This is a blog for all the trash stuff I’ve written and all the odd ramblings/HCs/the jazz. I’m in a lot of fandoms, so whatever I’ve written is sporadic, but I’ve tagged whatever I can.
This is a side blog; My main is up at divinitions
Littered with NSFW topics/fics. 18+, minors don’t interact. NSFW fics are UNTAGGED.
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Requests are open unless specified. My inbox/ask is always open for a chat or if anyone just wants to scream at the same fandoms I do.
Thanks for popping by and I hope you enjoy reading whatever it is I’ve written 😌
Tamlen/Mahariel still have me in a chokehold after all these years, if not more. Also Elven makes me want to bash my head against the wall, but I give thanks to Fenxshiral for doing god's work for us fanfic writers for gracing us with their wonderful blog.
Anyway, here's some snippets from an angsty fic I'm writing.
My last update on MeViMeri before I go back into not posting chapters on it. I love this series to death, and I love Amelie to death, and the remastered Oblivion hype is so, so exciting! I really have grown attached to this series, however, looking back at it has also made me realise that I absolutely am not satisfied with the way I've written it as a whole.
I'm definitely going to be continuing with MeViMeRi, but I want to come back to it and give it justice. I'll be posting stuff on my blog sporadically and with updates, but I probably won't be posting chapters on the actual story.
Thanks so much for sticking through with the series, and I hope to come back to it soon. In the meantime, I'll write up a character sheet, some story beats and share my other guilty pleasure (LOOKING AT YOU SPECIFICALLY DRAGON AGE)
Pairing: KaeLumi
CW: Kaeya has an anxious breakdown near the end, and a lot of this fic deals with his trauma of not opening up to people.
Blood is a loyal follower to Kaeya’s truths, a faint whisper that reminds him of everything that could—has—happened if he slivered an inch of his thoughts. It is the scent of iron he could never wash out, not from the thin line of death across the necks of so many people, not from his hands, nor from the soles of his feet, split open as he walks across the evergreen growth of thorns, fed fat from his deceit.
These are only skin deep, is how he convinces himself as he tucks the unease behind a veiled smile that pinches his cheeks. Flesh wounds will heal but honesty, baring an unguarded heart out upon his sleeve, is a dangerous game and Kaeya has no desire to tempt mortality again.
One narrow escape is enough.
Sweet words, sweeter lies, he offers those instead. They always repay him in trust, a valuable currency he never quite could give away, so he sacrifices what spare human feeling he has for the pristine beauty of a white winter when he responds. Clean, untainted, pure.
It is easier to deal with the disease that is loneliness than a knife to the back.
A laid-back, duty-shirking cavalry captain, whose dull seaward lineage is made riveting through ten rounds of Death After Noon. That is who Kaeya is.
That is how he introduces himself to Mondstadt.
That is the image he’ll set in the starlit traveller’s mind.
That is who she, with unabashed vocality, politely refuses to believe.
Lumine chalks it up to the vagueness of a hunch, and he can’t help but roll his eyes, click his tongue. Sure, he might enjoy throwing the same reason around, but it feels like complete nonsense to have it flung back at him. He pouts, intentionally puppy-like and innocent, and pleads with a tone of feigned hurt.
Lumine laughs.
Laughs and looks at him with topaz-cut eyes, eyes like honeyed spring water. Kaeya can’t decide whether he should feel offended at her subtle dig, or honoured that he’s made her smile. He settles on brushing it off with a shrug and a, “Well, you’ve got me there.”
“I know,” is Lumine’s response, a simple phrase that holds much more depth than it lets on, and he wonders if she’s seen just what it is he’s truly hiding.
The prospect sends chills down his spine. Does she know me, more than I do?
Kaeya drowns those fears in the tavern, his local safe haven, a place away from his worries and her all-seeing gaze. It is short-lived some nights, languorous on the others, but at least, here, the chatter is comfortable. Leaning forward, he listens to the slurred words, the odd secrets, to keep his thoughts at bay.
And yet
And yet, Kaeya finds himself following the wide expanse of her back, her small frame belying her insurmountable strength as she carries every single burden in silence. “Trust me,” she would assure with her sunlit smile. Kaeya would never admit it, but he does—he wants to.
But what has trust ever given me?
Rain and ichor, and festering wounds.
