Hi, lately I came across your blog and I really adore your writting style :3
I was very excited when I saw you have open requests (if I am not wrong, otherwise ignore me hah), so I have request for Bakugou × reader, when they are in established relationship, but lately it got rocky, because he was barely home, trying to climb ranks and just neglecting their relationship, so they barely even talk. Then reader gets kidnapped, due to being Bakugou's SO, but she feels so irrelevant at this point that she starts saying to the kidnapper that they are wasting their time, because Bakugou is not coming for her, whick Katsuki overhears, you know just good old angst with fluff at the end maybe
If this request is too complicated or specific please don't feel pressured to do this, anyway have a lovely day/night
I am very much receptive to asks, and thank you so much for providing one!! super flattered actually and spent my entire afternoon crafting up this bad boy bc I had an instant idea for it
Hopefully I touched all the right notes on this one, enjoy anon! Don't be a stranger~
Do It Scared
Words: 4.9K
Warnings: Pro Hero!Bakugou x reader TW: kidnapping, intimidation, light descriptions of violence, protective Bakugou is protective, language, angst with a happy ending (promise!!) and potential spoiler: Pro Hero!Deku
for my My Hero Academia Masterlist, check it out here!
Read on Ao3
Dynamight is on top of the world– or at least working his ass off to get there.
With Deku back on the leaderboard, he’s got twice the motivation and has never been in love with being a hero more.
“That’s what -heh- nine for you this week, Dynamight?” the newly suited Pro beams at Bakugou- not unlike the five year old version of him did back a lifetime ago.
Only instead of bashing the twerp upside the head with a gloating tease, Bakugou simple smirks and gives Midoriya a stiff push on the shoulder,
“Ten, but who’s counting, nerd?”
The winded, black-and-blue villain currently under custody finds the heroes’ track records funny. Midoriya doesn’t necessarily take these villain types’ remarks to heart, but hates the attitude of this one today.
“Yer sidekick keepin’ count?! You wanna badge or a chest to pin it on, smartie pants? –AAGH!”
“HEY- THE ONLY GUY CALLIN’ THIS DEKU A NERD IS ME, DUMBASS!! YOU’RE THE SHITHEAD GOING TO JAIL FOR THAT STUNT– AND HE’S HEADING INTO THE TOP TEN!!”
“HO-OKAY, DYNAMIGHT, I think he’s had enough!!”
Deku corrals the punk’s restraints a bit, but leaves the remaining process of reading rights and detainment for the police who just rolled up. Deku will proudly share that much prefers this ‘thick as thieves’ treatment to the ‘fight me or die’ dynamic they shared in school, and couldn’t be happier to be Pro Heroes once again.
And if Bakugou were completely honest, so was he. He’s in his element and closer to reaching his goal by the day.
Walking out of earshot from the police unit, the two are heading over to Ingenium and Creati who are deeply engrossed with the intelligence officers who just arrived on the scene.
“Ten it is, then– you really need to start leaving some to me though; I can handle it, you know,” Midoriya slips his facemask down, exposing a pleading grin Bakugou still kinda wants to punch some days. “Might give you a little time to actually take a rest day now and then!”
“Tch, if you were fast enough, you’d do it, ‘Zuku.” Bakugou straightens out his gauntlet, but misses his best friend’s tilt of a frown. “N’ who said I need a rest day, anyway? I’ve never been better!”
“I can think of one person..” Midoriya hinted strongly at something that truly escaped Bakugou’s focus. Every now and then, he couldn’t quite mindread the nerd like normal, if he was deep in work mode.
“Heh?”
Midoriya raised a friendly, tired brow, “How’s your girl been lately, hm?”
Bakugou tenses a touch, but quips back, “Whaddya mean. She’s fine, been working a lot too.”
“Not as much as you. What’s she up to? You haven’t said much about her.”
Which was an oddity, indeed. Your successes, your insights, and even your random memes were common topics of conversation from Bakugou’s lips. But Midoriya did raise a finer point between the lines– you’d been put on something of a backburner, and he knew better that something must be off for the blond porcupine to rarely speak of you. Bakugou sensed it himself, but the more repeated check-in texts he received, the cycle of his non-answers worsened. This must be what the nerd is getting at.
“She’s fine-” Bakugou pressed, assuring himself and no one else, “Look, we’ve got our flow, and it works. I keep her in the loop when I’m busy and she gets it.”
Midoriya heaves a disbelieving breath, and just fixes Bakugou a look.
“What’s that shitty look for, huh? Whaddyou know?!”
“I know when she texted me yesterday that she doesn’t sound thrilled about your overtime…” the freckled sweetheart touched a personal chord within Bakugou. “Or that she hasn’t even heard from you to talk about it? I mean, I-I know it’s not my business, but Ka-”
“Deku, Dynamight!” Iida waved the two over from their aside, and back into work mode- to Bakugou’s drop in spirit, “We have a bit of a time-sensitive mission to take care of~”
Deku turned to the officer, raring to go and and straightening up his shoulders to address their more formal counterparts, “Of course, officer- how can we help?”
“Well sirs, we’ve got an ongoing heist over on the other side of the riverbank, and need a bit of coordination to respond.”
