Chapter Text
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31 days.
In just 31 days, everything had changed. I’d been torn away from the only family I had left—and from the second home I had ever truly known. It only took 31 days for my life to shift course entirely, as if Celestia itself had reached down and rearranged my fate—just like it did with Khaenri’ah—leaving everything in ruins and forcing me to keep walking through the aftermath, no matter how much I wanted to scream.
Why me?
Why my sister?
Why us?
We had already lost so much. We were already orphans. It wasn’t fair.
I thought all of this as I scribbled furiously in my journal, the words spilling out faster than I could contain them. When I finally closed it with a quiet snap, the silence around me felt heavier. I looked up at my surroundings—an alleyway in Liyue, where I had been sleeping for the past two, maybe three weeks. I couldn’t tell anymore. Time had started to blur, just like the faces of the people who walked by me each day. The sounds of the city—once vibrant, full of life—now passed through me like wind. Liyue was already preparing for the next Lantern Rite. Another celebration, another moment I wouldn’t be part of.
I wandered over to my makeshift bed and collapsed onto it face first, not caring about the sharp sting of the rough fabric beneath me. It wasn’t real cotton. Nothing about my life felt real anymore. I turned over slowly, the chill of the night brushing against my skin. No blanket tonight—I’d used it to build a weak little roof to catch the rain.
As I stared up at the stars and the moon, the only light I had left, I let my eyes close. The cold bit at my fingers. The breeze whispered through the alley like it knew I didn’t belong.
And before sleep pulled me under, I thought of Samara.
My sister.
My whole world.
The one person I couldn’t stop missing.