#God... but what could have been if they cared enough to preserve what the original had in terms of gameplay | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

spacedace · 2 years ago

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Reluctant War AU Part 3

Part 1 Part 2

More of the brain worm that has taken me over, gonna probably post it to Ao3 here before too long. Already got another part started and so many ideas for additional stuff, someone please send help I've been consumed by this thing lol

Sorry if Waller seems out of character, outside of fandom I'm mostly familiar with her through Justice League the animated show & Justice League: Unlimited and her vibe there has always struck me as "deeply incredibly unlikable character that also kind of has a point but also has done so much fucked up shit in the name of her goals that you don't really care about her point anymore." So you know, complicated lol. If she's completely unrecognizable let me know, but I'm hoping she feels at least somewhat like Waller.

Forgot to say this in the last update, but still feel free to use all this as an overly long prompt if yall want. Literally anything I throw out to the void should be treated as a prompt lol If there's anything at all interesting to you in any of this nonsense go for it <3 <3 <3

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Amanda Waller was someone who did what needed to be done.

Ruthless, heartless, vicious, cruel.

She’d been called it all. Wore the words thrown as insults as a badges of pride and valor. Because at the end of the day, when it came to the problems she was given to face, the issues she was meant to solve, those words meant she’d done what others had been too squeamish or cowardly to do. Life was a never ending slog of trolley problems and she the only one unshakable enough to pull the levers that needed pulling.

It wasn’t so simple as a matter of greater good.

Greater good was what the weak willed muttered to themselves after having feelings over doing the bare minimum. A justification used by people on all sides to do what they wanted with fractured, faulty logic thrown around like truth was a thing immutable. To assuage their guilt when they were forced to make a call they didn’t want to.

It wasn’t a matter of greater good. It was a matter of preservation. Of protection. Of digging through the filth to find the threats skittering beneath and crush them with ruthless abandon. Of facing a god and not blinking because if you did it could cost the world.

Of doing what needed to be done, no matter how underhanded or atrocious it was.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands wrapped tight around the throat of something that could threaten to destroy it all.

When the Ghost Investigation Ward had been shoved her way with it’s sucking wound of a budget, it’s bloated incompetent staff, its asinine methods she’d seen a rotted limb in need of hacking off. It hadn’t been until she’d been conducting her inspection, digging through the trash for a few pearls of effective agents she could snatch up and put to work elsewhere, that she’d truly seen what they were working on. The potential.

Potential to better arm themselves with in the forms of the strange new weapons being created.

Potential for threats far greater than anything even she had thought possible before.

The GIW as it had been when she’d first come across it was a fetid waste of time and resources. A laughing stock agency only secret because no one took them seriously enough to look. Made stupid and useless with its own conceited delusions of importance it didn’t actually have. Yet.

She went to work on it. Hacking away as she’d originally intended, but this time with a different goal in mind. She ripped out the weeds with bare, calloused hands and planted proficiency and loyalty in their place. She took over as director herself, tossing the self-aggrandizing fool that had been running the place into the ground to the dogs as the culprit for misappropriate spendings, saving the agency by tweaking things until their ballooning budget was pinned neatly onto the former director as an embezzling charge.

Then she got to work.

The Fentons were brilliant, if entirely insane. But Amanda could work with that. She’d reigned Harley Quinn in - more or less - she could do the same to the two deranged scientists that so eagerly wanted to be apart of the fight against the dead. Especially when the benefit came in the form of the inventions they threw together so easily, especially when those inventions were weapons.

It took very little to get them on board with her plans for the GIW. Keeping their focus could be a chore, at times, but she didn’t even have to really do much in the way of pressing to get them back where she wanted them. They craved knowledge and understanding nearly as much as they craved the eradication of the entities themselves. Letting them have the first look at a new subject here, free reign over a vivisection there, it took so little to fuel their fervor and keep them busy working on the projects she set for them.

Things had been going smoothly.

For a time at least.

Until Phantom.

He’d been the main focus of the previous director’s attention, the big fish he’d so desperately wanted to catch and put up on his wall. Amanda wouldn’t lie and say it wasn’t a tempting prospect, but not one she’d put above the other projects she had set in motion since taking over. No, Phantom was powerful, enough to be a real problem one day, but she could the awkward youth in the way he held himself, the inexperience in how he handled situations. She had time to get everything else in order before focusing on getting Amity Park’s would-be hero brought to heel.

And he would be brought to heel. One way or another.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands wrapped tight around the Core of a fledgling god and bending him to her will.

An artifact, old an powerful, recovered with some effort. A means of controlling specters, of chaining them to the will of the artifact’s wielder. Dangerous in the wrong hands. Dangerous in the right hands.

It was shattered, and even whole and functional Phantom was resistant to its power. But Amanda Waller prided herself in her ability to see the potential in things. It could be repaired, be made better. Even gods could be bound, be made to kneel, with the right pieces, with the right application of force.

It was just a matter of time to gather everything needed.

Phantom didn’t know he could single handedly destroy every last member of the Justice League. The baby fat, the innocent eyes, the split-second hesitations when he fought. He knew enough to be confident in fighting the usual ghosts that haunted Amity Park, but he still very much saw himself as a little fish. Maybe it was the part of him that was still Daniel Fenton, gangly teenager not quite sure what he was truly capable of yet.

She had time before the Fenton’s son truly became an issue. Time to judge if his parents’ obsessiveness would overcome their - rather shoddy, by Amanda’s estimation - parental instincts and continue to hunt him once they knew the truth. Time to get as much out of them as she could before hand, should they falter at the idea of attacking their own son. Time for the staff to be repaired and returned to working order, to get the other items needed for the truly big fish hidden on the other side of the veil between worlds.

She had time.

Until she didn’t.

Pariah Dark had not been something she thought she’d have to account for - not yet, at least.

If he wasn’t already dead, she’d ring the Ghost King’s neck with her bare hands. His arrival had opened Phantom’s eyes to what he was capable of, of just how big of a fish he was. Worse still, Phantom’s defeat of the war mongering King changed the state of play. Phantom was no longer an impressively powerful half dead teenager.

He was King Infinite.

He was an Ancient.

He was getting on her last damn nerves.

Phantom’s rogue gallery were now firmly under the boy’s control. Still distinct nuisances around Amity Park, but no longer considered true concerns. They were loyal to their boy king, delighting in ruffling his feathers but never crossing the line into treason or attempted regicide. Which meant that the GIW was the only thing that held his attention.

Amanda took the time to send a care package to the former GIW director in his tiny, dank prison cell. As thanks for his carelessness in revealing to the entire town - both living and dead - of the agency’s existence and their intentions. Had he stuck to standard protocol, Phantom would have been none the wiser to their presence. Would have scratched his head and shrugged his shoulders at the ghost that went missing upon occasion. Would have been boredly uninterested in the people his parents had begun working with. Would have been taken by surprise when they finally came for him.

But no.

No that self-obsessed, fame chasing imbecile had to go and announce to everyone and their dead mother that the GIW existed and exactly what it was they were in Amity Park to do.

Phantom knew what they were there to do.

They could only count on his naive certainty that he could broker peace with them for so long.

Peace. As if he and his people weren’t the invading force, the monsters slipping in through the cracks between worlds, the latest threat that had to be accounted for. As if he himself hadn’t rent their world asunder himself in another world, another time. No. Peace was not something they could hash out with this baby-faced monarch with his too-big crown. Peace was the assurance of safety, security. Of control of the situation.

There could be no peace.

The higher ups were somehow surprised when Phantom took that to mean there would be war.

Amanda Waller was not.

The Fentons, as suspected, took the right side when all was revealed. Steady hands and flinty eyes as they crafted the weapons that would be needed for the coming fight. Minds even sharper in their maddened grief, hearts set on revenge for the son lost and the entity that stole his face and friends and sister in his garish pretense at humanity. They were blinded to the reality of the situation in its entirety, the potential in what their son truly was, but at the end of the day it didn’t really matter. They did what she needed them to do, they could believe whatever it was they wanted so long as they did.

By the time the boy king and his armies marched upon the Amity park facility, preparations had been put into place. The base in Amity had been stripped back to bare essentials, everything of importance moved to more secured locations.

The weapons labs.

The artifact.

The girl.

All tucked well away from the front lines where Phantom and his motley crew could not reach. Their time to be put in play would come, but not yet. First she needed to gauge what Phantom and his people were capable of, what they were willing to do in the name of what they wanted. Amity Park was a pawn well sacrificed on that front. As were the other facilities she’d left easy to find.

The problem with making children gods, with giving them crowns and calling them King and giving them armies to play with, was that they thought there should be rules. That even in the trenches tearing apart their enemies, there was a certain level of playing fair that everyone was held to. They thought there was a way the world worked, of how things should be that blinded them to more effective options even as time stretched on and desperation set in.

It was the Dead’s problem though, not hers.

She reached out to the Justice League. Sour faced, unhappy, bitterly reluctant to accept that she needed their help. Stone faced and barely containing their rage at what little they knew of the situation, they agreed to a meeting.

She didn’t let herself smile until she was well and truly alone in her office.

Greater good. A lie people told themselves. A fairytale told to children. A means of convincing the weaker willed that they had no choice, that they had a noble duty to bend to. A belief that could be wielded like a weapon if the fantasy of the idea had dug in deep enough. And there were few it had dug into so deep as the members of the Justice League.

Amanda Waller was someone who did what needed to be done.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands clenched tight on a victory long in the making.

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Part Four

#dc x dp #dp x dc #dpxdc #danny fenton #amanda waller #GIW #ghost investigation ward #Jack Fenton #Maddie Fenton #bad parents jack & maddie fenton #cause none of this is angsty enough yet lol #tw references to vivisection #tw references to death #waller out here playing 3d chess #of course she wasn't surprised by the inevitable war she was just hoping she'd have her secret weapon ready before it actually kicked off #oh well she still has plans B - J to get through #and all the variations for each #gonna take care of her ghost problem and her justice league problem in one fell swoop if she gets her way #just throw some GIW agents into the meat grinder for a bit while she gets stuff in order & so she can see just what Danny is willing to do #anyway wonder what Elle is up to during all this #i'm sure she's fine and there's nothing to worry about #waller playing the long con yall

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the-mountain-flower · 9 months ago

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The Exiled and The Outcast

Chapter Five: A Rose,

Previous chapter

Next chapter

Dainix noticed his leg was bouncing when it bumped against the desk, startling him out of his reading stupor.

How long had he been doing that?

He tried not to worry about it too much, and went back to scanning the open book in front of him for anything useful.

Except… once interrupted, it became surprisingly difficult to go back to focusing on his task.

His mind kept wandering, and he found himself fidgeting with anything he could get his hands on.

Dainix sighed and leaned back in the chair.

He was bored out of his mind, subconsciously looking for anything else to do other than sit there and read for hours on end. Doing nothing but his exhausting search for-

Wait a second.

Just how long had he been at this? How long was it since he last got some exercise, how long since he’d been outside?!

He’d arrived at the castle only a few days ago, almost a sef at this point. The second day he’d gone to buy food, but other than that… he’d been in the same two rooms, repeating the same routine. Wake up, eat, research, eat, sleep, repeat. For five days .

Gods, no wonder he was so restless! He hadn’t stretched his muscles or even seen the sun in almost a sef!

Dainix stood up the second that realization set in, almost knocking over the chair in the process. He was out of that library that exact moment.

It was past time to get some fresh air.

The sun on his skin felt good . It wasn’t nearly as bright or hot as it was back home, the light broken up by the occasional cloud or leafy tree. Still, Dainix practically basked in the sunlight like a lizard. He breathed deeply, letting the fresh outside air into his lungs to replace the dusty, stagnant air of the castle.

It was probably the first time he found the world outside the desert not as cold and unfamiliar, but instead as a warm, welcome relief from the monotony he’d found himself in.

Dainix took his time familiarizing himself with his surroundings. The castle grounds had long since been neglected, the original gardens reclaimed by nature, trees and vines covering every stone arch and pillar. The amount of vibrant green still made him a bit uncomfortable, but not nearly as much as when he’d ventured into a forest for the first time. It was actually beautiful, in an overgrown, ancient way. The plant life here was so vastly different than anything he’d seen growing naturally in the desert, even in the underground oases.

He considered preserving something to take with him to show his family back home, settling on some brightly-colored flowers that looked like the wild descendants of what once grew in the flowerbeds. He’d seen something similar every once in a while, sometimes worn by traders and travelers passing through his village, and its likeness replicated during the Feast of Serenis. He hadn’t known roses came in colors other than red and pink, though. This one had petals that were white, its neighbors various shades of orange, yellow, red, pink, and white.

Careful of the thorns but knowing the wyrmsilk would block the sharp points, Dainix tucked the flower into his belt. He was aware that even dried out, it might not last for as long as it might take for him to return home if ever , but he tried to ignore that thought. It didn’t hurt to have a little token of hope.

Dainix started looking around for somewhere with enough space for him to get some exercise. He wanted to go over some of his forms and such, at least enough to keep his skills honed even if he wasn’t actively having to use them. He was still Ravvan, no matter where he was, and he wanted to hold onto that.

He thought he found a suitable place to practice, but stopped himself from entering all the way he noticed something off to the side, and realized this area was in use.

East of his position, back turned to Dainix, was Falst. He was sitting on the ground, a stick in one hand, and drawing something in the dirt in front of him. It was a little too far away for Dainix to see what it was, though what he could see were multiple pictures drawn in the ground around him. Falst was clearly absorbed in his work, detailing the lines in the ground with great care.

Dainix left try somewhere else, leaving Falst to draw in peace.

Falst’s ears picked up rustling and footsteps. Immersed in his drawing, he initially dismissed it as probably just an animal.

Sure enough, it stopped soon after. Then it came again, and Falst realized it didn’t actually sound like some random animal.

He whirled around, and saw the stranger- Danix- as he turned away and left the clearing.

Falst scowled. Someone so heavily armed had seen him with his guard down like that, and he hadn’t even noticed! He hadn’t seen Dainix outside the castle before, but context clues told him that of course he wouldn’t be the kind of person to willingly stay inside for too long. Falst was getting sloppy with keeping his guard up.

