I had two splintered timelines wherein I played the Game in one, but not the other. In my Game timeline, I was a Prince of Doom. The event that caused my timelines to split was when H.A.A.L. (Hyperion Auto-Auxetic Lalonde), the android created by Dirk Lalonde, used his advanced A.I. technology in conjunction with ancient cherubim technology to open an intra-dimensional rift into our universe with the intent of hijacking the Alternian Empress (Her Olympian Tyranny) in order to obtain the power to rule over galaxies. His destination coordinates happened to lead him to my abyssal abode on Alternia, where he accosted me and “uploaded” a copy of his A.I. into my brain by way of a nanobot that crawled into my ear (eugh) in an attempt to hijack my mind as well. However, due to a miscalculation on his part, the only thing he accomplished was establishing a neural network link between us that couldn’t be terminated. He was very annoying.

I played the game with thirteen other trolls and six humans that were kidswapped versions of the canon characters.

Kidswaps:

Dave & Dirk Lalonde — Guardian: Bro

Jade & Jake Strider — Guardian: Dad

John Harley & Jane English — Guardian: Becquerel

Rose Egbert & Roxy Crocker — Guardian: Mom

Trolls:

Ezriae Sequia (cyan mutant)

Vesani Materi (burgundy)

Shenzi N'Daiye (bronze)

Neveus Ivreas (gold)

Lakaia Neskem (lime)

Mehiti Aeifra (olive)

Zokira Nytrus (jade)

Theron Kuiper (teal)

Cresia Euriel (cerulean)

D'mitri Hooke (indigo)

Jeriko Qadire (purple)

Deciim Moirae (violet)

Ovluna Clitus (fuchsia)

I was not the Alternian heir. The heiress was Ovluna. Ovluna was my kismesis until I killed her, after which point Dirk became my kismesis. I was briefly moirails with Neveus and Deciim simultaneously, then just Deciim when Neveus and Theron became moirails. Ezriae was my matesprit until Ovluna killed him. Vesani and Zokira were kismeses. Deciim and Ovluna were on-and-off moirails, but he broke it off with her for good a while before I killed her.

Leading up to the separation of both timelines, I masqueraded as a violetblood to hide my tyrian status. Despite my blood having a sole claim to the throne, I was born male, which made me a "defect" and therefore stripped of any right to ascend according to ancient Alternian law. The only reason I even made it out of the brooding caverns alive was because of an underground flood that left my cavern destroyed and abandoned until my lusus found me and took me out to sea. Valerian was a colossal eel drake and one of the only two remaining fuchsia lusii on Alternia. The other was known as the Kraken and belonged to the royal bloodline.

Valerian raised me in an underwater trench hive deep in the abyss where my body was naturally equipped to survive. Tyrians were almost always abyssdwellers as opposed to the lack of such features in the more "common", diluted fuchsia branches. I had extra fins on my body, bioluminescent markings, and shark-like facial features.

When I inevitably crossed paths with the heiress Ovluna online, I kept up the violetblood facade for as long as I could, doing everything in my power to keep my choice of words in check while simultaneously challenging each of hers when she spouted her pompous bullshit. Things went sideways when she developed pitch feelings for me. This wouldn't have been much of a problem if I weren't, um, a fucking homosexual. I took some glee in turning her down, but Ovluna wasn't the type to take no for an answer.

She used her influence to make her goldblood acquaintance track down my location, to which she sent drones to "intimidate" me, but they accomplished far more than that when she saw for herself what I truly was through their live feed. Thus came her ultimatum: be her kismesis, or be culled for the treason of existing. It was a good deal and more than what I deserved, she said. Perhaps one day, she said, I would make a good little slave the same way my traitorous ancestor was for hers.

His Mutinous Disgrace, my ancestor, was once known as simply The Executioner. Specifically, he was the executioner for Ovluna's ancestor and the reigning empress, Her Olympian Tyranny. The Executioner suffered the same fate of a defective hatching that I did, but rather than have him culled, The Olympian offered him a similar deal: work for her, bend to her will, and she would let him live. To ensure his unquestioning loyalty, she cut out his tongue and made him wear a symbolic gold muzzle that mirrored her own golden jaw. For sweeps, The Executioner did her bidding, culling her opposition in steadfast silence. He was her weapon, an extension of her rule, and Alternia feared him for it. She made sure they would never turn against her in his favour by turning him into a monster whose heinous deeds far overshadowed her own.

Until he rose against her, that is. Having quietly assembled a rebellion of his own, all without the ability to speak, The Executioner led an insurgency against The Olympian, but it was doomed to fail from the start. He left his back exposed to a double agent, a limeblood gladiator called The Champion, who struck him down and sent him crawling off into the shadows of history, presumably to die. From then on he was known as The Disgraced, while the one who, allegedly, slew him was praised as a hero with The Olympian's royal pardon.

I took Ovluna's deal not only because it was the survivor's move at the time, but because it gave me the opportunity to succeed where my ancestor failed. Unlike The Disgraced, I wasn't stupid enough to rely on the questionable loyalty of comrades. No, I had something much more reliable in mind for my uprising.

I was a skilled bioengineer who specialized in genetic splicing. I prided myself in successfully creating new lifeforms that I intended to use in my eventual coup d'état. The only experiment that produced viable results as a potential living weapon was Project Juice Boy, or PJB for short. PJB turned out to be a parasitic organism with a mind entirely its own. A single egg from the nest I had incubated hatched and cannibalized its siblings, then camouflaged itself on me when I entered the Game. Gradually, it poisoned my brain, making me more susceptible to the whispers of the Horrorterrors on Derse, eventually triggering my Grimdark Mode where I nearly killed everyone in the session. During this, I only successfully killed D'mitri, whom Neveus was thankfully able to bring back to life, and severely wounded Vesani, Jeriko, and Ovluna.

Alternia’s First Guardian was supposed to be Doc Scratch, but a glitch in the system caused by HAAL’s interference disrupted his data and turned him into “N” (real name Nephishesim, whose screen name was simply “[REDACTED]”). He was mischievous and a key factor in the failure of the trolls’ session. Once we realized our session was doomed, we crossed into the humans’ session via an intra-dimensional rift created by me (with the help of HAAL’s prowess that I inherited after prototyping him into my sprite with my dead dreamself and then ascending). This session was successful in beating the game.

Not long after entering the new universe per our “Ultimate Reward”, and after establishing civilization by leaping forward in Time, Ovluna grew jealous of the mutual pitch flirting between me and Dirk and, in a misguided fit of loathing, she killed Ezriae. Mourning his loss, I wasted no time in tracking her down and killing her in retaliation. Deciim attempted to help me cope, but nothing ever felt enough after that.

I threw myself into my science instead, working with HAAL to bring our world into a new scientific era. Being a cyborg myself, cybernetic equipment became the focal point of my inventions, since I could draw from my experience with bioengineering and HAAL’s knowledge of cyberware.

In my No-Game timeline, I never met HAAL and continued on with life without knowledge of the humans or most of the other trolls. I was still in an unhealthy kismesissitude with Ovluna that led to my killing her in order to seize the Alternian throne (as per my lifelong mission). I was able to witness the birth of PJB and stop it from latching onto me. I then tweaked its genetics to be able to control it and use it to turn my front-line allies into super soldiers in the fight against Ovluna and The Olympian. After killing the heiress, Her Olympian Tyranny returned to Alternia to defeat me herself, but my ancestor, His Mutinous Disgrace (also known simply as The Disgraced), came out of hiding to defend me. He slew the Empress, but at the cost of his own life.

After taking the throne, I stumbled upon a dormant ability to “absorb” the psychic powers of trolls by consuming their blood. Doing so in excess led to the deterioration of my sanity, which the Horrorterrors took advantage of to lead me on a murderous rampage. The same Alternians who had rallied behind me in my coup d'état imprisoned me and worked tirelessly to cure my insanity. Eventually they succeeded by transfusing the blood of non-psychic trolls into my body while they drained my tainted fuchsia. Once I’d recovered, they welcomed me back on the throne and I ruled for many sweeps. However, due to the transfusions, my lifespan was significantly shorter than it would have been.

I lived in a desert oasis with my kaprosuchus lusus, having built an impressive treehive within the available trees. When I came of age to leave Alternia, I was recruited as a psycholiquidator. Alongside Commander Sryrah and the rest of our crew, we were tasked with interrogating those suspected of treason against the Empire. More often than not, we were obligated to incriminate every suspect regardless of whether or not they proved to be innocent. Those who were definitively convicted of more serious crimes were sent to the threshecutioners to be publicly executed. Psycholiquidators were not typically expected to engage in physical violence such as conquering planets or performing executions, but we were trained in various martial arts on the off chance that we were needed in the Empress’s lethal brigades.

As it were, the day came that a threat to the Empire required our fleet to become soldiers in the name of Her Imperial Sacrament (A.K.A. The Imperatrix). Before we could join our brethren in the battle, however, our ship was infiltrated and our crew was taken by a rebel faction of Alternians and other aliens alike. Neurotransmitters were surgically implanted into our brains, forcing us to fight for the enemy on a barren planet. I was a spectator in my own body during the fight, watching helplessly as my hands drew the blood of my comrades. The enemy had almost taken the upper hand when their base of operations was destroyed, releasing us from the neurotransmitters’ control. Unfortunately, this all happened at the exact moment that a soldier of the Empire kicked me off a cliff. I remember them reaching for me after they realized what had happened, but I was just out of reach. I fell into the river below and blacked out.

When I awoke, surprisingly alive, I was on a threshecutioner ship alongside other wounded soldiers who had been abducted by the rebels. We were being transported to scienstiffs who would remove and examine the neurotransmitters in our heads. In the meantime we were confined to our isolated chambers because no one could be sure that we wouldn’t be “activated” again and start attacking. Sryrah and many from my former crew did not survive the battle.

The captain of that threshecutioner ship was a cerulean named Skorpi Indomi. Hardened by a difficult life back on the planet and the subsequent battles he faced after joining the lethal brigades, he was a rather crass and imposing troll with burns on the right side of his face that he covered with a mask. He had one robotic leg from a gruesome incident that resulted in the need for an impromptu amputation.

My ancestor’s name was Raseim Glaice, his title: The Archivist. As a Junior Archivist of the Grand Alternian Archives, his job was to collect all manner of knowledge and information (either peacefully or forcefully) for perusal of those granted access by the Archivist Council, a largely independent organization tasked with maintaining the overarching history of Alternia and commanded only by the Empress herself. He would later join the Archivist Council once he received Senior Archivist status and begin his work as a double agent for the growing rebellion. A haemoist in the beginning, he was swayed to a more accepting and open-minded lifestyle by his matesprit, a rebel mutant (a blackblood, the caste a mutation of drones) who opened his eyes to the true terrors of their dystopian society.

Raseim used his exclusive access to the secrets of the Grand Archives to start altering the records of Alternian history, sometimes by writing out the haemoist scandals and sometimes by correcting certain documents that pandered to the victor’s perspective (i.e. the highbloods). He meticulously rewrote book after book and secretly replaced the originals with them. Once the history buffs who regularly scanned the Archives caught wind of these seemingly outrageous texts, contempt and suspicion of the Empress began to rise. Raseim’s efforts to subvert the Empress’s vice over Alternian society was a major foothold for the rebellion, though he was inevitably caught and culled when the Empress realized what he was doing. Even so, the doubt he threaded into trollkind at large was to such a great degree that the rebellion continued for many sweeps thereafter, which was the same rebellion in which I was forced to fight.

For the entirety of my recovery process, I was under the impression that Skorpi had come to rescue us on behalf of the Empire. It wasn’t until I was mostly healed, the neurotransmitter removed from my head, that he approached me privately as the defacto commander of my fallen crew and informed me under no uncertain terms that he was an undercover rebel warlord. He told me that he had rescued the stranded survivors in hopes that we would join his cause. I asked him why we would join the very people who had forcibly hijacked our minds to fight for them and he explained that that had been the doing of a separate faction unaffiliated with the efforts of the rebellion and that they had been a nuisance for them as well.

I listened to him explain the rebellion’s cause and why it was so necessary. He claimed that my help in rallying other psycholiquidators would be a great asset in taking down the Empire a peg or two. I couldn’t deny that he made a convincing argument as he laid out all the faults in Alternia’s hierarchical system that I had been so blind to. I agreed to observe his operation before I made my final decision.

It just so happened that I was just in time to oversee an important mission that the crew of that ship was undertaking. They had received intelligence about a certain programme that would supposedly allow them to hack into the Empire’s military headquarters’s database. This programme turned out to be a variation of the Game called SKROLL and it was through that that we found ourselves in the Medium.

The programme had quickly revealed itself to be something else entirely, but we had no choice but to follow its commands in order to avoid getting annihilated by a sudden asteroid cluster the radars hadn’t picked up before. The ship was effectively ripped apart at each terminal used to run the programme, placing us all on our respective planets. We were still able to communicate through the radio devices installed in the terminals and this was how we discovered that there had been a stowaway on the ship.

The other “players” consisted of myself, Skorpi, the active crew, the stowaway, and three others who were not on the ship at the time:

I was an Alternian idol well-known for acting in advertisements as well as a few movie roles, but my main claim to fame was my singing career.

On camera, I was in avid support of the Empire, a loyalist to a fault. Off camera, however, I used my fame and fortune to cover up my side-gig as an assassin-for-hire, taking hits on imperialists left and right.

I always kept my true identity hidden during these jobs, however. When "on duty", so to speak, I used the alias "Glacier" and took every precaution to avoid being recognized.

I was also a talented potions master, running a "small" online business selling tonics and elixirs of varying effects. I commonly used these resources to execute my trademark assassinations by way of an untraceable kill.

My ancestor, informally known as The Sword, was an oddity amoung jadebloods. Hatched into the mundane duties of Auxiliatrices, The Sword yearned for more out of life. She sought (or demanded, depending on the story) an audience with the Empress, unwavering in every deflection until finally her wish was granted. The Empress bid her to explain herself as to why she insisted upon leaving the brooding caverns. The Sword claimed that she could be of so much more use to the Empire if only she were given the chance. Intrigued and amused, the Empress humoured the jadeblood's request, sure that she would merely make a fool of herself or die in the process. Per The Sword's desires, she was placed on the front lines of the lethal brigades with no formal training.

The Sword astonishingly thrived, showing no hesitation under the strain of these conditions. She failed and faltered many times, of course, but still she persisted. Before long, she became one of the most skillful and brutal warriors on the field, garnering the attention of her superiors and earning her begrudging praise.

The Empress, shocked, but not displeased with this new development, acknowledge The Sword's talents and assigned her to a battalion lead by an indigoblood called Admiral Zekeriya. These were the Empire's most prized soldiers, the aces up its sleeve, the ones who never failed in their endeavours.

Initially, Zekeriya expressed his contempt for being burdened with a jadeblood amoung his ranks. He was not amoung those who were impressed with her progress. He was harsh, strict, and at times downright cruel in his efforts to make her see "reason", see that she was not equipped to handle this line of work. The Sword persevered through it all and, as the story goes, never once fell to her knees no matter the severity of the training and the punishment she was made to endure.

