#There's a lot going on for this poor boy. He's going through a lot.

[minhosimthings]

Bewitched ft LHS

Two lovers and the adventure of dried lilac

Pairing: bf!heeseung × fem!reader

Warnings: fluff, mention of food and bacterial infection (don't question it), kinda cringy ig? hee being down BAD for reader

Song: Bewitched by Laufey

A/N: Hello everyone! This is my submission for @flwrstqr My World event. Congratulations to Danielle for 3k followers! Now sit back, relax, and read my cringey poetry.

I didn't know that much at all 'bout love before

But now, I think I'm learning

"Are you absolutely sure this will work?" Heeseung eyed you nervously.

You were trying to figure out how to stab open the extremely restrictive packaging of the box of dried lilac flowers, so without even looking up at him, you scoffed, as if you were offended that he was trying to undermine your amazing box-opening skills. 

 "Of course it will." You stated, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, "Plus, I did a lot of research for this."

"By research you mean the first three search results you got?" Heeseung chuckled, wrapping his arms around your waist and placing his chin on your shoulder. You shuddered at the cold touch of his skin on yours. 

"Be careful,Lee Heeseung, I have a weapon in my vicinity." You threatened him, waving around the dying scissors in your hands. The countertop was littered with scraps of cardboard and a crumpled up bill. The dried lilacs from Japan took three weeks to arrive and boy were you excited when it came. You almost hugged the poor delivery boy with how giddy you were. 

Your monthly tradition of doing something new with Heeseung was today and you were determined not to mess it up. Ever since the tradition started, something or the other has gone down the gutter. Like last August, when you had booked a seat for bungee jumping, which had to be cancelled due to heavy rains. Or the February of the year passed, when you wanted to make a bundt cake with him, which unfortunately never came out of the pan due to the absence of butter. 

But this time was different, you thought. This time, nothing could go wrong. After all, how can making lilac tea out of scratch ever go wrong in any possible way? There was no butter and no rain, except for the slight drizzle outside, which announced the end of the monsoon season and the start of September.

You bewitched me

From the first time that you kissed me

"Finally..." You muttered under your breath, as your hands reached for the flowers. They were tiny little buds packaged in an airtight ziplock packet. The colour was less lilac-y now, with hues of dark purple staring at you and Heeseung.

"Is it supposed to look rotten?" Heeseung asked, his eyes set on the packet that you were toying with possessively in your hands. You rolled your eyes at him playfully, and let out a dramatic sigh.

“How many times must I tell you-” You started dramatically, turning your body to face him, you could see the smirk tugging at the corner of his lips, “-that cooking is the art of turning a duck into a swan?”

“Calm down Shakespeare.” heeseung chuckled, his fingers teasing you by drawing shapes on your waist, “And ducks are really cute for your information!” He put his hand to his chest as if he were clutching his invisible string of pearls. A giggle erupted out of your mouth as you stood on your tiptoes to quickly leave a chaste kiss to the tip of his nose. Heeseung’s smile only widened as you did, a slight red mark lingering on the spot where your lips touched his skin. The calm scent of the evening, combined with the quiet of your kitchen sent a wave of absolute relaxation into Heeseung’s being.

“Hmm,” you hummed thoughtfully, your eyes rushing through the words on the lavender-hued instruction manual, “The recipe I saw on the internet said we can just boil them and the tea will just seep out.”

“But?” Heeseung’s chin returned to its rightful place on your shoulder. He was like an overactive cat, which would rub itself against its owner to show its affection.

“But-” you looked worried, much to Heeseung’s concern, “-this thing says we should wait for three goddamn months so there’s no-’ you cleared your throat and read from the manual, “‘threat of bacterial infection.’”

“Ominous.” Heeseung laughed, “I like it.” He smiled at the sight of a pout forming on your pretty lips, “Hey, what’s wrong?”

“I guess we have to wait then.” You sighed, a real one this time, “I mean, unless you want to get sick.” 

Great, you internally thought, another month gone wrong again. You wondered to yourself whether there will ever be a time when you actually get it right, when something that you and Heeseung do works out without any hiccups.

“Can I tell you something?” Heeseung smirked mischievously, garnering your attention. The pout on your lips melted his heart completely and his eyes visibly softened when he looked at you.

 “I actually like bacterial infection.”

 A moment of silence followed, before the both of you were convulsed with laughter. Your hands gripped the  edge of the counter to balance yourself, when Heeseung stuffed his nose into the nape of your neck, effectively putting half of his weight onto you.

“Hee, I’m gonna fall, get off me!” You laughed, but he only held you closer to him, as if you’d float away if he let go, “Ok, ok fine!” You giggled, raising your hands in mock defeat, “We can make the tea!”

“Yipee.” Heeseung cried in an adorably high pitched voice, that stretched your smile out even wider. If Heeseung were to die because of someone’s expression, then he knew it would be because of your smile. It was something that could make him forget all grief and suffering, no matter if he had the worst day ever, no matter if he had spilled hot coffee all over himself or accidentally snapped at someone, that smile of yours would be there to fix him.

Then we ran down the street in the late London light

The world froze around us, you kissed me good night

“Hee. Hee. Earth to Lee Heeseung.” Your words were half consumed by laughter, bringing him back to reality as he realised he had been staring at your face, “What are you looking at, idiot?”

Heeseung didn’t respond to your words, instead choosing to merely send you a lopsided smile. “Your idiot right?” he asked, to which you put your hands on top of his and squeezed it.

“My idiot.” You said, sacrificing your toes once more, to plant a kiss on his cheek, making Heeseung mentally kick his feet in the air for the fiftieth time that evening.

You set Heeseung about to do some kitchen duties, while you carefully extracted the dried flowers. Heeseung watched the surface of the water dance with the bubbles as it heated up. It reminded him of all the times you two had danced with each other. On particularly long nights, when the moon shone in all its majesty, bathing lovers all around the globe in her glamorous shine, both of you would find your hiding places in each other. Both of you would find your home, in each other, with arms wrapped not only around each other’s body, but around each other’s hearts.

“Is the water ready?” Heeseung heard you call out. He turned to see you, carefully sweeping the last of the petals into a bowl. 

“Yes, your highness.” He responded with a laugh. You tottled over to the pot of boiling water, slowly dropping your flowers in. You and Heeseung let out a collective gasp of wonder at the burst of colour that engulfed the colourless water. Hues of purple and lavender now coated each part of the pot, seeping out from the petals. 

“Woah…” You exhaled, not even knowing you had been keeping a breath in, “That’s the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.” 

“It is.” Heeseung responded, to which you nodded, not taking your eyes away from the concoction. Unbeknownst to you, Heeseung was no longer even looking at the water. He was instead, gazing lovingly at you, with eyes so full of affection, you’d think he was looking at the last person on earth. In that moment of silence, he couldn’t help but trace his eyes over you, over every detail of yours that made you, you. The you that he loved so much. The you that he would go to the ends of the universe for, if you had asked him to.

Cursing at the moon and losing all control and crying

'Cause I think I'm falling

“This better be the most amazing thing that I’ve ever tasted or I’m never even touching a satchet of tea again.” You said, sinking down onto your sofa, with a mug of pinkish-tea in your hand. The sofa sank down further when Heeseung plopped down next to you, an identical mug in his hands.

“Shall we have a toast then?” Heeseung asked, raising his mug, “To hopefully not catching bacterial infection!” You chortled at his enthusiasm, before responding with a “Hear, hear!”

Clinking your mugs together in a ‘cheers’, you put your lips to the edge of the mug, wholly prepared to take a sip of your concoction and taste something that is equal to the nectar of the-

“We forgot the sugar, didn't we.”

You caught Heeseung’s eye and doubled over with laughter, almost spilling some of the tea onto your lap. In the midst of you admiring the pretty liquid, and Heeseung admiring the pretty you, you had forgotten the key ingredient which actually made the tea drinkable.

“Well, you kept distracting me with your beauty so much!” Heeseung defended himself, setting his mug down on the table, “How could I ever remember the sugar?”

“Do you really think flirting is gonna get you out of this?” You said, putting your mug down and glaring playfully at Heeseung.

“Depends.” He shrugged his shoulders, a smirk tugging at the corner of his lips, “Is it working?” He didn’t have time to say anything else, before he was practically tackled onto his back by you. Heeseung wrapped his arms around your waist and you lay down on him, using him as your mattress, though there was plenty of space for the both of you on the sofa. 

“Welp,” You said, pressing your ear to his chest to listen to his heartbeat, “At least we won’t be getting a bacterial infection anytime soon.”

Heeseung chuckled, bringing his lips down to your forehead to leave a kiss. In the sanctuary of his safe arms, you forgot all about the fact that tonight’s attempt had turned out to be an utter fail. But you realised that it didn’t matter to you anymore. For in the warm cocoon that Heeseung had spun around you, all that mattered was the unnoticeable seconds that had drifted away in failed attempts of lilac tea, and successful attempts of love. In the pale cast of the full moon’s light, you and Heeseung drifted off to sleep, as the world came to a silent halt, waiting patiently for another tomorrow. 

You wrote me a note, cast a spell on my heart

And bewitched me

You bewitched me

Dividers by @strangergraphics

[ladykailitha]

Eddie and Nancy

Just giving my brain a break from the Secret Tunnel (aka the game show) story. I still have two chapters to get through and my brain needs a cool down.

I've seen a lot of headcanons that Eddie is the Wheeler children's older half brother because of how much they look like each other.

But may I propose instead: cousins.

Hear me out.

You have first born, Elizabeth. Absolute hippie child. All about that free love, sex, drugs, and rock and roll. She learns how to play guitar, falls in with the charming and cool, Al Munson. They plan to tour the country his beat up old truck. But before that can happen, Elizabeth gets pregnant with Eddie. So she marries Al.

Then you have Karen, the younger sister. Bright, demure, absolute golden child. She dyes her hair and blows out the curls to more like waves so she doesn't look like Elizabeth anymore.

She does what she was raised her whole life to do. Get married to a good boy so they can have good children and pay taxes and never do anything fun.

When Elizabeth dies, Karen refuses to go to the funeral, hates that her name is even in the obituary at all. Then three years later when Al is sent to prison, CPS calls her first.

She's the boy's aunt. She has a comfortable home, and bringing him in would barely dent their finances. But Karen refuses. She won't have that delinquent anywhere near her children.

So they go to Wayne. Wayne who really doesn't have the space or the money to take care a little boy almost teenager. But he looks into those big brown eyes and can't say no.

They keep apart until the murders in town start in Wayne's own god damn trailer. He keeps his mouth shut when Nancy comes up to him asking about Eddie. He would like to throw it in her face that he knows who she is and that he knows full well that Karen would throw a fucking fit if she found out where her daughter was. But he won't. It's not the girl's fault her mother is a bitch.

After Vecna (and Eddie NOT dying) Nancy is sent to the attic to see if she can find some of Mike's old things to donate as a lot of Nancy's went to Holly. She finds an old trunk and though locked it comes apart in her hands. In it she finds dozens of pictures of her mom with beautiful girl with flying dark brown curls and sparkling eyes.

She smiles as she reminds her of Eddie.

Her mother calls out for her to hurry and slips one of the pictures in her back jeans pocket. Nancy closes the trunk and hurries back to her mother.

Then because Nancy can't leave a mystery well enough alone, she goes digging. All while Eddie and Max are in a coma, Nancy works on her mystery.

She finds her answer in the most unlikely of places. Joyce Byers's year book. She had it out showing her boys the outrageous hair styles they had in her day.

There two rows down from Lawrence Byers is an Elizabeth Childress. She's got ribbons in her hair and smiling brightly at camera. So full of life.

Childress.

She closes her eyes. There is no doubt this is her mother's sister. A sister Nancy never knew anything about.

She points her out to Joyce. "Oh, I remember her. Such a sweet girl. It's really too bad she fell in with that Munson boy. Or rather the wrong Munson boy."

She flips the pages and on the same row as her, is Wayne Munson staring up at her. So happy and free. The Vietnam would too soon take that from him. "That's Wayne. Such a good boy. Elizabeth would have thrived with him. But Wayne was shy and more interested in getting good grades than girls."

Joyce flips back to the seniors with Jim and Lonnie and began searching for the M's. "There." She pointed at another boy. Alan Munson. "He was trouble from the moment he was born. But he had a motorcycle and a leather jacket. Lizzy fell hard. They got married right out of high school, I heard."

Jonathan and Nancy share a look of shock.

"What happened to her?" Jonathan asks.

"Cancer," Joyce says sadly, "poor thing."

Armed with her knowledge and a borrowed yearbook, Nancy marches right up to her mother and slams the yearbook in front of her. The picture Nancy took from the attic serves as bookmark and she shoves both at her mother.

There is no denying it now. All the proof is right there in black and white.

"This is why you didn't want to join the D&D club my freshman year, isn't it? Because it was Eddie's club?"

Karen buries her head in her hands. And the truth just starts spilling out.

"And that boy is just like his father!" Karen cries. "He might have not have killed those kids but he was a drug dealer."

