Work Text:
The place they arrived at this time was thick with the stench of blood.
The Lord of Mysteries had only just slightly furrowed His brow, when the Angel of Darkness on His side had already cast a Concealment, erasing the heavy metallic scent of blood around Them.
"Where are we..." Before the Lord of Mysteries could even begin a Divination, the Angel of Darkness had already recognized where They were.
"This should be the place where I chased down that group of Outer Deities remnants last time," the Angel of Darkness said, His brow also furrowing after figuring out their location. "The intelligence before wasn't completely accurate. It only mentioned one Sequence 2 and one Sequence 3, but there were actually two Sequence 2. If it weren't for the fact that I have your Worms of Spirit on me, it might have been a bit troublesome."
They began to look around and soon discovered, at the edge of the bloody battlefield, a small patch of Concealment.
This bit of Concealment naturally couldn't block the Angel of Darkness, who was nearly at His peak state, let alone with the Lord of Mysteries watching intently nearby. After making contact, They both fell silent, staring at the dying Demonic Wolf inside, who looked like he was about to breathe his last at any moment.
"Let me first..." It was the Angel of Darkness who stopped the Lord of Mysteries from acting. Although what appeared before Them now was a dying version of himself, Mr. Star, as a high-ranking deacon of the Church, became even calmer. "You told me last time that if another you, meaning this world's Lord of Mysteries, isn't nearby, it would be difficult for you to perform large-scale 'Fooling' and 'Deceit' on another world without paying a huge price. So, rather than you doing something right now, we should first see if this current 'Leonard' is still capable of praying."
He approached this world's version of himself and frowned again when he found that the other seemed to still be conscious, and was even deliberately restraining his spirituality.
" He's still awake, hasn't lost control..." Now the Lord of Mysteries was also puzzled. Since this Leonard still had the capacity to think, it was obvious that, even without knowing that the Lord of Mysteries was Klein, the first thing any sensible member of the Tarot Club should do was to pray to Mr. Fool, begging to resolve the current situation and save his life.
Or was it that the relationship between this world's "me" and Leonard was so bad that "I" would ignore such a situation? That shouldn't be the case, right?
He swiftly stole the thoughts of the dying Demonic Wolf, and then His expression turned extremely strange.
"He's thinking... if he dies, He might become the vessel of the Lord of Mysteries, that is, Klein..."
" He seems to think... that time when 'I' relied on the Staff of Stars to appear in his dream during the purge of the Demoness, 'I' was telling Him that in the future, Klein wanted to use His body to walk upon the earth... It's just that Mr. Fool is a benevolent deity, patient enough to wait for an Angel's natural death, so He's very... happy... that He can die here???"
What a mess... The Lord of Mysteries felt His head hurt more than after fighting the Celestial Worthy for three days and nights.
"Never mind, no matter what this world's 'me' is thinking, I'd better save him first." The Lord of Mysteries, having made up His mind, was stopped again by the Angel of Darkness. "Klein, there's still time, let me try one more time."
The Angel of Darkness knelt before the Demonic Wolf, and when He spoke again, his voice carried a soothing tone.
"You, like me, want to protect Klein well, right?"
The Demonic Wolf barely lifted his head to look over, the remaining emerald color in His dull eyes growing increasingly turbid.
He nodded almost imperceptibly.
"Then if you don't pray to Mr. Fool right now, Klein will be in danger."
"You don't want him to be in danger, right?"
Severe injuries and excessive blood loss had long left this world's Leonard in a daze. Under the deliberate soothing and inducement of the Angel of Darkness, reduced to mere instinct, He was quickly "implanted" with the thought of helping Klein escape danger through praying.
" The Fool...that doesn't belong to this era..." The voice, as low as the buzzing of a mosquito, was almost like an illusion.
But in that instant, everything nearby became blurry, like a TV screen with a poor connection.
Gray fog diffused through the air. This world's Klein, dressed in a gentleman's three-piece suit and draped in a black robe, practically leaped out of the void immediately. He looked expressionless, but the tentacles writhing beneath His robe were enough to show His inner state was far from calm.