Determined to prove himself right, Zekeriya ordered her into a vicious battle that even his strongest soldiers were struggling with. Surely, he thought, this would break her. If not that, then it would kill her. Either way he believed he would come out on top. The Sword's involvement in the battle, however, tipped the scale in the Empire's favour just enough to secure victory. Bloody and broken, physically, The Sword was rushed back to headquarters by her comrades who knew better than to dismiss the strength she had shown.

Zekeriya was forced to look into her eyes and admit that she was, indeed, a valiant warrior. Some tales claimed that she died that night, tears of acceptance on her cheeks. Others said she recovered and went on to fight many more battles side by side with Admiral Zekeriya. Others still proposed that her injuries were such that she could no longer continue to fight for the Empire and, consequently, took her own life after sweeps of resignation. As far as ancestral folklore went, there was no certainty in the truth. Regardless, The Sword of Zekeriya remained a thrilling tale told throughout history classes in young trolls' schoolfeeding.

Gay and evil, just the way it should be.

I was human, trans, and gay.

I was a musician in a band alongside my twin Dirk, our cousins Seth (Sawtooth) and Skylar (Squarewave), Roxy, and Jake. Jane didn't really see the point in a band, but she did kind of try to support us and was sort of our de-facto manager in high school.

Calvin (Li'l Cal) was still in middle school and thus could not join our band. We didn't want him to, anyway. Dude was kind of a freak.

I was TRANS.

Bakugo was the only one who knew I identified as a boy for the longest time. Our relationship didn’t really change much outside of that, though. The only difference it made was that he was very adamant about beating the shit out of people who were transphobic around me, but he never outed me to anyone.

I didn’t fully come out as trans until after junior high. Bakugo had gone off to U.A. while I gave up on trying to get in because by that point I was truly hopeless that I would be able to without a Quirk. I tested the waters by coming out to some friends I made in a different high school because the dysphoria was getting super bad and I realized that people knowing about it made me feel better about myself. I ran into some rough patches, of course, but for the most part it made me happier.

The reason for giving up on my dreams of being a hero was because, during the sludge villain incident, I couldn’t bring myself to do anything to try to save Bakugo. When I encountered All Might prior to that, his discouraging words and the reveal of his “true form”, so to speak, were enough to crush any hope I had left. I was frozen in place while I watched the villain nearly consume Bakugo, completely oblivious to All Might’s presence, but at the last second, Bakugo came through with a burst of what could only be described as raw willpower. He shook off the sludge villain enough to start gaining the upper hand and it was later revealed that his show of determination was what made All Might spring into action to help him finish off the villain. Watching that with my own two eyes only made me realize that I could never hold a candle to either of them with the way I was.

I eventually enlisted in the police academy once I graduated high school and became a uniformed officer. I worked under my mentor, Sansa, and he became something of a father figure/best friend to me (a dad friend, if you will).

All Might ultimately chose Mirio to inherit One for All and inevitably succumbed to the effects of his injury shortly after the generation of heroes from Bakugo's class graduated and gained their hero licenses.

Bakugo quickly climbed the ranks to being the #2 Pro Hero, Mirio being #1, and Tamaki as #3. Kirishima was Katsuki’s primary sidekick in his own agency.

Shinso was also publicly trans as a Top Ten Pro Hero and I looked up to him a lot as an idol. He was a great inspiration to me, though it did make me regret never taking the entrance exam to U.A. so that I could have had the opportunity to work alongside him.

I’m still trying to figure out the details on how it happened, but I ended up dating both Katsuki and Kirishima.

Todoroki turned out to be a villain. He had joined his brother Dabi in the League of Villains, brought together by their mutual hatred of Endeavor. They were the ones who killed Endeavor and began the domino effect that led to most of the former Top Ten Pro Heroes dying. The League worked meticulously to bring down each Pro Hero in order, but they were quickly replaced by Katsuki and the others despite their best efforts to destroy the hierarchy of heroes.

Althought he League was eventually dismantled when its core members were apprehended, there was another group of villains waiting in the shadows for their turn to shine. They called themselves a different name that I can't remember, and when they inevitably began targeting the new Top Ten, starting with Bakugo, he put his best efforts toward ensuring that I was safe. He assigned his agency’s best equipment specialist, Mei Hatsume, the duty of developing anything that would increase my safety. She quickly developed a device disguised as a watch that kept track of my location at all times and sent distress signals to the companion device at the Ground Zero Headquarters if it detected any traces of danger in my surroundings. As invasive as it was, I agreed to wear it.

Our fears were realized when the new villain group kidnapped me in an attempt to draw out Bakugo. It was while being held captive that I learned the Todoroki brothers were once again at large. They met with me personally to torture out any information I had on Bakugo. In the process I learned about their childhoods and I couldn’t help but sympathize with them despite the circumstances. I did my best to convince them to turn over a new leaf, to put an end to their villainy and live out normal lives now that the source of their trauma was dead. It was a lost cause at the time, but it frustrated Shoto enough to storm out before he could kill me. Dabi stayed to talk with me for a while, asking if I really thought that they could abandon their villainous paths. I gave him my answer and then he left me locked up without replying.

Everything was pretty much normal compared to canon up until that encounter with Shigaraki at the mall. After our "conversation", I asked him to tell me what All for One was after, and instead of answering, Shigaraki had us warped to the man himself to tell me in person. AFO was more than happy to give me his grandiose speech about how he intended to obtain One for All for himself. Since the opportunity had presented itself, he chose to make me the U.A. spy for the League of Villains so that I could keep tabs on All Might and the school's movements. I refused, of course, but he didn't give me much of a choice when he implanted a secondary Quirk in me called Doppelganger, though I didn't realize that at the time.

AFO let me go with a vague statement about how he looked forward to hearing from me and I was warped back to the mall where Uraraka was looking for me. Afterward, I relayed what had happened to All Might, who nearly had a heart attack from hearing about my close call with AFO, but he seemed just as perplexed about my being released as I was. He decided that he would keep a close eye on me.

Doppelganger made itself known soon enough. It started out as minor headaches accompanied by uncomfortably intrusive thoughts, then gradually developed into dissociative episodes where I temporarily seemed to lose control of my own body. At a certain point I began blacking out completely and losing time, having no recollection of my activities until I came to again. It was then that I began to notice my classmates distancing themselves from me, claiming upset with things I didn't remember doing.

All Might as the one who first hypothesized that it was another Quirk tampering with my mind. Since it wasn't a Quirk associated with OFA, it was far more difficult for me to coexist with since my body wasn't suited to this Quirk factor. I started having dreams about meeting a distorted version of myself who called himself Dekiru. It was as if the Quirk had a mind of its own as it explained what it could do. As it turned out, once I made that connection with Doppelganger, I was able to start using it consciously, projecting "Dekiru" outside of myself as a featureless clone of sorts that could interact with its surroundings.

However, the more I used it, the harder it became to maintain control. At first I thought that training with it was helping, but it only made the blackouts and dissociation worse. Dekiru corrupted my thoughts and drudged up some of my darkest feelings of shame and spite to warp my view of the world around me. Although I fought against it, I couldn't deny the effect it was having on me.

During the fight against Shigaraki and the Paranormal Liberation Front, I was battling Dekiru at the same time that I was trying to parallel process the new Quirks that had surfaced from OFA. Up until then, I had attempted to visualize Doppelganger as something I could lock and unlock like I did with my other Quirks, but that method didn't work so well against something unnatural. After Shigaraki retreated and the dust from the war settled, I resolved to isolate myself from U.A., not only to avoid making the school a target, but also to keep Dekiru at a safe distance from those I cared about. Shigaraki didn't so much as attempt to repossess Doppelganger when he tried to take OFA, so I was still stuck with it for the time being.

Unfortunately, the isolation only made things worse. For some reason, I thought that I would be able to keep a grip on Dekiru if I didn't have to worry about protecting people around me, but without the support of my friends, it only made it that much easier for Dekiru to get a stranglehold over my mind. I began to remember things that happened during my blackouts, things that Dekiru chose to show me about the secret second life I had been living under everyone's noses, including my own.

I was the U.A. traitor. Even though I had returned to the mall that day under the impression that AFO had merely chosen to show mercy, Doppelganger had been working from the shadows all along, feeding information to the League of Villains without even my own conscious awareness of it. I had met with them, talked with them, broken bread with them, made friends with them. Or rather, Dekiru had. Dekiru's connection with the League was not dissimilar to my own connection with my classmates. Dekiru wanted to serve and protect them the very same way. It was jarring and disconcerting to have these feelings flood into me as if they were my own. I felt adoration for Dabi in spite of my disgust at all the lives he'd taken and the way he fought to tarnish his family's name. I felt kinship with Toga even though she had caused my friends so much harm. I loved dishing out gossip with Kurogiri and even missed him when he was captured. I admired the skills of Mr. Compress and I enjoyed the company of Twice and I sympathized with Spinner's conviction to carry on Stain's will.

All of Dekiru's feelings became one with my own, genuine and sincere, and I felt like I was being torn apart. I couldn't protect the people who threatened others that I also wanted to protect, but I couldn't deny the truth in Dekiru's feelings, either. I also couldn't deny the atrocities I had committed while under Dekiru's influence. I didn't deserve to call myself a hero. I may have stopped to help those in need while wandering the desolation that became of Musutafu, but people were right to compare me to a villain. They were right to be wary of my connection to AFO. Even I couldn't trust myself anymore.

When Class 1A came to confront me, I struggled to get away from them as much as Dekiru struggled to fight them off. It came down to me and Bakugo—or rather, Dekiru and Bakugo. He could see through Doppelganger without issue, though, and pinned me down to deliver the shock I needed to come back to my senses. Well, more like the blast I needed. Uraraka chastised him for going overboard, but truth be told, any less power behind it and Dekiru would have seized the opportunity to gain the upper hand. Part of my face was left severely burned afterward, but the words of apology Bakugo shared with me were all the salve I needed to heal.

Although Todoroki came to assist with my capture, he wouldn't look me in the eyes anymore. Uraraka told me that he was still processing the truth of my betrayal of U.A. and couldn't bring himself to forgive me just yet. Even so, despite that, he and the rest of my classmates had come to rescue me from myself. I was heartbroken by the depths of their friendship, so moved that I was finally able to lock Dekiru away, albeit just temporarily.

I was kept in confinement at U.A. once I was brought back, primarily to ease the minds of the civilian refugees who, while they did accept my presence there, were still uneasy about me. However, it was also so that the doctors present could run tests on me in order to devise a way to subdue Doppelganger for good. Their hypothetical solution was still in development when AFO finally attacked, but they had to let me join the fight regardless. It took blood and grit, but we were eventually able to get AFO on his last legs, aided by Shigaraki's will trying to overpower AFO's.

However, it was in that moment that Dekiru awakened once more, breaking out of the imagined prison I had put him in within my mind. He allowed AFO to get a hand on me and we confronted each other in the mind realm where One for All met All for One. Dekiru's corruption caused the vestiges of OFA to begin receding back into the Quirk's subconscious, making it that much more difficult to resist AFO. In the end, I was able to summon the combined power of OFA that resided within me to overpower AFO, at the cost of creating a sort of vacuum that destroyed both of our Quirks.

One for All and All for One were no more, and suddenly Shigaraki and I were just two badly wounded teenagers lying on a battlefield. The war was over. U.A. bested the remaining villains. The threat to Hero society was no more. And I was Quirkless again.

I spent a month comatose, an after-effect of being stripped of my Quirk in that manner. When I awoke, I was visited by All Might first. I couldn't remember how the battle had concluded, my memory of those final moments completely wiped clean, so he filled me in on the details, up to and including what happened to One for All. I was devastated to have lost the very thing that had allowed me to become a hero in the first place, but All Might reminded me that I'd had the spirit of a hero long before I received One for All. Still, I couldn't help lamenting the loss of my dream. Though, it was true that I had fulfilled everything I'd thought being a hero would mean, even if it ended up causing me to do villainous things.

I was stuck doing rehabilitation for six months before they would release me from the prison I was being kept at. Of course, that made sense. I had acted on behalf of the League of Villains, after all, even if at the time I was being influenced by a Quirk that wasn't my own. During that time, All Might continued to visit, and then so did my mom. They began seeing each other and I couldn't have been happier for them. All Might kept me informed about how my classmates were doing at U.A. now that classes had resumed and they were officially send year students. I was happy for them, too, even if I knew I wouldn't be joining them.

On the contrary, however, once my rehabilitation was complete, All Might delivered a letter from Principal Nezu containing the details of my return to U.A.'s hero course. Even though I was Quirkless, they still accepted me back into the school. Perhaps I would never become the hero I could have been with One for All, but there was still a place for me at U.A. nonetheless. I had some catching up to do first, though, of course.

When I did return to U.A. and stepped into the Heights Alliance dorm, all of my classmates—now Class 2A—eagerly welcomed me back, but the first to reach me was, surprisingly, Bakugo. He hugged me. A real, genuine hug, almost too tight to breathe. So much had changed and yet I found that I liked these changes much more than I thought I would. Particularly the part where Bakugo and I not only eased into a bona fide friendship, but finally addressed the romantic tension we had both secretly felt for one another. That part really made it all _{Plus Ultra}.

I also learned over the course of my rehabilitation and return to U.A. that the League of Villains members Spinner, Toga, and Mr. Compress had all been apprehended. Dabi, on the other hand, sadly lost his life during his final confrontation with Endeavor and Todoroki. No matter what they tried to avoid it, Dabi refused to let go of his resentment and more or less forced them to put him down as a last resort. Todoroki was understandably distant because of this, but it also brought him closer to the rest of his family.

The three villains who were caught eventually agreed to their own rehabilitation, though Toga took a little more convincing, given her trauma. I wasn't allowed to visit them for obvious reasons, but I did write them letters. I felt obligated to since I could still remember the bonds I had formed with them as Dekiru. Surprisingly, they even wrote back. The only one I never heard from or about was Shigaraki, but All Might assured me that he was being taken care of at a classified location.

I have no idea when or how it managed to happen, but I distinctly remember Himiko and Uraraka doing each other’s nails at one point in time. They seemed to have gotten along really well ??? Bless their hearts.

Anyway when I graduated U.A., I did actually manage to become a Hero despite still being Quirkless. Rather than fighting out on the front lines, though, I worked from the shadows as a "ninja" of sorts. Since my body was still strong and trained, I could do things most civilians couldn't and I still ended up making a name for myself as the renowned Quirkless Hero: Deku. It wasn't as flashy as I had hoped when I was younger, but, to be completely honest, I'd had my fill of flashy heroics by that point. I appreciated the opportunity to continue helping society from the sidelines, especially since it allowed me to continue working closely with Bakugo.

When All Might told me I couldn’t become a hero without a Quirk, my entire worldview was shattered. The man I looked up to above everyone and everything else had just single-handedly crushed every hope and dream I’d had for the future. Looking back on it now, I can understand why he would have wanted to dissuade me. There were a number of reasons somebody without a Quirk would endure many a hardship on the path to trying to become a hero. At the time, though, I didn’t have that kind of perspective. All I felt was complete and utter devastation and the seeds of a bitter resentment that would grow and fester within me from that moment onward.

