Chapter Text
A single mistake made on years of fatigue ended with Kaeya being kicked down onto the ground as a scorching blade was pierced through his abdomen and into the burning soil beneath him, pinning him down in searing hot pain.
The metallic taste and smell of his own blood became increasingly pungent as he felt the sticky wetness sink into his clothes and pool under him, adding more discomfort onto his pain.
A stubborn part of him refused to give his enemy the reward of his screams as he gritted his teeth together, periodically breathing in burnt soil as tears gathered in his eyes from the over sensitivity caused by the wound.
A loud ringing filled his ears as his head was forcibly yanked backwards, forcing him to look up and into golden eyes that glowed with malicious intent.
It was Aether, but not the Aether that he had grown to know and consider to be a friend. This Aether was evil and corrupted by the darkness, the same darkness that was held over Kaeya his entire life as someone that had Khaenri'ahen blood running through his veins.
Aether didn't say anything, he just grinned at him with a manic look in his eyes as he twisted the blade in Kaeya's abdomen, tormenting the wound and trying to pull some sort of audible reaction from him.
Kaeya knew he was going to die, he was dead the moment he made that mistake. He was going to die to this curse in the same way that all of his friends did, the only difference being that there was no one left to bury him.
His instincts were yelling at him to fight back, but he was tired, tired of everything, tired of carrying this mountain of regret and responsibility on his shoulders for so many years. Everyone he ever cared about was dead, killing Aether wouldn't bring them back or fill the void in his heart.
It was going to be over soon, he could finally join them up in Celestia. A sick sense of relief came over him, maybe once he got there they would resent him for selfishly giving up just because he wanted to see them, but that was okay, he was used to disappointing people's expectations.
Kaeya took a shaky breath and braced himself as his head was slowly lifted and then violently slammed down into the ground, enveloping him in darkness for one last time.
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Kayea violently jolted awake, instinctively hunching his upper body over himself as his breaths came out in short gasps, his heart pounding violently in his ears due to the vivid nightmare.
It took him a couple of moments to collect his disoriented thoughts and remember where he was and who he was. Once he did, a calmness settled over him and he moved to lean back against the tree he fell asleep under with a sigh.
It had been a while since he had gotten that specific nightmare, it was one of the more haunting ones that often left him shaken for much longer than the rest of them.
Those final moments were his darkest hour where he had truly reached rock bottom.
Kaeya had witnessed all of his friends dying one by one until he was the only one left, leaving him to survive alone in a post-apocalyptic Teyvat for more than a decade until he was found and murdered.
Nineteen years have passed since the day that he died to Aether on Khaenri'ah soil, and it has been nineteen years since he had been reborn in a world different than his own.
He remembered that first day like it had happened yesterday. Words couldn't express his shock when he woke up after being murdered, only to find out that he was a toddler that could barely even walk.
Mid-thirties Kaeya Alberich had become Prince Kayea Alberich of Khaenri'ah and that certainly took a bit of getting used to, especially since he had the mentality of an adult in a child's body.
It wasn't all too bad though since biology was on his side and made the experience much easier to handle. Otherwise, he would never be able to bring himself to cry whenever he soiled his undergarments or felt hungry.
Kaeya unfurled himself from his cross legged position in order to stretch out his limbs that went numb from the disuse, only to get distracted when he heard a thud from beside him.
Looking down, he realised that it was his sketchbook that had fallen from his lap. A momentary feeling of panic rushed through him at the thought that his drawing might have been ruined by the slightly damp ground, moving hastily to reach out and pick the book up, scanning over the portrait for any specks or smudges of dirt.
Drawing wasn't a hobby that Kaeya was very interested in during his past life. He was more into academic hobbies such as reading books and solving problems. Even when it came to art he was only ever interested in the art of wine manufacturing.
However, since Kaeya had the knowledge of a man in his mid-thirties, he didn't really need to study for anything apart from history since he already knew the answers to everything, making the time that was allocated to his studies quite boring.
It wasn't like he could act like he was a genius either since he could already see how that would effect the future of this life and he would rather not go through with that.
So, the only thing he really could do to alleviate his boredom was to doodle in his workbooks. It was easy to get addicted to and Kaeya had accidentally become obsessed with drawing at some point.
Once he got good enough, the sketches of his friends had even begun to actually resemble them. Though for some it had taken a couple of tries before they looked accurate since it had been a decade since he last saw them.
The piece that he was drawing before he fell asleep had been a black and white portrait of Diluc with a Cecilia tucked behind his ear. This moment had happened mere weeks before Diluc's death, the two of them were having a lighthearted moment spending some time together which is when Kaeya placed the Cecilia behind Diluc's ear as he was focusing on re-dressing one of Kaeya's healing wounds.
