As the Lord of Geo, as well as the Lord of Liyue, Zhongli had many responsibilities. And he also had many people to help him with his responsibilities. In fact, he had whole teams of many peoples to help him with his duties, because however powerful and capable he is, he was only one person. And of course, one of these people were Xiao. And despite the Yaksha's quiet and seriousness, he was good company. And that was how Zhongli found himself asking the Yaksha (instead of a certain very annoying Archon) to help him with clearing out a newly grown Pyro Regivine.
Xiao accepted, and the two of them agreed to meet on Cuijue Slope the next morning.
It was now sunrise, and the red rays lit up the grass, making it look as if the two adepti were standing in a sea of fire. A suitable reminder for what they were about to do.
Zhongli entered the cave first, closely followed by the masked Yaksha. As they approached the plant, the Regisvine unfurled itself and shook threateningly. Before it could do much more, Zhongli quickly erected a pillar on one side of the flower, crushing a thick root. The anemo-user followed this up by using his anemo-infused spear to slash open a few of the smaller roots on the other side, thick slime bubbling out of the severed veins and covering the floor in boiling glue.
The Regisvine reacted by shuddering it's heavy flowery head, leaves curling in pain. It must have realised that it was a case of kill or be killed, for it quickly followed the two's attacks by exposing it's core to the sky, calling up the thick slime of it's blood to spurt through the soil, serving as miniature volcanoes. Zhongli and the Yaksha stopped their attacks, instead focusing their energy on trying to dodge the fountains of hot lava resulting from the Regisvine's attack. Zhongli climbed atop one of his pillars, as luckily the spurting liquid couldn't reach that high. This also inspired his partner to create an aircurrent on which he could glide.
When the Regisvine's energy failed it, and the fountains started to die down, the two continued their assault.
Needless to say, a mere Regisvine stood no chance against two experienced adepti, and soon the plant was cut up enough to be used as an ingredient in Xiangling's cooking. Zhongli wiped his spear of the cooling slime and put it away, the weapon fading in a golden display of light.
Zhongli turned around, "I appreciate your aid in this endeavour, Alatu—"
He didn't get to finish his sentence, as standing in front of him, wearing the Yaksha's clothes, wielding the Yaksha's spear, was not Xiao, but Venti. Grinning.
"Hehe, I hope I'm not unwelcome."
The Geo Archon ignored his comment, "Where's Xiao"
He said it as a statement, not a question. Venti innocently explained that he had happened to come across Xiao yesterday evening, and (after much begging) was told that "dear Morax" (in Venti's words) had asked Xiao to join him in dealing with a Pyro Regisvine. And so of course, Xiao (not Venti, of course not) had suggested that they play this prank on the Lord of Geo, as they were both similar in build and height, and had similar hair too. So of course Venti voluntarily accepted.
When the little bard was done with his tale, Zhongli could have summarised the whole story in one word (bullshit) but as he did not use such vulgar language, he settled with an unamused glare.
Aether was strolling around the the Adventurer's Guild's stand in Mondstadt, definitely not paying attention to a word of what Paimon was saying. he had been looking for Venti for the last week, since he really needed the bard's help in clearing out one of the abyss order's retreats. He would have done it himself, but his mastery over anemo did not go as far as the little bard, and he couldn't create aircurrents. And even though practically every time Aether didn't want to see the bard, Venti could be heard singing in Mondstadt's main square, the one time Aether actually needed Venti the bard was gone.
He was busy being irritated when he spotted a corner of the bard's ridiculous cloak. The fabric spread out behind the bard when he walked, and even though Aether could see the cloak, the bard was not in his view. He quickly ran to the bend in the road where he saw the turquoise clothing, almost slipping in his haste to turn the corner. This caused a bit of a commotion, and whilst Aether tried to regain his balance the bard looked back over his shoulder.
And he ran.
Now, let me give you a picture of what it looked like in Aether's head:
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Why would Venti run after seeing him?
Aether had had people fight, cry, laugh, jump, scream when they saw him, but run?
And so a game of parkour ensued.
At first they stayed on the streets, pushing aside passersby in their game of Cat and Mouse. Aether raced around a corner, almost bumping into one of Flora's plants. Every time it looked as though he would catch the damn bard the gap between them would suddenly grow wider. And then it got worse. Soon, they were jumping across rooftops, landing on people's tables and food, stepping on a flag to rise to the rooftops again. If there were any circuses in town at the time the two of them would surely have been invited to join as acrobats.
Staring at the billowing cloak and flying braids of the bard, Aether realised that the gap between them was growing wider, the result of him starting to tire. The other seemed completely fine though, and still pranced about the city with the same energy. At this Aether tried to force the bard toward the Statue of barbatos in the city, since he knew that people were discouraged to run there, and however naughty the bard was, Aether believed he wouldn't want to face the wrath of sister Rosaria.
But when they got there and the bard still did not slow, Aether started to despair. In his desperation he used the power of anemo to try and propel him through the air in a last ditch effort to catch up. Aether must not have realised his progress over elemental mastery, because he miscalculated and ended up crashing into the green-clad figure. They tumbled to the ground in a mess of arms and legs, Aether taking most of the impact (he didn't remember Venti being so heavy).
The green-clad bard got up almost immediately ready to run off again. Seeing his intention, Aether quickly shot out his hand and grabbed the bard by the wrist.
He got up trying to keep him from running off again, and looked into the green figure's face, a complaint ready on his lips.
But instead of the mesmerising turqoise eyes of Venti, he was met by shocking gold.
Aether widened his eyes in surprise as a very feminine-looking Xiao (Venti's hairstyle could drastically change anyone) very vigorously blushed.
Aether was stunned for so long that Xiao took this chance to break free of his grasp, quickly disappearing among the buildings of Mondstadt.
As the Yaksha sprang away Aether noticed the furious blush going so far as even his neck, and burst out laughing so hard he knew Xiao could hear him (he also thought he saw Xiao's blush deepen if that was even possible)
I really don't know what made me write this but maybe it was my mind's image of Xiao in braids XD.
Also I just realised that 'xiao' is the same pronunciation for 笑 (xiào) in Chinese meaning laugh.
