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helliontherapscallion · 3 years

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Going Mining (Adrenaline Junkie Part 2)

Part 1 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17

Spotify Playlist (collaborative)

Warnings: swearing, OOC sbi

Word count: 2,582

It had been about a year since you told your family about your tendencies. Since then, you quickly became efficient in the art of redstone wiring. The precious dust became your saving grace in a way, it was because of it that you stopped skydiving. Of course, you missed the feeling you got when you got close to the ground going at mach speed, but they were just intrusive thoughts at this point; you didn’t make any move to fulfill your desire. Redstone wiring took your mind off from it.

Lately, you spent most of your time in the basement where you set up your workshop to craft most of your supplies and write out blueprints. You were working on finding out a way to somehow launch TNT to make igniting it safer. You figured out that you could use a dispenser to plant the TNT, repeaters to prolong the time the TNT gets placed, a button to press to initiate the whole process, and use redstone dust to connect everything together. Now you have a working TNT launcher, but you have to find a block to use as a wall to protect the user from the shockwave of the explosion. You found out the hard way that the shockwave is enough to knock you back a few feet and give you small burns.

You reached over for more iron to make another repeater, but your hand came up empty. You furrowed your brows as your hand patted around the chest before finally looking over to look more closely. The chest was completely empty. You groaned in frustration, you could’ve sworn that you had more iron to work with. Looks like you had to go mining again. Sighing as you checked your redstone dust supplies, you supposed that you could look for more of that too.

Prying your goggles off from your eyes and placing them on your crafting table, you checked the time. It was almost sunset, which means it’s close to dinner time. You walked up the stairs and to the kitchen, where Philza was cooking dinner.

Sitting down at the dinner table, you greeted him. “Hey Dad, what’s for dinner tonight?”

“Steak and baked potatoes. How’s the TNT launcher coming up?”

“It’s coming along. At this point, I just need to figure out what block I could use as a wall to block the shockwave and how many repeaters I need.”

You remembered earlier today when you got the unexpected knockback in your backyard where you were building the launcher. Philza got used to the constant explosions, so he wasn’t phased when the explosion was louder than usual. He just thought you were using more TNT than usual, so he just resumed chopping wood. Soon after the explosion, he heard a thud and a groan coming from you. When he glanced in your direction, he saw you laying in the grass a few feet from the launcher. He chided you for not being careful with how much TNT you used, but he was proud of you for being so innovative. After giving you a health potion for your burns you got, he told you that you were done building for the day.

He hummed thoughtfully as he flipped a steak. “Have you thought about using obsidian? It’s pretty durable and it could withstand quite a bit of damage.”

You slapped a hand to your forehead. Why didn’t you think about using obsidian? Most TNT technicians used obsidian to shield them.

“...No, no I haven’t. You don’t suppose that we have any laying around?”

“I’m sorry hun, but we don’t. I could go mining for some though.”

“No that’s fine, I was actually going to find a cave tomorrow to restock on iron and redstone. I’m running low.”

“If that’s the case, I’ll lend you my diamond pickaxe. The iron pickaxe you have won’t mine through obsidian. Dinner’s almost done, can you go get your brothers?”

“On it!”

You ran up the stairs, hearing the strumming of a guitar growing louder as you approached Wilbur’s room. Knocking loud enough for him to hear over the guitar, the strumming stopped and he called out a “come in”.

Opening the door, you smiled at him. “Hey Wil. Dad wanted me to tell you dinner’s almost ready. That new song sounds great by the way.”

He put his precious guitar back into its case on his bed as he turned around and returned your smile.

“Thanks (y/n). Tell him that I’ll be down in a moment.”

Nodding, you closed his door and went across the hall to Techno’s room. Before you could knock, the door swung open to reveal your oldest brother.

“I heard you tell Wilbur dinner’s ready. I’ll see you there.”

You stepped aside to let him into the hall and started to walk to Tommy’s room. You swung open his door and chuckled lightly as he jumped.

“Hey gremlin. Dinner’s ready.”

“How come you knock on Wilbur’s and The Blade’s door but not mine? I could’ve been naked!”

“You do the same thing to me. Techno and Wil knock on my door, so I knock on theirs. Now, get down to the dining room before your food gets cold.”

He stood up to his full height and casually walked over to you. In the past year he has grown to be almost 8 inches taller than you and he didn’t show any signs of stopping any time soon. To your surprise, he shoved you to the side and sprinted out of his room.

“LAST ONE TO THE DINING ROOM HAS TO DO THE DISHES TONIGHT!”

“NOT FAIR, YOU GOT A HEAD START.”

You sprinted after him, but he was ahead of you by time you passed your other brother’s rooms. By the time you got to the top of the stairs, he was halfway down them. There was only one way you’d win. You hauled yourself over the railing of the stairs and jumped, extending your wings to slow your descent. You swiftly regained your footing and sprinted towards the kitchen with desperation. You weren’t going to do the dishes when it was Tommy’s turn; it was your night last night. You laughed in an early celebration when you neared the door to the dining room. There was no way Tommy could possibly-

You yelped as you felt your body being pulled back and a slight pain in your wings. Tommy must’ve grabbed your wings. Falling on your ass, you quickly reached to grab Tommy’s ankle to bring him down on the ground with you. He landed on his stomach with a thud as you pulled him back as hard as you could. You crawled towards the dining room door, only to feel Tommy grabbing your wings again to pull you back. Wincing as you felt some feathers being yanked out, you cursed your wings for growing to be almost larger than your body and easy to grab. You slid across the ground as Tommy pulled you back and tried to crawl into the dining room. You reached out with your other wing and started battering his head to disorient him. It worked as he stopped and you felt him trying to swat your wing away so he could see. Making haste, you crawled into the dining room.

“OI THAT’S NOT FAIR. YOU STARTED HITTING ME.”

“All’s fair in love and war, gremlin. Besides, you pulled my wings first, so you technically started it. I wasn’t about to do the dishes for you.”

“I don’t know why you are the one calling me gremlin, you’re short as hell.”

“Oi, 5’2 is average height! You all are just way too tall!”

Despite you and Tommy arguing, you both were giggling and smiling at each other. The rest of your family watched you two in amusement for a couple of minutes before Philza spoke up.

“Alright you two, dinner’s gonna get cold if you keep it up. Tommy, (y/n) won fair and square. You will also pick up the feathers you plucked out after dinner. (Y/n), don’t jump over the railing again. I understand that you can fly but still that’s dangerous.”

You both murmured “yes, Dad” before taking your seats at the table. As the dinner progressed, everyone had small side conversations about how their days were. Dinner went by faster than usual, probably because everyone was tired.

Tommy grumbled to himself as he picked up the feathers on the ground. Taking pity on him, you picked up everyone’s dishes and took them to the kitchen sink and filled it up with soapy water for Tommy. You washed and dried them by time he got done picking up your feathers. He was an annoying little gremlin, but he was your little annoying gremlin. You loved your little brother.

“...Thanks for helping me. You didn’t have to do the dishes.”

“It’s not a problem, Tommy. You already had to pick up my feathers. Er, sorry for hitting you with my wings, that probably hurt.”

He chuckled, rubbing his head. “It kinda hurt, but I deserved it for pulling out your feathers.”

You moved your wing in front of you to examine it. Only a few secondary feathers were missing, it was probably mostly your semiplume feathers he pulled out.

“You didn’t do too much damage, no worries. I’m going mining tomorrow, is there anything you need me to pick up?”

His eyes lit up. “If you find a diamond, give it to me. My jukebox broke today.”

“I gotchu. It’s getting pretty late, T. We should go to bed.”

You gestured for Tommy to follow as you started to walk back into the dining room and into the kitchen. You two made comfortable small talk as you walked back to your rooms for the night. After changing into your pajamas, you plopped onto your bed and buried yourself in your sheets. You struggled to cover your wings before giving up and leaving them to droop off the side of your bed. You really needed to ask Philza how he covered his wings, they were larger than yours so he probably had a little technique he uses.

Having wings kinda sucked sometimes. Besides not being able to cover them with a blanket easily, they didn’t fit on your bed if you wanted to stretch them out to their full length. When you were younger, your wings always fit on your bed and you would always keep them covered. But now with your wingspan being longer than your height, they were a pain to manage, especially at night. You always had to either sleep on your stomach or side and you couldn’t roll over without pulling a muscle in your wing. Because of this, it usually took you a little longer than most to fall asleep.

Your blissful slumber was interrupted by the light peeking in through your curtains. Sitting up, you stretched out your wings, smiling in satisfaction when you heard them crack. You stood up and grabbed your clothes for the day. Since you usually woke up a little earlier than your brothers, you always got first dibs on the shower after Philza. You yawned tiredly as you flicked on the water faucet and stepped into the shower. Now slightly more awake, you stepped out and started to preen your wings. Another downside to having wings is how high maintenance they are.

After taking care of the rest of your morning routine, you went down to the kitchen where Philza was sitting at the table drinking some coffee looking as dead inside as ever.

“Mornin’ Dad.”

He grunted in response. He was never a morning person, even after adopting four kids. You walked over to the chest where the food is kept and pulled out some eggs, bread, and beef. Usually, you made breakfast while Philza made dinner. You hummed a small tune as you flipped the eggs and turned over the beef sausages. One by one, your brothers joined Philza at the table and waited while you cooked.

You grabbed four plates and sets of silverware from the cabinets and put on an appropriate amount of food on each, placing them in front of your siblings and dad. You grabbed your own before joining them at the table.

“So, I’m going mining today. Is there anything you guys want me to get?”

They all chimed in with their needs. Philza wanted you to grab more iron and diamonds, Techno wanted some gold, Wilbur didn’t ask for anything, and you already knew what Tommy wanted. It sounded easy enough.

While the boys wrapped up breakfast, you excused yourself from the table and went back to your room to grab your satchel, pocket watch, iron pickaxe, and iron sword. Walking back downstairs, Philza gave you the supplies you would need today: a diamond pickaxe and a plethora of torches. “No staying out past sunset. Don’t mine down. Stay aware of your surroundings. If you see a mob, do not try to fight it, just try to run. If you get hurt, come straight home. If you get lost, follow the torches.”

“You worry about us too much.”

He sighed as he pulled you into a hug. “I just want you to be safe, hun.”

You smiled as you hugged him back and wrapped your wings around him. “I know, Dad. I’ll be safe, promise.”

“You better, or else you’re grounded,” he joked.

You chuckled as you pulled away and said goodbye to your brothers for the day. Heading out into the brisk morning, you took in a deep breath and smiled to yourself. You had a feeling that this mining trip was going to be bountiful. You spread your wings and took off into the sky.

Flying for a while, you spotted an opening in the ground. Grinning, you gradually landed before walking into the cave.

You spent hours mining precious ores, working your way deeper and deeper into the cave. You still had at least five hours before you had to start heading back to the house, so you thought going deeper wasn’t going to hurt anybody.

You hummed to yourself as you passed multiple stalagmites. This cave was seemingly never ending, you’d have to mark it on your map so you could come back to it. The mouth of the cave kept getting larger and larger until it melded into a huge, winding cavern. You’ve never been this deep before, so you were excited to explore. Being mindful of placing down torches, you explored the cavern before you came across a strange looking block you’ve never seen before.

It glowed a luminescent green as weird looking projections (tentacles maybe? Was this thing alive?) flailed about before they fell into a relaxed movement and stopped glowing. Reaching out to poke it, you cringed as it felt weirdly moist and it made a slight squelching noise. It flailed about again as it glowed. You saw movement in the corner of your eye and turned to see another one of the blocks doing the same thing. How weird.

Suddenly, the nearby lights started to flicker on and off, even your torches, as you heard a rhythmic thudding sound bounce off the walls of the cave. The thudding got louder and louder gradually as you frantically looked around for whatever it was and pulled out your sword. Hearing movement from behind you, you turned around only to freeze in fear.

What the fuck was that?

#sbi x reader #sibling reader #philza x reader #technoblade x reader #wilbur soot x reader #tommyinnit x reader #platonic #mcyt x reader #tw: swearing

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jjheejz · 3 years

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About Internet Water Army in the case

This is an ongoing update about the case from start to development. List of all related posts can be found on this blog's pinned post (link provided at bottom of each post as well).

19 August 2021 update: Added the scale of his success for reference, before bonus below

18 August 2021 update: Added timeline of events, orange title in post, found out the official English term for Immoral Media = Internet Water Army)

Major updates since first draft: Added bonus, added disclaimer, certain info details

Originally posted on 16 August 2021

[The purpose of this post is to provide a perspective as to why the Media is raised/blamed regarding the issue. Especially for international fans, as all the encounters happened on Weibo. Also, those who were on weibo, do read through if you will. So although it's lengthy, do try to read all, at least if not the last two parts].

The Media referred by most, is not the common perception of the Entertainment Industry (celebrities, directors, shows, channels, staff etc), but the dark side of the Entertainment industry: Antis, toxic fans, toxic marketing accounts. They are called Internet Water Army💧.

Toxic Marketing Accounts is one of the things they do, these accounts on Weibo has millions of followers, each of their post likes are in the hundred thousands (buyable) to give credibility to passer-bys. Some use similar names to Official accounts, some use similar logos. Their posts are usually subjective or aims to steer view points of a certain celebrity/movie/show. Before the latest update of this post (18.08.21), I just group them all together and term them as Immoral Media*.

*Below is my original post using my original term because at point of first draft, I did not know the official term (so have changed/added the term from Immoral Media to Internet Water Army in content below but retain the content based off first draft).

If you have chased before celebrities, or just simply passed by an article about certain celebrities, recall how some title that caught your attentions were like. Clickbaits is one of the many things they do. If GZ is your first and you do not have Weibo, then this read(link) is good enough.

Just as the term Immoral Media (Internet Water Army), it’s immoral and unethical, but they exists because they are paid to do so. Who pays them? Entertainment Companies, and maybe other Organisations

Normal Media/Marketing vs Immoral Media/Toxic Marketing/Internet Water Army

When a show or movie comes out, the normal Marketing department will generate outreach and buzz so that people know a show is airing soon/know the show exists etc. Official announcements are not enough, because there isn’t much context (limited content to put up as well) so having some other Marketing accounts do the buzz in a planned period to gain awareness through posts, some articles about the casts, the plot summary, the production details etc is normal. This is Marketing, bigger companies will probably have stronger Marketing departments (aka influence) and can hire more Marketing accounts to generate buzz. Celebrities (aka casts) themselves, are also Marketing point.

Then we have the Internet Water Army/Immoral Media, these are what they mainly do:

Create Fanfiction-rumors: Creating rumors about celebrities to shift audience perception of them. [eg. XX was seen with XX leaving a hotel, XX was drunk on Event Y and did ZZZ to AA, XX is dating BB and has been in a relationship for N years etc]

Honing their brain degrading skills: Come up with titled clickbait headings/ trending topics with negative written contents. For articles, exceptionally out of heading content related to the celebrity. [Refer to Baidu, it’s a winner of these, feel free to Google Translate]

Regressing their common sense and understanding skills: Take everything a celebrity does completely out of context in a negative way and create a topic out of it [eg. XX said AA is a ---, “XX raised his finger, a sign of ---?”, XX pushed BB aggressively on Variety Show Y - A competition variety show, XX is in beef with CC because XX was caught giving CC the eye]

Using their fingers to stir shit and bathe each other in it: Escalate all smallest form of possible tension created by fans/themselves into a huge thing by acting as the fandom's fans/lurk in fandom chat groups, and voicing their disguised opinion to spread tension/exaggerate severity of the issue [eg. XX fans mocked AA - in groupchats: tbh I've never liked AA before, AA just gives off a vibe that I dont like and now this? It just disgusts me even more > Yea, i feel this way too. AA has problems / XX Lurkers expressing views on XX about NN, slowly to NNMHFXW - XX did NNMHGT - I cannot accept NNmHfHw, I'm leaving = multiply by 1000++]

Epitome of a self-deteriorate: Creating something out of nothing and react to that something negatively to gain massive attention/reaction [eg. “XX raised his hand on show Y” - dk what XX fans are thinking, are they literally blind? XX fans are tasteless just like XX hahaha / “XX did community service” - they are acting / “XX breathed” - From the start, i thought XX was NN, but I am so ZZZ that XX breathed. Goodbye fandom, i’m leaving. Those who still want to stay I urge you to rethink your life choices] - if I may add, Xiao Zhan’s fanfiction case as well.

Metaphor - Ability to use bare hands to collect paychecks from the urinal/toilet bowl where their boss/client peed in: Doing all of the above.

Apologies for any term offense, but not apologetic of the term context. This is what they do for a living. Any normal human being who do not like anything, will generally not be interested at anything about it in the first place, so to have some antis/toxic fans knowing certain things and inside jokes/references in their posts questions their goal.

On involved in Internet Water Army/Immoral Media 💧

Fans on weibo during these few months witnessed many of the above on GZ. From rumored girlfriend (spammed with articles) to mean and nasty comments on trending topics, to bouts of insults and fake emotional cryouts by certain fan accounts that GZ's office has to release a number of Lawyer’s letter to them.

Aside from WOH there were also a few other BL adaptation films that were actually released this year but they did not reach exponential success like WOH. BL adaptations are so highly followed by because this is the key to wealth. Literally. Successful BLs like The Untamed and Dao Mu Bi Ji saw the amount of wealth fans are willing to spend on the celebrity as compared to say BG or idols (younger fan groups). This is why when WOH shot up exponentially, Immoral Media start to sweat.

Major anticipated adaptations were supposed to air this year eg. Hao Yi Xing(HYX), Sha Po Lang(SPL) etc but was severely held back due to the stricter change in BL adaptations submitting their scripts for approval regulations (WOH manage to submit earlier before the change). Because of this, most final films were rejected and they have to keep re-editing, by then WOH was already months into reaping tonnes of major brand endorsements, shows/movie casting, variety show appearances etc, something that is seen as too successful in the Immoral Media’s eyes, because they have to create buzz for other celebrities, some are specific celebrity oriented and thus circulate rumors about having endorsement opportunities shifted from celebrity X to GZ (think fanfiction-rumors and shit stirrer) causes tension in celebrity fandoms. - A real event just in July:

The Untamed’s cp fandom is called BJYX which had always been in the Top 1 of Cps for 2 years dropped for awhile to Top 2, over taken by LLD. Both of them had a war and hated each fandom, one fandom is somehow not allowed to like the other fandom even casually after everything broke out because it started out with some BJYX toxics photoshopped GZ on of portraits .

Also another case of which he wore the same costume as WYB did in a previous photoshoot and it became a useless comparison of who wore better, who looks better, degrading the other. (Finger stirring shit).

Now apply all of the above things the Internet Water Army do and we have them earning money, while both fandom reacts and hate each other.

In LLD, our own fans started suspecting each other on who is a spy from BJYX and what not.

The first few months of Internet Water Army saw LLDs mostly mocking them because the average age is 30-40s, they know and see through all of their intentions so nothing was big. They were trumpeting and LLDs didn’t even care, what with all the doing tedious stats was not even important to them.

Over time, as the issues they create became more and more serious LLDs did start to care, reporting Toxic Marketing accounts/toxic fans became a daily task, go vote for GZ at certain polls etc, solo fans, and LLD fans also split apart. Solo fans think cp fans use GZ to furnish their fantasies, and cp fans thinks they are the ones furnishing their dreaming-girls fantasy with (aka my boyfriend).

There was also a period where LLD had a habit of continuously mentioning “we are in the 30-40s so we can see through everything about the media, we are all fans for the first time, we are good at spending money (because of purchase power compared to other fandoms)” it was prevalent for so long it felt odd, ‘chasing celebrities the first time’ in particular sounds more vulnerable as a weakness than a strength / sth to be proud of.

Gradually, more secretive/insider confirmed ‘sweets’ were flying around. Fans advised each other to not circulate, and the mindset of “if you know, you know, dont tell.” (This is a problematic mentality, of which fans will still be curious to know and search for it themselves, but this secretive hook is unhealthy. Over the long term, it becomes hard for existing fans to know a lot of things properly to judge for themselves, especially those who knew and publicly reacted, but blasting those who ask and telling those who know to keep quiet, this did not help some to understand why on certain things, even so for international fans, dont know and dont understand, causing misunderstandings. Yes, certain information should not be shared, so why should you react about it publicly in the first place? - Internet Water Army effect)

The last few months (for example the July fan war) created a tonne of seriousness and anger. A period even broke out with a tonne of ‘insider confirmed sweets’ (which is LLD’s daily dose of happiness), it was hard to tell what was real and what was fake. Trending topics became negative and everyone warned each other not to enter because it will give the trends ‘views’ and trend statistics, in reality entering there is to enter an exhibition by the self-deteriorates, collecting the fandom's traffic data (it's a sure lose for fans each time they enter the topic). Everyone even starts thinking that the trend’s popularity was caused by each other (it's true but it can be bought daily and not caused by fans). There was a raise in the number of fans who were getting emotional because they want to protect but Internet Water Army kept coming and got worse, because fans, tbh, not just GZ fans, every other celebrity’s fans are always fighting with an Army, getting played and plotted in that Army's calendar.

Even so, despite all of these, LLD is actually a fandom Internet Water Army may find the hardest to break because they understand GZ so much, they could tell what are fake news regarding GZ, because among everything above, there are still plenty of logical fans to stop many fans from drifting too far and debunking them. Why? 30-40s are grown up adults.

Why 13.8.21 and the Japan issue is plotted?

First of all, in the political climate of China, there are many political dates in a month that is NO-Entertainment news. Because it’s the honoring of certain important political events. It’s like Remembrance Day, thus the sensitivity is higher. On these days, there are usually no news and even the Internet Water Army zip their pants. This year also marks the 100th year of the Chinese Communist Party(link)

Secondly, he had no work schedule on 13 August 2021. A great full day to focus on any other news (because if he had schedules, everyone will turn their attention to his events, what trumpeting outside is just bird chirps).

Thirdly, when the news broke out, especially about the shrine, the reception was actually quite serious within the fandom so the scale of this might be big but to what extent in reality?

Lastly, 15.8.21 marks the 76th anniversary of the announcement of surrender of Japanese in World War 2(link). Also a day of NO-Entertainment news.

Timeline of events:

13.8.21 - [His rest day, Eve of Chinese Valentine's Day, Japan News broke out] His rest day, no schedules = increased attention about him online. Lowered guard among fans because they are getting ready for tomorrow's Chinese Valentine's sweets = Caught off guard = Huge break out of fans' reactions

14.8.21 - [Chinese Valentine's Day, Eve of the 75th Anniversary of the announcement of Japanese surrender] Keep a wishful and happy demenaor to not destroy the mood, suppressed thoughts about ZZH's Japan news

15.8.21 - [75th Anniversary of the announcement of Japanese surrender, Official announcement of ZZH's boycott and all China social media account ban] NO-Entertainment news day, Solemn day, not allowed to voice anything so the fandom can only wait for tomorrow to start voicing out/debunking but before they can wait out, the boycott and social media ban happened, every official accounts about him was gone overnight, fans had no time to react

17.8.21 - [All official fandom accounts related to ZZH and JunZhe were locked/removed]

Forced to be silent since the day his matter broke out, over the course of official news release with everything taken down in a day because of the Japan correspondence, his accounts banned overnight across the Chinese media and the overnight cancellation, fans could not speak anything about it. Overnight cancellation like this scale happened for the first time in China, leaving no time to react by the fandom, by the time they can, they are silenced.

When the period of events occured within a set of special dates, it’s not coincidence.

Conclusion

Because he was too successful and had many actually honorable past things, and a hard to influence fandom, Internet Water Army view him as a huge threat enough to want to destroy him, because it’s hard to defeat. With a chance they have, they will hold it till the end, bringing up this issue to the Government during this period also shows a sign of how scared they were of him and perhaps his fandom to plot something like this.

Updated on 19 August: Here's a screenshot of assumed calculation on the scale of GZ success for reference while chatting with a fellow fan, assuming GJ also has 27 brands, and there are 1000 brands. Rationale of numbers used: Only big brands can hire big celebrities.

Bonus

Mentioned in the first post, will mention again in case. After the news broke out within 2 days, there was a drop on his weibo followers from 18.9mil to 18.7mil. 200k+ drops, if the politics was such a big national issue, there should at least be a huge drop, even at least a million right? Because weibo is a China-Chinese majority right? Nope, we get a puny 200k drop.

What's funny? The self-deteroriates:

Translation: "Are his fans bought? Why didnt he drop fans? Those people got brainwashed to this point?" / "I've never entered his weibo and today i feel like having a look yet it showed I've followed him. All his fans were bought right? It disgusts me, i immediately unfollowed. This kind of process is worse than WYF..." / "i dropped fans because of him...no...I just reposted 2 posts and I've dropped 4 fans?"

Isn't the tone and regressing brain cells, all too familiar and same?

Added above, will remind again to read this link. It has an even more in-depth knowledge on who are paying them.

So what should we do? Link here

Related posts 🛏️:

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thejustmaiden · 3 years

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So out of nowhere I was tagged and quoted by a SR shipper for a blog of mine posted in August of last year. Talk about throwback but, hey, gotta appreciate that level of snooping. 😉

Back in the day I actually used to encourage discourse amongst Inuyasha fans- both shippers and antis alike- but I've since realized that it's a lost cause. But for you, @feministmetalgreymon , I'll grant this exception. Just 'cause it's been a while so why the hell not. haha

I want to assure you, however, that nothing you say will ever convince me that Sesshomaru and Rin are meant to be together romantically or that the story intended it so. Nor will you find any validation here. You can ship them for all I care, but please for all that is good and holy while I have your attention try- I mean really try- to understand why it is so many of us Inuyasha fans are so against this pairing in the first place (newsflash: it's not about ship wars), and why we believe a romance between the two of them is completely and utterly out of character.

For those of you interested in reading this, the blog of mine in question that the above shipper mentions in their counter-argument is here for reference. It's titled "Jaken = Rin's Dad?" I'm going to try and keep this short, but I'm also making no such promises. After all, I'm not exactly known for my brevity. haha Now let's get crackin'!

Like you, feministmetalgreymon, did for your recent blog here where you took screenshots of mine to address certain parts, I will be doing the same and dissecting yours accordingly.

[Snippet 1]

I worked with kids for many years as a teacher, and many people in my family have too or still do. Two of them happen to be just over 5 feet which is quite short for the average adult woman living here. I've also worked alongside many a women of short stature, and never did I hear any of them complaining of issues with their students having difficulty differentiating them from their own peers just because they were short as well. I'm sorry but that's just ridiculous. Kids are quite smart and pick up on a lot more than you seem to give them credit for. Height is not the only characteristic they look at to determine who's an adult and who's not, and it's foolish to suggest otherwise. So unless you're a babysitter who's still in their teens and/or who has very childlike features or behavior then I'm afraid what you're getting at is total hogwash. This is just another example of how you shippers offer nothing of real substance to your reasoning, it's only ever cherry-picking or strawmanning from you guys. Stop deflecting from the real issues please, because this certainly isn't one and only winds up being a complete waste of time for all parties involved.

[Snippet 2]

Okay, calm down now. I wasn't insinuating that relationships between parents and children can't change over time in terms of how they get along. Of course that's possible, as all families experience their fair share of estrangement and abuse. What I was speaking about was in reference to the overall dynamic between the two. Because a bad mother or father can still be viewed as a parental figure to their child even if say they're not in said child's life anymore. Since Sesshomaru and Rin share a healthy bond- and just a friendly reminder that in my blog I even said that he doesn't have to necessarily be labeled her father but that a romantic relationship later would still be inappropriate- I didn't deem it necessary to address what you brought up. Plus, it kinda, umm, misses the point?? Please, let's stay on topic. And it's not captured in the screenshot, but stop acting like there isn't a small part of them that idolizes their parents at some point during childhood. Just like you mention later on how it's normal for kids to have innocent crushes on adults that they eventually grow out of? Well, guess what, the same concept applies here. Kids eventually learn that their parents are far from perfect and make mistakes too. Rin is so damn young in the OG series though that we never even get to see her reach that maturity level.

