#i'm calling him the evil wizard

[nyastyaraspurrtina]

from what i understand from seeing tumblr posts about it, game changer is a show where a man locks game show contestants in some sort of chamber and psychologically tortures them like some sort of evil wizard. also i think he's a ceo?

[enha-doodles]

please do a slytherin boys reacting to you being a hufflepuff pls

SLYTHERIN GUY'S REACTION TO YOU BEING A HUFFLEPUFF | ✧⁺。

Pairing : (Mattheo , Tom , Theodore, Lorenzo , Draco) x reader

Notes : okay so now only Slytherin left and next will definately be an enhypen post , it's been too long since I posted something for them 😭

Warnings : not proofread , written in a hurry my bad guys

MATTHEO RIDDLE

Mattheo's smirk widens as he gazes at you, unable to contain his amusement. "Well, well, well, my dear Hufflepuff," he begins, his tone playful yet affectionate, "aren't you just the epitome of kindness? It's like you're allergic to anything even remotely sinister." He chuckles softly, leaning in closer, his breath warm against your ear. "But fear not, my sweet, for I'll be your guide through the shadows. Together, we'll navigate the dark corners of Hogwarts, with your innocence as our secret weapon." He grins, his eyes sparkling with mischief.

"Who knows, maybe you'll even rub off on this Slytherin and teach me a thing or two about being... less evil." He winks, his playful tone laced with genuine fondness for you. "But until then, let's just enjoy the ride, shall we?" You can't help but laugh at his teasing, feeling a surge of affection for the charming Slytherin who's captured your heart.

TOM RIDDLE

Tom rolls his eyes at the mere mention of Hufflepuff, muttering about the insignificance of a house that values kindness above all else. He's determined to toughen you up, constantly pushing you to shed your soft exterior and embrace the cold, hard reality of the wizarding world. "Kindness is a weakness, darling," he'll growl, his gaze steely as he lectures you on the importance of ambition and cunning.

He'd manipulate you by turning you against your friends because in his eyes you are born to evil that's why you ended up with him , your friends are the wrong influence "And those so-called friends of yours? They're just wolves in sheep's clothing, waiting to take advantage of your sweet nature. But fear not, my dear, for I'll always be here to protect you" He's there even if it means scaring away every potential suitor with a well-timed glare.

THEODORE NOTT

Theodore can't help but chuckle at the irony of your Hufflepuff allegiance, but it's all in good fun. He'll mock you mercilessly, recounting every Slytherin victory over Hufflepuff in Quidditch or other competitions. Yet, despite his teasing, Theodore knows when to concede defeat, his love for you outweighing any petty house rivalry.

"Alright, alright, my little badger," he'll sigh, pulling you into a tight embrace. "I may be a Slytherin, but you've got me wrapped around your little finger. Just promise me you'll stop bringing up that time Hufflepuff beat us in the House Cup. It still stings, you know."

LORENZO BERKSHIRE

He'll even go as far as pretending to roar like a ferocious dog lion - oh the irony , whenever someone gets too close, much to your amusement.

Lorenzo can't resist the urge to baby you at every turn, his heart swelling with pride whenever he looks at you. He'll hover protectively by your side, his arm draped over your shoulders like a shield against the world. "My sweet little badger," he'll coo, pressing a kiss to your forehead. "I'll protect you from every danger, real or imagined. No one's laying a finger on my precious Hufflepuff, not while I'm around."

DRACO MALFOY

Draco's annoyance is as evident as ever, his aristocratic features twisted into a perpetual scowl (his resting face actually) as he begrudgingly accepts your Hufflepuff allegiance. He'll grumble about the stupidity of your house, his annoyance palpable in every word he utters. "Hufflepuff" he'll mutter under his breath, as if the mere mention of the word leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

But despite his disdain, Draco can't help but crave the princess treatment you're all too willing to provide. "Fine, Hufflepuff," he'll huff, crossing his arms in a dramatic display of annoyance. "But don't think for a second that I'm not expecting extra cuddles to make up for it."

。　　　　✧　　　　⁺　 　 　。

[hrrtshape]

a list of things from my marauders dr of what was real and what was just very intense fanon

starting off with the real ,

the forbidden forest was a hazard. centaurs were passive-aggressive. spiders were size of sleds. there was a vampire squat.

the dorms were messy as hell. this was not aestheticised masculine chaos. this was socks-in-the-ceilings, exploding cauldron fumes, stolen pork pies under beds, and at least one cursed object under every mattress.

although the girls WERE cleaner than the boys. gryffindor, as you can guess, was the winner of mess.

snape got pantsied at least one time per term.

i can't say that the slytherins were "scary" as in like the murderous, bout-to-call-you-a-slur way. just like. rich and quiet and deeply invested in almost-evil-things and staring contests. one of them had a toothpick in his mouth 24/7.

quidditch culture was cult-like. NOT cute. we had hazing rituals. there was an entire week where everyone in gryffindor had to wake up at dawn. it got weird. obviously.

filch was the devil. no explanation needed.

mary mcdonald was THAT girl......let me tell you that.

mcgonagall is......so terrifying sometimes.

sirius WAS attractive (both real in fanon and the source-material). except not in the ryan rossification pipeline. and he (worst of all) knew it. like a diva.

the castle was falling apart in every single nook and cranny. hogwarts was held up together by spite and mildew and unpaid labour. stone slabs creaked and stairs changed mid-step. and the plumbing was from 1066. the third floor corridors smelled like wet dogs and or chemicals.

toilets exploded during full moons. no i'm not elaborating. this was both a health and safety issue.

madam pomfrey was the only adult worth her pension.

remus was incredibly passive aggressive.

castle gossip was a closed-loop economy. the portraits spread 80% of it, house elves leaked the rest AND the teachers listened in.

hogsmeade was not cute.........more so lawless. a bunch of magical teenagers?? dropped into a village??? with one pub??? three joke shops??? zero adult supervision??? james got banned from zonko's. remus once got caught reading wizard erotica in public. i once fell asleep inside honeydukes and woke up during a robbery.

people shagged!!! in empty classrooms!!!!!!

and the fanon ,

no one was in their 'dark academia' era. everyone was in their can i pass this test and not die in potions era. no candles on windowsills. no dramatic readings. sirius tried to wear a scarf indoors and remus set it on fire.

sometimes the house rivalries got MEAN mean. east end pub brawl mean. slytherins would call gryffindors "serfs." gryffindors would call them "incest club." ravenclaws just hated everyone in general and hufflepuffs sold you out for snacks.

no, students did not get drunk off firewhisky and proceed to dance in the rain. they got drunk and threw up in the hallway and then had to clean it with a hungover using a sponge that sang old war ballads while a professor stood nearby tapping the ground with their foot.

(as much as i know (and i knew a lot)) there was no love triangle bullshit, no in the cw way at least. there were flings and awkward hand brushes and essay passed back and forth, sure. but no one was like...."i love him but he's dating my best friend and i'm torn between duty and desire." you're not helen of troy, you're fourteen. calm your tits.

no slytherin prince of darkness core poetic loners sadly. they were spreadsheet adjacent legacy brats. they had family rings. they carried walking sticks.

sirius was not an uwu babyboy. he hexed a teacher's wig off and barked at prefects in the halls.

(on the topic of sirius) he was not playing guitar. are you fucking serious. where did he plug it in?? the forbidden forest?? into mcgonagall's pension fund???

(and also sirius) he was not a punk anarchist let's put our thinking caps on for one second. he was rich and posh and sometimes miserable and he never bothered to fake that. but he didn't go around calling dumbledore a fascist. he called snape a dickhead or a cunt, sure, but then he moved on. the man wore a monogrammed cloak.

nobody used the astronomy tower for dates. cause girl. most times it smelled like bird shit.

no homoerotic tension during detentions. sorry, folks. they just got sweaty and miserable and said awful things about slughorn's trousers. no slowburn and no longer glances. just dust allergies and poorly veiled threats.

no one in their right minds called the marauders "the marauders." they had nicknames. in-jokes. but no one walked around like "oh, we're the marauders."

lily didn't hate james. that entire enemies-to-lovers timeline is revisionist propaganda!!!!! they were rivals, not enemies. she rolled her eyes at him, yes, bur she also asked him to help her carry books. and then he did. and she called him "potter" in the same tone you use for an overconfident scattered-brained golden retriever.

there was barely a music scene in hogwarts. this was a medieval castle, not empire records. the only radio we had was celestina warbeck and sometimes weird contraband muggleborns smuggled. did sirius once try to start a band? yes!! and everyone laughed.

[alice-angel12x]

The Blue Knight ch.5

The complicated heart arch

<- Ch 4 / Ch 6 ->

"The Silver Tree!" White Lily and Y/n Cookie gasped.

The two run past screaming fairies, as chaos takes hold. But in all the panic, it made getting to the tree very difficult. Y/n and White Lily Cookie try to fight against the flow of running fairies.

"Please, Everyone, We Need to get through!" White Lily cookie tried to shout over the screaming.

"That may be difficult," Y/n cookie gasps as they turn White Lily's attention to the transformed faeries.

As Shadow Milk's deceit flows over the kingdom, some unlucky fairies are turning into clowns. Y/n quickly searches around and sees a branch, a ledge, and some jumpable walls.

"White Lily Cookie, we need to hurry. I need you to hold onto me," Y/n says as they extend a hand.

"W-what! Won't that slow us down?" White Lily cookie asked.

"Nah, trust me. I'm a lot stronger than I appear." Y/n knight cookie smiles. "Quick we need to hurry to save the world. “

White Lily slowly looked up to this strange cookie, the light shining down behind them. A confident and kind smile on their face.

“Will this be enough to even consider the idea of redeeming myself?” White Lily cookie asked.

“Do you think so?” Y/n knight asked.

“No.. but… it’s a start,” White lily cookie smiles slightly as she takes Y/n’s hand.

Y/n quickly holds White Lily close as a power courses through their dough. They’re e/c eyes turned a royal blue. With one leap, they were soaring through the air. From branch to ledge to calling the castle walls.

Leaping and avoiding the turned fairies, Y/n made their way to the tree.

————————————————

Pure vanilla Cookie holds his head in pain. Something was wrong, as he slowly opened his eyes to see the other plain.

“Pure vanilla cookie? Pure vanilla cookie,” the light of truth called out. “Aah, there you are. To think you would keep me waiting for so long.”

Something was wrong, Pure vanilla could feel it in his dough.

“ I have already regained my strength. Why are you here?” Pure vanilla asked. “I’ve sworn to use my power for good. For all cookie kind.”

“Your power? Your power?” The voice taunted. “Ha.. Hahaha! Your power. That was my power, it was my powers that the witches took from me on a whim! Why do you get to use it however you want.”

“You’re not the light of truth. Who are you?!” Pure vanilla interrogated.

“You spent so much time here under my gaze for so long,” the voice changed. “And you don’t know who I am?! I’m a little hurt.”

“You.. you used the power of knowledge for evil, and reduced it to deceit. The witches took your power and sealed it,” Pure Vanilla slowly pieced together.

“AND MAY THEY BURN UP IN THE OVEN,” Shadow Milk growled.

Pure vanilla flinches at his sudden burst of anger.

“Phew, Alrighty. You think you have what it takes to defeat me? Your so so so so so silly, oh silly vanilly.”

“That’s enough from you!” Shouted a familiar voice, music to Pure vanilla’s ears.

—————————————————

Gingerbrave and company stare in shock as Y/n Knight and White Lily crash down on Shadow Milk, forcing the beast to face-plant into the ground.

"Y/n Knight Cookie! White Lily Cookie! You came!" Strawberry cookie gasps.

"And miss all this, no way," Y/n chuckles, and they put White Lily down.

"Sorry for lagging behind everyone," White Lilly apologized.

"It's just good to see you here," Wizard Cookie sighed in relief.

As Y/n Knight looked over the small team, their eyes landed on Pure Vanilla. His form was hunched over, hands over his head, struggling to stand.

"Pure Vanilla," Y/n gasps, quickly rushing to his side.

Gently wrapping their arms around him, as his from trembled under their touch.

______________________________

As Pure Vanilla searched for any way of escaping the Shadow Milk's realm.

"Pure Vanilla? Pure Vanilla cookie!" A voice called out.

Pure vanilla looked up, and in the distance, a star shone in the darkness. It was bright and warm.

"You have important things to do, you can't stay here," The warm voice said.

The star started to glow brighter, even crystallizing into the shape of a star in a sphere.

------------------------

"Pure Vanilla!" Y/n Knight called, when Pure Vanilla gasped to full awareness.

"Pure Vanilla Cookie! You're Awake!" GingerBrave awed.

"What have you done to pure vanilla cookie?!" Wizard cookie investigated.

"Aww, it's been so long since we last met! What's an old chat between friends?" Shadow milk mocked.

"I'm surprised you have friends," Y/n snapped back.

There was a brief moment of silence as Gingerbrave stared at Y/n in horror. Shadow milk stared for a bit, slowly taking in a long breath.

"I can't wait to watch you slowly crumble," Shadow Milk said simply.

Pure vanilla stands tall, an arm held out in front of Y/n Knight.

"Pure Vanilla, don't push yourself if you're still gathering yourself," Y/n Knight said to their king.

"I'm alright... Just a bit dazed, that's all," Pure vanilla said.

Elder Farie slowly walked past everyone, standing tall and brave in front ain't Beast Cookie.

"There is no need to be disappointed, for I will devote the rest of my life to casting you back into your prison," Elder Faire said, faltering a bit. He is not the young king he used to be.

"Look at me, your majesty. And see a force beyond your ken!" Shadow milk chuckled.

Everyone turned to see all the transformed fairy cookies. They were clowns, doing dangerous acts and not even being themselves. Shadow Milk chuckled as he called his power. The world around them started to warp and change as a force sent them flying back.

"Ah, my dear audience! The Long-Awaited show is finally about to begin!" Shadow Milk's voice boomed over the kingdom. "I'm heeeere! The world's finest playwright, poet, director, actor, and clown."

Suddenly, a stage appeared in front of the tree.

"Let the show begin! And if any of you is offended by this innocent play, please... Accept my humblest, deepest apologies! Believe me, it was never my intention to cause dismay! Only to entertain! The story is a product of imagination! All characters, unreal!" Shadow Milk announced.

From the stage 5 poorly drawn puppets of the ancient hero. And proceed to make up a falsified tale of the tree and the king.

"Pst. Let's move while everyone is distracted," Y/n knoght whispered to white Lily.

She nods and helps Elder Fairy forward, sneaking past the turned fairies. Sneaking their way to the stage.

The story was an absolute dumpster fire, with Shadow Milk Cookie only keeping a few truths sprinkled throughout the play.

Just as they made their way up the stage stairs, a puppet of shadow Milk plopped in front of them.

"OOOooh! You wish to join me on stage?.. I should give you a most cordial welcome!" Shadow Milk chuckles.

As Y/n readied themself, a vision flashed across her mind. A large wave of terrible drawn puppet warriors, they're going to be outnumbered.

"Ready yourselves! He's going to attack!" Y/n Knight shouted.

Just as Y/n Knight rushes to the front, puppet soldiers swarm the group. Y/n, Mercurial knight, and silver bell fought with all their might to protect Pure Vanilla and Elder Fearie. But there was too many of them.

"There is no other way..White Lily Cookie, Pure Vanilla Cookie. Please hold on a little longer to buy us more time," Elder Faerie cookie said. "I need time to prepare my final attack."

Y/n turned to say something when their eyes went blank for a moment. Back too in a mere second.

"Yes, Your Highness," Y/n Knight said.

With a powerful swing, the faerie king slashed at Shadow Milk Cookie! Everyone watched in awe at the guardians' might, but Y/n grimaced. It's not over yet, and the king... Collapses.

White Lily rushes over to the faerie king. Pure Vanilla tries to follow, when Y/n holds out their arm to block his path.

"Let her go, this has to happen," Y/n said, sorrow etched in their tone.

Pure Vanilla watched as White Lily ran to Elder Faerie's side. Y/n looked to Pure Vanilla with a serious look in their eyes.

"Pure Vanilla Cookie," They called to attention. " White Lily Cookie is going to go through an amazing change. I know you want to protect her out of some sort of lack in the past, but she does not need that. You need to be there for her as a friend and ally. She is an ancient hero who fought on your side all those centuries ago," Y/n knight smiled gently, as they held Pure Vanilla's hand.

Pure Vanilla stared at Y/n with surprise, as Y/n looked to White Lily as the Faerie king gave her the last of his power. The light of the guardian's power shimmered and shone across Y/n's face. Making them glow in Pure Vanilla's eyes. They slowly let go of Pure Vanilla's hand, but he didn't let go of theirs.

"Pure Vanilla Cookie?" Y/n notices that he still has their hand.

"Thank you, Y/n Knight Cookie... I needed that," Pure Vanilla said slowly. "And.. I'm sorry for how I acted during this time. I was thinking about myself and I wanted. That I lost sight of you. Every step of the way, you were always looking out for me, for everyone."

Y/n Knight Cookie smiles softly as Pure Vanilla turns to them.

"Shadow Milk Cookie... Has been echoing in my head. The closer we get to him... The harder it is to hear my own thoughts," Pure Vanilla opened up.

Y/n slowly tightens their hand on his.

"When that happens, just focus on me, listen to my voice. Can you do that?" Y/n asked softly.

"Of course," Pure Vanilla as he tightened his hold, too.

Y/n knight smiles as they let go of Pue Vanilla's hand and turns to white Liliy. Who was still gathering herself over the loss of one of her friends.

"Are you able to keep going?" Y/n asked gently.

"Keep Going?" She asked, confused.

"Sadly, it's not over," Y/n said, as a vision flashed in their mind.

They quickly jumped to the front and tried to cast a shield spell. It was faint and flickering. They struggled to expand the shield when a hand gently squeezed their shoulder. As a familiar staff stretches forward.

The shield shone and expanded in time for a wave a fire to crash against it. Pure Vanilla held Y/n close as he effortlessly protected to group from the wave of fire.

"So you have been listening in on my lessons," Pure Vanilla lightly teased.

"Not well enough, it seems," Y/n huffs, slightly tired.

Sadly, the light moment shattered as Pure Vanilla hunched over, clutching his head.

"Cut the Tree! CHOP DOWN THE TREE!" Shadow Milk shouts in Pure Vanilla's head.

"Get Out Of My Head!" Pure Vanilla screamed in pain as he clutched onto Y/n Knight.

Y/n Knight holds Pure Vanilla close, looking towards the tree. Shadow Milk grows more frustrated with his plans not going through.

"Come Out Guardian! I know you still live. SHOW YOURSELF!!" Shadow Milk roars.

"She, for I, the guardian of the seal, stands before you," White Lily cookie says, slowly raising to her feet. "Did you think it was going to be that easy?"

"You Little PEST!!" Shadow Milk Growls.

As Shadow Milk was about to say more when he noticed Y/n Knight holding Pure Vanilla close. Pure Vanilla looked deeply into Y/n's eyes as she helped to keep him out of the beast's control.

"So it's you two getting in my way, fine. Let's make this FUN!" Shadow laughs as he summons his puppet strings. The blue string quickly Snatched Gingerbrave and friends, and Pure Vanilla.

Just a pair of threads reach for White Lily, Y/n was the only one quick enough to push her out of the way. Time slowed as White Lily watched in shock, then horror as the threads wrap tightly around Y/n's neck.

With a hard yank, Shadow Milk drew Y/n Knight close to get a good look at this little smart aleck.

"Outside of your sharp tongue, you're pretty plain-looking Vanillian," Shadowmilk commented. "Vanilly sure has bland taste."

"While you have no taste," Y/n choked out, as Shadow milk tries to hold his cocky smile at that remake.

The threads tighten around their neck as he lifts them to eye level.

"Y/n Knight Cookie!" Pure Vanilla cried out.

_____________________________________________________

Lovely Fanart by @justa-skyourself. (This is so cute and beautiful! Thank you for your beautiful work.

--------------------------------------------------------

To be continued

[little-one-eyed-monsters]

Quick Pitch: Dream Projects for my Favorite Thai BL pairs

For context: When Singto Prachaya left GMMTV in 2021, and ceased all partner activities with Krist, I was truly heartbroken.

We all have our entry series into the BL genre. Many of us might have started with 2Gether-- the BL that helped usher the genre into the mainstream, or KinnPorsche, the most high-production BL series of its time.

For me, it was Thailand's Sotus. I absolutely adored KristSingto and was rooting for them to have more shows. When Singto left, I was devastated.

I don't blame Singto of course. By that point GMMTV really was giving him and Krist the short end of the career stick, but man, what a bummer. I used to joke with fellow Peraya fanclub members that my dream project for KristSingto, if in an impossible world Singto rejoins GMMTV, is about exes getting back together, just to be really meta about it.

Fast forward late 2024, and GMMTV announced a series called The Ex-Morning starring Krist and Singto.

And ya' know what? I'll take credit for that (even though I had nothing to do with it). Yes, I called that.

So since I'm obviously a wizard, Harry (proof above), let me conjure up a few more dream projects for my favorite Thai BL pairs, in the hopes that the BL gods, (a.k.a producers) will heed it.

Also, I did one of these for SmartBoom of Top Form already (because they deserve to have more shows yesterday) here.

Alright, let's begin with:

1. Yinwar- a BL remake of Korea's Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo

War's truly expressive, overdramatic acting style is PERFECT for historical dramas. He's a shoe-in for scenes that require intense confrontations and betreyals. I'd even argue that War's technique often clashes with Yin's boy-next-door acting style, which fits more rom-com than drama. So the perfect vehicle to balance the two? A main character from the present (Yin) gets isekai'd into the past, and finds himself in the middle of a civil war, and the true heir to the kingdom (War) is mounting a coup to overthrow his father's evil advisers. I can picture the shenanigans already 😅

Just a tip tho, PLEASE do not follow the ending of Moon Lovers for YinWar. The original ending was depressing. Let's give YinWar happier endings in 2025 and beyond.

2. UpPoom- an adaptation of USA's Red, White and Royal Blue

Both Up and Poom are such masterful actors-- truly leagues ahead of the current BL roster. And most of it has to do with their experience (which I touched upon in a previous post). However, because they're both great at playing broody or villainous characters, the audience often forgets that Up and Poom are actually VERY good at one genre-- COMEDY.

Poom absolutely STOLE the show as the wisecrack sidekick in Jenny AM/PM (a series starring Singto), while Up had great comedic timing in Start Up TH. So imagine a romcom filled with both wild shenanigans, and a broody, political sideplot-- a dream project for Up and Poom. Up will play the son of Thailand's Prime Minister, helping in his father's re-election campaign while running for a cabinet position himself (perfect for Up, considering his doctorate in Political Science). He falls in love with the worst person he can possibly end up with due to Thailand's strict les majeste laws-- the King's second son and the only heir to the throne of Thailand (Poom). Chaos ensues.

Up and Poom can balance between the serious, tearjerking scenes of the plot, while maintaining the chemistry and rom-com core of the original. Bonus: Poom loves desserts! Let them eat cake! (Or get smothered in cake)

3. BossNoeul- a BL adaptation of USA spy film Mr. and Mrs. Smith

A sexy action thriller for BossNoeul. Need I say more? Both of them have previously expressed their desire to star in action-themed series. But Boss' acting style and persona aren't quite suited for the brute and macho demeanor that Kinnporsche, or even Manner of Death, has. His strength lies in being mysterious-- suave, predatory, but not too forward; like a fox. Boss would play a great James Bond character.

And Noeul plays desire devastatingly well. Say what you want about that boy's acting-- his sex appeal is still the best in the business. He can go from innocent to sexy in one glance. A femme fatale-type character who uses both his skill and beauty to get the job done? Magic.

Combine the two and you get a series that will break the internet the same way Brangelina broke our collective minds in the early 2000s.

