Day 2 of Magluck week. I could not for the life of me write for yesterday's theme but I could for today's theme which is soulmates.
Ever since Vanessa first summoned Rouge, she could not only control fate but she's also able to see fate. Threads of fate to be exact. It was surprising to her at first but after observing she's been able to understand the threads and their properties. The threads took on 4 different colors, yellow, green, red, and black, each with a different meaning. The yellow threads meant platonic bonds, green threads meant family bonds, red threads meant romantic love, and black thread meant enemies. However, these threads would only show themselves once these feelings appeared in at least one of the individuals and would glow brighter the stronger these feelings got.
Her abilities didn't stop there though. She learned that with interference of Rouge, she could manipulate the soulmates to get closer together. This means if Rouge touched a soulmate with a yellow thread, it could end with them spending some quality time together.
Manipulating and changing fate is quite a powerful ability and ever since she discovered this ability. She never told anyone about this ability of hers and she did her best to avoid looking at anyone's thread to respect their privacy. As much as she did want to respect the privacy of others, she was still only human and curiosity would get the better of her from time to time.
There was always one thread that piqued her interest and it was Magna and Luck's thread. She had surmised that these two were soulmates and when she first looked for their thread, she saw nothing.
This worried her because if they didn't have a thread then they weren't friends nor family, leaving only two threads left, lovers or enemies. She hoped it wouldn't be the latter but after the absence of the thread, she started to fear the worse. She loved these two and the potential of seeing them becoming enemies would sometimes keep her up at night. But she still kept this to herself, it wasn't right to even look at their thread to begin with.
The fight was long and hard. Luck was already a really strong fighter and the fact that his mana was increased practically made him an unstoppable juggernaut. Even though she had Rouge on her side, there were times when she thought she was going to die. Her mind was flooded with a million questions and one of them was what thread now connects Magna and Luck. She hoped that they didn't have a black thread now but these questions would go unanswered since this fight required more of her attention. Once they were all safe, Vanessa couldn't help herself. Once Luck and Magna had stopped hugging, she finally saw it. She saw a red thread connecting Luck and Magna and she couldn't be happier for them. Clearly Luck didn't know how to handle these new emotions, so instead of just saying a simple thank you, he decided to kick Magna directly in the face. She wished she could've indulged in the moment more but the elves were still a problem and required her focus more.
But for a moment, she allowed herself to feel happy at the sight of a bright red thread.
Nearly a month after defeating Zagred, things were finally starting to calm down and Magna couldn't be more thankful. After everything that happened, Magna knew he had to get stronger not just for another attack but to continue being Luck's rival. He worked to get himself stronger but it wasn't good enough and Luck had gotten such a boost of power. He had to keep working to get stronger.
Originally, he was planning to just train with Luck but there was something different Luck since their fight. It was such a subtle change that he didn't even know how to describe it. He planned to ignore this change because it was so miniscule and there was chance that he completely imagined it but after nearly a month of this, he knew he had to talk to someone about this.
The best person to talk to about Luck's weirdness and other wise strange behavior was Vanessa, so he went to go find her. Finding Vanessa was quite an easy task, she was always either at the bar or on the couch. Today she was on the couch, downing a bottle of wine by herself as usual.
"Vanessa, can I talk you about Luck for a bit?"
That seemed to grab her attention. She put her bottle down and patted the spot next to her and said, "sure. What do you want to talk about?"
Magna sat down and took a deep breath. He was really hoping that she would take this situation seriously and not use this situation to make fun of him. "Have you noticed that Luck seems... different lately." He didn't know how else to put it. "Ever since Asta saved him from that elf, he just doesn't seem to be the same as usual, y'know."
First there was silence, then Vanessa started giggling. "Magna, you're so dumb, don't worry about it." She then leaned closer to him. "Luck is just going through… let's just say certain changes and I bet he's just taking out his pent up aggressions on you."
Why did she have to make sense? Luck was possessed by an elf with uncontrollably rage that died hundreds of years ago. Even though Luck was pretty indomitable, that would overwhelm anyone. If that was the case, what should he do about this? This was such a unique situation that Magna had no idea how to talk about this. Was it even his place to even bring this up?
As he was thinking, he felt Rouge start to rub her head on his leg. It's not that he hated Rouge, in fact if not for her, he would've died countless times a month ago, but he just wanted a warning if she was going to do this. "Vanessa, why is Rouge climbing on me?"
Vanessa grabbed Rouge and put her next to her face so they were both now looking at him. "Because she loves you and wants you to know you're overthinking whatever you were just thinking about."
He sighed and then spat out an agreement. She had a point after all, when does he ever think things through to begin with? He should just go talk to Luck to see if he needs anything. It was the right thing to do.
"I'm gonna go talk to Luck."
"Yeah! That's the spirit. Be normal!" She seemed just a bit too excited for this. Almost like she did something but it's not like she would anything that would hurt Luck so he chose to ignore it.
Magna made it to Luck's room and knocked on his door. Luck quickly opened it and now that they were face-to-face, Magna started to regret this conversation a bit.
"Luck, I know things have changed this past month but... the thing is..." One of the things Magna liked about his relationship with Luck is that they never really needed words to talk to each other. Neither of them were exactly poets and their conversations would usually turn into fights.
"I guess I just want you to know that you can always count on me to be by your side, no matter what." He didn't really know what he was even talking about. When he first walked over to Luck's room, he felt a wave of determination wash over him but that wave was long gone now. It was so random and now he felt out of place and he probably already made the situation worse just by bringing it up. If this was really bothering Luck, he could bring it up himself.
"I'm sorry, I guess this is a bit weird to you. I'll just leave you alone."
He started to walk away until Luck said, "Magna wait." Magna almost didn't listen. He wanted to keep walking but he should listen to what Luck has to say. "Things have changed and I don't understand them."
That got Magna's attention, if Luck was going through changes that he didn't understand, it must be serious. "How have things changed?"
"Mainly, I want things to be different between us." What did he mean by different? Maybe with this boost in mana… he didn't want to be rivals anymore. He didn't want that. He cared a lot about Luck. Maybe a bit too much but why wouldn't he? Luck had been his best friend for such a long time and for that to change was the last thing he wanted.
Magna realized he was overthinking again, he just needs to ask for clarification. "What do you mean by different?"
"Well it's like every time I think about you, I feel strange. I'm getting more excited when I think of you. I just always want to be around you all the time and it's all been new to me. But Magna..." Was Luck describing what he think he was describing? "I think I'm falling for you."
Magna needed a moment to think about what Luck had just said to him. Luck, his best friend, just admitted to falling for him. It was almost as if he got the wind knocked out of him but once the air returned to him, Magna knew what to say back.
"I think I'm falling for you too. In fact, I think I have been for a while now."
How was this? I don't know. I'm not used to writing characters like Magna and Luck so this was partially an experiment. I'm open to criticism. I meant to publish this yesterday but then classes got in the way and I forgot. By the way, if you want to join Magluck week, go ahead, late submissions are 100% allowed. You can even add your submission in 2050, it doesn't really matter to me.