#Teahouse Tales

[sirenjose]

Teahouse Tales Analysis

Translations of the backstory (by Pascal): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1L_Lk5zmhuSHJMzS0ERV0jVHb-nWXgddwZJjT8oyJPmM/edit#

Translation of the event (by Pascal): https://docs.google.com/document/d/131Uuz69qVe6wJEOqnAx8LSWSdZyGUutg7kTd1zmNtUs/edit#

Teahouse Tales trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-_qrWTpzbs

Teahouse Tales was the 2nd anniversary event for the Chinese version of the game. The setting for this event is a teahouse run by the owner Lady Thirteen (Michiko). Besides going there to drink tea, secretly the main customers of this teahouse are those who have “committed” something. They come to this teahouse “without direction in life”, “at the end of their rope”, seeking “salvation” and “financial aid”. Lady Thirteen hears out what they have to say, and if she believes them, she may decide to help them. The reason they go to Lady Thirteen is because she controls the town’s “information lifeline” and there’s nothing “she doesn’t know” or “a person she can’t protect”.

To support her she has her assistants Flying Guillotine (Wu Chang) and Sparrow (Norton). Flying Guillotine is a former famed assassin who now serves as her head waiter. He takes orders at the teahouse but also is in charge of “some of the boss’ more fearsome transactions” (meaning he likely kills for her when she needs it).

Sparrow is her second waiter. His role is to gather information and act as a “silver tongue” (based on the trailer), as he is “a master in the slick and sly, skilled in observation and indirect questioning, digging out and analyzing information amidst merrymaking”.

People go there to drink tea, but the teahouse also secretly gives aid to those who’ve committed crimes and come asking for help from Lady Thirteen. Lady Thirteen knows everything, as she controls the town’s information lifeline. Regarding her helpers, Flying Guillotine helps Lady Thirteen maintain order and eliminate potential problems, while Sparrow is in charge of gathering information. The player comes to the teahouse because they need her help with the photo album they have (of all their memories of the Manor). In return for helping with the photo album, Lady Thirteen asks the player to  do a job for her: check gift boxes for poisonous gifts and help identify a traitor planning a “rebellion” against her.

One note about this event is that, depending on the choices you make during the event (based on the answers you give to questions you’re asked), you can get 1 of 2 endings: one where you side with Flying Guillotine, and the other where you side with Lady Thirteen.

After reading through the events and both endings several times, I believe there is for the most part only 1 timeline, with the events being given to us out of order and scattered about. The 2 endings aren’t mutually exclusive (Lady Thirteen’s ending occurs some time before Flying Guillotine’s ending). Each little bit of the event we get helps to fill a hole in the story we read in “Bone-Eating Gift”.

Bone-Eating Gift begins with Lady Thirteen having the player help her out by checking for poisonous gifts in return for assisting with their photo album. On Day 2, the player asks Lady Thirteen why she picked them to help her. She explains it’s because they are a “no-strings attached” outsider. They’re fresh, not familiar with anyone or anything at the teahouse, unbiased (at least for now), and only care about getting the photo album, thus making them the most suitable person to find the traitor for her. It also may be possible she has the player checking giftboxes as a way of testing the reaction of others at the teahouse (to further help her discover who the traitor is). The very next day, as a result of their talk with Lady Thirteen, it’s mentioned that the people at the Teahouse look at the player differently, while Sparrow and Jade Dew (Emily) notably keeping their distance from the player.

Day 4 has the player mention to Lady Thirteen that she should pay attention to Sparrow, because he’s been “acting odd” recently. This question makes Lady Thirteen unhappy, as she gives the player a “distasteful” look, before stating “He has remained by my side for a long time; He will not betray me”. The day after, the player is talking to Flying Guillotine who warns the player about Lady Thirteen and about how they should be careful about trusting her, before pointing out a window “at the child kneeling in the cold, wet snow”.

On Day 6, it’s mentioned today is Lady Thirteen’s birthday, and Sparrow thinks it’s a good day for lighting fireworks. The player asks if he’ll wish Lady Thirteen a happy birthday, but he says “No need, she just needs to know I’m here”.

The final day of Bone-Eating Gift brings up the fact Lady Thirteen is investigating Silver Steed (Freddy). She also gives the player their photo album before telling them “you and I both have what we want; and with this, you have my thanks”.

In the ending where you side with Flying Guillotine, we learn from Jade Dew about Flying Guillotine’s past, and why he wants revenge on Lady Thirteen. “The noble son of aristocrats studying abroad, who suffered until his family was broken and people had died. And every last part of it was because of Lady Thirteen; because of her ‘trade’”. Later, with the help of the player (they don’t really seem to directly help out. They just seem to support Flying Guillotine and not help Lady Thirteen) and Jade Dew, who gives Flying Guillotine a gun, Flying Guillotine kills Lady Thirteen.

In the ending where you side with Lady Thirteen, it starts with Bohea (Mike) asking Sparrow about where to put some goods, though they freeze when the player enters the room. Sparrow tells the player not to worry (about what he was doing), but when the player asks if they were doing some kind of business, he smiles and “put up a finger and shushed: ‘You must keep this private’”. After this (at this time, it’s said that the player is watching fireworks), it’s said that the player gets Sparrow in trouble: “I knew of business, but not how to do it, and I got discovered; Sparrow was punished for it”. The player feels guilty for getting him punished, but Sparrow tells them not to feel bad, “Lady Thirteen is my biggest benefactor. This job really is my responsibility, too” and says just to stand by their side next time.

Later, Sparrow tells the player not to sleep in “because of unnecessary questions” before saying they should go deliver refreshments to Lady Thirteen. Right after, he says “I believe she might be in danger” (the “Drops of water leaking from the roof ran down his neck” might actually be sweat, potentially to show he’s nervous). With Lady Thirteen, we find her with Silver Steed (Freddy), who’s apparently been beaten and dealt with harshly. Sparrow at this time is described as indifferent to him and what’s going on.  Lady Thirteen says she’s trusted Silver Steed, but apparently he’s “gone and palmed off” Lady Thirteen’s goods, which is the reason for his current miserable state. She takes a stack of deeds from Sparrow, before saying to Silver Steed, “These are all your worldly possessions. Oh, not only that, but I just remembered. Your wife is newly pregnant, isn’t she?”. This apparently breaks Silver Steed and makes him freak out. He says he’ll talk, but before he finishes speaking, he’s shot and killed.

Now that I’ve summarized all of that, let me talk about what I think happened.

I’ll start with the beginning of Lady Thirteen’s ending, where the player finds Sparrow and Bohea talking about goods of some sort that Sparrows says is a “private” matter. Sparrow’s actions and behavior in this scene, especially since he doesn’t explain himself and he’s already been keeping his distance from the player, should be the reason why the player brings up to Lady Thirteen that Sparrow is acting “odd” and that she should keep an eye on him. The reason why they tell Lady Thirteen to be wary of him stems from Lady Thirteen assigning the player to help her identify the “traitor” at the teahouse.

Regarding the goods that Sparrow and Bohea had been handling, I believe these goods were for Lady Thirteen’s birthday. The reason why it was “private” is likely because he was trying to plan a party for her without her knowing. That’s why he didn’t want to tell the player what he was doing. It also fits considering soon after these events we hear about Lady Thirteen’s birthday. Things Unfortunately, things don’t go well for Sparrow and his plan after the player tells Lady Thirteen that Sparrow is suspicious, as this leads to him being “punished”.

Remember that one day mentioned a child kneeling out in the snow?  

That was Sparrow.

Poor Sparrow is betrayed by the player and punished by Lady Thirteen all because he was trying to plan a surprise birthday party for Lady Thirteen.

This is likely why he tells the player he isn’t going to wish Lady Thirteen a happy birthday, and why her simply knowing he is here is good enough. He had just been punished by Lady Thirteen due to being suspected of being the traitor because of the player’s comments about him. We know Sparrow isn’t the traitor as he’s described as being completely loyal to Lady Thirteen. Lady Thirteen reflects these same feelings about Sparrow when she talks about him. Even though Lady Thirteen knows he would never betray her and that he isn’t the traitor, she is forced to punish him anyways to keep up appearances for the real traitor, to seem unbiased and on guard. Sparrow, because he is so loyal, accepts this and appears unbothered, with his only desire to help her out however he can. If Sparrow were to wish her happy birthday right after his punishment, it would ruin the image she’s trying to display to everyone and hinder her attempts to find the real traitor.

From her “distasteful” expression we know she was just as unhappy about having to punish him, but also aware that she now didn’t have a choice.

This scene explains the part when it says the player was “discovered” (aka they made a mistake) and Sparrow was punished. The mistake was the player suggesting that Sparrow was the traitor because they thought Sparrow was suspicious from whatever he was doing with the goods. The punishment was where we see Sparrow (the “child”) kneeling out in the cold ice and snow. Bohea was likely helping Sparrow out because he is the kind of person who wants to make people “smile” and “a rowdy crowd always makes him forget his fears”. Mike is a happy person who likes having fun, so it’s not surprising he'd be willing to help Sparrow plan a birthday party.

Switching now to Flying Guillotine’s ending, the beginning of this ending, where Flying Guillotine asks for the player’s help to get his revenge, occurs before Lady Thirteen’s birthday. One part I want to discuss is when Flying Guillotine says “Silver Steed has been discovered”. This comes after Lady Thirteen finishes her “speech” at her birthday celebration (and after Jade Dew gives Flying Guillotine a gun). Silver Steed being “discovered” should refer to the scene during lady Thirteen’s ending, where she kills Silver Steed for betraying her. This may refer to Silver Steed’s body being discovered from the Lady Thirteen ending, when he is killed for betraying her.

Silver Steed was also mentioned at the end of “Bone-eating Gift” on Day 7, which is the same scene Lady Thirteen gives the player the photo album and says “you and I both have what we want”. If Lady Thirteen has what she wants, this should refer to her goal of discovering the traitor, and relate to the “business” she is said to have with Silver Steed that day. Therefore, this implies that Bone-Eating Gift Day 7 happens before Lady Thirteen’s ending, after which is Flying Guillotine’s ending. This also implies the player didn’t leave immediately after getting the photo album, potentially staying at least long enough for the Lady Thirteen’s birthday.

So Silver Steed is killed before Lady Thirteen’s speech and before Flying Guillotine kills Lady Thirteen. If these 2 scenes happen near in time to each other, this could also mean that when Sparrow says he thinks Lady Thirteen is in “danger”, he’s sensing Flying Guillotine is getting reading to carry out his revenge and kill Lady Thirteen. This could also mean those “fireworks” were for Lady Thirteen’s party, and the “refreshments” he was brining to her were also from the party.

If Sparrow was at least in the previous scene when Silver Steed is killed, that means he is still alive and somewhere at the party. But the fact that we don’t hear about him at all afterwards, or anywhere in Flying Guillotine’s ending. I don’t think Flying Guillotine would’ve killed Sparrow. His only target was Lady Thirteen, the one he deemed guilty of killing his family, so he could fulfill his revenge. I don’t think he would’ve done anything to Sparrow once he accomplished what he wanted to do. But from there, we don’t really know what happens to Sparrow after Lady Thirteen is killed.

It's also possible, based on Silver Steed’s description (“What can compare? The gold clutched in your hand; is there anything more valuable?”) plus Freddy’s background that Silver Steed may have been involved if not mostly responsible for whatever led to Flying Guillotine’s family dying. It’s mentioned that Lady Thirteen’s “trade” is what caused it to happen. And if you compare this and the outcome to Freddy’s background, where he tricks Leo to buy a debt-ridden factory so he could take Martha from him and eliminate Leo (not to mention Leo and Martha both die, while Emma is orphaned), it fits really well with what happens to Lady Thirteen. Leo would be like Flying Guillotine’s family, regarding them getting a bad trade and getting killed as a result, with Flying Guillotine being similar to Emma since he, like Emma, is all alone now (Sparrow is similarly left all alone like Emma after Lady Thirteen is killed). Silver Steed being taken out by Lady Thirteen could relate to Freddy being taken out by Leo in the diaries.

From various bits during the event, I think Lady Thirteen may have known about Flying Guillotine and his desire to kill her for revenge. She likely knew why as well, which may have been part of the reason she had Silver Steed killed. She should’ve known about the “trade” that got his family killed, and if she finally learned that Silver Steed was the “traitor” that got them murdered,  she likely wanted to eliminate him as a way to try to get revenge for Flying Guillotine’s family. Lady Thirteen is also continuously mentioned to know everything. Therefore, there’s a chance she knew Flying Guillotine was coming to kill her. She may have even let him do it. Maybe it was another way to make it up to him (help him end his suffering over his family’s death by letting him carry out his revenge).

During the “Sixth Tale”, it mentions Lady Thirteen has a photograph of everyone from the teahouse. The idea of a “family” is important to her. “On Lady Thirteen’s face hung a smile. ‘Not a single victory happens without relying on those by your side’”. Based on this, it’s possible that Lady Thirteen cared about Flying Guillotine as well, even though she likely knew he wanted her dead, and maybe that was part of the reason why she may have let him kill her (it depends on how involved she really was in his family’s death, and thus maybe she wanted to make up for her mistake).

To Lady Thirteen, the real “traitor” was likely Silver Steed, and she got what she wanted by killing him, but she likely also knew Flying Guillotine was the one who wanted to murder her for revenge. If she knew her death was coming, maybe she tried to send Sparrow away. Unfortunately, it’s probably more likely that Sparrow was around when she died, especially with how loyal he was to her and how much he cared about her. He may have even ended up having to watch his adopted mother get murdered right before his eyes.

I’m going to talk about Lady Thirteen a little bit.

In the backstory for Teahouse tales, it’s mentioned this teahouse is located in a Chinatown in Europe. This goes with Lady Thirteen’s skin description which describes her as a “foreign beauty”, referencing how Lady Thirteen isn’t from Europe. Her design notes also specifically refer to her as a “Far Eastern beauty”. This matches with her backstory, as we know she’s from Japan. Specifically, from her 1st deduction, her hometown was likely Eversleeping Town.

Michiko’s Deduction 1

Hometown: This is the last stop for our ancestors and the starting point for our journey.

A diary: Before entering, I called it Forever Sleep Town. Those moving objects really catch your eye on in those quiet, sleepy streets.

Sometime after this, 1 of her backstories from her release references she became the “best dancer in Yoshiwara”. Based on deduction 3 (and her backstory), we know she meets Miles at a banquet, after which they get married and he takes her back to his hometown. Considering Mr. Donnelly is at Lakeside, and Lakeside is near the manor, this likely confirms Miles’ hometown was in England. This fits with how the teahouse was stated to be in Europe and how Lady Thirteen is referred to as a foreigner.

Going back to the design notes for Lady Thirteen, it specifies that the purpose for her teahouse is for her own survival as well as to “protect those like her, her compatriots staying abroad, defenseless, while also collecting valuable information to exchange”. Lady Thirteen was far from home, all on her own, without any friends or support. She initially created this teahouse as a way to ensure she could make ends meet and ensure she could survive. But she began meeting others like her, who were potentially people also from the far east, and she sympathized with them due to her own circumstances. That’s when she decided to utilize the teahouse as a method to gather information, which she could use to help those that came to her for aid (meaning she likely used the info both for the sake of knowledge to help those wanting salvation, but also to improve her own finances which she could then give to those asking for financial help).

Due to being on her own in a foreign land from the far east, she had to become vicious to endure the foreign environment. This fits with her skin description, which talks about “the only way” to keep herself safe was by using other people: “For a beautiful woman who lived in a foreign country, perhaps the only way for her to keep herself safe... is to obtain sufficient leverage on people. Lady Thirteen always said, ‘Kindness alone withers the roses. Only the valuable nutrients will keep roses alive’”.

She wanted to ensure she wouldn’t get trampled upon by those who’d look down on her for who she was, and as a result of constantly socializing and working with people who aren’t always truthful or don’t always have the best intentions. As we see in her design notes, “in the world of Chinatown, no man dares overthrow her dynasty”. Lady Thirteen succeeded in building up her image as a “venomous woman, all snake fangs and scorpion’s sting”, “flirtatious”, “a manipulator, one who kills decisively”, “unyielding”, “clever and resourceful, ruthless, but never losing her kindness”. This allowed her “dynasty” to be protected for some amount of time.

Until Flying Guillotine starts planning his revenge.

If Lady Thirteen was killed due to Flying Guillotine wrongly believing she was the reason his entire family died, this could relate back to Michiko’s backstory. In her backstory, Miles’ father Mr. Donnelly really hates Michiko (similar to how Flying Guillotine really hates Lady Thirteen). After Miles has to leave for India on a business trip (he’s an army officer according to Michiko’s backstory), Mr. Donnely uses that chance to murder Michiko and then hide her body. When Miles returns, his father lies and insists that Michiko had eloped with a servant and stole some of the family’s property, though Miles doesn’t believe this. This can parallel the rumor that Lady Thirteen was the reason all of Flying Guillotine’s family had died.

Speaking of Lady Thirteen being killed, I want to briefly discuss the snake hairpin that she has in her hair in the Teahouse Tales poster.

The reason I want to draw attention to it comes from how this same hairpin can be seen during the Teahouse Tales trailer alongside Flying Guillotine.

The hairpin appearing next to Flying Guillotine while talking about a “conspiracy” to “end an era” is meant to further represent how Flying Guillotine is the one starting a “rebellion” and planning to assassinate Lady Thirteen.

We know Flying Guillotine was indeed forming a “rebellion” based on the various mentions of all those he is likely working. The first and most obvious is Jade Dew from his ending, who is literally the one to give him the gun and comments “looks like the plan was a success” with a “cheery smile”. Then there’s potentially Silver Steed (even though he may have been the one actually responsible for Flying Guillotine’s family dying, it’s possible Flying Guillotine didn’t know this, and it’s possible Silver Steed intended to betray him later) and Lantsang, who Flying Guillotine tells the player to find for him and let her know “Silver Steed has been discovered”.

This hairpin being used to symbolize her being killed also parallels Michiko’s backstory. Specifically, it fits with her deduction 5, which mentions a “hatpin”, which was likely the object Mr. Donnelly used to kill Michiko after Miles had left for India.

Michiko’s Deduction 5

Feelings: This is a completely different kingdom. The women wear exaggerated hats.

Buckle Hatpin: A delicate butterfly hatpin. It is 6 inches long and has a very sharp tip.

This seems to be confirmed by her deduction 9, which once again references the hatpin at the same time as mentioning a “grudge” and how “he must know”.

Michiko’s Deduction 9

Grudge: Unrequited love, endless complaints.

A diary: He really doesn't know anything? No, that hatpin... he must know. He has to know.

On to comparing Sparrow to Norton.

A one-word summary about Sparrow is that he is a good boy that’s completely loyal to Lady Thirteen.

Yes, Sparrow does watch Lady Thirteen kill people and isn’t bothered by it, but for the most part otherwise, he is a good kid. At the very least, Sparrow never kills anyone himself, and everything he does is for Lady Thirteen. Yes, she’s said to be ruthless, but it also mentions during the “Second Tale” (from the anecdotes or “Tales Proven” according to the translation) that she is still capable of mercy: “A beauty who kills decisively and ruthlessly, but in her hidden depths one catches a glimpse of rare mercy”. Therefore I don’t think she’s completely evil, which is backed up by her design notes which state: “ever and resourceful, ruthless but never losing her kindness, in the eyes of the people, she had long surpassed such descriptors as good and evil”. As such, I don’t think Sparrow would be completely evil either for following her. In any case, Sparrow being a good boy could parallel how Norton really is, despite how he seems in his deductions. At the very least, it could be referring to how he used to be before his parents died and/or before he went to the 13 mines. He, like Sparrow, never directly killed anyone, though his actions (or lack of action in the case of Sparrow at the teahouse) due lead to people dying.

Sparrow is also described as loyal. This can combine with how he’s described in that “Second Tale” I mentioned earlier: “Sparrow may be a master of cunning, but to those he cherishes, he is sincere and pure”. To me, that sounds like Norton is the kind of person who has a small, but close-knit group of friends (kind of like the ones introverts have) vs. other people who are more the type to have large groups of friends. Him being sincere and pure to those he cares about can also be a mirror for Norton and how he is. We might be able to see this with Ronald and Inference in Golden Rose Theater. Ronald, like Norton and how he acts in his official tweet responses, isn’t the type to really form relationships. He is mostly a loner that pushes people away when they try to get too close, and tends to avoid social interactions whenever he can. But Ronald apparently does see Inference as a friend (and he is mentioned to really trust the Detective and describes him as one of the only 2 “good” people in his mind).

There’s also the strong bond between Sparrow and Lady Thirteen. This could be a hint towards how Norton felt about his parents before they died. That may also maybe explain why he is so extreme in his deductions and acts the way he does, because losing them hurt him so badly. Just like how much it likely hurt for Sparrow when he found Lady Thirteen dead, and just like Ronald felt when he had to deal with the death of his father.

The fact Sparrow and Ronald both lose a parental figure may help imply Norton himself lost his parents at an early age. The fact Lady Thirteen and Ronald’s father were both betrayed and essentially murdered, and it was by someone they were close to, could hint towards what happened to Norton’s parents. Someone close to them, that they trusted, betrayed them and got them killed. The only person we know related to Norton’s parents is Benny. If Benny is essentially represented by Scrooge in Golden Theater and Marshall in Season 10 Essence 1 (the essence with Andrew’s Desolate Sands skin, specifically based on the description for Gold Digger in the Chinese version), not to mention what we know about Benny and his strong desire of “returning to the mine” to find gold, it could be a way of hinting that Benny caused Norton’s parents to get killed for a reason related to that and/or to his greed.

Sparrow is constantly described as being smart: with how he constantly watches the player (being on guard until he finds out more about them, and/or just making sure to watch out for Lady Thirteen to guarantee the player doesn’t do anything to harm her), how he’s described as having “day-to-day sharpness and slick wit”, being called a “master of cunning”, being the one in charge of gathering information, etc… This links to Norton being quite smart himself. It’s related to his willingness to learn, his desire to improve his skill and ability, eagerness to learn new techniques, etc… That was why in the letters of recommendation he’s mentioned to not stay with any one employer or place for very long. He’s getting different experiences, so he’d learn more things and be better at his job (and at mining). Then there’s also how he had to be incredibly smart and talented to be able to utilize magnetic prospecting after Norton changed from being a miner to a geological prospector (after getting the meteorite chunks which he made into his magnets)

The fact Sparrow looks innocent and childlike, but in fact uses this advantage to gather information (make people drop their guard with him, get them willing to talk to him or talk more than they would otherwise) is similar to how Ronald in the Golden Rose Theater gathers information as well (to use against Scrooge so he can get revenge and also so he can become the owner). This relates to how Norton is a good actor. He’s good at pretending, getting people to see him a certain way, and good at hiding his true intentions and how he’s really like (someone who doesn’t like social interaction or making relationships, a loner, someone desperate to change his fate, etc…). The character relations page even references this when it talks about how Norton trying to gather information from the old miners in hospice and how he managed to swindle Benny of the list of 13 mines.

Finally, there’s also how Sparrow is described as “listless” during the scene Lady Thirteen kills Silver Steed.

Listless means: having or showing little or no interest in anything; languid; spiritless; indifferent. I think this may be a good description for how Norton normally is, especially if you think about some of the tweet responses he gives that are a bit darker than his other, happier ones. It could also relate to how Norton is after the accident. He was traumatized by the entire thing, to the point he desperately wants to avoid the “darkness of the mine” and changes his job to geological prospector just to keep from having to go back into the mines. He’s guilty over the deaths of the miners (which his Soul Catcher skin hints at, as well as how in at least 1 of his tweet responses he mentions “don’t forget” in regards to the Golden Cave), which is why he’s somewhat self-destructive (the fact he smiles when you down him in game, meaning he seems to be happy about possibly dying or suffering). Basically, the accident really changed him, leaving him in a state you could describe as “spiritless” or “indifferent”.

These descriptions can apply to Norton in general too. He essentially doesn’t really care about anyone, which also relates to how he pushes people away, avoids social interactions, and is pretty much “indifferent” and shows “no interest” in a lot of things, except for himself and changing his fate.

To go to Sparrow’s skin description, it states how he’s never been shown kindness. This sounds similar to what we see in the Famitsu article. This article talks about how, before Norton went to the 13 mines, people were intimidated by him and how hard he worked to escape his fate. Then it goes into how, after the accident, people didn’t comfort him and actually avoided him, despite how he was currently in the hospital recovering from the injuries he received as result of the accident. Then there’s how Norton is a miner. They were treated horribly back in those days (essentially just like slaves) and working conditions were incredibly bad (there was a really high chance of dying on the job, and owners didn’t care about spending money on protections, health, or safety). Not to mention they were pretty much paid next to nothing, so Norton, especially since his parents had died and left him alone, was really poor. Basically, Norton has lived a tough life just like Sparrow.

About the other parts of the skin description, Sparrow having to blend into the adults’ world relates to Norton having to grow up (and mature) quickly after his parents died. With them gone (and at an early age too), he had to learn to take care of himself. He had to get a job to get food and some shelter, and as a miner he also had to deal with horrible conditions, a horrible environment, and horrible people. And all of this he had to do on his own.

Regarding Sparrow learning to disguise himself, this goes back to Norton (and Ronald) being “actors”. They pretend. They act a certain way around people and they don’t really show their true selves (not to mention they keep people away mostly, while Ronald literally wears a mask). Based on Sparrow’s description, learning to disguise himself seems to have been necessary for his survival (the same way Lady Thirteen had to according to her design notes), so its likely that Norton had to learn to do the same for the same reason.

Moving on to another thing I want to take note of, for Sparrow’s skin, I want to mention how his magnets actually have a message written on them.

The left one is “smooth sailing”. This is an idiom that means “to have a pleasant journey”.

The right one is “may you invite fortune and become more and more treasure”. This is another idiom that means “we wish you success and riches”.

Both are the sorts of things Sparrow would wish for himself (and for Lady Thirteen).

For the first one about “smooth sailing”, this relates to one of his deductions that talks about not being unlucky forever. Smooth sailing can also relate to Norton’s goal, to change his fate and have a more “pleasant journey” than the one he currently has. Pleasant meaning he doesn’t need to work at a job where he’s paid extremely little despite working so much, where he has to risk his life everyday surrounded by people who only care about themselves, and working for employers who only care about money and not at all for their employees. A journey where he doesn’t need to worry about whether he’ll live to see tomorrow or have enough food on his table.

For the second idiom that says “may you invite fortune and become more and more treasure”, this obviously relates to what Norton wants, meaning his desire to change his fate and acquire wealth. It could also specifically relate to how the 13th mine is his last hope and to his wish to find gold there.

Another note about Sparrow’s lion hat is that (in Chinese) it might be a symbol for driving away evil or bad energy/spirits, famines, and plagues. Basically, it protects people and things from threats and harm (or from spiritual influences), and may also bring good fortune.

A symbol for driving away evil (spirits) could relate to Norton and him being affected by the meteorite. The good fortune bit again relates to Norton’s desire to change his fate and acquire wealth. For Sparrow, this might mean he’s hoping to protect Lady Thirteen, kind of like how in that one part of Lady Thirteen’s ending he comments on Lady Thirteen being in danger. This could also mean that Norton is good at noticing things and has good instincts.

The very last thing I’ll point out to go with Sparrow being loyal to Lady Thirteen is how we can see in one of the posters for the event that Norton signed his name on a contract (of sale I think?).

This could be the scene when Sparrow first joined Lady Thirteen. It could be a way for Sparrow to prove his loyalty. It may also relate to how Lady Thirteen essentially adopted Sparrow (after she found him, whenever that was).

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[kainereee]

If I'm dead to you, why are you at the wake? ( a commission I did for someone a while ago! )

#idv #identity v #idv fanart #identity v wu chang #idv wu chang #xie bian #identity v michiko #idv michiko #identity v geisha #idv geisha #teahouse tales fucking broke me #toxic straight people

[oletus-hullabaloo]

🫖 What’s it like in the tea house?

🫖 BOHEA HAS RECEIVED YOUR LETTER! 🫖

Bohea was in a back room of the teahouse, applying the last strokes of his chou makeup. Even though the venue was no proper opera house, it brought him comfort to have the familiarity of a mask or some covering on his face. The customers all enjoyed him more when he was fulfilling that role, anyway.

Why would they want to see him for who he was?

He was the lowly clown, and always would be - the smiles of the customers were all he needed to keep himself happy. His own elation stemmed from that of the crowd, so a job like that suited him just fine. Lady Thirteen hadn't found reason to scold him yet, which was the best he could hope for in that environment.

A knock at the door caused him to fumble, dropping the brush in his hand and blotting makeup onto his shirt. He frowned for the first time in an age, wiping frustratedly at it with one hand as he stood to pick up the paper that'd been slid beneath the frame.

He scanned the paper quickly, setting down his brush in favour of a pencil at the desk.

"You'd really find me boring to ask, dear sender, but the teahouse is a lovely place. I couldn't ask for anything more fulfilling than a place in this stage... I doubt I'll be performing in any major roles any time soon, though that hardly matters.

The mere sight of Lady Thirteen is enough to draw more people forth, and that means I get to entertain truly devoted crowds when she's about. I'm just a silly clown, but it's rather comfortable. Acrobatics and such are my strong suit, you see.

All I could wish for is a smile.

Why don't you come and visit? Even if I'm not around, you'd certainly be in for a treat. Do mind the displays, however, because you'll have to pay for whatever you break. Some of those teapots are worth more than I've ever seen in my lifetime...

Be well, and remember - you'll always have a friend at the teahouse. Just ask after "Bohea" and I'll be by your side."

#🫖 teahouse tales / bohea 🫖 #🎪 hullabaloo hijinks / ask answered 🎪 #identity v #idv #idv askblog #mike morton #idv mike

[shibaraki]

IF TIDES COULD SPEAK (THEY’D CALL YOU HOME) ┊ BAKUGO KATSUKI

synopsis: an unlikely hero comes in the form of a barbarian. your stolen pelt is returned by his hand— but for a selkie that is more than simple kindness. it is a proposal.

tags: AFAB reader (referred to as a 'wife' once + 'baby' a few times), fantasy au, barbarian bakugo (+ the squad), selkie reader, brief non graphic suicide attempt, minor injuries, previous forced marriage + captivity, strangers to friends to lovers, accidental marriage + bond, magic elements, bathing together, sharing a bed, miscommunication, love as a choice, getting together, shapeshifters, angst + fluff, eventual smut, bakugo carries reader (he’s strong!!), oral + fingering (reader receiving), unprotected vaginal sex

wc: 25K+

↳ for the mermay collab hosted by the teahouse server ↰

The battle rages on behind as your bare feet carry you frantically toward the cliff side, incognisant to the uneven earth and jagged rocks cutting under your heels. 

A magnificent orange glow is cast across the land. Blistering heat radiates at your back and seeps through the thin robes pulled across your shoulders. Fire eats away at the canopy above, at the dry grass in the gardens, at the place you deign to call home. 

It is a sight you wish you had more time to savour. A draconic clan hailing from the north had descended upon the land and sought to reap the riches for themselves. The anguished screams of your once wretched husband still echo in your heart, dancing through its chambers like wind through chimes. 

You fled with only one destination in mind. 

Many, many moons ago, you had been stolen away by greed. A man that called himself king yet acted anything but kingly. Lord only in name. He speared your pod mate and took you, dirty calloused fingers sinking into your flesh, violently tearing the pelt from your back. Nausea churns in your stomach as you recall his grin, eyeing you greedily, desiring servitude that was not his to have. 

“You are to be my wife,” he said, drunk on tales of rare creatures who would keep a hearth burning and bear his children if only he stole their hide. “Now you belong to me”. 