4. TayNew- a remake of Taiwanese BL Papa and Daddy

As a Polca, I've always been well-fed by the GMM machine. Even when New refused to renew an exclusive contract with GMMTV years ago, he didn't cease to take projects with them, and star along Tay in any and all manner of shows and content. They've had so many BLs, and more to come. They have their own mascot now, dear God. They'll have their own building at the GMM compound at this rate.

It is therefore only fitting that the longest-surviving Thai BL pair gets the most mature storyline any ship can possibly get--parenthood. Tay and New have established such a comfortable, domestic dynamic that they'll blend seamlessly into the role of new parents navigating marriage and their own family unit. It can serve as a wholesome tribute to Thailand's legalization of same-sex unions. Show how the adoption system remains brutal for same sex couples. And let's be real: Tay and New have no need for storylines that establish romance and chemistry anymore. They're so in sync and recognizable that even their bromance shows like Peaceful Property read off as BL. They ARE the romance now.

Do it, GMM. Give us sweet domesticity.

5. Billkin and PP Krit- a BL remake of Japan's The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window

My biggest gripe with BKPP's remake of Marry My Dead Body is that, similar to its Taiwanese adaptation, it feels like the producers didn't commit to the bit. And what is that bit, you may ask? It's the bit where the main homophobic cop character is obviously queer-coded. At times he showed true attraction to his ghostly husband, and by the end, even starts to question himself and his motives. But that's a rant for another post. What I'm trying to say here is that Billkin and PP Krit were obviously hampered by the source material. I want them to redeem themselves with a better vehicle.

The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window features the same supernatural and mystery elements that MMDB does-- about the unlikely partnership between a clairvoyant bookstore clerk, who gets hired by an exorcist assisting in police investigations. It's the perfect show to showcase Billkin and PP Krit's dramatic chops, given the heavy plot, but also a chance for them to feature in something befitting their star quality-- an intelligent plot with great character dynamics, and the most horrifying fantastical scenes to boot. They would easily KILL these roles. And this time, I know they'll make it a true BL, since the original manga relied on the romance of its characters for later plot resolutions.

6. WilliamEst- a remake of Taiwanese BL We Best Love

I gotta admit, this was a tough pick. I've seen so many Taiwanese BLs, but We Best Love is still MY number one from Taiwan, and my number 5 of all time. There's something so charming and light about it, while delivering truly believable performances and a relationship dynamic that's so well-matched. In my book, William and Est have some very big shoes to fill.

But I really think they could do it. They match the age and personality of the characters well. William can play the moody, temperamental 2nd fiddle who's unrequitedly in love with his best friend, while Est can play William's quieter, and better-skilled rival who's always had a thing for William's character. Bonus: Est is a nationally-ranked swimmer, and William is a musical prodigy, which are integral traits of the original characters. William and Est also exhibit a comfortable familiarity with each other due to their long acquaintance, again similar to the original characters.

7. DaouOffroad- a remake of Taiwanese BL First Note of Love

How do Daou and Offroad NOT have a music-themed series yet? Their whole persona revolves around their musicality! I want them to navigate the highs and lows of the music industry, while being a little jaded about all of it.

Daou could really play off a character whose disillusioned about his fame and carries around a personal tragic backstory. I think Daou would relate to all this pretty organically, given his early struggles in the industry. Offroad can play the fan-turned-upstart who'll help Daou find meaning to his music again. And then they'll release an OST-adjacent album that will sell millions of copies around the world 😅

And for a bonus:

Neo Trai (yes, just Neo 😅)- a truly unhinged remake of Japan's legendary show A Man Who Defies the World of BL

In my head, they'll film this at the top floor of the GMM building, with all of GMMTV's established BL pairs just casually being lovey-dovey in the weirdest places-- the breakroom, the main office, the stairwell, even the bathrooms. Neo, traumatized, is out here trying to buy lunch at the concessionaire stall downstairs 😅

Neo resolutely rejects all manner of "pairings" being thrown at him, until at the end he latches on to the one guy nobody wants to pair him up with (Mond Tanutchai maybe? Hahaha the ghost ship in My Golden Blood lives in my head rent-free). Imagine the CHAOS- I love it dearly already.

That's all and thanks for finishing this mammoth-sized post. If you don't see your ship here, feel free to share which dream projects you have for yours, and feel free to make lists of your own. Stay kooky folks! 😁

[onbearfeet]

In Which the Wizard School Books Are a Hammer

Okay. I'm gonna tell this story once, and only once, because I think it might help people who are struggling to finally, FINALLY boot J.K. Rowling from their lives.

I can't precisely say I sympathize, but I definitely know how you feel, because I have already had to do this dance with someone I guarantee you've never heard of. I've had all the feelings you've had. I had to find a way through all by myself, and now I'm going to help you so you have an easier time. Okay? Okay.

Content warning: discussion of child sexual abuse (mentioned but not described in detail).

So there's this writer. I refuse to speak or write his name these days, so we'll call him Evil Bob. ("Bob" is my default placeholder name, and this Bob is evil.) Evil Bob was a damn good writer and, frankly, an underappreciated one in his time. I picked up a few of his projects out of the bargain bin on impulse when I was about 12, and after that he was one of my names to conjure with. If Evil Bob had written it, I wanted to read it. He had a kind of perfect workman's style--he did a lot of things pretty well, and he did them in such a way that a bright 12-year-old could see how the trick was done. I learned a lot of basic writerly technique from Evil Bob--things about dialogue and pacing and how to convey character through action and lots of other stuff. Evil Bob unlocked something in my brain, and I really blossomed as a young writer by applying the lessons of his work.

Evil Bob's fiction started to fall off in popularity eventually, so he switched to nonfiction and wrote a damn good history book that won a lot of awards. I read it in college. The man could really interview, I tell you what.

I even got to interview Evil Bob myself, eventually. I was working for a small magazine that wanted to publish an article about a certain minority group's representation in a certain fiction genre, and Evil Bob had written one of the seminal works in that niche, so I tracked down his contact info, called him up, and we had a lovely hourlong chat. He was kind and gracious and funny and --

Yeah, this is where you learn why I named him Evil Bob.

A few years ago, people in Evil Bob's old fiction genre started circulating a list of, shall we say, disgraced writers in the field. Think of it like a MeToo list. The list got passed around every time a new name was added, and at a certain point, after a much more famous name had just been added to it, the list crossed my feed for the first time in a while. I dutifully scanned down it in case there was anyone on it I'd missed; after all, I attended conventions for this genre, and some of these fuckers were on the list for assaulting fans like me, so I wanted to know who to watch out for.

And there, in the middle of the list, was Evil Bob.

Weird, I thought. Evil Bob had seemed chill when I spoke to him, and usually, being 22 with big boobs (as I was when I interviewed him) brought out the perv in these guys if there was any perv to bring out. Well, maybe this was something else--maybe he used a slur on an old tape or something. I googled.

It was something else, all right.

As I sat there googling, Evil Bob was sitting in a federal prison a thousand miles away. He was there because, according to his Wikipedia page, he had been convicted of having so many CSA images on his hard drive that the judge in his case became physically ill. Honestly, I want to know where he got a hard drive that big in the year he was arrested, but I absolutely will not be asking him.

Evil Bob was EVIL. Fuck the carceral state, but also never let that particular dude near kids or a computer again.

So now I had a problem. I was going to stop buying Evil Bob's stuff, obviously--I would drop the man like a hot potato--but I couldn't so easily remove his influence on me. I'll never be 12 years old and digging through the quarter bin at the used bookshop again. There's no way to re-learn the foundations of my artform without Evil Bob. The bastard is part of me, whether I like it or not. He's left his fingerprints on my brain. And while I have negative interest in creating my own criminal hard drive, it's a little hard to shake the irrational guilt (especially since I had been raised in a high-control religious environment where any contact with sin could permanently stain one's soul, and Evil Bob's writing was part of how I escaped, and--you get the idea). I couldn't shed the stink of Evil Bob. I'd written that article. I was covered in the fuckin' ooze.

I'll spare you the six months of angst and self-flagellation. I've been to therapy since this happened. Here's what I eventually decided:

Evil Bob is like a hammer.

My dad gave me an old hammer when I moved out, along with some other miscellaneous hand tools in a paper bag. I bought a toolbox, I put the tools in it, and I use them when I need tools. My dad is an asshole who abused his children, but a hammer is a hammer. Scratch the previous owner's name off the handle, and you can build a pretty fine house with it.

What I learned from Evil Bob are the tools of a trade, and tools are not inherently evil. He taught me how to put sentences together--but I decide what my sentences say. He showed me how to convey character--but I choose what I'm conveying. He made me a writer--but I'm the one writing now.

So I still use Evil Bob's tools, with his name scoured off. I still teach some of those lessons, but he's the one source I don't cite. Oh, that dialogue hack? I picked it up in grad school, pinky swear. Here, let me share it with you for free, with no credit or compensation to the bastard who taught it to me.

I won't pretend Evil Bob wasn't an influence on my younger self, but you'll never hear me speak his legal name. I was one of the few people who really counted themselves fans of his work ... and he'll never get a whisper of a hint of that support from me again. I guarantee you won't be able to track him down from this post, and that's just the way I like it. There's a reason I haven't identified what genre he wrote in, or what his seminal fiction work was about, or whom he interviewed for that prizewinning book.

Damnatio memoriae, motherfucker. This is my hammer now, and it always has been.

So how do we give JKR the Evil Bob treatment?

Unfortunately, the Terf Queen has a larger media presence than Evil Bob ever did. One sad ex-Potterhead won't be able to erase her from culture. But there's a lot more than one of you, isn't there?

The thing is, cultural trends fade faster than you expect. Plenty of celebrities and famous artists of your parents' generation are nobodies now, and it's usually because their work spoke to your parents but not to you. I once witnessed my brother trying to read his sons a 1912 book about Spanish naval history as a bedtime story, and let me tell you, it did not go over well. Some art burns hot and bright and then it burns OUT.

The Potterheads are the parents now. Imagine how easy it would be to just ... stop talking about her. Stop buying the merch. Don't watch the new TV show or play the new game. Don't tell people you used to be a fan--not because you ought to be ashamed, but because you're not going to give her the satisfaction of saying her name. And when your kids ask about your tattoo, just tell them not to get blackout drunk in college.

Damnatio memoriae, motherfucker.

And if you feel the need to explain where you learned your kindness and courage, your unshakable loyalty to your friends (especially the trans ones), your hope in the face of overwhelming darkness ...

... why, that's your hammer. And it always has been.

[admiringlove]

➵ pairing. gojo satoru x fem! reader.

➵ summary. the pieces are in place, the shadows are shifting, and soon, everything will unravel.

➵ warnings. mentions of blood; one character almost dies; lots of fire; bickering™; crying; ; mentions of familial abuse; mentions of death; mentions of physical injuries; slight evil geto; this is the last official chapter before the epilogues; yes i'm crying too.

➵ genre. wizarding world au; academic rivals to lovers; enemies to lovers; angst; fluff; adventure; SLOWBURN (NOT ANYMORE 😼😼); slight inaccuracies in the wizarding world because i did make some stuff up for the sake of the crossover; etc.

➵ word count. 33.2k (longest chapter record broken again!!!!).

➵ author's note. second part of chapter seven, as tumblr wouldn't let me post it all in one go 💔💔 enjoy!!

➵ navigation. chapter six, chapter seven part one, masterlist, next.

When you step out of the temple, the air is still cool against your skin, the sun hanging low in the sky, casting long shadows over the temple grounds. The mist has begun to lift, dissolving into thin streams of white that curl around the wooden beams of the temple before vanishing completely. Somewhere in the distance, a crow caws, its cry cutting through the hush of the early morning. The scent of incense clings faintly to your clothes, to your hair, to your skin. 

Nothing had happened.

You’d gone inside, paid your respects, bowed your head in prayer, and willed the universe to grant you some kind of sign. Something—anything—to lead you forward.

But nothing came. No shift in the air, no flicker of magic, no hidden passage revealed beneath the temple floor. Just silence and the rhythmic sound of your own breathing.

Your shoulder had brushed against Gojo’s for far too long while you prayed, though. And he hadn’t moved away.

Maybe he didn’t notice. Maybe it meant nothing.

But then again, Gojo Satoru never does anything without intention. He moves through the world with certainty, with a self-assurance that is almost infuriating. He does everything with conviction, with that smug tilt of his lips, with the confidence of a man who has never once doubted himself. He does not hesitate.

You don’t let yourself think about it for too long.

You exhale, stepping down from the temple’s main hall, your shoes scuffing against the ancient wooden planks. The others follow, descending the steps one by one, the quiet hum of their conversation barely registering in your ears. When you reach the gravel path at the base of the temple, you turn to face them.

“How are we supposed to get to the next one?” you ask, scanning their faces.

Utahime presses her lips together, her brows furrowed as she considers. “The man at the tea shop said there were three that could be of use to us.” She pauses, tilting her head slightly. “But I really don’t think it’s Ninna-ji.”

Gojo snorts, shoving his hands into the pockets of his coat. “You mean the one where the royal family used nepotism to get their jobs as head priests?”

Utahime levels him with a glare. “No, stupid. It’s called serving your community.”

You almost smile at the way Gojo’s lips part, ready to argue, but she continues before he can interrupt. “But yes, that one,” she admits. “I don’t think it’s Ninna-ji because it’s… small. Compared to the other two.”

You glance back at the temple behind you, its towering wooden pillars stretching high into the sky. Kiyomizu-dera had been vast, an entire world built into the mountainside. The idea of Sukuna’s grave being tucked away in a smaller, lesser-known temple feels… wrong.

“So we’re discriminating based on size now?” Gojo quips, rocking back on his heels.

You ignore him, narrowing your eyes in thought. “But, ‘Hime, wouldn’t that be precisely why it is that one? It’s different compared to the others. Process of elimination.”

Utahime hesitates. Her fingers tighten around the edge of her scarf, tugging it slightly before she exhales. “I don’t know,” she murmurs. “It’s just a feeling I have.”

Gojo lets out an exaggerated sigh, tilting his head back. “Your feelings aren’t exactly the most reliable way to get accurate directions.”

She turns on him instantly, face pinched in irritation. “And what do you suggest, then? Wandering around Kyoto until we stumble onto a cursed grave?”

“Could be worse,” Gojo says breezily. “Could be cursed spirits. Or dementors.”

“Don’t jinx it,” Shoko mutters.

Utahime crosses her arms, still glaring at him. “Enryaku-ji is technically way more powerful,” she argues, voice firm. “We’ve already gone to the oldest temple. Ninna-ji is only considered powerful because of its ties to the imperial family. And if Sukuna is as old as the texts say, then the oldest or the strongest would make the most sense.”

There’s a pause. A breath of silence. The wind shifts slightly, carrying the scent of cedar and damp earth.

You glance at the map again, though you already know it won’t give you any answers. The ink remains still, unmoving.

“How would we get to that one?” you ask, voice quieter than you expect it to be. The stillness of the temple grounds makes everything feel heavier, like the weight of your words might press into the earth itself. “I can’t see anything on the map except us.”

Utahime exhales, the breath curling in the cold air before dissipating. “We could take the train,” she says after a moment. “Then the cable car to the top of the mountain.”

You glance up from the map. The thought of winding through Kyoto’s train stations, of standing in a crowded car, pressed up against civilians who have no idea what lurks in their city—what you are searching for—makes your stomach turn. It would be a waste of time.

“That would take too long,” Gojo says, voicing your thoughts before you can. His hands are deep in his coat pockets, and when he speaks, it’s casual, like it’s the simplest answer in the world. “We could just Disapparate.”

There’s a beat of silence, then—

“What?”

Shoko’s voice is sharp, rising an octave.

“I am not doing that again,” she snaps, stepping forward, the loose ends of her scarf whipping slightly in the wind. “Did you not see me almost vomit earlier?”

Gojo tilts his head, unimpressed. “Relax,” he says, and you can hear the grin in his voice before he even smirks. “I have another vial of Pepperup Potion.”

You close your eyes for a moment, inhaling deeply.

You don’t necessarily like Disapparating, but right now, it’s the only logical option.

“We’ll go first,” you say, looking at Gojo as you roll the map back up. “I’ll see if there’s anything there before the rest of you follow.”

“You’re not scouting a potentially dangerous location alone,” Shoko says flatly.

You give her a look. “Then don’t take too long.”

Gojo rolls his eyes, but he grabs onto your arm before you can even make the first move, the warmth of his fingers searing against the cold. The familiar pull of Apparition wraps around you before you can protest, the world collapsing inward, a crushing force against your ribs, and then, cold air. Biting against your skin. The smell of damp earth. A dull, thick fog.

You stagger forward slightly, your boots pressing into the soft, leaf-covered ground. The wind up here is different—thinner, sharper, as if you’ve stepped into another realm entirely.

The mountain looms ahead.

Or at least, you think it does.

Everything is cloaked in mist, a heavy, impenetrable white stretching far into the horizon. You can just barely make out the outline of trees, their skeletal branches twisting into the sky, disappearing into the thick fog above. The ground beneath you is uneven, sloping upward as the base of the mountain begins its ascent.

It is eerily quiet. No birds. No insects. No distant hum of life. Only the wind, curling through the trees like something alive.

You unroll the map, pulling it free again. You open it carefully, letting the edges unfurl, and—

Your stomach drops. The map remains blank.

You frown, adjusting your grip, as if tilting it differently might make something appear. But no—there’s nothing. No outline of the temple, no indication of paths or terrain. Only a vast, empty space where the mountain should be.

It isn’t just missing information. It’s obscured.

A hidden place. An unmapped land. A part of the world that refuses to be seen. On purpose, perhaps.

“There’s nothing on it,” Gojo murmurs beside you.

His voice is quieter than usual, stripped of its usual teasing lilt. You don’t look at him right away, your gaze still fixed on the map—on the blank expanse where the temple should be. The pulse of golden light—your location—is the only thing that remains, flickering steadily, useless.

You inhale, slow and steady. You’ve always been good at grounding yourself, at keeping your head even when everything else unravels. But this—this emptiness, this sense of being unseen—it unsettles you in a way you can’t quite name.

When you finally glance at Gojo, your breath catches. He’s closer than you expected, his face turned toward yours, expression unreadable. You swallow. The remnants of Apparition still linger in your body, making your limbs feel unsteady, though not enough to be nauseating. Not like the others. You should say something. You need to say something.

“Tell Utahime and the others that they should get here too,” you say, voice quieter than you mean it to be.

For a moment, he doesn’t move.

“Fawkes,” he says, soft but deliberate. A name. Your name. The nickname he’s always used when he wants your attention, when he wants you to listen—really listen. You know what he’s about to do. You always know. The way he shifts his weight just slightly before he says something important. The way his voice dips when he means something more than his words let on. You know him like the back of your hand, like a familiar passage from your favorite book. You know him better than you should.

So before he can speak again, you shake your head. Just the slightest movement. Barely noticeable, but he catches it. He always does.

“Afterwards,” you say. “When everything’s over.”

A flicker of something crosses his face—confusion, maybe. But it fades just as quickly, replaced by something closer to understanding.

“How is it,” he muses, “that you always know exactly what I’m going to do?”

You huff, forcing a small smile. “The same way you always know exactly how to push my buttons.”

He exhales through his nose, something between a sigh and a laugh, shaking his head before pulling his phone from his coat pocket. The soft glow of the screen illuminates his features for a second before he types out a message, sending it off into the ether.

The silence stretches between you. You don’t mind it.

You let your fingers brush over the map again, feeling the worn leather binding, the texture of the parchment beneath your touch. It feels different now—lighter, almost fragile. But nothing has changed. You glance up, gaze flickering over the mist-covered landscape, the atrophied outlines of trees scarcely visible in the distance. It feels like you’ve stepped into a place that exists outside of time, somewhere separate from the rest of the world.

You’re still alone. Utahime, Shoko, and Nanami haven’t arrived yet. The mountain is quiet, still watching.

You tilt your head, looking back at Gojo. He’s already staring at you.

“Do you think your mother meant it?” you ask, your voice just above a whisper.

His brow furrows slightly. “Meant what?”

“That Dumbledore is a selfish man,” you say. You don’t mean to hesitate, but you do. The weight of the thought is heavy, pressing against your ribs. “That he won’t stop at anything until he gets what he wants. And that’s why your mother made sure he was put under surveillance after the prophecy was revealed to her.”

He doesn’t answer. The silence that follows is heavier than the one before, unmovingly thick.

But you don’t get the chance to press him, because then, a sharp crack breaks through the quiet, then another, and another.

The others appear in front of you, the aftershocks of Apparition still rippling through the air. Shoko and Nanami stagger slightly, their faces pale with nausea, while Utahime immediately moves to steady them. She murmurs something under her breath, a hand on Shoko’s back, but the words are lost to the wind.

Gojo reaches into his coat, retrieving another vial of Pepperup Potion, handing it over without a word.

And then—

He looks at you. That same look. The one that means he knows something. The one that means he’s holding something back, keeping something from you. The one that means he’s already decided how much he’s willing to share, and how much he’s going to keep to himself.

It infuriates you. But now is not the time to fight him on it. And you hate that. But you sigh.

You clutch the map tighter in your hands, the leather-bound edges digging into your palms. 

“Guys,” you say, voice steady but sharp, getting their attention, “there’s a problem.”

They all turn to you. Gojo, who had been stretching his arms above his head like this is nothing more than a casual morning stroll, groans slightly, knowing how everyone’s reactions will be to this information. Utahime, adjusting the strap of her bag, looks up with a frown. Nanami watches, unimpressed as always, and Shoko, looking at you with mild amusement, only raises an eyebrow.

“How are we supposed to find anything,” you continue, slowly turning the map toward them, “if the map suddenly goes blank?”

A golden dot pulses at the center. Your location. But everything else—everything beyond this exact point—is nothing but an empty abyss of dark, almost black parchment. No trails, no trees, no temple. Nothing.

Utahime steps closer, furrowing her brows. “Wait, what?”

“It’s blank, different from the other temple, but still blank” you repeat, flipping it back toward yourself, as if looking at it from another angle might reveal something different. “No forest, no mountain, nothing.”

Utahime leans in, peering at it, before crossing her arms. “That shouldn’t be possible.”

Shoko groans dramatically, tilting her head back toward the sky. “Maybe it’ll update itself when it realizes we’re struggling.”

You shoot her a look. “Right. Let’s just wait for it to pity us.”

Gojo snickers. Utahime ignores you both, snatching the map from your hands, flipping it around as if it might reveal some hidden layer beneath.

“Well, that’s fucking useless,” she mutters.

“Oh?” Gojo says, smirking. “The great Utahime, admitting something is useless?”

She turns to him, already exasperated. “What is your problem?”

“My problem,” Gojo starts, voice infuriatingly smooth, “is that we’re supposed to be solving a centuries-old mystery, and you’re acting like an old lady who just realized her clock is broken.”

Utahime scoffs. “That’s the stupidest analogy I’ve ever heard.”

“Oh? Would you like me to try another?”

“No, I’d like you to shut up.”

“That’s not very nice, ‘Hime.”

You sigh, already used to this. “Are you two going to bicker the entire way up the mountain, or…?”

Utahime presses her fingers against the bridge of her nose. “I hate working with him.”

Gojo clasps his hands together, mockingly sincere. “You wound me.”

Shoko hums in amusement. Nanami, standing beside her with his arms crossed, looks deeply unimpressed. “Are we done?” he asks, voice flat. “Or should we give you two more time to act like children?”

“I’m not acting like a child,” Utahime snaps.

Gojo grins. “That’s exactly what a child would say.”

Utahime makes a noise of frustration. You roll your eyes, grabbing the map back from her hands and turning to her. “‘Hime, Where are the cable cars?”

She exhales, composing herself before looking around. For a moment, her expression shifts into something more serious—distantly calculating. Then, she points past a clearing, toward a narrow path framed by trees.

“There,” she says. “We go up, and then take the cars to the top of the mountain.”

You nod. “Then let’s go.”

“Wait,” Gojo says, voice suddenly sharper.

