Honkai Star: Rail x Reader Oneshots

"What a gambler gains in the end is also what they lose in the end." | Aven

The weight of the gift box lingered in your hands—heavier than it looked, heavier than it had any right to be. The velvet beneath your fingertips, soft and inviting, seemed almost mocking. Aventurine's flair for dramatics clung to every detail, but the somber stillness of the moment stripped away his usual charm.

You opened the lid with trembling fingers, revealing a set of poker coins gleaming in the dim light. Each coin shone brilliantly, polished to perfection, yet cold to the touch. Your reflection warped across their surfaces—fractured, distorted.

Beneath the coins lay the letter, its folds crisp, the ink bold yet eerily delicate. You recognized his handwriting immediately. The flourish of each letter mirrored his showmanship, but the words carried the weight of a man stripped bare of illusion.

When all the things worth cherishing in life are traded for chips that flutter between your fingers, losing them becomes all too easy.

“What a gambler gains in the end is also what they lose in the end.”

Your breath hitched.

The room felt smaller, the walls closing in as the silence thickened. Each word burrowed deeper into your chest, cold and cutting, like the edges of the coins now clutched in your hands. You tried to imagine his voice as you read the words again, but all you could summon was the emptiness between his practiced smiles and hollow laughter.

Was this his way of saying goodbye?

Anger bloomed hot and fierce in your chest, but it wilted almost as quickly, leaving only a raw ache. The coins clinked softly as your grip faltered, each sound a reminder of how easily they slipped through your fingers—just like him.

He had always warned you, hadn’t he? Always made you understand, in his roundabout way, that he was a man destined to play and lose. But you had stayed, believing you could be the exception to his game, the one hand he would never fold.

The coins lay scattered across the table now, their perfect symmetry disrupted by trembling hands. The letter remained open, its words blurred as tears welled and spilled, each drop darkening the paper like the weight of the truths he’d left unsaid.

You wanted to scream, to call him a coward for running, for turning your connection into another gamble he couldn’t afford to keep. But beneath the hurt, you understood. You always had.

He had never feared losing the game. He had feared losing you. And, in the end, his way of keeping you safe was to let you go.

A single coin rolled off the edge of the table, hitting the floor with a hollow ring. You didn’t pick it up. You couldn’t. Instead, you sat in the quiet, clutching the letter to your chest, feeling the weight of his absence press against your heart.

And though you didn’t want to admit it, you finally understood: Aventurine had gambled, and this time, he had lost everything.