Work Text:
Tighnari is washing up his mortar and pestle he’d been using for a minor experiment when there’s a knock at his door.
“Come in.”
A young man enters, parting the leaves at his entrance. “Mr. Tighnari, the General Mahamatra is looking for you.”
Long, black ears twitch with curiosity. “Thank you, Iraj. I’ll be right there.”
The Forest Ranger nods and takes his leave.
Tighnari finishes rinsing his tools, sets them to dry, and wipes his hands on a cloth before finally setting off, idly wondering what Cyno wants.
It’s just about midday, and it’s rather warm out. He sees Cyno soon enough, standing imposingly by two alert dogs wagging their tails, mouths open and tongues hanging to combat the heat, talking to a Forest Watcher. Tighnari steals glances at him when he’s not watching the wooden bridge he’s on, observing the way his hair turns blinding white when the sun gets even hotter.
When he’s close enough, he calls out, “Oh? The venerated General Mahamatra himself has come to grace Gandharva Ville with his presence?”
“I missed you, Tighnari. What can I say?” Cyno replied with an unexpected softness.
Tighnari was at a momentary loss for words.
“Besides, work has been… aggravating lately.”
And there it is.
“But you, dear Tighnari, have a way of spreading joy to those around you.”
Tighnari sighs, crouching to the floor to give well-deserved affection to the Rescue Dog Team.
“The Akademiya sages have had me working like a dog,” Cyno continues solemnly.
Perhaps not hard enough.
“Without paws.”
Think happy thoughts. Loyal puppies. Mushrooms. Premium tail conditioner....
“Won’t you throw me a bone, dear Tighnari?”
“Alright, alright, Cyno, that’s enough.” Tighnari gets to his feet and nods in acknowledgement at the Forest Watcher amusedly watching their exchange. “Amir.”
Amir nods back in kind with a, “Tighnari,” and leads his dogs back to training.
Tighnari looks at Cyno. “So, what did you come all the way here for?" He heads towards home, and Cyno follows him immediately, like they’ve done this a million times. Tighnari secretly hopes one day they really will have.
“I just happened to have the day off, so I thought I’d come over for a friendly game of Genius Invokation™.”
Tighnari knows the General Mahamatra does not often get days off.
“And what if I happened to be occupied?”
“Just seeing you would have been enough. Which is why…”
Oh, Archons, here we go again....
“I thought it would be worth it to… roll the dice.”
“Don’t make me deck you, General Mahamatra.”
Cyno clearly beams at that, and it does make Tighnari a little happy to know Cyno will always enjoy it when he responds to his puns in kind.
And, to be honest, he’s missed Cyno a lot, too.
⟡⟡
They make it back to Tighnari’s home after a short while, and he holds the leaves open so Cyno can enter.
“I can’t be-leaf you’re such a gentleman.”
“You’re awfully punny today,” Tighnari says, ignoring his joke as he grabs his deck and bag of dice off a shelf. They’re slowly becoming more well-loved, especially now that Collei’s been asking to play more often.
Cyno materializes a Genius Invokation board out of nowhere that Tighnari figures he carries with him everywhere and sets it down on the floor. It’s carved like the Sumeru traditional board, but painted a pale, classy yellow with shimmering Nilotpata Lotuses decorating it instead. Cyno pulls out his deck, taking out the character cards, and sits down to begin shuffling it.
Collei had saved up for months to commission Albedo for his and Tighnari’s favorite decks with matching cardbacks as birthday gifts. Tighnari has an amethyst Lupus Aureus design, and Cyno’s has a verdant Vulpes Zerda one, which he admires now.
Distracted, a random card somehow flies out of his hands—Starsign, with a holographic layer. He puts it back in his deck.
“I’ve been brainstorming. I want to try to make you laugh at least once today from a pun,” he replies, with the same determination Tighnari hears when he sees him clearing out Withering Zones, or corrupt officials in the Akademiya.
I can’t help but doubt this goal in particular could be achieved, Tighnari thinks dryly, but I’d also be hard-pressed to find any instance in which Cyno has ever failed after really putting his mind to something.
Tighnari runs a hand arbitrarily over the board to smooth it over. He pours out his dice on his side as he takes his seat. He hands his deck over when Cyno’s done shuffling his own, because he always says he needs the King of Invokation’s magic touch, but really he just likes the chance to touch hands and feel Cyno’s warmth on the cards, sort of like how they never play using sandglasses because he likes them taking as much time as they need. Cyno obliges automatically, and after he hands the deck back, he pours out his dice as well, albeit with a bit more care since his were custom-made, so high-quality they were something one could only afford on the General Mahamatra’s salary.
