#so it’s all water under the bridge tbh

[seaprofound]

Hot Take: if I had the choice, I’d much rather piss off Po than Hera tbh—like, no offense to my weird fish, but Hera’s wrath is much more terrifying

[vaguely-concerned]

travis matagot just -- the very concept of him unlocks something deep and feral in my brain, even aside from all the changeling stuff. an angel looked upon you once as a child and, after seeing every possible thread and pathway of the man you will grow into one day, said 'I see no sin here' even as its holy flames consumed your screaming parents and the town around you. that angel, having stumbled head over heels to earth after killing god, later deliberately loses their name to you in a card game so the eyes of heaven can't find them. you and the angel have proceeded to annoy the everloving FUCK out of each other for centuries because you just keep. bumping. into each other!!!! through the power of like Narrative and also simply being two of the only people who've even been around that long. you've kept their name for them this whole time and never breathed a word of it, even though they seemingly never even explained why they wanted to lose it in the first place. you've sworn to die together or not at all.

what if you met an eldritch horror as a child and then became their best (and most irritating) friend/life partner/frenemy/perpetual thorn in their side (affectionate). I'm obsessed with this idea of being divinely judged as unworthy of damnation so early in your life and having to have that in the back of your head forever even as your self-loathing and trauma start piling up over the centuries and you have done so many shitty things along the way. like. is he trying to prove them wrong. is that part of his whole thing about trying to escape the narrative. or is it to prove that 'no actually awful things happen to me because I'm awful, you got it wrong from the start (fuck you btw)' because at least that feels like a choice, like some kind of control to hold on to? what is going on here travis. what the fuck

[todayisafridaynight]

What Yakuza character do you think has an only fans?

i was going to say shinada but if he did he wouldnt be in crippling debt anymore

[frostdayz]

More than enemies

Genre: Enemies to Lovers

aemond x reader (aemond uncle and y/n niece!!) (f! reader)

summary: Y/n is Rhaenyra's only daughter and at a young age she is betrothed to her uncle to keep the peace between the two families. Years pass without seeing each other, but when the day of the wedding arrives feelings are changed and emotions are spilled.

Note: Laptops on 3% so this was super rushed and tbh idk if i like it. Anyways this might be my last HOTD post for a while (I might be lying to myself)

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

My wedding day. I stand before a mirror, the silver and red gown draped elegantly over my form, my mother's house colors blending with those of House Targaryen. My heart races, not with excitement, but with apprehension.

Aemond Targaryen. My betrothed. My enemy. The boy I had loathed for as long as I could remember. Our union was meant to be a symbol of peace between our families, a bridge over troubled waters. But to me, it had always felt like a shackle.

I had not seen Aemond in years, not since we were children. He had been sent away to train, and I had remained in Dragonstone, under my mother's watchful eye. Now, as I prepare to meet him again, I wonder if he has changed. If I have changed.

The door creaks open, and my mother enters, her face soft with maternal concern. "Are you ready, my daughter?" she asks, her voice gentle.

I nod, though my heart is anything but steady. "As ready as I'll ever be, Mother."

She takes my hand, squeezing it reassuringly. "This union is important for the realm. But more than that, it is a chance for you to find happiness." She smiles at me.

Happiness. The word seems foreign in the context of my impending marriage to Aemond. But I nod again, forcing a smile. "I understand." I sigh.

With a final kiss on my forehead, she leads me to the great hall. The steps we leave behind sound out an echo that leads me to my new and unwanting future. The doors swing open, and I step inside, my eyes scanning the crowd until they land on him. Aemond. He stands tall, his silver hair gleaming, his eye patch adding an air of mystery. Our gazes lock, and for a moment, the world falls away.

He looks dare I say different? Stronger. More confident. And in his remaining eye, I see something I had not expected. Curiosity. Apprehension. Perhaps even a hint of regret. Regret for all the torment he gave me when I was a child. Or regret going through with this wedding and not running away while he had the chance?

Without my mind wanting to my feet start to walk me down the aisle, my mind races with memories of our childhood. The arguments, the insults, the constant competition. Does he still feel the same all these years later?

I reach the altar, and he takes my hand. His grip is firm, but not harsh. I look up at him, searching his face for any sign of the boy I had despised. Instead, I find a man who looks at me with wonder and uncertainty. Something I didn't expect to find, my eyes linger on his face confused with the feeling that's starting to stir inside my stomach.

The ceremony passes in a blur, words exchanged, vows made. And then, it is done. We are married. Bound together by duty and destiny.

Later, at the feast, I find a moment to escape the throng of well-wishers and slip into one of the halls in the keep, seeking comfort in the quiet lit hall. Moments later, I hear footsteps behind me. I turn around and find myself face-to-face with my now-new husband.

"May I join you?" he asks, his voice devoid of the arrogance I had once associated with him. He takes a few shy steps forward as if he is scared that I will reject him.

I give a small nod, and he steps beside me, his gaze fixed on me the whole time. For a while, we walk in silence, the tension between us palpable. Finally, he speaks.

"I never wanted this," he admits, his voice soft. "I never wanted to be bound by duty to someone who hated me." He stops his steps and looks away from my gaze.

"I never wanted it either," I reply, my own voice tinged with bitterness. "But here we are." I take a step forward so I am now standing right in front of him, he lifts his head to look at me, his expression earnest. "Perhaps... perhaps we were wrong about each other. Perhaps there is more to us than the hatred we clung to as children."

I look up at him towering over me, searching his face for any sign of deceit. But all I see is sincerity. "Do you really believe that?" My eyes softening

He nods, taking my hand in his and looking down fiddling with the rings on my hand. "I do. And I think... I know I would like to try. To see if we can be more than enemies."

My heart skips a beat at his words. Could it be possible? Could the years of animosity have been a mask for something deeper, something neither of us had been ready to acknowledge?

"I would like that too," I whisper, feeling a weight lift from my shoulders. I take my hand out of his grasp and lift it up to graze his right cheek. I wouldn't in a million years think that I would be open to the thought of falling for the man I once hated.

He smiles and leans his head into my palm planting a soft kiss. "Then let us start anew, my wife. Let us find out who we truly are, together."

I feel a spark of hope. Perhaps this union, born of duty, could become something more. Something real. And for the first time, I see Aemond not as my enemy, but as my partner, my equal, and perhaps, one day, my love and the father of my future children.

[garagepaperback]

What are your favorite drarry fics?

oh. ooooooooooooh oh oh.

here are my staples:

draco, the magic dragon - libbydrew a fic i first read on livejournal (showing off the varnish of my casket here) that i thought about regularly for the almost two decades i fell out of fandom. canon to me tbh. libby invented my draco rubric: proud lil showboat even when everything around him has gone to rancid shit, sarcastic and aloof personality as a poor facade to distract from the big ol' gaping well of hurt.

Potter took a great breath, then let it out slowly – a low whistle between his teeth. "Malfoy, I had no idea. I thought—" "Why are you here?" Draco cut him off before the idiot embarrassed them both. Their shared past was water under the bridge – even if Draco had drowned in it.

nightingale - michi_the_killer

another back-in-my-day fav, even though i can only stand to read half of it. actually even thinking about it is making me stare off in a distance for upwards of three minutes. this one i would hand off wrapped in about a million miles of caution tape. + also a huge fan of michi's gory veela fic.

It was better than fighting, Harry thought, although sometimes he still wanted to rip into Malfoy, to hurt him. Other days, he thought, it was better than anything.

rookie moves - peu_a_peu

what can i say that hasn't already been said - peu is a MASTER. if you somehow know who i am but haven't read this, reassess your life choices through professional means but not until after you dive in.

“Feels kinda big,” Malfoy said, smirking. “For a guy your height.” “My height is average,” Harry said, although he was undeniably glaring upward at Malfoy’s face when they stood so close together. “And it is kinda big.”

stately homes of wiltshire - waspabi another one that crept into my heart and made a home. hard to choose between this and waspabi's other drarry fic, but there's something about the decrepit manor that just does it for me. a perfect harry and draco, perfect soft reaching towards each other.

Draco smiled and dragged Potter from the shop before he could charm any more elderly ladies with his unkept, take-care-of-me-I’m-confused-and-have-nice-shoulders aesthetic. Once outside in the drizzle, he realised he still had his hand around Potter’s forearm. He yanked his hand back immediately.

i wake up falling - warmfoothills

warmfoothills :,) just reading this moniker makes me vision go soft around the edges. their writing has made me out loud, quietly say "oh," multiple times. the prose is darling, this story is such a brief, aching glance. it was also really hard to pick just one (flashback, warm nights i also go in for).

“I love you,” he says, unable to stop himself. Draco blinks, a barely-there flinch, like Harry’s taken a swing at him. “I know,” he says, still oblivious to the reference, oblivious to the way his words scoop right into the meat of Harry’s stupid, hopeful heart. “It’s not enough, is it?” Draco shakes his head. Above, the stars watch unfeelingly on.

the pure and simple truth - lettered no one does dialogue with the mastery lettered does. my GOD. my god. i feel like this fic is drarry perfectly distilled.

“What’s he going to be?” Blaise raised a brow. “Pardon?” “You said he says Hermione should be Minister, and all those other things. What does Malfoy think he should be?” There was something much like pity in Blaise’s eyes. “He thinks he should never, ever be forgiven for the things he’s done.” Harry felt ill. “That’s not fair.” “When has Draco ever been fair?” “I meant―” Harry swallowed hard. “That’s not right.” Blaise looked more pitying still. “When has Draco ever been right?”

far from the tree - aideomai

the writer i avoid talking about the most bc once i start i cannot physically restrain myself from going on about their beauty forever. i sat for forty-five solid minutes frowning, trying to choose between this one and in the hand. and dwelling. okay anyway. i keep a doc of quotes from fics that resonate and it's 50% aideomai.

Draco wondered what Potter thought of this day, in the future the twins came from. If he had told Ginny about it. If he had forgotten it. He couldn’t forget it, could he? It felt burned into Draco’s body already, a final point that he had been moving toward for years without knowing.

i could go on but i think seven is a nice solid number tyvm for this ask!

[olderthannetfic]

Fandom wank incoming:

So, there's a Japanese creator that did (does?) pretty popular RPGMaker horror games back when RPGMaker games were REALLY big. This creator is called Funamusea/Okegom. She did the games Wadanohara, Mogeko Castle, The Gray Garden. Those games were pretty popular not only because its length and stories and cute character designs but also because... they're what in the modern fandom scope people call "problematic". They have a lot of +18 humour. They also have non-con endings. Big fucked up themes. You know, things we all love.

So, I think back in 2020 (more or less) she got popular again but for the wrong reasons: people (mainly English-speaking antis) got their pearls clutched because Funamusea's games were ~problematic~ and ~bad~ and ~inappropriate~. Y'all know the deal with this people. So Funamusea basically got tired and said "okay fine fuck all of you, you are prohibited to translate my games and to do gameplays/walkthroughs". This got the Spanish community too. No one from this side of the World had permission to translate Funa's games.

Fast forward, we thought this was water under the bridge and that everything was fine now. But like, apparently (haven't seen any receipts about it TBH), recently some LATAM people criticized Funamusea's games (people are just saying 'criticized' and not 'harassing' --but then again, haven't seen any receipts and I'm blocked from Xitter so I can't search shit on there) and Funa's got mad? And she blocked almost all LATAM countries from accessing her website???

This just doesn't seem right. If she blocked us (yeah I'm from LATAM) just because of some supposed 'criticism' that's an overreaction. So I don't think that's the case? If she snapped in such a way, then I had to be for something more serious like what happened in 2020-2021 with English-speaking people, yes? Because she did not block the USA nor Canada nor Australia. So like, does anyone have any more info about this?

--

[daylighteclipsed]

What's it about cloti that you like? I'm curious, bc we otherwise tend to ship the same things. I love both cloud and tifa, and they have some cute scenes, but I don't feel it with them. Idk if it's because of the truly awful shippers, or something else. For me it feels like sokai in kh 1, I see why ppl ship them and that the narrative is pushing for them to be together, but i don't really care about that aspect of their relationship. Your answer doesn't have to be elaborate or anything, it's genuinely only curiosity on my part. Other than that, how do you like rebirth so far? I know some ppl dropped it pretty fast, bc they didn't like the crazy amount of mini games. Which I get, bc some of them were a hassle, but all in all i still had fun.

Short answer: I really like their individual characters and their complicated friendship and past that Rebirth starts delving more into, and that’s made me warm up very quickly to the romance between them.

