1cookedegg

[1cookedegg]

Wow, this is such a lovely fic!! It reminds me a lot of this really good one I read a few years ago in 2023 called "Clingy" by yandere-daydreams, it's got a lot of similar elements! The stolen keys, for example, going through the reader's phone, making fun of the reader for having childe as a contact, not taking reader seriously about their breakup, giving them a new laptop as a means of emotional/financial entrapment, breaking down at the possibility of the breakup being legit and reader subsequently offering a hug which ultimately results in them perpetuating their toxic relationship with scara and oh.... that's a lot of examples, huh.

It's okay to be inspired by someone's ideas/writing, but shameless plagiarism is absolutely not okay. If you want people to respect what you contribute to fanfiction spaces (or to see you as a credible author at the very least), let it be your own creativity shining through instead of other people's hard work that you stole. I sincerely hope you don't do something like this ever again. If you do, shame on you.

synopsis : you found your ex inside your apartment, snooping through your phone that you forgot to bring with you. pairing : scaramouche x reader (no gendered pronouns used for reader) warnings : yandere themes, unhealthy relationships, emotional abuse, mention of financial abuse. author's note : i kind of wrote this instead of writing the report i need to lol

you should’ve known it was a mistake when he demanded a key.

not asked—demanded. tossed the word like it offended him to have to say it at all, like of course he deserved access to your “shitty shoebox of an apartment,” and the real crime was that you hadn’t offered sooner.

kunikuzushi never let you into his place. not the penthouse ei paid for, not the dorm two cities over, not even the sprawling, cold beachside mansion he’d begrudgingly flown you out to once, just to shut you up about “meeting the family.” nine months in, and you still didn’t know if his moms even knew your name.

that should’ve been your first red flag. you’d mistaken it for shyness.

you used to tell yourself he made you feel alive—that you liked the way he snarled when you fought, the way he kissed like he was trying to make you forget how to breathe.

you wanted to sink your nails into him, clamp your jaw on his throat, and stay there. maybe you just wanted something to hold on to while he tore you apart.

you should’ve changed the locks. you should’ve changed them after the breakup. especially since you never got your keys back.

and you regret this decision—or the lack of one—with the sight in front of you.

keys he never returned spinning lazily around his finger, the phone you forgot on the kitchen counter balanced in his other hand, one ankle hooked over his knee, his body draped across your couch like he owned the air in the room.

he wears his usual uniform: ripped jeans clinging to narrow hips, a black long-sleeved shirt hanging loose around his frame. half a dozen silver rings clinking against each other as he fiddled with your things. the belt he’d probably spent more on than you made in a month.

his hair was a mess. not the styled kind, but genuinely disheveled—like he hadn’t slept, like something had kept him up, pacing circles in his head. his eyes were worse. dark, sharp, edged with a frustration that only ever bled out when you made the mistake of not playing along.

you should’ve expected it.

you don’t greet him. just exhale like you’ve been holding it all day and finally remembered how. you toss your bag on the nearest chair and ignore how your hands tremble when you loosen your scarf.

he’s made himself comfortable. too comfortable. a half-finished drink from that café he always complained about cooling next to it. he used to whine that it “reeked of desperation.” said the baristas spelled your name wrong on purpose.

he’s not looking at the drink or towards you. he’s reading your phone like it belongs to him.

he used to delete names from your contacts if he “didn’t trust them.” no warning. no apology. it was a reflex, the way he’d scroll through your messages and clear out anything he didn’t like. back then, you’d called it jealousy. a little toxic. a little cute. you’ve run out of euphemisms now.

you open your mouth, but your voice catches in your throat.

“you know ajax?”

you freeze. he doesn’t look up. his tone is lazy. disinterested. like he’s reading a grocery list, but there’s something coiled underneath—something sharp. his thumb is still on your screen.

you cross your arms. “why are you here?”

he ignores the question. “i mean, i knew you were in the same class. but seriously? him?”

you can already see where this is going, and it’s not anywhere good.

“i’m surprised he hasn’t flunked yet. he’s got that look, you know? the kind that crumbles the second it gets hard. give it until spring. i promise, he’ll be gone.”

you drop your bag onto the chair by the door, readying yourself to deal with whatever he did and will do today. 

“what’s he got that i don’t? oh, right. the emotional availability of a plank of wood. you must be thrilled.”

“i didn’t say you could come over.”

he lifts his eyes then. slow. like he’s just remembered you have a voice at all. and then, he smiles.

“and yet, here i am. sitting on your couch. drinking your favorite coffee from that mediocre café. reading your little group chat messages. you should stop typing like you’re trying to be funny. it’s embarrassing.”

you want to tear your voice out of your own throat—scream, cry, maybe laugh until it breaks. but you don’t. because you’ve done this before. you know how it ends. hours of shouting until words turn to static, until your voice is raw and his is worse, and neither of you remembers what started it.

if you let yourself unravel now, you won’t have anything left by morning. and he’ll still be here.

you know he’s here because he’s bored. because he missed you. because he wanted to remind you that lock or no lock, goodbye or no goodbye, he never really left.

“i texted you last night.” his voice was light, almost mocking, a glimmer of amusement in the way the words curled at the edges. “don’t tell me you tried to block me again.”

you had. of course you had. blocked the number, reported it, changed yours twice after he’d started using burner phones like a bad habit — drunk, desperate voicemails slurred between brittle laughter. little monologues about how much better his life was without you, how free he felt now that you weren’t suffocating him, how many people he’d fucked since the last time you were stupid enough to let him crawl back.

all of it was pathetic. but he knew what words would catch in your throat, what bitter little lies would sink their teeth in and fester. he always did.

he scoffed before you could answer. “forget it. i’ll handle it. should’ve known you’d fall apart the second i stopped cleaning up your messes.”

you gritted your teeth, fingers curling into a fist at your side. swallowing the retort burning at your tongue, you stepped in, snatched your phone from his hand. his fingers twitched, as if tempted to catch your wrist, to pull you back in the way he always did—but he didn’t. not yet.

the urge to check what he’d been scrolling through prickled at the back of your mind. which conversations he’d thumbed through, which friends he’d insulted this time. but you forced yourself to power it off, shoved it deep into your pocket like you could bury the damage with it.

it would take hours to untangle what he’d done. calls you’d have to make. names you’d have to apologize for. people you’d have to convince not to disappear from your life just because he decided they weren’t worth keeping around. but first, you needed him gone.

“leave,” you said, voice low, tight around the frayed edges of your control. “now.”

his gaze dragged over you, cold and slow, lingering on the faint wrinkles in your shirt, the scuff on your cheap shoes like they were a personal insult. that crooked little grin ghosted across his lips.

“you know,” he drawled, as if it was a casual observation, as if the weight behind it wasn’t deliberate, “if you hadn’t fucked this up, you wouldn’t have to slum it in a job like this. could’ve quit. could’ve moved in with me. let me take care of you.”

it wasn’t a new game. once, when your laptop had died halfway through a semester you couldn’t afford to fail, he’d shown up with a replacement. secondhand, outdated, and an excuse. you’d promised to pay him back. he hadn’t let you. hadn’t let you pay for anything after that, either. it was never about kindness. it was about the tether. about knowing you owed him something. about watching you squirm under the weight of your own gratitude.

you knew exactly what would happen if you took another inch from him now. if you let him decide which walls you lived in, which people you spoke to, and what future you were allowed to have.

you took a breath. closed your eyes. “it’s an internship,” you said, voice flat. “i need it for my major. get out.”

his expression twitched—not quite a frown, not quite a grin. something brittle in between.

“when did you get so bossy?” he muttered, like it was a genuine grievance. “this isn’t going to work if you think you can tell me what to do.”

“i’m not bossy,” you bit out, each word cut clean. “you’re just a manipulative asshole. get out.”

for a moment, silence. and then, that familiar smirk, curling like smoke. “you should watch that mouth. it’s not a good look on you.”

he stood, slow, deliberate, as if humoring you. as if this wasn’t over the second he stepped out your door.