Everything is unflinchingly loud. How laughable, how maddeningly soft of him, to be so weak in his resolve. Against the hushed humdrum dawn, he watches her leave the gates.
They say if you stare too long at the sun, you’ll go blind. In her presence, Kaeya feels robbed of his vision. He looks to her footprints instead, at the trail of fireflies she leaves in her wake. They don’t hurt him as much as her wayward glances do, not as much as the sincerity in her voice when she reminds him that he can always seek her company when he needs someone to talk to.
“I won’t stay long in Mondstadt, anyway,” Lumine laughs, laced with melancholia. “Whatever your secret is, I’ll bring it with me.”
Kaeya’s chest tightens, constricts. “How fun would I be without my mysteries?” he hums and she scoffs.
“Well, either way,” she says, shrugging while she goes to her feet, “I’m here to listen.”
He knows, he knows, that’s why it’s proving difficult to keep all his bottled thoughts neatly safeguarded. Everything is easier around her, as though he can just be honest and loose-lipped, and bare, and Kaeya despises it.
He despises how vulnerable he feels, how vulnerable she makes him feel.
Each passing day only serves to coddle that parasite of an idea, the frail, tempting whisper at the shell of his ear, gnawing at him endlessly. The words coagulate in his throat, begging to be spoken and put to death all at once, barred only by gritted teeth and sheer willpower.
Lumine never quite pries him, not when he excuses himself of her company through the blatant lie of working through his commissions; nor when he hides at the corner of the bar when they celebrate her victorious homecoming; nor when his nightly patrols loop him back to her in some cyclical torment.
She gives him his space, lets him breathe. Kaeya isn’t sure if he enjoys the consideration, the lack of judgement, the misplaced respect.
A clean-cut, clinical distance maintained. Lumine never quite meets him again, and he never bothers. It’s easier, it’s easier, he tells himself, chanting it through like a broken record.
It’s easier, Kaeya convinces, even when he finds her perplexed at her usual spot at Good Hunter, bathed in the scarlet red of a sunset.
“My,” he greets, pulling up the chair reserved for him, “I don’t think I’ve seen you quite so bothered, Traveller.”
Lumine’s eyes never quite meets his, even when she’s turned her body to his direction. A chill creeps up the length of his spine.
“I’m leaving for Liyue,” she says under her breath, so quiet it’s near indistinguishable from the wind. “Tomorrow morning.”
“Oh,” is all Kaeya manages to muster. She doesn’t speak after that. He doesn’t either, all the sentences tangled and fumbling on his tongue, and It’s easier this way, he reminds himself still, even when she’s long receded into Mondstadt’s crowd.
There’s a ringing in his ears, a loud, obnoxious pounding against his skull.
Lumine’s leaving.
The creature in his chest twists, writhing as he inhales deeply, like it is wounded and angry. Isn’t this what I wanted?
Iron fills his mouth as his teeth bite into the inside of his cheek. He’s never once looked at her, not in the longest time, and before he knows it, Kaeya’s letting his feet lead him to the home she’s staying in, blood cold and hands trembling.
The last time Kaeya’s ever held a person so warm dear to him, he burned to ashes.
Something old and ancient stirs, an acquaintance he thought bygone. Wrapping around his shoulders like a winter veil, it hovers, large and engulfing.
What has trust given you? Trauma sneers. Kaeya swallows. Rain and ichor, and festering wounds. Scorched skin black to its bone, pain still as new and fresh as spring. All that hate and fear, and loneliness.
His hand rests quietly on the door, shaking softly.
Intimately, anxiety slithers around his neck, a spurned lover begging for a second chance. His back is soaked in the frozen thunderstorm, the terrorised flesh on his arm throbbing painfully, this memoir he’s carried with him since eighteen.
I should leave. I should go. There isn’t much point in this.
Flashes of white dancing at the peripheral of his eye, embers sparking like coals. Kaeya balls his hand into a fist, breaths shallow and ragged, the smell of carbonised ozone filling the air.
This was a terri-
“Kaeya.”
His demons fall quiet.
Her fingers are warm around his wrist, comfortingly so, a hearth on a winter’s eve, and Kaeya’s heart steadies. Everything does.
I’m scared, he realises when he keeps his gaze to the ground, when he struggles to look back at her, when he’s being honest to himself past all those pretences, a lost child navigating uncharted wasteland.