[Snippet 3]

LOL! Alright, okay, so the "unbreakable bond" bit you're mentioning was actually me quoting you sessrinners. Did you not catch that? I literally spelled it out. *sigh* The whole point I was making is that shippers like yourself make hypocritical and contradictory statements all.the.goddamn.time. One moment you guys claim that Sesshomaru and Rin were essentially strangers and meant very little to each other, only to say in the same breath a few seconds later that they were destined to be together and their bond is like no other. I agree, their bond is special, but why must that mean they're going to fall in love?

That is the root of the matter here. Too many animes/mangas have romanticized this older adult man & young girl growing up falling in love trope that it's become way too normalized and widely accepted across the world- and yes, in some cultures more than others. Sadly, you lack the awareness to recognize how this all works. You know how we know that? When we see that you shippers are so desensitized to sexualized images of girls in the media that you share posts like this one below which *subtly* imply a future romance although one half of that pairing is still just a child in the pic and then try and pass it off as cute. That's like super fucking problematic and it scares me that you can't see that (or deny you do). 🤢

After all that's said and done, Sesshomaru leaving Rin in the village with Kaede is to me the strongest indicator more than pretty much anything else he's done for Rin that proves he is her adoptive father. It's so funny to me how you somehow see the exact opposite though. 🤔 What I think is happening is that you got yourself on some squeaky clean ass shipper goggles fresh out of your little echo chamber. Because I hate to tell you, but what you're fantasizing is what you want to see and not what's actually there on screen or was written into the story. I'm strictly talking about Inuyasha and the manga of course. [For the TL; DR version skip to the last paragraph.]

Parents looking after their kids is what parents are supposed to do. A good parent will do anything to keep their child safe and ensure they are cared for, so what he did for her by leaving her there was in her best interests clearly. Besides, as a babysitter, you more than most people should understand that parents aren't always able to be there for their kids so sometimes others gotta step in to help. Haven't you heard of the saying, "it takes a village to raise a child?" Which in Rin's case is literally true! 😂 Sometimes kids are even sent off to stay with grandparents and that's who raises them instead. Or maybe they have to temporarily live with an aunt or uncle because their single parent's job requires they work out of town 4-5 days of the week so they're hardly home. But that doesn't mean that the parents care or love their kids any less, and it's foolish to assume that Sesshomaru must have thought very little of Rin simply due to the fact that he made the decision to leave her in the village. Come on, y'all are acting like he abandoned her there!!

It's just given the circumstances Sesshomaru finally came to learn that Rin traveling with him was no longer safe. I also like to think it's because he wished for her to live a more normal life and to learn how to fully trust humans again. Plus, continuing to travel with him as young as she was would have proven dangerous and unwise. Now for you to know all this and still manage to turn his past actions towards her while she was just a child into a romantic gesture is what boggles my mind. Regardless of how you look at it, from my perspective or your own, Sesshomaru is in the wrong. Either he's a father figure who impregnates his daughter at the young age of approximately 14. OR he's this man she used to travel with who maybe isn't a father to her but who nonetheless basically rapes her since kids her age can't consent to sex with an adult. Idk about you but it sounds to me like nobody here wins with either scenario we're given. In other words, you should be just as mad as we are. If only one side didn't choose to forsake their morals they know we both have in common for the sake of a ship. Welp. 🤷‍♀️

I agree, incest is disgusting but that's not the only problem we have with this pairing. A romantic bond forming between Sesshomaru and Rin would also constitute as grooming.

You realize that over the years he visited her in the village that he brought her gifts too and essentially watched her grow up right before his very eyes, right? I mean, I know you do, but I really shouldn't have to explain further why pursuing a romantic/sexual relationship with each other is plain and simple wrong. And before you say it's not because he didn't have any malintent, please understand that considering their history and power dynamic up to then that yes this is still considered grooming even if Rin supposedly "wanted it" or "made the first move." Whether you consider him her father or not, as the adult who took on a role resembling that of a caretaker in her early life- a critical developmental time for a child- Sesshomaru is obligated to turn down any advances by Rin and most definitely should not initiate any himself. As the first close adult figure she's had in her life since her parents died, it's unfathomable to imagine how Sesshomaru could go through with taking advantage of this young girl who was under his care and supervision since they met. To think he could be capable of betraying that trust sickens me to the core.

This. Now THIS is how a parent/guardian or a similar adult caretaker (babysitter, teacher, etc.) talks to a child. And, in turn, this is how some young children talk to adults. You'd be insane and delusional to deny it! We see it in our everyday lives, do we not? From where else do you think our stories draw most of their inspiration? Yes, obviously these fictional universes have aspects of fantasy that don't exist in the real world, but so how then do you suppose we're able to relate to them? The reason for that being is because these stories are written by people for people, so naturally there are going to be real life aspects embedded throughout. Sure, a little escapism doesn't hurt as we don't need to take everything so seriously, but ultimately we all need to recognize that the messages in the stories we tell matter. Most stories possess a combination of both light and dark themes, but when it specifically comes to the latter we gotta be careful with how we tackle this in children's media since kids are far more impressionable.

So if at the center of a story we have two of the main protagonists whose mom is basically their same age and to top it off she knew their dad when she was just a girl and who just so happened to help raise her, wouldn't you say that's beyond fucked up or at the very least so fucking weird? Like why would we think it's even remotely okay for our children to watch this garbage?? Really think about it. Try and be objective for once and think about how it would sound explaining this storyline to an outsider who's never watched IY or HNY. Well, antis have tried this before many times and we always get the same reaction: Ewww!

Like I said earlier, if you wanna ship it then fine, but 1) please stop seeking our approval or trying to change our minds - your ship wish came true didn't it, so why do you need us to validate it? 2) even though it's not canon, respect that we don't support this sequel portraying pedophilia in a positive light. It's harmful af to not only allow but glorify the continuation of sexualized images of young girls everywhere. And I shouldn't have to say this, but just because this trope is popular as you say does not make it right. Lolicon themes in the media have been an issue forever and it needs to stop. Yes, even some people in Japan or "the East" would agree. Shocker!

We're pissed off and rightfully so because Yashahime's TV rating is 14, not to mention it airs at the prime time kids in Japan watch TV after getting home from school. That's Towa and Setsuna's age, true, but if Rin being the mom when she's like only a year older than them (please don't argue w/ me about the math- antis have so far been right every time with it) is straight-up disgusting and not something we should be supporting or endorsing. Rin's a whole ass child!! Please don't start with the "but times were different then so her having kids at 15 is acceptable" argument either, because we've already debunked that and every other single excuse you guys throw at us. Besides, how or why would you expect young viewers to know these historical "facts" anyway, especially if as you suggest fiction doesn't affect reality so what does it matter? Yet here we are, arguing over a fictional show in real life almost a year and a half into the "Sesshomaru fucks?" sequel being announced. My ass, your ass, hell all our asses fiction doesn't affect reality!

Look, I do apologize if the tone of this blog came off as snippy or condescending at times. I do not wish you any ill will, it's just I'm not really sure what you expected to get out of all this besides maybe getting on my nerves perhaps. haha A lot of you shippers have been desperately scrambling to interact with us, lurking in our tags, jumping onto our posts screaming canon and getting so defensive even though you sought us out first. We've been sticking to our tags, so how about you stay in your lane too. By the way since we're on the topic, have you seen Twitter or Reddit?! SR shippers there are the actual worst and many Inuyasha fans (not just antis) have complained of not feeling welcomed to engage in fandom spaces anymore. Shippers swarm them and scare them off simply because fans don't like your ship and refuse to accept it. It's pathetic, really. No one should ever be bullied or harassed just because they don't like something you might. We're all fans of Inuyasha, aren't we? So let's act like it. Yashahime on the other hand, you guys are welcome to that pungent heap of trash. Fans have a right to criticize it too, but if you like it then good for you, so keep on liking it and don't mind us.

I'm almost done, but real quick back to Jaken! Let's not forget about how the official Yashahime website- which came out after my blog, mind you- described Jaken. This translation isn't the best one available but it's the only version a fellow anti friend could track down. They do recall a better one done by a native Japanese speaker who was also an anti, and that member confirmed that Jaken is indeed called Rin's babysitter. So you see, I was right in my interpretation. In the original post I did compare Jaken to a brother, but after talking to others (some comments can be found under said post) I did acknowledge that he's more of a reluctant babysitter who's not related. And if he's not at least a brother to Rin, then he's definitely not her father.

At the end of the day, the creator Rumiko Takahashi has the final word. Which is guess what? Hogosha. 💖 Probably should've just started out with that and saved us all the trouble, huh? Good day/night to you.

Papamaru bids you adieu now. 🤞

#anti yashahime #anti sessrin #sesshomaru is rin's dad #papamaru #hogosha 💖#the sequel may not be canon but sunrise can still burn in hell

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stayndays · 3 years

Text

𝐚 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐮𝐩𝐢𝐝𝐬! - 𝐲𝐚𝐧𝐠 𝐣𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐢𝐧

part of my anime!skz series, this story is based off of “Toradora!” and will include spoilers on the plot of the show.

genres & tropes: fluff, minor angst (mostly at the end), high school au, love triangle/square, enemies & neighbors to lovers au, tsundere!jeongin (i guess?), gender neutral reader, reader is misunderstood as a cold person

disclaimers: drowning (but no death), mentions of rumor spreading & outcasting, mentions of anxious feelings/actual anxiety, one or two swear words, i have not proofread this so if the last few episodes seem really wonky that’s why

word count: 11k... we don’t comment on that

summary: “Y/L/N Y/N. Yang Jeongin. Kim “Chuu” Jiwoo. Kim Seungmin. You like Seungmin, Jeongin likes Chuu. You’re best friends with Chuu, Jeongin’s best friends with Seungmin. You don’t like Jeongin, but you know about each other’s crush. It’s time to play a game of Cupid, while being struck with Cupid’s arrow yourself.”

a/n: happy valentines day and belated jeongin day! this is the first story i’ve decided to tackle for my anime!skz series as well, so i get to hit three birds with one stone with this fic. also, i decided to take out a couple elements in the original anime (such as the addition of a character that’s like ami, taiga’s family issues, and some events) just so it’s simpler and totally not because i’m on a time crunch. i hope you enjoy reading this! <3

taglist: @skzwriternet @dayawantstosleep @desertofdessert @mr-jisung @dreamylunarnight (sorry if i forgot you i’m running on 0.2 braincells)

anime!skz masterlist is here!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Episode 1: Collision Course

“Psst, look over there!”

“Huh? What?”

“The fennec fox is about to face off against the dark delinquent!”

You turn to face the two students after overhearing the words “dark delinquent”, making the duo back away in fear. Cursing your parents who gave you these intimidating genes, you heave out a breath out of annoyance, and continue walking down the hallway.

Alas, maybe your appearance is the reason why people never approach you unless it’s absolutely necessary. You still manage to give off this dark atmosphere despite how much you try to change your appearance.

“Don’t worry, Y/N,” your best friend, Chuu, attempts to reassure you. “It’s only the first day of school! You still have an entire school year to prove them wrong.”

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t envy your best friend, who basically embodies the definition of the sun. Always smiling and having a positive attitude regarding the situation, you just so happened to be the exact opposite of her. Boys are constantly crushing on her, she’s one of the most popular girls of your year, but she just so happens to be buddies with you.

“Oh, watch out Y/N!” Distracted by your thoughts, you process Chuu’s warning just a second too late, and collide with a particularly tall boy, somehow smacking your face right into the torso part of his male school uniform. The force manages to knock the both off you to the ground, sending your papers flying all over the place.

Oh, that’s right. That’s what the two girls were talking about. You’ve heard rumors of who this “fennec fox” person is, and how he has a really bad temper when you push his gears. But this guy you just bumped into? A fennec fox?

You guess you can see some resemblance of a fox in his facial structure, but his figure literally towered over you, making you feel like an ant standing next to a tree. The small crowd of passing students trying their absolute least to hold in their giggles make you feel even smaller, your neck growing hot because of how embarrassed you are.

“Watch where you’re going next time!” the boy scolds you, brushing off the paper that landed on top of his head. His voice makes you flinch slightly, and it’s only in that moment that you realize the rumors, so far at least, were true.

“Er, sorry,” you quietly mumble out, scratching the side of your face. He definitely looks pissed, you thought, smoke practically fuming out of the guy’s ears. “Here, I’ll help you gather your stuff.”

“I’ll help you guys out, too!” you hear a familiar voice, and meet the eyes belonging to a face you know all too well.

Kim Seungmin: your secret crush that nobody truly knows about (you’ve tried approaching the topic to Chuu multiple times, only to be interrupted by her other friends). He’s the vice president of your school, a role he’s gained through the student body president herself. The definition of hardworking and kind at the same time, who would you be not to fall for a guy like him?

Your breath gets caught up in your throat as you try to answer him. “Oh- Uh- Thank you, Seungmin.”

“Of course! Wouldn’t hurt to help out my best friend, too,” Seungmin replies.

Best friend?

“Thanks..” the boy simply mumbles in response, and you almost did a double take on what you just heard. Seungmin and this guy... best friends? Before you can dwell on it long enough, however, you’re already being pulled to your feet by Chuu, and your papers are back in your hands.

“Let’s go, Y/N!” Chuu beams with enthusiasm, and you could only afford a small smile in return. “Say, which class are you two in this year?”

“2-A,” the boy answers in a composed manner, the anger he released on you must’ve vanished by now, and you could almost see the pink dust coating his face. “What about you, Chuu?”

You can’t even process the way the guy completely skipped over you to only ask Chuu personally before you blurt out,

“We’re in the same class?!”

Episode 2: A Bold Strategy

Bad news: your love letter is gone.

That bastard fox dude, Jeongin, you learned his name was, must’ve taken it when you bumped into him in the morning. Not that you blame him entirely, because how could you remember to grab your letter in the ocean of textbooks and notebook paper?

Good news: you have his own love letter.

Why good news? Well, that just means he’s in the exact same boat as you, and now you can call yourself even with him. An exchange of love letters, it almost makes your heart calm down for a split second.

Until you read who the letter was addressed to.

There’s no way in hell this guy could get with your best friend. Jeongin, based off of first impressions, is a literal firecracker (who, for some reason, shouts at people he just met), while Chuu is a ball of sunshine. You don’t blame him, though, as almost every male classmate you’ve had has taken some sort of interest in her at some point, and you guess he’s no exception.

Then again, you’re in the same situation as him, crushing on somebody way out of your league.

While Seungmin is a star student, always willing to help people out and socialize, you’re a total outcast who can barely get average grades in school. Seungmin just so happened to be one of two (the other being Chuu) who’s approached you willingly, and that’s why you fell for him. That charming smile of his, and his caring nature. It was all too much for you.

As you thought about it more, flipping Jeongin’s love letter to Chuu between the flesh of your fingers, it’s not a terrible idea to help out Jeongin. He may currently have a 0% chance of getting with Chuu, but if you succeed and play a bit of matchmaking, he could return the favor to you.

You like his best friend, he likes your best friend...

You gently rip open the envelope encasing Jeongin’s letter, and start reading.

Episode 3: The Cupid Game Begins

“Uh, Jeongin-” you tap the boy’s shoulder once, which was conveniently right in front of your desk. He continues to talk to the people around him, which makes you tap his shoulder harder.

Jeongin whips his head around to meet your calm eyes, only turning slightly frightened when you flinch at his sudden movement. “Wha- Ah! What do you want?” He says in an aggravated tone.

“Sorry,” you apologize quickly for making him jump, not wanting to cause another scene like yesterday. “I just need to talk to you about something for a few minutes.”

Jeongin lets out a groan, fixing his position so he can look behind him more comfortably. “What exactly do you want to talk about?”

“Something I’m sure you don’t want your friends to hear,” you respond casually, picking at the skin on your fingers. The boy’s eyes visibly perk up at your reasoning, and finally nods. “Thanks,” you say to him and stand up, pushing in your seat.

“Careful Jeongin!”

“Fight back if they hit you!”

You let out a deep sigh at the comments directed towards you, not even bothering to shoot them a glance in response. It’ll only make the rumors worse, you think as you walk out of the classroom, Jeongin trailing behind your footsteps after closing the door.

The hallway was silent once you stepped out of your class, no longer hearing the chattering of your fellow classmates about the latest gossip and homework. You could only hear your very own footsteps, along with Jeongin’s feet, which were behind you. Once the two of you made your way to the vending machines near the school stairs, you take out the coin you were holding in your hand and insert it into one of the machines.

“Which drink do you want?” you ask the boy without turning to face him, fishing out another coin in your mini wallet.

“The melon one-” Jeongin does a double take, not believing what he heard as he watches you insert another coin into the vending machine. “Wait, why are you buying a drink for me?” He questions your antics, slowly sliding down the wall to sit on the floor.

You stick your hand into the machine to grab Jeongin’s drink, making eye contact with him as you hand it over. “Why not? Is there a reason I should be buying you a drink?”

“Well, I mean,” Jeongin scratches the back of his neck in confusion. “Aren’t you supposed to be... a delinquent?”

You chuckle at his explanation, “Does that mean you’re a fox? Our nicknames in this school are only based off of our appearances, isn’t that funny?” Joining him on the floor, you crack open your own drink. “So no, I’m not a delinquent, and I’ll never be one.”

“That’s not what I’m here to talk about anyways,” you don’t bother to check Jeongin’s facial expressions as you continue, starting to take out his envelope before you’re stopped by him.

“Wait! I have something to give you too,” Jeongin stops your movement, slipping out something from his pocket as well.

“Is this yours?”

You both say at the same time, revealing each other’s envelopes. There’s yours, with a tacky, red heart sticker stamped onto the envelope to seal it. Then there’s Jeongin’s, with only the word “To: Chuu” on the back.

Jeongin quickly snatches his letter from your hand, and quickly throws your own onto your lap. “Uh, thanks for returning it. You didn’t- Give it to Chuu for her to read... right?”

“Of course not.”

“And you didn’t read what’s inside?”

“..You got me there, I’ll admit it,” you chuckle slightly, raising your hands in defeat as your face starts to grow hot. Jeongin hums a bit, surprisingly not even a tad bit angry at your confession.

“Well,” Jeongin leans back against the wall. “I guess we’re even then.”

“What?!” you exclaim in surprise. “I mean- Yeah, cool. Actually, this works out perfectly.”

“Why?”

“I have a proposal for you,” you start. “We both like each other’s best friend, right? So we could be each other’s wingman and try to get with our crush. It’ll just take a bit of cooperation, though.”

Jeongin scoffs, “You made me look like a fool on the first day of school, why should I?”

“Well, besides being the apparent ‘delinquent’ of this school, I’d say I’m quite good at matchmaking thanks to Chuu, a cupid, you could almost say,” you cross your arms in defense. “Then again, since I’ve already read your sappy love letter to Chuu, I could always tell her that-”

“Fine!” Jeongin finally gives in. “I’m in, I’m in. I have absolutely no idea how I could get somebody like Seungmin to like somebody like you, but if you’re able to get me and Chuu into a relationship, I’ll try my best to play cupid. Okay?”

“I’m just going to ignore that comment about me and take it,” you shrug, standing up after checking the clock on the wall. “I’ll give you my address on a piece of paper later, so we could meet up and start planning.”

“Yeah, sure,” Jeongin follows your actions, standing up and tossing his drink into the trash can.

“Remind me to pay you back for the drink, by the way.”

Episode 4: His Angelic Neighbor

“How ironic.”

“How ironic, indeed,” Jeongin agrees with you, the two of you standing at the entrance of Eda Apartments Complex, your backpacks on your back.

The studio apartment complex the both of you just so happen to live in, that is.

Part of you is relieved that you live near Jeongin, so maybe you could get to know him better (not as a friend, of course, but to see if Chuu would actually like him), and of course to work out your cupid plans together. However, the other part of you is confused as to why you’ve never even seen him around your apartment until now.

These thoughts run through your head as Jeongin leads you to his apartment, walking up a lengthy three flights of stairs, as opposed to your usual two.

When he’s about to open the door to his place, Jeongin turns around to face you, key in hand. “Whatever you do, don’t comment about my place.”

“Okay...?” you comply with an incredibly confused tone, but it seems to be enough for Jeongin, as he swings the door open.

Soda cans upon soda cans are messily piled up near a trash can, which was overflowing with paper plates and tissues. His bed, which is in the corner of the room (which, to be fair, it’s a studio apartment, and you have the same bed layout as him), wasn’t even made, and what you could assume to be a dining table had leftover Chinese takeout boxes on it.

When you peered into the sink after reluctantly placing your belongings near the door, it’s almost clogged up with muck and filth, making a shiver run down your spine. Not to mention, when you asked Jeongin if you could have a drink from the fridge, all your eyes could see were frozen meals & rows of soda and juice. How long has Jeongin been living this way?

“Uhm, hate to mention this to you,” you close the fridge gently after grabbing a can of soda. “but your place is really-”

“What did I say to you before I opened the door?” Jeongin fires back before you could finish.

You stay silent.

“Exactly. Now can we please start talking about our ‘Cupid Plans’ as you like to refer to it?” Jeongin raises an eyebrow at you, taking out the items in his backpack.

“It’s a cute name, okay?” you respond, making your way to the table as Jeongin pushes the takeout boxes to the side. “And we’ll be studying too, we have a quiz tomorrow, remember?”

“I’ll rather do the studying later,” Jeongin. “So what does Chuu like?”

“Hmm...” it takes you a moment to think about what your best friend likes when it comes to love, which is a bit strange, because you’d think you’d know what Chuu likes after watching people confess to her after all these years. “I think she’d prefer something planned? Even extravagant, if you really push it. She likes plushies and small gifts.”

“What about Seungmin?” you ask Jeongin.

It also takes Jeongin a second to come up with an answer. “He’s always been into nerdy, yet bubbly people, I guess? Since you’re so antisocial, though, he probably won’t like somebody like you right now.”

“Wow, thanks.”

“I’m only trying to help!”

The conversation shifts slightly, and to your surprise, flows well despite your polar opposite personality. You and Jeongin discuss possible ideas as to how both of you could help each other out while studying for your upcoming quiz.

“And for equation 17, would it be-” you lift your head up from your math textbook, only to see Jeongin using his arm as a pillow and sleeping on his own book. You blink a couple times in disbelief, but remember that you’ve been over at his house for a little over three hours at this point. Shrugging, you gently close your textbook and decide to call it a day at Jeongin’s place.

But then you go back to your senses and remember how filthy of an apartment you’ve been at this entire time. The more you look at your surroundings, the more you desire to clean up the place.

A neat freak, that’s what everybody calls you. It’s what your mom taught you all throughout your childhood, and it’s a trait you’ve kept until now.

Your mind goes into autopilot mode as you start moving around his place left and right. Somehow, you were able to find a box of plastic gloves stored in the back of the sink cabinet, so you put a pair on and start cleaning. Tying up garbage bags and cleaning out the sink, you also make the effort to place the leftover Chinese food into the fridge after checking if it’s spoiled or not. Most people would stare at you in confusion, but you shake your head at the thought, only hoping that Jeongin would at least appreciate your efforts.

By the end of your cleaning session, you could now call the studio apartment an apartment, and not some kind of swamp. Pleased at your work, you take out one of your notebooks and rip out a piece of paper, grabbing a pencil along the way. You write a quick note for Jeongin to read when he wakes up:

“Cleaned up your place while you were asleep, I could also cook for you and teach you how to cook? (Chuu likes food) text me: xxx-xxx-xxxx”

Swinging your backpack onto your pack, you leave his apartment and make your way to your own.

Later that night, your phone dings with a message from an unknown number.

[Unknown: i’m so tired of frozen meals and takeout, please cook for me (and teach me how)]

Episode 5: However

“Here’s your lunch, Yang,” you pass your spare lunchbox to the seat in front of you, which Jeongin takes gratefully. Chuu, who was making her way over to the seat next to you, catches sight of your interaction with Jeongin.

“Y/N’s food is good, isn’t it Jeongin?” Chuu strikes up a conversation right away, leaving Jeongin flustered, and most likely burning hot.

“Y-Yeah, it is.”

“Say, you two have been talking a lot lately,” Chuu starts talking as you tilt your head up to take a sip of your drink. “Have you two been, or should I say, has Y/N finally gotten a-”

You choke on your drink, almost spitting it all over Jeongin’s back before catching yourself. Jeongin has almost the same reaction as you, only choking on the food you prepared for him instead. It had only been two weeks of school; two weeks of talking to Jeongin solely about each other’s crush, and yet Chuu believes that you two have something going on.

“Absolutely not, Chuu.”

“Yeah, no way.”

You exchange a glare with Jeongin, almost in a panicked manner. If Chuu believes that you two are dating, that would practically be the end of your chances to be with Seungmin, same going for Jeongin with Chuu.

“Alrighty then, I trust you two,” Chuu leans back in the chair she’s sitting on, before promptly getting up and making her way to the door of the classroom. “I’m gonna use the bathroom.”

As soon as she closes the door, Jeongin immediately leans over to your desk, ignoring his bento box. “We have to do something about what Chuu said.”

“Duh, there’s no way we could let her think that about us,” you agree with him. “What are some solutions? We could try to be more distant with each other, which honestly I don’t think either of us would mind too much. I could simply tell Chuu that we aren’t even close friends, or-”

“You need to confess to Seungmin,” Jeongin bluntly tells you, catching you off guard.

“What- why would I do that?!” you almost yell at the boy in front of his face. His plan is all kinds of crazy, you would’ve never thought of it yourself.

“You’ve known Seungmin longer than I’ve known Chuu, so you have a lower risk of being rejected. And if you actually end up dating Seungmin, then Chuu would know that us two aren’t a couple,” Jeongin crosses his arms over his chest. “It’s a win-win situation.”

You scoff, “And if I get rejected?”

“I’ll like- I don��t know, buy you ice cream?” Jeongin attempts to persuade you, to which you sigh as a response.

“I guess I’ll trust you on this.”

The day passes by without a hitch, to your utter shock, as the churning in your stomach says otherwise. The thought of impulsively confessing to your long time crush makes you feel lightheaded and dizzy, as it was something you’ve never done before. However, your stubbornness is refusing you to back down from Jeongin’s wild plan, so here you are, face to face with Seungmin at the roof of the school.

“Erm- So-”

“The weather is pretty nice today, isn’t it Y/N?” Seungmin casually breaks the ice wall between you two.

The sudden question catches you off guard. “Ah, yes.. yes it is...” Already, you could feel the heat rising up your body, even when the weather today was particularly cloudy. “Uhm, I brought you here to tell you something, Seungmin.”

“Oh, what is it?” Seungmin seems surprised at your statement, but the voice in your head tells you otherwise. He’s smart enough to look through people, you know that already, so why are you trying to hide your feelings when you’re already this far?

It’s time to take a leap of faith, you think, as you take in a large breath before telling him everything. “Uh, you see.. I’ve always appreciated you ever since you approached me that one day. Nobody’s ever done that for me except for you and Chuu, and because of that I think you’re a.. great person... What- What I’m trying to say here is-”

“I like you, Seungmin.”

You tilt your head downwards, almost in shame as you play with your fingers anxiously. Letting out a shaky exhale, you can’t believe that you just confessed all of those things to your own crush. Your heart beating a thousand miles a second, it felt like you were about to explode from either embarrassment or anticipation; quite possibly even both at the same time.

“You, know, Y/N..” Seungmin starts to chuckle, grabbing onto his left wrist with his right hand.

“I used to like you.”

That made you look back up at him in shock, blinking a couple times out of disbelief. “Really?!”

Seungmin simply hums, confirming what he just stated. “That’s why I approached you in the first place. There was something about you that drew me into talking to you. And of course, you didn’t disappoint me,” he flashes you a comforting smile, but it soon goes away at his next word.

“However...”