Yauyorozu had just finished off a protein pack of some sort and had demurely crumpled its trash in her hand while navigating an ipad passed to her. She’d welcomed Midoriya over when he took interest in whatever footage she’d been presented.
“Well shit, we supposed to be standin’ around like this when time’s wasting, or what?” Bakugou asked brusquely.
Ingenium -in his formal, helmeted fashion couldn’t hide his practiced patience well with the hothead in his response;
“The need for firepower is necessary, Dynamight– but caution is as well,” Iida reminded dryly. “We are in a heavily populated area, and must exercise control.”
Bakugou merely purred a low growl and turned diplomatic.
“Fine. We got live wires? Hostages?”
“To our knowledge, only a select few- a dozen at most,” the officer answered, “We can see most of the victims through the bank’s glass lobby. It’s a small, petty theft group- or so we thought, but there are some decent quirk users among them. Seems they are after more than funds, but records as well.”
Bakugou refrained from rolling his eyes, but only barely. Surely there were bigger and better missions to be pursuing than this– something a bit flashier, more suited for his skills with higher civilian rescue numbers to add to his count.
“One guest was able to contact via the emergency text line, and reported that someone did pull an emergency trigger and was taken further back into the vaults as a prisoner.”
Iida empathized, “Hardly fair- I’m sure none of these customers were armed, and they were simply acting as any hero would trying to notify the authorities.”
The officer firmed up a smile in agreement and proceeded to share some more info about how far back into the bank the team would need to infiltrate based on proximity to servers.
“Sure you don’t just wanna call ‘Tape’, bust in there, strap ‘em up, and call it a day? Y’don’t really need a whole evac team, do you.”
A simple rescue in-and-out should be easy enough, or so he assumed- until Yaoyorozu took a bit of a sharp intake of breath in her nose, alerting Deku to fixate on the screen again,
“Bak- erm. Dynamight,” Yaoyorozu interjected gently, “-you need to see this-”
Bored and still half paying attention to the officer, Bakugou only barely looked Momo’s way, and didn’t really feel like a crowd around a tiny screen -in full sun- was warranted.
“What? It’s frickin’ bright out-”
“Kacchan,” Midoriya shot back icily, “get over here.”
Something alarming had struck him in the face, and he was purposefully putting on a front to those not personally connected to the heroes. Sidestepping ‘Legs’, Bakugou was passed the ipad and played back the security footage of the interior of the bank.
Time stamped at just fifteen minutes ago, a civilian in question had tried dipping around the counter to where some clerks had been bullied up to the opposite wall- but one of the employees jerked her head towards one of the registers- a lightning quick gesture. This cued the civvie -a woman, if the hiked up skirt was a correct indication- in the foreground to feel around the bottom lip of the keyboard for something- likely an alarm switch. Once done so, she’d merely knelt back down, hoping to stay low and sneak back to avoid the thug to lash out at the person who’d tipped her off.
But then -comically enough- the thug sneezed and unfortunately whipped to the side to let it fly. Looking up, there she was in his sightline. With something akin to a spider’s web knocking her flat onto her back, she’d been dragged up and back with the others- trying to ground herself with a squatted stance first, tried to force her elbows back, then bashing her head back in an attempt to hit her captor– until she was ultimately slapped and taken back to the far hallway, hunched over.
Bakugou saw red. His heart stopped then set itself on fire, hotter than Hades. He’d known that self defense response from having taught it, himself.
You pulled the alarm.
For the first time in his career- he knows the target he’s saving. He’s in love with her, after all.
Damn your neck hurts. If your elbows hadn't been glued up to your sides, you woulda used those instead; but now having jerked your head back, you’d given yourself a healthy dose of whiplash.
And got a punch to the gut. And a slap to the face. Joy.
There’s fight, flight, freeze, and fawn. You’d seemingly gone for the fight route, with your body moving before your self-preservation could catch up, but it seems your fawning tactic of remaining calm and quiet wasn’t working out for you now. At least you took the attention off those poor girls in the lobby who were in near hysterics.
Only now it seemed you’d taken on the role yourself, back here. You try to breathe deep, drop your shoulders, drop your jaw. You’d think this would double to avoid showing any fear that your captors can use against you, but it’s honestly just to help keep you grounded and not panic and curb the intense need to vomit or cry.
Please. As if you’d even call yourself heroic for pulling the theft alarm– but you suppose it’s instincts. Carry-over bravery: osmosis you assume, from hanging around these heroes. Your hero. Katsuki.
You’re stunned– you’re shocked– and you’re scared.
Katsuki. You want Katsuki. More than the police, more than your mom.
You want your hero to come for you, over any other in this entire country. The name pounds behind your eyes when you shut them against a wave of pain, the person you want more than anything else in the world.
–And at the same time, that man’s name hurts at the cry for it: given he hasn’t spared you more than a one or two word response in days. Because he’s overworked by his own volition. By his own drive. And you should be angry. You have been, for this is the longest you haven’t seen each other outside of a trip; considering you’ve all but committed your lives together and he’s typically at your place every other night, the drop in communication is a cold bath.
