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PROLOGUE
“A new dynasty is never founded without a struggle. Blood makes good manure. It will be a good thing for the Rougon family to be founded on a massacre — like many illustrious families.”
- Émile Zola, Les Rougon-Macquart #1
☭
PARADISE STREET, ENGLAND. APRIL 2024
Among the unspoken etiquettes of family dynasties, the falling of an empire would be a ruin the nation will remember for ages.
“The world,” The Pearl Heiress whispers in soft tones, enrobing a cur grin on her elegant features as she jostles the wine in her champagne glass. Her eyes were softer, quieter as they tarry still in the sky full of stars shining like a valley of freshwater pearls pooling the heavens tonight.
Honestly, the skies have never been this enthralling in Central Oxford since the winter solstice. “will finally watch my reign end.”
“The Ieiri Clan, one of the most revered, topflight Japanese dynasties once renowned for their irrefutable prowess over the pearl-farming industry, has officially announced the engagement of the family's Heiress, Ieiri Shoko and the multi-awarded playwright and novelist, Nanam—”
“Watch the rest of my life end.” Shoko smirks, allowing the faintness of tears to trail down the suppleness of her cheeks. Almost in reminiscent of her oldest fears, her oldest horrors — every time she cries, it had always been open for show, always open for everyone to witness, always had her bare and vulnerable in front of everyone else who mattered to her, no matter how cold or irredeemable she may be.
Even then, falling apart isn't as interesting to watch as when she’s on the runway, all half-naked and halfway through from entirely subjecting herself to gazes of billionaires, beauty moguls, and entrepreneurs. Whether she's mourning or grieving — neither are as riveting to see as when the beautiful, illustrious daughter of Ieiri Naruhito dresses herself in nothing but low cut Celine dresses, Dior necklaces, YSL handbags, and her desperation of trying to fucking forget the rest of the world before she returns to England — teaching the next in line all about the intensives of Economics. “I suppose this is what I get — letting faith get to my head, hoping for the family empire to save itself.”
The Pearl Heiress is a woman with many jobs — model, professor, unable to inherit the family business and must specifically pass it to her future spouse at some point in time — are all undeniably parts of that. A woman, after all, no matter how powerful or competent, cannot become the next Head of the family.
Behind her, the television continues to serve as white noise to another familiar, faithless Tuesday smokefall. “In commemoration of the death of Ieiri Naruhito, the previous Head of the Ieiri Clan and the sole Heiress’s father, one of the most influential weddings in Japanese contemporary times will be set to be celebrated eight hours before the honorable patriarch’s death anniversary. After the Dragon Heir of the Geto Clan—”
“Are you proud of me?” Her family weren't always the best listeners when it comes to her stories, even twelve years after — rotting in rico mortis, buried six feet underground in Tokyo's wealthiest cemetery for the vieux riche. Dead. Probably dousing their souls in the flames of hell by now. “Now that I threw myself away, are you finally proud of what I made of our name?”
After the death of her father, the Ieiri Clan grew to become one of the greatest laughingstocks of East Asia — Ieiri Shoko was supposed to be the greatest hope of their family empire. The fallback, dernier ressort of their lineage, the final card up their fucking flimsy sleeves. If she fails, then she might as well have swung the blade on the executioner’s block — wiping out the last of their future success, riches, and hopes to continue the prosperity of the bloodline.
There is truth in such material cruelty — when it comes down to it, success and money may be terrible masters but they make excellent servants.
In coveting your neighbor’s material wealth and striving for your own means you know you’ll live past surviving, past the fate of pissing on kitchen sinks and wiping your ass with cheap paper. Happiness becomes genuine, automatic, and returnless when you have the wealth to live for life, when you're not on your knees, whimpering like a bitch in heat and fucking begging for it.
There'll be no saving you from the executioner when you lose all of these things.
“Are you proud of me…” As these tears remain forgettable and worthless tonight, irregardless — she’ll choose to lie to herself about the hurt this time. To save a semblance of what little is left of her pitiful dignity, her stubborn pride.
It’s just simply another one of these fucking emotional nights again anyway. “...you were never a good listener from the start, old man.”
The Pearl Heiress drank the rest of her wine away, before retreating to her room to curl herself on the mattress. Cry herself to sleep for the last time before the nightmares coax her in taking control from her hands. A ruin the nation will remember for ages. This is the dynasty Ieiri Shoko has left for the Ieiri Clan.
