#thieving with dignity

[luxapollo]

Apollo,

King of the Arts,

Protect artists from scammers and AI thieves

May we keep our dignity and earn a luxurious living from our own hard-earned skills

Lord of light, lend us your keen sight so we can detect scammers with ease and attract the most excellent of commissioners

May our love for our work flourish with every stroke, and delight our clients to no end

Lord Apollo, guide our hands and minds as we work hard to create fresh art, liveliness apparent in every detail until our characters seem to push themselves out of the pages

Blessed is your light,

Lord of the Sun and Leader of the Muses

[extensionallydefined]

Okay, so, I need to talk about the relationship between Persona 5's ending and Persona 5 royal's ending, because I think it isn't discussed enough how one puts into question the themes of the other and in doing so it elevates everything that came before.

Spoilers are coming, you've been warned.

The main thing that's given me an outlet to think about this is a few quotes from the Phantom Thieves when they're in the Velvet Room after being Thanos-snapped by Yaldabaoth. Specifically these quotes:

Ann: "I... I never want anyone to have to go through what I did!"

Yusuke: "Just as art is meant to break boundaries, people should be saved even if they frown upon it. I won't allow the justice I believe in to be shaken any further!"

Ryuji: "We're doin' this to make sure people don't go through the same crap we did. It doesn't matter if they think we're just or not. We gotta do what we believe in!"

Futaba: "I can't let people suffer like this, even if I don't know them personally"

They mention some core ideas: 1. They want to prevent people's suffering because of the suffering they've felt. 2. They must do this regardless of if people want it, because they think it's the right thing to do. 3. Their justice is worth fighting for by virtue of being what they believe in.

Does this seem familiar? Maybe makes you think of a certain therapist who shows up in Royal?

I think Takuto Maruki serves a decent amount of purposes narratively and thematically, but one of the most genius things about him is that he serves as a foil to both the Phantom Thieves and Akechi, and in being that foil, he is, deep down, following the principles that the Phantom Thieves fought for - In the end, it was largely Joker who inspired him to fight for his reality.

Maruki fights for a reality where suffering straight up doesn't exist, because he doesn't want anyone to feel the suffering he's had to endure. Maruki wants the Phantom Thieves and Akechi to never feel suffering anymore, regardless of their stance on the matter. He is "saving" them regardless of their wishes, and will fight them to keep the reality he wants. He thinks the world is unfair, so his "justice" is to make a perfect world for everyone - and that's what makes it worth fighting for, because that's what he believes.

Maruki's rationale to fight against the Phantom Thieves and Akechi is (partly) the same reasoning that the Phantom Thieves use to regain their motivation to fight the Holy Grail/Yaldabaoth.

So, narratively, Maruki serves as a mirror that's telling things not to be told for the Phantom Thieves to look into and to see the ugly parts of their own way of acting. Can they really fight Maruki, knowing that he is just acting how they did?

I see people sometimes refusing Maruki's reality because it "wouldn't actually work" or "it's imperfect". But as far as I'm aware, it's imperfect because it hasn't been completed yet - I think the game is a lot more interesting under the pretense that Maruki truly has the power to erase all suffering, once his reality is complete, past the deadline. I also see the argument, and even the game uses it, that Maruki's world "isn't reality". But did we listen well to Morgana's speech before he disappeared in the Yaldabaoth arc? The world itself is made up of cognition, reality is born from the points of view of everyone. Maruki *can* change reality, and the real question of the game is not about the logistics or "ontological dignity" of his reality, but rather - Do you want a world where all your wishes are granted and no suffering exists?

In the end, the game shows the Phantom Thieves that "sticking to their justice" will make them fight against people with similar ideals as theirs. It's funny, in a way, how Akechi was the one fully willing to fight Maruki from the start. His rebellion has always been more individualistic in nature than the Phantom Thieves' - he wanted revenge for himself, then redemption for himself and now he wants a reality where he isn't under anyone's control anymore. To him, Shido's country, Yaldabaoth's ruin and Maruki's world are all the same - Maruki just has a nicer, more therapy-speaky way of presenting his proposal, and sees people as his equals rather than as insolent masses, but his goal is the same. They're all worlds that shackle you for the "greater good". And in the end, Maruki, and Royal, force the P5 gang to become more like Akechi - to value their individuality in the face of the public's "justice".

To fight for what you believe in you will face people with the same determination as you. They will be your equals in many, many ways. In the end, you can only stick to your guns and hope that what you believe in is worth more than what they believe in.

I have a lot more to write about these topics but I'll leave it there. Maybe about the relationship between Maruki's reality and individuality next? That could be fun ^^

Btw - Special thanks to @thedaythatwas for inspiring me to write up stuff about Persona 5 Royal!

[lattaeyongs]

the trojan horse (hrj)

original gif

↳ pairing: huang renjun x reader

↳ word count: 19.6k

↳ genre: royalty!au, historical (late 1700s)!au, arranged marriage!au, heavy angst, fluff, smut

↳ summary: in which the boy you fall in love with isn’t who you think he is.

↳ warnings: character death, political unrest, violence, nudity, explicit sexual content (oral, penetration, switch!renjun, switch!reader, cum play), may contain historical inaccuracies

↳ a/n: influenced heavily by the events of the french revolution.

1791

Ominously, the large, mahogany doors of the Royal Court open. Two guards tightly grip the arms of a shadow, and as the three slowly approach the center of the room, you realize it is a middle-aged, disheveled, pitiful-looking man who wouldn’t put up much of a fight against the guards anyway.

Across a large table sit the Members of the Royal Court. They include some barons and earls, along with religious leaders. Your father, the King, sits at the center, looking especially royal in his brand-new purple robes, and you sit by his side, your fingers intertwined together neatly.

“Order!” Your father announces loudly to the Court. The barons and lords’ chatters die, and the room is silent. 

“Name?” Asks the King. 

“Kim Donghyun,” the man says. He is practically just skin and bones, and it makes you think about how you’ve never gone a day without having three exquisite meals. 

You guiltily avoid his gaze; he doesn’t notice. His attention is toward the King. Due to the days of sitting in a dungeon in utter darkness waiting for his trial and sentencing, he has to blink a few times to get adjusted to the bright light in the Court. 

“What is your crime?” 

Kim Donghyun takes a deep breath. You observe him intently, and you notice how he is practically quaking in fear at being in front of the King. The only time a peasant like him would ever be graced with the presence of the King is when it is nothing good at all. 

Being tried in front of the Royal Court constitutes as ‘nothing good at all.’  

“Theft,” he says in a small voice. At his fear, the King looks at him in disdain. Kim Donghyun knows that his time is limited, and he won’t die without a shred of dignity.

He raises his voice. “I did it for my family.” 

“Only describe the crime,” the King interjects.

“I work in the farming district. In an apple orchard. Instead of turning over all the apples I collected to the cart that takes it to distribution centers, I kept some hidden in my home.” 

The King turns to look at the rest of the Court and discusses quietly, avoiding your gaze. You’re able to make out some words, such as ‘sin’ and ‘infestation of the poor,’ but you don’t interact. Of course, he ignores you, as if you don’t have an opinion. As the only woman on the Court, you were only there after you convinced (more like begged) your father. Deciding a man’s fate wasn’t apt work for a royal woman, whose responsibilities lie in producing a legitimate, male heir for the Kingdom after your father chooses your husband, who is the next in line to the throne – not you, who is your father’s own flesh blood and has a right to the throne. You told your father that Queen Elizabeth I more almost three hundred years ago took the throne of England and ruled through a golden age, dismantling your father’s claim that women weren’t fit to rule, but your father argued that was why England didn’t have a direct, legitimate heir, and why England fell into turmoil after Queen Elizabeth’s death in 1603.

“There is only one suitable punishment for thieves,” The King says in a sure, kingly voice. You gulp harshly. You knew the next words that would come out of his mouth, after sitting in the Royal Court’s proceedings, which all practically ended the same way, no matter how big or small the offense is. He doles out this punishment like it’s nothing. There used to be other punishments for thieves such as cutting off their hands, but the only places those punishments are described in history books.  

“Death by The Dragon’s Fang!” Your father declares. Through the ornately decorated window, you see the chopping block where executions take place. The Dragon’s Fang, the family sword that has been an important symbol of Justice in your Kingdom, cuts cleanly across the neck of whoever has done the Kingdom of Ambrosia wrong. Sharpened every day by the Executioner, it never gives anything but a decisive end to someone’s life. 

“Please,” the man pleads. The chains around his wrists rattle as he folds his hands together tightly in desperation. The two guards accompanying him hold him even tighter, creating small impressions on his skinny body, but your father gestures for them to let go of Kim Donghyun. He falls to his knees, tears forming at the rims of his eyes. 

You’ve sat through hundreds of proceedings, and every single one of them rips a new hole in your heart.

“I never intended to steal,” he explains. “My family, we’re starving. Starving!” He screams in anguish. The guards come closer to him but do not hold him like they once did; desperate this man is, but not desperate enough to run.

“It’s no excuse,” the King says firmly. 

“I had to do it. Come to the farming district yourself! We’re all suffering before dying of starvation and disease. Reeking dead bodies are everywhere and we have no medicine and no food! How are we supposed to live?”

At his anguished voice, you decide that you’re not going to let this be yet another proceeding that you will watch and do nothing about the result. After all, this is supposed to be your kingdom in the future, not your future husbands, even though it doesn’t seem like that.

“He’s right,” you say. Stunned gasps echo through the room. Not a single member of the Royal Court has second-guessed any of the King’s decisions. But you do not let that affect the firmness in your voice.

“How are the working class supposed to serve us if we cannot give them enough resources to live?” You spin it another way. You don’t truly mean what you say, only giving the situation in this light in order for your father to understand; he only understands when things affect him; the rest of the Court are the same way, almost medically unable to expand their cold, selfish hearts to show a little compassion. 

“If we show mercy to this one man,” your father says patiently, “then others will start doing the same thing. We need to make an example of the misdeeds of this man, to prevent further law-breaking.” Your father knows of your compassion for others, an un-queenly trait that he thinks you will outgrow when you get a little more experience with royal affairs, the only reason why he let you take part in the proceedings of the Royal Court. Being that you’re only a child, twenty years old, you have not the same maturity as a seasoned King. But to you, it’s not just a phase.

Whatever happened to the great leaders of yesteryear who knew when to show compassion and when to rule with an iron fist? Your father’s ruthless punishments are what earned him the title of ‘The Mad King’ by the commoners, according to the King’s spies (aptly called his ‘Ears’) everywhere. It is even rumored that the Resistance, an organization whose goal is to destroy the royal family, is real. After hearing about the American Revolution and the Revolution in France, common people hold out hope for a democracy, where everyone’s voices are heard. The writings of Thomas Paine and John Locke started circulating in the Kingdom of Ambrosia and have stirred up more political unrest than what could be imagined.

Your father afterward made it his mission to find every copy of Common Sense and Two Treatises of Government and burn them, as well as execute anyone with a physical copy of those books. He could not have that sort of insolence from his subjects. However, that did nothing; the words were still in peoples’ minds, spreading to others orally, and who knows how many illegitimate copies there are, the words printed on cloth or in their minds? This made people want to get bootlegged copies even more. If the commoners had enough food on the table and compassionate leaders, then their cries for revolution are quieter. If the Gods chose you to be a ruler, then that means that the Gods see leadership potential in your lineage, and you should follow that.

“I’m not saying to spare Kim Donghyun any punishment,” you explain cooly with your hands in your lap in a lady-like fashion, just as your governess taught you when you were little. “There are other means of punishment which will get the point across.”

“Other means of punishment?” Your father echoes in a tone that makes you feel small. “Stealing is a sin and sins are punishable by death.” 

“Can’t he get a whipping? I’m sure that he learned his lesson. He’s frightened to death and needs to feed his –”

“Quiet, girl!” The King declares. Instantly, you feel your father’s palm connect with your cheek, and a stinging sensation burns your skin. This immediately makes your tear ducts tingle with the need to let hot tears roll down your cheeks, but you will not let the Royal Court see you as a little girl being chastised by her father.

You are a young woman and one that is to be the future queen at that.

At the way you take a painful slap, Kim Donghyun meets your gaze with a resigned, yet thankful look at your efforts. He already knows that in a few short minutes, his blood will be pooling on the floor in the adjacent room.

“The Royal Court here rules that Kim Donghyun is sentenced to death by the Dragon’s Fang.” He bangs the gavel against the table loudly, glancing at you before locking gazes with Kim Donghyun. He doesn’t cry, he doesn’t scream. He knew he took a massive risk with those apples. He only wished that he stole more because the look of satisfaction when his wife and children ate was intoxicating. 

The two guards grab Kim Donghyun’s elbows before escorting them out of the Royal Court and into the next room. The window gives a clear view of the large chopping block stained with dry, brown blood where Kim Donghyun is supposed to lean, his knees on the floor, his neck and the edge of the block lining up. Then, the Executioner takes the Dragon’s Fang and raises it above his head. He doesn’t close his eyes at the sight he is about to see, a ritual he has performed thousands of times, only asking the victim for any last words, as you can tell from seeing this proceeding many times. Kim Donghyun says something, but you are not sure what. Then, the Executioner swings the sword, and Kim Donghyun crumbles to the ground in two parts after a sickening crunch (that you’ve heard so many times, it echoes in your head).

You think you’re going to be sick.

-

Just like there were many court proceedings before the trial of Kim Donghyun, there are many afterward. The Resistance is growing larger, according to the King’s Ears, and is ready to plan something large. Normally, your father would not tolerate this insolence against the royal family. He would have liked to nip it in the bud and hang the bodies of all the rebels in front of the streets to make an example out of them, but the King is running into a huge problem: he is close to bankruptcy. He barely has enough resources to pay guards and mercenaries to protect the current palace, as well as cooks and maids and servants. He doesn’t have enough resources to pay for a large army and create a special task force to get rid of the rebels. After spending his money on clothes and shoes, brand new wings of the palace and concubines, he was spending money faster than he was receiving it. 

Obviously, you knew that this was a serious problem, and it was information that select people had access to; Royal advisors were trying their best to make sure that this information was kept under a tight lid and wouldn’t find its way to the Resistance. Royal advisors suggested that the King find a source of needed materials without raising taxes yet again, and that’s where you come to play. Your father arranged for you to meet a suitor to set up a much-needed marriage alliance.

Today, you would be meeting the Prince of Neo, Huang Renjun. Neo is a small kingdom a few days journey from you by the sea, and they are known for their ample craftsman class who commission some of the finest weapons. They are also a source of skilled fighters, and they will be more likely to ship off their people and provide resources to Ambrosia if they have a suitable marriage alliance.

As much as you hated being auctioned off like an antique vase, it was something that couldn’t be helped as a royal woman. You only hope that this Huang Renjun isn’t like the other suitors you have met, who are snooty and stuck up, ruthless as if they are miniature versions of your father. More importantly, you wish that they won’t cast you aside, using you as a pawn to get their hands on the better prize, the Kingdom of Ambrosia, the largest kingdom in the area.

There’s already tension in the air when you are escorted by your mother and lady’s maids into the drawing room where you first lay eyes on Huang Renjun.

His raven-colored hair is neatly gelled and combed, and his skin is pale in contrast. He stands up politely at your presence, and you get a good look at his clothing: rich, exactly what you expect for a royal from another kingdom. He wears red robes with delicate, intricate yellow designs, and you suspect the material is velvet. He has white frills at his neck, and milky white socks that compliment the black shoes at his feet, which have a gold flower at the center of the foot to match the gold designs on his robes. 

You’re thankful that the suitor you’re meeting is actually in the same age range as you, but it’s an additional bonus that he’s one of the most beautiful men you’ve met without even trying.

He is also observing you with the same tenacity as you do with him: You’re wearing a crown of pink flowers on your head, which matches the pink flowers on your sky-blue dress. Your skirt is large and trails at your behind, which shows your royal standing, and the sky-blue sleeves of your dress slowly become white lace as his eyes follow from your shoulders to your wrists. The sleeves of your dress are cone-like, and the edges are able to reach your knees. 

For a few seconds, you meet Renjun’s gaze. His eyes are a beautiful dark brown, and they offer you a friendly look, which puts your heart at slight ease. 

“Princess Y/N, this is Prince Renjun of Neo,” your mother introduces in a voice that makes it seem like she has known Prince Renjun for a long time (which she hasn’t).

“Pleasure to make your acquaintance, your Highness,” Renjun says. His voice is absolutely magnificent, song-like, and dreamy. He steps forward and bends down on one knee, taking your right hand and kissing the back of it. 

His lips feel warm against your skin. 

There are a few other men by Renjun’s side. There are his personal guards, who came with him on the carriage ride from his castle to yours, and another man in fine clothing, someone you failed to notice due to your observant study of Huang Renjun. 

“And this is the King of Neo,” your mother continues, gesturing. He bows down and takes the time to bend down and kiss your mother’s hand (which has her bubbling with pleasant words) and your hand, which you give a curt greeting. His black robe shuffles as he steps back, and you study Renjun side-by-side with his father. 

“Pleased to meet you, Your Highnesses,” he says. 

A few maids come in bearing silver trays piled with bite-sized sandwiches, in the shape of a pyramid. You and your mother take one, while Renjun and his father take one each, all four of you being overly courteous to the help in an effort to keep appearances. 

“Your daughter looks like a lovely young lady, perfect for my Renjun,” the King of Neo comments, giving your mother a gracious smile. “So elegant and full of grace, she will make a fine queen and wife, Your Highness,” he addresses your mother. 

“Thank you for your kind words,” Your mother responds back, her eyes crinkling as a part of her practiced genuine smile. “May I escort you to the King? He has some matters that he would like to discuss with you.” 

“Of course, my good lady,” the King of Neo responds back courteously. Your mother leads the way out of the room, and a few maids look like they are going to follow her, to make sure that she is okay, but she only needs to give a flick of her wrist for them to disperse back into the drawing room. Now, you and Renjun are alone, except for the help, but they don’t count. You’re grateful that your mother has left you both alone because you absolutely hate being chaperoned during meets with suitors – it makes you more nervous having that extra company. That just shows how important this alliance is for the Kingdom that your mother understands your weakness and tries to put you on the best possible foot to make a good performance for Huang Renjun.

Performance. The word has the connotation relating it to a game, which is what this whole suitor business is. 

“Please have a seat,” you say to Renjun, gesturing at the plush pink-and-green sofa that he abandoned when you entered the room. There is a small ottoman opposite of the sofa, and there is a glass table in between with the pyramid of sandwiches that the maid brought a few minutes ago. You’re ready to bring up something about the weather and other practiced lines you have prepared for occasions like this when something catches your eye on the table, a leather-bound book. It is a copy of The Oresteia by Aeschylus. You remember reading it back when you were still taught by a governess. 

“Excellent choice,” you start off, gesturing to the volume on the table.

Renjun smiles at you, a pretty sight just as beautiful as his voice. 

“Thank you. You have a wonderful library, larger than the one I have at home,” he says in awe. The library room is in the next room, and it is dark and paneled with fine wood; it would not be a good choice to meet a suitor, for it is a major turn-off if a woman is too well-educated, enough that she would love books more than making an heir for the family.

Personally, the library room is your favorite room in the house.

“You don’t have Oresteia in your library?”

“No,” Renjun says sheepishly. “It’s been on my list of books to read for a long time, but I just haven’t had the chance to get a copy with all the suitors my father forc–” Renjun suddenly stops, realizing who he is talking to. His face turns into a bright beet red, thinking that he has messed up more than he ever thought he could.

Your face doesn’t shrivel with offense the way Renjun thought it would. He met a royal woman once who after he said he didn’t like blueberry scones, escorted him out of her castle. Instead, he is greeted by a smile. You experienced the same feeling.

“It’s okay,” you say lightly. “I wasn’t exactly that happy to meet you too.” You’re glad that your mother isn’t chaperoning, or anyone in your Court is either because hearing those words from your mouth would earn you a slap across your face. ‘A lady isn’t supposed to tell someone what she thinks,’ you can hear your mother’s and governess’ voices ringing in your ears (they practically had the same voice… all high-class women had a high pitch, sultry yet innocent voice). 

Renjun finds your words refreshing; this is the first time he’s met a royal who actually says what she thinks, and that sort of directness is what he craves in someone – he hates having to analyze every little word in a woman’s sentence in order to find out what she truly means.

“How far are you?” You ask. 

“Not very,” Renjun sighs. “I wished you came later so I would have had more time to read.” You titter a little, and Renjun is glad that he is able to see a real, genuine smile from you.

“But Clytemnestra has just killed King Agamemnon and Cassandra.” You nod, remembering yourself all those years ago holding this same volume. You’re trying to think of something to say that will contribute to the conversation when Renjun’s voice becomes lower. 

“Do you think he deserved it?” 

Initially, you’re not sure if you should answer the question. On one hand, you do want to answer the question because you can’t believe that you have a suitor who wants to intelligently discuss literature with you, a complete dream that you can’t believe is happening in real life, but there is another part of you that wants to follow your mother’s advice she gave you a long time ago when it came to meeting suitors: to not let him know too much about your opinions too early. 

“I apologize,” Renjun says hesitantly. He just broke all rules when it comes to meeting suitors. He is also not supposed to ask questions like these. Questions like “what are your favorite sweets?” or “what is your favorite city?” are more appropriate for someone you just met. 

“You don’t have to,” you say more confidently. “I think I understand Clytemnestra’s fury. Imagine finding out that your daughter was sacrificed so that your husband can help his brother get his wife back. There’s a line that has to be drawn between your family and someone else’s family, and Agamemnon failed to do so. Menelaus had other allies from various kingdoms that could help him, and Agamemnon could help in other ways than sacrificing his eldest daughter to Artemis. But Iphigenia only had Agamemnon. She was his daughter. He was supposed to protect her. He wasn’t supposed to auction her off to her death. So he must pay with his life,” you explain rationally.

Renjun is pretty sure that you’re not only talking about Oresteia anymore. And he’s right. Maybe you feel a little like Iphigenia, but the free will that you are sacrificing is for the good of your kingdom and not someone else’s. 

After your father overspent his money, even after charging ridiculously high tax rates and has no means to quell the Resistance by force. 

The way you passionately discussed literature was endearing to Renjun. He didn’t want to be stuck with a bimbo for the rest of his life, who was only interested in parties and pleasure. You have substance. 

The two of you continue to discuss other Ancient Greek literature since much of the literature includes myths that are implicitly referenced in other works that people in those days would have understood. The conversation is entertaining, and you freely give your opinion and Renjun does the same, and you appreciate the candidness more than anything in the world.

“I’m glad for one thing,” you say during the conversation.

Renjun raises an eyebrow. 

“That the Greek Gods don’t meddle in our lives.” 

-

Sometimes, just sitting around in the castle got boring – no, a lot of times, just sitting around in the castle got boring. You didn’t have much of a say in the Royal Court and you didn’t have much of a say in royal decision-making either, so you decided a few years ago that there would be something that you would have control over. 

Every weekend, you went into the cities of your Kingdom and practiced healing with the royal healer. A maximum of four people knew about this, and you wanted to keep it that way because if your family found out about this arrangement, they would serve your head on a platter. But so far, no one unnecessary knew about this. The royal healer, the cart driver, and your head maid were the only people who knew. It was your way to give back to the kingdom since so many were dying of diseases or were injured and lamed forever, and these tragedies could be avoided if there was a better spread of healthcare across the kingdom. 

Your head maid has clothes prepared for you, a maid’s outfit that you go into town wearing. With how the people feel about the royal family now that the Resistance is trying to spread their message, it was better if your deeds went unsaid; you didn’t want to attract unnecessary attention to yourself, or else the people in your care could get hurt.

So here you are, sitting in a prepared cart filled with medicine, along with the royal healer. The hot late-summer sun burns your shoulders as you sit, but you’re glad you’re only wearing a maid’s outfit and not the eight different skirts you have to wear all day as a royal; wearing all that clothing in this heat is the definition of hell on Earth. 

Maybe you’re being dramatic when you say that because when you see the capital city, Ciel, it certainly looks like hell on Earth. A little part of you is glad that you’re safely tucked away in your castle in the countryside because you’re not sure you could ever bear calling what is now Ciel, home. Sick people decorate the well-trodden streets, orphaned children scour waste for food, wails of anguish fill the air as people cry over the dead, and the stench – oh, the stench! How pungent and repelling it is, you almost want to gag. Thankfully, you have a flower from the royal gardens tied to your wrist, and you harshly press the flower against your nose, breathing in the fresh scent.

But the saddest thing on the street is the people who are wholly unaffected by all the events happening. They are residents no doubt, with tattered, stained breeches that have probably never seen a wash, but the resigned look on their faces is what breaks your heart into a thousand more pieces. They accept that this is how life is going to be. These people are usually able to hide among the crowds of people, but to you they stick out like a sore thumb.

Speaking of people, there seems to be less than there was last week. Everything seems a tad quieter, and people don’t seem to be sporting angry, belligerent looks on their faces against the royals, just the resigned, sick, and anguished seem left.

But this doesn’t stop you from setting up shop. With the royal healer Doyoung, you both find an abandoned building – a building that you have kept under a different name using some royal funds you’re able to get out of your father’s hands – and set up medicines, table cloths, bandages, and other tools needed to properly heal the masses. After seeing your appearances, people start coming in. It was an unspoken thing with the people of Ciel, the most poverty-stricken people in your kingdom, living in shanty towns because the capital is where all the work is. It spread around to others that a healer and his assistant would come every week to try to relieve them. They didn’t know anything about the healer or the assistant, or why they only came once a week (many people have requested that you and Doyoung make your presence known more often), but you would simply sigh and shrug your shoulders, that you could only ever manage once a week. In your heart, you knew that your family wouldn’t notice you gone for at least six hours in a day, but if you tried six hours in two days, that’s asking for problems. Although, you never say that. 

