Ren
'So this is the Chasm…'
Ren stood at the edge of a collapsed ridge, looking down at a hole in the earth so wide that it was unnerving.
The walls dropped straight and dark, disappearing into a black that swallowed the afternoon light completely after going only a bit down.
Above all, there was also this uneasy presence that loomed over him.
He didn't sense anything like he usually did. It was his instinct that told him that this place just felt off.
Brushing off the thought, Ren reached out with his senses to find Xiao. It wasn't that hard, as the Yaksha had made his presence a bit more noticeable than normal.
Xiao wasn't too far to his left. Without wasting another second, he headed off.
'I really wish he did the teleporting thing for me too,' Ren grumbled internally, 'I had to hide and take different routes because of the shit ton of Millelith here. Thank goodness I can hide in the shadows, or else that would have taken way too long.'
The Millelith checkpoint at the access road was a lot bigger than he expected. There was news of something big happening here, but nothing to warrant this much surveillance. At least, to his knowledge.
The fact that Xiao had also brought him here told him that something was going on in the Chasm that the Qixing wanted suppressed.
Xiao stood at the edge with his back to him, arms folded, looking down at the empty abyss below.
"You took long enough."
"There were a few obstacles along the way."
Xiao turned his head and raised a brow.
Ren let it go and walked up beside him. 'That's a lot deeper now that I'm up close…' There was no visible bottom and no path down. Just a long fall into the dark.
'How do miners even get down there?'
He turned to Xiao, "So, how are we getting in?"
Xiao didn't even turn to look at him. He raised a foot forward, then stepped off the edge and dropped.
His form shrinking fast, the green of his coat fading into the dark below until Ren couldn't see it at all.
'...Of course.' Ren sighed hard.
He brought out the hand sign for Nue. It materialized beside him with a low crackle of electro. Ren placed his hand briefly on the side of her neck, giving them a gentle rub before climbing up onto her back.
"Let's go buddy," he said.
Nue stepped off the edge without complaint.
The wind cut fast as they dropped, the walls of the Chasm rising around them, and the light from above shrinking quickly.
/ — /
'How deep is this hole?' Ren had been descending for what felt like five minutes by now.
Nue's wings kept them from dropping too fast, but the descent still felt like it went on longer than it had any right to.
The Chasm walls stayed close on either side, and the circle of sky above got smaller and smaller until it was just a dim smudge of grey light that Ren stopped looking at after the third minute.
Then, finally, the walls opened up.
He came through the entrance hole and into a wide area. A cavern so wide he couldn't immediately see the far wall.
Somehow, light from above still reached this area. And across the floor and walls and every surface in between, something was growing. A pale blue-white cluster of crystal, and patches of bioluminescent fungus in deep violet and green.
"Wow." Ren couldn't help but mutter.
In his short time in Liyue, he's seen many beautiful sights. From Qingce all the way to Jueyun Karst. He'd seen the seasons change and nature with it. Liyue's surface was beautiful, basically everywhere.
He had not expected the underground to be just as gorgeous.
It wasn't the same kind of beautiful. But it was breathtaking all the same.
But he didn't dally for long, as he felt Xiao's presence loom closer. Ren redirected his eyes across the cavern floor until he located him.
He spotted him standing in front of two Hillicurls with an annoyed expression.
Ren guided Nue in that direction and watched from above.
'Funny,' he thought idly as he flew over. 'I don't think I've actually run into many Hillicurls since getting here.'
Liyue had Treasure Hoarders and geovishaps. But Hillicurls specifically, he could count the encounters on one hand. Which was odd now that he thought about it, as most people say that Hillicurls are the most common monster an adventurer would come across.
The thought evaporated when the closer Hillicurl took a swing at Xiao.
Xiao didn't bother to dodge. He brought his arm up so fast that it became a blur, the edge of his palm connecting with the Hillicurl's head.
SPLAT.
Xiao shook his hand once, dispersing the blood as the Hillicurl's headless body fell to the ground. He turned to the second Hillicurl, who had stopped moving entirely, before it immediately turned tail and ran.
Unfortunately for it, Xiao was already beside it. The second result was the same as the first.
"Damn," Ren muttered.