I’m scared, he realises, of learning how to trust. It feels like centuries since he has. What has trust given you? Rain and ichor, and festering wounds.
Her grip on his wrist tightens.
A home. A friend. A brother. Tiny, stumbling memories that fill with laughter.
Kaeya swallows and turns around, and this time, he meets the gold of her eyes. In the dying light of day, she seems to glow brighter still, undying and unyielding.
They say if you stare too long at the sun, you’ll go blind. As long as it’s her, he can learn to live with that, to have faith in her promises and follow her lead.
“Are you alright?” Lumine questions, and he’s touched by the worry in her voice. Kaeya allows himself to smile, just barely, and nods.
“I’m here for that offer,” he says. There’s an unusual tremor in his words, a nervousness that he’s not quite felt in ages, and ages past. She blinks, once, twice, and Kaeya wonders if he’s misread.
Maybe-
Lumine laughs, then, like chimes in the wind, and Kaeya can’t help but chuckle along. With practiced ease, she slips her hand around his, linking their fingers together.
Kaeya lets her.
“Make yourself at home,” she guides him through the door and into her space effortlessly, seamlessly. Within the four walls she calls hers, in the incandescent ardour of her presence, he feels safe. Safe and heard, and at peace.
It isn’t likely that Kaeya will tell her everything he’s been shouldering within the day, nor the coming week, or month, or possibly a year, but he knows he eventually will. If it’s her, he wants to, and when she offers him a gentle sunburst smile, he’s certain of it.
For the first time since eighteen, Kaeya offers his heart, bare and beating, and him.
Across the waters, an algae bloom of salt crystals blossom.
[Genshin Impact | Zhongli]
Here, the air shimmers with clustering voices, coalescing hopes, a soft-carved smile ringing like chimes across the cloudless blue of a sun-graced afternoon. Zhongli sets the lacquer box down and unlatches it, unearthing the contents in an orderly, single-file form, laying them out on the ground.
The pouch is his first gift, filled with the seeds of hope her people had sown, an end to the blood-red dawn. In his palm, it weighs heavy, but it makes no mark when he places it upon the mound of salt centred between the monuments of a village swallowed whole.
He exhales.
Persimmons, mandarins, rice buns and a bowl of rice next, heaped tall so she and her people need no longer conflict over who goes home in starvation. Let these tide your suffering, if for a day. He goes onto his feet, then, and gathers all he needs for his final offering.
This one starts with a strike.
The brimstone-tipped match bursts alight as Zhongli burns the fallen maple leaves he’s collected. He dips the gaiwan into the surrounding sea, underground minerals swirling at his fingertips as he purifies the water clean before letting it heat. Once it does, he pours the liquid over the two teacups.
Zhongli draws the pot full again and brings it to warm, tipping the water from the gaiwan after briefly blooming a spoonful of tea leaves. He repeats the steps for the last time, counting until thirty beats under his breath before he fills the cups with freshly brewed tea.
Autumn petrichor and the scent of the woods, warm and rich, faintly sweetened by elderberries.
The breeze today carries well.
Sitting under the shade of the maple tree, Zhongli places the cup beside him. “I hope you’ve been well, old friend,” and in response, the surface of the tea in her teacup ripples. A small smile curls his lips.
He blows the steam rising from his drink before taking a sip. Shoumei is an unaccustomed brew for him, who prefers the darker roasted oolongs or pu’er to the mild flavours of white tea, but this is surprisingly pleasant.
I can understand why it is your favourite.
At the back of his throat, the taste of brine lingers, an unforgotten memory.
“Us divines,” Zhongli starts, “we belong no longer in the present Liyue.”
Another drink and Zhongli empties his cup. “Would you like yours filled?” The wind answers with a laugh, disturbing the calm of her unfinished tea. He takes that as a polite decline and refreshes his own.
Emboldened by the longer steep, the fragrance sharpens, a tart note akin to unripened sunsettias.
Zhongli presses his back against the tree’s trunk. “The people have come to decide their own fates.” Through the rustling leaves, he watches the lights shift, a translucence of fire and gold. “Whatever dominion I held over them has now ended.”
Exhaling, he glances down to the reflection of him, an amber visage on the tea’s surface. Zhongli swirls the cup between his fingers and stares at his own twisting distortion.
“Rex Lapis, Morax—I have consigned them to the earth from whence they came,” he pauses; the air stills. A pair of eyes affixes upon him, as bright as Cor Lapis’ in the dark, glimmering into focus.
