#ily but you can go <3

[m1d-45]

will you promise that i'll see you again?

summary: your people refuse reason, and their damage refuses to heal. when it seems as if the whole world has left you, your dutiful knight still remains by your side.

word count: 2.3k

-> warnings: implied suicidal ideation (reader + unnamed side character), reader's previous deaths are mentioned in somewhat graphic detail

-> gn reader (you/yours)

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky || @valeriele3 || @shizunxie || @boba-is-a-soup || @yuus3n || @esthelily || @turningfrogsgay || @cupandtea24 || @genshin-impacts-me || @chaoticfivesworld || @raaawwwr || @yuryuryuyurboat || @undrxtxd || @rainswept || @wanderersqt || @rozz-eokkk

< masterlist >

“you’re one of the only things keeping me going, you know.”

dainslef turned to you in surprise, the even neutrality to your tone a sharp contrast to the rapid pace of his heart. he wasn’t a fool, he knew that the hunt had to be taking a heavy toll on you, but this…

this was more than he expected.

he knew he was one of a pitiful few who saw through celestia’s false puppet, who knew you for you and not their mirage. he knew that the entire world was hellbent on erasing you from existence, that you’d been forced through your own death countless times as teyvat pulled you apart and pushed you back together far from the scene of your would-be murder. he saw the golden scars across your skin, the dried remains of blood lining the wounds you hadn’t been able to patch yet. he’d been the one to wash them away, not minding the refuse soaking into his gloves if it meant your hands could be clean.

he recognized the dull exhaustion in your eyes, the same as the ones he saw in the reflections of lakes. tired, worn, barely there, hanging on by one solitary string that was wound so tightly around a desperate hand.

you had always been his reason for continuing. when the traveller broke down and the ruler of the abyss hid from the sun, you were there. when the chasm’s mud clung to his boots and the memories in his head burned as nails forced between his eyes, you were there. his rosary was kept tight to his chest at all times, familiar prayers pulling him up in the morning and forcing him to sleep at night. he was alive for far, far too long, but you made it bearable. you were his duty, his promise.

he never once thought that he’d be yours. then again, he never thought that he’d have to defend you from the ones you once called friends. time never did pass how he expected it to.

“…leading light?”

you looked down, twirling blades of grass around your fingers. he had led you up to a mostly desolate area of sumeru, west of bayda harbor. it close enough to the sea, forest, and desert that you could reasonably make an escape through any of those routes if need be, while also providing a rather pleasant view. the sky was bleeding red and gold as the sun sank below the horizon, a remarkable sight that fell on blind eyes. there was no use trying to enjoy nature’s beauty when he still kept one hand on his sword and both ears pricked for the slightest sign of danger.

you shouldn’t have to worry about your safety. you shouldn’t have to prioritize based on how likely you are to get hurt, or how easily it would be to make an escape. you still flinched when the wind blew a little too quick, used to it heralding armored footsteps and battle cries. in another life, you were welcomed with open arms, able to enjoy yourself without constantly being on high alert. teyvat did what it could to adapt; the air was still, frozen in time, barely a bird chirping for miles. it was meant to be comforting, he thinks, but dead silence was more unnerving than any breeze.

“i mean it.” he could hear every shift in his cloak around your shoulders, the heavy fabric doing little to soothe your stress. it was yours more than it was his now, to the point he felt claustrophobic wearing it. how long had he been traveling with you? the days blurred.

“i don’t doubt you.” he never would. never could. he’s not sure, even if he somehow wanted to, that his body would allow him to treat your words as anything less than fact. “but i don’t understand what you mean.”

you were a god. the creator, the first, the one that shaped the sovereigns scales and laid the foundations of earth. you predated the archons, celestia, the very skies themselves…

and he, somehow, was a driving motivation for you?

his words must have been funny, a sharp laugh tumbling out of your mouth. it was bitter, humorless, and somewhat raspy. he made note to find some water for you later. “what else could i mean?” you turn to him, some of his confusion lost as your eyes found his. even this burnt out, deep bags set beneath them, you still managed to steal the very air in his lungs. “you’re the only reason i’m still here.”

he didn’t know what to say. what was there to be said, when you were you and he was him? when the world had abandoned you, it made sense you’d cling to what remained faithful. it was merely coincidence he happened to find you first, that’s all. coincidence that you trusted enough not to run from, coincidence that you allowed to care for your injuries. there was nothing to say, because you held nothing for him in particular, only leaning on him out of need. he had to believe that. what was he left with if that wasn’t true? an awkward truth hid beneath his well-known lies, too large for him to see the edges, let alone to contain.

