Distant Worlds ~ A Black Clover Story (Fuegoleon Vermillion X OC)

Chapter 25 - Halloween Ball

A/N: Shout outs to Shiroda9kyu, Aaykevin and Musically_awsome for your comments on the past chapters. Reading the comments is honestly my favorite thing about this.

The first thing I recognize when I float out of my dreamed state and into reality is a warm hand lazily running up and down my bare back. Sighing, I recognize it as Fuegoleon's and let my mind drift off. It's too early to start thinking about getting up.

"You were talking in your sleep again." I hear his slightly distracted voice tell me. I grumble incoherently, burying my face further into the pillow. I feel a temporary stop in his strokes as I hear him flip the page of what ever report he's sitting, reading in bed this morning. He then absentmindedly resumes running his fingertips up and down my spine. It's something I've gotten used to waking up to the last few weeks as I tend to sleep on my stomach, face smashed into the pillow. The day after my birthday the only thing the squad seemed to want to talk about was my relationship with the Crimson Lion's captain. And Fuegoleon was right, the news had spread pretty far by the time we announced it through the proper noble channels. Everything was alright for the most part. No one in the squad openly disapproved of our relationship to my astonishment. I was afraid I would have to beat the crap out of people who said I sleeping my way up the ranks or using Fuegoleon. But the squad all seemed happy for us. The worse complaints I heard over meals were from fellow knights whining how they were going to ask me out but the captain beat them to it. Fuegoleon also had to confiscate a betting sheet making its way around the squad. He wouldn't let me see it for fear that I would slaughter whose ever name was on it, but I did manage to find out it was for bets on how quickly we would get hitched and how long it would be until I was, as they so crudely put it, knocked up. Apparently the most popular bet was 7 months for both scenarios.

I was also kept preoccupied with the amount of short term missions. Now that the seal allowed me to leave for several days, Fuegoleon sent me to quite a few relief missions as my talents were still best used as a medic. A handful though, was as a battlefield medic as the number of skirmishes with the Diamond Kingdom continued to increase. I held my own with ease though in these battles as my magic training with the Vermillion brothers helped me fine tune the use of my grimoire.

When I was at the base I continued the work on my potions as well as teaching first aid and hand to hand combat to the stationed knights. At night I usually spent time in Fuegoleon's office trying to mold the raw Dalmascus steel ore into a weapon while he continued his own work. The farthest I've gotten is to make the chunk of steel smooth. Needless to say we were workaholics. But as the saying goes: work hard, play harder. And that's what Fuegoleon and I did in the spare moments we had together. Usually it was after we called it quit in the office and right before bed (but sometime we didn't make it out of the office before we started). Other times it was right after training when one of us would take a shower to get ready for the day. Overall I was the happiest I've ever been.

"What are you planning on doing with cinnamon?" Fuegoleon's voice reaches my ears despite my face being firmly in the pillow.

"What?" I ask turning my head to face him. He's still reading his report.

"You were talking about adding cinnamon to something in your sleep." He says. Yawning I push myself up on my forearms causing Fuegoleon's finger to stop dancing across my backside. The air feels cool against my bare skin as the morning breeze comes through the opened window.

"Oh" I yawn again. "I was playing around with adding spices to my potions yesterday to help the taste. Cinnamon improves blood flow, reduces inflammation and can help with digestive problems. Plus most people seem to like the flavor." I turn to my right side so I'm now facing my lion. I notice his eyes flicker from the page to my uncovered chest before returning to what he's reading. I sigh at his resolve to finish reading this report. I rest my head on my right arm as I start running my fingers up and down his forearm in hopes he'll get the hint to put the reading material away. "Did you want to try it?" Finally he closes the cover of the report and places it on top of his nightstand.