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reasonsforhope · 18 days ago

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Here's the top 2 stories from each of Fix The News's six categories:

1. A game-changing HIV drug was the biggest story of 2024

In what Science called the 'breakthrough of the year', researchers revealed in June that a twice-yearly drug called lenacapavir reduced HIV infections in a trial in Africa to zero—an astonishing 100% efficacy, and the closest thing to a vaccine in four decades of research. Things moved quick; by October, the maker of the drug, Gilead, had agreed to produce an affordable version for 120 resource-limited countries, and by December trials were underway for a version that could prevent infection with just a single shot per year. 'I got cold shivers. After all our years of sadness, particularly over vaccines, this truly is surreal.'

2. Another incredible year for disease elimination

Jordan became the first country to eliminate leprosy, Chad eliminated sleeping sickness, Guinea eliminated maternal and neonatal tetanus, Belize, Jamaica, and Saint Vincent & the Grenadines eliminated mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis, India achieved the WHO target for eliminating black fever, India, Viet Nam and Pakistan eliminated trachoma, the world’s leading infectious cause of blindness, and Brazil and Timor Leste eliminated elephantiasis.

15. The EU passed a landmark nature restoration law

When countries pass environmental legislation, it’s big news; when an entire continent mandates the protection of nature, it signals a profound shift. Under the new law, which passed on a knife-edge vote in June 2024, all 27 member states are legally required to restore at least 20% of land and sea by 2030, and degraded ecosystems by 2050. This is one of the world’s most ambitious pieces of legislation and it didn’t come easy; but the payoff will be huge - from tackling biodiversity loss and climate change to enhancing food security.

16. Deforestation in the Amazon halved in two years

Brazil’s space agency, INPE, confirmed a second consecutive year of declining deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. That means deforestation rates have roughly halved under Lula, and are now approaching all time lows. In Colombia, deforestation dropped by 36%, hitting a 23-year low. Bolivia created four new protected areas, a huge new new state park was created in Pará to protect some of the oldest and tallest tree species in the tropical Americas and a new study revealed that more of the Amazon is protected than we originally thought, with 62.4% of the rainforest now under some form of conservation management.

39. Millions more children got an education

Staggering statistics incoming: between 2000 and 2023, the number of children and adolescents not attending school fell by nearly 40%, and Eastern and Southern Africa, achieved gender parity in primary education, with 25 million more girls are enrolled in primary school today than in the early 2000s. Since 2015, an additional 110 million children have entered school worldwide, and 40 million more young people are completing secondary school.

40. We fed around a quarter of the world's kids at school

Around 480 million students are now getting fed at school, up from 319 million before the pandemic, and 104 countries have joined a global coalition to promote school meals, School feeding policies are now in place in 48 countries in Africa, and this year Nigeria announced plans to expand school meals to 20 million children by 2025, Kenya committed to expanding its program from two million to ten million children by the end of the decade, and Indonesia pledged to provide lunches to all 78 million of its students, in what will be the world's largest free school meals program.

50. Solar installations shattered all records

Global solar installations look set to reach an unprecedented 660GW in 2024, up 50% from 2023's previous record. The pace of deployment has become almost unfathomable - in 2010, it took a month to install a gigawatt, by 2016, a week, and in 2024, just 12 hours. Solar has become not just the cheapest form of new electricity in history, but the fastest-growing energy technology ever deployed, and the International Energy Agency said that the pace of deployment is now ahead of the trajectory required for net zero by 2050.

51. Battery storage transformed the economics of renewables

Global battery storage capacity surged 76% in 2024, making investments in solar and wind energy much more attractive, and vice-versa. As with solar, the pace of change stunned even the most cynical observers. Price wars between the big Chinese manufacturers pushed battery costs to record lows, and global battery manufacturing capacity increased by 42%, setting the stage for future growth in both grid storage and electric vehicles - crucial for the clean flexibility required by a renewables-dominated electricity system. The world's first large-scale grid battery installation only went online seven years ago; by next year, global battery storage capacity will exceed that of pumped hydro.

65. Democracy proved remarkably resilient in a record year of elections

More than two billion people went to the polls this year, and democracy fared far better than most people expected, with solid voter turnout, limited election manipulation, and evidence of incumbent governments being tamed. It wasn't all good news, but Indonesia saw the world's biggest one day election, Indian voters rejected authoritarianism, South Korea's democratic institutions did the same, Bangladesh promised free and fair elections following a 'people's victory', Senegal, Sri Lanka and Botswana saw peaceful transfers of power to new leaders after decades of single party rule, and Syria saw the end of one of the world's most horrific authoritarian regimes.

66. Global leaders committed to ending violence against children

In early November, while the eyes of the world were on the US election, an event took place that may prove to be a far more consequential for humanity. Five countries pledged to end corporal punishment in all settings, two more pledged to end it in schools, and another 12, including Bangladesh and Nigeria, accepted recommendations earlier in the year to end corporal punishment of children in all settings. In total, in 2024 more than 100 countries made some kind of commitment to ending violence against children. Together, these countries are home to hundreds of millions of children, with the WHO calling the move a 'fundamental shift.'

73. Space exploration hit new milestones

NASA’s Europa Clipper began a 2.9 billion kilometre voyage to Jupiter to investigate a moon that may have conditions for life; astronomers identified an ice world with a possible atmosphere in the habitable zone; and the James Webb Telescope found the farthest known galaxy. Closer to Earth, China landed on the far side of the moon, the Polaris Dawn crew made a historic trip to orbit, and Starship moved closer to operational use – and maybe one day, to travel to Mars.

74. Next-generation materials advanced

A mind-boggling year for material science. Artificial intelligence helped identify a solid-state electrolyte that could slash lithium use in batteries by 70%, and an Apple supplier announced a battery material that can deliver around 100 times better energy density. Researchers created an insulating synthetic sapphire material 1.25 nanometers thick, plus the world’s thinnest lens, just three atoms across. The world’s first functioning graphene-based semiconductor was unveiled (the long-awaited ‘wonder material’ may finally be coming of age!) and a team at Berkeley invented a fluffy yellow powder that could be a game changer for removing carbon from the atmosphere.

-via Fix The News, December 19, 2024

#renumbered this to reflect the article numbering #and highlight just how many stories of hope there are #and how many successes each labeled story contains #2024 #good news #hope #hope posting #hopeposting #hopepunk #conservation #sustainability #public health #energy #quality of life #human rights #science and technology

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 month ago

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Predicting the present

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/12/09/radicalized/#deny-defend-depose

Back in 2018, around the time I emailed my immigration lawyer about applying for US citizenship, I started work on a short story called "Radicalized," which eventually became the title story of a collection that came out in 2019:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250228598/radicalized/

"Radicalized" is a story about America, and about guns, and about health care, and about violence. I live in Burbank, which is ranks second in gun-stores-per-capita in the USA, a dubious honor that represents a kind of regulatory arbitrage with our neighboring goliath, the City of Los Angeles, where gun store licensing is extremely tight. If you're an Angeleno in search of a firearm, you're almost certainly coming to Burbank to buy it.

Walking, cycling and driving past more gun stores than I'd ever seen in my Canadian life got me thinking about Americans and guns, a subject that many Canadians have passed comment upon. Americans kill each other, and especially themselves, at rates that baffle everyone else in the world, and they do it with guns. When we moved here, my UK born-and-raised daughter came home from her first elementary school lockdown drill perplexed and worried. Knowing what I did about US gun violence, I understood that while school shootings and other spree killings happened with dismal and terrifying regularity, they only accounted for a small percentage of the gun deaths here. If you die with a bullet in you, the chances are that the finger on the trigger was your own. The next most likely suspect is someone you know. After that, a cop. Getting shot by a stranger out of uniform is something of a rarity here – albeit a spectacular one that captures our imaginations in ways that deliberate or accidental self-slayings and related-party shootings do not.

