#now question is do i include and the sea became blood in this

[crown-ov-horns]

My stupid OTP

and their stupid theme song

#Spotify #warrior nun #ava silva #adriel #warrior nun fandom #wn fandom #diary pages #playlist #otp #ava x adriel #avadriel #otp playlist #ghost #alba baptista #william miller #music #this song so gives s1 finale #but their possible dynamic in general #because even though he used his insights for manipulation i do believe he saw through the scars inside her #and they're both opposites and more like each other than they (or the fandom) want to believe #they'd make one hell of a force together #now question is do i include and the sea became blood in this #because this is temptation by the devil #atsbb is... less that since she's also a divine being #but i guess it works... because he's the only one who truly sees her and the only one she feels she can lean on eventually #atsbb differs a bit from my usual wn storylines

[madsfrank]

This isn't a request or anything just some thought sharing but I-

I'm kinda obsessed with the thought of Sole going to the glowing sea all alone. They couldn't possibly ask anyone else to come there with them, not when they know the risks. So they go alone. One night they and their companion go to sleep only for the companion to wake up alone with a note (or a holotape) next to them explaining where Sole had went, what they planned to do.

Sole knows it's near suicide to go there, alone or not, they won't let anyone but themselves to take that risk

The synths and robots aren't immune to deathclaws, the rest are at risk of radiation poisoning and deathclaws, and frankly they don't want to risk Hancock going feral just because they dragged him in there, so they go alone

Maybe the companions go after them only for them to get to the edge of the sea just as Sole is coming back

DONT MAKE MY CRY. 😭😭

No, I absolutely agree with this idea. I’ll add that sole knows they have been exposed to the least amount of radiation. They have the best chance of walking out alive.

Now, the question is, does sole wear power armor? I’m gonna go with they do…cause it’s suicide in game if you don’t, lol.

Anyways…(idc if it’s not a request you’re getting your damn reaction lol)

Not including cods or strong or any of those guys bc this is more of a romance prompt sooo.

X6 also isnt included because he wouldn’t have met sole yet…so…

• Cait

Waking up…feeling that emptiness beside her that she was so used to…sole’s absence didn’t even alert her at first. She was so used to being alone.

Now, frantically, she searched around their shred room in sanctuary, before finding a holotape hidden between some detective cases on sole’s personal desk.

When she heard…in sole’s own voice say not to follow them…and that they love her…her breathing became shallow and fast.

Screw what sole says, they aren’t leaving her behind.

(Basically running like the flint Lockwood meme) she makes it to the edge of the Glowing Sea. She forgot most of her gear and was basically just clutching a few bags of radaway

Looking beyond the mess of fog and broken trees, she sees a massive form…

…more specifically the shape of power armor.

“Sole! You bastard!”

She’s crying as sole steps out of the power armor…collapsing onto the ground…coughing up blood and gasping for air.

She gladly tosses Sole all of her Radaway…basically pouring it down their throat.

When sole wakes up…against a tree nearby..Cait is punching their arm…asking them why…why they would leave alone…that there could have been another way.

Sole knows the truth though, it had to be them.

• Curie

In her new body…she was so used to sleeping next to sole…feeling their warmth…now gone suddenly.

She jolts awake, quickly feeling herself go cold…even colder when she saw the private note written to her.

She figured as much, she calculated it. They were gone…most likely out there…suffering or even…dead.

Quickly, she gathered a supply of stimpacks and radaway from their shared home and took off towards the Glowing Sea.

…seeing them…at the edge of the sea…collapsed next to a suit of power armor…she thought it might have been too late.

She wasn’t strong enough to draw them away by herself so she utilized the power armor

Once out of the danger zone, she began stimming them and inserting the Radaway into their veins.

Hearing them cough and moan in pain nearly broke her heart. She payed on top of them in exhaustion, having rested for the first time since she set out for them.

Sole will drag their arm over her form…thinking about all the pain they just put her through and having to remember that there was no other way.

…the only other way would’ve meant losing her.

And they just couldn’t risk that.

• Danse

Danse is a military man. Waking up alone had never bothered him before.

He didn’t wake up immediately. When he did awake, he didn’t even put together that sole had went to the Glowing Sea

But that damn holotape…

He wasn’t sad…he was angry…he could’ve grabbed a suit and followed him

He’s a damn synth he should be able to handle more radiation. He should…he…

“SHIT”

Danse grabs a supply bag for himself and for sole before leaving their homestead.

The trek was long…but Danse prayed it wouldn’t be too long.

Reaching the edge of the glowing sea…he saw them. Their damn near lifeless form nearby a suit of tattered power armor

A deathclaw had gotten to it

“God no…no no no…sole…”

He easily carried them out of the irradiated area and into an abandoned home…laying them on a bed full of dried blood.

He felt them breathing and instantly got hit with adrenaline…he quickly gave them Stimpacks and Radaway. Then, he just sat nearby in silence and prayed silently to whatever deity would listen.

When they awoke..he’d be right there…his eyelids heavy but soles safety was much more important.

He’d never watch them die…never…not like this…

…he knew it would always be him first.

• Deacon

Being alone for so long…he wondered why he woke up so fast…noticing the warmth next to him gone.

“Christ, no”

He already knew though. He already knew…even without the handwritten note next to his pillow…

He couldn’t even bring himself to read it. He was so…upset? He basically threw it away.

He didn’t even try to make sense of his emotions as he gathered a heap of railroad supplies to track them down with.

His mind was racing with thoughts he couldn’t make sense of the whole trip…they couldn’t just leave him like this…even if it WAS because they cared.

Coming to the edge of the sea…he spotted them.

They were covered in blood…power armor long abandoned.

He wasn’t a hugger, but literally forced them into his arms…not even caring about how heavily irradiated they were.

Pulling them against him and out of the Glowing Sea, he applied what he brought with him…bringing them out of their pain and suffering.

“Don’t ever do that again…I…Dez…someone could have helped you…don’t leave me behind here.”

Sole had to go though…they knew they had the best chance…and they could risk loosing the only man in this whole damn wasteland with hope.

The only man…who they loved.

• Gage

“Shit…”

He already knew when he woke up.

He knew sole was a damn hard head and this just proved it…

“Leaving alone to protect some damn raider?” He said aloud as he read sole’s note to him.

He was pissed that sole would not take him with them…he could have protected them…

It’s not even worth it to go out there alone…there has to be another way…there just had to be…

He’d gather up a few supplies before storming off…prepared to give sole a earful

However…when he found them…laying in the dirt face down…his expression shifted.

“Shit…hey, boss?”

He’d soon try to focus on their faint breathing before hurriedly giving them Stimpacks and Radaway to ease their pain.

He then prop them up and take them in a tight grip

“Sole, you idiot…let me go with you…I’m just a raider…I’m expendable…your not”

Sole would shush him before trying to convince him that it had to be them…

But sole knew Gage would never believe them…because sole knew that gage really cared…

…maybe he was the only one that did.

• Hancock

Hancock’s late-night jet trip kept him asleep well after sole left.

Waking up, he didn’t register the fact they had gone. When it did though..he felt more hurt than when he started becoming a ghoul.

The holotape only made things worse.

Gathering up what little supplies they kept within their home, he took as much as he could carry and began the not-too-far hike to the Glowing Sea.

They were collapsed against a tree…breathing shallow enough they could have been mistaken as dead.

Luckily they were already out of the high amounts of radiation.

He gave them much needed care, as much as a man like him could figure out how to do without needing an actual doctor.

“Don’t you dare do that to me again, sunshine. Now I’ve gotta haul your ass to a doctor”

Truthfully, he understood why they left without him…he could go feral.

But that doesn’t mean they should have gone alone.

Sole had never been happier to see him, but they felt that familiar pang of guilt. They knew they had to be the one…so why…why did seeing hancock’s expression hurt them so much?

After a while of Hancock just holding them close, he looked up at them:

“Your the only damn thing I care about…don’t go taking off on me now”

There was that smile…that damned smile

And soon, all their pain felt small again.

• Maccready

Maccready was a very, very light sleeper. Duncan being young and his past trauma made sure of that.

It’s a wonder he didn’t catch sole climbing out of bed before they left…but seeing as how well they knew him…they also knew how to stay quiet.

He played that damn holotape on loop and could believe anything that he was hearing.

“S-sole?”

He felt…hurt and..betrayed? He didn’t know.

He was always open with how he was willing to walk to the ends of the earth with sole.

But…he knew in his heart that they were more well equipped…

“Don’t think like that!”

Shaking off the fact that they may have been right to go alone, he gathered supplies and began his own way to the glowing sea…and being a traveler himself…made it in record time.

…oh god…

They were covered in blood and laying at the edge of the Sea.

He didn’t know a damn thing about wound-tending…and he all he could think about was how they were gonna die…how it was gonna be Lucy all over again and then he’d be alone…

His mind found his hands already getting to work on half-assedly patching the love of his life up. Hitting them with Stimpacks and Radaway as needed.

His eyes would lock with theirs:

“Don’t do this to me, beautiful…don’t you dare…I..”

Sole would shush him and draw him into a hug. Holding him tight and near sobbing into his shoulder.

“Never again…never..don’t do that, sole”

But sole would do it., again and again, if it meant keeping Mac out of danger.

• Nick

They had stayed over at the agency, Nick had awoken in the middle of the night, per usual as he really didn’t sleep…only to find them gone.

The handwritten note…

Oh boy…just them he knew what happened

“Trying to protect an old bot like me, huh?”

It’s not like he could very well be upset, he’d have done it for them…he was…going to do it for them.

Deathclaws ran wild out in the Glowing Sea…and he knew sole was just trying to protect them as they had the only set of power armor.

However, Nick was worried, very worried. So, he gathered up supplies from Ellie and took of to the Glowing Sea.

When he made it to the edge of the green-hazed air, he saw sole limping back through the thick fog.

“Sole! Over here!” Nick called, praying they would hear.

They did hear.

Nick then would catch them in his arms…not minding the blood from their clawed leg on his coat.

He gently applied a Stimpack followed by his Radaway supply.

“Don’t you go getting yourself killed. I’ve been out here a lot longer, I would have gone instead of you.”

Sole just nods into his shoulder, smiling.

Nick meant it too, he’d do anything for sole.

• Piper

Piper was used to sleeping with one eye open. This was because of Nat. If something ever happened to her…Piper would be listening.

So it’s no surprise that she felt sole’s absence in their shared bed.

“Blue…?”

She’d call sole’s name to no response and would quickly become frantic.

“Blue…where are ya blue?”

Again…no response. That’s when she’d find the holotape and play it.

“No…”

Without thinking she’d grab the supplies she had available and would make her way to the Glowing Sea…hoping she would make it in time.

Upon reaching the edge of the green hellhole, she’d see sole, decked out in the remaining pieces of power armor.

Sole would basically fall out of the suit upon seeing the familiar red trench coat. However, the were to weak to stand and embrace her.

Piper would do the rest. Giving sole need medical care and telling them that they were safe.

“Don’t do that to me…please…you and Nat are all that I have left”

Sole knew it wouldn’t be the last time they pulled something stupid…after all, they had a son to find and someone to protect.

• Preston

Preston wakes up at the crack of dawn pretty much so he quickly would realize sole’s absence… and immediately knew why they were gone.

Preston is a very emotionally open man with sole and sole alone. So he actively discussed the trip to the glowing sea with sole the night before.

This was all to sole brushing off the question with “we can talk about it later”

He knew that they didn’t want him to worry about him…but he did worry…in fact he was rather upset that they had up and left…leaving only a note behind explaining what they planned on doing.

He’d silently curse, leaving sanctuary with all the supplies he could muster as he headed out into a cold, early morning

Along the trip, he began to think about his emotions…he was upset and worried, yes, but…

Anyone else would have made him go…the settlers would have…but sole…

They cared.

Upon reaching the wide open area before the Glowing Sea…he saw sole tending to their broken power armor

They would greet him…before coughing and nearly collapsing.

To that, Preston would apply Stimpacks and Radaway.

“Sole…babe…I know you want to keep me safe and I’m so..very grateful for that…for you…but please, next time, wake me at least?”

Sole agreed to his surprising light terms with tears in their eyes.

Preston knew sole, they weren’t gonna stop caring. They needed to do everything they could to find their son…he just hoped next time the would communicate better.

#fallout #fallout 4 #fallout series #fo4 #paladin danse #danse #fallout maccready #fallout 4 maccready #fo4 maccready #fallout 4 deacon #fallout 4 companions deacon #deacon #piper wright #piper fo4 #preston garvey #cait fallout 4 #fallout 4 curie #curie #mayor hancock #john hancock #nick valentine #porter gage #gage

[sabrinathepolytheist]

Do you have to follow ancient tradition to be an Hellenic Polytheist?

Hello! Welcome to my very first official passion blog post! I hope you enjoy reading it and do let me know what you think! <3

I would like to start right off the bat and say that Hellenism, otherwise known as Hellenic Polytheism, can be a very vast topic to explore, and even with the depth that I provide in this post, I don't think I will ever be able to convey everything correctly. It is also important to note that this post is mostly theoretical, and philosophical in nature. My sources you may ask? Well, that's just it, my sources are the many things I have read, and learned over the past year about being a Hellenist. I cannot provide a direct source to what I know as to me it is now common knowledge.

I will go ahead and say that I do not represent the entirety of the community who worships these gods. I am just one person, and this post and my blog is just my perspective on our shared spirituality. I don't know everything, and frankly, I am sure neither do you, dear reader. Let us all remember a remarkable quite by Socrates;

"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" - Socrates

This post will discuss the following:

A general definition of what a Hellenic Polytheist is.

A description of what ancient traditions and customs were like.

How ancient tradition, and customs can change to accommodate our modern era

Do you have to practice ancient tradition to be considered a Hellenic Polytheist?

What is a Hellenic Polytheist?

To answer this question simply, an Hellenic Polytheist is a individual who practices Hellenism - the ancient Greek religion. A Hellenic Polytheist simply believes in the gods of Greece as being the divine powers over the universe itself. One who is not familiar with these gods may know their names from just pure happenstance. Their names consist of; Zeus, Hera, Apollon, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Hermes, Athena, Dionysus, Poseidon, Demeter, and last but certainly never least, Hestia. Yet, there are countless of other gods, daemons, heroes, titans, and primordials that fall into the pantheon of the Greek gods. However, some Hellenist only worship a handful of gods, or all the gods, or just primordials, or perhaps just titians, and some even worship only one of the gods. The range of gods that you worship in Hellenism can vary from person to person, just as it varied from city to city in ancient times. Interestingly enough, Hellenism even has an element of animism to it.

A great example would be the many personified deities the Greeks had. Thanatos - the personification of death, and Hypnos - the personification of sleep, are just the tip of the iceberg when talking about personified deities. Another example of animism in Hellenism, would be the many nymphs whom are believed to frolic around in the forests, seas, rivers, and more. Both personified deities, and nymphs seem to be powers whom encompass the human condition, or nature itself. Mother Gaia is another example, whom is seen as mother nature, or the earth herself in some views.

What did ancient tradition look like?

What about the tradition behind the worship of these gods? Well in traditional Hellenism, there were structures in place that would determine if you were ready to approach the gods in worship. Typically, in ancient Hellenic tradition one would have to rid themselves of any "Miasma" or otherwise known as "spiritual dirtiness" before ever approaching the gods for worship or prayer. The concept of Miasma is not to be confused with the Christian concept of "sin", rather Miasma was seen as a spiritual fifth, often acquired by being among the dead - this included being in the presence of blood, death, illnesses, or fighting in a war. Some claim that Miasma can also come from sexual acts. With Miasma being such a feared thing in ancient times, purification became an essential part to the practice.

When addressing the gods after a purification of Miasma was completed, one would then commence in ritual, or prayer to the gods. Most often the first and last prayer of the ritual was given to Hestia - the goddess of the hearth and home. It was believed that Hestia was the center of the home, and without her fire burning within the home, the home would surly parish. Of course, a home does not have to be a building, it could also be a family, or a group of people you are close with. Most often after addressing and giving to Hestia, libations would then be poured to other gods.

Libations where an essential part of ancient Hellenic practice, and they were often the only type of offering given to the gods by some. For some, Hellenism is not Hellenism without the offering of libations. Libations were poured liquids. The liquids would consist of water, or wine most often. It was said that libations poured to the gods should not be drank, but instead poured into the ground to return the liquid to the gods. After all you offered the liquid to the gods, it is technically now theirs.

There were likely many other types of offerings given to the gods in ancient times. In fact, some have excavated votive offerings to the gods that were buried in the ground. There is so-so-so much more that goes into ancient Hellenic practice, however, I cannot go through them all here, as that would literally require me to write a book. Goodness, even the customs, and ancient traditions are a huge mouthful to explain - this is just the very tip of the iceberg.

How ancient tradition, and customs can change to accommodate our modern era

One might say that the ancient tradition never changed and will never change. However, is that really the case? How could it be? Everything changes at some point, right? Well, it depends on who you ask really. Re-constructionists (Recons) of the ancient Hellenic practice would argue that one should practice the exact way that the ancients practiced the tradition. The thing is this is a very hard thing to replicate to full accuracy in the modern day. There are people out there who have tried to replicate an ancient ritual to the gods to an absolute spitting-image. The problem? They still had to substitute items into the ritual because they simply didn't have access to the items that the ancients used for their honorings. So even Recons must stray away from tradition.

Revivalists are more lenient and would tell you to take what vibes with you and leave what doesn't vibe with you (for the most part). A revivalist is more likely to accept the fact we live in modern times, and our world is modernized, and because of this, we can honor the gods in modernized ways, as we see fit, so long as we remain respectful of the gods. The practice is modernized, but the gods are still ancient.

Other worshipers of the Greek gods may not even identify as Hellenists, and may be eclectic Witches, or Neo-pagans. This goes to show that Hellenism - the tradition, isn't what connects you to the gods. What connects you to the gods, is in fact - well, you! Yes, you have the ability to connect to the gods just as you are now.

In our modern world, it can be hard to cling to the past. This is why recons may be annoyed with revivalists, or Neo-pagans. Recons tend to have a harder time accepting the modernization of ancient practices, while revivalists, and other groups do not have this issue (again for the most part). A thing we must realize is, change is inevitable. Even the physical planet we live on itself has morphed its shape with tectonic movements countless times. The seasons too, are a great example of change. Everything goes through changes and phases. The sooner we take note of this the happier we will all be.

Do you have to practice ancient tradition to be considered a Hellenic Polytheist?

I must reveal for those who are concerned that I am not a Re-constructionist, although I am to a slight degree, I am mostly a revivalist. You could even consider me to be a hybrid; a Recon-Revivalist. it is my personal belief that tradition is only secondary to divine relationship and communication. You do not have to stress about performing an ancient ritual to absolute perfection in order to have a connection to the gods. To me, Hellenism is about the gods, and how you connect with them. In ancient times there would be communal rituals and cleansings of miasma, that multitudes of people would be able to participate as well as city-wide festival celebrations, and worship rituals. These people were capable of honoring the gods in the same environment, so it is no shock that they would have similar ways of worship to each other.

However, we live in a modern world, and we are modern people. While ancient tradition provides a much needed insight into the way the ancients went about worshiping their gods, and I do think it is only respectful that one would at least consider trying to do worship the way the ancients would have conducted it, that doesn't make it the end all be all for what Hellenism is. Think about the vast amount of philosophers, and philosophical wisdoms, and ideas passed down from the ancients. Not a single one of them thought about Hellenism, or the gods in the exact same way (to my knowledge). Due to this, we can come to realize that philosophical thinking is not something limited to the ancients. Everyone can think about life philosophically and come to see what they truly believe about themselves and about the world.

So, do I have a personal philosophy? Well, yes, but I would say as I learn, and grow myself, it can change as time goes on. I would say I have a tendency to take things from many different ancient philosophers. For example, I agree with Sallustius that the gods are pure good and are never the cause of unrest and heartache in our lives. That said, there are also many other things I believe in that are not of ancient context. I believe that true Hellenism in the modern day is most easily experienced in the eyes of the individual. In ancient times it was a communal tradition, now days it is harder to do so, and because of this it is much easier to be a solitary Hellenist rather than a Hellenist that is a part of a community. Not many of us have local temples to our gods, and that is a valid and real thing to understand. Our homes are our temples now.

I know the idea of straying away from strict ancient tradition may put some individuals off from my blog. However, I am willing to take that risk in order to be able to provide a safe place for fellow Hellenists to gather and read my blog; a blog written from the hands and mind of a Hellenic polytheist, for the eyes of other Hellenic Polytheists, or aspiring ones.

Conclusion - Do you need to practice ancient tradition?

So, in closing, to answer the question each and every one of you have been waiting for; no, you do not have to practice ancient tradition to be an Hellenic Polytheist. Just do you, stop batting around the thoughts and opinions of a million other people in your head, and get up, walk to your alter(s), and just pray. Connect with the gods, speak with the gods, grow a relationship with them. This is true Hellenism in my eyes. The relationship that you have with one or more of the gods is priceless, and it is something no human being could ever take away from you. So, cherish that relationship. Of course, this view could be seen as subjective, and that's okay, people deserve to think what they wish, but this will not change my personal viewpoint.

Above all respect each other's practices. A hardcore re-constructionist, and a more lenient revivalist are one in that when we consider that they worship the same gods. Neither of these groups should be viewed as any less of a Hellenic Polytheist either. We must learn to co-exist with one another without getting into arguments. Arguments only lead to a bad situation for each party involved. So, to settle this dispute, if at all possible, perhaps recons could be more lenient and accepting of revivalists and their more modernized traditions, and revivalists could perhaps explore parts of ancient tradition do resonate with their practice and incorporate those parts of ancient practice into their own.

I personally do find it important to consider ancient ways of practice when starting out your path, as the last thing we want to end up doing is appropriating a culture - that would be a no-no. That stated, I do also feel it is completely valid if one wishes to stray a bit away from tradition. Do you like offering libations? Yes? Good for you! Own it, it's your practice. Say you don't enjoy giving libations due to the possible inconvenience of having to return the liquid to the earth, or maybe you do not like that you can't consume the liquid offered to the Chthonic gods according to tradition. That's A-okay. You don't have to do libations, you can simply offer votive offerings like stones, rocks, crystals, anything physical really. Perhaps devotionals are more your speed. Good! Write a song, or a poem, or a story in honor of the gods and offer that work to them.

Whatever you are doing, you are doing it for you. You aren't doing it for anyone else but you. So, understand, especially those new to Hellenic Polytheism, that when I say it is okay to stray from tradition, that it is absolutely okay. Individual practice is individual practice, and it is very sacred to the individual, and no one can tell you how to do your individual practice. Don't listen to the people who try to control your practice for you. There is no way you can do your own personal practice wrong. The only way to go with your own practice is up.

-Sabrina the Polytheist

Thank you all for reading! If you wish to learn more about Hellenism, or perhaps start learning about Hellenism, here are some sources that I would recommend:

Hellenic Polytheism : Household Worship by Labrys https://www.amazon.com/Hellenic-Polytheism-Household-Worship-1/dp/1503121887/ref=sr_1_1?crid=UVH9MRG9RL5K&keywords=hellenic+polytheism+household+worship&qid=1691612186&sprefix=%2Caps%2C299&sr=8-1 (This is a stable in the Hellenic Polytheist community, this book tells you in detail how ancient tradition was conducted in the home: can be found on Amazon for $14.00 USD!)

https://www.theoi.com/ (A site to learn about the many gods of the Hellenic pantheon, as well as to read up on myths)

https://hellenicfaith.com/ (This site showcases a multitude of information about ancient tradition, philosophy, and worldviews)

Pic the Pagan on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQmVTgvWkXrbdod_Ni1XFUw (is a well-known Hellenic Polytheist content creator, he creates short form V-log style videos that are very insightful, I do recommend you check him out).