Your pelt remained locked away in an armoured vault along with his other opulent treasures— goods that would now be burning, turned to ash. He had finally taken from the wrong people and must reap the consequences. 

You are so relieved to be free of his clutches that there is no time to grieve the loss. This is your chance. With or without your pelt you are a selkie, and the ocean always welcomes her children home. 

Guided by the tides' tumultuous song you sprint through the woods, treeline funnelling out on a plateau to reveal the edge of the cliff. You take a staggered breath, wincing at the pain in your chest. Now your momentum has slowed to a stop, the fatigue catches up with you. An ache seeps through your legs and your knees threaten to buckle as you shiver. 

This is it, you think. You watch the waves below roll like dark ribbon. Steeling your resolve you spread your arms as far as they go, until the sinew holding your back pulls taut. Something acrid sinks in your gut and you feel distinctly ill. It takes all of your willpower to deny the fear pounding in your body as you step forward. 

The wind billowed around you, swaying your human form towards the edge. Faux wings spread and a roar pushed to the limits of your small voice, sound whipped from your mouth and cast far asea. Eyes squeezed shut, you tip into the oncoming depths trusting your mother will catch you. 

The sound is cacophonous. Not even your pulse can be heard over the waves; elemental fingers apply sharp pressure to the north and south of your body, shaping flesh until you're nothing but a pebble caught in gravity's path.

If you should concentrate you’d hear a frantic shout through the white noise. And between the milliseconds left before bone collides with the tide, a large clawed foot encircles your forearm. A rush of air swells in your lungs as you try to scream, the abrupt disruption of your freefall forcing your shoulder from its socket, talons tearing through capillaries as if your skin were wet paper. 

Suddenly, you’re a sail without a mast, rippling over the open ocean. Dark and cloudless, not a speck on the surface. The spray is icy against your ankles, a million papercut kisses. In the mirage, you can see fleeting reflections. The silhouette of a dragon mid-flight. 

You’ve no memory of hitting the sand or being carried along the shoreline. Your consciousness dips and peaks. The few times you come to are when your body is being jostled, a blurred figure looming above and unrecognisable. In one breath they are washing your wounds with water poured from a wineskin, the next you are flinching away from salve covered fingers as they poke and prod to stem the bleeding.

Warmth is the first thing on your mind as you wake. With a sudden gasp for air, all the exhilaration and adrenaline hits you as if your soul had been caught, suspended in that moment. Phantom touches skim the length of your spine and all at once you are overwhelmingly aware of your body. 

The sharp noise startles a figure in your periphery. 

“Back in the land of the living, huh?” 

A broad, bare chested man sits at your bedside with his arms crossed tight and pillowed in his lap. There’s a single delicate braid by his ear, longer than his short-spiked hair and dangled loosely beneath his jaw. You’d find him beautiful if not for the searing glare. 

“That was a fucking stupid thing you did back there,” he snarls. Brusque and overfamiliar. When you don’t respond he continues, “What’ve you got to say for yourself?”

You shrink back. 

There’s an awful pinch in his brow. Concern seems to be superseding what was a show of honest anger. Dimly lit by a few oil lamps, from what you can ascertain there is no one else in the room but you two. Inhaling the residuals of healing magic you find that your throat is unbearably dry, tongue stuck to the back of your teeth. How long have you been asleep?

You couldn’t find a voice to ask, exhaling a pathetic whine. The silence provides a window of opportunity for him to further scold you yet he doesn’t take it, fuming as he recedes into his chair. “Don’t need to act so fucking skittish. M’not here to hurt you,” he exhales hard through his nose, reaches out and leaves his hand upturned on the edge of the bed. “Alright?” 

Something draws you to this stranger. Inexorable, like the pull of the tide. You accept his proffered palm and it feels unsettlingly familiar. The skin is rough, battle worn and hot. Slowly, your fingers intertwine, and you see fair hair on the back of his knuckles. 

Disorientation, loss and anxiety err on the edge of your consciousness. The lamp above his head gives him a warm hued crown, highlighting strands of gold. You can feel sleep weighing on your eyelids but you don’t yet want to look away. “Whatever,” his mouth sets into a frown. “Get some more rest or I’ll knock you out myself”.

When you come to the sun has risen and filters into the room in thin streams of light. Dust fairies dance around the bed. You squint as your vision sharpens, a dull throb reverberating through your skull. 

You look at your body first, arm well bandaged and the rest of you bruised tender like an old peach. The wounds throb in time with your pulse when you shift, reminding you that they’re there as your thin clothing brushes against them with little movement. All you can remember is falling. How the waves had careened up the cliff side to catch you, only to have you snatched out of reach once again. 

Wherever you are now it is obviously far from your Lord’s grasp. He has never bothered to take you to a healer. You are in a private office, tucked into a bed with soft blue sheets. The shelves are stocked with various medicines, salves, and analgesics. Herbs and chopped petals are stuffed in glass jars labelled with messy penmanship you can’t decipher. A metronome sits on the nearby wooden desk, ticking back and forth, filling the silence until the door is pushed open. 

Whoever enters is trying to be careful. You can tell by how slowly they turn the handle and pause at every little complaint the hinges give. Their hair is green, richer than the later weeks in spring, with loose waves that bounce as they move. You watch wearily while they move through the space, humming under their breath and picking up a notebook from one of the desk drawers. 

The healer, you presume, pinches the end ball on the metronome and brings it to a stand still. He hushes it as though it were an unruly child before turning on his heels toward you—

And immediately screeching as your eyes meet. 

Loud enough for the entire country to hear, his abrupt shout seems to alert others in the building, causing a gaggle of people to burst their way into the room. A metallic tang fills your senses; magic ready, the man that sat brutish yet kind at your bedside wields explosive sparks in the palm of his hands, adorning chains with carved talons and beads and asymmetrical armour strapped to his left bicep beneath a red fur lined cloak. 

“What is it, Deku?!” 

You offer wordless gratitude to the final dregs of sedatives in your system. You barely flinch at the hostility in his voice, time seemingly slowed as your gaze drags to the companions at his back. First a woman doused in pink. And like the sun, her face glows the rich ochre of dawn, framed by silky salmon toned curls. There are horns protruding from the top of her head, bending like the junction of a tree branch. 

Beside her is a large man. Red, red, red. Bright eyes split with a reptilian slitted pupil. Crimson hair styled into sharp spikes. He’s built like a warrior, tall enough to swallow most of the doorway, yet you feel no true fear when you look at him. Something innate in your gut tells you this is a kindred spirit. Energies aligned, you think he must be a shifter of some kind too. He locks onto you first, his alarmed expression smoothing into a wide toothed grin. 

Last are two men who have managed to tumble to the floor amidst their rush to get into the room. Distinct gold bangs with a symbol of lightning, pale faced, an undercurrent of electricity thrumming below his skin. Dark shoulder length hair, white spools of rope wrapped around the crook of his elbow, grappling hook in hand and ready to strike. 

“Sorry, Kacchan!” the healer, Deku, spluttered. He holds his hands up in surrender, shaking them in a placating motion. “Nothing, it’s nothing! All of you please calm down!” 

Deku is quite the unfortunate name, you think. At his insistence the group lower their defenses and slump forward, relieved. All but ‘Kacchan’, who only raises his hackles further. 

“Don’t fuckin’ scream like that if it’s nothing,” his upper lip curls to bear his teeth, moving fluidly as his group slinks past him to stand by your bed. “I damn near blew up the building”. 

Distantly, “I couldn’t help it…!”

The frame jostles, mattress dipping as it takes on the weight of another. Head turned into the pillow you blink dazedly at the sharp toothed shifter. Propping his chin in his hand, his elbows are braced next to your thigh. “Hi. I’m Kirishima,” he chirped, unmoving as his friends wrapped themselves around him to get a look at you, all repeating his jovial greeting with introductions of their own. 

“…Hello,” you rasp. The word grates the inside of your throat and tears well in your eyes as you fight the urge to cough. “Where am…?”

“Back up, losers,” ‘Kacchan’ forces his way to your bedside, shoving the group aside. There’s that odd sensation again as you stare up at him. Strong jaw clenched with eyes narrowed and blazing; sliding to where you lay, waning briefly. “Have some manners”. 

“Since when have you cared about manners,” the pink woman, Mina, bemoans. 

“Shut it!” 

Deku’s nervous disposition dissipates quickly and he ambles to the opposite side of your bed, his notebook flipped open to a page covered in incomprehensible scrawl. While the others squabble he leans forward and flashes a trembly smile. 

“Hi! I’m Midoriya Izuku, the one that fixed you up,” Midoriya—not Deku—lowers his voice into a more soothing tone. “It’s good to see you awake. Do you think you could tell me your name?”

You remember your name. Yours. The one given to you before human hands stole your hide. Midroiya’s pen scratches at the parchment as you recite it, his lips silently repeating it. “Great! Thank you. Now can I ask, how are you feeling?” he asks, eyes darting across your face, your body, scanning the bandages wrapped around your arm. “Any pain? Nausea? Loss of vision? Numbness in your limbs? Hallucinations?”

“Slow down, nerd,” Bakugo grunts. 

Midoriya immediately appears sheepish, “I’m sorry”. 

“It’s okay,” you say. “My mouth is dry and my arm hurts but I’m— okay, I think”. 

“That’s my bad,” Kirishima speaks up from his place next to Bakugo, lifting a hand. Despite their difference in stature it was clear who led the charge and who fell in line. “I was rushing so I wasn’t very careful when I caught you”. 

Your first thought is that he must have been the dragon. Your second thought is, ah, right. You had tried to fling yourself off the cliff. 

As though he’d read your mind, Bakugo scoffs. “Not much choice when you’re saving someone that’s trying to kill themselves”. 

Overlapping objections ring loud in your ears. “Bro, not cool,” Kirishima groans, similar sentiments sent loud and fast from the rest of his group. 

“I wasn’t trying to—” your half lie is halted by the seething look Bakugo turns to you. Same as before, beneath it all is worry and confusion, unblinking as though you might disappear between the seconds. “I just wanted to go home,” you confess weakly, tethered by the restless twisting of your fingers into the linen. 

“Home?” the electric blonde, Kaminari, murmurs. 

Tension returns to your limbs, instinctively bracing for the greed you have learned to expect. You may get away with evading questions now, but the healer—if he’s worth his salt—would already know what you are. 

“I’m a selkie,” hesitance bleeds into your tone, the confession coming quiet and small. Your chin dips as you swallow, canines sinking into your inner cheek. “The Lord whose castle you raided stole my pelt and kept me hostage for months. I figured it was long gone, so as soon as the attack gave me an opening I ran”.

The atmosphere is stifling. Silence befalls the group, equally stunned. Midoriya is the only one that does not react, kind eyes closely observing you.

A litany of emotions weave through Bakugo’s face as you speak. Disbelief, anger, regret. “Sick bastards,” he mutters heatedly from behind gritted teeth. 

A head of pink hair rests by your knee. You’re taken aback by how informally they all behave towards you. “You still would have died though,” she says, bottom lip jutted, sadness colouring her features. 

“I would have become seafoam,” you rectify passively. “It doesn’t mean death, not to my kind. It’s a sort of rebirth. My pelt is with the ashes now. I thought… it was my only option”. 

“Wait. It got burned up in the fire?!” Kirishima straightens worriedly, eyes wide and apologetic. His fingers twitch as though he wanted to reach for you but thinks the better of it. 

“Surely. I mean, I assume it was,” your mouth thins into a strained, rueful smile. “He kept it in the vault with all his other treasures. I watched his quarters go up in flames”. 

Recognition passes over Bakugo’s expression but Midoriya is already stepping forward with his outstretched hands waving dismissively. “Okay, guys! No more stressing my, uh… patient,” he says, allowing some strength into his instruction. “Give us some space. You can ask more questions later. Please?”

Your new guests surrender with a chorus of groans. Bakugo squints pointedly at you over his shoulder as Sero ushers him out into the hallway. You feel rooted by its significance somehow. An unspoken instruction that you can’t decipher. 

“Are you really feeling okay? No wooziness?”

Drawn to the gentle cadence your gaze meets Midoriya’s. He has set the notebook back onto his desk and rolled up his cuffs. “I’m okay,” you reply after a moment of consideration. “Thank you. You fixed me up, right?” 

Rubbing at his nape, Midoriya shoots you a sheepish grin. “To the best of my ability, yeah,” he says. “I’m just a researcher and I don’t have an affinity for healing magic, but Kacchan insisted that I help”. 

“You’re not a healer?” it’s then that you notice how untraditional his dress is for a doctor. A bishop sleeved shirt, six buttoned green waistcoat and dark pants. There’s a belt strapped tight around his hips, small satchels hooked into the leather, and an empty waist sheath clearly meant for a sword. “Ah. You really aren’t a healer,” you repeat blithely. 

Midoriya giggles, nervous. “No— I mean, this is my office! And I guess I am an apothecary of sorts, but that’s only a small part of what I do,” he explains, gesturing to his various  shelves and cabinets. “Kacchan could’ve taken you to the next town over on Kirishima’s back but I think he was panicking— oh, please don’t tell him I said that. He just doesn’t trust other people much. So you got shafted with me”. 

When he leans down to untuck your bedsheets you bend your unharmed arm, propping your upper body onto your elbow and working in sync with him as he fluffs the pillows behind your back. Sat upright you hold your bandages out to him. “Thank you,” he mumbles, delicate as he slides his hand around your forearm, patting around his belt and satchels with the other. 

Finding a small pair of scissors he tucks it beneath the top of the bandage and carefully cuts down the length of your arm. Your chest constricts as the inflamed skin is slowly revealed to the tepid air. There are ribbons of sutures running from your inner elbow to your wrist, puckered but thin and largely healed, sinew clumsily fused together. 

“Sorry about my poor suturing,” Midoriya says as he overturns your arm in his palm, checking from root to stem. “Everything looks good, though. No infection or fever,” he continues muttering, thumb pressed to the shadow beneath his lip. “Your immune response was pretty quick. I wonder if it has something to do with your selkie blood…”

You barely register his apology, stuck on the jagged scar tissue decorating his own hand. The cautious call of your name breaks your reverie. Midoriya’s brow is furrowed, eyes wide in genuine concern that wanes when you try to smile at him. “Got lost in my head there, sorry”. 

“I get it,” he breathes, glancing over to the largest cabinet in the room. Reaching the ceiling, stained dark wood, and looks slightly out of place alongside his other furniture. Misaligned, you realise. It is on four small wheels and placed an inch away from the wall. Odd. 

You watch Midoriya stroll over with a bounce in his step. His biceps strain under the pale sleeve fabric as he grabs either side of his cabinet and pulls. The wheels squeak and it rolls away with some exertion to uncover a hidden door. Dust cascades through the air; he coughs into his shoulder, shaking out his hair. 

“I’ve got a private washroom through here if you’d like to use it,” he explains after catching your questioning frown. The room is barely bigger than a closet. There’s a toilet, a tiny sink, and a tub that, given the width and depth, would require you to sit with your knees beneath your chin. A mere speck compared to home. If you closed your eyes and concentrated, maybe you could pretend you were resting in a tide pool along the shallows of a beach. 

You stand for the first time in who knows how long. An uncomfortable prickling sensation crawls the length of your legs as the phantom turns solid and blood rushes to your toes. You grip at your bare thighs where the hem of your robe falls, flesh bursting through the gaps between your fingers, and you gasp through the pain. It’s as if you’re growing a new limb all together. 

“Careful,” Midoriya murmurs kindly, hovering at your side in case you need assistance. You hobble over to the washroom, each step like treading on seaglass. He moves away once he is happy with your progress. 

“It’ll take a while to warm up,” he warns. “But there are various medicinal soaps and salts under the sink that I’ve made, so you’re free to use them”. 

The door is closed behind you. 

Left to your own devices the first thing you do is fill the tub with water. You find that the bathroom has no lamp, illuminated only by the cool light flooding in from the main room. His warning had not been exaggeration — fingertips touching the bottom of the basin, the water comes slowly and remains cold up until your second knuckle. Then it warms, warmer than the sea, and with no salt at all. 

Bare knees against the floor and skin pimpling under the thin robes, your breaths come quick, stumbling over the erratic jumping of your diaphragm. Indentations between each tile press uncomfortably into your skin, the initial pain dulling into numbness as you sit back on your heels. Beneath the sink behind you are the medicinal soaps and salts. You delicately take a small pot, squinting to decipher the handwritten labels in the dark. 

Pulling back one of the lids you’re overwhelmed by an unfamiliar floral aroma. Inside are rocks— tiny, tiny pink rocks, with dried white petals. You pinch some with your already damp fingers, feeling as they immediately dissolve in the moisture, and sprinkle them into your bathwater. 

Once full enough, you strip yourself of the robe and fold it neatly, left by the closed doorway. The cold air prickles, your nipples pebbling and the soft hair across your body standing on end, but the water is hot. 

You dip your foot in and breathe a sigh of relief as the temperature suffused through your skin, swaddling you in warmth. You submerge yourself completely. As suspected the space is remarkably cramped. Your legs are bent, tucked against your chest with knees below your chin, arms folded around your shins to keep yourself together. 

Enclosed in four walls again, shrouded in little to no light, you feel lonely. The type of quiet that makes you whisper. Your mind drifts to the stranger that had saved you, wondering where you might’ve met him before. You smile ruefully, cupping the scented water between your hands. He’s strong for a human. Imposing, you muse, staring back at the reflection held in your palms. Not only in his stature, but even his presence is difficult to ignore. 

You bathe, scrub away the blood and grime until you’re a flesh wound. The temperature is cold by the time you’ve turned focus to your fingernails, neurotically picking away the flecks of blood dried beneath them. Drain the murky water, refill, repeat. No matter how harshly you pinch and pull, the feeling of being dirty does not go away, but you stay in the water at least until you feel like yourself again.

The towel you find is coarse to the touch. Sitting in the heated water has tended well to the knots in your muscles. Ungainly as you re-enter Midoriya’s empty office, you flop back onto the freshly made sheets with little guilt. You sit there for a while and let the air dry your body. 

There is a pile of spare clothes on the end of the bed; neatly folded shirts, tunics, skirts and pants. You throw on a sleeved shirt and come across a simple beige kirtle as you parse through, the skirt falling just above the ankle, delicately sewn buttons lining the back. The fabric is very soft, though fitting and naturally cutting at the waist. 

After putting on some thick knitted socks and a pair of hardy brown boots left by the desk you run both hands down your sides and spin on your heel, causing the free flowing skirt to plume. Satisfied, you slip out the door and creep toward the gathering voices at the far end of the hall. Phantom fingertips walk the length of your spine. Odd, but you put it down to the apprehension churning in your stomach. Gradually you are able to make out what they’re saying. 

“Get your filthy hands off it,” Bakugo growls venomously. 

“I just wanna feel,” another whines. You recognise it to be Kaminari. “Why is Kacchan the only one allowed to touch it?”

“Stop calling me that, fucker!”

You round the corner and the bickering halts with a harsh shushing sound. They’re all in the centre of a cramped lobby, few chairs lining the walls, woven tapestry hung from the ceilings. Kirishima stands in front of you wearing a pleased grin, comically large. The armoured plates on his naked shoulders clink as he moves. “Hey! You clean up nice,” he tells you. “Feeling better?” 

“Much better,” you affirm, perking up at his sincerity. “I’m grateful to you all for watching over me”. 

“Our Bakugo did most of the work, really. Got a little protective,” Mina, the one kissed by dusk, leans into your space with her plump mouth curled into a smile. The thin gold jewellery hung from her lobe to ear cuff glints in the late afternoon light. “Barely let us in the room”. 

“Cause you idiots are too loud,” Bakugo grumbles, stepping forward holding a shiny garb. The fond undertones belied his annoyance, and everyone heard it loud and clear. Your skin prickled as he drags his eyes over your clothed body, evoking a sense of insecurity that is foreign to you. You aren’t sure what, but you wanted him to see something in you worth coveting. 

Then your gaze falls to the fabrics folded over his forearm. Your heartbeat ricochets through your ribcage. A tide of emotion wells at the base of your throat. He handles the pelt with purposeful care. Shivers break out across your skin as he smooths a hand over it. Holding it out, he says your name as if it was the simplest thing in the world. 

“Here,” he thrusts the pelt into your arms. You scramble and clutch it to your front. Something deep inside you shifts. “This is yours, right? We took it during the raid”. 

You’re frozen to the spot, mouth gaping around words that won’t come. Bakugo frowns, the group members behind him glancing at each other and shrugging when they find no answer to your silence. 

“Well?” he demands, embarrassment staining his ears pink. 

“Yes,” you choke, bringing the hide up to your face and rubbing your cheek against it. So warm and alive. Brine fills your senses, overwhelmed by the smell of home. The relief is short lived. “Thank you for returning it, but…”

Losing strength, you try to convince yourself that he needn’t know— that the old ritual would not be binding if done with a human. If the Gods were merciful there would be no condition that tied you together for the rest of your lives. Yet you felt it the moment your pelt was handed back to you. You’ve been feeling his touch all this time, even before the bond had solidified. Heat rose to your cheeks at the realisation; such an intimate act, and it had been accidental. 

From one prison to another. Maybe things wouldn’t be so bad. Bakugo seemed good, in his own rugged way, and he was handsome even by faerie standards. 

You wet your lips, breath shaken. “Bakugo. Do you understand the significance of what you just did?” 

Bakugo’s expression darkens and he becomes rigid. You get the impression he hates being left in the dark. “What is it?” 

“To…” your nails sink into the short velvety fur. “To a selkie their pelt is like an extension of their soul. In our culture, to find and return it is viewed as a…marriage proposal”. 

Sero catches Kaminari and Mina as they grapple one another in a dramatic fashion, swaying on their feet. Kirishima puts a hesitant hand on his friend’s shoulder, eyes flickering between the barbarian and your slouched form. “Bro… don’t do anything hasty,” he faltered. 

“Bakugo is married now?” Mina shrilled, promptly shut up by the hand covering her mouth. Sero sends you an apologetic grimace. 

“Like hell I am”. 

Hackles raised, voice sharp and commanding, Bakugo is staring you down like an enemy. Your knees threaten to buckle but you stand your ground, shielding your body with your thick hide. His hands remain by his hips, sparking as the tang of magic bleeds into the air. Despite making no move to attack you still feel his rejection strike you. 

“Break whatever vow I just made,” he demanded. “Now”. 

“I can’t,” you admit helplessly. “It’s more than a legal contract or a declaration of love. We’ve— it binds us together”.

The barbarian starts forward, upper lip curled into a beastly snarl, held back by the dragon shifter’s grip. Stumbling as you dodge, two familiar scarred arms catch you before your fall. “Kacchan, what are you—?!” Bakugo darts out to grab you and Midoriya immediately pushes you behind his back, shielding you with his body. “Stop it!” 

“Midoriya,” Kaminari wheezes, tears beading along his lash line. “Kacchan accidentally got married. Can you believe it?” 

Midoriya observes their exchange with a look of confusion. In the seconds that follow you see his eyes fall to the pelt folded against your chest, eyes brightening in understanding. Incognisant to this, Bakugo continues his verbal barrage. “Oi, Deku. You’ve got brain cells. Figure out a way to fix this”. 

Mouth gaping like a fish out of water, Midoriya pins Bakugo with a pleading look. “Kacchan. Please tell me you didn’t personally give back the selkie pelt”. 

“You knew and didn’t think to say anything?!”

“Why would I?” Midoriya returns, equally irritated. You press your face into the space between his shoulder blades, feeling the vibrations of his voice as they argue. “It’s common folklore!”

“You know I don’t listen to fucking fairytales, Izuku”. 

Midoriya reaches back to brush your wrist and offer a comforting touch. You knock your knuckles to his own, grateful for his consideration but unneeding of it. While Bakugo’s furious refusal hurts, and his volume is harsh on the ears, you aren’t truly scared of him. More than anything your body remembers those warm palms— how he had held your hand, even as a stranger, and how he meticulously groomed your hide only knowing that it was of importance to you. 

“There’s nothing I can do to fix this,” lowering his tone into something more apologetic, Midoriya’s shoulders slump in defeat. You step to the side, coming into view. Head bowed, weight shifting between each foot. You refuse to be subservient any longer but cannot ignore the guilt that churns in your stomach. 

Bakugo sees you. Something flickers in his features; a brief glance, a rough exhale, it flies across his face like the shadow of an albatross and disappears, equally fleeting. Never taking his vermilion eyes off you he argued, “What about cheeks?” 

The golden hour spreads her hands all over the room, air cooling when his spitting frustration dwindles to uncertainty. 

“Uraraka?” Midoriya mused aloud. His softer countenance tempers your anxiety. “It’s possible she could do something… Let me go see if I have her recent coordinates written somewhere…”

Midoriya scurries back down the hallway, leaving you defenseless. Without thinking you ask the group, “Uh. Who’s Uraraka?” 

Everyone’s attention falls to you and you resist the reflexive urge to cower. “She’s a witch,” Kaminari supplies happily, arms wrapped around Sero’s neck like a scarf. “An old friend of ours, but she’s pretty hard to find now. I heard her place is always moving”. 

A building that could move with magic. The human world never ceased to be fascinating. 

Mina nudges her elbow into his side and a shock of electricity sparks from his crown. “That’s outdated, dummy! You’re supposed to say occultist”. 

Kaminari whines, rubbing at his ribs. “To-may-toe, to-mah-toe,” he enunciated, pouting. “Same thing”. 

Bakugo growls, ignoring their exchange in favour of pacing the room. Your pelt is a comforting weight as you follow the back and forth motions, taking the chance to really look at him. The fur lined cloak across his shoulders billows obnoxiously as he turns, jewels and talons strung around his neck knocking against his clavicle. Doused in sunlight, the markings painted across his bare chest are highlighted, and you notice the uneven skin beneath them— more scars. 

He combs his fingers aggressively through his hair and his arm bulges beneath the armour strapped to his bicep. Kirishima tires of watching and cuts into his path, hands open in surrender. 

“Stressing won’t do you any good, man,” the shifter reasoned. “We’ve all got your back. I’m sure Uraraka will know what to do”. 

Bakugo huffs. You think there should be steam coming out of his nose. “I know, shithead. I just,” he takes a quick look at where you are awkwardly standing. “I don’t like this”. 

There’s an abrupt yelp in the distance. Midoriya’s cry is followed by a crash, the sound of books tumbling from shelves onto the wooden floor. He stumbles out into the hallway slightly dishevelled, patting off the dust on his waistcoat and proffering a sheet of paper. Tucked under his arm is a rolled up map. 

“Kacchan,” comes his breathless chime. “Here’s where she was last. But I remembered that she was planning on taking a short trip to the valleys near the coast to find more idiran leaves since they’re in season now. I mapped out all the areas where they usually grow, in case you—”

Bakugo snatches the coordinates and the map without ceremony. “Thanks,” he grunts, turning on his heel and making for the exit. “Come on, losers. We only got a few hours until it’s too dark to fly”. 

The group works in perfect synchrony. Sero reaches under one of the nearby chairs and drags out a large bag, hoisting it over his shoulder. Mina does the same, pulling back the draping tapestry by the doorway and taking back a concealed sack. You watch as they walk leisurely behind Bakugo, in no real rush despite his demands, Kaminari lamenting how little they trusted him with their cargo. 

Kirishima lingers behind, clapping Midoriya soundly on the back. “Thanks for everything as usual, man. We appreciate it,” he emphasised his gratitude with a strong squeeze. 

“I’m always happy to see you,” you’re impressed by Midoriya’s reaction; a smile from ear to ear, sturdy and unaffected by Kirishima’s obvious force, his smaller frame belying his strength. “Just promise not to shift too close to the building. I don’t have time to re-thatch my roof”. 

“I promise!” Kirishima traces a cross over his heart with his fingers. Their focus turns to you. You tense, feeling entirely out of place. “Sure you’re feeling alright? Have you ever flown before?”

“No,” you admit, needlessly smoothing the fabric of your kirtle down. “I’ve probably never been this far inland, nevermind flying”. 

Midoriya’s eyes widened, though not unkindly. They’re sparkling, as if he were excited on your behalf. “Then you’re in for a real treat,” he beams, the intensity dimming within the next breath, sadness hemming his smile. “Just know you’re in good hands. Kacchan is a little abrasive but he means well”. 

“And I swear I’ll fly carefully,” Kirishima interjects. It’s funny, a man so large exuding such gentility. “I’m a dragon shifter, if you hadn’t already guessed”. 

You had sensed it immediately. Shifter energies were palpable and animated things. They hung in the air like a humid fog. Despite your similarities you are still so uniquely different. While you were tied to the pelt in your arms, Kirishima had no such restriction. You envied his freedom. 

“You caught me…?” you say. He nods at your words. “Thank you, then. Again”. 

“That was all Bakubro. He saw you before anyone else did,” as though on cue, Bakugo’s voice penetrated impatiently through the walls, demanding that you both get outside. Kirishima’s lips uptick affectionately. 

“If I don’t get to see you again, well…” Midoriya begins to corral the pair of you to the door as he speaks. “I hope you make it home. And I’m really happy I could meet you”. 

Surrounding Midoriya’s residence is a dense forest. The trees are tall, older than any you’ve seen, their branches reaching out and intertwining with one another to conceal your group under a canopy shrouded in gold. Further ahead it thins out onto a winding road. Built on a steep hill it dips in the distance, opening up to the many plots of land below. 

The earth is soft under your boots. There are wildflowers at your feet. You try to step around each one carefully while Kirishima advances forward to the group with vigour. 

Bakugo is saying something but you barely hear it, lost in your thoughts, besotted by the vast canvas around you; a sense of harmony as the pigments blend together. It is like a dream in which you can’t tell one side of the veil from the other, and nothing like the dreary castle you were once stowed away in. 

Your moment in lucidity is soon interrupted. You instinctively pull the pelt closer to your chest before realising who had approached. “You listening or what?” Bakugo calls quietly, an attempt at being reposeful. Amidst your daydreaming Kirishima has disappeared into the overgrowth and the others are watching your interaction with poorly veiled interest. 

“Uh, sure,” you blurt uselessly. He raises a brow and you feel ridiculous. 

“Kirishima said it’s your first time,” he pauses and you nod in affirmation. A hand comes to rest on your back, breath caught in your throat, pressure pulling you close to his side. “Then you’ll sit up front with me”. 

Your head bobs again, unrolling the pelt and knotting it tight to your waist, skin prickling under his close scrutiny. Bakugo brings his fingers to his lips and whistles, “Red!”

‘Red’ answered the call with a low room and a rustle of wings. The dragon’s head lifts, towering above the treeline, his body following as he steps out into the open. Amber eyes gleamed in the early evening light as he bobbed his head on a serpentine neck. His deep red scales shimmered with a faint golden sheen as he flashed his teeth in greeting. 

You err on the side of reticence while Mina and Kaminari sprint toward the dragon whooping excitedly. Various lines of thick rope trails behind them and Sero picks up the slack, looping it thrice through their bags. He spins the cut end, undulating as the momentum builds, and throws it over Kirishima’s back to be caught by Kaminari and pulled taut. 

“C’mon,” Bakugo leads you forward. He is surprisingly patient with you now. You’ve faced young whales and sharks yet still you feel dwarfed by the sheer size of the dragon, heart all pitter patter behind your ribs. It is the prey animal in you. 

Kirishima snorts, lowering to the ground. The earth trembles, a gust of wind dancing through the grass. Another rope is flung around his neck, threaded through the horns protruding from his skull like a set of reins, dropping in front of you. 