“i’m not going to want you back if you keep acting like a child,” he teased, teeth glinting behind the words.

“i don’t want you back.” your hand moved to the door, a wordless command. “out.”

for a moment, there was silence. not real silence, not the kind that felt clean. the kind that hung heavy, too thick, like the air before a storm.

you didn’t look at him, but you felt the shift—the sudden absence of that smug little smirk in the room, the way something behind his eyes cracked, even if only for a breath.

then, a laugh. airy. more of a scoff than anything genuine.

“you’re serious.” he said it like he couldn’t quite believe it, like it was some kind of cruel joke you were too stupid to realize you’d told.

you didn’t answer. didn’t so much as flinch when he pushed himself to his feet, slow and petulant like a kid told to leave the party. he moved closer, steps unhurried, gaze sharp. that look of his—not angry, not yet, but annoyed in a way that always came right before something ugly.

“i thought it’d be nice to see you,” he muttered, tone dipping low, casual in a way that felt anything but. “after, what’s it been? two months?”

like you were supposed to feel bad about that.

“i thought we could hang out. order lunch, watch a movie, maybe talk.” he shrugged, the motion exaggerated, his hand flexing like he was debating reaching for you.

“then, i don’t know…” a smile now, soft, crooked. the kind that used to mean something. “kiss and make up? it’s not like we haven’t done this before.”

you didn’t dignify it with a response. because he wasn’t wrong, not really. two and a half years of this. of slammed doors and shouted words you didn’t mean, of whispered apologies you never believed, of breakups that never stuck. a cycle so familiar it made you sick.

and the worst part—the part he counted on—was that he knew exactly how to say it. exactly how to look at you. exactly how long it would take for your resolve to crack, for your stomach to turn, for your hands to twitch toward him before your head could remind you why you shouldn’t.

it was never fair. you could scream until your throat bled, throw his words back in his face, curse him for every awful thing he’d ever done—but it wouldn’t matter. you’d never be able to take as much as he did. never win. and yet, you still tried.

you shouted when he shouted, slammed doors when he stormed out, and when he came crawling back days later, eyes raw and voice hoarse, you always let him in.

because it was kunikuzushi. because you loved him, even when you hated him. because you knew what he was capable of when you didn’t.

which was why this tired, clumsy cycle couldn’t keep happening. not this time. not if it meant gutting yourself just to give him what he wanted.

you exhaled slowly, arms crossed, keeping your face set in something hard and unyielding even as the weight of it pressed in. “i’m tired, kuni.” his name tasted bitter.

“i don’t want to do this anymore.” you hesitated, teeth sinking into the inside of your cheek. “this isn’t good for either of us. it never was. and i’m done pretending like it ever could be.”

his grin faltered. didn’t vanish, not yet´, but the cracks were starting to show. “what’re you saying, dear?”

“i’m saying,” you swallowed hard, shut your eyes for a beat too long, “i think you should leave.”

that, at least, landed. you watched it hit him like a blow to the chest, saw the tension collapse in his shoulders, the forced humor twitch at the corners of his lips before dying outright.

he let out a laugh—thin, broken halfway through, more of a breath than a sound. “you’re breaking up with me?”

“we broke up a month ago.” and he hadn’t stopped haunting you since.  “and we’re not getting back together.”

his lips parted, glassy eyes catching the light like he didn’t even realize he was about to cry. a hand raked through his hair, trembling fingers pushing dark bangs out of his face in a desperate attempt to pull himself together.

it was nothing you hadn’t seen before—this crumbling, this unraveling—but it didn’t stop the ache from blooming in your chest, didn’t make it any easier not to reach out, not to drag him in and let him shatter against you, mumbling soft, useless words into your shoulder while his arms locked tight around your waist.

“fine,” he spat, though his voice cracked halfway through, dragging the word out like it physically hurt to say. “that’s fine. great, actually. i don’t even know why i’d wanna be with a heartless bit—”

the insult splintered, cut off by a sharp hitch in his throat. he swiped at his face, like he could pretend the tears hadn’t already slipped free, streaking pink-flushed skin and making him look younger, smaller, infinitely easier to forgive.

it made you want to close the distance between you, to kiss him quietly, to pretend none of this was happening.

“fine,” he said again, voice barely holding together. “if you’re so desperate to be rid of me, i’ll go.”

he shouldered past you, heading for the door, and that should’ve been it. that was what you wanted—kunikuzushi out of your space, your apartment yours again, your life one step closer to being bearable.

you should’ve let him go. should’ve stayed where you were, should’ve kept your arms crossed, your mouth shut, and watched him disappear down the hall. you should’ve let him leave.

but you heard it—a strangled, hitched breath, a sharp curse under his breath, and something in you cracked. not enough to fall apart, not enough to forgive him, but enough to let out a sigh you hadn’t meant to, your arms falling limp at your sides. the words scraped their way out through clenched teeth.

“do you want a hug before you go?”

he turned, scoffing, though his eyes were still glassy, his mouth twisting like it physically pained him to hold onto his pride. “a hug? what do you think i am, a kid?”

“it’s the only thing on the table,” you shot back, already regretting it. “do you want it or not—”

you didn’t get the chance to finish. one second, the words were halfway past your lips, and the next, his arms were crushing you to him, pinning yours to your sides as his face buried itself against your chest like it hadn’t just been cursing you moments ago.

you swallowed hard, stifling the instinct to shove him off, to remind him this wasn’t how it worked, not this time. but his grip was suffocating, and you were pitying him a little bit, enough to not shove him.

a few long, bruising seconds passed before the grip around your waist eased, his spine straightening, his chin coming to rest on your shoulder, his lips brushing the side of your throat. it was a kiss that felt different from the others, it was soft and lingering, followed by another against the angle of your jaw. you didn’t bother stopping him. you should’ve. you didn’t.

instead, you shifted just enough to nudge against his chest, to make some pathetic, useless effort at putting space between you. but you’d done this to yourself, cracked the door open, reeled him back when he was already halfway out. you didn’t get to act surprised now. “i didn’t say you could—”

“i knew you’d come around.” his voice was low, smug in that brittle, desperate way it always got when he’d almost lost.

a hand dropped to the small of your back, the heel of his palm pressing into your spine like a warning. “you always do. you know better than to leave me.”

your mouth opened, half a breath away from telling him no, from reminding him this wasn’t you giving in, this wasn’t forgiveness, but you hesitated.

there was something about the way he said it, the way his smile lingered against your skin like it belonged there, that made your stomach turn. like a threat dressed up in honey.

“i think…” you started, voice thinner than you meant it to be. you bit down on the side of your tongue, forced the words out. “i haven’t changed my mind. you need to go.”

though neither of you believed it.

[1cookedegg]

Sword Dance - Part 3 of 3

yandere scara x fem!reader. 3.6k words. tw for graphic descriptions of violence, murder, and also general mental instability miss girl is going through it :(

<<< Prev ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ Next >>>

Kunikuzushi is holding the blade from yesterday when you arrive. You still have another in your sack, as per the agreement, and it's enough to make you question why he would even still have it. He hardly seemed like the sentimental type.

He raises it as you approach, stopping you from approaching. Good. You had no desire to be close to him anyway.

A few moments pass and he's staring at you. No spiteful remarks, no derisive quips- it's just silence, and you decide you don't like it. You hastily rummage through your sack and pull out the new sword, preparing to toss it over. You already fulfilled two ends of the bargain, surely it couldn't be helped if he refused to speak-

"Stop." His voice rings in your ears and you hate how easily you obey. Kunikuzushi lowers the blade in his hand, tilting his head. "Tell me how you feel, holding that blade."

You take pause at this. You hadn't given it much thought- hadn't wanted to give it much thought, since yesterday's incident- but it's weight felt... heavy, against your hands. Foreign, like it was never meant to be there, like it was never meant to be held by you.

