Chapter 11
Secrets revealed and allies found
Two months after the end of the Stormterror Crisis
Will, Aether, and Paimon silently skirted around the beach of Amakane island, off the shore of the larger Narukami Island. Though the sun was still below the horizon, the first rays of light had already begun to shine over the ocean's crest, and they all knew it wouldn't be long before the sun itself came into view. They had to put more distance between themselves and Narukami Island before that happened.
Unfortunately, even with his leg numbed by the icy shell formed around it, Will was still unable to run easily. Aether had to help him along for most of the trek, while Paimon flew ahead to make sure the coast was clear, a hindrance that had caused them all precious time. Still, Aether refused to leave Will behind, and so did Paimon.
Eventually, however, they managed to sneak aboard the waverider, using Will's Cryo Delusion to form a ramp that led onto the boat. With their tracks covered by the rising tides, they set off, the Shogun's army nowhere in sight.
"Thanks for coming to get us, Will. You saved both of our lives, sure enough," Aether said, accelerating the engines as Will sat down against the wall. The prow of the boat sheered right through the incoming breaker waves, and Will shook his head.
"You would've done the same for me. But seeing as we're now going to be on the open ocean for a bit, if you want to ask me anything, now would be a good time," Will responded, breaking the ice off of his leg to let the skin air out while they weren't walking.
"Ok then. First thing's first, you're not from Inazuma, are you?" Aether asked, and Will shook his head.
"I'm not. I was born and raised in Snezhnaya, and five years ago, right after I turned fourteen, myself and a good friend of mine enlisted in the Fatui, as many teenagers and young adults in Snezhnaya do."
"But why would you join the Fatui? Don't you know the things they've done?" Paimon asked. Will shook his head.
"Not then, we didn't. A lot of what happens outside of Snezhnaya is heavily filtered. I only learned of the Fatui's true nature, as well as the truth behind their crimes, during my first mission outside of Snezhnaya around four months or so ago."
Aether tilted his head to the side as he steered the boat around a discarded crate. "What was your mission?" Will leaned his head back against the wall, staring at the tarp ceiling of the Waverider.
"I was sent to Fontaine with orders to extract a high value target. This person was another member of the Fatui, by the name of Kurogane, and he had been sent to Fontaine to collect information on the nation, specifically it's Archon, the god of justice. However, he was captured, and before the Fontaine interrogators were able to extract any information from him, I was supposed to rescue him and deliver him back to Snezhnaya. We managed to escape his cell unseen, but then we were spotted and forced to run soon after we hit the main bulk of the capital city. Kurogane kept trying to use his Pyro Vision and claymore to destroy buildings, bring down flying cars, and more, and I'm glad I was there to keep him in line," Will replied, before laughing for a moment. "I don't think I've ever gotten so close to punching someone I was supposed to be protecting in the face."
Aether raised an eyebrow. "Why did you want to punch him in the face?" the blonde asked, confused and somewhat amused by the thought of Will punching an ally in the face.
"He thought collateral damage and endangering innocents would get our pursuers off our backs. And maybe… maybe it would have, but that's not something I'd be willing to do. Pulling civilians into the crossfire and sacrificing their safety in order to escape," Will explained. "At any rate, we were crossing under a bridge when they got the drop on us. I tried to keep my target safe, but then there was a pair of officers with Cryo and Hydro Visions, and… well it didn't go well."
Aether nodded. "You escaped, but your mission was unsuccessful?" he guessed as the next island came into view. Will nodded.
"Mm hm. It turns out that the higher ups decided not to inform me of the small detail that not only was this assignment a test to see how well I handled myself in the field on a solo mission, but that Kurogane had been given orders to do whatever was necessary to prevent Fontaine from acquiring our secrets if he felt I was unable to keep him safe. I managed to escape the carnage, but Kurogane… well, he decided not to leave in one piece." Will shuddered as he remembered the blinding flash of light, and the deafening explosion of sound and noise. The sight of Kurogane's arm poking out from under the rubble resurfaced, and he clenched his eyes shut to try and block out the memory.
When he opened his eyes again, Will saw that Paimon was looking over at him with an expression of concern, and he actually laughed. "Geez Paimon, you're not actually worrying about me are you?" he chuckled, but the darkness in his eyes betrayed the futile attempt to hide the trauma that Will knew all to well was coming.
"Well yeah! Paimon worries about her friends all the time! But Paimon is also curious about what happened when you got back to Snezhnaya… did you even go back at all?" she asked, and Will sighed.
"You don't have to answer if it's too sensitive a topic, Will," Aether told him, but Will shook his head. He'd bottled up these feelings for long enough, and it hadn't done anything but eat him up inside, making him regret so many decisions for so long, even those which realistically had no impact on what came next. Perhaps it was time for a different approach.
