Cooking has always been more than a job for Xiangling. It was her passion, her drive, her reason for her life. She was the embodiment of her passion. It helped that she was born to a chef, a humble cook who owned a small eatery in Liyue, and from a young age, Xiangling had been exposed to the joys of cooking. She always enjoyed watching the happy faces of the customers and hearing the cries of "Delicious!" as they complimented the chef.
She remembered the day when she told her father her dreams and aspirations to become the greatest chef in Teyvat who could use any ingredient, even the inedible ones like slime condensate and hilichurl masks, to make the tastiest food in the world. Her father looked like he wanted to cry from happiness and throw up in disgust at the same time. Instead of being a sensible parent and telling his daughter to stick to edible ingredients, he supported her and wished her the best of luck.
"I thought that he would stop me but I was surprised at how supportive he was!"
Many people were afraid to try out her strange creations, and for good reasons. Xiangling's father was the frequent victim in her experiments even when she herself suffered no ill effects from consuming the food. No one knew why it was only Xiangling who was immune; perhaps it was due to her youth or her resilient body. Either way, it was beneficial to her quest.
"Xiangling's cooking is universally praised, but I personally don't touch any of her spicy dishes. Why? Oh, you know — just, uh…personal preference, that's all. I mean, come on, Mushroom Slime Stew… Does that sound appetising to you?" Chongyun said, his eyes glancing to the side as if expecting his friend to show up at any moment.
She also remembered the day she met her trusty companion, Guoba. She had been out gathering ingredients one day, losing track of time until the sky turned dark and the storm descended upon her. She took cover in a cave, only to find a strange shrine deep within it. She was curious about the object but her young mind was distracted by the raving hunger in her stomach.
She sat down to eat, pulling two pieces of cornbread buns that her father had made for her that morning, and set one down before the shrine. She fell asleep, exhausted from running in the rain earlier, only to wake up to her cornbread bun missing and a strange bear-like adeptus standing in front of her.
Rather than showing her disappointment at the adeptus for eating her food without asking, she offered the creature more food. And from that day onwards, the two became inseparable.
(The less said about her father's reaction to Guoba, the better.)
Her friends took a liking to Guoba the first time she introduced the adeptus to them. They were curious of course, but did not press into the creature's origins (not that Xiangling could answer that anyway).
Surprisingly, Guoba was not the strangest thing the people had laid eyes on in Teyvat, not when gods walk amongst men in the city of contracts, not when Morax descended every year to bestow his wisdom to his people. If anything, the experimental dishes Xiangling served would easily come within the top ten strangest things one could find in Liyue.
So when a man dressed in very exotic clothes showed up one day with a strange flying adeptus at Wanmin Restaurant, Xiangling did not bat an eye at the sight.
She had not known who the man was, not when people bearing clothes from different nations come and go at one of the largest harbour cities in Teyvat. There was nothing about him that screamed out that he was the famous Traveller, the hero who saved Mondstadt and Liyue. Sure, having a flying adeptus as a companion was rare seeing as the adepti were content on never interacting with the mortals living in Liyue. However, it was merely a rare sight and not at all an impossible one.
She handed over the menu to both of them and waited for the two to decide their orders. Strangely, the man set the menu down while the tiny adeptus read each item on the menu to the man. Was the man unable to read? Though rare in the city of Liyue Harbour, it was common for most towns in the countryside to lack the ability to read.
The flying adeptus placed the order for herself and her friend, two servings of Jueyun Chilli Chicken. Xiangling took the menus back and started to cook, unaware of the sparkle of interest in Guoba's eyes. She plated the food and served them fresh out of the wok, throwing a quick "Enjoy your meal!" before returning to clean her cooking area. She had been focused on her task, scrubbing the cooking utensils and paying no heed to the customers until one of them spoke up.
"I know Paimon! So stop pointing it out!"