You pause, turning back to him. “What now?”

His gaze is lifted toward the peak, obscured by mist. His smirk is gone, replaced by something unreadable.

“Why would a grave be near a temple?” he asks.

The wind shifts. The trees whisper. The silence lingers. Something about this place feels wrong and right at the same time.

You tighten your grip on the map, its edges rough beneath your fingers. The golden dot marking your location pulses steadily, as if mocking you—taunting you with how utterly useless it is.

“What do you mean?” you ask, voice cutting through the silence. “These are very prominent Buddhist locations, right? That’s what I thought we were supposed to be—”

“No, Fawkes,” Gojo interrupts, shaking his head. His tone is different now, sharper, more serious. “Think.” His gaze is locked onto you, searching, urging. “Have you ever seen a grave near a temple?”

You open your mouth, then pause.

“A shrine, sure,” he continues. “But not temples. Temples are holy, they’re peaceful. They exist to guide the living, not house the dead. A place like this—it isn’t meant for someone like Sukuna.”

His words settle in the space between you, twisting into something uneasy. Because he’s right. He’s right, and that realization is enough to send a shiver down your spine.

Your grip on the map tightens. “The map is blank,” you murmur, almost to yourself. The thought coils in your mind, its implications clicking into place with a slow, creeping dread. “It’s the most we’ve gotten out of it today.”

Utahime snorts. “Please tell me you meant to say ‘the least.’”

You shake your head, shaking away the uncertainty, forcing yourself to focus. “No, this is… progress. I think. Everywhere else, we could see everything. Streets, buildings, trees. But here?” You glance down at the map again, at the empty expanse of parchment surrounding your lone, flickering marker. “We can’t see anything at all. Except for where we are. It’s different. I think… I think we might already be where we need to be.” Your voice wavers slightly, but you push forward. “Even though it feels like a big fucking fluke.”

No one speaks.

The silence stretches between you all, thick with unspoken thoughts.

But Gojo—he isn’t looking at you. He isn’t looking at the map or the others. His gaze is fixed on the landscape, scanning the trees, the mountain, the uneven ground beneath your feet. He takes in everything—the way the mist clings to the treetops, the way the air feels, the way the world has shifted into something just slightly off-kilter.

Then, without a word, he reaches up and removes his glasses.

The movement is slow, deliberate. He folds them neatly and slips them into his pocket like they mean nothing.

You inhale sharply. He isn’t looking at you, but he doesn’t need to.

Your breath catches as you follow his gaze—out beyond the clearing, past the trees, to a spot that seems unremarkable at first. Just a small dip in the earth, a shallow indentation where the grass grows thinner. But then, you see it.

A thin, near-invisible trail of water, trickling down from the mountain’s peak, weaving through the rocks and roots before pooling at a small, quiet basin near your feet.

A natural spring.

The water is clear, perfectly still, undisturbed by wind or movement. Yet there’s something unsettling about it, something that makes your skin prickle as you stare at the way it gleams under the weak morning light.

“Satoru?” you murmur.

He doesn’t answer.

Instead, he takes a step forward, his expression unreadable. Then another.

And without a word, you follow.

The map is clutched tight in your hands, the edges damp with sweat. You don’t hesitate, don’t pause to look back. You don’t even think—you just move, drawn forward by something unspoken, something you don’t quite understand.

The others follow, footsteps muffled against the damp earth. Utahime’s eyes flick between you and Gojo, wary but unwilling to interrupt. Shoko walks with a lazy sort of interest, while Nanami remains silent, watchful.

The water ripples as Gojo steps closer.

The trail beneath your feet is uneven, slick with damp moss and loose stones. It’s not a real path, not something meant for people to walk on, and yet Gojo moves like it is—like he’s always known this route, like the mountain itself is bending to his will.

"Where are we going?" Utahime asks, voice quiet, almost wary.

No one answers.

You catch the way Shoko shrugs, unbothered, the way Nanami barely shakes his head, resigned. The silence stretches longer, broken only by the crunch of your boots against the dirt and the soft, persistent trickle of water.

You glance up, watching as Gojo climbs higher, moving with a lazy sort of ease that feels wrong in a place like this. He doesn't look back, but when you step onto a particularly loose rock, his hand is there—steady, offering balance. You take it without thinking, just for a second, just until you find your footing again.

And then he moves on. There is no hesitation in his steps. No second-guessing.

He’s leading you all off the path, away from the marked trails, away from where anyone—tourists, monks, even the occasional lost hiker—could possibly see you.

You exhale, watching as he keeps following the water, trailing its source up the mountainside. You let yourself believe, for a moment, that this is his plan. That he's taking you somewhere with purpose. That there will be an answer at the end of this.

But then, he turns. Sharp, deliberate. Away from the water.

The thought in your head withers immediately, cut off before it can fully form. You frown, rolling the map in your hands, stuffing it into your pocket as you pick up the pace, trying to catch up to him.

"Satoru," you call softly, stepping over a gnarled root. "Say something."

He doesn't stop walking. Doesn't turn around.

"Afterwards," he says, and his voice is quieter than usual, the weight of it settling somewhere deep in your bones. "When everything’s over."

The words echo between you, and this time, you don’t argue because he’s repeating your own words from earlier back to you.

The ground gets trickier the farther and higher you go. Loose soil, jagged rocks, the kind of uneven footing that makes every step more of a risk. Your fingers brush against damp stone as you reach out to steady yourself, and for the next few minutes, there is nothing but the sound of your breathing, the press of the mountain rising steeply around you.

And then, Gojo stops.

You barely register it in time before you collide into his back, the impact forcing a small grunt from your throat.

"Satoru—"

"Those rocks."

His voice is different now. Sharper. You follow his gaze, heart stuttering as you take in what he's pointing at. Ahead, near the base of a twisted tree, is a cluster of stones—weathered, arranged deliberately, something that is unmistakably meant to be here. But that isn’t what makes your breath catch.

For a moment, you think your eyes are deceiving you, playing tricks with the shifting shadows and the slivers of moonlight filtering through the branches. But then he shifts, just slightly, and you see the glint of something—his belt buckle? A knife? No, just the metal of his rings catching the faint light.

Your breath stills.

Gojo is already moving before you can react. His footsteps are sharp against the forest floor, crunching dried leaves and twigs, and his wand is raised before you even process that it’s Toji standing there.

“What are you doing here, Fushiguro?” Gojo’s voice is low, sharp-edged, crackling with restrained magic. He presses the tip of his wand to the back of Toji’s head, fingers curled around the handle so tightly his knuckles are white.

Toji turns, slow and lazy, like he has all the time in the world. His hands are up, not in surrender, but in that easy, mocking way of his—shoulders loose, chin tilted, smirk playing at the corner of his lips. The same lips you’ve kissed before.

Your stomach twists, your pulse a beat too fast.

“Dumbledore sent me,” Toji says, voice calm, infuriatingly nonchalant. He rolls his shoulders back, stretching slightly, as if none of this—Gojo’s fury, the tension simmering between everyone—concerns him in the slightest. “I don’t mean any harm. The old man just thought I should help, ‘s all.”

Gojo doesn’t lower his wand. If anything, he presses it harder against Toji’s skin, his eyes glinting dangerously behind his glasses. “Like hell we need your help.”

Toji clicks his tongue, shaking his head with mock disappointment. “Didn’t yer mother ever teach you to be nice to yer elders?” His grin widens when Gojo tenses. “I’m tellin’ you. Dumbledore sent me.”

“How’d you know where to go?” you ask, voice quieter than before. The map is still clenched in your hands, its edges crumpled under your grip.

Toji shrugs again. “Dumbledore gave me a few hints.”

Gojo’s nostrils flare. “What do you mean, ‘hints’?”

There’s a sharp shift in the air, the atmosphere suddenly charged with something volatile. Gojo pushes forward, his wand nearly digging into Toji’s neck, his jaw tight with barely contained rage.

The hairs on the back of your neck rise.

“Satoru,” you say, softly but firmly. “Step back.”

He doesn’t listen at first, doesn’t even glance at you. He just stands there, breathing through his nose, his grip still tight on his wand.

“Satoru.”

Finally, he spares you a glance—his gaze still burning, still full of suspicion and anger. But after a long moment, he steps back. Two paces. Then four.

You exhale, turning back to Toji. He watches you carefully, his smirk fading just slightly, replaced by something unreadable.

“Toji,” you say, slowly, measuring your words. “Tell me you’re not lying.”

His expression flickers—just a fraction of hesitation before he speaks.

“Princess—”

“Don’t call me that.” Your voice is sharper than you intended.

His lips quirk up, but the amusement doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m not lyin’,” he says simply. “You think I wanna be here? ‘Course not. I’m doin’ this to boost my Auror applications. Classified work. Dumbledore made sure I’d get to the right place.”

You don’t break eye contact, studying him for any tell, any flicker of deception.

Then, you sigh. “He’s telling the truth.”

There’s a sharp inhale from Gojo, and when you turn, you see him looking at you like you’ve just betrayed him. His disbelief is so palpable you can feel it, seeping into your skin like cold water.

“You can’t be serious.”

Utahime exhales heavily. “If there’s anything you need to know about Fushiguro, Gojo, it’s that he does things solely for selfish purposes.”

Gojo is still looking at you, like he’s waiting for you to take it back, to say you were wrong.

You don’t. And slowly, reluctantly, he lowers his wand.

You swallow, your throat dry, before finally turning toward the rocks by the tree. There’s an incense stick. Already lit, and set on top of the stone. Already burned halfway down to nothing. Your stomach twists.

Geto. You know it before anyone has to say it.

You step forward, your boots pressing into damp earth, closing the distance with slow, careful movements. The others follow, drawn in by the same terrible realization. The scent of the incense is faint, something familiar but unwelcome, curling into the cold air like a whisper.

Gojo doesn’t move. Neither does Toji.

Utahime breathes in sharply, hands curling into fists, while Shoko just watches, her expression unreadable. Nanami stays still, watching the scene disentangle immovably.  

But you? You kneel.

Your fingers ghost over the edges of the stones, their surfaces worn smooth from time and exposure. You hesitate for only a second before pressing your hands against them, testing their weight, pushing.

They shift. Just slightly. Your breath catches again, harsher this time.

"We have to move them," you say, voice steadier than you feel.

No one argues. Together, you start working, lifting, shifting, clearing away the stones one by one. The deeper you go, the more you realize—they weren’t just placed here at random. They were meant to hide something.

The last rock is heavier, and it takes both you and Nanami to push it aside. But when it finally moves, the map burns.

Not in flame, not in a way that destroys.

But in a way that ignites. 

A sharp, golden pulse erupts from it, so sudden that you nearly drop it. Your fingers tighten around the parchment, feeling the warmth spread through your skin, sinking deep. It glows, flickers—something shifting across its surface like ink bleeding into water.

And then, a drop of blood.

Yours.

You barely register the sting until you see it—a thin, shallow cut across your palm, left behind from the sharp edge of a rock. A single bead of blood swells, wavers, and then—

It falls. 

And time slows as it does, finally landing on the map with a soft plop.

The reaction is immediate. The golden light surges, curling outward, the blank space unraveling like a spell breaking. And then—slowly, slowly—something begins to appear.

Lines. Symbols. A path.

And beneath your feet, a low, deep rumble. The earth shifts, and the entrance reveals itself.

“Well,” Gojo glances back at the rest of you. “Shall we?���

You inhale sharply, the scent of damp stone thick in the air, before stepping forward, gripping the map tightly in your hands. The parchment is warm now, pulsing like a second heartbeat against your fingertips. You push ahead of Gojo, brushing past him without sparing a glance.

"I have the map," you say, voice steadier than you feel. "I have to tell you all the way."

Gojo doesn't argue. No one does.

The passage ahead yawns open like the throat of something ancient, something waiting. Darkness stretches out in both directions, thick and undisturbed, and yet—there is a structure to it. This is no ordinary cave, no natural formation carved by time and water. The walls bear the shape of something deliberate, something built. There is a symmetry to the archways, the way the stone has been shaped, pressed into perfect, unnatural precision.

A catacomb. A tomb.

"Lumos," Nanami murmurs, and then one by one, all their wands ignite, their glow illuminating the space in flickering bursts of gold and blue. Shadows dance wildly across the walls, stretching, bending, making shapes where there are none.

And then, the entrance seals behind you.

A dull, grinding sound shudders through the space as stone drags against stone, the path behind you closing in on itself with a finality that makes your stomach drop. The air thickens, pressing against your skin like the weight of something unseen, something watching.

Utahime swallows audibly, walking beside Toji. 

"Why are there weird runes on the walls?" she asks, voice barely above a whisper.

You turn, eyes narrowing as she lifts her wand, illuminating the carvings. Symbols—etched deep into the stone, curling in intricate patterns, spiraling down the length of the corridor. Your heart lurches as recognition settles in.

The runes. From Mirai's parchments. They are here. Real. Tangible.

You suck in a breath, turning sharply to Gojo, and he meets your gaze with something grim, something knowing.

"That's exactly what you think it is," he says. And you exhale.

"These," you whisper, "were in Gojo’s mother’s notes. Specialists have been trying to decode them at the Ministry, but there hasn’t been any luck so far."

Utahime stares at the symbols for a moment longer, then exhales, shaking her head slightly.

"Well," she murmurs, "at least now we’re sure we’re going in the right direction."

"You wouldn’t know the right direction if it hit you in the face, Iori," Gojo mutters.

You elbow him before he can say anything else, rolling your eyes as you glance back at the map. The golden marker is still there, a single pulsing point in the vast, twisting pathways now revealed on the parchment. And extending from it—

A path. A single line, leading forward, winding deep into the tunnels.

"Alright," you say, voice heavy with something unnameable. "Up straight ahead so far."

The silence that follows is different now. It is no longer the quiet of an abandoned place, nor the hush of the unknown. It is oppressive, lingering, as if the air itself is thick with something unsaid. Every step echoes too loudly, the sound bouncing off the walls in ways that don’t feel natural.

It is not like the One-Eyed-Witch Passageway.

It is way, way worse.

Here, the air is damp and stale, laced with something metallic. You can hear water dripping, here too, slow and steady, but it is not a comforting sound. It is wrong. Everything is wrong. Each drop is sharp, ringing out against the stone like something waiting, something watching.

A knife at the back of your throat, waiting to cut.

"Fawkes," Gojo murmurs, his voice uncharacteristically soft, "you okay?"

You nod, though your grip on the map tightens slightly.

Behind you, Utahime and Shoko are murmuring, their voices low as they trace their fingers over the runes, trying to make sense of them as they walk. The symbols seem to shift under the flickering light, twisting into something unrecognizable whenever you look away.

And then, a sound. Not footsteps. Not water. Something else. You take another step, turning the first corner, and freeze.

A song. High-pitched. Piercing. Not melodic, not harmonious, but shrill, discordant—something between a wail and laughter. The hairs on the back of your neck rise, and before you can react, Gojo moves.

Fast. His hand is on your shoulder, shoving you back, pressing you against the wall as he raises his wand.

"Lumos Maxima!"

Light explodes outward, flooding the passage.

And there, Erklings.

Lining the path ahead, their bodies hunched, composed of wood and thorns, twisted and gnarled like something out of a nightmare. Their eyes gleam yellow in the wandlight, and when they grin, their sharp teeth glisten with something wet.

Bavarian Erklings.

You scramble for your wand, reaching for the hidden sheath in your boot, fingers fumbling against the leather. But they are fast. And one of them is already lunging, your breath catches, heart hammering, and before you can even react—

"Crucio!"

The word slams into the air like a physical force.

The Erkling shrieks.

A sound unlike anything you've ever heard—raw, agonized, its body twisting, writhing as it collapses onto the stone floor, limbs convulsing. Your head jerks toward Gojo, mouth wide open. His wand is still raised, expression unreadable. He holds the curse for a second too long. And then he stops.

The Erkling slumps, twitching, gasping in short, ragged bursts. And then—

"Pullus," Gojo mutters.

The Erkling barely has time to react before its body shifts, contorts—feathers sprouting in jagged tufts, limbs shrinking, warping, until all that remains is a dazed, disoriented chicken.

There is a silence that stretches between all of you. Your lips part, a protest forming, but nothing comes out.

Gojo does not look at you. Instead, he turns back to the others.

"Keep moving," he says.

And then the fight begins in earnest. Utahime, Toji and Nanami are already moving, wands raised, throwing jinxes faster than you can process.

"Melofors!"

"Pullus!"

A burst of magic surges through the tunnel—Erklings dropping one by one, their bodies warping, twisting, shifting into harmless forms. A pumpkin-headed creature stumbles into a wall, its shrill shriek cutting off abruptly. Another chicken flaps wildly before darting into the darkness.

Shoko dodges an incoming attack, flicking her wand sharply.

"Expulso!"

The force of the blast sends the creature flying, colliding against the stone with a sickening crunch. And then, it is silent. The last Erkling crumples, transformed, defeated.

Your breaths come fast, uneven.

Gojo exhales, rolling his shoulders as if shaking off the weight of an unseen thing. You clutch the map, pulse still unsteady.

And then, you step forward.

"Come on," you say, voice quieter than before. And you keep walking, deeper into the dark. This time, with your wand clutched tightly in hand. 

This is silent in the way that a tomb is silent. A silence so complete it feels wrong, heavy, pressing against your skin, against your ribs, like the weight of the catacombs is threatening to collapse inward and swallow you whole. You listen to it, to the near-absence of sound: the shuffle of cautious footsteps against the uneven stone, the slow drip of water from unseen cracks above, the occasional intake of breath as someone stifles their unease. Even your heartbeat sounds loud in your ears.

You keep moving forward, leading them through the winding passage. The walls narrow and widen unpredictably, swallowing you in shadows one moment, then spilling out into dimly lit chambers the next. The light from your wands does little to dispel the oppressive blackness that lurks beyond its reach. Shadows stretch unnaturally, warping against the stone. You swear they move when you're not looking directly at them.

There are creatures here, but nothing large. Small, skittering things that vanish into cracks when light passes over them. They don’t bother you. Not yet. But something about them—about all of this—itches at the back of your mind.

You swallow down the lingering feeling of failure. You hesitated before. You could’ve been hurt. Worse, someone else could have. And you don’t know why it happened. You’ve been in fights before, but when that Erkling lunged for you, for a split second, you did nothing. You don’t have the luxury of hesitation now.

You glance back. Gojo is near the rear now, keeping pace with Nanami, his head on a constant swivel, eyes sharp, searching for threats before they find you. He hasn't looked at you since—since before, when the Erkling nearly reached you and he cast the Cruciatus Curse without hesitation. You don’t know what’s worse—the fact that he did it, or the fact that you didn’t say anything.

“Hey,” Toji’s voice is quiet beside you. You flinch before you can stop yourself. If he notices, he doesn’t say anything. He places a hand on your shoulder as you walk, firm, grounding. “Don’t worry. You’ll do fine.”

“I know,” you say quickly, avoiding his gaze, “I got distracted for a second. It won’t happen again.”

“It’s okay, y’know,” he continues, easy, unreadable. “Happens when it’s your first time. Can’t really blame yourself.”

“Right,” you nod, tightening your grip on the map. And then you feel it—the shift in the air.

It’s almost imperceptible. A sudden drop in temperature, the taste of damp stone thickening on your tongue. The hair at the nape of your neck stands on end.

You stop. “Wait.”

Toji furrows his brows but listens. The rest of them come to a halt as well, footsteps trailing off into silence. You exhale sharply, steadying yourself, rolling the map back up as your fingers tighten around your wand.

You step forward and whisper, “Lumos.”

The soft glow barely reaches the darkness ahead. Toji doesn’t hesitate—he flicks his wand, sending out a small burst of light, something like a spark, and you watch as it streaks forward, down the corridor.

It travels far. Farther than it should, down the endless stone passage, before it hits the end of the tunnel.

And for a moment, it illuminates them.

Inferi.

The sight slams into you like a physical thing. A suffocating, all-consuming wrongness that crawls up your spine and wraps around your ribs, constricting, pressing the air from your lungs.

They stand in the clearing where the tunnel widens into a vast chamber. Hundreds of them. No—thousands. Lurking at the edges of the light, motionless. Pale, waterlogged skin stretched thin over bone. Empty, milky eyes turned toward you in eerie synchrony. Their mouths hang open, twisted into expressions that were once screams, their fingers curled like claws at their sides.

They don’t move—not yet.

The spark dies. Darkness returns. And then, they move.

A sharp, jagged inhale rips through your throat. “Prepare yourselves!”

Shoko stiffens beside you. “What—what are they?”

You don’t take your eyes off them as you force the words out. “Inferi.”

Toji exhales sharply, a humorless, disbelieving sound. “You’re telling me Sukuna left an army of dead bodies here before he died?”

Your grip tightens on your wand as the Inferi lurch forward, slow at first, dragging, unsteady, like they are remembering how to move.

“Yes,” you whisper.

Then they run.

“Incendio Maxima!”

A torrent of fire erupts from your wand, surging forward like a wave, roaring through the tunnel and slamming into the first line of them. They ignite instantly, collapsing into heaps of smoldering ash before they can even scream. But there are more. So many more.

You glance at Gojo. He understands immediately. “Incendio Maxima!”

His fire burns hotter, brighter. The tunnel is bathed in violent orange and gold, casting nightmarish shadows along the walls as the Inferi burn, as they keep coming.

“There are thousands,” you yell over the roar of the flames. “Do your best.”

“Thousands?” Utahime breathes, horrified, but there’s no time for fear.

Gojo pushes past you, casting another massive burst of fire that incinerates twenty, thirty at a time, but they don’t stop.

They will reach you. They will consume you. You can already see it happening—how their hands will grab at you, how their fingers will dig into your skin, how their rotting, open mouths will close around your flesh.

You will die here.

No. No, you won’t. You can’t. You promised Gojo’s mother that you’d put your life before his. 

“Satoru?” Your voice cuts through the fire and footsteps and snarling groans. “Firestorm Charm! I can’t do it—I’m not powerful enough.”

His head jerks toward you, and there’s fear in his eyes, something raw and wrong, and he shakes his head. “I don’t know the incantation for it. Trust me, I would do it if I—”

An Inferius lunges for him.

“Satoru!”

Toji grabs the back of Gojo’s coat, yanking him away just in time, spinning on his heel. You don’t see him cast, only see the eruption of fire that follows.

It spreads fast—a ring of flame roaring to life around all of you, crimson and gold, alive in a way magic shouldn’t be. The Inferi reel back, screaming, but they can’t reach you anymore.

Toji exhales, glancing back at everyone. “Move with me.”

And he does, stepping forward, the fire moving with him, a living shield, a boundary between you and them.

Your throat is dry. “How do you know how to do this?”

Toji doesn’t look back. “You kept your secrets all year and now expect me to tell you things?”

You swallow. “Sorry.”

“’S alright,” he says.

Then, above you, movement.

You glance up. The Inferi that didn’t burn are crawling across the ceiling. Your stomach twists violently, but you don’t hesitate this time.

“Incendio Maxima!”

They burn. They fall to the ashes. And Toji gives you a triumphant smile, “See? You didn’t get scared.”

You can’t help it—you return the smile, the edges of your mouth curling before you even think to stop yourself. A quiet, fleeting moment, as fragile as the flickering light of your wands.

“Yeah,” you murmur. “I didn’t.”

Then, you turn to Gojo. He’s a step away from you, close enough that the heat from his body lingers in the space between, close enough that if you reach out, you could touch the soot-smudged sleeve of his coat. You don’t.

“You okay?”

His lips press together for half a second, then, “I’m fine.” He says it lowly, almost grumbling. His voice is rough at the edges, worn thin, like he’s been pushing it too much, yelling over the roar of fire and moving bodies. Then, softer, but still urgent, “Check the map. We have to keep going.”

