"We tangle endlessly
Like lovers entwined
I know for the last time
You will not be mine
So give me the night, the night, the night"

The Night Does Not Belong to God -
Sleep Token

Jimin
🌌

I thought I knew what pain was until today.

Before, pain was regret. It was consequences, it was burning bridges. It was physical and mental.

That was before Aera was right before me holding my entire heart, and gone the next.

"Aera!" Her name thrust from his lips, a function of his body like breathing.

That deep, endless darkness that had taunted Jimin since he was a child fully engulfed him now. Screams mixed with cries as the smoky prison burned dark marks over his skin. Leaving traces like the scar over his eye, a twin to Lily's.

It did not matter, he did not care.

"Ihrin!" His voice was only a child's. It was the sound he made, calling to her when she schemed and tricked. It was the sound he made when he begged for her attention. It was the past, present, and future he yearned for her all at once. "Aera, help me please! I can't—"

He couldn't fathom saying the words aloud. He had finally reached her. The animosity that had bound them tightly finally loosened into a wreath that resembled peace, at least, in their own way.

The darkness did not scare him. Not right now. Not at all when all he could think about was her.

She touched his chest, right above his heart. She practically told him that she loved him. She didn't run away when the light faded, it never left her eyes.

Aera had never been able to withstand looking at him for too long. Jimin had been waiting for the day she could not look away.

She had been there, inches apart when lifetimes and ocean lived in the distance between them before.

The dark did not seem so harrowing, when her green jade eyes remained in his mind.

He ran forward into the nothingness, battling thick air and cold drops trying to get closer to that beacon.

Almost there. In the green there was blue, silver, and even flecks of gold. They would bring cold winters and soft summers, a kiss of fire amongst the blaze of night. Her eyes were laughs and cries and all the terrible parts of love; the things that scare people away from it. The sheer force of it could wipe away cities, could bend leaders to their knees. War, blood.

"Aera!" He yelled again, just to hear her name. He hoped more than anything she heard him.

It was clear to Jimin now why Nox and his mother decided to eliminate Aera from his mind.

Jimin loved her more than anyone else.

She was the single thing that tethered him to himself. A single thought of her was memories and a sun that shined without it being in the sky, and all the emotions he tried to suppress. His enemies, his family has seen this. They had peered into his soul, and found that it had limits for what he could and did feel for Aera. A single woman was enough to foil their selfish plan.

Magic and mind games was nothing with the thought of Jimin needing to make his way to her.

He would crawl, fight, and kill just to lay at her feet.

It made sense to erase her meaning to him for his first attempt to prevent the curse breaking. The god had chosen wisely, before they had declared themselves to each other.

Taking her from him entirely would be the god's worst mistake.

Now, Jimin would bring hell to the heavens if it would not surrender to his will.

"He should have erased you from my mind again." Jimin gritted his teeth, fighting foggy shadow with his own sharper shadows. He cut through them like they were merely clouds floating in the sky. "Stupid fuck." The man clapped his hands together, and spread them apart. Green became clearer in the distance, and his shadow continued to cleave at the darkness. "If he wanted me to lay down and fucking take it, he should have killed me. Now he will deal with the consequences of his grave mistake."

He fought for what seemed like hours. Pieces of his clothes started to disintegrate from his body, leaving wounded flesh bare. Hair stuck his head from sweat, his teeth felt sore from how hard he was biting down. Even a Dimidium tired of using magic after this long, his shadows growing weaker and weaker.

"What would Aera say if she saw me giving up?" He gritted through his teeth, forming another hammer of dense shadow. A lick of a smile kissed his mouth, "Right. She'd call me a pussy and tell me to deal with it."

It was enough to make him push harder. His lungs squeezed painfully at the same rhythm of his heart.

I will reach you.

The shadow was so dense and cold it burned him. More marks appeared on his skin. But the spark green only got brighter, larger. He threw out his arms, sending shadow before him. Arching through the air, and breathing without breath.