That you could feel that way over something created by your dear family made more than your palms ache, but it was the unfortunate truth. When you relay this to Kunikuzushi, he (unsurprisingly) does not share your guilt. He only snickers, taking slow, deliberate steps forward.

"That's not hard to believe, given your meek disposition..." he pauses, "but that's not the whole truth, is it? No, there's more to you then just that... there's a certain boldness within you, a ferocity you've hidden from your precious family."

His smile tightens when he presses his body teasingly against the tip of your sword. "Yesterday, when you first held a sword in my presence..." his voice is a whisper, something almost intimate, "did you want to kill me?"

Something catches in your throat. It's either your breath of words of denial, spat instinctively to deny his claims- but you find that you cannot lie, because he's right. You had thought to pierce Kunikuzushi, to strike him down along with the threat he poses.

Your silences seems to speak louder than any words could, evidently, as his grin only broadens. He takes a step back, letting his own blade fall to the floor as he opens his arms in the mimicry of a warm invitation.

"Go on, then. You were obviously holding back, yesterday, so I'll reward your restraint. Strike me down, L/N Y/N."

Your grip tightens involuntarily, despite the pain it brings to your still-fresh wounds. You wince, slightly, but you find yourself numb to the stinging when you look at the man- the thing- before you.

Dancers had to know their anatomy well. Your body was your instrument, so understanding as much of it as possible was essential to your craft- and Kunikuzushi was leaving all of his most vulnerable body parts exposed. An invitation. An opportunity. A chance.

When you take it, you're knocked to the sand almost instantly. His glinting eyes betray nothing. "Again."

You continue like this long into the night. It's a torturous cycle of attempt after attempt on his life, of him evading and forcing you to the ground beneath him.

"Do you see, now, how far your resilience takes you?" he jeers, "In the end, it's just futility."

You stare at him from the sheen of the blade, panting, sweat and sand sticking to you like crushing weights. "And yet... I can't see myself giving up." You raise your head, inclining it in some show of defiance. "That, in itself, is another form of eternity."

Kunikuzushi's eyes narrow, slightly. "How irritating."

When you strike once more- the 40th or 50th attempt, you lost count-  he swoops down to retrieve his own discarded blade, holding it against yours in a show of force.

"You're a dancer, aren't you?" He clicks his tongue, "you should know that a basic stance is the difference between life and death. Bring your heel back, a bit."

You blink at the instruction. Was this some kind of trick, another cruel test, something to disadvantage you once again-

When you obey, you find yourself feeling much more anchored. Silently, you curse your hastiness in forgetting such basic training.

You don't remember how long the two of you continue like that. He barks instructions at you, you almost cut him, and then he sidesteps and sweeps your legs from under you. The cycle repeated itself over and over, but the neither of you seemed to waver. You were battered and bruised by the end of it, but in a way, it felt almost like the perfect dance you had been waiting for since your mother's passing.

Then, you woke up. Face down, grains of sand stuck between your hair and the crevices of your face, the sword clattered uselessly at your side. You wince as you try sitting up, a numbing static prickling all of your nerves until all you knew was its incessant buzz. The feeling was so much that standing practially caused you to buckle all over again.

"What... happened?"

The surreality of it all hits like a weight as you looked up to the sky. The sun was sinking into the horizon, just as it had the previous two days-

Which meant that this day was the third.

Your haze shatters instantly. You've been unconscious for an entire day? How has no one come looking for you? Frantically, you gaze swept up and down the beach, looking for any evidence of the one who had been with you. Your blood runs cold when you see no signs of Kunikuzushi, which can only mean one thing.

He's gotten bored of your arrangement.

The sword is more useful to you as a cane, the brunt of it as firm and unwavering in supporting your weight as you were in returning home. You run with all the swiftness your aching body can muster, and no matter how many times you fell, you force yourself back up.

Kunikuzushi's words race in your mind as you move. "Originally, I was just going to kill you and move onto your kin."  He must have thought you dead, you realize, and if you were dead it gave him the perfect excuse to do what he came here to do, but you couldn't let that happen, not to your brothers, not to your father, you couldn't-

Your pace falters as you come to the edge of your home. You saw only glimpses of what the country destroyer was capable of, and you had imagined the worst- a burning workshop, bodies crumpled on the ground, a maniacal laughter echoing off the dying walls of your bloodline-

But there's nothing like that. In fact, nothing even seems to be wrong. The surroundings are so calm- so quiet- that you, bruised and heaving for breath, feel like an outlier in your own home. Like you don't belong here, anymore.

The creaking of the floorboards is exceptionally loud when you step inside. It makes you wince, but you press on. If your fears truly were unfounded... if everyone was safe, if you were uneeded... you'd have loved nothing more than to rest your body, just a while longer. To curl against your futon, let sleep envelop your stinging body, to have the memories of anguish that Kunikuzushi left you with drain from your mind...

You stop when you open the curtain to your bedroom. Your futon, your low table, your spare dancing shoes- they're all gone. Where have they gone?

There are voices in the hallway to answer the deafeningly loud questions in your mind. They whisper to themselves despite being under the impression that they are alone.

"...taken..."

"...the deal?"

"She won't-"

The curtains swing open again and you are face to face with your brothers. They stare at you, wide-eyed, and you feel bile rise in your throat. It feels like the first time they're truly seeing you, lately- but the way they look at you doesn't feel comforting in the slightest.

"...Hey," you start, voice hoarse from disuse, "where's... where are my things?"

They look at each other. They look at you. One of them finally speaks up.

"Why are you still here?"

The question is accusatory, and it feels like a punch to the gut. Your throat feels scratchy, constricted as you speak. "What are you-"

One of them grabs you before you can finish. Another joins in, until they're all dragging you, thrashing like a limp fish, out to the backyard as your heart hammers in its chest.

Your sword is ripped out of your hands, and it feels a part of you is being ripped away, in turn. What are they doing, why are they doing this to you, what is happening, why would they ask you that-

"Stop, please just stop," your voice was a pleading sob, "you have to listen to me, there's been someone coercing me the past few days! He's a t-threat to all of us, and he's gonna... he's gonna kill us-!"

Your brothers press your knees into the coarse earth as you thrash weakly. They hold you down, ignoring your tears, their voices blurring into an indiscernable mess to your ears. You can't even tell if they're speaking to you, anymore.

His footsteps ring with perfect clarity, though. So does his voice.

"Well, well... you fools do know how to follow orders. Well done."

There's a jeering lilt to his tone, a sarcastic, demeaning clap to echo his utter lack of being impressed. Kunikuzushi doesn't look at you when your head snaps up, eyes boring into his perfect picture of boredom. You want to scream, cry, gauge his eyes out, but all you can muster is a agonizingly high squeak as your mind trembles.

He looks through you, past you- his gaze settling on another faraway figure that makes the corners of his lips twitch.

"I'll admit, I didn't think you had it in you to be so ruthless... but it seems I was proven wrong. As the head of the L/N clan, I must express my deepest apologies for doubting you."

He mocks the reverence of a bow and your father sighs aggreigosly. Your father. You can barely make out the outline of him beside your brothers. This is the first you've seen him outside in... you don't know how long.

"F...father?" Your lip trembles. He doesn't look at you, either.

"There's no point in drawing this out." He says gruffly, "we gave you what you wanted- now take her and go. Leave us and our forge be."

You're pushed somewhat harshly to Kunikuzushi's side of the yard. The dirt gets in your eyes, and you can see your family stepping away so as to distance themselves. You were at an utter loss for words.

"W...what-" the words you would've spoken are swallowed up as he pinches his cheeks and raises your chin. Kunikuzushi finally looks at you, the only one to look at you, and it's to him you pose your hollow question.

"What is happening?"