"No, I need to talk about it. If nothing else, I can't bear the burden any longer. I need to get it out," he said, taking a deep breath. "To answer your question, Paimon… yes, I did go back to Snezhnaya. But I wish I hadn't… maybe then, they would've assumed I'd died in Fontaine."
"Ok, Paimon gets wanting to stay under the Fatui's radar, but is the punishment for failing a mission that severe in the Fatui? You just told us it was the first solo mission you'd ever been on, surely they'd be more forgiving?" Paimon interjected. Will shook his head.
"Once upon a time, maybe that would've been the case. But not anymore… When I got back without Kurogane, I was told to go to my home and rest up, that the higher ups and I would talk the next day about what had happened… It was a lie," Will explained, looking down at the ground. "That night… while I was eating dinner with my family… a woman knocked on our door. My father, he… he went to answer the door but…"
Will paused in an attempt to calm himself before going on. "He had just barely grasped the door handle, when the entire house shook. I looked over and saw that there was a massive hole in the wall where the door once was, and a mark on the floor like charcoal. I never saw my dad again. I stood up to go see what had happened, but I got knocked to the floor by a large chunk of ice. And when I came to, my mother had been frozen into a statue of ice." Paimon gasped in shock, and Aether turned around to look at his friend just in time to see a single tear fall from his eyes.
"After that… all I remember is that I ran. I ran as fast and as far as I could, trying to put as much distance between myself and that witch as possible, even as I had no clear destination in mind. Eventually, I wound up standing outside the Snezhnayan historical archives, and decided that if the Fatui wanted to take something near and dear from me… well, two could play at that game, so I stole the original Cryo Delusion you see embedded in the pendant necklace on my neck," Will said, gesturing to his Delusion. "Maybe because it was the Prototype Delusion, or because it was said to have been used by the Tsaritsa herself during the Cataclysm five hundred years ago… but it doesn't negatively affect me like normal Delusions would."
Aether and Paimon were silent as Will continued his tale, explaining how he had escaped Snezhnaya on a small raft, floated across the sea for days, using the Cryo Delusion to filter the salty seawater into fresh water to drink. The boy told them how he ended up shipwrecked on the beach of Narukami island, how he met Yoimiya, and first came into contact with the Vision Hunt Decree.
"Since you came from Liyue before coming to Inazuma, I need to ask if either of you ran into a Snezhnayan by the name of Childe," Will said, and Aether and Paimon both nodded.
"Childe? The Eleventh Harbinger? Yeah, we met him. How do you know him?" Paimon asked. Will smiled.
"So he's still a Harbinger then. Good, at least my failure didn't ruin his life too. Did he tell you about his youngest brother?"
"Yes… we met Teucer. Quite the handful Paimon would add," the floating pixie replied.
Will let out a sigh of relief. "Childe may be… prone to losing control sometimes… but he and his relatives became like a second family to me during my training in the Fatui. I'm glad my failure didn't impact them greatly."
"Ok, quit avoiding the question. How do you know Childe?" Paimon asked again. Will chuckled.
"He was my mentor. He taught me how to use the Foul Legacy Transformation, though I was never able to use it until the other day, and he taught me how to fight with dual swords, and many more things."
"Childe was your teacher?!" Paimon exclaimed, before pretending to fall over in the air as if she had fainted from shock. Aether on the other hand just nodded in understanding.
"That's why your fighting style with two swords felt familiar to me," he mused, before slowing the Waverider to a stop off the shore of Kannazuka. He stood up out of the captain's chair, and helped Will to his feet after the latter refroze his foot. "How's your leg? Getting any better?"
Will shrugged. "Too early to tell. The ice has definitely numbed it though, so I think I should be good to walk. But I'm not sure I'm going to be able to run, so if we could avoid any confrontations at all, it'd be appreciated." The blonde nodded, and with a wave of Will's hand, an icy gangplank materialized from the sandy shore to the boat. They slid down the walkway, which melted soon after they stepped foot on the beach, and then Aether's armor glowed with a golden light. Small walls of stone sprouted up from under the water's surface, forming a ring around the boat.
"Hopefully that'll keep it from going anywhere," he thought out loud, and Will nodded in agreement, before shrugging.
"Well, even if it floats off, we've got our provisions with us in our bags, and if I remember the map correctly, we won't be needing a boat until we get all the way to the opposite side of Yashiori island, and that's at least a whole day's walk from where we are now I'd imagine," Will predicted.
"Why's that? Paimon thought Narukami Island was the largest island in Inazuma," Paimon asked, and Will shook his head at the pixie.
