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It is on a sweltering summer afternoon that Ningguang suddenly finds herself angry.
Now, Ningguang is an expert at putting on airs. She’s been carefully crafting her image for the majority of her life and using it to her advantage for nearly as long, and somewhere between the days spent planning and the nights spent poring over dusty textbooks and the numerous meetings with important public figures, she had no choice but to master the fine art of, well, lying to people. Ningguang can make herself palatable to even the most annoying of dignitaries—or she can usually, with a few marked exceptions.
The pirate captain Beidou is one such exception. Another is the sniveling little weasel that she’s currently meeting with.
There are a great many corrupt people in the world of politics. Some say that for every intelligent and just person in the field, there are an equal amount of greedy and senseless idiots lurking around the corner just waiting to soak up your time—something Keqing certainly seems to agree with, and tends to moan about when they talk during lunch. So yes, Ningguang has met her fair share of nuisances. She’s well-prepared to deal with them! But this one has reached a new low.
“My—My Lady, I just think that it would be economically improbable to give handouts to my employees like that,” The weasel says, clasping his hands and giving her a sickly sweet smile.
Ningguang raises one sculpted brow. “Sure, sure. And what do these handouts constitute exactly, sir?”
Her client seems to understand that he misspoke, but he barrels on. “Why, the majority of the tips, of course! That’s important revenue that we can use to repair the shop, and we need the money quickly in time for the summer festival. W-We only have a few days left.”
Ningguang feels something in her temple throb.
“Well,” she says, crossing her legs imperiously. “If you’re taking the majority of the tips for yourself, I would be correct to assume that you’re compensating your workers for their effort in helping the establishment thrive during such tough times, wouldn’t I? Anything else would be extremely unprofessional and, according to Liyue law, illegal! An upstanding man such as yourself would never sink so low, would he.”
The weasel squeaks. “Ah, well, My Lady—”
Ningguang leans forward, locking eyes with this sad little excuse of a man. “Would he?”
“Ha! Ha ha, of c-course not,” the weasel manages. There’s sweat beading down his impossibly large forehead, his wiry hair and traditional clothing suddenly damp.
That ought to do it for today. Ningguang’s mother always said she had a talent for putting the fear of the Seven into people—Ganyu likes to call it the fear of the Tianquan.
“Well, the work you do for the festival is indeed valuable, and it isn’t your fault that you were hit by that earthquake, so I will give you a minor sum,” Ningguang says, sinking back into her chair. “The check will come by mail sometime tomorrow. Use it carefully.”
The weasel brightens considerably. “Thank you, My Lady! Your beauty and generosity knows no bounds!”
Goodness, the man has no shame. “Yes, of course. You may go now.”
At that, the weasel jumps up from his chair and hastily skitters out of the room, and that should be it, she should be done, free to retreat to one of her many homes or the Jade Chamber and exhale, but for some reason Ningguang is still seething. She’s had to deal with this man and his advances for weeks by now, and she’s nearly at her breaking point.
Her mind runs itself in circles at the sheer absurdity of it all. How long did those poor workers go without getting paid properly? Who in their right mind would think it’s alright to collect their own employees' tips? And tips that the customers had no idea were going elsewhere? It’s madness, pure and simple, and Ningguang itches with the urge to run outside and wring the tiny man’s neck.
That’s not an option, so she decides to get some fresh air instead.
The marketplace is like a pocket of heaven compared to Yujing Terrace. Liyue Harbor sits snug against the ocean, and the cold air that wafts from the sea keeps it nice and temperate even through the wet heat that tends to settle further inland during this time of year. Many of the houses keep the windows cracked open to let the salty breeze pass through, and so as Ningguang makes her way through town she can hear the murmur and chatter of plain-clothed civilians and shopkeepers alike.
“Did you see? Down by the pier,” One particularly loud woman says to her friend. “The Alcor has docked! The great captain Beidou is back!”
