Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Albedo was set to leave his apartment at the Knights of Favonius Headquarters early in the morning, like he usually did when he left on expeditions to Dragonspine, although the conditions this time were ever so slightly different.

His apartment was sparsely furnished, set up as more of a place for him to rest in briefly than anything else. When he had joined the Knights of Favonius, they had offered lodgings, as they usually did to members that didn’t already have any, and he had taken them up on the offer. It was comprised of a decently sized room, already furnished with a bed, a desk pushed to the furthest wall from the entrance, right under a window, a dresser, and a bookshelf. Aside from said furniture, he had an easel propped up against the wall next to the bookshelf, upon which he stored several sketchbooks, notebooks, painting materials, and a sizable amount of textbooks— though most of his collection could be found in Dragonspine proper.

It was the very state of his living quarters in Mondstadt that had led to Acting Grandmaster Jean all but forcing him to go on leave.

The Traveler had dropped by not long before Jean had called him into her office that very same day, wanting to inform him of something they had learned during their adventure. He never did learn what it had been they had originally barged into his apartment for, as the conversation had very quickly devolved into the topic of his spartan living conditions. Of course, it didn’t help that they had caught him at a time where it was early even for him to be up, and that he had only returned to his apartment from an excursion the night prior, and had been too worn down to do much else other than fall face first into his bed to sleep. The pair had left just as quickly as they had arrived, and he was all too willing to let them go on their way. If what they wanted to discuss with him was truly that important, then they would seek him out another day. Preferably with some forewarning beforehand.

Of course, he couldn’t have known that they would leave only to alert Jean of some…concerns that they held for his well-being, illogical as they might have been.

He packed a few of his belongings into his well worn travel bag, most often used when he went up to his campsite, slung it over his shoulders, and left his apartment, locking the door behind him as he did so.

He felt the drastic measures Jean took to prevent him from working were overkill, and exceedingly ironic when Jean herself frequently used up most of her monthly quota of candles, lamp oil, and coffee with her self imposed late night shifts when compared to himself. Despite his misgivings, he did not speak against her when she laid them out before him during their previous meeting.

Thankfully, despite how extensive they seemed, they truly were not that complex: no taking on new investigation cases, no working on projects to aid the Knights, and absolutely no conducting research of his own or otherwise. His colleagues had been instructed to not mention any developments in any of the cases he was already even slightly involved in or otherwise, and to steer clear of any topics that had anything to do with his work when talking with him.

Jean had even alerted Sucrose of his ‘break’, and told her to only discuss matters that had nothing to do with either of their lines of work if an opportunity arose where they ended up talking— an enormous ask for either of them to subject themselves to. Albedo was sure that Sucrose would much rather avoid him altogether rather than try to carry a conversation without bringing up any of their passions and risk going against Jean’s orders.

This would be in effect for at the very least one week, after which he would report back to her office and catch up with what he had missed out on during his break. He figured that leaving the country altogether would significantly lower the possibility that someone who was aware of said break and its stated terms being able to confirm if he was actually resting amid its duration and report their confirmations to Jean at the end of his time off.

Said possibility would be much, much lower were it not for the involvement of the nation-hopping Traveler in his current predicament, but he trusted them enough to not tattle on him more than once— maybe Paimon would, but the Traveler themself was more aware of when it was appropriate to step in, and having already done so, likely would not do so again unless the situation called for it.

Jean was already in her office despite the early hour, her presence there given away by the dim candlelight visible from the space under the door leading to it. He knocked twice, and let himself in at her mumbled prompting to do so from inside.

He walked up towards her desk, where she was working on a never diminishing pile of paperwork. She massaged her temple with one hand, the other occupied with a pen, which lay on top of a piece of paper where he had caught her mid-signing, though she made no move to finish said signature as he approach. There was a cup of a dark liquid that might have (definitely was) coffee at her side, but it had long since gone cold. “I will be taking my leave to Liyue soon, and should come back near the end of the agreed upon week-long period,” he stated his business as succinctly as possible, not wanting to take up too much of her time, already taking off his bag strap from one of his shoulders and moving to open it. “I will not be taking any of my research materials with me, as per your orders. If you wish to confirm that I am telling the truth—”

“No need— thank you, Albedo,” she cut in, raising her right hand some, still holding the pen she’d been writing with. He readjusted his bag to carry it properly once more. “I didn’t take you to be the type to consider travel.”

Albedo blinked. “Why?”

“No particular reason, other than the fact that I haven’t seen you take interest in doing so when not accompanied by Klee. Why Liyue, of all places?”

“… No particular reason,” he said, echoing her words, “other than the fact that I have never set foot in the nation. The trip is not short, but it’s a more realistic notion that I’ll be able to travel there and back in the space of a week without running myself too ragged than a lot of other places I’ve wanted to visit. It’ll be a good opportunity to see the sights that the Traveler has oft relayed to me in correspondence.”

“I hope you enjoy your time there, then.”

“Thank you,” he said, and, figuring the exchange to be over, turned around and began walking back to the entrance of her office.

“Please don’t take this personally,” Jean said just as he was about to open the door. He looked back at her over his shoulder,only to find that she had gotten up from her desk, hands splayed out on its surface. “The Traveler just brought your situation to light and it hit me that as an organization, we don’t have a system in place where time off is administered unless it is explicitly requested, and I need to work on remedying that so that no one else falls through the cracks without taking any breaks as you have.”

“No such thing,” he said, his hand struggling to find the doorknob without looking at it directly, prioritizing maintaining eye contact with the Acting Grandmaster. “If it isn’t too presumptuous of me to provide an opinion, such a system would no doubt be greatly improved if you were to include yourself as part of it. Hypocrisy doesn’t befit you, Jean.”

 With that said, he left Jean to her duties, exiting the building soon after. The sun wasn’t even fully out yet by the time he made it to the gates of the city. The early morning air might’ve been chilly. Not that he could tell what counted as ‘chilly’ reliably with how acclimated to the bitter cold he was.

…Ah, how the upkeep of interpersonal relationships oftentimes relied on trust. Had he not already agreed to go on this break with Jean the previous day, and had she not gone through the trouble of making sure his company was aware of said break, he would be on his way back to his laboratory, perfectly guilt-free. Alas.

“Morning, Albedo,” Kaeya called out from further up on the road not long after he had passed the bridge that divided the city of Mond from the rest of the nation proper. He seemed to be walking back to Mondstadt from Springvale, coming up right at the interception between the road that led to the small town and the route Albedo usually took to reach Dragonspine.

“You’re up early,” Albedo pointed out. Kaeya’s appearance was more often than not pristine, a fact that he knew the man took pride in, and this morning was no different. He was breathing heavily, though, as if he’d been running. Or fighting. He could imagine either of those being the case. If he squinted, maybe Albedo could say that his hair was ever so slightly messy by Kaeya’s own standards, though he could very well be imagining that. He left his question unspoken.

