Chapter Text
When the Devoted Doubt - Part 1
To Lumine, it should have been like any other day.
Just another afternoon spent making the plains and mountains of Liyue a little safer. Quashing the ubiquitous churlish threat and Abyssal abominations swarming the uninhabited wild.
Like countless times before, Teyvat’s heroic traveler—accompanied by a certain Adeptus who was oft by her side when she traversed the remote corners of Liyue devoid of human presence—had set out to fulfill commissions requesting assistance from the Adventurer’s Guild.
There was nothing novel about the nature of her task, or the circumstances of the specific quest she had been assigned this time.
Just another Hilichurl camp nestled into the slopes of Minlin’s Westernmost mountain range, growing at an alarming rate, until the danger of its occupants encroaching upon more traveled areas became inevitable.
According to the Guild, they were already causing out-of-bounds trouble. Getting in the way of voyagers seeking to cross the mountain pass nearby, and lying in wait of curious adventurers who climbed this high only to catch a glimpse of Sumeru’s infamous fluorescent mushroom forest from afar.
Nothing unfamiliar. No matter she had not taken on many times before, and successfully so.
Except that Lumine had just returned from the Chasm mere days ago, body wrought from the aftermath of battles she had fought beside Dainsleif deep within the mines, and her mind heavy with the gruesome knowledge she had attained—of the cursed fate that had befallen the former people of Khaenri’ah.
Once ordinary humans full of dreams and desires, now dwelling in the wilderness of Teyvat as nightmarish abominations with no semblance of the hopeful souls they used to be.
Masked, to escape the visual reminder of their misery, to hide their disfigured faces from themselves and from one another.
Reduced to a shadow of life led by instinct, their sentience fading until they were but mindless beasts trapped in unending agony that even death could not release them from.
Creatures she had previously treated as mere monsters, dispatched with no second thought, the light behind their deformed eyes so easily snuffed out, were now pitiful souls fallen prey to Fate—and her ignorant blade.
Cursed lives she had taken, oblivious to their wretched past, the poignant history of what—who—they had once been. Every single hilichurl she had slaughtered over the course of her travels, like animals, now burdened her conscience with the weight of every person she had murdered with her own hands.
For days after, ever since emerging from the depths of the Chasm again, Lumine had had to grapple with the implication of her discovery. With the guilt and horror of seeing her past, heroic deeds shifted into this new, direful context.
One in which she was no hero at all, but just another bringer of pain and destruction. No better than the Abyss monsters she’d thought were her ultimate foe.
Even after she’d destroyed their physical bodies, their spirits continued to suffer. And she, with her misguided righteousness, had only exacerbated their pain, only added to the misery of their wretched existence…
She had been so preoccupied dealing with the past, then, that she had not a single thought left to spare for the future.
The future in which she would be called upon to raise her blade against the cursed and tormented once again. To inflict more pain, to spill more blood. To indiscriminately harm those who had once loved, smiled, laughed, just like she did.
And now, that future had arrived.
Lumine’s mind churned with unease, a sick feeling stirring in her stomach as she crept up the far side of a hill alongside her Yaksha companion. From up there, they would be able to glide down into the encampment erected against the steep of the grass-covered mound, rather than have to approach from the open path guarded by an axe-wielding Mitachurl and hilichurl shooters on elevated platforms to both sides of the fenced entrance.
At her side, Xiao was the very picture of a calm and composed warrior preparing for battle, long used to this type of operation.
As she, as well, should be. They had done this countless times together, after all.
His attention was entrenched in counting down the steps of the guards patrolling the perimeter, until both were out of sight and there was a blind spot to exploit, precious seconds for the two of them to slip in undetected and neutralize the threat from within.
Just like they had always done.
“Now,” he whispered, already in motion, rising fluidly to crest the hill and take to the air beyond. With two quick, powerful bursts of Anemo, he crossed over the camp border and descended past it, feet barely making contact with the ground before he dove for cover in one of the roofed huts nearby.
Lumine pushed aside her mounting turmoil and forced her limbs into motion, rushing to follow after him before their window of opportunity closed. Using the highest point of the hill and her wind glider, she sailed onto camp grounds from above the barbed structures set up to keep intruders from breaching.
Yet distracted as she was, her usually sharp movements felt dull, her senses less refined. As if her mental reluctance inadvertently translated to the physical, body and mind equally disrupted by the state of her faltering subconscious.