I didn’t end up on the scene of the sludge villain’s second attack on Katsuki. I took a different, longer route back home and would only find out about the incident later on the news. As it turned out, Katsuki’s determination to resist the villain was what inspired All Might into action.

I went through a really dark time after that. Depression hit me harder than it ever had before and, frankly, I had no hope for myself anymore. I was contemplating suicide almost every day and the lack of anything to keep myself occupied over the summer didn’t help in the slightest. It was in that timeframe that I packed a bag of the bare essentials and ran away from home in the middle of the night while my mother was asleep. I didn’t bring a single piece of All Might memorabilia with me.

I didn’t know where I was going or what I planned to do, but I felt like I couldn’t stay there anymore. I couldn’t face my mother again knowing that I had given up on everything I had been working toward in hopes of getting into U.A.. It would only have broken her heart a second time and I knew it was already hurting her to see my depressive state get worse and worse every day.

A couple nights into my journey without a destination, I encountered the Hero Killer called Stain. I indirectly bore witness to one of his murders. I was sleeping at the back of an alleyway that night, stomach empty and feet sore from hours and hours of walking. A commotion woke me up and I saw two figures down the alley: Stain and one of the local heroes he had pinned to the wall by the throat.

I remember his words about how heroes had fallen from grace, how All Might was the only “true” hero, and how the rest of them were just pathetic frauds with no real sense of justice. I remember the taste of disgust in my mouth and speaking before my mind had caught up with my actions. I said something to the effect of All Might being the real fraud, an outburst that drew Stain’s attention to me after he had already finished off the hero. He came closer until he was looming over me, that murderous, blood-chilling look in his eye that paralyzed me where I stood.

He asked me to repeat myself, so I did. I told him, despite All Might’s warning against uttering a word of the secret he had revealed to me, that he was only putting on a show for the rest of the world and that his time was coming to an end. Stain grabbed me and warned me that if I were lying, I would regret it, but I only reaffirmed my stance instead of backtracking. He seemed to see the truth in what I was saying and let me go. He said that, if that’s the case, then there truly was no hope for heroes. I couldn’t help but agree.

Stain had a change of perspective then in much the same way that I had. He asked me what I was doing out here by myself in the middle of the night and I told him I had nowhere else to go, so he told me to follow him. Given what I had just said, I had no reason to refuse. From that point on, he took me under his wing. While he had lost what little conviction he had left to reconstruct our heroic society, he found a new goal that he confided in me. He wanted to completely abolish the concept of heroes. If the pillars of “justice” themselves couldn’t even maintain their own moral code, then they had become obsolete.

By the time Shigaraki had recruited Stain to join the League of Villains, I had become a proper apprentice of his. Even though I didn’t have a Quirk, or maybe because of that, he trained me under his own guidance, taught me how to wield a knife and how to kill someone with it. I was scared at first, of course, but every time I would see All Might’s likeness in a shop window or on the TV screens in town, all I could think about was what he told me. If the best of the best himself didn’t believe in a world where anyone could become a hero, then I thought, perhaps, no one should become a hero.

Stain agreed to join the League under the condition that I be included as well. Shigaraki initially expressed distaste at the idea, but Kurogiri managed to convince him that Stain’s assets were enough to make up for any liability I presented as a mere Quirkless boy. Little did they know how much they had underestimated my potential.

I didn’t like Shigaraki, plain and simple. I didn’t like his attitude, I didn’t like his short-sighted approach, and I especially didn’t like the tantrums he threw every time something didn’t go according to plan. I expressed my discontent with Stain in private and I was surprised to find that he agreed despite joining the League so readily. He told me that he never intended to follow Shigaraki’s leadership forever. His current obedience was merely a ruse to gain the other’s trust, but he fully intended on overhauling the entire operation himself. He told me that, should be fail to do so, he would entrust his goals with me instead.

As the League of Villains began recruiting more members, I found myself making moves to put into action what Stain had envisioned for the League’s future. I planted seeds of doubt in the others’ minds about Shigaraki’s intentions for them and his real plans. I sabotaged certain aspects of the League’s movements to paint Shigaraki in a bad light.

Eventually, I managed to catch All for One’s attention. Shigaraki, who had no qualms with expressing his continued distaste for me all this time, begrudgingly told me that I was to meet with his “Master”. He had Kurogiri warp us to AFO’s place of hiding, but before Kurogiri dissipated the gate, AFO told Shigaraki to leave so he could speak with me in private. He pitched a fit over it, but eventually did as asked when AFO raised his voice.

AFO told me he wanted me to take over the Nomu project. He said that it would be a test of sorts to see how I would handle being in a leadership position within the League. It was a step up from what was essentially errand boy status, so I agreed. Shigaraki wasn’t happy when he heard the news, which only delighted me further.

After the display of Quirks during the U.A. sports festival, I took a special interest in some of the students. While Bakugo was amoung them, I knew better than to try to sway him from his path. He was the stubborn, hard-headed type who wouldn’t listen to reason. If I wanted to break down his will enough to question his dreams of becoming a hero, I had to take other measures, starting with his classmates.

After a handful of failed attempts, I did have one success. Todoroki Shoto. Aggrieved by his father and still yet to show any interest in acting like a hero, it was surprisingly easy to convince him to think my way. Thus began my undercover recruitment process, helped along by Toga, who was particularly good at infiltrating the school and planting the seeds of doubt in students’ heads.

Called to an impromptu meeting by Todoroki at a nondescript location, he brought along some of his classmates who had similarly lost their faith in heroes thanks to recent events orchestrated by the League of Villains. Denki Kaminari, Kyoka Jiro, and Mina Ashido. They, along with Todoroki, would all become my spies. My operation was growing larger by the minute and I couldn’t have been happier that I had done it all on my own.

Of course, when Shigaraki caught wind of this, he immediately took his complaints to AFO. According to Kurogiri, who witnessed the entire exchange through his warp gate, AFO cruelly reprimanded Shigaraki for his impudence, saying that my forward-thinking initiative was one to be emulated rather than criticized. AFO then had Kurogiri take me to him alongside Shigaraki, who looked as though he were in the midst of a full-blown mental breakdown on the floor. I ignored him.

AFO offered me a reward: any Quirk of my choosing that he had at his disposal. He offered powers of all kinds in an attempt to appeal to some desire within me to seize it. I turned him down, much to his confusion. I explained that I didn’t need a Quirk to do what I had to do. All Might was right in that I couldn’t become a hero without a Quirk. Instead of that, I would become the Anti-Hero. Neither a hero nor a villain, but a third party who would dismantle the foundations of each faction from the inside out, starting with the League of Villains. By that point, Dabi, Toga, Twice, Mr. Compress, Spinner, and even Kurogiri were wrapped around my fingers. I told AFO then and there that if he wanted a place in the new world order, he would be wise to join me.

He laughed and said he’d consider it, but for the time being he would watch from afar without interference. He claimed to have taken a keen interest in seeing the fruits of my labour and I was determined to show him that I was capable of achieving my goals. Without a Quirk.

My next recruitment target was Hitoshi Shinso. His Quirk was particularly interesting when I saw it used in the sports festival and I could only see the merit in having it at my disposal. I planned an abduction scheme, one facilitated in much the same way as Bakugo had been kidnapped in canon, and succeeded in containing Shinso in a secret underground facility that was intended to be used to expand the Nomu project before I terminated it.

Despite everything I had to say, every trick and ace up my sleeve, every word that I twisted, Shinso didn’t budge an inch. He was steadfast in his ambitions and he reminded me a bit of Bakugo. I asked him why he thought he could make a difference in a decaying society. He asked me why I thought I could make a difference without a Quirk.

I had avoided all of his questions up until then, but that one set me off. Once he had me under his control, he forced me to untie him and took me as his hostage before my other pawns could make a move. I remember Dabi saying something to him along the lines of “Now who’s not acting very heroic?”

Shinso effectively subdued me and carried me off a fair distance from the hideout once he managed to escape through all the traps that had been set as precautions. Tied up and gagged, I was more or less helpless when his mind control wore off. He kept going on and on about how sad it made him to see a kid his age so burdened and hurting that I had resorted to villainy, and that he would promise to become a hero that I could look up to again. I hated how much those words stung.

I was brought to a villain containment location—not quite a prison, but rather a temporary place of holding—while police and heroes alike interrogated me. I didn’t say a word to any of them. I refused to speak to anyone. I overheard some of the discussions about what they should do with me. I was Quirkless, after all, but I was also the mastermind behind a large-scale villainous organization that had caused so much destruction and even death. Some of them speculated over whether or not I had an invisible Quirk that made me smarter. It was funny to see the confused and mildly horrified looks on their faces when several tests produced negative results on any Quirk genes.

Finally, they brought in All Might. All Might, who had turned me away all those months ago. All Might, whose face fell with shock and guilt upon seeing me. All Might, who knew without having to ask that he was the reason for the chaos inside U.A.'s walls. He was the first person I spoke to, laughing in his face when he attempted to plea with me to cooperate. He asked me why I had resorted to villainy and I corrected him that I wasn't a villain—I was an Anti-Hero. I explained how he had opened my eyes to the pain heroes were causing and that I knew, now, that reformation was necessary. Heroes and villains alike needed to be abolished in order to start anew, but my plans didn't stop there. I told him that Quirks were a disease that made people believe they were better than others, and that as long as Quirks existed, there would be no peace. I was going to eradicate Quirks in their entirety, once and for all.

I ended up marrying Melissa Shield and we had two children together: first a son and then a daughter a couple years later.

This timeline included the events of Heroes Rising wherein part of One for All was transferred to Bakugo. From what I can recall, the Quirk essentially split itself into two, not cutting it in half, but duplicating it entirely. I don't know what exactly caused it to happen that way, but if I had to guess, it probably has something to do with the previous hosts' being reluctant to part with their chosen successor, but also knowing that passing along the power to someone else was essential at the time.

Bakugo only suffered temporary amnesia after the incident and gradually regained his memory of what had happened. It became increasingly difficult to keep One for All a secret after that, so we eventually had to come out with it as well as explain how we both had the Quirk now. It was a rough time to say the least.

On the bright side, with two heroes in possession of One for All, the world couldn't have been in better hands once we became Pros. It's why I felt comfortable enough to get married and have children—I knew my family would thrive in the safety we heroes had created for them.

It's also worth noting that Melissa had transferred to UA while we were students to study in the support course. She and Mei became really great friends and went on to be business partners.

Pretty sure Bakugo and Kirishima ended up together, but they did stumble through a couple of failed relationships themselves—and a marriage, in Bakugo's case. Kirishima and Mina got engaged, but never went through with it even after Mina found out she was pregnant. Bakugo and Uraraka really did rush into things and god knows how that even happened, but it definitely crashed and burned about as much as one would have expected it to. Kirishima and Mina were still friends even after their break-up, but I don't think Bakugo and Uraraka ever made amends, which was...really awkward for me as the in-between guy, not to mention the tension in their joint custody over their kid.

If you ask me, I think everyone got way too over their heads at the first sign of peace in so long and, honestly, I can't blame them, but it definitely sucked knowing those kids had to grow up in those situations. Nothing is ever really perfect, though, I guess.

YES I thought Dabi was hot YES I would have fucked him if given half a chance NO I don't care about your opinion.

Real talk though I hope he got some kind of therapy and is doing better now.

My timeline was largely composed of D&D-inspired elements. As such, I was the Dragonborne heir to the Draconic Empire, a realm of notably barbarian tribesmen who once were a nomadic race, but adopted a more sedentary lifestyle after the erection of the empire. We were constantly expanding our territory by either force or negotiation, but mostly force.

The Dragonborne’s primary industry was blacksmithing. We weren't exceptional miners like dwarves, but given the right materials, we were capable of making some extraordinary tools and weapons and the like. Since we more or less had total immunity to fire and lava alike, the process of metalworking was a simple task.

Dragonborne were said to have descended directly from dragons and thus possessed dragon-like traits, such as wings, scales, claws, fangs, tails, and horns.

I was autistic, but seeing as Dragonborne looked down upon anything that could be construed as weakness, my mother made a point of shaming and ridiculing me into hiding my more unsightly symptoms as much as possible.

Like most Dragonborne, I was able to breathe fire, the range of which varied depending on whether or not I ate spicy food or went into a rage. My sweat also produced a chemical that could heal burns, and my internal body temperature heated my blood and tears to the point that they would start to steam upon contact with air.

I resented my mother for raising me to be the same cruel, bloodthirsty tyrant she was. The pressure to become a "proper" ruler by her standards eventually became too much for me and I departed from the empire's stronghold unannounced to travel the world in hopes of "finding myself".

Along this journey I met Eijiro, a dragon cursed into the shape of a human for offending the Dragon Lord. There was some set of requirements that needed to be met for him to regain his true form, but I don't remember what it was. He did eventually break the curse, though, and we became life partners.

I also met Izuku, an adventuring Paladin who had trained under the great hero All Might to inherit his mission of destroying the dark wizard known as All For One, who sought to absorb all the magic in the world to become a god. I didn't get along well with him at first despite a begrudging admiration for his strength and willpower to tackle such a dangerous quest, but somehow we ended up travelling together anyway. Along the way my feelings for him gradually changed and grew into affection, which led to us becoming romantically involved. Of course that confession would happen at the worst possible moment while we were in the heat of battle against the League of Villains.

Before that battle came to pass, though, we also met Prince Shoto, the youngest, prized heir apparent of King Enji and Queen Rei of the Shizuoka Kingdom. Despite having two older siblings (or rather three, on paper), Shoto's affinity for both fire and ice magic caused his father to denounce both Fuyumi and Natsuo's claim to the throne. Shoto was out on a quest of his own to prove his worth in the eyes of his kingdom by securing an alliance with their neighbour and rival, the Aichi Kingdom. He was to meet with Princess Momo, Commander of the Royal Guard, and her lieutenant Tenya. Izuku was moved by the prince's story and dragged me and Eijiro along to accompany him on his quest, naturally.

(Truthfully I didn't even have to go. I was just following him around everywhere at that point. And Eijiro was following me. It just kinda happened that way. But if anybody asks, we were FORCED.)

The eldest Todoroki sibling, Toya, had been presumed dead as a child due to being caught in a forest fire caused by his untempered fire magic and King Enji's harsh treatment and negligence. However, he was actually revealed to have survived, having escaped the fire and adopted a new life with the League of Villains under the alias Dabi, his single goal being to disgrace the Todoroki family's name.

Long story short, we continued to run into several of the others, some of whom joined our party as we travelled, taking quest after quest (largely due in part to Izuku's inability to leave well enough alone). We fought against the League which later became part of the Liberation Army (an uprising of rebels and outlaws who wanted to throw the world into anarchy) and eventually confronted All For One. Dude didn't even stand a chance.

(He put up a hell of a fight and Izuku and I almost died, but that's besides the point.)

After all was said and done, we returned to the Draconic Empire so that I could challenge my mother for the throne and end the age of tyranny once and for all. With Eijiro by my side, his devotion inspired the long-slumbering Elder Dragons to rise up in my defense, even summoning the Dragon Lord from his keep to commend Eijiro for his feats of valor and achieving redemption for his past faults. The Elder Dragons banished my mother to the wildlands as punishment for continuing the Bakugo lineage's crime of suppressing the dragons so that our own bloodline would remain the most pure. I didn't even know about that until they revealed the truth, and subsequently released my father from the magical prison she'd kept him in when all this time I was made to believed he'd died. In fact, he was a full-blooded dragon himself.

