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6 Hours Later
7am
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"Hey Xinrei. You alright man?"
Jeongho nudged me, and I nodded and yawned.
"...I'm fine. Just really sleepy now"
"Your ability to stay up this long when you're this tired is commendable. I'll make sure that you get all the rest that you need after this. After we beat Woojin, we'll be able to find our next targets. It was really good luck for him to come to us. We saved a lot of time because of this"
"Right. It would've been a hassle trying to find him"
"Also, the way that you destroyed that airship was amazing. You really know how to utilize your powers to your advantage"
He gently pat my shoulder.
"I wanted to make sure that Woojin wouldn't be able to escape with Xinya. It just comes with quick thinking, and analyzing everything that I can"
"And that's amazing all on it's own. Not even I can think as fast as you all the time. You really take after Uncle Renjun with that"
"...I really appreciate that"
We watched as the sun continued to rise, enjoying the beautiful view.
After a few minutes, we saw Mark starting to wake up, and Jeongho immediately woke up Xinya in the turtle. She in turn woke up everyone else, and he came back to my side.
Mark rubbed his eyes, slowly pulling himself together. He shook Donghyuck's shoulder, but then he just stared at him.
He looked exceptionally confused and started to examine himself. He then abruptly launched an ice shard out of his hand, and then he became even more confused.
It was then that Donghyuck began to wake up, but when he saw Mark and they stared at each other, they both shrieked in a panic.
"Hyung! What's going on?! How am I you?!"
Mark asked him in a panic.
"Dude! How am I you?! This doesn't make any sense!!"
Donghyuck stressfully exclaimed.
Everyone else began to wake up because of their yelling, and they all looked confused too. They were acting as if they didn't belong in their own bodies??
Wait.
Mark addressed Donghyuck as hyung, but he's older than Donghyuck. And when he used his ice, he looked like he was expecting the exact opposite.
It's almost as if he was expecting fire.
And the others are acting the same way. They're each looking at certain members, and are acting the same way that Mark and Donghyuck are.
Now it makes sense...
"They all swapped souls"
I concluded.
"So that's why they're acting so different. That mist from Requiem made them fall asleep, and Requiem swapped their souls while they were sleeping"
"That's not all. It's not a completely random swap. If you noticed earlier, Uncle Mark and Uncle Donghyuck fell asleep right next to each other, as did Chan, Lee Know, and Woojin. They each swapped with the closest living thing"
That seems to be about right.
Mark and Donghyuck swapped. I.N. and Hyunjin swapped. Seungmin and Jisung swapped. Felix and Changbin swapped. And Chan and Lee Know swapped. Then Chan and Woojin swapped.
With those three, Lee Know is in Chan's body, Chan is in Woojin's body, Woojin is in Lee Know's body.
"I'm gonna kill you..."
Chan suddenly produced wrist knives, poised to attack.
That's definitely Chan in Woojin's body.
He bolted towards Woojin and tried attacking him, but then his own Stand's arm abruptly protruded from him and stopped him from cutting Woojin.
I get it.
They can still use their own Stands, even if they're in foreign bodies. But what just happened is a result of another one of Requiem's abilities.
Not only can he swap souls and regenerate itself, but it can also manipulate Stands.
In this case, Requiem has no desire to protect the arrow if it can't find it. So now, it's only desire is to protect Woojin. If any of the others try to attack him, then their own Stands will go against them, and might even attack them, to protect Woojin.
This is because Requiem swapped their souls, and it gained control over their Stands by doing this. Now the others can't control them if they try to attack him.
"How's that for killing me Chris Bang? None of you can touch me now. Your Stands will protect me, and attack you if you try"
Woojin smirked, as Chan still tried to cut him.
"We've gotta figure out how to defeat Requiem. If this continues, then he'll be able to do as he pleases with them. He might just kill them all if we don't end this quickly"
"Right"
As the others tried ganging up on Woojin, Jeongho and I went up to Requiem to examine it up close and personal.
It turned a bit to face us, but refocused its attention to the others when it found nothing.
"That's where Silver Chariot got pierced with the arrow"
Jeongho analyzed, finding the mark that the arrow left behind.
We continued to examine Requiem's body from head to toe, but found nothing that could give us a hint to defeat it.
But then I noticed something.
Every time I walked around it, its shadow changed directions. But it wasn't normal.
Its shadow wasn't cast from the sun, like a normal shadow. If that were the case, it's shadow would be cast in front of it and would stay there.
But this isn't the case.
Its shadow acted as if I was the sun, and moved accordingly. It's almost as if its shadow will always be opposite to the observer, like myself, regardless of where any source of light, such as the sun, is coming from.
To test this, I picked up a nearby rock and threw it a short distance away from us. Requiem took notice of it, and began to walk towards it. I walked with it, and walked around it while watching its shadow.
It did the exact same thing as when it was standing still.
"Jeongho. I figured it out"
"Lay it on me. I'm as clueless as ever"
"This is Requiem's other ability. It has the power to manipulate souls. If you walk around it while looking at its shadow, you'll notice that it'll change directions based on how you look at it"
He walked around it and instantly saw what I meant.
"How can it do that and just completely ignore the sun's light like that???"
