2 Months to Mondstadt

by enbydm

Summary:

The story of Aether and Paimon's first meeting and their adventures together before the events of the game. Updated every Thursday.

Chapter 1: Awakening

Aether awoke to violent shaking, and a terrible headache. He furrowed his brow, curled in on himself and shut his eyes tighter, but that only seemed to aggravate whatever earthquake he was sleeping through. Actually scratch that, it wasn’t the earth below him shaking, it was someone shaking him . He felt the distinct pressure of a hand on his arm, trying to yank him out of his five extra minutes.

Aether slitted one eye open and caught sight of the exasperated face of his twin sister, Lumine.

“Finally,” she said, heaving a sigh. She pried open his other eye with two fingers. “I thought all those crash landings might’ve finally done something irreparable to your brain.” 

Aether blinked, and Lumine backed away, offering a hand nonchalantly “Come on. This one’s a bust.”

A bust, huh? Well, it happened sometimes. Not every world could be some feather-fanning, grape-feeding utopia. One world they went to had been full of nothing but old and testy abandoned landmines, for instance, while another housed inhabitants that all somehow carried the inescapable stench of sewage. Aether rubbed his eyes and worked out the story quickly. Lumine must have woken up first, after they landed, and wandered off to explore. She knew he could find her easily, and awakening in a new world often took time–sometimes hours, sometimes months, it varied for both of them (although, Lumine had always been the lighter sleeper). Point being, it wasn’t odd for him to awaken, only to find that his twin had already been on some grand adventure while he was asleep. If she had been so desperate as to forcefully wake him up herself (one was not supposed to interrupt the awakening, a similar sentiment between travelers and sleepwalkers) then this world was probably not worth looking twice at. Time to move on.

Aether took Lumine’s outstretched hand and pulled himself up, shaking out his tense limbs and rubbing at his temples. He placed his hands on the back of his hips, spread out his wings, and stretched his spine, groaning a little at the stiffness. Lumine rolled her eyes.

“Don’t be such a baby. Let’s go,” she said, grabbing him by the wrist and tugging him behind her.

Something about her was a little off, Aether thought. Underneath her cool exterior was an intent, bugging nervousness. She wasn’t usually this insistent about leaving, and Aether saw her eyes darting around, like she was one the lookout for something, or someone.

“Lu?” he started, carefully. “Is everything alright?”

“Fine,” she answered, too quickly. “We should just get off this world as soon as possible.”

“Why?” he asked.

“I’ll tell you later,” she said. Honestly, that response made Aether feel a bit petulant. He wasn’t used to his sister keeping anything from him.

They were heading up some kind of hill, working their way back into the Place Between, as the twins called it–the exit of this world, and the door to the next. Aether was looking around, taking in what he could of the place they were about to leave so entirely. It looked nice, actually. The grass under his feet was long and green, swaying in the gentlest of breezes. There was a small pond nearby, and two small songbirds washed themselves near the water’s edge, droplets flicking off from flapping feathers. It seemed peaceful, but there had to be more to it. Aether trusted Lumine’s instincts about these things.

The sky was dull, and the higher they climbed, the more Aether could see of the deep gray that sat on top of the horizon. Fat, dark clouds loomed low in the sky, floating out from somewhere, like a puff of ash from a volcano. That must be it, Aether thought. There was some imminent eruption from a supervolcano nearby, threatening the entire planet. No wonder Lumine was so keen on leaving quickly. He thought of the two songbirds by the pond and his forehead crinkled with worry. Hopefully, this world wasn’t too inhabited.

And so, when they reached the top of the cliff, Aether was expecting to see some variation of fiery mess. When one was a traveler of worlds, there were very few views one felt unprepared for. And yet, this one stopped Aether right in his tracks.

It was as if the world itself was splitting apart. Chunks of earth had been ripped from the ground and hung suspended in the air, lava bubbled up from deep crevices that must have spanned miles, and the sky at the horizon line was a vivid, blood red. There were shapes in the distance, what Aether first thought were the appendages of a giant beast, arching up from the center of destruction like a spider’s legs sprouting from its abdomen. But looking closer, he could see that the massive forms were actually made up of smaller objects, too uniform to be organic–lines of dark red cubes, opaque on the faces, and glowing at the seams.

And this was all very surprising. But the thing that caught Aether’s attention the most was the dilapidated and crumbling architecture at the center of the thing. Pillars and arches clung to the earth by their feeble, destabilizing foundations. Frames of enormous buildings burned like they were nothing but kindling. There were enough structures to suggest that the empty hole in the planet had once been several cities–perhaps even a nation. Aether hadn’t known it existed a few moments ago. And now, it was gone.

 “Are there people there?” Aether gasped, addressing his sister. She didn’t respond quickly enough, so he took action. “We have to go and help them.” Aether marched towards the edge of the cliff, preparing to spread his wings and take off, but Lumine maintained her grasp on his wrist, and she stood still.

“Lumine?” Aether asked, concern visible on his face. His sister’s mouth was pinched in a straight line, her rosy lips going white with tension, and she wouldn’t look at him, her gaze fixed on the disaster in the distance. She looked determined, solemn, but she didn’t look surprised.

“...Lum–” Aether started again, but she interrupted him.

“We can’t,” she said, still not looking at him.

“What?”

“We can’t help them. It’s not our place. Let’s just go.” She released him, but only to step forward and begin drawing the array that would lead them to the Place Between. Its structure required a geological–or sometimes a metaphorical–edge.

“So there are people there.”

Lumine’s hand slipped. She quickly erased the mistakenly drawn line and kept going.

It was a familiar disagreement between the two siblings. Lumine thought that, as guests, they shouldn’t interfere in the business of their host world. Aether didn’t see a point in traveling around, if they weren’t going to try to better places in the limited time they spent there. But this wasn’t something Aether could just leave alone. How many people had died in that disaster? How many more would die trying to escape? Maybe it was pointless, maybe this world really was beyond saving, but it didn’t feel right to just leave it to die.

Lumine stood up, and fixed Aether with a gaze that let him know she knew exactly what he was thinking. A door materialized behind her, ready to spirit them away.

“I’m going,” she said, “Are you coming with?”

It was such an unfair card to play, and she knew it. Of course he was coming with. They were all they had, in this world, the next, and the one after that. There was no higher price to pay than losing each other. And manipulating the Place Between to choose a new world destination was a bit like working with a half-trained cat. You had a little sway with it here and there, but there was no guarantee that it would give you the outcome you wanted. If they didn’t go together, there was a real chance of never finding each other again.

Lumine walked up a set of prismatic steps, and opened the door. Every Place Between was a little different, shaped by the world they were leaving behind. This one had clear blue skies and a long stone platform that seemed to be floating in midair, building on pieces of itself as Aether’s eyes traced down the path. It was such a stark contrast to the scenery behind it.

It pained Aether to turn away from this burning world. And looking into his sister’s eyes, he could see it pained her too. But of the two of them, she had always been of stronger character, more decisive in her actions, more sure of her choices. Aether was supposed to be her older brother (by seven minutes, and honestly, they had lived long enough that any age difference short of a century wouldn’t mean much) but he always felt that he relied on Lumine more than she relied on him.

So when she stretched out her hand, he took it, and the door closed behind them.

---

Aether looked down at his feet, dragging slightly as they walked down the stone path. It was quiet here, and serene. Hundreds of intricately-designed columns stood straight and regal around them, their lower halves unknowable, disappearing into the sea of white clouds below.

“I’m sorry,” Lumine said quietly, but when Aether looked up at her, she kept her focus on the path ahead, so he wasn’t sure if the apology was meant for him, or for the world they abandoned to its fate. She opened her mouth a few times, taking in breaths like she meant to say more, but she let whatever it was drop.

He knew what she was thinking about. Lumine and Aether often talked to each other about their homeworld–remembering the two red suns that followed each other through the sky, the forests of tall grasses that stretched a hundred feet above their heads, the endless hospitality, the strong community foundations that tied the people together. It was a secret they kept between them, as the last two remnants of that world. Precious memories, cautiously released, the crank of a music box turned with the utmost care. But they never talked about the end. It had been a hundred and four years already, and Aether wasn’t sure they would ever talk about it. Whenever either of them tried, it was as if their bodies shut down, and their minds clouded with a thick fog.

They both knew well the pain of losing a home. They knew it didn’t much matter if it was an entire planet, or just a single person–a world was defined by its connections, not by its size. Aether hoped that the people of the world they left would be able to heal and rebuild–that the destruction they witnessed was not the beginning of their end. He had faith. If there was one thing Aether learned in his journeys, it was the depth of life’s resilience.

A loud slam interrupted Aether from his thoughts. He whirled around, hand on the hilt of his sword, and saw Lumine respond the exact same way from the corner of his eye. The door they had just left through was once again open. That… really wasn’t supposed to happen. Lumine and Aether should’ve been the only beings capable of operating that array. Creatures bound to the laws of the world should never be able to open it, especially after it had already been closed.

The twins met eyes, and Lumine drew her sword, waiting for someone to walk through the threshold. But no figure appeared. Instead, the doorframe started shaking, and the scenery on the other side grew darker and darker. Lumine’s eyes narrowed, and she started to step forward, but Aether tugged at her shoulder, pulling her back. It was just in time too, because at that very moment, hundreds of red cubes exploded through the doorway.

The twins turned and ran, barely waiting for the path to form in front of them. Aether wasn’t sure exactly what those cubes were, but given their proximity to the disaster on that world, and the ferocity with which they chased after him and Lumine, they couldn’t be anything good. He and his sister were skilled combatants, but it wasn’t a very good idea to fight in the Place Between. It was unstable and finicky. One wrong move here, and they could be trapped in some deep space liminality for the rest of time. His eyes locked on the door in front of them, the way out, the path to the next world. They wouldn’t have time to try and set any destination parameters, but that was fine, as long as they were in stable spacetime. They could leave again right after.

Finally, Aether and Lumine reached a wide stone platform, across from which was their exit. But before they could make their final dash, a long, thin red line appeared in the sky. It split open like a gigantic, gaping wound, and the force from it was powerful enough to bring both Aether and Lumine to a stop. Aether held his elbow up in front of his face, bracing himself against strong, heavy winds. Lumine dug her feet in and struggled to press forward even as her eyes teared up.

The red cubes behind them were gaining ground quickly. They had to get moving. Aether tried to think of a way to get past, while his sister kept trying to bulldoze her way through, and a figure stepped out of the void in the sky.

She was tall, with pale skin and piercing yellow eyes. Her white hair flowed up in tendrils around her head–easily, as if the power to defy gravity was some cheap hairdressing trick.  A red cape whipped around her calves and ankles, and her hands were wrapped in fitted black gloves. She stepped in midair on bandaged feet, and swept an arm out, her hand curling to a fist.

Immediately, the force holding them back was no more, and the red cubes parted behind Aether and Lumine to surround them instead.

“Outlanders,” she spoke, with an authority that Aether had only ever heard from gods. “Your journey ends here.”

Chapter 2: Awakening (again)

Summary:

Aether attempts wilderness survival

Aether awoke, bolting upright, and gasping as if his lungs had not known air for the past 500 years.

“Lumine?” he breathed, looking around for his twin between green, grassy hills. He didn’t remember falling asleep. Actually, the last thing he remembered was…

 

Oh. Oh no.

 

Aether scrambled to his feet, too fast, his vision went spotty and he fell to the ground. He felt weak. Like something was wrong with him. Was something wrong with him? What exactly had happened with that god? Where was Lumine? Was she okay?

Aether’s arms were shaking, and he struggled to hold himself up. His knees stung for some reason, he felt nauseous, and his throat was sore. He wasn’t sure if he could successfully stand again, let alone walk around and scout the area. Did that god do this to him? If he was this weak, why not finish him off? Did he and Lumine escape somehow?

He sat back and tried to calm himself down, taking note of his surroundings. He hadn’t seen much of the world they left, but he was fairly certain this was the same place. Whenever they jumped worlds, Aether always woke up with a particular kind of headache, right above his left eyebrow. His head did hurt, but this specific feeling was lacking. That, combined with the fact that the place seemed to have an identical ecology, atmosphere, and organization of celestial bodies, made Aether sure that he was still on the same world. And if he was still here, there was a good chance that Lumine was as well. She might not be in his near proximity, but as long as they were on the same planet, they could find each other.

He closed his eyes, put aside his own discomfort for the moment, and reached for her presence, but for some reason, their communication path was blocked. He tried again. Blocked. And again. Blocked. Something wasn’t right. Even if she was asleep or unconscious, he should at least be able to send her a message. There must be some interference. Aether did not allow himself to consider the other scenario in which their communication path would stop working. Lumine was alive. If she wasn’t, he would surely feel it.

Aether was starting to panic again, but he stamped it down. If he was going to find his sister, he needed to regain his strength. He pulled at his core power, coaxing it out to ease his aches and pains. But that wasn’t working either. He could feel his core, glowing and warm in his chest, but for some reason, he couldn’t get at it. It had been sealed away.

Blood drained from Aether’s face. Without access to core power, he wasn’t all that different from a regular mortal. He tried to manifest elemental energy–nada. He tried to spread his wings–an action that had been so effortless before, but now just the attempt reduced him to a panting mess on the ground. 

This was a disaster scenario: stuck on an unfamiliar and dangerous planet, powerless, and separated from Lumine. 

And of course, just then, as Aether had his face turned toward the sky in utter despair, it began to rain. At least it was just water this time, and not corrosive acid like there had been four worlds ago. It started thinly, just a few drops here and there, but before long, it was coming down in heavy sheets.

Aether opened his mouth and let the rainwater soothe his aching throat. After a couple of swallows, it felt much better. Apparently, he needed water now, just like a mortal. And probably food too. That would explain the stomach pain and nausea. He shivered in the wet and cold, unable to warm his body with elemental energy, like he normally would. His long blonde hair was heavy and dripping, and it was getting hard to see.

Aether spotted a small overhang in a nearby hillside. It wouldn’t be apt to call it shelter, but it looked like it might provide some cover, especially on the side closer to a large, evergreen tree. He took a deep breath, held tight to his sword and his traveling bag, thankfully still with him, and slowly made his way over.

Once there, Aether collapsed against the rocky wall and wiped away his wet hair from his face. His entire body was so heavy, and his limbs felt so shaky, but he was, for the most part, out of the rain. He was going to need to address this food situation soon, though. Aether rooted around in his traveling bag, looking for something nutritious. He had plenty of plant samples from other worlds, and some of those were edible. But he had really been keeping those as mementos, not as emergency supplies, and from what Aether knew about mortal beings and metabolism, they weren’t near enough to be a sustainable food source for more than a few hours.

He took them out anyway, along with an empty jar, and set the jar out away from the outcropping to catch rainwater. The plants were incredibly bitter, and Aether had trouble swallowing them, and then, later, keeping them down. As travelers, he and Lumine had tasted the finest dishes from across the universe. But they had never needed to eat before. They had also been to countless worlds where people went hungry. Aether generally helped where he could, but he didn’t really ever understand the feeling. Now, it was all too easy to imagine what it could be like, a body, gnawing away at its own fat and muscle until there was nothing left to chew.

Aether sat there until the world’s singular sun went down, shivering and sniffling, watching the rain fill up his jar, wondering how he was ever going to find Lumine like this. He reached for his core power in vain, over and over again, trying to elicit even the slightest spark, the weakest connection, to no avail. He didn’t know what to do. Cores were part of how he and Lumine perceived and interacted with the world. Losing access to it was akin to losing an entire sense. He had never spent a moment without it, and now suddenly, it was gone.

When the rain let up, Aether gathered some things to start a fire, but he wasn’t used to doing it the no-powers way, and everything was just too wet. No matter how hard he rubbed two sticks together, nothing would catch. He sneezed, and rubbed at his wet clothes. It wasn’t freezing out–in fact, the temperature was rather mild–but because he spent so long in the rain, Aether was chilled to the bone. Would it be colder to keep his wet clothes on, or to take them off to dry? Aether didn’t know, so he settled for stripping off only his outermost layers and hanging them from a low tree branch.

Between the leaves, he spotted a small, green and yellow fruit, about fist size. And Aether knew the rules about unfamiliar vegetation, really he did, but the thing just looked so edible , and he was so hungry. He plucked it off the branch and examined it. It was wider at the bottom and thinner at the top, in kind of a rounded conic shape. He dug his fingernail into the flesh, and it gave easily, fruit juice dripping out onto his hand. It smelled pretty good too.

Aether considered the possibility of the fruit being poisonous. If he had access to his powers, it wouldn’t even be an issue–he could just heal himself right away. But even though that wasn’t an option, it wasn’t like he had lost his core completely. He was fairly sure he wouldn’t die. Like, 80% sure. Maybe 70. But he was certain that if he didn’t regain some energy somehow, he wouldn't be able to look for Lumine.

Aether grimaced and took a bite of the strange fruit. It wasn’t bad, really. Very tart, and a little chewier than he expected, but not bad at all. He sat down against the tree and spent a while biting off the rest of the flesh, working around the hard pit in the middle. He had resigned himself to waiting with the food in his stomach for a few hours at least, to make sure that he wouldn’t vomit, or hallucinate, or just keel over, but before he knew it, he was reaching for another fruit, and then another, and then another.

Soon, he was feeling much better, probably thanks to the sugar content in the fruits, and his stomach felt full, and man he really hoped those fruits weren’t poisonous, but there was no turning back now. He was still weak, and he knew that a body of his size would need more than a few fruits to keep it going for the long term, but he used the energy he had now to set up some sticks and logs against a large rock so that they would dry faster. He also searched around a little more, and while he didn’t see any sign of people, he did find a nearby river, and every once in a while, a fish would swim by.

Aether took out his sword. It was rusted and dull, a far cry from the polished, deadly look it had before. If it weren’t intimately tied to Aether’s core, he might even think it wasn’t his sword at all. The seal must be affecting its presentation. Regardless, it could still be used for a task as simple as this. Aether waddled his way over to the river, got knee-deep in the water, and waited. Fish would be good food, if he could catch some. Before too long, a small shadow passed nearby, and Aether plunged his sword down in its direction. But he was sluggish and weak still, and the fish dodged easily and continued on its journey, unbothered. He tried a few more times, but ended with nothing to show for it beyond, once again, dripping wet hair and clothes.

Aether let out a shout of frustration. How could this feeding-himself thing possibly be so hard? How did mortals do it without any powers? The answer, he knew, was teamwork and deep knowledge about the world, of which he had neither. If Lumine was here, maybe they could have herded the fish somehow–snuck up from both sides and trapped them against the bank. But right now, it was just Aether.

His eyes wandered to some long, flexible reeds growing in the mud. He uprooted one, paused to fill another empty bottle with river water, and brought everything back to his spot under the outcropping.

Aether pawed through his bag again. He really didn’t have much in the way of wilderness survival gear, but he was glad he hadn’t lost his only possessions. The bag was given to him long ago by a minor snake deity, in return for his retrieval of her lost egg. It was made from her shed skin, and its carrying capacity was almost endless–as long as an item could fit through the opening, it would fit in the bag. Aether could bring with him as much as he wanted, basically, and he wouldn’t even feel the weight of it.

And still, he tended to be rather minimalistic. It was hard to shake the habit of traveling lightly after so many years. Once, he had tried to acquire some small token from every world that he and Lumine visited–something that reminded him of the place they would leave behind. But the more they traveled, the more the worlds all mixed together, and the individual tokens started to lose their meaning, becoming nothing more than an amorphous pile of vaguely recalled memories. So he had stopped, at some point. He wasn’t quite sure when.

His fingers wrapped around something fibrous and soft, and Aether pulled out a large spool of thread–a light, powdery blue. Weaving supplies were the only real indulgence that crowded his bag now. It was sometimes a struggle to get the small loom in and out, but worth it every time.

He cut off five equally long strands, braided them together, and sewed the string through the end of the reed. Then, he used his sword to cut a small branch off of a nearby tree, cut it down to size, stripped off the bark, notched the wood and sharpened the ends. He had watched an old woman do this, once. They sat by the lakeside and chatted as she made one for each of her grandchildren. It was harder than it looked, especially without the right tools. Aether nicked himself with his sword twice, and marveled at how long the cuts stayed open. Mortals were indeed fragile.

He wrapped the other end of the string around the notch in the wood, tied it off, and tugged. It perhaps wasn’t the most efficient fishing pole in the world, but it was stable, and easy enough to fix if something broke. So with that, Aether took a quick gulp of rainwater, and headed back to the river.

 

He used bits of the fruit as bait, occasionally taking bits of one to stave off hunger as the moon began to set and the sun began to rise. He’d moved downstream twice, and gotten a few bites, but couldn’t manage to hook anything. And halfway through the night, he’d developed some type of itchy rash all over his hands, and his stomach started to hurt in a distinctly not-hungry way. It was a bit concerning, but he wasn’t frothing at the mouth and keeling over, so he figured it was okay for now. It wasn’t like he could do much about it, anyways.

Aether’s eyelids were heavy, and his hands were starting to slip on his makeshift rod. He was exhausted so easily now, just the act of being awake used up energy. He really shouldn’t fall asleep here. The space was too open and vulnerable, not to mention too close to the water’s edge. There was a reason Lumine had wanted them to get off this world so quickly, and Aether wasn’t too keen on sticking around much longer to find out what that was. He would feed himself, try to get help, find his sister with or without it, and move on from this world. Easy.

And then suddenly, something was caught and pulling. Aether’s eyes went wide, and he stood up to get better leverage. This fish was big, for sure, and, with any luck, edible. Something of this size might be able to keep Aether going for a full day, maybe even two, if he was determined. Maybe he could follow the river and catch even more fish along the way. He could leave this valley, and finally search for Lumine. He was likely to find more sources of food in other places. Aether’s mind was racing with possibilities as he pulled on the rod, praying that nothing would snap, trying to tire out the fish, instead of fighting it with his brute strength, like that woman had taught him to.

With one hard yank, Aether managed to catch his first glimpse of the creature, only…he wasn’t too familiar with this planet’s fauna, but he was pretty sure the thing on the end of his line was not, in fact, a fish. It was mostly white, with blotches of pink in places, but the thing was…well, Aether was sure he had seen legs dangling from it.

It hadn’t been moving or struggling or anything, so Aether kept the line taut, pulling the thing carefully across the river’s current until he could reach out and lift it up onto the shore.

It looked like…a child? A little girl, or possibly a little boy, or maybe just a child–Aether was too far removed from this world to tell. They had long, white hair, wore a white and pink jumpsuit-looking thing, and their eyes were peacefully closed, as if in sleep.

When they continued to not move, Aether’s gut sank. He shook the child gently, and pressed his ear to their chest, listening for breath or a heartbeat, although he wasn’t sure if that was how life on this world worked. It was slight, but he felt the slow rise and fall of lungs in action, and he breathed a sigh of relief. Just unconscious, then. It might take a while for them to wake up, and they would need food, water, and warmth. The logs and sticks that Aether set out earlier were probably dry enough to burn by now. 

He lifted his head, and poked once more at the child’s cheek, intending to carry them back to his small camping spot. But before he could, his face was suddenly sprayed with water as the child coughed and spluttered awake. Their eyes opened, and met Aether’s.

Then, they let out a loud, shrill shriek.

Chapter 3: The Best Travel Guide in Teyvat

Summary:

Aether poisons himself. Incoming emergency food joke.

Aether leapt back as the child propped themself up and started…floating? It certainly looked that way. They continued yelling, stringing together strange phonemes that sounded like a language, pointing at Aether and gesturing at the area around them.

This part was always complicated. During their travels, Aether and Lumine had learned several hundred languages, but the first one in a new world was always the hardest. It was made even harder when the encounter was especially surprising, exciting, or hostile. Aether watched the way the child stuck their index finger out at him and wondered if he had made some grave and insulting error. Was the child an aquatic life form? Probably not, given that they were speaking and moving fine on land. Amphibious, then? Had he removed them from their home by accident?

