#nothing will ever compare to what my ancestors have been through | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

connan-l · 10 months ago

Text

bittersweet

Fandom: Ciconia: When They Cry Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationship: Mariana/Noor Summary: While Cairo Squad is on a trip to Lubango, Mariana invites Noor to eat cakes with her. [Femslash February 2024 Day 3: Cake] Words: 3,118 Link: AO3 | Fanfiction.net

Notes: Late annual Ciconia FemFeb fic delivery. It’s meant to be for Day 3: Cake, from those prompts.

I feel like the Cairo Squad girls could be a fun OT3 in and of itself, but admittedly Gannet is like Naima to me in which she feels too… young and childish compared to the others to really ship her with them? I know we don��t have canon ages for the Ciconia kids, but in my head Gannet and Naima are more 12-13 years old, whereas the others are 15-17 years old. (Though I admit I’m a bit of a hypocrite here as I do enjoy Naima/Rukhi as a pairing, if only for the pink/black aesthetic.) So that’s why I actually settled for Noor/Mariana as a ship, even though admittedly Mariana really don’t seem to appreciate Noor whatsoever so that was a bit tricky to do. As a result the fic feel more like an unrequited crush-fic than an actual pairing-fic, but I hope that’s still satisfying.

In Mariana’s profile, it is mentioned that she went to the “Lubango Toddler Brainpower Research Center” as a child, so that’s why I decided that Lubango was her hometown — though obviously I don’t know if it’s actually the case in canon. Noor’s profile also mentions her “ancestors,” so although it could mean anything I interpreted it has her having an actual biological family instead of being born through a factory.

Also I never went to Lubango or even Angola before and I know very little about the culture/country, so I hope I was able to be mostly-accurate from the tidbits about it I put in there. If I wasn’t you’re free to yell at me about it!

On the other hand, I still haven’t replayed Ciconia since. Well, 2019 now. And truthfully we don’t know much about Cairo Squad girls, so, not sure how… accurate to their game-self they feel. But it was still fun to try writing them.

No spoilers here except for the start of Phase 1, or content warnings except for the inevitable vague mentions of war/child soldiers.

* * *

The trip to Angola hadn’t been planned.

They were still in Cairo this morning when suddenly their superior let them know that because of some political complications their squad was needed in Lubango. Nothing serious, he’d assured them — and truthfully they were only needed to make act of presence more than anything — but they couldn’t just ignore it, either. So here they were, a few hours later, in Lubango. They’d taken part to the needed boring reunion, during which they hadn’t even been allowed to say a single thing. They should be used to it by now; as soldiers, the only thing expected of them was to listen to orders, but it was still frustrating to be treated that way sometimes. And once that had been over, their superior gave them permission to have a break and to do whatever they wanted. They’ll go back to Egypt tonight, but for now they had the whole afternoon entirely free.

Noor didn’t know Lubango. Since she’d become a Gauntlet Knight, she’d visited a lot of cities throughout the whole continent and even outside of the continent. She might not be as familiar with ACR’s countries as Princess Rethabile, but she still went multiples times to Lagos, Abidjan, Alger, Lubumbashi, Douala or Gqeberha. However, it was the first time she’d ever set foot in Angola; she’d never even been to Luanda before. The only thing she knew about it besides some surface-level history was the fact it was where the famous Lubango Toddler Brainpower Research Center was, and that it was Mariana’s hometown.

Which, despite how interesting the city might be otherwise, was actually what interested Noor the most. She tried to appears as her usual, composed self, but inside she actually felt herself fidgeting as soon as they landed to Lubango Mukanka Airport. As they strolled through the streets, she couldn’t help but look around left and right, trying to imagine a little Mariana running around here and how cute she must have been all while her ears kept catching bits of Portuguese and occasionally Umbundu conversations. Noor had decided to not use her Kizuna translator here, as she thought it would be good practice for her — she’d decided last year to start learning Portuguese and Umbundu not only because it could be useful even in their era, but also because she hoped Mariana would be more open to her if she were to communicate in her native languages; but so far, as usual with Mariana, her efforts had been in vain.

Even though they’ve been teammates for a while, Noor didn’t know much about Mariana. She’d heard about her being born in Lubango; about how she was the only one of the children who received mental training at the Lubango Toddler Brainpower Research Center to achieve the highest P3 levels of her country, and that the ACR Royal Brainpower Research Center has set up a research team just to raise her Aerial Augmented Infantry aptitude. But all of these were information anyone could know about her. When it came to more personal things, like how she grew up, whether she had a family or was born through a factory, if she had any friends or siblings… There was nothing. And whenever she tried to make conversation to know more, Mariana always shot her down right away. Gannet had no idea how lucky she was, to be able to gain her affection like that with no effort whatsoever — and yet she always rejected it. That was how their squad’s relationship had been since the beginning, but it was not any less so frustrating.

“Wow…! That looks so cute! Hey, hey, big sis Noor, have you seen this? Do you think it’d look cute on me?”

The smallest girl of their trio excitedly tugged at Noor’s skirt with a wide smile spread on her face and her blue eyes sparkling, but Noor only groaned. At the start of their break, Mariana had been kind enough to accept to take them on a tour to show them around — although it had only been at Gannet’s insistence that she’d accepted — and yet that damn puppy had not stopped being overexcited for one second, stopping and pointing at every little thing; and, of course, specifically soliciting Noor’s attention. It was always like that, so Noor should be used to it by now. She wasn’t.

“I told you to not pull on my clothes. And no, I don’t think it would.”

“How shameful to say something like that. You truly have no heart,” Mariana suddenly argued back with her usual blank face, although Noor could tell she was annoyed at her comment. “Don’t worry, Gannet. Of course this looks cute on you. You look adorable in everything. Come here.”

Mariana tried to pet Gannet, but the girl avoided her with a pout. “Stop petting me! You know I hate that. I only want to be petted by big sis Noor!”

And then she yet again tugged on her skirt, and Noor sighed, making it clear that no, she would not pet her, stop asking. She would never ever understand what Mariana found so endearing about that idiotic child. She was so immature and noisy and irresponsible; just the sight of her managed to give Noor headache.

And yet, Mariana spent all of her time fawning over her. Noor knew that it was silly of her, to be jealous of Gannet like that — but she couldn’t help it. No matter what she could try or not try, Mariana always favored Gannet over everything, and she always refused any attempt from Noor’s part to get closer to her.

That was, until today. Allah may have finally answered her prayers then, because right after that Gannet actually got lost.

Or, well, it would be more accurate to say she vanished on them. It wasn’t something unusual exactly, as Gannet was never able to stay in a same place for too long and always ended up wandering about — but that didn’t mean it was any less annoying when it happened. Still, in general Gannet would use her Kizuna to contact them right away, asking for help — but this time, there was nothing but silence from her. Mariana got worried of course, and admittedly, so did Noor; she might not be fond of Gannet even at the best of time, but she was still her teammate and she certainly never wished any real harm upon her. Thankfully, they finally managed to reach out to Gannet half an hour later, after they’d run around Lubango’s streets while screaming her name.

“Sorry,” the girl said, having at least the modesty to sound a little ashamed. “I needed to go to the bathroom and then I got lost. So I asked to find my way and realized we were close to the military base, so I went back there.”

“Why did you not contact us then? Couldn’t you hear us calling you?”

“I just forgot! Sorry!”

Noor tried not to get too mad at her in Mariana’s presence, but it was hard when Gannet had made them run around the city for no reason — and she suddenly felt angry she’d ever let herself get even slightly worried for her sake. Mariana was only relieved to know Gannet was fine, and they promised her they’ll find her back to the base once their tour was over.

And then, just like that, it was just the two of them; just Noor and Mariana. An embarrassing silence spread between them, and suddenly Noor — the top scorer of the ACR Egypt Aerial Knight Corps, one of the most talented teenagers in the world who received perfect training — simply didn’t know what to do with herself anymore. She kept steeling glances at the pretty girl next to her, wondering what she should say or do; and weirdly enough, she now actually thought that she missed Gannet. At least when she was here, there never was such awkwardness between them.

Mariana, as always, appeared completely unperturbed. She let out a small sigh, looked to her right and left — and then said the last thing Noor would ever expect to hear from her:

“Do you want to go eat cake with me?”

* * *

Of course Noor loved cakes.

She loved sweets in general — like most Gauntlet Knights. She didn’t think there was a single one of them who didn’t. Noor’s father was a big sweets lover himself, and when she was little he would bake her the best basbousa and qatayef that she’d ever eaten.

So, Noor loved cakes, absolutely. She’d just never thought she ever would have the opportunity to eat some alone with Mariana in a shop in Angola. It wasn’t even the first time she’d eaten cakes with Mariana, exactly, as their squad ate together most of the time; but it was the first time she’d ever ate with her alone — especially when it was something Mariana herself had initiated — so the situation was so strange and unusual to Noor that she honestly didn’t know how to handle it.

“Have you chosen yet?”

Mariana asked her in her perfectly controlled, monotonous voice, but Noor knew her well enough that she could detect the slight movement of her eyebrow, signaling her annoyance at her indecision. That hint of a scowl was a shame, as she otherwise looked quite cute sitting here in the middle of the shop. The place Mariana brought her to was a cozy, colorful little place decorated with curtains and garlands and traditional trinkets Noor couldn’t identify, with joyful Ovimbundu music resonating around them. It was small, with very few people, but it felt nice and familiar. Mariana told her she found this shop by coincidence once when she was a child, and she’d loved it ever since — it had become a bit like a secret base of hers. And Noor would’ve felt honored that Mariana opened up enough to her to show her such a place from her childhood if it wasn’t for her adding afterwards that she wished she could’ve shown it to Gannet as well.

“I-I’m still… trying to decide. I just don’t know any of these cakes, so…”

Mariana sighed, then looked the menu. “… Bolo de ginguba is very popular around here.”

“I can’t. I’m allergic to peanuts.”

“…Well, their bolo de fubá is quite good.”

“I… don’t like corn…”

“…I guess you can try their cocada amarela then.”

“…That’s not a cake, though, is it?”

Mariana stared straight into Noor’s eyes, and then, bewilderingly, threw at her an actual, expressive exasperated look, before putting down the menu. “See,” she declared. “That’s why I can never stand you. You never make any effort to be likable whatsoever.”

Noor felt herself flushing. “I-It’s not that I’m not making any efforts, it’s just… I haven’t decided on anything yet, that’s all.”

Mariana, of course, didn’t seem convinced by her excuse at all; she just sighed, then looked away at the street by the window.

And Noor… Noor just didn’t know what to do. Mariana was never satisfied with her, no matter what she did. She could try anything, and Mariana’s image of her never seemed to budge in the slightest. Noor never let this kind of things get to her usually, but today, she just couldn’t ignore the weight in her stomach.

“Did you bring me here just to be cruel?”

Her voice was soft, a murmur, a drop of water falling in a sea of strangers’ conversations and background music — and Noor hated how fragile she sounded right now. That wasn’t like her at all. Noor was a confident person, proud of who she was, of her heritage and ancestors and accomplishments, and she never spoke so shamefully. But somehow Mariana did always have that ability to makes her feel that way.

The other girl looked at her, and for once, there actually seemed to be a slight… surprise, in her pretty amber eyes.

“I know you don’t like me,” Noor continued, unable to look at her teammate and instead staring down at the table. “I’m not an idiot. Of course I’m aware — you don’t like me as much as I don’t like Gannet. But you know— I’m still trying, most of the time. And I just thought…”

She trailed, and couldn’t even finish her sentence. Honestly, she didn’t even really know what she was saying. The air between them felt so thick now, and Noor might hate herself a little bit. It was such a rare opportunity, to have just the two of them without Gannet around and for Mariana to propose on her own that they do something together… and here she’d messed everything up, again, somehow.

Why couldn’t she do anything right when it came to Mariana?

“…I don’t dislike you.”

Noor felt her breath get caught up in her throat. She swallowed, and with an insurmountable effort, stared at Mariana. Her teammate was staring straight ahead, her shoulders steady, her chin up; almost as if she was trying to challenge her.

“—What?” Noor blurted out, because surely she must have not heard that correctly; in what world had Mariana ever showed anything other than contempt towards her? Had ever extended any kindness to her?

And that was fine; Noor was used to that. She could wait and continue to make efforts for as long as it was needed, until Mariana finally realized Noor was someone worth investing in. It might be frustrating and hurt a little sometimes, but Noor was strong, and patient, and Mariana honestly just meant that much to her. But that was the thing — for now she still hadn’t showed any signs of progress, so what was she—

“I don’t really like you either,” Mariana continued. “But… I don’t dislike you.”

“But you… I mean, you always shot me down. No matter what I do or say.”

“Yes, because you annoys me. If you tried to be less coldhearted, or to actually be nice to Gannet, then…”

Noor almost snorted at this, because of course everything came back to Gannet in the end — but the way Mariana slightly vacillated at the end of her sentence here caught her attention. Her heart skipped a beat, and she stared at Mariana expectantly.

“…Wait. Are you saying that… that if I was nicer to Gannet, then… then what?”

“…Nothing. Just, it would be better.”

“Do you mean that you’d give me a chance then?”

“I have not said that.”

She pretty much had, but Noor knew now wasn’t the time to push her on the issue. Mariana sighed, then looked down, as if she’d suddenly noticed a very interesting thing on the ground.

“I wouldn’t have invited you here if I disliked you,” she added, her voice a lot softer than usual. “You’re still my teammate. You just could be cuter sometimes, that’s all. …Sorry about being mean about the cakes earlier, though.”

Noor should probably feel a little embarrassed about it, but she couldn’t hide the wide smile spreading on her face even if she tried. And she knew Mariana noticed it, too, as she could almost sees her rolling her eyes.

“…So. Have you chosen yet?” She repeated, and Noor could tell she was trying to not be as curt as before.

“Hmm, well…” She looked up at Mariana, then smiled. “What about you?”

“Me?” Mariana briefly glanced at the menu, as if hesitating. “My favorite is the bolo de cenoura.”

“Cenoura… Carrots?!” Noor exclaimed after a moment of doubt, unsure of the word’s meaning at first; without Kizuna, the translation didn’t instantly came to her mind as she almost never used that word. “Carrots in a cake?”

“Yes. You’ve never eaten one?”

“No…”

Somehow, the idea seemed a little ludicrous to her. Carrots weren’t common in Arab cooking in general, but as a dessert?

But Mariana had said it was her favorite.

“…In that case, I’ll take one too.”

Mariana blinked at her. “What?”

“You said it was your favorite, right? Of course I need to know all of your favorite things too. Maybe I could try cooking one for you, too. I’m a pretty good cook, as my father taught me when I was young.”

Mariana stared at her for a moment in silence. Her face was just as blank as usual, but there seemed to be something, in her eyes. Something more , that Noor couldn’t entirely figure out. It disappeared just as quickly as it appeared — but Noor wondered, then, if it would be possible to get her to have that something in her eyes while looking at her once again. To get her to smile, just because of Noor.

The thought made her feel dizzy, and she couldn’t wipe out her smile even after they left the shop. After tasting it, Noor decided that she didn’t like bolo de cenoura in the end — but that didn’t really matter much. She still would do her best to cook it for Mariana once they’ll be back.

“In Cairo,” Noor said as they walked slowly in the street, a bit shyly. “There’s, um. A cake shop I like quite a bit. They make great basbousa there. Not as good as my father’s, but… still good.” She took a quick glance at Mariana next to her, who seemed fairly determined to stare at the road and not at Noor. “I’ll… take you there, when we have time.” And then because it sounded a bit too commanding, she added: “I-If you want to. Of course.”

Mariana stopped walking for a moment, a slight frown on her face, as if thoughtful. Then she finally glanced up at Noor, very slowly.

“Is that a date?”

“…Wh-What? No! Just, erm…”

“All right.”

And then she started walking straight ahead again.

Damn. Maybe I should’ve said it is a date, after all.

She caught up with her teammate, and then suddenly felt a hand slip into hers, pulling her in the right direction. Mariana claimed it was because the streets were starting to get quite crowded, so she didn’t want to lose Noor and have to run after her like they did for Gannet earlier — but her grip still tightened firmly on her hand, their fingers intertwining, and Noor made no comment on it, simply enjoying the moment for as long as it could last.

When they finally got back to the military base, Gannet got jealous about their hand-holding; but Mariana reassured her it was nothing and only petted her, much to the girl’s dismay. Even so, to Noor’s surprise, she didn’t say a word about what they had done during the afternoon.

A brief, quiet encounter in a cake shop that would stay only between the two of them.

4 notes · View notes

beardedhandstoadshark · 1 year ago

Text

Y‘know I‘m usually not into shipping at all but, hear me out, TP Link x Hena (fishing pond lady)

No wait come back hear me out

Ok, so. Farmer boy is sad about never being able to see companion again. Country expects him to date the princess and fulfill the fairytale story despite them barely knowing each other and both knowing the city will never be his home. Actual Home Town still expects him to get together with childhood friend like they probably would have if nothing happened, but it did. Both of them changed, but most importantly, by growing into his destiny he outgrew the village. He’s not part of one or the other, but something in between, a wolf trapped behind wooden gates and stone walls. So, Farmer Boy leaves both behind and wanders (hey look it’s the post credit scene)

Riding across the country, searching for something do to, a problems to fix, a new destiny to be fulfilled. Farmer Boy ends up visiting the fishing pond for respite on his travels from time to time, just like it was a save haven during his adventures. Through those meetings, and with more time on his hands than before, they slowly befriend each other over all sorts of different things.

