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Neuvillette wasn’t the best at keeping a healthy sleep schedule.
This was not news to anyone who’d spent more than a week in Fontaine’s legal system, nor to anyone who had heard the faint echo of footsteps pacing through the Opera Epiclese’s upper corridors at an hour when even the stars considered turning in. What may have been news—though not surprising—was that Neuvillette, Hydro Sovereign of Teyvat, the Iudex himself, was once again nose-deep in documents long past midnight.
Yes, he was an immortal dragon. Yes, his mind was sharp, honed by centuries of law and trails, unbent by fatigue and bolstered by patience beyond mortal comprehension. But he also currently had bags under his eyes.
The issue lay in how quietly he eroded himself. His newly acquired assistant hadn’t noticed—likely because he still moved with that same fluid grace, kept his tone steady, and hadn’t collapsed dramatically across the Palais Mermonia floor. But Zhongli had been watching for centuries. He didn’t need dramatics. He knew the signs—
Pinched brows curled together as if trying to strangle a headache at its source. Furling upper lip. Not quite a sneer—Neuvillette was far too dignified for that—but the tiniest twitch when reading something especially bureaucratic. The subtlest snarl. Always at paper. Never at people. Contracts that were worded poorly, reports that were filed two hours late, proposals that dared to use improper comma placement . They all got the same low, restrained huff through his nose.
But worst of all, the comfort-purring.
It was so soft it could almost be mistaken for a hum. His chest would rumble low, like thunder threatening to rain. Zhongli had caught it before. Usually, it meant Neuvillette had forgotten to eat, or sleep, or do something as basic as blink properly in the past two hours, perhaps all three. He did not like it.
Tonight was the kind of night that brought all his worries together.
Their shared study—spacious and warmly lit with fireglass sconces imported from Liyue—had become a nest of parchment and clipped sighs. Neuvillette sat at his desk in a loose white blouse with ruffles at the sleeves. It was loose around the collar, his long hair barely tied back with his signature bow—and he’d be lying if his messy hair didn’t bring warmth to his heart—and a pile of folders stacked beside him like judgmental towers. The ink pot beside his right hand had run dry at least once already. A replacement had appeared without him noticing. Likely summoned via water from the faucet. Not the best for quality, but by this state, Neuvillette had no other thought than the awaiting paper at his desk.
Zhongli stood in the doorway, watching him. He stood with the distinct expression of a man who had been here before.
Neuvillette didn’t look at him.
He murmured something—half draconian, half Fontaine legal clause—and surely chicken-scratched something on a page. His lip twitched.
A nervous, unfulfilled purr vibrated in the air. Zhongli sighed through his nose.
It wasn’t a sigh of annoyance. It was the long-suffering exhale of someone who had loved a creature for far too long to be surprised by his particularly favourite flavour of self-neglect.
He crossed the room with unhurried steps, the soft patter of his bare feet mute on the carpet. Neuvillette still didn’t look at him.
“You’ve been at your desk for ten hours,” Zhongli said calmly.
“Have I?” Neuvillette replied, as though someone had just told him the moon had opinions; absurd.
“You haven’t blinked in the last two minutes.”
“I’m aware.” His voice was quiet. “The ink smudges less when I don’t.”
Zhongli stared with a respective frown. “That is not a strategy worth preserving.”
“Respectfully,” Neuvillette said, still scribbling, “this case involves a Snezhnayan trade envoy who attempted to falsify shipping routes through Fontaine’s Romaritime Harbour under the guise of ‘accidental misfiling.’ That misfiling resulted in the destruction of two bridge pillars, one minor hydro-anemo incident, and a lawsuit filed by a man whose prized pet bird was startled into flying away .”
“Startled?”
“Mortally.”
Zhongli was quiet for a beat. “…Mn.”
Neuvillette sighed—long and exhausted, the kind of sigh that sounded like it was trying to crawl out of his bones. His shoulders slumped, barely noticeable, but for someone like Zhongli, it was the emotional equivalent of watching someone fall into the depthless sea.
And the nervous purring had started again.
A low rumble, almost involuntary, as if Neuvillette’s body were trying to comfort itself in the absence of sleep, sustenance, or the common sense to stop.
Zhongli walked up behind him, leaned down, and gently plucked the stylus from Neuvillette’s fingers.
Neuvillette blinked. “Zhongli.” A frown followed suit.
“You are done,” Zhongli said, already setting the stylus in its inkwell.
“I still have—”
“You are done .”
Neuvillette stared up at him with the expression of a man who had accepted his fate, but was still trying to write an appeal. His hair was in his eyes. His pupils had gone a little hazy, as if his internal body clock had completely given up and switched over to “overtime dragon mode.” A jest in hindsight, but not healthy.
Zhongli placed a hand on his shoulder and gave it a firm, grounding squeeze.
“I am taking you to bed,” he said. “You may protest, you may sigh, but you will come willingly.”
Neuvillette looked utterly, profoundly betrayed. “You can’t expect me to walk away from a case halfway through—”
“I do not insist. I demand.”
Neuvillette opened his mouth again, then paused. His brow twitched once more—this time, less agitated, more resigned. His shoulders slumped. The purring hadn’t stopped. If anything, it got louder , as if broadcasting his defeat.
Zhongli’s expression softened. “I’ll reheat the soup when we get to bed.”
“…You made soup?”
“Of course.”
“…Is it the kind with the—”
“Roasted sea fennel and white shell broth. Yes.”
There was a long pause.
Neuvillette groaned softly, dragging a hand down his face. “Fine.”
“Good,” Zhongli said, helping him to his feet. “You’ll be asleep before the second sip.” He smiled fondly.
“I have more endurance than—”
“You nodded off last time between spoonfuls.”
“That… was only the one time.”
Zhongli didn’t respond. He merely guided him from the study with a steady hand at his hip, leading him down the hall like someone ushering a very large, very tired cat out of the courtroom, but instead of a cat it was a very tired dragon in human form.
Neuvillette’s feet dragged a little behind him. His lips quirk upward, his body swaying lightly. He still looked vaguely put-out, like a dignitary being politely escorted from his own trial. But he allowed himself to be led.
Beautiful. Zhongli didn’t say it, but he thought it (with the cheekiest inward smile). He would make sure Neuvillette slept, and ate, and blinked, and remembered—at least for tonight—that rest was not something to be earned.
When he sat him down on the bed, Neuvillette’s eyes were closed already. His head drooped in fatigue, and muttered something about being able to get into bed himself. Zhongli shook his head and smiled, already heading out the door to heat up the soup. Hopefully his darling Sovereign wouldn’t fall asleep before he could eat.
The image of Neuvillette curled up on Zhongli’s side of the bed, snuggled up against his pillow, nestled itself comfortably in his mind.
Cute.