The_Kiwi_Platter

random scenario

Chongyun had always thought Xiao was attractive.

With the way his hair sways along the wind, the faint glow in his sharp golden eyes that shows resilience in the darkest of nights, the sight of his reliable back in the frontlines of a battle, his gentle and kind heart under the cold exterior.

It was hard not to fall heads over heels over such a person.

Chongyun had found himself staring absentmindedly at the yaksha too many times to count.

The only reason Xiao hadn't said anything about it was because of Bosacius's comment about him being a "fish brain", to which Xiao only stared at the other yaksha with bewilderment along with an exasperated Menogias. (As soon as Xiao's back was turned, Bosacius looked back at Chongyun with a thumb up)

Until now.

It was a mundane evening, they were staring at the sunset with Chongyun inhis mer form in the ocean with his arms on a boulder stone supporting his upper body and with Xiao seated beside him.

It started normal enough, with them admiring the scenery and enjoying the calm the ocean brought to them both.

And in the middle of it, Chongyun had gotten distracted by how ethereal Xiao looked under the setting sun.

"You're staring again." Xiao stated with a straight face

"You've been doing that for a while now."

"I-"

"I'm not stupid, and I know neither are you."

Chongyun gulped, in a feeble attempt at getting rid of the lump in his throat.

He'd been found out, most likely for a while now.

Chongyun cast his eyes down at his scaled webbed hands and the thought of his slimy tail came to mind.

He'll have to come clean, at least to an extent.

He'll have to deal with these feelings of his at a latter date, in a more secluded place.

"I'm sorry for making you uncomfortable," Chongyun couldn't bear to look at Xiao's expression and just settled on staring at the ocean waves.

“I get easily distracted when I’m around you…”

It took Xiao longer than expected to reply, but when he did, Chongyun almost hoped he could drown himself.

“Why is that?”

Chongyun winched and clenched his fists. Xiao revealed nothing in his tone, and somehow that makes it scarier.

“I-“

Chongyun chuckled awkwardly and closed his eyes “You’re just…”

he could feel Xiao’s intense gaze staring holes into him.

Chongyun opens his eyes to stare at his scaly hands again

“Too pretty…”

.

.

.

“You don’t make me uncomfortable,” Chongyun almost snapped his head towards Xiao, heart thumping in his chest and ears ringing

Xiao’s voice started to grow small “You’re the one…”

Chongyun slowly tilt his head up towards him. A pair of gentle ember eyes stared back with intent

“who’s too pretty.”

Chongyun could practically feel his cheeks heating up and tail gently swaying behind him. Xiao took a glance at his disobedient tail and whipped his head away, his eyes hidden behind his hair and ears turning crimson red.

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Hope you guys like this little thing I wrote and also a little fact.

Some birds have better eye sight than humans and I decided to add that for Xiao here.

So if people sees Chongyun as a really attractive mer, than you can onlly imagine what Xiao is seeing with his sharp eye-sight hehe (●'◡'●)

When Alatus, no. When Xiao was assigned the role of yaksha, the problem with his karmic debt arise.

Rex Lapis shared a glance with the other yakshas present and nodded his head as he came to a decision.

Reaching into his sleeve, he pulled out what seemed to be a blue clam. Its appearance was ordinary, with tiny cracks and discoloration around the edges.

Spotting the object, the other yakshas all watched in anticipation, with some giggling and others standing closer to the lake on top of mount aozang.

Then Xiao felt a sudden vibration of geo in the air coming from Rex Lapis and into the clam, it shook with as much intensity as the amount of elemental energy surrounding it as it slowly levitates in the air. And with a light flick of his hand, the clam dipped into the water and it took a moment for Xiao to process what was happening before he caught onto another vibration in the wind.

Cryo.

Xiao turned around just in time to see a person appearing out of thin air with a puff of cold smoke, leaving behind tiny snowflakes in the morning wind.

The new arrival bowed with his hands in a fist-and-palm salute

"Ready to heed your command, Rex-" the words died in his throat as the stranger locked eyes with him.

Xiao found himself looking into a pair of icy blue eyes with his mouth agape.