He taps his finger to your cheek thoughtfully and hums to himself, considering the despair on your face. It makes you a sopping wet, pitiable thing, and he seems to absolutely relish it.

"That's a loaded question, Y/N, but it has a simple answer." his gaze flits past you. His grin seems to tighten. "The L/N clan values the life of their only daughter less than they do their precious legacy."

Kunikuzushi's voice is a death bell ringinf in your ears. "Did you know," he states, matter-of-factly, "that when I came here to eviscerate them and their forging art, they tried to barter with me? Do you know what it was they offered up to me, first?"

You say nothing, because what can you say? Of course you know. Of course it would come to this, it contextualized everything far too perfectly.

"Why?" It was all you could do to cry out. You wanted them to hear you. You needed them to feel something. Your voice was hoarse and strangled and strained but you didn't care. It felt like you were dying, and you wanted them to hear that. "Why would you do this to me, why?!"

You can't tell if you're screaming to the men behind you or the thing in front of you, but surprisingly, Kunikuzushi isn't the one to respond.

"All day, every day... all you do is sneak off to the beach to dance." Your brother says. "You don't help at the forge, you barely know how to read the blueprints-"

"You've been a spoiled brat since we were kids, and now our entire way of life is under attack," another interjects, "you can finally be useful for something."

Your body trembles. Kunikuzushi hasn't lessened his grip on your face, and your tears pool over and across the length of his fingers. You're in disbelief. They... they gave you away. They chose to sacrifice you, to save themselves, when they had no idea the agony you had endured for their sakes-

Did they know? Perhaps they did. Who was to say that Kunikuzushi hadn’t come to find you immediately after brokering the deal, that day? Who was to say that your deal with him, in turn, wasn't just an elaborate scheme to break your spirit?

"P-please," your voice warbles like a child, desperate for something, anything more secure than the grip on your face, "please don't let him take me, he'll- I don't know what he'll do to me! Please don't let me go, I- I can be useful, I can have a place here-"

"The place for dancing in this family ended with your mother." The sound of your father's bootsteps shifts in the dirt, as if he's turned himself away from you. There's a grief to his voice, one you haven't heard in years, but it's resolute. "This is all we have left. This is how you must be useful to us now, Y/N."

It's only when you begin to hear your family walk away from you that Kunikuzushi releases your face. Your body crumples to the ground like a rag doll, curling into itself as unto a worm in dirt. Your heart pounded, your ears rang, your body prickled with static from the sheer, soul-crushing shock.

The screaming you hear, you're unsure if it's something your mind has conjured in its haze- so too for the sounds of sharp cracking you hear and the scent of iron that stings your trembling nose.

Without warning, you're pulled up from the ground like a puppet on a string. Kunikuzushi holds you from behind, steadying you as your eyes adjust to the sight before you.

Your brothers, your father, your family- mangled, twisted, a mess of misjointed limbs and bulging eyes and gaping mouths-

You double over and vomit. He's holding you with bloody hands, staining your clothes and skin with the remains of your family, your absolute worst fear realized and you were helpless to stop it-

There's a strangled cry from your father. You see your brother's chests rapidly rise and fall. One of their fingers twitch.

Your heart stops beating for a moment. He let them live?

Kunikuzushi curls a blade around your fingers. It's the same one you gave him, in what felt like an eon ago, when you were too naive to realize that there was never a chance at escape for any of you.

"You see it now, don't you?" His whisper curls around your ear, "You've done so much for your clan, and they're too shortsighted to see it. They've repaid your loyalty by selling you out. By betraying you. Doesn't that make you angry?"

There's a swell of something bitter in your chest, as if he himself had commanded it. Your grip tightens as they groan in pain. What right did they have, to suffer the same as you, then cry out as if someone would come to save them? How many times before today had you kept your despair silent?

He lets you go and you take a slow, stilted step forwards, looking down at the men splayed before you. There was no way they'd survive what Kunikuzushi had done to them, not with the amount of blood they've already lost, and this was obviously his ultimatum for you.

You look at him from the corner of your eye, and he's watching you, as silently and keenly as he was when he was just your audience. He wanted an encore, you realized. He was probably expected you to use the sword to end their prolonged suffering, and it would be very like him to revel in the irony of a clan destroyed by the things they've created.

And yet. Your hands were not made for slotting in a sword, so you stick it into the ground beside you.

If it was a performance he wanted from you, a grand finale, then it would be on your own terms, with your own art.

In dance, one must know how to quickly and seamlessly shift their weight. Failure to do so could result in injury for the dancer, and the same could be said for toiling in the forge, where one must maintain a delicate balance with the hot, unformed blade in their hands.

Your family had failed to see the similarities between your passions, and in doing so, had made you the molten sword upon which they would burn.

Your heels dig into open wounds, widening gashes and stomping out life as they scream and thrash underneath you. Their splintering cries are your music, the beat you move to as you shift between them all as artfully as you could. Your movements were hardly as graceful as they were usually, but you hoped the raw viscerality of it all would speak power into the world in the stead of your typical restraint.

When your screaming brothers go silent, you stumble towards your father, pulling the sword out of the ground as you go.

You kneel before him, drawing his head into your lap as you block out the moon from his purview. His eyes have glazed over, and you nearly mistook him for dead, if not for the shallow rise and fall of his chest.

Shakily, your one hand holds his cheek. The other holds the blade. How ironic, that you had to carve a place for your hands to hold both such objects, and it was doubly cruel that it hurt so much.

You lean down and press a kiss to his forehead. You whisper something to him- an apology, a platitude, you're not too sure- but you do it as gently and soothingly as you can. It's more than he deserves, but you can't help but recognize the loss you feel for what it is.

When you slip the tip past his flesh and stab into his windpipe, you squeeze your eyes shut. You don't want to see it, but you hear it in every fiber of your being. Your father gurgles and chokes on his own blood, writhing and convulsing with what little strength he has left before he goes deathly still.

You open your eyes and are met with your father's corpse. His lifeless eyes stare at you, through you, wide and petrified. All this time, you just wanted him to see you again. Now, at least, you won't be without the memory of his gaze ever again.

You don't fight Kunikuzushi as he wraps his arms around your waist. He's on your level, you realize, and you have to wonder why something so untouchable would lower itself to the ground just for you.

"You," he laughs breathlessly, "are interesting, L/N Y/N. I knew you had potential, but you've surprised me."

He pulls you away from the ground, from the eerie stillness of your clan's graveyard, peering down at them derisively as if you were other, like himself. You should pull away, you should spit and hiss and claw at him for all he's done to you- but you couldn't deny the heady rush you feel when Kunikuzushi holds you close to him. Like he knows the despair you're feeling, like he won't let go.

Instinctively, you turn your head into his chest. He strokes it as if you're some lovely, obedient little pet. "I think I'll take you with me," he says aloud to no one in particular, "there are better stages for the both of us elsewhere."

Despite being so close to him, you don't hear a heartbeat. It's unnerving, but its rigidity serves you well as an anchor. He leads you away from the forge, from the smell of steel and dewy grass, away from the sounds of shifting sand and lapping waves, and you follow him. If there did exist such transciences as familial bonds, then you needed the eternity Kunikuzushi promised you.

When he brings you to a dock late at night, towards masked foreigners loading boxes onto ships, he offers you his hand once more. Offers you a new stage, a new life, a new eternity, by the definition the two of you wrote in a traitor's blood- and of course you take it, because above all else, he's inviting you to dance.

You would perform no lonely dances, henceforth. The ones that glide across your mind taste like a sweet, dulling indulgence, and your memory lingers on the one your mother taught you to teach your future husband.

Kunikuzushi is snapping at what looks to be a subordinate. His hand is still gripped in yours tight and unrelenting. Your lips twitch in either amusement or disgust. Perhaps the two of you could learn to do a different kind of dance, together.