In frustration, he threw away the stick he’d been using, and raked his claws through the drawing in the dirt in front of him. It was a hobby he’d picked up in his time here, something he’d never had time for in the past. It gave him some comfort, at first just reminding him of the drawings gifted from a caring mother long ago, eventually becoming something he did fairly often.

Falst walked away from the small collage, leaving his newest drawing unfinished. Through the scattered dirt could be seen a rough sketch of tight, circular petals wrapped around each other above a thorny stem.

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Y'all have no idea how excited I was writing that last paragraph.

I'd like to give lots of love to everyone who's been SO supportive so far!! Seriously, your comments have made me so happy, and reminded me why I love sharing my stories. Thank you so so much!!! <3

Remember to drink water, eat food, take your meds (if applicable), and get enough sleep. Love you all, and have a great [insert time here]! <3

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theblackestnight-ffxiv · 10 months ago

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[ffxivwrite2024] prompt 16: third-rate

“Seven hells, I’ve had it!” D’zinhla threw up her hands, scowling daggers at the paperwork on her desk.

From behind her, she registered Airraim’s curiosity-tinged concern. “What’s wrong, love?” she asked, and after the sound of a few footsteps, a hand rested on her shoulder.

D’zinhla was immediately contrite–but still very frustrated. “I didn’t mean to disturb you, Airraim,” she said in a softer tone. “It’s just… Well, this folio!” She wrinkled her nose as she gestured at the offending documents. “It was so promising! There’s some very old works in here! Padjali and Gelmorran, besides Gridanian, things I’ve never found before! But because it wasn’t stored right, and especially because it wasn’t printed on the right materials, I could teach a class in incorrect archival procedures from just what’s wrong with this singular folio!”

“Mmm,” and she felt Airraim gently squeeze her shoulder. “That’s a deep disappointment.”

“Gods, is it ever. The only pieces that haven’t had parts lost to degradation are pieces I already have well in evidence in other, much better preserved folios.” She couldn’t help the scorn in her voice. “Meanwhile, the pieces new to me? I can tell, even as old as it is, that the paper was hardly worth the pulp it was made from. Too thin in some places, too thick in others, the thin places have worn away entirely and left me with missing sections.” She sighed, shaking her head. “It was kept well, there’s hardly any book-rot, the spine is cracked but that’s manageable, but when the very paper is fallen apart, that hardly helps preserve the information within!”

“Perhaps it was all the paper they had available?” Airraim ventured.

“Perhaps,” she said, biting her lip. “But that means whoever took possession of it later should have seen to it that copies were made, if not a restoration. Though there’s not a whole lot that can be done to restore what was already of poor quality to begin with.”

Her partner kept her hand on her shoulder, brushing back and forth with her thumb. “Though it could mean that copies are out there that were not kept with this piece.”

She flicked an ear. “True enough,” she conceded. “But they haven’t been found by me, or anyone I know of, so they might as well not exist until they are found. Still, I suppose that might have been done, make copies and keep the original as intact as it was… I could only hope that such copies, if they exist, were made before all this damage.”

“But for now, it doesn’t get you the new material you wanted.”

“Well,” and she hummed, considering the documents. “It does get me evidence of these songs, incomplete though they are. And they are new to me, even if they could have been whole and entire, and are instead piecemeal. Still,” she sighed, and lifted a hand to pat Airraim’s. “Thank you for hearing me out, love. I know the minutiae of document preservation hardly interests you.”

“But it interests you, and therefore, I care to hear about it.” Airraim bent and pressed a kiss to the top of D’zinhla’s head. “You heard me out about my latest batch of fragrance failing miserably.”

“But that I can follow better, it’s-” She stopped herself with a wry smile, twisting in her chair to look up at her partner. “Sorry, you’re right, thank you.”

Airraim smiled, and it filled her with a flood of warmth. “Of course,” she said. “Now- what do you need to go on from here?”

D’zinhla knew she was being shepherded away from her indignation and onward into something more actionable, but she could bite back the ridiculous obstinate urge to resist the attempt. “Well, now I need to start transcribing what I can, before this terrible paper degrades even further. So I’ll need my inks-”

Her partner chuckled. “I’ll leave you to it then. But I think I will take this time to go put some more tea on.”

“A lovely idea, but no rush for me, I’ll need to keep it off the desk while I’m working.” She was already preparing her workspace, thinking mindfully of what needed to go where, what hazards needed to be mitigated, what steps would need to be taken. She heard another chuckle, and Airraim’s steps away, but it faded into background as she focused on the work in front of her. She could indeed salvage something of worth out of this, even if it wasn’t the prize she had hoped it to be!

#ffxivwrite2024 #wol: d'zinhla rhee #timeline: some ill-defined period after EW MSQ

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milich96-ocs-blog · 2 years ago

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sooo what's the story of caden's return? I need to know. What has malakay been up to all this time

Caden was born in a small village in the hills, into a peasant family. He made himself known when at 16 he managed to chase away a vampire spawn that had been oppressing his fellow villagers for months. Having become a small local hero, he defended the village from other attacks by little monsters until he was 20, after which he left to become a soldier of the Flaming Fist. During the military service his dreams of doing something good were soon destroyed: many soldiers only aimed at power, making money, they didn't care too much about defending others. The straw that broke the camel's back was seeing one of his legion companions beat the hell out of a boy slightly younger than Caden.

He abandoned the hood and decided to return to his origins: son of farmers, the land and nature are our greatest assets and we must preserve and protect them. He became a paladin of the ancients - venerator of Chauntea. He led his happy life for many years, protecting the druid coven of Emerald Woods, but he also realized that his life was limited. Being human, he could only help them until he was 70 at most. Seeing his friends elves, gnomes, dwarves, halflings not age like him brought him a sense of sadness and anger towards himself, his nature. He decided to do something crazy: he made a pact with the hag from the nearby forest.

He asked her to have the chance to live forever and never grow old again. The hag agreed at the price of adding another purpose to Caden's life: fighting for someone he loved. The human was surprised. That's all? Fighting for someone he loved? But he was already fighting for his friends in the woods and his loved ones at home. The crone replied: "It's not enough. You have to have someone, a favorite person and fight for them too." However, he didn't have a favorite person, he had never bothered to cultivate love as he was too busy defending nature. And he didn't even think he had a chance with other people. The hag spoke "there is no problem - I will find them for you. But you will have to swear to fight with soul, mind and body for them"

Caden did not understand the gravity of that request and accepted. The person the hag chose was a devil who had recently stolen 4 crow's feet from her: a certain Malakay Avaritia.

Malakay until then had lived a normal life in Cabrafè, together with his family. He met Caden when he was 20. He found the paladin more of a nuisance than dangerous: annoying at best. He never hurt Mala, but it was creepy and kinda weird. At 24 Mala met Octo for the first time and fell deeply in love (he would never admit it). So much that he left home to follow the god. Caden was devastated and began roaming the world to look for Malakay, while also following his paladin path.

Mala has travelled for centuries with friends and lovers, and has now bought at home in Porto Veneno, where he lives with his 3 husbands and 2 children. As for Caden we are still cooking up something for him.

#caden #malakay avaritia #malakay avaritia tonic phander polpi #malakay #ask and you shall receive

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tumble-d-wumble-phd · 9 months ago

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So I was talking to a friend today who is sort of fond of AI features. He’s a tech guy, loves the latest trends, and is a very receptive and kind-hearted person who does photography but cannot draw. We were discussing pornography of Clippy the Microsoft officesona, which he immediately assumed had been created by AI. I had seen this particular art piece at around the age of 16, so I told him that was impossible and that, anyway, AI cannot make art because it does not have a soul. It can make images, but it cannot make art.

He balked at this and suggested we debate it, which I don’t think personal opinion with zero impact on the other party needst be debated but off we go because it’s fun. His argument was that art is defined by having a passionate reaction: love, hate, fear, disgust. Therefore, if you hate AI art, that makes it art. We were chatting over pizza in a loud bar, so he didn’t get to elaborate much between slices. However, I think following this line of logic is interesting. It makes me think of urinals in museum displays and swastika graffiti. Do we preserve that which we hate, despise, find generally offputting?

When?

Why?

Recently, I saw images of a sculptural set here on Hellsite. They were made to look like litter in a big stark-white modern museum, scattered haphazardly. One piece got thrown away: a dented soda can.

It was relocated and got a clearer label.

The soda can does not make me disgusted, angry, or insulted. Moreover, it does not summon any sort of passion I can name.

Why do I think it’s art?

My first prong of the argument back was on that very question. I pointed to cathedrals first as I struggled to conjure a better point: they weren’t meant to stir passion, but devotion. Here was something big and vast that had to depict its major facets in pictures because the holy men spoke a weird language you didn’t necessarily grasp called “Latin” and sometimes they couldn’t speak it either and a guy got so mad about it he made a whole other religion. I think I choked something out about brutalist architecture too, more art made to make you feel humble and collective. Therefore, art does not have to stir a passionate reaction in order to be classified as art.

There’s obvious problems with this, namely that we can slightly shift his argument to encapsulate any sort of emotional reaction whatsoever. In this case, the discovery of a spider web by walking face-first in and screaming is art. Maybe it is, to God.

Via the water slide that is ADHD, I found myself discussing artistic depictions of Muhammad (a subject I do not feel qualified enough to explain on the internet) before cascading into Christianity. I told him about how Eastern Orthodox produced depictions of Jesus and co. in what some might find a more “medieval” or “unrefined” style well past the renaissance. They knew about the trends and the gay Italians. However, to them, holy art had to summon up to otherworldliness, sanctity. The face of God cannot cast shadows. Even in Italy itself, the brief rise of Dominican friar Girolama Savonarola (whose name I butchered horribly) in Florence allegedly had even Botticelli torch some of his paintings. To Savonarola, it was to combat the heresy of vanity. All these works cared about was the beauty of delicately rendered bodies, not Christ himself!

The Catholic Church had him executed.

Jesus HAD to stay sexy.

They really needed this at the time.

The second point I was trying to make with this, before I got distracted misnaming dead Italians, was that what ACTUALLY makes art is the meaning behind it. The bit of our soul we mix in is how much fun we’re having with this new brush, or that we really hate our stepdad, or that I need something to cheer me up after school. The soda can is art because the artist meant to make it. They meant to make it SO close to the original that someone could easily be mistaken, which I’m sure took weeks of hard work. They succeeded.

AI cannot make art because it doesn’t mean anything to the machine.

God did mean for me to run into that spider web though. The bastard.

#art #ai #god #spiderwebs

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labyrinthinesyndicatex · 3 months ago

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"Not jealous, huh? Could've fooled me," Cian said, enjoying the moment more than he probably should. Her flustered denial made his heart do funny little jumps. Not that he'd admit it. "Regular customer service skills? Sure. And that eye roll was just a muscle spasm?" He grinned, deciding to ease up a bit. No need to make her more uncomfortable. Her burning cheeks told him enough anyway, and that tiny hint that she might still care gave him a ridiculous flutter of happiness. Hard to stay cool when your pulse keeps skipping beats like this. "Business is good, actually. Pete's was always special, but it needed fresh energy. When I bought it, I promised myself I'd preserve its soul while bringing it into this century." He ran his fingers across the worn bar top, remembering those early renovation days. "I kept what mattered … the original bar, those bullet holes everyone asks about, the vintage mirrors. People come for the history but stay for the drinks." Her compliment about the classics made him feel oddly proud. She noticed the details, just like before. "Weeknight crowd's pretty diverse. College students, locals, business types … even the occasional scientist." He winked, unable to help himself.

"They all mix well together. Kind of like a good cocktail." God, that was corny. But seeing her here, in his space, made him stupidly happy. All those nights wondering if she ever thought about him, and now here she was, getting jealous over cucumber martini lady. "I'm glad you stopped by. Really. Feels nice, talking like this again." He wanted to say more - how he'd kept her favorite bourbon stocked just in case, how sometimes he'd catch himself making drinks she'd invented, how he still remembered exactly how she liked her coffee. But that seemed like too much, too fast. Better to tread carefully. This fragile reconnection felt too precious to risk. "But what about you? Still practicing those mad chemistry skills, or have you branched out?" He genuinely wanted to know everything she'd been doing. Each piece of information felt like rebuilding a bridge between them - not to cross all at once, but to slowly make their way toward middle ground. Maybe they could be friends again. Maybe even more, someday. For now, just having her here, sitting at his bar like old times, felt like enough.

"I'm not jealous of cucumber martini lady, you're totally seeing things," Mariana says, but her burning cheeks tell a different story. She gulps her drink, annoyed at how easily he reads her after all this time. It kills her that he's right. Something about watching that woman lean across his bar asking for special treatment set off a possessive streak she thought was long dead. "You're having way too much fun with this. I seriously don't care who you make drinks for. I was just noticing your regular customer service skills." His smug face makes her want to either flee or fight back. Neither seems like a good idea right now. Three years should've been enough time to build resistance to his teasing, but apparently not. No way she's giving him the win by admitting it though.

"But anyway, how's business going here? Prohibition Pete's seems to be thriving since you took over." Not her smoothest topic change, but whatever gets them off this dangerous path. "The place looks really good. You kept all the classic stuff but freshened it up. Smart business move. Weeknight crowd seems decent too." She's talking too fast now, but anything beats letting him analyze why seeing another woman flirt with him bothered her so much. Because truthfully, it had. And that realization shakes her more than she wants to admit. Three years of carefully built distance, of telling herself she'd made the right choice pushing him away when her mom got sick, and one woman ordering a fancy drink makes her feel stupidly territorial again. What is wrong with her? She doesn't get to feel this way anymore. She gave up that right when she walked away.

#interaction: cian zhang #cian zhang + mariana vieira 003

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vickyvicarious · 2 years ago

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God preserve my sanity was told like a legit prayer in the audio!!

It's like. Preserve my sanity. Let me die sane and leave the real me behind. Let me fight the madness clawing at the edges of my mind until I can preserve my soul in these pages and help someone else. And because it's not a story about Individualist Hero conquering all, he manages to save his sanity until he could no more. And then, mad and at the mercy of kinder souls, he waits for his love, whose name was the very first thing he could manage remember, to come to him.