And you’re scared now- it’s a blurry feeling. Time is wonky when you’re stuck in a room with no windows, no visible clock and just waiting. All those tips they tell you about how to react in an emergency to keep calm? The ones you’ve heard over and over again in security briefings and teacher preparedness days before the school year starts? Man, is it easy for those to go out the window when you’re in actual trouble.
You just want Katsuki. And that’s a silly thought, considering how wide the city is. He could be clear across the district right now.
But just saying the name -thinking of any other pleasant time when he had his arms around you play-fighting that could make these bindings feel more bearable- that’s what you want to cling to.
The villains here are pretty pathetic as interrogators go, but that spares you no calm as they taunt you as if you were a captured magistrate or politician. They’re split into two parties; their head honcho trying to tap into the databanks of the servers two doors down while your immediate captors with the creepy quirks are choosing to go through your recovered phone seeking out blackmail like the assholes they are. Your primary apps for insurance and paying your bills are thumbprint protected, so really what could they get to that's confidential? Nothing, to your knowledge. But it seems your camera roll strikes their interest.
Oh yeah, they hit low. They see your lock screen first- a sweet photo of your harmless, dopey dog who they snark that you won’t be home to feed on time. Then even more, as your home screen displays a picture-perfect selfie of you and your darling man. You picked it because it’s rare proof of him smiling at some wisecrack you made before snapping the shutter.
Your handsome and infuriatingly busy man.
“Aww, well just look at little miss hero’s cute lil boyfriend! Bet he’ll be awful proud of you playing the savior~”
“Tehehe, too little too late though, yeah? Gotta be quicker than that for us.”
“Geez, how sappy can you get. This guy’s all over her…and can’t blame him, honestly. Makes me feel a little bad for roughing such a pretty thing up.~”
Gross. Just gross. You act like you don’t listen, your simpering pain turns to nausea the more they talk. Until a renewed sense of fear hits:
“Wait- go back. Oh. Ohhh shit, no.”
“Whuh.”
“Fuck, man, that’s DYNAMIGHT!!” the jerk with the copious amounts of tattoos and chains draping off his arms like whips gets nervous real fast, “We have Dynamight’s girlfriend!!”
Your other guard seems to swallow for a split second, but immediately tips to a feigned dominance,
“Well, ain’t that just icing on the cake~”
“THE HELL DO YOU MEAN? He’s gonna come after her!! You know how scary that guy is?! I’m telling the boss-”
“Don’t wimp out already,” he fires back. “Why do that and waste time- when knowing this, we could get paid double? Heroes ransoms can cost him a pretty penny, and you know he’ll do it for her. Those heroes make bank.”
You flatten your brows angrily.
“Whaddya think, princess? Big man gonna come and save you, huh?
You really want Katsuki. But you truly have no idea if he’d know or care to come at this point. The spiral downwards in the mind is dizzying along with your headache, and just makes your heart sick for him.
When you see him next, you’re not sure if you’d hug him or throttle him. Though now, you just wanna see him.
“Unless.. He doesn’t!” his mood shifts- patronizing, “Too busy makin’ a paycheck and name for himself and all his hero buddies than to settle down and think about the pretty thing at home? Well, I would fix that real quick–”
A muffled boom sounds on your right. Rooms away.
Another, louder. Two beats after, the guards look at each other.
You hear a yell, a harsh one, then another blast that sounds cracklier than the rest. Someone’s close. But you’re honestly not sure if it’s friend or foe.
You’re excited, but get nervous again when the lackeys move into action. Chains loops a rough swing of his appendages around you and starts dragging you back into the adjoining office, while the muscle goes back to type at one of their private laptops that’s downloading something.
You give off a flare of panic in your voice- a sound you hate but can’t control.
“It’s-s not him–” you force your pitch lower, but it shakes despite your best effort. “Cmon, there’s too many heroes, s’not gonna be him– n’there gonna come an’- bust yall anyway!! Whaddya want me for?!”
As you’re dragged, you catch a glimpse of shine from above you. In the vent, you see mustard yellow and teal saturated with shadow- all metal. Then, his voice, through a comm on his wrist that flashes in the reflected light:
“Got her. Light it up, on your left.”
Both lackeys drop what they’re doing and look up to see the vent kicked into the floor– and the wall totally blown in from your right.
Dynamight -the Symbol of Victory- and Deku -the Symbol of Peace- are dropping in at breakneck speed, though the former is out for blood.
“ALRIGHT, WHICH ONE OF YOU FUCKERS AM I KILLING FIRST??”
Deku’s landing creates a decent wind with his jump, revealing Bakugou behind where the door usually is, and clocking your position almost immediately.
It’s a powerful thing, to see him in action- you’ve certainly never seen it in person, and you’ve never heard him this mad. To his credit, he never raises his voice enough for you to fear it.
He spots you and the guy who rushes him, but just snarls, evades his whip of weighted chains entirely, grabs him by the calf, and chucks him into the opposing wall with a spinning throw. Then, he sets straight to you.
“DEKU!!” he shouts to Midoriya, “Trash, at your ten!!”
