#FERAL FON FOR THE WIN

[rejectedfables]

Do you mind if I ask your top 10 favorite characters (can be male or female) from all of the media that you loved (can be anime/manga, books, movies or tv series)? And why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before.....Thanks...

Character: Draco Malfoy (HP) Why I love them: I don't. I love the version of him I frankensteined together from fics I read/wrote as an undiagnosed autistic preteen who wished I knew how to be meaner, and was hopelessly demisexually gay for a brunette with glasses.

Character: Uzumaki Naruto (Naruto) Why I love them: Emotionally neglected ADHD powerhouse who thinks "what do 600 hot girls look like? Me with titties and pigtails 600 times obviously" followed by "what do 600 hot boys look like? All my male friends with bedroom eyes OBVIOUSLY" and somehow hasn't figured out he's into dudes and is probably genderfluid. The Haku and Zabuza arc came SO close to "child soldier figures out that making children into soldiers is bad, actually, and resolves to create a better society where fewer people needlessly suffer" but then I think the author got old and forgot his own trajectory in favor of endless spectacle creep and, idk, something about the moon crushing Konoha or whatever. I lost interest in the story, but not the BOY. Also his relentless fixation with that dark haired cool guy he kissed one time makes every other character feel awkward, and I relate to that.

Character: Urameshi Yusuke (Yu Yu Hakusho) Why I love them: LOVE me a guy who even HEAVEN writes off as an irredeemable asshole surprising everyone with an act of selflessness. Love me an asshole who dedicates his life to love and friendship. Yusuke's narrative is basically "Obviously all yokai are evil. Wait, some aren't (some of my best friends are yokai)? Wait, most aren't (I actually really enjoy the yokai world/community)? Wait, I'M a yokai? (THAT'S why I am the way I am, and actually that's not evil it's just different)??? So there's evil humans AND evil yokai but neither are inherently bad, MOST are just regular people on both sides, and both are worth protecting" and anyway this is a neurodivergent and queer allegory to me, which slaps severely.

Character: Shi Qingxuan (Heaven Official's Blessing) Why I love them: Gender

Character: Luke Fon Fabre (Tales of the Abyss) Why I love them: Nobody's doing character growth like this little shit. An icon. It takes like 30 hours of gameplay for him to become likable and when he does it's somehow genuinely worth it.

Character: Changheng (Love Between Fairy and Devil) Why I love them: (I'm picking only one character per story, which is the only reason Xiao Lanhua and Dongfang Qingcang aren't also on this list.) You're telling me the God of War's narrative is a "tragic princess, betrothed since childhood, can't escape her family's expectations, constantly has to put everyone else above herself, until finally she snaps" story blended with "man who has been forced to live in war, falls for the first person who acknowledges that he, too, needs protection, ultimately rejects the violence he's been forced to endure and enact in favor of pursuing peace" and I'm what? NOT supposed to go insane? Also his nose freckle gives me heart palpitations.

Character: Logan Echolls (Veronica Mars, specifically season 1) Why I love them: What an excellent example of a badly coping shithead jerk fuckup boy who would be SO soft in any context where he's not under constant threat. Something about his mouth-breathing under duress compels me.

Character: Kyo (Fruits Basket) Why I love them: Badly coping under duress, the entire system is stacked against him, anger management issues and the snatched waist of a 90's manga twink. What can I say, a feral cat finding stability and love gets me every time.

Character: Xue Yang (MDZS) Why I love them: Irredeemable asshole feral cat ass man, coping badly at all times with all things but holding it together with a winning personality (gratuitous violence and bad jokes). Falls SO hard for the first person to show him love and kindness, becomes SO soft when not under threat for the first time ever, and then fucks up SO badly he ruins his whole fucking life. Spends more time trying to get back what he lost than he actually HAD what he lost. He's irredeemable. He's irredeemable. He makes apple rabbits for A Qing because she's sad. He's irredeemable. He doesn't pull a weapon on Xingchen even when Xingchen has already stabbed him and he's renowned for violence and revenge. He's irredeemable. I starting writing a post in his defense and hit the character limit halfway through my 'notes to flesh out later' bullet pointed list. He's irredeemable?? Xiao Xingchen could, though, is all I'm saying. The deeper you look into his actions the more humanity there is to find. I'm rotating every single thing about him in my mind like a rotisserie chicken.