#hellenic polytheism #hellenic worship #hellenic pagan #hellenic polythiest #hellenic pantheon #sabrinathepolytheist #pagan #Hellenism #philosophy #hellenic community #hellenic devotion #hellenic gods #hellenic paganism #hellenic polytheist #hellenic reconstructionism #helpol

[dreamingofyeo]

𓏲๋࣭ ࣪ A siren's song࿐࿔𖦹ִ

chapter 4: artefacts of decay ࿐࿔𖦹ִ

~ details in masterlist

~ playlist

~ 832 words

~ chapter warnings- none

~☆彡 tumblr's algorithm works off of reblogs so please consider it if you like my work :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Escape? With Yeosang? This has to be a ploy. You raise a tentative brow at him.

“Why would you extend your plan to include me, that doesn’t seem wise.”

He nods thoughtfully and shuffles closer to you, his voice more hushed than before.

“You’re right, it makes it more complicated. But I can’t have it on my conscience that you’ll be alone here.”

“You’ve known me for less than a day.” You state bluntly.

“Right again, but time shouldn't tip a moral scale now should it?” He smiles.

You look at him in confusion, how is this man a pirate. It doesn’t make any sense.

“I don’t understand you, you speak of morals and yet underneath it all you’re still a pirate.”

He dips his head almost shamefully.

“Upon this ship, I understand greatly where this confusion comes from. Though we all still have our darknesses, my crew are not ruthless killers such as these. We have a cause and codes.”

“What are they like?” You find yourself asking.

“When they need to be, dangerous, tactical and cunning. But under all that they’re each in their own way a source for good in this world. They’re funny and kind, loyal to a fault...”

He trails off momentarily.

“my point is, regardless of everything, bringing you with me off this ship is the right thing to do, if I don’t I might as well stay. Nothing more to it than that.”

Right. So he’s just maybe got a minor saviour complex. A way out is a way out though. 

“So, this plan… what is it?” You ask.

“When the ship next docks in Tortuga, I have a favour to call in, we’ll use that to get away.” 

“A favour? From whom?”

“An old friend.” He says bluntly.

“Right, and when will the ship next dock.”

“Truthfully, I have no idea, not for a couple of weeks at least given our position, the captain hasn’t given any indication of our next heading but it will be soon now that you’re here.”

Right, there’s a purpose for your being here. You almost forgot. Taking the opportunity, you ask him about it.

“And why am I here exactly? What is all this talk about me remaining unspoiled?”

Yeosang sucks in a breath and looks troubled to answer you, he does so anyway.

“There’s an ancient treasure that Vervona has had his sights on for years, decades even. He’s slowly been ticking boxes of the things he needs to acquire it, various priceless artefacts from all over the map. But each one has came at a cost to his soul. It drove him mad, abandoned his own moral code as the years went on. He became more ruthless, with every conquest becoming more barbaric than the last; drove his own son off the ship eventually. Now he’s almost got all the pieces- well technically he’s already got them but like I say, I don’t plan on either of us sticking around here to keep it that way.”

“Okay.. but I’m afraid that doesn’t answer my question, what does he want from me?”

He meets your eyes tentatively.

“To put it simply, your blood.”

The very thing he speaks of runs cold yet again, it unnerves you that you’re growing accustomed to the uncomfortable feeling.

“My.. blood?”

You’ve heard plenty of sea legends, the pieces click into place. Vervona is searching for the cromer, a mysterious artefact rumoured to hold the power of time itself, and he needs ‘unspoiled’ blood from someone of your lineage to do it. You should’ve known your family’s secrets would come back to you eventually. Broner seemed in the dark about your identity, the attack seemed random, you wonder just how in the dark he keeps his crew. You also wonder how much more there is to Yeosang than meets the eye, a navigator is certainly not on the list of acquisitions required to locate the cromer, so why is he here? Your train of thought is broken by the man in question.

“I’ll take your silence as agreement to escape.” 

You eye him with suspicion now. 

“I’m in.”

~

The following days pass by in a blur. You do your best to avoid any and all interaction with the crew when you collect your breakfast. That being stale bread and some watery alcohol concoction which made you gag- drawing a slight chuckle from the navigator and earning himself a scowl right back.

Throughout the days, you keep your head low, doing whatever bits of navigation you can with Yeosang until dinner- stale bread and alcohol. Yeosang redresses your lashes when the crew goes to sleep, and you discuss your plans.

It’s on the sixth day that he gives you an excited look after checking the lanterns were dim.

“Oh jones~” he drags out the ’s’ making you raise a brow.

“What’s got you all happy? They give you a drop too much at dinner?” You smirk at him.

He snorts at you and laughs.

“Speak for yourself. Even if I had though, we have something to celebrate.”

Another eyebrow raise.

“That being?”

He plants his hands on the table, tapping a spot on map in front of you. He smiles and tugs his lip between his teeth for a moment before gracing you with an answer.

“Our new heading, Tortuga.”

<-chapter 3 ~ chapter 5->

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

taglist: @baek-at-it-again95 @amalialoved @voicesinmyhead-rc @decadentstrangernacho

#ateez fanfic #ateez yeosang #ateez jongho #ateez mingi #ateez hongjoong #ateez san #ateez seonghwa #ateez wooyoung #ateez x reader #ateez yunho #ateez pirate au #yeosang pirate au #asirenssong #dreamingofyeo #yeosang x reader #ateez x you

[somethingclevermahogony]

Hey, hope you're doing well! I've noticed in a couple of your posts you mention Arkodian Bronze (might have misspelled), and I'm wondering, what makes it different from normal bronze?

Ah! Sorry for the delay! Thank you for the question! So the simple answer as to how Arkodian Bronze is different from normal bronze is that Arkodian Bronze in actuality is not actually bronze. Two varieties of actual bronze exist in the Green Sea these being Arsenical and Tin Bronze. Arsenical Bronze, that is bronze which uses arsenic rather than tin, is relatively uncommon as its creation comes with certain risks. Among Tin Bronzes there are several variations, dependent on the ratio of tin to copper within the alloy.

The Kishite word for Bronze is Zuba, and this is where "Arkodian Bronze" comes from. While Arkodian Bronze is in itself not a bronze, its coloration is somewhat reminiscent to certain varieties of true bronze. Due to this superficial similarity and the fact the Kishite's had no clue how the metal was actually produced, "bronze" became a placeholder. The full Kishite word for the metal, created only in the now extinct region of Arkodai is "Zubabarakodi" which translates as "Bronze of Arkodai" or more simply "Arkodian Bronze."In the Korithian language, which itself descends from Arkodian, the metal is called "Arkitbatalo" or "Ancient metal."

So the question is, if Arkodian is not bronze then what is it? Arkodian bronze is an alloy consisting of a convoluted combination of metals including something akin to high carbon steel (iron) in addition to chromium, copper, cobalt, and other metals, in addition to several supernatural ingredients, most significantly "Sadidonti" or Serpent's Tooth, the remains of the Primordial Dragon, Tuliya. The resultant alloy was then additionally bolstered and manipulated via the use of magic, allowing for an incredibly strong metal without also increasing its brittleness. Arkodian Bronze has a number of magical qualities, not least of which is its effectiveness against Spirits and Spiritbloods, which are otherwise resistant or immune to harm from lesser metals. Additionally, specially made Arkodian Bronze may act as a receptacle (or prison) for certain spirits, thus giving that object and its wielder certain magical capabilities without resorting to sagecraft.

The formula and process needed to make Arkodian Bronze has been lost, as such all Arkodian Bronze currently in circulation within the Green Sea are centuries old, a fact only made possible by the alloy's magical resistance to degradation.

Excerpt: Narul finds his hammer

Narul’s fingers searched desperately for something, anything to defend himself.  He was all but blind now, the world little more than a crimson tinged sliver.  His fingers alighted on some sort of wooden handle. He had no idea what it could be but as he lifted it, he felt a new strength course through his body, like a shot of adrenaline. With a defiant roar he swung, blindly striking out at where Sadaric was, seated on Narul’s chest. There was a splash of blood, a hideous crunch, and Narul could breathe again. Narul stood and gasped for breath. He wiped the blood from his eyes. Sadaric was sprawled on the ground, his eyes bulged from his head, mouth opening and closing like a fish. He clawed weakly at his chest, where his sternum had been caved in. The old Spiritblood was dying. Narul looked down at what he had struck him with. It was a hammer, not a warhammer, but the sort that one might use to drive in stakes or break large rocks. The handle was roughly hewn wood, the head a misshapen lump of brownish metal.

I hope this answered your question!

#worldbuilding #writeblr #writing #fantasy writing #testamentsofthegreensea #fantasy #fantasy world #narul #wip excerpt #asks answered #ask more!

[kuipernebula]

Talk about your Exhalted characters, KP. This is not a question.

I appreciate the sentiment, but like. I dunno. I really wish I could talk about this shit in a context where people understood what I was talking about.

I'll shorten the list to just the shortlist of Sidereal Exalted I've developed to be played. I actually have more Sidereal PC's I wanna play than this but these 4 have received the most development and cook time in my brain. I need to make it 5 to hit the last Sidereal caste(/closest thing to classes the game has) but only one idea has hit me with any lucidity and it was like, a week ago, so it needs to cook some more.

Listed in order that the maidens are generally listed (Coincidentally, also the order of their planets)

The Journeys is a young man born in an independent city state in the jungles of the South East, one of the rare few cultures around the Dreaming Sea with few imperial ambitions. Here, members of [PC's] family were bonded to a tiger cub at birth, to act as their sibling and protector. Such was his life, until he came of age. Then, the Prasadi Empire sought to finally incorporate his home into its imperial regime. Guided by visions of a golden tiger, [PC] and his brother led his people to a hidden grotto beyond the notice of Prasad - but not heaven. Now, [PC] and his brother act as agents of fate, helping lead others to where they must be. Well. When they feel like it.

[PC] is loud, obnoxious, messy, and immature - but he's forceful, charismatic, and diligent, so he tends to get by just fine. His brother, by contrast, is serious, chooses his words(?) carefully, but refuses to raise a claw if its not in his or his brother's interest. At essence 2, [PC] gets a charm that lets him turn his brother into a God that works fro the Bureau of Destiny, meaning they're OFFICIALLY co-workers, and also his brother gets a human form and can talk.

His charms aren't as solid as the other ideas yet but he's a Tiger stylist, and fights in tandem with his brother. They're kind of attached at the hip. And if you try to say they're not brothers or bring up blood relation then they'll both probably try to kill you. (I need to pick a Sidereal Martial Art for him but I haven't found one I like quite yet.)

The Serenities is a former slave to House Cynis on the blessed isle. [Here there's some gray area in his backstory, as the specifics of his slavery and how he got there juggles in my head, and his exaltation isn't super clear.] Now he is forced to work alongside such figures as the Goddess of Slavery (who keeps calling him) and the Bronze Faction (set up a status quo that allows slavery to flourish.) To avoid killing his coworkers, he became a drunk, but became so enamored with wine and alcohol that he also became a legendary brewmaster. Most other Sidereals think of him as a laissez-faire drunk with a rude but friendly demeanor.

Though he works diligently for the Bureau of Destiny, he is largely entrenched in his own personal revenge project: burning all of House Cynis to the ground. The corrupt house that enslaved him cannot be allowed to stand. He will do anything to curry favor and allies to this goal, and will equally hide all his intentions about it until he knows for sure they can be trusted.

His fighting style is the Drunken God style, which isn't in the game yet so I haven't nailed down a lot of specifics. He also uses Augmented Implements of Strive to improve his use of Improvised Weapons, allowing him to turn any bar fight into a huge spectacle. (His Sidereal Martial Art could be a few things, but Sapphire Veil of Passions might lean the best into his Drunken Fist shenanigans, while the unreleased Amaranthine Chains of Samsara might be better thematically if it's about breaking those chains.)

The charm synergy I'm most excited for with him is that he gets a craft charm called Elemental Vision that gives you bonuses based on your Maiden's element; among other things, this includes that Elementals and Dragon-Blooded of the appropriate element have an automatic tie of Patience towards you. House Cynis is famously Wood aspect. Venus is the Maiden of Wood.

The Chosen of Secrets is a lightly Sun Wukong-inspired Super Thief. A huge adrenaline junkie that finds infiltration and larceny to be the height of excitement, he got his start in the Scavenger Lands, working under a Scavenger Lord picking apart First Age ruins. There he found his first true score: a seemingly-ordinary walking stick with a band of prismatic metal on his tip. He knew it, and himself, were destined for more than this particular Scavenger Lord, so he absconded with it. He was picked up by heaven shortly thereafter.

His various heists are viewed by most of his coworkers in the Bureau as an eccentric hobby and nothing more, mostly because he mostly sticks to Creation-based targets. Which isn't to say he hasn't considered Heavenly targets - he just needs the right plan. Either way, he has no interest in Faction politics, and regards the affairs of the Bureau as a day job he has to entertain for his salary.

His walking stick is the Starmetal artifact Gnomon, once wielded by a Solar Phantom Thief who famously stole it as a cutting from one of Heaven's Peach Trees of Immortality. Now it's our guy's, and it's main power is to stop time for brief moments, often to assist in a fight or in a heist.

He combines the above with Monkey Style Martial Arts, his Sidereal Charms (like most of the Larceny tree), and later on, Emerald Gyre of Aeons style. (It's the Martial Arts style about Time Loops, Eternity, and Time.) (Monkey Style and Gyre both styles that use Staves as weapons, and Gnomon is a staff. Synergy!)

The Endings is my Exalted character I've developed the most, Kyon Shi. Orphaned while still an infant in one of the Hundred Kingdoms, he fell in with other urchins. When he was learning to walk, he earned his name from a kindly old widow who would give food to the urchins. She found his awkward hops endearing, and thus called him "my own little kyonshi" in jest. The name stuck with the urchins, who found his pale skin and haunted eyes eerie.

As he grew, he became more and more enamored with death and funerals, consuming as much information as he could from the undertaker, from adults, from priests, whoever would let an orphan ask them questions. They, as with the urchins, found it off-putting, but sometimes humored him.

When he was still young, the other urchins decided they had enough of him. One of them - a boy that Kyon had once awkwardly expressed interest in - offered to meet him, alone, at the graveyard that night. He excitedly went to find his whole gang of street toughs. They proceeded to beat him half to death, stick him in a grave, and attempt to bury him alive. Kyon lost consciousness and the next thing he knew, he was above ground, with the boys having run away.

When he was old enough to make the journey himself, he hitched a ride on with a merchant caravan to the tomb-city of Sijan. There he, like many other morbid youths, joined the ranks of the city's mortuary students. He felt like he lagged behind many, but not all, of his fellows, but after much hard work, graduated top of his class.

His first assignment as a fully-fledged Sijanese funerist was to enter and clean one of the oldest tombs of the city. Inside, however, he found an old, dying man, who claimed that his sucessor was found, and it was his time. Kyon Shi felt compassion for the dying man, and performed a short funeral service for him. When he exited the tomb, he was greeted by a woman who introduced herself as The Green Lady.

Now he works for the Bureau of Destiny and is a key member of the Convention on the Dead. The Green Lady has taken him under her wing, and he has been given the impression he's being groomed to take over her position as Chair of the Convention one day, a position he'd be excited to accept. He trusts her implicitly, and would do anything to please or impress her, but since she's James Bond in The Underworld she can be... enigmatic. (In large part he views her so highly because she's the first person to see potential or promise in him; at every turn before hand, he had to earn it.)

His secretary is a ghost named Peach Blossom Princess, who lives in his manse in heaven and helps handle his paperwork. His manse, for what its worth, is contained in a folded space under a Torii. Enter it one way and you enter the Memorial of the Starless Soldier, a solemn and sacred place built by Saturn and Sol Invictus shortly after the Divine Revolution meant to honor the un-Exalted mortal soldiers of the Revolution. Enter the other way, and you are right outside Kyon's home, a temple-mansion-dojo where he (and his secretary) live (and train) between missions. (No matter which way you enter the Torii, it appears to be under an eternal starry, moonless sky)

Primarily he wants to build up relations between ghosts in the underworld and the bureaus of heaven; he thinks a future can be built where the dead can be part of the affairs of destiny, where all can be met with compassion. Secondarily, he wants to build relations with ancestor cults, as he thinks this, too, could be a valuable function of their alliance. This is idealistic, of course, but it's why he's tentatively aligned with the Gold faction.

He fights with the extremely deadly and unsettling Hungry Ghost Style, which emulates the movements and hunger of the angry dead. He is also a skilled necromancer, having been trained by The Green Lady herself; he maintains the ghostly bindings of his secretary himself. He also has most of the undead stuff in the Medicine tree, and also the charm where you become legally dead to heaven by performing your own funeral and thus get to be considered undead when it would benefit you (like if you are underwater).

He may eventually learn the Albicant Sepulcher of Extinction style, a Sidereal Martial Art made by one of the Deathlords. (How is up to debate...)

The other thing I've spent a ton of time on with him is that he has TONS of fun acts about various funeral practices around creation. I wrote down tons of them. I should write down some more.

#cw: long post

[battybiologist]

Hi! I found your account off of a post to r/curatedtubmlr, post is here.

The comments are all talking about how the line "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" should not have been included, what are your thoughts about this?

During the first protests, it was labeled as antisemitic, which the sources for this accusation was the media and occupiers of Palestine. I personally don't believe it, Palestine deserves freedom form their oppressors.

Thanks for your time ✌️🍉

Very much understand and empathize with the Redditor that reposted my thoughts over on your server, but they probably should have thought more about their approach, in particular considering their audience.

I was vaguely aware that this phrase is seen as antisemitic, but to be fair, it sort of became white noise, like "antizionism is antisemitism". Just another tool to bludgeon us into submission. I had no idea that actual antizionists really believed that.

So let me ask this question: Why would "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" be antisemitic?

Let's get something clear: "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" is almost 30 years older than Hamas. I saw a couple people saying this is a Hamas battle cry calling for Jewish blood to be shed, and I had to dispel this wildly ahistorical notion. In fact, I'd say this is one of the few truly secular ideas Hamas has right now, which is always a good thing in my book.

please bring back leftist secular decolonization rhetoric in the Arab world we really had something going on

If it's not the association, maybe it's the text? "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" is just a poetic way of saying "Free Palestine". So no.

Now, the real core argument: "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" has the implication of a world where Israel doesn't exist, and that this constitutes antisemitism. And, to be fair, half of this is right.

I do not believe ethnostates should exist under any circumstances, and the only inarguable thing about the Israeli occupation is that its aim is the creation of one. The two-state solution is not a real solution, it just slows down the process of the land being ruled by one nation. I choose Palestine.

What does this mean for current Israelis if Palestine is restored from the river to the sea? Well, a lot of them might have to give up their illegal settlements. The former IDF members are going to be hated to hell and back. Everyone who built their business on cheap Palestinian labor is going to go out of business. The generational trauma is gonna take so long to heal. But there's not going to be another genocide.

What tips me from "gotta be the respectful bougnoule* so my voice can be heard" to "I don't give a shit about some fiche S**, I'm doing this" is that Zionists fucking know this! The only thing that's at stake is the concept of an ethnostate, which they equated with Jewish identity. There have been a couple attempts recently to redefine the Jewish identity around support for Israel. This is a ploy to frame the Palestinian resistance as genocidal: if the country doesn't exist, the Jewish people doesn't exist. But the Jewish people is not defined by the fever dreams of a couple of 19th century Europeans and the antisemitism of the rest of 19th century Europe. They predate these colonialist pieces of shit by a couple millenias.

This is why I think Reddit Reposter should have picked a different post. I do not share the same hatred and disgust towards liberals as my fellow commies, but they are coming at this issue from a deeply imperial core-esque angle. Living in the imperial core warps your vision of the world, since you've been swimming in propaganda all your life (I know, I went through that, nobody is born a communist). In fact, I have a post about the relationship between antisemitism and Zionism (it's not a full analysis, but I still agree with it) that would've been a much better pick

Anyway, to conclude: From the river to the sea, a Palestine full of Jewish and many other kinds of people will be free.

#from the river to the sea palestine will be free #free palestine

[vynania-business]

Welcome // READ ME //

(artwork drawn by me)

Hi there, and welcome to this grand-spanking-new blog to house updates and random shit about Vynania. This post will go over some important notes and updates on how the mod is coming along!

Inbox: Open to all

About Vynania:

Vynania D’Lyrandar began as a character I played in a D&D campaign in the Eberron setting. She’s a half-elf paladin/warlock multiclass, with her being “Oath of the Sea” and her patron being a figure similar to the Kraken. 

Being a daughter of the Lyrandar family, who invented airships and mastered ocean travel, she was well versed in sailing both sea and air since she was very young. She’s always dreamed of becoming an airship pilot, but that dream was crushed during the Mourning, when her home was destroyed in a wide-scale magical blast that took out nearly a whole country.

Vynania is a hot-blooded woman with a no-nonsense attitude, but she’s not immune to having a softer side on occasion. She prefers to use her axe during battle, and has a slight inclination to magical abilities, including restoration magic, and storm spells. (Ice, lightning, etc).

Vynania’s Skyrim Lore:

In skyrim, Vynania is considered a Breton, by definition, but she uses a Nord model. (She also has no idea what a ‘Breton’ is. Have fun with that.)

Vynania will likely be found in one of two places upon the mod’s launch: Either at the Windpeak Inn, in Dawnstar. Or near the Wreck of the Brinehammer, located between Dawnstar and the Solitude Lighthouse.

My girlfriend and I have an inside joke where, in a playthrough, Vynania’s axe was enchanted to paralyze her foes for a brief time. When asked what the axe should be named, she responded with “Vy-NAN-YA BUSINESS”, thus became this blogs title.

Important Notes:

I am very, VERY new to the modding community. I’ve been rattling this idea in my head for a good amount of time, but only just now began to teach myself how to use the CK. By all accounts, I’m a modding noob. Please bear with me orz

It’s very likely that progress on this mod is going to be extremely slow. I have Vynania’s model in the game, but no voicelines recorded. (As of 6/19/2022) I have plans of moving to a new apartment, I work retail, and I also run my own D&D campaign that currently takes priority. Updates on the mod will be posted here, leading up to the moment that the mod goes live on the Nexus, and beyond.

This mod will be 100% free. I will not be taking donations or earning money from this at least for the forseeable future. (This may change in terms of letting people commission specific voice lines but I’m not quite to that point admittedly lol)

I accept questions and criticism as long as it’s constructive. I do not accept and will not answer anon hate and the like.

#Welcome // read me #skyrim custom followers #skyrim #skyrim modding #TES 5 skyrim

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

snake | myg

pairing(s): yoongi x reader

summary: Your parents have no qualms on doing whatever they can to climb the social ladder. That includes assigning you a betrothed you've never met, an offering to the crown prince. You, the one the gossipers whisper under their breath... the Snake Princess.

warnings: implied parental emotional and physical abuse; language; non-idol!AU - prince!Yoongi x aristocrat!reader, ft overprotective (but secretly soft), tattooed, little brother!JK; based on this

–

“I don’t care what our father said, you’re not marrying him!”

You scratched your ear, partly shielding it from the loud voice of your brother.

“He’s an asshole!”

“You don’t know him?” you offered, affixing your earring, somewhat annoyed. The yellow gold wasn’t quite your style. Your parents liked such gaudy, ugly things.

Both in fashion and tradition, unfortunately.

“Do you?” your brother shot back, throwing himself up from your bed where he was yelling at the ceiling about nothing he could change. It was a favorite past time of his, along with following you around like a talkative shadow.

“No, that’s why I’m meeting him today,” you replied dryly. You switched to the other ear, adding the dragon-shaped ear cuff above the gold earring. Your parents hated it when you added such aggressive accessories – they’re not womanly, they would say – but if you were going to be betrothed to some guy on the sole basis that they had ambitions and he was the man who so happened to be the next-in-line for the throne, you weren’t going to lie about what kind of woman you were.

“Aren’t you pissed?”

You shrugged. “Is it so bad?”

“Yes!”