Even as she dashed behind some crates and barrels clustered close to Xiao’s hiding place, she could sense that she had been too slow. The hairs on the back of her neck rose, her instincts triggered to the awareness of wild eyes drilling into her retreating back.
Cursing softly, she peeked through the crack between two wooden containers—and found a trio of hilichurls already rushing towards her while a fourth and fifth broke away, likely to call for reinforcements.
Thanks to her hesitation, their invasion of the camp had been discovered by the patrolling sentries, and that right at the onset.
Her heart seemed to leap into her throat, palms turning clammy with sweat and…fear.
This was the worst possible turn of events. It was not supposed to go like this.
Lumine had been hoping to sneak in, determine that this camp was led by an Abyss mage or two, and only eliminate those to destabilize and break down the camp’s power structure from within.
Hilichurls alone rarely banded together to form groupings of this size. There was usually a leading force of Abyss creatures at the helm, rallying the cursed wildlings into a mindless army and pushing them to cause carnage and harm to humans.
Due to her blunder, the entire camp would be alerted to their trespassing soon. Every single hilichurl present would engage in battle to defend the campsite, and she would have to fight her way through them, hurt them, in order to leave and regroup.
The sole downside to their hillside infiltration plan had always been this very possibility, to find themselves with their backs to the wall if they were to be discovered.
“Lumine!”
Xiao’s warning call cut through her fraying nerves like a saw blade, jagged and harsh, catching at the tangled threads of her panicking mind.
Flinching, she stretched past the crates to watch for the incoming hilichurls—
Weather-worn wood splintered and shattered mere inches from her face, the flying debris gouging scrapes into her cheek and the side of her jaw.
Pure, familiar instinct prevailed, forcing her body into motion when her mind misfired.
Lumine threw herself to the ground and rolled out of the way, a fraction of a second before a spiked club smashed into the spot she’d been crouching in.
The biggest of the three attackers wielded the thick, heavy weapon more befitting of a mitachurl. And he was coming after her with no hesitation.
Lumine ducked under the next swing and twisted away, only to find herself in the trajectory of a second hilichurl’s torch. Before she could dodge, a spray of crimson painted her face, hot and metallic, and she jerked away at the gruesome sight unfolding before her between one thunderous heartbeat and the next.
The torch-swinging churl stood frozen with his arm raised above his head, the flaming sprig clutched in his claw-like grip trembling in mid-air. A familiar, emerald-hued spear skewered his neck, blood pulsating out to both sides of the shredded flesh in heavy streams that doused the ground in seconds.
For an instant, it seemed like time had ground to a jarring halt.
Then a strangled, distinctly human-sounding groan escaped from behind the shaggy creature’s mask, and he—somehow, she knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that he’d once been male—crumbled in a heap of twitching limbs, his life leaking out of him irrevocably.
Lumine’s legs collapsed. She sank down beside him. Her heart gave a hard thump, like a cannon beat to lament the fallen.
It hurt.
“No!” Her cry was lost in the sound of bells shrilling around them all at once.
In her anguish, she failed to comprehend that it had to be the dreaded alarm, set off to warn of their intrusion.
Xiao was there the next moment, crudely yanking his spear out of the dying hilichurl and dropping onto one knee in front of her. “Are you hurt?” He took in the scratches on her face—not too deep but already bleeding—, tension tightening his pale features as he passed his gaze over her body in search of further injuries.
Confirming that none of the blood covering her was her own seemed to ease his wound up nerves only by a fraction. His eyes, yet dark with worry, flickered past her shoulder to ensure no immediate danger lurked, before he tugged at her hand with barely contained urgency.
Even as her head spun, Lumine had no will to resist when he pulled her to her feet. She was unable to look away from the now lifeless hilichurl glistening with his own lifeblood, mask knocked askew from the impact of his fall.
Lumine’s face felt stiff, frozen into a mask of horror, the same feeling squeezing her chest until her pulse quickened to the pace of a rabbit’s, running for its life.
In her distress, she didn’t realize the bigger hilichurl still loomed mere feet away, waiting for his companions to close rank so they could advance on the intruders with greater numbers.
Or that blood had soaked into the once white hem of her dress and stained the leather of her boots.
“You killed him.” A toneless statement. Through lips gone numb, her voice barely carried over the blaring alarm.
