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xcrust · 8 months

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Ok just because i’m in my promotion era. Here is the chapter that leads to meeting Stolas!!!

Eternity

Note: It’s more of a reader insert compared to a slash fiction. Depending how the story goes i’ll be more than happy to add that plot line for whichever characters we got too. However, I’m going to try to keep the story as close to the source material as possible!!

GN! reader

Word Count: 1.6K

If you value an ounce of your sanity, then a bit of advice that would be given is to not be royalty growing up. Living in a place full of murder happy screw ups can sometimes get to you while growing up. Well it's already getting close to the year where all the angels that were old are eligible to take part in the execution and those who are not get to learn about why they do it. However as a Morningstar, you get a lot of that information thrown at you from a young age.

Even though the infamous siblings of hell were not actual angels, they had a certain specialty of having the mix of both; some may say that in their prime they could be more powerful than the king of hell himself. I wouldn't believe it. I don't have anger issues like most of these people.

You've gotten used to waking up and being pampered every two seconds. But with living a life of royalty you get the treatment whether you like it or not. Especially for a princess to the king of hell. Don't get the wrong idea though. You could never be more grateful for living the bountiful life since birth. However, the way things are going in the castle, it seems it's time for an escape.

Being born into such power should be a sin in all cases. Lucifer giving life to his children had also given life to a half angel which means by all cases this family is powerful in all senses. You can have all the money you asked for and physically and magical wise it's superior to all classes hell has to offer.

These thoughts of your position seem to lay in your brain more than a regular amount in your lifetime. Currently sitting in the bathtub actually seemed to be the best place to think. These thoughts wanted out. Out of this life that seemed to have tarnish and hope for good around you.

Dripping water onto the tiles seemed to be the wake up call that it was time to get up.

Only a few years being around mid 20s, well physical wise. In hell time does not work exactly the same for each race as earth but if you were to guess it would be around a hundred and seventy five years? Not too far of a stretch considering Charlie was 200 years.

“(Y/N)! Get out of the washroom!! I need to pee!” Well that's the most ridiculous thing you've heard from your sister's voice.

“We literally live in a castle, go to another one you dipshit” That's right; you are (Y/n) Magne. The child of Lucifer and Lilith and the younger sibling of Charlie. With this fact you'd think that she would choose an unoccupied bathroom.

“Coommmmee onnnnnn, this was the closest bathroom to me at the very current second of the very minute of all of hell”

Looking down to your pruned skin It's been about an hour now, the water has gone cold and miserable. At least it gave me some time to think about things.

“Fine, but I'm coming for your neck the minute I'm done getting ready” You're not actually mad but it's definitely the definition of a sibling being annoying.

So you immediately poofed a robe on and went out to your room. Instead of coming inside the washroom, Charlie started following you. "Didn't you really need to pee like two seconds ago?”

“uhh … I don't need to anymore! That feeling kinda just came and went.”

“Charlie thats the most disgusting thing ever what the fuck” Turning with a devious giggle. The look on her face looked mortified with the most dramatic open jaw.

“Ok well I did NOT pee myself, I was just bored and wanted to bother you but now i see i'm just being shamed here”

“Hey i'm not the one that peed themselves on the bed wayyyyy to many times to count when we were younger, the more you defend yourself the more it sounds like you did”

As you were walking back to your room there were imps ransacking the castle making sure everything was pristine and fine. Some of these people that you have known for years and some were a new face every single day. Your parents loved you very much but in your lifetime it seems as though it were only the imps that cared. However, even that wasn't possible because they are all only here for a check. No where else to go. I guess that's a place where you can relate. You definitely felt trapped beyond belief.

“Anyways, what have you come to bother me with today?” Opening the door to your room. You never knew why you maintained a level head and polite, you're in hell so there really wasn't any point

“I adore you but you're invading my space lady” you pause returning to your desk “Why don't you go to your boyfriend's house? You know dad likes when you both are out and about”

“UHhghUGUHh yeah he's not bad but can’t I hang out with my sibling every once and a while”

You took a moment to think about your thoughts from a few moments prior. “You know I love you right?”

“You sound like you're about to say your last goodbye to me” Charlie said excitedly. “But of course I do! You're the most fun the place has to offer. Even if you are a little grumpy pants”

“What?!?!? I am the furthest from being a grumpy pants, miss sunshine and rainbows” you both never could argue. It's just naturally you guys being stuck like glue that makes you work. Keep everything light hearted.

“Ok that's not even rude, that's just a fact.” she said while jumping onto your bed “Ok yes there is a itty bitty favor that i need to ask you”

“So the truth comes out” The most obvious deadpan that you could give was just laid out to your sibling. “What do I have to do?!?!”

“Hehehe… So you know how that goetia family is having a kid? I knooooow you went last time but I'm a little too tired for this one.”

“Wait, what do I get from you if I go?” Remember that deadpan from moments ago? It just got 6 feet underground.

“My love and affection?” that deadpan is now in double hell. See you didn't hate going to all these balls. It's the best form of entertainment, watching different levels of nobles try to fight for your attention. Really if it weren't for that you wouldn't even think about going to these parties.

“Uh huh, I don't even have to be there, you're the only one they really want to see. The heir of hell” maybe you should go though, it has been getting pretty lonely in the castle. “Ok fine, but whatever you're doing while I'm there better be worth it”

“Who says im bu- I MEAN yes I will i'll be doing too much work so”

“Yeah yeah now cut the shit when is this happening?”

“Oh hehe it's tomorrow”

“CHARLOTTE WHAT”

...

After many hours this is what it has come too.

Looking in the mirror there you were in the most lavish attire for a party. No matter how many times you look at yourself you get shocked about how extravagant it gets. Oftentimes those don't wonder why the Magne children became so humble.

Every time there is a party, Charlie always asks (Y/n) to go because of the fact that other than at these points she never gets to go out. It was her few hours of freedom. Meanwhile (Y/n), wasn't an heir to the throne. So most of the time she really just got to indulge in free time stuck in the castle. A classic fairy tale if anyone asked

Like Charlie they were a precautionary heir but unlike charlie they were something special. At least physical wise. Like her family they resembled the most out of humans but oddly enough (y/n looked the part the most. It made them desired.

So as much as status was present, being such an impossible being just made everyone want them. Although most people in hell other than the nobility don't talk about them. To them the existence of (Y/n) was the stuff of legends. Which is really lucky for them when they've been to different rings of hell. They could actually be normal because the people don't know much about them.

So what's the game plan for today? Maybe we go and get a box full of feathers to start some drama. Actually no, the last time you did something like that there were practically 20 imps thrown out of the last party. OR maybe you could just ignore the hosts until the end of the party?

In all honesty you never heard much things in high regards towards the one named Stella and as it is her party maybe we can bother her a bit. The Goetia have been an important family for the longest time. However, Satan knows how stuck up they can be.

#helluva boss x reader #hazbin hotel x reader #hazbin hotel #hazbin charlie #charlie magne #stolas x reader #helluva boss #lucifer magne #lilith magne #alastor x reader #stella helluva boss #stolas helluva boss

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starsstuddedsky · 4 months

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Doyoung as your brother's best friend...

(wc: 1.7k, non idol au, mentions of food, alcohol, reader has a mother/family, i really dont know what this is)

who you were always fond of because he was way nicer to you than your brother ever was growing up (a pretty low bar, but a win is a win)

he graduates before you and you see him only a couple times a year when your brother would hang out with him, which fizzles out and suddenly you realize you haven’t seen him in five years

you finish college and get a great job offer except it’s a city five hundred miles away from home and you don’t know anyone, until your mother mentions Doyoung moved there a year or so ago and says something like you should reach out

to which you think no thank you but you politely say you’ll see what he’s up to

and you don’t give it a second thought, you meet a few friendly people at work and try to call your old friends as much as you can but loneliness has a way of seeping into the empty corners of your room and the quietness of 9:56pm on a Tuesday

so you figure a hinge date or two isn’t the worst idea

hey, guess what’s the worst idea?

the first man you decide to go on a date with spends the first hour bragging about his job and how he’ll be able to retire by the time he’s 35 and simply does not stop talking about himself

you’re sure you’ve given help me eyes to every person that’s walked past but no one takes pity on you, until you’re looking into a familiar pair of eyes

Doyoung doesn’t hesitate to stride up to you, saying “I’ve been looking everywhere for you, why haven’t you been looking at your phone?” and “The doctor’s say he won’t make it much longer!”

it isn’t difficult to follow him out of the café and listen to him throw out fake medical terms until you’re around the corner

he slows after that and you realize he’s gotten even taller and let his hair grow out a little

before you can tease him about the hair, he asks if you’re busy and when you say no, he drags you to the coin laundry to watch his clothes spin around

sitting on the plastic chairs and sipping paper cups from the water dispenser, you trade stories, amazed at the Doyoung from your memory and the Doyoung that sits in front of you

he’s changed so much (he spends his free time painting and going to art museums) and not at all (still ducks his head when he’s feeling shy and smiles with his eyes just as much as his lips)

you try to pretend like you aren’t stealing looks at him. he isn’t nearly as successful.

you walk to his apartment, only a couple blocks away and it’s gotten so late that he insists you spend the night, saying that your mom would kill him if he let you walk alone this late and to just take the couch

to which you protest, because, honestly, what would his mother say not offering the bed? and he just rolls his eyes and gives you his best pillow

except he must have really never slept on the couch because it’s actually so uncomfortable that you can’t sleep. when Doyoung gets up for a middle-of-the-night bathroom break, he finds you watching a crime show

despite making fun of you for it, he sits beside you and it’s actually way more comfortable when you’re using his shoulder as a pillow and then it’s suddenly morning and you wake up fully in his arms, meeting his smug smile

he does not waste time making fun of you, saying “what was that about the couch being uncomfortable?” and “are you sure you didn’t just want to sleep with me?” and pretending he wasn’t just as flustered

even though it’s daylight, he still walks you home and you find you don’t mind it at all. in front of your door, neither of you can figure out how to say you want to keep seeing each other, especially since you aren’t sure if it’s in a flirty context or not and what any of that would entail

finally you tell him your apartment has laundry, if he doesn’t want to pay for it and he says somehow he thinks you’re going to cost way more than a laundromat but he’s smiling

Doyoung slowly becomes a fixture in your life and even when you truly befriend your coworkers and become particularly close with one of the baristas in the coffee shop next to your apartment, he’s always the first person you think of–when you get a commendation at work, when you have another fight with That One Coworker, when you stub your toe. and he tells you about his constant fight with the owner of a dog on his floor that thinks it’s okay to let their dog pee on Doyoung’s doormat, and you hear all about his friends before you finally meet them

there are countless “almost” moments–telling him about this guy at work who flirts with you more blatantly than Doyoung himself and when you pause after saying you told him you have someone, he doesn’t say anything so you just say it was a lie to get the guy off your back; holding your hand on your birthday (after cooking a five course meal for you) but letting go before you even reach your apartment; staying over at his apartment again and refusing to sleep on the bed but he builds a wall of pillows between you “so you don’t feel uncomfortable”; waiting for the bus after drinking with his friends under a flickering streetlight where you think for sure he’s going to kiss you but he ducks away before you can let the fantasy dip into reality

you know you have to talk to him about it directly (especially since all of your friends say that he’s as in love with you as you are with him) but every time you try to do it you freeze up and you can’t get the words out

but when the holidays come around, you go to visit family with him and realize Just How Much you’ve changed around him

you’ve completely forgotten how to be normal around him, how to look at him without hearts in your eyes, but you’ll die if your family asks you what’s going on and you don’t have an answer, so you steel yourself up for a Doyoung-less Christmas

it goes really well until Day 2 when your mother announces Doyoung and his family will be coming over for dinner. to make matters worse, your brother finally shows up and it becomes very clear 1) he and Doyoung still talk all the time and 2) Doyoung has not mentioned how close he’s become with you

you try your very best to pull stories out of everyone else, since you can’t seem to mention anything about your life that doesn't include Doyoung, which apparently is true for him, you discover as he tries his best to tell the story about the time he wound up halfway across the city with a dead phone and no way to get back without telling them you were right there with him (ultimately failing since you were the one who ran into a friend who let you into their apartment to charge your phones)

after dinner your brother and Doyoung disappear and maybe you’re being paranoid but you swear everyone is looking at you

so you go ahead and vanish into your childhood room, thinking about anything except your brother’s best friend who’s become your… (damn you really thought you’d have a word for him that time)

an hour or so later, your brother knocks at the door and asks to come in (already scary since he’s always just busts in and purposefully leaves the door wide open). he sits down and says he doesn’t care what happens between you and Doyoung but not to hide anything on his account and you’re like okay well there’s nothing to hide and he’s like if my dumbass can pick up on the vibes, there’s something to hide so go figure it out and you’re like wait what did Doyoung say and he rolls his eyes and mutters something like “I am not doing this” and tells you Doyoung is waiting for you outside

you did not sprint down the steps, no matter what anyone says. it was a controlled pace, one foot per step, hand gripping the railing to keep you upright

Doyoung waits for you like your brother said, sitting on the porch swing wearing his winter jacket with his hands stuffed into the pockets, and he perks up when you come out the door

you sit beside him, trying not to lean into him and letting the cold air warm from the tension between you. there’s a couple heartbeats of silence, your breath hanging in the air in front of you before you manage to get the words out.

“i like you”

silly words, immature words, not the right words for how you feel, but you can’t quite figure out what those might be.

“it’s like mixing paint,” he says and you think maybe there really aren’t any right words, but he keeps going. “at first you think ‘wow i used way too much blue and this will never look right’ but you keep mixing it together and even though it isn’t the color you wanted it to be, you’ve found a whole new color and it changes the painting completely but it makes it so much better.” he pauses before admitting, “maybe it isn’t the perfect analogy. my point is, i wasn’t expecting you at all, but you make my life so much better.” and another couple seconds for him to remember he’s got something else to say. “oh, and i like you, too. if it wasn’t obvious."

it’s stupidly like a movie when the snow starts to fall, but you’ve been waiting far too long to kiss him, so you won’t let the feeling that this is a bad hallmark movie stop you

what does stop you is hearing half your family cheering through the window when you scoot closer to him

(your first kiss happens a couple days later on a secluded hike in the woods)

(a few years later at the wedding, one of your cousins pulls up footage that can only be described as stalker-like)

and you never sleep on his crappy couch again (though you do stay over, even when it isn’t late), and he keeps doing laundry in your apartment until his lease is finally up and he moves into a bigger apartment that just so happens to have enough space for you

(oh, and it has in-unit laundry too)

a/n: i swear i have been writing i just haven't been finishing but i got 2/3 of sending this to bestie before i realized this is a writing format so yeah. idk this is very much my delusional stream of consciousness but tell me im wrong. go ahead. tell me.

#🌟 stars galaxy #nct 127 #nct #nct u #nct fanfic #nct x reader #nct 127 x reader #nct 127 fanfic #nct fluff #nct 127 fluff #doyoung #kim doyoung #doyoung x reader #kim doyoung x reader #doyoung fluff

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blueparadis · 9 months

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꒰ SOMETHING ABOUT U ꒱ ⋮ KAEYA ALBERICH → [ CONTENT & TAGS ]:fem!reader, references to canon divergent lores ( mixed with my ideas; nothing promising but i needed to get this months old idea out of brain so that i can focus on other activitis :">) , kaeya has obsessive behavior, angst, mention of prostituion, implicit smut. word count —2k // back to blog navigation. // beta read by my beloved ari @orchid3a . also tagging @kaelily <3.

synopsis:: “Beyond the sea, against the waves

where the sea and sky meet, where tides kiss the moon,

A protector shall be re-born, and Khaenri’ah will rise once again with retribution.”

Many grave and galant eclipses and solstices have been witnessed by the mortals, humans lived and died but the protector did not return. A prophecy that was made years ago has now made it to the front page of the newspaper with the headline, “DID THE GODS GRANT MERCY TO THE KHAENRI’AHNS ?”