"To keep the lights on his trailer!" Nancy yells back. "If you and Dad had taken him in maybe he wouldn't have turned out the way he did. Maybe he be a better person."

"Or maybe he would have dragged you other children with him!"

"If you really thought that Mike wouldn't have been allow in Hellfire either!"

It's at this point Mike walks in and suddenly Karen is caught.

She breaks down and explains that Eddie had helped her with her car right before Mike started high school. So as a way to return the favor she let Mike join.

Nancy heads to the hospital and manages to get into see Eddie.

Wayne tells her only family is allowed to see him and Nancy smiles.

She knows.

Then Eddie wakes up, falls for Steve, the whole party teases Steve about keeping it in the family and Karen gets her head out of her ass and everyone lives happily ever after.

The end.

[submattenthusiast]

sub matt having a boner in public cause you teased him!! poor baby all embarrassed

this!!

it was hard to get matt to admit when he was turned on, you only knew it when he had boner.

you were out shopping with matt, lingerie shopping in particular. you were strolling around victoria's secret picking up all the nice sets and showing them to matt, asking if he liked them and whatnot. a vibrant blue set caught his attention once you held it up, his cheeks flushed, imagining how pretty it would look on you.

"i like that one a lot" he admitted, hoping you would put it in the basket. his words made you stop rummaging through the rack of clothes to hold the set against your body. "do you really? should i go try it on then?" you suggested, knowing he would get all flustered seeing you in it.

"we can try it on at home, let's just continue shopping" he urged, knowing he wouldn't be able to contain himself if he saw you in that set. his sudden dislike for the set told you that he would indeed get worked up and you needed to see that. "it's just one set matt please, i'll be quick" you pouted, hoping that would convince him. matt sighed but nodded, following you to the fitting room.

you admired yourself in the mirror, the blue looked amazing against your skin, hugging you in the right places, making everything pop. you turned around with a gasp, the set made your ass look so good. you reached for the door handle, turning it and poking your head through the open door to call for matt.

he was taken aback at the sight of you, his eyes widened as you did a little spin, showing off the full set. "do you like?'' you giggled, his silence told you everything. "yes yes you look so pretty" matt said as he fully stepped in the room, moving to grab your waist. he moved you both infront of the mirror to check you out more.

"please get it please" he begged, tent beginning to form in his pants. you felt him against your back and smiled to yourself. "since you like it so much i will" you winked, planting a quick kiss on his lips.

matt sat at the little bench in corner of the stall as you redressed and gathered your items. matt thought he was being slick with the glances he was giving you but you caught his eyes every time. "cmon matt let's go" you said but he didn't move an inch. there's no way he didn't hear me you thought. you were about to try again until you heard him mutter under his breath.

"just a minute it'll go away in a minute" he spoke, referring to the boner he had. you looked down at his pants and back at his face, his cheeks were burned red with embarrassment, this was exactly why he didn't want you to try it on. you chuckled at his situation finding it cute how easily he got worked up. "matt let's go" you demanded. "no please i can't go out there like this, can we wait a little more" he begged you, he didn't want everyone to know how pathetic he was. to make matters worse he was wearing a tight fitting shirt, meaning he couldn't cover himself.

"you'll be fine matthew, just stay close to me and nobody will see" you sighed, feeling a little bad for the boy.

he walked as close behind you as possible until you got to the car. matt nearly tripped over various items in the stores due to his head being down in shame. he's never going lingerie shopping with you again.

[chiisana-sukima]

Hey so this post just came up on my dash and its an interesting perspective for sure. I was wondering if youd feel inclined to share your thoughts on it but no pressure ofc feel free to ignore.

https://www.tumblr.com/zudilio/648738136098275328/the-thing-is-that-i-miss-the-early-seasons?source=share

Yeah, I saw it on my dash too and considered reblogging with comments, but it's three years old and the OP has said in other posts that they're a "Sam ignorer", so I figured they wouldn't be appreciative. Also, to a certain extent, "they should've given the plot points I don't like to the character I don't care about" is just a matter of taste, so there's not a ton to say about that part anyways.

As far as the "Sam is like John because at the start of the show he's driven by anger and his need for revenge" part, my thoughts on it are here, and @ardentpoop and @aliusfrater have excellent meta here as well.

Leaving aside the piece where I think the OP is wrong about Sam though, I do agree with them that Dean's character arc was mismanaged, and I sympathize with them and all the other Dean girls (gn) who got stuck with *waves vaguely at spn in general*. I agree with OP that Dean isn't an inherently angry person. I don't believe inherently angry people exist, but even beyond that, I don't think the intended reading of spn is that Dean's story is about anger. Gamble said at some point very early on that on the inside Dean is a frightened little boy who never had the chance to grow up, and I do think spn carries that thread through the seasons pretty well all the way to s15, where it attempts (with not-great success imo) to resolve it.

Unfortunately, I also think that spn's failure to resolve Dean's character arc satisfactorily was inevitable, and that the things that attract many fans like OP, who identify with Dean, are the same things that made resolving his issues impossible given the set-up. Just as Sam has a realistic case of poorly-controlled, chronic dissociative/classic PTSD (with psychosis during s7 and some CPTSD-like features) and doesn't have the resources to manage it beyond bare-bones survival, Dean has pretty realistic untreated, chronic CPTSD/BPD without the resources to even begin to manage it in a way that doesn't destroy his own life and the lives of the people around him. Dean's violence stems ultimately from his childhood environment, sure, but the person he is by the time we meet him in s1 has severe attachment issues, difficulty regulating his emotions, poor distress tolerance, black and white thinking in a job where black and white thinking results in victimizing people based on factors they have no control over, and most of all, no real concept of boundaries whatsoever. The cause was for sure his childhood, but the present of spn is just a very symptomatic adult. His mental health issues--and Sam's too--are the kinds of chronic illnesses that never go away and that people struggle with over their entire lifespans.

I don't want to be overly negative; many people with mental illnesses this severe do learn to manage them well and live full and happy lives (I am, within reasonable limits, one of them). But it's hard. And longstanding, deeply-rooted patterns of thoughts, beliefs, and behavior don't change without community resources, considerable effort, and for most people, years of trial and error. Spn's main premise is, for some wild reason, that the problems Sam and Dean encounter are metaphorically equivalent to real life problems normal people encounter all the time, but that in the spn world, all of the resources real world people have available to help them are impossible to access, except guns and torture. It's s13 before spn manages to get Sam and Dean into ONE SESSION of therapy with someone they can tell the truth to, and by then, we get this:

Dean is being a lot less unrealistic here than one might think, and yes, this picture will end badly in real life too.

Since the finale, a lot of fans have said things like "Dean deserved to go to therapy and get better" or "spn thinks if you have trauma, you should kill yourself about it", but deserving is fake. We in the real world live in a The Good Place universe. There's no fair calculus for who "deserves" anything. Everyone both deserves health and happiness and love and a comfortable life and also deserves nothing because there are other people who have nothing.

And unlike ours, the spn universe is not a The Good Place universe. It's worse. The writers of spn are and always have been profoundly ungenerous. The whole universe is built on victim-blaming and bullshit calculi of what crimes deserve what punishments and who should or shouldn't mete them out. In the spn universe, Dean is lucky. He had not one, but two BPD favorite persons, and he treated them both like shit, and they still both loved him and wanted to be with him and will be with him in the afterlife, presumably continuing to have the same intense, volatile relationships they've always semi-tolerated.

I like to pretend that maybe Sam, Dean and Cas can all read The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook on Heaven's version of archive.org and take it to heart, or that maybe Sam grew some boundaries in the years he lived without Dean that he can insist on hard enough and long enough for Dean to get a reparative relationship out of, and they can all after-live happily ever after. But the Dean that was alive during the 15 years of spn hadn't done that work yet, and the outcome he got was--if one subscribes to "deserving" as a concept--better than what he "deserved". If you hit your partner, you deserve to be left. If you hold a gun on them, you deserve for it to go off and kill them by mistake and you never see them again (although of course they don't deserve to die). It doesn't matter who the "angry" partner in the relationship is. Any sane person in this universe or the spn one should be angry a lot of the time, because both universes suck. Not to beat a dead horse with a flowchart but:

image source

The violence is the bastard. The emotions are not.

[soralinklokidottirofmirkwood]

Raindrop: Platonic Yandere Neuvillette x young sister of Favonius.

Age: 15. Reader Chan is a young sister of the church of Favonius, while visiting a friend in Fontaine reader Chan catch’s the attention of the chief of justice, who immediately falls in love with her (in a fatherly way read the title) and would do anything to get her even if it means breaking the law.

Warning: Stalking, Yandere (platonic) Neuvillette, d3@th, Kidnapping, reader chan gets to keep her vision (I see a lot of fanfics where the yandere takes reader’s vision but in this one, the yandere lets reader keep it) and this is platonic no romance or anything inappropriate.

BF/N- Best friend’s name

You are helping Barbara heal Bennett and Razor, the poor boys got into a bad fight with Hilichurls and some Fatui while hunting rabbits “Alrighty boys, you two should go rest and not use your arms for awhile.” You said wrapping up Razors arm “Thank you shinning Y/N and shining Barbara.” Razor said happily making you smile “Yeah thanks guys, sorry for always troubling you two. Man I can’t even go hunting without my bad luck.” Bennette said sheepishly “It’s no trouble Benny.” You said using Bennett’s nickname making him smile “Y/N you should go on vacation, you work hard.” Bennett said “Yes Y/N, you’ve been very busy lately, I think it’s time you took a vacation.” Barbara said with worry “But I can’t leave my parents, especially with my dad having a bad back.” You said “Ahh, Y/N there you are, an invitation came for you from BF/N.” Your mother said walking towards you with your father “Really?” You asked taking the letter and opening it, the letter read.

Dear Y/N I would love for you to visit me in Fontaine, we haven’t seen each other since I left Mondstadt and I want you to meet some friends here, I’m sure you’ll love them.

With Love BF/N.

PS two of my friends are having a magic show here in two weeks, I hope to see you.

As you read the letter you were conflicted on whether to go or not but your parents already decided for you “I think you should go my dear.” Your mom said gently “You’re mother’s right dear, you’ve been working very hard and you haven’t seen BF/N in years.” Your father said “But-“ you tried to protest but no one was having it “We may be old but not that old. Your mother and I still have some pep in our steps.” You’re father said “I’ll be happy to allow you to take time off to get ready for your trip.” Barbara said.

You couldn’t help but smile “Alright then, I’ll get packing right now.” You said going home to get packing for Fontaine and to wright back to BF/N.

The next week:

After packing it was time to go to Fontaine.

After saying goodbye to your parents and friends you set off to Fontaine, of course there were bumps on the road with the monsters, Fatui, treasures hoarders and Abyss but you meet interesting people along the way like Chongyun, Xingqui, Xinyan, Yanfei, Xiangling, Gaming, Layla, Nilou, Sethos ect and you saw many great places such as Liyue Harbor with the Jade Chamber floating above it, Sumeru city, Aaru village and the Vourukasha Oasis with the Harvisptokhm tree floating above it.

After walking across the Sumeru desert with Vahumatra Cyno who told you hilarious jokes that you couldn’t help but laugh at, you made it to where the boarders of Sumeru ended and you can see Fontaine in all its glory.

You’ve read books and seen pictures on the nation of Justice but it was even more beautiful in person.

After thanking Cyno and paying him (which he tried to decline but you insisted) you glided down to the Waverider and road It to the entrance of Fontaine.

After going through the elevator you waited for the Aquabus while reading one of your favorite fantasy novels “Flowers for Princess Fischl. That’s a great novel series.” Someone said looking up you saw a familiar girl with dirty blond hair in a braid wearing Mondstadt clothing making you smile and squeal “By Barbatos it’s been so long.” You said hugging the older girl happily “I missed you so much.” She said happily.

You happily patted a spot for BF/N to sit on the bench then you both began catching up she explained what happened in Fontaine and you explained what happened in Mondstadt until the Aquabus came.

After a five or ten minute ride and the guide telling you interesting things about Fontaine and pointing to land marks the bus stoped at the court of Fontaine “Your going to love it here Y/N, there’s so much to see and do.” BF/N said taking your hand and walking you to her house to drop your bags off “Ah, BF/N there you are.” Said a voice turning around you saw a silver haired young man wearing a top hat with shorts and a white button up walking towards you with a silver haired young woman with cat ears and a tail wearing a romper with tights underneath and a white long sleeve blouse “Is she your friend from Mondstadt?” The cat eared girl asked “Hello, I’m Y/N! Y/N L/N.” You said placing a hand over your heart “Any friend of BF/N’s is a friend of ours. I’m Lyney and this is my sister.” The boy you now know as Lyney said “Lynette, it’s a pleasure to meet you Y/N.” Lynette said with a gentle smile until a boy with bobbed Platinum blond hair wearing black and gold trimmed clothing came over “Hey guys, what’s going on?” He asked “Freminet, this is the friend from Mondstadt BF/N told us about.” Lyney told the younger male you now know as Freminet “The one she said is a sister of Favonius?” Freminet ask “It’s nice to meet you Freminet.” You said with a warm smile “The pleasure is all mine.” He said gently “Miss BF/N, there is an emergency that needs your attention.” A woman said fearfully “Now? Sorry Y/N I have to see what happened this time.” BF/N said sadly “It’s ok, I’ll just explore the court, we can tour Fontaine after the show tomorrow.” You assured BF/N “Ok then, I’ll make it up to you after I’m done with the emergency or after the show.” She said “We have to finish preparing for the show tomorrow, see you tomorrow Y/N.” Lyney said but before leaving Lynette pointed out the restaurants and Cafes in the court.

