#Wow I almost made it sound like Kiera is a more-or-less normal person compared to T.histle

[villain-in-love]

Behold! The elves and the ship chart!

Imagine falling in love with a crazy woman that barged into your dungeon and continuously tried to kill you. Press F for Thistle. As well as for Kiera, for that matter, since she also didn’t expect for things to turn out like this.

This relationship is such a mess that nobody (even the pair themselves) can figure out what the hell is going on between them anymore.

Clarifications are, as always, under the cut:

♤ The age gap goes in several directions at once. Technically, Thistle is at least 700+ years older than Kiera, since he was a dungeon lord for a thousand years, while Kiera is only 302 years old. On the other hand, he’s younger in terms of physical and perhaps mental maturity. In my narrative, Thistle stopped aging when he was an equivalent of a human 17-19 years old. In the same way Kiera would be somewhere around 21-23 years old if she was human. (In any case, both are equally emotionally stunted and immature...)

♤ They’ll be together forever because Thistle is the living embodiment of “Bold of you to assume that death will get you out of this relationship”. Also after all the shit they went through (including what they personally put each other through), they became so attached to each other that they will kill you if you try to separate them.

♤ Though they don’t dress up much while in the dungeon, both are naturally pretty, but their deeply unpleasant personalities ruin everything. Therefore not a 100% cute couple.

♤ They were not thrilled about being in love. They more or less calmed down about it by now (mostly Thistle) and took on a new approach, but at first it was nightmarish.

Thistle also used to be especially infuriated by that fact because, like, he’s got a dungeon to run! The Golden Country to protect! He needs to find his brother! Meanwhile Kiera is literally the number one hazard. He already had to think about her a lot lately because of how troublesome she is, but now he completely lost the ability to get her out of his head. He’s so busy, he already knows what he wants, and he simply has no time nor need for this nonsense. The worst part is that Kiera started to slowly replace thoughts about Delgal in his mind, and Thistle is truly horrified by that.

Kiera took it all with a bit calmer “Damn, I need to hurry up in killing him”. She hates experiencing those kinds of feelings, she hates that she wants to be closer to someone again, she doesn’t want to get stuck with him in this dungeon for eternity, how can she possibly fail- She had one job, goddamnit. It’s her own fault for wasting time because of her own curiosity. Giving up because of falling in love with a target is pathetic and nothing like her. Especially when those feelings endanger her freedom.

♤ I don’t think Thistle would eat dry noodles even in the modern AU, but nutritional value is almost the only thing that concerns him about food. Would probably eat something incredibly bland or barely cooked and wouldn’t care as long as it keeps him functioning.

Kiera's relationship with food is a long and complicated story... In any case, she is rather picky and her eating habits are all over the place, but she genuinely finds healthier food options tastier most of the time.

♤ Just because Thistle rarely brings up Kiera and the fact that they’re in a… “relationship” (if you would call it that) doesn’t mean that he doesn’t spend a frustratingly large part of his day thinking about her. He’s just the type to obsess quietly.

And in any case, who is he going to tell about her? Soulless bodies of his family sitting in his dining room? His monsters? Villagers of the Golden Kingdom who are all terrified of him?

At least Kiera mingles with other adventurers from time to time.

♤ What draws them to each other is not only being able to understand each other due to their similarities, but also the fact that both of them are really fucking lonely. That’s the glue here. That’s why they latched onto each other so hard and so quickly. (Kiera might claim that she’s okay with being alone, but she’s still human)

♤ Regarding "What stands in the way". Basically, the problem is that they stubbornly cling onto their old priorities because it’s the only thing they have ever known. Thistle is nothing if he doesn’t serve the Golden Kingdom. Kiera is nothing if not a war machine. I guess they both see themselves as tools that are only allowed to have one purpose.

On another note, at this point Kiera tries to kill Thistle not only “for sport” and because she hates giving up, but also because she’s terrified of attachment. Thistle doesn’t make things easier for her, since he tends to get too attached, as well as controlling, and his idea of expressing love includes putting Kiera in the safe terrarium that he controls, so he could take care of her fo-re-ver.

So what we have is a “control freak vs free spirit” kind of problem. This does get resolved by the end of the manga and they come to a "compromise". Not willingly by themselves, though, but because of the circumstances.

♤ Regarding Thistle and “haven't experienced any genuine human connection in centuries” – yes, he had Delgal, but I think that that after everything Thistle has done, their relationship most likely became way more emotionally distant in the last few centuries, at least on Delgal’s part.