#was also thinking about looking into neocities that could be fun too

[star-studded-zweilous]

with tumblr going the way it is [ie down the drain] i think im going to look into setting up an account somewhere new. i do have a discord but its not the same as having somewhere dedicated to post things

the two ive been hearing most about are cohost and pillowfort, so ill likely look into those, any advice about them would be appreciated

#ive havent posted much of my creative works anywhere recently cause my writing is still cooking and im not fully back into the swing of art #but once i do have stuff id like to put it somewhere where it wont be scraped by ai #ive been on this site for over a decade im a little bit surprised its lasted as long as it did #but with the way its going lets be honest how much longer can the nonsense go on #was also thinking about looking into neocities that could be fun too #give me an excuse to relearn basic coding

[cat--comic]

blog 1. happy birthday

welcome to the new cat comic blog! if you're reading this on tumblr, hello! if you're reading this on neocities, i love you more. page looks pretty snazzy, right? check out the very pretty melankorin.net, this page looked a lot more plain before i ate that page's design aesthetic.

ok.

it just so happens that yesterday, the 13th of april, 2024, was cat comic's first birthday. this comic is officially one year old! goo goo ga ga! it makes me glad and more than little scared that i've been working on this for so long. it's my longest-lived project to date and still going strong, which means a lot coming from my bloody trail of abandoned projects.

what the hell is cat comic about?

cat comic is a story born out of a lot of my fears vis-a-vis my creative projects. it's a story about creation, whether that deals with art, identity, or culture, and about the history that doggedly stamps itself on any creation, and about the problems of indie projects. it's a story about a cat and a dog and some other various animals who get into lots of trouble, and it's mainly a story about the end of the world.

i think you can tell that there's a lot of throughlines to my other work (unfinished or otherwise), which is pretty thematically appropriate. actually, cat comic was originally reusing far too much of eyrie, an old comic idea of mine. eyrie followed an aspiring paladin and their little buddy as they made their way to the shining capital of a theocratic nation, delving into a mirror world that reflected public perception of things along the way. it was a pretty fun concept.

anyway, it informed a lot of cat comic's original premise—it began with an ascent from belowcloud to a shining city in the sky. huh... sounds familiar. like eyrie, it also dealt a lot with divinity, mirrors, and perfection (as in: perfection in the eyes of society, not cat comic's current sense of it). it's fun looking back at these early drafts of cat comic because you can clearly see all the influences i was pulling on, big or small. i was pretty fine with doing this because, as it pains me to remember, cat comic was to be a "fun" and "short" project where i could "do whatever". haha.

cat comic's changed a lot since then and it's also hardly changed at all. a lot of the original ideas are still there in the batter, but it's also evolved into something pretty different and much closer to my heart. and it will continue to change and evolve! although perhaps not quite so drastically as it has over the last year.

what's the plan with this thing?

i had a conversation with a friend a while ago (hiii ardenna i know you're reading this. love you) about our respective story projects and our problems working on them as single creators. i don't have a team for art or writing—it's all me, babey—and that means everything about this project is going to take what we in the industry call a "long time".

this time next year, i want to have a comprehensive plot. that might sound like a lot of time for not a lot of work but believe me i need it—i'm doing a bit of a unique format for this story and i want to put the time in to make sure i stick the landing with it. my secondary goals for the next year also include finalizing designs for all of the main cast and making sure they're all fleshed out... basically, by next year, i want to be able to start actually drawing the comic. i don't want to start drawing it then but, just, you know, be able to.

as of last week, i've handed in my senior project (and passed with flying colors, thank you), which means i can start turning my attention to things other than that. i've already talked a bit in my 2024 blog post about my plans for the year and how i would like to devote the rest of the spring to exercising my comic muscles. i would like to stick to this plan, despite the fact that school is trying to murder me.

right now, i only have vague ideas of what those exercises will be. once i'm completely done with my senior project (report handed in at the end of this month) i'll start workshopping them. again, my priority with them is not telling a story so much as working on coloring, panelling and figuring out my workflow.

and, apart from my year-long goals and season-long goals, i just want to flesh out these pages a little more. i kind of rushed getting these up because i wanted to hit the birthday (and i didn't even manage that LOL). i want to get some more of my brain bits out on canvas! but they never tell you how hard it is to figure out how much you want to share and how much you want to keep to yourself for now. i'm making little lists and i think i'm doing a pretty good job.

final notes (SAPPY WARNING!!!)

thanks to my friends (hi again) who are very excited about my comic. it means an immeasurable amount. friendship forever

and to everyone else... remember: birds can't fly with wet wings. goodbye for now!

#blog #cat comic #webcomic

[aseriesofunfortunatejan]

Honestly I know so many people who like. Know about Vocaloid, maybe other synths too, enjoy it, but feel distanced from it because they can't really put their hands in it. That was me for many years.

If you like some vocal synth voices, if you think it'd be fun for a vocal synth voice to say this and sing that, remember that there are many ways to use vocal synths for free.

You could make your own covers, or you could just. Make them say the one funny sentence and go "hehee"

UTAU is a free program that allows for anyone to create their own vocal synth, and for anyone to use these vocal synths, (or UTAUs) granted they have the download link. There are a few famous UTAUs like Kasane Teto or Namine Ritsu, but you could also fall in love with a lesser known UTAU created by some rando! In case you don't enjoy using UTAU, the program, there are front-ends for it such as OpenUtau that are easier to use with some more functions. There are UTAUs in many different languages.

Synthesizer V Basic is the free version of Synthesizer V. It's completely useable on its own, with some limitations such as having only three tracks at a time (which is completely manageable) and not being able to use paid voicebanks to their full potential (which won't impact you if you only use the free voicebanks). As of right now, being that I'm missing just a few Standard Lites, I have 22 Lite (aka free) voicebanks, + 3 Free Limited Trial voicebanks on SynthV. This includes some voicebanks you may be familiar with, such as Kasane Teto SV, Eleanor Forte, Eleanor Forte AI, SOLARIA, Haruno Sora...

Synthesizer V Editor (also known as R1) is an old version of Synthesizer V with a free trial that you can use forever. It has a few free voicebanks, iirc being Yamine Renri, GENBU and Eleanor Forte. If you like GENBU, you might be interested in testing his R1 voicebank, since his Lite on SynthV Basic has some imperfections. (sob)

DeepVocal is another free program similar to UTAU. It has its own voicebanks and its own appearance. It's not currently being developed but you can continue to download and use all its free voicebanks!

NEUTRINO is a lesser known AI program which is, at the moment, completely free. It's a little tricky to use, and is not compatible with... well, my PC for example, but if you listen to it and like its voices, it's worth looking into - it may work for you!

VoiSona is another current program that can be downloaded for free with a free voicebank, being Chis-A! If you like Chis-A... she's free!

I'm less familiar with ACE Studio because I don't. personally like it. but it comes with a free trial - another option to look into!

I think you can also get you a free trial for VOCALOID6 with its native voicebanks. If you're into text-to-speech programs, VOICEVOX is an option if you know Japanese! (It supports some recognisable voicebank such as GENBU-as-just-a-guy, Namine Ritsu, Shikoku Metan who is also on UTAU and NEUTRINO... etc.)

Thanks to her new SynthV voicebank, there's even talk of Gumi Megpoid having a Lite (aka free) voicebank in the future. If you want to get into vocal synth, if you just want to test it out, you can do it right now for free. I'm sure I forgot some examples. People often talk about their paid voicebanks collections, about buying the newest release, but you can do so much for free. Like just get Chis-A. What's stopping you? Some SynthV Lite voicebanks are really high quality, like Kyomachi Seika AI, to me, is barely distinguishable from her full version. Sorry to keep rambling, but I think the "wow! you can make a neocities website for free??!" site needs to know you can also make a vocal synth cover for free. You can make your own songs featuring a vocal synth for free (not commercially) too.

#nospon #vocal synth #vsynth #synthesizer v #synthv #neutrino #voisona #deepvocal #utau #openutau

[unfriendlyamazon]

creative talents of the ygos

yugi - fanfiction, fanart (he's not the best at either but he's earnest), also loves a magic act and i've never stopped thinking about the au where he's a drag magician, i think he knows a lot about fashion and modifies his own clothes so he's a fairly skilled sewer

joey - actually really good artist copies pictures of shoes out of magazines probably draws gundams or something obv posts saucy duel monsters fanart (bnf among panther warrior stans), i do want to write him as a sculptor too probably has a lot of fun with any creative endeavor, obsessed with joey loving cooking i think he gets really into it later

tristan - drag (won't elaborate), also plays the guitar (knows at least 3 chords) and sings (badly, but he does it goofy so it works), actually a pretty good dancer, happy homemaker and can cook a whole barbeque pig for his friends

anzu - dance, obvs, she wants to train to be a dancer and is going to school for it, but i think she's also got an eye for fashion and can size anyone up just by looking at them, she's great at makeup and it's makeover city for everyone

ryou - loves making models and painting things, i think likes three dimensional art a lot and probably also sculpts, i could see them getting into metal engraving too, though that might be low key triggering

duke - what can't duke do? they're not a great singer but can do a metal or rock voice really well, loves coming up with concepts for games and collaborating with the artist, loves makeup, probably also modifies their clothes (they're an original), also a drag artist in my head

serenity - i usually picture serenity as a writer, most of the time i give her an academic career so it's probably a lot of academic writing but i think she could get into it in other ways, terrible cook, burns microwave mac n cheese

seto - terrible artist, like can't draw a stick figure bad, but obv he's an amazing coder and i think he would be on neocities making his bewd shrine page, also an eye for fashion and loves being ostentatious with it, i flip flop on whether he can cook or not depending on the au and what i want him to do but i think baking in particular would appeal to him

mai - fashion, makeup, hair, obv, look at her, and i think she's been sewing her own clothes since she skipped out on her parents, her creativity is more sneaky since she's head to be creative a lot in her life, and you'd be amazed at what she can do.... but can't cook worth a damn

isis - not a lot to do in a tomb under the ground for most of your life but i really see her into needlework, embroideries, probably spends a lot of time doing anthropological research into traditional fiber thread art

zigfried - theater, opera, musicals (cannot act, or sing, or sew)

#ygo #headcanons #add your own

[faultychips]

It Begins (Again)!! Switching it up with Picross and Pokémon

Hello and welcome to the new format I'll be using to review game content!! (Those who know me outside of Tumblr know I have a personal site on Neocities where I’ve been posting mini game reviews for a while now. Thankfully this new format lets me start cross-posting to Tumblr, in addition to my own site!) While the old format was fun, it felt a little too restrictive. I want to be able to just talk about video games without putting them into categories; plus I realized it was kind of silly to have categories labeling games as "bad" or whatnot. I've decided that if I simply don't like a game, I just won't talk about it here. But almost every game has something I *do* like in them somewhere, and as much as I'm sure to complain and criticize, I'll include games here because they're worth playing one way or another.

Starting with something I wish I had checked out sooner (and definitely a game worth playing), Picross is a pleasantly fun puzzle game that I recently picked up (I'm playing Picross S8 on the Switch, but you can play it for free on sites like http://liouh.com/picross). Each Picross title will give you a large number of nonograms to solve, which reveals a cute little pixel art image when you've completed it! It's a fairly simple concept but the puzzles in Picross S are a fun challege and there's a variety of kinds of puzzles to choose from (such as Regular, Big Picross, and Color Picross) that keeps each type feeling fresh. I haven't played a true, pure puzzle game in a while so I was expecting to be a little bored with Picross but I think the straightforwardness actually lends a lot to how enjoyable Picross is; it's easy to pick up whenever, whether for a long session of puzzle cracking or for when you need a quick 20-ish minute break. There are a lot of different Picross games, but if you'll pick up any of them, I've seen it recommended that you start from the most recent title and then work your way backwards in release order. I think I agree with that, since Picross S8 has a lot of helpful tutorials and general gameplay polish that I really enjoyed having, and which might not be available in earlier games.

...And also, speaking of complaining, I finished the new Pokémon Violet game that came out last month. I'm in a place where I've decided I'm not going to be buying Pokémon games anymore because their release schedule and quality drops have really started to grind on me, but thankfully I have found ways to play Violet without...spending 60 dollars...so I did that. Without that price tag I was technically able to play the game without the pressure of large personal investment, but that didn't stop the cracks from showing on this one. Honestly it's a perfectly fine game; I had plenty of fun with it, and would end each session excited to get back to playing later. I sunk a good 30+ hours into this thing, so there's definitely something there. Any way you go about it, Pokémon has always had a pretty solid and enjoyable gameplay formula, and despite the new open world feature that element is still very much intact here. However, as much as I enjoyed it, I feel a fair amount of my enjoyment was centered on the story, my favorite parts being the animated cutscenes, which look genuinely amazing. In contrast, when I had to do Pokémon battles inbetween this unraveling story, I found myself getting increasingly irritated, as it started to feel like unengaging and unnecessary padding. The ending of the whole thing is brilliant, and generally feels worth the time I spend getting there, but I can't help but wonder if I could have gotten the same amount of enjoyment out of watching someone else play, or better yet, a highlight reel that cuts out all the slog and boring bits (which there is plenty of). I definitely did not run through all the content and side-quests, but after the credits rolled, any urge I had to ever pick it up again just kind of evaporated. If I ever do, it will probably be when the DLC is released, which I will maybe play, and either way gleefully not pay for.

Aaaand that about wraps it up for my games played over the last few weeks! Not much to talk about for now but with school workloads I haven't had a lot of time to play or to get into new stuff. Hopefully during the next few weeks I can get to some indies I've had my eyes on for a while.... >:-]!

AND LASTLY, THE GAMES:

Picross S8 is available for $9.99 on: Nintendo Switch

Pokémon Violet is available for $59.99 on: Nintendo Switch

or...cough...romslab...dotcom...or somethin...cough...

Thanks for reading!! And see you next week!

#game review #faultychipsgamereviews #hello and hi....hi and hello <3

[peridyke]

Can you give more details about your lapis comic? Like what time is it set in or is it an au or a rewrite? I'm sory I'm just curios 😔 it's really fun seeing your occasional posts about it

omg yes ofc thank u so much for asking 🥺🥺🥺 YEAH so its basically intended to just fill in what I would consider as a missing arc for lapis, everything in it is written so that it could believably have happened in the show offscreen similar to how other series spinoff comics have done things. Its not an au and not intended to be a rewrite, I'm doing my best to just expand on her character in a way I think was implied in the show but was never fully fleshed out (imo). I have a prologue that takes place right before Super Watermelon Island, then parts 1 thru 4 take place between seasons 3 and 5 and I have an epilogue that takes place a month after Change Your Mind. Hopefully the end result fits decently within the narrative of the show without too much suspending of disbelief necessary. Also gonna fill in missing development with her and Peridot obviously.

I'm writing it with the intention of it being a psychological horror while not being jarring different toneally from the show aha. I've actually been going out of my way to watch and read more surreal and psych horror based media to try and get more creative with it, its been a good way to get myself to finally pick things up that I've been putting off looking into! The horror elements are definitely secondary to keeping things feeling natural within the universe and I'm not introducing anything that would feel absurdly out of place (at least I hope not!) I would say the peaks are maybe equivalent in tone to Keeping It Together with maybe sometimes veering a little darker but nothing crazy.

ANYWAYS I'm hoping that I'm not overwhelming myself haha, I'm being really careful about how much I'm public about before I at the very least have everything completely scripted because I know from personal experience that jumping the gun on starting huge comic projects before you're prepared can quickly lead to a ton of stress and burnout. The comic has a title and each part has a thematic name but I'm gonna wait until everything is more solid before I actually say what it's called lol, its just another way to keep some pressure off myself until I feel like I'm ready. I am working on making a set of pages for a scene that I really wanted to see visualized so I can feel out the style and look that I'm going for and once I'm done I'm gonna post em here! I'm probably gonna release it one part at a time but I'm gonna wait until I at the very least have everything sketched before I go that far, once I'm ready I'm gonna make a little neocities website to host all the pages on ^__^

Ok sorry this is kinda going on for a long time, I wanted to be a little more specific but there's like a lot I wanted to cover LOL I really the commentary and interactions people have with my art esp anything having to do with this project 🥺 staying motivated with big projects can be really tough especially with things like comics and I don't wanna expect too much out of myself but people interacting with my art on here has really put me in good spirits about creation and I'm really excited to share everything one day <3 if anyone ever has any other questions abt it u r very encouraged to ask i love to talk about my projects

#askz #txt #thank u sm for asking <3

[eyeballtank]

Main links post (WIP)

Will edit it later.

NewGrounds: https://eyeballtank.newgrounds.com/ Itch io: https://eyeballtank.itch.io/ Pixiv: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/77420289 Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_X_mTUAr3SPIC3To-lwA_w/videos Tellonym: https://tellonym.me/eyeballtank Retrospring: https://retrospring.net/eyeballtank Codepen: https://codepen.io/EyeBallTank/projects/ Discord: EyeBallTank#5681 GitHub: https://github.com/EyeBallTank Neocities: https://eyeballtank.neocities.org/

TAGS:

Essential: Important stuff https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/essential

OC: https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/oc

Art: https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/art

Gamedev: https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/gamedev

Update:

Reblogs of other people's works and interesting stuff: https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/reblog

Rants, opinions, random talk etc: https://eyeballtank.tumblr.com/tagged/blog and this shit https://rentry.co/4i85w

And also this https://rentry.co/icvzk

Third: https://rentry.co/pbnbk

ABOUT RANTS:

Because i used to have a different handle and posted some opinions or “hot takes”, i thought of reposting some stuff on this blog.

But only so i don’t have to say them again and if someone asks, they could just look back into old posts so i don’t have to repeat stuff.

Whether i change my mind on certain topics, if i’m wrong/hypocritical/lacking/etc about them or even if they affect my works may be irrelevant.

Because i’ve been thinking of putting them in a specific corner for anyone that dare to look into stuff, while also not being annoying over it.

Because i want to primarly focus on actually making stuff that some people will like and don’t want to get into stupid fights or cause controversies that don’t need to happen.

(Or at least waste my time on better stuff like practice or having fun).

One thing is seperating art from the artist, another is seperating parts of an artist because humans are supposed to be complex creature.

Besides, even if some opinions of mine aren’t agreeable, they’re not horrible fucked up shit either.

And even if someone likes what i have to say or agrees with it, i still want to put my time on better stuff (Without having to regret opinions that aren't even bad to begin with).

And this sounds cliche but i really hope i don't get "cancelled" over shit i said because none of this is a crime or even horribly offensive.

At worst, it's me revealing that i may have been "too online" at some points but i drew a line at least and want to keep my word.

Also, i'm autistic and ESL, so i may have flaws with how i articulate myself; So take what i say with a grain of salt.

I also spent a good while on some topics because of self reflection or at least trying to see other prespectives and the "logistics/anatomy" of discussion.

I can also see someone go "i see where you're getting at but" and expand on the shit i way, because i know someone will say some stuff better but i also don't trust Youtube commentary guys.

At least i don't mind if an opinion is "stolen" because you know... i have ACTUAL content to make.

AND ALSO: If i do say something from this long post and outside of it (Like in a Tumblr or Newgrounds post), it might be about a topic like certain art styles or media, not drama or politics related shit that's contained in that link to begin with.

#essential

[eltube]

dream a little dream of me (oneshot)

Remember how I said the fics were reaching critical mass…I finally finished one…incredible

I refuse to host my KND fics on ao3, because it is frankly a triggering experience to look for content there and I’m not going to put anyone through that. In the future I’d like to make a neocities homepage where I can put everything but it will probably be a while—in the meantime i give u all this.

This fic is: 1/Lizzie, adult timeline, GKND-adjacent. It is tangled up in my web of headcanons and theories so here is some background info/canon reminders:

Nigel and Lizzie are married and in their 30s here; in my adult timeline, Nigel went to prison at 19 for blowing up one of Father’s factories and meets/gets together with Lizzie again when he’s released

The GKND used chester’s happy headband in operation WHITEHOUSE to control Nigel’s dreams, but it isn’t clear how the technology works; I expand on this with a headcanon that the GKND enters Nigel’s dreams regularly and remotely; Nigel’s PTSD means that he is in general just used to having very intense dreams

Lizzie went AWOL from the GKND around the time of operation GIRLFRIEND and, in my adult/non-GKND timeline, successfully got the GKND to leave Earth and abandon their plans to recruit Nigel. She did this all behind the scenes; she lives as a human woman and has disavowed her former life, telling no one and wanting to keep it this way.

The rest I hope I have left up to you to read between the lines! There is discussion of PTSD but no other content warnings. 

I love these two so much xoxo love is real etc. please enjoy

——————————

The chapters of Nigel’s life were, in a way, defined by his nightmares. They were familiar, closer to companions than adversaries, like black dogs that followed him but bit his hand. Though he grew and changed, they barely did—at least the themes were always the same.

It seemed ironic to him that, now that he was free and married and bewilderingly at peace, Nigel talked more about his dreams then than he ever had in the chaos of the past. He felt each time less guilty about the gruesome details, finding he could pick and choose which parts of his life he shared. Nigel supposed he must have gotten too used to it all, though, become really desensitized, because sometimes when he told Lizzie he had a dream, the look on her face was so disturbed. It was almost like the dreams scared her.

Some, more than others, she almost wouldn’t let go of.

“How long have you had that one?” She asked, her hand on his. He had his glasses and the bedside lamp on, and her eyes bore into him with some kind of urgency. He couldn’t understand the source of it; he had barely stirred at all on waking. If she hadn’t asked, he might have gone back to sleep.

“That dream specifically?” He felt his brow knot together, thinking. “It’s a common one, I guess. Not always exactly the same. Honestly, I feel okay.”

Sometimes he called it the trial, almost affectionately, like it was a fond but stubborn friend. The dream always went the same: he would be shown to a series of tasks by some figure he had looked up to—his dad, Numbuh 274, some bizarre facsimile of James Bond—and before something bad caught up with him, he had to complete them. They usually demanded a moderate amount of physical skill, almost like his field test when he was a cadet, but harder and decidedly more urgent. Obstacles and people from his life blended into it all the time, updating it, making it more challenging.

It was also often done in zero-gravity, which was kind of weird, and a lot of the time there was this big spaceship that showed up at the end, but he had spent enough time on Moonbase that these were probably familiar images to him. Truly, compared to all his dreams, he felt it meant him little if any harm. Why would he even bring it up?

“This one isn’t even exactly a nightmare, to be honest,” he assured her further. “I’m usually more stressed than scared. Sometimes it’s even kind of fun, like I’m on a game show or something.”

His wife looked unmoved, continuing to study his face. “But answer the question,” she urged. “How long have you had variations of that dream?”

He blinked. “Does it matter?” When she kept staring, he searched his memory. “Well…I guess as long as I can remember? Maybe not as far back as…kindergarten. But I remember telling Abby about it. Maybe in second grade?”

“Before the Kids Next Door?” Lizzie interjected, squeezing his hand and bringing him out of his thoughts. She was still staring. “Did you have it at all before then?”

He paused, then slowly shook his head. “No, not before then. Well.” He tilted his head, seeing the obvious. “Before then I didn’t have nightmares at all. Lizzie, the Kids Next Door isn’t always related to—“

“But you say this isn’t a nightmare.”