You sighed and flickered your eyes to the mirror, seeing Jeon Jungkook’s furious expression, long black hair tied back with lingering strands framing his high cheekbones, his black and gold robes wild, poorly tied and revealing half of his tanned, toned chest. His dark brown eyes flashed, pressing his cherry-painted lips together, jawline sharp and defiant. That’s how Jungkook always looked, messy, undone, borderline furious.

Everyone called him the Reckless Prince.

You just called him little brother.

“Noona…”

“Hmm?”

You saw him frown and you looked away, running a hand through your hair, browsing your hair accessories. You used to have an aide to help you at one point, but you told your parents to get rid of them, preferring to get ready by yourself. And besides, Jungkook liked to burst in and interrupt you with his relentless tirades about how unfair your arranged marriage was. There was no point in having hired help when you could coerce your brother into doing things as you put up with him.

“Can I brush your hair?”

“You have arms and hands, so you’re physically capable, yes.”

You heard him click his tongue in annoyance and smirked, shifting your eyes to the mirror. He was behind you now, face no longer visible. It didn’t matter. You already knew his cross expression quite well. He snatched the ornate comb from your vanity, the black snake head clearly visible on the side of his right wrist, inked near his thumb. Your parents scolded and beat him for getting it, but Jungkook could care less, breaking the wooden paddle with ease, right out of your mother’s hand.

You hadn’t said anything.

The rumors called you the Snake Princess.

Quick-witted, sharp, vicious. Not to your face though, because that was just foolishness. It wouldn’t be only your wrath they would be evoking.

Jungkook ran the comb through your hair, gently separating the strands, careful not to pull too hard. He was better than any aide anyway. They merely yanked and pulled you into their standard of beauty, ignoring your opinions or input, always citing that it was important to not look like a peasant, important to always look above your status, using your beauty to save face.

Saving face.

You hated those words.

“What if he’s a horrible person?” your brother asked quietly, tucking the strands away from your eyes only for them to slip back stubbornly.

“Then he’s a horrible person,” you replied, applying your makeup. “And you’ll probably do something about it.”

Jungkook made a noise between an aggravated bear and an injured tiger.

“If he so much as puts one fingertip on you, I’ll kill him.”

You snorted. “I’d hate to tell you what marriage entails, Jungkook.”

The comb in your hair paused.

His anger subsided, just like that.

“You’re really going to do it?” he asked softly. “Really, really?”

You heard the pain in Jungkook’s voice.

You recalled when you received the news many years ago, silent fury as your parents gave you away, turning you into a transaction to raise their own reputation and status. Your reaction was nothing to your little brother’s, him running to your room and crying in your arms, distraught and upset that you were leaving him, declaring he hated your parents, everyone, and everything.

“You’re supposed to protect me,” Jungkook had sobbed, already too big for you to hold like this but you did anyway, patting his head and wiping his tears with your sleeve. “You’re supposed to be here, with me, forever and always.”

He had taken your hand, tucking his fingers in yours, pressing your pinkies together.

“You promised me.”

And you had, from the very beginning, the shy kid always following after you and making you speak for him, your parents yelling and scolding him to be a man, but you defending him, taking the slaps meant for him, sneaking him sweets when he was hiding his tears, telling him it was okay to cry and that noona would stay here and listen to his worries, no matter if it was as stupid as a butterfly flying away or the teacher once again reprimanding him for his poor scores.

The amount of pressure they put on him just because he was the son was immense.

“I wanna play,” he had cried softly. “I don’t have to study anymore.”

“You want to be stupid?” you had teased, patting his head. “What if I had my lessons with you? I can make that happen.”

“R-Really?”

So, you made it happen, telling your parents and tutors that it would be better for him to be exposed to more complex concepts earlier rather than later and watching someone learn would improve his own scores. You made yourself a better student for his benefit and he, in turn, followed obediently, doing what you did, always overjoyed to hear your praise.

You and your snake tongue could made anything happen for him.

“This servant is bothering me.”

You found some questionable information on that servant and they resigned rather quickly.

“I don’t like the girl our father introduced me to.”

Suddenly said girl was no longer interested in Jungkook. For… reasons.

“I wish I could go on vacation, even for a couple days.”

That one got you both beaten for your three-day adventure to the sea, mostly because you had to run away from your duties to do it. But it was worth it to see the smile on Jungkook’s face.

Then Jungkook became a teenager.

You might have taught him that rules were for old people, for the generation too uptight.

He wanted to do a whole lot of things and you made it happen. Getting him out of those sticky situations was a bit tough, but nothing unmanageable. And now Jungkook was a young adult who did not care about anyone’s opinion other than yours, getting tattooed and spending all of his time with his friends, lackadaisical and free, your parents giving up and calling him a disgrace, relying on your marriage to restore the reputation they valued so much, the face they themselves ruined with their own poor decisions, taking out their frustrations on you and Jungkook, sometimes without warning.

You stayed home, playing good daughter so Jungkook could be the bad son.

Ah, maybe it was your fault he was the Reckless Prince.

You turned, looking up at him now from the corner of your eye, up his loose robes and exposed collarbone, up the line of his jaw that was similar to yours, his lips not quite as full, his round brown orbs that were actually much more innocent and purer than he liked to admit, similar to your eye shape.

But not the same.

Because your eyes were sharper, cold-blooded, predatory.

Even with Jungkook, there was no mistaking the power behind your gaze.

“Do you think just because I’m married to some man that he can control my life?” you said with a sly smile, your lips painted lush red. “I’ll come visit you whenever I want. You can come whenever you want. You can live with me if you want.”

You turned back, sweeping your hair and twisting it in place, deftly and quickly pinning it back, leaving some strands loose and messy that your parents would highly disapprove of, but why did that matter? If this man was to be your husband, then he would see you completely undone at one point, so he should get used to it.

Your parents wouldn’t approve of the black and dark green combination you had chosen either, but that’s why you learned how to sew to dress yourself as you liked. You have to be a lady. You were a lady. Just your version of a lady and not theirs. They tried to gatekeep you by saying that the pink and yellow fabrics were all they could afford. They had a tendency to underestimate your craftiness.

No obstacle was too high for the Snake Princess to slither over.

“Really?” Jungkook asked as you stood up, smoothly adjusting the tie at your waist.

You chuckled at him as he began to follow you out of your bedroom.

“If that’s what you want, I’ll do it for you.”

-

“You brought your brother.”

“I don’t bring him anywhere. He comes and goes as he pleases.”

Jungkook was sitting behind you, arms crossed, glaring at the dark-haired man sitting in front of you. You had mildly fixed his appearance before entering only from him to push up his sleeves so he could reveal the entire snake tattoo wrapped around his arm, a black snake surrounded by thorned vines.

“Hmm.”

This man had requested to meet you first, alone, without the parents. Untraditional, but as long as his father agreed to the request, it was done. Your father had no say in the matter, although he did protest rather loudly and uncouthly.

You had poured the tea for your future husband and you.

Neither of you were drinking it.

The man before you had a piercing gaze, cloud-white skin, shapely lips. Somehow, he surprised you by being dressed in black and gold as well, although he was much neater than Jungkook, black hair tied back in a the usual, curated traditional style.

“I intend in marrying you, you know.”

He had a deep, rough voice, reminding you of dead leaves and winter.

“Is that not the point of this meeting?” was your dry response.

A dark eyebrow lifted.

Jungkook clicked his tongue dismissively.

Those shapely lips curved into a slow smirk.

“I thought I wouldn’t like you,” the dark-haired man mused, reaching over to the teacup and pulling it to him. “I was fully prepared to refuse this proposal and put your family more in the dirt than your brother has already put them into.”

“You bas–” Jungkook hissed, but you held up a hand, cutting him off.

You kept your eyes on those dark brown orbs, cat-like and predatory. He took a deep inhale of the aroma of the tea, letting out a satisfied, smokey sigh.

“I thought you would be like the others. Prim, proper, begging for me to take your hand.”

You raised an eyebrow. “What do I need to beg for? You either will or you won’t. It has nothing to do with me.”

A dark chuckle. “Indeed.”

He took a long sip of the tea, savoring it. You watched him swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing, tongue flickering out to lick his lips. Slowly lowering his head, scrutinizing gaze on you. He made you wait for his words.

“And besides, snakes can’t kneel, can they, Snake Princess?” he purred.

“Don’t you dare call her that!”

“No, they cannot,” you replied calmly, ignoring Jungkook’s outburst, staring into the eyes of the man who was going to decide whether or not you were going to be his wife.

“They can’t pray either.”

The dark-haired man tilted his head, intrigued.

“I have no need for gods to be able to live the life I want, Min Yoongi,” you said quietly, venomous edge to your voice. “The ties you put on me cannot restrain me from living as frivolously or ambitiously as I like.”

Min Yoongi, the man who would decide whether you would live an honorable or disgraceful life, the man who was next-in-line, the crown prince. You were meant to be his, but, unlike you, he was free to refuse. Unlike you, he had nothing to lose. Unlike you, he could destroy your life in a heartbeat with a simple no.

“You believe that?” Yoongi questioned, daring you.

You didn’t back down, small serpentine smile on your lips.

“I do not need to believe when I know.”

Silence.

Then Yoongi’s shoulders shook, raspy laughing bubbling from his throat, smirk on his lips.

“You want me to refuse. You want to ruin your parents’ lives.”

You didn’t say anything, your smile fading.

“Ah, but the problem is, I really do like you, Snake Princess,” Yoongi hummed. “You sharp tongue and you even sharper mind. A simpler man would have been tricked by you.” He tapped his long fingers against the table, keeping his feline poise directed at you. “I did not want some placid, useless little thing but a real woman, someone who isn’t afraid to say what she thinks. Why have a trophy when you can have a weapon?”

He placed his chin on the back of his other hand, clicking his tongue thoughtfully.

“What shall we do then? You absolutely must be my wife.”

“You–” Jungkook hissed, rising up behind you, glaring at Yoongi over your shoulder. “You know she doesn’t want to marry you and yet you’re going to do it anyway?”

The dark-haired man raised an eyebrow. “She doesn’t want to marry me because she wants her parents to pay for using her so carelessly to further their status. However,” he added with a sweep of his hand on the table, palm upward towards you. “Has she actually said she has no interest in me as a person? During this entire meeting, has she declared that I, the crown prince, am not to her liking?”

Yoongi gave Jungkook a sharp look.

“Do you think she would hide her disdain for me if she had some?”

Silence.

“N… Noona?”

“Yes, Jungkook?”

“You don’t like him at all… right?”

Silence.

You let out a deep breath, slow and controlled.

“Hmm, you are very intuitive.”

Yoongi grinned. “You know we would be a good match, you and I. Here,” he murmured, pointing to the table. “On the throne.” Pointing outside, indicating the land. His cat-like eyes locked with your snake-like gaze, lips forming his next words slowly and deliberately.

“In bed.”

Your eyes trailed from those glittering dark eyes to his pleased smirk. Not a malicious expression somehow. An exciting one. You fully expected to be walking into this room to tear down an arrogant, gaudy man with grandiose self-centeredness.

Instead, it was Min Yoongi.

He ticked his chin to Jungkook, now right next you instead of behind you, clutching your arm tightly.

“Do you want him to be with you? That could be arranged. I can make that happen.”

You really thought you would hate Min Yoongi and yet it seemed as if you were being drawn closer and closer to him. You pursed your lips, not ready to give up yet. He continued.

“And, of course, there’s no reason for your parents to enjoy luxuries that they didn’t earn, is there?”

You narrowed your eyes at him. Yoongi smiled, calm with an underlying slyness.

“That would reflect on you if you treated your in-laws poorly,” you responded coolly.

Yoongi shrugged. “And so? I still have you.” He tilted his head. “Why take a wife if you’re not prepared to do anything for her?” He nodded to himself, tapping his fingertips on the table once more. “Whatever you want, I can make it happen. Be it your brother tagging along, your parents’ lives in ruins…”

Yoongi’s eyes found yours and there was a kindness, already knowing your and him were meant to be.

You weren’t so sure.

And yet.

His next words made you fall in love.

“If that’s what you want, I’ll do it for you.”

--

masterpost

#yoongi x reader #yoongi scenarios #bts fanfic #yoongi x you #min yoongi x reader #min yoongi x you

[adobe-outdesign]

Reviews of All Scrapped Spaceword Betas

Exactly what it says in the title. This is also for my reference, as I might redesign some of these later for funsies. 

I’m only including Pokemon that were 100% scrapped (we’re not here to argue what might have become what) and aren’t evos/pre-evos of existing Pokemon. Also, I’m using the English fan-translations for the names because I don’t speak Japanese.

Flambear/Volbear/Dynabear

Our original fire starter, and yeah, I can see why this was scrapped. For starters (heh), it looks more like a rodent that evolves into a lion than anything resembling a bear. And secondly... it doesn’t really have a clear focus, nor a memorable design. It’s just kind of a rodent-bear thing with flames tacked onto it. 

The best Pokes usually have a "catch” to them, and these guys lack that. For example, this got replaced by Cyndaquil, which has the concept of flaming spikes that form out of its back. That’s memorable. This, well, isn’t.

Possible reason for being scrapped: Lack of focus/interesting design

Pokes to fill the void: Teddiursa and Ursaring are probably the closest in terms of being bears. Something about it also reminds me of Growlithe/Arcanine, probably because it’s a fluffy fire thing that evolves into a bigger fluffy fire thing with a mane and black markings.

Cruz/Aqua/Aquaria

This has the same problem as the Flambear line, just less extreme. It’s okay, being a little plesiosaur that evolves into a bigger plesiosaur, but it also lacks an interesting catch to it. The pearls are maybe something, but they’re not really emphasized, just kind of tacked on. Plus Dragonair kind of has the crystal neck ornaments on lock. And the horn. And the underbelly. And the water theme...

Whoops.

I definitely wouldn’t be opposed to a plesiosaur water starter in the future, but it would probably have to be completely redesigned.

Possible reason for being scrapped: Lack of focus/interesting design; too similar to Dragonair

Pokes to fill the void: Dragonair, as mentioned above. If you want a plesiosaur, Lapras is always a thing.

Putting the rest under the cut for length.

Sunmola1/Anchorage/Grotess

This is one of the most chaotic beta evolutions out there, aside from beta Girafarig. I can see the resemblance between Sunmola1 and Anchorage to some extent--counter-shaded blue fish with two fins and a short body--but the anchor part of the evolution comes out of nowhere. Then it sporadically turns into a gulper eel, which has nothing to do with the previous two evolutions at all.

I’ve heard some people suggest that Sunmola1 basically gets dragged into the depths and turns into a deep-sea creature due to its anchor, which is a fantastic idea. However, if that’s what they were going for here it’s not really clear, and I think it could be executed much better.

Individually, Sumola1 is a little plain. Not terrible, but I think they could do something more interesting with the little head thing. Anchorage is memorable, but there’s something very un-Pokemonish about it. I think it’s just the fact that it’s basically cut in half--I keep expecting the backsprite to show its organs or something. Grotess is also a bit too plain.

It’s also worth noting that at some point, this was the evolutionary line, which is more consistent but much less interesting (save for the middle evo’s eyes, which are pretty great).

Possible reason for being scrapped: Lack of evolutionary consistency; some designs plain or not very fitting for Pokemon

Pokes to fill the void: Alomomola is a sunfish Pokemon. Sharpedo is a shark crossed with an object, and Grotess almost certainly became Huntail and Gorebyss.

Rinring/Bellboyant

These two... are pretty good. They have a simple catch--black cats with bells--and the designs are nicely executed and memorable.

If I had one complaint, it’s that they maybe seems a tad unfocused in the backend of things. They’re dark types, but have a bunch of “cutesy” moves, and it’s not clear why’d they be dark apart from being black cats. They seem to have a magical girl vibe (Bellboyant looks a bit like Luna from Sailor Moon, which is probably not a coincidence), which also has nothing to do with the bells or the dark theme. I do think that the designs themselves are fine though, and that if you just focused on the sound concept a hair more you’d have a pretty great Pokemon.

Possible reason for being scrapped: Not entirely sure, these definitely would’ve been popular. Might’ve just been a balancing thing, or it lost the dev popularity contest. 

Pokes to fill the void: Skitty kind of has the same vibe as Rinring. They also remind me a bit of the Meowth line, being cat Pokemon with metal attached to them. The Purrloin line takes over the “dark-type cat” aspect.

Bomseel

I’m torn on this one. On the one hand, it’s a very plain looking Pokemon. The idea of it balancing a fireball/bomb on its nose instead of a ball is clever and memorable enough... except that it’s dependent on it being on that pose. It can’t balance that 24/7, and once it stops all you’re left with is a plain sea lion with dark points.

However, it’s fire/water. The only fire/water we have right now is a legendary, so it would be sweet to have one that’s just a regular poke. So it’s not that the concept itself is bad, using a water-based animal and adding a fire type; it’s just more that the execution is lackluster. Give this guy a hook not related to the fireball and make the seal itself more interesting and I think you’d have something here.

Possible reason for being scrapped: Lack of interesting design

Pokes to fill the void: Volcanion is our only fire/water Pokemon for now. In terms of seals/sea lions with a circus theme, Popplio is a decent enough match.

Tigrette/Electiger

Someone at Gamefreak hates tigerballs, because this line was planned for Gen 1, scrapped, then planned for Gen 2 and scrapped again. Which is strange, because while it’s not the best design it’s not bad either. It’s very very cute, and could definitely find an audience.

However, I’m not really sure what the premise is here. If it’s based on tiger clay bells, then it doesn’t really play into the bell theme much at all. And if it’s not... why is it so round? It’s not that the roundness is bad, but it would usually form the hook for this Pokemon, like it collects static electricity in its fur that makes it puff out or something. Maybe some dex descriptions would’ve made this clearer, who knows.

Also, Electiger is literally the exact same design as Tigrette, just bigger. It would either need a completely new final evolution or would need to show up as a single evo. 

While that sounds harsh, I do really like this design. Fix the evo, figure out/build on the hook of it being round or bell like, and maybe refine the markings a touch and it would be pretty perfect.

Possible reason for being scrapped: Not sure. Might’ve been too similar to Pikachu (both being yellow round electric type Pokemon with zig-zag tails, and og fat Pikachu was also very round). The need to rework the evolution also might’ve turned GameFreak off of it.

Pokes to fill the void: Spheal and Rowlet are both pleasantly round. Pikachu is cute and electric themed in a similar way. In terms of tigers, Raikou is also electric-type. The exact way the stripes are done here is also very similar to Litten.

Kurstraw/Pangshi

GameFreak. GameFreak, you are telling me that we almost had a voodoo-doll Pokemon based off of Ushi-no-Toki-Mairi that evolves into a fucking jiangshi panda?? You are killing me here.

A few interesting things to note here:

Kurstraw evolves at level 1. How? Why? No idea. It could just be a placeholder, but...

The fact that Kurstraw was set to have Curse as its signature move (then called “nail”) and that it only learned this move at level 100 makes it evolving at level 1 seem intentional.

To make things more confusing, it almost seems like (and this is speculation on my part) GameFreak’s intention was to encourage players to not evolve this thing. Stats are comparable, Kurstraw only gets its signature move if you level it up to where it can’t evolve, and Kurstraw has the better moveset (getting frigging destiny bond at lv. 16, while Pangshi gets... splash (which. makes more sense when you consider it’s called “hop” in Japan but it’s still useless). If that was what they were aiming for, then that’s a really unique mechanic that would really make this poke stand out.

Design wise, Kurstraw is... well, it’s a doll with a nail rammed through it. Nothing wrong with that, but it’s not very Pokemon-ish. Meanwhile, Pangshi is maybe a little too much like a Jianshi rather than being reminiscent of one, right down to the little hat. The pose, fangs, and panda colors (which resemble Jiangshi mandarin robes) are more than enough to get the hook across.

What I really love about these two are the expressions. They are just like, so dissonantly happy. Kurstraw is literally like

and Pangshi has the dead-eyed thousand-yard stare of Espurr, except unlike Espurr it looks completely and utter deranged. It looks like if this Pokemon ended up in Mystery Dungeon, it would respond to every question with “my favorite color is blood”. Amazing.

Possible reason for being scrapped: I think these two might’ve been scrapped just because they were too scary. I mean, it’s a voodoo doll impaled on a giant nail that evolves into a literal actual corpse. The implied violence was probably just a bit much for GameFreak.

The reason I think this is, beside the fact that they have fairly solid designs, good hooks, and all of their stats and moves in place, most beta Pokemon have had their premises revisited at some point. But we’ve really never gotten a voodoo doll Pokemon since this, and we definitely haven’t gotten any jiangshi Pokemon either, which suggests the problem lied in the very concept rather than the execution.

Pokes to fill the void: People say that Kurstraw was reworked into Banette, but if anyone Pokemon resembles it to be, it would actually be Mimikyu. They both have cloth bodies with drawn-on smiley faces that resemble something cuter than them and they both want to curse you for existing.

For Pangshi... well, there’s Pancham if you’re looking for tiny pandas. If you’re after a jiangshi though, you’re out of luck.

Wolfman/Warwolf

This Pokemon has a great hook. I mean, a Pokemon that wears a pelt that transforms it into a werewolf? Hell yeah. Not to mention it might be a reference to an obscure Nordic tale about people donning wolf pelts to turn into wolves for ten days.

Design wise, it... well, Wolfman looks almost exactly like Venonat. I’m not the only one who sees this, right?

That aside, I think the idea could be played up a little more. Wolfman is fine, save for its Venonat-ishness, but Warwolf doesn’t do much for me, basically just being a larger version with claws and fangs. If the idea is that it turns into a werewolf by wearing the pelt, what if its evolution looked somewhat like a wolf? Or better yet, the actually body of the thing changes to fill the wolf skin more, so it looks like its a part of it? That would really elevate this Pokemon to a new level.

Possible reason for being scrapped: I’d guess that it’s the same problem as Kurstraw and Pangshi--too scary. I mean, that is a dead pelt of some kind, which means that it killed and skinned some kind of Pokemon, and that’s not getting into questions of what Pokemon they got that from.

It’s also worth noting that when we did finally get a werewolf Pokemon via Lycanroc, it was minus the pelt concept.

Pokes to fill the void: Lycanroc as our werewolf Pokemon. In terms of design, Venonat is very similar as noted above. And something about it really reminds me of Snorunt, being little critters with glowing eyes that wear a cloak of some kind and live in the cold (this line was ice-type).

#pokemon #pkmn #beta pokemon #pokemon gold and silver #pokemon gen 2 #outdesign posts things #god this ended up a lot longer than I intended it to #anyway I hope you enjoyed me rambling about concept art for 2k words

[obssessivethorn]

“Home” [Genshin Impact]

Synopsis: In the final moments before battle, the traveler's worry grows fast. Their own twin stands at the other end of the battlefield, refusing to put their resolve to rest and come home. Archons forbid their fight be to the death.

Trigger Warnings: Angst, Major character death(s), death in general

Word Count: 2,889 words

Date Posted: July 8, 2021

Note: This is based purely off of fan theories, my own predictions, and knowledge of the game as it is currently. It will include spoilers for the “We will be reunited” archon quest if you have not gotten that far into the story yet. As well as hints of lore from the Honkai Impact game. This is in no way in indication of the game’s ending and should be taken as merely a fan based prediction/theory of one of the many possibilities of this story’s ending. Please enjoy! (This turned out longer than intended-)

Let me know if you want to see more to this au type thing. I’d gladly write about Diluc and Kaeya reconciling and seeing each other as brothers again as well as other stuff with the characters!

"Home"

★★★

The traveler had gained the former power back, their hand retracting from their resonance with the holy statue. Their friends stood around them, watching with widened eyes which hold a burning amazement. The traveler’s power unlike any they have ever seen.

Wings stretch to their sides to bask in the moon’s godly light. An ethereal glow began to emanate around their being as if they too had taken the form of an archon. Each element’s swirl could be felt within their body, bringing forth a familiar feeling. Near completion.

With their power restored once more, their feet landed back to the ground. Sword in hand, they turned back to their friends. From adepti to everyday workers, the traveler has gathered their closest and very best known fighters and friends to help them.

