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Venti’s been acting weird lately.
It’s been about a month now since the knights returned from their expedition. The city had only just finished celebrating their triumphant return. Everybody was happy to have their family members and friends back with them. The last few weeks the City of Freedom was filled with the sounds of songs and clinking glasses.
Venti the Bard didn’t miss a single public celebration, always ready to step up on the scene with a new song to celebrate the heroism and chivalry of the knights. At least that’s how it was. It was a week ago when he started acting not like his usual self. He’d ran off in the middle of his song, not even bothering to pick up his hat with mora in it, as if someone spooked him. He’d watch the door in the tavern and once even left his drink unfinished and disappeared when a new group of guests walked in. People said they saw him looking out of the corner on the streets, as if he was afraid to meet someone.
Over the last few days, it became the topic of every conversation in the city. People started to worry if their beloved bard was being chased by someone malevolent but they couldn’t even imagine a reason why someone would want to settle scores with Venti of all people. Their beloved bard didn’t look like he could hurt a fly. Still, he seemed genuinely disturbed at the slightest sound around him, so there was no doubt he was afraid of something. Whatever or whoever that was had no business messing with their dear bard, so the people decided to take the matter into their own hands.
Aether was lucky enough to decide to visit Mondstadt just when all of that was happening. He and Paimon were on their way to the Knights of Favonius headquarters to meet Varka but just as they turned the corner, they heard some sort of commotion. In front of the entrance to the headquarters gathered a group of people, all clamoring about something and looking very agitated, with Varka in the middle of them trying to listen to whatever they had to say. Aether and Paimon exchanged confused glanced and decided to check what was going on.
As they got closer, they heard Varka exclaim:
“Alright, can you guys please not talk over each other? One at a time, so I can understand. What’s got you all so worked up on this fine morning?”
“It’s Venti!” They replied in unison.
Varka frowned.
“Venti? What happened to him?”
“He’s been so weird lately.” Sansa said. “The other day he was teaching me poetry, as usual, when all of a sudden he jumped as if stung by a bee and ran away. I didn’t even understand what happened, so I asked a knight that was just passing by if he noticed something but he said no.”
“I saw him run away in the middle of his performance the other day.” Added Marjorie. “Left his lyre and his hat, so I had to go look for him after to return it.”
“Same here.” Charled intervened. “That bard cherished wine more than anything but one evening he walked into the tavern and kept looking around, as if scared that someone was hiding in the corner. Then when the door opened and a group of knights walked in, he all but disappeared. And left his wine unfinished!”
“Yes, I’ve also seen him act this way.” The other people started clamoring again. “It’s like he’s scared of something.”
“Wait, so…” Varka rubbed his temple. “You all are so worried because Venti’s been acting a little strange?”
“They’re not saying the main issue!” Six-fingered Jose exclaimed, his eyes glistening with tears. “Venti’s gone missing! We haven’t seen him for two days now!”
The crowd once again erupted in heated exclamations, some suggesting that he must’ve been kidnapped or that he’s on the run from whoever he’s hiding from. It took Varka some time to manage to calm them down again.
“Two days is not that big of a deal.” He said after everyone has somewhat calmed down. “Venti’s been gone for more in the past. Maybe he went to Liyue or something.”
“But Grand Master, this time it’s way too suspicious.” Six-fingered Jose cried out, tears now actually running down his face. “You have to find him! What if something happened to him? How will out city carry on without his songs?!”
“Hey, why are you crying?” Margaret grumbled. “Isn’t he your rival or something? Shouldn’t you be happy that he’s gone?”
“He might’ve taken my job and my title.” Jose sobbed. “But I can’t imagine never hearing his voice again!”
“Alright, alright, calm down.” Varka patted Jose’s shoulder. “No need to worry that much. I’m sure he’s alright but if it’ll sooth your worries, I’ll look into it.”
Hearing their Grand Master coming to the rescue, the crowd screamed once again but this time in joy. At that very moment, Varka’s eyes landed on Aether. Seeing that glint in Varka’s eyes, Aether shook his head but before he could quietly disappear Varka pointed at his direction and exclaimed.