Long answer: Cloud and Tifa’s dynamic is so interesting to me in Rebirth. I feel like the game does a good job of pulling back the curtain on a relationship that up to this point has been summed up as “childhood friends” to reveal how much more complicated it is than that. Imo, these are two people who have always yearned to know each other but never really have. They were friendly when they were very young, it seems, like under the age of 7. Then, Cloud started pulling away, and Tifa has never understood why. And they haven’t been able to really reconnect since then, made all the more difficult by Sephiroth and Shinra.

FF7 pushes romantic angles with both Tifa and Aerith, which I don’t really love tbh. I do wish it was a little more toned down and optional. But I really like the sense of yearning and desire to connect that threads Cloud and Tifa’s entire relationship — and the consistent symbolism of reaching for each other, trying to bridge that physical and emotional gap between them (usually when one is about to literally or figuratively fall), that goes with it. I like watching them bond and get to know each other now, so many years later, as best as they can (considering Cloud’s memories and sense of self are all screwed up), while navigating the unique trauma of being two of the only survivors of the massacre of their village. I like their mutual support, how they take turns supporting/grounding/saving each other.

I like that memories play such a big role, that they both have precious memories of each other that are key to who they are and which no one else knows. Fucking love when Tifa falls into the Lifestream and she realizes Cloud tried to save her from crossing the metaphorical bridge of death/falling when they were kids, and you see how much the past seems to parallel the present with their roles reversed this time. I want to see the whole memory so much. I don’t know if we ever will, but man. I really feel like even if Cloud couldn’t stop Tifa from falling, he must’ve saved her from drowning. There’s a river below that bridge, right? She hit her head and presumably passed out — someone had to keep her head above water, and he was the only one there because he refused to abandon her… I think, metaphorically, that’s pretty much what’s gonna happen in the game. I don’t think Tifa is gonna be able to catch Cloud from falling, but I think she’s gonna hold his head above water when they hit the bottom.

Sorry, I’ve been thinking about this part so much shsbdbsbs I just feel like it’s so interesting and crucial to the story. I think it really helps Tifa understand what’s going on with Cloud and Sephiroth on a level the others don’t. She’s much more conscious of Cloud’s behavior and notices the distinctions between Cloud and Sephiroth. She’s usually the first to notice when something’s not right and intervene.

I like that Tifa is established as the truth to Sephiroth’s lies and the one who can kinda “wake” Cloud up because, unlike everyone else, Tifa was there when Sephiroth (and Zack and Cloud) came to town and Tifa has seen what Cloud was like before the Jenova cells/false persona (even if she’s never been able to fully understand him). She’s the only one stopping Cloud from losing complete touch with reality, which is why Sephiroth is trying to undermine her credibility and eliminate her.

Like it’s really obvious, to me, that if Cloud and Tifa could properly reconnect by finally understanding the past and each other, Sephiroth’s manipulation wouldn’t work. Like, you know in the Loveless play how the bad guy’s weakness is true love. And then the hero (Cloud) and whoever is playing the princess (I had Tifa) try to declare their love, and it doesn’t work. The bad guy just laughs and says their love is an illusion or whatever? That’s what’s going on in the game, I think. I do think they love each other, but they don’t understand each other yet, Cloud isn’t even sure who he is, his identity is scrambled eggs, so it’s not a complete or true love. They have to bridge that gap, discover the truth and really meet. You know what I mean?

I still haven’t talked about the actual romantic stuff fbdbdbsbe I’m sorry, romance is usually always secondary to me. Um. I like that Cloud initiates a lot of those intimate moments with Tifa. Other people usually invade his space and make him uncomfortable. But Tifa’s patient with him and doesn’t pressure him. He reaches out to hold her hand and hug her and stuff. He opens up to her about his doubts and fears. It’s sweet how bashful they are, how realistically awkward they are sometimes. Yeah, idk, I just think they’re neat. I want them to understand each other, finally like really know each other, and I like when they hold hands.

As for how I’m enjoying Rebirth as a game (as someone who has never played the og FF7): I’m really loving it. I think it’s so much more fun and interesting than Remake. Love the open world, the different regions, the exploration, side quests, party bonding and banter, chocobos, whatever tf is going on with those protorelics and the Queen’s Blood creator, the battle challenges, Chadley (I know he was in Remake, but I grew more attached to him in this game), the return of other old NPCs, the new ones, the fun silly stuff like the segways in Costa del Sol. Rebirth fleshes the whole world and characters out, and I’m never bored. I have very little complaints. If it sticks the landing, it might be one of my favorite video games. Rip to the mini game haters, but I’m different. (Except the piano. The piano can go fuck itself.)

[anitalenia]

₊ ⊹.𖥔 ݁ ˖ 𝐒𝐔𝐆𝐀𝐑 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑 .𖥔 ݁ ˖༘⋆𐦍⊹₊ ⋆

⋆˙⟡♡ 𝐒𝐔𝐆𝐀𝐑 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑. ✧･ﾟ: * 𝔀𝓮𝓵𝓬𝓸𝓶𝓮 𝓽𝓸 𝓔𝓾𝓭𝓸𝓻𝓪𝓼, 𝓽𝓻𝓪𝓿𝓮𝓵𝓮𝓻. 𝓲𝓽 𝓼𝓮𝓮𝓶𝓼 𝔂𝓸𝓾 𝓪𝓻𝓮 𝔀𝓸𝓾𝓷𝓭𝓮𝓭. 𝓬𝓸𝓶𝓮, 𝓲'𝓵𝓵 𝓽𝓪𝓴𝓮 𝓬𝓪𝓻𝓮 𝓸𝓯 𝔂𝓸𝓾 . ⋆˙⟡♡✧ ℕ𝔸ℕ𝔸𝕄𝕀 𝕂𝔼ℕ𝕋𝕆 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑙𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝘩𝑒 𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑘 𝑤𝑜𝑜𝑑. 𝑡𝘩𝑎𝑛𝑘𝑓𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑡𝘩𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑎𝑛 𝑒𝑡𝘩𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙 𝑤𝑜𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑡𝘩𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑤𝑎𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔. 𝑎 𝑤𝑜𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑤𝑖𝑡𝘩 𝑏𝑒𝑎𝑢𝑡𝑖𝑓𝑢𝑙 𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟 𝘩𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑤𝘩𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑒𝑑 𝓱𝓮 𝔀𝓪𝓼 ��𝓸𝓷𝓷𝓪 𝓫𝓮 𝓪𝓵𝓵 𝓻𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽 . . . ₊˚⊹.* ♡ *.⊹˚₊ 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐊 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐀𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐃 ✧‧₊˚

၄.၃ ݁ ˖ִ ࣪₊ ⊹˚ 𝓹𝓪𝓲𝓻𝓲𝓷𝓰 ₊˚✧ 𝕥𝕣𝕒𝕧𝕖𝕝𝕖𝕣! nαnαmí kєntσ x 𝕕𝕒𝕣𝕜 𝕗𝕒𝕚𝕣𝕪! rєαdєr

၄.၃ ݁ ˖ִ ࣪₊ ⊹˚ 𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰𝓼 𝓽𝓸 𝓴𝓷𝓸𝔀 ₊˚✧ the reader will have very long hair and dark navy blue eyes for the sake of the story. I tried to be as vague as possible in every other aspect. this will also be in multiple parts, like a mini series. I’m not sure how many parts there will be 😔

၄.၃ ݁ ˖ִ ࣪₊ ⊹˚ 𝓪𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓪𝓵𝓮𝓷𝓲𝓪 𝓼𝓪𝔂𝓼 ₊˚✧ I took a different approach when writing this than I usually do, or in other words a different writing style than usual. Tbh, I know it’s not my best writing but it’s not the worst either. So please tell me if the writings good, I’ll definitely appreciate it !! Also, Sugar Water is one of my favorite songs by Cibo Matto, I definitely recommend it 😫✨. Thank you, and enjoy the story ✨ nanami header and gray sparkle divider made by me 💖

⋆˙⟡♡ 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒂𝒓𝒆 𝒄𝒖𝒓𝒓𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒍𝒚 𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝑷𝑨𝑹𝑻 𝑶𝑵𝑬 𐙚 ‧₊˚ . 𝜗𝜚𝒕𝒘𝒐 𝜗𝜚𝒕𝒉𝒓𝒆𝒆 𝜗𝜚𝒇𝒐𝒖𝒓 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁

⋆⭒˚. ࣪˖ ִֶָཐིཋྀ 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐋𝐄𝐆 𝐖𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 the sun was quickly setting — either that, or the trees were so thick it made the sky look black.

Nanami couldn’t be sure; he was too focused on the pain in his leg and the pounding in his head that made it hard for him to think clearly, his vision blurring with every pulse.

Was it day? Had it been only hours since he escaped with barely his life? How long had he been wandering through these dark woods with nothing but his own wits about him?

Nanami had no clue.

Long enough for twigs to stick in his hair that’s for certain, long enough for mud to cling to the sweat on his skin and stain the fabric of his clothes. Long enough for his mind to blur the reality of hours and minutes that time itself seemed to stretch and bend forever.

He was sure he was leaving a rather noticeable blood trail behind him for those beasts to follow him and yet it seems they hadn’t — they must be too busy sucking out the marrow of his companions to bother with him.

Nanami couldn’t argue with that reasoning, however. With an injury like his, bleeding out like he was, he was bound to wither away eventually; he was already a walking corpse.

A morbid thought, but his macabre reality.

The forest floor was brown and black slush, muddy from the light rain that squished and sloshed under his boots. His glasses were dotted with water and his leg shot pain straight up his spine with every dreaded step forward yet Nanami wouldn’t give up — he couldn’t.

Not when his boots sunk into the mud and he had to pull his legs out of the earth to move, not when he smeared water on his glasses when he’d push them up the bridge of his nose, not when every step felt like a millennia of war battling in his calf… he smelt of his own blood and misery yet he conquered on, further into the dark wood with splinters in his palms and blisters on his toes.

A part of him was drawn forward anyway, drawn towards the mystery of the shadows and the fortune that may just await him if he continued on just a little farther. A symptom to his love for adventure; he was always weak to the allure of intrigue.

It was also hope.

Nanami couldn’t die here, not like this, not after all of his adventures and misfortunes and treasures. He was a traveler after all, a born adventurer; he’s faced many great monsters and beasts and traversed the most dangerous of terrain — fierce lions with claws of blade and savage wolfs with teeth of daggers, fiery lava pits and cataclysmic grand canyons.

He’s been dealt with far worse things than a clawed leg — he’s been poisoned and stabbed and bit and bludgeoned and nearly flattened by an avalanche yet this seems to be the one injury to ruin him despite them all.

A damn cut.

Maybe his bad luck had finally caught up to him.

Maybe it was purely by chance and blind, ignorant luck that he survived those encounters at all, maybe it had been luck that saved his life tonight.

He didn’t believe in luck but maybe that was just it.

Maybe he’d die from blood loss first before the infection set in; he hoped he’d just collapse into the forest floor and let the mud swallow him as his body weakened and his blood pooled around him to soak into the dirt.

At least he wouldn’t feel it when he rotted into the soil and roots buried themselves in his bones, when flowers would eventually sprout from his decay and grow gardens.

There was always beauty to be found in ugly things he guessed, a rule just as simple as beauty could be recycled from the horror of something else.

Something beautiful to come from something dead, something finally meaningful to come from his meaningless purpose.

No.

Nanami swallowed down that dreaded feeling, motivation bursting at his seams and ripping at his shirt, pooling at his feet and pounding in his ears as he stepped onward with a clenched jaw and sore muscles.

He was determined to live, determined to find something or someone or… he was bound to find safety eventually, some kind of sanctuary, even if it took him all night (if he even lived that long).

He walked a little longer until he stumbled upon a thick berry bush that seemed to block his way further; it was dark blue berries he certainly didn’t recognize and definitely didn’t trust to eat no matter how badly he needed the energy.

Nanami took that as a sign, stopping against a tree trunk to rest his throbbing leg for just one minute — a minute he couldn’t really spare. He leaned down and put a hand on his one good knee and huffed and sighed, panting weakly and tiredly; he really wanted nothing more than to be in his big comfy bed back in Hawksborough, surrounded by the comfort of his own home and safety of his room.

A few quiet moments passed with him like this. Him leaned against the tree, tired and haunted with nothing but the sounds of nature and the weariness of his own fragmented breath surrounding him.

Then, then he heard something rather remarkable, something that had his breath stop and his back straighten.

It was a hum, a beautiful, deep hum that seemed to resonate in the air around him and shake the leaves of the trees and the petals of flowers on broken stems.

It started out faint, like the strings of a harp between soft fingers. Then it crescendoed into something greater, deeper, like if someone were to play the keys of an organ and each heavy note echoed on the walls of an empty cathedral; hauntingly beautiful.

