Project IZ*ONE: Secret Files

The Masked Singer: Part 4

"Yen-Yul?" Yuri asks suddenly with a questioning tone while the two wait for the crowd to disperse.

"What? I just came up with it on the spot! I'll make sure to announce your name first next time then, Ms. Superstar." Yena replies with a contagious laugh that gets the hamster cracking up too.

"Anyway, you notice the masked singer watching in the distance, right?" Yuri queries after calming down.

"Yeah, as soon as our song finished, she was gone. I'm not sure yet if she took the bait though." Yena says with a nod. With the crowd gone, the two began walking in the direction they'd seen the masked singer. For around 15 minutes, the duo snooped around the area to no avail. It was like she just disappeared.

"Hmm... maybe we got too ahead of ourselves, Yena. I think we should take a break." Yuri says as she stretches. When she turned around though, the duck was nowhere to be found.

"Yena? Where'd you go?" The idol's danger senses were beginning to tingle again, and they were especially heightened now that her girlfriend was the one who might be in grave danger.

"Unnie! Please answer me!" She shouts as she runs around the block to no avail. Eventually, she changes tactics and begins asking people in the area until one said they saw a blonde woman turn towards an alleyway.

"Oh no..." Yuri quickly thanks the person who gave her the tip and runs off to where Yena was last seen. Once she got there, that's when she began to hear it- a melodic whistling that sounded eerily familiar to what she heard a couple days ago.

After a couple turns, the hamster finally sees her beloved slowly walking towards a masked woman in black clothing. As Yena begins to inch closer, the woman unsheathes a knife from her waist. Yuri couldn't let this go on any further.

"Yah, you aren't going to get the jump on me this time!" Yuri yells as she runs in between Yena and the masked singer.

"Oh, it's you again." The woman says, her voice a bit muffled from behind the mask.

"You got a cheap shot on me last time, and I'm not going to let this be a repeat. Now let me hit you!" At this, Yuri lunges forward to swing a punch, but she was surprised at her attack being blocked. She was sure she'd put charmspeak into her words. It appeared that her target was immune to it.

Is that why the singing doesn't seem to affect me either? Yuri thinks momentarily.

"Don't try to mess with me, child. I've been in this game way longer than you. Your voice won't work against me." She replies in a condescending tone before swinging her blade.

"Why are you even doing this? Killing off musicians and singers? What did they ever do to you?" Yuri asks while dodging each attack. Her strength wasn't the same as the masked woman, but her smaller size did give her a speed advantage. The hamster's goal was to simply stay in between the assailant and Yena.

"You wouldn't understand. You're a pop star with thousands of fans. I was going to let you off because I can sense you have some type of voice power too, but you're forcing my hand!" The woman yells before faking an attack just to spin and connect on a swing that leaves a cut on Yuri's forearm. The idol screams in pain, much to the delight of the masked singer.

"I could never feel that my music and singing was genuine because of my power. Every time I would perform, people would cheer no matter what, even when I tried to mess up on purpose. Because of that, I just hate all of you singers who are free to use your voices however you want!" These words strike Yuri hard as someone who had the same worry for a long time. At least for her, she had control of when she could use her charmspeak. That didn't excuse any of this woman's actions though. Yuri steels herself, taking a deep breath, before standing up straight, blood dripping from her arm.