I have been trying and failing to come up with an eloquent response to this for days and days now. Well said. God.

I can't get the image/sound of Jonathan praying into his diary out of my head. There's something here in finding faith and in his desperation and determination keeping him going when he doesn't even have hope anymore, because he wants so badly to live, to leave this place, to return to the one he loves. He just keeps going and going and pushing himself through as long as possible, but as soon as he is out of immediate danger he just can't anymore. He's been running on fumes for so long already. But it's okay, because even if that diary (diary as sanity, diary as soul, diary as ability to help prevent this happening to others) is all he has when he leaves, he still has it. He lost so much else but he managed to protect the most important things long enough. It's okay that he couldn't keep going longer, because as soon as he managed to get out he wasn't alone anymore. The kindness and care of strangers bookends his castle experiences and ensures Jonathan's survival. This novel isn't about an Individualist Hero at all, it's about bonds that bring people together, trust and love and support, and when Jonathan simply can't carry the weight of everything he's experienced any longer, others are there to support him. Even before Mina physically arrives. But she was there all along...

The thought of Mina gave him the strength to stay alive long enough to make it back to her, she was the first one he could speak about, his first clarity in the depths of his madness. And she accepted him, as changed and weakened as he was, with immediate and complete joy. She accepted his diary, the gift of his horrible experiences (diary as sanity, etc--), and treasured and protected it and him. Never betrayed his trust but only sought to help him, and once she learned what he'd been through she believed him without hesitation. Sought to validate him immediately, to reassure him that the sanity he scratched and clawed to preserve was indeed real - and yes, thus his nightmares too, but he did it. He made it out. And his record achieved what he wanted all along, it helped to protect others from Dracula and his like, it helped them to end him forever. (But not alone. None of them could have done it alone.)

His prayer is granted, more than granted because he makes it out the other side of this in the end. Forever changed, but not in the way he feared so badly, the way he was willing to die to escape. And instead of dying alone with only the desperate desire that his words can serve to help someone, anyone... he lives on, surrounded by a new family. Having defeated his former tormentor for good. And while the original diary no longer exists (just as pre-castle Jonathan can never come back), there are copies. The knowledge (his soul, his sanity, every metaphor or symbol ever applied to his diary as well as all the other letters and journals of everyone else) will never be lost.

#dracula daily spoilers #dracula daily #idk if this is coherent i got emotional #jonathan harker #jonmina #anonymous #replies #dracula documents

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mistyshadow0 · 3 years ago

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A Return, or a New Beginning?

This is Part 1 of my first fic here, so I hope you like it! Its a SAGAU fic.

Part 2 (Next)

Teyvat is a vast land with a long history. It is a place where many different people and many different cultures exist, develop, and thrive. You could travel Teyvat for a lifetime and still learn something new every day.

Though the seven nations have held a tentative peace for many years, the differences among them are still enough to raise tensions at times. Each of the seven nations worships a different Archon, have different customs, and hold different values. Through the ages these differences have caused many a skirmish. However, despite all of this, there remains one unifying factor between the nations that brings them all together. One factor that, even with all of the differences and hard feelings between nations, none dare to even think of working against.

The universal worship of the Divine Creator.

The one said to have shaped Teyvat into what it is today. The one that even the Archons themselves kneel before and dedicate their entire lives to worshiping.

The benevolent one. The highest of beings.

Mention of the creator can be found just about anywhere. Elaborate shrines for the Divine One litter the land, right alongside those of the archons, though far larger, more embellished, and adorned with offerings of all kinds. One can find offerings of the most expensive, rare, and precious kind right alongside the rather mundane, everyday gifts of the common folk. The Divine Creator is well-loved and revered throughout all the lands.

Although the Divine Creator is mentioned and praised in many ways across Teyvat, original traces of the creator can only be found in the oldest of texts. Far older than any of the current Archons have lived. These texts are few and far between, and have been painstakingly preserved by groups of people specifically trained and assigned by the Archons themselves to care for these sacred texts.

Those privileged enough to get their hands on these texts would find secondhand stories of the Divine Creator themselves. How they shaped the land of Teyvat to be habitable to the people of this world, so that they may live in peace and prosperity. How they ruled over Teyvat with kindness, not because they made themselves ruler, but because the people revered them so much that they wished to serve the Divine Creator in every way possible.

It is said that the Divine Creator loved their people so much that, when infighting began over worship of the Creator, they put themselves in-between the fighting factions, getting harmed in the process.

It is also said that the Divine Creator has blood of the most unique, glistening gold.

The day Teyvat killed lost the Creator was the day the first Gods emerged, fighting over the land until the Seven Archons rose to power, when peace was again achieved.

However, legend states that the Divine Creator was not lost forever, that they were sent away to recover, only to return in their physical form when Teyvat was ready to welcome them again in peace. The world has waited in anticipation for the return of the Creator, and the Seven have done all in their power to ensure that the world is ready, that Teyvat has become something the Creator can be proud of once again.

For even the Archons themselves have never witnessed the Divine One, and have made it their mission to prepare for this event. To one day see them with their own eyes and worship them in person.

It is the sacred duty of the people of Teyvat, but especially the acolytes of the Divine, those blessed to have the attention of the Divine Creator, to prepare the world for their arrival.

#sagau #genshin impact #genshin #genshin x reader #self aware genshin #reader insert #genshin fic

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1kook · 4 years ago

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crunchyroll & rail

the 10th installment of my netflix & chill series !

SUMMARY Never mind the fact you really like Sailor Moon, or that you really want to pay attention to every little detail; the moment becomes Jungkook and his big smile and his red cheeks and the tiny box he produces from within his pocket. WARNINGS smut in the forms of making out, jk nipple play, some 69 action, cunnilingus, blowjobs, brief choking, jk trying his best to listen to oc but he doesn’t rlly :/, fingering, missionary bc his eyes are pretty, unprotected fuckin raw, its romantic but when is it not… MISC fluffy and domestic <3, weekend getaway <3, the Big Question, shy jk, sailor moon supremacy, jk makes this big elaborate speech about the sun and moon, mentions of 240p YouTube quality, RATING m (18+) WC 8.7k

NOTE (!) the smut in this chapter is relatively short ! I was more concerned with writing this monumental step in their relationship, so sorry to all the lads who come here specifically for the p0rn but today we focus on the l0ve <333 anyway nc 10!!!!! Can u fuckin believe….

Jungkook mentions it at the dinner table one night. You’re not eating— well, you are not eating; Jungkook has been stocking up on his protein intake like a madman —but finishing up some work you had brought home. Your back aches, your eyes burn. The mere sound of his soft voice has all those feel-good endorphins shooting through your nervous system like a shot of adrenaline. “We should take a trip,” he says, fork clattering against his plate to signify the end of his feast.

Your fingers tap across your keyboard, eyes flickering between an Excel sheet and the report you’re typing out. It takes you a moment to respond, a delayed, “huh,” that even Jungkook doesn’t find convincing.

In the background, you’re listening to what has to be one of the worst voiceovers of the original Sailor Moon series in a language you don’t even understand. But you know the series like the back of your hand, know what exactly is happening even if you don’t understand what they’re saying, because you’ve watched it only about a million times. It’s mostly just there for background purposes anyway, some white noise to try and replicate the noisy soundtrack of your office.

To make matters worse—complicated?—, you had been too lazy to get onto your usual pirating sites and had settled for the five minute, five part, 240p clips of Sailor Moon on YouTube (you know the ones), and Jungkook has to wait until Episode 74: Part ⅖ ends before you grace him with a proper response. “Where do you wanna go, baby?” you ask, giving your eyes a break from the data as you move to scour YouTube for Episode 74: Part 3/5.

He’s stretching back now, arms wound up above his head. His hair— god, his hair —is an ashy color now, a faded version of its golden ancestor from a few months ago. Soon, he’s planning on going back to brown, claims he’s getting too old to be dying his hair, whatever that means. For now, you watch his inked fingers run through his scalp; he looks delectable. Maybe you’re hungrier than you initially thought. Or at least thirstier. “A cabin,” he suggests, and he offers this little half shrug that would otherwise seem normal had you not been well-versed in the art of Jungkook Body Language. His front teeth nibble at his lip, eyes laser focused on his empty plate. Even now, he still gets nervous asking you out. That thought alone makes your ego soar as high as an airplane. “Just something small.”

Usually, “something small” with Jungkook ends up being something big and, in most cases, something expensive. Which you’re totally not opposed to— you’re at the point in your relationship where you don’t even bother trying to dissuade Jungkook from showering you with gifts. It’s one of his many, many, many, many forms of loving you and, well, he knows you like the back of his hand. He rarely misses.

Lo and behold, it is a grander affair than a simple cabin. “Well, it’s more like a resort,” he confesses, reaching across the table for your hand. Immediately, his thumb finds itself rubbing over the simple band of your promise ring. “Just wanna do something nice for you. I know you’ve been tired lately,” he adds on, voice a quiet murmur that nearly gets lost under the intensity of the pout that appears whenever he becomes even the slightest bit bashful.

You smile, the fondness in your heart skyrocketing to impossible heights when he lifts your hand to press those pretty petal lips against your knuckles. “Well, just let me know when,” you tell Jungkook. “So I can request time off from work.”

Episode 74: Part 3/5 starts playing after an ad, and you’d pause it for the sake of preserving this moment with Jungkook, but it’s hidden under so many tabs on your laptop that you lose it the second you leave the tab. Jungkook’s head tilts to the side, sending his ashy locks cascading beautifully. “You know that show is on Crunchyroll,” Jungkook says, seemingly moving past his bout of shyness now. “And you have the password.”

“Do I,” you murmur, but he’s lost you once more, your true talent of typing with one hand showing itself as you return to your Excel sheet, the other still firmly squeezed in his grasp. Jungkook releases soon enough anyway, cleans up the table quickly, and disappears off into the kitchen. He sings when he washes the dishes, likes to pretend he’s a terrible singer even though you’ve told him countless times he could easily take X Factor by storm. (And you know exactly what it takes to wow those judges— you spent the entire last month psychotically watching multiple X Factor seasons from multiple different countries, nearly considered joining the damn audition yourself.) The horribly dubbed Sailor Moon is yelling now, shrieking really, and Jungkook calls from the kitchen, “don’t forget to take your contacts out, sweetheart.”

It’s domestic and it's nerve-wracking.

You want Jungkook, that much is a fact. Aristotle and Socrates and that other guy could debate the philosophical intricacies of the world, turn this dimension in on itself until it was a scrambled mess of emotion and thought, but the one thing they could never change, could never even question, is your love for your boyfriend. You want Jungkook badly, but more importantly, you want Jungkook forever.

And you’re sure Jungkook probably, maybe, hopefully feels that way too. But the way you feel is… slightly concerning to say the least. For starters, you’re convinced your love for Jungkook was meant to be, and that’s saying a lot coming from you. You’re not one for cheesy, soulmate tales— that was more Jungkook’s thing —but the more you think about it, the more you become convinced that you and Jungkook were destined to meet. Like the planets aligned one year, the stars conferred, a tectonic plate somewhere in California shifted; whatever it may have been, something happened somewhere that led to the birth of this beautiful romance of yours.

Lately, being with Jungkook has this inexplicably fiery feeling blossoming in your chest, these waves of emotion that sometimes have you fantasizing about the weirdest of scenarios with him. Like yelling at him for not taking the garbage out on time, or bumping into each other as you make dinner in the kitchen, or buying a new rug together.

(Most drastically, the other day, you had a dream where you were pregnant and Jungkook was there and there was a house and a dog and an annoyingly friendly neighbor and this god-awful tile in the bathroom.)

Long story short, you’ve been fantasizing about a forever with Jungkook. The concerning part is the timing; was this too early? You’re nearly halfway through your second year with Jungkook now, and you know most people date for many, many years before the mere thought of union even occurs to them. In another life, maybe you were the same, would have held off until the very last moment. But with Jungkook things just feel right (at least for you), like there wasn’t going to be anyone else after him. And you sincerely hoped there wouldn’t be.

You slump back into your seat, eyes fluttering shut. Too many thoughts swirl around your mind, and the screech of the Sailor Moon voiceover on screen certainly doesn’t help. How you managed to spiral that far down your thoughts in the span of one 240p, five minute clip of a larger episode amazes even you. To add onto your worries, the clip abruptly ends and Episode 74: Part ⅘ is nowhere in sight, a fact that draws a frustrated moan out of the already sensitive you.

Luckily, Jungkook eventually returns, standing closely behind you. His presence is enormous, the room suddenly overflowing with a shit ton of those feel-good endorphins all over again, except this time they reach an all-time high when he leans over and quietly shuts your laptop. “Come sleep,” he says softly, and it’s a pleasant mixture of his genuinely caring voice and that horndog purr of his that lures you into bed. And it’s that same voice that croons softly into your ear, fingers nestled between your folds until you’re orgasming yourself into a deep slumber.

Much to no one’s surprise, the cabin turns out to be quite the luxurious lodging; two floors of dark oak everywhere you turn, a stunning stone fireplace in the bedroom, and a truly breathtaking view of the resort’s snowy hill (read: front row seats to watch all the snowboarders and skiers wipe out in the snow). Jungkook had splurged quite the pretty penny on it, so you make a point to clap it up for him when he first opens the door to your temporary home for the weekend.

The main bedroom is beyond words. It’s got an attached balcony (that you doubt you’ll be using in this chilly weather), and a wooden canopy bed that makes you feel like a royal (that you will certainly be using). It’s separated into two areas, the bed space and a tiny entertainment area on the other side of the room. Perhaps the best thing about the room— and the cabin itself —is the huge, smart TV mounted above said stone fireplace and the fact it allows the phone mirroring option in lieu of not having any streaming sites. And as is with every and anything to do with televisions, Jungkook is the most excited of the two of you. “Baby, look,” he beams, pointing excitedly at whatever he’s got mirrored onto the television this time. Knowing him, it’s probably another documentary.