Cyno places down his Cyno, Razor, and Xingqiu cards; Tighnari mirrors them with his own Tighnari, Cyno, and Collei cards.
“Let us begin,” Cyno declares with a real smile.
⟡⟡
Cyno places his hands together, number-sided coin between them. “One or two?”
“Two,” Tighnari said resolutely. Two people, two friends, two hearts....
Cyno flips the coin into the air with a flair. Tighnari thinks about how Cyno once explained he’d seen some guy from Mondstadt with an eyepatch do it with such practiced ease when he was at Port Ormos, he just had to learn from him. What a character....
Cyno catches the coin in the center of his palm. “Two. You start first.”
Tighnari draws five cards and looks at them, considering. The cards he’d drawn included a Skyward Spine and a Thunder Summoner's Crown. In the past, he had always started with his own card, but lately he’d been favoring his Cyno card more often. And since he didn’t draw his signature talent....
He returned a duplicate card he got to the bottom of his draw pile and took one off the top. Changing Shifts. Hmm....
He watches as Cyno takes a bit more time to decide, and swaps out three cards from his own hand. They then both pushed forward their Cyno cards.
“Interesting. Once again, I’m the opening act.”
“I’m just forcing you out first so you’ll soak up all the incoming damage. I’m hoping you’d be put off by the thought of executing yourself.”
“Psychological warfare. How heinous. And, yet, just the kind of fervor I want from my opponent.”
For some reason, Tighnari unexpectedly feels slightly nervous as he rolls his dice. Which was ridiculous, because this was pretty much like any other time they’d played together.
He gets quite literally nothing useful, so he rerolls all his dice.
Three Hydro, two Pyro, two Cryo, and one Anemo.
Tighnari frowned slightly.
“Bad rolls?”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
Cyno shakes his head mournfully. “Don’t I.”
Tighnari spends his Hydro dice on the Skyward Spine, uses the Pyro on the artifact for Cyno, and burns Chang the Ninth and Wagner so he could use his Cyno’s Elemental Skill on the opposing Cyno for four Electro damage. “Okay, I end my turn.”
Cyno equips his signature talent, attacking Tighnari’s Cyno, and uses his Elemental Skill again in quick succession, dealing six Electro damage instantly. He then places down a Parametric Transformer. “I end my turn.”
Tighnari’s sullen look returned to his face. “I thought you said you had bad rolls.” Usually, Cyno was an honest player with Tighnari, even if he was careful to not reveal anything against other opponents. Maybe he should have just looked at Cyno’s dice.
“I implied I had bad rolls in the past. It’s not my fault you misunderstood me.”
Thinking back on it, Tighnari did remember Cyno looking rather satisfied with his dice, but he had been too absorbed in his thoughts to notice.
Drawing two cards, he made his voice pitiful on purpose. “Oh, so now you’re blaming me. If only the people of Sumeru knew what their General Mahamatra—”
“General Mahamatra this, General Mahamatra that. It’s just us, Tighnari,” Cyno said gently. “Why not call me by my name?”
Tighnari paused. His tail flicked unconsciously. “Cy-no way you’re now telling me what to do, too.”
Cyno, briefly shocked, burst into laughter. His shoulders were shaking so much he started leaning forward, so Tighnari took care to not peek at his cards, looking up at him instead. His hair had more blue undertones than purple in the shade like this.
Tighnari chucked one of his dice at him, being careful to not hurt him. It really wasn’t even that funny....
“I’m glad I can relax with you, Tighnari.” Cyno handed him his die back and finally drew two cards, diligently placing them in their respective places in his hand.
Tighnari made an indignant noise, then dropped his act. “I’m glad, too, Cyno.”
⟡⟡
They each rolled their dice again with hopeful hearts. Tighnari ended up having to reroll every single one, but this time he landed a decent mix of Omni, Electro, and Dendro. He decided he’d feel too bad if he let his Cyno card die, so he swapped to himself as the active character instead with the Changing Shifts card, hoping to make use of the Electro status on his unfunny, but soft-hearted, opponent.
Cyno put a hand to his mouth and furrowed his brow in concentration. It was quite nice to look at him like that.
He then mercilessly unleashed his Elemental Burst for four damage.
Never mind.
Well, then.
Tighnari burned a Deepwood Memories—he really should update his deck, even if he is good at playing it, and those new-fangled Arcane Legend cards sound interesting, though Cyno enjoyed the simplicity of playing without them. He uses his Elemental Skill to deal three Dendro damage as well as create a Catalyzing Field. He had wanted to focus on building his characters early on so he could use energy and off-field Dendro Elemental Bursts as his main source of damage, but his deck and dice are telling him otherwise..