She looked up from her cleaning, her eyes glancing over at her customers as she listened as the flying adeptus pointed out the dropped food on the counter. The man did not try to defend himself, only mentioning irritatedly that he was well aware of the wasted food. She watched as the man picked up a piece of chicken by sliding it up with his chopsticks, only for the morsel of food to fall off the side of the plate.
That was when Xiangling realised that Guoba had climbed up to the wooden counter and was staring at the foreigner who seemed to be unaware of the adeptus in front of him as he continued to eat. His friend, on the hand, was staring fearfully at Guoba.
"Guoba!" Xiangling cried out, startling her friend and her customers.
That cry of course, did not deter her friend's decision to carry on with his plans with the foreigner, whatever that might be. He did, however, acknowledge Xiangling calling his name by nodding his head. So when Guoba decided to eat the food the person had dropped on the table, Xiangling was both horrified and mortified.
She ran over to her friend to pull him away from the confused customer, only to fall back when Guoba lost his balance and fell on top of her.
"Are you okay? What happened?" the foreigner asked, standing up from his seat but not making any further movement.
"We're fine!" Xiangling assured the man from where she was lying.
The man returned to his seat, frowning but made no comment. He patted the table, fingers touching the dropped morsels of food as his hand roamed the table in search of something. In the end, he sighed when he was unable to locate the item he was looking for and rested his arm on the table to lean against it. His friend asked if he was done when she looked down at the half-empty plate. He shook his head in lieu of a verbal reply and the adeptus was quick to grab the plate and move it closer to her.
Xiangling watched everything silently, confused. There was no way the man was full. There was something wrong, something amiss, but she did not know what it was. Guoba patted her leg, drawing her attention away from the person. He gestured to her, making noises of excitement before trotting off to the cabinet to pull out her father's book of recipes. He sat down on the ground, opening the book and carefully flipping the pages one by one. Xiangling squatted down behind her friend, watching until he came to a stop at a page titled 'Rice Buns'.
Guoba looked up at his friend and patted the page, as if suggesting she should make the recipe. Xiangling stood up, walking over to where her father stored the dough for making Rice Buns. There was no harm making it and even if the man did not want it, then she could always eat it later for supper.
"Guoba's pretty smart and sharp, even if he doesn't know how to communicate well."
As soon as the Rice Buns were ready, Guoba was quick to take the dish out to serve to the foreigner. The flying adeptus was curious about the new dish, only to be frightened away when the adeptus spit out a lick of fire when she tried to sample one of the Rice Buns. He made noises at the confused foreigner but the man did not move to grab the food. In the end, Guoba climbed up the table to take one of the Rice Buns and place it into the foreigner's hands.
The person finally understood and cautiously brought the Rice Bun up to his face. He smelled it first before taking a small bite, savouring the taste before devouring it quickly in hunger. The bun was gone in a few bites and Guoba was more than happy to give the man another one. It was not long before all the Rice Buns were gone, leaving the man satisfied with his simple meal.
"Huh, was it that good? Paimon wants to try!"
"Didn't you just eat!?"
After the man and the flying adeptus paid and left, Xiangling had thought that would be the last time she would see them but when evening came, the two returned to her father's restaurant for dinner. It was then that she was asked a strange question.
"Do you have food that can be eaten without using any utensils like the Rice Buns earlier?"
It was not to say that the restaurant did not have food that could be eaten without chopsticks but rather, those food tend to be festival food and are usually appetisers. They were not meant to be eaten as a single full meal.
"I'm blind so I keep dropping the food… I don't want to waste the cooking you put so much effort in."
Xiangling opened her mouth in shock. That explained so much! Had Guoba noticed it which was why he made her cook Rice Buns for the man? Still, apart from forcing him to eat specific food, there was another way that she could help.
"Just order what you want! I promise that you won't spill as much this time! And even if you do, Guoba would be delighted to eat them, he won't say no to free food!"