“Look, our Honorary Knight is here today.”
The crowd immediately turned around. When they saw Aether, their joy seemed to double up.
“Honorary Knight!” They exclaimed. “This must be a blessing from the Anemo Archon!”
“Honorary Knight.” Six-fingered Jose grabbed Aether by his sleeve. “Help our Grand Master find Venti. For the sake of this city.”
“Yeah, the more the merrier!” Varka said, coming over to them and swinging his arm around Aether’s shoulder, completely ignoring the glare he gave him.
“Well, looks like we don’t have a choice.” Paimon sighed, hovering on Aether’s side. “So, we will have to spend our day off looking for Tone-Deaf Bard.”
“Well, I am intrigued now.” Aether said. “I guess we’ll have to go and see what happened with Venti this time.”
They walked out of the Mondstadt gates when Aether decided to finally ask Varka of their plan for the search of the runaway archon.
“Any ideas what could’ve happened with Venti?” He asked. “Or where we should begin looking?”
“Yes, to both of your questions. I have my suspicions about what caused all of this.” Varka sighed. “That brat…”
“Hey, don’t you think it’s a little excessive to call your archon that?” Paimon said. “I know it’s just Venti but still…”
“What? Oh no, I’m not talking about Barbatos. I might be a little blasphemous from time to time but that’s all in good faith.” Varka shook his head. “I’m not talking about him.”
“Then who are you talking about? Come on, why the intrigue?!” Paimon stomped her feet in the air, making Varka chuckle.
“Just follow me. I think it’s better if you see it for yourself.”
Varka took them to Falcon Coast and up to the Witches’ floating island. Turns out Varka was right: as soon as the flew up on the island, they saw Venti sitting at the tea party table, face hidden in his palms, his hat discarded and hair disheveled. On both of his sides sat Alice and Nicole. The angel patted his back in what looked like a supportive gesture.
As soon as their feet touched the ground, the wind ruffled Venti’s hair and he flinched on his chair, looking around with a panicked look on his face. Then, he saw them and let out his breath in relief.
“Oh, Traveler, Paimon, it’s you.” He slumped back on his chair as Aether raised his hand in a greeting. “And Varka’s with you.”
Just as he said that, his eyes settling on Varka, his pupils narrowed and his face twisted in anger.
“You?!” He jumped up and pointed his finger at Varka. “You told him, didn’t you?”
The wind around them picked up, nearly blowing away both Paimon and Alice’s hat, which she had to catch with her hands. Varka raised his arms in a conciliatory gesture.
“I swear by my honor as a knight, I did not. I have no idea how he found out.” He said hastily, then added, quietly. “Although, you probably shouldn’t have casually appeared on Andrius’ arena accompanied by Dvalin right in front of him. That doesn’t seem like normal bard activities to me.”
“Varka’s got a point.” Nicole’s voice sounded in their heads. “You’re not very good in keeping it a secret.”
“Ugh.” Venti slumped head first on the table, making the cutlery and cups clink from another strong gust of wind.
“Who are you talking about?” Paimon asked.
“I think I know what’s happening here.” Aether muttered, looking at Venti’s slumped shoulders with sympathy.
“Well, Paimon doesn’t.” She stomped her little feet. “So can someone explain?”
“It’s Lohen.” Venti replied, finally lifting his head. “He somehow found out that I’m Barbatos, and ever since then, he can’t leave me alone.”
“You do seem pretty stressed out.” Varka sat, sitting down at the table, Aether and Paimon following him. “What did the kid do now to make you of all people so terrified?”
“He just constantly wants me to fight him!” Venti exclaimed, his eye twitching. “Every day, every hour, every second! He manages to find me anywhere. At this rate I’ll just run away to Liyue and stay there forever!”
His voice became louder with every new word and a mini-hurricane appeared on the table, smashing the kettle onto the ground. Alice immediately summoned a new one and poured a cup of pleasantly smelling tea.
“How about you drink some more chamomile tea?” She said, giving the cup to Venti. “Or I’m afraid by the end of the day there will be nothing left of our island.”
Venti took a deep breath and sipped the tea. He closed his eyes and closed his eye, relaxing a little with the effect of the tea.