“Eh, work. Nothing you should be concerned with for a good while, according to Jean,” he said, catching on to his implied query without missing a beat. ”Where are you headed? It better not be Dragonspine.”

“No,” Albedo said, not even stopping as he walked past Kaeya, taking the road on the right rather than his usual left. “Liyue. I’m traveling.”

Kaeya’s own footsteps stalled someplace behind him. “Does traveling count as resting?”

“Have a nice day, Kaeya,” he called out, throwing a hand back to wave without so much as turning around.

The sun was already well up on the sky by the time he made it to Dawn Winery, and, if only for keeping up appearances, he diverged some from the path leading to Stone Gate to walk the steps of the manor and sit himself on one of the benches in front of the building, rummaging through his bag to take a better stock of the things he had brought with him. His sketchbook jumped out at him first, its cardboard cover serving to give some structure to the fabric rucksack, along with a few pencils, pens, charcoal sticks. He had a small fabric pouch filled with hardtack. An apple. Should he need to, he had enough funds on his person to buy himself a few meals. It was less than he would be comfortable with, say, Sucrose taking with her on an outing, but it wasn’t like he needed as much sustenance as his colleagues did, so he figured it was fine.

He lingered for less than five minutes before setting off again before he could draw any more attention to himself by the slowly waking people at the manor, taking off at a brisk pace towards the path that led to Stone Gate and Liyue proper beyond it.

It was nearing early evening when he finally passed the threshold of Wangshu Inn. He completely missed the presence of he elevator and instead ended up taking the stairs all the way up to the lobby, whereupon arriving, the receptionist at the desk took note of him haggard appearance to inform him of its existence. Somewhat embarrassed (and incredibly winded), the woman— who introduced herself as Verr Goldet— helped him check into a room.

“You’re not from here, I gather?” She asked as she jotted something down into a piece of paper.

“I’m visiting from Mondstadt,” he replied, passing over the amount of money for a few days’ stay across the desk.

“Oh, lovely— I’m from there as well,” she said, sliding over the key to his room.

“From where?”

She did not answer his question, instead informing him of the amenities— such as the elevator that he had neglected to use— the outdoor restaurant, and the stalls set up by traveling merchants just outside the inn, among other things, like pointing out the general direction of Liyue Harbor should he head there at any point during his stay in Liyue. Albedo expressed his thanks, and retreated to his room for the night.

He slept like the dead, much too worn from the trip to Wangshu Inn to be caught up in the discomfort of sleeping someplace new for the night, and indicative of that, woke up much later than he was used to, being roused from sleep by the sun shining through his room’s window where he was usually up before its first rays had graced the skies.

He only stuck around long enough at Wangshu Inn to eat breakfast— when he had asked the chef for something sweet, he’d given him an odd look, and he had been served a dish Smiley Yanxiao had called ‘almond tofu’. He made sure to ask for the recipe to make for himself in the future before setting off for the wilderness, sketchbook already at hand to sit and sketch whatever struck his fancy.

He mostly stuck to the path that stretched south of the inn, though whenever there was a split in the road, he veered right, and further west, where in the far off distance, he could spot mountain peaks that seemed to reach similar heights as Dragonspine did. The view from them would no doubt be beautiful, he thought as he wandered west, right past a sign that was too high up for him to read.

The path that meandered around one of the mountains was long, and it had even him winded by the time he reached its peak. He had stopped more times than he could count in his path to sketch out various things, take notes. The height was similar to Dragonspine, but nowhere as cold, which he was not surprised by.

A crash in the distance broke him out of his focus mid-pencil stroke as he detailed the lines of a golden-leafed tree— a sound so deep that it rattled whatever foundations made up his being. His core shuddered as a weight settled over him, something deeper than panic, more primal than fear, stronger than both, a dread that threatened to swallow him whole as he searched for its source. Whether it was to his benefit, or to his detriment, it wasn’t long before he found it.

There was a darkness, a void so dense that its mass threatened to consume the world around its immediate surroundings, somewhere in the middle distance— the source of the nexus of activity every so often broken out by the sound of a blade striking against something. Not too far off from it, there was a tree, its branches glowing a pale blue as they stretched towards the afternoon sky. The Dragon-Queller— the tree under which an ancient dragon was sealed. The Traveler had told him of it, having determined that he would be interested in learning about it after having learned of his research regarding Durin’s still beating heart long after the rest of his body’s death.

The Dragon-Queller was in Nantianmen; an area easiest to reach from Jueyun Karst, the realm of the Liyue Adepti. Realization had never felt so hollow as it settled itself somewhere in his solar plexus.

Another shockwave hit the area, and the force of it had Albedo falling to his knees, his vision blurring at the edges. There was a figure, one other than the one engaged in battle with the— was that a demon? It sure fit the description of what the Traveler had mentioned offhandedly to him in the past. The woman stood her ground despite the seemingly rising pressure. Albedo forced himself to his feet, his drawing supplies forgotten at the ground where he had dropped them as he managed to break into a run towards her. He grabbed at her arm, positioning himself between her and the worst of the conflict, and she turned to him as if she had not noticed his presence before then, eyes wide behind her glasses. “It’s dangerous, we should—”

He felt the beginning of a shockwave make the ground under his feet rumble, but the worst of it never came. He realized he had pressed his eyes closed only after he had to blink them open, his vision slowly returning. The woman set him down on the ground— when had she picked him up?— and turned away. They were on a mountain peak— not the one he had walked up earlier that day, but one that oversaw most of the karst, including the now faraway pinprick of black in the distance. Slightly less importantly, he could breathe again, and even if he necessarily didn’t need to, he allowed himself a few seconds to revel in it.

It took him perhaps more effort than it should have to find his voice anew, and when he did, he only managed to utter a shaky, “What…” before the woman raised a clawed hand at him over her shoulder, her back still trained in his direction as she oversaw the battle in the distance, clearly meant to silence him. It worked. Albedo shut his mouth, very much so feeling like a scolded child despite not a single word having been aimed at him.

The minutes ticked by slowly, and with each tick of the clock, the sun dipped lower and lower into the horizon line until late afternoon faded into early evening, vibrant oranges melting into blue.

So lost was he in thought that he would be lying if he said he didn’t startle some when the woman raised her voice to speak, and he floundered as he searched for the person whom she addressed. “Do try to pay attention to your surroundings next time you engage in battle,” she said to a young man, seemingly somewhere in his twenties, as he approached, his appearance battle-worn, though not a single drop of blood marred neither his features nor his clothes. “This one had to step in to prevent any casualties.”