He had pale skin with glistening light blue scales around his cheek and neck, complimenting his long fluffy blue hair that reaches his waist, making them almost unnoticeable if not for the fact that they were mere millimeters apart.

"Chongyun."

The amused voice of his lord shook both of them out of their trace.

The stranger lower his head in embarrassment "I apologize for letting you witness such a display, my lord."

Rex Lapis chuckled "Raise your head, you have done nothing to offend me."

Chongyun straighten his form but it was evident that the encounter prior still weight on this mind from the vibrant color from his cheek and pointy ears. And the sound of the other yakshas' amusement was not helping in keeping his composure. Xiao swore he saw his ear droop down a little.

"I digress," Rex Lapis gestured towards him "Chongyun, I would like you to meet your new confidant, Xiao. Xiao, this is Chongyun, he's responsible for taking care of your karmic debt from now on."

Xiao bowed "I'll be in your care."

Chongyun smiled and did the same "Likewise."

"Xiao," Rex Lapis reached into his sleeve and pulled out a familiar looking seashell that resembles the one he saw his lord used earlier and placed it on Xiao's hands. But after further inspection, this one looked almost brand new with hints of teal on its shell. "Use this to contact Chongyun, just infuse it with your anemo and he'll be at your aid."

Xiao carefully covered the shell with both of his hand "Thank you, I'll keep it safe."

Rex Lapis nodded approvingly before continuing "Ah, I need to inform you that you'll need to be near the ocean for it to make the summoning successful."

"...Huh?"

Chongyun cleared his throat awkwardly "Perhaps a demonstration is better than an explanation in this case?"

Rex lapis chuckled "Proceed."

Chongyun glanced at his hanfu sheepishly "As you've probably guessed, I'm not a human, nor can I hold onto a human form for a long period of time like the other adepti..."

Chongyun trail off as he step into the water with his bare-feet til' it reached his hips. "So..." with that, Chongyun let himself fall backwards into the water with his whole body submerged as Xiao could only looked on stupefied.

But not a moment later, a clawed hand found its way on the stone platform they were standing on, and along with a familiar mop of blue hair.

Chongyun's other clawed hand lightly pushed his wet hair back "So more often than not, you'll be seeing me in this form."

Xiao's breath got stuck in his throat as he laid eyes on a long blue tail connected to Chongyun's hips.

A mer?

Xiao could see gills at the side of his neck accompanied by larger patches of scales and sharp teeth in the corner of his mouth. His tail was shining under the morning sun with its pretty flowy ends. Chongyun's face was dusted a familiar red with how he's probably eating up the sight of him right now, his blue pupil dilated and his iris reflecting the water below him.

It makes it hard to look away.

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It'd been a while since I wrote something like this so I'm rusty- (。﹏。)

At one point I kinda wanted to change his tail into a shark tail but I was too far in at that point and I wanted to keep his scales /_ \

In an apocalyptic world where monsters started appearing from cracks in the sky a few years ago, humans started developing abilities with different elements.

Chongyun was apart of an organization that protects people from such monsters. The team he was in focuses on collecting food and other necessities, the ones with the easiest job in the company, at least that was how they were perceived by the public.

Food was the least of their worries after ability users who focuses on defense as well as dendro and hydro users started appearing, the problem was shelter. Monster appearance were consistent, and they are getting stronger, smarter. As annoying as that can be, it also meant that they could predict these attacks to some extent.

Chongyun's team were the ones responsible for these investigations. It was arguable as dangerous as the attack forces, there was only so much information they could find to assess the monster's weakness and strength. One mistake could cost the attack team's life, the safety of the people and affect the subsequent attacks they have to face.

And the only people suited this team were those who were weak, the ability users who had better abilities were known to have heavy aura around them that made them hard to approach, it also made them easy to notice, for both people and monsters.

Naturally, people with weaker ability had weaker presence thus making them perfect for the job. Chongyun was a cryo ability user that had no specialty, he could do both offense and defence, but it was decent at best and mediocre at worst, he couldn't heal nor be a good enough support for the support team.

But he was observant and quiet, those alone were enough for him to land on the information team. One day, Chongyun was surveilling a cave for any signs of a potential attack, and that he did.