"Narukami Island is harder to traverse because of it's mountains, so it takes longer to get from one side to the other on foot. But Kannazuka, though not as steep with it's cliffs, is simply just much bigger," the former explained, and then Paimon nodded in understanding.
"Ah, gotcha! So all we have to do is walk… from one side of a massive island… all the way to the… other… You know on second thought this isn't going to be as easy as Paimon thought, is it?"
The trio walked from where they'd made landfall up a gently sloped mountain to get a better view of the island. "So. Have you ever been to Kannazuka before?" Aether asked Will, tired of the silence that had arisen between the three of them.
"No, I haven't. Since arriving in Inazuma, I've only had the chance to venture to Ritou, Narukami Island, and the Seirai Islands to the south of Narukami. I've never traveled this far west of the main island," Will replied as he used a small blast of Anemo to help push him up over a cliff. "What I know of the islands we're crossing is limited to books, maps, and what I've heard from other members of the Yashiro Commission."
"According to legend, the name Kannazuka actually goes back many, many centuries. While the people on Narukami Island worship the Electro Archon, Sangonomiya worships another god, known as Orobashi," Will explained as they walked. He continued, telling Aether and Paimon of the legends that said that Orobashi had invaded Yashiori Island near the end of the Archon War, and how that had led to the battle between the Raiden Shogun and the serpent god of Watatsumi island, a battle that was ended by the Shogun's Musou no Hitotachi.
"Of course, the people of Watatsumi island probably have their own take on the legends. History is written by the victors after all," Will added. "But ever since the death of Orobashi, the Sangonomiya clan and the Shogunate have never seen eye to eye. Thus the land between Narukami Island, governed by the Shogunate, and Watatsumi island, led by the Divine Priestess of their island, was given the name Kannazuka… the hill where no gods reside…"
"Wow, you really know a lot about the history of Inazuma Will!" Paimon exclaimed, her eyes wide with wonder. Will laughed as he shook his head.
"Oh if only. There's much, much more to the legends than what I know. But thank you, Paimon. It means a lot to me that someone could find my retelling of legends from the Inazuma of old to be… interesting," he admitted, smiling.
Will kept talking with the two travelers, telling them legends and stories he'd heard from Ayaka and other members of the Yashiro Commission, or from old, hardly used books he'd read from the Yae Publishing House's library. But it wasn't long before they came upon a path, and on that path stood two Shogunate Samurai. Will quickly stopped talking as one of them twitched, thinking he heard something from behind him. The trio hid behind a dense bush, out of sight, but not out of earshot.
The first guard yawned. "I heard they added a couple more people to the wanted list. They're high-priority targets, apparently."
"But most of our forces are out on the front line. How are we supposed to effectively prioritize them?" The second one asked, before letting out a breath. "We'll just have to make sure we keep our eyes peeled when we're out on patrol, I guess."
The first samurai sighed. "I wonder how they're faring on the front line… The last thing I heard was that we'd pushed the resistance back to just northwest of Musoujin Gorge. I don't know if that's true."
The other samurai made a disagreeing grunt with his throat. "I doubt it. Their rearguard isn't far from there. We're gaining ground at the moment, but I don't think we've pushed them back that far," he said, before sighing. "Well, we should focus on patrol. Come on, we're up."
The first samurai sighed again, and groaned as he stretched his arms. "Yeah, fair point… Time to go to work."
The three fugitives waited in breathless silence as the sounds of footsteps grew quieter and quieter, until at last, Paimon looked over the top of the bushes. "They're gone… The northwest of Musoujin Gorge, huh? So that's where the resistance forces are based…"
Will nodded. "That's not far from where the Shuumatsuban's last reports said they were," he mused, and Aether side-eyed him. "What? Even on the other islands, it's not a secret that of the three clans leading the Tri-Commission, the Kamisato Clan and the Yashiro Commission are more amenable compared to the Kanjou and Tenryou Commissions. Ayato figured that due to that fact, it would be best if our commission acted as representatives to the Sangonomiyan people," he explained, before looking down. "Or at the very least attempt to…"
The trio kept moving, eventually running into a pair of fleeing travelers like them, named Sakamoto and Jiichirou. They swapped news and information, and from them Will and Aether learned that the Resistance was rumored to be entrenched near Nazuchi beach. "Nazuchi beach huh? I guess that's where we're headed next. Safe travels you two!" Aether called out as they parted ways, and they headed towards the ravaged beach.