“The heat of battle renders it difficult to do as you suggest," the man growled, "and I am no longer so careless so as to fail to notice and account for any humans passing through the kar—” The man cut himself off as his eyes landed on Albedo. Although he had been the perfect picture of honed ferocity in battle only minutes prior from what little he could witness from afar (and even less so from the peak of the mountain the woman had taken him to) the young man now looked far more haggard than anything, leaning heavily on his spear for support, a dark aura emanating from him like a miasma. Albedo recalled both what he had read in preparation for this trip as well as what knowledge the Traveler had imparted to him, about the adepti of Liyue, and the lone surviving Yaksha that was duty bound to protect the nation from the festering remains of dead gods. The Conqueror of Demons, as he had been referred to in various historical documents, raised the gloved hand that was not already occupied with keeping himself from falling over from exhaustion, and pointed at Albedo's direction where he stood behind who he could only assume was another adeptus. “That is not a human,” he said.

Albedo distantly felt himself frown. Alright. Rude— although, he supposed, not entirely wrong. The woman—another adeptus, most likely— continued unimpeded, crossing her arms over her chest. “What of it? Could he not have still ended up hurt had one not intervened?”

The Conqueror of Demons’ eyes were still trained on Albedo, shoulders squared, jaw tensed. He was sizing him up, Albedo noted. “You. State your business.”

“I hail from Mondstadt,” Albedo said upon being prompted. “There, I am known as Albedo, or by my title of Kreideprinz. I am the Chief Alchemist of the Knights of Favonius,” he bowed his head some, uncertain as to how to show respect to the two. “I’m passing through the country on…” he stalled, hoping that they would not take his hesitation as one borne of malicious intent— he couldn’t really say he was in Liyue on business, could he? “sabbatical,” he decided on.

“Why?” The conqueror of demons pressed, sounding no less assuaged on his suspicion of Albedo than before— the single word delivered as less a question and more of a demand.

“Overwork,” Albedo answered, just as clipped as the Vigilant Yaksha’s own question had been, no less polite than he’d been before. Foreigner status or not be damned, he was not particularly in the mood for being verbally trampled on. “The Acting Grandmaster found it fit to put me on a weeklong break from my duties, and I found it fit to use said break to travel. I did not mean to be a burden, nor enter Jueyun Karst.”

The Yaksha crossed his arms over his chest. “Would it have done you in to procure a map? Or read a sign? We have a sign.”

Albedo blinked. He vaguely remembered there being one on the path he had taken to get to where he was. Not that he’d been able to read it with much accuracy; the text had been too small to read from afar, and he was a tad too short to read it when up close. There had been mention about a ‘misty realm’, that he remembered. And something about returning east.

… Upon further thought, he really should have heeded the sign even if he hadn’t been able to read it in full.

“Adeptus Xiao,” the woman chastised, long suffering.

“Cloud retainer,” the Conqueror of Demons responded. Absentmindedly, Albedo drew a connection between the Yaksha’s tone and the one Klee’s voice took when trying to convince Jean that her actions didn’t warrant consequence, even while standing right next to a sizable hole blown up into brick and stone.

It took everything in Albedo to keep his face neutral.

“Kreideprinz, a word,” the woman said, sending a pointed glare to the Conqueror of Demons.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, and almost immediately doubted himself. Was that an inappropriate way to regard an adeptus of Liyue? He tried to read her expression, but it was inscrutable.

“One apologizes for Adeptus Xiao’s…” She hesitated for a moment before landing on, “behavior,” with a resigned sigh. “One understands you are a traveler to these lands. Will you be staying long in Liyue?” The woman— who Adeptus Xiao had addressed as ‘Cloud Retainer’— asked, guiding Albedo along, and out of the other adeptus’ earshot.

“A few days, most likely, though I can leave the area if you wish me to. I really do apologize for having inconvenienced you. I hadn’t realized I had trespassed the land of the adepti until I saw the Dragon-Queller in the distance, and by that point I was already, as you yourself put it, at risk of becoming a casualty."

Cloud Retainer raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow at him. "You are aware of the unspoken boundary, of the danger you almost put yourself in, and yet failed to steer clear?"

“I am a friend of a traveler that has roamed much of Teyvat. They told me of it and some of its history, and the rest I have learned from books," he explained. "This did not translate well to practical knowledge of my surroundings, and I fear my eagerness to see the sights, as one would put it, took precedence over procuring a map."

Instead of calling him out on his very real miscalculation, Cloud Retainer instead frowned, tilting her head to one side as she considered him, looking him up and down for a moment. “Traveler, you say? Blonde? Around yay tall?” She gestured horizontally just under the height of her shoulder, just around his own height. “Followed around by a small white haired pixie?”

Albedo perked up some at the description of the Traveler. “Yes,” he said.

“You are a friend of theirs?” He nodded. “Hmph. That child keeps strange company. That being said, this changes matters a considerable amount. One trusts them and their judgement implicitly." She tapped her chin with a clawed finger, deep in thought for but a moment. "When first you noticed something was amiss, you first moved to protect oneself over prioritizing your own wellbeing before learning of one's own status as an adepti, and thus, a being more resistant to the corruption the demons that haunt Liyue are capable of inflicting," she started. "While one such moment is not enough to judge a being's character, it is in instances of heightened danger that true colors are often shown. Speak your truth, Kreideprinz— do you have any intention to harm Liyue or its people?"

"No."

"Then you are henceforth permitted entrance into Jueyun Karst. Should you bring harm of any kind to either the karst or Liyue, however, one and one's colleagues in arms shall be forced to rescind this permission, and bring you to retribution."

"You have my gratitude," he said.

"One shall be alerting the other adepti of the karst of your presence," she motioned for him to approach her, and upon doing so, she pointed at the mountain peaks visible in the distance with a clawed finger. "That is Qingyun Peak, home to Moon Carver, Mt. Hulao, home Mountain Shaper,we are currently on Mt. Aocang, where one's own abode resides. One shall allow you permission to set up camp there, should you need it, as one only briefly returned to retrieve some mechanisms, and shall be taking one's leave to Liyue Harbor."

Which meant that she had only been present to get him away from the crossfire of Adeptus Xiao’s battle with demons by complete and utter coincidence. Gratitude melded with guilt over having inconvenienced the woman. "There is truly no need to offer me shelter, Cloud Retainer. I can very well return to Wangshu Inn if need be."

She glanced back at him over her red-rimmed glasses. "An offer is merely that— an offer. It need not be taken if the recipient is not willing, and yet the giver is by definition duty-bound to comply in having given it at all, which one is," she said. Her gaze softened. "Should we meet again, one would appreciate being addressed as Xianyun," she corrected, not unkindly, then added, "One should not have need to repeat that you are not to disturb Conqueror of Demons while he performs his duty, yes?"

“I will not,” he said, with perhaps more conviction than necessary. Several meters away, just outside what would constitute a human's range of hearing, stood the very same Conqueror of Demons whom they were discussing, jade spear still at hand, though he had long since stopped leaning on it for support to stand. He was also very pointedly glaring at Albedo. He was sure beyond the shadow of a doubt that Xianyun had only asked him to follow her a few paces away from the other adeptus for his own comfort; Adeptus Xiao certainly had to have heard every word of their conversation.