However, you and Doyoung have trained others in town who want to heal some basic hygiene and herbs that can be found around Ciel, such as poppy seeds for sleeping and ginseng for preventing inflammation of wounds (but sometimes a cure-all for desperate people). However, due to how populated Ciel is, it’s hard to find even find these plants since medicinal plants need care to grow. They aren’t like dandelions that can grow among the trash and ruin. Which is why you and Doyoung bring a decent stock of other plants from the royal medical gardens and teach others how to store them. But even still, basic training and plant stocks are not enough to keep people alive, and many times, you need a trained medical opinion or experience.

As some patients take rest on the blankets that are scattered in this makeshift hospital, other helpers (practically employees) come in as well. 

The first to come is the brother-sister pair, Soobong and Sooyoung. They were always the most punctual, and they live for healing and helping others – with enough medical training, they were good enough to work at the castle.

“Good, you’re here,” Doyoung says brusquely. “More and more people are coming. Sooyoung, ask patients what their ailments are, and Soobong and Y/N, help me unload the stock.” Doyoung commands confidently. 

Kim Doyoung had been at this for a long time, as you notice through his weathered, experienced face. He’s been doing this before you knew about it, and when you caught him, you told him that you would join him or you would tell the King, and he gladly took the former option. Doyoung himself grew up on the streets of Ciel, orphaned, but he met a man who helped him learn the art of healing, and he became a revered healer in Ciel before going to the castle. As much as he loved being generous, most of the people who came to him had no money but were only able to exchange favors. He gladly accepted favors – fresh honey, a wonderful story, a beautiful flower, but he also liked recieving a salary. 

Still, it doesn’t seem like the streets of Ciel were angry with him for wanting to get paid for his skill; they were only thankful that he was generous enough to continue sharing it with them after all these years.

As Sooyoung socializes with the patients, she is courteous as she asks about their ailments. She can take fifty people’s troubles and tell you every single one – she just has that sort of memory. She would write down all the conditions if she knew how to read or write; only now have you taught her how to count, so that she can refer to each patient as ‘patient at blanket number x’ so it is a more efficient way of describing them.

You and Soobong along with Doyoung are going out to the cart and bringing in jars and wrapped packages of medicinal herbs, from marigold to milk thistle to goldenseal.

When the last of this week’s stock is brought in, Sooyoung approaches you and tells you what conditions people have today. 

“The man at blanket thirty is suffering from diarrhea and his wife is very worried about him,” she reports, ending her interactions with all the patients. All of these conditions you’re too familiar with after years of healing. Diarrhea from eating contaminated meat. Cholera from drinking contaminated water. Itchy skin due to a poor personal hygiene regiment. Infection after a metal bucket scraped skin. Sleeplessness after the violent death of a loved one. All of these conditions, you were able to easily escape due to your high status. And you were the one with the best healthcare in the Kingdom after you rarely did anything. When was the last time you picked up a bucket? Or had itchy skin? You live such a good life that half the time, you didn’t need a healer. 

But these people do. And they don’t have a healer.

You, Soobong, and Doyoung crush some marigold leaves for the man with the infection, valerian for the sleepless woman and others, handing the paste to Sooyoung who would administer the herbs to the patients. Thankfully, as more and more sick people came in, more and more help was arriving, including Na Jaemin. 

He and a few others were bringing injured-looking people. You rushed to their sides, helping them out after abandoning the leaves you were crushing. Before Soobong could do anything, Doyoung ordered him to stay and that you and Jaemin were taking care of whatever needed taking care of.

“What happened?” You gasped, carrying the people to empty blankets. Jaemin follows you, carrying a heavy-looking older man. 

“T-There was a riot,” Jaemin says breathlessly. 

“A riot?” You echo dumbly. Jaemin nods. 

“The Carcel,” he says as if he explained the whole story. At your confusion, though, he continues. 

“There was a storming. Weapons were stolen, and the place was trashed before it started burning.” Your blood runs cold. 

The Carcel has served as a fortress, armory, and political prison for as long as you can remember. Erected by your great-great-grandfather to protect the castle – the old castle that your family used to reside in before picking a different, more luxurious location in the countryside that gave plenty of room to expand; that castle burned in an earlier, angry riot. Now it looked eerie in the capital, and it was moderately reconstructed as an armory and a prison for prisoners that your father decided not to kill on the spot before his killing spree started.

Knowing this information, Ambrosia was teetering closer and closer to ruin. You gulp. You thought that if your father gave more freedoms to the people and modernized, there would be a higher chance that you would still be in power for generations to come, or at least… your lives. Now, that hope is all gone. People are angry, and they won’t stop until the Royal Family is gone for good. You know what that means. The people won’t rest until your heads are hacked off by the Dragon’s Fang.

“A-And these are,” you take a deep breath. “Insurrectionists?” You ask. No matter how much sympathy you had to the people of Ambrosia who have been wronged by the royal family, you still feel a chill crawl down your spine

You wonder how Soobong, Sooyoung, and Jaemin would react if they knew your true identity – or anyone in this room except Doyoung knew.

“Not all of them. Some of them were just caught in the crossfire.” 

“What were you doing there?” You ask accusingly. You bite your lip in shame, hating how transparent you seem. Jaemin looks at you with a brow raised. For all he knew, you were just Y/N, a maid to a nobleman who knew Doyoung as a child on the streets of Ciel.

Immediately, you clear your throat. “It could have been dangerous. Are you hurt anywhere?” You ask with concern, taking his bare forearms in your hand to inspect. You furrow your brows at a fresh-looking mark, but it’s just a smudge of red dirt. 

Jaemin smiles. “No. Clean as I’ll ever be.” He chuckled in a hearty way that put all your worries at rest. He continues. “And I was there because my cousin was there. I didn’t want him doing anything stupid, but he wouldn’t listen to me, so I went to watch him.” His expression hardens. “Where his stupidity took him,” he grunts, pointing to another boy carrying a younger boy, maybe fifteen years old, to a bed, with bleeding on his arms and his leg twisted. 

“Jaemin!” A voice shouts. You and Jaemin whip your heads to see Doyoung, still crushing leaves into paste and squeezing the juice out of roots. “I need some help over here. Y/N, work with Sooyoung to get the ailments of the newcomers.” 

“Yes, Doyoung,” you say and shuffle away. To Doyoung’s perceptive eye, he could see slight cuts on your fingers from all the crushing, and he couldn’t possibly return you home like that. So, he gave you a less taxing job. It was a shame though – you were one of his most skilled apprentices.

Sooyoung takes care of half of the newcomers while you take care of the other half. As you ask them what is ailing them and inspect their injuries, you can already see yourself writing a mental list of needed herbs: marigold, garlic, echinacea, aloe vera, poppy seeds. All of these were anti-inflammatory plants with poppy seeds bringing patients to sleep to help cure their wounds. 

But there is a face, an unmistakable face attached to a body that is sitting on a blanket. Despite the contusions on his face and body, as well as his twisted leg at an odd angle, the boy sitting at blanket number thirty-seven is Huang Renjun, Prince of Neo. 

As shock finds its way to settle into your face, so does suspicion. What was Huang Renjun doing in a rebellion against the King of Ambrosia?

Every part of your royal instincts tells you to tread carefully. If Huang Renjun is an enemy, then it’s best to keep that information to yourself so you can give yourself an advantage.

Before you can decide whether you should pretend you don’t know him or acknowledge his existence, Renjun speaks first. 

“Y/N,” he says softly. You look around. Soobong, Jaemin, Sooyoung, and Doyoung all look preoccupied, and the others that you know are hurriedly applying salves to injured people or offering them edible medicine. You didn’t want to explain how you knew this stranger. 

Renjun, like you, is dressed in a commoner’s clothes. He wears a casual set of commoner’s breeches and a faded, light-blue shirt. He has a brown hat next to him that smells oily and full of sweat, and his jet-black hair is disheveled, compared to when you met him. Renjun has been staying at the castle, and your father and his father are trying to strike a favorable deal when it comes to providing an army to quash the Resistance. During the past two days, from what you can hear behind the door, it is a long deal, with both men throwing numbers and getting others to write a contract of this agreement. Renjun has been sitting in the negotiations, to learn the art of negotiation, but you aren’t allowed to sit in. And when they aren’t negotiating, the three of them go hunting together, for your father to get to know the man that will marry his daughter and take over his kingdom. So, you haven’t seen the boy ever since you talked about Aeschylus and other Greek authors and myths together, only seeing him in passing at dinner, which you are almost always joined by the Huangs. Other invitees at dinner seem interested in this stranger, leaving almost no more time for you to know him.

At this moment, your chemistry is undeniable. 

“What are you doing here?” You blurt out. 

Renjun smiles in pain. “I’m injured obviously. But I could also ask the same for you.” He eyes you in your maid’s outfit. 

“I mean, what were you doing at the Carcel?” You inquire. Butterflies erupt in your stomach. You see him reach for something, and you tense up. Your instinct thought it was a knife, a plan to kill the Princess of Ambrosia since he is the only one in this crowded room who knows your true identity. 

The object Renjun was reaching for was his dirty messenger bag, and he struggles to open the latch. You take the bag and look inside. Paints, and a smeared painting of roses. You’re not sure if it’s red paint or blood.

“I was painting at the Square.” He says simply. The town square is still a bustling place, in viewing distance to the Carcel, cobblestoned and filled with a rose garden that is sometimes known as the envy of the land, the only place in Ciel that doesn’t look hopeless thanks to various people in the area who consider those roses a part of Ciel’s character. It’s the only greenspace in the center of Ciel, minus a small wooded place two blocks away where helpers gather poppy seeds and milk thistle. 

“I was painting roses since it was the only time I could get away from everything,” Renjun starts. “But then I heard people screaming and there were people with weapons and then a stampede ensued.” Renjun shivers thinking about what happened in the past thirty minutes, and at this movement, his twisted leg twitches and he bites his lower lip to contain a scream.

You’re about to scurry off and get something for the pain, but Renjun grips your wrist tightly, an uneasy smile on his face. 

“You didn’t tell me what you’re doing here.” 

“Isn’t it obvious?” you scoff.

“Enlighten me.”

You take a deep breath. “I’m here as a healer. I come every week with Doyoung.” 

“And I can imagine that it’s not what you’re supposed to be doing?” Renjun asks, knowing what the obvious answer is. 

You don’t answer him. 

“Well, I was here doing what I wasn’t supposed to be doing.” He chuckles. “If my father found out I was painting, he would rip me in half.” Renjun wasn’t lying. The life of a royal was restricting, no matter if you were a man or a woman. For a man, hunting was seen as an appropriate, manly hobby, but painting isn’t.

“Apparently, painting is only for indecent people who ogle naked women and sleep with their muses.” 

You almost want to gasp with how crass Renjun sounded. Renjun only laughs at your shocked expression before sucking in a breath due to his pain. With a wet cloth on a tray nearby, you dab the wounds on his arms, and Renjun’s face contorts at this gesture. 

You hurry back to the shelves of herbs and grab some marigold paste and some thin, bandage cloths. Gently, you apply the salve on Renjun’s wounds and bandage them with a precision that you have been perfecting for a long time. Renjun only focuses on you as he tries to forget about the pain, admiring your expertise. It wasn’t every day that a royal knew a skill that didn’t include commanding others to do tasks for them.

Looking at his awkward leg, you make direct eye contact with Renjun. 

“This is going to hurt a lot,” you say. Rushing to the counter at the front, you grab a stick and give it to Renjun. “Put this in your mouth,” you say in a commanding voice that Renjun doesn’t want to argue with.

Carefully, you hold the side of Renjun’s knee with one hand, and with the other hand, you yank his leg, locking it back into its correct place. 

The twig in Renjun’s mouth snaps during the process. 

“You were right,�� Renjun says breathlessly.

“Say,” Renjun says after a while of watching you apply a salve of milk thistle on the cuts on his legs before bandaging them. 

“I won’t tell your father that you were out here healing the poor, not once but weekly with Doyoung unless I get to paint you.” The request is shocking, and you look at Renjun, puzzled for a split second before you make an offer of your own, a smile on your face. If there’s anything a royal is good at, no matter a man or woman, it was negotiating.

“And I won’t tell your father that you were painting unless you come and help out with me here,” you counteroffer. 

“An eye for an eye,” Renjun recalls, remembering how you passionately defended Queen Clytaenmestra for making King Agamemnon to pay for his life after leading his eldest daughter to her death. In this case, one favor each to keep you both doing what you loved doing.

“Yes. This knife cuts both ways,” At how solemn you both sound, you two look each other in the eye to seal the verbal contract that you have just created.

For once, your parents made a good match for you.

-

It’s another few days before you see Renjun again. It’s at dinner, but this time the air of tension, filled with encoded thoughts is gone, and both your father and the King of Neo look jubilant. That can only mean one thing: they both have reached a deal that they are both happy with. It’s surprising, given that at the end of such long deals, one side is unhappy in ‘giving in too much’ while the other believes that they have won a match. 

Nonetheless, dinner is no less than fine. Renjun’s father sits at the end of one table with Renjun at a seat nearby, while your father is seated at the other end of the table, with your mother accompanying you. You sit in between your mother and Renjun, while on the other side, the King’s advisor is facing you directly. Joining you tonight are a couple of earls and marquis who your family has always been particularly close with, enough so to share such an important meal as tonight’s meal. 

“We have some exciting news,” The King of Ambrosia says. You think everyone in the room already knows what the news is due to his expression, but that doesn’t stop him from sharing. 

“King Huang and I have reached a suitable deal. They will provide a sum of armory and mercenaries to help us with our problems with rebels. Just in time after the incident at the Carcel. He has been so agreeable due to the arrangement that Princess Y/N and Prince Renjun have. Our grandchildren will be certainly powerful!” Your father cheers. You smile pleasantly and find Renjun’s face beside you, and he also stares at you with equal fondness. The others in the room are pleased that you two have gotten on well. Although they only know of one meeting between you two, no complaints have been made by either of you against the other. For the two of you, suitors are a touchy subject, and you both have a hard time getting along with others that you are arranged to marry, but this time, it seems like two kindred souls have met. 

Your father’s prayers have been answered; Ambrosia won’t fall to ruin after his overspending. Of course, that doesn’t stop him from having lavish, excessive meals every night while the people of his kingdom are starving. 

King Huang starts speaking. “The King and I have started talking about something to celebrate the upcoming marriage. We have discussed a tourney in Princess Y/N and Prince Renjun’s honor.” 

Your mother claps gleefully, and the King’s advisor looks thoughtful. He hoped that Neo’s resources were in plenty, so he wouldn’t have to impose more taxes. 

Your mother looks at you pointedly for you to make a response, but Renjun speaks first. “On behalf of myself and my betrothed, I thank you both for your generosity.” His voice is crisp, sincere yet formal. He looks at you with a smile. “I’m sure that we both are going to enjoy it.” You both know that if there’s anything that you’d enjoy, it would be a room full of books and paints. 

The servants arrive with plates and plates of food, freshly and expertly cooked by the castle chef. You eat the creamed lobster, poached eggs, meat-stuffed bread, carrot purees, chocolate souffles, and wash it all down with red wine. The table is filled with content eating sounds, the clacking of forks against ornately designed china. 

As the last plate is collected by a kitchen maid, music fills the nearby ballroom. 

“A night like tonight should be celebrated with music!” Your father announces. The dinner party follows him and the King of Neo to the ballroom, where there is a live orchestra filled with the best musicians in Ambrosia. They play waltzing music, so the earls and dukes start dancing with their wives, and their children find people to dance with. 

“May I have this dance?” Renjun is on one knee, his hand held out as he waits for you to accept his invitation. You scoff a little at how ‘noble’ he is acting, compared to the boy painting in secret and stating that he hated meeting suitors. 

“Of course, my betrothed,” you say smoothly, taking the boy’s soft hand. He stands upright, and you look almost eye-level with him. He gingerly puts a hand to your waist and the other clasps your hand as he dances with you. You think that you probably learned to Walz around the same time you learned to walk, and the steps feel familiar as you follow the compound beat. 

“One, two, three, one two three,” Renjun murmurs to himself. If you hadn’t been listening carefully enough, you wouldn’t have heard him count to himself. You only did so when you were a beginner of the walz, counting to make sure that your steps were correctly timed as your dance instructor danced with you. 

You can’t help a giggle bubble up your throat. 

“What’s that?” Renjun asks. 

“What’s what?” You reply, feigning ignorance. 

“I know you heard me.” Renjun confronts you. 

“I’ve never heard anyone our age counting during the Walz.”

“What’s wrong with counting? I like to be precise.” Renjun challenges in that playful way that you can’t get enough of. You exhale. 

“Only children count when they Walz.” 

“Can I make a confession?” Renjun asks. His voice is quiet, and his lips are close to your ear, his breath hot and smelling of spices. At this moment, he looks absolutely ravishing. 

He doesn’t wait for you to reply. “I only learned to Walz last week. Your mother taught me. She thought it was improper that I didn’t know how to dance with a lady.” That did sound like your mother. You take a second to see her dancing with your father in a perfect Walz, from years of hosting and attending events that are similar to this one.

You sigh, bringing your body closer to his and correcting any of his missteps. You loved the way that his body deliciously brushed against yours, and the way that his hand moved down your back, not entirely gentlemanly. You keep your voice quiet, closing some space between your faces. “She knows I don’t care about that.”

“Does she?” Renjun questions. You don’t answer. The royal breed wasn’t exactly the best listeners. There were a lot of ideas that your parents liked to push into your head, such that a woman should be the type devoted to her husband and her life’s work is creating an heir to the throne. And there is one thing for sure: women were supposed to be pure. They didn’t have sexual urges, they were subject to the will of their husbands. 

You’re not going to pretend that thoughts wouldn’t enter your brain as Renjun’s length brushes your leg…  

You and Renjun keep dancing for a few more minutes, but neither of you is really feeling the mood anymore. It’s always a surprise how the upper class can keep dancing and dancing and dancing.

“Does this dance ever end?” Renjun groans. No one seems to hear him, trapped in their own worlds. 

“It does now,” you say. You stop dancing and gently yank Renjun’s arm. Without an eye on either of you, the dull Walz music becomes a distant memory as you both walk into the dark castle corridors. There are a few guards here and there, but you and Renjun walk up the stairs and stop midway through the staircase, on the flat piece of floor that proceeds another swivel staircase. A large window is on the wall, and you can see the moon, a small crescent. 

There’s something so romantic about the dark, something that makes you want to unleash your inner feelings. Huang Renjun is thinking the same thing. 

You can barely see each other’s faces as your lips meld into his. Renjun was different, and you wanted him, you think as you taste his lips from every possible angle, his nose bumping into yours. His hands feel intoxicating as his hands find your waist, his grip deceptively tight as if he never wanted to let go of a woman like you.

At the sound of echoing footsteps, you and Renjun jump away from each other and search for the source of the footsteps. It’s a few guards, and they make brief eye contact with you and then with Renjun. 

You press a quick kiss on Renjun’s lips. It was the perfect time to stop. You haven’t given up your chastity just yet, your dress was still on! Now you would leave him wanting more. It was the strategy your mother gave you when you were meeting suitors, but you can find other ways to keep that statement relevant in your life.

“Until later, my sweet,” you lean in, murmuring those sultry words against his lips. You leave him standing by the large window as you find your way back to your chambers on the other side of the castle, becoming a smaller and smaller shadow in Renjun’s vision.  

-

The next time you would visit the streets of Ciel is sooner than you think, for this week has gone by rather quickly. As per your agreement with Renjun, he would help you out in the makeshift apothecary with Doyoung if you kept his secret that he paints in his spare time. This week, the apothecary is not less active than it was last week since the spread of disease is rampant in these areas, so you’re glad that you’re able to bring some forced labor with you.

Renjun is also dressed in servants’ uniforms, getting it from your lady’s maid, who covertly got this from the washerwoman. However, before you got out of the cart bringing you, Renjun, and Doyoung into the city, you still felt like he had a ‘noble’ look to him. Finding some dirt on the ground, you take a handful and rub it on Renjun’s cheek. 

“There,” you say, admiring your handiwork. “You look more like Y/N the maid’s friend.” Renjun just laughs a hearty, carefree laugh. 

The story behind Renjun was easy to fabricate when you were explaining his presence to Soobong, Sooyoung, and Jaemin. He also worked at the same nobleman’s house that you did but as a server, and he wanted to find out what you were hiding when you disappeared one afternoon every week. You made him swear that he would never tell since you were supposed to be working, and after he promised he wouldn’t tell, you brought him here. Sooyoung looked a little suspicious after you told your story, and you felt like your heart was beating in your throat as you waited for her to say or do anything, that maybe she recognized him from the last week after the storming of the Carcel, but she doesn’t say anything. You were more than relieved. 

She probably didn’t care anyway, given that your group needed more help than you could imagine. More healing apprentices showed up, mixing salves and administering medicines, but most of Ciel has been under strict curfew. After the storming, your father demanded that there be soldiers on the streets, prowling for any rebels, courtesy of the deal made with the King of Neo.

They were given the right to shoot if they even looked dissatisfied with how the people were behaving.

Although you were (somewhat) safely tucked inside the abandoned building that you have been paying to keep as a hospital for the sick of Ciel, you can still feel the tension outside, as if they are waves licking at the windows. People walk stiffly, their eyes darting before they say something, trash litters the ground, hastily-built huts and pieces of wood serve as many peoples’ homes as they inhabit the slums for their work. 

Of course, only when there is dissent are the royals actually thinking of the people of Ciel.

Soldiers stand outside, backs straight, yet some squirm in their thick uniforms under the bright, hot sun. It’s not like they can do anything to an apothecary, so they stand, looking around. The thought of being watched makes you feel almost breathless, and you just hope you don’t look like royalty enough for them to notice. As your heart beats a little faster, you tightly wrap a bonnet you found around your head, focusing your vision only on the sick.

You show Renjun to the table where Doyoung is, and show him how to crush leaves and efficiently save all the healing juice, how to wrap a bandage, how to clean a wound, where to get some water to soak cloths, and where the stores of poppy seeds, milk thistle, and other anti-inflammatory herbs are. Those, you think, are the most important training to learn first. 

Renjun watches as you talk to Sooyoung, the girl who chats with new arrivals and diagnoses their conditions. Then you grab herbs, bandages, and wet cloths and work around the room with the help of Jaemin, who is now administering medicine since Renjun is supposed to be crushing leaves and filling the water bucket.

If you haven’t noticed, life was getting harder at Ciel. Just as you were curing more sick people, more and more people were coming in, needing treatment. Not to mention that not everyone survives treatment; every week, you’re surrounded by death. On top of that, with the current instability in Ciel, Renjun was surprised that you were dead-set on coming with Doyoung because it wasn’t really your job to care. Sure, it wasn’t really Doyoung’s job to care either, but since he grew up in Ciel as an orphan, he always would feel the need to give back to his hometown. But you? You were the child of two royals, who had everything you could ever possibly need in the castle. But that wasn’t enough for you. You had to know that your subjects were okay, and if they weren’t, you wanted to do your part and help even if you have no say in most royal affairs. 

Every day, he has more and more reasons to fall in love with you.

For a while, Renjun admires your work from afar, but he continues to work himself; just being surrounded by such productive people makes him want to be productive as well. 

Finally, he’s able to get a moment alone with you. 

“Why do you even care?” Renjun asks. You both are in a back room alone as you lead him to the borage supply to help cure a family’s fit of coughs. 

“Why shouldn’t I?” You challenge. Renjun voices what he has been thinking while he observed you working yourself to the bone. 

“Because you have everything you need in this life and in the next. What is a reason for doing this other than you’re probably the kindest person I’ve ever met in my whole life?” 

You smile. “You know how our families were picked by God to rule? To conquer?” 

“Of course.” 

“There’s got to be a reason, right?” You question. “To give us such a high position in power over so many people.” 

“He must have seen potential in our families. We need to live up to that.” You say simply. 

“Have you ever told anyone your opinion?” Renjun asks quietly. 

You snort a little before looking at your feet. “Once. To my father.” You turn your head to face Renjun, the smile widening on your face. “That was probably the hardest slap I’ve ever received.” 

Renjun closes the space between you, and his face is so close that your noses are brushing. “Probably not as hard as the whipping I got after getting out of our palanquin to give a homeless man a few crackers in my pocket.”

“I guess we’re two soft-hearted people.” You giggle, finally closing the pesky gap between your lips. You pull away, letting your finger trace his lips. Renjun’s nostrils twitch at this feeling. 

“We’re going to be different rulers when we get the throne, right?” You ask as you study his soft, pink lips that look deliciously kissable. 

“Of course,” Renjun says after a long pause. “If there was a way to tell the people to wait for a little while longer…” Renjun trails off as he presses his forehead against yours. Immediately, he feels the dampness of your skin, how you’re sweating in this hot building, but he doesn’t care.

Renjun thinks he loves you now at this moment more than he ever thought he would even though your appearance is less than exemplary. But because it’s imperfect, it makes you feel more real. 

“We’re going to give people more freedoms, like in other countries. We’ll share our resources better. And we can build schools to educate people and help them learn how to make the right decisions,” Renjun says. The word ‘we’ echoes in your brain. For the rest of your lives, Huang Renjun would be on your team, and together you would try to undo the oppression that your families have facilitated through generations. 

“Would you rather be loved or be feared?” You ask Renjun as you absorb the warmth of his chest. It’s a pleasant sort of heat, not the heat that prikles your skin.