Short A/N: thanks for all the support on this little mini series everyone!! It's been in my drafts a while, so getting to finish it off has been quite satisfying 😌 if you guys have any thoughts/drabble ideas be sure to hit up my inbox teehee♡♡

[1cookedegg]

Sword Dance - Part 2 of 3

yandere scaramouche x fem!reader. 3k words. tw for graphic descriptions of violence.

<<< Prev ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ Next >>>

That next day, when the sun sat on the horizon, you told your father the same lie you'd been telling him since you were a young girl.

"Father, I'm going to see if the traders have any high-grade jade steel today."

Some days, traders and merchants would trek through your home on their way towards Inazuma City. That was where they did most of their business.

Even still, you had bartered with them on more than one occasion. They were more than happy to take the L/N clan's Mora on their travels.

Your family lived in seclusion, but their forging skills were well-renowned throughout all of Inazuma's islands. You'd get adventurers young and old greeting your father every other day, those who had made the pilgrimage all the way just to commission a blade from your family.

The orders were seldom taken, as your father and brothers were a prideful sort, but they paid extremely well. Well enough so that your father waved you off casually after the mention of high-grade jade steel.

It was bitterly humorous to you- when you had been a young girl, your father hadn't always accepted payments of Mora for commissions. He had simply asked that the adventurers told you stories of their exploits, and, were you to find them suitable fuel for your imagination, the blades were theirs free of charge.

Your older brothers had teased you mercilessly for this- they'd ruffle your hair and call you a brat, coveting the fact that your father had never gone out of his way to get his boys any stories. No, it was a privilege reserved only for his youngest child and only daughter. The one who shared her mother's laughter and passion for the arts, the only L/N child to inherit her gorgeous e/c eyes.

As a young girl, you were clearly your father's favorite. But your father took no favorites. Not anymore.

He became... detached, as he grew older. You really couldn't remember the turning point all that well- it was as if he carried light in his eyes one day, and it was all but gone by the next.

It likely had something to do with your mother. The sicker she had gotten, the more of a strain there was on his smile.

Now, your father was content to lose himself in his work. Content to wave you away without looking up from his workbench, content to forget that you had "gone out to see the traders" four times prior that week.

You didn't even see him look up when you carelessly clamored a blade into your sack. It was hard to tell if it was the severity of the circumstance; but just touching the blade was enough to make your head pulse in agony. You desperately wanted your father to look up in that moment. You desperately wanted him to stop you from what you were about to do, who you were about to see.

But his gaze would sooner grace his blueprints than your trembling face, so you departed with all of the silent dejection that you were already used to.

Seeing that loathsome silhouette on your beach, however, forced you to lift your head and march onwards. It was laughable how you could bring yourself to detest the company you had once been ecstatic by a mere day ago.

Even still, if your father was capable of forgetting himself and the love he had for his daughter, you were capable of feigning cool indifference as the handsome stranger wordlessly held out his hand for the blade.

He studied the sword intently, holding it in a myriad of different grips. Some you knew from your brothers, but most of them were completely foreign to you. He swung it in a similar manner, cutting and slicing the air in such a precise way that you'd think he was actually tearing it to ribbons. His movement was almost mechanical. Inhuman.

You felt him catch your gaze a few times during the tense exchange. Just a silent reminder of the power he held over you. Also inhuman.

He then tilted the hilt towards his face, gazing downwards at the sheen of the blade. In spite of the ebbing light from the horizon, it shone in such a brilliant way that you thought he was trying to capture the sun itself in its length.

How ironic, you thought, that the sun could glow so brilliantly in his hands while the moon glinted so coldly in his eyes. Beautifully inhuman.

Those eyes set upon you once again and he smiled. His smile was beautiful. He was beautiful.

Infuriatingly so.

"It's the same as I remember. I knew it'd be." He sounded satisfied, in the same way one might sound after gulping down a sprig of water on a dry day. The meaning behind that smug, mocking tone was lost on you, and some inkling of a feeling told you it was better not to pry.

Besides, he was the one who was supposed to be questioning you.

You stayed silent as he drew closer, purposefully avoiding his appraising glare.

"Have you ever performed a sword dance before?"

The question was enough to shatter your illusion of calmness. "Excuse me?"

He smiled one of his tight, empty smiles. "I don't like repeating myself, L/N Y/N."

You turned your gaze to his- your, you had to correct yourself- blade. The moon had yet to fully rise, and there was only the dim reflection of your muted shock on its surface. He must have sucked all the light in the sky up for himself, you realized. Embittered by this, you exhaled slowly.

"No," you seethed, "I have performed no such dance before. I don't often use props in my work."

The stranger barked out a laugh. "Props... how amusing. I wonder how your family would react to such a blatant dismissal of their craft."

A twinge of guilt flashed quickly across your face, but not quickly enough for him to miss it. He said nothing, but his smile broadened.

"I must admit, that wasn't an answer I expected. But it's no matter, because..." the blade in his hands was now suddenly at your feet. He nudged the hilt toward you with his foot encouragingly. "I'm quite eager to witness your first attempt."

He moved away from you, seating himself on a nearby rock. His gaze was set upon you expectantly, and you knew then and there that he was being completely serious. You stared down at it with bulging eyes before slowly- hesitantly- raising it in your hand.

You, with a sword, and him, with nothing but a twinkle of intrigue in his eyes. It was a far cry from yesterday's meeting, when a cold and glittering blade like this was pressed against your neck.

You turned the hilt in your hands and wondered for a brief, fleeting moment if you should raise it against him now. If this would be your only opportunity to, if you should take it while you still have some semblance of an upper hand against him.

Then, you remember the bitter sting of steel against your neck and decide against it. You'd show him a better use for a blade.

You moved your hands and feet to a desirable position, signalling the start of your dance. Your movements were deliberately slow to account for the blade. It felt like a shackle, rubbing raw against the skin of your sweaty palms. You never could fully melt into your usual rhythm with the hyperawareness of its weight in your hands- the stranger's birdlike glare, predatory as ever, also didn't help.

The stranger. The stranger was the root cause of your anxiety, the source of all this rage and powerlessness you never knew you were capable of feeling. He was dangling your entire life on a tight string, taunting you with snapping it completely the moment you took a step outside your dance that he didn't like.

You had once looked upon him so eagerly, so, so excited to finally have a willing audience after so many years of solitude. That excitement only grew a thousand fold when he agreed to join your dance, to be your first partner, to feel his hands hold your back, your palm pressed into his so firmly, naively assured that he wouldn't let you go.

The bitter tang of that once-sweet dream felt like acid on your tongue, burning and coroding your sense of self as you melted into the rage that quietly festered in your heart.

If not for that traitorous tongue of yours, that silent rage would be anything but. You wanted nothing more than to scream.

"I think this little show is over, now," his whisper slithered into your ear from behind as his arms snaked around your own, holding them taunt as the sword clattered uselessly to the ground.

Oh, how badly you wanted to scream.

He slowly coaxed your hands to your front. You wouldn't have known it had they not been in your immediate sight, but both were curled into shaking, bruising fists. Your dominant hand still gripped tight as if the blade was in its palm, a ghost that your body could see but your mind could not.

The other hand felt different. It felt... wrong. He moved to peel your fingers back, agonizingly slow, one at a time. It felt sticky and clotted and it hurt to move. You wanted to scream and spit and claw out his eyes but remianed silent.

Your palm was stained red, thick, crimson blood gushing out of a long, deep gash that ran from your ring finger to your thumb. It rolled down your hand and onto your wrist in an almost vein-like pattern, staining his hands the same.

He dropped your arms, but you still held them up, blinking. Processing. How could you not have felt the blade slice into you like that? You wouldn't have smelled the scent of iron, felt the searing pain if it wasn't presented before you now.

"That was almost elegant," he scoffed, "I guess you were right. There is some beauty in the transient."

His jeering words felt like static against your ears. All you could bring yourself to do was stare at your hand, even as he re-entered your line of sight as a blur in the corner of your eyes.