The hand by your hip slides further at your abrupt flinch, arm securing around your waist. “On three I want you to climb,” he commands, giving you no time to think. “One… two…”

Bakugo takes the weight like it’s nothing, lifting you higher so you can grab the rope. Molten heat. You pull yourself up, scrambling to straddle Kirishima’s upper back. The others are further down his spine, playing around at the base of his tail without a care in the world, as though they were not about to be thousands of feet in the air. Kirishima’s lungs expand for breath and you cling to a spike protruding from the dragon’s nape, grip flexing at the warmth that settles behind you. 

Bakugo frames your body with his thighs, thick by the skirt bunching above your knees, and pulls the rest of the rope up to wrap it around your pelt. In an instant you are all too conscious of him as a man, the proximity plucking at your centre of gravity, a cold sensation spreading throughout your chest. “Sorry,” he mutters unprompted, so quiet you aren’t sure you were meant to hear it. You get the impression he doesn’t say it often. “For dragging you into more shit”. 

You mull the words over as you relax into his hold. With that one sentence you think you understand him a little more than before.

Sero’s voice travels through the silence, “Good to go!”

Fastening his arm across your middle, solid and steady, Bakugo brings his boot hard down onto Kirishima’s shoulder. “Get moving, Red!” he roars. 

The dragon’s movements are heavy, slow. Aligned with the winding road, he builds up speed. As though he’d shaken off his own mass Kirishima is suddenly quick on his feet and breaking into a run; forced back in the momentum your stomach swoops, upheld by inertia as your body follows the broad bounding movements. 

Leathery wings snap open into the clearing. Your hands clutch at Bakugo’s forearm and he digs his fingers in harder, his lips warm against your temple. “I’ve got you,” he whispered, but all you can hear is the thundering wind and the blood rushing in your ears. You watch the steep edge approach and take a reflexive breath as it abruptly disappears. 

Air pours into your lungs and then out again in a ragged, exhilarated gasp. The ground falls—and then you are gliding.  

The cool air whips against your cheeks. Smooth and steady as a horse’s canter, Kirishima soars through the open skies, his magnificent wingspan bearing the weight of five riders. Below, the fields coalesce into one land. Towns and villages become an inscrutable speck. Incredulous laughter bursts from your throat, nerves evolving into excitement in the climb towards the clouds. 

Bakugo mellows by the second, tension ironed down by gravity. There’s a particular satisfaction to his expression, contentment you’ve only ever experienced in the ocean’s depths, and yet, as he squeezes around you intermittently to remind you he is there, you can feel it too. 

“You with me?” he shouts. “Not scared?”

You lock eyes and try to show him a tremulous smile, answering at the top of your lungs, “I’m good”. 

Then he bares his teeth, grinning proudly. Over you comes the sense of being praised. Your smile widens.

Time moves differently in the skies. Closer to the sun, you thought perhaps things naturally moved slower. Change is always less apparent when you are walking alongside it. Instead, you measure the hour by the shadows cast chasing Kirishima’s tail, and eventually the skies darken. 

Lowering his head, tilting a wing to swing out in a broad arc, Kirishima angles toward the earth. Bakugo raises up a battle worn hand, the lineaments of his face irradiated by streams of dim light threading through his fingers. He makes a specific gesture, signalling to the others of the incoming descent. Like the sun, you can’t look away from his raw brilliance. 

Kirishima lands at the base of a mountain valley. It sends a gust of wind across the clearing. Through the dark you make out a familiar reflection of light in the distance. The lake is hardly an ocean, but you’re extremely comforted to be by a body of water. 

Chest pressed flat to your back Bakugo’s natural heat spreads through your shirt. Helped down much in the same way you were boosted up, he seems determined to keep you near. You can’t say you mind it— a quiet attraction comes and goes as he steadies you on your feet. He clicks his tongue, muttering clipped insults that he doesn’t mean. 

It’s decided you’ll remain there for the night. “You can bet your ass we’re having an early start,” Bakugo says, pointing at each of you with stubborn intent, squinted glare lingering on the less than enthusiastic members. Kaminari slumps forward dramatically and you worry his knees might buckle. 

Kirishima leaves again, briefly, to circle the area in his full form while Bakugo starts on the pit. It’s lit by a whisper of fire from the returning dragon’s mouth, setting the tinder ablaze over the nest of branches; the dry, withered pine slowly releases years of energy soaked up from the sun, the air, and the ground, keeping the camp brightly lit. 

Smoke swirls above and dissipates into the atmosphere. You are far enough from any large human settlement that you see the night sky in all its clarity. Around you now are the soft voices of acquaintances filtered between conversations; none you could hear properly, but the sounds were still soothing, coming in hushed tones that add to the intimate atmosphere. 

Flames dance on their cheeks, illuminating the prominent parts of their faces. You’re sitting beside the water’s edge with your pelt strewn across your lap, close enough to feel the warmth as it crackles and spits, watching the way they love each other. 

Kaminari has fished out a big bottle from his bag, dramatically popping the cork, and is steadily passing it around. Alcohol, you guessed. Sero took a heavy swig without flinching. Mina had tried to do the same and now has her head pillowed by Kirishima’s thigh, thick and sturdy as a human, and his fingers stroked through the curly by her temple aimlessly as he lost himself in discussion. Sensing your gaze, she meets your eyes and smiles dazedly, lids fluttering. 

You look away, take a breath and notice the air tastes like sake and smoke. Darkness covers the lake. Under the waxing moon your face stares back at you, swimming among minnows and echoes of stars. It ripples where you dip your fingertips, mind empty, anaesthetised by the chill.  

“You idiots never pace yourselves,” Bakugo’s voice rumbled over the flames and rolled over your skin. He is sitting closest to you, legs loosely crossed in the dirt . “If you throw up on Red tomorrow I’m not cleaning it up”. 

Kaminari shakes the bottle in his direction. The bubbles fizz upward, some spilling out. “Such a stick in the mud, Kacchan. We gotta celebrate your marriage somehow!” 

Sero cackles as the other two chime in agreement.  You stroke your pelt, restless at the mention of your union, and it soaks up the water from your fingers. Surprisingly, Bakugo lets it slide, though not before scooping the loose earth into his hand and throwing it at an oncoming Kaminari. 

Eyes of amber briefly flicker over your form in his approach. Kaminari drops into the empty space beside you and pulls the bottle from his mouth with a resounding pop, leaving behind a wet sheen, and tilts it forward. “You too,” he grinned. “Congrats. Our boy is quite the catch, y’know”. 

“So I can see,” you smile, letting the gloom be pulled right out of you, your fingers wrapping around the bottle's neck. They grazing his own and spark static. Neither of you comment on it, his squinted stare fixed curiously on your expression as you bring the finish to your lips. 

The aroma is rich, sweet like overly ripe bananas. You tip back, feeling it dry and bitter on your tongue. There are hints of vanilla and brown sugar, a sting to your throat that begs you to cough. You hear a quiet laugh. 

“Too strong?” Sero teases lightheartedly from across the campfire. 

Your expression twists, “It’s good. But it burns. Is that normal?”

“That’s why it’s good,” Kaminari snickers. You clear your throat, handing the bottle back, attention drawn back to the lake in a beat of comfortable silence. “Oh, hey. I did want to say— you can swim if you need to, y’know”. 

“Hm?”

“Kiri has all sorts of weird urges if he doesn’t shift for a while. Gets all restless and snappy,” Kaminari gives a knowing look to the man in question. Kirishima nods at you, his features taut with sincerity. “So if you want to swim for a while or something we totally get it”. 

You’re flustered by their earnestness, gripping at your pelt, all too aware of it. Slipping into your other form feels far too personal; well meaning as they are, they’re still strangers to you. “That’s— I’m alright,” you politely decline, “my needs as a seal aren’t really felt while I’m like this”. 

A surprised noise resonates from Kirishima, Mina unmoving from her place in his lap but watching with rapt curiosity. “You’re practically human right now, then?” he asks. 

“Practically,” you give a self conscious shrug. Somehow admitting it felt like stripping yourself. Confessing to a weakness. Unsettled, you deflect the subject back. “Do you keep your dragon traits as a human?”

“Nah, not while I’m in this form. I don’t even have my hydrogen glands— look,” Kirishima hooks his fingers into his cheeks to spread them wider. You lean in for a closer look. The glow from the campfire illuminates the back of his throat— barely, and ironically. His tongue wiggles as he tries to lay it flat. You’re not sure what he’s trying to show you. You’ve  never seen a dragon’s maw before, but aside from the shark-like teeth his mouth really does seem the same as any other man’s. 

“Pretty boring, right?” his words come garbled around his fingers and so he pulls them out, wiping the spit on his pants. “But even though I can’t breathe fire right now, I can do this!”

You stare in surprise as the skin along his forearm hardens into tough scales. He holds it out to you in permission to touch; they feel jagged under your fingertips, tough like the bark of an ancient tree. “That’s amazing. You have your own shield,” you breathe, awed. 

“Damn right,” Bakugo interjects. There’s that unfettered pride again. Kirishima’s cheeks redden and you sympathise with him. In your short time with them you knew receiving praise from Bakugo felt like standing under the sun. “Should‘ve seen him as a kid,” he continues, eyes alight and mirthful. “Had scales like wet paper. Even cried when he first shifted”. 

“D’you have to bring that up,” Kirishima groans, though not upset by it. He shares in the amusement, uplifted by the sound of his friends' laughter, and pouts playfully in your direction. “It was scary!” 

Mina giggles. Her movements are sluggish and dopey as she waves her arm in Kaminari’s direction, who then stretches around the pit to Sero, who then passes it off to her. She takes a quick sip, free hand pinching Kirishima’s cheek. “Wasn't your first time an accident, too? That’s so cute”. 

“He sneezed actually,” Sero supplies, smirk crooked, foot tapping Kirishima’s ankle in a preemptive apology. “Destroyed half his house”. 

Kaminari slaps his knee, “Man, you were stumbling around like a newborn foal. It was hilarious”. 

Bakugo grinned as the others bickered, a fond, radiant thing that lit up his whole face. He’s softer like this, drenched in warmth. Cloak tucked behind his shoulders you are given the view of his broad chest. And when he finally looks at you, his half lidded gaze has been softened by his third swig; though he remained considerably sober compared to his companions. 

“What’re you starin’ at?” he mutters.

“Nothing,” you answer quickly, then, quieter, “It’s just nice that you’ve all been together for so long”. 

“Since we were snot-nosed brats. We hail from the same clan. Deku too,” he replies, elbow propped on his knee, chin cupped in his palm. “Getting sick of seeing their faces at every turn”. 

“Liar,” you hum amusedly. “What do humans call it…? Emotionally constipated”. 

His eyes slide over you, brow quirked. With his friends distracted he is more emboldened giving you attention. “Got some liquor down your neck and suddenly you’re givin’ me cheek?” 

“Guess so,” you feel yourself endeared by your not-husband. The pleasant honeyed sensation shrouding your body must’ve loosened your tongue. “Anyone can see they’re like family to you”. 

The barbarian kisses his teeth and shifts himself toward you, an ugly look on his face. You catch his peek at your pelt. “What about you?”

“Me?”

Bakugo grunts. “Yeah. You got family?” 

If not for the alcohol that question might’ve sucked all the joy from the air. You settle on a sad smile, dragging your fingertip through the dirt to draw a vague seal shape. “That’s hard to answer,” you intoned gently, barely audible over the crackling fire. “My memories of them are vague. The longer I stay human the more I forget”. He frowns, but you continue, unperturbed, “Usually it would be the same thing in reverse, if we weren’t bonded I would likely forget all of this”. 

“And you’re okay with that?” he says, some edge to his tone. “You’re okay with being stuck here?” 

The ‘with me’ goes unspoken but you hear it, and you fall silent. Because you have no answer. You’d had months to reconcile a pallid future— at one point you thought you would never again see the ocean, least of all your family. It was probable that they’d already moved on without you. 

“I don’t feel stuck,” you admit. His actions and his words, albeit harsh, proved that to be true. Aside from the obvious differences from your previous capture, the biggest is that you are equally in possession of Bakugo’s individual liberty— you’re married, you mentally amend, not in possession. While it is true you wouldn’t be able to stray far from him with the bond established, you held your pelt, independence, control. 

A near imperceptible tension seeps from him at your answer. “What about you?”

He scoffs, stretching out his legs. The soles of his boots drag in the dirt. “Do I look fuckin’ stuck?” 

“No,” you murmur with amusement, turning to gaze at the flickering pyre. “A man that can fly hundreds of miles on dragonback in a single day certainly isn’t stuck”. 

“Now you’re getting it”.

The other conversation has worn into soft murmurings. Kirishima drunkenly hands off the last of the alcohol to Bakugo, gesturing to the three who’ve surrounded him and fallen asleep. As the dragon shifter repositions himself to join them, curled together like a pack of seal pups, Bakugo takes a sip. 

There’s probably only a mouthful left and you accept it when he offers. “You should sleep, too”. 

You heed his instruction and lie down on your side, your pelt pillowed under your head. The smell of home swaddles you. “Early rise, right?” he nods, leaning back onto his arms. “How long do you think it’ll take to find the—uh, occultist?” 

“A week if she’s where she’s supposed to be,” he scowls. You’re not sure what draws the heat to your face; the drink or his voice, now gravelly with fatigue. “Three at most”. 

“Okay,” you exhale, eyes fluttering closed. “Thank you, Bakugo”. 

A soft breeze dances through the brush. Your skin pebbles, shivers slipping down your spine. Something heavy drapes over you and encases you in a warm cocoon. Fluff tickles at your nose. Your fingers curl into the familiar red fabric of Bakugo’s cloak. He has pointedly angled away from you, ready to ignore any attempt at interrogation. The gruff act of kindness makes your heartbeat faster. Fondness settles in your chest, so big that it aches. His natural scent mixes with yours and it’s like being laid on the shoreline, stitching sea and land together. 

“Don’t fuckin’ thank me yet,” the muscles in his back ripple as he tends to the dwindling fire, declaring with conviction, “Just follow me. I’ll fix this and get you home”. 

You lick your lips, mouth dry from the alcohol. In that very moment you want to tell him that the ocean and the sky are like a two way mirror; that when you were up there with him, strangely, your body thought it was at home. 

Instead, you close your eyes and watch the embers paint yellow and orange kaleidoscopes behind your eyelids. 

Instead, you sleep. 

The weeks that follow are arduous. Uraraka is nowhere to be found, and your group resorted to searching the areas of iridian growth Midoriya circled. 

You weren’t used to hiking up mountainous lands, navigating forests or scaling dragons, not in the beginning. Rising with the sun, enduring unpredictable changes in weather, wincing through the ache that grew in your weaker human muscles, Bakugo found your crankiness amusing and irritating all at once; never missing an opportunity to comment on your lack of stamina, then using it as an excuse to assist where assistance is not truly needed. 

But you saw through him, and let him. You did not need help climbing, yet your hands weaved together so he could pull you up. You’re soon practiced in saddling Kirishima, yet you always wait for Bakugo to put his arm around your lower back every ride. Your inner voice sings whenever he brings you food— begrudgingly, he throws it into your lap and grunts like the barbarian he is— or hangs his cloak over your head without a word as though you were a rack. It’s a little more charged every time you interact, and you found you liked being taken care of in those subtle ways that did not undermine your independence. 

The others noticed and teased accordingly. They call him a dutiful husband and his aggravated explosions saw you driven out of two small settlements for startling livestock. You become closer to each of them. Their patchwork family makes room for you quicker than you know what to do with. And you enjoy it; learning about the people around you, peeling back the rind of their lives piece by piece with mundane questions, seeing what they’re made up of.

You learn Kaminari enjoys literature, dramatically reciting love tales in the night, referencing poems you’ve never heard. He’s charming but never with actual intention. It is somehow more endearing that he doesn’t know his own allure, finding comfort in the role of a jester. Mina is pure joy wrapped in flesh. Apologetically overbearing and well meaning. Like an older sister she showed you how to securely fashion your pelt—over one shoulder, a belt fastened around the waist, keeping it in place— and let you use her combs. She speaks fast when she’s happy, hits hard when she laughs and gossips avidly, picking up new information wherever she goes. 

Kirishima looked at you with kindness and iron surety in his eyes from the start. Good natured and feeling— he has a heart so big that he apologises to a flower bed after he steps on it. There’s a natural fraternal air about him that sets you at ease and the group’s clear affection and appreciation for him diminished any worry about your own treatment as a shifter.

But of everyone else in the group you found Sero the most easygoing. Conversation came fluidly and your initial diffidence was thrown by how naturally you were able to fall into place with him. He lends an ear to any questions you have, practised in the art of human interaction; a man capable of adapting to any one person he comes into contact with. As such, he is the member sent to negotiate, collect information, and make arrangements. 

When you make it to the last destination on the map you are drenched in a time-steeped sunset. Sero trudges back through the brush, returning from the nearby port town. Landing at such a late hour Sero had been tasked with finding the local tavern to buy a few rooms for the night, and the lazy thumbs up he waves from a distance is proof he accomplished his goal.

“They don’t get too many travellers passing through here so I swiped up three rooms,” he huffs, coming to a stop and brushing the dirt off his pants. “They’ve got a bathhouse, too”. 

Bakugo makes a noise of approval, lifting a bag over his shoulder while Kirishima carries the rest under his arms and  flashes a toothy smile. “Glad it went smoothly, man”. 

“Thank the Gods,” Kaminari cheers, clapping his friend on the back. “You’re a lifesaver. I can’t wait to sleep on an actual bed again”. 

“Uh huh. Two twin rooms for us lowly minions,” Sero continues, his grin curling into something more sly. You get a sense of foreboding. “And of course, a double room for the newlyweds”. 

Mina whistles, slipping her hand into yours and tugging. You freeze, heart in your throat, and force yourself to relax, not yet used to how tactile they can be. She’s too invested in Bakugo’s response to notice. Your eyes flicker over to find him red faced and incensed, knuckles white with the pressure he has around the drawstrings of his bag. 

Sharing a room with Bakugo. Alone. Thus far you’d all been together. Either under the stars or in caves, or packed into cramped quarters stuffed with wattle and daub if a villager felt kind enough. 

“You've got exactly five seconds to explain why you thought that was a good idea”.

Sero quickly put his palms up in surrender. “You gave me a budget, Bakugo. They offered to lower the price as a wedding gift. I figured it would be okay for one night”. 

Bakugo jerks his head in your direction, his steely glare unmoving. The tips of his ears are pink, too, frustration unfolding across his skin. “You don’t get to decide that,” he chided, tone harsh like a hiss. 

Suddenly, Sero looks rather ashamed of himself. “Shit, I’m sorry. Should’ve asked,” he says to you, rubbing at his neck as his head lowers. It’s unlike him to be so wilted— and all because of your potential discomfort. 

You meet Bakugo’s eyes, gleaming intensely, already trying to scrutinise your reaction. Mina hums quietly. She tightens grip on your hand again in reassurance, the other running along your bicep. “If you want I can swap with you”. 

Bakugo snorts at that, as if the idea was ridiculous, but he doesn’t shoot it down despite his clear aversion to sharing with Mina. You understood his disbelief. They behaved much like siblings, squabbling and poking at one another. It’d rouse suspicion and you didn’t fancy being chased out of town for swindling the keepers for a discount. 

“Thank you guys. But it’s alright,” you reassured, mouth lifting into a small smile and reciprocating Mina‘s gentle squeeze. “I don’t mind sleeping with Bakugo”. 

A few beats of silence. You see Bakugo’s expression slip, jaw loose and eyes wide for a brief moment before it twists. He turns away from the group as a chorus of suggestive crowing erupts. 

Understanding your mistake almost immediately hot mortification comes over you, stifling beneath the pelt on your shoulder. “Shut up, you useless fuckin’ perverts,” Bakugo snaps, flustered and wild, swatting at the nearest victim. Kirishima feigns a wounded noise. 

“Hey, I didn’t do anything!”

“Just get moving,” the barbarian marches onward, tearing his way through the overgrowth and heading for the tavern. “And walk behind me!”

His choleric mutters continue, heard even at a distance. Tucking your chin to your chest, you hide your laughter in your silken pelt as you follow after him, mouth filling with a comforting briney scent. You think Bakugo undeniably cute when he’s embarrassed; a sight you’ve had the pleasure of seeing more than once on account of his pod. That feeling from the campfire returns, fills your chest, pulsing through to your fingertips, tempting you to reach out, to touch him. 

More and more you’re inundated with the need to be close. You quell the urge and tighten your grip on Mina, her cheek squished to your shoulder, loose curls the colour of blossom tickling your throat. “Don’t worry. He’s not really mad,” she tells you furtively, as if it were a big secret. 

“I know,” gaze lingering on Bakugo’s back, covered by that thick red cloak, you wonder if your scent still clings to it. Contentedly, “I’m getting used to it”. 

The town is beautiful. Bursting with flora and fauna, accentuated by the dusk, ocean curling around the village in a way that reminds you of mother. Nature's cradle. You cling protectively to your pelt, scenting the salt in the air and hovering closer to Bakugo. If anybody could identify a selkie skin it would be fishermen. Stray drunken locals stumble by, arm in arm with boisterous cheer. You’re greeted like a long lost friend, neither person recognising your true identity. Humans really can be hearty and genuine at their core. Life before had been so desolate in comparison, so lacking in love and colour. 

“Oi,” Bakugo beckons you to his side. When you don’t fall in line he grabs your wrist, pulling you close. His natural body heat lingers like a brand. “Make sure you call me Katsuki from now on,” he instructs under his breath. 

You blink at the unexpected request. The muscles in his face are tight, twitching, and his nose flares the longer you stare. Given names are important to humans in this region. Sharing them is an intimate thing, a sign of your close relationship. “Are you sure?” 

“Wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t sure,” he punishes your questioning with the fleeting tightening of his grip. You can’t help it. He’s pink again and you like it. “I’m your husband, yeah? So call me by my fuckin’ name”. 

The keeper waits surreptitiously by a sheltered stairwell leading to the inn above her tavern. A small Elven woman, uncloaked, the lantern overhead creating a halo of light to circle her ginger crown. She perks up when Sero hands over a small velvet sack, the drawstrings pulled tight. “For the rooms,” he emphasises, coins chiming dully against one another as he shakes it. The woman takes it and cradles the payment to her breast, exchanging the gold for three keys. 

You’re guided up the stairwell and into the building, presented with a narrow corridor. There are numerous doors, decorative runes carved into the frames, a coloured piece of string hung from each handle corresponding to the colour of the keys.  “It’s good to see some youngins pass through. We only ever get the same old geezers around here,” she says, “Makes for a mundane life”. 

The crows' feet wrinkle by her eyes when she smiles, laughter lines framing her mouth. She hands out the keys to your pod who all rush in childish excitement to see their rooms. At last she turns to where you stand stiffly beside Katsuki. 

You’re handed a key. The stem is long and thin and made with copper, the key wards in the bit uniquely shaped to your door. Threaded through the bow is a lavender string. “It isn’t much but I hope you will be comfortable for the night,” with a wink, she adds, “Congratulations to you both”. 

“Thank you. We will be in your care,” your reply is tremulous, undecided whether to be pleased with the sincere acknowledgement of your marriage or nervous to be seen through. At your side, the large barbarian grunts. 

It is uncharacteristic of him; always very respectful of his elders. You lean against him, just a nudge. His attention snaps to you and you smile innocently. “Be polite, Katsuki”. 

Like it was meant to be spoken only by you, Katsuki’s name sits right in your mouth, lips shaping around the characters softened by warm intonation. The reaction is instantaneous. His jaw ticks. His faint blush returns. His stoic expression wanes as he looks to the keeper, who is observing the interaction with mirthful eyes. Lowering his head he mutters, “We appreciate your hospitality, ma’am”. 

“You’re quite darlin’ together, aren’t you,” she comments heartily, mostly to herself, as if airing her thoughts. “We got good food and drinks downstairs, do come if you’re hungry! Blessings be upon you”. 

On her departure you enter the room. Spangles of light dusted the air. While it clearly isn’t lived in, it is homely. You canvas the space. Two square-headed windows facing the street are covered by thin cloth. There is an old, tattered tapestry strung across the wall to cover up a fist sized hole, a patterned glass vase and various other unique tchotchke adorning the shelves. You drag your fingers across the brick fireplace opposite a wide double bed, mattress made of wool but compensated by the many feather pillows and blankets. 

“This is good,” you say, “homely”. Though there is an animal hide on the floor, which you find rather… untoward. A soothing musky smell with overtones of caramel and vanilla rising through the cracks in the floorboards from the tavern below. You breathe it in deeply. 

“It’ll do,” Katsuki voices his agreement and drops his bag with a conclusive thud. “Let me hide our stuff and we can meet with the others for food downstairs. You haven’t eaten in hours”. 

The small consideration makes your heart flutter. “Ah. I’ll be there soon,” you tell him. He squints at you, attempting to mentally pry the answers out of you. “I’m okay, Katsuki. I just need a minute”. 

Pausing in the centre of the room, Katsuki scrutinises you. You fidget under his intense appraisal, undecided whether it pleases you or not. It is strange to want something that often leaves you feeling excruciatingly… exposed. 

You wait apprehensively and wonder if he’ll comment on your use of his name— needless, this time. After all there are no ears or eyes in these walls. You’re not sure what you’ll do if he asks you to stop. 

“Are you sure?” you nod, mouth strained in a thin smile. Bakugo frowns but ultimately gives you your space. “Make sure you catch up. If you’re not down in ten minutes I’m coming back”. 

“I will,” you land heavily on the edge of the bed, wrinkling the sheets as you unclip your pelt. The collar of your ill-fitted shirt slips forward with the motion to reveal cleavage, and Bakugo immediately averts his gaze. 

“Whatever,” he rasps, unexpectedly shy. The door slams as he leaves. You right the collar, tugging it back up, lips pressed thin to repress the laughter that bubbles in your chest. Aimless and left to your own devices you take a solitary moment to groom the pelt in your lap, marbled and downy-soft. Brushing through the coat, fingertips trace the rings of black and brown.

Things are so different. Being a person is more overwhelming than you imagined. Being locked away had kept you in a state of inertia, suffocating in numb misery, but now you were left to grapple with the immense spectrum of human emotion. Urges and wants that you had never experienced before meeting Katsuki. 

You swallow, staring at the spaces between your fingers. Spaces filled with short tan fur. Selkie marriages were simultaneously complicated and simple. Rather, they were so simple that they bore unnecessary complications. 

A stolen pelt creates a one sided bond but upon return it is consummated. Between two selkies in courting pelts were exchanged, solidifying their promise to one another, deeply unified by their magic. Elder podmates said that it meant they belonged to only one another. Abandoning the tides, in a way. 

Since being a pup the voice of the sea was a ceaseless whisper you were always aware of. Yet since Katsuki held your seal skin, unknowingly cradled your very being and returned it to you with only sincere intention, that voice had gradually been ebbing away. 

Would there come a day that you no longer recalled your identity as a selkie—? No. You quickly smother the thought. The immaterial, chimerical magic that made up your very being could never be forgotten. And deep down, you knew Katsuki would not let you. Indeed, you can only picture his surly retaliation if you ever woke up and could not recall your lineage. 

With that you get to your feet. Ten minutes would soon pass and his probable wrath was enough motivation. You consider the pelt in your grasp and give a surreptitious glance around the room for somewhere to hide it. Taking it into a tavern full of drunken strangers and mariners seemed like a much worse idea. 

After rolling it up tight you stuff it behind the pillows at the head of the bed, further pulling over the coverlets. The hallway is quiet when you step out. You lock the door, tensing at the loud click. You can hear muffled laughter rising through the floors. 

It grows in volume when you step out into the evening air. Slurred conversation and bickering pour through the tavern windows. At front is a large, arched door, overshadowed by a dark blue awning. The wood panels are weatherworn and rustic, covered in rivets. You reach for the brass handle. It’s heavy in your palm as you turn it, using your full strength to push forward. 

First, you are met with a crescendo of boisterous cheers. Stepping inside, your eyes are drawn to the green dyed sailcloths hung from the rafters above the bar. The establishment is modestly sized, enough that there is a longtable set up in the centre of the room and a fair few smaller roundtables dotted with stools. 

Across the far end of the tavern is a line of small booths, separated by wooden screens decorated with mosaic carvings. Oil lamps are hooked on the walls, casting a warm sepia hue that seems to cohesively bring everything together. It felt welcoming, and intimate, like approaching a friend by the fire. 

You try to seek out a familiar head of blonde hair. The place is busy but nobody bats an eyelid at your entrance, lively enough that you cannot hear clearly above the overlapping voices around you, intermingling with the low playing of music. 

“Lost, stranger?”

You startle. 

She finds you easily, like she’d been waiting. Mina curls an arm around your back, pressure light as if she was suddenly worried about being too familiar. It tightens when you lean into her and she smiles with more vigour. 

“C’mon. Let’s get you something to eat”. 

The distance between you and them is barely that of a crevice, but it is daunting, yawning like a trench. Over in the far left booth, both secluded and closest to the bar, is a group of friends. Directly beneath a lantern strung onto a hook, Katsuki is bathed in orange and nursing a drink. The others are tucked away in the booth, cups and plates lining the table top. Their laughter slows as you approach and you battle the urge to recoil from everyone’s eye. Mina, sensing the discomfort, begins to rub her hand along your back. 

“All of you scoot up,” she asserted, wiggling her pointer finger. “Make some space for us!”

They move around on the long, curved seat to make space. You end up on Katsuki’s right, sandwiched in by Sero who smiles, though awkward, earlier remorse persisting as you take your place beside him. “What’s the verdict, are you happy with your room? Best I got from Bakugo is a grunt”. 

“Yeah, I like it. You did good picking this place. It’s cosy,” you glance over toward Katsuki. “Beats a cave. The fireplace is nice. I wonder if it works…”

Mina tucks into Kirishima’s side where he sits across from you. Most of the plates are piled up in front of him, food aplenty to sate his dragon-sized appetite. His chin dimples as his bottom lip juts forward, “You guys get a fireplace? That’s so unfair”. 

“C’mon, Kiri. The fireplace is there for…”—Kaminari leans in, suggestively lowering his voice and nudging Katsuki’s left arm—“…ambiance”. 

You feel a gentle nudge. Katsuki, ignoring his friend's harmless influx of innuendos, slides a glass across the table toward you. “What is it?” you ask, bringing it to your lips. The liquid is dark, red like fresh blood, but it smells fruity. Before he can tell you, you’ve taken a sip. 

It is weighty on your tongue, unlike anything you’ve tasted before. Cherries and jam and oddly well paired notes of spicy tobacco. The corner of his mouth curls into a barely there smile, pleased at the immediate delighted sound. He brings forward a large opened bottle and presents it to you. 

“Barmaid gave us this to share,” Katsuki taps at the calligraphy on the label. “It’s wine. Expensive too, usually”. 

“Guess marriage does have benefits,” Sero gibed, raising a glass of amber liquid you assume to be beer. Expression open in sincere merriment, he declares, “To the happy couple!” 

Six glasses come together, toasting to your accidental bond, alcohol spilling over your hands. Katsuki’s cup is there too, his monotonous voice blending into their hurrahs. A hand slides from the back of the booth to rest upon your shoulders and you lean into it, heat prickling over your skull at the feel of his bare skin. Blood thinning, belly full, inhibitions lost to bliss. 

Mina brings her hands together in a succinct clap, weaving her fingers. “Another round!” she beams, and the enthusiasm stirs once more. 

The evening crawls on. Your modest group barely puts a dent into the chaotic din but it sure can eat. You’re made to swallow your fill under Katsuki’s direction—watching you closer than he did anyone else—and savour the dishes, heady and complimented by your flavoursome wine. 

Stories pass through loosened lips, new and old. You don’t mention it when Kaminari repeats himself twice over— nobody else does, either. You all sink into the balmy atmosphere, sharing food and conversation, relaxing entirely for what felt like the first time in months. 