“On it!” Your angel from the ceiling ducts is currently laying into the other guy, but keeps the reeling villain in his sights before he can get up and strike again. You imagine the sucker has more than a few broken bones (or truly is dead, as promised)… he doesn’t move from his figure on the floor.
While you’re still coughing up a storm from the drywall throwing dust everywhere, Bakugou comes to your side and immediately picks your bound body up in a rush from the chair you were perched on.
“C’mere you-”
He sounds rushed and spent, huffs it out of the room and into a separate office down the hall.
You spot Ingenium and Creati moving on to the other end of the hall where you know the final villain remains, but you can already hear the squeals of said wimp once Iida bursts in. This will be quick work for the rest of them, so you weren’t worried Dynamight would be needed anymore.
Inside an executive’s office, Bakugou kicks the door behind him shut with his heel and sets you on the dearest flat surface- a decently sized desk.
“Hey you- you still with me?”
You don’t realize you’re breathing so fast until he’s looking you square in the face with split concern. It’s night and day from when he burst in after one of his more gusty explosions, his voice all cracked and high in pitch.
“Cmon, baby look at me- here, let’s get this crap off of you..”
Your gasps for air turn wet and you can’t keep yourself from crying anymore. It would be notably sweet that he still tries his hardest not to curse wildly around you, but right now you don’t care what font his expletives are in. Every bit of stress leaving your body all at once is a rush for your senses and your emotions.
“Kats~”
After his pocketed knife’s quick, careful work separating your arms from your waistline covered in a still-sticky webbing, he sheaths the blade again and collects you up when you launch yourself at him.
Bakugou holds you hard and fast and you can’t even be bothered to worry about how his shoulder pauldrons are nearly choking you. He’s got you back in his arms, and he’s just saved your life.
“I’m here,” he grunts to you, relieved beyond measure, “I’m here, sweet’eart. You’re safe.”
You’re so thankful. You’re so happy-
“N’d I am so sorry.
-You’re so confused.
In a flippy tone that betrays what heightened nerves you’d just gone through, you ask,
“Huh?”
Bakugou’s fingers thread into your hair when you try and pull back-
“Don’t. S’the first.” His iron-sure voice wavers, “I- I haven't hugged you all week.”
Then, you’re both crying into each other, and it’s a healing thing.
Dragging careful nails across the back of his hero suit, you try to offer a tiny bit of comfort to this mass of man cradling you on this desk. You know you’re still in dire need to talk about his recent absence, but what a reunion this was. Feeling him after a seven or eight day stretch of near radio silence changes the degree of flame you hold against him. Honestly now, you’re in the mind to think he deserves a pass entirely.
Bakugou finally lifts enough to press a kiss to your head, but makes no move to let go of you. “I’ve missed you, baby.”
Has he? He’s barely texted you past the ‘I’m heading out’ and ‘I’ve gotta sleep’ with no room to offer or reciprocate any form of love between you; so much so, it threatened to make you doubt.
“Have you? I haven’t heard.”
“No, you haven’t. And that’s all on me.”
You turn your head very slowly- your entire neck is still tender, but you'd rather listen to him with an ear to his chest, where you belong.
“I’ve missed you too,” you settle on the truth. You might have more to say when you’re not so exhausted, but the truth is you’ll still love him no matter what, and you do always miss him.
You miss every moment, big and small. His wins and losses. Nights where he’s high off a victory or the ones where he’s bone-tired and in his head about how weak he must seem. Nights where he takes out his hearing aids and just wants to fall into your silence to sleep safely, and the mornings where he’s up and ready to go take on the day after he has your kiss and hug to charge him up. Whether he has your chapstick smeared up on his cheek, or the promise of your arms to hold him in whatever state he greets you when he comes home, you just miss him. You notice when he’s not there. The house seeks him out, with lights on for him to find his way inside, and low music to soothe what anger might have followed him home.
You take a few moments to just soak each other in. You hope and pray he’ll come home with you after this.
And thank the Maker, your prayers might just be answered.
“This was a wake-up call, sweetheart.” Bakugou sounds a bit bolder, but still talks softly to you and the dust mites around you, “I’m takin’ a leave. A long one.”
The way he promises time off is something he’s toyed with before, but never followed through on.
“You can’t do that, Kats,” there’s no coldness to the words, but you mean it.
“Yes I can. It’s my race; I can step away.”
You sigh against his pec, “I’m.. I’m not asking you to. I can’t, that wouldn’t be fair.”
To you, sure. But not for his dream. Not the dream he’s worked and fought and lived for since before you met, and long before he fell in love with you. You’d supported him in this chase to save everyone and be the best at what he does from day 1, and you’ve never wavered on that– you still wouldn’t, even if someone asked you now feeling as dejected as you do by his absences–
“Tch. Y’know what's not fair?”
Bakugou finally loosens his grip on you to lift your chin up to him with thick, strong fingers,
“Leavin’ you for days on end; waiting up, worried sick. Leaving, and just assuming you’ll still be there when I get back. And now you’re getting fuckin’ snatched the minute I turn my back on what we have. That isn’t right.”
