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"It's getting late, so let's set up camp for the night. We'll explore further tomorrow after a night's rest."
Tighnari walks to the camp sight, hoping that Aether will follow along, however the Traveler did not get the memo.
"Hey! Over here!"
The traveler looked around for where the two eared boy was however he couldn't find him.
"Come on you big lummox, raise your head and look up!"
Aether looked up and saw Tighnari looking down at him with a little smile on his face, the blonde smiled back and started to head up to the camp site.
"Let's set up camp here"
They all set up the camp while the mechanical crab goes and gets some food, in return Tighnari gives him some more repair parts.
"I'm off to prepare dinner. We'll take shifts on lookout duty tonight. You two can sleep first. I'll wake you up later." Tighnari said while looking at both the traveler and paimon.
"We need lookouts?" Paimon tilted her head in confusion wondering why we did need it.
"Yes. Even though most of the animals fled because of the Ley Lines, we can't completly let down our guard." They both nodded understanding why.
"It's settled then. I'll set up some pest-repelling devices so poisonous insects don't come crawling into the tent. Have a good night. Not too good, though." Tighnari looked at the traveler on the last part as he walked of, brushing shoulders with the traveler for a second. Aether, being in slight confusion, walks to the tent and lays down. He looks up at the roof of the tent thinking back to what Tighnari ment by that.
'What did he mean by "not too good, though"?' Aether shook off the thought and chose to sleep it off.
A little while later the blonde haired boy wakes up from his nap and see's Tighnari sitting down on the grass. He walks over to him and sat down.
"Hm? You're awake a earier than expected, did you sleep well?" He looked up at the sleepy looking traveler's eyes and slightly glances up to his hair, which had a few stands that escaped from his braid.
"I slept good, though i'm still a little sleepy"
"You have to maintain coinstant vigilance in dangerous places like this. Yawning all the time like that is no good"
"It's fine, I can handle it"
"You can go and sleep for a little while longer, I'm used to staying awake all night on guard duty"
The blonde looks at Tighnari with a raised eyebrow "Well, you should go an get some sleep then"
"I'm.. not that sleepy yet." Tighnari turns his head to the side a bit.
The traveler looked up at the sky lost in thought.
"So, you came here to Sumeru in hopes of finding the Archon, is that right? What do you need from her?"
The traveler looks over at Tighnari and looks down a bit.
"I'm hoping that she can find my sister.."
"Hm.. That must be hard on you. How long ago did she go missing? If I may ask, you don't need to answer."
Aether smiled a bit at Tighnari trying not to step over boundries, but for some reason, he felt as if he could trust the tailed boy with anything.
"It's fine to ask.. but it's a bit complicated.. since well, me and my sister aren't really from this world.. so it might be a bit hard to understand"
Tighnari had a small shocked look on his face but it quickly evaporates soon after "Well, I'm willing to listen. You know traveler, you intruige me. i'm very curious about you."
"Well, for starters, I lost my sister 500 years ago.. We were teleported into this world by an unknown god. But turns out that my sister woke up before me and chose to have a mission. I don't really remeber anything before that. But I know that me and my sister traveled to different worlds. I know it would of been pretty seeing all of the different places. Whenever I try to recall what happened my mind goes foggy but I feel this small feeling of joy and love when I think about my unknown past. So I can tell I had a fun time."
"It sure looks like you did, when you were talking just now, you had love and laughter in your eyes, pretty different than the eyes I saw when I first saw you. It's nice to see, really. I'm sorry for your sister, I do hope you find her, I can see you love her dearly. You must be close with her?" Tighnari smiled at the traveler.
"Ah, yes I do, although I have had a few runins with her recently, however... She said that our time to reunite isn't near, that she still needs to complete her quest. And every time I find her, she slips away. I don't have enough strength to save her, to bring her back.."
Aether felt two hands on his shoulders, turning him to face the Sumeru man. "I'm sure your sister did that for a valid reason. I know you have plently of time to find her. I do wish you luck on your adventures, traveler."
