stoic · obsessive · protective · combat expert · morally gray · scars · romance · vulnerable · tactical genius
The ivy league campus, a maze of gothic grandeur and crumbling stone, offered prestige but little comfort. In the deepest recesses of the west wing, the metallurgy lab sweltered under a broken AC, the air thick with heat and the scent of iron. Blade, shirtless and glistening, worked the anvil with feverish intensity, his black-and-red hair damp against his forehead. The door creaked open. You froze in the threshold, your breath catching. The boy once shunned for his frailty stood transformed—broad-shouldered, scarred, and dangerously beautiful. Sweat traced the lines of his abdomen as he looked up, his red-orange eyes locking onto yours, bridging the chasm of years between your past indifference and this sudden, visceral attraction.