An icy silence permeated the air when he realized your attention wasn't on him. It wasn't another moment longer before his arm shot out for your hand and caging it within his own.

He harshly dug his thumb into your gaping wound, pressing down into the meat of your palm as your blood gurgled against his skin. The pain felt like white, hot lightning in your eyes and you finally let out the bloodcurtling scream you had been forcing down this entire time.

"Shh," he cooed down at you, "there's no need to fear. The pain won't last." His words were like razors against your ears. You struggled and struggled against his hold, but his grip was steely and iron-tight.

"It'll be transient, almost, but..." the more you tried to wrentch yourself from him, the wider he smiled. "I want you to remember this, L/N Y/N. I want this memory to haunt your body for the rest of your sorry, mortal life- for the eternity you so cherish. I want you to remember this pain I share with you and receive it for the blessing it is."

The silence that followed was only broken by your choked-out sobs. You couldn't look at your hand, not anymore, lest you find yourself at the mercy of his unpredictable rage once again.

Instead, you stared at him, at those hypnotic eyes. They almost seemed to pulse with energy when they met your own.

There were no words left on your tongue, save for the last question you had asked him the previous day.

"What. Are. You?"

You spoke with such conviction, such a complete disregard for your own wellbeing that he almost looked surprised. It sounded less like a question and more like a demand, an entitlement. A right to know, after all of this agony.

He remained silent for a few long, tense moments. His smile faltered, as if muddled by some sort of thoughtful contemplation.

In an instant, his grip relented, slender fingers sliding from your sliced palm to your sensitive, veiny wrist. He idly traced patterns on your skin with your own blood. His touch was light, yet you remained stiff. Even stiffer once he lifted his finger, still wet with blood, and brought it to his mouth to taste your gore.

He made a noise that sounded almost satisfied before staring down at you.

"My name," he accentuated, whispering into the side of your face with a voice so eerily quiet that his lips ghosted the shell of your ear, "is Kunikuzushi."

Your lips parted as he drew back, testing it on your tongue. "Kuni... kuzushi." you somehow managed to choke out a humourless laugh. "Really? Country destroyer? That's a bit on the nose, isn't it?"

Kunikuzushi sneered down at you, a mocking approval in his tone. "So, you're acquainted with kabuki theatre... interesting."

He pulled away and his absence felt like a deep breath of air after being throttled. You were still pinned by his gaze, but any distance you could have from him was a victory unto itself.

"I'm willing to bet you didn't learn about it from that brazen, meat-headed family of yours."

You swallowed the air bubbling in your throat and gave him another quiet glare- not because of the almost childish name calling, but because he was right.

"My mother... taught me about it while I was young," you said simply. "she was always very artistically inclined. Perhaps even more than I am."

"Your mother." he scoffed, clearly unimpressed. "How cute. If only she was as good at teaching you how to hold a blade."

Memories of your youth flickered across the surface of the beach. Your mother, a bumbling youth clung to her arm, laughter as you shoved sand into your mouth and soothing platitudes when it tasted rough and grainy on your tongue.

Her large hands wrapped around yours, your bare feet atop of hers, as she directed you in a dance choreographed for two.

"I taught your father this dance," she had said, "and one day, I hope you'll teach your husband, as well."

Sometimes you would stumble, cut your feet on the rocks and cry as small trickles of blood pooled at your heel. She would wipe your tears with her finger and wrap your wounds in cream-coloured bandages, soothing you in her arms until your sobs softened to sniffles.

You would dance and sing and talk away on that beach for as long as her body would allow, before the coughing would begin again and she'd lean her weight on your tiny arms as you both hobbled home.

She never did tell you what was wrong with her, but your brothers had whispered to you about whisperings they had heard in turn- whispers of Tatarigami and incurable illness and a home in Tatarasuna left abandoned while you were still ripe within your mother's belly.

It was a miracle, you realized in retrospect, that you had been born so healthy while her symptoms were still mild. Perhaps that humility was the first thing she taught you. You often wished you could wrap her in cream coloured bandages to soothe her own pain in turn, but alas.

"My mother taught me many things in my life," you retorted defensively, "and I have adapted her wisdom to my own. Not all hands are built for war, for forging... for slotting in a sword."

"Is that right?" Kunikuzushi clucked his tongue, gaze sharpening. "I would love to hear what you think your hands are built for."

The bitterness on his tongue did nothing to ruffle your composure. You couldn't afford to let the cracks show. Not now, not when you were already brought to his heel.

"My hands," you say slowly, "are built for dancing. Besides that, they are used to embrace my family. To love and support and protect them from that which intends to hurt us."

You glare at him pointedly. He appraised you again, condescendingly, before barking back a laugh.

"Your hands, L/N Y/N, have been gauged and maimed by your own doing. They are incapable of protecting anything."

Kunikuzushi's fingers softly carded through your hair for just a moment- a brief glimmer of something in his expression, you weren't prepared to call it compassion- before his grip tightened on your scalp and your head was harshly thrust down. Your gaze could behold nothing but his feet, now. As if you were unworthy of looking upon his face with such vitriol.

He laughed again. How pathetic you must seem, forced to bow before him like this.

"They are incapable of embracing your family..." he continued, "and in turn, your wounds will disgust them, and then there will be no one left to embrace you."

Kunikuzushi let his statement settle on your own tongue, and you were foolish enough to consider it for more than a moment.

When you had returned home that first evening, hair soaked and clothes muddied and skin rubbed raw, your brothers were eating dinner together. When they saw you, they looked at you as if they were seeing a ghost. There was nothing left over for you, so you hid away in your room with your tail between your legs and an empty stomach.

His words tolled in your mind like a death bell the entire walk back home, and they seemed all the more true in this moment, curled against your futon and gazing out at the shoddy wrapping you had hastily put around your aching hands.

The bandages were cream-coloured, just like the ones back then, but your mother hadn't been there to help you tie them. No one had, and never before had the red of your blood seeped through them so abundantly.

Settling into a fitful rest, you started to wonder how much longer you'd be alone for.

[1cookedegg]

Sword Dance - Part 1 of 3

In which a suspiciously beautiful stranger watches you dance in the rain.

The dance was transient, but the memories remain eternal.

yandere scaramouche x fem!reader. 3.8k words. takes place during his emo crybaby genocide phase. Slay

<<< Prev ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ Next >>>

A dance performed alone is a lonely dance, some would say. To be without a partner is lto be without a half of your heart; a piece of your soul that adds vigor to the art form.

You had found yourself agreeing, in some instances- but you had to remind yourself that were never truly alone. Not really.

The sands would shift beneath your feet as they moved, calm, firm and focused, respectful of your precise movements. The wind was cut into intricate shapes by your arms, blowing your hair up as if joining in to a rhythm only the two of you were privy to.

To dance upon the beach as you did, with the sun on your face and the sea at your feet, meant that you were never lonely. You would always have a partner in the seven elements, and for that you thanked the Archons.

But there was something different about your beach today. You could feel it in the air, heavy with humidity- today, you had company aside from the elements.

You felt his stare from behind before you saw him yourself.

There was a young man watching you from afar, stance firm and expression undiscernable. He stood at a respectful distance, at first glance, as he was no more than a blur from the corner of your eye.

You could tell he was intrigued by your movements. He was completely and utterly still, gaze never straying from your form.

You almost wanted to chuckle. This was the first time you had ever had an audience, and you didn't want to disappoint him.

"Alright then, Y/N," you hummed to yourself, half a heartbeat thrumming against your chest,  "let's put on a show."

And what an enthralling show it was, for all but a single person observing you from afar- your performance was as magnetic as the waves lapping against the beach, as alluring as the rain that now flowed against your movements.

You had danced through harsher showers in the past. Alongside booming thunder and striking lightning, rain so heavy and unrelenting that you almost felt yourself drown against it.

