Chapter 80: The Plan of The Abyss
The gods have given me an errand… again. Why can't they just investigate this place? And it's a place where an Abyss Herald was sighted for fucks sake! Were they seriously trying to annoy me!?
"Haah… I've been way more irritable lately…"
I took a deep breath and continued on walking down the mountain where the old fossils were happily drinking tea. I can't really call them fossils actually… I am older than them after all… Meh, I don't really look like it. However, as I walked down, I felt that same malice that I felt in the alternate world. I looked around and spotted the very same white haired woman that I saw in Lumine's world. She was just there, sitting at a cliff while her legs dangled on the edge.
I don't know why, but I feel like there's something attracting me to her. What is this, a destiny related thing?
"Hello? Why are you here? Were you not having tea with my master?"
Wait, master? Who does she mean- Wait a second… Now that I look at her clothing, which I knew were familiar to me, it seems like it's the missing pieces of Ganyu's* clothing. So her master is Cloud Retainer? I should confirm that.
"Do you mean Cloud Retainer?" She nods. "Ah, well I was, but those two Archons just had to make me do an errand. Haah…"
"Hm… what was the errand?"
"It was to check out a part of Liyue that had sightings of a humanoid Abyss monster, which they presume was an Abyss Herald."
"I see, do you mind me joining you?"
"Eh? Why?" Though, I wouldn't really mind.
"I'm trying to find my place in human society again, but I'm having some problems. The methods that I use were said to be… inappropriate?"
"I see… alright then, let's get going."
She nodded and we both headed down the mountain. You might be wondering why I just accepted her to join me. Well, that's easy to answer. She's beautiful. Well, that and she's powerful. With her master being Cloud Retainer, being the doting mother-like figure that she is, I'm pretty sure she taught her some powerful Adeptal arts. That would come in really handy if it really was an Abyss Herald.
There weren't really any words spoken as we continued on walking down the mountain, but it wasn't an uncomfortable silence. It was the opposite really and I guess that it was that same feeling like earlier again.
"What kind of god are you?"
"Hm?" Well, that was a sudden question. "What do you mean?"
"If Rex Lapis is the God of Contracts and Barbatos of Mondstadt is the God of Freedom, then what are you?"
"Hm…" That's a good question actually. What exactly am I the god of? I can't exactly say death even though that's how I get my power. Hm… what's the one thing that only I can do… While thinking of that, flashes of Lumine's world and how everything that happened differently popped up in my mind.
"God of Change, I guess."
"I see. I won't ask any further details."
"Thanks." I didn't know how to explain it anyways. That's when I realized something. "Oh, you haven't told me your name yet."
"Shenhe."
"Oh, I'm Aether. Nice to meet you, Shenhe!" I held out my hand and she did the same as well. We shook hands and continued on walking.
—
There was one thing that I noticed about Shenhe in our short time together. She was like… a blank slate. Don't get me wrong, she has her own mind and everything, but she lacked emotion. It took me quite a bit to find the reason, so long actually that we were almost at our destination, but I still got there. Something was holding her emotions back, and looking at her closely, I could see the faintest of adeptal energy being emitted by the red strings that are bound to her.
"Who is that?"
I was snapped back into reality when she pointed to someone who was in front of the cave entrance we were supposed to go into. The person was a tall man with short blonde hair. He was wearing some… exotic clothes that were themed around the color blue and black. However, something else drew my attention. That was the energy that his body had.
'Something akin to Abyssal corruption…no, it's something else…'
I immediately became wary and slowly materialized my Festering Desire. Seeing this, Shenhe started materializing her weapon as well. Seems like she's a polearm user as well.
"The newest god in Teyvat." My eyes widened when he said that. Only a few knew about me being a god, so how did this man know about it? "I am Dainsleif."
"Oh, uh… do I even need to introduce myself?"
"For formalities, yes."
"Well then, I'm Aether." I looked at Shenhe and she nodded. "I'm Shenhe."
"No need for hostility. I presume you're here for the Abyss Herald too?"
"You too?" He nodded.
I sighed and made my sword disappear once more. I looked at Shenhe and nodded, signaling to her to do the same. Without any sort of refusal, she made her spear disappear. I looked back at the man with narrowed eyes. After all, even if our goal is the same, our reasons are different.
Dainsleif told us about something he's heard of that the Abyss Order is looking for. When I asked him where he heard these from, he said from Abyss Mages that he "interrogated". Anyways, the Abyss Order were looking for something called the eye of the first Field Tiller. The fuck was a Field Tiller?
"You seem to be confused about something. Is it about the Field Tillers?"
"Yes, what are these things exactly?"
"The Field Tiller is the real name of the machines you now call Ruin Guards. These were made during the time of Khaenri'ah-"
"Khaenri'ah? The nation that was destroyed 500 years ago?"
"You know about it?"