This time, the man ordered a simple dish of Stir-Fried Fish Noodles for himself. Fortunately for Xiangling, her father happened to be working at the restaurant at the time and the two hurried to cook the mountain of food that the flying adeptus had ordered. Even Guoba helped by serving the dishes to the customer! It was only when those orders were cleared that Xiangling began cooking the Stir-Fried Fish Noodles. Her eyes blazed as she cooked, her passion heating up higher than the flames in her stove. Guoba cheered her on as he always would while her father stepped out, no longer able to stand the scorching flames.
The dish was cooked to perfection as always but instead of pulling out the usual ceramic plate, Xiangling ran over to the cabinet of plates reserved for fancier dishes and pulled out a plate with a lip. She scooped out the noodles and placed them onto the special plate before personally serving the meal to the foreigner.
"Enjoy your meal!" Xiangling said with a smile as she grabbed a pair of chopsticks and lightly tapped the foreigner's hands with it until the man understood what she was doing and grabbed the utensil.
Although she had turned away to clean her wok, she continued to sneak glances at the man behind her. She watched his expression as he slowly ate, from the way he picked the noodles up to eat it, to the way he was surprised when he tried to grab a piece of fish with his chopsticks and felt the morsel of food hit the lip of the plate. She watched the man touch the raised edge of the plate, tracing it before returning to his meal with a small smile on his face.
The man and his companion returned to Wanmin Restaurant every day, three times a day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, whenever they were in Liyue Harbour. Xiangling learned the man's name, Aether, before she found out that he was the legendary Traveller.
"You're the Traveller? The one who defeated the god who attacked the city? You're the hero everyone's been talking about? Wait… You mean that the hero's been regularly visiting my father's restaurant and I've been serving Rice Buns to him all this time!?" Xiangling exclaimed loudly, her pitch becoming higher with each revelation.
"Not just Rice Buns," Aether corrected. "You also served me Grilled Tiger Fish. There's also that one time you slapped my hand away when I tried to eat the skewered meat I dropped on the ground."
"Five seconds rule is not a thing, Aether!"
She also learned that her best friends had already met Aether long before she did.
"Ah Traveller, it's good to see that you're well," Xingqiu greeted as he and Chongyun sat down on the empty seats in Wanmin Restaurant.
"Eh? You've met him already?"
Xiangling enjoyed every single one of those meetings. When she revealed that she enjoyed experimenting with ingredients for cooking, he volunteered to taste test her food when she mentioned that her friends avoided her experimental dishes because they did not look appetising.
(After Aether got food poisoning a few times from her experimental dishes, he started refusing her enthusiastic offers.)
Even when he and Paimon disappeared for a great amount of time, because of their duty to adventure, Xiangling would always welcome them back with a bright smile to Wanmin Restaurant.
When the two arrived at the restaurant to inform her that they would be heading to Inazuma the next day, Xiangling was touched that they cared enough to let her know. She swiftly handed them a large supply of dried food she had been storing in the restaurant. Then, the two bid her farewell once more.
It was months later when the two returned, changed by the experiences on the land far beyond the waters.
The two sat at their usual seats and Xiangling brought out their usual orders. It was as if nothing had changed between them, as if the two had never left, but anyone with sharp eyes could see the invisible weight burdening the Traveller's shoulders, the blank eyes of guilt and self-hatred. Anyone could see the slightly torn scarf that he wore, proof of the many unknown battles he fought in the other land. Anyone could see the way Paimon would stare worriedly at her friend, the way she fidgeted with her hands instead of pouncing at the food right in front of her. Anyone could see it and Xiangling did. But where others might ask if they were fine, if they were okay, Xiangling posed a different question to them.
"Do you want a hug?"
Both Aether and Paimon looked surprised at the question, as if they had not expected someone to offer them something as simple as a hug. When he nodded, Xiangling stepped out of the restaurant, dragging her steps to warn him, and entered his personal space to hug him. Paimon and Guoba joined in not a second later and although the hug lasted for less than a minute, it was a moment that Xiangling would remember forever.