The battle was approaching, yanking every breath of fresh air and common sense from the traveler. Their friends would be fighting faceless beings. People turned to monsters. Who couldn’t be saved.

But the traveler couldn’t hold the same courage they could. On the other side of the battlefield stood their sibling. Their twin. Flesh and blood who they have traveled worlds together with. And they would fight. Archon forbid, to the death.

A shaky breath left their lips, eyes closed shut after gazing harshly at the ground for too long. Feeling a hand placed on their shoulder pulled them back to reality before they could spiral further into fear’s welcoming grasp. Looking back at the owner of the limb, they could finally find a clear breath to fill their lungs.

Venti’s sorrowful smile pierced the traveler. A silent understanding blew through their hair, sending golden wisps in different directions. Archons forbid death.

Taking a step back, the wind god left a lingering warmth upon the traveler’s shoulder. He made his back to where the other archons stood, powerful grace dawning him as the traveler had never seen before. A true god ready to fight a war once again.

The traveler took a sigh, grasping any courage they could find before turning their gaze to their friends.

“Alright, so as you all probably know, The Abyss Order has finally risen.” Their voice shook, cracking every other word. They cleared their throat before continuing.

“We were unable to prevent them from creating what is essentially a mechanized god. However, this does not mean we are doomed!” The traveler looked upon the sea of faces. Fear, shock, and suppressed somber mixed together.

How could they let this happen? It was never supposed to come to this. Dragging their friends into a war. Starting a war to begin with! Children stood among the crowd. While they may be talented vision holders, they were still too young to face this. But they still insisted. Pleading with the traveler to let them help. And they let it happen.

Their breath began to shorten again, tears fighting their usual calm composure. They could feel themselves spiraling once more. How could they let this happen? Let it get this far? Let children-

A voice broke them from their thoughts yet again.

“Traveler!”

Looking over to the figures running around the outside of the crowd, they saw four familiar Knights Of Favonius growing closer. Amber waved her hands high to grab their attention as the small group approached.

“Mondstat has been evacuated, all of the citizens are being led to Liyue by the knights of Favonius.” Amber smiled, reassuring the Traveler of innocents’ safety.

“Great, and the people of Liyue?” The traveler asked, redirecting their attention to Jean.

“Safely protected by a shield covering the harbor.” The woman smiled. “But if worse comes to worse, you can’t forget that both cities’ people are still able to fight. While Mond has the Knights of Favonius, Liyue has the Qixing. Each nation has their own means of defense, so trust us, Traveler. Even Schneznaya has the Fatui.” Jean’s grin grew wider, excited pride slipping through her calm mask.

The traveler smiled back, chuckling at their own worry. “You’re right, they should all be able to hold their own and protect each other, with Visions or not.” They turned back to the crowd, Amber, Lisa, Jean, and Kaeya now by their side.

“Now, as we stand, the Abyss Order is marching our way. Their movements may be unpredictable to us, but we know this land better than they do. It definitely won’t be easy,” the traveler took a quick breath, heart weighing heavier in their chest. “But The Regions of Teyvat will triumph today.” The crowd’s cheers roar through the field.

“Nicely said, Honorary Knight,” Jean turned to the traveler, smiling proudly at them.

“Ya know, I didn’t think you had such a thing in you,” Kaeya mused, patting their shoulder.

“To be honest,” the short blonde chuckled,” I was totally speaking out of my ass there.” Their light grin faltered, falling into uncomfortable worry.

“I know it’s hard, but you’re not alone, traveler,” Jean placed a hand on their shoulder, sympathy painting her features.

“We’re all here for you,” Lisa gave them a quick, meaningful hug. “Besides, what would I do without my little helper~.” The traveler let out a light laugh, however, the easy moment couldn’t compete with the bubbling anxiety filling their lungs.

Air weighed heavily.

Gentle breezes turned to cold gusts.

“May the archons protect us.” Jean prayed, stepping away to rally her section of the Knights. Lisa and Amber followed suit, preparing their squadrons both mentally and physically.

Kaeya remained by the blonde’s side, gazing at the crowd with an unreadable expression.

“Are you going to be okay?” The traveler’s question broke him from his thoughts.

“Yeah,” he chuckled, a piece of his mask beginning to slip. “I understand.”

The traveler’s face morphed into confusion. Understand? Understand what? What could Kayea, a man of many eloquent words, mean by such a short, vague statement?”

The man chuckled again.

Another crack in his mask.

His eyes drifted to Diluc, then to Dainsleif. Crack.

A sigh escaped his lips, forcing his smile to fall sour.

Crack.

His gaze fell to the floor, watching his now fallen, damaged mask lay among the dancing grass as if it had separated from a slain hilichurl.

The man who stood before the lost twin was not the same flirty and mischievous Knight of Favonius they had met all those months ago.

This man was Kaeya. A Khaenri’ahn who’s life was ripped away by the archons themselves. A man sent to create a downfall of other nations in retaliation for the onslaught of his country’s people. Kaeya Alberich. Khaenri’aian survivor.

His gaze drew from his Mond identity laying idly by his feet, to the traveler. “I understand why you’re scared.” Tears brimmed in the man’s eyes, a glint of fear sparkling in his pupil.

All previous disdain for the people who had fallen seemed to hide, a glimpse of it remained hiding beneath his eyes. But it soon became evident to the traveler, whatever conversation he had with Dainsleif, was enough to inject guilt and sympathy within his veins. But still not enough to instill total remorse.

A silent understanding passed between the two. No words passed through the air between them.

Despite being humans turned monsters, despite Kaeya’s place of blame on his people, they were still victims of the Cataclysm.

The traveler placed a hand on their friend’s shoulder. They sent a quick smile, opening their mouth to speak, only to be interrupted.

“Hey, traveler!”

Turning their head to the sound of their name, they were met with a certain ‘tone-deaf’ bard.

Kaeya nodded with a slight smile, turning away and walking in the direction of his brother.

“Are you ready?” The archon’s voice was soft, contrasting from his usual high pitched giggles.

The traveler had expected a witty one liner to help bring up their mood or a quick joke poking at their seriousness. However, the bard merely looked drained, eye bags lining his face with a somber expression painted over his soft features.

“I don’t know.” The words brush past their lips before they could think. Were they ready? They had to face their twin of all people. How could they be ready? “I plan to bring them back.” They stated. “To bring them home.” The traveler stared out into the crowd, watching people prepare.

“But will you be able to?” Venti stared intently at the ground as if it were his enemy. The question was aimed mainly at himself rather than the traveler and seemed to slip past him before he could stop it. He quickly shook away the thought, noticing the growing worry on the lone twin’s face. “Of course you will!” His mask was back up, a playful ‘hehe’ drawing past his lips.

“Yeah, I will,” the traveler breathed, a lie beautifully woven within the truth.

•~•

The city of Mondstat lay dim in the distance, the army of Knights and vision holders drifting further from home with each step.

Across the clear fields of Windrise stood monsters. Creatures from the Abyss wielding dark and power hungry gazes.

Many stared in disgust, watching the distant crowd draw closer. Other however, glanced at the group in pity, quickly averting their gazes to refocus their minds. Few knew the true story of the fallen nation 500 years ago, letting their hearts weigh heavy with sympathetic solitude.

Leading the enemy was a familiar figure. The Abyssal Royalty stood proud yet steeled away, gazing at their opponent from across the grassy pathway. Few stems of small lamp grass paved the way between both sides, guiding each distant traveler to meet their other half once again.

Away from their allies, the lost twins hesitantly stepped nearer. A temporary truce of peace passed between them, its wick quickly beginning to burn.

“Lumine,” Aether broke the evening silence. His voice held strong, only to be mocked by the hurt hidden beneath his golden eyes.

“Aether.” Lumine mimicked her brother, the same strong yet weak presence plaguing her voice.

A silent plea from both siblings rang through the surrounding air.

“We can leave, go home! Together..”

“My battle and your journey are yet to be over.”

“After all this time, you still keep saying things that make no sense. Who are you battling other than me?”

The traveler’s twin paused, momentarily shocked from their sibling’s words.

“I’m fighting those who tore us apart.”

The Abyssal twin’s gaze hardened, shifting into an icy glare which shot through their sibling’s heart. Oddly, the sharpened look seemed to pass through the traveler, aimed at a distant being among the crowd of Knights.

“Those who..” the traveler’s words drew thin, disappearing within the air.

A crackling rang through the air, drawing the twins and their respective allies’ attention. Three familiar diamonds tore through the sky, ripping an entrance for a rather infamous figure to emerge.

“Your journeys must end here, outlanders.” Golden eyes pierced the twins, an authoritative air emanating from the unknown goddess. “You’ve altered the weight of destiny from your first arrival, now you must own up to your actions.” With a flick of her hand, the god isolated the three, barriers blocking the view of both armies racing toward their leaders. Their screams fell silent as the last cube sealed them in, the last view being the face of Barbatos, reaching out in elegant mimicry of the day he tried and failed to rescue her. Once again, he wasn’t fast enough.

Within concealment, the twins readied their swords, tri-wings stretching after years of rest.

“Fight as long as you wish, but you will always come back to the same point. Failure.”

Upon hearing her words the twins launched forward, entering yet another intense dance with the god.

•~•

For what felt like hours, the three battled as they had once before, only with the twin’s new found strength to differ. The outlander’s feet hit the ground, enough adrenaline pumping to let them ignore the battered bruises.

The fallen goddess now lay still, defeated by the twins with the joint help of the archons’ powers. A wind-bearing bard tends to a scared girl, broken from the evil which once plagued her.

The abyssal twin gazed at their sibling in awe. A twinge of pain entered their chest at the thought of what they must have gone through trying to find them. How could they have so badly abandoned their own twin? Millions of questions and blame raced through their mind, blurring their vision with tears.

A name reached their ears. Was it theirs? Wait. It was from their twin. Why were they shouting his name? They were safe now.

The traveling twin rushed forward, pushing their other half out of the way and taking the incoming blow. They fell to the ground clutching their chest in pain. The cold felt strangely welcoming. Only, their hands filled with warmth. Now wasn’t the time to nap, but sleep’s comforting embrace wanted to engulf them. Closing their eyes for a second wouldn’t hurt.

•~•

Tears began to pour, outweighing the pellets of falling rain. “Please, wake up.” They cried, pain filling their chest with each second passing by. “We can go home now, the war’s over.” They hiccuped, silently denying an unreal truth.

“Majesty!”

“Honorary Knight!”

Shouts from either side could be heard, only to fall on the deaf ears of the traveler’s sibling. Upon viewing the sight, the surroundings fell silent. Not even the thundering sky could dent the area’s torturous quiet.

Holding their twin close to them, the abyssal sibling let tears slip through their grasp. “We can leave now, just like you wanted!” A small squeeze around their hand gave them hope, gasping with widened eyes.

Below them, the traveler forced their eyes into a squint. Their hand squeezed lightly within their sibling’s. “Home is wherever we are together.”

A sob left the abyssal twin’s lips, forcing a cry to echo in the pouring rain. “You’re right, we’re home! We’re together. We’re-.” Their twin’s grip loosened.

“Hey…,” the crying blonde nudged their other half. “Hey, wake up… we’re home.” Their nudges grew to hasty shaking. “Come on, wake up.” Sob.

“Wake up!” Sob. “Come back!” Crack.

The final thread holding the lone twin’s hope snapped, releasing a titlewave of buried emotions. Unsaid words of appreciation. Unplanned surprise hugs. Introducing new friends which they both longed for. Battle training in different worlds. Fulfilling their prophecy for this world. Long forgotten “I love you”s. Gone. With a stupid flick of a wrist.

The now lost twin sat alone, hand traveling through matted blonde locks stained with blood. As to who the red liquid belonged to, they hadn’t a clue.

Silence once again weaved through the solemn tension which hung frigid with every breath. Tears continued to stream down the outlander’s face, falling onto the face of their loss.

“Your majesty…” An abyssal mage floated steadily toward their ruler. Its words were phrased more as a question of fear rather than a statement.

Wordlessly, the Abyss Ruler began to stand, hooking their arm underneath the crook of their twin’s knees and their back. Their eyes didn’t leave the body now laying limp in their grasp. A hollow warning passed through the air as they slowly trudged to the wind Statue of the Seven.

The statue of Windrise was a signature point of Mondstat, the giant tree creating an elegant background for the stone monument. Windwheel asters lined the edge as anemo crystalflies drifted through the general breeze.

The now lone traveler placed their sibling down on the ground in front of the statue, kneeling beside them. Another broken sob left their lips, silently pleading with whatever remaining archon Teyvat had left to bring their twin back, punish them for their actions, kill them too, anything.

“Anything please,” they whimpered, eyes squeezed shut to prepare for any punishment the gods may bring. “Just don’t let them suffer for my mistakes. It should have been me. If only I was faster.”

The wind’s light breeze grew heavily, picking up into gental gusts of air. The change wasn’t enough to gain the attention of the traveler, however. Only a new voice entering their mind broke their distraught focus.

“Open your eyes, child.”

Doing as the voice said, the blonde was met with a young bard whose physical body seemed as if it was disintegrating. Patches of pale skin detached from the main vessel, floating upward toward Celestia only to vanish within the rays of the rising sun.

“Your twin will never be forgotten, and neither will you.” The bard outstretched his hand, an ethereal light seemed to emanate from him. “Your story will be remembered.” An empathetic smile dawned his lips, attempting to distract from the pain which glimmered beneath his gaze. An understanding of pain.

“Lord Barbatos?” The still kneeling traveler gazed up in awe at the god. “The wind archon?”

Light chuckles passed his lips. “Yes, only… I am no longer the archon of wind, merely another god whose time is finally up.”

“Please, punish me. I’ve only caused pain to the people of Teyvat.”

“No.”

“No?” The blonde whimpered.

“No, just please, come home.” The bard bent down in front of them, pushing a strand of hair from their face as he had 500 years ago. 

Oh, how the beautiful fall.

•~•

#genshin impact #genshin #genshin lumine #genshin aether #genshin traveler #genshin x reader #genshin fandom #genshin fanfic #genshin angst #genshin kaeya #genshin khaenri'ah #genshin venti #genshin archon #archons #diluc ragnvindr #kaeya alberich #angst #dear god #the angst #end me now #please #lumine #aether #dansleif #major character death #character death #death in general #cry with me

[becomewings]

The Most Beautiful Moment in Life <I’M FINE>

    BTS Universe Story Highlights, pt. 2 / 4

« pt. 1  |  » pt. 3

Introduction

JungKook’s and YoonGi’s stories are the first of the paid content in BTS Universe Story and are substantially more detailed than the episodes covered in part 1. As this led to longer summaries (4.2k and 3k), I have added “tl;dr commentary” at the bottom of the post after a section of additional thoughts. This commentary summarizes the parenthetical asides I made throughout the summaries and may be of interest as standalone reading to those who have already played the game yet would like to review its connections to the BU texts and MVs.

Content warning: contains references to death, suicide, suicidal ideation, child abuse, domestic violence, blood, homicide, depression, trauma, PTSD

This guide contains major spoilers and includes references to other BU media

Do not repost, copy, or quote without permission

The Boy on the Threshold

In this story, SeokJin works to uncover the motivations behind JungKook’s nightly street wandering, instigation of fights with thugs, and decision to jump from the roof of a construction site. He was aware of the “darkness” within JungKook but never thought that he would give up on himself. SeokJin is determined to find a way to make JungKook think “I want to live” on his own.

In the afternoon on 11 April Year 22, SeokJin drives by the crosswalk outside Songju Jeil High School. Spotting a grim-faced JungKook, he gets out to greet him. JungKook visibly brightens and pelts him with question after question, finally finishing with, “But how come you’re here at school?” If the player chooses the response “I came to see you” rather than “I was in the neighborhood,” JungKook seems a little disbelieving due to the coincidental timing but nevertheless pleased. SeokJin offers him a ride, thinking that JungKook will not carry out that night’s actions from previous loops if he gets home right away. In the car, SeokJin reminisces aloud about the day they all met. On 3 March Year 19, all seven boys arrived late on the first day at Songju Jeil High School and were scolded outside by the Dean. (Aside from the absence of extra students, this scene looks very similar to the BTS Begins Middle Scene VCR, including the detail of YoonGi arriving last. This VCR predates official BU content.) When the Dean spotted SeokJin in their lineup, he reduced their punishment of community service for one month to just that afternoon. After classes, the boys cleaned the annex. The old classroom-turned-storage room became their secret hideout where they enjoyed various activities like dancing, playing the piano, and spending time with one another. JungKook appears happy as they chat about their school days, although in one path, his face falls after he remembers when he and YoonGi were caught in the annex. SeokJin is concerned, but JungKook insists, “It’s nothing.”

They say goodbye outside JungKook’s house, but SeokJin watches to make sure he goes inside. JungKook hesitates before ringing the bell at the gate. His mom answers, surprised and at a loss by his unexpected arrival. She asks him to come back later because his father’s relatives stopped by, and the intercom cuts off before he can answer. (His mother remarried, so this is really his step-father and family.) SeokJin wonders if JungKook has no one to lean on at school or at home and if this is why he wanders the streets at night. He asks JungKook where he wants to go now. “The beach… the one I went to with you guys,” JungKook answers, then says he’s kidding when SeokJin hesitates, thinking about the night ahead. SeokJin invites JungKook home instead, hoping to keep an eye on him before he needs to save NamJoon at the gas station.

In his bedroom, SeokJin hastily takes down the map and notes pinned on the wall of the boys’ incidents around the city. After letting JungKook inside, he shows him a box of photos from their time together in school. While JungKook browses, a notification on SeokJin’s phone reminds him of Songho Foundation’s inaugural ceremony that evening. Songho Foundation is a scholarship foundation funded by his maternal grandmother’s estate, and his father formally introduces him on this occasion. SeokJin also receives a call from his father’s long-time aide, a man he refers to as Uncle JunHo, who instructs him not to be late to the ceremony. Claiming it won’t take him long, SeokJin asks JungKook to stay there and wait for him to return. He is worried about leaving JungKook alone but also concerned that bringing him to the gas station after the ceremony will make him late to intervening in NamJoon’s incident.

In the lobby of the hotel hosting the Songho Foundation Inauguration Ceremony, SeokJin recognizes many important faces from around the city: Song JunHo, his father’s aide; Seo HyunJung, the city’s deputy mayor; the CEO of Youngjin Engineering & Construction Company; a professor from Munhyeon University; and the Jeil High School principal, Jo JinMyung. SeokJin doesn’t want to cross paths with the principal but is drawn into a conversation with him, the mayor, and his father, Kim ChangJun. “Assemblyman! Congratulations on the launch of the scholarship foundation,” Deputy Mayor Seo says to Kim ChangJun. “I hear that your son has been accepted to Munhyeon University? You must be happy that he’s attending your alma mater.” Kim ChangJun shakes his head. “He still has a lot to learn.” She remarks that everyone knows how well SeokJin has grown up and inquires about his career plans. The player is presented with three choices: “I haven’t decided yet,” “I want to become a good person,” and “I want to become someone like my father.” SeokJin’s father continues to look grim while the others chuckle in response to the first two answers, but his expression softens at the third, which SeokJin knew would not rub him the wrong way. Deputy Mayor Seo proposes to Assemblyman Kim that they establish a regular meeting to discuss community development, mentioning that it would be better if he could invite the city’s prominent citizens and give a speech. Assemblyman Kim agrees, telling his assistant Song JunHo to make note of it. The ceremony concludes, and the guests head towards the hotel’s restaurant. SeokJin is wary of his father’s watchful gaze but impatient to carry out the rest of the night’s plans. While his father is surrounded by other people, he informs Uncle JunHo that he has to leave to work on a group project. SeokJin slips out of the hotel and heads to NamJoon’s gas station.

While SeokJin is gone, one of the photos in the box catches JungKook’s eye. It shows the seven boys sitting on a wall with the ocean behind them. (This photo resembles the shot in Euphoria at 5’32” except that they appear to be wearing school uniform shirts and slacks.) A flashback retells the afternoon of 12 June Year 19 when the boys cut school early and visited the sea, trudging over 3 kilometers under the scorching sun to find a boulder that is rumored to make your dreams come true. (The date is not specified in the game, but the memory closely follows this set of entries in The Notes 1.) Everyone collapses in disappointment when they can’t find the rock at its designated location. JungKook is tired but not as disappointed as the others—just walking there with them is enough for him, even though he often feels uncertain of his place among the group. He gets up on the pier railing, reflecting: “I’ve always liked walking on the edge of walls or on top of lines. Focusing on centering my gravity means that I don’t really think of anything else, and the boundary—not quite a part of either place—always felt like where I should be.” Balancing precariously, JungKook walks until someone grabs his arm. YoonGi scolds him not to do this. JungKook assures him that he will not fall but privately thinks: “YoonGi would often grab my arm when I walked on railings. The others would look after me, too, after seeing him do that. I liked their helping hands. It felt like they were telling me that I should go to them. That this wasn’t my place. Maybe their hands were why I walked on the railings.”

The story returns to the present in SeokJin’s perspective. He rushes back to his room after saving NamJoon and finds JungKook asleep, leaning against the bed with the photos still scattered around him. Feeling both relief and regret, SeokJin quietly coaxes JungKook to lay down and sleep more comfortably. JungKook wakes up and says he should go home after hearing that it’s past ten o’clock. The game cuts briefly to SeokJin’s father in his study with his aide. Kim ChangJun asks Song JunHo to fetch SeokJin, as he needs to know what goes on for the foundation. JunHo says that SeokJin must be entertaining a guest for the group project because he spotted an unfamiliar pair of shoes in the entryway.

Back in his bedroom, SeokJin is startled when his father knocks on the door. It’s rare for his father to visit the second floor of their home, so he let his guard down while chatting with JungKook. “F-Father.” Stammering, SeokJin flinches and gathers up the scattered photos. “Did you leave the ceremony early to waste time like this? Even lying to say you were doing a school project?” asks Kim ChangJun. His cold and reproachful stare suffocates SeokJin. When his father’s eyes scan to JungKook standing awkwardly at the side, SeokJin is plunged into a childhood memory. On 10 October Year 9, 9-year-old SeokJin hid a school friend who was being chased by scary men in his bedroom. His father arrived and asked if the boy was Mr. Choi’s son, saying people had come to take him. When Kim ChangJun ordered him to “be a good boy,” SeokJin froze and was powerless to stop his friend from being handed over. The following day, SeokJin was told his friend transferred schools. (This event is also depicted as the first entry of The Notes 1.) In the present, SeokJin struggles to think of an explanation, smothered by that memory and his father’s pressuring stare. JungKook timidly speaks up. “I was only here to visit for a short while. I was actually about to head home. Hey, I’ll go now.” SeokJin knows he can’t leave him alone yet and finally forces himself to move. “Father, I… I’m going to go out for a little while.” He runs outside, but JungKook is already gone.

The story cuts to JungKook’s perspective as he arrives in a familiar alleyway. He is thankful that SeokJin was so considerate to him but feels that he shouldn’t have gone to his home since it made things more complicated for his friend. “YoonGi even got expelled because of me… Why do I always mess things up for the people around me?” JungKook thinks. The player is presented the choice to either text SeokJin or call YoonGi. In the first path, SeokJin calls JungKook while he is mid-text and says that he’ll come pick him up, but JungKook declines, thanks him, and hangs up. In the second path, JungKook fiddles with his phone, wondering if YoonGi will be annoyed or even answer. He remembers when they crossed paths a few days earlier. On 7 April Year 22, JungKook heard a familiar tune while roaming the dark streets and saw YoonGi playing piano through a broken window of a music shop. YoonGi stopped and eventually staggered out of the shop without noticing JungKook reaching out to him. JungKook tried to play the music by memory, and suddenly YoonGi returned—just like their days at the classroom. (Note: In his 7 April Year 22 entry of The Notes 1, YoonGi is drunk and stumbling by an empty construction site when he recognizes a clumsy piano tune that he’d been playing “not long ago.” But when he runs to the music shop and finds JungKook, the text does not indicate that he remembers this is his second visit to the shop this evening. Additionally, the Wings short film First Love seems to reference some of the events of this night—or evokes YoonGi’s distorted memories of it, mingled with a representation of JungKook’s later accident.)