You began walking around the court and met so many people and Melusine, you saw Gardemeks and tried Fontaine cuisine when all of a sudden you accidentally bumped into someone “Sorry about that sir, I wasn’t looking where I was going.” You said looking up to see a tall man with long milky white and blue streaked hair in a low ponytail held in place by a black ribbon and he wore blue and gold trimmed clothes and he had a Caine “Quite alright young lady.” He said turning around but when he saw you he had shock in his violet eyes “May I have your name young Miss?” He asked “Y/N L/N! And you sir?” You asked “Neuvillette.” He said “Nice to meet you Mister Neuvillette.” You said “Please, just call me Neuvillette.” He said the last part “Ah, there you are Y/N, I see you’ve meet Monsieur Neuvillette.” BF/N said walking over slinging an arm over your shoulder “How did the emergency go?” You asked “A new worker was having trouble with some documents but we figured something out” she said both of you unaware of a pair of jealous violet eyes.

The next day:

You and BF/N sat at the front row seats with Neuvillette at the seat next to you, staring at you as if you were the most precious thing in the world but with a look of malice at BF/N.

You watched as Lyney turned cards into doves, do a disappearing act with Lynette and pulled animals from his hat then it was time for the grand finale where he gave a bouquet of flowers to a kid but the flowers flew up into the air and became fireworks thus ending the show.

After the show BF/N took you, Freminet and the twins to a cafe as a treat “I really loved the disappearing act.” You said “Thank you Y/N.” Lyney said as the waitress came with your drinks and asked for your orders.

After getting your food you all dig in then BF/N payed the bill and you all went home but you are unaware that tonight things were about to change for the worst, at BF/N’s house outside the court of Fontaine she said she was taking a nap to digest the food, you decided to write to your parents about your experience in Fontaine so far and that you made new friends.

As your writing you heard a scream from BF/N’s room, scared that something was wrong you went to her room.

Slowly opening the door you weren’t prepared for what you were about to see.

On the ground in a pool of blood was BF/N “BF/N!!” You screamed running towards to her to feel her pulse.

When your in front of BF/N you felt her pulse to find non, scared your about to run out to get help when you saw Neuvillette standing at the doorway, holding a bloody knife, gulping you stepped back only for him to come closer “I’ll finally have you my new daughter.” Neuvillette said standing in front of you but you pushed him away and made a bolt for the door only to find it locked then you tried the back door and the windows all of them were locked “Y/N! Stop this foolishness and let’s go home.” Neuvillette said until you grabbed a chair and threw it through the window about to make a run for it when a strong pair of arms wrapped around you “Now now my dear, let’s not make things difficult.” He said holding you up as you scratched and kick until you kicked him where the sun doesn’t shine and ran for the ocean to escape through the water then glided to Chenyu Vale.

After arriving at Yilong Wharf you called for a boat, after it stops at Qiaoying Village you paid the man named Sun Rao mora (Does anyone else have more Mora then they know what to do with?) then began your journey across Liyue and you won’t be stopping until you reached the stone gates.

After you finally reached the stone gates by mid morning you saw the dawn winery and Mondstadt city ahead then began running to the city.

Once your in the city you ran to your house to find your parents quite surprise “Dear, what happened?” Your mother asked concern etched on hers and your father’s elderly faces.

You explained what happened but you couldn’t bring yourself to say who killed BF/N for the mention of Neuvillette’s name sent shivers down your spine, your parents ushered you into your childhood home with your mother going to make you tea and your father going to get Barbara.

You couldn’t believe what had happened, one minute BF/N was with you while eating and laughing and the next Neuvillette came and took that away, you wanted to know why he did it? What was he trying to accomplish? What did he want with you? As all those questions went through your head your father came back with Barbara “Y/N, what happened?” She asked seeing how destress you are.

You explained to the deaconess what happened after the magic show but once again the thought of saying his name sent shivers down your spine again “Oh, Y/N I’m so sorry.” Barbara said hugging you.

Your parents and Barbara stayed by your side to console you.

After crying for a while Barbara suggested you two went out for a walk “I would like that very much.” You said.

You and Barbara walked to Windrise where you felt the comfort of the tree and wind then you went to Starsnatch cliff.

After the walk you two returned to the city to see Jean talking to Neuvillette, someone you thought you got away from after escaping Fontaine “Y/N! What’s wrong?” Barbara asked seeing you scared “Let’s go in through the back gate.” You said grabbing her hand.

After going through the back and carefully avoided being seen by Neuvillette you arrived at the cathedral “Y/N, why are you so fidgety?” Barbara asked until you two heard Jean’s voice “I’m sorry Mister Neuvillette. But I can’t give you Y/N’s personal Info, Iudex or not.” She said “And why not?!” Neuvillette asked “I’m sorry Mister Neuvillette, but we can’t do that and she has parents.” Lisa said putting her foot down “What do you want with our child?” Your father asked angrily with your mother also angry “I’m quite curious myself.” Kaeya said walking out of the Favonius HQ leaving Neuvillette surrounded “Can we discuss this tomorrow? it’s late.” Jean asked clearly tired making everyone agree and return home but Neuvillette was escorted to an inn.

Sighing in relief that Neuvillette is gone you and Barbara didn’t noticed Amber behind you “Y/N, Thank Barbatos I found you. Your folks asked me to take you to HQ so you could be safe.” She said taking you to the HQ where Jean, Lisa, Kaeya and your parents are “Y/N, you’ll be staying here until Mister Neuvillette is gone.” Jean said “Sorry about BF/N.” Kaeya said placing a hand on your shoulder gently unaware of the angry eyes of a certain Hydro Dragon.

That Night:

You are asleep in a bed in the solitary confinement room where a night guard is stationed outside the door, you suddenly felt thirsty and decided to go get a glass of water.

Slowly opening the door you saw that the hall was completely empty “Wasn’t there a guard stationed out here?” You asked yourself going to the HQ kitchen to get that water.

After getting the water you suddenly felt arms wrap around you “I finally have you.” Said the voice that sent shivers down your spine then you felt your vision going black.

You slowly woke up in a room with blue wallpaper and no furniture aside from a bed with your veil sitting on it and a dresser, you’re about to stand up but you felt like you couldn’t move.

Looking down, you saw that you are tied to a chair.

You tried screaming for help only to find that your also gagged, you began struggling in your binds but they were so tight it was hard to get free from them, you tried using your vision in hopes of the wind blowing the ropes lose but it didn’t make the ropes loose.

As you struggle to get out of the binds the sounds of unlocking was heard, looking up you saw the door opening to reveal Neuvillette with a smile on his face “I see your finally awake my dear.” He said walking towards you, caressing your face with a gloved hand “Are you ready to behave yourself?” He asked, gently running a hand through your hair and taking off the gag “Let me go.” You pleaded “I’m afraid I can’t do that, for you are my daughter now.” He said angering you “I already have parents in Mondstadt.” You shouted “I’m afraid not anymore, they sadly passed away.” He said making your eyes widen with tears “No….” You whispered in shock, your struggling stopping as you felt your heart falling into your stomach “I’m sorry it’s the truth, they both got ill and died peacefully.” He said still running his gloved hand through your hair “I didn’t harm those Mondstadt friends of yours, though that Calvary captain peeved me but I didn’t let my anger get to me so, no one else got killed.” Neuvillette said gently “I understand your anger rain drop and it is justified.” He said seeing the tears in your eyes “I’ll give you space to grieve.” He said walking out of the room and locking the door.

After you calmed down, Neuvillette came back into the room, untied you, gently picked you up as if you were a small child and sat on the bed with you now on his lap “It is now late little one.” Your new “Father” said rubbing your back gently “You will be joining me in my chambers tonight.” He said “You can wear one of my shirts for tonight until your clothes from your old house in Mondstadt get here.” Neuvillette said walking out of the room to give you some privacy.

After you changed out of your sister of Favonius uniform you through on the way to large button up Shirt with your dandelion tights still on.

After you changed Neuvillette carried you to his room then both of you fell asleep the moment your bodies hit the king sized bed.

The next day, Neuvillette had the day off so he got to sleep in making him smile and hug you close to him, during the day he took you around the outside of the court and showed you more of the environment of Fontaine along with the animals including the cute otters that oddly looked like him but this freedom came with a price, you were handcuffed to Neuvillette so you wouldn’t run away like last time and he even brought Gardemeks so they could help with watching over you, though you got to keep your vision.

After a long day of exploring more of Fontaine, your back at the Palaise Mermonia with you sitting on Neuvillette’s lap and he’s singing you a french lullaby that was slowly lulling you to sleep much to his delight “Goodnight Raindrop.” He said kissing your head.

[dootznbootz]

I know you talk about your head canons for OdyPen a lot, but do you have any for Telemachus? 👀

Thank you for the Ask!!!! And I have quite a few but I like "revealing" things in my fics and since I'm basically starting from the beginning of Telemachus' life, kind of hiding for now :D I still have a lot though that I can share!!!

He's just like Odysseus but with Penelope's hair and eye color and MINOR Naiad traits. His ears are slightly pointed and his teeth are sharper but he can smile and not frighten people immediately. (Penelope has freaky large pupils/irises and his are only slightly larger. Not as noticeable but once you finally notice it on him, you can't unsee it) Them both being the Water Wife™ and Water Son™ are very important to meeeeeeee 😭

Baby boy technically learned to "swim" before Crawling (Naiads and their children, no matter HOW lil Naiad they have in them. Have to give birth in water.)

While Penelope can control most freshwater no problem. He can basically only swirl around a bath tub full. (neither can really do shit with saltwater. And both don't really care for swimming in the ocean as they can't breathe in it. Why it's a big deal for them to want to help Odysseus with HIS fear because he knows they both hate it.) Anything more and he loses control (something that frustrates him. Especially when the suitors come. He doesn't like that he has to be "rescued by mom or Athena" sometimes when he's fucking around with them with his water. Making diluted wine dribble on them (Something Penelope does in her youth as well), spraying them in the face. stuff like that.

The Naiads that are mentioned in the Odyssey that Odysseus meets on Ithaca are Telemachus' "Aunties" and become a bunch of "sister-in-laws" to Odysseus. It's why he knows them so well.

Odysseus is a woodcarver. Penelope is a weaver. Telemachus does Pottery! :D it helps with the little amount of water he can control as someone who has done pottery, it's the perfect amount! Odysseus tries to learn more about it with him but Odysseus SUCKS at it (OdyPen broke a LOT of pots while courting because they SUCK. Their son loving Pottery is their "retribution" >:D )

Telemachus tries with Woodcarving but he's not very good either and is embarrassed by that. he tries SOOO hard to be like his dad :'( They have a moment where Telemachus talks about how he feels he'll never be able to fill his shoes and it's a sweet moment!!! (no spoilers!!!)

He was kind of afraid of Horses at first! He kind of gets over it but is still a bit intimidated by them!

He has a little knick on his cheek from the Palamedes incident. Penelope healed it but as she was in such distress it still scarred as she was shaking and panicking still.

Odysseus was a fucking loving and doting dad when he was a baby. Even though He doesn't remember him, he KNOWS something is missing because having so much love and devotion from two suddenly becoming one?? There's an emptiness there.

That's all for now!!!

[imaybe5tupid]

if you see absolutely anything that has kabru in it. And are unable to stop yourself from making it about L/abru (even when Laios doesn’t even appear or is irrelevant to the content in question!) and reduce kabrus entire deuteragonist-level character into wanting to fuck laios. I’m stealing something out of your house!!!!!

disclaimer: If you ship l/abru and gaf about kabru and don’t do this then this post isn’t about you 🤓

[welcometogrouchland]

Batman #149 by chip zdarsky is mostly unremarkable, but I'm really fascinated by how it makes a great case for 'good' endings not saving 'bad' stories*. Because there's a lot of interesting concepts in this issue (bruce having to deal with his rapidly aging and decaying clone making him think about his own life, re-establishing a 'nest' so to speak for his family after pushing them away, etc) but bc of the OOC slog that came before it, almost every moment w/ the batfamily comes off as unearned and disingenuous imo.

Like, everything with Damian is the perfect example in this. Because in isolation it's...fine. admittedly it's a missed opportunity to not go deeper into how Damian would feel about a clone of his dad who tried to kill considering Damian's relationships with clones of himself (the heretic rejects and respawn) or with former enemies who wanted him dead but who were manipulated and/or brainwashed (like suren and maya).