"I've read about it, but I still don't know what exactly caused the destruction…"
He sighed and then told me and Shenhe what exactly destroyed Khaenri'ah. Truth be told, both of us were shocked. Why would the gods destroy a flourishing nation of humans? However, I soon got my answer. It was a nation without a god. Meaning, no one will monitor the development of the nation.
Seeing what exactly Khaenri'ah has created through the Ruin Guards, or Field Tillers I guess, I could see which direction they were going…
I sighed and after that, I remembered something. There was an inactive Ruin Guard in Stormterror's lair and I faintly remember having a weird feeling about it. I told Dainsleif about this and we agreed to go there. Shenhe was just following along with me. I should seriously teach her how social proceedings go. She didn't even say a single word in this whole interaction.
We all walked together to the direction of Stormterror's lair. I could have just teleported us there, but it was just a few hours walk and I wanted to talk to Shenhe more. Knowing this will take more time than I expected when I accepted this errand, I called Ganyu and told her that I might come home late.
"Oh, work at the Adventurer's Guild?"
"Nah, just an errand from Barbatos and Rex Lapis."
"Oh, I see. Be careful then, love you dear."
"Love you too."
I put down my phone as we continued on walking. While on our way, we ran into some Hilichurls with a Hydro Abyss Mage leading them. They were searching a Ruin Guard for something, the eye I presume. As soon as the mage noticed us, it directed all the hilichurls to attack us. I sighed and just when I was about to materialize my sword, Shenhe dashed and took out a Cryo…sigil?
With one swift movement, a Cryo version of herself with the sigil on its face came out and attacked the incoming Hilichurls. I swear I heard her yell "incarnate" when she summoned that thing. Anyways, as the "incarnate" attacks the Hilichurls, Shenhe went straight for the Hydro Abyss Mage. Ah, how unfortunate for the mage…
Shenhe used her Cryo Vision to freeze the mage's shield. All she needs to do now is to thrust with her spea-
"Hyah!" Shenhe broke the shield with a punch and I swear I heard a bone crack. And it seems I was right, since the shield dissipated and the Abyss Mage that was skewered on Shenhe's arm turned to dust.
Holy shit, I knew she had a ton of malice but holy fuck. She doesn't even seem bothered, not that I'll actually notice it with her stoic expression. Haah, this is gonna be hard…
—-
We were almost at our destination and while we were walking along earlier, we ran into another group of Hilichurls with another Abyss Mage. Although, this time it was Cryo so I was the one to take care of it. Anyways, the mage dropped a talisman, to which Dainsleif translated and told us the contents.
It seems like the plan was to get Osial's limbs and put them onto a defiled statue of The Seven, using the eye as the core. Wait…
"Defiled statue? Statue of which Archon exactly…?"
"The Anemo Archon, Barbatos." said Dainsleif.
I felt my left eye twitch and the crack got longer. Ah, they really have no shame do they? If I could just exterminate the Abyss from this world, I would. That'll make my job easier after all. Oh if only…
"Your eyes are becoming more and more like that of a vishap-person ."
The fuck is a vishap-person? Was someone that desperate that they fucked a vishap? Actually… I can't really talk about horniness when I have multiple wives huh…
"I don't know what those are, but I think his eyes match him perfectly." Shenhe said, having a bit more emotion to her voice this time.
That's a good sign. That means that my teachings to her during this whole trip are going through. I know she's far from it, but little progress is better than no progress at all. Anyways, I smiled at her compliment and we continued on going our way.
Once we reached our destination, I suggested we levitate there using my Anemo. However, they both just jumped. Well, that's one way of doing things… I sighed and jumped as well.
Scanning the ruin guard, I couldn't see anything weird about it at all. So, I asked Dainsleif to give it a try and he succeeded. He pulled out the eye of the very first Field Tiller. I don't really know why, but seeing how it just looked at the distance makes me feel kinda sad.
Haah, no use feeling that now, we have a plan to foil. The Abyss' plans also makes me want to kill Osial even more, but I know the consequences of that decision so I'd rather not. We went back to the spot where the Abyss Herald was spotted via my teleportation and went in.
"Gah, my eyes!"
It was too bright, for me at least. The whole place was filled with a lot of energy that I needed to switch from energy to life sight. There, much bett-
"What the…"
Looking at Dainsleif, I saw that his life force was looping around. It was making something akin to an infinity symbol… The same as mine when I got curious and looked in a mirror. So he's an immortal too, no wonder he knew about Khaenri'ah. Was he a resident of Khaenri'ah? Was he just traveling around and just witnessed it's destruction? I might ask him about these later.
"Let's get going." Shenhe was the first to walk in further. "Hey, wait up!" I followed suit and Dainsleif did as well.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Ayato_Suzuki
Ayato_Suzuki So, I'm changing my schedule to 1 chapter a week. Details in the chapter comments.
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