A year ago Kaeya Alberich would neither have believed in this prophecy nor would have sworn to pursue the veiled truth and call it ‘fate’. But now, his ship sails across the oceans with him sitting in his personal chamber holding a brown paper, reading the same article that was published a year ago while a girl sleeps in his bed.

His million moras haul, alive and breathing.

Kaeya settles at the edge of his bed swirling the wine in his goblet. With your eyes closed, bosom rising and falling at a slow steady speed he thinks you look like one of those sleeping fairies inside those nyctinastic flowers that he once saw in picture-book when he was a toddler; he accidentally stumbled upon it and saw the wonders that belonged to the out of the word, this word— a child sitting at one of the corners of the library, hiding from the Archon’s wrath, hiding and protecting, hiding and fearing. He is not someone to put faith in the Archons. He does not feel anything about the mocking existence of the Archons, neither rebel nor rage; nothing. Therefore, must he be the one to go against the waves and wind, against the sun and moon, against the gods?

But if Archons were to really exist as people claim, then perhaps it was the Archons' will when his eyes fell on you for the very first time, on that cold night, on that dead island under an enormous tree as you were lying half-clad, breathing but barely alive. While his home was swallowed by the oceans five hundred years ago with no trace at the bottom of the sea, there was you, a fragile creature taking the last of its breaths. He found you in the exact same place where once he breathed and lived in the air of Khaenri’ah. Kaeya does not believe in the Gods, but he does believe in ‘miracles’, and ‘chance encounters’. Now he is ready to believe in some years-old prophecy.

A flame flickering to live on still delivers light.

The winds were treacherous that night, they were not howling like other stormy nights Kaeya had endured. There was an uncanny smell in the winds of the island, a smell that he can neither remember nor recognize, the mixed smell of something greater, something divine— like ichor, blood and bones. He could hear something eccentric too; He knew the winds of the sea like a caterpillar knows its fate to become a butterfly. But this was different, a foreign feeling. It felt like the wind was whispering right into his ears. He has never felt so hollow before.

That was the first time he heard how hollow he was. It is like when someone was blows air through a hollow pipe so rapid, so full and so hollow that it is on the verge of breaking. Standing there in the dead of the night, with his crew busy at the shore decking the ship he could not separate between himself and those bullet shells that looted lives while his eyes glimmered at your corpse-like body in the pale moonlight, lips trembling and then curving into a crescent.

The clanking sound of bullet shells hitting the floor, the sound of blazing homes which once were made with love and care, the screams of the dying, and the smell of the dead— he remembers it all. It might have been five hundred years ago for others, but it was still fresh as a morning dew in his mind. He can not forget. Every time he sleeps, he dreams of destruction and every time he is awake he vows on vengeance.

“Woah! Careful there,” Last time when Kaeya was here you had been sleeping. You have been in and out of slumber for a week now. He helped to restore your balance as you tried to wake up and stacked a few pillows behind your back so that you sit at ease. You do not resist, do not have enough power to do so. The marks on your skin are slowly fading, your eyes are now much more expressive, lips and ankles devoid of any fine lines. The only scratch on your body is on your forehead, a star, and a half circle at the lower end of the star. It is very faint now but its there. It was raw and fresh at the night when he first laid you on his bed. It seemed like someone carved it with a knife but there was no dried blood along the scar or anywhere on your body.

Last month, precisely, a week ago, when Kaeya fetched a doctor for you from the port city of Mondstadt, Dorman, he did not mention anything about the scar. Even when he asked about it specifically, all he got was a laugh at its non-existence. But he can see it, clear as a day.

“You are doing a lot better than when I first saw you.” He admits as you finally look at him. “Are you hungry? Last night you did not eat much.” It has become a part of his routine now. Being there when you wake up, helping you, telling you stories, taking you out on the deck, watching you from afar when you are awake, and watching you up close when you are asleep. He is trying his best to help you to feel comfortable as much as possible so that you remember your origin, so that you remember your fate, so that you remember what the Archons did. But so far you have only talked minutely about your home and he did not make much of it.

“No. I do not feel hungry.” Your fidgeted with your fingers averting his gaze. Your attention falls on the dip created on the bed where he kept his hand to adjust the pillows. You gulp wetting your throat. “But I do feel thirsty.” You keep your hand beside his, an inch away. He looks at you, with sapphire-embedded eyes and then at the hands. His little finger shifts towards yours, slowly. You quickly pull your arm into your lap. “Do you think we can visit the port city today?” you ask hoping to divert his attention.

Last night he mentioned it and when you ask so eagerly so softly, his barren cold heart is set ablaze. You are now strong enough to pay attention to him. It makes him happy. Kaeya smiles looking at you before answering, “Of course we can. The others will take care of things at the ship and meanwhile we can visit the port.” He leaves the bed and walks towards the exit of his room. Before vanishing from your sight he states, “Get changed. I will be be the one to accompany you to the city today.”

You have been living in his room, breathing his air, sleeping in his bed, and wearing his clothes for a month since the day he rescued you. Traveling amongst the winds and the waves with you has not been entirely in vain either. Truth be told, Kaeya likes your presence. Today he is finally taking you out amongst the people and needless to say he is not leaving you out of his sight. He is walking behind you while you are in awe, admiring the surroundings.

You two stand at one of the shops as you ask about all the things and watch everything with such surprise in your eyes that it reminds him of himself when he was a child. He occasionally scans your surroundings, waves at the people he knows, and smiles at the girls he visited at the pleasure house. Those were some bright evenings he lived, enjoying the night at the pleasure house, fucking the girls till they fainted and disappearing into the sea at the break of dawn— the best he had of his life until . . . you walked into his peaceful luxurious life. He glances at you increasing the amount of distance between you two scooting to a side.

The crowd is slowly increasing and why would it not? Kaeya is here and word must have gotten around the town. He rarely visits port cities unless he has to collect hauls and buy some supplies in exchange for them. This was neither of them. This was a new thing. A news: ‘Lord Alberich is here with some maiden.’ It will draw attention more to him than to you. His smile fades away as he turns his head and does not see you. He asks the shopkeeper and he tells that you went towards the sea. shit.

The dusk is approaching and he should be in his room in his ship with you, not scouring the earth for you. Kaeya enters his room briskly with hundreds of thoughts running in his mind, wild and free. What if you are not here? What if someone recognized you? What if someone abducted you? What if . . .?

He sits on the chair with a thud seeing you on the bed with a new set of clothes, lying unconscious. He remembers buying you some clothes but not changing them. The clothes you had been wearing are neatly folded and kept on another bed. His eyes are still on you like a hawk watching its prey. “When did she get hear?” He asks as his breathing becomes even.

“About an hour ago, Lord Alberich.” one of the members of the crew answered. “She found her way back to here. We found her lying unconscious to the ground when we came to give the food.” Kaeya waves his hand at them asking them to leave. He pours some wine into his goblet and like always, sits at the edge of the bed but this time closer to your face.

He runs the back of his fingers along your cheeks murmuring to himself, “What am I gonna do with you… you are driving me insane, paranoid a bit.” He does not know your origin, your past nor your full name, nothing. Even though he is trying his best to give you the benefit of doubt, you keep thinning his faith on you every time.

He lifts up his head, his arm reflexively stretches towards the gun in the hostler. He presses and clicks open the safety lock and keeps the nozzle at your temple. Will you bleed blood or ichor if he hurt you? Will you lament or will you punish him if he hurt you? Are you here to kill him and his people? Or Are you here to help him and his people?

His fingers move over your forehead, over the marks. He is sure he is the only one who can see your forehead scar. So he takes a risk that he did not think of doing it, ever. Keeping his goblet aside, his index finger slipped underneath his eye patch, pushing it aside for it to remove. There is it, his suspicion is confirmed.

As the scar on her forehead glows and his right eye does not sting or hurt like it should his limbs give up and he lands on his knees beside the bed. There he sat and wept like a boy while his ‘fate’ lay in front of him. How can he not believe what he sees with his own two eyes?

So many questions yet answers to none. But he is aware of only one thing— that you are everything that he does not believe. An Archon. A deity. A bane to his existence. But he refuses to hurt you. He refuses to become the very thing he despises. He refuses to let it go in with just one shot and therefore, he must keep you, tame you, and protect you.

—

ik this has a lot of loopholes & might make this a multichaptered series but that depends on how well it will do :]

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piebingo · 7 months

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More yr fanfic recommendations here you go!

All my loving (I will send to you) | chaptered | completed | by pagegirlintraining / @pagegirlintraining

“ Especially now that they’d been happily dating again for nearly ten months, Simon could’ve easily just teased Wille about being a drama queen and then kissed the pout off his lips.

He didn’t, though. Instead, he kept staring at Wille’s handwriting, usually scrawly but now tidy and precise, feeling his heart slowly break for the sad, lonely boy who’d written and never sent this letter all those months ago.”

In which Simon finds an unsent love letter from Wille and decides to reply in big style.

I have read this one many times, because it’s just that good. As is everything by this author. This fic is just full of love and sweetness and captures everything I love about wilmon and their love. Do yourself a favour and read it (again, if you’ve already read it).

You’re still the one | chaptered | completed | by queerfrogprince / @thewaterloovases

Simon and Wille meet on tumblr as teenagers, but when they lose contact, Simon doesn't think he'll ever hear from Wille again, much less bump into him in a supermarket in Stockholm one random afternoon. It's been five years, after all. He barely even thinks about Wille anymore.

But, it seems, Wille never stopped thinking about him. Maybe it's not too late to rekindle what they had at fifteen, after all.

AKA Simon has only ever loved two boys: Harry Styles, and Prince Wilhelm of Sweden.

If, like me, you can be a bit hesitant when real people are included in fics, this is one I recommend anyway! It’s really cute and feels a bit like an ode to tumblr. Wilmon starting as best friends will always get me. Also read the second one in the series!

The season of rebirth | chaptered | completed | by notalotgoingonatthisinstant/ @notalotgoingonatthisinstant

Simon knows two things:

1. Wille is the love of his life and Simon would have married him already if not for him being the Crown Prince. Plus, Simon knows that they won’t be treated like a serious couple by a lot of people until then. BUT,

2. Marrying Wille will be a spectacle that will change his life forever and strip him of his civilian identity, apart from giving the Queen and the Court the satisfaction of tiring Simon out.

But Easter is the season of rebirth, and maybe there is something poetic to be said about it triggering the death of Simon's civilian identity and the birth of Prince Simon.

This fic is a pure delight! It’s sweet and funny, and Wille is a little shit and Simon is Simon, and you should really check out this whole series actually.

See you (soon) | chaptered | completed | by gulliblelemon / @gulliblelemon

All of a sudden Wille didn’t hate everything. Or, he still hated most things. But he didn’t hate whoever this person was, singing with all his might on a sunny stage in front of hundreds of boring, judgemental spectators.

Wille never attends Hillerska but is still dragged to the jubilee celebrations, where he sees an angelic choir boy for the first time and maybe falls a little bit in love. He drums up the courage to talk to him, and then does everything in his power to see him again. And Erik is around to tease him a little bit too.

This was very sweet (I like sweet fics, what can I say?) and I loved seeing how they would meet again and again. I love those kind of AU where they meet anyway, even if Wille doesn’t go to Hillerska. I suggest reading the whole series.

Simon-Appreciation-Posts | oneshot | completed | by DrogonTheDragon

Wille didn't mean for it to blow up as it did. He didn’t.

… or

Wille makes a secret Simon Eriksson fan account and it gets a lot more attention than he intended.

Listen, I love me some good media posts in fics, but I love it even more when Wille makes them because he’s obsessed with Simon. He loves to look at pictures of Simon! We’ve seen it! Anyway this a nice fun fic that brings the mood up.

Ours | oneshot | completed | by RubyIntyale / @earlgrey-lateatnight

He leaned over Simon’s bed to grab another pillow, something to rest his back against so the ridge of the mattress would stop digging in so badly.

Huh. That was weird. Why did Simon have…? Oh.

I love love love when people write that missing scene, and this one is amazing.

Other recs: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5

#young royals #wilmon #wilhelm young royals #simon young royals #yr fanfic rec list #queue

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velidewrites · 1 month

Text

Don’t Look Back

Five hundred years ago, the humans fought hard for their freedom in the Great War and won. Now, their former masters seek retribution in a rebellion that grows stronger year by year. When Elain Archeron finds out marrying Greysen Nolan might be the only solution to keep her family safe from the ancient, cruel Fae, she doesn't hesitate to fulfil her duty. What Elain doesn't know, though, is that the man with the fiery hair and russet eyes is not her fiancé, but his killer—and when she finally finds out, well…it will be far too late to turn back.

Chapter 5/15 || Read on AO3 || Go to Chapter 1

Chapter 5: The Hold

Much to Elain’s dismay, Lucien decided to put a blindfold on her before she managed to examine the strange place.

The Vanserra Hold, Lucien had called it. All Elain had caught a glimpse of, though, was the circular clearing, and the fire burning around it. As far as she was concerned, the only things this forest held were the Vanserras’ egos and a rather pungent collection of mud.

She could feel the magic around her, though. The metallic tinge of it was familiar enough for her to make out through this blend of autumn and sunlight—she had scented it on more than one occasion in her father’s private repository. It was almost like autumn had somehow found a way to trap this piece of land as the rest of the world moved through the rest of the seasons unaffected.

Despite herself, Elain enjoyed the way it warmed her skin. Her body seemed to move of its own accord as she tilted her chin upwards, as though to soak up whatever light the gaps between the trees offered.

Doing so had been a mistake—something sharp caught in her hair, grazing against the back of her neck lightly, and Elain jumped at the sensation.

“Stop moving,” Lucien instructed, tying the piece of cloth around her head at last. The blindfold may have covered her sight—her entire face, really—but Elain could practically hear his eyes roll at her reaction to his claws. “I thought you weren’t afraid of monsters, Princess,” he teased.

“Stop calling me that,” she barked. Frankly, she was starting to get quite sick of his little jabs—sick of everyone calling her the title she had not earned. In their mouths, it had always sounded like at worst mockery. At best, it had been respect for her father, not Elain. Never Elain.

She felt Lucien shrug. “I’ll call you whatever I like,” he said, taking a step back as if to admire his work. “You’ve had no trouble calling me a beast earlier.”

“I never said beast,” Elain corrected.

A sigh. “Beast, monster,” Lucien said. “Creature. It’s all the same to me, just as I know it’s all the same to you.”

Behind the blindfold, her eyes narrowed. “Don’t presume to know what I mean,” she hissed. “You are a monster. You killed my mother.”

“Eris did.”

“I don’t imagine you tried stopping him,” Elain said, crossing her arms over her chest in accusation. “He doesn’t even feel a shred of remorse about it.”

Lucien snorted. “No, he does not,” he said. “And neither do I. Think of me whatever you like, Princess, but I’m not even half the monster your mother was.”

It wasn’t the first time she’d heard the Fae slander her mother in the past few hours. The two of them had never been as close as Elain had wished—Mother had always seemed to prefer Nesta, which, as disappointing as it once had been, was not surprising in the least. Nesta was, and always had been, a force to be reckoned with—an heir that would strengthen the Merchant’s position in the new world no matter the odds. Elain…Mother had never once looked at Elain the way she would look at Nesta. With pride, with determination. Still, Elain supposed, it was better than Mother never looking at her at all.

As much as she’d always underestimated Elain, and ignored her youngest daughter completely, Elain had never believed her mother to be a bad person. She was ambitious, yes—stricter than most parents would have been, even the titled ones—but a monster…

She wished she wasn’t blindfolded, if only to give Lucien the nastiest look possible as she told him, “I don’t believe you.”

An equally nasty retort must have been armed at the ready on Lucien’s tongue, because Vassa interjected, reminding them both of her presence, “Give them a chance, Elain.” A hand on her shoulder—Vassa’s, thankfully, if the gentleness of the touch was any indication. “I promise you, all will be explained soon.”