You had the forethought to finish your work before the trip, spent two days in the office going absolutely ham on this month’s final reports until your department head promptly sent you home to finish the rest there. You had given yourself a fright upon entering the bathroom that night, the state of your under eyes so severe, you feared it was sufficient cause for a national emergency. Similarly, Jungkook had done the same with his work, cooped himself up in his study until he was free from the shackles of capitalism for the weekend. All this to say you’ve missed him these past few days.

But even though you’re sorely malnourished in the affection department and craving a good kiss or two, you wouldn’t dare interrupt one of Jungkook’s little nerdy, tech-induced fanboy moments. They’re cute, in their own geeky way, providing some insight to a mellower side of your boyfriend who looks on with childlike wonder; Jungkook’s eyes always get so big when he talks about nerdy stuff. You get to work hanging up the silk shirt he packed for tomorrow night’s fancy dinner at the resort, listening to some British narrator’s detailed description of the functionally extinct Northern white rhinos living under 24-hour surveillance in Kenya.

(Jungkook’s really into nature documentaries again, had spent a few nights sniffling as he watched that one Koko the gorilla film.)

The original plan was to head to the nearest store and whip up something small to eat at the cabin. But Jungkook is a little tired from the long drive, slumps down into the couch in front of the now lit fireplace like a limbless blob as he tunes into his documentary. His nose is a little red from the outside chill. It’s so cute. He’s so cute. You love him so much, you fear you’ll accidentally squeeze his cheeks to death. It’s a thought that occurs more times than you’d like.

According to the pamphlet on the nightstand, the resort has its own room-service to order from. Normally you would do that, but not this time; you had gotten into a bit of a squabble with the man at the front desk after he had tried to withhold Jungkook’s reservation for arriving two minutes past your check-in time, called each other all sorts of names before he backed down and gave you your room key. So you’re still a little salty, to say the least. Instead, you settle in for some pizza in front of the huge TV, calling up the nearest place to order some of Jungkook’s and your favorites.

You plop down beside him, instinctively cuddling closer when he wraps an arm around your shoulders. “So,” you start, flipping through the rest of the resort’s introductory pamphlet. There’s a loud roar on screen. In all honesty, you didn’t even know what Northern white rhinos sounded like until then, and you probably never would have if not for the man beside you. “What are you in the mood for tonight, sweet boy?”

You’re not sure if it’s the fatigue or the overall relaxed vibes he’d been exuding since the moment you entered the cabin, but Jungkook is weirdly cooperative today. “Whatever you want,” he responds, head on your shoulder. He even places the remote in your hands, gives your enclosed fist a gentle tap as if he’s just handed you the secret to eternal youth. In other words, it’s a rare sight to behold. “This is your trip, pretty girl.”

You appreciate the sentiment, but feel the need to clear the air, tucking your feet up onto the couch as you snuggle closer. “Our trip,” you clarify, and snatch the remote anyway before he changes his mind.

Jungkook releases a quiet huff of laughter, head rolling back against the couch cushions to display his thick, juicy neck that definitely doesn’t awaken any vampiric tendencies in you. “We can even watch some anime if you want,” he murmurs, casually throwing an arm around your shoulders in a way that would have made any teenage girl in the early 2000s squeal with excitement. It’s one of those barely there touches, but the way he holds you makes you feel so safe and warm and loved. So loved and in love. “The ones on Crunchyroll, though.”

For the sake of preserving these good vibes (and your ears [and Jungkook’s sanity]), you navigate to the Crunchyroll app on your phone, quickly finding your latest obsession and mirroring it onto the big television before Jungkook can react. “Sailor Moon?” he asks with a tone that implies a feigned interest, mostly out of respect for you; he’s, sadly, still not the big dorky anime fan you had hoped to convert him into.

“In the name of the moon, I’ll punish you,” you recite dutifully, snatching up the throw blanket on the end of the couch. It’s barely big enough to cover the both of you, has Jungkook’s outstretched legs and your booty subject to the chilly air. Who cares, Jungkook is a furnace anyway.

He snorts. “Punish me,” he mumbles, as if he doesn’t believe it. His snarky comment wins him a playful pinch against his doughy cheek, not that he particularly defends himself against it anyway, eyes fluttering shut as you tug at the pale skin.

“Don’t fuck with the moon, Jungkook,” you warn him, snuggling closely against his side as your favorite opening song begins filtering through the speakers of the television before you. It’s infinitely better than the 240p YouTube clips you had subjected yourself to the entire last week, the graphics scarily clear.

“Right, of course,” Jungkook says, but a hint of amusement seems to curl around the sound anyway. Nevertheless, he lets it go, cuddles into your side as you pour your full focus into watching yet another group of ragtag teenagers with supernatural abilities kick some ass.

You can tell Jungkook isn’t really into it, and you’re torn between just snuggling him into a well deserved nap or taping his eyelids open so he can become a fan of this show with you.

The loving, caring, adoring side of you says Jungkook deserves the entire world and more (the more in question preferably being a fluffy blanket and a nap). He worked hard this week, just like you, and on top of that he was the one who planned this entire weekend getaway for the two of you to enjoy. You want him to rest up.

The obnoxiously in love girlfriend-slash-best friend in you says Jungkook is sorely missing out on one of the greatest shows on planet Earth and that naps are for the weak.

Your jumbled thoughts are interrupted by a loud sound on the television, a yelp from Ms. Sailor Moon herself that has you jolting up in surprise. Jungkook welcomes you deeper into his embrace, chuckles at your little fright. “Scared?” he teases in that low voice that makes you feel like you’re going crazy, really. So crazy and irrational, and the only thing that stops you from bombarding him with an unexpected outpouring of love is that hard and sharp thing that pokes your side when you get too close to him. It’s not Jungkook, sadly, but something in the front pocket of his hoodie instead.

And for some reason, part of your brain is stuck all of a sudden, rewinding the last two and a half years like a broken cassette tape that had the tape reel hastily stuffed back inside by a toddler. It’s choppy to say the least, and it certainly doesn’t help when Jungkook calls your name softly, tenderly. “__,” he murmurs. It’s a little weird; it’s not often he says your name, mostly referring to you with one of the many pet names from that part of his vocabulary that focuses exclusively on terms of endearment. Your heart skips a beat.

Now, if anyone were to ask, it’s approximately around this time that you begin to spiral. The pink curve of his bottom lip is just too close, the mole on his nose too prominent. Paired with the obnoxious tittering of Usagi on screen, you can feel your thoughts begin to overlap, bumping into each other within the realm of your brain until all that comes out are the messiest of messy thoughts.

They go like this:

Most episodes of any anime run for approximately thirty minutes. Take out the commercial breaks, the opening and ending credits, and it becomes something closer to twenty. Twenty minutes per episode, filled with plot and gags and tears and whatever else necessary to make you feel something, anything really.

“What’s in your pocket?” you ask tentatively.

In contrast, it takes approximately two seconds for Jungkook’s lips to quirk up— first the right side, always the right side —and his eyes to crinkle. Two seconds for him to smile, a sweet expression that reminds you of Netflix and college and quiet laughter and tattoos and silly YouTube videos and cookies and cell phones and job applications and blond hair; two seconds to make you feel everything all at once.

“There’s nothing,” he says, but his cheeks are pink, and it’s not from the cold anymore. His smile is so big it makes your own cheeks ache just looking at it. You can’t even hear the television anymore. Never mind the fact you really like Sailor Moon, or that you really want to pay attention to every little detail; the moment becomes Jungkook and his big smile and his red cheeks and the tiny box he produces from within his pocket. “It was supposed to be for tomorrow,” he admits, unwrapping his arm from around you.

It’s a little funny, somehow, because his hands are covered in ink, in tiny doodles and intricate pieces of swirls and words that ooze this aura of strength and toughness. But they tremble when he opens it, as unsteady as a wispy dandelion on a windy day, fumbling with the box. And when you look closely, he’s been biting at the skin along his thumb again, that nervous habit you’ve been trying forever to help him overcome.

Someone is saying something on screen, something important to the plot. The volume is loud, but not as loud as your heart. Not as loud as Jungkook’s quiet murmur when he speaks again. “Will you marry me?” he asks softly, looks at you with flushed cheeks and big eyes and his heart on his sleeve.

The answer has always been the same, hasn’t changed since the first time he planted the seed in your mind. Still, it catches in your throat, nearly loses out to a surprised and emotional sob that you barely manage to bite down. You had just been speaking, had just been ready to deliver a whole spiel on the importance of him watching Sailor Moon with you. But when you try now, it’s raspy and dry, as if you haven’t used your voice in years. “I— yes,” you exhale, surprised by the lonely tear that trails down your cheek. You go to wipe it away, but Jungkook beats you with a gentle hand cupping your cheek.

His smile is wobbly, patches of red blossoming across his face that eventually consume his entire appearance as he leans his forehead against yours. Only then do you realize he’s crying, and you laugh out of reflex. “You’re crying,” you say, and Jungkook snorts.

“You cried first,” he sniffles, smiling. “You made me cry.”

He looks like a wreck, but, like, a hot wreck. An engaged, hot wreck who’s eyes flicker back to the TV to remind you to pause your anime, always so considerate. You do, hastily smashing buttons on the remote before remembering it’s controlled by your phone, hands flying back and forth as your nerves actively work to retire themselves after Jungkook’s proposal. “Easy there,” he soothes, eventually catching your hand in his, drawing it up for a kiss against your knuckles.

The ring fits perfectly, snuggly. Vaguely, a memory drifts through your thoughts of Jungkook and Doyeon on a rampant mission to reorganize your jewelry box a few months ago, but it disappears as quickly as it came. You’re taken by the ring, a simple band with a pretty diamond on top. It’s a good mixture of you and him; flashy yet mild.

“You love me,” you marvel, a revelation you’ve had the honor of experiencing time and time again with Jungkook. Still, it never fails to render you speechless. He hums.

“I do,” he says, taking your hand in his. “It’s the easiest thing for me. Like breathing, or existing. I think I was made to love you.” And normally, you’d be the first one to correct him. Jungkook was made for so much more, a fact he’s proven time and time again with his abilities and the sheer size of his heart. He was your golden boy, could do anything he set his mind to. Always amazing you, always making you fall in love all over again.

But now, with the weight of his words sitting heavy in the air, you find yourself incapable of negating the fact, instead sniffling at the meaning.

Pleased with your silence, Jungkook places another chaste kiss against your ring. “I love you, __,” he confesses, voice nearly a whisper. Your entire body feels as if it is doused in gasoline, lit aflame over and over again. Your heart threatens your rib cage, pounds away with the strength of a world renowned boxer. Jungkook’s hands curl around your wrists carefully. “I used to think we were like the moon and the sun,” he admits, “that you were my sun and I was your moon. In love but always separated by those thin veils of the sunrise and the sunset.” He pauses, nuzzling sweetly against your palm once more before gently guiding them down between the two of you. “But that really sucks— saying goodbye to you every night? I hate that, __. I hate watching you leave, I hate watching you run off in the mornings or halfway through the day, having to drive back and forth from your place to mine. I hate having to be away from you when all I wanna do is hold you. I— I want to be by your side,” he rambles, eyes nervously meeting yours. They’re still glassy, dark lashes framing his chocolate irises wonderfully. “Forever.”

Your heartbeat stutters, the simple word looping itself in your mind like that night in his dining room all over again, all the fantasies of having a forever with Jungkook bubbling to the surface. Jungkook pushes on. “You are my sun,” he says softly, mostly to himself. “But… I don’t wanna be the moon anymore. Being the moon means, eventually, I’ll have to say goodbye. In the night or in the morning, it always comes to an end. And I don't want there to be an end with you,” he insists, clutching your hand tightly. “I wanna be another star, the closest one to you. The one who gets to be with you forever. I wanna be by you and shine with you and—“

“Explode into a gazillion little fragments of cosmic dust with me,” you offer, and Jungkook nods along eagerly, too amped up on his speech to bother scolding you for your playful comment.

“Yes, I want to— to—“ The words catch in his throat. So much emotion from the man you once thought was the dictionary definition of calm and collected. “To—“

“Marry me,” you fill in, and Jungkook practically blows a fuse from how emotionally fired up he’s become, exclaiming a resolute, “yes!” that leaves you stupidly grinning back at him.

His outburst leaves him with flushed cheeks. “I do,” he reiterates in a softer tone, averting his gaze from you as if embarrassed by his cheesy outpouring of emotion. Usually, it’s the other way around; you make all the corny declarations of love and Jungkook laughs along suavely. It feels nice to have the tables turned.

There’s so much to say, but the words all fade away when Jungkook shyly looks at you again. You settle on tackling him back onto the couch cushions, taking his surprised little yelp in stride as you suffocate him in your embrace. “Save those words for the big day, superstar,” you giggle, peppering his red face with tiny kisses that make him scrunch up cutely. “I can’t wait to blow up into one huge supernova with you.”

Beneath you, Jungkook groans. “I’m sorry,” he huffs, voice muffled against your shoulder. Begrudgingly, his arms come up to envelope you, pulling you closer until the blanket scrunches up uncomfortably between you two. “That must’ve sounded so lame.”

Leaning back so you’re not completely squishing him, you carefully push his silvery hair away from his forehead. “Don’t be,” you assure him, placing one chaste peck against his pouty lips. “I thought it was cute. I didn’t know you were into astrology.”

A sigh. “Astronomy,” he corrects, “astrology has to do with zodiac signs and placements.”

You run your thumbs over his cheeks, collecting any of the drying tears that paint his face. “Oh, like how you’re a Virgo and I’m a“—

The TV remote you had lost somewhere along the way is suddenly rematerialized beneath your knee, sends the speakers blaring to life with a deafening screech that has both you and Jungkook leaping up like two frightened cats. “You always do this,” he laughs, that loud boyish sound that makes you feel like you’re sitting on a cloud. He watches you with a gentle smile as you hurriedly shut off the television, the remote haphazardly tossed somewhere behind you afterwards. You return to his embrace, wrap your arms around his waist and snuggle into his warmth. His heart thumps a steady rhythm beneath your ear.