The fucked up implications of all that aside, I was glad to finally meet my father and I proudly took up the throne as the next Draconic Emperor, with the blessing of the Elder Dragons and the Dragon Lord himself. Izuku was technically dubbed Emperor as well as my mate, but only on paper. He wasn't so much interested in ruling as he was continuing to adventure and help people all around the realm and I respected that. Eijiro served as my right-hand advisor in his place, and though Izuku and I didn't get to see each other that much, I still joined him on reckless adventures from time to time.

Since neither of us could produce an heir, I established a new rite of ascension that mandated only the Dragonborne who could best me in single combat could claim the throne. They didn't have to kill me for it (I didn't have a death wish); just beat me. I figured that way, if the day came that someone did challenge me for the title of Emperor or Empress and won, I could relinquish my duties and spend the rest of what remained of my lifetime with my mate. It was a win-win scenario.

The Hokage were Madara, Tobirama, Kagami, Minato, Orochimaru, Itachi, and Sakura.

Obito was the captain of Team 7. Kakashi didn’t have Obito’s Sharingan so neither of them covered their eyes, but Obito still had that big facial scar from the Third War.

When my father mysteriously disappeared without a trace, I resolved to defect from the village in order to find him my own way because I was unsatisfied with the pace at which the village was trying to find him. I became the leader of the new Akatsuki, which had almost entirely different members than in canon. The original Akatsuki founded by Yahiko, Konan, and Nagato perished with its leaders during the battle against Hanzo.

Hinata defected from the village with me to help me start the Akatsuki. We found and recruited Jiraiya along the way, who was a fugitive for betraying the village during the Second War and abandoning his teammates. So far the other members I remember are Gaara, Suigetsu, Karin, Jugo, Kimimaro, Ryuzetsu, Zabuza, Haku, and Zetsu.

Since Jiraiya oversaw the emergence of the original Akatsuki, I allowed him to act as the organization’s figurehead to draw attention away from myself per Zetsu’s suggestion. Zetsu attempted to manipulate me to reach his end goal of resurrecting Kaguya in rather unconventional ways, but eventually he convinced me to form a plan to force Orochimaru, the interim Hokage after the mysterious disappearance of my father, to use their scientific knowledge to recreate the Rinnegan using the remainder of Madara’s DNA from within his crypt.

Because I only possessed Asura’s half of the spiritual chakra needed to awaken the Rinnegan, the plan was to infuse Madara’s essence into myself so that I would gain the doujutsu. I intended to use this power to hasten my search for Minato, but Zetsu had a different idea in mind.

However, I didn’t get the chance to make use of Orochimaru’s results by the time they finished with their experimentation. Minato’s whereabouts were revealed when he escaped the prison Zetsu had crafted for him, having been the one to abduct my father in the first place. He tried to warn me about Zetsu, but Zetsu took advantage of our distraction to “possess” me with his black side.

He forced me to fight my weakened father while White Zetsu kept Orochimaru occupied. The battle began in the Hokage’s office, but migrated to a large open field where both Minato and I could activate our jinchuriki cloaks without damaging the village too much. Both halves of Kurama were distressed at having to fight each other, much like my father and I, but Black Zetsu persisted until I delivered the final blow.

I watched my father die at my own hands. The grief was such that even Kurama felt intimidated by the dark intent broiling within me. My hatred tamed Kurama’s chakra to the point that I could fully access my Tailed Beast Mode. I very nearly caused the second Kyubi attack on Konoha, so lost in rage was I, but Sasuke arrived in time to subdue me with his Sharingan. He let me grieve in his arms for a while before ANBU came to apprehend me.

I was locked up for the time it took several villages to track down and apprehend the rest of the Akatsuki, eventually returning Hinata to Konoha. Needless to say she wasn’t very happy with me, but she was released from holding along with me when the time came. When Jiraiya was brought back, he was kept in a special holding centre where only authorized personnel and Orochimaru were allowed to enter. Zabuza and Haku fell off the radar entirely, Kimimaro was killed in the efforts to capture him, Gaara was returned to his family in Suna, and Karin, Suigetsu, and Jugo went into hiding for the time being.

I actually bonded with Hinata quite a bit while we were in the Akatsuki. She showed me parts of her softer side that I didn’t know she had and we shared each other’s first kiss. We were never really a couple until after we came back to Konoha, though. I was confused about my feelings for both her and Sasuke, but in the end we all worked things out together. Sasuke and Hinata were already good friends from childhood since their families were close and it was only so long before she fell for Sasuke’s stupid charms too.

Sakura had become Orochimaru’s apprentice at some point along the way. Instead of becoming a medic nin, she became a renowned scientist. She spent a lot of her time in the village while I was away to prepare for the worst case scenario if the time came to confront me. Meanwhile, Sasuke spent as much time as possible looking for me and eventually came across Tsunade and trained under her. He inherited the Strength of a Hundred Seal and learned a lot about medical ninjutsu, though he mostly utilized it for offense rather than healing.

Hinata, Sasuke, and I had only one child, a daughter named Miyavi. When Hinata got pregnant, we weren’t sure which of us was the father. Sakura and Orochimaru kept us up to date on the baby’s progression, which began as two fetuses, but one absorbed the other in the womb. When Miyavi was born, she had the Rinnegan. Sakura theorized that this happened because two eggs were fertilized during conception (I hope I don’t need to explain the nitty gritty details).

Miyavi was eventually placed on a genin team with Mitsuki and Kawaki. Kawaki was an orphan of Konoha at the time, having been found and rescued from Kara by Orochimaru after Itachi succeeded them as Hokage. No one knew much about Kawaki’s past and the experimentation he underwent, which made many in the village distrust him, much the same as Mitsuki.

Royalty AU. I was originally the prince of the City of Josai, formerly the Seijo Empire, but I inherited the throne at age eighteen after my parents' untimely deaths.

Iwaizumi was the Commander of our kingdom's order of knights known as the Royal Crownsguard. Matsukawa and Hanamaki were both knights under his command.

The Oikawa family was host to a bloodline curse that began with some of its earliest ancestors. The curse was that, after knowing true love, we would awaken within ourselves a transformation. This transformation manifested in the form of a dragon, different for each accursed member of the bloodline, which would trigger immediately after awakening and every subsequent month on the same day. Transforming back into our human forms was only achievable through total peace of mind, which normally only happened once we fell asleep as doing so was extremely difficult.

The curse was placed upon the bloodline by a witch scorned by the royal family in a bygone era.

My mother and father had both died in battle, for the City of Josai had been at war with the Shiratorizawa Principality.

Kyotani was a mercenary sent to assassinate me. When he attempted to infiltrate Aoba Castle in the dead of night, he encountered Matsukawa and Hanamaki first, and though he was able to best them and get through their guard, by the time he reached my bed chambers, Iwaizumi was already there waiting for him. When Iwaizumi defeated him, having awoken me during the scuffle, he commended Kyotani for his strength and gave him a choice: accept his demise in the bowels of the castle dungeons to await his execution the next day, or train directly underneath Iwaizumi in preparation to join the ranks of Seijo's knights. Kyotani accepted the latter option, practically under duress and much to my own apprehension, but he would turn out to be quite the powerful and loyal asset.

Kageyama was a young usurper of another, smaller kingdom, who made a name for himself as the Crow King. He commanded an elite group of warriors who specialized in different forms of combat. Hinata was his right-hand man and most lethal soldier.

Ushijima was the prince of Shiratorizawa, though his father still ruled above him for a time until Kageyama slew him, albeit underhandedly. It was for this reason that Ushijima later proposed a truce between Shiratorizawa and Seijo in order to battle against Karasuno's forces. While I was reluctant to accept, the Council who acted as a sort of royal advisory committee convinced me that it would be a beneficial alliance in the long run.

The Miya twins were bounty hunters, and bloody good ones at that. They had a hit on Hinata that drove the three of them into the Nekoma Clan's territory within the Cattswood forest, coincidentally at the same time that I was traveling through it on the way to the neutral territory that served as a meeting point for all the nations without fear of bloodshed, where I was to meet with now King Ushijima to discuss the details of our treaty.

Hinata and the Miya twins crossed paths with our caravan, resulting in a bout of fighting between the three factions until clansmen of the Nekoma intervened, warning us of disturbing their forest. While the Cattswood wasn't exactly part of the neutral territory, its residents defended it furiously, and demanded to "escort" the unlikely group to the borders of the forest without incident lest they finish the jobs themselves.

There was a certain, strange camaraderie that developed amoung us in the day's time that it took to reach the edge of the forest that bordered the neutral territory. Along the way, we were accompanied by the chief of Nekoma himself, Kuroo Tetsuro, who, while gruff and off-putting, also had a sense of humour and cut right through the tension with ease. We also caught a glimpse of the cat-and-mouse dynamic the twins had created with Hinata throughout their chase.

The Nekoma were, in essence, a clan of ailurianthropes—those with the ability to shapeshift into cats—who occasionally bartered out their services as mercenaries to the nations that neighboured the Cattswood. They had serviced the City of Josai a number of times in the past, but so had they serviced Karasuno and Shiratorizawa, amoung others, which meant they were neither friend nor foe. After traveling with them for a time, however, I couldn't help but view them as promising potential allies, if not friends.

The meeting with King Ushijima also included the likes of the Fukurodani Republic, who bordered Seijo to the north. The nation was represented by its president, Bokuto, his two older sisters who served as his guard, his witch Akaashi, and his close advisor Yukie Shirofuku. I myself was accompanied by Iwaizumi, Kyotani, Hanamaki, Matsukawa, and my advisor Yahaba, who was in training with the Council. Ushijima brought along a scrappy-looking right-hand man (Tendo), his guards Semi and Shirabu, and Goshiki, who was supposed to be some sort of scribe, I guess.

Fukurodani wanted in on the alliance as well, despite having no direct grudges with Karasuno. They wanted to offer their magical forces, the existence of which had been the primary cause of tension between Fukurodani and Seijo for many generations. I was reluctant to accept and highly uncomfortable with the witch's presence. Similarly, Ushijima's entourage didn't hesitate to voice their reservations about allying with Seijo.

The conference lasted three days, during which time we could do nothing but argue. It didn't help that we were sharing quarters with the bounty hunters and the Karasuno warrior, whose constant antics offered no respite, seeing as they were forbidden from attacking one another on neutral land. In the end, none of us could come to an agreement other than to adjourn the conference and reconvene in a fortnight for reconsideration.

The finer details of what followed are a bit foggy, but I do remember reluctantly marching into war with Fukurodani and Shiratorizawa forces alike at our side to face Karasuno, who was flanked by Inarizaki and Itachiyama troops.

Sometime in the in between, I had fallen for Iwaizumi. A part of me always knew I would, but having been raised by my parents' insistence on political marriages and urging against "selfish love", it took me far longer to come to terms with it. We had grown up together, never apart, always destined to be the prince and his royal commander. Such was our bloodlines' decree. I realized the depth of my feelings the night a formal declaration of war was announced, when the weight of knowing what I would have to do as the city's fledgling king broke me down to my core and Iwaizumi sat by my side through it all, secluded in the castle gardens with nothing but the moon's glow to witness our tender first kiss.

...And then I changed. The Oikawa bloodline curse took root and sincere vulnerability twisted into shock and horror when my body mangled itself into that of a dragon, none too painfully. The scariest part was that I was still me, I could still think and feel as I always had, but none of it made any sense in the form that I had taken. What hurt the most, though, was not the transformation itself. It was the fear and ensuing rage in Iwaizumi's eyes when he drew his sword and convinced himself he had been tricked by a shapeshifter of some sort hellbent on attacking the castle and its throne.

I fled into the mountains far to the east of the City of Josai that night, the rest lost to history after I woke up the next dawn naked and stranded and human again. Well, as human as a cursed dragon shapeshifter could be. Except I wasn't entirely stranded. I was in a large cave, but it wasn't abandoned like one might find meandering about in the wilderness. It was well-kept, lived in, but still undeniably wild. Something lived there, but it wasn't human.

It was another dragon, a real dragon, the first one I had ever seen. I, like everyone else in the world, was certain that my ancestors had hunted the creatures to extinction some years ago, the last sighting during my grandfather's reign, still recent enough to bleed into whispers and rumours in pubs and plague the nighttime stories parents told their children to scare them into staying in bed, but distant enough that people chuckled at the notion that any could still exist.

I was still so stricken by the sight that I barely even questioned when the beast began speaking and I could understand it, respond without thinking, and only then blanched in realization. The dragon spoke of the curse, laughed at the irony of those who hunted its kind for sport now destined to change into the very things they feared and loathed. It spoke of the witch who cast the spell in the first place and how dragonkind had been forced into hiding in spite of the pride and honour they carried. The dragon called it deplorable and all but spat on me with a quip about how it was much more satisfying to watch an Oikawa wither in their curse than put them out of their misery.

I remember crying. Not out of shame or despair for my fate, but out of sadness, out of pity, lamenting what had become of such proud and legendary creatures that once ruled the land, the sky, the sea, that once enjoyed the worship of temples that regarded them as nothing short of gods. I wept for that dragon and all of its kind, and I remember making an oath to myself that I would see to it that dragons would once again reclaim their rightful place in the world if it were the last thing I did. The dragon was shocked, and it scoffed, clearly skeptical, and told me to prove that I could possibly make something like that come to pass with my own two hands. I remember leaving that cave with every intention of doing exactly that.

The vast majority of my timeline is based around the fic Worthless Pride. (Apologies to the author. It kind of just happened.) I recommend giving that a read to gain a better understanding of the events of my life as an alpha pack leader with a vision for the future in an ancient world of kingdoms ruled by corrupt kings and malicious ne'er-do-wells who favoured the old, barbaric ways.

One notable difference was that Matsukawa and Hanamaki played major roles in my life after meeting Toru. Matsukawa was a merman and Hanamaki a beta assassin from the Western kingdom originally sent by Toru's father, the king, to dispose of his "disgraced" son. As Hanamaki explained, the king evidently thought this the perfect ruse just after forging an already tenuous alliance via my arranged union with Toru.

Needless to say, Hanamaki didn't succeed in his mission, primarily of his own volition. He had happened across Matsukawa whilst observing the Southern castle from the beach. As he told it, the Goddess's voice lured him toward the water, but the ethereal merman perched on a half-submerged boulder had ever so casually knocked him back to his senses just in time.

Merfolk were, for a long time, just a part of the legends that surrounded the Southern kingdom's beliefs when it came to their connection with the sea. Merfolk came into being as the departed souls of Southerners whom the Goddess claimed as her favoured children, or so the stories went. They were thought to be, in essence, ghosts, or at the very least spirits, but more profound. Nobody had actually lain eyes on one for centuries, though, until Matsukawa presented himself.

He did confirm that his kind indeed carried the souls of the departed, albeit how they came to be was more akin to reincarnation, a "blessing" of sorts from the Goddess. Alas, while they were given new life in a new form, they were bound to the sea and forbidden from seeking those from their mortal lives.