He raised his hands in a kind of shrug. “I guess it’s not! Who knows. It’s a dream of…undeclared affiliation.” He smiled, trying to change Lizzie’s expression, but not succeeding. Why does it matter? “Look, it’s fine. It wakes me up a lot, that’s all. Dreams are weird.”

She turned away, running a hand over her face. Nigel puzzled further—he tried to lean in but she evaded his gaze. “What’s…wrong?” He finally asked.

“Am I ever in it?” Her voice was tentative. “The person who…gives you the test. Is it ever me?”

He considers the question, trying to understand what’s behind it. Does she feel left out? He had thought that when they married, her jealousy of the Kids Next Door—sure, warranted in the past, but no longer relevant—would finally wane, but it came back like this sometimes, with a bizarre undertone of fear. It made no sense, but he worried for nothing sometimes, too. That was something he finally understood. He should reassure her.

“Yes, you are in it,” he says truthfully, remembering, and smiles as he does. “I forgot until you said so, but it’s definitely been you a few times.” See, nothing to worry about! “Actually, I think it’s been you more often, you know, since we got married. I guess that makes sense, we just can’t stay away from each—”

A stifled sound cut him off, and his mouth fell shut. He had said the wrong thing, somehow, still. He would have to unpack all this later. His insides withered further as she turned her whole body away, smothering another a small gasp in her hands. “Are you…crying?”

“I’m sorry,” she bursts out, hiding her face, spitting the words like a confession. “I’m sorry I can’t stop them. I don’t know how they’re still doing it. They should be gone already. I don’t know how they’re still using my face.”

Something twists inside him, deeply guilty, propelling him forward to put a hand on her back. He never thought she would be one to blame herself for this, but maybe he hadn’t said enough.

“Lizzie, it’s not…” He bit the inside of his cheek, trying to remember all he had learned in the last few years, the words all the pamphlets used. “That’s not something anyone can do. There’s no need for you to stop it yourself, it’s, you know.” He waves his hand dismissively. “PTSD business. I don’t expect it to go away. Who really knows how any of this stuff works, right?”

“You don’t understand,” she replied, her arms wrapped around her like she was cold. “You can’t.” It was enough that he wondered if he was meant to hear—he risked it anyway.

“Maybe I can’t,” he admitted, gently. Their bedroom in the dim light felt like the safest place on Earth. He only wanted her to know. “I mean, we can’t understand everything about each other. I like that you…know that. But I just don’t want you to worry about me when I really am okay,” he tried.

Lizzie never pushed him when things felt too painful to say. He wouldn’t do the same to her—but whatever her anxiety was, he was sure it was unfounded. How else would he be here, in one piece, at all?

She finally turned to look at him. She looked fearful, lIke how he imagined himself in bed as a child, not knowing what the night would bring. “Will you tell me?” She asked at last. “When you have that dream again, or something like it? If it changes? Will you promise not to keep it from me?”

He flashed a slight smile. “I couldn’t keep anything from you. But what’s so…special about these ones that worry you so much? I never really get it.” He shook his head. “There are so many worse dreams.”

She avoided his eyes. “Not for me.”

It’s such a strange thing to say, and he isn’t sure how to ask, so he doesn’t. He just nods, and pulls off his glasses, putting his hand on hers like she did before and lying back. Nigel learned to comfort others by watching—from Abby, from Kuki—it never came to him naturally. He wouldn’t minimize how he admired them still, but he admitted he was biased: Lizzie was the greatest model of love he ever had.

“Well.” he mused, settled back on the pillow, strands of Lizzie’s curls in his periphery as he stared upwards. “Honestly, I have that dream often enough that I could probably go through it lucid. Is there anything you want me to say to you while I’m in there, if I see you again?”

She lay down next—stress evident in the force of it, a flash of deep orange beside him as she fixed herself on the ceiling as well. “I have some things I’d like to say to me,” she muttered, Nigel meeting her with respectful silence before she continued.

“Tell me—tell them.” There was a rustle of covers as she crossed her arms, shoulders tight with something unreadable. “Tell them that you need to be getting home when you wake up.” She gripped his hand. “But don’t tell anyone there where we live.”

“Where we live? Like, physically? Why would that—never mind.” He learned things about Lizzie every day, it seemed. People told him he was paranoid; the least he could do is be polite. “Okay. Will do…well, what about you?” He reached out beside him, hand hovering over the lamp. “Do you ever dream about me? It seems like you never talk about yours.”

“Don’t need to.” There was a smile in her voice; she closed her eyes. “I live my dreams. You’re always here.”

#knd #marty write time #this has been sitting as a draft for like a month now…be free #also the title…there are like 1000 1/lizzie fics i want to use it for so it may not be permanent LOL i listen to this song and think ab them

[aestherians]

About 2 weeks ago I wrote an essay for my (hopefully some day finished and shareable) Neocities site. While I have no idea if I’ll finish the site itself, I took another look at the essay today, and, though I might add more in the “strengthening connections” part later, the essay is pretty much done! So, here it is, the first explanation I’ve actually ever written of my bison therianthropy - I apologize in advance for the long paragraphs:

Part 1: Awakening

The bison was the first kintype I became aware of, back in spring 2016. I'd been getting phantom shifts for a few years at this point, but didn't pay them much mind. They overlapped a lot with phantom feelings that I would later find out were gnollish in nature, and this overlap ended up as something very similar to a maned wolf. Especially the combination of unguligrade front legs with paw-like hands, and of a long tufted tail with a shorter, more bushy tail. I was extremely casual at this point - I didn't even write my own stuff or read what others had written! Being not-quite-human was basically an afterthought.

So, like I said: Spring 2016. One second I was following along in my math class (well, I like to remember it that way, at least), and the next it was like I'd been transported into the body of a bison. I pictured myself wading through soft, green grass, feeling my heavy hooves and broad back working, smelling the summer air. And just like that I was back in my classroom. Crazy what the mind can do - I imagine it's the closest I've been to astral traveling. The 'vision' was so overwhelming I had to excuse myself, go into the hallway, and just breathe for a minute.

I instantly connected the dots between that experience and my previous phantom shifts. For the next weeks I pushed aside all experiences that weren't quite bison in nature, and just examined the recognizably bovine feelings. The questioning process took about 2 months until I was confident enough to say I was a bison therian. Then I promptly made a therian-focused aesthetic blog on tumblr :p

Since then I've had a few other 'visions' and I've had time to examine my bison feelings a lot more. I've come to the conclusion that the original experiences were spiritual in nature (partial rebirth, my soul includes 'bison Dust'), and that they turned into an integral part of me through psychological reinforcement.

Part 2: Being Bison

By ruminating (ha!) on my shifts, visions/memories, and other noemata I've come to a few conclusions: The specific bison that my soul comes from was an American bison (Bison bison) 'spike bull', which is a bull whose horns haven't started curving inwards yet - this means the bull is somewhere between 1 and 4 years old. The bison, at some point, was in a herd that included cow-calf pairs, and it felt protective towards these herd members, but through most of its life it roamed with a band of bachelor herd. I don't remember ever breeding or fighting for a harem or anything of that sort (except trying to mount other young bulls), so I assumed the bison died before it could get the chance. I don't have any memories related to death, but due to the environments I remember, I'm pretty sure the bison was in a managed herd, or maybe even a beef herd.

What all these vague memories and conclusions mean for my current self is that I identify partially as a bison bull on a spiritual and psychological level. This also affects my gender identity somewhat. My gender is fluid, but it's usually somewhere along the lines of 'gnoll female' - which is really more like a human man than a human woman. But there are also hints of bovine in my gender. I'm not gonna lie: I wish I had the kind of equipment bulls have haha... But it does goes deeper than just physical body. I feel somewhat like a bachelor bull - an outcast who hangs out with other outcasts and plays at one day winning the respect of those who cast him out. Desiring females carnally (I don't think I could make that sound more like the statement of an incel if I tried lmao). The whole vibe of being a young and virile animal. My gender isn't so much 'bison bull' as it has hints of bullishness.

The bisonness doesn't just inform my gender identity, of course; it is primarily a species identity. Don't misunderstand that though - it's not my primary species identity! That would be gnoll. What I mean is that my bison side mainly presents itself in a way that affects my overall species identity. My bison identity is directly tied to my body image and the way I think of myself, reflect on my behavior, and conceptualize my thoughts. At the most basic level, I deeply wish I could shapeshift, and just choose when to be a bison and when to be a human (or gnoll or other!). It's a much stronger feeling than just "hey, shapeshifting would be cool!" The cool-factor is how I feel about, say, werewolves. It would be cool to be a werewolf. But my desire to shift into a bison is much more of a yearning. It feels like it's the right shape (this hole was made for me!), though I'm definitely not blind to how impractical it would be. I appreciate my thumbs and brain and modern medicine!

When I try to imagine myself in 'my mind's eye,' so to speak, I picture myself with a lot of bison attributes. Most notably the horns, but also the cape/chaps/beard, the sloped/humped back, the tail, and sometimes the hooves. The fact that I don't have any of these traits is anywhere from an afterthought to deeply distressing, depending on the day. Whenever I get phantom shifts, it's also these traits I feel. I can trigger the phantom shifts easily enough, but since they're distracting I rarely do so. More often than not, they just show up on their own.

I rarely get strong mental shifts. The few I've had were disorienting and not very fun, so I usually try to suppress them when they do show up. Weaker m-shifts are a common occurrence, though, often spurred on by feelings of frustration. When I'm in a mental shift my personality becomes more ''stereotypically bison-like'. I get bullheaded (pun partially intended), more physically than verbally aggressive, and my temper becomes more volatile. I perceive a lot of things as potential threats and become more defensive in that state - often those feelings are accompanied by mental images of goring said threats with my horns and urges to attack. Little of it shows outwardly; I just seem more sullen and like I want to be alone.

Shifting is a noteworthy part of my bison identity, but as a whole it's a lot more about all the little day-to-day experiences. Mostly the physical ones of missing horns, and the social ones of not being treated like a bison-person or of not having the same social role as a spike bull would have in his herd.

Part 3: Strengthening Connections

There's no shame in being a bit proactive about your identity. I think the therian community has this idea that you shouldn't have a hand in creating your species identity, and I strongly disagree. While I didn't create the original bison-like feelings, I've been reinforcing the ideas a lot since they appeared. Every little trait that could be connected to my bisonhood, I take to be connected to my bisonhood, whether as a cause or result of it.

I've always had these conflicting traits of being stubborn as heck and fairly conflict-avoidant (and of wishing I could resort to physical violence rather than talk when a conflict shows up). These traits could obviously show up in any human, so I don't consider them "inherently bison-like" in any way. And yet they're the same traits a 1000kg horned prey animal would have. If a threat gets too close to a bison, the bison will stubbornly stand its ground and attack - if the attack doesn't work, only then does the bison flee. These traits, while not directly connected to it, help reinforce my bison identity.

My friends also help. They'll buy me bison-themed gifts (one gave me a pendant that I wear every day) and they'll jokingly refer to me as a bison. Once when we were at a safari park they stopped the car near the bison herd and just let me watch for as long as I wanted. I'm lucky that I get to be so open about this side of myself.

#otherkin #therian #therianthrope #therianthropy #about me

[natural-namjoon]

Touch me, Tease me, Feel me up

18+ Lucas smut

You had no idea what you were doing here but holy shit you were having so much fun, it was probably 1 in the morning and you were being led by your friends through the crowded streets of São Paulo, you and a couple friends had pooled some savings and booked a spur of the moment vacation in brazil, one of the hottest locations in the world for partying and clubbing. Currently you guys had been club hopping, checking out the diffrent vibes of each one and none of them had spoken to you, they had either a boring crowd or older people.

After a bit of walking around, you all had come accross a brightly lit, building that was painted red, the color of sin, and a large sparkling sign on top of the building read NeoCity. The music coming from inside was pretty good and the men and women walking in were very, very hot. You shared a look with all your friends and then as a unit started heading to the long line.

You guys stood in the line for what felt like forever and slowly the line shortened but as the people were let in it was cut off right before you and your friends were able to get in. Groans of disaproval came from not only your group but the many people behind you. Again you had to wait. After a bit the front door opened and a man came out, he stopped at the front and observed the long line waiting to enter the night club. He turned to talk to the bouncer and before he walked back in he turned as he noticed you and your friends. He stopped and you got a good look at him. Right off the bat you noticed how tall he was, he was huge, and even under his prestine blazer you could tell his arms big and long. He was handsome too, beautiful square jaw and full lips, his eyes were sharp and intense and you felt so exposed as he raked them over your body, clearly checking you out and your friends as well. After a bit he smiled and walked over.

"Well hello ladies, how are we doing tonight?" He asked you guy and you all just nodded and said you were good, just waiting to get in.

"Well I noticed the wait is probably going to be pretty long and I would hate for a gorgeous bunch of girls such as yourselves to wait out here, were its noisy and crowded. Why don't you follow me through our V.I.P. doors? My associates and I will take great care of you" he explained as he unhooked the rope divider and gesturing to the set of double door that was adjacent to the main entrance. You and your friends looked at eachother in disbelief and excitement at his words, but just being cautious you turned and asked him "Thats so nice of you but who exactly are you and your associates?" You asked,

he smirked and leaned down like he was going to whisper in your ear

"We happen to be the owners of this night club." And with that he winked at you and gestured again for you and your friends to follow him, you all just excitedly and nervously followed him through the secluded set of double doors into the loud sexy abyss that was Neo City.

Once inside the tall man turned to you and again gave you that look like he was devouring you with his eyes,

"You can call me Johnny, by the way" he leaned down so you could hear him over the music, he must be American, you thought to yourself. His english was perfect and he didnt have any kind of accent he also didn't really look Brazilian.

" Oh, im Y/N" you introduced yourself and he smirked again and this time he leaned down so close you could feel his breath on your earlobe. It sent a wave of shivers down your body.

"That's a beautiful name." He said then without another word gestured for you to follow him. He led you and your friends up some stairs and onto a sort of open bacony that over looked the rest of the night club, there was couches and table and a few spots on the floor with pillows and stands for drinks. There were a few people ther already, some couples and girls and guys just mingling, all of them though, were extremely attractive.

Johnny had told you and your friends to make yourselves comfortable and he was going to be right back.

You and your friends found a couch with a table close to the railing of the balcony so that you could watch all the people dance. A waiter came by and took your drink orders and promptly returned so you guys could start drinking. You guys started with a round of tequila shots with a salt and lime chaser, after that you got your drink which was a sex on the beach, strong but oh so sweet.

After a bit you looked over and saw that Johnny had retuned but he had 3 other men with him and it looked like they all walked off the page of a Calvin Klein ad as they approached. Johnny walked over and gestured to the men with him,

"Hello ladies I just wanted to introduce you to a couple of my associates, this is Jaehyun," he gestured to a brown haired, gorgeous man who smiled showing a prefect set of dimples

"Hello, Im Jaehyun and I'm so pleased to meet you all," he said in a smooth deep voice

"And this is Ten" Johnny gestured to a smaller man next to him, he had midnight black hair, though he wasnt as tall or built like the other 3 he made up for it in beauty and style. He bowed slightly and greeted you and your friends

"Call me Ten, Johnny wasn't lying when he said you all were a lovely group of gorgeous women" he smiled as you all felt yourselves blush, and lastly Johnny introduced the 3rd man who he claimed was named Lucas and holy shit was this guy hot, like scortching hot. Johnny and the other two were hot but the way Lucas had been staring at you since they walked in had you feeling like your skin was going to melt. Lucas didn't say anything but instead he nodded cooly. After introductions Johnny, Jaehyun and Ten sat on the couch across from your guy's and started chatting with you and your friends.

You tried to focus on what was being said in the conversation but you couldn't quite keep your thoughts straight as Lucas had decided to take a seat on the couch armrest right next to you.

You snuck a glance up at him and he sat there perched like a god, seemingly focused on the coversation but all you could feel was the heat from his large body and smell the sweet yet deep scent of his cologne. You didnt know if you felt dizzy from the alcohol or from your arousal, all you could do was sit and sip your second drink and try to stay upright. Vaguely you heard the guys talk about how they and 17 other men from all over the world owned a share of the club and as a whole they brought the nightclub together and made it what it was. You thought about how that was so many guys and you also vaguely wondered if they were all also as attractive as the 4 in front of you right now and if so when was the next orgy?

A soft touch on your upper arm startled you out if your dirty thoughts, it was lucas gently caressing your arm, he gave a crooked smile at your reaction and his right eyebrow arched a bit, you wondered if he could see down your shirt from his angle.

"I'm Lucas, what is your name? " his voice was deep and smooth, he had a heavy accent to his words unlike Johnny and Jaehyun, Ten had an accent but it wasnt like Lucas's.

"My name is y/n" was all you could breath out.

"Y/n," he repeated, the sound of your name with his accent was so sexy you suddenly had a new appreciation for your own name. He said something else after but it wasnt English, it sounded like Chinese? You cursed yourself for wasting your high school career learning spanish when you could have taken Chinese instead.

Before you could respond you heard one of your favorite songs come on and you jumped up to go look at the dance floor as it was flooded with beautiful bodies. You ran over and watched the people dance, girating and moving along with the heavy bass and addicting rhythm, they were all sweaty and disheveled but they all looked so damn hot.

Finishing up your third drink you felt the warmth of the alcohol spread through your body and the thundering of the heavy base echoed in your pulse and soon you were standing there holding on to the railing, hips swaying to the song, all the sudden you felt a big pair of hands gently grab your hips and from behind, Lucas leaned down to your ear,

"Would you like to dance?" He asked and you turned and nodded exitedly he smiled and lead you down the set of stairs onto the crowded dancefloor. Immediately you let the music take you. Your body was not your own as the mix of drinks and music had you moving your body and without thinking found yourself grinding back onto Lucas's big firm body. Not feeling shy himself, he let his hands run along your body feeling all your curves and lines. It was heavenly. You turned to face him and again was floored by how gorgeous he was, he never took his eyes off of you as you both danced. His eyes were hypnotic, beautiful brown and intense, framed by long lashes, the look in them was primal, like he was ready to devour you at any second and honestly you would have let him. As the song progressed you felt yourself start to get more and more wound up, the feeling of Lucas's soft warm lips on your ear and neck definitely didnt help. Feeling bold you snaked your hand down to his crotch and found a semi-hard suprise in his trousers, you heard his breathy gasp as you gave a little squeeze, he pulled back slightly to meet your eyes and you could tell by the look on his face that it was on.

He leaned down again and with a smooth sexy voice he said something to you in Chinese.  You could see his lovely lips moving but you had no clue what he was saying, but based on the aroused look on his face and the questioning arch of his eyebrow you felt like you knew what he was asking. After a beat you nodded and he smirked, turning he grabbed your hand and led you to diffrent set of stairs towards the back of the club. It led up to a grand set if double doors, after he pulled out a heavy key ring full of keys, he unlocked it and led youbdown a long hallway and eventually into a room that looked like a luxury hotel room. There was a large comfy looking bed, a TV some dressers and an adjoining bathroom. The sound proofing must have been magical because you couldnt hear a sound from outside, had you not known any better you never would have thought you were in a nightclub at that moment. The only sound you hear in the room was the thundering of your hearbeat and the sound of Lucas taking his black blazer off.

You turned around and met his gaze, you felt your breath hitch and your core throb in inticipation as he walked towards you. Slowly, he reached up and caressed your cheek then running his thumb over your bottom lip, he spoke to you again in his language and you just loved the way he was talking to you, you may not of understood him but it was beautiful when he spoke. In response you reached up and planted your lips on his. The kiss quickly went from sweet to needy and his soft lips became more desprate and intense. Feeling brave and not breaking your make out session, you reached up and started to unbutton his shirt, wanting to feel more of him but out of impatience he reached down and just tore the whole damn shirt open, you could hear buttons scatter and bounce all over the floor, you gasped suprised but he just let out the sexiest chuckle then pulled you back in for a kiss this time letting his toungue explore more.

Your ran you hands along his torso and chest, it turned you on how solid he was, clearly he worked out and the feeling if his tight abs and pecs was so nice. Taking some time himself to explore your body you felt him reach down and slowly lift your skirt and with both hands he grabbed your ass, both cheeks fitting prefectly in his big hands, you felt a smile on his lips and he lifted you and walked you over to the bed. Based on the hardness in his pants and the uregency in his kisses you knew he needed you right away but the way he layed you on the bed and gently went to undo the lace of your top, so calm and caring, it drove you crazy.

After removing your top he slid your skirt and underwear off leaving you fully exposed for him and after a bit of marveling at your nude body he leand down and started tasting every inch of you, he started kissing and licking little bits of your neck then making his way to your sensitive breasts, the way his mouth licked and nipped and bit was turning you into a pathetic mewling mess. You were almost begging him for his cock, you wrapped your legs around his waist as he layed on you and proceeded to grind your core against his clothed member. The friction provided some relief but you were still desperate. He groned into your chest and then brought his lips to yours,

"Be patient." He whispered against your lips all you could do was whine in response.

Again be brought his lips down and started teasing the skin on your torso, me moved painfully slow all the way to your navel, you knew where he was headed next and your chest rose and fell fast as you waited patiently, he looked up at you and the sight of you looking down at him deperate and needy made him smile, you wanted to smack him for his cockiness but you needed him to go further so you shimmied your hips under him hoping he would get the hint, but still he stayed watching your reactions, eyebrow arched.

"Lucas," you whined and then without warning his head dipped down and you felt his toungue dive deep in your folds

"Oh FUCK!" your cried both in suprise and at the sudden stimulation to your most sensitive parts.

He was showing no mercy at your sensitive clit, he was eating you out like he was starved, you could feel his tounge brutally attacking your clit, you had to grab on to his soft brown hair for dear life as you screamed his name. After a bit you felt him use his fingers to tease your entrance and you just knew if he used his long fingers you would be completely unraveled. He teased your entrance for a bit with one finger before he again looked up at you making full eye contact as he alowly inserted it all the way. Again he had you throwing all the curse words ever created. His fingers where so big and long you couldnt even imaginge how his cock was. Without warning he added a second finger and proceeded to stretch you out as he pumped his fingers in and out of you while not letting up on his assult on your clit

'this dude is relentless' you thought as you felt your mind melt at the intense pleasure you were feeling.

Faster than you anticipated you felt the pressure build in your stomach and you started to shake, and your felt yourself trying to escape his hold but his hands held your hips down firm and you weren't able to escape as you approached your climax. Without slowing down at all Lucas pushed you over the edge and you came on his toungue and fingers all while screaming his name.

You layed there there trying to catch your breath as Lucas got up and removed his pants and boxers, you loked up and you couldnt help but gasp at how he looked standing there compleatly nude, body sculpeted and lean, arms big and stong and when you looked down and saw your assumtions were right, his dick was long, reaching to his navel as it stood hard and ready, you suddenly forgot that you had just came once and already you craved more of this man who was sex incarnate.

He climed back on the bed and crashed his lips and to yours, you could taste yourself on his lips as his skillfull toungue mingled with yours.

He reached down in between your legs tangled with his and lined his memeber up with your entrance he gazed into your eyes and watched your face contort with pleasure as he pushed himself into you. You swore you could see stars he was so big, he streached you out more than you have ever been before. He grunted and his breath became shaky as he slowly bottomed out in you. He stayed still letting you adjust but you were beyond patience,

" Lucas please, fuck me" you moaned reaching up to grasp his wide shoulders. He moaned in response and then started moving. You could feel every movement as his big manhood stretched and stroked your walls in all the right spots, he filled you so well and for a moment you forgot your own name. His grunts and deep groans were music to your ears as he picked up the pace, pounding deep into you.

