weeks and thanked the group members of GOT7 for their surprisingly early arrival. On Taeyong's side stood Kun and Yuta. Kun was after all NCT's second in command and Yuta was NCT's magical genius. He probably stood up there because he managed to pinpoint some important location or figure something about the hunters out.

Beside those three were eleven other creatures on the makeshift stage including Chan and Sungjin. All of them were leaders of groups but Changbin also saw the moon pack leader standing up there. Taeyong had introduced all of them at the beginning and Changbin had taken this as an opportunity to get to know more groups. Of course he knew the really famous ones like MonstaX, BTS, Got7 but also the ones with important roles within the supernatural community like K.A.R.D and A.C.E as well as some smaller groups like Day6, which have good connections. Entirely new to even the vampire were the groups IZ and ONEUS.

The leader of ONEUS was a rather tall male with black hair and eyes named Kim Youngjo but he was better known as Ravn. Changbin was surprised to not know him since he was introduced as a mixed blood between a raven hybrid and a warlock, meaning he possessed the ability to turn into a raven and could use magic just like Jisung. Maybe Changbin had never heard of him due his group being not very well known and Ravn's rather "normal" appearance. He could pass as human if he wanted since his natural black hair and onyx eyes didn't give away that he was part warlock. The other part of his species was a hybrid like Chan, who didn't have visible animal traits but could shift fully into an animal.

The leader of IZ was Lee Hyunjun one of Changbin's classmates at Miroh High. Changbin knew the elf was the leader of a group but he never knew they had ties to NCT and he also never remembered the group's name. Now, he would never dare to forget their group name ever again.

"Yuta will now reveal the whereabouts of our two missing group members. We believe that the facility where they are kept is one of the headquarters of the hunters and an important building for Zendala", Taeyong announced, looking at the warlock beside him. Yuta gave his leader a short nod before he stretched out his arms and let a blue, magical map appear in the air for everyone to see. The map showed a forest with a rather small building in the middel. It was mostly hidden by the surrounding trees.

Changbin stared at the map and had a hard time to not let his mouth drop open. NCT did already know about a possible headquarter of the hunters and had also mapped it out. Just how fast did they work for that?

"This is the building where they are kept according to our search. It looks like nothing special from the outside but there is much more than you can see on the first look", the red-haired guardian continued while Yuta flicked his wrist and let the map expand, showing everyone that the little building was the entrance to an complex underground system. The map of the underground system was very vary, so it must still be in progress but Changbin could already tell that invading it silently wouldn't be easy.

"We know with certainty that Jaehyun and Ten, the two missing members of our group, are there but we believe that more prisoners are kept there since the underground system is too complex for keeping only two prisoners but we need a bit more time to figure this out", Taeyong continued while his dark blue eyes scanned over the crowd for a short moment. Everyone was surprisingly clam, in Changbin's opinion.

"There is already a plan for a rescue mission but there are still adjustments, which need to be made before it can be carried out. Still, we know that we need a lot of assistance from the groups, whose leaders are standing up here with me but considering the current situation of our world nobody is obligated to take part in this mission if they consider it to be too dangerous-", the red-haired guardian went on but he was interrupted by the loud howling from the many members of the moon pack.

The moon pack leader Keon Yun, a tall man with broad shoulders and messy dark brown hair, raised his hand and calmed everyone of his pack down with that simple gesture.

"I guess nobody of my wolves wants to miss out on that", he laughed with a husky voice. "Make your plan adjustments while everyone, who participates, already trains for a little revenge. Am I right?", he roared the last question in an almost excited voice and got nothing but approving howls and cheers fro not only the moon pack wolves.

Changbin couldn't decide if he should be scared of Keon Yun or admire him for motivating his gigantic pack to participate in the rescue mission. The vampire glanced to his side to check the reaction of Felix, who sat on his left side, and Jae, who sat to his right. Both Jae and Felix remained rather calm but Changbin could tell Felix didn't like the noise because his cat ears had pressed themselves against his head a few seconds prior.

When the howling and cheering died down Taeyong raised his voice again. "For now the meeting is dismissed but we will gather here again tomorrow when the first adjustments were made. For the making the adjustments I would ask everyone, who is familiar with creating strategies for such missions, as well as all leaders of groups, to assist me and my team", the red-haired guardian ended.

A short mumble went through the crowd before it began moving. The majority of the crowd began to move out of the hall while the leaders and some probably higher-ups from each group met up on the side of the stage.

Changbin tried to continue watching the leaders and their higher subordinates but his view was blocked, which made him unconsciously pout a little but he quickly covered it up when he noticed it.