Genuine interest in that rolling game Hena made thats sitting in a corner. Both getting excited whenever Link beats another rolling game level, her making new levels and him beating them turning into a challenge. Oh your brother’s running a small shop at the edge of Faron? No way, my fam lives in Ordon, I even met him. Yea his soup still tastes like shit. Hey you gotta bring me some of that Yeti soup with fish sometime. Yea fishing is pretty cool. Let‘s compare fish notes. Woah that’s some rare guys you’ve got here. What do you mean your predecessor and maybe ancestor also managed to catch that mythically rare fish no one‘s ever seen in decades, that’s wild. Would be funny if we managed to do that too right? Haha, yea, that’s a fun thought. Yea.

Hey what was the price for canoe-fishing with staff supervision again

So they start doing that, but it’s not the right season so they prepare by scouring every lead they can find and Link riding across the country to collect as much info as possible on that fish, meeting in-between to compare and plan and just hang out together and maybe go say the fam and friends hi until summer arrives and they go out together on that canoe every day in hopes that maybe today they’ll finally manage the impossible. And that means more bonding time, during which Soup Brother gets befriended by Ordon villagers through knowing Link and also soup, and they realize that their own family member they haven’t seen in a long time has been doing the best they’ve been in a while thanks to the others‘.

But back to Farm boy and Fish girl, they continue canoe-fishing and bonding, and as the time goes by it becomes clearer that with each passing day they meet less for the fish and more for each other, and sooner than later summer is almost over and they still haven’t caught it. So they sit in that canoe together, maybe it’s even a sunset for that extra cheese if you’re into it, or not, and they go, hey, we had a good time. Promise this won’t be the end? And it won’t be.

…And if you’re up for even more cliche cheese on all that cheesy stuff, maybe right when that conversation happens, the fishing line suddenly gets pulled. Fast. No way?? They look into each other’s eyes and don’t hesitate before grabbing that fishing rod together, pulling as hard as they can, and there it is- the super mythical fish no one’s seen in decades. No way. No way. They got it. They actually- the fish pulls real hard and takes both of them + the canoe with them, swimming back into the pond and leaving them in the water. Ah well, that’s too bad. But now that they know it’s real and here, Link just has to keep coming back here after all so they can try again next summer. So, not that bad after all.

And in the meantime, they can maybe eat some soup with Ordon cheese and rare fish. :)

#legend of Zelda #twilight princess #does this even qualify as a crack ship anymore #i have no idea #crack taken seriously rather #or perhaps even #rare pair #:0 #…it’s very much written with the intention of it not to be taken seriously though so idk #hence the most likely ooc-ness #also sorry River minigame Sister but you’re not important here :(#except for bringing the fish for the yeti soup since it can only be found with the Zōra #…the epilogue of this nonexistent fic is Fish fam eating soup with Ordon fam #IS HENA EVEN HER NAME I FORGOT #it’s some npc‘s name that’s for sure #zelda shitpost #yea…yea let’s go with that

5 notes · View notes

songsofbloodandwater · 1 year ago

Note

🌞 🎭 🥂 🎉 ⭐️ for the ask game!

Hello!

�� - Which deity(ies) are you closest to/do you worship the most often?

Right now, that would be The Blue Queen, Stella Maris, and The Wild King, the Akephalos. La Dolorosa deserves a special mention because even though She only makes Her appearances here and there, and I wouldn't say I work with Her as often these days, Her touch is always weighty and decisive. The Blue Queen has been my guide ever since I can remember and She's the one I turn to for most things, while the Wild King has been a constant presence over my work and craft these past few months, quickly but firmly taking root in my life.

🎭 - What is an emotionally impactful or a silly worship-related experience you've had?

I don't think my experiences with Spirits are something most people would consider 'worship' proper. Ancestral veneration is the closest thing I have to worship in my personal practice. I don't really 'worship' Ancestors or Deities. I commune, from a sense of filial relation, which I personally don't think is the same as worship. I guess whether the difference exists or not, and how we use these terms, is up to each person.

The way that I 'worship' or rather, venerate Deities and Ancestors is through invocation. Inviting Them to my house, to my table, and to my body. Each experience is emotionally impactful to me, because in each they share with me a piece of Them, and viceversa. Each God or Ancestor has their own ways, experiences, and teachings, but each is important. It's not exactly putting yourself in Their shoes, as I wouldn't dare pretend to know a drop of what they know, or to have lived a second compared to what Their times entail. It's more about finding ways to let them live through you, act through you, speak with you, feel with you. You can learn a lot by simply listening, with all your senses, and the bond you create with your Ancestors and Deities is unparalleled.

But I do have to admit, there's nothing quite like meeting a loved one on the Otherside for the first time.

🥂 - What is your favorite devotional act or offering to give?

Probably prayer. It's not exactly what I do most often (that would be quick simple things like pouring a cup of coffee for Them while I'm making my own) but it's the kind of offering that makes me feel closest in alignment to my Deities.

🎉 - Do you celebrate any festivals? If so, which ones?

I observe the Solstices and Equinoxes, as most do, but following my family's indigenous traditions aswell as incorporating what I've learnt in the Land I live in, from it's own keepers. I also observe some catholic feast days that are significant to my Spirits, and to my living relatives.

⭐ - What is something you wish people outside your practice knew more about?

ROCKS. Dirt, yes, but more specifically rocks. You often hear people mention the many uses of dirt (depending on where and how it's collected, what it contains, and more) but when we're talking about rocks, the conversation feels painfully oversimplified. Most people seem to turn to either the modern "correspondence lists" for crystals and the like (it's own can of worms), or it's anthropological - historical (barely any better, in my opinion) sibling "folkloric attested uses". The latter at least tends to give the reader some context to be able to understand Them better, but it's still incomplete. In fact, most of the time what I see flying around is deeply, painfully, uprooted and taken out of context, and thus stripped of all sense.

It's interesting to see so many witches who call themselves animists yet don't really take into account mineral spirits, as... their own thing. On their own right. Not just "haunted dirts" and "ensouled stones" or Spirits of the Dead inhabiting the Land, I'm talking the actual Spirits of the rocks themselves. Of mineral formations. Of Mountains. Of entire continents. It's something I rarely see acknowledged. I think it probably has something to do with how, to most people, rocks being alive is unthinkable. To me, it's just about what we consider "alive" to mean and which time (and space) frames we use. To me, they are very much alive, and rightful, powerful allies.

Thank you for asking!

#asks #ask game #ask games #my notes

3 notes · View notes

windmilltothestars · 2 years ago

Text

15 Questions Meme!

Not really tagged by @magnetocerebro but it’s been a while and I’m in the mood, so why not?

1. Are you named after anyone?

Sort of? I apparently had an ancestor named Malinda Minerva Spanigal! Is that not the coolest name ever?? My parents also found ‘Malina’ in a name book or something and decided they liked the sound and meaning of it and it could also honor the ancestor but just knock of the ‘d’!

2. What was the last time you cried?

It’s actually not too recently, oddly enough! I’ve been a little on edge for hormonal reasons the past few days, and the good ol’ dissatisfaction with my current place in the world, but I’ll cite the funniest example. I watched an episode of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys where the people tried to put Herc on trial for inspiring people to endanger themselves by trying to be ‘heroes’ and how ‘heroes’ had no place in a civilized society. But in the end he gave a passionate speech about what it means to be a hero and if that’s wrong in the modern world, he’ll gladly go to prison for it, and then all his friends stood up and did the “I am Spartacus” thing to stand by him, and I’m not gonna lie, I got a little choked up.

3. Do you have kids?

Nope! This is unusual among my high school classmates, but normal among my college friends. I do have two cats that I unload my motherly feelings on, though, along with some of my friends’ kids, to whom I am an honorary auntie.

4. Do you use sarcasm?

I’ve come around to being mostly irony-free and earnest! However, I feel being around my brother brings out my sarcastic side. And sometimes I will try to use sarcasm for good, ie. sarcastically complaining about my friends’ qualities that are clearly false and the opposite of their best qualities, to demonstrate how absurd their own self-criticism is to me.

5. What’s the first thing you notice about people?

I mean, obviously just seeing them I’ll notice what they look like, but I feel I am also very attuned to the kind of energy people project, and shy away from certain kinds of energy and gravitate toward others. I don’t mean anything weird and spiritual by this, I just mean the vibes and emotions I pick up from the way people talk, carry themselves, respond to others, etc.

6. What’s your eye color?

It’s a dull greyish shade of green or blue that looks greener or bluer or brighter depending on what I’m wearing.

7. Scary movies or happy endings?

I mean, for sure happy endings! There’s certain brands of ‘horror’ that aren’t too rough for me and have elements I do enjoy, but often that milder horror will have a happy ending, too!

8. Any special talents?

Well, if I’m honest, I have no false modesty about my singing voice. In fact, I have been known (to my shame) to get a little vain or show-offy about it. But so many people tell me it’s nice, and I take great joy in singing, and I like the sound of it, too, and I have a special pride when I am able to lead people in song because my voice is on-pitch and strong and confident.

9. Where were you born?

Billings, Montana!

10. What are you hobbies?

At the moment? I’m trying to get back into drawing and writing fanfics. But I have not achieved massive success so far! I’ve had more success reading through my third biography of Lafayette, and writing weird meta-essays comparing fandom stuff . . . When I’m with like-minded friends, we always sing folk-songs or hymns together, and that’s always a wonderful time! Occasionally I enjoy playing my guitar alone or cross-stitching as well . . . To simplify, my hobbies are everything and nothing!!

11. Do you have any pets?

Cats! My two girls I adopted in Korea, Kartoshka (Toshka for short) and Dulcinea (Dulcie for short) have now joined their venerable old uncle Phoenix, whom I got in high school and who stayed with my parents while I was in Korea.

12. What sports do you play/have played?

I used to play softball in middle school, and I took a summer course in Mixed Martial Arts once. When I was a little girl, I took ballet. But I’m not super-athletic by nature, so I haven’t played in quite a while.

13. How tall are you?

5′3′‘-5′4′‘ I think.

14. Favorite subject in school?

English, Choir, Art (specifically loved my sculpture class; my teacher was amazing!) and Acting in high school. Really loved my Philosophy class and Classical Mythology class when I got to college, but my FAVORITE class of my college career was Screenwriting!

15. Dream job?

Well, as you can see by my favorite subjects and favorite hobbies, my interests are very wide across the spectrum of the arts! Do I wanna be a musical theatre actress? A folk/filk singer? A stage or film director, or actress? A screenwriter? An author of fiction or an author of comparative literature criticism? A comic book writer/illustrator? A sculptor? An English teacher or college lecturer who just gets to monologue about my favorite books and themes as a living? A youtuber who does the same? All of the above and more?

But also, my career experience so far has been in International ESL Education, and I do love working with kids! I specifically loved working closer with individual kids in a tutoring capacity, while also experiencing new cultures! So I was looking into au pair/governess stuff . . .

Following in the footsteps of my esteemed forebear, I won’t tag anyone specifically, but welcome anyone who sees this (especially if we know each other!) to participate, if they feel so inclined! :)

#about me #this was nice and meditative

3 notes · View notes

percontaion-points · 9 months ago

Text

Heartless chapters 9 & 10

Today's review might be difficult for some; reader discretion is advised

Click to see the rest of the snark & image descriptions

Click here for the rest of the series!

Chapter 9

I spent my days in class, because even though the academy wasn’t big on educational pursuits for omegas, I was technically the Sawyer Luna-in-Waiting. Which meant I had to show up to deportment and the culinary arts, as if my only goal in life was to dance around Callum’s kitchen while whipping up his favorite dish.

I am once again begging this book to please look me in the eye and explain to me why Vail bothers to attend classes at all.

“Oh, you’ve already decided on my future career? Rad. Why do I have to go to maths class? Deportment? Yeah, no. I will not be doing that. *upends wine decanter all over the rug and makes un-breaking eye contact with you while doing it*”

…and spending my nights cuffed to his desk leg until there was a permanent cramp in my spine.

Unless that desk weighs 500 pounds… Lift up the leg and free yourself babe. There’s literally no reason for this bullshit.

“You don’t have to go,” Nadia whispered fiercely in my ear. “Jay will move mountains to protect you, Vail. Please. Just stay and give him a chance.”

HOW DO YOU MISS THE POINT THAT BADLY?!

“I told you, sweet wolf,” Jasper purred, “you don’t have to hide from me.”

Chapter 9 summary: We mercifully hit the fast-forward button, and basically skip ahead to right before Vail is supposed to leave to meet up with Darkness.

However, before she goes, she decides to ask Theo one last question about the other shifters. He names all of them, and the region in Europe where they’re all from. (Please don't tell the author about Asia and Africa. Please, for the love of sanity.) He says that you can tell the difference between a pure-blood other-shifter and a werewolf, but you have to know what to look for.

He then starts to ramble on about Vail’s so-called ancestor, the one who did the first blood-claw. The story the wolves tell is that they had such a strong mating bond that it made all wolves more powerful. However, Theo is certain that Estelle wasn’t a wolf, but some other kind of shifter. That they called together all of the other shifters and made EVERYBODY stronger. But he’s certain that this version will never be told, because it goes against the wolf supremacy story that they cling to.

Then, it’s time for Marnie’s alpha party. Vail has a bag ready in the basement, where she’ll leave from after she slips away from the party. However, this means she has to get ready in the basement. As she’s leaving, she overhears Pearl bemoaning to the school nurse that she has a clan alpha mark. The nurse is like “the fuck do you want me to do about it? Petition the clan alpha, you daft bitch.” Vail is smart and hides until after Pearl leaves, but I’m anticipating some encounter with her sooner or later. She’s kind of faded into the background, but I sense something is coming.

Vail goes up to the party, where she dances with Jasper a bit. He leaves to “make a call”, so Vail goes to say goodbye to her girlfriends. They all know what’s going on, and the omegas beg Vail not to go; that Jasper will protect her. How they continue to miss the point is beyond me, but whatever.

As she makes her way from the basement to the forest, she’s encountered by Jasper. Because of course she is. We can’t have nice things in this story.

Chapter 10

“It’s not a trip, Jasper,” she said quietly. “I’m going home. Well, I have to find Driftwood first, but I’m not planning on coming back.”

I’d been walking around with an empty chest ever since my wolf froze me out, but that was nothing compared to how I felt now. She was leaving me. And if that didn’t send my wolf back to me in a panic, I was fucked there, too. “Why?”

[Image description: A horrifying zombie horse with rotting flesh and glowing red eyes. It is running through a spooky forest with dead trees and mist on the ground, at night with a full moon in the background. It is captioned with “Horace the dead horse here to tell you that he is already dead and to please stop beating him”. End description]

Tall, with lean muscles and corded arms that came from physical work, Darkness Chance clearly wasn’t shifter strong, but I got the sense he could hold his own in a human fight. I’d just re-read his file and knew he was nineteen in a few months, but he looked older, maybe because of the hard light in his eyes. I was so used to the alpha sheen, it took me a moment to realize this was human hostility, and for the first time I was glad my wolf had split.

Jasper didn’t realise that Marnie was an alpha, and has yet to realise that Vail is a cat. So excuse me if I say that he’s shit at identifying what people are.

Vail chewed on her lip, her expression torn. “I think… maybe he’s staying at mine.”

Chapter 10 summary: As you might have guessed, after overhearing Vail on the phone with Darkness, Reed turned around and ratted her out to Jasper. However, he knew that confronting her with this knowledge would only make her change her plans, leaving him high and dry. So he lay in wait to confront her as she left campus on Friday night. But then he also said that he was going to go with her, since obviously no amount of imprisonment was going to convince her to love him. Ugh.

So they meet up with Darkness, who was forced to bring a friend with a truck, since his own truck is dead. Said friend is Chastity, and I get romance vibes from the two of them. Even from Jasper’s POV.

They drive for a while, but it’s kind of meandering and pointless narration. When they get up onto the mountain where Vail and Darkness lived, Chastity starts to white-knuckle the wheel of her truck, since it’s snowing and steep and dark; mood.

At their old house, Darkness wastes no time in telling Jasper and Chastity that he basically wanted to bone his foster-sister. The entire thing is icky. The two foster-siblings get into an argument because Trey hadn’t told Darkness about Vail coming home for a week about a month earlier. The entire thing is kind of odd, and I’m still waiting for the other shoe to drop about Trey and what he actually is.

Anyway, they kind of get settled into the house for a bit of a driving break before they leave in search of where Driftwood might have ended up. Darkness has a shotgun, and he seems intent on keeping it pointed at Jasper. Eventually, Vail is like “I think I might know where Driftwood is.”

#heartless (hma 3)#hunter moon academy #bookblr #book review

0 notes

shimmerbeasts · 1 year ago

Text

So that is what it feels like when claws tear at your flesh.

It had been a long while since Silco had last been in the centre of a brawl to the point someone used their claws or teeth upon him as opposed to a man-made weapon like a knife or a short sword. He had almost forgotten how vicious, a Zaunites' claws could be when being targetted by them. Many of the Vastaya immigrants of the past had been predators, equipped with razor-sharp claws and pointy fangs. Plenty of them packed either speed or brute strength in their swipes and strikes.

Silco's strength lay in his jaws, not his limps. His ancestors had been powerful marine Vastaya, who could spend an extended period in and under the water. A bitter part of him suspected that this legacy was what had made drowning him such a tricky ordeal for Vander. Wolfish strength or not, they had wrestled in water. And water as Silco had come to understand, was where someone like him thrived. Even if it had been Vander's own knife, which had saved him from an untimely demise, he had still been able to wound himself out of his brother's grasp faster than he had ever believed possible.

After this unfortunate murder attempt, Silco had become obsessed with understanding his own inner monster - which he back then had begun to perceive as a shark instead of a fox; it would take many more years for him to finally realise his beast was the leopard seal, a 600 pound heavy, torpedoing behemoth which dominated the Freljordian ice waters - and so, he had studied marine wildlife to an excess. By now, Silco knew more about the fish and predators, which swam and dove in the Pilt than even Piltover did.