I will find you.

The walls of darkness thinned. Gray cast over a landscape, and Jimin could feel victory at his fingertips.

I will stop being a coward, and tell you I love you. That I have loved you, and I will never stop.

He cut through the air, slamming into the blanket of night and the shadow in front of him cracked and misted off into the air.

There was a clear opening to the outside. Jimin spotted the brilliant sea, the comfort of night. Tiny houses across a jagged line of mountain.

He found his way back.

Jimin wrestled through some stray strands of shadow and ran through the tear. He was heaving, his eyes wide like an animal as he turned in a circle.

There was no shadow behind him.

And no Aera in front of him.

No. No. No.

His fangs pierced through his lip as he looked around in a low crouch. He didn't even feel the blood trickle down his chin and onto what was left of his clothes.

He didn't give a damn it seemed like every other being that had been at the edge of the water did not exist either.

Jimin growled, "Aera!"

I need to find you. Now.

He ran to the water. He kicked over carts and market tents that were already over turned. He created a block of shadow in an attempt to travel back into the cage he was in, but there was no luck. There was no her.

Wrath turned his blood to ice.

Jimin was done being used. The gods had played their games, and his mother had been a willing participant. She salivated at the idea of power that was only a mere tool to keep her at their feet.

His heart beat with the rhythm of weeping, as he could feel Aera's absence. The man grabbed at his chest, falling to the ground. He stared at the sand below his body, his knuckles disappearing when he spotted sea glass. The color of jade. The color of her eyes. He stroked the piece of earth and ocean tenderly. He refused to wet it with his tears.

This is over.

"I will find you." He said, looking absolutely insane as he spoke to sea glass.

She would hear him, she would know. He touched his heart caged by flesh once again and knew that they beat in time.

If she is hurt, if she—

The man groaned, biting the side of his cheek to taste blood. It was not the blood he wanted, but it was laced with the promise of vengeance. He raised himself from the ground, not caring that sand and salt festered in the cuts and burns along his body. Raising his head to the sky, he blinked at a sun that he did not care shined or not.

Wracking his brain for all the past tutoring he received on the deities, he searched for a solution. It would be helpful if Aera was here because she paid more attention. His laugh of irony was pitiful and got lost in his throat.

Gods cannot walk the earth freely. Despite their expansive power, they were limited to area where people worship them, as it gives them the power to shed their celestial bodies for a shell akin to human. They were able to manifest back home because of the old temple that the castle was built around.

"Nox cannot be far."

He knew it in his bones. It was not his followers that had taken Aera, they were a distraction. A ruse so that they would look the other way. It was not his mother's father, he could not have created that complex of a shadow prison. No it was the god himself taunting him.

A blaze of tan skin and soft voice entered his mind.

"Thank you. Thank you, thank you." He sighed with relief, feeling the salt of the sea enter his chest. That strange woman had given a clue to the only spot of land the god could truly be.

The ancient temple by the sea.

Jimin looked up at the sky, and decided it would be the last day anyone controlled him. Except maybe Aera if she was feeling sultry. She would be the only person he got on his knees for ever, deities be damned.

But he would see her again. He was hers, and that was a vow he could no longer break.

Nox wanted night? He would give it to him.

Jimin lifted his hands, letting shadow seep into the sky. It was boundless, stretching over houses and carts and sand and swallowing everything in his path. The smoky mist had only started to blot out the sun, but it wasn't enough.

"If a god thinks he can take me away from her...I would beg to see him try."

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(A/N: again I just want to be clear I am not neglecting my writing duties! Just working on...other things 😋

Also work and school are super busy for me for this couple stretch of months but I will do my best to put out more chapters! Love yall thank you for the all the support, it keeps me going !

Ooooo feral I need to save my woman Jimin unlocked! It's hawt. 🐱

Tell me your thoughts and theories of how this will pan out!