Up ahead, Toji moves steadily forward, his wand raised, the firestorm curling outward as he walks. Behind him, you all stay huddled, feet shifting carefully across the uneven stone floor, the remnants of charred bodies crumbling underfoot. Nanami, Utahime, and Shoko move in rhythm, their wands flicking up in quick, precise motions, sending bursts of flame whenever an Inferius manages to crawl too high, whenever the walls shift with the weight of something overhead. You don’t let yourself think too much about how many of them are left, how many still lurk just beyond the reach of your fire.

You kneel slightly, unrolling the leather of the map, fingers trembling just enough to make it frustrating, the heat of your skin bleeding into the parchment. Your breath is quick, uneven, but you don’t stop, don’t hesitate. You press your fingers against the worn edges, trying to smooth it flat against your thigh, eyes scanning over the markings—

And then you see it.

Your breath stills. The end. It’s near.

The pulsing light of the map—the magic leading you forward—stretches just past the clearing, just past the sea of Inferi. Then it stops. No, not stops. It pauses. There’s a break. A small indentation in the ink. In the light. Not a dead end. A doorway.

Your eyes trace the markings carefully, slowly. Beyond the doorway, there is another corridor, another tunnel, drawn in the same narrow lines as the one you stand in now. But there is no light there. No pulsing glow, no magic guiding you forward. The path just continues into nothing.

A door before the grave. A tunnel leading into blackness before the grave.

You exhale, forcing yourself to swallow down the thick knot of unease in your throat. You roll the map back up, standing swiftly, turning to Gojo. He’s already watching you.

“It’s not that far ahead,” you say, voice steady, despite the way your hand still burns with sweat seeping into the cut from earlier, despite the way the air still hums with distant, unnatural movement. He doesn’t respond, just tilts his head slightly, waiting. You shift, just enough that the distance between you is reduced to inches. No, centimeters. Close enough to feel him. But you ignore it, focus back on the map, lifting a hand to point. “This, however, may prove difficult.”

Gojo’s eyes flicker downward, watching the movement of your fingers, the subtle indentation on the map. His voice is softer when he speaks now, no longer rough with urgency, just quiet, questioning. “How so?”

You shake your head, stiffly. “The Inferi are here.” You tap at the clearing. “The grave is where the light stops.” Another tap. Then, finally, your finger hovers over the break in the ink. “This indent. It’s a doorway. There’s a tunnel past it, but I can’t see anything there. No markers. No details.” You exhale, slowly. “That means it could be worse than what’s out here.”

Gojo is silent for a moment. Then his lips press together, flattening into something grim, something careful, before he finally says, “I won’t let anything happen to you. I hope you know that.”

You blink, startled by the sudden sincerity. Then your shoulders tighten, your breath catches slightly. But it’s gone quickly, replaced by something sharp, something certain. You shake your head. “That’s not what I’m worried about, dummy.”

He exhales. A laugh, maybe, but too short, too quiet.

“I can’t let anything happen to you, either,” you say.

Gojo looks at you for half a second too long. Then his expression flickers, shifts—eyes widening just slightly. And before you can react, before you even register why, his wand is already raised, aimed just above your head.

“Incendio!”

A sudden burst of fire, sharp and white-hot, surges past you. You jerk backward, the heat searing the air above as something screeches—a raw, grating, inhuman sound that echoes through the tunnel, bouncing off the stone walls. You look up, breath caught in your throat.

The Inferius is falling, already burned, already gone, its hollowed-out face twisted into something monstrous, something not quite human anymore, something that might have once been a person, long ago. It collapses into ash before it even reaches the ground.

“Thanks,” you murmur, barely above a breath, before turning to Toji. He’s just ahead of you, his body silhouetted against the flickering wall of fire, his grip on his wand unwavering despite the exhaustion evident in the rigid set of his shoulders.

“Hey,” you call, voice low but firm, “can you see the hall up ahead? There’s a small tunnel past it. We have to go through there. Be careful.”

Toji doesn’t turn, only grunts, his eyes locked onto the shifting mass of the dead just beyond the flames. “Not many left. Barely a few hundreds now,” he mutters.

Your pulse stutters as a handful of Inferi lurch forward, nearly breaking through the barrier of fire. You raise your wand in an instant, fingers slick with sweat, and send out a burst of white-hot flames. “Incendio!”

The heat flares across your face as the creatures crumble, bodies collapsing into blackened ash, and the smell of charred, rotting flesh thickens in the stagnant air.

“Keep going straight,” you say, voice softer now, but urgent. “Stop just before the big hall. If we go in there, we won’t be able to control them. There’s too many.”

Toji gives a stiff nod. “Right.”

Gojo moves beside you, stepping forward slightly, his wand still raised. He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t falter—just sends another torrent of flames into the darkness, clearing more of the army of the dead so the group can push forward. The firelight catches against his skin, his white hair glinting gold for brief, fleeting moments before flickering back into shadow.

And Toji does exactly as you told him. He stops just at the entrance of the hall.

You freeze beside him, eyes widening at the vast, open space before you. It’s circular, cavernous, the walls stretching high into a dome of blackness. You can’t see the ceiling, can’t even see where the walls end. It’s just dark, an abyss of stone and silence. But it’s filled—packed—with the Inferi, bodies stacked, pressed, twisted together in a sea of the undead.

There’s a tunnel at the other end. Barely visible. If not for the firelight, you wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference between the walls of the cavern and the creatures standing in front of them. The way they move—it’s not all at once, not a coordinated attack. Just slow, unnatural twitches, heads turning sharply, bodies shifting awkwardly in reaction to the flames. But they don’t stop. They can’t stop.

Gojo exhales sharply beside you, gaze locked ahead. “Keep the wall up.” His voice is gruff, lower than usual.

Then, he raises his wand. And this time, it’s stronger than anything before.

A single, roaring inferno bursts forward, crashing against the Inferi with devastating force. It engulfs the first hundred instantly, burning them to nothing in seconds. You can barely see beyond the sheer brightness of it, your vision flickering between gold and black as the flames spread outward, stretching past Toji’s firestorm, devouring.

Some of them try to retreat. But they don’t—can’t—make it far. It’s in their very nature to chase, to seek out the living. And so they keep moving, even as their bodies burn, even as they collapse into nothing.

Gojo exhales, lowering his wand slightly, turning to you. A question in his eyes. You nod.

And this time, you do it together. “Incendio Maxima!”

The flames that erupt from your wands are immense, combined into something unstoppable. It surges forward, past Toji’s wall, past the clearing, past the horde—a monstrously magnificent burst of gold and white, twisting into shapes you can’t even comprehend, consuming everything.

The heat is unbearable. The light nearly blinding. The screams—horrific, unnatural, echoing endlessly against the stone walls—fill the cavern like a terrible chorus of the damned.

By the time the flames die down, the cavern is silent. There are only a few left now. Twenty, maybe forty. Easily manageable.

A breath escapes you, unsteady, but relieved. A grin breaks across your face, triumphant, and before you can stop yourself, a quiet laugh slips past your lips.

Shoko and Nanami step forward, raising their wands, sending their own bursts of flame into the few remaining Inferi, finishing them off.

And then, finally, Toji lowers his wand.

A harsh breath leaves him, something between a sigh and a quiet grunt, and you watch as Utahime claps a hand on his back, murmuring a small, “Thanks.”

You catch her eye, and give her a small, tired smile.

“Hey,” Shoko then says, nodding up ahead. “There’s the tunnel.”

You follow her gaze. At the very back of the cavern, beyond the burnt remains of what was once a horde, there is an opening. A tunnel, carved into the stone.

But it splits.

“There’s three paths,” Utahime murmurs.

You glance down at the map, scanning it quickly, before looking back up. “Go straight.”

A chorus of “Lumos” follows, each voice low, exhausted, but clear.

Your steps are slow now, careful, as the group moves through the charred remains of the Inferi, past the blackened bones, past the ruined, hollowed-out eyes that no longer see.

And as you walk, you look up.

The vastness of it unnerves you. The way the stone stretches up, up, up—higher than you can see, disappearing into the darkness above. The walls are carved, etched with runes, scattered across the cavern in patterns that feel deliberate, that feel ancient. You can’t make out the inscriptions anymore, not now that the fire is gone, but you’d caught glimpses earlier, words you didn’t recognize, shapes that felt wrong.

Your fingers tighten around your wand. “There might be a doorway up ahead,” you say.

You step into the tunnel, and the sound of your footsteps echoes against the dark stone, each step swallowed by the weight of the silence pressing in around you. The air is coagulated, lifeless, untouched by anything living for centuries. The only light comes from the glow of your wands, flickering against the uneven walls, casting elongated shadows that twist and stretch with every movement.

Behind you, the others fall into step, their breathing shallow, quiet. No one speaks. There is something about this place—something about the way the tunnel narrows, the way the walls close in—that makes words feel too loud, too dangerous.

You glance down at the map again, eyes tracing the inked lines. It’s supposed to be just ahead.

You stop. Only a few feet away, you see it. The incantation, faintly marked on the stone beneath your feet.

Your grip tightens around your wand, and you whisper, “Nox.”

The light dies instantly, plunging the tunnel ahead into darkness. For a moment, the silence is deafening. Then, you lift your wand and flick a single spark forward.

It dies before it reaches the ground.

Your pulse thrums in your ears. Now, you see it—it’s not exactly a doorway. More of a gate. A metal door with bars, stretching from floor to ceiling, its iron-blackened with age, embedded deep into the rock like it had been built into the mountain itself.

It’s locked. You step forward, staring at the intricate mechanism, and exhale slowly, murmuring, “Alohomora.”

Nothing. The gate doesn’t budge. Not even a shift, not even a sound. Your heart sinks as you turn back to the others, the cold metal reflecting the dim light of their wands.

Shoko presses her lips together, stepping beside you. She raises her wand, whispering the spell again. Still nothing. The tunnel falls into stillness, thick with expectation, with unease. The metal gate looms before you, unmoving, impenetrable.

Nanami shifts, his voice low. “What now?”

You stare at the gate, pulse quickening. Then, the realization practically hits you in the face.

A slow grin spreads across your face as you turn to Gojo. “Hagrid.”

He frowns, brows furrowing. “What?”

You shake your head, already reaching down, stuffing your wand back into your boot before carefully, delicately, peeling back the embroidered fabric of your chest pocket. The Gryffindor crest is still warm against your fingertips.

And inside, two tiny, beady black eyes peek up at you.

A quiet breath of relief escapes as you gently lift your hand, offering your palm, and the small creature blinks before climbing onto your fingers with its delicate, twig-like limbs.

Gojo steps closer, eyes widening. “That’s what Hagrid gave you?”

You nod, extending your arm slightly. “Everyone, meet Twig. He’s a Bowtruckle.”

There’s a pause. 

“Oh my God,” Shoko mutters then, running a hand down her face. “They can open practically any lock.”

“Exactly,” you say, grinning now. The tension in your chest loosens, just a little, as you bring Twig closer to the iron gate, whispering, “Sorry, Twig. I promise I’ll take you back to Hagrid after all this, okay? But I need your help.”

Twig chitters softly, tilting his tiny head, before gingerly stepping onto the cold metal. He moves with careful, deliberate precision, scuttling down toward the lock like he already knows exactly what to do.

For a moment, there’s only the soft sound of his small limbs scraping against the metal. Then, he reaches the keyhole, pressing his tiny branch-like fingers into its intricate gears.

He twists. Turns. A quiet, rapid chitter fills the space, echoing through the tunnel.

Then—

Click.

The lock releases. The gate swings open, groaning loudly as it moves.

A breathless laugh escapes you. Relief floods your chest as you extend your arm again, and Twig eagerly clambers back onto your sleeve.

“Thank you,” you murmur, brushing a gentle finger against his tiny head before opening the pocket of your sweater again. He slips inside, curling up in the fabric, and just as he settles, you swear he yawns.

You shake your head, smiling. Then, you look back up, past the open gate. The last tunnel stretches before you, silent, waiting.

“One last tunnel,” you say. Your voice is steady, despite the pulse thrumming in your throat. You lift your wand. 

“Lumos.”

You step forward, and the tunnel seems to shrink around you. The air grows impervious, heavy, pressing in from all sides like an invisible force, as if the walls are breathing, as if the tunnel itself is watching. Your breath curls in front of you in thin, silver wisps, barely visible in the dim light of your wand.

You exhale, and the cold deepens.

It is the kind of cold that seeps into the marrow of your frame, that settles in the hollows of your chest, that burrows beneath your skin and stays there. It is unnatural, empty, a cold that has nothing to do with winter. And yet, your mind scrambles for something logical—maybe it’s the mountain, maybe the temperature is dropping outside, maybe it has started to snow in Japan. Maybe—

But no.

Something is wrong. Again.

You feel it before you see it. The shift in the air, the way it suddenly thickens, curdles, as if time itself has slowed, as if the world has bent, imperceptibly, just enough for you to notice. A sharp ringing begins to crawl up your ears, a muted, suffocating silence swelling, pressing against your ribcage and sternum.

And then, a slow, creeping shadow.

You see them.

Dementors.

A dozen. No—more. Their cloaks billow, though there is no wind, ragged, tattered, stretching as they move. The darkness around them is thick, almost living, swallowing the dim light of your wand, suffocating it. You can’t see their faces. You don’t need to. The emptiness they carry seeps into your lungs, into your chest, into the marrow of your bones, twisting through your mind like a silent, insidious poison.

The temperature plummets.

It is not the kind of cold that bites at your skin. It is worse. Deeper. It is the kind of cold that drags—drags every happy memory from you, drags every warmth, every safety, until you are hollow, until you are nothing but this moment. This tunnel. This darkness.

Your heart pounds. You can hear it in your ears, beating too fast, too frantic, but even that sound is starting to feel distant, as if the Dementors are already working, pulling something from you, something you can’t lose.

A soft, keening breath escapes from behind you.

You turn, and you see them—Shoko, Utahime, Nanami—standing frozen, rooted, paralyzed by something deeper than fear.

Shoko is breathing too fast, her eyes too wide, her fingers trembling around her wand. Utahime has a hand clamped over her mouth, as if trying to keep something inside, as if she is already hearing something she cannot bear to hear. And Nanami—Nanami, who is always steady, always sure—Nanami is pale, his gaze locked on something beyond what anyone else can see, something inside himself, something that is being taken from him.

Gojo doesn’t move. Toji doesn’t either.

But they feel it. You know they do.

You can see it in the way Gojo clenches his jaw, in the way his fingers tighten around his wand, in the way he forces himself to stay upright, as if holding onto something only he can see. Toji is the same—face impassive, unreadable, but there is a tension in his shoulders, in his stance, in the way his fingers twitch.

And then, a slow, rattling breath. One of the Dementors shifts forward.

Your lungs seize. You can feel it—something pulling, something peeling away, something you cannot afford to lose.

You react before you can think. Your wand is already raised. Your voice is already there.

“Ready?” Toji asks, his voice low, steady.

You nod, pulse thrumming.

"Expecto Patronum!"

Light erupts from your wand—brilliant, silver, cutting through the suffocating darkness like a blade. Toji’s does the same, but his is different—his is mist, a wave of shapeless silver fog rolling forward like a shield, casting long shadows against the stone walls.

You glance at him, breathless. He catches your look and shrugs, his voice as casual as ever. “I have a corporeal one. This is just easier.”

You shake your head, turning back as your own Patronus fully forms. A phoenix. Its wings spread, luminous, searing against the darkness. It rushes forward, cutting through the closest Dementor, pushing it back, driving it away—

But then—

The Dementor stirs, its tattered cloak billowing, its skeletal hands reaching, and the moment your Patronus dissipates, the cold rushes back, fast, suffocating, merciless.

You lower your wand, chest heaving.

The Dementors are still there.

And they are still coming.

“This is why Gojo calls you Fawkes,” Shoko murmurs, the realization settling over her like a slow-burning light.

You glance back at her, the ghost of a smile flickering at your lips, but it’s fleeting—momentary—because the cold is still here, wrapping its fingers around your throat, pressing into your chest, tightening. You nod once, sharp, before turning forward again, gripping your wand just a little bit tighter.

You try again.

“Expecto Patronum!”

The words leave your lips, the spell bursts from your wand, but—

It is weak.

A flicker, barely a glimmer of light before it fades, like a candle snuffed out by an invisible hand. The cold is too strong now, seeping into your bones, rotting through your veins, pulling at something deep, deep inside of you, something you need.

You try to breathe, but the air is thick, heavy, pressing down. Your heartbeat pounds in your ears, faster, faster, thudding like a frantic drum. It feels wrong. It feels impossible. You have done this spell a hundred times before, practiced it enough, but now—now—your hands are shaking, your fingers numb, your breath short, your mind clogged with something like fear but worse.

They are coming closer.

You see them, gliding forward in eerie, silent unison, their tattered cloaks swelling, their hollow, faceless voids of heads tilting, as if they can already taste your fear, as if they are already pulling from you. And you feel it—you feel the emptiness coiling in your stomach, reaching into your chest, clawing through your memories, through everything that makes you you.

Your lungs stutter. It is not a scream that leaves your mouth but a gasp, a ragged, breathless sound of realization—

You can’t do it. Your Patronus isn’t strong enough. The Dementors keep coming.

And then, there’s  a sharp pull at your jumper from behind you.

You yelp, the ground disappearing from beneath you as you fall, hips slamming against cold stone, your hands catching against the rough surface just in time to keep you from falling completely. The world lurches. You hear your own breath, fast, shallow, a mess of panic as you scramble for your wand—

Gojo shoves Toji back, arm slamming across his chest, because there are simply too many of them.

Too many.

Too many.

You push yourself up, eyes wide, head snapping toward him as you scream, “Satoru!”

You reach out, reaching for him, reaching for something, anything—

But he is already moving. Already casting.

“Expecto Patronum!”

His voice shakes the tunnel.

It does not echo—it rings. Resonates. The walls tremble, the air splits apart, the darkness shatters beneath the weight of it. It is not just light that bursts from his wand—it is power, raw and absolute, swallowing the Dementors whole before they can even think to move.

Your breath catches.

The Patronus takes shape. And then you see it.

Something so vast, so impossibly enormous, you cannot tell where it begins and where it ends. You do not even breathe as it rises—tall, monstrous, majestic.

A dragon.

It is the most powerful Patronus you have ever seen, will ever see, in your entire life.

The silver light is blinding, molten, burning through the tunnel with an intensity that is almost too much, almost impossible to look at. The heat of it reaches you, even through the numbing cold, even through the stagnant air. Its wings spread—massive, a single beat sending a shockwave through the space, parting the Dementors like dust in the wind. Its body coils in a great, arcing motion, a beast of light and fire and fury, silver scales reflecting like mirrors against the stone walls.

And suddenly, you understand. You understand why the Marauders’ Map had that strange name written across it. The nickname Gojo had given himself.

Ashen.

Because this is what he is. It’s what his patronus is.

Something untouched by the dark. Something that burns through the shadows, something that refuses to be swallowed.

The Dementors flee.

And Gojo Satoru stands, Patronus burning, face illuminated in silver light, untouched, unshaken, like he was always meant to be here.

He turns once the last of the light fades, once the dragon—vast and towering, ancient and blinding—dissolves into thin air, leaving behind only echoes, only the remnants of a power that felt like it had been carved from something greater than magic itself. The tunnel is silent now, the Dementors gone, but the cold remains, a whisper of what once was.

Gojo’s breath is heavy, chest rising and falling in sharp, uneven motions as he stares at you. There is something in his eyes—something raw, fragile beneath the usual arrogance, something that flickers, almost unsure. He is waiting. You are not sure for what.

You push yourself to stand, legs still unsteady, the weight of what just happened pressing against your bones, curling itself into the hollow space beneath your ribs. There is a strange pressure in your chest. You cannot name it, so you exhale sharply and place a hand on his shoulder, awkward but grounding, your fingers curling slightly against the fabric of his robes.

“That was…” you start, but the words do not come. They falter, caught somewhere between your throat and your teeth, so you click your tongue instead, shaking your head.

Gojo tilts his head at you the way he always does—like he knows something you don’t, like he is already laughing at the words you have not spoken yet. His eyes soften, but only for you. Only ever for you. And you cannot stand it, cannot stand how infuriatingly charming he is, how easily he wears that ridiculous, tender smile even after nearly dying.

“Incredible,” Shoko cuts in from behind, walking toward the two of you with her hands shoved in her pockets. “You’re teaching me that. I want a fake pet dragon of my own.”

“It’s not a pet, stupid,” Gojo scoffs, rolling his eyes, but there is no bite in his words, only amusement. “It’s a Patronus.”

“You’re teaching me, anyway,” she insists, shaking her head, before glancing around the now-empty tunnel. “All of the Dementors are dead. I thought they only existed in Azkaban.”

“I’m guessing someone left them here,” Toji mutters, his voice low, unreadable. He nods toward the tunnel’s exit. “After Sukuna was put into a tomb.”

“To keep people from coming,” you murmur.

The words leave your mouth before you have fully processed them, before you have even considered the weight of them. But it makes sense. Too much sense. A defense mechanism—an ancient one, old magic twisted into something cruel, something meant to deter rather than protect.

And then, another thought. One colder than the last.

“Then how did Suguru make it through?”

Gojo turns to look at you, his brows furrowing slightly. You can tell he is thinking it through, letting the pieces fall into place as his fingers flex at his sides.

“Salazar fucking knows,” he mutters.

You don’t miss the way he glances toward the end of the tunnel, toward the dim light that filters in from beyond, its glow stretching across the stone floor in uneven patches. It calls to him, the way all things dangerous and unknown seem to. And before you can say anything, before you can stop him, he moves, fast, as if something is pulling him forward, as if his life depends on reaching that light.

You follow after him, matching his pace, the air growing thicker around you as you near the exit.

The tunnel ends suddenly. One moment, you are walking through a tight corridor of damp stone, the walls pressing in, the air thick with the scent of decay and age, the sound of your breath loud against the silence. The next, the passage opens up into something vast, a space so cavernous it takes your breath away. You slow to a stop, blinking against the dim light, your fingers twitching at your sides.

It’s an amphitheater. Circular, ancient, impossibly large. The stone steps curve downward, layered in rings, leading to the center like a pit meant for something dark and long buried. The walls curve inward, enclosing the space, trapping the air inside so that every movement feels weighty, every breath thick with something old, something forgotten. The torches lining the walls flicker low, their glow too weak to chase away the shadows. You get the feeling that the darkness here is not merely the absence of light but something more.

Your breath catches when your eyes find him. Suguru.

He stands at the very heart of the amphitheater, next to the tomb that sits heavy in the center like an altar. His head is bowed, his wand raised, his lips moving in some hushed murmur, the words slipping from his mouth like smoke, curling into the air before vanishing. In his other hand, something glints—just barely—a locket, swaying gently with the movement of his breath.

It’s him, but it isn’t him. Not really.

When he hears you, hears the soft shuffle of boots against stone, his head snaps up. His eyes, when they meet yours, widen—but only for a moment. Then they land on Satoru, and the expression shifts.

“Satoru,” he breathes, like the name alone is enough to steady him, enough to pull him out of the trance, enough to make the thing inside him loosen its grip. For a moment, there is hesitation, a flicker of something familiar, something real.

Satoru steps down the stairs, once, twice, slowly, measured, like approaching a wounded animal. He tests the ground beneath him, the weight of his own voice, before he speaks, low but firm, echoing across the cavernous space.

“Don’t do this, Suguru,” he says, voice cracking. “I’m begging you.”

You feel it then. The weight in your pocket, pressing against your thigh. The phial. 

And then, your eyes are on the locket, gleaming dully in Suguru’s grasp, and everything clicks into place.

Your mind churns, the realization dawning not gently, not slowly, but all at once, a violent kind of clarity that makes your stomach turn. The way his eyes look hollowed-out, the way his movements have been wrong for months, the way he speaks like something is pressing against his throat, curling around his words, twisting them into something they were never meant to be. You know what this is. You’ve read about it in books, whispered about it in dark corners of the library, terrified at the implications of what something like this could do to a person.

