A pitter-patter of small soles echoed through the empty yet filled chamber. Bereft of a physical mass, individuals, and items. Except for the ethereal substance that composed the network of Teyvat’s knowledge. Instead, adjacent to a glowing tree-like structure was a short woman that looked not that different from a child. The toes of her stirrup-clad feet clenched in disquietude. The squelching of nervous sweat was even audible in this immaterial realm. The Dendro Archon didn’t expect to become beset with such anxiety after sending the Traveler and the Wanderer on their way to Inazuma.
I shouldn’t…but I haven’t gotten a missive or heard a word from them.
But Nahida couldn’t help but worry. It was a familiar, yet distinct sensation as compared to the time when she was held hostage by the grand sages. Back then, the very person that the Dendro Archon was currently worried about, was being used to become a god to replace her. How so much had changed in so little time. Since then, the individual once known as Scaramouche and Nahida slowly became closer. To the point that when the woman had asked if Scaramouche could assist the Traveler in finding information of his sister in the Irminsul, she had come to predict the high possibility that the failed god would try to erase his existence from reality by tampering with the information network.
It was a fortunate prediction as Scaramouche, who now referred to himself as the “Wanderer”, was left an amicable but nearly empty husk. Unaware of who he was and looking for his place in the world. If it wasn’t for the Traveler’s unique perception of the Wanderer and Nahida’s quick thinking in writing down Scaramouche’s past as a fable that wouldn’t be erased by the Irminsul, then the Wanderer would have continued wandering aimlessly. Alas, because of the Wanderer’s actions everyone else in the world had forgotten of his existence. Thusly, the Wanderer was now traveling to Inazuma. A means to get closure over his estrangement with the Electro Archon. An individual that could be viewed as the Wanderer’s mother. Someone who had created him, but due to the erasure of the Wanderer’s existence from the Irminsul, most likely does not recall doing so.
Maybe him and the Traveler got into some trouble along the way. Danger always seems to be attracted to Aether.
Nahida tried to rationalize. It was happenstance that the Traveler was nearby when the Wanderer voiced his desire to visit Inazuma. Although, if he wasn’t in Sumeru then Nahida may have just sent for him. As the Dendro Archon had come to rely on the reliable vagabond. Idiosyncrasies and all.
Nahida let out a heavy sigh. An exhalation that did not ameliorate the tight pressure that was wrapped around her heart. Truly, if these somatic symptoms held any significance to the Dendro Archon, it was that she had come to see the Wanderer as her own child. The physically child-like woman was simply an adoptive mother who worried over sending her child to his biological mother.
Was it premature for him to leave? He hasn’t even decided on a new name yet. His biological mother doesn’t even know that he exists.
It was this anxiety-filled maternal affection that led Nahida to touch upon the Irminsul. Electricity passed through the Dendro Archon’s balmy fingers. As she began viewing the records of the world. Nahida looked at events that transpired in the past. To see what the Wanderer and Aether had gotten themselves into.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This was vexing.
“So…why was it that you weren’t a fan of the name Aang again?”
Very vexing.
The Wanderer couldn’t help but feel his face twist into a habitual visage of malice upon hearing Aether’s incessant inquiry. Despite the doll’s efforts to become a kinder individual, his strained past with the Traveler made it difficult.
I should just drop him.
What made tolerating the Traveler even more difficult for the Wanderer was that the former was asking these questions as the latter was carrying him. For the Wanderer was using his vision to fly through the air. The Traveler, unable to fly, held himself firmly against the Wanderer’s shoulder. A film of light dirt and effort coated their bodies.
Man…I really owe the Wanderer. I wouldn’t have possibly gotten to Ei’s compound as swiftly in this shrunken size. I hope that he appreciates my attempt to lighten up the mood after what we saw earlier.
Another reason as to why the Wanderer was so stressed was that the Traveler and him were both shrunken down to a minute size. On the way to the center of Inazuma, a surge of energy passed them. One moment the Wanderer was walking as Aether prattled on about how he also has a strained relationship with his family, and then the next they were both shorter than a blade of grass.
Despite the drastic change in stature, the Traveler seemed to take things in stride. As evidenced by how he continued bothering the Wanderer with inane topics as they utilized the latter’s skill in flying to expedite their now much greater trip. It was providential that they decided to go with this tiring method. For on the way to Ei’s compound the two of them had seen several horrific sights done to individuals of their stature.
