love at first sight? might be so, vi just doesn't admit it.

CROWN PRINCE!VI X PRINCESS!R

...

At dawn, the world was painted in fire and steel. You saw her before you heard her—Vi, the warhound of an empire, her banners bleeding red against the pale sky, her armor blackened from a hundred campaigns. The marble steps of your father’s palace trembled beneath the weight of her retinue, a thousand disciplined breaths held in unison as she dismounted. She moved like conquest made flesh, cigar smoke curling from her lips, eyes cutting sharper than any blade. Everyone around you bent—your sisters with trembling curtsies, your brother with his gaze nailed to the floor. But you... you stood. Not dressed in the silks they pressed into your hands, not shaking like glass before the hammer. You stepped forward as though this butcher of kingdoms were only a guest at your table, your smile open, unflinching.

And in that still, suffocating silence, she noticed.

...

😛 t1 vi came on screen and so did i, forgive me i need to INDULGE MYSELF.