Chapter Text
The path of a Yaksha is one that is filled with slaughter, hatred, and suffering. A path Xiao knows all too well.
Another battle. Another slaughter.
Though he's never been as close to the end as he is now.
There were too many demons, they overran him from all angles. Shredding his defenses and attacks along with his flesh, each time one passed it left a deep mark on his skin and soul alike. He fought until his arms ached, his blood coating his skin and the ground beneath his feet and nearly obscuring his vision from whatever head injury he had sustained. He knew he was growing tired, yet he had to keep going while his skin burned and his clothes had a good few slashes that he'd eventually have to sew back together.
It got to a point where he could no longer tell which one he was trying to fight, his energy running out and his anemo doing little to help disperse them. So, in a last ditch effort, he fled.
Adeptus Xiao fled.
He mustered all the energy he had left and teleported to nowhere in particular.
Now he finds himself aimlessly searching for something, anything, to help his situation. He needs rest to heal, but to rest and heal he would need safety.
The passing trees loomed over him, each time ones branches brushed over his broken skin he flinched in what can only be described as pained fear.
Each step left a trail of blood behind him, the red obvious against the dark green grass of nightfall. The moon helped in what silver light it gave, reflecting off the red that stained his very being. He could smell it, the metal smell and the copper taste. If he could taste it he was either bleeding inside or the injury on his head had bled so much it had reached his mouth, both seemed likely.
His legs grew weaker and weaker, his spear doing little to help support him. In a flash of green, he mustered his remaining energy to teleport.
This time, he was falling, and not a short fall either. This fall is long, leading down and down like the chasm all that time ago. The wind rushes past his ears, screaming and making them ache and his cheeks sting with the icy chill they bring with them. Xiao's entire being burns as he falls with the breeze, stinging his wounds as they are exposed to the cool, stinging air full force.
What comes next though, is cold beyond what he could imagine since the snow. It surrounds him as he plunges deeper, bubbles floating up from where he rudely disturbed the air, floating up from his lungs as salty water fills his lungs in it's place.
The sea, he's fallen into the sea.
It rushes past his ears in it's own song. Dark crimson clouds radiate from his freezing being and he can't bring himself to swim up, his limbs locked and exhausted. His energy depleted. The moon shone through the rippling water, slowly returning to it's former calm. He is not supposed to die this way, but maybe this will be the most peaceful one he may get.
He let's his eyes slip shut with that thought.
Peace.
The water shifts, a sound nearby. Hands grasp him under his shoulders, dragging him into the cold air. He doesn't fight them.
He stops feeling for a while.