This performance was not unlike those moments, you realized. You didn't fully understand that until your audience had clamped a hand over your wrist.

Your movements were staggered, and you snapped your head to look at him. He was silent, as were you, save for the heavy rain that crashed at both your feet.

You were sizing each other up, you realized. You didn't know what this stranger thought of you, but his appearance caught you off guard tremendously.

He was beautiful. Suspiciously so.

His eyes and hair were a striking indigo, skin unblemished and as pale as porcelain.

He looked like a doll, almost. An immaculately crafted, human-shaped doll.

You would have thought your musings true had he not spoken in that moment.

"Why are you dancing out in the rain like an idiot?" The ice in his voice made you flinch. It didn't sound right coming from such a soft-looking face. "Don't you realize that you'll catch a cold? Why do you persist?"

You met his gaze evenly, a quirk in your lips. "There is no such thing as bad weather for dancing. If I'm to catch a cold, then let it be my consequence to bear."

The strange man regarded you with a squint. His grip on your arm didn't abate right away, but it softened into what anyone else might mistake as a caress before dropping it back at your side carelessly.

In that brief moment, he almost looked as if he enjoyed the feel of your flesh in his hands.

"Are all humans as stupid as you are?" He scoffed. A rhetorical question, though one you knew the answer to nonetheless.

The beautiful, eccentric stranger took a step back and watched you expectantly.

"Well? Go. Continue."

You frowned at him. Normally you would have. Your dance is not something you are easily distracted from, but this entire circumstance left an off-putting taste on your tongue. It might have been his eerie demeanor, or his disassosiative use of the word "human-" but you knew in your heart what kept you from moving.

It was probably his eyes.

In a dance, the audience doesn't tend to look at their performer's eyes- they care more for the contortion, the movements and the utilization of the body as a well-tuned instrument.

You were more or less the same way, for you had no qualms against the tendency. But it had been a long while since you had seen such... interesting eyes on another human being.

Deep and mesmerizing as they were, there swirling within were layers upon layers of depth unfathomable to you. They were the eyes of someone who had seen more than he cared to share. Of someone who was hurting.

Of someone who had cried.

Your imagination was too vivid for your own good. You could practically feel them sliding down your own cheeks; bitter, salty tears melting into a pale-stained face...

"Do you dance, stranger?"

The question leaves your mouth before you can think to ask it otherwise. The stranger seemed surprised, too, as if you asked him something he'd never been asked before. Or something he hadn't been asked in a long time.

You were too presumptuous for your own good. He eyed you distastefully.

"What in Teyvat would make you think that?"

Truthfully, you didn't know. Any conclusion you came to about him was no logical one, not unless he himself were to confirm it. The gravity of his gaze threw all bases of rationality to the sea-salted winds.

"Just a gut feeling, I suppose." you admit. "Was I right? Or am I being too forward?"

He stared at your eyes a moment longer, searching them for something. Did he think you were telling a joke? Trying to make a fool of him? Your reply was too earnest for him not to be suspicious.

His squint finally relented, cast to an infinitely more interesting rock at your feet rather than your face.

"...Only once, with a... friend."

"That must have been nice," You hummed, taking silent note of the darkness in his tone. "Having a partner to dance with is a special bond indeed. I... wouldn't know what that's like."

A chuckle left your mouth, twinged with an unmistakable layer of bitterness. "My family is only occupied with forging blades. They don't care much for my dancing."

The man clucked his tongue. "I didn't come here to listen to a sob story, woman."

You nodded. "Right, right. Sorry. It's just been a while since someone's wanted to see me dance. I'm a bit nervous."

That was not a complete lie. Dancing for this stranger was easier when he wasn't so close. Having that sharp, cutting gaze upon you while you moved was... certainly a daunting prospect.

He seemed to understand your apprehensions as well as you did. The stranger sighed through his teeth, snapping his arm out to the same place he once held yours, and dragged you away from the beach.

"Uh, where are you taking me...?" You tried to ask the question as politely as you could. You were starting to get a little frightened.

The eccentric man didn't really reply. Just kept grumbling under his breath, as if he were the one being inconvenienced by this bizarre exchange. He led you through muddy dirt paths and past rocks slicked with rainwater, up and up steep slopes until the two of you happened upon a large stone arch.

The grass under the cover of the arch was dry, making it an ideal spot to wait out the rain. You were also able to spy a monument erected in the form of the Electro Archon nearby, of which brought you great comfort.

Your father and elder brothers would go on and on about how their ancestors learned to forge weapons from the exalted Shogun herself, and how the sacred art has been passed down to each generation of the L/N clan since.

Your relationship with her was less hinged on your bladesmith lineage, though. The booming thunder always acted as a good, resounding beat for your dance, and there was a simple joy to be derived from that. It was from that simplicity that your gratitude stemmed.

"Don't tell me you're one of her devotees." The stranger's face contorted into what you thought to look like disgust. He must have caught you staring at the statue.

"Well now, what's wrong with that?" You retorted, somewhat offended on the deity's behalf. He looked just as Inazuman as you did- for what reason did he speak so scornfully of the Shogun's noble ideals?

"I suppose you're not the biggest fan of eternity, then?" You asked. It was a light jest, though you were curious of his response.

He narrowed his eyes at the word. Eternity. That alone seemed to be enough to irk him.

Even still, in spite of that bitterness, his expression was contemplative. Calculating. He was considering something in his mind very carefully.

"Eternity is... an idealistic concept." his voice was unexpectedly soft. Soft enough from his typical rough tone to intrigue you.

"But it's just that. A concept. Nothing lasts forever, and whoever thinks it can is a delusional fool."

You hummed. You couldn't tell if he were brave or stupid to speak out against the Shogun so brazenly.

Even still, there was merit to be found in a differing perspective.

"I suppose you're not wrong," you mused, "but at the same time..."

You moved to sit down on the ground, weaving the grass between your bare feet with a sigh. One day, it would lose its lush green colour and turn brittle and yellow- but for the moment, you hoped you and your new friend could enjoy it together.

You patted the spot next to you, motioning for the stranger to sit down.

He grimaced, but complied.

Once he had settled next to you, head leaning against the stone behind him apathetically, you smiled softly. You were happy he was giving you a chance here.

"Close your eyes and listen," you instructed. He stared at you harshly.

"What is the point of-"

"Ah ah ah!" You hushed him. "Mouth shut. Eyes closed. Listen. There's a reason for all of this, trust me."

Begrudgingly, the man straightened his back and those beautiful indigo eyes fluttered shut. You followed suit, letting the sounds of nature wash over you like a warm, silken blanket.

You had a tendency to do this when you weren't dancing. Meditating on the elements that danced so well alongside you was great for self-reflection. You hoped that maybe it'd help the stranger reflect too.

Sometimes you'd hear raging winds, sometimes you'd hear booming thunder. The most prominent sound today was the rain, pouring so loudly and strongly it was as if Celestia itself were crying.

"You hear that, right?" You whispered. "The rain is eternal in its own right."

"Yes, well," he sounded especially jaded, "it all stops eventually. Rain doesn't last forever."

"But the effect it has remains," you were certain he could hear the grin in your voice. "The rain nourishes the earth and wildlife, giving it new vigor to endure. Then, when it is needed, the rain returns, and the cycle continues."

"Tell me, stranger," you hummed, "does honouring that sort of eternity make me a delusional fool?"

The man scoffed, and you opened your eyes. He was sitting closer to you than he was before, eyes already open and peering keenly into your own. How long had he been staring at you like that?

"Well, the eternity you describe doesn't apply to humanity." You didn't think his gaze could become any more intense, but this stranger was full of surprises.

"One day, you'll die. And then there will be no one left but me to remember you. If you're even worth remembering at all."

You sucked in a breath through pursed lips. Goodness, how could one person be so simultaneously arrogant and morbid? He looked to be your same age... what was this talk of outliving you? Was he secretly a youkai, or something of a similar ilk?

