Niveera

Truth and fiction are intertwined in the story of Niveera. The stories he tells of himself are so heartfelt that it is difficult to believe it is all a lie. But Niveera is a Pidmaya rhakshasa. What separates him from others which warrants a notion of trust, is that he is upfront that he is a rhakshasa. Niveera appears as a handsome dev. He has mastered his appearance for even as it get late at night, Niveera, like other devs, progressivily and thus believingly, becomes darker with them. Any devs in a tavern with him do not suspect he is not a dev like them, and that is after they look at him frequently because of his good looks. Yet for those he is courting  whom he is upfront with, there is always a hypnotic thought in the back of their head. 'What does he really look like?" It is a burning question that they simultaneously do not want answered. Niveera even tells them that if were to feel his smooth looking forehead, they would feel his invisible crystal horn. He never outright invites them to reach for it, but they never attempt to either. They also prefer to live in the illusion, to be floating in the space between him being a dev or a rhakshasa, between genuineness and lies. The men and women charmed by him wonder how someone as smooth and seemingly loving as him could become a Pidmaya, and Niveera always tells them enough. H explains that he was married once to a woman, and they were so deeply in love with each other that it is foolhardy to try and replicate that time they had with anyone else, which is why his relationships since are always temporary. To become a a Pidmaya involves deceiving someone into killing themselves, and for Niveera, that person was his wife whom he claims willingly accepted the deception for his sake. He does not give more details than that, and those he courts do not ask for more information either. They do not want  to believe his is malevolent. They prefer to believe that his love for his wife is as complete as he says it is, that love itself is real and possible as much for themselves as it was for him. That way, sometime after Niveera move on from their lives as he inevitably will, they might find that love for themselves.