His gaze focused on the wound. Even if it had been an instinctual and unattentive move, the result of it was impressive. An ugly triangular-esque cut with weirdly overlapping skin. Blood seeped out of it. Silco experimentally flexed his fingers, feeling his muscles tense on his palm. The gesture caused more blood to seep out. He listened to Jinx speak while he tried to somewhat get his morbid curiosity under control.

Pulling out a satin napkin with his initials and wrapping his injured hand in it, Silco addressed Jinx: "It is alright, Jinx. You have nothing to apologise for. This is an oversight on my part. I should have realised that something was going on. I just feel sorry that you felt like you couldn't tell me about this. Child, you know you can tell me everything. No matter how strange."

He fell silent, letting Jinx explain herself. A soft hum of surprise escaped his lips as she revealed that her hunger manifested in the form of his voice. Her gaze remained transfixed on his bandaged hand. Blood seeped through the satin. Hearing her reveal how she had killed more and more people in her mind by his encouragement caused Silco to chuckle softly and muse: "That sounds a lot like me."

Once Jinx had finished explaining her symptoms, his fingers flexed a touch in the same vein a leopard seal might move its flipper. Silco remarked: "It is different from the conditions of the other Hounds. But that is because your own conditioning process was so different compared to theirs. It is unexpected, but not unwelcome." He reached forward with his bloodied hand and tugged a strand of cobalt-blue hair behind her ear. "You did not do anything wrong, do you understand me, Jinx? This is something outside of your control. But we now know what's going on, which means we can work with it."

He rose from his seat and headed towards the door. As he did so, he plucked his cloak from the coat hanger and slipped into it. Buttoning himself up, Silco explained: "There is a Chem-Baron in a territory to the south. Not the biggest territory, but very famous for one thing: A very fanciful, high-class restaurant. It is a bit too Piltovan for my tastes. I was going to give The Baron of Taste a warning so he might mend his ways, but given that you are so hungry, I might just prefer to see the piggy run. You can handle fatty meats, can you, my little predator?"

Looking at Silco’s bloody palm, the regret was immediate as grasp his wrist, drastically softer this time. In her hound episode, she had let it take the reins, had been powerless as it hurt the only person who had truly cared for her. His hand was bleeding and it was all her fault. It was her wolverine-like claws that had dug deep into his palm.

‘Way to go, you hurt your precious papa. When do you think you’ll hurt him next, huh? Or will you kill him?’ No, she had to keep telling herself it wasn’t her who did this. It was the hound. Even then neither of them would ever go after him, conditioning or not. Then again, she didn’t think it would hurt him either.

What if she had been anywhere but the office? Where Silco was unaware and unable to control her? If some bystander walked up to her in concern and got torn into? She was lucky that hadn't been the case. Oh, how she could see how disappointed he would have been with her then.

She’d been so hyper-focused on the wound that she’d barely registered a single word he’d said. “Usually when this happens I’m never around anyone, I’m sorry papa, I’m so sorry.” It wasn’t anything that Singed couldn't heal, like Silco said. “I’ve been feeling like this for a while, I started noticing these… episodes before the last few hunts. It's never been this bad before, though.”

Despite no longer being in the state, Jinx remembered every detail of what she’d experienced and seen. It was hard not to get drawn back into it as she forced herself to pull back. Judging by his reaction, this wasn’t normal either. Did that mean this was some sort of side effect unique to her?

Jinx let go of Silco’s hand and sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk. “It’s like I feel this intense hunger when I go so long between hunts. Then it becomes a craving, eating at me at me until It's satsified” She started to explain, and she couldn’t get herself to look at him, ashamed that it had come to this as he messed with her nails. “At first it’s little whispers in my head, telling me what it wants me to do. It has your voice.”

Her attention returned to the bloodied hand. What else had she done? How had it looked from the outside while she lost to reality? God, had she hurt anyone else in the Last Drop? There were too many unknowns for her to be comfortable right now.

“When I did that to you, I was hunting and I lost control of myself, papa.” It wasn’t like she was ashamed of killing anyone, but kids had been involved… “You weren’t stopping me. I was covered in blood, oh I killed so many. You kept encouraging me to continue."

Hands were trembling, something she didn’t even bother to hide from him. The excitement was still buzzing through her system, similar to way it felt when shimmer hit. It was a high she couldn’t shake and it was intense. Jinx wasn't entirely sure she wanted to come down from it, either.

"Until I heard your voice tell me to stop, but I couldn't tell if it was you or just in my head." Jinx finally mustered the courage to look Silco in the eyes. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you, papa, but I thought it was a normal thing with the rest of the hounds until now."

She didn't like begging, but everything was out in the open now. There wouldn't be any more secrets between them now. Maybe now that he knew she could avoid this completely. He could understand why she had poked and prodded so much.

"The excitement, the craving, none of it is going away." She finally admitted out loud as she stood up. "It never does, not until I hunt. That’s why I ask you so often about hunting, to prevent this."

#jynxd #rp: hounding side effect #break you or forge you into something greater: silco interaction #nothing ever stays dead: jinx||in character #Default Verse[Silco]#things changed since you left: queue

12 notes · View notes

prince-les · 2 years ago

Note

Idk if you still doing the submas x sky stuff but uhhh— I'm quite curious, does the twin ever goes to Homespace? Y'know where we always be spawned everytime we enter the game? What's their opinion about the Homespace? The seven portals of the realms are there and all, Eden where the kiddos sacrifice themself daily are fricking there also. What are you/submas twin thoughts? :o

I know I haven't openly draw or talk about Submas and Sky here but honestly they're still resting in my brain. (Also mainly because I'm trying to subtly steer myself away from Pokémon around now because I get salty at myself and it's not really a good feeling)

Anyways! Brainrot below, let's answer some of these really wanted questions;

In my own personal Subway in the Sky au, Ingo fell into Homespace first while Emmet fell in Daylight Prairie. But both of them have been there! They visited the home space at a later date in their adventure through the small praying statue thing (?)

——

Ingo feels like Homespace, like it's name suggests, is the place with the most feeling of being a 'Home'. He knows that Sky Kids doesn't necessarily all live in the Homespace 24/7, but he finds that place to be more comforting and the calmest. A small, quiet, safe yet lively environment. Fitting of the name.

Emmet thinks while the place is quite small compared to literally everywhere else in the Kingdom, when he sees the kids calling it Home and seems content with it, he really doesn't have any personal opinion on the place. While yes he still look at them as children, some have developed quite a mature mentality. He doesn't need to scold them about their options in picking home.

——

Unfortunately about the portals, Ingo and Emmet can't see it open the very first time other than the portal to Isle! (Just like how a moth would) as they're forced to explore each of the realm individually, visit each elder, and gain access to the portal at home space.

When they later figure out how it works, they're fascinated about it! It's literally a fast travel system that the kids uses to explore the world! (They were questioning the mechanics of it but gave up considering that so far, everything that exists in the Kingdom doesn't seem to go according to the laws of science from their world).

——

Oh I've talked a lot about the Twins'opinions on Eden and I'll keep standing by this opinion; their mix of feelings are swirling around anger, pity, confusion.

They're angry because why would these kids be attracted to something so dangerous to the point that many would confess it's their true purpose and calling? Even if God exist in that world, what kind of God would let children experience such things, repetitively?

They pity the children because no matter how many times they try to explain about the danger of death and how unhealthy the mindscape that they'll be fine even if they just got hit by a red rock, the children would just tilt their head in confusion and told them that they're, in fact, okay and have been doing so for dozens of times now. (He noticed some children actually agree with what he said, but they really aren't that much different. Still thinking that death is nothing to be worried about and pain is nothing big for them)

And the confusion is mainly because.. Well.. Why? Why would these kids have this weird calling that wherever they go, whenever they ask for directions from the bottom of their heart, it'll always lead to a place with such danger and smell of death? What happened to the fallen Kingdom, ruins left by their ancestors and the lack of living being but the presence of ghosts?

Anyways thank u for coming to my pep talk. I hope this answers most of the questions you have uwu

#havent write this long for a while #prince does ask #anonymous #sky cotl #sky children of the light #subway in the sky au #submas

65 notes · View notes

haraways · 2 years ago

Text

Jonsa Halloween Event ~

~~For the prompt Magic - here is my entry~~

@jonsa-halloween

Magic -

There was a lady of Winterfell.

Who had a gift.

Most parents are thrilled if their child is gifted; they may draw, play music, memorize books or fight with swords.

But the girl's parents were scared. Scared of her and scared for her.

As it happens, the girl's gift is the gift of life. Life for the new dead, life for the long dead. Wounds would heal, and the body would be restored, but the mind is what stayed damaged. There is no natural way to have the dead rise again.

That emotion that you die with will come back will faster within your breast until it drives you to the madness once more.

A girl of ten and one discovers her gifs in the crypts of her family, Kings and Queens and Lords and Ladies long gone.

She sings her sweet song of nonsense, and it wafts through the miles of Starks long gone from the world. The young girl is trying to be brave as she wanders between statues; her siblings and cousin have deemed her craven, and she would prove them otherwise; she would be brave like those ladies in the songs.

She is to stay down in the dark until her candle is gone, a few hours at best. It wasn’t so bad; down in the dark, there was nothing here but an odd rat.

Further, the little girl wandered. Until the faces of the statues began to fade, and their iron swords had near rusted to nothing. She had gone so far as to pass the Lords and come upon Kings. The Kings of Winter, on each of their heads, sits a circlet of bronze. Some have runes; others have designs of winter. All too big for little girls though she desperately wants to place it upon her own head.

She wandered very far, down slopes and around corners singing softly and sweetly to her dead ancestors hoping the song finds them in the long after. It is down a narrow path that strangeness begins to occur.

The girl heard a stone skipping on stone and the flutter of fabric. A terror rises in her throat, halting her sweet song. And slowly echoing footsteps fill the cavern. She raises the candle higher to see who lurks with her in the dark, but she does not dare call out. The shadows dance across the walls, and it is with a bizarre thought she thinks that if it is danger coming her way that, they will see her light. She snuffs it out with her breath.

The footsteps stop.

Her heart beats too loudly in her ears as she makes her way behind the wolf of a king whose name has been scratched away. She was too scared to think about the oddness of that.

Her ragged breath began to calm after a few minutes of hiding. Perhaps it was her imagination, as it does tend to wander and get lost far away. It would not be the first time she had frightened herself of shadows.

“Why are you crouching behind a wolf?”

Sansa let out a scream that echoed through the crypts, bouncing and reverberating off the walls. She was a lady, but she could not help it when she hit whoever was behind her, whispering in her era. She scrambled away from the person, falling on her bottom in her haste to get away.

A light laugh followed her as her cousin, the Bastard Prince Jon, stepped out from behind the wolf statue. He was rubbing at his jaw where Sansa had managed to strike him.

Her horror grew at the realization of her actions. She was but a girl on ten and one, but she knew not to ever raise your hand to royalty, bastard or not.

She babbled out apologies, and she made to get up but stumbled. Prince Jon reached out to steady her as a true gentleman would. She stepped out of his reach and dipped into a plight bow.

“I’m sorry, my Prince. You frightened me.”

Prince Jon turned his head and frowned a little. Before smiling slightly at her after turning back.

“It is no trouble, cousin. It is my own fault for sneaking up on you, and I should not have done so. Now I know it's as unwise as pulling the wolf's tail.” His small smile bloomed into a full grin, and Sansa felt her ears grow hot. It was nice to have her compared to a wolf rather than the fish of her mother.

Sansa was glad that the Prince did not take offence to her assault, unladylike as it was. Perhaps he wouldn’t tell her mother and save her a thrashing.

“My Prince,” now that the fright was gone, she did wonder as to why he was down here. “Why are you down here?”

“You were gone so long, My lady, your brother grew worried, and I’m here to escort you out lest we miss dinner.” he extended his hand out to her. She reached out but stopped to turn her head to look deeper into the darkness. Her brow furrowed.

“Did you hear that?” she whispered.

It was the sound of shifting stone. The deep scratch sound of heavy stone moving over heavy stone. Echoing around the crypts, bouncing off the wall down the history of the Starks and their Kings. Louder and louder still, it grew, and with it, a great shacking.

Sansa yelped as she pulled to the Prince. He had taken up a rusted iron sword in his hand, a King's sword of no name. The lid of the coffins beside them began to move, adding to the sound that was further down the passage. It fell to the side and cracked.

Sansa left out a shrike as a body rose up slowly. The dead King's skin was dry and gray; some parts of him had no flesh at all but white bone exposed to the world. The deep frost that had permeated the ground of the North had kept the King from truly rotting away, even if he was a King of ages before the dragons.

Jon pushed her back more as he followed her. Never turning away from the dead rising again. Sansa knew he was trying to be brave, but she could see his hand shaking as he held the sword out and pointed at the dead.

But the dead batted the sword away and spoke.

“Watch your self boy. Don’ go paintin’ that sword at King's”

All breath left them, and they both let out screams.

#jonsa #jonsa halloween #pompt magic #ficlit #oneshot

29 notes · View notes

bambamramfan · 2 years ago

Text

Sim-Modernism

I've been thinking about the endless war between Modernism and Post-Modernism. Not even a debate, since so much of the discussion is about even defining the borders and who is on what side. To restate things:

Modernism is the James Scott sense of a belief that we can figure out the rules and principles - behind the universe, life sciences, sociology, morality and ethics - and our leaders can apply them to create an ordered and just society. The Enlightenment was big on Modernism, and really Marxism was its apex.

Post-Modernism is the post-WW1 understanding that none of these rules ever consistently work and the world is nigh-impossible to understand, and any rules we *think* we have about the world are really just stories we tell ourselves, to justify our position in society or to advance one political side over another. It's very meta, often in the Bulverist sense. This is what current Marxists actually sound like.

(Pre-Modernism just being the regular traditionalist "I do this because my ancestors' ancestors were doing this hundreds of years ago. And because God, speaking through His divinely chosen ruler, tells me to or else He will strike me dead.")

A key thing about both of these philosophical schools is that they can't really be disproven. If a modernist regime fails, obviously they just had bad laws instead of good laws, or the people didn't try hard enough to stick to these principles. And post-modernism never fails, it's failure is just a story *you* tell to justify your opposition to it.

(Really you should think of both of these as tools to analyze situations with, sometimes even using both tools on the same situation and asking yourself which is more useful in this moment. But anyway.)

I'm not going to resolve the war between these things today, but just talk about another *modernism I see that is neither of these.

***

Let's talk about World of Warcraft.

It's the extremely big MMO that has had millions of players for well over a decade now. In the beginning, we knew nothing about the undercarriage of how the game worked (what items dropped from what, how good they were, etc.) Over time we figured out some principles, and we got large forums called "Elitist Jerks" where people argued over the best classes, the best ability rotations, the best gear, etc etc. They referenced guides and came up with general theories and had vibrant conversations. This is clear modernism.

Then almost all the conversations died, and people talk very little on the forums last I checked, compared to years at its prime.

What happened? Politics and post-modernism?

No, what happened was Big Data.

Eventually someone built a downloadable tool called simcraft. It knew every spell, boss, item, and talent in the game. You could just input all your gear, the skills you used, the order you used them in rotation, the general style of fight and... hit a button and it would tell you how much damage per second (DPS) you would do with perfect execution.

This is in some ways a cludge. Few of us have perfect execution, after all. And this doesn't cover utility, tanking, and healing and so those needed other sims with more assumptions. And there were a number of errors anyone could find with its assumptions. But it at least gave a concrete answer to argue over.

Now anytime anyone had a question of "is this talent underrated, because combined with this weapon, on this fight you could..." and the only answer would be "sim it." If sims reliably showed your new idea was better, the top raiders would drift to that, and then the way they did things would trickle down to everyone else. No one really had to argue about which class was the best - there were numbers for it.

The "skill" of the world of warcraft community got better, and the discourse of it dimmed. Just sim it.

Now this would just be an anecdote about games, except for the fact that Big Data is entering more and more of our life.

If you have any problem that can be addressed by throwing it at GIANT FUCKTON OF DATA, now people do that. We often don't know *why* the correlation between two things is the way it is, but we know it's correlated now.

Our incipient AI's aren't Asimovian entities built on three principles taken to their logical conclusions. They're neural nets trained on a ton of data and reinforced with adjustments to hell and back. They give very good answers (and beat us at boardgames.) We generally don't have any modernist explanation for what they are thinking or what rules they are following.

While manipulating training sets is as old as data science, with big data we are talking about sets too big for naive actors to change a few datum and get the answers they want (plus part of this mythos is that anyone can run the simulations themselves if they want to.) The simulations are still built very much on human error, but they are too large and incomprehensible to be easily hijacked by postmodernists into giving the simple answers they want (or rather, that they claim ideologues want.)

This is Sim-Modernism.

We don't just see it in videogame sims and GPT outputs. We see it when someone asks our favorite route from NYC to Philadelphia and we answer "...I just follow whatever Google tells me to." We see it in the most famous political prognosticator of our era not making a simple political model (like Sam Wang would), but rather the model with the most inputs they can imaginably throw in, run the simulation 10,000 times, and see what the results look like. Nate Silver has some idea why his models will favor one party or the other, but he still is in the dark often on what is going on "under the hood." And most of all we see it in algorithms on social media and video sites, that are trained to get the most "engagement" from audiences, and so start throwing up bizarre recommendations that no tech executive would have predicted or even wanted.

A lot of the answers Sim-Modernism gives are pretty good! And even more useful, they are plentiful. Sim-Modernism isn't limited to theorizing what a good novel is, it can generate a new one in seconds, or hundreds of new novels for you to read, once it gets good enough.

I'm not celebrating this as "WE HAVE THE ANSWER that cuts the Gordian knot of modernism." Sim-Modernism does get more accuracy than either regular Modernism or Post - but it's obviously scary in its own way. It means running or being a part of a system that you don't know how it works or where it is really leading you.