So I told her, "Look, you can basically ignore everything they tell you during those lockdown drills, because they almost certainly have nothing to do with your future. But if a friend ever says to you, 'Hey, wanna see my dad's gun?' I want you to turn around and leave and get in touch with me right away, that instant."

Guns turn the murderous impulse – which, let's be honest, we've all felt at some time or another – into a murderous act. Same goes for suicide, which explains the high levels of non-accidental self-shootings in the USA: when you've got a gun, the distance between suicidal ideation and your death is the ten feet from the sofa to the gun in the closet.

Americans get angry at people and then, if they have a gun to hand, sometimes they shoot them. In a thread /r/Burbank about how people at our local cinemas are rude and use their phones in which someone posted, "Well, you should just ask them to stop." The reply: "That's a great way to get shot." No one chimed in to say, "Don't be ridiculous, no one would shoot you for asking them to put away their phone during a movie." Same goes for "road rage."

And while Americans shoot people they've only just gotten angry at, they also sometimes plan shooting sprees and kill a bunch of people because they're just generically angry. Being angry about the state of the world is a completely relatable emotion, of course, but the targets of these shootings are arbitrary. Sure sometimes these killings have clear, bigoted targets – mass shootings at Black supermarkets or mosques or synagogues or gay bars – more often the people who get sprayed with bullets (at country and western concerts or elementary schools or movie theaters) are almost certainly not the people the gunman (almost always a man) is angry at.

This line of thought kept surfacing as I went through the immigration process, but not just when I was dealing with immigration paperwork. I was also spending an incredible amount of time dealing with our health insurer, Cigna, who kept refusing treatments my pain doctor – one of the most-cited pain researchers in the country – thought I would benefit from. I've had chronic pain since I was a teenager, and it's only ever gotten worse. I've had decades of pain care in Canada and the UK, and while the treatments never worked for very long, it was never compounded by the kinds of bureaucratic stuff I went through with my US insurer.

The multi-hour phone calls with Cigna that went nowhere would often have me seeing red – literally, a red tinge closing in around my vision – and usually my hands would be shaking by the time I got off the call.

And I had it easy! I wasn't terminally ill, and I certainly wasn't calling in on behalf of a child or a spouse or parent who was seriously ill or dying, whose care was being denied by their insurer. Bernie's 2016 Medicare For All campaign promise had filled the air with statistics (Americans pay more for care and get worse outcomes than anyone else in the rich world), and stories. So many stories – stories that just tore your heart out, about parents who literally had to watch their children die because the insurance they paid for refused to treat their kids. As a dad, I literally couldn't imagine how I'd cope in that situation. Just thinking about it filled me with rage.

One day, as I was swimming in the community pool across the street – a critical part of my pain management strategy – I was struck with a thought: "Why don't these people murder health insurance executives?" Not that I wanted them to. I don't want anyone to kill anyone. But why do American men who murder their wives and the people who cut them off in traffic and random classrooms full of children leave the health insurance industry alone? This is an industry that is practically designed to fill the people who interact with it with uncontrollable rage. I mean, if you're watching your wife or your kid die before your eyes because some millionaire CEO decided to aim for a $10 billion stock buyback this year instead of his customary $9 billion target, wouldn't you feel that kind of murderous rage?

Around this time, my parents came out for a visit from Canada. It was a great trip, until one night, my mom woke me up after midnight: "We have to take your father to the ER. He's really sick." He was: shaking, nauseated, feverish. We raced down the street to the local hospital, part of a gigantic chain that has swallowed nearly all the doctors' practices, labs and hospitals within an hour's drive of here.

Dad had kidney stones, and they'd gone septic. When the ER docs removed the stones, all the septic gunk in his kidneys was flushed into his bloodstream, and he crashed. If he hadn't been in an ER recovery room at the time, he would have died. As it was, he was in a coma for three days and it was touch and go. My brother flew down from Toronto, not sure if this was his last chance to see our dad alive. The nurses and doctors took great care of my dad, though, and three days later, he emerged from his coma, and today, he's better than ever.

But on day two, when we thought he was probably at the end of his life, as my mother sat at his side, holding the hand of her husband of fifty years, someone from the hospital billing department came to her side and said, "Mrs Doctorow, I know this is a difficult time, but I'd like to discuss the matter of your husband's bill with you."

The bill was $176,000. Thankfully, the travel medical insurance plan offered by the Ontario Teachers' Union pension covered it all (I don't suppose anyone gets very angry with them).

How do people tolerate this? Again, not in the sense of "people should commit violent acts in the face of these provocations," but rather, "How is it that in a country filled with both assault rifles and unimaginable acts of murderous cruelty committed by fantastically wealthy corporations, people don't leap from their murderous impulses to their murderous weapons to commit murderous acts?

For me, writing fiction is an accretive process. I can tell that a story is brewing when thoughts start rattling around in my mind, resurfacing at odd times. I think of them as stray atoms, seeking molecules with available docking sites to glom onto. I process all my emotions – but especially my negative ones – through this process, by writing stories and novels. I could tell that something was cooking, but it was missing an ingredient.

Then I found it: an interview with the woman who coined the term "incel." It was on the Reply All podcast, and Alana, a queer Canadian woman explained that she had struggled all her life to find romantic and sexual partnership, and jokingly started referring to herself as "involuntarily celibate," and then, as an "incel":

https://gimletmedia.com/shows/reply-all/76h59o

Alana started a message board where other "incels" could offer each other support, and it was remarkably successful. The incels on Alana's message board helped each other work through the problems that stood between them and love, and when they did, they drifted away from the board to pursue a happier life.

That was the problem, Alana explained. If you're in a support group for people with a drinking problem, the group elders, the ones who've been around forever, are the people who've figured it out and gotten sober. When life seems impossible, those elders step in to tell you, I know it's terrible right now, but it'll get better. I was where you are and I got through it. You will, too. I'm here for you. We all are.

But on Alana's incel board, the old timers were the people who couldn't figure it out. They were the ones for whom mutual support and advice didn't help them figure out what they needed to do in order to find the love they sought. The longer the message board ran, the more it became dominated by people who were convinced that it was hopeless, that love was impossible for the likes of them. When newbies posted in rage and despair, these Great Old Ones were there to feed it: You're right. It will never get better. It only gets worse. There is no hope.

That was the missing piece. My short story Radicalized was born. It's a story about men on a message board called Fuck Cancer Right In the Fucking Face (FCKRFF, or "Fuckriff"), who are watching the people they love the most in the world be murdered by their insurance companies, who egg each other on to spectacular acts of mass violence against health insurance company employees, hospital billing offices, and other targets of their rage. As of today, anyone can read this story for free, courtesy of my publishers at Macmillan, who gave permission for the good folks at The American Prospect to post it:

https://prospect.org/culture/books/2024-12-09-radicalized-cory-doctorow-story-health-care/

I often hear from people about this story, even before an unknown (at the time of writing) man assassinated Brian Thompson, CEO of Unitedhealthcare, the murderous health insurance monopoly that is the largest medical insurer in the USA. Since then, hundreds of people have gotten in touch with me to ask me how I feel about this turn of events, how it feels to have "predicted" this.

I've been thinking about it for a few days now, and I gotta tell you, I have complicated feelings.

You've doubtless seen the outpourings of sarcastic graveyard humor about Thompson's murder. People hate Unitedhealthcare, for good reason, because he personally decided – or approved – countless policies that killed people by cheating them until they died.

Nurses and doctors hate Thompson and United. United kills people, for money. During the most acute phase of the pandemic, the company charged the US government $11,000 for each $8 covid test:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/09/06/137300-pct-markup/#137300-pct-markup

UHC leads the nation in claims denials, with a denial rate of 32% (!!). If you want to understand how the US can spend 20% of its GDP and get the worst health outcomes in the world, just connect the dots between those two facts: the largest health insurer in human history charges the government a 183,300% markup on covid tests and also denies a third of its claims.