“I hate that question.” Renjun chuckles. 

“Just answer it,” you pout. 

“Fine.” Renjun sighs. “Feared.” You raise an eyebrow curiously.

“Why?” 

“I only want to show love for my people. But I want my people to fear what will happen if they take advantage of me.”

“Interesting take,” you say softly. “You already know my answer. Love. I want to be loved by my people, no matter what.” 

Renjun takes your cheeks into his hands as he stares into your beautiful eyes. 

“Just be careful, my darling,” Renjun says. “You’re so trusting, too trusting for a royal.”

“Isn’t that what you love about me? That I’m different?” You ask playfully, poking his chest with your index finger.

Renjun doesn’t answer, only placing a kiss on your warm cheeks 

You take Renjun’s hands and wrap them around your body so you can be held in his embrace. The future together seemed so sweet, but now, you need to focus on the present. 

“Right, the borage,” you say, pulling away reluctantly.

-

If there was anything that your royal parents would disapprove of, it’s letting a man into a young maid’s bedroom, especially if she is unmarried. 

But you’re not for one with the status quo, and as per the deal, you were going to let Renjun paint you. The only place that wasn’t crawling with servants and event planners trying to organize the tourney celebrating your’s and Renjun’s upcoming wedding that would be held on the royal grounds was your bedroom. 

If there was anything you yourself would disapprove of is not keeping your word. 

You’re sitting on the ottoman by the window of your bedroom, one leg over the other and your hands knit over your knee as you pose for Renjun’s painting. You’re wearing a long turquoise dress, one that doesn’t have a million underskirts. Renjun wanted you to wear a dress that was so undeniably you, and this turquoise gem was it. The soft blues complimented your pacifist nature, and it was incredibly simple too. It is one of those dresses where the top is laced up, creating a ‘v’ on your chest, and underneath, to keep you modest is a white under-dress. The sleeves are conical and long, which is one of your favorite styles. Your parents didn’t like this dress after you requested the seamstress to make it because it looked like something a working-class girl would wear, which after that, was the reason why you weren’t allowed to request dresses anymore and your mother would do that. You were only available at the dress fittings, which bored you beyond end. 

It was just another way for your mother to silence you.

After some ten minutes of Renjun painting, you had a hard time remaining still, and that was when Renjun asked you to focus on something. You thoroughly focused your gaze on him, at his furrowed eyebrows at how he paints, dipping his brush in water, mixing new paints on his wooden palette. It’s as if the rest of the world is drowned out as he paints, and he exists only with you, his canvas, and his brushes. The way his eyes would drink in your appearance to replicate on the canvas made your heart rise to your throat; not so hidden in his eyes is his lust. 

Renjun stops for a few moments. His fingers are at his chin as he looks pensive, looking between the canvas and you. His eyes are glazed, and his lips are pursed when he suddenly says something in a raw voice.

“Take off your clothes.” 

“Excuse me?” You shoot back, stunned. 

“You heard me.” 

You’re not sure what’s happening in your chest, if your heart completely stopped beating or it’s beating so fast that you can’t even tell its keeping you alive.

You’re finally able to regain your composure when you say back wittily, “I guess you’re turning into the kind of painter that ogles naked women and sleeps with their muses.” 

“I guess so,” Renjun smirks. 

Your simple dress slips off your shoulders and falls to the ground when you unclasp the hook resting at the nape of your neck, and the following hooks that went down to your mid back. You’re left in your underdress, and your corset is beneath that. 

“Beautiful,” Renjun murmurs. At the way you stop, reveling in his attention, Renjun chuckles. “Now take it off. All of it.” Renjun says. He watches how you untie your white underdress that is fastened by a thin bow on your waist, and he watches how the string comes undone, and the dress comes to your feet. You untie your corset in the same way and discard it carelessly to the side. 

“I never liked that thing anyway.”

Renjun’s eyes travel down your body, to the way your waist is curved, beautiful with an hourglass shape and a cute paunch. He watches how the nubs of your breasts become hard at the way they are exposed too long, and to a man for the first time. 

You sit back down on the ottoman. You think about re-creating the pose you were doing but think against it. As a caterpillar comes out of its cocoon to become a butterfly, you shed your cocoon of clothes and become this butterfly.

And you love how your nakedness weakens the man in front of you. 

You reposition yourself on the ottoman, the expression on your face playful and carefree as you let your breasts hang on your chest shamelessly, plaching your arm between your narrowly-open legs to cover your womanhood. At the way your shoulder hunches, you create a cleavage on your chest.

It’s as if you’re Medusa, turning him into stone as he not-so-secretly ogles, the strokes of his brush against the canvas more sparse. 

All of a sudden, you leap from the ottoman and saunter to Renjun, who stares up at you from his sitting position. 

“You know you’re supposed to stand when you’re in the presence of royalty. That’s basic manners.” With a coy smile on your face, you swat his shoulder, your breasts jiggling and almost hitting his face. 

“Y-yes Your Highness,” Renjun says, bashfully looking away. He stumbles as he stands, and you can see even through his thick breeches a large erection. You can’t stop yourself from giggling as you grab him. Your bed is barely a meter away from where Renjun is, and you grab his shoulders and push him backwards, forcing him under you on the bed. 

You have both of his wrists in his hand as you animalistically kiss him, your womanhood searching for his manhood underneath his clothes. You can feel his rough stubble from his cheeks after maybe two days of not shaving, and it feels delicious, that you’re being touched, fucked by a real man. Renjun passionately enjoys your kiss, biting and sucking your lips as he pushes his tongue into your mouth. Your tongues war inside your mouth, sliding against each other in a slobbery way that is normally disgusting, but beautiful if it is done with the right person. You gasp as his tongue reaches further and further down your mouth, almost entering your throat. Your second of shock allows Renjun’s wrists to slip from your grip, and he places them on your naked side, squeezing the softer part of your body, his hands slowly climbing up and down your back until finally, he gives your rump a delicious squeeze. Panting, you finally find his hard dick under his clothes, and you hump him as hard as you can, moving your hips along Renjun’s body, shaking your bed.

“Slower, Your Highness. You don’t want to break the bed,” Renjun chuckles. 

Renjun audibly moans at how you’re riding him, but slowly, the pleasure comes to an end. Renjun opens his eyes (that he didn’t realize was closed) to see you slide off of the bed, reaching from the side to pull off his breeches. 

“You’re reading my mind,” he says. You’re able to pull his thick breeches and pull up his tucked-in shirt to find his cock hidden in his underclothes. You pull it down to Renjun’s mid-thigh, watching with excitement as his cock springs out, large and erected at how much your humping aroused him. You reach out and excite his member some more, moving the delicate skin up and down, squeezing his hard length.

Leaning forward, you decide that it is time to suck, and you wrap your lips around his cock. You move your head up and down his length, your lips following, shielding your teeth from coming in contact with his sensitive skin. Your tongue swirls around his member, creating obscure saliva designs, and you can hear Renjun above you, turning into puddy by the minute as you pleasure him. 

Your mouth starts to fill with seed suddenly, and you gulp it down, tasting the sweet cherry pie that was for desert tonight in his cum. You close your eyes blissfully, and you don’t even realize that Renjun is sitting up. With a strength you didn’t even know he possessed, he pulls you up to his side, and he climbs on top of you. 

He’s ready to take charge. 

Renjun takes your lips into his mouth as he freely moves his hands on you as if he’s never going to touch you again. He hands travel from your cheeks to your jawbone, moving down to your collarbone and then your nice, plush breasts. He spends a few moments there, letting his hands massage the soft flesh, and you can feel moans leave your mouth. After a few moments, he focuses on your nipples, pinching them until you yelp. Then, his hands travel down your body, to your slightly paunchy stomach and your curvy sides. His hands wander to your throbbing womanhood, and his lips wander to the side of your neck. 

You’re overcome with more pleasure than you think is possible. 

“You’re so beautiful, like art.” Renjun murmurs as he pulls away from your neck, starting lovingly at your ruffled hair, at your smooth skin, at your bruising breasts and neck that will surely yield black and purple marks from tonight’s activities. 

You smirk at him. “Then you should be looking, not touching.” 

Renjun’s eyes glow at how you use your wit, how mischievous, how playful yet serious you can be. He’s lucky to consider a woman like you his betrothed. 

“You’re the exception.” 

Once those words slice the air, you feel Renjun’s fingers force themselves inside of you. About to scream, Renjun takes his other hand and places it over your mouth. 

“You don’t want the world to hear how good you’re getting fucked, hmm?” Renjun asks in a soft voice. Your screams remain trapped between your lips and his palm as Renjun forces one, two, four fingers into your womanhood. Your legs are flailing, but Renjun’s position on top of you keeps him steady on your body. 

Everything that comes out of your mouth is just a jumble, but you can hear yourself whimper and moan while saying “please.”

“You’re so well-mannered, Your Highness,” Renjun coos. “Oh, look,” Renjun notices. “Something came,” 

You don’t realize the white-ish, clear-ish liquid that came out from how fucked you were getting until you look down. 

As Renjun leans down for a taste, you suddenly close your legs. Renjun’s hands travel to your upper thighs, his knees on the ground since he hopped out of the bed. 

“Please please let me taste it, Your Highness,” Renjun begs from underneath you. His eyes become larger, rounder, and you realize that the power has shifted to you. For you and for Renjun, you realize that you both don’t fully take control of the bed, but it comes in waves. As Renjun becomes more submissive, you can feel yourself inflate, becoming more dominant. 

“Beg some more,” you command. 

“Please please please,” Renjun says in a string, the word jumbling more and more as he repeats his desire. He nestles his chin between your thighs and looks up at you with wide, innocent-looking eyes. 

It was these same eyes that watch you flail around as he inserted digit after digit of his right hand into your vagina. He’s a lion in sheep’s clothing, and you can already feel the little sheep start to suck the skin of your inner thighs, pressing loud smooches. You watch him graze your legs, his nose becoming covered with a dollop of his own saliva as he uses his mouth to convince you. 

You don’t realize that you’re opening your legs to fully enjoy the pleasure that Renjun is giving you when you feel his head between your thighs, licking your vagina. 

“Mmmhm” Renjun rumbles to himself, enjoying your sex. You can feel loud moans catch in your throat at how skillful his tongue, how sinful this pleasure feels. Renjun moves up your body, to your lower stomach, trailing your skin with your own cum until he finally meets your jawline. He presses more than ten loud smooches to that small piece of your body before surrendering his lips to yours, his mouth tasting like the cherry pie that you ate also that was present in your cum. 

Renjun’s hands still linger by your pussy, taking your cum in his hands. You feel slightly ticklish at what he is tracing along your stomach, and you look down, only to see his name written on your skin in your cum. 

“Mine,” Renjun says possessively, quickly taking your lips into his mouth. You bring Renjun closer to you, crushing him against your body because you want to become one so badly. You tangle your legs with Renjun’s, feeling his bare, naked member rub against your clit. Renjun decides to drive you crazy, rather than relieving you and your throbbing walls with his large dick, he decides to keep rubbing himself against you. 

“Please, please go in, Your Highness,” you address your betrothed, properly. “I need you I need you,” you mumble to yourself. 

“Have you got enough room for a future king?” Renjun asks coyly. 

“Yes, Your Highness. King Renjun,” you reassure him. 

With that, Renjun pounds his length into you, in and out, in and out repeatedly until you start feeling your head spin with delicious pleasure. 

Yet at the same time, you feel adrenaline coursing through your veins. You feel like you could lift a mountain with how much energy Renjun’s dick puts inside of you. Renjun shakes a little, roaming his body along yours so that his penis could explore inside of your walls. You gasp at how good that feels, how your walls squeeze his member, craving for his seed that dried up after you gulped it down like a hungry child.

As your mind wanders, the whole world turning into background noise as Renjun’s dick pounds into you, you whimper at the pain, how Renjun is tearing at your hymen. Yet, you still feel pleasured at the sensation, satisfying Renjun’s manly needs, and your needs for new experiences. 

You look down at your stomach, and maybe it’s your mind playing tricks on you, but you swear you see the outline of Renjun’s penis in your stomach as it roams around. You gasp and whine at how good the feeling is, how rough Renjun’s hands are while he grips your sides, and Renjun pulls out, his member dripping with his seed, arousal that coursed in him due to being inside of you. He pounds his length into you more and more as he looks into your eyes. 

You feel as though you could be trapped in this moment forever, of just you and Renjun panting to a rhythm that only you two know, completely naked as Renjun puts a little more of himself in you, making you both into one person. You think that all your problems being a royal, the daughter of your father, the impending stress of taking your kingdom and enforcing a newer, freer, more modern rule that hasn’t been seen or heard before. Certainly your royal advisors would be against it, only interested in perpetuating the old ways. 

Those problems feel elevated knowing that Renjun is by your side. Fucking your brains out every night. 

Renjun heaves a breath as he finally pulls out of you completly for a second time, lying down next to you. His member is still seeping with cum, and with a mischevious glance, you climb on top of him, your nipples barely touching his chest with how you’re positioned on top of him. You grab his penis, pleasuring it for a little bit before squeezing out more cum from your betrothed. He moans at your touching, and you can feel him shifting his position so he can enjoy you on top of him more. Pulling yourself away slightly, you trace your name onto his skin. 

“Mine,” you say with a cheeky grin, admiring your handiwork under the moonlight that filtered into your bedroom. 

All of the animalistic urges are gone from you two, and you both are panting heavily at the activity of the last hour, staring into each others’ eyes, shocked that you both were capable of such passion. You bring your face a few centimeters away his chest and kiss his heart. Renjun coos at you, gently placing his lips on your jaw. He trails soft kisses along your collarbone until he kissing the soft flesh of your breasts. He sucks on the nubs of your breasts, this time he is the infant, and he places his head between your breasts. 

“I suppose we were overenthusiastic about our jobs, and made a male heir too quickly,” Renjun murmurs between the mounds called your breasts. Your laugh only causes them to jiggle, causing Renjun to laugh too. 

“We’ll find out if we were successful if I skip my period.” 

“The birth date would certainly raise some eyebrows among the Royal Court,” Renjun chuckles. 

“It would, but then I would remind them that their wives are waiting for them at home, waiting for them to finish their work in the castle and nothing else,” you have a cutely evil look on your face, and Renjun picks up what you try to hint. 

There’s silence between you and Renjun. He pulls his face away from your breasts, and your faces are so close, you can feel the shadow of his nose on yours. 

“I love you,” Renjun says quietly. “From our first conversation in the library, I’ve known you’re the one.” Renjun waits in anticipation for your answer. You trace the outline of his face with your index finger. 

“I love you too. I’m glad that if I’m allied with anyone in this cold world, it’s you.” 

Renjun sighs, and your faces slide against each other. Completely naked under the romantic silver moonlight that pools on your’s and Renjun’s flesh, you act as though cuddling with your beloved like this is the most normal thing in the world.  

“I’ll never let you down.” 

-

The day of the tourney has arrived. Your father and Renjun’s have spent the greater part of two months preparing for this tourney, providing your mother the funds to put it together. If there’s anything a royal woman loved is party planning, and a tourney is just in your mother’s wheelhouse. 

All of your noble friends have been invited, dukes and earls, barons and other landlords that your family is on good terms with. They are said to bring their families, that this was one grand party. 

You’re seated with your mother and father, and Renjun is by your side. The King of Neo would be arriving late today, discussing some terms of the agreement he and your father came up with to his weapons suppliers, and he would be joining you later.

Together, your family and Renjun are watching a fencing match between two men, but the stakes are raised higher in this match: the two competitors must fence on horses. Until one man is unhorsed, the match will continue.

You never understood the point of watching two men fight on horses, but it is something you’ve gotten used to attending hundreds of matches with your family. What was the point in all this when the kingdom needs help? 

Sighing, you keep your thoughts to yourself. Renjun is sitting beside you with equal boredom, and you can tell that he probably has the same opinion as you. However, neither of you suggested leaving for some alone time because after all, this whole event was held in your name. Together, you would imitate the cheers of the other dukes and earls sitting with you, agreeing when they would talk about fencing strategy. 

The man in a dark horse and slim, fitting steel armor is Jung Jaehyun, a knight that was trained in Ambrosia. His father was a lower baron, but his status increased the second that his son was accepted into the King’s Guard when you were just a little girl. With his helmet and his clean strokes to his opponent, you’re reminded of the girlish crush you had on him as he ingratiated himself with your father. However, he married the daughter of an earl and had a daughter that was a few years younger than you. 

Normally, a man can be unhorsed by Jung Jaehyun in the matter of minutes, but his opponent is not giving up. The other man is someone you do not recognize after your years of attending tourneys and matches. He must be some new talent if he is able to be on the roster for the tourney and face of Jaehyun for this long. 

From the others around you, this man’s name is Qian Kun, and he’s from a different kingdom (those around you are throwing around more names than you can keep up with). He’s on a white horse, wearing minimal armour and determination on his face. His name is whispered as if he’s a forbidden secret. If one thing’s for sure, he’s keeping the audience interested – even you and Renjun are focused. 

Every thrust that Jaehyun throws, this Kun is able to block it, moving his body with a flexibility that you know for sure Jaehyun has. Jaehyun has brute force, from what you learned watching him, and he’s able to break down his opponents by being relentless. Most don’t have the skill to dodge. 

After multiple dodges and audience gasps, Kun starts attacking in his own right. You think that Jaehyun took the phrase ‘the best defense is offense’ too seriously because he struggles to dodge Kun’s shots. He’s so used to being on the attack that he doesn’t know how to defend himself properly. Being a big fish in Ambrosia make his skill in taking a strong opponent weak. 

It doesn’t take long for Kun to unhorse Jaehyun, and Jaehyun falls unceremoniously to the ground. The umpire calls it a match and races towards Kun, pulling his hand up in the air to signify to the audience that he really won. The audience is in shock before a few people start clapping, and then the rest. Kun gets a standing ovation from you and Renjun, and the others in the tourney follow in suit. 

The winners of matches get to enjoy the fruits of their rigorous training. There’s a cash prize, and for a boy like Kun, who wears homemade-looking armour and has a tan on his face and neck from rough outdoor work, the cash prize is something that can alleviate his and his family’s pain. 

Finally, you see Renjun’s father, the King of Neo, appear after all the hoopla that Qian Kun’s victory was for this torney. Another match would be taking place between two different knights or other sportsmen. 

“What a match you missed!” Your father says to Renjun’s in a light tone. 

There’s something different in the air with the King of Neo. All of a sudden, you feel as though the eyes of the world are around you. While you’re surrounded by a few of the nobles that your family is close with, the others are scattered around, and if you really think about it, the others sitting around you beside them are completely unfamiliar. They are people that Renjun’s father brought from Neo who are allegedly very close to his family, who would want to honor the marriage of their prince with the princess of Ambrosia. 

The King of Neo nods, and then hands grab your father and mother, as well as your family friends. You feel the tight grasp of familiar hands on your forearms, and you look behind you, to see it’s Renjun. 

His gaze isn’t recognizable. He only looks to his father, waiting for his instruction. 

Your father is cursing, spitting, while your mother’s face is drained of all blood as she stares in horror around her. 

“Renjun?” You ask, looking at your betrothed, hoping this was all some sort of game or mistake, but a part deep down in you knows that it’s not either. 

“Where to, father?” Renjun asks, avoiding your gaze. His grip on you becomes tighter. 

“Take them to the cellar.” 

-

You feel almost stupid as the story is unfolded in front of you. Renjun and his father are the Resistance, and their identities have been cloaked well. Ambrosia, as the largest kingdom in the area, was vulnerable, and the people were struggling and starving. All the King of Neo had to do was inject the idea of revolution by distributing literature that cried for revolution, and educate people that life could be better than being a peasant. Declare independence from your ruler, like those in France and America few years before. That worked as a recruiting process, and made his organization stronger. It gave him ears everywhere and a wonderful plan to destroy Ambrosia and take the fertile land for himself.

The information that your family is almost bankrupt passed to the Resistance through maids that were seen and not heard, and Renjun’s father set up a match that your father could not refuse. It was a perfectly crafted offer that would make any normal man suspicious. You guess your father was just despirate to make his money problems go away.

So Renjun came, his father got what he wanted from your father, and now you were trapped in a cell, your castle sieged. Wooing you or no wooing you, your father would have forced you to marry Renjun, but in the time that you’ve been locked up, you concluded that Renjun enjoyed watching you fall for him.

Huang Renjun was one hell of a trojan horse. Always be wary if a deal is too good. And always be wary when someone is just too perfect. 

You’ve never felt so stupid and childish before. Thinking that after the tourney, you would start seeing dressmakers who would taylor your wedding dress. Hire musicians, cooks, cleaners, and waiters. Tasting delicacies that will be present at the wedding meal. You thought that you were going to be with Renjun forever, but you now realize that forever was just a fantasy. 

Instead, you were starving. Compared to the delicious, decadent three meals per day that you were used to seeing, the mysterious mush that gaolers presented you did not sit in your stomach well, and sometimes, your meal times were skipped. You never knew when your next meal came. 

You guess you now understand the life of the poor people of Ciel. 

One day, out of deliriousness and anguish, from the lack of sleep you were getting on the floor of a wine cellar, you threw your hot mush at the guard who opened the door to give you one of your meals. He hit you across the head and you fell over anticlimactically like a rag doll. 

Furious at this insolence, the higher-ups of the Resistance decided to tortue you some more. Forcing your head into a bucket of ice cold water. Ripping open your skirt. Beating you with anything they had on them; once a gaoler beat you with a spoon. You’re chained to the floor as the door opens, and your new gaoler is in front of you. 

It’s none other than Huang Renjun, the same way you met him but different. His hair is combed back, and he wears a warm overcoat, trousers, and long boots. He has a small book in his pocket. It’s Oresteia by Aeschylus. The weather has been getting colder in the few weeks you’ve been trapped under the castle that you’ve always called your home.

Renjun drops the plate in front of you. He can’t even bear to look at you. 

“How are you enjoying Oresteia?” You challenge, venom in your voice. God, what you thought you would do after you saw Renjun on that fateful day at the tourney. You thought you would slap him and kick him and hurt him in the way that you have been hurting in the past few weeks.

Since you’re too weak to do any of that, you settle for some ‘dull’ conversation about a book, a book that brought you two together. How apt. 

“It’s good.” Renjun says simply. He looks away. He doesn’t say anything more than that. Where is that spirit that impressed you when you first met? You wonder if that was a sham. 

Renjun is about to leave when he stops himself. He turns around and faces you. You, out of all people, deserved an explanation. He shuts the thick door of your cell. He doesn’t face you as he clears his throat.

“You know, I didn’t want to do any of that.” He struggles to say any of this, to verbally disagree with his father. His father is the seed he came from. You are not his blood at all. Words made this whole fiasco more real. 

“Really?” You ask, unimpressed. The dark circles under his eyes tell you that he needs your forgiveness so he can sleep at night. 

“It went too far. Why couldn’t he just be happy with what he had?” Renjun grovels, not speaking to you in particular anymore. 

“I want to speak with my father. Or my mother,” you command icily.

Renjun sits down. “They’re dead. Beheaded two days ago.” His voice is dry and cold. “My father went with them.” 

You gulp. This information isn’t that shocking, yet you feel bile rise in your throat. You knew any news of your parents would mean death. They represent everything that the proletarians hated about the upper class. They would be the first to be kill. Yet still, knowing that the people who raised you, the people who you didn’t always agree with, were erased forever from this world makes your heart sink. 

You don’t have any other siblings. You are now truely alone in this world. 

But then the second part of the news sinks in your brain. You raise your brow. Renjun explains. He finally has someone he can process these events with. 

“Once the other members of the Resistance found out that my father only gathered them so that he could take over, they killed him.” He choked. “Knowing that their cause was manufactured so that another king could rule them made him just as bad. I swore my fealty to the new Resistance in exchange for my life. The organization has decided on a new leader today. A man named Bang.” 

“Just a few hours ago, five of your dearest earls were killed. The ones at the tourney. Bang and his cronies are scouring the records of anyone who was friendly with your family.” 

You snort a little. Renjun looks at you, and he knows that he deserved it. 

“Poetic justice, I guess,” you say, speaking about the deceased King of Neo. Renjun shrugged his shoulder. After a silence ensues between the two of you, Renjun gulps in a deep breath. 

“You know, they want to kill you next. Who better than the offspring of the Mad King?” He asks rhetorically. You were prepared for this. It’s not like you were going to be held in a dungeon until the end of time. You were going to have to face the music for your father’s crimes against his people. It felt so unfair, but it couldn’t be helped. 

“I’ve been postponing it. I tried to postpone your parents’ execution too.”

You didn’t even realize that you were holding your breath. 

“Even after all of this, I still care about you.” Renjun says. His voice is small, as if he’s afraid of someone hearing his declaration of love. After all, there is still a guard posted outside these echoey cellar walls.

Who you thought was a sweet, sensitive, artistic man was one who was always under the thumb of someone else, be it his father or this Bang character. 

“You’ll care about me until your new master calls,” you say derisively. 

Renjun pursed his lips. 

“I deserved that. But I want to be better for you.” 

You bite your lower lip. 

“How?” 

Renjun’s lips are close to your ear; you can barely hear the words he’s saying. 

“My men found a network of tunnels down here. One of the rocks on this wall is movable and will open a passage inside. I will give you a map. When you are done reading, eat it up, so there’s no paper trail.

“When I give you a lantern, you know that that is the time. I’ll give you a watch and a slip of paper about the time that there are the least guards watching the outside of this castle. I’ll distract anyone else. All you have to do is run. Got it?” Renjun asks. 