Suddenly he pulled out of you and you gasped at the empty feeling he left behind. he leaned back on his knees then pulled you up onto his lap, you straddled his hips as he entered you again and he bucked his hips up, you let out a scream in suprise and pleasure as he was able to reach even deeper from the new position, once he got situated he proceeded to fuck up into you while all you could do was wrap your arms around his neck and hold on for dear life, again for the third time that night this man had your brain melting and you seeing stars and the moon and the whole damn galaxy. All you could do was scream his name over and over, again you felt the coil in your belly as he contiued his animalistic pace. His moans became more frequent which let you know he was close as well. He reached in between you and with his thumb toyed with your clit pushing you faster to your finish, with one last scream of his name you came on his dick but he didnt let up on his pace letting you ride your high for a little longer while he tried to chase his. You decided to help him out and quickly you stopped him and climbed off his lap, laying on your stomach in front of him, taking as much of his cock in your mouth as you could and started to show him how you were also skilled with your tongue.

As you bobbed your head on his length you used your toungue to move and swipe quickly inder the head. He groaned loudly at the new feeling around his cock and he dug his hand in your hair as his climax approached. Finally, throwing his head back with a guttural cry, he came hard. Thick ropes hit your throught as you tried your hardest to swallow it all.

When he came down from his high you took your mouth off his member with a small pop and he looked down and smiled at you. You got up and layed,back down, on the bed. He crawled over to you and took you into his arms and captured your lips with his in a sweet slow kiss. You let yourself relax in his embrace and part of you felt like you should say something but on the other hand you felt content just laying there cuddling in silence. You felt yourself starting to doze off since you were exhausted and Lucas was big and warm wrapped around you, you were pretty relaxed when you felt something on your nipple you looked down and Lucas was brushing his fingers over your breasts groping them slowly, you looked up at him questioningly and he gave you the biggest smile, he almost looked like a silly kid in that moment. All he said was,

"Again?"

Oh lord help you.

#superm lucas #lucas nct #lucas smut #nct smut #wayv smut #not enough nct smut in this world #smutshot #smut #nct127 smut #natural-namjoon works

[lideria]

Lost in Yesterday. | Jeno | Backstory.

➥ pairing(s): jeno x gender-neutral!reader, kind of haechan x gender-neutral!reader

➥ genre: lots of angst, also fluff, somewhat suggestive, royal!au, rivalkingdoms!au, loverstoenemies!au

➥ warnings: swear words, mentions of suggestive themes, themes and mentions of war, themes of heartbreak, themes and mentions of family distress/unhealthy relationship, themes of manipulation, themes of psychological abuse, themes of confusion, drinking, mentions of injuries, mentions of gun use, mentions of disassociation. english is my second language so there might be errors.

➥ word count: 25.6k

➥ summary: the firsts and lasts of a forbidden relationship between two heirs.

➥ songs that have inspired this piece/i recommend readers to listen: lost in yesterday - tame impala, low - lenny kravitz, strangers in the night - frank sinatra, six days - dj shadow, next to me - imagine dragons, don’t you cry for me - cobi, to be alone - hozier, c’mon - panic! at the disco ft. fun, morph - twenty one pilots, moon river - frank ocean, sinking man - of monsters and men

➥ author’s note: THIS IS A REPOST, because tumblr’s algorithm did me dirty and took this off the tags. i dearly hope this does not flop heheh please like/reblog if you enjoy this! because i just about lost my mind while writing! also, a big thank you to my beta readers @shimmershimmernct and @neocity-sarai, you guys are awesome!

➥ sequels: reader’s pov // jeno’s pov

i hope everyone enjoys this, have a great morning/day/evening/night!

The Last Ball

The orchestra remains playing songs in the background even after all the past hours they have done so. Hallways are empty and partially dark if it was not for the moonlight. Most of the staff is occupied with serving the hundreds of guests in the middle wing of the palace— working in the kitchen, in the ballroom and outside stood the guards. The left wing of the palace, the one that is supposedly closed to the guests for the night, is only alive because of the two people running through its moonlit halls.

Jeno is holding your hand as he leads the way, excited giggles making their way out without much effort to stop them. The both of you run up the last set of grand stairs and Jeno runs to the end of the wide corridor. He pushes the doors of the library open rather harshly, making you both stumble your way in. His hands wrap around your waist as he pushes you to the nearest set of shelves. It does not take much time for your lips to meet.

The prince, dressed in a pure, blinding white suit with his jet black hair takes your breath away in the best way possible. He pecks you on the lips so many times it makes you dizzy, steadying you with his hands placed delicately on either sides of your jaw as lingers out some of the pecks into longer lasting, tender kisses.

As always it feels rushed and desperate. Yet so, so precious.

It does not feel like you had enough of him when he places his forehead on yours, looking into your eyes while his thumbs caress your jaw. You can hardly see him in the dark, save for his eyes that are sparkling with the weak and pretty rays of moonlight hitting them. He audibly gulps.

“One more,” Jeno whispers before kissing you again. You feel so lost in him that you have to steady yourself to know you still have the strength to stay on your feet. Your hands that had been resting against his chest come up to pull him closer to you, now stationed at his nape. His teeth ever so slightly graze down on your bottom lip, eliciting a breathy hum from both of you at the tension that seems to radiate from where your lips meet— and it clicks in him. That this is not the time or the place.

When he pulls away he takes a couple steps back, and then he smiles. Moonlight barely hits him but your eyes are, at this point, somewhat adjusted to the dark from running through dark halls and semi making out in the dark library. Both of you know why he stops and pulls away too soon before it can go any further. He cannot even kiss you for as long or as hard as him and you would like to, because people would notice from your appearances and the duration of your absence. And gossip was a deadly thing within the royal class.

It was okay. As long as you could escape with him for some time, it would be okay. You two were too used to it at this point.

“You look blinding tonight, your Majesty,” He teases, his eyes curved into the crescents they are. The nickname hitches your heart instantly, triggering all the dreams you know could not come to be. All you can do is press them down in your heart until they become so compact that you feel back in control. Him being there right beside you does not help with the situation in your heart, but the least you can do is to touch him in some way because you missed him.

Hell, you missed him even when he was right there, stood before your eyes.

So you opt to run a careful hand through his soft and silky hair, tidying the mess it had come while running. Realization hits you suddenly then, and your heart picks up again though of causes less pleasurable. “Is Jaemin out? We left so quickly.”

Jeno leaving without his guard would surely create chaos. With the tension the regional monarchies and the state kingdoms were in, and the unspoken arguments and arrogance hanging in the air, any heir even daring to breathe without their personal guards would mean letting them out into the wild with all the dangers and possibilities awaiting. Alone.

And that is a risk none of the kingdoms are willing to take.

The Prince’s eyes flutter a bit, but he sounds somewhat confident. “I was making hand gestures all the time, there’s no way he didn’t pick them up.”

As if on cue, there are loud knocks at the door when you nod. Both of your heads snap at the source of the noise— the doors are then opened even harsher than how Jeno had done some moments ago, and two figures rush in, clearly out of breath.

For a second you dare to think that you have another forbidden couple in the library, but the voice that speaks debunks your theory. “They’re here,” Jaemin breathes out in what could best be called relief. He kneels to his knees and takes a few moments to gulp and recollect himself. His silence is instantly filled, however, with another voice you know all too well.

“Excuse me for dropping the honorifics but for the sake of my poor mother stop doing this to us,” Donghyuck, your guard, complains. Jaemin lets out a laugh and nods appreciatively at his words. The guard carries on with his complaint but not without sucking in a big breath first. “At least inform us of where you’re going so we don’t have to lie through our teeth to the kings and queens while also worrying about your safety. A generation earlier and we would be beheaded if they found out what we’re doing.” Donghyuck kneels to grab at his legs as well, looking at the ground. Jaemin pats his back once in support. “The things I do for this relationship. Really, I would’ve gotten married already if I paid this much attention to my own relationships. I don’t know about Jaemin.”

The guard beside him chuckles. “You and me both at that one.”

Both Jeno and you laugh at their words, too stunned to move from your place. You both give your guards a good few seconds to catch their breaths but Jeno moves towards his guard and best friend before you can even move, waiting for him to groom his outfit and straighten up first. “Did anybody see you?”

The cautious words leaving Jeno catches Jaemin off guard, but he still answers the question rather quickly. “We kept some distance between us until we were out of the middle wing. No one was around after that as far as I could tell.” Upon his words he pats Jaemin on the shoulder as if to say good job, and he mumbles his thanks to both of the guards in gratitude— even though the two of you did not necessarily need them to find you, as in them walking in on you.

Jeno turns to you when Jaemin is done, a warm smile on his face again, probably sharing the same feelings but also knowing the consequences of not being down at the hall for longer than expected. “I will see you in the ballroom, my love.” Affection beams from his words and it makes you incredibly happy, even though you have heard the nickname countless times before.

“Hurry up already, I can hear your father scolding you.” He chuckles a breath and nods at Donghyuck, giving him his recognition and respect, before making his way out of the door with Jaemin trailing next to him.

You sigh when the door closes behind him and his company, knowing this would be the only time you could get to yourselves with him tonight. Just like that, the prince was gone.

Relationships between royals were heavily looked down upon unless they were arranged marriages, because they could bring unexpected feuds, wars, or peace. No royals wanted their love life to affect their politics unless they could impose full control over them. Considering the state the nations are in— with all kinds of political feuds and tight anger in between that waited patiently until it was the time to blow up— your relationship between two heirs of monarchies that have never necessarily gotten along feels all the more forbidden. Even after three years of being steady and having things under control.

Loving him would not be this difficult if it was your ideal world.

“Your Highness,” Donghyuck starts, looking at you with some level of concern. “You should be looking happy. Not like this.”

There is something weird about the way Donghyuck speaks to you. Most probably because of the fact that you have known each other since childhood, there is still a sense of warm and homely friendliness and informality in his words, despite the title he has to call you by. The two of you had met at eight years of age, when his mother who works in the kitchen brought him into the palace that time when his father was sick and she could not take the risk of leaving him alone with an ill man. He had been the first child that you actually made friends with outside the heir community— if it was even one.

Fourteen years of friendship. One of which was spent apart as he was sent away to train to become your guard by your father’s order, and three of which was spent with him as your guard. Mostly with laughs, sometimes with tears, lots of kept secrets, shared feelings and struggles, and helping each other with anything and everything. Donghyuck was your one loyal friend, and perhaps, the only friend you truly had.

Honestly, you could not have asked for a better primary guard. “I am happy,” The words prompt an automatic smile on your lips, albeit one of longing. “I just would’ve loved to dance with him again.”

The First Dance

The first time you had danced together was three years ago, it had also been the day  where  you had completely fallen for him. Years of silently crushing had been leading up to it— momentary glances at the dinner table when his family or yours were doing their yearly rounds of visits followed by shy smiles, playing in the snow when they visited your kingdom of mountains, exploring the beautiful forests of his kingdom of what felt like a sea of green, helping each other with duties that required a second thought, late night talks in the gardens and balconies, watching the night sky with the astronomy-lover prince. Sometimes he would tell you all about it, sometimes the both of you would lounge around and sketch architectural pieces and compete on insults and comebacks, sometimes you would ride horses together— basically, you would share what you loved doing with one another.

For years it felt like a snowball rolling down the edge of a mountain, starting off small but swiftly tumbling and getting bigger and bigger as it made its way down. Surely it would end in an avalanche where the neatly formed snowball would disintegrate into a new spread of snow that would cover every inch of the surface.

The first dance was the scream that caused the avalanche.

Jeno had come to your side in the ballroom full of royal members and the elite class, roaming through an ocean of people just to find you. He had sensed the stress around the hall— the unhappiness that swarmed within the people spread around, and he thought— you were young. In fact, most people in that very room were young except for the rulers. It should feel energetic and fresh for everyone to take a short break from duties and responsibilities. It was a ball, after all. Not a conference. Nor a summit. Nothing political, so why was everyone making it feel like it was? Why would he not ask someone he liked to a dance?

Because that person was you, and your parents’ views did not go hand in hand? Because it was basic and proper political etiquette for him to not ask you to a dance?

Well, that would have just been plain stupid and a shame in his opinion.

“Hey,” He had leant over to your ear while you were looking at some group of people who were dancing away, prompting a little jerk of your shoulders in surprise. It makes him chuckle. “Hello, and excuse you, I don’t think I heard the ‘your Highness’ part,” You had said in return. “I could start some drama with the way you are disrespecting me right now.” He saw your eyes point at a particular group of teenagers your age, ones that were heirs of ‘lesser’ kingdoms— whatever that meant. Just because they did not have much land to rule over. The heirs, though, were known to be quite the chitter-chatters. They were the ones to have a word with if you ever needed some catching up with the society.

Your eyebrows had lifted a bit then in an effort to point them out further, and your finger had slightly pointed at them as stealthily as you could muster. “All it would take is a few words with them and I swear within the next hour everyone would know how you don’t even have the manners to address people correctly.”

That made Jeno start laughing silly, but you protested further. “You should have been at the last Unity Ball. They made sure everyone knew Doyoung and, you know, his now-wife-and-the-queen were a deal. I don’t even know where they spotted them doing what because I sure didn’t see them.”

You chuckled after your words as well, and Jeno could not take his eyes off of you. He smiled fondly, relaxing his linked hands placed at his back. “I was thinking…” He held out a hand, palm looking upwards at the ceiling, relaxed enough that his fingers were not fully straight. “Maybe we could give them something to talk about.”

With a smile, you rolled your eyes. “Jeno, this will give everybody something to talk about.”

Jeno shrugged carelessly with pursed lips. “I know and frankly I do not care. I just want to dance with you.”

It made your heart skip a beat— a couple, actually. He felt the same way in his chest.

And he knew his father would be watching over him somewhere, muttering to his mother about what was he doing and why would he even do that and this is going to raise so many questions but he had meant it. He simply did not care. Jeno also did not care about what your father must think of him. If it was as he expected it to be, it was somewhere between neutral and he is tolerable. Not he is as bad as his father. Plus, if the two of you got into trouble, just how hard could it be when the two of you were the only heirs for your parents’ thrones and had your own duties every living day?

Yes. It would not be much trouble at all.

Perhaps you also had a similar thought process, because you willingly put your hand in his. The two of you walked to the floor and felt gazes shift towards your direction along the way. And then, you placed your hand on him and let him place his hand at the small of your back, linking your other half of hands together.

And you started dancing. In the same way you would have danced with anyone that was not him. As more gazes landed upon the two of you and people watched you dance instead of only seeing you, understanding and observing first hand that being rivals is not applicable to situations like these and that your parents’ disagreement do not have to be yours, you swayed and you smiled and you looked into Jeno’s eyes.

But something was different.

You got lost in his eyes. You felt your breath escape free from your chest at the feeling of his hands holding you, and your heart started beating at a much faster, hypnotic rhythm— like that of a horse’s trots when it is set free to run around. And honestly, you got lost in the feeling. The feeling of being able to say so much when none of you are speaking. It was comfortable. It was strengthening. It was freeing. Fresh, warm, calm yet exciting.

Maybe he had felt the same, because you could feel his hold getting tighter and his gaze fonder by the second as you danced.

Jeno and you colored your way through that year’s annual visit, the usual black-and-whiteness of it nowhere to be seen.

The Last Official Visit

“Mere years ago I thought it couldn’t get any worse,” You mumble quietly as Jeno and you walk your way to the dining hall. You are making sure you keep your voice down so as to prevent the staff— especially the educational staff— from hearing your complaints. Both of your hands are at your sides lightly brushing against each other’s. That is the most affectionate thing you could do when everyone is around, really. “Having too many lessons on too many subjects in one day and somehow trying to keep all of them in my mind so I can have a shot at being a decent ruler,” Jeno hums in agreement and nods a little, waiting for the actual complaint to come. “But now that I’m actually getting closer to the being a monarch, everything’s just.. I think my head will crack open if I need to memorize anything more about law. Do you ever feel the same?”

From the corner of your eye, you can feel a staff looking at you with judging eyes, so you feel inclined to add the honorific. “Your Highness?”

Jeno chuckles as you turn around the corner and nods enthusiastically, when both of you notice one of the head guards and all three of you bow a bit in greetings as you pass by each other. “I can relate to that. For me having to deal with and participating in the military is draining as I get older. A lot of the time I just want to be able to learn things I want to learn. Astronomy, music theory, science…”

“Nothing to do with politics, I know.” The two of you snicker at his words and yours. You really knew. Jeno, if there were any other heir, would give up his place on the throne immediately— because he hated politics. Not the study or the theme itself as he knew its importance because of his first-hand experience, but he rather hated the reality of being a politician. Every word he says, every action he does, and every step he takes is closely monitored and very likely to cause major changes. And he hates that. Jeno is the type of person that is more reserved, dependent on his privacy, someone who wants to engage in his own interests as he thinks it is the major way to preserve inner peace throughout his life. He wants to live an enjoyable life, understandably.

“How are things going with your father?” You ask him upon the topic with a hopeful tone, knowing it is a bitter one, and thinking that maybe asking about it while you are moving and loaded with sensory surroundings could give him the benefit of swiftly giving the answer without much occupation in his mind. “Not great. I cannot seem to make him happy, ever.”

The answer hurts your heart because it is true. Jeno’s father is never happy with him, as he is a man washed over with his own ideals and denies any alternatives. In his views, it is almost like Jeno has to be exactly like him to be a good king. Ever since you met Jeno around twelve years ago now, his father has bothered you and not only because he is the King of a rival monarchy.

The worst part is that his mother never raised her voice about it. Even though she is much more affectionate towards Jeno and  seems to approach him with love unlike the King.

“He was really upset with my performance in the military last time. Said I had to work harder if I wanted to be a lieutenant.” He adds with a barely audible huff, the two of you slowing down as you spot the doors to the dining hall. You frown, and it is audible when you speak. “We have to endure it just a bit more. It will all work out in the end— we always make things work, right?”

With that Jeno smiles assuringly. You feel his finger caress the back of your hand a couple of times as his eyes point downwards with the force of his smile. “Yes, my love. We do.”

Just out of the doorkeepers’ reach, you whisper to him. To reassure him, and to give him strength, and perhaps to apologize to him about nagging him on a topic he does not like to mention. “I love you.”

He whispers back. “I love you too.”

The two of you share a fond smile that lasts a couple of seconds before taking the last few steps to the entrance and the doorkeepers open the doors for you.

Both of your parents are seated at the table, with yours at the opposite ends of the table and his on the left side. Your parents look delighted to see you both, and his mother does look content too, but his father not as much. It is less than surprising to you at this point, but you still want to be naive enough to believe his face looks so down because of the political tension  he had with your parents and not because he genuinely disliked his son and you.

Bowing your heads slightly in greetings at the Kings and the Queens, both of you start making your way to your seats.

“Father,” Jeno greets him with a smile of his face that is rather mocking, as he walks over to them to sit at the assigned chair between his parents.

“Son,” His father greets back, watching Jeno’s movements. The King sounds stern and less than moderately content which makes you furrow your brows as a staff pulls the chair for you to sit down on the right side of the table. You realize how your chair is the only one on the right side even though the table is big enough to host grand meals and it makes you wish that the seating plan could be in a way that could have both Jeno and you sitting at the same side. Because you do not want his father to converse with him and be in close proximity to him, where he can bother him all he pleases.

Contrary to all your thoughts, though, Jeno looks okay. He places his hand on his father’s shoulder as he sits down, and turns to his mother to take her hand in his before placing a kiss at the back of it. Jeno whispers something to her that makes her smile bright, her eyes sparkling at her son, and then she brushes some of his hair that has fallen behind his ears. You can hear her asking Jeno about how his studies have gone, along with the duties he had to take care of that day that were just some document work.

Jeno tells her it has gone well, that he has taken care of everything and even has gotten a head-start on his work for the next day. She praises him in return and cups his cheek, turning back around to the table thereafter.

When the attention is at the table and the first course is served, your father takes his glass of fine champagne and lifts it up slightly with a smile on his face that you know is only professional. Him and your mother dislike Jeno’s father just as much as you do if not more for his political stances. “I’m happy we can all gather here annually and share food, thoughts and words with each other in peace even though we are not necessarily on the same side of ideas, and I’m raising a toast for everything to stay this way— in peace— for the eternity to come.”

Me too, you think. Both Jeno’s parents and your mother raise their glasses to meet your father’s with two genuine smiles and one quarter-meant. You raise your glasses as well with Jeno and say your cheers after they do so.

Jeno winks at you before taking a sip when he lifts his glass up to his lips, and you know that it is the two of you that wants your father’s wishes to come true probably the most as you smile.

The First (and Only) Time You Got Caught

It had happened on one of your yearly rounds barely a full year after the annual Unity Ball, in which he had finally collected the courage to tell you about his feelings and asked if you felt the same as you two danced with a beautiful smile on his face— presumably because it was the only time the two of you could truly be alone without your primary guards on your tails.

“Can I tell you something, in all my seriousness, your Highness?” He had asked with his hidden smile on his face, the one where the corners of his mouth were not pointed upwards but there was still a very noticeable amusement on his face. Teasing a bit, if you will. “I have a feeling that you will even if I tell you you can’t.”

Jeno had tilted his head at your words. “You are right, but only because of the heaviness of my words. I really would not tell you otherwise.”

He took a breath, and when he spoke again, it was with a much lower tone. A tone where people dancing near you would not have been able to hear it but only you would, as his voice got drowned out by the sounds of the piano and the violins and the cellos and every other instrument. “I think a lot whenever I see you and spend time with you,” Then, ever so slightly he leaned in a bit closer. “And what I think is always good and relieving. You make me feel like I can drop my mask off with you: the mask I keep on my face at all times. It is incredibly easy for me to be myself around you because of the way you are, and I appreciate you for that. But for a long time now I’ve been feeling like this appreciation and awe I have for you,”

Your brows furrowed a bit at his words as confusion took over you, and he let out an airy laugh at that before picking his words back up. “Has evolved into something much more. Something much bigger and stronger. Something that tells me it is you, and I am okay with that. I can and I do accept that, and I just wanted to tell you because it is so hard not to anymore.” Another breath. This time he leans back again to regain his composure. “But you should know that I will understand if you do not feel the same way about me, or do not want to have what I would like for us to have.”

The two of you continued to dance, making sure your waltz steps were matching both to each other’s and to the music playing in the background. Shocked would have been an understatement for what you felt— not because it was a surprise that he felt that way about you as you were sure the mutual attraction was real before, but because he actually told you. Moreover, because he wanted something with you in the same way you did with him. It was only when you could wrap your head around it that you let out a bright smile with a squeeze on his shoulder. “This is so hysteric.”

Jeno had shook his head in a questioning manner upon your words, but had immediately relaxed upon the ones that followed soon after. “I do. I do want to have that very same thing, because it is you for me, too.”

Needless to say it had been a tad bit difficult after that.

As it was with all new lovers, keeping your hands or eyes off from each other was quite frustrating and a demanding task. You could really only love each other physically when you were completely alone; could hug when you were alone, could kiss when you were alone, could hold hands when you were alone— being alone was a treasure. And for the communication bit.. well. Communication outside of blatantly seeing each other and talking was a non-existent concept.