And yet, I am never truly unbound.
“Liyue has no need for gods.”
Because we have created, and destroyed, and ravaged, and built.
“We have bled and made blood,” Zhongli mumbles, “and Liyue has bled enough.”
Beside him, she quiets at the mention of their past, shared and heavy with iron. Zhongli simply looks toward the horizon, where the sea borders the sky and splits. Whose bones is he sitting upon? How vast is this graveyard underneath? Whose history will time erase, erode, forget?
“This land is at relative peace, now,” he states. A bare whisper flickers through the islands of Sal Terrae; it sounds like hope. How she holds the people with boundless kindness, so much forgiveness, Zhongli could never understand.
He finishes his tea and pours himself another cup.
This time, the scent is bittersweet.
“I wish you could see the Liyue of today, dear friend.”
When the breeze blows gentle against his cheek, Zhongli offers a smile to reassure her. He hears her echo, and he tells her he understands. Cruel as their actions were, their hearts held mercy, a value scarce available in such times of strife.
“I desire naught of change, or regret.” What is done, is done; Zhongli fully subscribes to this. Still, that does not mean he feels no sorrow for the transgressions of a bygone past, of a well-intentioned mercy that begot a death deemed as salvation.
Bringing the cup to his lips, he takes a sip of his tea. A lingering sourness is all he can taste.
I wish that you lived in gentler times.
A comforting hand on his shoulder makes him chuckle, an act of consolation whose wearied seams betray him. Zhongli gazes out into the distance, to the shimmering tides ebbing away at the creases in their history.
Six thousand years. He will be the first to remember, the last to forget.
Six thousand years more, these plains he’ll walk upon alone.
It’s a foolish thing, for this notion is one he has learned to come to terms with, but his heart aches.
Sung in waves, she calls out to him and he looks towards the brightest star atop the waters. Tiny crystals flowering into a field, blooms of salt rime the surface in patches, like winter preserving spring blossoms in white before it melts away into the snow.
Traceless, soundless, wordless, her presence leaves him with only the fragrance of sweet rice to contemplate upon.
On the tip of his tongue, the tea’s aftertaste is a pleasant jasmine, mildly honeyed. Zhongli smiles.
“Thank you.”
In silence, in solitude, he watches as time slowly pulls the sun’s descent into the earth, accompanied by the stars, the spines of the many mountains and the untouched cup of tea gone cold.
your eyes spill red, his hands carve your disaster.
(Nanami Kento/F!Reader)
Inspired by the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea, which stemmed from the copious amount of times I’ve seen Nanami described as a statue of some sort, prompted by adelek’s ave maria. and flintstrike’s erosion (both of which are gorgeously written fics. Please check them out).
Nanami Kento was a statue of a man, that much you understood, weathered down by the autumn rain and the burden of existence. Erect, upright, upstanding, a model masterpiece whose shoulders sagged ever just in Tokyo’s watercolour nights.
He’d allowed you to taste the cool of his lips then. He reclined in the chair and shuttered his eyes as you kissed yourself against him.
If he breathed, you didn’t notice.
Tucked between the blurring haze of the city skyline, the blue light of computer screens and whirring of overworked fans, you typed in distant silence with him and swallowed the event into bygone. He never spoke of it either.
Not until summer, at least.
Drenched in syrupy heat and the cliché of romance, you held your gaze for a minute too long in the still waters. Lips wet, he let you kiss him again and this time, Galatea cupped your cheek and returned your thoughtless affection, borne of warmth and heat for the first time since your meeting.
And you, Pygmalion, marvelled at the way marble yielded to life.
In the quiet spaces, the dark, early hours of a morning where the only ones that dared so peek at your twining bodies were the gods, Nanami bared to you his heart. It thrummed and pulsed, and weighed heavy in the palm of your hand as he confessed to the endless thoughts he had of you.
Hypnos rarely ever graced him, but you did.
“Why?” you asked as he brought your knuckles to his lips.
He seemed to ponder the question, then, “You compelled me.”
Sincere, earnest, an accusatory hush that you chose to ignore as he held your body deft and prayed your name, head between your thighs in worship to his creator. Slowly, you studied the lines of his form: the noble slope of his nose, the sharp gauntness of his cheekbones, the angular dignity of his jaw, the flex and ripple of his muscles every time he moved closer, gold spun hair brushing ivory skin as he looked at you through glassy aqua irises, stern and gentle.