Finally reaching the ground, Nue landed softly, and Xiao turned to them. Ren got down quickly and desummoned Nue.
"So, what do you want me to do?"
"What do you think of this area?"
Ren looked around. The cavern stretched in three directions from where they stood, with a worked mineshaft cut into the eastern wall and smaller passages at either end.
The lumenstone clusters were denser here than they'd looked from above. The abandoned equipment was scattered across the floor. picks, ore carts, and more had started gathering the same pale growth on their surfaces.
"It looks like a standard mining area," Ren said. "Better looking than I expected. Though I imagine it was a lot more lively before—"
"I meant the energy," Xiao said.
"Oh…"
Ren closed his mouth and extended his senses.
Like the rest of Liyue, the Chasm was saturated in elemental energy. The difference being that there was more negative energy here than anywhere else he's been, though not to an overwhelming amount.
He didn't know what the negative energy was, but something was off in the distribution of it in the Chasm. Some areas had higher concentrations while others felt much more muted, and some didn't have any at all.
"It's not consistent," Ren said. "Some areas feel heavier than others. And there are spots where it almost disappears."
Xiao hummed. "That's about right." He paused. "Go deeper. Find where the concentration is highest."
Ren turned to the mineshaft, measuring the distance. It looked like the obvious route.
"Where should I go—"
Xiao was gone.
Ren looked at the empty space where he'd been standing.
"You've gotta be fucking kidding me." He turned back to the mineshaft, sighed, and started walking.
/ — /
Ren went deeper into the Chasm and let his senses spread throughout the area. The tunnel was reinforced with old timber framing, most of it intact, some of it bowing under the weight of decades.
He was a little disappointed that the area didn't show anything interesting. There wasn't even any interesting energy to take note of.
As contradictory as that may seem to his paranoid and averse nature, he's more of a complain and whine but still has fun kind of guy.
What did unnerve him, though, was not being able to locate Xiao.
He couldn't feel him. Which almost certainly meant Xiao had decided to conceal his presence, which was arguably worse than him just not being there.
Somewhere behind or above or around him, a thousands-of-years-old yaksha was watching him walk through an abandoned mine like a test subject.
But Ren couldn't complain too much. Xiao had been far more reasonable than he'd expected, and he'd take this any day instead of getting impaled by his spear.
The tunnel opened into a larger passage after a while and then into a broad natural chamber, and Ren's senses caught something. A concentration of negative energy from somewhere further ahead.
He followed it and quickly realized that he was sensing the concentration spreading.
'This might be trouble.' He thought as he prepared himself.
The passage narrowed, curved, and then stopped at the edge of a ravine.
Ren looked down and couldn't see the bottom. 'How much deeper does this place go?' Looked across to a decent distance to the other side, where his senses were pulling him.
Looking around, he also noticed that there were no bridges in sight.
'Extension Technique: Orochi.'
Geo energy concentrated beneath his feet and manifested a construct that extended to the other side, connecting across in a flat bridge. He made sure to add some support beams and guard rails just in case anyone else wanted to cross it.
'This should also help anyone traveling through here,' he thought, testing the surface with one foot before crossing. It held. He dusted his hands off and kept going.
'Now what's—Huek!' The foul stench filled his nostrils.
Ren instinctively covered his nose as a thick and disgusting smell filled the air. He pushed his senses forward and got a wall of negative energy. He identified multiple small concentrations nearby, and he turned the next corner and found what he was looking for.
Large lumps of something purple and viscous were distributed across the cave floor. Between them, the ground was covered in dark mud that glistened in the lumenstone light and smelled like something that had been rotting for a century.
'Archons, that's fucking disgusting.'
The lumps themselves were slowly pulsing. Periodically expanding and contracting like pressure building and releasing. It looked uncomfortably close to breathing which made it more unnerving.
'This better not be some monster's shit.'
Knowing Xiao is still watching, he got close to the lumps and let his body's passive absorption do its thing. He could feel it happening quickly, the energy denser than the ambient saturation in the tunnels.
With the lumps emitting a different kind of energy, he waited to see if his body would respond to it differently.
Yet nothing happened. His body absorbed it the same way it absorbed everything else. More of it, faster. Nonetheless, the same.
'Interesting.'