You’re stunned. Immediately, you want to tell him that you’ve got it, but you’re now suspicious. After all, your family’s demise was being too trusting to the wrong people. 

And Renjun has proven that he’s the wrong person. 

“How do I know if I can trust you?” You ask. 

“It’s the only choice you have. If you don’t escape using this plan and try to run off any other way, then you will be caught, tortured, and beheaded. The Resistance is scary business. You want my help. I’m their inside man. And I love you. I still do, even after all of this.”

You sigh. You could be fooled again. But it’s better than rotting in a wine cellar at the mercy of the Resistance, living every day hoping it’s not the day of your beheading. At least running gave you an iota of control that you lacked your whole life, as a royal or as a ragged prisoner.

And there’s something else. His eyes. His eyes were able to fool you once, but there is something truthful to it this time. 

You don’t have to say anything for Renjun to understand your agreement.

-

The lantern comes only a few weeks later. Since Renjun came to you with a plan of escape, you’ve felt more lively, and Renjun notices that as your gaoler for a few weeks. Due to the “good behavior” that Renjun vouched, you were unchained once again in your cell. 

Your first small step towards freedom. 

Renjun is able to slip in a few delicacies that Bang and his cronies are eating upstairs in the dining room that you used to eat your whole life. One day an apple pie, another lamb stew with herbs. While you gobbled down that food – the only food you’re actually able to stomach – he would engage in a brief conversation with you; it was the only social interaction you’ve had since the Resistance took over and placed siege on the castle, yet he would only stay long enough that Bang would not grow suspicious of him. 

Renjun handed you the map only a few days before the true escape, which was when you knew that the biggest moment of your life was coming. He wanted you to learn by heart the tunnels in the castle, enough so that you can reproduce the map in your head, and he didn’t want to give you the map too early in case you forgot. Obediently, you learned the map as best as you can, associating certain turns as if you were walking above ground in the castle that you were raised in. Once you were done, you ate the map, as Renjun said so no evidence would be left behind. 

“180 degrees, vertical” was all he said. You knew what that meant; 6pm. You had no way of keeping time in your little, windowless cell, so Renjun gave you a pocket watch. It wasn’t just any pocket watch, but your fathers that he always kept in his breeches. Overwhelmed with emotion, you dismiss the man who is saving your life, and clutch the pocket watch. 

A few minutes to six, you start palming the stone walls of the cellar, hoping to find the notch that will open a door that is your entrance to the secret passage. Your heart is in your throat as you claw the walls like a despirate animal, until finally you hit the right one. Using the minimal light and the small, hidable lantern that Renjun gave you, you trudge through the secret passage, remembering the map he gave you clearly, each step you take being another “dash” of your path on the map. You successfully navigate until you see a trapdoor. It requires a key for it to open, but you have a beautiful hairpin still in your hair from the day of the tourney. As you wiggle the pin into the lock, you take a deep sigh. This is a side exit that shouldn’t reveal your escape quite immediately. 

Your heart is pounding restlessly as the open air touches your skin. The warm sun and fresh, cool air feel good against your skin, where in the past few weeks, you’ve been entombed in stale air. You gleefully inhale the scent of the garden’s orchids, which is wafting from the garden that is north of your estate. 

You linger a little longer than you should. Renjun didn’t have to say it for you to know that this will be the last time you will see your beloved home ever again. Nothing will ever be the same again. You won’t be a high class woman (not that that mattered much to you anyway), you won’t have your excursions with Doyoung (what happened to him?), you won’t have your exquisite library anymore. 

Your love for Renjun is a distant memory. Today, you will be leaving everything behind. 

Your lingering turns to loitering when you feel a bright flash hit your face. 

“The prisoner!” A guard shouts. He rushes towards you, and you are just quick enough to slip away into the large woods in your estate. You used to play here as a child, and you know the woods like its the back of your hand, and just as Renjun’s map promised, the areas you ran through were sparse of guards. 

You can feel more footsteps thumping the ground as more and more men join the first man that noticed you loitering, and you feel nauseous. You can feel yourself screaming in your head that this is your one last shot, you can’t afford to mess up, and Renjun can’t even help you if you were caught. 

Wading through the creek nearby with your bare feet, you run into a ditch, taking scrap leaves from the ground and covering yourself with the debris. You’re too out of breath to keep running anymore; the gruel has not been doing you any favors. You hide in a nearby ditch, clothing yourself in debris and the shadow.

“Sir, she went through the water,” you hear one man say.

“Then get into it!” Another man said, more likely the head of this security unit. “You all are a bunch of pussies, a little water doesn’t hurt anybody!” 

You hear some reluctant groans as the men trudge through the creek, and you hear the shuffling of various feet at various positions, making it impossible to pinpoint where the noise is truly coming from. 

You’ve never been more terrified in your life. You’re honestly not sure how you’ll react if one of the men on that security team find you. Will you scream? Will you cry? Will your heart break into two pieces knowing what lies in wait for you when you’re sent back to the Resistance? To another, worse cell burrowed deeper into the castle cellar than your previous cell? Tourtue would surely be a staple if you were caught. These are thoughts you want to filter out of your mind, but they seem to be infesting your thoughts. 

“I don’t see her,” you hear one man say. 

“I don’t either,” another man says. You feel slight relief coursing through your veins. 

“What should we do, sir,” one man asks his superior. 

He takes a deep breath. He shuffles through the woods, causing the anxiety and adrenaline to spike in your veins, and he takes a look around once more. 

“Here’s what we will say,” you hear feet shuffling as the men get closer to their commander. “The girl died. She fell down that cliff over there,” he points to the cliff at the distance, the cliff that gives you a view of the Kingdom of Ambrosia. “We don’t mention what really happened here. Understood?” You can imagine that all the men are nodding. 

As you hear the mens’ footsteps receding, you wait for ten minutes before your head peaks from the ditch. The sun has fallen, leaving the world pitch black. 

Quietly, you shed off the debris from your pitiful dress as a snake sheds its skin. 

Now begins your new life. 

-

1802

You think you have seen the sun rise and set almost four thousand times since you escaped from the Resistance’s clutches. You haven’t seen or spoken to Renjun in the past eleven years, and he’s as good as dead. In the end, he righted his wrong, and you are not as bitter as you were when you were thrown into that cellar. 

That night, you traveled tirelessly north from the woods of your estate, going somewhere you didn’t know yet. All you saw were woods and woods and woods. Maybe a racoon or two. Plenty of squirrels. You tried to talk to some, but that didn’t work very well. It was the loneliest period of your life. 

Towns you considered settling in littered the landscape once you crossed Ambrosia’s boarder. Every day, you became a little less fearful that you were being searched for by the Resistance, and eventually, your quest for a new home came to an end after three months of searching. The peaceful little town you would be settling in was called Heaven’s Gate, called because of its high, rocky shores well above sea level. 

From the newspapers, you observed the rise of the Resistance, with more and more bloodshed every day that Bang was in power. Eventually, he was beheaded, and the whole Resistance fell apart. From then, Democracy slowly rebuilt the area. In honor of its roots, the state that is your old home is now the Democratic State of Ambrosia.

The switch into democracy didn’t stop peoples’ fascination with the former royal family that was wiped out. There were public records of the death of your mother and father with images of their bodies and eyewitnesses of their death, but none of you. This lead many scholars to believe that you were still alive somewhere. 

It’s a nicer alternative to the current narrative. 

You smile at the few books and pamphlets you found in your new home’s library detailing the reasons why people think you are alive and where you are now. The common theory is that you boarded a ship to America as a stowaway, living your best life.

It occurred to you that if you walked a little longer, perhaps a few weeks, you could get to the coast and become the stowaway like the stories said and land yourself in America. That would truely be a fresh start. But to leave your homeland? Never.  

The people of Heaven’s Gate were quite unassuming. Nobody asked many questions about your life before Heaven’s Gate. You took on a new identity, and the role as the town’s healer. At the ripe age of thirty-one, you have decided that Heaven’s Gate is your children and that you will repent for the sins of your father against his people. 

You operate your healing out of your home, and thanks to healing a construction worker’s mother, you got an extension for your practice built for practically free. There is an entrance to your office from directly outside, a little waiting room, and an operating room for you to examine the sick. Definetly much better than your travelling medic act in Ciel. 

As you sweep the floors of the operating room, you hear a knock on the door. 

“Come in!” You shout. 

In comes your apprentice Yoona, who has a strange man limping, leaning against her for support, his messenger bag dragging against the dirt. 

“I found him by the creek. He’s already rubbed some marigold paste on his wound, but I wanted to see if you could do anything else with it.” 

When you look at the man, it’s like you’ve seen him before. He’s around your age, wearing shabby, dirt-trodden clothes of someone who has begged for their whole life. He hasn’t looked like he’s showered in days, and he’s thin like a stick, but at the same time, he looks… content? 

Nothing about this man made sense. Beggars didn’t know that marigold stops infections. Where could he have learned that? A friend? He looks like he’s been wandering alone for a long time. 

Deciding not to much further thought into those observations, you notice how Yoona looks at you for a way to proceed. 

“Right,” you say, hoping to hide how taken aback you are. “Any sickness? Headaches, sniffling, coughing?” You ask. 

“None yet,” the man says grimly. “Although that bread looks very nice.” His gaze falls to the bread pan you have in the kitchen next door to your wing, fresh out of the oven. Despite how content this man looks, there’s a glint in his eye that betrays the hunger that gnaws at him, from days of starvation, running off of whatever he could find, most likely berries on the land. The man in front of you doesn’t emanate skill in hunting either, or else he would have a bow and arrow with him.

Out of pity, you take the bread from your kitchen and bring it into your operating room, letting Yoona shoulder the man into your extension. She lays him down on the bed, and nods out. She will be getting the standard items — water from the well, a few blankets, and spare clothes that you kept washed to give to anyone that came to you for medical help — sometimes, just being clean helps cure the illness more than medicine. 

Once she leaves, it’s just you and this stranger. You curiously watch him as he gnaws on the bread, a look of relief in his eyes at not having to forage for this food. Something about this stranger though feels so familiar. But you don’t know how. Any associates of your family were wiped out during the violent period of the Resistance, so no one you love from your old life is left on this Earth. 

Since the man already used your standard cure of marigold leaves, the only thing left for you to do is to rub a fresh coat, wrap a bandage around his wound, and hand him poppy seeds to put him to sleep faster since he has no signs of infection. Sleep is also an excellent cure. 

When you hand him some poppy seeds, the man shakes his head. “I can take that in a little bit. Really I’m fine,” You look into this deep brown eyes, and the feeling of you knowing this man is gnawing at your brain. “Can you hand me my bag?” He asks. You look dubiously at him and to the poppy seeds still in your hands. “I promise I will take them.” 

Knowing that you’re not going to breech this patient’s stubbornness, you grab his bag and place the poppy seeds into a small piece of cloth. The flap on top of the bag is pulled back, revealing a sketchbook and a small canvas. Memories, painful memories haunt your conscience of the boy who fooled you and then saved you. 

Watching the man take his sketchbook, he opens to a page of roses. Immediately, the storming of the Carcel rushes back to you. At the way you’re watching the canvas peak out of the man’s messenger bag, he breaks the silence between you. 

“I can show you what’s inside too.” He says. But you already have an idea what it is. Putting his sketchbook aside, the man pulls out the slightly dusty, smudged canvas. 

It’s you. Naked. That fateful night. 

“Huang Renjun?” You ask, finally able to find your voice. 

The man smiles, confirming his identity. “I was beginning to think I would have to reintroduce myself.” 

You’re completely flabbergasted. “W-What are you doing here?” You ask, your jaw practically dropping to the ground. 

“Getting healed. Remember?” He points to his wounded leg. 

“I know that,” You snort. “What I mean to say is how are you alive? Wouldn’t Bang have had your head since you let me escape? And then the ending of the Resistance. You were extremely high-profile. How did you avoid death all these years?” 

Renjun stares into the distance, recounting his life in the past ten-ish years. “I wasn’t as high-profile as you’d think. I was the Resistance’s painter, painting portraits of high-profile Resistance members. And I was a gaoler. Something about my presence,” Renjun gestures. 

Smiling, you agree. “You do have a power over people. Quite a comforting jailer.”

“I was close to the action, but was never really involved in it. I was more of a servant to Resistance members, if you will. And then the Resistance was overthrown. Any “close” members were taken into an interrogation center. I gave up everything I knew in exchange for a presidential pardon on War Crimes. That lead to the execution of Bang and his lackeys. Their over-the-table chatter led me to know about a little residence they have in Corsica where they went when things got too tough,” Renjun says ruefully.  

You nodded, absorbing every part of this story. 

“And then I heard rumors from old associates from my former kingdom. Neo is now a democracy. And then the papers. That you were alive somewhere. Deep down in my heart, I know you’re a fighter, you’re the strongest person that I know, and I just knew you couldn’t have died somewhere. I would have felt it.” Renjun places a fist against his heart. 

“As I searched for you, I completed this canvas of you with the last of my expensive paints from my time with the Resistance. That’s how I felt so connected to you, so sure you were alive.” Renjun smiles at the painting, letting himself get lost in time. 

He slowly moves his gaze from the painting that provided him condolence and guidance, his eyes glassy. “And here you are in front of me. Living your life. This is the life you always wanted, isn’t it? No royal chaos, no backstabbing and plotting. Just healing.” 

You nod. “I’m happier in this little house in this nowhere town, paid mostly through favors and the peoples’ love of me,” you smile. “I’ve always wanted to be loved.” 

“I remember,” Renjun says. 

Your hand finds Renjun’s. You study the sight. With the dirt caked under Renjun’s fingernails and all the creases in your hands from the mashing and plucking of herbs from questionable places, you can hardly tell that you both experienced a royal life. Genuinely, it feels like it was a lifetime ago. 

“There were times that I wanted to give up finding you, though. This is a big, wide world, and you could be anywhere. The rumors could have been right, and you could be on a boat to America, and I wouldn’t know better. My intuition could only tell me that you’re still alive.

“After seven years of being the Resistance’s little puppet, I was ready to find a purpose in my life again. As cliche as it might sound, my life had meaning when you were in it. Otherwise, I was always working for someone else, whether it was my father or Bong. This was the one thing I wanted to do in my lifetime.

“I had been wandering around for a while, visiting village after village, town after town, never staying too long. I wanted to settle down, but I was also attached to my mission to find you again. So I’d move on. Then your assistant found me. When I walked into this town, and then your house, it screamed of you. After all these years, I was finally sure of something.” 

You’re silent for a long time after this monologue, processing every single word, racking your brain to say something, anything. 

“The period of my life with you was the happiest. I wasn’t meant for the royal life, but having someone who felt the same way felt as though we were meant for each other. And then the Resistance happened. And then you saved me. You corrected one bad deed with one good deed. I don’t miss the old Ambrosia and my old life which is what made me able to forgive you after I escaped. I miss my parents sometimes, though. But if it wasn’t your family and the Resistance, it would have been something else — monarchies are growing out of style.” You chuckle. 

Another silence between you two. You’re out of words to say to each other, enough of the small-talk. Without you realizing, you come closer to Renjun, closer and closer until your chests are pressed together, and you can smell Renjun’s breath. A thin layer of dirt and sweat cover his face, and you take your thumb to brush his cheek, making a visible mark on his face. 

“I never thought I’d be in this moment with you, but the Universe is kind. I love you Y/N.” The fat tears falling from his eyes make tracks along his skin. You feel the stinging sensation of tears developing your eyes. You don’t realize how much you’ve suffered. Townspeople have tried to set you up with their sons, uncles, friends. But you’ve always rejected. At first it’s because you wanted to be a dedicated healer, and it would be difficult to do that with children. But now you know the real reason, and he’s standing in front of you. 

Huang Renjun. He is the reason. Despite all that has happened, despite how he expedited the end of the Kingdom of Ambrosia, you loved him more than you ever realized. Enough that it seems like that love is about to burst. After all these years of being alone, you finally feel complete. 

Grabbing Renjun’s cheeks, you pull him impossibly closer to you, letting your lips land on his and suck his dry, parched lips, but you don’t care. Renjun grabs your waist as he kisses you back.

Your breaths hitting each other’s noses, you finally pull away, your noses touching, as if your bodies can’t bear to be apart any longer.

You were finally going to have your happy ending.

tagging: @peachjaem00 @infnteen @zennymeow-blog @shwizhies

a/n (2): if you've made it this far, thank you so much for reading! as my longest fic yet, i've spent countless hours on this fic, and i'm glad to publish the final results. i hope you found this fic enjoyable, and let me know what you thought in the comments or in an ask :3

[suzukiblu]

Day six of fic NaNoWriMo, obligatory sugar daddy Tim/sugar baby Kon.

"You're bluffing," the thief says flatly.

"And you're fucking stupid if you think this is the play that's getting you out of here," Kon snorts, tapping a foot against the floor. "C'mon, man, give it up. I've got plans tonight." 

"Use the artifact!" the alleged "Mark" yells at the thief holding it. 

"Right!" said thief says, then . . . pauses, and looks embarrassed. "How do I . . . do that?" 

Kon looks incredibly unimpressed. Tim empathizes. Deeply. 

"You guys need a minute there?" Kon asks, raising an eyebrow. 

"Shut up!" Mark snaps at him. "Just use it, Lisa!" 

"I thought you said no names–" 

"Use it!" 

"Uh, right!" 

The thief chucks the little clay goat at Kon. Tim is genuinely embarrassed for this entire crew. 

Kon catches the goat one-handed, which is kind of a stupid idea, but letting it smash on the floor admittedly wouldn't look great. People over property, obviously, but Kon also historically has issues with property damage and letting the bad guys smash up ancient artifacts is not the best plan in general anyway. Especially given how often said ancient artifacts have ghosts or curses or apocalypses locked inside them. 

"Lisa!" the thieves all yell in horror.

"Was this the whole plan?" Kon asks, making a show of inspecting the goat. "Like, was this it? I can come back later, if you're still cooking on that."

Tim muffles a laugh with a snort. Kon definitely caught it, though, judging by his smug smirk. 

"Shut up, wannabe!" the thief still holding a gun to Tim's head snarls, which reminds Tim he should be pretending to care about the gun currently being held to his head. Honestly, he would in Gotham, but the only way this moron is shooting anybody is by accident. 

. . . admittedly, that is a concern, given the trigger discipline issue. Hm.

"Killing me would probably count as felony murder, just so you know," Tim mentions, glancing around the thieves. "Which you could all be charged with, not just whoever actually shot me. Plus I'm pretty sure stealing objects of cultural heritage from a museum is a federal crime."

He's completely sure of all that, actually, for obvious reasons, but he has to at least pretend to be a civilian here. Like, some effort needs to go into that illusion, if for no other reason than to avoid a Bat-lecture from Bruce or, worse, a Bat-"I'm not mad, just disappointed" from Dick. 

Or, worst, Alfred might make disapproving shortbread instead of approving jammy dodgers for post-patrol tonight. That'd be really unfortunate. Tim could really use an approving jammy dodger tonight. He's already going to have to write up a very annoying incident report of this situation as it is, and also deal with the mortification of getting his neck saved by a Super. There is no dignity in that. At all. 

He is definitely never telling the team his secret identity. At least not until he's absolutely positive Kon hasn't inherited any of Superman's eidetic memory, anyway. He's ninety-nine percent sure he hasn't, but that last percent is a definite concern right now. 

"No one asked your opinion, brat!" Mark snaps, though a few of the other thieves now look extremely uneasy. Tim makes another mental note about their crew's obvious lack of prep time and general planning and continues to be embarrassed for them. Museum robberies in Gotham are themed events with careful research and preparation involved, and frankly usually involve more thoughtful effort than whatever gala they may or may not be crashing did. Smash and grab is for convenience stores and small-timers. And these guys are definitely small-timers, but this is equally definitely not a convenience store.

Metropolis is so weird. Why anyone even bothers doing petty crime in it at all is beyond Tim. Maybe they're just banking on Superman being more concerned with natural disasters and alien invasions and rescuing cats from trees, which is a valid strategy. Same theory as splitting up and making a cohesive group into multiple targets.

"He has the idol!" Lisa hisses, glaring at Kon like she's not the one who threw it at him to begin with. Tim gets a gun barrel jammed into his temple again. He has no idea why Trigger Discipline: What Not To Do thinks that's, like . . . a productive thing to do. At this rate he's going to get a bruise or something.

Well, he's not actually doing it hard enough to hurt, admittedly, though Tim does keep expecting it to. The guy looks like he's putting his back into it, but the impacts continue not to actually hurt, so Tim supposes he's just trying to put on a show here. 

Well, at least he's putting in some effort, Tim supposes. That's something. 

"I really do have plans tonight, you know," Kon reminds them, raising an eyebrow at the thieves again. 

"I would appreciate you delaying those, actually," Tim mentions. "If you don't mind, I mean." 

"Oh, yeah, don't sweat it, dude," Kon says, waving him off. "These people are annoying but I'm not gonna ditch out on you here, that's not your fault." 

"Don't ignore us!" one of the unnamed thieves yells. "And give the idol back!" 

"I have no idea why you would expect me to do that," Kon says. 

"I'll shoot!" the thief holding Tim threatens, jamming the gun barrel into his head again. 

"I mean, I'm pretty sure that dude was right about the felony murder thing, so maybe don't?" Kon says, inspecting the little clay goat again. "Hm. This thing is actually kinda cute." 

"It is, isn't it," Tim agrees. "I thought it looked like a kid's toy."

"Oh yeah, I can see that," Kon says, squinting assessingly at it. "Like those chunky toddler ones?" 

"Yeah, like those," Tim confirms with a nod. "Fisher-Price, Duplo, that kind of thing." 

"I'll take your word on that one, man, my 'toddler' stage only lasted about half a day and I was sedated for it," Kon replies in amusement. Tim seethes internally and thinks very uncharitable thoughts about Cadmus. 

"I said I'll shoot!" the thief holding him says furiously, tightening his arm across Tim's neck. It's still not actually enough to hurt, but again, Tim appreciates seeing a little more effort. "Give us the idol, you stupid brat!" 

"I'm trying to help you out here," Kon says, looking exasperated. "You're just making shit worse for yourself the longer you keep this up. Put down the gun and let the guy go, you'll get a way lighter sentence." 

"Fuck you!" the thief shouts. "The power of the idol will protect us!" 

"The idol that I am currently holding, you mean?" Kon says, hefting it meaningfully. "The one that is in specifically my possession and not yours?" 

Tim does understand that talking people down is the preferred approach and Kon can't actually super-speed this problem away, but Kon could at least pretend to be taking this seriously. From his perspective, there's a civilian hostage with a gun to their head and an angry criminal with their finger on the trigger, but he's acting like there isn't any danger in the situation at all.

Tim gets the posturing thing and the general "cooler than thou" attitude Kon likes to present, but it's definitely not making any of the thieves calm down. Like, not at all is it making any of the thieves calm down. 

This incident report is going to be very annoying to write. 

"It's not yours!" Lisa shrieks at him. 

"You literally threw it at me," Kon says. "I only have it because you threw it at me. Also pretty sure it's not yours either, given all the screaming alarms and broken glass and the smashed-in wall I am currently standing in the wreckage of."

Tim starts wondering if maybe he should revisit his "tripping" plan. He doesn't really want to pull any Robin-esque moves in front of Kon, but also dying would really fuck up all that hard work he's put into being Bruce's emotional support sidekick. Also two dead Robins in a row could not possibly end well. Especially in such a stupid way. Especially in Metropolis. 

"You don't even know what you're holding, you idiot!" Lisa fumes.

"A toddler toy, I thought we established," Kon says. "'Doopler' or something?"

"Duplo," Tim corrects, internally calculating tripping angles. 

"That one, yeah," Kon amends. "Doppo." 

Tim, resignedly, thinks his determined commitment to pointlessly fucking up is adorable. Also still hates Cadmus and has the irrational urge to buy him a teddy bear or something, although Kon would definitely just think he was fucking with him if he did.

Maybe he could just smuggle one into his room and disavow all knowledge of its existence. That's an option. 

"Give us the idol now!" the thief holding Tim snarls, his face twisting in rage. 

"Yeah, no," Kon says. 

"You little–!" the thief starts to yell, and then his trigger finger slips. Tim knows this because the gun goes off right next to his ear. 

And right against his temple. 

Half the room screams and the thief yells and drops the gun, recoiling in horror. It goes off again as it hits the floor and a bullet shatters a historically-significant vase the way one should have shattered Tim's personally-significant skull. 

What the fuck?

"Shit, sorry, that was probably kinda loud," Kon says apologetically, wincing a little but otherwise looking completely unphased by all of that. Tim blinks, very slowly, and attempts to restore his resting heart rate. It's not a particularly successful attempt.

"Yeah, kinda," he says.

"Sorry, sound waves are harder to block," Kon apologizes, pointing at his own ear with his free hand, and Tim remembers the other's total lack of concern for any threat to civilian life this whole time and realizes that was because, from Kon's perspective, there wasn't any actual threat.

Huh. 

Well, that explains why neither the gun barrel nor the being choked thing actually hurt at any point, doesn't it.

"Oh," Tim says, looking down at the floor that they are, in fact, all still standing on. "Tactile telekinesis?"

"You've heard of it?" Kon says, looking pleased. 

"Once or twice," Tim says, managing not to say it too dryly. Kon looks even more pleased. "I didn't know you could use it like that, though." 

"Practice makes perfect," Kon replies smugly.

[shebreathedherlast]

Daughter of the Sea

Part III

Masterlist

Quest

Luke Castellan x f!reader

Summary: You wake up in the infirmary with a horrifying surprise.

