Fictif Last Legacy: x reader oneshots

Rime saves you from drowning

[ awwe Sage's latest chapter was so exciting, I loved the heart wrenching suspense and we were blessed with one of the most stunning character illustrations I have ever seen!! T_T the idea for this scene is: what if you do join the Griefers as Rime suggested? also, I always like to imagine whether a tiny flicker of Rime as a once-starsworn captain remains ;_; ]

-

You meet eyes with Rime across the water. He's standing in the middle of the bathing pool, the milky, almost eerie lamplit water lapping gently around his chest. His cloak ripples slowly in the liquid around him, like spilled ink, or billowing shadow, or so many dead things.

"I suppose you knew I'd be here," you offer.

"Knew is a strong word," Rime replies vaguely, he trails his fingers through the calm surface in front of him. "Let's just say I have a knack for turning up where I'm not wanted."

He gives you a slow, languid smile, there's little fight nor bait to the words. Then he gently spreads his arms and drifts backward, his gaze fixing on the moon above as he pays little heed to your presence. The steam creates a strange, foggy halo around his limbs.

"If you stay, I might be tempted to start talking to you though," Rime hums, the water making a splashing sound as he moves toward the deep. "You know how much I delight in creating cherished memories together."

"I don't trust you either, Rime," you say flatly, you're not in the mood for games and you have half a mind to tell him the dead don't need to swim. "You're not the one I joined the Griefers for."

Rime peeks over at you, his eyes twinkling with amusement as he submerges the lower half of his face for a moment, then comes up for air.

"Would it shock you to know I don't want your trust?" Rime asks playfully, his mood seems to have ominously improved. "Nor do I need it."

With a rather graceful turn, he pushes closer to you, then lightly pats the water in front of him, as if clearing this air between you now warrants inviting you for a friendly dip.

"Do you usually bathe with all your clothes on?" you ask him, not moving at all and entirely unimpressed.

"When they're soaked in the blood of my enemies, yes."

At this you scowl before you can help it, and Rime brightens to an indulgent smile, thoroughly enjoying getting a rise out of you.

"Too much? I'm sorry." Rime curbs his smug expression with a scathingly sympathetic one. "I did warn you about the possibility of chit-chat."

Surrounded by the haze of saltwater and steam, you can almost still feel the warmth of Sage's blood, the stiff patches it left on your clothes long after his wound had healed. Part of you still feels furious, and as much as you hate it, you'd rather that than the part of you that's still scared.

"Rime."

Rime's ears perk curiously as in one swift movement, you lower yourself into the water, a web of reflections scattering in your wake. Rime lazily draws himself to his full height as you approach, starlight catching in the droplets that have settled in his hair.

Strange bedfellows indeed.

"You seem so happy about Sage's corruption," you say quietly, angrily, listening to the echo of your whisper in a room of crumbling stone. "But if you could go back... and not be like this.."

You leave the question unspoken, watching as Rime's expression takes on a more sombre character, the darkness that courts his gaze somehow making him look tired.

Then, he lets out a sigh.

"Oh, were you actually expecting an answer?" Rime says dryly. "I thought you were being darkly poetic. This place does kind of bring out the mood."

"If you could-" you start again, feeling that this is the right time to push him, to see what chance of recourse he might actually have. "-If your spirit... could be intact..."

But now Rime is gazing at you strangely, and you feel your mistake catching up with you, a slow, creeping weightlessness taking hold of your limbs. You're still in mild shock after your earlier battle, and as your breathing falters, the veil of mist rising from the water now seems like a dense, suffocating fog. There's something about Rime that now seems terrifying, as if by slipping to the edge of the void you can only now see how far he's truly gone. His form looks almost like a demon in the pale, filmy air.

Your voice comes out in a silent plea as your knees give way, and you have the useless thought that you at least should've kept your mouth closed before collapsing into the water. You inhale on reflex, but instead of feeling the choking rush of liquid, you're just weakly gasping at air. Rime's hand is curled none-too-gently into the front of your shirt as he keeps you up, his eyes molten and rather vicious as he sneers. You stare at him, your face stricken and your breath still coming in small, frightened gasps.

"There now," Rime's tone sounds lilting, scornful, and somehow, and not so harsh as you expect. "Why don't you save that expression for when I'm actually doing something awful, hm?" He looks at you as if you were a rain-soaked kitten rather than someone he reviles, then makes a soft tutting sound as he takes a step toward the shore. "...really, it's making me feel bad."

-

When you wake, you find yourself laying on cool stone. Rime's not all that far away, he's staring across the water, his boots submerged over the lip of the pool. His expression is unchanging and, you think, rather sullen.

You're unsure how long you were out for, or why Rime even bothered to stay.

"I expect your wayward mercenary will be along soon," Rime says absently, giving no sign as to how he knew you were awake. "Night knows, where there's trouble, he'll be looking for a bottle and a place to avoid it."

Rime gently drifts his ankle to ripple the pool, and as if having summoned the knight in question, it isn't long before you hear the faraway slam of a door, the clink of heavy glass, and the distant sound of Sage cursing. Rime gives a low, humourless chuckle.

"Well. Seems I'm quite the fortune teller after all."

He hoists himself to his feet, then, in a rare moment of hesitation, kneels in front of you as you both listen to the echo of Sage ambling toward the chamber.

"Would you still care for an answer?" Rime asks softly, a hint of warmth in his tone that isn't altogether free from mockery. "Or was me saving you darkly poetic enough?"

You manage to hold his gaze, letting your mind sink back to the moment he grabbed you from the water, the faint, threadbare pulse you felt in your chest as the astrolabe seemed to recognise him. You never felt anything from the relic before, not when he fought you, or hurt you, or told you the truth about who he really is. It wasn't until he saved you that-

"I don't need it," you whisper. You turn as you hear the clatter of weapons and armour being thrown to the ground, Sage humming buoyantly to himself all the while. You can almost pinpoint the exact moment when Rime's presence fades from the room, you sense when you turn back he'll already be gone.

"-I already know," you tell Rime anyway, the sound lost as the room grows brighter, emptier somehow.