It certainly did, it echoed in his chest so hard he could feel his ribs shake.

It was a melodically smooth sound, coming from somewhere close to him but yet everywhere around him; it was hypnotic and bone chilling and mesmerizing all in one and Nanami felt a shiver run down his spine at the sound of it as the hum seemed to grow louder the more curious he became.

He looked around the darkness for anything to hint at where the sound was coming from, but saw nothing except black air and the twisted limbs of trees.

Nanami gulped down the pain in his body with a sore throat, then winced as he stood up straight.

His leg throbbed and his head was starting to ache but with one final push he managed to scramble his way through the berry bush where the hum seemed to drown in his ears and coo at his brain; something told him he was going the right way.

He grind his teeth at the thorns pushing and breaking into his skin, ripping at his shirt and tearing at his seams.

When Nanami was through, a dirty mess of ragged clothing and mud, he stumbled into the grass with a grunt, falling to his knees and landing on his bruised palms.

“Fuck…” He muttered painfully, never one to cuss but too damn frustrated not to; he’d forgive himself for it.

Nanami took a moment to relish in the agony of his battered leg; he didn’t even realize the humming had stopped until he picked his head up to see where he was.

And by the gods Nanami was in utter awe of what he saw.

There was a bright blue pond a little ways ahead of him, surrounded by flourishing plants and flowers and vines that all seemed to glow vibrant colors of blue and gold. The water itself was sparkling and bright, reflecting cerulean pools in the flora around it.

Iridescent blue weeping willow trees hung around the water and seemed to whisper longingly to the wind that caressed their leaves. The grass was long and wispy surrounding the blue bosque that seemed to sway and dance all on their own accord, to their own little melody.

The air itself was sweet and sprinkled with little golden fireflies that buzzed happily around him; it was like a portal to a whole new thriving world.

Although, it was eerily seductive; Nanami wanted to stay in the grandeur blue arms of this utopia forever, but something in the way his hair stood up on his arms and his heart pounded in his ears told him he wasn’t completely safe to do so.

Nanami pushed that thought aside, not necessarily in his right mind to pay attention to what his body was subconsciously telling him.

He was too wide eyed and breathless, for even the wind seemed so fresh and magical every pore in his body felt alive and tingly — he even felt the pain in his leg stop, some sort of euphoria flood through his nerves. Unless he just became so accustomed to the pain he couldn’t feel it anymore.

It was so beautiful and unlike anything he’d ever seen; how he wished he could take a picture and write it down in his journal so he could remember this place forever… if only those beasts hadn’t ripped his satchel off him.

Nanami blinked, once, twice, then pushed himself off the ground with all the strength he could muster. He was dirty and torn and completely out of place in such an ethereal land; he felt almost guilty for tainting its grass with his muddy shoes.

Still, he stumbled further into the mysterious place as the soft sound of wind chimes twinkled somewhere around him, not loud and obnoxious but soft and gentle, a lullaby almost that made him feel sleepy, like the notes themselves were wrapping their velvety arms around him and pulling him in.

He didn’t resist it, looking around in awe at the paradise in front of him as he took a couple steps forward. He caught the movement of two butterflies playing together in the air, their dainty wings glimmering with glowing white sparkles and a vivid sky blue — he even swore with every flap of their wings it left a trail of delicate golden dust behind them.

He watched with wonderment as they faded somewhere into the trees, then turned his head to look back at the pond; the real treasure.

He felt his mouth salivate, all too aware of the dryness in his sore throat now as the water swayed and tempted him into its crystal blue depths. He knew he should’ve been wiser about this, hesitate for just a moment and linger on the possibility of entrapment but his thirst wouldn’t allow it; a pathetic, wandering fly in a deadly flytrap.

Nanami took two strong steps — all the strength he had left — towards the ponds edge for some much needed refreshment, falling down to his knees at the waters edge. The buzzing of nature seemed to drown out behind him in a mesh of forgotten sound as he scooped up a handful of water and eagerly drank it out of his palm.

He didn’t bother looking at his reflection; he knew he was an utter mess and always hated to see himself in disarray. He must’ve looked vaguely threatening to any outsider who saw him — not that anyone did (as far as he knew).

The water rippled as he drank from it, the liquid cool and translucent blue in his dirty palm he had haphazardly wiped on his trousers.

It passed over his dry gums and throat in a refreshingly cold blast with every gulp; it tasted so good and clear he could even feel the chill of it going down his throat.

With three more frantic gulps Nanami had had enough; his stomach was full and his thirst was quenched as he leaned back on his palms and looked up towards the sky in a spared moment of relaxation.

It was a dark navy blue sky twinkling with yellow and gold diamonds, no moon in sight but he didn’t care as he got lost in the coolness of the air on his narrow cheeks and the way it wrapped around his aching body, warping between the tears of his shirt and washing over his warm skin.

It was the opposite of how he used to sit on a cliffs edge and soak in the warmness of a golden sunset after a hard journey. He didn’t want to feel the heat of a days end on his glowing skin so much as he wanted to bask in the cold stillness of a breezy evening.

He hadn’t known how he got here and he didn’t bother trying to figure out how; as an adventurer such as himself it was always about the journey rather than the destination itself anyway, but not in this case.

In this case he couldn’t be happier that the troublesome voyage had ended and he had finally reached where he needed to be — maybe needed was a strong word but he’d rather be here than out there. It was certainly weird to think that way, and it went it against his very passions but… he’s been through too much in this night alone than he’s ever really suffered through in the totality of his life.

Nanami felt disappointed in himself for thinking so, guilty even, like he was betraying this metaphorical odyssey he was destined to travel on. Still, for the first time in his career Nanami was relived to be off his feet.

He sighed wistfully, fingers sinking into the soil as cool air flooded his lungs. He closed his eyes as he relished in the feeling.

Nanami didn’t even feel it when his elbows buckled under him and he fell back on the grass, only seeing a glittering blue sky and yellow diamonds behind black, closed eyes.

The water went still once more and the blue went black.

You studied the contours of his face delicately, your hands intertwined in your lap and your legs tucked under you as you did.

The room was small and cozy, lit by nothing but a soft blue flame in the corner that crackled and popped every few moments, tendrils of butterfly bush hanging from the ceiling and walls. The room smelt of honey and sweet rain, dark and joyfully dreary but you saw his face just fine.

He was quite handsome, you couldn’t deny that.

His blonde hair all in disarray, his narrow cheeks and sharp nose, his thin pink lips and angled eyes.

He was handsome.

You narrowed your eyes at him curiously, raising a delicate hand and gently brushing your cold fingertips over his cheekbone.

His skin was smooth and warm, cheeks flushed a light pink. It was always a small envy of yours — the warmth of humans. You were so cold all the time, your skin like crystals and frigid like snow.

Your fingertips fluttered over his blonde eyelashes, unable to keep your hands off him.

You wondered what color his eyes were. Green? Brown? Blue maybe?

You were eager for him to wake, your boredom having become tiresome and your patience having become thin. Still, you didn’t want to disturb his sleep just yet. The poor man had been through so much already; his leg was still healing, wrapped in bandages and honey salve and you certainly didn’t want to add any extra stress that could damage him further.

Really, you loved to stare at him with no complications, enjoyed the thrill of blatantly admiring his beauty before he could wake up and you’d inevitably make him uncomfortable, before he’d say it was improper to do so.

You were selfish in that regard, in many regards.

This man, you hadn’t learned his name nor his origin, but you knew he had been in the dark woods at a time he should not have been.

He was tall and brave, strong and perseverant, that much you knew and that much was certain. It was why you liked him so much, it was why you spared him.

But who was he?

He was no real threat to you and that was all that mattered.

You smiled softly, bemused and smitten, when his nose crinkled in his sleep. You gently dusted away a stray blonde hair that had fallen out of place.

You seemed to have bothered him then, because not a moment later did his head turn slightly and his lips part to exhale — he was waking up.

Finally.

You settled your hands back in your lap before he could notice, staring down at him with a sweet, welcoming smile in hopes to comfort him as his eyes fluttered open to look at you.

You gazed back into them delightedly.

Mm, they were brown.

Nanami had woken up with an ache in his skull and a sting behind his eyes, lost in a daze of twisted black thickets and enticing blue ponds; the sensation of featherlight fingers tracing his cheek tickled his brain and made his skin itch.

The first thing he smelt when he came to was blueberry pie and sugar, the sweetness of it making his mouth water but his stomach twist.

He wanted to eat something, badly, but he also wanted to throw up.

The air was warm around him, comfortable and pleasant, his sore back laid on something soft and plushy. He didn’t feel any reason for panic as he found himself melting into the comforter — whatever the hell it was he couldn’t be certain — against his better judgment.

Nanami tried to gather some sort of sensation in his body, tried wiggling his fingers and his toes but all he felt was nothing, numbness. He couldn’t even feel the pain radiating in his leg anymore.

He found that worrisome; maybe it was finally his time, maybe his luck had finally run out. Maybe he was lying face down in the forest floor right now as his mind conjured up the smell of his favorite pie and the feigned comfort of his mattress as a sweet gesture to bid him a final farewell.

Hell, if death was this peaceful he would’ve never been so against it.

Then he felt another whisper of skin across his forehead, soft and untraceable. If it wasn’t for the stark coldness of whatever it was touching him he would’ve missed it.

With the coldness making his skin shiver Nanami quickly found himself grounded back to reality. He wasn’t dead, he couldn’t be. Death didn’t exhibit the mundane concepts of hot or cold; temperature had no purpose in a void of nothing.

He was very much alive if the sound of his heart beating in his ears and the chill on his forehead was anything to go by. He even felt the tips of his fingers tingle as feeling came over them again, numbness having lingered in his bones for far too long.

He somehow found the strength to open his eyes.

For a brief moment he saw a blurred vision of black and blue. The shadow of a pale, azure colored light shining from somewhere, flickering in and out. It made a headache settle into the cracks of his skull and spread a torturous ache throughout his head.

He couldn’t stop the groan from leaving his lips as his hand flinched up towards his temple.

“Oh no, it seems you have some head trauma, it’s best not to strain yourself right now.”

It was a voice, soft spoken, barely above a whisper that piqued his interest immediately.

His vision focused on you once the pain faded; the girl next to his bed side with glittering dark eyes and a wickedly charming smile, wearing a baby blue colored dress embroidered with delicate flower designs; vines and flowers all intertwined in a tangled mess of thorns and petals that reminded him so greatly of the dark wood.

A sheer, glittering lily white shawl was loosely hung around your shoulders, hair in wavy tendrils down to your waist that pooled around your thighs. You were certainly pretty and unassuming.

He could tell you were a frail little thing, gossamery and lovely in a dainty sort of way but he also knew better than to underestimate you; appearances always deceived and there was no greater trick than the feigned purity of an impure thing.

Thankfully, he was not one easily fooled.

Nanami looked back up at you after a quick study of your form — your posture and seemingly innocent facade that did nothing to comfort him — so he just stared at you distrustfully, dark brown eyes narrowed cautiously. He noted the feigned sweetness of your lips as they curved into a small smile and the mischievous twinkle in your eyes as you gazed down at him; he felt preyed upon, the same feeling he exhibited in the meadow.

Kento had been through enough near death experiences in his life to recognize a snake when he saw one, for even the devil had come as a beguiled serpent so who was he to know if you were any better? He felt uneasy under your vehement stare, like a mouse in a cobra pit.

It was peculiar and uncanny, you yourself were frightening and unusual, no doubt a cacophony of horrors wrapped in a cute little bow with pretty blue eyes. He knew you could have anyone fooled, but he was too good, too experienced in the matters of trickery to recognize a fellow trick when he saw one.

Nanami was on the cusp of your deception, giving you a heady stare from beneath stern eyes.

He subtly leaned further away from you.

You flickered your gaze between his stare with an amused look, noting the change in his aura surrounding him as he regarded you tentatively.

You were honestly impressed by how quickly he seemed to have caught on to your true nature, not all humans had the innate sense of danger that he did; something in his gut had told him you were a vile, dangerous thing, and his instincts were telling him to run.

Even though it was unfair to categorize you as such, it was only fair to assume, and not necessarily distinguished too far from the truth anyway.

You sympathized with his ornery skepticism, not wanting to scare him any further so you just smiled down at him in the sweetest way you could fathom. You waited patiently for him to gather his thoughts and wit. Although, it seemed his mind was already made up.

“How are you feeling?” You asked in a nonthreatening, soft tone, raising a hand and barely touching the flushed skin of his bare chest, only enough for your fingertips to graze across his skin and grab his attention.

You were pleasantly thrilled at the feeling of his warmth under your fingertips, but Nanami just shuddered like a ghost had touched his bare soul with cold, lifeless hands.