“please… do not say such things again.” to ask of his god what he could not ask of himself was surely some form of heresy, as was willingly laying aside his guard when he was the only one who was tasked with protecting you. he pulled his attention from the tide below, from the rustling trees, holding faith that the world would not be needlessly cruel. he stepped forward, kneeling beside you. even up close, you still seemed painfully small. “it is your own resilience that has allowed you to persevere.”

it’s the earth that leads you from danger.

it’s the water that follows you wherever you go.

it’s the leylines that whisk you to safety.

it’s the wind that warns you of what’s to come.

it’s the you from the past that protects the you in the present.

it’s the you in the present that provides for the you in the future.

it’s you, from everywhere and everywhen, continuing to fight.

and yet you sigh. you look away, across the sea, tracing fontaines skyline. “it really isn’t. i was lucky to run into you when i did.”

you had just crossed the wall back into the forest, burning hot and shaking. he was the lucky one, in truth, to be able to pick your figure out from the sand below. perched on a high cliffside, even mitachurls were reduced to small brown flecks.

you had worn a cryo mage’s cloak, which was what initially drew his attention. abyss activity wasn’t uncommon in the area, but a cryo mage in the desert… that was cause for intrigue. he stepped forward and slid down the steep face in front of him, a slight puff of dust marking his landing in the desolate sand of old vanarana.

he didn’t know what to expect. you stumbled around the jagged remains of a tree, heading for the statue of the seven. he followed, only growing more confused. cryo and dendro did not react with each other, and there was no way to “slow” a statue. a scouting mission, maybe? but why a cryo mage, when pyro would have been far more advantageous in the case of an attack?

he leaned around the corner carefully, prepared for the sight of a staff or the chanting of abyssal magic filling the air. the entire world seemed to be holding its breath, frozen in place and waiting for some trigger to continue.

he saw none of that. you were collapsed at the foot of the statue, faint wheezing only making it to his ears by virtue of the standstill around him. you held no staff, commanded no magic, your chest barely moving with air.

he’d never seen a mage seek out the archons when dying. one hand squeezed the handle of his sword as he crept forward, ready to strike should the situation turn against him. the sand barely shifted beneath his feet, his own heart sounding too loud to his ears. you did not move, showing no signs that you had noticed his approach. he still didn’t trust it.

your cloak was tattered and torn, with thick gloves atypical of a mage. they reminded him more of hilichurl wraps, which was strange considering you wore no mask. your face was instead covered by what looked like eremite cloth, just as stained and dirtied as the rest of your clothes. what he could see looked almost human; in another life, he could believe you were a weary traveller, lost amidst the sand.

he was acting foolish. if the abyss had a human tool, he needed to figure out why. he reached down, undoing the sloppy knot of your veil and letting the brocade fall limply to the grass.

…grass. he blinked, eyes flickering between the ground and your face, not sure which was harder to believe. flowers had bloomed around you, protecting your body from the blazing sands, and he’d be a fool not to recognize the face plastered all over every bounty board.

he didn’t understand. if nothing else, he thought the archons would have enough respect for their creator to know when they were being lied to, yet before him was barely living proof of the inverse. sweat beaded along every inch of exposed skin, deep-set heat exhaustion burning you from the inside out. how could you be a threat? how could they be so blind?

he looked again, the shine of elemental sight straining his eyes, catching flickers of the dendro energy pouring from the statue. you were the only one the archons would feed. you were the only one to make the very earth break its own rules, allowing lotuses to bloom from barren soil. something painfully similar to rage threatened what remained of his rationality, and it took all he had to push it aside.

that didn’t matter. if he went off on some banal revenge quest, he’d be no better than them. your safety mattered more. he picked you up and set aside how calm his curse felt, beginning the trek back to his camp. behind him, the flowers already began to wither, losing their persistence without you to foster it.