Xiao frowned, as if he wasn’t sure he’d heard her right. He glanced around vigilantly, keeping his sight on the threat that was slowly pressing closer. “Lumine. We have to finish this or retreat. Time is running out.”
“You killed him.” Her eyes were fixed on the gleaming pool of scarlet steadily, portentously creeping closer to her boots. Like it possessed sentience to do more than just paint them in its garish color.
Xiao’s jaw ground at her half-incredulous, half-accusing tone. “I did what you should have done first. He was about to hurt you.”
“No…” Still blind to everything but the dark red that seemed to saturate her vision, Lumine shook her head back and forth, the movement choppy and disconnected. “We don’t hurt—we don’t kill the innocent…they don’t deserve to die. He didn’t deserve to die!”
A hard tug on her wrist sent her stumbling backwards, away from the approaching hilichurl and the three guards moving up to flank him. Among them was a mitachurl carrying a shield, his heavy mass and huge muscles bulging with every booming step that shook the ground beneath them.
And still, she remained alarmingly unresponsive.
Xiao gripped her shoulder and whirled her around until she faced him. The unchecked momentum caused her head to bump into his front.
She didn’t even bother catching herself against his chest to stop the collision.
Dread locked his shoulders into painful rigidness, his body suffused with tension over the uncertainty and peril of their current situation. He drew in a consciously deep breath and held it, struggling to banish the beginnings of disquiet from his mind and to loosen his tightening body.
He might have to fight for two from this moment on. Under these circumstances, it would do him no good to allow his limbs to seize up and his joints to stiffen.
“Lumine. Look at me.” Xiao kept his voice low, but the firm, almost forceful insistence in his tone roused Lumine out of her mental deadlock at last.
Unfocused eyes settled on his face, the dark pupils blown so wide, they left but a thin ring of pale gold around the edge of her irises.
He had never seen her like this. Not even when she’d come to him that night, the first time she’d trusted him with her vulnerabilities and the nightmares that haunted her since her arrival in Teyvat.
Of reaching the end of this long journey without ever finding the answers she was seeking, or worse, coming upon a truth during her travels that would forever change the path she had walked and leave her doubting herself and the cause she’d been fighting for.
And…the secret fear of losing her brother even before they could be reunited.
“Lumine.” Xiao was not accustomed to the effort it took to gentle his tone at her flinch. Yet, her clouded gaze sparked with recognition at last. “Draw your sword.”
She went as if to shake her head, but he took hold of her hand and guided it to where he knew the hilt of her weapon was waiting. A flare of power zipped against his fingertips as they touched on the hidden pocket of energy she kept her belongings stowed away in.
Her stiff fingers refused to bend of their own volition, so he applied pressure with his hand around hers to urge them to close, to grasp the hilt with her own strength.
Lumine trembled against his shoulder and a sob caught in her chest.
“I don’t…I don’t want to hurt them anymore.” Her voice cracked and wobbled on the quiet plea, her eyes misted over with desperation when she raised her head and placed a hand against his shoulder at last.
His heart felt struck with the thousandfold effect of his karmic debt condensed into a single blow, crushed by an agonizing weight that carried the sins of multiple lifetimes, of countless lives and souls that haunted him still.
“I know.” He swallowed hard, forced the rough edge back from his words as he watched her shake and quiver, her heart too soft to fight this battle after learning the gruesome truth about her once familiar and monstrous, now too human, opponent. “But there is no time for hesitation. For now, we need to leave this place.”
His hand tightened on her arm, until he was certain her attention was on him still, tense despite the vacant, bruised look in her eyes. “If you can’t fight, stay behind me. I will keep them away from you. But if one makes it past me…you raise your weapon. Do you understand?”
He waited for the tiny nod that was her response, knowing he would not get any more out of her as long as her mind held her hostage, paralyzed with guilt and the fear of inflicting more pain on the suffering.
Determination and the need to protect her crystallized into resolve, reinforcing his unbreakable will to do what had to be done.
Deep within himself, in the tenderest core of a tempered heart devoted only to her, Xiao took a silent oath.
He vowed to spare her the burden of killing that would weigh on her conscience now that she knew their adversary had once been human like her. He would be the one whose blade stopped the hearts that stood in their way, even if every life taken further added to his karma and stained his soul like poison.
Nudging her behind his back as he turned to face the encroaching enemy, he let the essence of Anemo and the power of the Yaksha fill him to the very edges of his Adeptal being.
