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| [ Ever since Aether arrived, the palace has been abuzz with curious chatter. It began with his background — could this beautiful youth be of royal blood himself, a distant kingdom's long lost heir to the throne, abducted from his homeland? — and like parched wanderers stumbling upon a lush oasis at last, gossiping tongues lapped up the mystery to spin into fanciful stories. Soon, they came to circle connected questions: how did Aether win Prince Alhaitham's favor, and so quickly at that? Less politely: what goes on behind closed doors now, night after night?
After all, so the whole of Sumeru knows, the prince is notoriously and unrepentantly difficult, albeit never in ways that would cost him his birthright. Though he gives neither the king nor their subjects reason to despair overmuch, he is said to prefer the company of books to that of humans, lacking a future ruler's manner. That is, he does nothing that tarnishes the royal family's name, and the people have no cause to fear the years ahead, but what sort of leader is a man so uninterested in power and prestige? Prince Alhaitham has all but stated just that outright, from his refusal to engage with anything that he deems needless ceremony to his apparent reluctance to entertain even a political marriage while it serves no purpose better achieved by other means. He may not shirk his duties, but nothing kindles ambition or desire in his heart, it seems, save the prospect of expanding the borders of Sumeru's already vast library.
Were he not born a prince, he might have joined the scribes. As a prince, someone else in his place might aspire to become a philosopher king, at the least.
Why, then, was he the one to bring Aether to the palace like a new acquisition added to the library's collection of texts? To the outside world, he appears to be thoroughly taken with the young man, uncharacteristically lavishing so much attention on him.
Some of the whispers decide that Aether's beauty makes him an otherworldly being capable of enchanting mortal men and robbing even the most rational among them of all reason. Others simply call him a cunning actor in a wider plot, here to pursue an unknown objective. Perhaps he will reveal himself as a spy or a thief, nothing more.
No one considers innocuous possibilities.
The talk has reached Alhaitham's ears, too, but he leaves it alone — intervening to silence speculation is a waste of time, and besides, keeping his unexpected chosen companion close ensures that someone watches Aether's movements as it is. Thus far, he can conclude that he hasn't made a mistake. What the rest of the palace believes won't sway him.
Tonight, the twentieth night, the recent routine continues. The prince and his companion have dined together, and they settle to while away another evening not only by making full use of the bath and the bed, but with tales offered like tribute, akin to a handful of pages turned at a time.
Standing behind Aether, near the arch of the window overlooking a view of the city far below, Alhaitham lets his hands come to rest on the smaller man's slim shoulders, warm and steady. ]
What do you have for me, Aether? | |
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| [He used to go by a codename — Viator, meaning Traveler — but the jig's been up for a while now, and Aether's not really anonymous anymore. Ever since he started making bigger contracts, working bigger jobs, his background hasn't been a secret. It's out there for the highest bidder to find on the black market, and Paimon gave up trying to stop the sale of his information long ago.
The file is brief and to the point. In summation, Aether "Viator" does not exist in any of the government registries throughout Teyvat. Most informants agree that he was most likely a former test subject from the labs of a shadowy, now-defunct group referred to vaguely as the Myrmidons, or MOTH, but it's unclear what they were researching. The fact that he displays inhuman reflexes and firing accuracy suggests some kind of supersoldier project; the fact that there's a suspicious, artificial beauty to his doll-like features only bolsters the theory.
It is known that Aether has a sister. It is known that Aether's sister is so far deep in the darkest recesses of the criminal underworld that it is all but impossible to find her.
Rumor has it that all who have come across "the Princess" have been killed, indiscriminately, and without evidence of their bodies left behind.
In any case. Aether's fruitless search for his sister isn't a secret. The fact that he entered the world of organized crime in search of her isn't a secret, either. He has standards, or so it's claimed. He doesn't take jobs involving human trafficking or slavery; he doesn't kill or kidnap children; he refuses most things that don't involve revenge or justifiable homicide. Contacting him is still a matter of security and clearance, of course: you can't get in touch with the Traveler unless you have the sway of an organization like Mondstadt's Ordo Favonius or Liyue's Qixing on your side, and Paimon screens all his job requests, anwyay.
(Paimon herself is an absolute mystery. Aether only ever communicates with her through earpiece, and few have ever seen her in person. Allegedly, she looks and sounds like a little girl, but the efficacy of her work and the speed at which she crushes the world's best cybersecurity protocols both suggest otherwise.)
As for his current location? Well, at the moment, there's a rumor that the Traveler just wrapped up some business with the Adepti in Liyue (a rival group to the Qixing sometimes, their associates at other times), but others swear that he's now in league with the Kamisato-gumi in Inazuma.
As of right now, only Lesser Lord Kusanali and her group of Sages know the truth: Aether's current job is with the Sumeru Akademiya. He's here to help the Haravatat locate a missing shipment, allegedly stolen by either the Fatui or a local group known as the Eremites. What's inside the shipment isn't for him to know, but the Kshahrewar representative who negotiated his contract assured him that it wasn't anything that would compromise his legendary sense of morality.
I'll be the judge of that, Aether had replied — but even so, he took the job.
This particular operation shouldn't end in bullets or the flash of steel. He's just here to meet a Haravatat operative by the name of Alhaitham — allegedly because the man is one of their best agents, but also completely, utterly unpredictable. Not a good combination, in Aether's experience, but the Sages seemed to believe that hiring the Traveler as a handler for this Alhaitham was warranted. Perhaps they'd tried a number of their own handlers already. He wouldn't know.]
...Alhaitham, I take it?
[Action movies and pop culture would have them meet under cover of night outside the building that they plan to infiltrate, but the reality of their line of work is that it doesn't work that way. Organized crime would not be so appealing if it were not comfortable. As such, he's meeting Alhaitham in a conference room within the Akademiya library. Aether's assuming that the whole place is wiretapped, but that's fine; he's not planning to say anything that would incriminate himself in any way.
The traveler knows better than anyone else that there's no sense judging a man in their line of work by his looks — but even he can't help but wonder why he's been put on this particular job. Alhaitham looks very much as though he can handle himself. The same experimental treatments that froze Aether's youthful looks also gave him preternatural strength, but if they were going off appearances alone, the traveler would be forced to conclude that Alhaitham could probably snap him in half.]
I'll assume your contact briefed you. I'm here as your backup. | |
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