Chapter Text
Aether’s boots thumped softly as he bounced his way down the stairs of the Qixing tower. Another day and another set of commissions. This was his daily routine nowadays. Wake up, eat breakfast with Keqing, slip on his boots, and make his way down to the main city to the adventurer’s guild. It was a peaceful existence, yet Aether wished that the circumstances were different. He wouldn’t mind living like this at all if he were honest. It made money, it kept him active, and he got to explore the world outside. Plus, he got to live with a cute girl. His stomach full and his sword at the ready, he entered the presence of Ganyu and Ningguang when his foot landed on the final step of the tower.
“Hello, Ningguang, hello Ganyu,” he greeted the Qixing members as he passed by them.
“Hello, Traveler,” the two women replied in unison.
Ningguang did not typically frequent the main floor of the Qixing tower, as she tended to hole herself up in her personal office attached to her quarters. However, today was an exception as she needed the help of Ganyu to sort through various tax paperwork. Unfortunately, things kept piling up one after another, and Ningguang, despite her seemingly infinite intelligence, began drowning in all of the worksheets. She sighed, her breath rustling a few loose papers. Ganyu and Ningguang continued to scribble away at the government documents, not paying any significant attention to Aether’s entrance and exit of the Qixing building. Fifteen minutes later, Keqing’s pumps clicked down the stairs as she subtly announced her own entrance.
“Hello Keqing,” Ningguang murmured idly.
“Good morning Ningguang, Ganyu.”
“Morning, Keqing.”
Keqing made her way toward her office, opening the door and then rustling some maps about. She was to embark on a minor road planning trip for a small settlement east of Mt. Tianheng and had forgotten to bring the map with her upstairs the previous night to study and mark. It was then that Ningguang’s attention was suddenly pulled away from her paperwork.
“Wait a second, that was quite odd.”
Ganyu looked up from her tax return sheet and regarded Ningguang.
“What was odd?”
Ningguang turned around in her chair.
“Keqing?” she called.
“What is it?” Keqing replied, walking out with a rolled-up scroll in her hand.
“Why did the traveler come down the stairs from your quarters earlier?”
“What do you-” the girl began before freezing like a deer in the torchlight. Urk. She realized the implications behind a boy leaving her quarters, especially since Ningguang hadn’t gotten an inkling as to what Aether’s situation was.
“I… He just needed a place to stay for a while, there’s nothing weird going on between us!” Keqing fumbled, caught off-guard by the sudden suspicion.
Ningguang furrowed her eyebrows at Keqing, not entirely convinced by her answer. “Uh-huh…” she began slowly before casting aside whatever thought she had. She was far too busy to worry about Keqing’s romantic life. “Well, whatever it is that’s happening, I don’t want to hear any of it downstairs, and especially from my quarters, got it?”
Ningguang may as well have had a Pyro vision because Keqing overloaded right there on the spot and imploded. Her features were highlighted hot pink as her mind ran through the scenarios that Ningguang had implied.
“Oh, leave her alone, Ningguang, the traveler had a lot happen to him recently, and Keqing is just helping him out.”
Ningguang merely grunted in response.
“Besides,” she lightheartedly smirked at Keqing. “I’m the only one who’s allowed to tease her about it.”
“Ganyu!” Keqing retorted indignantly. She sputtered, struggling to find a response to Ganyu. “I- I’m leaving now!” Keqing stammered, ending the conversation as she beelined out of the room.
Around midday, Aether had finished all of his commissions for the day and was sitting with Paimon at Wanmin restaurant, eating lunch. It made decent enough money, but being an adventurer with the guild was slowly losing its charm. It was the same four commissions over and over again, whether it was clearing a hilichurl camp, bashing some treasure hoarder heads, or laying waste to a ruin guard. Nothing seemed to change, and Aether was beginning to find it relatively dull.
“Whatcha thinkin’ about, Aether?” Paimon asked between a mouthful of golden shrimp balls.
“Nothing much, really. I’m just thinking about how incredibly boring doing these daily commissions are becoming.”
“Why’s that?”
“It’s the same old thing all over again, every day. I mean, sometimes we get a one-off commission from a civilian somewhere, but those are few and far between.”
Paimon scratched her chin for a second, reflecting upon Aether’s words. She had never really given the commissions much thought, but now that he mentioned it… “You’re kind of right… Paimon wonders why that is?”
Aether shrugged. “Beats me.”
“Not only that, how do those camps keep coming back in the same exact spots? And where are all of those ruin guards coming from? And who’s hiring all of those treasure hoarders?” Paimon held her head in her hands. “Urrgh… there’s too many questions for Paimon to process…”
Aether set his elbow on the table and leaned on it, wryly chuckling at Paimon’s existential crisis. “You’d better stop asking those questions, or some archon is going to cleave you in two for being too self-aware.”
Paimon sputtered at Aether’s flippant disregard for her completely valid questions. “Haven’t you ever noticed those things too?! It just doesn’t make any sense!”