Understandably enamoured, Hanamaki allowed Matsukawa to convince him to spare Toru, for this was the Goddess's will, and instead watch him from a distance, like a protective shadow. Of course, it was only a matter of time before I found him. I very nearly killed him, too, if he hadn't pled his case so convincingly. I found it strange that a foreigner (more specifically, a Westerner) had so much insight on Southern folklore and tradition, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt until he told me his story.

I often met with Hanamaki in secret and during one of our meetings I was introduced to Matsukawa. With this proof to substantiate Hanamaki's tale, I had more than enough reason to place my trust in him, such that (after being reassured that Toru did not know of this man during his years spent in the Western kingdom) I selected Hanamaki as one of the personal guards to attend Toru when I was forced to leave him at Meili's castle under the guise of making him my paramour.

I was initially surprised to learn that the two had gotten on rather well during their time together there and, once again, very nearly killed Hanamaki when I could smell him all over my wife, but he assured me that he had merely been summoned to Toru's chambers for comfort some nights and nothing more. You know, as if sharing a bed with my wife in any fashion wouldn't piss off the raging beast of a pack leader's inner alpha. It's fine, though. It's fine. Totally fine.

(It wasn't fine. I had to enlist Kyoutani's aid in an impromptu wrestling match just to let off some steam. He told me after that that he was never going to wrestle with me while I was angry ever again. I didn't blame him.)

A lot of things mostly stayed the same, but I gave up on my volleyball career after high school due to losing part of my left leg in a surfing accident the summer after graduating junior high. I was attacked by a shark and it had to be amputated. I still played volleyball during high school since I was determined not to let it hold me back, even taking ballet classes on the side to improve my balance and coordination, but I ultimately decided it wasn't for me.

The main factor in leaving behind sports altogether was the attention. A lot of sports equipment companies wanted me to sponsor their gear advertised toward those with disabilities and while I admired the cause, I couldn't handle being a spotlight in the media for that sort of thing.

I went to college for art to pursue a career in being a mangaka instead. I had always loved to draw and it was the perfect, inconspicuous job to pursue my passions. My most successful manga was more or less a self-insert story to write about my experience as an amputee in a fun, not so depressing way and it did really well in certain communities.

Needless to say I never surfed again after the accident, but I did take up skateboarding as a hobby that I kept mostly to myself. It served as a close substitute for the feeling I enjoyed so much when I surfed without triggering memories of the accident.

Bokuto was extremely supportive of me during my recovery period when we met in high school, often offering the encouragement I needed to keep trying when it seemed like I was falling behind on our team. It was part of the reason we became such close friends so quickly. He made me promise not to quit volleyball after he graduated the year before me so that he could come back to watch me play on my own in games. That was very embarrassing of him and I made sure to tell him that, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't try to show off for him when I knew he was coming to watch.

Naturally I returned the favour by coming to watch all of his games once he joined the MSBY Black Jackals and Japan Men's Volleyball Team. We even agreed to participate in the collaboration video Kuroo approached them about, despite my no longer playing the sport. He said Kenma had suggested they still offer to include me since I had unique insight into a part of volleyball most people don't get to see and that it would lend itself greatly toward inspiring younger players. Bokuto would not let me turn down the offer, of course.

Accidentally killed someone and immediately called up Matsukawa because obviously.

Of course he helped me hide the body. Then we had to go on the run. Dude literally dropped everything and became a fugitive with me. Ultimate homie.

We managed to stay under the radar in Japan for a couple months, but along the way we ended up having to kill more people that were after me for killing the first guys.

Eventually we just had to leave Japan entirely.

Okay so like here's what happened. I was between jobs, just a couple of years out of high school, no degree, sleeping on Matsukawa's couch because my parents kicked me out of theirs. I was DISTRAUGHT. Weed wasn't working the way it used to, so I, like a fool, decided to try to get my hands on something stronger.

This was a bad idea because 1) I didn't know shit or fuck about most drugs even though I talked a big game, 2) I was laughably inexperienced with drug deals and did not expect to get ripped off so blatantly right out the gate, and 3) I'm an idiot.

The deal itself went smoothly. I met the guy behind a building in the middle of the night, got the goods in exchange for a hefty chunk of the measly pocket change I had in my bank account, and we went about our business. Got home and experienced the best high of my life, so naturally I kept going back for more. At around the sixth or seventh transaction in as many weeks, I started to notice that I was not getting nearly as much of a buzz as I was paying for.

I confronted the dude about it, he got all testy, and all of a sudden there was a gun in his hand. Now picture this for me: a fledgling drug junkie desperate for a high with not a whole lot to lose. At the time I felt more like a cornered animal whose hand was being forced to act rather than some miserable misfit simply learning the hard lessons of life who could have easily backed away and taken the L. I did not take the L.

It happened really fast and the details are a little blurry to say the least, but to make a long story short, I shot him in the gut. I didn't even care about the drugs at that point. I had just killed a man. I fucking ran right back home to Matsukawa freaking the fuck out. I didn't even hesitate telling him what happened. He was pissed, of course, but surprisingly level-headed, all things considered. Like, he was frighteningly calm about the whole situation. He was more worried about the fact that I just left the body in a dingy back alley rather than the more glaring fact that I KILLED SOMEBODY.

So anyway he makes me take him back to the scene of the crime and then he just. Loads up the body in the trunk of his car and starts driving off into buttfuck nowhere. All the while I'm just sitting there like. I didn't know what to say. I felt like he should have been more pissed or whatever but he just looked normal as could be. Well, he did have this look in his eye that was honestly still just a little bit terrifying but he didn't say anything the entire time.

He took us out to some forested road and turned off down a path that looked like it very specifically was not made for cars, parked a little ways out, then just got out without a word and started dragging the body into the brush. At this point I was back to freaking out and I got out to follow him and just TRY to get him to say something, but he didn't open his mouth until we came up on a steep bank that led down to a river and he just. Dropped the body down there. Like he was taking out the trash.

Then he looked at me and said, "This never happened. You've never met that man before in your life. You stop doing drugs, you get clean, and if anybody asks where you were tonight, you say you were home all day so I can be your alibi."

LIKE BITCH WHAT??????

So that's what I did because like what the fuck else am I supposed to do?? It still weighed on me, though. I couldn't stop thinking about what I'd done and how Matsukawa had handled it. The cops never came around, but we did see the news report about a body discovered at the dam a couple cities away.

But the cops were the least of our worries. I had finally gotten a job at some diner or something and was taking a "smoke" break out back when a car pulled up and a couple guys started getting out. Somehow I knew they were after me and I just fucking bolted. The diner was in the rougher part of town, lots of alleys and uneven pavement and non-functional street lamps. They chased me for a few blocks in their car, always right around the next corner no matter how many turns I took to try to throw them off.

I definitely was not thinking straight while trying to get away from them, so maybe climbing the next ladder I saw in an alley that led up to the roof of the building wasn't my brightest idea ever. I made it about halfway up before the car appeared in the alley below and they got out to pursue me. They weren't shooting (yet), probably so as not to start drawing unwanted attention, which was a small blessing. But when I got to the top, I was basically trapped. They were coming up the ladder and I wasn't fucking Spider-Man so jumping across rooftops wasn't exactly in the cards.

I managed to kick off the first guy as they crested the top of the ladder and he fell directly on the hood of the car below, setting off the horn. There was still one guy left on the ladder and two more got out of the back of the car with guns in hand. I was so fucked.

I sent my phone's location to Matsukawa in a panic. There was no way I was getting through a coherent phone call, much less a coherent text message, so I just hoped and prayed he would get the idea.

I found a loose pipe of some sort and hid behind one of those big blocky things on rooftops, whatever they're called. All three men were on the roof then and I could hear them closing in. When the first one came around the corner, I managed to take out his fucking kneecaps with the pipe and then whacked him over the head while I had the chance. That gave me some time before the other two came rushing in.

Don't ask me how I avoided getting shot at first because I have no fucking idea. I knocked the gun out of one guy's hand and took cover again when the other one started shooting. The discarded gun was only a few feet away, but I didn't have any cover to go and grab it. I was playing cat and mouse with the two left for as long as I could before the sound of tires screeching came from the streets below. We weren't too far away from where I lived considering how far I'd run, so it was no wonder how Matsukawa managed to get there so quickly.

The distraction was just what I needed to lunge out from my hiding spot and clock the one who still had a gun over the head. The other guy looked like his hand was still injured, but he made a pass for one of the guns on the ground. Matsukawa, bless his goddamn soul, came up the ladder then and there were two gunshots. The last guy dropped like a bag of rocks.

Later, while we were speeding away from the scene in Matsukawa's car, I asked him where he got the gun and he casually explained that he took it from the drug dealer he'd helped dispose of a couple weeks ago. You know, since my fingerprints were all over it by then.

We got home and he told me to start packing and I was like??? What the fuck. He said we couldn't stay there. Someone could have seen me at the diner, or on that street, and it just wasn't safe.

Now up until this point Matsukawa had insisted on acting like everything was normal and that his best friend and roommate wasn't a murderer. Of course it had only been a matter of time before that wasn't feasible anymore, so unbeknownst to me, he had already come up with a contingency plan for a situation just such as this. We were both killers now, but Matsukawa definitely didn't seem as stressed out about it was I was. Yeah, he was a mortician and dealt with dead bodies all the time, but this was on a whole new level.

We stayed on the run in cheap motels and shit while we tried to figure out what to do from there. There was a warrant out for my arrest by that point because of course they found my fingerprints on that stupid fucking pipe we left behind. And the people who had come after me? They were in the goddamn Yakuza. We were doubly screwed.

Life was hard for a while. Oikawa and Iwaizumi kept trying to get in contact with us; no doubt they'd heard the news, but neither of us wanted to risk getting them involved. The next time we had an encounter with the Yakuza, we were ready. I did end up getting shot that time, and Matsukawa didn't hesitate to gun them down.

There were always police everywhere we went. We just couldn't get away from them. We had a few more close encounters, and then one night while we were hiding out in some shady inn planning our next move, I finally caved and called Oikawa without Matsukawa knowing. It was driving me nuts going completely off the radar while our friends worried their heads off about us. Oikawa was righteously pissed off, as he had every right to be, but he, too, expressed more worry for our well-being than anything else. By the end of the conversation, he had bought us both plane tickets to Argentina. Matsukawa wasn't very happy about the fact that I had contacted someone behind his back, but even he couldn't deny that getting out of the country was our best bet.

Surprisingly enough, this whole experience had brought us closer together than we had ever been. It was never any secret that there had always been something between us left unspoken, intimate moments we shared without ever addressing them after the fact, and there was some sick excitement in what we were doing that had led to frenzied, desperate tumbles in disgusting hotels and in the back of his car once or twice. We never bothered putting a label on it, but it was there.

I mean, come on. Who wouldn't get turned on watching a devastatingly attractive man kill people for you? I can't say I knew exactly what he saw in me on the other hand, but like hell was I going to question it. It was almost like he had just been waiting for an excuse to have me to himself.

Anyway. We went to Argentina and Oikawa set us up with a pretty sweet deal. Unsurprisingly, he had told Iwaizumi everything, and the night we flew in, he had us on video call to chew us out for our stupidity and recklessness, and then he chewed out OIKAWA for endangering himself by getting involved. None of us could deny that it was an extremely messy situation, and yeah, maybe Matsukawa and I were international fugitives now, but we were able to keep a low profile for a few years until things settled down in Japan.

We never risked moving back, though. Argentina had become a home for us, and Iwaizumi came to visit on occasion. He never really looked at me or Matsukawa anymore, and if he did, he had this look in his eyes like he didn't know who we were anymore. It hurt, a little, but it was to be expected. Oikawa, at least, still treated us like his old friends, even if he were maybe a little overly nice sometimes and it felt as if he were actually worried we'd do something heinous if he stepped out of line. Needless to say, nothing was ever the same, but Matsukawa and I were never caught and were able to live out our lives in relative normalcy. As normal as could be for two criminals who had gotten away with murder on numerous occasions and maybe didn't always live strictly by the law anymore.

Some random tidbits of stuff: we thought it would be both disgustingly cute and stupidly ironic if, instead of paying for a slab of concrete to imprint our hands in, we just found a nice strip of freshly poured road pavement and imprinted our hands there instead.

Married the love of my life A.K.A. OmiOmi A.K.A. Sakusa Kiyoomi.

That's it that's all you need to know.

(JK I'll add more when I get more memories lel)

People from select bloodlines could change into dragons and were considered invaluable warriors, even though there were many accounts of rogue dragon-borne wreaking havoc. Most dragon-born families were "protected" (a fancy term for imprisoned, if not enslaved) by the realm in which they lived and forced to serve in that realm's military. There was an illusion of honour and prestige, but dragon-borne freedoms were extremely limited. They were little more than prized possessions, like exotic pets for others to control and flaunt.

I was dragon-borne, but when I was a child, our reserve was raided for children like me, not by officials of the realm, but a band of outlaws seeking to amass their own dragon-borne army. They forced us into our dragon forms and kept us in them by way of enchanted collars and shackles that prevented us from turning back.

We were abused for years while the outlaws used us to attack their enemies. We were even made to battle our own brethren. We moved around constantly, never staying in one place for too long before the threat of being found and attacked forced us to move again. At some point I had been a dragon for so long that I had forgotten I could turn back.

The few of us that still remained after those long years were finally freed by a group of fellow dragon-borne who operated on their own, independent of a realm, side-by-side with humans. They introduced themselves as the "Seijō Guild", mercenaries with the ultimate goal of liberating all dragon-borne. I didn't trust them at first and made many attempts to fight them or get away, but they were persistent in their efforts, even going so far as to hunt me down again when I eventually did manage to escape.

Hanamaki, Iwaizumi, and Kindaichi were dragon-borne, while Matsukawa, Oikawa, and Kunimi were their respective "dragoniers". Yahaba was a scholar and a healer, Watari a former knight, Kunimi and Matsukawa were mages, and Oikawa the self-proclaimed leader of them all with an ambiguous history. Thusly, Iwaizumi also had some command over Hanamaki and Kindaichi, and later myself.

After so much time spent as a dragon, even with the freedom to change into a human again, I preferred not to. Trying to adjust back to the full range of thought and emotion humans possessed was more challenging than I cared to deal with at the time. Thankfully the Guild was mostly accommodating when it wasn't inconvenient to travel around with a creature as large as a dragon.

There were three other dragon-borne that had been liberated alongside me that the Guild convinced to stick around as well, but they didn't stay long. One of them was significantly more volatile than even myself and skittishly tried to make a break for it in a very sketchy neck of the woods that just so happened to be the hunting grounds of a group of poachers that took them out without hesitation.

Another, Kuroo, was far more collected than the rest of us ever were and often spoke about returning to his homeland in Nekoma. The Guild helped him do that and eventually reunited him with his childhood friend Kenma, who would later become his dragonier.

Then there was Akaashi, who, like me, didn't really have anywhere to return to. He had always kept to himself and could be a little prickly at times, but I never got to know him beyond that. I got the impression that he had been somewhat close with Kuroo, however, since he became noticeably more moody after Kuroo parted ways with the Guild.