UHC is a vertically integrated, murdering health profiteer. They bought Optum, the largest pharmacy benefit manager ("A spreadsheet with political power" -Matt Stoller) in the country. Then they starved Optum of IT investment in order to give more money to their shareholders. Then Optum was hacked by ransomware gang and no one could get their prescriptions for weeks. This killed people:

https://www.economicliberties.us/press-release/malicious-threat-actor-accesses-unitedhealth-groups-monopolistic-data-exchange-harming-patients-and-pharmacists/#

The irony is, Optum is terrible even when it's not hacked. The purpose of Optum is to make you pay more for pharmaceuticals. If that's more than you can afford, you die. Optum – that is, UHC – kills people:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/23/shield-of-boringness/#some-men-rob-you-with-a-fountain-pen

Optum isn't the only murderous UHC division. Take Navihealth, an algorithm that United uses to kick people out of their hospital beds even if they're so frail, sick or injured they can't stand or walk. Doctors and nurses routinely watch their gravely ill patients get thrown out of their hospitals. Many die. UHC kills them, for money:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-08-16-steward-bankruptcy-physicians-private-equity/

The patients murdered by Navihealth are on Medicare Advantage. Medicare is the public health care system the USA extends to old people. Medicare Advantage is a privatized system you can swap your Medicare coverage for, and UHC leads the country in Medicare Advantage, blitzing seniors with deceptive ads that trick them into signing up for UHC Medicare Advantage. Seniors who do this lose access to their doctors and specialists, have to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for their medication, and get hit with $400 surprise bills to use the "free" ambulance service:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-12-05-manhattan-medicare-murder-mystery/

No wonder the public spends 22% more subsidizing Medicare Advantage than they spend on the care for seniors who stick with actual Medicare:

https://theconversation.com/taxpayers-spend-22-more-per-patient-to-support-medicare-advantage-the-private-alternative-to-medicare-that-promised-to-cost-less-241997

It's not just the elderly, it's also the addicted and mentally ill. UHC illegally denies coverage for mental health and substance abuse treatment. Imagine watching a family member spiral out of control, ODing, or ending up on the streets with hallucinations, and knowing that the health insurance company that takes thousands of dollars out of your paycheck refused to treat them:

https://www.startribune.com/unitedhealthcare-will-pay-15-7m-in-settlement-of-denial-of-care-charges/600087607

Unsurprising, the internal culture at UHC is callous beyond belief. How could it not be? How could you go to work at UHC and know you were killing people and not dehumanize those victims? A lawsuit by chronically ill patient whom UHC had denied care for surfaced recorded phone calls in which UHC employees laughed long and hard about the denied claims, dismissing the patient's desperate, tearful pleas as "tantrums" :

https://www.propublica.org/article/unitedhealth-healthcare-insurance-denial-ulcerative-colitis

Those UHC workers are just trying to get by, of course, and the callouses they develop so they can bear to go to work were ripped off by last week's murder. UHC's executive team knows this, and has gone on a rampage to stop employees from leaking their own horror stories, or even mentioning that the internal company announcement of Thompson's death was seen by 16,000 employees, of whom only 28 left a comment:

https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/unitedhealthcare-tells-employees

Doctors and nurses hate UHC on behalf of their patients, but it's also personal. UHC screws doctor's practices by refusing to pay them, making them chase payments for months or even years, and then it offers them a payday lending service that helps them keep the lights on while they wait to get paid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frr4wuvAB6U

Is it any surprise that Reddit's nursing forums are full of nurses making grim, satisfied jokes about the assassination of the $10m/year CEO who ran the $400b/year corporation that does all this?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/leading-medical-subreddit-deletes-thread-on-unitedhealthcare-ceos-murder-after-users-slam-his-record/

We're not supposed to experience – much less express – schadenfreude when someone is murdered in the street, no matter who they are. We're meant to express horror at the idea of political violence, even when that violence only claims a single life, a fraction of the body count UCH produced under Thompson's direction. As Malcolm Harris put it, "'Every life is precious' stuff about a healthcare CEO whose company is noted for denying coverage is pretty silly":

https://twitter.com/BigMeanInternet/status/1864471932386623753

As Woody Guthrie wrote, "Some will rob you with a six-gun/And some with a fountain pen." The weapon is lethal when it's a pistol and when it's an insurance company. The insurance company merely serves as an accountability sink, a layer of indirection that lets a murder happen without any person being the technical murderer:

https://profilebooks.com/work/the-unaccountability-machine/

I don't want people to kill insurance executives, and I don't want insurance executives to kill people. But I am unsurprised that this happened. Indeed, I'm surprised that it took so long. It should not be controversial to note that if you run an institution that makes people furious, they will eventually become furious with you. This is the entire pitch of Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century: that wealth concentration leads to corruption, which is destabilizing, and in the long run it's cheaper to run a fair society than it is to pay for the guards you'll need to keep the guillotines off your lawn:

https://memex.craphound.com/2014/06/24/thomas-pikettys-capital-in-the-21st-century/

But we've spent the past 40 years running in the other direction, maximizing monopolies, inequality and corruption, and gaslighting the public when they insist that this is monstrous and unfair. Back in 2022, when UHC was buying Change Healthcare – the dominant payment network for hospitals, which would allow UHC to surveil all its competitors' payments – the DOJ sued to block the merger. The Trump-appointed judge in the case, Carl Nichols – who owned tens of thousands of dollars in UHC bonds – ruled against the DOJ, saying that it would all be fine thanks to United's "culture of trust and integrity":

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/the-antitrust-shooting-war-has-started

We don't know much about Thompson's killer yet, but he's already becoming a folk hero, with lookalike contests in NYC:

https://twitter.com/CollinRugg/status/1865472577478553976

And gigantic graffiti murals praising him and reproducing the words he wrote on the shell casings of the bullets he used to kill Thompson, "delay, deny, depose":

https://www.tumblr.com/radicalgraff/769193188403675136/killin-fuckin-ceos-freight-graff-in-the-bay

I get why this is distasteful. Thompson is said to have been a "family man" who loved his kids, and I have no reason to disbelieve this. I can only imagine that his wife and kids are shattered by this. Every living person is the apex of a massive project involving dozens, hundreds of people who personally worked to raise, nurture and love them. I wrote about this in my novel Walkaway, as the characters consider whether to execute a mercenary sent to kill them, whom they have taken hostage:

She had parents. People who loved her. Every human was a hyper-dense node of intense emotional and material investment. Speaking meant someone had spent thousands of hours cooing to you. Those lean muscles, the ringing tone of command — their inputs were from all over the world, carefully administered. The merc was more than a person: like a spaceship launch, her existence implied thousands of skilled people, generations of experts, wars, treaties, scholarship and supply-chain management. Every one of them was all that.

But so often, the formula for "folk hero" is "killing + time." The person who terrorizes the people who terrorize you is your hero, and eventually we sanitize the deaths, and just remember them as fighters for justice. If you doubt it, consider the legend of Robin Hood:

https://twitter.com/mcmansionhell/status/1865554985842352501

The health industry is trying to put a lid on this, palpably afraid that – as in my story "Radicalized" – this one murderer will become a folk hero who inspires others to acts of spectacular violence. They're insisting that it's unseemly to gloat about Thompson's death. They're right, but this is an obvious loser strategy. The health industry is full of people whose deaths would be deplorable, but not unsurprising. As Clarence Darrow had it:

I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.