But you made it work. Even at its first stages, your love had proved to be stronger than the obstacles. The two of you would find a way, eventually.

Perhaps, the one time you were not alone while you displayed your affection was the door opening to communication outside of seeing each other and between the distanced kingdoms.

The two of you were on your way to the greenhouse outside in their garden to have tea with your families, the sun shining through the big windows— not a sight you could always have in your palace as the country was usually covered in snow whether it be a light cover or a heavier one. You loved how green their palace was. It felt like an explosion of colors after staying months on end in your palace until you started your yearly rounds, visiting every single kingdom over the course of several weeks.

Maybe it was what made you more lively, too. More loving, because you do not think there could be any explanation as to why the Prince’s speech on the whole history of the foreseeable future in space sounded so charming to you. “Kiss me.”

Jeno stopped dead in his tracks at the sudden demand. You did too, and could not help but snicker at his widened eyes. “Pardon me? We’re literally in the middle of the hall, dove.” Which was true, but the hall was empty. Completely empty, as the transition halls were some of the most unoccupied during the daytime. Had it been nighttime, it would have been a completely different story. “Where’s the beautiful and bold boy that did not care when he was asking me to a dance in front of everyone in the royal and elite class?”

He chuckled at that, amused and somewhat bothered, but lighthearted. “We’re too out in the open. It would be a disaster if anyone wanted to change wings and walked in on us.” At that you let out a frustrated sigh, laughing a little at him with a slight roll of your eyes. “Just kiss me, Jeno. There is no one around.”

Maybe it is the fact that you asked him for the second time, or that he felt the sudden bravery rush over him, but he did kiss you then. With an amused smile spread over his lips he had leant over with his hands still placed on his back— presumably because it would have made pulling back easier had it come to that. It was a sweet kiss despite the frustration the two of you had in store just seconds before he did so, his lips soft yet firmly on yours as he started kissing your demand and his worries away in a careless moment.

It felt good to be careless for once. To melt into the environment, to feel one and to feel whole by taking only one risk.

Until the sound of laughter echoed through the hall, that is, and the faint footsteps grew louder in sound as the people they belonged to got closer. The footsteps were approaching rather quickly, and Jeno tried to pull away from you muttering something along the lines of see, someone has to come here just to ruin everything but you did not let him. Instead, you pulled him in closer with hands placed on the other’s jaws.

Honestly, you two really could not care. Especially after the laughs got recognizable to you long before they did to him.

And as one would have expected the steps came to a halt once they entered the hall, however as one would not have expected while you were just pulling away from each other.

If you had to stay positive about it, it was an immense embarrassment for both of you. Them possibly seeing you in that state was not something the two of you would have wanted nor planned; the plan was to pull away just before they came in, and you had failed miserably.

It would be fine, though. They were your primary guards. One of whom looked shocked beyond belief, and the other looked a bit uncomfortable. Nonetheless, they were your primary guards and your own closest friends. If anybody could be trusted, it would be them.

“Oh my god. Oh, my god.” Donghyuck rambled, mostly in disbelief and possibly a bit nervously as they kept on walking over to where you and the Prince were standing. “I can’t believe I just witnessed that, you were kissing, weren’t you?” The last part of the question had come out in the lowest whisper he could muster, and Jeno only nodded. It was not his proudest moment for sure if you took the slight blush on his cheek to account.

Mentioning what had been going on between you to them had been out of the question for so long in a dire attempt to protect yourselves from any and all eyes— even theirs, that are supposed to watch over you. Maybe if it was not for this moment you never would have told them as the nature you two held had been too cautious to do anything up until now.

The guards seemed to get even more distressed at that, especially your friend of eleven years. He turned to Jaemin with his hand in his hair, eyes closed, and his face genuinely upset. “It’s too early for this. I’m on my first year of primary duty and this is what you do to me?”

At his words, the Prince beside you cleared his throat, and everyone turned their gazes towards him. “I know this must have come as a shock to you, but we are still two heirs you are talking about.”

Donghyuck tilted his head then, and pushed his tongue against his cheek at the comment, chuckling a little as he placed his hands on his hips. “Well, your Highness, one of them happens to be my best friend of years— and for the record, I think we have well given up on the professional distance protocol at this point.”

That made Jaemin bust out an actual laugh, prompting Jeno to glare at him and the guard to simply shrug before apologizing. “Donghyuck,” You snapped at him with a warning tone. “Keep your composure.” The only voices inside the hall or at the close distance around the hall still happened to be the four of yours, which was rather fortunate considering the last few moments.

“Just let us forget about this, your Highness,” Jaemin suggested to you with a calm manner. “Both of us have vowed to be loyal to you two. Not a single word would leave from our mouths regarding this.”

And that happened to be the best thing Jaemin had ever said to you. For him, and the stressed guard beside him, it was probably the most unfortunate thing that ever did leave his mouth. A smile spread on your face as the idea hit, and Jeno must have thought the same because you saw him jerk a little in his place in a moment of eureka. The guards knew something (or anything, for that matter) would not be going their way as the same kind of knowing smile spread across your faces simultaneously.

“Vowed to be loyal, you say?” Both guards nodded when you asked, and Jeno followed suit with his own question. “And what if we asked you to help us with finding places for us two to meet at?”

The Last Promise

It is a pretty night.

The nights at your palace are always breezy and cold at the right amount: bearable with the right attires, and the type that is a dry cold where the humid cold that might stick on you is never a problem that passes through your mind. Moonlight is bright in the open sky. The stars are visible and scattered across the night like wild flowers scattered across a field. The snow is a thick blanket on top of the ground and under your feet as you sit at the entrance of the abandoned and long-out-of-use tunnel.

Jeno looks pretty, too. Despite traveling for a long time and having to cover everything up at such a time where having this relationship is even harder than it has ever been, he is glowing with pleasure. His eyes constantly seem to smile, and his skin glistens under the shifting rays of the moonlight as he speaks to you. You both were catching up on the last few weeks where you have not been able to see each other and only could deal letters to one another through selected staff that were being paid in exchange of keeping your long-going secret. A lot of it was through affection.

Jaemin and Donghyuck are guarding far in front of you— Donghyuck farther than Jaemin, keeping an eye out for the rest of the palace that was surely asleep and in the distance as the other watched out with binoculars for royal photographers. They seemed to be everywhere after noticing the drama and feud-filled relationships of the recent royal class, and they were insatiable.

“I feel so on the edge whenever I have to talk to anyone lately,” You confess to Jeno as he looks deep into your eyes. “Even on phone calls, and even though I am not my father but just a representative, everyone treats me like I am some manure sticking to their shoes.”

The Prince laughs at that, holding your hand in his and lacing your fingers without taking his eyes off of yours. “You could not be farther off than manure, my love. These are trying times for everybody is all.”

“Which is exactly why I think they should be more compassionate,” You add with a huff of frustration, a pout on your lips. Jeno lets out a breathy chuckle as he leans over and places a chaste kiss on them, before turning back to his seat. “Are you cold?”

“Not really, why?” You ask. “The tip of your nose felt really cold.” With that, he looks down at your linked hands and shrugs a little. “You could go inside. I don’t want you to be cold because of me. I got to see you, and that is what matters.”

“I am not cold. I want to stay here longer.” He smiles at the attempt to reassure him, starting to play with the tips of your fingers. Squeezing them, touching them with his own, fiddling them mindlessly. “Good.” There is a slight relief at the way his word sounds, but it is nowhere to be found with the words that follow. “Listen,”

You know what that tone means, and it means that he is being dead serious. “I don’t know if you have noticed anything about it, but there is a big likelihood that a war is coming. Some areas are already in conflict,” You had known about it a little, as the military paperwork seemed to mount up on your table about the raise of the aids and what-not— but you had not seen or heard any plans of an attack. Jeno gulps as he picks his head up to look into your eyes again. “My father just assigned me to the troops located nearest to the conflict zones as a lieutenant today and I have to be there in the morning,” A breath before he concludes his words. “I will have to fight at the warfront when it breaks out.”

His words struck you harder than you would expect it. Jeno does not say if the war breaks out, no, he says when the war breaks out. And you know he is more invested in the military than you ever will be, so his words hold an impeccable reality to them. It gets you feeling terrified because a war is a war and there is no sense of security in it, and he will have to be in the midst of that chaos fighting; and it gets you feeling angry, because how could his father do this to him? “Aren’t you his only child?” Your breath hitches as you ask, and you feel the warmness at your eyes. “Why is he sending you?”

“Because I have been training my entire life and he said he trusts me now.” Somehow, you think, and a good part of you believes that his father is only doing this because he is too much of an arrogant himself to go fight. That his father is doing this only because he wants to keep his place on the throne as long as he can. Because he is the type of person who makes you really believe that he could have been the best alchemist considering he is so selfishly determined to stay on the throne that he would have probably found elixir of life.

And you see the ugly reality that his father does not care if something happens to Jeno during the war. It breaks you that Jeno sounds so hopeful when he says his father trusts him.

So in a moment of selfishness, you ask him. “Jeno, what if you die?”

He seems to get alarmed at the point where your voice gets shaky, and he tightens his hand around yours, leaning in and placing his other hand on your cheek as he stares deep into you, trying to reach your heart. “I won’t.” He shakes his head to further emphasize. “I won’t die. I have so much to do— we have so much to do still. I will come back,” Jeno’s thumb on your cheek rubs the surface firmly, his palm growing warm now. “I promise, my love. We must hold on for a little while longer.”

A part of you thinks why can you not see it? Do you really not see how your father is using you at a matter like this? How he is using you as a pawn and as a puppet, a mere imitation to his presence at the warfront?

But the other part of you says that what is done is done. That there is no way to hold him back from going after being assigned. And that very same part also notices how confident Jeno is being about this, and yearns to believe that his father had told him truthfully that he trusts him now.

So you give him the benefit of the doubt, for now.

You nod at the Prince with a tight smile. The tears had not even arrived at your eyes because you wanted to keep him from getting upset because of your reaction, especially when he would be the one rushing to his destination to arrive by the morning and would involve himself in something way beyond training. With a turn of your head, you kiss his palm and nuzzle further into it, and he lifts your hand in his to kiss it. He does not pull your hand away from his lips and lets you recollect yourself with your eyes closed for a few moments.

“Love,” He whispers after some while. You open your eyes to meet with his fond ones that are looking at you, adoring you. “I need to ask you something before I go.”

You nod once again as he pulls his hand away from your cheek, and you start following the movement of his hand. It goes to his chest pocket on his jacket and digs something up into his palm before holding it in between the two of you.

Then he opens his palm with a smile on his face.

You notice the bunched up chain before you notice the sparkles that reflect the moonlight. And when your eyes fall onto them, there is a ring. A ring. With many small crystals all over it instead of a single or a few big ones. It looks delicate and easy to hide, with a simple knot to its shape and nothing else.

It means the world to you.

“This is not much of a surprise considering the amount of times we have spoken about the future, but,” He squeezes your hand. “Every time I look at you, I do not even dream about it anymore. I see it. And I want it. Because my heart says that it will always be you. Every day, every time. No matter what. Because I love you that much, and I want to go away this time knowing that when I come back to you, you will be my future and I will be yours.”

A bright smile that is a contrast to the dead of the night, yet one that matches his spreads across your face and he knows the answer then. But he asks the question anyway. “Would you do the honor of taking my hand in yours for the rest of eternity?”

The tears rush to your eyes and break free in a matter of maybe a couple of seconds if not within the same second and you nod. A tsunami-worth wave of emotions hit you; sadness at still not being over the fact of the war that was surely coming, happiness at the reality that you will get to keep your love for the rest of your life, nervousness at the uncertainty of it all, him going away and his father, but mostly— finally. Finally, finally.

Not finally, he asked me to marry him but finally, we are moving to the last stage of everything. We have fought for so long, and we have endured so much, and we now finally get to move onto the time where we get to be us without the obstacles. Everything is finally truly paying off.

With a smile on his face and his own unspilled tears in his eyes, he reaches over and puts the necklace on you and tucks it in to your night attire, patting the place the ring extends to. And he lets you kiss him afterwards.

He pulls away, though, before any of you can open your mouths and before the kiss can turn into anything less gentle. “I found a place. The registrar agreed to wed us in impartiality, and told me we could have a small and serene ceremony.” You listen to him with a newfound spark in your eyes that make Jeno fall for you all over again, your hands on his jaws. “You will love it there. It is deep in the forest and the road is really worn, but it only secures us further. No photographer would be able to follow us. There is a lake and lots of different trees varying from the rest of the forest at the ceremony area, and the place is so pretty at night with dim lights everywhere. It is really quiet, and the staff are very kind.”

Your lips land on his again with a quick and messy smooch, and he can feel you giggle into him. When you pull back you bite down at your lip in a smile washed over with excitement. “That sounds like a dream, Jeno.”

“I’m afraid it will all come true, your Majesty.”

Jeno laughs against your lips when you crash them onto his again, and lets you climb into his lap when you make the move.

The First Escapade

Your heart, for the lack of a better word, was racing.

Donghyuck was leading you somewhere. Neither of you were talking much, even the steps you were taking had to be calculated and soft so as not to alert any other guards that were on watch that night. Moving through the halls was a scary, almost foreign feeling— you would usually breeze through them. But not this once.

He had woken you up with a knock at your door, telling the doorkeeper that there was a minor problem with your belongings being sorted for the upcoming tour through the country that had to be sorted immediately according to your liking, and had taken you through the halls and down the many stairs. Most of which you had not once used in your life, and were widely used by the staff only.

He was good at distracting people, you had come to learn. The amount of people he had lied to and distracted by saying there was a problem with power shortage (which there was, and it was him that caused the shortage in the first place) and it had to be repaired but there were parts that had to be bought from the town (with all the businesses listed), and that the other group of guards would be coming to replace them would have been impressive even for politicians. And that was only the first of the lies he had told people that night.

Through the countless halls and stairways you passed through, you finally arrived at the basement. You had never been in there before, and it was a basement for basically just about anything— cars, old furniture, old belongings, a lot of scraps and some things covered with big, beige and gray drapes.

“We’re almost there, don’t worry.” Donghyuck had told your sleepy yet very much amazed self, bothering to turn around and laughing at whatever your expression was. You trailed behind him to the deeper corners of the basement, letting him lead you until he stopped in front of a group of furniture and what looked like instruments all bunched together.

“Is this it? They are surely not coming from the big entrance, and I would like to think you are not talented enough to smuggle them all the way inside here.”

There was a chuckle that echoed after that. “I don’t know whether you complimented or insulted me,” He was holding off on the honorifics seeing they could give everything away if someone had been watching, or were on your tails, or simply heard you. “But for the record, no they’re not.” And with that, he starts moving the old piano and the bigger pieces of furniture like a wardrobe and bookshelf— moving the rugs away and pushing the boxes with his feet until the metal square made itself apparent.

Donghyuck put the furniture he had pulled away in a way that would cover the two of you, a furniture wall if you will, and set the boxes on top of each other inside the wall as well as planting the rugs upright to imitate a cramped space behind the belongings.

It was kind of terrifying how good he was, and you could only hope he had learned such things in training.

Once he was done, he put a hand on his hip and pointed at the trapdoor. “We’ll be going in through there. It opens to the tunnels.”

The tunnels? They were more than a couple hundred years old, and supposedly in unusable condition, completely blocked. “I thought the palace was built on top of them to cover them up.”

“It was, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t an opening to it. Only the King and the architect personnel know about this I think, someone I know mentioned that he wanted to rebuild the collapsed part back up once.” He shrugs. “But he apparently gave up on it after noticing it had gotten visible to the surface after the heavy snowfall made the dirt on it collapse. We’re going to that end now, and trust me when I say no one ever goes there.”

Going through an old trapdoor proved to be harder than you initially thought. The old ladder was slippery with whatever it was, most definitely not fit for two people, and a bit shorter than the drop down.

It took quite a bit of speed walking to get to the end Donghyuck was talking about, and it was mesmerizing to you how there was this complex system of tunnels with brick walls and cracked stone with small hints of life whether it be plants that made their way in through the cracks or bugs, or the occasional stray cats.

But when you reached the end, there they were. The two silhouettes at the opening of the tunnel system and the collapsed remainder of it behind them. Moonlight was shining through in between and around them as they chatted, both of their shoulders shaking with slight laughter. Although you could not see them, you knew which silhouette belonged to the Prince. Maybe because of the way his shoulders shook, or rather because you had known him for so long already that you could basically find him with your eyes closed if you had to.

The silhouettes turned towards you at the sound of your footsteps when they were audible to them, and you could see the smile on Jeno’s face even in the shade of the tunnels. Automatically you smiled back at him and hurried into his arms that welcomed you, hugging into his chest with a happy chuckle. He kissed your cheek, breathing in your scent, and nuzzled his forehead against the side of your face and neck much like a cat as he cozied against the crook of your neck for a brief moment.

He had his hands on your shoulders when he pulled back and took a look at you. “How are you, dove?”

You smile. “Sleepy, but otherwise well. You look far better than I do.” Jeno tilted his head with his eyes squinted. “I’m sleepy as well but the cold has a way of waking people up.” Not to you, after so many years of living here.

When he noticed Donghyuck who had been standing next to you for a few seconds at that point, he asked him about his well being and inevitably cut through his conversation with Jaemin with an apology to be polite. The two guards had been standing at a bit of a distance in order to give you some personal space, you noticed.

Then, he addressed them both in his gratitude. “Thank you for taking the time out of your sleep to make this possible for us,” When he said it, he meant it. You got two bright smiles in return, and words followed those of two of your favorite people in the world.

“We vowed to be loyal to you, to protect you no matter the circumstances and to keep you in safety, your Highness,” Donghyuck quoted the same way once how Jaemin had done. But his smile spread a bit further across his face as he looked at the two of you— with you leaning into Jeno’s side and his hand placed at your waist, almost back-hugging you as he tried to warm you up with his body heat, both of you oblivious to your states.

“And beyond that, we just want to see our best friends happy.”

The Last Wound

To say that the war had broken out would be a severe understatement.

As if on cue, mere weeks after Jeno’s words governments and monarchies around the world had started declaring war against nations upon nations, showing their feuds and unmet requests as the reasons. There were sides that were established; sides that your father refused to be a part of, hiding in the safety of neutrality for the time being. That being said, the military was still getting aided economically and personnel-wise, guards being transferred into several military branches they could serve in without much training and folk (usually the ones that were severely affected by the financial hardships of the war) taken into the accelerated guard training. There were many faces all around.

The land, thankfully, had been secure so far except for the economical burdens. People were still reliable. The monarchy and your family continued to be respected, presumably because of the immense effort your parents and you put into making feel everything as normal as you possibly could.

But news came in every single day, sometimes more times than you could count, and they were scary nonetheless.

Some nations were fighting on land, some at sea, some in the air. There were too many people that had lost their lives for absolutely no reason that should concern them and their words and actions. Too many had been left in poverty, in famine, in conditions that no human should be left in. Too many homes destroyed, too many businesses left unrecognizable.

Theoretically you had known it all. All your life you had been educated on the possibility of this exact situation. War and its consequences were something you knew too well already, but it was much different to experience it first-hand. And you were not even experiencing it truly first-hand, the people were.

Your routine had changed for the past few months as well. Everything was fast paced. You would be woken up in the mornings either by Donghyuck or your doorkeepers, and would immediately go to have breakfast, checking several newspapers in the process while listening to your father’s senior advisor read out the papers that had arrived that day and summarize the reports of the past days. Then you would move to your office to deal with all the paperwork that were unnecessary burdens on your parents’ shoulders. They would be taking care of calls and meetings while you dealt with the maths and the written bureaucracy. That would go on until it was late in the night and you had to go to sleep to start all over again the next day.

One of the most concerning facts was that you had not heard from Jeno in months, aside from the rare shared secret phone calls between your primary guards and the one letter he was able to send at the very start of things. All you knew was that he was not dead, according to the countless newspapers you had read so far.

And that was all that mattered.

Surely there were days where you were more concerned about him and his well being, but you tried to keep your attention on your work and your people. The distraction, and the fruits of your hard work helped to keep you in line.

It is on one night where you are lounging around with your family in the library to read and forget about the problems a little that Donghyuck barges in, but with a few knocks beforehand in proper etiquette.

He bows his head in greetings when your heads turn at him, and when he picks it up, you can see the slight panic on his face. “Good evening your Excellence. Your Majesty,” Then, he physically turns to you, pointing his feet at your direction where you  stood, picking out another book. “Your Highness, I have the car ready.”

You furrow your brows. “For what reason?”

“There is a tree selection going on to be distributed to people in need,” Your father says without glancing up from his book. “You have been working so hard lately and you hardly even go out to the garden. You deserve to take a breather. Go and take your coat.”

So you do.

Hurrying to your room, you ask for a staff to give you your coat and gratefully receive the help that they offer when they dress you. Donghyuck walks after you, waiting for you just outside of your door. When you come out you realize the restless look he has to his body. Especially when he starts speed walking right after you come out of your room.

He does not say a single word until you are out of the building and walking through the garden, he only encourages you to hurry up. But when you are close to the gates opening up to the road of the palace, he speaks up. “You aren’t selecting trees, I’ve got that covered.”

Your response is immediate. “Where are we going then? Did something happen?” The snow crunches below your feet and it is growing harder to keep up with Donghyuck’s pace as he keeps his eyes nowhere but forwards. “He’s here. I’m taking you to him.”

Donghyuck’s words make your heart jump in your chest half in excitement and half in worry. “How is he—?”

“They were moving bases. Jaemin said the Prince told him to make a stop at the forest,” He smiles slightly then, as you can see from the side. “He needs to see you, apparently.”

A warm feeling spreads over your chest, and excitement finally takes over, as well as happiness. “That is fortunate, because I need to see him as well.”

The car ride to the forest closer to the top of the mountains was a bumpy and somewhat long ride in the black car that melted into the dark go the night. Towns all around were strictly following a dark-out rule each night after a certain hour— to make the areas undetectable from the air and hard to detect even in person in case of an attack. Therefore the ride is definitely dark except for the shining lights of the car, the snowfall growing faster as it climbs up.

Donghyuck sits beside you instead of at the front seat and keeps his eyes narrow and focused on the road. At some point he leans forward and tells the driver that they can drop you two off at this point, and that they should be back here to pick you up in a couple hours sharp.

And then, you two leave the car.

He helps you with walking uphill in the thick snow. The snowfall, although fast paced, is with big and fluffy flakes. Nonetheless, when the slightest wind makes the flakes hit your face, it hurts.

The two of you walk deep into the forest, deeper than you would have expected, and you have a good feeling that you would not have trusted with the process if it was not Donghyuck walking beside you with a lantern in his hand. Another lantern gets visible after a while.

And you get happy, so happy like a child, slipping a bit on the snow when you try to pick your pace up.

But when you see their faces, your heart drops.

You notice Jaemin’s face first, as he is the one holding the lantern, and you notice the big healing slash on the side of his face. It is the initial alarm for you that immediately makes your gaze turn to Jeno who is standing beside him.

And surely enough, he looks horrible. There are several cuts on his face that are not as big as the slash on Jaemin’s cheek but still quite fresh, his lip has long busted before and is now almost healed, there are stitches near his hairline on the left side, and his under-eyes are almost a plum-colored purple from how dark they are. You can almost feel his hurt.

