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“I am only human. In my limited time, I cannot wait for you forever.”
Ajax’s words echo in his mind. Zhongli has watched countless summer since then, with its changing leaves and high moon. And yet, those words still etched unblemished. The only constant in Zhongli’s ever-changing world. It’s there. Unmoving. A constant reminder of a painful mark. Never gone no matter how hard he scratches. It just etched deeper, carving a permanent brand on his heart.
“Be gone, then. What is it to me to entertain you, a mere mortal?”
He said once long ago, in the darkness of his new domain. A lone candle light simmering gently, casting a shadow on Ajax’s tired face. He showed nothing on his face and told nothing on his tongue. The warm grin was gone, in its place a carefully placed blank mask to Zhongli’s sharp words. He stood stills, as if waiting for Zhongli to say something, but the geo archon heart was as unmovable as the pillars he created.
Ajax smiled then, for one last time. A faint curve that bore pain rather than joy. And then he nodded, then left, and that was the last time Zhongli ever seen him.
And the first time he found out his heart was not as much as a stone he thought it’d be.
Ajax longed for a companionship and nothing more. He emphasized on his mortality over and over again, that in his short time on earth, he wanted Zhongli by his side and he wanted to be by Zhongli’s side, but what does a god knows of mortality? Zhongli had a mountain to attend, a sky to watch. He couldn’t afford to stop a minute. Ajax was just a blink in his span of time.
Was it fear? Or was it a simple cowardice? Was it shame for being immensely smitten by a mere mortal? Maybe it was all, a toxic concoction he drank because he was mighty and above it all, and he had no time to spare for a foolish act humans called romance.
And Ajax was right. Time waits for no man.
When the cloud was gone and sobriety comes over, he treads the world for his beloved. His heart now red and beating. It longs for one person. He cries with each step, holding his heart gently in his hand. One day… one day this heart will be held by its true owner, the hand of his beloved. Each step is closer, yet it feels further. He reaches the end of the world and Ajax is still not there.
Because he is no longer in this world.
It’s not Zhongli. It’s death who takes Ajax in its embrace.
And yet, Zhongli’s heart is still beating. Dead couldn’t take him. His heart just bleeds more, red river flowing long, long to the horizon. Pooling as deep as the vast ocean.
“I am only human. In my limited time, I cannot wait for you forever.”
Ajax once said. Again, it echoes loudly in Zhongli’s mind.
It was impossible for Ajax, but not for Zhongli.
In his infinite time, he’ll wait for him forever.
.
.
.
Zhongli’s heart recognizes its owner the moment his eyes laid on him. No matter how much time passed, he’ll always know. He introduces himself as Childe, a Snezhnayan diplomat stationed in Liyue. The Eleventh Harbinger serving under the Tsaritsa. He belongs to another archon, but it’s alright.
It’s alright.
He’ll come back to him eventually.
Zhongli’s rotten heart mend slowly, each cracked healed with every gaze and head-thrown laugh. His beloved still laughs the same way, loud and carefree. The sound of it brings a smile to Zhongli’s lips without a failure.
His real name is Ajax, he finds out later. The same name he used to whispers eons ago. Zhongli sits in his balcony, staring at the sky with happiness he hasn’t had in ages. It’s a sign from Celestia, he tells himself in endless joy, of two lovers intertwined.
The thing about looking is that, you are bound to find something. Zhongli found his real name, he also found that Ajax is the harbinger the Tsaritsa promised him in their cursed contract. The only reason Ajax is even stepping in Liyue is to take everything away from him. His gnosis and his home. But it’s alright.
It’s alright.
“Why is it so hard,” Childe grumbles, clicking the chopstick in annoyance.
Zhongli sits closer, feeling his ears warmth as he takes Childe fingers among his own, moving the digits to fall better on the wooden sticks. It’s a cheap excuse, but his chest expands widely to the touch he has been denying himself for centuries. Just a tap on his fingertips, yet enough to send him soaring.
“Oh! It works!” Childe exclaims, showing the shrimp between his chopstick like a winning prize. It falls down to his lap a second later. He blinks, before bursting to a loud laugh. It’s so much like how it was, Zhongli squeezes his own hand as his smile blooms.
This is enough.
.
.
.
Childe adores his family and Tsaritsa more than anything. He doesn’t necessarily hate Zhongli. He just happens to be the archon his Tsaritsa wants a gnosis from, a tool for Childe to please his dear Tsaritsa. He is not the first nor the last priority for Childe. He is not loved nor hated. He is just here and there. Not important enough to be in a list.
With every word and every act, a new feeling wake in Zhongli’s heart. It’s bitter, a black tar whiffing an awful stench, poisoning the love he nurtured.
Jealousy, they call it.
If Childe can’t love him, at the very least he should hate him. He wants Childe to watch him, to never ignore him. Even if that’s beyond impossible, then Zhongli refuses to be the mean for Childe’s quest to earn Tsaritsa’s approval. That used to be Zhongli. Zhongli was the one Childe desperately tries to please. He’d beg on his feet just for Zhongli to glance over him.
Maybe it’s how love supposed to be. Frail in his mortal vessel, but still an ancient being in his soul, maybe Zhongli just not capable to fathom the intricacy of human’s feeling. Or maybe it’s spite. Or spite born out of love. Whatever it be, Zhongli wants Childe to hurt, to spite him.
As the gnosis passes over to Signora, Childe lets out a hollow laugh.
“So, you are Morax,” he smiles, but it never reaches his eyes.
Zhongli’s patched up wound reopened.
He hurts Childe, yet it’s himself that bleed the most.
(Is it love?)
.
.
.
He could keep his gnosis or destroy it for all he cares. All that spectacle and in the end, Childe still tread to the Cryo Archon, taking his long way home. With the gnosis changing hand, there is no reason for him to stay in Liyue.
The adepti look at him with something akin to a disappointment. They don’t voice it, but it’s there, simmering under. At that moment, Zhongli relates more to mortal than he ever been to his fellow adeptus. All the seemingly obvious terrible decision, all the helplessness, all the desperate scrambles, all lead to nothing. Childe still isn’t here. Pointless.
But, Childe— Ajax comes back.
Zhongli walks next to him in silent joy.
Ajax calls him his “friend”. Zhongli let himself drown in it. His eyes closed as his lips curved up. They are moving somewhere. It’s slow, but the path is right and true. Somewhere in the horizon, there is a place where they’ll be together as lovers, as how it should be.
He tells himself again, this is enough.