His dark eyes quickly flickered down to where your hand had touched him, covering it with his palm like you had just struck him. Your fingertips seemed to have jolted his skin with a sudden frigid coldness that throbbed through his veins and made his heart stutter. He flinched at the shock of it, not seeing the way you had to bite back a smirk at his indignation.

He looked up at you with a sharp inhale, “I’m quite fine,” Nanami cleared his throat and tried to sit up straighter in an attempt to look half as intimidating as you did, “now who are you?”

You smiled at him, already loving the sound of his voice as he spoke to you; smooth, sharp, demanding, washing over your skin like the warm water of a hot spring. He was entirely too serious and you were too smitten. You could hear the underlying hatred he seemed to already have for you, hear the way his heart raced in his chest and see the way his fist tightly clenched the blanket between his long fingers.

You made him nervous and he made you pathetically giddy. You didn’t care about his fear however, for he would soon learn to become accustomed to you given the proper time spent together. All you really needed was just a little patience until then, after all, could you really blame him for being a bit standoffish given his bizarre situation?

You felt amusement pull at your lips as you folded your hands back into your lap, looking down at him with navy blue pools that reminded him so much of the pond he had so eagerly drank from, “Your savior. You’re welcome for that by the way.”

Nanami leered at you, the hair standing up on his arms as you spoke. Your voice was sweet enough but coated with undertones of something more sarcastic, something more sinister.

“Savior? I sincerely doubt that.”

You felt your smile pull harder at his pride; you couldn’t help it, he was like a frightened squirrel shrinking away from you with his tail between his legs, but trying desperately hard to appear like he wasn’t.

You heard the hardness in his voice though, the rigidness in his tone, the overcompensation for fear.

“Well, how do you explain where you are then? I hardly believe you got here on your own.” You teased him, gesturing to the dimly lit room around you and granting him a large, impish grin.

Nanami didn’t bother looking around, keeping his eyes narrowed in on your face and his hand on his stomach; he didn’t trust not having his eyes on you.

“Whatever the case may be… I can assure you I’m fine. I don’t need whatever it is you’re offering, and quite frankly, I don’t want it.”

You sighed lethargically at his stubborn insistence, staring at him for a moment as your shoulders slumped.

“Is that so? Then stand and walk out. I’m not stopping you traveler. You’re free to do as you please.” You teased him once more with a smirk on your face, gesturing towards the exit behind you — a rectangular opening in the wooden wall shielded by strings of diamond hanging off the top rim.

Of course, you knew he couldn’t leave anyway.

Nanami glanced at where you were pointing coldly, intrigued by the glances of blue-green trees — it seemed like — peeking through the swaying beads.

He didn’t move his head, only his eyes, considering.

There was no way you would just let him walk out that door.

He looked back at you, then looked down at his foot which he had almost forgotten about. It was heavily wrapped in big blue-green leaves he didn’t recognize, sealed tight with a sticky, glossy coating. He raised his brow curiously, face stoic.

You followed his gaze with a knowing smile, “Oh, that’s right… you can’t walk.” You looked back up at him, grin having not left your face.

Nanami clenched his jaw at the cheery way you seemed to say it. His biceps strained as he adjusted in the bed to sit against the wall completely, ignoring the ache in his spine and the heaviness sat on his broad shoulders. Flowers tickled the back of his neck and a small fur blanket slid off his hips as he did.

You stared heatedly at the flexing veins in his arms and the tightness of his abs, the smoothness of his human skin and the rigid curves of muscle on his virile body; he was beautiful and magnificent, like a diamond tenderly molted and pressed over the course of eons. Only a god who truly loved him could dedicate such time and care to carve him — every muscle and vein, from the tips of his toes to the strings of his blonde hair he was perfection.

You couldn’t let him leave you, not now, not after you’ve heard the whiskey smoothness of his voice and seen the chocolate of his brown eyes. He was everything you wanted and everything you desired.

Nanami swallowed once he was settled, glaring at you with his fist bundled in the black fur of the blanket you had laid on him.

“I can tend to my own wounds, I never asked for your help. I wish to go back home.”

You couldn’t help but giggle at him, raising a hand and covering your mouth as you did.

“Home? Your home is far away, you need to rest.” You laughed at him like he was silly, attempting to lay a consoling hand on his thigh with blue and white crystal bracelets jangling on your wrist.

Nanami gripped your hand before you could touch him however, keeping it locked in a tight grip between his strong fingers. He ignored the coldness of your skin in his grasp while your heart jumped at the feel of his warm palm wrapped around you.

“I don’t have the patience for your games. Where have you taken me and what do you plan to do with me?”

You huffed at the rudeness in his tone, slowly pulling your hand out of his grasp and laying it back in your lap.

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes at him.

“Could you stop being so hostile? I’m not going to hurt you… besides, if I wanted you dead would I have patched your leg? Would I have cleaned you? Would I have brought you to my home?” You said exasperated, giving him an annoyed look as impatience settled over your blood like a thin sheen of syrup over a plate of berries.

That was a flaw of yours, your impatience.

Nanami looked down at his body when you mentioned it, seeing that he was now wearing a white button up shirt with the buttons left undone, his broad chest exposed to you in a way he didn’t doubt you orchestrated. His lower half however was merely covered in a set of blue striped boxers he heavily recognized as one of his own.

He clenched his jaw at that, feeling exposed and vulnerable in a whole new definition of the word.

“Don’t worry I didn’t bathe you per se. Just washed away the dirt I could find on the already exposed areas.” You leaned closer to him with a playful smile, voice a teasing whisper, “I didn’t peek, promise.”

Nanami cocked his head at you, “No pants?” He deadpanned, ignoring your previous statement.

You flickered your eyes down to the blue boxers he wore, then back up to his face with the same kittenish smile on your lips.

“Oops. I must’ve forgot.” You lied flawlessly if only nonchalantly, leaning back away from him to your original sitting position.

Nanami frowned at that; he almost sneered at you, but managed to remain calm as he stared at you with irritation inflamed in his brown eyes.

You bit your lip to hide a widening smile.

“Well, did you hear what I said? I’m not trying to hurt you. I found you lying in the grass covered in your own blood and dirt… I thought you were dead, I would have felt guilty if I just left you there. So I brought you to my home and I fixed your leg. I did a rather nice job, don’t ya think?” You spared him a story that wasn’t necessarily a lie but not necessarily the whole truth either. It was a simpler version of events you knew he’d have no problem brushing off.

Nanami, of course, didn’t believe you anyway. He believed you had found him, yes, but not how you had claimed to. He believed there was more to the story, details you pointedly overlooked and purposefully forgotten.

He swallowed tensely, his strong body stiff and rigid like he was preparing for something to happen, heart beating in his ears and anticipation buzzing at his finger tips.

He wanted to question you, ask every question and hear every answer but he was too smart to blatantly antagonize someone he didn’t know. He knew you were off, maybe not entirely there, but he didn’t know what you were in the sense of your capabilities. He knew your small frame was misleading, your wide smile deceptive, your pretty little eyes twinkling stars of mischief behind glittering pools of blue.

You weren’t to be trusted and you weren’t to be taken lightly; you were strange and otherworldly beautiful; a kind of deadly combination he’s never had good experiences with in the past. Sirens were enticing just as you but nowhere near as cunning, pirates were fearless just as he but nowhere near as smart.

He refused to be the drunken, belligerent fool falling into your deep, hungry waters.

“Could you tell me your name? That way, we won’t be strangers.”

He eyed you with a clenched jaw and narrowed eyes, knowing he needed to play this silly game of yours the right way if he ever planned on getting out of here. If things went according to plan you would soon be the pliable object of his carefully curated manipulation, the one with all the questions and none of the answers, the trickster who would soon be the tricked.

He gave you a disinterested, cautious look, raising his chin at you, “Kento. And yours?” He replied shortly, not necessarily interested in hearing anything you had to say but knowing it was better to play along with your delusion than reap the consequences of not.

You hummed pleasurably at that, ignoring his question altogether, “Kento…”

You beamed at the sound of his name despite his impudence, loving the sound of it being pronounced in your voice, the way your tongue moved around every letter in your mouth as you said it.

His name was handsome, he was handsome.

You leaned towards him once more as a sense of demented idolatry swelled in your chest; you wanted to be close to him, feel his ribs enclosed around your lungs and hear his deep voice in your head. Hear his heart beat in your chest and feel his blood mesh with yours — you wanted to be one, to think, to feel, to have him.

He could see the almost manic look in your eye as you looked at him. He was disturbed by it, tried to lean away but couldn’t, already pressed as flat as he could be against your black, wooden wall.

You bared him a wide smile that glimmered the whiteness of your sharp teeth, “We’re going to have so much fun together…”

𝜗𝜚𝕤𝕦𝕘𝕒𝕣 𝕨𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕞𝕒𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕝𝕚𝕤𝕥 ✧･ﾟ: *

[shuacore]

barcelona nights

reader (afab) x lsm — 6.9K summary:  "The music is all but static in the background, and for a moment it’s just the two of you again, drinking in the airless summer night and the sounds of other couples enjoying each other’s company. You run your thumb across Seokmin’s bottom lip, completely enraptured. His eyes are dangerously dark." —a/n: a fun little birthday present for my bffl ang <3 tags: swearing, smut (18+), probably too much plot n not enough smut, not completely proofread i’m so sorry, mentions of alcohol??, emotional and physical intimacy are my kryptonite, additional warnings under the cut

additional warnings: unprotected sex (always be safe pls!!), oral (f receiving),  pet names (princess, baby, angel, etc), not very adventurous but i would do anything with him tbh

playlist 4 the vibes!!! wyoming — elijah fox a quick getaway — stephen rennicks spring 1 — max richter, antonio vivaldi puerto claridad — amparanoia bamboleo — gypsy kings since i don’t have you — the skyliners the sun is in your eyes — jacob collier tell me — groove theory

Sweat drips down the bridge of your nose as the precarious stack of books in your hands threatens to wobble. Please, for the love of God, don’t fall. The summer heat is brutal—hot and humid—and it sucks all of the energy out of you as you shuffle to the library. It had been a difficult week of research and you were finally returning your books, ready to throw them and the stress from working so hard away. A bead of sweat lingers on your brow, slipping onto your eyelid and you blink furiously, praying it stays there until you can set your burden down. 

In your fervor, you walk a bit too close to the curb, your toes slipping off the edge—you feel the stack slip dangerously, and you curse out loud as you realize you’re falling, desperately clutching your books to your chest, the pavement below approaching a bit too fast when—

A hand clamps around your wrist, hauling you out of the street just as a car zooms past, ruffling your hair. 

“Careful!” a male voice says, breathless. And when you get a good look at your savior, it feels like you’ve been rocketed into one of the dramas you and your roommates obsessed over. 

His name is Lee Seokmin, he’s 25, an anthropology major, and he is the most handsome and charming man you have ever seen. He picks you up off the street, flashes you the most blinding smile, and then your mind goes blank. The rest is history.

So it’s no surprise to you after three years when he still asks questions like, “Do you remember when we met?” You resist the urge to scoff fondly. Always so sentimental.  

It’s a warm summer evening as you sit on the plaza, observing the night life of a quiet coastal Spanish town you had come across during the day. You pause the furious digging in your purse—for something which you had forgotten some time ago—to look at your partner, whose eyes are glazed over in dreamy contentment. 

“Really?” you ask, tampering down the amused look of disbelief that fights its way across your face. Seokmin hates being teased unless he initiates, even if it’s all in good fun. 

“No, I’m serious,” he says, in unwavering sincerity, head lolling against the back of the bistro chair as he watches you unabashedly. Even after so many years, Seokmin’s eyes still set your skin on fire, and he looks so picturesque like this, just a little bit undone from the day’s toils and a few glasses of wine down the line. The collar of his shirt is open a few buttons down, exposing a swatch of buttery smooth skin that—after the drinks you’ve had—makes your mouth water. He looks like the last burst of fading sunlight before nightfall. 

You shake your head with a small smile. “You’re ridiculous. Of course I do.”

Seokmin opens his mouth to say something else when his nostalgic reverie is interrupted by the waiter, who asks quietly if the two of you would like anything else. Your fiancé orders two more glasses of wine for the both of you, and thanks the waiter again as he finally takes the menus from your table. 

It’s quieter now. The night is beginning to dwindle down, your bellies full of good food and wine, and in the distance the ocean waves wash across the rocky shores, pulling pebbles out to sea with quiet shushing sounds. The air is salty on your tongue, and you know you probably look a mess, especially after the long day of heat and humidity, but Seokmin watches you with shining eyes like you’re still the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. You blush sheepishly, fingers finally finding your lipstick in the bottom of your bag. 