Seungmin leaves you hanging after that one word: however. His mouth opens and closes, most likely trying to come up with the right words to say. You wobble your feet back and forth, becoming more and more impatient.

But then, he says something. A simple, ten word sentence. Not a compound nor a complex sentence. Easy for a little kid to understand.

“I hope we can be good friends in the future.”

And yet it cracks your heart.

In a blink of an eye, Seungmin has disappeared from your view. An unexpected wind blows through your body, almost feeling like a comforting pat on the back after being rejected; friend-zoned.

You make your way to the front of the school, dragging your feet in a lazy manner. Jeongin’s head perks up when he nears footsteps, only to gaze down at your slumped figure. Letting out a deep exhale, you give Jeongin a glare that could cut him in half; one of disappointment and exhaustion.

“You owe me ice cream.”

The ice cream place is about two blocks away from your apartment complex, decorated in obnoxious pastel colors that make your eyes squint. Jeongin is relatively quiet throughout your walk there, only offering to carry your backpack if it’s too heavy for you, to which you declined quietly. You can feel the burn of his eyes on top of your head, anticipating for you to let out a scream in anger, but you’re simply not that kind of person.

You remain deep in thought even when you sit down, grabbing a menu to cover your face. Jeongin’s eyes remain on your figure, and you wonder if he’s actually, genuinely, worried for you.

“Er, what do you want to order?” Jeongin asks you in an attempt to break the tension. “I’ll pay, since you seem a bit heartbroken right now-”

“Hi, welcome 901 Freeze Treats Parlor-” you look up from the menu at the sound of a familiar, cheery voice.

You forgot Chuu works here.

And you forgot to tell Jeongin that information.

“Oh, Y/N! And Jeongin, hi guys,” Chuu flashes a grin at the both of you, and you can’t help but smile and almost giggle at how Jeongin grows beetroot red. She’s sporting a pair of pigtails in her hair, and the striped uniform topped with a cute hat on top. “What can I get you guys?” “I’ll- I’ll get the banana split Chuu!” Jeongin exclaims a bit too loud, attracting the rest of the customers at the parlor. Chuu, although a bit confused, seems to enjoy Jeongin’s enthusiasm for ice cream and writes down the order.

You set down the menu and point to what you want with a hum, to which Chuu bends forward slightly in order to see what you want. “You always order that, Y/N! Don’t you want to try something else?”

“I’m good, Chuu, thanks,” you give her a gentle smile, praying that she won’t comment about how tired and defeated you look. Fortunately for you, she leaves you alone, and you’re left back with just Jeongin.

“How have my letters been doing?” Jeongin blurts out before he could stop himself, covering his mouth with one of his hands soon after. “I- I mean, I shouldn’t.. really ask when you’re sad.. but I mean I might as well ask you since we just talked to her, right? Sorry-”

“They’re doing good, she likes them a lot,” you reply softly to the frantic boy, and he lets out a sigh of relief at your answer. You’ve spent the past few weeks helping Jeongin write love letters to Chuu, even decorating them with cute stickers. For once, your writing skills can come into play, and you haven’t let Jeongin down yet. “And it’s okay, my head is just in the clouds. At least he let me down gently.”

“What exactly did he say?” Jeongin eggs you on, wanting you to elaborate further.

“Something along the lines of us being good friends in the future,” you explain to him. “He even said that he used to like me, but I don’t know-”

“Then you still have a chance, right?” Jeongin doesn’t wait for you to finish your sentence before jumping in. “He left the door wide open for you to walk into, or- something like that at least. And, now thinking about it, I actually do think he used to like you.”

You roll your eyes, “You’re only saying that to make me feel better about this.”

“No, really! He mentioned that he liked somebody quiet and mysterious, and that he was gravitated towards that person. He told me that he would approach that person someday. It must’ve been you! I’ve known Seungmin for years, and this is one of two times he’s told me about his crushes,” Jeongin carries on with his own explanation. “So, in conclusion, I still believe it’s possible to win over his heart.”

Your lips press into a thin line, “You sure? Like, you’re absolutely positive about this?”

Jeongin nods, and for the first time since you’ve met him, he sends you a genuinely positive smile. It’s not like the annoyed snarks or the cheeky smirks he gives you all the time, but rather, something you could find comfort in. Just like Seungmin’s smile.

“Okay then, I’ll trust you.”

Episode 6: Swimming Lessons

“Did you guys hear that the school’s swimming pool is opening next week?” A masculine voice you know all too well, yet you wish you didn’t at the same time, is heard from behind your back. Seungmin locks eyes with you as he tosses an arm around Jeongin’s shoulder while you continue walking down the hallway.

It’s all too weird in your opinion that Seungmin is actually even friendlier after rejecting you. Because, shouldn’t the two of you be distant for at least a week or two? You guess that’s just not how Seungmin operates, then, as he dove right back into talking with you after that dreadful day on the school rooftop.

“Yeah, Seung!” Jeongin answers with a joyful tone, giving you the chance to break your eye contact with Seungmin. You, on the other hand, were not a swimmer whatsoever.

Being submerged into a body of water to the point where your toes can’t reach the ground has never been ideal for you. Any kind of physical action required to even survive in the water is off putting in your option, so you’ve always stuck to dipping your feet into the water and nothing else.

But you guess that changes starting today.

“You know Seungmin,” Jeongin starts to say, “Y/N is actually a pretty good swimmer! I think they could even beat you in a swimming race.”

Your head jumps up in surprise, eyes widening when Jeongin turns to you. He mumbles the words “trust me” before going back to Seungmin. How many times will you have to trust Jeongin and his crazy schemes?

“Oh, really?”

Jeongin hums in confirmation, ignoring the side nudges coming from you.

“Then we should race once the pool opens, Y/N!” Seungmin suggests with visible excitement beaming from his face.

Your gut immediately tells you to deny, but then you have to consider Jeongin’s “trust me.” He seems fairly confident that everything would work out, so is the risk worth the possible reward?

“Oh- Uhm... Sure! Sure, let’s.. let’s race, yeah,” you manage to let out before you could change your mind. “Just give me time to prepare, I, uh, haven’t swam in a while.”

“Of course!” Seungmin grins. “Let’s do it in two weeks, okay?

All you could respond with is a nod, which Seungmin takes without anymore questions. He bids the both of you well, and makes a left to the student council room.

You feel like a puddle of mush, waiting to collapse onto the tile floor of the school hallway. “I. Hate. You,” you scowl harshly at Jeongin.

“What?” Jeongin is caught off guard at your sudden hostility. “You never mentioned that you were afraid of the pool, and I don’t think it’s that bad of an idea. This is your chance to impress Seungmin!”

You scratch your head in confusion and denial. “Isn’t this a bit much, though? And who’s going to teach me how to swim?”

“You could always get me back with any ridiculous idea on how to get Chuu to like me,” Jeongin suggests to you. “And I’ll teach you, I’m a decent swimmer.”

“Sure, sure. Thanks for the idea, by the way,” you comment with a smirk, watching as Jeongin’s expression turns into one of regret.

“Now, teach me how to swim.”

An entire two weeks pass, and with those two weeks, comes the opening of the school pool. Although the vast majority of your classmates are genuinely excited to get a chance to cool down in the recent, scorching weather, you’re visibly less enthusiastic about it. You still try to keep a smile on your face with Seungmin is around though, so he doesn’t see through the lie Jeongin spontaneously made up.

“Y/N!” Chuu approaches you after exiting the changing room near the pool; you’ve already changed prior to her. “Your race with Seungmin is today, right? I see you’re all decked out in floaties.”

“Yeah, I’m just, uh- using them for safety purposes.” you give her a short and sweet response due to the churning in your stomach after being reminded of the event happening today. It’s a shame that your entire class knows what’s going down in just a few minutes, because they’re all anticipating your match with Seungmin. “The Delinquent vs The Student Pet” is what they’ve dubbed the match.

Also, Seungmin was generous enough to add onto the rules that floats were allowed to be used. So now you have floats all around your figure: some attached onto you, some you have to hold.

“Hey Y/N-” Jeongin stops walking towards you after noticing Chuu, her hair in a braid and only wearing a casual swimsuit. “Oh- Hi Chuu!”

Chuu acknowledges Jeongin’s presence, but quickly turns back to you. “I hope you win the race, Y/N. I have faith that you could do it!”

“Y-Yeah Y/N! We didn’t train all for nothing,” Jeongin adds onto Chuu’s comment. Thankfully, although Chuu doesn’t even know that you couldn’t swim prior to now, she doesn’t question Jeongin’s extra addition of training. “Let’s head over to the start of the pool? Seungmin’s already there, I’m just here to fetch Y/N.”

“Okay! I’m referee as well, so I have to be there too,” Chuu claims, and the three

Seungmin turns around from a group of boys to greet you, “Hey, Y/N! Ready for our match?

“H-Hey Seungmin,” you greet him with a friendly, yet shy tone, along with a nod.

“Okay!” Chuu gathers everybody’s attention with just the sound of her voice. “We’re here today to watch the race of Y/N vs Seungmin. On the count of three, I’ll blow my whistle and they’ll start swimming. You must go to the end of the pool, and right back to where we are right now. Ready?”

“3...”

“Also, just to calm your nerves a bit,” Seungmin whispers to just you right before the race begins.

“2...”

“I already know that you didn’t know how to swim before this. It’s okay if you fail, I’ll make sure nobody makes fun of you. Just stay safe, okay?”

“1...”

Your breath hitches for a split second, but before you can fully process what Seungmin just confessed to you, the whistle blows.

Seungmin dives into the water head first, while you jump in measly with your feet touching the water before the rest of your body. By the time you’re able to start kicking your legs, Seungmin is already ahead of you, so you push against the wall using your feet and start doggy paddling. It’s quite pathetic, and you’re sure that’s what everybody is thinking as they watch you swim, but it doesn’t matter at this point.

Or does it?

Because while you’re swimming across the pool, your brain just had to remind yourself about what Seungmin said seconds before the race started. He already knew you couldn’t swim, so it’s not really about impressing him anymore.

Then again, it’s not necessarily about winning, but about showing Seungmin that you’re dedicated enough to try new things to have fun with him.

That’s why it matters now.

However, it feels like you’re sinking.

Throughout the race, you’ve lost float after float, and now you only have the two floats that wrap around your arms. The water is slowly starting to touch your lips, and falling into a standing position, making your situation even worse. Your heart pounds faster and faster in a panicked frenzy, struggling to comprehend what to do.

Thankfully, cupid comes to rescue you.

He jumps into the pool like a lifeguard, placing his hands near your armpits before pulling you out of the water with a surprising amount of strength. Despite the midst of chaos you were put in, you’re able to hear cheers and applauds, signaling that Seungmin must’ve finished the race. Once again, you’re left to vanish, with the only other misunderstood student to help you.

You feel the surface of the concrete outside of the pool on your bottom as you cough out water. Yet, Jeongin is nowhere in your sight.

That’s when you realized. He’s submerged under the water.

You assume that he must’ve lost energy while saving you, resulting in the two of you swapping places. Eyes widening at the sight, you sprint across the flooring of the pool site, screaming your lungs out for somebody to help.

“Shit!” you curse yourself when you finally get the an adult’s attention after being unable to get a classmate to help you. All of your classmates ended up next to Seungmin, aka, the opposite end of where you stopped swimming. It’s only when the teacher pulls Jeongin’s unconscious body out of the water for it to lay down that it grabs everybody’s attention, swarming to see what was happening.

That’s when you snap.

“I’m disappointed in all of you right now!” you scold all of your classmates, something you’d never think you’d get the courage to do until now. “All of you were focused on that stupid race, but you never bothered to check on Jeongin. He could’ve died because of your ignorance! I hope you all know that.”

After leaving your classmates’ mouths agape, you storm out of the crowd, and make your way to the changing room. Nobody, not even Chuu or Seungmin, bothers to approach you.

Later that day, after some of your classmates apologized for not noticing what was happening, you, and a now in-stable-condition Jeongin, walk home after an exhausting day. Not many words are said, just like your regular walks after each school day, until Jeongin turns to you.

“Uhm, I just wanna say..” Jeongin starts to speak,. “Thanks for defending me earlier after I drowned.”

You blink in surprise, “Wait, you heard all of that?”

“Yeah, I was already conscious for a few seconds before you started going off on them. But thank you, seriously. I appreciate it after being misunderstood by our classmates for all these years,” Jeongin sighs, and then gives you another one of his kind smiles.

“Of course...” your mouth forms a thin line after you mumble out those two words.

Why is your heart fluttering like Jeongin’s pair of cupid wings?

Episode 7: All For Your Happiness

“Hey Chuu, listen to this!” you hold your phone right next to Chuu’s ear, which was playing the sounds you’d find at a haunted mansion. She yelps once she realizes what she’s listening to, and pushes your phone away with her palm, making everybody laugh.

Never in a million years would you find yourself sitting on a train with Chuu, Jeongin, and Seungmin all at once. The four of you were on your way to Chuu’s beach house, a place you’ve been to before during every summer break prior to this one, but it was always just the two of you. Now, however, you have your very own crush tagging along, plus his own best friend (and you don’t exactly know what you should call him anymore... Friend? Good Friend? Partner in Crime? Cupid Partner?).

And you and Jeongin have a plan. One time, for once, you came up with, and you believe that it’s less traumatizing than nearly drowning in a pool.

It just so turns out that Jeongin is a horror movie enthusiast, so he slipped multiple DVD sets of horror movie classics into his suitcase to do a watching marathon at the beach house. It also turns out that Chuu is terrified of anything that could scare her, like jump scares. So, the plan is for Jeongin to become Chuu’s knight in shining armor for whenever she gets scared during this trip.

“Why are you making me listen to all of these things?” Chuu whines with a pout. To be fair, you’ve been making her listen to these chilling noises for the entire train ride, to the point where you’re almost at your stop.

“It’s kind of funny to watch your reactions, that’s all,” you semi lie, because while it is a bit hilarious to see Chuu’s dramatic reactions, you’re waiting for the moment for Jeongin to strike.

And it’s at that moment when Jeongin finally speaks up, “Er- Chuu! If you ever get scared during this trip, come to me and I’ll-”

You mouth the word “protect” to Jeongin once he stops speaking.

“Uh- protect you!” Jeongin finishes after looking at you.

“Oh okay!” Chuu gives Jeongin a heartfelt grin. “I’ll make sure to go to you then, thanks!”

Jeongin nods eagerly, something Seungmin chuckles at, and you lean back in your seat at ease. If you’re able to successfully help Jeongin be Chuu’s knight during this trip, you’re certain that Chuu will at least take some interest at Jeongin.

The train reaches your destination swiftly after Jeongin’s interaction with Chuu, and after a quick bus ride and a trek to the beach, you’ve finally reached Chuu’s family beach house.

“Wow, this is awesome Chuu!” Seungmin shouts gleefully as he looks at the house. The house is relatively small and gives off a modern feel, but it’s fortunately enough to fit four people in.

Chuu smiles at the compliment, “Thank you! My family is fortunate enough to own a place like this for the summer. But since my parents are always overseas when summer rolls around, this place turns into a paradise for Y/N and I!”

“Anyways,” Chuu continues. “We should probably clean up the house since it hasn’t been used since last year, but I say we go play on the beach first!”

While Seungmin and Jeongin nod their heads eagerly, a lightbulb is turned on in your head.

“Actually,” you speak up. “I’ll go on ahead and clean up the house first. It’s probably messy inside, and you guys know how much of a ‘neat freak’ I am.”

Jeongin seems to catch onto your idea, his eyebrows rising, “Oh, then I’ll clean up with Y/N too!”

“But you seem really excited for the beach Jeongin,” Seungmin questions, but Jeongin waves it off.

“It’s okay! You two can go play first,” Jeongin insists, and the other two don’t ask anymore questions, heading towards the ocean. “You really are a smart person, aren’t you Y/N?”

There it is; that fluttering in your heart again, but why now? “Well, you’re smart for catching on. Let’s go place scary traps all over the house?”

“Heck yeah.”

After some time cleaning up the house (and making what would be Seungmin and Jeongin’s room especially clean) and placing various objects around the rooms to create a horror effect, the two of you had finally joined the others at the beach. It was then that the “Scare Chuu Montage” officially began.

During your time at the beach, you attempted to kick some seaweed at Chuu’s legs to make her jump, but the ocean water never agreed to your intentions and spared her. That night, Chuu walked into the dark bathroom only to meet eyes with a reflection in the mirror. But when Jeongin came rushing over, Chuu had already turned on the light and saw the makeshift face you created on the mirror using face cream and cotton balls.

The second day, Chuu woke up to the sound of being a woman screaming her head off, making her jump out of her bed in alert. It was simply a sound you found on the internet, but at least it woke up her up. The day was spent shopping at the nearby mall, so you couldn’t do very much to scare Chuu other than to hide at various nooks and crannies. You also ordered for Jeongin to stay by Chuu’s side at all times, but he didn’t do very much other than attempt to hold her hand (which was a very poor attempt, so of course, he failed). At least you and Seungmin talked individually while getting some ice cream, and to your utter surprise, it wasn’t that awkward.

The third day, you finally got Seungmin on board with your plans. Although a bit skeptical at first, you insisted that it would be a fun and harmless prank, and counteracted him by saying he laughed when Chuu got scared during the train ride. With Seungmin teaming up with you and Jeongin (without knowing your real intentions with the pranks), the horror movie marathon started despite Chuu’s pleads (to ensure that Chuu didn’t find any other movie disks around the place, you hid them all on the first day in a location she’d never look).

With Jeongin and Chuu on the couch and you and Seungmin on the floor, you don’t think it’s possible for the two to still be away from each other after this marathon ends. The first movie starts off generally slow pacing, but it’s enough for Chuu to mutter out pleas of worry for the characters. Jeongin quietly laughs at her antics, telling her once more that he’s there if she needs to be comforted, and you give Jeongin a mental high five.

By the end of the night, the two were cuddling, Chuu’s face looking especially scarred, while you and Seungmin finished the massive bowl of popcorn. When the lights finally came on, Chuu and Jeongin finally realized the position they were both in, and quickly scurried away from each other to your amusement.

The fourth morning came shortly afterwards, and with that morning came the end of your trip at the beach house. Although it was spent mostly with your attempts at scaring your very own best friend, you still had fun yourself, and even spent some time with your crush.

And it seemed like your efforts finally paid off, because Chuu wanted to talk with Jeongin privately.

After Jeongin shoots a glance at you while walking off to a private room of the house with Chuu, you quickly shuffle your feet over when Chuu’s not looking, placing your back against the wall. You hear footsteps inside the room before they suddenly stop, and then hushed whispers are all you could hear.

But then, Jeongin’s voice increases in volume.

“You.. You knew that we were pranking you?”

Your next breath gets caught up in your throat once you realize what exactly that meant.

You failed?

Chuu hums, “I did, but I didn’t bother to tell you because it looked like you and Y/N were having so much fun. Actually, I was only guessing that you were pranking me this entire time, until Seungmin came and confirmed it with me.”

“Seungmin?!”

“Yeah, Seungmin! I guess he played you guys,” Chuu laughs. “At least you had fun on this trip! I actually did, too, because I love scary stuff. I’m not afraid of it at all.”

“Oh...”

“Hey, cheer up! You made me happy, and you’re happy too, isn’t that what matters?” Chuu reassures Jeongin. “Anyways, we should continue packing. I just wanted to get that off of my chest.”

You hear more footsteps, and then something that sounds like a cushioned thud.

“Thank you, Jeongin.”

You must’ve heard Jeongin squeak, because he has to clear his throat before answering. “S-Sure, Chuu. Yeah, of course!” Jeongin says the last few words more confidently as Chuu giggles.

That’s when you rushed into the nearest bathroom moments after the door swings open. The shuffling of footsteps is heard again, until they stop once more, and then somebody knocks on the door.

“I know you’re there, Y/N,” Jeongin claims, and that’s your signal to open the door.

“Yeah, but that’s not what matters here!” Jeongin’s eyes are wide open as he lets out wheeze after wheeze. “I- No- We made her happy, Y/N! She really enjoyed these past couple of days! And, and! She gave me a hug, Y/N!! I don’t think I’ll ever get over this, seriously. I’m falling for her more and more.”

It’s the first time that you’ve seen Jeongin as giddy as this, in the several months you’ve known him. Is this what love does to people? Is it supposed to make their heart burst like what you’re seeing right now?

Because, if so, why don’t you feel like that for Seungmin anymore?

Note to self: Jeongin, out of all people, loves hugs.

Episode 8: And He’s Gone

Seungmin has been acting.. rather odd lately.

To be fair, the school festival had just ended, plus the student council election was about to occur, so you’d reckon he must be exhausted as vice president of the council. Perhaps he must be busy thinking of ways to campaign (not that he needs to, everybody agrees that he’s the best person to become the next president) or maybe he’s just getting a good rest.

But that’s not what Jeongin claims.

[Jeongin: he doesn’t want to run for president]

[You: really?!]

[Jeongin: yeah, but he won’t even tell me the reason]

[You: ahhh what do we do now T-T]

[You: on one hand we should respect his decision]

[You: but on the other, the school will crumble without him]

[Jeongin: idk y/n]

[Jeongin: i could try to explain to him why he should run or at least try to get his reasoning]

[You: yeah you should do that]

[Jeongin: cya]

You drop your phone down onto your chest, sighing heavily. Rolling over on your bed to face the window, you ponder as to why Seungmin would make such an impulsive decision like that. He was always so passionate about being a member of the student council, so why is he backing away from it now?

“Bad news: I wasn’t able to get any info from Seungmin,” Jeongin confesses as the two of you walk to school for another day. “Good news: I have a plan in case Seungmin truly doesn’t want to run for president!”

“It seems like all of your plans are either dumb, crazy, or both,” you retort back at him. “But shoot.”

“One of us runs for president!”

“Don’t shoot, nevermind.”

“No no no, you have to listen to me for this,” Jeongin attempts to persuade you. “Because after you hear my explanation, you’ll probably think it’s a good idea.”

You stay silent.

Jeongin continues though, “So, if one of us runs for president, and campaigns really bad, we’re talking ‘I’m going to give everybody six ounces of homework when I become president’ bad, then Seungmin would want to jump in to save the school!”

“Why don’t we make somebody else do it? Like- Chuu for example!” you insist, but Jeongin’s not having any of it.

“Chuu’s too popular, she might actually win. So it has to be one of us.”

“Then you do it because it’s your idea.”

“Nope.”

You sigh in defeat, “Rock paper scissors?” Jeongin nods, and gets his hands out. You’re quite confident that you’ll win, as you’re somehow incredibly good at rock papers scissors. Jeongin seems like the type of person to throw out scissors as a first move, and since this isn’t a best out of three game, you have to take your shot.

“Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!”

Your rock is meant with his paper as Jeongin chuckles, covering your fist with his hand.

“Looks like you’re running for president!” Jeongin beams at you.

It’s now a week after your rock paper scissor match with Jeongin, the reason you’re even here in the first place. Next to you is a set of speakers, and in your hand is a megaphone. Taking a deep breath, and taking the time to glance at the boy behind you, you put the megaphone next to your mouth.

“Listen up you morons!” you shout at the confused crowd of students beneath your feet, trying to ignore the burning of your face. “I, Y/L/N Y/N, am running for president! So unless any of you cowards decide to run as well, I’ll be your new president! Get used to it!”

“Y/N’s running?”

“Out of all people?”

“Gosh, why isn’t Seungmin here when we need him?”

You continue on with your speech, going on and on about how you’re basically going to rip this school into shreds. You start to worry that you’ll be doing this until the school bell rings for first period, starting to question how much courage you have left to not collapse out of embarrassment, until he finally shows up.

“Excuse me! Sorry, I need to get through!”

“Why are you doing this, Y/N? And why are you helping them Jeongin?! This isn’t like you guys,” Seungmin demands with a worried expression on his face.

You and Jeongin look at each other, before you decide to answer. “We’re doing this because you weren’t running for president for some dumb reason. This school needs you, Seungmin!”

Seungmin’s mouth forms on “o” shape as he realizes your intentions, his eyes sparkling in the sunlight.

He chuckles, “You really are something, aren’t you Y/N?” Seungmin’s expression softens when he meets your eyes, showing gratitude. He gently takes the megaphone from your hands, and clears his throat.

“My name is Kim Seungmin, and I will be your next student council president!”

An uproar of cheers follow his announcement, and you let out a laugh of relief. Now you could bail out of the election, leaving Seungmin as the only person the school could vote for as president. It’s a win win situation.

Until the election ceremony rolls around.

All of the students are packed into the gymnasium, each class standing in rows. On the stage you could see the current student council members, along with Seungmin, and your heart races for him.

He’s called up to the front of the stage after being announced as the school’s new president, and a thunder of applause booms through the gym. Seungmin stands in front of the microphone.

“I’m Kim Seungmin, I’m your new president, and... and-”

“I am in love with our former president, Park Jihyo!”

He’s in love... with Jihyo?

Jeongin immediately turns to look at you, his mouth agape just like yours. The rest of the audience starts murmuring to each other in disbelief. Seungmin, out of all people, pulling a stunt like this?

Oddly enough though, you don’t feel the same heartburn that you felt the first time you were rejected. It’s almost as if... you’re okay with this.

“You’re the reason why I’m standing here today; because you gave me a purpose at this school! And I know that you’re leaving to study abroad right after I take your role of president, so that’s why I’m shooting my shot today!” Seungmin explains loudly to the microphone, right in front of Jihyo, who’s standing there with an unamused look on her face. “Do I have any chance to be with you? Any chance whatsoever?!”

By the end of his speech, Seungmin is out of breath from shouting so much, and Jihyo seems to be stunned. She quickly shakes her head to clear out her mind, though, and takes the nearest microphone into her hands.

“And here, ladies and gentlemen, is your new student body president,” Jihyo calmly announces to everybody, not even acknowledging Seungmin’s confession at first.

“I taught him how to be a good leader, and that’s how he ended up on this stage today. I have absolutely no doubt that Seungmin will do an incredible job as body president. I care for him quite deeply, and I hope you will help him succeed at his duties of being president.”

“Please look after my good friend, Kim Seungmin, while I’m gone. Thank you.”

Rejection: unrequited love, but confirmed. To some, it may feel like a glass filled to the brim with water suddenly shattering onto the floor. To others, it’s a gentle, yet brutal, falling of a feather, easing its way to the ground.

While Jeongin thinks that two hearts were broken in that gymnasium, only one truly was.

And it wasn’t yours.

“So you’re saying you’re over Seungmin at this point?” Jeongin’s voice goes higher in pitch when he asks you. “Did I shoot my cupid’s arrow at the wrong person or something?”

You walk in silence for a few moments, letting the both of you ponder for a bit. How do you answer that question without obviously revealing who you truly like?

“Yah,” you ultimately avoid the question. “You never paid me back for that peach drink I bought for you.

Episode 9: Shot an Arrow at Each Other

[Chuu: i think i like him]

[You: who?]

[Chuu: jeongin]

You suck in an unexpected breath, and it’s almost as if your heart stops. Valentines Day is tomorrow, so it’s no wonder that Chuu’s coming to you for love advice. When you don’t reply, Chuu keeps sending texts.

[Chuu: i think i might confess to him on valentines]

[Chuu: and i have suspicion that he’s the one who’s been sending me love letters, but im not too sure]

You gulp, turning over onto your side and tucking yourself further into the sheets of your bed.

[You: then go for it!]

[Chuu: i would but]

[Chuu: i feel like somebody else would be happier with him]

[You: care to elaborate?]

[Chuu: i know there’s somebody else out there who could treat him better than me]

Does Chuu know? Are you that obvious?

[Chuu: y/n]

[Chuu: you have a special connection with jeongin]

[Chuu: you like him, don’t you? ^_^]

That damn emojicon. You could imagine that if this conversation were to happen in person, she would smile at your real big before dropping the bomb.

And you wouldn’t know how to respond. Because she’s right.