"Stop pouting and get your ass moving", Jae said, who had already stood up from his place beside him. Changbin looked up to his blond hyung with a bit of confusion in his expression.
It only slowly dawned to him, that technically he was a leader too, just not one of a group but of an entire specie of supernatural creatures. Jae as well as Younghyun, Changkyun and Dowoon were currently the highest vampire subordinates in his surroundings.

"Alright, I am coming", he said before turning to Felix, Minho and Jisung. The three looked at him like he had grown a second head - or at least the Lee brothers did. Changbin had to refer from chuckling at their expressions.

"I will back later. Probably with Chan-hyung", Changbin quickly said. He got a nod from the three and a little encouraging smile from Felix and Jisung.

"We will grab Hyunjin and Jeongin and head to our room. Meet us there", Felix quickly added before Changbin could join Jae and Younghyun, who waited for him at the end of the row of seats. Changbin gave the ginger cat hybrid a quick nod and quickly jogged over to Younghyun and Jae.

The three vampires walked to the group of leaders, which waited on the side of the stage in front of a door, which probably led to another room where they would discuss the first adjustments to the plan. Chan quickly joined Changbin's side when the short halted near the group. The wolf hybrid was probably nervous because he never attended a meeting where they would need his opinion on pretty important things. Changbin could relate to this feeling but when he had his hyungs from Day6 and one of his close friends by his side he felt a lot more confident. Changkyun also joined the group, standing near his leader from MonstaX.

Taeyong waited until everyone had gather before he opened the door, which led to a rather large room. It had no windows and was only lit up by lamps but it mad an spacious impression since the only furniture here were couches, which were pushed to the walls and a simple-looking desk at the other end. There was also another door, which probably led to the corridor they walked down before entering the trainings hall, where the meeting took place.

"Please make yourselves comfortable", Taeyong said gesturing to the couches. Everyone slowly entered the room, taking a seat on the many couches.

Changbin sat down on a couch with Chan and Jae on each side of him. On another couch on his right side sat Younghyun with Sungjin while on the couch opposite of them sat Hyunjun, IZ's leader, together with Ravn and another male of ONEUS. 

The unknown male had black hair but with a lot of brown colored strains. His eyes were teal blue, which led Changbin to believe he was a warlock at first but when he noticed the pointy ears he corrected his first suggestion to an elf even though he had never seen an elf with teal blue eyes before. Normally elves had dark eyes like vampires. Maybe this male was an exception?

"I will have to cut the introduction short since we should make the adjustments as fast as possible", Taeyong stated, gaining the attention of everyone while Yuta, who stood beside him already let the map appear in the middle of the room. The leader of NCT was standing at the end of the room, leaning onto the table behind him.

"I will start with explaining in every detail the plan Johnny and I have come up with. It's a very rough sketch of a plan, so please interrupt me when something comes to your mind. After all the plan only works with a certain number of creatures, which we have estimated beforehand, meaning we only included very vague power sets", Taeyong continued, looking around to see if he got everyone's silent approval.

Changbin gave the guardian a little nod when their eyes met like most of the leaders did. Taeyong took a short breath before he started to explain Johnny's and his plan.

——————————————

Seungmin was biting his nails while he waited for Changbin to pick up his phone. The redhead sucked in a breath when he heard Changbin's voice only to realize a second later that it was the voice mail. With a sigh Seungmin hung up the phone. Maybe he shouldn't have fallen for the same trick twice or was it trice? He couldn't recall.

"And?", Wonpil asked from his spot besides the bed where Dowoon was laying. The vampire had passed out shortly after Wonpil and Byungho had saved him. According to Byungho it was normal, so it was nothing to worry about. It still amazed Seungmin that his angelic brother had reacted so quickly to the situation while he couldn't think of a single solution for anything.

"Nothing. Nobody is picking up their phone", Seungmin said, trying to leave his nails alone. He had gotten rid of his nail biting habit a long time ago but after everything that happened he just subconsciously started doing it again.

"I hope nothing happened at the NCT headquarter", Wonpil sighed and looked at Dowoon again. The older demon had tried to call his group members too but it was the same with Seungmin's friends, they didn't pick up no matter how often he tried.

Seungmin looked over to Byungho, who sat in the armchair next to a bookshelf, with a little bit of hope shimmering in his eyes. He had tried calling Chan and Minho but also tried reaching Jungwoo, a childhood friend of him, who was part of NCT.

"I can't reach Jungwoo either", the brunette said while shaking his head. Seungmin groaned and roughly put his phone onto the desk on his right. He ruffled through his red hair in frustration.

"What in the world is going on?", he asked more himself that his two brothers. After the incident with Zendala, after Dowoon almost died and after Athea's death Seungmin had the feeling everything was officially out of his control. By all gods his father was currently working on creating new barriers and on relocating the mansion, so no one could get in or out of the house without him noticing as well as giving Zendala not another opportunity to get in the Kim mansion.