“What?” you hiss without malice as Seokmin studies you. His cheeks are flushed, eyes shining even against the slowly dimming night light, and if you could commit an image to memory, if would be right here, right now, sitting at this table with him. Your stomach twists and you’re not sure if it’s a twinge of pain or an all-engulfing rush of affection, so instead you offer him another shy smile and replace your bag on the ground. 

He shakes his head, more to himself, and says, “You’ll make fun of me.” 

“Sure.”

“You’re just so radiant. All the time.” 

You suck in a breath, cheeks burning and laugh nervously. Seokmin was an all-or-nothing kind of guy, which meant you got all of his affection, all the time. It was overwhelming in the beginning, seeing how devoted he could be to one person, but you had grown accustomed to the quiet deference in which he did everything for you. Compliments were near holy to him. Nothing was more intimate than your name. His actions always spoke louder than words. For a while you had been resistant to it—like you would never quite deserve all the love he had to give—but Seokmin had a way of worming his way into your heart and lodging there until his smile was the only thing you could think of when you woke up. 

The waiter appears with two glasses in hand, asks once more if you need anything, before floating away again. You lift the glass—it’s a deep crimson and smells faintly sweet—and swirl the stem around in your fingers, watching the wine coat the sides of the glass with mesmerizing smoothness. 

Seokmin lifts his glass and murmurs a toast. You say it back, and the glasses hit each other with a soft ding! His eyes glint at you over the rim as he takes a sip. The wine is velvet on your tongue, rich and full-bodied, and it sends a flurry of warmth down your throat. 

You hum in appreciation and set the glass down on the table. Above, the stars blink into existence, mimicking the lights flickering to life around the plaza. They wash the patio in a lovely yellow glow, throwing Seokmin into soft relief. He looks a little out of it, pretty lips parted in hazy awe of the scenery around him. It’s still humid, but not too warm—just cool enough that it’s hard to tell where your body ends and the rest of the world begins. A moped passes by, its headlights bouncing off the stone walls of the buildings around you. The chatter from other cafe-goers could be white noise in the trees. In the background the sounds of sultry guitar float through the air, soaking into your skin and you sigh deeply, stretching your arms high into the air above you. It lulls you into a serene sense of calm and you close your eyes—just for a moment. 

Then—“Hey, dance with me,” you hear, whispered by lips pressed to your ear, and you open your eyes slowly to see Seokmin crouched next to your chair, his hand extended in offering. He looks so lovely here, so unguarded and pleased, the same overwhelming feeling of adoration—so strong it overflows into your throat—is difficult to choke back down. You take another hearty swig of wine, feeling it sink into your stomach and turn your legs to jelly. It activates the fuzzy feeling sitting dormant in your body, lifting you out of your chair and into the plaza center with other couples swaying slowly to the music emanating across the square. It all feels so horribly cinematic you’re having difficulty believing any of it’s real. 

You inhale sharply as Seokmin pulls you close to him, your bodies snapping together like magnets. His skin is sticky and warm from the summer heat as his hands brush over your ribcage and come to rest on your waist, coaxing you into a sensual rhythm of swaying hips and chests rising and falling in tandem. His strong arms wrap around you, pulling you tight to his body. The wine keeps you limber—which is nice because otherwise you’d be two left feet with out it. 

Seokmin tips his head to rest his sticky forehead against yours, eyes dancing with mirth in the evening light. His fingers press into the small of your back, searing through the gauzy fabric of your blouse, igniting a slow burn that sweeps through your whole body. You sigh deeply as your eyes flutter closed, taking in the sounds of soft timbales and claves bouncing off the stone under your feet, the heat from Seokmin’s body on yours, and his lips pressed against your skin, murmuring sweet nothings into your ear.

It’s sexy, to say the least. The laughter and conversations around you vanish until all you know is the sound of Seokmin’s breath ragged in your ear and hot on your cheek. He smells like rosemary and mint and the soap from the hostel. His lips dip dangerously low on your cheek until they brush over the skin under your jaw, sending a chill down your spine despite the heat. Seokmin smiles against your temple as your fingers toy with the hem of his shirt, skirting low over the smooth expanse of his stomach. He hums into your ear—a warning—as your fingertips trail just a little higher. But you’re still in public, so you pull back just enough to smile coyly at him and smooth the hem of his shirt back down.

The music is intoxicating, the melody swelling and swaddling you in a heady daydream of nothing but Seokmin. You tuck your nose into his shoulder, inhaling deeply as his fingers dance up your spine and land lightly on the back of your neck.

“God, I love you,” he confesses, and his laughter is swallowed by your lips suddenly on his, giddy and girlish. It’s just supposed to be an innocent peck—just a quick one you could share in public—but with the wine having gone completely to your head, the music reverberating in your chest, and Seokmin’s tongue in your mouth, it’s difficult to concentrate. Seokmin tastes like the Albariño you ordered, like lemon and nectarine, and so, so sweet your knees turn to liquid. He hums in content as a soft sigh escapes your mouth, unprompted. His hands are firm on your hips, fingers lacing through the belt loops of your skirt to pull you closer. You tangle your own in the damp strands at the nape of his neck, relishing the own sounds you can persuade from your partner’s throat. 

Someone catcalls in the background and you come to with a start. Seokmin’s face is rosy—from the wine or from you, it’s hard to tell—but he’s well past the point of having the grace to look embarrassed. His eyes are glued to you, drinking you in completely. You grin, hiding your face in his chest. The music is all but static in the background, and for a moment it’s just the two of you again, drinking in the airless summer night and the sounds of other couples enjoying each other’s company. You run your thumb across Seokmin’s bottom lip, completely enraptured. His eyes are dangerously dark.

“Go back to the hotel?” you whisper, mouth hovering mere centimeters away from his. 

Seokmin’s next kiss is indication enough. Grabbing your purse, he throws a few bills onto the bistro table before tugging you away from the plaza. Street signs bleed into flights of rickety stairs and cobblestone alleyways into flowered medians and quiet side roads. The ocean roars in greeting as you run unsteadily back to your hotel. Street lamps blaze into life amid loud shouts of laughter from nearby pedestrians, and the fluttery feeling in your stomach only grows. The only thing that stays constant is the feeling of Seokmin’s hand in yours, firm and reassuring. 

Then, unprompted, Seokmin tugs you into a hidden alcove off the street, and presses you hard against the brick wall, tilting your jaw up with his thumbs to pull you into a searing kiss. He draws in a sharp breath, groaning softly into your mouth as you sag into his touch. You feel like a teenager again, sneaking off the beaten path so you can put your hands all over each other. Seokmin is impatient—his hands dig into your hips, his mouth is on your jaw, and his body is so hot it’s any wonder he hasn’t yet burst into flames. 

“Seokmin,” you gasp, nails digging into his chest, breaking away. His excitement is palpable. He groans, irritated, and tips his forehead against your cheek, still holding you tight to him like you might still slip through his fingers. You extract yourself from his grasp, a little dizzy from the lack of oxygen and pull him away from the wall amidst protests. The privacy of your hotel room can’t arrive fast enough and it feels like eons before you’re pushing Seokmin against the back of the door yourself—so hard the air is knocked from his lungs—but he grins breathlessly as he draws you close, hip to hip, chest to chest, mouth to mouth.

You breath him in, smelling the lingering traces of cigarette smoke and lavender from the night markets on his clothes. Seokmin is all teeth and all tongue, hands traveling up and down the curve of your waist, over your ass, up your forearms and shoulders. His thumb tugs on your bottom lip, coaxing your mouth open as he slips his tongue in once more. You dissolve in his hands like water—you’ve always been so pliant with him, so eager to please it goes straight to his head.  

“Tell me what you want,” he mumbles, hand holding your jaw in place. His eyes are asking for a challenge. 

But you feel needy and slightly hysterical that it’s all you can do to say weakly, “You.” 

Seokmin’s breath is hot in your mouth and you have no choice but to ride the wave. This is Seokmin’s all-or-nothing, as he drags your thin linen blouse off your shoulders, popping the top button clean off amid breathless laughter so he can press more open-mouthed kisses along your shoulder and collarbone. You sigh deeply, winding your fingers into the hair at the back of his head again, chasing his lips with potent desperation. Seokmin grins, canines glinting wolfishly in the moonlight. It’s difficult to see in the burgeoning darkness—nothing but vague shadows dancing on the walls—so you kick off your shoes haphazardly, stumbling until your knees eventually strike the edge of the bed. You hit the mattress with a huff!, Seokmin in tow. His hand is hot against your bare skin, palm pressed flat to your chest where your heart races.

“This is your fault, by the way,” you tease, and Seokmin feigns sympathy, except his fingers are little too far up your thigh for the sympathy to land. You suck in a breath, eyes burning as Seokmin gazes at you with undisguised want, eyes flicking around your face in a dizzying pattern—eyes, lips, cheeks, forehead, nose, eyes, lips—like it was the first time he’d ever seen you. The air grows thicker like mud, sticking in your nose and throat and you struggle to swallow, pushing yourself off the bed. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Seokmin asks, voice laced with worry. His figure is clothed in deep blue shadow in the imminent darkness. Air is sparse, and anxiety flares in your stomach, unexpected, and you press a hand to your racing heart, willing it to slow. Your pulse is erratic and you realize you’re nervous.

“Woah, talk to me,” Seokmin pleads again, sitting up. His fingers around your wrist are soft, like all of him, and it eases the sudden ache in your chest, even if just a little. You place your other hand on top of his, stroking your thumb over his knuckles. 

Your voice is hoarse. “Just nervous. I don’t know why—it’s so silly.” 

And then Seokmin is there, tucking you into his arms and his nose in your hair, swaying as he holds you for a moment. 

“We don’t have to do anything you don’t want. You know that.” 

You frown, pushing away from his chest. “No–no, I want this. Just–had a moment, but I’m ok.” You lean your forehead on his shoulder again. “I’m always ok when I’m with you.” The quiet presses in on your ears. The incessant buzzing in your fingertips fades to the background, slowing to the steady rhythm of Seokmin’s heartbeat in his chest—reliable as always, a constant you had come to memorize like the spots on his face. 

“I’m right here, baby,” he whispers against your temple. “Whatever you want.”

The soft glow from the street lamps outside illuminate his features in a tranquil yellow hue. He looks angelic, always so gentle and willing, that it sucks the remaining air out of your lungs. 

He settles back on the edge of bed, hands resting on your hips as he gazes up at you with adoration so tangible it makes your heart ache. You run your fingers gently through his hair, pushing the dark strands off his forehead and trace the shape of his profile with your pointer finger, down his forehead and the bridge of his nose, pausing over his waiting lips, down his chin until you grasp it in between your thumb and forefinger. 

“You’re beautiful, too, you know?” you say, voice soft. And Seokmin smiles, pleased, and it lights up his whole face, sending a bolt of warmth down your throat like lightning. The crashing waves of the ocean are muffled under the sound of your heart in your ears. Seokmin is quiet, arms tight around your waist. Had it not been for the pulsing rhythm in your body, this might have been a tender moment—but the heat is still there, prodding in your stomach, building, smoldering, aching. 

You want him. Bad.

With a noise of impatience, you pull his face back towards yours, curving your body to pull him in, kissing him longingly, hoping he’ll sense the desperation growing in your stomach, understand the way you need to feel him under and over and inside you. Seokmin reads you like the back of his hand—senses the tension in your shoulders—and knows that if he uses his mouth just right your last remaining shred of self-control will snap.

He pulls at the rest of the buttons on your blouse with agonizing restraint, kissing every inch of skin revealed with painstaking deference. His mouth trails down your sternum, pausing as he listens to the quiet exhales that leave your mouth. The skin on your stomach is sensitive to his touch, and you bite back a few nervous giggles as Seokmin ghosts his lips just down to where the waistband of your skirt rests on your hips. His thumbs dig into the skin there, and he peers up at you, eyes sparkling mischievously. Asking for permission. You nod, breath shallow in your throat.

���Should be on my knees for a princess,” your fiancé murmurs lowly, dropping to his knees in front of you. What had been a steady flame in your gut erupts into a hunger so strong it might consume you from the inside out. Your mouth goes dry as he gentle pulls you down to the mattress, urging you to sit. 