TBA

The Eds and I were in a gang and we all played on the baseball team together; I was the pitcher, Eddy was the shortstop, and Ed was the catcher. We played dirty, if that weren’t obvious.

We hung out in an abandoned subway tunnel downtown where we would smoke and bullshit around late into the night until someone inevitably called the cops on us.

Kev was a football jock and we had an amicable back-and-forth rivalry. It might have seemed like we really hated each other, but it was like a game for both of us. I was openly gay and he was a closeted bisexual, something I found out about on accident and used to tease him on occasion with backhanded "flirting", if one could call it that. Despite all that, we actually got along rather well, especially after the incident involving Eddy's poor excuse of a brother. It took a long time for me to forgive myself after our horribly malfunctioned stunt, but the other cul-de-sac kids had resolved to let it go after witnessing that humiliating fiasco.

I still had a vested interest in bugs and small animals. I also had a morbid fascination with bones. I kept several display pieces of preserved skeletons and insects.

Some events vaguely followed canon up to a point (obviously without the extreme exaggeration). I was very much a kid who had way too many expectations placed on me that developed into excessive OCD and anxiety disorders and I overworked myself constantly until I was literally too physically and mentally exhausted to continue. I became visibly malnourished and ill near the end of middle school and had a near-death experience getting run over by a car while I was walking home late one night after studying at the library after school. This experience made me realize that I was wasting my life and that I wanted to do so much more with myself than be an obedient little book nerd.

The shift happened the summer before freshman year of high school, something the Eds fully supported me in. They were with me all through my rehabilitation and therapy. It was a sobering time for all three of us and ultimately changed us in the long run. My entire mentality had gone to a much darker place and that seemed to spread to the Eds.

The Kankers were not nearly as toxic and overbearing as they were in canon. They were still the “upperclassman bullies”, but they were less obsessed with me and the Eds and more concerned with keeping the cul-de-sac kids out of the trailer park (lest we faced the consequences). Marie, however, showed a different side of herself after my injury, coming to visit me in the hospital and admitting that she never really enjoyed being so mean like her sisters. That was what led to us actually getting to know each other and becoming very close friends.

Kev was something of a mechanic on the side. He fixed up old motorbikes and made customs from whatever he could salvage from the junkyard. That was actually one of the first things Kev and I bonded over when I decided to take an interest in motorcycles myself. At some point I just kind of started helping him, even going so far as to fix up his own bike when he wrecked it and didn't have the time to fix it himself. I used the excuse that it was just something to keep me busy, but the truth was that I quite enjoyed it, both for the creative stimuli and that it gave us the opportunity to spend time together.

I hated finger-food. I could not stand eating with my bare hands; I always had to use a utensil of some kind, or at the very least a napkin. This may seem insignificant, but considering how much I had to emphasize it back then, I figured it's worth mentioning.

Even before the accident, I struggled with depression. Middle school life was already a hell to endure in and of itself, so add to that the constant torment that resulted from each of Eddy's failed attempts to scam the whole neighbourhood and it didn't turn out so well for my mental state. Of course, I would never blame Eddy for it, or anyone for that matter, since as I grew older I came to accept that kids tended to be horrible as a general rule of thumb, but it nonetheless played a large role in my deteriorating mental health alongside my nigh absentee parents. It was something that I eventually talked about with the Eds, which, while a difficult conversation to navigate, ultimately brought us closer together. Hell, it even convinced Eddy to get an actual job in high school.

The abandoned Gag Factory was another of our regular haunts apart from the subway tunnels. At one point we started up the rumours that it was haunted by ghosts, which led to a number of people stopping by to spend the night on a dare or some other equally trivial attempt at proving their bravery. It should go without saying that we didn't miss a single opportunity to perpetuate those rumours by scaring the living bejesus out of those suckers.

Eddy's brother was none too impressed with the result of our little impromptu visit to him, especially not after getting dragged off by the sadistic Kanker Sisters (who had only followed along to watch us get pummeled rather than stop it from happening). He developed something of a vendetta against us after that and frequently chose me to be the object of his harassment since I was evidently the easiest to pick on out of the three of us. I would often get calls at home that were frankly as unsettling as they were irritating, which later became unsolicited text messages once we'd entered high school. I'd had enough by that point and, in the middle of the night, I took a taxi down to the amusement park along with Kev, who had insisted on coming along after finding out about what had been going on. Between the two of us, we gave that bastard a beating he would never forget. Hell, we probably beat him within an inch of his life by the time we were done with him. I'd never experienced such violent impulses before, but I can say with certainty that it was one of the major turning points in what had become my darker mentality.

Of course, I didn't manage to avoid the repercussions of pulling such a stunt. The guy had the nerve to call the cops on me and they showed up at my house the next day, my parents nowhere to be found as per the norm. I spent the rest of that school year serving my time in juvie, though I'd refused to implicate Kev to suffer alongside me. He never did let me live that down.

Even though my daughter was only conceived as a "precautionary heir", I loved her dearly and tried my best to prepare her for the responsibilities she might one day inherit as an Ars Goetia. I taught her spellcasting and rituals from my Grimoire, but I kept the more risky subjects from her until she was older.

Octavia was nonbinary and used she/they pronouns. She also ended up in a relationship with Cherri Bomb at one point or another. Although I didn't exactly approve, I had little room to judge given my own less-than-appropriate relationship with Blitzø. Their involvement did cause us to cross paths with Charlie and co., however, including the overlord Alastor.

It should go without saying that I didn't particularly like Alastor. He was a notorious figure in Hell on account of the unusually powerful abilities he possessed as a sinner. He always seemed to be scheming something, even when he acted like his behaviour was prompted by "innocent" boredom. I never had to worry about him trying to cross me directly, at least; he may have been powerful, but he was still just a sinner compared to my status as a Goetia.

Asmodeus, on the other hand, was far more intimidating. Naturally, part of this was due to his being a Deadly Sin, but also because he was king of the Ars Goetia—that is, the king. Even my father Paimon bowed to him. Asmodeus's word was law and ultimately he was the one who would oversee travel between Hell and the human realm. He was the one I had to fear getting in trouble with if and when Blitzø and co. misused my Grimoire. However, this was also why I went to Asmodeus to ask for one of his crystals to gift to Blitzø so that he could do his work without relying on my Grimoire and, by extension, eradicating the transactional aspect of our relationship.

I had hoped that by doing this, I would have better luck convincing Blitzø that my feelings for him were more than carnal. I also wanted to see if there were any possibility that he would continue to see me without the looming obligation.

My timeline had some crossover with the Holidaze short film. Specifically, I remember being acquainted with Jingle, who was a cherub that embodied the spirit of winter, whereas Jangle belonged to a lesser angelic order yet still represented autumn.

I was demi-grey-aromantic and asexual. No, I was not intimately involved with Angel Dust in any way, shape, or form, thank you very much, though I did at one point harbour some small affection for Charlie. It didn't develop into anything from what I can recall apart from a few chaste moments that were promptly subverted, no small thanks to Vaggie.

Vox and I were indeed bitter rivals. Ironically, however, Stolas was one of my closest "friends", if ever I had any. As for Valentino, I wouldn't have minded watching him suffer through a few more millennia of torture, but I never found it all that surprising how quickly he succumbed to his daemonic metamorphosis. No matter how much I despised Vox, I could never defend Valentino's sickening treatment of him and everyone around him.

Speaking of which, that "metamorphosis" was a strong theme in my timeline. Once one died and was delivered to Hell, the soul was then brutalized and abused into something else entirely by those delegated to the task by Lucifer himself, resulting in the oftentimes grotesque forms of the creatures that resided there. Those broken souls were only released from torment after they were twisted beyond recognition and began to lust for inflicting the same kind of pain unto others, or something to that effect.

I actually considered Husk a friend as well, even if he didn't feel the same way toward me. I appreciated the fact that he wasn't terrified of me like everyone else was. His defiant attitude was quite refreshing.

I must admit that my original intentions for aiding Charlie in her efforts to redeem sinners were purely selfish in the beginning. I had planned to use her as a way to get to Lucifer and ultimately overtake the throne of Hell, but that was later inhibited by my growing admiration for Charlie. I actually felt guilty for using her that way, believe it or not. I never claimed to be a good person, though, I suppose. I will say that I deeply regret my deplorable actions now, not that it entirely matters.

Fairly canon-compliant from what little I remember.

Nala was my daughter. I was never very interested in Sarafina, but she expressed an interest in me and I decided to mate with her to spite Mufasa. I thought that he would have revealed his darker side by shunning Sarafina and Nala and shown the pride that he wasn’t fit to be King, but instead he forbade either of us from saying that Nala wasn’t his cub and he refused to let me interact with her at all.

After I became King, I fell in love with Zira’s devotion to me and together we had Kovu, who was to be my rightful heir. The only reason I didn’t kill either Luka or Vitani before mating with her was because she likely would have despised me for it and my standing with the pride was on thin ice as it was.

Most of the pride understood that the drought following my crowning wasn’t my fault. I was harsh on the lionesses because I was desperate to prove that I could be a good King, but there was little opportunity to do that when there was no food to be found, due in no small part to the hyenas chasing off the few herds of prey that remained. I had discussed plans with Zira to move the pride in search of more bountiful territory, but Simba returned before we could do anything about it.

I survived my fight with Simba after being thrown to the hyenas. I managed to squirm my way out of their pack and they chased me out of the pride lands entirely. Eventually I found myself in a jungle that I didn’t recognize, exhausted and starving. This jungle was, apparently, the territory of a leopard named Jelani. We were rightfully wary of each other at first, but she seemed to take a liking to me despite her taunts and allowed me farther into the jungle she called her home.

Jelani’s best friend was a timid cheetah named Anaya. Her other friends that she introduced me to included a gelada who often rode on the back of a large gorilla, a vulture and a crow who spoke in riddles and finished each other’s sentences, and a jackal that had gotten separated from his pack at birth and firmly believed he was a feline.

Jelani had a very protective and ill-mannered brother named Ebo who tried several times to scare or threaten me out of the jungle. Jelani put a stop to that quickly enough, but he always held a grudge against me for gaining his sister’s favour.

Another lion pride I had never met nor heard of before lived on the outskirts of the jungle. It was less...dare I say organized as mine was, indulging a more barbaric lifestyle that focused more on keeping their own alive than that “circle of life” motto that Mufasa loved to drone about. It was led by a strong, dark-maned lion named Sadiki.

Sadiki had three sons, one much older than the others. He was nearing the age that he would have to leave the pride to start his own soon, or fight his father for the throne. From what I gathered of his personality, I assumed that he intended to fight Sadiki. His brothers were innocently ready to back him up, but Sadiki assured them that they had much longer before they would have to fight.

Sadiki had a very persuasive way of speaking despite the generally blunt attitude of his pride. He agreed with my ideals that lions were a superior breed, or so he said. In truth he had only spoken to me to figure out a way to separate me from Jelani and discover her weaknesses. When I told him not to tell her what I thought of lions compared to other felines, he correctly assumed we had feelings for each other and he abused that fact by telling Jelani anyway and driving a wedge between us.

No doubt feeling betrayed and hurt, Jelani abandoned me outside the jungle. Sadiki’s pride wanted nothing to do with me for associating with a lesser breed. I was alone, again.

I wandered the savannah on my own in search of food until I came across a lone, unconscious lioness by a riverbank. I couldn’t see or smell her well through all the mud that caked her fur, but when I nudged her awake and she opened her eyes with a feral snarl, I realized it was Zira.

She told me about her valiant battle against Simba’s pride up until the moment her own lionesses betrayed her. She pleaded with me to understand that she wanted to bring back my days of glory through Kovu, then proceeded to ask me how it was possible that I was alive. I returned the question after hearing about how she fell into the rapids of a flash flood. We agreed to let sleeping dogs lie, as it were.

Seemingly just as we became comfortable in each other’s company again, even growing close once more, Jelani’s vulture friend sought us out. She had been flying for days, she said, and she desperately needed my help because Sadiki had led his pride into Jelani’s territory and killed Ebo. Jelani was taken captive as a result to discourage a counter-attack from the jungle animals who viewed her as their guardian.

I returned to the jungle sanctuary with Zira in tow. Despite our differences I mourned Ebo’s death with the other animals, finally understanding a bit of what my fool of a brother had tried to teach with the “circle of life” spiel. We were all the same in the end: lions, leopards, monkeys, birds. Eventually we all became one with the earth, where our differences held no more meaning.

Having come to this new realization, I rallied the animals into action, Zira all too eager to lead the attack against Sadiki for my sake. My main purpose in the mission was to make the plans, weak as I was, but while Sadiki’s pride was distracted with the assault, I was able to slip into his lair to find Jelani guarded by Sadiki himself. She was severely wounded and only half-conscious, but when it seemed that Sadiki was gaining the upper hand in our ensuing battle, she used all the strength she could muster to attack him from behind. We delivered fatal bites to his neck at the same time, promptly bringing him to his end.

When we emerged victorious, my roar was powerful enough to silence those who were still fighting. I hadn’t been able to roar like that since I was a cub, but as suddenly as it came, it disappeared. Nonetheless, Zira headed the call of triumph amoung the other animals as Sadiki’s battered pride withdrew. I caught a glimpse of Sadiki’s sons on the horizon, the eldest sparing me a final glance before they bounded away from their late father’s failure.

I was genetically enhanced with Indominus Rex’s ability to camouflage and remove its thermal signature, and my pit viper DNA gave me venomous retractable fangs and heat-sensing pit organs. Like most other dinosaurs in my timeline, I had a lot more feathers than shown in canon. The genetic myriad of my DNA left me with frail mental stability, but I was more intelligent than both I.Rex and velociraptors and I possessed a nigh human capacity for emotions. Those emotions were largely influenced by my sadistic and malicious nature, but above all I was curious. A white indoraptor was bred alongside me, but we were separated when we were very young because we couldn’t live together without trying to kill each other. I have no idea what happened to her after we were separated, but I have no doubt that she managed to escape the mansion in the end.

I imprinted on Maisie the first moment I saw her. I didn’t understand what that meant at the time and my instinct to give chase when things ran from me was almost impossible to suppress, so I came off as aggressive and threatening when I simply wanted to be close to her. I think that I could sense that she was “different” like me and I wanted to understand what we were. When I had her cornered in her room, I had no intent to harm her and I think Owen realized that when he came in. He tried to say something to me, but Blue attacked me at that moment.

Owen and Maisie escaped to the roof while Blue and I fought. Once she threw me out the window, I followed them onto the skylight. At this point I was feeling something akin to fear, or at least a lot of confusion. When Maisie slipped off the skylight, I remember moving to leap toward her with my only thought being to save her, but Claire started banging the gun then and distracted me. All the noise and confusing emotions began to overwhelm me. Owen must have noticed that I was getting agitated and urged Claire to stop. Once my focus was back on him, he approached me with an outstretched hand. He came close enough to touch my muzzle and I remained still despite the murderous itch that made my skin twitch all over.

Blue returned then, surprising me enough that my movement caused the glass to give out beneath me. I clung to the metal frame, but ultimately it was Owen who pulled me back up with his arms around my neck. Once I was safe from falling to my death, I realized in that moment that there was more to my existence than the mindless killer my creators wanted me to be.