Seungmin, on the other hand, was currently stuck in a guest room enchanted by Lilith because it was safer than Wonpil's bedroom along with Byungho, Wonpil and an unconscious Dowoon. Woosu and Samuel were in another room with Rana because Woosu was still in shock over his mother's sudden death and was only reachable by the use of a siren's voice.

For the sake of Seungmin's sanity he needed to let his friends know all of the things that happened while he hadn't been with them but he also had to know if they are safe. Zendala got into the Kim mansion through Dowoon, so what if the NCT headquarter got infiltrated or attacked and nobody noticed it until now?

"Seungmin calm down", the young redhead suddenly heard Wonpil's voice. Instinctively Seungmin snapped his head around to look at his brother. While he was moving he subconsciously noticed his devil's tail and slowly felt the weight of it on his lower back. Looking into Wonpil's worried eyes confirmed that Seungmin's horns were probably visible too.

"It really is that bad, isn't it?", Seungmin breathed out and slowly raised his hands to look at them. Relief washed over him when he saw they were still normal and not transformed. It really wouldn't be beneficial if his hands had turned to claws now. Seungmin looked up again only to see that Wonpil wrapped him up in a hug.

"Listen, no matter what comes next. We will get through this together. Alright?", the older demon said and Seungmin felt that he also looked over to Byungho. The older male let go of Seungmin, so he could look his younger brother into the eyes. A certain flame burned within the usually clam and warm orbs of the older redhead.

"If Zendala dares to even come close to anyone we love ever again we will curse her and personally escort her to hell", the older redhead stated in unusual serious tone. It made something in Seungmin's head click. Now he knew what the flame in his brother's eyes was. According to old demonic books it was called "the flame of revenge".

Demons had a natural desire for revenge if they felt like injustice has been done to them. This combined with their vary moral compass could lead to great destruction but Seungmin knew Wonpil's moral compass was better than his, which was why he didn't worry about his older brother. It was the exact opposite, Wonpil had an advantage because the flame of revenge would keep him focused on getting revenge on Zendala. Seungmin guessed it had activated itself after Dowoon was hit by an spell of Zendala but he hadn't only noticed it now.

The flame of revenge was nothing you see in someone's behavior most of the time. It was just visible in the eyes and gave the demon a focused mind as well as a bit more power. Right now it also helped Seungmin collect his mind, even though it shouldn't affect him this way. It probably was more of Wonpil's influence anyway.

"Are you okay now?", Wonpil asked, slowly releasing the younger demon. Seungmin nodded and looked to Byungho, who quietly observed the situation. His wings were still out, which showed that a part of Byungho still wasn't okay but he seemed calm and was able to think rational, which he had proven by saving Dowoon's life with Wonpil's help.

Seungmin's eyes shifted back to Wonpil. "We should-", he began but he was interrupted by his phone ringing. The redhead quickly grabbed his phone and saw that Hyunjin was calling him back. He had ever picked up a call faster.

"Hyunjin", he almost yelled into the phone. From the other side of the line came a short pained groaned. "I'm holding my phone to my ear you know? I like my ear drums", the siren replied, in a complaining tone. In the background was a lot of noise but for now Seungmin didn't care. Relief washed over him like a wave. He hadn't known that he would react this way when he heard the voice of one of his friends.

"Damn it, Hyunjin. I called all of you idiots over a hundred times. I thought something happened to you",  Seungmin choked out, a lot less confident than he had planed to. By all the gods, why couldn't he just keep himself together today?

"Says you! Do you know that NCT is searching for your family? They tried finding your house with Jisung's help but failed. We were worried about you and Byungho-hyung too. Sure, we were told that your father is a powerful warlock and probably hide his house well but still!", Hyunjin replied, scolding Seungmin in a funny tone.

The redhead couldn't help but chuckle a little bit at the tone. Form the other end came some offended noises made by the siren, which made Seungmin laugh a tiny bit. "Stop laughing and take me seriously! We really were worried", the siren said in a tone, which told Seungmin he was probably pouting.

"I'm taking you serious. I'm just ... just glad you are okay. The others hopefully too?", Seungmin questioned, slowly regaining a bit of control over himself.

"Sure they are fine. Most of us just came out of a meeting. Taeyong officially announced the rescue mission and gave some basic information. Changbin-hyung and Chan-hyung had to go to another one because they're leaders", the siren explained.

All the fear and tension Seungmin previously felt were lifted off his shoulders after hearing this. They were all safe, they were all fine. Dowoon seemingly just got extremely unlucky and was the only one, who was somehow tricked into helping Zendala.

"Seungmin? Are you okay?", Hyunjin questioned after Seungmin was silent for a few moments. The siren's voice ripped Seungmin out of his little daze.