Sero chokes on his drink as Kirishima recounts the story of when he and Katsuki first became friends. How the tiny blonde barbarian would sneak up on him through the bushes, throw rocks at his tender head, and challenge him to battle all in pursuit of friendship. 

Your shoulders shake, burrowing into Katsuki’s side to sap his warmth. Bare skin pebbles as your fingertips skim his ribs, poking near his armpit. “Would it kill you to communicate like a normal person?”

Trembling mouth pressed firmly together, Katsuki refuses to give anyone the satisfaction of making him laugh. You see through it plain as day. “Shut up,” he grumbles.  

“Didn’t even flinch when ma threatened to eat him if I came home with any more teeth missing,” Kirishima continued, sighing happily. “My bro is so manly”. 

Steadily the energy begins to dwindle into a pleasant hum. You’re together, drunk on wine and laughter and a sense of harmony. Being with them is startlingly effortless. It feels like family. 

In the recesses of your mind you think, I don’t want to let go. 

“Hey,” Katsuki says, sharper when nobody hears him. “Hey, shitheads”. You lift your head from where it had come to rest on his shoulder, cheek slightly numb. “Think I’m going to head up”.

You hear a chorus of sluggish objections with no real heat behind them. While he’s fighting off their interrogation you simply watch him, awkwardly angled and ignoring the twinge in your neck. The bead in his braid glints in the low light. 

Sensing your stare, Katsuki looks down at you, dappled by lamp light. The flames dance in his irises, gaze unbearably soft, as it had been that first night by the campfire. You hold your breath when he sets his thumb with his tongue and uses it to wipe a crumb from your cheek. The touch is like a spark to flint. A fleeting sort of hope stirs in your chest, like this is all you’d been waiting for, that the universe was finally making things right for you. 

Then he snatches his hand back, as though waking up to what he was doing. 

“I’m going to bed. You idiots better behave,” he groused, returning his focus to the group. You mourn his attention. “If we get kicked out early I’ll kill you”. 

“You love us too much,” Mina tucks her drunken smirk into the cradle of her palm, arm almost slipping with the weight. Cloudy eyes follow Katsuki as he forces his way out of the booth like a bull. “Admit it!” 

Bending at the waist he meets her stare head on and deadpans, “Die”. Mina merely laughs and plants a kiss on his forehead that he aggressively rubs away as he leaves. 

You stay a little longer but find your mood dampening. Katsuki’s absence makes known an ache usually quelled by the weight of your pelt, almost as though his presence had placated that innate yearning for home. The thought leaves you dizzy. 

“I think I’m going to go, too,” you announce out of the blue. 

Expressions fall, concerned. Kaminari tilts into your space. You barely even blink at the proximity now. “Everything alright? Y’dont feel sick or anything, do you?” 

“No, not at all—“ he frowns at you, unconvinced, “—I just feel like going for a soak before bed. Sero, you said there was a bathhouse?” 

Sero perks up at his name and nods loosely, head barely held by his neck. “Yeah! They’re around the back, apparently. Just walk beyond the stairwell,” he shoots you a thumbs up. “They’re mixed but only guests can use ‘em, so don’t worry about it being crowded”. 

That’s comforting to know. If luck was on your side it would be empty. You duck out of the tavern with a final wave and a promise to see them in the morning. Thankfully the boisterous chatter grows dull as you step into the night air, stopping to look up the stairwell. You hope Katsuki can sleep through it. 

Heeding Sero’s instructions you follow the beaten path around the back of the tavern. There you discover another building, smaller, but with a steeped tile roof and shuttered windows. Curious, you gently lift the green dyed curtain hung in the doorway and enter the earthen-floored threshold. 

You are led to what you guess is a small changing area. Cabinets left open, again each handle corresponding the key colours. You find a lavender ribbon and peer around the empty space, contemplating getting undressed. 

Gathering courage you pull the strings in your shirt slack, slipping your arms from the sleeves and pulling it over your head. Tepid air breathes over your skin as you push down your pants, stepping out of them where they pool at your feet. Your clothes are folded and left on the shelf, boots lined neatly by the doorway. 

Further in is an open space covered in tiles of smooth green. There are low stools and basins with natural running water, washcloths and soaps. While unpracticed you are at least somewhat familiar with bathhouse etiquette. Sitting hesitantly, hissing as your bare thighs meet the cool wood, you dip one of the cloths to soak and begin to scrub at your body. 

The knots in your muscles become undone with the repetitive motions, again and again until you’re lathered in bubbles. You breathe in, feeling the humidity cling to your lungs, and rinse away the soaps. 

Eventually you dub yourself clean enough to enter the baths. The seafoam tiles soon taper to stone that borders the baths. You take in the tall ceiling with beautiful carvings along the walls and high placed glass windows allowing the moon to shine in easily. The patterns are comfortingly familiar. Shells, waves, gulls, rock formations and arches. Though the bathhouse is much warmer, hot tendrils of steam rising from the bubbling water. 

Penumbral light glinted on the water's surface. It held a distinct earthy scent, rolling in from the nearby springs. Again, you are reminded of a tide pool, but deeper. Clear and clean and natural. What immediately seizes your attention is the familiar man sitting close by, a head of wet golden hair still somehow holding its shape, the loose strands that typically make up his braid now tucked behind his ear. 

Katsuki tips back to rest on the bath's edge. A thin white towel is laid across his face. Your gaze follows the slope of his shoulders, roving over his defined chest, skin pink with the heat. Rivulets run between his pecs to his sternum, lower body distorted below the water but patently bare, same as you. You exhale a breath you hadn’t known you were holding and quickly look away from his lap. 

Time spent with Katsuki taught you that he hated being treated delicately. Tip toeing around this was not an option. You would join him in the baths and behave as normal. But—

Humans were fickle about nakedness. Where should you sit? What is an appropriate distance? Straying too far could make him defensive, yet getting too close might—

“Are you going to stand there all night?” 

Startled, the soles of your feet almost slip on the smoothed stone. “You knew it was me?” 

Katsuki scoffs. The towel remains over his eyes, obstructing his view, that which you were grateful for. Your previous indifference had so abruptly burgeoned into apprehension. Just the thought that he might see you this glaringly bare and skinless, a body without boundaries, made your stomach swoop. It is a peculiar sensation; you wanted him to look and you didn’t. 

“Nobody else thinks that loud. Unless you’re Deku,” you can imagine his eyes rolling, the exasperation clear in his voice, though not unkind. The corded muscles in his shoulders shift beautifully as his arm stretches across the bath’s edge, wrist limp to allow his fingertips to breach the surface. He flicks the water in your direction, creating capillary waves. “Just— fuckin’ get in already”.  

“Right,” you laugh quietly under your breath, descending the steps into the baths. The heated water is soothing, climbing the length of your lengths, eventually coming to rest above your hips. 

You sink near to him and pointedly keep your eyes above his collar. Katsuki neither twitches nor acknowledges your approach. In fact, you aren’t sure he is even breathing. It occurs to you that he too could be nervous, tempted to look but refraining. The possibility of being wanted by him brings a sudden sharp sort of awareness that slides through you and heightens your senses. 

Outstretched fingertips brush featherlight between your shoulder blades where you lean back against the wall. You sit with your knees close to your breast, relieved to be covered. “I thought you were heading to bed,” you comment quietly. 

“Saw the path and followed it,” he replies, stiff shoulder jerking as he shrugs. “Wanted some quiet”. 

A deep pink flush is spreading across his collarbones, clawing up the column of his throat. Your rational mind knows it is caused by the steam, yet the greedy part of you, the part so distinctly human, wants to know if you affect him as much as he affects you. 

These feelings had gradually been accumulating since the very beginning. You’ve no idea where to put them. The voice in your hindbrain all but panics at the idea of leaving. You’ve spent a lifetime listening to your instincts and they’re telling you to keep your place at his side. 

You inhale until the pressure in your chest is smothered by your lungs and your heart beat slows. Exhale. The water shifts in sync with your subtle movement. Emboldened by the wine in your veins you slide closer. The soft hair on your legs prickles, everything in you gravitating toward him. Katsuki doesn’t acknowledge it. 

“Always staring,” a flustered growl snaps you back to reality. “You got something to say to me?” 

“No,” you answer too quickly. 

“Good,” his upper body sinking lower. After a length of silence it must get to him. Voice pitched low, as though afraid to disturb the atmosphere, he mutters, “Ever had a bath this big, back at that shitty castle?” 

You snort. He turns at the sound and the surface ripples as you quickly smother it with your wet palm. It’s easy to picture the searing glare beneath the face towel. “Sorry. It’s just,” your mouth pulls into a tipsy grin. “All things considered, this place is pretty small to me”. 

“Dumbass. You know what I meant,” he huffs, not bothering to hide his fond exasperation. “The sea doesn’t count”. 

Humans are cute, you concluded. Trying to emulate the ocean in their warm wooden structures. “It counts,” you insist, moving closer still. You’re giddy in the water, with him. Like you’re sharing some special part of yourself in a strange way. “Have you been?”

A rough hum, “Where?” 

“The sea”. 

“Which one?” 

The steam must be making you light headed. You’re tucked to his side again. Thigh to thigh. Skin against skin. You are acutely aware of your shared nakedness. His arm has slipped over the bath's edge to drape around your shoulders. “The closest, obviously. Or any of them,” you knock your knees together. “It’s not like you to be purposefully obtuse”. 

“Big attitude for a little fish,” he mutters, free hand reaching for the towel, sliding it up to his hairline and revealing a crooked grin. Your heart squeezes. “Course I’ve been in the ocean. Flown over it on Red a few times too”. 

You want to do that, too. To bear witness to the wind driving the currents from above, feel the sea salt spray sharp on your cheeks, touch the unreachable seam where your two worlds become indistinguishable.

“Never bathed in it, though?” 

“No,” he drawled, an impatient edge to his tone. “I don’t plan on giving the finfolk an eyeful of my dick anytime soon”. 

You laugh, “Like you are now, you mean?”

Katsuki tears off the face towel before you’ve any time to process it. The water thrashes. You daren’t look away. His stare has a certain ferality, pupils dilated, fair lashes damp from the steam and clumped into little spikes; it pins you in place like prey. 

The blush across his chest is matched in his cheeks. A droplet slides down the delicate slope of his nose. You feel the surface of the water calm and settle just above your breast. You watch his gaze flicker reflexively to them, then to the ceiling, then clamping shut with a growl. Apprehension pulses through you and your thighs clench. 

“You—” he inhales sharply, gathering his thoughts. You track the movement of his tongue as it swipes across his lips. Thickly, Katsuki asks, “What are you trying to do here, exactly?” 

A sense of dejection comes over you and your immediate response is to feign innocence. “Soak with you,” which is no more than a half truth. You attempt to create some distance and his arm coils around your waist. Any effort to twist away from him proves futile; a snake that constricts the more you struggle. He doesn’t allow you to slip away, hand hot at your hip. 

“Yeah?” but there’s no real bite, no vitriol as he drags you closer. “Soaking, s’that what you call this? Rubbing up against me, practically climbing into my lap?”

You might feel demeaned if not for the lust hemming his words. His grip is bruising, fingers kneading soft flesh. You can see this for what it is— a choice, a question. He’s confused, and wanting. Presenting an opportunity for you to change your mind in the face of his callousness. Katsuki is kind, in his own way. 

Your palms come to rest over his sternum, pushing with no real effort, an accomplice in whatever cat and mouse game he was trying to play. His breathing picks up, abdomen clenching. You stare where bodies meet, low light reflecting off the wet sheen. Beneath your touch his heartbeat ricochets around his ribs. 

Katsuki calls you. Your name is barely above a whisper. Peering up through your lashes as his hand comes to cup your nape, the other massages simple shapes into your hip, his fingers splayed across your navel. You exhale shakily as his pinky fits into the crease of your thigh. 

He cradles your nape, guides you into his magnetism, and then you’re tilting— your world with it— into a careful kiss. Static blankets your thoughts. Katsuki’s lips slot over your own, a gentle press that quickly grows feverish as your tongue traces the seam of his mouth. 

Exhaling harshly through his nose he drags you over his lap, the bath water splashing onto the stone tiles, holding you to his front in a way that makes it difficult to discern where you end and he begins. You have all of him now. Half hard under you and tense like he was exerting effort not to do anything about it. Hands wandering, mapping out the topography of your body, clutching greedily at your thighs. Smoke fills your throat, a tang of explosive magic lingering in the grooves of your teeth. 

Minutes passed imperceptibly. You leave it feeling as though all the sinew in your body had unravelled, undone in his embrace like loose skeins of yarn. Katsuki doesn’t appear any more composed than you are; staring at you, slack with hunger, jaw relaxed the way a beast would do to taste the air. Palms cupping his cheeks, thumbs moving in idle back and forth motions under his eyes, you smile—

“Katsuki,” you murmur reverently. For reasons you can’t understand, it wakes him up. Snaps him out of his stupor. Panic flits over his features and you’re being pushed away, deposited back into the water. It rocks with the abrupt movement, waves breaking against your chest as he brusquely wades toward the steps with the small towel barely covering his modesty. 

Echoing louder now, “Katsuki?” 

And he was gone. 

You stare at the entrance to the baths for a long time, willing him to return. You stare until your eyes sting and you’re forced to blink. All that’s left is the soft sound of the running springs, your shallow breath, and the muffled chanting of a few drunken men. 

An emptiness makes home in your chest. Bereft, you follow in his steps, exiting the baths and heading to the changing room. You pat yourself down, rough towel absorbing the moisture, and pull on your clothes. 

A hopeful spark catches when a figure ducks in under the curtain. Snuffed out, then, when Mina greets you cheerily. She seems to have sobered up for the most part, more coherent than you’d last seen her. 

“You took a dip too?” she bounces on the balls of her feet as she undoes her shirt buttons, oblivious to your somber disposition. “I saw Bakugo come from this way too. Looked a little constipated if you ask me. I thought hot baths were supposed to relax you, not—”

Finally, she looks at you. Her voice stops as her brows pinch into a frown. You offer a brittle smile and endure the scrutiny. “Did something happen?” she asks worriedly. 

Your throat closes up. Your teeth sink into your cheek and lower your gaze to the tiled floor, cracks overlapping as your vision blurs. Mina reaches for you. She halts in your periphery, thoughts and actions misaligned. A flash of hesitance, and then determination. She strides across the threshold to pull you into an embrace. Her arms slip around your shoulders, crossing over one another at your nape, tightening. 

The tension begins to soften. Your body slumps, sinking into her kindhearted warmth as the rigidity weakens with your resolve. Bowing into the crook of her neck, you inhale her gentle scent. A soliflore smell, a flower you don’t know the name of, earthy undertones and hints of saké. 

Your eyes are wet. Tears cling to your lashes as you blink. The moths dancing in the lamp light blurs, small specks of white stretching and flickering like pallid butterflies. Breathing shuttered, there’s a thickness in your throat that squeezes your voice into a frail whisper. 

“Thank you”. 

She hums, rubbing a comforting hand along the top of your spine. Her natural heat seeps through the thin fabric of your shirt. Though her arms are muscled they are also supple, like her chest, like her waist. You haven’t been held like this since you last saw your podmates. 

After a few beats she asks, “Do you want to talk about it?” 

You shake your head, grasping your bearings, “No”. It’s best left between you and Katsuki. 

“If you’re sure,” Mina gives a final crushing hug before releasing you. “I’m bunking with Sero tonight. Knock if you need anything”. 

“I will,” you say on the end of a shuddering exhale. “I’ll see you in the morning”. 

She hums, watching apprehensively as you make your way through the changing rooms. The retention of her heat clings to your clothing when you step into the cold night air. Your boots rub at the sore skin around your ankles, fitting loose, having foregone tying the laces. They encumber your steps, obtrusively loud and ungainly on your journey up the stairwell. 

A closed door should not be so daunting. Your hand hovers over the handle, steadily turning it, flinching as the locks click open. Low light floods in from the hallway and your eyes adjust to the darkness between blinks, the shape of a figure under the covers sharpening into view. Katsuki is laid on his back, hand disappearing under the pillow beneath his head where your bunched up pelt resides. 

Hesitant, you shut the door and kick off your dirty shoes. You tiptoe around the frame and climb into bed. You try to alleviate your weight, balanced between your hands and knees so the mattress won’t dip, yet it is futile. “I’m sorry, Katsuki,” you whisper, feeling fragile as you lower into the linens. He’s awake, you can tell despite his efforts to appear otherwise, because you feel him stroking your sealskin between his thumb and forefinger. 

“…Shouldn’t have done that,” his cadence is unsettlingly calm; gently sheathing the sharp words. “We’ve been getting too comfortable, letting shit influence us. It was just the magic talking”. 

What? 

“It’s not—”

“Go to sleep,” the volume raises in momentary frustration, but as quick as it came, anger dissipating. Dropping his head into the pillows he looks as defeated as you feel. He closes his eyes. “I won’t fuckin’ do anything to you so just. Sleep”. 

You try, fitfully. The atmosphere is unbearable, keeping you glued to the far side of the bed lest you accidentally touch one another. Pressing your fingertips to your lips, you remember. You ache. You stare into the shadows and wonder at what point did the intentions become so crossed. 

Katsuki valued the right to choose above all else. You liked that about him. He respected and surrounded himself with people who steered their own destiny, marching to the beat of his own drum; a rhythm you had fortuitously interrupted. In his mind he’d given into a temptation, and that act of indulgence was somehow the same as losing in battle. 

Katsuki viewed your relationship as an infliction he needed to fight against. 

That knowledge hurts you in ways you hadn’t expected. The words “we’re getting too comfortable” reverberated around your skull. Perhaps he was right. Somewhere along the lines you forgot that these truly were temporary circumstances, childishly wishing that maybe he’d come to love you, that you could simply accept this reality and grow into each other like a child into new shoes. 

You blink. Linens rise and fall with his shallow breath. Katsuki’s mouth is open, the corner of his mouth wet with drool. His lips smack together as he bundles you closer. Unconscious, yet still seeking you out. He’s devastating even when he’s not trying to be. 

Sleep feels impossible. 

Then you wake. 

Morning spills her dewy light throughout the room. Katsuki’s side of the bed is empty— made up and tucked at the corners. Cold. You are suddenly a distance apart and scrambling to make it all better again.

You push up into a sitting position. The bedsheets shift and pool around your hips, creasing the perfect slate Katsuki left. You rummage for the pelt hidden behind the pillows, dragging it out and around your shoulders, ducking your nose into the dark fur for comfort before tying it to your midriff. 

Judging by the sun’s position you would guess it is still quite early. Sluggish movement can be heard through the thin walls, indicating that others are awake. Knowing Katsuki he would want to set off early to find Uraraka, especially after last night.

Another figure joins you in the hallway. Kaminari remains unaware of your presence as he fiddles clumsily with the key, squawking when it almost slips between his fingers. He’s dishevelled, shirt half tucked into his belt, cuffs undone and hung off his wrists; there’s still an impression of his pillow printed on his left cheek. 

Having finally turned the lock, Kaminari spins on his heel with a happy hum. The tune escalates into a shriek as he notices you standing a few feet away. “Holy—! Warn a guy, would ya?” he clutches at his chest, exhaling harshly. “I think my heart just stopped”. 

“Sorry Kaminari,” amused by his shrill intonation and melodramatics, you smile for the first time that morning. It exaggerates the bags under your eyes. “Did you sleep well?”

“Like a baby,” he falls into step with you, knocking your elbows together on your way out into the stairwell. “I don’t think you can say the same, though,” his mouth twists into a smirk, “did Kacchan keep you up all night?” 

Normally the teasing wouldn’t bother you. In many ways you saw it as a sign of acceptance into the group. Now you wince like somebody had carelessly pressed a bruise on your body. Kaminari, for all his obliviousness, knows when to drop the masquerade. 

Your smile tightens uncomfortably as his fingers circle your wrist. In daylight you are left feeling exposed, unable to temper the regret written so plainly across your face. His mouth opens and shuts, searching fruitlessly for the right words, only to be interrupted by a callous shout from below. 

Katsuki’s voice is incredibly distinct. He’s yelling, which is nothing new, but now it is with genuine frustration. Kirishima, Mina and Sero are there alongside him, speaking in low tones as you would to an untamed animal. 

Kaminari tugs at your sleeve and gives you a meaningful glance, gently coaxing you to the bottom of the stairs. He must’ve at least connected Katsuki’s poor mood with your own.  “Kacchan, my man. It is too early for all this shouting,” he implored, settling back into his jovial self. 

You collect yourself, trying to retain shape and rationality as Kaminari draws Katsuki’s ire. Those vermillion eyes rove over you, head to toe, before flickering to the man on your right. Fast, like he’s afraid to look too long. Nostrils flare. The warm puff of air from his nose is visible in the cool air. 

“It’s late enough. What took you so long?” Katsuki snarled, poking a finger harshly between Kaminari’s eyebrows. “The keep told me cheeks is planning on leaving today, so all of you get moving”. 

Kaminari pouts, rubbing at the spot. The pale skin turns slightly pink. Unheeding of the wary scrutiny he is receiving, Katsuki charges onwards in expectation that everyone will follow. Kirishima raises a brow at his shape verbiage but doesn’t comment. He takes you under his arm in a half hug, sharing a look of understanding with Mina and the others. 

Sero recounts their findings. According to the townspeople, Uraraka, the occultist, landed her abode miles outside of their bounds and set up wards in the valley to confuse strangers. It steered them in opposing directions and sent them in circles, practically making her impossible to find. You’re worried clear up until your group crests the precipice of a steep hill several hours later.

You take in the gentle undulations of earth and fauna. Grass tall enough to brush your shoulders, wildflowers and weeds hugging the barely worn path, sparingly tended nature left to flourish. The magic becomes apparent with proximity. It hangs in the air like humidity, an unnatural sheen muddying your vision. Katsuki continued with brass-bound determination; weaving skilfully through the runes, barrier fracturing under the pressure of his explosive palms. 

There’s a quaint cottage in the middle of the glen, done up with a sweet ivy on the walls, latticed strips of wood around the windows, and a cobbled chimney towering from the pink tiled roof. Each windowsill appeared to have a different unidentifiable herb growing on it. A small, circular stained glass window in the door refracted the afternoon light, a knocker below it. Hanging by the door frame is a wind chime, shells tied to strings producing delicate crisp sounds in the breeze; in the effort to knock, Katsuki shoulders it carelessly, and the tune turns sour. 

His fist comes down with hard momentum, stopped midway by another. “Be careful,” Kirishima gently chides. Katsuki shoves his hand off, sparing him an incredulous glare, which the shifter subjugates with a pointed reminder: “She won't help you if you bust her door down, bro. Play nice”. 

Katsuki grunted his understanding, jaw clenched. He raps his knuckles on the wood. The sound is dull, and you stare down at your scuffed boots as an unpleasant pang of anxiety knocks around your chest. A voice shouts from inside, somebody scurrying around, then the door is pulled open. 

“Can I—Bakugo?!”

“Uraraka,” Katsuki greets bluntly, giving a short nod. It is the first time you’ve ever heard him say her name. His hands flex at his sides, restless. Through gritted teeth he adds, “Deku sent me. I need your help with something”. 

“Oh,” Uraraka exhales in disbelief. She steps back, pink slippered feet in your periphery. “Come in, then. I haven’t seen you guys in forever…”

Their voices fade into the background. All at once subconscious acts like breathing and blinking become tiresome. Hearing him let go of his pride felt so final. You fall away, stuck in a cold fog. Your gait is uneven as you remind yourself to put one foot in front of the other, incognisant to the worried looks thrown your way. 

You remember being seated on a plush feather-pillowed sofa. Hands running over your shoulders, grounding you. You reach for your pelt, sinking fingers into the downy fur, and find no comfort in it. Now you’re here it feels more like a husk, leaden and hollow, ready for you to be stuffed into. 

“You married a selkie by accident?” Uraraka blanched, her volume rousing you from your haze. “You know, Bakugo, for someone so smart your ignorance is truly astounding”. 

“Can you fucking reverse it or not?” 

“Reverse it. Are you kidding? You’re not. Gods, Bakugo—breaking a soul bond isn’t common,” Uraraka snaps, rubbing roughly at her eyelids as she loses patience. You feel a pang of guilt, that which worsens as it unearths the hope that perhaps she wouldn’t be able to separate you from him. “Most of the methods are based on myth. You realise it will be incredibly painful, and possibly for nothing?”

You take in the surroundings while they continue to bicker. The cottage is modest. A small foyer leads to the living space, rugs of various shapes and colours laid to insulate a path through the house, runes and scrawls carved into the hardwood walls. Logs presumably for fuelling the hearth monopolise much of the space, spilling out from the nook in which they’re stacked. There is nothing particularly otherworldly, at least not where you can see it. Uraraka obviously lives within her means, a humble and frugal person despite wielding magic of her calibre. 

“I do have something I can try, ” she sighs with a sidelong glance. The skin on her lip breaks between her teeth. Your prolonged silence has likely done nothing to reassure her. You try to feign interest, to smile and express gratitude, but she grimaces. 

“What do we have to do?”

“Essentially I can sever the bond at the stem but not the root,” the group is quiet, tense as they listen. Mina’s grip is bruising, as though making sure you were still there. “The dissolution of your marriage will only be complete when the selkie returns to the sea. Within a day or two they’ll… forget you”.  

You sense the atmosphere darken. Katsuki shifts his weight in your periphery. Neither one of you can look at the other. Whether he’s threatened by your feelings or ashamed of them you can’t be sure, but what you know is that they are real, sown and tended in the weeks you spent together. 

Kirishima exhales a shuddered breath. His big body crouches before you, warm hand resting on your knee. Kaminari and Sero linger on either side, watching over the scene, wearing grief plainly on their faces. A broken part of you wants to laugh. They are acting as if this is your wake. 

“Are you sure about this?” he implores, discreet and unintentionally cruel. If you were to say no, what of you then? Nothing to do but follow them on their journey, dragging along like the hide of some shorn animal. Stuck waiting for Katsuki to resent you over an incredibly frustrating and misplaced presumption that he played a part in fabricating your thoughts and feelings.  

Uraraka’s method may well cleave the ties created in your accidental matrimony. You trust in her capabilities because Katsuki clearly respects them. You’ll say yes. And after it all, when your soul has been excavated, when you’ve gone home crying to your mother, rocked to sleep in her gentle undertow, you will still stubbornly want him. 

The thought comes unbidden, a sudden clarity that overcomes you. At that point he would have no room to question your will. “I’m sure,” you say, still breathless with the realisation. “You can go ahead with it, Uraraka”. 

Hesitating in her movement, Uraraka considers you for a moment longer before disappearing down the hall. When she returns she pulls seven tear shaped crystals from a velvet satchel. Dread churns in your stomach, sensing the energy emanating from them. 

She begins to recite machinations beyond your comprehension. Opalescent rays of light burst from within her enclosed fist where it pressed against her mouth, dappling sentient shadows across her face, now taut with concentration. Her features ripple and distort, not unlike a reflection on the ocean's surface, then fades into obscurity as the spell settles into its conduit. 

Uraraka hands the lustre of the stone to you, knuckles pale as she squeezes the magic out into your cupped palms. As a pup you would try to drink sunlight, specks chased across the seabed as the clouds shifted, caught like a cat to a mouse only to remain empty handed. Light was not made up of solid matter— it was intangible. To be felt, seen, but not touched. 

Yet it is swirling in your hands like that lovely warm wine from the night before, slipping through the thin cracks in your fingers. “Drink it,” she coaxes gently. 

You look at Katsuki. His eyes flicker up to meet your own. There’s an awful urgency coursing through your body, frozen like a fawn, something inside willing you to stop. Begging him to speak up. He lowers his gaze, expression pinched and inwardly furious. 

Heel to chin, you tip your head back as if drinking from a cup. Her magic is entirely flavourless, waning with your own imagination as if it were allowing you to choose the taste yourself. The consistency is like steam; inhaled rather than swallowed, and hot on the roof of your mouth. 

Elemental magic was external in the way it bursts forth from the user, often causing flesh wounds or dramatic change in the terrain. You think of Katsuki, the calamity at his fingertips, juxtaposed by the tender manner in which he would always touch you, cauterising your fear. Uraraka’s magic is unforgiving and uniquely invasive. It is so much worse than being burned. 

It spreads through your sinuses like searing wildfire, pressure balloons behind your eye sockets, undoing the seams that make up the very fabric of your being. Waves of nausea engulf you, throat tight and constricted. Breathing laboured and irregular, you fight against the urge to retch it all up. 

It’s too much. The incorporeal spell pierces through your mind, tearing at the bond, more overwhelming than anything you’ve ever been dealt. Knife-like pain persists after her chanting stops. You wince and cradle your head, weeping as it passes. Left in its wake is a muted soreness throbbing across your brain. 

“Hi,” Uraraka is before you, ducking to examine for any injury. Careful, her fingers encircle your wrists and pry your hands away. “You’re okay. Can you look at me?”

You squint, reluctant to blink and irritate the soreness around your eyes. “How’s your vision?” she asked, sotto voce. Her touch is deliberate and gentle, slightly pulling down your bottom eyelids, petting over your jaw and down the nape of your neck, feeling for something. “Does anything feel wrong, or out of place?”

Wrong? your mind echoes. Out of place? Cold is creeping into your muscles, gritty and dense like wet sand. You’re unnerved by the veil of apathy that settles around you. “I don’t think I’m injured. The light is more intense. Hurts,” you admit, voice breaking. 

Everything that remains the same yet is somehow more drab, lacking colour and difficult to look at. Your friends, clinging to each other. Your Katsuki, staring back at you. “But I can still see everything”. 

“Good,” she breathes, relief entirely palpable. If this is success then you wonder what the worst outcome might’ve been. “That’s good. If you reach for the bond, is it there?” 

You’re not sure what she means. Seeking connection you clutch your sealskin to your front, kneading at the familiar fur. It’s minor but it’s back— the voice belonging to the tide, beckoning you to shift again. “I don’t think so,” you reply. 

“Then there’s only one thing left to do,” Uraraka smiles and covers your hands with her own. You sense the tips of her fingers ever so slightly across your collar where they brush the pelt bunched in your fists. “You’re free now. You can go back home”. 

Her soothing countenance might as well be dry grass to your precipitous anger. “Right,” you deadpan, voice entirely devoid of emotion. Best kept that way, lest you release all your bubbling frustrations onto a woman that only wanted to help you; in her eyes—and the rest—you were just another trapped, useless selkie. 

That anger carries you to your feet. You want to cry but the tears don’t come. When you exit the cottage with a curt bow and a ‘thank you’ you find yourself in the lead for once, marching ahead of the group. They remain a few feet behind, muttering amongst each other. Without the view of Katsuki’s back you feel lonely. Even so you keep your hurried pace, too afraid to turn around and be inundated with questions. 

The journey back passes in a blur. Hours, surely, because you’re ready to pass out from the exertion. Loose dirt and geosmin clings to your clothes.  Shadows stretch across the emptying streets as dark cloud cover canopies the town, sparse instances of light rainfall that stick to your skin. There's a chill in the air now, a bite to it that rattles your bones and quickens your breath. It’s damp, imbued with the scent of sea salt. 

You don’t stop, not when the desperate calls of your name begin. Further up the dock is lit golden, lanterns lining cobbled roads and emitting a warm orange glow. You trudge through the quieting bustle, workers scurrying to shelter, while enduring a pervasive sense of wrongness. 

You don’t know what to do with this freedom, this precipice, so joyless and empty. Slowing to descend weather-worn steps onto the beach there’s a presence at your heel. “Shit. Would you slow—!” Katsuki moves to stop you. His fingers flex, start to close around your wrist. Then they hesitate and fall away, clenching at his side until all the blood recedes from his knuckles. “You don’t need to immediately run off into the damn water”. 

