Pearl greeted the guests as they went up to them for a brief talk. Though her eyes were dead set on the door, waiting for a particular bunch to show up as she secretly glanced back at the hallway every now and then. 'Your Highness, the Prince of Nashira, Prince Choi San.' She geard The courtier say, turning her gaze back to the the black-clad prince approaching Ember and her with a few guards surrounding him. 'Pleased to meet you.' He shook hands with Ember before he turned to Pearl with a straight face and bowed a little as a formal greeting. 'The pleasure is all mine, prince. It's an honour to have you here.'

'You flatter me too much, your highness.' Pearl tuned out of their conversation, eyes too busy to find a certain red-haired someone in the crowd who was no where to be seen. Disappointed, she turned back to San and Ember; the two were having a conversation about the well being of people, working together for mutual benefits or something like that, Pearl couldn't care less. Especially when Ember was the one talking about it. The night went into full swing with people getting drunk off their minds on the booze that was passed around. It was giving her Deja Vu, travelling her back to the night when people were intoxicated and gay just like today when her parents were attacked by her fiance.

'Honey, Prince San here and I am leaving to have a private conversation, Want to join?' Ember asked, his gentle voice fanning the flame of hatred that grew inside the princess.

'I think I'll retire to bed now if that's okay with you two. This celebration is bringing back some unhappy memories,' Ember looked at her with feigned worry, patting her head.

'Alright then, I'll have my guards escort you back to your room.' Pearl nodded, exiting with Mingi and Wooyoung to retire to her chamber. They entered the room, looking around a bit to take everything in. Truly, nothing changed in all these years. Her bed, her dresser, heck even her casual slippers were kept neatly where they used to be. The servants really took care of the place while they were gone. She heard the door to her room shut and turned to talk to the other two when she saw her escorts bolt the latch on her door as they drew out their swords.

'What is this supposed to mean?' Wooyoung growled, drawing out his own sword to stand defensively between the two royals and the guards. He straightened up, positioning himself to deliver the first strike and swung his arms back. Clang. The two swords struck, and the guard struggled to find a good footing while trying to defend himself. His partner tried to join in, only to be struck by a flower vase by Mingi on the back of his head and fall unconscious. He grinned, high-fiving the princess as he stepped over his body back to safety.

'Cut it out you all, it's us!' The struggling guard spoke from under his mask, his voice sounding oddly familiar. The knocked-out guard slowly gathered his strength, reaching his face to pull down his mask and reveal himself.

'Yeosang!' Pearl shrieked, kneeling down to take the poor guy's head in her lap and rub against the place he was hurt.

'I think I might have a concussion,' He spoke hoarsely, clearly still not completely back in his element.

'You think?' Jongho commented.

'Hey! It's not our fault you two didn't warn us beforehand,' Wooyoung pouted, sheathing their sword back.

'Well, we got this idea only a few minutes ago so we clearly didn't have the time to,' Jongho spoke helping his partner lie down on the bed.

'Oh yeah, weren't you two supposed to meet us outside of the palace?' Mingi questioned.

'We figured none of us knew which exit exactly you three would get out of. Besides, you might need some protection sneaking around the palace if someone caught you.' The trio nodded, handing Yeosang a cup of water when he finally sat up straight.

'We need to get out of here now.' Yeosang stood up, still a little dizzy from the unexpected attack but he deemed himself stable enough to fight.

'Alright, let's go.' The princess rose to her feet, beckoning the crew to follow her to her closet, she moved her array of dresses aside, pushing the back of the closet to reveal a pulley system of sorts. The team climbed into the little box; Wooyoung entered last after he arranged the dresses back to exactly how they were earlier. The princess then proceeded to turn the cogs and pull some levers on the system and they started descending downwards.

'This is a very specific system. Only I know the perfect combination to get it to work properly. So even if Ember finds it later, he won't get anywhere with it.' She explained to her teammates.

'What happens if someone puts the wrong combination?' Jongho asked curiously.

'Then the system lets go of the box and they fall down to their death,' The rest of them gulped at the casualness with which she said that. She reached out in the dark, feeling around for the lantern kept in the tunnel for emergency situations. She lit up the lantern, revealing what could only be explained as a labyrinth of tunnels twisting and turning in different directions. 'Even if they do survive,' Pearl continued, 'They'll never escape this without me.'

'Damn,' Wooyoung gasped, surprised at the build of the escape route. It was nothing like what he had seen before. Personal guards of the royal family knew more about the hidden passages of the palace than even the royal family itself at times but, this particular passage was unknown even to them.

'Come on, we should get going.' Pearl guided the team towards the tunnel to the far right, the light of her lantern fading as they moved farther into it till it finally disappeared.

_________________________

'Woah, they're more than what we thought.' Yunho whispered from the place of their hiding.

'Well, all we need to do is incapacitate them to cause a ruckus till we're all out of here.' Seonghwa shrugged, turning to his partner to hand him a dagger. 'You take the ones around the locker, I take the ones in the private library?'

'Deal.' Yunho sneaked out of his place, his footsteps silent as he pulled out a heavy baton and knocked the unsuspecting guard unconscious. Seonghwa too moved towards the little room in the corner, one by one knocking everyone out and tying their hands and legs together. He rummaged through the desks, looking for all important looking documents and shoving them all in a bag. He scanned the room, looking for all potential places where the papers could've been kept. It was then that his eyes landed on the chest of drawers in the far dark corner of the room. It was painted dark, almost unnoticeable and blended into its surroundings. Yes. that was it. Seonghwa pulled open the drawers, eyes finally landing on the papers he came here looking for. He snatched the papers, shoving them into another slim bag that he tucked underneath his shirt and exited the room to find his partner.

'What is that?' he pointed at the heap of papers in Yunho's bag.

'Decoy plus some extra proof.' He grinned, showing all the accounts of corruption, trafficking and other illegal activities going on in the country that directly pointed at Ember as the culprit. Some even dated back more than three to five years. Seonghwa nodded at Yunho in appreciation. 'His ass is getting jumped after we make this public.' He chuckled.

'What do we do with them?' Seonghwa pointed at the knocked-out guards.

'Did anyone see your face?' He shook his head no. 'Not mine either. Let's just let them be.' The two spies nodded, running off to the planned escape route and disappearing behind the wall in the hallway.

'Did they leave?' One of the soldiers opened his eyes, whispering to the one sitting next to him.

'They did.'

'Great, release my hands now.' the other soldier crawled to rest his back against the other's, deftly unknotting the knots and freeing his comrade. The first soldier then untangled himself from the ropes, turning to unknot the other one now.

'Free everyone here. I'll run to his highness to report this.'

'That's all well and good and all, but do we really want to do this?' The other guard gave him a look, raising his eyebrows when he finally understood what he meant.

'But we'll be killed if his highness found out!'

'Let's just let them reach a safe distance before we tell him. Everyone else is unconscious, who would tell him?' The wise soldier reasoned.

'You know what, you're right.' His partner nodded. 'Fuck the king.'

Fuck the King Indeed, my comrade.

How's the update?! did you like it? Do let me know in the comments!! ^^