The Horcrux. It’s controlling him. Twisting him. Suffocating him.

It has been for months. Maybe longer, depending on when and how he found it.

A sharp breath leaves you, too sudden, too loud. Toji turns his head at the sound, his scarred lip pressing into a thin line, but you barely register it. Your legs move before your mind does, carrying you forward, down the steps, just a few, toward Suguru.

“Suguru,” you call out, voice steadier than you feel, “it’s not you. It’s the Horcrux.”

His brows knit together, his lips parting, his fingers tightening around the locket.

“What?” he asks, but his voice is strange. Not confused, not questioning, but defensive. Like you’ve accused him of something, like he’s already made up his mind. “Of course not, this is what I want. This is what I must do. Don’t you understand?”

His gaze shifts from you back to Satoru, his grip still white-knuckled around his wand.

Satoru is nearly at the bottom of the steps now. Almost. Just a few feet away.

Suguru whispers something under his breath. You don’t hear it, but you feel it.

A chill creeps up your spine, and instinctively, your eyes dart around the amphitheater, searching, scanning, waiting.

Then, the doors opposite you groan open, slow, deliberate.

And the Inferi begin to pour in.

Dozens of them. No—hundreds.

A choked breath leaves your throat. Behind you, you hear Shoko, Nanami, Utahime—the way their bodies tense, the way their wands rise in unison. They do not have to wait. They understand immediately. They know what must be done.

But you don’t have time to think about that now. Because Suguru has turned back to Satoru. And he raises his wand. You feel something sharp twist in your chest. It happens fast. Too fast.

“Satoru!” you scream, his name leaving your lips like a prayer, like a plea, as you move without thinking. The map slips from your fingers, fluttering uselessly to the ground, forgotten.

Suguru does not hesitate. He attacks. The duel begins. 

Satoru does not attack back. He blocks. He dodges. He steps lightly, carefully, every movement calculated, precise, defensive. Every spell deflected, every curse sidestepped.

Suguru does not hold back. He moves quickly, viciously, every spell sent with intent, with force, with fury. His eyes burn, dark and wild, his body thrumming with something unhinged.

You watch, horror creeping up your throat, as Suguru raises his wand and sends out a curse. An Unforgivable one.

Satoru deflects it. Barely. Your heart jumps.

“Suguru,” Satoru breathes, dodging another curse, his voice low, aching, “please—”

“Stop talking!” Suguru snaps, eyes glinting with something terrible, something feverish, sending another curse, and another, and another.

Satoru does not stop trying.

But you—

You cannot focus on them anymore. Because you see it. The Horcrux. It sits atop Sukuna’s tomb, heavy, waiting. You scramble toward it, down the steps, heart pounding, breath ragged, feet slipping against the stone as you rush forward.

You are close. You can reach it. Just a little more.

Suguru turns. His wand flicks toward you. He whispers the curse before you even have time to react.

“Sectumsempra.”

You don’t see it happen.

But you feel it. A force slamming into you, knocking you backward, knocking the breath from your lungs.

Toji.

You hear the impact before you register what has happened. The way his body crashes against the ground. The way he lands in front of you, crumpled, still.

His blood pools too quickly.

Too fast, too much, blooming across the stone floor in a deep, viscous red, the edges of it creeping outward like fingers, like something alive, and reaching. You stare at it, at the way it spreads beneath him, at the way it gleams in the dim light, and your breath—

Your breath doesn’t come.

It is stuck somewhere between your lungs, between the moment before and the moment after, between understanding and denial. You sink to your knees beside him, your fingers hovering just above his chest, your hands trembling too violently to touch him. The wet sound of his breathing, ragged, uneven, clotted with something thick, echoes between the stone walls, and you watch—helpless—as his entire body begins to bleed.

There is too much blood.

He tries to say something, but it comes out wrong. The sound wet, bubbling, choked at the edges. A protest, maybe. A warning. A curse. You don’t know. You don’t want to know.

“No, Toji,” you whisper, shaking your head, “don’t—don’t say anything, please.”

You don’t know why you say it. Maybe because if he speaks, it means it’s real. Maybe because if he doesn’t, you can pretend for a little longer that he isn’t slipping away beneath you, his body torn open, his breath shallowing. Maybe because there is something so much worse about the idea of him trying to say something—to say anything—only to be cut short by the weight of his own dying.

Your throat tightens. Your hands curl, helpless, into fists.

Then, you remember yourself.

You rip your gaze away from him, from the ruin of his body, from the way his blood spills across your knees, seeping into the fabric, staining you. You look up, eyes burning, and search for Utahime.

She is up the stairs, her wand raised, sending bursts of fire toward an Inferius. Her face is sharp with focus, her body taut with it, every movement deliberate, decisive, honed by something deeper than just skill.

You scream her name, the sound of it raw, cracking, echoing against the stone.

“Iori!”

She turns at once, her head snapping toward you, eyes wide. Then, she is running, moving without hesitation, feet pounding against the steps as she descends, as she falls into place beside you, kneeling on the opposite side of Toji’s body.

She opens her mouth, about to speak, about to ask, but you grab her hand before she can.

“Iori,” you say, voice breaking, “go. Go back to Hogwarts. Take him to Snape. Snape will know what to do.”

Her face twists in something stricken, something close to refusal. “What?” she breathes. “I can’t just leave you all to fight here.”

“And I can’t let Fushiguro die when it was supposed to be me,” you say, firmly.

Your voice does not waver. Your hands do not either as you press hers against one of Toji’s wounds. You feel the heat of his blood soak into your palm, feel the unsteadiness of his pulse beneath it. You meet her eyes, hold them.

“Take him to Snape, Iori. I can’t Disapparate. You have to be the one to do it.”

She swallows hard. You can see the way her hands shake now, stained with blood, the way her chest rises and falls, the way she wants to argue, to tell you no, that she won’t, that she refuses. But she looks at Toji, at the way he is barely breathing, and she knows. She knows there isn’t another choice.

She nods. Then, she closes her eyes.

A second later, they are gone. The only thing left is the blood.

It stains the stone, pooling in the cracks, seeping into the seams. It stains your hands, thick and hot, clinging beneath your fingernails, pressed into the weave of your sweater. You can feel it drying already, the edges of it tacky, the scent of it thick in the air.

You exhale once, shoving the locket into the back pocket of your jeans. You stand, legs unsteady beneath you, and lift your wand. There is no time for hesitation.

Shoko and Nanami are holding the line on the steps, their wands moving in sharp bursts, handling the Inferi with precision. You do not need to look long to know that they will hold their ground.

Your eyes scan the amphitheater. And then, you find them.

Satoru. Suguru.

They are still fighting. Your breath leaves you in a shudder, your fingers enclosing around your wand.

You cannot waste another second.

You watch them fight. Your breath pulls short, uneven, catching at the back of your throat as your fingers tighten around your wand.

Suguru is relentless. His magic is not just offensive—it is furious, a ceaseless barrage of Unforgivable Curses, one after another, his wand moving in sharp, decisive arcs, his face twisted into something that doesn’t look like him, something too empty and too full all at once. His curses slice through the air like blades, hurtling toward Satoru with a kind of merciless precision, the kind that suggests he is not hesitating, not holding back.

And Satoru—Satoru is barely keeping up.

He does not counter. He does not send anything back. He only dodges, barely, stepping away at the very last second, twisting, deflecting, shielding, moving, but never attacking. He does not raise his wand in offense. He does not even try.

He is only trying to safeguard Suguru from himself.

Your heart is too loud.

Your fingers tighten, and a drop of blood—Toji’s blood—escapes the ridges of your palm, slipping past the gaps between your fingers, trailing along the length of your wand, clinging to the wood before finally reaching the tip and falling.

The droplet splatters against the stone.

Small. Insignificant. Except it isn’t.

Because Suguru is trying to kill him. Because Satoru won’t fight back.

Because it is terrifying, the way he is hesitating, the way he is choosing to hold himself back even as death comes hurling toward him, again and again and again.

You swallow. Your throat feels tight, like something is closing up from the inside, like something is pressing down on your chest, making it impossible to breathe. Your head rings with the promise you made to Mirai—to Satoru’s mother—that you would put his life before yours, that you would not let anything happen to him.

Your breath stills. Your feet move.

“Suguru, I can’t lose you!” Satoru shouts, voice cracking, desperate, his breath heavy with exertion. “This isn’t you. Please—”

Suguru grits his teeth. His wand snaps upward, another curse ready at the tip of it, his movements sharp with conviction, unwavering.

“I have to do this, Satoru.”

And then, before Satoru can lift his wand—before he can block it, before he can react—you reach him.

Time slows. You see it all, as if from a great distance.

Suguru’s wand flicks. A spell shoots toward Satoru, dark and green, the magic sizzling through the air, fast, too fast—

Your body moves before your mind catches up.

You shove him. Hard. Your hands collide with his chest, and you feel the impact reverberate up your arms as he stumbles, falling, his eyes widening in shock as he goes down, wand pointed at you.

The curse is coming.

Your body locks up, lungs closing, heart hammering itself into something frantic, too loud, too fast. You brace yourself, brace for the impact, brace for the pain, brace for something terrible and irreversible, for the kind of agony that will bring you to your knees—

You shut your eyes.

You wait.

And wait.

And wait.

But nothing happens. Your eyes snap open.

There, right in front of you, is a golden shield, pulsing, shimmering, strong enough to stop the curse just before it can reach you. The magic flickers, glowing, warm and brilliant, radiating from something.

Your gaze drops, then.

The phial.

You watch, frozen, as it falls from your pocket, slipping free, tumbling through the air as if in slow motion.

It hits the stone, shattering. The sound is small, fragile, like the breaking of something ancient.

Suguru’s eyes widen. His head snaps toward the phial, his breath catching, something flickering across his face. He looks at Satoru, then at you, his grip tightening around his wand, his entire body tensing—

And then, silence.

“You told her,” Suguru whispers.

His wand dips slightly, falling slack at his side, his fingers twitching as if he isn’t sure whether to hold on or let go. His gaze, sharp and searching, is fixed on Satoru, but his voice is barely audible, something small and breaking, something not meant for anyone else to hear.

The amphitheater is still. The fight is over, but the air remains charged, thick with something unspeakable, neither victory nor defeat, something much heavier. The smell of blood lingers from your hands and sweater, the echoes of magic still whisper against the stone, and somewhere, behind you, the sound of battle continues—Nanami and Shoko holding their own against the Inferi. But here, within the amphitheater, there is only silence.

And yet, something shifts.

You see it before you feel it.

It is not visible, not something you can touch or grasp, but it is there, in the way Suguru’s shoulders loosen slightly, in the way his breath stutters, in the way Satoru remains frozen, watching him with something unbearably raw in his expression.

Their blood pact has broken.

Your stomach twists. You know what this means.

Satoru can betray Suguru now, however many times he wants.

And Suguru—

Suguru can read Satoru’s mind.

You see it in the way Suguru looks at him, eyes dark, almost unfocused, his lips parting slightly as he stares. He is already doing it. Already slipping into Satoru’s thoughts, already pulling apart his mind, unraveling him thread by thread, seeing everything that has ever been unspoken between them.

Your breath catches.

You don’t know what he is seeing.

But you can see how it changes him.

Suguru exhales sharply, a sound caught between a scoff and a laugh, a hollow thing, humorless and bitter. His free hand clenches into a fist at his side. His expression does not shift much, but something in his face tightens—his jaw, his brow, the corners of his mouth pressing inward, as if he is struggling to hold something in.

“I just tried to kill you,” he says, voice quieter now, rougher, like something raw has been scraped open inside of him. He gives a short, sharp breath of laughter, devoid of any real amusement. “At least curse at me a little at the very end.”

Satoru shakes his head.

And then, as if it is the easiest thing in the world, he says, “You’re my one and only best friend.”

The words fall between them, and you feel something in your chest tighten, something unbearably fragile.

Suguru looks at him.

You shouldn’t be here.

That realization washes over you all at once, a cold, creeping sensation curling up your spine. This moment is not meant for you, not meant for anyone else. It is something sacred, something years in the making, built on a foundation only the two of them understand.

And yet, you are here.

You swallow, exhaling softly, watching as Suguru extends a hand.

For a moment, neither of them move.

Satoru just stares at him.

Suguru, silent, waiting.

And then, slowly, cautiously, Satoru reaches up and takes it.

There is no relief in their faces. No triumph. Only exhaustion, only something that lingers between regret and understanding, something neither of them is willing to say out loud.

They both turn to look at you.

You let out a slow, steady breath, gathering yourself, willing the weight of this moment to settle somewhere deep in your ribs, somewhere it will not break you open.

“We should get back to Hogwarts,” you say quietly.

Neither of them respond, but you don’t need them to.

Because the fight is over.

But the war isn’t.

There is a reason you made Gojo Disapparate directly into the hallway outside Dumbledore’s office.

It is quiet here. Removed from the castle’s hum of voices, from the frantic energy that must still linger in the halls, from the echo of footsteps in the Great Hall and the whispers that will follow in your wake. It is calm. The kind of quiet that feels undeserved, like something borrowed, something that might slip away if you breathe too deeply.

The five of you land in an unsteady heap, the force of the sudden reappearance sending a tremor through your bones. The shift from the suffocating darkness of the catacombs to the familiar candlelit stone of Hogwarts should be comforting, but it isn’t. The world is still moving, and you are still caught in its momentum.

“Merlin’s beard—”

Nanami staggers forward, a hand clamping over his mouth, his other arm thrown out for balance. Shoko wavers beside him, grip tightening around her wand as she presses the back of her hand to her lips, her entire body recoiling at the violent lurch in her stomach.

You almost laugh.

Gojo has finally run out of vials of Pepperup Potion.

Neither of them seem capable of forming words beyond a weak groan, and then, without a second thought, they both take off toward the infirmary, shoulders knocking against each other as they go.

You watch them go, shaking your head. The nausea will pass. It always does. Then, slowly, you turn to the other two.

Satoru and Suguru.

There is something different about them now.

You don’t know what it is—not fully, not yet—but something in the air between them has shifted, weighty, unspoken. Suguru stands still, his hands slack at his sides, his expression unreadable. Satoru, beside him, doesn’t quite meet your eyes, his gaze cast downward as if studying the stone beneath his feet.

You exhale through your nose, forcing yourself to steady the rhythm of your breath.

“I’ll take the locket and the map to Dumbledore,” you murmur, voice quieter than you intend. “You two should get some rest.”

Satoru looks up at you then, blinking as if registering your words a second too late.

“What about the Bowtruckle?”

Suguru’s brows furrow, his expression twisting in confusion, but Satoru doesn’t acknowledge it—his eyes remain on you, waiting. You blink, momentarily lost in the sheer absurdity of the question. Then, slowly, your lips curve upward.

You bring a hand to your chest, pressing against the pocket of your sweater. There, curled up against the fabric, the tiny creature stirs, its little limbs shifting slightly, warm and small and impossibly delicate.

“I think I’ll keep him,” you say finally, shrugging. “Hagrid probably has plenty more.”

Satoru exhales, nodding, his lips pursed in something like approval. Suguru watches the two of you in silence, his gaze heavy, unreadable. You let out another breath, quieter this time, before turning toward the gargoyle statue before you.

You hesitate only once, just for a moment, glancing over your shoulder at Satoru.

Then, softly, you murmur, “Sherbet Lemon.”

The statue shifts, stone grinding against stone, revealing the spiraling staircase beyond. You take the first step. The stairs move on their own, spiraling higher and higher as the stone walls tighten around you, the space narrowing, twisting, the light from the torches casting long shadows that flicker and stretch, stretching over your hands, over your face. Your fingers brush against the locket in your pocket, its edges sharp and cold against your palm, and for a brief moment, you wonder how something so small, so insignificant in weight, could feel like this—like a millstone around your neck, like a wound pressed too deep to close.

The stairway ends before you are ready for it to.

The door opens with the faintest creak.

Dumbledore’s office is as it always is—large, circular, lit by golden candlelight, filled with the quiet hum of things too old and too wise to remain silent. You step inside, your movements slow, deliberate, as if to disturb nothing, as if to exist within this space as lightly as possible. You feel, for a moment, like a visitor in a temple.

It is a beautiful room. No matter how many times you enter it. 

On spindle-legged tables, curious silver instruments whir softly, twisting in place, delicate and intricate, like living things made of metal and smoke. Some emit thin tendrils of white vapor, curling into the air like whispers. Others tick quietly, measuring something unseen, something vast. The walls are lined with portraits, framed in gold and heavy wood, each depicting a former headmaster or headmistress of Hogwarts. They are sleeping now, their breath slow, their hands resting in their laps, their expressions peaceful. You wonder how many of them died knowing what was coming.

At the center of it all, there is the enormous claw-footed desk, its surface polished to a dark sheen, and behind it, upon a shelf, a hat—shabby, tainted with age, the folds of its fabric as familiar as an old friend. The Sorting Hat.

You move toward the desk. The locket and the map feel heavier now than they ever have.

You place them down carefully, the metal of the locket clicking softly against the wood, the parchment of the map settling with a faint rustle.

You exhale.

Soft footsteps descend from the spiral staircase tucked into the far corner of the office, each step slow and measured, unhurried, deliberate. A figure appears at the top of the staircase, stepping down into the warm light of the room.

Albus Dumbledore, dressed in robes softer, looser than those he wears during the day, his expression mild, his eyes twinkling with something unreadable. His hands are folded before him, long fingers resting gently against each other.

“Ah,” he says, voice gentle, as if he has been expecting you. “Miss [L/N].”

He smiles.

“Good evening.”

You inhale, steadying yourself before you gesture toward the desk. “Sir,” you say, voice quieter than you mean for it to be, “That would be the Horcrux. And the map you gave us earlier.”

Dumbledore does not move at first. He smacks his lips together, his eyes narrowing, not in suspicion but with something resembling amusement. And then, after a moment, he steps forward, tilting his head as if seeing something delightful, as if inspecting an old book he has not opened in decades.

His hand, aged and veined, finds your shoulder. His grip is gentle, but firm. “You have outdone yourself,” he says, eyes twinkling, “and many experienced witches and wizards, I might add. You might just be the brightest witch of your age.”

The words should make you feel proud. They should make you feel something, at the very least. But all you can do is swallow. You think of Toji bleeding out at your feet, of Suguru’s face as he looked at Satoru, of the way time had seemed to slow when you pushed Gojo aside. It is not pride that sits in your chest. It is exhaustion.

“Thank you, sir,” you say softly. And then, after a pause, you lift your gaze to his. You can feel the question waiting at the back of your throat, feel the weight of it pressing against your tongue.

He sees it before you say it. He always does.

“Go on,” he urges, his voice light, pleasant, as he takes the rolled leather map from the table and places it back onto one of the many shelves.

You hesitate. But only for a moment.

“Why us, sir?” you ask, finally. “We’re just a bunch of teenagers. You sent us there, and we almost died.”

At this, he turns to you fully. The light from the candle beside him flickers against his face, casting shadows beneath his eyes, across the sharpness of his cheekbones. He does not answer immediately, only studies you, gaze quiet, knowing.

“No, you didn’t, Miss [L/N],” he says after a beat. “I sent you there precisely because I knew you could handle it.”

Your brows furrow, lips pressing together. “But, sir—”

“One of you got hurt quite terribly,” he finishes for you, nodding slowly, as if to acknowledge the truth in your words. “Yes.”

He strokes his beard thoughtfully, his fingers moving with slow deliberation. “Miss Iori arrived at Severus’ office an hour ago,” he continues, voice calm, steady. “I trust Mr. Fushiguro is already healed, and resting in one of the stretchers at the infirmary, with Madam Pomfrey caring for him.”

You blink. You are not sure why the confirmation makes your throat feel tighter, why the knowledge of Toji’s recovery does not bring the relief you thought it would. Perhaps it is because it does not change the fact that he almost died. That you had sent Utahime away with him, with nothing but the hope that he would make it.

“Don’t you think, sir, with all due respect, that it wasn’t fair to us?”

Dumbledore looks at you then, really looks at you, and for a fleeting second, something shifts in his expression. A weariness, perhaps. Something more ancient than his years.

He does not answer. Not at first.

Instead, he pulls his wand from his robes, long and strange, different from any wand you have seen before. He points it at the locket.

“Incendio.”

A burst of fire leaps from the tip, bright and hot, crackling in the quiet. It hits the Horcrux squarely. And yet, nothing.

The fire licks the surface, skitters across it, but it does not consume it. The locket remains, cold and untouched, as if mocking the very laws of magic.

Dumbledore watches the flames die out. He exhales, slowly, before he turns back to you.

“You see, Miss [L/N],” he murmurs, slipping his wand back into the folds of his robe, “I didn’t have a choice. If I had informed the Ministry of this precarious situation, one of you—and you know exactly who—would have certainly lost his life.”

Your breath catches. You do not need him to say it. You know exactly who he means. Suguru.

“And this Horcrux would never be destroyed,” Dumbledore continues, quiet but certain. “It cannot be undone by spells, nor by force. Only by things more powerful than it.”

You stare at the locket, at the way it gleams in the dim light, cool, unbothered, as if it has not spent decades housing something unholy.

“You hate that I’m right,” Dumbledore muses, watching you.

You blink. Exhale sharply through your nose. “I do.”

He chuckles at that, a small sound, but there is something tired in it, something that feels less like amusement and more like regret.

Silence stretches between you, the candle flickering again, the portraits along the walls still snoozing in their frames.

After a moment, you shift your weight, rolling your shoulders. “Is that all, sir?”

He studies you for a second longer. Then, he nods. “Yes, Miss [L/N]. That is all.”

You turn on your heel, making your way toward the door. Your hand reaches for the brass handle, cool beneath your fingers.

But before you can step out, his voice stops you.

“Miss [L/N]?”

You pause. Glance back.

He is watching you, expression unreadable, eyes old, too knowing.

“Rest,” he says. “There is still much more to be done.”

You swallow.

And then you leave.

The infirmary is dimly lit, the only light coming from the low-burning lamps hovering above the beds, casting long, sluggish shadows against the floor. The room smells of old parchment and disinfectant, the kind that sticks in the back of your throat, mingling with the faintest traces of blood and burnt cloth. The night is quiet outside, heavy with the hush of something ending, something settling, and for the first time since the mission, since the chaos of it all, your pulse slows. Just slightly. Just enough.

You see him the moment you step inside.

Toji is stretched out on one of the hospital beds, his shirt discarded somewhere, his skin marred with fresh scars and hastily applied healing spells that haven’t quite settled yet. He is talking to Madam Pomfrey, his voice low, teasing, that familiar lilt of amusement in it even as exhaustion tugs at the edges of his words.

She tuts at him, smacks the side of his head with a practiced sort of impatience, before pressing a small cup into his hand. “Take this, and go to sleep,” she tells him, her tone clipped but not unkind. “You’ve lost enough blood to be declared a ghost, and I do not have the time nor the patience to deal with any lingering dramatics.”

He grins at that, lazy, lips twisting around something smug, but he downs the potion obediently.

And then, Madam Pomfrey sees you.

Her eyes soften, just a little, but she still sighs, rubbing her temples as she jerks her chin toward Toji’s bed. “Five minutes,” she says, a note of warning in her voice. “That’s all you have until the medicine kicks in.”

You nod, murmuring a quiet thanks as you make your way over. Your legs feel heavy, slow, like they are moving through water, like the exhaustion from before has finally caught up to you now that everything is over.

Toji smirks when he sees you, the scar on his lip twisting with the movement, his dark eyes catching the faint glow of the lamps. He looks at you like you’re funny. Like you’re something fragile, something foolish, something not worth worrying about, even though it was him who had nearly bled out, him who had collapsed against you in that godforsaken amphitheater, him who had made that choice without hesitation, without a second thought.

You exhale, relief and frustration and something else you do not want to name swelling in your throat. “You’re okay.”

“I’m saint-like,” he drawls, stretching his arms over his head, fingers flexing against the sheets. “Practically holy.”