Work Count: 1.6k

TW: Brief memory loss, weapons, mean Luke, broken bones

. .・゜゜・・゜゜・．. ･ﾟﾟ･｡. .・゜゜・・゜゜・．. ･ﾟﾟ･｡. .・゜゜・.

When your eyes fluttered open, you were unable to see. Everything around you seemed to be screaming. You pushed your weight onto your elbows as you desperately gaged your surroundings. With your vision blurred you sought for any semblance of familiarity.

Your head was pounding and your arm ached terribly. What in the gods happened? You sifted through your memories, raising your hand to cradle your head when the pain became nearly unbearable.

Footsteps scuffled towards you and your heart rate accelerated. “She’s awake!” A voice called.

You turned your head to the origin of the voice, but with your blurred vision, everything only fused together.

You made out a tuft of blonde curls and you instantly knew you would be safe. The figure made its way to you, placing a delicate blanket across your shoulders. They carried what you assumed was a tray of food.

They called your name and your head tilted up to meet their words. “Will?”

“gods, how are you feeling? Is there anywhere else that hurts?” He asked

You shook your head in confusion, “Will, what are you talking about?”

The Apollo kid furrowed his brows. An expression you couldn’t quite place fell over his features. “You’ve been in the infirmary for an entire night.” He told you.

“What?” You question, as you burrow your fists in the linen sheets to ground you.

“Do you not remember what happened yesterday?”

Your vision cleared as the events from yesterday seemed to piece themselves together.

A single infuriated word flitted from your lips, “Castellan” you growled.

Will gave you a quizzical look, “Oh so you do remember.”

Anger radiated off you. Yesterday Luke Castellan had practically robbed you of your much-deserved glory. He had humiliated and belittled you and in order to spare some semblance of dignity you were forced to break your arm. Yes, you remembered everything.

“Where is that thieving son of Hermes?” You demanded.

Will shook his head in disapproval. He turned back to the tray and returned with a bowl of steaming hot chicken noodle soup. “Is that what happened? Another one of your qualms with Luke? Seriously?”

You shruggled in response, too preoccupied to give Will an answer. You were busy thinking up all the ways you could make Luke suffer.

“You two really need to get over your whole sworn enemies thing and act like grown-ups. It gives me secondhand embarrassment watching you two fight like entitled toddlers.”

You gawked at him, “Will, I’m only seventeen, I’m not a grown-up.”

And at your comment, both of you laughed. Will was one of those guys that everyone was able to get along with. He had this easy going persona complimented by his humor that had him making friends wherever he went.

“You’re legitimately the biggest idiot I know.” He said.

And who were you to deny the truth?

“I wouldn’t exactly disagree,” You replied, an amused smile painted against your lips.

Will didn’t further the conversation, opting instead to spoon-feed you the warm broth. He gave you another drink of ambrosia before deeming that you would live.

“Thank you, Will…I really appreciate all you’re doing for me.”

Will waved his hand, dismissing your gratitude. “You won’t be saying that when I send you the bill.”

You chuckled shaking your head as you made your way out of the infirmary bed, dressing behind a curtain. Will was walking away and you had just finished pulling on your shorts as loud footsteps rang down the hall.

“You still there?” Will’s voice came from behind the curtain barrier. You pulled the fabric to the side as you stepped into the hall. “Uh…yeah”

He audibly sighed. “Good, because apparently, you're going on a quest in three hours.”

“WHAT?” You gasped.

Will cringed at your response, “Yeah, sorry that you had to find out this way but Clarisse got word of a quest from Ares and she chose the two best half-blood warriors to go with her. I’m sure you can guess what I mean by that.”

A million thoughts came crashing down on you. First, you were going to set out on your very first quest. Second, Clarisse saw you as a powerful ally and that could be useful in the future and third, the only other person besides you and Clarisse who would be addressed as “one of the best half-blood warriors” was none other than…Luke Castellan.

You huffed in anger, your fists balling at your sides. It was just your luck, Castellan, the one who had got you into this whole infirmary situation was going to ruin your first-ever quest.

Tyche must have really hated you.

. .・゜゜・・゜゜・．. ･ﾟﾟ･｡. .・゜゜・・゜゜・．. ･ﾟﾟ･｡. .・゜゜・.

Less than an hour and a half later you were packed and ready to go. Though you were forced to endure the torturous presence of Castellan, you were determined to not allow him to get to you. This time the stakes were too high and the mission too important.

Well, that was your resolution until you saw his face.

You practically saw red as you lunged forward ready to strangle the Hermes boy. Clarisse had to step in and physically restrain you from tearing Luke limb from limb.

“I’m gonna kill you, Castellan!” You shout, “You’re dead! Do you hear me? You're dead!”

Clarisse set you down fifteen feet from Luke (what she deemed a safe distance to talk some sense into you without you going on a blood-lust rampage for the Hermes boy).

“In the name of Olympus, what in the world is wrong with you?”

You scoffed, “What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with me? I think you should be asking that question to that thieving piece of-” It was at that moment that you heard Chiron clear his throat, and you shrank back, swallowing your insult.

Luke approached you with an amused grin, hands raised in the air. He was mocking you. Of course he was, you wouldn’t expect anything less from him.

“As soon as I get my hands on you, I’m gonna claw your eyes out, Castellan.” You seeth.

He tsked, tilting his head slightly, “And a good morning to you too, Chaos.”

Your jaw clenched as every fibre in your body told you to beat the boy before you into a pulp.

“Clarisse,” you whine, “please let me separate his stupid face from this hideous body.”

Clarisse shakes her head to tell you “no.”

You sigh, defeated.

Luke curls an arm around your shoulder, “Oh come on, Chaos, don’t you want another chance to win back your glory?”

You hated the boy before you. You hated him and you don’t think you’d mind it one bit if he so happened to fall off a cliff to his impending death. In fact, you think that you might even enjoy the show.

Clarisse rolled her eyes at the both of you, “Enough! You two need to stop this insufferable fighting and start focusing on the quest, because if you two don’t suck it up and start at least tolerating each other, I have absolutely no problem choosing two other skilled half-bloods to replace you.”

At this you and Luke instantly shut your mouths and glanced at each other.

Then it hit you, he wanted this as much as you did.

“Good.” Clarisse said, “Now I want both of you to hug it out and shake hands, promising that you’ll be on your best behaviour for my quest.”

You furrowed your brows, mouth agape. “Hug it out? Clarisse are you serious?”

“Absolutely.” She replied, pointedly.

Luke cocked his head, “You’ve got to be joking. It’s not like we’re five.”

The Ares kid raised her eyebrows in a taunting expression, “Are you sure about that?”

Luke rolled his eyes.

“K, let’s go now, stop tryna be the mediator Clarisse. Chaos and I are not “hugging it out” like pre-schoolers.” He spoke, a hint of annoyance coating his tone.

“Um sorry to break it to you buddy, but if you two wanna come on this quest with me then you better start doing as I say.”

Clarisse was defiantly being manipulative. She was the one who picked the two of you and now she was placing all these conditions on your shoulders.

After a minute of silence, Luke consented, rolling his eyes again. “Come here my sweet little, Chaos.” He said in an exaggerated voice like he was talking to a baby.

You glared at Clarisse, before trudging over to Luke, who wrapped his arms securely behind your neck, burying you into his chest. When you didn’t reciprocate he brought his lips to hover over your ear, “Chaos, you gotta at least pretend to like me, or else big scary Clarisse here is gonna send you back, and I know you don’t want that, do you?” His whispers sent shivers down your shoulders and eventually, (after a harsh glare from Clarisse) you conseeded and wrapped your arms around Luke’s waist.

His head practically nuzzled your hair and you could’ve sworn you heard him sigh in contentment.

To emphasize how much you two would get along Luke slowly began rocking side to side while continuing to keep his hold on you.

Clarisse smiled in approval.

You stood on your tippy toes and even then you barely reached his ear, “Luke,” you whispered.

“Yes, Chaos?” He asked gently.

“I still hate you.” And with that, you pushed him back. He stumbled a little before quickly regaining his footing.

“I wouldn’t expect any less.” He mumbled under his breath.

As you ran to catch up with Clarisse, Luke stood still, because whatever happened he knew that this quest was going to challenge him beyond belief.

----

A/n This is more of a filler chapter so hang in there for the next update <3

Tag list: @motorsp0rt @astronomical-admonition @edenssworld @sillychloe @viennasaysstuff @esposadomd @bogbutteronmycroissant @moonykai @sflame15-blog @hoesindifferentshows @gloryekaterina @dakotali @notjustsomeblonde @silkenthusiasts @kanej-and-wesper-supremacy @ren-isdone @ashisabitgay @tsukiko26 @niktwazny303 @idgxitciycouv

[naxalite1967]

Some of my favorite quotes:

"While the state exists, there can be no freedom. When there is freedom, there will be no state." — Vladimir Lenin

"We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror." — Karl Marx

"When I give food to the poor they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist." — Dom Hélder Câmara

"I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops." — Stephen Jay Gould

"They talk about the failure of socialism but where is the success of capitalism in Africa, Asia and Latin America?" — Fidel Castro

"A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another." — Mao Zedong

"Those who come with wheat, millet, corn or milk they are not helping us. Those who really want to help us can give us ploughs, tractors, fertilizer, insecticide, watering cans, drills, dams. That is how we would define food aid." — Thomas Sankara

"Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of a cancer cell." — Edward Abbey

"Colonialism is not a machine capable of thinking, a body endowed with reason. It is naked violence. And it only gives in when confronted with greater violence." — Frantz Fanon

"The reason Socialism never took root in America is because the oppressed masses don't see themselves as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires." — John Steinbeck

"The life of a single human being is worth a million times more than all the property of the richest man on earth." — Che Guevara

"No altar, no belief, no holy book... have ever been able to reconcile the rich and the poor, the exploiter and the exploited. And if Jesus himself had to take the whip to chase them from his temple, it is indeed because that is the only language they hear." — James Connolly

"We will turn our hearts into steel, which we will temper in the fire of suffering and the blood of fighters for freedom. We will make our hearts cruel, hard, and immovable, so that no mercy will enter them, and so that they will not quiver at the sight of a sea of enemy blood. We will let loose the floodgates of that sea." — Luis Felipe de la Fuente

"So I decided to become a midwife… I wanted to deliver a thousand babies. And as each one arrives, especially the little girls, I’ll be there first to whisper into her tender little ear: REBEL! REBEL!" — Emma Goldman

"All revolutions have failed? Perhaps. But rebellion for good cause is self-justifying -- a good in itself. Rebellion transforms slaves into human beings, if only for an hour." — Howard Zinn

"The mine owners did not find the gold, they did not mine the gold, they did not mill the gold, but by some weird alchemy all the gold belonged to them." — Carlos Fuentes

"Without authorities and specialists, everyone would be a hundred ways wiser. Without benevolence and righteousness, people would rediscover caring, the familial bond. Without power-schemes and profiteering there'd be no thugs and thieves." — Mikhail Bakunin

"Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now for you will be filled ... But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep." — Jesus Christ (from the Gospel of Luke)

"I dream of a society where I would be guillotined as a conservative." — Mikhail Bakunin

"To revolt is a natural tendency of life. Even a worm turns against the foot that crushes it. In general, the vitality and relative dignity of an animal can be measured by the intensity of its instinct to revolt." — Peter Kropotkin

"We Live in Capitalism, it’s power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings." — Arundhati Roy

"Government is as unreal, as intangible, as unapproachable as God. Try it, if you don't believe it. Seek through the legislative halls of America and find, if you can, the Government. In the end you will be doomed to confer with the agent, as before." — William S. Burroughs

"With the abolition of private property, then, we shall have true, beautiful, healthy Individualism. Nobody will waste his life in accumulating things, and the symbols for things. One will live. To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all." — Oscar Wilde

"One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that 'an unjust law is no law at all.'" — Martin Luther King Jr.

"You cannot buy the revolution. You cannot make the revolution. You can only be the revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere." — Ursula K. Le Guin

"Ask for work. If they don't give you work, ask for bread. If they do not give you work or bread, then take bread." — Louis Blanc

[jujutsukgojo]

The Fourth Leg chapter 2

Summary: How it began.

tw: yandere, stalking, kidnapping, death, adult scenes/implied, violence, flashback scenes (a lot but that just happens), angst

an: this took me so long to edit omg.

Chapter one

------

       THEN

 Chrollo stands with his friends, his comrades in this endeavor for a safer Meteor City. The first one to arrive at the meeting is Uvogin, of course, then Phinks. Phinks combs his hair and yawns. “What’d ya plan this time, boss?”

  He’s decided to create a plan to steal a map. It’s going to be dangerous. However, he knows they can handle it. They are thieves and take what they please, especially if he commands it. Besides, they owe him. He hasn’t forgotten their stupid plan all those years ago and how innocent blood is splattered on everyone’s hands. Well, except for Phinks, he assumes.

  Even if all of these people argue with him about it, nothing can take away his satisfaction. Yesterday, he had the time of his life. Finally, after years of adoring and pining, he’s claimed you. Not as a friend whose heart already knew who it belonged to, but as a man and your boss. He’ll never forget it. He read so much on how to please and did it just for you. 

  It meant everything to get you to join and for you to submit to him. He, Chrollo Lucilfer, tamed you. Without violence or black mail. Just pure delight and passion. He’s taken your virginity that you so willingly gave to him in the house of mirrors, and greedily took all he could afford. Seeing your tears from your orgasms, how you tried to cling onto everything you could as he ravaged you, how amazing you felt, is something he’ll never forget. Such sweet cries and moans left you so tired. 

And God, how you taste is more addicting than any wine. More satisfying than any substance imagined. You will never deny him of that. Of all of this. He’s mapped you out and is determined to feel you clench around him again. How could he not? You were his the moment he met you. Everyone knew it except for you. He took you under his wing and protected you. Catered to your every whim and was patient beyond belief. 

  Now, he’s proven himself to you as a man. One that can hit the deepest part of you and make you shake and have your eyes roll. As your boss, one that you submit to, and only him. No worries, he’ll always treat you like a treasure that a dragon would cherish. After all this time he has wanted you. He has always been completely besotted with you. There is not a power or ant in the world to make him let you go. 

  You took him wonderfully and made him see heaven. A place he didn’t think he’d step foot in. Maybe you’re the way there. Every look you give, noise you make, your touch, the dreams you have, and your glorious taste, lets him know it's true. 

 He takes a deep breath to calm himself down at the memory of last night. The remaining bits of the Phantom Troupe come into the broken-down building. Some sit on debris, the others stand with their arms crossed. Recently, a new recruit has entered the fray, number eight. It’s a man of average height, thick wavy hair, and pure green eyes. He decided he was done with not fitting in with the world and joined. 

  Chrollo doesn’t know his nen ability. From the looks of things, he might be an emitter. He’ll give him one thing: number eight is smart by not telling him what his nen ability is. 

Chrollo hears the crunching and ruffling of a bag. He looks towards the noise and sees you come in. He can’t help but feel a smidge of pride when he sees your slight limp. No one knows what transpired between the two of you. So, maybe your dignity will be spared. 

   He can see their disappointment at your arrival. He shoots it down quickly. "Enough, she's part of the Spider now." His eyes never leave you. Machi asks how you're useful. You stick out your tongue and refuse to share your chips. Phinks groans at that and crosses his arms.

 “She’s the fourth leg.” He declares, clearing away the disappointment they have, especially when it's revealed that you're an exorcist. You look up at him with such pretty eyes. Do you know how beautiful you are? How cute you look right now, crunching on a bag of chips? Not to mention, you sat down next to him without complaint. You just automatically did it. Finally, you’ve realized you belong to him. His thoughts are interrupted by number eight. 

“Very nice.” Chrollo’s eyes flick over to him. The bastard’s head is cocked to the side and his fingers are on his chin, like he’s appraising you. Pakunoda nudges him and tells him to stop. The damage is already done. Chrollo will not tolerate this. 

  In due time, he’ll make an example of him. Not in front of you, of course. Chrollo would hate to scare you. So, he’ll wait. He has always been patient. 

________________

A few years later, Chrollo has once again come up with a plan. It all started with Sheila telling one of the members about the Kurta. As he is told, they are responsible for Sarasa’s death. Not only that, but they hold scarlet eyes which are one of the wonders of the world. You only heard the last part. You completely skipped over their alleged part of everyone’s dear friend’s demise. 

  Her name still causes soreness. Especially with you. Although you understand and have accepted that she is gone, it still hurts you. It was unexpected for Sarasa to end up the way she did. 

  Now is not the time to think about that. Especially when he welcomed you into his place after planning on making your favorites. Once, he had read that a date could be something simple, like cooking together. That was the plan. Dinner and a movie maybe trade the movie in with him reading to you. You always loved to hear him read.

    The two of you get your stomach full of mediocre food. The plainness of the dish was mainly because of Chrollo, he’d say. He’s studied up on cooking before and watched all of those channels but still cannot hold a candle to you. The two of you settled on a couch he stole a while back. You had sat on it one day and demanded to have it. Of course, he did as you wished. However, he put it in his house as an excuse for you to come over more often. It worked, surprisingly.

After getting cleaned up and a few more kisses, he tells you only a little about his gift. “Our next heist is going to give you something beautiful. Something you will really love. Are you excited?”

   You sleepily nod. He leans back, letting you snuggle to his chest. He wraps his arms around you like a lover would. No, he is your lover as you are his. Lately, the two of you have been doing things together a lot more. Just like a couple would.

  He rubs your back and speaks in a soft voice, “In order for it to succeed, I need your absolute cooperation, understand?” You nod. He can’t help but give you kisses wherever he can. He swears he hears you purr when you hug him back. He’s so happy. 

  The next day, the Spider leaves to find the Kurta. Everyone thinks it is the Scarlet Eyes he’s looking for, and while that is partially true, what he really wants is the Dark Sonata that the clan holds. It’s cursed, so you’ll need to purify it. Your gift will be beautiful and done masterfully. While Feitan’s beloved fancies odd gifts like flesh or appreciates whatever he finds, Chrollo doesn’t think you would like a random toe for a gift.

  To perform the most legendary music for you…the smile you’d have would be picture worthy. Something to belong in only the highest museum. 

   He’d have the Troupe play it since everyone has been told to take up an instrument. He told them that it’d help with their nen. In reality, they’ll play it for you. Your very own orchestra. Besides, they owe him. Forever, and always. He loves them dearly. They are his friends. 

  The elder meets him at the center of their settlement. The Kurta stands around, encircling them. Most are close to their homes, tents with blue fabric with Kurta clan symbols on it or the few buildings around with the same fabric draped on the stone.

They look nervously at the thirteen guests. 

Chrollo gives him a dazzling smile and kind eyes. He speaks to the elder calmly. The Kurta’s eyes widen with horror etched onto their faces. Chrollo knows you can’t hear what is being said since you are a bit farther away. You can’t tell that he is demanding their eyes and next will be something magnificent. The Head leans in and whispers to the elder, “Where is the Dark Sonata?”

“I’ll never say.” The elder shakily, and stubbornly, states. Chrollo hums and decides to perform. He loudly asks, “And why did you commit such a sin against Meteor City?”

  The members of the Troupe subtly look relieved. Had he been anyone else, it wouldn’t have been caught. Alas, he is a connoisseur of observing people. He loves to study them. Plus, he is familiar with his friends.

  “Boss, you really want those eyes, huh?” Nobunaga asks. Chrollo smiles. “Hm, among other things. Let us revel in their glory. That’d be nice, wouldn’t it?”

  “Chrollie…what are you talking about?” Your nervous and sweet voice, asks. “This is the job, darling. You have your role, and you’ll get to play. As long as the eyes shine bright.”

  You gasp in horror, your beautiful eyes round. “This is insane! Stop this right now!” Right when he thinks you’ve learned your place you retreat back into that attitude of yours. He takes a deep breath. “Enough! Just do your job.”

   The elder looks at you. Chrollo hates it. He cannot stand the compassion, the care, you have for this nobody. Why are your pretty eyes looking at this worm like that? He’s doing this for you. Getting the eyes for you to see and for the city to benefit from. Digging for the Dark Sonata for you to hear safely.

  The elder is about to speak when Chrollo interrupts. “Uvo.”

 Suddenly, Uvogin strikes one of the Kurta’s legs and reveals a woman’s red eyes from across them. She doesn’t hesitate to go to the fallen woman who cries for her missing legs. Right then, Uvogin gouges the Scarlet Eyes out. Number eight uses his nen to preserve them and places them in a jar. With a flick of his wrist, the rest of the members go on the attack. He turns his head slightly only to see you horrified and disgusted. You run to him, pulling on his arm, demanding him to stop this. Him, the Head, your boss, your lover. 

He jerks his arm out of your pleading hold. “Do as you are told.” 

  “You-thi-this is wrong! They haven’t done anything to us!” You see Machi begin to use her nen. “No!” You call out to her. You tug on him again and again. “Tell them to stop! This is evil, disgusting!”

  Irritation continues to grow heavier by the second.

  “Go and do your fucking job.” He points to a small group that is being guarded by two scared adults. The few children behind them don’t go unnoticed. “Don’t be this way, Chrollie. You're my friend. You can’t be this way.”

Friend.  Friend? After everything he’s done for you. Provided, protected, cared, loved? You let him make love to you and fuck your brains out when needed. You had him lavish you with everything you wished for. Reading to you in the dead of night when you couldn’t sleep. You let him vent with his head on your lap and listen to his ideas, just like he listens to yours. 

He gave himself to you. And he’s your friend? After the sin he committed and can’t forgive himself for, and done it for you?

  Darkness clouds his mind. He pushes you off of him. You land harshly on the dirt ground. He points to the exit of their little village. “Go and catch stragglers. Miss one, and you won’t get a head start.”

  You gasp and run. He remembers being this angry only twice. When you wanted to leave, and when Sarasa died. The only bright thing of that day was that number eight died and Chrollo let it happen. He couldn’t do it himself since the rule he placed for you. Members are not allowed to fight each other.

 The Phantom Troupe watched as number eight begged for help from a Kurta warrior, knowing better than to help him. 

  He admits that he began to get callous. Numb to the pain and had lessened his caring hold of you. He pinned a lot of responsibility on you now. Everyone was surprised at this new behavior. You took it in stride, though. Even as the two of you withdrew from each other, he wouldn’t let you get far. Him doing this was to discipline you. To let you have a taste of what he does for you. For you to once again trust him like you are supposed to. 

   Not long after, the two of you came across Silva Zoldyck. He knew you weren’t equipped to handle someone of this caliber, but he pushed anyway. He thought you trusted him enough to rely on him, to let him be the offense and you the defense. Then, the unthinkable happened. Stupidly, you ran right to Silva and attacked. 

  Chrollo held your dying form in his arms. He cried apologies and prayed every prayer in the good book. Nothing was working. He expected something to snap or crush. He has read that his heart should break and it to be literally felt. He expected a part of him to go with you. Instead, he started to feel whole. And he hates it. He feels the true burden of himself, something he assumes he split with you. There is no heated desire for vengeance or even death. 

  He feels…lost. There is no plan or even an identity, he thinks. Did it die with you? Did the compass of himself leave with you? The name you gave him, did you take it with you. That’s fine with him. His name is yours; he is yours. 

 He kisses you with tears streaming down his face, some landing on his lips and blending with yours. 

I love you, I love you. It was real, my love. No book in the world could ever describe it. Is this what it’s like for a soul to leave a body? To be a hollow shell for anything to fill in it, even the darkest of monsters. Or could this be what I was the whole time? 

Who gives a damn about the monsters even if they share his face? None of that matters now that you’re gone…you’re gone. You died. 

He squeezes you tighter, closer to him. He buries his face in the crook of your neck while your chest is pressed against his. If he was insane, he'd swear he could still feel your heartbeat. 

The members rushed to him and were shocked at your departure. He thought he’d hear their cheers or see smiles. Never would he have thought they would actually be saddened to a degree. Some more so than others. 

  Like a strike of lightning, a giant bright light brings its force. It’s a smaller version of what took you, he sees. It comes down and in a moment of reflex, Franklin yanks him away from your body. There is a rumble underneath their feet. Dust flies up and around the strike that makes a perfect, deep circle. It was aimed directly at the Troupe. Chrollo had looked at it and your body was gone. 

 He couldn’t even bury you. 

It was this event that completely changed Chrollo. Rather than the group staying together, they go their separate ways until he calls them, disappearing completely. Little do they know, he would frequent the places you loved most. That cottage that you and Chrollo would spend calm days, the meadow, Meteor City's library, and the church that the both of you grew up in. They are sacred places that he isn’t worthy of going to. They are practically holy, a place to cleanse a sinner such as himself.

--------

PRESENT

Here you are, sleeping like you didn’t run away from him. Your toes twitch and curl. You stretch your legs and yawn, slowly blinking awake. Chrollo sat in front of you, studying intently. After your betrayal, he’ll never admit to how you look like a cute cat. No, that’d only lead you to believe that you have a hold on him. And that, you will never have again. 

  The more he studies your face, the more he tries not to laugh at the situation. The whole thing is absurd. To think, he only discovered that you were alive is because of that Zoldyck kid. The little menace was teasing them about letting a spider slip. No one could figure out what he meant until Chrollo was abducted. He didn't have a plan and didn't inform the rest of them why they were rampaging that quaint village. He was just focused on the truth and the possibility of your existence. 

   Your eyes flutter open and focus on him. “C-Chrollo?”

It only takes a few seconds for you to understand the situation. His intentions, beliefs, and your place. You were right before. Number four is taken. As well as eight. Now, the other numbers of the members lost are filled as well. Have you figured out that there is no room for you? That this cushy bed is temporary?