This wasn’t supposed to happen. Jeongin wasn’t supposed to be nice to you. Jeongin wasn’t supposed to save you from drowning. Jeongin wasn’t supposed to encourage you to confess to Seungmin when you still liked him, and he wasn’t supposed to buy you ice cream

But at the same time, you weren’t supposed to buy him a drink. You weren’t supposed to clean his apartment. You weren’t supposed to cook him meals willingly. You weren’t supposed to help him that much during summer break.

The two of you were supposed to just be each other’s cupid, but because you weren’t, you’ve fallen for him.

[You: but jeongin likes you]

No, you refuse. You refuse to let your emotions get in the way of Jeongin’s and Chuu’s happy ending. You refuse to let your emotions get in the way of what you and Jeongin have been striving for this entire school year. You’re better than that, stronger than that.

But why does it hurt so much?

The next day, Valentines Day, comes faster than you would’ve liked. Normally, this would be your favorite day of the year, because you liked seeing other people happy despite you being alone yourself. The outcasting you’ve put up with for the majority of your school life doesn’t bother you on this day surprisingly, as it’s always fun to see Chuu’s desk swamped with candies and anonymous letters.

It’s fun watching other people be happy.

This year, however, you’re left with a stain in your heart that you’re constantly reminded of throughout the day. Jeongin raves on about how he’s thinking about confessing to Chuu, yet you don’t have the heart or the energy to tell him that Chuu is thinking of the same thing. Then again, it’s better not to get in the way of love, right?

Chuu hasn’t spoken to you much ever since she read your final message to her last night. You don’t blame her, really, but she should do what’s best for her, not what’s best for you.

And Seungmin, to your utter shock, has been pretty chill this Valentines Day, not making a fuss over being rejected by Jihyo. Jihyo has already been abroad for several months at this point, so it’s given time for Seungmin to heal.

You make it through the day without too much distracting you, other than those thoughts buzzing in your head. The bell rings, signaling the end of the draining school day, but Chuu grabs onto your wrist and drags you into an empty classroom.

Your stomach starts churning once more when you see Jeongin and Seungmin in the room. Flinching when Chuu slams the door close a little too hard, you watch as she walks to the center of the room.

“Seungmin, you’re only here if I need backup, okay?” Chuu eases down Seungmin’s nerves, to which he responds with a nod.

“So,” Chuu takes a deep breath. “Don’t you have something to say to me, Y/N and Jeongin?”

You’re caught off guard by the sudden question. “What- What do you mean?”

Chuu only laughs, “You and Jeongin teamed up to make sure I fall in love with Jeongin this year, right?”

You and Jeongin freeze.

“And also, you tried to make Seungmin fall in love with Y/N, yes? But it didn’t work out, which brings us here,” Chuu crosses her arms over her chest. “You know, you almost did make me fall in love with Jeongin. Remember our conversation yesterday, Y/N? About how I was gonna confess to Jeongin?”

You don’t bother to move a muscle, but Jeongin, across the room from you, looks stunned.

“Well, I never bothered with that plan anymore. I realized that I only merely had a crush on Jeongin, and crushes never go that far. So with that being said-”

“Why are you... ruining everything now?” you take the chance to ask Chuu, but your question comes out in a more timid tone than you had anticipated.

“Ruining everything, you say?” Chuu scoffs. “That’s not what I’m doing here! I’m making sure everybody gets the ending they’re happy with.”

“But this isn’t how it was supposed to go!” you finally yell at the top of your lungs. “Jeongin liked you, and now you like Jeongin. The two of you already have a happy ending, why do you need to push this further?”

“Because you like Jeongin, that’s why!”

You shut your mouth before you could utter another word, panic spreading all over your body. Not even making the effort to look at Jeongin’s current expression, you raise your head up to look at Seungmin, who looks like he could offer you no help whatsoever.

It’s all falling apart.

“Y/N-” Jeongin attempts to speak, but you cut him off without realizing.

“I.. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

“You’re running away, Y/N,” Chuu states, which makes you grit your teeth.

“Wait, Y/N, just listen to me-”

“Please, not now-”

“Y/N!”

Once Jeongin shouts your name, Chuu accidentally releases her grip on your wrist, and you flee the classroom, sprinting as fast as you could in your school shoes. Chuu stares at Jeongin once you swiftly exit the classroom, to which Jeongin responds by running after you, Chuu following behind right after after thanking Seungmin for being there.

“You can’t force love! You can’t make two people fall in love with each other!” Chuu tries to tell you while running through the hallways. “Love happens naturally. I might love Jeongin, but Jeongin only had a crush on me, that’s not the same!”

“So I’m willing to put aside my feelings to help two people who truly, genuinely, love each other without any doubt in their hearts! Can’t you see? Jeongin loves you, not me. And you love Jeongin, not anybody else.”

And then Jeongin snaps.

“SHE’S RIGHT!” Jeongin booms. “Y/L/N Y/N, you’re the one I love! I love y-”

But you’re already gone from their sight. The school entrance has no people around, not even a silhouette of you running in the distance. The two catching their breaths at the entrance of your high school, their shoulders slump over in defeat.

Of course, it doesn’t end there.

Hours after the incident, hours after crying over the mixed emotions you experienced this Valentines Day, your doorbell is rung. You hesitate on whether you should even answer the door in the first place, sifting through the possible scenarios in your head. Your feet answers first, though, making your way to the door before your brain could even stop your motions.

It’s a letter, and you know that handwriting.

“come upstairs!”

And despite how reluctant you are, you still head to his apartment.

Jeongin greets you at the door, still wearing his school uniform just like you. In his hand is a rubber spatula, which is somewhat odd because you’ve never seen him hold kitchen utensils unless you were teaching him how to cook.

But there’s the aroma of food coming from the kitchen, one of various vegetables, and even the smell of meat. When you turn the corner, you infer that Jeongin was attempting to cook one of your one pot pasta meals, and it seemed to be almost done.

“Honestly,” Jeongin quickly goes back to tending to his cooking. “I wasn’t even sure if you were going to come, and that would be bad because this is two servings of pasta. But I knew you wouldn’t left me hanging.”

You hum, taking a seat at the dining table that was sparkling clean (something Jeongin kept up with even after you cleaned his apartment). Jeongin brings over two plates of pasta, steam still coming off of them.

“Try it! It’s your recipe, so unless I messed up something, it should be good,” Jeongin dives in with a fork, slurping up the noodles eagerly as you do the same.

“It’s good, really good, actually,” you compliment him. “But why did you invite me over here?”

“Well,” Jeongin says with food still in his mouth, but he swallows shortly after. “This is a date.”

You almost choke on your food at the word “date” coming out of his mouth. “But what about Chuu-”

“Didn’t you hear Chuu while we were running earlier? She’s content at the fact that we’re about to become a couple. She told me that she rarely ever saw you as bright and as happy before you met me, that’s a good sign, right?” Jeongin smiles at you, and it’s that smile again.

“A good sign that...?”

“You love me too.”

You pause your movements for a full three second, before you laugh tiredly. The realization hits you while you twirl your pasta with your fork. “This is weird.”

“What is?”

“That we tried to be each other’s cupid, but ended up falling for each other instead.”

Your analogy makes Jeongin burst into laughter, nodding his head excessively. “Yeah, you’re right.”

The two of you eat Jeongin’s food in a comfortable silence for a few moments, before Jeongin speaks up again.

“Does that mean that I shot an arrow at myself then?!” Jeongin gawks at you comedically, almost making you choke on his food.

“Perhaps,” you simply shrug, leaving your, what you assume you could finally call your boyfriend, up to speculate for himself.

The cupid game was finally over, after many, many months of pinning.

And it ended with a pair of cupids, in love with each other.

it’s promo time baby!

follow my networks @fluffyskzclub and @/angstyskzclub, our members provide you with sfw fluff & angst content for you to read!

i’m starting an official taglist for my fics! there’s one for oneshots like these, and one for my stray kids ot8 reactions & scenarios! (not gonna bother with one for my blurbs, don’t waste your time on a 2 minute read fic LOL) just let me know through my inbox as to which one(s) you’d like the join.

thank you so incredibly much for reading “a pair of cupids!” this story was physically and mentally draining. i wrote the first 3 sections last week, took a 3 day break because my family visited another state, and then wrote these last 6 sections in a span of... 5 days? it was NOT FUN my back is killing me oh my gosh have mercy on me if you think this was bad

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blouisparadise · 4 years

Photo

Here are some of the amazing bottom Louis fics that were posted or completed during the month of September. We hope you enjoy this list. Happy reading!

1) Hard Candy Dripping On Me (Til My Feet Are Wet) | Explicit | 1997 words

Louis gets fucked on a plane. That’s it.

2) Fucking Nightmares | Mature | 2151 words

Louis has a nightmare. Harry comforts him.

3) You Could Take A Lick (But It's Too Cold To Bite) | Explicit | 2469 words

“You look kinda thirsty.” Louis croons softly.

Harry leans back in his chair and tilts his head to the side. His eyes are covered by the pair of expensive shades, but Louis feels his eyes drifting down his backside as he lays on his stomach.

“Why don’t you bring me a bit of that ice cream, darling?”

Louis and Harry have fun in a summer day.

4) Interview With The Vampire | Explicit | 4135 words

Note: The fic pairing is Louis/Robert Pattinson.

Working at an alpha magazine wasn't always easy for an omega like Louis, but he's just landed his biggest interview yet with an A list actor who has asked for Louis especially. Unfortunately, the interview is with Rob Pattinson, the biggest pain in the arse alpha on the planet.

Inspired by Rob’s interview in GQ Magazine and not actually about vampires

5) Conozco La Vida | Teen & Up | 4761 words

Note: This fic contains no explicit smut, but since it’s omega Louis, we’ve included it.

"I have a son," he declared, there was a very thinly veiled layer of hesitation.

Harry was unaware in the direction which this conversation was heading but chose to stare at the man instead.

"He is an Omega," he dropped the pivotal piece of information.

Harry's attention was hooked now.

"He has been raised in an Omega convent all his life, he hasn't been in the presence of any Alpha who isn't his immediate family."

"I am still waiting for you to make a point."

"You could take him as an Omega."

Harry did not react, his face remaining perfectly free of betrayal of any sort of emotion and leaned back upon his chair, his leg crossed upon his knee. "You are selling your son to me?"

6) It’s Hard For Me To Go Home | Not Rated | 4890 words

Don’t call me baby again.

7) So Baby, Let's Keep It Secret | Explicit | 4638 words

“I’ll leave with you,” Harry said after a beat, sounding sure of himself.

“What!? No!, you can’t leave with me, Harry, you have a life here. You have a job and friends an-”

Harry kissed him in the middle of his rambling. “Which means nothing if I don’t have you.”

Into You Music Video AU.

8) ZOMOS | Mature | 5659 words

Is it easy to forget everything and start afresh? Is it easy being served with hateful glances and insults when all you wish for is to be loved? Is it easy to make it seem like everything is alright when in reality your world is crumbling into pieces with every breath you take?

Is it easy to be the omega who is unwanted by their alpha?

9) Your Biggest Fan | Explicit | 9075 words

Just like everyone else, Louis has a few habits that he can’t seem to break. Guilty pleasures, rather. His nails are perpetually short because he can’t quit biting them, the bottom of his shoes scuffed from tapping his foot constantly. Sometimes his leg gets a cramp from bouncing it so often underneath his desk. That isn't too bad, he reckons, just some average teenage coping mechanisms.And also, occasionally, minor instances of theft.

10) Making A Splash | Explicit | 9557 words

“You want this?” Harry muses, fisting his cock as he drags his hand lazily up his thick length. Louis eyes the motion and nods his head absentmindedly. “You want to show everyone at this beach how much of a slut you are for Daddy’s cock?”

“M‘your slut,” Louis immediately replies, inching closer, inching closer with his eyes glued on Harry’s glistening cock, precome shining under the sun as it dribbles out his slit.

Harry grins widely and stops the movement of his hand to grip himself at the base again, pushing Louis’ head down. “Show everyone how much of a slut you are.”

11) Hung Up High in the Gallery | Mature | 14006 words

When Harry’s best friend, Louis, comes to support him at his art show, he decides they need to do some celebrating afterwards. How fast do the lines between friends and lovers get blurred ... or better, get painted?

12) My Home Is Your Body | Explicit | 15341 words

Note: The fic pairing is Louis/Henry Cavill.

He had seen who had made his senses go haywire. His ex was in the front row, five feet in front of him. He felt his eyes on him even as he mechanically made his way to the end of the runway, hoping to God he didn’t look like a maniac. Everything was a blur. He somehow managed to walk the rest of the way without falling or emoting anything. Why was he HERE? Of all places.

...where Louis is a successful omega model and the last thing he expects is his ex to become the co-partner of the new company he works for....

13) There's Nothing Like It (Nothing At All) | Explicit | 15471 words

Note: This is a sequel to this fic.

His hands are outstretched on the mattress like he’s reaching out for something, reaching out for Harry. It makes his heart swell, almost bursting with affection and love. He only waits a bit longer before reaching over to turn off the light and pulling Louis to his chest, smiling when the omega immediately sighs in contentment, nuzzling into his skin happily.Tomorrow, he tells himself. Tomorrow, they’ll talk about it.-Or, Harry isn’t ready for things to change, and the end is just the beginning.

14) Seven Simple Words | Explicit | 15535 words

It’s not like he and Louis were a couple. No, they might have been a lot of things—best mates and colleagues with a seemingly convenient friends-with-benefits arrangement—but never a couple. It wasn’t Louis’ fault he didn’t feel the same way and couldn’t reciprocate Harry’s feelings in the way he’d wanted, the way he’d needed. Harry had allowed himself to get in too deep, his entire being aching to be loved back by the object of his affections. But in love, as in life, you don’t always get what you want.

15) Works Like A Charm | Explicit | 18061 words

Ever since Louis joined the team in fifth year, a few facts have become set in stone.

One: Louis is the best chaser in Hogwarts.

Two: Harry is the best beater in Hogwarts.

Three: They do not get along.

So it’s really unfair of Liam to think that forcing them to spend time together as Louis recovers from his injury will make them the best of friends. The last thing Louis would do is get along with that git.

16) The Way This River Runs | Explicit | 27417 words

It’d be so easy to just open his mouth and plead with Harry, to scream I’m sorry until his voice disappears, but he can’t. Be it his pride or his ego or his insecurities, he just can’t do it. The worst part is that he knows Harry would probably forgive him.

But Louis doesn’t want phony forgiveness. He doesn’t want Harry’s soothing words and pity embrace, thinks he might just break altogether if he was offered them. He feels like he’s made of glass recently and it’s to the point where he kind of wants to tip over the edge, just to see if he’d shatter. Just to see who’d be there to pick up the pieces if he did.

17) Give Me Love | Explicit | 41041 words

Louis doesn't feel like a good omega, Harry doesn't remember how to be an alpha, and they figure it out together.

18) Falling Out Of Fashion | Explicit | 42123 words

Harry Styles has been the established face of the Grimshaw House of Design for two years. It’s a prestigious and coveted modeling contract Harry took away from once-famed supermodel Zayn Malik. With the model transition Grimshaw’s designs went from a more urban, Zayn-forward aesthetic, to a Harry-favoring flowery, flowing femininity in the Grimshaw designs for men.

So when Harry sees a dress Grimshaw made for a famous Marvel actress, “only a tease”, Nick says, of the evolving look, Harry knows Grimshaw is shifting his aesthetic.

Harry wonders if he can pull off the look.

19) Three Days In February | Explicit | 189346 words

Louis is cursed after a night out with the lads and the five have just three days to figure out what happened and how to break it before Harry and Louis both lose their sanity and maybe something more. Louis can hear everything Harry thinks and Harry isn’t sure he can keep his feelings for Louis a secret from his own mind.

Ridiculous amounts of banter and angst, a lot of Harry and Louis alone together, a healthy dose of OT5 friendship, and one very magical weekend.

20) Boss Bitch | Explicit | 386901 words

Harry had always wanted to work for this successful mafia; the mafia that everyone knew, everyone feared. Led by none other than the pahntom

"L'eue Courante", whom everyone knew existed, but had no other clues who this person could be. The only thing known was a high heel the phantom once left.

So this person had to be woman, Harry assumend. And man, was he wrong.

Check out our other fic rec lists by category here and by title here.

You can find other monthly roundup fic rec lists here.

#bottom louis #top harry #blp fic recs #monthly fic recs #fic recs #blp #larry

218 notes · View notes

hetalia-has-a-secretary · 3 years

Note

allies + eje human au headcanons

I had to look up what eje meant, which was Axis in Spanish 🌮 (there's no sombrero emoji, and I'm mad about it). This is mostly a college Human AU, but there's still some future stuff in there. Enjoy the longest list of Headcannons in one post lol

Human AU Hetalia!

Allies:

America:

Has rich parents, but doesn't tell anyone, and somehow his big house that everyone parties at doesn't give it away.

The only person who knows is Japan, and that's specifically because Japan's dad works for America's dad.

Is a college student, hoping to go for some kind of music degree.

A first year.

Black T-shirt and jeans. Has a plaid button up for everyday of the month, usually has it tied around his hips.

Has like, one basic tux and refuses to wear anything but converse or airwalkers.

Space nerd #1, except he's more into what's beyond our boundaries, and loves the constellations.

One of the most popular kids, and no matter how hard you try he's not easy to hate.

Gives off dumb college kid energy even though he's one of the A+ students.

His glasses are for show. It was meant to be a rebellious thing since Canada use to get bullied about his own glasses, now it's just an esthetic.

Skate boards and plays the acoustic guitar in his free time.

Jeans are usually missing the knee section.

Once set off firecrackers in a metal trash can as a school prank.

England:

Last year of college, majoring in history after failing his cooking classes.

Graphic tee central. We are unsure how many he has but he's up to 43 different shirts worn on campus.

Usually has his earbuds in, listening to punk rock.

Has an ungodly amount of bracelets. His favorite one is a black snap bracelet with little pirate skulls.

Was practically raised by his older brothers.

Lives alone, but is secretly an amazing writer.

Has a Tumblr blog he writes spooky stuff on.

Top of his class, but can be a dummy if he's put on the spot.

France:

No one is sure how he's been allowed to take nothing but art classes. No English, or science, just art.

Is also a transfer student, he's probably the second richest thanks to daddy.

Is the school stud, despite not sleeping with a single soul, and is actually extremely nervous about dating, and is just more comfortable with playful flirting.

He wants to be a fashion designer, or Model. Mostly a Designer.

Loose shirts and tight pants.

Has a weird obsession with belt sashes.

Plays violin like a god, and is a senior.

China:

Another senior in college.

Had the unfortunate event of being in the same cooking class as England before Arthur decided to switch degrees.

Still hangs out with him and Japan.

One of the few who is taking advanced classes, and is literally everyone's tutor.

Going for a Degree in Cooking. Wants to be a head chef.

His parents are over seas, but he promised to get them to America as soon as he can.

He wears a lot of colorful shirts that is always tucked into his pants.

Most of which look like bowling shirts, but he likes to add little Chinese patches to them. Has a signature jean jacket that is overwhelmed with patches.

Has a panda beenie baby keychain, so everyone knows exactly who it belongs to when he losses his keys.

Very quick to panic, and hates to admit he's wrong.

Russia:

Third and final transfer student, along with Japan, and France.

Poor confused child is trying so hard.

He's kind of shy, and is fully aware his social akwardness creeps everyone out.

Almost cried the day America and Prussia adopted him into the cool kid circle.

His broken english is probably the biggest turn off for the people at school. It's why no one really talks to him, mostly because they can't figure out what he's saying most of the time.

Biggest sweetheart though, and is painfully smart, but do to the english thing he's stuck in the average classes, but China comes swooping in and his english gets almost fluent by his third year.

He doesn't own a single thing tech, minus a flip phone, but somehow knows all the hot keys on the computer to every program, and it's only because he's lazy about it and it's the funniest thing.

Space nerd #2 but knows more about the planets and can name every single moon, and knows the history of space discoveries by heart.

Secretly a hopeless romantic, and doesn't realize he reads England's blog.

Is pretty much a closet goth, but likes bright colors too much to be seen in all black.

Knows way to much about torture devices and learned very quickly that gets you out casted in a school setting.

Isn't upset that he doesn't have many friends, but somehow attracts all the little kids from the grade school.

He likes his northface sweater, and loose pants. But his shirts are pretty colorful, and he likes collecting shoelaces.

He spends a lot of time in the woodwork shop, creating amazing figures and such.

Canada:

I can feel the dissapointed stares of Matt not being a photographer. Welp, guess he also gets a degree in art then.

Second year, Because he skipped one year in college.

Clothing style is long sleeves and vests.

He likes feeling fancy, and owns an endless amount of beanies.

One of the few people who talks to Russia.

His locker has a snot ton of polar bear stickers that everyone stuck to it, and he loves it.

Is baby but can kick butt in the wrestling club after school.

Has a tiny white Pomeranian that he rescued from it's mother who wouldn't take care of it, probably because the puppy was the runt of the litter.

Has a Harley Davidson and it's been painted black with the aurora on it, making everyone think it was his non-existent girlfriend's or something. Now it's a running joke.

Axis:

Germany:

He's not a jock, but he's friends with them.

Military Dad.

Is usually found hanging out in the gymnasium on breaks. It's quiet and no one is going to bother him. Usually.

Senior, and so ready to get the heck out of college.

Ladies love him, but he really hates the attention, like please help him.

Style wise he's pretty basic, but really loves his camo print.

Has owned countless doggos, and only attracted so many girls the day he walked to school with a fluffy poodle that France Hijacked for the day.

Doesn't ever go to dances after the first one and everyone tried to get him drunk, to no avail.

Had out drank some of the dumber students to shut them up.

Can be mean if you persistently pester him for dumb stuff, especially if he's already said no.

He's into construction and is working on a degree in Construction Management.

Japan:

Exchange student number 3

Degree in technology is what he desires.

Style = Geek, but like a stylish geek.

Him and Canada are in photography class together.

Japan is also part of the cool kids, but only when they're about to do some dumb stunt, and need a camera man.

Doesn't mind, loves watching them make fools of themselves.

Has a rebellious streak, and tends to be a complete sass.

As soon as something seems to go bad, he gone. He's heading towards the door. Been in detention once, and that was it.

Why does everyone go to him for advice when china is literally down the hall?

Rich kid #3 and his parents are traditional and are having a crisis over their son's rebellious attitude.

Italy:

Is a first year, and is oddly enough, going for a degree in history.

Really likes antiques and old artsy stuff.

Has a few shared classes with France, and they pretty much own those classes.

Rivals America's charisma, but isn't as popular due to:

Being seen around France, and not doing dumb and entertaining crap like america.

Gets picked on a lot Because he doesn't understand you can't be nice to the Jock's girlfriend without everyone thinking your flirting, even though you just needed directions on your first day of school.

Germany is now his bodyguard and he was kind of like "???" But they get closer the longer they hangout.

Fancy shirt man, like hand me downs from his Italian father. So they're really nice, and a lot of eye melting patterns.

Gets attached to people easily, and is sensitive when he gets taken advantage of during assignments, but toughs through it because he has too.

Has two cats literally named Mona, and Lisa.

Has cried at least once at school because he's a soft guy, but he gets a thicker shell the older he gets and learns to just laugh off other people's stupidity.

Romano:

Protective older brother gooooo

Second year in school, and his first year made him want to eat brinks.

Doesn't know what degree he wants, but settled for a degree in cooking.

Shares his brother's shirts practically and it confuses everyone Because, didn't Feliciano wear that shirt last week?

Immediately thinks people don't know washing machines exist Because of this, so his sass factor is high up there.

Doesn't really have friends, and also does not care. He's a bit of a lone wolf and needed something to do.

The amount of not caring attitude contrasts his high grades and his teachers are painfully confused by it.

Will jokingly tell people to fight him at McDonald's, and almost fought someone but literally laughed, and suggested they got something to eat instead.

He's somehow, in a bizarre and unwanted sense, everyone's brother which is just...

No one understands him, but they like him, and he doesn't know why and it kind of bugs him.

He's usually in the front of the school daydreaming about, god only knows what...

Is the epitomy of the "she doesn't even go here" joke from mean girls, except he does go to that school.

Why did he need a degree? Oh yeah, Because work places don't care what kind of paper, you just need a paper.

Prussia:

Rival friendship with america, and Russia has had to step in to break up petty fights.

He's not sure why he's part of the popular kids since he's so fricken chaotic and obnoxious. Or so he thinks.

Genuinely a sweet guy in his last year, desperately wanting a degree in mathematics. Like, no one understands why mathematics until he starts pulling card tricks from his pocket that deals with it, and blows everyone's mind.

He is also head of the newspaper club.

Has the style of a teenage band member and will not apologize for it.

Has hijacked the schools speaker system to blast evanescence, which gave a huge boost to his friendship with Russia, since the big fellow shares Prussia's taste in music.

Can eat a whole ghost pepper without batting an eyelash, and this is only Headcannon and a worthy note because he became sick the day after and the whole school had "in loving memory of Gilbert's stomach" posters all over the place.

Teacher's are very much done with his harmless antics. They're noticably stupid pranks, but only to the point it's annoying.

Like he managed to make all the teacher's computer backgrounds as Brad Pitt wearing a sombrero. There's no joke, and no punchline. It's just a poorly Photoshopped sombrero?

Races his brother to school every morning, and afternoon. Cops have stopped them at least twice due to other bystanders getting freaked out.

Him and Romano don't mix well, but try to leave each other alone.

#hetalia american #hetalia england #hetalia france #hetalia china #hetalia russia #hetalia canada #hetalia germany #hetalia italy #hetalia japan #hetalia romano #hetalia prussia #hetalia #hws #hetalia world stars #aph #human au

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water-fan-art · 3 years

Text

Jasper / Lapis swap (AU)

Since I’m not planning on making a fic, I thought I’d post some of my ideas:

War (Lapis):

Lapis was caught up in the middle of the war (like canon) but instead of being dissipated she joined the fight.

During the war higher officers took note of the fact that she was much stronger than the average Lapis, and post war assigned her to non-terraforming jobs.

War (Jasper):

There had been a tracking device planted on the back of Jasper’s gem after she was dissipated in battle one day- they did this because she seemed to be the most promising of her unit and wanted to test out the technology (which they later abandoned after era 1 ended).

Jasper was dissipated by a fusion during the war & put in the mirror - her gem wasn’t cracked during the retreat, but Pearl still put the mirror in her gem.

Mirror (Jasper):

Jasper reforming unknowingly set off the tracking device, making her gem traceable - Yellow Diamond ordered Peridot to go check it out since she already had Earth based missions, and asked Blue Diamond if she could assign Lapis to her Peridot - since Earth is mostly water, Lapis seemed like a good escort.

Jasper tries to attack Steven after he releases her from the mirror, but she collapses onto the beach before the Crystal Gems see that.

The Crystal Gems try to capture her but she spins off into the ocean (her eyes are still reflective like mirrors).

She figured she could hide until her strength came back, but doesn’t stray far from the temple - thinks it would be a good tactical advantage to observe them.

Hand ship:

When the ship lands on the beach, Jasper thinks Homeworld has returned to rescue her so that she can serve The Authority again- so she runs onto the beach.

Lapis think’s Jasper being happy to return to Homeworld is an act, and dissipates her with a Gem Destabiliser before using it on Garnet.

Lapis removed the tracking device when Jasper was inside her Gem. Jasper wasn’t happy to find herself reforming in a prison cell

Reforming fixed Jasper’s eyes - they were no longer permanently reflective (they can still go reflective when she zones out though).

Jasper kept trying to convince Lapis that she wasn’t a Crystal Gem, but Lapis didn’t believe her- only a handful of Crystal Gem’s managed to survive the war, so clearly Jasper was one of them. She tried to tell Lapis that she didn’t know Steven was Rose Quartz until she saw the shield on the beach.