“Ah, that’s better.” He sighed, relaxing a little with the effect of the tea. “Thank Barbatos.”
“Dearest, you are Barbatos.” Alice said, pouring everyone a cup of tea to drink while listening to Venti’s rant
“Right now, I wish I wasn’t.” He grunted in response. “Anyways, this kid Lohen seems like he lost his mind after finding out my identity. Before that, he’d bother Andrius and I loved to laugh about it, hearing that big wolf’s grumbling. But now it is so not funny.”
“Paimon still doesn’t understand.” Paimon spread her hands in confusion. “Why would you be afraid of him? It’s not like he can win you in a fight.”
“I do not wish to fight him.” Venti exclaimed, setting the cup down on the table with a clink. “I do not wish to fight anybody.”
“Can confirm.” Alice said with a smile. “We all remember your famous Let us make music, not war.”
“Oh yes, that song you played was marvelous.” Nicole clapped her hands.
“Yeah, well that didn’t work with Lohen.” Venti sighed. “I tried to play him a song but he didn’t even let me finish it, asking when we can fight. He does not take no for an answer.”
“Well, can’t you just ignore him?” Aether asked.
“He’s impossible to ignore. Every single day, he terrorizes me. He keeps drugging my wine. It won’t do anything to me, obviously, but it ruins the taste. He ambushes me on the streets when I’m playing songs, tracks me down in the forests. Last Sunday he went to the Cathedral for the morning prayer and just kept repeating “fight me, fight me, fight me”, so much that I couldn’t hear the prayers of other people. My head was hurting the whole day because of him!”
“Yeah, that does sound like something he would do…” Varka said, sipping his tea.
“I can’t even sleep peacefully anymore. Once I was sleeping on the Windrise Tree as I usually do, and he somehow managed to put a cat on the same tree. It crawled on my face and I woke up sneezing like crazy and he stood down there, smiling, asking if I’m going to fight him now.”
“It sounds like he’s just trying to make you mad at him so that you would actually want to fight him.” Paimon said.
“Yeah, well I’m not going to give in. I can’t just go around fighting my children, even if it’s what they want.”
“Can’t you just fight at your minimum strength and let him win?” Aether suggested.
“You think I didn’t try? He’s not falling for it. Nothing works on him. A few days ago, I couldn’t stand it anymore and accidentally sent him flying up a few feet. He landed on top of a tree and laughed.” Venti buried his face in his palms. “I can’t do this anymore.”
“I’ve heard that Lohen’s been going around challenging almost every supernatural creature in Mondstadt.” Nicole’s voice sounded once again. “The other day he scared off our little Durin, too. Poor boy had to stay with Albedo on Dragonspine the whole day, hiding from Lohen.”
“Well, good news he didn’t find our tea party zone yet.” Alice replied, taking a bite of a biscuit. “Say, did he try to fight Dvalin yet?”
“Dvalin told me that he has been wandering around Old Mondstadt lately but we don’t know if he was trying to find Dvalin.” Venti leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples. “Just before I came here, I went to hide in his lair and told him about my little problem called “Lohen”. Shouldn’t have done that. As soon as Dvalin heard that he’s been terrorizing me, he decided it was his duty to “protect me”. I barely managed to hold him back. Ugh, children…”
“Oh, dear…” Alice patted Venti’s shoulder. “Seems like you weren’t so lucky with your children. If only every one of your children were like my little Klee.”
Everyone at the table fell silent and stared at Alice in disbelief.
“What?” She said. “Anyways, I feel like all of that is the fault of our Grand Master here.”
“What?!” Varak chocked on his tea. “How is any of that my fault?! I didn’t do anything.”
“Exactly!” Alice exclaimed. “You didn’t do anything, when our poor archon here suffers from one of your knights. You have to take matters into your own hands before dear Barbatos withers like a cecilia without wind. He’s such a gentle soul, look at what all this violence did to him!”
She grabbed Venti by the face with both hands, squeezing his cheeks. Venti shook her hands of him with yet another gust of wind, which this time managed to knock of her hat. Alice squealed and puffed out her cheeks angrily.