“Oh my god,” Is the first thing that leaves your mouth when you hurry towards him. “What happened to you?”

You try to hug him but he hisses, prompting you to lean back and take his face into your hands instead, inspecting the injuries. This is exactly what I was talking about, you think, I knew something like this would happen. I knew you and the people around you would get hurt somehow, so why did you have to go and fight?

“My love,” Jeno greets you by nuzzling deep into your hands, his head dropping a little, but you do not listen to him. “Are you two okay? What happened?”

“The base got raided, your Highness.” Jaemin responds, and you notice he sounds almost too good for a person that has such a wound on his face. “Hence the change of bases.”

“I am healthy. Just sore.” Jeno adds, and chuckles drily once. “Turns out I am not all too good at one-on-one combat.” He tries to be funny despite themselves, but the state they are in is too bad for it to work. Making light of whatever had happened seemed like a far stretch.

Naturally, you cannot bring yourself to laugh at his joke. “I am thankful for that,” But you smile to comfort you both despite the situation. “Not that you got your bums handed to you, but that you are healthy.”

Jeno giggles with his mouth closed at that, and lets you pull him to a kiss when you tug at his face. His face feels really cold, more so than yours, and you wonder just how long they had been standing outside deep in the forest. “You are cold,” You breathe onto his lips.

“Mhm,” He mumbles. “But I want to stay for longer.” He joins in on it when a smile spreads pulls at the corners of your lips.

Getting a move on, you both sit on the snow under a tree not wanting to stand up for longer because in all honesty, Jeno looks nothing but exhausted. Donghyuck hands his lantern to you so you could have a light source before walking away with Jaemin— not too far as it is easier than ever to get lost in the forest with the dark night and the heavy snow.

“How have you been?” You ask Jeno once you are both comfortably seated, holding his hands in yours in an attempt to warm them up even though he seems to be in some of his warmest clothes. There was no guide on how to approach someone who has been through things he had been through, so you did not know how to and the best you could do was being careful about it. “How are things out there?”

“Like hell,” His answer is immediate. “People invade anywhere and everywhere, making decisions is so difficult, sometimes everything is so loud and mostly unnecessary and—“ He takes a breath. “A lot of them die. From both sides.”

Your heart drops further. “Do the decisions you make, do you think they—?”

Jeno shrugs and shakes his head. “I do not know. I try not to think about it.” His answer is spit out quickly. He takes a hand out of your hold, shaking with stress and probably exhaustion. His fingers rub his temple and his thumb rubs the middle of his forehead to try and ease the tension. “They are not even my decisions,” He speaks with pent up frustration and anger. “What goes in the end is my father’s word and demand.”

“He makes the decisions for you?” You ask with brows furrowed further. “When you are the lieutenant in the field?” A ridiculed chuckle leaves your mouth. “Why is he not there then?”

“I try to deal with everything as peacefully as I can, I plan all these negotiations and I mean, I use the advice that the counselors and other senior military personnel give me,” Jeno rambles. “But when I tell him about it he says that it does not work out for the plan according to the policies we have when in fact they do. Then why did he let me train in the military for so long?”

His chest moves up and down quickly and deeply when he is done with his words. You can see his eyes glistening, which is why you approach him lighter with your next words. “You do not have to inform your father beforehand,” At that, he turns his face to you. “If people agree with you, the heir and the lieutenant, you do not have to get your father’s permission. Let him know afterwards instead.”

“That is ridiculous.” An airy laugh comes out of Jeno. It irks you, how his first move is to shut you out. “He is the King. He has done this for years, and even after this all ends it is his word that counts. And he is my father, I do not want to disappoint him. One wrong thing I make, and all he ever did goes to trash.”

“I am sorry to say this, but in my eyes your father is someone with dead straight views. You could prove yourself to him by showing him it could all work out if your word went instead of his around the field— you could get away with less harm as well,” You try to reach him with your words, your voice soft in an attempt to not agitate him further. “You really do not have to follow your father’s guidance.”

“I do!” You know that it is the pure frustration speaking. “You don’t! Didn’t your father send you there because he trusted you? You are a man fully grown and capable of making your decisions— you will be the ruler sooner than later. Doing what your father tells you to do, constantly, is not going to help with anything especially in the future when it will be you who has the call on everything.”

There is a silence where the two of you do nothing but look at each other. His eyes shift continuously and very slightly as if they are trembling. His jaw clenches and he lets a loaded breath out that comes from deep within his chest, letting his head turn forward again and his back hit the tree. He furrows his brows and a couple of his shaky fingers come up to squeeze the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know,” Another burdened breath. “He has been saying he is proud of me.”

And you understand what it is about.

Nevertheless you hate that he lets his father’s pride do this to him; getting him hurt both mentally and physically. Like before the war, you act in a moment of selfishness as you take his hand in yours again and give it a squeeze. “Let’s run away.” Your voice sounds firm and confident. “Get married at that place deep in the forest, and go to some other place. Run from this madness wherever it follows us and come back when everything is over with,” The smile on your face is audible in your words. “We would be so free, Jeno.”

But Jeno breaks your heart into pieces when a sad chuckle leaves his lips and a heavy whine follows. “I wish we could.”

Without another word, you lean towards him and kiss his neck, his jaw, his cheek and temple. Pulling his hand away from the side of his nose on his cheek, which became its resting place after squeezing the bridge of his nose, you place his arms around you and pull him down to your shoulder by his hair for him to rest. He kisses the side of your neck as well, smiling at the feeling of the slinging chain around it, and slides his head back down.

Your hand still in his hair playing with it, you whisper your last sense to him. “It is your pride in yourself that matters. Not his.”

Jeno only nods. And within a few minutes of his steady breathing, he is fast asleep on your shoulder.

When the guards come back after so long a while you spent playing with his hair mindlessly, you have one request from Jaemin. “Make sure he sleeps on the way, will you?”

The First Breakdown

The first time he had cried to you had happened at a surprise visit.

In fact, he had visited you because of it. Had taken more than several hours of his time and more than several lies through his mouth just to get to you and to be vulnerable. In his defense, it was because he could be so vulnerable only with you.

Even so, you had never seen him cry before.

It was in the middle of the night again when Donghyuck had knocked on the door of your office, where you were catching up on some of your studies. He had told you that you had a visitor, and that they were waiting for you, and it had been all that it took for you to stand up from your chair and start walking with him. Following him, you had gone to the basement again, moved the furniture again, went down the trapdoor again, walked a lot again, and had seen the two silhouettes at the end of the tunnel again.

Only this time, only one of the silhouettes’ shoulders were shaking. And not because of laughter.

Jeno had started crying the moment he had spotted you. Jaemin tried to talk to him, but Donghyuck only pulled him away to go away for keeping watch; gave the two of you the privacy you needed.

It came as a shock at first. Jeno never cried— not once, you think, in the entire time you had known him starting from your childhood years. Even when people cried around him. Even when he was at a funeral. Even when he was too happy. Even when he got hurt and was in physical pain. The only exception would be the times you saw him angry where his eyes would tear up, but never did they spill before.

After they left you—  without wasting any time— pulled Jeno to you, letting him hug you however and wherever he needed. He made himself comfortable with his face in your shoulder, close to your neck, and his arms around your waist with hands spread across your back. You ran your fingers through his hair as he sobbed. Violently so. You could tell whatever he was crying about was not a one-time thing. It had been bottled inside and pent up for too long.

He held you that way and cried maybe for an hour straight for all you knew. But when his tears died down and all that was left were sniffles, you had finally asked him. “What is the matter, sweetheart?”

There was a content sniffle at the choice of your rare use of a nickname, if that could even be a thing. But a few heavy breaths followed after that, like he wanted to say the things on his mind but could not bear to. You only pulled your chest away from his to be able to look into his eyes, and shook your head. “You do not have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

Jeno placed his forehead on yours and stood in place, breathing with his eyes shut. You shut your eyes too, trying to connect with him at a level that is beyond words because that was what he seemed to need.

But then his voice cut through the night. “I just want him to love me.”

It angered you to no extent that you knew who he was talking about. “What did he do?”

He chuckled bitterly. “Humiliated me in front of my mother’s family and the whole staff at my early birthday celebration in the morning.” There was a gulp as he weighed the words that were told to him once again, as if they would have been lighter that time. “Said he could not believe I was his only son and only child. That a peasant would have done a better job at being a king if he placed one on the throne right then and there. That I am lost in useless studies. That whatever I do is still clumsy as if I am a kid.”

You let him rant on because whatever this was, it seemed to work. “I try so hard to meet his every demand. His dreams for me are so challenging to keep up with but I honestly try, I do.”

“I know,” But he was not done. “I try to be a good son for him and my mother and I work really hard and I train really hard and—“

“I know, sweetheart.” You pulled slightly away again, and hated that you saw tears flowing down his face once more. “What did your mother do? Did she do something?”

“She told me to go to my room and that she would come to get me,” The smile on his face was tight. “But I couldn’t.” A single sob left his mouth, defeated. “So I asked Jaemin to sneak me out.”

“You did the right thing,” Jeno shook his head and tried to turn it away from you, but your hands took a hold of it from the back. “Hey,” You forced him into eye contact, and saw that his tear-invaded eyes looked almost drunk. Empty and sluggish. Nothing like his usual sparkling, poem-worthy orbs. “You did the right thing by getting out and away from there.” But he shook his head, so you shook yours in a questioning manner, prodding him to tell you why. “When we get back they will ask him about everything first and then they will ask me. I am just troubling him.”

“Believe me when I say you are not. He is your best friend before he is your guard. He cares about you, sweetheart.”

It took awhile for that to sink in, but it did in the end and he nodded, which was what mattered. And you succeeded at making him smile genuinely when you kissed the tip of his nose.

What truly sucked then was the fact that you could not tell him that his father would love him someday. Because you did not believe in it, and you would not tell him what was a blatant lie to you. And despite it all, your beliefs, you could see how much he wanted to be loved by him. How much he wanted to be recognized by him.

So what could you have told him? ‘You do not need his love.’? That did not sound right. That felt like it was the opposite of what he should have heard. ‘Our love for you is stronger than your father’s lack thereof.’? That simply was not true for him even if it was for you and for Jaemin and for his mother, because there was a hole punched in his heart and he wanted it to be filled. Rightfully so.

In the end, you did not tell him anything related to his father. You just told him what was true to you. “Happy birthday, sweetheart. I am so grateful you are here, with me.”

The Last Breakdown

The two of you had not talked to each other in months, let alone see each other.

The war had been going on for too long at that point. It was a wake up call that showed you just how insatiable rulers were. If it was not land they were looking for, it was people that they could exploit in labor, or valuable reserves like mines or things like historical monuments that could be stolen. People were dying still. Even more so than the beginning, in fact. Some places were left in famine, a lot of places were taken over by other rules. Any war crime you could think of was most likely happening just outside the borders of your family’s rule.

Since day one of your education you had learnt about law and order, and ethics, and just like that they were all thrown out of the window in this chaos.

Standing in neutrality had proved to be harder and harder day by day as well. The economic conditions were not getting any better, trade was almost impossible because of the disassociation the other powers and partners who had declared their sides were putting you through, and the damage was big even though your family’s rule was one of the most powerful. Unemployment rates had risen despite your immense efforts to keep it stable, and in turn, healthcare had become a problem, hunger— especially throughout the population who had already been struggling with making a living below the hunger threshold— had become a problem, crime rates were on the rise.

Which was why your father, by the obligation the sociopolitical states provided him, declared sides one morning. Thinking it would be the best thing to do.

Of course it was opposite to the side where Jeno and his family’s rule had sided with. Your families’ stances had never been the same, so there was absolutely no way they could be now. And frankly, you did not care about that even though you recognized how big of an ordeal it was. All you could care about was the safety of your people and your loved ones in these cruel conditions.

Scratch that. You wanted innocent people to stay out of harm’s way. That was all.

War, in your opinion, was cowardice. You still could not wrap your head around the fact that people were mostly doing this just because they had feuds within themselves and the circle of their class. Hundreds of thousands, even millions of innocent lives were destroyed both literally and figuratively over some disagreements between only several rulers that were their ‘representatives’. Which was in fact the biggest lie you could have ever heard of, because they were just hungry for their exclusive benefits. There was nothing in this war’s roots where the actual folk were represented. Just elite individuals and their selfish problems.

Just because the said elite individuals did not want to make sacrifices.

The biggest cowardice.

After the declaration, the hard work you had to put yourself through was at least doubled if not tripled or quadrupled. You could barely get sleep anymore, and would count yourself lucky if you managed to get some shut-eye for a few hours seeing that even when you did get to lie down on your bed it would be restless with thoughts racing through your head. Most of your responsibilities still revolved around document work but at this point the document work had gotten more important and heavier in and of itself, to the point where your eyes burned and your brain screamed at you to give up reading the papers. The maths of it all had gotten a lot worse as well because now there were so many spontaneous expenses paid that sometimes there would be problems with communicating on time between bureaus and people, which would in turn lead to wrong calculations and wrong reports— which would in turn cause you to do everything from scratch again. Sometimes a single, seemingly minor error would take days to make right again.

The Prince came to visit you on one of those restless nights where you were rolling around in your bed with the discomfort weighing on your mind.

Donghyuck came to your door again and requested the doorkeepers to alert you that he was there. They did, and something in your heart immediately knew what was happening, so you only took your coat and bolted out the door.

And now he is rushing through the halls beside you, with you following him. “Where even are they?” You whisper as you pick your pace up, not even in the condition to feel excited about it.

“There is this abandoned farmhouse in the fields across the town.” He responds back, and your eyes widen. “How are they so close?”

“They are both in the military, your Highness.” His voice is serious as he speaks. “I would expect their stealth to be outstanding.”

Donghyuck leads you outside to the back road of the palace and it is raining outside, definitely with an intention to completely pour down within the hours that would follow. He covers your head as best he can with his jacket and places his hand at the top of the car when he opens the door for you, before hopping in himself.

Which is the exact point that you realize there is no driver, and that he hops into the driver’s seat.

“Donghyuck?” You lean forward with a frown on your face, placing your hand on top of the headrest-less seat which has its quality so that guards and whoever is inside can see the people sitting at the back (usually royals or their guests) better to ensure their safety. “What are you doing?”

“This is not a matter we can bring more people into at this point,” He says as he starts the car. “I basically bribed the guards to shut up about taking you outside the palace. If I brought a driver, I would have had to explain the situation.”

The frown deepens on your face just as he presses the gas and the car starts moving. “With what money?” You ask him, and you genuinely fear his answer at that moment.

He carefully drives his way out, even the guards at the gates not stopping the car to question his antics. It really was a wonder how much money he could have offered to them for their silence at only you leaving the palace with him, at an ungodly hour, in a car, and no other information given. It felt extremely suspicious even for an heir and their primary guard.

You could not help but also notice his silence after starting to drive, so you pushed your question. “Donghyuck, with what money?”

The guards tilts his head and licks his lips before making eye contact with you through the rear mirror for a split second. “I had been saving some from the allowance my mother sends me and from my paychecks for some time,” His eyes turn back to the road as your mouth falls open and your brows furrow, about to protest. But he beats you to it. “It doesn’t matter, really,” He says, and you know he means it, because you can hear the genuineness. “It doesn’t matter if it’s for the relief and happiness of my best friend and the person I’ve vowed to protect.”

At his words, you slump back against the seats. There is a lump in your throat that makes it hard to speak, so you do not. You only turn your gaze to the scenery outside your window and take out your necklace through the collar of your coat, holding your engagement ring in shame. It does give you comfort, but you still find yourself wanting to cry.

The ride does not take too long despite the rain, as there are no people outside and on the roads because of the dark-out policy, and since it is a fairly straight drive with no hills to drive up.

The two of you reach the farmhouse without a hassle. Donghyuck puts the car somewhere less visible (even though it is nighttime and the car’s exterior matches the dark) before he allows you to get out. He then guides you to the barn where the Prince and his guard must be and opens the doors.

Again, there are a couple of lanterns around that provide dim and unnoticeable light. The heir and his guard are standing apart, and you can see your love walking up and down with his hands linked at his back. He halts, however, when he sees you.

You waste no time in running into his arms, and the ugly sob that leaves your body is loud enough for everybody to hear when you tackle him with your arms around his neck and shoulders. The tears break free when you nuzzle yourself into him everywhere, squeezing him tight for numerous reasons. Because you missed him so incredibly much, because everything was going bad, because you were tired and you knew he was also tired, because he is looking better than last time where he almost gave you a heart attack, because you love him, and because it hurts that everything has come to a point where two of the people that care about both of you the most, and two of whom you care about the most, has to put themselves in danger and through many sacrifices. Because you feel ashamed for what you are causing. Because somehow everyone standing in that barn is hurt someway or another, even if they are things that all of you can make right whether it be by yourselves or with help.

“I have you, sweetheart,” Jeno whispers as he kisses your cheek, catching a tear that was trailing its way down. You smile at your shared and reserved nickname for the times where one of you had to console the other while they cried, but it is still a bitter one, because you can hear his choked voice as well. “I have you. It is alright.”

But you can see Jaemin behind him and Donghyuck, who is looking down at the ground. Jaemin looks at you with pity and genuine sadness, so much of those that you cannot give them a meaning. Yet it fires something in you when he looks at you like that. The best you can do is to cover your eyes with your hand. “Jeno, we—“

“I know. I know, my love.” He kisses you once more, this time from the top of your head. He rubs your back and holds you tight in his arms as you cry in your shame and emotional overload.

Why does it have to be this way? You think. Why is it so hard to make things work? Why is abhorrence at the base of everything, even love? I love you and you love me, so why do others have to be involved? Why do other factors have to be involved? And even if they have to be involved, why do others have to get hurt because of our love? Why does everything need to be so precise in order to have a chance for this to work? Why can’t this be happy and like a game again, where our excitement is caused by the fluttering of our hearts and not because of the dread that makes our heart race? Why do you have to do what you have to do, and why do I have to do what I have to do?  Outside of our love, why do people have to suffer? Why are people so selfish and filled with so much hatred that there is no place in their hearts for negotiation nor empathy? Why does everything link back to those people in the first place? Why are those people in charge of everything in life?

You weep, and Jeno holds you. He sits you down, and pulls you close to his lap, and he holds you. He asks the guards to please wait somewhere else, and he holds you. Your weeping subsides, and he holds you.

And you remember, when all that is left is your sniffling, that his voice was choked too. That he was about to cry too, when you first walked in.

So you ask him with your hoarse voice. “Why were you upset before, when I first saw you?”

His hand that holds you pulls you close a little tighter. “I wanted to tell you something, but I don’t think I can.”

Your eyes furrow again, but you nod once. “Why?”

He chuckles this deep, airy, thick huff that is full to the brim with emotions you cannot quite decipher, and then says what is on his mind. And his voice is so sad, so loaded and tired that you tear up again at his hopeless words. “I suppose you would not love me the same.”

A tear falls onto his hand resting on his lap with that.

The First ‘I Love You’

Dreamy, was all you could say about it.

It was the fruit of most probably the stupidest thing you two had ever done in your relationship. On one summer night where Jeno and his family were hosting a dance for his cousin’s engagement, he had stood beside you and leant into your ear to tell you that you should meet with him at the vineyard in their garden in half an hour, and excuse yourself saying you are going to your room. He seemed to be playful that night, conversing with anyone and everyone that stood in his way and entertaining them; genuinely happy for his cousin and his fiancé. On top of being entertaining, he looked like he was entertained as well. Aside from the happiness he felt for the couple, there was this whole-hearted, content smile on his face. Even when nobody was conversing with him, or looking at him.

You had gone there as a representative with only Donghyuck accompanying you. The King and the Queen were too busy with duties revolving around politics— and in all honesty, they did not want to be too involved with his family in the first place. So they had sent you as a solution.

It was a good solution for them and you. You could not protest such a plan.

Half an hour seemed to not pass at first. You were eager to be with him, as you did not have the time to meet beforehand, and to be close to him. There was something about the way he made you feel when he smiled around and beamed like a sun under the moonlight with his happiness like that.

To make the time pass, you did everything you could possibly think of. You conversed with people you do not have the slightest connections to, barely knowing who they were. Congratulated the engaged couple with a polite manner and got surprised by the same politeness they seemed to showcase. In return delivered a short speech to them about how lucky they were to find each other and to be with the person they loved and be open and celebrated about it in a world like yours where relationships like theirs between a royal and a commoner were hard to come by.

As if on cue, Donghyuck who must have been informed about the meeting beforehand called for you from just behind you, prompting you to excuse yourself by saying you had already had quite the travel, and that you would be leaving early tomorrow morning. That you had to catch some rest before you left for duty. They nodded in understanding and thanked you for coming, sending their best wishes to your family.

They were almost too good for the royal family they belonged to, but all of it was genuine.

Donghyuck walked you to the front yard then, taking you to the small vineyard area where Jeno was standing. Jaemin was at a distance as far as you could tell, conversing with other staff that seemed to not be guards. Soon enough, though, the staff he had talked to would leave and go to the backyard where the celebration was, leaving the four of you alone in the visible distance.

Jeno met you halfway, greeting you with a sweet peck on your lips. “Welcome, dove,” From the side of your eyes you saw Donghyuck leaving after seeing you two meet to greet Jaemin in the distance.

You giggled at Jeno’s words then, looking at his eyes that bore the rather occasional glasses that night. “I have been here for quite a while now.” He tilted his head and nodded, squinting his eyes, silently saying you are right but not spot on. “But you haven’t been here when it is completely empty. An immensely different version of this place.”

Furrowing your brows, you smiled at him mischievously. “What are you trying to imply?”

And he played along. “The guards are changing shifts,” With a hand, he moved his jacket’s sleeve to look at his watch with slightly furrowed brows. “We still have around five minutes, and I was thinking we could go to my room.”

He beat you to it to understand the rather shocking and awkward way his words sounded. “Only if you would like to.” Even under the weak light of the stars, you could see the embarrassment flushed over his face. The boldness he held had almost dissipated.

All honesty due, you wanted to go to his room. It sounded amazing, getting to spend time with him one-on-one completely alone for the first time outside of a library, where even guards would not enter to leave you unbothered while doing your studies. You wanted to have him to yourself truly, without guards or anybody else for once. So you nodded. “I would like that.”

The smile was back on his face. “Then we should hurry up.”

Taking your hand in his, he hurried you inside. Their palace was just as grand as yours. It was dizzying with the halls and the open plan, grand staircases, and it held a lot of colors to it presumably because of the warm climate. Paintings on the walls, lots of feature walls with art painted onto them, gold linings and marble floors. Nothing like yours, which is older than theirs so a bit grimmer with the colors. The cold climate had its effects on it too. Mostly everything was either dark in color like deep blues and greens or extremely light like almost-white grey, with old wood on the rooms’ floors and stone in the halls.

When you entered Jeno’s room, it felt weirdly familiar. Both of you had balconies, for instance. His balcony doors were right beside his bed, and his room was cluttered with bookshelves just like yours, blueprints and pencils lying around on his desk and his paintings of planets and constellations leaning against the wall under his desk, some of his favorite research papers and scientific articles messily pinned on a big cork board.

His room felt a lot like him to you. It looked all about his interests, anything other than politics which seemed to drain both of your personalities out slowly but surely.

