-June's P.O.V-

I entered into Head Quarters and was greeted by everyone. It felt good to be back but I left for a reason. I knocked on the door to the main meeting room where Kris was standing in front of a map and had pictures of suspects as well as Hongbin stood next to him. As I walked in, I was surprised that the prince was actually really tall.

"June! You made it! You liked the little joke I played?" he grinned. I punched him in his arm.

"You really scared me. That was not funny," I said as I gave him one my death glares. Kris shrugged it off and introduced me to the prince. He held out a hand I shook it. He had dark circles and looked a complete mess. Did he rest? Was his mind to busy on the fact of yesterday's event? Or maybe Kris just kept him awake with his non-stop talking and boring lectures? He ran a hand through his dark brown locks and I can feel my cheeks burning. I looked away. People were right; he was indeed handsome in person.

"The reason I bought you here was because you were one of our bests, trained by me. We went through the names of people who would fit this job but agreed on you because you're a prodigy." Being praised by the guy who taught me the best wasn't so bad. I liked it.

"So, we want you to join on this mission with us to figure out who killed his parents and why. Also, why was Prince Hongbin the only person spared."

"Join you guys? Umm, Kris?  I'll join and give you my theory if you allow me to handle this all by myself; with the prince of course," I suggested, sitting on the glass table and waiting for his answer. He let out a sigh and nodded.

"Okay. Deal. But, I'm not going to be in this mission at all. I'm just here to get your to work with him and these five other elite soldiers. Seem fair and easy? Not much people at all. What do you say?" he asked. I nodded. He then left and bought in the five elite soldiers and then waved at me. I bowed at them and they all introduced themselves. Hongbin smiled when he saw them, giving them a big hug. I guess they're friends.

"I'm N and this is Taekwoon, Ken, Hyuk, and Ravi. We're all very close friends if you don't mind me telling you."

"No, it's fine. But let's focus on what we have, shall we?"

I stared at the map of the entire kingdom as well as the neighboring kingdoms as well. Kris already circled the Capitol of Eastern Seoul and wrote the time and date of the assassination. He then jotted down a few notes onto his notepad, writing that the location was probably near the abandon building on one of the rooftops; where no one would be. (But I was there.) There was something there to use as an advantage to be hidden. (That's what I thought too.) He then circled the Southern Commonwealth, writing down the Kim Family. So far, there's only three prime suspects. But why would the royal family of the Southern Commonwealth want to ambush us?

"Hongbin," I began, "if that's okay I address you like that.." He gave me a nod and I continued.

"Princess Hana of the Southern Commonwealth..what's your affiliation with her?" I asked.

"Our marriage was arranged by her parents and my parents. We're supposed to get married in a year; on May 1st."

"Interesting. Marriage to emerge both kingdoms.."

"Hyuk, right?" The boy with red hair nodded.

"You're good with computers, yeah? Go look up articles and anything about her royal family." He opened his laptop and began to do what was told. Soon, Taekwoon spoke up.

"Hana is possessive of Hongbin. She really likes him. Can that help?" he asked. I dwindled on the thought. What if she just really really likes him and there's no intentions of her hurting the royal family? Or even her soon-to-be husband. But then there's that small part telling me that she could be one of those royal families that try to do some devious plan and end up ruling the entire kingdom.

"I'll keep that in mind. Thanks."

Hyuk finished typing away and pulled up articles about the Kim family being very clueless of the huge poverty and wealth gap. They even attempted to follow the Linh's idea of a perfect society with wealth but quickly failed when they were caught in the act. Another interesting topic would be Hana. They did a small interview with her saying she's been taking classes to learn how to defend herself and learning how different herbs work; a potion master? Maybe that will come into play. It also says she's really good at aiming and hits the target every time.

"Now that's interesting," I said. I stared at each picture and began to take Hongbin's picture and his parents, placing it onto the whiteboard and holding it up with a magnet as I wrote notes.

"Okay. The parents are deceased leaving Hongbin alive." I drew a line connecting Hongbin to Hana and wrote down "soon-to-be-married".

"Maybe you'll hate me but Hana can probably be really possessive over you. Any intentions of her wanting to rule with you? Ever met her and heard she wanted to rid of the poverty and keep the wealth?"

Hongbin shook his head and gave me a pitiful look.

"Hana isn't like that. She's really nice and she would never abuse her powers." But he said Hana and not her parents. Words are powerful and I use them to my advantage as best as I can.

I then drew two lines connecting her to her parents and then asked Hyuk to print out the article of them getting caught in their imitation of the Linhs.

"Her father...did he have good history with your father?" Hongbin honestly shrugged.

"Whenever they came to visit, the two always talked in his office alone. No one knows what goes on in there but every time he leaves his room, his eyes look angry."

I wrote down that Hana's father could be enlisted for potential greed over the deceased King. I guess the mother really has nothing to do besides play the innocent role. I then stared at the map and saw Kris write a big question mark on the other kingdom west of us.

"Why did Kris put a question mark on Questria?" I asked. N spoke up.

"Questria is a rather large kingdom that's very quiet and nothing bad ever goes on. An okay place to live but it's not the best choice. The rulers are the Oh family and they have a son who's 19 years old and his name is Oh Sehun. They are very secretive and supposedly nice folks," explained N.

