USEFUL ➴ Illumi x Reader

XLII. Virtue

My limbs were heavy and numb, it had been way too long, and I needed a break. Sadly, I was pretty sure the word "break" didn't exist in Illumi's dictionary. Who would've thought? Droplets of sweat dripped from my body, I was a mess, a sweaty, tired, nearly dying because Illumi freaking grabbed a fallen knife, like he didn't have the advantage, sort of mess.

Should I ask for a truce? Did he even know what that was? Oh my god, taking the hits instead of running was draining too much energy and I could feel my limits running to slap me in the face for thinking I could manage to fight the long-haired man without any sort of plan. His moves were still precise, and very spot on. I, on the other hand, could do nothing. Without having time to even spout some white flag words I noticed the man's leg way too late and got knocked down, the air was taken from my lungs, my ribs felt too numbingly close to death, the pain burnt through all the bruises. I didn't feel like getting up, my limbs probably wouldn't allow me, and it was hard to breathe after that kick. Suddenly I felt like crying, like leaving all this behind and have sweet caresses and whispers in the arms of someone, Illumi stepped slowly and carefully closer to me, like a cat wondering if its prey was already subdued enough to be eaten.

Maybe he was just expecting me to have some sort of plan after not getting up. I didn't. My mind was blank, and from my position there wasn't much I could see. He was now beside me, towering, but only because I was laying down on the floor, belly up trying to recover, my lungs were hungry for oxygen.

The knife dropped alarmingly close to my head. He was staring at me with those gorgeous dark eyes, so I just let myself drown in the dark maze they were. Was I going mad? Why did his eyes felt good?

Don't really know how much time passed, seconds? Minutes? How could I know? I was just way too tired and he stood there as if he had nothing to do before asking in a low voice. "Are you done with the training? Or shall I wait for your recovery?"

Oh, my dear goddesses, how I wanted to be able to get up and kick his ass. I tried supporting my body with my elbows and some nauseous feeling rose from within, scowling I sat. "Huh..."

"Are you very injured? Somehow it didn't occur to me that you'd have such a frail body." His head was tilted, an idiot would think he was worried, I could clearly see he was learning from the experience so he could adapt it to the circumstance when killing. I broke his deep thinking with a casual remark.

"Do you even know what I am like?" I laid down again, spreading my arms on the floor, suddenly wishing there was snow so I could do a snow angel. This place seemed high enough for snow, wonder if the Zoldyck brothers had their fun playing in a winter day. Probably not, this whole house screamed behave and watch your manners. He narrowed his eyes, clearly intrigued with my words.

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing, nothing, dear Illumi, your mentally is probably way too young for that..." And I just laughed, it was really funny to see that some people had different experiences, I forced myself to stop as it still hurt. "Aw... Anyway, I'm done, I shaaaaaaaaaaall not waste more of your time, young master Illu~"

He stared at me deeply confused for a while and left. My head felt lightheaded, and I sighed, feeling the thick wet air. "Didn't even have the kindness to help me out..."

"Chivalry is not his strongest virtue." A strong calm voice said, I nearly jumped to sit upright as my eyes set on Silva. The need to throw up becoming more and more evident, unable to stop my hand to land on my head as the headache that followed those quick movements decided to intrude.

"Does he even have virtues?" I questioned, there was nothing insulting on that, I just didn't feel like I knew any of his virtues and was truly curious. Silva seemed to understand my question but didn't answer for quite the time. He inspected the whole room, now that I looked around it looked like a hurricane had passed by, I felt bad for whoever had to clean this mess.

"Why don't you discover them by yourself?" A suggestion, nothing more. Even though anything coming from that huge body and with that kind of voice seemed like an order.

"Why would I spend time with your son when he's rude and thinks of me as an object?"

Clearly Silva didn't have an answer to that, so he kept quiet, his feline like blue eyes staring calmly at me. A cat -more like a panther- who had just woken up and was still feeling lazy.

"Does it snow here?"

"Yes, in the winter."

"You look a lot like Killua, but he seems to lead a happier life than yours." His eyes narrowed, guess there was really a bit of Silva in Illumi from that simple expression. Even though they didn't look alike at all. "I guess... Killua looks a lot like you and not the other way around..."

With that said I left the second confused Zoldyck as I slowly got up, nearly tripping and calmly staggering to the way I thought my room was.

Clearly my sense of orientation in this place sucked because I ended up in a large room, one of the walls was made of glass, now showing the dark blue night sky flickered with dots and the moon peeked under some clouds, the room was filled with comfortable looking chairs and small bookcases with casual books to read when here. It seemed dark and gloomy but as soon as the sun rose, I could bet it'd look warm and less constrictive than the other rooms.

Obviously tired, I laid down on a large couch, grabbing some of the decorative cushions, and soon enough drifted to sleep. It was not like I could find the way to my room if I went out anyway... so why not sleep here?

Art By: Mayer (Pixiv) /  pixiv.net/en/users/1627564

Author's Note: Helloooo helloo~ Hope the wait wasn't long. 

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