the sakamaki estate.
a drabble of headcanons...
ft. the sakamakis & yui | masterlist. | currently playing: premonition - toby fox
disclaimer: i haven't consumed a lot of the official media from Rejet regarding diabolik lovers, so some of my posts will be inaccurate. please take everything with a grain of salt.
[sakamaki mansion - 逆巻邸]
ok, look. the idea of vampires having a giant mansion in the middle of buttfuck nowhere seems very hot in theory. especially with the implications behind the ability to afford said mansion. but realistically, the sakamaki's mansion is probably a lot more menacing in practice.
the mansion itself is centuries old. you can see it in the gothic architecture and the various pieces of 19th-century furniture. it's even more obvious when you realize the kitchen has no electric stoves or a microwave. there's not a need for it. vampires don't eat, not entirely, and the girls that get sent don't last long enough to use it.
location-wise, the mansion likely is build someplace far, far away from the nearest city. evidence by the fact that the brothers and yui have to take a limousine just to attend school (flex, much?). it's isolated, surrounded by sprawling forests that block out the sun and completely theirs. ideal for what those sick bastards get up to. reiji tells yui that she's more than welcome to "leave" if she's not satisfied with her living situation. likely because he knows that they're miles away from any sort of civilization, and she has no other means of getting there except by foot. obviously, yui can't just leave, which is how they like it. prey that can't escape is probably their favorite kind.
who knows how many bodies are buried underneath that place. the sakamaki brothers have been doing this for years, centuries even. reiji can't be bothered to keep count of those poor girls who get sent like lambs to a slaughterhouse. the others couldn't care less. all that really matters is what their blood tastes like.
the church certainly seems to know the type that the brothers prefer. docile, meek, and pliant. look however you'd like; at the end of the day you'll eventually meet the same fate. if you're pretty enough, kanato might find you a nice place in his dollhouse. that'd be nice, don't you think? your skin would be just like porcelain, left as a lifeless corpse while he gets to stroke your hair and put you in frilly dresses. he'd be doing you a favor by keeping you rather than letting the bugs eat your body.
you might think that with the six brothers around, the mansion would seem small, but you really underestimate just how massive the place is. it's easy to get lost in the endless hallways that seem to stretch on for miles. each one looks exactly identical. stray too far off and you'll find yourself staring into a dark hallway where the servants forgot to light up. stay longer, and you notice shadows crawling where they shouldn't. the locals call the mansion a "haunted house", and i don't think they're just talking about the sakamaki brothers.
thousands of 'brides' were probably sent by the church. each one just as confused and in the dark as yui was. again, the brothers can't be bothered to learn their names. not when there's six of them and only one of her. there's never enough to go around. in the end they all wind up a mound of dirt in the graveyard.
with the amount of death, it's no surprise that the mansion is lingering with vengeful spirits. not all of the ghosts are mean. if you're just like them, a sacrificial lamb sent by a cruel shepherd, they might take pity on you. sheep have to flock together, don't they?
late at night, you can still hear quiet sobs escaping from one of the locked doors in the upper wing. where some poor bride spent her last dying breath piecing together her neck after she'd pissed off subaru for the last time. whispers breathe over your shoulder when ayato's calling out "oi, tit-less!", telling you to stay put. disembodied hands encourage you into the closet when kanato's on his rampage, screaming about how someone has touched his precious teddy.
yui wonders how many girls came before her. they're all nameless, and during the times kanato drags her to his dollhouse, she can't bear the thought of meeting the eyes of those wax figures. when she spends the night bent over the porcelain edge of the bathtub, holding a rag over whatever gash one of the brothers has bitten into her, she contemplates whether they were just as frightened as her.
which is why, under the full moon's guiding light, she'll head to the graveyard. she tries her best to ignore the thought behind why the sakamaki's have their own. on one of the many empty headstones that litter across the graveyard, she sets down a small bouquet of roses; freshly picked from the garden. she'll press her hands together and pray—not for their salvation, but for god to put their souls to rest. she understands more than anyone that they've suffered enough. it's not a lot, not nearly as much as they deserve. but it's all she can offer.
it becomes a small tradition for her to do. sometimes before she heads out, reiji will spot her from his bedroom window. he'll watch her kneel down with a pair of shears and pluck out the best-looking roses for the bouquet. he finds it ridiculous, though he never goes out of his way to stop her. mainly because he'd be forced to admit he was watching (and he'd rather die than do that), and quite frankly, it's beneath him.
[underground - 地下]
the tunnels underneath span for miles. the longer you walk, the farther the distance from the end seems to grow. well, if you can make it past the smell. they probably span past the actual sakamaki estate itself and keep going beyond that.
given that there's a literal toture chamber connected to these things, i wouldn't be surprised if any brides of the past were dragged down here for "punishment" by laito or ayato's hand.
a happier headcanon is that this is probably how some of the familiars travel unseen. you know how victorian aristocrats made hidden passageways for servants to move about without being seen? yeah, same concept except much damper.