“It’s easier this way,” and quicker, you think. 

“What?”

Listening to the sea sings an ancient litany, you let your anger wash away with the oncoming tide. The whiplash is intense. Your lips tremble, pulling into a tearful smile, laughter bubbling up through your chest, choked by the swell in your throat. “I think I understand why you’re always yelling now,” cumulus clouds pass overhead and bring with them a curtain of rain.  “Being human is very melodramatic”. 

Katsuki clearly hadn’t expected that, of all things. His expression softens in his surprise. The short hairs by his temples are laid flat, braid swinging in the breeze, the fur around his cloak dark and saturated. “That’s what this is? Baby’s first tantrum?” his tone is mean, and your hackles would rise if he were not visibly deflating. Katsuki reacts to vulnerability like a wounded dog. He laughs despite himself and scratches at his neck, “Fuck. I thought you’d be happy, or something close to it”. 

Standing a few feet behind him, Kirishima, Sero, Mina and Kaminari are linked together, waiting to approach. They remain in your line of sight as you consider the barbarian in front of you. A cold shock billows through his cloak, a wave crashing onto the shore. He shivers, but remains stubbornly rooted to the steps. 

“I’m not happy,” you lamented. “I’m going to miss you. You are an impossible man, Katsuki. Impossible to forget. I wish you’d believe that”. 

Katsuki’s mouth opens and shuts. Silence falls once again, and he can’t find the words to fill it. Your fingers work at the belt keeping your hide secure, tugging it loose and letting the sealskin unfurl, blanketing the length of your body. 

Mina takes this as an indication that you are leaving. She rushes ahead, stumbling past a stunned Katsuki, gathering you into her arms. The pelt is trapped between your bodies as you curl into the embrace. You feel yourself warm up, the wet winds rolling off the sea obstructed by three larger figures trailing right behind her, encasing you in a group hug. 

Constricted from all sides, the arms around your waist tighten. Mina���s nails dig in, and she shakes you gently in an attempt to scold you, “Don’t go leaving us without a proper goodbye”. 

Kirishima is at your back. He must be. The height, the rough skin, the hard spikes in his hair poking at your nape where he inhales deeply, memorising your scent. Sero flanks your left, resting his head on the shifter's shoulder as dark eyes watch you. Kaminari bears down his weight, slumping against your right, a sour metallic taste at the back of your throat as the grip on his magic loosens with emotion. 

It feels wrong without Katsuki. You crane your neck and look for him. The sight of him dithering off to the side, alone and wearing a visage of muted guilt, makes your insides twist. Your hand bursts through a crevice in the huddle, coaxing him over. 

He comes. Mina drags him into the middle without fanfare, and enclose around you in a last ditch effort to keep you together. “This is the worst,” Kaminari snivelled. “It’s like my parents are divorcing all over again”. 

Katsuki weakens to it. Gives a quiet, choked laugh and it blows warm across your temple. You’d know his hands anywhere. Hesitant, they rest on your hips. You close your eyes and centre yourself in the present, tilting your head to rest on his collar. The motion drags your lips up to his jugular and you kiss the words against the damp skin, thicker than intended, “I’m—really, so happy I met you all”. 

The briny air greets you when they finally step away. Mina rubs harshly at her eyes as your feet sink into the sand. There are stragglers by the port but nobody along the beach, so they trail after you to the shore, equal parts unwilling to leave and curious about your selkie form.  

You’re pointedly aware of their presence as you shake out your fur. You hold it to your face for a moment, blocking out the wind, the light and the rain with how insulated it is, before setting it on the sand. Kaminari coughs, the group spinning on their heels when you begin to undress. Katsuki does not. 

Kicking off your boots as you fiddle with your shirt strings, you consider the barbarian, impressing his appearance behind your eyes for a final time. “What will you do after this?” 

Broad shoulders rise and fall as he sighs. Looks up to the sky, frowning, a blush on his cheeks. “Go further inland to one of the bigger cities to find something to pay back Deku, I guess. Circle around, head back, and then home”. 

Shirt discarded, you unbutton your pants, letting them fall down your thighs, and step out of them. “How long will you be in the city?”

Shrugging, he grunts, “A week at most”. 

That’s good. Long enough to wait out the final stages and prove his place in your memory. You nod, spine straightening with determination. “When you circle back I want you to stop here again. Just for a day”. 

That half lidded gaze slides over to you, squinting. Pointedly kept above the shoulders. Searching. “Why?” 

The tide crawls further ashore. A wave breaks around your ankles. Your toes wiggle in the sand, sinking as it is displaced, a small smile curling at your lips. You bend to grab the pelt and slide it around your shoulders like a coat. It’s comforting, familiar. Energy thrums at the surface of your skin, ready to pull. But you wait. 

“In a week. Promise me?” you say without explanation. 

Katsuki swallows. Eyes boring into yours. His jaw shifts. Then he nods, tersely. Reassured by this you hold the coat tighter, chin tucked as you steady your breathing. Consciously, you reach inward, drawing upon the pelt.

And you change. Falling to your knees, cold water biting at your thighs, you crumple in the sand, body shrinking as flesh and fur meld together. It’s painful after so long, unsettling to be snapped back abruptly into your hindbrain, but the discomfort eases quickly, like stretching a muscle. 

You lift your upper body, nose flat and wide and twitching, scenting the air. The sand sifts under bootstrapped feet. A human approaches, beautiful and familiar, lowering into a crouch as you freeze. Forearms resting on his knees, he holds out his fingers. Faintly smoky, a mix of spice and earth. 

The way in which this man appraises your form is uncomfortably solemn. Vacuous expression betrayed by the gentle light in his eyes. He smiles ruefully and readies himself to speak. Alight with a bitterness that is vaguely accusatory in the oncoming darkness he says, “Already forgot us, didn’t you?”

It steals the breath right from your lungs. Recognition strikes through you. Bakugo Katsuki. The thought is alarmingly fleeting, almost evading your grasp. Nostrils flaring, you drag your body forward to wipe the look of self-deprecation from his face. You nudge your snout into his hand, not shying away from the fierce elemental energy radiating from his palms. You unhinge your jaw, canines gently indenting the heel, as if to scold him. 

He laughs, disbelief bleeding into the sound. It beckons his pod, more humans— one not so human. “Don’t fuckin’ scare them,” Katsuki calls over his shoulder. Not once do his eyes stray from you. 

A thick tang of draconic magic overwhelms your senses as the largest in the group mirrors Katsuki, making himself impossibly small, aware of his magnitude and the imbalance between your species. “Wow…” the shifter, Kirishima, breathes in awe, genuine rather than tainted with greed. “So cute”. 

More people come closer. Their faces filter through your memories in bits and pieces, stitching together into a patchwork timeline. “Yeah…” Mina echoes the sentiment. She gets on her knees, doesn’t care when the waves drench her skirt. “You’re beautiful like this too,” holding her hand an inch away from your skin, she asks, “Can we pet you?” 

Five fingers to your scruff, one hard pull and you could be torn from your rudimentary shell. Human hands are dangerous but not these ones. You give a short tonal whine and hope she interprets it as permission. They do, taking turns tracing the marbled fur and clawed flippers, murmuring awe filled words. 

The tides are high, wrapping around and coaxing you into their arms. You look toward the horizon and the itch grows. A seamless vista of clouded sky. Warm mouths litter the top of your head with kisses, their blunt human teeth behind soft lips, juxtaposed by rough, barely decipherable mutterings of something that sounds mournful. 

Mina sniffles as Kirishima helps her to her feet and they wade backwards toward the port. Katsuki cups your muzzle in his palms, searing where his thumbs swoop beneath your cheekbones, brushing over the whiskers by your nose. “Stay safe out there, yeah? Don’t get eaten by a shark or whatever,” he bends, bringing your foreheads together as if to impress his thoughts onto you. “I won't wait around for a weakling”. 

You can only hope he saw the promise held in your eyes as you stare at his retreating back. The swelling waves pull you into the current, submerged until only your head is above the surface. In the distance your pod breaks into cheers. They line up on the beach, jumping high as their legs will allow, waving their long arms in the air. 

A descending chorus of trills build in your own throat, mellifluous and loud enough to cut through the wind and the waves. Noise becomes muffled as you’re submerged into the dense water. Wrapped up in brine the ambience fills your head. It pushes out rational thought, drawing only instinct to the forefront. 

Your vision adjusts quickly to the dark the further you swim. Stretch your flippers and sweep them down like a dragon's wing, flying through the depths until you tire. Coming to an ocean shelf, there you rest. Cradled by a moving, ever evolving element. Creatures big and small pass by. Fish with vermillion scales haloing wide faces dart in and out of your dreams, shimmering under weak streams of sunlight. 

The shifting tide keeps you cognisant. You linger close to the surface to monitor the sun. Days pass and you are unbearably alone. It is harrowing; this unending, sombre ache. You think of Katsuki. Repeat his name until it sounds foreign. You recall his handsome face, the way his eyes always seemed brighter in the early dawn, how his nose would wrinkle if you stared too long, like he’d tasted something bitter. You miss him. 

Come the week’s end you’ve become something else, something new. Irrevocably changed by love’s hand. You recognise that you exist in two worlds: as a  selkie, tethered to the seabed and embraced by buoyancy, and as a human, struggling against the currents, compelled back to land—

To Katsuki. 

You glide through the waves, riding them as they swell and break onto the shore. Undulating your body, the hitching motion pulls you forward, wriggling up into a cluster of rock pools, safe from any onlookers. You wait there, chin propped on the shoulder of a jagged stone to observe the beach. 

He finds you there beneath an almost oppressive dusk. The approaching footfalls command attention, announcing his arrival. You slink into the shadows for a moment, detailing the subtleties in Katsuki’s expression on his march along the sand, pinching more and more as he casts he searches the beach. The breeze ripples through the notorious red cloak, fur collar tickling his cheeks. Shirtless, wearing his scars proudly. His pants sit low on his hips, adorning various belts and jewels. Warmth curls up in your chest at the sight of him. Giddy. You remember him. 

You lift your head. His focus immediately latches onto the movement. A croon rumbles in your throat as he approaches. He climbs up onto the rock, towering over you, his body obstructing the evening sun. It halos around his golden hair. The braid by his ear falls forward as his head tilts, squinting to get a good look at you. 

The laughter lines by his eyes deepen, brow creasing. Almost slipping as he climbs down, Katsuki frowns at the lack of traction on the surface. You laugh and it comes out like a rough snort. The shallow pools splash loudly under his boots upon landing. He curls his upper lip at you, “Laugh at me and I’ll kill you”. 

You do so again, more deliberate this time. He senses your sarcasm and flicks water at you. Your whiskers twitch, subtly tasting the air. He slumps hard on one of the flatter ridges and clicks his tongue. “This better be you and not some random fuckin’ seal I’m talking to,” he mutters, embarrassed. 

Unwilling to prolong your reunion any longer, you shed your pelt. Joints slot into place, the sealskin receding, your human form unearthing as it loosens and pools around your naked lap. Katsuki watches the air bite at your skin, nipples pebbling as you shiver. 

“Katsuki,” you rest your cheek on his thigh, knelt between his legs. You let him take it all in. Satisfied with his assessment of you his fiery eyes meet yours. 

“Almost didn’t come. Figured you wouldn’t be here,” he intoned gruffly, chin dimpling as he juts his bottom lip. “You were supposed to forget about everything”. 

You nod, mouth curling into a helpless smile. Your fingers flex and you feel the muscles jump underneath, “I know”.

Katsuki exhales a long breath, fists clenched tight in his lap with obvious restraint. “Why didn’t you?” his eyes track the movements of your hands. “It worked, I know it did. Cheeks doesn’t do shit halfway. I felt when… So what the hell are you doing back here?”

You pause when his words register, suddenly off kilter. There it is again, the displeased wrinkle on the bridge of his nose. You had never considered that he, too, would’ve experienced the connection. Admittedly a naive oversight on your part—but he never mentioned it. You figured it was just a selkie thing. Perhaps, all that time, he had been contending with his own feelings as well as yours. Wondering if he could trust himself, if they were true. 

Vows dissolved, he still chose to come back for you. To bet on that slim chance. Just as you did. 

The knowledge compels you to touch him more, to reassure, to lean further into the clutch of his thighs. The intrusion forces his legs wider and when you reach to cradle either side of his taut jaw he lowers to close the distance. 

“I felt it, you know. Before you offered me my pelt I felt you touching it,” you begin, watching how his expression splits open as your eyes meet. “I knew it was safe with you”. 

“That’s stupid,” he utters, though you can hear that he doesn’t mean it. Embarrassment slowly stains his cheeks pink. You can feel him twitch, smothering the instinctive urge to snap at whatever made him feel so intensely. 

“Maybe,” you pull back a hair's breadth to lightly knock your heads together. “My point is, I was drawn to you before all that, in such a short window. I think… I didn’t forget you because those feelings grew naturally”. 

The more you speak he progressively gets pinker, flustered and mad about it. It births an odd, primal urge to sink your teeth into something. To bite his cheek white, watch the blood retreat under the skin. Instead, you slide your hand lower to rest on his neck and his own cuff your wrists. 

“That first day, you apologised to me because I never had a choice,” there’s a soft grunt in acknowledgment. His pulse dances under your palm. “I’m making one now of my free will. And you—can say no, if you want,” you stutter, then, suddenly realising the real possibility of him rejecting your request altogether. “But I want to be here with you”. 

The last rays of sun stretch across the land, cosseted behind soft clouds as it sheaths. Katsuki considers you quietly. There’s a soft sort of intent in his eyes, wearing the revelry of dusk. You kneel in the rock pool, literally and figuratively bare, heart pounding in your throat as he readies himself to respond. 

“Back at the bathhouse…” he hesitates, promptly clears his throat and struggles to look at you. 

“Nothing was influencing me that night. Except maybe the wine,” you admit timidly, abashed at his sudden demurity. “I’m sorry”. 

That garners a reaction from him. In true Katsuki fashion his tongue clicks behind gritted teeth and applies pressure to your wrists, pulling you up. “Come here,” he tells you. You uncurl your legs and begin to stand moving with all the grace of a newborn fawn. “Oi, don’t—!” jerking his head to the side, he averts his gaze from your naked lower half, glaring at the shoreline. The sea-scented air prickles your skin, heat gathering where he has you held. “Expose yourself to everyone in the fuckin’ country, won’t you? Come here,” and then he’s hooking behind your knees, making them bend, gathering you into his lap in bridal fashion. 

“What’s the problem?” you mutter. Heat creeps up your neck, feeling defensive and distinctly embarrassed by his behaviour. “I don’t see how my nakedness is any different here than it is in the public bathhouse”. 

He holds you closer, voice vibrating through his chest as he roughly insists, “It’s different”. 

Your pout softens into a small pleased smile, letting him manhandle you until he’s satisfied with his grip. He bends, incidentally baring his throat stretching for the pelt discarded by the rocks. Tucking your nose to the underside of his jaw you revel in how his arm tightens around your lower back. 

Katsuki draws the pelt into your lap, covering your modesty. You laugh at how sweet and boyish it seems. “Laughin’ at me again, huh?” two fingers pinch at your cheek, pulling until you whine. “Got a death wish?”

Kneading at the sealskin coat your affections roar into existence once more with an intensity. “You wouldn’t hurt me,” you grin, and he abandons the pinch to stretch his big hand across your face. Thumb on your left cheek, fingers on your right, he squeezes together until your mouth is misshapen and pursed. 

“Sure about that?” he warns, tone steeped in fondness. It is exhilarating to have him touch you again, more freely than he ever had before; it is as close to ‘I believe you’ as you think you’ll get. 

You smile with your eyes, locked with his. Close enough to count every fine eyelash. Your words come garbled as you say, “You still haven’t given me an answer”. 

Katsuki exhales shallowly through his nose. His throat contracts as he swallows. The pressure releases. His hand cups your face, flexing with uncertainty. You shudder when he dips to press your lips together. You’re kissed without hurry, besotted by his firm but cautious movements. He relaxes as you lean into the rhythm, humming proudly. The soft, wet sounds of your mouths meeting again and again echo over the crawling waves. 

Katsuki pulls away first, eyes still closed but smiling to himself. He licks his lips and rasps, “I guess you can come along with us,” as though that was all the answer he needed to give. 

Alight with excitement you squirm in his lap, earning a quick slap to your hip. Katsuki ignored your grumbling and set to covering your body entirely. “Hold onto the corners,” he says, draping the hide over your shoulders, comforting warmth enveloping you as you obediently take the corners. “Put your arms around my neck. Do not drop it”. 

You do, curtaining both of your bodies with the pelt in the process, fingers interlocking at Katsuki’s nape. Your faces remain a whisper away. It feeds a skin hunger that plagued you for days. Satisfied, he then unties his cloak to slide it over-top, layering the two to keep you covered. 

Your stomach swoops as Katsuki pushes to his feet, carrying you in his arms with no sign of exertion and much better balance than before. His bicep bulges, fingers flexing under your thighs. “Where are we going?” 

Sand and broken shells crunch under his boots, gait leaden like wading through mud. Mariners whistle suggestively in your direction as he climbs the steps to the dock, making his teeth grind. “Taking you back to our room,” he grunts.  

You flush with heat at the implication. “You still have the key…?” 

Without disrupting his pace, Katsuki’s nose nudges along your temple to press a kiss there. “Said my shitty wife left something behind,” you feel his mouth pull into a smirk, “so they gave me it to go take a look”. 

A pleasant sensation erupts in your stomach. Fluttering like butterflies. “And the others?”

Darkness covers you when he ducks into a narrow alley. Katsuki meanders along the winding path with unfettered confidence. “I sent them on ahead. Said I’d catch up on foot,” he explains, eyes darting over the surroundings, striding back out into a familiar road leading to the tavern. “Wanted to be alone”. 

You’re carried up the stairwell despite the stern assertion that you would be just fine on your feet. In that same vein, Katsuki is clearly just fine taking all of your weight— proud of it, you think. Unwilling to put you down.  

He shoulders into the room and kicks the door shut. It is as you remember. Dim and homely, accented by a lamp that casts a soft yellow glow over the bed. Heavy footsteps take you forward, and you are swiftly deposited on the mattress. You bounce a fraction, losing purchase on the pelt and cloak. Both layers peel away, rumpled under your back, leaving you splayed out and bare. 

Katsuki stands next to the bed, watching the rise and fall of your chest. His features are tender in the light, smoothing his hard edges. It flickers in his irises. Gaze hungry, restless. 

Your body can’t help but react to Katsuki’s silent observation. The ardent stroke of his eyes across every part of you like it were his hands themselves. Heat races through you and coils between your legs. Feeling exposed, you try to close your thighs. 

There’s a hand on your knee, stopping the movement, firm but gentle as he pries them back open. Katsuki moves closer and kicks off his boots. The mattress dips under his weight. One knee on the bed, your legs part further to make space for the intrusion, wrapping around his waist without second thought. 

“This okay?” he murmurs, barely above a whisper. You exhale shakily, hands roving along the thick of his arms to clutch at his shoulders. The buckles on his pants bite into the back of your thighs. You can feel his arousal swelling through the fabric. 

Rocking your hips, your feet cross at his lower back. “Yeah. I want…” his eyes flutter, almost rolling up into his skull, pupils dilated. You chase the phantom feeling of his lips with your tongue and he tracks the movement. “Kiss me again”. 

“Thank fuck,” Katsuki groaned, the sound dwindling into a low chuckle. His forearms settle either side of your head, pressing all his weight down, pinning you to the bed. Taking up your vision until only he is in your orbit. The braid by his ear hangs loosely, the bead cold where it brushes your jaw. You tremble, fingers threading into his hair to scratch gently at his scalp. 

Your mouths slot together and he kisses you full, nibbling your lips until they part. Pushing deeper, tongues sliding over teeth, stealing the breath from your lungs. He handles you with indecision. Careful kisses followed by rough ones; grabbing at the soft parts of your body a little too hard, smoothing the flesh with his thumb in apology. 

It’s overwhelming how much he wants you. And you try to return the fervour, arms sliding around his back to keep him close, undulating your hips to feel the tremors wrack through him. 

The talons strung around his neck graze over your chest as he descends. Kisses left on the corner of your mouth, cheek, jugular. He takes your pulse between his jaws and you whine, clenching at his waist. Katsuki moves away, laving his tongue along your throat. 

“Wanna touch you,” he says. Goosebumps break out across your skin as he blows cool air over the wet stripe left behind. “S’all I could think about. You’re fucking distracting”. 

“Yes. Please,” your eyelids flutter, leaning back to hear your throat. “Please”. 

“Needy,” he mumbles, a satisfied lilt to his tone. His hand slides down to your ass, grabbing one cheek and filling his palm with it as he spreads you open. “Bein’ too quiet. I like it when you say my name,” he rasps. “Gonna let me hear it?” 

Fingertips brush against your sex. Heat flushes under your skin, anticipation and understanding unfurled within you. “Katsuki,” you sigh into his mouth. 

Katsuki flashes a predatory grin. Pleased, and pink all the way to his ears. Breath puffing over your lips he says, “Again”. 

“Katsuk—ah,” his thumb circles over your swollen clit, sparks zipping up your spine. Your breath hitches. You chase the touch, his four fingers splayed low on your navel; the other cups the back of your knee to keep you spread as he descends from throat to chest, forging a path of wet kisses, stopping intermittently to softly suck at the flesh and coax blood to the surface. 

You’re wet. Wet enough, warm enough, that the still air feels cold on your skin. His lips wrap around your nipple and you arch up into the sensation as he slowly sinks a finger inside of you. You take him to the knuckle, and he waits, gradually pulling out until you’re clenching around a fingertip. 

Again and again he fucks you on his fingers, adding another, curling them up mid stroke to brush the most sensitive part of you, spreading them to work you open. You mewl, steeped in pleasure as it diffuses through your belly, pooling between your thighs. 

Katsuki watches you, peering up through heavy eyes, mouth full of your breast. He flicks his tongue over the pert nipple, coming up and switching to the other, lavishing you in attention. You exhale, tremors wracking your body. Cradle the back of his head, grip tightening reflexively when he hits that sweet spot, and the groan rumbling in his throat prickles under your skin. 

Satisfied, he continues lower. Throws your legs over his broad shoulders, laid flat along the bed. The mattress jerks when he ruts into the sheets, still confined in his pants. You hold his gaze as his cheeks hollow. Saliva pools into his mouth and he tucks his chin, spitting it on your clit, massaging it over with his thumb. 

You shudder, hips canting. “Shit, look at you,” he pants, voice so thick and supple you want to wrap yourself in it. “Keep your eyes on me, yeah?” he litters kisses across your inner thigh, pressing praise into the sensitive skin there. Your heels dig into the thick muscle at his back when he dips to kiss your clit, licking in and around his fingers. “I wanna see your face when you cum”.

You’re pulsing around him, frantically chasing the feeling. It’s— overwhelming, like you can’t breathe through it, and every string in your body has been pulled taut, wavering on the precipice. You reach to grasp his forearm. The muscles flex under your palms, pave unrelenting, and tears begin to sting behind your eyes. 

“Fuck, Katsuki,” you gasp, breathlessness abated by the sudden rush of air to your lungs. “Feels so good, I can’t… Katsuki I can’t—”

A broken sound reverberates throughout the room the moment he stops, pulling back and leaving you empty. You can barely believe that it came from you, squeezing your eyes shut in shame. But then he’s right there, crowding into your space, caging your body with his own. “Oi,” he softly takes your jaw, “What did I say? Look at me”. 

You squint up at him. You take in his swollen lips, lidded stare, the sheen of sweat on his brow, hair matted to his forehead, arousal and spit coating his chin. For the first time you think you might understand, just a fraction, the greed of those who kept you. Because now you desire to be the one to take. To keep. To stow away his shamelessness and be the only one to see it. 

“You hurt?” 

“No,” you whisper, blinking away the haze. Katsuki tucks his knees up higher against your middle, tops of his thighs shelving your splayed legs. You feel yourself clenching around nothing, empty. “I’m sorry”. 

“Don’t fuckin’ apologise,” he tucks his nose against your temple, indifferent to the sheen of sweat. You inhale his musky scent and slide your arms around his shoulders. “Got too in your head, huh?”

His cock twitches in his pants, still hard and pressed to your thigh. Gathering your bearings you subtly rock your hips into his lap. You shiver at the sharp hiss by your ear, the drag of his soft lips over the shell. He nips at it in warning. 

“You want to keep going?” 

You nod, playing with the thin hair at his nape. He rumbles and it feels like a purr, pushing up only to pull at the belt buckles around his waist. Impatient, you reach to help, pulling the leather out from the loops, fingers trembling. 

Katsuki frees his hands and lets you work at the buttons. He wears a small, crooked smile on his face as he watches, chest rising and falling with every anticipatory breath. You pull them down his hips, a trail of light hair leading from his bellybutton to his cock. He shifts, hooking into the waistband and pushing them down his legs, kicking them off the bed. 

In your impatience your fingers wrap around his length, playing with the soft skin. You circle the blushing tip, smearing pre with your thumb. He throbs, abdomen clenching with a guttural moan that shoots straight to your own. 

“So impatient,” he cups your jaw and forcing you to meet his eyes. “Get me nice and wet?”

“Yeah,” you rasp, detailing how his pupils expand as you slide his cock through your folds. The corner of his mouth twitches. He grins as he dips to kiss you. It is more chaste than the last, a kiss for the sake of kissing. 

Then the grip on your jaw tightens. Firm and unyielding. Katsuki’s big hand engulfs yours, squeezing his dick, teasing the tip at your entrance. “Gonna make you cum on my cock. But you’ve got to listen to me and relax. Okay?” 

You desperately want to dig your heels into his lower back, to drag him inside and fill up that awful emptiness, to take him to the hilt and keep him there. Instead you acquiesce, forcing yourself pliant; rewarded with a soft kiss, he presses his forehead to yours. 

“Take a deep breath for me,” he tells you. You inhale, ribs expanding as your lungs bloat. Slowly, Katsuki pushes his tip past your entrance, and begins to sink his cock into you. His expression shutters, eyes rolling shut as his face scrunches up. Strained, he says, “Breathe out, baby. Slow”. 

You exhale, ending on a long moan as skin meets skin. He settles in the cradle of your hips. “Good,” his voice is gravelly, strained. His nails bite at your waist, “And in”. 

Repeating the motions your muscles clench around him as he pulls out, as though your body couldn’t be without him. He huffs through his nose and you feel it hot on your cheek. It continues like that. He fucks you slow and deliberate, pinned to the bed like a butterfly, guiding your breathing. You cannot look away from him. He’s devastating. He’s yours. Wild spikes are tousled around a flushed face, mouth kiss-bitten and slack with awe. “Katsuki,” you whisper, each more frantic than the last. 

The earlier intensity does not return, rather, it accumulates inside of you with every inhale, suffusing through you like a warm, pleasant fog. The pressure has you bursting at the seams, undone by the indelible drag of his cock, how his pelvis pressed so perfectly against your clit, little incantations of your name murmured into your hair. 

“Ah, fuck. Katsuki, I’m—” your thighs seize either side of his waist, toes curling as the words catch in your throat. “M’gonna…”

“I’ve got you,” he fucks you a little deeper, gritting his teeth. The muscles in his neck flex with exertion. “In and out, baby. I’ve got you”. 

Those practised breaths quickly stagger into uneven whines as you’re tipped over the edge. Ley lines erupt behind your eyelids. You arch back into the sheets—pelt and cloak rumpled beneath—as the pleasure quakes through you. 

Katsuki fucks you into your orgasm and then beyond it. You cradle him to your chest when his rhythm stutters, releasing a long groan as he spills into you. 

Together you collapse back on the mattress, rolling onto your sides. He slides his arm beneath your head and hooks your knee over his hip, keeping himself nestled inside you for a while longer. You lie there until the fog recedes, leaving a sated contentment in its wake. 

In that instance you can no longer tell where the line of your own body ends and where Katsuki’s begins. You feel warm, comfortable against him. All the fears and hypotheticals that sought to fill the hole in your chest have faded. You realise in those intimate few minutes that home is what you choose it to be. A place, a concept, a person. Home is the ocean, said to cover more than half of the earth, fissuring inland and stretching further than the eye can see; it is a current that will always run in your veins. But humans, too, are made of the sea. Water, minerals and tissue. Home is in the blood that rushes to Katsuki’s cheeks when you kiss him. 

This is where you belong. 

Eventually Katsuki decides he needs to get up. Your objections go ignored, silenced when he returns dressed with a damp cloth to wipe you down. Once he's done he pulls up the bed covers and manhandles you under them, declaring that he needs to go downstairs and pay ‘that woman’ for the room. 

“Won’t be long. Don’t even think about getting up. I’ll need to buy you some clothes tomorrow…”

Grin hidden under the blankets, you call out to him before he goes. He stops in the doorway, softened by the lamp light. Feigning innocence, you jokingly ask, “Before you go, could you pass me my pelt?” 

Your heart races when he reflexively goes to do so, only for him to halt halfway. His eyes narrow, lips thinning into a smirk:

“Real fuckin’ funny”. 

#bnha x reader #mha x reader #bakugo x reader #bakugo katsuki x reader #bakugou x reader #bakugou katsuki x reader

[cerastes]

It’s so funny to me that Dusk has a humansona.

You think she has a caard for ‘him’? Reference pages? I mean she has a backstory and characterization for him, a storyteller that frequents teahouses and tells many a tale simply because he enjoys it.

Do you think Dusk lays belly down on her bed kicking her feet excitedly about the noble winds and being unstirred by loss and unmoved by gain, rehearsing her stories to perfect their delivery?

“The Storyteller is always calm and welcoming, isn’t a hater, and even tolerates unemployed sisters with putrid taste in filmography… Indisputably, a paragon of virtue and scruples :)”

It’s just hilarious that she’s the opposite of people all around the world making thinly veiled overpowered self-inserts through which they project trauma. The actual physical goddess said “I self-insert as a regular ass dude who is pleasant”, queen.

#your honor I love her #arknights #dusk

[dailyadventureprompts]

Scragglmop the Destroyer

Once feared throughout the land, a great and terrible dragon grew tired of being endlessly hunted for his hoard and faked his death with the aid of a glory-hungry gnomish bard. Living on for centuries in the guise of a street cat, the dragon is now a hair's breadth from resuming his rampaging ways after the bard's descendants have lost the fortune he gave over to them for safe keeping.

Adventure Hooks:

A series of unexplained fires has wracked the city in recent weeks, which has both the guard and the populace on edge. Rumours swirl blaming arsonists, saboteurs from a rival kingdom, even an illegal duelling society of mages, but none have yet put it together that all of the workshops and businesses were all patronized in one way or another by the famed Candlebright noble family.

Coincidentally, Hignatta Candlebright, young head of that same noble house has sent an invitation to the party to join her at a famed teahouse to discuss a delicate matter involving the retrieval of stolen property. Hignatta has all but taken over the teahouse and its guestrooms since her own family home burned down near the start of the panic, and the party might begin to draw a connection when half way through their meeting the teahouse begins to fill with smoke, panicking patrons, and a booming, sourceless voice that demands "WHERE IS MY GOLD, CANDLEBRIGHT?!"

If you really want to mess with the party, consider introducing them to the fluffy street cat completely independently of the arson plot, making a nuisance of himself in the market while they're trying to shop, or catching mice in their store-room should they have acquired a residence in town. Have them befriend the cat as they might any bad-tempered stray, only to realize after the adventure is half way through that the mice he catches are always somewhat charred. Also imagine the looks on their faces the moment the party's home is broken into by an enemy and their housecat incinnerates a wave of intruders for disturbing his nap.