In the same tender manner, Seokmin lifts the sole of your foot to his lips, eyes darkening as your breath quickens yet. His breath fans across your bare skin, up your ankles and your shin, before he pauses to press a hot kiss to the inside of your knee, teeth digging into the soft skin there. The static in your ears increases tenfold as his other hand pushes the hem of your skirt up to your waist. Seokmin’s mouth continues upward, stopping on the supple skin of the inside of your thighs. Hunger gnaws at your insides by now, and you tense your stomach in anticipation. Seokmin’s pupils are blown wide—impossibly dark as he takes you in—forcing you backwards, his mouth hovering just over the fabric in between you and complete bareness. Your breath quickens—waiting, waiting, waiting—as Seokmin’s tongue trails from the inside of your knee right to where your thigh pools at your hip. 

And then, with a dazed smirk, he sets your foot down—not on the floor—but gently over the bulge in his pants. Seokmin leans forward ever so slightly, eyes daring. Already he’s so hard, even under his trousers and it’s all you can do to stop yourself from falling apart right there.

“See what you do to me?” he rasps, breath hitching as you press your foot down—just a little—to feel him so vulnerable under you. Your panties are soaked by now—it feels like you’re wearing nothing at all. Seeing Seokmin like this, shirt unbuttoned to his stomach, hair still styled so nicely, lips parted with desire; you want him like this, now, all the time. 

“Seokmin–fuck–” you choke, the words ripped from your mouth as you feel his tongue, wet and hot over your panties. Seokmin tosses one of your feet over his shoulder as he wraps his fingers in the waistband, pulling your panties taut. The ability to control yourself is lost. You curve into his touch as Seokmin gently pulls your panties aside, and presses one last reverent kiss to the inside of your hip.  

“So beautiful,” he murmurs, breath fanning across your skin, “always so beautiful for me.” Then his mouth is on you, open-mouthed and scorching on your cunt, the tip of his tongue circling around your clit, tasting every part of you. You clench your fists into the sheets, gasping for air as he wraps his strong arms around your thighs to pin you down. Even still, you squirm away from his mouth, hands pushing at his head as he sends you to cloud nine. His eyes are searing even behind closed eyelids as he drinks your pleasure, watching in rapture. 

Seokmin’s voice is almost inaudible over the thrum of your heart in your ears. “You like the way I worship you, baby?”

“Yes, please, yes, oh my god, Seokmin, please,” you plead, lurching upwards to curl around his head as a particularly powerful bolt of pleasure rushes through your body. He’s ruthless, nails biting into your thighs as you writhe in pleasure, nose bumping against your clit, mouth planted firmly on your pussy as your cries become higher and more desperate. It builds and builds and builds, a rope in your gut stretching and pulling until you feel like you might snap in half. The pleasure mounts as Seokmin crudely licks his tongue up your cunt, pressed flat against your skin and you release a strangled groan, fingers knotting in his hair.

“S–Seokmin, I’m—” you gasp, body tensed in anticipation.

And then he leans back, and your release fades as quickly as it appeared. Your body aches uncomfortably. The mattress sinks down on either side of you as he braces his hands by your head. Seokmin grins, tucking a few pieces of hair gently behind your ear, dragging your mouth open with his thumb once more to push his tongue past your lips. He tastes like you and he moans as you pull him in by the back of his neck, kissing him fiercely.

“You’re a dick,” you protest, shoving his shoulder. Seokmin’s smile is tender, his cheeks flushed despite his actions just moments ago. 

“Hey,” he says in between kisses to your collarbone that stifle the feeble protests spewing from your mouth, “I don’t wanna go too fast.” 

You groan weakly, as he shifts his knee in between your thighs. He wraps his fingers around one of your ankles, lifting it up onto his hip. 

“But I wanna feel you,” you complain, looping your arms around his neck as if to urge him on. But Seokmin just shakes his head, grinning. His leg shifts again, pressing against the ache in between your thighs and you instinctively roll your hips, mouth dropping open at the touch. He places a large hand on your pelvis, pinning you to the bed.

“I’m taking my time with you,” he says against your mouth, smiling as you sag onto the bed. 

He wanted to fuck slow.

And he does, touching you with feather-light pressure, building your frustration and anticipation until you’re a sweating, panting, desperate disaster in his hands—and only then does Seokmin let you feverishly remove the rest of his clothes. The desire to feel him, see him, taste him has grown so vicious you might cry. He perches on the edge of the bed again, and with shaking hands you jerk the rest of his shirt off his broad shoulders, scraping your nails down his chest to the belt at his waist. You’ve always loved Seokmin’s body—its strong, lithe build, all toned and smooth. Seokmin curses under his breath, tossing his head back in pleasure as you kiss along his jaw and down his torso. The muscles in his stomach tense under your touch, pulled taut as your lips reach his hips again. Slowly, you undo the button on his trousers, all the while keeping burning eye contact. You want Seokmin to see how much you need him. 

“Let me touch you,” you whisper against his abdomen, waiting for the desperate nod, before your fingers slip under the waistband of his briefs to finally take him in your hand. Seokmin moans low and you moan with him, imagining when he would finally let you take him, how he would stretch you out, and you’d finally feel all of him. 

You pull your hand back to spit, making sure to keep your eyes on him as you do, before wrapping your fingers around his length again. Seokmin’s voice is choked in his throat as you run your hand up and down his entire shaft, taking care to twist your fist around the base of his cock, delicately trailing up and around the head, soaking up every breathy sound of satisfaction that leaves Seokmin’s lips. 

With palpable restlessness, you yank the rest of Seokmin’s clothes off, straddling him on the edge of the bed again. He feels the damp fabric of your panties against his thigh and groans, his fingers knitting into your hair to kiss you again, feverish and wanting. You grind down, feeling his cock hard against your pussy and laugh weakly—except it sticks in your throat as Seokmin’s nails dig into your hip, dragging your cunt down his length again. 

“You want me so bad, don’t you?” Seokmin goads, hand holding the back of your head as you roll your hips up and down his length with increasing desperation. Your nails dig into his chest. He pulls your panties to the side, eyes fluttering closed as your arousal slides over his skin. The heat of the room muddles your brain, heightening every sensation. You’re already so wet, needy and willing to do anything to make the tightness in your stomach go away. “Want me to fuck you, baby?”

“Please–” you beg, “need you. Seokmin–”

His lips are crushing, destroying any semblance of thought you might have had. 

“Go ahead, princess,” Seokmin groans, as you pull your panties to the side, sliding two fingers into yourself and using your arousal to lubricate his cock again. The weight of Seokmin’s cock in your hand, the sound of your fingers sliding down the length is enough to have you weak in the knees. Seokmin’s hands splay across your back, propping you up as you line up his cock with your entrance. 

Your fiancé has always been a romantic, and this time is no different as Seokmin kisses you, open mouth waiting to breathe in your needy moans as you slowly sink down onto his cock. In your agitation, it’s still tight, extracting a few hisses of discomfort out of you. But Seokmin is there, soothing you with quiet shushes against your lips, thumbs stroking your cheeks as you take him all the way. He stretches you out, nice and slow, drawing the air from your lungs. 

There you go, that’s my girl. You’re doing so well, baby.

His praise rolls over you like late afternoon sunlight, settling in your chest until you feel lightheaded—the love in your chest is too much to take. It feels more intimate than usual, being nose to nose with Seokmin like this, seeing every emotion flicker in his eyes, feeling his breath fan over your face as he pants. You comb your fingers through his hair and cup his face in your hands, as the fluttery, panicky desperation for a hold on reality reappears in your chest again. You gasp as Seokmin shifts farther onto the bed, nails biting into his scalp as he pulls you closer.

He can surely feel the supersonic pace of your heart against his chest and he shushes you gently, pressing his lips against your sternum.

“I–I just need you to relax, sweetheart,” you hear him murmur in your daze, hands running up and down your spine. “Just a little more.” 

You nod, eyes squeezes shut as you try to swallow the trepidation in your stomach. Seokmin takes it all with grace; his voice is like honey in your ear, sticky and sweet, whispering soft reassurances. Seokmin’s love can be so strong—even after all this time—that it overwhelms you, leaving you vulnerable and defenseless. You’re not used to the devotion that even now, it sometimes takes a little to get used to, so you tuck your nose in the crook of his neck. The smell of sunshine still sticks to his skin, like a moth to a flame. 

“Baby, are you still with me?” Seokmin asks, forefinger petting your cheek. “Hm?”

You nod wordlessly, breathing deeply while Seokmin watches, attentive, until you’ve finally taken all of him. Seokmin bottoms out with a strangled groan, and presses a chaste kiss to your lips, chest stuttering as you roll your hips with impatience. Even then, it’s still too much right away and you freeze, gasping for breath. 

“Hey,” Seokmin says, holding your face in his hands, “we have all night. Take it slow.”

“I know I just—ah–” you whine, stubborn, as you roll your hips again—ignoring the vague hesitancy in your stomach—this time relishing in the dull ache in between your legs, feeling the stretch and pull as Seokmin coaxes your hips into a lazy rhythm. He watches closely, mapping out your body with his hands, leaving you out of breath and hazy in the head. You throw your head back as he kisses your exposed throat, mouth hot over your skin. 

Seokmin rests his hand at the base of your throat—not quite squeezing—and leaves it there. The possessive glint in his eyes is enough to say you are mine. Mine. The thought alone is enough to have you falling into his touch. 

Mine.

Mine.

He slips the other hand lower, using his thumb to rub circles around your clit, persuading languorous moans from your mouth, watching you with sordid fascination as you respond to his every touch. You brace your hand on his knee, brow furrowing as the pleasure in your core molds into shape. It’s hot and heavy, radiating so strongly it makes your arm shake.

“Just like–that,” you whine, nails digging into Seokmin’s thigh as he fucks into you slow, gripping your ass so hard you know it’ll leave marks. He curses as you clench around his cock, urging him to go faster. But Seokmin is, and always has been, more patient than you, and he grins slowly, even through heavy-lidded eyes clouded with lust, gripping your hips tight enough to still your movement. 

“What did I say?” he challenges, lips hovering millimeters over yours. You frown, protests falling on deaf ears, as he leans in closer. His lips brush yours as he whispers, “Go. Slow.”

So you try, rolling your hips, grinding down on his cock until you think you might die, until your restlessness is as tangible as the arousal dripping onto Seokmin’s thighs. He fluctuates between playing with your clit–just until you’re on the verge of release—and waiting, just long enough to keep the buzz in your body at bay. Your knees ache as you hold yourself up, feeling Seokmin’s cock slide and and out, his hands in your hair and on your ass. He edges you, daring you to come first each time you whimper you’re close, waiting until the shaking in your fingers stops just for him to continue. 

You’ve never been a crier, but after twenty minutes of this, you’re certain that even a slight breeze would cause you to come undone. Seokmin’s cock rests deep inside to the hilt, his mouth is on your skin, and you know that if he moves, you’ll come harder than you ever have before. 

“Baby, please,” you beg, hips jerking at every slight movement, “please–”

Seokmin smiles, and even just the sight of his pretty teeth have the tears you’ve been holding back, rolling down your cheeks like two big fat admissions of defeat. You suck in a breath as Seokmin lifts you off his cock, dropping you onto your back on the mattress. He places one of your ankles over his shoulder, pressing you down by the back of your thigh as you toss the other around his waist. 

The sounds coming from your mouth are less than human as Seokmin runs his fingers through your arousal again, placating your whines with his lips. You feel like you’re about to snap. 

“Seokmin, fuck me.” It sounds so ridiculous coming from your mouth you think you might cry again, but the thought is shoved away as Seokmin slaps his cock against your needy cunt a few times, pulling more animalistic cries from your throat. 

“Soon, pet,” he grins, and then his cock is pushing into you again, his fingers on your clit, his eyes dark and earnest as your whole body tenses in his arms. 

Your nails claw into his skin and he hisses, brow furrowed, as you drag them down his back with uncharacteristic force, but the thought of his beautiful back marked by your torment only feeds the fire in your belly. You arch your spine, pressing into him as Seokmin draws his cock back out, still much slower than you would like. He’s just winding you up at this point, seeing just how far you’re breaking point is.

Seokmin tuts, simpering as you pant deliriously under him. He leans down, brushing his lips over your cheekbone to rest his forehead against yours. You groan impatiently. 

“Patience, lamb,” Seokmin urges, pressing a chaste kiss to your lips, and you frown like a petulant child. Your protests are quickly silenced as he moves, pushing into you with little urgency, pulling back out with agonizing slowness, relishing in the tiny sounds escaping your tightly clamped lips. His strokes are languid as he holds you close to his body. Sometimes it feels like a challenge, to see how long you can go without indulging Seokmin, but today every sensation is amplified tenfold—the smell of his hair, the feeling of his skin, his fingers on your body, his tongue in your mouth, his cock deep inside. He holds your head in between his hands, petting your hair when you tense, whispering sweet words against your skin. 