(Has anyone else had the experience of driving well out of your way because Google says this path is faster, only to find it eventually requires you to drive through an area you wouldn't have - either because construction means it's really blocked, or it's a suburb that feels like cheating to treat as a bypass?)

And, it will feel sad, in a humanistic way, to live a life that is more efficient but not to understand any of its underpinnings. Do this because "the sim said it is optimal" is not a lot more satisfying than "because your father did and your father's father did..."

And of course, we will have to deal with "whether a computer code that is just regurgitating predictions based on a very large sample of text" is a person or not when it answers questions.

25 notes · View notes

robininthelabyrinth · 3 years ago

Note

Prompt: WWX is one of JGS's bastard sons, raised by his mother and her husband - until they die when he's young. Then he gets taken into the Jin sect instead of the Jiang.

Right Hand Man - ao3

It was a bad day.

All the days were a little bad, but this one was especially bad.

“He’s Cangse Sanren’s child,” Jin Zixuan’s father said, tapping his fan against his palm so that he would look more like a scholar. Secretly, shamefully, Jin Zixuan thought that it didn’t really work – he just looked like one of those scoundrels that tried to pay for their meals with calligraphy instead of pennies. “Taking him in will show our strength.”

“You dare bring one of your bastard children here,” Jin Zixuan’s mother said, “and I will drown A-Xuan myself rather than let him suffer through the shame of it.”

Jin Zixuan shivered. No matter how many times he heard his mother say that in her cold and vicious voice, he never got used to it. She’d explained to him that it was the only thing that might work on his father – the fear of losing face like that, of shaming his ancestors, of cutting off his legitimate line – and she was his mother so of course Jin Zixuan believed her, but sometimes when she said it like that he thought she might really go ahead and do it.

“It’s the immortal mountain,” his father argued, ignoring the threat. “The perceived connection is only to our benefit…and anyway, he wouldn’t be legitimized or anything. Legally, his father is that Wei Changze – I could even bring the boy in as a servant if that pleased you more!”

“Nothing you say or do will ever please me,” she said, and that’s when she started throwing things and he started shouting and Jin Zixuan waited until they weren’t paying any attention to him before slipping out.

They’d make a decision one way or another.

It didn’t have anything to do with him.

Wei Wuxian was nominally brought in as a guest disciple, but everyone knew he was really a servant.

Jin Zixuan’s mother made sure everyone knew.

Despite this, Wei Wuxian smiled at everyone, seeming as carefree as a butterfly. It didn’t seem to bother him when he wasn’t allowed to wear sparks amidst snow, or even the usual gold of the guest disciples – Jin Zixuan’s mother said that it was better that he wear plain colors, like white or black, to represent his father and mother and show the world that he hadn’t forgotten his filial piety. It didn’t seem to bother him that he had to room with the other servants, or that he wasn’t invited to dinner at the same time as the rest of them, or that he got less training time –

Whatever it was, it didn’t bother him.

It bothered Jin Zixuan, though.

He started having the old nightmares again – the ones where his mother belatedly found out that he’d been swapped in the cradle for another bastard child of Jin Guangshan, and started treating him just the way she treated all the rest of them while praising some other boy up to the heavens – and his temperament, never considered especially good, got worse due to lack of sleep.

“Go talk to him,” Mianmian suggested. “Maybe if you see he’s reallynot bothered by it…”

“It doesn’t matter if he’s not bothered,” Jin Zixuan muttered. “It’s that I would be bothered if I were him.”

She didn’t understand, of course. Most people didn’t.

They couldn’t understand why Jin Zixuan was so bothered by the knowledge that his parents’ love was conditional on his bloodline and legitimacy – after all, he was the beneficiary of that bias, wasn’t he? What did it matter to him if they were cold to others?

Jin Zixuan didn’t know how to explain that the problem was in knowing that their love was conditional.

It didn’t help that Wei Wuxian was excelling despite all his disadvantages – all their teachers praised him in private, or else when they thought that no one surnamed Jin was listening. All of his mother’s dark speculations about what his father would do if ever there was a bastard child brought back that turned out to be even more talented than he was rang in Jin Zixuan’s ears, and he couldn’t help but look at Wei Wuxian, and wonder if this was it, this was the moment, if he was finally going to be replaced…but no, that would never happen. He was the one with the right blood.

It didn’t matter if he wasn’t actually the best.

Nothing he did in life mattered, really. Nothing had ever mattered since the day he’d been born from the right womb.

“He’s actually really nice,” Mianmian said, and Jin Zixuan looked up, wondering what she was talking about, only to blanch when he realized that she was talking to Wei Wuxian. “Just shy, that’s all –”

“Mianmian!” Jin Zixuan hissed, rushing over, horrified. “He can’t be here! If my mother finds out –”

“Is that what you’re afraid of?” Wei Wuxian asked, his face brightening. “I thought you just didn’t like me!”

“I don’t know you,” Jin Zixuan said. “How could I dislike you? But really, my mother –”

“We can be friends!” Wei Wuxian declared, and Jin Zixuan was rendered immediately mute. What exactly could he say to that?

He wanted to be friends, too.

His mother found out, because she always found out, and when she did, she threatened to feed Wei Wuxian to the dogs.

It turned out that Wei Wuxian was scared of dogs, something Jin Zixuan’s mother had figured out pretty quickly. That wasn’t a surprise – she knew best how to find people’s weaknesses, and also how to use them. Looking at Wei Wuxian’s sickly pale face, it was clear to Jin Zixuan that this wasn’t the first time dogs had appeared in one of his mother’s punishment, although this was clearly more severe than in the past.

“It was my idea,” he lied, acting on impulse. “Mother, I want him to be my personal servant.”

“Ridiculous,” she scoffed.

“Why is it ridiculous?” he asked. “Wouldn’t the contrast between us only be magnified that way?”

She pursed her lips, but that wasn’t a ‘no’.

Seeing a possible waver, Jin Zixuan decided to trade away one of the very few point on which he and his mother had long disagree.

“He’s charming,” he said. “He can help me woo the Jiang sect girl.”

His mother knew him well enough to know that he was trying to manipulate her, but he also knew that she liked it when he did that. Men were supposed to be upright, straightforward, and virtuous, and yet she liked to see him being subtle and sly – it reminded her of herself. It made her feel like he was more her blood than his father’s, even though in actuality those traits could very well be his father’s, too.

Unfortunately, sneakiness wasn’t really in Jin Zixuan’s nature. Comparing his straightforward and even a little stupid self to his clever and cunning parents, he didn’t know who he took after – it was part of the reason he had so many nightmares about being some cuckoo’s child left in the Jin sect’s nest.

“Fine,” his mother said at last. “He gets one shot.”

Later, when she’d swept off, an empress with her retinue, Mianmian looked at Jin Zixuan with wide eyes. “But Jin-gongzi,” she said. “You don’t wantto marry the Jiang sect girl.”

“I’ve never met her,” Jin Zixuan hedged, which was also true but a little vaguer. He didn’t want to marry a girl he’d never met, one who was several years his elder and who had been described to him only as ‘nice’ and ‘average at best’, just because her mother was his mother’s old friend. He didn’t want his marriage to be yet another thing he had to do because he was someone’s child, rather than his own man.

He wasn’t going to get a choice, though, no matter what he did, just as always. Might as well use it for something good.

Wei Wuxian crashed into him a moment later, clutching him so tightly that it hurt.

“I’ll pay you back,” he promised, his voice tight. “I’ll make it up to you. I’ll be your best friend ever!”

“That’s good enough,” Jin Zixuan said, his face suddenly hot. “There doesn’t need to be anything more.”

Wei Wuxian really was very charming when they went to visit the Lotus Pier, far more charming than Jin Zixuan ever was or would be, and his future bride seemed positively enchanted by him, which was probably a bad thing.

Jin Zixuan felt he should probably do something about it, but he didn’t know what, so he just snuck off and went to go dip his feet into the river, something he almost never got the chance to go while at home.

“I’m sorry,” the Jiang sect heir, Jiang Cheng, said, sitting gingerly next to him.

Jin Zixuan looked at him sidelong, a little surprised. He’d thought that Jiang Cheng hated him. “What for?”

“My sister. Your half-brother.” Jiang Cheng looked uncomfortable. “I can’t even imagine growing up with someone who’d flirt with the person I was engaged to.”

Jin Zixuan thought it over, then shook his head. “I don’t think he likes her like that. Or her him, either,” he said, since it seemed like Jiang Cheng had misunderstood both Wei Wuxian and his own sister. “Wei Wuxian’s just – like that,” he added. “Always. Everyone loves him unless they’re specifically told not to.”

“That’s worse.” Jiang Cheng wrinkled his nose. “He’s the ‘other person’s child’ here, you know. My father really liked his parents – he’s always talking about him. My mother says he wishes he were his son, instead of your father’s.”

“Now that sounds awful.” Probably better for Wei Wuxian, though. Jiang Fengmian would probably treat him like a real son, not the way Jin Guangshan did, like a pawn or a liability or a bastard brought in just for his possible connections – but it would probably be much worse for Jiang Cheng, who’d have to live with that happening right in front of him. It seemed mean to wish for such a thing. “He’s actually pretty nice? We’re friends. I asked him to help me make friends with your sister…I’m not really good at making friends, when it’s just me.”

He hadn’t expected them to hit it off that well, though. At least to Jin Zixuan’s eyes, they’d clearly all but adopted each other as brother and sister the moment they laid eyes on each other…which in his opinion was actually a little bit worse, since he felt like he himself was still painfully trying to figure out what being a sibling was like, and maybe failing at it.

And in all honesty, he felt a little resentful at Wei Wuxian for being picked, too – or was it a little bereft? No one ever picked him just because they wanted to; it was all because of who he was.

Who his parents were.

“I can be your friend, too, if you like,” Jiang Cheng said. He was scowling into the distance. “A better one.”

“Uh,” Jin Zixuan said, startled. “Don’t you – not like me?”

“We’re friends now,” Jiang Cheng scowled at him. “Deal with it!”

Jin Zixuan liked Wei Wuxian a lot, and he liked Jiang Cheng, too, and Nie Huaisang, who he’d just met, fit in with the two of them as if they were three peas in a pod, so he guessed he must like him, too – but if those three endlessly chattering idiots didn’t shut up and let him study he was going to throw himself off some cliff in Gusu and be done with it.

“You really don’t mind me sitting here?” he asked Lan Wangji, who nodded.

Nodded and did not respond verbally – blissful silence!

Still, Jin Zixuan lingered a bit by the door to the peaceful little pavilion he’d found and thought to claim for himself as a secret study place – necessary on account of the fact that Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng, and Nie Huaisang spent all their free time together making trouble instead of studying, because Wei Wuxian just did that to people, winning them over despite themselves and then leading them into mischief – only to learn that it belonged to Lan Wangji. It was filled with gentians, which were more Jiang Cheng’s color than Jin Zixuan’s, but Jin Zixuan had seen enough peonies for a lifetime and needed the concealment besides.

It was very kind of Lan Wangji to let him stay, but he still felt he ought to apologize.

And not just for the intrusion.

Wei Wuxian’s ignominious departure from Lan Qiren’s classroom had made it much more peaceful, but that had come at a cost to Lan Wangji’s own education and opportunity to make friends with others – and while Jin Zixuan liked Wei Wuxian a great deal, he wasn’t sure how Lan Wangji felt about being stuck having to monitor him all day.

And now Lan Wangji was being nice to Jin Zixuan, letting him disturb his privacy like this without complaint, and even agreeing to let him stay so that he’d have somewhere quiet to study…he really ought to say something. Maybe apologize for Wei Wuxian, if that was appropriate. It probably was: he was responsible for him, in his own way. The only problem was that he wasn’t sure how to start the conversation –

“Do you like Wei Wuxian?” he blurted out, then felt his face go bright red. He hadn’t meant to ask it that way! After all, who didn’t know how much Lan Wangji disliked Wei Wuxian? He was always glaring at him and saying he was speaking nonsense and telling him to get lost and –

Lan Wangji nodded.

Jin Zixuan blinked. He did? But then why –

“Oh,” he said, suddenly realizing. “You’re socially awkward, too!”

Lan Wangji frowned at him, and Jin Zixuan waved his hands.

“No, no, I don’t mean that as an insult,” he said hastily, trying to cover for his blunder. “It’s like me! I always say the wrong thing, so most of the time I try not to say anything – of course people always get the wrong idea anyway, thinking I’m being quiet because I’m looking down at them…Wei Wuxian’s getting better at understanding people, but he’s still not very good at it, either. I bet he has no idea! If you like him, you should say as much.”

Lan Wangji shook his head.

“…I could say it for you, if you want?”

Even more urgent head-shaking.

Honestly, if Lan Wangji were a woman, Jin Zixuan would’ve thought that he had a crush.

As it was, he was probably just like Jin Zixuan: naturally awkward, and shy about it, too.

“It’s all right,” he said encouragingly. “Next time they throw a party, you can come and sit with me; we can have tea and pretend not to know them. It’s what I always do.”

Lan Wangji stared at him for a long moment, and then finally nodded very slowly.

“I appreciate the offer,” he said, voice neutral. “Thank you.”

When the time came and the Wen sect pushed things too far, naturally Jin Zixuan stood up for Mianmian.

Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng, and Lan Wangji all did, too.

Naturally, this made Jin Zixuan feel like complete crap on their account – Mianmian was his friend, his sect, and naturally he had a responsibility towards her; the rest of them were just helping because they were good people, and good friends. But at this point they’d done it, and Wen Chao was angry at them all over it, and there was nothing to be done about it.

And then there was the Xuanwu of Slaughter, and they were all trapped inside with it.

Sometimes, he really hated the Wen sect. Often, even.

“Jiang Cheng, you and Jin Zixuan lead the way out,” Wei Wuxian instructed. “No, don’t protest! You’re heirs of Great Sects; everyone will follow you and listen to you, and that’s critical – you’ll need to evade the Wen sect’s efforts to recapture you. That means cohesion, and cohesion means hierarchy. I’ll stay behind to distract the Xuanwu…”

“That’s a terrible idea,” Jiang Cheng exclaimed.

Jin Zixuan nudged him. “Wei Wuxian’s usually right about this sort of thing,” he reminded him. It was a good thing they’d gotten over that period in their lives when Jiang Cheng thought Wei Wuxian was an evil thief who wanted to take away his older sister and Jin Zixuan’s rightful spouse, when they’d fought all the time while Jin Zixuan desperately tried to get between them. He still had no idea what magic alchemy had happened that had suddenly made them best friends – he suspected Mianmian, or maybe Jiang Yanli – but he was deeply grateful for it. “And we can’t risk the majority. Preserve human life above all else, remember? Teacher Lan’s lessons were very clear.”

“I will remain with Wei Ying,” Lan Wangji said, to no one’s surprise. They’d been more or less inseparable after Jin Zixuan had recruited Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang to help them get along better after Wei Wuxian’s temporary exile to the Library Pavilion had ended. It helped that Lan Qiren had pulled Wei Wuxian aside for personal lessons to help him catch up with the rest of them, and that those had somehow metamorphosed into afternoon sessions about inventing new types of musical cultivation techniques in which Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian were the most enthusiastic, and only, students.

Best of all, it had given the rest of them a chance to finally actually do their work.

Well, not Nie Huaisang, but that was only to be expected.

“But your leg –” Wei Wuxian started, and Jin Zixuan nudged him.

“He’ll only be more worried if you don’t let him stay back and join you,” he said reasonably. “Anyway, it’s good for you to have an incentive not to detour into some big flashy heroic bullshit.”

“Awww, but Jin Zixuan, I like big flashy heroic bullshit!”

Jin Zixuan was, by this point, almost entirely convinced that Wei Wuxian actually was the biological child of Wei Changze, and that his father had lied, both about the man’s supposed infertility and possibly about having slept with Cangse Sanren at all. From Jiang Cheng’s stories, inherited from his father, it seemed that Wei Changze was also the sort of person who went in for big flashy heroic bullshit and reckless humor, the sort that would win him a disciple of an immortal mountain as a bride; it certainly seemed more likely than him sharing blood with Jin Zixuan or his father or even Jin Zixun, all of whom tended towards arrogance, but whose flash was all in their clothing.

Not that it mattered at this late date, of course. They were brothers now – as Nie Huaisang would put it, there were no takebacks allowed.

“No bullshit, you hear me?” Jin Zixuan repeated, looking pointedly at Wei Wuxian. “Not allowed. Take care of yourself, okay? Don’t make me have to tell Mistress Jiang that I lost her favorite idiot friend.”

“You tell her?” Jiang Cheng grumbled. “I’ll have to tell her. All right, let’s go.”

Jiang Yanli was not impressed with the fact that they’d left Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji alone in a cave with a giant murderous turtle.

She still made them soup and gave them bandages to wrap up their bloody feet, though.

(Jin Zixuan was never going to make a good impression on her, no matter what Jiang Cheng said.)

“Wen Chao has demanded recompense for the mess at the Nightless City,” Jin Zixuan’s mother said, reading a letter. Her lips curled up in a strange little smile. “He said Wei Wuxian’s right hand would do.”

“Mother,” Jin Zixuan exclaimed, leaping to his feet with his eyes wide. He’d only been home a week from the indoctrination camp, and Wei Wuxian was still lying in bed most of the time, pretending he wasn’t exhausted; Wen Chao must have sent the letter almost immediately after he’d realized they’d escaped. “You can’t be serious!”

“Why not?” she asked. “It’s just what the little bastard deserves, always trying to outshine you.”

Jin Zixuan shook his head, frantically trying to think of a way out of this, because he knew his mother wouldn’t so much as hesitate to order such an atrocity. She’d never forgiven Wei Wuxian for the possibility of being a threat to Jin Zixuan’s position, however remote the chance, and she’d tried very hard to convince Jin Zixuan of it, too – it was the only thing they didn’t agree on, the only thing Jin Zixuan didn’t yield to her on, and he hated every moment of it.