In the present (11 April), JungKook wonders if YoonGi is doing well. He has thought about him since their chance encounter but doesn’t have the courage to call him first. (The narrative paths rejoin here.) JungKook wonders where he should go now yet doesn’t want to think about anything. He stops in the middle of the road, and a passing car’s headlights make him dizzy. SeokJin arrives in the distance and shouts his name, but JungKook just thinks, “One more step from here. Just one more step, and everything ends.” He steps in front of the honking car. SeokJin calls him in the distance, and JungKook feels everything slip farther away. The glass shatters and the loop resets.

Awakening once more on the morning of 11 April, SeokJin vows to protect JungKook until the end. The memory of arriving too late as JungKook threw himself in front of the car reminds him of how he was also unable to protect his childhood friend when he was 9. He needs to devise a new plan, since JungKook practically ran out of the house when confronted by Kim ChangJun. The story cuts to that evening, with JungKook looking at the photo in SeokJin’s bedroom. This time, SeokJin ignores his phone’s buzzing reminder about Songho Foundation’s inaugural ceremony. He asks JungKook where he’d like to get next and, when he doesn’t have any ideas, offers him a tour of the university campus.

JungKook seems happier looking around the campus, the cherry blossoms in full bloom. SeokJin uses this opportunity to ask him if anything is on his mind and if school is going well. JungKook answers nonchalantly, but SeokJin remembers how grim he looked at the school crosswalk that afternoon. He asks if JungKook still hangs out with the other guys. “HoSeok and TaeHyung are working part-time jobs. The others… I’m not sure,” JungKook answers, expression darkening. SeokJin wonders if he shouldn’t have brought it up but still presses him. “How come? You should talk to them from time to time.” “But it’s because of me,” says JungKook. “The reason why YoonGi was expelled… It was because he was trying to protect me.” 

SeokJin either responds “It’s not your fault” or “Don’t think that way.” Following the first choice, JungKook insists, “No, it’s my fault. YoonGi wouldn’t have talked back to the teacher if I wasn’t there.” SeokJin shakes his head. “No, you couldn’t really do anything given the situation.” JungKook replies that he should have at least apologized and that he never had the chance to tell YoonGi he was sorry. “That’s how you felt, huh… I should’ve done more. I’m sorry,” SeokJin apologizes. JungKook shakes his head with a smile, but SeokJin knows that he doesn’t understand what he really meant. (Per events in The Notes 1, it is technically SeokJin’s fault that the teacher found them in the classroom.) If the second dialogue choice, “Don’t think that way,” is chosen, JungKook questions, “How could I? When it was because of me.” “No…” SeokJin is not brave enough to say that he’s the one to blame. The camera (i.e. the animation) starts wobbling as though SeokJin’s vision is swimming. “SeokJin?” asks JungKook in concern. “I should’ve done more. I’m sorry.” The episode ends with the same dialogue and animation of JungKook shaking his head with a smile, except that in the second path the camera is still wobbling from SeokJin’s perspective. (This is the only episode I noted in the game that has a slight difference in endings based on the player’s final choice, although it is essentially cosmetic.)

Episode 5 opens with a more detailed memory of 11 June Year 20 from JungKook’s perspective. The high school was holding an open house for parents. Not wanting to stay in a classroom, he wandered off and heard piano music drifting from the annex. JungKook slipped into their classroom hideout and settled down to listen. YoonGi continued to play without acknowledging him. The music helped calm JungKook—it seemed as though YoonGi understood how he felt and was trying to console him. The sound cut off abruptly as the door slammed open. “You rascals! What are you doing here?!” the Dean of Students demanded. He slapped JungKook, knocking him down. A flurry of verbal abuse poured over his crumpled form. YoonGi shoved the teacher’s shoulder and stepped in front of JungKook. “Wow, look at this kid… You put your hands on a teacher? You better be prepared, Min YoonGi.” With that ominous threat, the Dean departed. JungKook spoke from the floor. “Hey, sorry for making you—” “It’s nothing,” YoonGi cut in. JungKook wondered why he helped him. It was the first time someone had protected him, and he believed that he would never forget the view of YoonGi’s back. YoonGi asked why JungKook was smiling. “I don’t know.” Still smiling, JungKook touched his throbbing cheek. YoonGi stared at him before breaking into his own smile and sitting down next to him. They sat there wordlessly for some time. The feeling of growing closer to YoonGi made JungKook feel giddy the rest of the day. But YoonGi did not come to school the following day, and two weeks later, he was formally expelled. (The encounter with the teacher and YoonGi’s subsequent expulsion are also referenced in JungKook and YoonGi’s 25 June Year 20 entries in The Notes 1.)

In a brief interlude in the present (11 April at the university campus), SeokJin reflects again that he does not have the courage to confess to JungKook the real reason why they drifted apart. He walks with his eyes trained on the ground until JungKook calls for him to look at the cherry blossoms floating in the wind. The scene cuts to 30 September Year 20 for another of JungKook’s school memories. He stood outside the school’s annex, reflecting that his friends probably didn’t know that he went there every day. Although school was a place he found awkward and unfamiliar, their hideout was a space for him that put him at ease. On that day however, only HoSeok was inside the classroom, gathering up the items they’d left behind. JungKook realized that the time they spent together was now a memory and would never return again. (This is also an entry in The Notes 1.) Back in the present, SeokJin notices that JungKook looks grim once more and tries to improve his mood by asking if they should go to the beach. JungKook privately wonders: “Do you think YoonGi would go? And no one knows what’s going on with JiMin. Will we really be able to go together like we did then?” Holding up his pink camera, SeokJin says they should take a picture to commemorate the evening. They’re both smiling in the photo, and he hopes that they’ll all smile together again one day. After their campus tour, SeokJin walks JungKook home, ignoring the many calls he receives from his father’s assistant JunHo.

At the crosswalk outside the high school the next day (12 April), SeokJin reflects that staying with JungKook instead of attending the inauguration ceremony seemed like a good choice. He prevented JungKook from jumping off the building and stopped NamJoon’s incident too. But SeokJin wants to keep an eye on JungKook for a few days. While he’s waiting, the principal Jo JinMyung approaches and greets him, asking what brings him to the school. SeokJin tries to excuse himself, but the principal brings up the ceremony. “I thought you’d be there, but you weren’t. Did something happen? Why weren’t you there?” Caught off guard, SeokJin either answers vaguely (“I had something important to do”) or honestly (“A friend had an emergency and I couldn’t attend”). JungKook joins them slowly during the exchange, and the principal seems a little suspicious regardless of the player’s choice. In the “honest” path, he adds, “Next time, think about what's truly important before acting.” The paths rejoin when the principal smiles pointedly and mentions that he should call the Assemblyman soon. SeokJin wonders if Jo JinMyung intends to tell his father that he was with JungKook. Kim ChangJun did not approve of the time SeokJin spent with his friends even in school. “Father thinks it’s useless to have human relationships that don’t help you succeed.” When he and JungKook are in his car, SeokJin notices that the principal ominously watches them pull away.

Later that day, SeokJin meets with his father in his office. Kim ChangJun looks exhausted. Though they’re similar heights, to his son he seems like a massive grey wall. “Why didn’t you attend the inauguration ceremony yesterday?” he asks. SeokJin either lies (“A professor asked me to do something last minute”) or answers honestly (“A friend had an emergency and I couldn’t attend”). The ultimate result is the same: Kim ChangJun speaks after a long moment of silence. “The one thing I want from you is for you to be a good son.” “Yes,” says SeokJin. “I don’t think it’s a difficult task. You may leave.” As he exits, SeokJin hears him call Song JunHo and worries that his flimsy excuse will fall apart. Running into the principal may have made matters worse too. Despite his uneasiness, SeokJin has no choice but to keep going and trust that everything will work out. While NamJoon and JungKook are safe for now, he wonders if he can be a person for JungKook to lean on for comfort whenever he needs it so that he will not resort to such an extreme decision again.

SeokJin visits JungKook after school every afternoon the following days. On 15 April, JungKook asks if it’s okay for him to come like this every day. SeokJin assures him, “Yeah. I come to see you because I want to.” He observes that JungKook still seems to take social cues from him rather than acting comfortably, so he encourages him to either pick what they do next or where they should go eat. On 19 April, however, JungKook does not appear at the school gates. SeokJin tries calling him, only to learn that the number isn’t in service. Someone shouts his name, and HoSeok emerges from the Twostar Burger across from the school. “I had heard you were back, but I didn’t think I’d see you here in front of the school.” HoSeok digs a piece of paper out of his pocket, explaining that JungKook stopped by earlier. “He said he’s switching schools.” SeokJin asks where, but HoSeok doesn’t know. This has never happened before in a loop, and SeokJin wonders if he caused it. HoSeok hands over the paper, which JungKook requested be given to SeokJin. It’s a drawing of the cherry blossom tree they saw together, with a thank you note written at the bottom. SeokJin hopes that his suspicions aren’t correct.

Hunting for clues to JungKook’s whereabouts, SeokJin visits Jeil High School’s administrative office the next day (20 April). He receives slightly more information if he acts like he knows the Director of Administration, but as the student records are confidential, the man only reveals that JungKook transferred to a boarding school. On 30 April, SeokJin is summoned to his father’s office. Kim ChangJun asks him to sit down and continues speaking with his aide, Song JunHo. He confirms an upcoming appointment with the Deputy Mayor before asking, “Oh, did you take care of that incident?” “Yes. Do you mean the one concerning the Jeil High student?” JunHo responds. “I’ve taken care of the issue with the student.” Heart racing, SeokJin realizes that his father was behind JungKook’s transfer and deliberately let it slip as a warning to him. On their way out, Uncle JunHo adds, “SeokJin. You do know how difficult it was because you didn’t attend the inauguration, right?” SeokJin promises that he’ll be at the next meeting. Back in his bedroom, he decides that he made the wrong choice in this loop. He wanted to be someone JungKook could always come to, but instead he pushed him farther away. HoSeok calls him at that moment. Voice wavering, he relays that JungKook has disappeared. Some of his classmates stopped by the restaurant that day, inquiring if anyone talks to him often.

The story cuts back to 25 April with JungKook in class at his new school. His mom likes the dormitory here, and he suspects that she feels more comfortable without him at home. School, home, the dorms—he doesn’t belong in any of those places. While pairing up the students, the teacher notices that they have an odd number now and asks JungKook where he wants to go. He closes his eyes and remembers a voice: “JungKook, let’s all go to the ocean.” He thinks, “I want to go…” The scene jumps to JungKook walking towards the ocean shore. The glass shatters.

SeokJin opens his eyes on the morning of 11 April. He wonders what caused the loop to reset and assumes something must have happened to JungKook after he transferred schools. Again, he could not keep his promise of getting them all to the ocean. The episode ends with SeokJin sitting atop the seaside observatory at sunset. (This is a key location on 22 May Year 22, recurring in The Notes and depicted in the HYYH On Stage: Prologue short film and Euphoria MV. It looks the same in the game.) SeokJin ruminates on what may have happened to JungKook and where events started going wrong. He thought he could be the person JungKook needed to lean on, but he failed. This arc concludes with him wondering: “Was my method wrong? Or is it not supposed to be me? Maybe… If the person who’s supposed to console JungKook’s scars and be there for him isn’t me… Then, who can save JungKook?”

The End of His Gaze

SeokJin’s main challenge in saving YoonGi is the unpredictability of his actions between loops. The opening of this story is no different. On 2 May Year 22, SeokJin chases YoonGi after he leaves his workroom with a heavy bag but loses sight of him in the streets. As soon as he picks the nearest motel, black smoke pours from one of its windows. (The sign matches the motel in YoonGi’s scenes of the I Need U MV.) YoonGi ignores the commotion outside the room’s locked door. Once again, SeokJin is too late, and the glass shatters, resetting the loop.

Waking in his bedroom on 11 April, SeokJin considers how YoonGi backs himself into a corner no matter how or when he tries to intervene. It’s different from the incident with NamJoon because no outside person or situation is involved. SeokJin realizes that if YoonGi’s struggle and variables that make his decision so unpredictable are within him, then the only way he can stop YoonGi is by truly understanding him. He takes out his old camcorder from high school, hoping its footage may reveal some clues. In the first video clip he plays, YoonGi is off in the corner of their classroom hideout drawing music staves but speaks up to tell HoSeok and TaeHyung not to play a prank on JiMin. SeokJin wonders if YoonGi still writes music and remembers the piano in his workroom. In the second video, TaeHyung quibbles with NamJoon, who is tired yet refuses to take a nap until YoonGi pushes some desks together and tells him to lie down. SeokJin focuses on YoonGi for the rest of the video, but he is either motionless or off camera. He finds a similar challenge within his photographs: he has less than ten solo photos of YoonGi, and though his face is visible in group pictures, he is never looking at the camera. Still perusing the photos, SeokJin overhears voices from the camcorder. “It being here is a secret. Okay?” TaeHyung whispers to YoonGi. “What’s a secret?” SeokJin in the recording asks. TaeHyung and YoonGi, standing by the piano, both whip around. TaeHyung dismisses it as nothing and shushes YoonGi when he asks, “Why are you hiding something like that?” In the present, SeokJin wonders what they hid in the classroom and decides that it’s worth investigating in case it can help him save YoonGi.

On 15 April, SeokJin visits their old classroom hideout at Jeil High School, which is still being used as a storage room. The player can choose from a total of four locations to explore, provided they select the piano last. SeokJin identifies his father’s name alongside the message “Everything started from here” on the graffitied wall (he first saw this note in his 25 June Year 19 entry from The Notes 1). Even after thoroughly examining the piano, he does not find YoonGi and TaeHyung’s secret or anything else useful. Uneasy at leaving YoonGi alone for so long, SeokJin leaves the school and parks in front of his friend’s workroom. YoonGi appears to be safely inside, so SeokJin browses through the old video files on his camcorder and finds one that continued recording after he thought he had pressed the stop button. Listening to his and YoonGi’s voices, he recalls a forgotten memory of the day they walked out of school together.

The majority of episode 3 plays through a memory of an afternoon that SeokJin and YoonGi walked out of school together (date unspecified; this event is also referenced in YoonGi’s 2 August Year 22 entry from The Notes 2 and the similar Note accompanying Map of the Soul: 7). SeokJin receives a text summoning him to the principal’s office. The office is empty yet suffocating when he arrives. Principal Jo JinMyung arrives and apologizes for making SeokJin wait. SeokJin looks down, heart suddenly heavy. The scene cuts to YoonGi entering the storage classroom as he thinks about all the days he doesn’t feel like going home. It’s not a comfortable place for him, yet there’s nothing for him at the school either, except for the group’s hideout. He feels awkward in the oddly quiet room and puts some sheet music on the piano’s rack. But when he thinks about how no one is there requesting songs from him, he can’t bring his hands up to the keys. The flashback transitions back to SeokJin’s perspective following his meeting with the principal. As expected, the principal wanted him to report on YoonGi’s behavior. SeokJin spoke carefully so as not to tip him off about anything, but he hears internal whispers calling himself a hypocrite even when he’s laughing with his friends. Fretting over how much longer he can protect YoonGi, SeokJin runs into him at the classroom hideout’s door. He hopes YoonGi doesn’t notice how flustered he is, but YoonGi doesn’t say anything beyond confirming that he’s heading home. SeokJin tries to strike up a conversation as they walk out together, but the conversation awkwardly fizzles out whether he brings up food or the weather. YoonGi points out that his phone is buzzing, and SeokJin’s camcorder falls from his bag as he looks for it. YoonGi waves him off when SeokJin films him to test that it still works. He sheepishly lowers the camcorder and forgets to turn it off. YoonGi breaks the uncomfortable silence when they are almost across the field. “Is something up? You didn’t look very happy earlier.” Heart pounding, SeokJin tries to laugh off this sharp question with an excuse, but YoonGi stares straight at him. “You’re awkward too, SeokJin.” “What is?” “Your laugh.” YoonGi pauses before continuing, “When was the last time you genuinely laughed?”

The scene fades back to the present in SeokJin’s car (15 April). He can’t make out the rest of their conversation in the recording or remember what he answered. He wonders why YoonGi asked him that. SeokJin was always tense then, afraid that his friends would learn of his meetings with the principal. Did the others notice, too? While he’s lost in these thoughts, someone outside shouts, “Fire!” Flames erupt from YoonGi’s workroom. Realizing he should have focused on YoonGi and not the video, SeokJin runs into the building. As he tries to open the locked door, he hears the glass shatter.

The fourth episode opens on the night of 11 April with SeokJin watching JungKook and YoonGi walk away from the construction site and towards NamJoon’s container. A few days later, SeokJin spots JungKook on the sidewalk on his way to YoonGi’s workroom. When asked where he’s going, JungKook avoids his gaze and replies, “I was just… walking around.” SeokJin knows this is because he has nowhere to go. Not wanting JungKook to keep wandering and remembering that he was once close with YoonGi, SeokJin invites him along. The perspective switches to JungKook as they enter the workroom. It reeks of alcohol, and YoonGi is fast asleep among empty bottles. “YoonGi… will be okay, right?” he asks. SeokJin picks up the bottles without responding. A memory from their school days occurs to JungKook. TaeHyung chased him around their classroom hideout, trying to snatch his sketchbook and succeeding when JungKook found his escape unintentionally blocked by YoonGi standing in the doorway. JungKook was dismayed when YoonGi called TaeHyung over to the piano so they could look at it together, but then YoonGi deceived TaeHyung and threw the sketchbook to JungKook. In the present, SeokJin doesn’t want to waste time while YoonGi sleeps. He taps a lost-in-thought JungKook on the shoulder and says they should leave, but JungKook responds that he will stay until YoonGi wakes. 

Back again at the classroom hideout, SeokJin hunts further around the piano. He uses an old mop handle to fish out a piece of paper from underneath it. The hidden secret turns out to be TaeHyung’s abysmal math test. Dejected, SeokJin slumps to the floor. On this level, he notices a small handle on the piano’s lower panel and uses it to pop off the cover. Faded music sheets are wedged into the piano’s frame. A phrase on one of them catches SeokJin’s eye. (함께 라면 웃을 수 있다 : The Korean is not translated in game, but Google translates it as “if we are together, we can laugh.” This recurring phrase is instead translated as “we can laugh when we’re together” in The Notes 2. In YoonGi’s 2 August Year 22 entry, he also reflects on finding the note written in the margins of the music scores he took from the classroom. The handwriting isn’t his own. Additionally, a similar sentiment is expressed in a line of You Never Walk Alone, which is the basis for one of the BU-inspired Graphic Lyrics books.)

This message reminds SeokJin of YoonGi’s question: “When was the last time you genuinely laughed?” “This moment is the answer to that question,” he thinks, initiating a flashback to 20 March Year 19. The boys gathered around HoSeok in the classroom, chattering excitedly about the new club he’s leading. TaeHyung jokingly called him “Mr. President.” HoSeok told him only members could call him that before asking YoonGi if he wanted to join. “I’ll allow you to join without an audition, but only you.” TaeHyung exclaimed that he was just trying to get YoonGi to call him president. “Oh, it was obvious?” HoSeok chuckled. “Acting up again, huh?” YoonGi spoke up from the corner. The memory fades, returning to a pensieve SeokJin. He clearly remembers YoonGi’s face as he laughed with the others. “When did we stop laughing? Did it start that day, when I ruined everything?” SeokJin wonders. “It’s my fault,” he says aloud, standing there with the sheet music in hand until the sun begins to set. (Note: the date of the memory may be a typo. On 20 March Year 20 in The Notes 1, TaeHyung overheard SeokJin in the classroom informing the principal of the trouble he and YoonGi had gotten into. SeokJin realized that NamJoon heard it but not TaeHyung, who remained hidden out of sight and then pretended not to know. It’s not impossible that this memory really occurred in March Year 19, but most of them had only met at the beginning of that month.)

On the night of 15 April, SeokJin follows YoonGi at a distance from his workroom to an alleyway bar. (It is possible but not entirely clear that this is the same day SeokJin found the sheet music at the classroom, which is why I did not specify the date earlier.) It appears that YoonGi visits this bar often since the owner asks him if he has money today. SeokJin sits at a table behind YoonGi and watches him knock back shot after shot. Deciding that he shouldn’t leave him alone any longer, SeokJin musters up the courage to join him. YoonGi doesn’t look surprised to see him. He smiles before looking down again. SeokJin attempts a natural conversation to catch up. YoonGi asks why he didn’t come along the night when everyone got together at NamJoon’s container. “It’s been awhile since we’ve all seen each other, and JungKook… Never mind. You were probably busy.” SeokJin apologizes and inquires how JungKook is doing, then turns the same question on YoonGi when he replies that he doesn’t know. “Anything new with you?” SeokJin presses when YoonGi avoids his gaze. “Well, as you can see.” YoonGi dodges a direct answer.

The restaurant owner brings them a second glass. They are quiet in a restaurant full of chatter. SeokJin brings up the past to break the awkward silence, asking if YoonGi remembers the day they walked out of high school together. “Why do you ask?” says YoonGi. SeokJin explains that he remembered what YoonGi said to him that afternoon. “I want to ask you the same thing you asked me then.” SeokJin is nervous but continues, not wanting to waste this opportunity. “When was the last time you genuinely laughed?” YoonGi is silent for a moment. “Who knows.” SeokJin encourages him to think about it. “What good is it whether I remember or not? It wouldn’t change things now, even if I remembered.” YoonGi’s refusal to express his feelings upsets SeokJin more than his indifferent tone. “I just wish he would open up to me so I could figure out… anything. If only I could tell him,” SeokJin thinks. His internal narration continues over a shot of him in high school looking at his phone: “Or maybe… If I went back further in time, mustering up the courage to protect my friends, and prevented YoonGi from being expelled. If I did, maybe now we’d be…” “What’s with that expression?” YoonGi’s voice snaps him into the present, and he stares at SeokJin the way he had when they walked home from school. “Nothing, just… I feel like it’s been a while since I last saw you and I’m wasting time with useless subjects. It’s nothing—” SeokJin tries to laugh it off, but YoonGi interrupts. “You’re the same as always… There’s something there in your expression, but you say that it’s nothing.” This remark hits hard, rendering SeokJin speechless.

YoonGi’s words echo in SeokJin’s head even after he arrives home later that night. How did YoonGi notice what SeokJin thought he kept well-hidden? He once viewed YoonGi as someone who was indifferent to the world and trying to distance himself from everything. It dawns on SeokJin that he is mistaken. He opens his camcorder, hoping to see something new with this changed perspective. A recording plays in which he, YoonGi, and JungKook are the only ones present in the classroom hideout. When YoonGi starts playing piano, JungKook gets up from the desk and carefully stands by him. YoonGi doesn’t seem bothered and continues to play. Suddenly, he stops. “You wanna try?” In the present, SeokJin wonders why he asks JungKook that out of the blue and replays the footage, feeling like he missed something. This time, he notices that JungKook begins chewing his nails before YoonGi asks him. “Can I?” says JungKook. “Why not? It’s not my piano or anything. You can play if you want to.” At YoonGi’s words, the color returns to JungKook’s face and his hands drop from his mouth. SeokJin watches a little more of the video. As the recorded YoonGi patiently corrects JungKook’s wrong notes, he realizes that YoonGi doesn’t merely ask JungKook to play on a whim but out of respect for him.

SeokJin turns his attention to his box of photos. The player can choose up to three to examine. SeokJin realizes that YoonGi is a little further behind the group and not looking at the camera not because he feels left out or is avoiding attention, but because he is always watching how they are all together. YoonGi knows us very well, he thinks. He stopped JungKook from biting his nails by asking him to play the piano rather than acknowledging it directly. He saw through SeokJin and recognized when his laughter wasn’t genuine, even after several years apart. SeokJin thought that YoonGi wanted to give up everything, would never open up to anyone, and experienced feelings that were impossible for him to understand. “But if we were the ones to make YoonGi laugh… It may be possible to save YoonGi,” SeokJin reflects. With more determination, he vows to save him. “I’ll save him no matter what, because we can laugh when we’re together.”