You frown, brow furrowing in confusion, but he only chuckles, tapping a finger against his ear. “See this? Almost got cut off completely.”

You stare. And then, slowly, you realize what he’s saying.

“Out of all the ear jokes in the world, you go for holy?” you ask, fighting the urge to roll your eyes.

At that, he grins. “At least you smiled.”

Your breath catches. You shake your head. “You almost died because of me.”

He doesn’t even flinch. Doesn’t hesitate. Just reaches out and grabs your arm, his fingers warm, solid, grounding. “Hey,” he says, “I took the hit because I wanted to.”

“Quite the masochist, aren’t you?” you mutter, narrowing your eyes. “What if you’d died? What then?”

He shrugs, entirely unbothered. “You made sure Utahime got me here.” A pause. Then, “I knew nothing would happen as long as you were there.”

Your stomach twists.

“You are a scaredy-cat, sure,” he continues, like it is just a fact, like it is something that has always been true, “but you wouldn’t just let me die. I knew it when I took the hit for you. I knew it before I even went to that stupid forest.”

You swallow. Look away. The cup of medicine is empty on the table beside him, the remnants of the potion clinging to the sides in thin, translucent streaks.

He exhales, shifting against the pillows. “Oh, Shoko was here a while ago,” he says after a moment. “Got nauseous from Apparition.”

You nod, trying to gather yourself, forcing your thoughts back to the present. “Yeah. So was Kento. They ran immediately when we got back.”

Toji hums, thoughtful. “That’s what the blond guy’s name is?” He frowns slightly. “Didn’t know.”

You let out a breath, half-exasperated, half-disbelieving. “You are,” you tell him, voice flat, “so stupid. Almost like a Neanderthal.”

His smirk returns, but this time, his eyelids are drooping, his fingers twitching where they rest against the blanket. The potion is starting to work.

“You owe me,” he murmurs, words slurring just slightly.

You shake your head, grin slipping onto your lips before you can stop it. “Yeah, yeah. Go to sleep.”

“Oh, before you go,” he slurs, falling onto the bed. You pull the covers over him, as he murmurs, “Gojo was here. Idiot went to the Room of Requirement, I reckon.”

His eyes close. The rise and fall of his chest evens out.

And for the first time in what feels like hours, you breathe.

When you step into the Room of Requirement, the door shutting with a muted click behind you, the air inside is thick, weighty, filled with something you can’t quite name but feel all the same. It presses against your skin, settles in your throat, clings to the dried blood on your sweater, to the scent of earth and iron and damp wood still lingering on your clothes. You inhale, slow and deep, trying to shake it off, trying to collect yourself, but all it does is make you more aware of the heaviness curling around your ribs, winding itself into your limbs.

The room has reshaped itself again. The long table at the far corner is still there, but the walls are closer now, lined with flickering lanterns that cast long, wavering shadows. Shelves stand tall along the edges, some filled with books, others stacked with old maps and parchment and artifacts neither of you have had the time nor the patience to move. And at the far end of the table, beneath the dim glow of the lanterns, sits Gojo.

He doesn’t notice you at first. He is leaning forward, elbows braced on his knees, fingers loosely intertwined. His eyes—bleary, unfocused—are fixed on the pinboard in front of him, its surface littered with hastily scribbled notes, torn-out pages from textbooks, maps with charmed markings glowing faintly in the dark. The exhaustion is all over him now, seeping into the sharp lines of his face, dragging down the corners of his mouth, making his normally bright eyes look dull, worn, like he’s been ground down to his last nerve.

You swallow.

"Hey," you murmur. Your voice is hoarse, rough from disuse, from the cold air outside, from everything that’s happened in the past few hours. You trudge toward the seat next to him, slow and heavy-footed, as if the weight of the night is still pressing down on you, anchoring you in place.

Gojo blinks, once, twice, like he’s only just now realizing you’re here. “Hey,” he mumbles back, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand before letting it drop limply onto the table.

You sink into the chair beside him.

For a while, neither of you speak.

The silence is thick, stretching between you like an invisible thread, fragile but unbroken. The lantern light flickers, casting shadows that dance across the wooden surface of the table, across the maps and notes spread out before you. You stare at them without really seeing them, tracing the edges of the parchment with your eyes, watching the ink shift and swirl where spells have been used to keep the writing from fading. You hear the faint crackling of the flames, the occasional creak of the chair as Gojo shifts beside you, the slow, measured rise and fall of his breathing.

And then, you swallow, straighten, turn your head just slightly toward him.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Gojo doesn’t react at first. He keeps staring at the pinboard, fingers twitching faintly against the table, like he’s trying to work through the exhaustion clouding his mind, like he’s waiting for you to say more.

You exhale, watching the way the lamplight catches against his skin, the way the bruises are starting to darken along the curve of his jaw, along the ridge of his cheekbone. “About your Patronus,” you say, voice quieter now, the words more careful, more deliberate. “About how you knew exactly where to go back in the forest.”

At that, Gojo finally looks at you. His eyes flicker with something unreadable—surprise, maybe, or something close to it—before he leans back in his chair, dragging a hand through his hair.

For a moment, you think he isn’t going to answer.

And then—he exhales, slow and steady, and says, “Because you didn’t need to know.”

His voice is quiet, but there’s something firm in it, something that leaves no room for argument.

But you argue anyway. “That’s not your decision to make.”

Gojo watches you for a long time.

Then, finally, he sighs, tilts his head back, and says, “No. I suppose it’s not.”

You look at him, watching the way he exhales, long and slow, as if debating how much he should say, as if weighing the value of the truth against the burden of speaking it aloud. His fingers curl slightly against the wood of the table, knuckles faintly whitening before they relax again. Finally, after what feels like minutes rather than seconds, he sighs, tipping his head back slightly, blinking at the ceiling as if the answer is written there. When he speaks, his voice is softer than you expect.

"I knew where to go because it’s what my family has taught me. It’s what has been passed down in our bloodline for generations." He pauses, then adds, quieter, "It’s called the Six Eyes."

Your brows knit together. The name alone feels ancient, weighty and revered, something that sounds less like an ability and more like an inheritance. Like a curse. You wait for him to go on. He does, but not immediately. His fingers drum once against the table before stilling. His gaze drops, just slightly.

"You know how I said the Kamo family practices blood magic?" He asks. You nod. He exhales again, slower this time, measured. "This is what mine does."

The words settle between you. His, not his family’s. His alone.

"My father doesn’t have Six Eyes. Nobody in my family has had it for generations. I’m the first in four hundred years." He says it so simply, so plainly, but the weight of it is crushing. "I suppose that could be one of the reasons why my father made sure I was adept at everything. And so good at magic from a young age."

You don’t miss the way his jaw tightens on the word father, nor the way his shoulders stiffen for the briefest of moments before he forces them loose again. You wonder how long he’s carried this knowledge, this burden, before saying it aloud. How much of his life has been dictated by it.

Your gaze flickers to his hand. His fingers are long, elegant, but tense, curling slightly where they rest against the table. Without thinking, you reach out, hesitating for only a second before placing your hand over his. His fingers twitch beneath yours, as if startled by the contact, but he doesn’t pull away.

"And the Patronus?" You ask.

His lips press together, but there’s something faintly amused in the way his eyes move to you, something softer. "I really just wanted to keep it a secret for as long as I could." He admits, voice quieter now, less weighted than before. "You can’t go around telling people that you can conjure a dragon for a Patronus now, can you?"

You blink, absorbing it all. The room is silent except for the faint crackling of the torches lining the walls. Then, finally, you sigh. "I guess."

But your hand is still on his. And he hasn’t moved away.

He sighs, heavy and exhausted, before pushing himself to his feet. The warmth of his hand vanishes from yours, and you watch as he turns, crossing the room with long, deliberate strides. His fingers twitch at his sides, curling into loose fists before stretching out again, as if he's trying to shake off something he can't quite name. He stops near the bookshelves, glancing at the spines of the dusty tomes without really seeing them, then shifts his gaze to the sofas, as if debating whether to sit or keep standing. Then, finally, he turns to you.

"Back at the forest, I was going to—"

"Don’t." You shake your head, rising to your feet so quickly that your chair scrapes against the stone floor. The sound is sharp, almost violent, cutting through the thick silence that has settled between you.

"Don’t what?" He laughs, but there is nothing lighthearted about it. The sound is brittle, humorless. "You don’t want me to tell you what I must?"

"Satoru," you whisper, but his face hardens. His shoulders are taut, his entire body held in place by something unseen. His jaw clenches for half a second before he forces himself to breathe, to school his expression into something blank, something unreadable. But his eyes—his eyes are burning.

He exhales sharply, running a hand through his hair before looking at you again. His voice is quieter now, but no less intense. "You’re angry that I didn’t tell you everything from the beginning. You’re angry that I didn’t tell you I knew it was Suguru. That he can read minds. That we had a blood pact." He shakes his head, his tone tightening, sharpening. "But don’t let all of those muddled things affect this. Affect what has been clear to me for so long. What you have been blind to."

"I’m blind?" Your voice rises, incredulous. Your heart is hammering now, quick and unsteady. "You almost sacrificed yourself to the Dementors for me today!"

"And you jumped in front of the Killing Curse for me!" He yells, his hands flying up, his voice echoing off the stone walls. His eyes are wide, wild, his hair disheveled from where he has run his fingers through it again and again. "Do you not see how demented of an act that was? Are you mental? You could’ve died!"

"So could you!" You throw the words back at him, stepping forward, heat rising in your chest. "What do you think the Dementors do, Gojo? You could have had your soul sucked out for what?"

"For you!" He snaps, the words spilling out before he can stop them. His breath is uneven, his chest rising and falling with the force of it. "For you. You know that. You’ve always known that."

Your breath catches. For a moment, neither of you say anything. The only sound in the room is the distant crackling of the torches, the slow shifting of the wooden beams overhead.

Then, quieter, he speaks again. "You jumped in front of the Killing Curse for me, and you didn’t even think twice about it. Do you realize how insane that is? How terrifying? Do you think I could just stand there and watch that happen? You would have died if I didn’t put up a shield for you!"

"I didn’t think—"

"Exactly!" His voice is sharp, but not unkind. His fingers twitch at his sides again. "You didn’t think. Because it was me. And I didn’t think, either. Because it was you."

Your hands are shaking. You don’t know when they started.

"Gojo," you start, but the name barely makes it past your lips before he speaks again.

"Do you know what it felt like?" He asks, his voice lower now, his anger tempered by something else—something raw, something that makes your throat feel tight. "Watching you do that? Watching you throw yourself in front of a curse that should have killed you? Do you have any idea—" He stops, dragging a hand down his face before looking at you again, exhausted, furious, something else entirely. "You can’t ask me not to be angry. You can’t ask me to be okay with that."

"I’m not asking you to be okay with it," you say, and your voice is quieter, but no less fierce. "I’m asking you to understand that I would do it again."

He stares at you. He looks like he wants to argue, like he wants to shake you, like he wants to grab your shoulders and make you see sense. But he doesn’t.

Instead, he just exhales, long and slow, pressing his fingers against his temple. When he speaks again, his voice is different. Softer.

"And that’s the problem, isn’t it?"

You blink, forcing yourself to meet his gaze. It’s piercing—too much and yet never enough, overwhelming and impossibly familiar all at once. His eyes do not waver, do not flicker away, do not grant you even a moment’s reprieve. He watches you like he is memorizing you, like if he dares to look away, you might vanish entirely.

Your breath shudders. The air between you is thin, stretched too tightly, as if the very room itself is holding its breath, waiting. You take a step forward, then another, and another still, until there is no distance left at all, until your forehead presses against his chest, right over the steady, thrumming heartbeat beneath his ribs.

A slow inhale. A slow exhale.

"You are the most infuriating person I have ever met," you whisper, your voice barely more than a breath, but he hears it, of course he does.

And he laughs. A quiet, aching thing. A laugh dragged from somewhere deep inside of him, where things are fragile and breakable, where things are real. His hand comes up to the back of your head, his fingers threading through your hair with an unbearable gentleness, as if you are something precious, something he cannot risk shattering. The other rests at your spine, stroking slow, deliberate circles, grounding you, grounding himself.

"I have fought against this," he murmurs, and there is something raw in his voice now, something stripped bare, "against you, against myself. And yet, here I stand, utterly ruined by you."

You close your eyes. His touch is warm, his hold steady, and it is too much, too much, too much. Your chest tightens, your throat constricts, and when you finally tilt your face up to look at him again, there is a tear threatening to spill over, clinging to the edge of your lashes.

His breath catches. He lifts a hand, thumb grazing the corner of your eye, catching the tear before it can fall. The touch is reverent, devastating in its tenderness.

"You have undone me," you whisper, and the words are not easy, are not light. They weigh heavy on your tongue, on your chest, but they are true. "In ways I never thought possible. There is not a moment, not a breath, where I do not think of you."

Something in his expression cracks, but he does not look away. He never does.

The silence stretches between you, but it is not empty. It is filled with the quiet rise and fall of your breaths, the press of your bodies against one another, the unspoken things that have lived between you for too long.

His thumb strokes over your cheek, slow and deliberate, as if he is committing the shape of your face to memory. His voice is quieter when he speaks, but no less steady. "When I look at you," he says, as if he has never been more sure of anything in his life, "I see every reason to believe in something greater than myself."

Your breath shudders again, but this time, it is not because of fear.

You stay like that, standing in the quiet, in the wreckage of everything that has led to this moment. It could be minutes or hours or lifetimes. It does not matter.

"If you asked me to stay," he says, his voice softer now, like a confession, like a promise, "I would not need to hear it twice. I’m quite a selfish person, as you know."

You let out a breath, one that carries everything with it—all the hurt, all the longing, all the things you have tried to swallow down for so long. And then, you meet his gaze, unwavering.

"Stay, then," you say, voice steady. "I’m selfish too."

He lets out a breath, unsteady and quiet, as if he has been holding it for too long—years, maybe lifetimes. It shudders as it leaves him, and you feel it too, the way his chest finally collapses under the weight of everything he has carried, the burdens he has never allowed himself to set down. His head dips, and for a moment, he hesitates, just barely, before his lips brush against yours.

A touch—just a whisper of warmth, of desperation, of something so gentle it is nearly reverent. Then, he presses in, and you feel it all at once. His hands ghost over your back, over your spine, over every part of you he has nearly lost tonight. He pulls you closer, as if that alone will be enough to keep you from slipping through his fingers. And you let him. You let yourself fall into him, hands reaching up, fingers trembling as they frame his face, as if you are afraid he might pull away too soon.

But he doesn’t.

And when he finally does part from you, it is slow, lingering. His forehead rests against yours, and his breath is uneven. He exhales against your lips, and the sound of it, quiet and weary, breaks something inside of you.

“Don’t put yourself in danger for me,” he murmurs, and his voice is thin, threadbare, as if he is saying it more to himself than to you.

You close your eyes, shaking your head against him. “I’ll do it again and again if it means keeping you safe. I hope you know that.”

He sighs, long and slow, as if he expected you to say that. As if he knew you would. His hands slide up your back, fingers splaying across your shoulder blades, pressing, holding.

“You’re an idiot, Fawkes,” he mutters, but it is not unkind. It is exasperation, affection, exhaustion, all at once. It is everything.

You feel him shift, feel the way his hands tighten just slightly before he pulls away enough to look at you properly. His gaze flickers downward, to your sweater, to the stain smeared across the fabric, dried now, rust-colored under the dim light. You feel the question before he even asks it.

“Not mine,” you murmur, shaking your head. “It’s Toji’s.”

His brows knit together, lips parting slightly, but no sound comes out at first. You watch as he exhales through his nose, his shoulders loosening just slightly.

“Oh,” he says finally, his voice quieter now. “I went and thanked him for… you know.”

You nod. “He told me.”

For a moment, neither of you speak. The silence is full but not heavy. There is something lighter in it now, something softer. You step forward again, pressing against him once more, seeking warmth, seeking something solid. You press your forehead into the space where his collarbone meets his shoulder, where the fabric of his robes is soft and worn from too many years of use.

His body stills at first, just for a fraction of a second, but then—then his arms come around you, wrapping you up, holding you as if he never intends to let go. And you think maybe he doesn’t. Maybe neither of you do.

His fingers curl into the fabric at your waist, gripping, anchoring. He breathes you in, and when he speaks, it is barely a whisper, barely anything at all.

“I’m never letting you go,” he says, as if it is a promise. As if it is an inevitability.

Your eyes slip shut. You could stay here forever, wrapped in this moment, in this breath, in this fragile, quiet thing between you.

“Me neither,” you murmur, your lips brushing against the fabric of his robes. “You’re stuck with me for life.”

He chuckles then, low and quiet, the sound reverberating through his chest. And it is not the kind of laughter you are used to from him—not sharp-edged or arrogant, not teasing or cocky. It is something else entirely. Something softer. Something real.

You do not pull away. Neither does he.

And so, you stay.

to everyone who came on this journey with me, thank you so, so much. i am so happy, so glad, so soft with all my feels, that something i wrote received so much love. it's really such a wonderful thing to receive sm love for smth you create — and i'm so grateful to be on the receiving end. speaking of ends, this isn't it. there's two epilogues still left to go. stay tuned, my loves.

© all works belong to admiringlove on tumblr. plagiarism is strictly prohibited.

[explorevenus]

dessert before dinner ♡ gale dekarios x f!reader

nsfw (18+) - minors DNI or i will call the cops and also ur mom

word count - 4.3k

description - domestic life with you has turned gale into a big softie, in more ways than one-- he's already got the dad bod, why wait for the baby to match?

aka dad bod malewife gale wants to knock u up :3

tags/warnings - dad bod gale w mild self esteem issues at the beginning but he gets over it, technically bg3 spoilers ig (takes place post-game), food mentions, praise, p in v, creampie, breeding kink but fluffy cus gale is sappy, inappropriate use of the Weave, inappropriate use of mage hand

a/n - this piece was commissioned by my LOVELY LOVELY SWEET BABY ANGEL @d10nyx WHO DESERVES EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD AND MORE AND IS SUCH A FUCKIN SAINT FOR BEING SO PATIENT FOR THIS ;n; pls go check out her work i adore her so bad

also just as a note b4 i get One Billion Asks about it for posting this-- i am not abandoning 'something permanent' nor am i abandoning writing for resident evil just bc i am posting one singular bg3 fic !!!!!!!!!! might seem obvious but i just wanted to get ahead of it bc i'm paranoid and have seen it happen to other ppl ;~;

my masterlist ♡

fic under the cut, thanks so much for reading and i hope u enjoy ;w;

-venus ♡

Life post-Netherbrain softened Gale Dekarios in many ways. 

Some of the most obvious ways included the relief of tension that came with no longer bearing the weight of the world on his back, ridding himself of the curse that plagued so many of his living years, and finally being able to settle down back home in Waterdeep. 

But if you asked Gale, the one thing that softened him the most was you. You, you, you. Ever since the moment you tugged him out of that collapsing portal, everything Gale did was for you, and by the looks of it, that wouldn’t be changing anytime soon. 

Stability was something Gale hadn’t had in a long time, and while he wouldn’t exactly call running around Faerun fighting deities and monsters and people alike ‘stability,’ he could at the very least find that stability in you. Every battle, every brutal journey through the swamp or the Astral Plane or the wreckage of Baldur’s Gate, you were right there with him. 

And now you were home. 

Home had long since become anywhere with you, of course, but now you were really home, back in Waterdeep with Gale and his family and his beloved Tara, and what’s more, you had his last name. You were truly his and he was truly yours, in every possible sense. With his days spent teaching the art of illusion magic to the next generation of hopeful mages and his evenings spent returning home to his precious wife, Gale wasn’t sure it would be scientifically possible for him to be any happier, let alone any more fortunate. 

Gale was in the kitchen preparing dinner when you returned home, having spent the afternoon handling a few errands and wandering about the city. It always came as a delight for him to see you exploring his hometown in the same ways he did growing up, discovering all the neat little oddities and secrets that lay beneath the unassuming surface. 

He turned over his shoulder to face you at the sound of the door creaking open and then clicking shut, a smitten grin tugging at his face already. The sight of his beloved would never cease to fluster him, after all. 

“There she is,” Your handsome wizard greeted warmly, “The lovely and– might I say, stunningly beautiful– Princess of Waterdeep.” 

Just like that, you were blushing too, approaching to wrap your arms around him at the waist from behind, pressing a sweet kiss to his shoulder, affectionately roaming every inch of him you could get your hands on with a gentle touch. 

Yes, life post-Netherbrain softened Gale Dekarios in many ways, and his figure was no exception.

It was no secret Gale had an appreciation for the little indulgences in life, like rich wine and too many sweets, alarm clocks shut off when they really shouldn’t be, cozy bedding and plush furniture and hearty ‘marry me’ dinners. But, luxuries like that were rather few and far between when the two of you were on the road, and long days of traveling by foot and fighting to survive made for great exercise at the time. 

Suffice it to say, having a stable home and living without being under the constant threat of death meant you weren’t quite as active as you used to be. With time, his cheeks filled out a little more, and his clothes became a bit snug as lean muscle gave way to plush flesh. His skin glowed. He looked relaxed and nourished, he looked healthy, and you couldn’t get enough of him if you tried. 

Your wandering hands did make him a little timid in the moment, however– he hadn’t put on a concerning amount of extra padding by any means, but still, this new look was taking some getting used to. 

“Quite alright, my love?” Gale asked with a soft laugh as your hands came to rest at his hips, your kisses trailing up the side of his neck. His skin was glowing warm beneath your attention. 

“Mhm,” You hummed innocently, nodding, your hands sliding forward to feel along the delicate roundness of his belly through his shirt. “I just missed you today, dearest, and you look so delightful. I have half a mind to talk you into dessert before dinner, hm?” 

Your beloved husband was well and truly burning up now, stuttering over whatever he had going on the stove and very much considering abandoning it in favor of bending you over the countertop, but something made him hesitate. 

With a bashful laugh, as though he were trying to play it off, Gale replied, “Right, well, I suppose I could use the exercise.” 

Your brows furrowed with confusion and you glanced up at him over his shoulder, trying to read his expression. He said that so casually, like he didn’t think anything of it, and it broke your heart a little bit. 

“For all it may be worth, I think you look divine,” You said, face straight and meaning every word of it. Even if Gale was trying to laugh it off, it wasn’t a joke to you. Quietly, you added, “I would argue a bit of fluff suits you well, my darling.” 

Thankfully Gale tended to be rather easily convinced by you. 

His posture relaxed a little bit, and now the laugh that puffed out from between his lips was noticeably more genuine. “Perhaps it’s about time we put ‘a bit of fluff’ on you. I fear my mother will lose her head soon if I don’t.” 

You tilted your head and narrowed your eyes with playful curiosity. “Your mother? And what concern is that of hers, hm?”

“Only the same concern of every mother, dearest,” He grinned as though it were obvious, “Grandbabies.” 

This response of his gave you pause. Gale’s mother hadn’t exactly been quiet about her desire for grandchildren since the day you met her, but she’d never gone too far, never pestered you to the point of being uncomfortable, and never made it out to be particularly urgent– you wondered if perhaps she’d been less patient on the topic with Gale. 

Your pause had a lot less to do with the pressure to please his mother and a lot more to do with the undeniable fact that the thought of Gale fucking a baby into you made your knees go weak. You weren’t even sure you were breathing for a moment, until it occurred to you that you’d been quiet for too long and any further hesitation to respond could be taken the wrong way. 

Clearing your throat softly, you continued the playful banter, “I think my earlier suggestion stands to remedy that concern as well, no? Dessert before dinner?” 

What you didn’t know was that Gale had been thinking about this a lot more often than he was letting on. Sure, the pestering of his baby-crazy relatives was one factor, but more than anything, the safety and security he’d felt in the year since you’d married had him throwing himself into the romantics of domesticity with abandon. When you first met, he never imagined such a future would be possible for him. The chaos and uncertainty that came along with defeating the Absolute brought death far closer than most people would see the other side of, and yet you made it. 