Zdarsky doesn't go into any of this but you could maybe excuse it as the issue not being about Damian. However, coupled with the previous bizarre characterizations of Damian in 147 and 148, it ends up not being fine- instead it starts to feel...icky how Damian (who, despite often being drawn and written as white, will never have his connection to the non-white al ghuls forgotten and will always be effected by racism even when not portrayed as a poc) is constantly written as overly violent, uncaring and narrow minded in this run. Coupled w/ trying to recanonize the morrison origin for Damian it's like. OH this is badly written and laden with subtle bigotry, sick**

That's me going into detail on it with Damian but it's applicable to other things in this issue- the way Cass, Steph and Duke have all been ignored or turned into jobbers makes their inclusion in the 'family' here feel hollow instead of satisfying. Bruce proclaiming that Zur was still a part of him and he needs to accept responsibility for his actions (when it means taking in clone son) wrings hollow when just last issue zdarsky was bending over backwards to separate Bruce and Zur bc otherwise the Jason thing would get really awkward. Ends are achieved through means that feel hollow or strange. I'm at my destination but damn why'd the bus have to do all that???

I only really have opinions on this latest arc of zdarskys Batman bc it's the one I've read the closest (bc I'm a hater, masochist and avid follower of even the bad damian storylines) but it's not saying great things.

Bc zdarsky can do one thing good in this book, and it's write Bruce and Tim. And yet this entire story, whether of his own volition or editorial mandate, includes other characters who aren't Bruce and Tim, the fabric starts to unravel in very telling ways.

(p.s, I think pennyworth manor is an interesting idea but I feel like in execution it's just gonna be 'bruce living in a house haunted by the memory of the people he couldn't save' but with a different dead guy this time. Illusion of change and whatnot)

*whether or not the ending is good is up to you ofc, as is your opinion on the proceeding arc! I saw some ppl complain that the ending was too "WFA" for them, which I get even if I dont think it'll literally be the same premise. If anything it's probably a lead into the new tec run. Likewise many ppl who aren't in the weeds of Damian and Jason characterization liked the previous arc! But I have my opinions and rest my case before the bench

**disclaimer, I'm white and portrayals of bigotry in comics are complicated and subjective, but I am basing my point here off what other poc comic fans on socmed have been saying about 149. Also the "sick" is sarcasm incase that wasn't obvious

[tcfactory]

Please imagine:

[5k words of an outline for a big Bingge centric AU, mentioned QiJiu and MoShang and potentially one-sided BingQiJiu. Time travel, fix-it(?)

Warning for canon typical child abuse and torture, mention of sexual abuse, minor mention of cannibalism, Bingge is his own warning let’s be real]

Binghe goes insane from Xin Mo and abandons his humanity completely, then devolves further into a rabid beast until Mobei and the Wives all work together to put him down. Xin Mo is so entangled in him that it can’t exist past its host anymore, so it unleashes all that it has left to prevent Binghe’s death.

That’s when the reset happens.

It’s like coming back from the brink, when your head breaks the water and the dark recedes from the edge of your vision as air fills your lungs. Sanity is a cold thing when surfacing from the depths of madness, but it keeps the warm animal-hunger of bloodlust and beastly instinct on the edges of his consciousness and that’s fine.

He’s a child again when he regains conscious thought, standing in front of the tea set, about to make that first cup of tea for his future Shizun, and he can’t afford to be a beast right now. There’s a part of him that feels different, the parts that Xin Mo devoured alongside his sanity have now been returned to him, soft and squishy and human. It’s strange, coming back to humanity after so long - how long? Decades? Centuries? Time has lost all meaning to a beast that could hunt and breed whenever it pleased.

Binghe doesn’t remember how to make tea. He’s not certain he ever knew at this age, but the beast in him recoils at the memory of scalding tea dumped on his head. He looks around, as subtle as he can, to find something that might help him avoid that. Shen Qingqiu is talking to Ming Fan, rattling off the necessities they need to provide the first new disciple since Ming Fan became head disciple, but Binghe can feel the man’s attention on him. Shen Qingqiu has noticed his hesitation and he’s waiting to see what Binghe is going to do next. There’s no help to be had there.

Ning Yingying lurks around, too curious of the new shidi to stay away, and Shizun indulges her as long as she stays close enough that he can track her. She would know how to make tea. She has always been one of his smartest wives - she made the array that pinned him down and stripped him of fang and claw and poison so Mobei Jun could shove portals under his skin, drain him of his healing blood and finally unmake him.

It was an agonizing way to die. He deserved all of it and more.

When it seems like an opportune moment he quietly asks Yingying shijie how to make tea fit for their Shizun. She pretends to tie his hair for him - shidi can barely see through this fluff, this won’t do, here’s how you tie it properly - and tells him the instructions in a whisper so quiet even he can barely hear it. 

Shen Qingqiu notices, of course he does, but he pretends that he doesn’t. The tea is not great, but it’s palatable and Shen Qingqiu drinks all of it while he runs Binghe through the rules of the peak and the expectations placed on a scholarly disciple of Qing Jing. It’s such a jarring difference from the first time when he got sent away right after the tea incident that he can’t help but drift in his chaotically spinning thoughts instead of listening. This is not the kind Shizun, he thinks. So why did the tea make such a big difference? (Years later Yue Qingyuan happily tells him how he blackmailed one of the rich boys into showing him how to make tea for his own peak’s tea ceremony because he didn’t trust the adults enough to ask and couldn’t afford to seem lesser than those of higher birth and Binghe finally Gets It.)

His thoughts are interrupted when Ming Fan arrives and shoves the ‘new disciple care package’ in his arms. Binghe is still not used to being tiny again, so he tries to hold all of it like he would as an adult and can’t, dropping his manual and the writing kit in the process. Yingying immediately hops to pick it all up, scolding their shixiong for bullying the new shidi while Shen Qingqiu watches with a cold mask of indifference.

The manual has fallen open and it gives her pause when she picks it up. “Shizun, I don’t think this manual is right.” Shen Qingqiu says nothing, but he takes it from her and glances at the pages.

Binghe is certain that he’s the only one who notices how Shizun’s hold on the book tightens in anger until his fingers turn white. “It’s an older manual,” he says, neither voice nor expression giving away the rage he must feel to grip the book so tight. Luo Binghe knows even his smallest tells and the man is seething. “Go to the library pavilion and pick up the proper edition for your shidi. Dismissed!”

It’s a few days later when Binghe is trying to find a good spot in the library to practice his calligraphy - he knows how to write, in theory, but he forgot so many of these mundane little rituals in his madness that he needs to refresh the memory - when he walks into the range of a silencing array. It’s obviously a fluke that it extends into the corridor, but if Binghe puts his ear to the wall he can clearly hear Shen Qingqiu rage at his hallmasters and the head of the library pavilion because of the manual. The fake, harmful cultivation manual, one of many that have ruined and killed lonely disciples before, the ones who didn’t have friends or other support to notice that something was wrong.

Manuals Shen Qingqiu has ordered removed and destroyed when he became peak lord. Orders that the hallmasters ignored. Does Peak Lord Shen think they have the time to waste on something like this when the peak is already short staffed? There are more important parts of the collection to maintain than the beginner manuals - the only ones who would ever fall prey to the false manuals anyway are the charity cases, and they are not the ones who fund the scholarly peak. Really, this wouldn’t even be an issue at all if Shen Qingqiu didn’t let Liu Qingge goad him into taking on a dirty beggar child. Don’t they all know that things crawling in the dirt are never worth the trouble? Once filth, always filth.

Luo Binghe is almost bowled over when Shen Qingqiu storms out of the meeting, blind to his environment. The man’s qi roils, razor sharp like shattered glass, his anger driving him to the cusp of a qi deviation. Binghe has a hunch that whatever this is about, it’s not about him. Shizun would not be so angry on his behalf.

He could never figure out why the man mistreated him, could never break Shen Qingqiu open enough to get the answer he needed. This feels like an opportunity, a chance to unravel this puzzle, and it tickles his instincts to have something to chase, to press his nose to the trail and hunt.

So he starts to sniff around. People overlook children so easily, it’s almost effortless how he finds piece after piece. He learns that the people on the peak - the cultivators from his generation in particular, the pavilion overseers and the hallmasters - don’t respect Shen Qingqiu and often undermine his authority when he’s not there to personally force them to adhere to his standards. There’s an especially tense period every time after the Peak Lord leaves for the city - for the brothel, they say, to drown in his lust or to use some hapless girl as a cauldron and bolster his own mediocre cultivation - when they seem especially bold, holding his indulgence over his head like a finely balanced sword.

He learns from Yingying that he’s the first disciple to get into the peak through the selection for the last decade. All the other disciples are young masters and scholarly prodigies who come recommended by their mentors. They don’t need their Shizun’s encouragement to try and bully Binghe, even when he’s not rolling over like he did in his first life. He fights back, tooth and nail, a rabid little thing that leaves scratches and bruises on anyone who would provoke him and he doesn’t have to worry about sleeping in the woodshed because more often than not the dormitory overseers isolate him from the others as a form of punishment.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t interfere. He looks with the same disdain at both perpetrators and victim, bruised black and blue, and forbids them from leaving the peak until they are presentable again. It’s not until a particularly bad fight when Binghe takes a bite out of one of them, digging his teeth into a soft cheek and swallowing both the bloody chunk and the screams of terror with dark satisfaction, that Shizun’s hand is forced. Binghe is thrown into solitary confinement until the boy’s parents can come and demand fitting punishment for permanently disfiguring the rich brat. Binghe is grateful for these few days of isolation. He needs them to shackle the instincts screaming for blood, to calm his demon side that’s straining against his seals. It wasn’t like this the first time, but he came back as a beast in a boy’s skin so it’s not surprising.

He puts on the face of a lamb when they lead him outside, to the cold morning light and then to the punishment hall. The boy’s parents - a high-ranking official in the mortal Emperor’s court and his lady wife - look at him like he’s less than dirt, but there’s a glint of cruel satisfaction in their eyes when the stone faced Shen Qingqiu announces his punishment: by their demand, Binghe is to receive ten lashes with the discipline whip, or fewer if he passes out.

The Sect Leader came to oversee the punishment and the horror on his gentle face is obvious to all. The disciple whip is a cruel thing, one that can cripple even advanced cultivators, and will set Binghe’s cultivation back by years if it doesn’t ruin it altogether. The Sect Leader gives Shen Qingqiu a pleading look and Binghe lifts his head to tell him not to bother - when could Yue Qingyuan ever influence Shen Qingqiu for the better? - so he catches the Sect Leader’s expression when Shen Qingqiu flicks the case open and takes out the whip. Just for a moment, his expression flickers into surprise, then relief, before it turns into a blank mask. Binghe has no time to ponder what the hell that is about, because Shen Qingqiu swings the whip with the ease and confidence of practice and the line of fire down his back startles a scream out of him. He lived a whole life as a warlord and demon, but this body is that of a human child, unaccustomed to this sort of pain.

The world fades to black after two more strikes.

When he comes to, he is laying in a soft bed. The bedding smells clean, but oddly stale - like a guest bed they only air out every other day, but never use. He turns his head and the bamboo house comes into focus. It’s Shizun’s room and Shizun’s bed, but that makes no sense - where does the man sleep if not in his own bed? His cultivation isn’t good enough to forgo sleep altogether. There’s something here, a corner piece to this puzzle Binghe is struggling to fit into the big picture. Is this why Shizun keeps going to the brothels? Can he only find rest in the embrace of women? Binghe, formerly a very active master of a harem with hundreds of wives and concubines, can’t judge him for that. He already dismissed the rumors about Shizun abusing a cultivation cauldron; dual cultivation is one of the few methods to mend ruined meridians and Binghe still remembers how wrecked Shen Qingqiu’s cultivation was when he caught him.

There is yelling from the main room, Mu shishu’s incensed voice and the low rumble of the Sect Leader as he tries to calm him. Eventually a blank faced Shizun leads both of them inside and Mu shishu ignores all etiquette to rush to the bed and take stock of Binghe’s injuries. 

“These… these are not the marks of a discipline whip,” he says, confused and relieved. 

“Of course not,” Shen Qingqiu scoffs. “I don’t keep one of those wretched things around on my peak. As if those fools could tell the difference between a discipline whip and a regular slaver’s whip. All they wanted was to hear the little beast scream.” 

The Sect Leader hurriedly reassures Mu shishu that the whip strikes are painful, but with the right treatment they won’t even scar. 

“Zhangmen-shixiong, are you saying that from experience?” Mu Qingfang asks, massaging his temples and startles a little when Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan say “Yes!” in perfect unison. Another corner piece for the puzzle.

After his injuries are treated and Yue Qingyuan shepherds the healer outside, Binghe is left alone with Shen Qingqiu.

“What am I to do with you, little beast? If you don’t learn to rein yourself in, I will kick you off my peak before you can drag our reputation down.”

“He deserved it. They started it.”

“And? This is not Bai Zhan. You are in no position to make such a ruckus about things. Your stunt lost Qing Jing almost a tenth of our yearly funding. My own shizun would have beaten me to death if I pulled something so idiotic.” 

“Then why didn’t you?” He’s starting to understand Shen Qingqiu, the wretched little slave, who clawed his way up to become Peak Lord despite his ruined cultivation and digs his teeth into what’s his so nobody can take it away, but he still wants to hear it from the man himself. “Do I remind you of yourself, Shizun?”

