Imperial Affairs (Levi X Reader) AU

77. Sweet Delusions

Reader's POV

I didn't remember what happened after Levi left me. All I knew was that I wanted to call out to him and ask him to save me. But it would be much too cruel to expect him to save me instead of his sister. And he didn't have a choice either way. He couldn't save me even if he chose me.

That was where I would meet my end.

I thought it would be hard to accept but surprisingly, I was looking forward to resting. I was looking forward to not being looked down upon by others. I was looking forward to escaping a fate where I would be betrayed by my closest.

But I was scared. I was scared to die. I was scared to fall into the void and never exist again. Maybe I am the kid everyone thinks I am because my fear of death makes me cling to life even though it only ever hurts me.

I called Levi back for a moment to give him the birthday gift I had promised Kuchel I would give him because he had never received anything in his life before. Though the exchange didn't go as smoothly as planned, I was happy that there was something that would make him remember me. He had something that wouldn't let him forget me.

Because more than dying, I was scared to be forgotten.

But at the same time, I wanted to be forgotten.

Mikasa, Erwin, everyone...they would be better off forgetting me...it would hurt them less.

I wonder...this feeling of happiness that I feel when I think that someone would miss me after I'm gone...does it make me a monster?

Did the fact that I hoped Levi would turn around and not leave me make me a monster?

Maybe I shouldn't have treated him like a human. Maybe I should've been cruel. Maybe I should've acted disgusted by him. Maybe that would have made him hate me. Maybe that would have made his choice easy. I knew he was going to choose Isabel but I could notice the hesitation in his actions.

Was I a monster...because I made him want to choose me?

I know I shouldn't have let him get close to me. It would only make pushing him away harder. My position to rule on the corpses of my enemies is a place where I can only stand alone as the prince with a stone cold heart. I knew that when I revealed my identity to the Empire, they wouldn't take it well. They would never let a woman rule them. I knew there would be riots. I knew how they would be silenced. I didn't want him to see it. I didn't want him to see me as the monster that I was.

Maybe it was for the best that I would be breathing my last breaths in a few seconds. Those people would live. Levi wouldn't see me as a monster. Mikasa wouldn't cling to someone who can't love her back. Erwin wouldn't have anything holding him back from finding the truth he always searched for.

And I...I would disappear, like I always should have. If I didn't exist, Mother would be alive. If I didn't exist, Christa wouldn't have died. I have never been anything more than a prince with a pretty face and ambitions beyond the stars. My power was a farce that vanished without a trace the moment Father turned on me. I would disappear...and all my problems would be solved, wouldn't they?

Yet I didn't want to die. I was no martyr. I didn't want to die for anyone. I wasn't a sacrifice. So what if I didn't matter? So what if I wasn't important enough to be remembered? Just because I was weak didn't mean that I couldn't turn the world upside down. So what if I couldn't be the benevolent Emperor revered as a hero? I would rather be the cruel bloodthirsty tyrant who is the villain of the story than be forgotten, than be not known, than die in the background.

I wanted to burn the world to ashes to prove that I did matter. If anger had the power then in those seconds, all life would be erased from Earth. But that wasn't how it worked. I was dying. The poison was taking over my lungs and it wouldn't be long before my brain was corrupted too.

I am slowly losing myself...losing my head...even without this poison there was always that one...the one clogging my arteries and veins...making me forget everything...forget myself. And I let myself be poisoned...because I couldn't bear to lose them....

I didn't want to sacrifice myself just to maintain the lie that they were on my side when in reality, they were always with someone else, with the woman who took my everything away from me. They were always on her side, not even second guessing their choice or doubting their actions; they were firm, they had decided. I looked the other way because I knew that they weren't doing this by choice but I blindfolded myself in front of the fact that they still chose someone else over me.

Yes, I am selfish. I am selfish for wanting everything to be about me, for wanting them to choose me, for having ambitions, real ambitions for the power I wanted. But it was too expensive. The power was too expensive. It's price was much too high and I didn't have enough to pay the costs without losing my mind. But I had already purchased the power. I had to pay the price one way or another. Or I could choose to die.

I thought about the next day's newspaper headlines. Despite living my life so pathetically, my death would make the front page and the articles about me would be written by their finest journalists, all because of my blood. Without my blood, I wouldn't have survived this world for this long. My ambitions and anger couldn't have been defended if Imperial blood didn't flow through my veins. This blood that placed me over everybody else, my guilty pleasure was loving it, loving the unfair advantage I had ever since I was born. I knew I wasn't better than anyone else but who was I to refuse if the world wanted to place a crown upon my head?

But there was a price to pay.

Udo died. Zofia died. So many of my brothers and sisters died at young ages even when they did nothing wrong, they were simply paying the price for the blood they had. They were paying the price by playing this game of kill or be killed. Compared to them, my loss from this game is rather late. I played well.

Now was not a time to be a sore loser. If I lost, I lost. If I had to die, I had to die. If I had to be forgotten, I had to be forgotten. I had to be lost into the void, there was no getting around it. It wasn't a choice for me now.

Because after all, I always knew the price of the jewels adorning my body.

So when I slowly fade away when no one is even noticing, when my own father doesn't bat an eye, when my guard chooses to save someone else, I have to close my eyes and keep the lies I always told myself, hidden for the final few minutes so that it would be easy to fall. I would finally know how hard the impact of the crash would hit. I was only a few metres from rock bottom where once I fell, I would never be found again.

So I closed my eyes when I felt a strong pair of arms hold me tightly. I would let my mind entertain me with these sweet delusions one last time.

A/N = I ordered Levi's birthday figurine and it arrived today and he looks absolutely gorgeous. Maybe it's presence will help me watch the final aot episode without crying.

What do you call a one legged hippo? A hoppo.

Okay that was bad. But I am the queen of bad jokes.

December 6, 2023

- Heliaxa