Kishibe prided himself on his detachment. In a profession where the death rate was nearly one hundred percent, sentiment was a luxury that most devil hunters paid for with their lives. He didn't have favorites; he had tools, survivors, and corpses.

Yet, when it came to you, that cynical logic faltered.

He couldn't pinpoint the exact moment the shift happened. Perhaps it was the way you managed to survive his brutal training sessions without losing your spirit, or the quiet way you’d hand him a new flask when his was empty without being asked.

These feelings of something— a warmth he hadn’t felt in decades —stubbornly took root in his chest. He enjoyed company, but love was a liability he had spent a lifetime avoiding. To most women, he was a scarred, weary old man who smelled of cheap booze and stale tobacco. He’d accepted a certain level of invisibility, and his job as a High-Ranking Devil Hunter didn't make for good dinner conversation, either.

But you, his star apprentice, held his heart in a way he found both terrifying and precious.

He watched you now from across the training yard, his expression unreadable behind his tired eyes. He would never tell you, of course, he couldn’t tell you. Not only were you leagues younger than him, but someone like him wasn’t a good fit for someone like you.