“Little beast, you are asking for a beating.” Shen Qingqiu forgot his fan, or else he’d be hiding behind it, as always. Binghe’s Shizun has such a terribly thin face. “You have potential and drive to make something of yourself. I want to see how far it will take you. If you learn how to hide your claws better.”

Oh, Binghe knows exactly how far he can go. But he humors his Shizun and does a demonstration of his White Lotus routine. Shizun fetches a fan just so he can smack him over the head, but says that it’s an adequate act, for now. However, if Binghe can’t fool the peak into believing that he mellowed out from the punishment, then he shouldn’t expect help from his master!

They settle into an understanding over the next few years. They are not of a kind, but they are both beasts after a fashion and now that he finally peered under Shen Qingqiu’s unbreakable armor, he doesn’t resent the man as much. Is he himself not a violent, monstrous thing once you peel off his pleasant facade? What filled the human child with fear and resentment entices the adult demon that now lives in his skin. Besides, Shizun hasn’t hurt him in this life. Shen Qingqiu usually lets him be, only interacting with him as much as any other discipline, but sometimes under the guise of chores he takes remedial lessons to perfect his act. The years he let go of his humanity took their toll and he needs the guidance to set some of the details right.

“I think I might be part demon,” Luo Binghe says one day, sipping tea in the bamboo house. For two hours straight Shizun poked and prodded at his insecurities, reaching for a level of unpleasantness he doesn’t often aim at him and Binghe kept his mask of a perfect, demure youth all throughout. At the end of it Shizun poured him a cup of tea and reluctantly praised his acting. It’s a thorny thing, Shizun’s praise, but it has set a warmth in Binghe’s chest that refuses to go away.

“You are fifteen. It’s probably just puberty.” Binghe laughs at his Shizun’s expression of disgust. Shen Qingqiu is technically not wrong either, because it’s his steadily growing sex drive that keeps aggravating his demon half. “I have met men who wish they could be demons. I don’t care as long as you don’t tarnish the reputation of the sect.”

“The sect or Qing Jing Peak?”

“The sect. Drag me down with your madness if you want. I chose to take responsibility for you as your Shizun, but leave the others out of it.” 

The others in this case, Binghe has learned, means Yue Qingyuan. Binghe is not sure what ties the two men together (ten thousand arrows and a throat split open on the shards of a blade) but it’s a kind of devotion and he wants it for himself. He set this thread of fate against Xin Mo’s blade and it remained unbroken, so he wants to tangle himself up in it until he can forget that he has no thread of his own. He couldn’t find true peace in the embrace of a thousand women, but when he imagines himself sandwiched between Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan, the most resilient and the strongest man the human realm can offer, he thinks he could be satisfied. Shen Qingqiu’s sharp edges stimulate the demon part of him that wants to court with his fangs and claws bared and Yue Qingyuan’s soft brotherly manners soothe the neglected human boy he tried to rip out of his soul, but never managed. They would be perfect.

But first he has to find out why Shen Qingqiu keeps pushing the Sect Leader away and mend their relationship somehow, and a crucial step to that is making sure Liu Qingge lives. Binghe now suspects that the Bai Zhan War God’s death was an accident, but it drained Shen Qingqiu of any will to stand up for himself and he can’t allow that to happen this time around.

“When I passed Liu shishu earlier I sensed that his qi was unbalanced. He is heading to a deviation soon.” He can blame it on his Shizun that he learned to sniff out impending qi deviations, because Shen Qingqiu had them often and always, always tried to cover them up. “I know he is going to Lingxi caves for isolated cultivation and I overheard Mu shishu say that Shizun is following him in a fortnight. I want Shizun to be prepared to call for help if Liu shishu turns violent and attacks him.”

It’s a battle to convince Shizun to take the emergency talismans, but Binghe eventually wears him down. He spends the whole night before Shizun enters the caves drawing the talismans; it’s his punishment for bothering Shen Qingqiu so much in the past two weeks. Soon after, the Sect Leader leaves and Binghe doesn’t remember the exact timeline anymore, but it sounds like things are happening the way they did before; Liu Qingge’s death and the demon invasion was barely a week apart and Yue Qingyuan was absent for both. So Binghe loiters around the emergency medical team and waits.

Nobody notices it when he slips into the backline of the emergency team, keeping pace with them through the winding pathways of the Lingxi caves until something calls out to him, his instincts suddenly on high alert, and he falls behind, just as unnoticed. The side cavern is almost completely blocked off and once Binghe squeezes inside he can’t see anything, but he doesn’t need his eyes to tell what happened. Poisonous, disturbed qi saturates the cavern, heavy on his tongue with pain and fear and desperation, the rage of a dragon trapped in a bottle, thrashing to break free. He can feel the marks gouged into the walls when he touches them, can taste the blood saturating the surface when he licks along a deep crack.

A beast was trapped in here, a beast that tastes like Yue Qingyuan.

The discovery makes him giddy and he has to tear himself away from the cavern before the qi could damage his human cultivation or the sweet song of blood could awaken his demon half. Outside he finds that things happened as he expected, and to his relief both Peak Lords live. Liu Qingge seems unbearably insistent on undoing the damage he did to Shen Qingqiu’s reputation in the past, but Shizun seems just as annoyed by his attempts as Binghe, so it’s fine.

The demon invasion happens just on schedule and Binghe goes in with a plan to use the demon elder’s poisonous attack to pretend that was what awakened his demon half. It's a good plan, one that's immediately dashed by Liu Qingge, who can't bear to sit and watch when Shen Qingqiu gets to fight. For a blissful moment Binghe entertains the idea of revealing himself anyway and ripping Liu Qingge limb from limb, but he restrains himself and moves right on.

The encounter with Meng Mo is different. In the dream realm Binghe is not a child and he shuts off access to the dream before the old demon can pull anyone else in with them. Then he bows to the elder with all the respect his old mentor earned in that other life. “This Binghe is overjoyed to see Meng shushu has found him again.”

It’s strange, to explain what happened to him to someone who can’t possibly remember those events, but Meng Mo takes it all with grace, even when Binghe admits that Xin Mo trapped the demon in his own nightmare and slowly consumed him. Binghe doesn’t strictly need the grandfatherly old demon in his head - because as much as Meng Mo would deny it, Binghe has met enough demon families to now recognize him for the very typical demonic grandfather that he is - but his presence feels right and his power can tide them over until Binghe decides to break the seals.

Together they hatch a plan to trap his Shizun and his Shibo in a dream until they are forced to talk to each other. It’s easier said than done, because with Liu Qingge nipping at his heels again to demand a spar (get a hint already shishu, Shizun doesn’t see sparring as a bonding activity and you never told him that you mean it that way!) Shen Qingqiu refuses to go down to the brothel to sleep. Finally, when sleep deprivation is driving Shizun to the brink of a qi deviation, Binghe has enough and bluntly presents him with a sleep tonic. “You can take it willingly or I can hit you over the head and take you down to the city. Your choice, Shizun.”

It’s enough of a threat that Shen Qingqiu allows Binghe to distract Liu shishu with a barrage of very specific questions about an upcoming nighthunt and sneaks out to the city himself. The distance would usually be a bit bothersome, but Binghe can grasp the thread tying Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu together and pull them into a joint dream in the middle.

It’s worse than he expects. He gets a front row seat to their worst nightmares and even fully knowing that these are only memories, his demon blood burns to rip their enemies apart. Meng Mo bodily drags him outside of the dream so his enraged howling can’t disturb the long overdue reconciliation between Xiao Jiu and his Qi-ge.

“He was so cruel to me in that first life, I never imagined that he ever had it worse,” Binghe admits quietly when his rage has cooled, pale as a ghost as they watch the shade of Qiu Jianluo force himself on his child slave.

“Have you ever…?”

“No. Even I had my limits. I made sure they wanted me, even if they regretted it afterwards.” How many women did he feed to Xin Mo’s endless appetite over the years? He never counted. Meng Mo just hums and then shoos him away; the old demon can maintain the dream until the humans are done sorting themselves out and it’s probably not good for Binghe’s psyche to watch all of this.

The next few years are a blur. Binghe keeps his distance from Shen Qingqiu when it becomes clear that the reconciliation followed them out of the dream. He doesn’t want Shen Jiu to think of him as a disciple, a child, he wants to leave and return as a dashing suitor, so he watches from afar as things slot into a much more pleasing picture than before. With Yue Qingyuan’s broad shoulders propping him up, Shen Qingqiu finally gains the power to back up his words and a genuine confidence to match his proud bearing. He kicks all his detractors off Qing Jing and calls an audit from An Ding to clean up all the leftover filth before the new hallmasters take their post. Yue Qingyuan shuts down a nasty comment during a peak lord meeting about Shen Qingqiu’s brothel visits by reminding everyone that they are allowed to visit their family outside the sect if they want to, and this is everything the sect gossip talks about for the next sennight. It prompts Ning Yingying to bashfully admit to her trusted Luo shidi that her mother is one of Shen Qingqiu’s 'sisters', that she joined the sect on his recommendation. Maybe A-Luo would like to meet her sometime? He’s like a little brother to Yingying and she wants him to meet her family. 

Not everything is perfect, of course. Qing Jing is still heavy on the physical punishment, second only to Bai Zhan, because the fear of pain works extremely well on the rich brats, but Binghe’s growing restlessness sees him punished more than all the disciples put together and on him it has a very different effect. He can’t help it, his libido is out of control and the people he wants are out of his reach, so the only things he can channel his restless energy is aggression and too long nights of masturbation that leave him too tired to function the following day. At one point Shen Qingqiu even threatens him with the whip again if he doesn’t cut it out, and the thought of Shen Qingqiu whipping him bloody fuels his fantasies for the next several weeks.

It’s three months before the Immortal Alliance Conference when Meng Mo digs his heels in about the course of their future.

“We are not getting Xin Mo.”

“I need it if I want to become strong again.”

“I reviewed all of your memories and I can confidently say that’s not true. The wretched thing hurt you more than it ever helped.”

“I will never get out of the abyss without it. I need it for that long and then I will lock it away.”

“If you pick it up you will never be able to put it down again. Just like in that other life.”

“Then what do you suggest? Am I to just stay in the abyss and perish?!”

“No, of course not. Ask Xiao Mobei to teach you his portal trick.”

“... Let’s start with the obvious that it would not work and let’s not go into the logistics of how I’m even supposed to get hold of him.”

“You have actively used Xin Mo for fifteen centuries.” Was it really that long? It didn’t feel that long. “You have absorbed enough of its residual energy that with the right teacher you should be capable of learning portal manipulation. Whether the Mobei boy is willing to teach you or not is another matter.”

“We were friends before I went insane.” Before he merged the realms and accidentally destroyed Mobei’s entire kingdom and all his subjects in the process. “I think I have a way to convince him.”

Thus starts the long chase to get into Shang Qinghua’s house so Binghe can talk to him in private. It’s much easier said than done. Much as Qinghua has made his peak self-sustaining, he is still busy as hell and when he's not then he's in his leisure house which is the most well-warded building in the entire sect. They only manage a meeting with two weeks left to go before the conference.

At least convincing Shang Qinghua is easy enough. “I recently found out that I'm part demon and I want your prince to help me get away after the conference” is a clear motivation why Binghe would want to talk to Mobei and “I can see from your bruises that he's trying to court you - very carefully, by his standards, I don't see any frostbite - I can make him understand that you are not interested or how to do it the human way, whichever you prefer” makes Qinghua’s expression twist into something both calculating and flustered. The wonders a millennia lived as mostly a demon does, Binghe muses. He was too young and too human to realize that Mobei was pining hard for his little snake of an advisor the first time around. He's not surprised when it all turns into a Human Courting Dos and Don’ts 101. He's not sure if Qinghua is really interested or he's just too scared to turn Mobei down, but when he comes to finalize the details of his getaway the leisure house stinks to the high heavens of happy ice demon, so it's working at least.

He talks Mobei down from letting his entire menagerie loose on the disciples (Qinghua breathes a sigh of relief. He might be able to keep his position as a spy and not lose all his enrolled disciples after all) and shows him where to send the most dangerous beasts for a more targeted attack against Huan Hua’s adult cultivators. Binghe doesn't much care about the disciples, but the least amount of damage done against the sect, the more likely Shen Qingqiu will take him back soon once he returns.

The night before the Conference he finally visits Shen Qingqiu in his dream to show the man his true self. “I told you that I'm a demon.” In the dream Qingqiu is scrawnier and not quite the perfectly polished image of a peerless immortal. Binghe revels in tracing his eyes over all the scars he can see that have been long erased from his skin in the waking world. “I need to leave for a time, after the conference. But do not fret. When I return I will be Junshang and lay the demon world in front of you and Sect Leader Yue as a courting gift.”

He keeps Shen Qingqiu in the dream long enough that his Shizun can't talk to him in person before the event begins. It would spoil the fun to have a fight with his future intended before the hunt.