Murder is never the answer. Murder is not a healthy response to corruption. But it is healthy for people to fear that if they kill people for greed, they will be unsafe. On December 5 – the day after Thompson's killing – the health insurer Anthem announced that it would not pay for anesthesia for medical procedures that ran long. The next day, they retracted the policy, citing "outrage":

https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/05/health/anthem-blue-cross-blue-shield-anesthesia-claim-limits/index.html

Sure, maybe it was their fear of reputation damage that got them to decide to reverse this inhumane, disgusting, murderous policy. But maybe it was also someone in the C-suite thinking about what share of the profits from this policy would have to be spent on additional bodyguards for every Anthem exec if it went into effect, and decided that it was a money-loser after all.

Think about hospital exec Ralph de la Torre, who cheerfully testified to Congress that he'd killed patients in pursuit of profit. De la Torre clearly doesn't fear any kind of consequences for his actions. He owns hospitals that are filled with tens of thousands of bats (he stiffed the exterminators), where none of the elevators work (he stiffed the repair techs), where there's no medicine or blood (he stiffed the suppliers) and where the doctors and nurses can't make rent (he stiffed them too). De La Torre doesn't just own hospitals – he also owns a pair of superyachts:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/28/5000-bats/#charnel-house

It is a miracle that so many people have lost their mothers, sons, wives and husbands so Ralph de la Torre could buy himself another superyacht, and that those people live in a country where you can buy an assault rifle, and that Ralph de la Torre isn't forced to live in a bunker and travel in a tank.

It's a rather beautiful sort of miracle, to be honest. I like to think that it comes from a widespread belief by the people of this country I have since become a citizen of, that we should solve our problems politically, rather than with bullets.

But the assassination of Brian Thompson is a wake-up call, a warning that if we don't solve this problem politically, we may not have a choice about whether it's solved with violence. As a character in "Radicalized" says, "They say violence never solves anything, but to quote The Onion: that's only true so long as you ignore all of human history":

https://prospect.org/culture/books/2024-12-09-radicalized-cory-doctorow-story-health-care/

#pluralistic #unitedhealthcare #assassination #execution #violence #murder #science fiction #radicalized #health insurance #m4a #medicare for all #Brian Thompson #guns #cancer #corruption #usausausa #torment nexus

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smileysuh · 10 months ago

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devil's girl

🌙 starring. Choi Seungcheol x afab!Reader I ft. Mingyu & Wonwoo

🔮 preview. “Three hundred years ago, one of your ancestors promised me a descendant as my prophesied betrothed. A girl of her bloodline who would bear my hybrid offspring, children with the power of demons and witches, bodies unrestricted by the laws of heaven or hell. A witch who would be identified by the mark of the Devil, drawn through with three lines.”

tw/cw. foreplay, fingering, oral (f receiving), Cheol is low-key pussy obsessed, overstimulation, 5-inch long demon tongue, invisible demon bondage magic, the demon magic can also vibrate her clit a little, bdsm themes, slight choking, squirting, wet kink, massive cock cheol, pussy stretching, impreg/breeding/cum kink, dirty talk, service dom Cheol, consent is a must, begging, multiple reader orgasms, unprotected sex, hand job, dream/incubi threesome with Mingyu & Wonwoo, double fingering, degradation, dacryphilia, etc… I pet names: (hers) little/my sweet, pretty girl, good girl, whore/slut (1), baby, little love, etc. (his) sir, daddy.

👹 rating.18+ explicit I wc. 7.2k

🍭 aus. king of hell!Cheol, witch descendant!y/n, prophesy, arranged marriage, yandere/possessive themes, slight kidnapping, etc…

☀️ mlist + an. I feel like I need the men I write about every time, but when I tell you I need this man biblically, when I tell you I need him to kidnap me and make me the Queen of Hell and knock me up with demon hybrid babies asap-

Prologue:

It was not a fate that she would have ever wished upon any of her descendants, but there was a price to pay for power, a price to pay for life and a line continued. The old crone signed the contract, bound in blood, with the King of Hell, promising one of her own line as his future intended.

She could not foresee when the prophesied witch would be born, all she could promise The Dark King was that the descendant would bear the mark of the Devil. Somewhere in the world, there would be a girl born with a pentagram birthmark, run through with three lines, and that girl, would bear the task of giving children to the King of Hell himself.

The crone did this to solidify her line would survive the witch trials ravaging the country, the contract would ensure demonic protection from death- none of the King’s loyal followers would allow harm to fall upon any woman who could possibly birth the next Queen of Hell.

As the trials continued, not one of the crone’s daughters were harmed. Years went by, with the crone checking every new grandaughter and great-granddaughter for marks. When it became clear that the prophesied girl would not be born in her time on Earth, she urged all her descendants to be fruitful and multiply, in the hopes that, with a large family line, the Demon King would have a harder time finding the contracted child.

Upon her death, the old crone’s family took her words to heart. Not only did the daughters multiply after the witch trials had ended, but they split. Some became nomadic, others found places to settle down and have whole swaths of children. Many of these descendants took upon new names, as women always took the last name of their husbands.

In this way, the old crone hoped to cheat the devil himself, and for a very long time, she was successful in her evasion of him.

one

“This better be important,” Seungcheol groans, shifting on his throne to assess the two low level demons in front of him.

The incubi exchange looks, and finally one steps forward. “Sir, we found her.”

“You found her?” the King repeats. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

“The witch,” the second demon says, fumbling as he also moves forward to address Seungcheol. “The one from the prophecy, with the mark.”

The Demon King feels a twitch of something electric, it makes his finger tips jolt, and he begins to strum them along the dark marble arm of his throne. “What are your names?”

“I’m Wonwoo,” says the first incubi, “and this is Mingyu.”

“Well, Wonwoo, Mingyu, the two of you better not be wrong.” Seungcheol stands up. “Where is she?”

“We can give you the details, only…” Mingyu casts an anxious look toward Wonwoo, “we’re pretty sure she was wearing a high level demon ward.”

“What?” The word comes out as a growl, and in the lava fields of hell that stretch as far as the eye can see behind him, there’s a tremor that betrays the King’s rage.

“A demon ward,” Wonwoo repeats. “An heirloom. It’s a necklace. We tried to get her to take it off, but even while dreaming, she was pretty protective over it.”

Seungcheol can’t believe what he’s hearing. It’s been over three hundred years since he’d made a contract with the old crone. Three hundred years of waiting for the ability to sire a line with a witch who would be able to withstand the process. He’d almost given up the hope of ever finding his betrothed, only for two sinful incubi to find her in the dream state. The fact that she’s warded is the cherry on top of this whole fucking thing.

“That bitch,” Seungcheol groans. “The old crone has done everything in her power to make sure our contract would never be fulfilled, and she’s even left warding jewlery.”

If the witch wasn’t in heaven, Seungcheol would pay a visit to her himself to enact his revenge for this final piece of treachery.

You do a service to save an entire line of witches, and this is how they intend to pay back your kindness.

“It’s not the end though,” Wonwoo offers helpfully. “We just have to convince her to take the necklace off, that will break the ward, and you can summon yourself into her room as soon as it’s off.”

“If the two of you do this for me,” Seungcheol notes, “you will be rewarded.”

“We’re just happy we found her for you,” Mingyu says, voice shaky. “It’s been a very long time.”

Too long, in fact.

two

You’re lost in a dreamy haze. Two pairs of lips are on your throat, one man pressed to your front, the other at your back. Hands caress your form, and nothing has felt this real. You’re moaning, eager for the fiery touches.

“We need you to do something for us,” the man in front of you whispers, licking past the shell of your ear and making you shiver.

“Anything,” you blurt out, already reaching for his cock.

A hand wraps around your wrist, stopping you in your tracks. When you meet the stern man’s gaze, you note the darkness in his eyes.

“This is a pretty necklace,” he muses, as the person at your back nips at the chain that encircles your throat.

“It’s a-” you swallow back your lust, trying to form words, “an heirloom.”

“How badly do you want to be fucked, naughty girl?”

“So bad,” you whimper, pressing your thighs together in the hope that you can quench some of your sexual appetite.