The correlation is irrational- this incident today was a freak accident. You couldn’t have planned it- or certainly hope that your identity as his significant other is not going to be weaponized. Shuffle in the hallway beyond tells you that the possibility of that information leaking is sufficiently locked up along with them.
Surely Izuku would have grabbed your phone– and maybe set you up a new lock screen with a mean mug to poke some fun at ‘Kacchan’.
You slump against him, at the sound that he’s being too hard on himself, and that’s not what you want for him either.
“I just miss you, Katsuki. And I want to see you succeed.” you study the bold ‘X’ across his chest with fondness and heartache mixed, “I want both those things. I just can’t help but wonder if you have to go at it so fast? And so hard, where I never see you? Like you’re racing against the clock to be #1? I just want you there in one piece; I don’t care how long it takes.”
You have no doubt he’s going to land the spot before he’s thirty. You just hope for a balanced ascension to the height of his power and ability. And selfishly… you hope you’re in the picture of his life when he does.
Bakugou hears and you do believe he listens, as he smooths a calming hand up and down your arm all the while.
“And today..” you clam up a bit with an uncontrollable shake, “Today was- scary. But you couldn’t help that. Any more that you can help it from happening t’ anyone. I know that,”
And you look up at him despite the burn it causes you. And -a funny contrast to your still teary eyes- you smile.
“-but you did save me. And that was- honestly one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen in my life.”
The comment strikes him as funny, too, since he gives a little chuckle.
“Me blastin’ in and causing you to choke on my smoke?”
You nodded briefly.
“Kinda hot, all things considered.”
Unbelievable, his headshake and eyeroll at how easily you can -and will- make jokes. Perhaps it is the shock still, deflecting with humor.
You do realize how fragile it is because when you laugh at the absurdity, you catch his eye again and you look just a little too long before you’re sniffling.
The reality is that you could lose him at any time: whether by his end or yours. He’s got the more dangerous job by far, but if today was any indication on your part, you shouldn’t just think yourself as a shoe-in for safety.
Bakugou cups your face in his hands to make himself perfectly clear.
“You’re the hero today, angel. Watched you in 16-bit as you snuck back there, taking that bastard into next week. You saved every- single- one of them.” he placed a kiss on each word as he praised you. “I am so damn proud of you.”
Your hands still skipped, limbs jumpy.
“I don’t feel like a hero.”
His lashes lured you in as he gazed at you through them, “Doesn’t mean you aren’t one. You did it scared. That’s pretty hot, too.”
You huffed your amusement as he thanked you in his own way. Best to let him carry on before he’s whisked away again.
Just as you thought he might release you in ushering you out of the office, Bakugou takes you by the hands so that you can stand, then keeps you in place by his immovable stance.
“Things are gonna change,” he vows, “because none of this shit matters if I don’t have you. Yeah I want you now, but I’m gonna want you after my fire’s burnt out. Which means, I gotta pay attention. I have to set ‘who matters’ just as high as ‘what matters’ and remember why.”
Touched by every word, your trembling lessens. You take in his warmth and his care and his explosive loyalty with confidence and nod in agreement.
Taking one last selfish hug, you sink into your hero again, standing more as equals than you usually feel being held by him. He’s lifted you up in more ways than one. Enough to let safety back into your heart, enough to tease,
“That can’t be your line. When did ‘Zuzu’ give you that one?”
“Hey,” Bakugou flicked you in the temple lightly, “I can be nice too, dammit.”
“Sure you can,” you kiss the dip of his neck in apology.
“You’re just always nice, you can’t appreciate the difference.” he pouts, taking your hand and leading you out of the office.
“...Sure I can.”
You have to give him a solid shot– he’s nothing if not insistent with what he wants.
Outside the room, there are a host of officers, photographers, medics and heroes aiding in the recovery efforts, so you relax your hand in his to let go,
–only he doesn’t let you.
Bakugou glances to you, “You’re in shock, extra. You need to get checked out.”
“I’m fine, Mr. Dynamight,” you chortle with a little head bobble like you would have normally done, only now the movement makes you wince.
“That’s what I thought. OI, Deku- where’s her sh-phone?”
The iron hero stands with the receptionists, looks to you both and smiles gratefully, before nodding off to his company and joins you-
“This, I believe, belongs to you, maam~” he perks up as he comes around to your other side. It’s not so much that you have to pretend to be strangers, but in this high-traffic place, it seems easier to fall into roles of ‘heroes’ and ‘thankful public’.
“How kind, Mr. Symbol of Peace~ I’d be missing this!”
Double checking your lock screen, he did -in fact- change your cover screen to a playful selfie: pointing at the crumbled remains of the wall they’d broken into, with the caption:
>>Whatever Kacchan wants, Kacchan gets <3<<
Muting your laugh, you simply tilt your phone Bakugou’s way and catch Midoriya’s quick wink back to you, before he sets off running with a screaming boyfriend sprinting after him.
At least Katsuki showed up back at your place at 6:30PM on the dot, fixed you both a salmon dinner, and started getting your baseline of support back on track. With his next two weeks off and barely keeping his hands off of you so far, you believed he was making good on remembering his why.
