the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!" - Jack Kerouac
Apparently, there were common themes among those who wielded Visions of the same element. Lumine had heard that theory enough times to (at least mostly) believe it, but she put less stock into the specifics of what those patterns were.
Pyros, for example, were generally positive, cheerful, vibrant, excitable—or they were Diluc. Supposedly he had been more upbeat around the time he got his Vision, and anyway, he could be the so-called exception that proves the rule. But then Lumine would try to lump Yanfei and Klee into the same mental category of 'happy fire children' and be struck with a sense of unease, like she wasn't sure if she was pushing circular pegs into… well, octagonal holes. They fit well enough, but she still suspected that the bounds of the category itself would start to make more sense once she met the Pyro Archon, and not before.
Some of the other themes were shakier still—the Cryos were a diverse bunch, and if she discounted Venti and Zhongli, Lumine only really knew a handful of Geos and Anemos. It didn't feel like enough to really base a meaningful pattern off of, just yet.
Electros, though. Electros were eccentrics, they were the ones at the fringes of any group of people, and the examples that Lumine had were compelling if not numerous.
Normally Lumine appreciated that the Electro Vision holders she knew could be counted on for a unique perspective. It was always worthwhile to have an Electro around, they added a certain spice to the battlefield.
Now, however, she was struggling. After she had attuned to a Statue of the Seven in Ritou, she went back to the docks and tested out her new power on the Alcor. She didn't need any of the commissions to catch her and try turning her inside out to find a hidden, non-existent Vision. That was when she found out the hard way that, at least in her own case, using Electro felt a lot like getting hit with Electro.
Beidou had laughed when Lumine kept shocking herself. Aside from, "make sure you're not standing in a puddle," she had no advice on how to avoid it.
Lumine would have to find another Electro to ask.
Keqing made her feel stupid and small. The Yuheng of the Liyue Qixing (probably) didn't mean to look at Lumine like she was some kind of insect, but that's how her face and voice and mannerisms and personality tended to come across.
"How long did it take me to stop shocking myself?" Keqing repeated back what Lumine had just asked her. The Yuheng could politely be described as horrified but more accurately as repulsed. She shook her head. "I'm sorry, but that never happened to me. You should keep practicing until you get it right."
When she got to the Stone Gate, Lumine had to decide whether she should seek out Razor or Fischl. Lisa would be the best teacher out of all of the Electros she knew, sure, but… She wanted to check her theory out to the fullest before the Librarian confirmed it for her.
Paimon and Lumine spent no less than ten minutes trying to figure out how to phrase her question into Fischl-ese. They failed, and then they considered the likelihood that Fischl might only give fictional answers. In the end, they settled on going through Wolvendom.
"Razor, when you got your Vision, did it ever hurt to use it?" Paimon asked.
He looked confused. "Vision hurts Razor? No, never… I fight with Vision. I hurt enemies. Vision helps."
And Lumine had heard the story; when Razor first got his vision, he had no one to teach him how to use it. Before that he had spent no time around Vision users or humans at all. Still, he hadn't shocked himself.
Lisa listened well, asked plenty of questions, and only sometimes made Lumine feel like a bug. And it was less 'beetle crawling over her shoe' and more 'butterfly pinned to a board under glass.'
"And it shocks you every time you use it?" Lisa asked, as an impish smile appeared on her face. "Would you mind doing a little demonstration for me? I'll look away if you're embarrassed to be watched."
Lumine rolled her eyes, mostly succeeded at denying Lisa the pleasure of seeing her blush, and held out one hand. She had resisted the temptation to take back her Anemo or Geo power while she had the opportunity—by the time she set foot back in Inazuma, she needed to have at least a partial handle on this element.
With pen set to paper and ready to take notes, Lisa watched closely, and Lumine let Electro spark to life between her fingers. She flinched with every purple light and soon felt her entire arm trembling. It was like every time she had ever been struck by Electro, but slightly worse—as if there was usually a bit of an edge that got taken off when an opponent's Electro attack traveled through the air, but now she was facing the full brunt of it.
"Now try and shock me," Lisa instructed, holding out one hand expectantly.
Fortunately, Lumine had no trouble directing the power. With the same focus she used to generate a Palm Vortex, she cast an arc of Electro at Lisa's hand, and watched the bolt of purple energy seem to crawl across the Librarian's skin for a second before dissipating.