But not as much as his mother hated it.

It was the only thing she couldn’t control in his life, and she hatedit, and hated Wei Wuxian for it, too.

(She couldn’t hate Jin Zixuan. She couldn’t, because he had the right blood, because he was her son, because he was the heir of Lanling Jin and the source of all her power. But sometimes, when the light was dim and she glanced over too quickly and thought she saw his father when she looked at him, he thought that she wanted to.)

“You can’t be serious,” Jin Zixuan said a second time, keeping calm by sheer willpower. No one but him would dare to object if his mother made a move, especially in his father’s absence…and even if his father was there, Jin Zixuan wasn’t sure his father cared enough about Wei Wuxian to endure another fight with his fearsome wife. “Mother, he’s my servant – my responsibility. Whatever he does is my responsibility, whether to my credit or to my deficit. That’s how that works. They may be asking for Wei Wuxian’s hand, but who’s to say, when they come to claim it, that they won’t seek mine instead?”

“They wouldn’t dare.”

“It’s the Wen sect,” Jin Zixuan reminded her. “What don’t they dare?”

She pursed her lips, thinking it over, and for a moment he thought he’d won. “Perhaps,” she allowed, and before he could even breath a sight of relief continued, “But no matter. They’ve set the price, and we can pay it, so why not? We can cut off his hand and send it to them as a peace offering in advance. After all, they’re important allies of ours, and he’s just a bastard.”

“But –”

“No, A-Xuan. No more arguing; I’ve decided.” Her smile broadened. “We’ll do it now.”

Jin Zixuan couldn’t fight with his mother. He’d never had the courage – he was as spineless as his father.

Almost as spineless.

“Yes, Mother,” he said, and drew his sword.

“A-Xuan..?”

“My servant, my responsibility,” he reminded her, and he knew that she’d misunderstood, that she thought that he was going to go take care of the grim task himself. He knew, because for a brief moment in time she looked happy – not true joy, but the only way she ever looked happy for as long as he could remember, like she’d won one over on someone and gotten her way despite everyone’s efforts. He hated to disappoint her. “I have my honor to think of, too.”

Jin Zixuan sent Wei Wuxian to the Lotus Pier, bearing words of warning. His father’s spies had reported that the Wen sect would probably target them first, using Jiang Cheng’s interference in the Xuanwu cave as an excuse – there wasn’t any point going after the Lan sect a second time, and the Jin sect were longstanding allies of Wen Ruohan, with Jin Guangshan being a coward at heart; if Wen Ruohan could keep him out of the inevitable war for a little longer by playing nice, he would.

Word came back not long after that they’d been right: the Lotus Pier had been destroyed.

It also said that Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli were missing – missing, but not dead. It didn’t say anything about their parents, and that was suspicious, too.

Maybe sending Wei Wuxian had helped after all.

“We should reach out to the Nie sect,” Jin Zixuan told his father. “With our money and their strength, we can resist the Wen sect long enough for the smaller sects to catch up.”

“The Wen sect is all-powerful,” his father objected. “What’s even the point of resisting? We’d be better off reaching out to them to see if we can reach a peaceful agreement.”

“We’ve already seen what agreement they want to reach,” Jin Zixuan said, and his father’s gaze dropped guiltily to his waist. Jin Zixuan didn’t bother looking down himself. He didn’t do that much, these days. “Am I your heir or am I not? You promised me that I’d inherit a sect, not slavery. Reach out to the Nie sect.”

Jin Zixuan should not talk that way to his father. He had always been a filial son, and a spineless one; his father’s son, and nothing else. The only thing he had going for him was the right blood – and even that wasn't that sure a bet, these days. He knew his father was already thinking about Jin Zixun in a way that suggested that all those rumors about his ‘cousin’ having a different father than the one everyone said he had might have some merit.

It seemed, though, that when pushed to it, he was also his mother’s son.

He hoped she choked on the knowledge.

“Reach out to the Nie sect,” he said again. “With all the cultivation world uniting, the Wen sect’s fall is inevitable. If we don’t act now, we’ll be seen as cowards, hanging back and waiting to see how things fall out to eke out the best advantage – if we act, we’ll be seen as heroes.”

“But what if you’re wrong, and the Wen sect does win?”

“Then we’ll tell Sect Leader Wen that we’re perfectly positioned to negotiate the other sects’ terms of surrender, and use that to win anyway,” Jin Zixuan said, less because he thought that was an acceptable course of action and more because he knew it would be what his father would do anyway. “Call the Nie sect.”

“I’m going to kill you,” Jiang Cheng hissed, wild-eyed, and Jin Zixuan blinked at him, taken aback.

“Is it because I wasn’t able to do more to help with the Lotus Pier?” he asked, feeling helpless. “I really did try to convince my father to send more people, but I barely even got him not to block my sending Wei Wuxian –”

“Not because of that!”

Jin Zixuan took a step back. “Uh, then –”

“You cut off your own hand you maniac!”

“The situation –” Jin Zixuan started backing up. “It was necessary – Wei Wuxian, help!”

“No, he’s right,” Wei Wuxian said, arms crossed. His eyes were teary, but they’d been that way since he’d left Jinlin Tower – ever since the Wen sect’s letter. “You’re a maniac, and Jiang Cheng’s going to kill you, and you’re going to deserve it.”

Lan Wangji, standing beside him, nodded.

“It’s not that bad, really.” Jin Zixuan tried to explain. “My mother and father would never have accepted anything else – threats to me are the only thing that work on them, and even that’s stopped working after all these years. Only a real injury would have an impact. If they hadn’t been so shocked, they would’ve just continued to ignore what the Wen sect was doing, or offered them an olive branch, and then then the Wen sect would’ve used that as an opportunity to come and divide up everyone else. We’d lose precious time to regroup, and the Wen sect would only get stronger and stronger –”

“You. Cut. Off. Your. Hand!”

“The Wen sect demanded the hand of the person who started the rebellion in the Xuanwu cave,” Jin Zixuan said quietly. “That was me, not Wei Wuxian. Why should he pay my debts?”

Everyone still seemed very upset, but maybe a little less murderous. Definitely a lot more teary-eyed.

“Couldn’t you have at least picked your other hand?” Wei Wuxian mumbled. “Your right hand – that’s your sword arm.”

Jin Zixuan shrugged. “They demanded the right hand,” he said. “Anyway, it’s fine, I’ve been using my left, and it’s been going smoothly enough…you know, I think I might actually be left-handed? I never knew; everyone always made me use my right.”

“Does it hurt?” Lan Wangji asked suddenly, and Jin Zixuan hesitated, not sure how to respond to that.

Unfortunately, everyone else took that in the worst way possible, and insisted on taking care of him, no matter how much he tried to explain that it didn’t hurt, not really, not anymore; it was just the strangest feeling of absence. Like something that had always been there wasn’t there anymore.

A bit like his mother. She wasn’t talking to him anymore.

He was a terrible son, and would probably end up spending eternity in some afterlife hell being tortured for failing to properly honor his parents.

He’d already resigned himself.

“How are your parts of the war going?” he asked, trying to change the subject. “Chifeng-zun says it’s going well, but you know how he is; it’s all business with him, you never hear any stories. Did Wei Wuxian really knock out old Sect Leader Jiang when he refused to leave the Lotus Pier? Tell me he didn’t.”

“He did,” Jiang Cheng said, and he looked amused about it – maybe he’d be in the next boiling pot over in the afterlife of unfilial descendants. “He was a little frantic, you see, on account of not wanting to fail you by letting them die. After all, you had just cut off your own hand for him…”

“Are you ever going to let that drop?”

“Sure. As soon as you have two hands again.”

“…so, never.”

“Yes,” Jiang Cheng said patiently. “Never. Never ever, if that makes it clearer for you.”

Jin Zixuan’s new hand was made of steel and wire, under the gilding, and functioned using some of the innovative new talismans that Wei Wuxian had invented. He couldn’t help but hope that they weren’t part of the subset that constituted demonic cultivation because people were being really weird about that.

“It’s like people wanted for me to just die in the Burial Mounds,” Wei Wuxian complained. He was dressed in black and grey and red, which he’d apparently adopted as his new sect colors – Jin Zixuan had only managed to send him out of Lanling the first time by officially ejecting him from the Jin sect, a decision his father had initially endorsed but now, he suspected, was regretting.

It was a lot easier to throw out a servant than it was to invite back the founder of demonic cultivation, especially now that he was a war hero and a sect leader.

“You didn’t have to be in the Burial Mounds to begin with,” Jin Zixuan reminded him, to no avail. “I know I said I needed an army because my father wasn’t supplying us properly, but I didn’t mean ‘invent an entirely new cultivation technique and raise an army of the dead’. You know that, right?”

Wei Wuxian shrugged it off, because of course he did.

“You know, they’re calling me the Yiling Patriarch?” he said, and grinned. “It’s because the Burial Mounds are in Yiling, and because I’m founding my own sect. Or whatever. Like I wouldn’t be supporting you, anyway.”

“It has to be your own sect because otherwise you might be forced to share your secret techniques,” Jin Zixuan explained, not for the first time. “Rogue cultivators don’t have the same protections that sects do, even small sects. It doesn’t matter if you’re the only person in it. Or, well, you and Lan Wangji, I guess.”

“I still can’t believe he’s willing to leave the Lan sect to join me,” Wei Wuxian sighed happily. “He’s such a good friend.”

Jin Zixuan wasn’t sure about the strength of his new hand, which was the only reason he didn’t try to pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration. “You’re a bad influence, you know,” he said instead of trying to explain to Wei Wuxian that people didn’t generally leave their natal sects for the sake of a ‘good friend’. “I nearly hit a girl the other day.”

“You did? You? What’d she do?”

“She gave me soup and implied that she’d made it,” Jin Zixuan said. “Except it tasted exactly the same as the soup Mistress Jiang is always making for you – I’ve had it recently enough to know. Sure enough, I push the issue a bit and it turns out it was Mistress Jiang’s. The girl was just trying to claim credit as an excuse to get close to me.”

He sighed. He’d been so angry about it. They were at war! People were dying, losing their homes, losing everything, and this stupid girl could only think about how to plot and scheme to try to get to a prized position as the future Madame Jin. Had his mother done the same, when it’d been his father…?

“You’ve had shijie’s soup recently?” Wei Wuxian asked. His expression looked slightly odd. “Shijie made you soup?”

“Yeah, I think she’s been dropping off whatever’s left over at my tent when she’s done,” Jin Zixuan said, shaking his head. Jiang Yanli was so nice, really truly genuinely nice. He’d never met anyone like her. “Could you thank her for me? I appreciate the thoughtfulness – it’s filling enough that I don’t need to go to the mess, which means there’s more left over for everyone else.”

“…sure,” Wei Wuxian said. “I’ll tell her. Or, and here’s a thought – why don’t you tell her yourself?”

“Why would I? You’re the one she likes,” Jin Zixuan said, puzzled. “I mean, you’re her adopted little brother, aren’t you? She’s practically your second soulmate, after Lan Wangji.”

“I’m really busy,” Wei Wuxian announced, despite having been lazing around complaining that they didn’t have any encounters with the Wen sect lined up for a whole week only a few moments before. “I couldn’t possibly take the time out of my schedule to go talk to her – you see, I’ve had an idea, which is going to keep me very busy…in fact, I’m not even going to be here at all! I need to go to the Lan sect encampment to consult with Teacher Lan.”

Discovering that Lan Qiren had a mad scientist streak when it came to musical cultivation had been extremely disquieting, Jin Zixuan reflected. The world might’ve been better off if Lan Qiren had never had a chance to actually get friendly with Wei Wuxian – Wei Wuxian provided the terrible ideas, Lan Qiren scolded him about them and then helped him smooth the kinks out of them anyway.

Teacher for a day, father for a lifetime…

“All right,” Jin Zixuan said, though he still didn’t exactly understand what had just happened. “I’ll go talk to her, I guess.”

“I just wanted to make sure you know you’re not obligated to make me soup or anything,” Jin Zixuan said, not sure where this conversation had gone off the rails.

Probably around the time that Jiang Yanli had started smiling at him, because he always turned into an idiot whenever that happened. She was so very nice, not just average at all no matter what anyone said, and blissfully down-to-earth – she wouldn’t be wasting her time and everyone else’s thinking about how to politically advance herself despite there being a war on. She spent all her time learning field medicine and helping cook meals for the mess and –

And he’d better stop thinking because he was turning red again.

“I enjoy making soup for you,” Jiang Yanli said peaceably. “Especially since I know you enjoy it, too.”

“I do! It’s just, I don’t know, you already do so much, with the medics and organizing and everything…It’s – uh – I – listen, I know our parents – you don’t have to pay attention to that. I only have one hand, I’m not – don’t feel obligated, not because of that. And don’t let Wei Wuxian make you think making soup is the only thing you’re good for, no matter how much he likes it, okay? You do so much more than just that!”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, covering her smile with her hand. “You’re very sweet, you know.”

Jin Zixuan made an incoherent sound.

He would need to do something in return, he thought, a little frantic; he really didn’t know how to deal with a sincere compliment from someone he actually liked. Maybe poetry? Girls were said to like poetry. He couldn’t write poetry worth a damn, but he could pay someone –

She kissed him on the cheek.

All thought abruptly departed.

“Don’t worry, it’s not inappropriate – after all, we’re already engaged,” Jiang Yanli said cheerfully. “Which I’m very good with, so don’t worry about that. Good luck in your next battle, Jin-gongzi.”

At some point she must have left, because she wasn’t there anymore, and Jin Zixuan was still opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water.

Mianmian peeked in, then snickered. “Oh no,” she said. “She broke him. Everyone! Come look! She totally broke him!”

“Did you actually cut off your hand to save a servant?” Jin Guangyao asked.

“It was a bit more complicated than that,” Jin Zixuan said, uncomfortable, then added, “Welcome to the family.”

Jin Guangyao smiled.

For some reason, Jin Zixuan felt a shiver run up his spine. He didn’t think he liked this new brother of his, and he felt bad about it – he’d welcomed Wei Wuxian whole-heartedly, hadn’t he? Was it really that different when it actually was someone of his own blood?

He didn’t like that thought.

“I hope we can be friends,” he said, willing it to be true, and Jin Guangyao murmured something agreeable in return.

Jin Zixuan wished he liked him.

“My mother is going to hate you,” he said, because he knew that she would. “If she does, let me know, and I’ll try to stop her…not just her. If anyone treats you wrong, just tell me. I’ll stand up for you.”

Jin Guangyao smiled again.

“You’re so kind,” he said, and for some reason Jin Zixuan had the feeling that he didn’t mean it at all.

Jin Zixuan had been engaged since before he was born, and it still somehow came as a surprise to find himself married. Not just the event, either – these days he woke up with his wife in his arms and was forced to just stare at her lying there in the soft morning light and wonder how he got so lucky.

He was married.

To a very nice girl, who actually seemed to like him a great deal – she’d made that clear enough when she’d had a chance. Very clear, in fact, which was why there was also a very slight curve in her belly that meant that soon enough he wouldn’t just be married, but a father.

“You’d tell me if I was dreaming, right?” he asked Wei Wuxian, who was visiting again. He did that a lot, but in fairness he didn’t really have a settled place to live – everyone knew the supposed ‘sect’ he’d founded was little more than a sham. He’d been technically kicked out of the Jin sect and refused all offers to rejoin, and it seemed he wasn’t quite ready to scandalize the entire cultivation world by marrying into the Lan sect no matter what Lan Xichen had been hinting. Sometimes he and Lan Wangji spent time at the Lotus Pier with Jiang Cheng, or the Unclean Realm with Nie Huaisang under Nie Mingjue’s long-suffering gaze…everyone called Wei Wuxian the Yiling Patriarch, on account of him ‘founding’ his sect there – or rather, summoning up extra resentful energy from the Burial Mounds for the purposes of obtaining an army while minimizing the number of disturbed graves – but he wasn’t, not really. He didn’t live there or anything.

Who would want to live there?

“I would,” Wei Wuxian agreed, but he didn’t follow it up with teasing or anything the way he usually did.

He just looked very uncharacteristically perturbed.

“What is it?” Jin Zixuan asked. “Can I help?”

“No heroic bullshit,” Wei Wuxian said at once, which meant that there was a possibility of heroic bullshit. Given Wei Wuxian’s personality, that also meant that it was heroic bullshit that would be bad for the Jin sect, which he still felt bad about on account of them raising him and all…in all honesty, it might be a good thing in the long run that Jin Zixuan’s father and mother had been so awful to Wei Wuxian as a kid, and that he’d known it. If they’d been good to him, he never would have been willing to leave. “But, uh, remember Wen Ning?”

Jin Zixuan blinked. Wei Wuxian had told him some stories: a junior disciple of the Wen sect, from a branch family – Dafan Wen – who’d helped Wei Wuxian out a few times when he’d been smuggling the Jiang clan to freedom.

More than a few times: he’d been Wei Wuxian’s first disciple in matters of resentful energy, which Wei Wuxian had apparently been thinking of since forever and started playing around with more or less the moment he was no longer officially tied to a sect, and had been a valuable contact during the early period of the war before events had changed and he’d been lost.

“Yes,” he said. “What about him?”

He hadn’t thought of Wen Ning in ages, beyond abstractly hoping he was doing well. It might be hard, with a surname as he had, but surely there was somewhere in the cultivation world for those surnamed Wen – Wei Wuxian had argued fiercely in favor of leniency for the remaining Wen cultivators, and the Lan sect had backed him, thanks to Lan Wangji. The rest of them had been exhausted, Nie Mingjue, Lan Xichen, Jiang Cheng and his parents, even Jin Zixuan…his father had ended up volunteering their sect to help with resettlement of the refugees, which had been a pleasant surprise.