Against all odds, hand-in-hand, you still made it. And every night since your wedding, as you tucked into bed alongside one another, he dreamt of you glowing with the radiance of motherhood. He didn’t want to pressure you– after everything that had happened, it felt like a lot to ask of you to also bear his child, like that might be pushing his luck… though you had all but just confirmed your interest with that last remark, and that didn’t make it past him. 

Gale turned off the stove so as not to burn the masterpiece he’d been cooking before turning around to face you, his broad hands coming up to cradle your face. The look he gave you was intensely romantic and almost vulnerable, his eyes gazing deep down into your own as he asked, “My darling, do you know how long I’ve yearned to make you a mother?” 

Your heart was hammering now, warmth creeping up your cheeks as you found yourself unable to break eye contact, not that you wanted to anyway. Bashfully, your hands came to rest upon his soft shoulders, feeling his own heart pulsing away in his chest, his cheeks going rosy with the same warmth. There was always a certain synchronicity between you and Gale. 

Voice lowering to a near whisper, the emotion behind your words just as strong, you replied, “How long?” 

The look he gave you was tender and reverent. Your husband clicked his tongue and smiled at the floor before cupping your jaw in his two strong hands, meeting your eyes once again. Tone rich with sincerity, he began, “Back in the Grove, seeing you with all the little Tieflings… a lot of people would have disregarded them as scoundrels, but not you, my darling. 

“You embraced their mischief– not only embraced it, but nurtured it. Refined it. You treated them with patience and respect, and you didn’t look down upon them, you kneeled to their level. At every turn, you protected them, but you never patronized them. You learned just as much from them as they learned from you.” 

He paused for a moment, thumbs stroking over your flushed cheeks, his own skin burning just as hot. Pressing a soft kiss to the tip of your nose, Gale continued, “I’m sure you can imagine how that sent off the train of thought. For the longest time, I bit it back. It felt like a pipe dream, and I didn’t want to kid myself– I’ve done enough of that for two lifetimes. But then the Netherbrain fell, the Absolute released her iron grip on the commonwealth of Faerun, and what’s more, you accepted my hand in marriage. 

“The first morning I woke up next to you in the safety of our marital bed, it didn’t feel like such a distant reality anymore. There you were right before me, and in my mind’s eye, you were bathed in the golden glow of dawn and fertility, your nightgown clinging to your divine, ripening figure. Ever since that moment, the image of you with child has dominated my every waking thought. I crave it like the sweetest wine, my heart, to see you become plump and radiant with motherhood.” 

Leave it to Gale to so easily render you weak in the knees with his poetics. The way he described it, you could see it too. You could see the silk of your nightgown becoming snug around your middle as your belly would come to rise like pastry, you could see the vein in Gale’s brow tense while he would struggle to put a crib together. You could see your grocery lists growing to include nappies and baby food, you could see a space at the dining table occupied by a high chair. 

He was right, it didn’t feel distant at all. It felt so close you could taste it, the veil between this reality and that one now paper thin, like a cobweb you could just blow away. 

Before you could think up a response, he was speaking again, his tone delicate and low, “Just imagine it, dearest. A child born of you and I would have the purest connection to the Weave imaginable, and you would make a gorgeous mother… You know I adore you always, but I must confess, I’m not sure I would be able to leave you be, seeing you like that. It might just require the strength of a thousand men to pry me away.” 

You puffed out a laugh, your face and the tips of your ears burning with bashfulness. Leaning forward to hide your face away in his soft chest, you teased, “So it wasn’t your mother who put you up to this?” 

“Ah, I’m afraid not, my darling,” He cracked a grin, planting a smooch to the crown of your head. “At least not entirely. This was a hole I dug the both of us into largely on my own, I’ll admit.” 

His hands slid down to rest upon your hips, and for a moment, you just held each other like that. It felt cozy, it felt comfortable, like time itself had paused around you. In all your days, no one but Gale could make you feel like that so consistently. You almost wondered if there might be some subtle illusion magic at play in moments like these, but you knew all too well that Gale’s charm had very little to do with the Weave– he was just like that, and you were all the more fortunate for it. 

Gale’s hold on your hips tightened in an affectionate squeeze before his arms were snaking around you, one at your lower back and one where your thighs met your bottom. He lifted you from your feet and spun you around to face the other way, propping you up on the countertop in one smooth movement, the tightening front of his pants nestled right up against the crotch of your underwear through your dress. 

Your breath hitched in your throat at the feeling, and he didn’t make it any easier for you to remember how to breathe when his next move was to stoop his head down and smother your throat with languid kisses. 

“Gale,” You gasped, hips rutting forward to knock into his own, your head spinning as the distinct outline of his arousal grinded right up against your clit. “Gods above, you’re going to be the death of me…” 

A low chuckle rumbled from his chest at your accusation, his teeth nipping playfully at your pulse point before he spoke against your skin, “Always a flair for dramatics with you, my beloved bride… though if that should turn out to be true, then you’d die how you lived; ravished, revered and adored by your most loyal wizard.” 

Just as soon as he’d put you there, Gale was plucking you up from the countertop again, and while it was your immediate assumption that he was going to carry you off to the bedroom, it would seem he didn't even have the patience for that. Your back hit the dining table with a gentle thud, though the ever mindful wizard braced the back of your head gracefully with an oven mitt just in time. 

You dissolved into a fit of squirms, giggles, and quiet yelps as his lips and teeth met your neck in a display of needy attention, his fingertips crackling with magic as they found their way up beneath the skirt of your dress. Grip printing into your hips, he dragged you back until your clothed cunt was flush with his bulge again, and the electric shock of pleasure that rang through you in response threatened to knock the wind out of you. 

Gale wouldn't, you thought to yourself, surely he wouldn't enchant his-- 

He tilted your chin up with his knuckle, a brutally smug grin plastered on his rosy face as your eyes met again. "Are you with me, dearest?" His thumb came forward to stroke over the plush of your bottom lip, almost pulling it into a pout himself. 

"Yeah," You shivered, nodding without even really thinking about it. You couldn't even bring yourself to poke fun at him for that like you might have otherwise. "Did you--" 

"Shh," Gale cooed, untying the laces of his trousers to relieve some of the pressure before he folded over you and rolled his hips forward again, caging you between the table and his warm, plush frame. The barrier between you was lesser now, and you felt it immediately.

He was radiating the Weave, delicate strands seeping through the thin fabric of your undergarments to kiss, lick, and tingle over your flesh. The sensation wasn't completely foreign-- taking a master wizard as a partner and lover for life naturally lent itself to inappropriate use of the arcane-- but no two intimate encounters with him were ever alike. Sometimes it made you wonder just how many of those hours he spent locked away in his tower were giving him ideas. 

In hardly any time at all you could feel yourself soaking through your panties, your hips rutting forward to chase him and your mind slipping away into a helpless little puddle of mush, and he had barely even touched you yet. It was all by design, of course-- he didn't want to get too cocky and risk wasting a drop of himself that could otherwise be getting you pregnant. 

Discarding his shirt and dragging your panties down with shaking hands, Gale groaned at the sight of your arousal, the extent of it. You were right drooling between your legs, pussy glistening with the very same juices that drenched and clung to your underwear. He couldn't help but dip two fingers between your silky folds to collect your nectar for himself. As soon as it hit his tongue he felt like he couldn't breathe. Your taste was creamy and sweet like icing, a flavor he wouldn't ever tire of even if it was the only thing he could ever have again. He could devour you for a lifetime and still hunger for eternity. 

"You're going to grow so beautifully," He said lowly, eyes half-lidded and his pupils blown wide as saucers. In you he saw nothing but the future. One hand shoving his pants and briefs down his thighs and the other planting itself upon your stomach, his cock sprang up to kiss the plump flesh of his own belly as he continued, "I will thank the divines for the remainder of my life that I should have the pleasure of watching you ripen with our fruit." 

You could have cried. Your bottom lip did wobble a little bit as you gazed up at him, choking up, and he stooped down to kiss you immediately. 

"None of that," He mumbled against your lips, dragging his stiff, weeping cock through your folds to keep you good and dizzy, every contact of his skin against yours still buzzing with the arcane. "I have you, okay? I have you. I love you. You're alright." 

Nodding in response, feeling the tears dry up right then and there, your lips parted in preparation to respond but all that came out was a deep, pleasured cry. Gale was sinking into your hole like he was made for you, stretching you open with slow, delicate thrusts, his breath heavy and lustful in your ear. 

Stuffing you full of himself until the head of him was threatening to kiss your cervix, Gale stilled for a moment, nipping at the shell of your ear before kissing your cheek affectionately and checking in with you, "Feeling good, my darling?" 

"Mhm," You nodded, and as soon as your approval registered to him, he began to move. 

Bliss. Pure and uncut bliss. That quiet little hum of approval quickly melted into staggered breaths and mewls, your hands finding purchase in kneading at the dough of his waist. You really couldn't get over how well the extra weight suited him, how perfectly it softened his edges and padded out the warmest parts of his physique. He was made for a body like this, a little bit round and squishy and sweet. You wanted to swallow him in one bite. 

Every stroke of his cock inside you felt like true euphoria, crackles and tingles of pleasure radiating outward from each and every nerve ending, and he felt it too. You could tell by the look on his face, the way his mouth hung open with deep, wanton moans, the way he shivered and stuttered with damn near every thrust. 

"G-Gale," You cried out, nails printing into his flesh as you tried to tug him down to you. 

Typically he would have obliged you without hesitation, but Gale had other plans at the moment. Bracing himself against the fine oak wood to the right side of your head, his other hand gripped at your thigh and angled your leg up with ease. Before you could register what he was about to do, he was already doing it. 

Folding you into a half mating press, he drove into you deep, the Weave sinking into your bloodstream with a staggering intensity that nearly made you scream. 

Swallowing your cries with his own lips, Gale kissed you just about as deeply as he was fucking you, his facial hair scratching and tickling at your cheeks as his silky tongue slipped over your own. Every knock of his hips against your own had the dining table rattling too, the walls of your marital home ringing with the sounds of sex, the obscene squelching of your pussy sucking him in, the needy whines and moans slipping from you both. 

You felt like you were on fire in the best possible way. Every square inch of your body was alight with lust and magic, your legs hooked around his hips to draw him even closer. The two of you could fuse together and you would still want to get closer. 

Soon enough, your throbbing clit was met with the unexpected pressure of arcane fingertips, measured strokes of a figure-eight over your swollen bud that coaxed you higher and higher and higher until you felt like you were weightless there on that table, lifting from it, your lips only parting from his own as your head fell back against the oven mitt in a desperate gasp for breath. 

That breath was almost immediately followed by a broken cry of his name, the stimulation causing your greedy cunt to clench and pulse around him, again, by design. Sinking down on his elbow so he could speak directly into your ear, his cock stroking so deeply into you that it nearly felt like it was prodding at your lungs, Gale groaned, "That's it, pup, there you are... Such pretty noises from my good girl, my darling little wife..." 

"I love you, I love you, I--" 

Cutting you off with a kiss, Gale replied, "I love you more, and I'll give you as many babies as it takes to prove it."

Your vision went white, thighs wrenching tight around his hips as you plummeted over the edge unlike ever before. It felt like traveling through a lightning bolt, your spine arching up into a fine point, your stomach pressing up against his own as he emptied his load inside you, mage hand still circling your puffy clit. 

Ropes and ropes of creamy seed flooded your hole until you were stuffed to the brim, leaving behind that delicious pressure that came along with being stretched so full. Your bottom half felt heavy as you fought to catch your breath beneath him, tears leaking from your dewy eyes. 

"N-No more, no more with the mage hand," You stammered, sucking in a sharp breath as its thumb and forefinger took your clit in a delicate pinch. 

Another second or two passed in which he continued to have his fun before deciding you'd had enough. The stimulation to your bud slowly ceased, but as he withdrew his softening sex from you, you quickly realized you didn't feel any less full. 

Brows knitting together, you squirmed and struggled to sit up, watching Gale turn his back to dampen a washcloth before returning to you, gently wiping the sweat from your brow and the slick from your inner thighs, brushing your hair away from your face reverently. "Shh, shh. Just sit still for a moment longer, alright? Let me get you cleaned up." 

He continued his gentle work until you were refreshed and sparkling before scooping you up from the dining table like a princess in his arms, carrying you off to the bedroom to get you both changed. 

It was only as the two of you entered the room and you caught sight of yourself in the floor-length mirror that you realized Gale's mage hand was still very much at work, its thick middle and ring fingers plugging you up nicely. Not a drop was wasted with the diligent digits blocking the way. 

Gale helped you out of your dress and into a soft nightgown, and in your exhaustion you were ready to just crash into bed for the night. Curling up atop the covers as Gale changed into loungewear of his own, you were about to fall asleep right then and there when he woke you with a loving grin. 

"Huh?" You mumbled, reaching up to rub your eyes, and as his own raked over the image of your beautiful body, he couldn't stop thinking about the many ways it would come to develop over the next several months. 

"We still haven't eaten, my love." 

You groaned, burying your face back into the bedding stubbornly. "But I'm tired..." 

"You were the one who wanted dessert before dinner, sweetest," He teased. "We've had our dessert, and now it's time for dinner. Besides, I thought we agreed to fluff you up a bit?"

A bashful smile tugging at your cheeks, you narrowed your eyes at him playfully, huffing out, "Okay, okay, fine," reaching your arms out for him to carry you again, and you were so lucky he loved to baby you. 

Gale didn't hesitate to take you into his arms, your head nestled up against his chest as you returned to the kitchen together. He placed you gently down in a chair at the dining table before assessing what he'd left on the stove earlier. His 'masterpiece' was now ice cold and unappealing to him, and surely his darling wife deserved better than cold and unappealing. 

Turning over his shoulder to look at you, Gale asked you a question that you didn't think you'd ever hear him ask; "How about tavern food tonight?"

[pearlescentparade]

requests are closed!

hello!! i am pearlescentparade, a writing blog that writes reader fics for the funny block game

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[greentrickster]

It's never going to stop being wild to me that the Wicked Witch of the West was never seen as green-skinned until the original movie came out, and the look was just so iconic it stuck, and also the movie's still under copyright (including the exact shade of green used for her) which is why more recent movies and productions have to be super finicky with the shade of green they make her due to copyright.

All of which is to say, if I ever do my own take on the Wizard of Oz (og!book version), I'm making her blue. Or maybe purple. I'd go with orange, for contrary funsies, but there's WAY too much history with various groups as being described as red or yellow, and I'm not going to risk going too far in either direction and adding unpleasant unintentional undertones in a choice that's about as deep as a puddle. There will also be no point in my take on events where anyone (even the narrator) makes a comment or joke about her not being green.

Might make a joke about how Dorothy's dress matches her skin and neither of them knowing what to do with this discovery, though.

Also I wouldn't go the full 'the Wicked Witch owns slaves' route from the original book and make her more similar to Madam Mim from The Sword in the Stone in her flavour of wicked/evil, and I would go with the 'Dorothy and the Wonderful Wizard in Oz' backstory regarding the Wizard and Ozma (basically retcons him having usurped the throne), so he's still something of a conman and trickster figure, but still definitively an ally to Dorothy & Co. Not only does this satisfy my own personal sensibilities for these characters, it sets up the delightful scenario of dangerously powerful evil witch versus some guy from Omaha with a quick tongue and a knack for stage magic and making gizmos desperately trying to keep a couple steps ahead of her.

She'd still get melted in the final confrontation of the original story, but she'd also get better later, Enchanted Forest Chronicles style. Dorothy is the only one surprised or concerned by this, but is also relieved that she did not, in fact, accidentally murder a second person. The Witch of the West shows up off and on throughout the continuing stories afterwards as a sort of side menace, maybe she has a domestication arc or something, I dunno, this post was just about making her blue instead of green because of who I am as a person, we're two paragraphs deeper than I planned, I'm calling it here before it can get any longer on me. O_OU

[intooned]

MY FAVORITE SHIPS!

This was a LONG time coming! And I want to thank @expensiveeggplant & @coffinbrotherr for putting up with my procrastination while boiling down the who and why of this list!

Adventure Time: Finnceline

My first real ship, the first fanfiction I ever read, and I spent hours watching Finnceline AMV's way back when YouTube didn't have commercials. Finn and Marcy's personalities and experiences play so well off of each other that I'm thoroughly convinced the writers were terrified of their potential. They would be an amazing butt-kicking couple, but that wouldn't leave Finn with as many flaws to develop as a young man coming of age. And it's such a shame because you know they'd always have each other's backs and best interests at heart. And with a fully grown adult Finn I'd bet money they'd have at least turned out as cuddle buddies... who occasionally engage in some very aggressive cuddling courtesy of my good friend Lofty! (Click at your own risk!)

Flame Princess and Huntress Wizard were great and had their cool moments with Finn, but something tells me Marceline would give up her immortal life in a heartbeat to protect Finn. Having seen each other's pasts and memories and going out of their way to help each other with deep-rooted life issues, Finnceline just has more depth to work with than the other ships.

Gravity Falls: Dipper x Pacifica x Mabel

The first episode I ever saw was the one where Pacifica and Mabel play mini-golf. I wasn't fully paying attention and assumed Dipper and Mabel were just best friends dealing with a bully. The car ride home together was cute and solidified my first ever threeway ship. THEN I found out they were siblings...

Then I found out fanfiction didn't care! In fact, here's a [link] to the BEST fanfic I've ever read for this ship, enjoy!

Star Vs. The Forces of Evil: MonStarco

The MonStar AU is where things are relatively the same except for one thing: Star is half or part monster. It makes good sense that Star, being an interdimensional magical princess from an interdimensional magical kingdom would be a little more... interdimensional. It gives some fresh blood to Starco fics, which can be a bit too vanilla most of the time, especially when you get to parts where Star's otherworldly anatomy and quirks cause all sorts of problems and shenanigans!

Sort of like her muberty phase but she's stuck looking that way, and if you remember the show said there's a chance every Mewman actually COULD end up stuck in butterfly form! Super interesting! It reminds me a lot of the episode of Teen Titans(original) where Starfire was going through alien puberty, and how fun of an episode it was to watch. The fact that there's tons of Monster Star AU and Mewberty art out there helps a ton as well!

Steven Universe: Lapiven & Stevinel

Lapiven: These two are the perfect example of "cute sunshine boy X hot goth gf". Plain and simple, Steven's optimism is exactly what Lapis needed to begin working through what happened to her. And no one appreciates a cinnamon roll the way a scarred person does. Also, tell me they don't look like a couple everytime they're onscreen together? I mean really watch them! Blushing, giggling, constant eye contact, twinkling eyes, immediately responsive to each others change in mood, plenty physical contact, elation whenever they call or visit each other.

You can call it platonic for the Shtewball, but Lapis adores Steven in every sense of the word. She warned him and negotiated his safety when she realized Homeworld would get involved. She held Jasper prisoner in her own head just to protect him. She faced her trauma and returned to confront the Diamonds, ready to put hands and feet on an enemy she knew she couldn't beat. And entirely because, to her, Steven's safety was more important than her own life. Weigh out those exact same scenarios, their exact same interactions with each other with just about any other two characters in animation and tell me it doesn't make sense? I swear most of their episodes together are just them going on dates!

Stevinel: Now this is special to me. On the opposite side of the scale Steven and Spinel share the same feelings of abandonment and inadequacy from and by Pink. Of course they aren't the only ones, but Spinel didn't raise Steven as a parent or sibling. There was no one better suited to empathize with Steven's issues, and mitigate his downward spiral into becoming a monster.

What Spinel went through in the movie is too on the nose for what Steven goes through in Future, and I'm flabbergasted that the writers chose to have her be of little to no help when Steven needed to be shown that he didn't have to hold himself together on his own.

But back on topic. The other Gems love Steven, but Spinel is wired to love him, just like Pearl, on top of whatever blooms between them naturally. So when those wires were damaged from Pink's abandonment, it's quite poetic that Steven is the one to mend them. From there It's as easy-peasy pink-heart-squeasy to assume the seeds of affection could sprout from such fertile ground. It also helps that Rebecca Sugar blatantly suggests Steven and Spinel's relationship isn't concretely platonic, at least for Spinel. Even going so far as to give us fan service!

Possibility is all that is needed for shippers and fanfictioneers to run wild with wishful thinking. I also might have a revenge boner for heartbroken characters who find happiness despite the tomfuckery done to them. "Pink abandoned me? Guess I'll be with Steven until the heat death of the universe!

RWBY: Nora's Arc

Although I may grow enamored with other RWBY ships, I always come back to this one. It's just tons of fun! Responsible & Awkward meets Extroverted Hurricane, legally banned from IHOP! Premium family man real estate meets poster girl for found family and there's no one better than Jaune-1-of-8-kids-Arc to get the job done!

I'm also of the mind that Nora's bombastic personality is meant to draw people to her, because she's absolutely terrified of being alone and left behind again. And with family gatherings at the Arc residence, isolation is all but nonexistent.

Wakfu: Yumalia

Dreams do come true! LET'S GOOO! Not much to say; they were set to be together from first sight and it was a rollercoaster from there. A lot like Aang and Katara, Yugo got his feisty princess and Amalia got her dashing hero. It's classic, it's timeless, and you love to see it done well!

The Dragon Prince: Rayllum

Disclaimer: I haven't watched the timeskip, and apparently it's kinda bad? I think I'll keep the rose-tinted glasses on thank you very much.

Obvious cuteness is obviously cute. It's nearly unheard of for the strange but exotic alien girl to be the one intrigued and smitten with the human boy. An action adventure fantasy but the non-human girl is the awkward one hiding her feelings? Sign me up! It's a breath of fresh air!

Sonic The Hedgehog: SilverWolf

The newest addition! Some fresh meat to sink my teeth into as I rekindle my love for the Sonic franchise! I haven't followed anything Sonic since the fever dream that was Sonic 06, but happened to see a few panels of Silver talking to what appeared to be a new character, Whisper the Wolf! Shy, soft spoken, but not from timidity, rather a desire to not scare others away because of her frightening eyes.

Pairing her with the very approachable and reassuring Silver makes for good chemistry in my opinion. I also adore Whisper's color scheme and the combination of silver, gold, and neon lights they have in a lot of comic panels together. They'd make a cute pair that's easy to reduce to a blushing mess with any little bit of teasing, and I'm here for it!

AND THERE YOU HAVE IT!

I have loads more ships but these are the ones that I felt were most worth sharing.

[astarioffsimpmain]

Cozy Up with: Gale

[Autumn photography by: coldoctober]

[Gale photography by: unknown - if it's you, please let me know so that I can tag you!]

Author's Note:

Okay so....... maybe it's become a series that I like to call "Cozy Up". LOL I'll probably do another one with Astarion since the first was pretty short, and I'm hoping to do more bg3 characters as well! Here's our beautiful, wonderful rizzard in some post-game domestic bliss: autumn-themed! Hope you enjoy.

You smiled as your eyes followed the colorful leaves in their path from the trees to the ground, carried on the wind like dancers performing a routine. The weather had turned crisp in Waterdeep, the night air boasting an even colder chill on the balcony of Gale's tower, where the breeze from the sea swept up to rustle the wind chimes that were a gift from your fiancé once you moved in. 

A shiver ran through you and you curled further under the massive blanket Gale had on the settee. It was your idea to sit outside. You didn't mind the fact that your ears and nose were numb. This was your first autumn in Waterdeep; your first autumn as a fiancé(e). Autumn was always your favorite season: the sweeping changes in the colors of the landscape, the crackling energy of something new and wonderful in the air, and the eerie glow of the large harvest moons in the evenings. You wanted nothing more than to experience this shift with your soon to be husband, who was currently fixing hot cocoa for the both of you in the kitchen downstairs, and probably supplementing Tara with some warm milk before he returned. 