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Unnatural Love
Part 3
Synopsis : Name has being transmigrated into the world of I'm Not That Kind Of Talent without ever reading the novel. She's not being reincarnated as a human but as a devil as well.
Hi There! I want to let you know that this fanfiction story isn't solely my creation. I borrowed the concept from @quqiwo2. I haven't actually read the novel either, just some spoiler to the end.
I hope you'll excuse my spelling and grammar mistake, because English not my first language.
"Adele, starting today you are assigned to be a servant of Mr Demon. Get to work today!" said the Head Servant of this demon palace.
He was an older man who seemed to have a lot of experience in workforce personalization.
"You mean I work for Mr Demon? Isn't there Mr. Ed, the deputy troop commander, ready to help him?" My curiosity getting better than me.
Wasn't he already has a deputy who ready to help him, why should me too?
"Adele, you have been given a name by Mr Demon, repay him for your beautiful name." This butler seems to be saying that I don't deserve this beautiful name given to me.
Because lowly background...
And that makes me really annoyed with him.
But in the end I could only agree with the butler's words, having no choice but to swallow my resentment.
Then I was curious, why did I become his servant Mr Demon. It's true that I was given a name after the first time they met and Mr Demon greeted me when we met a few more times.
But I don't think there's anything strange about it.
Did my job change like this because of a request from Mr Demon or was this actually a ploy by the demon king.
If it was the latter, I would most likely be used as a pawn as a spy.
Because after all Mr Demon still a human. Unless he completely sides with the devil.
I'm not stupid enough to don't know that he still holds on to his human side too.
The proof is that he just kept to himself in his room, not too involved with the zero troops he led due to illness.
Whatever the demon king's cunning plans, I will not remain silent if I am used as his temporary pawn. I still have my brain to think logically to subjugate him.
But for the time being I will remain obediently a virtuous servant.
"Mr Demon, I'm Adele. I brought your breakfast." I knocked his room door, letting him know that I'm here.
"Come in!" Although be muted, his voices are still heard from outside.
Then I went in and put the food Mr Demon on the table available in his room. Not letting my eyes wander to him when he wears his shirt on top of his turtleneck.
And Mr Demon who was already wearing formal clothes, finally sat down in his chair to eat his food.
I watched him eat until he finished before I finally started to tell him,
"Mr Demon, starting today I am assigned to be your servant."
Mr Demon was surprised. He seemed to choke on his own saliva before he finally drank the water.
"You?! I thought you were just delivering food as usual."
Indeed, before today I was assigned several times to deliver food Mr Demon too. We were quite friendly in chatting about things unrelated to our status and differences.
Honestly, talking to Mr Demon made me feel again what it feels to be a human again in the midst of interactions with demons that are very annoying and discouraging for me.
Here's my relationship with the demons is not healthy for my own body and soul. I always have to be hit by anger, belittled, blows, sarcasm, death threats. I'm tired to always nonchalant about that fact.
I always have to be patient so that there is no reason for me to just die.
So talking to him really made me think that he is more friendly than the rumors that say he will kill you if you bother him even the slightest bit.
The real demon isn't any better than the rumored Demon.
To answer the question Mr Demon earlier...
"I thought so too, but I only received orders from my superiors. So I don't know the reason. "
Then he fell silent with his face wrinkled and his red eyes turned into those of a scary predator. That looks is really scary though.
But from my experience, Mr Demon will only stare intently. didn't actually try to attack me.
When I first saw those eyes I was scared to death, but now I'm used to it.
'As long as I've done nothing wrong, why should I be afraid?'
So I remained calm even though I was being stared at like that.
But the effects of being stared at for a long time like that are also dangerous, so let's shift the focus...
"After eating, do you want to visit Troop 0? Troop 0 has been waiting for your presence among them for a long time."
"Team 0..." As usual, Mr Demon always reluctant to discuss his own troops. If someone really used their brain, they will know it.
"Mr Ed has also been waiting for your arrival for a long time."
"Mr. Ed?! Why do you call him so polite. Is he not being nice to you?"
Is Mr Demon is the actual crazy? Even if he's not like the strong one in Devil's troop, he's still be one of the strongest devil in this devil palace.
"You keep joking, Mr Demon. Mr. Ed also really hates lowly devils like me. Besides, Mr. Ed is good with you because he is loyal and admires you. There's no way I could get the same treatment as Mr Demon."
"Are you... are you still experiencing hate treatment like this all the time?" His face looks not very good one. He looks very annoyed but still care for me... and that's makes me give a sorrowful smile.
"There won't be any significant changes, Mr Demon. But if I could hide behind a name Mr Demon maybe I could even scare them." I joked around to Mr Demon.
I need to change the sad topic, maybe he'll say no and i move on.
"Do it!" a spontaneous voice Mr Demon making me open my eyes to stare Mr Demon that had been speaking nonsense.
"I was just joking, Mr Demon. Please don't take my joke seriously." I tried to persuade him Mr Demon he just shook his head.
"You have to fight, Adele. Even if you consider yourself a worthless devil, you still have to fight for yourself." His face shows the fighting spirit that i should have, but i lacked that spirit.
'Maybe i don't really cut out with this world.'