Character: Chu Wanning (ERHA) Why I love them: He's hopelessly demisexually gay for literally just one guy. His story is gratuitously tragic but with a happy ending. Autistic Yearning incarnate. He's a burnt out husk of a blushing virgin, and the horniest person alive. Would readily die for his convictions, but won't ask for help. Prettiest wife anyone could ever wish for, with a strong masculine jaw. Total knockout gorgeous with body dysmorphia. Hyper competent with zero emotional intelligence. Widely respected and beloved with intense self loathing. He's never not masking. He's an atticked wife, he's a bossy husband, he's a piece of wood. He's 45. He's 6. He's 20. He's 32. He is catnip for me.

[hopeswriting]

[ID: A golden, throne-like chair, with a red curtain behind it. It’s partly in color, and partly in black and white. The picture reads, “Even Rome Fell Chap. 3″ in all caps. /END ID]  

Byakuran walks right into The Eye of Fon's Storm, and is powerless when it tears him apart.

Ao3 & Ff.net

WIP INTRO

Also here’s the 400ish (platonic) 1827 words I cut because this chapter isn’t about them asdfgh:

*

Kyoya dies.

Millefiore surrounds the Vongola headquarters, but Sawada Tsunayoshi doesn’t surrender. He doesn’t try for negotiations, doesn’t ask for a ceasefire.

Sawada Tsunayoshi tears through Millefiore’s forces, breaking down their siege in a blaze of Sky flames. His Guardians stand right by his side, burning strong as their Sky, destroying everything in their path dutiful as their Sky.

The battlefield shines the colors of the rainbow, and it’s a terrifying sight, it’s history being made.

(“You do not make Vongola your enemy,” older mafiosi warn the newbies in search of glory. “You’ll see them come if you do. When the Vongola Rainbow will first shine for you, you’ll be nothing but a dead man walking.”)

It’s six against many more, not that it does matter—it doesn’t.

It’s only six of them.

That’s how the world knows one of Vongola Decimo’s has fallen—and not just anybody, but one of His. The Vongola Tenth Generation soaks a battlefield with blood, and wherever the Cloud is at the time, he doesn’t.

That’s how everyone knows.

Vongola Decimo lost his Cloud.

There're no survivors on Millefiore’s side, apart from the few he spared, the ones tasked to bring the tale home.

Not that Tsuna cares about psychological warfare, about Byakuran fearing the day he’ll come for him every second of every day until he does.

His Cloud simply loved his victories when they couldn’t be denied in any way.

The tides of the war change as the mafia all over the world rides on Neo Vongola Primo’s flames, fights back against Millefiore with their Dying Will the strongest it had ever been.

It’s not vengeful flames, not really. It is a slaughter, of the likes Primo never did, carried by Sky flames burning the way Secondo’s did, deep and ruthless.

It’s not wrath either, not really.

Neo Vongola Primo picks off the Millefiore’s men one by one, a line between his brow the likes of torment, his fists clenched as if in pain.

The Flames of Grief.

Vongola Decimo commands a Millefiore’s hunt worldwide, and it’s history being made.

(“You do not take what is Vongola Decimo’s,” Vongola enemies warn each other, because going against the famiglia is one thing, and going against Decimo himself another entirely. “His Sky flames will howl and hunt for your blood, and they’ll turn you to ashes before you can even scream.”)

Kyoya dies, and Byakuran doesn’t know it yet at the time, but it’s when he dies too.

*

Thanks for reading!