  Do you remember the hours before you fainted? He does. That and all of the memories he has of you. 

  You take a few deep breaths. “What’s going to happen to me?” He stands and looks down at you. Your eyes remain on the ground. He hates that. Worst of all, he hates that

------

THEN

   He walks in the church with another basket of flowers. He hears Father Rizole talk to a nun around the corner. Before he can even make out what they’re saying, he sees a little girl stand next to the priest. Fists balled, eyes red, and surprisingly, in decent clothes. You can’t be from here. Not when you have name brand shoes that fit perfectly, and a hair that looks properly taken care of. Plus, you have a healthy structure. 

  With you in front of the window, the sun shines behind you, creating a halo. He can’t help but stare. Is this how the outside looks? Like angels? You have to be a little younger than him. But is it possible that someone young can be a wrathful angel? There’s no way you’re not one. Not with how fires burn in your eyes and the glow of your skin looking heavenly.

  Unable to stop, Chrollo walks towards you with sweaty palms. His basket suddenly feels heavier the closer he gets. He gulps as he stands right in front of you. Your eyes remain low, like you don’t even register him. 

  “My name is Chrollo. What’s yours?” His voice is shaky. You don’t answer much to his dislike. Father Rizole speaks. “This is (Y/n) (L/n), a new resident. (Y/n) has only been here for a few days. I haven’t gotten around to giving a tour. Actually, Chrollo, will you watch (Y/n) for a moment? Maybe look around the church.” 

  Chrollo’s eyes light up at the proposition even though he wonders if the priest is lying about something. “I’d love to! Leave it to me!” Father Rizole presses his hand on your upper back and gives you a slight push to Chrollo. “Here, look around. Meet some friends. You know what? I bet you can use a snack. How about that?”

  “I’ll take (Y/n) to the kitchen!” He’s excited. Not only can he hang out with you but you can share a snack. “Sarasa made some cookies with Sister Mary. Find her and have fun!”

  Father Rizole asks to speak to the nun in private. She hurries away with one last slightly scared look at you. They leave you to Chrollo’s charge. “We’re going to have a lot of fun, okay? I’ll show you everything.” He tries to grab your hand but you yank it away. He doesn’t like that at all. His eye twitches a little. Especially since you still won’t look at him. 

  The two of you still haven’t found Sarasa with the cookies. Truly, Chrollo is starting to feel a little embarrassed. Here he is saying you can have cookies and he can’t provide them. “H-hey, I’ll show you one of my favorite spots. It’s safe so don’t worry.”

  He guides you to a meadow of the same wild flowers he carries in his basket. Your eyes are still to the ground, not taking in its beauty. He’s twitching again. 

  “Why won’t you look? Can you not see?” His voice raises when he doesn’t mean too. Before he can say anything else, you plop to the ground. He gasps and tends to you. “Are you okay?” 

  There’s a heaviness in the pit of his stomach and a fear of you being hurt. “I-I’ll get a grown up!” 

You sniffle. He waits to see what you’ll do next. Again, you sniffle and start to shake. “Y-you’re crying…are you okay?”

“I’m not crying! I don’t cry!” You yell as you shed tears. You finally look at him. “I don’t cry. I don’t care! I’m not…not…” You struggle to speak. Your eyes widen in surprise when you touch your face.  You throw yourself on Chrollo, with your head on his chest. He instinctively wraps his arms around you as you wail. “I-I don’t know!” 

You struggle with articulating your feelings, opting to scream, cry, and smack his chest instead. He knows you aren’t meaning to hurt him which is why they don’t. 

  He pets your hair that is decorated with barrettes. You smell and feel nice. “It’ll be okay. I’ll protect you. We’ll have lots of fun too.” He pats your back. After a bit, you calm down and are back to sniffling and heavy breaths. He takes some flowers and puts them in the hair between the barrettes. 

“Am I pretty?” You touch the flowers in your hair gently. The look on your face is so innocent and vulnerable. He wants to cradle and protect it forever. He gives you a warm smile and with pure honesty, he confesses, “The mostest. Nothing compares.”

  Sarasa appears with a plate of cookies. “Father Rizole said you were looking for me?” 

-----

   PRESENT

“Get that fake look off your face.” He cuts through with a tongue as sharp as a knife. “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”

Reluctantly, you do. “Do you understand your place?”

  You close your eyes for a second. “Not in the Spider. It’s filled.” He hums in affirmation. “So, where do you go?”

“The grave?” You sound too hopeful for his liking. He gets up from the chair and grabs your face. His eye twitches slightly, a dead giveaway of his anger. “That’s too sweet, isn’t it? Too poetic.” 

  “Chrollo, please let me go. It’s time, Chrollo.” He is a master at masking his emotions. Someone who had lost himself enough to fit any puzzle piece needed for a mission. For Neon, he just needed a mask that barely required effort. It was a person who he created for someone as naive as Neon. Over time, he has been able to handle so many personalities. He’s trained to keep emotions inside. Ha, leave it to you to rip that away.

   He starts to shake in anger at the audacity of not only you and your question, but his reaction. His heart had hurt at the thought of you leaving again. Images of the day he lost you do nothing but run wild. The day he met you to the last, to the present, all rush before him. 

   When your body disappeared, he thought of where he’d put your memory. It didn’t take long to think of the meadow. Where he put flowers in your hair, calmed you down, the place where you first hugged him and cried into his chest and was unable to fully articulate your emotions about your asshole parent. He went to the meadow and created a small shrine in your honor, right where you first hugged him. 

  It was the right thing to do. The perfect place, one that no one has visited in a while. He regretted that immensely. 

   He lets your face go. With a low voice he declared, “Darling, you will never leave me again.” 

  You begin to sink at his words, fists balling against the bare mattress. 

-------

THEN

“Chrollo, I have to go sometime.” He doesn’t like this. Lately, you’ve grown into that phase of wanting to explore. Talking of how life is outside, away from the city. You remember some of it and long for its familiarity. Years ago, Chrollo had been fascinated by it. It was one of the reasons he was so drawn to you. 

  “Not alone.” He says with finality. His words cause you to glare at him. “You don’t tell me what to do. I’ll go as I please. I’m practically an adult!”

  You're fourteen, the same age he was when he created the Spider. He clenches his fist. “You’re fourteen! That’s a child.”

“Oh, look at you! You murdered countless people since you were eleven and created your little clique when you were fourteen. All I want is to go home!” 

  He slams his fist down on the table. Clearly, you force yourself not to jump. “That’s different! And this is your home!” 

He can tell you didn’t like that one bit. You point around the area. “I am not from this God forsaken place. This is not my home or my people.” 

  “This is your home. You are staying!” He shouts. He’s never raised his voice at you before.  Your eyes widen for a split second then fill with determination. 

  “No, I’m not. You can’t tell me what to do. You're making it seem like a bad thing. Whi le I just want to go home, you and your posse run havoc and ruin everything! What’s so wrong with me going home?”

  The Phantom Troupe is his sensitive spot, and you know it. Yet you deliberately push it every single time just to hurt him. Chrollo is weak for you, he admits it and everyone knows it. Despite his love, there is an anger that brews inside him wanting to lash out. Degrading the spider is not allowed, you leaving is definitely off the table. Finally, he lets a tiny bit of that venom out for you to feel.

He leans in close to you, not breaking eye contact. 

“Do you expect them to just open their arms to you? That doesn’t happen! You’ll die out there. And you think you’re ready for them, ha! You look for validation and throw a tantrum when it’s not given. How far do you think that will get you, huh? No one will care.”

He’s breathing heavy, panicking at the image of your back turned, leaving the city limits. He sees you live a life of poverty again or worse, a life without him. Marrying someone, having children, a cat and dog, and living in a house. He doesn’t see himself in these scenarios. It’s driving him mad with rage. 

Look at him. Look at him! Stop looking down!

 Your body starts to shake. Your head hasn’t lifted to face him since he spoke. When it does, he immediately regrets his wish. 

  Filled with hurt, you strike back. “At least I know what things are without having to read about it! Experience them without stalking people! I know who I am and don’t depend on a book to find the answer,” You rub your eyes. “But I have a name! I’m not staying here and wasting it anymore.” 

  You run away from Chrollo who stands stiff. He didn’t mean to make you cry. He was just mad that you thought of leaving. Your words hurt a lot, but nothing compared to the knowledge that he made you cry. 

   Much to his dismay, you don’t talk to him. In fact, you avoid him all together. 

At least that thought of you leaving left your mind. 

Over the course of a few years, you avoided him and didn’t talk to him. He had to watch you from the sidelines, growing and learning. He wanted to help you read and do math. Proving him wrong every time you did it. Chrollo, thankfully, got a nen ability that allowed him to be invisible. He’d watch you closely, seeing how much you followed Father Rizole and his studies. 

  You even took up various weaponry since you still had pent up aggression. Father Rizole was hesitant at first lest you aim at someone who annoyed you. Chrollo supported your hobby wholly. He went directly to Father Rizole and encouraged the priest to allow it. Chrollo even provided the equipment, unbeknownst to you.

  The old priest wondered how he knew but Chrollo managed to convince him that he had heard through the grapevine and that people marveled at your talent. Upon hearing this, the caring priest caved. Despite everything, the children of Meteor city were like his own, including the Troupe and you. 

  After your training and studies, you go to your room and throw yourself on the bed. Chrollo managed to sneak in just in time. Suddenly, the most shocking thing happened. 

  You’re touching yourself. Your hands slip under your shirt. He sees your hands move and massage your chest. By the expression on your face, something soft and curious, you’re beginning to like it. Who did this to you? A rageful red is all he can see now. 

Right before you can explore further, you gasp at the knock at the door. 

The same day, he heads to the books, trying to calm himself down. Remaining on the sidelines and respecting your space was not the right move. Or perhaps it was, and he just let it go on for too long. Not when someone is latching on to you, making you feel things you shouldn't. As angry as that thought makes him, he couldn't just go up and demand for you to return to him. So, he figured it was best to look in a book for some kind of answer. 

The book had an excellent plot with a sweet side of romance. He studies it closely. He’s seen it in movies and plays, but books just explain it better. None of the characters share similarities with you. He can become and act like any of these people. You, however, are an immovable force of nature. They do not compare to you. 

  Book after book after book, shows nothing that you’d accept. What’s he going to do? After looking at the sky, Chrollo remembers what you had said.

“At least I know what things are without having to read about it! Experience them without stalking people! I know who I am and don’t depend on a book to find the answer,”

That’s right. He can’t go to a book for this. Getting you can’t be written unless in the stars. However, he’s experienced this before. Knowing who you are and what love is.  He perks his head up. The meadow. How he put flowers in your hair after comforting you. He closes whatever book that was and puts it with the twenty others he was reading to study.

  He asks Father Rizole your whereabouts. “Last I know, she was talking to Ray.” 

  Is that the one who made you desperate? On your bed, touching places you wished were caressed by someone else? Schooled in controlling his expressions, Father Rizole doesn’t know any different. Chrollo excuses himself and gives a lame excuse of why he asked. 

 Once he leaves, he sets out to find Ray. From what he remembers, Ray was an average looking boy who, in Chrollo’s opinion, was annoying. He chewed and slurped too loud, his laugh was obnoxious and for some reason, felt the need to always be right even when wrong. Chrollo distinctly remembers how Ray talked to you when you were younger. He was always flirtatious and tried to get close to you. So, in a dubbing performance when Chrollo played a villain, he looked directly at Ray through it all. Apparently, Chrollo was terrifying at that moment.

   By luck, he spots Ray blushing. The boy doesn’t notice the predator yet. The one who's eying every move Ray makes, waiting to strike.

“Chrollo? Is that you?”

He smiles and walks towards Ray, whose eyes are big. The Troupe has a reputation that has reached many ears. No doubt that is the reason for Ray’s nervous behavior. 

  “How have you been?” The boy nervously laughs. “Uh, good. Y-you? Y’know, besides the killing and stuff.” 

  “I’ve been fine. Actually, I need your help.” 

Ray squeaks and backs away. “No, Ray. Not like that. It’s for more personal matters. Man to man.”

   He visibly starts to relax around Chrollo the more the latter talks. “So, do you think white flowers will do?”

  “Hm, I like red better.” Chrollo nods his head, taking in this information. “And your beloved?”

“I-I, uh, don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ray’s cheeks are red. Chrollo chuckles, “Come on, I’ve heard some things. Tell me about it. It’ll make me feel more comfortable making my move.”

  “Oh, well, I haven’t asked (Y/n) out yet.” Chrollo pats Ray on the back a little too harshly. “Why don’t you? I mean, she’s here, right?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t know…”

“Go for it. You helped me a lot.” 

“Alright, I will! If she says yes…where would I even take her? It’s not like Meteor City has a lot to offer.” Chrollo has his arm around Ray’s shoulders. 

“Where else? There’s a meadow not too far from here. There are lots of flowers there. Just tell her you’ll meet her there. She’ll love it.”

  “Thanks, Chrollo!” He practically skips away, heading to you. 

“Tell me how it goes!” Chrollo calls out and gives him a thumbs up. Now, all he has to do is wait. Chrollo leans against the wall with his arms crossed. No one is around in the halls. He cracks his neck and sighs, taking in the few rays of the sun that peek through the windows. Ray soon runs back to him with a wide smile on his face. 

  “She said yes! She’ll be there this afternoon. I couldn’t have done it without you, Chrollo.” 

  “No, no. You did this yourself. Just needed a little push. Hey, do you know where the meadow is exactly?”

  “Um, it’s-”

“Towards the forest. Just go west, a few feet in. It’ll be paradise.” 

This scene feels so familiar. 

Chrollo sits in the meadow, taking in the scent of the wildflowers. He hears footsteps and already knows who it is. He calms his heartbeat and looks to the source of the noise.  You say nothing. Even though it eats at him, he takes you acknowledging his existence as a win. 

Play it cool, play it cool. 

   “Hi, (Y/n).” His voice gives a slight crack. Dear God, he must sound lame.

   “Hello, Lucilfer.” Your voice is as sweet as honey though your tone is slightly bitter. Your use of his last name stings a little but is softened when he remembers that you’re the one who gave him that name years ago.

“How have you been?” His legs lay long and unbothered, and he rests on his hands. He hopes he looks calm, maybe even suave. He’s matured in these few years despite his voice cracking a few seconds ago. 

“You can’t be here. I have a date.” You continue to stare down at him with indifference. 

“A date? With whom?” Your face remains the same. “With Ray. Leave.” Chrollo in the nick of time, stops his facade of nonchalance from cracking. “Well, if that’s the case, I’ll leave.”

  Your eyebrows raise at his willingness.

The moon has come out and the sun is gone. There are no stars above, just clouds. Lightning bugs float around to make up for those lost twinkles in the sky. Chrollo then makes his move. “How’d it go?”

“Shut up, Lucilfer.” 

“Damn…that badly? What happened? Did he do something?” Chrollo’s voice raises in concern despite the fact he knew good and damn well nothing happened. 

  You mumble something incoherent. “What?” Chrollo walks a little closer. When you fall to your knees, he’s next to you in an instant. “No! What’s wro-”

“He didn’t show up!” You yell with tears running down your face, illuminated by the moonlight. “So, there! Laugh it up! You were right.”

  Chrollo’s is now confused and worried. He doesn’t like you crying. He hates to see you sad. 

“You said no one would care and you were right. So, laugh! I know you want to!” He’s genuinely taken back. He didn’t remember saying that at all. His shoulders drop. So, this is what’s wrong...

  “I care about you. I want you. He might not see you, but I do. Do you understand? I want you.” Your lip wobbles just before you throw yourself on him, cuddling to his chest, just like the first time. This time, he feels more capable. 

   He lets you cry it out. He decides to apologize. “I’m sorry for saying that. I’m just a big dummy.”

You cry for several minutes. Finally, you settle for sniffles. “Here, these will make you happy.”  Chrollo puts wildflowers in your hair. He doesn’t go near the red ones. 

  You gently touch them, tears drying on your face. “Does it look good?”

“Gorgeous.”  You’re not leaving him again. 

----

  PRESENT

Much to your reluctance, he drags you out of the room. Your bare feet skid along the wooden floor, trying to resist his pull. This only makes him tug harder. You wince and lessen your fight.  

  Chrollo sees you look around, taking it all in. He has a more modern taste that is complete with an extensive library. You were always one to throw in some kind of weird decoration for it to not look so ‘bland’. That’s what you wanted. He preferred to have simplicity and elegance. 

 You say nothing as he continues to lead you out of a bedroom and land in the foyer. “Where are we going?” 

   “Down memory lane.” He opens a green portal from his book. It rotates like a flipping coin.

  “Do you remember this?” He’s holding your hand, guiding you through the carnival. It looks the same as it did last time. Even the night sky looks similar. The stars still shine and twinkle as they did before. The cotton candy vendor is different, but it’s made the same way. The elephant ears are still bigger than a human’s head. Laughing families are still joyous and oblivious to the monster with a book.

 “What about this?” He brings you to that damn roller coaster. He notices how your legs rub together ever so slightly. You probably don't even realize that you did it. “I’ve seen better.” 

  He clutches your hand tighter. “How about here? Have you seen better?” He guides you into the house of mirrors. The place where you lost your virginity. The blue striped building still looks the same and is still barely used. Back then, he made sure to make the experience special for you even if it happened in the heat of the moment. Not just because of the pact that was cemented, but because it was you. 

His tone is bitter after the memory of your legs wrapped around him and the understanding he had. At the time, he could feel the promise of him being your only. Until he found out that you gave yourself to another. Like it all meant nothing. As if you giving him a name meant nothing. As if he meant nothing. 

You gave him his last name. Before that, he didn’t have one. Here you came into his bleak life and lightened it up with an identity. A compass on the open ocean and a light in the darkest of tunnels. Apparently to you none of it matters.

  Chrollo wears a smile. “I haven’t been here in years. You?” 

“I haven’t either, Lucilfer.” Although you named him, it stung that you don’t address him properly. A nickname he never wanted to stop hearing. 

   “You sure? You didn’t fuck anyone else in here?” You gasp a little. “No. Even if I did, it’s none of your business.”

  He clutches your hand tighter. “Let us reminisce then, dearest.” 

  The two of you waltz in the house of mirrors. The glass is confusing, and the lighting gives an eerie feel. It’s brighter than last time. “What’re we doing in here anyway?”

  “Showing you what you left. Do you remember the fun we had over the years? The passion?”

“I remem-” You stop talking when you hear rattling. “Keep your voice down, someone else is here.” You warn.

  “Are you scared, my darling?” He notices that you hold his hand closer to you. “No! I can take care of myself just fine. I’m embarrassed. Here you are talking about old shit and someone can hear!”

  “Old shit…” He whispers. You nod. Suddenly, the noise gets closer until you see a familiar blond head. “Kurapika!” 

  Your eyes light up when you see him, the red eyed killer. His eyes are the purest form of the color. Filled with rage and wrath in them, they glow. Before you can even take a step forward, Kurapika launches his attack. Brutal chains race towards you with the intent to kill and scare. You don’t even realize it, Chrollo notes. 

  “(Y/n)!” He grabs you one handedly to dodge it. You are in his right arm, shocked and heartbroken. “Pika…”

   The boy you took care of shouts obscene things at you. Chrollo growls and puts you behind him protectively. “(Y/n), run away!”

  “No! Are you joking? I’m not leaving.” You shout back. Kurapika runs towards you, ready to attack again. “Kurapika, kid, please just list-”

  Chrollo once again picks you up and takes you out of the house. The beach is calm and void of people. He puts you down far enough to where he thinks you’ll be safe. “Stay here!”

  “Chrollo, please, don’t kill him!” You sit on the cool sand illuminated by the moonlight. You grab his hand and plead. 

  “After this? After Paku and Uvo?” You nod. “Please, that…that’s my boy.” Your body is shaking not from fear, but from disorientation as the killer runs out of the building and spots you. Your lip wobbles and Chrollo leans down and touches your cheek. 

 “I’ll try to avoid it. But love, if it can’t be helped, please forgive me.”

   A tear slides down your cheek. He wipes it away and faces the furious Kurapika who has yet to address you with manners. That alone is reason enough for death. Chrollo opens his book, pretending not to notice your flinch. He flips through the pages, dodging every chain the boy sends. 

   It’s a fight that rivals the Zoldyck’s. The one where he thought of you when Silva launched his nen ability directly at him and Silva’s father, Zeno. Chrollo at the time had wondered what you were thinking when it happened to you. How funny is it that you were alive and well the whole time?

  None of the boy’s chains touch him. He gets closer and closer to the blond. Every kick and twist the boy sends is futile. Chrollo has years of experience on him. 

  Sand lifts up from one of the kid’s kicks. The sand blocks the view momentarily then shows the boy on the ground once it settles. Chrollo’s book flips the page when the scarlet eyes try to raise up again. 

  “Chrollo, no!” You scream. The fight was happening so fast, and you were so confused that you didn’t act or even process it. You run towards them to separate it. “Please, please, he’s just a kid! He’s mad and scared-”

  You finally realize why the boy is on the ground. There is a big gash on his side. A wound so deep that allows blood to soak the earth. “N-no…” 

  You try to touch him but you’re panicking. Chrollo can see your eyes widen and your pupils dilate. Never has he seen you so scared, delirious even. It breaks his heart. 

   “Love, breathe, breathe.” He calmly encourages. You take little breaths. “W-why? How could you?”

“I’ll fix it. Tell me how. I need to know.”

“I can do it!” You try to push his hand away. He sighs and shakes his head no. “You can’t stop shaking. Please, let me help you.”

  You explain it the best you can. Chrollo watches as you stutter and stumble over your words. It isn’t much but it’ll do. “I don’t understand fully. Show me!”

 "Stop fucki-stop screaming!" Your eyes flick over the boy's body repeatedly. Chrollo can see it in your eyes that you are drifting as you make eye contact with the boy's scarlet eyes.

Chrollo's eye twitches. "(Y/n)!" 

  There’s an urgency in his voice once the blond kid’s breathing becomes ragged. "I’m a-an exorcist not a healer. Oh God, what if I can’t-” 

“Try your best, my love.” He kisses the side of your head and rubs your back. Your eyes are still fearful and shocked despite his efforts. Finally, your hand is out, and you whisper words that only the chanter and nen itself can understand. A symbol displays itself on the ground, surrounding the bloody young man on the ground. 

Then it immediately stops. All of it does. Not only does your technique leave you, but the image of the teen disappears. There is no blood, no death before you. Only Chrollo Lucilfer and a guy with an undercut. 

  “Kurapika? Kurapika!” You search the sand in the spot he was laying on. You mutter his name repeatedly. You look up and study the guy before you.

  He can see you recognize him: Milluka Zoldyck. With a handy ability to give illusions. It’s an odd choice for a Zoldyck, especially one that never leaves the house. The young man laughs at you and your devastation. There's a flame in Chrollo's chest that is too familiar as he watches you be laughed at. 

   “Thank you for your service.” Chrollo says. Milluka doesn't have time to respond when a gun conjures in Chrollo’s hand. He fires without hesitancy or remorse. The guy falls down with a look of betrayal. Although Milluka had a handy technique, he wasn't worth anything. 

   Chrollo turns around to look at you. To his surprise, you are on your back with your arm over your eyes, weeping. You were so caught up in the scarlet eye boy that you didn’t notice anything off. You couldn’t even control yourself from meeting his conditions. Him questioning it and your answer, then having to witness your nen ability. That went according to plan, but the kicker is that you touched his book on accident. You were so distressed that you didn't realize your hand landed directly on it when you went to the boy's side. 

  Distracted and careless is what you are. He taught you better than that. “(Y/n), get up.” His voice is colder now, more commanding than it had been seconds ago. 

You don’t get up or even look at him. Your arm is still over your eyes, only letting tears flow. “Let me go.”

  He grabs the sides of your face, pulling you up. “I did what I had to do. The house of mirrors was just to remind you.”

   “Of what?” You whisper. He can see the despair in your eyes. 

   “Of us. Of the lengths I will go for it. Your nen means nothing to me. That boy is nothing. You my love, my dear,” 

  He places a kiss with each word. “My heart,”

“My compass,” He presses his forehead to yours, his hands still holding on. “My very soul. You are everything to me and I will not lose you again.”

 You sob. “You’re insane…where’s the boy I once knew? How did you end up this way?” You try to separate yourself from him. His hands shake your head a little.

 With a hiss, Chrollo clears, “I was always this way.”   

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

P5R Random Thoughts #4: Ann and the Formation of the Phantom Thieves

Just a little note on something that struck me as interesting when I went back to rewatch some of the Phantom Thieves' awakenings - while Joker will eventually come to embody the justice the Phantom Thieves seek, he is relatively aimless at the beginning of the story, without much direction for this burning resolve and anger at injustice he has. Fittingly for a character who gains power through social bonds, the direction this justice will take is strongly influenced by the decisions of the people he meets early on - I've already talked about Ryuji as the driving force which breaks through a lot of Ren's early kind of spaced-out aimlessness, and of course, Morgana, who provides the two with a means to act. This post though is about what Ann contributes to the early conviction of the Phantom Thieves, because it's. A. Whole. Lot.

Ann's awakening is not just the formation of her own resolve, but also the foundation of what would eventually become the Phantom Thieves' entire brand of justice.

[ID: Screenshot of an in-game cutscene from Persona 5 Royal. Ann, newly awakened and transformed into her Panther outfit, points a gloved finger directly at the screen, glaring furiously. She says “I will rob you of everything…!” End ID.]

Look at this. No seriously. Look. What is she saying here?