Background: Everyone knows the story about how the legendary hero Gailen Candlebright saved the realm from the tyrannical dragon Slaggrath, a beast known to devour whole armies and raze kingdoms in search of treasure. It's the ubiquitous tale against which all adventurers are measured against, made all the more ubiquitous thanks to the fact that the deed is memorialized in drinking ballads, children rhymes, and even a few folk operas. Gailen was a troubadour of not insignificant skill before he became a legend, and he had little trouble using that skill and hardwon fame to ensure his deeds would never be forgotten.

As with many tales told by the bards, Gailen left out quite a bit of the truth when concocting his tale: It was a late night in a roadside tavern and the young Candlebright was approached by a sourfaced man with a tangled beard and clothes that might have once been quite fine. Gailen had sung for his supper and then some, his hat was overflowing with tips from a long night's work and a greatful crowd, and the old man wanted to know how it was exactly that the Gnome hadn't yet been robbed; The roads were full of all sorts of rough types who thought that their strength entitled them to others' wealth, bandits yes but worse yet kingsmen, who took what they wanted sure that that they were above any kind punishment.

Seeing that the old man had fallen on rough times, likely having been robbed himself, Gailen spoke from the heart: He'd been robbed a few times yes, but he got by looking like someone that no one would bother to steal from, dressing in his fine clothes only on days he'd perform, and keeping most of his riches in the safe keeping of others, such as the caravan masters he frequently traveled along with.

The old man considered Gailen's words and the two sat up drinking through the night debating the merits of the Troubador's duplicity. Was it not better, asked the old man, to defend what was yours with strength and reputation, That everyone might learn from the failure of those that had trifled with you before?

Gailen looked at the many scars the old man bore and countered that fools never learned their lesson, they just thought themselves better than the last fool who risked it and they'd keep risking it till luck won out or they went to join all the fools that had come before.

It was dawn when the two parted ways, Gailen tottering off to bed thinking he'd given council to a reformed bandit chief, the old man slipping out of the inn and taking to wing thinking he'd concocted a brilliant scheme with the help of his newest, and perhaps first, friend.

i was a week (and one pants-shitting revelation over the old man's true draconic nature) later that the legend of Slaggrath came to an end: Gailen walking into that very same tavern bloodied, burnt, and with the broken off horn of the great wyrm held above his head as a trophy. The news spread like wildfire, the name Candlebright ascended to the shortlist of the realm's great champions, and not a soul questioned when the newly knighted Gailen comissioned the construction of an elaborate series of vaults beneith the castle he'd just been awarded. The bard had everything he wanted, and in return he and his family would hold the dragon's horde in trust, not touching a single copper and adding a little to it each year out of respect for the wyrm's generosity.

Future Adventures:

Even before he charmed his way into unexpected riches, Gailen was an ardent follower of Garl Glittergold, god of ambition, wit, and wariness. Genresavvy bard that he was, he understood that this fabulous windfall wasn't just some gift from his god, it was a test, and that to keep his good fortune going he'd best abide by the exact deal he'd struck in that tavern. Gailen kept Slaggrath's treasure under lock and key all his life and made sure his children did the same despite never telling them where he got it, in accordance with his pact with the dragon . Feeling that the Candlebright family has sat on its laurels for far too long (especially since practical and buisness minded Hignatta has been increasingly questioning why her late grandfather insisted on keeping a giant pile of money in their basement and never spending it), the god has seen fit to shake things up, ensuring that some long lost blueprints for the vault have fallen into the hands of a group of thieves, who broke in and cleared the vault though the very same secret passages Slaggrath used to pop in every decade or so and make sure the count was up to date. The dragon is pissed, convinced Hignatta has reneged on her family's deal.. and all the while the thieves get closer and closer to escaping.

Depending on how the party handles it this situation could break bad in any number of ways: The dragon could give up on being Scragglmop and go on a rampage forcing the party to put him down, they could intercede on Hignatta's behalf and ensure the treasure is returned possibly earning themselves a cushy position as retainers of house Candlebright, perhaps most dangerously they could earn the attention of Garl Glittergold himself and end up being singled out for their own unstable blessing.

In addition to being motivated by the prerequisite desire to get rich, the thieves were hired by an ambitious mage who has long desired to get his hands on Gailen's Horn, the draconic trophy the bard thereafter used as the sigil for his house and hollowed out into a heavy instrument through which he channelled his most showy magic. The mage has designs on the horn as the centrepiece of a ritual drawing on the object's history of power and triumph. Given that the horn is in fact the centrepiece of a giant con it's going to bring some very unaccounted for variables into the mage's ritual which is liable to set off its own chain of problems down the line.

Art

#adventure #mid level #dragon #town #city #dungeon #thief #garl glittergold #disaster #bard #gnome #I thought this was going to be a short one T_T curse you writers brain #monster hunt #patron merchant #patron noble

[hunn1e-bunn1e]

Aether - "Mysterious Adeptus, Sky Weaver"

🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.

In which the Traveler and Paimon unknowingly come across a mysterious adeptus by the name of Sky Weaver while the two are exploring near the sparsely populated cliffsides of Mt. Mingyuan. Or; In which the long-forgotten tale of the adeptus Sky Weaver is uncovered by Aether from the lips of the various Adepti of the Nation of Liyue and the people who know them.

Prologue | Part 1 | (1.5) | Part 2 | (2.5) | Part 3 | (3.5) | Part 4 | (4.5) | Part 5 | (5.5) | Part 6 | (6.5) | Epilog | Extra 1 | Extra 2

                                                                                                   

🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠

“Now that we've helped Fujin tend to the soil, Paimon has noticed that it's a lot prettier in Chenyu Vale.”  

The floating fairy-like creature chirps as she hovers along the dirt path by her blonde companion's side.

“Speaking of prettier things. Traveler, did you notice that the sky here in Chenyu Vale is much different from the skies in the rest of Liyue?”

The golden blonde next to her stops and turns his gaze onto her, raising a brow of skepticism. His eyes then raise to the darkened sky that hangs above them and take in the sight.

What Paimon said was true. The sky truly was different from the rest of Liyue and any other region that the two had visited so far. As it was night, the sky was a deep midnight blue with swirls of violet and turquoise that seemed to glow from within the cotton-like clouds that partially obscured and circled the shining white moon. Stars speckle the suspended landscape of night haphazardly, their droplets of white add an almost otherworldly quality to the already ethereal scene. And, of course, the faded silhouette of Celestia looms ominously in the distance, creeping north ever so slowly. It truly was unlike anything that Aether had ever seen before.

“That's–… how did I never notice it.”

The golden blonde mumbles as he looks up in wonder and amazement, but also confusion. 

Why was the sky in Chenyu Vale so drastically different from anywhere else? What was so different about this place? How was the sky this way in the first place? It was strange; like the sky was altered by something to be this way, and although Aether wanted to think that something like that was impossible, his expectations have been demolished and rebuilt countless times since he descended into Teyvat.

The small bob-haired fairy floated in front of his face and waved her arms about to attract his attention.

“Hey, if you're curious about the sky, why don't we head back to Yilong Wharf and ask the locals about it? Maybe if we're lucky we'll run into Cloud Retai– uhm… Xianyun again; she might know too!” 

Paimon suggests before turning and floating further down the dirt road toward their new destination.

“Hm.”  

Aether hums, giving a curt nod as he follows his guide back to the wharf.

“Uuugh! Paimon is so tired! Why is Chiwang Terrace so far from here anyway!? It's already daytime!”  

Paimon whines as she slowly floats along with her blonde companion at a snail's pace in a slumped-over position.

“How about we head over to Jiulue Teahouse? We can sit down and eat some of the local dishes then we can start asking around.”  

The outlander chuckles softly as he reaches over and pats the floating girl on the head in sympathy before grabbing her and carefully holding her under his arm. Paimon only sighs and gives her friend a nod as she's carried off in the direction of the teahouse. 

On their way over to one of the nearby stalls, Aether spots a storyteller on the outside stage; maybe this storyteller has a few tales about the skies here. Though, after a short deliberation, he lets his floating companion go and buy food for the two of them while he goes and speaks to the storyteller; with a reasonable allowance, lest the girl buy out the stall's entire stock and empty his mora pouch.

Once the two part ways, the golden blonde sees the older man leaving off the stage, seemingly emptied of his arsenal of tall tales. So he waves the man, who he learns is named Jiewu going by the nearby chatter of patrons, down.

“Excuse me! I know that you just got off the stage, but I was wondering if you had any stories about the skies of Chenyu Vale?”  

He asked straightforwardly; getting a comical sweat drop from the older man at his bluntness.

Jiewu mutters a bit as he pinches his chin between his thumb and forefinger; his crow's feet becoming more pronounced as he squints his eyes in thought. The older man takes a glance up at the magnificent sky with a bland expression, as if it were the most mundane thing that he'd ever seen before. It was almost as if he didn't notice anything significant at all. Strange.

“I can't say I have any stories about the sky, young man. I've no clue why you're interested in something like that, there's nothing very spectacular about the sky.”  

Jiewu confusedly drones out; raising a thick brow at the blonde and taking another glance at the sky above.

“Was there anything else you needed, young man? If I'm not home soon, my wife will have a fit”  

The older man asks in a still polite but slightly rushed tone, making it clear that he wanted the conversation to end quickly.

Aether only shakes his head and allows the man to take his leave. Turning around, he sees Paimon floating toward him with bagged food in hand and an annoyed expression on her face. He raises a brow at her, silently asking what was wrong.

“Paimon asked the stall owner about the sky while waiting for the food, but he only looked at Paimon with a weird face and said ‘there's nothing really special about the sky, is there?’. And the other people Paimon asked said something similar!”  

The floating girl loudly complains before digging her hands into the bag, pulling out a skewer of food and angrily chomping on it; letting out muffled mumbles about giving the stall owner an ugly nickname.

Aether only sighs as he motions for his fairy-like companion to follow him.

Their next stop: Mt. Mingyuan!

As the traveler scaled the cliffs of Mt. Mingyuan, he kept hearing the sound of a paper bag rustling and the unmistakable munching of food. A metaphorical vein bulged out on his temple as he whipped his head around to look at his floating guide.

“You— Paimon, give me the bag! If you eat everything again, I swear I'll feed you to a cryo slime!”  

Aether growled as he recklessly took one hand off the cliffside to swipe at the bag in Paimon's hands, the girl dodging every time.

Unfortunately, all the wild movements made him lose his foothold in the cliffside and sent him plummeting towards the ground below. In too much shock to deploy his wind glider, all the golden blonde could do was stare upwards at the screaming Paimon who too was frozen in fear. 

But then… on the wind, he heard a faint whisper of droplets landing on the surface of water…

From beneath him, Aether felt a soft embrace pushing him upwards; the quiet sounds of shifting waters made him look back. What he could only describe was a small cloud of heavy mist with a ring of water swirling around it. The strange cloud lifted him, and Paimon when it reached the height she was at, up and over the cliffside, where it then came to a stop and seemingly patiently waited for him to get off. 

The golden blonde shakily stumbled off of the helpful cloud and fell on his bottom on the grassy cliff top. His heart beat erratically and his whole body trembled as the adrenaline finally caught up with him. He didn't even register the tearful apologies of his floating friend as she hugged him and sobbed into his chest.

“...One did not think that mortals had become so foolish over such a short time…”  

A gentle voice softly whispered from a place that Aether couldn't locate.

“...You shall consider yourself lucky that one was present to witness your fall, lest you no longer be among the living…”  

The voice spoke familiarly; it reminded Aether of how Xianyun and the other adeptus spoke. Surely this voice must belong to another adeptus that he just hadn't met yet.

“...Descend the mountain and return to a safer location, the cliffs of Mt. Mingyuan are no place for young mortals like yourself…”  

The voice spoke again, this time though, it seemed to be coming from the cloud that saved him from his fall. With every syllable pronounced, the cloud of mist gave off a faint but ethereal glow in a medley of colors. Colors that were reminiscent of the night sky that he had seen just yesterday.

Breaking from his adrenaline-fueled trance, Aether shakily gets to his feet and takes the still-sobbing Paimon into his arms. He spared a glance back at the cloud, tempted to stay and ask it about its possible connection to the mysterious skies that he had been wondering about, but one look at the disheveled companion in his arms and he knew his answer. He'd have to worry about that later, his dear friend needs him right now.

“Can… Can I ask you for your name?”  

The golden blonde asked, almost sounding as if he was begging with how his voice trembled.

“...One's name should be of no concern to you at this time; you must go now…”

The ‘cloud’ softly answered back, as if it were trying to coax a sleepy child back into a dream.

With that answer, Aether nodded and headed down the mountain with careful and measured steps, occasionally giving quick glances down at the sleeping Paimon's tear-stained face. He sighs, perhaps he can just ask about this mysterious adeptus another time, he has much more important things to worry about now.

🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠•♡•🌠

🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.

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[husbandohunter]

hello!! this is my first time requesting something ever so if i did something wrong im so sorry 😭

but i’d really like to request something with xiao where reader really wants to go to the festival with him but obviously he can’t/doesn’t want to so he rejects them :’) and reader ends up not going and just watches the fireworks alone from afar untilllll xiao comes and sits next to them and it’s just the two of them enjoying each other’s company 🙊🙊 and maybe like an angst to fluff/comfort typa moment

idk idk AHH if u aren’t comfy writing that it’s all good! this scenario just been stuck in my head for a while.

The Lights Bring me to my Qixin [Xiao x Reader]

Synopsis: He was hard to love, you were easy to love

Genre: angst/comfort, gender neutral reader, You fell first but Xiao fell harder and I WILL DIE ON THIS HILL!!

(A/n): tldr; Xiao needs to love himself 😤 also I'm so sorry it took this long anon. And you didn't do anything wrong! Thank you for sucha cute prompt :)

===============================

Xiao materializes himself on a bridge, a gust of wind fading beneath his feet. He doesn't move for a certain time, standing still as if he had no presence and just stares quietly. Only the moon was present tonight. No stars. A lone glow emitted right above where he remained and briefly he imagined, there was something melancholic about it. How the scenery made the lights in Liyue Harbor more apparent.

You would have loved to see this.

The adeptus recoils immediately and shakes away from those impending thoughts. No, he musn't dwell too much. He already made his decision. When you asked him to spend the lantern rite together, a voice inside his head acted before he even realized.

"No."

That was what he told you. It came out far more blunt than intended, followed by the poor choice of teleporting away. The pain on your face was something Xiao didn't want to think about. Because to him, you were like the city he gazed upon. Best admired from a distance. What affected the adeptus at the cost of what he wanted didn't matter.

His heart tightens. It's better this way.

"Why hello there! Care to join me for a drink this fine evening?"

Xiao spun around and saw Venti crouched on the handle while holding out a ceramic cup. Was he there the whole time or had his senses been dulled? It was hard to tell coming from an Archon.

Normally, he would refuse just as he would with anybody. But a part of him wanted to. Part of him wanted something that would help him take off his mind from those bothering emotions.

The two anemo users share a glass of rice wine pudding under the sky. Venti downs his fourth drink and Xiao glances at the watery reflection held by the glossy rim.

"If I recall, festivals are meant to be celebrated with wine and laughter. Maybe more of the former but it can't be complete without the other!" The bard cheers, his voice echoing around them, "Is the taste not to your liking?"

Xiao frowns, "No."

"No? Hmmm," Venti hums and taps his chin, "That's a shame. You were the second person who told me that."

As if he waited for Xiao to ask him who exactly, Venti proceeded to answer anyways, "As a travelling bard, I like to spread tales of heroic stories far and wide. Just so happened I landed a spot at the Teahouse yesterday. This good fellow sat in a corner, not even reacting to a single word I spoke, hmph!"

The teahouse? Wasn't that the place you always told him about? Repeating exaggerated stories about the mighty Yakshas who fought beside Rex Lapis during the Archon war?

"Ridiculous. Adepti cannot transform to anything but what they're already given. Mortal imagination are incomprehensible these days."

"Though you gotta admit, Bosacious with a serpent guardian sounds pretty cool...hold on, are you...laughing?"

"...Ridiculous."

"Did they say anything in particular?"

"Let me think, aha!" The bard snaps his fingers and looks upwards, "They said my interpretation of the story brought back good memories. That it reminded them of someone, which, they didn't tell me the name. But poor thing looked as if they were about to cry."

"...I see," he downs the drink in one gulp.

"Not even curious about who this mysterious person may be?" Venti insisted.

The adeptus huffs quietly and turns his head, "I have no recollection of such events. I must have mistakened them for someone else."

That's right. Whether you were happy or sad doesn't affect him in any way. Xiao knew where he stood. Karmic debt was a heavy burden to bear, it could be contagious and destructive if he wasn't too careful. Although you didn't like whenever he mentioned this, he truly believed that soon the curse will consume him completely. The yaksha's sole duty exists primarily for Liyue and to serve Rex Lapis whenever needed. Everything else becomes insignificant.

It's better this way. Xiao tells himself again. Mortal desires have no substance to him and neither does his own. I really don't care.

Settling down the glass, the adeptus walks toward the opposite direction, his back facing Venti away from the Harbor they watched.

"Leaving just when the celebration started? Someone's in a hurry," Venti chirped.

Xiao looks with downcasted eyes, stopping right at the edge. The trees rustle and a soft breeze picks up, brushing against his skin. It was colder now.

"Sorry," he breathes out, "Tonight, I just want to rest."

•••

You headed home through your usual route, sword in hand, except now there were no monsters to be dealt with.

How strange. Surely the landlord didn't suddenly commission members from the adventurer's guild, at least not regularly. It had been reoccuring for the past couple of days. Hilichurl masks sprawl across the field and whoever left this mess surely wasn't the type to play gently. Judging by how it looks, they were probably an aggressive fighter. A very powerful and aggressive fighter.

"Totally not complaining, though..." you mumbled, still perplex. It would be nice to know who did all this.

...

Xiao pierces the eye of a ruin guard and grunts as he retrieved his spear forcefully.

Just how many lives does he need to keep taking until he can finally rest? The question occasionally pops into his mind. Though seeing that he was fighting another day is proof enough. These hands were meant for war and destruction. Whatever comes near him, whatever he touches, would wither like a Qixin affected by poison.

When Rex Lapis appointed him, the adeptus said to be treated at his disposal. Xiao was a tool for battle. An extension of his blade and a mind equivalent to the vigor of any weapon. If he was ordered to throw his life away by facing the gods of Celestia, then there would be no hesitation.

But really, Xiao was more of a shield than a blade. He took every blow without complaining and did so for many years. Even if his achievements resulted in no glory, Xiao would remain in the shadows, exactly where he belongs. Just as you would one day come to hate him for hurting you that day, despise him for his silence, and see him as untrustworthy, Xiao would never leave his post. Because...that was his duty. The guardian yaksha.

Yes he'd rather had you hate him. Yes, he distanced himself without explanation and left things unsaid in more instances than one. Yes, it was better this way.

What am I even doing?

Regardless, in this year's lantern rite, he wanted you to enjoy the festival as you did the last. It was the least he could do. Xiao thought by eliminating the monsters that crowded your path would somehow alleviate the trouble he had caused. So he tosses blow after blow, harder than the last, trying to eradicate that pain and these unecessary emotions.

And right before the final strike, he stops. Within the adeptus a Qixin flower sprouted alone amongst the depths of his withered heart. Something that had already been planted during last year's lantern rite. Xiao made his decision. But he hesitated, unable to gather the strength and remove the thorn that bothered him incessantly.

"Adeptus Xiao."

The yaksha's breath races. Your voice. Thankfully he didn't sense any danger and concluded you made your way home safely. Did you eat yet? What were you doing out this late? Xiao waits and listens, once more, watching from a distance.

"Nevermind. I just missed saying your name, that's all."

The hard line of his mouth opens halfway as he tried not to make a single sound. He camaflouges himself among the trees, your back in his view while you hugged your knees close. Xiao leans against the bark, a shadow casting over his features.

He really shouldn't be here. An adeptus has no right to traverse into the realm he does not belong in. Xiao knows better than anyone exactly how the events will turn out between god and humanity. Like dark and light, made to balance the other, but too close would result in one's destruction, and the thought of that terrifies him to the core.

"I wonder if I said something wrong back then," you softly said, "He always did how much of a nag I could be. What if he...was fed up with everything I did...?"

Xiao caught his breath on hold, almost saying something he shouldn't. That's not true! Those words are clawing on his throat. You have no idea how hard it was for him to reject you over and over again. He pushed you away because he was afraid he would hurt you in more ways than one. Do you realize these feelings have been torturing him? Seeing you hurt, on the verge of tears, why can't you just understand that all he wanted was for you to be happy?

"I'm sorry. I had no idea that my actions affected you so much."

Yes. Yes they have, and he was forever grateful for it.

"Are you...happier though? If you're out there."

Silence passes through between the mortal and yaksha, accompanied by the chilly touch of a sky's breathly sigh. Bright rays thinned across the plains built upon Wuwang hills as the sun sets and around your small form. A golden reflection mirrored in the adpetus' eyes. 

He could never.

You hear a thump and the sound of leaves falling down as Xiao unmounted himself from the branches. Seeing him was like a dream, you hardly believed it was real. The man wore an unreadable expression, often carrying the hard edge in every part of his features. However perhaps it was the sunset which hindered your perception. There was something different this time, something you haven't seen before and you were oblivious to.

"You called?"

Even until now the shock hasn't left you completely and you struggled on what to do next, "I did, but," still seated where you were previously, you dared not to blink, "Why are you here?"

Xiao casted his gaze to the side as if unable to look at you any longer, "I should be asking you that question. Didn't you want to see the lantern rite?"

What a silly statement. Of course you wanted to watch the lanterns, and most of all, with him by your side.

You stood up and dusted the grass of your sides, "It's not the same without you, Xiao."

"They're just lights," he dismisses.

"Yeah, now that you mention it, there really are just a bunch of floating lanterns," you shrugged your shoulders, "But not for me. When my siblings passed away, I thought nothing would ever be the same again. We used to make lanterns every year. I didn't have the courage to do them on my own because I just thought there was no point."

For the first time in a while, Xiao stays instead of leaving, "Is that so?"

The adeptus has observed the changes Liyue had gone through. If there is one thing in this world which can carve the core of every human, it was loss. He has known many who were victims to it or were the cause of each grief. An emotion that can warp a man, to something more darker, more distant.

"I was right. Things won't be the same," you parroted, yet grinning from ear to ear, "When we watched the festival with you last year, I realized just because you've lost something good doesn't necissarily mean you won't find it again."

"Don't ever change," his gaze on you was softer now.

"I didn't but you did," stomping up to him, you puffed out your cheeks with an angry look, "What has gotten into you? If I did something to upsetting, don't just get up and leave me hanging! Here I thought I made you so angry which caused you to he in a bad mood around everyone else."

"I-- I apologize..." Xiao nears himself to you, little by little, he examines your countenance, "It wasn't my intention."

"I was worried, you know?"

Although you were showing signs of relief, you continued to bring forth your hands and wipe away the tears building up at the corner of your eyes. What an emotional creature. His Qixin. While you slowly recovered, Xiao waits patiently, with every passing moment filling his withered heart. And then things became clear to him.

It was impossible for the adeptus to severe his bond with this human.

"You can be such a fool sometimes," you meekly stated, sniffling from the cold, "The worry you cause others. Always putting up a mask when you obviously don't want to."

"I know."

"And going off on your own without considering how they feel."

"I know."

He wasn't going to argue against your words and admittedly, well deserved. You let out a breath and the two of you stayed there in comfortable nothingness. No exchanges but the gap mended itself somehow. Xiao hadn't moved all that much even when you were in arm's reach. This man was always so careful and you knew he wouldn't hurt anyone out of his own selflessness.

You took a hold of both his hands and brought them to your face.

"What are you doing?" Xiao retorts, desperately, "You can't touch me."

The nudge indicates that he wanted to pull away, but when you squeezed them a little tighter, his tugs have grown weaker.

"You're saying they do nothing but kill and destroy," whispering, you closed your eyes and reveled in his warmth, "They're rough from years of use but so soft. I can't help think about those horrible things you said about yourself, weren't true at all."

Xiao feels as if he was being washed away in a current he couldn't control. It brings him from his own sense, watching you fondly speak of him with words he didn't think was very fitting. Not a single drop of urge from the adeptus wanted to remove your touch. Like water to the Qixin growing in his heart, a healing balm to his tattered soul, he revels in it.

"Stay with me," you whispered.

How could he refuse?

In the sky, a thousand lanterns lit up among the stars. Xiao wonders to himself, if it would be selfish for an adeptus to dwell in human feelings. The battles he fought over a milennia was enough to make him solidify his identity as a warrior. Yet the new emotions he have come across, Xiao doesn't know when he will ever have the courage to give it a name.

Time. He has plenty.

Whatever the future may bring, Xiao will accept it as long as he can see you flourish into the beautiful Qixin he'd come to cherish.

#genshin impact xiao #genshin impact #xiao x reader #xiao headcanons #xiao #genshin x reader #genshin #genshin headcanons #genshin impact x reader #genshin scenarios #genshin impact scenarios #genshin impact headcanons

[wangxianficrecs]

Flowers Blooming by Ilona22

Flowers Blooming

by Ilona22

M, 35k, Wangxian

Part of the MXTX Epic Journeys Big Bang

Summary: At the coast, there is a city where they say the most beautiful of flowers live. Among them, one shines for many reasons. Wei Ying is orphaned when he is four years old. Unlike in another world, he does not have to wait years to be found by his father’s martial brother. Instead, he is found by a woman looking for a child to love. From that, he grows up differently. Some things are changed. Other matters are not influenced by the absence of one child. And yet others were written in the stars long ago. Kay's comments: A lovely canon-divergence story where Wei Wuxian gets adopted by commeners before Jiang Fengmian can find him. He still manages to grow into a formidable cultivator, but he also gains other talenst and a whole family! And when the Sunshot Campaign breaks out, he also meets Lan Wangji and of course, they fall in love. Really enjoyed how this story breathed life into the world outside of the gentry sects and expanded on the world-building of MDZS. With beautiful fanart by @krynnibear Excerpt: “We owe gratitude to that cultivator then. Do we know his name?” Lan Qiren asked. “No, they described him as very young, about Wangji’s age. Dressed in grey and a colorful underlayer, archer’s bracers,” she reported. Lan Wangji was interested, there were not many cultivators his age who could have successfully taken on all those ghouls. And from what Lan Lin reported, he had not taken money from the women in the teahouse, either. He sounded kind, and very skilled with talisman craft. It might just have been the way the tale was passed on, but some of those described did not sound like the standard talismans. “There have been reports of a cultivator of this description in several places,” Lan Mingchen remarked, telling them what he knew. There was no discernible pattern to the cultivator’s movements. Odd, as most rogue cultivators moved along trade roads, or in a fixed area. But all the tales added to the picture of a young man willing to help even without a big reward. Lan Wangji hoped he would be able to met him one day.

pov alternating, canon divergence, wei wuxian isn't adopted by the jiangs, rogue cultivator wei wuxian, inventor wei wuxian, genius wei wuxian, different first meeting, sunshot campaign, slow burn, falling in love, coming of age, getting to knew each other, strangers to lovers, families of choice, happy ending, cultivation sect politics, supportive lan xichen, supportive lan qiren, fanart

~*~

(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

#Wangxian Fic Rec #The Untamed #wangxian #MDZS #Kay's Rec #September 2023 #pov alternating #canon divergence #wei wuxian isn't adopted by the jiangs #rogue cultivator wei wuxian #inventor wei wuxian #genius wei wuxian #different first meeting #sunshot campaign #slow burn #falling in love #coming of age #getting to knew each other #strangers to lovers #families of choice #happy ending #cultivation sect politics #supportive lan xichen #supportive lan qiren #Mature #medium fic 15k-49k #Ilona22 #Flowers Blooming #Fanart

[astrophelstella]

Genshin Characters as Omegas pt.2

Your the traveler who's not from this world and hasn't experienced what alphas, betas and omegas are. But your still an incredibly powerful Alpha with the strongest of scents. The rest of the omega characters are scrambling in their attraction to you.

Characters: Thoma, Ayato, Albedo

Warning: Not beta read

Thoma

Being from Mondstadt he was never pressured into being a traditional omega but he picked up housekeeping bc he liked it and it helped out his family when his dad left.

Other nations would consider an omega traveling alone to a different nation to be dangerous but he went to Inazuma anyways. While he was stuck for a while, he was quickly hired by the Kamisato family. Being an omega only made trusting him easier and he could relate to their head, Ayato.

The strict traditionalist way Inazumans treated their omega was something he learned to deal with. It helped he was a known fixer and close to a noble clan. But with this, he made sure to look out for other omegas who weren't so fortunate.

Despite being an outsider, he gains the attention of plenty of Alphas and Betas. He was the perfect housewife after all. He's comfortable with being an omega and acting like one, but it never stops him from work.

Like right now, as he stands before you. A renowned Alpha Hero that saved two nations. Rumors spoke of their strong presence and he could confirm, hiding his flushed face as his nose took in their overwhelming scent. They were attractive too.

The feeling grows after he was rescued from the vision hunt ceremony. Watching you defy a god for him momentarily made him lose his breath. He never felt more like one of those omega damsels in stories than then. From then, he promised he would repay the debt he owed you.

His eyes would wander a lot around you. Watching your muscles as you carried heavy objects around or moved in a fight. If you were sweating, he had to lead you somewhere more private since you were starting to attract omegas.

Holding in his purring whenever you provided him something or proved your capability as an Alpha. When you gifted him a scarf after learning how to knit from him almost set off his heat. He wished it was scented but it was only a friendly gift and not one that announced intentions to court.

Still, he wore the scarf from then on. Enjoying what little of you he could smell from it. Sometimes, when no one was around, he would hold it to his nose and breath in. Or to just enjoy the soft fabric.

Sitting next to you when you're enjoying a meal at Komore Teahouse. He finds himself staring as you converse with Ayaka or eat food. Seemingly mundane activities suddenly seem mesmerizing. you'd notice his gaze and turn to him with a questioning look, making him look away flushed, hand to his neck nervously. Ayaka eyed him knowingly.

Blushed when you presented him with a bouquet of windwheel asters. That whole time felt like a fairy tale. Being gifted with something that reminded him of home from an Alpha he liked had sent him further into his feelings. Would recall that moment like a wonderful dream as he goes about cleaning the mansion.

Or when he's lost in the throes of his heat he remembers you grabbing his waist to prevent a fall and how you didn't let go for a time. He remembers that little charm he gave you that he sees worn on your belt.

Ayato

Since birth, he was raised on traditional omega values and manners. But his parents were happy enough to make him clan head. An unusual practice among nobles.

He faced the worst of those views as he rose to take on the position of clan head. Many believed Ayaka should have taken the spot but she was too young to bear such a burden. Nothing stopped him from protecting his family.

Snubbed every offer for marriage and courting. While he still went about with all the elegance of an omega, he wouldn't hesitate to put people in their place. Never letting his instincts slip. Not like any Alpha or Beta came close to impressing him.

That is until you stopped the vision hunt decree and engaged in battle with the Raiden Shogun. Your influence was incredible, stretching across three nations that regarded you as a hero. From the knights of Favonius considering you one of their own, the head of the Qixing being your friend and now both Watatsumi Island and the Shogunate seeing you as an ally. It only made sense he would meet you personally.

What really got his interest though, was the friendship you had with Ayaka. She was genuinely happy spending time with you and taking her to that festival reassured him of your character. And what a character you were.

He held it together as you introduced yourself but he could understand what Thoma and the rumors say about your scent.

Liked that you never acted like those pompous Alphas even though you did have a good reason to with your power. What's more was how disconnected you were to everything, from the politics to the mundanity, you seem to walk separate from it all.

It was why he found himself spending time around you. There were a lot less work thanks to you. Plus, someone had to get those pesky omegas looking to take advantage of your reputation away.