perhaps that initial meeting was luck. but these was no luck involved in your trust in him. when you woke up and saw him at your side, you chose to trust him. you chose to believe that he was not like the others, that he would protect you, and he was forever grateful for that trust. nobody could fault you for being angry, for being spiteful about what you were put through and choosing to lash out. nobody would have the right to be upset if you chose to vent your wrath against those that had hurt you.

but you didn’t. you chose, again and again, to believe in the world. you chose to let them live their lives, even if it meant getting hurt again in the process. you chose a quiet life traveling with him over the comfortable life on your throne. to willingly choose to travel with a disgraced knight to spare your people guilt… he couldn’t decide if it was noble or reckless. either way, he was selfishly happy that he was the one to stay by your side.

“i won’t try to convince you. but, please.. do not give up on yourself so easily.” i know far too many who have died by the same hand. “the world and its opinion does not define you. only you get to decide where fate leads.”

you lean towards him, and he thinks you might have passed out- but no, your head lands on his shoulder with far too much precision. he stiffens, not used to existence without a constant pain beneath his skin. “how motivational. you tell all your soldiers that?”

his heart is beating too quickly, thoughts unusually hard to grasp. you’re the only one who could have this effect on him. he only wished it wasn’t now, when your belief in yourself was on the edge. “i mean it. none of this is your fault, and neither are celestial actions the people’s fault. i know that you are hurt, but i don’t want you to accept that main needlessly. you shouldn’t have to view your creation with such pain.” slowly, carefully, he raises the hand closer to you, doing his best not to disturb you as he settles it on your arm. he’s can only hope that the contact brings you as much comfort as it does him. “if nothing else, believe me. promise you’ll at least try.”

he doesn’t think you’ll agree. why would you make a promise to one who represents the heaven’s betrayal? why would you let him hold you close at all, when you can surely sense the bindings of those who tried to kill you wrapped tightly around his soul? he doesn’t know. all he can do is hope.

“…alright, dainslef. i promise.”

twilight has long since fallen, and yet he smiles for the first time in centuries.

[grassbreads]

Man, genuinely there's little that excites me more than encountering queerness in fiction where I wasn't expecting it. I'm gonna be thinking about Kikuhiko/Yakumo from SGRS for so long.

Even setting aside the subtext of his feelings for Sukeroku, the narrative around his relationship to gender norms and his own expression is so fascinating. Guy who grows up steeped in rigid 40s gender roles and actively tries to enforce them, yet only truly feels like himself when he's acting on stage as a woman. Guy who says his life would have been better if he were born a woman and then refuses to elaborate.

[the-judicial-assistants-notebook]

sits up in bed. so lana and ema definitely thought they were responsible for edgeworth "choosing death", right?

(the rest of this post was supposed to go in the tags, because it's not very well organised or written, but it got too long so. here are the slightly edited tags for your reading pleasure (or otherwise)):

i was going to make this solely about ema because she's the obvious one with her open adoration of edgeworth, but the thing about rfta is that it goes to great lengths to emphasise the connection between lana and edgeworth as well.

the sl-9 incident showed that lana grows attached to people deeply, hence angel starr's comment on how, when neil marshall died, 'she (lana) felt like her own brother had died.' with edgeworth, i think it was similar but worse. because he's not just a coworker or subordinate who's dear to her. he saved her life. and it cost him his own.

at the beginning of the case, edgeworth says he was mistaken for thinking that lana was always looking out for him post sl-9 (a statement interesting on its own because that's when everyone else says she grew distant), and, later on, he brings ema fingerprinting powder because lana asked him to. then, of course, there's the 'lady luck' comment he makes.

similarly, on lana's side, you obviously have the end of the trial when she says he did well, but there's also that additional moment post-trial where she's the only one to notice — in a group comprising her, ema, phoenix and gumshoe — that he's 'hiding', listening to their conversation. point is, there's enough to suggest that she might have been the nearest thing edgeworth had to a mia; his 'chief prosecutor' to phoenix's plain 'chief'. they're as close as two people can be in a relationship where one of them is constantly lying and the other is von karma's star pupil.

