Chapter Text
Thursday night. It wasn’t a special day at Angels Share, it was a normal Thursday night. For Diluc, this meant he was behind the bar for the night. He could do without being here, if anything Diluc should have been at home resting after how busy his night was. The bartender ran a hand down his face and sighed.
Charles had taken the next two days off for personal reasons so it was up to Diluc to fill in his shifts. In reality, he could've asked Patton to be behind the bar but he needed something to do.
The Ragnvindr looked out from behind the bar, the tavern proper was filled with normal patrons; knights, adventurers from the guild, and normal citizens were all around tables talking and drinking. Some of the crowd had even spilled up to the second floor. Situated by the bar happened to be Diluc's least favorite trio, Kaeya, Venti, and Rosaria. The three of them together normally made him want to disappear from Mondstat for a few years again. Tonight though, the three of them were joined by the traveler and Paimon.
It was a surprise to see Lumine at the tavern but Diluc welcomed her presence with open arms. Instead of himself being bothered by Kaeya or Venti, they could direct all questions to the blond.
Speaking of questions, Venti turned to face the traveler and their companion, “So! How were the commissions today? I heard some news on the wind you and our beloved calvary captain ran into a little trouble,” the bard giggled
Lumine put her apple cider down and nodded to Venti, “Yeah, the guild had reported sightings of a hilichurl camp that was located on the way to Stone Gate. It was in the ravine between Springvale and Dawn Winery. It was causing a problem for a few merchants.”
'The winery?' That got some of Dilucs attention. If there was a camp close to his home how had he not learned of it? 'It's probably because I always take the path through Springvale home. But how was I still not informed?' He decided to ask about it later.
“The camp was way bigger than any camp Paimon had ever seen!” Paimon looked up from her plate of chicken mushroom skewers, “Paimon was really scared.”
“Yeah, they had said the camp was much larger than normal.”
That statement held Dilucs attention to the conversation. A large camp causing a disturbance on an important road? That could very well mean the Abyss Order had plans. He heard Rosaria snort from her corner, “So you brought the cavalry captain and not one of the kids from the adventures guild to help with a guild commission?”
Kaeya smiled next to her as he took a sip of his drink, “Well, dearest Rosa, us knights had received some complaints about the camp being too close to the road meaning some people didn’t feel safe traveling across.”
The bartender fought the urge to scoff and roll his eyes. If the knights had been contacted about the camp and it was a commission for adventurers this had been a problem for at least a few days. 'I still can’t believe I never heard anything about this.' Diluc mused to himself, 'Maybe I should start to patrol outside of the city more often… or take another route home.'
A cough from Lumine brought Diluc out of his musings, “Yes well, Kaeya had caught Paimon and I leaving to take care of it and offered to help out.”
“How big of a camp could it have been to give you two trouble?” Venti swirled the wine around in his glass and took a sip waiting for the answer
The three of them all spoke at once,
“It wasn’t that much larger than some other camps around-”
“The majority of the camp was smaller hilichurls, there weren't any malichurls-”
“Paimon saw three abyss mages when we were first approaching!”
The trio fell silent and all eyes were turned to Paimon. She yelped and dashed to hide behind Venti, “Don’t look at me like that Paimons telling the truth!”
The outlander sighed, “Paimon's right. There were three mages when we got there but one slipped away rather quickly.”
“The fight was still somewhat difficult but manageable,” Kaeya smirked and held out his empty glass to Diluc, “All of us got out with only a few scrapes and bruises.”
Diluc sighed as he grabbed the glass to refill it. Hopefully, he would have a chance to ask Kaeya more about the camp before he left for the night.
—
By the time closing was approaching there were only a few patrons left and most were probably too drunk to remember anything that happened tonight come morning.
Diluc took this chance to turn his attention back to the bar. Unsurprisingly the only one left was Kaeya. He moved closer to the bar and leaned slightly against it thinking about how to ask for information.
"That look can only mean you want information Master Diluc. What is it?" The knight turned his attention away from observing other patrons and to the redhead, Diluc cursed at Kaeya's ability to seemingly read his mind
Diluc stood straighter, "Well one, the third mage, I'm assuming it's still out there. And two, why wasn't I informed of a hillichurl camp close to my residence?"
"It left the camp. I don't have any other information on the mage. Your assumption is probably right," Kaeya sipped from his glass of wine, "The explanation behind you not knowing about the camp, it had been surprisingly mobile. We didn't know if it would still be there in a few days."
Diluc stared at Kaeya, "The traveler said this camp was a problem on the road for a few days," he scoffed, "The knights, so inefficient"
Kaeya stared back, "I was just following orders. I would have let you know had it become more of a problem."
Eventually, the bartender sighed and looked away, "Fine, alright," Diluc crossed his arms, "You're absolutely sure there's no other info on the last mage?"
