/ minor injuries and choking; just writing character studies lately.

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Some scars never disappeared. This was a thought not just about scars on the skin but those on the soul as well – memories etched into his mind that sometimes resurfaced violently. One of the significant reminders was the cold and Childe wasn't thinking about the Snezhnayan cold or sheer frost of Dragonspine. This was a sort of cold one could only find in the depths of the Abyss.

Scars were a good thing. They served as reminders for a warrior, telling stories of injury but survival, mistakes but learning, and this particular one Childe got from the Abyss was a sign of his personal growth. It had a prominent place among the other scars he'd gotten over the years, ran from above the collarbone across his chest and over his heart. The threat that had come with the wound was another reminder how thrilling fighting was. If the monster had cut deeper, if he hadn't dodged, "if"s that did not apply … he wouldn't be standing here.

And now, entering this ruin, Childe was hit with this familiar feeling. He felt the vibration run through his body, electricity coursing with his blood, the heat of battle slowly building up in every fiber of muscle and skin, all hands standing on end. He felt memories long forgotten resurface, his body responding to lessons he had learned in the darkness, mingling with fear, mingling with exasperation.

The Abyss …

Childe had no one to tell about the three months he had spent there. He didn't need to - his fighting style spoke the language he had learned there, his eyes reflected the threat lurking in the eternal shadow, his deadly grip could spell out the seconds from beyond. And now, Childe was back here. But what was this place?

Ruins in general were peculiar. Some ruins were Dottore's left-overs, playthings he had gotten fed up with and cast aside in a fit of rage. Some ruins were occupied by treasure hunters in search for eventual fortune. This one was different. Childe could tell. Well, but then again, everything connected to the Traveler seemed different … But was this a breach into the Abyss itself?

Childe entered the ruins, his fingers twitching as he scanned the night unseen to other's eyes. Feeling the weight of his Vision on his belt was a factor of safety he hadn't had back then, when he had entered the Abyss for the first time. Back then, he hadn't known how to hold most weapon types, not to mention wield them. But someone had once said that life was the sweetest after you've gotten a whiff of your own death.

The scar over Childe's chest itched.

The exciting scent and the chilling biting cold was everywhere but there was no sign of enemy – had the Traveler and his companion taken them out already? – and only human remains were here and there were signs of others having passed through – not corpses, just tents and books and that stuff from the treasure hoarders. The tension grew heavier with every step Childe took because he felt that something was bound to happen. Just past a corner, behind a column, after the next turn.

There was another shift in atmosphere after the next step, another gust of indescribable cold that made Childe freeze in place and manifest his swords now, shifting into a battle-ready position. His senses were on high alert, falling back into a pattern his mind thought it had forgotten, but the scars remembered the Abyss' dangers, they always did. And then the storm was everywhere, the corrupted light that permeated every single existence in its surroundings, the voices from the Abyss that mocked one to give up, give up.

That must've been the most exhausting thing about the Abyss. The screams of the deceased that sometimes permeated into one's dreams and filled it with nightmares. Something about the destruction of a home, the loss of family. Nothing a fourteen year old boy had wanted to pay attention to when he was struggling every minute to keep himself alive.

Childe's feet moved on his own but not back to the ruin's entrance into peaceful silence, no. He moved into the opposite direction, dashing into the center of danger, eyes burning with blood lust. That moment he didn't think of the others, which had entered the same place ahead of him, but his mind was dead to the animalistic instinct he had survived on for three months. Sanity? He partially had sacrificed that to the depths of this darkness, thirsting for the thrill only the Abyss could've granted even though its lessons were too harsh to ever face them twice or, beware, thrice.

"Hold there."

The cave Childe had entered was wide, spacious, and all of its lines - chains, upon closer inspection - lead to this Statue of the Seven that was hung upside down, in its hands an awful source of all-devouring violet light. In front of that stood the enemy: fully clad in armor of unknown material, tall and not moving, waiting. Meeting gaze with it (if that was a way to describe it because there was a helmet where eyes should've been) made the storm of voices quiet down again.