He waved his arms to get the child’s attention, and their body language momentarily shifted from spastic to confused. He pointed to the child, then the river, then his fishing pole, and mimed pulling something in. The child looked even more confused, and said something again in that unfamiliar language. By the way they paused and looked at him afterwards, Aether figured it was some type of inquisitive.

“I have no idea what you’re saying,” he said, in one of the languages from the last world he and Lumine had been to. Of course, there was no way the child could possibly know this language, but hearing Aether speak, they could still deduce the issue at hand.

They seemed to catch on, cocking their head to the side and saying something in what Aether thought might be a different language. When he stared back blankly, they tried a third language, distinctly unique this time, but, of course, still unfamiliar.

Aether shook his head and grabbed a nearby twig. In the mud, he drew a small campfire, pretended to warm his hands over it, and pointed in the direction of where the rest of his things were. If he had been wrong the first time, and made a mistake in fishing the child up, they could just leave. But if he had been right, they were probably just as eager to be dry and warm as he was.

The child blinked a few times, then nodded in a way that Aether took as enthusiastic. When he led the way, they floated behind him, so he figured something had gotten across. They were dripping wet and shivering, and Aether kept glancing back to make sure they stayed conscious. He slipped his fishing pole in his bag, and his stomach grumbled. So much for fishing up emergency food.

The logs and sticks he had laid out earlier were, miraculously, dry enough to catch this time. Soon, there was smoke, and then, a fire, and Aether carefully protected the young flame as the child wrung out their hair and shook off droplets of river water with wild abandon. When they were finished with that, they stared at Aether for an uncomfortably long time. He was busy inspecting his rashy hands (which had now begun to blister), tending to the fire, and ignoring the pain in his stomach–hollow and sharp now, like the cracked pieces of an empty nutshell.

He needed to think of a way to either communicate with this child, or ask them to take him back to wherever they were from so that he could find answers about this world, and about Lumine. He had some urgent, complex questions, and he couldn’t wait around and pick up the language through immersion, like he usually did. He would need some kind of shorthand pidgin, probably, and a guide, although acquiring those things would also take time. Aether glanced up at the child staring at him, and figured he might as well start with the basics.

“Aether,” he said, pointing to himself. No response. Once more, slowly and with emphasis. “Ae-ther.”

The child’s eyes lit up in understanding. They smiled, pointed to themself, and said “Paimon.”

And the world went sideways, and then dark.

---

Aether was getting really sick of waking up on the ground. It’s not like he was some spoiled prince or something (well, not anymore), it’s just that he preferred to wake up with even an inkling of where he was and what was going on. That only happened when he slept somewhere purposefully, like on a bed or something–which, admittedly, was rare these days. Planet-hopping had done a number on his circadian rhythm. Galactic jet lag was a bitch.

His ears were ringing and he felt hot and dizzy. When he opened his eyes, everything was blurry and amorphous, and it was hard to separate one object from the next, but if he squinted, he thought he could see a floating white blob just to his side. It fluttered in a small, nervous circle, and before he was completely aware of what he was doing, Aether reached out to touch it, maybe to calm it, somehow. But it only shrunk away from him as his hand fell limp.

He woke up a few more times like that, each instance with a little more clarity. Once, he swallowed something bitter, salty, and slimy, sliding down his throat like a rancid mollusk. Another time, his hands burned and itched, like an insect had burrowed its way under his skin and was stinging him repeatedly. But the fourth time Aether opened his eyes, he could see clearly.

The sun was bright and the weather was pleasant and fair. Aether was lying down underneath the rock outcropping he had settled at before, and the shade was calming on his skin. His stomach was light and queasy. His hands were still stinging and rashy, but not as much as before, and they were covered in some sticky green juice he didn’t recognize. He sat up–just a little, he was still dizzy–and found his sword and bag lying nearby. His sword was just fine, although still in poor shape, but his bag–it looked as if somebody had rifled through it, and then poorly hid the evidence. His fishing rod was out again, except it was missing the wooden hook Aether carved. A few of his collection bottles littered the ground–empty, and Aether hoped they hadn’t had anything important in them. Some of the fruits he had harvested were out too, and Aether reached out for one, his stomach growling.

But a tiny hand popped out of nowhere and smacked him away. Paimon was staring down at him, their hands on their hips and a belligerent look on their face. Now dry, their white hair had a substantial poof to it, and their jumpsuit-looking thing made more geometric sense with the ornaments on their legs and arms. A cape fluttered behind them. On it, the depiction of a beautiful, glittering night sky.

Aether looked at the fruit, and then back at Paimon, confused. Did they not understand that he needed to eat? He reached again, and got the same smack to his poor, injured hand. Aether pouted, but Paimon only huffed and rolled their eyes. They disappeared around behind him for a bit, out of his sight range, and came back carrying a large, orange object. Well, technically speaking, it wasn’t really that large, it's just that it looked very large when Paimon was the one handling it.

Another fruit, it looked like. Very similar in shape to the ones that Aether picked earlier, only fuller, rounder, and more pliant. Paimon’s tiny fingers sunk into the fruit’s flesh and left small, reddish bruise marks. Aether salivated, and his stomach growled impatiently. Where exactly had Paimon found this? 

Paimon pointed to Aether, and then mimed biting into the fruit, but he beat them to the point, his arm already halfway outstretched, and so they haphazardly dropped the fruit into his palm. He sunk his teeth into it so quickly, he almost nipped his fingers. The taste was incredible–juicy and sweet, a soft, slightly stringy texture to the flesh, which was a vivid orange all the way through. Food had never tasted so good to him before. He took bite after bite after bite, but when the fruit was halfway gone, remembered himself, and in a fit of embarrassment, ripped himself away from the thing, mangled and covered in his spit, and held it out to Paimon, his face bright red and sticky with juice. He had been so overcome with hunger that he forgot they were pooling their resources. This whole thing probably wasn’t just for him. He hoped his demeanor came off as apologetic, and not overtly rude.

But to his surprise, Paimon started to laugh–a light, honking sound, slightly buzzing, like the call of a duck. He cautiously looked up at them. Whatever had gotten them giggling was apparently very funny, because their eyes were shut closed and their body started to turn backwards in the air–first, they were horizontal, and then almost completely upside down, holding their stomach like their guts might spill out from laughing too hard. Finally, Paimon sighed a big sigh and righted themself, and they floated over to back behind Aether, where he couldn’t see. He heard some shuffling, rhythmic and steady, and soon caught Paimon again out of the corner of his eye, dragging along a large basket full of orange fruits.

He recognized the basket. He bought it at a market once, long ago, from a young boy who was still learning the craft. It was a bit lopsided, and littered with large gaps, but Aether thought it was a very fine attempt for a first try, and he had always felt a kinship with other weavers of any medium. Lumine made fun of him for it when he brought it home. It wasn’t like they were much in need of portable containers, after all. Paimon must have gotten it from his bag.

Seeing the fruits, he pulled his half-eaten one back and assumed it was okay to finish it off, but when the last bit was gone, and only the pit remained, Paimon was still stifling a giggle, trying to hide it underneath their hand. When Aether looked at them inquisitively, they pulled themself together, although an amused twinkle remained in their eye. They pointed to the fruits in the basket.

“Sunsettia,” they said, and Aether nodded. The name of the fruit, presumably. Then, Paimon pointed to Aether’s sad pile of small, yellow-green fruits. “Sunsettia,” they said again. Okay, maybe it was a broader word, covering a category of foods. He wasn’t sure why this was funny. Apparently, he wasn’t getting something, because Paimon tried a third gesture, curling themself into a tight ball. Slowly, they stretched out their arms and legs until all their limbs were fully extended, and they pointed between the two fruits again. “Sunsettia.” It was almost as if–

Ah. That was it. Aether had been eating the bitter, unripe fruits from the very same type of tree that produced the delicious orange ones. Well, how was he supposed to know? At least they hadn’t been poisonous. Presumably. He was bedridden, come to think of it.

Paimon, seeing that the message had gotten across, burst into another fit of laughter and kicked their legs in the air. They probably wouldn’t be taking this so lightly if the unripe fruits caused any real internal harm. Or maybe, the people of this world just had a very dark sense of humor. Either way, Aether was alive, and now had a local’s expertise on the area’s edibles.

They spent a few hours sitting together, sharing sunsettias, and working out a kind of half-pidgin. It was little more than a game of charades, but Aether managed to pick up a few things. The world’s name was Teyvat, and the area he and Paimon were in currently was called Mondstadt. There was a city of the same name some distance away. Also, the rash on his hands was caused by the sap from the branch he carved, and his stomach pain and fever from the rain and river water he drank. Paimon showed him the plant that they used to treat his hands, and the concoction they made him drink to help his stomach. Aether thought back to the horrible, slimy mass he swallowed, and he shuddered.

Paimon had not heard of any burning cities nearby, or any kind of destruction on the scale that Aether tried to convey. Either he was in a different place on the same world that looked remarkably similar to where he and Lumine landed last time, or more time had passed since their separation than he had originally thought. That idea made the creases in his forehead grow deeper. If it had been a long enough time, Lumine could be anywhere in the world by now.

Paimon themself was a bit of a mystery. They didn’t seem in a hurry to get back anywhere. They weren’t from Mondstadt, but they knew the language and the area well. Apparently most people on Teyvat were Aether’s size, and they didn’t hover above the ground. Aether still wasn’t sure why Paimon was in that river. Something about fish stew? But the anonymity was just fine with him. There were some things he wasn’t sharing, either.

It wasn’t always a good idea to announce that one traveled across the universe from another world. Made things a little uncomfortable with the power dynamics, usually. Caused political or heretical problems in other cases. So until they were certain it would go over well, or until they were found out, Aether and Lumine always posed as travelers from some vague, distant land. Now powerless, and without his sister, keeping that secret felt especially important.

That was about all Aether could manage before his fever flared up again and he had to lay back down. Paimon busied themself with collecting edible mushrooms, berries, and flowers, and searching the area to see if there was anyone around who could provide some aid, but as far as Aether knew, no one came by. Paimon stopped back in their makeshift camp to drop off supplies, and to check on Aether, once, twice, three times, before the sickness lulled him to sleep again.

---

It was a day or two before Paimon learned that Aether could, in fact, cook. And pretty well, if he did say so himself. Aether liked to try new foods. He’d been to hundreds of worlds, and yet, there was always some new flavor he hadn’t tasted before, some subtle interplay of seasonings that made each world’s cuisine entirely unique. It would be a shame to leave, and never be able to recreate them.

Paimon had skewered some mushrooms on a sharp stick, and was roasting them over the fire. It wasn’t that Paimon was a bad cook, it was just that her dishes had a nasty habit of bursting into flame. When this happened, Paimon tended to overreact, flailing the skewer in the air and dousing it in the nearest container of water. Suffice to say, a number of their meals had been severely burned on the outside, raw on the inside, and soaking wet. This time was gearing up to be no different.

Aether was still slowly recovering from his many ailments. The worst of it was past, and Aether was anxious to get moving again, but Paimon insisted on a bit more rest before any travel. Something about him being too heavy for her to move if he fainted again. She was the one who knew the way to Mondstadt, so Aether really had no choice but to relent to her wishes. He had already made enough of a fool out of himself, trying to make his way in this world alone.

But today he was feeling rather good, and he sat next to Paimon at the fire, watching as the top of a mushroom drifted dangerously towards a flame. He didn’t know how to say that food was usually best cooked over hot coals, not open flames–both in the sense that he didn’t want to be rude, and in the sense that he literally did not know how to say the words. He hesitantly placed his hand on the stick that Paimon was holding, and tugged on it gently, meeting her eyes with a questioning look.

Thankfully, she seemed glad to hand it over. She stretched and babbled out some phrase, probably along the lines of  “Paimon’s tired,” or “Paimon’s arms were getting sore.” It seemed that in Monstadt’s language, you referred to yourself in the third person. Aether got very used to picking out the sound of Paimon’s name.

Paimon floated lazily around the fire, swinging her arms from side to side, and Aether tended to the flames, blowing, poking, adding a log here or there, trying to get it to burn hot and low. It was easier when one had control of the elements, but this would do for now. When he got the fire to where he liked it, he held the skewer of mushrooms back out, turning them evenly and slowly. He even sprinkled on some herbs that Paimon had collected and dried. He wasn’t sure exactly how they tasted, but they smelled good with the aroma of roasting mushrooms.

When the meal was close to done, Paimon was pressed at his side, staring at the skewer with unblinking eyes and salivating to the point that Aether could literally see the drool dripping out of her mouth. The mushrooms looked good–just barely blackened–and when Aether pulled them out of the fire, he had to stop Paimon from grabbing at the hot skewer with her bare hands. And she laughed at him for his lack of survival skills. At least he had a decent excuse.

He managed to get her to wait until the first possible moment that the mushrooms could possibly be cool enough to eat, and then let her loose on it. In the blink of an eye, three of the mushrooms were gone, and Paimon’s cheeks were stuffed like a chipmunk’s. Something had made her stop chewing though, her eyes going wide and her limbs going limp. For a horrible moment, Aether was convinced that he had accidently cooked something poisonous, but then Paimon continued chewing eagerly, bouncing up and down in the air with a big smile on her face. Curious, Aether pulled off a piece of mushroom and popped it in his mouth. Yeah. Pretty good. Definitely the best thing he’d had since arriving.

Suddenly Paimon was grabbing him by the scarf and shaking him, speaking excitedly and very, very fast. He couldn’t even catch a single word. Finally, she released him, and then pointed to the ground. “Wait,” she said. Alright. Aether could do that. He nodded, and she quickly scooped up his travel bag and flew off somewhere. 

Paimon came back quicker than Aether expected, but it was clear that she had been working very hard. Locks of white hair stuck to her forehead, and she was breathing hard, but despite that, Paimon looked incredibly proud of herself. She triumphantly turned his bag upside down, and let the contents spill out. Dozens and dozens of mushrooms, flowers, tubers, fruits, and nuts tumbled out onto the ground, and then behind that, a couple of Aether’s personal items, before Paimon cinched the bag shut again. She pointed to the fire and said something, but Aether caught the words “cook” and “food”, so it was pretty obvious what she was getting at.

He managed to make seven different dishes in total, and Paimon inhaled six of them. He had no idea she could eat this much. Since he’d met Paimon, they’d always had an abundance of food, but she must have still been holding back, just so he could eat more and regain his strength. Or maybe she was just picky about quality, it was hard to say.

Paimon belched loudly, floated to the ground, and within a minute, she was snoring. It was a pretty funny sight. But mostly, Aether was just glad to be able to do something to repay her for how much she’d helped him. She wasn’t Lumine, not by a long shot, but to have someone he could count on in this world–it meant alot to him. The deep loneliness that ached like a hole in his chest was kept at bay for a little while longer. He wasn’t sure how much longer they would stay together. He had only asked her to guide him to Mondstadt, so that he could settle himself amongst people and gather information about his sister. After that, he would be on his own again. That was alright, too. Aether was used to his relationships passing like a falling star–beautiful for only a moment, and then never to be seen again. He learned to appreciate brevity in things. And he knew how wonderful it was that, despite all odds being against their meeting, he had managed to look up at the right moment and see the star anyways.

The next morning, Paimon deemed him well enough to travel (after breakfast, of course), and the two started on their way to Mondstadt, chatting in broken phrases all the way.

Chapter 4: Meeting the Locals

Summary:

first encounter with a whopperflower

Wherever Mondstadt was, it was farther from where they started than Aether thought it would be. They had walked for a day already, and the city was nowhere in sight. They hadn’t spotted a single other person. They hadn’t even reached a road.

They had, however, run into several creatures that Paimon called “slimes”--gelatinous beings that wielded the power of the elements, and were rather hostile. Aether had a little trouble fighting them off at first–the things were persistent, and they took a good bit of effort to scare away–but he learned that a few shallow pokes from his sword seemed to leave them frightened and unharmed enough to flee. Slimes in Teyvat were numerous and feisty, and their walk was long and tedious, and so when the sun started to set, both Aether and Paimon were tired and little on edge.

They were just about to settle down for the night, in a small clearing surrounded densely by pine trees, when Aether smelled it–smoke. And more than that, roasting meat. There were other people around, and they were close. Aether stepped back into the clearing and scanned the sky–there. Just to the east, a thin white pillar was snaking its way up and out of the forest.

He caught Paimon’s attention and pointed to it, then they looked at each other and nodded. Aether led the way this time, careful with his steps. He didn’t intend to sneak up on anyone, but it was usually best to scout out people first, and right now, he wasn’t sure how well he could defend himself and Paimon if there did happen to be trouble.

Within a few moments, the light of a campfire was visible, and around it were three slouched figures. They wore skirted leather outfits, braces on their arms and legs, and masks over their faces–what looked to Aether to be standard adventurer’s gear. They were speaking to each other softly, in a tongue that was different from the one Paimon used with him, and one of them turned a spit with the leg of some large ungulate on it. There wasn’t a carcass nearby though, or any evidence of preparation, so Aether figured they must have brought it from somewhere else. Possibly Mondstadt?

Regardless, they didn’t look dangerous, so Aether went to step forward and initiate something like conversation. Before he could, though, Paimon floated in front of him, her arms spread wide, blocking his way ahead. She rapidly shook her head, looking panicked, and whispered an unfamiliar word, “hilichurl”. 

Aether paused and cocked his head. What was that supposed to mean? Hostile? Dangerous? Rude? It was clear she didn’t want him to approach. But in Aether’s experience, there was very little that couldn’t be worked out over a friendly meal and a long conversation. He’d been arrested for trespassing enough times to know that if people were hostile towards mysterious outsiders, there was usually a very understandable reason–war, for instance, was a big one. Were Paimon’s people at war with these hilichurl people? Was it their cities he saw burning?

In any case, he certainly wasn’t at war with them, and Aether was pretty good at coming off as harmless and peaceful. Some different clothes, some shelter, and food that wasn’t fruit or fungus or nuts would do him and Paimon some real good. It was worth approaching just to see if they could trade something, at least. Paimon could hide behind a tree or something if she felt uncomfortable.

Aether ducked under Paimon’s arm and continued walking towards the campfire. He was just about out of the trees when something yanked around his neck. Paimon had pulled on his scarf, and it made Aether lose his balance and step on a large stick. The snap that it made when it broke was resounding.

In an instant, the three ‘hilichurl’ people sprung up and surrounded them. They carried large clubs, and from what Aether could sense, they weren’t very happy to find them here. Great. Now it looked like they had been spying, or sneaking up on them, or something.

Aether kept his hands far away from his sword and tried to look small and calm. One of the people started yelling something at them. He looked to Paimon for guidance, but it appeared that hilichurlian was not one of the languages Paimon knew how to speak. That made things trickier.

He tried out some words in the Mondstadtian tongue. Now was as good a time as ever to practice, and maybe they would catch on that he wasn’t a native speaker. “Don’t attack,” Aether said. “We’re only passing by, we don’t mean any harm.”

From the look on Paimon’s face, whatever he said had been entirely incomprehensible. Well. It had only been a few days. Maybe she shouldn’t have let the traveler from another world do the talking.

But even if his message didn’t get across, the hilichurl people backed off for just a second, confused. They seemed to be discussing something amongst themselves. One of them still sounded very angry, shaking a fist and yelling at a different, calmer one that seemed to be trying to keep the peace. The third one paid no attention to the other two bickering. Aether couldn’t see their eyes because of the mask, but their sights were most definitely locked on him and Paimon, keeping vigilant.

After some debate, the angry one huffed and crossed their arms, turning away. The calm one looked up at Aether and slowly lowered their club until it dropped to the ground. They took a cautious step forward and stopped, waiting for Aether to do something. When he didn’t, they took another step, and another, circling Aether with precise, steady footsteps, drawing closer and closer. Aether tried to hold still and breathe easy, knowing that any quick movements would dissolve the tentative trust they had built.

Finally, the calm one was within arm’s reach. Cautiously, they lifted their hand, reaching out to touch the pommel of Aether’s sword. They were almost there, a hair’s breadth from contact, when a pebble flew from Aether’s right side and bonked the calm one right in the center of their mask. Aether turned to see Paimon with her hand outstretched and cursed. This was, of course, just the type of hostile action that the vigilant hilichurl had been waiting for, and they charged at Paimon and Aether, swinging their club wildly. Aether grabbed Paimon by the arm, slipped past the angry hilichurl–a superfluous moniker, at this point–and ran.

 

Paimon at least had the decency not to fly faster than Aether could run while the two of them were chased across the forest by three very upset hilichurl people. She floated right at pace with him as he flitted between trees. Eventually, they must have gotten far enough that the hilichurl people decided they were no longer worth pursuing, because Aether could no longer hear the crash of footfalls behind them.

He stopped and bent over, breathing hard. Paimon flopped onto the ground and spread out her limbs like a starfish. Aether gave her a look, and Paimon had the gall to look back and smile, as if he had no reason at all to be upset with her.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and calmed himself down. There was probably a perfectly reasonable explanation for her actions. Some cultural subtlety he had yet to grasp. Still, it didn't seem anything but rude to him. Lumine was always better at this–the intellectual distancing. Aether was always too swayed by his emotions, too ready to jump in when his presence wasn't necessarily needed or wanted. Really, it shouldn't matter at all to him–the relationship between Paimon's people and the hilichurl people. He was only here to find his sister and leave. He would forget about everyone he met here in a couple centuries. Still, it was hard not to care in the moment.

Paimon yawned and took a survey of the area. The sun was completely set now, and Teyvat's constellations blinked to life above their heads. Paimon held a finger to her chin, tapped three times, pouted her lips and blinked owlishly before turning to Aether.

"Don't know the way" she said. Great. On top of everything, they had gotten themselves lost. Aether wanted to blame Paimon, but she had been against approaching the Hilichurl People in the first place. And she also wasn't the one who took off running without bothering to take note of the direction. Aether tried to remember where Teyavt’s sun had been before it had disappeared over the horizon, but he was exhausted, and everything was too twisted around in his head. 

But as he tried to place himself, just for a second, Aether was struck by the strong feeling that he had been here before. It wasn’t so much the trees or the other plantlife, but the underlying geography, the shape of the place that felt familiar.

He realized it when he caught sight of a tall hill. Its steep end was no longer sharp and jutting, but its structure was exactly the same. Before he knew it, Aether’s worn-out legs were hurrying him up the hill, and he heard Paimon call out to him, but he had no time to process the words when he had finally, finally found–

 

Nothing.

 

It was only a few days ago that the scene from this clifftop was fiery and red. Cataclysmic, on a cosmic scale–a persistent and world-altering detonation, like a sun.

And yet, now there was only the calm of an ocean, and the breath of its breeze.

Could he have mistaken the place? That would be…unlike him. Aether had centuries of practice paying attention to unfamiliar landscapes. There was the outcropping that looked like a nose, and the crater he almost tripped on, and the snowy mountain, miles away and directly at his back. It had only been a few days. Hadn’t it?

Once, he and Lumine had been to a planet where the tectonic plates were sentient beings. They moved of their own accord, drifting from, sticking to, and butting heads with one another like the planet was a cliquey high school cafeteria and teen dramas were literal natural disasters. The speed at and degree to which that climate changed was like nothing the twins had ever seen before. It was a wonder the planet was still holding together, and an outright miracle that its surface-dwelling life managed to thrive. Still, there was no change as fast as–

Someone grabbed at his shoulder and tugged him back. It was only then that Aether realized he had been drifting towards the edge of the cliff unconsciously. He stepped away.

Paimon was giving Aether what he was sure was the most baffled expression her facial muscles could possibly pull off. She said something, and Aether caught the word “Okay?”.

None of this made any sense. How could an entire ocean have just appeared? And how could it be this stable? Even if it was created by some purposeful force, there was just no time for the landscape to have adjusted. The rocks were weathered. The waves were calm. The plant and animal life were well adapted. By the way things looked, this ocean must have been here for at least two centuries, likely more.