“Look at me, baby,” Seokmin murmurs, brushing the hair off your forehead. Your pry your eyes open, resisting every impulse to squeeze them shut again as Seokmin pushes into you again, this time with more heat, feeling the burn in his own body increase as you brace yourself against his shoulders. His strokes are long and deep, barely a second apart before he drives back into you to the hilt, swimming in the crude sounds of skin against skin. A chorus of moans fills the room as Seokmin finally fucks you into subspace, your head going foggy with pleasure. The sounds leaving your mouth are barely coherent—just a messy jumble of garbled syllables. Seokmin is unrelenting. His stomach is tense with the effort it takes to keep up his pace. You’ve all but given up on keeping your eyes open, instead falling openly into the pleasure that builds in your gut again. 

Good girl. Just a little more, I promise. Look at you, so beautiful like this. Just like that.

Good girl. 

My girl.

You want to hold on. You want to hold on as long as possible. But Seokmin’s praise washes over you like the tide, saccharine and familiar, so you come again and again, feeling insurmountable pleasure pulse through your body—white-hot and blinding—so intense it leaves you breathless and weak, as Seokmin’s voice continues to flit in and out of focus. 

“God!” you plead, as an orgasm so powerful it rips your voice from your throat tears through you. Your nails bite crescents into your fiancé’s shoulders, and you jolt upward to kiss Seokmin feverishly, fingers carding desperately through his hair as he fucks you through your high. 

“Where–” Seokmin stutters, jaw clenched.

So you breathe, “In me,” and Seokmin groans long and low, as he comes undone, his release hot inside you, fingers searching for yours as he heaves. His hand is clammy and you smooth your other over his cheek, thumb skating over his cheekbone. Seokmin looks ragged, hair fucked and messy, lip bleeding from where you bit him in a fit of passion. He kisses you again, hungry and desperate as if the last forty minutes hadn’t been enough of you for him. Then he pulls out slowly, frowning apologetically as you wince in discomfort. He sets your foot back on the bed, before pressing one last, sweet kiss to your pelvis. You feel fucked raw, sensitive from all that the two of you had done.

Seokmin always ravishes you like it’s the first time he gets to hold you, taking his time until the bedsheets are tangled around your limbs and you’re both utterly spent. He loves you deep into the night, until the sun threatens to peek over the horizon. The dreamy cerulean color of the sky tells you it’s far too late for you to be awake. The street noise below has become all but mute, as the townspeople slumber peacefully in their homes. It’s the birdsong that pulls you from your reverie, still bleary-eyed and a little limp, so sudden you place your palms flat on Seokmin’s chest and stare at him in disbelief. He hums in acknowledgment, stirring from his place at your side. 

“What time is it?” you rasp, voice hoarse from use. 

Seokmin groans, reaching for his phone and murmurs, “Almost 4:30.” 

Your eyes open a few more centimeters. “It’s been—it’s been all night.” 

Your fiancé flashes his usual heartbreaking smile. “I know,” he says, and groans as he turns onto his side to look at you, “but I just wanted to be with you.” He tucks his arm under his head, reaching out a hand to run his thumb over your bottom lip. You kiss the pad of his thumb, leaning into his touch. “I love you.”

It always feels like a promise coming from his lips.

You flop back onto the bed, wincing at the twinge in your ass and roll over onto your stomach, tucking your chin over your folded hands. The Spanish coast is quiet, and for a while it’s just you and the ocean and the intimate sounds of Seokmin’s even breathing as he falls back asleep.

The next thing you feel are his lips on the base of your spine, and the early afternoon sun in your eyes. You blink groggily, shielding your eyes from the sun with your hand as Seokmin kisses up your back. Goosebumps erupt on your skin and you wrap yourself in the top sheet, smiling sweetly as Seokmin leans down to press a gentle kiss to your lips. 

“Good morning,” he murmurs, and rolls off the bed—still naked—over to the small kitchenette. “Coffee?”

You lift your arms high over your head, stretching until your muscles feel sore and limber, sighing deeply. “Mm, please.” Seokmin nods and grabs two espresso cups from the cupboard. 

From your spot on the bed, you settle back, admiring the view of your beautifully sculpted fiancé preparing morning coffee. He’s started working out again, and you see the smooth muscles across his back flex as he stretches. Your eyes trace the graceful curve of his spine to his narrow hips and you flush, stifling a nervous giggle. Even making coffee while butt-naked, Seokmin exudes an easy confidence that sets you at peace, the slope of his shoulders relaxed as he waits for the espresso to finish brewing. The aroma of coffee curls into the air and you smile to yourself, tucking your chin into the palm of your hand. How did you get to be so lucky? 

Seokmin catches you staring and breaks you from your trance by kissing your temple, holding a small espresso in his hand. 

“Yeah?” he asks, eyes glinting with amusement. You tilt your head and just nod, scooting so he can join you on the bed again and press a kiss to his bare shoulder. Seokmin still smells like his sunscreen. He squeezes your thigh again, gazing wordlessly over the balcony at the coastline. It’s picturesque—nothing exists beyond this hotel room except for you and him. 

The espresso is warm in your hands, but Seokmin’s body is warmer. 

You’ll never be cold again. 

--

check out my other stuff! :)

[nenemyunart]

Do u think Sonic thinks about Shadow’s death on SA2 a lot ?

Hmmmm tbh I think not so much anymore since it's water under the bridge but I definitely think he did during that period of time he thought Shadow was dead. If you think about it, going by the game canon I'm pretty that was the first time Sonic ever failed to save someone? That alone must have hit so hard. I recall a plot point for Sonic Heroes was that Sonic had been gone for a while, hence why Amy was so anxious to find him and Tails & Knuckles had to track him down to inform him of Eggman's plot. Although, Sonic likes to disappear often, i like to headcanon that during that time before heroes his disappearances had increased. this says it all really

[sunnysaystuff]

crimson rivers

i finished it

yes i've been a mess this whole 4 days (how long it took me)

(crimson rivers spoilers under the cut!)

oh my FUCK bro

oh my actual fuck

evan's death hit so hard tbh

like i'm still reeling from it even after everything else

i think the worst deaths were evan and augusta for me, like even though i've READ thg they just broke my heart in two. tbh it seemed sort of obvious how marlene NEVER got a pov like i predicted she would die, same for monty so those two deaths didn't hurt too awfully. but i was so sad about frank. like i never saw it coming, because he had so much ahead of him, and he and alice were. idk i was so sad for alice but when they said allat to james i was like AINT NO WAY you're goin for my boy rn???? but like. gah

agh and the way regulus - someone bellatrix actually loved - had to kill her? heartbroken by that. and sybill and lily and kingsley...and the way kingsley was like 'it's not water under the bridge this time red'- chefs kiss.

i think the WORST death of them all was barty. like, not poor barty? like it was obvious he was gonna die but it just destroyed me tbh like i loved him so freaking much and i loved him and regulus so freaking much and just. ugh

aroace pandora was so real btw ? and sirius discovering his sexuality. chefs kiss<3<3

gah cr is one of the best written fics i've ever read tbh like yes there was some cringe dialogue ? but the jegulus was so much more realistic than og everlark tbh like i bought into all the jegulus cuteness so much more

narcissa faking being pregnant and then actually being pregnant is like a power move

shes actually my goat

dorcas was so hot

like all the time

lily was also incredibly sexy

i'm so sad evan and barty never got to meet? grr rosekiller :(

anyways i'll drop more cr thoughts tomorrow it's late

[cbsghostsmetasandtrevor]

🇬🇧

OOOOH, Nigel.

Nigel, Nigel, Nigel.

TBH, I'm not sure my opinion on Nigel will be popular.

You see, I liked him at first. I thought he was a pushover in the way that he let Isaac admit he murdered him (by accident) and like ten minutes later is like "Water under the bridge - let's have a date to me / not date to you". But I liked him.

Until, of course, he came back and is seen assuming he and Isaac have already been dating or courting or whatever, and he started being pushy. It wasn't just with Isaac either, he was pushy about Thor, he was pushy with Hetty and the tea party, and the whole thing with blackmailing Hmoney. I just didn't like the turn he took in season 2. I would prefer that he worked to get in good with the main ghosts rather than expect the same respect as his officers give him without really knowing them.

I just feel like we could have used a longer Isaac/Nigel friendship storyline with Nigel just integrating with the others first before jumping to them being a couple and expecting things.

Also I'm tired all the relationships in general so like the fact that he's just a love interest bores me.

[christmassavestheyear]

scaled & icy live

an hour, huh? i best get comfy.

it's all under the cut xx

the graphics are kinda funky

OH IS THIS WHERE THE PANSEXUAL FLAG COLOURS CAME FROM OKAY

i can get hype about some pink blue and yellow fr

wait is this meant to be the dema morning show?? thats so fucking funny though. thats actually so fucking funny.

okay wait so in this dema universe, in the lore, twenty one pilots is still a band? tyler joseph and josh dun are still a band?

why is he sad :(

"is that. number 16 cotton candy" bitch ofc it is

YEAH JOSH WHERE ARE YOU

u good tyler

whats with the wookie noises

into choker tho is beautiful

THE STAGE AGH

sorry brief mention to how fucking good josh looks in this video oml

the stressed out bridge coming in there????

wait are these the bishops little minions or smth cause theres too many of them to be the bishops

this is a vibey little live version

man sidenote im so ordering merch this weekend

wait wahts the light thing at the back

is that supposed to be the nine towers?

oh into migraine?? was not expecting that

"depresS" everybody fucking freeze. "ive thoughts."

into morph??

its a little all over the place but in a good way?? does that make sense

wait no bring back tylers agonised screaming

"my personal favourite, mulberry street" i hate you but same

YES MULBERRY STREET

KEEP YOUR BLISS THERES NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS FUCK YEAH

the murals. yes

josh just doin his lil bounce in the back tho

whats with the chick wtih the teddy bear

that guy was not there before was he???

and back to the piano. agh.

the little adlibs afkdlsjfdsklfjsld

see in my head all these dancers are banditos and i will take no argument

in two days i will know this mulberry street choreo by heart. just saying

when tyler and josh are looking for people for their next venture i will be ready. im telling you now.

that girl in the front in the skirt ate that

wait whos this girl

LANE BOY FUCK YEAH

whats with the gas masks? are you my mummy? /ref

wait where did josh's shirt go not that im complaining

anybody want to learn this choreo with me too

wait i wonder if i can convince my partner to do this at our wedding actually (long long way away but i picture it being Highly Amusing)

joshs hair is just so good in this video idec

joshua william dun was that a lip bite and a wink. god fucking damn

oh hello guitar

into chlorine?? okay this setlist is. wow

whats with all of joshs costume changes??

okay tylers coat is eating here now tho

shy away yessss

the set for this is so interesting too

shy awAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY

his little dance is so cute stop

also side note josh ate that fit so hard

"it brought tears to my eyes" same, dude. same.

ok that was fucking weird

that shirt should be so ugly so why is he kind of eating

the outside yes

josh in the onesie wtf😭 he's so!!!!!

hey bud where u goin

just casually breakdancing in the street. ok

"shut uP!" lmaooo

the water into the night sky into the backdrop is beautiful

THE UKULELELLELELELLELELE

WAIT HEATHENS ON UKE??? THIS IS GORGEOUS

wait he's in a boat thats so fucking cool

the sets for this are jsut fucking brilliant

i love this being just sort of him and the ukulele. i love it.

torchbearers back yaaaaay

ohhhh jumpsuit???? and the set gives the mv vibes

and then immediately into heavydirtysoul???

tyler periodically turning into a velociraptor is feeding my soul tbh

why are the hosts gradually looking more and more demonic/dead

SATURDAY AYYYYYYY

the disco ball lmaoo

the vibes here are immaculate

wait???? is that jenna?????????????????????

her sweater is so fckn cute tho

him getting off the phone and just going "oooooooooooooooOoOooooooooOOOOOOooOoOOOOOOOOoooooo" is such a mood

the BOOMBOX yES

LEVEL OF CONCERN FUCK YEAH

oooooh the backdrop here is fire?? the colour palette fdjklfjkldj

the remixed vibes of all the songs are fucking slapping. are they available to stream or anything anywhere??

riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide!!!!!!!!

the visuals have been on point this entire video can i just say

also tylers shirt is so cool???

all the horn instruments are intriguing me

josh is so!!!!!!!!!!

car radio!!! car!!!!!!! radio!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

this song mostly just makes me want to cry actually. but

wait the mask!!!! the!!!! mask!!!!!