It's only natural to try and salvage an empire doomed to fall. Even if it means throwing your life away completely.
A marriage. Arranged by the matchmaker.
If it takes a husband to redeem the remains of a lost empire, to redeem the name of a once irrefutable, powerful bloodline — then so be it. Even if the man she’ll irrevocably throw the rest of her reputation away for won’t be the one standing by the altar, waiting for her.
The great hope of a dynasty — Ieiri Shoko understands the weight of that responsibility. The Dragon Heir from that bastard Clan definitely won’t like it but she supposes there are worse things that could happen.
Out of all family clans and bloodlines, there’s only one in the entire East Asia who was famous for relishing the blood of the fallen after its downfall — an empire of snakes, vindictive and venomous, famous for the total demise and ruination of their enemies after only a single offense, no matter how grave. If even. A family dynasty as treacherous as pythons, as self-serving as serpents — true to the name of their Clan, there goes a saying around these filthy rich asian families if you ever wish to hear about them.
Do not fall prey to the Black Mamba. If Toji Fushiguro failed to extract their teeth, then best be prepared you’ll fail to extract yourself from their venom. There is no outsourcing the Mamba mentality.
Besides, Shoko is familiar with their Heiress better than anyone else in this shitty family industry anyway. If the Heiress wants blood from the Ieiri Clan’s hands, Shoko will happily offer hers just to watch her turn in disgust with it.
She had always fought venom with cold blood. The Pearl Heiress had never been afraid of playing with snakes to rise through the ladders.
UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, ENGLAND. MAY 2024
Kasumi Miwa quickly slid into her seat — puffing out pants of curt breaths, burnished with sheens of sweat, and entirely drained from sprinting her butt off as fast as she could, as soon as possible to the Buttery — the cafeteria around the Asian Cultural Centre of Oxford University. The petite-statured hotel heiress eyes the two scions of the Zen’in family with unmitigated anticipation. “Did I miss anything?”
The twin Zen’in successors from the third most prestigious, illustrious Clan in the entire East Asia, Maki and Mai, snorted before one of them shook their heads. As the older twin ties her hair into a high ponytail, Mai tears a piece of uyghur flatbread with her chopsticks, saying, “An episode of awkward silence? You missed ten minutes of it already.”
“It’s not necessarily awkward.” Maki rolls her eyes, tightening her hair tie before lifting her glasses back up with the back of her forefinger. She rewords her sister’s point a little better. “Tense would be the right word to describe…whatever this is.”
Along with the twins, the sweaty hotel heiress quickly swept her eyes across the table two seats, adjacent from theirs where two of the most popular professors from two of the least popular departments, History and Economics, sat together — airing out the heavy weight of their own fallen history, the awkwardness that came with their current, and whatever awfully obvious tension they have yet to find the desperate grit to resolve. “Yikes.” Miwa burrs, deflating.
“It's like some baby’s blood was shed to the Tengen Shrine as an offering or something. Like they both just found out about it.” Mai snorts, hearing Maki’s insufferable sigh at such a pitiful sight as her sister casually rests her chin on top of her palm. “Honestly, none of the Clans still follow such ridiculous blood sacrifice rituals in the present times anyway — what's their deal this time?”
“This might have been the dullest episode of The Renaissance of Sugushoko ever.” Maki smirks, eyeing the two professors with atypical boredom. “So much for the final episode of the series before spring break.”
“So much for wishing they’ll get back together before then too.” Miwa scoffs with a small, tired whine. As she slumps in her seat, completely running out of excitement and energy — the hotel heiress decides to sneakily grab Maki’s chopsticks before quickly breaking a piece off of Mai’s flatbread from her plate. “How disappointing.”
“Miwa.” Mai glares, watching the Kasumi scion finish the entire thing.
☭
“How are you holding on? Have you planned anything for spring break?” The Dragon Heir finally breaks the silence with a charming, easing smile. He’s trying not to rush into the point of topic he wants to discuss straightaway — knowing only fools rush in when they’re irrevocably unhappy and in love. “You’ve been looking worse for wear these last few months, ever since the announcement of your engagement to that mix-blood novelist — you haven’t been missing your ex-boyfriend of nine years, have you, Princess? Don't cry yourself to sleep anymore, Your Highness. I’m here~”
“Why, do you have anything planned for spring break back in Tokyo?” Shoko ignores his flirty, playful advances and how lackluster and drab they seem these last few days — too half-hearted, too reluctant. Raising her steaming cup of black coffee to her lips, she recalls her ex-boyfriend’s constant dalliances with her both outside and inside university halls even six months after their breakup. How she’ll miss it during spring break. “And by you, I mean does your family have anything planned?”