"Yeah, but secretive nice folks can lead to another..but let's keep their family out," I said as I wrote down that the Oh Family has no ties with the Lees. I turned to Hongbin who sighed in frustration, in dire need of sleep.

"Can we just get the main point here?!" he snapped. As much as I wanted to yell back, I couldn't. I nodded and got to the point.

"Fine. We'll skip all the important things and go straight for the main course. We're going to search throughout the kingdom to see who doesn't like your family and who has the intention to assassinate them. Also, if we find ourselves in a dead end, we'll go to the Southern Commonwealth and live there for a while, seeing what we can get out of them and maybe even pay the Kim family a little visit."

"Why do you think they're such bad people?!" he roared, hand slamming onto the glass table. I stared at this obnoxious prince with my death glare that sparked a bit of fear in his eyes.

"Look, I know you have it ing rough but there's no reason for you to get so damn angry. I'm just trying to help. Now can you just hang in for one second then you can go ing to bed or something?!" I said in a stern shallow voice.

"Fine," he muttered. I took a deep breath and exhaled.

"The Kim family is probably the closest there is to this assassination leaving them as our prime suspect. Now, let's break everyone up. Hyuk and Ravi are in charge of computer hacking. N and Taekwoon are in charge of scoping out possible suspects that hold grudges against the Lee family. Ken, you'll be in the lab with creating nifty gadgets and working to re-act the assassination based on clues we find. And sadly, I'm stuck with the prince. Our job is to travel to the Southern Commonwealth before them. But as of now, we'll lay on the low and help Ken. Everyone got it?"

They all nodded and our mission to find the culprit or culprits began. As we all broke out into our rightful places, Hongbin decided to go home and rest. I have no intentions of calling him back nor stopping him. I just let him go. His attitude was very unnecessary though. I know he lost so much in a day and I understand but getting angry over a suspect is just ridiculous. Maybe there's personal feelings I don't know about and maybe that causes him to behave in such a way. But we're in a situation where all feelings must be set aside to see the clear target and focus on that main thing. Working with this prince is probably the biggest mistake I ever made.


-Hongbin's P.O.V.-

After she explained the whole mission, I left with an irritating and annoyed feeling. I understand she's doing her job but accusing Hana and her family of killing my parents is ridiculous. We've been friends since we were kids and when they arranged our marriage, we were happy because we were able to be together. Yeah my father and her father sometimes ended in heated arguments but at the end of the day, we all are still friends. So shouldn't there be someone else who should be on her suspect list? What about Oh Sehun? That prince from Questria. It's always the quiet people doing the most daring things, yeah?

I ruffled my hair as I walked out of Head Quarters and back home. It's been a day and already, the entire kingdom looks and feels like hell. No one hasn't stepped outside yet and there are already signs put up to light floating lanterns in the sky as a sign of respect and peace to my parents. I scoffed. How can this be a sign of peace if they died tragic deaths, both shot in the heart. That bullet that curved passed me and hit my mother...how was that possible? I was clearly in the way and it just curved passed my shoulder, hitting her heart. I should've died. I shouldn't be the one to only survive.

The thoughts of regret and how I could've prevented my mother's death haunts me. I get chills at night and find it harder to sleep, screaming at myself at how damn useless I am. I'm going to be King soon and I'm not fit for that role. My father was perfect and everyone loved him. I was just the wishful son who was able to be by his side growing up. Everyone appreciated me but not as much as they were with my parents. And I fully get that. But what if I sit on the throne, agree to fulfill my father's plans, and everyone would just say bad things about me? That they would hate me?

"He'll never be as good as his father."

"He'll never make this kingdom grow. He'll just demolish us all."

"He'll probably follow the Linhs. Get ready to see your death in five days."

Those were probably the words people were saying to me.

I reached the castle and walked in, usually greeted by my parents but all that was left was two empty thrones and their crowns sitting upon it. It was an aching sight to see. It's so weird how everyday, you're used to seeing the same people and hearing the same thing over and over again and then one day, when they're gone, it's new. It's like something is missing and then you realize that they're not going to come back; that they left you alone to fend for yourself on this world and wish for the best.

I hear people say I should be grateful that I wasn't like the ones in poverty. That if you lose someone...you're used to it because the only ones that care is the family and you get no pity from others around you because they've been through the same thing. But why are people wanting pity? If people pity you, don't they feel that they're grateful they're not you? I get pity from the entire kingdom but I feel like they're thanking the heavens and the universe that their loved ones didn't get murdered live. I couldn't stand being at home so I walked out.

As I stepped foot outside, June ran into me, both of us taking a pretty heavy fall but she quickly got up. I grabbed her wrist and looked at her, wondering what the hell was going on.

"What the hell was that?!" I snapped.

"Someone is escaping. This person is wearing all black with a black mask over the face. Can't tell if it's a boy or girl because it's either she's flat as a board or he's really skinny. Now let me go!"

Soon, she stopped and pressed her finger to her ear piece. She nodded and I released my grip on her wrist.

"I have no time to waste. Ken is meeting me by the boarder while Taekwoon and N are following that person. And I am going to use force."

As she left, my feet began to pick up and I followed her.

 

~Author's Note~

I really enjoy writing the start of some action and fighting parts.:) just a little note, the characters are very skilled in parkour.^^ I think it just makes the story even better if you imagine doing flips and stuff. *thinks back to Luhan's flipping in the wolf drama MV.LOL* Anyway, enjoy! ^_<