The kind of abuse that Kamoshida has inflicted on Shiho has caused her to lose hope entirely. Her future, gone. The respect of her peers, likely gone. With how much stigma still surrounds sexual assault victims, it is highly likely that she has pity from adults around her at best, their judgement at worst.

Kamoshida has stolen Shiho’s dignity. Her reputation. SA is a tool of violence that oppresses and humiliates its victims. And ordinarily, there would be nothing these kids could do to someone with that kind of social standing.

But with her awakening, Ann has declared that she will rob Kamoshida of his dignity right back.

Morgana’s been going on about being cool phantom thieves before, but this line is what firmly cements them as thieves, not heroes. While they certainly do act on behalf of those without power and attempt to seek justice for them, the primary goal established here is much more karmic. The Thieves steal desires, yes, but it’s so much more than that. By taking the desire, the whole foundation crumbles. Palaces literally collapse. And the abuser, left with nothing but their guilt and a burning need to confess it, is robbed of the thing that gave them so much power over their victims, and what they took from their victims every day - their dignity. Their societal reputation.

This direction for their justice is kickstarted by Ryuji and Morgana, but solidified with the addition of Ann to the group. Even before the awakening itself, you get the sense that this is the case.

Joker chases down Ann in the subway, the second major action he takes since his arrest and after his awakening that he makes entirely without influence from Ryuji or Morgana. He was already set to do something about Kamoshida, but hearing what Ann was going through very obviously cleared any lingering doubts about his course of action, despite the risks. As another less important but still interesting note, Ann is also the first of Joker’s future friends that he actually saw. She’s had a huge impact on him.

And it doesn’t end with her awakening either. Joker, Ryuji and Morgana leave it up to Ann to decide Kamoshida’s ultimate fate. This is a turning point. They are all willing to let her kill him if that’s what she believes needs to be done. Ann’s decision, therefore, not to finish him off is what sets the foundations for the Phantom Thieves as a group that does not kill. This in and of itself is likely a reference to og gentleman thief Lupin's refusal to cross the line into murder, so I find it pretty interesting that Ann is the one to decide this path for the group instead of Joker.

[ID: Screenshot from an in-game cutscene from Persona 5 Royal. Ann stands in front of a cowering Kamoshida as she firmly states “If his mind shuts down, he can’t admit his crimes.” Ryuji, Joker and Morgana watch from behind her. End ID.]

Ryuji and Morgana at first mistake this action as a kindness, but the beauty of Ann’s mercy is that it isn’t mercy at all. Death would be an easy out for someone who’s hurt so many in such horrible ways. Ann says “you will live with that guilt for the rest of your life. you don’t get to die. everyone will hear exactly what you did from your own mouth and then you will spend the rest of your life making amends for all the harm you’ve caused.”

“I just think death would be too good for him.”

Their targets are robbed in the same way they robbed their victims, leaving them inelegant and blubbering messes in front of the world. But as a side effect of leaving their targets alive, the target seeks to make amends how they can, without necessitating any forgiveness from the people they’ve hurt. This justice is a blend of retribution and rehabilitation, and it's this mix that makes the Phantom Thieves’ sense of justice so satisfying and appealing to victims.

So while the first Palace was mostly about self-liberation, it set the stage for the eventual justice they would chose to embody - victims helping victims, children helping children find courage in pushing back against adult oppression by reversing the position of power and stealing back what was taken from them - their dignity, respect and reputation.

And most importantly, they make a choice never to restrain oneself or hold back from action in the face of injustice - a core sentiment that Joker and Ann both share in their awakenings.

[gollancz]

We are thrilled and delighted to reveal the cover for HIGH VAULTAGE, the first novel from @victoriocity, coming in 2024.

1887. London, but not as you know it. The sprawling, chaotic metropolis of Even Greater London spreads across the southern half of England. The immense Tower casts electricity through the sky, powering the mind-boggling mechanisms of the city. The engineer-army of Isambard Kingdom Brunel swarms across the capital, building, demolishing, and rebuilding whatever they see fit. Queen Victoria is recovering nicely from her eleventh assassination, ruling with the dignity that comes from striking terror into anyone who sees the unholy union of human and machine that one has become. And at the heart of all this sits the country's first Private Investigation Agency. Archibald Fleet (formerly of Scotland Yard, currently administratively deceased) and Clara Entwhistle (formerly of Harrogate, currently intermittent crime journalist) hoped things would pick up quickly for their new enterprise. No-one is taking them seriously, but their break will come soon. Definitely. Probably. Meanwhile, police are baffled by a series of impossible bank robberies. With no trace left of the thieves, and nothing to connect each break-in to the next, their resources are absorbed by the case. Which means that when a woman witnesses a kidnapping, Fleet-Entwhistle Private Investigations is the only place she can turn for help. They're more than happy to oblige! But why would this man be a target for kidnappers? As Clara and Fleet dig into the mystery, things go deeper than they could ever have anticipated . . .

Pre-order here!

Can't wait until next year? Check out the phenomenal, hilarious podcast.

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) holds the occupation responsible for starving our people

The Popular Front holds the occupation responsible for starving our people. It warns war merchants, mercenaries and exploiters against their involvement in increasing the suffering and aligning themselves with the occupation’s plans.

In light of the unprecedented deterioration of the humanitarian situation and the aggravation of the daily suffering of our people in the Gaza Strip due to the war of genocide waged by the zionist occupation, in addition to the policies of starvation and systematic siege, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine holds the zionist occupation fully responsible for this catastrophic situation, and denounces the international partnership in this crime, and the shameful international silence and complicity in the face of the policies of mass starvation and daily war crimes committed against our people, and even the involvement of several International Institutions in covering up and concealing the crimes of the occupation.

The Front also stresses that war merchants and mercenaries have played and continue to play a major role in exacerbating the repercussions of the occupation's policies on our people and increasing their tragedy and suffering. The Front affirms that the role of these formations, which practice policies of monopoly and sabotage, and use gang methods of thuggery, looting and monopolizing goods, constitutes a complement to the terrorist policies of the occupation.

While the Front continues to demand and work for a unified national leadership for the battle in all its aspects, including the existence of a national administration and policies to support the steadfastness of our people, alleviate their suffering, and confront the occupation policy and the treacherous role of war merchants, today it, like all the national forces and free people of our people, is obligated to escalate its role and struggle to protect our people.

In light of this catastrophic situation, the Popular Front announces its decision, along with the forces and free people in Gaza, to lift the organizational cover from anyone involved in these destructive practices that only serve the occupation and contribute to starving our steadfast people. The Front stresses that it will confront with all its strength anyone who dares to violate the dignity of the citizens or contribute to deepening their crises and suffering.

The Front also renews its full support for the peaceful popular movements that stem from the will of the street and express just demands to provide the most basic elements of dignity and a decent life in the face of the policies of the occupation and its agents, the merchants of death, the thieves and those who benefit from raising prices, stressing that protecting these movements is a joint national responsibility that falls on the shoulders of all forces keen on the safety of our people.

The Front calls again for activating the popular protection committees to stand firmly against the encroachment of these gangs that attack the dignity of our people and seek to starve and oppress them, and to tighten popular control over the markets and combat the policy of raising prices and monopolizing goods, and to thwart any attempts to create chaos and undermine the unity of the national ranks.

At the end of its statement, the Popular Front affirms that it, along with all national forces, will not hesitate to defend the dignity of our people and will not allow any practices that increase their suffering to pass. It will continue to struggle and confront with all firmness anyone who tries to exploit the crisis to achieve personal gains at the expense of the dignity of our people and their steadfastness in the face of the occupation.

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Central Media Office November 8, 2024

[catacini]

thoughts on "writing oberon"

i don't think oberon is compelled to lie about everything intrinsically. if you ask him coffee or tea he can pick one. if you ask him what color the sky is he can tell you blue. if you ask him who won the superbowl, he's not googling it just to make sure he gets it wrong.

vocabulary for this post

vortigern: abyssal worm that destroys and loathes

faerie king: who he pretends to be

oberon: both/neither, just the fastest way to refer to the unit as a thinking being/practical reality

the nature of his lies comes from his existence as a walking contradiction. the faerie king is perfectly suited to faerie britain on the surface - he's friendly and silly and popular, and he enjoys playing pranks and entertaining people. he's never experienced any major loss like murian has, and he's as loyal to his wife as aurora is to melusine. the fairie king as presented by shakespeare doesn't have anything substantial going on between his ears. || the destroyer of faerie britain has always been disgusted by every part of it. he's keenly aware of how it was made; he's the will of britain trying to kill itself rather than limping along as this colossal parody propped up by moronic culture thieves. and just like the place itself, he's being paraded about as some kind of clown - hell, a cheater to boot. he's a walking insult to his own dignity, and he will only feel peace when it's all been blown to pieces.

this of course creates his cynicism. his experiences on the surface befriending the welsh forest faeries allowed him to feel real love for parts of this place, which heightened his disgust for all of it. surely he lamented in an irreconcilable way when barghest, the monster he created, [destroyed part of britain] and killed the friends he had made. and as his perspective becomes more disjointed in a way that can be understood, it all becomes even shakier when you add in that the faerie king is inherently unreliable, frankly just insubstantial - because any strong emotions the faerie king expresses are written to be ploys and no more, the being that is oberon-vortigern cannot voice sadness or anger, lest they be taken for the faerie king's crocodile tears. forget feeling responsible and conflicted, he can't even grieve because his strongest emotions are labelled tricks as soon as he shows them.

-

beyond that, it's really important to remember that oberon is an actor. he describes "the faerie king" as a character many times (titania too!), but you and he are not side characters - he calls the two of you spectators, i.e. not actively serving as characters at all. when he is participating, he plays a role. when he is with you, even though he as a person is still tricking you, he's not going out of his way to act like a silly faerie king and entertain you. it might be easier to understand this if you think about what he was pretending to be for you: a PHH faerie fitting in as a lostworld faerie. he's undercover, and even though the guy you talk to is still a faerie king, he's here with a more serious mission that differs from his public face.

him being an actor is crucial for how he was summoned in the first place. vortigern is a writhing mass of hatred for what britain has become. it can't love britain. it can't belong in britain. things that don't belong in faerie britain, like holmes and nemo, are weakened there. if it's going to enter britain, it needs a body that won't hate britain. it will hire itself as an actor to play "the faerie king," and read its lines dutifully. this isn't something vortigern manifested before doing and decided upon, it's something that had to happen as a premise of the summoning itself, to allow vortigern to manifest at all. for the duration of oberon's existence, from summoning til nonexistence, he is there as an actor. that includes while he's being vortigern. look at vortigern's sprite: do you see where his bug feet and bug hand connect to his body? not clearly, no! hell, his legs actually black out so we can't see whether the pants cover insect legs or turn into props. they appear to be melded to his clothes, but those aren't gloves and shoes. they're connected to his body, but they're something as removable as an actor's prosthetic.

all that is to say, [vortigern] [is an actor playing] [oberon] is a statement without removable parts. all that can happen is shifting the order into [oberon] [is an actor playing] [vortigern]. and just like the faerie king's love for the welsh forest faeries was just lines read off a script by vortigern, vortigern's vitriolic disgust for those same faeries is just lines read off a script by oberon. if the "actor" part was optional, vortigern's body would be a hell of a lot more fucked up.

-

i've previously likened oberon to an experience i have when i'm discussing something i dearly love with people who also love it, but i mention something i really hate about it. for me, this happens because i get nervous, but i end up panicking and trying to reassure my friends that i really do like the thing in question. so, i end up walking away feeling dissatisfied: i either didn't properly convey my unhappiness with That One Thing, or i did a disservice in expressing how much i love the overall product. when this happens, i feel i haven't done justice to myself.

i don't think oberon has self confidence issues (though obviously he does hate himself), so he's not going through it the way i am. but it's also true that when he's talking about things that really count, nothing he says can do justice to the multifaceted emotions he has about things. furthermore, the automatic devaluing of his most emphatic statements that comes from him being the faerie king is incredibly disheartening.

his options are either be noncommittal and insubstantial, or be sarcastic and dismissive. he's black and white in one, but not grey, instead a checkerboard. he's the ultimate "and" statement. to force an opinion out of him is to pin him to one side, but since the other side isn't less true, whatever he says becomes false. if you use a command spell to make him only speak the whole truth, he will fall silent.

i think that as you spend more time with him, a lot can be better conveyed without words. i think that if you make it clear you understand and believe the part of him that despises you, you can experience the equal part of him that is impressed by and maybe even grateful to you. i don't think it's impossible to understand him, and someone who understands him and still wants him is something he considers an unattainable dream.

[ohdorothea]

This tournament is being run by and for queer fans so please keep that in mind! Homophobes will be blocked on sight <3 More polls here and more info here! Lyrics for the songs and FAQ under the cut!

🫶🫶🫶

Long Live lyrics

I said remember this moment

In the back of my mind

The time we stood with our shaking hands

The crowds in stands went wild

We were the kings and the queens

And they read off our names

The night you danced like you knew

Our lives would never be the same

You held your head like a hero

On a history book page

It was the end of a decade

But the start of an age

Long live the walls we crashed through

How the kingdom lights shined just for me and you

I was screaming long live all the magic we made

And bring on all the pretenders

One day, we will be remembered

I said remember this feeling

I pass the pictures around

Of all the years that we stood there

On the side-lines wishing for right now

We are the kings and the queens

You traded your baseball cap for a crown

When they gave us our trophies

And we held them up for our town

And the cynics were outraged

Screaming, "This is absurd!"

'Cause for a moment a band of thieves

In ripped-up jeans got to rule the world

Long live the walls we crashed through

How the kingdom lights shined just for me and you

I was screaming long live all the magic we made

And bring on all the pretenders

I'm not afraid

Long live all the mountains we moved

I had the time of my life fighting dragons with you

I was screaming long live that look on your face

And bring on all the pretenders

One day, we will be remembered

Hold on to spinning around

Confetti falls to the ground

May these memories break our fall

Will you take a moment

Promise me this

That you'll stand by me forever

But if God forbid fate should step in

And force us into a goodbye

If you have children some day

When they point to the pictures

Please tell them my name

Tell them how the crowds went wild

Tell them how I hope they shine

Long live the walls we crashed through

I had the time of my life, with you

Long, long live the walls we crashed through

How the kingdom lights shined just for me and you

And I was screaming long live all the magic we made

And bring on all the pretenders

I'm not afraid

Singing, long live all the mountains we moved

I had the time of my life fighting dragons with you

And long, long live that look on your face

And bring on all the pretenders

One day, we will be remembered

🫶🫶🫶

Better Than Revenge lyrics

"Now go stand in the corner and think about what you did."

Time for a little revenge

The story starts when it was hot and it was summer and

I had it all, I had him right there where I wanted him

She came along, got him alone and let's hear the applause

She took him faster than you could say "sabotage"

I never saw it coming, wouldn't have suspected it

I underestimated just who I was dealing with

She had to know the pain was beating on me like a drum

She underestimated just who she was stealing from

She's not a saint

And she's not what you think

She's an actress

She's better known

For the things that she does on the mattress

Soon she's gonna find

Stealing other people's toys

On the playground won't make you many friends

She should keep in mind

She should keep in mind

There is nothing I do better than revenge

She looks at life like it's a party and she's on the list

She looks at me like I'm a trend and she's so over it

I think her ever-present frown is a little troubling

She thinks I'm psycho 'cause I like to rhyme her name with things

But sophistication isn't what you wear or who you know

Or pushing people down to get you where you wanna go

They wouldn't teach you that in prep school so it's up to me

But no amount of vintage dresses gives you dignity

(Think about what you did)

She's not a saint

And she's not what you think

She's an actress

She's better known

For the things that she does

On the mattress

Soon she's gonna find

Stealing other people's toys

On the playground won't make you many friends

She should keep in mind

She should keep in mind

There is nothing I do better than revenge

I'm just another thing for you to roll your eyes at, honey

You might have him but haven't you heard

I'm just another thing for you to roll your eyes at, honey

You might have him but I always get the last word

She's not a saint

And she's not what you think

She's an actress

(She deserve it)

She's better known

For the things that she does on the mattress

Soon she's gonna find

Stealing other people's toys

On the playground won't make you many friends

She should keep in mind

She should keep in mind

There is nothing I do better than revenge

Do you still feel like you know what you're doing?

'Cause I don't think you do

(No, no, no, no)

Do you still feel like you know what you're doing?

I don't think you do

I don't think you do

Let's hear the applause

(Come on, come on)

Come on show me how much better you are

(So much better, yeah?)

So you deserve some applause 'cause you're so much better

She took him faster than you could say "sabotage"

The question is which song is queerer to you! Queerer can mean whatever you want it to mean; you might consider a song queer because you think it was written that way, or because of Swiftian lore. It might be queer to you because of how you relate it to your own life. Maybe you think from a purely literary standpoint the lyrics have queer themes; maybe you're just thinking about vibes!!!

If you’d like to send in interpretations or propaganda for a specific song you can send them to my inbox! All interpretations are welcome and let’s be open and kind in response to all interpretations <3

[normal-internet-user]

Can I request a 2012 Donnie x male or gn fox mutant reader Where like Donnie is showing the reader his science stuff and all, and he see the reader tails is wagging and he's excited his crush is interested in his stuff And Donnie says something like "wow, you like my science" and the reader is like "yeah but I like you alot more" Or something And idk, have a good day :]

Of course Anon! This is such a good idea, you're all just so creative!💕 And I hope you're having an amazing day as well💕💕

PICK-UP LINE

♡~~♡~~♡~~♡~~♡

Summary: Donnie is showing you the new additions to his lab, and in a heat of the moment decision, you confess with a bad pick-up line.

Warnings: None!

Requested: Yep!

Male Reader!

.........................................

You nodded along happily as Donnie showed you everything new around his lab, tail wagging behind you.

You had your hands in the pockets of your hoodie, what with being a fox, even Donnie's shiny belongings weren't safe from your thieving impulses. So you often kept your hands in your pockets to avoid taking things from your best-friend/super adorable crush.

You smiled softly at Donnie's look of utter concentration while he explained an invention of his to you. He was just too cute for his own good.

How he hadn't caught onto your crush yet was a complete miracle in itself, since you weren't exactly subtle in your admiring.

This poor turtle has you completely whipped, but you just couldn't bring yourself to confess. Anytime you got close, your brain would pull out the mental list you'd made on all the reasons you should just let the feelings die.

One: He's your best-friend. Two: He has a crush on April. And three: Does he even like guys?

You have no intention of making him uncomfortable, so for now, you're completely content with just listening happily to his science riddled ramblings.

At least your brain told you that you were. Your heart had other things to say, and it seemed just about fed up with your lack of words.

You carefully examined the piece of equiptment Donnie had handed to you, your tail wagging excitedly behind you at the trust he was showing by allowing you to hold the delicate technology.

Donnie chuckled to himself, a soft smile playing along his features, "Wow, you really like my science, huh?"

You nodded absentmindly, your mind not properly registering the scentence about leave your mouth, "Yeah, but I like you alot more."

The moment you finished speaking, you froze. You did not just say that. Immediatly you started to backtrack, blushing wildly, thank god for your fur.

"Wh- uh, I mean, as like a friend. I think. No- I mean I know! Uh, ye- yeah. heh. Uhm moving on-"

You set down the trinket in your hand, attempting to leave and save what little dignity you had left. Just as you turned around, Donnie's hand caught your wrist, spining you to face him.

"Please tell me you meant that." he said, his voice just above a whisper, and a soft blush noticable on his cheeks.

"What?"

Donnie looked you in your eyes, the blush on his face becoming more and more prominent, "Tell me you meant it. I need- I need to know. please."

You chuckled, moving your gaze down to your feet, "Yeah. Yeah, I meant it. A-and I'm sorry if that makes you uncom-"

Before you could finish your sentence, before you could even react, Donnie pulled you in for a kiss.

Your eyes widened, this was a completely unexpected outcome. You wrapped your arms around Donnie's neck while your tail curled into the shape of a heart behind you, melting into the kiss with all the pent up feelings you had tried your hardest to get rid of.

When the two of you pulled away, both of you were completely breathless, and as red as tomatoes.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted to do that."

You chuckled, "I think I've wanted to do it longer."

You leaned in slowly, the space between your lips almost non-existent-

"GUY'S! DONNIE AND (NAME) ARE MAKING OUT!"

"MIKEY!"

You looked toward the door, embarrased. Donnie let go of you in favor of chasing after his younger brother, who was still shouting for Leo and Raph.

You chuckled to yourself as you followed bebind the two, this just might have been the best day of your life.

.........................................

There you go Anon! I hope this is to your liking since I really enjoyed writing this one! 💕💕 Everyone have a wonderful day!

[smilingformoney]

Three Secrets

Summary: Hans Gruber x reader | smut | You're a member of Hans Gruber's gang of thieves, and when you take the blame for another's betrayal, Hans grants your last request.

Or: you get fucked violently by Hans, and then you die.

I watched Die Hard, got horny, and this is the result.

Dedicated to @snowblossomreads, who so lovingly enables my thirst for this dead old man.

Warnings/content: smut, dubcon, gun kink, all your holes get penetrated (yes even that one)

Read on Ao3 or below the cut:

“Who warned die Polizei?!” Hans roared as he returned to the safehouse, panting and out of breath, his tie askew. When there was no answer from his fellow thieves, he roared in anger and smashed his fists on the table, causing the carefully-stacked Marks to collapse into piles and scatter across the floor.

“I WANT A NAME!”

The thieves began staring at each other suspiciously, agitated by the news of a betrayal and - although they’d never admit it - frightened of Hans’ anger.

With a sudden BANG!, Hans shot down the man nearest him. Probably not the rat, and certainly a good thief - but Hans was angry, and he wanted to punish someone.

You stood up immediately.

“It was me,” you lied.

It wasn’t you, of course it wasn’t. You would never betray your friends. But you also couldn’t sit there and watch Hans take his anger out on them.

The barrel of the gun met the underside of your chin, and you closed your eyes as you steeled yourself for the shot…

But it didn’t come. You dared to open your eyes, and you were met with Hans’ fiery gaze, his face dripping with sweat, a nasty snarl on his face.

“Tell me why I shouldn’t pull the trigger, Schlampe,” he growled.

You knew of a thousand reasons. You weren’t the rat; you were an asset to the team; you liked being alive. But Hans cared about none of those - all he wanted was to sate his anger.

“Do I get a last request?”

Hans’ eyes narrowed, then he chuckled darkly. “Perhaps,” he replied. “What is it?”

“Schlampe, you called me. I am no slut, Hans. No man here has touched me. No man has ever touched me.”

Hans laughed and turned to his men. “Do you hear that, boys? Die Schlampe wants to be fucked before she dies!”

The men laughed, far too many of them looking at you with hunger.

“I don’t want them!” you insisted as you stepped closer to Hans, the barrel of his gun digging deeper into your flesh. “I don’t even want to be fucked. What I want… is to suck your cock.”

As soon as the words left your lips, the men gathered went feral, cheering and whooping, shouting out words of encouragement to Hans. He, meanwhile, seemed merely amused.

After a pause, he grabbed you by the shoulder, spun you around, and marched you out of the room, gun pressed firmly against the small of your back. Wordlessly, he guided you through the house, leaving behind the wooting animals that called themselves men, and once he reached his bedroom, he pushed you inside and slammed the door shut behind him.

“Turn around slowly,” he said in a low, menacing voice, one that struck fear in most, but for you it only sent a rush of arousal through your body.

When finally you could see him again, Hans’ eyes were alight with danger, desire and anger. So long as that gun was trained on you, you knew any moment could be your last, even if your mouth was full of his cock - and, shit, you hoped it would be soon.

“So the little virgin wants to suck my cock, does she?”

He gestured at her body with his gun.

“Take those off. I don’t want any hidden tricks.”

Sure. That was why he wanted you to strip.

You pulled your t-shirt over your head, and Hans licked his lips when his gaze landed on your chest. Next you slipped off your shoes, then the rest of your clothing, leaving you in nothing but your bra and knickers.

Hans raised his eyebrows. “Did I tell you to stop?”

You had hoped to at least keep some of your dignity before your last meal, but this was Hans Gruber you were dealing with. He never did anything in halves.

You reached behind your back to unclasp your bra, letting it fall from your shoulders, then hooked your thumbs under your waistband to push your knickers to the floor.

And that was how you found yourself stark naked in Hans Gruber’s room, staring down the barrel of his gun, not daring to break eye contact with him, no matter how desperate you were to see if he was aroused.

“Show me your technique first, Schlampe. Open.”

You obeyed, and panic shot through your heart when the barrel of his gun - safety most definitely off - slid past your lips and threatened to choke you as it passed over your tongue and settled at the back of your mouth.

“Well?” Hans prompted. “I’m waiting.”

Of course he had a fucking gun kink.

You tried to ignore the metallic taste as you began to move your head back and forth, ever so slightly, trying not to get too close to the trigger. What a way to die this would be.

“Will you suck my cock with this little passion, Y/N? It is your last request, after all. You’re supposed to enjoy it.”

Bastard. Sadist. Psychopath.

You hadn’t been lying; you really hadn’t been with a man before. How were you supposed to show him your cocksucking technique on a gun when you had never even practised on the real thing?

You closed your eyes, hoping it would help you to pretend the barrel was a dick. You tightened your lips around it, telling yourself it was the most delicious thing you’d ever tasted, that it tasted like flesh and sweat, not metal and gunpowder…

You could hear Hans breathing heavily, alongside the sound of a belt unbuckling. You chanced a glimpse, and when you saw his other hand sliding under his waistband, you let you an involuntary moan.

