"Zhongli, I would like you to start dating me," Lumine stated firmly, her challenging eyes meeting his own.
Zhongli leveled a flat gaze on the Traveler in return. He was seated at the same bench he'd occupied when this trouble began. In the time since the incident, he'd repaired the pothole, and had also gone ahead and moved the storm drain six feet as Lumine had suggested. Even now, he wasn't certain why, but his time with Guizhong had given him the faith that it was for the best. Over Lumine's shoulder, Paimon had buried her face in her hands in utter mortification, chanting "This is a bad idea," over and over again like a mantra.
"Please, hear me out," Lumine continued, quickly. "I've studied the problem of Guizhong's gift, and it just isn't going to work. I can't put Guizhong's wisdom back in that box without putting MY wisdom in that box at the same time. I've looked at every possible angle I can think of, and I simply cannot separate her from me, at this point."
Zhongli looked stricken. The change was permanent?
Lumine noticed his distress and shook her head rapidly, "No, no – sorry, it's not what you're thinking. I can fix this. I can undo what was done to me. But doing so is going to eliminate the parts of me that are her, not isolate them. I can remove her, but I can't put her back in the puzzle without putting a copy of me in there, as well, if that makes sense. It's not something I want to do, and I'm sure she would not have wanted it, either."
Zhongli relaxed. "That is… acceptable. I came to terms with her death a long, long time ago. If you wish to lay these remnants of Guizhong to rest, you have my blessing to do so."
"That said," continued Lumine, "I do want to honor her wishes. She had a purpose, when she created the Memory of Dust. She was frustrated with you, you know. Frustrated that you couldn't understand her ideas, couldn't see the world the way she did."
"Yes, I know," Zhongli replied with a sigh. "Her intellect was on a completely different level than mine. She was endlessly patient with me, but in the end, I simply could not understand."
"The Memory of Dust was her solution to that. She wanted to augment your mind," Lumine said. "It was another problem she wanted to solve, and she found a way, in the end."
It did make sense, Zhongli considered. If he'd had the ability to grant Guizhong his own blessings, his power and his strength, he would have done so in a heartbeat. Perhaps if she'd had both his strength and her own wisdom, she would have survived the war. It was not hard to imagine that she would have wished the same for him – but Guizhong being Guizhong, she had actually found the answer.
"That wasn't the only thing that frustrated her, though," Lumine continued. "She was in love with you, and she had no more luck pounding that into your thick skull than she did her intellect. I don't think there's anything I can do about the intellect, but I DO think I can help you to understand how she felt. That is why I want us to start dating."
Zhongli had his doubts, but he had to admit that he was curious. The Guizhong he remembered… Had she really harbored these feelings for him? It was hard to imagine that the Traveler was making it all up. She had been, without question, the most important person in his life – and yet, he was now being presented with an aspect of her that he'd never dreamed existed. Even now, he could not recall a single interaction with her that hinted at what Lumine was implying.
There was one thing bothering him, however, "If Guizhong failed, what makes you think that you can succeed?"
Lumine smiled, "That's easy. I'm not Guizhong," she replied.
"I… fail to see your point. Surely, that's a disadvantage?"
"Not at all!" Lumine answered eagerly, obviously expecting the question. "Guizhong was… reserved. Painfully, painfully reserved. Even now, that part of her is cringing inside of me even more than poor Paimon over there. I can say things to you, do things to you, that she would never have dared."
"Do things to me?" Zhongli asked, dubiously.
"Physicality. Like that kiss," Lumine answered. "It's something Guizhong wanted to do, and pretty desperately, at that. It's something she couldn't do – but I could. And in those first few moments, when her feelings were fresh in my mind, I did."
The former Archon was wary, hearing that. The kiss had been… a very strange and awkward moment.
"What did you think if it, by the way," Lumine asked. "How did you feel?"
"I was confused," he replied. "It was quite unexpected. Strange."
"Did you like it?" Lumine pressed.
"It was… not unpleasant, I suppose," Zhongli admitted.
"What would you have thought of it, if it had been Guizhong, instead of me?" Lumine asked.
Zhongli nearly recoiled at the thought of the elegant goddess he remembered crawling into his lap to mash her lips against his.
Recognizing his distress, Lumine smirked a bit, "Hard to imagine, isn't it? But it was on her mind, trust me. That, and more."
Zhongli pondered that. "And you feel that this... physicality, will help me to comprehend her feelings toward me?"
"That's part of it," Lumine nodded. "The main problem that I see is that you have problems with closeness in general, both physically and emotionally. Guizhong was very important to you, right?"
"Perhaps the most important person I've ever known," Zhongli answered immediately.
"Did you ever tell her that?"
Zhongli went silent, searching his memories. Gradually, his expression fell. "…no." He said, eventually. "I was comfortable around her, and she seemed comfortable around me. I assumed that she… understood how deeply I valued that companionship." He had assumed that he had understood her feelings, as well, but clearly there were things he hadn't known about Guizhong. Perhaps his assumption was wrong. Perhaps she HADN'T known how much she had meant to him. The thought awakened a whole new dimension of regret inside of him.
"She understood," Lumine murmured, resting a hand on his shoulder, comfortingly. "Or she believed that she did." That qualifier stung; it undermined the comfort, more than Lumine seemed to understand.
Lumine's proposal was becoming more and more tempting. He DID want to know more about this hidden side Guizhong had never shown him. But it was still important that he refuse. "Lumine, I appreciate what you're trying to do. But the fact remains that you are, and I mean this only as the literal truth with no offence whatsoever intended, not in your right mind right now."