“Then you need to promise us that when you wake up, you’ll take this pretty necklace off, only for a while.”

“Huh?” You’re confused, and the man behind you immediately brings his hand to your core, stroking you through your nightie. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you feel like they’ve asked you to do this before- but your memory is as fuzzy as the vision in front of you, and the men are more than distracting.

“You can do this for us, right?” he presses. “Please?”

“Why do you need me to take my necklace off?” you ask. It had been a parting gift from your mother before you were put up for adoption, and in her note, she’d warned you never to take it off. You can already feel yourself becoming restless at the turn of this dream, what had started so sweet and sexual has turned darker than you’d been ready for.

“It looks like it needs a little… TLC, don’t you think, baby?” One large finger slips into your core, and at the same time, the man in front of you tugs down your dress to access your breast, flicking at the nipple.

“Tell us you’ll do this,” murmurs the one with his mouth on your chest.

Your fingers tangle through his dark curls, keeping him on your breast while he begins to suck on your sensitive bud. It’s practically impossible to say no to them.

“Okay,” you whisper finally, voice shaky. “Just for a little.”

“There’s our good girl,” the one in front growls, adding a hand to his friend’s so he can slip his own finger into your dripping core. They both begin to work you open, and you can’t help the gasps of pleasure that begin to escape you, your grip flying to broad shoulders to keep yourself standing between the two large men. “Now we all get our reward.”

three

You wake up feeling relaxed but needy. You remember ghosted touches as you head for a morning shower, washing your body and remembering strong hands trailing along the same path.

As you do your usual skin routine, your necklace catches your eye in the bathroom mirror, and you’re reminded of the promise you’d made in your dream. Upon inspection, you do think the necklace could use a little refurbishment- you’ve been wearing the chain since childhood, where your commitment to never taking it off had been like life and death.

If you’d had a dream about removing it, if even for a little while, maybe that was your subconscious telling you it’s time to let go of the hold your mother has on you. After all, she gave you up- what do you owe her? What’s the point in still wearing this around?

With a sigh, you reach behind yourself, fiddling with the clasp. There have been a few times you’ve been required to take the necklace off, at hospitals, or the dentist, certain airports- it won’t kill you to remove it for a little while today.

You don’t think much of it as you set the heirloom onto your bathroom counter, in fact, you’re already planning out breakfast. You go to the kitchen, humming to yourself while you open the fridge to look at the contents inside.

As you reach for the orange juice, the hairs on the back of your neck begin to raise, and you feel a powerful energy, as if you’re being watched.

“Goodmorning, sweet girl.”

The sudden voice makes you jump, heart lurching into your throat as you whip around.

There’s a man standing in your kitchen. He’s dressed in all black, with a long silky jacket over top of dress pants and a matching charcoal shirt. His hair is dark too, and he has a smirk on his handsome face.

It only takes you a moment to assess ‘oh, he’s hot’ and one more to decide to throw your juice directly at him.

The man quickly lifts his hand, flicking two fingers. It’s as if the container of orange juice hits some invisible barrier, and it goes flying directly into your sink.

“Don’t be like that,” he tuts, clicking his tongue. “Is that any way to greet a man like me?”

“Who are you?” you ask, mouth going dry as you cower back against the fridge, feeling suddenly very naked in your tiny shorts and crop top.

“An angel,” the man says simply, but the all black outfit is a dead give away that he’s lying.

“Yeah?” you let out a small laugh. “What’s your name then, mister Angel?”

He stares at you for a moment, something dark flashing over his features. When he smiles this time, you notice sharp canines. “Satan.”

Your entire body runs cold. “I don’t…” You lick your lips. “I don’t see any devil horns, or a tail-”

“Would you like to see them?”

“No?”

The man takes a step toward you. “You’re reacting better than I expected, Devil’s girl.”

“Devil’s girl?” you repeat, pressing your back tighter to the fridge in an effort to get away from him as he approaches closer and closer.

“That’s you,” he nods. “That’s what you are. It’s who you were destined to be.”

“I don’t know much about destiny-”

“Why would you?” he shrugs. “It’s been three hundred years since your family agreed to the dept they owe me. In that time, you witches have made it extra hard for me to keep track of all of you. I’m not surprised you don’t know anything about the prophecy, although, I will admit I’m a little disappointed you clearly haven’t stepped into your powers yet. Part of me had been hoping for a bit of a fight.”

“I can still fight you-” you insist, reaching out to grab a weapon from the knife block, brandishing it at the intruder.

He simply laughs, and with the flick of his fingers the knife goes flying out of your hand, landing in the sink next to the juice. “Silly little girl,” he grins. “Power reacts only to power, and though I can see you have power in your veins, it’s clear that no one has unlocked it for you. Don’t worry, I’ll help you get there.”

“Why would I want your help?” You cower back against the fridge, unable to move from where you’re standing. It feels like your feet are weighed down, and you wonder if this is another one of his magic tricks.

The devil puts his hand on the surface next to your head, blocking you into your fate. “Because, silly girl, at the moment, I’m your fiance, and soon, I’ll be your husband.”

“What?” The word comes out as a croak, your heart going a mile a minute in your chest.

“Three hundred years ago, one of your ancestors promised me a descendant as my prophesied betrothed. A girl of her bloodline who would bear my hybrid offspring, children with the power of demons and witches, bodies unrestricted by the laws of Heaven or Hell. A witch who would be identified by the mark of the Devil, drawn through with three lines.”

Realization washes over you. The mark on your ass- the peculiar birthmark, the mark you’ve always been insecure about-

“How…” you swallow thickly. “Why now? How did you find me?”

“I had help. Two incubi found you in your dreams. You were wearing an heirloom with a ward against me, but lucky for us, they convinced you to take off the silly little crone necklace. I couldn’t touch you while you had it on, couldn’t be in the same room as you, but now… I can be here with you, and…” he reaches out a hand, dragging a finger along your collarbone, “I can touch you.”

“And if I say no to all of this?” you ask. “If I say no to marrying a man who’s literally Satan?”

“Then I’ll convince you,” the demon leans close, his hot breath ghosting over your throat. “I can be awfully convincing… also, if it makes you feel better, don’t call me Satan.”

“Then what should I call you?”

“Seungcheol.” There’s a softening in his tone when he says this new name, and as you stare at his handsome face, you realize that is suits him. “And what should I call you, my sweet?”

You whisper your name and Seungcheol repeats it. You can tell he’s enjoying the taste of it on his tongue, and as you share this close proximity with the man who claims you’re his betrothed, you realize your innate attraction to him, despite the circumstance.

“So…” you lick your lips. “What now?”

“Now, little sweet, I take you back to my Kingdom.”

“You mean Hell.”

He grins, and you once again get a view of those sharp teeth. You wonder what they’ll feel like against your skin, and the thought has your body tingling with lust and shame.

“What if I don’t go with you.”

“Like I said, I’m awfully convincing, but on this one, you don’t have a choice.” He lets out a sigh, playing with a strand of your hair. “There are many religions in this world, little sweet, and in many of them, the King of Hell gets his Persephone. Although, in this case, you have no Demeter to protect you. The witch who promised you to me is long since dead, and your family line got muddled and convoluted in the hopes that it would hide you from me. Unfortunately for them, I’m here to collect, and there’s no one in the world who can stop me.”

“But, I mean-” you search for any way to get out of this. “I have a job-”

“Yeah? Tell me about this job.”

You can’t believe he’s humouring you, a slight appearance of interest appearing in his features. “I’m a full time baby sitter, an au pair, the girls are expecting me-”

Seungcheol lets out a low growl from deep in his chest. “So you’re good with children.”

Your mind goes back to what he’d said not minutes ago: ‘A girl of her bloodline who would bear my hybrid offspring, children with the power of demons and witches, bodies unrestricted by the laws of Heaven or Hell.’