“Stop this!” He exclaimed, then turned to Varka. “Don’t worry about it, really. I’ll figure something out.”
“And until then what are you planning to do?” Aether asked. “Stay up here until you figure it out?”
“Well, yes.” Venti nodded. “Or, if he finds me, I’ll go to Liyue.”
Varka shook his head.
“Nope, that won’t do. Do you know how worried everyone are because of you? I was ambushed this morning by a bunch of concerned citizens, begging me to find you and bring you back. You can’t deprive people of their favorite bard.”
“Ugh, yeah, I heard all of their worries on the wind.” Venti replied. “But I can’t just go back with being a bard for them when Lohen’s waiting for me at every corner.”
“Paimon thinks Alice is right.” Paimon said. “Varka’s the Grand Master and Lohen is one of his knights. Can’t you just… give him another job to keep him distracted from Venti, at least for a while?”
“As if this kid listens to what I say…” Varka sighed. “But you’re right. He's in my area of responsibility. I’ll have a talk with him.”
“No need, really.” Venti tried again. “I don’t want him to get in trouble because of me.”
“Well, do you want to keep living like this forever?” Varka said. “You know that he won’t grow tired of it.”
Venti bit his lip, feeling both guilty for getting one of his children in trouble and too tired to reject the help. Eventually, he sighed and said:
“Just don’t punish him too harshly.”
“Oh, trust me.” Varka said. “I know just the right punishment for him.”
After they left Venti with the witches and returned to the city, Aether asked Varka:
“So, what are you planning to do with him?”
Varka chuckled.
“Don’t worry. I keep my promises to my archon, so nothing harsh.” He approached one of the knights that stood at the gates and said: “Find Lohen and send him to my office, please.”
“Yes, Grand Master.” The knight quickly ran off into the streets.
“Want to come with me for this talk?” Varka asked Aether, to which he shook his head.
“Can’t. I promised Albedo to visit him in the afternoon. So, whatever it is you planned, I’ll have to see tomorrow. Hope it’ll work, or I’m afraid Venti will actually run away to Liyue for a few years.”
“And we can’t have that.” Varka said. “Fine then, I’ll be off to give our Vice-Captain a serious talk. See you later!”
“Bye!” Paimon said as Varka walked to the headquarters. Then she turned to the Traveler. “Do you think it’ll work. Paimon kind of feels bard for Venti, he did look quite disturbed by this whole thing.”
“Well, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”
The next morning the Traveler and Paimon walked past the Cathedral and were surprised to see Venti, completely undisrupted, rehearsing a song with the choir at the feet of the Anemo Archon’s statue.
“Huh, he doesn’t seem so worried today?” Paimon titled her head. “Looks like whatever Varka did worked after all.”
“Yeah, I think I know what the punishment was.” Aether said with a chuckle. “Look.”
Paimon looked at the direction he was pointing at. Up the stairs, at the entrance to the Cathedral stood Lohen with a broom in his hands. He was just sweeping the leaves but the look on his face made it look like he was suffering the most brutal tortures ever. A few feet away from him stood Varka.
The Traveler and Paimon walked up to him.
“So, this is the punishment you chose, huh?” Paimon asked, looking at Lohen’s slouched figure. “Doesn’t seem that bad to me.”
“Well, I figured that if he wants to terrorize our lord, the best punishment would be help around in our lord’s house.” Varka said with a smirk. “Two weeks of helping around in the Cathedral instead of fighting monsters and he will forget that he ever knew Venti’s real identity. Am I right, Lohen?”
Lohen sent Varka a glare. At that very moment, a gust of wind blew past them and swept the rest of the leaves into the pile.
“Oh, Vice-Captain, you already finished!” Sister Grace exclaimed. “How fast!”
Lohen turned a puzzled gaze to Venti, who sent him a sheepish smile.
“Ah, still our archon is way too kind-hearted.” Varka sighed, leaning against a column. “Just you see, in a few days he’ll come to me asking to free Lohen from his punishment.”
Aether chuckled. It looked like with Lohen back in town, no one in Mondstadt will be able to carry on with the usual peaceful life. Not even Barbatos himself.