He walked closer to the nearest lump. Up close, the surface was opaque and slightly iridescent, the dark mud pooling outward from its base.
He could see it very slowly shrinking as he stood next to it. His absorption was doing something, just not quickly.
"What if I…" He held out his hand and ran Nue's extension through it, building a charge of electro in his palm and discharged it directly into the lump.
SPLAT.
"Shit!" He jumped back fast as purple sludge scattered across the floor in every direction, two drops landing just short of his boots. Thankfully, none of it got on him.
He watched the scattered pieces for a moment. Then they started moving back toward each other.
The lump reformed. Slightly smaller, but it would grow back to its natural size.
"So that doesn't work," Ren muttered.
He stood there for a moment and thought about what just happened. The electro broke it apart but didn't neutralize whatever was holding it together.
The pieces just reassembled. It was less a creature and more a process, something that would keep happening unless you interrupted the process itself rather than the form it was taking.
He brought both hands up, opened his palms, and coursed Cursed Energy through them. Not shaping it into anything, just raw output pushed outward.
SPLAT.
The lump was blown up again, but this time, it didn't reform. The dark mud around it receded with it, pulling back like water draining, until both were just gone.
Ren moved to the next one and got the same result. He worked through the rest of them until the floor was just rock again.
'Good to know CE can still be used to exorcise things in a way.'
He'd been meaning to test this for months. He had even asked Chongyun to tag along on one of his trips to try it on a spirit directly. The problem was that Chongyun's yang energy had a habit of clearing the area of anything exorcisable before Ren got anywhere near it. Every time. He'd given up asking after the third try.
He looked at the now-clear chamber and called out to Xiao.
"Is this enough?"
His voice echoed off the walls. Yet he got no response from the Conqueror of Demons.
'Okay…' He turned in a slow circle, checking the passages. 'Maybe he wants me to go further?'
"Should I keep exploring—Woah!" Just as he called out again, the ground shook.
The entire chamber floor dropped half an inch and snapped back, and then the shaking started. Both the wall and floor vibrated with such intensity that part of them cracked. Dust cascaded from the ceiling in sheets. A support beam somewhere in the tunnel behind him cracked loudly.
Then the ceiling of the passage he'd come through came down.
"Shit!" Ren quickly ran in the opposite direction from the cave-in. Running through mineshafts and tighter caverns, deeper into the Chasm until he reached another open area.
The shaking went on for another ten seconds before finally settling down.
Ren panted slightly from the sudden exertion, "What the fuck was that?"
He looked back at the sealed tunnel. "Xiao! You still there?!" He shouted, "Is this part of the test?!"
No response again.
"Fuck," He started panicking a little, there was no way Xiao caused the cave-in to trap him here, would he?
'No, that's ridiculous.' Ren told himself, 'If Xiao wanted to deal with me, he would have just killed me. Wasting time to bring me down here doesn't seem like his style…'
A part of him wanted to call out again, but he knew Xiao wouldn't answer. With a sigh, he stared forward at a downward slope deeper into the dark.
In all likelihood, Xiao was still watching him and had things under control.
On the off chance he wasn't…
Ren sighed again. '...Deeper it is.'
/ — /
"Exploring a deep, haunted cave and got myself stuck after a cave-in… I probably should've let Ganyu come with." Ren grumbled.
After a while of walking, the Chasm had lost most of its uniqueness. It was just rocks, mineshafts, and the occasional glow from glowing plants.
He idly thought that if Xiao had trapped him, or if he somehow lost track of him, could he get out of the Chasm himself?
"Maybe with Orochi?" He muttered. He could hitch a ride on Orochi as it tunneled through the ground until they reached the surface. That would be unpleasant, but Ren couldn't see a reason why it wouldn't work.
'Maybe I could incorporate some more tunneling in my fighting style…'
The passage opened into a wider section of the mine, and that was when he sensed something new. Raising his guard, Ren carefully walked forward and saw five figures.
'Are those… Knights?' The armour definitely looked like that of a knight, but it looked corrupted, and the energy from it was just wrong.
'There's something different about them…' Ren immediately concluded. Their energy just felt different in a way he didn't know how to describe. It wasn't normal negative energy.