It looked like a safe space.

He showed you his paintings and told you all about them. His love for Neptune for example, how he liked its color and its personation in mythology. How he loved sketching stars the way he understood them from the books he read, transitioning through their seven stages of life, growing bigger and stronger until they expand into a Red Giant where it is its biggest at a diameter up to a hundred times of its original diameter to then transform into a White Dwarf where everything is dense and quickly growing cold, losing all of its personality, and finally the Black Dwarves where they were so old and so cold. Jeno went on to talk to you about how in way too far into the future eventually all the stars would be Black Dwarves and the universe would be even colder than it was then, but that there would be a second explosion where something new started.

He showed you his blueprints, skimming through the lines with his fingers, and told you how he dreamt of renovating the palace with his own prints someday. And he told you about the scientists that would inspire him to not give up on learning about space no matter what.

Jeno did talk about his interests, but usually they were confined to conversations in the library. Never had you once seen him talk about it so passionately before, the kind of passion where it added new sparks to his eyes, and something about it made you extremely happy to see.

At some point he realized he had been rambling about all these things in his room and the stories behind them, and had apologized. “Ah,” He rubbed his nape as it hit him with a chuckle. “Sorry. I get excited when people pay attention to these.”

“No, don’t,” You shrugged with your own smile. “You should not be sorry. It is very refreshing to see someone be so passionate about something.”

There is the start of a silence, but you cut through it before it can take over, pointing to the board. “And I agree with those scientists. Keep learning about the universe in your free time. It would be a shame if you got shackled to the small ground underneath.”

Jeno laughed at that, his shoulders shaking with the airy release. When it died down he looked around his room, his bookcases and desk, and the door that led to his bathroom, the documents he had taken care of that day before the event had started placed on the armchair next to the bookshelf, several notes set on them reminding him to do the things he had to take care of the next day.

And then he huffed, walking over to his bed and sitting down. He fiddled with his fingers a little. Looked up at the ceiling. Another lonely chuckle left him as he contemplated on what he wanted to say. “Can you.. Do you think—?“ One more fierce huff through his nose, but then he looked at you. “Can you not go to your room tonight?”

He saw that you were about to protest on auto-control, so he stopped it before it could happen, and made it a silent promise to himself that it would be okay if you wanted to leave. Even if it happened to be right then. “We do not have doorkeepers at night. No offense to how your family does things, but it feels creepy for me to have it, so we just do not have them. You would not be stuck or anything.” He shrugged, smiling but pouting at the same time, if it could even be a thing. “It is just really nice to have you in here.”

With the comfort of what he had just told you, you smiled and hoped Donghyuck would not lose his mind until the morning. “I think I can stay.”

Walking over to him on his bed, you stood in front of him and let him hug your middle with his head on your stomach. You ran your fingers through his hair repeatedly knowing he liked the combing feeling on his scalp. At some point while you played with his hair and scalp he tilted his head, placing his chin on your stomach instead and looking up at you with a smile on his face. The genuine, happy and content smile you had seen on his face throughout the night before you fled to his room. “I think I am in love with you and I don’t know what to do.”

Your fingers faltered with the smile that spread on your face, and the warmth that spread through your chest surely reached everywhere at the spoken knowledge of being loved. Truly and utterly loved.

You had your suspicions of it before with the way his words sounded and the way he acted. But to hear them being confirmed, so casually and bold and with confidence, made you feel like the most important person alive. In a different way than how it had felt all your life. Like it was only the two of you that mattered on the face of the Earth. Hell, like it was only the two of you that existed on the face of the Earth.

Then your hands retracted from his hair to carefully take his glasses off, putting them on the side table closest to you. Slowly you knelt down until you were face to face with him, and told your love your only request from him. “Kiss me and promise me a forever.”

So he did. Jeno gulped a little at first, keeping his eye contact with an intense gaze, one that mirrored everything in and around him. But then he crashed your lips with his, bringing a hand up to your neck and tugging at it gently in hopes of bringing you down onto the bed with him, which ended up being a wish that you granted. You let him pull you down and lay you down on the bed underneath him as he kissed you, not only on your lips anymore but anywhere he could find exposed. “I don’t want to call you dove anymore, as pretty as it is.”

“Hm?” Was all you could respond with as he kissed your neck. “I want to call you my love.”

At that did something burn and tumble inside you, and you found yourself talking before you could hold it back. “Say that again.”

He laughed out a huff. “My love,” He kissed your collarbone, nibbling only a little, driving you two to the edge with the frustration of what did not come after. “My love,” The nook between your jaw and your neck. “My love.” And your lips, sinking down with all he could offer you. It sounded better— more right in his ears to call you that, and you had to admit that the feeling of being treated exactly like what he called you was otherworldly.

When he pulled away from you, his lips puffy and his gaze still intense yet somewhat softer with the adoration that made itself more apparent, he gave his promise. “I love you my love, and I will for an eternity.”

With a laugh, you gave him your own promise right then and there too. “I promise to love you until the end of time.”

He found it appropriate to meet his lips with yours again, and this time, it was with a newfound hunger you had for each other, filled with the wish to know one another on a level you could not know otherwise had you not loved each other, intimate and private and special. The kind that made your heart race and your stomach twist in the best way possible. The kind that did not feel rushed, but instead gave you relief in knowing yes, it had not been wrong all this time. It was him for you, and for him it was you; the one.

Jeno made love to you that night when he asked you if he could and you gave him the permission, wanting to lose yourself in him and his love and yours. For once you got to spend a whole night with him, making love and talking and showing your love to each other.

And after that, the memory of him under his white sheets kissing you and laughing with the light blue of the lifting night, and the weak but golden-white rays of the early morning sun became the dearest thing to your heart and mind.

Jeno and white, and Jeno in white reminded you of that night.

The Last Goodbye

Everything starts at the dead of the night.

You do not know what was more alarming to you. The crashing sounds of windows that woke you up from your light sleep? The hurried steps that turned into running outside your room, breaking into an unsettling rhythm in the pure silence? The sound of crashing doors and harshly turned locks? The sounds of metal clanking? The occasional firing of the guns and the couple of groans and shouts that follow them? The shouted codes between the guards right outside your room? The surprised curses that leave whoever’s mouths? The unsettling feeling of not knowing who is who outside, perhaps?

Or the fact that you are completely alone for a few minutes, not knowing where to hide because of the shock?

More, the fact that Donghyuck takes longer than you would expect him to come get you, pushing you into thinking did they get to him? Did something happen to him?

There is not a single question in your mind about what this is. The palace is getting raided with soldiers— not that many like a whole army, considering the somewhat inactive nature the commotion seemed to have while you listened to it from your room. Never did you ever feel grateful that your room was placed in a deep and unsophisticated hall away from the library and the archives and the throne room, but you felt so grateful for it as you could do nothing but hide yourself away, locking the balcony doors and covering the doors with your curtains— completely blacking your room out.

You hurry over to the bathroom then, waiting next to the wardrobe sunken into the wall, knowing the far right compartment of it has an opening to a pathway between the walls of the rooms in between the halls that is otherwise inaccessible except from the way down.

The commotion grows more aggressive as you wait. Gunshots grew more frequent yet did not fail to make you jump in your place, and it is when you hear an order of search around that you lock yourself further in your room, locking the bathroom doors as well. You could not see anything, so there was nothing to do but wait for Donghyuck until he came to get you. Just opening the compartment and walking into it was not a possibility as well, since you had no idea what was and was not going on down under the palace.

You lose sense of time as you sit on the cold, stone floor of your bathroom. You lose a big chunk of your sense of self as well. That big chunk of your self melts into the sense you lost, vision, and doubles your attention on hearing. Everything sounds more clear, more violent, and more scary, as you hear bodies falling onto the ground and punches and kicks if it was not guns and daggers. You did not even know such sounds could leave from people’s mouths when they shouted orders and codes and warnings.

Maybe you wait for an hour. Maybe for a few. Or only a few minutes. But in the end someone opens the compartment open silently, filling the bathroom with the artificial light coming from the lantern in their hand, and you only hope that it is Donghyuck.

Thankfully, it is.

His head peeks out from the door and he searches for you, rushing over when he spots you. He kneels down on his feet to level with you and holds his arm out. “Are you okay?”

“I am,” You say, but truthfully, you do not know how you are. You are okay in the sense that you do not have any wounds or injuries, but experiencing something so violent you had only known in theory before? Could anybody be okay when they experience such things, and are separated from the people they care about, completely isolated even though it is in an effort to keep them safe?

Donghyuck links his arm in yours and pulls you off the floor and bolts the two of you out of the compartment door. He locks it behind him, and takes his belt off of his pants, rounding it around the top of the door hinge and securing it by tying— trying to push the door forwards and back, satisfied when it does not budge the slightest bit.

He then picks the lantern he had placed on the ground and rushes over to you, leading you to the narrow stone stairway and taking you down.

The way down is far deep. You pass through rooms you had not known existed, open and close countless doors at the top of the stairways, and you have a good feeling that you go way down under the ground floor of the palace. But you arrive at the destination within a few minutes of basically running down the stairs nonetheless, and you know it is the lair under the palace that you had never been in before.

It is almost a smaller version of the palace. There is a lounging area, a very compact library and office separated in a small room, a kitchen and a bathroom all the same. The place has its own landline— though you hardly expect it to be available to anyone outside of staff.

You can see the council members, some of the military officials, and their personal guards, along with some staff from the kitchen who had most probably been doing early preparation for the next day. There are documents of all kinds sprawled across the lounge table and some across the floor, and you see the military officials jotting down their notes, as well as the heads of the council. All eyes land on you when you walk down the last step and hear Donghyuck close the door from behind.

Your parents are nowhere to be seen.

With your hands sweating immediately and clammy, you ask. “Where are my parents?”

Your father’s senior advisor stands up and walks over to you as a few others look down. There is nothing good that could come out of that, and you feared the answer, to the point where you do not know if you want to hear it. The advisor lands his hands at the sides of your arms, a touch you do not mind and find rather comfortable, considering you had known him your entire life and would trust him with everything. “Your Highness,” He starts. Donghyuck comes to stand just a step behind you before he can continue. “The King has gotten severely injured, but he is stable and soon he will hopefully be in good health.” His wrinkled, bright eyes look at you behind his glasses reassuringly and calmly. You wonder how he actually feels. “We are taking him and the Queen away to a safer place away from here. With some of our best doctors at their company.”

Worried, you feel your heart skip a beat. You can feel the sadness running to your head and chest like a wild horse, but the confusion that hits you presses it back down. “How will we deal with this if he is not here?”

The old advisor glances behind over his shoulder, and at the agreeing nods, he turns back to face you. He clears his throat. “The King is unable to attend to his duties presumably for a much longer time than the matter at hand, and the Queen is royal by crown and not by blood. Therefore, she cannot be the next ruler.”

Opening his mouth, he takes a big breath, and gives you the news with a full chest. “Hence why we need you, as our new monarch.”

A wave of high voltage electric rushes over you then within less than a second. His voice being calm, and him speaking the words out trying to ease you into them does not help at all. You feel like your knees will give out but you do not let them, because there is this part in your brain that has somehow already accepted this and is screaming at you to keep your composure. What leaves your mouth, though, is not much the same. “I can- I cannot do that, my education—“

You get cut off with reassuring words. “Your education would have continued until the day you had no chance but to become the monarch, no matter how long it took,” And then with some of encouragement. “Most fruitful practice comes out of the ruling process, and it is very unfortunate that you are in this situation your Highness, but you have trained for this all your life. There is not a person in this room who can do this better than you.”

And you can feel all eyes on you, pitying you and worried for you. Although pitiful, their eyes do have good meanings behind them for the most part, wishing you good luck for both their sake and yours. It is understandable even though it hurts to see it.

Taking another breath, the advisor speaks, holding you tighter between his hands and rubbing them a little to ground you. “I will bring the book now, okay?”

Without a single thought, you nod.

It happens in a blink of your eyes. The advisor moves to the library and everybody stands up from their seats, and those who're standing away come just a bit closer. They still give you the space you need, and Donghyuck pats your shoulder lightly, giving you the most genuine smile he could muster at that moment. And when the senior advisor comes back he holds out the book of constitutional law upright, looks into your eyes seriously, tells you to put a hand on the book and the other in the air, and asks you to repeat the Oath after him. “You can take your time,”

But you do not. You repeat the words after him at the same pace. I vow to protect my people and love them as my own family. I vow to work towards my people’s best interests. I vow to see and listen to them. I vow to see them as my equals no matter the situation and the differences. I vow to never stop working for the betterment of my own, until the day I pass, or until the day I have to step down. I vow to see my place on the throne sacred and important, and I vow to recognize my power and its consequences. And I take the oath, right now and in the witness of my aiders and the people, to serve them as their monarch for the days to come.

Everyone in the room bows and kneels around you, and you take your hand off the book. Just like that you become the monarch and nothing about it is as you imagined, even though you have never imagined it before.

“Your Excellence,” The advisor smiles a soothing smile. The change of honorifics feel unnatural immediately. “I sincerely hope better days are destined for your rule.”

You hope so, too.

There is no time for anything to sink in as the seniors all take you into the small library to have a meeting. They tell you all they know, that a remote number of soldiers still roaming around at least a couple thousand have broken into the palace and the nearby town mostly in civilian outfits, and that there is a number of people that has been taken hostage. Not much damage was done according to them, as in there was not an expectedly big number of people who had lost their lives as these some thousands of soldiers broke their way in. The towns were left in relatively good shape. “I suspect they are here for the palace and your father, your Excellence.” One of the military personnel says, and adds. “Our troops are after the soldiers with all their equipment to take the hostages back. They will be severely outnumbered, so I am positive we will succeed.”

And then, they talk about national security following this night, and the guards who have lost a significant amount of staff. They talk about the upcoming days where you would have to appear in front of your people to address these events and to give your condolences, describing in detail what is being done in the aftermaths of this first-hand attack your people and you have experienced, and what will be done to ensure the security’s, the justice’s, the politics’ and the legislation’s wellbeing, as well as addressing your efforts of the sociopolitical betterment that will inevitably see positive progress if you do the right things.

That is exactly what scares you to no extent. The possibility of not doing the right things at a time like this.

So when they leave, you stay in the library, digging into your most trusted sources of law, security and sociology. You take notes, and read, and take more notes, and think of how you might apply these theoretical things practically, and take notes when the ideas come to discuss with the advisor later, and read— and it becomes a cycle. At one point the landline in the library that you had not noticed its existence of rings, and you get the news that around a dozen of soldiers have gotten captured across the land, one close to the palace who was being interrogated. You work on the documents given to you by the seniors, sometimes calling them in and asking them questions and advice on your notes as they have been specifically at these things for years. You do not recall ever working harder before in so many areas at the same time, and you hate that it is such a thin ice you are walking on. One wrong step and you fall in the icy water, bringing the people you have vowed to protect along with you.

Some things go well. The hostages got released suspiciously early on, before the troops in your rule could get to them. They took the hundreds of hostages back with them for interrogation and to provide them food and water, and if needed, healthcare. Which only meant one thing, really.

This was a dirty work. An attempt at an assassination, most likely targeting specifically your father, and espionage. A wide network of an espionage, and thousands of soldiers had left with whatever information they had. Their targets were you and your family, not the people, even though a good part of them got affected.

It felt incredibly wrong for you to admit it, but you were almost grateful that the palace was the target instead of the people. You would have rather lost information than people, because you were strong, and you knew you could tackle whatever problem was thrown at your way once you got the hang of things.

And since you do not have the luxury of time, you were already getting the hang of things slowly but surely.

After a couple of hours, while you are tackling everything related to law and law in war as they are most important to you for the night, Donghyuck excuses himself in with a knock at the door.

By the way his face looked, you could tell you were going to get bad news.

“Your Majesty,” He starts. But you notice that he cannot find it in himself to look into your eyes. “I have the reports back from the interrogation of one of the captured soldiers.”

He hands you the papers, and you gladly take them. Name, Huang Renjun. Position, Private. Why did they raid? To get information from the archives. For what reason? For the use of the King. Was he involved in the assassination attempt? No, he was not appointed to that purpose. Did he hate your land? No, he did what he had to do. Why did he have to do it? Because he has a mother to look after, and the military pays well enough. Why was he involved in espionage? Because he had done it before. Why was he dressed in uniform? Because he wanted to get back to his mother if he ever got caught and had to serve time in jail, he did not want to take the right away from her— the right to visit him. Why was he shaking? They would not do anything to his mother, right? No, they would not. They are not that type of people. He has been providing useful information and been hopefully truthful until now, could he tell his lieutenant’s name?

Lee Jeno.

Surely it cannot be real.

You look at Donghyuck, and see him looking at you now. “I’m sorry.” Is all he can say.

It is as if someone pours a bucket of boiling hot water down your head, and another bucket of ice cold right after. You feel your heart sink. Disappointed, sad, let down, but what hurts the most is that you do not feel like it does not make sense.

Your hand tightens, squeezing the pen in your hold as the other lifts to rub your temple, both elbows placed on the table for support. Although you want to cry and scream, what leaves your mouth instead is an airy, unhumorous chuckle.

It takes a few seconds for it to kick in. “Take me to him.”

The guard opens his mouth, but you shut him up. “I do not care where and how. Just take me to him.”

Donghyuck comes back to get you in what feels like less than an hour.

When you get out of the small office you had been stuck in for hours, most of the military and security advisors and seniors are nowhere to be seen. They were most probably dealing with the finalization of the reports of the captured soldiers, transferring them to the hands of the judiciary system. The lair, at that point, was more of a place used simply because the palace could not be used still. Duties were still duties and not all of them could be delivered to a few floors underground.

The senior advisor— your senior advisor was about to protest when he saw you walk away with Donghyuck alone, but you simply told him you had to see it for yourself as the reason for your outing. You decline when he offers you more company, saying he could provide you with more guards.

Then, you were out.

But you do not make your way through the palace. It hurts when you notice Donghyuck is taking you through the basement again, even though it makes sense. Nobody knew about the tunnel system still.

You make a note in your mind to change that after today.

Feeling numb in the eerie quiet of the palace, you let Donghyuck lead the way, helping him with the furniture, dropping down the trapdoor, and walking beside him. Neither of you talk. What could he possibly say? What Jeno had done was beyond words.

When you arrive at the end of the tunnels him and his guard are there. Standing in silence. You pick your pace up, unlike the excited and hurried steps you used to take, but angry, disappointed and confronting. Jaemin looks at you before he does, and you see his pitiful look. He does not greet you with the usual nod he does. Jeno looks at you only when you are a couple of big strides away from him, his eyes bright at first, but dimming slowly.

This is the first time you meet him ‘alone’ in early daylight. And frankly, you do not care if somebody finds this place and discovers him at that point.

Taking the last couple of strides, you come to a halt in front of him with a considerable distance between you two. Your chest rises up and down with all the emotions you are feeling and all the thoughts that are racing through your head. With one particularly angry breath, you speak. “Jeno, I have one request from you, and that is for you to tell me my best friend and primary guard is lying and mean it.” At the mention of your guard you had pointed at him with your finger, looking into Jeno’s eyes to find something.

But he does not speak. Because he cannot lie. Because your best friend and guard was, in fact, not lying to you. Because he really was at the lead of all of this. And the guilt, you could see in his eyes that did everything to avoid your intense gaze.

Figures you were not the only one who noticed that, because you hear the sound of Donghyuck’s pistol behind you. You look back at him to see his gun pointed at Jeno, and you hear another one drawn behind you. Namely Jaemin’s, pointed at Donghyuck.

Everything really kicks in then.

Alarmed, you raise your voice. “Nobody is shooting anyone.”

Jeno does nothing. Does not back you up, nor say his independent thought. He just watches, frozen in place, looking at you and yet not looking at you. “Donghyuck, lower your gun down.”

“But—“ You shut him up for the second time within a few hours. “I said, lower your gun down.”

He does, and Jaemin follows suit. You turn back to look at the person standing in front of you.

You do not know who this person is, you cannot tell. Because the Jeno who stands before you is not the one you know. He is not the one you love as well. Because the Jeno you love is someone who has his own pride, feelings, dreams and conscience. Someone who has his own passions. Someone who stands against all the bad and all the evil. He is someone who loves people and who loves you, who is truthful to the people he loves and cares about. And he cares about a lot of people.

But this person in front of you, this Jeno, is not him. This is someone who wanted his father’s acceptance so much that he let it swallow him whole. When, even though he protested he was not, he was someone fully capable of making his own decisions. This is someone who is alright with being used as a puppet for the foreseeable future. This is someone that gave up his personality and dreams just to go with someone else’s. This is someone that did not care if others got hurt because of him. This is someone who is selfish, willfully blind and deaf.

The Jeno standing in front of you was someone you would pity at best. The Jeno that stood in front of you was someone that would be much like his father. Not respected and looked down upon. Oblivious to his doings.

There was so much you wanted for the person that stood in front of you. You desperately wanted him to have a part of himself that recognized the things he had done until this point, whatever he did to you and long before that. You wanted him to experience the aftermath for years to come. To hear the consequences was one thing— they could enter through one ear and immediately come out of the other, as fast as if he had not even heard it. But seeing the consequences would be different. Turning a blind eye every single day would be impossible. You want him to live in the reality of what has happened, and you want some part of him to recognize everything from today on as well.

Looking at his empty eyes, you furrow your brows and sigh. “Most of the soldiers will be handed over once their judiciary process is done. They were caught in uniform.”

You do not even feel like talking to him. It is so disappointing, he is so disappointing; you had such hopes both for the two of you and him. He had his dreams and this person he wanted to grow to be. And nothing about this was what hope entailed for you two. Individually and as a pair, and as people who had huge populations of people dependent on you and following you.

Instead of saying all the things you would like to say to him, you reach for your necklace with a shaky sigh. You take it off, and hold the ring out for him to take.

Jeno obediently opens his hand under yours, and you drop the ring into his palm. You cannot even find it in yourself to close his hand when he fails to do it promptly. Partly because you are scared you are doing the wrong thing and that there is hope for him still, and partly because you knew you would break if you did.

“Leave, Jeno. Take your hand off my rule, my people and my family. Take your men, too.” You take a deep breath and straighten up, looking deep into his eyes that still have sparks somehow.

Not being strong was not an option. “And never come back.”

Jeno nods only once ever so slightly, gulping and closing his palm, putting the necklace into his chest pocket before turning back on his heel and walking out into the bright and silver snowy morning light that surely consumes him whole with his guard on his trail.

It is extremely difficult to watch him walk away. Because the bottled up emotions rush to your chest and the memories rush to your mind, and it hurts when the acknowledgement of the past few years of your life is being thrown into the trash dawns on you. The past genuinely beautiful and happy years of your life where the two of you had taken so many risks, so many things to account, had told so many lies to make everything work. Where you had shared so many laughs, some tears, a lot of secrets- the biggest secret the two of you could possibly ever share, so many kisses and fond words and physical affection. Where you had shared your true love at the expense of living it undercover. Because you had loved each other so purely and so intensely that you could do anything for each other. Still, you believed that what you two had was such an incredible, true, and big thing.

Which was exactly why your heart physically hurt when he disappeared from your sight.

Because you knew who did this was not him, and that the person who disappeared from your personal life for good was not him. The ‘him’ you loved was nowhere to be found in whoever this was; someone who lived according to the strings that were being pulled. Who this person once was, would only live in your memories. And even those, with the start of your healing process, would slowly but surely die down.