“Jiejie, hush up!” Her friend whisper-shrieks, covering her mouth. “Don’t you see the Tianquan coming?”
Ah, it’s just a little bit amusing how much they think Ningguang hates the other woman. If only they knew they were business partners—the rumors would tear the Harbor apart! Although….it does give Ningguang an idea.
She makes her way down to the pier, picking through the staring crowds that have amassed to gawk at the infamous pirate crew. Gossip in Liyue seems to spread faster than wildfires, something that Ningguang has found to be both advantageous and supremely fucking difficult to deal with. Still, she understands why people gather to watch the ship unload. The Alcor makes an incredibly imposing figure, at least twice the size of the other boats in this part of town and much more practical than the notoriously flashy Pearl Galley.
Ningguang finds the ship beautiful in a dangerous way, the bright red of the battened sails not unlike the fluttering wings of an insect, or some strange, poisonous flower. If she were less world-weary, she would probably be staring with the rest of them.
Because she is the Tianquan, and she’s far too keyed up at this point to really care, she instead pushes through the throng of people and makes her way to where the Captain and her crew are standing around on the rickety wood of the docks and taps her colleague on the shoulder.
Beidou whirls around, looking terribly confused when their eyes meet. “Wh—My Lady?”
“My Captain,” Ningguang returns, bowing slightly. “Come fight me.”
—
It seems to take Beidou a moment to recover from the initial shock of being approached by Ningguang in such a way, especially while she’s likely still adjusting to the feeling of being on flat land for the first time in weeks, but she takes her up on her offer without question. Of course she does. That’s why Ningguang likes her, though she would never admit it.
They don’t spar on the docks, obviously, it would be too dangerous to risk getting knocked into the water when they both carry such heavy weapons. Plus, it’s far too public for their purposes. Beidou points Ningguang to an outcropping in the forest surrounding the town where she apparently likes to practice instead. The grass is charred and burnt, the ground littered with upturned stones from distinctly heavy blows. There’s hardly any birdsong out here—the wildlife must have been scared away.
“There isn’t really a designated place to exercise when we’re out at sea, it’s pretty much always ‘go time’ there,” Beidou explains on the way. “It’s nice to brush up on my skills when I’m, you know, not in a life-or-death scenario.”
Ningguang supposes that makes sense. Not everyone has the luxury of a floating castle in the sky to practice in.
They agree on some basic rules of conduct: one weapon each, visions are allowed but they should keep environmental damage to a minimum, no dirty tactics (Beidou is adamant that hair-pulling is out of the question, Ningguang scoffs at the mere suggestion that she would do such a thing) and no attacking with the intent to kill. In the end, this match is only meant to help the two of them let off some steam.
Ningguang feels just a smidge bad for being so blunt with her business partner in asking for this, especially with her entire crew and half the town watching, but the feeling fades as soon as they get into their respective battle stances and Beidou starts to get cocky.
The captain whisks her cloak and hairpiece off and swings her claymore down from her back in one smooth motion, a slightly feral grin spreading across her face.
Always a showoff, that girl. Ningguang’s face hardens. She lifts her arms and her catalyst follows, floating comfortingly at her side.
“Ehh, what is that stance?” Beidou taunts, her feet digging into the dirt. “Are you fighting or dancing?”
“There is but a fine line between the two,” Ningguang says, her patience starting to run thin. “Now, are you going to spend all day heckling me or are you going to put that claymore of yours to good use?”
That gets Beidou’s attention. She rockets forward with a sharp cry, her claymore drawing in at impossible velocity, and Ningguang barely has the time to activate her vision and block the attack before Beidou is circling back to hit her again, and again, and again, using the force of her entire body to propel her weapon forward.