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The first of these sights were of the jovial and usually welcoming firework expert Naganohara Yoimiya. Aether had eagerly pointed her out as someone that could provide the two of them assistance in these dire straits. Although it disgusted the Wanderer to see the traveler’s mood brighten upon seeing an old acquaintance, he was bought in by the latter’s enthusiasm. After all, even though the amber-eyed and fiery-haired tomboy towered over the two of them like the largest building on Inazuma, the Wanderer couldn’t help but be drawn to her natural affability made physical.
Her were clothes styled as if she were a firework in the middle of an explosion. A vibrant energy radiated from Yoimiya as the shrunken Wanderer and Traveler flown closer to her. She bounced lightly on the balls of her feet as she tended to what looked like the components of a firework. The air surrounding around her shook enough for the shrunken duo to notice. It was a gust of wind that was soon followed by a booming thunder.
“GREAT NOW I JUST NEED MY LITTLE HELPER FOR THE GUNPOWDER.”
“Hey Traveler! Isn’t that someone like us that Yoimiya is holding?”
The Wanderer barked as his eyes widened in curiosity. They both adopted a perplexed expression as Yoimiya pulled out another shrunken individual from a nearby pouch. The young woman seemed to be squirming in her hand. As if in fear. Then Yoimiya widened her palm and the shrunken woman found herself nearly flat on the expanse of the tomboy’s hand. From the perspective of the two boys, her elevated posture may have been from the rough callouses on Yoimiya’s hands. A result from the firework enthusiast’s daily schedule of hard grimy work.
“What is Yoimiya doing…wait why is that woman naked?”
The shrunken woman’s struggles were well-founded as in mere moments. As Yoimiya moved her opposite hand and wrapped her fingers together. The female tiny seemed to make several pleading gestures just before the fleshy cage between the tomboy’s rough palms was created.
“Traveler…your friend…is she—”
CRRUNSQUEELCCCH
The Wanderer halted in the middle of the air. As the perplexed expressions of the Traveler and him turned into ones of dread. If they were any closer than the pair would have heard the woman’s ghastly wails as Yoimiya forced her palms together. The springy texture of the tomboy’s soot-covered palms quickly became firm and had forced the shrunken woman’s open jaws to embrace the briny palm skin. The disgusting swill of tomboy sweat graced the unfortunate woman’s palate moments before the pressure exploded around her. It was her ribs that were first compressed and then shattered. The fragments of bones pierced through the fragile tiny woman’s lungs as the space between Yoimiya’s palms narrowed.
The immense agony that this unnamed woman went through was juxtaposed by the tingling feeling that the tomboy felt between her palms. It was slightly bothersome for Yoimiya and all the reason she needed to press down with all the pressure that she could.
The shrunken woman’s body expired as the balmy darkness of the tomboy’s palms consumed her. The fleshy walls conformed around her mangled body just moments before the last fleeting embers of consciousness faded out. The shrunken woman’s thoughts were barely coherent. Only able to analyze the information that her torn nervous system delivered to her cranium.
A heated nebulous space filled with salt. Just how the shrunken woman thought the bottom of the ocean must have felt. Although maybe a little colder. But deeper thoughts were robbed by the time the minuscule cranium collapsed and she became a paste of meat and bones.
The vibrant smile that graced Yoimiya’s face stood in contrast to the uncaring action. The tomboy’s palms separated with a thin red strand connecting her palms.
“THERE! THIS SHOULD WORK FOR THE GUNPOWDER OF MY NEW FIREWORK. THANKS AGAIN.”
Yoimiya said before rubbing the smear of organ and viscera down into a canister filled with gunpowder.
“Did…did she kill that woman just for a firework.”
The Wanderer didn’t deign Aether’s shocked response with an answer. Instead, he exhausted more of his stamina to fly as far away as possible. The traveler was incapable of contesting this change in direction. As he was still processing what had just happened.
That didn’t just happen.
Meanwhile, the Wanderer didn’t have the mental faculties allocated to address such an inquiry from the Traveler if he had voiced it. Instead, the doll felt an affective change arise from within him. An internal shift that was spurred on by the tomboy’s callous display.
What is going on.
The pair flew a distance longer into the center of Inazuma. Except the Wanderer was much more cautious of the giants that looked around them. Each boom made the doll jerk his body in the other direction. In fear of what hazards they might come across.
This. I don’t recall anything like this happening before.
“…Wanderer! Wanderer!”