Lapis says something along the lines of “Do you really think you would be believed back on Homeworld? You somehow scared tracking for thousands of years, and you were found with your Crystal Gems. You’re going to be interrogated and then Blue Diamond will shatter you!”

Jasper is okay with being shattered at the hands of a Diamond if that’s what they viewed as just, but she refused to accept shattering for being a traitor when she wasn’t one- she hated the Crystal Gems more than she hated Earth.

Beach / fusion:

Lapis’s gem cracks on impact from the ship hitting the beach- but like in canon, she is still in control over her form and part of her powers.

They can’t return to Homeworld because of the busted ship. Lapis cant fly back because of her cracked gem, so she proposes fusion to Jasper, telling her it’s the opportunity to prove she’s not a traitor.

Jasper agrees to fuse without hesitation.

Lapis evaluated Jasper as the strongest Crystal Gem and think’s she acts as the leader, so she believes if she takes her out of the picture (by fusing with her and keeping her bound to her underwater for months) then Peridot would be able to eliminate the rest of the Crystal Gems.

She thinks she is keeping herself safe, and protecting Homeworld from the Crystal Gems by holding Jasper prisoner.

The whole time they’re fused, Jasper tries to convince Lapis that she’s not a Crystal Gem- while they can feel each other’s emotions, Lapis isn’t sure if Jasper is lying or not. She can’t take the risk.

Post fusion (Lapis):

Lapis is swept up into the water (because of the cluster-earthquakes) after unfusing. She stays there because it’s where she feels strongest with a cracked gem.

She rounds up the corrupted gems to fight for her bc the crack makes her vulnerable.

Steven heals her after she fuses with a corrupted gem, but it only heals the crack not the corruption.

Post fusion (Jasper):

Jasper is taken back to the barn - she’s angry when she reforms. Talk’s about how the Crystal Gems are traitors and that they should all be ashamed of themselves. She wants to run off but she still feels weak after fusion.

Jasper argues with Peridot over why she would ever become a traitor. Probably calls her defective (because of her height).

The baseball ep results in more broken bats / a ball explodes. (Jasper wears a bandanna over her face like a mask). The Rubies are asking for Lapis, since she was the leader of the Earth Mission - Jasper stay’s silent because one of the Rubies also asks Peridot where the traitorous Quartz they were tasked with retrieving was.

Jasper struggles to be around Garnet and flinches when she sees the others fuse- but she doesn’t say anything to let the others know.

Eventually Jasper tolerates Peridot because Peridot is more than happy to tell her all about what she missed over the years back on Homeworld. Jasper has a lot of questions, and doesn’t mind when Peridot gets off topic because she’s still leaning about Era 2.

While spending a little more time with the Crystal Gems, Jasper slowly learns to see the Earth from a different perspective, but still struggled with her inner conflicts- she still hates Earth and the Crystal Gems, and doesn’t want to betray her Diamond by falling victim to their propaganda.

One day while they were having an argument over everything, Jasper screams at Steven about him shattering Pink Diamond, before she runs away from the barn and makes her lil cave in the woods for a while (same as in SUF).

Jasper lets the others visit her once they find her - she acts like she hates it but she hates the silence. She accepts that Steven isn’t Rose, but he is Rose’s son so she still doesn’t want to see him. Peridot visits more often than the others.

Jasper naps a lot, and is a heavy sleeper (she doesn’t breathe when she sleeps, so no snoring). Sometimes her ‘naps’ last a few days.

She eventually returns to the barn (she stayed in her lil territory before the Rubies return and doesn’t come back to the barn until after Navy steals the ship again- she never knew the ship was there).

Jasper makes friends with Peridot- they mostly tolerate each other. Jasper doesn’t talk much, but she always listens to Peridot when she speaks.

Jasper is pretty calm until the others are around, but she doesn’t try to attack them- she’s mainly just tired. Sometimes makes snarky remarks about how they’re all traitors.

After the PD/ Rose reveal, she goes back to the barn to be alone. She doesn’t go to Garnet’s wedding, and sleeps instead.

She sleeps through the entire Diamond ordeal, (idk how they won without Lapis, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ it happens somehow)

Steven asks Bismuth to go to Jasper to tell her that they’re leaving - she replies with “who’s Jasper?” Greg shows her where the barn is.

Bismuth and Jasper become friends pretty quickly, and Jasper helps Bismuth rebuild the house & goes with Peridot and Bismuth to Homeworld (knowing PD was Rose, Jasper would rather fight alongside the Gems who Rose cared about than alongside the Authority)

Post CYM (Lapis):

Lapis returns to Homeworld to try to get over her fear of Blue Diamond, before deciding to live on a liberated Gem colony that she had never visited before, and try to put the past behind her.

She makes a few friends, and generally tries to stay away from conflict- she’s oh so sick of conflict.

Post CYM (Jasper):

Jasper helps Bismuth build Little Homeworld, and lives there. She doesn’t teach any classes, but she does take them (she still struggles to love Earth, but she no longer has to worry about being a traitor).

Jasper doesn’t label herself as a Crystal Gem, but she hangs out with Bismuth and Peridot a lot, and doesn’t get mad at comments like “we Crystal Gems” etc. that clump her together with them.

Jasper reconnects with the other Earth Quartzes, and makes friends with some Corrupted Quartzes too - she plays beach volleyball with them.

If I ever draw things from these ideas, I will edit this post with a link to the drawing like this.

#lapis / jasper swap #steven universe #steven universe au #jasper steven universe #lapis lazuli steven universe #long post

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aliceinreverselondon · 3 years

Text

You Really Got Me – part 2: First Impressions (Kakashi Hatake x Reader)

(note: part 1)

“Will you finally tell us what she is, Kakashi sensei?”

Sakura’s question came before they even reached the elevator which meant she lasted a good two minutes before demanding answers. Letting out a long sigh, Kakashi rubbed the back of his neck. He sure hoped she would soon grow out of this slightly annoying habit of hers. Especially since Naruto was the same, but there was no chance he would change in the near future.

But he really did promise them to explain what exactly happened so he couldn’t back out now. Surprisingly, Sakura had hit the nail right on the head with her question. If he wanted to explain who you were, he had to begin with what you were. When it came to how well you knew each other, though, he would have to be careful not to give away too many personal details. No one needs nosy kids in their life.

As he pushed the button to close the door of the elevator, Kakashi let out a thoughtful hum. “Well, Y/N is a phantom. Do you know about them?” While Sakura and Naruto both shook their heads, Sasuke remained silent as usual. But this time it could be because he had already heard about her kind, as one could expect from a kid who grew up in the Uchiha Clan. “They are considered a type of tricksters, although they’re a lot more powerful as adults than your average trickster. Because of their unique abilities and backgrounds, phantoms are members of an organization that operates worldwide. It’s a lot like ANBU, except they’re independent of governments and only answer to one person.”

“So she’s an Alpha?” Sasuke asked, sounding slightly surprised for some reason. When he received a quick nod in response, he folded his arms over his chest and leaned against the metal wall. “I thought they were more… serious.”

Kakashi shrugged and didn’t even try to hold back a short chuckle. “They’re not robots, they have different personalities. Y/N is… a wild one,” he added with a grin under the mask.

“Wait, what is an Alpha?” Naruto wondered out loud as his eyes scanned the faces of people around him, waiting to see who was ready to provide an answer.

“Are they the phantoms or the members of the organization?”

“Both, actually,” Kakashi replied as he glanced over at the girl. “Phantoms that aren’t good enough or simply refuse to be members of the organization are executed, this is why the two are the one and the same at the end of the day. Alpha is a nickname some gave them because you can say they are on top of the food chain. They usually work alone but every now and then they ask for the help of… specialists, humans or other supernatural creatures who have abilities or knowledge they need for the job. Those people, especially those who become regular aides, are called Betas,” he explained, this time looking at Naruto as he spoke.

The four of them left the building and Kakashi began to think about what else he should tell them about you. Your abilities? No, it would be better if you gave them a demonstration. How you met? Definitely not, his reaction to Sasuke’s question regarding your personality gave away more than enough already. To avoid further questions from the kids, he eventually decided to pull out his book and read on the rest of the trip to the restaurant.

For his luck Sakura and Naruto discussed this between themselves, occasionally trying to get some information out of Sasuke now that he wasn’t paying much attention to them. As long as they left him alone, Kakashi was okay with that. Especially because he wanted to think about the upcoming dinner with you. He wished it was just the two of you, though. After what he had done, he really wanted to make it up to you somehow. Well, maybe you could meet later to make this happen, once these three went to sleep.

Oh, how he loved and hated at the same time what you did to him. You were like a drug he just couldn’t get out of his system. But, to be honest, he had truly missed this high he was experiencing now thanks to you. He may have forgotten to call you but it didn’t mean he hadn’t thought about you once. In fact, every time he read one of the Make Out books, he couldn’t help but think about the two of you. Strangely enough, this was by far the most stable relationship he had ever had. Okay, not like he had so many other relationships in the past to compare it to but… It was still different. And special.

“You took your time, guys.”

When Kakashi looked up, his eyes fell on you as you watched them with a wide grin on your face. Tilting his head to the side for a moment, he put away his book and glanced at his watch. “You said fifteen minutes. It’s only been ten.”

“Duh, I thought you were ninjas, not a group of elderly people who went on a nice evening stroll,” you told him with a roll of your eyes.

He really wanted to laugh because he missed your stupid sense of humor, but it would’ve probably ended with him kissing you. And he wouldn’t have stopped at a quick kiss on the lips. Oh, no. If it was just the two of you, you would have skipped dinner altogether. But his mind was wandering too far again. He had to stop, damn it. “Very funny,” was all he said in the end.

“Is that blood?” Sasuke suddenly spoke up, pointing at your shirt.

“What?” You looked down and noticed the bloodstain on your chest. While you quickly zipped your red jacket to cover it up, you flashed a reassuring smile at the kids. “Don’t worry, it’s not mine.”

All three of them. All three of the kids opened their mouths at the exact same time, probably to ask for details, but Kakashi was fast enough to stop them with a pointed look. You had said it yourself back on the rooftop: there was something you quickly had to take care of. Knowing you, it was most probably an assassination and he didn’t want to talk about things like this tonight. Was it too much to ask for? Was a normal, delightful evening too much to ask for? Just one damn night.

After clearing his throat, Kakashi spoke up. “So we were about to get something to eat, right? Naruto, I’m sure you’re starving as always.”

But Naruto hesitated and scratched the back of his head as he flashed a sheepish grin at him. “Actually, as weird as it might sound, I have so many questions that I can’t even think about food right now.”

“Shoot.”

Were you seriously planning to answer his questions? “Y/N, come on,” he tried with a sigh.

“Don’t come on me. If he has questions, let him ask them.”

“We can do that inside.”

He had no luck because you clearly weren’t about to go inside anytime soon. Shaking his head, Kakashi pulled out his book and leaned against the wall of the restaurant. At least he had time to read a little more while the four of you talked. He already had a bad feeling about this conversation but for now, he decided to only listen and keep his opinion to himself. There was no need to interrupt you, he could do that if something went wrong. Which, knowing you, was highly likely.

“What kind of missions do you go on?

“Kakashi told you a few things about me, didn’t he? Well, covert missions, assassinations, manhunts… Usually, we go after supernatural creatures, but there are times when we assist in different cases too, like hostage situations. Since it’s really hard to kill us, we often help out when the situation is too dangerous for humans.”

“Cool. So what can you do?”

“Alpha’s are supposed to be powerful, right?” Kakashi looked up from his book and turned to Sasuke. Back when he had told the team about you, Sasuke didn’t seem very convinced about you being an Alpha. Sadly, he already knew where the kid was going with this, and he also knew perfectly well how you would react. But maybe he was wrong. “I can’t take you seriously enough to believe you’re one.”

“Excuse me?!”

Yes, this is exactly how he had expected you to react. “Oh, no, here we go,” he whispered under his breath as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

You took a threatening step toward Sasuke who didn’t even flinch at first. “You wanna see powerful?”

But when your eyes turned black, all three took a few cautious steps back to build some distance. “Y/N, please, just let it go,” Kakashi told you as he put a hand on your shoulder.

“No, no, no, if he wants to see what I can do, fine, I’ll show him. And I know just the place,” you explained hurriedly. At least your eyes were back to normal which meant you managed to calm down a bit already. That was good. He didn’t need more drama out on the street. You pulled out your phone and quickly dialed someone’s number. “Hey, Kisuke, I’d like to ask for a favor. Can I use your underground training facility tonight? I need to teach some stupid brat a lesson… No, I don’t want to kick his ass, but he pretty much called me weak so I nearly threw hands with a thirteen years old kid… Cool, thanks, we’ll be there soon.” Once you ended the call, you turned to the kids and said, “Alright, we’ll order food and eat there. Let’s go, my car’s just around the corner.”

Note: Wow, I wasn’t expecting so many of you to like the pilot. But here’s part 2, I hope you’re not disappointed 😳

tag: @spn-obession

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brittledame · 4 years

Text

Pairing: Shirabu Kenjirou/Reader

Warnings: Explicit, Cursing, Hair-pulling, Name-Calling, Hate Sex, Spanking, Slight degradation, Panty stealing, Table sex

Word Count: 7.6K

Summary: A school project brings together two academic rivals, where their dislike for one another reaches a whole new level. You and Shirabu constantly duke it out for the top grade, where it becomes an everyday occurrence to see the two scowling at and insulting one another. The tension between you two finally reaches a boiling point one afternoon when an argument breaks out.

Series: Part 1 of 3 (Part 2 & Part 3)

Shiratorizawa was a private school full to the brim of prestige and practically screams ‘money’. Inside of the sleek modern exterior, each extracurricular club ranging from calligraphy to kyūdō possessed state-of-the-art facilities. Basically, you name it and there was most likely already a club for it, with each one allocated a ridiculous amount of funding. It did help that a lot of old and new money sent their kids to the school, which unfortunately leads to uppity pricks with uptight attitudes flaunting their wealth at the drop of a hat festering the hallways.

One such uppity prick went by the name of Shirabu Kenjirou and he was the bane of your existence. He came from an affluent background, old money resulting from smart trades in property stock way back before the global telecommunications were even conceptualised. You could smell the money oozing from his pores in the form of some ridiculously over-priced Giorgio Armani cologne, topped off with his neatly pressed uniform and copper-toned hair perfectly sleek.

The part that pissed you off the most about the male, and has led to your open dislike for the asshole, was the fact that he got into Shiratorizawa solely by his phenomenal grades, never once relying on daddy’s money to get in, like most of your cohort. Meanwhile, you made every single second count when studying, not a moment wasted between school and sleep, just to hope to qualify for the academic scholarship. For a while your parents fretted that you were studying too much just to pass some school’s entrance exams, where their platitudes of ‘you’re already plenty intelligent enough, honey’ and ‘you could ace it this very moment’ weren’t enough to soothe your stressed mind.

Not even three months later, you sat the exam and low and behold, you did ace it, much to your amazement. It was a beautiful moment, witnessing your name on their admittance board not even a month later, tears of relief gathering in your eyes. The only thing that ruined your moment was the name that ranked just above yours, taking in first place: Shirabu Kenjirou. So, your well-known rivalry with the copper-tinged blonde asshole started one-sided and quickly evolved into something much greater than you could’ve ever imagined.

For both your first and second year, you shared the same class as Shirabu. It was to be expected since you were both in the same grade average bracket, but still a girl could dream, right? Much to your ever-growing annoyance you were placed in the same third year class as well. Evidently you were unable to escape his prickly attitude.

Every task, assignment and exam became a silent challenge between the two of you. Each and every time, you’d throw yourself into your studies just to wipe the smug look he gives you every time he pulls through with the top mark.

The worst part of all this was the fact that he consistently pulled high marks while balancing a sport on top of his studies. You’d have to give it to him, you honestly don’t know when he manages to fit in eating and sleeping in that hectic schedule of his.

Now to place two head-strong individuals together was just begging for trouble, especially when your little competition has reached infamy around the sprawling campus. Turn out trouble is exactly what your science teacher was looking for when she placed the two of you together for the physic unit’s partner research report about their topic of choice. You looked at her like she’d lost her goddamn mind, not sparing the equally shocked Shirabu a glance. You didn’t even bother to argue with her, knowing it would’ve ended up worse somehow if you did.

“Fuck.” You muttered, hoping four the next six weeks to pass quickly

As soon as the Ms. Nakamura dismissed the class, you marched over to his desk. Stopping directly in front of him, you perched your hands on your hips and gave him a disdainful look.

“Look, for the course of this project I am willing to be civil with you.” You place a genial hand over your chest to complete your saintly sacrifice. Looking up, Shirabu gives you a blank look, before returning to annotating his textbook with bright sticky notes.

‘What a fucking dick,’ You silently seethe.

“Whatever. Just pick a topic and I’ll start on it.” His monotone voice serves to piss you off more. You curl your hands into tight fists, resisting the glorious thought of punching his pretty face.

“Um, I think not. We’ll pick the topic out together and we’ll equally distribute the work. I don’t want to hear you bitching to your hot teammates that I’m slacking.”

Grabbing a vacant chair near his desk, you spin it around and sit on it backwards, ignoring his disgruntled look. Tapping on your phone, you open a new contact and start filling it out.

“What’s your number, dickhead?” Shirabu’s head shot up at the insult and you grin at him, shaking your phone in front of his face.

“None of your fucking business, bitch.” He bites out, forehead creasing as he glares at you, completing his signature expression.

“Well, asshole, if you somehow managed to forget already, let me remind you. We need to collaborate on this and to do that, we need a line of communication. Texting is the easiest option.” You reason. You weren’t fond of the idea of Shirabu having your number either, the ass will probably write it in the boy’s changeroom as retribution for some misdeed you’ve done.

Deliberating, Shirabu’s pen stops its furious scribbling. Heaving a great sigh, he concludes that unfortunately you were correct, but that didn’t mean he had to explicitly admit that.

Snatching your phone, he ignores your indignant shout as he taps out his phone number and tosses the phone back at you.

“Great, thanks for being a team player, sport.” You say, as you clean the screen off on the bottom of your uniform top.

As you get up and return the chair to its correct place, you trudge over to your desk whilst starting to conjuring up some topic ideas to suggest.

Peeking from under his uneven fringe, Shirabu watches your skirt sway as you walk. He loves it whenever you walk away from him, leaving him to both think in peace and admire the way your hypnotising hips move as you walk. The short purple plaid Shiratorizawa skirt left little to his imagination whenever you bent over, or a strong breeze came through. Shirabu briefly wondered how the hell you evaded the school’s disciplinary committee’s strict uniform coding monitors in the hallway because he’s sure that you’re breaking at least two of them on any given day.

The next day, you texted Shirabu the list of thesis concepts you wrote up. You were surprised when your phone vibrated in your hand, delivering his speedy reply.

Shithead: Sure.

What the fuck were you meant to do with that dry ass reply?

Now angry that he wasn’t taking you seriously, you texted him back to pick a god damn topic before you went over to his practice and caused a scene. And just like that he stopped being obstinate and picked the one you were secretly hoping he would choose; it was the one focusing on Einstein’s thought experiments how his process was adapted into modern-day quantum research.

After a few back and forth texts by that afternoon you had both scheduled a few meetups over the next few weeks for the more challenging components, such as devising a solid thesis and finding some credible academic papers to back-up your statements.

A week later found you waiting in the library, going through your homework as you wait for Shirabu’s team practice to end, hoping to make good use of some of your free time.

By the time Shirabu swept into the room, you had already gotten a good head start in the assignment. Dressed in his neatly pressed uniform and not a hair out of place, you almost suspected that he made up the excuse of volleyball practice to get out of spending anymore time than necessary with you. The asshole breezes past you, not even offering an apology or reason as to why he was late, but you could at least deduct that practice was at fault – that is if he even went.

“Well since you decided to keep me waiting for –“ You glance down at your phone, “forty-five minutes, I already started it. I’ve written both the study’s aim and objective and began devising the outline for what needs to be addressed in the introduction.” You say shortly, not waiting for him to seat himself and set up before you push your laptop across the desk and into his personal space.

Shirabu rolls his eyes at your accusing tone and started to read what you’ve written up in the shared word document. Kenjirou was mildly impressed at how much you accomplished in such a short amount of time, but he tried not to show that outwardly though, afraid your already inflated ego would grow. Grunting in agreement, Shirabu slid the laptop back over to you.

“That’s fine. I’ll start pulling some sources for the statements you outlined and start writing them up. Why don’t you start researching any recent projects detailing new discoveries and start collecting data to include?”

That last part was less of a question and more of a demand, but his usual flat tone made it hard to distinguish between the two. The lack of inflection in his voice could just about put anyone to sleep, and after sitting here for almost an hour in the calming atmosphere of the library, you were ready to start dozing off.

A sharp kick to your shin ripped you out of your thoughts, causing to to yelp and rub at the sore spot. A quick look at Shirabu’s smug face illuminated by his screen was enough to rid the last of your daze, begrudgingly returning to your work.

Two hours had passed, filled by the tap-tapping abuse of your keyboards and the occasional groan released by you at another paywall obstructing an article containing some nice data. Other than that, Shirabu was a quiet as a graveyard. You’d assume he had spontaneously passed away if not for the typing and blinking, the fucker didn’t even look like he was breathing.

What a completely boring guy with a nasty attitude. The most interesting thing about him was his unfortunate fringe, looking like he got mugged in an alleyway by a guy with no fine motor skills wielding a pair of scissors.

Plainly coloured hair, irises almost an identical shade of almost blonde but not quite there. He was of average stature, maybe a little below for the volleyball team. He was completely normal, nothing you would normally give a second glance while passing by, and yet…

You mentally shake away the unwanted thoughts conjured by the sight of his hands, or the slight flexing of his arm under the thin fabric of the uniform shirt.

Dirty little fantasies of Shirabu just snapping one day after one too many insults, throwing you over his lap and just going to town on your ass with the same hand that scored so many serving points for the elite team filled your head incessantly. The force would jostle you forward, tears in your eyes as you beg him – for what you don’t know, but you would beg and he’d wrap his strong hand around your throat, the threat of cutting off your blood flow to your brain was enough to stop your breathless begs.

Wrapped up in your raunchy thoughts, your typing ceases and your eyebrows furrow as you’re faced with the horrible realisation that you actually have feelings other than hate for the up-tight prick. The feelings were far from romantic, more likely resting somewhere between hate and dislike, but it was still the principle of the matter. Acknowledging those feelings alone felt like you ceded your part in a game that you two had unofficially started.

Fuck.

The next few weeks were going to be hell. You internally groaned at the thought.

You had no idea just how right you were, as the next few Friday sessions were almost unbearable for you since that day. After that dreadful meet up, one could slice the tension that brewed between the two of you with their bare hand, even though it was solely emanating from you.

As most horrific diseases start, it was all innocuous at the beginning. The session all started the same: witty quips and digging barbs swapped at the beginning of your sessions before silently coming to the unanimous agreement to not speak another word to one another unless it was absolutely necessary. Even then, you could feel the migraine pulsating threateningly behind your eyes at how effortlessly hot he was. The headache was quite literally the physical manifestation of the vexation you felt towards the irritating copper-haired male.

It turned out that your exasperation was mutual, Kenjirou thought if he had to sit through another session with your loud breathing or deafening clacking of your keyboard, he was going to start ripping out hair. He was at his wit’s end and he had no reason as to why you set him off so easily. Not even the over-exuberant Goshiki could elicit such a nasty comment so quickly from him, even on his worst days.

The tension mounting between you two from previous sessions hung heavy in the air, but neither of you were willing to acknowledge the elephant stampeding through the small and rarely used study room.

The irritating sound of your long, trimmed nails typing, no more like smashing, on your keyboard cut through the tension. It was enough to put Kenjirou on edge faster than any other assignment meet up. He’s had a hell of a week and while he didn’t have grueling practice today, spending it alone with you was the cherry on top.

Usually the silent and calming ambiance of the library never failed to soothe him when he’s tense and anxious, but his irritation was hitting a whole new level he’s never experienced before.

“I swear if you keep smashing at your keyboard like that, I’ll rip them off and shove them up your ass.” He seethes, hands curling into fists where they rested on the table.

Looking up, you give him an incredulous look before opening your mouth. God what Shirabu wouldn’t give to get that stupid mouth of yours to not ever open again. He’d be saving the world from one less idiot spreading their stupidity.

“That’s kinky Shirabu. This is a library, keep it in your pants and save it for the bedroom.” You tease, fluttering your long eyelashes at him paired with a plastic grin.

At the murderous look his gives you, you throw back your head and laugh quietly. You weren’t willing to face the librarian’s wrath if you broke the rules, even if you were situated on the deserted top floor in a room furthest from her station at the entrance.

Conversation stalls from there on out, with only the clacking of your keyboard’s once again filling the air, although you do take greater care when typing now, not that the asshole thanked you for your consideration.

Kenjirou watches you from his periphery as you brush your glossy hair over you your shoulder, ponytail bouncing with added weight. That stupid ass hair style that made Kenjirou want to reach over and yank –

“I know you lost a couple of brain cells playing volleyball but come on, are you really that slow?” You raised your eyebrow at him, glancing at the unfinished excel charts Kenjirou had elected to do.

Giving you an unimpressed look, he chooses not to bite, thinking he’s already wasted enough time acknowledging your existence. Kenjirou hadn’t even noticed you talking to him, he was just that used to tuning you out and hearing your annoying voice as background noise.

“Can you add a trendline to the data, so that the upward trend we mention in the discussion is clearly evident in the chart?” You carefully enunciate each word to him.

Your demeaning tone and slow talking really pissed Shirabu off this time, he clenches his jaw and expels an exasperated breath through his nose.

“I’d appreciate it if you don't address me like that ever again. A trendline on the data we collected is pointless, just a pretty line. If we generated the data ourselves, then maybe, but the studies these numbers are sourced off of don’t even have trendlines.” His reasoning is rock-solid, but he was a prick about it, so you rolled your eyes and moved on to the next section of the paper that needed sorting.

“Fine, I acquiesce. A trendline here would be rather inappropriate.” He scoffs at your formal language. This was coming from the same girl that he heard on many occasions say obscenities so vulgar it’d make a seasoned soldier blush.

Tense silence fills the void between you both. You brushed of the strange sensation of being on edge. It is true that Shirabu seems even more pissy than usual, but you’ve been dealing with his shit for weeks now, you could put up with two more sessions with the unbearable prick. Hopefully.

Focusing back on the shared document open before you, you stare blankly as you try to decipher his nonsense tables. Concerned, you quickly scroll through the rest of the discussion he had begrudgingly volunteered to complete. To your absolute horror, you noticed that your format of your portion of the discussion was utterly incongruous with his formatting.

Well shit.

While grammar mistakes and sentence structure could be tweaked and fixed within a day’s work, it would take you both at least a good day's to make the report’s content flow freely and have a singular format. Thankfully, you guys have the time to fix up his – and maybe some of your – mistakes.

“Could you not?” You say shortly, tacking on a sharp glare aimed at the bane of your existence.

“Could I not what? Use your big girl words.” He bites back, not even trying to hide his annoyance with you anymore.

“Could you please stop fucking up our assignment. I don’t know about you, daddy’s money, but I’d really like to get full marks for this.” You shoot back, angry that he had the gall to be annoyed at you when he was the one fucking up the format of the assignment.

“What the fuck are you talking about? I’m doing everything that we outlined in our past sessions.” Kenjirou fumed. He swears to fucking god, if he has to argue with you over the (lack of) importance of a trend line for this data set again he’s going to scream.

Crossing your arms over your chest, you miss the way his eyes quickly flit down. Kenjirou hates himself for the way his dick twitched at the sight of you inadvertently pressing your breasts together. Licking his lips, he allows you to stew over his words and watches as you reluctantly accept his logic.