With an approving nod, she handed him a yellowed slip of paper— a talisman that she referred to as a 'Sigil of Permission'— and walked away from him and towards where Adeptus Xiao had been all but glaring daggers at Albedo. She talked with him briefly, and Albedo, not exactly in the possession of more acute senses than what was normal, was not capable of overhearing the conversation. Whatever Xianyun had to tell him, Adeptus Xiao was not pleased to hear it, and Albedo not so surreptitiously looked away when he turned his piercing gold eyes to glower at him.

When he looked up, both Adeptus Xiao and Xianyun were gone, and he had been left alone.

Albedo left soon after, and his trek back to Wangshu Inn was much shorter than the one he took to leave it just that morning by way of not having much interesting in dawdling as he had before. He felt the weight of a pair of eyes trained on him even after he passed the threshold of Jueyun Karst, the presence following him only dissipating after he had closed the door of his room at the inn behind him. He sunk into the bed provided by the inn, all but bodily throwing himself into the plush mattress.

His limbs felt leaden as he went about taking off his boots. Maybe the others at the Knights of Favonius were right, and he did actually need the rest. He had mostly agreed to go along with Jean’s proposal in order to both assuage her worries and avoid conflict, but it wasn’t like his own body did much of a good job at communicating when he needed to take a step back from either work or his research until he was already dangerously close to collapsing—  a fact that he had never divulged to his colleagues.

That, or the run in with the Conqueror of Demons doing just as his duty-given title implied— albeit both brief and from a distance— had sapped some of his energy. He fell asleep not long after.

He left Wangshu Inn just as early the next day.

The feeling of someone observing his every move returned with a vengeance as soon as he neared the sign that Adeptus Xiao had spoken of the day prior. Its script was faded past the point of easy readability. Albedo ignored it. The Sigil of Permission lay comfortably and carefully folded up in half in an inner pocket of his jacket. Whether it was a matter of its material, or of the nature of the seal placed upon it, the talisman’s paper didn’t crease when folded, and Albedo surmised it would likely take some effort to actually damage it. Despite this, he was not about to test that assumption.

He walked past the shack inhabited by a man (who he was more than sure was a scammer), and his disciple, and across the first of several rope bridges to a dilapidated pavilion. He was all too willing to sit down at the bench set underneath the shade it provided. He briefly considered Kaeya’s words to him from what felt like an eternity ago. Perhaps traveling did not fall as neatly within the confines of ‘resting’ as Albedo had initially hoped it would. He slipped his bag off of his shoulder, retrieved his clipboard, set his pencil to the page, and paused, the intensity of the scrutiny being aimed at him having reached a boiling point.

He breathed in, out, slight irritation making his lungs stutter in what should have been a steady movement. Albedo set down his clipboard by his side, perhaps more forcefully than absolutely necessary, and cleared his throat. “If you’re going to watch me, I’d rather you do it where I can see you.”

Adeptus Xiao’s footsteps were near silent as he approached Albedo. He cast a shadow on the ground a few steps behind him, to his left. Albedo made a point of not turning around to face him. “Cloud retainer told me to keep an eye on you,” he said.

“Did she, now?” Albedo asked, knowing full well that the probability of the adeptus affirming his rhetorical was close to none. He was proved right a few moments later. “I already told her that I mean Liyue no ill will. I don’t fault you for not believing me, nor for not having forgiven my trespassing of the karst. However, the very same Cloud Retainer who told you to supervise me allowed me passage,” he said, reaching into the inner pocket of his coat that contained the yellowed, yet sturdy talisman that the woman had given him shortly before leaving. “I believe she called this a Sigil of Permission? From what I understand, these are not given lightly.”

Adeptus Xiao did not conceal his displeasure at Albedo essentially waving the Sigil of Permission in his face, and all but stormed off in a huff.

Mood soured some, though not entirely, Albedo finished his drawing, picked up his things, and left Jueyun Karst almost as quickly as he had arrived despite the early hour.

He spent the rest of the day at Wangshu Inn, sketching the people and scenery visible from there instead. Inevitably, he ended up attracting people, and his sketchbook ended up a few pages short by the end of the day as he had ended up selling a few of his drawings after people wouldn’t take his work for free. At the end of the day, he was winded, though not in the physical sense he often was after pulling a handful of all-nighters, but in a social one, having ended up talking with more people than he had bargained for when he sat himself at one of the tables just outside of the inn.

He didn’t go to Jueyun Karst the next day, instead wandering to Liyue Harbor. Despite having set out before the sun dawned, it was still a long walk there, and the sun was almost at its apex in the sky when he actually made it to Liyue Harbor proper.

The hustle and bustle of the city was overwhelming, but it was a great deal more orderly than Mondstadt’s only barely organized chaos cramped into the walls of its city. Problem was that he was at least somewhat used to Mondstadt, and not yet to Liyue; as things stood, the open Liyuan wilderness was more friendly to him and his senses than the city was. He only stayed long enough to briefly leave a message of greeting to Xingqiu at the Feiyun Commerce guild, who was off on business, and buy a kite for Klee from a woman who introduced herself as Granny Shan. She was all too delighted to help him decide on one upon her questioning who he was buying for, and the one he ended up picking one that looked like a fish, and weighed him down little.

He didn’t linger much aside from buying himself some lunch at Wanmin Restaurant before setting off again.

The sun had still been high in the sky when he left the harbor, and it was nearing night when he returned to Wangshu Inn. Overstimulation still making his skin buzz with discomfort, he was all too willing to drop his belongings at the door to his room and pass out face down on his rented bed.

On his third day in Liyue he made the trek up Mt. Aocang as Xianyun had offered days prior. Unlike Xiao, who had not kept his distrust of him a secret, the adeptus known as Cloud Retainer had seemed genuine enough in her offer, and hadn’t done anything to take it back other than perhaps siccing Xiao on him. There was no adeptal barrier preventing his passage, and no sign—adeptal or otherwise— instructing outsiders to stay away at the peak of Mt. Aocang regardless.

Winded from the climb, he approached the stone chairs and table set at the middle of the small pond, dragging his feet some as he slung his bag from his shoulder. Upon doing so, he noticed the carvings set into the stone chairs. “Here sits Retainer” one chair read. “Here sits Rex” read another. “Here sits Guizhong” read the last.

Albedo sat on the ground a few paces away from the stone chairs and table, against the trunk of the tree that guarded the area with its shade.

He dug around his bag for something to eat, fishing out an apple and a small pocketknife, and began the slow work of cutting it into pieces and peeling it, mostly out of muscle memory, as he often did the same for Klee.

He idly wondered how she was doing in Mondstadt right around the time he felt a shift in the air, the weight of a presence that hadn’t been there before somewhere out of his immediate line of sight. Familiar with his presence by now, he paid it no mind, finished cutting and peeling the first slice, held it in his mouth between his teeth, and began working on a second.