“I mean, the math behind what makes physics work doesn’t make any sense to me, but you don’t find me hung up on finding the numbers behind sending a hilichurl into next week. I just know that it works, and that’s all I care about.”
“You don’t appreciate the smaller things, Aether.”
Aether shrugged again. “Hey, if it makes money at the end of the day, that’s all I need to know.”
Paimon sighed. It was like she was talking to a brick wall at that point. “Whatever you say, Aether.”
“I will say that I’m curious as to whether Katheryne has some different kinds of commissions for us. Wanna check in with her after lunch?”
Finally, he saw some sense in her words! “Sure!” Paimon chirped, scarfing down the rest of her food. They left their Mora on the table and waved goodbye to Xiangling, thanking her for their lunch. Aether and Paimon then moved to the Adventurer’s Guild, where they found Katheryne relaxing in a chair, engrossed in a book. A little too engrossed, if you asked Aether.
“Hello, Katheryne!” Aether called to her. No response. “...Katheryne?”
The woman jolted upright, nearly launching her book through the ceiling as she addressed the blonde traveler. Her face was flushed pink, presumably due to being caught in a particularly vulnerable moment.
“A-Aether, hello! What can I do for you?” she faltered, reorganizing herself and setting her book at the other end of the counter.
Thirty Flirty Farmers, Aether read on the spine of the book. A romance novel, I see. I must’ve caught her in a particularly steamy scene, I guess. But, paying no heed to what had just happened, to save Katheryne the embarrassment, he continued on.
“Hi! I was wondering if you had any other random commissions outside of the usual scope of what I usually do.”
Katheryne pursed her lips, thinking. Then, something edged at the back of her mind… she swore-
“Oh!” Katheryne exclaimed as he ducked under the counter and produced a card she had made a little more than a few hours ago in the wee parts of the morning. “Someone came by and gave a reconnaissance report earlier today. They said that they had observed some suspicious abyss activity near a cave by the Dunyu Ruins.”
Aether quirked an eyebrow. “Abyss activity?”
Katheryne nodded. “They had seen enough to leave a description of what seemed to be the ringleader.”
“Do tell.”
“Here, you can just look at the card,” Katheryne said, sliding the card to him across the counter.
Let’s see… Absurdly tall, dressed in a lot of blue and black… looks really sharp, literally… looks like he has a wrist blade, wait a second…
“Paimon, doesn’t this seem familiar?”
Paimon glanced over the description again, paying closer attention to it. “Wait, isn’t that…”
“The Abyss Herald?” the pair said in unison.
“It seems like you recognize the description. Would you like to take it?”
“Yes,” Aether said without a shred of hesitation. He snatched the card off the table and sprinted toward the Qixing tower, leaving Paimon in the dust.
“I, uh, thank you, Katheryne!” Paimon babbled before disappearing to catch up with Aether. Poor Katheryne was left bewildered, as the both of them had ended their conversation extremely abruptly.
“You… you’re welcome, I suppose,” Katheryne said to no one in particular, primarily out of confusion. After taking a second to fully process things, Katheryne took her book off the counter, sat back down, and immersed herself in her romance novel once again.
Meanwhile, Aether had run full-speed back toward the Qixing tower, with only one goal in mind: hunt down the Abyss Herald. His lungs were burning, his legs were aching, and his shoulders creaked against him, but he didn’t care. He had to get to the Abyss Herald before he left the site. Lumine was in reach again. Aether couldn’t afford to lose this opportunity, not when the answers were right there in front of him. The door to the Qixing office burst open, and Aether barreled through the entryway and up the stairs.
“Hello, Ae…” Ganyu began before he disappeared out of sight. “...ther. What was that?”
A very short two minutes later, that same figure, now toting a small supply bag, bolted down the stairs and out the door, gently closing it when he got outside.
“Aether, wait!” Ganyu attempted to call after him, but he was already gone. “At least he didn’t slam the door…”
A couple of hours later, Keqing approached Liyue’s main gate, sighing. The work wasn’t particularly hard, but making the trek up and down the mountain wasn’t all too fun. Thank the Archons that her legs were conditioned for distance travel. There was only a little bit left to go, and she would be able to have a hot meal, take a shower, and relax. And she would also be able to see Aether, who was probably back home by then. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that they were like a married couple. Coming home every day to each other, cooking meals, living together… gah! It was too much for Keqing to handle, and she mewled like a distressed kitten and covered up her face, turning red. One of the Millelith guards that came with her took a breath to ask her if she was okay but immediately thought against it. He would rather not face the high-voltage wrath that was Keqing.
A few minutes later, the small party reached the Qixing tower, where Keqing dismissed her guards and entered the building.
“Good evening, Ganyu,” Keqing said tiredly. She walked past her desk and tossed the map on her own desk. She was gonna deal with it later. All she wanted to do was go upstairs.
“Good evening, Keqing,” Ganyu said politely. Keqing looked at the stack of papers on top of Ganyu’s desk. Thinking back at what it looked like earlier in the day, she swore it got bigger since she left. However, the Adeptus seemed happy in her work, so she wasn’t really going to question it. Then again…
“Hey, Ganyu, aren’t you tired?”