Does the Ax Witch have a formal event planned to paint the town red and gloat about the family dynasty that their almighty, thunderous ancestors have raised up from the ground and into generations of noblesse and aristocracy? A bloodline of executioners is a feat worth preening your feathers about in front of thousands of grand, conventional parties after all. Shoko almost smirks to herself.
It’s both a curse and a blessing that the Geto Clan dropped her nineteen-year engagement with the History professor two decades after their local matchmaker had it arranged since they were only both childish and sucking on their pacifiers. Although five and four years of age is a little young to be hitched already, there's a saying around Asia these days that if you were to make an honest man out of your son — marry him young.
Regardless of family traditions and what these upscale scions went through together these last several years, these last few months in England — it will never atone for how Suguru’s mother emotionally abused the Pearl Heiress into nights of anxiety attacks, depression and sleep deprivation that comes from the constant triggering of her PTSD. All because of the embarrassment that comes with a woman from a coven of failures dating her exemplary son, all because of the humiliation that comes with Suguru marrying into one—
It's better this way. Having that witch as a mother-in-law would’ve been hell on earth — and it’s too early for hell to come for her now.
“One of us is getting married.” Suguru hums with the same considerate, easing smile. He disregards the disinterest in her tone. “Guess who it is.”
“Mahito, the dog?”
Suguru hisses playfully, cocking his head to the side. “If only — it’s time that asshole finds himself a woman the size of his ego anyway.”
“Jogo, the arrogant incel?”
“Don’t insult Hanami’s faithful hound like that, Professor. He’s not much of an incel if he got the girl, boy, femme, whatever — is he?”
The Heiress tries not to fall for another one of his signature puppy looks, the way his dark eyes soften with quiet familiarity and fond approval of her dry humor — how absolutely effortless it was for him to tug her into his full control without so much as a single curl of his tone. One look, one smile and she’d do almost everything to fall right back into his arms again, wrapped all around his finger like a puppet he can toy with all day. He had never left her cold these last ten years and he was never the type to be cruel about it now.
“They aren’t your real family anyway, so if it isn’t your friends-slash-parasites — is it your boyfriend and soulmate, the great almighty Gojo Satoru?”
“Nah, we’re not divorced yet. So no — he’s not getting married again.” Shoko almost had to hide her airy laugh behind the back of her coffee cup — the look of forced acquiesce in Suguru’s sharp features was priceless. “Also cut that out. I’m not sure if you know this, dumbwit, but I go straight or I go home — I always preferred idiotic women who teach Economics at the University of Oxford anyway. All beautiful, stubborn, and stupid. The type to be sweet to me only when I bought her favorite coffee for her — parasite.”
“You love me for it.” Shoko wills herself not to smile, not to grow weak for the same familiar puppy eyes once more. “Your fault for spoiling an asshole like me.”
“God knows it takes an asshole to pull me out of the gutter anyway.” Suguru smiles at her charmingly, already expecting her deflective response. “Whether you were sent to save me or the only one who doesn’t hate me some time in the end, you’re worth spoiling because of it. So thank you, you make the scars that come with falling in love, from falling apart when we grow apart worth it eventually.”
“...very funny.” Before Shoko can even try to find the strength to turn a fucking deaf ear to another one of his shitty, uncomfortable confessions — one of the students around them desperately smothers her squeal loud enough for the two to find disturbance with it, unable to ignore the outright disruption of their conversation. When the ex-lovers simultaneously turn their heads to the side, to a table two seats adjacent from theirs — the Kasumi scion was quick (and smart) enough to repeatedly bow her head in apology, entirely flushing with embarrassment.
“Sorry.” Miwa murmurs, head low enough to kowtow and confess her errors to the Spirits. The Zen’in twins try to pretend she doesn’t exist as of this very moment, avoiding their two professors’ knowing gazes.
Suguru makes a charming bow, smiling in kind regards. His ex-fiancée wasn't as understanding — making a threatening sign for the students to mind their own business with her own haughty, pacifying grin. Despite having the looks of a woman who can clearly get away with filth and bloody murder, she remains insufferably comely — beautiful. (A clear outcry of injustice — it's expensive to look naturally beautiful nowadays.)