While he was assessing them, the knights took notice of his presence. Their heads turned in unison towards him in an eerie manner.
His first thought was that they were cursed humans, maybe. Former soldiers given the way they were standing.
More importantly, one of them was already hanging back with a bow drawn. Another had driven a war banner into the ground, emitting pyro elemental energy.
Ren's eyes moved across their positions.
'They're in a formation.'
These aren't normal monsters. They had enough cognition to create a battle formation. The banner one in the middle, the bow one in an elevated area, and the others fanned out to cover angles.
Their stances weren't sloppy either. These weren't creatures that had picked up weapons by accident.
'What are they?'
He was still analyzing them when the sword one on the left side suddenly rushed at him.
'Oh come on! I didn't even do anything!'
He immediately dropped into the shadows just as the sword was about to hit.
Inside the shadows, Ren thought about how he should approach the battle.
These weren't normal monsters and definitely had some skill. Their energy also showed that they were pretty strong. Individually, Ren wouldn't bat an eye. But together is when things got complicated.
His mind immediately went to the banner-wielding one. Its positioning was in the middle of the group, and when it planted its banner on the ground, Ren felt its energy seeping into its comrades.
'Either a shielder or a buffer.' Ren decided to take this one out first.
He surfaced from its shadow and drove a kick into its side hard enough to stagger it off the banner and send it stumbling back.
'Extension Technique: Nue!' Electro gathered between his palms.
"Rabbit Escape!"
Dozens of anemo rabbits erupted outward. Ren shot out a burst of electro just as they hit the monster. The anemo and electro detonated on contact, the swirl reaction creating a dust cloud, and threw the banner one far away and the others slightly back.
'That one down. Now I need to—Shit!' Ren twisted his head just in time as an arrow came out of the dust and missed his ear by centimeters.
He was already back in the shadows and reappeared at the far end of the battlefield. 'Extension Technique: Orochi.'
Geo pillars erupted from the floor, creating a maze-like structure. Not aimed at anyone specifically, just random bursts, forcing the group to split. Limiting their movement.
The bow one repositioned immediately, light on its feet, already tracking the new angle.
'You're fast. But not fast enough.' Ren smirked.
Just as the bow wielder caught sight of Ren, he had already summoned Rabbit Escape again. This time, filling the tight area with rabbits and once again creating an electro swirl reaction.
The detonations went off in tandem across the whole area. A carpet of explosions that covered everything in dust and debris.
'That was fun.' Ren let himself chuckle, 'Now did that get any of them?'
He waited until the dust finally thinned.
The axe one and the sword one were still standing. They'd taken the hits and hadn't gone down. The other three were down but alive, he could still sense them.
'Tougher than expected,' he thought, without particular concern. 'But it doesn't matter.'
Then the axe one brought both weapons around and burst out of the Geo trap. The pillars came apart in chunks. The sword one was right behind it, both of them crossing the distance to him fast.
Ren almost went back into the shadows when a thought came to him
'Sinking to the shadows all the time would be boring…'
It was rare that he found opponents like this. After he arrived on Teyvat, he could count the number of hard battles he fought on one hand.
He didn't count the battle with Shenhe as a hard battle, as it was more of a one-sided beatdown.
This was a good chance for him to have some fun against a decent fighter.
'Besides, I've already worn them down.' He reasoned.
If he somehow got injured by weakened monsters, then it was on him for being weak.
"Orochi!"
Orochi came up from the ground the moment the sword one got close, jaw closing around it mid-swing and slamming it sideways into the cave wall with enough force to crack the rock behind it.
That left the axe one.
It swung fast and wide, both axes moving in alternating arcs. Ren moved with, letting the swings pass by him without connecting. It was strong, but not fast enough to hit him.
He waited for the next slash and rushed in the moment it went to strike. Ren felt the axe pass close enough to move his hair.
The axe one tried to step forward. But let out a strangled noise once it realised it couldn't move its legs.
It looked down. Toad's tongue was wrapped around both ankles, the partial manifestation barely visible in the low light but doing exactly what it needed to.
'Let's see if you're durable enough for this.'
Using Rabbit Escape's extension, he created a vortex that pulled its body to his fist. Then he layered Nue's extension over it. Anemo and Electro were building in his palm into dense concentration.