You'll have a handful with this one. In private he's awfully cheeky and playful, a contrast to when he's out in public. If you have any work that needs to be done, good luck trying when he's trying to get your attention.

During vulnerable moments he gets almost shy. He's not used to being genuine outside of family or being intimate, not since he was little. What was scary was how easy it was to be genuine around you.

Can't get you out of his mind during his heat. Maybe he'll make a plan for you to guard his door next time. He doesn't need it with the estate in lockdown but you don't know that and you're so willing to help. He wonders how much it'll take for you to crack when his scent fills the area and the weak sounds coming from behind the door you're standing guard for.

Albedo

Had no interest in his second biology beyond scientific research. He would take in other people's scents or take down notes while in heat.

He was an odd omega though he took care of Klee and was rather soft-spoken. Maybe he was just odd in general. Still, his looks and manners garnered him the occasional admirer.

When he first met you in Dragonspine, he was quick to make his interest known to you. He wanted to know how being not from this world affected your biology, or how you even had similar biology to them.

Fascinated as he listens to you explain the lack of any omegas or alphas in other worlds. Gladly informs you of what one needs to know about Teyvat's second gender.

While he does regular tests on you, he has a few...other tests in mind. Including taking something scented by you to see its effects on him and others.

Eventually, he ends up keeping it to himself as it comforts him. Doesn't mention it unless he asks you to scent it again, for science.

Has you sniff his neck to see how an omega's scent affected you. Ignore the flush on his face. Confused by the fluttering in his chest. Makes a note to look into it later.

Studies your expressions constantly. Very pleased when he notes the facial changes when you get a whiff of his scent. Creates plenty of sketches of your expressions alone.

When he does figure out that he's caught feelings, looks into courting you traditionally. Spends his free time in your teapot wanting to see you.

If his heat is ever near he lands subtle hints in letting you in his nests. Unfortunately, it flies over your head and you just agree to guard the door so no one disturbs him.

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

Note: Sorry the second part took a while. Had to move. With Al-Haitham coming next I know who I'm doing next ;)

#genshin impact #genshin albedo #genshin thoma #genshin ayato #genshin omegaverse #genshin omega!character x alpha!reader #genshin headcanons

[wri0thesley]

treasures - zhongli x chubby reader (7.5k)

your favourite patron at the teahouse sees in you something that others do not. perhaps that has to do with the something special that he, too, hides from only the most worthy. you certainly meet that criteria. 

cw: not sfw, minors dni. reader is afab and no gendered terms are used. reader is explicitly chubby. reader is inexperienced and insecure. zhongli has monstrous features; claws, two dicks, a forked tongue, fangs. fingering, piv sex, light strength kink, ‘sir’ kink (reader refers to zhongli as ‘sir’ and ‘mr zhongli’), pet names. 

this was a commissioned work. 

It is difficult to not be in awe of Zhongli.

You had been awestruck the very first time you'd seen him; sitting, perfectly still and calm and poised, at a table in the teahouse your family owned. Your father had gently pushed you towards him and warned you that Mr Zhongli was extremely well-respected, intelligent and important, and you ought to treat him with the proper respect - who knows, he said, what Zhongli's patronage could mean for your humble little family business in the future? So you'd tugged at the uniform you were wearing and tried to plaster on a customer-service sweet smile and hoped that he couldn't tell how your knees were trembling beneath the fabric.

He’d given you a polite smile when you’d greeted him and given him the menu; asked your opinion on what the best dish to order would be as if he genuinely cared. That had been hard on you too; you’ve always found yourself rather shy, and that had come rushing to the forefront all over again when you’d been faced with honey-warm amber eyes and a low, lilting voice and Zhongli’s full attention on you. You’re not sure what you’d stuttered out in reply – all that you remember about that particular interaction is stumbling over the word ‘Sir’ more times than you could count, and the fact that Zhongli had been unerringly patient as he waited for you to get to the end.

If you’d been a little less nervous and a little more observant, perhaps you’d have noticed the clench of his knuckles on the desk, the soft intake of breath when you’d been so clearly in awe of him, or even the slight shifting in his chair when your pretty lips had shaped the polite title--

But you didn’t. So, instead, you’d rushed off in a little flurry of activity and relayed Zhongli’s order and tried not to think too hard about just how handsome the man currently sitting at one of your tables was.

You wouldn’t have been surprised if he had never returned, after you’d showed yourself up as so easily rattled that first time – but not only does Zhongli continue to pay patronage to your family’s teahouse, but . . . he asks after you, on the days you’re not working. He always sits in the same seat, and if you didn’t know better you’d say that he sat at that table because he knows it’s one of the ones assigned to you for waiting upon. He lures you into conversation like a man feeding a shy deer; and when you cast worried glances at other members of your family, they intimate through their gestures that you should stay. Listen to him. Keep him happy.

It makes Zhongli happy, you discover, to tell stories; to pontificate on folklore and history and – most surprising of all – gently coax your own opinion out of you. When you try and protest that surely someone like you has no new information to offer him, he simply chuckles in that low, rich voice that makes you want to bite your lip and avoid looking at him for a while lest you embarrass yourself further.

“Oh, my dear,” Zhongli says, with that soft smile on his lips. “Your contributions are greatly valued. It is always fascinating to hear things from a new perspective . . . most especially one as unspoiled as your own.”

Late one night, Zhongli gets lost in one of his stories; some old folk tale about the Adepti of the Stone Forest that you have hung onto every word of. Zhongli, delighted to have such an adroit listener, had gone from story to story, his low voice meandering pleasantly, until it had been all but empty aside from you and your father.

“I trust you’ll look after them, Mr Zhongli,” your father had said, as he’d gotten his own coat. He’d smiled at you in turn. “And I trust you’ll lock up the teahouse, won’t you?”

“Of course,” you’d said, still enraptured with what Zhongli was telling you. With no other customers, you had even been able to take a seat at the table with Zhongli; giving him your full attention, instead of merely hearing snatches of what he had to say as you went about your duties. You cannot help but hang onto every word he’s said.

Tonight is no different--

Only . . .

Only, tonight, there is something more going on. A pleasant buzzing that at once fills you with churning anxiety and wondrous anticipation – the sense that something is shifting. When Zhongli smiles at you and inches just a little closer, you feel heat rise to your cheeks. It’s hard not to simply stare at him; to take in the warmth of his eyes, or the perfect, elegant lines of his face – the way he sits so self-assured and certain, the breadth of his shoulders and the lilting music of his voice--

“What do you think?” He breaks you from the reverie. You start, and have to face the embarrassing fact that you have just missed a good half of whatever it is Zhongli was saying to you; far too distracted by all of his other attributes. Your teeth dig into your bottom lip, your gaze guiltily flashing from him to the lanterns left burning to light the tea house floor.

“I-- ahh, I’m afraid I got quite lost in my own thoughts, Mr Zhongli.”

“Mm. Is that so?” He smiles at you, and that smile makes your heart skip a beat; it is as if he is looking directly into your soul. “Ah, I must say I’m disappointed. That one was one of my favourite retellings so far, I think . . . It’s rare to find someone I feel as though I can share it with.”

Anxiety prickles down your spine.

“O-oh, I’m so sorry, Sir,” you say, words rushing out of your mouth. “I didn’t mean to let my thoughts wander – I j-just find you . . .”

“Distracting?” Zhongli supplies, and then he chuckles at the look of doe-eyed guilt on your face. “Oh, dear. Don’t look so surprised. It’s flattering that I can still attract the attention of something so pretty.”

Your mouth falls open quite against your will, and Zhongli’s eyebrow quirks, his lip twisting.

“You still look surprised,” he tells you.

“I . . . You think . . .” It’s downright embarrassing, how much of your own poise you’ve lost in the face of a compliment from a handsome man; but Zhongli is still staring at you curiously. “Thank you.”

“I have no reason to lie to you,” Zhongli says. “You’re . . . ahh. Excuse me. It’s probably inappropriate for me to say as a customer, but . . . whilst your family’s tea is perfectly adequate, it is not their blends that have kept me coming back. It’s been a very, very long time since I’ve been so utterly captivated by someone.”

“Surely not that long,” you say. “You’re an extremely handsome man, Mr Zhongli. I’m sure you’ve had your f-fair share of admirers--”

“Worshipers,” he says, and his mouth curls into a smile that makes you glad that you’re already sitting down; for you cannot help but fear if not, you would be falling to your knees. He hesitates, before he reaches out to you. “Not any more, though.”

(Something pulls at the back of your mind; threads weaving themselves together, an understanding that you should have come to this conclusion far sooner). Your eyes widen further, your heart pumping blood so loudly and quickly you feel sure Zhongli himself must be able to tell.

He hums, gloved thumb brushing over the apple of your cheek, eyes trained on you as if you are the only thing in the whole world that it is worth his time to look at. You look into his eyes in return; see the amber-honey shade of them, the pupil that is not shaped like any other mortal pupil you have ever seen.

“You already know, I think,” Zhongli tells you--

No.

Rex Lapis tells you.

Of course he is.

It all makes perfect sense, looking back; his amused smile when he asked you about folklore, the fact he’d so often quirked an eyebrow and murmured something about how time so often erodes truth whenever other people brought up all of his own great deeds, the knowledge of rites and customs far disappeared from most mortal minds . . . Some of the things you’ve said suddenly come back to haunt you. You have never been outright rude – that is not in your nature – but the fear that something you’ve once said without thinking has stuck in his craw and will come back, now, with fury--

He chuckles, the sound like black velvet.

“Don’t look so frightened,” he tells you. “I am . . . not what I once was. I do not have any bone to pick with you – I meant what I said, about hearing things from an unspoiled state of mind. I’ve found your thoughts quite engrossing.”

He hasn’t moved his hand from cupping the softness of your cheek; and, too, that soft smile has not faded a whit. You are suddenly made all the more aware that Zhongli is the last customer left in the teahouse – that your father had trusted you and he implicitly in the space, even though it surely would not do wonders for your reputation if anyone knew you’d been left alone here with such an esteemed patron.

Your heart has not ceased in its rhythm, battering wildly against your ribcage like a caged bird longing to be free.

“I—I’m grateful,” you say to him. “Sir.”

The title does not sound quite right falling from your lips; it feels like you ought to be calling him ‘my Lord’ or something that more properly represents everything he has (everything he was) – but Zhongli’s eyes merely darken a touch, his fingertips on your bare skin flexing just the smallest amount as if in a show of possession.

“Ah,” he says. “I . . . must make another small admittance now, I fear.”

Your eyelashes flutter; your tongue darting out to wet your lips. Your throat has suddenly gone quite terribly dry; heat and desire and surprise are all swirling in your stomach in a hurricane that leaves you feeling like you’re on the unsteady deck of a boat docking at Liyue Harbor.

“Would you mind if I told you?” He asks you; ever gentlemanly, even though he could surely hold the fact he was an Archon over your head. Even though he must know you could not truly deny him anything, even if you did want to. You give him a breathless little nod. Zhongli’s smile does not fade, but he pulls your own face a little closer to his. When he smiles, you see the slightest flash of sharp fangs, the hint of a tongue that’s not quite human. “I will, then. Every time you call me ‘Sir’ . . .”

“Would you like me to stop?” you ask him a rush, and he chuckles again.

“Oh, far from it,” Zhongli says, with those sharp eyes and that wicked smile and his touch not easing in the slightest. “In fact, the problem is rather more . . . that I would like to hear you say it in both an encounter and a location that’s a little more . . . Well. I would like to hear that particular title from your lips when things are taking a turn for the intimate, if you’re amenable to the idea.”

“Mr Zhongli, Sir,” you breathe, your cheeks all hot and your voice soft and your thoughts tumbling over one another. To think that you could be desired in such a fashion by a man (an Archon, a God, a deity) like Rex Lapis himself. “I. Of course I am.”

“I’m very pleased to hear you say it,” Zhongli murmurs. “An agreement, then. A . . . contract, if you will.”

This time, when Zhongli smiles, you are far more certain of things than you were before.

Those are definitely fangs in his mouth.

“I haven’t really done much of this before,” you admit to Zhongli, several days later, in a bedroom filled with expensive trinkets lining the walls, in the rooms that Zhongli rents in Liyue Harbor.

(Well; that’s not entirely true. From what you’ve gathered, Wangsheng Funeral Parlour pays for this expense, much as they do for his expensive meals and elaborate things that take his fancy, thinking him worth it – you’d seen him with Hu Tao, a few days after he’d revealed to you his secret, and the smile she’d given you as you crossed the street had made you think that perhaps she knows more than anyone else what her consultant really is. Still; you do not envy her. You are aware of what Zhongli’s tea house bills look like, and your establishment is hardly the most expensive in the area).

It’s a terrifying thing to admit to a God of over a thousand years; that, though you’re sure his fingers have played across many people’s skin and his mouth has kissed many pairs of lips, you have nowhere near that same experience – in fact, that you are almost as far away from that as it is possible to be. You have had a few quick fumbles in the dark, a few nervous kisses; but this? Rex Lapis himself before you, who has surely had his pick of lovers? Anybody would be frightened.

You feel your teeth bite into your lip again, anxiety flaring down your spine and making your shoulders shake – but Zhongli simply smiles. One of those elegant gloved hands reaches for you once more, tilting your chin up to look into a sympathetic, handsome face.

“I won’t hurt you,” he reassures you. “I will go as slowly as you require, darling. You have my word on that.”

You swallow.

“I d-don’t want to disappoint you,” you admit – and there it is. That shameful other secret.

The one that whispers that you are not worthy to be the lover of a God; that says that the curve of your hips and the roundness of your stomach, the dimpled arms and the plump thighs are too much for him. That he ought to be with someone else; someone elegant and lovely, someone who is confident in their own skin, someone who is not you--

The fingers on your chin tighten in only the most subtle of movements; those eyes laser-focused as they look at you.

“How could you disappoint me?” He asks, and you flounder for the words.

“I-- I’m simply afraid that . . . I w-won’t please you,” your throat is dry as you let the words out. Zhongli’s brow twitches. “I mean-- I know I’m not . . . I’m not the traditional beauty that you’re probably used to, that you. Deserve--”

He jerks your chin this time, rougher than he’s been with you so far – closes his eyes for a moment, as if he needs to wrestle himself back under control. When he opens them again, they’re very dark amber, and his voice is low.

“Do you think I do not know a precious treasure when I see it?” He asks. “Do you think I do not have an eye for beauty? Do you think that I would do something like this from . . . from pity? Do you not realise that whenever I look at you I am struck with the most overwhelming desire to steal you away and keep you for myself, forever?” He smiles, but there’s a sharpness to this smile; and you see in him, a flash of that warrior God. “I’m almost offended, my dear. Ah . . . If you’re not yet certain of what exactly you do to me, let me enlighten you.”

His other gloved hand reaches for yours; his grip tight as it fastens about your wrist, and suddenly he is pulling it towards him – and settling it directly over the expensive fabric of his trousers, on his crotch.

He’s radiating heat. Stiff and hard and big beneath the buttons; his eyelashes flicker against his cheekbones for a moment at the pressure of your own hand there. He breathes out quietly.

“Do you feel that?” He murmurs, and he moves your hand for you; strokes it over the bulge that’s only growing moment by moment. There’s something else there; it’s bigger than you’d expected. Harder. Your own face is hot, but you can also feel that your mouth has gone dry and there’s a pressure between your thighs, a ball of heat gathering low in your stomach at the thought that this reaction of Zhongli’s is entirely for you. “This is from thinking about you. Thinking of having you beneath me; of touching you. How soft your skin would be. The feel of your thighs about my waist, the taste of you lingering on my tongue . . .”

“Sir—” You breathe out, and he lets out a breathless chuckle.

“That’s what I thought,” he says. He leans down to you – his lips mere inches from yours, his voice still velvety as he speaks to you. “Know, my darling, that when I touch you it is fulfilling an ache that I feel down to my bones. That every inch of you is more lovely than I can express. Now – may I kiss you?”

You’re breathless; wordless. Nobody has ever spoken about you with such reverence as Zhongli just has; you have never felt quite so adored as you do under the gaze of your Archon. You nod, and Zhongli captures your mouth with his in a kiss that’s all searing, needy heat.

One arm wraps about your waist, pulling you closer and closer. Sharp little fangs nip at your lower lip, and you can do nothing but open your mouth in a needy gasp, as a forked tongue playfully presses against your own. Zhongli does not merely kiss you; he takes ownership of you, claiming your mouth as his territory. And there is nothing you would rather do than melt into the embrace and let him.

He holds you, touches you, like you’re something precious; such delicate glass that if he grips too tight, you may shatter in his arms. You suppose it’s to be expected – Rex Lapis is a God of stone, after all – but it’s hard not to be overwhelmed with just how gently he’s handling you. When his gloved fingers reach for the clasps of your garments, he handles them like the finest silk – strips them from the shape of your body as if he’s a master artisan revealing his greatest work yet.

“Look at you,” he murmurs, low, his thumb brushing over the curve of your collarbone and the soft plumpness of your shoulders, where your skin is soft and a layer of plush makes it all the more pleasant to touch. “You’re exquisite.”

He dips his head again; his mouth brushing across the hollow of your throat, this time. A tongue lapping against the line of your jaw, fangs nipping carefully at your earlobe until your hands fist in his suit and you whimper at the sensation of heat coiling inside of you.

“Beautiful,” he murmurs, working your clothes off in their completion.

“Breathtaking,” he says, as he bids you lift your hips to make slow work of your underwear. He sees the slick shining between your thighs, how the gossamer spider web strands cling to the gusset of what you’re wearing – but he merely chuckles.

“My,” Zhongli’s voice is lightly amused. “It appears I have just as much an effect on you as you have on me, doesn’t it?”

When you are bare completely before him, laid on his fine sheets – Zhongli takes another long, lingering moment to simply take in the sight of you. An Archon who has lived as long as he has is blessed with infinite patience – and though you’re squirming, though your face is hot and you feel need whispering up your spine, Zhongli simply chuckles.

“Patience,” he chastises you, in that musical voice. “Ah. You mortals don’t know the meaning of the word, hm? What seems a lifetime for you is mere moments for me . . .” He slides his hands up your full thighs, around the curve of your waist and the pudge of your stomach, to the heavy weight of your breasts – his thumbs brushing your nipples in small circles that have gasps dying in your throat. “You will surely allow an old man a few more moments to enjoy one of the most lovely sights he’s ever been privileged enough to see? I didn’t have you down as cruel--”

It’s still heart-rendingly lovely to hear him talk about you like you’re something beautiful – you feel like a shy flower, finally blooming before him – watered by his gentle words, the reverent touches.

He is not being glib when he talks about having patience; when he asks you for a few more moments to enjoy you. He does not fully touch you yet; instead, he merely dips his head once more and begins to press hot kisses to every inch of skin that he can see, leaving none of you feeling underappreciated. His tongue flicks out against your nipples, forked edge teasing them until they are so stiff they feel almost sore – and only then moving further, trailing them down the round curve of your stomach--

He parts your thighs further, fingers sinking into the flesh; breathes in deeply the scent of you, but still does not deign to pay attention to what’s between your thighs in favour of more kisses up the soft skin of your inner thighs, the slightest sink of his fangs into that same meat. He immediately licks, soothes the sting of his bite-kiss – and then shifts his attention higher, to a different part of the thigh, to repeat the motions. Every scrape of his teeth and flicker of his tongue and brush of his lips makes you feel so on edge you fear you may die; your desperate need to be touched further coalescing into a ball inside of you that you cannot keep under control.

“There,” he murmurs, pulling back from a kiss at the very apex between thigh and sex. “Look how wet you’ve gotten for me, darling. I think we can move on to the next step, can’t we?”

A brief flash of fear; anxiety churning in between all of the anticipation – but Zhongli has not lived so long for no reason. He smiles at you with that same perfectly calm, unruffled expression that so haunts your thoughts, the same tilt to his lips.

“Shh,” he says. “Don’t worry. I said I would be gentle, and you ought to know that I am not somebody who goes back on my word. The next step is not simply – forgive me for being crude – fucking you into the mattress. I am not so louche as all that. It’s merely time to kick things up a notch--”

He pulls back. His fingers move to his own garments, now; hands unbuttoning his collar, shrugging off his jacket. You stare at him as he disrobed with wide eyes – he’s exactly as handsome as you’ve always imagined. Lean, but in the fashion of a predator animal; defined muscles beneath the skin. His skin darkens somewhat as it reaches the crook of his elbow, carrying on into darker and darker shades until his hands are hidden by his gloves.

“Y-your gloves,” you say to him, as he stands there – and you avoid looking at what’s between his thighs, straining heavily and needily against the fabric. “A-aren’t you going to take them off?”

Zhongli smiles.

“I will,” he says. “Eventually. But, my dear – I intend to prepare you first, and my . . . well. I’m capable of doing many things with my hands, but I have no desire to hurt you. You’ll see for yourself, I’m sure.”

“Prepare me?” You say, softly – and Zhongli smiles, gathers himself up on his knees, and settles carefully between your spread thighs. Those same clever fingers brush higher and higher up your thighs, until you understand exactly what the man means when he puts it in those terms.

Your own fingers curl into the sheets beneath you as Zhongli gently pushes one of his fingers inside of you; you’re more than wet enough, from the kissing and the biting and the teasing and the compliments, but it’s still a surprising sensation to have someone else touch you so intimately – especially when you chance a glance up and see the utter concentration on Zhongli’s normally serene face.

“That’s right,” Zhongli whispers. “You’re doing very well.”

He’s gentle as he slides it partway out, and then in again; slow as he establishes something that verges on a rhythm. The sensation of the gloved fingers inside of you is strange but not unpleasant; it simply adds a certain kind of friction to the act, rubbing along your inner walls in a way that has you shuddering. You can hear, too, the slick noise of your own arousal on the fine leather – and Zhongli is still smiling, still murmuring soft little encouragements in between the pumping.

“I’m going to put a second one into you,” he murmurs, and you give him a breathless little nod – one finger pulling out, only for you to feel two of them gently circling your entrance, pushing inside of you. He scissors his fingers slightly and it goes through you like an electric jolt, your back curving in surprise as a soft whimper falls from your lips – Zhongli pauses, and waits for you to mumble; “N-no. I’m fine. Don’t stop--”

“Good,” he praises, falling back into the rhythm he was working on. “Oh, look how well you’re taking me . . . Feel how tightly you’re holding onto me, darling. Mmm. Good, good—”

His thumb brushes the swollen nub of your clit.

That one you feel like it’s a bolt of Electro that zips up your spine and sets fire to all of your synapses; pleasure that has gasps dying in your throat, your body jerking. Zhongli still has that unshakeable smile on his face as his thumb continues to circle your clit, rubbing at it with persistent pressure. Muscles jump in your thighs, your skin quivering beneath his attentions. You’re squirming against your will, hot all over from the new feelings that Zhongli is coaxing forth – and he sees that you’re squirming, sees that you’re getting needy and whimpering with sweat beading on your forehead, and simply chuckles.

He shifts slightly, fingers still buried deep inside of you – and then, he’s on his knees between your legs and he’s leaning in closer and closer and--

You whine aloud as you feel that same long, forked tongue lap at your heated core. One of your hands comes immediately to tangle into his hair, as if by its own volition; silky strands slipping through your fingertips as you desperately try to ground yourself as Zhongli continues to finger you with one hand and lap and suck and lick at your clit with his tongue.

You can’t put a description to the feeling.

There’s a warm heat, a wetness, as the flexible muscle flicks over your swollen nub and swirls the tip around it, as soft lips close over it for the lightest suck only to immediately return to teasing it with ripples of the tongue. You’re helpless; floating on nothing but air, blood rushing in your ears, as Zhongli devours you once more.

He keeps making noises, too; the pleased sighs of a man who has finally been allowed to sample a delicious treat that he’s been longing to taste for longer than you’ll ever know. The noises make vibrations ripple through your body like a low hum, and then, again, you are lost in eddies of sensation – there is nothing left in the world but the steady thump of your heart, the rhythmic pumping of Zhongli’s fingers, the teasing sensation of his tongue as it works over your most intimate parts--

He makes a soft noise of encouragement against you and then does something with those fingers buried inside of you; crooks them up slightly, so they rub against a spot inside of you that you’ve never realised was there before until Zhongli sought it out with such ruthless precision, and then it is like you are tumbling over the edge of a great precipice. Sound rushes into your ears at the same time as sensations overwhelm you entirely, like the crashing of waves against the stern of a boat.

You feel yourself pulse around him; feel the little gush of your own wetness, hear yourself whimper and moan ‘oh, Archons--’ aloud, as if you are somewhere very far away from where all of this is going on. Zhongli guides you over the peak; slows his fingers somewhat, slows the rhythm of his tongue as the aftershocks of your orgasms slowly recede and you come down from the high of your peak slowly and dreamily.

You blink up at him, pleasure still clouding your thoughts – and Zhongli chuckles again.

“I must say,” he says, “if I were a different man, perhaps I’d be offended at you calling out for any other Archons. I’d far prefer to only hear my own name from that pretty mouth of yours.”

He pulls himself away from between your thighs and crawls higher on the bed – leans down to press another slow, lingering kiss onto your mouth. You can taste yourself on him, but it’s not unpleasant – when Zhongli’s tongue begs entrance to yours, you part your lips and let him claim you once more.

“Celestia themselves couldn’t find a taste sweeter than you,” he says, pulling back, his breath puffing against where your lips have been swollen from the kiss. “Mm. I could stay buried between your thighs for hours.”

Heat rushes to your face, but Zhongli merely smiles; presses a kiss against the apple of your cheeks, where it feels warmest and roundest. Brushes his lips across your cheekbone to whisper into your ear;

“Now,” he says. “Do you feel ready to continue? You need only say the word, you know that--”

“No,” you breathe. “I want to.”

“Good,” Zhongli says. He’s slow as he peels himself off of you; slow as his thumbs hook into the waistband of his underwear – and then, he’s pulling the fabric down his toned thighs, revealing the elegant v-line of his groin and . . .

Your eyes widen, and Zhongli chuckles.

“I wondered if you’d be surprised,” he says. “Don’t worry so. I don’t intend to hurt you. In fact . . .” He settles onto the space on the bed beside you, tugging gently at your wrist until your positions are somewhat reversed; he laid out beneath you, you on your knees before him. He slowly brings a hand down to what’s between his thighs; lazily pumps the first of his cocks, and then the second. “I wanted to switch positions, in order for you to be able to control the pace a little better.”

He reaches for you; captures your chin in his hands.

“Is this alright?” He murmurs, a soft question that fills you with warmth. Zhongli really meant it when he said he would not hurt you, and that he’d go as slowly as you desired. “You are free to terminate this contract at any time. You know that.”

You smile at him – chance another glance down, to where his cocks are standing erect and proud, glistening with pre-come, waiting for you to give them the attention that your body so desperately wishes to provide.

“It’s alright,” you tell him. “I want to.”

His smile is beatific; if you ever were to be bold enough to imagine what Rex Lapis’s smile would be like, before you knew the truth about Zhongli, you think you may very well have imagined his face all the same. He slides his thumb along your lower lip.

“I’m very glad,” he says – and then, he’s stripping off his gloves, and as you see how the darkness of his forearms tapers into fingers that are almost claws, you understand entirely why he’d left the gloves on as he’d prepared you for him.

“Set the pace,” he tells you. “Go as slowly as you need.”

Before everything that had occurred into the quiet solitude of Zhongli’s chamber, you would have felt nervous about how slow you are approaching his cocks – about the length of time that it takes you to find the right angle, to reach between the two of you and guide the tip of the lower cock to press against your opening. But Zhongli has been more than clear that he does not mind waiting; that his idea of a long time is almost entirely different from your own. And he’s soft-eyed as he watches you, murmuring little soft noises of encouragement and praise as you find the right positions, all the while looking at you with honeyed amber eyes that are so soft you feel like you could melt into them.

The head of his cock presses against the slick ring of muscle at your entrance, your thighs trembling as you rear up onto your knees – you feel him push you apart as you lower yourself slowly, feel the head of him working you open with every breath you take and every increment you sink down on him in.

It’s another sensation that’s mostly indescribable; a feeling of fullness, as you take him in as slowly as you can. Zhongli’s teeth grit, a huff of breath escaping his mouth – and his hands-claws come to rest on your hips, gripping you, keeping you rock-steady.

“You’re doing wonderfully,” he says, as you take a moment to breathe. His other cock is brushing against your mound; you realise with a start that when you are able to begin bouncing in earnest, it will slip and slide wetly against your clit with every thrust. “You cannot imagine how good you feel, my darling.”

The Lord of Geo, you know, believes in things being slow and steady – and so he has no qualms as you take him at your own pace, the soft sounds of your own panting and his slightly more even breathing only broken up by the occasional wet sounds of you taking another inch of his cock inside of you.

When he has bottomed out inside of you, and his second cock is pressing flush against you, you take a moment to simply revel in the glory of succeeding in the task; of worshiping your Archon in the most intimate of ways. His thumbs stroke circles over your hips, waiting for you to make the first move and control exactly what pace the two of you are going to take this at.

“This is a most lovely view,” Zhongli tells you, and a soft, breathless laugh escapes you. Zhongli smiles. “I could stay here for hours, you know. Simply enjoying the feel of you clinging to me. Enjoying the view of that pretty face, that lovely body--”

You move experimentally; an inch or so, that you lift yourself off and then drive yourself back onto. Your eyes roll into the back of your head for a moment, a gasp catching in your throat – and Zhongli chuckles in that rich, dulcet tone. You repeat the motion with a little more confidence – and before you know it, you are bouncing on his cock.

It’s not a violent rhythm - it’s not even as fast as Zhongli’s fingers inside of you had been earlier on that evening. But it’s perfect for stoking a fire within you; perfect for letting his cock stroke against your velvety insides, seeking out every sweet spot and pushing mercilessly against it. Your own hands come to cling onto his broad shoulders as he assists you in your bouncing with a grip on your hips that is at once as hard as steel and as soft as satin.

His second cock does indeed slip wetly against your clit with each bounce.

Your body is still sensitive from the earlier attentions – and, if you are honest with yourself, you are still sensitive and overwhelmed from the thought that it is Zhongli here beneath you. Zhongli’s calm, elegant eyes watching you fuck yourself on his cock with hunger hiding behind his serene gaze. Zhongli’s voice sighing pleasantly, murmuring about how well you’re doing and how good you feel, how lovely you are for him.

Even if you did not know his secret, it would be more than overwhelming just to have the man who you have been nurturing a crush on want you so openly – but you do know his secret, and that makes it all the more exciting.

And it means that your second orgasm creeps up on you even faster, before you can even really register that it’s about to take hold of you.

You are simply bouncing on his cock, stoking a warmth inside of you with the stiff length of him, feeling yourself clench and pulse about him – and then it is like you are reaching the peak of a mountain.

This one is even more intense than the last; as if it comes from deeper within you, another place that you never even knew was hiding inside. You whine aloud, reaching down – surprised by your own daring – and muffling your noises with Zhongli’s mouth. For his part, he does not seem to mind – for when you kiss him and whimper against him, huffing and panting as pleasure suffuses all of your senses, he simply kisses you hungrily back.

It’s like a galaxy swirling inside of you; all heat and noise and rushing pleasure that overtakes you in every way one could ever imagine, a tightness and warmth that spreads from your fingertips and the tips of your toes to the centre of your body and explodes in a shower of sparks that makes stars dance behind your eyes.

“Good,” Zhongli breathes, when you break the kiss. “Oh, darling. I felt that.”

You’ve practically soaked the cock inside of you; you can feel your own wetness streaming down your thighs, making a mess of where the two of your bodies are joined. Zhongli’s cock inside of you is still just as hard as ever, though, and you feel your brow furrow.