He turned to Paimon and pointed out at the horizon, wracking his brain for the right Mondstadtian words. “City,” he said, after a moment. She looked perplexed. “Fire,” he added on. Still nothing. “City fire over there, no big river, over there!” Aether was pointing emphatically now, and was starting to get frustrated. Curse this stupid language barrier. Curse this planet and that unknown god. What was wrong with this place? Was this supposed to be some type of divine punishment? Or a cosmic joke? Did Teyvat think it was funny, messing with Aether’s head like this?

Small stars twinkled behind Paimon, her expression a mix somewhere between regret and pity. She reached out slightly, then pulled back, keeping her small fists close to her chest. She shook her head. “Don’t know,” she said. “Don’t know.”

---

In the end, Aether decided he must have had the wrong place. It was easy to get mixed up on an unfamiliar planet. Fortunately, orienting themselves to the coastline seemed helpful for Paimon, who was now leading them upstream along a river–a different one than the one Aether had fished her out from. She stopped every once in a while to pick a few flowers–a red, frilly one that looked like a mouth, a big-leafed one with a white bulb and triangular red petals, a coned yellow one, with green and white sepals, a tall light blue one with strong-smelling leaves. She handed them off to Aether without a word, and though he hadn’t known Paimon very long, he could safely assume that all of these plants were ingredients in some particular dish that she wanted him to figure out how to make. Aether wondered if there were many farms in Mondstadt. The wild edible plants were certainly plentiful enough, now that he knew how to find them.

He picked a few flowers himself, using the ones that Paimon gave him as references, careful to note the fine detail– the scent, the patterning on each petal, the color of the juices that dripped out from a plucked leaf–in case there were poisonous mimics. He really had lucked out with that random guess on his first day, as long as one could consider days of paralyzing stomach aches ‘lucky’, which, yes, Aether could. There were many worse things in the multiverse.

He was on his knees in the grass, bent down to inspect an endearing yellow and white flower, fully bloomed and nuzzling into the bright rays of Teyvat’s one sun. The weather was very fair here. Even when it rained, there was no chaos about it. It was as if rain existed only for the pure joy of falling through the sky. Of course, that didn’t mean that one didn’t get wet, as Aether could attest. The flower’s petals were soft and warm beneath his fingertips as he stretched them out, examining them, and for some reason, Aether got it in his head to speak to the dear thing.

“Hello little one,” he said, his voice a bit ragged from disuse. He practiced his Monstadtian now, figuring the flower would be most familiar with that language. “Are you alright with letting me–”

 

Blam! Blam blam blam blam blam!

 

There was something cold and sharp in Aether’s mouth. And nose. And eyes. He couldn’t see, but he knew he was falling, backwards, while something was pelting him over and over again in the face. The strikes were hard, some kind of pellet, and every time Aether tried to get up and wipe at his eyes, he was blasted anew and sent careening further down Mondstadt’s picturesque hills. He had drawn his sword on instinct, but he could only wave it around uselessly, deprived of a target.

 

Blam! Blam blam–blam blam!

 

A slight pause in the onslaught allowed Aether to roll away from his attacker, behind the vague outline of a medium-sized rock. With cover, he let go of his breath and thoroughly wiped at his face, cold and stinging. A flaky, dry substance came away in his hands, so cold that it almost felt like burning. Ice, Aether’s brain put together, although it wasn’t melting, not even in the warmth of his hands. He pulled an ice pellet out of his hair–a thin, prismatic thing, pointed and even at both ends in that natural crystalline way. No wonder it had hurt so much, slamming into his face like that. In fact, now that he had a bit more feeling, he noticed small, oozing cuts all over his cheeks, mouth, and nose. Aether was still a bit perturbed by the sight of his own blood. He didn’t used to see it often, but now, in this weakened state, it started flowing at the simplest of injuries. Were mortals always so fragile?

Aether peeked out from behind the rock and took a quick survey of the area. Everything looked just as calm and peaceful as it had before. The hills were still green and rolling, the trees still swaying in that light, sweet breeze. The flower that Aether had spoken to was still perky and prim, although…didn’t it used to be closer to that one bush?

“Aether?” came a high-pitched call from over the hill. “What happened?” He saw Paimon’s floating blue headpiece first, and then her fluffy white hair. Her arms were full of flowers, leaves, and roots, and she was leaking a trail of petals as she flew.

From behind his rock, Aether waved to get her attention, and then motioned for her to stop. She did pause for a second, and she scanned the area, but, like Aether, she seemed to find nothing amiss. Paimon gave him a confused look, and then cautiously started moving towards him again. It was just after she passed the flower that Aether saw it, and then many things happened at once.

First, a great blue…thing popped up out of the ground where that flower had once been. If it wasn’t a plant, it was obviously meant to look like one–a bulbous head with large, wrinkled leaves growing from the top of it, a strange, viney-looking body. Beside it were two floating ice shards, like wheels with sharp, pointed spokes, and, yes, that was definitely the stuff that had pelted Aether in the face. It had the same elemental look to it–a raw, but controlled power, a manipulation of the natural world.

The second thing to happen was Aether’s warning yell. Paimon turned, came face-to-face with the thing, and froze, just for a second. Enough time for Aether to spring into action. Spring–literally. He jumped on top of the rock he had been hiding behind, sword in hand, offhand arm at his brow to block any ice shards. It wouldn’t do to just go around killing wildlife randomly in an unfamiliar world. It was clearly some type of ambush predator. If he could just disable it for a moment, long enough for him and Paimon to make a prolonged run for it, it probably wouldn’t be able to pursue.

The third and fourth things occurred at the exact same time, to the millisecond. Paimon flew upwards and out of range of the thing, which Aether, with his savior complex, forgot she could do. And the rock that Aether stepped on started squealing.

The squeal was the second hint. The first was that his foot had not braced against hard stone, but in fact, had sunken into a pliant, fleshy material. The boar made a break for it, clearly upset, and Aether was violently thrown off the boar’s back, landing face first in its muddy wallow.

 

Blam blam! Blam blam blam blam!

 

Honestly, the ice pellets hurt more when Aether knew they were coming.

Chapter 5: Allan's Dilemma

Summary:

Plot begins. Took a break for the holidays, updates as usual now.

Teyvat was a cruel and unforgiving world, Aether was coming to understand, as he wrung out his wet clothes for the third (fourth?) time since his arrival. His muscles ached, his hair was a tangled mess, and it felt like every inch of his skin had some type of cut or scrape or bruise on it.

Paimon looked a little haggard as well. She was fast asleep, snoring like a bull. Her white clothes were grass-stained and her eyes looked a bit more sunken in than they had when Aether first met her. He hoped that she really did know where she was going. Even without access to his powers, he was pretty sure it would take a lot more than a little stint in the wilderness to kill him. Paimon, on the other hand, he didn’t know anything about. Presumably, she was mortal. At least, that’s what her appetite suggested. It wouldn’t do for her to be out here much longer.

How was Lumine doing, on her own? Were her powers sealed away too? Was she hungry and aching and bruised? Did she find someone else to travel with?

That last thought left a sour taste in Aether’s mouth. Which of course was hypocritical. If Lumine found a local to guide her through this world, that was a good thing. That would increase their chances of finding each other again. Still.

Paimon spluttered for a moment in her sleep, then rolled over and went right on snoring. The last embers of their campfire were still glowing amongst charcoal and ash. Aether had made them some kind of root vegetable soup for dinner, using the plants they had picked that afternoon. Now, he poked at the remains of that cooking fire with a stick, spreading out the coals so they would cool faster. It was a simple, pleasant task–something to focus on so his mind didn’t drift elsewhere. At one point, a coal he pushed away caught again, just a bit–a flame just larger than candlelight flickering in the cool night air. Aether watched it burn, shrink, extinguish, his eyelids drooping, his head growing heavy.

A scream, in the distance. Aether’s eyes flew open. Had he dreamt it? He was almost asleep. His dreams had not been pleasant lately–a problem he would normally solve by simply not sleeping, but as he was, his body needed the rest. He needed to find a way to break the seal on his core soon. It was a real hassle traveling like this. Not to mention embarrassing.

But there was the scream again, clear this time, obviously not in Aether’s imagination. He was on alert immediately, sword drawn, reaching over to shake Paimon awake. She stirred slowly, slapping her lips together a few times, blinking blearily and rubbing the crust from her eyes. “Wha–” she said, but Aether shushed her. She seemed to grasp the atmosphere then, quieting, tensing, sitting upright.

Her eyes darted about warily. “What’s happening?” she whispered. Except, it was very hard to understand a whispered foreign language, so for a moment Aether thought she said “Who sharted?”, but he figured it out from the context.

Anyways, back to the problem at hand. “Stay here,” he said, quiet but enunciated. “I’m going.” And he stood up fully, carefully, heading towards the direction of the scream. He wanted to rush there, to get to the site of trouble as quickly as possible, but it was dark, and he didn’t want to risk scaring off whatever or whoever had made the sound. His intentions were to be helpful, but he was still a stranger. Best to approach cautiously. 

The scream sounded a third time, closer and clearer. This time, Aether could make out the Monstadtian word “Help!”. A person, then. He quickened his pace.

The tall pine trees of Mondstadt’s forests loomed over him in the dark, and as he neared the source of the scream, Aether was sure that there was something, perhaps several somethings, in the woods that had noticed him. Every once in a while, there was a shadow that looked darker than normal, a low growl in the distance, but also right by his ear, a flash of streaky purple light just in the corner of his eye. The person’s voice was very close now, somewhere above Aether. Keeping on guard, he decided to try calling back.

“Hello?” he called. “How are you?” Stupid, but he didn’t want to experiment with complex phrases at a time like this.

There was a pause, and then the person responded. “Draff?” they yelled. “Jotun?” Aether did not know what these words meant, so he stayed awkwardly silent. Then, the person started babbling, just a stream of nervous, incomprehensible Mondstatian. They were scared, obviously, and somewhere up in the trees. Aether stopped trying to work out the words and instead focused on pinpointing the person’s location. He was just about sure, when he heard three words that he did recognize: “Watch out!” and “Wolves!”.

And not a half-second later, the creeping shadow on Aether’s left suddenly darted out at him. He had his sword up in just enough time to block, the blade now wedged in a furious, growling jaw. Black teeth scraped against metal, and a foul, spit-like substance dripped from the tongue, cheeks, and gums of the beast’s mouth. Where it touched Aether’s sword, it sizzled.

Aether could make out the vague figure in the darkness as he struggled against it. From the mouth was a long muzzle, a large, wild mane, and a pair of glowing purple eyes. He was also intensely aware of two dangerous-looking claws, so long and sharp they could easily pierce a deep and hidden organ. The rest of the beast’s body was strangely…bare. As in, where there should have been flesh, there was nothing there at all. The thing had no legs to stand on, hovering above the ground at Aether’s height. The claws were in no visible way connected to the main body, but it seemed like there was some kind of tether, because, although they were flailing violently at him, they could not reach him while he held the beast back. And out from the neck, there was no chest, no belly, only a thick, skeletal spine that curved into a wickedly sharp hook at its end. It was as if the beast existed for no particular reason other than to tear into flesh. Aether had been to many planets, and seen many life forms, but this was unlike any organic, natural life he knew. Mechanical, maybe?

Whatever it was, he didn’t have time to think about it. The person had said “wolves”. Plural. Aether had seen and heard Mondstadt’s wolves before (from a safe and respectable distance) and these were definitely not the same thing, but they were still likely pack hunters. Which meant they would be surrounding him. And if they had chased this other person up a tree, they were either territorial or hungry. The latter would be easier to deal with. If Aether could just prove himself enough of a threat, they would leave him alone. Of course, this was all assuming that the beasts followed normal beast rules, which, given their strange forms, Aether wasn’t too sure about.

He sensed the attack from behind just a moment before it happened. All at once, the beast in front of him pulled back into the shadows, and he had just enough time to twist himself around clumsily throw his sword in front of a trio of knife-like claws. The impact resounded. Aether’s hold on his sword was awkward, the force almost levering it out of his hand, but he held firm as this beast, too, vanished back into the treeline. They were going for quick, successive attacks, it seemed. Trying to tire him out before moving in for the kill. It was in moments like these that elemental powers really came in handy. A single sword was hard to defend with when the attacks were omnidirectional.

Aether scanned the trees around him, looking, listening for any signs of movement. The growls from earlier had stopped. He could only identify the beasts by a soft rustle of pine needles, or a quick flash of violet eyes. One, two, three…at least four of them. Small for a wolf pack, but still dangerous. That person was very lucky, to have gotten out of their reach. Aether hoped they could hold on just a little longer.

This time, he saw the beast as it lunged for him, claws forward, jaw snapping. He sidestepped artfully, because he was, after all, a trained and respectable swordsman, and he swung his blade down the beast’s cheek and side. Deep enough to maim, but certainly nothing lethal. He only needed to drive them away.

The beast thrashed and howled, splattering blood along Aether’s forearm. Or, something like blood. It was thick, dark, and jelly-like, as if it had already congealed. And it stung where it touched Aether’s exposed skin. Quite badly, in fact. He hurried to wipe it off with a gloved hand, and noticed that the places it had touched were tender and bumpy–blistering, like a chemical burn. He remembered the way that the other beast’s saliva had sizzled on his sword. This was probably going to be complicated.

The beast in front of him was still in shock from its injury, but its packmates were quick to react. Two of them leapt out on either side of Aether, forcing him back. Something about them seemed more serious, more dangerous–the opposite reaction of what Aether wanted. They were snarling again, skeletal tails whipping back and forth, defensive as the injured beast licked at its wounds. Aether’s eyes flickered between them and the trees around him, trying to figure out where the next attack would come from. No one seemed to be making a move, but he noticed a faint purple glow around each of the beast’s claws. It was building, he realized, and sparking, like electricity.

The glow intensified, crackling with what Aether was now certain was some type of elemental energy. He caught a glimpse of it from the treeline just before the fourth beast lunged for him. Claws met steel, and Aether’s sword lit up a brilliant violet. And suddenly all of his muscles were tensed, rigid as stone, and he was in a tremendous amount of pain, and his sword was no longer in his hands.

The pain ceased not long after his sword fell, and he regained mobility in the nick of time, dodging a nasty swipe from the beast’s second pair of claws. He tumbled to the ground, landing mostly on his shoulder–which hurt–but he was within reach of his sword. He grabbed it, rolling sideways to dodge another strike, and slashed up at the beast’s exposed chin and throat. The sludgy blood poured from the wound, and the beast whimpered and choked. A few dollops of it fell on Aether’s face and stomach, burning where it touched him. Damn. He really hadn’t meant for the strike to go that deep.

Aether quickly shoved the beast aside with the blunt edge of his blade and got his feet under him again. The thing was deteriorating quickly, losing a lot of blood. It was on the ground now after Aether’s shove, heaving breaths and making pained noises. It didn’t look like it was going to come after him anymore. Aether doubted it could even float.

The other three beasts in front of him snarled and howled. Aether held his sword out in front of him, ready to defend against their attacks. His hands were shaking, he realized. His body was still recovering from that elemental energy. That, and the fight had gone on too long. He was running out of stamina. He likely wouldn’t be able to make it out of this without some grave wound. That was alright. As long as he could chase the beasts away.

He readied himself, physically and mentally, for the onslaught that was about to occur. He could see the elemental energy charging up in the beasts’ claws, their mouths, their eyes. But just as they started to move, just as he braced himself for impact, Aether watched three pairs of triangular ears perk up.

The beasts stopped. All the purple energy disappeared, and for a moment the sudden vanishing of its light made Aether blind in the darkness. He stiffened with panic, fearing some ambush, but when his eyes adjusted the beasts were exactly where he had left them. The three of them each cocked their heads, this way and that, as if they were listening to something that Aether could not hear. And then, something very strange happened.

The area around each of them suddenly got…dark. It was nighttime, there wasn’t much light to begin with, but this was a noticeable and contrasting darkness. Space-like, black hole-like darkness. Like any light unfortunate enough to fall in it would be consumed in a fraction of a second. And the beasts just…faded into that darkness. Slowly, from their tails to the tips of their noses. And then they were gone. And everything was normal again.

Aether stayed on guard. He wasn’t sure if the beasts had left for good, or if they were just hiding somewhere nearby. He certainly didn’t feel like he had chased them off. What was it that they heard? Something more threatening coming their way?

There was a rustle from behind him. Aether whipped around, the moonlight glinting off the edge of his blade tinged a dark red. He watched the trees closely, cautiously, ready to respond to any number of new threats.

Another shuffle. Something was definitely there, and it was close. Aether gripped his sword harder, trying to keep his hands from shaking so much. The shuffling grew louder, and louder, and then–

A droopy, white fairy came out from behind a pine, yawning and rubbing at her eyes. “Aether?” she called, voice heavy with sleep. “Whassit…”

Aether lowered his sword and sighed with relief. Just Paimon. He would have to explain to her what happened, maybe get some information on what exactly those beasts were. But first–

He walked up to the tree that he was pretty certain that person had been in. They hadn’t spoken in a long while, and Aether hoped they were okay, after all that. He yelled up the trunk, “Hello?”

“Yes! Here!” came a nervous reply. Good, they were still alright.

“Come here!” said Aether, sticking to short, concise phrases. “The danger is over!”

All that yelling must have broken Paimon out of her slumberous stupor, because she floated over next to Aether and began calling up the tree, perfectly alert. She said a few words that Aether didn’t recognize, but, if the cracking branches and panicked yelps were any indicator, it seemed like the person was coming down. Soon, Aether could see them clinging to the trunk. They were much bigger than Paimon, larger than him, even, and they carried a bow and quiver on their back. Aether couldn’t see any arrows, though.

Once the person got about a foot above head level, they jumped the rest of the way down. Aether caught them as they stumbled.

“Sorry,” the person said. “Thank you.” And that was the last thing Aether got before the person erupted into a stream of Monstadtian. There was the word ‘wolves’ again. ‘Camp’.... ‘Lost’, maybe? He stared back blankly, unsure of what to say.

Luckily, Paimon seemed to be following. She and the person had a short back and forth, and she must have mentioned something to them about Aether’s not knowing the language, because they began to speak slower and clearer.

“I’m with a hunting xxxxxx people nearby. Xxxxx names are Draff and Jotun.” Ah, so Draff and Jotun were names, not Mondstatian words. The person (presumably named I’m?) continued. “You xxxx come back with me. I’m xxxx. Can xxxx you somehow? What are your names?” asked I’m.

That one was easy. “Paimon’s Paimon,” said Paimon, no longer any trace of sleep in her tone.

“Aether’s Aether,” Aether copied. And for some reason I’m looked at him funny. Was his name too foreign? He tried to pronounce it with a Mondstadtian accent. But, wait, hold on, why was Paimon also looking at him funny? He was so sure he had gotten this one right.

Just to get things concrete, he decided to ask the person directly. “What is your name?”

And he got a different answer from what he had inferred: “My name is Allan,” said Allan. Aether scrunched his brows together, and Allan must have thought he didn’t understand, because they rephrased. “I’m Allan.”

Oh. Oh. “I’m Aether?” he said, unsure. Allan stuck his thumb out, smiled and nodded, so that was probably good. Then they both turned to Paimon, expectant.

Paimon shrugged. “Paimon’s Paimon,” she said. Well. Aether was not taking Mondtstatian language advice from her again. Apparently, there was a singular first person pronoun. Would’ve been nice to know.

In any case, Allan seemed to be trying to get them to follow them somewhere. Back to a camp with other people? That would be nice. Aether and Paimon hadn’t met anyone else besides those hilichurl people. He hoped Paimon would be a little kinder to these folks. The way she acted at ease around Allan, it was looking good so far.

But he had one thing left to do here. As Allan and Paimon prepared to leave, Paimon hefting Aether’s bag on her shoulders (it was a good thing it was enchantedly light), Aether signaled for them to wait. Then, he turned back towards the scene where he had struggled with the beasts.

There was some of that corrosive blood on the ground. Where it had fallen, it had burned holes through the leaf litter. Aether was careful to step around it. As he got closer, it started to pool, slowly eating away at the organic matter around it. When it rained next, the water would wash it away, diluting it until it was no more dangerous than the juice of a citrus fruit.

The body of the beast he had slain was still there, as he expected. He hadn’t seen it disappear like the others, and assumed it had died from its injuries. The scene was gory, but the darkness gave some cover, hiding details like someone might draw a sheet over a corpse. Minding the blood, Aether crouched next to the beast, placing a gloved hand on its forehead. He ran it down the back of the head, through the mane, watching the coarse hairs part around his fingers. It always felt bad, to take a life on another world. He was a stranger here. Although he had no qualms about mixing himself up in other people’s problems, to become a judicator of life and death was a different matter.

But Aether was also old, and he knew that sometimes things died, and it wasn’t necessarily anyone’s fault, and there wasn’t always a correct decision to make about it. And he knew that death was not always the end of something, that there were pieces you could keep alive if you just took a moment to be with them. Besides him and his sister, there was no one else to grieve for his home planet. There were no bodies, and there was no place to bury them. They had to be the grave markers themselves. And so, what was one more soul? It was no extra burden to carry them with him, all those who left their world alone and forgotten. If there was no one else to be with them, Aether would do it gladly. There would be no one left to grieve for him either.

Lumine said he was too sentimental. But she always placed her flower right next to his on an unmarked grave.

Paimon and Allan had followed, and were staring down at him, looking solemn. Mortals had all kinds of different ideas about death–fear, celebration, stoicism, taboo, humor, pride. It was from them that he learned how to process his grief.

With his limited vocabulary, he didn’t know how to ask about funeral rites in Teyvat. The best he could do was “How can the dead sleep?”

Paimon and Allan exchanged a glance, and for a moment Aether worried he was once again not understood, but then Allan stepped forward and cleared their throat.

“As hunters, we xxxx to use xxxxx part of the body xxxx not sure this one xxxx eating xxxxxx xxx xxx–” They seemed then to realize their audience, and stopped themself short. Allan took a breath and made a series of complicated faces, like they were deep in thought, and then trudged through the leaves until they were right next to Aether.

They reached towards the body hesitantly, pausing right before contact, but eventually placed two fingers right above the beast’s eyes. They were no longer glowing, just a dull, cloudy white. Allan stroked down lightly, gently, pulling the eyelid closed. They did the same with the other eye, and then pressed their two palms together, fingers pointed towards the sky. Allan’s eyes were closed now, and they were mumbling something Aether couldn’t understand under their breath. A prayer? Aether copied Allan’s actions. He couldn’t repeat the words, but he could clasp his hands the same way, and he could close his eyes just as softly.

He opened them again when Allan stopped murmuring. They nodded to Aether, placed a hand on his shoulder and said, very clearly, “The wind will take them now.”

Aether knew all those words, but wasn’t sure what they meant put together like that. But in any case, it seemed like the rites Allan came over to do had been performed. They stood up, and Aether stood with them, sparing the beast’s body a last glance, and giving his own version of a goodbye.

Chapter 6: The Town of Springvale

Summary:

Aether learns new words and wears a dress. Sorry I killed Diona's mom.

By the time they reached Allan’s camp, Aether was about ready to collapse. There were two new people sitting around a roaring fire (Draff and Jotun, Aether assumed), and they both ran to accost Allan as soon as they were in sight.

The first one talked very loudly and excitedly. They were slapping Allan on the back, just a bit too hard, every once in a while losing their balance. A strong smell was coming from them–something fermented–and two fluffy animal ears poked out from their brown hair. They seemed very happy that Allan was back.

The second one seemed to be giving Allan something of a talking to. They had their arms crossed and their words were sharp and direct. Allan flinched back from them, only to jolt forward again from the heavy-handed back pats he was receiving.