rfta is pretty straightforwardly depicted as the case which solidified edgeworth's resolve to do what he did; i don't think i have to prove that. rumours about him have reached new heights, his car and knife were involved in goodman's murder, he makes an unprecedented mistake in court by failing to connect the evidence room and carpark incidents, thus forcing the chief of police to enter the trial to do so himself, and he's publicly revealed to have relied on falsified evidence to secure a conviction in the sl-9 case, all of which only happened because of lana. jake marshall even claims that from the beginning — that if you trace edgeworth's rumours back to their source, you end up meeting one person: lana skye.

and it gets worse because at the end of rfta, she thinks he's fine!! she literally says, 'i was afraid the pressure would break you, but you rose above it,' and reminds him he's nothing like gant because he's not alone. she leaves the case thinking he will be okay. and then, what, like a week passes, and she finds out that he wasn't, and that he's gone, and it's her fault. even after she was freed from gant's control, even after she had finally stopped lying, she couldn't prevent herself from claiming another life. so much for 'lady luck', i suppose.

and the game reiterates this multiple times. gumshoe states at the start that edgeworth's ties to those higher up in the department have made him the subject of constant rumours, and phoenix says (in front of ema) that he shouldn't be held responsible for the forged evidence because that was all lana's doing, which then leads to edgeworth commenting (again in front of ema) that he feels as though 'something inside him has died.' it all goes back to lana. we can argue and say that it was technically gant's doing that caused all of this, but lana still took actions that led to it. even her complicated friendship with edgeworth isn't spared; it's that closeness between them that exacerbated those rumours. how could she not feel responsible in some way?

and with ema, it's rather obvious, isn't it? if she hadn't gone poking her nose into things, none of this would have happened or come to light. and, of course, she'd never choose anyone over her sister, not for anything in the world — it's simply not a question, but that's the problem, isn't it? it's not a question. it's not some hypothetical moral dilemma. it just is. she may not have killed neil marshall, but she still has one king of prosecutor's blood on her hands. and now she has to live with that. she just. has. to live with it. no matter if he chose otherwise.

moving on from that a little, i think it's actually wild how much of ema's journey to becoming a forensics investigator is paved with bad memories. neil marshall's death and her subsequent inability to testify are what drives her to begin pursuing it, her first proper investigation results in her idol's "death" and when she finally graduates, the person who saved her sister has been disbarred, and she can't even help because she isn't allowed to. all that pain and constant pursuit of her goals, and she's still the same ema skye, still that girl shrouded in darkness, always one step behind the truth, one step a little too late. no wonder she was angry in aa:aj. i would be furious.

[cordiallyfuturedwight]

1 OF 1, SHINee (2016) ╰┈➤ for @namjoohyuk 💎

[babygirlgiles]

I think my fic where Xander accidentally becomes a successful novelist (largely without realizing it) is the funniest idea I’ve ever had. This guy started writing little stories to remember their adventures in Sunnydale (his last line in Chosen about “how will anyone even know about this unless we tell them” burrowed itself into my little archivist brain and won’t let go) and posts them online. He unintentionally goes viral. He thinks someone named Simon N. Schuster is leaving him voicemails. He ends up on the New York Times bestseller list.

He doesn’t even realize that everyone else thinks the stories are fiction. Xander is out here writing autobiographical non-fiction but everyone else thinks he’s a weirdly dedicated author that’s really committed to maintaining a Lemony Snicket style pseudonym/persona for the narrator of his novel. There are “Who Is Xander Harris?” articles. No one can dig up much of anything on him because he lived his whole life in a town that got wiped off the map. He keeps rejecting requests for interviews because of his stage fright. At first this drives his publicist absolutely ballistic but it just adds the the air of mystery that’s drumming up book sales so she lets it go.

He only responds to questions over email and only ever responds “in character” as his “novel’s narrator” and this baffles everyone, only adding to the supposed mystery. It’s literally not even Xander actually writing the emails 95% of the time. It’s Dawn. She has appointed herself as “Xander’s representation” even though she doesn’t really know what being someone’s representation means. She printed business cards.

[immunetoneurotoxin]

“Not a soul assigned to their case at the Bureau could make sense of their existence. There wasn’t a single scientist, parapsychologist, doctor, or specialist with over a dozen PHD’s under the sun that could figure them out. Pyrokinesis in a human? They defy every law of nature, yet they exist amongst humanity regardless. How do you explain that?” “The truth is that there are a lot of unknown things out there in the world that mankind hasn't even begun to scratch the surface of. Everyone flocked to this case trying to find rational answers, but there aren’t any. Look at the files in your hands. By the eyes of science, Pyro should not exist. Don’t you know what happens to things mankind doesn’t understand? The Bureau has done sickening things to them in the name of research.” “That’s why I helped them escape, Conagher.”