"Oh, so you're the one making this mess? Did no one ever teach you to clean up after yourself?" Childe joined his sword into his signature spear and shouldered the weapon, waving at the Abyss Herald provocatively. He had seen creatures like that. The size did not scare him – he himself used his Foul Legacy every now and then, a technique he had learned from the Abyss. This was something easily dealt with. And once this was out of the way, Childe would be able to pursue the Abyss' voices, the secrets, pry into what was fleeing from him.

"Spies are not welcome. I will eradicate you."

Nothing that had ever come out of the Abyss was human in any form. Everybody sacrificed something. When the Abyss Herald floated toward the Harbinger, Childe cast aside the question who or what this was and playfully eluded the first strikes, parrying the next one with his spear overhead. From a spectator's viewpoint the Herald's strikes seemed lazy but every blow had tremendous force behind it and took Childe some effort diverting to the sides or else he'd be sliced in half.

One step, two, dancing backwards lightly – Childe anticipated the following strike, broke his spear in two halves as he dove past the Herald's attacks and left a mark across the enemy's side casually. It didn't matter if it just grazed the armor, this was about sending a message. In the next moment he dropped his weapons, which shattered into little pieces of ice when they reached the ground.

The Herald gave a sound that Childe wanted to read as recognition and turned around, following his opponent's movements without ever giving up his stiff pose.

"Apologies for underestimating you. I see now that you are not part of the thieves whose life was claimed by the Abyss." He manifested two blades left and right on his gloves, this time eliciting an appreciating sound from Childe. He usually would've gone with a bow for training purposes but considering the cave's temperature, every weapon that he stopped infusing Hydro into or that left his hands immediately froze. Contrary to the blades Childe had to keep forming in this fight, the Herald's Hydro weapons withheld the Abyss' cold and did not freeze, did not leave frostbite through gloves onto skin, did not slow his step as he relentlessly attacked.

At first, this sparring had been fun. Nothing of a challenge, just a brawl between two Hydro Vision users, who had similar attack patterns. Stamina did not exist in this cave and especially not for the Herald, but at some point Childe felt that this wasn't just fun anymore. This thrill running through his veins as he counted the slashes he left at the Herald's armor, the myriad of little cuts he found on his own body, he had missed that. The scars remembered. They ached.

The temperature sank and continued to sink, slowly draining Childe's ressources, which he barely noticed as he kept mocking the Herald: "Is this all you've got?"

Then, a stalemate in strength and finally the realization that he was the one being toyed with, the activation of the delusion, the break but oh, this was so exciting!

Childe felt like he was cheating when he called for the Electro powers but he still laughed maniacally underneath the mask now covering his face, found new strength in his attacks. The freezing temperatures didn't matter now that Childe could make use of his Delusion. However, the Herald was too quick to allow Childe the use of his bow (could it be human if it kept spinning in circles like a Ruin Hunter ...?), but there was a big arsenal of weapons Childe could choose from – and quick breaths escaped his mouth in little clouds the longer this fight dragged on.

"Do you like this?" Falling backwards, Childe swung an ax imbued with Electro over the Herald's chest, stunned for a moment when the Herald quietly took the hit across the chest and through the armor and grabbed for Childe's throat instead. No weapon at his hand when he consciously did it, no deadly attack as Childe had expected, just a quick motion of his hand and suddenly Childe found himself dangling mid-air by his throat, struggling to get free from the grip. He wanted to dig his fingers into the flesh holding him but the armor around the Herald's hands was irritatingly sturdy and didn't prove too effective.

That was strange. All these fights all these years and a creature of the Abyss would be the end of him after everything?

If Childe had the breath, he might've laughed at the irony. All he could do was bare his teeth in a smile.

And then the grip was gone. Before falling backwards to the ground like a stone, Childe thought he saw a familiar figure swing against the Herald -

Ah well, he would've had to explain some things once this fight was over.