The cluster of hilichurls settled into a three-point formation, an arrowhead shape with the shield-wielding mitachurl at its tip.
Xiao squared his shoulders and gripped his spear as deadly calm descended upon his senses.
He would conquer even the Abyss itself if it meant he could save her from being tainted by its wickedness—or the heartbreak of losing her brother, or having to see her hands stained with the blood of innocents. He would stand between her and any such curse that twisted familiar reason until your own deeds appeared cruel and evil in contrast.
Until she became strong enough to persevere, he would take the brunt of it for her. Until she learned to guard herself against those matters that laid claim to your sanity and chipped off pieces of your heart, he would wade through the darkness in her place, and further harden his heart if it meant that hers could stay soft and full of the hope that made her shine even in the deepest dark.
He would give his last breath to protect her, until she no longer required his protection—or no longer wished for it.
The one thing he would not do, was to overstep his welcome should she grow tired of his company, or one day suffer harm from the effect of his karma.
In front of them, the hilichurl formation fanned out to both sides, attempting to cage them in.
Xiao shifted backwards, keeping one hand on Lumine’s hip where she stood in his shadow, directing her to move with him.
Moments passed, the hilichurls’ wary gazes drilling into them even through the masks that covered their disfigured visages.
Then the mitachurl at their head hoisted up his shield and charged at them with a roar, clutching the wooden construct in front of him like a battering ram.
Xiao gave Lumine a firm push, trusting her instincts to kick in and cushion her fall, and rolled out of the way of the approaching force in the opposite direction. From there, he used his spear to push off the ground and leap towards the three hilichurls who’d hung back to cover the rear of their shielded vanguard.
He would attend to them first, lest they harm Lumine while he was locked into a separate battle. The mitachurl’s massive size and the weight of his shield made him a lumbering, slow enemy. The momentum behind his initial attack had taken him far, and Xiao would utilize the precious time to thin their numbers before their defenses were restored by the shielder’s return.
Taking note of a dusty, unsteady Lumine getting to her feet after the impromptu dive, he made sure to situate himself between her and the enemy once more as he prepared for his offense.
A torchbearer, a crossbow, and the unusually big, burly hilichurl carrying a spiked club.
Although he would have preferred to turn the tide in his favor by neutralizing either of the two larger threats first, Xiao went for the shooter, cutting him down before he could attempt to lose a single bolt in his or Lumine’s direction.
The torch-swinging fighter churl and even the brute would have to physically get past him to advance on Lumine, so eliminating the ranged threat early increased his chances of keeping her safe at his back. Even if she were to fall behind and lose his protection momentarily.
Whipping around, Xiao caught the bigger of the remaining two attempting to stomp past, and intervened with a swift slash of his polearm to one thick, sinewy thigh of the towering creature.
Though far from seriously injured, the churl shrieked and jerked back, then swung his club at Xiao’s head in a fit of rage.
Xiao sidestepped the arbitrary blow with ease. Upon recognizing his chance to manipulate the impulsive attack to his own advantage, he dipped under the mighty, still-raised arm to stab his weapon into his opponent’s side, the blade sliding deep between two ribs.
An enraged bellow echoed around the enclosed space, distorted by the concave rock face to resemble the roar of a far more frightening creature.
As if intending to help his struggling companion, the torchbearer scurried closer, rumbling menacingly and shaking his torch at Xiao.
The Adeptus’ focus on his prey was accosted with disruption at the wrong moment.
Thus distracted, fearing the torch-swinging creature would go after Lumine while he was preoccupied, he turned to throw a glance at her for reassurance and caught one heavy hilichurl arm to the torso, knocking him back with the force of an uprooted tree trunk swept into a violent autumn gale.
His polearm slipped from his grasp, remaining stuck in the hilichurl’s sturdy body while he himself was sent flying into the air.
Mumbling curses under his breath, Xiao broke his fall with Anemo and hurried back to insert himself between Lumine and their enemy once more, breathing significantly harder than before.
The blow had disarmed him, and it might have cracked one or two of his ribs as well. But none of it mattered. He would not repeat his error, and his weapon was easily retrieved with a flick of his hand and a burst of Adeptal power.
Numbing his mind against physical pain was a habit he had mastered centuries ago, one by now as familiar and easy to him as drawing his next breath. He used the lull in the violence to check on his own partner, to assure himself that his fear of a stealthy ambush had not come to pass.