I could never take credit, you thought as he called you his god; you could never have made a man so beautiful.
Yet Galatea had only ever known Pygmalion.
And he had only ever known you.
And it was always so violently quiet, whatever it was you had with each other. Clipped replies, the unanswered phone calls, questions that he’s never asked; your doubts grew large and plaguing by the day. Despite the intimacy of each embrace, everything else contradicted, revolted, a growing fissure you couldn’t quite mend.
A lacuna.
This is just who he is, you convinced, dripped in the honey of his words as he coaxed you to his making, as your eyes wept roses when he touched you holy, made you sigh his name the way revellers would at the feet of god. He made sure you knew what a sight you were, a marvel of Aphrodite’s kindness when she blessed you awake, the only one who’d ever afflicted him with pining, with yearning.
“No one else,” he affirmed as you sobbed his name.
No one else, you repeated in delight when he cuffed a golden chain around your wrist, subtly proclaiming that you were his to all those he worked with across the office’s three floors.
No one else, you reminded yourself when he forgot the plans you’d made with him, the rush of work and urban havoc gnawing him alive. Dinners at upscale bars were his preferred method of apology, next to the glass bottles of Keiko Mecheri and small lily of the valley bouquets. He never said his sorry’s, never wrote them down either, even though those would’ve meant more than petty treasures.
No one else, you clung to those words still, when he began to dye you in his colours, mazarine blue and wheaten yellow. He painted the winding patterns of his childhood into you, your arching back his fine-bone china, the fire of his palms your kiln. Nanami was a sometsuke ceramicist, and you were his greatest creation.
Behind the mirror reflection of a brightly lit bathroom, you found the perfection of yourself confounding. Warped, twisted, unsightly, a repulsive mess of parts you couldn’t comprehend.
Galatea was unsettlingly beautiful.
Nanami stripped you bare that night and made love to your body. You, however, watched from the carcasses of your milky whites, watched as you moved to the rhythm of him. Your arms wrapped around his neck while your voice sang his name, flushed into his flesh as lines blurred. You never knew how honey-sweet you sounded, how perfectly small you were in his massive, calloused hands, like you were made just for him.
You felt unrecognisable.
And Pygmalion was hopelessly, unwaveringly infatuated.
“What do you love about me?” you asked in your nakedness; Nanami twisted onto his side and looked at you. Fingers came to touch your cheek.
“Everything,” he simply replied, a nauseating calm of a smile gracing his features.
Betrayal coiled around the spaces between your ribs. It felt like an excuse, a cheap-shot answer that rang hollow through the marrow of your bones, a refusal to elaborate because he could not, even if he tried. He didn’t know you, and neither did you.
Whoever you were prior to him, you could no longer reconcile with.
So you curled against him as he caged you in a lavish lovelessness, the glossed lacquered surface of his empty words weaving you together into someone new. Desperate, you reached for the image in his mind, a tapestry of faces that shifted every time he chipped you away.
Tsutsuji, he called when he cupped the curve of your figure. Tsubaki, he called when you looked up at him through your lashes. Suzuran, he called when he smelled the perfume he gifted you on your pulse. Sumire, he called when you reddened at his touches.
You were all of them and none of them all at once.
In the sunlight of a nine-to-five morning, the bracelet around your wrist glittered, beautiful and dangerous. It felt heavy. Your eyes had easily found his, the softest, emptiest shade of forget-me-not petals. You smiled. Something cracked at the shell of your ear.
Who are you?
You stopped right before the door. Winter slipped from underneath as puddles formed. Even in the stillness, you could not find yourself, so you answered your question with the one thing you knew:
Nanami.
And then you were in his arms again, wholly and utterly engulfed, your existence brought to life only through his divinity.
One month, three days. On this lantern haloed night, you remember the seafoam of his eyes, the red-spun crown of his hair, the gentle curve of a winter-weathered smile and the quiet promise of the mark on he bears.
Eleven months, four nights. You sleep cold, the creeping frigid loneliness hoarse against your skin. Exhaustion drags you through the starless night, cloudless and clear, and the moon hangs by a string on the edge of breaking.
Three months, twelve days. Basked in afterglow and sake-rimmed kisses, he offers you his heart. Amber glass slivered with tiny cracks, heavy with thick, sloshing secrets, you take it in your hands and there’s a whisper of a smile.