"But, aren't you injured because of the effects of fighting a hero. If I involve you who are still sick in my problem..."
"I'll take care of it in time."
My mouth opened with reflexes, I found my savior in the midst of the complexity of this devil's world...
So I leaned a little closer and smiled broadly at Mr Demon and said "You said that yourself, I would like to thank you first, Mr Demon. For the inconvenience i'll brought"
I was busy thinking about the best way to use a name of Mr. Demon to get revenge on my bully until I didn't see his red face while looking at me.
To Be Continued
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I definitely do not have the time for a full essay's worth of commentary on the Casting of Frank Stone, but I definitely could give you that if I did. There is...a lot to take apart there. I am certainly...fascinated...by some of the writing & gameplay choices they made, to summarise my thoughts somewhat vaguely.
A few spoilery comments under the cut.
Like I said, I don't really have the time to offer extensive analysis (a full paper) of the game, but I do want to say a few things.
First and foremost: Do not purchase this game. In the words of Mr. Otzdarva himself: Go and watch someone play it instead. Your play through will be 95% the same as theirs. It is not worth your 50 dollars. If you still want it after you've viewed someone else's playthrough, that is your own right.
I honestly became annoyed with the writing much faster than Mr. Otzdarva did, and at first I thought it was because I was spoiled by BG3's infinitely better writing. But no, it's rather that he was being very patient. He finished with a rather negative opinion of the game, after thoroughly going through it to test just how much control you as the player really have.
I will be fair-- It is certainly a visually stunning game, as far as Supermassive titles go. Much better looking than The Devil in Me. The music is also incredible. And some of the voice acting was well done and added much needed life to otherwise bland characters.
But good grief is the writing utterly nonsensical!! Even if you respect the "a multiverse exists, so anything is possible" fact which is canon to Dead by Daylight itself, it still doesn't make any damned sense. I mean, is it ever explained why there is time travel involved? Or how it is even possible? Did they simply expect people to just assume that Augustine figured out time travel in a certain timeline? Does it have something to do with the Entity, since it can clearly traverse time? If so, why was Sam able to voluntarily time travel to Madi & elder Linda's timeline? Why and how the FUCK is Frank Stone first bound to the mill and then camera using what is clearly the same magic as the horologium, when we know the Entity has not yet been brought to that timeline??
And playing the "anything is possible" card would be fine to explain certain things, I will concede, but it really starts to feel meaningless when you realise just how many massive plot elements are never explained and that none of your choices really have any impact on the ending of the game. The story literally ends the same no matter what you do. And to be fair, I do not think it is a bad ending at all. Barring the corny "trial starting" sound that they jammed in at the last second, I thought the ending was one of the better parts of the game. It works great to make you feel hopeless, and like there is truly no escape from the Entity. I just feel that this format of a "your choices impact the outcome of the story" game was the incorrect format for the story they wanted to tell. Because it truly doesn't even matter if you get everyone killed, or you save everyone-- everything happens the same way and the world's fate is the same.
There are other things that bothered me, too. I thought having Frank Stone appear as this corny, glitchy spectral monster for most of the game was...a terrible choice, both design wise and writing wise. Now, I do not think killing him in the opening was necessarily a bad decision. I honestly thought it was a bold choice that functioned well to surprise the viewer and urge them to continue, so they might discover how the story plays out after the death of the titular character. But keeping him as this ghoulish creature, that honestly looked as though it were from some solo indie developer's first low budget horror game, was awful. He did not feel threatening whatsoever, just wildly out of place in a visual quality sense. I hate the final design much less, it is certainly much more threatening and much, much more gruesome, but it still does not make sense as to why he looks that way. The Entity still had not taken him, why did he appear as this inhuman monster before his entry into the Fog? They should have kept a more humanlike design until the very end of the game, when the Entity arrives. Then, a transformation sequence where the Entity mutates him should have been restricted to the ending where no one from the cast is seen in the Fog, so players at least get something different in that allegedly "unique" ending. After all, if a cast member does get taken, at least you get to see visions of what followed the 1980s storyline.
Also why did Augustine work alone when she is clearly part of the Black Vale? The excuse of "the cult didn't exist yet" doesn't work here, because she can time travel and is fully aware of the multiverse she exists in. Like... I thought elder Linda's mention of secret passages being for staff "so they are seen as little as possible" was foreshadowing for Augustine having fellow cultists aiding her, but it just went nowhere. Another thing that goes nowhere is the baby that Sam can save at the very beginning. Should the baby live or die has absolutely no impact whatsoever on the story, which feels like an enormous mistake to me. That baby should have grown up to be a character that the cast could have interacted with to gain...oh I don't know, some piece of important knowledge, or an item, that could then later change the fate of the cast. This way, the player's choices in the 1960s segment actually have an impact on later gameplay, rather than meaning absolutely nothing.
I'd also love to know why the hell elder Sam was sent alone to prevent this situation from occurring, when the Imperatti (I think they were called? The parents of the Pariahs, or something, right?) would have surely realised the gravity of this situation? Like, how does this make any sense? And this is far from the only moment that makes no sense at all.