Of course the King of Hell has an impreg kink and is turned on by your job as a nanny.

“I can’t go with you,” you insist.

His hand wraps around your throat, thumb teasing your jaw. “It’s not your choice.”

His eyes flare a fiery red colour, and it feels as if the air is sucked out of your lungs. Your hair ruffles, as if you’re in a wind tunnel, and a moment later, you’re no longer standing in your kitchen.

Seungcheol releases your neck, gesturing to the room you’re now in. “This is your new home,” he announces, giving you a moment to take in the black marble floors, scarce furniture, and large bed in the center of the space. There’s a floor to ceiling window that encompasses a whole wall, and through it, you see what can only be decribed as a literal Hellscape.

You can’t help it, you approach the window, mind going blank as you stare out at the fire fields.

Seungcheol is silent as he comes up behind you, pressing two hands to the windowed wall and blocking you in with your back to his chest. You can feel his breath along your throat. “Welcome to Hell, sweet thing. This is all yours now, although, I doubt I’ll let you leave this room too often, not until I know I can trust you.”

It’s funny to hear Satan talking about his ability to trust you- a girl who’s done her best to be good her whole life.

Seungcheol’s lips brush by your ear. “Should we get started, then?”

“Started on what?”

“You know what.” He presses a shockingly soft kiss to your throat, nose nuzzling by your jaw.

“Please, don’t hurt me.”

“I’ll be honest with you, little one, I’m not a nice man. But… I’ll be good to you, if you’re good for me.” One of his hands slips down from the window to grab at your hip, tugging your back flush to his chest. “The way you were good for Mingyu and Wonwoo in your dreams last night.”

The names mean nothing to you, as the men in your wet dream had never given them, although, they must be the incubi he was talking about earlier. The fact that Seungcheol knows about your sinful nightly escapades with two other demons has you feeling shy, your skin heating at his words.

“Even so, demons need consent to enter human bodies,” the King of Hell explains. “Which means, if you withdraw your consent, I’ll be forced to stop. Although… something tells me you’ll consent.”

His hand glides from your hip to your exposed abdomen, and he teases you on what path he’s going to take- up to your breasts, or down to your aching core.

“What…” you swallow back a moan, “What makes you so sure?”

“I can smell your arousal, sweet girl, and there are signs I can see too.” His hand smooths up to your breast, and he squeezes your sensitive flesh, thumb brushing over your hardened nipple. “I think you’re well aware that I’m going to fuck you, in a way you’ve never even dreamed of being fucked before.”

Your breath catches, and you bite at your lower lip to stop a whimper from slipping out of you. Your back arches, pushing your chest more into his large palm.

Seungcheol grins against your throat. “I can see how much you want this, little sweet. Do you want to see how much I want you?”

He grinds his front against your ass, and you can feel his hard cock- fuck, he feels big. You shiver at the realization that your betrothed is packing, and Seungcheol laughs at your reaction.

“Tell me you want this,” he commands.

“I-” You bite your tongue.

His hand wraps around your throat, lips moving to your ear. “Tell me you want this.”

“I want this,” you admit weakly.

“That’s my good girl,” Seungcheol growls. His hand raises from you neck, fingers finding your jaw again. He prompts you to turn your head, meeting his gaze as he leans over your shoulder, looking down at you with a dark expression.

You know what’s coming, and you can’t help yourself as he draws your lips to his own. Your eyes flutter shut, mind going blank as you enjoy the feeling of him. He’s warm, but you suppose you should expect that from the King of Hell.

The kiss deepens all too quickly, and you find yourself turning in his embrace, grabbing at his broad shoulders to pull him even closer.

Seungcheol lets out a growl when your breasts press against his chest, and he leans down, grabbing at the back of your thighs so he can lift you off the marble floor. He presses you back against the window, tongue tasting your own and dominating you as he kisses you like a man who’s waited a hundred years for this- or, strike that, a man who’s waited three hundred years.

There’s a rage in the way he kisses you, rage in the fact that he was forced to wait so long, but behind the rage is something like desperation. His fingers dig into your thighs, his mouth unrelenting against your own.

You’re not sure how long the kiss lasts, but soon, he’s carrying you to the bed. He sets you onto the lavish mattress, tearing at your clothes until you’re naked before him. He towers over you, staring down at your body while you catch your breath.

“Beautiful,” he muses, reaching down to massage your breast, which sends sparks of delight through your entire form. “You were made for me. My sweet. My little queen. My lost witch.”

When he says it like this, something about it feels right.

Something about him feels right, as if your soul has accepted him, even after such a short amount of time.

Then, in the most shocking twist of events, the King of Hell himself gets onto his knees for you. “Come here, my sweet,” Seungcheol says softly, grabbing at your thighs to tug you down the silk sheets toward his face. “It’s time for me to have a taste.”

He leans toward your core, taking in a lewd breath before letting it fan across your skin. Your core throbs at the proximity. Seungcheol grins at your reaction, tongue moving to prod his own fang- which is when you realize, his tongue is like his cock: monstrous.

You suck in a choked gasp, eyes widening. You’d thought he was going easy on you by giving you his mouth first, come to find out his tongue alone is probably as large as most men’s cocks- this must be a Devil thing, but before you can think too hard about it, Seungcheol is licking your slit and your mind goes silent.

A whimper escapes you, your back arching, core pushing closer to his face. Seungcheol lets out a small chuckle, his large hands finding your abdomen to pin you in place. “Stay still and take it, pretty girl,” he warns. “Or there will be… consequences.”

He licks at you again, flicking your clit with as skilled a tongue as you’ve ever had. Your pussy is already throbbing with need, and it takes everything inside of you not to buck toward his face again.

You can feel him watching you when you throw your head back, whimpering at the way he circles your clit. Then he drags his tongue down, dipping it into your wet heat. Your body tenses at the intrusion, mind short cirucuiting as inch after inch of tongue invades you, licking at your walls while Seungcheol groans at your taste.

Fuck- a five inch tongue is definitely a demon thing, but you can’t bring yourself to hate it as he begins to literally tongue fuck you stupid.

Not only does Cheol have the largest tongue you’ve experienced, and a willingness to use it, he’s got an eagerness in the way he eats you out. It’s as if he’s trying to devour you, holding nothing back as he growls and groans his way through working you up to your orgasm.

The feeling bubbling in the pit of your stomach is hot and all consuming, your muscles tensing with effort as you get closer and closer to your peak.

“Fuck- Cheol-” you whimper, unable to hold it in any longer as your hips push toward his face, one of your hands moving down to grab at his hair-

It’s as if hot, invisible handcuffs wrap around your wrists, tugging them up and over your head, pinning you to the bed while you squirm with confusion and lust.

“What did I say about consequences if you didn’t behave yourself?” Seungcheol asks, pulling away from your core and licking his wet lips with that tongue of his.

“I-” you push at the invisible binds on your wrists. “I’m sorry- I was just so close-”

“So close that you lost your manners?” He taps his fingers along your abdomen. “That’s not very queenly of you, my sweet.”

“I’m sorry-” you say again, tears begin to form in your eyes as you feel your orgasm dissipating. “Please-”

“Please, what?”

“Your tongue- I was so close-”

“Do you really deserve it?”

“Yes!”

“You’ll be good for me?”

“Of course, I’ll be so good-”

“If you’re not good for me,” he warns, “you don’t get to cum, remember that.”

“Yes, okay, I understand-” you fight the urge to thrash in his embrace, and it feels like forever that he assesses you before finally bringing his face between your thighs again.

Just as his tongue is about to lap at your pussy, he stops. “Actually, I want to hear you beg for this. Beg for me to let you cum.”

You’re practically delirious, muscles still tight in preparation for your orgasm, and you’ll do anything he says right now. “Please, please, Sir- please let me cum!”

Seungcheol lets out a satisfied growl. “Sir, huh?” He clicks his tongue. “I’ll take that for now, but pretty soon, you’ll be calling me daddy.”