THE MASK IS OFF!!!!

well that was short lived

all the sirens and the freaking out and hes just like 🥰👉👈👏👏

NEVER TAKE IT

everythings on fire. again.

the little adlibs are so fucking cute tho

also i love when tyler just fuckin. screams

the three guitars in the one shot is such a fuckin vibe

the two in the back just clapping😭

and then there were two....

the lil dragon omg

oh look whos back on the couch

choker again????? yay??????

no tyler dont be sad :(

the overhead shot of all the sets>>>>>>>>>

yeah bitches you better clap for them

wAIT THEYRE CLAPPING FOR US

no cause josh and tyler at the end there kdfjfsdjfjdksl cuties

wow okay so much to unpack there im gonna go grab some chocolates and soda water

okay i've got the chocolates and soda water.

wow! so that was quite the experience. i can kind of understand how it all ties in with the clancy storyline, but it also feels like its not really *integrated* in the storyline. at least not for me at this point.

i really really enjoyed that whole video itself, regardless of lore. it was just a very interesting and cool way to present those songs

god i wish!!!!! there was a higher quality video. i couldnt find one on any of the sites i normally use, most of them said they were taken down, so.. :(

i dont really get what was happening with the woman and the man, the hosts? like i get that they were hosting but their whole vibe was off and they kept seeming to look injured/possessed/straight up weird. so.

im gonna take a quick break, maybe 15 minutes, to just draw a little bit and have some food and water and then i'll come back to the saturday video. i'm just sort of losing my focus and i need to do something else rq to kind of get my head back into it! so brb!

[romanticfistfightz]

hiii. so. ive read a LOT of fics. destiel mostly. and if i wanted to give you all my favourites. it would be too much. (its already too much i think) so i just went through the ones that i have saved on my phone in pdfs. i loved reading themm so muchhh . if you want more, just ask!!! or if you want to read something specific. <3333

short:

I CARRY YOUR HEART (I CARRY IT IN MY HEART) by unicornpoe - i know its 25k words but. for me its short. cas in dean . (possesing him. wink wink)

Professional Couple Only by saltyfeathers - dont look at the wordcount. shh. fakedating destiel au.

blessed arrangement by gracecomets (almondrose) - this one IS short! basically what happened when cas was getting dean out of hell. and what if dean remembered that.

And so we begin by Sequesters - bobbyrufus lebanon. like the ep in s14 where john comes back for a sec. so yeah . destiel is there too

Water Under The Bridge by beingforcedtolivebadwriting - season 9. god everytime i read something with ep 3 or 6 in it. i want to die. its so good tho

for the love of a triangle by dothraki_shieldmaiden - college au. cassie/dean/cas . idk if you like cassie but this fic is SO gooddd.

between sex and death and trying to keep the kitchen clean by ftmsteverogers - 15.18 fix it <3

In Case Of Emergency by HeddersTheOwl - season 5 cas meeting season 1 dean.

sweet creature by casiferfans - "And then it clicks. Oh. Oh. Cas was turned on by Dean acting like a pet."

long:

The Law of Equivalent Exchange by awed_frog - INSANE destiel fic thats all i will tell you.

a turn of the earth by microcomets - timetravel kind of again yay. i love this one so much its so good

All Alone In Your Holy Fire by zombiesam - reversefic. hunter cas angel dean you know the drill.

Contingency by Cheerful_Shinigami - season 4 but a little bit different. cas is possesing dean after getting him out of hell. its good trust me

the cost of a thing - quiettewandering. fucked me up. season 9 (cas is human) fakedating with angst.

Immigrant Song by trinityofone - au season6. so GOOD.

Profoundly Different by by amireal, tiamatv - season 4 if cas was a fallen angel. like anna. i love itt

Home Is by Castielslostwings - normalauverse. sandover dean x endverse cas . and they are on a roadtrip together

ghosts that we knew by dothraki_shieldmaiden - hunter cas x hunter dean. but cas is a ghost. yay

Don't by tricia_16 - Catstiel. thats it

Scion of Stars by Aerlalaith - if cas had a kid with that daphne lady. and he didnt know about it until crowley kidnapped him lol

Gnome Place Like Home by teacass (Fushigi) - retired destiel. gnomes. POLISH REF!!!!!!!!!

Into the fire by Northernsparrow - THE greatest fic ever. Its been YEARS and I can't stop thinking about it.

soooo. if you cant find any of them, just ask me for a link.

enjoy <3333

YAYYY okay i found all of them <33 i havent read fics in sooo long last time i read some for dbda but i used to read SO much in middleschool/highschool and then . stopped. cringe tbh i added all of them to my marked for later but also i have fics there i marked for later in 2018 so asdfghm

[oodlyenough]

i saw you post about Adrian being one of the most poorly written characters from the trilogy, could i please ask you to elaborate on that? genuinely curious why

Well tbh the caveat here would be that I played 2-4 once, a year or so ago, and I didn't exactly find Adrian compelling enough to study her writing intensely or something, so this is general impressions, but:

Mostly I thought the plot of 2-4 sort of dragged her through the mud and then had the resolution be her... deep gratitude towards both Phoenix and Edgeworth for doing that, lol. As soon as we found out about her suicidal tendencies and had her begging the player to keep her secret, I thought, "well obviously Phoenix is gonna have to bust this out at some point", and then instead they had Edgeworth do it very dramatically lmao, and then it's... all kind of water under the bridge and she ends the case like wow <3 the two greatest men I've ever met <3. I think it's probably a casualty of the games having a relatively simplistic moral system. By the end of 2-4 Phoenix, Edgeworth and Adrian are all on the same "team" ie The Good Guys, so the game doesn't want bad blood between her and them. But I didn't think her um... mental health struggles etc were treated with particular care. And the canon having her turn to Franziska as her new stronger-person-to-latch-onto doesn't really solve anything nor do I think teenage timebomb Franziska is well-equipped for that role.

In general I felt like the tone of the writing around Adrian was odd, like they flipped from "look at her, suspiciously competent, probably a murderer" to "alas ... her dark secret is that in reality she's a weak-willed woman" lol. Like we put a few different sexist tropes in a blender. I suppose she was better in AA3, but you still hinge the plot on her goofing up often enough to be the crux of the issue, and Phoenix in court calling her an "accident-prone human". (Also, not really the point, but it raised questions for me about the jail time for tampering with a body lmao. Are Lana and Iris getting similarly short stints?)

I will say the anime cut out most of the parts of Adrian's story that I found awkwardly written, and in doing so I thought they made a much flatter version of Adrian all around, so I guess that's not really a win either. And as I said in the original post, it ended up messy enough that I found myself liking her, lol, in a "date a girl who's bad at everything" sort of way.

[jotadoul]

ESCAFLOWNOTES ep 20

during the wedding, Hitomi prays on the card and not on her pendant

meanwhile, da qorls tell Folken they will for sure capture Hitomi. he is upset about this.

we see that big blue light tube lit up that the sorcerers have

Escaflowne’s energist glows

it shoots a beam thru the roof of the windmill barn and reveals the stealth cloaked Flying Fortress so we can assume that Folken psychically activated Escaflowne to reveal the fortress because he opens Escaflowne in ep 5 (touches energist, it glows, the cockpit opens up to fling out Van) ahhh

if the above isn't true, what did happen? this assumotion is based on the continuing evidence that folken, using zaibach's advanced command of the air to maintain watchful eye over van, has been doing what he can to keep van from being killed by zaibach. (this is, after all, the episode right before he defects.) the only time van is captured, it's by folken himself. we saw folken commune with escaflowne, and we saw dilandau be rejected by it. when folken touched escaflowne, it opened and launched van the same way it does in this moment. we see folken very upset by the orders given to him by dornkirk,

heartbreaking

and the next thing is the vione's location being revealed only a short distance away. van wasn't piloting or thinking about escaflowne until after the beam was initiated. hitomi also wasn't commanding escaflowne. the cat girls are surprised, saying "it revealed its location all on its own!" but how? if it wasn't him, what was it? even with the increased gravity of luck, or especially with the increased gravity of luck, escaflowne should malfunction, not give away zaibach's position. it isn't advantageous for zaibach to reveal themselves at that moment.

we also went back and watched balgus' death in the first episode. varie scolds hitomi for 3 things

balgus' death

van's wounds after merging with escaflowne

allen's wounds after he steps in to save her while he and van fight the dragonslayers

in the 2nd, hitomi taught van to psychically link with escaflowne/see his targets. in the 3rd, hitomi prayed that someone would save van when he was trapped by the dragonslayers, and since allen was on his way in the crusade, he shows up— and then only minutes later, he steps in to save hitomi, and is injured for it. what... is going on in the 1st? nothing comparable that i can find other than her— unwillingly and subconsciously— seeing the locations of the enemy. balgus steps in to save van, but this is exactly what happens with voris in freid, too. this is what balgus and voris both signed up for (for better and worse) and the thing that kills balgus is zaibach attacking, which was already in motion before hitomi got there. can someone explain why these 3 things were what varie/hitomi thought of?

this episode reminded me too of how often folken speaks with his teeth clenched relative to other characters— not angry, but as in, he doesn't fully open his mouth, even in profile.

more thoughts, i'm rambling

you can look at folken and van and intuit that van takes after goau and folken takes after varie but i wish anyone else on earth had done the legwork as to how/why because i realised i'm STUPID, and have looked at ao bing (of nezha fame) enough to know that strictly based on the trappings of his appearance, folken is Giving Dragon. purple kabuki makeup signifying nobility, tear under right eye (right eye signifying the past wrt daruma) red eyes signifying otherness, blue-silver hair signals stuff like dependability, loyalty, affiliation with nature/water, seriousness, wisdom, mystery and magic lol, flat affect (king. we are all 🧩) plus his fucking ARRRRMMMMM BROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. HE HAS POWERS. ON THE BRIDGE IN ASTURIA HEEEEE SAAAIIIDDDDDD HE COULD SEE INTO VAN'S MIND

i'm sorry, cancel that thought. bearing in mind that they're inspired both by pan-celtic concepts and also nepal (been wondering if Van is named after Bon tbh) and bearing in mind that varie is a celestial dragon bride/feather cloak maiden following in the japanese & chinese tradition, the fact that the dative from 'mháiri" (among other spellings in ireland and scotland, like muire) is pronounced like the english v, and comes from maryam, "sea of bitterness/sorrow", and in sanskrit + hindi, vari means water/ocean. and dragons are ALWAYS connected to water! and she has the court/celestial eyebrows! she has the coveted midori no kurogami hair! and they never found her body or blood in the woods! why would dragons kill her if the dragon also didn't want to kill folken? they're all the same, they're all dragons, and varie is a spirit, she's always been one, she doesn't conform to the laws of the living because she isn't a human. she didn't die, she's just a straight up freak who abandoned her kids, i'm putting my foot down. Draconians are seen more as a “phenomenon” than “existence”. Van’s mother also appeared suddenly, and in the end, vanished into the woods. Also jesus christ is balgus = vargas = fergus. fergus ganesha. beautiful tbh

girl TELL! YOUR! SON! THAT! HIS! BROTHER! ISN'T! DEAD! WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUUUUU! YOU KNOW WHAT'S UP!

i'd like to know if energists in any way map to pearls, given that the drag-energists cook inside of dragons for a while? in a series that is so western-inspired, regardless of how often they talk about samurai, i guess the visual lexicon of anime didn't immediately jump out at me as something as crucial to this series as one set in japan or comprising of more than 1 japanese character, but i think it's so interesting to learn about which unspoken motifs are meant to tell you things. i like linguistics, i like visual art. wat can i say. now is goau the sound of roaring or is it something to do with gallstones. (note to self: look up šarīra and the mindstream)

in my own work i don't/can't rely on tropes like this so i also don't automatically assume they have any significance— araki for example says he designs his characters specifically to stand in contrast with one another. i don't assume that if someone's birthday is in may that it's like, giving vital information for their archtype. that kind of thing doesn't interest me at all. but as far as a visual language, of course i want to understand any symbols and what they're meant to impart, especially with anime where Everything is a shorthand/approximation of something real, abstracted to the degree that it is. i'd love to learn someone else's, another culture's, visual signifiers if it's load-bearing like this. i'll never do it myself, but it's not something i want to be ignorant of, either. zodiac and blood types is kinda pushing it though and at mbti i'm fully out.

anyway folken is obviously a dragon because i've seen like, gym leader clair and seadra before. their mom came from the lake and to the lake she shall return. she's an eel

wish-granting jewel

如意宝珠 (Skt, Pali chintamani; Jpn nyoi-hoju )

A jewel said to have the power to produce whatever one desires. It symbolizes the virtue and power of the Buddha and the Buddhist scriptures. The Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom states that this jewel can be obtained from the head of a dragon king, and another reference in the same work describes it as a transmutation of the Buddha's relics.

god damn it