Albedo wordlessly offered Xiao an apple slice after catching the other man following his movements with his gaze a few paces away, not the least surprised at the other's sudden appearance.

"Adepti have no need for human sustenance," he said, turning his head away and towards the stone table and chairs, the table clearly having been set for a meal, albeit one that had to have started and ended centuries prior.

Albedo shrugged, content to finish eating his first slice and throw the second slice into his mouth without further inquiry. Xiao, however, didn’t seem to be content with this arrangement in the least despite having been the one to decline Albedo’s offer. Even with most of his body turned away from Albedo, he still peered at him from his peripherals.

Albedo had finished half of his meal (if a singular apple could be considered a meal at all— which it could, for him, at least) when he spoke up to say, “May I ask you a question?”

“Make it quick,” Xiao said, despite the irrefutable fact that, had he something more pressing to do with his time, he would most certainly not be using it to shadow Albedo. Again.

Albedo suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. Being openly rude not only to someone who already clearly did not regard him well, but also to a person of as high standing as Adeptus Xiao while in a nation he was an outlander to was a plain bad idea. “You initially did not notice my entering the karst, as you didn't recognize my presence as human. Is there a particular reason why?”

It took several minutes for Adeptus Xiao’s answer to come. Albedo did not press it.

“I am no scholar, nor as knowledgeable in these matters as one like Cloud Retainer, but,” he punctuated his words with a cursory glance in Albedo’s direction out of the corner of his eye, which Albedo caught. They maintained eye contact for but a second before Xiao broke it. “You do not share in the same air or presence as a vision holder, much less that of an ordinary human.”

Xiao fell silent, in that way people often did that Albedo knew meant they wanted to say something more, unspoken words held hostage where they rested on the tip of his tongue.

Adeptus Xiao was a curious individual. So often did he decry humanity and the tendencies associated with it, especially when it had anything to do with him, and yet, almost equally as often, his own proclivities were no different than the ones he dismissed as ones only mortals possessed.

He did not comment on this. Instead, Albedo met Xiao’s internal speculations with a hum, and nothing else. They didn’t speak on it further, and Albedo finished the rest of his meal in silence.

When Albedo got up from his spot, leaving his heavier bag behind and carrying only his sketchbook and a charcoal pencil under his arm, Xiao followed after him. His footsteps were silent on the grass, and as Albedo settled down on a corner of Mt. Aocang’s peak with a particularly scenic view, he found he could almost imagine he was alone, if he ignored the definite weight that Xiao’s steady, quiet presence provided.

Just as he had many times before by this point, he paid it no more mind than he would any other person, set his pencil to the paper of his sketchbook, and began to draw.

Starting was always the most difficult, he found— though it was not something that couldn’t be overcome with a few experimental lines to set down the vague idea of whatever he was sketching, and the same was the case here. After a few seconds of laying down the foundations of the sketch, he was fully immersed in his labor, only interrupted in small bursts whenever the wind picked up enough to rustle the page he was drawing on.

Xiao’s heavy gaze did not leave the back of his neck. At some point between Albedo putting the last finishing touches of his depiction of the view and aimlessly doodling various different plants, animals, and structures he had seen during his stay in Liyue, Xiao had actually lowered himself to the ground next to him.

Albedo cleared his throat, having found that doing so was effective in getting Xiao’s attention. It did. “I’m going to be taking some seeds and flowers back to Mondstadt with me,” he said by way of explanation as he finished the last touches on a sketch of the local flora. “Is that going to be a problem?”

“No,” Xiao said. “As long as you do not take more than what is needed.”

Albedo nodded. “Of course. I’d loath to throw the local ecosystem out of balance.”

“What will you be taking them for?”

“Some for my assistant, Sucrose, who studies bio-alchemy, and for my little sister, Klee,” he said. Albedo didn’t miss a small twitch of one of Xiao’s eyebrows, falling short of raising it in question. Albedo readily elaborated, “I’d like her to have a hobby that does not include blowing things up, and I’m sure Jean and the other Knights of Favonius would appreciate it as well. Taking care of a few plants seems like a good place for her to start with gardening, and I don’t want to go back home empty-handed after leaving her with the others for so long.”

Xiao considered Albedo, then his rendition of a smattering of flowers he had sketched from memory after having spotted them from afar. “Don’t take qingxin. They only grow on the rocky mountain peaks of Liyue. Keeping them on either normal soil or in a pot would not do them well. They'll wilt.”

“Is that so?” Xiao hummed his acknowledgement into the windy peaks of the karst. “Then they are not dissimilar from cecilias, which only bloom on Starsnatch Cliff in Mondstadt, and yet,” his gloved hands sought purchase on the Liyuan soil, and he plucked off a browned blade of grass that was already well on its way to drying in the sun. It took but a small spark of alchemy to bring the cecilia to life in his hand, its delicate petals spreading out as it bloomed, and its stem taking form in between his thumb and forefinger. “New birth finds a way to spring forth despite the circumstances therein. You needn’t worry about them wilting as long as I am there to provide guidance.”

Albedo set down the newly formed cecilia down on his clipboard, considering his options as he gazed out at the view from the peak of Mt. Aocang. The sun was beginning to dip into the horizon, dyeing the sky various shades of oranges, yellows, pinks. It was in moments like these he wished he had brought at least some of his art supplies with him other than his charcoal pencils to at least try to render the view around him in paper or canvas. The traveler had certainly not exaggerated about the wondrous views in Liyue. With such a view as a backdrop, he wondered— would it be an insult to offer the cecilia to Xiao as a gift? With how disdainful the adeptus had been regarding anything of the material world, he figured it likely would be taken as one. He could always press it in one of the notebooks he had brought with him, he supposed.

So taken was he with his musings that he didn’t notice Xiao approaching until he sat next to him, leaning slightly towards him. Not enough for them to actually be touching, but enough that he was very much so in Albedo’s personal space, Xiao’s attention held captive by the flower still held in his hand. Albedo stilled his movements, apprehensive that not doing so would prompt the adeptus to return to his previous facade of detachment.

Xiao’s eyes had not left the cecilia flower, and there was something in them that hadn’t been there before— the faintest hint of wonder. He didn’t look up at Albedo’s face as he addressed him, eyes trained on the flower with laser focus. “Is it alive?”

“As alive as any plant recently plucked from the earth, I suppose.” Which was to say, that it was alive, though it wouldn’t stay that way for long. At most, a week, if cared for in a vase properly, though Albedo didn’t have the means to sustain it for that long, and asking the adepti of Liyue for a vase to store it in felt, at best, absurd. “I can crystallize it so that it doesn’t wilt, though,” he suggested as the idea occurred to him.