Aether smiled at Tighnari "Please, call me Aether, I know no one actually knows my name, which is how I would like to keep it so I don't form any bonds with the people here, but I have this feeling of trust from you, well the only person who knows is Paimon, but she calls me traveler or fake names to respect my decision, i suppose."
"Well, Aether. It feels like I should be regarding you as something higher, as you said you lost your sister 500 years ago, and well I am nowhere near that age. Or do you just perfer Aether?"
"Aether is fine, I don't really want to sound that old, I mean it doesn't really go with my look does it? My look doesn't exactly scream "500 year old over here" does it?"
Tighnari laughed a bit at that, he looked the traveler up and down anlysing his physical body, which made Aether nervous a bit, wondering why he liked the thought of the boy looking at his appearence "well I do suppose you have way less younger looks, I would say your physical appearance is around the 20's zone."
"Oh really? You think so?" Aether slighty thought about it.
"Yes, I do think so, you are an attractive and beautiful young man, who I would expect to have a few people wanting you. I would be quite surprised if that's not the case though."
"I don't think I do.. I mean I appreciate the compliment, but I don't think I do"
"Anyone who says that they don't think so, does have a few people crushing on them. I know so"
"Are you speaking from experience? You yourself are attractive, it wouldn't be surprising if you had a few poeple crushing on you too"
"Okay well...-"
"-And you can't say you don't think so, that would be quite hypocritical"
The eared boy sighed
"Well probably one, but my looks are nothing compared to yours, you look like a literal angel, and I don't really have that angel look going for me."
"Well I can say you sure as hell have good looks on your side, you're quite the attractive man"
Tighanri glance away from the eye contact of the traveler.
"Okay, thank you for the compliemnt as well. I'm glad you think so."
The traveler smiles at him "Has no one called you attractive?"
The boy immediately looked up at Aether, he coughs off his look and asks "How.. did you know? How could you tell that?"
"Well, you glanced away, and when I said that, your eyes kind of opened a little bit from surpsie, they also had a cute shine to them after too, like they're full of-"
"Okay, okay, you can stop explaining how you anylased me.." he mumbles after "it's embarrassing.."
Tighnari hears the blonde chuckle a bit, after hearing the last part, as he feels a hand on his back. He looks over at the traveler
"It's fine, I'm used to anylasing people, mainly used for threats, but it just got turned into a habit"
"I see..." He looks away from Aether, wanting to change the subject before the situation gets deeper and the traveler opens his heart more.
"Oh, tra- I mean Aether, do you want me to redo your hair, as some parts are coming out."
"Oh, you know how to style hair?"
"Yes, I did Collei's hair for a little while. Come on, turn around so that I can plat your hair again"
The traveler turns around, his back facing Tighnari as he felt hands lightly undoing his hair and combing through it to get out the loose knots. Tighnari was very smooth on his hair, so smooth he felt like falling asleep while feeling the boy run his hands through the blonde locks. He feels the plat being made, and eventually he feels the warm hands move away from him, which he felt slight dissapointment by the action. He turns back around and looks at Tighnari.
"Thank you for doing my hair"
"That's alright. You have very soft and silky hair. Your hair smells nice too- Okay that sounded a bit wierd, what I meant by that is that I have a slight heighnted keen of smell so I can smell things a bit more, and I was able to smell your hair while doing it up. That's what I meant by that" The boy corrected his wording, hoping that Aether wouldn't notice the slight tint of blush on his cheeks at his misswording. Thankfully the traveler lets it go.
"Anyway I should go and get some sleep, you can keep watch, if that's okay with you?"
Aether nodded in responce and, caught in the moment, lightly kisses tighnari's cheek. He pulls away immediately and starts stuttering
"Omg please forget about that ever happening! I didn't mean to!"
Luckily his stuttering was put at ease when the eared boy leans in and gives the traveler a peck on the cheeks
"No need to get winded up about it, its fine. I'll go to sleep now."
Aether smiles and says back "Have a good night. Not too good, though."
Tighnari rushes back to the tent in surprised that he used his own line back at him. He falls asleep into a peaceful sleep with no worries on his mind.