It was true, you guys didn’t really decide on a true format in the initial planning phases, it seemed like a far-off issue to worry about at that moment. Well the future is now and that issue was just going to compound by the day if it didn’t get sorted out soon. It didn’t help that you hated editing papers with a passion.

At your silence, he rolled his eyes so hard you were scared they may get stuck – although he deserves at least that much for all the shit he’s given you over the past three years. He turned back to his work and went back to ignoring you.

Oh well, two can play at that game. You didn’t want, nor need, to talk to the prick anyway.

Shifting your restless legs under the table, you accidentally kick Shirabu in the shin, earning you a dirty look. Enjoying the ugly look of his face, you give him a sickly-sweet smile.

“Oops, my bad, Shirabu. I’ll sure to be more cautious next time!” Topping off your act with some obnoxious batting of your eyelashes.

“Do it again and I’ll wipe that look off your face real fast.” He sneered back at you.

Ignoring all common sense, you played with the idea of what exactly he meant by his threat. Most likely nothing sexual and most definitely involving a punch. But that doesn’t stop you from briefly entertaining a short sexual fantasy involving the two of you fucking in his chair.

Damn, these thoughts have been getting more frequent and out-of-hand recently. If they became anymore of an issue, you may just have to see the on-campus therapist about your obvious undiagnosed nymphomania.

True to your nature, you decide to grab the metaphorical bull by the horn to see how hard he bucks. Adjusting your posture again, you lean your elbows on the table as you uncross your legs and again hit his leg stretched out under the table.

You could practically hear Shirabu’s restraint snap, a dark expression taking over his face. He jerks up and out of his chair and proceeds stalks towards you, a dangerous glint in his ochre eyes.

‘Oh shit, I might have actually overdone it this time. He’s going to fucking kill me.’ You were frozen in place, not even breathing as he towers over your seated form. You mentally said your goodbye’s to family and friends. They wouldn’t be shocked to find out that you met your end due to pure pettiness.

You were expecting at least a slap, maybe even a gut punch, so when he grabbed your arms and hoisted you onto your feet, you assumed the absolute worst. Unexpectedly, he backed your body against the table, his hips pinning yours against the hard edge, making it dig harshly into your back.

You gasp as a calloused hand grabs the back of your exposed neck, the other moving to your waist. He pulls himself incredibly close to you. You're sure there isn’t an atom of space left between the two of you now, feeling every inch of his body pressed up against yours.

He bends down and breathes softly into your ear words that set off a blaze within you.

“I warned you not to try me today and yet you kept on pushing me.” His low tone sent shivers down your spine.

Hands flat on the table, you shove yourself up against his hard chest even more, meeting his dark expression head-on.

“I figured you were all bark and no bite, so what’s the harm?” Ignoring the sharp edge of his previous words, you kept making digs at him. You already made peace with the fact that you may die at the hands of the unfairly attractive man before you.

Snapping, Shirabu grabs you by your tie, pulling you upwards and meeting your lips in a fierce kiss. It honestly was more teeth than lips, but you’d take whatever he would give you. Lust quickly replaced shock as you reciprocated the kiss, giving back as much as he gave you.

Never one to be one-upped, you both furiously made out against the table. Eventually you reluctantly conceded to him, pulling away gasping for breath to fill your aching lungs. While he didn't look as effected as you, he still panted as he caught his breath.

Lips kiss-swollen from the hard kiss he gave you, he gulped at the mussed up look of your uniform from the short make-out session. The sight alone was enough to spur him back into action. You met his lips half-way, hands flying up to bury themselves into surprisingly soft hair.

The kiss was more than just that, it was a battle of wills. It was another challenge set before you both, another one added to the extensive list of trials. It tested who had the guts to resolve the unresolved sexual tension building between you both.

Fingers digging into your soft flesh, he easily hoisted you up onto the table, slotting himself between the space made between your open legs. The kiss picks up intensity as he throws in a few nips at your bottom lip, while you lightly bite at his tongue invading your mouth.

You gasp at a particularly harsh bite at your bottom lip, drawing back to give the self-satisified male a scowl.

“Oh? Is this the reason why you’ve always been so short with me. It’s cute that you don’t know how to act around your crush.” Your teasing words make the male between your legs tense up.

“I’d rather bite off my own tongue than date you, bitch.” He goes to kiss you again. It was the only thing that got you to shut up, which he very enjoyed.

“Who said anything about dating, dearest? My, my, so you have been thinking of me.” You laughed and gave him a belittling look.

“The only thoughts I’ve had about you involve either shutting you up or fucking you senseless, so make of that what you will.” He grits out between clenched teeth, not willing to give you that inch he threw out to you like a lifeline.

If he was going to go through with this, he at least wanted you to know exactly what he wanted to get out of it. Nothing more, nothing less.

You consider him under hooded eyelids, gaze sweeping up and down his clothed torso. Well at least he wanted the same thing that’s been haunting your waking thoughts for the past month. You weren’t going to look this gift horse in the mouth that's for sure.

“Sure, I mean you could try, but I doubt that you could even a moan out of me.” You said languidly, setting up another challenge. Now all he had to do was pick up the gauntlet.

Words igniting a fire within him, his lips tipped into a lopsided smirk. You had no idea what you just started and he was more than happy to show you the consequences of your bold actions.

“Oh, I assure you, I’m not going to stop until I hear you screaming.”

The room you occupied was situated on the top floor, at the end of a long corridor of empty study rooms exactly like this one. It was highly unlikely that the elderly librarian at the entrance would hear what was about to go down. It was also unlikely any snooping students would come across your study room on the neglected floor.

You fully expected him to pull you into another bruising kiss before fucking you but it seemed that the stupidly hot bastard was just full of surprises today. Instead, he pulled you off the table and turned you to face the chair he had previously occupied. With the hand placed at the nape of your neck, the other moving to your opposite side of your waist, he pushed you down to lie against the cold tabletop. Though definitely not for your benefit, he pushed aside any stray bits of paper out of your way to prevent them from creasing.

You gasp as the pressure he applies onto you forces the breath out of your lungs, pressing you hard against the unforgiving surface. Hands scrabbling for a purchase to help you establish a counter force to push up against him, he bends down and breathes softly into your ear.

“Look at you so pliant for me, I could get used to this.” His smug tone made your blood boil. That bastard was going to milk this situation for all it has and you have no ground to stand on to refute him when you were planning on doing the exact same.

“You know, your nasty attitude destroys that pretty boy stereotype you have going on.” You retort. You weren’t going to take his bullshit laying down – metaphorically speaking.

Fed up with you running your mouth, always talking but never saying anything of substance, he hastily loosens his tie. Without warning, he shoves a bundle of fabric into your mouth, quickly moving his fingers away from teeth that would gladly bite down onto his precious setting tools.

Trying to voice your anger, you squirm in his grasp with muffled nonsensical words leaving your mouth.

Kenjirou marvels at the sight of your stuffed mouth, words finally muted and wide eyes that were angry at his action. If he knew this is all he had to do to get you to shut up for more than two seconds then he’d gladly do it again.

Kenjirou couldn’t help but wonder if your cheeks would also look like that if he’s shoved his dick between your plush pink lips but he saves that thought for another day. After all, he had at least half a year left to put up with your bullshit.

Pressing his hips against your ass, he revels at the feeling of finally having you under him, squirming and all. Deciding not to draw this out anymore than he already has, he smoothly grinds his slowly growing erection into the cleft of your ass obscured by ugly purple plaid.

Unsatisfied with the lack of friction, he flips up your skirt to reveal lacy panties. He thought it was a bit risqué to wear them at school but who was he to complain about the lovely gift.

You gave a muffled shout when he snapped against the waist band against your hip. Tempted, you considered trying to kick him in the shin again somehow in your position. The thought dissolved into nothing as he lightly smacks your ass, causing you to jolt forward more in surprise than in pain.

With the absence of any complaints or irritating whinging, Kenjirou weighed the plump flesh in his hand, grinning to himself when he hears you moan at his curious squeezing. He wondered what other delicious noises you’ll make under him.

Well there was only way to find out.

Winding his hand back, his hand came down with a loud ringing smack, hard enough to leave his hand pleasantly tingling. The pink imprint of his hand on your ass was going to be burned into his mind for a long time, a wave a heat rolling through him and coalescing in his groin.

Again, you jolt forward at the impact, nails scratching at the acrylic lacquer of the tabletop, unable to find purchase. While you could feel the poor skin pulse dully with pain, pure arousal flashed hot and bright within you. If you had ever thought spanking would be something you were into, you’re pretty sure Shirabu was one of the worst people to discover along with, always the one to abuse any situation.

The next time his hand came down on your ass, you mistakenly tensed, causing the pain to shoot through you ten-fold. You wince at the sensation of him hitting the exact same spot over and over again. You were sure the spot would be rouge red by this point, but the pain didn’t take away from the pleasure you derived from his rough treatment.

Mixing things up, Kenjirou bites his lip as he aims a smack right at the apex of your thighs, close enough to your core that the vibrations of the hit ripped a lewd moan from your lips, much louder than the rest. Blood rushing down to his already engorged cock at your noises, he knows that he could easily get addicted to your bent form. You enjoying the spanking was just a fun bonus for him.

“I should’ve guessed you were into spanking. It fits the ‘good school girl’ façade you’ve got going on,” Shirabu hums, throwing the words back into your face. Leaning down, he breathes into your ear, “I could really get used to you like this beneath me. I have such big plans for you.”

Shivering at his low tone, your mind whirled chaotically with half-baked ideas of what exactly he had in plan for you. Honestly, as long as it ended up with his dick inside of you, you don’t care about the rest. You were always opposed to the saying ‘It’s not the destination, it’s all about the journey.’ And this situation was no different to you.

Kenjirou slides your panties over your ass and down your legs, half tempted to chuck them across the room just to see you panicking over locating them after this. On second thought… He shoves the offending piece of lace into his back pocket, as a present for himself putting up with you.

His hands bracket you bottoms of your ass and smooths his thumbs over the soft pink flesh. Kenjirou watching them slightly jiggle in the palms of his hand, admiring the rosy tinge he painted them. Kenjirou firmly decided that the flesh looked much prettier painted pink by the very hand that slammed balls over the side of the net with shocking force.

Fingers gliding over the cheeks and trailing downward, he makes contact with your wet lips. Mildly surprised, he runs a slender finer between them, gathering your juices.

“Look at how wet you are for me. I bet I won't even have to prep you, your greedy hole will probably just suck me in.” He states, rubbing his finger slowly -torturously - over the entrance of your hole.

You whine through your makeshift gag and buck your hips against his fingertips, hoping for them to dip in deeper. The pad of his crooked index finger dipped shallowly into you a few times from your efforts. Kenjirou was greatly amused at your efforts, deciding to hold his fingers in place for you to try and fail to fuck into yourself.

“Look at how desperate you are, it’s honestly pathetic. I expected so much more from you.” He tutted.

The flash of anger fizzled and died before it took root, much too distracted by him inserting his entire index finger in without warning. While you had explored yourself on more than a few occasions, mapping out sensitive flesh with your fingers, the feeling of his much longer and slightly thicker finger inside of you was incredible.

You whimper at the slick feeling of him moving his finger in and out of you, occasionally curling against the spongy tissue, seeking for the bundle of nerves that will make you scream. Slotting in another finger and him twisting them simultaneously had you panting and clenching your eyes at the full feeling from just the two.

Feeling your walls tighten and quiver around his finger as he crooked them a few times, he doubled down to find your erogenous zone before he fucks you. It only took another finger and few moments of scissoring them deep inside of you, indicated by your abrupt gasping jerk.

Licking his lips, he rubs his fingers harshly against the soft area, committing to memory the muffled breathy moans and whimpers that dropped from your panting mouth. Dick twitching, hard and painful within his tight slacks draws him out of his mind. He withdraws his saturated fingers from your sopping hole, briefly abandoning the sensitive spot for now.

Slumping, you simultaneously miss and despise his fingers fucking into you, hating that he found your G-spot quicker than you’d anticipated. The prick was too smart for his own good, the asshole probably knew more about female anatomy and orgasms than you did with biology being his best class.

The rustle of his pants being undone pulls you back to reality. Oh god this is really happening. Your breath picks up, anticipating the next move the bitter setter will make next.

The sensation of something long, hot and rigid, his dick you assumed, rests between your still stinging cheeks. His fingers dip back between your lips and gather more liquid arousal. Kenjirou ignores your groan at the odd feeling, preoccupied with smearing your slick over his dick, taking his sweet time.

One hand on his cock, guiding the tip to sit at your entrance, with the other placed for support on your hip. Tense, you waited for him to just slam on in, not anticipating him to draw out the moment. You hated the way that you squirmed at the thought of his dick being so close but so far away from where you wanted it most.

“You better hold onto the desk. Once I start, I’m not going to stop until I hear you screaming.” He said, smug tone and all ringing loud and clear.

You huff indignantly at his statement, as if to say: ‘Sure, whatever you say, asshole.’

Rolling his eyes, he tightens his grip as he starts to insert himself inside of you. Obviously taking pity on you, he graciously chooses to glide in at a decent pace. The breath was punched out of your lungs as he completely sheathed himself inside you, hot and throbbing. You try not to violently shiver around him because you couldn’t bare the thought of inflating his already unhealthily enlarged ego.

Dropping the niceties, as if there were any with Shirabu involved, he slid out not a moment later and slammed back on in, loving the sound of his skin smacking against yours. Sloppy sounds of your fucking fill the air and frankly you’d be pretty grossed right now if your brain didn’t reside in your pussy that very moment.

Fucking you from behind, Kenjirou grabs a fistful of shiny hair and harshly rips back your head, hot breath cascading over perspiring skin.

“You take me so well, like you were made for me. Maybe I should fuck this hole of yours again sometime.”

In retribution, you clench down as hard as feasibly possible, hoping to knock him off of that high horse of his. The grunt that rings in your ears pacifies your ire, but the unexpected resistance doesn't stop him from trying to fuck up into you even harder.

Pardoning his attitude, you loosen up for him, more so for your own pleasure than his. He doesn’t hesitate to pick up his unforgiving pace, pumping in and out of you like a sex-crazed mad-man. Eyes rolling into your head, you felt the tip of his thick dick kiss the entrance of your cervix, which paired fantastically with the friction his thick cock made against your quivering walls.

Moaning around the tie as he furiously fucks you from behind, you can feel the piece of fabric become saturated with your drool. He seemed to appreciate the sounds you made, hands tightening around your hips and starts to seek out the highly sensitive spot hidden somewhere inside of you.

Every time he slid out, he’d readjust his angle with only the tip still in before slamming back on into, waiting for the moment he found his target. The pain of the table cutting into your stomach is buried underneath the pleasure Kenjirou relentlessly delivered to you.

An idea flashed in Kenjirou’s mind, a cruel one, but not too cruel as revenge for all the shit you’ve put him through. Unknowing of the feral grin on his face, you continued to moan as his dick fills you so perfectly, suddenly jolting when you feel his warm lips against your throat. You let out a squeal and clenched down hard around his length when you feel his teeth bury into the soft skin. Manicured nails scratching small divots into the desk as he sucks the bruise deep into your skin.

You grit your teeth when you feel him release your skin, the spot already feeling sore at the rough treatment. You could tell from the position that it was too high for the uniform’s collar to hide and wearing a scarf in this summer weather was way too suspicious. That motherfucker probably planned that; you silently fume as he smirks against your perspiring flesh.

The worst part though was when all conspiring thoughts of retribution were wiped clean from you mind as your entire nervous system is struck by lightning. You cry out loudly at the sensation, to which Kenjirou huffed under his breath, muttering out a quiet ‘Thank fuck’ that went unacknowledged by you as you tried to recuperate from him hitting your G-spot with the force of a tank.

Kenjirou greedily ate up each cry leaving your lips as he continued to hit the sensitive nerves with deadly precision. The sight of you writhing underneath him was enough payment for the annoyance he’d suffered through at your hands the past month. But it was the feel of your walls clutching at him tightly and your delicious moans that was the true reward for all his patience.

The wet squelching noises of your furious fucking was enough to make you blush, which was hilarious thinking about it. Not even four weeks ago you were ready to jump the table and non-sexually choke him out with your tie – and now he was railing you with his tie as a makeshift gag.

Ah, fate truly was a bitch.

Thrusts becoming frantic, you knew that Kenjirou was nearing his end and you would swear bloody vengeance if he finished and left you high and dry. It turns that promise would be for naught. Shirabu reaches around you with his still slick covered fingers and rubs furiously at your clit, giving it a few good squeezes, rightfully assuming you loved the rough treatment. And that you did, you bucked wildly in his grasp, moans hitting a whole new pitch as you unravel quickly under his dual ministrations.

The arousal that had been sitting hot inside of you, seemed to snap and unleashed upon you an orgasm that had stars sear into your eyelids, eyes clenched tightly as the sensation threatened to drown you in it. What felt like pure electricity coursed through your veins, feeling as if Shirabu’s dick had just sent you to a new dimension, brain liquefying inside of your skull.

Behind you, Kenjirou seizes up as he feels you tighten up considerably around him, delivering him to his peak as well. His pace slows as his hips stutter, unleashing his load within you. Even completely incoherent, you shivered at the feeling of him feeling at you, not able to muster up and ounce of disgust at the feeling. That should’ve been the moment that you knew that you were truly fucked; you were completely wrapped around Shirabu’s long pretty fingers.

Limbs trembling with the aftershocks of your orgasm, you laid there limply as he pulled out. You felt a bead of sweat drop down your brow as you weakly collect yourself together, drawing yourself up on shaky arms. The sensation of thick globules of Shirabu’s cum slipping out of you was enough of a distraction to brush of the intense stare Shirabu aimed at your leaking hole.

Leaning back, Kenjirou fights down the flush on his cheeks from watching his cum slowly dripping out of you, feeling hot under the collar from both the sight and from the mind-blowing orgasm. Shuffling back, he cleans himself off with a clean tissue in his shirt pocket before tucking himself back into his boxer briefs and pulling up his pants.

Slumped against the table, you felt like a wreck, both inside and out. Dick rearranging your insides aside, you were happy that Shirabu deigned for you to orgasm instead of leaving you a begging mess, which was a very likely move for the bastard.

Your jaw felt sore from how full your mouth was with his tie crammed in. Pulling out the wet article, you tossed it onto the table in his general direction. Kenjirou looks at the crumpled fabric with disgust. Weirdly, he doesn't complain as he gathers some tissues from his bag to wrap the article in until he can get it cleaned.

Choosing not to question his sudden pacified attitude towards you, you pushed yourself up on weak arms. Kenjirou laughs at your struggle, not at all intimidated by your nasty glare.

“Asshole.” You mumble under your breath.

You make quick work of cleaning yourself up too, feeling weirdly exposed bent over and naked from the waist down whilst a fully clothed Shirabu almost looked bored, acting as if he didn’t just fuck your brains out.

Your skirt slides back into place as you stand upright, shortly followed by more of his load trickling out of you. Pinned underneath his burning stare, you refused to give him an inch and fought back the tremble that threatened to overtake your body at the odd sensation.

“Alright, now sit down. Let’s finish this project before I leave and you have to finish fixing up the format by yourself.”

You blink at him. “Really?”

It seems the bastard wouldn’t even let you properly clean up first before diving back into the assignment.

“Really. Now get your lazy ass up, you’re creasing our data sets.”

Not willing to reveal how flustered you were, you downplay your disgust at the feeling his cum drying on your thighs and stiffly walk over to your chair, trying to spy your panties somewhere on the ground, but ultimately found nothing. You could have sworn that Shirabu smirked at your searching looks, but a second glance showed you his normal bored expression.

Sticking your nose up in the air, you start discussing your plan on how to fix the minor issue of formatting. Shirabu gave lackluster nods at your prodding, clearly wanting nothing more than to leave. You did your best to push through the sensation of the sticky mess drying between your legs, internally fretting as to where your panties may lie. You're pretty sure that you'd perish on the spot if a staff member found them.

Thankfully, it took only half an hour before Shirabu beat a hasty retreat, quickly placing all his stuff neatly into his bag and intent on walking out of the room without another word. The fucker wasn’t even going to say goodbye to you.

Shifting in your seat, you start packing up. Eyes wildly darting around, you didn’t notice him pausing in the open doorway.

Glancing over his shoulder, shooting you a dastardly smirk, Kenjirou savours your infuriated expression before turning away and walking off. Slightly confused, you squint as you try to make out an odd-looking lump in his back pocket. At the sight of familiar lace peeking out of his slacks, your eyes widen in shock and indignant rage.

“That bastard.”

Edit: I fixed an incongruity with a bit in the end scene, sorry to anyone that picked it up!!

Notes: We need more Shirabu content so here I am delivering some extremely self-indulgent content. I made Shirabu a dick but I made reader a bitch towards him and he strikes me as the type to hate stuck up people. Hope you all enjoyed!

#shirabu kenjiro x reader #shirabu kenjirou #haikyuu!! x reader #x reader #Shirabu x you #haikyuu reader insert #shiratorizawa #haikyuu!!#haikyuu!! fic #haikyu!! x reader #haikyu!!#shirabu kenjirou x reader

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earthlyemily · 3 years

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I’m struggling so much financially and honestly just wanted to vent somewhere. I’ve always lived in poverty and I think in my whole life I’ve had maybe 2 years where I didn’t have to stress about money and not be able to buy groceries or pay rent or be put into collections for not being able to make payments etc and that was when I was in college. For at least the past 5 years I’ve been struggling but I never talk about it. I don’t even know where to start haha I don’t even know what it’s like to not stress financially and be in debt. I’ll just start with the first things that come to mind with what I’m owing maybe. So it’s Dec. 23 and rent was due yesterday because we moved into this small suite attached to someone’s house on Nov. 22. It’s $1200 which is so expensive, but also the average price for BC if not even cheaper for a one-bedroom with a yard, utilities included. and no first and last, no pet deposits, etc because this is just short them for 4 months until the end of March because i reached out and asked and they said yes.

After 1 month I already remember why we went into the trailer almost 2 years ago and it’s literally because we can’t afford any other lifestyle. I think that’s the difference between us and some people that live in trailers, vans, etc. like we lived in a mouse & mouse shit infested trailer for 6 months breathing in their feces and urine and having it all over all our belongings. i literally had to take my whole life to the dump and we officially have no food storage because they ruined it all. there were at least 50-60 mice because a few birth cycles happened in the ceiling. I could write a whole post about my experience of living with field mice, but now isn’t the time so for rent, i only had $600 yesterday so that’s what I gave them. thank goodness they were okay with me asking for a few more days to make the other half. but I don’t even know when that’s going to be :(

my etsy shop veganveins has been doing so bad lately for more than one reason, most of my orders are just postcards and stickers, and while I’m grateful for them, that $1-3 profit isn’t going to keep my business going. and it’s so hard for me to work lately. the wifi doesn’t work sometimes for hours and I always get distracted by shawn and the dogs working from home in a small space. I need to get better at my time management. I got up at 8:30 today which is actually early for me so I’m proud of myself. I’m chronically ill and I really need to go get a blood test and see what’s happening because I haven’t gotten one since being diagnosed with graves disease again 1.5 years ago. anyways. i switched to a print on demand method this year for veganveins for some shirts and sweaters because i couldn’t afford to keep ordering shirts in bulk, and it’s honestly been so, so expensive and i barely make any profit. I’m currently owing my t-shirt printer $999 on one invoice (it was originally $2196 so I’ve at least paid half of it) but that was 2 weeks ago and I still need to pay it. Mario, my t-shirt printer has been with me since I started veganveins and I’m so grateful he gives me extensions on paying the invoices. every other t-shirt printer I’ve ever asked has said no. in addition to the $999 there’s going to be another $2200 invoice I’ll be receiving this week for my last order. I think because of the holidays he’s going to give me some time to pay off that too, but the problem is when I have outstanding invoices he doesn’t print new orders for me. He’s closed now until Jan. 4 so I just need to somehow make that much before then.

btw I don’t have a credit card ($8500 all used on veganveins and it got put into collections last march) and I had a fully used $5000 line of credit but I got a debt consolidation loan for $16,000 1 month ago and my payment for that is $167 a month. it fully paid off and closed my credit card and line of credit + $3000 overdraft which is nice. but now I don’t have any extra money except for what comes in. my credit is only 640 which is really bad in canada so I won’t get approved for a new credit card or loan until I build that up, which is going to be a few months of regular payments. so for regular payments, the $167 for the loan is due on Dec. 27. Yesterday the trailer loan which is literally unliveable from what the mice did until we renovate it came out for $260, that’s how much I pay once a month for it on the 22nd. I didn’t have $260 in my account so it got rejected and I got charged a $48 NSF fee. omg if anyone is reading this long i’m shook. i’m genuinely just writing this for myself to process my feelings and in case anyone was curious about my financial situation here you go haha. maybe some of you can relate, maybe some can’t. anyways. so now I somehow have to get $260 in my account for that for when they try to take it out again in the next few days.

another payment that was supposed to come out yesterday but hasn’t, but I’m sure will come out today is our truck loan. they deferred it for 8 months because of covid which was so nice, but we started paying it again 2 months ago. for both those months I called and made my payment a later date and that helped, but there’s barely any service here so when I called 4 times yesterday to try and change the date the payment comes out, I was on hold for 20-30 mins then my phone would disconnect and hang up. so that’s $586 and it will come out today, I have $0.46 in my account right now so it will get rejected and I’ll get charged another $48 NSF fee. this is why being poor always costs more and the banks are always harsher on those who don’t have money. today I’ll try calling again to see if I can ask for it to come out on a different day like january 10 instead, so I can first have time to pay rent and the trailer and also our $190 truck insurance which got rejected from my account 3 days ago, which was another $48 NSF fee. oh and something else i’m so stressed about is CIBC is going to put me into collections on December 28 if I don’t pay $1000, $700 of which is purely their fees. I have a $300 overdraft which they said i have to cover by then and the $700 is literally their $48 fees added up over the past 3 months. I got a text from them today saying my account is over and it’s because an amnesty international $11 monthly donation came out and obvi there’s no money in there, so that’s another $48 they charged. they’ve already given me a month to pay it and don’t want to wait any longer :(

I owe everyone in my family money, my sister $1650, my mom $700 and my brother also lent me $700. none of my siblings have money either and my mom definitely doesn’t so I hate that i had to borrow that much, and it’s literally been months. thankfully they’re so patient but i can’t wait to not owe them that

omg and i can’t even think about the amount of money shawn’s grandma has lent us. she’s genuinely the only reason we haven’t been completely homeless. but it’s a lot. like i don’t even want to say the number on here. she let us use it from her line of credit over the years and we’ve been slowly paying her back, but she lets us go months at a time without making a payment which i honestly hate doing, but have no choice. i’ve felt a lot of shame and guilt about this, but I also know that she genuinely would rather help us than see us suffer.

so i’m gonna talk about a big reason I’m broke this month especially - saving a pig named buster. his rescue cost me $1850 out of pocket that I didn’t have. but otherwise he was going to be killed in 2 days, he was my baby and I loved him so I had to do it. I somehow made $1350 that went towards it but I’m still owing $500, which I just asked for an extension for today until the new year. i’m not really supposed to talk about it but everything I’ve ever posted here has stayed here, so that cost was literally just from me buying the pig off the farmer. myself along with everyone else ive talked to is disgusted that he charged that much, but he wasnt budging and if that’s what it was going to take, of course I’m going to do it. I wouldn’t think twice about doing it for my dogs and Buster was smarter and more affectionate than them. i love him and I’m so happy he was saved. a non-profit organization transported him to a sanctuary and it was my biggest wish come true and the happiest moment I’ve had all year. my eyes are literally tearing up haha i love him so much. i could write a whole post about his neglect but basically he hasn’t had fresh water in weeks, he was only being fed handfuls of mixed nuts, he was constantly dirty in a muddy enclosure with an electric fence that he was always getting shocked on. he never got true love or affection except for when I gave him it. i posted an instagram story about him and asked people to message me and that i needed help, 2 people donated $111 and $120 each, and 2 other people donated $15 and $12. Someone also e-transferred me $20. These 4 donations equaled almost $300 ($277) and I was so grateful for those people wanting to help me help buster. if anyone else wants to help me with the cost of his rescue i still do need help and would appreciate it so much. this feels really weird and vulnerable for me to do and i’m sorry if anyone is annoyed by this post, I just genuinely am struggling and figured if someone does have extra and wants to help, there isn’t harm in that. but i do feel guilty for asking because i know there are so many other people struggling out there that need even more help than i do :(

i haven’t talked about it publically but i guess I will now, this farmer that I bought buster off of is the owner of the organic vegetable farm i was living and working at this past spring and summer. we worked really hard all summer to be able to stay there and park for free in the winter, but this past fall he told us no one was allowed to stay at the farm anymore, including us, so we had to find a new place to bring our 14ft trailer in to live. so that was an unexpected bummer and if we had known we wouldn’t be allowed staying there anymore (despite doing the labour of $1200 a month for free harvesting organic kale, for an off-grid spot he told us was worth $350 a month to park) we wouldn’t have driven 8 hours with the trailer and we would have stayed in the snow in northern BC and sucked it up and lived on the land we got the opportunity to rent this fall. Donna, the woman who is renting the land to us has been the biggest blessing in my life this year. I love her so much. Basically, she’s letting us live on 170 acres for $600 a month. letting us do whatever we want on the land (building a cabin, setting up rainwater catchment systems, having a solar passive greenhouse and a huge garden) LIKE WHAT. we could even open a farm sanctuary if we had money, i wanted to so bad but obviously that dream didn’t even come close to being reality. opportunities like this literally don’t exist in canada, especially not in BC. i cant even process my gratitude, i cry everytime i think about it. when we go back in the spring it’s going to be the beginning of the rest of our life :) i want to rescue so many senior dogs. everything we’ve always wanted to do we’ll be able to do, assuming we have money haha. but i want to have an organic farm and grow veggies to donate to families in need, especially since we live on stolen indiginious land and I see how the goverment actively restricts their access to fresh healthy produce. but anyways by then it was too dangerous to drive 8 hours back hauling a trailer in the snow and it was just easier to stay in the okanagan until the spring. i know the farmer probably doesn’t realize this and he’s also probably struggling financially but not being able to stay at the farm for the winter months we worked for, and buying buster for that price is a big reason I’m in the financial stress I am now so I figured i’d talk about it.

anyways. i think this is long enough and i think anyone reading this gets the point, i’m drowning in debt, my small business is almost costing me more to run and i’m not making nearly enough profit to live, the past few months ive been living off grid (not by choice) and just focused literally on surviving and not freezing and getting water etc and not having service or internet has affected me negatively. there’s internet now in the suite I’m in, it works really good in the morning and not as well at night, like for example tumblr doesn’t work past 5 pm for me to post photos. but ive been in a bad sleep schedule since i got here that i need to change. im sick and i need to heal myself. tomorrow i’ll set my alarm for 7:30. hopefully i make some money today. i got a social media managing job and it will end up being $1000 a month once i do the 3+ hours a day of work which im already feeling like i barely have time for my own basic life tasks. but i can do this.

if anyone reading this wants to help me out a bit, my paypal email is [email protected] or http://www.paypal.com/paypalme/veganveins

and my e-transfer email is [email protected] i have auto deposit so you won’t have to ask a question :)

this is my first time in 7 years i’ve made a post like this or asked for help. i won’t do it again but figured i have nothing to lose. if you read up to here i love you a lot and thank you so much for being here <3

#personal #finances #broke #poor #vegan #small business owner #graves disease #saving animals #off grid #I wonder if anyone will even read this all #debt #life update lol #p

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aenwoedbeannaa · 4 years

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Forest Fires || Geralt x Reader

Requested By: salmonbutter

Word Count: 2,080

Warnings: Mild Violence, Gore, there will eventually be smut let’s be real.