Lisa shivered, and it was definitely a less pronounced twitch than Lumine's. "I have good news and bad news. I think I know what's going on," she said. "And I think I know where you can learn to counteract it."
Paimon wiggled impatiently. "Well don't be cryptic about it! What's the problem?"
"When you use an element, it works just like a Vision user's, but you don't have a Vision. With nothing to conduct the Electro, it's being channeled through your body instead," she explained. "We could experiment with some alternatives, like a Catalyst or some kind of metal that you could focus the Electro through, but I imagine you've already attempted to use it while holding your sword?"
Lumine nodded. Paimon bobbed in the air, looking frustrated. "Wait, wait, wait. But she can use Anemo and Geo just fine!"
"I would need to run some tests, but I bet those elements affect you in passive ways, too—your body is acting as your Vision, somehow, and your control over the elements flows through it," Lisa explained. "Everyone you asked about this received their Vision and their control of the element at the same time, so we have never hurt ourselves with our own power the way you have, I'm afraid."
Lumine frowned. "You said there was bad news?"
Paimon sputtered. "Wha-! This still doesn't make sense to Paimon, and that's bad enough on its own!"
"Well, I thought you might take it as bad news, but it's a matter of perspective, I suppose," Lisa said. She had that terrible twinkle in her eye that usually forecast some comment designed to make the listener squirm. Lumine tried to brace herself. "It's just that you already know someone who uses Electro without a Vision, and that person might be able to mentor you better than I could, in just this one subject."
The traveler and her emergency food blinked. Lisa's implication dawned on the former before the latter, and one of Lumine's hands slowly raised to cover her mouth.
"Who is she talking about? Why does it look like your eyebrows are trying to climb off your face? Someone explain to Paimon what's going on!"
"But he's a Harbinger," Lumine protested.
"And he has an Electro Delusion… Not a Vision. Delusions are thought to channel through the body in some way or another- unlike a 'naturally occurring' Vision. Chances are, he's your best bet to finding out how to use Electro and overcoming the issue of shocking yourself."
Lumine could tell her face was slipping into something like dismay before she found the energy to summon ragged belligerence instead, and play the role of a put-upon victim of a schoolyard bully. "Can't believe a Knight of Favonius is sending me to go take lessons from a Fatui member."
"Paimon can't believe you're thinking of actually doing it! Did you hit your head or something?!"
"Hopefully, he can impart some knowledge quickly and then you'll just have to train on your own," Lisa said, finally looking a little bit sympathetic. Mostly, she just looked like she saw right through Lumine and knew the Traveler was only complaining to cover up any feelings of eagerness relating to getting lessons from that particular, potential tutor. Luckily, Lisa chose to let Lumine pretend to keep her feelings secret.
The librarian paused, pursed her lips, and deliberated before speaking again. "Traveler, I want you to know that… As dangerous as Inazuma is, I'm glad you're going there. No one has received an Electro Vision since Baal enacted the Vision Hunt Decree, and I'm… worried."
Lisa paced over to the window with a white-knuckled grip on her teacup.
"When you ask people about the… circumstances surrounding the moment they received their Vision… A lot of the time, they were in dire straits. They or someone near them was gravely injured or worse. Whether they were in danger or not, a Vision often comes to a person on what might be called the worst day of their life."
Lumine thought of Kaeya's Cryo turning the tide of battle in his fight with Diluc; Bennett's Pyro appearing when he was mortally disappointed.
"Afterwards, of course, they're grateful for the power, but…" Lisa sighed. "It's somewhat commonly understood in academic circles that a Vision is granted when the Archons see two things; worthiness and need. And I'm concerned about the people who would be receiving Electro Visions, and haven't been," Lisa said. "Not getting bestowed with a gift you're worthy of is one thing. Not receiving a potentially life-saving ability, even though the need is still present, the danger is still there? And, perhaps selfishly, particularly for Electros…"
"They're alone," Lumine said, interpreting the hollow look in Lisa's eyes. Electros are on the fringes.
Lisa nodded. "So I'm glad you're going to Inazuma. I will wish every day for your safety, and I hope you're able to shed light on the situation there."
"No," he said in full Master Diluc mode. Somewhere outside, Moco and Hillie felt a chill run down their spines but weren't sure why. "You do not need to seek out that… That person. The Fatui. Absolutely not."