So "I" actually came directly in person... Even the Lord of Mysteries was startled, but since this world's Klein had already appeared, He naturally didn't need to just stand by and watch like before. He didn't interfere with this Klein's rescue efforts for Leonard, but instead began carefully checking whether those Outer Deities remnants on the battlefield were all dead beyond any doubt, and one by one marked the organizations that might have participated in this matter, planning to settle accounts with them after returning as well.
Of course, as a friendly Lord of Mysteries, He also prepared a copy of the same list for this world's version of Himself.
Soon, the bleeding stopped, emergency treatment administered, in short, the Demonic Wolf, who would live for a long time yet, was carried back to Sefirah Castle by this world's Klein, along with two uninvited guests.
On Sefirah Castle were still the familiar bronze table and seats. This world's Klein, biting His lower lip tightly, waved His hand and directly made all those things vanish. Then He quickly conjured up a huge, very soft-looking cushion, before carefully placing the Demonic Wolf, who had barely regained normal breathing, onto it.
Then, seemingly in a terrible mood, He directly dispersed into a mass. Within the thick gray fog, many tentacles bearing strange and eerie patterns could be seen lashing about.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the agitated tentacles within that mass of gray fog finally re-aggregated into a human form.
"Sorry, I lost control for a moment... You..." Before He could finish His apology, this world's Klein stared at the Lord of Mysteries—who had conjured a large single-seater sofa on Sefirah Castle, guided the Angel of Darkness to sit, and then nestled Himself into the Angel's arms—with a subtle expression, appearing intensely rich in Humanity.
"You and Leonard... what's your relationship?"
Sitting comfortably, even braiding the Angel of Darkness 's hair, the Lord of Mysteries appeared quite relaxed. Now that He had confirmed this world's Leonard would be fine, He was in a good mood. Adding to that, the fact that this time, it was this world's Klein being shocked by him and the Angel of Darkness, which made Him feel even better.
"Take a guess~" He smiled at himself in a good mood.
"...Good friends?"
Seeing His counterpart's hesitant expression, the Lord of Mysteries suddenly wanted to be mischievous. He pressed the back of the Angel of Darkness's head and planted a sticky kiss on His lips.
After a sticky, lingering kiss, the Lord of Mysteries was satisfied to see that on Sefirah Castle, besides Himself, all other conscious humanoid beings had blushing faces.
Well, actually, the tips of His ears were also red, but He was confident that His Poet couldn't detect the Great Old One-level Clown 's disguise, and this world's Klein probably had no heart to study such trivial matters right now.
"I shouldn't... shouldn't be like this with Leonard..."
"Whether you should do something or not has nothing to do with me, you and I aren't from the same world," the Lord of Mysteries rolled its eyes at Himself. "Anyway, the one injured, nearly dead, and still lying there is your Leonard, not mine."
"Klein!" Seeing this world's Klein become increasingly despondent, the Angel of Darkness frowned sympathetically and called the Lord of Mysteries' name, but was quickly pulled into the next kiss.
"Klein?... " A weak voice whispered softly.
This world's Klein, who had just been at a loss in front of his counterpart from another world, jolted and directly flashed to the side of the Demonic Wolf who had regained consciousness.
The Demonic Wolf, still dazed, soon seemed to understand what had happened and struggled to rise from the cushion, appearing ready to transform into human form.
"Don't move! Just stay like that!" This world's Klein quickly extended a tentacle to stop the Demonic Wolf 's actions.
"Klein, I'm sorry..." The Demonic Wolf froze in place, not moving, but His voice revealed even more hesitation and pain.
"What that 'me' means is, you've just been injured, don't waste spirituality on such trivial matters, and don't move recklessly to avoid worsening the wounds." The Lord of Mysteries, who had been watching the situation closely and was almost frustrated to death by this extremely awkward version of himself, interjected. "Anyway, you lie down first, rest well, talk about everything after you're better."
"You two?" Hearing this, the still-rigid Leonard finally moved His gaze from the Klein in front of him, turning His head to look at the two newly appeared people on Sefirah Castle. "Not a dream?"
"No, They are 'us' from another world. Listen to Him, lie down first." This time, it was this world's Klein who explained. Although He still appeared expressionless, seeing that the Demonic Wolf hadn't immediately followed the other self's advice, His brows relaxed slightly.
Only then did the Demonic Wolf obediently lie back down.