Lumine stood with the sword hanging limp from one hand and her free arm wrapped around her middle, uncharacteristically dark eyes fixated on him as her body trembled and quaked with mute distress.
Xiao’s teeth ground together in frustration, until sharp, punishing pangs of pain streaked through his jaw and the base of his skull. Once more, he dismissed them with less than minuscule effort.
But the ache within his chest was not as easily expelled.
It tore him apart inside to see his proud, heroic traveler reduced to a helpless, quivering shadow of herself. And that, too, due to the bounds of her own agitated mind.
When those who were firmly devoted to a cause encountered something that not merely opposed their values, but called into question everything they’d thought was right, until they began to wage war with themselves…the ensuing doubts over the integrity and soundness of their own senses and instincts could turn the most powerful and unshaken warrior into a timid, despairing husk, destitute and fearful of ever trusting their own thoughts and judgments again.
Xiao had witnessed countless souls, mortal and not, succumb to such insidious inner conflict over the course of his long existence.
He did not wish to see Lumine lose faith in herself and her abilities in the same way, until her confidence was shattered, what remained of it as fragile as a mild winter’s frost.
Even as he turned back to the threat he was shielding her from, he realized that it would not suffice. He would have to become her shield in more than just the physical sense to safeguard her from the true threat.
The mightiest enemy lurked inside her own head, after all.
The brute, clutching his bleeding side and limping in place, barked something at his torch-bearing comrade, who dashed forward in a wide arc around Xiao, his intentions to directly target Lumine more than obvious.
Xiao gave chase at once, although his instincts whispered to him to remain cautious, that something was off about the situation.
He caught the hilichurl a sword’s length from Lumine, whose eyes brimmed with tears as she shakily raised the tip of her sword off the ground.
The sight made Xiao’s hardened heart throb and tremor, like a marble slab toiling not to burst apart under a novice sculptor’s hammer strokes.
Her blade will not be stained with blood today, he vowed, and drove his spear into the gap between Lumine and the churl, pivoting until the shaft struck the front of their adversaries throat and staggered him backwards, into Xiao’s waiting embrace of death.
Xiao caught the spear’s opposite end in his other hand—uncaring that the feathered blades at its tip bit into his unprotected palm—and simultaneously kicked the back of the hilichurl’s leg, sending him to his knees.
The torch fell from his panicked grip.
Xiao, too, dropped his weapon and looked up, willing Lumine to close her eyes so she would not have to witness another tragedy, so she would not have another reason to hurt.
Snap!
One forceful twist and it was over. The shaggy head fell from his grasp at an unnatural angle before the lifeless body crumpled fully to the ground.
Bracing for the worst, Xiao raised his head, hoping to see her eyes closed, her face averted…
…and met wide eyes instead, swirling with shock and shadows in a face frantic with terror.
His troubled mind failed to realize she was not looking at him, but past him.
Until a shadow fell over his head like a cloud shoving in front of the moon, snuffing out the light and turning her luminous, fair hair a bleak gray.
“NO!”
Her shrill cry hurt his ears, a split second sensation his mind caught on before a moving force crashed into his front.
A flash of gold seared his vision as he fell backwards. Before he could take a tumble, his battle-honed reflexes prompted his body to tuck and roll with the momentum, away from the huge mass that had blotted out the afternoon sun.
Something huge and heavy pounded into the spot he had vacated, stirring up a cloud of dust that dispersed into the air and obscured his immediate surroundings like a smokescreen.
Visibility took a dramatic turn for the worse, and yet he couldn’t yield to logic and abandon the muddled area in favor of a better vantage point. Not if it meant leaving an equally disoriented Lumine stumbling around in it on her own.
Sensing movement to his right, he crouched low and waited, waited until it drew closer and he could make out a silhouette in the sandstorm-like chaos of their surroundings.
The shadow of a giant beast, glowing faint orange in some places, shuffled through the cloud of billowing dust slowly, as if on the lookout for someone to squash like insects. The ground quivered and quaked with each thunderous step that swirled up more of the fine debris before it could settle, until it seemed like the creature was wading through loose desert sand instead of trampling on dry, beaten earth.
Xiao swallowed down the curses clinging to his tongue like excessive spice.
A Stonehide Lawachurl had not been present during their reconnaissance of the camp prior to infiltrating.
This would make matters considerably more difficult. They had to leave, now.