After dispatching a pair of Electro Whopperflowers as they walked around Tatarasuna, they finally reached Nazuchi Beach. "Keep your eyes peeled. According to the Shuumatsuban's intelligence, Nazuchi beach is called home by all manner of bandits, criminals, and Ronin. And there's still the war between the Resistance and the Shogun's army going on," Will warned Aether, who drew his sword. Since his Rancour blade had been broken by the Shogun, the blonde had replaced it with a more ordinary looking sword. Regardless, Will knew Aether well enough by now to know that, despite its appearance, the blade was almost certainly just as unordinary as its wielder, who was ready to fend off a foes at a moments notice. Will's leg however, was still not healed enough for him to fight. While he could manage some basic attacks with his Vision and Delusion, and he'd been taught how to fight with a bow, he still wasn't proficient with either it or catalysts. And even if he was, he didn't have one to use anyway. That left him with just being able to use some basic attacks, but he doubted that'd be enough to fight off the Shogunate Samurai or Ronin they were bound to come across.
Aether led the way, with a frustrated Will behind him, wishing he could do something to help. But his limp would only cause him to get in the way, and then he might cause someone else to get hurt. As difficult as it was, he knew it was in everyone's best interests that he stay out of battle as much as possible. They gave the groups of Treasure Hoarders and Ronin a wide berth, the latter eyeing and staring them down, but fortunately not thinking they were worth the time to attack. Seeing Treasure Hoarders and Ronin working together again reminded Will of Lumine and the Abyss Order. "I wonder how Vilhelm's fairing… has he been made a Lector yet?" Will thought to himself. But then his thoughts were interrupted as a shout swept across the beach.
The three of them looked over to see two Shogunate Yoriki standing over a wounded samurai wearing red and white clothing. He wore black armor with gold outlines and highlights on his wrists and one of his shoulders, and on the ground next to him was a spear like the ones used by the Shogun's army, but snapped in two. "Hey, look! D'you think that's a resistance fighter?" Paimon asked Will and Aether.
"Could be. Either way, it looks like he's in a tight spot... Let's go help him out!" Aether answered, charging towards the Yoriki samurai with his Dull blade in hand. With his unusual fighting style, the Yoriki samurai were quickly overwhelmed by powerful strikes combined with blasts of Anemo, falling rocks made of Geo, and rings of Electro. In no time at all, Aether had defeated both samurai single handedly.
Will and Paimon slowly walked over to the wounded fighter, who pushed himself up from the ground and picked up one of the fallen Yoriki's katanas.
Aether walked back over to them, his dull blade floating behind him. "Are you alright?" he asked, and the samurai nodded.
"I am, thanks to you. I'm Teppei of the Gobius Platoon. I'm with the resistance," the samurai replied, sheathing the Yoriki's katana and clipping the sheath onto his belt.
"You're with the resistance?" Will asked, and Teppei nodded.
"I am. Are you looking to sign up?"
"Er, something like that," Paimon confirmed. A smile appeared on Teppei's face as he let out a sigh of relief.
"Great! Just the other day I heard General Gorou talking about how desperately we need more people. Your support will make a big difference. I'll escort you back to our camp… But first, let me bring you up to speed on our current situation," Teppei said, leading them towards the gorge.
"As I'm sure you're aware, the resistance is at a constant disadvantage when it comes to open confrontation," Teppei explained. "The goal of the Shogun's Army is to uphold "eternity." To this end, they have the support of the Tenryou Commission's general, Kujou Sara, who commands an exceptionally strong force, much larger and more well equipped than our own."
"As for us… Vision bearers are few and far between as it is, and because of the Vision Hunt Decree, they're rarer than ever. Even if we had more people with visions, I don't know if they'd be able to learn how to fight with them well enough to use them on the battlefield without getting hurt," said Teppei as they all picked up an electrograna. With it, they flew through the gorge, using the magnetic pull of the Thunder spheres to propel themselves up to a ledge while remaining protected from the Balethunder permeating the gorge.
"The fact we're even able to hold out is thanks to the brilliant strategic mind of Her Excellency, Sangonomiya. We're also indebted to the great courage shown by General Gorou and the resistance troops," Teppei told them. But then, he sighed. "If only I had a Vision myself… Not only would I be better placed to share Her Excellency and General Gorou's burden, but I'd be able to hold my own on the battlefield, too…" he lamented, before looking back at Aether. "I couldn't help but notice that you used elemental energy when saving me earlier. You must have a Vision yourself then, right?"
To his surprise, Aether shook his head. "Actually, I don't."
When Teppei's face changed to one of confusion, Paimon explained Aether's ability to him. "He's a special case! Aether doesn't have a Vision, but he can control the elements anyway. And as for Will, he's injured right now so you didn't get to see it earlier, but he has two visions!"
Teppei's jaw dropped wide open in shock. "Are you serious!? That's... incredible. And I guess that means you're immune to the Vision Hunt Decree?" he asked. "You have to let me introduce you to General Gorou! He'll welcome you with open arms!" he added without waiting for an answer as they entered a mountainside encampment.