BOOM.
It hit the cave wall before the sound did.
Ren looked up to see its chest now having a hole that went straight through it.
'That's a lot stronger than expected,' he hummed in surprise, 'Not too much CE drain either—Woah!'
He turned to the lancer just as it drove a thrust at his side. He stepped back, let the lance pass by him, and discharged a short anemo burst into the weapon. The force was enough to blow it away, but not enough to blow it off its grip.
It was faster than the axe one, but long weapons were something he'd been training a lot to counter after a certain white-haired lady beat his ass.
It thrust again. He stepped inside it, drove an anemo-infused upward kick into its chin, and followed through.
It was sent flying upward, but before it could fall, Ren channeled Anemo through his legs to burst him upwards.
"Got you~" He caught it by the head.
'Extension Technique: Nue'
SPLAT.
He threw the headless body aside and landed softly on the ground.
Orochi had the sword one pinned. Its armor was coming apart. The banner one and the bow one were still recovering.
'I think that's enough fun,' Ren thought as he dusted his shoulders, 'Nue should be enough to finish this,' he thought, bringing up the handsign—
The world froze.
◣̷̡̹̙͕̤͓̟̠̬̯̬̤̤̈̾̽̆̅͋̌̈̍͂͐▌̶̧̧̰̼͇̟͉̲̰̥̣͍̞̘̳̹̟͊̆͊͗̀͊̆͛͑̑͑́̅̏̓̉͌̈́͘͘̕͝͝ ̷̧̞̮͈̖̼̳̯̲̪̱̬̻̞͖̠̬̦̍̈́̈́͌̀̿͊̀̎̎̇͊̾̌̚͘⬤̸̧̡͚̪̱̫̬̱̣̺̺̒̀̽̐̈́̅̿̈́͌́̈́̔̒͋̆̓̎̕͝ ̵̢̡̤̫̰̼̹͔̖͖͈͈͍̭̞̮͎͕̹̗̙͖̄͊̑̈́͗͆͒͐̎̅͌̓̕͜͝͝▐̵̧̞͓̩̰̻̣͉̮͈̦̲̻̖̼͍̲̰͍̜̈́͆̈́̏̕ͅͅ▄̶̡̳͔̻͈̳̬͉̮̓̏̂̇̈́͌̅͗̄̔̈́͌̃́͌̾̀̒̂̄͐͆͆̚͜ͅ█̶̢̡̡̜̹̤͍̖͚͕̺̥̜̖͎̖͔͒̀͆̀͌̀ ̸̯̰̟̻͚̺͍̟̈́ͅ█̸̢̟̣̽̍̈́̾͐̀̄͌̆͊̒̀̈́̈́̈́̈̽̌̀̕͠͝█̶̫̘̭͚̭͇͐͊͌̆̎̓́͆͘ͅͅ ̴̨̗͔̓͋̾̈́͊̿̍̾̌͐͗́͒͗̕▄̸̦̲̠͖͔̗̳̞̟̙̗̤̻͕͒̒͊̄̀̍̋͂̑̇̌͘͜͠͝█̴̧̹̗̯͖̭͖̻̪͉͍͙̣̫̰̟̀͐ͅ▀̶̢̛̛͕̼̳͓̜͇̭̞͍̞̙͚̫̦̮͙̼̜͉̫͚͑̒̊͑̆́̉͝ ̷̟̳̿̂̽̀̅̅̾̽͝█̴̧͍͕̗͈̰̥̪̮̘̭͗̂͑̊̃͛̋͐͠▀̴̡̡̛̞͚͙̦̗̼̤̜͚͇͕̬̺̻̠͖̳͔̞̜̂̓́̔̓͐͂̈̍͒͌͑͛̎̒̚̕͝ͅ ̴̡̡̡̡̫̜͈̞͎̙͔̪̣̠̙̥̳̄͑̐͌̎̃͊̃̈́̽̉̀͗͘͝͠
̵̧̓̊́̐̅̈́̒̎͘͜͠ ̵̢̛̛̰̩̙͇̙̹͔͚̭̑̃͊̒̎̀̐̌͑̕͠͝ ̷̧̢̨̹̹̣̞̗̭̗̟̰̳̥̗͈͖͎̳̲͙̃͗̕▐̷̹̱̯̪̰͖̥̪͙͖̪̯̮̭͇̫͓̜͚̯̮̰̯̏̓͆̌̊̀̊̄̒͗̏̈́̊̐̊͂̿͊̔͆͗̍̕͜͝▄̴͈̬͉͔̹̬͇̝̪̜͈͕̖͔͉̞̰͉̲̖̘̒̒͆̎̆̋̊̿̄̍̎́̍̒̏̊͊͗̾̐̕͘͝█̷̧̢̟͚͇͍̩͙̱̙͖̥̥̟͍̩̝̦͚̻͛̃̋̽̔̓̃̎̊́͌̓̑͒̽͒̀͂́ͅ ̵̰̖̞̮̮̦̲̲͈̭͓̄̍̆̐̈̚̚◖̷̹̤̣͕̭͇̞̥̝͔̣̞̠̩͗̃̋̍̈́̒̅͗͆̇͘̚█̵̡̢̧̛̟̘̦͉̣̘̝͖̪̫̭̯͍͋͊̈́̊̈̍͑͛ ̵͉̺̦̱̱̪̟̳̜͙͎͗̈́█̶̧͙̗͖̭̙̦̰͔̖̜͙͕̬̺̲̭̤͚̰͕̓̐̇̈́̆̂̋͊̃̽͛̍̕͜ͅ ̴̧̡̻͙̬̰͕̰̼͖̫̭͓͇̩͔̫̳̳̈́̕█̸̡̢̧̡̭̦̬̻̣̖̱͎͚͈̗͉͍͇͕̯̖̄̀͜͝█̵͔̗̤̮̘̭̞̖͉͙̩̽̽̃̄̋̚͜█̸̰̭̺̲̹̱̥̽͑͐̊͛͗͌̀̿̃̇̚͘̚͝ ̵̡̤̦̱̹͎̘̗̰̜̲̈́͂̑̋̈̂͑̄̀͊͋̆̈́̓̉̍͜͠͝͝▞̷̤̻͙̪͈̝̫̗̩̞͕̲̞́͂̉́̈́̽̓͗̍̆́̂̐̉͑̀̓̋̚͠͠
̵̨̞̖͈̭̘̦̱̗͎̘̹̫̿̀█̵̛̺͍͖̖̱͍̰̠̤̳̦̹͛͗̐̌̃̍̉͊͑̍̆̽̈́̆͊́̀̚͘̚͘͝█̶̨̛̠̣͉͎̪̺̝͙͉̘̬̎͝█̵̧̨͚̦͔̱͍̯̜͔̯̱̣̯̖̱̥͈̥̘̳̱͒̇͗̌͛̈́̃̽̓̒̅̽̕͜ ̵̡̡̥̱̣̟̮̞̳̠̣͈̰̭͈̳͓̙̾͋̾͊͋̎̈́̌͜▞̴̛̛̛̱͙̼̰̗͔͔̗̩̗̗̲̪͐̎͌̂͐̋̈́͊̈͛̋̎̈́̎͛̌̓̄̚̚͠▚̴̢̣͍͚͉̙̝̱̭̞͉̱̳̟͇͇̻̙̦̺͌̒̉͜ ̷̛̰̞͈͓̊̏̈̃̀̂̆̊̓̒̚͝͠ͅͅ▄̶̤͓͉̻̠͔̻̙̣̗̳̮͇̲̠̪̦̹̝̟̭̘̏̀͑͛̀̑̔͊̔̏̋͘̕͜͜͝█̷̩̯̥͊̎̿̿̎͆̃̋̆̂͆͘▀̶̢̭͙̩͓̰͛͊͂̊̃̌̂͊͒́̓̀̿́͐̌̊͌̽ ̸̻̞̮̺̱͉̰͚̺̯̝̾̋̉̈͒̏̇̏̂̎̚̚͠͝͝▎̴̟̮͊̽̽̈̈́̌̈́͑̈́̓̂͑̓̈́̈́̇̕▶̵̨̠̞͇̼̬̝͈͙̮̲͇̼̮͇̬̰̈́̏̿͒͜͝ ̶̧̡̨͎͚̼̬͈͕̟̫͚̹͙̬̳̱͖͈͎̟̤̕͠▞̶̺͉͚͈̝̂͌͑̏̿̆͆̄̌̏̎̀͘͘͜ͅ▚̸̱͚̖̫̬̼̣̤̭̥̯̼̫̈́͋́͆̎́̿̀́̂̓͝͝͠ͅͅ ̵̙̖̠̘̘͈̠̗̃̔̌͛̀̋̽͂̄̽͌̔̓͘̕╚̸̡̛̱̦͕̣̖͈̘̯̟̖̒͌̾́́͗̑̓̅͆̀͒̔̏͆̊̀̀̎͘ͅ╣̶͔̔̿̒̃͊̊̂̓̾͒̓̒̀͆̐̈́̓̃͂̕͝͝
'WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!'