SeokJin visits YoonGi every day after their meeting at the bar, responding that he’s making time to see him when asked if all university students have this much free time. They grow more accustomed to each other’s company, but SeokJin’s glimmer of hope fades as alcohol and aimless wandering continues to fill YoonGi’s life. Since just visiting YoonGi’s workroom seems meaningless, on 24 April SeokJin decides to show him the sheet music he found in the hideout, hoping it will encourage him to resume songwriting. Upon seeing the music, YoonGi has a flashback to 25 June Year 20, the day he received the school expulsion notice. He ran immediately to the classroom and played the piano as though possessed. The anger refused to settle. He shoved all of his sheet music into the piano and vowed to never play the piano again. In the present, YoonGi asks, “Where’d you find this?” At his cold expression, SeokJin wonders what he’s done wrong and explains aloud that he just happened to find it in the hideout’s piano. The papers fall from YoonGi’s hand, scattering across the floor. “Leave,” he spits. “What? Min YoonGi, what’s going on?” SeokJin asks. YoonGi shoves him. “Just leave.” “Don’t do this, let’s talk for a moment,” SeokJin tries again. But YoonGi replies, “I have nothing to say to you.”

YoonGi avoids him after that. On 25 April, SeokJin calls him numerous times without any answer and finds only torn sheet music and empty bottles in his workroom. He remembers YoonGi’s last words to him and says aloud, “It can’t be. No way.” An ominous thought crosses his mind, but he forces it out to focus on recalling something from memory. The story cuts to him running down a street, trying to figure out where YoonGi went to set the fire in the last loop. (It is never clarified what SeokJin’s “ominous thought” is—it may refer to YoonGi setting a fire or possibly even a suspicion that YoonGi figured out SeokJin was involved in his expulsion.) SeokJin finds the same motel (the one with the sign like in the I Need U MV) and rushes upstairs in a cold sweat. Faced with a hallway of identical doors, he doesn’t know how to locate YoonGi’s room. Whether the player chooses for him to call out to YoonGi or “think of something else” (which results in him pulling the fire alarm), the result is ultimately the same. SeokJin forces open the last closed door with a fire extinguisher, but the room is empty. Filled with regret, SeokJin wonders what he has done wrong. “Like an idiot, I… I knew that the location and method of YoonGi’s attempt could change, and yet…”

“Fire!” someone yells. The motel across the street erupts in flames. “No! Please…” SeokJin begs, falling to his knees. “How can I stop this tragedy? … Am I not enough to stop it?” The story ends as he hears the glass shatter once again.

Additional Thoughts

For me, JungKook’s arc really draws back the curtain on SeokJin’s private life. It demonstrates SeokJin’s challenge to balance saving his friends and maintaining his own daily life, particularly fulfilling the duties that fall to him as a prominent assemblyman’s son. We see little of this side of him until The Notes 2, when his perspective has already drastically changed.

JungKook’s reflection about his habit of walking along the edges of walls is an interesting moment of self-awareness. This “tightrope-walking” is depicted frequently in the MVs.

The car accident and loop reset at the beginning of JungKook’s 4th episode suggests the possibility that the I Need U MV depicts JungKook deliberately stepping in front of the oncoming car rather than accidentally. (Maybe people have already interpreted it this way, but personally the thought had never occured to me due to how it’s shot and acted.) The car accident is a recurring theme in the loops for JungKook, particularly as he is struck the night of 22 May and comes to believe that it was SeokJin who hit him.

This internal dialogue of SeokJin’s from YoonGi’s arc gives me a lot to think about: “If I went back further in time, mustering up the courage to protect my friends, and prevented YoonGi from being expelled. If I did, maybe now we’d be…” SeokJin’s first experiences of the time loops are depicted in the Save Me Webtoon. At that time, he believes that 11 April is the date that he can begin fixing things, but it’s not clear if this ability granted by the cat-like creature truly gives him control over to which date the loop resets. (It is more obvious that he cannot control what triggers the reset itself.) Does he ever go back earlier? Only *ahem* time will tell, but if you want some more food for thought, please check out these interesting quotes that occur before 11 April Year 22.

As mentioned above, the following “tl;dr” commentary summarizes the parenthetical notes I provided in the summaries in case you want to review them on their own.

The Boy on the Threshold — tl;dr commentary

SeokJin’s flashback to 3 March Year 19, when all seven boys arrived late on the first day at Songju Jeil High School and were scolded outside by the Dean, looks very similar to the BTS Begins Middle Scene VCR (aside from the absence of extra students), including the detail of YoonGi arriving last. This VCR predates official BU content.

The photo in SeokJin’s collection that catches JungKook’s eye resembles the shot in the Euphoria MV at 5’32” (the seven boys sitting on a wall with the ocean behind them) except that they appear to be wearing school uniform shirts and slacks.

JungKook’s flashback to the night of 7 April Year 22 expands the context of his reunion with YoonGi, adding that he is drawn to the music shop by a familiar tune and through its broken window sees YoonGi playing piano. YoonGi doesn’t notice him when he staggers outside, and JungKook tries to play the music by memory. In his 7 April Year 22 entry of The Notes 1, YoonGi is drunk and stumbling by an empty construction site when he recognizes a clumsy piano tune that he’d been playing “not long ago.” But when he runs to the music shop and finds JungKook, the text does not indicate that he remembers this is his second visit to the shop this evening. Additionally, the Wings short film First Love seems to reference some of the events of this night—or evokes YoonGi’s distorted memories of it, mingled with a representation of JungKook’s later accident.

I mentioned in part 1’s introduction that every episode’s ending is identical regardless of the decisions made by the player, but the end of episode 4 is actually cosmetically different (a wobbling camera/animation effect) if the second path is selected for the last choice. The dialogue is the same.

The end of episode 7 depicts the seaside observatory. This is a key location on 22 May Year 22, recurring in The Notes and depicted in the HYYH On Stage: Prologue short film and Euphoria MV. It looks the same in the game.

The End of His Gaze — tl;dr commentary

The motel sign at the beginning and end of the story matches the one visible in YoonGi’s shots of the I Need U MV.

When searching the classroom hideout for clues on 15 April, SeokJin identifies his father's name alongside the message “Everything started from here” on the graffitied wall. He first saw this note in his 25 June Year 19 entry from The Notes 1.

Episode 3 presents a memory from both SeokJin’s and YoonGi’s perspectives of the afternoon that they walked out of school together. Although the date is unspecified, this event is also referenced in YoonGi’s 2 August Year 22 entry from The Notes 2 and the similar Note accompanying Map of the Soul: 7.

On his second attempt at searching the classroom, SeokJin finds sheet music that was hidden inside the piano. A phrase written in the corner of one paper catches his eye: 함께 라면 웃을 수 있다. The Korean is not translated in game, but Google translates it as “if we are together, we can laugh.” This recurring phrase is instead translated as “we can laugh when we’re together” in The Notes 2. In YoonGi’s 2 August Year 22 entry, he also reflects on finding the note written in the margins of the music scores he took from the classroom. The handwriting isn’t his own. Additionally, a similar sentiment is expressed in a line of You Never Walk Alone, which is the basis for one of the BU-inspired Graphic Lyrics books.

SeokJin has a flashback of 20 March Year 19 in which the boys are excitedly chattering about HoSeok’s new club. However, given the larger context of this moment (both in the past and what prompts it in the present), the date of the memory may be a typo. On 20 March Year 20 in The Notes 1, TaeHyung overheard SeokJin in the classroom informing the principal of the trouble he and YoonGi had gotten into. SeokJin realized that NamJoon heard it but not TaeHyung, who remained hidden out of sight and then pretended not to know. It’s not impossible that this memory really occurred in March Year 19, but most of them had only met at the beginning of that month.

Did you learn anything new from these stories that I did not specifically mention? Let me know in the replies or tags! Please stay tuned for part 3, featuring JiMin and HoSeok’s stories.

#armiesnet #bangtanarmynet #networkbangtan #armysource #dailybangtan #bts universe #hyyh #bangtan universe #bts universe story #bts universe story highlights #seokjin #jungkook #yoongi #jinkook #yoonkook #yoonjin #bts theories

[ficsilike-reblogged]

Sweetest of Exiles - One

Summary: When Oberyn Martell travels to Essos for exile, he found more than he anticipated when he first lays eyes on Pero Tovar, his brother-in-arms in the Second Sons mercenary company. While Pero is a bit resistant to his Oberyn’s overt charms at first, the Prince always gets what he wants. When the Second Sons are hired to rescue a wealthy merchant’s daughter, Oberyn learns there is much more to the grumpy sellsword. And Oberyn doesn’t mind sharing–especially when the merchant’s daughter smiles at him like that.

Pairing: Oberyn Martell x Pero Tovar, (past) Pero Tovar x F!Reader (No Y/N), future--it is a surprise.

Rating for this chapter: T for mentions of blood, guts and gore...magic. My overuse of italics. 

Word Count: 5k

A/N: I wrote most of this drunk (or buzzed). I am still riding my red wine high so I almost apologize for the nonsense. If you have any questions about the ASOIAF lore/geography that I’m mentioning, please send me an ask or a DM! I’m always happy to ramble about this series.

(thank you to my love, @starlight-starwrites for the absolutely gorgeous banner. I love you.)

Or read on Ao3 here!

CHAPTER ONE: The Mercenary

Oberyn had always wondered what he looked like when fucking someone. He had looking glasses set up in one of his lover’s rooms so he could try to catch a glimpse himself. But his unrelenting need to keep his partners satisfied always won out over his curiosity.

But then the gods seemed to have a sense of humor when they sent him away from Dorne after he might-have-killed Edgar Yronwood. The Citadel and Oldtown had entertained him for a moment but it soon bored him and he set off across the Narrow Sea to Essos. While the Second Sons mercenary company welcomed him and his sword arm, his eyes were firmly trained on the man toward the back of the company with the scar down his face.

His face.

And well, his time away from Dorne just became much more interesting.

**

It had taken almost an entire year of not-at-all subtle flirting and propositions and nearly losing their lives time and time again before Pero found himself tumbling into the Prince of Dorne’s bed. The Prince was definitely persistent, Pero would never admit that his charms—his annoying charms—had worn him down instead of Pero’s selfish desire for release while the company was too far away from any sort of willing woman and his hand just wasn’t cutting it. But the Prince had been attentive—willing to let Pero wrap his scarred and rough hand around his throat when he was pressing him into the threadbare bedroll in the quiet corner of camp.

The prince felt good—and he knew how to make Pero feel good.

It was infuriating—he wanted to strangle he smug smirk right off the prince’s face but he knew that the Prince was only capable of enjoying when someone’s hand was around his throat. But he had to admit that he had finally found a true friend (and not just release) with the man who looked strangely like him.

It had been nearly two decades since he could speak with someone as openly as he did when he was alone with the prince in their tent.

But his mind still drifted—to years ago. To his life before finding coin in the service of the Second Sons.

“You make the moon shine brighter, Pero.”

It was childish of him, stupid, to still think of her all these years later. Surely she had forgotten him. They had just been children—he had just been a third-born son of a disgraced lord from Valysar and she had been… she had been everything.

“You are pensive, Tovar.” The prince’s voice cut through his reverie.

He had thought the prince asleep—spent from a long day’s ride and a quick, near-desperate fuck as soon as their shared tent was erected. “It is dark, princeling. You cannot see me.”

Oberyn chuckled. “I know your brooding silences from your angry quiet.”

“You think a great deal of yourself, don’t you?” He grumbled, rolling his eyes despite the dark.

“I believe you think a great deal of me, as well.”

Pero sighed.

“Tell me what weighs on your mind.”

“Nothing that concerns you. Go to sleep.”

Oberyn laughed. “I will find out what has you brooding.”

“Do not hold your breath, princeling.”

He only laughed.

Pero was not sure when they had both fallen asleep but they were both woken by a frantic yell outside their tent. The prince’s knife glinted in the dimming moonlight and Pero had never let his hand leave the hilt of one of his smaller swords as they charged outside. They expected an ambush—a retaliation from the Tyroshi they had just pushed back on behalf of Lys—but instead, they found a disheveled man, bloodied and bruised and desperately limping toward their camp, frantically waving his hands above his head, shouting something in the Myrish bastard Valyrian dialect.

Pero sheathed his blade as he finally started to realize what the man was babbling. “Calm yourself, man.” Pero said, stepping in front of Oberyn.

The man nearly collapsed as he reached them, big, brown eyes shining in the moonlight. “They took her. They took her—I barely escaped.” He continued to jabber and Pero mostly listened—having heard desperate pleas from hundreds of men and women over the years of his service in the mercenary company—the man’s story consisted of being surrounded on the road to Myr by a group of religious zealots. The story was not an unfamiliar one. The Free Cities were known to erupt with pockets of violence; the causes ranged from trade disputes, claims to land, religion, and everything in between.

Pero had heard it all.

But then the man opened his mouth, blood drying on his chin, and said, “but they took her—they wanted her.” And a name pushed by the man’s bruised lips—a name he hadn’t heard in years.

Before he could stop himself, Pero reached out and grabbed the man by the collar of his tunic and hauled him to his unsteady feet. “Tell me where.”

**

The captains deliberated for only a few short moments before refusing to take the charge.

The fact that the woman was Qohorik had negated the fact that the Myrish magistrate who had fought his way to their camp had promised a princess’ ransom and promised that her father, a prominent merchant, would double it for her safe return. The Second Sons had been humiliated generations ago at Qohor and had not taken any bounties or contracts from the city or its inhabitants since then.

The Second Sons gave the magistrate—Orestes, his name was—some water and a bit of feed for his exhausted horse and then told him to leave. They would not go.

And Pero was an angry man. He had wrath in his blood since he was a boy, tempered only with bouts of relief and quiet. But this had sent him into a near rage with how flippant they captains had been when they had delivered their decision. Of course, he had not mentioned that the woman Orestes had pleaded to be rescued had been…her. Or how he knew her. Attachments like that were frowned upon, even by mercenaries. Soft hearts made easy targets.

But as the sun set the next day, Pero knew what he had to do. Even if he was alone. He packed his bare essentials, mostly worried about his sack of coin and weapons, and then pushed out of the tent-

-only to be met with the smirking face of the princeling. “Come, I have a surprise for you.”

“I do not have time for this.”

“Yes, you do,” Oberyn said with a broadening smirk as he turned away, leading Pero further away from camp as the moon continued her climb up into the inky sky. And why was Pero following him? He had to leave. He had to find that stupid magistrate. He had to-

There were about two dozen Second Sons, including one of the company’s healers, waiting at the tree line with their packs and mounts. Oberyn’s smirk reached its peak as he winked over his shoulder at Pero who only scowled in return. The Magistrate—Orestes—was standing with them, looking more than a little out of place with his rumpled fine clothes, now stained with dirt and blood. But he offered a tentative tilt of his head when Pero stepped up to the group with Oberyn.

“What did you do?” Pero hissed.

“I formed my own mercenary company,” Oberyn replied with a roll of his shoulders. “I know you are brighter than this, Tovar.”

If possible, his lips formed an even thinner line.

“Do not pout. We are going to save the damsel and get paid.” There was a cheer from the small band of men—both Tovar and Orestes were the only ones who did not seem to enjoy it. But soon they were on their way, each step taking them further away from the strange safety of the Second Sons and into the wilds of Essos.

**

Orestes, Pero found, was fond of speaking to anyone who would listen. His voice was pleasing but Pero preferred the quiet in most instances. But, he supposed it was necessary to learn just how he had ended up fleeing to the Second Sons in a desperate plea for help.

Orestes and his companion had been traveling from Qohor to Myr—and Pero tried very hard to not grind his teeth every time Orestes referred to her as ‘my lady’—to allow her to see more of Essos and to return Orestes to Myr after his year-long residency to Qohor that had been in the name of strengthening trade routes and agreements.

(“But, of course, I found myself more entranced by the city and its people than my fellow magistrates’ mandates that I was told to quickly solidify.” He sighed, the sound only a lovelorn man could make and Pero could not stop the grinding of his teeth at that.)

But on the road between Volantis and Myr, a group of heavily armed, religious zealots had slaughtered their small band of traveling companions and guards and took her and Orestes captive in a plot to gain the knowledge her father was keeping secret.

Her father, Lord Ollo, had been one of the famed smiths in Qohor who still knew the secrets of re-forging Valyrian Steel. The famed metal had become a treasure since the Doom and those who could work with the fickle and strong metal were regarded as lords and wielded their power like nobility, too. Travelers from all across Essos sought him out for new weapons, armor, and the occasional piece of jewelry from bits of Valyrian Steel and he had gained a reputation for being excessively secretive but the best at his trade. His wife was a noble woman and had raised his status with their marriage while providing her with the lifestyle on par with princesses.

But Pero knew all of this. He had seen it firsthand. He had supped with him and felt his lady-wife’s fingers tug at his boyishly poorly cropped hair with a fond smile. He knew that their home, an imposing fortress deep in the Forest of Qohor, always smelled of fire and metal and drying flowers.

It smelled…like home.

Well, it had. For a time. A long time ago.

And Orestes never needed to know that—never needed to know that the only reason he had a small band of mercenaries at his call was because the Prince knew that the woman, whose name he could not even say aloud, meant something to Pero.

For all his pride and well-earned arrogance, Oberyn was a good man, Pero had to admit. (He would never actually say this to Oberyn, his ego was big enough without the extra fodder.) And he would have to find a way to repay the prince-who-had-everything in some fashion. Pero’s pride would not allow this kindness to be left unpaid.

Orestes went on to explain that the zealots thought attaining the knowledge of Valyrian Steel would allow them the proper way of sacrificing in order to satiate the supposed blood lust of some old, stupidly named god. They hoped to trade her for Lord Ollo’s knowledge.

“But you seem to know my lady,” Orestes said, turning in his saddle to look Pero straight in the face. “Do you?”

“Is she your lady?” Pero asked in return, ignoring Orestes’ question and how his stomach turned at the thought of her being alone with a group of men as delusional as the band of zealots. Thankfully, they were nearing where Orestes said he had been held captive—less than two days’ ride from their camp but they had set their horses upon the trail with haste, cutting time from their journey.

Orestes’ answering smile was small. “No. But I am blessed to know her and I will never forgive myself for leaving her behind.”

“But she told you to, didn’t she? Told you to run and not look back.” The words were out of his mouth before he could bite them back and his ever-present scowl deepened.

“You do know her. Indeed, she told me to run as soon as I was able. But not to Myr—she told me to run west.” He paused and shook his head and Pero barely caught the confusion coloring the Magistrate’s features. “I had thought the prince was jesting when he said you knew her. I am in your debt, it seems.”

“Just pay the fee you promised.”

“Of course! I would not dream of-”

“Good.” Pero dug his heels into his horse’s side and urged the animal into a faster trot. “You will keep your head, then.” Orestes said something else but Pero had already galloped away to Oberyn’s side at the front of the group. “What have you said to the magistrate?”

“Nothing of consequence.”

“Do not lie to me, princeling.” Pero scarcely noticed the men behind them slow their horses’ pace to give them room. Their relationship—if it could even be called that—was an open secret to most in the Second Sons and some of those who followed Oberyn into this new company were also willing to indulge themselves in each other’s bedrolls if the time called for it.

Oberyn only laughed. “I did not know that your obvious reaction to a lady’s name was a secret needing to be kept.”

“What else have you told him?”

“Nothing. Just as you have told me nothing. But I have still called the men who were loyal to me and the promised coin to save this woman you have kept like a secret.” Oberyn arched an eyebrow, a look Pero knew meant Oberyn was daring him to argue. “She will be safe. The Magistrate will be on his way and our pockets will be filled.” Oberyn’s dark eyes sparkled in the growing sunlight. “And I shall meet this lady of yours. She must be a sight to behold to warrant such attention.”

“She…” The words died on his tongue. How would he even try to describe her? How childish would he sound to a prince for harboring such affections for his childhood love after all this time? “She warrants much more than any man could ever give. Including the Magistrate.”

Oberyn huffed but a smile tugged at his lips. “We are nearly there, Tovar. You can make the polite introductions.”

**

Night had just started to fall, painting the sky a violent shade of orange, when Orestes had announced that the ruined castle was just over the next hill.

Pero felt his chest tighten for a moment, a shot of adrenaline he had not felt as strongly since he was a new recruit to the Second Sons facing a small horde of Dothraki.

They crested the hill and Pero saw the broken remains of a once-grand castle. A single window was lit with the dim light of a candle just as the sun disappeared behind the stone, making it look like it had absorbed the red light and bathed in an inky black.

Defense of the castle was nearly impossible with its location and the small band of mercenaries quickly surrounded it, ready to drive inside when suddenly….the door, large and rusted, opened and a single man rushed out, screaming something in what Pero thought to be Old Ghiscari and covered in…blood.

Pero turned to look at Oberyn who seemed to be waffling between amusement and confusion at the sight. He waved a hand, silently commanding two men to secure the fleeing zealot—quietly, if possible.

“It is too quiet,” Pero said as he turned back to the castle after watching the screaming man be brought to his knees and a dirty rag shoved between his lips.

Oberyn agreed. “Surely a band of zealots would make more noise. I’ve been told they’re fond of chanting.” The prince slid closer to the ruined castle, staying hidden behind the rolling hill and scattered boulders for cover.

Pero watched him move, knowing the prince had an innate talent for hearing the smallest noises—whether it be from a rabbit or a sneaking assassin, and would trust whatever his judgement was.

“If anyone is left, they are not moving.”

Pero nodded, ignoring the umpteenth time his chest clenched, and signaled for the rest of their band of men to press forward. Step by step, they neared the castle and spread out to find different entrances. Orestes stumbled in the loose dirt to stay near Pero and Oberyn and Pero grimaced when Oberyn nudged him in the side, silently telling him to allow it—at least for the time being.

Closer and closer, they crept until they Pero was able to curl his hand around the edge of the door and peel it open just enough for him and Oberyn to slip inside. Orestes tripped over a loose stone as he followed.

And Oberyn had been right.

The castle was quiet. Unnaturally so.

The grip on his swords tightened as the small group pushed further into the dark ruins. Torches were scattered and burning out in their holds on the wall, casting even more shadows against the crumbling stone. He heard the soft footfalls of his fellow mercenaries coming in through the east and west entrances but it gave him little comfort. They were alone.

Alone.

His next step made a splash and he looked down to see the toe of his boot submerged in a dark puddle. He reached out and grabbed a torch from the wall and let the dying flames shine near the floor.

It was blood.

He raise the torch just enough to light the end of the hall and sighed.

“How interesting,” Oberyn said as he glanced over his shoulder.

Blood pooled between the broken stone and drip-drip-dripped from some unseen source to puddle in the corner. Bodies were crumpled along the path and Pero turned to pin Orestes with a look. “These men were the ones who slaughtered your guards and took you captive?”

Orestes looked down at a body and seemed to bite back a gulp. “Yes.”

“It looks like they put up quite a fight.”

“It looks like they were ripped open,” Pero corrected before pressing forward. “What did this? Did they do this to each other?”

“I’ve never seen a group more cohesive than them,” Orestes said. “They never contradicted each other or spoke out of turn. They had a singular mentality, it seemed. I would not believe they turned on each other.”

“Men turn on each other all the time,” Oberyn said. “Even without cause.”

They continued forward, Pero leading. He was not sure where they were going, but he knew—instinctively—that he needed to keep moving. If another person or creature had found the castle before they did, what hope did she have? Would he find her like this, too? Reduced to a bloody corpse? Would that be the last chance he would have to see her?

But they walked on, further into the dark, catching glimpses of the rising moon in the half-collapsed windows until they turned and saw the outline of a door, lit by a dim, orange light. Without a care, Pero pushed forward, hilt of his sword still in his hand as he pushed the door open and his grip faltered.