Lumine had been kind of banking on him reacting like this. She was leveraging her own contrarian nature; when Diluc tried to tell her she couldn't or shouldn't or didn't have to go ask Childe for help, that would be the push she needed to go ahead and do it against his wishes.
Unfortunately, Diluc had gotten to know her fairly well, anticipated a bratty response, and changed strategies.
"What makes you think he'll even agree? Isn't it better for him, for the Tsaritsa, if you don't learn how to control this?" He prodded. "This isn't just a spar. This is an entirely new power, an element you can use against him and his queen. Will his loyalty to his Archon and country allow him to aid you to such an extent? Are you that confident?"
But what other choice did she have? None of the other Electro users she knew could help her. Childe had control over an element he was never meant to have. Lumine stole powers from the Statues of the Seven.
"Tartaglia isn't your only option," Diluc grumbled as if responding to her thought process. "Just bear that in mind, whether he agrees or refuses."
"Are you kidding me?" Xiangling shook a ladle at her and rolled her eyes. "He's not going to turn you down. He's obsessed with you. Just ask the servers at Wanmin! You guys show up covered in sweat, breathing like you just sprinted all the way there from Mount Aocang, get enough Chicken Mushroom Skewers to feed a small army, and every time without fail I have to hear about it!"
Bless Xiangling (and her cooking) but Morax have mercy she was loud. Lumine glanced up the stairs leading out of Wangshu's kitchen and hoped Verr Goldet wasn't being subjected to every word of this.
"What's there to even hear about?" Paimon demanded. "He loses a fight, he has to pay for lunch. What's the big deal?"
"It's his face! Listen, I'm saying even my dad picked up on it, okay?" Xiangling tipped a bowl of chopped scallions into the stir-fry, chased that with chili oil, swirled and tossed everything. Her wristwork was smooth and seemingly effortless. When she spoke again, she was more focused on the food, and some of the mischief had left her voice. "He looks at you like he's just come inside from a long day and you're a tall glass of his favorite drink."
The chef served her dish onto three plates and dropped the wok into the sink to be washed. She came back over, handed Paimon and Lumine utensils, and a full cheshire grin unfolded across her lips. "Trust someone from the restaurant industry, we know hunger when we see it. That man is thirsty. He would teach you the Snezhnayan alphabet if it meant getting to hang around you while you learned it. He'll definitely help you with Electro."
Childe was half working and half indulging in a fantasy in how he might ensnare the traveler. It was an idle line of thought, a vague seduction plot with no real intent to execute it. He felt confident that he would eventually have her, so there was no real sense of urgency behind his planning.
He pictured her at the end of a fight, sweat plastering her hair to her neck and temples, a flush on her cheeks, the rise and fall of her chest with every deep breath, her tired smile, and energetic eyes. Her hand reaching for him, letting him pull her to her feet. Maybe he could yank her wrist just a little, light enough to maintain plausible deniability about his intentions but hard enough to send her stumbling against him, her fingers landing on his shoulders while his tightened around her waist. He imagined his hands leaving trails of ink across her and not stopping until there wasn't an inch of pristine skin left unstained.
He was lost in thought about the backs of her thighs when the woman in question casually threw open the doors to his bank.
"Comrade!" He called, recovering quickly. "To what do I owe this rare pleasure? Did you come to visit your favorite Harbinger?"
To his surprise, her lips twisted into a sour little pout—the exact expression of a person who was feeling caught, cornered, called out. Embarrassed because they had been accused of something which happened to be true. He stood up straighter. Oh?
He was so used to people looking scared or irritated when they saw him, it didn't even register anymore. Seeking him out and looking shy about it? That was novel. And... exciting. Childe rotated his shoulders to subtly stretch through a pleasurable shiver rolling down his spine.
"The traveler needs your help," Paimon huffed, crossing her arms.
He raised an eyebrow and met her uncomfortable gaze, then cocked his head to the side. "And I don't suppose it's going to rain today?" He cajoled her, enjoying the flash of anger in Lumine's eyes and the blush that crawled up the tips of her ears. "What were you hoping I would help you to get... hydro applied to?"
Lumine clearly ground her teeth and took a second to collect herself.
(She might have even considered attacking him. He saw her fingers flex and hoped she would give in to the urge.)
"That's... not the element I wanted to ask you about."