“Ah, yes. The truth.” Elain rolled her eyes, and, as politely as she could muster for old time’s sake, shook Vassa’s hand off. “I want to believe you, Vassa, but how can you be sure they didn’t use their magic to lure you over to their side?” she asked, then added, “In New Prythian, they tell us if the Fae who could hold a person’s mind like it was nothing. Who could make it their own with less than a snap of their fingers. How can you be sure they haven’t done the same to you?”

To her utmost surprise, Vassa giggled. “Eris doesn’t have this ability,” she said. “And neither does Lucien—though I imagine he feels very bitter about it.”

A low scoff sounded beside them. “Can you not see me standing here?”

“Either way,” Vassa continued as if Lucien hadn’t spoken at all, “I didn’t simply trust their word, if that’s what you’re afraid of. There is…” she hesitated. “An object.”

Perhaps it was the Merchant’s daughter in her—but Elain’s brows rose. “An object?” she asked, her interest piqued as her mind began running through her father’s collection of truth-enhancing artifacts.

Lucien hissed. “Not here, Vassa.”

Vassa sighed deeply. “Sorry, Elain,” she told her. “You’ll have to be patient with us, I’m afraid.”

Elain huffed. “It’s hard to be patient with a blindfold around my face,” she complained, blowing the loosened cloth away from her mouth. “I can hardly breathe.”

A light step towards her crunched one of the autumn-coloured leaves as long, slender fingers reached for her, gently adjusting the blindfold and pulling it high enough to expose her mouth to the sunlight once again. It was a nice change from Lucien’s talons and Vassa re-tied the piece of fabric—a little tighter this time, yet not tight enough to pull on so much as a strand of hair.

“Thank you,” Elain told her, shoulders relaxing in Vassa’s warm presence.

But it wasn’t Vassa’s voice who spoke back, so close to Elain’s face she could almost feel its owner’s breath on her neck as he pulled back. “You’re welcome,” Lucien said quietly, leaving nothing but a light tingle on her skin.

The memory of his body’s closeness to her own made Elain suck in a breath, and, for the first time, she truly allowed herself to think about the events before she discovered Lucien’s deception. The way he’d swayed her in a dance, a strong hand braced gently on her waist. The way his laugh rasped against her ear as he told her her eyes were the most beautiful he had ever seen—as she had confessed the exact same to him before pressing her mouth to his own.

The reminder of it—the lie, made her empty chest tighten. But before she could take her thanks back, before she could blow up at him for tying her up and taking her from her home all over again, the sound of someone’s steps reached her ears.

Eris stopped by her side, tall and commanding. “If you three are done wasting our time, I suggest we get moving.”

“Let me help you,” Vassa offered, taking Elain by the arm. “This really wasn’t necessary, Eris,” she added pointedly, her gaze palpable on the cloth covering half of Elain’s face.

“I can’t have her running back to the Merchant and spilling all our secrets,” Eris said calmly. “The entrance to the Hold is sealed and has never been opened by anyone who doesn’t bear the Vanserra name.”

And with that, he simply turned and left again.

“So demanding, these males,” Vassa hummed, and, with a light tug as her only invitation, Elain started walking.

The heat of the fire burning atop the pillars signalled that they reached the very centre of the bizarre circle—the entrance to their family hold, Elain suspected from Eris’s words. As much as she hated to admit it, Eris had been smart to demand a blindfold be put on her. Elain would’ve started noting every corner of this place into her mind had she only been able to see them.

Still, she would make do with whatever clues she’d been offered. The ground changed beneath her feet, the heavy echo of stone signalling what had to be a door. The Vanserra Hold laid underground, then—it was not some invisible fortress hidden between the trees she’d initially suspected had been glamoured using whatever remnants of High Lord magic Eris still possessed. If he indeed was the direct descendant of Old Prythian’s Fae regime, Elain needed to be careful. The Fae’s magic had become nothing but a shadow of its past might, but—as Elain had learned—darkness could be haunting if one walked into it blind.

Silently, she cursed the damn blindfold again.

Around her, the flames intensified, and Elain could feel it blaze high up into the sky at whatever command Eris had given it. To have such power over an element, especially one as uncontrollable as fire, filled Elain with unease. Just what, exactly, could the Vanserras do with the fire in their blood?

The stone rattled loudly beneath her feet, and she felt Vassa pull on her arm once more as if to get her to step back. Elain obeyed. She may not have appreciated being taken here, but that hardly meant she’d let herself be swallowed by the depths of the earth itself.

Apparently, she was instead supposed to walk into them of her own volition. The entrance had stopped moving after a few seconds, its final groan sounding in what had to be a hallway stretching underneath. After Vassa murmured something that suspiciously sounded like “stairs,” Elain realised this might take a while.

To have survived this long—five hundred years after the War, to be exact—the Vanserras must have taken all the precautions their magic had allowed for to protect themselves. The Hold must have been carved deep into this enchanted piece of land. Elain couldn’t help but feel some excitement at the thought of being one of the few humans allowed to step foot in it.

Kidnapped or not, she was in Old Prythian. She had visited Braemar only once as a child, and, even so, she had spent the entire trip either in her father’s golden carriage—so unlike the half-rotten wooden wagon Lucien and Eris had her travel in—or the Huntsman’s fortified castle. She wasn’t even allowed outside—not that the Huntsman had any gardens or sights to offer beyond the hunting rounds surrounding his residence. Elain wondered how Vassa must have felt leaving that place for good—seeing the world beyond her father’s iron gates.

Elain had always found ways to occupy herself. The Archeron Manor boasted acres upon acres of rolling green hills, of greenhouses and little fruit orchards Elain tended to on summer days. It was her way of being useful, in whatever way she could. She was not a tactician the way Nesta or her mother had been, or a free spirit like Feyre, sneaking off the family grounds whatever chance she could. Perhaps it was why Elain hadn’t ended up married to one of the most powerful men in the world, like Nesta. Perhaps it was also why she hadn’t ended up killed like Feyre.

The thought made something heavy lodge itself into her throat as she began descending down the stairs. Her quiet life spent conforming to the rules may have avoided her being married to a family as cruel as the Harvester’s, or being taken by the Fae and presumed dead. But, about to discover the trove of one of the most ancient magical families Prythian had ever seen, Elain couldn’t help but wonder if she ever truly lived at all.

Nesta had hardly written her at all these days, kept under the Harvester’s close watch, but Elain had no doubt her older sister’s scheming did not end with her marriage. And Feyre—her wild, wonderful Feyre—while she hadn’t lived very long, Elain knew that, if given another chance, Feyre would not have let herself be trapped in their family’s manor for the sake of something as fleeting as safety.

Perhaps, eventually, she would have run away the way Vassa had, which brought Elain back to the question she’d been meaning to ask ever since that awful carriage ride to the Hold.

“How on earth did you manage to kill twelve men on your own?” she turned to Vassa, grimacing at yet another wet drop of watery mud gracing the top of her head. From the amount of cracks in the ceiling, Elain deduced the Vanserra Hold was a lot older than five hundred years—perhaps twice that, or even more.

“You don’t get to be the Huntsman’s daughter without learning how to fight,” Vassa said, a sly smile creeping into her tone. “I became a warrior on the day I learned how to stand.” Then, “I could teach you, if you’d like,” she offered.

“Oh, I’m no warrior,” Elain said. Someone like Feyre or Nesta may have taken her up on the offer, but Elain…

“Just because you’re not a warrior doesn’t mean you can’t learn how to fight—to defend yourself,” Vassa said. “Lucien isn’t a warrior, but I can assure you he knows how to land a strike or two.”

Somewhere behind them, Lucien scoffed. “Excuse me—“

“Oh, shut it,” Vassa interrupted, much to Elain’s content.

The corridor rumbled with a snarl in answer.

Elain jerked her chin pointedly at Lucien. “He sure seems like a warrior to me,” she told Vassa, who laughed at the comment.

“Lucien commands one of our legions, but his primary role is diplomatic in nature.” Elain felt her shrug. “He’s an emissary—sometimes even a courtier, when the situation demands it.”

Elain arched an eyebrow. “Courtier?” She scoffed. “I’ll make sure to advise all the other human courts to keep him off the guest list.”

Courtier. The Fae certainly had some way of showing it. As far as political envoys went, Elain was pretty sure she’d never heard of kidnapping their host being one of their responsibilities.

Lucien seemed entirely unbothered by her not-so-subtle dig. “I have no desire to attend your human parties—if you can even call them that—ever again,” he said.

Rude. “Looks like he could use some additional training,” she said to Vassa. The woman laughed again, apparently all too happy to play witness to their exchange.

Lucien hummed lowly, the sound reverberating into her bones. “You seemed to find my presence perfectly enjoyable, Princess,” he teased, the stupid nickname quickly prompting the return of the anger she’d been stifling.

Lucien Vanserra was such a liar.

“Is he always this insufferable?” Elain asked gruffly.

Vassa’s chuckle danced off the stone walls. “Oh, yes,” she told her. “Worse, even.”

Elain didn’t get the chance to play along—the entire party came to a halt.

She heard the crackling of flames again, followed by a quiet whisper of something she couldn’t quite discern from Eris’s lips—and then, a loud grunt of heavy, wooden doors, protesting against the clearly rusted, iron hinges.

Vassa led her into the room, an almost indiscernible gust of wind greeting them as they entered. Elain felt the wooden panels beneath her feet—then a balustrade, smooth and polished as though recently renewed. She rested her hands on the wood, then reached out only to find an empty space.

A pair of hands reached the knot tied at the back of her head, working smoothly to undo it. Elain nearly sighed with relief as the material fell from her face, and her gaze immediately darted to follow its direction.

It did not rest discarded on the floor—no, her blindfold kept on floating downwards, down what had to be at least ten stories built deep into the core of the earth, each of them a trove for the Vanserras’—for Prythian’s—most ancient history.

Books, tomes so old she could make out their yellowed pages from the balustrade overlooking the cylindrical space—filled every shelf along with scrolls Elain’s trained eyes couldn’t even begin to try to date. Chests, scattered and squeezed into every empty corner, It did not rest discarded on the floor—no, her blindfold kept on floating downwards, down what had to be at least ten stories built deep into the core of the earth, each of them a trove for the Vanserras’—for Prythian’s—most ancient history.

Books, tomes so old she could make out their yellowed pages from the balustrade overlooking the cylindrical space—filled every shelf along with scrolls Elain’s trained eyes couldn’t even begin to try to date. Chests, scattered and squeezed into every empty space, containing what Elain had to imagine were artifacts the family had gathered over the course of their entire lineage. Sofas, ottomans and small, cushioned puffs waiting at every level, as if to provide reprieve for every Vanserra wishing to take a moment to study the knowledge and wisdom of his ancestors. The entire place had been crafter of warm, auburn wood, with small globes of fire trapped within stained glass floating around calmly, illuminating the space.

It was a library. It was a treasury. It was a home.

Eris led them to the left of the small balcony, then through a foyer where the staircase to the first downstairs level stretched out, and a door waited patiently to let new visitors in. Eris ignored the staircase, much to Elain’s disappointment, and wrapped a freckled hand around the golden handle—then twisted.

They walked into an unassuming, circular study, with red sofas and a large, heavy desk placed at the back of the room. The entire wall was clad in paintings—some of them portraits of the Vanserras of old, most brown or red-headed, all with a piercing, fiery stare—and others displaying scenes of a hunt, with the family mounting proud stallions and flaunting red banners, hoardes of greyhounds running at their side.

The Vanserras, Elain realised right there and then, had once been royalty.

“Stay here,” Eris instructed, as if thoroughly unimpressed by the scenes laid out before him. “Vassa, I need you with me,” he then said, and, without so much as turning over his shoulder, went out the door.

The only thing Vassa offered Elain before following in the High Lord’s footsteps was a rather exaggerated roll of her eyes. “All those centuries, and they never learned to say please.”

***

Because luck seemed to have made its personal nemesis out of Lucien, he was left in the room with Elain Archeron. Alone.

He did not support Eris’s decision to bring her into the Hold. It had always been a trove of their family’s legacy, and, more importantly, their secrets tha Elain was not privy to. With the exception of a few close allies, no living beings apart from Lucien and his brother knew about this place, and Lucien preferred to keep it that way. There were so few places he could call home these days.

The truth, as Vassa had so eloquently put it, could have been revealed to Elain somewhere else. As far as Lucien was concerned, the Merchant’s daughter, of all people, had no business stepping foot into the Vanserra Hold.

But, for some reason far beyond Lucien’s imagination, Eris wanted her here, even when her family had proven time and time again they were not to be trusted.

He would speak to his brother about this later. For now, apparently, he was Elain Archeron’s assigned guard dog.

Lucien dared a glance at the human Princess, and regretted it almost immediately. As much as he didn’t enjoy her presence in his home, she might very well have been the most beautiful thing that had ever made its way into the Vanserra thought.

He could almost feel his ancestors’ sharp looks of disapproval from the portraits above him, as if they had heard the traitorous thought. They haven’t spent much time alone, and yet, whenever the two of them had found themselves with no company to interrupt them, Lucien had a hard time remembering what Elain truly was. It felt strange—that something so beautiful could have come from a lineage of such monsters.

There was simply something about the way she took in her surroundings, wide-eyed with the awe written all over her face—as though she could feel the magic buzzing in this place. It lit up her features like the fire shining above them, like the sunlight warming the entrance to the Hold, turning her brown eyes into pure, liquid honey.

There was some wariness etched into her face, too, though. She must have recognised exactly how much power this place housed, and how unmatched she stood in comparison had she tried to run away again. Clever little thing—he could practically see the wheels of her mind turning, cataloguing every image, every object into the pages of her memory to report to her father later.

Over Lucien’s dead body would he ever let that happen.

“I have to ask,” Elain’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts. “What was so horrible about our human parties?”

Lucien blinked—how she’d always managed to catch him off guard, he did not know, and frankly, he didn’t want to. Perhaps it truly was some magic the Archerons passed down to one another generation after generation. Perhaps it was in their blood to be the thorn in the Vanserras’ side.

Their conversation from a few minutes ago flitted back into his memory. What wasn’t wrong with the humans’ dreadful balls and ceremonies, really?

He told her exactly that. “They lack…life. You walk into the room and the very air drowns you.” He shook his head, recalling the engagement festivities arranged by her father. “It’s impressive at first, I’ll give you that—the walls and chandeliers dripping in gold, and the finest cuisine the world has to offer.” He grimaced. “But then, the music starts playing—and it may be performed by some of the most sought after quartets in Prythian, but…”

Elain’s perfect brows rose an inch. “But?”

“The dancing—all of it, really—it feels like a chore. A formality required to earn some standing in society. Your parties,” Lucien added, the word he’d been chasing finally finding its way onto his lips, “feel like a contract. The dullness, the lacklustre monotony of it—

Elain huffed. “Alright, I get the picture,” she interrupted, but Lucien hadn’t missed the curiosity in her gaze as she side eyed the scenes of the hunt stretched out beside them. “What are your parties like, then?” she asked.

It may have been the longest the two of them had spoken since the ball, Lucien realised. So little time had passed since then that it almost felt as though they were continuing their conversation from the night before. “I’m only a little over four hundred years old,” he told her, ignoring the shock parting her mouth at his words. “I never got to witness my predecessors’ celebrations before the War, or any of their holidays for that matter. A shame, really.” He felt his mouth twitch. “One of those holidays, I think I would have been a most devoted participant of.”

“I have a feeling I know where this is going—something terribly Fae and uncouth.”

“Quite,” Lucien agreed, unable to keep the grin off his face. Something told him he was going to enjoy scandalising this female—this woman—his mind immediately corrected, but he ignored the voice anyway. “In most parts of the world, they called it Calanmai, or Fire Night. It originated in the Spring Court, actually—the lands your family has claimed as New Prythian.”

Elain frowned. “We do not have any such holidays in our records.”