Xiao reached out a hand towards the cecilia as if he hadn't heard much of what he'd just told him, his movements slight, almost timid. Albedo wasted no time in handing it to him. The Conqueror of Demons cradled the delicate growth in his gloved hands with a gentleness unsuited to one bearing such a title. “That… was alchemy? I was not aware that it could do that.”

“Art of Khemia is a form of alchemy, and it is what my master trained me on,” Albedo explained, realizing a moment too late that he was speaking to a being old enough to recognize the art he spoke of, and understand the implications that the statement bore. He briefly considered if he should lie should Xiao question him further, and soon after, wondered if the adeptus would be able to tell if he was being deceived.

If Xiao perceived said implications, however, his face did not show it. The wonder was still there, if somewhat subdued, as he carefully felt at the petals of the flower, tracing the curve of the delicate tissue. “May I keep this?” he asked after a concerningly long bout of silence, not quite looking up at Albedo.

"Ah— sure? I have no need for it myself. Do you wish for me to crystallize it?"

He did, in fact, end up crystallizing the cecilia flower for Xiao, and in doing so, soon after found something else out:

Adeptus Xiao was a curious individual, sure—

He was also, generally, curious.

“You have a sister,” Xiao started, lingering only a few paces behind Albedo as he reached for the small shoot of purple flowers growing from a rocky cliff. He very pointedly left the question hanging in the air, unspoken.

“Adoptive,” Albedo supplied, gently prying the roots of the growth from the stony surface it dwelled on. “Her mother, Alice, helped me settle in Mondstadt when I arrived there. She has always insisted I call her ‘mother’.”

A minute pause, though no more than five seconds long. “And do you?”

Albedo let his silence speak for him as he jumped off from where he had climbed to retrieve the flower, once again facing Xiao where he stood leaning against a nearby Sandbearer tree.

“Do you not sleep?” Albedo found himself asking while he worked on stoking the flame set under a cooking pot for warmth as the night chill began to set in.

“Adepti have no need for it,” came the quick answer. Albedo’s eyebrows disappeared under part of his hair as he raised them. If he were to go merely off of Xiao’s words, then he would have a very skewed view of what adepti had actual need or want for. The stone table not too far off from where they were had a bottle of wine (though long empty), bowls, and chopsticks set on its surface, and he doubted that any traveler would dare to set up a cooking pot in Cloud Retainer’s home, or that she would allow it to remain had she not wanted it there.

“But do you?” He pressed.

The wind howled around them, only accompanied by the crackle of the fire. “...I can,” Xiao relented, a solid five minutes after Albedo had first posed the question.

“So you choose not to,” Albedo concluded. Xiao neither refuted nor confirmed it.

Xiao was gone when Albedo woke up in the morning after camping out at Mt. Aocang. Albedo took his time getting out of his sleeping bag, and meandered through the practiced motions of brewing himself a pour over cup of coffee over the fire. Although he wasn’t as fond of it as Jean, the fact that it didn’t have the same effect on him than it did on her notwithstanding, he could appreciate it some when the situation called for it. He was not alone for long.

Xiao announced his presence with a strangled, pained cry as he materialized at Mt. Aocang, one that had Albedo jumping into motion.

“Stay back,” Xiao rasped, all but collapsing in a heap several meters away from Albedo, only remaining mostly upright by virtue of using his spear as a makeshift cane.

“Why, pray tell, should I do that?” Albedo said, eyeing the Yaksha after having essentially dropped everything to rush to Xiao’s side. He wasn’t injured. Albedo frowned. No. Slight correction; he didn’t seem injured, not by human metrics— but much like during their initial meeting, he was enveloped by a darkness, one similar to the presence that had almost managed to incapacitate Albedo in its oppressiveness.

(Funny. Xiao had more than once warned him against using said human metrics on him, and only now had Albedo’s hesitation to heed said warnings proved to be an issue.)

The effect that this miasma had on him now was similar, but greatly diminished. At Xiao's insistence, Albedo stayed far from him while he recovered from his flare-up, though not far enough to impede further conversation. He sat on the ground, keeping Xiao’s face in view so that he may be better able to gauge his condition as the worst of it abated. "What is the nature of your affliction?" he asked, because asking, ‘what can I do to help?’ felt both too forward and more likely to be met with dissent than the alternative.

"Karmic," Xiao responded gruffly, though Albedo got the feeling this was due to said affliction and not because of the adeptus' natural curtness.

“…Karmic,” Albedo repeated in hopes that he would be met with further elaboration from the Yaksha.

He wasn’t. Instead, Albedo sat with him until the worst of Xiao’s karmic condition lessened, and the two were able to return to the tentative semblance of a routine that had been forming between them.

Upon Albedo’s prompting (although it would not be wrong to also refer to it as nagging), Xiao reluctantly instructed him on how to prepare qingxin tea.

“It will not help,” Xiao said, even as Albedo went through the process of alchemically drying the flowers for tea and setting them on the two mugs he had set out for him and Xiao respectively

“Will it hurt, then?” Albedo asked, setting some water to boil over the flame.

“No,” Xiao admitted.

“Then I don’t see the harm in it— here,” the water boiled quickly over the fire, and Albedo wasted no time in pouring it over the dried herbs in their mugs and handing one to Xiao, who wordlessly took it with a slight incline to his head, almost a bow. “Careful— it’s hot,” he warned out of habit, but Xiao had already taken a first tentative sip of his drink.

Satisfied with his handiwork, Albedo moved to set up his own mug of tea, all too aware of Xiao’s eyes on him

“It is bitter,” Xiao warned.

Albedo took a long sip of it. He wordlessly reached for the small pouch where he carried sugar cubes and dropped a few more into the drink. At his side, Xiao breathed out sharply, somewhere between a huff, and maybe a laugh.

Albedo saw Xiao take something that looked like a pill in between small sips of his tea.

Albedo averted his gaze to give the adeptus some privacy. The small pouch Xiao had put away just as quickly as he had retrieved seemed almost fully depleted of its contents. He didn’t ask.

“Why the insistence on doing this?”

“I want to see something,” Albedo said— more like yelled out, really— from where he had started the slow ascent up Mt. Aocang’s rocky cliff face that led towards its true highest point.

Despite the wind, and despite the distance, Xiao’s voice managed to carry to him with ease from where he stood a good several meters under where Albedo was holding on to the cliff face for dear life. It didn’t seem like he was raising it any. “What would you want to see that badly?"

Albedo only answered him with a huff as he pulled himself up to a ledge— not without some considerable effort. Inhuman constitution or not, he could not exactly push himself past certain limits. Or, he could, but not without consequence. He was not in the mood to have a limb crack under too much pressure because he didn’t think to control how much of his weight he placed on it in front of Xiao, or anybody else for that matter.

Catching his breath took him the better half of a minute, and by the time he had, Xiao was already at his side, looking up at the red leaves of the tree growing on the peak of the mountain. “You want to go all the way up?” He asked.