His only chance at finding her as long as the Lawachurl was lumbering about, was to blow those particles away and restore a clear line of sight.
Xiao unfastened the Yaksha mask from his belt and slid it onto his face. Then he gathered his breath, summoned his power—and leapt.
At the peak of his jump, just before gravity reclaimed him, he flipped himself and his weapon upside down, and plunged into the ground below.
Once, twice. By the fourth time he plummeted down, the force of his impact coupled with the Anemo imbued in it began to push at the dust cloud surrounding him like mighty fluttering wings. It took another three strikes to make the oddly heavy haze recede enough to grant him a precious twenty feet of unobstructed view in every direction.
To the right, he could make out the shape of a hut at the edge of the retreating dust trail, likely the one he had taken cover in upon their entry into the camp.
The Lawachurl had been stomping around a good distance to his left, but the sound of shuffling feet, big and small, seemed to be everywhere now, closing in from all sides.
Xiao gripped his spear and moved towards the hut, tread swift but light to avoid making noises and drawing the enemy’s attention to himself more than his strategic plunging already had.
He would refocus his efforts on finding Lumine as soon as he had a better idea of the number of opponents that awaited them, and for that, he needed them to show themselves first, without spotting him.
Before he could reach the structure, a hilichurl leg cut through the shroud of dust off to the side, and the brute whose blood Xiao had spilled earlier stepped into his path.
The unusual hilichurl froze at the sight of Xiao, then threw his head back and howled.
Before Xiao could decide on a course of action, he sensed the stir of a power not unlike his own, and the cloud he’d merely pushed away began to dissipate, until the dust settled back down and the camp came into view once more.
His sneaking suspicions proved true after all. The visual obstruction had been a deliberate ploy to throw them off and herd them into an ambush, and he had walked right into it with his own two feet…
Tension took possession of his body anew as he turned for the full picture.
In the center of the space, beside a big campfire, stood an Anemo samachurl, still swinging his staff in the air while the swell of elemental energy died down. The Stonehide Lawachurl flanked him, along with a group of hilichurls, shooters and fighters, standing in a loose semi-circle.
Now, the brute was at Xiao’s back, a new danger at his front. And Lumine was nowhere to be seen.
With the camp’s every inhabitant already surrounding him and no one left to alert, he had nothing to lose.
He called out her name.
“Lumine!”
Had she found an exit and escaped? They both knew Xiao could take out a hilichurl camp on his own if need be, but perhaps in her agitation, she had not anticipated that he would stay behind and search for her first. Or that he would be unable to commit himself to a fight unless he had confirmed her departure, so he could focus on the battle and not have to divert half of his attention into defending her safety.
Keeping both hostile sides in his peripheral vision, he did a visual sweep of the camp in hopes of catching sight of her.
The only thing that moved was the brute, shuffling closer with his club at the ready. The hilichurls opposite mirrored the approach, scurrying forward like a bunch of rats excited to gnaw on any sliver of meat they could find.
Xiao bared his teeth at their impudence. They dared think him easy prey to sink their fangs into?
“Lumine!”
Part of him couldn’t help but hope she would appear out of nowhere like he did when she called his name, no matter the time or place.
Twirling his spear to both sides to deter the churls drawing their noose tighter around him, Xiao sent his senses outward, searching for any familiar traces, the glint of her sword, a shred of her dress, the sound of her footsteps, an echo of her energy…
And spied movement in the distance, beside the hut he’d been headed for before the brute blew his cover.
At half the distance to the Lawachurl, a pile of crates and barrels lay scattered, some of them smashed to pieces. One of the sideways wooden boxes stood ajar, and a single golden-hued eye peered at him from a pale face shadowed in the crack of the slightly open lid.
His relief was as sweet as the fresh almond tofu Lumine made only for him.
Silently imploring her to stay where she was, hidden and out of the fray, he spun his weapon faster and drew upon his powers, finally free to engage the enemy in earnest.
“Stop!”
The very flow of time seemed to slow, each passing second drawn-out and sluggish, as if Celestia itself had reached a divine hand through the clouds and flipped Teyvat’s hourglass onto its side.
It had slipped his mind, the fact that Lumine had had a change of heart. That she would not sit by and watch him kill a dozen hilichurls, even if it was to save her.
Hilichurls who had once been human. Innocent souls whose very existence had been cursed to suffering with no relief, to a continuance with no conclusion.