"Well, there's not much to be done about all of that." you relented, pocketing the thought for now. There will be a more important time for those sorts of questions.

"Human life may be fleeting," you continued, "but that just makes the constants in our lives all the more precious."

You plucked a blade of grass from the ground, rolling it in between your fingers idly. It would leave a green stain on your fingers, you knew, but it would always be washed away in the rain.

The man groaned at your idleness and hastily rose from the ground. "You need to make up your mind, woman. Your way of thinking changes with the wind."

"Well, I'm not speaking falsely..." you retorted, brushing your knees off as you stood. "There is beauty in transcience, just as much as there is in eternity."

He was silent for a long while. His back was turned away from yours, head leveled at around the statue's height. What was he thinking, looking at it so spitefully.

"Prove it then."

His voice was merely a whisper above the pattering rain. It, like his temperament, had grown significantly quieter. He peered over his shoulder at you.

"Show me the beauty of your eternity."

You stepped up to his side, looking to him in understanding. Again, you did something he wouldn't grasp the immediate meaning of. You offered a hand to him.

"How about you experience it alongside me, stranger?"

This time, there was no argument. With someone as strong-willed as you, it was annoying to bite back. Interesting, but annoying. He'd play along some more.

You led him through the dance slowly, marking it with your steps as you went. A part of you was panicking, because you hadn't danced with a partner like this before.

The other part of you, however, small as it had started, grew confident and assured in your shared improvisation. You flowed together as naturally as the river currents, moving around and alongside each other like it was what the two of you were born to do.

Before long, the stranger had his hand on your hip, your arms rung around his neck, and his face so close to yours that you could see your flushed expression reflecting in his eyes.

His eyes almost looked... soft. But you were probably just imagining things.

He put his hand on the small of your back and lowered you down to a tender dip. It was a move you'd never done before, but the way his hands embraced yours felt right in every possible way.

He didn't move from the dip for a long while. He leaned over you, eyes examining every inch of your face for something.

Then, he clucked his tongue and dropped you to the ground with a harsh thud.

Before you could cry out, the tip of a sharp, glinting blade was pressed against the bare skin of your throat. You looked to the stranger in a panic. What was the meaning of this?

He met your panic with a disinterested stare. He almost looked bored.

"L/N Y/N of the L/N clan, successor of one of the five bladesmithing techniques imparted unto your kin by the Narukami Ogosho. Am I right?"

You were at a loss for words. The stranger knew your name. He knew it all along. Who was he, why did he know you?

You dug your fingers into the ground. Did your dance together mean nothing to him? That tender intimacy, that silent understanding of each other? Was it real at all?

"Speak, L/N Y/N." The blade was cold against your neck. He spoke with such a palpable arrogance that you knew all of your words were just trivialities to him. You could feel the sharp edge push against your soft skin, still wet from the rain.

"What is there to say?" your voice did not betray the hurt you were feeling. You hoped it didn't, at least. "You've had an agenda all this time. My business is obviously yours."

You lowered your voice to a whisper, but you knew he could hear you. "Were you sent here to kill me? Who is your employer?"

You heard him laugh for the first time. It was a rich, throaty sound, sick and patronizing.

"I don't need an employer," he lilted. "I do what I want. And I want the Raiden Goukaden- and all who practice it- destroyed."

You yourself were no bladesmith- that was a practice only your father and brothers exercised. It was something they harbored against you, you with your feet on the ground and your head in the clouds.

Your throat went dry. "Please don't. My family has done you no harm."

Confrontations were all but inevitable within your family, but, in spite of that, you feared for their lives. You feared for what this stranger was capable of. Especially when you remembered he might not even be human.

"How bold of you to demand such a thing," he cooed. The blade began travelling slowly down the side of your neck, glinting at the tip of your collarbone- not deep enough to draw blood, but close enough to help you vividly hallucinate the stench of iron. "Last I checked, I was the one with the sword."

He was playing a game with you, you realized. Toying with you like you were a naive little idiot. You felt heat rush to your cheeks in anger.

"You cannot just-"

"Ah ah ah!" he harshly shoved his finger to your lips. "Mouth shut. Eyes on me. Listen."

You swallowed your apathy and furrowed your brow at him. A pointed glare was enough to convey your thoughts on the matter.

"I'll be honest. I knew who you were the second I laid eyes on you, L/N Y/N." he mused. "Originally, I was just going to kill you and move onto your kin, but..."

He quirked his head at you. "You started dancing. And your dancing intrigued me."

"And then what," you rasped, "you thought to make me out to be a fool? Is playing with another's life so amusing to you?"

He hummed. You couldn't tell if he was confirming his own psychotic perspective or not. You weren't sure you wanted to hear his answer.

"I won't bore you with the details," he said, "not yet, at least. My point is that I find you interesting. You're human, so that in of itself is an impressive feat."

You were at a loss for words. "What... are you?"

He didn't reply right away. You could have sworn you felt static crackle in the air as his smile tightened.

"I have a proposition for you, Y/N." He finally took his sword away from your neck, running a finger along one of its shining edges. "If you do two things for me, I will spare your family and their pathetic lives. Do we have a deal?"

You considered him as carefully as you were able to, coughing and sputtering for breath. You drank the air in as you would water, gulping it up as heavily as the rain once poured. It had gone silent and dead by now, but you couldn't afford that same luxury. Not when your family was on the line.

"Fine." You lowered your head shamefully. You were caught in a stalemate either way. "What do you want from me?"

He hummed, pleased by your compliance. "The first term of our agreement is this- you will meet me on this beach every day, when the sun sits on the horizon. Am I clear?"

You were caught off guard for a moment. Had you misheard him? You thought his interest in your dance was just a ruse. Why was he so keen on seeing you again?

Was a dance all he was going to demand of you?

The thought made you go pale, but you had no choice but to meekly nod. This was for your family's lives, you had to remind yourself. You couldn't fight, so you had no choice but to go along with this.

"And..." you almost didn't want to ask the burning question. "What of the second condition?"

"You will bring me one of your father's newly-forged blades. I will also ask you a question," He was already turned away from you, leaving you in your spot amidst the dirt. "I will ask it tomorrow, and you will answer me then."

You watched him walk away, jaw hanging open in the stupor you were stuck in. There was still so much more you wanted to say, to ask, to do- but as he receded from view, you remained utterly silent. You couldn't bring yourself to act in any way whatsoever.

Perhaps it was fear that kept you stuck in paralysis. Perhaps it was the part of you that was still processing his demands. His question. What would he ask you?

There was no way of knowing right now, you realized, picking yourself up from the ground. The wet earth clung to your clothes, staining them an ugly muddy brown. You brushed it all away from your skin, sighing bitterly as it stuck to the palms of your hands in clumps.

It was then that you realized the way he walked irritated you. This stranger you didn't know the name of, yet knew yours all this time. His walk was too relaxed and assured. Too confident. Too arrogant. Like he knew he would get every aspect of his will enforced with no drawbacks.

Such a walk made your blood boil, because yours was quite the opposite.

You walked with your back straight and head poised, stance so rigid one could stack several books upon your head without them wavering at all. You were on high alert, watching for an invisible predator, senses keen in case that stranger decided to change his mind.

His will was seemingly both versatile and firm, and that was a dangerous combination.

You never knew if you could bring yourself to walk as he did. His was a strong stance, while yours was meek and compliant. You had to remind yourself, though, that your walk was different from your dance. That was an important distinction to make to keep yourself sane.

Your dance was enough to stop that psychopath from killing your family, you realized. They were enough to stave away death, those, raw, strong, alluring movements of yours.

"And they'll have to be enough to stave him away, too," you thought bitterly. You lifted your bare feet stubbornly through the mud, chin raised and defiant against the storm brewing in your head.

This stranger was keen on a dance, was he? Then a dance he would have. With blades, without blades or otherwise; he would surely have it.