You rubbed your feet together and admired the two pumpkins that sat on the balcony across from you, faces carved in them by you and Gale, glowing brightly with the spell the wizard had used on them. "It's a tradition in Waterdeep!" Gale had exclaimed with excitement while urging you to find a pumpkin you liked from the stall. 

You'd heard of the practice, of course - carving a face into a gourd and lighting it to keep the evil away - but in Baldur's Gate, there wasn't a guarantee your warding gourd would be left alone for very long if left outside where they were meant to be, so most people lit candles in their windows and drew faces on their doors with coal instead to ward off the evil. So many firsts for you this year, and so far, you were enjoying them all.

The clank of cups on a tray brought you back to the present and you turned your eyes to the patio door, where Gale had appeared with two steaming mugs and a dazzling smile on his handsome face. "Here we are! My mother's famous recipe." He said, carefully handing you one of the mugs by the rim. You sighed in audible relief as your cold fingers wrapped around the warm ceramic, the effect taking hold immediately. A single sip had a  satisfying chill running up and down your spine before your entire body began to warm from the inside out. 

"Mmm Gale, it's perfect, thank you." You hummed happily, your mug held close to your face to allow your nose to defrost as well. He chuckled in response and sat down next to you with his own cup, pulling some of the blanket over his legs as he settled in. Your pull to him was immediate, and you were nuzzling into his side the moment he was in reach. He opened his arm to you just as quickly and pulled you closer by your shoulders. 

The scent of weathered book pages and amber flitted across your senses, enveloping you in a sense of safety and belonging as you rested your head in your usual place under Gale’s arm. You looked out over Waterdeep over the balcony railing, and the city was littered with tiny flickers of candlelight as people ducked in and out of shops, restaurants, and taverns far below. Motion in your peripheral caught your eye and you smiled to yourself. 

Gale had conjured a mage hand to open the volume he was reading on the latest popular recipes for Waterdhavian weddings. He was insistent on making your meal for you on the day you wed, and would hear nothing against it. He was making something new everyday, bringing plates of his new dishes to you. "My love," he would say every time. "Try this one. How is it compared to the last? Should I keep looking? I'll keep looking, I haven't tried this other one yet.." and he would trail back off to the kitchen to start again. At first, you'd tried to dissuade him from trying every dish in the book, but your fiancé was nothing if not hard-headed, and you found yourself going along with it, content enough to try new food every night until the wedding. Each dish was better than the last, and that you certainly didn't mind. 

You chuckled quietly and allowed your eyes to fall closed, listening to the rhythmic sound of Gale’s heart beating beneath your ear. The wind was chilly, but your hearts were warm, as long as they beat together. 

~

fin

[j4gm]

SPOILERS!!! REFERENCES AND EASTER EGGS IN F&C ep. 2: SIMON PETRIKOV

Let me know if I missed anything!

First of all the title sequence is fucking cool. I don't want to speculate about the various things we see in it, like the apartment getting blown up or the Fern tree growing into its 1000+ version, because I'm sure the show will get round to all that!

The first scene was an awesome reintroduction to the post-apocalypse, showing us the dynamic between Simon and Marcy. The button popping off Marcy's dungarees was a reference to young Marcy's first appearance, Memory of a Memory, when she removed one of the buttons herself to fix Hambo's eye.

Simon was show playing a live set at Dirt Beer Guy's tavern in Obsidian. It seems they've gotten to know each other quite well over the past twelve years. Dirt Beer Guy asks Simon if he's read his new book draft, about a character called Joe Milkshake who was first mentioned in the episode Root Beer Guy.

Despite the fact we saw Jake in the trailers, Finn and T.V. pretty much confirm in this scene that Jake is dead, and has presumably been dead since before Obsidian. I guess Bronwyn wasn't the only Jake descendant who Finn took on as an apprentice, but T.V. doesn't seem all that into it. The Finn and Jake we saw in the trailer are likely from an alternate universe that we have yet to see.

Finn uses his weed whacker to cut through these bushes. A nice way of showing he's fully recovered from his Fern guilt. The focus here is very much on Simon's problems instead of Finn's.

Finn parts with Simon to go and visit Huntress Wizard. The nature of their relationship remains ambiguous and I expect it to stay that way.

Simon has the Island Lady from The Party's Over Isla de Señorita in his phone. I guess they reconnected after he became Simon again. He also has Abracadaniel. I always liked Ice King's friendship with Abracadaniel and the rest of the Order of Giuseppe so I hope they're still friends!

Cute Bubbline scene. Back in the episode Bonnibel Bubblegum, Mr. Creampuff suggested he and PB get matching tattoos. Now she's (trying to) do the same with the girl she's chosen rather than some guy who was chosen for her! Also Marceline is using the same phone she's been seen with in a few previous episodes, including Go With Me and Be Sweet.

I think the flying human city is called Up-Ton.

Choose Goose! He keeps coming back! And he's evil now! People were joking about him being the antagonist of Fionna and Cake after that weird post-credits scene in Wizard City and the fact he was in hell in Together Again. I wasn't expecting that to actually come true. Glob knows why he's hanging out in a cage in Simon's house.

The pattern of GOLB's eyes is reflected in Simon's glasses during the ritual. He is doing the same dance that Betty was doing to summon GOLB in the finale.

Among the objects in Simon's GOLB shrine are the Farmworld Enchiridion, the flying carpet that Simon stole from Ash and was later frequently used by Betty, the crocodile clips that Betty used for her magic rituals, two effigies of GOLB, and what looks to be the shell of the snail who was seen throughout the original series.

In this credits sequence, Fionna and cake are dreaming about the mask being worn by the bear than Finn slew, and a butterfly with a smiley face on it. Perhaps symbolising Finn?

Tune in next week for episodes 3 and 4!

[femdomlieeh]

a wizard and an elf (m)

Sub!Masochist!Sunoo (ENHYPEN) x Dom!Reader

THEMES—nsfw ✧ wizard!owner!reader x elf!servant!sunoo ✧ just a tiny bit toxic(?)

WARNING—2.4k wc ✧ masochism ✧ spanking (m rec.) ✧ leaving him hard ✧ calling her master ✧ calling him a whore ✧ crying ✧ injury

NOW PLAYING—Abracdabra ✧ Lady Gaga

A/N. Thank you for 2000 followers!!<3 This is an old reupload except I edited it a bit and changed the idol. This summer I wanna get back to writing again! I'm starting uni and my program will be fully in English so I wanna improve my language skills, while also picking up an old hobby that is creative writing. I will reupload more posts while I'm writing new stories<3

M.LISTS—enhypen ✧ latest updates ✧ wattpad

All rights reserved © femdomlieeh

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Once upon a time there was an elf. His name was Sunoo and he was lonely in the woods. Almost all of his people had been hunted down till death. The blood of a wood elf has immense healing properties and that is attractive to many people. Wood elves, in particular, are also exceptionally sexual but that fact is not as widely known.

Once upon a time there was a wizard. Her name was ___ and she was lonely in her tower. Almost all wizards and wizards lived alone but some had company of slaves. The blood of a wood elf has immense healing properties and that is attractive to people with magic.

One day the two met in the woods. The wizard was taking a walk to find a creature she could catch and try a new potion on and the elf was walking around trying to find a place safe to stay. When they saw each other they were both shocked. When ___ heard rustling sounds, she had been expected to see a common animal like a deer with gold antlers — not a wood elf. Sunoo had been wandering around in these woods for days only having the dissatisfaction of meeting touchy rose bushes, judgemental trees, gossiping squirrels and Adele wanna-be birds — so, to see another two-legged being in front of him sacred him. What if he would end up like all his elf friends? A blue potion for an astrology scientist to pour in a kettle to make a love potion or worse, to make a perfume?

The squirrels were giggling amongst each other, probably at the terrified elf.

Cautiously, Sunoo took a few steps backwards until his back met something hard. The wizard’ face darkened. She snapped her fingers and the tree held the elf in a tight grip. He was so terrified, he was not aware of the tree’s strong arms. His expression was one of great hopelessness; tears pooling in his eyes like the floods his elf friends were drowned in.

Her expression was one of great hope. A smile was plastered on her face, which was even rarer than the wood elf species itself.

But the smile made him cry. He didn’t want to die. He begged her to not hurt him, told her he'd do anything to stay alive. His people were almost completely wiped out and he had promised himself to not let it happen.

She asked him if he wanted to make a pact.

He said yes, a bit unsure.

She told him he could stay with her and keep his life but from that moment on he would became her servant.

He said yes, nodding excitedly.

She gave him a home, shelter, no risk of meeting a creature that would kill him for his blood. He owed her. She owned him. And so he his life was dedicated to serve her. That is not an ordinary story. Actually, it is my story. And that is of how we ended up here, in my tower.

Like usual I said "Alohomora" to open the door.

(Yes, wizards do have spells like that, because we're lazy like many other creatures.)

But the sight I was met by wasn't normal. There was Sunoo, on the cold floor, with blood in his eyes. Dumb elf was clumsy enough to knock over a few glass tubes with poison and curses that were on the shelf. It was clearly labeled DANGER with capital letters for his own safety. Dumb, dumb elf. I promised that I would keep him away from all evil even when the evil was because of me. I hated seeing him in such pain.

"Episkey!" Poof! The blood was gone. If it weren't for my magical abilities, or my being there, he would be to death. But if it weren't for my magical abilities, he wouldn't have been bleeding in the first place.

Sunoo looked around the place confusingly. The panic he had rushing in his veins was slowly turning to tranquility and warmth. He had almost forgotten what it felt like to be able to see and not feel pain. His gaze met mine and he kept it there. These days he’d gotten so comfortable around me that he wasn’t embarrassed to stare at me openly.

I walked him to his room. He knew that when I point at him I want something done, so he followed me. I pointed at his bed and he laid down.

"Rest. Don't move," I whispered and tucked him in without thinking too much about it.

But when I did I realized that I was being less cold than usual. I never came in contact with his skin, I only pointed at him when I wanted something done. And the only time I spoke was for spells, commands, small talk or greetings. His eyes were staring into mine, he was observing my face as if there were something on it.

"What?" I asked sternly, back to my old persona.

"You care for me..." he said slowly, almost as if he were trying to convince himself or as if he didn't believe it himself.

"Go to rest."

"But-"

"Silencio." He shut up.

Although he was healed, he needed time to rest since he’d been overworking himself lately with all the chores and building a mini garden of flowers in the balcony.

Sunoo slept until noon — which was the longest he's ever slept since he became mine — and claimed he was feeling well and capable of helping me.

The incident the day prior had shown the vulnerable part of myself, and I didn't want to seem more sensitive or weak, so I told him he could get back to helping me but he needed to stop being so damn klutzy. "Asylciaana." The elf brought said potion to my side instantly. I was working on creating a new spell and needed a hand to help me.

But then I heard the sound of glass shattering and a whine following it. It was as if he did it on purpose. Choking him was my go-to punishment when he didn't obey me — which wasn’t very often — so I recognized the sounds of his whimpers and attempts to breathe all too well. In my peripheral view I could see that he was holding one hand on his neck, most likely trying to loosen the grip the potion was holding, and the other hand on the floor trying to crawl towards me.

He was testing my emotions and he deserved to be punished so I let him suffocate for a few more seconds till his face become purple before I whispered "Episkey." His body dropped to the floor at the sudden release of pain. His chest went up and down as he tried to catch his breath. I smirked while keeping my eyes on the potion. Dumb, dumb elf. This would hopefully teach him a lesson. "Asylciaana," I said out loud, indicating that he should bring said potion to my side instantly as if nothing had happened. I couldn't see it but he had a smile on his face.

That night I woke up to the sound of a scream. It wasn't a scream I had heard before. The sound of one dying. I followed the scream to Sunoo's room. There on the bed he was sitting with his feet dangling in the air, unharmed and smiling. "So you do care about me?" his smile widened. My face was one of hatred. "Whore," I answered coldly and watched his face falter slightly. "Bend over. Do it or else I'll make you and you know I can." He got on the hard floor and leaned on the soft bed as if he in fact wasn't a disobedient whore.

"Tell me, why have you been acting like this recently?" He didn't answer me as if he was under a silent spell, but I knew he wasn't and that made me angrier than I already was. My hand went to his hair and pulled his head back. His neck was at an awkward angle and I was happy about it. He looked likes bitch. To add more to it, my remaining hand went for his neck in a grip that made him gasp.

"Answer me, whore," I spat at him. He didn't flinch. Instead he looked me in the eyes. "I wanted your attention."

"First you're a whore, then you're a whore without manners," I chuckled and tightened my grip.

"I'm sorry, Master."

He always addressed me as Master when I punished him and I always addressed him as whatever title he deserved.

"Don't lie to me."

His choked expression and eye contact proved that he really wanted my attention. But in the form of a reward. I could feel him gulp against my hand and kept my strong gaze at him for a moment before releasing his throat and pushing his face to the bed with the grip on his hair.

"Stay still, whore." He listened to me and heard my steps somewhere away from him. I was in front of his wardrobe and reached for something at the top of it. A slapper. It was placed there the day he first disobeyed me. Till this day it hadn't been put to use as he never had disobeyed me to the point where he deserved to be spanked with it. It was of leather and looked scary, but I knew it wasn't as scary as a whip — but he wasn't ready to be introduced to that yet.

I went back to him and stopped behind him. The sound of the slapper hitting the bed right next to his head excited him. "Count after every hit and don't you dare make a sound other than that," I whispered beside his head.

"Yes, Master," he said and I could hear in his voice that he was looking forward for what was about to happen.

He was still in his clothes, which was good since I didn't want him to feel the pain that was added when it was against naked skin. I sat down beside him on the mattress and that took his attention as he turned his head to me.

"Did I tell you you could look at me, whore?"

"No, Master," he said with no guilt in his voice as he took in the view of me with a slapper in my hand.

"Five spanks less."

His expression turned to one of confusion, "Isn't it supposed to be the opposite?"

"I know you like pain, you masochistic whore. That's why less pain is punishment."

He whimpered and turned his head back to the bed.

"Good whore," I praised with a light voice, contrary to the hard spank I left on his clad ass.

"One," he said steadily.

He's not going to be that composed for long.

I raised my hand and let the slapper hit him again.

"Two," he said, still not fazed.

I spanked him again and made him hold back a needy whine, while I was comfortably sitting on the bed.

"Three, Master," he said with a tone that told me he couldn't act so tough in front of me anymore.

I told him not to say anything other than numbers, but I let it slide since it was my title and I was too tired to react. With a yawn I slapped his butt again.

"F-Four," he said fast and tried to cover the impact it had on him.

Spank!

"Five," he said loudly and bit his lower lip to try not making it sound like a moan.

His fists gripped the sheets till they became light.

"Good whore, taking it so well," I praised, impressed he hadn't given up.

I went back to my rough self and spanked him harder, hoping he could take it.

"Six," he half-screamed in a slutty tone. Fit him perfectly. The sound of the slapper making contact with his ass was so loud it hurt my ears. Apparently his ass was quite sensitive too since he choked on air. His clothes were in the way of me seeing his ass, but I was sure it was red.

"Seven," he let out barely like when he was suffocating just the day before.

My smirk became visible as I saw how his body arched and how the side of his face crumbled into pieces of desire.

Spank!

"Ei-Eight," he whimpered and arched his back erotically out of both need for more pain and to keep his mind from moaning.

I noticed his action and thought he deserved more harshness. And so I went at it way more than before.

The increase of pain and pleasure noticeable as he immediately put his hand on his mouth the second after he said 'nine' since he was scared of making a sound.

My tired self couldn't help but laugh at his pathetic state.

"This is the last one, whore, be as loud as you want," I whispered from above him and spanked him the hardest I could to make him remember the pain for the rest of the day.

The moan he let out was high pitched and showed how much he had actually enjoyed it. Seeing his body reacting to his punishment was enjoyable, but hearing him was beyond pleasant.

"Ten. F-Fuck, Master," he moaned.

He closed his eyes and tried to breathe properly. I didn't even touch him with my skin and he looked completely fucked out. What a masochist. "Turn around," I ordered him. He did as told. His flushed face filled with sexual frustration and embarrassment and an apparent tent in his pants was what I was met by to my satisfaction.

"Water your flowers then clean every room and corner and everything you can think of, whore. I’m going back to the sleep you ruined — don’t make a sound until I’m awake," I yawned and walked away, leaving him alone on his bed.

"Yes, Master. Sleep well," he gulped and looked at me as I left the slapper back at its place on top of his wardrobe, now aware of where the wonderful tool was all along.

"I will if you don't touch your cock. So if you do and rob me of my sleep again you're fucked, understood?"

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"With a haunting dance, now you're both in a trance

It's time to cast your spell on the night

Abracadabra

Amor ooh nana

Abra-ca-da-bra

Morta ooh gaga

In her tongue she said

Death or love tonight"

—lady gaga

[theaskscenter]

The wizard Lizzy got cheated on

and the crowd....... saw this coming.

I tell you girls to not listen to pretty skinny white looking girls that scream at the camera about issues and got called bitter but. like. uhm. well. I tell you girls these girls have NO idea what they are talking about and well. I tell you girls anyone that tells you do X and Y and gives you action based content is lying to you and well. Anyway I KNOW for a fact she will leave that clown because she is, IN FACT that girl (my thing isn't that she isn't who she says she is- SHE IS- its that her content is surface level. It won't work for YOU but it'll work for her. You know how rugby players play rugby because they're big and strong they are NOT big and strong /because/ they play rugby? Thats it with Thewizardliz Pespehronewhateverhernameis TamKaur type girls thats it with them. They're not wrong, just not right for you. She is in fact THAT girl but you won't be the same way LeBrone James is in fact that guy in a way your 5'6 homeboy isnt. They are ?Meant? to be that so any advice they give you is immediately surface level. Anyway I know she'll leave him I'm just not sure why she let that fugly looking ass clown babytrap her who gets a baby THAT EARLY into a marriage

Anyway reminder men, including your father and brother and bf and every single male out there, hates you. And you can not buy their love or perform your way into getting it because it's genetic. Every single 'feminist' and 'good' guy will ALWAYS be exposed for being a misogynist because ALL mn hate womrn. Including gay men. EXTREMELY almost always ugly men. Self Made men that didn't get women when they were broke will always hate the women that have now because they know its not them its the money. I tell you rich men are just men with money but 30times more freedom than your average high school boy. So whatever your local high school bully is doing times thirty. I tell you a man will NEVER be your equal, either you are his boss or his bitch no in between. I tell y'all whatever happens a man will want to bring you down not even because he's evil but because it's nature. I tell you ALL the time that these men want to embarass you and the second you start gassing them up they will. I know for a fact James never cheats on Shera because she isn't his bitch she's his boss he knows for a fact she's not his fully she'll embarass him on main and have him pay her car bills you KNOW he's doing whatever she wants.

I don't talk about men because you have eyes and you're supposed to use them in conjunction with your brain. The second she started gassing that twink up she became its bitch. You keep these men humble they won't be out here in your space. She looks like a goddess and gave that thing a chance, gassed up the bare minimum it did for her and made her new content all about him what did she think would happen its a twink with attention and bagged a baddie is this y'alls first time outside do y'all not have eyes?

Anyway I know she's a queen she'll leave his stupid ass but I tell you to not listen to these women because they have never had to put in the work for anything and even when they do it's not half the amount of work your local overweight darksin broke girl has to. The same way LeBron does have to work hard to be a baller but never a quarter as hard as some asian kid that's like 5'6 has to. So i'll take balling advice from teh asian kid than lebron because with that height only you were 40000m into the race shut it. Yes you work hard but shut it.

stop giving these twinks chances god. Stop listening to these women also. Just because someone is screaming at their screen doesnt mena they have anything of value to say. Matter off fact im saying this as s psychologist with a bachelors in the field god's sake divorce these women ugh.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

I just finished going through Tales of Beedle the Bard and I have a few notes

First: There's a weird timeline discrepancy with the Tale of the Three Brothers as a whole and it bothers me

In Dumbledore's notes, he traces the first historical reference of the Elder Wand to Emeric the Evil:

The first well-documented mention of a wand made of elder that had particularly strong and dangerous powers was owned by Emeric, commonly called “the Evil”, a short-lived but exceptionally aggressive wizard who terrorised the South of England in the early Middle Ages

(Tales of Beedle the Bard, Dumbledore's notes on the Tale of the Three Brothers)

Now the period referred to as the "early Middle Ages" is between the 5th and 10th centuries. Way before Beedle wrote down the story (15th century).

We also know (thanks to irl history) that the name Peverell is one that arrived with the Normans to England, meaning the story of the three brothers could only have taken place after the Norman conquest in 1066, which usually isn't referred to as "early Middle Ages" and it's kind of odd to do so. So, someone has to be wrong here because Emeric couldn't have had the Elder Wand before it was made.

It's possible Dumbledore is referring to the 11th century as "early Middle Ages", which would make the timeline make more sense if we assume Emeric is the wizard mentioned to slit the oldest brother's throat to steal his wand in the story (possible, but doesn't sound like Dumbledore, so I consider this unlikely). It's also possible Emeric didn't have the Elder Wand at all, but a different powerful wand (also unlikely). Or that the Peverell brothers weren't the brothers in the story (even less likely). Or that the Peverell brothers arrived in South England before the conquest (possible, maybe, not super likely either).

I don't really have an answer for this discrepancy so I'd be happy if someone has an idea how this could make sense... (looking for a Watsonian explanation, not a Doylist one)

Second: Why are we all saying the Gaunts are descendants of Cadmus Peverell?

I mean, Marvolo says this:

but then realized that he was showing Ogden the ugly, black-stoned ring he was wearing on his middle finger, waving it before Ogden’s eyes. “See this? See this? Know what it is? Know where it came from? Centuries it’s been in our family, that’s how far back we go, and pure-blood all the way! Know how much I’ve been offered for this, with the Peverell coat of arms engraved on the stone?”

(HBP, Ch10)

From this we know two things:

The Deathly Hallows symbol was known as the Peverell Coat of Arms at one point in time, at least among UK purebloods. Which, makes sense with the same symbol being carved on Ignotus' grave.

The ring was in the Gaunt family for centuries, but that's hardly a clear timeline, neither does it indicate dependency, even though, it's what Marvolo is implying.

Now, why do I doubt the Gaunts are actually related to the Peverells? Well, I'm not. They might be distantly related since all purebloods are, but I think they might not be the descendants of the second brother. Why is that?

Simple, it's implied he died without children.

The tale of the three brothers literally says he asked for the stone to summon the girl he wished to marry who died before they married:

To his amazement and his delight, the figure of the girl he had once hoped to marry before her untimely death appeared at once before him.

(Tales of Beedle the Bard, the Tale of the Three Brothers)

Unless he fathered some child outside of marriage before (which I don't think is the case), then Cadmus died before he had any kids.

Now, the tale as we see it has some inaccuracies (such as Death being a character) for the sake of embellishment or due to time. After all, Beedle wrote the tale down in the 15th century and the story of the Peverells happened in the 1070s-ish or earlier. By the time Beedle wrote down the story it's been long enough that the story could've gotten corrupted. Also, Beedle seems to take some creative liberties in his stories even if there is likely some truth to all of them (like in Babbity Rabbity). But I feel like the creative liberties had more to do with Death giving them the items and less to do with the fate of each brother, considering he was correct about the cloak and how it passed from father to son and the violent transfer of the Elder Wand. Like, why would he be wrong just about the second brother?

I mean, all we know is that the Gaunts had the stone for a few centuries and were clearly unaware of its actual power and purpose and we have the implication from the tale that Cadmus had no children. So, why are we assuming Marvolo is correct about being a descendant of the Peverells from a millennia ago?

It's possible a Gaunt received the ring from Cadmus, or that they are descendants of an unnamed Peverell sister, but I don't think they really do descend from Cadmus himself. Like, the tale mentions him killing himself to be with the girl he wanted to marry, idk, to me, this implies he didn't have kids, so I feel this assumption (which was confirmed by JKR) is kinda weird.

Anyone else was bothered by this or is it just me overthinking things?