DECATHECT | HSR x F!Reader

09 ~ 295 Days Before

"A-Achoo!" 

Goodness, it's been a while since [Y/N] had fallen ill. She had almost forgotten how terrible it was, not being able to breathe properly and having mucus lodged in her nose and lungs. Never again, will she take breathing properly for granted. 

Sniffling, the woman blew her nose again loudly with a tissue, scrunching up the soft white paper and throwing it into a nearby wastebasket before flopping back onto her bed. 

Business had been rather slow lately. Not many people were coming here to have custom pieces made, and as with how the world works, other rival businesses have popped up. Maybe it's about time she hired an assistant, or maybe even someone who's good at market to put some posters up around the area. 

Even though this entire job of selling and making jewelry supported her entire livelihood, [Y/N] felt oddly.... apathetic to the whole business situation. Maybe it's because of burnout. It was hard interacting with so many people everyday and trying to appear that she had energy for those said interactions was exhausting at times. Or maybe it's because neither Dan Feng, Jing Yuan, Yinxing, or Baiheng had visited her in months now. They had been busy lately with their.... duties. From what she had last heard from them, they were going to... what was that place called again? Right, Thalassa. Something about driving out the borisin who had invaded the place.

In all honesty, [Y/N] never truly understood why the people who lived amongst this fleet of ships harbored such a deep hatred towards the Abundance. From the stories that she's heard when she first came here, the Xianzhou ships were sent out into the stars to find the miracle medicine of immortality. Though they had traveled so long to the point where they had almost lost all hope, they encountered Yaoshi who bestowed upon them the fruit of immortality. Of course, the immortality came at a cost, which was losing your sanity (mara), but they got what they wanted. It didn't make much sense that they would take out their anger on the one who bestowed upon them what they desired. But she never said that. The Cloud Knights would probably arrest her and throw her into the Shackling Prison.

Rolling onto her side, she lazily opened one of the drawers in her nightstand and pulled out a small glass vial filled with green liquid, staring at it as the liquid sloshed around, taunting her to pop open the vial and down the concoction in one gulp. So many years.... and she still hasn't used it yet. Maybe she'll give it to someone who needs it later. Well that was assuming that she even knew what her master died of. There are many diseases out here in the world. 

Sighing, she carefully placed the vial back into the drawer and blew her nose once more before slowly sitting up, cracking her stiff neck. Wow, not only did the lady feel under the weather, but her joints were stiff too. [Y/N] slid off the bed, grabbing a gingko leaf that had somehow ended up on her pillow before throwing it into the wastebasket. Might as well get started on work.... 

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"Oh my, this looks wonderful, thank you!" 

The [e/c]-eyed lady smiled, bowing in appreciation. "Thank you, 姐姐. Would you like to get a box with it?" 

She turned around, flicking open several drawers on the shelf behind her before presenting the middle-aged woman, Zhang Yao, three different velvet boxes. 

Zhang Yao pondered her options for a moment before pointing at the blue box with little pink and white flowers stitched onto it. "I'll take this one then. My daughter loves blue, it's her favorite color." 

"Wonderful! Just one moment then...." [Y/N] carefully took the delicate topaz ring and slid it into the small slot in the box before closing the lid shut and sliding the box into a small paper bag. "Here you go, have a nice day, and thank you for your patronage."