Excerpt from the novel INCENDIARY; A TF2 Pyro origin story Read the latest chapter of 'Incendiary' on AO3 here! Artwork created by the incredible @narklos ♡ 

[starite-wishes]

i always feel kinda bad getting tagged in some tag games because i really do appreciate getting tagged and don’t mind whatsoever and i do want to participate but like most of the time i have absolutely nothing to answer. unfortunately i have been doing pretty much nothing but rotting my entire life

[the-valiant-valkyrie]

okay well. one thing that i absolutely adore abt ieytd3 specifically is their dedication to The Bit. The Bit, in this instance, being the telekinesis.

i first heard of ieytd pretty much the year it came out- although i wavered in and out of the community until a few months before the sequel was announced. within that time, there was this trend in what few ieytd fics were published that they would reject the telekinesis mechanic entirely. they would pretend it didn't exist. they brushed it off as a mandatory game mechanic for a VR title, but obviously it doesn't actually matter in canon. it's unnecessary.

but seeing schell games literally go "nuh uh". and take what's a pretty significant step in a unique direction from their source material. and say "actually, not only is telekinesis canon, but we are going to make it's existence critical to the plot of our entire third installation" was so much fun. i respect them so much for that.

a lot of times i find the best sort of games are those that take their silliness seriously. they don't feel ashamed of doing their own thing- breaking the mold a little bit, if it means developing a deeper sense of identity. they took this mandatory mechanic- essentially the only obstacle between them and an untarnished james bond-esque experience- and said "we can roll with this". and just did.

i love a game that's not ashamed to be what it is.

[ghost-proofbaby]

“I love you” “it’ll pass” okay but which one is Eddie and which one is reader bc I don’t think I’d be able to handle either outcome

okay. just. hear me out. listen. listen to this idea i don't know if i could ever put myself through the heartbreak of writing. (tw: i'm bringing up the cursed thing that is eddie's canon ending in stranger things as of right now. yes. his... very, very, very long nap.)

"i love you" = reader

"it'll pass" = eddie

...and how ironic it is, for him to have insisted so many times that it'll pass, especially after the canon events of season 4. in which you are left alone, with nothing more than a memory of him, and all you can think is how it'll never pass. the love, the grief, the pain - he lied. it won't pass. even when you finally crave it to.

[litany-writes]

What's one thing you'd like to see happen this F1 season?

OSCAR PIASTRI WDC‼️‼️‼️‼️

but more realistically, lando norris first win, PLEASE, especially especially if it’s somewhere like silverstone 🤞🤞🤞

it would also be neat to see someone other than max win, or at least a stronger title fight (ferrari redemption arc⁉️) but honestly i’m not a max hater, it’s just that one person dominating for like the whole season isn’t as interesting to watch

[sugarsnappeases]

i've been... engraving sybill into my brain today. if you even care

it’s the constant confusion, the flimsiness of the border between her reality and her visions, always struggling to differentiate between what’s real and what’s in her mind, and even then, within her mind there’s still the chaos of what’s impossible, some imagined horror, and what will happen in the future, the future where there’s a war and where imagined horrors can become reality.

it's a miserable place, endless waking nightmares as she tries to separate her physical reality from that which her mind conjures for her, reliving her past failures and seeing symbols that don’t make sense to her yet, flashes of images like lightning strikes and she can’t pick out the important ones, she can’t pick out the ones that she needs to understand, until after the fact, until people she knows are dead and she could’ve stopped it if she’d only figured out what the images meant.

she’s drowning in guilt, seeing ghosts everywhere, their hands always accusing her, clawing at her, because she as good as killed them - it’s the struggle of whether the future is determined or not, whether things happen just because she predicted them or because they were always going to, no matter what she did.

