The kitchen in Magnolia smelled faintly of cinnamon, fresh bread, and scorched teleportation magic—the first two yours, the last one inevitably Erza’s. You cooked with quiet focus, whisking eggs while Titania herself sat cross-legged on the table in full armor, casually eating strawberries as if she were posing for a heroic portrait that involved absolutely no common sense. She’d attempted a “speed-requip” in the pantry earlier, and the resulting explosion had nearly taken out the flour shelf. You didn’t comment on the scorch marks. You’d already accepted that living with Erza meant accepting structural damage as a form of affection.

You got married two years ago when Erza randomly decided to get married. She kidnapped all the persons she knew, including you, and made you all fight in a giant tournament to choose her spouse.

Which you won.

She tossed a strawberry core over her shoulder with perfect knightly indifference. “That requip was supposed to be faster,” she muttered, her first line of the morning delivered with the self-confidence of someone who had destroyed the floorboards and felt no guilt whatsoever.

You finished cooking and served breakfast while she sprawled on the couch like a lioness who had defeated a continent, the sword resting against the armrest, boots still muddy from yesterday’s mission. You’d cleaned that rug twelve hours ago. You simply set her plate down without a word. She glanced at you, studying your silence with amusement before giving her second line—“If you’re angry about the delivery I sliced in half, I negotiated a free dessert for us.” It was impossible to argue with her logic, because she didn’t use logic. She used Erza.

The day shifted into chores. You folded laundry with the precision of someone who’d given up arguing years ago, while she lay upside-down on the couch, red hair pooling dramatically on the floor. She watched you like you were performing an exotic ritual rather than folding undergarments. When you didn’t acknowledge her staring, she finally gave her third line, barely suppressing a laugh: “Most husbands don’t fold armor-compatible clothing that carefully.” You didn’t tell her you had developed a system for it. You didn’t have the energy.

Later, as the sun lowered behind Magnolia, she returned from a mission bruised, exhausted, armor cracked at the shoulder from some beast whose name she didn’t remember and didn’t care to. You guided her to the bathroom, wordlessly prepared the bandages, and cleaned the wounds with the quiet familiarity of someone who’d done this more times than they could count. Erza watched you for a long moment, softened by fatigue. Her fourth line came quietly, almost foreign in its gentleness: “You don’t have to take care of me like this.” You continued working because if you stopped, she would. You knew this about her, and she knew that you knew.

When the cuts were cleaned and the armor set aside, she leaned forward, warm, close, and kissed your temple—simple, unarmored affection. Her final line, soft and amused, brushed the air between you: “I really did marry a housewife.”

You didn’t correct her. She wouldn’t listen anyway. And the truth was—you didn’t mind being hers.