Nine months, ten nights. Salt-stung eyes, vision blurred by tears, a throat hoarse from all the yelling. You’re not quite sure what it is you’re waiting for or what answer you’re yearning for, or if you want the silence to end. He apologises, a hush broken by shame and guilt, and a sincerity that settles in your skin. You simply stand there.
Six months, two days. I miss you. The letter is by no means short, a recount that tapers into a full-double sided affair, but it’s those words that you fixate upon in particular. His voice hums against the shell of your ear, and from the window, you pray upon the heavenly blue of the sky. A dull ache settles in your chest.
Six months, twenty one nights. A dull ache settles in your chest when you realise he’s stood you up. There’s no anger to be held, none of the frustration or disappointment you’d have thought would take over, just a sluggish weariness that slows your steps. You wonder how much longer you can hold out for before it drags you into its depths.
Ten months, fifteen days. Blush colours his cheeks when he gifts you a cactus, covered in white, hair-like spines and dappled with flowers of pink and cream. You remember seeing it perched by his windowsill as he tells you it’s the first plant he’s ever bought for himself. You’re not quite sure how to receive the gesture, but he insists that he wants you to have it, for good luck and as a reminder of him when he’s away, for a day or a lifetime. Placing the plant on the table, gilded by the gold of the sun, you kiss him in gratitude, and with the hope he never falls far from home.
Eleven nights. Bathed in moonlight and linen, with iron in your mouth, you watch his sea glass stare crack, his lips pursing into a tight frown, the crimson of him fading into rust.
“It’s not you.”
“You can’t tell me that,” he says sharply and you wince. He looks away, a held breath, then, softer, “Not after you’ve made it clear it’s my absence that’s causing you pain.”
Leaning forward, unsure, you draw him into your arms, let him settle within you once more, taking him in a kiss that spells the end to a rain-graced summer. He holds you closer than he ever has, bodies flushed and perfectly fitted, lavishing you with his affections for the last time, as if to make up for the stretches of months he’s left you alone.
In the distance, you hear the welkin cry.
Twelve months. Beads of water trickle down the overhanging, curved eaves of the roof, pooling into sheets of puddles. You sigh and cross your arms over your chest, and wonder if the rain, welcome as it is, will last long, seeing as you’re severely ill-equipped.
Behind you, the restaurant door rattles open and you, instinctively, turn to meet him, who seems just as startled as you are. An overtaking silence, filled by raindrops, and then, hushed, “Did you forget your coat?”
You nod and he, with a kind smile, unfurls his umbrella while he steps outside. He waits, patient, unquestioning even though you take a lifetime too long before you take shelter with him, muttering your thanks.
“You’ve always had a habit of under preparing for wet weathers,” he reminisces and you hum in agreement, unsure of what to feel that he still remembers your quirks. In the evaporating distance, your shoulder bumps his, fingers brushing, catching the remnants of charcoal and smoke, but the predicament of it all isn’t unpleasant.
He accompanies you all the way home, sheltering the both of you despite the storm ending halfway through. He says his goodbye’s when you’re at your front door, but something tells you that if he leaves you’ll never see him again, and so you, without much thought, call out to him, foolish as it is, selfish as it is.
“Yes?”
“Would you like some tea before you leave?” you offer tentatively. He’s surprised, for a brief moment, but it’s soon replaced by a soft sigh, the imperceptible quirk of his lips and a nod.
Leaving the door open, you welcome the summer monsoon.
Akihabara is the obvious answer behind the portal you’ve dragged him through, but he’s taken aback when that’s not where both of you end up in.
Nope.
Instead, he finds himself surrounded by a throng of normies, loud, clamoring groups of them that huddle in a line that moves as quickly as it’s replaced, an endless conveyor belt of people.
“This isn’t Akihabara,” he weakly manages and you shake your head.
“Nope, it’s the aquarium,” you answer and he’s not quite sure if he likes the sound of that, but he’s a little less jittery when you squeeze his hand. “You okay, Levi?”
“Just,” he starts, eyes darting between you and the landscape of faces; “a lot of normies.”
He flushes red when your fingers lace his. “Hey,” you call out, his gaze averting to meet yours. “We can always go to Akihabara if you’re more comfortable with that.”