So much for an eternity.

The First Vow

After the war everything turned back to normal slowly but surely.

You were becoming better and better at this ruling business you had to attend to, keeping in touch with the communities more in the aftermaths, occupied with duties of all kinds from any branch, meeting people, going on travels for said meetings, seeing beautiful sceneries. There would be new faces at the palace to get acquainted with every once in a while. You would get to go to trips in your own land, visiting farmers and asking about how harvest season was treating them, visiting businesses to see if they could hold up in the fragility of post-war days, visiting families in need to have a chat with them and hear them out, to see if you could do anything for them. More often than not you would be able to provide them care and whatever else it was that they needed. Sometimes you would visit schools and the neighborhoods no one dared to go into, and you would try to help them, too.

Sometimes you would check on the prisons and courts to see how the atmosphere was, and sometimes you would have a brief chat with Renjun on visiting days, updating him on his judiciary situation yourself.

Did the anxiety completely dissipate after what happened? No. Definitely not. The fact that you had gone through espionage on a very big scale was a fact that still stood strong.

But your father was there to aid you with his wisdom. Back on his feet and retired, living at a house far from the palace, your mother and him kept the doors open for you for whenever you had the time or the wish to pay a visit. Him and your mother’s experiences as well as their advice helped you so much during the beginning of your rule where everything felt like you had to learn how to walk again. You were grateful for them and your advisor, who would not comply with your words and just retire because he wanted to help you out as long as he possibly could.

Some things were nice. You were adored by the people, because you had been loyal to the oath you had taken so far. Your full days and duties were keeping your mind off of most things that could bring you down. The palace staff and you seemed to have a close relationship as well, genuinely having fun in your daily life because of your young aura that beamed with energy. Truthfully you were energetic. There was no way you could do what you did if you were not as energetic. You pushed yourself to be happy too, reminded yourself of these things to keep you going.

Yet, some things were bad. There were a lot of things that you could not get no matter how hard you tried, but that was okay, because you were trying no matter what too. The fact that your parents had moved out left you with the reality of living alone in an utterly gigantic space. You would have to eat breakfasts and dinners alone, reading a book while you ate because no one would agree to have a meal with you even though you told them it was okay— except for Donghyuck who would agree to have lunch with you most days. Going to your room would leave a bitter taste inside your mouth. And when you laid down on your bed, sometimes the daydreams of what you could have been come up.

You try to push them away, but sometimes you find yourself breaking down over them anyway.

And then, there are some realities. Like the fact that all these duties, although incredibly helpful at distracting, were growing to be a bit too much for you. The fact that you really needed to share these duties with someone to get some workload off your shoulders. The fact that although wise and helpful, your advisor is growing older and older, and you want him to have a retirement.

The fact that you need another monarch.

It is ridiculous how you deal with it. On one restless night where your mind is flooded with things you need to take care of and the things that are yet to come, you find yourself leaving your bed and your room. Without a drop of sleep in your eyes you walk down the halls and greet the guards silently with a smile on your face, changing the wings of the palace twice to go to the far left end and walking down numerous sets of stairs to get to the room you were looking for.

When you do get to it, you knock only once and excuse yourself in not caring if the guards were staring, finding your guard and best friend on his bed about to pass out. “Why is there such a thing where royals can walk into places without any alert beforehand?”

“I knocked.” He hums at that, and you move to take the seat in the chair at his desk across from his side of the bed. You look at him, who has his arms under his pillow, and think that it is better to pull the bandaid quickly rather than easing it. “Donghyuck.”

“Hm?” You love how he has given up on the honorific in this setting. Usually he would call you by your rather new honorific to get his mouth used to it. “Will you marry me?”

He snickers. “Isn’t that a rather important question to ask me at this hour?” You only smile, so he questions further with his squinted eyes. “Why?”

You shrug. “I need someone to share duties with, and I need someone who will understand me. The only person I can trust is you.”

That makes him smile sleepily, a soft huff of breath leaving his nose, causing his chest to jolt a bit forward. “Well I think I will have to take you up on that.”

“You do not have to,” You whine, a bit annoyed at yourself. “I can hold on for longer. Assign another senior advisor, I don’t know.” But it would not be the same as having someone you could constantly trust. And you needed that, someone who can be there for you whenever you needed them to, as much as you needed another monarch.

You also needed a partner if you were to commit to something so big.

“No, really,” He assures. “I feel honored. I don’t have much of a life outside of my life as your guard already. Which is okay, because I love it. I love that I get to spend so much time with my closest friend despite what they have to do, so when you ask that from me, it feels as something I would only benefit from,” There is a silence before he picks his words back up again, realizing they do not sound the greatest when they are left there. “As a person.”

“It is not that simple,” You warn him as you feel he leaves out some important points. “You will be the King. That is going to take a lot of work, at least a couple of years’ intense education. And all this time you have gotten used to shadowing people. It is a completely different thing to have countless shadows following you with every step you take.”

In all honesty you expect for him to consider it. To retract from his words, and to say that he is in fact not fit to that role because he wants to live a life more free. But he does not. Donghyuck just smiles and buries his face deeper into the pillow, and holds out a hand to you. “I was serious when I said I’ll have to take you up on that. I am willing to do whatever it takes.”

Relief washes over you then. It feels as if almost a big, heavy weight has been lifted from your shoulders at the knowledge that you will get to have someone to really help you out with everything and be there for you; someone who you will be willing to do all the same for them. And how fortunate it was that your closest friend would be that someone, because you think you lacked the energy to look out for new people at this point.

You sigh as you place your hand in his, holding onto his fingers when his curl into yours. “Thank you.” You whisper, and feel your hand get tugged towards him before you can feel his lips on your knuckles. “Let’s give these people the most flamboyant royal wedding they will ever witness.”

The two of you share a light laugh that would have surely been louder if it was not for the stupidly late hour this conversation took place in.

And that was it.

You had to remove Donghyuck from his position as your guard when you announced your engagement, getting rings the day after the conversation and breaking the news to the council at an emergency meeting. Thankfully they seemed to be on board with that, and teased the two of you for all the times you disappeared together without much explanation.

It made your heart pang that no, although you had disappeared together you two had not been the lovers. It was for and with someone else. Nonetheless, you were glad that they felt that way, so you made light of the situation by joining in on their laughs.

Donghyuck starts his education immediately after the announcement. It is a nightmarish process almost, seeing him so deep into studies you are far too acquainted with at that point, being reminded of your own struggles trying to learn. Sometimes you would meet him at the library if you had piled up document work to meet and work with him, which would result in him asking you questions about stuff he did not understand when the tutor was not around. Some other times he would nervously laugh at the dinner table (that he could finally join you at) when you would quiz him on things he should have learned, but he would do a great job at that as well, even with his occasional slip-ups.

Donghyuck would make public appearances with you from time to time, and the people would be loving the idea of you and him together. They would tell you how you went so well with each other and how you were so powerful together and they were great compliments, they were, but sometimes they would hurt you deep down even though you had a smile on your face.

In the first year of his education, you get a letter inviting you to a conference held in impartial land. A conference where safety measures and war prevention will be the focus, and one that will be held annually. You agree to it, go alone, see faces (one face in particular) that you do not want to see, and come back.

At a grand meal close to the end of the year with your family and the staff and the council and their own families, someone asks about the wedding plans. That happens to be the exact moment when you realize you do not have plans for your own wedding, and they tell you it is okay before drunkenly jumping from idea to idea on the colors and the venue and whatever else they had to talk about.

Mid-year after that, you slowly start letting Donghyuck in your business. You give him first-hand education, saying these documents should be handled like that and these types of documents should be taken into meetings instead of those ones even though they are basically the same thing, and these reports come from here to go to there, and they go there when you hand them to someone (which sometimes happened to be him in the past) but when you are the one sitting down while doing all your work you call people over like this when you want something to be delivered. And when you file them you can have your own way but one that is preferably neat, I like to do it this way, for example. It becomes an occurrence that grows more and more frequent as time goes by.

Around the cold fall of that year, Donghyuck almost gets done with his education. He had known quite a lot in theory having been with you for a long time and that was probably what helped with him and his pace, and since it came to that, the wedding planning started. Your parents joined in at that as well, and you got to see Donghyuck’s mother and siblings for the first time in years. Which was why you proposed to him the possibility of moving them into a house closer to the palace, or even into the palace that night. Because you knew his relationship with his family was close and sacred to him, and you knew that it had been interrupted by his heavy shifts as a guard and his obligation to stay in the palace. So, you thought it would be convenient for both sides if they lived closer.

Attire fittings for the wedding are always eventful with chitter chatter, some dramatic emotional response from both mothers and fathers as you two stood on platforms with your arms wide open to the sides, the tradition about to-be spouses not seeing each other’s attires until the wedding inapplicable simply because everything has to be perfect at a royal wedding.

Throughout everything, choosing outfits, choosing themes and colors, choosing the venue and sending the invitations, there is always a slight pull at your heart’s strings. The kind of pull where it feels a bit pitiful and hard to breathe. Sometimes your hand lands itself around the area on your chest where your first engagement ring would fall onto, and most times you can stop yourself by saying it is completely unneeded but sometimes you cannot stop it— and sometimes you can see Donghyuck realizing it.

But the hardest is when the wedding day finally comes right after the new year’s, on a bright sunny day without snowfall, which was extremely rare for where you lived. Everything was still and calm outside but not inside, neither inside the venue nor inside your heart and mind.

The reality of getting married gains another dimension when you walk into the venue. At the heart of a town rather far from the palace, the venue does not have the feeling of being far from home with its stone structure, greenery that surrounds it, and its grand scheme. Decorated in royal blue and a bright red that matches the liveliness of the blue, everything looks like how a royal wedding should look. There are golden lights on the walls and dropping from the ceiling that bring the power of the decorations down with their warmness yet somehow also emphasize the importance of everything. The old structure has cracks in which various plants and ivies have made their way in, the sole reason you and Donghyuck had chosen this place. Because you both believed that they symbolized second chances and faith, seeing as these plants had somehow survived the cold and the stones placed on top of the earth, and had been strong enough to crack through and claim this place as their home.

Overall, everything is bright, red and blue and green and golden, and it looks like this is your destiny. And everything including Donghyuck welcomes you, even though there is a road of hurt and imperfection that you still have to walk on.

You are grateful for that feeling.

Yet, suddenly everything feels wrong and out of place when you start the process of getting ready. Not because of Donghyuck and his dear soul that was trying his hardest, but because of yourself. Because your past self that was once in love with a person that did not exist anymore was still looking for a way and time to throw a tantrum about it all. It made sense, somehow, that it was at the most inappropriate moment that it would decide to act up.

The bigger problem is that a lot of people can see how you feel, presumably because you get quieter and inactive. You are extremely distracted from everything that you get so clumsy, tripping all over the place in the old, stone building that had greenery cracking through its a few centuries old material. The people who dress you might as well have been dressing a toy with how nonchalant and flappy your body was.

Despite the obstacles, they get you dressed and taken care of at your room, where you can hear people starting to walk into the venue. At first it is a few greetings between some handfuls of families and people, but it so quickly turns into a sea of undetectable voices that it is almost scary. Everyone sounds excited and happy outside in the hall, and you can hear them dining and conversing on topics that were mostly around you. That was nice after having your name in gossip for quite a long time regarding the espionage and your seemingly amateur ways of ruling, and the ones that suspected a relationship between you and the person you used to love.

Neither side shut the gossips down, but they died down anyways. You had gotten engaged shortly after their surfacing.

At some point people’s voices start to dim down. The wavy ocean turns into a much more still sea with hushed conversations, and it is then that you are able to hear the chants outside.

The happy chants of your people, who had come there to celebrate.

Donghyuck walks in when you get frozen in place, looking at the big, frosted and stained windows as if you could hear the chanting clearer if you did so. From the corner of your eye you see him nod his head slightly to the side and smile, silently ordering people to leave the room to only the two of you.

The ceremony would start soon.

He comes to stand in front of you, and he opens both of his hands, palms looking upright. You look down at them when you notice his moves and let your eyes linger there, not knowing if confidence or hesitance would take over you first.

Not being strong was never an option.

You place your hand in his with a deep exhale, and meet his eyes. Donghyuck smiles at you, as if to say it is alright. It will be okay.

And then he speaks.

“I know I am not the one you would have liked to have here today,” He starts, and that hurts you perhaps with the truth but also with your newfound care for him upon getting engaged, but he does not let you protest. “But I have once sworn to protect you with my life, and I just want you to know that I will continue on with it. And I swear to you— forget the Oath I will take in a matter of minutes now, I swear to you that I will try to be the best I can be for you, for us, for whatever that means from now on, and for our people.”

You smile at him with your first genuine smile of the day when a fresh comfort washes over your heart the same way an angry and fizzy ocean wave washes over the shore, and give his hands a squeeze, holding onto the hopeful future they offer. Thank you.

#NCT-WRITERS #nct imagines #nct scenarios #nct dream imagines #nct x reader #nct dream #lee jeno #jeno #haechan #lee donghyuck #nct jeno #nct haechan

[heartau]

Oooh you went to Neocity right? I’d love to hear descriptions of the boys in the words of a writer 🥰

omg this sounds fun !!! ok before i start this i just wanna say this is from what i personally saw when i saw them live. i was relatively close to the stage, enough to make eye contact and to be waved at, so i’ll do my best!!

taeyong: seeing him in real life was a little surreal because he looks exactly how he does in pictures and videos which is already jarring because he’s already really beautiful through those. he has really big, expressive eyes and the warmest smile; every time he would look at the audience he’d have this small smile that looked like pride. it was really really heartwarming to see. he has such a calming, relaxed and cute aura durings ments but once he started to perform... whew! his head also really big, honestly a lot of their heads were really big in real life which is adorable idjdjddk, but yeah!! i made eye contact with him a number of times and you would think his gaze would be intimidating but it really really wasnt! the only word i can describe the feeling i got from him is motherly :(

johnny: first and foremost, i do not believe that he’s 6’1... that man is gigantic. his proportions are so good, his leg to chest ratio is so... [chef’s kiss]. what you see of him in videos is truly what he is in real life, he’s so goofy and funny and lively and he always encouraged other members to do their thing as well. he’s honestly so hilarious too which makes me sad because it makes me feel like we’d get along really well if i knew him personally ... man i just wanna be his bff. but yeah he’s really tall, like towering over the other members tall; even taller than jungwoo, who was surprisingly tall as well. maybe it’s just me because i’m really short. he also has a small face in real life, but at the same time his features are so expressive that you dont even realize it haha. but yeah he’s just a happy, talented, gentle giant.

jungwoo: if i could describe jungwoo in one word it would be cherub-like. he literally has the softest features ever and he moves so gracefully, he literally glowed on stage and it was kinda shocking really. he was also really tall omg, like i was expecting it anyways since i knew that he’s around 6ft, but like... he’s REALLY tall. he has the SOFTEST, most honey-like voice but he speaks with so much confidence, it’s so so so cute and made me so happy. he also has really fluffy hair, like even from my seat i could see how soft and light his hair was; every movement he made that night just made his hair whip around really easily, like even if it was bleached you really couldn’t tell because his hair didn’t look fried at all. all in all jungwoo was truly angel-like and very graceful.

taeil: oh man taeil is beautiful on screen and through pictures already but in person he glows 100x more. he has really, really pretty skin that made him shine under the spotlight and his jawline is REALLY sharp omg. he’s also really short (which i was expecting... probably still taller than me though) and has a big head hehe. he’s also one of the members that had a really calming, nurturing energy, during the ments he would literally have heart eyes full of pride when he’d look at the audience, it was really really heartwarming. a GOOD butt. also his vocals are so, so, sooo good and very stable - there was one point (i think it was back 2 u(?) i can’t remember anything from that night other than my videos) where he used his headvoice for the highnote and not falsetto and it floored me - i’m a classically trained vocalist so you bet i freaked out in the audience. but yeah, taeil is just really calming and nurturing and REALLY funny too :(

yuta: yuta honestly shocked me because although i knew that he’s baby from interviews and other clips, i was still somehow intimidated by him, but when i saw them live he really stomped on my intimidation. he literally has the most fresh, most positive, most genuinely kind energy i’ve literally ever felt :( he had the biggest smile throughout the night, every time i’d look at him he’d just be grinning from ear to ear. “healing smile” doesn’t even come close to describing how GOOD his smile is in real life. he’s also short, something i really wasn’t expecting, like a good 2nd or 3rd shortest - really really REALLY funny too and a REALLY good dancer, i got some of his freestyle dance on camera and every time i watch it, i’m floored bc he hits every beat on the spot. i made eye contact with him at one point and i remember feeling just so happy and at peace, like... he’s not intimidating at all... he’s just a happy boy :(

mark: ohh mark... i see mark as a childhood friend so when he came out on stage i literally felt tears spring in my eyes. i live in vancouver and saw them in vancouver so i feel like that kinda intensified it a bit more as well. he is SOOOOOO undeniably funny its crazy, throughout the night i’d just be laughing at things he’d say (that were intended to be humourous ofc). his head also really big omg it was kinda jarring, and taller than i expected. his stage presence is so good, everytime they’d perform my eyes would sometimes land on him, literally SO good. honestly, when i walked into that venue i was expecting him to cry which i feared for because when someone cries, then i cry, but he didn’t!! although after the concert ended, when they were saying their goodbyes, they left mark alone to say his own goodbyes and when he was doing so, his voice kinda cracked before he did this bow and his eyes were a little glossy and i got SO SCARED because i didn’t wanna cry rkdndkdndk but yeah :( im proud of mark and you can tell that he holds pride in what he does as well!

donghyuck: MAN... donghyuck literally has the most beautiful skin i’ve ever seen. i know i’ve said this before but he glows, like he literally glows, fullsun is an appropriate nickname for him. he emitted nothing else but cute, happy, mischeviohs energy during ments but once he started performing his vibe changed so drastically it was crazy - especially during wake up and baby don’t like it. there was one part during baby don’t like it when he pressed his forehead against taeil’s and when i tell you how much i lost it because i wasn’t expecting it... oh man. i also see donghyuck as a best friend; i was born a week before he was and our natal charts are exactly the same save for our moons, so seeing him rip it up on stage was so so soo good it made me so proud :( i made eye contact with him somewhere during summer 127?? I WAS SO HAPPY AFTER like it was refreshing omg i sound so silly but im telling the truth iddndkjd he’s also shockingly tall as well, around mark’s height, maybe even taller, and REALLY long legs. like a good 90% of his body was made of leg didjdjdjd but yeah donghyuck is just... he’s really the sun and he was meant to perform.

doyoung: i will start this off by saying; i left that venue as a doyoungzen. doyoung... whew... he also shocked me because through videos and pictures i was NEVER intimidated by him at all, i honestly genuinely always just saw him as cute baby but man oh man. you know when you just KNOW that someone’s rich by the way they hold themselves? that’s doyoung... he’s really regal-like and holds himself really gracefully, like a strict prince type. he intimidated me SO much that night (in the best way possible... sexy intimidation... dont worry) like his energy was just so... intense. i made eye contact with him a number of times and when i tell you how SMALL i felt just from meeting his eyes... my goodness. he has really broad shoulders and a tiny waist, also really tall, small-ish head. his features are REALLY sharp like it’s crazy, i really have no other way to explain it. he also has really pretty hands, nimble-looking fingers. he was really adorable during ments and at one point kept hopping which was so CUTE but even then... man. his energy is just really intense. i ended up making him one of my ults after i left the venue.

jaehyun: deep inhale... so. jaehyun. honestly its kinda silly because i can remember so many details from the other members but i feel like once it comes to jaehyun i’m at a loss of words because of how in SHOCK i was to see him up close bc as you all know he’s my ultimate bias, it was my three years with him a few weeks ago. but gosh... jaehyun... i really can’t see the whole “cold prince” image they give him bc he’s so chill and relaxed? ok wow a few memories are coming to mind now; he has a really big head, which i was expecting because i’ve seen people talk about how big his head is but yeah it’s big but it’s CUTE he’s just a little bobblehead :( i made so much eye contact with him that night too and god like. i got some of those moments on camera and you can see through the videos how i’d just FREEZE every time we jefkenfkd he’s just... really chill, really relaxed, let the other members do their thing, but at the same time really silly and had this aura of confidence which was really nice. a lil shorter than i expected omg but his skin was reeallllyyyy nice and he’s very pale irl omg. he waved at me and my friend at the end of the show and i also got it on video and like... every time i watch it its just so surreal cuz like ... 😭 LIKE WHAT NOW how am i supposed to live the rest of my life now knowing i reached my peak at neocity like .... bruh

all in all these boys are just so talented and have the best stage presence ever, and they’re super SUPER interactive with the fans. beingin the crowd during touch and replay was just so... nice :( it was truly one of the happiest moments in my life and i hope that they come back soon !!! i also hope that the next time i see them, winwin is part of 127 again as well :( and lastly, i also hope that whoever is reading this sees them in the future as well bc u deserve it!!!

#nct #nct imagines #nct scenarios #nct reactions #nct 127 #neocity #taeyong #yuta #johnny #jaehyun #doyoung #taeil #mark #jungwoo #donghyuck #taeyong imagines #johnny imagines #jaehyun imagines #doyoung imagines #yuta imagines #taeil imagines #mark imagines #donghyuck imagines #jungwoo imagines #omg this started off so calm but ended so chaotic i just got rly excited im so sorry 😭 #heartau

[nctinfo]

[TRANS] ViVi Magazine: NCT 127 on touring in Japan

Let's go! Right now NCT 127 are touring throughout the country with their 1st Tour NEOCITY: JAPAN - The Origin. NCT 127 who are gaining attention from all around the world are featured in an online women's magazine for the first time in Japan! Let's begin our series by visiting different places in Japan together. In our interviews we'll show you the individual side of the members that has not yet been seen by fans. 

How do you feel and what are the most memorable events during the tour?

TAEIL: Our tour began with performing at the venues. I think, that it's a valuable experience when we think about the little details when going on the stage, one by one. I really can't wait to be able to meet our fans from different parts of Japan. Personally, I think that ballads sung live are showing us in a completely different light. I can't wait to show you our different colours, so please anticipate it!

MARK: It's an honour to be able to hold our first tour in Japan with NCT 127. I'm excited, really excited! I'm extremely grateful that I can perform our songs live in front of our fans, who give us lots of support and I think it's a good opportunity for NCT 127 to grow. Our first show was in Osaka, but we'll do everything to be able to meet our fans in the entire Japan and make great memories together. Each NCT 127 member will show his own colour, but there's also a part where we become one getting excited together with the fans, so I think it's a great experience for all of us. I also love the VCR that we play at the concerts and I really want you to see it too. When I saw it for the first time I thought "Aaaah, I bet everyone will love it"! Please anticipate us and have fun! JOHNNY: I'm really happy to go on our very first live tour. Every time I'm on the stage I learn something new and I feel like everything's constantly changing. That's why I wish that people who have seen our performances had fun, and those who have yet to see us to experience a show they haven't seen before. Especially during "Wake Up", which has a really refreshing vibe. It's a song that will surprise you no matter how prepared you think you are.