For the first time in nearly two decades, Pero let his swords fall from his grasp.

In the corner of the small room, huddled near a solitary candle, was a woman. Not just a woman—her.

Chains wrapped around her ankles and wrists and angry, deep cuts spanned the length of her legs and arms and her fine dress had been reduced to rags. He barely registered Oberyn calling for the healer as he stepped to her side and quickly knelt down. The locks on the chains were easily undone and his roughened hands carefully prodded at the broken skin.

“Pero,” she whispered, the name sliding by her chapped lips. Her head sagged and Pero moved just enough to let her forehead rest against his shoulder. “You’re here…” her voice was rough and raspy, like she had been screaming for hours. And perhaps she had.

“I’m here.”

The healer came in, arms filled with supplies, while more than a few of their company stuck their heads into the room to see their charge. Oberyn quickly moved them back and shut the door—Pero would thank him for it later.

“Look at me. Look at me, Petal,” Pero said as the healer tutted as he looked over her wounds before uncorking a bit of firewine.

Her unfocused eyes slid to him as the healer set to work. A cry broke her chapped lips as the firewine started to spill across her legs.

Pero reached out and kept her head still, gaze on him, as the healer continued. “Just me, Petal. I am here.”

“Pe-Pero.” The name was stilted on her tongue. “Please—it hurts-” a scream tore its way out of her throat but Pero held her steady even as his chest clenched.

“I know. But it will be over soon.”

Tears gathered in her eyes and slid down her dirty cheeks as her hands shot out to grab at his armor; he could feel the heat of her touch sliding and blooming warmth through his thick tunic. But he kept her focused on him even as the healer muttered about needing more wrappings.

“I’m here, Petal. I’m here.”

**

“This is my fault,” Orestes whispered.

The company had settled into the ruins as a camp for the night, finding the rooms (where there wasn’t blood or any bodies) more comfortable than the outside ground. Pero, Oberyn, and Orestes were the last three to retire from the roaring fire they had made in the remnants of the great hall.

Pero agreed but kept that to himself. “How?”

“We travelled by Myr weeks ago. But I could not bear to part from my lady’s side—I convinced her, selfishly, to let me take her to see Volantis, Lys, Tyrosh. She had marveled at everything Norvos and Braavos had offered—even Lorath had made her wonder like a child. I wanted to give her more of that, to show her all I could.”

“And then you were set upon by zealots. Probably followed you from Dagger Lake.”

Orestes shook his head. “Our party never neared that pirate hive. The closest we came to it was when she insisted on seeing Valysar. That little town of no consequence.”

Oberyn, only briefly, touched Pero’s back and he knew the prince meant it as a comfort at the mention of Pero’s former home. Orestes did not notice it.

“But she was adamant and refused to tell anyone why. But she all but disappeared for an entire day once we arrived and would not speak of her adventures—the little box she had procured never left her side and was never opened.”

Pero almost smiled at that. She had not changed—in that respect, at least.

Orestes yawned and stood from the rickety chair. “I must retire for the night. Please alert me if my lady calls for me.”

Oberyn hummed an agreement while Pero felt his face curl into a sneer as the magistrate left the hall.

“He certainly holds a candle for his lady, does he not?” Oberyn mused as soon as Orestes was out of earshot.

“She did not ask for him once,” Pero said before reaching forward to grab the jug of terrible wine left on the table and took a large gulp.

“But she’s asked for you? Hm?” Oberyn asked, snatching the jug from him. “And you’ve yet to introduce me. I am almost insulted.”

“She needs rest, princeling.” He had made sure she was comfortable in one of the largest rooms and was happy to find that her trunks, filled with her belongings, were still intact and made sure she received them before he had let her rest for the night, making sure to let the rest of the company know that she was not to be disturbed.

“I’m sure she does.” He took a drink. “But she has also been trapped, alone, with men who meant her harm for nearly a week. You were the first friendly face she saw—do not think that I misheard her. She called for you. Pero.”

“You could walk in there now and she would not be able to tell the difference.”

Oberyn tutted and Pero stole the jug back. “I believe she would.”

Pero nearly startled when Oberyn reached out and grasped his wrist, keeping him from draining the rest of the wine. His grip was firm but gentle and a hold Pero knew well. “I thought people in Essos were more willing to indulge themselves in matters of the heart and flesh. Do not be stupid.”

And somehow…that worked. Pero slipped into her room and found her sitting on the small bed, wrapped legs atop the thin blankets and a book on her lap. In the warm candlelight, she looked almost healthy. Like she was not covered in healing salve and he didn’t know there were long, angry cuts hidden by wrappings and her thin nightgown.

She looked…so much like the girl he had left behind decades ago.

Pero remembered Lady Daeryssa smiling down at her daughter, flowers twisted into her braids.

“You are special, my star. Like me.”

“Like you, Mama?”

Daeryssa nodded and grabbed the small, blue rose she had Pero fetch just that morning and pressed her thumb against one of its thorns until blood bloomed on her skin and started to trickle down her skin. Her face was serene and Pero could not look away. Her bloodied fingers pulled the petals from the rose and she carefully pressed them against her daughter’s forehead, sticking them to her skin with blood. Words he didn’t understand slipped by her lips as she pressed another petal and then another to her daughter’s face until she stripped the flower bare.

“You will be magnificent, my star. Your trials will be hard but you will always rise above.”

“Come in,” she said, setting her book aside.

Pero did as he was told and blindly set his hands in hers as she reached out for him, letting her tug him onto the edge of her bed. “How are you?”

“I will heal.” She smiled as if nothing had caused her pain and his chest hurt. “I brought you something.” She leaned back just enough to retrieve a small box from the mess of blankets.

The box was nothing spectacular, made from a polished dark wood with a simple latch and did not weigh more than his dagger. “How did you know we would see each other again?” He asked.

She only smiled and pressed the small box further into his grip. “Open it.”

And he could not tell her no. He unfastened the latch and felt his face crumple as he looked inside. His mother’s handwriting, still beautiful and tilted, drew his eye first. He grabbed the thin bit of parchment and unfurled it.

My dear boy- I love you more than words can say. You have saved us.

The rest of the letter was filled with anecdotes, telling Pero how the coin he had sent back home kept their family afloat and settled his father’s debts, allowing his mother and brothers to stay home and retain their titles and livelihoods. He had saved them. His mother had written it at least three times in her short letter.

But I still wish I witnessed you grow into the man you are today. Come home. You are always welcome.

He quickly let the letter curl in on itself again and shoved it back in the box, knowing she was watching him, face serene and almost unreadable. He reached into the box again and let his fingers brush against something cold and smooth. A shuddering breath pushed its way out of his lung as he pulled out a small, carved wooden wolf that fit in his palm. He raised it up to press the well-worn wood against his lips, just once, before placing it gently back into the box.

“You met my family.”

“I did,” she said. “They were very kind.” She paused. “And they smile so often. I almost didn’t believe you were related to them.”

He huffed. “You never let me have a moments’ peace, Petal.”

“You were the only peace I knew as a child,” she responded.

Pero sat with her for hours under their tree after her mother had disappeared and the petals remained on her face, only falling one by one after the sun had set, leaving little bloody thumbprints across her skin. He tried to press them back onto her skin without success, and she only giggled at his attempts, leaning into each of his touches and letting him try and try again.

She collected all the petals as they fell and Pero had given up on trying to re-stick them.

“What are you doing?”

“Practice.” He watched her reach out and scratch her palm against the broken bark of the tree, slicing open her palm in a single movement.

He squawked and moved to grab her hand but she curled her fingers into a fist, crushing the petals against her bloodied palm. She took a single, long breath through her nose and then unclenched her fist. The petals rose from her bloodied hand and floated up into the air as if pulled by invisible strings. They swirled around the pair before, with another long breath, she let them fly away, disappearing into the thick of the forest.

She laughed then, a light sound that had blood rushing to his cheeks for a reason he could not explain or pinpoint at that moment. All he could mutter as she looked at him, eyes twinkling and a giggle still on her lips was…”petal.”

“Why did you leave?” She asked as he tucked the small box away into his tunic.

Pero froze. “I had to.”

A/N: please let me know what you think! I hope you guys like this! there will be three chapters. 

#oberyn martell x reader #pero tovar x reader #oberyn martell imagine #pero tovar imagine #game of thrones imagine #asoiaf #game of thrones #the great wall

[lyallblacklupin]

Don’t miss the Yule Ball.

Sirius was already battling with their post break-up situation. He hasn’t moved on, but maybe Remus has, after the Incident with Snape. He has been forgiven by all of the Marauders, but he still doesn’t feel like going to the Yule Ball because he loves dancing a little too much, and to watch Remus dancing with someone who isn’t him is something he won’t be able to cope. He rather he will stay in than go and deal with another heartbreak. However, Remus encourages him to go to the Yule Ball. Is he giving Sirius a chance to improve their ties?

Tags: Post-Incident with Severus Snape, Angst with Happy Ending, Getting Back Together, Trust Issues. 

Chapter 1

The distress was like a cold molten lava, spreading in Sirius’ chest to deepen the void that was already created inside of him. He could feel it. The hollowness around his heart, but simultaneously there was something heavy. Like a boulder, sitting at the top of his chest. There was exhaustion in his veins, plummeting his blood pressure that made him unlike the person he used to be: steady, hyperactive, and energetic. He didn’t know what he wanted, so he let life go through him. He thought he may never live, might as well survive because he was not ready to die yet. There was still hope. A newly aroused hope of getting his friends back in his life after the two and a half month of shutting out in consequential to the Incident with Severus Snape.

Three days ago, James and Peter had asked Sirius to come in the dorm when he had been sitting in the common room, literally, doing nothing but staring at the fire grates before him. All of the Marauders, including Remus, had gathered in the dorm awkwardly.

“Look, Sirius,” James had been the one to break the silence, and Sirius’ perplexity, “Whatever we have with you is just too real and close that—we cannot just see you being so…”

“Different.” Peter had said.

“Yes, different!” Sirius had never seen James so nervous, “And we know how sorry you are for what you did.” Sirius could distinctly recall that he had flinched at those words.

“So…” Remus had begun, not meeting Sirius’ eyes, “We would like to give you a chance.”

Sirius had expected himself to smile or laugh in happiness that finally his friends had decided to forgive him, but he didn’t—more like, he couldn’t. James and Peter had been staring at him with funny looks on their faces, while Remus had a tired look as if he had been forcefully asked to forgive him. Sirius didn’t even internally blame him for that, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t hurt.

“Thank you. You have no idea how much this all means to me.” Sirius had said. He knew that time was the only key to slip into normalcy, so he went with the flow.

This time of the year, Hogwarts was illuminating with more candles, and stardust in every corridor. The lavatory sections had more irises and lilies, and the Library was filled with color-changing lanterns hanging in the mid-air. All of this was because of the Triwizard Tournament was being held, and the awaited guests from other wizarding schools were welcomed to avail the chance of becoming the lucky participant in the Tournament. The students from Drumstrang, and Beauxbatons were roaming around the decorated Hogwarts.

“They should see the real face of Hogwarts, dull and old-fashioned. Not the flowery one. That’s called deception.” Marlene commented, making everyone snigger around her. She never failed to catch attention.

“That’s called hospitality, Marls. Try to be positive.” Dorcas flung her arm around her to pull her closer so she kissed her cheek. Sirius tried not to look because it painfully reminded him of his rock solid relationship with Remus Lupin, before it crashed brutally after one reckless mistake. He rubbed his eyes because he felt tried. Again. He was tired all the time, but he didn’t like being in bed in odd hours. It made him feel useless.

“So, that means I get to take you as my date for the Yule Ball?” Sirius’ ears stood alerted at Marlene’s muffled voice in the crowd.

Of course, the Yule Ball. He loved going to the balls, and waltzing with the music. If there was anything the Black family had taught and he had loved, were the dancing lessons. He had always imagined holding a certain someone close to him, and waltz with them peacefully. This was his secret. He had never displayed it. After he had realized that he had a crush on Remus, he had always pictured him in his dreams, slowly swaying through the soft music. His hand holding Remus’ while his other one on his waist, leading him. He had never enjoyed dancing with girls. They were too small and delicate to hold, except Marlene who was tall and broad.

The night befell, and everyone filed to their dormitories from the Great Hall after the dinner. Sirius was quietly walking with the Marauders, highly tensed because he was in pace with Remus who hadn’t utter a single word to him since the forgiveness. James was loudly speaking as usual, his arm around Peter’s shoulder, while craning his neck in every angle to find a certain fiery red head in the flood of students.

“Evans! You and me to the Yule Ball, how does that sounds?” He called out once he had spotted her.

“Nauseating.” She replied, causing an eruption of laughter from the sea of student around them.

“Oh come on! You won’t regret!” He continued his show of stupidity but suddenly Sirius’ hand brushed the neighboring one, accidently. He and Remus responded at the same time by flinching away their hands.

“Sorry.”

“Sorry.”

Remus was scarlet in the face, and Sirius felt liked he had touched something electric. He could still feel the burning on his fingers. They walked in their respectful distance, and Sirius started to feel the same process of hollowness in his chest. He was sad. Very sad. They were never supposed to be like this. He missed Remus, but it all seemed like he had lost him forever. Remus had forgiven him, but not by his heart. And it was nothing but heart-breaking. Sirius felt a strong surge of emotion as if he was going to have breakdown in the middle of the staircase. He held the railing of the stairs, widening the distance between him and Remus. Sirius stopped there to breathe out, hoping his friends wouldn’t notice. However, his friends were nor heedless neither heartless. Specifically, Remus wasn’t.

“Sirius? Are you okay?” Remus retreated from the crowd to stand beside him. Sirius felt heated up, and not because he had any rage reserved in the corners of his heart or mind.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.” He tried to act nonchalant, “You go ahead. I just need a break from the walking.”

“No, it is okay, I’ll stay with you until you are good to go.” Remus’ voice was very soft, and Sirius wished that he never leave him, even as a friend. Remus was too precious to lose. Sirius stayed silent. He kept breathing in and out, until his heartbeat became normal. Suddenly, he realized that the staircase was changing with a thud, signifying that all of the students were vanished and gone to their dorms, leaving Remus and Sirius alone.

“How are you feeling?” Remus’ wide amber eyes looked into the dull grey ones, probably for the first time in a longest while. Sirius smiled at the question. How was he feeling? He was feeling sad, useless, pathetic, sick, disappointed, and hopeless and so much that wasn’t easy to name or comprehend.

“I’m feeling better now.” He answered instead.

“Well, looks like it going to be a long detour since the staircase is leading to the third floor. Four floors away.” Remus’ mouth quirked up in an uneasy smile. Sirius smiled back at him as they both began to climb the stairs.

There was silence hanging between them. Surprisingly, it wasn’t uncomfortable to Sirius because he had nothing to say which made his mind a little less chaotic. He had tried saying everything to Remus; the fact how much he regretted his mistake, how much sorry he felt, how much he valued his relationship with Remus, how much unconditionally he was in love with him. All explanations had gone into vain. He decided he had nothing to say.

“Here,” Sirius looked to his side to see that Remus was offering him a goblet of water.

“What is that?” He asked.

“Just water. You need it.” Sirius wanted to slap himself. Of course, he knew it was water, then why asked?

“Thanks.” He took the goblet from his hand. His finger brushed with his that sent tingling feelings to his body.

“So, what are you planning for day after tomorrow?” Remus asked sheepishly, smiling half-heartedly, trying to make a conversation.

“What is on day after tomorrow?”

There is sudden pause, and Sirius had to look at Remus who seemed slightly taken aback.

“I thought you knew,” He mumbled under his breath, “I meant—the Ball. The Yule Ball. Are you going?”

An ugly feeling suddenly jabbed him in the stomach.

“Oh—that. I forgot, to be honest.”

Remus chuckled awkwardly.

“But—umm…” Sirius hesitated, “No, I don’t think I’ll be going.”

“Oh.” Remus became silent then.

They were now on the fifth floor corridor, chasing the giant staircase to lead them to the seventh floor.

“Any particular reason?” Remus piped up, and Sirius felt his lung was lacking air.

“I don’t like dancing.” He lied. And SHIT! He lied to the wrong person. Remus stared at him for a little longer as if he was scanning him.

“You don’t like dancing.” Remus said than asked.

“I don’t like dancing.” Sirius repeated, hoping that saying it again and again would become a truth.

“You don’t like dancing.” Remus repeated too, under his breath but Sirius had heard him. He knew that Remus had spotted the lie, and now Sirius Black was surely labelled as a liar.

“What about you?” Sirius asked to erase the discomfort in the air. They were still chasing the staircase.

“Yeah, I think I will.” Remus replied. Sirius nodded, repressing his sad loneliness, but Remus continued, “I think you should go too. The ball is just not about dancing. You don’t have to dance, just have some fun.”

Sirius smiled at him because Remus’ voice is cheerful and encouraging. Maybe he could go. Maybe this was the chance to heal things in their relationship. Maybe Remus was giving him.

He kept thinking, quietly until they were on the seventh floor. The portrait of Gryffindor Tower was before them.

“Just think about it, you know,” Remus said gently, “Banana Fritters.”

The portrait door opened, and the common room was empty. They climbed to the dormitory when Remus slowed his pace to stop before the door.

“After everything, all of us deserve some fun,” Remus spoke tenderly again, his eyes softening and a hint of smile on his lips. Sirius returned the smile, but it was painful. He couldn’t get a word out of him. They stood there facing each other before Remus came close, and gathered him in his embrace.

Sirius felt like he became numb, all of a sudden. He was there, under Remus’ arms. Wide-eyed, his body paralyzed, and his blood racing abnormally. Trying to process how, where, why and what just happened.

Suddenly, hot tears obscured his vision before they began streaming endlessly. Sirius didn’t remember if he brought his hands up to hug him back but he was able to feel Remus tightening his embrace. He sobbed into his shoulder, and Remus let him. That was enough. It had never felt so comforting.

Chapter 2

#wolfstar #WOLFSTAR FLUFF #Wolfstar fanfiction #wolfstar angst #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #remus x sirius #Sirius x Remus #James Potter #marlene mckinnon #Lily Evans #peter pettigrew #hp marauders #Harry Potter #post prank #hogwarts #angst with happy ending

[pairofmelaninkweens]

Nostalgia

Characters: Kuroo Tetsurou x Natsumi Myaski (oc)

By: @sweet-darling91

Summary: (Post time skip )Kurro has been looking for a chance to possibly reconcile with an Ex, but soon comes to learn that nostalgia can realy lead you down a path of thorns instead of a bed of roses.

CW/TW: Angst, vanilla sex,  and cunnilingus.

Wc: 4783

art by: twi.night on Instagram! one of the pictures Kuroo kept on the wall of his condo of Him and Natsumi.

The subtle warm scent with fresh citrus notes alerted his senses. It was mixed with that perfectly unique smell and feeling that only one person in existence could provoke, Natsumi. It sprung memories of late-night lovemaking in his dorm, as the rays of moonlight illuminated your cocoa brown skin, highlighting its cinnamon undertones.

 The buns you swept your hair up in were removed when he pulled the hair ties free, sending your dark curly tresses tumbling down past your shoulders. Wrapping the curls around his fingers as he tugged them, groaning when you bowed your back as he took you from behind. Remembering the way your ass pressed against his pelvis, the way you would keen when he spread your buttery smooth thighs further, watching your essence coat his cock as he plunged it deep into your quivering cunt.

 He remembered the way your silken walls would quiver around him as you moaned his name, the way your small frame would tremble as he sunk balls deep into you, your cum would drip down his balls. Fuck, you were so perfect. He would get lost in you night after night. Even now, years after you left his life. He would still fantasize about you, craving the way your warm body clung to him. It broke his heart when you lost contact with him, because like it or not you were a pillar in his life.

 You were the one that brought him to accept parts of himself he neglected. The origin of most of his kinks and preferences. Especially the first girl he endearingly called Chibi-chan. Of course, he ignored the fact that it was indeed the same name he teased his Orange haired buddy with over his height-or lack thereof.  It was different for you though; it was meant to be endearing. The most important detail is after all this time and secret pining, he found you, mere feet away far enough not to be in direct contact thanks to the layout of the patio, with the decorative shrubbery around, and the angle his table was stationed at. He had the vantage point in observing you, and it made his cock twitch remembering the way you made his blood heat. The memory of the connection you once shared painfully squeezes his chest.

 Natsumi Miyazaki, a name that was burned into his memory forever. Now sits with perfectly crossed legs poised in your seat. Hair cut into a bob, parted on the side, with bangs framing your slender face. Hazel eyes sparkled when you beamed at the man cracking jokes over coffee. He couldn’t be that funny to be making you flash your smile like that he thought as he turned up his nose, letting his lips sink into a frown and eyes narrow at the sight of you with him.

 The cashmere top with the sweetheart cut highlighted your delicate clavicle and the swell of your breasts. Your form-fitting skirt accentuated your small waist, hugging your hips and thick thighs. Kuroo began biting his tongue wishing he could get a better view of your ass. The white and cream outfit was cute, clean, and professional. It read that you meant business, that, and the subtle tells in your body language confirmed it. The way your eyes analyzed the orange-haired man, and the all too polite way you sipped at your latte, made him laugh darkly.

 Whatever Shoyo was saying must have given you the answer you were looking for, and your response was subtle pettiness. He recognized that polite smile was a mask, the exaggerated nods and the batting of your eyelashes was used to do to supress rolling your eyes. This happened when you asked him questions you already knew the answers to. A cleaver warning and it seems that went over Shoyo’s head. What were you up to? Why were you out here all dolled up with a new outfit and hair styled completely different than when it was back in college? Why change your appearance to shortcake? Then it dawned on him, information. You were working, he knew you were, but was distracted staring at you. The longer you took probing Shoyo, the more impatient he became, fidgeting in his seat and glowering.

 Leaving a tip for the waitress he made his way to your table; he was only 5 feet away when the rhythmic tap of 4 manicured digits followed by a double-tap of your index finger against the glass table halted his stride. It was your sign to him; acknowledging his presence and warning not to interrupt. This shouldn’t surprise him. You were always the most astute in class, rivalling him for the top academic grade and overall performance. Along the way to those achievements, you spent so much time together you were well versed in each other’s non-verbal cues.

 That’s what got him so interested in you, seeing how your mind worked. The way you would speak volumes with so few words and see everything with a glance. Now pointedly walking past the table, he answered your rasp with two taps of his umbrella against the cobblestone patio floor. “Looks like rain” he remarked as he opened it out, and started walking up the street.

 Five minutes later he heard the quick taps of heels and the gentle, beautiful fragrance returned when you wrapped your arms around his waist from behind. “Is this a good time?” he asked, eyes still trained forward, steps returning to their previous pace.

 You release a contented hum, and then raise your head to ask, “Which one is yours?”  releasing your hold on him and motioning towards the parked cars.

 “The black Audi,” he responds, as you smile to yourself eying the 2017 R8 model. “Of course, the flashiest car for the former prince of Nekoma high.” You say as you playfully shove his shoulder. He looks down at you and curls his lips shrugging at the tease. “ I mean, were they wrong?”

 Rolling your eyes you open the passenger side door, settling in the seat and sliding off the bob-cut wig and cap that encased your curly tresses. Kuroo watched the curls spill down your shoulder as you rub your scalp and sigh in relief, only stopping to spot the time on the dash. “Ok, let’s go, my schedule’s free after that meeting.”

 His eyebrows raise in surprise, “Always so forward."

 “There’s no time to beat around the bush, if you have something to ask me, go ahead,” you quip, with a sharp side glance at him, before pulling the visor down to adjust your lipstick in the mirror.

 “I just missed you,” he admitted.

 “Missed me or missed what I could do for you?” Closing the visor, you turn and look him in the eye, your gaze piercing through him. His shoulders slump slightly, and a bitter chuckle escapes his lips. “Is it always going to be business with you? Even after everything?”