Sure, Jin Zixuan knew his father well enough to know that he was only doing it for the clout and possible advantage it would give him, but he was pretty sure the Wen civilians didn’t especially care why they were going to get a reprieve from death and a new place to live, only that they did.

“I’ll get there,” Wei Wuxian said. “It’s a bit complicated…you know how Jin Zixun’s in charge of resettlement?”

Jin Zixuan nodded, puzzled. “What about it?”

“You can’t do that!” one of the guards shouted at Wei Wuxian. “We’re disciples of the Jin sect –”

“Is that so,” Jin Zixuan said, and they all turned to look at him, each one of them blanching in utter horror. “And why didn’t I know that my Jin sect had such people as you?”

“Where’s Wen Ning?” Wen Qing asked Wei Wuxian, looking desperate. “I don’t see him…Where is he?!”

“That monster?” one of the guards blurted out.

“My brother is not a monster!”

“He’s been hiding in the woods,” one of the Wen civilians volunteered. “He’s been raiding the camp, rescuing people who are being abused –”

“Our response was reasonable in light of his aggression,” the guard argued. “He used demonic cultivation – he’s a monster! We had no choice –”

“We’re going to need to question them,” Jin Zixuan said to Lan Wangji, who was looking faintly murderous in his usual righteous sort of way. “To find out who’s their backing – Jin Zixun wouldn’t have dared something like this, not on his own. Can you bind them for me?”

It was his father.

Of course.

“A-Yao, what do you want?” Jin Zixuan asked, and Jin Guangyao stopped in his tracks, staring at him in confusion – as well he should, since he’d only come into Jin Zixuan’s study in order to say good morning on his way to breakfast. “No, sorry, that’s not what I meant. I meant, you know, in life.”

Jin Guangayo blinked at him.

Probably not the best question to spring on someone before breakfast, Jin Zixuan reflected.

“It’s about the trouble that my – that our father got into,” Jin Zixuan explained. “The other cultivation sects are furious to no end that he took advantage of their trust in order to do such a disgraceful thing…I’ve ordered Zixun to be confined for now, and I suspect he’ll have to be banished to some country house for a few years. And as you know, my father will be retiring soon and handing over the position of sect leader to me…”

Neither of them especially wanted that to happen, his father as loathe to give up power as Jin Zixuan was to take it. But what other solution was there after such a scandal?

The Lan sect, ever concerned with morality, had been horrified when they’d found out what had happened; the Jiang sect, despite their close relationship to the Jin sect, had immediately denounced it, and Jiang Yanli, who was Wei Wuxian’s friend, was the very first to speak. The Nie sect, never a firm ally for the Jin sect, was growling about righteousness, and if Nie Mingjue was sincere about that being his only concern – and having worked with the man, Jin Zixuan believed he was – then there were plenty of others in the Nie sect that had their eyes on the greater influence and power that would accrue to their sect if Jin Zixuan’s father were allowed to bring his sect down with him.

Handing over power was the only way to make sure their Jin sect remained strong.

“He won’t be alone, at least,” Jin Zixuan sighed. “I won him that much.”

Jiang Fengmian had agreed to step down from his position as sect leader as well, making it seem as though Jin Guangshan’s retirement were voluntary, part of a joint agreement of the older generation handing over power to the newer. Everyone would know in their hearts that that wasn’t the case, but it would be far less shameful than the alternative – saving a little bit of his father’s face.

“You did well,” Jin Guangyao said, listening with a neutral expression. “In uncovering everything, and revealing it.”

“I would’ve brought you in to help, but I couldn’t,” Jin Zixuan explained. “I know he asked you to help in finding demonic cultivators to join the Jin sect, and…”

He hesitated.

“He implicated me?” Jin Guangyao asked.

He had. Their father was shameless: he’d even sought to move all blame to Jin Guangyao’s back, whether as the actual mastermind or, when that was rejected, as the inciter of the scheme. Nonsense, of course.

Anyway, it didn’t matter. Even if Jin Guangyao had suggested it, it would have been his father’s responsibility to refuse.

“No one believes it,” Jin Zixuan said, which was only partially a lie. “Even Chifeng-zun laughed in his face and said you wouldn’t be nearly that stupid.”

Jin Guangyao looked – oddly pleased by that, if Jin Zixuan had to guess.

“Still, it’s awkward,” he said, rubbing his head. “People talk, and our subsidiary sects have never been as quiet as some others…you don’t have to tell me right now what you’re planning, or what you want in the long term. But maybe – uh – you have two sworn brothers. Is there any chance…”

“I could go visit them for a while?”

Jin Zixuan smiled helplessly. “I wish it weren’t necessary. And if you did know what you wanted, I could take it into account when planning the future…”

“No, no,” Jin Guangyao said. “Visiting my sworn brothers will be – fine.” He looked thoughtful. “You said Chifeng-zun didn’t think I was involved?”

“Zewu-jun was also vociferous in your defense,” Jin Zixuan said, trying to elide the fact that it wasn’t so much that Nie Mingjue didn’t think Jin Guangyao was capable of such atrocities, but rather that he declared, and loudly, that if Jin Guangyao had intended to do something horrific like that, he’d have handled it better. Judging by Jin Guangyao’s amused expression, he might have guessed anyway. “I appreciate your understanding.”

Jin Guangyao smiled.

Jin Zixuan thought he might even mean it, this time.

“I’m an uncle!” Wei Wuxian crowed, holding Jin Ling in his arms. “I’m an uncle, I’m an uncle!”

“Big deal,” Jiang Cheng grumbled, which would be more convincing if he wasn’t beaming foolishly. “So am I. Hand him over...hey, A-Ling! It's me, your jiujiu!”

“Can I be an honorary uncle?” Nie Huaisang asked – Jin Zixuan had no idea when he’d even arrived, or why he was here, or anything, really, but that was probably because he hadn’t really slept on account of over-excitement. “I mean, my brother’s sworn brothers with Jin-xiong’s brother, so it works, right?”

“That’s ridiculous –” Jiang Cheng started.

“No, I love it!” Wei Wuxian immediately declared. “That means Lan Zhan’s his uncle, too!”

“Wei Wuxian…!”

“Don’t worry,” Jin Zixuan said, hugging Jiang Cheng out of sheer excitement. “You’re his only jiujiu, right? Everyone else is related through me, so they have to share.”

Jiang Cheng seemed pleased by that, and Wei Wuxian laughed.

Nie Huaisang was calculating on his fingers. “You know,” he said thoughtfully. “This might be the most well-connected baby in the entire cultivation world? The only thing we’re missing is the Wen sect…Jiang-xiong, how about you marry Wen Qing? Then we’d have them all!”

“That is not how I’m determining my marriage!” Jiang Cheng yelped, but notably didn’t reject the idea.

Jin Zixuan looked at Jiang Yanli, who looked back at him, and they both started laughing.

There was more noise after that, and eventually Jin Ling woke up and started crying, making everyone start fussing like a bunch of old hens surrounding a long-suffering Jiang Yanli who’d already grown accustomed to it in a way the rest of them hadn’t.

It suddenly occurred to Jin Zixuan that everyone who was here was here because they wanted to be. Not because of his name or his wealth, not because he was Sect Leader Jin, not because of the circumstances of his birth, but just because they liked him – because they wanted to celebrate with him, and to cherish his child, to share his joy.

It was a good day.

All the days were a little good, but this one was especially good.

#mdzs #jin zixuan #wei wuxian #mianmian #jiang cheng #lan wangji #jin guangyao #jiang yanli #my fic #my fics #right hand man

451 notes · View notes

fierysafrina · 2 years ago

Text

Runaway train | Obey Me x reader

Fandom: Obey Me! Shall we date Rating: General Word Count: 6.900 Genre: Slice of Life | Drama | Hurt/Comfort | Angst Additional tags: choking Summary: When the truth of your ancestor came out, you were surprised. You couldn’t say you expected it, but … for some reason it felt weird. Finding out your ancestor long ago was an angel and that a very small part of you is somehow related to the demons confused you. But you accepted that. You accepted the truth and helped the brothers come to accept it as well. It was hard, especially for Belphegor and Beelzebub, but eventually they did. And a part of you already expected for them to compare you to her. Notes: So this one has been in my drafts for far too long and it’s, in a way, based on a real thing too. Sometimes, if not most of the time, I get called by a different name, which I dismiss completely, but then I wondered what if and this story came. It’s been a long time since I posted anything for Obey Me! Fandom, so I hope I’m not too out of the form..

What you didn’t expect was for it to hurt. You knew them as nothing but demons, for who they showed you to be. But the brothers? You could see those gazes that lingered on you for a second too long, those gentle and warm smiles they sent your way before they disappeared. It hurt. You couldn’t tell them, but it hurt, because they didn’t see you for who you were, but for your ancestor.

But that was okay. It was okay, because at least they were talking to you, still treating you like a normal human being. It was okay, wasn’t it?

You were sitting beside Barbatos in the Student Council Room, talking about the exchange program. Simeon, Luke and Solomon were sitting not too far away, adding what you might have missed. Out of seven brothers, only Satan was present. It didn’t surprise you, since Satan mostly accompanied you from one place to another while others continued to do their own thing.

You felt your phone ring in your pocket, announcing a message. While the rest talked, you took the chance to check, having a hunch it must have been from Mammon. And indeed it was.

Hey wanna come with me later?

You raised an eyebrow, wondering what he was up to now. With a small smile, you quickly typed your answer, accepting it.

If only you wouldn't get your hopes up.

If you were honest to yourself, you were just waiting for it. Waiting for one of them to slip up. You wondered who would be first; one of the twins? Or would it be Lucifer, who you know he still feels regret to this day.

Lilith.

The moment the name slipped off his tongue and not even realising his mistake, was perhaps what hurt the most. You wanted to correct him, saying that no your name wasn’t Lilith, but you couldn’t bring yourself to make that gentle expression disappear. Not now after so many months of him finally opening up to you.

“It’s just one time.” you told yourself. “Just one time.”

Yet it was one too many times, because the second time came and then the third and it went on, until you couldn’t take it anymore.

Perhaps they took you for granted, thinking you wouldn’t be angry, upset that they misspoke your name. They’re demons after all, perhaps that day still lingers in their mind like some do in yours. You remained quiet through this all. And perhaps because Satan was the only one to call you by your name that you spent more and more time with him instead. It wasn’t fair, you knew that, but you couldn’t help but feel hurt that they never apologised.

“Are you okay?”

You feel Satan’s eyes on you as you sit on an armchair in his room. You’re reading one of Devildom's history books and if it weren’t for his sudden question that startles you, you would have ignored him completely.

Raising your head, a smile spreads across your lips. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You’ve been acting strange ever since you came back with Mammon two weeks ago.” He doesn’t look away from you and you know he knows why. After all, the brothers aren’t very subtle about calling you Lilith. “Want to talk about it?”

“No.” You answer much too quickly for your comfort. Wincing at your own brashness, you close the book and sigh. “I’m used to getting my names changed.” You force a smile and something in Satan’s eyes changes, because you look away instead, not liking how he’s looking at you with sadness. “Don’t look at me like that.” you grit your teeth.

“I won’t apologise in their stead.” He says and you hear the book closing before he stands up and walks to one of the many bookshelves. “What they’re doing is not okay, but you must stand up for yourself as well.” You look at his back, staring at him. “The longer you let them, the more they’ll do it. You must draw a line, [Name].”

It feels so odd being called by your name that it makes your chest ache. “I’m not exactly the type to correct someone…” you murmur more to yourself.

“You’ll continue to be hurt by them.”

He’s right. You know he’s right, but no matter how much you try to correct them, you can't let those smiles disappear. “I’m fine…” you whisper.

Satan turns his head to look at you. He stares at you for a moment before he turns back in front. “You’re always welcomed here.” He says instead and you feel your eyes sting from sudden tears.

You’re sobbing, trying to catch a breath, almost to no avail. Hiding in one of the empty classrooms at RAD, you tried to be as quiet as you could be, yet it still seems like luck wasn’t on your side. Someone calls your name and you realise it a bit too late to see Diavolo standing on the doorway. Right beside Lucifer. Something flashes through Lucifer’s eyes and he moves forward before he stops abruptly like he just realised something.

“I-I’m sorry…” It’s unusual for him to stutter, but he turns and leaves instead.

Not once does he look back.

You grip your uniform, biting on your lower lip enough to draw out blood, as you try hard to control your sobs. Diavolo is by your side in a second along with Simeon and Luke, for whom you’re not sure where they came from. You hear Luke asking what’s wrong, what happened, why Lucifer left in a hurry, but you couldn’t answer him, because all you could see was Lucifer’s disappointment, his regret, shame. Why couldn’t he approach you? Was he thinking you were Lilith and when he realised he left? Did you really mean nothing to him?

“H-home…” you whisper, wrapping your arms around yourself. “I-I wanna g-go home…”

Diavolo and Simeon exchange a glance, but they don’t say a word. Along the way Barbatos comes and the two angels accompany you back to the House of Lamentation. Part of you expects to see one of the brothers there, but there’s no one. You’re not even sure why you expected anyone to be there. Ever since you came to Devildom, you were alone. Even Solomon was different from you even if he’s a human. You can’t exactly call any of them your friends, but they’re not just classmates either.

Once you’ve calmed down, it’s Barbatos who approaches you in the living room where you’re sitting. It’s quiet, too quiet for your liking, yet you can’t bring yourself to call for anyone. Simeon and Luke had to go back to the Academy for a meeting that Diavolo suddenly called upon, so you’re left alone.

“I’ve brought some tea. Would you like some?”

You look at the demon in front of you and smile, giving a small nod.

Barbatos returns the smile before he disappears into the kitchen. Not wanting to be alone, you follow him and sit down by the counter instead. You observed him so many times, yet his elegance continues to amaze you.

“Thank you,” you smile when he places a cup in front of you.

“You’re welcome,” he replies without hesitation as he sits in front of you, a cup in front of him as well.

There’s a comfortable silence between the two of you and you’re not exactly sure what he’s doing here. You can only guess.

“Would you like to go home?” Barbatos is the first to break the silence.

His question makes your eyes wide and you choke on tea, coughing seconds later.

“I-I’m sorry?” you stutter, looking at him.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.” He apologises, looking slightly embarrassed. He hands you a handkerchief that you slowly take, like you’re unsure. “Lord Diavolo wanted me to ask you if you want to go back to the human realm. He noticed something was odd and found you in the classroom, he worries you might feel homesick.”

Averting your gaze, the corners of your lips twitch. You remain silent for a moment before you look directly into his eyes and smile. If you get the chance, you won’t let it slip away. “Yes, I’d like that if it’s not too troublesome.”

Barbatos nods in understanding as silence becomes almost too deafening. At least you can focus on the cup, leaving Barbatos to the silence until he speaks. His voice is quiet, filled with understanding and you wonder if he saw your future.

"Wherever you'll be, you can always call for Lord Diavolo or me."

You meet his eyes and there’s sympathy and warmth in his gaze that makes your chest tight and eyes fill with tears. Barbatos moves before you realise it and he’s embracing you.

Your throat is slowly closing in on you and you feel your eyes burn from the tears you’re hardly holding back. You shut your eyes and hug him back, your hands shaking with realisation dawning on you.

“Thank you…” you whisper into the crook of his neck.

Being back home feels … odd, yet at the same time you have never felt happier than in that same moment you walk through the front door. There's noise and you see your mom cooking, completely startled by the door opening. She's looking at you like she has just seen a ghost. There are tears in your eyes and you're running to her, embracing like your life is depending on it.

You feel the pacts burn in your skin and emotions are overwhelming you that makes you feel like suffocating if it weren't for the small circles on your back that let you know you're home.

There's anger and yells, voices overlapping each other all while Diavolo and Simeon stand there, their expressions telling everything they need to know. Excuses are spoken, blame pointed at the one person that isn't there and it takes just a small amount for the wrath to be felt to the deepest corners of hell.

There's silence, heads lowered in shame and regret. No one dares to say anything, but Satan.

“How is [Name]?”

Anyone could see brothers flinching while Lucifer tries to be as expressionless as ever. But both Simeon and Diavolo know the oldest brother wasn’t fine with the situation either.

For a moment there's silence before Simeon speaks; “They’re happier.”

“Are you suggesting they weren’t happy here?” Mammon glares at the angel.

“Tell me something.” Satan says, his eyes focusing on the latter. All attention falls on him, including Lucifer’s. “In the last three months, how many times have all of you spent some alone time with them?”

Everyone is looking at Satan confused, except for Diavolo and Simeon.

“What do you mean?” Beelzebub asks.

Satan looks directly at Lucifer. “After that incident, how many times have you seen them?”

Lucifer narrows his eyebrows before he looks away, refusing to look at anyone.

Turning to Mammon, Satan continues; “How many times have you called them by a name of a person, who has been dead for centuries?”

The silence that falls upon the room is deafening.

“What are you talking about, Satan?” Luke’s quiet voice breaks the tension the moment he walks inside with Solomon and Barbatos.

No one dares to look at Satan, less alone at Luke or Simeon. Lucifer refuses to look at Diavolo, but feels his eyes on him.

“What do you mean by that?” Luke repeats. “Their name is [Name] and [Name] alone. They don’t have any other name. They shouldn’t have another name, unless they alone decided to change it. But they didn’t or they would tell us. Wouldn’t they, Simeon?” The young angel looks at his friend and protector, who sadly smiles.

“I wonder.” Satan scoffs. “How many times have you called them Lilith unconsciously?”

“What?” Luke’s eyes widen and he looks from one brother to another, his eyes lingering on Beelzebub the most. “But you didn’t, right?” he takes a step towards Lucifer, eyes now focusing on him. “Satan is wrong.” He looks directly at Mammon, who’s turned away, but Luke could see the way he’s gritting his teeth and balling a fist by his side.