Blue communicated with me then, more or less asking me if I wanted to help her or run away. Feeling as though I had been challenged, I agreed to help her and we ran off while the humans released the captive dinosaurs. In the meantime, Blue and I picked off the remaining InGen traffickers one by one, leaving only Mills and his associates. While we did this, Blue managed to assert herself as alpha once more. I had to respect her authority, even if I did consider myself superior. I was simply happy to have my first real “friend”.

When Owen offered both of us asylum, Blue tried to tell him that what we needed most was freedom. After she retreated to the treeline, I hesitated in front of Owen. I let him put his hand on my muzzle again and I understood him when he called me “Foxtrot” and told me to take care of Blue for him. Maisie approached me then and didn’t say anything, so I pressed my nose to her head as my way of saying “thank you” and “goodbye”. Blue called for me then and I ran after her to begin whatever new life awaited us.

At some point I developed romantic feelings for Blue and we became a mated pair. Unfortunately our DNA wasn’t compatible enough to reproduce, so we couldn’t increase our numbers or form a larger pack of our own.

The name is pronounced "Ah-zuh-ry-us", last name "Veh-sell-kuh".

I was the "Apprentice" of the story. My appearance can be found here. I was roughly 6'0", cismale, and gay. My ending involved taking the Devil's place in the Arcana realms indefinitely. I had a chinchilla familiar named Cecil who stayed in the Arcana realms with me for the most part except when I needed to relay a message to the others in the mortal realms and vice versa.

I was a sorcerer, not a magician. They may as well have been two words to describe the same thing, but my cultural background was much different than Asra's when it came to views on magic. He was born and raised in Zadith, a place where magic and science were valued equally, whereas I grew up in Firent, a theocracy that praised magic users who received their gifts from "God" and spurned those who didn't. Anyone who learned magic any other way than divine worship was considered a blasphemous heretic and called a "sorcerer", as opposed to the well-revered priests. I took pride in my label as a sorcerer as it set me apart from the fanatical zealotry of my people. I hated it when people called me a "witch" or "magician". It took me a long time to get comfortable with Asra using it as a label for himself and to understand why he was okay with people calling him that.

I developed a relationship with both Asra and Julian, though that unfortunately didn't last long once I became the Devil. Before that, though, things were really good. I loved them both so much. I think Asra was on the ace spectrum. I just remember that our relationship was significantly less sexual than my relationship with Julian and that was A-okay. We didn't need it to show that we loved each other, whereas sex was a big part of Julian's love language.

There are still some gaps in my memory. My timeline didn't follow any one route in particular, but rather was a combination of routes and some other details. It seemed to incorporate themes from Julian's and Asra's routes the most, but I also remember binding Lucio's ghost to myself and stumbling through the Arcana Realm with him, as well as a brief interlude involving Valerius trying to overthrow Nadia... Yeah, that was something. But let's start with the details I do remember clearly.

I was born in Firent to parents who were blindly devout to the divine patrons who ruled the nation through the Papess. I had always had my suspicions of such governing practices, but I was too young back then to have any weight in a discussion about it with my parents. It was this that drove me toward the study of magic, desiring to find the meaning behind my parents' worship, but while the priests and priestesses taught me what they could, I never got my spark until I turned away from their God and drew from the magic in the world around me instead.

My parents weren't exactly enthused by my discovery. They insisted that it was still a gift from their God, that it just found me in a unique way, but I didn't hold the same convictions. Unfortunately, the last meaningful interactions we had with each other involved a heated argument over the very same topic before the Red Plague reached them. I tried in vain to take them to the island of Sirenia where the Papess had retreated for safety, but they denied us entry, leaving my parents to rot outside its walls. It was then that I officially, beyond a shadow of a doubt, lost my faith in God.

Before they passed, my parents told me of an aunt I had who lived in Vesuvia and would take me in. I still wasn't of age yet, so I had no choice but to travel to Vesuvia when my parents inevitably passed away. My aunt, Eliana, taught me everything she knew about magic, as well, raising me into a powerful sorcerer without the help of any gods. When I came of age, I began to travel, partly so that I could acquire rare herbs and the like for my aunt's shop, and partly so that I could broaden my magical horizons and attempt to find a way to stop the Red Plague that continued to ravage the world around us.

I continued to visit Aunt Eliana frequently, delivering ingredients and helping her run her shop, attending one or two of the spectacular masquerades celebrating the Count Lucio's birthday, meeting Asra and falling in love for the first time. He was such a lovely vision in his gossamer and silks and hair as soft as clouds and those perfect, cupid bow lips—I was helplessly at his mercy by the end of the first night. It was a welcome surprise to learn that he was a magician in his own right. He was the one who taught me the art of Tarot, something I had only come across in passing at cheap roadside attractions and festivals with fake fortune tellers.

Although our respective reasons for travelling often kept us apart, it was always a treat to get his letters or find him helping Aunt Eliana in her shop when I returned. The scarce time we found to spend together never failed to be a magical experience. Distance really could do a harsh number on one's libido when they were missing someone.

Alas, all good things must come to an end. One day, I returned to Vesuvia to find that the Red Plague had reared its ugly head in none other than my aunt. I had seen traces of it elsewhere, tried to no avail to heal its victims with my magic, but I had never anticipated it would come to Vesuvia, let alone hook its claws into my last living relative. I spent her last days by her side, tending to her and making her as comfortable as I could until she drew her last breath.

This was what spurred me to hunt down a cure for the Red Plague. I wasn't able to save my aunt, but I would be damned if I sat idly by while the voracious disease continued to feast upon the world at large. I wrote to Asra to give him the grave news and tell him what I hoped to achieve. I set off once more in search of an answer, but found the same thing every other foolish scientist and healer found: nothing. Asra's letters kept coming in waves, though, begging me to come back home before I inherited my aunt's fate.

Reluctantly, only to appease his worries and assure him that I was perfectly healthy, I returned to Vesuvia, only to find him packing away all of our belongings. He insisted that we had to flee the city and get ahead of the plague—he mentioned seeking refuge on the island of Sirenia, which still stood tall as one of the last bastions against the spread of the disease. I told him, under no uncertain terms, that I refused to take the coward's path when there was still research to be done, discoveries to be made, people to help and to heal. Unfortunately, this was one topic we couldn't agree on. We raised our voices at each other until we were both blue in the face, and then Asra left on his own, telling me to come find him when I had come to my senses.

Needless to say, that never happened on account of my death. For the next two years, I kept looking for my answer, eventually finding myself under the tutelage of Doctor Julian Devorak. I never much cared for medicine and science since I had always relied on my magic, but I quickly learned that there was much more to the practice than the extent to which magic could reach. I studied under him as his apprentice, both of us equally hellbent on finding a cure. Tragically, it was this single-mindedness that led to my demise. As much as Julian remained ignorant of my growing symptoms when the Red Plague came for me, I, too, neglected my health in order to continue my research. A part of me knew, even then, that it didn't matter whether anyone knew I was sick or not. The cure was still well out of reach. All that I cared about was contributing what I could in the meantime. This was why I decided not to write to Asra about it; he didn't need to suffer with the knowledge of my death after the way we had left things.

Of course, I had forgotten about all of this once Asra made the deal to resurrect me. Without a single memory to my name—including my name itself, which Asra had to give me—I had to piece myself back together with Asra's help. Once equals, I was now his apprentice to re-learn my magic. Thankfully, most things came back easily, but it was still a bit of a learning curve. I was lucky that I still had him, that he still cared about me so much, even though some things about our new relationship, once I remembered the past, eventually left a bitter taste in my mouth. Luckily for him, I was still just as helpless to fall in love with him the second time as the first.

At that point, though, I had doubts that my feelings would be reciprocated. He always kept a certain distance between us, retreating every time something was about to spark, and it left me worried that he merely pitied me. Me, the poor amnesiac who constantly followed him around like a lost puppy because he was the first person I had seen when I woke up and the single lifeline I had. I began to wonder if my own feelings were merely some type of idealistic worship as the result of his help re-introducing me to the world.

When I met Julian (again), I let those doubts get the better of me. I figured that if I couldn't have Asra, then I simply had to move on, and Julian was a welcome distraction. He was fun and witty and smart and charming and, gods, that body. At first it was all purely physical, or at least that's what I had told myself. Julian Devorak, however, was insanely difficult not to fall for. If I took one step back, he took two steps forward, and when he started to doubt himself and stumble, I came running like an addict to catch him.

It was a dangerous, enthralling dance, but that didn't make it easy. The harder I fell for Julian, the less I could ignore my feelings for Asra. It felt wrong to keep it from him, so I told him, preparing for the worst. Surprisingly, Julian took the news in stride, confiding in me about his own past fling with Asra and how, despite their relationship being emotionally one-sided, he still thought fondly of Asra. I, on the other hand, was miffed to learn about how Asra had treated him, even though Julian had almost certainly downplayed the events. At the time, I had only known Asra as kind and doting, if a bit withdrawn, so I couldn't imagine why or how he could have been so cold to someone like Julian.

As much as I wanted to find out the reason, I had a feeling Asra wouldn't give it up so easily. Rather than try to force it out of him, then, I instead proposed an idea to Julian. We both still had feelings for Asra, and Asra was at least somewhat attracted to Julian and I knew there was some underlying tension in his feelings for me, so what could it hurt if we both tried to court him?

It started out as just a silly little side-quest in the grand scheme of the trials we were facing; I wasn't wholly convinced it would even work. As the events of our convoluted lives unfolded, however, Julian and Asra were more or less forced to work together anyway, and while Asra dug his heels in at first, he gradually began to respect Julian and, dare I say it, even like him a little bit.

At some point I found the time to confess to Asra in the midst of everything. It was a difficult conversation, given the circumstances at the time, and though he finally admitted to returning my feelings (in his cryptic, roundabout way), he lamented that those feelings were wasted because I was with Julian. I was thrilled to give him the good news that that was an easy problem to fix, considering Julian also still cared for him. Asra was apprehensive, of course, still on the table about how he felt about Julian, but he was willing to give it a try. I was blindsided by how quickly everything fell into place after that. It all felt perfect, as if that's how it was always meant to be.

It should go without saying that Portia did not miss a single opportunity to squeal and tease us over all the "unnecessary drama" that led up to it, as well as the embarrassing hijinks that followed.

When it came time to bind the Devil, I knew it wouldn't be enough, or at least that I would never rest peacefully knowing that one day, perhaps long after we were gone, the Devil would break free and wreak havoc upon an unsuspecting world. I couldn't allow that to happen in good conscience, so instead of using our combined magic to bind him, I used it to attack the Devil directly. Of course, our magic alone wasn't enough to destroy him, but we were connected to the Arcana, and the Arcana readily answered our plea. Their strength flowed through us, through me, and eviscerated the Devil. All the while, my friends tried to stop me, pleading with me not to go through with it, but I was deaf to their warnings. We were all brought to our knees from the influx of magical power we had just summoned, most of all myself, who had gathered it all inside me. Against their better judgement, they were forced to give me the Devil's heart to save my life, effectively making me into the new Devil Arcana.

Needless to say, no one was especially enthusiastic about my decision, but what was done was done. I had replaced the Devil in the Arcana and there was no reversing that. I had tried to pacify them with the fact that nobody would ever have to worry about the Devil returning to wreak havoc again, but of course they had none of it. Asra and Julian vowed to find a way to release me, or at least a way to allow me to cross over to the mortal realm with my physical body, but I didn't keep my hopes up. I was happy enough when they would come to visit me in the Devil's realm that I now ruled, where we could still travel amoung the Arcana Realms to our hearts' content. At one point they foolishly tried to tell me they would stay there with me, but I couldn't allow that.

On the bright side, becoming the Devil awakened all of the memories I had lost without the life-threatening headaches to accompany them. I could remember everything and, while that did make the separation more painful, I was glad for the relief of knowing. It was a heavy weight, one I had thought I would burden for the rest of my life, suddenly lifted off my shoulders. I could remember the years I spent by Asra's side, my time as an apprentice to Julian during the plague, the masquerades I had attended, my aunt, my parents. I felt whole again, a feeling I hadn't known for a long, long time.

Ever since Asra had resurrected me, I had been cursed with an unusually potent disposition toward sensing the presence of departed souls. This had made it especially easy for Lucio to invade my mind and latch onto me as a magical anchor to the mortal realm, but that's besides the point. Since coming back to life, I rarely got any sleep due solely to the fact that each time I did sleep I was plagued with nightmares of the dead. Coupled with every waking moment being tormented with glimpses of shadows in the corners of my vision and whispers in my head I couldn't turn off made for a very tired, very anxious sorcerer. There were times when I was just downright prickly due to sleep deprivation. All of this ceased to be once I became the Devil, allowing me the luxury of total peace and quiet for the first time in my (second) life. It was utterly blissful.

There were some things I did that I still regret. For instance, binding Lucio to myself. I'll be the first to admit it was a rash and impulsive decision, especially since I didn't bother consulting anyone else first, but it seemed like the right thing to do at the time. I didn't want him roaming the Palace and plaguing Nadia's nightmares or getting up to whatever dastardly trouble he would have had he been allowed to linger in his old wing.

Luckily we managed to free Lucio by destroying the chains that bound him to the deals of his past and returning his spirit to his own body from within the Lazaret. For all that we had gone through to get him to that point, though, he became understandably wary of me after I replaced the Devil Arcana, skeptical of being lured into another dangerous deal. He regarded me with suspicion and even a note of fear, if I weren't mistaken, any time we were in each other's presence. It kind of hurt, in a way, seeing as I had thought we almost had a shot at being friends at one point.

Eventually Asra and Julian had devised a way for me to cross into the mortal realm temporarily by way of a summoning ritual that gave me a twenty-four hour window in which manifest physically. This ritual required the combined energies of those who shared a strong connection with the Arcana, so it was rare that they could gather enough of our friends together to perform the ritual—not to mention how draining it was on their magic—but that made it all the more special.

Over time, though, it became increasingly clear to me that I was never meant to hold on to my humanity forever. Being one of the Major Arcana meant the very opposite—my responsibilities, my purpose far exceeded that of trivial mortal affairs like maintaining relationships. At first, I felt the heartbreak and guilt, but that, too, faded with time. Eventually I stopped answering the summons of my lovers altogether. When they came looking for me, I went to great lengths to keep them at bay, but still they found a way to confront me. At that point, I had nothing more to tell them than that I could no longer feel what they felt. A part of me still felt sympathy—I still held them near and dear, after all, but what once was "love" had shifted to something more akin to fondness.

I hated to break their hearts this way, but it was always inevitable. I knew that Asra, at least, had seen it coming. I could see it in his eyes: resignation, as opposed to Julian's freshly bleeding heart. I could offer no words of comfort or reassurance. I can't remember ever seeing or hearing from Julian again, but Asra still kept in touch, scarcely, only because of his connection to the cards. Sometimes, once in a blue moon, he would visit and we would chat like old friends, but there was always a distinct indifference to it, just as there was always a fleeting glimmer of hope and adoration in his aura, as if some buried part of him still cared for me. Then again, I doubt he would have ever stopped caring after all he had done for my sake.