The doll felt his clothes being tugged at as Aether tried to get his attention. The Traveler’s was incited by him having spotted another set of individuals that were of a similar size.
“Wait? Aren’t they larger than that shrunken woman?”
The Wanderer said as he was able to discern their greater stature due to their size in comparison to the environment.
“I don’t think it’s just them. I think we are returning to our former height as well.”
Aether said as his mood began to elevate. He too took not that they might have been an inch taller. Meanwhile the Wonderer contemplated as to the reason for the slow regression to their normal size.
Is our shrinking temporary? Or was the power source behind those transformation weakening? Or maybe…?
“Wanderer! We should go down and see if they have any information to share.”
Even though it pained him, the doll couldn’t help but agree. As the pair of shrunken individuals who were now taller than a blade of grass may have information that would help the Wanderer and the Traveler.
Thus, the Wanderer began to fly a little lower. Just enough for the shrunken strangers to see them descending from the sky, and for the Wanderer to relieve some of the tension in his body. Tension that had accrued from the building exhaustion of flying non-stop since he had been shrunken.
Just before they were able to see these new strangers faces, a pillar descended from the sky.
THUDDD
A pillar with a gold-plated base, appeared out of thin air covered and concealed the pair of shrunken pedestrians. They may have been larger than a blade of grass, but the towering pillar extended far above. A rounded white structure that bulged outward as the infrastructure underneath tensed. It was an organic structure composed of heated muscle and stalwart bone and covered by a shear white fabric.
They were stepped on by a woman’s booted foot and the Wanderer and Traveler were staring at her leg.
SQUELLCCH
“OH MY…”
A voice thundered above as the Wanderer tried not to lose his poise. The giant woman grounded her foot down on the tiled floor. A thin pool of blood squirted out from underneath her sole. Both the Traveler and Aether had recognized this woman from Sumeru. Despite her lower tone that shook the heavens. The booming voice’s quality still shook in itself. As if the owner was unsure of even uttering the two words, she spared for the crushed tinies. Alas, the woman, whose blue hair was styled into two drills, was much too tired to contemplate such matter of anxiety further. Instead, with tired yellow eyes, Layla looked down at her foot before extending her toes upward to the top of the interior of her white boot. A reaction that was due to her disgust at having the minuscule individual’s guts and bones get caught within the treads of her footwear.
Great…Now I need to clean them before I head to Yae’s place.
Layla begrudgingly thought as she lifted her foot and took the next step towards the shrine that Yae Miko resided at. For the insomniac student from the Rtawahist Darshan of Sumeru Akademiya was promised by the Kitsune living there that she had records on Theological Astrology that Layla would be interested in. A tantalizing offer for a female college student nearing a deadline on some of her papers and in need of inspiration. What better source then documents that had not left Inazuma since the time they had isolated themselves from the rest of Teyvat.
Thus, Layla didn’t give further thought to the pulped organic grime on the underside of her boot. At most the next and final thought that Layla would give to these shrunken individuals was of how difficult they were to be dislodged from the treads of her soles. The vibrant red and white of muscle and bones having turned a dull brown and black. From being trodden upon by Layla through the streets of Inazuma. Such a sight that obfuscated the identity of the victims was not given to the Wanderer and Aether. The former having floated low enough that they saw the various bones and a meat squeezed into the grooves of the sole. Even the yellowed color of their fatty tissue was observable.
THUD
Shit!
The Wanderer flew up higher once more. Ignoring the strain his body felt as he tried to stay as far away from the ground as possible. The last thing he wanted was to be pulverized under the weight of a person who didn’t even know of his existence. There may have been a time where the Wanderer would have laughed at the humiliating fate of crushed individuals. However, such natural and indiscriminate animosity had waned since he had been in the care of Nahida. A woman whose size was inversely proportional to how positively supportive she was of the Wanderer. Even if the Dendro Archon tried to cover it up with rhetoric of it being advantageous to have someone from the Fatui in her ranks.
“Wanderer. It’s okay.”
“What are you saying.”
The Wanderer’s voice didn’t belie the conflict he felt within. A facet that Aether was able to successfully conceal.
“You may have some difficulty with the feelings that you are sitting with now. But…”
However, the Traveler didn’t shy away from sharing what he felt.
“The casual malice of those above us…towards our shrunken selves is rooted from a systemic lack of empathy. I’ve seen it many times in how individuals still hunted after Hilichurls even after I told them of how they were once human.”
