Riven gets cursed by a magical jewel and he must act on his deepest desire in order to break it and live (aka rivusa fuck or die with feelings)
Musa/Riven | Explicit | 21380 words | 2 chapters
Favorite Quote: The entire fucking fic.... Like I my favorite quotes are spoilers and I can’t type them here because I want you guys to react to it in the context of the fic. So yeah, read the fic.
If you like hurt/comfort fics with a lot of feelings and internal struggles and pining, and also fuck or die and amazing smut, you should should read this fic!
READ IT HERE
So I have to start with a disclaimer, Jo, the writer of this fic, is my best friend in the whole world and was the one that got me into writing fics and into making gifs and the whole fandom world. So I might be a little biased with everything she does - even if I think I’m not.
I also followed the creation of this fic, reading it multiple times before it was finished and giving her my 2 cents about it (And making a gif for it). Jo hasn’t written a Rivusa centered fic in a while and I was trying to keep a chill head while internally screaming with excitement that she was writing one - If you aren’t aware, I’m I like Rivusa a bit. Just a little bit.
This was a birthday fic for @gossipqueen2000, another amazing writer and fellow rivusa-stan (totally recommend her fics btw), and Jo first asked Mo what she enjoyed most in fics so this gift would be perfect. I’m not 100% what was in that list because that was a private conversation but boy am I happy with whatever Mo said because the final result was EXPECTACULAR.
This fic. THIS FIC. Ugh, where to even start?
Jo has a way of writing that not only sets the scene perfectly but takes you back and then into characters heads in a way that’s not tireing or confusing or that breaks you out of the plot. Everything happens in the perfect pace, fits right where it needs to fic and flows easily, you could read 100 pages of her writing and feel like you read only 10.
What I also love a lot about her writing, and something I think I struggle a lot with, is showing characters emotions, what they really feel in a way that isn’t “he was sad”, “he was angry”.
You could feel Riven’s love for Musa, not only the romantic love, or the physical lust he has for her, but the true, real love, because of little things like how he knows to keep her ID and her card in his wallet because she has a bad habit of not carrying one, or how he knows the lyrics to her favorite songs- which he also knows not to sing along because she hates when people do that. Details like this, details she adds at just the right place at the right time, show you so much more than what is said, shows the reader characters habits, their history. It gives their feelings depth and it makes it all just feel more real.
And the whump! Jo can write whump. The same way she writes love she writes pain and its so detailed and hurts it makes your heart squeeze. I don’t read a lot of the fics she puts out and I’ve apologized to her tons about it but because she loves hurt and whump and my heart is very fragile, I cry about the most littlest things and when I read a whump fic of hers it literally ruins my day because its all so real and raw and my mind just can’t stop thinking about it.
And the smut... oh boy oh boy... Jo says she’s not really a fan of writing smut but she’s amazing at it, with just a perfect dose of kink mixed it to make it spicy(er). And the smut in this didn’t dissapoint. After reading about, what 19k words of hurt/comfort you finally arrive at the smut and you yell FINALLY! and its HOT!
The plot, which maybe should have been the first thing I talked about but oh well. The plot is... what other word can I use that isn’t “perfect” or “amazing” because I think if Jo were to beta this post she’d say I used these words too much already... The plot is genius (?)
But seriously, Jo could have taken a trope like fuck or die, which is usually straight to the point and PWP, but made it just that, quick and easy. But no, she created a whole intricate universe, a whole detailed backstory, ten years of pining, before she delivered on the prompt. And then instead of making it so they resolve the issue right away, she draggs it over a few days, makes Riven taste the power of the curse, makes him prepared for death as much as he can be because he thinks there’s no way out of it. She makes you yell a the computer/phone screen because RIVEN YOU ARE SO FUCKING STUPID.
I think if I say anything else I’ll be spoiling the fic too much for those who haven’t read. So read it.
And while you’re there check out Jo’s other fics, only a few are rivusa because her main ship is skloom but I 100% recommend them. All of them.
Riven and Musa are out in a mission for the Solarian crown and he gets cursed. Except breaking the curse is impossible, because Musa doesn't love him...Right?
Happy birthday Mo!!