Lucien scoffed. “Of course not. I don’t imagine you humans would have found it appropriate by any means. Calanmai was a celebration of the coming of spring—and in the Court itself, it was a most sacred ritual performed by the High Lord to imbue magic into the land. Think of bonfires, thousands of them, lighting up every hill, smoke lilting into the stars. Drums, loud and echoing into the night. And wine—so much of it that you’d end up falling asleep under the sky, waking up to the spring breeze in your hair. The sun warming your face.”

Lucien cleared his throat. “Or, at least, that is how it was described to me.”

He could have sworn something pink heated in Elain’s cheeks. “I could see it, you know. You being a courtier—when you’re not such a condescending asshole, that is.”

Lucien’s eyes narrowed. “I have never met a Princess so crass before,” he purred, deeply revelling in the resentment she bore for the nickname. How could she not be a Princess, though? Everything about her stance radiated command as she crossed her arms in disdain, her full lips pursing and those doe-like eyes flashing with challenge.

“I told you to stop calling me that.”

Lucien’s mouth twitched. “And I told you I’ll call you whatever I like,” he said. “Comes with the Asshole title, I’m afraid.”

Delighted, he watched as Elain whirled back to the Vanserra family portraits, murmuring something that suspiciously like prick and ridiculous, even her ears flushing that warm, lovely pink. Lucien smiled to himself.

“So, what was the ritual?” Elain’s voice reached him, still gruff as she focused on the rather unpleasant profile of Lucien’s great-great grandfather.

“Ritual?” Lucien questioned, his attention refusing to step back as far as two minutes ago for reasons unbeknownst to him.

Finally, Elain turned to him again. “Calanmai,” she reminded him.

Right. Lucien coughed again. “As I mentioned, infusing magic back into the land was the primary aim of the celebrations—it was the High Lord’s obligation to perform what was called the Great Rite.”

Elain’s brows knitted. “And how, exactly, was he supposed to do that?”

The grin made its way back Lucien’s face as he explained, “Every year, the High Lord of the Spring Court allowed the power of the Rite into his veins. Transformed into a beast, a creature of the very essence of spring, he would allow it to seize his body, his mind, his senses entirely.” He met Elain’s gaze directly as he added. “Each year, the magic would choose a Maiden—usually one of the members of Calanmai celebrations—a companion for the High Lord to…complete the Rite.”

Elain’s eyes widened. “They—they would—”

“Fuck, yes,” Lucien completed for her with a wave of his hand, eliciting a small gasp from Elain’s lips. He chuckled. “And, with the act, they would ah, release the magic into the land. To allow crops to grow healthier, of course.”

The silence hung between them long enough that Lucien couldn’t help but tease her some more. “Something wrong, little fawn?” he asked, realising that he was indeed thoroughly enjoying this—and that perhaps it was a good thing Eris or Vassa weren’t here to scold him for scandalising their guest a step too far. In his defence, Elain had asked him first.

“Your parties sound outrageous,” Elain finally said, that heat in her cheeks rising.

Lucien winked. “That’s exactly what parties should be, Princess.”

Elain smiled at that—a true smile, the kind she’d offered Vassa when she first saw her at the camp. The same kind she’d offered him when she hadn’t yet thought him an utter monster. “Is that why you brought me here? To show me how to throw better parties?”

Lucien choked. “Show you?”

The picture of it invaded his mind without warning—an image of him and Elain partying the way Lucien’s ancestors demanded it. A cave, lit up by faelight and thrumming with magic, their bodies naked and intertwined on the mossy earth, its fragrance mixing with their sweat. Elain laid out bare beneath him, her breasts heaving up and down in panting, shallow breaths as he entered her, so perfect and ready for his taking, his—

Lucien sucked in a breath, nearly choking again on the force of it, the force of the picture pushed back into the darkest, most secret corners of his mind. Eris and Vassa should have been here after all, if only to remind him of what happened the last time Lucien Vanserra had decided to trust a human like Elain Archeron.

Because she was a human. And the humans—the humans took his mother. His father, however horrible he had been. His brothers. They had nearly taken Eris, too, and Lucien’s heart right with it.

Lucien would not let it happen again. He would not let another Jesminda into his life.

“Of course,” he said tightly, “My people’s traditions would not have faded from common memory had it not been for you humans.” He shrugged. “As for why we brought you here—take it up with Eris. If it were for me, I would have never brought you into the Hold.”

He could see it—the way Elain’s smile faded. The confusion filling her shining stare, blending into hurt, so sharp it could no doubt pierce his own chest if she only stepped in closely enough.

Lucien could see it all, and the worst part of it was that he hated himself for it.

“We brought you into the Hold,” Eris voice sounded from a place Lucien was not yet ready to return to yet as his brother walked back into the study, Vassa falling into step beside him, “Because it was the safest place to show you this.”

In a few long strides, Eris reached the desk, and placed the heavy object right at its middle, the wood croaking slightly under its weight. A thick red fabric—an old Vanserra banner, from the looks of it—covered the globe entirely. Eris motioned for Elain to step in closer—and she did, as if drawn by the mystery of it alone. Lucien, though—Lucien remained frozen in place.

“This,” Eris began, placing his hand atop the smooth surface, “is the Veritas Orb.” In one, swift motion, he slid the banner off, revealing one of their family’s most prized and priceless possessions. The Orb shone a quiet, crystalline light, as though somehow made of all the colours and none of them at all, humming gently at the closeness of its owner’s hand—as if begging. Touch me. Talk to me. Ask me.

But Eris turned from its whisper—and looked at the Merchant’s daughter who stood in utter shock, mesmerised by the treasure laid out right before her.

“So, Elain Archeron.” Eris smiled. “Are you ready to learn the truth?”

#elucien #pro elucien #elain x lucien #elain archeron #lucien vanserra #elucien fic #elucien fanfic #elucien fanfiction #acotar #my writing

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rosetta-j-stone · 25 days

Text

So...I wanted this to be a one-shot but I think it might end up being a slow burn after all...

Er, I mean, yes, I absolutely intended this to be Chapter 1 of MANY.

ANYWAY

AU BOJERE FANFIC LET'S MM MM GOOOOOO

If you'd told him five years ago that he'd be living in London, he wouldn't have believed it.

London is for rockstars. Models. Hotshot city boys.

Bojan is none of those things.

But he does love people. And excitement.

So maybe it's not so surprising after all.

...OK, so it's a bit less glamorous than he expected. He's working three jobs and sharing a house with four other guys.

Five, if you count that mate of theirs who's always coming over.

Anyway.

He checks his watch. Plenty of time.

He takes one last drag on his cigarette, savouring it, then lets it fall, still smouldering, to the ground, before shoving his hands deep into his pockets and hurrying back inside.

He'll never get used to the British weather.

****

Jere is nervous. This is definitely the right place. Right? He checks his phone again, like he didn't check it a hundred times on the way here. Yep. Definitely the right place. Probably.

It's just...there's no one here.

He can't be the only student on this course, can he?

He hopes not. He still remembers that summer when he had to retake Swedish. He shudders.

But no...wait...those are definitely footsteps echoing down the corridor.

Phew. He won't be doing this all alone after all.

He turns with a smile to see who his classmate is.

****

There's already someone waiting outside the classroom when Bojan gets there. Either they're really keen, or they live so far out that they've learned, as he has, to allow 2 hours to get anywhere in this city. Or both.

He's about to introduce himself when the student thrusts out his arm, grasps his hand firmly and vigorously shakes it, rather faster than Bojan is used to.

"Hellohelloyoualsohereforlanguageclassyesyes? Nooneelsehereyetbut" - he breaks off from shaking Bojan's hand to dig his phone out of his pocket and check it - "Ithinkweinrightplace"

Bojan grins. Yes, he is also here for the language class.

AKA the worst-paid of his three jobs.

****

Jere is gabbling. He knows he is, he can hear he's talking too fast, but honestly he thinks he's doing pretty well getting any actual words out when he's just been confronted with one of the best-looking men he's ever seen.

And Jere considers himself something of an expert.

This guy should consider himself lucky Jere isn't speaking total gibberish actually.

He leans against the wall, which is 100% so he looks cool and casual and definitely not because he suddenly feels weak at the knees.

"So...you new student like me? Or you do this course already some time?"

The other student stifles a laugh for some reason. Jere frowns. Did he accidentally say something weird? Or is...is this guy laughing at his accent? That's pretty rude of him.

...pretty...him.

OK, he needs to focus.

****

This is what he gets for teaching adults, his sister would say, before asking him for the umpteenth time why on earth he doesn't work with kids, he's a natural, she can put in a good word for him with her friend who's a headteacher, he only has to ask-

He doesn't do it because he's a coward, is what he'd tell her.

He'd say it'd be too much to be surrounded by kids all day every day when he still doesn't have any kids of his own.

He really did think he'd have at least one by now.

Anyway, that's what he'd tell her. If he wasn't a coward.

Besides he doesn't really mind being mistaken for a mature student once in a while.

"Actually," he says, taking a key from his pocket and unlocking the classroom door, "I'm the one giving the classes"

****

Of COURSE he is. No wonder he was trying not to laugh.

Although, in Jere's defence, this guy looks way too young to be anyone's teacher, even if he does have a streak of grey in his hair.

Hmm, distinguished.

Focus, Jere.

You're here to learn, remember.

He sighs and follows his new teacher into the classroom, kicking himself every step of the way. Hopefully the rest of the students will arrive before he can make a bigger fool of himself...

#bojere week 2024 #bojan cvjetićanin #bojan cvjeticanin #käärijä #kaarija #bojere #fanfic #when I kissed the teacher

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purrplegyuu · 5 months

Text

Cold | Choi Beomgyu

Index

Chapter three

Warnings: unhappiness, slightly angst, soft beomgyu, abusive mother, swearing. omg the softest chapter eveeer

Word count: 1.4k

Taglist: @arianap23e, @haatohwa

I don't know why is it soooo soft, I don't like it ughhh. Like this is a dark story. Anyways, the following chapters are gonna be waaaay darker (i mean i hope). I kinda like soft Beommie tho...

Let me know if you find any kind of mistake, i'm not a native speaker and this helps me so so so much ^_^

Also let me know if you want to be added to the tag list, if you want to suggest an event to happen on next chapters or if you have any question about any detail. Luv yaa (●'◡'●)

I’m not happy. I know that. I know I will never go to school with a bright smile on my face like Jiwoo, because unlike her, I don’t have anything that makes me enjoy sitting on an uncomfortable chair for hours, looking at the professors as if I am paying attention, and talk kindly to my classmates as if I don’t hate them so much.

I even started to believe happiness is a vile lie American series have shown to us.

However, lately, these bad feelings have been increasing. And dad knows that.

That’s why he came home early on a saturday night and announced that we were going on vacation to that pretty house on a lake that his mother left him as an inheritance.

“You okay guys?” He asks while driving, looking at me through the mirror. I smile slightly at him, nodding. “Gyu, I heard you got really good grades again. Bet your mother is really really proud” Beomgyu looks at him back, quiet, and totally ignores him.

The awkward aura all over the car now, as dad looks at Beomgyu’s mother, scared of making his relationship even worse. He has tried thousands of ways to get along with Beomgyu, but the boy sitting by my side never really cared.

Once we arrive, dad gets out of his car, stretching his back. I look at Beomgyu. He really hates my father. At least that’s what it looks like—he gets even darker when our parents are close to him, doesn’t even smirk at any kind of jokes and doesn’t say a single word until they are far away again.

But today, he looks even more dark than usual, which makes me feel a bit scared.

I get out of the car when he does. I see his mother running towards my dad in order to enter the house with him.

We both stand in front of the house quietly, looking at the way our parents play like kids with their luggage as they take it in the house. They really look like a young couple. However, I find it a bit weird, but I guess it is just because I never liked her.

I look around. There are so many memories from my childhood—the garden full of flowers I planted when I was five, the rustic oven I used to make pizza in when I was eight, the lake where I learned how to swim when I was nine. But everything looks just too old and dirty—it’s been seven years since the last time we came here, it’s been seven years since the last time I enjoyed being in such a place… it’s been seven years since I last saw her.

I walk through the trees until I have reached a certain place. A small dock made of old wood, mouldy and poorly stable. Hundreds of drawings all over one of the wood tiles—’Jeongseo’ on top of everything, followed by ‘Namhyuk’ and ‘Dami’.

I really miss those times.

By 6 p. m., dad calls me to the big dock in front of our house.

“Gaeum, honey, could you please go get the meat?” Beomgyu’s mom smiles at him, and makes a disgusted face when she turns around. Dad’s on the white boat his father used to drive right before dying three years ago. Everything I can think about when I see it, is him swearing he will never use it again because it was his dad’s, not his.

“We’re taking Luna on an expedition” he says. I can see the happiness on his face. Luna is the name grandpa gave his boat. “Remember when we used to go to the other side of the lake?” I nod. “Well, we are going to go there to take the dinner tonight” a big smile on his face makes me force myself to smile although I’m not happy or excited.

“I will go get a sweater”

When I get in the house, I don’t see Gaeum in the kitchen, which I found a bit weird, but don’t really pay attention to it. I go to my room, take a pink sweater and try it on in front of the mirror. I’m wearing a long-sleeved dark shirt which is supposed to cover me up enough to make me feel warm, however, the short jean skirt makes it hard for me to get warm. Even with a big coat, and in the house, I’m trembling.

However, I get out of my room, holding a white blanket, and stop walking when I hear some noises in Beomgyu’s room. The door is closed, so I cannot see anything, but I don’t also see any light under the door, even though it’s 6:30 p. m., and it’s very dark already.

“Don’t be fucking dumb” Gaeum’s voice sounding so different—meaner, unlike her usual fake sweet voice tone. “Could you please think a bit? Ha, you’re almost an adult, why would I have to ask you to not be so dumb?” The door of my room closes strongly due to the air running through my open window, which makes me jump, touching my chest. No more sounds in the room makes me feel scared someone can catch me, so I walk back to the door.

Gaeum gets out of Beomgyu’s room, and I look at her, trying to look as natural as possible, holding tightly my blanket, faking a blank face to her like I didn’t hear anything.

“What?” I ask when she keeps looking at me. I even impress myself with my almost perfect acting.

“Are you ready? I’m asking Beomgyu if he is also ready” I look in his room. He’s not visible from outside, so I just nod to her, going down once again.

Some minutes after that, Gaeum gets on the boat, giving dad the things he asked for and his coat. Beomgyu walks behind her, blank face as always, and doesn’t look at dad, just gets in the boat and sits by my side.

Dad knows perfectly how to drive the boat, so he does it while we all try to warm ourselves with our coats.

The place we and Beomgyu are sitting is lower than the place our parents are at, so they can’t see us unless they go down.

That’s why he puts his hand on my thigh, caressing it as we’re alone over there. I look at him, looking at the lake deeply. His soft hair moving with the air, his face even prettier than ever, flawless skin, and some red marks on his cheeks like he has just cried.

“You don’t seem that happy” he says, still looking at the lake.

“I never look happy” I say, jokingly. Spending so much time with Jiwoo has started to affect me. But he doesn’t laugh. The silence makes me want to be sincere with him. Guess he has this effect on me. “I don’t really like here” He turns around to look at me, almost surprised at my words. It’s a pretty and almost paradisiacal place. Why wouldn’t I like it? “Everything I can think about when I’m here is her… the last time I saw mom”

We stay silent for a few minutes, weirdly enjoying each other’s company.

Then, he talks once again. “I know you listened” his husky voice should make me feel scared, however, his hands touching me so softly, his head against mine, his arm around me, his body warming me up… I can’t be scared even if he says he will kill me after that. And I wonder if that kind of scenes are the reason I love him so much even when he treats me so wrong most of the time. Maybe I don’t love him, maybe I just love the way he treats me so wrong, but sometimes, he acts like he loves me back.

I don’t try to deny it. He knows me well. The voice tone he used isn’t even doubtful. He knows I listened.

“Don’t want to know why was she so mad?” Weirdly, everytime he doesn’t use pet names, it’s just because he’s treating me well.

I look at him quietly. I find it a bit acted the way he fakes peace, like it doesn’t really bother him. His eyes a bit red, like his nose and cheeks.