This plan, unlike the demon invasion one, goes off without a hitch. When Qinghua is portaled into Mobei’s palace a week later for one last report before Binghe leaves, the man has only good news - the sect only suffered injuries and no deaths, and as an added bonus the Iceclaw Assassin Wolf they dropped into the Huan Hua ranks took out the Old Palace Master and his most trusted people before it self destructed. It’s a better outcome than he dared to hope for.

Mobei refuses to teach him portals (for now) but gives him a token that can portal him out of the abyss if things get dicey or Binghe is done training, so that's fine as well. All is ready. Binghe is going to go into the abyss and then seven years later he’ll come back out, fully in control of his heavenly demon heritage and as much of a beast in body as he is in spirit.

The Northern Consort greets him coldly, glaring at him from under a huadian painted with Mobei Jun’s blood that leaves no doubt in anybody’s mind about the king’s devotion to his little human husband. “What took you so long?” Shang Qinghua asks, unwinding one of his many layers of fur and dropping it on the shivering Binghe. The pelt barely covers his shoulders, but it warms Binghe all the same. “Zhangmen-shixiong has been hounding me day and night about your return. Shen Qingqiu refuses to hold their wedding without you there.”

“Ah, but Shang shishu.” Binghe spreads his arms wide, showing off his new physique with a grin. “I promised to lay the demon world before their feet. I couldn’t possibly return before I was capable of upholding that promise!”

Consort Shang is unimpressed.

“Next time, just get them a stick of tanghulu to share. Much easier to get and I bet you anything they would appreciate it more.”

He might not be wrong about that. What is the demon world to a pair of slave boys who rose to the top of the cultivation world on their own power? Comfort food made by his own hand is a much sweeter gift.

Binghe is still going to conquer the demon world for them regardless. He promised, after all, and what kind of husband would he be if he went back on his promises?

[relicsongmel]

Was doing some thinking today and realized that one of the reasons I'm really drawn to Kieran is because he's a rare example of a character that's shy (and usually good-hearted) but still has some rougher edges to him.

I feel like all too often shy characters are shoved into being portrayed as either "smol bean who would never hurt anyone and just wants friends uwu" or "brooding loner who snaps at people to cover up the fact they don't actually know how to socialize" with not a lot of wiggle room in between. While I can and do enjoy characters that (arguably) fall into those respective categories, they're a bit reductive in the sense that things are very rarely that black and white in reality. Even the kindest people have a limit to what they can tolerate. They have bad days or respond poorly to events around them that cause them stress. And the same can be said in reverse as well—point being, people are multifaceted and don't always behave as predictably as we'd like to think.

And I think Kieran reflects that dichotomy perfectly. When we first meet him, he's meek, timid, and relies heavily on his more brash and forceful older sister to help him navigate social situations where he would otherwise lose out on something valuable because he's too afraid to come forward and ask for what he wants (like how she has to ask the player to battle him on his behalf). He's often quick to cower whenever she starts to get heated, but he's also not afraid to point out when he thinks she's wrong and sometimes even gets sassy with her himself. He's undeniably sweet and gentle and shows eagerness to make friends with the player, but he becomes much more curt when he notices we're lying to him about Ogerpon. The rest of the Teal Mask storyline shows him fluctuating even further—yelling at Carmine and the player for keeping secrets from him, punching things in fits of anger...then backpedaling and apologizing for the trouble he caused a few scenes later. Spreading the truth about Ogerpon to everyone in the village to help make her happy...then selfishly demanding a battle to see who's worthy of being her Trainer when she has already clearly chosen the player.

After being lied to and suffering repeated losses at our hands (including the Pokemon he's idolized all his life choosing us over him), he leans even more heavily into his bitter side during the Indigo Disk—being cold and ruthless to pretty much everyone around him, but at the end of the day it's primarily overcompensation for what he perceives as his own personal weakness (because he's still just a kid trying to be taken seriously). He's shown to drop the act on multiple occasions—most notably when he's caught off guard by our appearance at Blueberry Academy and at a few points during the Area Zero expedition. He antagonizes the player up until the moment of his defeat and tries to catch and use Terapagos in a last-ditch moment of desperation that ends up going horribly wrong, but after everything resolves he's quick to admit his mistakes and asks the player for forgiveness and if they can still be friends. After the epilogue he's mostly back to his old self, but still seems to get worked up when provoked (e.g. when he yells at Drayton for refusing to stop calling him "ex-Champ" in one of their League Club Room interactions).

And I think this varied and sometimes contradictory behavior is precisely why Kieran is such a cohesive and believable character—because it shows how even kind, well-meaning people may have a hidden darker side that can show itself under the right circumstances. How they might let their insecurities get the better of them. How a shy, timid kid might not have the experience to know how to deal with sudden feelings of frustration and/or jealousy that are far too strong to keep to himself, so he lashes out as a result. How despite all this he remains kind, sensitive and loving at his core and shows willingness to learn from his mistakes. And that is what makes him so compelling to me.

[marinaiguess]

I cant remember if i’ve mentioned this but since tangle was made canon in the games, the comics (idw) are also canon in the games’ timeline/universe. all of it; the return of neo metal sonic, mr. tinker, dr. starline, the metal virus saga, belle, surge and kit. sonic knows tangle in frontiers, thus the game took place after the neo metal sonic incident. if you remember, the chaos emeralds were still lost by then. but before the metal virus was spread out to the world, starline had the emeralds, which he gave to eggman. so, they were found. and i doubt starline tracked down and retrieved all 7 from the starfall islands just for the emeralds to return to those islands after the metal virus was gone, just so sonic and co. could find them again in frontiers. 

which means, frontiers took place before the metal virus saga. sonic and co. investigated the disappearance of the chaos emeralds and when they found them they spread out like they usually do, not limited within the islands anymore. then, starline found them. 

which means, sonic hasnt been infected by the metal virus yet. and he’s already gone through the cyberspace corruption. 

[the-insanity-of-mojiru]

Finally giving Final Fantasy XIV a try now that I have the computer space. My boy Izayoi Matsuri is a dumbass who tries to climb on top of everything as a shortcut and can't see where he's going.

[orcelito]

listen. romance in the culinary. akechi cannot cook bc he never got the chance to learn. i think he tried experimenting when he first started living on his own, but it went Disastrously bc there's so much backround knowledge you need for even the simplest of things. if you have no one to teach you, it's very difficult to effectively cook.

so goro gives up. he accepts he's a bad cook. he doesnt have time for it anyways.

but akira. akira loves to cook. cooking is a love language, especially for him. he wants the people he loves to be nourished. he wants them to eat well. he wants goro to eat well. so he cooks for him, of course he does.

but romance in the culinary. he realizes the origin of goro's inability to cook. and he decides to try to help fix that. goro didnt have anyone to teach him before, but he does now. akira will teach him how to chop vegetables, how to make soups and noodles and eggs, how to brown meat and fry shrimp. hell, he could teach him how to make sushi too, since goro loves it so much.

with akira's help, he gives goro the chance to have this bit of independence he never had before. as much as akira loves cooking for him, he wants goro to be able to cook for himself. akira will make it happen.

[sunderwight]

AU where there's no system (or a decidedly less restrictive one) and Shen Yuan transmigrates into an OC rogue cultivator before the start of the novel, and decides he's gonna steal the protagonist before Luo Binghe even gets to Cang Qiong.

The logic is sound -- he'll keep Luo Binghe from experiencing neglect and abuse at Shen Qingqiu's hands, raise him away from the pressure of the sects and the likelihood that anyone else might find out about his heritage and try to harm him over it, keep him fully away from the Immortal Alliance Conference, and then Luo Binghe's course will change trajectory because he'll have no reason to want revenge against the world and no access to Xin Mo. Shen Yuan will be able to spare Luo Binghe some suffering and possibly survive in a world less subject to the harrowing whims of a half-mad tyrannical overlord. Win-win!

However, the tricky bit is that he's not sure exactly how far ahead of the novel he is, and also Airplane didn't specify where Luo Binghe grew up. This means that Luo Binghe could be any age younger than twelve and in any number of places along or near to the Luo river.

Shen Yuan decides he's going to approach this by pretending he is looking for the long-lost son of his sister, traveling through the likeliest areas, asking after abandoned children who might fit the protagonist's description. It's a long shot, he knows, and he's mostly relying on the existence of Narrative Destiny. But eventually he is directed by several people towards a particular city, which is not as close to the river as he'd have expected Luo Binghe to grow up, but then again he only knows that was where baby Binghe was found, not where the washerwoman who took him in ultimately lived.

It becomes clear to him, though, that he's been sent to the wrong target. But also why he's been sent astray is apparent in nearly the same breath, because among the slave children living in this area is a little boy who could be his much younger clone.

Seriously, this kid looks just like him! Or, well, close enough. He looks a lot like Shen Yuan's actual nieces and nephews from his past life. It's uncanny.

Also, because of his search, the slave kids get wind of what he's looking for (his long-lost nephew) pretty quick. The boy with the obvious resemblance to him greets Shen Yuan's own assessment with wary cynicism, but he's just a little boy. So it's not difficult to notice the way he's also practically vibrating with hopefulness, half-hiding behind a protective older kid and looking at Shen Yuan with big dark eyes like he expects to be rescued or destroyed with whatever he has to say next.

Shen Yuan has a big problem now. He just knows that if he says something like "actually no this boy is too old to be my nephew" or whatever other excuse, no one will believe him, and also this poor kid is going to be permanently scarred by it. He's going to think Shen Yuan is lying just so that he can reject him. On top of that, he's not in a good situation here. None of these children are even remotely well cared-for.

Shen Yuan's rogue cultivator self isn't rich on the level of being like a wealthy sect leader or anything, but he's made some money since transmigrating by doing random cultivator jobs and quests along the way here. He uses it all to purchase two little slave boys (Do Not Separate), then takes another job and uses that coin to acquire a somewhat rundown manor which used to belong to the local gentry. The Qiu family (rings some bells but that's not exactly an uncommon name) kept it up for a while in case a branch family sprung up in need of a residence, but they've been in decline and the place is downright decrepit, so they had been looking to sell it instead. It's too big for a wandering bachelor like SY to ever need on his own account, but that's sort of the idea. He makes more money taking on cultivator work, at first taking his boys along with him for lack of any alternative. Nerve-wrackingly dangerous! Eventually he hires workers to start restoring the manor, particularly setting up a yard to be a school area, and then starts taking on any freelance jobs he can get in order to steadily buy out the contracts on all the other kids. He gets it nice enough to house and care for as many orphans as he can acquire.

Not because he's a big old softie though!

His story of looking for his nephew is a bust now, since he's apparently "found" the kid. So he's got to change tactics! If he can't find baby Binghe and the washerwoman, the next best approach is to create an opportunity for them to come to him. So once he's got his new household established, he starts offering free lessons to all the local kids. Not just the ones he's taken in, but also any who come by and want to learn some things. It's a tempting setup for anyone who wants their child to get education but can't afford a tutor, and Luo Binghe's mother had been entirely the sort of person who would have packed up and left her situation if there had been an opportunity for it.

On that note, SY also starts hiring single mothers to help look after his new gaggle of children and do the work he doesn't know how to do in these times, like keeping house, laundry, cooking, actually raising kids, etc.

His "little school" is not universally popular. A few groups try and ruin him, because the poverty in the region provides a basis of business for them. The ringleaders of the human traffickers in the area don't want their trade to dry up, even if it means selling all of their merchandise for this round, so when they find out that their underlings let Shen Yuan buy off all the kids they try and intimidate him into returning them (it doesn't go well for them). The Qiu family also isn't thrilled after it becomes clear what he's doing, and get him investigated by the local authorities (read: use their bribed officials and local goons to try and interfere.)

When that doesn't work either the sects get involved, because the Qiu go crying to Huan Hua Palace that Shen Yuan is sketchy and is trying to establish his own sect. So Shen Yuan talks his way around the matter, and frankly the Qiu are small fish even if they're the biggest ones in the local pond, so HHP doesn't care to pursue things much further. (Read: SY could mop the floor with the disciples they sent to investigate him, and it's not worth it to piss off someone this mysterious and powerful just to bully some impoverished children.)

Shen Yuan is appalled by all this bullshit though. Trust the world of PIDW to make it so hard just for a guy to teach some poor kids how to read and do math!

It makes him dig in his heels about it, because he is at heart a stubborn bastard. The fires that once fueled a thousand angry screeds on zhongdian literature site is now aimed at the local magistrate. One of the women he's hired on has some dirt on the Qiu family, which leads SY to dig up some more until he eventually has enough to turn the tables on them. Local officials won't investigate because they've all been bought, but that in and of itself is of some interest to their superiors closer to the palace, and so SY arranges an investigation of his own that goes way further than he thought? Turns out there are some ugly skeletons in the Qiu closets, and the imperial investigator comes down on them hard.

Well, he can't say they didn't have it coming? Though he does feel bad for the children in the family, especially the oldest son, who gets hauled off to jail along with his father. At least the girl is sent to live with relatives. Maybe he should have done more to shield the minors in the situation...?