Them and Paimon all chatted for a bit, and then the excited one grabbed Aether’s hand and started shaking it violently up and down. It was unpleasant, but Aether sensed it was supposed to convey some sort of gratitude, so he let it be.

 

Draff–the smelly one with the animal ears–was shoving chunks of cooked meat in Aether’s face as Allan rubbed some sort of salve on his blistering arm and stomach. Aether politely took a bite every now and again, but really, they had fed him enough. Paimon, on the other hand, was just swallowing every meat skewer that Jotun handed her, so fast that Aether was sure that the stick that came out of her mouth was shorter than the stick that had gone in.

Draff was talking to him about something. Meat and hunting, at least. He knew now that Aether did not speak Mondstadtian, but seemed not to care that his conversation partner couldn’t understand his endless prattle. Aether got the feeling he was some type of intoxicated.

The good news was that these men were from a small nearby town called Springvale,

which was apparently only a couple days' travel from the city of Mondstadt. They were out on a hunting trip, and planned to head back that afternoon, only Allan had gone off to chase a pheasant and then gotten himself lost, so now they all had to wait until tomorrow morning. It was a lucky break. If they had left on time, who knows if Aether and Paimon would’ve caught them.

The prospect of finally exploring one of Teyvat’s functioning communities, even if it wasn’t Mondstadt, was enticing. Aether had so many questions he needed to ask. How connected were Teyvat’s people and its divine beings? Would there be information about that god that attacked him and Lumine? He hadn’t mentioned anything to Paimon about them yet. He wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to tell Teyvat’s locals that he had been in contact with one of their gods. That might alienate him, and then he really wouldn’t be able to get any information. Did the people of Mondstadt have a writing system? If so, he should probably start learning to read. Historical records might be helpful.

But Aether was also…a little afraid of what else might lie in those historical records. Exactly how much time had passed between his first and second awakening? What would he do if…Aether shook his head. It wasn’t worth thinking about. His goal–to find his sister–was the same regardless.

Draff had had Jotun prepare one and a half extra bedrolls for Aether and Paimon under the hunter’s little lean-to. It was a bit crowded, but still comfortable, especially after sleeping on nothing but the bare ground for the past few weeks. Aether laid down on one now, squeezed between Allan and Paimon, who were both already fast asleep. Draff was snoring not far away, and Jotun was keeping watch for the rest of the night, having slept in that morning. And for as tired and bruised as Aether was, he couldn’t find it in him to get to sleep. He’d been plagued by insomnia since he and Paimon had started traveling. Unconsciousness felt dangerous, somehow. Like if he went to sleep, he might wake up lost and alone again. Or worse yet, his sleep-muddled brain might forget that his sister was not here with him, and he would have to come to terms with the fact that he was, truly, lost and alone.

But despite all this, Aether was now at the whim of mortal necessities, and so he could not help it when he finally fell asleep.

 

Springvale was larger than he expected. At the center of the town was a large windmill, turning easily in Mondstadt’s fresh air. A number of houses dotted the landscape, made of mostly stone, but also wood and some sort of plaster. There were several paths winding through the town, not paved, but clearly upkept, and many of them connected to a larger, main road that ran alongside the eastern edge of the town. It was this road that Aether, Paimon, and the Springvale hunters were currently on. It was almost sunset as they arrived, burdened by large sacks of cut meat. Inside each of the sacks, Aether learned, was a bundle of strange blue flowers. He was at first a little wary of them, because they leaked the same cold, dry substance that had been introduced to him via pellets to the face just a few days ago, but the hunters and Paimon assured him that there was nothing to worry about. Mist flowers, they were called–a special element-fixing plant that Mondtstadters used to preserve their foodstuffs. And sure enough, they kept the meat frozen and fresh even during the heat of the day.

There were a few villagers waiting at the edge of town. When the hunters came into view, they rushed to welcome them home and relieve them of their burdens. There was a child among them, still very young, only about knee-height. Aether watched them run circles around the hunters and steal peeks inside the bags when no one else was looking.

Aether and Paimon were getting some obvious stares, but it seemed like the villagers were trying to be polite, working first on unloading the sacks of meat and hunting equipment. Though, there was one person not taking the cue.

They were tall, equipped with a red bowler hat, a goatee and mustache combo, and that unmistakable aura of someone trying to sell you something. They were jabbering to Aether in Mondstadtian. He couldn’t be sure exactly what they were saying (something about water?), but he knew a sales pitch when he heard one.

He was trying to figure out how to communicate that he had not only no money, but also no concept of local currency when another person–rounder, their hair in two pigtails–punched Goatee in the arm. Pigtails shook their fist at them and said something, and Goatee went quiet after that.

 

When the food was on its way to storage, and the hunters, Aether, and Paimon were shown a proper place to sit down and relax (a nice, park-like area, with wooden benches and garden plots) the questions began. Aether caught about half of them. Who are you? Where did you come from? How long are you staying? Would you like something to drink? He spoke when prompted, but otherwise let Paimon field the questions, instead trying to pick up the conversational flow of the language. It was the first time he had been around people other than Paimon, and he was beginning to realize that she talked a little funny. Dialect, maybe?

As the sun sank lower, they were brought food and drink, and somebody started a fire in the pit nearby. Pigtails handed Aether a bowl of some kind of creamy meat stew. Whatever it was, it was delicious. Paimon had six servings. Aether mentally mapped out the flavors and textures so that he might recreate it for her later. Now that they had reached a proper town, he wasn’t sure if she would still accompany him to the city. There wasn’t a need, probably. He could figure his own way from here. But he’d still like to come up with a good way to thank her. Food seemed an auspicious avenue.

The child from earlier was hiding behind a bench, sneaking glances at Aether. Aether wondered if he should smile or wave, try to seem friendly so the kid might not be so shy, but he decided against it. It never worked to push things like that. He was kind of reserved as a kid too. So he turned his back, giving the child some privacy to stare from afar as they wished. Turned out, that was the wrong thing to do.

He was suddenly tackled to the ground, a small pair of arms wrapped around him. The child was giggling madly, in between fits getting out “Got him!” and “Another catch for the xxxx hunter!” But soon the child’s weight was lifted off him, and Aether looked up to see them in Pigtails’s arms. 

“Oh xxxxx, I’m so sorry! He’s xxxx at that age xxxx everything is a xxx,” they said. Then to the child, “Xxx Pepe, xxxxx to the nice young man.”

Pepe only looked confused and despondent. “But xxxxx Brook, I’m xxxx to be a hunter just like xxxx! Xxx xxx I xxx xx I can save the town! Ow!”

Pigtails–Brook, had grabbed Pepe’s ear and tugged. “Xxxxxxx,” they repeated.

Pepe hung his head low and dutifully mumbled out “Sorry for hunting you.”

“It’s okay,” replied Aether, and it really was. His shoulder still ached from earlier, but that was it. How long did mortals take to heal, again? In any case, he was more curious about–

“What does he mean, ‘save the town’?” asked Paimon, wiping a ring of creamy broth from her mouth. “Is Springvale in trouble?”

Several glances were exchanged, and the tension around the fire heightened for just a fraction of a moment, but then Draff started to laugh. “Oh, you know xxxxx,” he said. “Always with the xxxx xxxxx.”

Brook smiled and nodded their agreement. “Yes, that’s it. Now, xxxx don’t xxxx go and have a wash? It’s xxxx to clean xxx and rest xxx the night.”

Jotun yawned. “Xxxxx whatever you say. Doesn’t xxxxx me either way.”

“A good xxxxx rest sounds xxxx,” added Goatee.

Brook shot them a look. 

“I’ll uh… xxxx the water,” said Goatee.

 

Aether hadn’t felt so clean since he arrived in Teyvat. The bathwater he was given was warm and fresh, even a little sweet-smelling. He wondered if something was added to it to make it that way. The rivers he drank from before didn’t have that quality.

He and Paimon were each lent a room in Draff’s house. He had a lot of extra space. Apparently his daughter was away working in the city, and his wife had died a long time ago. He told Aether and Paimon all of this while drunkenly sobbing at his kitchen table, and had then pulled both of them in for an extremely awkward group hug. Aether wasn’t confident that Draff would remember the conversation in the morning.

Aether wrung out his hair and put it up.  He had to cut it a bit, ratty and knotted as it was, and some of the shorter pieces escaped the hairdo and hung down around his shoulders. It was honestly a miracle that his hair was still, on the whole, long. Some of those tangles put up more of a fight than unearthed ancient gods.

Brook had taken Aether’s regular clothes to wash and repair. Aether was hesitant to hand them over, but was assured that they would be returned to him by tomorrow evening. For the moment, Draff was lending him some things to wear. Except, Draff was a good bit bigger than him, and so he offered to let Aether use some of his dead wife’s clothes. Paimon thought that was a little creepy, but Aether didn’t mind. No one missed their possessions less than the dead.

Aether dried himself and threw on a white nightgown with short, frilly sleeves. He folded the towel and placed it nicely on a nearby dresser, then let his eyes wander along a wall-mounted shelf holding an array of different books. He carefully examined each of the spines, trying to remember which title belonged to which series of letters from when Paimon read them aloud for him. It would probably be impossible to practice reading by himself, but he could at least familiarize himself with the shape of the language, maybe make a list of all the symbols.

Ah, this one, he remembered. The Boar Princess. Paimon had made some pretty funny snorting sounds when she was explaining to him what the title said. Aether pulled the book off the shelf. It was dusty, and smelled of old paper. On the inside of the cover was an image meant to look like a tiled mosaic, or maybe stained glass, Aether couldn’t tell. It depicted a snowy mountaintop, a small boar, and a giant, blue wolf. Aether remembered a snow-capped mountain from when he first arrived, and he wondered if this was the same one.

All of the pages had pictures, which was very helpful for Aether’s comprehension. As he identified Mondstadtian’s written symbols, trying to separate the letters from the tone and dialogue markers, he took note of the repeating words accompanying each image. He was pretty sure that he had isolated the word for ‘boar’, now. One down, only a couple hundred thousand to go.

The hours passed, and Aether had learned just about as much as he could by himself. He wondered who this book might’ve been for. It gave the impression of being a children’s book, so Draff’s daughter was a good guess, but it didn’t look like he was in a child’s bedroom. It looked more like some type of office/storage space. There was a desk, a bookshelf, and a number of stacked wooden crates. The bed and the dresser looked crowded and out of place, as if they were shoved in the room as an afterthought. And aside from the places where Aether touched, there was a fine layer of dust on everything, like it hadn’t been bothered with in a very long time.

As he was looking around, Aether remembered his used bathwater, which had long since grown cold in its basin. What was he supposed to do with that? It was filthy, now–contaminated with the byproducts of his journey in the Mondstadtian woodlands. Completely unusable as more drinking or bath water without intense filtration and treatment, but it would probably feed the plants just as well.

He placed the book and his notes gently on the bed, hefted up the basin, water sloshing, and padded quietly out the back door of the house. The air was fresh and crisp, and Aether wondered if there had ever been bad weather in Mondstadt. Springvale was quiet–the very picture of a sleepy, idyllic town. Only the faint, warm glow of street lanterns revealed any liveliness.

Draff did not keep up any gardens, and Aether was hesitant to spread his wilderness filth all over the communal garden plot that grew people’s food, and so he made his way to a small wildflower patch on the outskirts of town.

He felt very exposed, in his borrowed nightgown and bare feet. A chill ran down his spine, the echo of it reflected in the bathwater. Aether greeted the flowers warily, still cautious from his last experience, but not a petal stirred. He breathed a sigh of relief, and watered the flowers in little spurts, watching the water trickle down through the coarser grains of rock and into the silty ground. He was sure the plants appreciated it. Some of them looked a little wilty. Maybe the area was going through a dry spell.

He was just about done when something caught his eye. A bright blue light, on the roof of a nearby house. It flickered like fire, but never spread, staying a distinct shape. Aether left the basin by the flowers and wandered a little closer. To his surprise, the light floated down off the roof and towards him.

It seemed to be some sort of life form. It had a definite head, out from which shone a brighter white light and on top of which Aether could see two tiny rounded points, like ears or maybe horns. It had a body too, very simple, triangular, with two small arms poking out from the sides of it. Its mane was the thing that had caught Aether’s eye–an amorphous, ghostly fire from which no heat was produced. Attached to it on either side were two long strands, like whiskers, that extended down the creature’s body.

Aether stood still and let the creature approach him. It circled around him a few times, almost playfully. When he turned slightly to catch a glimpse of it behind him, it would quickly dart in the other direction, like they were playing a game of hide and seek.

He snorted a laugh and relaxed a bit, holding out his hand. The creature went to explore this new part of him, stretching its head towards his fingers, like it was sniffing him. Then, to his amazement, it slowly crept forward until its body was snuggled in his palm. It felt like holding a songbird–weightless and slightly warm, with just the vaguest assumption of a pittering heartbeat.

Then quickly, the creature popped up out of his hand and flew a distance away. Aether worried that he had startled it somehow, even though he was trying his best to remain non-threatening, but the creature turned back around, did a few loopty loops, and stared expectantly, like it wanted…

Aether walked towards the creature, and sure enough, it started moving again, every once in a while checking back to make sure that Aether was behind it. He followed it down a trail into the forest. By all rights, he really should have headed back to Draff’s house and grabbed his sword or at least some shoes or a jacket, but something about this creature, this interaction, felt ethereal and dream-like. Like if he interrupted it, some spell would be broken and he would lose his chance. And so Aether stepped carefully around sharp rocks and twigs, and headed deeper into the woodlands.

They hadn’t gone very far at all when the creature stopped at what could only be described as a giant, muddy hole in the ground. From the erosion lines, Aether could tell it had once been filled with water. There was no indication of a water source feeding into it, so maybe it was some vernal pool, and Mondstadt was past its wet season–although honestly, it seemed a bit deep for that. In any case, Aether couldn’t tell why the creature had led him there. Maybe it was just a stop along the way. The creature waited for him to walk the whole perimeter of the hole before it continued onwards.

And apparently there was something up with these holes, because Aether was led straight to a second one. It was a little deeper into the woods, but still within a few minutes walk of Springvale. And this hole had some water in it still, just a few inches at the bottom.

Aether crouched down, and immediately the creature floated a bit in front of him to provide some light.

“Thank you,” he said. The creature looked pleased.

There wasn’t anything noticeably off about the water. It was a bit murky, but that was to be expected, with how low and still it was. The only thing that caught Aether’s attention was the smell. There was a faint floral sweetness, just like the bathwater he used. Probably some local peculiarity. Nothing really concerning.

The only thing out of order Aether noticed was that the plant-life that grew in the shallower areas of mud seemed to be suffering, even moreso than the wildflowers he watered earlier. He recognized the calla lilies from when he cooked the petals in a soup for Paimon. Those ones had looked plump and red, with brilliant green leaves and a thick center bulb. These ones here were about a breath away from being uprooted. Aether reached out to examine a leaf, and it just came away in his hand, thin and yellow, curled in on itself like a despondent child.

The creature floated closer, nudging Aether’s palm where the leaf lay. If it was upset by the deteriorating state of the plants, there was little Aether could do about that. Sometimes environments changed. If the water level was low here now, the lilies would simply have to reseed somewhere else and hope for the best in the next generation. He supposed he could try to transplant them, but he was reluctant to remove them from their home, even as they were dying. Especially as they were dying.

The creature nudged Aether's hand again, and then started in a different direction, back the way they had come. Before Aether knew it, they were back in Springvale. The creature led him past Draff’s house, past the communal garden, past a bench and what looked like a set of market stalls, up to the giant windmill in the center of town. And, lo and behold, just underneath the windmill, surrounded by the thick brown stems of dead calla lilies, was another large hole.

This one wasn’t even muddy. Its bottom was dry and cracked like clay, littered here and there with shriveled organic matter. At its center was a thin strip of land. If there was water in the hole, it might be called a small island, but without said water, it just looked like a strange pillar of dirt sticking up out the middle. Set on top of that pillar was a gray stone statue of…nothing that Aether could recognize. It was covered in moss, and looked as if its top had broken off at some point in the past. The edges were now smooth and weathered, and the old break formed a cozy little hollow at the statue’s peak.

The creature settled into this hollow, familiar, like it was returning home. It flashed brightly once, temporarily blinding Aether, but the light dimmed again, painting the entirety of the empty hole in a soft blue glow. The creature didn’t move after that. It seemed to be in some sort of restful state. If Aether hadn’t been following it just seconds prior, he might’ve mistaken it for a decorative torch.

There must be something here that it wanted him to find. Something related to the other two drained holes. If it just wanted some company on its way home, it would’ve just taken the direct route.

Aether thought for a minute, shrugged, then hiked up his nightgown and jumped down into the ditch. He was in it this far. He would just try to avoid getting any stains on his borrowed clothes.

The dirt was dry and chalky on his hands–all the way down, which was strange. It at least should have been a little wet from the last rain. Aether dug a bit into the sides to check for moist soil, but it was all just dust and sand. He would say the area was experiencing some sort of drought, but it would have to be extremely isolated and severe. Aether had just been traveling in the surrounding woodlands, and there was no indication of anything like this. Everywhere else around, the landscape was picturesquely lush.

Suddenly, Aether felt something cold–almost painfully so. He reflexively jerked his hand back out of the dirt and inspected it. There was some strange purplish-black substance on the tip of his index finger. He rubbed at it with his thumb, and it stuck to itself and unstuck from his skin like putty. It was definitely the cold thing he touched, but it was slowly warming in the heat of Aether’s hand, as he rolled it between his fingers. It was elastic, but tough, like some kind of super sticky rubber. And, for no reason in particular (other than perhaps that they were both very gross), it reminded him so much of that congealed, sludgy beast blood.

It was instinct that saved him. Otherwise, he would be retiring to bed tonight with a big, bloody hole in his head. But Aether had under him a thousand years of proper martial training and and hundred more years of roughing it, and so he dodged and caught the staff, letting the momentum carry it and it wielder up over his shoulder and then hard back onto the ground, where Aether pinned them with his knees.

His attacker was short, clothed in flowing golden robes and a furry red shawl. They wore a black mask, with two gold-painted eyes and a long, beak-like protrusion. The staff, which Aether was now using to pin the person’s upper body, was a wicked-looking thing, with a spiked ball on the end. It radiated a fierce heat, the tips on the spikes glowing forge red.

Aether and the masked bird-person stared at each other, and Aether got the impression that, for some reason, both of them were equally as surprised to see the other.

In a high-pitched, warbly voice it spoke to him: “Princess?”

“...No?” Aether replied.

And then his knees smacked the hard dirt as the body underneath him disappeared in a quick flash of red.

Chapter 7: All Dried Up

Summary:

almost forgot to post this but here it is

Aether woke up to a tiny hand slapping at his cheek. The morning was bright and yellow, and his field of vision was blocked almost entirely by deep blue, star-speckled eyes and a fringe of white hair.

“You’re xxx!” said the shrill voice–ow–right next to his ear. “Paimon was worried xxxx you. What happened?”

What happened indeed. Aether groggily sifted through his memories of the night before. There was the bathwater…then that blue thing…the drained pools…oh! And that bird-masked person who tried to murder him and then disappeared. That’s right.

After the attack, Aether had done a quick patrol of the town. He wasn’t sure if the masked person was a Springvale resident or not, but it wouldn’t do to have somebody sneaking around at night hitting people in the head with a spiked staff. Finding nothing, he went back to Draff’s and tried to wake up Paimon. When her eyes slitted open, he tried to explain the situation, but she just waved him off and went back to snoring.

And so there hadn’t been much else he could do. He certainly couldn’t wake up the entire town to warn them of something that wasn’t even there anymore. For all he knew, everyone in Springvale was already aware of the Bird-Mask, and nightly murderous sneak attacks were a common occurrence. Still, he didn’t want to just let it go. If he had been anyone else–someone with a less trained reaction time, or someone who really could’ve died from a knock to the head–things may not have turned out as smoothly.

So he grabbed his sword and bag and camped out by that hole near the windmill. That was where he was first attacked, and so if the Bird-Mask were to return, he figured it would be there. He would keep watch the rest of the night, just to be safe, and let the townspeople know about everything in the morning. Except, he had forgotten that bodies with mortal needs often overrode conscious decisions no matter how strong the will, and so he had fallen asleep. Outside. Again.

Paimon moved from her position right in front of his face, and Aether saw that a number of townspeople were also staring at him. Like, a lot of people. Possibly everyone who lived in Springvale. Aether’s cheeks flushed red. He was just trying to keep people safe. He hadn’t meant to cause a scene.

But then he realized that they weren’t actually looking at him. Well, some of them were, but the majority of the townspeople were looking at something behind him, with a mix of shock and unbridled joy.

An older person, with curly brown hair and a flat, narrow-brimmed hat broke away from the crowd, walked right up to the edge of the hole, and prostrated.

“Xxxxx the xxxx,” they said. “The Spring xxxx has returned!”

And just like that, the fragile quiet of awe was broken, and the crowd erupted into bird-like chatter.

“Xxx old man, the Spring xxx isn’t xxxx. It’s just the xxxxx.”

“Yeah, but why did the xxxxx suddenly xxxxx? I thought it was supposed to xxxxxx.”

“Who cares how it happened? I say, xxxxx xxx xxx.”

“Do you think all the water’s gonna come back? Are we okay now?”

“Look at it xxxxxxx, it’s all xxxxx, something’s wrong with it.”

“Hey, who’s that blonde xxx? What’s she doing xxxx the spring?”

“Someone should call the xxxxx of xxxxxxx. We don’t know who this xxxxx is or what she xxxxxx with our water.”

“Xxxxx of xxxxxx? Who needs ‘em? We got xxxxx xxxxx good men xxxx here in Springvale.”

“Stop with the xxxxxxx. First we should make sure she doesn’t xxxxxx.”

Aether wasn’t quite sure what was going on, but he could tell that he now seemed to be the main topic of conversation, and he wasn’t completely sure that that conversation was all especially friendly. The gazes that were once curious turned suspicious and mistrusting. A group of young men all shared a look with each other, and started walking toward him.

Aether scrambled to his feet, preparing to dissolve any kind of conflict. Paimon glanced between him and the men and quickly glued herself to Aether’s side. The sudden movements made the men approach with more haste, afraid that their target might bolt, but all four of them stopped short when Allan stepped in front of Aether and Paimon.

He nervously waved them away. “Ah, xxxxx, xxxxx, I’m afraid this is a xxxxxxxx. This is Aether. I got… um…. a bit lost xxxxxxx. He helped me find my way back.” Allan avoided eye contact, and the skin on his forearm seemed especially itchy. “There’s really….no need to xxxx.”

The men looked at each other. “So why’s he out here?” said the first one.

“Uhh…” said Allan, and he turned around to look at Paimon, who in turn looked to Aether.

This time, all eyes were really on him. Aether opened his mouth and closed it a few times, trying to put together the words in his head.

“There was a bad guy,” he started, slowly. “With a bird nose, and a… fire stick.” He outlined the instrument in the air, making sure to denote the spikes on the tip. “They tried to hit me on the head, so…I stayed out here for…hmmm…”

“To xxxxx everyone?” Paimon guessed. Aether cocked his head at her, and she rephrased. “To make everyone safe.”

He smiled and nodded. “Yes. To protect.”

Aether was met with more stares–some confused, some concerned, some blank. He wished someone would give him some feedback so he knew if they understood him.

Draff was the one who broke the awkward silence. “All xxx xxxxx, xxxxxx,” he started. “I trust you, but what does that xxx xxx xx with the water in the spring?”

“The water?” Aether questioned. He hadn’t said anything about water, had he? Was there a spring nearby? He hadn’t seen anything besides that desert dry ditch.

Oh. Well, that was interesting.

Down from the strange statue on the miniature island (notable, missing one blue flame), the hole in the ground where Aether had been attacked the night before was no longer as dry and dusty as death. It wasn’t brimming with water either, but there was a small pool forming–just enough to muddy the bottom and layer over itself.