You whimper at his words, core dripping with spit and arousal. “Please-”

He buries his face in your pussy again, holding nothing back. His hands move down to your thighs, squeezing and adding a slight pain that has your entire body tingling. Gasps escape you, escalating in pitch as he drags you closer and closer to your orgasm again-

“Cumming,” you whisper, as the most intense orgasm of your life slams into you.

You do your best not to thrash around, but as Seungcheol obscenely tongue fucks you through your high, it’s the most you can do to stay as still as possible. You push up against the invisible binds on your wrists, gasping and whimpering-

“Fuck, my clit- it’s too sensitive-” you try to tell him, only for Seungcheol to focus more on the sensitive bud.

Your toes curl, a strangled sob escaping you at the stimulus. All you can do is lay there and take the pleasure he’s giving you- you’d thought he was being nice when he’d decided to eat you out, but you see now that maybe there was a bit of sadism in it. He’s clearly enjoying making you cum so hard that you’re beginning to cry, your muscles screaming at you from how tense you are-

“Please, please, please-”

With one final flick at your clit that has you letting out a high pitched squeal, Seungcheol pulls away from your pussy. He blows hot air on your core and you twitch, thighs closing, body shaking in the aftershocks of your orgasm.

“Look at you, crying and I haven’t even given you my cock yet,” Seungcheol muses, standing up and staring down at your body.

He pulls off his shirt, and even through your tears, you take a good look at his chiseled form.

Fuck, he’s even more gorgeous with his skin showing. His shoulders are broad, arms all beefy and strong- he’s an absolute unit, but you guess you shouldn’t have expected anything less from the King of Hell.

Then he goes for his pants, pushing them down to reveal the largest cock you’ve ever seen in person.

Your mouth begins to water, fuzzy mind trying to figure out just how many inches this man is about to bury into your wet, twitching pussy.

“Think you can take it, pretty girl?” he asks, wrapping a hand around the base and pumping his hard length.

“Something tells me you’ll make it fit,” you whisper, your core throbbing at the idea.

Seungcheol grins. “We just met, and you already know me so well. Guess that’s part of the whole destined to be together thing. Makes shit easier.”

Instead of getting on top of you, Seungcheol tugs you closer to the foot of the mattress, then, with one twitch of his fingers, the entire bed raises, positioning you exactly where he needs you to be in order for him to fuck you while standing up.

He grabs at your breast, teasing your nipple while you mewl. Your own hand reaches out for his cock, and he allows you to grab him. You wipe your thumb across the angry red tip, smearing precum along his shaft to add lubrication, making it easier to pump his cock slowly while he continues to tease your nipples.

His hand begins to decend, and he teases two fingers along your pussy lips. “I guess I can be nice and stretch you out,” he sighs, slipping the digits into your core.

It’s a kindness you’re not sure you expected from him, and it prompts you to squeeze his cock tighter in your palm while he begins to finger fuck you open, scissoring his digits and testing your inner walls.

“I can’t fucking wait to ruin your perfect little pussy,” Seungcheol groans, fucking you even harder. “You’re squeezing my fingers so fucking well, gonna be a good girl and squeeze my cock even better.”

“Yes, Sir,” you whimper, abdominal muscles tensing as he begins to stroke your gspot.

“Should I give you one more before I give you my cock?” Seungcheol asks, thumb finding your clit and making you cry out. “You’re already wet, baby, but I want you dripping when I finally fuck you stupid.”

You pump is cock faster as he pistons his fingers into your gspot, his thumb unrelenting on your sensitive bud. He works you up to another orgasm with deadly precision, your entire body tensing with pleasure before falling over the edge.

“That’s it,” Seungcheol growls, fingers fucking you through your high. “That’s a good girl, squirting all over my fucking hand-”

No man has ever made you squirt before, and the feeling is intense. You’re gasping, crying from how good it feels, like an overwhelming sense of relief washing over you, a warmth spreading out from your core.

The sound of your squirt is obscene too, gushy, spongy noises filling the room with each pump of Seungcheol’s fingers.

“Sir,” you whimper, “need your cock-”

“Yeah? Is my good girl finally ready to please her King?”

You can only nod, letting go of his cock in favor of grabbing the sheets, needing an anchor for what’s about to come next.

“You know what this means, right?” Seungcheol asks, teasing his tip along your wet pussy lips. “You know I’m going to cum so fucking deep inside of you that you’re going to be dripping for days.”

You nod again, whimpering at the idea.

“You want to be bred though, don’t you, pretty girl? You’re practically begging for it now. What happened to the girl who threw juice at me this morning? All it took was a little cock and you’re dick whipped for you King.”

“All it took was a big cock,” you correct him, skin flushing at the words that have just slipped out of him.

Seungcheol laughs, his canines sparkling in the low light of the room. “Biggest cock you’ve ever had,” he agrees. “Biggest cock you ever will have. After this, you’re mine. Completely. Body and soul.”

In past relationships, you’ve toyed with the idea of forever. It’s been a thought that strikes fear in your heart, but for some reason, looking up at the King of Hell, forever doesn’t scare you anymore.

Something tells you he’s going to take care of you, in a way no one ever has.

It’s clear he’s very protective over you. He believes in soulmates, in destiny, in prophecy- you’re his perfect match, and he’s fully bought into that idea… maybe you’ll buy into it someday too.

“I’m yours,” you agree finally, staring up at the beautiful devil.

He bends over you, pressing his lips to your own. With one hand, he cups your cheek, keeping you close, and with the other, he guides his cock to your pussy again, slowly pushing in.

You gasp against his mouth at the immediate stretch of his cockhead in your tight core, your hands flying to his shoulders.

“I know,” he coos, “I know, but it will feel good in a second, I promise.”

You’re happy he made you squirt, because the wetness coating your pussy makes it easy for him to slowly slide inch after inch into your core. He thrusts shallowly, and the movement helps your body become adjusted to his massive size.

You’re shocked at how big he is- it was one thing to see it, and another thing entirely to feel him- to feel the vein running along the underside of his cock while it drags against your sensitive walls.

Seungcheol’s mouth is hot against your own, his tongue seemingly back to a normal size as he licks at your lips. You think he must be trying to distract you from the intense feeling of being stretched out on his cock, and it’s another kindness you’d never expected from him.

When he’s fully sheathed in your core, you both let out groans of pleasure.

The King of Hell straightens again, looking down at you while his hands graze your form. “Ready, sweet girl?”

You nod, licking your lips. “Yes, please.”

He grabs your hips, holding you steady so he can begin to rut into you.

Your view of him is insane. How is his body so perfect? He’s chiseled in the best of ways, his chest looks downright biteable, his biceps bulging as he holds you down, his abdominal muscles clenching with each thrust-

You’re absolutely delirious for him, your own hands finding your chest to tease your nipples.

Seungcheol’s gaze shifts to where you’re touching yourself, and a smirk appears on his face. “Fuck, baby, that good, huh?”

You can only nod and let out a needy mewling sound, pinching at your nipples and making your back arch while he rails your pussy.

Each drag of his cock along your sensitive inner walls has you seeing stars, and when his hand flattens over your abdomen, you nearly loose it.

“This is how deep I am,” he tells you. “Bet having-” he groans, “Bet having your guts rearranged by the King of Hell wasn’t on your bingo card this year, was it, little love?”

“No, sir,” you shake your head, whimpering at the feeling of pressure on your stomach from his hand. God- why does this feel so good? You can feel him everywhere, he’s all consuming, and that familiar feeling of an oncoming orgasm is building yet again.

“I can feel you tensing up,” Seungcheol notes with a laugh, his thumb moving down to find your clit. “Gonna cum on my cock, aren’t you?”

“Yes, daddy,” you mewl, the title feeling more than natural on your lips.