“She found out I’m fucking someone” He flashes a bit more than usual. “, and scolded me for not using condom” His eyes shiny, and can feel like he’s being forced or something like that. However, I don’t say anything.

I never say anything.

#beomgyu smut #txt smut #txt choi line smut #soobin smut #tw: noncon #toxic beomgyu #tw: dubcon #kpop #kpop smut #fanfic #txt x reader #txt imagines #Beomgyu stepbrother #beomgyu overstimulation #beomgyu hard dom #beomgyu mean dom #Cold | Beomgyu #purrplegyuu

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stillness-in-green · 7 months

Text

On Heteromorphs & Heteromorphobia (Arcs XI - XIV, Shie Hassaikai to Joint Training)

Thanks again for all your great responses, everyone! This week I'll be covering, among other things, the early indicators gradually getting more overt, the way the Hero System in its current incarnation is set up to fail rural heteromorphs, the eye-rolling shallowness of thought that says heteromorphobia is fake because Hawks is the Number 2 Hero, and some spitballing about Watsonian reasons that the One For All's bearers are all baseline.

Hit the jump!

The Shie Hassaikai Arc (Chapters 122-162)

Chapter 122:

Gag sequence with Hound Dog, playing up the discomfort of the students when Hound Dog “forgets how to talk when he flips out.” Also a very weird instance of an animal-type heteromorph wearing a costume accessory that would be seen as a method of control if an actual animal of his type were wearing it: a muzzle. There will be another of these in a hundred chapters or so.

Chapter 123:

Nejire asks Shouji directly what’s up with his mask. He looks legitimately shocked—as well he might, given that he’s been in this class for five months and none of his classmates appear to have asked about his scar yet! He nonetheless starts to explain, but only gets as far as, “A long time ago, I—” before Nejire interrupts to ask Shouto about his scar. This chapter was published five years and ten months before the chapter in which the reader finally gets the rest of this tragic, violent story. The gag with Nejire goes on for another page, of her hopping from person to person, asking six of the students in all about some distinguishing feature of theirs. With the sole exception of Shouto, all are in some way heteromorphic, though it’s obscured somewhat by Mineta not being one of the class’s really obvious heteromorphs, and Mina having an Emitter-type quirk. It’s unclear whether Nejire's questions were leading to some point or if she just completely blanked on anything she’d been intending to say about work studies when her curiosity reared its head. It definitely feels like her targets are all kind of taken aback to be asked about this so openly—even Mina has a small sweatdrop, while Mineta (being Mineta) excitedly charges her with sexual harassment.

Very shortly after, we find Nejire toying with an extremely uncomfortable-looking Mina’s horns while Mina asks her to stop.

Chapter 126:

Quick shot of Kaminari playing with Ojiro’s tail in the classroom, but no accompanying shot of Ojiro’s face, so we don’t know how he’s feeling about it, but it and the bit above with Mina’s horns could speak to a certain amount of tendency to treat heteromorphic features as open property to play with or poke at regardless of the person in question’s feelings. That’s a bit reachy even for this piece, but there will be one further example later on. Three examples in 300+ chapters does not exactly make for a phenomenon, but then again, that kind of physical forwardness in Japan is probably pretty unusual as it is. Could be a case that’s more common in countries that are more culturally comfortable with casual touch.[1]

Chapter 131:

It’s not clear heteromorphobia, per se, but this chapter has another one of those fights with “giant villains”—two fighting each other, in this case—where they just get carted away in the background and no one asks—nor does the narrative concern itself with—why they were fighting each other to begin with. Indeed, Ryukyu and her interns just stand around in the foreground chitchatting about work while, in the background, the dust settles on the two villains Uravity and Froppy just buried under rubble. Hope they don’t revert to normal size and then have to be rescued from under a collapsed building! o The “heroes stand around and talk in the foreground while villains get carted off behind them” thing comes up so often, and in most cases, it’s totally absent of context, just a cut-in on some hero in the middle of a work day. Only very rarely does the audience get any context on what the villain's deal is, and it's striking that all of the examples coming to mind for me —Starservant, Ending, the gang mook dude coming up shortly—are non-heteromorphs.

Chapter 141:

Tabe, of Overhaul’s trash trio, is described by Hojo as having been tossed aside when he didn’t mesh with society. This makes Tabe both the only heteromorph of the trio and the only one described as having been rejected by society at large, rather than victimized by a specific person as in Hojo and Setsuno’s cases. That said, given that his appearance is—while a bit manic—not all that far from baseline, and that his character blurb says he’s always hungry, I suspect Tabe’s ostracization is rooted more in the kinds of difficulties faced by characters like Toga, whose quirk comes with a strong psychological component they have difficulty managing and were not given any outlets or coping mechanisms for.

Chapter 144:

The bullied kid who middle school Kirishima tries to help is a heteromorph. The reason he’s getting bullied, however, is that the two kids bothering him want him to use his quirk to transform leaves into money; it’s a pure Emitter quirk. Still, the kid is shorter than average and literally mousy, only marginally more humanoid than Nedzu.[2]

Chapter 159:

The other incidence of Tsuyu being addressed by frog onomatopoeia rather than name—Suneater calls her Miss Ribbit.

Chapter 160:

A moment that looks small at the time, but will look considerably different when My Villain Academia rolls around: Dabi addressing Spinner as “lizard” and Spinner angrily firing back that his name is not Lizard, it’s Spinner. This makes Spinner the first heteromorph to protest being addressed as their associated animal. In true microaggression fashion, I imagine a lot of heteromorphs in similar situations just run the mental arithmetic and decide they don’t feel like making a stink about it and getting into a debate or coming off as a killjoy. This would be especially true in Japan, with its culture of meiwaku, not being a bother to others. Spinner, being a villain, is already resolved to make lots of trouble for others, so he comes right out and complains. Dabi, for his part, brushes Spinner’s anger off with, “You don’t need to flip out,” which I have to imagine is also pretty typical. It was just a joke, I didn’t mean anything by it, why are you getting so angry?: all probably pretty common responses to actually trying to push back against that kind of name-calling.

The Remedial Course Arc (Chapters 163-168)

Chapter 164:

Gang Orca compares the students under his charge unfavorably to plankton. I suppose if you get to the animal comments before they get to you…? That or he’s leaning into it.

The children’s teacher calls Gang Orca “Mr. Whale” rather than addressing him by his hero alias or any generic titles. It stands out a bit more than Suneater doing the same to Tsuyu, in that there’s little reason to assume the teacher shouldn’t know what Gang Orca goes by, given his exceptionally high rank (on both leaderboards we know he’s on) and the fact that she would have had to agree to this whole exercise on behalf of her class.

The U.A. School Festival Arc (Chapters 169-183)

Chapter 169:

When Jirou is getting angsty over her music hobby not supporting her hero work and snaps at Kaminari about it, there’s a shot of Koda watching her with concern. They were, of course, paired up for their final exams, but it stands out to me as being the first time Koda’s had a relationship beat with a student that isn’t as blatantly heteromorphic as he is? Jirou still is a heteromorph, but she doesn’t have the animal features or Weird Head that the students Koda’s mostly been associated with previously do. He joins Kaminari in encouraging her later in the chapter, which is, again, about the most concrete character beat I think he has with another student in the entire series up until the hospital material.[3]

Chapter 173:

In the panel showing the totally spectacular original fantasy screenplay from Class B, I can’t help but notice that of the eleven students shown, all eight of the baseline/near-baseline types are in standard fantasy gear, while two of the three heteromorphs—Shishida and Pony—seem to have been decked out in wings and are playing at being quadrupeds. Mounts? Wild animals? Sure, the giant eagles in Lord of the Rings (which is namedropped in the play’s title) are sapient, but it does stand out that the animal-associated heteromorphs in the shot are playing animals, not humans. o Incidentally, the third, Bondo, is a bit less clear. Only his head is visible atop a swatch of black cloak, so he could be some kind of wacky flying monster, but given his position up by the dark castle, I would assume he’s playing the main villain. In the play itself, however, later on in Chapter 183, he seems to have been downed prior to Tetsutetsu’s character, and is at least collapsed amidst the heroes’ number. Perhaps he’s a minion who joined the good guys or something?

Whatever in hell is going on in this exchange between Midnight and Midoriya:

I’m assuming what’s happening here is that Midnight, being Midnight, is flavoring her facetiousness with a kinky metaphor.[4] But like, wow.

Chapter 175:

Hound Dog—this being the arc in which he gets the most screentime—shows up to run the students out of the gym. He’s still wearing the muzzle and has spittle flying comically from his mouth. Gets a “Yikes!” response out of the kids, comedic fear.

Chapter 183:

Hound Dog finally gets a good moment. The bit starts off much as his scenes usually do, with Midoriya standing rigid and on-edge as Hound Dog leans in too close, panting heavily and shout-scolding. The tension bleeds out of Midoriya, however, as Hound Dog segues into the stern reminder that teachers are there to protect students, and they should and can be relied on if fights break out. It’s a nice scene, though it transitions back to cartoon violence immediately after as Hound Dog turns on All Might. Ectoplasm gives us a reminder that Hound Dog forgets how to talk when he gets mad.

The billboard showing the beauty pageant entrants is exceptionally loosely drawn, but from what we can see, it contains only people who are at least close enough to baseline to have normal hair and facial features. One girl has ears that look enough like fins that the anime went ahead and made her a reptilian heteromorph, with a face somewhere between Tsuyu’s and dragon-form Ryukyu, but that’s pure extrapolation. Regardless, even if you count her, she’s the only full heteromorph in the six entrants. (And it’s not like the contest is even about traditional beauty, because reigning champ Kenranzaki Bibimi is a joke.)

First appearance of Gori, the gorilla heteromorph police officer. Between him, Tsuragamae and Sansa, an extremely sizeable portion of the named police officers are animal-type heteromorphs, though certainly police in crowd scenes run baseline enough. It makes a certain amount of sense: if your animal quirk doesn’t give you enough badass superpowers to become a cool hero, joining the force is probably the next best thing. It’s a slightly odd choice to make given what will later be implied about heteromorphs and their rate of villain designation, but perhaps, as with Shouji and Shinsou, there’s a degree there of wanting to prove oneself as well-intentioned and worthwhile against persistent dehumanization and discrimination. o Gori and Sansa are both played pretty straight—no stray animal sounds or mannerisms from them. Honestly, looking at how completely reserved they and numerous other animal-type heteromorphs are compared to Hound Dog’s tendency to meltdowns, I begin to think one could make a pretty decent argument that people with animal-trait quirks experience the same spectrum of psychological compulsion other quirk users do: on one end are people who are so completely in control of their quirks that their quirks seem almost incidental to who they are as people (ex. Momo, Sansa), while on the other end are people who are so deeply impacted by their quirk that it gives them significant issues with self-control (ex. Toga, Hound Dog).

The Pro Hero Arc (Chapters 184-193)

Chapter 184:

The Hero Billboard Chart chapter, in which the criteria that determine a hero’s rank are listed are incident resolution rate, contributions to society, and public approval rating. I’ll ask the reader to consider how these metrics might combine to keep many heteromorphic heroes squarely in the mid-ranks, while also indirectly contributing to rural heteromorphobia. Public approval is the most obvious place where they’re going to run into difficulty. In a society where heteromorphobia is openly espoused in certain parts of the country, and, as we will find, simmering below the surface even in less regressive areas, heteromorphs are obviously disadvantaged. I don’t know how the public approval rating is calculated, but if there’s any way for bigots to register their disapproval, that’s going to be a significant hit to a heteromorphic hero’s popularity. Likewise, there’s plenty of room for unconscious bias to be present, in the, “I’m not biased against heteromorphs; it’s a complete coincidence that I think all these other, non-heteromorphic heroes are more worthy of my approval!” mode. Poor public approval in rural communities is an excellent motivator for heteromorphic would-be heroes to come to cities—you can hardly have a good approval rate if the only people who’ve ever heard of you hate your guts! Societal contributions would seem to require at least some amount of demand that heteromorphs can’t control. Public appearances, charitable activities, maybe all the commercials and modelling gigs if contributing to the economy counts as contributing to society—how much of that can a heteromorph do if they aren’t being requested by other parts of society? For example, we know Gang Orca is in high demand to make appearances at aquariums, but he's also the Director of an internationally popular aquarium, and clearly does extensive charitable work in that field. How much demand is someone who hasn’t made that much of a niche for themselves going to be in? What about someone whose power and personality aren’t as strong as Gang Orca’s? If they can’t make much headway in other metrics of the ranking, how can they stand out from the rest of the pack enough to get those opportunities? This also feeds into the pressure for heroes to move to cities—a small-town hero can work themselves to the bone for their small community, but that’s just one small town in the whole country. It hardly compares to someone who can make contributions on the national level! Finally, incident resolution requires a power that’s good at quickly, efficiently stopping villains and saving people, and, at least in terms of raw power, I think this doesn’t immediately disadvantage heteromorphs. Heteromorph Mirko has a brutally simple power set and she makes it work like gangbusters. Transformation-type Crust’s power is dead basic, yet he places just fine. There are plenty of weak emitters and wildly OP heteromorphs, so in terms of who’s best suited to stopping trouble on a dime, that feels like a relatively even playing ground. However, this one is the real killer in terms of keeping heroes out of rural areas. After all, having a high incident resolution rate requires working in a place with a high number of incidents happening!�� That means coming to cities, where the higher population means higher amounts of villain activity. It's not like bigotry is even illegal, after all, nor does it require the illegal use of quirks. I’ll be coming back to this topic again later, after the series gives us more context for how ugly rural heteromorphobia can get, but this chapter gives us the pieces we need to understand how absolutely ill-equipped the Hero System is to address heteromorphobia in the places where it most needs to be addressed.

We find that the Top Ten is comprised of a whole array of baseline or near-baseline types, with the ones who’re farthest from human appearance either wearing a mask (Kamui Woods) or being cartoon appliances (Wash, who could just as easily be a normal dude wearing a costume and doing a bit). One of the frequent bits of sophistry I see about heteromorphobia is that it can’t be that bad because Hawks and Mirko are in the Top 10, but you only have to look at those two's cover-ready, conventionally attractive faces and tertiary animal characteristics to know that they’re hardly comparable to someone like Spinner. Kamui Woods makes the better argument, and he is, again, masked. However, I don’t want to harp on this too much, because the fact of the matter is that Gang Orca is noted to have been in the prior Top Ten, so certainly a scary demeanor isn’t necessarily that huge a deterrent. (Though Gang Orca does a lot of public appearances at aquariums and the like, so his societal contribution score is probably crazy good. Very powerful quirk, too.)

Chapter 186:

This chapter has the other incidence of the “non-heteromorph puts their hands all over a heteromorph’s divergent feature without any sign of asking for permission first” thing I discussed back in Chapter 123. And while it is technically only one incident, it’s notable that it’s rather more than one case.

Not pictured: any of these grabby little assholes asking permission.

Hawks has the line, “The son of the Number Two would’ve been a nice feather in my cap,” which I would normally count as an animal-themed quip and talk about, but there’s no bird metaphor in the Japanese line. I’m not going to comb the entirety of his dialogue in Japanese to see how regular bird puns are—maybe Caleb was fitting one in here in place of one he couldn’t work in elsewhere, or maybe he was just localizing colorfully without much thought for how it reflected on Everything Else About All Heteromorphs.[5] Hawks will present another opportunity later.

Chapter 187:

This reads like absolutely nothing in the moment, but it’s noticeable in hindsight that, when Fuyumi brings up the possibility of Natsuo having gotten a girlfriend in college, Natsuo blushes and frantically deflects without confirming or denying. We will later find out that he has gotten a girlfriend—she’s mentioned in his character profile page following Chapter 189, and we will later see a picture of her on the cover page of 259. That cover page will establish that she’s a heteromorph, which, together with the knowledge of later reveals about the Himura family being blatantly heteromorphobic, adds some less-cute context to Natsuo backflipping out of talking about her in Himura Rei’s room at the psychiatric hospital.