A boss attack from what he could tell from the blood red glow coming from the small crack in the middle of the air.

Chongyun scanned the area and come to some conclusions.

A boss with a karma debt, hidden grudges of a tyrant, slaves and demons. The faint sounds of crying and screaming accompanied by whipping noises that could be heard from the small gap were chilling to the ears.

Before Chongyun could gather more information, a skinny and bloody hand could be seen coming through the gap and continued to widen as the rest of its body came through. Chongyun quickly hid behind a boulder and turned off his flashlight.

This has never happened to him before in his three whole years in the team, it was unheard of!

Before he could send a signal to his unit, a hand suddenly gripped his neck from behind him and then the world turned dark.

.

.

.

"Wake up."

A hoarse male voice rang in his half-conscious head. Chongyun quickly regain his bearings but could only tense up in the situation he had landed in.

The monster-human was hugging him and his body was numb, probably from poison. If he had to guess, it was from the sharp claws that was awkwardly petting his head.

"Make a deal with me."

Chongyun couldn't see the human-looking-monster's face but he could feel that he was getting stared at.

The monster then murmured "...weird yang human,"

Maybe there's some untold lore in other artifact sets or weapons that I haven't seen before(If so pls tell me) but I feel like hoyoverse just said "Yeah, exorcism exist in genshin" and then dropped the subject.

In this au, Chongyun's the main character, and most of his character and motivations stem from his past as an ultimate exorcist who feel like he doesn't deserve his title and his clan's teachings.

However, besides from the fact that he came from an ancient clan of exorcists, we don't know anymore than that. I just feel like it's a pity hyv haven't explored the lore behind exorcists in genshin.

It would've been interesting to see how exorcists in the past work alongside with the yakshas to protect Liyue, how their clan came to be, what was their motivation and inspirations for their art.

Before I get cancelled, let me just say this is just my opinion, don't like it, cool, scroll away.

For the record, I feel like Chongyun’s Eng va did a good job on delivering his lines, of course there are some lines that defer from some of the CN version but you can still understand Chongyun’s personality.

But I still see some questionable characterisation of him. I’m just gonna give some examples and explain why it pisses me off 1. The shy, could do no wrong, stutters at every word, without anyone by his side he’s hopeless, full of concealed(badly) anxiety Chongyun.

I. Hate. This.

I know, he’s actually quite shy and get easily flustered on occasion but NOT EVERY SINGLE MOMENT MY GOD-

He isn’t shy to the point he needs someone to order a simple drink for him. He can be professional, prideful, calm, passionate and so much more.

He looks up to Adeptus Xiao, he respects him but got pissed when he recalls his words for his fellow exorcists. He didn’t get depressed, he didn’t get disheartened from his dream. He got annoyed and acknowledges that they don’t see eye to eye on the subject.

He’s proud of his fellow exorcists and those who fought for Liyue in the past, and Xiao’s words didn’t shake his respect and admiration for them.

Also a point I really like about Chongyun as a character. He sees himself as a fraud among the “true” exorcists, the ones who used thaumaturgy to banish evil. He undervalues his worth as an exorcist because of that, since with his yang energy, it just requires him to walk in and out of the haunted location and then the job is done.

He wants to one day gain control over his constitution, he’s even seen being embarrassed and ashamed of it. And yet, he doesn’t hide it, he doesn’t use fancy tricks to mask his ways of exorcism even when he was treated with spite from clients who doesn’t believe him. Most don’t even apologise after realising he was telling the truth.

He’s stubborn, he doesn’t easily back down from what he dreams and what he wants. He continues to trust Xingqiu’s “leads”, even after facing numerous failures and disappointments. And yet he still tries and tries again. Aside from his yang spirit, he isn’t naturally gifted, all the promise he’d shown is from vigorous training.

I don’t see this getting mentioned often but there actually exist some sort of unexplored hierarchy among the exorcists. And Chongyun happens to be one of the top. And the fact that he’s the future heir of his family, LIKE HELLO???WHY ISN’T PEOPLE TALKING ABOUT THIS- His family is really sus and has lots of mysteries in my opinion, BUT THIS ISN’T THE THREAD FOR IT-

He definitely isn’t perfect too. He jumps into conclusions at times, often landing himself in more trouble and misunderstandings. He’s impulsive. He put mental restrictions on himself to become better. He pushes himself to the point it's concerning. He isn’t perfect, but he tries.