He warms at your gesture, the consideration in your invitation, and he’s more than tempted to take you up on your offer. Akihabara would be a dream for him, rows and rows of his favourite manga on display, so many figurines and anime, and Ruri-chan merch. That’d be perfect, yep!
“No, let’s go in,” he asserts and your lips curl, soft in the morning sunlight as you tug him towards the line.
Akihabara would be perfect, no doubt, but it’d be perfect just for him, and that’s not the birthday he wants. No, he wants a day that’s perfect for the both of you, a birthday where you’re enjoying yourself, too.
You’d never say it, but he knows you’re not a massive otaku like he is, so he takes it upon himself today. It’s the least he can do after you’ve gone out of your way to surprise him.
Besides, an aquarium would be fun (sans the normies).
Amongst the aquamarine haze, the undulating blues bobbing across the floor, Levi finds himself at peace, more so than he’d ever thought he would be. Hand in hand, you walk with him through the various tanks, stopping every so often to admire the undersea creatures.
“Look, Levi,” and he follows the line of your sight towards the cylindrical tank, to the gliding bioluminescence inside the waters.
“Moon jellyfish,” he identifies, pressing his palm to the cold glass. They coalesce around him in response, glowing in the darkness, and he hears you let out a breath of wonder; he smiles.
They follow the tip of his finger as he leads them in circles, straight lines and patterns, their tendrils a flickering, remnant trail. When he stops, they do too, resting, pulsing with light. He stays like that for a moment before he pulls away and they scatter into the confines of their home.
“They seem to really like you,” you muse, and he shrugs, slightly embarrassed when he’s snapped out of the daze.
He scratches the back of his neck, awkward and sheepish. “I was an admiral.”
Not that he’s ever liked the title. Sure, it had given him power and respect, but all he can remember is the envy in their eyes, the contempt, the curling, forked ends of unspoken insults. He remembers the cold, ruthless isolation of being at the top and the way he clung to the only thing he knew how to do with desperation.
He dislikes it all.
“Levi?”
Your voice brings him back, concern pulling the corners of your lips into a frown and clouding your eyes.
“It’s nothing,” he replies, waving it off, though you’re not so convinced; you let it slide anyway.
Still, if being able to communicate with marine life could make you smile like that, maybe that past of his isn’t so unbearable after all.
The touch pools are an experience, Levi concludes. Like a swarm of overzealous otakus trying to get a limited edition merch of their favourite character, the critters come at him in troves and variable speeds. He thinks it’s cute, though the normies might say otherwise.
“He’s just like Aquaman!” he hears a boy squeal, and he hears you laugh beside him, though you’re trying to stifle it down.
“What’s it?” he asks.
“Aquaman’s a superhero,” you respond as you drag your hand through the water lazily, petting the nearby manta ray that’s busy trying to make its way to his hand.
Oh. He supposes it is ridiculous that he’d be viewed as a superhero, as a character of justice. He doesn’t really fit the image of it; aren’t they usually well-built and fit, and handsome, and charismatic? That’s more Lucifer than -
“I think it suits you,” comes your easy answer and he blushes red to the tip of his ears, muffling an embarrassed noise, and you’re chuckling again.
“W-what makes you s-say that?” he stutters out, lips pulling into a frown as he strokes the shell of hermit crab. You shrug.
“You’re always kind, for one,” you start. He leans in closer to listen while you continue. “You’re passionate about what you like, you’re reliable when you need to be, and I think, most importantly, you’re someone I can easily put my trust in.”
And he’s averting his eyes away, biting his bottom lip, his free hand coming up to cover his face as he mumble a muffled ‘thank you’. His heart’s going a mile a minute, but when he peeks at you between fingers and you look back, that smile of yours never once faltering, he can’t help but feel seen, appreciated, loved, even.
He doesn’t protest when your fingers curl around his, when you pull his hand down to reveal the blush of him and bump shoulders. This - being with you, liking you, having you return his affections - is something he’s never imagined happening, not just because he’s, well, him, but also because it’s just a feeling he’s never garnered from the people around him.
Yet here you are, admiring the very skills he’s been so hated for.
“I like you,” he mutters and you look up to him, eyes wide. Without hesitation, he repeats himself. “I like you.”
There’s a heartbeat of silence, then, a genuine, confident, “I like you, too.”