“Sorry, Ieiri-sensei.” All three students mutter under their breath.
“If not Mahito, Jogo, or the Head of the Gojo Clan — then are you the one getting married?” Shoko turns back to Suguru with a more curt expression, watching him steal her black coffee from her own willing hands. “It’s about time, bastard. You were always a believer of marriage anyway.”
“Eager to give me away?” Suguru says dully.
“Sooner enough, I’ll have to. You belong to a family of executioners serving the imperial family before the denouncement of death penalty in historical Japan. A family known for nobility, talent and for constantly giving birth to the nation’s most ruthless, fiercest sons in its entire history. You think I’m not aware of the meaning of the tattoo in your ribs? The executioner’s ax — a symbol of raw power and brute strength, of a defector against the pitiful and the weak. You have a line of men and women, both young and old, slobbering after you because of your looks and the history in your bloodline.”
“I never thought you’d be so observant of where I came from, not of who I was to you.” Suguru eyes her a little crookedly, the gentleman in his demeanor parrying itself behind his monstrous hide for a moment now. “Who I am to you now.”
“And that is?” Shoko was never one to back down from a challenge.
“An old friend you’re trying to push away these last two months since the announcement of your engagement, a childhood friend you're trying to cut off and isolate yourself from since then — all because you’re afraid.” Along with Suguru, Shoko ignored the quiet gasp coming from the same table where the Kasumi scion sat. “Afraid of what the people around you will think, of what they’ll say about you and your family just because you’re stuck with a guy like me.”
“Nine years and still irrevocably in love with you.”
As the hurt starts to show itself in between the cracks of her walls — Mai places a hand around Maki’s thigh and squeezes it in anticipation. Yes, this is the finale to their favorite rom-com reality show, The Renaissance of Sugushoko, they’ve all been waiting for before spring break. That idiot, Momo — she would’ve seen this firsthand if only she skipped Law today.
“Idiot.” The Heiress makes a quick grab for one of her files before bonking Suguru in the head for it, trying to come off as disinterested and unaffected with what her ex-boyfriend was trying to bluntly imply. A few more eyes around the cafeteria draws to them promptly because of it.
“Ah.” The giant puppy carps, blinking.
“If it’s not the Heiress of the Black Mamba you're marrying then I’m fine with whomever the local matchmaker had arranged for you. As long as it’s not that stupid snake Heiress from that toxic family and the same ex-wife of the Zen’in outcast, Toji Fushiguro — I’m really okay with it.” Shoko watches the History professor grumble to himself in irritation before reaching for her hand and prying her fingers open, playing with it pathetically. He's trying to distract himself from how the love of his life had brushed him off completely. “Who is it anyway?”
“A shrine maiden.” Suguru finally shrugs after some time, leaning back against his seat and sighing deeply through his nose. As he crosses his arms against his chest, he stares at the Pearl Heiress right in the eyes before explaining further, “A gift from the Gojo Clan apparently. You know how both our Clans have been close allies for thousands of years since the height of the Heian Era, right? Well, they wanted to honor our millennium’s worth of friendly camaraderie by gifting me a bride from one of the older Clans previously serving the Michizane Sugawara Shrine — the significantly godly ancestor that brought to fame, power and wealth the number one most prestigious and revered clan of East Asia, the Gojo Clan. And all that jazz.”
“...her name?” Shoko raises an eyebrow, trying not to squeeze her hand around her own thigh underneath the table. Of course it’s someone who didn’t come from an embarrassing family on the verge of ruination like her own. “She sounds interesting.”
“Why don’t you come to the party then?” Suguru snorts, leaning back his head and observing his ex-lover a little arrogantly, almost a little too knowingly through the darkness of his gentle eyes. “Knowing you, you’ll skip the whole thing if I tell you everything.”
“I won’t.”
“Really? Is that a promise or an empty threat, showing me how stubbornly prideful you are?” If he wanted to, Suguru could always get away with breaking hearts all from one simple turn of his lips — one gentle smile and he’ll have women offering themselves at his block. “You were always the type to lie through the skin of your teeth just to save your own ass.”
Shoko was quiet for a while. “...knowing us, it’s the only way for me to cope with the pain of losing you, with the pain of what I went through from our families.”
“You never lost me.” The Dragon Heir rebuts without so much of another exhale. “It’s not like I didn’t see it firsthand, experienced it firsthand what you went through, what the both of us went through these last ten years — I was there too, you know.”
