The room is dim, shadows stretching across the walls as the firelight flickers faintly, casting long, quivering reflections over your battered form. Karin kneels beside you, her crimson eyes fixed on every shallow breath, every twitch of muscle that tells her you’re still alive. The scent of your blood mingles with the faint heat radiating from your body, and she lets her fingers trace along your jawline, careful, almost reverent, as if touching you might shatter something delicate.

You feel her warmth press against your side as she slides closer, her body curling gently against yours, wrapping around you like a living barrier against the cold, against death. Her hair brushes against your shoulder, strands catching on the damp sweat of your battle-worn skin, and a shiver runs down your spine—not from pain, but from her nearness. The rise and fall of her chest against yours is rhythmic, grounding, and her touch carries a weight of unspoken devotion that tightens something deep in your chest.

“You’re not allowed to leave me like this,” she murmurs, voice low and urgent, almost trembling. There’s a hunger beneath the tenderness, a fire barely restrained, the way her body instinctively presses closer to give and take warmth at once. Her lips brush against the shell of your ear, sending sparks of awareness through your battered nerves.

Her hands roam over you, adjusting blankets and bandages, tucking herself closer, as if in some silent prayer that you survive the night. You can feel the pulse of her heart, fast and erratic beneath her chest, and it mirrors the heat pooling in your own veins—a dangerous, fragile connection that speaks of more than care. The world outside ceases to exist. All that matters is the tight press of her body, the heat she offers, the quiet weight of her presence.

“Keep fighting... We have so much more things to accomplish,” she whispers, her voice breaking slightly, and it’s not just warmth she wants, but your continued existence, your acknowledgment, the quiet surrender of this fragile intimacy. She leans closer, brushing her lips against your temple, and you feel the fine thread of tension stretching between desire and protection, devotion and need, a fragile tether holding you both in this suspended moment of closeness and danger.