The Wanderer flew up higher. To the point that they were level with some of the heads of the giant pedestrians.
“What does that have to do anything!”
“Yea. It’s a bit out of the blue. But I’m mentioning because I think it has relevance to what you are thinking right now.”
Aether continued as they neared another acquaintance that he knew. A masked individual whose green hair was done up in a short wild ponytail. The second-in-command of Itto’s crew was walking in their direction. Away from the inner sanctum of the Raiden Shogun’s residence. Kuki Shinobu’s piercing purple eyes had not yet registered their presence. And it seemed like it would stay that way. As the traveler didn’t motion the Wanderer for the two of them to seek her for help. He knew better now.
“You lived most of your life trying to cause agony to the humans and gods that so casually incurred heinous transgressions against you. However, now that you are trying to be better, you are still seeing the same cruelty in humans.”
The Wanderer’s gaze was now also focused on Shinobu. Although, it wasn’t for the reason of recognizing this woman. Rather it was due to a nascent piece of information that was hidden from the two of them. A detail that was unveiled by an inaudible swallow. A fellow normal-sized individual would have assumed that it was merely saliva that she had swallowed. Rather, what traveled down and away from her sodden mouth was a slightly wriggling bulge. The rounded protrusion that descended to the green-haired woman’s clavicle was most certainly another tiny. One that Shinobu had been playing with in her mouth. The earnest woman probably relished in the taste of the little snack in between bouts of demanding activities. Whether that would be coordinating on some policy with Kujou Sara or cleaning up after Itto. A stressor that the swallowed tiny would not have the luxury of enjoying. As they were undoubtedly being boiled alive within the woman’s taut gut. Not even a bulge to indicate their presence in her digestive tract once they settled in her stomach.
“So, what! It’s not as if I care about other people anymore. I’m just focused on my own self-worth and no one else.”
The wanderer countered as he watched with concern as Shinobu raised both of her hands up to her masked face. One to pull down the mask that covered the lower half of her face. In the other hand, held within Shinobu’s black nail-polished fingers, was a shrunken woman whose garb was more typical of someone from Liyue. The tiny was larger than the other shrunken individuals. As she was the same length of the span of her hand.
Wait. I think we have become larger as well. Shit.
The Wanderer flew to the periphery. Hoping that the change in flight path would prevent Aether and him from being spotted. Before they could have been mistaken for a large insect such as a butterfly. Such a hope may be too far-fetched now that they were reaching the Raiden Shogun’s compound as they grow another inch or two.
Could the curse we are under be related to time…or maybe are the effects weakening the closer we get to the Electro Archon?!
“It’s good that you are shifting your focus to something that you can control such as yourself, but if you are trying to live as a human…then you will be affected by the actions of humans regardless.”
The Wanderer listened to what the Traveler had to say. At least to the best of his abilities as his eyes widened in disgust. Shinobu opened her lips and for a fleeting second the doll was able to see strands of thick saliva go from the bottom of the green-haired woman’s molars to their upper partners. The second-in-command of a local gang was uncaring to the pleading cries of her prey. The green haired woman merely shoved her into the muggy space past her lips. An exhalation of brewing breath, dense with natural oral miasma, was made visible by an expulsion of steamy air. Then Shinobu clasped her mask back on. Once more hiding away the lower half of her face. Obscuring the bulges that protrude from both sides of her cheeks as she licked and chewed the second tiny to grace her moist mouth.
At least, it was the second tiny that the Wanderer and the Traveler bore witness to in the short amount of time before they passed one another. The prey’s fate was determined by this point and Shinobu and the pair separated. With the Wanderer and Traveler ever closer to the Electro Archon’s residence. The home of the Wanderer’s birth mother.
“I just want to reassure you that what you are feeling is normal, and that I’m here for you.”
Aether said to the silent Wanderer. The most he received was a grunt, which the Traveler accepted. As Aether had witnessed many aspects of life that he thought were irreconcilable with his meaning of right and wrong.
We just need to get to Ei. If we can get her attention and I reveal myself…then we should be fine.
Aether thought hesitantly. As he wasn’t sure how best to accomplish this task with the minimal amount of risk taken.
The plan went without many words exchanged. As the Wanderer was of the same mind. However, it was more likely since they were increasing in size the closer they were to his mother’s home.
Is this the Electro Archon’s doing? I swear…
The Wanderer who once hated the people of Inazuma, could no longer hold such aggression towards them any longer. That much was clear to the doll and son of the Electro Archon.