The story follows Aether, who was traveling to different worlds in search for his missing sister. While in the process, got swept up into all sorts of bothersome trouble and unintentionally became the hero of the world.

Xiao sighed, resting his head in his palm. The silver luxurious throne he sat on lost none of its shine even in the dark.

It's unfortunate.

How he became the cause of the fall of his once beloved world.

After multiple aggravating events and misfortunates, the hero of the people turned for the worse.

Karma and erosion from centuries of slaughter and seclusion has took a toll on his already dampen spirit.

"All for her."

Xiao had read those lines far more than he could count.

And after meeting "him", it became

"All for them."

Chongyun. A mere side character from what he could tell. A character with seldom screen time it was almost pitiful.

And yet, Aether was completely and utterly whipped for the boy.

Either the author didn't know what they're doing or they're foreshadowing some hidden relation. It still stands that every time Aether reunites with Chongyun, his affection for the boy and their relationship was deeper than shown in their previous encounters.

It was understandable, he suppose. Even he, as a reader, was completely drawn to the boy.

His backstory was summed up pretty quickly even when compared to the other side-characters. Born in the slums, betrayed at the age of 6 by his best friend who sold him to human traffickers, and then bought by a wealthy son of a duke. With the name of the wealthy son branded on his chest, he became a "property" overnight.

His new master was the illegitimate child of the duke, a good-looking boy with great affiliate with anemo and talent for weaponry.

But a complete psycho.

He started innocent enough. Due to his lineage, he was casted aside by everyone. A thorn in everyone's eyes, the living breathing result and proof of the duke's...misjudgments...as well as his "benevolence".

But in Chongyun, he found a friend, someone who cared for him, someone who won't leave him.

Someone who *can't* leave him.

Innocent affection turned into love and with love comes obsession.

No one was permitted to see him, most of his days were spent wearing a white veil and a long hanfu that covers every parts of his body except for the branding on his chest. He was encouraged to only consume cold beverage and food, while sprouting some bull about hiding and protecting him from people with lecherous intentions.

But even so, his actions mentioned in the novel always gave Xiao mixed signals.

He put so much effort on keeping Chongyun hidden but doesn't hesitant on bringing him to a noble gathering to introduce him two nobles from different countries, Razor and Kazuha. And there's that strange astrologist, Mona...something something.

Simply put, he's a confusing bastard.

But a bastard nonetheless.

After all, he's the one who was responsible for wiping Chongyun's memories and completely blinding him, as well as the "Midnight Massacre".

And much to his dismay. Xiao peeked a glance at the bed, on it sat a person covered in white while sharpening a spear, the Primordial Jade Winged-Spear.

"Master Xiao?"

Chongyun was brainwashed into swearing his loyalty to the Tsaritsa and just to mess with Scaramouche, Dottore recommended to have Chongyun work under him.

Chongyun doesn’t know who he was before he was presented to her highness, the Tsaritsa but he somehow still retains his own moral code. However the orders from the fatui outweighs said morals.

And to mess with both Chongyun and Scaramouche even more, the Tsaritsa holds the most power over Chongyun's orders followed by the other fatui harbinger by ranking but only Scaramouche has the least power despite being the 6th of the fatui harbingers.

Seeing Chongyun being ordered around and having little to no mind of his own, it irritated him.

It reminded him too much of his own past, a doll, to be discarded once he becomes useless to its creator. So much so that he requested Dottore to give him a conscious, or at least some form of thought process that makes him think about the orders he'd been given and not just blindly following every command, ranging from suicide missions to simple chores.

Dottore ended up complying but not without mocking Scaramouche about how Chongyun won't be able to tolerate his trashy personality and most likely would request for another harbinger to follow.