"It all makes sense. Chariot Requiem has the ability to manipulate the souls of living beings. This in turn means that Requiem is, by its very nature, the silhouette of the soul. If anyone looks at Requiem, they'll notice that its shadow will always be opposite to the observer, regardless of where any source of light is coming from. Requiem's shadow is actually the shadow of the observer's own soul, which means that Requiem manifests itself in that shadow"
Jeongho attentively listened.
"As you may know, a shadow only appears when a source of light casts them. If the shadow's position changes based on the position of the observer, then that must mean that there's a source of light behind the observer. This means that Requiem manifests a psychic orb of light which always hovers behind a person's head and is only visible to the person to whom it is attached. This means that this orb isn't visible to us, but it's visible to the others since their souls were the ones swapped"
"I see... So how do they destroy the orbs?"
"It's like this. They can't just destroy any one of their orbs. Chan has to be the one to destroy the orb behind him, since he's in Woojin's body. If the others destroyed theirs, Requiem would fall apart, but it would only weaken him and their souls wouldn't return to their normal bodies. But since Requiem is Woojin's Stand, if Chan destroys his orb, Requiem will be destroyed and their souls will return to their bodies. But only his Stand can destroy the orb, since Stands are the physical manifestations of our own soul and life energy. If Atum destroys the orb, then the shadow would no longer be cast and Chariot Requiem will be destroyed"
Jeongho looked amazed by how I figured it out so fast.
"The orbs should be behind each of their heads. We just have to get Chan to strike there"
"I'll do it. The others are ganging up on Woojin, so he's very distracted. You stay here so Requiem doesn't notice you"
"Right"
We ran to the others until we were close enough to Chan.
I touched Jeongho, and he transported back to our dimension. He quickly told Chan everything we had found out, making sure that Woojin didn't overhear him.
Once Chan realized what he meant and found his orb, he used Atum to strike it behind its head and it completely shattered.
Immediately after it shattered, Requiem fell apart, and the same mist from before appeared.
"WHAT?!"
Woojin yelled, shocked from his Stand's condition.
As Requiem began fading away, we could see all of their souls quickly retreating back to their original bodies, causing all of them to collapse again.
I travelled back to our dimension, finally, to finish the job.
"Xinya. You can come out now sis"
I informed her, peaking inside of the turtle.
"Right! Here I come!"
She immediately came out of the turtle, ready for action.
"I heard everything that happened. Is it time to shrink him now?"
"Yes. Shrinking him now would be our best option. When he wakes up, he'll be too small to do anything. And with Requiem gone, he'll be completely powerless"
"Right. I'm on it then. You two did a great job on taking him down and saving the others~"
She happily kissed me cheek, and immediately used her Stand to cut Woojin.
He began shrinking more and more as the minutes passed, and she stopped him from shrinking once he got to about the size of my palm.
Now we just have to wait for the others to wake up.
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15 Minutes Later
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"We really appreciate everything that you've done to help us finally defeat Woojin. Not only is he too small to cause any trouble, but Requiem's gone too, so now he's definitely incapable of wreaking havoc on anyone"
Chan smiled.
I gave the arrow to Felix, since he has the other one. I trust him to watch over both of them well, until we may need them.
The others imprisoned Woojin in a jar with small holes at the top for him to get air to breathe. We're taking him with us, to ensure that nothing happens for him to break out.
"Now that he's taken care of, we can head out to the next team on your tracker"
Lee Know smiled, happy with their accomplishment and successfully executed revenge.
"It says on the tracker to locate a team called ENHYPEN. Luckily, it's giving us the closets group next. ENHYPEN is the last group on Ethora. All of the others are on different planets"
Xinya explained showing the tracker for the others to see.
"ENHYPEN... Oh yeah! That's the group of heroes that trained under BTS! Their HQ isn't to far from theirs. If they didn't go to the party, then they should be there. The worst case scenario is that they heard the news of what happened at the party, and went to save them. The best case scenario is that they're still at their HQ, either fighting off enemies or coming up with a plan to help out"
Seungmin explained.
Let's just hope they're still at their HQ then.
"B-But how are we gonna get there? We don't have any means of transportation... Do we?"
Minkyu asked.
I checked the bag that dad gave us, and I found a two cases.
One was labeled "Midnight Shadow", and the other was labeled "Lightning Chariot".
"We actually do have transportation. This smaller case has dad's car inside that he made with Uncle Jaemin. It's called the Midnight Shadow. And this bigger case has dad's ship inside that he got from the HDJ years ago. He and his team used it on many occasions to travel across the galaxy and save Ethora. It's called the Lightning Chariot"
I explained.
Dad always told me and Xinya stories about his adventures in his youth, so we definitely know what these are.
I put the small case away, and made everyone stand back before releasing the ship from its case.
"It's huge~!"
Suyun's eyes shimmered with excitement.
"Uncle Renjun is so cool...~"
Sungmin stared at the ship, amazed by how big it was.
"All right. Everyone on board. I can put the coordinates from the tracker into the ship's system, and then we can cruise there on autopilot"
"We'll be sure to stay vigilant, to make sure that no one attacks us in the air. You, little Xinrei, should really get some sleep while we travel. That goes for you too Jeongho"
Chan gently pet my head, leading me and Xinya into the ship as the others followed behind us.
We're finally making progress now. We have a lot more places to go, but at this rate, we'll be back home in no time.
But for now, I can finally get some sleep...
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