Why do Jaime and Robert have almost no relevance whatsoever after the 1980s segment concludes? Robert is guaranteed survival of this segment, as that part of the game is written so that two characters always survive-- be that Linda and Robert, or Sam and Robert. As annoying as Stan was, I didn't hate him because he had great dialogue that pushed other characters to have different dialogue than what we were used to. But it felt scummy that Robert was just given this sad, offscreen death instead of being included in a lot more meaningful way.
Not going to lie, it reminded me of how in Stranger Things 4, Patrick was the one teenager whose trauma wasn't really explored or given the same respect as the others. It's like the writers went, "Guys, guys! It's okay! We still have the other Black guy! This makes our game Diverse, and therefore no one could possibly complain!" Meanwhile, we get an entire cutscene about Madi's nightmares, and elder Linda's movie career and associated trauma is talked about numerous times. But all we know about 2024 Robert is that Stan took advantage of him, and then he later died, utterly miserable. Also, Sam somehow knows about this and he and Stan know one another, despite this Sam being from a different timeline than elder Linda, Madi, and Stan himself.
And Jaime, poor sweet Jaime, he really just feels like he's there as someone they can conveniently kill to shock the player. The first chance he has to die results in a horrible, very graphic death (although not the most graphic in the game by a long shot) that I feel many players will encounter because they see it as reasonable to visit the curiosities shop first, and then to later attempt to save Chris (even though her fate is the same here, regardless of what you do). And even if you should keep Jaime alive through that first confrontation with the spectral Frank Stone, it's not as though his survival impacts following events. He can die again, when fleeing Frank with Bonnie and an injured Linda. Why they have Linda, who has a gaping hole in her shoulder, attempt to pull Jaime up the platform alone while HIS OLDER SISTER just WATCHES is beyond me. But writing his death, whether it be here, or earlier, to have no impact on Bonnie's fate, or any future events, is plain bad writing.
You cannot save Bonnie, no matter what you do. And this scene makes no sense. When Frank grabs Bonnie, Linda points the camera at him, which should work. There really isn't any reasonable explanation as to why this should not work, or should not even momentarily distract him (Which could have led to a different ending where Bonnie lives and Linda dies instead?), because in the storm drain, so much as yelling at Frank causes him to abandon whoever he's attacking to seek out the new target. I suppose, at the very least, 1980s Bonnie's death does serve some kind of purpose in the 2024 storyline, because it serves as foreshadowing for Madi's potential fate. But just like Robert, 2024 Bonnie is given a sad offscreen death and we never really learn about how she or Jaime survived that night at the mill.
And I will say, it just feels shitty from a player point of view, to make it so you cannot save certain characters. Like, I'm sorry, is that a canon event? Where is Mr. O'Hara? Because Madi must be a god-damned anomaly, being Bonnie's daughter!! And Chris- god- Chris who mysteriously travels through time...I really do hate this part of the story because understanding its purpose can only happen if you manage to get the secret ending where she goes through the projector screen and DOESN'T burn and die. Which would require you to not have taken the pocket mirror or given the "protective" amulet to her. This unlocks a secret ending where she goes back in time to the moment where she, Jaime, and Linda were inintially shooting in the mill, right before Sam interrupted them. I took this as the writers trying to show us that there would be one timeline in which Frank Stone is never released (not sure how he ever was in the first place, really), likely saving them from the Entity. But other than the player somehow luckily getting this ending, I really don't see the point of Chris' time travel, because she can also be sent immediately back in the horologium, which does nothing meaningful. And why does it have to be Chris? Why not write it so it could be her or Jaime, so that maybe the player's choice to have her and Jaime breakup or not actually has some kind of impact on the gameplay?
One of the worst things about the game though, and I cannot stress this enough, is how badly the references to DBD are integrated. I love a good reference-- it can serve to add a little playful flair to a moment, or even go so far as to have the viewer look at the piece from a different perspective they had not previously considered. Buuuut... this is only if the reference is done well. And, well, what this game does could hardly be described as tolerable, even. In was so heavy-handed, it felt almost as bad as product placement in a Michael Bay movie. Many of these "references" felt out of place to the degree that someone with no knowledge of DBD would be likely able to pick them out, because they heavily disrupt either the game's aesthetic or the gameplay itself! One generator was funny, and honestly expected, but THREE of those damn things? Clunky, corny, and honestly? Lazy.
Unfortunately, I feel those three adjectives describe how I feel about the game overall. I feel bad for the people who put hard work into making it, because there is potential there for something great. But it really felt as though they were pushed to release this game as quickly as possible, so BHVR could sell us a 50 dollar, five-to-six-hour advertisement for their next DLC chapter. Hard to think anything else, really, when completion of the game is followed by a a literal ad for it.
All I can say is-- I really hope we get 2024 Linda as a survivor. It seems more likely that it will be Madi, but it is possible we could have a two-survivor chapter (unless they specifically outlined in the roadmap that there are no upcoming 2-survivor chapters?).
Madi and 2024 Linda would be cool though. We have no older women as survivors, despite having more than one older man. I think it's about damn time. And I love the mother/daughter bond that can sort of develop between Madi and 2024 Linda in the game.
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