His entire perception collapsed inward to a single point somewhere deeper in the Chasm. Something was there. Something had just made itself known.
Xiao had felt like a predator. Something had locked onto him, and he was prey. That was terrifying in a way he still understood. There was a scale to it, something he could at least conceptualize.
This was different.
This was standing at the base of a mountain and watching it erupt.
A natural disaster.
A calamity.
Something that wouldn't notice the difference between him running and him fighting because neither outcome would matter to it at all.
And underneath the most foul and vile energy he had ever felt in his life was something warm. Something holy.
Both of them were coming from the same source simultaneously, which made no sense, which made it worse somehow. The wrongness of the combination hitting some part of his brain that couldn't process it and simply shut down trying.
Something in him said, with complete certainty: it's looking for you.
He ran.
He didn't pay attention to the knights anymore. The passage didn't exist. His senses narrowed away.
Away from the presence, away from whatever that was, deeper into the Chasm. He moved through sections of tunnel and wider chambers and narrower passages without registering any of them, just putting as much rock as possible between himself and that… thing.
He didn't stop until he couldn't feel it anymore.
"Haah!" Ren fell to his knees in the middle of a dark passage and stayed there. His breathing was loud in the silence, and his heart drummed loudly in his ears.
He let himself have a moment to calm down.
When he finally straightened up and looked around, the area was darker than anywhere he'd been yet.
Barely any lumenstone. The rock formations were different here, and there were no signs of mining activity at all.
'How far did I go?'
He exhaled and was about to figure out what came next when his senses registered something unexpected.
Presences. Four of them. Close.
He snapped his head right.
It was a camp. Rough and clearly worn down. Supply crates stacked for shelter, a small light source, four figures that looked like they hadn't slept properly in a long time.
The one closest to him was already on her feet, purple hood pulled up with her face covered in a fatui mask.
"W-Who are you?"
/ — /
???
The dark portal opened, and an Abyss Lector fell from it roughly.
They hit the ground on their hands and knees, armor cracked across the chest, dark fluid seeping from the gaps where the plating had given way.
It stayed like that for a moment. Just breathing, or whatever Abyss Lectors did instead of breathing, before it gathered itself and pushed onto one knee.
"My sincerest apologies, princess."
The blonde woman standing a few meters away didn't move.
She looked down at it with an expression that said nothing. Not displeasure. Not relief. Just a blank gaze that bore into him and saw more than it ever should.
It was just silence for a few moments.
Then she closed her eyes.
"No matter." Her voice was even. "The Conqueror of Demons appearance was unexpected. Were you able to drive him out?"
The Lector dipped its head once.
"Good."
She turned slightly, looking out over the passage that led further into the Chasm's depths. The lumenstone light here was dim, the rock overhead pressing down in a way that made the space feel compressed.
Her eyes moved in a specific direction.
The princess narrowed her eyes.
Not at anything visible. At something she was trying to locate, or trying to confirm the absence of, it was difficult to tell which. She held that look for long enough that the Lector noticed.
"Is something the matter, princess?"
She blinked.
The look was gone. Her expression reset to the same unreadable surface it had been before, and she turned away.
"No… It's nothing."
She moved past the lector, and with a motion of her wrist, a black portal opened up in front of her.
"Come. We still have work to do."
The Lector slowly got to its feet and followed.
The portal closed behind them.