It obviously hadn’t rained, or Aether would be soaked from sleeping uncovered outside. So the water probably came from some underground source–a river or an aquifer or something. Maybe some snowmelt had finally trickled down through. But all that was fairly ordinary natural phenomena. If Springvale was as established as it seemed to be, they would be familiar with the rise and fall of the local water table. A small change certainly wouldn’t be something for the whole town to get up in a fuss about.

But then again, when he thought of it, he hadn’t seen any other water sources around the town. There were several wells in the village. Were those dry too? The river was at least a half day’s travel away. And upon closer inspection, the water in the ditch didn’t seem right. It was hard to see with all the mud, but Aether caught in the sunlight a slight purplish tint. His eyes drifted to the old man from earlier, with his face still pressed against the dirt.

“So, if this place is called Springvale,” Paimon started, floating over to inspect the small pool of water, “how come your spring’s so…umm….how does Paimon put this….”

“Xxxxx and dry?” supplied a voice from the crowd–a person with a red dress and framed glasses. Then a sudden thought seemed to distract them. “Oh wait, that’s a good xxxxxx,” they said, pulling out a notebook and quill to write something down.

“...Sure, something like that,” said Paimon, sheepishly. 

Aether saw some of the townspeople exchange uncertain looks. Draff heaved a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. Then, he turned and addressed the crowd.

“Why doesn’t everybody get back to their morning xxxxx,” said Draff. “I’ll xxxxx everything here and xxxxxx everyone later.”

There was some murmuring–a few dissenting voices here and there–but Draff must have held some significant sway over the people of Springvale, because the crowd slowly, but decidedly, dispersed.

Draff sighed again, turning to Aether and Paimon. “Sorry about all that,” he said. His gaze stuck on Aether, and his expression twisted. “Would you like to change clothes?”

Aether looked down at his frilly white nightgown, still remarkably clean despite his nighttime escapades, and nodded.

 

Equipped with new borrowed pants and a shirt two sizes too big, Aether made breakfast for him and Paimon. Draff refused his offer for food. Instead, he sat at the kitchen table with two small greenish brown pills, a small glass of water, and a cup of hot brown liquid–coffee, Aether learned. It was a delicacy from a nation called Sumeru. He thought it was a bit bitter, but overall, alright.

Draff explained the situation, and, with Paimon’s help, Aether understood most of it. Within the last two months, almost every water source in Springvale had run dry–all of the wells, and the majority of the surrounding springs that gave the town its name. It was a sudden and grave change for the town’s residents, who now had to travel all the way to the river and back for drinkable water. It was an impossible task for some people–the very old, the very young, and the otherwise occupied or disabled–and so water-collecting parties had to be formed and sent out on a regular basis.

But the more dire part of it was the hit to Springvale’s economy. Springvale was a hunting town, the main supplier of meat for all of Mondstadt. When the springs dried up, the animals in the area also left. Draff and his hunting parties had to travel further and stay out for longer, and they often returned home with less.

And the wilds of Mondstadt, as Aether had experienced, were no joke. Several people, like Allan, for example, had been attacked on their way to get water or food. Thankfully, no one had been seriously injured, but with the situation getting more desperate by the day, it was only a matter of time.

Paimon squirmed in her chair beside Aether and glanced down at her sizable serving of sausage and eggs. She was no doubt also thinking about all the meat skewers and bowls of stew she had eaten the day before. Aether was the same. He should’ve asked about water treatment before he dumped all that bathwater.

When he expressed that sentiment to Draff, the man only chuckled. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “We’re not that desperate. If we couldn’t afford to treat you to the xxxxxx Springvale welcome, you know we’d really be in trouble.”

Aether nodded and smiled politely, but from what he surmised, Springvale would be in real trouble in fairly short order. He took a moment to rehearse his next words in his head, and then spoke aloud. “Where does the water come from?” There. That sentence was probably his cleanest Mondstadtian so far. Aether felt a twinge of pride in his chest.

“Oh, it comes from an xxxxxxx,” explained Draff, and Aether mentally sighed.

Paimon gave him a quick glance, and then she spoke up. “So, rain?”

“Basically, yes,” confirmed Draff. “The rocks underneath Springvale are xxxxx, kinda like a xxxxx. They soak up and store water. The springs were formed when the xxxxxx xxxxxx was changing up the landscape, after the xxx against xxxxxxx. But Springvale wasn’t founded until after that event xxxxx years ago.” Draff leaned back in his chair, taking a swig of his fermented drink and rubbing at his mustache. “There was another settlement at the same spot before then, but it was xxxxxxxx, for...some reason. I wouldn’t xxxxx to know.”

“Hasn’t it been raining a lot?” Paimon wondered aloud. And she was right. What Draff was describing was an aquifer. Ostensibly, as long as it was raining on a regular basis, the springs should be fine. And it had rained, not too far from here, just the other day. There was no barrier cutting Springvale off geographically from the rest of the area, at least not as far as Aether could see. Paimon was even more knowledgeable about the local area. Although, Aether supposed, she hadn’t known about this town.

“Something is...blocking it,” Aether guessed. “Under the ground.”

“Something like that, yeah,” said Draff, shrugging. “It hasn’t rained over town for the last two months. That’s strange by itself, but it shouldn’t be enough to run the wells dry. The aquifer covers this area all the way to the river.” Draff took another sip from his drink and placed the mug down on the table, the foam at the top sloshing. He sighed the heavy sigh of a working man, and pulled at his mustache again. “Mondstadt doesn’t get heavy rainfall, but the xxxxx xxxxx never lets anywhere get completely dry. My whole life, Springvale’s been a xxxxxxxxx hunting town. Now…well, we’re figuring it out.”

Draff was obviously trying his best to sound confident and at ease, but his triangular ears were twitching, and his long brown tail swished back and forth. Draff and Allen and Jotun and Brook–they had all been so kind and welcoming to Aether. He wanted to do something to help this town. It wasn’t like he could change the weather, but surely there was something.

Lumine would ward him off of doing this. She would stress the importance of allowing people to solve their internal matters internally. She wasn’t heartless, of course. If someone asked directly for their help, Lumine was ready to lend a hand. But she would never go making offers. Butting into things was Aether’s MO. 

And truth be told, he was a little torn. Searching for Lumine was critical–the most important thing. He wasn’t likely to find her by staying in this town. But he also couldn’t just leave knowing that Springvale and its people were teetering on the edge of disaster.

“Is there a path below ground?” Aether asked. “Are there any caves in the area?”

Draff eyed him suspiciously. “There are…” he said, hesitant. “Northwest of here, there’s a cave that has an underground river–or, used to have one, anyways. It’s dried up now. Blocked from somewhere.”

Paimon’s eyebrows scrunched together. “That sounds very suspicious,” she said. She was floating near Aether’s head now, subconsciously rocking from side to side. “Did you xxxxxxxx it?”

Draff shook his head. “I’ve xxxxxxxx anyone from going near there.”

“Huh? Why?” Paimon cried out in surprise.

“The lack of water has made the area unstable. Cave-in could happen anywhere,” said Draff. “It’s dangerous. And a weak lead. Too much xxxx for what could very well end up being pointless.”

Aether thought of the bird-masked person from the night before. If they weren’t from town, and they were poking around the area regularly, as seemed to be the case, then they must be holed up nearby–somewhere none of the townspeople had seen them. It was kind of a stretch to assume that this cave was the place, but Paimon was right–it did sound suspicious. He was suddenly sure of his next move. 

Draff had to get going then, both to reassure the townsfolk that Aether and Paimon were not related to the town’s current crisis, and to investigate the purplish water that had suddenly appeared in the town’s central spring. Aether and Paimon reluctantly finished their meals, guilty, but not willing to waste the food, and by the time they were cleaning up, Brook dropped by to return their washed clothes and gear. 

She did a wonderful job. Aether’s gloves were crisp, his boots were polished, and he could’ve sworn his scarf was a shade whiter than when he’d arrived on Teyvat. Although Aether was very grateful to Draff for lending him clothing, it felt good to have his things back. Himself, and these clothes–those were the only cultural remnants he had left of his home planet. He was fairly attached to them. 

Paimon’s outfit looked great too. The variety of stains that were previously on it had all but disappeared. She came out of her room extraordinarily pleased, twirling in the air and shouting “Aether! Look! Don’t Paimon’s clothes look so clean and fresh?” She pulled the fabric up to her face and inhaled deeply. “Ahhhh, smells like sweet flower and sticky honest roast.” Aether was familiar with this Mondstadtian dish, because Paimon asked him to make it for her about twenty different times, even though he had no idea what it was actually supposed to taste like. He sniffed at his own clothes, and didn’t detect anything beyond that same sweetness his bathwater had, but he was glad to see Paimon’s ever-ravenous imagination working at full capacity.

Feeling refreshed, mostly full, and just a bit groggy from a poor night’s sleep, Aether headed out into town. He was just about to close the door behind him when a small hand pushed it back open again and Paimon came floating outside.

She looked at him expectantly. “Soooo,” she said. “What are we doing today?”

Aether was confused. He enjoyed Paimon’s company, and he was grateful to her for guiding him until they found a place with other people, but he’d figured that this was the natural ending point of their journey together. Surely, Paimon had better things to do than follow him around all day. Shouldn’t she be getting back home? Wherever that was?

Plus, a complication: Aether didn’t really want Paimon involved in his plan. Draff had implied that he was to stay away from the cave tunnels, and Aether wasn’t sure if Paimon would keep his exploration of them a secret. She had kind of a loud mouth. Trying to convince Draff that he really would be fine in the face of a cave-in would be just another situation to handle.

“Ah,” he started, feeling a little awkward. “I think….I will be by myself today. Is that alright?”

The sight of Paimon’s crestfallen face made Aether’s heart lurch. “Oh,” she said, and the awkward air grew denser. Her face cycled through a variety of expressions, all plain and easy to read–surprise, confusion, sadness, guilt, and finally, feigned acceptance. The smile was tight on her face “Of course. Paimon will just be…over there, yeah.” She pointed in what looked like a random direction towards the edge of town.

Aether was seriously about to cave. He didn’t mean to make Paimon feel so dejected. He genuinely figured she would be more than tired of him by now. But it was also important to get this underground river checked out, and she certainly couldn’t come along for that. He would make it up to her later, collect some ingredients while he was out to make an especially lavish dinner for her and the villagers. Food was always the way to Paimon’s heart.

He smiled apologetically and waved a sheepish goodbye. Paimon did the same, and then floated off in a slightly different direction than the one she pointed in.

Well. That was a bit more painful than Aether had planned. He heaved a sigh, adjusted his gloves, and headed vaguely northwest.

Aether made sure to stop by the town’s central spring. He didn’t want to rouse Draff’s suspicions, in case he was there investigating, but Aether was also curious if the returning water had revealed any clues. The spring was also where he had encountered the Bird-Mask, who was becoming more and more of a dubious character in Aether’s mind. Although, he shouldn’t pass judgment too quickly. From the outside perspective, Aether himself was also fairly dubious.

Draff was not at the spring. Instead, the old man from that morning was sat cross-legged by the edge of the ditch. Aether hesitated for a moment, but decided to approach, adding a bit of weight to his footfalls so that the old man would not be spooked.

Before, when all the villagers were crowded around the spring, the old man had a sort of desperation to him, prostrating himself before the water as if he were praying for forgiveness of a terrible sin. Now, he sat calmly, relaxed, a small twinkle in his drooping eyes, and the slightest smile on his wrinkled face. Aether crouched at the edge of the spring, not exactly beside the old man, but close enough to warrant a nod of acknowledgement from both parties.

The spring looked as it had that morning, except, the water level might have been the tiniest bit lower, and slightly darker in color. That was disheartening. Would it be dry again by nightfall? After all that?

Aether’s powers were still sealed, but there were some abilities intrinsic to his being that he should still be able to access. Being able to see the traces left behind by concentrated elemental power use, Aether had learned, was a fairly rare trait even in the vastness of the universe. He and Lumine, and all of the people and creatures on their home planet, had been able to do this since birth. It required no sigils, no harnessing of core power–as long as one was in contact with their surrounding elemental forces, it was just as natural as breathing.

For Aether as he was, it was a bit harder than that. Without core access, his elemental connection was…dulled. Like blind-tasting with a burnt tongue. If he focused, and used some context clues, he could tell the traces apart. It was a relief, honestly, to have some of that side of himself still operational.

And, there it was–a flickering, ghostly red trail, leading in a northwestern direction. Aether was worried that the Bird-Mask wouldn’t leave a directional trace, since it had seemingly teleported away from him. But apparently, it could only teleport so far. The trail vanished after a few meters, but then reappeared nearby. 

There was another trace too. It was blue, and very faint, but it filled the empty spring like a liquid would. Only the absence of refracting light hinted at it being something different.

And then, in the water and the soil around it, something…what was that? Was it elemental energy? Something related? Aether remembered the black, putty-like substance he had found in the soil the night before. It hadn’t seemed to be giving off any elemental energy, but he hadn’t gotten to study it for very long.

Aether shot a glance at the old man. He probably shouldn’t poke around much longer, since some of the townspeople were still suspicious of him. But that goo could be important. The old man wasn’t looking at him, so Aether subtly reached out a hand, disguising the movement as a stretch. He was just about to reach a section of soil that radiated the strange elemental energy, stretching just a little further when–

“Excuse me.”

Ah hell.

Aether quickly altered his course, and finished out the stretch above his head, yawning for good measure. Then, he turned to the old man and smiled pleasantly. “Hello,” he said, trying hard to look charming and inconspicuous.

But the old man didn’t look mad, or distrustful. Instead, he engaged Aether in what was–to his outsider perspective–a totally normal conversation. “You were the one here this morning, weren’t you? I’m sorry, can you understand me?”

Aether nodded. “I understand.”

The old man breathed an awkward laugh, and then coughed twice. “Good, good. How are you doing? Getting to know the town? Sorry about the, er…less than warm welcome.”

Okay, so he hadn’t seen anything. 

“No worries,” Aether said, internally sighing with relief. “The town is nice, and the people are friendly, it was just a….” He squinted hard, searching for the word.

“A misunderstanding?” Offered the old man, and Aether nodded. That was it.

The old man chuckled, and looked somewhat relieved himself. “I’m Finch, haha. And as you can see, I’m old, which is why they call me Old Finch.”

Aether thought that was great. Everyone should have some descriptive moniker. It made them easier to remember. “I’m Aether,” said Aether, not about to make the Paimon mistake again. “They don’t call me anything else. Nice to meet you.”

“Same to you,” said Old Finch, and it seemed as if introducing himself was all he wanted to do, because he turned away from Aether and stared back down at the near-empty spring, eyes flashing with something almost reverent.

Aether should have left it at that and followed the red elemental trail. He certainly wasn’t going to get any goo samples with Old Finch here, at least not discretely. But he remembered the way Old Finch had acted at the spring that morning, so distinct from everyone else, strange enough to be ridiculed even amongst the chaos, and Aether was curious.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, and then realized he came off a little confrontational. “I mean–everyone else left earlier. Why did you come again?”

Old Finch turned back to him, a light, but almost sad smile on his face. “I come to this spring every day,” he said. Then he quieted, and stared down at the small pool of water, thoughtful. “Have you ever heard of the Spring xxxxxx?”

The phrase was familiar. Old Finch had said it that morning as well, but Aether wasn’t sure of the last word. He repeated it back to Old Finch, questioning.

“Ah, Fairy ,” he replied, more clearly this time, “A small magical creature, like your white floating friend.”

Another Paimon? “Here, in this spring?” he asked.

“Yes,” answered Old Finch, pleased, but there was that flicker again, something bittersweet. “Although, she’s not here anymore.”

That might explain the presence of the blue elemental traces, and why they were so faint now. Old Finch’s fairy was probably an elemental being. “She left with the water?” Aether asked.

But Old Finch shook his head. “Before that, I think. Or maybe she just didn’t want to see me anymore.” He gave Aether a curious glance. “None of the villagers believe me about her, you know. They all think I’m xxxxxx.”

Aether didn’t quite understand what was so hard to believe when no one batted an eye at Paimon floating around, but it wasn’t his place to judge. Everyone, on every planet, had different ideas about the line between myth and mundane. But in any case, “She was your friend,” he said. It was clear from the look in Old Finch’s eyes–that familiar hope-filled grief.

Old Finch nodded, without any hesitation. “When I was a boy, I would talk to her all the time,” he said, and his eyes looked far away, like he was somewhere else. “We’d talk about the weather, the spring water, the fish, who had xxxxxxx xxx with who in the village…” A fond smile crept up on his face. “And when a kid fell into the spring, she’d tell me how she had secretly helped them back out and given them a few pretty stones to make them feel better.”

Aether smiled at that. Even when he knew what was coming next.

“And then, suddenly, one day, she refused to see me any longer,” said Old Finch. His eyes were sad when he said it, but the soft smile persisted at the corners of his mouth, as if he couldn’t stand the thought of giving it up. “That was, thirty? No–forty years ago now. I’ve waited for her all this time, but she never came back, and now–” Old Finch looked at the barren spring, an extra crinkle appearing on his already wrinkly forehead. He sighed, and his voice dropped to whisper-quiet. “It’s fine if she doesn’t want to see me anymore. I just want to know that she’s safe.”

A moment of silence passed between them, and then Old Finch must have felt awkward, because he spoke up again, at a normal volume this time. “Heh, listen to me, xxxxxxxx my woes on some poor xxxxxxxxx who never asked to hear them,” and he laughed, like something was funny, but Aether didn’t get the joke. “Let this be a lesson to you boy, don’t wait until you’re old like me to seek out the ones you care for. By then, it’ll be too late.” Old Finch was smiling at him again, homely, his hands clasped behind his back.

It was a beautiful sentiment. One that Aether had heard many times before. And if Old Finch had been speaking to a normal human, one born of this planet, it would have been perfectly sound advice. But Aether was different. He wouldn’t grow old like Old Finch. He was transient, and as much as he tried to show kindness in every interaction, in every flickering fateful meeting, there was only one person who wouldn’t benefit from his quick and graceful exit. Nevertheless, he looked Old Finch right in the eye when he said, “Thank you.”

And with that, he followed the red trail northwest.

Chapter 8: Spelunking

Summary:

long one. edited this a bunch so there might be inconsistencies. just ignore them.

Aether wasn’t surprised to find the trail leading to a small opening in the ground. The entrance was rocky and tight, but even from where he stood, Aether could tell that it opened up into a vast cavern only a few meters in. So he cracked his knuckles, got down on his belly, and squirmed his way through.

         Once on the other side, Aether found he could stand up quite comfortably. He brushed the dust off his pants, and with a flick of his finger, lit a–

         Ah, damn it. He forgot he couldn’t use elemental power. An oversight, perhaps.

         That was okay. As long as he could still see the elemental traces left by the Bird-Mask, he could follow. It was just going to be a little more difficult.

         Aether walked slowly, feeling the cave wall with his left hand and testing the ground in front of him before placing his weight down. Like Draff had said, it was all startlingly bone dry. There were, clearly, formations sculpted by water—limestone dissolved and deposited in a river-like flow—but whatever wetness that once spurred the growth of the cavern was now gone.

         From there, the path forward only grew thinner, darker, and more treacherous. Aether could still stand and walk, but his footpath became unstable and crumbly. At one point, he gingerly pressed the toe of his boot out in front of him, and the ground crumbled away beneath the pressure. Aether couldn’t see well, but he heard the loose dry rock clack against itself, falling downwards into a deep pit. He never heard it strike the bottom.

         It was nearly impossible to see now, but Aether kept following that red trace, hoping that the Bird-Mask’s ability to teleport wouldn’t bar him from taking the same path. But then, little by little, it seemed to Aether as if the cave was getting lighter. He dismissed it at first, thinking it a trick of the eye, but then, slowly, his own shadow started to appear on the ground before him.

         Aether whipped around and peered into the darkness, and there was a small, single light behind him, down the way he came. It was still far away yet, but too bright and flickering to be the sunlight from the cave’s entrance. And, it was undoubtedly coming closer.

         Aether crouched low and hid behind a large stalagmite. If he could let this person pass him, then he could stealthily follow them in, making use of the light they carried. But before long, a strange, high-pitched sound started to echo off the cavern walls.

         With the echo, it was hard to tell, but Aether thought it sounded like a voice, repeating the same word or phrase over and over again, first a high tone, then a low. Was someone yelling in the cave? That was ridiculously stupid, considering how unstable it was at the moment.

         The stalagmite’s shadow elongated as the light grew closer, the voice, louder and clearer, until it got to the point where Aether could decipher the syllables.

         “Ae-ther!!” the voice said.

         Ah. This complicated things.

         Aether stepped out from behind the stalagmite and was greeted with a shrill shriek.

         Then, there was a flash of recognition in her eyes, and Paimon floated right up to Aether to smack him on the head.

         “Don’t do that! You scared the xxxxxx xxxxxx out of Paimon!!” she squealed.

         Aether whispered back. “Paimon, shhhhh,” then, “What are you doing here?”

         She at least had the self-awareness to look a little embarrassed when she said, “Paimon followed you here.”

         Aether gave her a look.

         “You were clearly going to the caves, and you didn’t bring a xxxxx!” she yelled, swinging her lantern in Aether’s face. “Paimon was…worried, that’s all.”

         Aether softened a little at that. He sighed and held out his hand. “Okay, give me the light and I will take you back outside,” he reasoned, still with his voice low. “But you have to be quiet.”

         Paimon looked at his hand, then at the lantern. Then back at his hand, and at the lantern again. Quickly, she pulled the light high over her head and said, “No.”

         “No!?” said Aether, forgetting for a moment to keep his voice down and then coming back to himself. “What do you mean ‘no’? Why else did you come?” he whispered, a little annoyed, but also genuinely confused.

         Paimon only turned away from him, her brow furrowed and her lips in a pout. “If Paimon gives you the lantern, you’ll just leave again.”

         “What?”

         “Paimon’s coming with.”

         “What!? You can’t! It’s—” Aether winced at his own echo. “Dangerous,” he whispered.

         “Then how come you’re here?!”

         Aether hesitated. “That’s different,” he said.

         “How?!”

         “Paimon, shhh.”

         “No, don’t ‘Paimon shhh’ Paimon! Paimon wants to help too! You’re not the only one who—waaaaaah!!”

         Aether yanked the fairy toward him just as a rock the size of her head came bouncing down the cave wall. It hit the ground where Paimon had been floating with a hard thwack, and cracked in two. Aether and Paimon looked at each other, all fight between them dissolved.

         They waited, tense, listening for any more falling debris. A moment passed, but the cave remained silent. Another moment, and they both breathed a sigh of relief.

         All too soon, because just then, a violent rumble shook the ground beneath them, and the ceiling came crashing in.

 

         “Paimon?” Aether called, wiping cave dust from his mouth and eyes.

         “Over here!” came the reply, just a short distance away. Miraculously, she had held onto the lantern during all of that, and it remained lit and unbroken.

         “Are you okay?”

         “Paimon’s fine. Are you okay?”

         Aether stood up, and winced. He pulled up his pant leg to reveal a decent-sized gash on his left calf, the surrounding area already bruised. He rolled the fabric back down. “I’m okay,” he said.

         Around them, the dust began to settle, and it became clear that the passage they came through was now completely blocked with debris. Aether wasn’t sure exactly how thick the blockage was, but trying to move it would only increase the risk of another cave-in. They would have to search for another way out.

         Paimon coughed next to him, and she spit out a loogie of dirt-infused saliva onto the ground. She stared at the rubble for a long while, not saying anything, just pulling her hands in closer to her, twisting her fingers one by one. She looked upset, and Aether could imagine why. It wasn’t very nice being trapped underground. He’d been before, but it was probably Paimon’s first time. He prepared himself for the forthcoming freakout.