 “It’s always going to be business with you because of everything. You're the one that said ‘lets just be friends. Realistically that's the best option because I’m too dangerous to be a stranger to you with all that I know." You finish, chest burning with your bitter pettiness and disgust in sympathy for his masked pain.  "You were one of the greatest loves of my life. But not THE love of my life.” you continue, thinning your lips and turning away and closing your eyes to soothe the burning in them.

“I still love you too. But it’s not gonna happen, our time is over.” You finally say.

“I figured that you became an information broker to get Kiyoomi’s attention recently.” He interjected with jealousy clear in his tone.

Snapping your gaze back at him. “I chose my career to be independent, so no would hurt me like you did.  I don’t want to take orders from someone because I’m no goon. I stand by my policy. It would do you well to stand by it too.” Ignoring his pained reaction, you continued. “Taking me to your place, right?  Then let’s get on with that instead because I don’t owe you any of my personal details.” The thought crossed you mind, and the words slipped past your lips before you could stop them. “That information is a premium charge if you’re that curious.” you stated holding out your hand.

“it’s in the glove box” he sighed. “I know you didn’t seek me to purchase information for your ‘work.’ you wanted my time, didn’t you?”  looking up to see him nodding in reply with a dejected smile. You weren’t finished though, thinking to yourself as you exited the car, followed him through the underground garage, past security and into his penthouse. You had a point to prove with your hidden agenda, and you weren’t leaving here until you got what you came for.

  Stepping through the threshold was like sinking into the warm comforting depths of the deep sunlit seawater. Warm, familiar, and comforting. Immediately you could tell that nothing had changed, relief washed over you with the realization that dramatically increased your advantage and success rate for your target. Just like the deep-sea waters though you knew there were dangers the deeper you sank into this familiarity. Shoving that thought to the side you slid off your shoes and began walking through the hall, hands grazing the walls observing pictures of him and his family. Passing one of you in a group shot together cleverly placed in the collage on the wall, slipping into the living room, passing the pictures of the old gang and snapshots of you studying with Sienna, and Kenma. Then seeing yourself standing in the rain in the background of a team group shot mocking Bokuto who was trying to duck out of the shot but failed to. Blushing wildly covering your best friend from the rain with his jacket and hiding his face that was covered in tinted lip balm. “Always the gentleman Bo.” You grinned at the shot, roaming over other pictures of his MSBY friends, the rival teams, some shots included new coaches, vice-captains, fellow higher-ups and the team medics. Then you saw the generous helping of pictures of your time together though, the two of you studying with Sienna and Bokuto, who was flustered looking at Sienna instead of the textbook. Shots of you riding on Kuroo’s shoulders, a cute one that you vividly remember Sienna taking of you covered in your own lipstick when Kuroo put it on and smothered you with kisses all over your face and arm, a flustered expression clearly focused on the camera. You remember the way he was focused on you, only looking to the camera to smirk before he continued his assault of kisses on you. Finally, the last picture was of you landing that ‘Oikawa serve’ in one of the final games before leaving college. Once again you closed your eyes, trying to soothe yourself from the melancholy trip down memory lane with his display.

Slipping open your lids you accepted the fact that the burning in your throat and prickling in your eyes would not cease, letting the cool tears flow freely.  “you cruel bastard. You kept all of it. Why?”

“Because You’re always on my mind, you never left.”

 “is that all?” you say turning to face him, hating the conflicting feelings swarming through you all at once, the nostalgia was warm, sweet, and welcoming. But the result was bitter, cold and lonely. Logically you should stick to the job, but your emotions were forcing you to focus your mind elsewhere.

“Nope, your here too.” He points to his heart. “Every time I close my eyes it’s you, I see. Wishing that it’s your voice calling out my name, your hair that fanned out on the pillow next to mine. Your arms wrapping around me. If I take them down. If I remove all the stuff. It would be leaving a void in the middle of my life. I can’t have that, I’d crumble.” He admits with his eyes locked in your gaze.

You answer him by bounding into his arms like old times and breathlessly kissed him. He deepened it, holding you tightly, cradling the back of your head gently letting his free hands travel down your back and firmly grabbing your ass pulling you close to his body and rolling his hips into you. Groaning as he feels your warm body. Relishing in the smooth suppleness of your skin under his hands.

 "Your skin was always so smooth, so soft." He murmured into your neck. Trailing open mouth kisses down it. Leaning your head to the right, granting him more access to your throat. Fluttering your lashes enjoying the feeling of his lips on your skin again. Your brought back down onto your feet, as he sinks to his knees, unzipping your skirt and letting it pool around your ankles. You grabbed his tie and pulled him flush against your pelvis, slipping one leg over his shoulder and angling your puffy lips to align with his mouth.

"Kiss me, show me how much you missed me." Winking and smiling at him sweetly. His face heats at your sudden boldness, a contrast to the usual blushing submissive side. Leaning forward he obliged and kissed you through the thin crotch of the lacy fabric separating his lips from yours. Flattening his tongue, he laved it down your wet slit. Biting your bottom lip to stifle moans threatening to echo through the apartment, you began rocking your hips back and forth, craving more friction. Sensing your eagerness Kuroo pulls at the material with his teeth and lets the elastic snap against you. Humming in pleasure when he hears the responding gasp melting into a soft muted moan. He missed the sounds you made, and he wanted to hear more of them. Slipping his index finger past the ruined panties he sinks his index finger knuckle deep, groaning at how eagerly your gummy walls wrapped around his digit. "God, your so tight Chibi-chan, did u miss me?"

 Whining in response you wrapped your fingers around the strands of raven hair pulling harshly. "Mmmm more" you demanded, he smiled noting the lack of answer and obediently slipped the second digit in, pumping the fingers in and out, taking pleasure in the feeling of you clenching around him, the sweet taste of your slick and skin. But what really got him going was the sounds spilling from your lips when he swallowed your clit into his mouth hollowing out his cheeks and grinding his fingers against that spongey spot that had you bucking her hips and crying out. His breathing started to get obstructed when you yanked at his tie, tightening it around his throat. His vision getting blurry and the sound of his blood rushing through his veins filled his ears. Then on instinct you released the tie, fresh air flooded into his lungs, the rush of oxygen and the dopamine surging through his system delivered an indescribable high.

 He freed his cock from his pants giving himself slow soothing pumps to his throbbing length. Its head swollen, pink and dripping pre that he used as a lube before grabbing your hips and easing you to sit on his face. He bucked into the empty air craning his neck and slipped his tongue into your quivering pussy. Your legs gave out as your orgasm surged through you like a flash fire, igniting every blood cell in our body with hot pleasure that clouded your mind and mad your eyes roll to the back of your head as you released a litany of curses and Kuroo’s name. He gripped your hips with a bruising force, drinking in your cum as it spilled into his mouth, embracing your trembling form.

 As you caught your breath Kuroo brushed the stray strands of hair free from your face and immediately searched your face for signs of discomfort. His lips stretched into a smile when you started smoothing your hands through his hair. “I’m not a dog, you don’t need to pet me he nipped at your hand. Standing, and stripping off his shirt and shooting you a wink. “Well at least dogs are loyal.”  Returning his wink as you get to your feet and watch him as he flings his shirt and tie over his shoulder, grasping his chest and looking down at you through his lashes. “Ouch, you aren’t here to play nice, are you?” he croons as he slips his hands on your waist and back steps toward his room.

 “Not at all.” you answer while pointing over to his bed, “have a seat,” waiting for him to do so, your request before you slipped out of the top, revealing the strapless bralette and flinging it his way, grinning when he caught it in his mouth, shooting you a wink and growling. Releasing a playful “woof” before dropping it onto the floor to watch you close the space between you two. You slid your palms up his thigh bracing the other hand on his chest, coaxing him to lean back  allowing you to slink up his long body letting your glistening pussy lips slide up his hardened shaft and muffled his groan when you pressed your plump lips over his pulling back to whisper, “shhh, don’t get too excited too soon” you tease trailing kisses down his neck, leaving blossoming bruises in your wake, kissing down his chest and finally sitting back up halting your hip to search his face. You could feel the way his heart was hammering in his chest against your palm. “Don’t be shy now Natsumi.” He bucks his hips and you sink your teeth into your lip to stifle the moan rising from you.

 His hands fastened to your hips in a death grip, his fingers and knuckles white, his pupils blown, his chest heaving with anticipation. He nodded and bucked his hips, slipping his shaft through your delicate petals and being rewarded with a sweet soft moan. “Lean forward Chibi-chan, I got you,” he assured. Reluctant to trust him for much, you relented with a sigh and obeyed.

Feeling his swollen velvety tip breach your entrance, you couldn’t hold back from slamming your hips down, enveloping him in your warm, hungry pussy with a moan that made him growl low in his throat. “D-don’t move, ok?” you struggled through whimpers at how the stretch sent pleasure flooding your senses. Your body flushed with heat, goosebumps flashing across the surface, nipples pebbling before his eyes, and that plush bottom lip being tortured between your pearly teeth as you bit down on it to suppress moans threatening to spring free but still reaching Kuroo’s ears. Your hips bucked forward, working your waist in slow delicious circles that edged both of you just right. The friction your swollen clit got from grazing his hilt urged you to close your eyes and twerk your ass cheeks, the sudden movements caused his dick to grind against the walls of your tight core, which clenched him snuggly inside you. He gasped each time you jerked and rolled your waist, bouncing up and down his cock, building a punishing speed that drove him wild and bow his back up off the bed. “Chibi-chan that’s it, fuck yourself on my cock baby.” he moaned thrusting his hip up in time to crash into yours when you thrusted your hips down, making him moan out in bliss, lolling his tongue out as your hips jackhammered down onto him. “Kurooooo, I’m gonna cum.”

 He eased the pressure on your hips, his breath stuttering and sweat collecting on his brow as he watched the way you raised your body up the length of his dick and dropped onto it. Your swollen lips swallowing him deeply, convulsing around him. “Mm cum on this cock Chibi-Chan!” he growled demanding your attention and compliance. “I’ve been dreaming about this for so long when you would finally come back and ride me and let me fuck you into this mattress. Ffffff fuck Natsumi.” You throw your head back as your pussy convulses and your orgasm ripples through your body. Radiating waves of intensity surging through your body sending your eyes rolling to the back of your head. He sits up to let you rest your forehead against his, both of you panting for breath. He laid slow soft kisses across your flushed cheeks, smoothing his hands up your back and down your sides slowly but gaining in pressure. You also feel his cock harden inside you as he starts brings his lips against your, kissing your deeply and letting your taste yourself on his tongue.

Rocking your hips in slow motions you let him take advantage and toss you into the mattress, sinking his incisors into your neck and his cock balls deep “you feel so good baby~ I wanna cum deep inside you, look at me Sumi. I want to see your face when I fill you.” He ruts into you setting the delicious pace of pulling out and pounding into your dripping cunt, the chorus of hips crashing into each other, the squelching of your wet pussy milking him, and wanton moans filled his ears. He forced his eyes closed trying to burn it all into memory. The beautiful pitch your voice took when he hit that perfect spot deep inside you, lacing his fingers with yours, he crowded your frame with his broad upper body. Balancing on his elbows he used every muscle in his thighs to push into you, bringing tears to your eyes as flashes of black and white cloud your vision, all the breath left your body as Kuroo sent you tumbling into a prolonged orgasm. A wild blissful ride rendering your body weightless, gravity no longer existed, lost in the incredible sensations coursing through your body and spasmed when Kuroo thrust almost painfully deep into you pumping you past your limit with hot ropes of cum pulsing into you. You felt warm everywhere, there was tingling under the surface of your skin, movements reduced to the speed of warm molasses. “I’ve got you Natsumi.” his voice sounded so far away but the sound was followed with gentle soothing strokes up your sides, slowly grounding you. Soon after the feeling of him caressing your cheek and feeling him planting a soft kiss on your lips brought your mind back to the present, just like he would back then. Bringing you back down to earth after fucking your soul out of your body filled him with pride knowing he still could do this to you. The bitter pangs of his heart told him that one day the person doing this wouldn’t be him. The gentle sound of your voice thanking him grasped his attention and gave him the chance to appreciate your raw beauty. The lipstick had long been kissed away revealing plump two-toned nude lips, the even tone of her golden chestnut skin and deep chocolate eyes made his sting with tears. “It’s been a long time, nostalgia’s hurting, isn’t it?” you teased reaching your arms out for him to pull himself into an embrace, sighed at the feeling of you nuzzling into him and kissing his jaw. “Seeing you like this hit hard. It’s like seeing my dreams and memories merge together and play out in front of me, yet the actual thing, still pales every single image, every thought, every memory in comparison.” Pulling back to see his face you arched an eyebrow. “oh?”

 “Every time I have someone next to me, I wished it were your body warming that side of my bed instead, your curls fanned out across my pillow, your voice filling the room when you call my name, and your lips I taste when I kiss. I shouldn’t have hurt you the way I did Sumi, I’m sorry.” He breathed. You closed her eyes and hummed. This was supposed to hurt more. But it was just a dull ache of sympathy, the bond that you had with him had long frayed and snaped, well at least you hoped. You truly moved on. It was a relief and a pity. A relief that you felt nothing, a pity for him, that he was feeling everything.

 “That connection had long since ended Roo, the love I feel for you now isn’t the same. That level of devotion was gone the moment you left me. Understand? I only give that out to those deserving. This was sweet, to an extent. But by no means is it a sign of any kind of romantic reconcile, ok?” his eyes swirled with remorse, and he numbly nodded. Finishing the water he gave you, you placed it on the side table as headed to the bathroom to clean yourself up in the hot shower, rinsing the feeling of him off your skin. Breathing the hot steam deep into your lungs to refocus your mind. Inwardly thanking him for not following you in there. After the shower you grab a town and dry of, return to the room finding him sitting on the bed.  Looking up at you a smile flashed across his face along with a faint blush on his cheeks. “Your hair, it brings me back to when I would help you with drying it out, detangling and oiling your scalp.” You shook your head. And cast him a side glance. “And?”

“Well, it was my favourite, you know I always thought your hair was cute in those buns" he muses, she glared at him. "How childish. People grow Kuroo, I have long grown out of that. You know it was cute walking down memory lane with you, but it revealed one thing. You haven’t changed, your out here fucking girls that remind you of me, holding onto the past while I, and the rest of the world move forward. Grow up, you should try it sometime." You spat, spinning on your toes to invade his closet, boldly slamming the door and reef through the clothes for something to wear only to come up to another nostalgic discovery, with out uttering a word you grabbed the old uniform and put it on, gathering up his travel bag and rummaging through his drawers, eyes scanning every free surface. Noticing that he was not making a sound made you suspicious. “You alive?” tensing waiting for his reply.

 “Yeah, just giving you space-” he was cut off when he saw the college uniform hug your curvy figure. He truly felt like if he blinked, you’d vanish, but when you realized what was going on you yanked the bundles of hair free, shaking the damp curls and sweeping them up into a messy bun letting stray strands frame your face. “I may be a vision from your memories, so take a good look. This is the last time you’ll see me like this. Once I leave this room you won’t have this chance again. So, I do hope that your ‘hoe phase’ was an enjoyable one.” you finished slipping on a pair of runners. “I really can’t believe you kept everything here, that isn’t healthy, and if you have other women wearing my things, that’s- disturbing.”

“What should I do with the clothes you came here with.”

“Burn it. Toss it, it’s of little consequence to me, my job is done.” You shrug on the travel bag on your shoulders.

“But I didn’t tell you anything, you never asked any questions. Did you even get what you needed?” Cupping his cheek to look into his eyes. “Thank you for being one of my greatest loves Kuroo, you really should stop putting yourself in danger trying to steal glances at me. Turning up in places where you think I will be or following my potential targets. You’ll end up putting a target on your back if you keep that up, I’m grown. I can handle myself.” you warned, “bye Sumi.” he closed his eyes and felt you kiss him, when he opened them again his heart sank to see the room empty, but then it sank into his belly realizing what exactly she did. Running into the walk-in closet he yanked open his draws in search of his files and the dossier. No surprise, they were all missing, the dossier, all the files including the first classified drive he had in there.  Damn, He really paid her to rob him. He smiled bitterly to himself admiring the finesse. He attempted to buy time to plead his case, only to be out of luck with love, and now possibly his job.

#kuroo angst #haikyuu kuroo #kuroo x oc #kuroo x reader oc #haikyuu smut #haikyū!!

[somesaycosmo]

laurence, the first vicar - an analysis

hi! this is future marie, when i'm going back through and finalizing my draft of this post. this was originally meant to just be an analysis of laurence's song, but it turned into more than that, so just bear with it!

"oh look it's my favorite boss soundtrack in soulsborne! thankfully, bloodborne is a very simple game with straightforward lore, and the lyrics of its tracks are similarly straightforward, so there's not much to analyze here." -a quote from an alternate universe marie who was blessed with a game that didn't give her frenzy

"bloodborne's tracks have lyrics?" you might ask - and yes, in fact, they do! many of them have choral lyrics in latin, including mr laurence "i forgot the sacred adage" lastname's track here.

before we start, please listen to the song, if only because it's very good

this post is using the translated lyrics from this bloodborne wiki, while taking some liberties with the interpretation based on the game's lore. i do not know latin, but if anyone does, i'd love for them to hit me up. i'm also going to specifically tag @rococospade-main, both to shout them out for being great to discuss bloodborne lore with (it's where i got the idea to write this post)

as always, lore starts below the line

so the song starts with 4 lines, as follows

Children, know that if you will abide by the sacred rite with great commitment There will be a reward through the Holy Blood You will be rewarded with the hidden Holy Blood Or, maybe I shall lose my humanity through the Holy Blood

already starting off strong with the "questioning one's faith" vibes, eh, larry?

"children" might be in reference to actual children, or it might be the thing priests do, where they're called "father" and stuff (can you tell i'm not christian?) with laurence in this case being the "father" and the disciples of the church being his "children"

the reward from the holy blood is, of course, ascension, which we all know everyone from byrgenwerth strived for, because they're losers. "hidden holy blood" might be in reference to ebrietas bein all locked up in the chalice dungeons?

"maybe i shall lose my humanity through the holy blood" is, based on how early it is in the song, likely about laurence looking forward; loss of humanity is seen as a good thing, because it means ascension. the dramatic irony of this is of course obvious, considering the song plays when we're beating the shit out of laurence's fallen and bestial form - because loss of humanity can also mean other things, it turns out.

We honor you with the Blood Yet you judge this as blasphemy You are obsessed with this mystery And you shall be overcome by bestiality

We honor you with the Blood Yet you judge this as blasphemy We are hindered by this mystery Water does not achieve success

now laurence is speaking to the gods instead of to his followers. "we honor you with blood / yet you judge this as blasphemy" is likely him pleading to the gods. the description of the defiled chalice reads, "Curses are caused by inciting the anger of the Great Ones, and used to hex others." this paints a picture of the gods as somewhat vengeful; it makes sense that the beastly scourge, then, would be hypothesized to be a plague cast upon humanity for some sin they've committed, and laurence would know best what exactly that sin is.

"you are obsessed with this mystery / and you shall be overcome by bestiality" seems out of place in the rest of this section, given it's the only one that refers to humanity as "you," but i've taken this as it being the gods replying to laurence in the song, with the mystery likely being "how to ascend to godhood". this is the blasphemy you have committed, they say, and you shall be overcome by bestiality

"we are hindered by this mystery" once again, we're talking from laurence's perspective. firstly, laurence for the first time admits that obsession with ascension might not be so great, actually.

"water does not achieve success" this could be interpreted as talking about the whole "great bodies of water are often bulwarks" thing discussed in the lake and sea runes, laurence sort of saying "protecting ourselves from the truth does nothing to help us ascend," with water, effectively, being "safety." to go further, in my personal interpretation, this is more about the comparison of blood and water. you know that old saying, "blood is thicker than water"? that came to mind immediately while reading these lyrics, given the constant talking about blood in the song (and in the game). perhaps here laurence is comparing water to blood with water, water being "safety" and blood being "success" (ascension). to reference the item description for the white church set, "They believe that medicine is not a means of treatment but rather a method for research, and that some knowledge can only be obtained by exposing oneself to sickness." this will come up later.

By the Gods, friend Be afraid By the Gods, friend The Blood Be afraid You are right to

this is familiar! this could be willem speaking, this could be laurence speaking to someone else, or this could be laurence speaking to himself (my writer's brain imagines him muttering this quietly to himself in despair as his mental health and questioning of his faith declines) - due to "you are right to [fear the blood]," i lean towards him talking to himself as if talking to willem, perhaps wishing he had actually feared the old blood, or saying that willem is better off for doing so. regardless, it is incredibly reminiscent of the sacred adage ("fear the old blood" etc etc we all know it by heart at this point), and is likely supposed to be that.

It will be a majestic festivity By the Holy Blood So come, this sweet wine O defiled juice (this has to mean "wine" or "drink" i refuse to believe laurence would refer to the holy blood as a juice. i will not allow it)

this one, oddly, seems to indicate a toneshift - i would argue it's a result of his spiraling mental state. throughout the song he's questioning his faith and his actions, chanting his old mentor's sacred adage to himself; his life up to this point is a life of success while the cure and path to ascension he was peddling to yharnam turns them into horrific beasts. so he ends up doubling down on the religious fervor he started this endeavor with. this delves more into headcanon territory, so bear with me for a second:

have you ever thought about why laurence drops the beast's embrace rune?

laurence, the first vicar, the first cleric beast, drops the rune that allows you to enter a state of controlled beasthood whenever you want (provided you use a beastly weapon, of course). isn't that odd? shouldn't he drop something that, like, increases the amount blood vials heal you? maybe super duper extra special communion +6? why would he drop that rune, of all things, especially when the game already has a named character they could've put in to drop it (that being irreverent izzy)?

let's look at the item description.

After the repeated experiments in controlling the scourge of beasts, the gentle "Embrace" rune was discovered.

When its implementation failed, the "Embrace" became a forbidden rune, but this knowledge became a foundation of the Healing Church.

now i am not necessarily going to suggest that laurence dreamed up the beast's embrace rune himself - it could make sense, but that isn't necessary for the rest of what i'm about to say, which is this: the last part of the song is laurence giving into beasthood voluntarily.

perhaps he believed so strongly in the blood of ebrietas taking him to ascension that he decided beasthood must be it, must be the next step for humanity; perhaps, in a final move of desperation, he tried to control beasthood by experimenting on himself with this rune; or perhaps he had already imbibed so much of the old blood that he couldn't control his need to spill the blood of others.

personally, i lean toward the second interpretation. let's look at the description of laurence's (human) skull:

Skull of Laurence, first vicar of the Healing Church. In reality he became the first cleric beast, and his human skull only exists within the Nightmare.

The skull is a symbol of Laurence's past, and what he failed to protect. He is destined to seek his skull, but even if he found it, it could never restore his memories.

firstly, i'd just like to point out the irony in the statement "he is destined to seek his skull"; he spends his human life seeking ascension, and when he achieves metamorphosis, he is cursed to spend that form trying to find his humanity again, mindless, lost in a nightmare.

secondly, and more to the point, let's look at the line "a symbol of laurence's past, and what he failed to protect." examining this item for its symbolism is fairly clear - it's a relic of laurence's humanity, and that's exactly what he failed to protect, the humanity of himself and others. this description leads me to believe he wanted to protect humanity, but failed.

a lot of interpretations of him have him as this truly evil person who was just deceiving the city of yharnam for his own personal gain, but honestly, i don't buy that. that's not what bloodborne is about. i mean bloodborne is and can be about a lot of things, and i could ascribe dozens of basic thematic interpretations of it off the top of my head, but characterization that simple doesn't fit bloodborne (and, frankly, it's not tragic enough for miyazaki).

so, with all that combined, why do i believe that laurence branded himself with beast's embrace in an attempt to further research on the control of beasthood, so as to protect humanity? well, to go back to an item description from earlier, some knowledge can only be obtained by exposing oneself to sickness.

thank you for reading.

#bloodborne #bloodborne lore #laurence the first vicar #that one post that's like catholicism is problematic but catholicism is sexy #song analysis?? i guess?? #lore analysis definitely