“You’re gonna be stuck with me forever,” you warn him, clutching at the fabric of his shirt like he’ll suddenly disintegrate before your eyes.

Above you, Jungkook hums, placing a kiss against the crown of your head. “I look forward to it,” he responds, pulling you impossibly closer, until you can feel the wrinkles in his shirt imprinting themselves against your cheek. He’s back to being that suave bastard again, and you find yourself wishing you had milked those big crocodile tears out of him for just a little bit longer.

Fingers gently press against the muscles in your nape, push themselves in deeply until you can feel all the tension seeping out, turning you into a limbless blob over Jungkook. “Jeez,” you sigh, eyes fluttering shut. “And you wanted to wait until tomorrow.”

He huffs out a laugh. “I just thought you’d rather get engaged at a fancy restaurant with a pretty dress,” he defends, and you can hear the grin on his face. “For the photos.”

“Fair point,” you concede, eventually pushing yourself up so you’re not entirely squishing your boyfriend beneath you. Jungkook is already looking at you when you lift your head, has got this funny double-chin from this angle that makes his normally sharp jawline disappear. You find yourself tapping a finger against his chin, on the chocolate chip mole that hides itself beneath his plump bottom lip. “If anything, just propose to me again tomorrow at the restaurant.”

It wins you an eye-roll. “I’m not gonna propose to you again tomorrow,” he laughs, doesn’t even push you away when you become annoying and start tapping your fingers against all his beauty marks like you’re playing Whack-a-Mole.

“Booo,” you frown, but let it go soon enough, foregoing your little game to press your lips against his. “Then I better make this a night to remember,” you murmur, tilting your head to the side.

Your hands dip into his luscious locks, fingernails tracing thin lines along his scalp that are certain to send tingles down his spine. As predicted, Jungkook releases a quiet groan soon after, a sound that’s muffled against your own lips. He’s pliant tonight, but not in a way that would elude fatigue. Pliant in a way that suggests he wants you to take the reins tonight, exhaling softly against you as he parts his lips.

“Let me take care of you,” you hum, the hand that had been mindlessly hovering along his cheek drifting down to caress the side of his neck. Jungkook nods, his irises swimming in lust. You smile at his silent compliance, give his throat a light squeeze that makes his breathing hitch in surprise.

He’s always at his prettiest when he’s beneath you like this, limbs moving in slow motion as you guide him along. You can already feel the beginnings of his arousal stirring beneath the front of his sweats, his cock slowly making its presence known against your thigh. You press your lips against his once more, making sure to make it rougher than the first kiss. Your tongue is met with little resistance, slips past his lips and dips into the hot cave of his mouth where Jungkook releases another trembling breath.

Two hands come up behind you, trail themselves over your back and down to your ass, where he gives the two globes a tight squeeze. It draws a whimper out of you, one that Jungkook greedily swallows up. His tongue rubs up along yours, the wet muscle daringly pushing back against yours. His rebelliousness is only quelled with another press of your fingertips around his throat.

“Slow down,” you tell him. The first roll of your hips against him is slow, cruel in that you cut the motion short just as Jungkook begins to push back. A bratty huff escapes him, swollen pink lips pushing out into that endearing pout you love so much. It makes you grin, releasing the grip around his throat to carefully brush a stray strand of hair away from his eyes.

It’s a gesture that works to soften Jungkook as well, the petulant look on his face melting away as you trail your pointer finger along his cheekbone. It’s replaced with a more tender one, dark lashes blinking up at you slowly. “Open,” you command upon reaching his mouth, finger pressing down against his pink lower lip. Jungkook obeys, opening his mouth until you can see his pink tongue and the dark abyss that leads down his throat. Your finger pushes itself in, and Jungkook certainly doesn’t try to resist. His lips suction around the digit fairly quickly, tight enough to keep you there but loose enough for you to slowly draw your finger in and out, each short plunge pressing down against his tongue.

It’s a rather short affair, one that comes to an end when he accidentally bucks up against you, pressing his hardened member against your core. You retract your finger. “Can you,” he tries, but his cheeks are stained red and he refuses to meet your gaze. “Just…”

You intercept him with a chaste peck, maneuvering your legs until your knees are firmly pressed into the couch cushions beneath him, his thin waist trapped in between. When you sit up, you feel drunk on power and the way Jungkook looks up at you certainly doesn’t help. “Can I sit on your face?”

He chokes. “I— sure, please,” he blurts out. His gaze follows you as you slip off of him, quickly discarding your pants and top on the floor. One pat against his thigh has him hurrying to shimmy out of his clothes, his sweatpants caught around his ankles.

“You’re excited,” you laugh, stripping him of his bottoms when the frustration takes him over.

Jungkook scoffs. “Well, yeah,” he mumbles, tugging his shirt off with one smooth motion. The ink around his bicep is as dark as ever, contrasts wonderfully against his warm face. “My fiancée is gonna sit on my face.”

The title makes you preen, quickly finding your place on his lap once more. With your clothing out of the way, Jungkook really does become a furnace. Every inch of his body is hot to the touch, soft too. “Fiancée,” you giggle, hands on his chest. They slide down, fingers playfully nudging his brown nipples. Jungkook flinches at the touch. “Gonna sit on my fiancé’s face,” you parrot back, delicately pinching one nipple between your fingers. A moan spills from his lips, his cock pushing against your thigh once more.

It’s the reminder you need, pushing back dutifully against him as you continue to toy with his chest. He’d look pretty with piercings, you find yourself thinking, watching on in fascination at the way his pert nipples stand at attention. Beneath you, Jungkook begins to grow desperate, his hands finding their place on your waist to encourage you to grind down against him once more.

Jungkook swears up and down that he’s not particularly sensitive about having his nipples touched. But when you’ve got him like this, sinfully laid out before you, you can easily confirm that his claims are nothing but lies. He loves having his nipples touched, squirms beneath you impatiently with each playful tug and twist you bestow upon them.

You duck down, pressing a kiss against his pectoral, just beside his nipple, and Jungkook’s entire body shivers. A few careful drags of your tongue against his warm skin only serve to string him along further, the prettiest whimper pulling itself from his lips when you finally envelope one of them in your mouth. “Wait,” he gasps, clawing at your clothing as if he both wants to push you off and push you closer. You grin, brandishing one mean nip at the sensitive nub.

Eventually, your incessant need to play with Jungkook’s chest is fulfilled. “Lay back,” you instruct, watching as he shuffles down flat on the cushions, silver hair tumbling away from his eyes. He’s so red, eyes hazy. Your panties are discarded, joining the ever growing pile of clothes on the floor.

Once upon a time, the idea of sitting on Jungkook’s face had terrified you, filled you with nightmares of crushing his windpipe or breaking his nose. For the most part, they’re pretty unrealistic fears, ones that can be easily shut down after one careful Google search on safe sexual practices. These days, it’s all too easy; in the mornings, especially, it’s become natural for him to guide you on top carefully, holding your hand as you whimper and sob over his face.

In the current moment, you find yourself stroking a hand down the side of his face, completely enamored with the huge puppy eyes he levels your way. Jungkook likes having your pussy in his face just as much as you do, loves making you feel good in any way he knows how. But there’s a separate matter at hand, one that stands at attention beneath his black boxers and successfully wins your attention.

Truthfully, there is no dilemma to ponder over; you want both to ride Jungkook’s face and suck him off. The solution?

“We’ve never done this before,” Jungkook mumbles in amazement, his voice slightly muffled from his position beneath you and slightly behind you. Still, his arms dutifully wrap around your thighs, guiding you closer to his mouth where his hot breath fans against your glistening folds. You rock back willingly, hands preoccupied with pushing his boxers down and away from his engorged cock.

“Really?” you ask, suddenly feeling overwhelmed with the cock before you and the tongue that gently laps at your folds. Jungkook makes a sound, something between a hum and whimper, his mouth slowly getting to work against your folds. “M- Maybe,” you stutter, all thought processes coming to a halt as you carefully take him in your hand.

His cock is hard and long, his tip an angry shade that weeps with precum. From this angle, you get to watch Jungkook’s huge thighs twitch at the sensation, the tattoo that marks up one of them doing little to hide the fact. Your hand squeezes him, watches in awe as another fat droplet oozes out of his tip. A moan tears itself from his throat, and it’s so goddamn sexy it nearly drives you insane.

It’s one particularly long lap of his tongue over your clit that sends you into action, back arching at the tingles that shoot down your spine. Wasting no more time, you guide Jungkook’s cock into your mouth, let your own tongue shower his mushroom tip in kitten licks that have him bucking upwards. He releases your clit with a lewd pop, hot breath fanning across your lips. “Fuck,” he gasps, voice harsh.

Admittedly, it’s more difficult than you thought it would be.

You’re not one to be easily overwhelmed (says you), but with Jungkook’s twitching cock in your mouth and his teasing tongue dipping into your entrance, it becomes hard to juggle your attention between the two. Even Jungkook, who is quite frankly the master of cunnilingus, seems torn between the two, his breathing shallow and quick against your folds.

With each slow descent around his cock, he shudders, thigh muscles tightening in anticipation. It causes a lull in the pace of his tongue, the generous kisses and licks against your folds subject to a somewhat uneven pace that, surprisingly, leaves you more on edge than you’d ever expected it to; right when you think he’s about to suck your clit into his mouth, you’re met with a harsh exhale instead, one that makes your lips flutter.

You’re both disappointed in yourselves for never having tried this mind-blowing position before, and equal parts understanding as to why you haven’t tried this position before— it’s a lot. His cock is halfway down your throat when it twitches, sends a gush of precum into your mouth that has your eyes rolling backwards, a whine slipping out around him. Jungkook appreciates the vibrations, letting it fuel him as he plunges his tongue into your hole. It’s a two way street, you realize, one that is constantly experiencing traffic.

“Baby,” you gasp, pulling off of his cock with a slick sound, hypnotized by the trail of saliva that connects your lips to his tip. Jungkook’s tongue prods along your slit, makes your eyesight go blurry when the tip of his nose brushes along you as well. The idea of his cute nose buried deep someplace it shouldn’t be has you grinding down on him. “We can— we should stop,” you stutter, your trembling hand reaching forward to grasp the base of his cock.

He’s slick with your saliva and his precum, and your hand makes a squelching sound upon contact. It must feel good, because Jungkook moans against your folds, his thighs unconsciously falling farther apart as you slowly jerk him off. You think you might’ve heard your name slip from his lips, but your mind is fuzzy, lost in your lust as Jungkook licks a sinful line from your hole to your clit, curling his tongue at the end. “J- Jungkook,” you cry, flinching away because it’s become too much, your toes curling as the beginnings of an orgasm threaten you.

Before that can happen, he relents, leaning back with a heavy exhale, his hands loosening their grip against your ass and plopping back down against the cushions. “Fuck,” he pants, his cock twitching in your hold. A lonely droplet of precum trails down the side, your knuckles coated in the glossy substance. Beneath you, Jungkook rubs one soothing palm against your hip.

You slink off before he can get any funny ideas, maneuver yourself around until you’re kneeling between his parted thighs, his fat cock standing at attention between the two of you. From here, he looks ravenous, and you begin to question who exactly is taking care of who. Jungkook looks like he’s a second away from pinning you down and swallowing you whole, a thought that makes your toes curl.

It’s with a cautiously horny hand that you reach for his cock again, holding him with both hands. Jungkook growls, head lolling backwards until all you can see is his neck and his chin, thick veins protruding along his skin. Jungkook doesn’t waste a moment longer. “C’mere,” he purrs, hauling you up until you’re clumsily leaning over him, palms framing his face. A lone finger runs down your spine, its faint touch making you arch forward. “Sorry,” he says, securing an arm around your waist. “I know you wanted to take care of me, but…”

You roll your eyes, submitting yourself to his clutches as he masterfully rolls the two of you over. The couch is soft beneath your back, and Jungkook looks pretty from above too. “You just can’t sit still, can you?” you murmur playfully.

Jungkook’s forearms find their place beneath your thighs, the fold of the back of your knee perfectly slotted against his warm skin as he shuffles closer. “Maybe another time,” he laughs along sheepishly, his hard cock gliding over your slit, teasing your clit. You gulp, eyes scanning over his lean build as if it’s the first time. “Sorry,” he repeats, but he’s got this stupidly dopey grin on his face as he glances down at your pussy; he’s insane, he’s got to be, what man makes heart eyes at a pussy?

Your man, apparently. Grasping the base of his cock, Jungkook takes care to drag it along your folds collecting your wetness along his length, a deep shudder wracking his body through it all. “I knew you would do this to me,” he mutters, so low you nearly miss it under the thundering sound of your heartbeat.

“Huh,” you mumble, and you’d like to defend yourself and say you weren’t as cock-crazy as Jungkook was coochie-crazy, but that would be a lie. You’re staring at his cock as if it holds the secrets to the universe right now.

Jungkook juts his head to the side, a motion similar to the one he does when he’s trying to crack his neck. His tongue prods along his cheek, eyes laser-focused on the point where your two bodies meet. “From the moment you walked into my house,” he grunts mindlessly, finally lining himself up with your entrance. He chances a glance up, meets your gaze with a patient look, “all good?”

“All good,” you hurriedly reply, fingers finding their place against his broad shoulders. With the way he had prepared you earlier, mouthed along your clit and your folds until you were pleasantly aroused, the glide now is too easy. Tight, but easy, has the two of you releasing twin moans that echo off the wooden walls of the cabin.

Jungkook’s forehead is covered in a thin veil of sweat, one that glistens when the evening sunset pours in through the balcony doors, highlighting him in a golden light that makes you dizzy. The angry tip of his cock sinks into your walls, Jungkook’s ashy strands sticking to his forehead and his cheeks. For some reason, you find yourself reminiscing on the aforementioned moment Jungkook had spoken of. Of the soft sweater he’d worn that day and the dinner he had made, the blond tips on his chestnut hair and the way he’d clung onto every word you’d said.

It makes you tear up, and, after laughing at Jungkook early for crying, you quickly turn your face away.