Summary: A master huntress living deep in the woods, you rarely find yourself in human company. On a cool late autumn evening, the forest goes quiet. Not one to sit and wait for trouble to find you, you grab your bow and head out to look. A gravely injured Witcher with silver hair is the last thing you expected to find.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

Note: This is only Part I of what will probably be a pretty long story. The rest will be linked when they are posted. Make sure you follow to stay up-to-date!

Part I: A Stranger in the Woods

The forest is eerily quiet. Yes, your home is far from civilization——by choice—but still, the usual sounds of evening were notably absent. Adrenaline courses through your veins, your body telling you that something was off. If the animals were silent, there was something quieting them.

You remembered a time when the adrenaline coursing through your veins would have filled you with panic. That was a long time ago, before you’d set off to live on your own. Now, the adrenaline only brought the world into hyper-focus. Every leaf, every twig, every silent creature scuttling past were noted.

Your bow is in your hand, one arrow drawn, though it is unnecessary. You can pull an arrow from your back, string it, and shoot before most people have time to blink twice. Your steps are quiet thanks to the leather boots you’d fashioned and years of practice. Your cousin used to joke that you should have been a Witcher. You always laughed it off, but if you were completely honest, you did not disagree.

You slip between the trees, keeping in the shadows and ensuring that your back was protected. The trees of the forest were excellent for that, and you knew the general area nearly as well as you knew your bow.

A twig snaps somewhere off to your left, and you draw in a silent breath. Its at least twenty feet away, but you need to be careful. It is unlikely that whatever snapped that twig is just an animal scrambling for hiding. The animals of this wood, just like you, are silent as death.

You slip between the trees, moving in the general direction of the sound. You’d rather catch whatever it is off-guard than wait for it to find you, which you are almost certain it would. You do not doubt your skills—you are an efficient killer, but you learned long ago that it was far better to be a predator than prey.

You keep your breathing even. If you don’t, your heartbeat will speed up, and trying to hear over the roar of blood in your ears is nearly impossible. You’ve covered at least half the distance between the tree you’d been using as protection when you heard the twig and the approximate location whoever or whatever it was that snapped that twig when you hear the sharp whistle of steel in the air and a sickening crack.

You are not the only hunter in the wood.

The swing of steel tells you that there is at least one human or elf involved. This is quite surprising, considering you’d heard only the snap of a single twig. Humans are never so silent. Even elves don’t move that quietly.

A moment later, you hear a sharp groan. It sounds like a man.

Growing curious, you speed up your movements slightly, still careful not to make a sound. Whatever is going on, the parties are moving quickly. It seems like you cannot catch up unless you are constantly moving.

The next sound you hear is the sound of something——claws? The sound of tearing flesh. Then there is another groan. The man is hurt, and badly from what she can gather. But there is one more powerful slash, steel cutting through air, flesh, and then bone.

You shudder. There is a reason you prefer your bow. Well-aimed arrows kill your prey instantly, and from a distance. Swords may be efficient, but they are messy.

You cautiously move forward, in case there was more than one creature. The chance of that being the case is quite unlikely, however. The air is already filling with the usual sounds of the wood once more. Birds tweeting, the scraping of tiny claws against wood as squirrels dash climb the rough tree trunks, jumping from branch to branch with ease.

You reach a small clearing——oddly perfect for battle. Your eyes land first on some grotesque creature that you are quite positive that you’ve never seen before. These woods are generally untouched by beasts. A chill runs up your spine as you stare at the creature. Its dark, patchy fur is coated with blood. Its hideous head has been hacked clean from its body.

Once you tear your head away from the supernatural-looking beast, they fix on a man. You see the sword that must have done the hacking lying on the ground next to him. You notice immediately by its shine that it is silver, not steel. So, a Witcher. That explains why he he hadn’t made a sound.

He is lying in a pool of his own blood. Four claw marks seem to have cut clean through his armor. As you approach, he groans once more. If he hadn’t, you would have thought he was dead, as wounded as he was. It was said that Witchers were able to withstand much more than the average human, thanks to their mutations. Still, Witcher or no, if he stays there much longer, he will die. He’s losing too much blood.

You sling your bow back over your shoulder, confident that there was only one of those things, and this Witcher killed it. You are already digging in your satchel as you lurch toward the Witcher. You’re going to have to staunch the bleeding and keep the deep wounds from getting infected.

Ever prepared for a hunt gone sour, you’ve got a small jar of healing salve and a roll of cotton bandages. Judging by the look of the Witcher’s injuries, you are going to need the entire jar. You momentarily hesitate, because that one jar had taken you at least a month to prepare, and the herbs it contained were either difficult to find or incredibly expensive. Still, your conscience would never let you leave someone bleeding out on the forest floor——especially when that someone killed a beast that could very well have done the same thing to you had it been left to freely wander the woods.

You go to work immediately, pulling your hunting knife out of the strap that held it to your leg. It takes some effort, but you are able to cut away most of his leather armor and underclothes to reveal four deep gashes across his torso a and up to his shoulder. Thankfully, you were used to things like this. Well, not exactly like this, but similar enough.

A deer and a human aren’t so different, you had to tell yourself. You didn’t complete the thought, which was that, when you saw a deer in this situation, you were usually in the process of gutting it for a winter’s worth of food and new clothes.

Stifling the urge to vomit, you scooped out a good deal of the oily mixture and began slathering it on the open wounds. The moment it touched his skin, you heard a harsh intake of breath. You glanced up at the Witcher’s face to see his eyes had opened wide in what you could only read as fear and pain. They were amber, with pupils like a cat’s. His jaw was clamped tightly shut, teeth barred.

“It stings, I know,” you tell him in as soothing a tone as you can muster thanks to your own fear. “It will numb after a few minutes,” you add.

The silver-haired Witcher just grunts and nods his head, screwing his eyes shut, and you go back to work slathering the ointment over each gash, ignoring the blood now coating your hands.

You unroll the cotton bandages, thankful that you have an exorbitant amount with you. You begin wrapping it tightly around his shoulder, the easiest place to begin. By now, though, the Witcher’s eyes are open and his breathing has steadied somewhat. The numbing agents in your salve must be working. And thank heavens for that, because there is no way that you’d be able to wrap the rest of his wounds without him sitting up.

“Can you sit up?” Your tone is gentle but firm. Hopefully, he can. Otherwise, you’re going to have to figure out how to bind his wounds some other way.

Thankfully, he answers, it’s more of a grunt than the word “yes,” but he nods his head. You support him as best you can with one hand on his back, helping him into a sitting position. Once he is sitting, you position yourself behind him so that he has something to support him.

His hair is softer than you thought it would be——though you were surprised to even think about that at the present moment. It is difficult not to, though, when you’re nose is nearly buried in it as you look over his shoulder to make sure that you’re covering his wounds.

It takes a few minutes, but finally the Witcher is tightly bandaged up. You can see blood seeping through the bandages, but thankfully, they are not soaked through. It is, you assumed, a combination of your homemade healing salve and the mutation that you’ve read about—Witchers heal much more quickly than humans do.

Now that he’s bandaged up and the salve has numbed the worst of the pain, he looks far better than he did even ten minutes ago. You pull your water skin off of your pack and offer it to him.

“You should drink,” you tell him. You are on auto-pilot. The auto-pilot that has, so far, saved your own skin a number of times.

“Thank you.” His voice catches you somewhat off-guard as he takes the water skin from your hand. His voice is deep and soothing, somehow. But you shouldn’t be thinking about that right now, either.

You are already digging in your pack, looking for something for him to eat. With so much blood loss, he might topple over. You manage to scrounge up a handful of dried berries, seeds, and nuts.

“No need for thanks,” you tell him, meaning every word. You may be a bit of a recluse, but you do not have contempt for others. You just prefer to be alone. “Eat this,” you add quickly, practically shoving the handful of gathered food at him.

There is no need, however. He takes it and tentatively takes a few bites before eventually wolfing down the entire thing.

“That’s all I’ve got with me,” you frown. “But there’s plenty more back at my cottage, and I can make you some real food.” It’s more of a command than an offer. He is no longer toeing the line between life and death, but he is still not well. It will take an excellent healer to ensure that things go smoothly.

Thankfully, you are an excellent healer.

You look over at the Witcher, relieved to see that there was slight color in his cheeks now. Despite the slightly bloody bandages, he no longer looked like he was on the brink of death. You know already that there is no way you will be able to carry him all the way back to the cottage. You are strong, but the Witcher is huge, and clearly made all of muscle.

“Do you think you can walk?” you ask, chewing on your bottom lip. If he cannot, you already have a few ideas in your head. It wouldn’t be ideal, but you could probably run back to the cottage for some of the freshly tanned deer hide and fashion a bed of sorts. Dragging him back through the trees would be difficult, but not impossible.

Thankfully, however, he nods.

“Okay,” you say nodding. “Good…” You seem to have run out of words. Mostly because you were already running through a list of what you’d do once you got this stranger back to your home. You’d have to address his wounds more carefully, give him something to eat and drink. You have poppy milk, so he will be able to sleep without pain.

He pulls you from your thoughts when he finally speaks.

“My name is Geralt,” he says. “Can I ask yours, Huntress?”

You smile, despite the fact that you know he is gleaning information from you. You don’t blame him. It is difficult to trust anybody these days. You respond with your name, and he smiles back.

“Well, Y/N,” he says as you position yourself to help him up, one of his arms wrapped around your shoulder so he can lean on you for support. “I suppose I ought to thank you for saving my life.”

To be continued.

#the witcher #geralt of rivia x reader #geralt x reader #the witcher fanfiction #geralt fanfiction #writing #fanfiction #story: forest fires

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tundrainafrica · 3 years

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Title: A Tale of Two Slaves (4/17)

Summary: “Soulmates don’t exist. Fate doesn’t exist. Everything is a choice.” At that moment, Levi could only watch as she made the choice for him.“

Reincarnation AU. Levi remembers everything from their past life. Hange doesn’t.

Note: Feedback is very much appreciated!

Other Chapters: 1 2 3 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Link to cross-postings: AO3

As it turned out, Hange’s thesis wasn’t just about jumping.

But it would be nice to do it about flying. She had mentioned, echoing that same sentiment in those numerous interviews he had read.

A case study on the changes of an athletes body and muscle composition from preseason to postseason.

Levi only found out exactly what Hange and Moblit were doing for their final thesis as she ran through it with him over coffee the morning after they met in the lab. He had to admit, he had forgotten whether or not Moblit had explained that same thing to him which was probably just easily overshadowed by the pages and pages of waivers that had been laid out in front of him.

Hange had a different approach to the documentation. She had the same waivers that needed to be signed but had completely understood that no one would have that same drive to read the whole thing and consider the nuances and implications of every bullet point. She had just asked him to check everything and sign or she would not be able to work with him.

Compensation. Injury Insurance. Transportation Subsidy. Meal Subsidy

Levi quickly complied. In fact, he probably would have complied even without the benefits that came with participating in the study. He was already half way through mindlessly checking the boxes by the time Hange had mentioned those parts after all.

“Everything is funded.” Hange had explained. He knew their university was particularly well off. Being an athlete he had been a beneficiary multiple times of free branded shoes, gym bags jackets, meals and even gadgets with championship wins

The generous funding she had received to conduct the research was particularly seen in the well equipped sports facility where Hange was to conduct said research.

Cardiovascular endurance, strength power, speed, power etc. He listed the physical fitness components she wanted to study, the logistics of switching partners and starting anew completely forgotten.

It had been less than 24 hours since he visited her office and it was as if Hange wasn’t as deep into her research as Moblit had made it out to be.

She’s been cooped up in the lab lately, watching track and field videos.

She’s already been talking to Elijah, they did a few tests.

There was truth to what Moblit had told him. Hange did admit to having already the preliminary data needed for her case study but as Hange had shown him soon after they started talking, she had no problem just scrapping her data or giving it to Moblit and starting again from scratch.

As Levi soon found out, she was too passionate about her research to consider the preliminary data wasted work.

Levi had found that last part out after their talk in the lab after she had casually mentioned her lurker Instagram account on top of her blatant refusal to use Facebook and Twitter since too many social media sites were just too much to manage. He could not resist the urge to check the accounts she followed and just as he expected, they were all famous athletes from all different fields, the one thing common about all athletes being the almost inhuman height and airtime they achieved.

Nanaba Briete her friend and the subject of her high school thesis, was a volleyball player. Elijah Miller was a horizontal jumper. Moblit pointed out as well, her data for both players was too comprehensive beyond what was expected from someone of her level of study.

Levi soon realized with her YouTube and Instagram lurker activity, she probably was a stan and for some reason, he was one of the objects of her stanning activity. Levi had seen those types of people on Twitter and Instagram. They had weird voting conglomerations, used some sort of weird language and interacted incessantly with any post on the object of their stanning activity Hange was not vocal in particular, her Instagram profile and YouTube channels both empty. He only had to go through the profiles she followed to see that she left likes in most if not all pictures. Among those she had liked were profiles that reposted pictures of his jumps.

Liked by Wingsoffreedom132 and thousands of others.

Levi soon realized after hours going through most if not all the accounts she followed that just like the average stan, Hange spammed the like button like crazy

Looking deep into the comments of one of his jumps that year, he had found a comment from her. A pair of wings and a heart next to it.

How long has she been following him?

Did she have those dreams too?

“Why?”

“Why what?” Hange asked.

“Why me?” Levi continued.

“I told you before. You're amazing. Your forms are all perfect, your body composition is good and that crazy fast improvement from no name player to rookie of the year?" Hange seemed too sure of herself and glimmer of hope that somehow she had any inkling of their connection in Levi's dreams dissipated. She started to rattle off numbers relating to Levi’s height differentials and vertical leap every year since high school, Levi had to note that there was some truth to what she was saying.

High jumping events had suddenly become much easier for Levi when he moved to the city for college. He had attributed it to the more frequent training that came with the more competitive environment of collegiate sports. It was an ironic turn of events though since that was also around the same time he had started experiencing those painful mornings after dreaming things he could barely member. He chose not to mention that just yet. The connection was just too illogical to be a causation or even correlation issue. It might have even just been an irrelevant coincidence.

Levi continued to listen as she explained schedules and outlines for meet ups. There was preliminary data gathering, multiple tests to be done on weekends in a sports facility a little farther away from the school. There were a few more documents that needed to be answered and submitted similar to what Moblit had sent. It would be time consuming, inconvenient. The prospect of Hange being there made it somewhat bearable.

So bearable, that Levi had found himself arriving at the train station Saturday morning one hour earlier than they agreed upon. They were going to the sports facility for preliminary data gathering. To his pleasant surprise, Hange was already there waiting.

“I hope you don’t mind the shitty schedule,” Hange said in greeting. She was staring at the duffel bag Levi had slung over his shoulder.

Levi had to stay overnight. With the sports facilities being shared among multiple researchers and multiple athletes, Hange found the most she could secure for a last minute booking was an early morning slot, offering instead to provide lodging to Levi for a night so he wouldn’t have to take a taxi late night and early morning when the trains were already closed.

“As long as there’s a place to stay.” It’s still better than commuting at 3am.

“Let’s drop your stuff first.”

The sports facility was a 15 minute train ride and as Levi exited the station, he was greeted by a large building that stretched out a fair number of meters in both directions. Was that the sports facility?

That wasn’t their destination though. Hange guided him through a few alleys and out into a main street where a quaint mid rise condominium was located right to their left.

“My condo only has one bedroom so I hope you won’t mind staying on the couch. It has a pull out bed though so you wouldn’t be too uncomfortable.”

Somehow Levi had expected a hotel. “Wait, I’m staying in your place?”

The area Hange lived in turned out to be only 15 minutes away by train but oddly enough, it was Levi’s first time there. He found himself just gazing at nothing in particular but whatever was in front of him at that moment as they walked through the streets. They were going to have brunch in a nearby cafe, Hange had clarified. He found himself particularly entertained by the crowds, the grey pavement and the tall buildings that lined his view all making up the urban jungle of the center of town.

The university and the surrounding town where Levi spent a good chunk of his five years was located in a quieter part of the city which Levi had gotten accustomed to pretty fast when he moved there. He never left that area unless necessary for competitions or for schoolwork. Consequently, he was not completely used to the bustle at the center of the city,

They had settled into a diner in a small part or town with Hange offering to pay for the lunch. As soon as they had given their orders, Hange slid a document to him with the words “personal data sheet” written in bold on the top. “In the final output, you will remain anonymous, Erwin just requested we keep the basic data on everyone we study.” Hange explained.

Levi scanned the document before looking up at Hange again. By the way she had looked at him, Levi was sure she could have answered some of it for him. “Why don’t you answer it for me.“ He challenged.

“It’s your data Levi so I---”

“I wanna see how much about me you know.” Levi answered with a no-nonsense tone.

Hange turned red as she pulled the form back towards herself. She scribbled a few things on the paper. “Where do you live?”

Levi gave his city and province.

“I knew that much.” Hange admitted. “Exact address?”

Levi answered it briefly, spelling it out when needed. “How many siblings do I have? What are their names?”

“Trick question. You’re an only child.” Hange said, looking up from the data sheet.

“The number question isn’t a trick question. You can answer with zero.” Levi continued. He did not need to make an effort to keep his tone playful. He was amused already. “And how do you know about my family?”

“Interviews.” Hange answered briefly.

Levi smiled. “I know you’re an only child too.”

“How did you know that?” Hange asked.

“Interviews.” Levi could see she had relaxed, a small smile creeping up her lips.

“So you’re researching me too.” She asked.

“You started it.”

“Which city am I actually from?” Hange challenged.

“You grew up here…” Levi answered. He sat up a little straighter. Seeing the amused smile on Hange's face, Levi felt it was a good time for other questions. His mind raced as he articulated one of his passing thoughts as he read through her articles. “Which brings up the question, if you live so near campus, why do you live in your own condo?” The public transport here isn’t shit either. Levi noted to himself. She had little excuse to live alone and from the looks of her place, she seemed to come from a well off family who could at least afford a place like that.

“I wanted freedom.”

A Tale of Two Slaves

The gym was huge. It was also so complete, the coverage so comprehensive that Levi was almost inspired to take up all the sports offered. They had indoor basketball courts, tennis courts and a complete track and field set.

The important part Hange pointed out as they entered though were the devices that could measure things like speed, weight, pulse, all necessary for her study. One of the more boring parts of the tour but surprising none the least.

Levi found himself particularly fixated on the fact that Hange was greeting everyone in the job like a regular.

"Hey, you weren't at the gym this morning."

"Had to pick up my friend here. He'll be helping me with my thesis."

Levi felt a tap on his back, brief and light. Maybe hesitant? Levi could not help but entertain the passing thought that if he were Moblit or maybe anyone else, she probably would have had her arm around his shoulders. He had seen her make that gesture towards Moblit and Elijah after all.

As Hange walked towards the desk and made conversation with what looked to be the receptionist, Levi watched her from behind. At first she had seemed too nerdy and too geeky that he had expected her to be lanky under the sweaters and the white coats she wore.

That day, she was in shorts and a blouse and Levi could not help but notice how her body curved underneath her clothes, and as he focused on her legs, he could make out the subtle muscle cuts on her legs. Hange's physique was definitely more toned than average and Levi pondered Hange's own physical fitness.

Her vertical. Her endurance. Her strength. The same things she had mentioned wanting to study about him.

As Hange gave him a tour though, Levi decided that it could wait until later.

A Tale of Two Slaves

That morning, with only less than a minute to drop his bag and could only afford a glance of her room.

As he arrived back there late in the afternoon after a long tour of the gym, he had to stop himself from making a face. The fastidious side of him was silently judging Hange.

It was obvious in the way Hange had prepared the bed and the way that most tables and furniture had space for a visitor to sit or rest that Hange had at least cleaned in anticipation.

But she's a horrible cleaner.

The sofa bed was prepared but the sheets were wrinkled. The trashcan was overflowing, a disturbing sign that Hange did not segregate her trash. The dining table was empty but a display table at the corner of the room took the brunt of what Levi guessed the dining table used to carry.

There were jackets messily folded on the display table and Levi recognized her schoolbag particularly by the keychain he had returned only a few days ago.

“Make yourself at home.” Hange dropped a few towels on the sofa bed before making her way to her own bedroom. “You can use the shower in the powder room. Also, what do you want for dinner?”

“Anything.” Levi answered. He was still bothered by the state of the room to demand much of anything. The food was free, the accommodation was free, he felt guilty just complaining internally.

Hange seemed unbothered by the shitty state of her “cleaned up room.” In fact she had seemed proud as she toured him around her house. As Levi watched Hange with her goofy smile as she played with her phone in between bites of the pizza they had ordered, he could not help but feel guilty for having harbored such negative thoughts when Hange seemed more relaxed than he had seen her in a while.

“What are you watching?” Levi asked, an attempt at conversation more than anything. There were things he had wanted to ask her, yet at that moment, he felt would seem too intrusive.

Hange turned her phone to him. The video Hange had been looking at was that figure skater glided to the rink and jumped into the air, rotating quickly.

“I didn’t know you liked figure skating.” Levi said, his eyes focused on the heart on the side, to see it filled over. Hange liked the video.

“I like a lot of sports. I definitely would have wanted to try skating as a kid. Maybe gymnastics or even track."

Levi tried to imagine Hange in a tutu or a leotard, having to hold back a snort as he did. “You never looked like the type to wear a dress.”

“I wouldn’t. But I’m pretty sure you know how fun it would be to be able to launch yourself up in the air like that. You’ve done it multiple times.”

Levi thought back to the interviews he had read, the answers she had made even since grade school. I want to see how people can fly . “Why didn’t you take a sport as a kid?”

The smile she had given him after was wry, a little sullen and Levi knew he must have hit something sensitive inside her. “Because my parents didn’t allow me. If I take gymnastics, I’d break my neck. If I take skating, I’d break my spine. If I take track and field, I’d break my knees." She explained in an almost mocking town." They never ran out of excuses when it came to sports. But when it came to academics, they were always shipping me off to some new competition.”

I wanted freedom. That afternoon in the cafe, Hange had answered it so casually, he had brushed it off as they continued to fill out the data sheets. As he listened to Hange explain her situation right there, Levi could not help but recall a twinge of sadness in Hange’s voice as she had said the word “freedom.”

“Don’t get me wrong, academics can be fun.” Hange said. “But I don’t think it’s ever going to beat the adrenaline rush of jumping or sprinting.”

“And that’s why you’re going to the gym a lot now.”

“I’m in college. My parents can’t stop me now. But yeah, my childhood is done. I don’t think I’ll ever get to your level, even when I train everyday.”

Levi had heard people say that before. The body of a child is flexible, the bones and muscles can still be easily molded. By the time people grow to be adults, their body is set and sure, they could probably jump or run along a track casually, collegiate competition and professional competitions were out of the question for most if not all people who start a sport as an adult.

"Maybe I can teach you?"

A Tale of Two Slaves

The Hange in Levi’s dreams was able to fly. She was the one who would be screaming as they glided through the air in those contraptions. She had the ability to launch herself up in the air, to flip, to spin, just like the athletes in the videos she constantly followed.

Hange wasn't at all out of shape either. In fact as he saw her in gym clothes and as he watched her do a few rounds around the empty track, he had to note that her form was good. Her physique and the cuts in her muscles were also well defined. He wouldn’t have been surprised if the Hange who was watching him do rounds of jumps as she took notes was the same Hange in his dreams.

The bar Hange had set for him was clearable with little to no effort. After clearing a few rounds, enough for Hange to be satisfied with the preliminary data, he took the stopwatch from her hands and guided her to the place he had positioned himself a while ago. He opted to adjust it a few centimeters lower, at a height he had seen less skilled jumpers back in high school clear with no problems.

He spent a few minutes going through the basics with her, particularly the method of softening a landing, having seen teammates from long ago get injured from that in particular.

“You’ve seen me jump countless times. I’m sure you can do it.” Levi assured. He knew that that last part was for himself more than anything. It pained him to see her nervous. Her face was a far cry from the Hange he knew.

She should know how to do it right?