The Joint Training Arc (Chapters 194-217)

Chapter 195:

First real insight on Shishida Jurota, whose quirk is technically a transformation type, but whose appearance is plenty bestial even in his resting state. Another interesting case of someone whose animalistic powers do have an effect on his personality, though it only comes out in his transformation; he’s otherwise pretty collected.

Chapter 197:

Shishida protests Shiozaki calling him “Apocalypse beast,” but I’d say it’s just as possible that he’s objecting to her using the wrong mythological critter, seeing as his hero alias is a reference to a mythologized historical man-eating beast, so he’s clearly not above claiming monster cred himself.

Rin echoes the nickname literally a single panel after Shishida complains about it. It’s not a great look, honestly.

Chapter 199:

Hawks has that “’Cuz we’re birds of a feather!”[6] line to Tokoyami, who asks him, in what looks to be an extremely unamused fashion, “Is that meant to be funny…?” So, Hawks feels comfortable making bird jokes about himself, but Hawks literally does modeling work and is on magazine covers; he has extremely cool bird wings that he doesn’t even have to fly with normally, because he can control them with his mind, meaning they can carry a lot of weight—including his own—that physics would not normally allow. Tokoyami, meanwhile, is of a body type (specifically, a head type) that we will later find had a hate group specifically dedicated to it. It’s easy to imagine Hawks having a more flippant view! (This might even be exacerbated by him being raised first in an abusive home and second by government agents. One doubts he’s exactly learning wonderful lessons about body positivity and self-love.)

Tokoyami has one line that’s a bird reference, while the other is another bird pun inserted by the localization. Relevant to my point is that the bird-themed one is the “dumb carrier pigeon” bit—in the Japanese, it’s “not a dumb messenger bird.” It’s coming out of frustration and annoyance that Hawks seemingly recruited him for no reason but to grill him about the stuff going on at his school. He’s being derisive towards the thing he thinks Hawks is using him as. o The other bird allusion is, “He took me under his wing again.” In the Japanese, it’s just, “He accepted me again.”

That said, while Tokoyami may not think the bird jokes are cute, Hawks does make the biggest impression on him by taking him flying and encouraging him to find a way to fly freely for himself.

Chapter 200:

The proper introduction of Fukidashi Manga, a character who makes a complete mockery of quirk classifications. His head alone marks him as heteromorphic as all get-out, and indeed the wiki classes his quirk as heteromorphic. But given that he can both make sound effects appear on his face and then transmute them to real manifestations (a transformation effect) as well as use the regular old voice he somehow has to manifest his sound effects by yelling them (an emitter effect), his categorization seems deeply arbitrary.

Chapter 203:

Proper introduction of Tsunotori Pony. Not the most obvious heteromorph to ever walk the planet, but the tail and the satyr-esque structure of her legs and feet are a giveaway that her horns wouldn’t be on their own. Like Hound Dog, she's making some very weird choices about her hero costume: stirrup accessories on her boots and a hairpiece clearly designed to resemble a bridle. Pony’s a bit of a mishmash, really. Her tail and horns say goat heteromorph, but her name and costume say horse-type.

Chapter 204:

In a flashback, Iida’s older brother Tensei mentions that their grandfather, the founder of their hero family, passed down the tidbit about how the Iidas can rip out their pipes to regenerate stronger ones. I really have to wonder how in God’s name anyone would ever just happen to figure that out, and some of the possible answers are wildly grim. The most probable answer is simply that he found out after taking a bad injury in his hero career—having one engine torn out or damaged so badly it had to be removed—only to unexpectedly recover later on. But if it wasn’t that, and assuming he didn’t just intuit that his pipes would grow back stronger if violently dismembered, that really only leaves removing them because he wanted to get rid of them permanently, only to find that they’d just grow back, or having them removed against his will. The former, removing them himself, seems unlikely—even if he’s, say, a decade or two older than All Might, that’s still well after the period in which metahumans would have been such a persecuted minority that I can see one self-mutilating to hide it—though he might have been told the story by an ancestor of his own. The latter, them being removed against his will, would also have been more believable some generations prior, but given the existence of the CRC, remains ominously plausible even in the modern day.

Chapter 205:

An extremely rare case of an animal-type heteromorph using dehumanizing language towards another animal-type heteromorph: Pony tells Shouji that she wants to wrap a clash with him up quickly because she can’t stand octopus. It has a similar tenor of Dabi calling Spinner a lizard, and Hawks calling himself and Tokoyami birds, 1:1 equating heteromorphs with their associated animal. I believe Hawks is the only other animal-associated heteromorph[7] who does this, at least up until the hospital attack.

Shouji responds, “I’m no stranger to being feared,” another explicit canonical nod towards his still-unknown backstory.

Chapter 207:

A good look at Class B’s Kamakiri Togaru, unusually open about his bloodthirst for a heteromorph, much less a heroic one.

Bakugou calls Jirou “Lobes,” another in his pattern of referring to heteromorphs by their defining feature.

Tokage Setsuna is a somewhat interesting case of having a bunch of animal signifiers—her name, the name of her quirk, her hero alias, her costume—but not actually resembling an animal to any degree at all, barring her pointy teeth. Also, remember when I raised the point that animal heterormorphs can seem to get stuck with very plain quirk names that don’t distinguish them at all from other heteromorphs associated with the same animal, regardless of how many sub-abilities come as part of the total package? And compared that to people with other quirk types, who get wildly varied quirk names despite having relatively similar abilities? Here we see that with Tokage—she’s a transformation-type, and her quirk name is Lizard Tail Splitter.

Bondo Kojirou, Class B’s other really bonkers heteromorph. Seriously, what is life even like for this guy? How do your senses function when you have a glue lid for a head?

Chapter 208:

Bakugou calls Kamakiri a bug, saying, “I guess bugs do have quick reflexes!” He follows up with a muttered, “Quick at scampering away, too,” that is likely aimed at Kamakiri’s bug-ness as well.

Conversely, Tokage (in flashback) merely refers to Bondo as “big-boned,” which is true: Bondo has one of the largest frames of any of the first years.

Chapter 213:

Introduces the SIX QUIRKS!!1 element of the story. This has nothing to do with heteromorphobia per se, but I do think it’s somewhat interesting/telling that neither AFO nor OFA seem to much like heteromorphic quirks. Despite All Might implying rather strongly in Chapter 257 that OFA is a completely random assortment of weak-ish quirks,[8] accumulated from those who just happened to be there to help one another, every single quirk within it is an emitter-type. Likewise, all of AFO’s quirks are either emitter or transformation-types, with the only known exception being Ujiko’s Life Force—a heteromorphic quirk by sheer technicality, and one that does nothing whatsoever to shift the bearer’s needle away from baseline. Now, I can’t rightly accuse OFA of being heteromorphobic—again, it’s allegedly pure luck of the draw—but it is still worth comparing OFA’s train of 100% baseline prior bearers with the demographics of heroes, villains, and society in general. To wit, if heteromorphs—especially strongly divergent ones—trend more towards villainy compared to the population at large, perhaps there’s a reason there haven’t been any heteromorphs willing to reach out a hand to someone in need? There are other things I’ve posited about where heteromorphs tend towards gravitating in Hero Society that could be reflected in OFA’s composition, but it’s hard to theorize in greater depth without knowing more about the context of the OFA “passes.” o Did the bearers know their successors in advance, as seems to have been the case with almost all of them? Then it’s probably down to social groups, and we will see that heteromorphs often band together in times of social upheaval, which was the case for most of One For All’s span of existence. Perhaps the prior bearers simply weren’t close with any heteromorphs because heteromorphs were distrustful of baseline-types back then. (The bearers having pre-existing relationships would seem to conflict with All Might’s noble sentiments in 257 about the bearers not being chosen ones, but rather just people writhing in hell whose only capabilities were to receive OFA and to entrust it to another. This writer will humbly ask you to take that up with the man who decided to portray every single bearer barring Shinomori and Nana as having some indication of a relationship with their predecessor prior to the latter’s death.) o How visibly disruptive were the prior battles with AFO compared to the ones he has with Nana and All Might?[9] If they were very dangerous, that could explain there not being a lot of mid-rank, so-so power-wise heteromorphic heroes at the grounds zero of those battles. On the other hand, if they were very hidden, we’re back to the only people knowing and being present for a given bearer’s final battle being their own allies and possibly a random selection of cliquishness-prone bystanders. Of course, the most likely explanation is pure Doylist: Horikoshi didn’t want anything that would radically alter the design of his main character. Still, how hard would it have been to give even one of the bearers some kind of minor heteromorphic body trait like Koda’s weird head that wouldn’t have been a function of their quirk, and thus wouldn’t necessarily reflect itself on Deku’s body? (I can and will accuse AFO of being heteromorphobic as all get-out, however.)

Chapter 217:

A largely facetious note, this, but All Might has a small comment during his, Deku and Bakugou’s conversation wherein he tells Bakugou not to call Deku a dweeb. It’s the first and only time I can remember any teacher pushing back on Bakugou’s habit of assigning classmates derisive nicknames. I believe there are instances of both All Might and Aizawa telling Bakugou to calm down or ratchet back on his temper, but nothing more specific than that. As with Mineta’s sexual harassment, Bakugou’s heteromorphobic microaggressions go completely unrebuked, with All Might only protesting the nicknames when Bakugou insults All Might’s successor.

--------

Have you been enjoying these lengthy rambles? Do you want even more? Then come back next time for a special installment devoted to one arc and one arc only, the arc of my heart, my one true arc love: My Villain Academia.

------------------- FOOTNOTES -------------------

[1] C-C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER.

[2] For Kirishima’s efforts here, he’s told by his friends that he should stop butting his nose in where it doesn’t belong. Which is a hell of a thing to say to a guy trying to intervene with school bullying, but apparently that’s “old-fashioned.” This probably speaks less to heteromorph discrimination than it does to the civilian attitude towards helping others when one is not a hero, a point that would be more relevant to e.g. the essay defending Shigaraki’s philosophical points, rather than this one.

[3] Which is a Problem, given how much emotional load the series is going to try and saddle him with regarding Shouji, a character with whom he has zero established dynamic. But we'll get there, though this will probably still be off-topic even then.

[4] Not that, “Let Hound Dog off the chain,” would be any better in this circumstance.

[5] Insert, “RIP to him, but I’m different,” meme of choice.

[6] In the Japanese, tori nakama, lit. bird buddies/comrades.

[7] I keep specifying “animal-type” because of the incident early on with Sero and Mineta referring to Shouji as an octopus. All three heteromorphs, but only one with that extra distancing factor of having an animalistic quirk rather than a simply fantastical one.

[8] Because AFO “went around crushing the strong,” also per 257.

[9] I’m perennially vexed by the question of how serious AFO was being in those fights. The image of OFA being passed from bloodstained hand to hand is striking and all, but why would AFO be so freely trying to murder these people if he wanted OFA for himself? I have theories about this, but they’re getting pretty off-topic for this series of posts!

#bnha #heteromorph discrimination plot #bnha worldbuilding #bnha meta #my writing

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sanctus-ingenium · 1 year

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Can you tell us more about your horses? Are they part of a story? Love the creature design

boy are they

Félix - he's the main character of the 1860s cycle of the Inver setting. Well, one of three main characters. He's my take on the classic Victorian orphan story with a changelinegtwist, and ends up becoming a regular conman who mainly does door to door sales of bullshit snake oil and insurance scams. Also a master of pretending to be hit by a carriage. A falling out with his two best friends/boyfriends results in him trying and failing to make it on his own, and he gets captured by the Púca just as he's basically dying of exposure in the middle of winter. In return for saving his life, the Púca takes on Félix as a faery servant whose job is to feed his new master by tricking humans into falling into the barrow (the endless field in the Otherworld which is the Púca's territory). He tries to patch things up with his friends, only to find that five years have passed since his disappearance, and old arguments have become deep festering wounds. Neither do they believe that it's really him.

Yeah so as a horse(/shapeshifter) he's the youngest, he's spiky all the time, and he tries hard to hide that part of himself. He wants nothing to do with it. He's the one in my icon. Personality-wise he's a manipulative liar who would say anything to keep his friends at his side, even at their expense.

Macha was once in Félix's exact position - snatched up by the Púca who told her she was special, that she was its favourite. But that was hundreds of years ago now, and the Púca has a shiny new toy to play with. Macha has been abandoned and is slowly losing herself to the erosion of time, and the way she sees it, the best way to regain her former status is to take care of the Púca's newest pet.

Macha spends most of her time as a horse and can be distinguished by her long straight mane and tail. She cannot tell the truth no matter how hard she tries, and speaks mainly in riddles.

Puck is the Púca itself, a pure shapeshifter with no human origin, the original master of the field and Lord of Lies. It is intensely clever and loves to fuck with people, and particularly enjoys watching its own underlings fight for its attention. Puck never takes a human form and tends to appear slightly abstract or unreal, not like a flesh and blood creature, with a minimalist silhouette. I'll be honest I have rarely drawn Puck like ever because the whole point of it is fear of the unknown, and I don't feel strong enough artistically to depict it properly.

Pascal is the modern day equivalent of Puck and its de facto replacement as the master of the field. Pascal is nothing like Puck and likes to throw the whole kitchen sink into his appearance in an effort to seem flashy and intimidating. he is in love with his own face and that's why he tends to take his centaur form in a certain... direction. You can learn more about him including details about his origin and human disguise in my sketchbook all about him with like fifty unpublished drawings but basically he's just kind of a dipshit jerk with a massive ego who gets tamed by a bona fide horse trainer. He has a habit of abducting humans to psychologically torture them on his TV set, but he claims that not all of the abductions are his doing, and that, for some, he has been falsely accused...

Unicorn is Pascal's antagonist. It is mysterious and appears to live on or under the water of Lough Cánamac, the centre of magic in the country of Inver. Unicorns are not supposed to exist in this setting, let alone unicorns which might be the actual culprit behind the most brutal abductions

#setting: inver #the readmore went in the wrong place... it was supposed to go before the image

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sionisjaune · 9 months

Text

Part 2 of the problematic sebcedes polyamory by which i was consumed this afternoon:

The aftermath of the failed threesome is as follows: Seb spends Saturday evening watching Taskmaster with Lewis instead of dropping him off at Nico’s apartment, and he is awoken the following morning (read: the crack of dawn) by a spectacular blowjob. Lewis beckons him out of bed with promises of smoothie bowls and granola. Seb likes these things, but not as much as Lewis does. He wonders whether Nico gets this treatment when Lewis sleeps over there.

By 5:30 a.m., Seb and Lewis are on the way to the beach, Seb in the driver’s seat and Lewis blasting ENNY from the stereo speakers. When they arrive, Lewis changes into his tiny swim trunks behind the car, and Seb strips down to his boxers. It’s fucking freezing, and the sun is just peeking above the horizon. Seb shivers and wiggles his bare feet atop the sand while Lewis ties his hair back.

The polar bear plunge involves charging madly towards the tide with a few hundred other nutty participants and submerging one’s entire body in near zero degree water. Seb grabs Lewis’s hand and orients him towards the water. He can feel himself grinning. Lewis is already bouncing on the balls of his feet—he loves this shit too.

Seb and Lewis race down the beach, hand in hand, until the water is up to Seb’s waist, and he can practically feel his balls retracting into his body.

“Fuck, that’s cold!” Seb shouts over the sound of a hundred other freezing people shrieking.

Lewis giggles madly and pulls Seb under. He comes up sputtering and shuddering, but Lewis rewards him with a sub-zero kiss on the lips.

In the end, Seb has to drag Lewis out of the water and back to the car. He retrieves the emergency blankets from the trunk, and they cuddle up in the backseat with a thermos of mint tea.

“We should do this again next year,” Lewis says, knocking his head against Seb’s.

“I think my toes are going to fall off,” says Seb. Lewis snorts.