Albedo got up on his own, dusting off his knees as he did so. “Yes.”

“I can take you there,” Xiao said, and, going against Albedo’s assumptions, offered him his arm, presumably to hold on to. Albedo eyed the limb, waiting for a confirmation on this lest he offend him. Xiao looked back at him sharply. “Grab on,” he ordered.

Albedo obliged.

In the space of time between Albedo haltingly placing a hand on Xiao’s arm, and blinking a singular time, there was a burst of anemo and what he had now started to recognize as adeptal energy, the distinct feeling of falling for but a split second, and then breeze, blowing ever so slightly colder and wilder than before. Albedo swatted away his hair with his free hand as it was blown into his eyes, and Xiao just as quickly extricated his arm from his grasp.

“Thank you,” he managed, brushing his hair out of his face to the best of his ability— anemo and its effects had the a quality of lingering in organic materials for a few seconds after being used. This, of course, included hair, as much as Albedo wished it didn’t in this very moment, if only so he could address Xiao properly.

Xiao hummed.

Albedo set his gaze east, wandering past a statue of a crane atop the spiral pattern of the stone peak, and onto the snowy mountains of Dragonspine. The Skyfrost Nail at its peak was but a line of blue in the night sky in the distance, just as it had been since the Traveler had restored it

Xiao regarded him quietly as he approached him. He didn’t ask outright.

Albedo answered him anyway, pointing out the Skyfrost Nail set against the sky. Xiao followed his words with rapt attention. “That is the peak of Dragonspine,” he said, then, feeling silly for having pointed out a geographic location to one that was likely already familiar with it, added, “my campsite is there. It’s where I conduct most of my research.”

“There is one of those in the Chasm,” Xiao said.

“...Oh?”

“In the underground mines.”

“You’ve seen it?”

“Briefly,” Xiao said in a tone that all but discouraged any questions for further elaboration. Despite this, he added, “It would take a lot to convince me to enter its depths again outside of a crisis.”

“I can imagine,” Albedo said. “A divine nail at the depths of the world, and another at its heights… one can only wonder the reasons for them being cast down on Teyvat.” Xiao was silent. “The traveler has been up there, you know,” Albedo said. “I can only imagine what being that high up might feel like.”

“Why not go there yourself?”

“The climb up to Dragonspine’s peak is long and arduous, and most of the time I’m there, it’s on business of some sort or another,” he said.

It wasn’t a lie. Not a full one, at least. He had heard from none other than the Traveler themself that the divine nails cast down from the heavens were rather adept at breaking down that borne of the abyss. Albedo, being a synthetic human created with the power of Art of Khemia, had quite frankly no idea what being in close proximity to such a structure would do to him. It could very well do nothing. He was not eager to test this.

Xiao was contemplative where he stood by his side. When he next spoke, Albedo would have actually been lying if he said it didn’t startle him some. “There is someplace high up, here in the Karst,” he said, his words stilted, hesitant. Albedo looked at him out of the corner of his eye. His shoulders were set so that he was ever so slightly curled in on himself, chin tucked in, his head turned away from Albedo. He looked almost bashful. Albedo marveled at this some. “I do not know if it is as high up as the Skyfrost Nail, but I can take you there, if you so wish.”

Albedo considered him. “Would I be allowed in this place?”

“Good question,” Xiao made a show of (pretending) to think on this matter. “Cloud Retainer allowed you passage into the place of her abode, and the dwelling in the clouds should be an extension of that since it was her creation.”

“...So, would I be allowed there?”

“If she were to be against it, then you would not be here,” Xiao said cryptically.

Albedo decided to take him at his word.

Xiao offered him his arm again. This time, Albedo only hesitated some before taking it.

The view from the dwelling in the clouds was beautiful, and when Albedo realized he had left his sketchbook behind in Mt. Aocang when he expressed his want to immortalize it on paper and graphite, Xiao was kind enough to make the trip back to retrieve it for him.

They talked late into the night— Albedo doing most of it— and watched the sunrise together until noon neared.

Albedo collapsed.

It happened quickly and without much warning aside from a slight dizziness that settled over him as he stood up from the ground to go fetch his sketchbook and clipboard from where he’d left it in his bag. He didn’t even notice he had fallen until he distantly noted the grassy ground pushed against his cheek.

He frowned, made a definite attempt at getting back up. He was unsuccessful. His arms didn’t even move in response to his will. At most, one of his fingers twitched, if just barely.

Xiao had been at his side the moment he’d noticed he had collapsed, a gloved hand placed on his shoulder. Irritation at his failure to carry out something as simple as getting up began to eat at his composure.

“Can you,” Xiao paused; Albedo, being unable to see his expression from his current (bad) vantage point, could only imagine what Xiao’s expression looked like, “get up?”

Albedo’s fourth attempt at doing just that came and went. He managed a humorless laugh. “No,” he said.

Xiao’s hand remained on Albedo’s shoulder, its weight steadying, grounding. “Is this because of the overwork you mentioned?”

“Oh,” Albedo said. He hadn’t expected Xiao to remember him saying that. “Very likely.”

Another bout of silence.

Albedo was genuinely considering simply taking a nap there for half an hour if it would help him get enough energy to get back up when Xiao announced, “I will take you to your room at Wangshu Inn.”

“There is no need for that—”

“Do you intent to just lie there and make me watch, then?”

Unable to dispute that, Albedo let Xiao pick him up from the ground. His touch was careful as he folded Albedo’s arms to wrap around his neck, securing his place on the adeptus’ back.

“I don’t think I have the strength to hold on,” Albedo pointed out, his face nestled against the crook of Xiao’s neck and shoulder, having long passed the point by which he would have been embarrassed by this situation.

“I will not let you fall,” Xiao said, with the same amount certainty one would have when saying that the sky was blue and vast.

Every other one of Xiao’s steps was followed by the distinct rush of anemo and adeptal energy that marked a several meters crossed in a matter of seconds. At one point, Albedo let his eyes slide shut.

This did not escape Xiao’s notice. “Did you hit your head when you fell?”

“I cannot get concussed,” Albedo confessed.

Xiao stepped over a shallow stream“...That was not what I asked.”

“Oh,” Albedo said dully. “I did. Somewhat. I’m fine.”

Xiao hummed. Albedo got the feeling he did not believe him. “This has happened before?”

“Not around others, no.”

“What did you do, then?”

“Nothing,” he said. Wangshu Inn had long since come into view.

Albedo settled his head back onto the crook of Xiao’s neck. “...Do your comrades know?”

“About what?” Albedo asked, not particularly in the mood to breach this topic and making the deliberate choice to play dumb to avoid it.

He could almost hear the ensuing eye roll from Xiao. “They do not, I assume.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. What’s it to you?”

Xiao ignored his question to ask his own. “Were you aware your condition had worsened to this degree?”