The context behind the seemingly peaceful portrait was a bit dark, but Kaeya already had three to four decades to process and mourn the deaths of his friends. Nowadays, he only reminisced on the happy memories he had with them, ridding himself of any overwhelming negativity.
It goes without saying that he still had days where the memories would return and plunge him into a depressed state, but that was only natural and he slowly learned to cope with it.
After all, he was gifted a new life and he didn't want to waste it.
Kaeya had led a life that was full of regrets in the past so he set himself a goal. A goal to live a better and more fulfilling life for himself and for everyone that he cared for in the past. That way maybe they could also find peace in their untimely deaths.
"So this is where you were hiding" A familiar voice called out loudly from beside him.
Kaeya almost jumped out of his skin as he whipped his head towards the voice. He had been so immersed in his contemplative thoughts that he didn't even hear the man approaching him.
He sighed in exasperation at the grinning face he was met with and narrowed his eyes up at him.
"Viren... don't scare me like that" Kaeya complained.
Viren, a 6'5 man with short curly black hair and large blue eyes. Kaeya considered him to be a cheerful and kind giant to the people that he was friendly with, he could also sometimes be an asshole, but it was nothing compared to how ruthless and cold hearted he could be against his enemies.
Most significantly, Viren is Kaeya's biological older brother. Kaeya never knew his biological family in his past life other than some fleeting memories of his father that had been completely eradicated from his memory by now.
His familial experience in this life was very eye-opening and nothing like the time he had spent with the Ragnvindr family, not that he remembered much of that either.
"Ah yes of course, my apologies your highness, I should have sung a loud tune as I approached you so that you could ease out of your daydreams more naturally. I hope that I didn't interrupt your kissing sequence with the Pyro Prince milord" Viren responded with a mocking but playful tone, bowing to Kaeya at a dramatic 90 degree angle.
Kaeya rolled his eyes at the teasing, muttering 'asshole' under his breath before regarding him again.
"What do you want Viren? Or are you just here to purposefully interrupt my kissing sequence?" Kaeya responded, going along with the bit.
Since Kaeya had drawn Diluc a lot more than the rest, Viren had naturally noticed and dubbed him as the Pyro Prince, dooming Kaeya to incessant teasing about Diluc being his dream lover.
Kaeya used to get flustered by the teasing since it was technically true, but he had gotten used to it by now and started to play along with the act.
Viren relaxed his narrowed eyes from Kaeya's muttered insult from before and perked back up to his happy demeanour.
"As a matter of fact, I'm not. Father wants to see you in his office and none of the servants could find you so here I am relaying this very important message to you."
This piqued Kaeya's interest. Their father had rarely requested his presence in his office, especially during office hours since whenever he needed to tell him something it could usually be said over the dinner table.
The curiosity must've been visable on his face because Viren followed up his statement without Kaeya's input.
"I'm just as confused as you are. He didn't tell me about wanting to see you so I have no idea what he wants either." Viren said, holding his hand out for Kaeya to take.
Kaeya hummed in response as he took the offered help, standing up from against the tree with sketchbook in hand.
"Well, I wish you luck in your meeting with father, you can tell me all about it later cause I have to go do some really important Crown Prince duties so I can't accompany you to his office, but I'll see you at dinner." Viren announced with a grin.
"Sure, see you at dinner" Kaeya responded as he was pulled into a short hug before Viren walked off in the direction of their shared palace.
Now that he was alone, Kaeya began to make his way back to the main palace, the short walk gave him plenty of time to clear his head from the nightmare which was great since there was no way he could face his father with the anxiety still snaking around in his mind.
Kaeya's father was a bit more difficult to talk to compared to his brother and mother so he didn't want his confident mask to falter because of that dream.
He reached one of the many entrances of the palace rather quickly, getting greeted with bows from servants that were working in the area. He handed off his sketchbook to one of the maids and instructed her to pass it off to one of the maids in the Prince's Palace with the same order.
"Good afternoon, your Highness. His Majesty is expecting you in his office." A voice from in front of him called out.
Kaeya turned to the voice and came face to face with his father's personal butler, Dainsleif.
Dainsleif, well... He was strange. Kaeya wasn't even entirely sure if he was a servant to begin with, let alone a human. Every servant in the castle had a role, but he just existed, sometimes he was a butler and other times he seemed like he was an advisor, one time he even saw him ordering around the Royal Knights. He was definently a sketchy person in Kaeya's eyes and he much rather perfered not being around him, especially if they were alone in a room together.
Kaeya nodded in acknowledgment in Dainsleif's direction and took the lead in heading to his father's office. Despite not coming here often, he had memorised the layout of the many palaces of the kingdom so it was fairly easy to find his way to the room.
He came to a halt in front of the room as Dainsleif moved forward to knock on the door and announce Kaeya's arrival. That was a Royal custom that Kaeya could never wrap his head around since he was more than capable of announcing his own presence, but it wasn't like he had much of a choice anyway.