"Yeah I ... I'm fine", the redhead replied sounding normal now. Both Wonpil and Byungho looked at their younger brother and then at each other. A silent way of saying: "Is he serious?" but they weren't the only ones, who thought this was strange.

"Are you sure?", Hyunjin asked, sounding worried. "I-", Seungmin began but he interrupted himself when he heard a familiar voice on the other end of the line. Was it Jisung?

"Seungmin I'm putting you on speaker. An annoying squirrel just arrived", the siren said, which was followed by the sound of someone being hit and an "Ouch" from Hyunjin.

"KIM SEUNGMIN WHAT BY ALL GODS DID YOU THINK NOT REACTING TO OUR CALLS AND MESSAGES FOR ALMOST TWO DAYS", Jisung yelled into the phone. Now it was Seungmin's turn to become almost deaf.

"Minho-hyung get your boyfriend under control or Seungmin-hyung may become deaf", you could hear Jeongin in the background. This was followed by Jisung loudly protesting against something, which Seungmin guessed was a forced hug by Minho.

"For the sake of our sanity. Seungmin are you and Byungho-hyung okay? Where even are you? Are you safe?", Seungmin heard Felix ask. The ginger sounded so concerned it made Seungmin just a tiny bit.

"Byungho-hyung and I are at home and safe, don't worry. Hyunjin already told me that NCT searched for us. My father hid the house very well, so I don't blame them for not finding us", Seungmin answered.

"Not finding for sure. They probably thought I was joking when I led them to your address only to see the whole damn mansion was gone!", Jisung yelled in the background, making Seungmin lightly chuckle again. Still, it didn't fail to remind Seungmin, that he did not know why NCT was even searching for his family.

"Why did NCT even search for us?", Seungmin questioned, hoping to get an answer right away.

"We were told you and your family could be potential targets of the hunters just like my aunt, so they wanted to bring you and them to the NCT headquarter for protection", Jeongin explained.

This made Seungmin freeze a bit and look over to Byungho and Wonpil and then to Dowoon. Well, they already had become a target apparently and Zendala's first attack didn't succeed since she wanted Byungho, Wonpil and him but she did manage to kill Athea.

When he started to think back to the situation his blood began to run cold. Zendala knew what Wonpil and he were and she also knew about Byungho being a demon-angel mix. And she ... she panicked after seeing Athea because apparently Athea knew her or better knew who she really was as well as her real name.

Suddenly someone took Seungmin's phone out of his grip, startling the redhead. He immediately calm down after looking into Byungho's golden eyes.

"Sorry guys. Seungmin just spaced out a little", Byungho said calmly into the phone, which was followed by excited greetings and the usual chaos of different voices. Seungmin looked at Byungho talking at the phone for some time while his mind was entirely somewhere else. Which name did Athea try to say before she was killed?

"Seungmin?", Wonpil softly calling his younger brother's name and successfully ripped him out of his thoughts. Seungmin turned his head to look at his oldest brother. His mind was running, trying to figure out how he could find out more about Zendala. The most important detail was Athea knowing her, which could also mean that Woosu knew her. 

"Hyung, we need to find out who Zendala really is. We need the name Athea tried to call her by before she died. We need to talk to Woosu. He could already know her", Seungmin immediately said. If he could figure out who Zendala really was, so he could find her weakness and use it against her.

Wonpil seemed to think about it for a while. His eyes drifted over to the still unconscious Dowoon, who hadn't moved a muscle in over an hour but was still evenly breathing. There was no telling when he would wake up.

"Start with father. He said he would help if we asked, didn't he? Let's talk to Woosu when he is ready", the older answered. Seungmin gave him an little nod. This suggestion made a lot more sense and maybe was even more beneficial. 

"We should show up at the NCT headquarter as fast as possible", Byungho spoke up. Seungmin turned to his older brother, who had just hung up the phone. He walked over to his two brothers to hand Seungmin his phone. Seungmin took the phone and put it into the back pocket of his jeans.

"Sounds like you two want to keep quiet about what happened", Wonpil mumbled, probably more to himself than Seungmin and Byungho. Seungmin shook his head at that. It was the last thing he wanted to right now because at the moment, he felt like he didn't have the energy to hide anything.

"We will tell them", Seungmin promised and glanced at Byungho. The brunette nodded as silent approval but Seungmin couldn't tell if the older truly wanted to tell their friends about the passing of his mother and Athea or not. Still, he wanted his friends to know but he wanted to tell them about the current situation of the Kim family personally.

"We will tell them in person and let them in on what we know as well as Taeyong and NCT but for now we will figure out what father knows and maybe already get the real name to the female warlock we currently know as Zendala", Seungmin added.