Ningguang is stunned by her speed. She’s seen Beidou fight before, has even fought alongside her, but there’s something completely different about actually going up against the other woman in a one-on-one match. She dashes around like her claymore is weightless, and it takes a few more hasty blocks for Ningguang to realize that she’s actually using the massive weight of her weapon to her advantage, relying entirely on her momentum and a supernatural sense of balance to make sure that she’s always, always moving.
In direct contrast, Ningguang is more of a stationary fighter. Keeping her feet planted firmly, she flicks her wrist and sends a wave of gemstones flying towards her opponent’s head.
Beidou rolls out of the way of the barrage in one fluid movement, and the stones land firmly in the grass behind her. “Ha! So you can attack me head-on!”
Ningguang smiles. “You aren’t giving me a chance to breathe. Aren’t you afraid of running out of energy?”
“In your dreams, Lady,” Beidou grins, and then she’s on the offensive again.
They continue in a flurry of movement, the field transforming into a warzone as Beidou continues to run circles around Ningguang, drawing more and more risky moves out of her as they go on. Beidou swings her weapon low, Ningguang jumps over it easily and sends a torrent of gems crashing down around her head. Ningguang sends her Jade Screen out to take control of the field, Beidou moves elegantly around it and bats the offending particles away with the hilt of her blade.
They seem to counter each other perfectly. It makes for a thrilling fight, more fun than anything Ningguang has experienced in a long while.
In one incredibly impressive moment, Beidou actually kicks her claymore forward, and it’s only Ningguang’s years of intense training that keep her from being cleaved in half. It’s then that she notices one glaring discrepancy, and one that she feels extremely silly for only recognizing now.
“You aren’t using your vision,” Ningguang accuses, jumping back to avoid her companion as she charges forward like an angry boar.
Beidou skids to a stop behind her, and pivots on her heel with a sly smile. “Maybe you just aren’t working me enough.”
“I see the way your chest is heaving. It isn’t that,” Ningguang says, staunchly ignoring Beidou’s amused snort and mutter of “Oh, you’re looking at my chest, are you?” “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of hurting me.”
“As if you’ve ever been that fragile,” Beidou laughs. “Okay, fine. You want my vision? Come get it.”
With that, she sticks her blade in the ground and calls forward a surge of celestial energy that nearly knocks Ningguang back, sending waves of electricity that ripple menacingly across the battlefield. Two small, purple beasts circle around her, and Ningguang barely has time to marvel at what must be one of the prettiest elemental bursts she’s ever seen before she’s leaping away to avoid getting hit.
Beidou wastes no time in this form. She can only hold it for a few supercharged moments, so she’s even more aggressive with her attacks than usual. Ningguang finds herself stuck in a loop of blocking, dodging, and stepping backwards, stuck purely on the defensive as Beidou lifts her claymore and swings it around in a dangerous arc so that bolts of lightning fly directly towards her head.
It’s completely wild, pure hot-blooded ferocity, and Ningguang feels immensely satisfied with herself for being able to pull such intense moves out of her opponent. Beidou eventually comes to a stop, electricity still crackling around her and making her hair frizz, and they lock eyes for a single heated moment.
“Hah….was that what you were looking for?” Beidou huffs.
Ningguang nods. “Impressive,” she admits.
Beidou bows jokingly, then raises her head with a playful leer. “But aren’t finished with me yet. You’re still a little bit mad, I can tell. Want to keep going?
“You’re incorrigible, Captain,” Ningguang says with a sigh, to mask her surprise. “Am I that transparent?”
“To me? Certainly,” Beidou replies. “Don’t be shy, show me what you’ve got!”
“Hmm. Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Ningguang watches as Beidou readies herself for the inevitable attack, claymore drawn up in a block. The message is clear: she’s free to do whatever she wants. Ningguang could dash behind the other woman and catch her by surprise with a jab between the shoulder blades, seeing as she’s expecting a big, flashy move. She could activate another Jade Screen right where Beidou is, though that would drain a substantial amount of her stamina. Or, she could warp up into a plunging attack, see what the captain does then.
Oh, what the hell.