“No,” Albedo admitted. “I am not able to tell when it has worsened at all, most of the time.”

Xiao shushed him gently as they approached the entrance of Wangshu Inn. In two blinks’ time, they were past Verr Goldet’s reception desk, and in another, further down the hall. “May I…”

Albedo blinked. Xiao had been monitoring him for the past several days with varying levels of intensity, and yet this line, he wouldn’t cross? “Yes? You can put me down if you want, I think I can stand up on my own for a—”

He didn’t get to finish that sentence before the both of them were already inside his room. Xiao set him down on the bed, just as careful as he had been when picking him up in the first place.  

He was not, however, as careful with his words. “You came here because the acting grandmaster sent you away for overwork, and you decided that this would be a perfect opportunity to walk half a country more than once in the span of a few days while running off of scraps?” Xiao asked as soon as they could regard each other face to face again, arms crossed over his chest.

“I haven’t been conducting myself much differently from how I do in Mondstadt,” Albedo countered weakly.

“Maybe so, but are you exerting yourself in Mondstadt as you have been during your time in Liyue?” Albedo let his silence speak for him. “If your comrades are not aware of your… condition, then you should at least trust them enough to help you identify when you are nearing your limits if you are unable to do so yourself.”

“That feels somewhat hypocritical coming from you,” Albedo pointed out.

“I am not the one bedbound at the moment, am I?”

…Fair.

“I will go to the kitchen and bring back something for you,” Xiao said.

“You have no need to do this,” Albedo said.

“Cloud Retainer asked me to watch you,” Xiao said. It sounded like an excuse.

Albedo sighed. “Sure, Xiao.”

“I will be back soon.”

He was left alone in his room, and, with not much else to do, resigned himself to bedrest, not amused in the least by the fact that his original plan to leave Mondstadt to avoid someone fussing over him had rather ironically backfired on him.

The door to his room creaked open, effectively waking Albedo up from his light doze. Long enough had passed that he had recovered enough of his bearings to sit up on his own, stifling the barest hint of a yawn with a hand. “No teleporting this time?”

Xiao approached after closing and locking the door behind him, a bowl of something steaming at hand, which he set down by his bedside. “Anemo would have made the soup cool down faster, and Smiley Yanxiao said this was better served warm, if not hot.”

Oh.

That was incredibly endearing.

Xiao turned away from him as he ate. Albedo was grateful for the fact that he had regained enough of his bearings to eat by himself in the time since collapsing.

“This is of Liyuan make,” Xiao noted, breaking the silence a few minutes into it, looking at the kite Albedo had purchased for Klee in Liyue Harbor where it sat on the desk provided by the inn that he had only used to hold his things up till then.

“It’s for my sister,” he said. “I bought it in Liyue Harbor a few days ago.”

Xiao raised an eyebrow at that, but did not comment further. Albedo finished the rest of his food, set the bowl by his bedside table.

“You should sleep,” Xiao said.

“I should,” Albedo agreed.

They stared at each other.

“Sleep does not come easily to me,” Albedo disclosed.

“You had no such issues on Mt. Aocang.”

“Having company helped.”

Xiao studied him. “Then I shall stay.”

Albedo breathed out a laugh, pulling the covers over himself. “Because Cloud Retainer asked you to watch me?’

His teasing was met with what he was sure was an embarrassed huff.

The chair Xiao had been sitting at was empty when Albedo woke up the next morning.

On the last possible day he could stay in Liyue without going over his self imposed one week vacation time, he checked out of Wangshu Inn before dawn had set in to an ever dutiful Verr Goldet. To his perplexity, the woman thanked him as she went about finalizing the transaction. He asked her why, but she refused to budge on it, just as she had refused to divulge where exactly from Mondstadt she hailed from when she offhandedly mentioned being from there.

He started his day the same way he had started his others while in Liyue— by wandering towards Jueyun Karst, though he made a point to avoid stepping past the sign that he still couldn't read in full that he now knew marked its true entrance. He sketched a few more plants, parts of the scenery, even small animals, even though his sketchbook had long since filled up with similar drawings of roughly the same things.

“I will be leaving Liyue today,” he spoke into the wind, knowing that it would carry his words to where they might be heard by the Vigilant Yaksha, and yet not fully understanding why he had done as such until he heard the tell-tale 'woosh!' of Xiao materializing somewhere behind him.

Xiao's expression was guarded when Albedo turned to see him, and he avoided his eyes even as he approached him. “I will escort you,” he said, “only as far as Wangshu Inn.”

“Thank you,” Albedo said.

Despite Xiao having offered to escort him, for the first stretch of the walk toward  Wangshu Inn in the distance, Xiao walked a few strides in front of him until Albedo was able to catch up, though he was only able to do so by jogging until they walked roughly side by side. Their shoulders didn’t brush as they walked, but it was a close thing.

The silence between them hung heavy, in a way it hadn’t been since the two of them had first made each other’s acquaintances.

"If possible, I would like to stay in touch,” Albedo managed to say. “I don't travel often, and my work is the opposite of sparse. I wouldn't wish to impose in putting a specific label on your own duties, but I can hazard a guess that your case is somewhat similar in that regard. Would you be favorable to a correspondence agreement?"

Xiao stared at him for a long time. His steps slowed enough to allow Albedo to keep up with him without having to maintain a light jog. "Why?"

"Why what?"

Seemingly not having expected Albedo to shoot another question back at him as quickly as he had, Xiao averted his gaze. "There would be no need to stay in touch once you leave Liyue."

Albedo considered the Yaksha for a moment. During the scant amount of time he'd known him, he had not failed to notice the almost melancholy air he had to him; like he only breathed and kept on living because he felt he had no other choice but to, rather than for the joy of the miracle of life itself. He breathed in, out. It had rained shortly before dawn, and the air still carried the faint scent of petrichor. "Your presence is gentle, and I value the company of those who don't mind keeping up with my tangents," He could see Stone Gate coming into view from afar as they trekked through Dihua marsh. Xiao had only agreed to accompany him as far as Wangshu Inn, and they had long since passed it. "Just those attributes alone would aid most people in me taking a liking to them, and they are by no means the only reason I would appreciate the opportunity to continue to make your acquaintance in the future."

They continued to walk in silence, and did so until the ground they walked on changed from shallow ponds, to the paved rock of the steps that led up to Stone Gate, and the path back to Mondstadt. Xiao had stopped walking a few meters behind him by the time Albedo set foot on the land that converged the nations of Liyue and Mondstadt. He had already resigned himself to Xiao's lack of answer as a refusal as he turned around to thank the adeptus for his company and guardianship over the duration of his  short stay in Liyue.

"Send your correspondence to Wangshu Inn," Xiao said, beating him to speaking by a hair's breadth. "I am more likely to receive it if it arrives there."

He didn't get the chance to thank him as the Vigilant Yaksha of Liyue disappeared in a plume of adeptal smoke.