However after Chongyun gained a new conscious and identity named "Cloud", he chose to stayed with Scaramouche cause even though he didn't have a conscious back then, he realised that as much as Scaramouche like having power over people, he doesn't like how he act like a puppet rather than a subordinate, he's also the one most likely to have requested Dottore to give him a conscious.

Just like that, 2 years past and Cloud became Scaramouche's second-hand. Although he has no right to command the other fatui working under him, he was given the right to speak his mind about missions and strategies, given how his lord likes to have absolute control over his own subordinates, it was understandable.

Cloud didn't complain, and was instead quite pleased that Scaramouche was even willing to listen to his opinion.

One day, they received a new mission to retrieve a book. A member of the fatui had rebelled and given the book to the qixing.

In it was the internal networking of the qixing and such that will aid them for the Tsaritsa's future plans.

They succeeded in getting the book back but escaping became a problem since the adepti got involved.

Xiao recognizes Chongyun and demanded to know what they did to him, but Cloud didn't recognize him and was quickly getting annoyed by his words about returning him back to Liyue.

In the end, Cloud got captured while Scaramouche managed to escape with the book(not without cursing and swearing to get Cloud back).

Now Cloud was being chained up in a room with a bunch of people who he doesn't recognize. All of them have some sort of conflicted expression.

It must be the first time they’re handling a puppet instead of a human.

A hand reach towards him with hesitation before its owner turned away and let out a shaking breath.

His dark blue bangs covered his eyes but looking at his attire, he must be someone of high standing.

The adeptus that captured him put a hand on his shoulder and said in a stern voice laced with desperation.

Guoba.

I saw some art with them and I can't help but picture Guaba sitting on Chongyun's lap as they eat with Xingqiu and Guoba can try the dish to see if he added anything spicy.

One day, Xiao comes across Chongyun with a bunch of cats on his lap but because the cryo user doesn't want to scare away the cats, he just bowed his head as a greeting. While Xiao is left wondering why and how are the cats not running away from him.

Chongyun nervously asks if he wanted to pet the cats since he was staring so intensely at them.

And unfortunately, that included moldy bread. Imagine Chongyun's horror when he sees adeptus Xiao picking out the place with visible mold and proceeds to consume said moldy bread.

Xiao reasons that adepti isn't as weak as humans and that it won't effect him. But with Chongyun's obsession with keeping himself fit and healthy, he knows it can lead to some health problems, adepti or not, he refused to let Xiao eat any more of the moldy bread, with his mind made up, Chongyun rudely snatched the bread from Xiao’s hand, screw etiquette, he dumps it in the trash and decided to make his special dish for him instead.

———————

Bonus

Yeah that. I can't help but picture that’s what Xiao and Chongyun thought of each other as well as themselves.

For Xiao, he thinks his hands are far too dirty and even though he is the protector of Liyue, he could only protect the land and people through slaughter. And in Xiao's eyes, Chongyun chose to protect Liyue with the hopes of keeping the people safe unlike he who did it to repay Rex Lapis and redeem himself. And while Xiao has to distance himself from people to keep them safe from his karma, Chongyun can bring comfort to people with his personality and exorcism, with or without his pure yang spirit.

Chongyun’s attack pattern was heavily inspired by Xiao’s.

I don’t know how exactly to explain this but I’ve never seen another claymore user with an identical attack pattern with Chongyun’s except for maybe Noelle.

But even when compared to Noelle’s, Chongyun uses momentum to carry his claymore while Noelle depends more on her physical strength so his moves tend to be faster than an average claymore user.

And another thing to note is Chongyun’s the only claymore user(when I was writing this post) who jumps in his last melee attack which reminds me of Xiao’s last attack, where he leaps into the air and slams his polearm down with his body much like Chongyun.

Both of their last attack deals more damage than the others and they preform more slashes compared to other claymore and polearm users

I played as Xiao in Chongyun’s hangout event and imagining him in some of the situations is kinda funny.

Kids’ route: playing hide&seek

Xiao, the ghost: *Senses Chongyun’s yang energy in front of him* “Does this count as cheating…”

When looking over “reliable” clues of demonic activity given by Xingqiu

Chongyun: “Oh, that’s probably just adeptus Xiao, he isn’t a bad guy, don’t worry *insert praise* x??? “