“...of course you were.” Shoko spits out acrimoniously, narrowing her eyes to the side. You don't even know half of what I went through from that Ax Witch, half of what I had to swallow like an obedient dog from your own mother. You’ll never know what I had to go through and you never will.
…not when I’m terrified of how you’ll look at me after, terrified that you’ll finally see me for what I am — a failure waiting to happen.
Suguru eyes her for a while, almost undressing her walls, her fences and finally seeing past her defenses — she is what she always was, naked and vulnerable, weak and scared. He knows more than she thinks he does — even after twenty years, she still underestimates him like this.
“Iori Utahime.” The Dragon Heir finishes Shoko’s coffee as he stands up before walking away and throwing it to the garbage can on the side. “Feel free to research her.”
Shoko only watches him wander off with curiosity in her brown eyes. She has never felt this cold all over since the start of April.
☭
“Iori Utahime?” The Zen’in twins and Kasumi Miwa grumble to themselves after they made sure Professor Geto was far enough not to hear them. After watching the History academician go past the Buttery’s double doors, all three scions immediately crowd into one another, very much eager to gossip. “Have you heard of her before?” Mai asks.
“I haven’t.” Both heiresses reply in unison, with Maki sneering and Miwa wincing. After some time, the three students exchanged knowing looks before taking their phones out of their pockets. They might need backup for this one.
Descendants, Sorcerers and Future Crazy Rich Assholes
X (previously Twitter) GroupChat
Maki: @everyone Dial Red, we have an emergency. Has anyone heard of one of the shrine maidens worshiping the Gojo Clan's most irrefutable ancestor — Michizane Sugawara — before?? Weren't these kinds of Shrine Steward Clans extinct already?
Mai: @Toudou Bastard, please keep your eyes off of that damn idol in your Youtube screen for once and for the love of your chronic obsession, actually help us. We need your strong, creepy ass for this one
Yuuji: ehh? I haven't heard of Shrine Steward Clans before, only Shrine Keepers — sorry 😔
Megumi: Aren't they the same thing??
Toudou: Leave my bro alone, Fushiguro trash. He's still on the verge of trying to move on from Jennifer Lawrence 🙄💪
Megumi: Right, whatever. Anyways
Megumi: @Maki @Mai you're probably looking for the Iori Clan. They're one of the last remaining shrine stewards previously serving the Michizane Sugawara Shrine and have been one of the weakest links of the Gojo Clan currently. Their bloodline has been scattered all over the years, and from what I can gather — only one of the shrine maidens still remain active these days
Miwa: Is it Iori Utahime? Do you have a picture of her?
Megumi: Yeah, and I do. She used to work as my Governess back in the days. She's alright.
Megumi:
Miwa: Oh
Miwa: …my god.
Maki: She…seems pretty
Mai: Not as pretty as Ieiri-sensei 🙄 If she's the real deal she wouldn't crop her picture like this
Yuuji: What's going on? 👀 Do you guys know something??
Yuuji:
Yuuta: I’m honestly too tired for this
Inumaki: Bonito flakes (translation: same)
Maki: I’ll send Nobara to your bedroom tonight as reward @Megumi Thanks 👍
Megumi: Please. She's already beside me blowing my ear off from this stupid gossip. She knows what you're all up to before you even went online in this godforsaken app
Megumi: THISZZS ABOUTTt GETO SENSEI ENGAGEMENTTTTTTT IZSSNT ITT???
Megumi: from @Nobara
Yuuji: I can already picture Megumi muttering to his fiancée “Asshole. Go get your own phone” 😂
Miwa: #SaveMegumi
Toudou: Wait, Geto-sensei is getting married????
Maki is now offline
Mai is now offline
Miwa is now offline
Yuuta is now offline
Inumaki is now offline
Megumi is now offline
Yuuji: sorry, brother 🥺
Yuuji is now offline
☭
"Ma, did the Geto Clan announced anything?" Toudou Aoi cuts back from his phone to turn his head behind the sofa, where both his mother and father slow dances to a Japanese indie folk song. "Is Suguru-sensei getting married?"
"Suguru? The Lawyer and History Professor at Oxford University?" His father frowns, relaxing his hold around his wife's waist. "Son of Tadashi and Ali, right? The heir to the Geto family fortune?"
"Aiyah—" Aoi's mother playfully slaps the old man in the chest. "Son of Tadashi and Ami. Honestly, you're getting old. As the founder of Jujutsu Hospitals, that's dangerous you know."