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For centuries, the Todoroki bloodline with their fire magic was one of the most important hunting families. Pictures of their ancestors hung on the walls of their castle-like home. Keepsake items from the rarest and most dangerous beings they had hunted lived on, enshrined by Enji in the collection room within their library.
The same could not be said for the rest of the family.
Todoroki Enji wanted to strategically marry two important families and create little soldiers with pure hunter blood in their veins. He never wanted children; all he wanted was to raise perfect hunters to continue his legacy.
While the Himura family, known as the ice purebloods, had been struggling with a great collapse in the last decade, they had blindly accepted Enji’s offer that was too perfect to refuse, and without even thinking twice, they had sold their daughter Rei for the fame and glory the marriage would bring.
Rei, who could see the light in people and the goodness that everything could bring, had agreed to this for her family. Unfortunately, her grave mistake was in believing wholeheartedly that this would bring her a happy family.
Things were not perfect, but for a while they did waver between normal and good.
Their first child Touya was the apple of their eye. For Enji, he was the unique product of the union between two purebloods with the strongest fire magic. For Rei, he was her North Star, her little baby, her sweet son. Although they were scared that he was born prematurely and weighed less than expected, the doctors reassured them that this was normal.
They made a mutual decision to have a second child because they wished Touya to have a sibling. Enji had already gotten what he wanted: A boy. The rest didn’t matter.
Thus, their second child Fuyumi was born. Since she was a girl, their father did not care much about her because to him, being a hunter was the supreme duty of men. Their mother was overjoyed. Her princess was born and Fuyumi became her big brother’s playmate.
Obsessed with the idea of raising the perfect hunter, Enji began training his son at a young age, but Touya was no good with a bow and arrow. All he wanted to do was play Princess, Knight, and Dragon with his baby sister. Ever since his mother called him her ‘little star knight’, Touya had considered it his duty. He also didn’t want to hurt anyone. Even in games, he would befriend dragons and fly with them!
To his further downfall, during training his fire started to burn him, causing his whole life to spiral down hill. With all this, it had made him lose his father’s favor and little Touya was thrown away like an old toy.
When their third child Natsuo was born, a strange storm cloud began to gather in the Todoroki household. Touya, who could not make sense of his father’s actions, followed him into the forest with his bow and arrow, planning perfect attacks with his flames against targets. His flames were starting to leave more and more permanent marks on his body, but Enji did not care at all. Although his games became more interesting thanks to Natsuo, it hurt Touya that their father no longer cared about him.
After Enji realized that his second son was not blessed with any magic, he stopped caring about him a few months later and caught Rei with the demand for a fourth child. Rei, whose eyes had lost their light, helplessly submitted to him. But with each passing day, her mental health was getting worse.
Their fourth child, Shouto, had become the golden boy their father had wanted: A perfect pureblood hybrid blessed with both Todoroki fire and Himura ice.
Their lives were plunged into darkness as their youngest brother overshadowed them all. At first, Touya hated Shouto, but as he grew older, he began to realize that the fault lay not with his baby brother but with his filthy father. No matter how much he wanted to win his favor again, to take Shouto’s place and become the hunter of his father’s dreams, that was impossible. His flames, which had turned from red to blue, left deep purple burn marks on his body that tainted him forever.
He lost all of his children forever after Rei’s attack on Shouto caused their mother to be committed into a mental hospital. Unfortunately, this left them with nowhere to go and no means of support. So Touya resolved to finish his education and prepped for his exams in hopes of finding a well enough paying job to support his life with his siblings.
When his father sent him to the HPSCollege where only the elite were accepted, Touya had thought it was all a terribly bad joke. This was no ordinary college after all. Only people with certain qualities were chosen. And Touya was not like his father ‘Endeavor’. But Todoroki Enji’s reputation was enough to open all doors with just one word of his.
This wasn’t just a college, it was also a place to train people with magical powers to fight against monsters. Their first goal was to clear the forest next to the campus of all the dangerous beings in it.
But when Touya found himself in front of the massive gate doors of HPSCollege, the reality of it all came crashing down on him like the weight of the entire sky.
This couldn’t be happening to him when he was aiming to end the hunters with the friends he had found over the years. He felt at home among a group of chaotic people who called themselves the League of Villains, and the harmony between their ideas and his own caused hope to flutter within him.
They took this news better than he did because Touya could then leak information to them from the hunters’ nest.
He went to his dorm room first, but was surprised to find it empty because the board had told Touya he had a roommate. Touya hastily dropped the boxes on his desk and ran to his first period in order to make it to the classroom in time. He was surprised to see that it was full. He swallowed hard and climbed the stairs, his sapphire eyes were on the empty seat at the very back. When his eyes fell on the boy sitting next to the seat, Touya’s knees buckled and he nearly fell down the stairs. His messy wavy blond hair resembled a bird’s nest, his golden eyes emitted a warm glow as if they had captured the sun, the markings next to his eyes were too perfect to be makeup.
