songs of the welkin moon

song of burning dreams - xiaolumi

[ xiao conquers demons, but not the open wounds immortality has cut into his soul ]

ft.

-•xiaolumi

-•zhongli

-•lantern rite

[ "𝒊𝒇 𝒅𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒉 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒔 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒄𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒕 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒅𝒐𝒐𝒓, 𝒄𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒎𝒚 𝒏𝒂𝒎𝒆. 𝒂𝒅𝒆𝒑𝒕𝒖𝒔 𝒙𝒊𝒂𝒐. 𝒊 𝒘𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒃𝒆 𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒄𝒂𝒍𝒍." ]

It is said that each year in Liyue, the lanterns float to the feet of the adepti, guided by the firelight. On the mountain, a thousand burning wishes and crumpled prayers, all nestled inside a light, find their rest in the wake of the towering crags. 

Every person, from the children to the elderly, carries the tradition on, generation through generation. It is a symbol of hope and a reminder of a powerful hearkening; now, it is the escorting of an uncertain people to a future brighter than the one promised before. It is as if the lights that glimmer on the Sea of Clouds, that float through the cracks of mountains, and that drift over the flaxen plains of the past, shout a lost people's dream to the corners of the earth. It is an unspoken contract—the scattering of this dream to wherever a lantern may land.

This year, it was no different.

Xiao leaned against the red railing of the watchtower on the outskirts of the city. With Mount Tianheng at his back and the blazing city before him, it was the perfect spot to see the lights. The perfect place, that is, without the jubilant cries of celebration. None of the making of the sky lanterns, the laughter of children. That was for someone else. 

Everyone else, but him. Each year, he convinced himself that the lights were more beautiful from afar; small, glowing, crafted stars gliding into the sky. At first glance, they were nothing like the people that made them, but with closer inspection, the lanterns were just like them. Burning with desires and laments and wishes and dreams, yet so delicate. Drifting off into the night and over the ocean only to land somewhere as a trail of ashes in the wind. Dreams forgotten, prayers unanswered. Yet in the sky, they burned like suns.

Perhaps if you looked hard enough into the dark, you could see the form of a stag prancing through the mountains before perching on a jutting cliff to see the burning dreams. His eyes try to glean each and every wish before each one burns to dust. On another mountain—a much steeper and taller one—the slender figure of a crane emerges from an abode sealed away. She mourns the loss of a friend and glides by the table they used to feast on.

For Xiao, the sting in his chest had long become a dull ache. But on the night of the sky lights, it festered into something a bit more. He could never watch the lanterns as they departed for long. The ones who had once surrounded him as they'd watched had all disappeared. Some were bewitched by the voices of the shadows, some drank too deeply of their bloodlust, some faded into the dusk until they became hollow husks of their former selves. For him, resistance from that temptation had delivered him to this day. But it had cost him.

"Alatus."

Xiao closed his eyes. The name prodded at his heart eerily. It was spoken only by those who were no more, another history written in the rocks of the land. But a gentle hand rested on his shoulder.

"You have done well, Alatus."

Xiao swallowed. It was the voice of Rex Lapis, his former master, watered down into something more brittle. Something mortal. A bitter taste filled his mouth.