After the polar bear plunge, Seb savours a picturesque dinner with Lewis downtown before Lewis has to leave to start packing for a work trip. He wants to protest, but he knows it really will take Lewis most of a day to stuff his ridiculous, designer luggage. Lewis sends him a text when the plane is about to take off, and then five days later Seb is waiting in front of the airport to pick him up.

Seb helps him heave two suitcases and a compact duffel into the back before kissing him on the cheek. Lewis lingers in his arms for an extra second, his chin on Seb’s shoulder.

“I missed you,” says Lewis.

“Let’s stop at the pizza place you like,” Seb says.

Lewis pulls back with wide eyes. “Cauliflower crust?”

“Obviously,” says Seb.

Two days later, Seb is back at the airport, dropping Lewis off for the promised Bali trip. Nico is waiting at the gate with his own ridiculous mountain of luggage and giant, tinted sunglasses sliding down his nose. Lewis jogs happily into his arms while Seb lingers beside the rack of overpriced travel pillows.

Seb crumples the receipt for Lewis’s green juice in his fist, watching Nico and Lewis tow their suitcases towards the boarding area. Nico is literally intolerable—Seb can’t stand to be in a room with him. Speaking to him is like speaking to an ex that knows how to push all of his buttons and doesn’t hesitate to do so whenever it’s convenient for him. The only good part about it is that Nico doesn’t like him either, which prevents Seb from shouldering any guilt.

He walks back through the airport to get to his car and drive home. Roscoe greets him at the door, snuffling like a human with a severe sinus infection. Seb kneels to the floor to pat him on the head, and Roscoe flops on his back and wiggles gratefully, soliciting tummy rubs.

Seb used to have another partner—this was in the middle of Lewis, two-ish years ago—but he was younger and ultimately not interested in Seb’s lifestyle, so it ended. Still, it was nice to have someone living in his home.

Now it’s just Lewis. Seb is okay with that.

Seb and Lewis are in the car again, on the road to spend the weekend camping out in Joshua Tree. Lewis reserved the site he wanted six months ago and has been talking about it ever since. Seb convinced him to pack one suitcase instead of two, and made him promise they won’t break up during the fight that will inevitably happen while pitching the tent.

“If anyone would break up with anyone over a tent,” says Lewis, his elbow out the window, “it would be you breaking up with me. Not that I’m calling it, or anything.”

“Ha ha,” says Seb. “Wait until I tell you you can’t light candles inside the tent.”

“The tent is flame resistant,” says Lewis. “I checked.”

Seb shrugs, one hand on the wheel. “Sure. Let’s test it.”

Lewis snorts, and settles against the window. The dust from the road is floating inside the car, mixing with the afternoon sunlight to form a heavy haze. Lewis looks good in rugged conditions—as good as he does wrapped in fluffy bathrobes and slathered with shea butter.

“So,” says Lewis, turning his torso towards Seb. He really should wear his seatbelt correctly. “About two weeks ago. We didn’t talk about it… but that was objectively awesome sex, right?”

“Excuse me?” says Seb. It figures that Lewis would trap him in the car for this conversation. He blows out an overwhelmed breath. “It was… satisfying, in a certain respect.”

Lewis tilts his head and sucks on his lower lip. He has that wobble in his eyes like he isn’t very happy with what he’s being told. “You’re telling me that wasn’t the most intense, coordinated scene we’ve ever done?” Lewis rubs his temple. “Fuck, that was so hot, when both of you…” Lewis trails off and his thighs fall open a few extra centimetres. Seb wonders if he’s remembering the part where he and Nico fucked Lewis at once, both holes filled, or when Seb held Lewis down so that Nico could eat him out.

Seb chooses his words carefully. “It was a challenge,” he says. “There was a lot of negotiation that you didn’t see beforehand.”

“It was perfect,” says Lewis. Seb chances another look over at Lewis, spread across the passenger side. His smoothie and his kombucha occupy both cupholders, and he clipped an air freshener to the dash that smells like pina colada. “Thank you for doing it for me.”

Seb grips the steering wheel and forces his gaze back to the endless road. He can’t think of anything he wouldn’t do for Lewis, even if Nico were involved.

#next installment: lewis parent traps his partners because they want to fuck soooo bad #also lewis is vegan pixie dreamgirl in this i won't lie #sebcedes #i wrote this #problematic sebcedes polyamory

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etsuven · 2 years

Text

rating: fluff, slightly suggestive character: venti cw: none? idk, it does hint at a mini make out session in the end includes: petnames (sweetheart), so many kisses, lots of cute fluff that makes me jealous why can't this be me summary: today is your boyfriends' birthday! you spent a while planning for it, and you were determined to make this his best birthday yet!

note: OMG ITS VENTI'S BIRTHDAY AHBDHASDHSABD BEST CHARACTER IN THE GAMEM, AMFBASKJBD. anyways this is my long overdue venti fic because i miss writing for him (as i'm starting to write this, it's 12:53 AM. i will finish this on time >:( ). also technically this is a little… continuation (?) of my “venti gets really flustered when it comes to physical touch” post i made a longggggg while back :DDD

was i supposed to write for venti months ago??? maybeeee.... sorry if it's mediocre at best, like most of my fics it's completely improvised and none of this was planned out (i had a small idea of what i wanted but the overall feel wasn't planned) anyways, enough of that! onto the fic!!!!

today was a special day. why, you ask? it's venti's birthday!

now, venti normally wasn't the type to celebrate his birthday. he had gone through with it more times than he could really remember, so over the several... several hundred years, the day had begun to lose its meaning.

this doesn't mean that venti doesn't care about his birthday, he does! it just feels like a normal day to him. you couldn't accept that.

you had been dating venti for a while now, and whenever it was his birthday, you opted for simple stuff. a few bottles of his favorite wine from the winery, the freshest apples you could find... stuff like that. but you had planned a bit more this year.

the day began early with a quick kiss. venti had a performance scheduled at the angels share around noon, which gave you enough time to plan out everything you needed while you waited for him to finish. as much as you wanted him to stay (and as much as he wanted to stay in and lay around) you both knew that he had things to do, so you reluctantly sent him off with a small wave.

once he was gone, however, the sad pout on your face quickly morphed into excitement as you rushed back into your home to prepare for the day.

your plan was simple. use the time that was open while venti was away to prepare the best birthday ever! you had ingredients for many small foods, and you could only hope it was enough as your lover's appetite would probably be huge after his long performance.

you had around five hours to prepare everything, but what you didn't account for was how messy everything would be. there were ingredients everywhere, and you were rushing so much that you barely took the time to clean up.

luckily you realized around the halfway mark that there was no need to rush, and you could take your time doing whatever you needed to do until it was time for you to leave.

the last few hours passed quickly, and before you realized it, you were already on your way to angels share to pick your dear boyfriend up.

you opened the tavern door to find venti packing up, lyre in hand as he spoke to a few people around him. giving diluc a quick greeting, you closed the door behind you. venti must have heard you speak because he turned around, a wide smile on his face. he gave the people he was previously talking to a quick nod of the head before rushing over to you and giving you a big hug.

"(y/n)!, you're here!" venti squeezed you tightly, only pulling away when you let out a small cough. for someone as small as he was, he was quite strong. "how was your day? were you lonely without me?" taking his hand, you playfully rolled your eyes, leading him out of the tavern.

"my day was good, thank you for asking!" you laughed, remembering all the things you went through in these past few hours just for him. you didn't really care too much though, as you were certain that his reaction would be worth the pain you went through. "also, of course i was lonely without you! whatever would i do without your pretty voice!"

venti laughed, his ego clearly boosted by your comment. he was used to you saying things like this, as you often made it a habit to compliment him whenever you could. honestly, it was probably his favorite thing about you.

"well, i wouldn't be a very good bard without my voice, ehe! by the way, where are we going?" venti looked around, only now noticing that you weren't headed to your shared home. he looked at you last, and you tried your best to hide your facial expression. he was very smart, and if you let anything slip, he would probably figure out that you had something planned.

now that you thought about it, he had probably already connected the dots.

luckily however (and strangely enough) venti didn't ask any questions. he just walked with you, hands swinging as you made your way towards your final destination. over the next few minutes, you walked, listening to the chirping of the birds and the soft whistle of the wind as it blew past you.

suddenly, you heard venti let out a small gasp, and you looked over to find him staring back at you with a surprised look on his face. you smiled shyly, looking over to what had caught his attention.

under the big windrise tree was a large blanket. a picnic basket was set on top of it, along with a bag with something inside. you dragged venti towards the picnic setup, giggling as you sat him down in front of you.

"surprise!" you exclaimed, bouncing around in excitement. "i planned a picnic for you! you don't really celebrate your birthday often, so i tried my best to make this one as special as i possibly could! i hope it's good enough..."

suddenly, you felt shy. it was most likely a combination of nerves and the anticipation for his reaction that had you feeling this way. but venti's next words had you smiling happily.

"oh, it's more than good enough, it's wonderful!" he gave you a large smile, bringing your still intertwined hands to his lips. "so this is what you were planning? i had a small idea, but i didn't know it would be this!"

letting out an embarrassed laugh, you grabbed the basket, opening it and bringing out the main surprise. a fresh, handmade apple pie that was still quite warm (you had popped it into the oven for a bit before bringing it here, just so that it would be warm.)

you also pulled out a few other bags that had things like apple slices and sandwiches with and without cheese. personally you wouldn't choose apple pie and apples as picnic items, but this was venti you were talking about. apples were his favorite!

funny how he could eat apples upon apples but he draws the line at cheese. but you won't judge him. for now.

after venti got over the initial surprise at all of the food (you had continued to pull more and more things out of the basket, along with the most expensive dandelion wine diluc had to offer that you hid so venti wouldn't notice it too soon) he insisted that the two of you start eating.

you happily served the pie, and you spent the next few hours chatting. venti unsurprisingly loved the wine, but he held himself back so he wouldn't get too tipsy and finish the wine too soon.

before you knew it, the sun had started setting, and the sky was starting to change colors. you had been out here for quite a while. you and venti were now laying down on the blanket, shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand as you enjoyed the quietness of the area around you.

you took a quick glance towards your lover, admiring his side profile. he was as pretty as ever with a small smile on his face, perfect twin braids and hair framing his face. the slight little chub in his cheeks made you laugh softly, and your gaze trailed up to his eyes only to find him staring back at you. "you're staring."

you shrugged your shoulders at his comment, smiling and turning your body so you were facing him. "i know, but i can't help it. you're too pretty..." venti's eyes widened slightly, and he quickly looked away.

here's the thing about venti- only certain things can fluster him. he's told you this before, he's heard compliment after compliment, so everything you tell him has already been said. but there are some things that still go through to him, like this comment. a sincere few words combined with a soft smile had his stomach fluttering as if a thousand crystalflies had made their home there.

"don't say that..." he whispered. his cheeks were a bit more pink, and you couldn't tell if it was because of the wine or if he was embarrassed. sitting up on your elbows, you hovered over him, smiling at his flustered expression.

it definitely wasn't the wine.

"why not?" you asked, faking concern. you scooted further up slightly, placing your arm above his head as you used your other hand to touch his forehead. dragging your fingers across his skin, you brushed a few strands of hair away from his eyes, slowly trailing your fingers down until they reached his cheek. venti's eyes were now closed, his eyebrows twitching as he struggled to process the sensation.

leaning down, you pressed your forehead against his, your lips dangerously close to touching. "i can't tell you about how pretty you are?" feeling your forehead against his, the eyes of your lover opened, and you smiled in satisfaction as his breath hitched. he too had noticed just how close the two of you had gotten.

now that you were closer, you could see that venti's cheeks had become a darker shade of pink, an adorable color that suited him quite well. the soft press of his hands against the sides of your neck and a small whisper made you look back into his eyes, which averted once you made eye contact.

"what was that, sweetheart?" you whispered back, pinching his cheek softly as a small way to keep him grounded. venti shyly looked back you, making you smile comfortingly as you waited for him to speak again. a second or two passed before the words left his mouth, and you swear you felt your heart melt. "kiss me?"

letting out a small laugh, you leaned down, connecting your lips for a bit before pulling away. or at least you tried to, but venti's hands pulled you down for another kiss. and another, and another... you really didn't mind though- you'd give him as many kisses as he wanted. because, well...

who were you to deny the birthday boy?

i did in fact finish this on time! it is now 2:36 AM as i am starting to write this part, and i feel great! happy birthday to the best character in the game i'm not biased- i. am. RIGHT. this has to be my favorite fic because so much of my love for venti went into it, i didn't get bored ONCE because i was too busy making it PERFECT for you guys so i hope you enjoyed it!

this is my venti appreciation post because i will never get as lucky as i did when i first got him (aka march 29th 2021 literally minutes after getting my account back from getting hacked, he came home in three ten pulls <3) literally i would have never gotten through the abyss without him i'm pretty sure he's literally the reason why i got past the last few floors of the first part of the abyss.

i would say goodnight but knowing me i’ll be up for another hour i should probably fix my sleep schedule. but anyways byeeee!!!

#genshin #genshin impact #venti x reader #genshin fluff #genshin fanfic #genshin impact venti #genshin smut #genshin impact smut #venti #venti smut #genshin venti #genshin headcannons #genshin scenarios #genshin venti fluff #genshin venti x reader

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hourcat · 7 months

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okay so i wrote this for kinktober, which you can find on ao3 here, but i really lit my lizard brain on fire with this one so i have to post it here too.

au where pierre is a deity banished to earth for being self-absorbed and charles is an artist that comes to find him.

Pierre has been doing this for hundreds of years—literally. Cursed to live among mortals until he learns to see past the glisten of his own reflection, he’s been trapped in a human body in the southernmost tip of Italy for five hundred and twelve years, now, learning no lessons and choosing instead to work at his craft: sculpture.

It’s a difficult time, these days, to recreate the world how it’s meant to be. Pierre has watched societies form and collapse around him. He’s been famous, he’s been reviled, he’s been forgotten entirely by the human race from his island just off the coast of Sicily. There is nothing he hasn’t witnessed. He has all the perspectives, from all sides.

Yet even with all that knowledge, it is still a lonely existence, even if Pierre can never admit to it. His brothers visit every so often: Alex and George sometimes, Yuki more often than he’d ever admit to, but it’s mostly to beg him to leave his thickheadedness behind and atone so that he can return home, where the rest of their godlike people are. (Yuki will sometimes spend longer with him. It feels like when they were young, before the world had formed and they were at the seat of creation. The nights where he departs Pierre’s company are some of the worst.) No mortal has ever piqued his interest long enough to matter, and he’s sworn himself off of human lovers after the last one went so south—a young man with dark hair and dark eyes, a smile that looked foolish but hid sharp intellect that Pierre had wanted nothing more than to devour.

But that was long ago. Pierre was young, then, and still hopeful that his punishment would end, and he’d lost everything he’d built to that point as the young man…disappeared, the way all mortals do.

He’d retreated into carving stone shortly after that, and it’s carried him through his miserable, endless existence for all this time since. A statue cannot cure loneliness, but it can at least mask some of the abysmal despair that comes with not being known. Every creation Pierre has ever carved carries a piece of him, somehow—when he looks at them, he feels a glimmer of what he does when Yuki returns to him, bright eyed and sharp-tongued and infinite.

It's a solitary life. Pierre hates it, but it’s a hate that’s grown old and brittle. There’s more acceptance in his heart than ever that this will be where he spends the rest of eternity: a small, solitary island, a house full of statues, and a heart so empty that the sea breeze whistles through it at night.

At least.

It’s solitary until he hears a loud banging at his front door one indistinguishable afternoon, from the knockers he’d built shortly after first arriving. They’re grandiose: heavy, bronze, polished perfectly the way all godly metals shine. It’s…been a very long time since anyone has touched them. He lurches from the couch he’s curled up on, torn from slumber at the loud, heavy noise that rings through his cavernous hall. There’s no way it’s an accident—the wind is not strong enough to shake them, and no traveler would even be able to seek out his home for refuge from a storm from the enchantment cast upon it. You must live in the world, Pierre, to come home to us. A cruel sort of thing. He’d never quite understood it.