Once, centuries or eons or a lifetime ago, Xiao might have possessed the ability to empathize. Now that he realized he carried a similar curse, his heart had grown too firm to allow softness for anyone but her.
Breathless from the sense of foreboding that squeezed his lungs dry, Xiao watched as the crate’s lid fell open and Lumine climbed out, her face stark with panic.
She was three strides away from the Lawachurl. Her cry had drawn every single creature’s attention to her. And her sword lay forgotten at the bottom of the crate behind her
The Conqueror of Demons took off running even before the Stonehide beast had commenced its first reverberating step towards her.
Up ahead, the samachurl raised his staff and started chanting. Swirls of Anemo shot at Xiao, past him, and he dispersed glowing cyclones of power with slashes of his spear as he raced against time.
The ground shook under the Lawachurl’s second step. Xiao employed two consecutive, explosive bursts of his power to dash forward faster, even managed a third before the repeated samachurl attacks threw him off-center.
And made him realize that, apart from the cyclones, none of the shaman’s blows even came close to hitting him. They were all aimed beyond him, where—
Xiao felt a pull from behind, like a vacuum field had formed at his back and was attempting to suck him in, or at the very least slow him down.
A brief glance over his shoulder had him doubling his efforts to forge ahead, to move faster than before.
The oversized hilichurl brute was hot on his heels, hands and feet glowing in the shades of Anemo as they pumped vigorously to close the distance between them.
The samachurl had been enchanting his comrade to enhance his speed, not seriously attempting to harm Xiao while he rushed to Lumine’s side.
Xiao pressed ahead with a snarled curse as the ground vibrated once more, bringing the Lawachurl close enough to swing his mighty, rock-like fists at Lumine’s head.
She ducked the attack, to Xiao’s relief, but instead of running the opposite way, away from the danger, she came towards him, her lips forming words that were drowned out by the boom of walloping footsteps as the huge beast followed after her.
“Run!” Xiao shouted at her, but she shook her head and scrambled to meet him halfway.
Xiao had intended to teleport them both far away the moment he caught hold of her, but she never slowed down. Instead, she used her momentum to crash into one side of his body, hooking her arm into the crook of his and swinging them both around like she was trying to knock him out of the path of a raging wild Sumpter Beast.
For the span of a single, timeless second, the two of them spun around a joint axis like the petals of an unusual red flower she had brought him once, all the way from Mondstadt.
The impetus of it whipped his body back to face the direction he’d approached from, and he discovered the reason for her frantic approach at last.
The Anemo-infused brute, long caught up and with his spiked club raised high, had been about to strike Xiao when Lumine yanked him out of the way—and put herself in the trajectory of the blow instead.
Xiao reacted before his mind fully processed the sight, trying to swing them around one more time, to knock back the brute before he could land a hit.
But their enchanted opponent was faster. His arms seemed to blur when he forced more speed into his attack.
The spiked club merely glanced off the side of Lumine’s shoulder instead of striking her full on. And yet there was still enough power in the grazing blow to wrench her arm from Xiao’s and send her flying back the same way she’d come.
Xiao felt himself move, yet his body and mind no longer seemed connected. A thud, a slash, before warm iron splattered his face and the brute collapsed face-down, bone gleaming through the deep slit cleaved into his neck, a morbid caricature of a smile carved into the base of his skull.
“LUMINE!”
Although he was desperate to reassure himself that she was alright, Xiao lifted her limp body into his arms first. She had landed among the crates she’d used as a hiding place, now a mere pile of shattered and splintered wood that added to her scratches and bruises.
Her arm lay oddly against her side, the joint clearly displaced from its socket, And her shoulder was bleeding heavily where one of the club’s spikes had punctured her skin and torn through flesh as the weapon skimmed down her body.
The fact that she was unconscious, her golden hair matted with blood at the back of her head, spoke of a head injury with risk of concussion.
Suppressing the blind rage that painted his vision crimson, Xiao growled low in his throat and sent raw power arcing towards any creature that made a move towards them.
He would come back and end them all, later. For now, he had to tend to Lumine’s injuries.
He had meant to—vowed to—protect her spirit, and allowed damage to her body in the process.
No curse or karma he carried would ever be punishment enough for his failure to keep her safe.
Tucking her sword back into its sheath, and her head securely against his shoulder, Xiao located the nearest exit route and carried the softest part of his heart to safety.