Because Beidou looks excited and Ningguang is, apparently, a giant sucker, she gathers up all of her restless energy and channels it into her own show of force. It feels nice to use her skills in a more friendly setting, and she’s going to take the opportunity to show off a little.
The power emanating from Ningguang’s catalyst is enough to lift her up into the air, and she allows herself to spin around a few times before summoning an almost improbable amount of gemstones that swirl and twist in lazy arcs around her. She gestures towards Beidou and they all dutifully lock on to their target, rushing forward with brutal speed.
There are precious few ways to counter this attack, and Beidou knows it—she keeps her stance for an admirable amount of time, but even she knows better than to try to block an elemental burst head-on. She seems to think it over for another millisecond, and then—in a very strange turn of events—she falls onto all fours, running forward and narrowly dodging the slew of gems that embed themselves into the stone behind her, miles away.
Ningguang lets out a startled laugh once she lands. “What was that? Are you a fox?”
“What do you mean, what was that, you could have killed me!” Beidou gasps, but her eyes crinkle in good humor, so she must be fine. “Archons, I pity the hilichurls around here if that’s what they have to deal with.”
“No, I save attacks like that for when Geovishaps wander too close to the city,” Ningguang says. “And you’re no slouch either. What you did earlier—you used that move on the great beast Haishan, did you not?”
“Keen eye. I might’ve gotten a bit carried away,” Beidou says, walking up to Ningguang and punching her shoulder lightly. The feeling of knuckles on skin is somehow soothing, reminding Ningguang that it’s starting to get late.
“The sky is darkening,” she observes. “That was a nice spar. Thank you.”
“‘Course,” Beidou says. “You feeling better?”
Surprisingly, she is.
—
The feeling that settles over Ningguang in the aftermath of a good battle is pleasant, even peaceful, but it only lasts for so long. She returns to Yujing Terrace, shrugging off the fur lining of her qipao and her damp gloves, and collapses into a sweaty heap on her silk sheets.
It’s terribly humid even as the sun sets, and the salty breeze that wafts through the parts of town closer to the shore doesn’t reach her here. She’s going to have to scrub the shit out of her bedding later. She can’t really bring herself to care.
She falls into a fitful sleep soon after, skipping dinner entirely, and dreams of nothing for a few blessed hours.
Then, she opens her eyes to the sight of golden bars. They’re thin, but long—she tilts her chin up as far as it will go and they still stretch upwards for what looks like miles, arcing down and connecting far above her head. Ningguang turns around to see even more of the strange beams, then brings her gaze down to her feet. The floor is solid gold. She’s trapped in a gilded cage.
Around her hang a variety of other enclosures similar to the one that she’s currently encased in, silver and bronze and jade, and the idle chirping and clanging that reverberates through the room alert her to the shadowy forms that sit unhappily within. Birds, possibly? Ningguang walks to the edge of her cage and squints. No, they’re too tall and regal to be ordinary songbirds. They’re phoenixes, and she must be a phoenix too, if she’s stuck in here with the rest of them.
A clatter of bells draws her attention to a door near the front of the room. A beam of light enters the shop, and two men enter in a bustle of footsteps and flapping cloth, long robes dragging across the floor.
She recognizes the first one as a shopkeeper she’s seen around Chihu Rock with a holler that could stun a Mitachurl—during the Lantern Rite, his yell of “Come and get it!” brings in customers from near and far—and the second one is a spindly little man that she remembers as that horrible weasel she had the bad luck of meeting with in the waking world.
The two men draw closer, seemingly inspecting the phoenixes. In a rather unintelligent move, the weasel sticks his fingers between the bars and is rewarded with a sharp bite for his actions.
“Gah! I thought you said this one was docile, but she’s far too feisty for my liking,” Ningguang hears the man exclaim.
The shopkeeper with the booming voice sighs. “If she’s unsuitable for your purposes, then we can look at another. But sir, you must know that these are wild animals by nature. You can never completely tame them, nor should you.”