“Luke,” Simeon calls softly.

The angel turns his way. “Is that why [Name] left?” his voice is quiet, but the venom and coldness heard in it sends chills down their spine.

“I’m afraid so.” He agrees and looks at Satan.

“Oh…” Luke lowers his head before he leaves without a word.

Simeon closes his eyes and sighs. He sees the way Beelzebub is looking at him and says; “He was supposed to find out eventually either way.”

“Should you leave him alone?” Belphegor asks, eyes lingering on the doorway.

“He can handle himself.” The angel smiles. He looks at Diavolo and Solomon, continuing; “I will leave Devildom for a couple of days. I hope you don’t mind accompanying me, Solomon and Satan.”

“Of course not.” Solomon smiles and looks at Satan, who nods with a huff.

“Don’t worry about the exchange and focus on your work.” Diavolo agrees.

“Did they really leave because of us?” Leviathan speaks as he meddles with his fingers. “Was it truly because we called them Lilith? But it was done unconsciously. We didn’t mean to do it on purpose. It wasn’t on purpose. Why didn’t they correct us? We wouldn’t if they did.”

Satan’s expression changes.

“But they did at first.” Barbatos answers. “They told you their name wasn’t Lilith but [Name]. Yet you brushed it aside like it meant nothing.”

Diavolo looks at Lucifer, who’s gritting his teeth. “What did you see that time, Lucifer?” The said demon looks at him. “In the classroom. Who did you see? Was it [Name]? Or was it Lilith?”

Sitting on a balcony you listen to Luke ramble as he’s comfortably sitting on your lap, his arms wrapped around you. Your mother is inside, preparing dinner when the doorbell rings. A smile spreads across your lips before you laugh at Luke, who immediately straightens up the moment he hears Simeon’s voice.

Instead of letting the angel sit back on his own chair, you embrace him tighter, refusing to let him go.

“Ah, no! Lemme go, [Name], Simeon has come!” Luke is pouting.

“Don’t wanna.” You shake your head.

You hear Simeon’s chuckle when he stands on the doorway of the balcony. Your mother is saying something from inside, but you don’t hear her clearly for the children, who pass just below the balcony are running and screaming.

“Hello,” Simeon greets you and you look at him. “It’s been a while.”

“It has been.” You agree.

Simeon steps outside, his eyes focusing on the children as well as Luke, who gave in on his demise. “It’s always so lively when I visit.”

“It is.” You laugh and brush Luke’s hair from his forehead. He’s quiet, his attention on the string from your hoodie, but there’s no doubt that he’s also listening to your talk. “It’s quite a change from the Devildom.”

For a moment Simeon remains silent, watching the children. “Do you truly want to go through with the plan?” Turning your way, his eyes find yours in a second.

“Yes,” you don’t hesitate to answer. Luke stills his movement and looks at you. “I’ll be alright.”

“You won’t be.” Simeon says. “A part of your soul will be gone along with their pacts. There’s also a possibility you might lose some memories if all seven pacts are gone in that same moment.”

“Then that’s even better.”

“[Name].” he says your name sternly.

“What do you expect me to do, Simeon?” you sigh. “Have they asked you how I am? Where am I? Have they even bothered to think of visiting me? All I feel through their pacts is anger. Even Satan hasn’t sent a letter, less alone a message, since he visited the last time. Does he also blame me for what I'm about to do?”

“No,” Simeon is quick to shake his head. “If anything they’re too prideful to even check up on you.” he goes with his hand through his hair, looking away.

You chuckle at that, expecting it. Yet it still hurt hearing it. Closing your eyes, you take in a deep breath, releasing Luke, who straightens up. You can feel his eyes on you, but instead you look away, afraid to see the pity in his eyes.

“Here you go.” Your mother appears on the doorway, holding a cup of tea in her hands.

Simeon smiles and takes it with gratitude before she disappears back inside. Your heart aches at the sight of your mother. While you didn’t tell her the whole truth – of angels and demons being real instead of only a legend and myth – you told her enough to know that something happened, that you refused to return to the exchange program.

“You know once we go through the procedure, you’ll need weeks, if not months, to recuperate.” Simeon turns to face you. “You won’t be able to remain here in the town.”

“I don’t mind.” you shake your head. “I have an uncle living at the farm. He has a small cottage near-by, so I can stay there.”

Simeon is staring at you, but doesn’t say a word unlike Luke; “But do you truly want to?” His voice is quiet and you look at him. You spot tears in his eyes and you unconsciously reach out to caress his cheek.

“I’ll be okay…” you smile.

You start to believe your own lies.

It’s like every normal day in Devildom. Everything seems to be like in the past, before you came as an exchange student. Each brother kept themselves in their own rooms, not one bothering to check up on you.

Except for one.

Mammon is pacing up and down in his bedroom, biting on his thumb. His eyebrows are furrowed and the longer he thinks and wonders and worries, the more he’s doubtful to go through with his plan.

It’s been two months since you left, since you felt “homesick” and you still haven’t returned back. Mammon knows he messed it up. He knows you’re not Lilith, his fallen sister, but he didn’t know how big the consequences were when he called you by that name. He knows it didn’t happen once, but a couple of times, but he couldn’t help himself. Not when you looked like a lost puppy, just like his sister.

He massages his left wrist, feeling sadness and regret before it tingles. He scratches it when his heart skips a bit when the black lines like vines appear. His eyes widen, because even if he forgot what this moment means, it's still fresh in his memory from when it happened.

"No…" Mammon murmurs to himself and begins shaking his head all while digging nails into his wrist. "No, no, no…" he's chanting, but those same vines begin to disappear along with the emotions he felt just a moment ago.

Suddenly he feels empty, like an empty shell that once held something warm and gentle inside. He feels tears threaten to spill and before he knows it, he's running out of his bedroom and down the hallway. He hears Beelzebub in the background, asking where he's running to, but Mammon doesn't have time to stop and tell him.

It's seconds before it completely disappears that he rushes into Lucifer's room all breathless only to show him the last marks of the pact. Lucifer's eyes focus on it and narrows his eyebrows. He stands up, ready to speak, but he alone is forced to a stop when he feels it.

It starts like a tingle that spreads throughout his whole body until it reaches the inner side of his left wrist and stops there. He watches the black ink of a white side of the yang appear. It lingers for a moment and Lucifer can feel the doubt you might feel for a split second and before he can take action it begins to disappear.

His eyes are wide at the sight. He's frozen on the spot as he watches. Mammon is mumbling something, but Lucifer couldn't care more, because it's the sadness and pain that he feels the last before it disappears. It leaves him bare of any emotion, struggling to breathe until Mammon holds him. He stumbles and looks at his younger brother for answer, yet what greets him is nothing but the realisation that they messed up badly.

By the middle of the day, the whole house of Lamentation is in turmoil. The brothers are talking over each other, asking for your whereabouts, trying to contact you, but Lucifer is lost. He doesn’t know where you are, less alone how to contact you after you left your D.D.D back in the Devildom.

Lucifer recalls Diavolo’s question and shame fills him to the last core. He doesn’t dare to admit it, but he knows Diavolo is right. He should have apologised that day when it happened, and told his brothers to mind what they’re saying. If it wasn’t intentional, he should have prevented it somehow.

But then again, a part of him also blamed you. Refusing to take the whole blame upon his shoulders, when you could have corrected them as much as he could. And if anything it was that emotion alone that made Lucifer just a bit angrier at you than at his brothers. If you didn’t answer when they called you by a different name, it wouldn’t have gotten this far. You wouldn’t leave them. You could have stayed by their side, laughing with them.

Yet instead you remained silent as you took all of it in.

“My, my, what’s with so much noise.” Solomon’s voice makes the arguments quiet down.

“Solomon!” Asmodeus’ eyes are wide like he just came up with an idea. “Solomon, my dear, you must know where [Name] had gone to.”

Solomon blinks with his eyes, confusion visible before it dawns on him. “No, I do not.” His answer is short and simple.

It confuses the brothers.

“But … didn’t you leave with Simeon and Satan?” Beelzebub murmurs.

Solomon turns his way, a smile present on his lips. “I did.” He agrees and just when Mammon is about to speak, he continues; “But we didn’t meet with them after that one time. I don’t know where they are.”

All attention turns to Satan, who silently shakes his head, raising his hands like he doesn’t know either. But Lucifer knows they’re lying and it only makes him angrier. They know exactly where you are.

“I thought you’d be different, brother of mine.” Satan speaks when he sees Lucifer’s expression darken.

“What do you mean?” he narrows his eyebrows.

“Although you haven’t called them Lilith directly, they could still see it clearly.”

Lucifer grits his teeth.

Satan looks at Solomon, who closes his eyes and sighs. “They don’t wish to be found.”

“You know where they are!?” Mammon raises his voice and steps closer to Satan.

“I might have before.”

“Before what?” Belphegor asks. “Does it have to do anything with our pacts?”

“Bingo.” The corners of Satan’s lips turn upwards in a taunting smirk.

“You knew they’d try to break our pacts?” Leviathan is confused. “Why didn’t you stop them if you knew? Who else knew? Were we the only ones in the dark?”

“We didn’t stop them because we couldn’t.” Solomon answers, glancing at Satan in case he said something too much. “The same day we wanted to visit them once more, they were already long gone. The only one who might have an idea where [Name] is, is Luke.”

“Luke?” Mammon is even more confused. “What does Luke have with all of this?”

“Don’t you know?” Satan laughs as if he’s mocking them. “Luke is their protector and he’s the one who decides who can visit and who not. You guys are definitely the last on the list if you even are on.”

“Does that mean we can’t … see [Name]?” Leviathan’s voice is quiet.

“Unless Luke says otherwise, then no.” Solomon answers.

“And Simeon?” Lucifer asks. “Where is he?” He looks behind the wizard, expecting the angel to come, but nothing.

“He’s beside Luke, teaching him.” Solomon says and walks over like he’s in his own house. He watches Lucifer’s expression, smiling when he notices the gaze in his eyes shift, but doesn’t say anything on it. Instead, he continues; “It is a bit unfortunate that Satan and I cannot visit them, as they have lost quite a lot of the soul and strength when they broke the pact all together.”

“W-what?” Beelzebub stutters as Belphegor’s eyes widen while the rest seem slightly confused aside from Lucifer and Asmodeus.

“They didn’t.” Belphegor is shaking his head as he takes a step forward. “They couldn’t have broken all pacts at the same time, unless–” He stops abruptly, freezing in the spot before his head snaps towards Lucifer.

“It’s too late now.” Satan sighs. “What is done is done, there’s nothing we can do.”

“You don’t understand!” Belphegor raises his voice, frustrated.

“Oh dear…” Asmodeus murmurs, hand covering his mouth.

“What’s wrong?” Leviathan and Beelzebub are looking from one to another until Leviathan focuses on Lucifer. “What’s Belphegor talking about, Lucifer?”

Lucifer’s eyes are closed when he sighs. “They had enormous power from the beginning.” he starts slowly. He looks at Solomon, who’s quietly standing there only to realise that he doesn’t have any intention of stopping him. He’s not exactly sure if he’s glad about that or not.

“Any normal wizard cannot break all the pacts on his own, be it human, demon or witch, it doesn’t matter.” Lucifer looks at Belphegor, who’s glaring at him, yet his eyes show completely different emotion. The same emotion he saw when their sister fell, when she died as a human – fear. “But [Name] has been … different from the very beginning. They could use their voice to command all seven of us at the same time, so it doesn’t come as a surprise that they could also break the pacts at the same time. All seven. But …” he’s hesitating.

“But what?” Leviathan asks.

“There is a price they must pay if they do so.” Lucifer sighs and glances at Solomon and Satan, hoping they would continue, yet they don’t have any intention of doing so.

“There’s a chance they might lose memories.” It’s Mammon who speaks. “It’s that, isn’t it?” he asks and steps forward. “Because it depends how powerful the demon is. So if the demon isn’t as strong, then the price for breaking the pact isn’t so severe. But if you break it with a powerful demon times seven, then …” he grits his teeth.

“It’s as Mammon said.” Satan agrees. “Despite being their ancestor, Lillith is gone.” He looks from one brother to another, all of them looking anywhere else. “You should have been glad, happy that Lillith lineage isn’t broken, yet here you are, always comparing them to each other. [Name] is a person as well, different from Lillith in many ways than just in name.”

You’re not sure how much time has passed. Finally being back on your feet, after months of recovering, you couldn’t have felt more glad and thankful to your uncle than you did during that time. No one from your family questioned you about the boy that was always around you, helping you.

“Luke,” Your voice is rather quiet when you call for the angel.

Sitting on the stairs of the porch, reading a book, the angel turns and looks at you. “What is it?” he asks and he’s on his feet, rushing to your side.

“I was wondering,” you start slowly, unsure if it’s a good idea. Luke doesn’t say anything, waiting for you to continue. “I wanna see them…” you breathe out, your eyes averting to the sky, more afraid of his reaction than anything. It was no secret how overprotective he was, and still is, of you.

There’s silence and you dare to look at him only to worry when his expression is nothing but frown.

“Do you want to?” he asks, eyes looking into yours like he wants to make sure you really want to.

You hesitate to answer.

Letting out a silent sigh, Luke closes the book, places it on his side before he stands up and walks over to you. You unconsciously shiver, feeling the calmness and the purity of his presence alone, yet it doesn’t seem like he has noticed. Or if he has, he doesn’t say anything about it.

“When you’re hesitating like this, I can’t allow it.” He’s looking into your eyes. You spot sadness that diminishes and you wonder when did he grow up so much. “Forgive me.”

A small smile spreads across your lips as you reach out to caress his cheek. “It’s alright. Thank you for staying by my side.” you say and a wide smile replaces his frown.

You should have listened to Luke when he told you to wait. You should have waited for him no matter how much you were tempted to go to a bookstore and the market. You should have waited.

But now you can’t help but notice the nails that are slowly digging themselves into your neck, your toes barely touching the ground as you try to free yourself from the tight grip the woman has on you. The air doesn’t seem to come, no matter how much you try to scratch the witch’s hand as she laughs at you. Suddenly the faces of Luke and Simeon appear in front of you, remembering their smiles and there’s Solomon, speaking and your eyes water.

“It took me so long to find you.”

You can barely hear her words, the pounding of your heart too loud in your ears.

“It was silly of you to disappear into a remote place like this. Hidden behind the angels,” she scoffed; “but no demon in sight. What a day when I already had a hard time hiding from Mammon.”

At the mention of the said demon, his blue eyes are the first thing you remember. You try to free yourself, but you’re still not completely healed.

It’s Solomon’s words in your head, from those years back, when he studied with you, that your lips part and your voice is barely heard;

“Hear…me…”

The witch narrows her eyebrows, staring at you.

“...denizens of-of darkness…”

“What’s this?” She raises an eyebrow.

“...y-you, who are bo-born of shadow and…you, w-who give birth to it…”

The witch’s lip twitches. “Are you trying to summon them?” she mocks you. “A useless human without powers?” she muses and tightens her grip on your neck as she leans closer. “Go on. Amuse me more.”

You look up into the sky, noticing how there’s not a single cloud in the vicinity. “H-hear me…a-and do as I c-co-command…” you start to feel your consciousness slowly fade. “I, [N-Name]...call u-upon you to-to send f-forth one…of-of your number…”

You see the sky shift and suddenly you find yourself kneeling on the ground, gasping for air and coughing. You’re holding your neck, eyes looking at the witch, who’s watching you with a wide smile on her lips. Before you can use the chance to crawl away, she holds for your ankle, kneeling just in front of you.

“Don’t do anything funny and end your summoning spell.” She licks the upper lip before she bites the lower one, her eyes boring into your soul.

“I…” For a moment you hesitate, yet you can’t help the shiver when her hand slowly wraps around your throat once again. “I summon the Avatar o-of Greed, M-Mammon!”

Silence that spreads, tells you everything.

Tears fill your eyes, no sign of a tingling sensation that you once felt. The witch watches you for a moment until her laughter fills every corner of your body. You should have known it would be futile. You don’t even know why you wanted to summon a demon.

Closing your eyes, you lean on your hands, head buried between them as you break. The witch continues to laugh like she just won the lottery.

“M-Mammon…” you whisper-call, desperate. “P-please …”

There’s a brush of wind that gives you goosebumps when a silent; “Huh?” reaches you.

The laughter you heard just a second ago, disappears.

“W-what?” the witch stutters. You don’t raise your head, feeling too tired to care. “T-that’s impossible!”

“[N-Name]?”

There’s an all too familiar voice and pair of hands holding you that wake you from the daze. Your eyes widen from fear and you try to push the person away, thinking it’s the witch, only to freeze when you meet with the same blue eyes you thought of before.

“M-Mammon?” You choke on your own word.

“How did you manage to summon him?!” The witch yells, making you flinch and unconsciously cling onto Mammon, trying to hide. “You lost all the powers you had, including the pacts! You shouldn’t be able to summon anyone!”

Mammon is quietly staring at you, noticing how you shiver and it’s not from the weather. Not when it’s warm in the human world, so it must have been the witch’s fault. He was just having the time of his life, ready to hit a jackpoint in the casino back in the Devildom only to feel a tingling that he hasn’t felt in a long time. Before he realised what happened, he was in the human world and all he heard was the laughter until he spotted you cowering on the floor, shivering.

And then he notices. A bruise on your cheek, red marks on your neck, turning a darker shade of purple and a wave of anger consumes him.

Your eyes are shut tight as are your ears that you don’t notice another breeze of wind, arms that disappear and some distant screams that cease a moment later.

Hands slowly touch your face. It’s the warmth of them that makes you slowly open your eyes. Tears that you tried so hard to hold back, stream down, seeing it’s Mammon, who’s kneeling in front of you. You don’t look for the witch, knowing he took care of her, because that’s what he promised when you were still in Devildom. He’ll always protect you.