Jungkook isn’t dumb. “What now,” he chuckles, though his breathing is labored, every inch of his cock that penetrates you further bringing with it another rush of adrenaline. At the hilt, you’re embarrassed to say there’s multiple tears streaming down your face, so you can’t even play it off as you usually do. “Crybaby,” Jungkook teases, but his voice is so soft and tender you don’t know what to do with yourself.

“Just move,” you bite out, shamefully covering your face with your hands. Jungkook leans over you, the movement pushing his dick deeper inside of you, your walls clenching around him. A kiss is placed over your knuckles, just shy of your engagement ring. Your chest lurches with a silent sob. “Jungkook,” you whimper, sinking further into the cushion, “please, just—“

“I got it,” he assures you, placing one final peck against your handmade (literally) shield. And then, so quietly you almost miss it, he makes sure to whisper, “love you,” before unsheathing himself.

You shudder, your heart feeling so full, you fear it’ll burst. You both love and hate when he treats you like this, like an ice sculpture in the scorching heat that has him doing everything he can to keep you solid. His touch is soft, the roll of his hips too slow for your liking. You feel so small and vulnerable— too pampered. “Harder,” you beg, your voice an airy whine that has Jungkook chuckling above you.

He lives to please you, hiking your leg over his shoulder with a renewed vigor. His hands find themselves on your waist, forcefully pinning you down against the couch cushions as he sets upon fulfilling your latest request. The next series of thrusts are jerky, have you jostling in his grip as Jungkook pounds into you with an all new mindset. “Lemme see you,” he huffs, thumbs painfully digging into your skin. You tremble in his arms, heart swayed by the quiet plea in his voice. “Let me see your face, pretty girl.”

Reluctantly, you do, brandishing your tear-stricken face his way. Jungkook smiles, that stupidly handsome smile, his hips snapping into you roughly. “Fuck,” he moans, the expression never leaving his face, even when run your nails over his chest harshly. “You’re so pretty.”

You ignore him for the sake of your already weakened mental state, focusing instead on the brutal force of his hips, the way his cock stretches your walls out. Each push has you seeing stars, thighs quivering from the sensations that shoot up your spine and down your toes. “Oh,” you mewl, hands gripping his biceps as you lose yourself to him. Your eyes roll back, vision a mess of colors and nothingness all at once.

“Is this hard enough?” Jungkook husks out, and he sounds so close. His proximity is confirmed when his mouth slots against yours, his harsh breath mingling with your own as he continues to frantically buck into your inviting heat, each new round of thrusts leaving you weaker and weaker than before. “God,” Jungkook cries, the sound nearly lost beneath your own moans and whimpers. “Gonna k- keep you forever,” he spits, tongue slipping into your mouth.

He’s messier than usual, moves with unrefined movements unlike his normal self. You don’t care, you love him all the same. His sloppy kisses turn into desperate ones, matching the pace of his hips. “Kook,” you sob, arms wrapping themselves around his neck, pulling him close until his thrusts are reduced to a shallower depth.

“I’ve got you,” he croons, lips against your jawline. His cock presses in and you swear you feel it alongside every inch of your walls, a warmth blossoming in your stomach. He’s layering messy kisses down your face now, lips sucking dark marks any chance he gets.

True to his word, Jungkook indeed has you. His cock pistons in and out at an astonishing pace, each surge into your folds making you dizzy over and over again. It’s a feeling you fear you’ll never grow tired of, in fact, it’s a feeling you fear you’ll begin to crave even more in the future. The good thing is, that future will extend into forever.

You yank him towards you, swallow his low laughter with your lips. Jungkook doesn’t complain, lowering himself until he’s practically squishing you beneath his beefy body, cock ramming in and out despite all that. His tongue glides along yours, makes it his mission to muffle each of your cries.

It doesn’t take long for you to be fulfilled. Given the fact you had sucked him off like a lollipop whilst having him eat you out, you’re not entirely surprised. That and the emotions of tonight have you melting into him sooner than you’d like, his name falling from your lips as your thighs clamp down around his waist. Jungkook takes it in stride, slows the maddening pace of his hips to cradle you in his arms. You’re like jelly, practically flop back into the cushion when he slips an arm beneath you. “You’re so good for me,” Jungkook praises, lavishing your throat in tiny pecks as his orgasm circles around. “My pretty girl.”

“Love you,” you sigh, and your body feels numb, his intrusion but a small touch now that he’s tired you out once more, your walls tender and raw. Jungkook presses a smile against your throat and, moments later, releases inside of you.

Even minutes after the deed, the feeling refuses to return to your legs. He didn’t go that hard— well, you’re not entirely sure. The memories always become blurry toward the end of your escapades. Everything rushes back in waves, and for some reason, your first thought is, “where’s Sailor Moon?”

Your post-rump conversations have never been the most coherent, usually filled with pretty weird thoughts and ideas. Still, more grand things have happened tonight for you to be worried about a magical anime girl. Jungkook draws himself out of your core with a huff of laughter. “On the TV,” he answers, unfazed by the oddity of your question.

That’s how you know he’s a keeper.

It takes a while, but eventually Jungkook responds. “Avocado toast,” he says, though his answer is dripping with uncertainty. He’s naked as the day he was born, snuggled up beside you in bed. He’s propped up on one arm, looking down at you over the ample swell of his manly bosom. It takes everything in you to keep your hands off his chest.

“Correct,” you respond, “and what movie did we watch?”

Without missing a beat, “Transformers, the first one.”

You nod, glancing at the ceiling as you rack your brain for any other trivia questions to ask your fiancé. “The title of the playlist you made?”

A flush paints his cheeks. “Date Night playlist,” he answers through a pout, reprimanding you for bringing up such a memory with a flick to your forehead. You wince. “I was young and silly,” he defends.

You beam, cuddling into his side until he’s forced to lay back down. “Yeah, yeah,” you tease. “We’re only gonna get older from here,” you lament. You’d say it’s difficult to picture him with a gray head of hair, but his current silvery locks don’t leave much room for your imagination.

Jungkook pulls you close. A beat of silence passes, and then, “so who are we telling first?”

Definitely Namjoon.

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cussundria-nerd-kneal · 4 months ago

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Your Lavellan's story, motives, and personality are so similar to my Emmerie Lavellan. I'm feeling a weird sense of kinship to Sloan, its so similar.

Key differences though:

1) Emmerie never wanted to be a Keeper, and wasn't really set up to be the next Keeper (I know that is ypur character's backstory, and its a good one!) She was the last Mage allowed in her clan - as Dalish only allow three mages before they start chasing the children out of the clan - so she was trained by the Keeper... but she would spend much of her time alone, wandering the woods and exploring the ancient elven ruins.

2) She didn't have a particular attatchment to her her culture as a Dalish... because she wondered how much of it was true, and how much was the result of Tevintar propganda. That thought made her highly unpopular in her clan, ESPECIALLY when she questioned if the stories of their gods had any credibility at all. (She wondered if Fen'Heral was even originally bad, what with how many wolf statues are littered around ruins, and wondered if the Vints just villianized him because they wanted to completely destroy Dalish moral/culture [like what the Christians did with Loki's story and just general Norse mythology]. But even she wouldn't dare speak THAT thought out loud). So... she was kinda the black sheep of her clan.

3) Emmerie is tomboyish, outspoken, opinionated, stubborn... maybe her only real talent was that she had gift for magic, and that made her a good fighter. She helped out a lot on hunts, and/or clan squirmishes. That's why she was chosen to scout out what would happen at the Conclave. Skilled enough to take care of herself, perceptive enough to gain thecnecessary information, but if something were to happen, it wouldn't be a huge blow to the clan.

4) Emmerie, spending a lot of her personal time alone and without companions to keep her company, developed a deep seated love for ancient history, for what REALLY was their culture. The only thing that Emmerie took seriously and regarded with respect was their Vallaslins. She thought that that was the only concrete thing they managed to perserve all these centries, because its a magical ritual. And takes multiple attemps to acheive the markings at times. She proudly underwent the ritual when the Kerper deemed her worthy of it after she 'graduated' from her Arcane studies, also at age 16. Not the youngest to receive the Dalish tattoos, but a feate many didn't think she's accomplish.

However... that scene with Solas when he revealed to her what the Vallaslin really were shattered her. In the worst way, the knowledge that the only 'pure' thing that her people managed to perserve and carry with them through the ages-- was SLAVE MARKINGS. Emmerie - viciously independant, obstinate, uncontrollable, proud, indomitable mage - was marked as a SLAVE to the Goddess June. She want to claw the skin off her face, her skin burned like it was on fire, and it was all suddenly unbearable. She readily agreed to have those markings removed from her face, because she viciously want to preserve her sense of self. She served NO ONE but herself. (We sll know how the rest of that night goes. Needless to say, she was having a shit day)

5) While Emmerie also adamatly refused and tried to disuade the "Herald of Andraste" claims, she DID however understood the importance of public opinion - after all, she had been nearly ostrasized by her own clan for refusing to be amicable - and wouldn't outright denounce any claims in public. She'd side-step it as best as she could, and try to redirect the conversation to what was ACTUALLY important and what she CAN do. "ARE you the Herlad??" - "I can close the Rifts and Breach." (Most could tell she what she wasn't saying though, much to her frustration. She'd always make the situation worse, no matter what she said)

However... her mullish and downright childish displeasure at this sudden position of power shifted after the first proper conversation you have after you recruit Madam Vivienne. In Haven. Where she GRILLS you on what YOUR intentions and view points are in the Mage/Templar rebellion and the Chantry. Vivienne puts into perspective that Emmerie is in a position to DO something. To make a *difference.* And Emmrie realizes that she's right. She shifts from resenting being a figurehead... to owning it. She realizes she can help her people. She can shift the tides of political power to give her abused and enslaved people more power, independace, *freedom.* Vivienne disapproved of the display of ambition - as that could arise a corrupt mindset - but Emmerie decides to take ownership of her circumstances, and really commits herself to the cause of the Inquisition after that talk. And that leads to her taking the initiative in the Inner Circle discussions.

She goes from a carefree, snarky, childish, immature 'kid' who just wants to go back to exploring ancient elven ruins, to a reliable and driven leader, one that weighs her every action before she moves. She has a goal, a purpose, and learns that she was a hell of a lot more capable than her quaint clan ever gave her credit for.

Different, and yet similar characteristics.

It's been fascinating to discover the general inclinations and assumed/most popular canon of Solasmancers after finishing DAI and DATV. Mainly, I'm kind of flabbergasted to find out I was in the minority with choices towards the end of Inquisition - Sloan was adamant about keeping her Vallaslin and immediately opposed Solas upon finding out what tearing down the veil would do to the people/things currently living in the world (though of course she did commit to saving him rather than flipping over to wanting to kill him.)

A lot of it has to do with personal canon blinders, I'm sure. Sloan being the person she is with the character arc she had makes both of those choices absolute no brainers, but obviously that's not gonna be true for everyone. I remember early on while I was playing, a friend and I were chatting in vc, and she was asking me about Sloan since I was spitballing so much of who she was that day. Upon learning that Sloan was a little less socially inclined, a bit rebellious, confrontational, and had a sporty/tomboy demeanor, she asked me "Oh, she must not have been very interested in being a future Keeper, then?"

And the answer was of course "No, being first to the Keeper was everything to her!" Sloan in many ways failed to live up to the image of a perfect Dalish daughter, she grappled with her inability to live up to expectations a lot, actually. Despite that, she was still extremely invested in the idea of being a Keeper and being able to serve her people in that way. She built herself around that idea from the age of 8, when she started to show an aptitude for magic and ended up in the Lavellan. She pushed to get her Vallaslin relatively early at 16, successfully endured the process on her first try, and is quite proud of it even to the present day. Yes she had trouble getting along with her peers, but whenever socialization failed she covered up any anxieties there by committing harder to studying and delving into Elvhen ruins to see if she could learn even a little bit more from them.

The Inquisition and role of inquisitor is very much something she feels was forced upon her, and she had a difficult relationship with the part she had to play up until disbanding the Inquisition in Trespasser. She only accepts the role and helps because the world might fall apart if she doesn't (this would hurt the Dalish) and because being offered a position of power and influence might allow her to make some tangible improvements to how the Dalish are seen and treated in Thedas. She chooses to go along with the Inquisition knowing this will lead to her ostracization from her own people just because she thinks the good it might do them as a whole outweighs her own puny wants and needs.

She was so committed to the idea of being a Keeper that in many ways it held her back from conceptualizing herself as her own complete person. Obviously not good, but she does find some comfort in it. One such example, it works as a great defense against her gnawing fears about failing to live up to her clan's expectations of feminity. She doesn't need to see herself as a woman, shes a Keeper. That mental block contributes to how much growing she had to do once she's extracted from the small pond she's lived in her whole life.

I'd never describe Sloan as closed minded given that she comes around on people so quickly, but she has had very little experience with anything beyond the Dalish prior to being dubbed the Herald. She's terrified and thinks every human is out to get her. She assumes that one elf you see after waking up in Haven is a slave, and that that's probably how she's going to end up too. Anyone human or aligned with the chantry is immediately a threat in her eyes, and it takes time for her to unlearn that.

That said, she does unlearn it. She's constantly being challenged by the people around her and growing because of it. Surviving at the center of the storm that is Inquisition requires her to adapt on the fly and allow herself to place faith in others. Fighting front lines also just naturally builds comradery and helps her to become comfortable with opening her heart to people she would have previously written off or remained weary of. I could say more but that's like the main point of her arc and would take many many more words.

The big take away here is that across the story Sloan moves from suspicion and discomfort with anything beyond the Dalish to deep appreciation of the wider world, while still retaining love for where she came from and the things she's always cared about. Despite the pain and suffering she goes through in inquisition, she ends up legitimately grateful that she was forced to see broader vistas because she found so much beauty and purpose in them.

In an odd way, Solas is the one that gets the credit for it. But at the same time, her growth means she ends up standing diametrically opposed to him and his intentions come the end of Trespasser. She just learned to love the world and now he's trying to take it away. Sloan still loves Solas, now more than ever given the truth of Fen'harel, but she could never be a Lavellan that asked to join him. She thinks he can be saved and resolves to do just that, but no matter how much she understands his motive she can't sign off on what he's willing to sacrifice. Sacrifice is a big part of Sloan's narrative, but she only ever sacrifices herself. She doesn't believe she has the right to make that choice for anyone else.