The man snorts, already moving on to terrorize another of the poor creatures. “Pah, I’ll find a good one yet.”
They make their way through the room, the weasel carefully inspecting each of the phoenixes one by one. Be it pattern, size, weight, disposition, or even the color of their beak, he’s never satisfied by what he finds, and the shopkeeper seems to rapidly lose his patience with the man as they go on. Finally, they stop in front of Ningguang’s enclosure.
“Hmm,” The weasel says, peering into the cage. His huge face blocks out the natural light of the store, something that unnerves her greatly. “This one is very beautiful.”
The shopkeeper nods in agreement. “You have a good eye. She’s one of our most prized possessions, a very rare bird indeed.
Ningguang shifts into a fighting stance, ready to attack if she must, but to her horror she can find neither her catalyst nor her vision.
Well. It isn’t optimal, but she has teeth. She can bite if she must.
She receives one last appraising look from the weasel, and then he shifts towards the shopkeeper. “How much is she?”
“About ten thousand Mora.”
“Hefty,” the weasel muses. “But worth it. I’ll take her.”
The shopkeeper nods, and Ningguang braces herself against the back of the cage as his giant, meaty hand draws closer and closer, opening the latch and reaching in to grab her. She prepares to nip at him, claw at him, kick his hand, dart through the gap between his fingers and out to freedom, whatever she has to do to escape this horrible place and—
Ningguang sits up in her bed with a jolt, heart beating at a rabbit’s pace. She lifts a shaking hand up to her chest.
What in the name of all the Seven was that?
—
Too amped up to go back to sleep after such a strange dream, Ningguang sits for a moment, processing. Then, she strips her mattress of all of its bedding and places it in a wooden tub to soak for a few hours. She shrugs off her qipao, now truly drenched with sweat, and exchanges it for a cream colored set of robes that she doesn’t like enough to worry about soiling.
Those tasks completed, she pads down to the cellar, reveling in the cool underground air for just a moment before hefting up a sack of rice flour and a rope and bringing them out front. The sky outside is still pitch-black, but the buzz of cicadas and the distant call of Azure Cranes suggest that it’s nearing sunrise. She slept most of the night, then, but the Harbor won’t be awake for a few hours yet.
Ningguang can’t in good conscience go up to the Jade Chamber at such a time. Fortunately, she knows a perfect place to let out some of her excess tension.
It only takes her a few minutes to get back to the field where she and Beidou sparred yesterday, and even that’s while she’s deliberately taking her time, slowly ambling along with a burlap sack weighing heavy on her back. It’s a miracle that she hasn’t noticed Beidou practicing there yet, she doubts the captain is sneaky enough to fully conceal her movement.
Ningguang scouts for a tree with strong branches, ties the bag up so it’s dangling just a foot off of the ground, and just fucking loses it for a while.
She aims fist after savage fist at the sack, punching it with all she’s got, her form somewhat sloppy from inexperience. It doesn’t stop her though, and she even gives it a couple roundhouse kicks, pretending that the bag is a certain slimy little man that’s taking up far too much of her valuable brainspace. She gets lost in the flow of punching and jabbing her makeshift training dummy, and she’s only snapped out of it when she comes at the sack a little too hard and a rift forms in the corner, flour seeping out and spilling on the grass.
A voice rings out from behind her. “Archons, Lady, have you ever thrown a punch before in your life?”
Ningguang freezes. What is she doing up at this hour?
“Not now, Beidou,” Ningguang grits out, not really in the right headspace to deal with the other woman.
“What, had enough of me so soon? No, you definitely need to learn how to do this right,” Beidou hums, stepping closer. “You’re going to break your hand at this rate, and that won’t do.”
She places her hand over Ningguang’s, so close that her breath puffs along the back of her neck. Too close. “Here. Curl it up into a fist like you were doing before, but keep your thumb behind your fingers, just like that. The bone will snap otherwise.”