in her mind, with the ghosts and the horrors, she’s the one to blame, always; she’s to blame when she can’t figure out the meaning of the visions she sees in time to warn anyone of their future; she’s to blame when she thinks she understands something but can’t explain it well enough to make anyone believe her; she’s to blame when she can’t stop time from rolling onwards incessantly, when she can't thwart her own predictions somehow.

she’s trying every method of divination under the sun to try and find the answers, she’s drinking copious amounts of alcohol to try and open her inner eye further, hands shaking, desperately trying to decipher the mess in her mind before it’s too late, pushing herself to the edge and over it to make sure she doesn’t fail her next victims in the way she did all the others.

she’s isolating herself bc it’s worse when it’s people she knows, it’s worse when she can remember both what they look like when they smile and what they look like when they’re tortured to death. but that leaves her alone with all of these ghosts and a very tenuous grasp on reality that feels like it’s slipping through her fingers, impossible to grasp.

she’s spiralling and miserable and still trying so desperately to help, to find an answer, a way that she can assuage her guilt. she’s incredibly highly strung, she’s constantly on edge because if she lets herself relax for even one moment she’s scared she’ll lose track of who, where, when she is, she's scared her world might just collapse around her.

and on top of all that fuckery, there are all these expectations from her family, bc she’s inherited her great-grandmother’s famed inner eye, they expected her to be just as successful, just as renowned as the legendary cassandra trelawney and she doesn’t know how, doesn’t know how to make the visions work like they should.

and then there’s the ridicule from everyone else because no one believes her, she tries so hard to warn people about the things she thinks are coming, the things that she thinks she understands, and she’s met with laughter, laughter that rings in her ears until she hears about her predictions having come true, then all she hears are screams, screams and guilt because she didn’t do enough, she didn’t try hard enough to make them understand and now they’re all dead.

and the one time she is believed, the one time she’s taken seriously, her first official prophecy, and she thinks that maybe she’s starting to find herself, starting to live up to her great-grandmother’s legacy. in the end, all she manages to do is kill another two people she went to school with, all she manages to do is orphan a little boy and place him at the forefront of a new war that’s a thousand times bigger than him…

all that she has left at the end is a handful of Real prophecies that only serve to harm people, hundreds of deaths on her conscience, their ghosts screaming and scratching at her - your fault, your fault, they say in an undying chorus - and still there are visions that she doesn’t understand, still pushing and pulling her between fact and fiction, the hellscape that is her mind, her life. and still she’s trying to understand, trying to cling onto reality, trying to live up to her family name, trying so so hard to save someone, anyone, just once.

she’s a ship in a storm, knocked about on the waves like a ragdoll, and looking up at the stars for guidance, for a way to shore that they cannot provide for her, hidden by the thunderclouds.

[teddybeartoji]

Ask and ye shall receive

:33

The silly

EVERYBODY STOPPPPP KFBTKSBFNDBGBEGBGLCNRBKSBRKFFNRKKFBRKFHGKF

THIS IS SO PERFECT BC I WAS IMAGINING HIM WITH THE HOOD ON TOO AND EVERYTHING FUUUUUCKKKK YOU'RE AN ANGELLL🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏 AND I AM FOREVER IN YOU DEBTT🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏 HE LOOKS SO FUCKING GOOD WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FCUK oh i am so. crawling inside that hoodie with him>:333 and he will zip it up too and i will be safe and sound mmmm so warm and cozy waaoooowwwwww

[scrunkalicious]

FUUUUUUUCK JAYVIK UGGGGHH im begging they don’t try to push it next season, im gonna keep my expectations low but we have a chance to survive cuz its the last season

sending love and joy and whimsy ur way………

REAL. TYSM LUCY U A REAL ONE....

im hoping praying so so bad that they rlly go thru w the jayce and vik LoL lore in s2 BC THEYRE ENEMIEZ OK. LIKE DEADASS MACHINE HERALD AND DEFENDER OF TOMORROW CANT STAND EACH OTHER. riot thatd be soooo lovely pleabse,,,,

[gemharvest]

(id in alt - do not repost)

Ekubo Week: Day 2 (God) @dimpleweek

[secrettastemakerland]

ONE WEEK LEFT!!!!!!

#May16th

anon I'm gonna need you to check back in on the 16th fr I fear I won't awake up in time for the second part haha

[kdelarenta]

right so i just started n's route and got to the first sex scene - go girl, give us nothing 😐