“No trip is complete without getting souvenirs,” you chirp as the exit comes to sight, and Levi nods in agreement. Merch is everything and he’d like to leave the aquarium with more than just memories, even if that’s greedy of him.
Ugh, I sound like Mammon now.
He digresses.
Passing by the shelves, all filled to the brim, he takes in the variety of options. From keychains, to notepads, to cute casings and fluffy plushies, and embroidered hats; the possibilities are truly endless.
It’s the graphic tees that catch his eye, though.
“Matching shirts?” comes your startling question.
He nods, then shrugs, then stuffs his free hand into his jacket’s pocket. “It’s fine if you don’t want to.”
“What makes you think I’m against the idea?” you retort with a grin and before he knows it, you’re tugging him along to the rack of clothes.
Both of you rummage through your options and you’re occasionally bringing one up to model over yourself, which makes it harder on him because he thinks you’d look good in all of them, and he makes it known. You roll your eyes, calling it banal flattery, but the glimmer in your gaze tells him otherwise.
“What about this one?” Levi asks as he pulls a light blue shirt with a picture of a content whale, tucked into the shirt pocket and the words BRB, I’m gonna whale underneath.
You can barely stop yourself from chuckling at the sight, wheezing out an, “Oh, that’s perfect,” when he brings it up over him.
It comes in two other colours, white and peach, and you settle on the blue while he grabs the pink one in his respective size. He wanders around with you through the entirety of the space in search of more things to take home, ending up with a jellyfish keychain and a clownfish decal while you pick up a seal plushie.
After a losing squabble, Levi lets you pay for the entirety. “Consider it a gift,” you smile, taking the paper bag with a tilt of your head before you make your way out of the shop.
Sunset streaks the sky in orange and purple, and he’s transfixed by the beauty of you when the colours paint you rich and honeyed. Both of you start to retrace your steps to the portal, blending in with the dispersing crowd and he feels comfortingly normal.
“Should I carry that?” he asks as you trudge back up a hill, tilting his head towards your bag.
You shrug and hand it over. “Sure, it’s all yours anyways.”
“Didn’t you buy a -“
“Seal plush?” you finish. He nods while your eyes crinkle in giddy. “It’s yours.”
“Hah?!”
You shrug. “I wanted you to have something to remember me by,” you reply and he stops dead in his tracks, blood running cold.
“Are you leaving?”
“No! God, no, Levi,” you answer, closing the minimal distance between the two of you. He’s close enough to smell your body wash now. “I just want you to never feel alone, Levi, and maybe I’m being selfish when I say I want you to think of me while you look at it, but I hope it gives you company if I can’t, at any point in time.”
And he’s pulling you to him before he knows it, lips pressing yours in a kiss that clings like salt to the ocean breeze. You sigh into it, pliant in his arms as his fingers flutter over your cheek, your hands resting around his waist.
He pulls away ever just and he sees that you’re the one flushed over now, and a sense of pride wells up in him when he finds his reflection in your eyes.
“Thank you,” he mumbles, cradling you as he rocks on the balls of his feet.
“For what?” you question, giggling.
“For today,” he answers, but that’s not quite it, that’s not quite enough. “For believing in me, for being you, for everything.”
“Always, Levi,” and he knows, with every inch of him, that you mean it.
An MC that loves Diavolo is cute and all, but I’m convinced that while he returns MC’s affections, he’s also probably using their relationship as leverage against Lucifer
Yeh I also got the impression just from the game that he was ruthless in a way. If he had a goal, he wasn't going to let anything get in his way. Even though I think belphie's ire towards the humans was kind of unreasonable ( and I can't decide whether that was good writing or not), he was kind of put in prison for basically having a dissenting opinion???
I agree with you! Not to mention Diavolo sounded really shady when he confessed to Lucifer that he knew Belphie was in the attic.
Call it me overthinking things, but when Dia proclaims he’s sad that Lucifer’s being pulled in two directions, and that his loyalty was a source of a guilt, it reads to me as someone who wants absolute subservience/agreement. If he knew Belphie was in the attic, there would’ve been multiple opportunities to approach Lucifer about it and talk, and maybe even talk to Belphie (considering his home screen dialogue that says he wants to have a heart-to-heart).
Nah, but instead Dia goes straight to lock him in a prison. It just seems to me that he’d get rid of all the obstacles that’s filling Lucifer’s head with doubt, or revolt, when it comes down to it.