Anyway, it's been interesting to compare her story with others. At this point it's practically tradition in Sloanlas fics for the two of them to be having some sort of debate. One of the most compelling things about them is how much they both agree and disagree, and how both of them stand so firm while simultaneously respecting each other and being willing to listen and reconsider their perspectives. It's about the push and pull. We're shipping the thesis and antithesis here. What is Sloanlas but one big philosophical debate that finally sees it's end in Veilguard.

#dragon age #dragon age the veilguard #dragon age inquisition #fandom critical #dragon age veilguard #bioware critical #datv #dragon age critical #datv spoilers #dragon age inquisition spoilers #dragon age spoilers #dragon age oc #dragon age lavellan #oc #my oc #Emmerie Lavellan

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nullb1rdbones · 3 years ago

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Do you have any Alois headcanons

HI HI THANKS FOR THE ASK! I have a number of them!! I'll try to categorize them best I can! (Design, Relationships, Backstory, Extra)

DESIGN <3

AS YOU CAN KINDA SEE FROM MY ART...I like to draw him with slightly longer, wavier, curlier hair. This isn't just to differentiate how he looks next to Ciel, but it kinda emphasizes his more 'high-energy' nature

I really do think my favorite part of his anime-design are his eyelashes, so I try to preserve those!

ALSO I DONT KNOW IF THIS COUNTS AS A HEADCANON BUT!! He's got such an interesting color scheme if you look at it from an analytical point of view. here, see-

You can see, his outfit (specifically his tie/vest) are green when he was a kid, as in before the 'incident' took place.

Around the time that he is a new earl/chronologically speaking the former Earl Trancy is still alive, he wears red. Red is a direct contrasting color to green. Red is also the color of that god forsaken kimono (but also, additionally, this outfit here)

His clothes in the current/majority of the story are this sort of reddish-purple, with a green vest. This, in a way, shows that he has reclaimed some of his original self, but he's still wearing something reddish -- the past is not gone. It should also be noted that, while black, Claude has a reddish undertone, and Hannah has a blue scheme. Hannah wants to save Alois, and Claude wants to drive him to ruin. They clash, and he wears a purple coat.

And, at long last, when he finally accepts Hannah's love for him, he is in Ciel's body. And what is Ciel? Blue!

THAT WAS LONG BUT I'VE BEEN SITTING ON THAT RANT FOR A WHILE! I might repost it, is just find it so damn interesting!

Onto the other stuff!

RELATIONSHIPS <3

Part of the reason he hates Hannah so much is this innate '6th sense' he's been shown to have (he's actually quite good at reading people!). He can tell she's deceiving him in...some way. So he doesn't trust her one bit!

Another reason is because, genuinely, he feels like she's trying to distract Claude away from him. While I don't ship them, I think the story has much more depth when he's portrayed/interpreted as having a one-sided crush on Claude. Erasing that, or at least erasing the codependency of that relationship (whatever form it might take), is to the story's detriment. Even if you don't think Alois wants to kiss Claude, it's undeniable that he has an unhealthy bond with that spider demon.

Also, part of the reason I even ship cielois is because they have such a unique and interesting dynamic of 'I'm/you're the only other person who understands, yet we are so incapable of showing it.' I think if there was ever anyone who could get on Ciel's level, it would be Alois.

BACKSTORY :(

it's kinda shown in my fic moth wings, but I believe Alois was probably ostracized a bit by the other boys in his situation

I always saw 'Alois' as a concept he grappled with for a number of years. First Alois was like a persona he 'went into,' but later on, he just became more and more of his expression of himself. And, later, an expression of revenge and anger at the rest of the world

He definitely has some memories issues/a bad memory. I wouldn't be surprised if he only really recognized Luka in dreams, or went weeks without thinking about his face.

Also! Since he had to look after Luka, he is/was surprisingly good at taking care of himself.

Someone brought up the headcanon that Luka and him were Irish, and that was part of the reason the village hated them. While I think that's super interesting, I don't know enough about that history to fully adopt it!

EXTRA!!

He absolutely hates other rich people. I think he knows he's going to die soon, so he wants to basically...fuck with as many people as he can. he had little to no qualms destroying that entire ballroom/the nobles trapped inside because...they're just nobles! eat the rich!

He was also...so eager to put on that dress HGJAJ Gender Non-Conforming AF and I love that for him. if he was in a modern setting, I honestly think he'd be perfectly happy with any/all pronouns.

He's also a lot more animated than Ciel. Even during a quiet scene, he's most-likely tapping his heel or fidgeting with something

#alois trancy #headcanons #I probably have more #long post #asks #answered

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dendrite-blues · 4 years ago

Photo

For a relatively short exchange, this scene is jam packed with characterization for Loki.

It’s also our first reliable look into what Loki was like before Thor 1. Not as described by others, but first hand and from his own mouth. I think that deserves a closer look, to see what we can learn about Loki and how he thinks.

This scene is significant because it tells us what Loki’s personality is like when he’s not running for his life. It tells us who he was before his trauma and what his core beliefs are underneath those layers of humor and bravado.

Better yet, since he’s alone we can assume that every line in this scene is presumably true, or at least Loki believes it to be true since he has no audience but himself.

The dialogue centers mostly around the statement “You deserve to be alone, and you always will be.” I’m not going to focus too much on the “alone” motif since I already dedicated an entire meta post to it.

What I think is more interesting about this scene is actually the looping, and the stages Loki goes through in trying to deal with it. There’s a lot of really interesting character traits on display in that progression.

Loop 1: A Warm Bath and Glass of Wine

The first loop entails Sif lecturing Loki about cutting her hair, kicking him in the balls, and storming away. Loki kneels on the floor and he gives us this great line:

“A bad memory prison? How quaint. Some punishment. I remember exactly what I did after that. I went and had a nice, hot bath and a glass of wine, and I never thought about it again. Because it was just a bit of fun.”

So we can take this to be Loki’s default reaction to pain and criticism. When put into an unexpected conflict without any forethought or outside influence, this is what he says/does.

1) Downplay the damage/threat. How quaint. 2) Dispel/soothe the emotion. Nice hot bath. 3) Minimize the impact. Never thought about it again. 4) Deflect responsibility. Just a bit of fun.

Keep those in mind as we move forward, since we’ll be using them to make sense of what else Loki says in this scene.

Loops 2 and 3: Okay, Sif, Hang On

This bit is about Loki realizing just how bad his predicament is.

L: Okay. Okay, Sif. Hang on. S: No, you hear this. You deserve to be alone... And I always will be. L: Alright, I get it. Listen. You are a reconstruction of a past event created by the organization that controls all of time. So you need to trust me and you need to help me escape. Yeah? S: Pathetic. (she kicks him again) L: (winces and groans)

As we all would expect from him, Loki’s first impulse is to try and talk his way out of it. What he says to achieve that goal is pretty revealing though. Because he doesn’t try to ease Sif’s upset by apologizing or explaining or offering to magic her hair back.

Any of these would have been more likely to save his nads in the given circumstance, right? The present threat is Sif, and she’s mad about what Loki did to her hair. But Loki doesn’t really see that. Rather, he treats her as a means to an end.

“So you need to trust me and you need to help me escape. Yeah?”

To me, that choice reveals something of a blind spot Loki has to the feelings of others. Even if he doesn’t actively like hurting people, he does prioritize their problems below his, and quite shamelessly. And at least on his first impulse, he doesn’t seem to feel much remorse or empathy for them.

Usually in fanon we attribute this callousness to his trauma. He’s learned that no one can be trusted and no one cares, and so he doesn’t allow himself to care for others.

But between his Loop 1 sentiment of “It was just a bit of fun” for an event which caused real hurt to Sif, and his Loop 2/3 behavior of “you, stop being mad and help ME” I think it’s reasonable to say that selfishness/low empathy are traits Loki possessed pre-trauma.

Loop 4-????: Happens Off Screen

It’s unclear how many times Loki loops while the camera is following Mobius, but the implication is clear that it was been many, many repetitions. Somewhere in this his denial and deflection must break, because we come back to a much humbler, more pleading Loki.

The Final Loop: I Crave Attention

S: You conniving, craven... L: Sif. Sif. S: ...pathetic worm. L: Please, please, no more. Please, I beg you. I'm a horrible person. I get it. I really am. I cut off your hair because I thought it'd be funny. And it's not. Uh... I crave attention... because I'm... a narcissist. And I suppose it's... It's because I'm scared of being alone.

HOOO BOY, so this is quite a tough bit to analyze. There’s a lot of interpretations you could make, and a lot of topics to delve into. For the sake of focus, I’m going to ignore the narcissism question. That one really needs an entire post, and I want to focus on something else here.

That being, Loki’s way of processing conflict/punishment.

I’ve always found it strange how Loki takes such pride in being called a liar and cheat when he simultaneously has this chip on his shoulder about how nobody likes him.

Those two traits don’t seem to play well together, and I always scratched my head over how they coexist in his character. If he wants people to be nicer to him, maybe he should stop antagonizing them? Yeah?

Well, here we’re finally given a clear reason. Loki craves attention, he hates being alone. So how does he avoid it? Pranks and mischief.

Fair enough.

But then, if all his pranks lead to this outcome--outrage, retaliation, insult--why doesn’t he ever learn? How is it that after 1000 years of this behavior, he hasn’t found a better way to get the attention he craves?

Loop 1: Downplay, dispel, minimize, deflect. He accepts zero accountability for the impact of his actions, and doesn’t think at all about how they affect other people. Just a bit of fun. I had a hot bath and a glass of wine, and never thought about it again.

The only reason he reaches the level of self awareness on display in the Final Loop is because the looping forces him to contemplate his actions and the impulses within him that lead to that behavior.

This is projection on my part, but to me he acts as though this kind of deep reflection is a new thing for him. He sounds like someone sharing a revelation that he’s just had about himself. We’re being shown that Loki is a man of action. He will always move forward if he can, possibly because looking back to so painful that he can’t bring himself to do it.

Circling back around to the pride Loki has for his knavery, let’s suppose that he’s been on this negative reinforcement cycle since childhood. He’s always acted out to get attention, then received retaliation and insults for it, and then pushed the bad feelings out of his mind with creature comforts and mental gymnastics.

What happens over time, when you’re being constantly told that you’re a pain in the ass and no one likes you? Most of us would take it to heart, but Loki doesn’t. He has a big ego, big enough to resist that constant barrage of hate coming at him.

So how does he marry these two conflicting realities?

He turns it into an identity, the God of Mischief.

In his head, Loki excuses himself of blame by shifting the culpability to his moniker. It’s not that he’s immature and petty, he’s just a “trickster.” It’s in his nature to cause trouble, so he can’t help it. You wouldn’t dangle a steak in front of a tiger and blame the tiger for striking, would you? And if other people can’t take a “joke” then that’s not his fault, that’s on them for not having a sense of humor. It was just a bit of fun.

Here we see the union of these two halves of Loki, the lonely ice runt and the mischievous scamp. (And a little bit of the original Loki who Thor accused of being incapable of growth!)

By refusing to think about others, and excusing himself from responsibility, Loki successfully preserves his self worth and insulates himself to most of the negative emotions he experiences.

Pain, embarrassment, and grief aren’t pointless emotions though. They are vital feelings that serve to regulate our behavior, and that push us to conform to the ways of our social circles. Without them, we annoy and upset others. Be annoying for long enough and you will eventually find yourself, well, alone. As Loki is.

Thus “Mischief” is a self-defeating loop, and Loki is just as caught in it as the cell Mobius trapped him in.

In order to be free of both traps, Loki has to stop running. He has to take a deeper look at himself and realize how much he is getting in his own way. The entire scene is one big parallel between these two “loops.” Pretty neat, huh?

Sadly these kinds of thought loops are really difficult to break, they’re buried so deeply in our personalities and habits that we usually don’t notice them until life forces us to address them.

The cell is Loki’s wake up call, and thankfully he does seem to rise to the occasion. He tells Sif quite clearly what his problem is, and he does it with beautiful, painful honesty.

Which is why it’s so fucking awesome for Mobius to acknowledge that, and to finally give Loki a taste of positive attention.

You don’t deserve to be alone. I believe you can be anything, even something good. Whatever you two did, it was powerful enough to bring this whole place down.

It’s a beautiful scene. Well written, meticulously acted. The clarity of vision in the pacing and shot selection, it’s really something special.

#loki spoilers #loki #mcu #mobius #meta #discussion #discourse #scene study #long post #sif #time loop #tva #character study

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robininthelabyrinth · 4 years ago

Note

i've been keeping a list of possible prompts for you and there's one i have no memory of adding that just says "courtesan nmj????" so i guess that's the prompt you're getting lmao

What Does the Fox Say - ao3

“Second Madame Nie!” a disciple shouted, rushing into her little garden. She didn’t recognize him, but he was solidly built and well-muscled like most of the others – truly, the Unclean Realm was a rapturous feast for one with eyes to see it. Yum, yum. “Second Madame Nie, I have bad news!”

Boo. She hated bad news: bad news meant she’d have to do something, usually, and right now she was seated very comfortably in a pleasant piece of sun in the garden path that’d been made up just for her and to her preferences, with her feet up on a chair and a full plate of fruit from the kitchen on the table in front of her just begging to be devoured, morsel by delicious morsel.

Her schedule was packed!

“I regret to tell you, but your husband has been killed!”

“Oh,” she said, frowning slightly. “Has he? How obnoxious of him.”

How unreliable. Men.

She sighed.

“Second Madame – Second Madame – you don’t understand!” The disciple was all red-eyed and weepy, which was a look she liked, especially in big, stout men like this. The salt added a bit of spice to the whole thing. “You must flee at once! He was killed by Sect Leader Wen in an act of outright aggression – Sect Leader Wen has declared war – the Wen sect is invading!”