His kids tell him not to worry about it, though, that apparently young master Qiu was known to run people down in the streets and beat his servants and do other cartoonishly awful things. SY's not sure how much of it is true and how much of it is his little flock of fluffy sheep trying to ease his conscience, though they do all seem to take a lot of vindictive delight in the whole affair. Especially Nephew, who clings to his sleeves and loudly declares that the investigator should have publicly flogged the discredited nobles so that everyone could go watch, and then begs him for sweets as if that wasn't a creepy thing to hear come out of an eight-year-old's mouth. SY just sighs and tells him he can have something good when he finishes his calligraphy practice.

Of course, it's not exactly easy running what is basically an orphanage-slash-school (and maybe a budding sect...?), especially when pretty much all of the kids have been traumatized and faced stuff like rampant dehumanization, food insecurity, abuse, and neglect. Hiring single mothers soon becomes not only a plan to try and lure in Luo Binghe's mom, but an absolute godsend of an idea because SY has no clue WHAT he would do on his own about the discipline issues or emotional breakdowns or acting out that some of the kids get up to once it registers that they're in a safe enough place to unpack their baggage.

Apart from Nephew, SY's favorite kid is the one who came with him, the oldest of the flock of former slave children. He's the big brother of the group, the one who tries his best to look after the others and to not make any trouble himself. But even poor Little Yue is still just a kid who has been through too much, and he also eventually starts having some meltdowns and struggles with processing everything that has happened to him as a vulnerable child in an unkind world.

SY really didn't mean to start a trauma center for mistreated children!

Though, that's still not necessarily a bad thing for Luo Binghe to one day come across, provided he ever actually shows up...

Eventually, Shen Yuan does figure out that he must be ahead even of Luo Binghe's birth, though he still doesn't put together that he's interfered in the scum villain's backstory. Probably something even more amusingly obscure, like the creation year of some random artifact Luo Binghe used in some wife plot or other, tips him off and he mentally throws his hands up in the air. He's got to wait DECADES? Maybe he ought to try and find Luo Binghe's biological parents and just follow them around at this point!

Not that he can, now, though, because he has to make sure no negative IQ villains (who will probably just be cannon fodder for a subplot one day) decide to send goons to literally burn down his orphanage. Also if he's gone for too long his kids get upset. Probably because no one else is as weak to their puppy dog eyes and pleas for treats and toys as he is.

At least it gives him time to shore up his position, and train Nephew and Little Yue more extensively in cultivation. Despite his initial assurances to HHP that he was but a humble orphan wrangler who was only incidentally a cultivator, Shen Yuan does also teach the other kids some basic cultivation exercises. There are a few reasons for that.

One is just the principle of the thing. No, these kids don't all have the potential to become great immortals or anything, but they can still learn some of it and it's good for their health if they do. The only trouble is if they try and push too hard or attempt things beyond their range, and that's a risk with everyone who cultivates. Or even just exercises!

Another reason is that it helps stave off the jealousy that some of the kids have towards those with more cultivation potential. Teaching a lot of the basics all around makes it into just another topic at school. Some kids might not be as good at it as others, but those kids might also be better at math, or memorization, or board games, and while cultivation can open more doors to people as adults, for the children this is generally enough to satisfy their sense of fairness. Or at least reduce outbursts and fights.

Finally, the impression that any of SY's kids might be a cultivator also makes wicked people more reluctant to try and abduct or interfere with them. Cultivators are revered and nearly mythological figures in the public consciousness. It isn't difficult to see why, if even a rogue cultivator NPC like SY* can mop the floor with most random muggers (*Shen Yuan is not a normal rogue cultivator). Not many people want to risk bringing SY's ire down on them, but of those who might chance it if he wasn't around to immediately react, even fewer want to risk that the kids themselves could kick their asses.

Not knowing that only two of the orphans probably could in fact mop the floor with them helps keep all the rest safer, and is more believable when all of them can conduct themselves enough like disciples to fool anyone who doesn't know what to really look for.

Developments that surprise Shen Yuan but wouldn't surprise anyone else who is paying attention:

People start leaving unwanted babies and younger children on his doorstep. Not all the time, but more than once has he had to frantically find wet nurses and worry that he's changed things enough that some fishermen might just randomly drop the protagonist outside his gate, and he wouldn't even know because Binghe would be a literal infant??

Nephew (SJ) and Little Yue (Yue Qi -- only Shen Yuan calls him "Little", especially when he gets taller than SY by the time he's sixteen) are prodigies who get really good at cultivation, really fast, and between that and Shen Yuan's OP skills they completely warp Shen Yuan's ideas for what normal cultivation potential looks like. This would probably cause more problems if he wasn't teaching all the kids how to cultivate anyway, but means his students actually do kinda run the usual range of skills for a small sect.

SJ and YQ swiftly reach the point where they need more advanced equipment than just SY's teaching can provide, if they're going to keep building their skills. Gaining access to certain tools, aids, and materials (like spiritual swords) is a real hurdle though, and usually is for rogue cultivators (one of the major disadvantages of no sect affiliation.) Shen Yuan is hesitant to use stuff from the plot, since it's For Binghe, but he eventually caves and starts going after some things that he doesn't think the future protagonist will miss much. He also ends up buying stuff from HHP, since they're willing to sell things like spiritual tools and weapons if the price is right, whereas most other sects like Cang Qiong reserve them for members only.

They get an invitation to the Immortal Alliance Conference. Not the one where the Abyss opens up, obviously, the one where (originally) Shen Jiu reunited with Yue Qi and killed Wu Yanzi. Shen Yuan debates on going but the boys really want to, and things have calmed down enough that no one's trying to burn down the school whenever he leaves these days, so eventually he figures it'll be interesting to see some of the Cang Qiong characters and should be safe enough if he keeps his disciples close.

They don't run into young Yue Qingyuan or Shen Qingqiu on the trip, but Wu Yanzi does show up and get killed, and SY only hears about it and assumes they just missed all that action. (WYZ just got caught by some senior cultivators who recognized him and killed him to avenge some disciples he murdered.) Nephew and Little Yue do meet young Liu Qingge, Shang Qinghua, Mu Qingfang, and Su Xiyan though! Which gives Shen Yuan the opportunity to tell them all (mostly Su Xiyan) that if they're ever in trouble near his school, they can come to him for help. Hint hint.

This open invitation ends up being accepted broadly by a lot of traveling cultivators after the conference, who from then on treat Shen Yuan's school like a free motel whenever they're passing through. Plenty aren't even people SY met, but it seems his statement was taken as a general one to fellow righteous cultivators all around! Luckily, this has some advantages. Shen Yuan has no qualms running off anyone who tries to take unfair advantage of him or especially his kids or staff, and no shame in conscripting anyone who is decent enough to help teach his students, even if it's nothing to do with cultivating, and somehow word gets around and people start bringing school supplies, medicine, food, or other useful things along with them as gifts to help repay the hospitality. Young Liu Qingge comes by a lot on his way to and from various quests, or even seems to just turn up randomly sometimes (he comes to challenge YQ and SJ to fights), and SY's just like "I guess this is happening now" and teaches him to recognize the early signs of qi deviation and advises strongly against meditating in caves.

At one point a young Shang Qinghua turns up in one of the spare rooms, very obviously hiding an ice demon. Shen Yuan again is just like "I guess this is happening now" and shelters them until Mobei Jun has recovered, and sends a message to Cang Qiong that one of their An Ding caravans was attacked and their disciple is recovering under his roof but isn't well enough to travel yet. Much less stressful situation for Airplane (who is desperately trying to figure out what he did to manifest SJ's benevolent uncle from somewhere???)

Su Xiyan seems like the only person they met at the Immortal Alliance Conference who doesn't turn up at their door in a state of emergency at some point.

A few years later, there is a big scandal involving her and the demon emperor. Su Xiyan disappears, Huan Hua Palace accuses Tianlang Jun of plotting against the righteous sects, and Shen Yuan is even invited to the meeting where they try and rally everyone to go kill Binghe's dad. Naturally, he declines to participate in the witch hunt, but the major sects agree to it. By luck (or narrative fortune) Shen Yuan comes across Zhuzhi Lang on his trip back home, and mentions the ambush and his distaste for it (not knowing who ZZL is). ZZL warns Tianlang Jun and the confrontation goes very differently, especially since there's no Yue Qingyuan wielding Xuan Su.

It doesn't go well for the sects involved. Huan Hua Palace gets decimated. The Old Palace Master gets killed. Shen Yuan is like uhhhh that's... whoops? Didn't Luo Binghe need that in the future?? Fuck.

But the sect isn't wiped out completely, they just take a massive beating. Some of their younger disciples end up leaving and turning up on Shen Yuan's doorstep, for some reason. The manor house is becoming too small to account for all of these foundlings! They have to expand. Though the expansions would be a stretch to term a "palace" they end up occupying a much larger chunk of territory, and even investing in farmland and some storehouses to help support the sect. That's still not really a sect, of course. Even if a lot of the business that would have normally gone to Huan Hua Palace starts coming to them instead. Once HHP is back on its feet the stream will probably dry out. Probably?

Zhuzhi Lang starts hanging around. He's actually looking for Su Xiyan or their baby, dead or alive and per Tianlang Jun's instructions, but he uses Shen Yuan's school as base camp for his kind of hopeless efforts to find any traces of them, while also looking for ways to try and repay Shen Yuan. All the kids are just like "oh great, another weird man has fallen in love with Shizun -- someone go run interference" about it.

Some years later, an older woman and her young son turn up. Shen Yuan's off on a quest at the time, so SJ receives them. As is standard procedure he gives the woman a job and places the boy in classes, after giving him the aptitude tests. The kid is cute and precocious, so SJ uses him to distract YQ while he himself sneaks out to go join LQG on a monster hunt (and claim the valuable parts of the beast's remains for himself), and neither SY nor ZZL notice anything until SY's going over the paperwork for stuff he missed while he was gone. Since he procrastinated, it takes him like a week to find out that Luo Binghe is finally under his roof. He's going over the admission form right when SJ arrives with The New Adorable Child to try and distract SY enough that SY will let him go on a solo hunt -- as far as being distracted goes, it is way more effective than even SJ anticipated.

Then he has to figure out how to let ZZL know, so that ZZL can let Tianlang Jun know, so that Luo Binghe will have more family than just his mom and more resources than just a shabby little not-sect! But even once he figures it out and sets up the dramatic reveal, TLJ is just like "great! so can he just stay with you? he's probably fine there" which... irritates SY.

SJ fully conscripts Luo Binghe as a minion in his many cons. He never lost his street kid conman tactics, although he now uses them less as a ruthless survival tool or weapon and more to just get things to go his own way. LBH has the face and disposition of a little angel, which SJ no longer can pull off as a full grown adult, so he fills a gap. LBH also knows full well what's going, especially since a lot of SJ's tactics involve throwing LBH at SY like a smoke bomb.

Luo Binghe inevitably still develops a big fat crush on SY, so this is fine by him. Especially when he gets older, he starts bringing SY tea and making him breakfast and running his errands until even SJ is like "wait a minute, this little brat's stealing my job!" and by then it's too late. Luo Binghe is SY's personal assistant, the disciple at conman puppydog eyes has surpassed the master! While SJ was busy being like "I'm going to trick this idiot into doing my chores" LBH was going "I'm going to trick this idiot into giving me his job".

SY takes too long to officially name his school so everyone calls it the Shen Sect, much to his embarrassment.

[vampiricgf]

☆ FAVORITE GIRL

ᝰ you think he's just another frat boy with meaningless flirty words for the person he sits next to in a boring class (he's down horrendous)

frat boy satoru x f!reader, college au, somewhat established relationship you guys are classmates, sfw no smut, alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking, just lots of him being an idiot with a massive huge earth shattering crush <3

"And how's my favorite girl?"

"Worse, thought you'd skip this class again and we'd have some peace." You roll your eyes as you slide the straps of your backpack over the back of your chair.

Satoru Gojo, nuance Sig Ep and unfortunately glued to your side since the first day of statistics for reasons unknown to you. You'd made an effort to avoid members of greek life on campus, not wanting to get involved in party culture or whatever new dramatics were unfolding with its subgroups. That only seemed to encourage him though, casually throwing his arm around you through the duration of lectures and begging in that whining tone of his for you to come by the house.

You never did, you also pointedly ignored most of his text messages and actively regretted ever having to give him your phone number after the one assignment you'd been paired up for. Outside the occasional drunk text where he'd plead for you to show up, which did make you feel both bad for ignoring him and a little high off the attention. Not that you'd ever admit to clicking your phone lock and grinning to yourself in bed on those nights.

"C'mon, I'm the highlight of your day!" He shoots you that signature megawatt smile and you stick out your tongue at him, scooting your chair in the opposite direction and creating a wide gap as you sit down.

You see him frown and for a half second it looks genuine, making a pang of guilt reverberate through you so you scoot back to where you were and he resumes pestering you with some latest escapade in the Eps house as you both wait for the stream of students to peter off and the lecture to begin.

"Hey so, why you been ignoring my texts?" He pulls a pout and god you wish it wasn't actually cute.

"You send me weird combinations of emojis Gojo, what can I say to that?"

