FIREFALL, OR IN EXO WONDERLAND ▷ COMPLETE

Secret Garden

CHAPTER 42: SECRET GARDEN

Kris remembered that a story in his mother's Looking-glass book had told about the Castle of Hearts. The book itself was written in English, and not only was that a tad foreign to his Wonderlandic tongue, it was written not in the right order—reversed, so reversed that he had to place the book in front of the mirror to read it for himself. Too much time wasted away for reading and his eyes would grow too accustomed until he couldn't distinguish the world he lived in from the world through the mirror. He would walk away to do other things, but alas, he would always end up slamming into the glass for all the boy's confusion.

Not that Kris was too accident-prone, but he was well-engrossed in the tales between the pages. There was a tale about the Ivory Tower in the Castle of Hearts that had a thousand of chambers. And Chanyeol and Baekhyun were imprisoned in two of these chambers. Two per thousand. How under Earth can he find them?

But, Kris would like to visit the famous indoor garden first.

The indoor garden was on the third floor. However, Kris couldn't recognise it as he entered. The garden was boasted by the Castle of Hearts and its rulers before. Today, the notion sounded fanciful. Everything in the garden looked like monochromic representations of their former selves. Everything was snow-white.

The room started to sigh. There was a rustling, a sign of motion.

A sign of life.

A white figure walked out from the snowy landscape. Amidst those forgotten relics, came a human.

"Hello, there... I'm Xiumin." the figure introduced himself. "Once the Head of Secret Police, then the Minister of Internal Affairs, later the Regent and one day, the first King of Diamond suit."

"Xiumin? Minister of Internal Affairs? What's all this?" Kris's chest tightened.

"Remember the day you almost drowned at the Mermaid Cove?" Xiumin nodded gravely. "Yes, I froze the way out."

"No—"

"Remember the giant snowman you couldn't draw? It nearly drew all blood from your arm. Then, you couldn't even draw your sword..."

"Stop it—"

"The White Heart Rebellion? Or the former Resistance of Shuffling Decks? Those noisy Wonderlanders? I'd managed them nicely." Xiumin smirked.

"You... Traitor!" Kris gritted his teeth and snarled.

"This is, my great adversary, the card game of Wonderland. At first, Sehun was favoured, but in the end I'll be the one chosen! Reminds you of something?" Xiumin peered at the blotchy Vorpal blade. "Yes, I was the one who'd controlled Sehun."

"I can't believe it—you—" A storm of anger brewed inside Kris. He threw some lightning-bolts at Xiumin.

The ex-minister shielded himself with a wall of ice. Another bad case of shields. Kris gave himself a face-palm.

One hand was outstretched, giving out a freezing beam.

A petrified Kris flew away.

Simultaneously, Xiumin's ice-shield was dispersed into sharp fragments (or were they icicles?) aimed solely at Kris.

Xiumin had left Kris with meagre time.

Kris could catch up with Xiumin's deadly speed, though wasn't by much. Most of the icicles were dodged by the Vorpal blade, but he could feel some of them embedding into his flesh and grazing his skin.

"A nice overture, don't you think?" taunted Xiumin.

"Don't you think that I should be asking you the said question?" Kris pulled the icicles from his spiked skin. "Enough dilly-dallying, shilly-shallying. I have a surprise for you. Have a ball!" He tossed a ball of golden flame at Xiumin.