While my former lovers grew more distant, however, Lucio, surprisingly enough, grew closer. I had taken the role of his patron, so it was only natural that he would reach out to me, consciously and subconsciously. He was never very savvy with magic and so travelling to the Arcana Realms wasn't really something he sought on his own, but occasionally he would call to me in a dream, like so many of my other mortal proteges, and every so often he would try to strike a deal. Seemingly harmless deals, of course, but deals all the same. He hadn't changed that much during our short-lived time together, after all, and now that his previous bonds had been broken, he had no qualms creating new ones for himself. I, unlike my predecessor, only agreed to deals that I knew he could fulfill, and once he got a taste for what he could accomplish through my help, he was quick to shake off his distrust for me.

Things didn't happen exactly as they did in canon. He never usurped Nadia to reclaim his title as Count of Vesuvia, nor charged into war to conquer in my name, but when Vesuvia eventually did find itself under threat, Lucio was the valiant hero who vanquished their enemies. When Valerius tried to overthrow Vesuvia to rule it in his own vision, it was Lucio who stopped him. When the pirates of Hjalle laid siege to their shores, Lucio fearlessly led the charge against them and drove them away. For every new story under his belt, he placed another chain in my hand. At some point I suspected he began to do it intentionally just to have an excuse to come to me. I won't beat around the bush—we were definitely fucking on the side. He knew that I couldn't love him, though, and what he felt for me was little more than an infatuation with power manifested into some distorted semblance of affection and lust.

The old me would have felt guilty and disgusted for falling into the metaphorical bed with someone like Lucio, especially after what he did to Julian and Asra, but the person—creature—I was at that time was far from human. All that I felt was a selfish satisfaction that soon I would have Lucio's soul in my hand instead of his many chains. I had designs on making him my daemon, and whether he suspected it or not, he fell for it through and through. By that point he had burned every bridge around him, anyway. He almost seemed happy to belong to me in some official capacity. While I still could never love him, I could honestly say he was my favourite pet.

Mostly canon-compliant.

Mostly canon-compliant.

Lysandre and I were close friends, at least from my perspective. We met in Shalour City when I was training at the Tower of Mastery and he was there chasing after some adventure or another. We hit it off really well. Back then he still had stars in his eyes about achieving something great and helping those in need. I admired that about him.

I, on the other hand, wasn't sure what my goal was at that point in my life. I knew that I wanted to learn more about Mega Evolution and conduct my own research into the phenomenon, but I just wasn't cut out for a hands-on approach at the Tower of Mastery. It wasn't that my bond with my pokemon was lacking; I just wasn't the battling type.

Gurkinn was kind enough to give me the Gible that was being raised there for research and used for training so that I could continue my own studies with a dedicated partner. It was the same Gible who eventually evolved into Garchomp and became my closest pokemon partner. It was a peculiar match up to be sure, but nobody could deny our synchrony when we started working together.

Lysandre and I kept in touch over the years, significantly more so when we both took up residents in Lumiose City. I can't deny that I had begun to fancy him a bit. He was so engaging to listen to, so passionate about his thoughts and feelings—it was hard not to develop something of a soft spot for a man like that. I kept those feelings to myself, though, for fear of disrupting the friendship we had forged.

That is, until a particularly frustrating night at the lab when I had hit a solid wall in my research and it seemed like I had come to a dead end altogether (which happened more often than I cared to admit; the constant sleep deprivation wasn't exactly conducive to productive study). I broke out my expensive wine, intent on drinking myself to sleep since I knew I wouldn't be able to stop thinking about my research long enough to fall asleep myself, and proceeded to send Lysandre an incredibly embarrassing Holo-clip.

Before I knew it, he showed up at the lab and all but dragged me to bed by force. Well, we almost made it to the bed, anyway. I, of course, being the drunken, lovesick, pathetic sack of crap that I was, tried to return the favour by dragging him into the bedroom with me, but I fell short of that goal when we stumbled against my desk and fuck did it hurt when I hit my elbow on that stapler. In my drunken stupor, all I could think about was wanting to make something happen, something to take my mind off of how much of a failure I felt like at the time. Whatever it was had turned out to be messy and awkward and not at all how I had fantasized making a move on Lysandre would have gone.

In spite of all my self-inflicted humiliation, though, there was still a moment in which he looked at me, his hands clasped somewhere on my body and barely holding me upright, and in that moment, I saw the want in his eyes. Not just desire, but affection, worry, conflict. Even considering how inebriated I was, that expression remains etched into my memory to this day.

Nothing came of it, of course. Lysandre, unlike myself, was a reasonable and responsible man (in most walks of life, that is) who would never allow himself to take advantage of someone like that, even if he had known of the way I felt for him at the time. Instead, he helped me to bed, sent for an assistant to check up on me in the morning, and put in a word with the barista at his cafe to give me a free cup of coffee when I inevitably stopped by the next day. He wasn't there—I wasn't expecting him to be—but the gesture settled deep within my heart as if he had done all of those things himself.

I pretended not to remember what had happened that night after the fact, much to Lysandre's apparent relief. Once he was convinced that I suspected nothing, he stopped walking on eggshells around me and we gradually returned to our usual routine. Work, meet for coffee twice a week, regular visits to the lab, repeat. Knowing what I knew then, it all felt a smidge lacking, but it was familiar and nice, so I didn't let myself dwell for too long on the unspoken truths between us.

Finding out about Lysandre's involvement in Team Flare was one truth I wished had remained unspoken. To call it a heart-wrenching discovery would be putting it lightly. "Disappointed" didn't even begin to cover the potpourri of emotions I was dealing with. The hardest truth of all was that I still loved him. Yes, I still loved him, and even now I can't bring myself to say that it was wrong of me. I was in love with the man I had met a little over a decade ago, who had shown me how bright and kind his heart could be, the man I knew to be inside him still.

Loving him didn't mean that I didn't hate what he had done and what he was going to do, though.

I was autistic and semi-nonverbal about it. The only times that I could make myself say more than a couple words at a time was when I was singing or talking about trees. Yes, trees. I loved trees. All kinds of trees. Trees were my favourite part about working on an orchard. Ironically I didn't particularly care for apples one way or the other, but my family's recipes were always bangers, so that was a plus.

I ended up with Fluttershy and we had two foals together: first a filly named Rosebud and then a colt named Holstein.

Applejack was NOT happy about us having feelings for each other at first and made misguided attempts to keep us apart because she was afraid of losing her brother and her friend (largely due in part to Pinkie Pie's unintentional influence sowing seeds of doubt in her mind). We ended up having a big heart-to-heart over it and she ultimately gave us her blessing and welcomed Fluttershy into the family.

Apple Bloom, on the other hand, gave Fluttershy one hell of a time by going a little overboard with the "sisterly appreciation". She wanted to make Fluttershy feel welcome so badly that she almost drove her away. Similarly, Rainbow Dash and Rarity were all over my case about treating Fluttershy right and what would happen if I even thought about hurting her.

It was all this behaviour that drove us to begin meeting in secret, which sort of blew up in our faces in the end, what with all the pressure of sneaking around and making excuses. It did make for quite the emotional duet, though.

TBA

After Gwen left Camp Campbell to pursue her career as a writer, I was hired on by David as a co-counselor. I considered myself an "outdoors enthusiast" (in theory, not practice) so I leapt at the opportunity to get some practical, hands-on experience with which to put my extensive knowledge to use.

I was able to use my organizational and financing skills to help renovate Camp Campbell and make it a little more...hospitable, for lack of a better word. We installed proper cabins for the campers, which was a big hit with the group that summer, and restored some dilapidated structures, amoung other improvements, though we didn't quite get to fixing everything before the campers arrived. Mostly due to lack of funds.

I admired and respected David for his extensive experience as a camp counselor and someone who had spent real time in the outdoors. He certainly taught me a thing or two about how reading books would never prepare me for the outdoors until I went out and experienced it for myself, which came as a learning curve for me. However, for all the respect I had for him, I still couldn't help but question some of his more...controversial decisions, such as, but certainly not limited to: re-hiring Daniel.

Yes, that Daniel. The same Daniel who attempted to sacrifice a camp full of children on not one, but two occasions, plus a third incident David didn't elaborate on much at the time, but that I now know to be the impersonator incident. Daniel was allegedly undergoing rehabilitation while on probation since his sentence was cut alarmingly short on account of his being manipulated by the cult of Scientology and therefore deemed "mentally unsound" at the time that he committed his crimes. David advocated on his behalf when Daniel came to the camp looking for work and a way to reconnect with the "real world" now that he had been "disillusioned". It was also a position that would contribute to Daniel's community service, which meant that David didn't have to pay him, which also meant more help for the camp at no additional cost. I wasn't buying any second of it, but David ate it up without a second thought. He always was a sucker for redemption arcs.

Well, anyway, it didn't turn out to be so bad. There were a handful of close calls and almost-but-not-quite attempts at reverting back to his old ways, but surprisingly enough, Daniel really did put in the effort to change. He started off somewhat despondent, rarely ever smiling and, when he did, it was obviously forced to play the role of a cheery camp counselor. Gradually, though, I observed David inspire change in him. I like to think I had my own hand in Daniel's redemption, but, honestly, it was mostly David. I wonder now if the reason were because David saw something of his past self in Daniel's lack of lust for life and wanted to reignite it the same way he found his passion for summer camp.

By the time that summer came to an end, that's exactly what David managed to achieve. Those two also happened to fall creepily in love. I had the awful misfortune of walking in on them in the act of "consummating" their relationship when it happened and, needless to say, I was scarred for life. As was Max when word inevitably found its way to the campers.

Although, I imagine it hit Max especially hard, considering that when the bus dropped him off in town to be picked up by his parents...they never came. It was the middle of the night when he finally found his way back to camp, tears spilling out from under the hood of his jacket that only got worse when David pulled him into his arms. We called and called, but the numbers that were left as Max's contacts were non-operable. I offered to inform the local police station, but Max vehemently objected, saying that he would rather die than get carried off to a dead-end orphanage where he'd be cooped up with no hope of escape until he came of age. His words, not mine, but I couldn't say his fears were unfounded.

Instead, David allowed him to stay at the camp while the three of us finished cleaning and organizing the place in preparation for its long hibernation until next summer. That only took three days, though, and by then we had stopped trying to call the useless numbers that were supposed to have belonged to Max's parents. I wasn't present for the conversation about Max's adoption, but he came to me about it afterward, confessing his trepidation about going through with something like that when Daniel was part of the equation. It goes without saying that I felt sickeningly under-qualified to guide Max through that kind of decision, but as his camp counselor, I felt obligated to assure him that, no matter what, David would always have his best interests in mind, and if Daniel ever threatened that, I was sure David wouldn't think twice about dealing with it swiftly. Of course, at that point, I had a lot more faith in Daniel than I cared to admit. He had shown nothing but improvement over the past two and a half months and I could see the genuine concern in his eyes when Max had come back.

With the help of Cameron Campbell's masterful skill in forgery, it was made official. Max was now, formally, Maxwell Anderson, son of David Anderson. We all returned the next summer, this time with Max as our very own counselor-in-training. Nikki and Niel were quick to follow and the three of them made a surprisingly effective team, despite their rambunctious reputations. I was mainly left in charge of managing them, while David and Daniel spent the majority of their time doing...God knows what. That was all well and good, though, since it reduced the awkwardness of third-wheeling all the time.

That summer was probably the best one Camp Campbell had ever seen, but there were plenty more to come after that. Luckily, we left it in good hands.

TBA

TBA

After a long, long time of painful obliviousness followed by much trial and error, I won the heart of Twilight Sparkle. I suppose I was technically a prince at that point, but I hardly played the part. Neither of us was particularly preoccupied with royal titles or worried with the admiration of Equestria. Honestly I became more of a folkloric cryptid around Canterlot because of my reclusive nature, but I was rather well-known for my advancements in magic and many a pony would come in search of me to study as my apprentices.

That being said, I still never was very good at using magic myself, but I don't think that was ever my destiny to begin with. I was much better at and more comfortable with conducting research and compiling that knowledge into an archive to enrich the lives of all creatures, as well as to ensure that darker magics stayed hidden well away from the wrong hands.

Twilight and I had three foals together. Prominence was the oldest, born an alicorn just like her cousin Flurry Heart. Admittedly she was quite spoiled, being our first, and was raised with every intention of succeeding Twilight's role as princess one day. She had a magnificent, colourful mane reminiscent of Celestia's. She went through a phase of entitlement that lasted a couple years, which was what prompted us to start backing off from our lax hoof with her, but she eventually grew into an admirable pony who mastered the magic of friendship.

Our second foal was Stardust Twinkle, a pony who fought tooth and hoof to reject the expectations placed upon her. We loved her independence and ambition, but she really was unnecessarily difficult a lot of the time... Like her older sister, however, she grew out of this defiant attitude with time, though she was still quite the contrarian when she wanted to be. She learned a lot of those habits from her aunt and my sister, Sunset Shimmer.

And last, but certainly not least, was our youngest foal, Charming Night. Yes, many ponies simply called him Prince Charming. It wasn't necessarily intended at the time since Twilight chose the name in honour of her brother. In fact, Charming was very close with his uncle. He was an adventurous spirit who wanted to prove himself and set himself apart from his siblings for something unique for which he could be remembered.

Speaking of family, you read that right—Sunset Shimmer was my sister. We were quite close when we were foals, but Sunset was always the prodigy since she could actually use the magic she learned about. She was quite the powerful caster, too, which was why she was invited to apprentice under Princess Celestia despite being so young at the time. I, on the other hand, had to study night and day just to have a chance at getting into Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, let alone be taken under her wing. The difference in our abilities and the opportunities we each had was what drove the wedge between us in the first place, and when Sunset went rogue and took off into the parallel universe, I even found myself glad, however briefly, that I didn't have to compete with her anymore.

Of course, that feeling was fleeting. I grieved for the absence of my sister for months before I could come to terms with it all. After all, I had no way of knowing if she were okay or even still alive for that matter. I just had to accept that she was gone and that was that.

And then, suddenly, she wasn't gone and everything was flipped upside-down. When Twilight first mentioned her adventures in the parallel universe and meeting Sunset, I nearly broke down in relief and grief alike. I had just found out my sister was alive and well and reformed to top it all off. When she later returned to Equestria on a brief visit to retrieve a replacement for her magic journal, we had something of a bittersweet reunion. She didn't part on great terms, after all, and while I still resented her for it a little, the bigger part of me was just glad to see her again. Starlight Glimmer, however, had more than enough scorn for the both of us. She had nothing kind to say to Sunset during the time she came to visit.

On a lighter note, though, Starlight did have other reasons to be happy. She and Trixie were an adorable couple. It's funny that things worked out that way because, in the beginning, Trixie was the one who kept trying (and failing) to set up me and Starlight as a couple. She kept putting this in these awkward, blind date-esque situations, and at one point, after we had sussed out her intentions, Starlight and I confronted her about it and she admitted to what she was up to. It was in that moment that Starlight brazenly confessed her feelings for Trixie in the same breath with which she berated her for trying to set her up with her best friend. I'm still not sure how that worked as a come-on, but they ended up happily ever after, I guess.