Lie down he did, but the Lord of Mysteries had chosen His position perfectly. Even lying down, the Demonic Wolf could easily see the interaction between the Lord of Mysteries and the Angel of Darkness.
He undid the small braid messed up by the previous kiss, picked up a few strands of the Angel of Darkness 's hair again, and started weaving a new plait. The Angel of Darkness, meanwhile, obediently held the Lord of Mysteries snuggled in His arms, watching His actions with a doting smile on His face.
This world's Leonard watched the Angel of Darkness holding the Lord of Mysteries, His eyes filled completely with envy.
"I like you." Perhaps stung by that envious gaze, this world's Klein suddenly spoke. "I've liked you for a long time."
"You..."
"Sorry, I only just realized it."
The still-lying Demonic Wolf froze for a moment, then, ignoring this world's Klein's attempts to stop him, quickly transformed back into His human form with long hair and emerald eyes. The wound on His abdomen, which had nearly cut Him in half, became even more conspicuous, but He disregarded everything, straightened up, and said in a dreamy tone as if He had won the jackpot, "So you don't hate me, don't resent me?"
This world's Klein was startled. On one hand, He awkwardly extended a few tentacles in an attempt to cover the wound that seemed to be starting to ooze blood again; on the other hand, several other tentacles were in a state of complete confusion, entangled with each other, not knowing what to do next.
" I did for a while, a little, but later actually..."
"... Maybe I shouldn't have dug up your grave, but I won't apologize for that..."
"No, no, no! It's not like that!!" This world's Klein finally realized He still had His human parts, and hurriedly used his own hands to grasp Leonard's. "What I meant by 'for a while' was back in Tingen. Back then, I thought you were too annoying, always interrupting my thoughts, staring at me, coming to chat with me, bringing me food. Especially later, because of the Sealed Artifact, you suddenly, inexplicably kissed me, it was too strange! At that time, I thought I shouldn't like males, shouldn't be attracted to you! So, I always thought I probably disliked you a bit, and my strange attention towards you was all due to that dislike. And when you dug up my grave, although I kept complaining the whole time, telling myself you've caused me big trouble again and that you'd never leave me alone, actually I was very happy... really happy that someone still remembered me..."
“After that… I've always… liked you…”
“Looks like there's no problem anymore?” The Angel of Darkness, lounging on the single sofa, whispered to the Lord of Mysteries still nestled in His arms.
The Lord of Mysteries, who had been using the excuse of being scared by this world's Leonard to demand kisses as compensation from the Angel of Darkness, glanced up—only to see that Klein and Leonard from this world were also hugging each other, whispering love words. Disinterested, He shrank back into the Angel's arms, responding with perfunctory indifference.
He was a bit tired of this world. If it weren't for being impolite in someone else's territory, after seeing the various large and small scars on this Leonard's human form, he would have wanted the Angel of Darkness to transform back into Demonic Wolf form right now, so that every single one of his worms could carefully confirm that His Star was perfectly healthy all over, not even the tiniest hair showing any sign of malnourishment.
After completely calming down from the earlier show-off mood, the Lord of Mysteries belatedly realized that He was frightened as well. After all, if it were the Apocalypse, an accident, lifespan, or other uncontrollable factors that forced Him to lose His Poet, although He could never accept it easily, at least He knew that they were of the same mind, and could only curse destiny's cruelty. But if He lost His Star forever because of such ridiculous misunderstandings...
He had no doubt that He would lose control.
"Promise me, if you ever doubt my feelings, you must verify it with me directly! And never take your own life lightly. As long as there's a possibility you can survive, don't think about the cost first, you must tell me!"
"Okay, okay," the Angel of Darkness rested his chin on the shoulder of the suddenly insecure Lord of Mysteries, adding, "I know, Klein likes me the most, and my survival means everything to you. As long as there's a possibility, you'll try your best to keep me alive."
"Me too, I like Klein the most too. No matter what happens, as long as there's a possibility, I'll try my best to live for you."
The Lord of Mysteries, who got the personal confirmation, finally felt at ease. He glanced at the newly formed couple over there—already locked in a kiss—and decided to leave without saying goodbye.
It shouldn't be considered impolite to leave them alone—after all, interrupting would be really impolite.
I'm very polite, He thought.