DISCONTINUED!
➥ "Aren't you even a little bit angry, Y/n? After all... we've deceived you for your entire existence."
In which a modern-day teenager got abruptly hurled into Teyvat's ancient past, long before the main story unfolds. Yet, this journe...
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"Back to square one, huh?" Y/n's voice echoed over the scorching sands, a scornful lullaby swirling within the desert whirlwinds. She stood, a lone silhouette, resilient against the sun's relentless glare.
The two wanderers - a man and his child - halted mid-step. Their faces bore the duality of hope and despair. Endless days, depleting water skins, and the desert's unyielding embrace had worn them thin. Another living being was an oasis in their arid hell.
"Indeed," the man managed, knees trembling. "Lost...no water."
The girl, strength fading, lifted her gaze to Y/n. She parted her cracked lips, but Y/n's raised hand silenced her. "I'm not your savior," Y/n declared. The desert echoed her refusal, harsh as the relentless heat.
"You have water," the father persisted. His desperate gaze fell upon Y/n's water skin.
"Sure do," Y/n replied, a chilling calm in her voice. She shrugged off her bag, uncorked her water skin, took a lengthy sip. All while staring out at the vast desert. Cold indifference emanated from her, a pillar of ice in a sea of heat. Her drink was tantalizing torment for the man and his child. A glimpse of salvation, yet agonizingly out of reach.
"We need it," the girl whimpered, her voice barely a whisper.
With a dismissive shrug, Y/n resealed her water skin and swung it back onto her pack. "We all have needs," she mused, her voice an echo in the oppressive silence of the desert. Then, with a dry chuckle, she added, "Yours, I presume, includes a GPS and a lesson in desert survival 101. Note to self, don't lose those next time."
Time lapsed. Shadows grew long and stretched across the barren dunes. A relentless sun clawed its way across the sky, then began its languid descent.
Y/n perched on a dune. Silent. Observant. Like a hawk waiting for its prey's inevitable end.
The duo – a father and daughter pair, once brimming with thieving anticipation – now lay defeated by the merciless desert heat. Their breaths came in ragged gasps. Movements slowed. The stolen prize, a relic of yore, was abandoned, its significance swallowed by the sands.
Through the shimmering heat, Y/n observed. Their decline, their fading life force – it was a scene of clinical detachment to her. She contemplated the abandoned relic, their ill-gotten gain. They had unwittingly served her purpose, paving her path from King Deshret's ruins. Their violation was none of her concern.
Survival of the fittest. An age-old rule. Their fate, merely a result of their actions.
The final breath escaped the pair. The desert winds picked up, howling mournfully.
Only then did Y/n move. Her boots crunched softly against the arid sand as she descended her perch. Approaching the lifeless duo, her eyes mirrored the unyielding desert – void of regret or empathy.