She nodded and picked up another lychee to start peeling it. She’d get around to fleeing in her own time. As long as this Wen sect or whatnot was being led by a man, she wasn’t terribly concerned.

“They intend to wipe out the inheritance of Qinghe Nie! They will rip out the child in your belly!”

She hummed noncommittally. Really, how attached was she to having a child of her own? Really?

“They will slaughter civilians – execute Nie-gongzi –”

Her hands stilled.

“What,” she said, and the disciple took a step back automatically, proving that he, at least, had something more of a survival instinct than her late husband did. “Hurt my little meat bun? My darling rice roll? My savory zongzi?”

She stood up, diminutive height and over-large belly and frilly clothing doing absolutely nothing to diminish the vaguely menacing aura that darkened the sky around her. She bared her teeth.

“Who does this upstart Wen dog think he is?!”

The disciple blinked owlishly, but nodded, seeming relieved that she’d finally accepted his concern, though she could see on his face that he was thinking that her reasoning was – characteristically – a little strange. But then again, and she could see this thought process on his far too honest face, it was well known that the second Madame Nie been quite strange ever since Sect Leader Nie had found her in some lonesome place with no family or background and brought her back to be his new wife nevertheless.

Such a charming man. Pity about his loss, really.

“You have to flee at once, we can’t possibly fight so many people,” the disciple said once more, and this time she nodded in agreement. “We can escort you to a hidden exit –”

“No!” a little voice called. “We can’t go.”

She turned to look, and there was the little pork-and-shrimp dumpling himself, chubby-cheeked and earnest-eyed, looking as delicious as always.

“What do you mean, fish cake?” she asked. “Of course we have to go. Didn’t you hear what this strapping young man said? This Wen person wants to kill you!”

“If Father is dead, then I’m the sect leader,” her stepson said. He was serious and solemn in a way that made her want to pinch his cheeks and bury her face into his belly to blow raspberries, and also possibly to eat him right up, flesh and marrow and gristle and all. “That means it’s my responsibility to preserve the Nie sect.”

“Nie-gongzi, no!” the disciple cried, throwing himself to his knees in a dramatic display of loyalty. “You would only die – far better for you to run, and live!”

“Then isn’t the same true for everyone else?” the tasty little dish asked, crossing his arms over his chest and pouting. Possibly he was trying to put on a fierce expression, maybe, she couldn’t quite tell sometimes. He was so cute. “Why should I live, and them not? I refuse to buy my life with their deaths!”

“But – Nie-gongzi –”

Her charming little honey cake shook his head and held up a hand to stop the disciple, turning to look at her instead.

“Second Mother,” he said, and he had that wholesome trusting expression again that was such a perfect little one-shot-kill to the heart, ugh. “You always said you’re the best at hiding. The best in the world, no one better among all the gods or demons!”

She was, too. She couldn’t help but preen a little, proud.

“– can’t you do something?”

“Oh, darling cabbage bun,” she said, not without fondness. “I can hide myself from even the net of Heaven itself if I so choose, from gods and demons alike, and I can most certainly hide a small group from any mortal eyes that dare to look, if you don’t mind being a little tiny bit dishonorable about the business. But an entire sect? That’s a bit much, even for someone as talented and skilled as me.”

Her stepson looked up at her, all straight-steel sincerity and upright righteousness wrapped into a perfectly edible little snack-sized package. “If we split them up, the sect could be small groups,” he said eagerly. “Couldn’t you do something then?”

He was so cute, and he trusted her. He trusted her, believed in her, felt that she could perform miracles with a wave of her sleeve if only she so wished.

It was awful.

She couldn’t bear it.

“Oh all right, you nummy little slice of roast pork belly,” she said, yielding. “But I’m telling you now, it won’t be the least bit honorable! There’s only so many excuses you can come up with for having a lot of strong men with wide shoulders and women with thick thighs hanging around, and not a single one of them has the slightest bit to do with what you people consider to be appropriate.”

“That’s all right. Preserving human life comes first, always.”

The disciple looked between them, clearly completely confused. Clearly all his effort had been spent on developing the muscles in his arms (quite nice) rather than his brain (quite slow).

“What?” he said. “What’s happening?”

“We’re saving the sect,” Nie Mingjue announced happily, clapping his hands together. Too precious, too precious entirely; she’d have to make sure no one else even thought about going near her darling little snackling. “Tell everyone to prepare to evacuate.”

“That will take too long,” she said, and smiled, with teeth. “Let me call some friends to help.”

When the Wen sect arrived at the Unclean Realm, they found the gate open.

That was unexpected enough, but when they entered, they found that the entire place had emptied out – not just of people, but of everything else, too. There wasn’t a single intact chair or table in the entire place, not a scrap of cloth nor a bit of food, like it’d been swept clean by locusts or wild monkeys come to pilfer whatever they could.

Even the paving stones where arrays had been laid out by the Nie sect’s ancestors had been pried up and carted away.

Sect Leader Wen ordered a search, but there wasn’t any trace of it – of the people, of the stuff, anything.

No one ever found out what happened.

Jin Guangyao despised social events, he’d found.

It was one thing when it was something he’d planned himself, where the work was interesting enough to distract him, but when he was an honored guest for someone else…miserable. Utterly miserable.

The only thing more miserable was when the host was his erstwhile father, from whom he’d forcefully extracted recognition. With Wen Ruohan as his backer, indulging his favorite torturer as if a beloved pet, there wasn’t much Jin Guangshan could do to refuse, and neither could he force Jin Guangyao to do anything on his behalf, either. And so Jin Guangyao, sitting as always by Wen Ruohan’s side, right beneath his sons, was now an honored guest at his father’s house, getting offered his pick of prostitutes as if the man had no notion of the irony.

Maybe he didn’t. Jin Guangyao couldn’t quite tell if his father had just forgotten his origins, thinking his bastard son too unimportant to remember the details of, or whether it was meant as a deliberate insult – who could tell?

“Oh, right,” the simpering idiot in front of him, a nephew or cousin of some sort to the sect leader, said. “Our dear Jin Guangyao is known not to like the gentle flower queens, even when they come from the finest houses in Lanling. Isn’t that right, cousin?”

Jin Guangyao’s fists clenched. A deliberate insult, then.

Despite that, his face remained neutral. Instead, he chuckled and said, “The appeal is limited. After all, I have seen the best of them.”

Beside him, Wen Ruohan nodded and smirked. He appreciated Jin Guangyao’s devotion to his mother, though Jin Guangyao suspected it was because he thought it funny that Jin Guangyao would bother to honor such a lowly woman – but what he thought didn’t matter, not really. All that mattered was that he let Jin Guangyao pay his respects to her to his heart’s content.

“Well, you’re in luck!” the idiot Jin Zixun said, looking absurdly smug. “We have something of a different flavor than the usual tonight – we’ve invited entertainment from the local branch of Splendid Spring.”

Jin Guangyao barely managed to avoid rolling his eyes.

The Splendid Spring Palace was a series of brothels that had popped up fully formed just about everywhere some years back, with madams and girls and musicians and bodyguards of all sorts. It was so patently a political move that Jin Guangyao had barely bothered to pay attention to it once he’d become actually powerful, and Wen Ruohan hadn’t paid attention to it at all. After all, in the unlikely event that the business really was backed by a cultivation sect that didn’t care about its face any longer, anyone who needed to use such a façade to gather power was clearly beneath notice.

Jin Guangyao had paid only very little attention, but to different and unusual aspects of the place: by all accounts, they were surprisingly decent employers as far as places like that went. They didn’t steal girls or accept unwilling goods – they had some connection with the merchant caravans, or at least one of the companies that helped coordinate routes and provide protection to such things, and they were as meticulous about checking things over as they were about seeking refunds if they were dissatisfied – and they did accept married girls fleeing unhappy marriages, which not everyone did. They did buy up all the girls in the local markets wherever they were, but they swept them away and brought them back transformed, even the ones that wouldn’t sell because they were too ugly; Jin Guangyao assumed that meant they had people who were talented in make-up and clothing, since the usual rumors of the girls being blessed with a yao’s enchantment were obviously ridiculous and nothing more than the usual marketing gimmicks that brothels since time immemorial had tried.

Even once they had the girls in hand, the places were pretty decent: they had physicians on staff to help with the usual side effects of the business, made sure their girls were clean and healthy, and were said to even limit the number of customers a girl would be obliged to take on in a given evening…honestly, knowing as he did the brothel business, Jin Guangyao sometimes wondered how they’d managed to bespell enough people to even make money in the early days. At any rate, whatever they’d done, it’d worked, because by now they had a solid enough reputation to trade on.

In short: a decent enough place, far better than the usual run of the mill. Once he’d had the ability to do so, he’d even pulled a few strings and arranged for the better of his mother’s old compatriots to end up there, since he couldn’t convince them to leave their old professions behind entirely.

Anyway, if they also seemed to have a sideline in information brokering and assassinations, well, let them. In the cultivation world, where the only thing that mattered was strength, real strength.

A little thing like that wouldn’t make any real difference.

Or so Jin Guangyao had thought.

He found himself re-thinking that, though, when the entertainment in question came out. There were the usual set of attractive (albeit in a wider variety of shapes and sizes than usually seen) dancers, dressed up in silks that seemed actually high quality, and plenty of strapping young men carrying sabers – dancers as well, once assumed, to provide some spice to the entertainment, and implicitly on the offer for men who cut their sleeves or women with more flexibility, like widows or ones with especially permissive husbands. Wen Ruohan’s wives were in that latter category, and they were already whispering to each other excitedly, looking at them.

They’d even brought in the local madame, who was…

Well, she was actually breathtaking, even by Jin Guangyao’s extremely jaded standards. She had hair that fell almost all the way to her ankles, shimmering in the light, and dark eyes shining with liveliness, a smooth and ageless face that simultaneously suggested youth and health but also winked at knowable experience, the features characteristic of what his mother’s employers had called the ‘fox-face’. As if to emphasize that, the lady was wrapped in fox-fur and draped in embroidered brocade, with little stylized foxes running up and down the hems of her clothing and along the gazy silk draped on her shoulders.

It ought to have looked absurd, looked gaudy and overwrought and overdone, but it didn’t.

She was a thousand dreams of wealth and beauty and power and sex appeal all wrapped up in one, and even Jin Guangyao – who was in his personal preferences quite firmly a cutsleeve – couldn’t help but intrigued by her, wondering what it might be like to touch the hem of such a glorious creature.

And next to her…

The lady was accompanied by two men that seemed completely different from each other. One was a slender and winsome young man, fluttering his eyelashes from behind a fan with a charming smile, emanating the appeal of softness and weakness, ready to be indulged. While the other…

Jin Guangyao swallowed.

He was the exact opposite of the first man. Clearly strong, muscular and powerful, and tall to the point of towering, with wide shoulders and a narrow waist, a chest that you could lean your head against and an ass that begged to have someone’s hands on it – and there were his hands, big and broad, perfect for holding someone down or up if they so wished and of a size that was very promising as to what was only hinted at under his clothes. His face was hidden behind a veil as if he were a woman, marking him, like his comrade, as one of the available courtesans of the Splendid Spring, but his body was visible under clothing clearly cut to put it to the best advantage.

And oh, what advantages it had…!

“It seems we found something to the tastes of dear cousin Guangyao after all,” the idiot said mockingly, sniggering and snorting like the pig he was, and for once Jin Guangyao didn’t even care.

“Who’s the woman in front?” Wen Ruohan asked, ignoring their interplay. He seemed utterly fascinated, almost spellbound, and Jin Guangyao couldn’t blame him one bit. If this woman had been at the same brothel as his mother, there wouldn’t have even been room for jealousy or shame; his mother would have gone straight up to her to ask for some tips. “She seems…familiar, somehow.”

“That’s the madame of the Splendid Spring,” Jin Zixun said proudly, as if he’d done anything at all in relation to this – nonsense, of course. Everyone know which brothels were backed by the Jin sect, and Splendid Spring wasn’t one of them. He was acting as if he deserve a pat on the back just for the introduction! “That means she’s not for sale.”

His smile faded a little, twisting in a small bit of bitterness. “Or so she told my uncle, anyway…although I’m sure if it were Sect Leader Wen asking, the answer would undoubtedly be different.”

Probably because Jin Guangshan couldn’t slaughter prostitutes with impunity if they said no to him, whereas no one could stop Wen Ruohan from doing any damn thing he pleased.

Wen Ruohan grunted, pleased by the answer – he was a possessive man, in the rare events that he did exert himself in the realm of women, and there had been more than one instance where he’d stolen away some girl his sons had been eyeing first just for the joy of having had her first – and raised a hand, catching the lady’s eye and gesturing for her to come over, which she did.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

She laughed. “You can call me Hu Jiuwei. With the ‘Hu’ being the character for fox.”

Jin Guangyao tried not to choke. There were false names and then there were false names – the lady’s theme was already clearly related to foxes, given her fox-face and fox-fur lining and the foxes embroidered onto her robes. Was the over-the-top name really necessary?

“It’s a fake name,” she added, unnecessarily.

“I see,” Wen Ruohan said, sounding a little choked himself. Possibly it was the woman calling herself ‘Foxy Ninetails’ and then kindly reassuring them all that the name was false as if she thought them too dumb to figure it out that was tripping him up a little. Jin Guangyao couldn’t tell if she was doing it deliberately in order to make her frankly inhuman beauty a little less frightening, or maybe she was blessed with so much beauty that she hadn’t bothered to cultivate her brain at all. “Are you our entertainment for the evening?”

She smiled, and any complaints Jin Guangyao (or indeed Wen Ruohan) might have had about her intelligence faded away at once.

It was that type of smile.

You could wreck nations with that type of smile. Jin Guangyao couldn’t help but wonder: how had a woman this extraordinary ended up in a brothel, of all places? How had no one snatched her up to keep her all for himself before now?

“My sons and I –” she gestured at the two behind her, “– would be more than happy to provide you with all the entertainment you could possibly want.”

Her smile widened.

“We’ve been hoping for an opportunity like this for a long time.”

#mdzs #nie mingjue #second madame nie #jin guangyao #wen ruohan #my fic #my fics #what does the fox say

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