“I want to make you c-come,” you admit to him, though the words sound terribly vulgar said aloud – if your head were not so fuzzy from your own pleasure, you’re certain you would have even more shame about it. As it is, though, all you can think is that it’s unfair that you have gotten to come under Zhongli’s touch and guidance twice, and he is still so hard that it must be painful.

“You won’t mind, then,” Zhongli purrs, “if I . . . switch our positions, a little?”

You shake your head. Before you have so much as finished the second turn, though, Zhongli has effortlessly swapped the two of you around; your back pressed against the sheets, he on his knees between your thighs – his hands gone from your hips to instead fasten about your upper thighs, pressing your knees against your chest and ensuring that your legs are spread wide.

You gasp at the show of strength. You do not consider yourself waif-like by any means; and yet Zhongli has swapped the two of you around as if you weigh no more than a feather. You would, if he’d told you his plan, surely whimpered and shyly confessed you feared you were too heavy for such a manouevre – but Zhongli has simply done it.

It makes you dizzy to think of what else he may be strong enough to do.

“May I have your permission?” He asks you – ever formal, ever intense about the exact bounds of the agreement the two of you are sharing. You do not know exactly what he is asking your permission for, but that doesn’t matter; you think, at this point in time, there is very little that you would not grant him leave to do. Your fingers once more curl into the sheets beneath you, and you nod wordlessly at Zhongli.

You know you must look like a devotee at a shrine, the way you are staring up at him with worship clear in your eyes – but that isn’t important either. In fact, as Zhongli draws back and then drives the length of his cock into you with a low groan of satisfaction, you can’t think of anything that matters half as much as the feel of the man who is currently fucking into you.

He takes a few strokes to establish his pace, but it is faster and deeper than anything has been so far – the position that the two of you are in allowing for his cock to reach further inside of you than it has before, stroke spots that have you whimpering and pulsing around him all over again. The slick noises of him fucking into you echo around the room – the head of his second cock once more catching your clit on every thrust.

This is for Zhongli, but that does not mean that it does not feel good for you too.

You lose sense of time once again, as Zhongli fucks into you with a fervent need. You cannot think of anything but the constant feel of his cocks rocking into you, the way that he fills you up – the noises of the two of you intermingling in the air, the way that Zhongli looks with his hair falling into his face and a single-minded determination in his expression that once more serves to remind you that he was a warrior God, once.

He kisses you, bites at your lips, huffs against your shoulders and neck and sucks possessive marks into your skin in the form of love-bites that once more have your back arching; he claims you. There is no better way to put it. You are something that belongs to Zhongli, now – one of Rex Lapis’s most devoted acolytes, through and through.

“Please,” you breathe up at him, fingers tightening on the fine fabric below you. “Please, I want to feel you come too . . . Sir--”

The last syllable – that polite little honorific, dropped from lips that have been haunting him for what feels like months – pushes him over the edge.

He twitches inside of you – groans, corkscrews his hips further and further into you. You feel the wet, full feeling of him releasing his come inside of you; ropes of his pearly fluid squelching inside of you, being fucked further in with the final few shakes of his hips. You shyly reach for his other cock yourself with one hand; fasten it about the thick length of him, slick with your arousal, and give it a final few pumps before he groans out your name again and more spurts of his release spatter across the softness of your stomach.

He blinks at you all hazy. It is not a look you would usually associate with a God; but it would be a lie to say that it does not make you feel warm and golden inside to see Zhongli looking at you with such deep affection, a smile softening his handsome face as he pulls out of you and you feel his come leak out too, pooling between your legs and on his sheets.

You don’t quite know what you’re expecting, after Zhongli has come. With him so lit from the glow of his own orgasm, it’s hard not to think of him as the Archon Rex Lapis; hard not to imagine that, now he’s had his fill of you, he will simply bid you leave him in peace. You’re not expecting him to roll off of you and then simply curl around you instead; wrap his arms around your body, still sticky with his release. You’re not expecting him to nuzzle his face against the crook of your neck, to murmur;

“Just a few moments. I want to enjoy this.”

It’s almost cute – he is like some kind of animal – like a dragon, curling around his most precious treasure, protecting you like you are a hoard of jewels and not merely yourself. He presses a kiss to your jaw and hums in contentment, as if he would be perfectly happy to spend the rest of the evening – or perhaps the rest of your life – simply lying there, with you.

“I hope, at least,” he breathes against the shell of your ear in that low, lilting voice that is one of the reasons you ended up in his bed in the first place, “that tonight has gone a ways towards showing you just how desirable you are, my dear.”

He pauses. Kisses, again, so tenderly that it makes you ache.

“Of course, if it didn’t, I’m more than happy to continue this little arrangement – if you’re amenable to that too, naturally.”

You’re more than amenable.

You have heard that Rex Lapis is not kind to those who break his contracts, agreements, arrangements and suchlike – thankfully, you have no intention of doing any such thing. You smile at him shyly and let yourself curl into his arms, too; feel his chest press against you, hear the beat of his heart.

“Ah, Mr Zhongli, Sir,” you say. “I think I may need to be shown again. Several times.”

#genshin impact smut #genshin impact x reader #zhongli smut #zhongli x reader #chubby reader posting #not sfw #writing #commission tag #i LOVED writing this one and i love how it came out!!! #zhongli x you #chubby reader

[nightingaletrash]

Tallis loves Auntie Ethel. Aside from Astarion, she was the only person not to have some averse reaction to the weird shit that falls out of her mouth and instead treats her with kindness, which immediately gets Ethel on her good side. She then believed Ethel over Mayrina's brothers, who she happily murdered the shit out of, and popped down to the teahouse to see about getting her tadpole removed.

She struck a deal, and while she was surprised to discover that Ethel really is a hag, she didn't think it her place to judge, considering all of her fucked up thoughts, urges and impulses. And when Ethel failed to remove the parasite? Well, she tried. Its not Auntie's fault that she didn't know about the Netherese magic. Tallis couldn't ask for more than that.

And then nothing happened to challenge Tallis' love for Ethel. She never showed up in Baldur's Gate to reveal her monstrous intentions for Mayrina's child or to be the bad guy in anyone else's tale so Tallis just... continues to love her Auntie Ethel. She legit writes to her sometimes, hoping that she's doing well while telling her about the things they're grappling with. And then one day its just, 'hey Auntie, turns out this whole tadpole thing and Absolute Cult is literally my own fault and I'm a Bhaalspawn lmao crazy right? btw dad murdered me for refusing him, but I'm okay because Withers resurrected me and now I strongly suspect that he may be Jergal himself. Anyway, hope you're well and that you're getting lots of bargains that are going better than mine did xx'

Ethel must be flabbergasted. She had a Bhaalspawn in her house and didn't clock it. That same Bhaalspawn has so much genuine affection for her despite the deal utterly failing to work out for her, and now she won't stop writing letters. She gets an invitation to a wedding. Jergal is there.

#bg3 #bg3 spoilers #durge #tallis devranne #auntie ethel #ethel really has no idea why this weirdo loves her so much wtf

[alhaithamcore]

i really hope we get more events where characters get to visit different regions, especially sumeru and liyue cuz they’re my faves

like imagine alhaitham going on vacation to liyue specifically to learn about its culture and traditions, cue him running into zhongli who knows literally everything about everything and internally haitham’s just like !!!! omg!! and then they chat for hours about the most obscure things. and haitham is just completely enthralled and zhongli finds himself smiling and enjoying himself because it’s been such a long time since he’s been able to just chat with someone like this

or ningguang showing kaveh around the jade chamber because he is absolutely beside himself with fascination (and excitement) about the architectural design of the place, she even lets him examine the blueprints and answers any questions he has about the construction process, fondly observing the way his eyes light up when she tells him different facts about its design and functionality

or yunjin showing nilou around the teahouse and introducing her to the yun-han opera troupe, and nilou is just completely amazed because she’s never really had a chance to explore other nations’ performing arts traditions before and she thinks yunjin has the prettiest voice ever!!!! and then they teach each other their favorite dance techniques and nilou is just so happy to find someone who loves performing as much as she does!!

or tighnari volunteering at bubu pharmacy and eagerly watching baizhu prepare different prescriptions and medicines, fascinated by his various explanations and techniques, and he’s so excited to see plants from different nations that are hard to acquire in sumeru, enthusiastically scribbling in his notebook and making sure to read up on native liyue plants when he returns home!! he even accompanies qiqi when she goes to collect herbs and is there to help her when she forgets things and baizhu lets him keep some of the herbs as a gift

or dehya spending a day on board the crux while beidou tells stories of her various adventures, admiring her bravery and carefree spirit, particularly enjoying the tale of haishan’s defeat. beidou eagerly listens to dehya recount the daily life of an mercenary in sumeru city, enthralled by the events of the sabzeruz festival samsara, lesser lord kusanali and the treachery of the akademiya sages. they exchange battle tactics and spar with each other, and dehya smiles and laughs because she is genuinely enjoying herself, making a mental note to tell candace everything about her experiences as soon as she returns to aaru village

i could go on and on but this post is already kinda long and i don’t wanna bore y’all fjskdksks-

anyways tldr i love sumeru and liyue very much and i think their respective characters would be best friends. thank you for coming to my ted talk

#genshin impact headcanons #alhaitham #zhongli #kaveh #ningguang #beidou #dehya #nilou #yunjin #baizhu #tighnari #genshin impact #sumeru #liyue #genshin impact kaveh #genshin impact alhaitham #saturn writes 🪐

[shibaraki]

BE STILL MY INDELIBLE LOVE ┊ CHOSO

tags: GN reader, shark mer choso, mating behaviour, accidental acceptance of courting, fluff, interspecies relationships, blood + mild gore (fish death), biting (plenty of it), fluff, forbidden love vibes

wc: 1K+

↱ for the mermay collab hosted by the teahouse server — written using @petrichorium’s prompts: “This is… food? For me? I can’t eat this” and “A cloud of blood billowing from a thrashing creature” ↲

Curiosity is just shrouded gluttony. The need to see more, know more, devour as much of the world as you can. Your village elders impressed fear on the young to keep them from treading far afield. They punished those that set foot beyond the borders. Do not leave the boundaries. Do not enter the woods.

You always had been an insatiable child. Restless and unhappily kept in your four walls. The hunger never settled. It drew you to stories of eldritch creatures cast away by God, tales woven with drunken mariner whispers, pages in books quickly torn at the spines and burned. A travelling scholar once told you that the Earth was covered in salt. The sea. The monsters you sought resided there, finding home in the briny depths.

There is a vein outside the village where the salmon run upstream to complete their life cycle. Every river led to the ocean, that much you knew. The first time you crept out of the village had been on impulse. You walked for miles, closely following the sounds of free flowing water until you stumbled upon the inlet. You recall how your feet sank into the mud, grit of silt and icy embrace, and how the oppressive current worked against you as you trudged downstream.

That is where you found Choso.

Where the treeline flanked the narrowing river on either side and rose to create a tapestry of foliage that obscured the sun, in a palatial veil of gold, you saw him; large and angular, a shadow moving on the riverbed. Half fish half man. A long dark tail and a pale belly that blended into skin. Torqued fins, caudal and pelvic, another beginning at the base of his spine, standing proud and tall. Black hair plumed around a gentle face, markings cut across the bridge of his nose. Serrated teeth hidden behind soft lips that tore into your ankle and unearthed a merry scarlet waterfall when you came too close.

Monsters are defined by their aberrance. Monsters are unnatural, wicked and ugly. On your second visit you quickly learned that Choso was none of those things, watching in awe as he drug himself onto the banks and cradled your injured heel. A long tongue too rough and dextrous to be human lapped over the scabbed wound in apology, his saliva numbing the residual pain.

Monstrous? No. To you, he is about as threatening as a limpet. You returned to his neck of the river every day since— rather, every day possible. He is the one to receive your first and last words. With each sun cycle and mark left on your skin your neighbour’s expressions grow more sour. Monstrous are the grating whispers, louder still, the eyes pinned to your every move; endured, only if it meant seeing Choso once more.

A cloud of blood billowed from a thrashing shadow in the dark crevasse. You wait in the mud, cushioned by dry grass pressed flat under your thighs. The surface ripples violently and eventually settles into foam, fizzing out in broad rings. The stillness breaks where a head rises from the water. Red rivulets paint Choso’s chin, running down the column of his throat and staining his gills as he drags himself ashore.

You hold a trepid breath. One swing of his large, muscled arm and there’s a severed fish carcass hauled into the dirt. It comes apart like wet paper, viscera spilling out in a streaming tide. “Eat,” he states firmly.

Choso doesn’t speak often. When he does it is usually just to demand something of you. Give when he needs to tend the thin wounds his teeth leave. Come when you’re too far from him. Watch when he wants you to pay attention as he dives deeper to perform strange, intricate dances for you.

Eat is a recent addition to his verbal repertoire. For some reason he is intent on feeding you. ��This is… food? For me?” you smile ruefully, apprehensive as you poke at the dead eyed fish head at your feet. “I can’t eat this, Choso.”

He huffs. The currents break around a too-big tail as he crawls to your lap. You fall back on the soft earth, knees parting to accommodate his breadth. The fins on either side of his pelvis press into your navel. You reach out to cup his face in your palms without much forethought, drying blood now chipping under your fingers.

Something warm and pleasant coils in your chest when his whole body shudders. His gills flutter around a long exhale. You laugh quietly, relenting when he nuzzles his head against your midsection, blood smearing your clothes. Sometimes it felt as though he was trying to dig into your bones.

Head whipping to the side, he takes the flesh of your forearm between his jaws with just enough pressure to pierce skin. The flat of his rough tongue rolls over the wound, blood congealing. Satisfied, he noses at the sensitive skin of your wrist before returning your hand to his jaw. You barely flinch. Choso has done this so many times now you’ve lost count. He steadfastly refuses to tell you why but there’s never any malice in it.

A thought crosses your mind. Your arm falls limp to the side where his own lies. You feel him seize when your fingers enclose around his forearm. Choso stares unblinking while you bring his wrist to your mouth. Pliant, allowing you to shape him as you please.

His skin is thick and tough and so unlike your own. A rumbling purr begins to resonate in his chest as you sink your dull human teeth into him, biting down harder than you’ve ever tried, eyes clenched shut with the effort. Your jaw locks, a soft pop rattling around your skull when the scales break.

You reel away as his blood fills your mouth, sticking to your gums. The taste of copper pervades your senses. Hare brained, your elders called you. Foolish glutton. But in that moment, when Choso braces himself over your body, pinned back to the verge, he dubs you something new.

Crowding close to nip at your cheek, he murmurs, “Mine”.

#jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #choso x reader #choso x y/n #m.choso

[bloomingapricots]

The Cunning Cat and Lazy Fox

Updated here first at AO3

Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 (here) | Chapter 4

Chapter 3 | Growing Closer

“Is this all you can remember?” You asked.

“Give me a break, I basically reincarnated,” Shang Huaisang whined. Currently, you are hanging out with Shang Huaisang at a teahouse and reading over the information he remembered of Proud Immortal Demon Way.

“It’s just that your book was not popular enough to warrant a Wiki page, or from what I last looked at. Much less the animals and plants,” You are contemplating mentioning Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-lang. However, it is too early for that as Yue Qi is still Yue Qi and not Yue Qingyuan. “Anyways, how is Mobei-Jun?”

“I’m still gaining his trust,” Shang Huaisang replied.

“Alright, just… don’t take his hits and remind him that you’re a human,” As much as you like teasing Shen Jiu and gaslighting Yue Qi and Liu Mingcheng. You have some pity for Shang Huaisang as he is not only overworked but is also in a constant state of paranoia. Plus you do not like the pain-for-comedy trope either. Bonking Yue Qi the other day was your patience snapping, afterward, you went to sword training to release your rage.

“I will,” Shang Huaisang appreciated your care based on his small smile. You and Shang Huaisang became good friends over a couple of weeks.

“Jiu-er, I made sure you got your own room, it may be small but the door is strong and it has a lock,” You turned your head to look at Shen Jiu who lay right next to you. “So why are you here?”

“Do you not like Jiu-er anymore?” Your prickly junior brother asked. His eyes were wide, wearing a sad look. This damn cat is gaslighting you. You wrapped your arms around Shen Jiu and brought him closer to you where your foreheads touched.

“My dear Jiu-er,” You smiled sweetly. Shen Jiu's eyes widen at suddenly being pulled closer to you and the look in your eyes. You lowered a hand to hold his waist to pinch it.

“Hey!” Shen Jiu pushed you away and rubbed his waist.

“Jiu-er, as much as our martial sibling respects me, many will still talk behind my back. After all, I was not born male,” You pointedly stared at a dresser that held your undergarment. You know that Shen Jiu looked through your room, though you did not mind as you did give him a key to your room. “Hell, Yue-Shixiong asked if we dual cultivated,” You sighed.

“... What. Qi-ge asked that?” Shen Jiu mumbled. Now Shen Jiu actually looked upset.

“I didn’t reply to that and just hit him with my bamboo dizi. Jiu-er, as much as Shizun and the disciples of Qing Jing Peak respect my identity, not everyone does as such, you stick with me this closely” You gestured to yourself and him, in your bed, laid right next to each other. “Is seen as improper so there is a lot of gossip,”

“There is always gossip,” Shen Jiu complained.

“Yeah, that’s true. I guess it's better than your rumored lecherous ways,” You shrugged.

“There was a rumor of me seducing you so I could manipulate you and become the head disciple,” Shen Jiu said.

“Ha, as if, the disciples forgot at the beginning how lazy I was and it wasn’t till a certain incident that got me chosen by Shizun to be head disciple,” You said.

“I have been wondering about that, how did you become the head disciple,” Shen Jiu asked.

“Hm, I’ll tell you some other time,” You rolled over to lay on your back and closed your eyes. “We have a lot of work to do in the morning,”

“A-Duzhe! Tell me!” Shen Jiu whined.

“...I don't think this night is the right night for that tale, Jiu-er.” You turned your head and looked at Shen Jiu. Shen Jiu saw the look in your eyes and decided not to push anymore. He also rolled to lay on his back. You closed your eyes but smiled when you felt Shen Jiu hold your hand. Hand in hand, you and Shen Jiu drifted off to sleep.

—

“Oh fuck, oh fuck,” You mentioned last night to Shen Jiu that there will be a lot of work to do in the morning. The morning came and you took Shen Jiu with you on a hunt for a time-sensitive herb that your Shizun wanted to study but it went terribly wrong. Three overly-sized spiders are chasing the two of you. “Jiu-er! To the left,” Shen Jiu turned as you instructed and you followed after him while releasing many talismans that either protected your and Shen Jiu’s back or stuck to the three spiders to slow it down. Did you mention that you have a stupidly large amount of qi? Well, you do and when your Shizun learned about it they scolded you for hiding your potential.

“A-Duzhe! Where are we heading?” Shen Jiu yelled.

“To the cave tunnel that is only average people's size!” You yelled back.

“Alright!” Shen Jiu replied. As you defended your backs, Shen Jiu took the lead to find the cave tunnel you mentioned. He was quick to spot it as the two of you approached the mountain. “A-Duzhe! I can see the cave!”

“Okay!” You pulled out some talismans that glow brightly. “Jiu-er, lighting them up now!” You warned. Shen Jiu grabbed your hand as the spiders paused because of the lights and the two of you ran for your life towards the cave. Once deep enough the two of you stop running to catch a breath. “So much exercising,”

“...” As you were busy catching your breath, Shen Jiu was glaring at you as he caught his breath.

“Jiu-er?” You questioned when you turned to check on Shen Jiu.

“Since when did Shixiong have so much power?” Shen Jiu asked.

“What? Oh,” You remembered the aforementioned stupidly large amount of qi that is kind of an open secret of the mountain sect and how you recklessly used up a lot of talismans in front of Shen Jiu.

“Shixiong is truly lazy,” Shen Jiu pouted. As you come to learn, when Shen Jiu calls you senior brother and not your name with endearment, he is slightly annoyed or mad at you.

“My Shidi should know his Shixiong is not that attached to his position of head disciple and Shizun has chosen this Shixiong because of his achievement from the incident,” You explained. “Besides, this Shixiong got terribly scolded and lectured already by Shizun.”

“Shixiong has a lot of secrets,” Shen Jiu said.

“Shidi will learn all in time,” You replied.

—

“A-Duzhe, where does this tunnel lead to?” Shen Jiu asked after you dotted on him some more and started walking to the other side of the cave.

“Just a town, I think it’s called Peony Village because these soft pink peonies naturally grow there no matter what,” You explained. “Doesn’t it sound romantic, Jiu-er?” You teased him.

“Shixiong,” Shen Jiu gave you a blank stare. “Does Shizun not need us back soon?”

“We have the herbs in the time-frozen Qiankun pouch,” you shrugged and looked at the sky. “Plus I don’t think we have the energy to fly back before night falls,”

“I’ll trust A-Duzhe for now then,” Shen Jiu huffed. You grinned as the two of you entered Peony Village. Like its namesake, the village is overflown with soft pink peony bushes. The villagers were pleasant and welcoming as they placed peony flower crowns on your head and Shen Jiu’s head. Shen Jiu looked away from you as you and the village girls giggled at his flustered face. He grabbed your arm and dragged you to find a brothel. “Let’s go!”

“Haha Alright, alright, Shidi!” You laughed.

“There is a big banquet in front of the village chief’s home later, this one hopes the two Gongzi will appear,” Waved a nice auntie.

“Sure,” You yelled back and waved. As you and Shen Jiu found a brothel that was willing to room and board the two of you for the night, you asked Shen Jiu out on a date tomorrow.

“As Jiu-er heard, there is a banquet later tonight, shall we go together,” You asked.

“Why would this one go with such a shameless Shixiong?” Shen Jiu teased.

“Your Shixiong will get his Shidi’s food for him, so he doesn’t have to get up from his seat,” You smiled and leaned on Shen Jiu.

“Very well, this one will go with A-Duzhe,” Shen Jiu huffed.

“Will Jiu-er also like to view the peonies with me in the morning?” You asked.

“Is A-Duzhe trying to take up all my time?” Shen Jiu asked.

“A-Duzhe wants to have lots of memories with Jiu-er,” You replied.

“... Very well,” Shen Jiu agreed. You smiled brightly as you hugged Shen Jiu and forced him to lie on the bed.

“A-Duzhe!” Shen Jiu yelped but all you did was laugh.

—

Each time you went out and brought Shen Jiu with you, you conveniently went to photogenic and fun locations. You totally did not bribe your Shizun by allowing him to call upon you to play your dizi. Did you ever mention that you are a good dizi player? You are an incredible dizi player but you rarely play anymore and have to be bribed to play. Anyway, you had many fun “impulsive” dates with Shen Jiu and you can see that Shen Jiu softens over time. You also saw over time that Shen Jiu was willing to go out with not only his senior and junior sisters but his junior brothers too. No luck on his senior brothers though.

#svsss.cclf #svsss #svsss x reader #mxtx svsss #shen jiu #shen jiu x reader #scum villain's self-saving system #mxtx #mxtx x reader #non binary reader #scumbag system #scumbag villain

[sumeru-academy]

hello! can i request jean, ningguang, and keqing getting jealous after meeting reader's ex while on a date? this blog is amazing btw^^

Full of artless jealousy.

synopsis: they can't help their jealousy over your ex.

character(s): jean, ningguang, keqing. (separate)

warning(s): depictions of not sexual non-consensual touching (ningguang), drunkenness (also ningguang).

note(s): female reader. uses of y/n. thank you so much anon for the request and the compliment, we appreciate it ♡

⎯⎯mod lie 🪜

JEAN GUNNHILDR

• Jean never usually has to worry about others trying to shoot their shot with you.

• Not because you aren't gorgeous, but because everyone in Mondstadt was aware of your relationship; and if anything, they may be your biggest supporters. Everyone adores you and Jean, your relationship sparking many comments about fairy tales come true and how beautiful young love could be. Jean took great pride in her relationship, and that was fairly obvious just from seeing the way she looked at you.

• You were both painfully in love, so there's no way someone would come along and try to ruin that, right?

• And thus, Jean had no reason for jealousy. The feeling was completely and utterly foreign to her.

• Which made it all the more earth shattering when your ex came to Mondstadt. Jean was... ill prepared, to say the least.

• The moment your ex had approached you both whilst you were shopping in the town square—Jean's mind immediately assumed you both were simply friends. Your ex was nothing but friendly smiles and laughs, happily exclaiming that you just had to introduce them to your new girlfriend.

• You had introduced Jean as your girlfriend, the Acting Grand Master of the Knights of Favonius. Jean had blushed and laughed nervously at your admiring eyes, but her brain slowed down to hear your ex's next words.

• "Wow, I can't believe you were able to snag an Acting Grand Master!" They laughed cheekily. "It's definitely a good thing we aren't together anymore, then."

• And that, ladies and gentlemen, is when Jean's brain turned into nothing but static. An ex?

• Jean immediately sensed an ugly, heavy feeling soar in her heart. It felt... terrible.

• Your ex exclaimed some happy wishes for you and your relationship; but Jean's head was too busy freaking out to notice them. All she saw was how you were smiling. A lovely smile, but it was one that wasn't directed at her—instead it was at your ex.

• Jean felt she was going to be sick.

• Eventually your ex excused themselves, saying something about a sale they can't miss out on. You had smiled and waved them goodbye, and Jean's heart turned ever so darker.

• "Jean...?" You asked when she didn't immediately go to follow you, but after Jean's silence your eyes widen in realization. "You're not jealous are you?"

• "Ah, what? No, of course not!" She laughed way too enthusiastically before clearing her throat. You tried very hard not to giggle at her obvious turmoil. "That's ridiculous."

• "Pfft, Jean, c'mon," You interlock your fingers with her own. "You know you're the only person for me."

• Jean's whole being lights up at that, a heavy blush spreading over her normally composed face. This jealous feeling... she hopes it's nothing she has to get used to.

NINGGUANG

• She is very good at hiding her jealousy.

• Like... very good.

• But that doesn't diminish her feelings—and with that insight its almost painfully obvious how heavily her jealousy can manifest. On the outside, she's all calculating smiles and practiced movements. The embodiment of grace and composure. But on the inside, however...

• Ningguang's eyes narrow further as she takes in the sight before her. Tonight your date together has seemed to spiral out of proportion. Perhaps it's her own fault for even recommending a night within the Yanshang 'Teahouse'. Drunken strangers in a tight-fitting casino setting was something Ningguang thought she and you could handle. Keyword: Thought.

• Her attitude immediately shifted when your ex appeared out of the growing crowd, taking your attention and laughing all the while. She would not be surprised if she accidentally cracked the glass of her drink when she saw them lay a hand on your head to ruffle your hair.

• While you understood that this was only an ex; one you were on good terms with at that—all Ningguang saw was a challenge. Even so, she smiled cordially when you were introducing them.

• Ningguang eyes caught the way your ex stared at you while you were speaking, a combination of regret and sadness in their eyes. They still wanted you, and the Tianquan was not blind to such a fact.

• The drinking continued, shared laughs between you and your ex and continued silence from Ningguang. At one point you had stopped listening to whatever story was being shared to raise an eyebrow at Ningguang in silent question: "Are you alright?"

• Ningguang shook her head and gave a silent smile, the equivalent to a kind "I am fine, dear." And you were sated. At least, for a while.

• But the atmosphere began to change shortly thereafter. You, Ningguang, and your ex had been sitting at one of the casino's provided tables together; and at first, there had been some obvious distance between you all.

• Your ex however, seemed to be unhappy with this arrangement. At one point, their drunken hand reaches over to slap your back after an attempt you made at a joke. Ningguang stiffened, but didn't move; as she thought they would take their hand away from you.

• But she was incorrect in her assumption. And after seeing the uncomfortable look on your face, all the strings in place trying to keep her anger held back snapped.

• She reached around your form to grab at your ex's wrist; smile as sharp as a knife and grip as solid as stone.

• "I think it is time for you to leave," her voice is cordial, but you can sense the underlying threat in her words. "You don't want my y/n to think of you as a surly drunk, now would you?"

• Your ex is speechless for a while, before Ningguang finally releases them. They excuse themselves sheepishly to their exit and the moment they're gone; you let out a deep sigh of relief.

• You glance to your girlfriend, eyes shining with guilt. Ningguang shushes you kindly, leading you by the hand out of the establishment. You thought the date was ruined, that Ningguang was upset with you. She had pushed away these thoughts with fervor, reminding you that it wasn't your fault your ex was a creep.

• To Ningguang, however, there was at least one good thing that came out of tonight. Even if it had ended in disaster, she had gotten to show you off. You, who is somehow more important to her than any jewel or deposit of mora.

KEQING

• She prides herself on being a put-together, responsible, stable person. Keqing was the beloved Yuheng of the Liyue Qixing, after all. It would do her no good to be over emotional in the public eye.

• These words are what repeat in her head each time someone tries flirting with you. And it's only worse this time, because it's your ex lover—a person who knows you. They aren't a random storeclerk, or a stranger on the street, or a blushing teenager who had caught a glimpse of you in passing.

• No. This... was an entirely different game.

• That evening was a rare time off for Keqing. Her work had been completed, reviewed, and approved. She was free to come home to you; and while she would be happy to sleep her fatigue away in your arms—she would be happier awake and spending time with you. That's when she had suggested a dinner at Liuli Pavilion.

• You had accepted quickly and happily, and in a matter of minutes you and your girlfriend were walking hand-in-hand to the restaurant. Of course, you were used to the looks you had garnered by now. The Yuheng's lover was not free of any attention, after all, and many people watched you both with unsubtle eyes. It's just something you had grown to ignore.

• One set of eyes however... seems to be very persistent. Keqing notices it first, but her suspicions are only confirmed when the persons heavy stares are accentuated with a gasp.

• You and Keqing had been stopped for a moment to catch your breath on nearby plaza seats, and Keqing immediately regrets this decision when the person rushes over into your space; eyes glittering and mouth... blabbering. They practically tower over where you and Keqing are sat, and whether they meant it or not; it came off as imposing.

• "y/n, do you remember me? I had no clue it was you until I saw that lovely smile."

• "Oh... hello again." You had replied, voice quiet and obviously laced with discomfort. Keqing immediately began to connect the dots in her head, a heavy frown threatening to break out across her features.

• Even with your stilted replies, your ex still seemed okay to rattle on about their life, ignoring Keqing wholly and completely. It's obvious you were trying to play nice, but the way your mood had shifted immediately after this buffoon had shown up out of the blue had made it obvious to Keqing that this had to end. Now.

• Keqing cleared her throat, cutting off whatever your ex had been saying to level them with a glare that had disciplined Millelith for years.

• Your ex seemed to finally recognize who the Yuheng was, and wisely shut their mouth with an inelegant clack.

• "Excuse me, but I believe you are interrupting our date," She stresses the word date heavily, before standing and pulling you gently up with her. You blushed at the state of your interlocked hands. This felt like a statement of some kind, and her words only serve to make your heart flutter. "We will be leaving now, unless you have something of actual importance to share?"

• The question had been rhetorical of course (as if Keqing cared at all what this inconsiderate imbecile had to say), and so Keqing took it upon herself to silently push her way out of the situation; leading you along all the while with gentle hands.

• After finally gathering the courage to break the silence—while you were both finally seated at your table in Liuli Pavilion, you smile. "I've never seen you like that before."

• Keqing's ears are burning when she replies. "...Let's just enjoy our food before it gets cold."

#mod lie 🪜 #keqing x reader #jean gunhildr x reader #ningguang x reader #genshin jean x reader #jean x reader #keqing x you #genshin jean #genshin fanfic #genshin imagines #jean gunnhildr #genshin x reader #genshin headcanons #genshin fluff #genshin ningguang #ningguang #keqing #genshin #ningguang x you #ningguang x y/n