Kaeya walked into the room as Dainsleif moved away from the entrance, seeing his father sitting on one of the couches in front of the desk. He formally greeted his father before looking towards the man.
"Good evening Kaeya, come sit." His father ordered, gesturing towards the couch opposite to the one he was sitting on.
King Ivaan, Kaeya's father, was unsurprisingly not the best father in the world, but at least he didn't abandon him in a foreign country to spy on a rich family for some dumb ancient war plot, so he had that going for him.
Other than that, his father was cold, strict and stayed relatively distant from his kids and wife, but it could easily be chalked up to his sense of duty and from having to constantly manage the nation wide crisis. It wasn't like he was a bad man either, he just had troubles expressing positive emotions and was more harsh than necessary. Though, all in all he could've been worse.
Kaeya moved to sit down on the couch as instructed and looked up at his father, preparing himself for what this conversation would entail.
"You wanted to see me?" Kaeya asked.
"Yes I did. Am I right in assuming that you are aware of the nations current state of affairs due to the disappearance of the Lux Archon a couple of decades ago?"
This Teyvat was very different from the Teyvat that Kaeya knew. Geographically speaking, everything was more or less the same apart from the fact that the actual size of the continent was at least ten times larger.
Visions were also for the most part unchanged except from the Archons that ruled over them. Instead of there being seven Archons, there were nine Archons.
The Archons of Pyro, Cryo, Anemo, Hydro, Electro, Geo and Dendro were the same, but in this world there were also the Lux and Arcane Archons that watched over Khaenri'ah.
Unlike in his Teyvat, Archons did not show themselves to humans or dictate over what they should do. Archons were always worshiped in temples led by Priests and Priestess' and it was very rare for them to make direct contact with humans.
However, a couple decades ago, it was assumed that the Lux Archon had died, this was because all vision holders with a Lux vision had lost their ability to use their vision, which was something that happened if an Archon had passed away. The passing of an Archon was rare, but not impossible and these Archon's would usually get replaced within the next year or so with a new Archon.
That never happened with the Lux Archon and they had been gone for over half a century, leaving Lux vision holders with no vision to utilise. This is why people now consider the Lux Archon to be missing because if they had died, then they would have been replaced by now.
If that wasn't bad enough of a problem, the entrance to the Abyss sat just beyond the border of Khaenri'ah. The Lux Archon had generally kept the Abyss monsters at bay those couple of decades ago, but with them gone, the activity of the Abyss had doubled tenfold and the Royal Treasury had taken quite the hit from the funds that were spent supporting an army to deal with the Abyss monsters.
The only help that they had received with this crisis was from minor donations from foreign nations and the blessing of the Arcane Archon who used their power to stop the Abyss from being able to enter Khaenri'ah cities and settlements at night.
Kaeya didn't know why his father was asking him this but he figured he would find out as the conversation continued.
"Yes, we are running extremely low on funds for the military and the safety of the nation cannot be guaranteed. The majority of citizens can no longer pay the raised taxes and it is inevitable that we will soon fall into debt." Kaeya recited the information.
He only knew these things because of Viren who would sometimes rant to him about these issues. Kaeya condensed those rants and recited them in a more professional manner since he doubted his father would appreciate all the profanities in the original version.
"Good, you are well informed. As you have said, Khaenri'ah can no longer survive on it's own, even if we have the support of the Arcane Archon and donations from foreign nations" Ivaan confirmed, looking up at Kaeya.
"What do you reckon I should do in this situation Kaeya?" He followed up with a curious lilt in his voice.
Kaeya fell into contemplation, there was something not right about this. Sure his father could be honestly asking for his opinion, but he seriously doubted it. With how long the Lux Archon had been gone and how many times he had to listen to his brother rant about this issue, the nation must have come up with hundreds of solutions by now that would range from plausible to impossible. A solution from a nineteen year old that has no known experience in diplomacy wouldn't be anything new.
The difference here was that Kaeya wasn't just a nineteen year old with no experience in diplomacy, but no one knew that apart from himself.
Keeping this in mind, Kaeya formulated a solution that seemed plausible for someone of his age and experience to suggest.
"I believe that the best course of action would be to form an alliance with the other nations of Teyvat. The Abyss as well as the Abyss Order are a threat that affects the continent as a whole so they would surely see the benefit of putting together an official force to push the Abyss back at the source so that we can focus more on trying to find a long term solution." Kaeya suggested, trying to weigh his fathers reaction for any clues.
Kaeya's father looked satisfied with the answer so that certainly meant something. "Theoretically, this is a decent plan, but Khaenri'ah has been completely shut off from the rest of the continent for many centuries up until this crisis hit. The nations of Teyvat are unlikely to trust us enough to form such an alliance as there are many who believe that we are keeping the Lux Archon captive on purpose due to ridiculous rumours that have been spread due to misinformation." He countered.