         But instead, Paimon’s shoulders just slumped, and she gave a heavy sigh. “Paimon’s sorry,” she said.

         And how else was Aether supposed to respond to that? He made his way closer to her, stepping over a few loose stones, placed a hand on her head and mussed her dirty white hair. “It’s alright,” he said. “Let’s go.”

 

         Aether had to admit, it was so much easier to navigate with the light from the lantern. He and Paimon followed the red traces deeper into the cave, trying to move stealthily. If there were other people in here, they would undoubtedly come this way to investigate the cave-in. So they kept the light low, just enough to see in front of them, and didn’t talk the whole way. Or, at least, Aether didn’t.

         Paimon at least kept to a whisper this time.

         “Paimon didn’t realize this cave would be so…. well, so big. It’s super big.”

         “Does it smell like slime condensate in here to you?”

         “This is kinda like a secret spy mission, huh? Agents Paimon and Aether, on the case of the Dried-Up Town! No, that sounds lame. The Case of the Vanishing Springs!”

         “Paimon bets there somebody’s long lost treasure pile down here. You can’t have an adventure without lots and lots of treasure!”

         The path narrowed, opened up, and narrowed again. There was one time Aether had to crawl. But eventually, they found themselves in a wide trench. The walls were lined with deposited sediment, layered clear and thin.

         “This must be the river that Draff was talking about…” said Paimon. “It sure is…wetter than Paimon expected.”

         The wetness that Paimon was referring to was not from water. In small piles at their feet, and in increasingly larger mounds in front of them was that purplish-black goo that Aether had found in Springvale’s central spring.

         Paimon held the lantern up to a glob and poked at it with the edge. It stretched inward with the pressure, and then wobbled like a gelatin upon release.

         “Gross,” said Paimon. Aether agreed.

         And it was strange in that, although it looked and behaved like jelly, it didn’t have a shine to it. It was like the light from the lantern’s small flame was purposefully avoiding it—not reflecting a sweet round dollop, but disappearing into a gaping, dark, hole.

         Aether checked it for elemental energy, and that same something was coming off of it, beating, like a pulse. If it was an element, it was one Aether had never seen before. That was extremely rare. Generally, all elemental energy across all worlds was the same. Its manifestation and classification differed from planet to planet, but all of it had the mark of a common ancestor. Aether’s core was made from that original, prime elemental energy, and it gave him the ability to manipulate elements in any world. Usually. When it wasn’t all sealed away.

         But the elemental energy from this slime did not have that mark. It didn’t look like anything Aether had seen before. And he knew, even if his core was not sealed, he wouldn’t be able to manipulate it. What exactly could have made this?

         Aether retrieved a small vial from his bag and carefully, without touching it, scooped some of the goo into it. It resisted separation from the main body, stretching out like elastic. Aether cut the thin strand with a sharp rock.

         “Do you really wanna take that with us?” asked Paimon, eyeing the vial with visible disgust. “Paimon doesn’t think it’ll taste very good.”

         Aether rolled his eyes. “I keep other things besides snacks in here, Paimon.”

         “What’s the point of that?”

         A thumping noise from above them—footsteps. Aether quickly dropped the vial and the lantern into his bag and pulled Paimon up against the side of the riverbed.

         The light came first, something like an open flame, mottling against the cave walls. Its source moved, one set of footsteps, trailing along the side of the empty riverbed. One set of footsteps, but two voices, hissing low and hushed.

         “Why are we looking for intruders? If there were any, they probably got themselves squished in that rockslide,” trilled a high, hoarse voice—the Bird-Mask. That explained the lack of footsteps

         “We don’t question the Princess’s orders,” said a lower voice, stern.

         “Oh sure, like the Princess is wasting her time on useless xxxxxx like us. She’s not here, dumbass! That lector is the one makin’ us run around like scarab beetles!”

         “The lectors’ word is the Princess’s word.”

         “Don’t tell me you actually believe that xxxxxxx horseshit! What are you, a xxxxxx or something? Ugh, why does processing xxxxx blood have to be so gross. Look at this stuff! It’s all over the place! It’s even on my shoes! Nasty!”

         “We’re almost done. Just finish the job and stop complaining.”

         “Why? Complaining is fun. And there’s nothing else to do around here anyway. What do you suggest I do? Stand around and glare at people like you do? Honestly, I…” The Bird-Mask’s voice trailed off as the pair walked/floated further away, until it became only a chicken squawk in the distance.

         Aether’s mind was reeling from the new information. Bird-Mask mentioned a Princess. They had called Aether “Princess” the night before, too. She was clearly some royal that Bird-Mask and co. followed, but it didn’t sound like she was personally directing whatever it was that was going on here. Maybe she wasn’t seen often, and her subjects only knew her by a vague description. That might explain why the Bird-Mask mistook Aether for her.

         And what was going on here? Something to do with blood? From the way the Bird-Mask talked about it, it seemed like the goo was a product, or maybe a by-product, of whatever they were doing.

         But most importantly, they knew that Aether and Paimon were here, and they weren’t happy about it. With any luck, Bird-Mask and their companion would assume that they had been obliterated by the cave-in, or maybe trapped on the other side of the debris. Regardless, they should try to keep this visit stealthy and short. When the fiery light faded, Aether pulled the lantern from his bag and wordlessly handed it to Paimon, and they continued forwards.

 

         “Well, that sure does explain why the river’s blocked,” said Paimon, as both her and Aether stood staring up at the towering pile of goo. The blobs had been getting thicker, larger, as they walked in the dried riverbed, and now it was to the point that the way ahead was utterly impassable, completely jellified. It was colder, too. Aether expected a change in temperature from their descent into the earth, but this was something else. It was the type of cold that made the skin tighten around the bones—an aching, cowering kind of chill. It gave Aether goosebumps, with no elemental energy to keep himself warm.

         “Yeah,” he said, deep in thought. He was getting the sense that this whole thing was bigger than he had originially imagined, and he was no longer confident that he could handle it in his current state. Still, in for a penny.

         “So….what now?” asked Paimon. “Paimon’s worried about what those guys said back there. Do you think…somebody could be making this stuff on purpose?” She reached out with her pointer finger, like she meant to touch the wall of goo in front of them, but then thought better of it and placed her arm back down by her side.

         “I think that’s likely,” said Aether.

         “So that means, if we wanna help save Springvale, we gotta stop whoever is doing this.”

         “Yeah, probably.”

         “So we’re gonna kick some bad guys’ butts?” Paimon’s eyes were lit up, and she was forgetting to be quiet again. “This really is like a real adventure!”

         Aether snorted a laugh. “I’m not making any promises about kicking butts.”

         “Aww, but you gotta!” squeaked Paimon. “You’re a really good fighter, like wham! Pow!” She punched the air as she made the sound effects, to demonstrate. “Ultimate flying super kick! Woooaaahhh!” The force of her ultimate flying super kick sent her off balance, and she spun wildly in the air. Aether watched as Paimon flapped her arms, struggling to stop her momentum. Once she was finally upright again, she held one hand to her mouth, and the other to her stomach. “Well, you get the idea. Ugh, Paimon should not have had six fried eggs this morning.”

         Aether smiled. He couldn’t help himself. They were trapped underground, presumably surrounded by unknown enemies, and Paimon seemed genuinely nothing but thrilled. He really should be upset, remind her to stay quiet, but her confidence and carefree nature were somewhat contagious, and something about her put Aether at ease.

         He backed away from the jelly wall, and stepped around piles of goo, searching the wall of the riverbed until he found what he was looking for.

         “Here, we can get up, it’s less…” Aether suddenly blanked on the next word. He was sure he had it a second ago.

         Paimon floated over to where he was, and cocked her head at the wall. “Goo-covered?” she offered.

         Aether shook his head. The description really wasn’t that important. He could just climb up the wall and keep going. But he knew he knew this word, and it was bugging the hell out of him for some reason. “It’s like…if something is more up than sideways?”

         Paimon squinted at him. “Xxxxxxx?”

         “I don’t think so….” He was sure he would recognize it if he heard it.

         The both of them stood there for a longer than they should have, wracking their brains, until suddenly, Paimon’s eyes lit up. “Oh!” she said. “Steep!”

         “Yes! That’s it! Thanks, Lumi--!”

         Aether’s mouth stayed open on the final syllable as he struggled to process what he had just said. Guilt twisted his stomach, and all of a sudden, all he wanted to do was bury his head in a pile of goo and suffocate.

         “I mean, thank you, Paimon,” he mumbled, and started climbing up the side of the riverbed. “Uh, you’re welcome…” Paimon said, confused, but picking up on his awkwardness.

She hesitated a moment, started “Who’s–” but then cut herself off, unsure. She quieted, and settled on silently floating on up right behind him as he scaled the not-as-steep walls of the riverbed. Right. He forgot she could just do that.

         Stupid. How could he mistake a person he had only met a week and a half ago for his constant, immortal companion? It was just situational, Aether thought. Normally, it would be him and Lumine doing something like this, and that type of conversation was just one he had with his sister often. Lumine and Paimon weren’t even really that similar! Polar opposites, in fact. It could’ve happened with anyone.

         That didn’t lift the weight of the guilt, though. And it wasn’t helping that Aether was here, on some side mission, instead of looking for his sister. Lumine was probably looking for him. As long as both of them were alive, she wouldn’t stop looking for anything.

        He reached the top of the bed with little issue, and he and Paimon  walked further into the cave, past the blockage of goo.

I promise I haven’t forgotten , Aether thought. Just a little longer .

         He closed his eyes as he promised, for effect. And just at that moment, Aether stepped onto a loose rock that gave way to a deep crevice.

         “Watch out!” Paimon called, but by the time she finished, Aether had already slipped, fallen on his behind, and begun tumbling into the hole.

        

         All in all, the damage wasn’t too bad. A few scrapes and several large bruises. Aether thought the back of his head might be bleeding a bit. But the good news was, he wasn’t wedged in some tiny crack in the cave. When he came tumbling out the other side, coughing and spluttering, it was into another cavernous area.

         Paimon had been holding the lantern, so Aether couldn’t tell exactly how cavernous it was, but there was room enough to stand and put his arms out. This far in, it was completely dark. He couldn’t even see his hand in front of his face.

         “Aether!!” cried a voice, panicked. It echoed through the hole and the syllables came out in bits and pieces.

         Now wasn’t exactly an excellent time to yell, but there wasn’t really any better option. “I’m okay!” he called. “It’s alright! Come down!”

         He just needed to see exactly where he was, and if there was a good way to get back up. Paimon could easily fly through the hole without hurting herself, especially with the light from the lantern.

         He put two fingers to the back of his head. Yep. Definitely bleeding.

         A faint light started to bounce its way through the crevice, and as Aether moved a bit to prepare for Paimon’s emergence, his elbow hit something abnormally square and pillar-like. He ran a hand against it, and felt a soft grain.

         “Phew,” said Paimon, her worried expression aglow with lantern light. “That was scary! Paimon thought you were gonna get stuck and stretch out like a noodle!”

         An active, food-themed imagination as always. Aether gave her a half-hearted smile, but then politely took the lantern from her and turned back around to get a sense of their surroundings. It seemed the pillar he bumped into was actually that—a tall, solid piece of wood that made up the left side of a support frame. It looked newer than Aether would have expected, given the fact that the villagers didn’t seem to make use of this area very much. In fact, now that he could see properly, the walls of the cave looked strange as well—not carved out by water, like the previous section was, but…dug out. Or maybe blasted open. Rather recently.

         Aether shone the lantern back up the hole he had fallen through, and sighed. It didn’t look like he would be able to climb back up the same way he had fallen. The edges were too jagged in some areas, and too steep in others. But there was a path leading away from the hole. Beyond the first support frame was another support frame, and presumably, there was another beyond that. The man-made alterations to this part of the cave were also a good sign that an exit was within reach. As long as he didn’t go stumbling through any more cracks, or starting any more cave-ins. Less likely now, with the support structure. Aether cautiously started down the new path.

         “Hey, wait a minute,” said Paimon, so he stopped, and she rushed up behind him. Like, directly behind him. He kept turning to face her, but she just moved with the swivel of his head. Eventually, she placed her hands on either side of his ears to stop the movement. “Stay still!” she said.

         Aether was confused, but he did as asked.

         “You’re bleeding,” said Paimon. “It’s kinda bad, we should—” she grabbed at his braid, and the second Aether felt the weight lift, he whipped around and backed away from her.

         Paimon floated there, her hands in front of her, kind of stunned. “Sorry,” she said. “Did it hurt?”

         “No,” Aether answered immediately. “It was—”

         But he didn’t actually have an answer for her. He was a bit stunned himself. It was just a reaction, with no real thought behind it. He was gripping the back of his head. Not hard, but his hand was stiff, caging the wound under his fingers. “I don’t know why I did that.”

         “Okay, well…” Paimon trailed off. Her hands moved out and back, like she was debating whether or not to try and check his head again, and then her arms fell to the side. “Paimon guesses….keep pressure on it? To stop the bleeding.”

         Aether nodded, and dutifully pressed his hand against the wound. Then, awkwardly, they continued forwards.

         The carved-out tunnel was more even than the earlier part of the cave, and easier to traverse. Aether had lost the Bird-Mask’s red elemental trace, but replacing it were dozens of multicolored trails, all through the tunnel. This confirmed two things for Aether: One, that there was indeed another exit, and two, that he and Paimon were largely outnumbered. It could be that the traces came from some object, perhaps some elemental ore being mined down here, but given the frequency, pattern, and variety of the elemental traces, Aether was more inclined to think they belonged to people.

         There was also still that strange, pulsing energy. Unlike where they were before, this tunnel was completely clear of any goo, but now that Aether knew what to look for, he could see the echo of it, throbbing in a line down the length of the space.

         As they moved along, Aether noticed, on the ground and the walls, a faint purplish light. He turned the lantern off, which surprised Paimon, but now they could clearly see that there was another light source ahead, something artificial. Keeping the lantern off, Aether and Paimon crept forwards until they reached a point where the tunnel opened into an enormous space, cathedral-like, and they found where the purple light was coming from.

         Above them, sitting high on a plateau, was a large glass tank, filled with purple-red liquid. In its midst, a glowing crystal was forming around a string, and something about it made the hair on Aether’s neck stand on end. It was hard to tell from this angle, but if he squinted, Aether could see the thin trickle of inflow from the mouth of a metal pipe.

Around the plateau and out towards the walls of the cave, someone had built a complicated network of wooden scaffolding. It sprawled in all directions, and several pulley systems scattered about allowed for traversal between levels. Sound bounced off every surface, too muddled for Aether to get an idea of its source. Here and there, something would come through a bit clearer – the creak of poorly lubricated metal, the rumble of wheels on a track, the constant drone of tumbling rock.

         “What is tha—” Paimon started, but Aether swiftly covered her mouth when he saw a large black muzzle appear over the side of the scaffolding, followed by two yellow eyes, and a wild, coarse mane.

         Paimon and Aether stayed extremely still as the wolf sniffed the air. They were a good distance away, far below the scaffolding, but it was hard to tell if that was enough to hide from the wolf’s sensitive nose. What was it doing in here anyways? The rest of the place was so clearly made and upkept by people. Aether had assumed these wolves were wild when he encountered them in the forest. Was it possible there were domesticated ones? Was it possible the wolves in the forest were not wild at all? He remembered the way their ears perked up, and the suddenness with which they left, almost as if they had received some sort of command.

         That was bad news for him and Paimon. A guard dog was significantly harder to outsmart.

         The wolf was still sniffing, and it was making its way closer. If things continued like this, they would definitely be found out. As quietly as he could, Aether grabbed a loose rock from the ground, and hurled it far away, hitting the scaffolding on the opposite side of the cavern. He saw the wolf’s ears perk up, and then its muzzle turned and disappeared.

         Beside him, a soft sigh of relief from Paimon. Then, she turned to Aether and mouthed “What is that?” and she maybe should have been conscientious of the fact that lips in a new language were hard to read, but Aether deduced her meaning anyways. It helped that she had already blurted out eighty percent of the message.

         But Aether didn’t know quite how to answer her. What was it that the Bird-Mask was going on about? Something to do with blood? It was clear that something here was causing the crisis in Springvale, but without an understanding of the full process, there was little Aether could do. He scanned the area again, and saw, in the corner of the cavern, a large pile of goo. On the level just above it, more goo, hanging over the edge. Gravity leaned on it, and a heavy, viscous droplet formed, its attaching strand growing thinner and thinner until it landed in the pile at Aether’s level with an echoing squelch.

That was as good a lead as any, so Aether made his way over, swung a leg up on the nearby scaffolding, and started to climb. 

         Paimon buzzed about him, panicked, and Aether got the sense that if it wasn’t absolutely necessary for them to be quiet, she would be shouting things like “What are you doing?!” and “Get down from there!” But they did need to be quiet, and so she just waved her arms frantically to communicate a similar idea. He was about halfway up, a good 30 meters off the ground, when she finally stopped, instead choosing to cling to his back and stare obsessively down at the ground, like she was afraid to fall. She didn’t weigh much, so Aether didn’t really mind, but for a person who had been flying up to this point, the terror on Paimon’s face didn’t feel strictly necessary.

         As he looked towards the ground, his vision started to split and spin. Dizzy, Aether shook himself out of it, and in doing so put just a bit too much weight on his left leg, but he stopped himself from crying out. His pain tolerance was fairly high, but he’d been walking on his injured leg since the cave-in, and his recent fall hadn’t helped things. Something seemed to have reopened, and his pants leg was growing heavy and slick. Mortal healing was so difficult.

         When he was nearing the top, Aether hung down and away from the scaffolding with his arms outstretched, trying to check if there was anyone on the walkways around him. He didn’t see anyone, so he climbed a bit higher and peeked over the edge–only to quickly duck back down, as a pair of legs passed him by–dragging behind, a thick iron pickaxe that clunked against the wooden panels.

Whoops. Well that was close, the guy must’ve been just in his blind spot. Aether tentatively peeked up again, and watched the Hilichurlian person walk with purpose down a dark, narrow shaft.

He hauled himself up over the edge of the scaffolding and crouched low to the ground. On the surface, beneath his fingers, were tracks for a minecart, and in front of him, in the direction that the Hilichurl person had headed, Aether could see that the tunnel branched off in three distinct directions. If he listened well, he was sure he could hear the plinking of multiple pickaxes amid the cacophony of sound.

Paimon poked at his back, and Aether flinched from the sudden touch. He looked at her over his shoulder, hovering just above him, and followed her gaze.

They had found the riverbed again, delicately winding along the perimeter of the room. It was entirely filled with purple gunk, overflowing in some places, leaking over the edge into small piles like the one Aether had seen. At a slow tempo, the gunk oozed forward, a pulse running through it like a long digestive bowel. Paimon turned to him and pretended to dry heave.

Further upstream though, the goo looked just a bit thinner–a little more dilute, and in between there and where they stood was the interference Aether had been looking for–a man-made channel from the upper level met the riverbed right where the goo became dilute, and from it slid the thickest, darkest version of the substance Aether had seen yet. 

To get over there, they would need to climb up and over that central plateau, where all the noise was coming from. They had been lucky enough not to run into anyone just yet – this level seemed like it was mainly constructed for the transportation of whatever ore the people here were mining, and the miners seemed to be deep in the caves. But the level above was clearly aflutter with activity, judging by the numerous voices and footsteps Aether could make out.

Aether’s leg ached at the idea of climbing up another level, but it would be stupid to try and use the ramps or the pulley systems, so he grit his teeth and bore it. Paimon looked at him like she had something to say, as they made their way up to the top of the plateau, but it wasn’t the time or the place, and so she stayed silent.

About halfway there, Aether and Paimon had to quickly dodge a rain of sharp gravel pieces, so sudden and dense that it must have been a person who dumped them. For a minute, Aether worried that they’d been found, but the dumping continued in a lazy manner, as if someone were only taking out the trash. The gravel hissed and sizzled as it hit the cavern floor.

At the top, Aether quickly clambered up and behind a collection of large wooden crates, and hoped and prayed that no one would need them in the next few minutes. Paimon scrambled up beside him, and they both took a second to sit and breathe hard.

It smelled foul up here, the air thick and heavy with some sulfurous chemical. The main culprit seemed to be a hissing, steaming liquid, held in a metal vat with a funnel-shaped bottom. Aether had been right about the activity–the floor was crawling with Bird-Masks, Hilichurlians, and some other, similarly masked peoples that Aether had not seen before. Two tall, muscular people stood guard at the entrance to both the ramp and the pulley system, respectively, and on their backs they carried axes the size of dining tables. Aether shivered, glad he had opted for the stealth route.

The rest of the people, though, seemed very busy with various tasks, and as Aether watched them, the process was simple to put together. First, the ore collected from the mines was placed into some heavy-geared machine and crushed into pieces. Those pieces were then dumped into the funnel-shaped vat, where they were mixed with the foul-smelling liquid, maybe a solvent of some kind. The excess gravel was removed via a hatch on the bottom of the vat, and tossed over the edge of the plateau, while a series of pipes and valves led the resulting liquid out somewhere, another room, maybe, the same room from which the purple goo channel was coming from. And then, the liquid came back out from a different pipe, now bright red, into the glass container, where it began crystallization.

Aether took a look at the elemental traces from the central crystal, and the sight of it stung his eyes and made him dizzy. Once he recovered, he reached into his bag for the vial of goo he collected earlier. It was strange—he was sure he had gotten more than this. The vial was barely a quarter of the way full. Maybe the goo had some decay rate? But if it decayed so quickly, then how would it…?

         In any case, Aether’s suspicions were confirmed. The elemental footprint was exactly the same. Whatever this was, it had collected and hardened in the soil below Springvale, and it was incredibly potent.

         Here was where Lumine would stop him. Well, actually she would’ve stopped him a long time ago, but if she hadn’t managed to up until this point, it would definitely be now. Aether, for all intents and purposes, knew next to nothing about this operation. He had only gotten one side of a story that was undoubtedly nuanced, within the context of a world he knew nothing about. But Draff and the other Springvalians had sheltered him, fed him, washed his clothes—it was hard to believe that the crisis that threatened to ruin them was somehow justified, or even at the very least, that Springvale was an unavoidable casualty of a larger cause. And so Aether stealthily made his way out from behind the crates and toward the other side of the plateau.

         Or, he would have, if he had not been stopped by a tug on his scarf. Paimon gripped it with a small hand behind him, and for some reason the action filled Aether with an irrational rage. He had the sudden, uncharacteristic urge to rip it from her fingers, and to demand to know what exactly she thought she was doing. But before Aether could either react impulsively or calm himself down, Paimon put a finger to her lips and pointed at a Bird-Mask across the room, who had stopped in their menial task and was turned towards Aether and Paimon.

         They waited a bit, and the Bird-Mask eventually shrugged off whatever they had seen and got back to work. Aether tried to regain some control over his emotions. The hell was up with him? What a stupid, unnecessary way to almost blow your cover. What was he even mad about? Personal space?    

         The duo snuck their way over to the goo chute, but as a Hilichurlian and floating wolf passed, they had to quickly duck into a nearby passageway. It was a bit tight, and unsupported, but the pipe carrying the red liquid continued down it, and so Aether wondered if this was some incognito way into the other room. Aether had to crouch most of the way, and his head and leg ached for it. After a time, they came upon a fork in the tunnel. The pipe continued down the left path, and so Paimon started that way, but the faintest sound stopped Aether in his tracks. A whistling, and a rustle of leaves—an exit.

         He crept down the right path. Paimon gave him a confused look, but followed. The whistling grew louder, and the further they got from the purple glow of the main cavern, the clearer it became that light was shining through from somewhere else—not much, but enough to give the passage the slightest natural glow.

         Aether and Paimon stood side by side and stared up at the cave ceiling.

         “Well…” whispered Paimon. “That wasn’t really what Paimon was hoping for.”