He grinned, looking like a devil as he palmed himself under his boxers, finger far too close to the trigger of the loaded gun you were currently allowing him to fuck your mouth with. Because he was, he had taken over the movement, and while one hand rubbed up against his cock, the other pulled the gun from your mouth, only to send it back in violently, and you grunted with pain as the metal tip collided with the roof of your mouth.

“I could pull the trigger at any moment,” Hans said, speaking aloud the very fear that sat at the forefront of your mind. “You would die sucking my gun, wishing it was my cock, dead before you knew what was happening. How does that sound, Schlampe?”

Fuck. He was asking you a question, and still he was thrusting his gun into your mouth; you were sure he would leave a bruise.

Not that a bruised mouth would matter soon, once you were dead.

Hans suddenly pulled the gun from your mouth, switched on the safety and returned it to the holster on his hip. You gasped for air, glad to be free of the metallic taste and the imminent threat of your head exploding.

He placed his hand on your head and pushed down, forcing you to your knees as he pulled his cock from the confines of his boxers, and you couldn’t help but stare.

You always knew Hans had big dick energy. Now you knew he had the size to match.

“I will show you mercy,” he decided. “You’ll get my cock… and maybe I’ll blow your brains out with my cock down your throat.” He held his erect cock to your lips, and instinctively they parted to allow him in.

Fuck, he was big. Too big; you thought the gun might have been more comfortable. It may have been cold and metallic, and ready to blow your brains out at any moment, but at least you could breathe. As Hans pushed further past your lips and over your tongue, you felt the muscles in your jaw protesting as you stretched them out as far as they could go.

His tip hit the back of your throat and you gagged. If Hans noticed, he didn’t care. Tears began to fill your eyes, and through your watery vision you could see that he was hardly even halfway in.

Hans grabbed either side of your head with his hands and tilted your head upwards, forcing you to look at him.

“So full, and I’m hardly even in,” he growled. “Now, are you going to just stare at me, Schlampe, or are you going to suck. my. fucking. cock?”

You decided to go with the latter.

You tried to pull your head back slightly, but Hans’ large, strong hand on the back of your head kept you in place.

What were you supposed to do? He wanted you to suck, but he clearly didn’t want you to move back. That only left forward, but you rather enjoyed breathing.

Ah, but you had another option - your tongue. At the moment, it was flattened uselessly under his cock, but perhaps you could - yes! You managed to loosen it slightly, just enough to allow it to slide along his shaft. You hadn’t realised before how veiny cocks were, but you certainly knew now as you traced a line along one that ran from the head, down the underside, and past your lips. Curious, you raised a hand to the rest of him and gently ran your thumb from your lip, tracing the vein all the way to the base, where it was lost in amongst his pubic hair, which was surprisingly coarse, much coarser than your own.

Somewhere above you, Hans hummed with satisfaction, and you hoped you were doing well. If you weren’t, you supposed you would know by the prod of a gun in your temple.

You stuck your tongue out as far as you could past your lips, then retracted it. You followed the movements of your own tongue with your lips, and you were relieved when Hans allowed you to do so, his hand on your head loosening its grip slightly as he allowed you to pull back until you felt his lip threatening to pass your lips. You were just about to go back in when Hans decided to take control of the situation - as if he weren’t in control already - and, twisting your hair in his hand tightly, he tugged your head back towards him. The movement was so sudden, so violent, that your gag reflex had no time to kick in, and this time you found your nose buried in his hairs, his thick cock gliding down your lubricated throat.

Before you had chance to adjust to your new position, Hans began to violently fuck your mouth - or, more accurately, he fucked himself with your mouth, as his hips were perfectly still, whilst his fist in your hair tossed your head back and forth, leaving you in a whirlwind of pain as he tugged on your scalp, choked you with his cock, and stretched your jaw beyond what you’d ever expected possible.

Your eyes flicked up, and through your streaming tears you could see him, staring down at you with a hungry snarl. Sweat began to drip down from your temple – whether from exhaustion or fear, you were unsure. You were terrified, you were in agony, you were suffocating… and you were undeniably turned on.

“Mhm… a perfect mouth for fucking,” Hans growled as he wiped a tear from your cheek before bringing it to his mouth and sucking it off his thumb as if it was the nectar of the gods. “Such a shame to waste it.”

Naively, a hope rose in your heart - perhaps, if you were good enough for him, he would spare your life after all, punish you by making you into his personal cockslave. It wasn’t exactly the life you craved, but it was life.

Suddenly, your lungs filled with air as you instinctively inhaled deeply, your body reacting before your mind had even the chance to process what had happened - his sudden withdrawal from your mouth, leaving you a simpering, drooling, gasping mess.

His hand still in your hair, Hans tugged you to your feet. You winced in pain, although you were glad to be breathing freely again.

Your heels had hardly touched the carpeted floor, however, when Hans threw you violently back. The pain in your scalp was replaced by pain in your calves as they collided with the bedframe just moments before your back hit the mattress, and you let out an oof as the air was forced from your lungs.

You gasped desperately, and once you were finally in a state to look up, you saw that Hans had removed his jacket and tie, and was in the process of removing his shoes. Even in his carnal state, he took the time to neatly fold his clothes. This gave you the chance to recover, however briefly, and you adjusted yourself on the bed, finding a more comfortable position with your head against the pillows.

You’d seen Hans’ body before - just last summer, a particularly lucrative job had allowed the gang enough funds to holiday in the south of France, and it was there, seeing Hans in nothing but a pair of swimming trunks, that you had developed an attraction to the man.

You had even seen his arse once, after a drinking game dare from Karl resulted in Hans mooning ein Polizist from a moving car.

And, of course, you had seen his cock just now. But you’d never before seen him completely naked – until now.

He crawled over you like a panther on a hunt, and you fully expected him to continue until his throbbing cock slid into your mouth so that he could fuck your head into the pillow.

Instead, he stopped as his hungry grin reached level with your own lips, and he ran his tongue along them testingly. You parted your lips obligingly, and he chuckled.

“Two years you’ve been with us now, Y/N,” he mused. “Two years that perfectly fuckable mouth has been in front of me and I did nothing. It’s only now, after you seal your fate, that your true talents are revealed. Pity.”

You were tempted to offer your mouth to him, to offer him every hole to be taken whenever he liked, so long as he kept you alive. But that would be begging, and Hans abhorred beggars. No, he had to come to the idea himself.

“How many other secrets are you keeping from me, Schlampe?” Hans growled. He shifted his weight back slightly and for the first time you realised he held his tie in his hand. He grabbed your wrists, crossed them over one another above your head, and used the tie to secure them to the headboard. Once satisfied with the tight knot, he began to run his hands down your body, starting from your face and down your neck towards your chest, as if challenging himself to touch every inch of your flesh before it turned cold.

He took your nipples between his fingers and twisted them harshly, eliciting a loud yelp from your throat.

“I asked you a question,” Hans said plainly. “How many secrets do you still keep?”

Was he seriously interrogating you right now? Was that what this whole thing was, just a way to torture information from you?

Information you didn’t have, because you weren’t the rat.

You had to draw his attention away, to remind him what a waste your death would be.

“Two,” you gasped as an idea struck your brain. “I have two more secrets.”

“Only two?”

You nodded, trying to suppress a whine as his fingers squeezed on your nipples again.

He surveyed you for a long moment, his amber eyes staring into yours, as if hoping he might find some hidden information in there.

“It would be a shame if your secrets died with you,” he growled. He sat up fully now, and his cock came back into view, still erect, throbbing and glistening in the light with a mixture of precum and your spit.

He let out a sigh of relief as he stroked himself, his eyes never leaving your squirming form beneath him. With his spare hand, he pushed open your legs, tugging on your hips to bring them close to him. You took the hint and wrapped your legs around his waist, presenting your soaking wet cunt to him.

“Will you tell me your secrets before you die, Y/N?”

“Yes,” you replied immediately, understanding his meaning.

“Good. I would hate to take the from you by force.”

You felt his cockhead pushing against your lower lips, then past them, then – it slipped inside, aided by your gushing juices.

Hans gave you no time to adjust. If he remembered you were a virgin, he didn’t care as he sheathed himself inside you, cock crawling up your tight walls, forcing them to stretch open for him.

You bit down on your bottom lip hard, trying to ignore the pain as he finally bottomed out. He barely gave your walls a chance to adjust to his size when he withdrew again, only to thrust forward again. He was nothing short of stabbing you with his cock, venting his anger at your apparent betrayal.

His thrusts picked up pace, and soon enough the pain had subsided, leaving only the pleasure.

And oh, what pleasure. Was this what you had been missing out on for so long? You had never dared make a move on Hans, never dared risk his anger if your proposal angered him. You wished you had made a move, that you had spent the better part of the last two years getting railed.

What a wish to make on your deathbed.

If you weren’t already busy moaning with pleasure, you might have laughed.

This was your deathbed, quite literally – and you were getting fucked into it like there was no tomorrow, because for you, there wasn’t.

Hans not only had a massive cock, but he had incredible stamina too. He pulled out, and you weren’t ashamed of the whine that left your throat when he did so, leaving you feeling suddenly empty. His cock was throbbing, almost twitching, and leaking so much precum it seemed as if he might cum just from a change in the wind.

He wouldn’t, though. Of course not. He was Hans Gruber, and he came only when he chose.

He made no clever pun about secrets now. He just took your hips in his large hands and turned you over, ignoring your grunt of pain as your wrists rubbed against your bonds.

He also ignored the veritable scream of pain you let out when he stretched open your arsecheeks and pushed inside your final hole, the last secret you hadn’t known you were keeping from him.

You sobbed into the pillow. You couldn’t help it. Although painful at first, his cock felt good in your cunt, the stretch painful but pleasurable too. This, however, was nothing but pain.

Any hopes you might have had of your own orgasm were now dashed. You felt nothing but pain as Hans stabbed into you again and again, and over your own sobs you heard him, growling and muttering something to himself under his breath.

“Dumme verdammte Schlampe,” you heard. “I’ll teach you - oh, I will fucking show you - you don’t - keep - secrets - from - me!”

He stilled suddenly, hilted deep inside your arse, and Hans let out nothing short of a roar.

Your head was dizzy, the world spinning, and you continued sobbing into the pillow as Hans finally withdrew. You couldn’t move, you just lay there on your front, covered in sweat, tears, and - although you couldn’t see to be sure - blood and cum leaking from both your holes. Even so, you missed Hans’ warmth when he moved away from the bed.

After a minute, water began to run from the bathroom. Five more minutes, and the water stopped. Some movement and shuffling of fabric. Still, you didn’t move, too stiff with pain.

You certainly didn’t move when you heard the cocking of a gun, and you felt the barrel pushing against the base of your skull.

“Any more secrets?”

Your hopes were dashed. He wasn’t going to spare you after all. No, he had just fucked you raw, and now he wanted what he had always wanted - the truth. To him, you were a rat, not to be trusted and certainly not to be spared.

The truth, you knew, would get you nowhere.

So you lied.

“Nein,” you mumbled, face still smushed against the pillow. You daren’t move.

Somewhere above you, Hans sighed.

“A shame,” he muttered.

It really was a shame. Those were nice bedsheets, ruined now with her blood…

…and her brains.

[kairologia]

The Triplicities in Hellenistic Astrology

In Hellenistic Astrology, triplicity is a term used to describe the division of the 12 Zodiac Signs into 4 elements (Fire, Earth, Air, Water), which represents the third level of dignity. Triplicity rulership on the other hand is the assignment of the Planets to these elements.

Each element has :

1. A main Triplicity Ruler for the day.

2. A main Triplicity Ruler for the night.

3. A cooperating Ruler.

They are divided thus:

What’s more, is that triplicity can be used to delineate house rulership in a way that brings more meaning to the qualities of each house. Here is a breakdown of it:

1st House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st lord describes the life, life force, preferences, desires and nature of the native, the first years of life, the beginning of any endeavor.

— 2nd triplicity lord indicates life, body and strength in the middle of life.

— 3rd lord represents the life, body and strength of the native, the final years and the end stage of life.

2nd House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: acquiring possessions at the beginning of life.

— 2nd Lord: acquiring possessions, wealth in the middle of life.

— 3rd Lord: acquiring possessions, wealth in the later years of the life.

3rd House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: older siblings (born before the native).

— 2nd Lord: middle siblings (close in age to the native).

— 3rd Lord: younger siblings (born after the native).

4th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: Parents & ancestors. The father according to Ibn Ezra.

— 2nd Lord: lands, field, ancestry, real estate, homes, cultivated lands, buried treasure, concealed objects

— 3rd Lord: final outcomes, endings, prison, the final period of life, the end of anything.

5th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: children, offspring, pregnancy, oldest child.

— 2nd Lord: pleasures, vices, enjoyments, love affairs, middle children, clothing, gifts, eating, drinking and things that bring one joy.

— 3rd Lord: messengers, the act of giving gifts, the youngest child.

6th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: illness and recovery from illness, disease, sickness, medicine & pharmacy, injuries, wounds, poor health.

— 2nd Lord: employees & people working for you.

— 3rd Lord: small cattle, domestic animals, prison and confinement.

7th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st lord: spouse, intimate partner(s), sex partner(s).

— 2nd lord: conflict, controversies, disputes, confrontations, war, adversarial relationships, litigation, thieves, open enemies.

— 3rd Lord: covenants, formal and legal agreements, business associates and partnerships.

8th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: death, fear, grief, ruin, anguish of mind.

— 2nd lord: old things, anything ancient.

— 3rd Lord: inheritances and legacies from the dead.

9th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st lord: travel & its objectives.

— 2nd Lord: religion, faith, ethics, honesty, religious observance.

— 3rd Lord: science, knowledge, wisdom, visions, premonitions, omens, divination, astrology, & related matters.

10th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: authority, honor, high rank, governance, career, profession. The mother according to Ibn Ezra.

— 2nd Lord: reputation, fame, dignity, bravery, boldness, style of action, ability to lead.

— 3rd Lord: the stability and endurance of one’s authority or fame, professions.

11th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: hopes, things given in trust, praise, commendations, recognition from others.

— 2nd Lord: friends, companions, allies, patrons.

— 3rd Lord: benefit or harm from friends or allies.

12th House Triplicity Lords:

— 1st Lord: secret enemies, sorrow, sadness, grief, poverty, fear, disgrace.

— 2nd Lord: imprisonment, fortune or misfortune, labor.

— 3rd Lord: large animals, enemies.

[sketchfanda]

Commission:Chestnut Stud:Jagua MILF

Jagua del Toro was quite a slice of paradise for being a resort on an island off the coast of some middle of nowhere third world country, but diamonds in the rough as they say. Especially when you had the hottest beaches and even hotter bitches and one such fine example of hotness was not having herself a good day. Now Cassandra Garcia was a woman of mature age, the kind of which certainly designated her as a high quality class grade MILF, and in experience she was more than used to having ups and downs but this was ridiculous!! The nerve of those bastards, whoever they were, stealing her swimsuit, her gearbag with her clothes, even her towel!! All while she had been taking a shower to boot, she swore to herself she’d hunt those thieving perverts down and make them suffer, she knew for damn sure they likely snuck some pictures and videos on their phones if they had any!!

But right now, she had to focus on maintaining her dignity, as she was currently ducking and weaving in between and among bushes and trees on the beach. Taking cover wherever and whenever she could, hands covering her most intimate parts, a challenge particularly with her quite sizeable boobies of course. She just had to leave her cellphone at home today or all days, damnit she’d even consider calling that damn trickster minx Maya for help even if it meant owing her a solid!! She felt like some damn stupid college kid having to run around streaking like this, if anyone saw her, her dignity and reputation would suffer!!

it didn’t help the tropical Caribbean quality air was making her exposed skin feel all tingly in certain places, blushing as she suppressed any urge to moan or shudder. Damn it all she didn’t need to start feeling horny now of all times, if she could just get her hands on a robe or towel at least then she’d be in the clear for some modesty. If even just a single brat saw her, she’d never live it down, the rumours alone that would spread would be severe especially when facts got distorted and context was removed. When lo and behold, the diner owner spotted an opportunity just for what she was looking for….

Just by another public showering area, where beach goers could go change in and out of swimwear and wash off the sand and saltwater, much like the stall she had been using prior, she saw a blonde babe departing from her own gearbag, no doubt to have a a swim or go soak some in some sun rays. Just the moment she needed, as the naked milf streaked on over just managing to escape any risk of being seen or caught as she began to open the bag and search it. All she needed was just a towel or robe, besides she doubted that girl’s clothes could fit her admittedly thicc, meaty frame. Only for Murphy’s law to pick a time to remind her what a bitch it could be right then and there as a shower stall door opened, a five foot bald runt in swimshorts stepping out, none other than a familiar face many of us all know….

Krillin::*Clad in his swimshorts,having just finished changing as he was emerging from the stall, unaware at the moment what he was about to witness.*”Hey babe sorry to keep you waiting, I-“*Whatever he was about to say went off the rails on his train of thought as his eyes bugged out, jaw dropping at the sight of naked woman who seemed to be trying to raid his wife’s beach bag. The lovely mrs.Garcia blushing, looking like a deer in the headlights as her worst nightmare seemed to be becoming a reality. Before either of them knew it, she was glaring at him as she charged and tackled him, shoving him back into the stall as she pinned him up against the wall, hand over his mouth to keep him from screaming.*

Cassandra:”Stay quiet or….or I’ll smother you with my breasts!!”*She couldn’t believe what she was saying, hell what was she even doing right now? She was naked in a beach shower stall with some random shorty, who caught her trying to steal, far as she knew, his wife or girlfriend’s stuff and this was now happening? Christ she knows Maya would never let her hear the end of this and live it down if word got out.*”you listen and you listen well to me, little man. I’m not having a very good day and I’m in serious need of cover so…so…”*Whatever the MILF was about to say as she explained herself to the man she had maybe a foot or just 8 inches over him, as she couldn’t help but notice the quite sizeable tent he was pitching in his swimshorts.*”…….Are you seriously hard right now?!!”

Now really she shouldn’t be surprised Krillin was getting a boner at this moment and time, he had a thicc, hot piece of ass alone in a confined space with him in all her naked pornographic glory after all. Last thing she had even wanted was to give this rando a show and yet any anger or Indignation was crumbling and giving away to a growing arousal the more she stared at it. Her body remembering how it’d been way too long since she had truly experienced and enjoyed the touch of a man, the primal thrill of raw, uninhibited no strings attached sex. Her pulse racing as her pussy quivered and gushed with need and thirst, soaking her thighs with slick, sticky warmth as her free hand was cupping and stroking that erection, all the while she was unaware she had pressed her tires up against his face, delivering on that smothering.

Before either of them knew it, she was kneeling on the floor, his shorts tugged down as she was stroking his cock, assaulting it with licks and kisses. Krillin groaning as this seemingly random naked hottie slobbered all over his shaft, the look of primal lust in her eyes as she gazed up at him making his spine tingle. One moment this woman was threatening him and the next, she was doing this, he was no stranger to this sort of experience but hot damn what a woman!! Specially as soon as she sandwiched his dick between those meaty marshmallows of hers and started stroking him off with a heavenly titfuck, sucking on the exposed tip whenever it came near those luscious lips of hers.

The pleasure of course was skyrocketing as those cute little puffy inverted nips of hers popped out, milk proceeding to gush from them as they added some flavourful lubrication to his length and girth. The short king feeling his mind go numb with ecstasy as his hands fidgeted about to grasp and grip Something, one hand grabbing the shower tap and turning it on, causing hot steamy water to spray and rain down on the lair. Which only served to fuel the growing spark of lust and passion between the pair, Cassandra gasping, panting and moaning as her pussy juices dribbled and flowed to mix with the shower water. Her arousal reaching such a level that she was soon performing intense fellatio on what was quite frankly, the biggest cock she had ever seen, lips latch around that slab of meat as she suffocated herself with deepthroating inch after inch of that beast.

Krillin had thought this woman had been intense before but the sight of this woman outright unhinging her jaw, pink glowing hearts of lust twinkling in her eyes as she bobbed her head like some lewd metronome. He couldn’t help but buck his hips, much to her horny delight as he proceeded to facefuck her, balls smacking her chin as she slobbered all over that jackhammering cock. Her pussy gushing like a waterfall at seeing those muscles of his lex and ripple, her brain becoming a borderline bitch in heat, as if growing a desire to have this compact Adonis mate and breed with her. Her neck swelling with a rising bulge from how deep that meat was getting as her pussy got an oral preview of what it could soon come to expect as her tastebuds dazzled with the taste of his pre on her tongue.

But of course Cassandra had found thst Krillin was as good at giving pleasure as he was at receiving it, as she was experiencing first hand while he was kneeling beside her. Suckling on her MILF tits, drinking uo her quite delicious milk while he probed her slit with his fingers, her nectar soaking up to his wrist. Coaxing deepthroated moans out of her lucious lips which not too long had sucking off his cock, pulse racing as he groped one tit with his free hand while sucking on the other, switching uo between the two. Her arousal skyrocketing as any doubts about this sudden act of spontaneous intimacy wwre further pushed away into the back of her mind, thinking nothing less than to want this short king to utterly destroy her.

But ooh once Krillin had finished warming her up and had his fill of her natural milk, she was finding her world being rocked to pieces, the walls and ceiling of the shower stall echoing with her moans and cries of lust. The heavy smack of skin slapping, primal and animalistic mating mixed with the splash of showe water as Cassandra was bent over and pressed up against the wall, Krillin jackhammering her from behind as he held her by the waist. Thrusting and pumping his cock away like the erotic jackhammer it was, grunting as he felt the tightness of the MILF’s pussy embracing his snatch with intimate desire. She was no virgin but tip it was clear that she had never taken anyone of his length and girth before and hit damn she was loving it, this feeling like she’d be ruined for other men from this point on!!!

Cassandra:”Yes yes yes yes!! Fuck me yku golden god of man! Destroy me so I never so much as think of another man!! Make me your brood mare!!”*The horny MILF hollered, among other such obscene dirty remarks when she could manage to form sentences as Krillin now took her in a mating press. The compact stud shiting between having his tongue dance with hers in a sloppy kiss or latching his mouth onto those meaty milktanks of hers as he had her bent like an accordion, plowing her lik an erotic butter churn. Cock plowing away into her greedy snatch as he splashing juices mixed eit the shower water going down the drain, those smooth heavy balls of his slapping her ass, making those twin booty cheeks jiggle and clap like jelly. She was so horny right now, she wouldn’t even mind Maya showing up and joining in, that’s just how good Krillin was giving it to her!!!*

Krillin had been with his share of horny women before, more so especially after marrying 18 and satisfying her personal quirky kink and some of those encounters had been as spontaneous and random such as finding this naked woman trying to go through his wife’s bag. But some of them had maybe at least half the level of sex drive Cassandra had, as she seemed intent on wanting him to use her to unleash a Kama sutras worth of positions. Currently enduring the force of her currently riding him cowgirl style, groping those bouncing titties and slapping that titanic booty as she was like a woman possessed. An expression of raw desire and lust adorning her sexy face as if she was driven to have her proclaimed golden god of a man not stop until it was guaranteed she would have a child from him.

Orgasm after orgasm, minutes passing into hour after hour to postion after postion, from prone bone to missionary and spread eagle to name a few of course. The amount of times she came too many to keep count whereas the times he would blow his load were few but relished with delight. The fact he was cumming inside her raw and bareback without a condom hardly a bother or a problem to her, if anything it would’ve felt wrong to her to have such a glorious cock be restrained with such insignificant rubber!! No an alpha male like this had to be enjoyed the proper way, mourning a bitch like herself to mate and breed!

Android 18 certainly stood by such a concept, as she secretly stood by the doorframe of the stall watching on with voyeuristic delight at seeing ankther sexy bitch enjoy the experience omly her husband could provide. One hand down the front of her thong and the other growing her tits with shameless abandon, waiting for the right moment to invite herself into this little soiree. She had wondered how and why Krillin had seemed to be delayed coming out of the changing rooms so imagjne her delight to come back and hear the familair sounds of her man being the natural born stud he was. Her arousal only increasing once she had a direct look inside, finding her hubby tapping quite the hot sexy piece of ass.

If Cassandra had been a horny bitch in heat before, it had only skyrocketed when 18 finally joined the fray, the fact she found herself getting it on with a married couple only making it all the swerter and spicier fo her. Eventually the trio laid together ina tangle of limbs, basking kn the afterglow as they recovered, ready to go again soon as they got their eager guy back. That is,in a more cozier, private and intimate setting lkke 18 and Krillin’s hotel room which they most certainly did, all night long and well into the sunset. That is after the short king and his golden goddess of a wife did a small favour for her on the way on over.

That being finding snd beating 7 shades of shit out of the thieving trolls who had swiped Cassandra’s bag and swimsuit, as well as taking their phones and deleting the pictures and videos. After 18 of course made and sent herself some copies, no reason to deny her Krillin some wet dream material for their eyes only after all. The MILF of course was only all too happy to express her gratitude as well as provide contact details with the lair, after all an encounter like this was too good to be a one time thing. Who knew such a brief bout of misfortune could lead to such unexpected but welcome delights?

Suffice to say, those who knew Cassandra Garcia personally Especially her employees at Boobters were a little puzzled and perturbed by the beaming smile and the distinct glow she was giving off. But hey who could blame her for feeling like she was walking on sunshine when she had the best sex of her goddamn life?!! Especially when she already had a date planned in mind with 18 and Krillin later on today, after all she wants to make the most of the time they’d be here during their vacation. As well as give them plenty of reason to make Jagua a go to destination for them, she didn’t want to be kept waiting too long for next chestnut fox after all, that little man was addictive…….