“Hey,” said the golden boy, and nodded to the professor. “You’d better sit down. It looks like class is starting soon.”
“Y-Yeah,” Touya stuttered, his heart beating in a strange rhythm as he placed his bag on the table and sat down.
“I’m Takami Keigo, by the way,” the golden boy said, holding out his hand.
“Todoroki Touya,” Touya whispered as he squeezed his hand, small sparks dancing inside him. Keigo’s eyes widened, but the professor’s voice brought both of them back to the lesson.
This was already the beginning of their never-ending story.
The two of them hung out and talked after class and walked around the campus orientation together. When they headed to their dorms and stopped in front of the same door, the look on Touya’s face made Keigo burst out laughing. Apparently, Takami Keigo was also his roommate.
And Touya’s education in HPSCollege began with his new… friend from the first day.
At the end of the first week, on Friday evening, two letters were thrown through their doors. Inside them, stamped with a blood-red seal, were their invitations. The students were divided into groups according to their magic, and were trained according to their chosen weapons and fighting styles.
Both Touya and Keigo had fire magic, and wanted to focus on ranged and close combat. So the two became training partners.
Weeks turned into months, months into years, and after dancing around each other for a long time, the two finally managed to trust their feelings and make the first move towards each other. At the beginning of their second year, Touya introduced him to the League and Keigo became a member of their team, and their family. Their training was going just as well. This was surprising to Touya. Even though his flames burned him, Keigo had taught him how to balance it.
During the winter break of their second year, they were supposed to go on their first hunt. Their teacher wanted them to harm the most powerful being in the forest: the Phoenix.
Touya and Keigo started to make plans as a team as usual, but there was something strange about Keigo. The light in his beautiful eyes had faded, his gaze always drifting out the window. But Touya didn’t care; he believed in Keigo with all his heart. His soul was connected to Keigo’s in a way Touya couldn’t understand. He loved him with all his being. After what he had seen from Enji and his mother, Touya had never thought that he could have a good relationship with anyone…
Maybe that’s why when Touya found out who Keigo really was, he left everything behind without a second thought.
On cold snowy nights in January, Keigo would slip out of their dorm and silently return early in the morning. Touya took deep breaths as his dark thoughts whispered terrible things to him. He knew Keigo, he believed in their love—he believed in him.
But still, he couldn’t help but follow him.
When Touya found his lover in flames, his heart stopped and before he knew it, he threw himself on Keigo. As harsh coldness and darkness surrounded him, his own screams tore at his ears.
When he woke up, he was in a huge tree in the forest. It was many times bigger and fuller than his own dorm. Keigo was next to his bed. There was a big shadow behind—
Wings. Keigo had wings.
Keigo sighed before letting him speak and started to pour his heart out. He told Touya how he was the prince of this forest. That he was the Phoenix who swore to protect the magic and living things in this forest. He confessed that it was the real reason behind his entrance into HPSCollege.
His objective was to end the PLF training and eliminate the HPSC forever.
The love between Touya who has pure hunter blood flowing through his veins and Keigo, a supreme being who has sworn to protect magic was perhaps a sign that the two were soulmates who would bring about each other’s end.
After he had told Touya his secrets in all their truth, Keigo had an expression on his face that made Touya’s heart ache. As if—as if Touya wouldn’t believe him, as if he would push Keigo away and crush their love under his boots...
Didn’t Keigo know how much Touya loved him? Didn’t he know that Touya would burn himself—turn the entire world into ashes for him? He would tear the stars from the sky and put them in his hair, steal the moonlight and sprinkle it in his golden eyes, and wrap the warmth of the sun around him like a blanket. If Keigo asked, Touya would leave everything and everyone behind and stay with him forever.
Touya would do anything for him.
These things he had learned? They had renewed Touya’s faith in him and strengthened his loyalty even more.
Touya didn’t expect his lover to cry after telling him all of these things one by one. When Keigo found his place in Touya’s arms, he was sobbing about how much he loved him and what he would do for him. He silently admitted that he wanted him here, by his side in his kingdom, but he couldn’t tell anyone about them.
Touya smiled softly at him as he cupped Keigo’s cheeks and wiped his healing tears away with his thumbs. “You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath.”
Keigo was like a religion to him, if he asked him as the Phoenix to protect the forest, the creatures in it, and the magic itself, Touya he would do it without a second thought, with all the beliefs he held dear. Because Touya loved Keigo with all his heart, his soul, his entire being.