         The hole letting in light and wind was small, only about the diameter of a large sunsettia. It was also a good twelve feet above them.

         Paimon let out a breathy sigh. “Guess we’ll have to look somewhere else,” she said, turning around to head back down the passageway.

         But Aether stood still, calculating something. Finally, he said “You could fit.”

         Paimon stopped and turned to him, looking a bit offended. “What?”

         “You could. And you could fly up there,”

         Paimon stared inquisitively at the hole, roughly measuring various parts of herself with her hands. After a moment, she said, “Eh, maybe. But that doesn’t matter. You definitely couldn’t fit through.”

         “I know,” Aether said. It came out a bit colder than he meant it.

         Paimon sucked in a breath to say something, but then stopped herself, as if some idea had suddenly struck her. She looked thoughtful, and a bit nervous, in the soft daylight twisting her fingers together.

         Her expression was making Aether feel guilty, so he tried to move things along. “You should get out while you can, Paimon,” he said. “I can handle the rest from here.”

         Oh, that didn’t help at all. Paimon was looking right at him now, still thoughtful, still nervous, but underneath upturned brows and a bitten lower lip was the flicker of something that made Aether feel like he was about to witness the true and righteous fury of his fairy companion.

         But if there was anything about to be unleashed, they didn’t have time for it. Faintly, but then louder, footsteps echoed down the cave, and soon, a low, strange voice. “…saw them go this way.”

         They were cornered. The only traversable path was back the way they came. Aether drew his sword and made wide, pleading eyes at Paimon. She looked conflicted, her gaze darting between Aether, the exit, and their quickly approaching enemies. Finally, she locked eyes with Aether, and her expression seemed to read something apologetic. Then, in a white flash, she flew through the hole and out of the cave.

         Aether felt a weight lift from his shoulders. And yet, there was something childish in him that felt…hurt. Which was stupid, really. He didn’t need Paimon to stay. He didn’t want Paimon to stay. He was the one who asked her to leave.

         Aether turned around just as a tall, regal person stepped into the light. Their face was covered with a mask—not a Bird-Mask, though—something else, almost skull-like. A gemstone set in their forehead gave off an eerie purple glow. They were suited in armor, not bulky but sleek and flowing, shimmering in violet night and stars. The only real protruding parts were the shoulder pieces, broad and curved on either side, and a large, spiked metal halo floating behind their head. Flanking the person on either side were two Bird-Masks, one in red and the other in a powder blue.

         Skull-Mask reached out a hand, and their armored fingers curled into a fierce, rigid talon. Aether blinked, and a large, ornamental book appeared right above the hand. Elemental energy tore from its pages, licked down its spine in bright purple arcs. The light illuminated the cave, glinted off Aether’s sword. He gripped it tighter.

         And then all at once, the cave was dark again, save the streak of sunlight from above. It shone down onto Aether, as his opponents were bathed in darkness. Skull-Mask’s book snapped shut, their tall figure growing shorter and shorter as they bowed, deeply and respectfully, to Aether.

Chapter 9: Captured

Summary:

Aether Callirhoe heart 2 heart

This was all getting very confusing. Aether couldn’t help but feel like there was some big misunderstanding going on. But Skull-Mask never spoke a word to him. And, despite their earlier reverence, they still directed the two Bird-Masks to disarm and restrain Aether, speaking in a language he couldn’t understand. Aether had put up a front earlier, pulling out his sword, pretending like he could take on the three attackers before him. In reality, he was dizzy from the earlier blow to his head, sapped of strength from ongoing blood loss, and had already been pushing himself too far. It took only a few moments for the Bird-Masks to knock his sword out of his feeble hands and grab him tight by the shoulders.

It was promising that he wasn’t attacked outright, he thought. He wasn’t sure how long it would take his new powerless body to recover from a serious wound. Just small scrapes and scratches were healing unbearably slowly. So, better to be a prisoner for a while and watch for a chance to escape. And maybe, if he was observant, he could find an opportunity to sabotage this mining operation. 

Skull-Mask and company led him back out of the passageway, back up onto the plateau, and surprisingly, into the room that Aether had originally been trying to get into–the one that the goo chute was coming out of. There were no Hillichurlian workers in here, only a few Bird-Mask overseers and some of those floating elemental wolves. The Bird-Masks straightened up as Skull-Mask walked by, lining up neatly like soldiers. But behind them, on a raised platform, was what looked like a massive pot still. Its main chamber was made from glass, filled with purple-red liquid, lining the bottom, that thick dark purple goo, like clots of congealed blood. This was the chamber that the chute was connected to, a series of valves controlling inflow and outflow. Above it was the lyne arm, and from there, the still looked like any other, tubes twisting through another large tank of water, continuing back out into the main cavern area, where it must lead back to the crystallization tank, Aether presumed.

So here was his target. Unfortunately the two Bird-Masks were leading him swiftly on to another side chamber. Just as they passed the threshold, the buzzing of working machinery started, and Aether could’ve sworn he heard someone cry out in pain.

The room Aether was brought to looked completely out of place compared to the rest of the makeshift facility. The cave walls were lined with bookshelves, and a desk that looked more decorative than functional sat atop deep purple tiling, a mosaic that depicted a golden eight-pointed star. A throne-like chair sat behind the desk, its back echoing the halo-like design on Skull-Masks armor. When they took a seat, the two circles lined up perfectly, concentric. Apparently Skull-Mask was very concerned about aesthetics.

The two Bird-Masks sat Aether down in the corner of this room, and apparently weren’t too worried about restraining him or anything. That was a decently sensible call. Right now, Aether felt like he couldn’t even stand up on his own, his head was so wobbly. There was no way he would be able to make any kind of escape attempt anytime in the near future. The Bird-Masks kept Aether’s sword and bag, saluted Skull-Mask, and silently exited the room.

After they left, Skull-Mask focused their attention solely on Aether, glowing purple eyes boring directly into his own. The sculpted metal of the mask showed not a hint of emotion–no reverence, no detestment, no fear–only the focused atmosphere indicated the barest scrapings of recognition.

Aether was not quite sure what had happened directly after he was sealed by the unknown god, and although he tried not to think about it, he was beginning to get an inkling of just how long he had been unconscious. Perhaps his body had been discovered during that time, later to be dumped in the grassy field he awoke in. Perhaps these masked people actually did know something about him. That was the worst case scenario. Recognition as something distinctly other often led to restrictive and/or dangerous situations much like the one Aether found himself in now. It was much easier, and safer, to mingle among the people. But there was also still a good chance this was all a big misunderstanding. It would still be better to lie low and play dumb for the moment.

Skull-Mask turned away from him then, reaching into their desk for a stack of stationary, an ink well, and a pen. Their glowing eyes relaxed, and the purple elemental energy that radiated from them dimmed to a dull crackle. They showed no more interest in Aether, but he was sure that if he were to attempt anything, that energy would spark right back to life. There was nothing to be done for the moment. So Aether closed his eyes and listened to the soft scratching of pen on paper.

His head and leg ached. Now that his body had finally come to rest, the pain was catching up to him, dizzying and sharp. In their travels, Lumine often chastised Aether for being too reckless, too clumsy, too willing to take the hit for someone else. Aether thought, as long as he could patch himself up afterwards, it was fine. The more important thing was to do what needed to be done. Now, he was beginning to see the wisdom in her words. He would have to learn to be more careful with himself.

Nevertheless, he would recover. It was only a matter of time, and Aether, as an immortal, had lots of practice being patient. It was better that Paimon was able to escape, unharmed and unhindered. Aether could do this.

He was just settling into a kind of meditation, tapping into what little healing power he could reach within himself, when he heard something. It was muffled at first, but as it cleared, Aether was able to distinguish the faint sound of someone crying. From very close by.

He popped an eye open to check on Skull-Mask, but the sound wasn’t coming from them. 

They had no visible reaction to it at all, in fact, which grew stranger the more that the crying grew crisper, clearer, louder. Man, Aether’s head really hurt. He squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed at his temples–and that must have roused Skull-Mask’s attention, because the pen scratching suddenly stopped, and so Aether reluctantly opened his eyes again to make sure he wasn’t about to be accosted for having a headache, and then…

Wherever Aether was, he was no longer in Skull-Mask’s makeshift office. He wasn’t anywhere recognizable really, other than vaguely…underwater? The reflective blue all around him and the slightest feeling of resistance when he moved seemed to indicate so. But he was certainly breathing just fine.

A few other odd sensations – or lack thereof. His headache was–blessedly–gone, his bones no longer felt weary, even the stinging pain from the cut on his calf had mysteriously vanished. And sure enough, when Aether looked down to check on the wound, the skin was new and unmarred.

But the crying from before had not stopped. It was not as all-encompassing now, feeling less like it was coming from the inside of Aether’s head, and more like it had an actual sonic direction. The sound was clear, and it was coming from a small figure just off in the distance.

“Hello?” Aether called, and the sniffling halted. Aether thought he could make out a head turning in his direction.

After a pause, the person replied. “Who are you?”

“My name is Aether,” Aether said.

“What do you want? How did you get in here?”

I–um…” Aether started, unsure of how to explain his predicament. The water around him started to ripple with a ferocity. “It was an accident?”

The ripples intensified–an angry, turbulent sea. “Wait! Um…” He had to pick his next words carefully here. “I don’t want anything from you. And I don’t know where I am. I was captured and injured, and was just resting to recover my energy. I’m sorry if I disturbed you.” Aether was surprised at how easily the phrases came to him. It was as if he was not translating at all.

The waters around him stilled.

“You were captured? So you’re not with them?”

“...If by ‘them’, you mean the masked people clogging up the water supply,” Aether shook his head, “I’m not.”

Silence followed. The waters spun, as if they were being stirred lightly with a spoon. Then, “One moment.”

The next time Aether blinked, a three-foot-tall, non-humanoid being stood in front of him–or, floated, rather. Swam? Aether still wasn’t too clear on the medium of this place. The being had a tail that split and fanned out at the end, and two wings, or maybe flipper-like limbs that spanned a bit longer than their total height. Their body was…difficult to perceive. It camouflaged into the background, rippling just as freely, and only slight differences in shade, light, and color let Aether carve out the edges of the being with his mind’s eye. At its head, however, was a distinct sphere of light, intelligent and expressive, darting this way and that like the pupil of an eye. It came off as rather bashful.

“Sorry,” said the being. “It’s my fault you’re here, I didn’t expect anyone to–I mean–” they sighed heavily. “Most people can’t connect with me in this way.”

“In what way?” asked Aether.

“Elementally. We are communicating through a telepathic link. Your body, mine, and the space before you–they are illusions conjured from our minds, made transferable through our mutual resonance with the Hydro element. Usually, this form of communication is accessible only by gods and other elemental beings, but a powerful vision-wielder like yourself is occasionally able to…tap into the same frequency, in a manner of speaking.”

Aether was not exactly sure what a ‘vision’ was, and he definitely didn’t wield one, but it didn’t seem like this situation was a ‘normal human’ thing to stumble upon. If this being came to their own in-world conclusions about how he was able to traverse this space, Aether was happy to play along.

“I…was captured by the same people you were. I was broadcasting a distress signal in the hopes that…” here, the light from the sphere dimmed just a bit, “in the hopes that someone I know might hear me, and come to my aid. It was not my intention to invade the mind of a stranger.” The being’s flippers folded in at their side, and their tail dipped a bit–a curtsey.

“My name is Callirhoe,” they said. “I hope you can forgive me for my initial discourteous behavior.”

“Ah, it’s alright,” said Aether, waving it off. “I understand.”

An awkward moment passed where neither of them seemed sure of what to say. Ugh, this was exactly where Paimon and her loud mouth would come in handy. Aether had never been that good at small-talk.

“So…you were captured?” he started, and immediately felt from the way the water winced away from him that he had touched on a sore spot.

Callirhoe’s glowing ‘eye’ flicked down and away from him, but after a moment, they answered. “Yes. I have wandered this world for quite some time now. I know of the Abyss Order, and of the havoc they have caused the people of Teyvat.” Callirhoe still did not meet Aether’s gaze, but the water felt like it had turned just a degree or two colder. “A…weakness…of mine was exploited. A bad habit. I will not let it happen again.”

“I see…” said Aether, then a thought struck him, “Hold on, are you being held here in this cave? Where are you?”

Callirhoe nodded. “In the boiling chamber of the large glass still.”

“ Inside the–” Aether remembered, distinctly, the cry of pain that had sounded when its motors engaged. “Are you…are you hurt? Do you need help?”

Callirhoe got very quiet. Then, they said, “The machine is making use of my innate purification properties to separate out a toxic substance from a desired distillate. The process is…uncomfortable. I was not made to be used in this way.”

So that was a yes. Well, destroying that thing would be two birds with one stone, then. Aether would make sure to factor Callirhoe into his escape plans. Whatever the reason these masked people used to justify their whole operation, it could never overshadow the imprisonment and torture of a sentient being.

“What is that red liquid? What is it used for?” Aether asked.

“I do not know. It comes from something that has remained dormant in this soil for as long as I have known it. I sensed it a long time ago, and I knew as soon as I made contact with it that it was something of theirs–not of this world, of the void. But it seemed harmless then–an old dead artifact of a bygone era. I do not know how it was rediscovered after all these years, nor do I know its origin or purpose, but I can say this–the substance they have created here is alive, and potent in corruption. There is no telling what dangers it may spread across this world. Its production must be stopped at any cost.”

That seemed straightforward enough.

“Alright, it’s settled then,” said Aether, feeling determined, “All I need to do is break you out and bust up their machines? Consider it handled.”

The water seemed to swirl a bit. “...Forgive me, I do not mean to be rude…” Callirhoe started, “...but…what exactly could you …do?”

Aether blanched.

“Er–I only mean to say…ahem,” Callirhoe’s eye hurriedly focused on everything except Aether–which, in a metaphysical mindspace, the options were limited. “It’s my understanding that your position is…quite similar to mine. You are injured, yes?”

Aether looked down at himself, saw no injuries, and presented this evidence to Callirhoe.

“Not here,” they said, “Your physical self.”

Yeah, he figured the insta-heal was too good to be true. 

Water soothed his skin, flowed gently through his hair. “The entrance to this place is well-guarded, and its master is extraordinarily formidable,” said Callirhoe, softly. “The Abyss came prepared to subdue one of the Hydro Archon’s Oceanids. I have been severely weakened over the years, but I am still counted amongst her ladyship's most faithful. They have spared no man.”

Aether took in Callirhoe’s words and sighed a heavy sigh, letting all the worry and frustration he had built up until this moment out through his nostrils. He collapsed onto the ‘ground’, his knees tucked in, and let his head fall back loosely. Yes, what could he do? Him, at a frustrating fraction of his true power and strength. What could he do when a single fall rendered him useless? When he grew sick and felt hungry? When all his strings were cut and he fell limp like a wooden doll? He tried very hard not to think about his sister. 

He breathed.

“So what do we do?” he asked.

The water stilled, silent, as Callirhoe answered.

“I do not know.”

Aether sighed, troubled. He could wait out his own injuries, but Callirhoe was being

actively harmed, and all the while, more of that red liquid was crystallizing. Stars this fragile body was frustrating. Callirhoe was right. There really was nothing he could do.

“This person you know…” Aether said, carefully, “are they likely to hear your distress call?”

“...No,” said Callirhoe. “In truth, it was a vain attempt, perhaps…a futile gasp for air in the midst of a deep, swirling ocean–an instinct that your mind knows will not work, but your body cannot help but try…” they trailed off there, seemingly lost in thought. From that far-away place, they said, “It was many years ago I left Springvale, and the villagers no longer believe I exist. I travel alone now. No one will notice my absence.”

Aether nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said. Then, he gave a half-hearted chuckle, his feeble attempts to ward off thoughts of Lumine at last failing “If it helps at all, I don’t think anybody is coming for me either.”

The water stirred. “What an unfortunate characteristic to have in common.”

“Yes, it’s not ideal.”

“The path of a lone wanderer sounds so romantic. You think ‘oh, I will learn so much about myself and the meaning of independence’, and then–”

“Then you find yourself hundreds of feet underground, chained to a rock in some guy’s cave office.”

“Or something to that effect.”

They both stared at each other, then burst into a fit of giggles. Aether felt the water ripple in tune with Callirhoe’s laughter.

After things had settled down, Callirhoe spoke again. “Aether,” they said.

“Hm?”

“Would you mind if I asked you something?”

Aether straightened up a bit, his elbows on his knees. “Not at all.”

“...I ask this because…I do not often have the chance to speak with humans. And…when an end is in sight, one tends to reflect on their life’s choices and regrets. I have lived a very long life, and yet, it is because of that long life that I feel I lack this wisdom, something mortals seem to grasp so very easily.”

Aether nodded.

Callirhoe took a deep breath, and the tide flowed in. “Why do you love, when you know it will inevitably end in grief?”

Aether’s eyes softened, and he smiled sadly. Why, indeed? He had wondered the same thing about mortals many times himself. It was sad, Aether thought, that after gathering all of that courage, Callirhoe had asked the wrong person.

“It would seem to me,” he said, “that the Spring Fairy is no stranger to mortal love.”

“So you do know who I am.”

“He’s still waiting for you.”

Callirhoe sighed. “Of that, I am painfully aware." Her form seemed to shrink a bit, wide wings no longer as all-encompassing. In a small voice, she said, “Was it a mistake?”

“Caring for someone could never be–” Aether cut himself off, a sudden strange taste in his mouth “--a mistake.” 

Callirhoe studied him. “Perhaps we both have some things to make up for,” she said.

And then, very suddenly, Aether’s skin was burning, boiling, squeezing. He let out a cry of surprise at the sudden pain, and frantically searched for its source.

Callirhoe, beside him, was shivering violently, her wings and tail curled inwards and wrapped around each other, a protective self-cradle. Her eye met with Aether’s, and she spoke a single word.

“Go.”

And Aether was back in the office again, as if nothing had ever happened. The searing pain was gone, and his previous aches were back. Skull-Mask was at the desk, scribbling on some papers.

Outside, he heard the hum of machinery, and the bubbling of liquid.

 

Alright, that was enough. Injured or not, Aether was wrecking the piss out of this stupid, ugly facility. He grit his teeth and pushed himself up and out of the office in a single motion.

But he only made it as far as the threshold before his entire body went rigid, and his feet were lifted off the ground. He levitated there, jaw locked, and was spun around to face his captor. Skull-Mask sat at the desk with a hand half-heartedly raised, a thread of elemental energy coming from their finger and connecting to Aether. They hadn’t even stopped writing.

Skull-Mask looked up at him with their blank mask face, almost bored, just the slightest bit annoyed, like a parent with an ill-behaved child. They casually flicked their finger, and Aether was set back in his corner. The paralysis was lifted and Aether collapsed to the floor, heaving breaths and tingling all over. His muscles felt weak and uncertain, and they spasmed as Aether fought to regain control of his body.

Okay. So that wasn’t going to work. He would need to distract Skull-Mask, or get them out of the room or something. Think, Aether, think. If he could get at his sword, maybe he could take them head-on. But he definitely wouldn’t win. Maybe he could wait until Skull-Mask landed a fatal injury, and then pretend to be dead. He would probably come back after his body had healed itself. His core was sealed, but he was still an immortal. After they disposed of his body, Aether could sneak back in and cause havoc. But exactly how long would that take? How much time did Callirhoe have left?

Aether was still thinking through all this when something of a ruckus started in the main cavern. There was a split second where he heard the alert bark of a dog, and then the entire floor was quaking, a thunderous rumble echoing, loud, through the space. Aether reflexively covered his ears, as dust cascaded down from the ceiling. He watched the support frame at the threshold of Skull-Masks’ office sway.

The whole place was predictably thrown into chaos. Dogs barking, people screaming, etc. It sounded like the initial explosion had perhaps caused a few small landslides, and, through all the dust, Aether swore he caught a whiff of gunpowder from somewhere. A Bird-Mask appeared at Skull-Mask’s doorway, gesticulating wildly, a frantic stream of syllables spoken so fast that Aether was sure it was almost unintelligible despite the fact that he did not speak the language.

Through it all, Skull-Mask looked…not calm, but still. Quiet, in the way a snake might coil before striking. They ignored the Bird-Mask’s chattering and looked right at Aether, studying. Aether stared back, unsure. Then, there was another explosion, smaller this time, but still earth-shaking, ear-splitting. Skull-Mask whipped around, barked a few orders to Bird-Mask, and marched out the door.

Well, that was awfully convenient. What the hell was happening out there anyway? A chemical mishap? Callirhoe did say the stuff was dangerous. But either way, Aether didn’t particularly care to stay and find out. The number one obstacle to his and Callirhoe’s escape was now preoccupied with other, more explosive matters. 

Unfortunately, it seemed the orders Skull-Mask had given Bird-Mask were to stand guard over Aether. He was getting pretty sick of all this special attention. But Bird-Mask didn’t seem to be too fond of their orders either. They were clearly nervous, constantly turning over their shoulder, looking back to where all the action was happening. Aether didn’t blame them. The Masks may have strengthened the structure of this section of caverns, but that didn’t mean a good shake or two couldn’t knock it all over. If whatever was happening kept happening, they would all be in danger. Nevertheless, Bird-Mask apparently took mask-based hierarchy very seriously, and so they stayed put despite their obvious nerves.

He had to move fast. He had to succeed on this first escape attempt, while his guard’s attention was still divided. As long as he had enough time to reach the still in the other room, it would be worth it.

Aether shifted slightly, and every time Bird-Mask turned away, he inched just a bit closer to the bookshelves. Slowly–he couldn’t afford to rouse suspicion yet, and then…there. His hand wrapped around the spine of a thick book. Maybe a dictionary or something. It didn’t matter, as long as it was heavy.

And then, Aether gasped audibly, pointed out the door, and put on his best ‘oh shit this is really a big deal’ face. “Behind you!” he shouted.

Bird-Mask whipped around, too on edge to realize the obvious trick, and Aether pulled his dictionary out from the shelf.

He stopped just short of throwing it, however, because just at that moment, a large rock fell from the sky, hit Bird-Mask square on the head, and knocked them to the ground, unconscious.

Emerging from the top of the doorway, clocking in at 20 lbs, 4 oz, was a small, white fairy.

“Phew,” said Paimon, panting. “Don’t make Paimon lift something that heavy EVER again.”

Chapter 10: All's Well that Ends Well

Summary:

this one's for the klee fans out there

Aether blinked, looked at Paimon, looked at the Bird-Mask on the ground, and then looked back to Paimon.

Her shrill voice made him jump. “Well c’mon! Let’s go xxxxbones! Paimon didn’t do all this for nothing.” 

All this. A rescue mission. For him.

‘Caring for someone could never be a mistake’

Aether jumped up to his feet, wobbled slightly, his knees still weak from being electrocuted.

“Whoa, be careful Aether, you look kinda xxxx, are you alri–oomph!”

Aether held Paimon tight against his chest, semi-collapsing on her, burying her face in his scarf.

Paimon pushed him away a bit and made a face. “Ugh, you’re too heavy! Get off!” She squirmed and kicked, so Aether released her, but then his knees gave out and he almost fell right on top of the Bird-Mask. “Whoa!” Paimon said, flying underneath his armpit to give him support. “Okay well…you can hang on a little…”

Some pieces were being put together in Aether’s head. “Paimon,” he said. “That big sound earlier?”

Paimon grinned. “Hehe yep, that was allllll Paimon.” From seemingly nowhere, she produced a small, strange object. It was spherical, maybe made of metal? And it was designed to look like a small round animal poking its head out of some kind of sack. It looked like a child’s toy. Aether couldn’t fathom what it would be used for. 

Paimon noticed his confusion, and a mischievous light glistened in her eye. With all her strength (which was decidedly, not much), she hurled the object towards the main cavern, still full of people trying to stabilize the framing and searching for the explosion’s root cause. It bounced a couple of times–pretty high, actually–until it rounded the corner completely and Aether could no longer see it.