Begrudgingly, he shuffles to the doors and swings one open—

—only to find a young man, surely no older than twenty-five, staring up at him with wide green eyes and a mess of dark hair. He’s…picturesque.

Pierre has no idea how he’s found his way here. “What do you want,” he says flatly, crossing his arms out of instinct.

But the young man doesn’t respond—at least not at first. His face lights up when he hears Pierre speak, like he’s never heard a sound in his life before. “You are…” the boy is Italian, or has been here long enough to let it flow into him. “I did not know you were from here.” He sounds awed. A small, small part of Pierre preens at the tone of it—at how good it feels to be admired, even just for a moment. But it doesn’t last, as the reminder that this boy should not have been able to find him sinks back in. Any breath of amusement in his heart is gone.

“What do you want,” he repeats. There’s no godly tone in him anymore, not after losing the last of his will to return ages ago, but this is the closest he’s felt to it in a long time.

The boy cowers for a moment but doesn’t look away. “I want to learn,” he says after a long moment of thought, and then…sticks his hand out, as if trying to greet him. “My name is Charles Leclerc, and I came here to be your apprentice.” He sounds remarkably confident for a human. Pierre looks at him, then glances down at his hand, and then back to his face, which is still blindingly earnest…and then erupts in laughter. Apprentice? Pierre has lived alone on this island for centuries and he’d never once thought he would want an apprentice with him to keep him company. There is no room for a human in this house, no matter how large it is.

The boy—Charles—scowls at his amusement and drops his hand, but stands resolutely in his doorstep. “I’m serious,” he insists, “I have learned from the best my whole life and I was told to find you to further my teachings.”

Pierre stops laughing, perhaps the first kind thing he’s done in decades, and leans in his doorframe. “You think you can learn from me,” he says slowly. “Charles Leclerc, you would not last an evening in my palace, let alone an entire apprenticeship.”

Charles doesn’t flinch, though. “I think you underestimate me,” he retorts, and then crosses his arms in an amusing mirror of Pierre’s own stance. “If you have such little faith in me, Pierre Gasly, where is the harm in letting me try?”

Truth be told, Pierre has been getting a little bit bored of his latest sculpting project—a triad of angels, fingers twined as they stand in a circle—and had been contemplating returning to land for a few days, whether to fuck or to fight still to be determined. This could be entertainment, at the very least. He won’t even have to leave his own home.

“Okay,” he concedes, then grins as the boy’s expression brightens immeasurably. “Charles Leclerc, be careful what you wish for. This island does not release people back into the world once they step foot in here.”

Pierre would never admit this to his face, but Charles is…good. For a human, anyway. He’s got a light touch and an expansive mind, and the pictures of his work that he’d brought in his portfolio are beautiful. Elegant, painstakingly detailed, all full of sorrow. He’s got a keen eye for detail, too—the first three nights Charles spends, he wanders Pierre’s seemingly endless hallways of sculptures, past and present, complimenting and analyzing each with a remarkable amount of skill.

Art school, or whatever. That’s what he says. Pierre thinks he’s being humble, but that’s neither here nor there.

“Pierre,” Charles says as they walk by the first installment of his mourning collection—a woman, knelt under her veil with her hands outstretched. He stills in front of it. “This is beautiful. I cannot—the veil looks so real, you can make out her facial expression as if she were living and breathing now.” He’s awed again.

Pierre needs to stop enjoying that so much. “I have been doing this for a long time,” is his answer, which is certainly more modest than he’d thought he’d want to be.

Charles laughs, a quiet little sound. “I can see,” he murmurs. Then, turning to face Pierre: “how long did this take you?”

It takes a moment for his memory to reach that far back—to the time he spent pouring his heart over this woman, to being her, to wanting to make love to her and then wanting her to swallow him up in her arms. He’d lavished each of this first group of creations with the same grieving attention, but her…

“Oh, a hundred years or so, give or take.” A rough estimate, really. He’s not in the business of exactness anymore. Time has forgotten him, so he simply returns the favor.

Charles just stares at him for a long beat, then dissolves into laughter that’s…sweet, almost. Disbelieving, as if he thinks Pierre’s just tried to tell a joke. Mortals always struggle with the concept of immortality, anyway. So he goes with it: chuckles along with Charles, nods and gestures for them to move to the next sculpture that the boy will undoubtedly devour with the same intensity that kept Pierre up the first night.

He'd journeyed to find Pierre in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. He’d gotten onto the island without help, he’d stood on Pierre’s doorstep without fear, and he’s got the mind of a scholar with the face of a child. Pierre doesn’t understand him.

He’s never understood humans, so he shouldn’t be surprised, but something about this one in particular is getting the better of him in a way he can’t express.

Perhaps his brothers are right. Maybe he’s spent too long away from the world he belongs in. Maybe it’s time to try and come home.

Twenty days in—because somehow, Charles Leclerc has survived ten whole days twice being Pierre Gasly’s apprentice—he asks it.

“Are you ever lonely?” He’s perched in front of the block of marble Pierre had retrieved from deep in his cellar, playing absentmindedly with the chisel tool in his hand as he stares at the barely-chipped surface he’s been working at.

Pierre, who’s watching him work with half-interest and half-annoyance, blinks at the question. It is strange, to have someone else here. “What?”

“Are you, you know.” Charles gestures vaguely with the pick, shrugs. “There is no one else here, and you seem very…introverted.”

Pierre snorts. “So you noticed,” he deadpans, and Charles squeaks a laugh. Even from the distance between them, Pierre knows his apprentice is flush with embarrassment. “How can I be lonely, when there are all these people here with me?” Charles turns back with a raised brow only to watch as Pierre gestures to the array of art surrounding them, hundreds of men and women and children, strangers and yet more familiar than almost any relationship Pierre has had in five hundred years.

Charles laughs, then turns back to the sculpture at hand. He taps once at the sleek pale stone. “I guess that makes sense,” he muses, and then delivers another neat tap, angling his wrist carefully like he’s seeing the finished product here and now. There’s another long stretch of silence as he works. Pierre just watches him. It’s a first, really: for all the time he’s spent here, all the art he’s created, he’s never sat down and just observed. His earliest sculptures, born out of rage and inhibitions, had been crass and ugly, and he’d bought work after work to learn the planes and lines and curls of a human face. He’d once even brought a teacher into his home to observe him creating, although that engagement had been short-lived.

Sitting here, watching Charles, Pierre finds himself caught up in it—in the beauty of what they’re doing, in the elegance. Somewhere at the back of his mind, he knows Charles is here to learn from him, but right now…right now, Pierre just wants to see what happens next. They can work through the night later.

“I don’t know how you do it,” Charles murmurs after a while. He’s made a little progress, but it’s nothing substantial. From his seat, he swivels around to face Pierre, face so painted with raw emotion it almost makes the god recoil. “Spend so much time here and not feel lonely.” He sighs. “Even when I sculpt at home, I feel it. I—” he falters, then carefully sets down the tools in his hands and stands up, too-quick, clearly more moved than he’d realized. “I’m going to run to the bathroom,” he says quickly, and then scurries off, leaving Pierre alone once again in the expanse of his studio.

He can never admit to the loneliness, lest of all to a human. But it’s there—it’s always there, it…

Funny. It’s not where he left it last.

Three months in, Charles breaks into the wine cabinet Pierre’s left in the dust for the last two hundred years.

Admittedly, it’s not like Pierre was ever planning to drink it, but when he returns from his evening walk on the rocks, he returns to Charles, red-faced and clutching a bottle of what has to be two hundred- and fifty-year-old wine and giggling as he stumbles across the floor, the epitome of delight.

“I see you’ve been enjoying yourself,” Pierre says—he’d been aiming for a sharper tone but it’s come out all wrong, too soft in places he’s kept hardened for ages. For all the accusations of possessiveness that his brothers and sisters once cast upon him, he can’t seem to will any of it up now. Instead, he laughs as Charles hiccups while trying to formulate an answer.

“I…finished the butt.” His expression, which had twisted up in focus trying to string his sentence together, dissolves into giggles once again. He takes a step towards Pierre, reaching to likely drag him to the studio to see, but he loses his footing and almost lands on his ass in the process.

Pierre catches him—sort of. He’s never been the fastest of his siblings, but he’s faster than a human, which means he’s at Charles’ side in a moment to steady him and his unbelievably old bottle of wine before anything gets on the floor. Charles is too drunk to do anything but continue laughing. The heat of his body is steady against Pierre’s side, firm in a way that makes him remember what life used to be like at the very beginning, when he wasn’t afraid to offer pieces of his heart in exchange for pleasure.

“You finished the butt,” he murmurs in Charles’ ear, and Charles squeaks another laugh before turning to press his face in Pierre’s shoulder, clearly out of his own head from the drink. His giggling continues, a pleasant vibration against Pierre’s body, and Pierre…finds himself relishing it unexpectedly. He loops an arm around Charles’ waist, presses a hand to his back for a moment before helping him untangle himself from their startlingly-intimate embrace. Charles has touched him maybe twice before this. Does now make it three times, if their bodies never quite stop touching as Charles leads him to the studio? Pierre’s not certain.

Charles finished the butt of his sculpture, and has passed out on the couch that Pierre used to spend days wallowing on, and the inexplicable thing lodged in his throat practically doubles in size. He’s been alone for three hundred years, yet the feeling settled deep in the pit of his stomach seems ancient.

Things come to a head a few weeks later. Charles shouts for him in the studio from across the house, clearly aware that Pierre has trained his ears to reach every corner of this place—when Pierre comes running, concerned that something has happened, he finds Charles standing with his arms crossed in front of the stone he’s working at. It’s partially formed, an ass and the start of defined thighs, but it’s still woefully blockish at the front.

Where it matters.

“Pierre,” he says, “I need your help.” There’s a tone in his voice that makes Pierre light up, somehow—like he's settled here. Like he believes he belongs here, too. Pierre can’t disagree with the sentiment.

“Ah,” he answers instead, “so we’re no longer using formality, Mr. Leclerc?”

Charles rolls his eyes, although Pierre doesn’t miss the blush that starts to build on his cheeks. “Maestro,” he corrects, “I need your help.” A huff. “Please?” It’s ridiculous that he even tries to use his sweet doe eyes to get anything, since Pierre has more of an upper hand than he’ll ever know, but…

Pierre still acquiesces, because somehow it feels like the thing he needs to do. “What do you need, Charles,” he hums, wandering over to observe what his apprentice is working with. He's sure he could assist with rethinking the angle that Charles is going with, and if they need to start from scratch with a new block, Pierre has no qualms helping him get back to this point—

"Will you pose for me?" There's that confidence again. Pierre admires it, even if it's misplaced in his ask here. He chuckles at the question, waves a hand dismissively.

"I will bring you to the mainland," he answers, "and you can find your subject there, Charles." There are plenty of humans who would pose naked for him, especially him: he's beautiful in an innocent way, a way that makes Pierre want to raze him to the ground with his tongue and teeth. There's no shortage of men who would throw themselves at him.

"No," Charles says flatly, and that makes Pierre glance up from where he'd been half-admiring the work. Pierre raises a brow. "No, I—" he stops for a moment to take a shaky breath, but again here he is, standing in Pierre's face, fearless. "I want you," he finally says, firm and resolute in the same way he'd been on the doorstep on his very first day.

And, truthfully, it's not hard to see through his intentions. Pierre knows his gaze has flickered down to the crotch of his sweatpants several times—couldn't miss it for anything, the way Charles looks so determined to see Pierre, as he is, beneath the man he's been for all this time.

His master. Charles is his apprentice, and Pierre is his master, and yet the proposition has gone completely over its heels. Charles wants to have sex with him.

Pierre is surprised to find that his resistance to human lovers is nowhere to be found as he takes a few cautionary steps forward into Charles' space. "You want me," he repeats back, and Charles nods weakly. The admission makes Pierre laugh, although there's not an ounce of cruelty in it to be found. "Charles," he warns quietly, voice barely a whisper as they come face-to-face, almost chest-to-chest. "Nothing good will come of this." It's the truth, one that Pierre knows deep down. Somehow, he feels that he owes Charles that.

"Don't care," Charles answers back. His voice is shredded already. He leans forward to try and catch Pierre in a kiss but Pierre leans back, avoiding him easily.

"This will only damage your work, ma belle," he hums. It's a wonder as to why he's dragging this out, because this is pleasure in a way he hasn't had in ages…and then it hits him, all of a sudden, that Charles matters. He matters in ways that no human ever has before. "It will ruin the integrity of this place, and of your apprenticeship—"

"I do not care," Charles interrupts, voice pitched. "It is—Pierre, it is all about you anyway, it has—it has always been about you, the work cannot be ruined now if it already has been." He's devastatingly earnest. Pierre knows this look, this voice, would spear a thousand men back home. No lover he's ever taken has given him this, whatever it is: Charles is gripping the hem of his ratty work tee, and he's leaning close again, and Pierre…Pierre can't deny him.

Pierre is a god. To this mortal, he is a god, and yet he is helpless to him entirely. Something about his apprentice has wormed its way into his heart, filled the carved-out space that's hollowed him out for half a millennium. It's barely been six months. A blink of an eye to him, utterly unfathomable.

Pierre crushes their mouths together, forceful yet cautious despite the trembling need that he can feel building in the young man pressed up against him. He's almost shaking. If Pierre had seen this at the start, when Charles had first found him, maybe he'd laugh: call him a dog, remind him that humans do not belong in the presence of such godly beings like this. But here and now, he's only caught up in feelings of…affection. One arm slides around his waist to tuck him close to Pierre's body, the other gently angling his head for another deep kiss.

"If we do this," Pierre whispers, voice barely-there, "it will be by my rules. You will follow my lead." Charles moans against him. His whole body shivers as he shifts even closer, the trembling of desire wholly unmistakable. It moves through Pierre enough to make him wonder if this is what all humans feel when swallowed in bliss. "Say you understand, petit."

"I follow you," he repeats back faintly after a long, breathless pause. "Always." There's a flicker of something like devotion in his eyes. Pierre hasn't seen that for almost five hundred years. He doesn't know, and yet he does.

I will bed him, he promises to himself, and then does. Charles lands easily on his too-large mattress, a statuesque tangle of pale limbs and freckles and soft lines that drive Pierre, for perhaps the first time in his immortal life, utterly speechless. The way his legs fall open so easily feels like glory. Pierre is between them immediately, two spit-slick fingers tucking inside him effortlessly as Charles sobs from the pleasure. His sheets, silken and pristine and untouched for so long, tangle between the human's fingertips with each flex and stretch.

l will ruin him, Pierre thinks, and a cruel streak of pleasure ricochets through him at that. He will never take another lover after me. To be loved by a god is the pinnacle of human existence, after all, he knows. Charles will never want to leave. He crooks his fingers and Charles makes a sound Pierre hasn't heard for what feels like a lifetime.

"Please, Pierre," he sobs, body curling as Pierre works his fingers deep once again. "Please, please, I—"

"What did I say, Charles," he interrupts softly, brushing his lips to Charles' jaw and then biting his bottom lip softly, then sinking into it more. "You will do as I tell you, nothing more, nothing less."

Charles, trembling, just nods. Then, as his lips part: "Y-yes, maestro." It's breathy, faint, and yet it sounds like thunder in Pierre's now-hungry mind. Maestro. Master. Charles doing as he's told always, even here as he's practically bent in half from lust under Pierre's body.

There has not been a mortal in his bed for a very long time. And as Charles shudders and moans when Pierre breaches him, languorously slow and steady, there's a small part of him that believes that he may be the last. Even as he sniffles and gasps from the stretch of Pierre in his wound-tight body, he reaches for him—eyes ablaze through tears, body arching, whimpering between sobs. He wants this.

Pierre fucks him mercilessly, until he's weeping with sensation, and thinks: if my brothers do not come for me, I could learn to live like this.

#piarles #10 x 16 #fic #AU tag #ive been thinking about this all day on GOD

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