Ningguang slaps her hand away. “Don’t touch me. Please,” she adds, remembering the colossal palm that came so close to grabbing her in that dream.
“Huh? What has you so touchy?” Beidou asks. If Ningguang didn’t know better, she would think the captain almost sounds worried.
“It’s none of your concern,” Ningguang says, a non-answer.
“Well I am concerned,” Beidou shoots back. “Did someone hurt you?”
“No,” Ningguang says, but it sounds wobbly even to her ears.
Beidou takes a step closer. “Then what happened?”
“Nothing! Nothing happened.” Ningguang snaps, having more than enough of this pointless back and forth. She pivots on her heel and gives Beidou a harsh shove, a move that normally wouldn’t affect the brawny woman at all. Beidou isn’t expecting it, so she’s knocked back a few steps, unsteady in her confusion.
“You’re acting strange,” Beidou says, looking frustrated. “Are you looking for another fight this early?”
Ningguang doesn’t answer. She runs forward and pounces on the other woman with all the force she can muster, slamming the two of them down into the dirt as Beidou raises her arms in a hasty block. Beidou gets the message, struggling to gain purchase on the charred, rocky ground so that she can get a few hits on her sudden opponent.
The rest is a total free-for-all, disorganized and messy and raw, as they both scuffle in the dirt like children. Dimly, Ningguang recognizes that this is completely unacceptable behavior on her end and her clothes are getting smeared with mud, but she’s too blind with fury to reel herself in like she usually does. She fights dirty, biting at Beidou’s hands and pulling mercilessly on her cloak to bring her back down to the ground. To her credit, Beidou gives it right back to her tenfold, yanking at her hair and kneeing her in the stomach like a true ruffian.
Eventually Beidou’s heightened physical strength and superior technique wins out over Ningguang’s ferocity, and she manages to pin the Tianquan down by the wrists. Ningguang writhes in her grip, surprisingly slippery, but the captain has her stuck firmly in place.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Beidou snarls.
Ningguang thrashes like a dying animal, ignoring her entirely. “Get off! Let me go, damn you!”
Beidou doesn’t budge. “Not until you tell me what’s going on!”
“I don’t know,” Ningguang gasps. “Leave me alone.”
Beidou gives her a little shake. “Not until you promise me you’re alright,” she says, softer now. “This isn’t like you, Lady.”
That little admission startles Ningguang into calming down. She’s still breathing heavily, chest falling up and down in ragged, heaving wheezes, but her eyes lose their glassy sheen.
“I don’t know,” she repeats, more lucid. “I had a bad dream. It’s silly, but it scared me. I wasn’t sure what to do.”
“You’re done, then? The Tianquan is lost for once, so she takes it out on her poor captain,” Beidou laments, half-jokingly. “How unfair.”
“Sorry,” Ningguang says in a small voice.
“It’s alright,” Beidou says, lifting a hand to smooth Ningguang’s bangs back from her face.
“It’s really not.”
Beidou pauses, considering. “No, it wasn’t. You were hurting, and that’s okay, but don’t take it out on me.”
“I won’t do it again,” Ningguang promises. Her face is still flushed from the wrestling they did not even moments ago, hair fanned out across the ground, pristine white robes streaked with patches of dirt and grass. Beidou is so obsessed with her, it’s not even funny.
“I really, really want to kiss you right now,” she says. “Is that okay?”
Ningguang makes a surprised little noise, pupils blown. “I think if you don’t I might die.”
“Well, we can’t have that,” Beidou murmurs, and leans in.
If fighting Beidou is perfection, then kissing her is beyond perfection, almost dizzying in its intensity. They don’t come together perfectly at first—it’s been a long while since Ningguang has bedded anyone, and Beidou has been out with her crew for the past few months—but once they get into the rhythm of it they slot together like two puzzle pieces, like it was always meant to happen this way. Ningguang on the ground, Beidou above her, the sky and sea flipped on its head and meeting at the horizon line.