“Cover your ears,” Paimon said.

Seconds later, another explosion shook the caves, just the same as before. Aether tried to steady himself and Paimon against the door frame, the shock traveling up his knees and knocking his bones together. Chaos bloomed in the other section, though Aether couldn’t see in what way exactly. It sounded quite like a lot of people got blown up.

“Paimon,” Aether said, carefully, “Where did you get that?”

“Uhhh, Draff found them! You want some? Paimon has more,” Paimon said, and two more of the explosives appeared in each of her hands. She offered them to Aether as if they were some kind of delicious snack.

Explosives were such a stupid weapon to use in their situation. He wasn’t opposed to violence at this point, with the circumstances being what they were, but if they made one wrong move, they would all be buried alive. Aether went to express this. “No, I don’t ‘want some’, are you wrong in the he–” And in that moment, a Hilichurl person rounded the corner from the main room. They stopped suddenly, and stared at Aether and Paimon. Aether and Paimon stared back. Then the Hilichurl started pointing and shouting, and a whole squadron of people armed with all types of weapons came rushing in.

Not missing a beat, Aether grabbed the two explosives from Paimon’s hands and chucked them at the oncoming force. 

The room shook so bad that Aether was almost knocked to the ground again, but Paimon, free-floating and unaffected by terrestrial instability, grabbed his hand and pulled him forward, towards some tunnel he had never been in before. Despite the ringing in his ears, Aether had just enough sense left to stop, turning towards the giant still on the opposite side of the room. He detached himself from Paimon and started scrambling in its direction.

“Where are you going?!” Paimon shouted.

Out of breath, Aether reached the still and placed his hand on the glass of the boiling chamber. Somewhere, in the mix of all that thick, purplish fluid, there was a person who needed his help. He couldn’t spot a figure, either similar to the fairy-like form or otherwise, but Callirhoe was definitely in here. In the middle of the chamber was a faint and fading splotch of pure blue elemental energy.

Aether reached out an arm behind him. “Paimon! My sword!” he called.

Paimon blinked at him. “Paimon thought you had it.”

“Why would I have it?”

“Paimon doesn’t know. It’s your sword.”

Aether grunted in frustration, “Fine, I’ll just–” he stopped short, not entirely sure what to do. The glass was too thick to break with bare hands, and he couldn’t risk injuring Callirhoe by using one of Paimon’s mystery bombs. Aether’s head was pounding, he could feel his adrenal glands working overtime just to grant him enough strength to move his beaten body. There had to be something he could do.

Out of the corner of his eye, Aether spotted a Hilichurl person that must have gotten their feet back under them fairly quickly after the explosion, because they were armed with a crossbow, arrow aimed, flaming, about to head straight for Aether.

He ducked just in time. The arrow pierced the chamber behind him and stuck in the glass, cracks spider-webbing out from the impact. Aether examined it, then turned towards the Hilichurl person, who was looking extremely panicked at having damaged the still. Then, he gripped the arrow with both hands and pulled.

It came loose with a pop , and a small stream of liquid jetted out the crack. And then all at once, the cracked glass gave out, and the contents poured out and onto the ground. Aether tried to dodge, remembering the chemical burns, but he wasn’t quite fast enough in his current state, and his entire left leg was drenched in foul-smelling liquid. He winced, anticipating the sting, but none came. It felt just as cool and gentle as fresh spring water.

And then Aether watched as the growing pool of liquid diverted from gravity’s outlined path, rose up in a wave above his head, shot forwards and splashed down on his enemies. The strange neutralizing benevolence shown towards Aether was not extended to the Masks. Red rained down, hard, hissing as it hit its target, cloth and metal and skin corroding at an alarming rate. Wooden and elemental shields alike provided no cover from the storm.

There was a tug on Aether’s scarf. Paimon had caught up to him. “Paimon doesn’t really understand what just happened, but it’s time! To! Go! Now!” she said, emphasizing each word with another pull. Aether shook his thoughts away and went with her. She was right, after all. The explosions from the bombs earlier seemed to have set off some sort of chain collapse situation, and they probably didn’t have long before the entire cave system was buried under rubble. Huge chunks of rock detached from the ceiling and crumbled, snapping support frames and blocking off exits. Soon, there would be no way out at all.

Paimon led Aether down a tunnel, different from any of the ones they had taken before, but she seemed to know where she was going. Every bit of Aether ached and stung, and he could barely keep pace with the fairy. Twice, he had to stop to cough cave dust out of his lungs, and twice, he and Paimon were almost squished to death by falling boulders, but finally, they emerged in an area that was familiar to Aether. They seemed to have looped back around at some point, and were now standing in the place that Aether and Paimon had separated before, the sunlight shining in from above.

Aether realized where they were quickly, and anxiety struck him through the heart. Had she forgotten?

“Paimon,” he said. “I can’t climb up, and I’m not small enough to fit through–”

“HEAVE, HO!” shouted voices from above. Aether heard people, several people, struggling with something, then came the low growl of rock against rock, and the patch of dim sunlight grew brighter and wider.

Aether looked up to see several familiar faces.

“They’re here!” shouted Draff. “Lower the ropes!”

And Paimon had to pull him out of the way yet again, as Aether was stunned speechless at the sight of a netted rope ladder cascading down the side of the opening. It hit the floor with a thunk and kicked up a whole bunch more dust. 

Draff’s face disappeared from view, but Aether heard him ask, to someone else on the surface, “Secure?”, and a thumbs-up appeared in the opening, silhouetted in the sunlight.

Paimon took the cue and held on fast to the rope ladder, motioning for Aether to do the same. It struck him, as the villagers of Springvale worked in tandem to pull them up, that Paimon could have easily flown up herself, but it really didn’t seem like the time to bring something like that up.

“Xxx your back into it!”

“Quickly, quickly!”

“Ah! It’s xxxxxxx my hands!”

“No xxxx meat for xxxxxxx lets go!”

The shouts of the villagers were fuzzy in Aether’s ears. He gripped the rope bridge so hard that his fingernails dug into his skin, but he only felt the pressure of it, and not the pain. Paimon just said something to him. Was it a question? Aether didn’t have the brain capacity to translate any more.

He watched as the cave floor crept further and further away, 5 meters, then 10, then 15, and out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a tall figure clouded in darkness, with broad, sharp shoulders and a spiked halo. Then, in a dim purple flash, the figure disappeared.

Several hands reached out to grab him then–by the scarf, the shirt, the armpits–and they hauled him over the edge of the opening, into full daylight. The brightness stung Aether’s eyes. Someone shouted something. He was vaguely aware of being carried somewhere. And then a loud boom resounded throughout the valley.

 

The next time Aether opened his eyes, he was back in bed at Draff’s house, and a cup of coffee that had long gone cool was sitting on the table at his bedside.

He stirred, stretched, then stopped. A bandage on his torso restricted his movement, adhesive pinching the skin underneath. Carefully, Aether maneuvered himself into an upright position and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

Next to the coffee was a vase full of calla lilies and several pieces of paper with various words scrawled on them. Aether had to study them for a while before he was able to loosely grasp the contents of each letter, which contained, as far as he could tell, words of gratitude and various attempts at spelling his name. The phonemes seemed to be difficult for people to get across in written Mondstadtian. There was one letter, in a young child’s formulaic handwriting, that tried to spell his name five different ways. All of the attempts were eventually scribbled over, and the letter was addressed simply to what Aether translated as “The Traveler”. Yeah. That worked.

The door to the room creaked open, and a familiar face peeked through.

“Oh!” said Brook, “You’re up! Sorry, do you need a moment?”

Aether immediately shook his head, then realized that his entire torso was bare except for a few bandages. He awkwardly wrapped a blanket around his shoulders.

Brook stepped fully into the room and smiled at him. “It’s good to see you awake,” she said.

“How long was I sleeping?”

“All of yesterday and most of today. You’re just in time for dinner, if you’re hungry.”

Involuntarily, Aether’s mouth started to water. “Yes, please,” he said.

A few minutes later, Brook came back with a hot bowl of meat stew and a large glass of water. It burned the roof of his mouth to eat it, but Aether couldn’t help himself. When was the last time he ate? Three days ago? He wasn’t as hungry as he had been when he first woke up alone in the fields of Mondstadt, but he was pretty sure that for most people, that was a long time to go without eating.

Brook cleared the old coffee next to him and started to head back out the door, but at the threshold, she stopped. “By the way,” she said, and Aether looked up, his face still deep in the bowl of stew. “If you’re feeling up to it, after you’re done eating,” here, a joyful glint lit up her eyes, “you should check outside.”

He heard it just before he opened the door–the softest pitter-patter of rain. 

 All around the village, people were celebrating in their own ways. Children ran and jumped hard into puddles, adults chatted and laughed with each other, holding out big buckets to catch the rainfall. There was even someone singing and playing a small harp under a tree, a song to the water and the sky and the clouds. Everyone was somewhere in between damp and soaking, and nobody seemed much to mind.

Aether stepped out from underneath the overhang of Draff’s front door, and held out a hand to catch falling droplets. The air was clear and warm, and all around, it smelled sweet, as if the village grounds were blossoming with hundreds of invisible flowers. Droplets peppered Aether’s arms and shoulders and head, and for a moment it felt like the rain came down with a bit more intensity, but only in the spot where he was standing, as if he had his own personal rain cloud.

“Thank you, ” whispered someone to his left, so softly that he only barely heard it, but when he turned, there was no one there.

“Mr. Aether!” called another voice, further away. A young child (a boy he had met before, but the name, Aether had forgotten. Something with a P?) waved to him from across the way. Behind the boy was another child, staring at Aether blatantly, their jaw literally hanging open. 

Aether smiled and waved back, and before he knew it, the boy and the wide-eyed child were rushing him, jumping up and down.

“Mr. Aether, can we see your vision?” asked the boy excitedly.

Aether cocked his head. Callirhoe had asserted something similar. They weren’t talking about his ability to see elemental traces, were they? How would he show them that? And how would they even know about it in the first place?
“See, I told you he didn’t have one,” said the wide-eyed child.

“But all the cool xxxxxx have one! Plus, I heard he went head to head with the leader of the xxxxx xxxxx and won ! So how could you do that without a vision?”

“My big brother is in the xxxxxx of xxxxxxxx. He doesn’t have a vision, and he catches bad guys all the time!”

“Sure, but not the leader of the xxxxxx xxxxx,” said the boy, rolling his eyes.

“Does too!”

“Nuh-uh!”

Aether was becoming increasingly confused about the necessity of his presence in this conversation. “Excuse me,” he said, and both kids looked up at him. “Do you know where my friend is?” Paimon was way better at navigating these kinds of situations.

“You mean the little white fairy girl?” asked the boy, and Aether nodded.

“She went out with Diona’s dad and all the hunters, I saw them leaving,” said the wide-eyed kid. “I don’t think they’re back yet.”

“Hey, we gotta show him the spring!”

“Oh, yeah, yeah! The spring!” And simultaneously, both of Aether’s hands were grabbed and he was being pulled towards the center of town.

“HEY! Careful! He’s still recovering!” called a voice from afar, and Aether spotted Brook underneath a pitched up tent, ladling out bowls of steaming stew from a large pot over coals. Her gaze was fierce, and she gripped the ladle like a bludgeon.

Immediately, the pressure on Aether’s wrists relaxed, and he was able to stand up straight again. “Oops! Sorry,” said the boy.

“It’s alright,” said Aether, although he was honestly still stuck on Paimon going out with the hunters. Did they need someone to act as small and vulnerable-looking bait?

Nevertheless, he followed the three children to the spring at the center of town. Even from afar he could see the difference that the rain had already made, the surrounding vegetation now spry and full. Right near the edge, a few calla lilies bloomed, and Aether wondered if the ones by his bedside were from here.

“Old Finch! You’re all wet!” called the wide-eyed child, and indeed the old man was in his usual spot, uncovered despite the rain. His hunched-over figure turned to look at them as they approached.

“Haha, I guess I am!” said Old Finch with a smile. “And so are you!”

“Yeah but you’re old, and old people get sick and die. You should go inside.”

Old Finch chuckled again. “Maybe you’re right,” he said, and then he looked up towards the sky, letting the raindrops fall on his face. “I suppose I was just happy to see the rain again.”

“Mr. Aether, look here, see?! Look how much the water came back!” said the boy–Pepe, that was it–tugging once again on Aether’s wrist and pointing. Aether’s gaze followed Pepe’s finger, and he failed to stifle a small gasp.

The spring was half full of clear, sparkling water–a serious improvement from the last time he had seen it, and certainly enough to get excited about, but what Aether noticed was something he was sure the other people with him couldn’t detect.

From the center of the spring came the bright blue shine of pure elemental energy, its essence leaking into the spring water, merging with the rain. It didn’t present in a particular shape, but it was so clearly alive, thrumming, the beating heart of the spring.

So she managed to escape after Aether burst that tank open. That was good. But for now, at least, she still kept herself hidden from the villagers. Aether looked over at Old Finch, his face still directed at the sky. The wide-eyed child had wandered over to Old Finch’s side and started to tug on his shirt.

“C’mon uncle,” they said. “Mom will yell at me soon if we don’t go inside,” but Old Finch seemed to be lost in his moment, and he didn’t say anything. All he did was remove his hat from his head and hug it tightly to his chest.

The wide-eyed child was beginning to get annoyed. “Come on!” they said, tugging on his elbow now. 

The scene caught Pepe’s attention. “Old Finch,” he said, letting go of Aether, “we have to go, it’s dinnertime and we still need to make a xxxxxxxx plate.”

Light returned to the old man’s eyes then. “Yes,” he said, nodding, “Yes, that’s right, now more than ever, I’d say…” His gaze lingered on the spring as Pepe moved to take his other hand, then quickly, Old Finch turned to Aether.

“I don’t know how you did it,” he said, “but thank you, from the bottom of my heart.”

Aether smiled and nodded politely, and he watched as the two children and the old man walked each other down the lane.

When they were a reasonable distance away, Aether turned back to the spring, and was not surprised to see the small blue fairy-like form, leaning on the edge, wings folded, eye-sphere focused on the backs of the retreating figures.

“What is it about humanity,” said Callirhoe, “that makes them so willing to waste their short lives waiting?”

Aether wiped at his face. The rain had grown heavier. “I don’t know,” he said, “But is it up to us to decide if their waiting is a waste?”

They watched in silence, until the three figures could no longer be seen through the fog. Callirhoe still seemed to be lost in thought, so Aether decided to move the conversation forward himself.

“So…” he said. “You did all this?” Gesturing vaguely to the spring and the sky.

The question snapped Callirhoe out of it. “I’ve done what I can,” she said. “I’m still very weak, and it will take a long time for the corruption to run itself out of this village’s waters. I will stay and provide cleansing until Springvale is able to function on its own again.”

“And then…?”

“I will leave here, and not come back.”

Aether nodded. “I see. And the villagers?”

“They will live their lives oblivious to my existence, as they should have all along.”

And perhaps Aether would have left it there, if the longing in Callirhoe’s voice had not been so obvious, if her gaze was not still fixed on a figure that was no longer there. It may not be his place to guide the short lives of strangers, but who was he if not a meddler?

“I know I’m just some guy who doesn’t know anything about this,” he said, thinking of the look in Old Finch’s eyes when he thanked him, “but from what I’ve seen, even just the knowledge of your existence might be more important to them than you think.”

To that, Callirhoe had nothing to say, and so they waited and felt the rain, until Aether was aware of her presence retreating back into the spring.

“Aether!!!” called a high, nasally voice that had Aether’s ears perking up the second he heard it. He looked around, and through the fog, could just barely see Paimon, waving both arms at him. “Look what we found!!” she said.

Aether picked himself up off the wet ground and met Paimon, Draff, Allan, and Jotun halfway. They were all drenched, muddy, and on the hunters’ hands, there were thick leather gloves coated slightly in polluted purple goop.

“Aether, look!” said Paimon again “Ta-da!” And when she gestured at Jotun, he could now see what she had been so excited about. Instead of his own hunting supplies, Jotun carried on his back a familiar sword and bag.

“We found them stuck in a big blob of gooey stuff,” said Paimon. “And we had to blow up a buncha rocks to get to them. Sorry if they’re kinda messed up.”

Jotun slung the items off his back and held them out to Aether, and yes, the blade was dinged and the bag was torn, and they were both slathered with a thin patina of gel-like goop, but being magical items, Aether assumed they held up much better than the other things down in the cave system.

Either way, he was delighted to see his stuff again. Despite their bedraggled state, Aether took them from Jotun carefully and held them close. “Thank you,” he said, meeting each one of the hunters’ gazes before settling distinctly on Paimon.

“Awww, it’s no big deal,” she said, tucking her arms behind her back. There was a hint of a blush on her cheeks and she seemed to be having some trouble holding Aether’s gaze.

“It’s really us who should be thanking you,” said Draff. “Who knew the xxxxx xxxxx had such a huge xxxxxxxxx going right underneath our feet. Couple more weeks of that and who knows what would’ve happened.”

And now it was Aether’s turn to be embarrassed. “I didn’t do all that much,” he said. Honestly, he had spent at least half of his time being captured. It was kind of humiliating.

“Now that’s a load of nonsense if I ever heard it! Quit playing humble, your fairy friend already told us everything.”

“Clean-up is gonna be such a pain,” remarked Jotun, “but at least it’s over now.”

“I’m glad we were able to help, at least at the end,” said Allan.

That reminded Aether of something. “Oh,” he said, “where did those….” he didn’t know the word, so he mimicked an explosion with his hands, “come from?”

Draff caught on quickly. “Oh, those. There’s a Knight of xxxxxxxxx that likes to hide them in stashes around these parts. They could be dangerous to people, so I always gather them up when I can.”

Aether squinted. “Why?”

Draff looked about to speak, then stopped himself, uncertain. “Mondstadt is the land of freedom, I guess.”

“Can we go inside already?” said Paimon. “Paimon’s glad about the rain too, but she still doesn’t wanna catch xxxxxxxxxxxx.”

And so Jotun and Allan went their separate ways, and Draff led Paimon and Aether back to his house. 

“There’s fresh towels in the closet, xxxxxxxx of Brook,” said Draff, “and I’m brewing up a pot of hot coffee now, if either of you are interested.”

“Thanks Draff! Oooh Paimon can’t wait to get dry and warm!” and then, despite the promise of towels, Paimon proceeded to shake the water off herself like a dog right next to Aether.

Aether let out a yelp of surprise and jumped away. When he looked back, he caught a

glimpse of the sly smile on Paimon’s face. Well, two could play at that game. Aether slung his dripping bag over his shoulder, so it landed square on top of Paimon’s head.

“Hey!” she said, flailing about. The soggy fabric had drooped so it covered almost all of Paimon’s face, and she looked for all the world like she had a magical snake-skin bag for a head.

Aether laughed and laughed, so hard his chest hurt (more than it did already), as Paimon tore the bag off and threw it to the floor.

“Bleh!” she said. “Rude! And after all Paimon did to get it back!”

He tried, but Aether couldn’t stop himself from laughing, tears forming in his eyes. Eventually, Paimon broke too, and they both ended up collapsing to the floor, caught up in a fit of giggles.

 

It was “recommended” that Aether stay in Springvale to recover for the next three weeks. His internal injuries were quite bad, and apparently he had something called a ‘concussion’. This “recommendation” was quite strongly enforced by Brook, who had found an ally in Paimon, who was unfortunately available to “look after” Aether most hours of the day. If Aether was honest about it though, he knew he needed the rest. It just made him anxious to sit in bed all day, when he should be out searching for Lumine. He had put off the task enough already. He tried to make good use of the time, practicing his spoken and written Mondstadtian, reading up on Teyvat’s history and studying maps. A particular bit of history caught his attention one afternoon, and he asked Paimon about it.

“Paimon, what’s this word here?”

“Huh? Oh, ‘Archon’. They’re the gods that rule over Teyvat.”

“Like spiritually or politically?”

Paimon shrugged, “It depends on the archon.”

“And they each control a specific elemental energy?”

“Yeah, that’s right. But regular people can control elemental energy sometimes too, if they have what’s called a ‘vision’.”

Perhaps it was one of these ‘archons’ that had attacked and separated Aether and his sister.

Many conversations from his time in Teyvat began to make sense as Aether studied. In his books, quietly, he searched for evidence of that burning city–the one that he and Lumine watched from atop that hill–but information seemed to be sorely lacking. The only historical event that came close to describing the events that Aether witnessed was the destruction of an entire nation by the heavens, but, according to the book, that had happened over 500 years ago. The sinking pit in Aether’s stomach grew deeper, and he didn’t dare to read any further.

Slowly, the three weeks passed, and Aether was finally allowed to make preparations to continue on his journey. Needless to say, he was supplied with no shortage of food.

“You make sure to take care of yourself, you hear?” said Brook, sternly wagging a finger at him. “I don’t want to hear about any more heroics from you.”

And an honestly unhealthy amount of coffee and alcohol from Draff.

“Don’t go drinkin’ it all in one go, that’s how you end up like me haha. Hey wait, how old are you?”

And it went on like that as Aether made his final rounds around Springvale–a poem from Myweiss, a bottle of ‘holy water’ from Hopkins, a flower from Pepe and a storybook from Old Finch–until all was prepared and all goodbyes were said.

All goodbyes, except for one.

Aether and Paimon sat together by the road that led out of Springvale, Paimon kicking her legs, and Aether absentmindedly playing with a stack of rocks. 

“So….” said Paimon, “you’re heading out now?”

“Guess so.”

“You’re really good at learning languages. Paimon doesn’t think you’ll have any trouble in Mondstadt.”

“Thanks, Paimon.”

“But if you do need help you can just send Paimon a letter. Or…well…nevermind, there are probably lots of people in the city you could ask.”

An awkward silence hung in the air that made Paimon squirm and fidget. Aether continued to stack rocks. It was strange, somebody must have stacked them here previously. Aether was just kind of adding to it

“You know…Paimon had a really fun time traveling with you. We made a pretty good team, don’t you think? It’s kinda like we’re a real adventuring team–we got to eat yummy food, blast away some bad guys, save the town–the only thing that would’ve made it a real adventure is if we found treasure at the end of it.”

“Paimon.”

“Hmm?”

“Will you come with me to Mondstadt?”

“YES!! Umm, wait, Paimon means…sure, why not?” But the ferocity of her first answer had made Aether jump, and he accidentally knocked over the entire stack of rocks. And then, literally out of thin air, right in front of the both of them, a huge wooden chest appeared. They both stopped and stared at it, stunned to silence.

“Uh, Paimon, is that yours?”

“Paimon thought it was yours.”

They looked at each other.

“You open it, Paimon’s too scared to.”

“You’re scared of a box?”

“If it’s a creepy, mysterious ghost box, then yes, Paimon is.”

“Is that even a real thing?”

“Well clearly! Wahhh!”

The chest, having gotten tired of waiting, decided to swing itself open of its own volition,

which was why Paimon screamed. Though, once its contents were visible, her mood took a drastic turn.

“Wooooaaaahhh,” she said, ogling the shining pile of gold coins. The glint of the sun bounced off the coins and reflected in Paimon’s eyes. She turned to Aether, a wide smile slowly spreading on her face. “Aether! It’s our adventure treasure!”

“We can’t take that. What if it belongs to someone?”

“Ohhhh, don’t be such a stick in the mud. We helped the town, and now the gods have blessed us with treasure. All’s well that ends well!”

“I thought it was a ‘creepy ghost box’.”

“Silly Aether, there’s no such thing! Now help Paimon carry this.”

Aether sighed and rolled his eyes. There was probably no use fighting it. And so reluctantly, but with a hidden smile, he helped Paimon scoop the chest’s contents into their bag, and the two set off, side by side, on their journey to Mondstadt.