"It's Satoru," he quips almost immediately, barely allowing you to finish.

"Alright, Satoru, it's because you send me weirdo shit. Say hi every once in a while and maybe I'll say it back." You shrug, opening your laptop and preparing yourself to block out his incessant whispering for the next hour while you take down notes.

~

"You actually came!"

The sheer volume in the cramped, would-be living room of the house made you wince in tandem with his shout as Satoru threw an arm around you.

"I'm just humoring you so you stop bugging me!" You shout back, accepting a cup of god knows what from his hands and already formulating a plan of when it would be polite to bow out for the night without a barrage of where'd you go texts.

He doesn't answer you, too busy immediately yelling at some other guy over the volume of the music but you don't miss the way his hand slides down your back to settle at the lower curve, just above your ass. It makes you smile a little, despite your own misgivings about the scene you're in.

But quickly it becomes too much, being jostled by a permanently sweaty and horny crowd in such a cramped space, and you find yourself drifting outside to a patio sparsely populated with only a handful of smokers. The alcohol buzzing inside your brain makes you crave one, a thick, acrid stream of smoke spreading like thick flower petals blossoming inside your lungs.

One girl catches your eye and slowly you meander over to where she's perched, away from the rest on a railing that's seen one too many coats of poor paint jobs.

"Could I bum one off you?"

"You got a dollar?"

Lamely you pat your hips, absentmindedly searching for one until she lets out a soft laugh and extends the pack in her hand out to you. Marlboro lights, the gold top of it shimmers faintly in the dim light as you slide one out and accept the lighter she passes you.

"I tell myself lights mean I'm working on quitting. What a load of shit." She huffs out a laugh to herself as you flick the lighter and it gives a few sparky coughs before the flame catches, burning the tip of the cigarette into a solid ember cherry.

"I'm Ieiri," she says cordially as you hand back the deep purple lighter.

You give her your name before taking a deep drag of the cigarette, enjoying the feeling of it settling in your chest.

"They should invent a kind of cigarette that doesn't kill you." You say absentmindedly and she cracks a smile.

"Too bad the "healthy " cigarettes of ye old days had asbestos in them."

That makes you laugh, enjoying the way it flows into the air with the breeze that plays against your skin, like a lover running fingers over it and giving you gooseflesh.

"Wait, you're the girl Satorus got statistics with right? Tuesdays and Thursdays?" She asks between puffs, flicking ash off into the dark.

"Yeah, the very same. I figured I should finally take him up on the offer to come over, I've blown him off so many times." Saying out loud makes you feel a little like an ass, he may get on your nerves but he's never been anything but sweet to you.

"You know he's like, obsessed with you, right?" She says with another laugh and it makes you raise a brow.

"Oh yeah?"

She shakes her head, another drag before continuing. "Oh yeah. Gets too drunk every weekend and cries in the bathroom because you didn't show, has a crisis every day because he doesn't know what to say to you in texts. I've never seen him excited about a math course before this semester either, usually it's any excuse to cut class until a prof bitches at him."

With every word a strange sense of giddiness grows in tandem with the alcohol drenching your brain, and you can't help but think about those devastating blue eyes. The opposite of rose colored glasses but it fits, a shade of comfortable blue that tints the world because of him and suddenly you're gripped by the urgent need to go back inside and find him.

"Hey, thanks for the cigarette but I'm gonna go find him. See you inside?" You crush the butt out with the toe of your shoe, grinding it down and giving Ieiri a wave goodbye as the wall of thumping bass and neon light swallows you back up.

It strikes you as incredible how a house can turn into a labyrinth when filled to the brim with bodies and only offering the occasional flash of strobe or neon lights to guide you in the dark. After when feels like hours and checking nearly every room you come across for Satoru, without luck, you find Ierie once again leaning against a closed door with a particularly bored expression.

"Satoru she wasn't saying she was leaving she said she was coming to find you, dummy. Open the door."

As you sidled up beside her she shot you a conspiratorial glance before pulling you closer so you could hear her over the din.

"Can you tell him you're right here? He's such a whiny drunk." She rolls her eyes but you can tell it's playful, although you get the feeling this has happened more than once.

Hesitantly you put your palm against the door, feeling the distant bass thrumming through the wood. "Hey Satoru? I didn't leave, I'm right out here with Ierie!"

There's silence on the other side, making you frown in concern until the door is suddenly wrenched open and you nearly fall right against him. Despite clearly being drunk his hands come to grasp your upper arms gently to steady you before yanking you inside the hazy dark of what you assume was his bedroom.

"You're welcome!" You hear Shoko yell through the door as he sits down in a huff, still holding onto you, against a well worn futon.

You can't help but giggle at the way he almost curls around you, as if determined to attach to your side like some sort of sucker fish. With a bit of wiggling you manage to pull back, sweeping a few stray strands of hair from those baby blues as you do.

It's in that moment, when your fingertips brush his skin, that everything seems to pause. The noise outside seemingly vanishes, and it's like only the two of you exist in a comfortable bubble of silence. You never really noticed how his eyes looked almost crystalline before, too pretty to exist.

"Who gave you eyes like that?" You murmur, more to yourself but nevertheless he beams down at you.

"So you do like me, huh?"

The way he says it, so boyish, so... happy. You can't help but smile back, a shy thing that barely tugs at the corners of your lips.

"Duh, of course I do."

That makes him frown a bit, brows knitting in thought and somehow it made him look even cuter. No fair.

"Then how come you never showed up before? And you don't text me back?" A little pout forms on his lips as he finishes and you're struck with the overwhelming urge to kiss him.

With a superhuman effort you keep yourself focused on answering him. "You're, well... All this," you gesture broadly with your hands as you pull away slightly. "And I'm just a girl you have stats with. I thought maybe you were just yanking me around, being flirty in class but that's it, you know? I didn't wanna look stupid getting my hopes up."

"A girl I have stats with? You're joking, right? You're everything." He says incredulously, eyes wide as if more shocked than insulted that you could've looked at the situation that way.

Heat rushes beneath your skin at that, you're everything, and you know it's not the alcohol making you lightheaded. In your silence he continues.

"Y'know I'm not just messing around with you, I think about you all the time. Sometimes you're all I think about all day-"

With a surge of confidence you grab him by the front of his shirt, pulling him down and cutting him off with your lips pressed against his. It grips you like a fever, a crushing need to taste him. It's all sloppy teeth and tongues and spit but it feels perfectly serendipitous at the same time, an otherworldly calm that takes hold of your mind as your lips move against one another.

As you open your eyes into his you can't help the grin that now stretches wide across your mouth, giggling as you press kiss after kiss against his lips, his cheeks, his forehead and soon enough he's dissolved into a puddle of giggles and faux pouts in your arms.

"Will you tell me I'm your favorite girl again?"

"I'll tell you that forever."

[midnightwriter21]

demon slayer hcs: the hashira men as boyfriends

characters: tengen, sanemi, giyuu, rengoku, muichiro, obanai

AN: i don’t write for gyomei srry

TENGEN

- this isn’t just a little fling

-mans doesn’t wanna be ur bf

-he wants to be your HUSBAND

- and he’s gonna make that happen ASAP

- and when y’all get married you’re not just getting a husband

- ur getting 3 wives too

- it’s a package deal

- overprotective!!

- the way he made his wives promise to prioritize their lives over the mission

- my heart was bursting

- carries u around

- when tengen is around ur feet hardly ever touch the floor

- doesn’t matter how big or tall u are

- he’s bigger and taller

-he's big all over if ykyk

-nicknames include: sweetheart, princess, baby

- and don’t think he’s saying those to be cute

- he’s absolutely mocking you

-which brings me to…

- this man teases the HELL out of you

- but with love

- he loves you just as much as he loves his wives

- in his mind ur alrdy married

- and he is NOT letting you go

- or letting any harm come to you as long as he can help it

- 4 lifer fr

- id marry him

SANEMI

-i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again

-he’d tear it UP

-and i’d let him

- loves you so much

- doesn’t show it in public

- but in private?

- clingy as fUck

- he’s like ur shadow fr

- will follow u around all day

- hands on ur waist

- arm around ur shoulder

- holding ur hand

- he will not let go of u when ur alone

- in public he’s a lot less touchy

- but he will still stand near you

- jealous af

- every slayer knows by now to stay tf away from you or face the wrath of the wind pillar

- you belong to him

- makes sure they know it

- makes sure you know it

-hickey MASTER

-no i will not elaborate

- everybody knows sanemi is a little rough around the edges

- so there are days when it’s hard for him to open up to you

- but he does try

- he’s got a reputation to keep up!

-gotta act tough

-no weaknesses!!

- except for u

-he’s so soft for u he can’t help it

- nicknames: dumbass, idiot, & feather (my personal favorite)

-like i said he is almost always physically connected to u in some way when ur alone

-ignore him? he's throwing u over his shoulder

-he's strong he can manhandle u all over the place

-sheeeeeshhhhh manhandle me however u want sir

-claims ur super light no matter ur size

-hence the nickname "feather"

-i love him

GIYUU

-ik damn well this man had EVERONE in a chokehold from the first second he showed up

-speaking of chokeholds... ;)

-put me in one pls sir

-anyways

-awkward as fuck

-but he tries for u

-terrible with physical affection

-but we all know he's SOOO touch starved

-you'll have to initiate any type of physical touch

-and make sure he's not uncomfortable

-but really there's nothing he wants more than to touch you

-takes a very long time to say "i love you"

-but can u blame him??

-every good thing the poor man has ever had has been ripped away from him :(

-because of this he's veryyyy protective

-cause he'll be damned if the last person he has that accepts him and loves him for all he is

-is hurt or killed

-100% will die for u without a second thought

-not really a nickname type of guy

-remember he's awkward as hell

-most you'll get is a "-chan" attached to ur name

-and even that is only when y'all are alone

-but still

-even if he doesn't always show it

-you are always on his mind

-he's on a mission and walking through a market?

-he's buying you a hairpin or som

-walking through a forest and sees some flowers?

-"i wonder if she'll like these"

-AND HE'S PICKING U A BOUQUET

-ugh soft for bf giyuu

RENGOKU

-sunshine boy!!!

- epitome of golden retriever boyfriend

-all smiles all the time

-follows u around like lost puppy

-shows off for u

-yk when ur around kids and they're like "watch this" and then they jump and spin a circle lmao

-thats him

-"did you see what i just did?!"

-if u didnt...

-he's doing it again

-wants to impress you so bad

-also you will never have to lift a finger in his presence

-service bf!!

-you need the dishes washed and the floor swept?

-he's on it

-you need help styling ur hair?

-welcome to rengoku's hair salon

-will attempt to dress you in the morning

-and by dress you, i mean he's tugging ur shirt over ur head

-zipping up ur pants

-and tying ur shoes

-brags about you to anyone and everyone

-the other hashira can't have a single conversation with him without him bringing you up somehow

-compliments compliments compliments!!!

-he loves you and isn't afraid to show it

-nicknames from him: my love, my beautiful girl, sweetheart

-constantly confessing his love

-also lowkey speaks poetry for u

-some shit like

-"my light in the darkness, the one who gives me strength, you set my heart ablaze just by allowing me the privilege of seeing your smile"

-ugh he's the sweetest baby

MUICHIRO

-my airheaded angel baby

-i love him sm stop

-baby boy has a terrible memory

-that we alrdy knew

-but!

-he tries so hard for you

-keeps a little journal with notes and information about you

-so if he forgets he can remind himself over and over

-when he's on missions away from you he reads it so he can think about you to pass the time

-can not and will not remember anniversaries

-unless they're written in that journal

-will pick u flowers

-hope ur not allergic cause he's not gonna remember that

-but it's the thought that counts

-the fact that he's thinking about you at all counts

-you wanna go on a date?

-your dates consist of watching the clouds and taking naps together

-maybe a picnic if ur lucky

-no nicknames from him

-he calls you by your name

-its all he can remember

-he's the cutest

OBANAI

-like sanemi, he's a lot less affectionate in public

-however, he's not afraid to express his thoughts about you

-at least not to the other hashira

-might not be glued to your side

-but he's got eyes on u at all times

-and someone is talking about you?

-the second he hears ur name leave somebodies mouth

-he's tuned in

-and they better not say anything negative either

-mans turns murderous

-they will wake up to a snake in their bed

-will prob threaten them within an inch of their life

-don't have to worry abt other people while he's around

-cause he's got everything

-and i mean EVERYTHING taken care of

-protective but not pushy

-i feel like obanai trusts you and your ability to handle yourself

-but thats not gonna stop him from watching over you

-you're not drinking enough water?

-here comes obanai with a cup and u better drink it all

-haven't had lunch yet?

-he's sharing his with you. and will force feed u if need be.

-on a mission with him?

-he's not gonna push u behind him or anything

-but nothing is gonna get the chance to bring any harm to you either

-he's got ur back

-he's pretty vanilla with the nicknames

-nothing too crazy

-especially in public

-mostly uses ur first name

-might add a "-chan" in there every once in a while

-when ur alone he'll call you "sweetie"

-acts like a hard ass

-but he's soft for u