Kaeya feigned a frown for a few seconds as a precautionary measure before dishing out a response.
"In that case it would be better to start interacting and gaining the trust of the other nations of Teyvat through the high society system. The Arcane Archon protects the citizens of Khaenri'ah at night so if we lower the amount of guards at night we can save enough mora to send out representatives that can gain favour with the rest of the nations. It might take a while, but if we identify and target their weaknesses and help them with those issues, then we are more likely to join the alliance."
"That would be the correct way to go about it and would've been a splendid plan a decade or so ago, but the Abyss Order is starting to make its move and they have been making coordinated attacks on our borders, we don't have the time to play tea party with the other nations and gain their favour."
Kaeya didn't know about that detail, Viren must've sneakily avoided telling him about this part in their last discussion, probably to not worry him or something of the sort.
Regardless of that, Kaeya was starting to see a familiar pattern with how this conversation was going.
On occasion, Kaeya would purposefully do something bad to act out his part as a child which would lead him to being scolded by his father. Usually parents would tell off their children or punish them, but Ivaan would make Kaeya explain to him what he did word for word so that he knew that Kaeya fully understood what he did wrong.
The reason why Kaeya was reminded of this is because it felt like he was trying to make Kaeya understand something. He wasn't sure what that 'something' could be yet, but he was getting a few ideas popping up in his head.
"Then that means we would need to gain the favour of the nations quicker, or focus all of our attention on the nation that would take the least amount of time to persuade and use them to convince the rest." Kaeya continued the conversation, now curious to see what would happen.
There was no point in mentioning starting a war to pillage another country since they already had enough on their hands as it was. On the other hand, suggesting begging and surrendering to the nations was a stupid idea that would bring ruin to Khaenri'ah so that was the only way forward.
"As you have said, we need to gather support quickly and this is where you come into play Kaeya."
Kaeya was right. Ivaan did need him for something. Judging from the conversation it would be a pretty big favour that required Kaeya to understand the nations state of affairs, so it was definently going to be no small task. It was almost exciting, he hadn't had a challenge to complete in a while.
"I need you to convince the Crown Prince of Mondstad to marry you."
"...huh?"
Well... that was unexpected.
There were not many times where Kaeya was caught off guard so strongly, but this was one of those times.
Kaeya was not expecting for his father to essential ask him to seduce and marry another man. Perhaps it was because of the generalised homophobia within Khaenri'ah that made him think that his father wouldn't even consider him as an eligible candidate for a political marriage, but here they were.
The surprise had escaped him with his undignified 'huh?' and it must've been written all over his face too since his father went ahead to address it.
"I know that this request might seem shocking to you, but it is one of the only options that we have left. Mondstad is the richest nation after Liyue and they are also the most lenient and likely to help due to their nature as a country of freedom." he started.
"Though their nature is also a double-edged sword since the King of Mondstad is unwilling to force his son into a political marriage and made it a requirement that you should both agree to it which is why you will be engaged until a decision between the both of you is reached."
Ivaan made eye contact with Kaeya's uncovered eye.
"So Kaeya, will you do it?" he asked.
After Kaeya got the shock out of his system, he considered the question. It was not a question of if he will do it, since it sounded like the engagement preparations were already made, but it was rather a question of if he will put his feelings aside and get the Crown Prince to marry him regardless of if he wants to or not.
As cruel as it sounded, the thought process did make sense, something as simple as being engaged with the Crown Prince would be a sure fire way of guaranteeing more funds to flow into Khaenri'ah's treasury. Marrying the Crown Prince would boost that even further and from then on Kaeya could start networking with nations that are allied with Mondstad and build up some solid relationships that could save Khaenri'ah.
This was no small choice. If Kaeya declined to convince the Crown Prince to marry him then the whole plan could backfire on Khaenri'ah since the engagement could be called off rather quickly if he doesn't even attempt to make the Crown Prince like him which would deeply damage their already poor reputation. There was also a chance that the Prince would be an infuriating douchebag who will make his life horrible, and make him go against the goal he had set himself.
There was also a chance that the Crown Prince would be a lovely and kind person that Kaeya would want to stay married to even if Khaenri'ah's problems were solved. He would also be lying if he said that he didn't miss Mondstad, it wouldn't be the same but it would still be the country he wholeheartedly dedicated his past life to.
It was a difficult decision indeed. The task itself wouldn't be very hard since he had seduced his fair share of men in his past life for information, but he wondered if he would be able to keep it up for long enough for the nation to stabilise.
Kaeya took a deep heavy sigh before looking up at his father with a clear and determined eye.
"I'll do it."