“Very well.” Cyno then proceeded to just completely obliterate Tighnari with his Elemental Skill, hitting him for six damage and killing him off. No qualms with killing his dear Tighnari, I guess. So much for psychological warfare.
“Guess you aren’t the King of Invokation for nothing. Electro-Charge decks,” Tighnari sighed. “The bane of my existence.”
“I haven’t even Electro-Charged yet.”
“You killed me.”
“Are these the heights of the observational skills one expects from the Chief Officer of the Forest Rangers?”
“You killed my me before I could even setup my me.”
“Ah, I see,” Cyno says, nodding sagely.
Tighnari switches back to Cyno as the real Cyno’s Parametric Transformer activates. He uses Cyno’s Elemental Skill to kill off the enemy, but not without lamenting Cyno’s loss, because some people actually have hearts.
Cyno switches to Xingqiu and places down Starsign, Wagner, and Liu Su. “I end my turn.”
Tighnari doesn’t stop there, using an Electro Normal Attack on his opponent to do five damage. “That’s it for my turn, I’m afraid.” Things were looking precarious.
⟡⟡
In the third round, Tighnari gets lucky when Cyno’s rolls go poorly and his own don’t, though he supposes it’s just making up for his bad rolls from the beginning.
“I feel like I have the same good fortune as a certain architect friend of ours....” Cyno complains.
“Oh, so I can’t call you General Mahamatra, but you can talk about other people?”
Cyno puts a Sacrificial Greatsword and Thunder Summoner's Crown on Razor, places down yet another Parametric Transformer, and eats a Northern Smoked Chicken so that he could Normal Attack himself for two Physical damage. “My sincerest apologies.”
At two HP, Tighnari sort of needed a miracle to win. He uses Cyno’s Elemental Burst, dealing seven total damage to Xingqiu and removing him from play. “Apology accepted.”
Cyno was just down to Razor, but with all of his equipment, it wasn’t going to be easy.
Tighnari considers his options before swapping to Collei. Heart racing for a couple different reasons, he uses her Floral Brush to deal four Dendro damage.
“I end my turn,” Cyno says with a wave of his hand. “And, won’t you have mercy on your dear Cyno?”
“Dearest,” Tighnari corrects, pretending to be offended. He uses a Woven Weeds card to enable Collei to use Floral Brush again for another four damage. “I end my turn. And, mercy is only for the merciful.”
The rhythm of the match is comfortingly familiar; like a dissertation on Sumeru’s beetles he reads every night; like the Ley Lines Cyno studied in his youth; like the stars they look at in a sky that might not be real; like the banter between them that is always the same: a bad joke, a weary reply, and an even worse joke.
⟡⟡
Looking at the board with fresh cards and fresher dice, Cyno sheepishly plays Starsign, then a different event card, and attacks.
“Did you just eat a Northern Smoked Chicken and proceed to use your Elemental Skill?” Tighnari cracks up.
“Look, you’re going to win either way. You’ve truly.... smoked me.”
Tighnari’s ensuing laughter is loud and bright, like a flower that only blossoms under the moon. Cyno’s heard of blooms in Liyue that only open up when sung to, and he thinks maybe this sound would count, at least if he were one of them. It’s ridiculous how it’s only the really bad but unexpected jokes that make him laugh. Cyno quickly joins him in his ruckus, his own hysterics dying off and restarting every time he hears Tighnari’s.
“Oh, Archons,” Tighnari eventually says, “I... I can’t breathe. My cheeks are all sore.” Tighnari’s eyes are twinkling, face a little red as he looks at Cyno.
“Just finish the job. Either way, we both won,” Cyno says good-naturedly.
Full of humor in his heart, Tighnari dutifully executes Razor with a Floral Brush to the face.
“Well fought.” Cyno grins genuinely as he sets down his cards on the board. “Not many people can say they’ve won against me as much as you have. Your tactics are exceedingly clever.”
Tighnari shakes his head. “Everybody knows that nobody wins at Genius Invokation when their opponent is the great General Mahamatra unless he wants them to win.” Then, remembering what they’d talked about earlier, he quickly continued, “But perhaps it was just my fortune that I found my enemy was instead my dearest Cyno.”
“Master Tighnari!” a certain young Forest Ranger-in-training’s voice called from outside the building.
“Coming!” Tighnari gets up from his spot, stretching his limbs briefly—Archons, he didn’t even realize how long he’d been sitting like that—and tells Cyno, “I’ll be right back.”
Cyno smiles to himself as Tighnari leaves, gazing at the Lunar Lotuses under his cards.