“Tired? No, I’m…” she was betrayed by her own body as she stifled a yawn with her hand. “I suppose I’m a little tired…” Ganyu said sheepishly.
Keqing sighed, exasperated at the secretary.
“You really should sleep more often, Ganyu.”
Ganyu set aside the sheet she was working on and pulled another one from the top of the stack. “I know, but my work calls me. I can sleep later.”
“You say that, but you’re about to fall asleep on your desk.”
“Oh, I’ll be fine. I just have a few more sheets to get through, then I’ll be done.”
Keqing eyed the unrelenting stack of sheets that never seemed to dwindle.
“If… if you say so. Would you like some tea, then?”
“Yes, that’d be nice, thank you.”
“Alright, I shall be right back then.”
Keqing climbed the short flight of stairs up to her quarters and opened the door. “Aether, I’m back,” she called out. No response. She looked around, but there wasn’t a trace of the blonde traveler to be found.
That’s weird, she thought. He’s usually back by now. I suppose I’ll ask Ganyu once I get downstairs.
A few minutes of cups clinking and a pot singing later, Keqing produced two cups of steaming hot tea and brought them downstairs to Ganyu. Even though she wasn’t officially a member of the Qixing, Keqing found solace and a friend in Ganyu. At the beginning of their relationship, they, understandably, didn’t get along very well. Still, after working with one another for a while, they began to understand one another and even began to joke about their opposing beliefs. At the end of the day, they were both girls, and despite their age difference, they shared similar interests outside of work. Though, it proved quite difficult to tear Ganyu away from work. That held true even now, even when the Adeptus was about to fall asleep at her desk.
“Here you go,” Keqing said, setting the teacup delicately down on top of its saucer.
“Thank you, Keqing,” she said, taking a small sip and sighing in satisfaction. “You always bring out your Qingxin tea for me.”
“Why would I not? It’s your favorite.”
The secretary hummed happily, smiling at her friend. “Thank you, Keqing. I appreciate it.”
“Oh, before I forget,” said Keqing.
“Hm?”
“Have you seen Aether? He wasn’t home when I went upstairs.”
Ganyu looked upward, trying to recall the past couple of hours. “No, I haven’t. Why, do you miss him that much already?” she teased.
“I- gah, no, it’s not that,” Keqing blushed. “It’s just that he’s typically home around this time, and he wasn’t upstairs.”
“Ah, I see,” Ganyu mused. “I think, yes, I remember I saw him earlier today come through the door in a hurry, run upstairs, run back downstairs with a small bag, then rushed out the door.”
“Hm, odd. When was that?”
“Around one in the afternoon. Why?”
“That’s weird, he usually finishes his commissions around noon.”
Ganyu quirked an eyebrow at that. “And you know that why?”
Keqing waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. In any case, he should’ve been done by then.”
“Right…” Ganyu sweatdropped. “Anyway, what’re you gonna do?”
Keqing stood up, her chair scooting backward as she rose. “Call it a hunch, but I’m gonna go ask Katheryne.”
“You sure? He might just be out late tonight, hanging out with someone.”
“Maybe, but it doesn’t hurt to check.”
“Alright, if you’re sure.”
“I’ll be right back.”
“See you in a few minutes, then.”
With that, Keqing exited the Qixing building and made her way to the Adventurer’s Guild booth. She didn’t know what came over her-- While the possibility that Aether was just out late rang true, a small part of her brain screamed in the background that something could have happened to him. If she was being honest, Ganyu was probably right. He probably was just hanging out with someone and would be back later. There was still that chance, though, and Keqing wouldn’t be settled if that chance was still there. So there she was, standing in front of Katheryne’s stall, asking about Aether.
“Hello, Katheryne,” she greeted.
“Good evening, Miss Keqing. How can I help you?”
“I, uh, was wondering if…” Keqing began, embarrassment slowly taking over. “Did Aether take any commissions that would’ve taken him out late today?”
Katheryne blinked at her, unsure of how to process her question. After a few seconds, Katheryne shot her a knowing smile and spoke.
“I do recall him taking a commission earlier related to some Abyss activity and then bolting out of sight, Miss Keqing.”
Keqing’s eyes widened like saucers. “Did you say Abyss activity?”
“Indeed.”
“Where was it sighted?”
“I don’t have the card, but I believe it was around the Dunyu Ruins.”
“Thank you very much, Katheryne!” Keqing exclaimed before she broke into a sprint back towards her quarters.
“You’re very welcome, Miss Keqing!” Katheryne called out to her.
Within minutes, Keqing burst through the door to the Qixing office, causing Ganyu to nearly spill her tea.
“Welcome ba-” Ganyu started as she watched Keqing nearly leap up the stairs. She came back down less than two minutes later in a similar fashion to Aether hours earlier.
“Keqing, wait!” Ganyu attempted to stop her, but she was already out the door by the time she finished her sentence.
They really are meant for each other, she thought wryly to herself, chuckling.