JAEHYUN: Because it's my first tour, every time I go on stage I'm wondering what kind of vibe will surround the place. It's also a lot of fun. I'm cherishing every moment of it and I'll do everything I can to represent our colour well and share good energy with our fans. The main point that I would like to focus on is everything! From the very beginning right till the end! Honestly, because choosing one thing to focus on the most was really hard, I tried my best to make each performance different and enticing.

TAEYONG: I think that our first tour I was able to showcase performance and emotional vocal that I couldn't show during our activities before. We're letting you feel the versatile charm of NCT 127. I was really happy when we've been told about the tour, I was happy during the preparations and I'm happy now that we're actually touring. I wish for us to share great memories.

DOYOUNG: Personally I like all songs and performances and I am positively confident about the show. It would be hard to pick just one element to focus on, because each song, each section is a part of a composition which has a meaning, so I'd like you guys to pay attention to that and have fun from the beginning to an end.

YUTA: First of all I would like to thank all our fans, thanks to whom we were able to organise this tour. Thank you very much! I was really happy when our first tour was decided! Thats why I was preparing the members and everyone who are supporting the show by talking to them all the time. Although picking one thing to focus on is very hard, amongst all I'd go with Jungle Jam Wake Up and Dreaming performed for the first time on this tour. Also it's a performance that each one of us was preparing for a lot, so please pay attention to all of it! (laugh) JUNGWOO:  At first I was a bit worried, because it's our first tour after all. On the other hand I was very enthusiastic in order to show you guys our own colour! After all it's a space only for us and our fans and just the thought of being able to feel closer to each other made me feel so happy so I thought I had to do my best to prepare for it. Personally I like the part that leads to our opening song, as it leaves a strong impression. I would also like you guys to see each member dance! Please expect performances with songs of different energies! Also I think that Wake Up is extremely thrilling, Please pay attnetion to the light and image production.

Please show your enthusiasm for this short series by sending the NET ViVi Readers a brief message!

TAEIL: Thanks to NET ViVi I'm very happy to meet the readers! From today on I will show you various sides of me through our performances, so please anticipate them and me a lot!

YUTA: ViVi readers! It's Yuta from NCT 127. Because I have two sisters (older and younger), who often read magazines it's a real joy for me to be featured in NET ViVi. Because we could take part in a photoshoot in different situations, I'm sure it will be fun for you as well! Make sure to check it out!

JUNGWOO: Even though it's my first experience with an online magazine for women I am really happy and I hope that you will anticipate us! I think that each one of us was able to show you guys our individual and own colours and the rooftop photoshoot showed NCT 127 in a very natural way. I'd like it if you keep following NET ViVi series in the future. Thank you~ MARK: I was feeling really good during the photoshoot that was starting this series. We had a shoot at the rooftop with a beautiful sunset in the background. We also had  shoot in a studio and we had interviews during which we could talk about lots of funny stories. I can't wait to see your reactions when you watch us. So ViVi readers! From now on please anticipate the various colours of NCT 127 that we will be showing you. JOHNNY: I'm really excited that we can appear in the NET ViVi series as NCT 127. The atmosphere at the photoshoot was really nice and I think everyone looking at the pictures will be able to feel it too. I'd like you to see NCT 127 as a group with lots of charm, so please have interest in us~~ TAEYONG: Nice to meet you ViVi readers! We're seeing you for the first time as NCT 127. From now on we'll work hard in order to show you guys the best side of us. Please anticipate and support us!~ DOYOUNG: To all ViVi readers reading this! We have taken part in ViVi series and I'm very happy that we were able to do such a beautiful photoshoot and talk to everyone. I hope to have even more concerts in Japan. Please anticipate our various activities. JAEHYUN: During the sunset we were able to take life-size photos at the rooftop and the studio. I twas really fun to be able to participate in this interview. We're in the middle of our Japanese tour and I wish to get closer to you guys, so please keep supporting us and to those who don't know us yet, please try to get to know us through our music and performances!

Translation: Paula @ FY! NCT (NCTINFO) | Source: vivi.tv — Do not repost or take out without our permission!

#NCT #NCT 127 #taeil #johnny #taeyong #yuta #doyoung #jaehyun #jungwoo #mark #t:interview #vivi magazine #t:trans

[nctdaoying]

190819 GRAZIA Magazine September Issue - Interview with Doyoung

190819 GRAZIA Magazine September Issue - Interview with Doyoung 

Translation by @nctdaoying (Twitter) / take out with credit.

Editor’s note: “I sat face-to-face with NCT’s Doyoung, a person who wants to sing for a long time, and during the time (I sat facing him), I saw a new face which I have never seen before.”

ISAC

Q: I heard that you took part in the recording for Idol Sports Athletic Championships (ISAC) yesterday?

A: Yes, I competed in the archery competition.

Q: Actually, aren’t you the member who doesn’t like to move the most? You made a huge decision (to participate in ISAC).

A: At least I was in a sport that required me to move the least, hahaha.

Q: Can we look forward to an outstanding performance then?

A: Previously, we won the silver medal for archery in the ISAC New Year Special. This time round, I practiced a lot for archery whenever I had the time, so I think it’s worth looking forward to.

Q: So you actually practiced.

A: All of the idol group members who participated in ISAC practiced. Personally, I really looked forward to it as we specially practiced a lot this time round. And the archery teacher felt that it was a pity that we got silver the last time round so she/he put in even more effort to teach us this time round.

NEOCITY Tour - learning point, memorable moment, time spent on flights, favourite shows

Q: Since January this year, you have been touring round the world, from Seoul to North America, then to South America, Asia, and even Europe. Since you have been touring for over 6 months, did you learn a lot?

A: Personally, I think that our team has grown a lot. I have been busy for more than half of the year. Especially for our U.S. tour, I performed once every two days so it was physically demanding for me. However, I believe that this sort of difficulty is a process for growth. Also, thanks to the support of the fans, I was able to overcome this period of difficulty, both mentally and physically. Through this world tour, I felt just how precious the fans are once again. I really thought of them as great comfort which helped me to endure. 

Q: Please share with us if there was an especially memorable moment during the tour.

A: The Atlanta stop was especially memorable. The venue where we had our concert was the venue where many pop artistes, whom we recognise just by hearing their names, have held their concerts, and their photos were hanging on the wall of the corridor (where the waiting rooms were located). Among them, they only give the “SOLD OUT” sign to the artistes who have sold out their concerts. So thankfully, we sold out our concert as well and had the sign on our photo too, and because of that it felt really strange (to me).

Q: While you were on tour, the distance you travelled must have been really long and you must have spent a lot of time on the plane. What do you do during the flights?

A: I love watching dramas so I downloaded a lot of movies and dramas. But because we didn’t have a lot of time to rest while on tour, I spent most of my time on the plane sleeping.

Q: Are there any necessities that you’d bring along?

A: (My) iPad and airpods to watch dramas. Other than those, nothing else (laughs)

Q: What are the works (movies/dramas) that you like watching recently?

A: Not too long ago, I really enjoyed watching <Search: WWW>. And also even though I might sound like I am promoting my brother (actor Gongmyung), he’s appearing on a new drama recently. I wouldn’t have mentioned it if I thought that it’s not interesting, but I think <Melo is My Nature> is really interesting (laughs).

King of Masked Singer (KOMS), thoughts on his own voice/singing, and cover videos

Q: We can’t go without talking about how you recently became a hot topic after appearing on KOMS and winning 3 rounds with over 70 votes, to go straight to the final deciding round against the Masked King.

A: While on tour, I was preparing for (my performance) even though I was really busy and often lacked the energy as well, but I felt that it was a special experience. Because I love singing originally, so I felt really happy throughout this whole process. To be truthful, KOMS is a programme which I have always wanted to appear on since I was a trainee. Since that was the case, I also had the desire of getting good results. However, as the filming date neared, I started thinking that it was more important for me to truly enjoy the process. So mainly with the songs I love and sing well, I appeared on the show.

Q: Usually, before you appear on KOMS, you will have to keep it a secret, so how was it? Did you keep this a secret from the NCT members?

A: Because I had to prepare, there were members who saw me going out in the wee hours to practice, and asked about it. There were times I replied them truthfully, but there were also members who didn’t ask about it till the end. So those friends will find out for the first time when the show broadcasts, hahaha.

Q: How did the members react after watching the broadcast?

A: To be honest, as compared to my singing, the members paid more attention to the sexy dance I did as my personal talent. Maybe because it had already become a hot topic, so they were busy teasing me about it (laughs).

Q: From the recent interviews I saw, I can tell that you really love your own voice.

A: When I was young, I always wanted my voice to sound unique. I felt that it wasn’t that special and wished that I had my own (vocal) colour. So I’d imitate those singers whom people could recognise after just hearing a small verse - those people their own unique vocal colour. But as time passed, I came to think that the voice should be something like mine, one that people wouldn’t hate or love at first listen, but rather a voice that people can listen to comfortably. Now, I like my voice (smiles).

Q: Your singing ability is one that has been recognised by all. After looking through the NCT Music YouTube Channel, it seems to me that you mainly cover female singers’ songs? Is there a special reason for that?

A: There is no special reason. I just wanted to showcase something that is different from the original singers - I think the beauty of a cover is that I get to add my own colour (to the song). When I cover female singers, I can choose to lower my range or add my own colour (to the song) freely, so that’s why I choose to cover them frequently. And also because they simply are my favourite artistes.

Q: When I watched your cover videos, I discovered that you have a lot of different concepts for them, and it seems like you put a lot of thought into them.

A: I am the type of person who will prepare a lot if I have something that I want to do. For example, I will contemplate a lot over things like whether or not to use a mic when I’m singing, or what type of mic I should use, and whether I need to film the video after recording my singing. Although the song is very important as well, I’d also actively express my opinion on what sort of video would suit me best.

Travelling with Gongmyung

Q: Not too long ago, your brother Gongmyung mentioned that travelling with you is something that is on his bucket list. Did you know about this plan of his?

A: Even though my brother always talks about travelling together, it is really hard to find a day where the both of us are on break. But regardless of when the time comes, I definitely want to go someday. I also think it’d be interesting to show our trip through a reality show.

Q: If the two of you can travel together, where would you like to go to?

A: Actually, it doesn’t matter where we go. Although my hyung and I don’t particularly like to drink, we’re the type who would still drink a little (laughs). So I think travelling together to find the specialty liquors unique to different areas will be fun.

Life Motto & photoshoot

Q: I heard that your motto is “let’s live like myself”. So how is it like to be living like Doyoung?

A: I’m the type who firmly believes that I can do well and lives while thinking positively. For example, I would think of things like “I am doing great now” or “I am cool” when I have a photoshoot. I strive to do my best in believing in myself.

Q: So what sort of thoughts did you have when you had your photoshoot just now?

A: Hahaha, to be honest, I was a little embarrassed just now. The staff’s cheers were amazing… (laughs)

Something special to Doyoung

Q: What is something that is special only to Doyoung?

A: It may be the same for other singers, but I really love singing. I have come to the conclusion that when I am going through a hard time or feel tired, I am only able to overcome them simply because of my love for singing, and because of the fans’ support for me.

Ultimate goal in life & artiste he envisions himself to be

Q: This may be a big question, but what is Doyoung’s ultimate goal in life?

A: There are people who I have acknowledged as the artistes of my life since I was young. I have been listening to the songs of Park Hyoshin, Adam Levine, Oasis, and Taeyeon sunbae-nim since young, so if I become a great vocal in the future, a great deal of credit has to go to them. Even though I may add more people in the future, I think to sing like them is my iron rule and goal in life.

Q: What kind of artiste do you envision yourself to be?

A: Rather than doing music that (only) I like, my dream is to do music that people who listen to it also like. I wish to perform in many more places, with many more songs, and have an enjoyable time with many more people.

Next dream?

Q: The person whose dream since young is to become a singer has already realised his dream. What is your next dream?

A: Maybe not to the extent of directing, but I would like to challenge planning a concert. Even though I am still lacking now and I am still not at the level of being able to lay out something concrete, I hope that one day I can be someone who can express and share my own opinions when I am preparing for my own concert.

(END.)

#nct #doyoung #dongyoung #nct doyoung #kim doyoung #kim dongyoung #nct u #nct 127 #nct127 #grazia #interview #translations

[superhumankrp]

Welcome to NEOCITY, [ Nam Hoon ]!

Make sure to follow the admin’s twitter page within the next 48 hours to become a full-fledged citizen in Neocity. Make sure your twitter account follows all the guidelines stated in the rules.

[ Ability: Drawing Manipulation. ]

Drawing Manipulation: Hoon is able to create objects and beings by drawing. How lifelike, effective, or useful a creature/object is depends entirely on how much detail goes into the drawing. He can create 2D figures which can only move around on flat surfaces and also create 3D figures which can move around freely just as a person or animal would, however only if his drawing depicts them in such a way. A crudely drawn knife will create an equally as crude real object and likely won’t be of much use.

His biggest limitation is his own imagination. If he can’t see an object clearly in his own mind, he won’t be able to draw it well enough for it to be of any use. His creations are susceptible to water in the same way an ink drawing on a piece of paper would be. If the piece of paper is destroyed, the creation suffers the same fate. He also runs the risk of creating something that, when “alive”, could turn on him and possibly hurt him.

The drawings last either for as long as he wants them to, or for as long as he has the energy to keep them alive, whichever depletes first. Without at least a pencil and paper, or a marker and a sticky note, Hoon cannot create. He will always need a surface to draw on and a tool with which to do so. He can’t draw in the air with his finger to create something, it needs to be visible.

How he arrived at Neocity:

Ever since he was a child, Hoon was in and out of hospital every month. It was always the same cycle. He’d start feeling ill, his ex-nurse mother would rush him to see a doctor, only for him to be sent home with something to relieve the pain and no diagnosis. This happened over and over until his teachers reported his absence, medical staff became suspicious, and his mother uprooted their lives to move them to the other side of the country. Things were fine in their new home, at least for a while. Hoon hadn’t been ill for over a year and he finally caught up with all his school work. Then the cycle started once more. Hoon grew sicker and sicker until he was confined to his room, forbidden from even answering the door let alone leaving the house. His mother was always the one to administer his medicine. An injection of some kind, the contents of which were never fully explained to Hoon. All she ever said was that it would make him better.

Even without being able to leave his room, Hoon was never truly lonely. All he needed was to put graphite to paper and he could create friends himself. Imaginary and yet so real, they’d emerge from the paper and sit with him, their skin as pale as the medium they were created on. It was only ever something he did while alone, as if afraid his mother would take that from him just like she’d taken everything else. To him it felt as natural as anything else did and he assumed this was something every child could do. Although he was proven wrong after asking a friend and receiving confused looks. By the time he was 13 years old Hoon had become quite the little artist. He could make anything appear in front of him as long as he had the means with which to draw them. Mythical beings, characters from his favourite cartoons, animals, almost anything he could ever think of. Of course the food he sketched tasted like cardboard and the things he created lasted all of five minutes if he was lucky, but it all filled the emptiness of his home life.

A few months after his 14th birthday he was admitted to hospital again. His abdominal pain had become so unbearable that he had passed out from it. His mother was, as always, quick to rush to his side and take care of him. She was praised for her diligence, called an amazing mother - until the truth came out. Toxicology reports paired with Hoon’s medical history set alarm bells ringing. The authorities were involved and the cause of Hoon’s illness was found: rat poison. The medicine he had been given at home by his mother was exactly what had been causing everything. She was taken into custody and Hoon was left to wonder why his own flesh and blood would want him to suffer.

Years later, after a few more hospital stays and another relocation to live with his grandparents’, Hoon was finally feeling healthy. He found out through eavesdropping on a phone call that his mother had been moved into a clinic for the foreseeable future, after being diagnosed with Munchausen Syndrome by proxy. Knowing what she did was less out of malicious feelings toward him and more out of her control lessened the anger he felt towards her. Deep down he stilled loved his mother despite everything that had happened, but a big part of him knew things would never be the same between them.

The time he spent living with his grandparents was pleasantly uneventful. His High School graduation came and went, a little later than most but still, then so did university. It wasn’t the most prestigious school, but after having missed so much as a child, Hoon felt lucky to have even been accepted. He graduated with a degree in Fine Art and decided it was time to bid his grandparents’ goodbye. He had to go out into the world on his own at some point, and he chose the place that he felt would be the most accepting for someone like him.

Neocity, where Hoon felt he would be able to create a fitting identity for himself, away from people who knew about his childhood.

Other Information:

Faceclaim: Min Yoongi (Suga) / BTS

Full name: Nam Hoon

Nicknames (if any): 

Age: 27

Sexuality: He likes who he likes

Occupation: Dispatcher @ Neocity Fire Department 

Personality:

Hoon is an extroverted introvert. Around the right people he feels at ease and is able to let who he is shine through without his social energy draining at an alarming rate. He has no trouble making small talk although he prefers something with more substance and grows bored easily with “hi, how are you"s. It takes less energy for him to say what’s on his mind than it does to pretend he’s interested in the weather. To Hoon, people are both intriguing and exhausting - some more than others - but most are worth knowing.

His childhood was mostly void of any kind of long lasting and meaningful relationship, which has left him craving that kind of intimacy in adulthood. It can be difficult for him to open up about his past out of fear of being pitied or driving people away, but it isn’t a taboo topic entirely.

He can poke fun at himself and be the butt of a joke, but as soon as it goes too far, out comes an icy demeanour. He has no tolerance for people who bring others down for their own gain especially, and although he can become annoyed easily by childish or over-the-top personalities, he still believes nobody should be ridiculed for the way they are. Their taste in movies? Yes. But their personality? No.

#accepted #first character

[xhostcom]

The Web Can’t Go Home Again

It’s far too easy to look back and imagine that everything was better then than it is now. God knows I miss being a skinny teenager, but I don’t want the acne back. The hormones can just shove right off, too. Even so, there are things I miss about being younger, and frankly a bit naïve. Lately, there has been conversation about the nature of the Internet, and many people seem to feel much as I do about my teenage years: that is to say, they miss the relative innocence. Though once reviled, dancing baby .GIFs and elements seem like high art compared to the click-bait, the passionate-yet-incomprehensible comment wars, and the desperate attempts of corporations to look “hip”. We’d be hard-pressed to look around and say, “Yes, this really is better.” We even miss Tom, and his kind of desperate-feeling attempt to be everybody’s friend We miss the utopianism of the early Internet pioneers. We miss the creativity of people just learning HTML, from the days of the first pages, to the days of the customized MySpace page. We even miss Tom, and his kind of desperate-feeling attempt to be everybody’s friend; because at least he was trying to be friends, not tell you how your every opinion was wrong. And so here we are, in a new world of our own making, and we wish we’d made it differently. Some people blame corporations, and their focus on profit over community. Others more or less blame the blog format, and the press of people who all want to be a little bit famous. There are more than a few who blame social media. None of these people are entirely wrong, of course. We could have done better. We can do better. We can make a friendlier Internet that promotes creativity. What we cannot do is go back. “You can’t go home again.” For those unfamiliar, it’s an old saying based on the idea that once you leave a place, you can never truly return to what once was. Even if the place you left has stayed the same, you will have changed. The you that comes back is not the you that left. We can do better. We can make a friendlier Internet that promotes creativity. We can’t go back to the old Internet because we have changed. Like Adam and Eve in the proverbial garden, we now have knowledge of both the good the Internet can do, and the evil. Businesses have seen how much money can be made. The near-monopolies of the Internet have no reason to give up their advantages. Elsewhere, communities have seen how, when there are not enough rules, or when the rules are not enforced, the loudest and most violent voices will oppress the rest. We have also seen that with too many rules, and inflexible enforcement, the bureaucrats will become the oppressors. Knowing what we know now, we cannot go back to the wild west days of the Internet, because it’s unlikely that most of us could ever embrace that sort of potential without the fear born of our experience. Whatever the Web becomes next, I hope it has the better qualities of the Internet of the past, but it will not, perhaps cannot, be the same. Okay, that’s quite enough mourning of our collective innocence. There are things we can reasonably do to help improve the state of the Internet, and after all that, I’d like to include a few I thought of.

Get Political

Now I don’t mean that you should tweet at your ideological opponents more, and I’m not going to tell you who to vote for. What I am going to say is that most politicians in most governments are sorely ignorant what what the Internet truly is, and how it works. Watching Mark Zuckerberg getting questioned was one of the more painful things a nerd could ever watch. Don’t even get me started on the mess that was/is the EU’s attempt to redefine copyright law. Articles 11 and 13 are nightmarish concepts. Watching Mark Zuckerberg getting questioned was one of the more painful things a nerd could ever watch If we’re going to bring back some of the fun to the Internet, we need to make sure our politicians are better educated about it. I’m not an expert on political activism; but perhaps we could all stand to reach out to our local politicians more, and not just when they’re about to take away half of our online rights through ignorance.

Make Alternatives More Attractive

For example: many video creators are feeling stifled under YouTube’s arcane and sometimes arbitrary sets of rules, and many a creator has lost their source of revenue overnight. You see, YouTube has become so massive that many video creators wouldn’t even think of putting their content elsewhere, which makes the platform even bigger. That centralization gives YouTube massive power over millions of creators, and their algorithms more or less define what many would-be artists create. So on top of controlling smaller creators’ revenue, one website is having an out-sized impact on entire cultures. That is antithetical to the spirit of the Internet as it was intended to be. Some smart cookies have decided to try to alleviate this problem, and other crises caused by corporate near-monopolies, by creating decentralized versions of YouTube, decentralized social networks, and even decentralized versions of the Internet itself. Alternatives to massive sites need more tangible, immediate benefits These alternatives face one major problem (besides plain old logistics): attracting a user base in the first place. This is normal for any business breaking into a crowded market, but many of these projects advertise themselves by saying things like, “We’re not corporate and evil like Google.” The problem is that this is not something the average user cares about. We already give away our information freely, so privacy isn’t going to sell it either. Alternatives to massive sites need more tangible, immediate benefits.

Support Efforts That Lower the Web’s Creative Entry Requirements

We, as people who love the Internet, need to each make our own efforts to improve it. But we should also remember that there are plenty of people out there already doing what they can, and they need some love. One of my favorite examples is that of NeoCities, which we’ve previously discussed here on WDD. Basically, it’s a place where anyone can create a basic HTML/CSS site about anything they like, for free, in the spirit of the old GeoCities sites. The idea is to encourage more people to try making sites for themselves with the lowest possible barrier to entry. Projects like these need ongoing support, and frankly deserve free advertising. So that’s why NeoCities is getting a link.

Be Kind, and Forgive

If the Web is going to change (again), people will have to change (again). And as people change, we’ll need to be ready to forgive. We’ve all made mistakes in the past, from simply saying rude things online, to building tools that might have had a part in making the Internet a less friendly place. What’s worse is that the Internet has a better memory than we do. as people change, we’ll need to be ready to forgive If we’re going to make massive, sweeping changes to make the Internet more fun, and weird, and friendly, we need to be fun, weird, and friendly. More importantly, we’ll need to be kinder. We may find ourselves needing to be kind even to those who took part in making the Internet the unfriendly place it is now. People can and do grow and change, and if we’re going to make a better world, we can’t hold their past mistakes against them (so long as those mistakes are truly in the past). Ultimately, the people on the Internet are the Internet, and we can’t go home again. We can build a new home, though.   Featured image via DepositPhotos. Add Realistic Chalk and Sketch Lettering Effects with Sketch’it – only $5!

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