Seungcheol’s grip on your hip tightens at the word, his thumb applying more pressure to your clit while he fucks you even harder, impaling you on his massive cock with each rough thrust.

“Beg for daddy to let you cum.”

“Please- please, daddy, fuck- I wanna cum so bad, wanna make you feel good-”

“I’m not cumming with you, not yet,” he warns. “As much as I love this position, there’s only one way I want you when I’m filling you with my seed, and that’s on your hands and knees, face buried in the pillows, crying like my good little whore.”

His words have your pussy fluttering around his cock, and it makes his grin widen.

“You like that, huh? Like the idea of being my perfect little cock slut?”

“Yes, daddy.”

“Made for me,” he grunts, pinching your clit and making you cry out. “You were fucking made for me. Cum on my cock, baby, show me you deserve it.”

You can’t even fight the command, your body short circuiting, muscles clenching as you follow through with what he wants. Your orgasm hits you like a ton of bricks, pussy clamping down on Seungcheol’s large cock.

He doesn’t stop, he only fucks you harder as you squeal and thrash against the bed- when you reach out to grab his arms, the invisible binds appear again, pinning your hands above you.

Seungcheol laughs, but there’s a groan in the sound too, and you know you’re probably squeezing him like a fucking vice.

“Good girl,” he growls, and it only makes your pussy flutter harder.

The squelching sound returns, and you can’t even find it within yourself to be shy about the way your body is reacting to him, you’re too overwhelmed by the euphoria surging through your being to think cohesively.

“You’re crying again,” Seungcheol notes. “How cute.” His pace slows, and suddenly he’s grabbing at your jaw, hauling you into a sitting position, your face just inches from his own.

His eyes are dark as he looks at you, then his long tongue is lolling out of his mouth, licking away your tears while you struggle and shiver, his cock buried so deep inside of you that you think you might faint.

“Tell me you’re ready for me to breed you,” Seungcheol growls.

“I’m ready for you to breed me,” you say meekly, core throbbing again at the idea.

The King of Hell presses his lips against your own, kissing your breath away while you claw at his shoulders. Then, as suddenly as he’d kissed you, he pulls away, cock slipping from your core and making you whine.

“Onto all fours,” he instructs.

The bed slowly lowers to an acceptable height while you fumble on shaky legs to get into doggy position.

“That’s my good girl,” Seungcheol praises you, the bed dipping as he joins you on his knees behind you. His large hands find your body, skimming along your sides.

Then he grabs the back of your neck, shoving your face down into the mattress.

“Part of me wants to thank you for making this so easy,” he says. “But another part of me thinks you should be the one thanking me for giving you the opportunity to carry the children of the King of Hell.”

“Thank you,” you murmur.

Seungcheol scoffs. “You can thank me when my cum is dripping out of your used hole and you’re still begging for more.”

He slams his cock back into you, and a cry escapes your lips. God, in this position, he feels even deeper- if that’s possible.

Your toes curl at the sensation, and with every rough thrust, his balls clap against your clit, making you dizzy with pleasure.

His grip on the back of your neck increases, skilled fingers finding the arteries that flow to your brain- soon, you’re not only dizzy with pleasure, but dizzy from air being restricted too. It’s a beautiful, tingling feeling, and it has you clawing at the bed, arching your back as you moan like a desperate whore for him.

You feel something on your clit, but both of Seungcheol’s hands are still occupied, one on your hip, one on your neck-

That’s when you realize that whatever invisible magic grip he’d used to pin you to the bed, he can use to pleasure you too-

Now, you truly feel him everywhere.

“Fuck, fuck-” you struggle against the mattress, another orgasm bubbling in the pit of your stomach.

“That’s it, take it.”

“Are you close?” you ask, and from the silence that you’re met with, you’re pretty sure you’ve caught him off guard. “Please tell me you’re close- I want to be full so bad, want you to breed me, Cheol- please-”

He sucks in a shaky breath, gripping your hip so hard that you’re pretty sure you’re going to bruise. His hand moves away from your neck in favour of grabbing both sides of your waist. He roughly pulls your ass back to meet each hard thrust.

“Keep begging.”

“Please, daddy, please- fuck, this is what you wanted me for, right? This is what I owe you? Then give it to me- give me everything, breed me-”

“Cum for me first,” Seungcheol commands. “Cum on my cock so I know you deserve it.”

The magic on your clit suddenly feels like a harsh vibration, and it’s enough to tip you over the edge. You grab at the bed sheets, letting out a primal sound of pleasure as your core clamps down on Seungcheol’s length for a second time.

He lets out his own groan, and a moment later you feel his cum shooting deep inside of you, filling you up in ways you never even imagined possible.

He fucks you through your highs, his grip unwavering on your hips. It feels amazing to be used like this, to feel rope upon rope of Seungcheol’s seed invading you and coating your walls.

And the sounds he’s making- rough grunts and groans- you’ve never heard anything like it. You’ve never been this head over heals for someone before, and the notion shocks you.

Maybe you really were meant for each other- it’s hard to say what’s real as you sacrifice yourself to be his little cum dump, taking every last drop until he stills behind you, cock still buried to the hilt.

He’s breathing heavily, his gasps teasing your back.

Neither of you say anything for a solid minute.

One of his hands leaves your hip, trailing along your spine. “Good girl.”

You can only whimper in response.

“I will admit, I’m still disappointed you’re not adept in the art of witchcraft, although, that’s hardly your own fault.” What a topic change. “I’ll find you someone to teach you, you’ll have lots of time to devote to the craft.”

His palm flattens against the small of your back, and he wordlessly prompts you to flatten onto your belly, pressing his own large chest against you like a blanket. His lips find your throat, and he peppers your skin in kisses.

“Your days will be spent learning how to be a Queen, and your nights will be spent like this, with me.” His nose nuzzles by your cheek. “And tomorrow, I’ll make you my bride, officially.”

“Tomorrow?” you squeak. “Isn’t that a little… too soon?”

“I’ve waited three hundred years for you, little love. At this point, there’s no such thing as too soon.”

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🔮 preview. “Trust me, little love, I haven’t cum in you for months, pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to help myself even if I tried.” With a grin, you allow Seungcheol to cup his fingers around the nape of your neck, dragging your lips to his. He kisses you as eagerly as he had the very first time, pushing you backward with his large form until you bump against the window. “I’ve got an idea,” your husband tells you, his mouth moving to your throat. “I wanna fuck you against this, want you to look at your kingdom while I pump our second heir deep into your perfect little pussy.”

cw/ tw. Unprotected sex, impreg kink, cum kink, oral (f recieving), fingering, demon magic as a vibrator, fucking against a window, fucking while wearing a dress, quickie, biting/marking/blood licking, breast play, dirty talk, praise, begging, etc… I petnames. (hers) baby, little love, little sweet, etc… (his) daddy, sir.

👹 rating. 18+ explicit I wc. 2.7k I teaser wc. 200

🌙 staring. Seungcheol x afab!reader

bonus

Hell is no place to raise a child, and it’s not a place that is easily accessible to witches either- which is why, soon into your pregnancy, Seungcheol made it his mission to find you a safe haven on Earth that you could call home.

Nestled in a small valley, far from any towns or cities, Seungcheol crafted you a home. It’s a cottage, very different from the Hell palace you’d become accustomed to.

Your days are spent basking in the sunshine with your tutor, a witch of a strong family blood line who had long been acquainted with the King of Hell. Your teacher, a woman named Faeble, also acted as your midwife, ensuring your birth with your first child was as seamless as possible, with the aid of magic of course.

She tends to the wards, teaching you about the ways of the witches, and helps you raise your son- she’s become like the mother you never got to have, and your days are peaceful.

In the evenings, Seungcheol appears, whisking you and your son away to the safety of Hell. It’s a simple little life you’ve made for yourself, but you wouldn’t have it any other way.

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