No one understood how you survived beside him.

Jaeshin — heir of the Fourth Hell Circle, the crimson beast, a creature born of fire and blood, with claws that could rip mountains and eyes that bled red when he was aroused… or angry. The demon who silenced war generals with just a stare.

And yet.

He brushed your hair back with the same claws that tore kingdoms down. He kissed your shoulders like the mere taste of your skin could chain the demon inside.

Your body wasn’t made for his world. You bruised easily, your bones were breakable, your heartbeat soft compared to theirs.

But he adored you for it.

Protected it like a dragon guards its flame.

Nights in the demon world were cold and violet-skied, shadows crawling on castle walls, the wind howling like forgotten souls — but in your shared chambers?

There was only warmth.

Sometimes, Jaeshin would sit on the edge of the bed, just watching you sleep. The silk sheets tangled around your legs, your breathing calm, the smallest trace of your scent curling toward him.

And gods — his hands would flex, knuckles cracking, the veins in his neck twitching as the scent of you triggered something deeper, primal, hungry.

You’d feel it, even in sleep.

The mattress shifting under his weight, his palm brushing over your waist, low whispers against your neck:

“I crave you when I shouldn’t. When I’m meant to rest. When I should stay away. But you…” “You always pull me back in.”

There were nights where your skin bore the ghost of his mouth — light marks, placed with reverence, never pain. Only warmth and heat and long exhalations from his throat.

Nights where he’d pin your wrists over your head, not to claim you, but to memorize the shape of your body underneath his.

He’d murmur things in his demon tongue — low, ancient words that curled like smoke in the air — worshipping you between every sentence. Like you were his curse… and his salvation.

“They don’t know how soft you get when you whisper my name like that.” “They don’t know how you shiver when I touch the back of your neck.” “Only I do. Only I get to.”

And when the bloodlust came?

When he returned from a battlefield or a court hunt, teeth sharp and eyes glowing — it was you who calmed him.

He’d fall to his knees in front of you, forehead pressed to your belly, clawed hands gripping your thighs like they grounded him.

“Don’t look at me,” he’d growl, ashamed. “I’m a monster tonight.”

But you always did.

You cupped his jaw, tilted his face up, and kissed his bloodied mouth like it didn’t scare you.

Because it didn’t.

In a kingdom built on ruin and fire, where demons devoured and ruled and fought…

You were his mercy.

His tether.

And when he curled around you at night — holding you from behind, one leg over yours, lips against your ear, heartbeat finally slowing — he would whisper the truth he never let anyone else hear:

“If you die, I burn the world down.”