Lumine smiled. "You're a good man, Zhongli. But fixing the Memory of Dust isn't the only thing I've been devoting my mind to." She tapped her head with a finger. "I've been spending a lot of time compartmentalizing what's going on inside my head, both for my own comfort and because if I'm going to get the bits that aren't me out of me, I needed to figure out which bits were which, first. You don't need to worry about a thing!"
Lumine stepped back, twirled, and curtsied. "This is one hundred percent me: Lumine the Traveler, making this offer as a friend." She grinned, a bit impishly. "You don't need to worry about my going too far. I like you and all, but you're really not my type, romantically."
"Your type?" Zhongli asked. Hu Tao had mentioned something similar, but he'd not put much thought into it.
"The kind of man I'm attracted to," Lumine explained. "I like guys with a lot of passion in their personality. You tend to be a bit too composed. Sometimes a girl likes to be swept off her feet, you know? If you were the type, I doubt Guizhong would have been so frustrated."
Actually, Zhongli recalled, he HAD once done exactly that. It had been during the Archon war, and the two of them had been ambushed by Leraje the Plaguebearer, god of Miasma. He'd been forced to scoop her up and leap to safety when their enemy scoured the valley they'd been in with a wash of disease and putrescence that left it barren and lifeless for centuries. It was one of the few times he'd ever touched her, he suddenly realized. As he'd leapt to safe ground, she'd wrapped her arms around his neck much as Lumine had when she'd kissed him. At the time, he'd considered it only logical, since it aided him in carrying her to safety. But had it meant more?
Lumine had continued chattering while he'd been lost in retrospection; it was perhaps to his ego's benefit that he'd missed out on some of the many ways in which he fell short of Lumine's ideal as a lover. "…and you're also WAY too tall," Lumine finished. "I mean, I barely come up to your chest. I'd have to jump to kiss you, and I'm not always patient enough to wait for my guy to offer. And, of course, you being you, you'd likely never offer, would you? See what I mean? Frustrating."
Zhongli sighed. It was probably a mistake, but… "Very well," he said. "I accept." If nothing else, it would keep him from getting an ass kicking from Hu Tao.
Lumine beamed. "Excellent! I promise you won't regret it!"
"I should warn you, however, that I know little about 'dating'," Zhongli said. Not wholly true. Over the millennia, he'd sampled novels and poetry of all kinds produced by the people of Liyue, including a fair number devoted to the subject of romance. That said, he'd always approached the topic from a very detached perspective; he was certain he couldn't be trusted as any kind of authority on the topic.
"Color me shocked," the Traveler answered dryly.
"So what, exactly, does one do on a date?"
"Honestly? It doesn't matter a whole lot. The important thing is to be together, to learn more about one another, to have fun. I do have an idea about how we should spend our first date, though! You still got that puzzle?"
"Of course," Zhongli answered, producing the Memory of Dust from the pocket space in which he kept it.
"Oh! Nice! You did figure out the Geo trick!"
Zhongli nodded. "I haven't made much progress beyond that, though."
"That's fine. I'm going to help you through it!"
"Didn't you say it was important for me to solve it on my own?"
"That was more Guizhong than me," Lumine admitted. "It was important to her, but I think she'd have forgiven me. Anyway, I won't be straight-up solving it for you; I'm going to be giving you hints to help you figure it out for yourself."
Lumine sat next to Zhongli on the bench, but much closer than she had before, arm pressed up against his arm. She leaned over to point at one of the stone tiles composing the puzzle, and Zhongli's nose was once again tickled by the sweet scent of the flowers in her hair. "This was one of the Geo rods, right?" Zhongli nodded. "Now, you pulled it open, that's good – did you try anything else with it?"
A few hours later, the puzzle still wasn't solved, but Zhongli could tell that significant progress had been made. The sun had set, however, and the Traveler had retreated to the Adeptal Realm she'd been gifted for a night's rest. As Zhongli made his way to his own home, his thoughts returned to the sensations of her arm against his, and the scent of her flowers. Lumine was not wrong. That kind of physical closeness was something alien to him. Still, it was… nice. It was something he could acquire a taste for, he was sure.
While sleep was not something he strictly needed, he was living as a mortal, now, and he made a point of sleeping just as the mortals did. As was sometimes the case, he dreamt of Guizhong – only this time, her hair was gold instead of obsidian, and she smelt of flowers instead of dust.
Author's Notes:
This is the chapter in which Lumine falls into her role as the Manic Pixie Dream Girl of the relationship, taking charge and drawing her hapless partner out of his shell! I see Zhongli as the sort of old soul who is in his twilight years, looking fondly upon the next generation of the world, ready to guide and advise but not actually intending to participate. He's a kindly old grandfather, who just happens to have the physical body of an attractive thirty-something. If he ever had any aspirations of engaging in romance, those days are long, long past – but not if Lumine has anything to say about it!
Fantasy makes some really odd romantic situations possible. If it could be said that Zhongli is presented as an old soul, the Traveler and the Traveler's Twin are almost certainly presented as young souls, in spite of the fact that they may be as old – or possibly even much older – than he is. They behave like spirited youths, full of fire and the desire to change the world for the better. The Traveler's relationship to Zhongli in-game feels like an intergenerational friendship to me, and so changing that to a romance hits a lot of the same notes that an intergenerational romance does. It might even be a bit creepy, if Zhongli was the initiator.
Hopefully, with Lumine taking the lead, and Zhongli being more-or-less clueless that pitfall is avoided!
