Opera courting human!reader
It's been a minute since I did something Iruma-related, who better to get back into it with than -
Our favourite resident security devil, unlike the guard dogs, is completely fine with having feelings towards you.
Well, they have a slight initial freak out when they figure out that the warm, cosy feelings they get from serving and being around you are vastly different from the warm feelings they get working for Sullivan or even Iruma.
Because oh. They're having emotions, romantic emotions.
Honestly, their only hang-up might be the fact that you’re technically their master, but they get over that quickly enough.
Their initial courting gift was going to be food of some kind, after all, humans are a bit gluttonous, especially where Opera's cooking is involved, but they decide to do something a bit different.
Something along the lines of proclaiming that they are always going to look after you, they just want to do it from a different position in your life.
So they have a weapon fashioned for you.
One day during your afternoon tea, Opera brings you a box.
It's beautifully carved and made of a deep red wood so dark it's almost black, but it gleams red in the light. They kneel before you and present the box,
They have a nice short little speech about how they've never known the taste of defeat until they met you. You who somehow managed to break down their walls and thoroughly ravaged their heart until they could have none other but you.
They slowly up the box and inside it gleams a beautiful silver dagger
Once you accept, they’re rather surprisingly touchy.
Not in an overt way, they’re too polished for that, but their fingers linger a little too long on your wrist when offering you tea. Their tail brushes your ankle as they pass behind you.
You’d almost think it was incidental, if it weren’t for the fact that Opera doesn’t do accidents.
When you accepted the dagger, a thing clearly designed not just to defend, but to fit you, weight and balance made precisely for your hand, they smile with something like satisfaction, like they’ve just checked something off a very long to-do list.
From then on, Opera’s gestures of affection only grow more… peculiar.
You’re no stranger to being cared for, of course — Opera has always looked after you in that watchful, efficient, almost unsettlingly competent way of theirs. But now? Now you find that they’ve installed warding spells on your clothes. You never quite reach the point of fatigue anymore. Opera has already “gently encouraged” you to rest, or sleep, or take a moment to breathe.
Usually, by curling up around you, with their head resting on your lap, their body lightly vibrating in purrs, they'll lull you to sleep. Then, they'll linger a little before getting back to work, ensuring everything is perfect for you and the rest of the Sullivan family.
It’s devotion, yes, but laced with something fiercer.
Protective doesn’t quite cover it. Possessive is closer, but still not quite right. It’s more like:
You are theirs. You always were. They simply hadn’t claimed it yet.
They don’t announce it to the world. There’s no public declaration, no change in demeanour around others, but the way they look at you now is different.
Sharper. Softer. Something between reverence and hunger.
Hunger for you, their lovely master and partner.
And woe betide anyone who tries to challenge that claim, intentionally or not.