Keeping the bar at its minimum and going through that landing with Hange a few times had turned out to be a good decision. It was in the way Hange had run to the bar, through the way her eyes went wild as she ran and as she landed right next to the bar that had fallen did Levi realize though, that Hange was terrified.

Terrified yet determined. Hange went back to her starting point and prepared herself for it a few more times.

“You don’t have that bounce in your step when you take off.” Levi bounced on the balls of his feet a few times for emphasis.

Hange gave him a quick nod before readying herself to run again. Levi could see she was tired. As Hange went through the motions pre jump, Levi could feel his heart beat faster. It took him a split second longer to realize why. Hange’s motions were wild and unsynchronized.

Levi did not say anything for fear of distracting her and possibly causing injury. He found himself running towards her instead. He was too late though. By the time he had arrived by the bars, she had fallen on it. One side of the bar flailed up in the air as Hange landed and she let out a loud gasp of surprise.

“Hey, you okay?” Levi asked, as he crouched next to her. He had kept his voice soft for fear of her hearing the panic in it.

Hange was lying face up on the mat, her light brown eyes looking longingly above her.

They had started training in the stadium at four in the morning, hours before the sun was scheduled to rise. It was only when Levi saw how unnaturally light Hange’s eyes were did he realized the ceiling above them was glass, and the sun had risen enough for the light to reflect on it.

“Must be nice to fly huh?” Hange voiced out before sitting back up again. “I’m fine but I think I bruised my shoulder.” She reached out for her right shoulder with her left hand and winced.

Having been jumping almost his whole life, Levi had forgotten for a while, how difficult the mechanics would be to pick up for the average adult. While gazing at Hange who had bent her head back and continued to watch the sunrise from the glass ceiling, Levi continued to reflect on it. If it were any other person, he probably would have even removed the bar as he thought them the mechanics.

The game changer in those particular circumstances was that it was Hange he was teaching, the subject of his dreams, the one who was flying with him from tree to tree in the forest. The one who was smiling and doing backflips, provoking him to chase her. For the life of him, Levi could not believe that she was not able to clear that jump.

A Tale of Two Slaves

The sullen mood of a while ago quickly dissipated to something a little more bearable when Levi suggested they play on the trampolines adjacent to the track.

It had felt ridiculous at first. As Hange continued to gaze upward, mumbling about wanting to fly and as Levi himself dealt with the disappointment of what just happened, it had seemed like a logical suggestion.

It was the most mindless way he could come up with to get both of them flying and jumping and maybe, get them both cheered up in the process. They only had to bounce a few times for it to be exciting. After a few bounces, Hange started to laugh, she started to scream in excitement.

The same excited scream he had heard so many times before in his dreams. Levi found himself staring at Hange as she jumped. The spark in her eye was brighter than it had ever been. Her cheeks were starting to flush from what could have been excitement or exhaustion. After what could have been a few more minutes of jumping, Hange landed on her ass and let out a loud laugh in between gasps.

“Something tells me you haven’t done this before.” Levi said as he settled on the floor of the trampoline next to her.

“Parents didn’t allow me.They said I’d break my ankle.” Hange answered, after she had gotten control of her ragged breathing. She was sweaty and flushed but she looked carefree.

That was the Hange Levi was familiar with. Before Levi even noticed it, he had brought out his hand and lightly touched her on the side of her arm. Oddly enough, she did not resist the light and quick squeeze he had given her. As Levi looked closely at her, he guessed she probably didn’t notice or didn’t care. He quickly let go of her arm, a few seconds after he had noticed the odd action. Before that, he had allowed himself a few seconds to process the warmth of her skin and the up and down movement that came with her heavy breathing. It was oddly calming and assuring.

She's real. She's alive. She's warm and she's breathing.

Soon after that, they were kicked out of the gym. Actually, no one had kicked them out. The Sunday gym goers though had taken up their territory on the track as they started their warmups. Levi and Hange soon realized their time was up. The rude awakening to that reality had felt like they were being kicked out anyway.

It also turned out the giant trampoline Levi suggested they played on was only for the children's use. One reason, Hange had never bothered to touch it even when she did frequent the gym.

Hange had sleepily explained that part to him as she sprawled herself on the sofa of her condominium that afternoon. The early morning in the gym had left her exhausted. She fell asleep soon after and Levi could not help but notice the smile on her face as she slept. He wondered if she usually smiled in her sleep.

Levi settled himself on one of the chairs around the dining table in a good position to watch her, busying himself by going through all the Instagram profiles Hange had followed, following them using his own account. Some of the videos were in slow motion and Levi found himself in that same blackhole as Hange had been in many times before, begrudgingly agreeing that Hange was right.

The slow motion videos in particular showed the detail. The way the legs make a slight bounce before launching up, the slight movements the body made as it is suspended in the air. Levi knew there was a lot of body coordination involved in getting the highest vertical possible. Seeing the body work together, the miniscule movements all cooperating to get the jumper spinning, flipping or twisting was oddly satisfying. Levi was distracted, so distracted the only thing that could break it was the vibration of his phone accompanying the banner on top.

Coach Greg.

Levi was once again pulled out of his blackhole. Of course he’d have to train. He had missed multiple trainings the past week due to the wound in his knee. He had also missed yesterday morning’s training having to meet Hange. Their season was starting in a few weeks and he was their best chance at a championship that year. Levi wasn’t too surprised that their coach was more than ready to run through drills with him on a Sunday night.

After a few minutes of digging through Hange’s unit, Levi managed to unearth a pile of post-its and a pen. Thank you for letting me stay over. Gotta run. He wrote. He kept it short and simple, knowing he would probably end up chatting with her soon anyway. He stuck it on the dining table, slung his overnight bag over his shoulder and silently left the room.

As he took the train back to campus, Levi continued on his little blackhole. A video was just released, taken in a tournament in Russia just a few days back.

Quad Queen Alexandra Trusova.

Levi did not know his way around figure skating jumps but he found himself watching it in slow motion anyway. The sped up version was surprising but the slow motion version that followed was mesmerizing. Levi counted four spins in the air, noting both the slight bounce before the jump and the bounce that followed the landing.

As Levi refreshed the video on his phone, he could not help but notice that Hange’s name still wasn’t among those who had liked the photo. Was she still asleep?

He could only imagine the smile she makes as she watches videos. He clicked the paper airplane icon below the videos, scrolled through the users and clicked send on Wingsoffreedom132. He made sure to add a wings emoji and a heart emoji, the way Hange had done in a few of the videos.

Somehow, after doing that, it became easier to imagine that goofy smile a little more vividly.

#levihan #levi ackerman #hange zoe #levi x hange #levi x hanji #fanfic

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seiin-translations · 3 years

Text

2.43 S1 Chapter 1.7 - Young Yunichika

7. (COOL BUT WORST) PLAYMAKER

Translation Notes

1. The term used here, 球威, means “pitcher’s stuff”, which basically refers to how effective a pitch is at being the pitch it’s supposed to be

2. Refers to the popular myth/saying/action that writing the character for “person” on your hand and then pretending swallowing it will relieve stress

3. Some neat wordplay here. アタッカー並み means on par with an attacker, but 並みのアタッカー means average attacker

Previous || Index || Next

He felt like he could see Haijima’s smug face painted on the raised set. It was after the opponent blocker fell for the decoy in front of the net and jumped. Kuroba jumped in from behind the decoy with a back-row attack. From the point of view of the opponent blocker, a new shadow suddenly shot out from above the decoy’s head. This was the combination they were best at, called a pipe attack, and it should have been already analyzed by the opponent, but it felt great to be given a face of astonishment that said, “How did you appear there!?” every time. This is the moment when I’m the coolest one on the court.

Haijima’s sets were completely different than his senpai setter’s sets from last year. Kuroba still couldn’t explain it in theory, but even though his senpai’s sets were a big arch that “went up and fell down,” Haijima’s sets “didn’t fall down.” The ball was thrown “straight” to the place where it could only be reached by stepping in the fastest, jumping the highest and swinging his arms at the highest point. If he didn’t stop it, it would just whoosh past him. In practice, he constantly missed the timing and missing the ball, which ended into arguments. While he became reckless everyday, desperate to stop the ball next time for sure—a strange phenomenon occurred today.

As long as he jumped and swung his arms with all strength, the ball would be there. The sets fitted into his hands so cleanly, like they were sticking to his hands, that there was not even a millimeter of deviation. All he had to do was to add power and hit it out with a nice feeling. He cut through the gaps in the opponents’ defense, who were unable to take a step, and landed after seizing the ball with his eyes until it pierced the court. “Yes!” he pumped his arm into the air, still on his knees.

“Yuni!”

“You were so cool!”

While his gathered teammates messed up his hair, he searched for Haijima. He caught a glimpse of Haijima, who was always on the outside of circles like these. Haijima smiled thinly and nodded.

The rotation moved once, and Kuroba came up to the front row right after he did a back-row attack in the back row. When Haijima went down from the front row to serve in exchange, they exchanged a low high-five as they passed each other.

July 26th. The first round of the boys’ volleyball division for the Prefectural Middle School Summer Games, taking place on the two courts of A and B in the Suzumu City Municipal Gymnasium. In the first game on Court A, Monshiro Middle already took the first set. For the second set, the other side came close in the middle of the game because of a disordered receive, but they didn’t allow them to form a comeback and extended a wide lead again to close out the set. It was a three-set match, so if they took this set, they would have a straight-set win.

Haijima moved back considerably in the service zone, almost to the wall, and got into the serve position. He put the ball in his left hand and extended his arm straight out in front of him. His narrow eyes were narrowed even more sharply and he stared at the other side of the net with a fixed gaze. For a moment, the stands that were cheering loudly fell deathly silent. Everyone held their breaths at the clear, intimidating something Haijima was clad in.

Taking just one second to lightly adjust his breathing, he tossed the ball up high without any perceivable jump and hit a powerful jump serve from a beautiful, textbook-like form. The gym became filled with cheers that bordered on roars once again.

But it was a bit too long. It’s out—Kuroba could see it in his eyes, but there was no time for the receiver to avoid it. The ball bounced up all the way to the ceiling with such tremendous power (1) that the receiver nearly fell over.

Ah——.

His body moved naturally before he could think about it, and he jumped. Above the net, he caught hold of the ball that returned directly and knocked it down to the opponent’s court.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

Since sixteen schools participated in the first round, the passages behind the gym were crowded with players in jerseys of all sorts of colors, teachers, and management staff.

“Somehow while I was in a daze…”

“We won!”

“With a team of only eight people!”

“Yuni, you reacted well to that direct one.”

“Well, I guess. For some reason, I feel like I can see the ball really well today. Also, when I see the opponent’s faces, I somehow know what they’re gonna do.”

“What the hell’s that, that sounds cool. I’m falling for you!”

“We should have talked to the girls from class more. All I could hear was the moms’ voices.”

“Agh, I was switching the moms’ voices with the girls’ voices in my head, but you just dragged me back to reality!”

Having finished their match in good time, everyone was still in good spirits, and there was a constant stream of excited chatter. It seemed that the match that started at the same time in Court B was carried over to the third set, so muffled cheers and the sound of the ball bouncing could be heard. When he wondered why this extremely stupid conversation never ended, he realized that it was because Haijima wasn’t there to chop through the mood. He was supposed to be with them when they left the court, but…

Their advisor, who had said he was going to drop by the management headquarters, came back just then.

“Sensei, do you know where Haijima is?”

“He went back inside. The second match in Court A is about to start soon. He said that he’s going to go watch it since it’ll decide who we face in the second round.”

“Eh…He didn’t have to go alone.”

If it’s for our next opponent, then shouldn’t we all go scouting them out, not just Haijima? A tinge of dissatisfaction sprouted in his heart as he thought that he should have at least called out to them.

“Didn’t Haijima want to give you guys a break because he was worried? You’re fine now, but if you get too excited, you won’t enough energy for the second round.”

Haijima worried about them? It was a phenomenon that seemed like it wouldn’t happen even if the heavens and earth were turned upside-down. It was exactly a phenomenon. It was equal to a natural disaster that only happened once every few hundred million years or so.

But, it was true that playing two games in one day was unfamiliar terrain for them. Although everyone seemed to be in good condition right now, it was hard to predict how tired they would be in the second game.

“But, you know, I knew Haijima had volleyball experience, but I didn’t expect him to be that good. Even when I stopped by the headquarters earlier, teachers from other schools kept coming up to me and asking who that player was.”

“Hey, what about me? They didn’t ask about me?”

“Hmm? They didn’t.”

“Tch. My efforts always get overshadowed by Haijima.”

When he pouted and grumbled that, he was soothed with “You’ve got this from now on.”

“Keep this up for the second round. Don’t get too worked up about it and just have fun with everyone.”

He thought he was in good form and stood out quite a bit, but he guessed that Haijima’s skill was so outstanding that his own level wasn’t enough to leave an impression. He couldn’t believe that he was getting noticed by the volleyball team advisors from other schools, who was probably much more discerning than their own advisor.

“We’re gonna win”—Haijima was extremely confident, but at the same time, he was a realist. He never gave lenient assessments to himself or others, and he wasn’t the type of guy who would say soft and easy effort goals like “It would be nice if we could win.” He said that back then because he had a serious expectation that was possible.

He had a feeling now that it really might not be a dream if Haijima was there.

If they won four times, they won the championship. They had already cleared one match. Three more to go.

We can…reach it…?

I want to win, he thought. I want to win next time too. And after that. And then if we win after that—. When he heard it in June, he felt a lot of bewilderment, but now for the first time, he definitely wanted to win. His heart began to beat fast.

***

Right when they entered the venue since the time for the second round’s official practice was approaching, cheers similar to an angry roar rose up, and the entire team leaned back in the same direction despite themselves.

A horizontal banner—which wasn’t there in the first round—with the words “Monshiro Middle School Boys’ Volleyball Team” written with excessively good handwriting was hanging from the second-row bleachers. And next to that, there was a square flag with “Spread your wings! Kuroba UNIVERSE!”

His face turned hot.

“Wow. Yuni’s cheering squad is amazing.”

“It’s like we’re at Koshien.”

His teammates were more taken aback and put off rather than being jealous. Their parents formed a small cheering squad for the first round, but it was just a modest thing where they cheered for their children on the spot, with no bells and whistles or anything else. The huge cheering party that newly appeared completely swallowed that up, sounding their megaphones loudly and as for his relatives, they were shouting in voices that couldn’t be called refined.

“…That’s Grandpa’s writing.”

On a pure-white cloth, the words “Monshiro Middle School Boys’ Volleyball Team” were written in bold, stirring letters like a rampaging dragon in all black ink. Come to think of it, when he went out this morning, his mother was in a hurry making phone calls to here and there. It would have been better if his family had just come here modestly instead of taking the time to organize something like that and be late for the first round.

The other one, “Spread your wings! Kuroba UNIVERSE!”, had a black background and decorated with sparkly gold tinsel, and it was a lot more lowbrow than his grandfather’s single brush stroke. Right above where that deathly embarrassing flag—which he thought of as more like harassment—was hanging, he saw Itoko shouting into a huge megaphone. …If she had the time to prepare that, she could have come for the first round. You should have seen that really nice back-row attack in the first round.

Yorimichi…didn’t seem to have come. He couldn’t spot him as far as he could see. He was sure he would have heard that there was a game today through Itoko.

“Oh, Haijima, your grandma came. I wonder if my mom also invited her.”

He tugged on Haijima’s uniform and whispered that into his ear. “Huh…” Haijima didn’t look all that happy as he looked up at the stands, straining his eyes as a wrinkle formed between his brows.

“Can’t see her.”

“Right there. She’s above ‘team.’”

“Even with contacts, my eyes aren’t as good as yours. It’s fine.”

He immediately gave up and returned his eyes to the court.

“Concentrate, Kuroba.”

He said in a low tone. He can see Haijima’s consciousness narrowing and condensing. As though saying that the world he needed only existed inside that nine-by-eighteen-meter court, he raised his awareness by shutting out outside gazes and cheers. He could feel that the power of his concentration that made his skin tingle just by being next to him.

“Y-Yeah. Got it.”

Kuroba responded vigorously with all his might, but even if he took his eyes off the stands, he couldn’t get rid of the feeling of being surrounded his relatives’ faces, faces, faces from 360 degrees.

The rotation started with Haijima on the right back as the server and Kuroba “diagonal” to him on the left front. The rotation was made so that Haijima, who was strong at serving, got to serve as much as possible, and either one of the tall Kuroba and Haijima was always in the front row. There were six people, so there were three pairs of players connected by diagonal lines, and one’s partner was called one’s “diagonal.” The diagonal relationship was always maintained even when the rotation moved. However, when he became absentminded, he sometimes lost track of his current position, which was quite confusing.

Back-row players weren’t allowed to jump up to block, and they could only spike by doing a back-row attack from behind the attack line (the line three meters from the net).

As though saying that victory went to the one who made the first move, Haijima smashed in a jump serve with all his might from the very beginning. A jump serve was hit with a lot of force, and consequently had a high risk of error. In practice games, Haijima used a low-risk jump float serve, but right when he wondered what he was going to do in the official match today, he was actively using a jump serve.

Regrettably, it went behind the end line and was out, giving their opponent their first point, but the air in the opposing court was frozen for a moment.

“Don’t worry about it!”

His teammates called out to him, but Haijima didn’t seem to care about the mistake in the first place and unashamedly responded lightly with one hand, staring over the net with a brazen expression as though that was his substitute for a greeting. Even though it didn’t result in a point, he had successfully planted the seed of fear in them that made them think, “What would happen if that had gone in?”—Their amount of experience was different by one or two orders of magnitude. And more than anything, the fearsomeness of Haijima was that he had such nerves of steel.

Haijima was making the game in a literal sense. As a setter, he didn’t just set up his teammates’ offensive, but also controlled the mood in the opponent’s court. He of course knew that the difference between their amounts of experience couldn’t be filled in overnight, but he felt strangely impatient.

He felt like it took an awfully long time for his own first serve order to come around. He impatiently waited for the rotation to move, and when he went down into the service zone and was about to receive the ball,

“…ba! Kuroba!”

Haijima’s voice burst into his ear, and he jumped. He was so out of it that he didn’t hear him, as though there was a membrane around his head. He looked and saw Haijima pointing to the right position of the front row with an unusually anxious look on his face.

The color drained out of his face. The rotation was wrong. He was in the front row for one more time. Nagato, who was in the original service order, was standing confused in a halfway place.

“S-sorry.”

“No, it’s my fault too. I thought I got it wrong when Yuni moved back…”

He talked to Nagato and hurried back to his defensive position. Haijima was about to go to him to say something, but the whistle prompting Nagato to serve sounded. The cheering squad was noisy in the stands, probably because they didn’t understand why the server was suddenly changed.

Something’s wrong…I can hear the voices from the stands well, but the voices on the court are distant. He almost felt like he was standing in the bleachers right now, not on the court.

He felt the rotation was moving quickly, contrary to earlier. His sense of time wasn’t stable. The wrong service order came around this time, and he ran to the serve zone and received the ball. He stood facing the net and took a deep breath to try to calm down, but couldn’t breathe in deeply.

Haijima’s first jump serve suddenly replayed in his mind. Kuroba also practiced the jump serve. He was getting able to hit the ball squarely more and more, and practice could be exhilarating sometimes. It would no doubt feel good to carry out that kind of thing successfully in a game. He would be able to show the cheering squad his good points, but of course his accuracy was not yet usable, so he made sure to do a jump float serve as usual…

Huh? Which foot do I usually step forward with? What’s the timing for the toss? What’s ‘usual’?

His usual way of doing things had completely slipped out of his mind.

Beep—.

The whistle sounded.

He didn’t immediately understand what the signal meant. Something was wrong. His own court was in a panic. After the referee showed the opposing team’s score, he made an “8” sign with his fingers.

An eight second violation!?

The spectators were buzzing once again about the point loss that was difficult to understand to the layman’s eye. If you didn’t serve within eight seconds after the whistle sounded, your opponent scored. It wasn’t like he didn’t hear the first whistle. And yet, he himself had absolutely no idea why he made such a basic mistake.

Haijima made a hand gesture towards the bench, and the advisor, who received it, hurriedly requested a timeout.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

“You’re nervous, aren’t you.”

Haijima poked him above his heart with his fist. He didn’t seem angry, but he was definitely fed up. A series of careless mistakes that had nothing to do with the play itself.

“Do you have stage fright or something?”

“Ugh… I’ve never really been in a situation where I’ve gotten stage fright, so I don’t know.”

Was he nervous? He was aware that he was overly concerned with unnecessary things. During the first round, he was able to see the court so well and concentrate on his own task. He knew what he should do without thinking about it and his body moved. It was as if he was being made use of by being incorporated as a part of the organic matter that was the game Haijima finished weaving. He wasn’t displeased with that at all; rather, he felt euphoric. And yet, after they entered the second round, that feeling suddenly stopped, his field of vision abruptly narrowed, and only the voices in his mind increased.

Haijima sighed at him.

“Write down ‘people’ and swallow it.” (2)

“Can’t, can’t you give better advice?”

“I’ve never been nervous. I could tell you all about play, though.”

He felt like he was being shown the disparity between them again. “Can’t be helped, Yuni. If that many of my relatives came, I’d get nervous too. Don’t worry about mistakes.” Though everyone else encouraged him, the sigh Haijima alone had given him weighed heavily on him.

The thirty second timeout went by in the blink of an eye. In the end, he noisily dashed back to the court without putting his feelings in order.

Anyways, there was nothing to do but to recover from here. Right when he moved back to the rear, he immediately got a gesture for a pipe attack from Haijima. It was a fast back-row attack from the middle using the center’s A-quick as a decoy, which was the source of their points in the first round. The shocked face of the opposing blocker who was drawn in by the decoy and jumped at it when he jumped in from over the center’s head was so satisfying—.

“!?”

This time he kept blocking. The do-or-die expression of the opposing blocker appeared from the other side of the net that was like a towering wall, blocking the course. How—!? The ball crashed straight onto the block and was knocked down onto his own side. While falling on his behind from the excess momentum, words such as “What?” came out of his mouth.

As he let his mind wander for a moment and stared at the opposing court, where there were fervent roars, from beneath the net, his teammate was held out in front of him. After he borrowed that hand and stood up, he reflexively drew back his hand when he saw that it was Haijima.

“Sorry.”

An apology slipped out of his mouth. For what? Getting blocked? Drawing back his hand?

“It’s fine. There was no helping that. They’ve already guessed that you’re the only one who could hit it properly. We should have marked them thoroughly.”

Haijima seemed to have accepted the former’s apology. His eyes never left the opponent’s court, where they were exchanging high-fives and celebrating, and spoke quickly. If the only decent hitter was Kuroba, and he was marked for it…then what were they going to do?

Haijima gave him a sharp side glance. He looked fed up again.

“I told you not to let it show on your face… Shake off the guy blocking you as much as possible. However, don’t think you’re not being marked, stay calm and watch the block. I told you about straight and cross. They’re not at a level where you can’t get rid of them.”

Well, from Haijima’s level, middle school volleyball in a rural prefecture like this would seem like a piece of cake. The prefectural finals in a place like this was probably the same size as a subdivision preliminary in Tokyo. It was no consolation for him, as it only deepened his inferiority complex.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

Haijima scattered his sets to other attackers, but Kuroba always had a block on him whether he hit or not. The opponent seemed to think that as long as Kuroba was suppressed, the rest of the team couldn’t hit too hard, so they could respond with receives. Unfortunately, it was an effective strategy.

Although the team was able to score some modest points with Haijima’s skillful direction, they still were unable to score consecutively due to the lack of a decisive blow. The seesaw game where stress accumulated continued. No, in terms of overall team morale, the flow was completely on the other side. There were more and more situations where the receives were so disordered that even Haijima had trouble covering them, and when he couldn’t get the set, the rest of the team couldn’t do anything.

Far from regaining his composure, Kuroba was experiencing the sensation of gears steadily becoming less and less aligned. Even though his mind was panicking, his body wouldn’t work together with it. It was like his head and body were doing on their own thing on this side and the other side of the court. While his spike success rate had decreased, moreover, at the beginning there were many times where he would slam the ball into a block and get shut-out, and it became noticeable that he was making the mistake of getting it caught in the net himself, let alone hitting the ball into the blocking.

“Just stop looking at the blocks. It’s better not to. Don’t think about avoiding them, just hit it where it’s easy to hit.”

Haijima pulled on his uniform and whispered that, but he was only extra confused by the change in instructions. Didn’t he say “Watch their blocks” earlier?

Did my jump power go down? Aren’t my legs getting tired? The instant he realized that this is what it was to play two games in a day, his body suddenly became heavy. Are my knees okay? Don’t I feel more burdened than usual? He suddenly started to worry about the growing pains that should have been unrelated to this. What if that thing that hurts so much I couldn’t sleep at night hits me during the match? What do I do? What do I do? What do I do——?

Haijima was saying something from his diagonal position to him. But he couldn’t hear his voice. He could probably hear him physically, but his heart was blocking his ears. Listening to Haijima’s just reasonings now was of no use whatsoever.

Do you, who's completely disconnected from nervousness or agitation, have the words that I want, the words that will help me? I don’t think so.

He didn’t remember at what point—Haijima turned away with a look of resignation on his face. Ah, if Haijima has given up, then this was already a complete loss, he thought.

For some reason, only a small click of his tongue and the word “useless” reached his ears without being cut off.

***

“Get in line, Yuni.”

It was only when Nagato called out to him that he realized that the game was over. A smattering of applause came down from the stands. When he absentmindedly looked at the score board that was still standing on the court, he saw that the set count was 2-0, and the winner—Monshiro Middle School.

…Wait, what? Did something…happen…? I have almost no memory of touching the ball…

Even when he looked over the faces of his teammates standing in a line along the end line, he didn’t actually feel like they had won at all. Were these really the faces of a winning team? The atmosphere was not as merry as it had been when they won the first round, and everyone looked somewhat apathetic and subdued. And maybe it was just his imagination, but the applause from the stands seemed like it was just done out of politeness.

When he was about to line up next to Haijima, who was standing there with his expression erased, he recalled it along with the flashbacks of some scenes—it was all Haijima's doing.

Haijima’s play changed after that tongue click and badmouthing.

The jump serve was of course incredible, but Haijima’s original domain was at the net. At the net, the control of the ball was not passed over to anyone—neither opponents nor even his own teammates. Rather than entrusting the set to the attacker, the cases where he hit the ball by himself by performing dumps increased dramatically. A dump was a surprise attack where the setter pretended to set the ball and returned it to the opponent’s court with their left hand, but the power of the dump released from the left hand of the ambidextrous Haijima was not confined to the level of a surprise attack. He smashed it into the opposing court with the same power as an attacker spiking with all of their strength. It should have temporarily made the opponents agitated and close the score gap considerably.

However, it was from there that Haijima showed his demon-like true power. When the opponent marked his dumps and started to block it, he switched from hitting hard to deliberately hitting the ball lightly at the head of the block where they jumped with power in preparation for a strong hit to make it drop to his own side. He pulled off the feat of getting down low to pick up the rebound that gently dropped down without a moment’s delay and swinging it to a nearby teammate with an underhand pass and the instructions “Give it to me!” This time, he used his right hand to smash the ball that was set to him by his panicking teammate into the opponent’s side.

The venue was stunned by the powerful spike that was on par with an attacker’s, or even stronger than an average attacker’s (3), and even the referee’s whistle was a beat late.

How was he able to do that…? It was technical, but more than that, what kind of nerves did he had that enabled him to play in a way that overturned the foundation of team sports like that in front of people?

To be honest, Haijima, you’re…disgusting.

When he heard “Thank you,” he hurriedly matched them in a small voice and bowed. For an instant, he felt as if the shadow of Haijima standing next to him broke out of its human shell and swelled up into a warped shape, and a shiver ran down his spine.

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#2.43: Seiin Koukou Danshi Volley-bu #2.43 translation #2.43 book 1

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