Your eyes fall on his lips when you notice him speaking and slowly pull your hands away from ears.

“It’s okay…” his voice is quiet, like he’s afraid if he speaks louder, you’d disappear again. “You’re safe. The witch is gone.”

You can feel your shoulders slumber as you fall deeper into his embrace. Mammon wraps his arms around you and it’s not long before you completely break down.

Mammon’s heart aches at the sight. He has never seen you so beaten, so powerless. There’s no sign of any confidence that you used to emit, there’s no smile that always greeted him or a playful scolding when he did something stupid. There’s nothing but a broken shell of a someone, who you used to be, of a human that not a single thing could break you until …

Mammon comes to a stop, freezing as his eyes grow wider.

It’s their fault you became like this.

You’re sitting on the couch, back at the uncle’s house when you hear a panicked: “[Name]!” recognising Luke’s voice. In a second, he’s in front of you, looking over for any kind of bruise until he sees them on your neck. He stills, staring at them when his gaze turns into a glare and turns to Mammon.

“I-it’s not his fault!” You blurt out.

Both Luke and Mammon turn to look at you.

“Don’t excuse his actions.” Luke says, his expression that of a slight disappointment. You can’t blame him for thinking this way.

“Hey, what’s the big deal, huh?” Mammon speaks, his attention on the little angel. “I was summoned here. Summoned.”

“What?” Luke seems confused. “Who would summon you to the human world?” he scowls and crosses his arms while standing in front of you.

“I did…” your voice is quiet. The angel looks at you even more confused. “I-I don’t know how I did it, but a witch found me and apparently she had some kind of resentment against me.” you chuckle more to yourself. “I-I tried the summoning and somehow–it worked somehow.”

Luke is staring at you for a moment before he turns to Mammon. “What did you feel before you were summoned?”

His question throws both you and Mammon off guard. It felt like he knew this would happen.

It doesn’t take Mammon long to answer. “At first there was nothing,” Your heart broke at his words; “but then the place where the pact was started to burn a little and I felt that same tingling whenever I’m summoned.”

Luke pursues lips into a thin line as he listens, his arms still crossed.

“Luke?” you call quietly.

He doesn’t turn to you and you look at Mammon, who seems taken aback for some reason.

“What’s going on?” you ask, feeling more and more confused.

“Simeon warned me of this.” The angel starts slowly and looks at you. “He told me when you’ll be in danger, you will manage to summon them once again.”

“But…the pact was…broken.”

“Yes,” he nods, seeming like he’s deep in thoughts. “But at the same time, there are still some traces of it left behind.”

“How?” you ask and glance at Mammon, who’s too quiet.

“That…” Luke looks to the side. “Simeon has been trying to find out. Solomon once talked of this, but he himself didn’t know what it means.”

“I think I may know why…” Mammon murmurs.

Both you and Luke turn to look at him. He hesitates, but when he looks at you, you can see the guilt and regret in his eyes and you’re suddenly reminded why you wanted to break your pacts with them.

“Usually when we break our pacts with the summoner, it’s not one sided.” Mammon’s voice is rather quiet and it takes you a moment, but you quickly realise what he means. “I don’t think anyone knows, aside from us demons, but we can still feel the bond that connects us. Of course it depends on the strength of both the demon and the summoner.”

“So, you’re saying that because you didn’t agree, you can still be summoned?” Luke asks and Mammon nods. “But [Name] broke all pacts. It took part of their soul, their power and memories with them and they’re still able to summon you?”

Mammon winces at Luke’s words. It’s not the reaction you expected and you wonder what else he knows. Instead of saying anything, he simply nods.

“So, am I able to summon others as well?” you ask.

“I don’t know…” Mammon shrugs, unsure. “Ya had a pact with all seven of us and we’re not exactly some lower-class demons either.” For a moment he thinks, before he continues. “It also depends who yer first was. Ya might have trouble with the rest, since I didn’t feel it right away. There’s a chance they won’t feel anything at all.”

“Oh…” you murmur and lower your head.

“Do ya wanna see them?” Mammon asks and you look at him.

You don’t miss the way Luke shifts nervously, reaching for your hand unconsciously like he’s trying to change your mind just by his actions alone. “I…” you start, but stop, unsure what to say. “I don’t know…” you end up saying and Mammon nods in understanding as he looks away.

“Mammon,” you call quietly and he looks back at you. “I missed you…” you whisper.

A small smile spreads across his lips as he approaches you and kneels in front of you. He’s looking you directly into your eyes and you nibble on your lower lip, wondering what he’ll say. If he’s going to say anything at all.

“I’m sorry.”

Your eyes widen at his apology. His hands are holding on your legs and at first glance it seems like he’s holding onto them like he’s begging you for his own life.

“I’m sorry for calling ya Lilith. Ya didn’t deserve that and it was never our intention.”

You narrow your eyebrows.

“Ya remind us so much of her that whenever we saw ya, we felt so much regret for her we unconsciously began to call ya by her name. It might sound like an excuse to ya, but it’s the truth.” he stops and tightens his grip on your legs.

It seems so unlike him, yet the sincerity in his eyes is real, that much you know.

“I’m sorry as well.” you say and Mammon looks at you confused. “I could have corrected you so many times, but didn’t.”

“No,” he shakes his head. “Ya have, but we just … we continued. We were selfish. We wanted to have our little sister back so whenever we saw ya, we felt so much regret for not being able to protect her enough that we began to see her instead of ya. And whenever yer face appeared after we saw hers, we felt guilty, so we pretended yer her.”

You’re not sure what to say, if you even should say anything.

“I’m sorry, [Name].” he’s looking directly into your eyes.

You can see the sincerity in them. A small smile spreads across your lips that Mammon spots with his gaze when Luke clears his throat. Turning to look at the little angel, you caress his cheek, smiling softly.

“I’m okay…” you whisper.

This time Luke believes you and so do you.

29 notes · View notes

arcadejohn127-9 · 4 years ago

Note

Can we get the brothers and undatables being at one of Diavolos parties and a nobles starts telling MC that The brothers and undatables don’t really care about them. They start telling them that they are just Diavolos pawn and Lilliths replacement. BTW I love your writing it’s honestly some of my favorite pieces in the fandom.

Some of-of your f-favourite pieces in the fandom??!! Um Chile anyways- OMG!! Y'all are too sweet to me!!! Thank you so much!

I'm not going to lie, I got shocked when I saw another requested this as I just finished writing section for this ask but my brain is dumb and really focused on one sentence and read it utterly wrong

Part 2 - ending

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"ah, so you're the human I've been hearing so much about."

You turned around to see a Noble, you bowed at him with a smile.

"oh- hello, who are you? If the human you've been hearing about is (Y/N) then Yep! That's me!"

"splendid! I'm so glad I finally get to meet you, I've heard so much from Diavolo and news sources, you wouldn't mind humouring me for a dance and talk?"

"it'll be my honour." You took his arm, letting him guide you to the dance floor.

You could feel the brothers eyes on you, watching closely to how you rested your hands on the demons shoulder. All of them slowly stalking as you two danced.

"what is it like being a human in the Devildom?"

"scary...at first but now I feel like it's my home! I really can't imagine being anywhere else."

"free housings, connections to the most powerful beings in this realm and outside, pacts with the the 7 brothers and having them do anything you desire."

"I mean- I guess? It's nothing like that or that I'm using them, it's a long story - I love them all very much."

"you may not be using them but they're definitely using you, we're demons after all and there is nothing more precious to us than a soul likes yours."

You were suddenly pulled through the crowd, his dancing becoming quicker and sharp as if sensing the brothers watching him.

"don't you realize you're just the princes pawn? A small piece of a puzzle of his 'plans' - do you really think a demon of his importance would really care about bringing peace?! It's all but a ruse and you're just helping him fulfil it."

"that's not true! Diavolo is a kind and thoughtful man, he wants peace and I will be a stepping stone for that to happen - after all I am a link to all three realms."

"human with demon pacts and ancestral connections to both the brothers and angels - how is it being the ancestor to Lilith? I heard she was a real doll but such a shame she risked it all for some moral, have they ever compared you two?"

"how do you know about my ancestor? They've- never properly made a comparison and I'm sure they mean it in an affectionate way-!"

"don't you ever feel like a replacement? I heard since the discovery they've treated you even better, that can't be a coincidence."

Your blood went cold as your heart collapsed into your stomach. Your eyes glancing to the brothers In the distance. You knew he wasn't right but apart of you was scared. After all, he knew so much that you didn't think anyone outside of your social circle would know. How did he know all this?

"we went through something really traumatic together, it was bound to make us closer-"

"just admit it, you know you're being use but you just won't accept it because you're scared of facing and truth and being left - is there something unpleasant waiting for you in the human world? Is that why you're so willing to be preyed upon?"

"it's not like that..."

He suddenly dipped you, you clutched to his shoulder as tears glazed your eyes.

"isn't it? Can you confidently say it isn't?"

"yes.." your voice came out shaky and distant, you wanted to be confident but you couldn't.

"they don't care about you, all they want is to use you, make it easier on yourself and leave, run as fast as you can and never come back to the devildom."

Lucifer:

He was the first to reach you after your dance with the Noble

He twirled you so you would face him

"what did he say to you? You're crying."

"it's nothing..."

He opened his mouth to press on but he saw you grit your teeth

Glaring at the dance floor as you two stepped to the music

"If he threatened you then I'll handle him, it's no issue for me to do so."

You just shook your head

"stop being so overprotective, I know you don't actually like having to look after me, just stop forcing yourself."

"That's not true, I look after you because I care about you, it's become more than a duty."

You just clicked your tongue, pushing yourself away from him, disappearing into the crowd

Mammon:

Mammon held your hand, hugging you from behind as you two swayed

"You don't look too happy, are you overwhelmed?"

"I am now that you're here."

Which wasn't a lie, you felt so conflicted and betrayed, having him around just made you want to cry

He frowned, spinning you around

"oi, what's that all about? If I did something you gotta be honest with me,I swear I didn't steal nothing."

"I'd prefer it if you did, then being mad at you wouldn't feel so horrible."

He raised a brow

He was completely confused on why you were acting like this

"Was it that noble guy? Did he say something to you? I swear when I find him-"

You shook your head, moving away from him

"You're not going to do anything, you're a coward - just stop pestering me."

You felt awful but you didn't do anything to fix it, just running away from the shocked demon

Levithan:

"You here to take a break? Join you, I will."

He pointed to the empty spot smiling at himself for his Yoda voice

You wanted to feel bad but right now you were extremely upset

"Yeah, I do, I don't want to be around anyone right now."

"I get that but Lucifer said someone's has to be with you but I don't blame you for not wanting me to do it-"

You snarled

"can you not make this about you?! I just don't wanna deal with anymore demons!"

You shuffled closer into yourself, eyes subconsciously finding the noble you talked to

Levi followed your gaze, his Insecure angst turning into annoyance

"That noble did something....it's okay to speak up, we can go to prince-"

"go away! I don't want to keep hearing you pretend to care about me!"

He was stunned

You suddenly stood up and trudged away from Levi, seeking out the bathroom

Satan:

You ducked away from the crowd of demons

Sticking close to the wall as you clutched your arms

The nobles clawing at your mind as you stared to the side

"Did you enjoy the dancing? You look tired, I know a good hiding spot."

"Where is it?"

"I'll take you there-"

He went to grab your shoulder but you just shrugged him away

Not daring to look at him

"just tell me where it is, I'll get there on my own just fine."

Satan turned his head, trying to get a better look at your expression

But you just stepped away from him

"if you're not going to tell me I'm going to go find it myself-"

He grabbed your wrist, cutting you off

"Was it that noble? What did he say to you?"

His anger flared as he glared at the noble

You Yanked your wrist away, frowning

"wouldn't you like to know?! Just let me- just let me breathe-!"

He paused, inhaling a deep breath

You took that moment to run off, wanting to escape the situation

Asmodeus:

"oh (Y/N)~!! I'm so glad you're finally free, when I saw that guy dancing with you I got so jealous, I thought you were going to give me all your dances?"

He playfully pouted whilst holding your hands

When he saw you weren't smiling his chipper mood immediately dropped

You moved away from him, Unable to pull your thoughts together

"what's wrong..? Did he say something?"

You shook your head

Should you tell him? But what if they treat you different?

What if it really is all a fake?

"I just need to get some air."

"oh! I'll come with you!"

He springed up, grabbing your hand once again

You threw yourself back in panick

"NO-! I mean- no thank you."

You quickly dashed to the nearest balcony ignoring the murmurs in the ballroom

Beezlebub:

You bumped into one of the many buffet tables

Avoiding an active ballroom wasn't easy

"you're not dancing anymore? Want to sit with me?"

You jumped, somehow surprised Beel was at a buffet table

"no....I'm good, I'm going to the dorm."

"Already? Do you need me to walk you home? It's pretty late."

You shook your head

You wanted to chew him out for being so kind of you

Your overwhelming emotions rising as you tried to stay dismissive

"Just tell the Brothers I'm leaving, I think I'm going to head back home."

Beel raised a brow

You looked away from his confused expression

"my real home, I need to leave the Devildom."

"you're upset from your dance with the noble, we can talk about instead of you leaving-"

"I need a break."

You repeated, your voice becoming irritated and cold

You held back your frustration and left the party

Belphegor:

"Are you leaving?"

You yelped, knocking your hand on the main door

You just wanted to slip out of the party but it seems you'd have to confront one of the brothers

Belphegor yawned, rubbing his eye

He was sleeping in the coat closet until you woke him up by your footsteps

"yes- I'm tired of this party."

"I'm tired aswell, let's go together, I'm ready to sleep."

He shuffled out of the closet but you put your hands out Infront of you

"go sleep in the palace, I don't want to be around you or-or any of you-!"

"Was it that noble? I felt jealous when I saw you two dancing together but now it seems I shouldn't of, he said something to you, didn't he? What did he say?"

You didn't even realize he saw you or was awake when that happened

You backed up until you bumped into the door

Belphegor cornered you

Wanting his questions answered but you just shoved him back

"leave me alone-! I know you're just see me as an replacement!"

You slammed the door after you and sprinted back to the dorms

UNDATEABLES↓

Diavolo:

"I see you're expanding your circle, I'm glad- why do you look so upset?"

"it's nothing, my Lord-"

You both stopped

You haven't referred to him like that since the beginning of the exchange program

He leaned down to get a better look at you, eyes darting over the conflicted and slightly Horrified expression

Both of your gazes landed on the noble

"What did he say to you? If he made you uncomfortable or threatened you, I'll deal with this-"

He tried to give you a comforting pat on the shoulder but you pushed your body away

"Quit it! Stop trying to act like you care."

You were sure if people saw your interaction they'd be glaring at you

Thinking of your audacity

But Diavolo was worried about you

He knew that Nobel has hurt you

"I do care for you, we all do - please tell me what happened."

You covered your ears, tears pricking your eyes

You shook your head and ran away

Needing space to figure out your thoughts and your emotions

Barbatos:

You trudged past Everyone, growing irritated with yourself

Were you really going to believe that guy? But it seemed to make sense

If it wasn't right then why did you feel this way?

"here, you look as if you need it."

He hands you a handkerchief

You took it slowly, looking at him with distrust

You frowned as he just smiled at you patiently

"why do you even care? Is it because of the prince?"

"I'm simply helping because I desire to, it seems Someone is causing an issue with you."

"Don't you know everything? You should know exactly what's wrong....you don't have to keep acting all vague in hopes it'll throw me off, I know you all are-"

He tilted his head, eyes squinting with an almost annoyed expression

"nevermind....Just leave me alone."

"I will but it is best to remind you that the Noble you're trusting Is not the type of man you want to be around, he is using you not the other way round."

Your froze

Unsure how to respond, you clutched the handkerchief as you gritted your teeth

You quickly ran off not wanting to confront your emotions

Solomon:

Isn't this Fun? I've even made a few pacts whilst here-"

"why are we even here? Do you ever feel like we're not actually wanted? Just being used?"

Your eyes flickered between Diavolo and the noble

Rubbing your arm as you tried to soothe yourself

Solomon followed your eyes

Clicking his tongue

"I see, that nobles gotten to your head, don't fear my apprentice, I'll fix this."

He rolled up his sleeves but you just grabbed his arm

You felt stupid for thinking you two could be on the same thought process

Was it really just the Nobel Getting to you???

But what you're feeling feels so real and so genuine - this feeling of just being a pawn or a replacement to them

"No...it's silly to think we'd be on the same page, they have much more history with you meanwhile all I have is being their sister's ancestor."

You walked off leaving the wizard to mewl over your words

You didn't stay to find out what would happen now that Solomon knew the gist of what the Nobel said to you

Simeon:

As you charged away from the party you suddenly bumped into Someone

Simeon grabbed your arms as he steadied you

But that's when he noticed your teary eyes

"Oh, what's wrong? You look upset."

"I want to leave this party."

You frowned, holding his arms whilst he held you

You glanced at the demons on the dance floor

"Are you sure? The brothers will be upset with your sudden disappearance-"

You huffed

Pushing yourself away from Simeon as. got ready to just leave by yourself

"if you don't take me back then I'll just go myself."

He was caught off by your sudden change in mood

Realizing something really harsh must of happened he grabbed your hands and wiped under your eye

"Wipe your tears, I'm sure Luke will be thrilled to see you in purgatory hall."

And just like that he walked you out of ball

A few shouts from the brothers rang in your eyes but you just sped up your pace

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me mammon #gamingclubpresident #aracadejohn217 9 #obey me mc #obey me asmodeus #obey me satan #obey me beezlebub #obey me belphegor #obey me demon brothers #obey me diavolo #obey me barbatos #obey me simeon #obey me solomon #obey me levithan #obey me luficer #obey me imagine #obey me x reader

1K notes · View notes