"Positive."
"Okay," A pause, "Could it have gone back to the camp later?"
He shrugged, "Always possible."
"Alright then. Thank you."
"Mhm," Kaeya stood up and dropped some mora on the counter, "Goodnight then Diluc. Be careful on the way home, will you?"
"I always am."
—
Diluc watched as the last drunkard stumbled out of the tavern while he was collecting some leftover glasses. Once he put the glasses in a sink to get them washed he locked the door.
The tavern was officially closed.
Before washing any of the dishes, he cleaned up around the bar putting away any bottles of alcohol still left out.
Afterward, Diluc moved on to the dishes making sure to clean them as best he could before putting them up to dry. Once everything was washed he started drying each item with a rag before putting each cup in its respective place.
While working his mind drifted back to the news about the Abyss and Kaeya's parting words, 'be careful on the way home will you?' Why was he being so polite?
Diluc shook his head, they didn't hate each other. Obviously, Kaeya would care, he was a knight and their job is to protect the citizens of Mond, obviously, he would care. However, it wasn't just Kaeya telling Diluc that as a knight.
He cared,
And Diluc hated that idea.
He tried to focus more on the task at hand instead of his thoughts.
Diluc put the last glass away, and, he was stationary again, and there was nothing to occupy his thoughts.
So, more of them tried to fight for a place in his mind.
'I need to go home and sleep'
'The abyss order is probably planning something'
'I hope I didn't forget anything that needed to be washed around'
'I still need to apologize to Kaeya-'
Diluc sighed and moved to sweep the floors and wipe down the tables, hopefully the distraction got rid of his unwanted thoughts.
As he worked his mind slowly got much quieter than it was before
The bartender let out an exhale and took the moment of reprieve to grab his coat and anything else he wouldn't want to keep at Angel's Share overnight.
As Diluc stepped out into the night, a cool wind rushed past him. The city was quiet. The only sounds being the click of Dilucs boots against the street. He decided to skip the patrol of the city tonight, it would be important to take care of the hillichurl camp encroaching on Dawn Winery property.
Soon enough Diluc Ragnvindr left the walls of the city. As he walked, instead of turning onto the road into Springvale he continued down the main road to the winery.
If the adventurers guild or even the knights couldn't take care of a simple hillichurl camp it was up to the Darknight Hero to clear out the roads. With or without the knights the plan was always to protect Mondstat.
—
As Diluc walked along the path in the ravine he pulled out his cloak and mask from an inside pocket of his jacket when he paused.
'I really should have gone home first.' He still had his coat on.
Unlike the cloak of the Darknight Hero, Diluc's coat was much more noticeable and held much more value. He debated keeping it on, covering it with the cloak, and risking any damages, but ultimately decided on taking it off. Not wanting to backtrack, he found an empty stand that was set up and hid his coat from view. Once he was finished he could backtrack to retrieve it. Diluc threw on the cloak of the Darknight Hero along with the mask and continued on.
The further and further he walked, the quieter it seemed, 'If the mage came back to the camp I should have found something by now…' Diluc let his eyes wander ahead and that's when he noticed it, fire.
The vigilante snuck ahead to the light and there it was the abyss mage. The camp seemed to be a normal hillichurl camp unless someone really focused on the details. It was clearly made to be easily taken down and moved. The abyss mage happened to be electro, a rare sight in Mond.
'Ah, there's more hillichurls around here too. The mage must have brought backup once Kaeya and Lumine left.' Diluc's eyes settled on all of the hillichurls As Lumine had described, all of them were the typical ones to find out about in the open, fighters, guards, and shooters being the most prominent.
With one last look around the ravine, Diluc summoned his claymore and stepped into view. The electro mage noticed him first and instantly put up a shield. When the hillichurls saw that their attention was on the cloaked figure and drew their weapons.
The melee fighters amongst the group ran to the figure while the archers and mage stayed back and attacked from further away. Diluc swung his claymore and managed to knock a large number of hillichurls back. He continued attacking and pushing the hillichurls further back.
Soon enough he felt his vision hum with pyro energy, Diluc smiled and raised his sword, "Time for retribution!" Dawn was unleashed, lighting up the night. He took advantage of the pyro-infused weapon to reach the electro abyss mage.
The electro shield took a decent amount of damage from the attacks but before Diluc could finish it off he felt a searing pain in his right leg. He let out a pained scream as he stumbled forward, catching himself on his claymore. On instinct, he foolishly turned to face the new arrival only to come face to face with a pyro abyss mage. Before he could make a move a jolt of electricity ran through his body, he dropped his claymore, and the Darknight Hero fell forward.
Before everything faded Diluc caught the cackling of the abyss mages, "Perhaps now his highness' plan will finally succeed with the Darknight Hero out of the way."
Diluc could barely make out the words before everything faded to black.