They break apart to breathe, and Beidou lets out a giddy laugh, and then Ningguang lets out a little laugh of her own, and then they’re both giggling like children in the middle of the forest, the dawn rising over the trees like a cracked egg.
“Lady, you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to do that,” Beidou admits.
Ningguang shakes her head emphatically. “If you’ve been waiting a long time, I’ve been waiting a millennia. Allow me to guess—Liuli Pavilion?”
“Close,” Beidou says. “Does the South Wharf ring any bells?”
“Really, that early?” Ningguang asks.
The captain looks a little mollified as she nods, which is wholly unacceptable. Ningguang wraps her arms around Beidou’s waist and mouths at her neck, which sufficiently distracts the two of them for a few more minutes.
“I wasn’t trying to make fun of you,” Ningguang says after a long moment. “I’ve liked you since before we even met.”
Beidou smiles against her. “I know. You sought me out personally, I remember.”
“Yes, that was...bold of me, I suppose.”
“Nothing wrong with bold,” Beidou says. “I liked that about you.”
“Of course you would like that,” Ningguang huffs good-naturedly.
Beidou closes her eye and sighs, a faux-hurt expression on her face. “Aiii, what’s that supposed to mean? You wound me, My Lady.”
Ningguang hums in response. “You should call me by my name more often.”
“Oh, good point,” Beidou says. “You’d have to call me by mine, too, though. That’s the rule—if you’ve had your tongue in my mouth, you address me that way.”
“Alright,” Ningguang agrees. She tests the waters. “Beidou.”
Beidou grins. “You look pretty when you blush, Ningguang.”
“Stop it,” Ningguang says, and kisses her silent.
—
After that, sparring becomes a thing between the two of them. They don’t do it often, because Ningguang has her duties as a member of the Qixing and Beidou has a strange schedule, spending months away at sea and returning for only a few weeks at most, but it’s a relatively common habit between the two of them. Ningguang loves it.
The clap of thunder as Beidou activates her vision, the rush of wind when she swings her claymore, the adrenaline rush as they abandon their weapons altogether to scuffle in the mud, it’s all completely exhilarating. There’s no feeling like meeting the perfect match, the one person who can counter you without fail.
And if anyone notices that Ningguang’s form is getting sharper, her figure more muscular….well, it’s not like they would ever be brave enough to ask her about it outright.
With the sparring comes other developments in their relationship, too, though two of them keep those tightly under wraps. It’s better to avoid the rumors that would arise if they were spotted by someone of high standing, both for their own sanity and to maintain at least some modicum of legality in Liyue Harbor.
Life is nice. That’s no small feat for people like Ningguang and Beidou. And two days after the summer festival, Ningguang is rewarded with some of the best news she’s had in months.
She’s idly strolling by the docks, listening to the shouts of sailors and the distant clang of buoy bells, when she overhears a whispered conversation between two traveling merchants.
“Hey, have you heard that rumor that’s going around? About the guy who ran that zongzi stand,” the older merchant says, elbowing his friend.
“You mean that shrimpy little dude with the big forehead? No,” the younger merchant replies. “Tell me, tell me!”
The first merchant laughs. “You’re going to like this. Apparently, his employees were being paid dirt for their work, so they all quit right after the festival ended. Next thing you know, nobody’s buying his stuff anymore because the food all tastes like hilichurl dung. The guy said he was one of the greatest chefs in the Harbor, but it turns out he can’t even wrap his own zongzi!”
“No kidding!” The other merchant says, hefting his knapsack further up on his shoulders.
“Crazy story, right? I guess he got what he deserved. Between you and me, I never liked that guy much.”
Ningguang allows herself a quiet smile as she walks past. Even in the cutthroat world of Liyue, fate keeps its watchful eyes open.