Chapter X

Idril: Thank you!

I don't own Genshin Impact.

Rain continued to pour from the dark sky as Diluc ran through the countryside, regardless of the muddy, slippery ground and the small cliffs he had to climb. Instead of choosing to run on the safer and less strenuous road, Diluc had chosen to run in a practically straight line to Mondstadt from the Dawn Winery. He was panting in exertion because of it, but Diluc didn't dare slow down. Not when he completely forgot about writing a note to Jean about Jurian, not when he could have stopped Jurian hours ago, and especially not when Kaeya could be in danger.

Diluc wasn't going to let Kaeya handle it alone this time.

The city of Mondstadt finally came into view and while Diluc felt some relief at the sight, it wasn't nearly enough to quell his panicked urgency. Diluc only pushed himself to run even faster, until he came across a cliff jutting slightly over Cider Lake. Stopping for a brief instant, he looked over to the bridge and when he saw it was a couple of miles away, Diluc just turned his attention back to the city right in front of him and jumped off the cliff before activating his glider. He made it halfway before he eventually dropped into the water. His body started to feel the burn as Diluc immediately swam towards the other side but he didn't care.

He would be fine. This was nothing compared to fighting in the freezing winters of Szehnaya when he was running on little sleep and hadn't eaten much food in days. Diluc still had plenty of energy left to get to Mondstadt and fight Jurian.

A voice in Diluc's head then whispered that Kaeya wasn't actually in danger, that Jurian very well might not even be in the city of Mondstadt, but be somewhere else entirely. That Diluc himself would be the one to scare Kaeya when he barges into his room at the cathedral.

But even if that was so, that was okay. Because as long as Diluc could ensure Kaeya's safety and well-being with his own eyes and made sure that it stayed that way, then that was all Diluc cared about.

But what if Kaeya didn't want him there? What if Kaeya didn't want to forgive him?

Diluc caught the bright red of his new gloves at the corner of his eye, despite the fact that clouds covered the stars and moon.

He shook the negative questions and fears out of his head before picking up his speed. Kaeya still cared, and even if Diluc was wrong, it didn't matter. Diluc was still going to protect his baby brother from Jurian, even if he had to do it from the shadows and out of Kaeya's sight.

Diluc finally reached the other shore and started to climb the cliff. In a few minutes, Diluc was kneeling on even ground and taking a moment to catch his breath as he tried to figure out his next course of action.

Which route would take more time? Sneaking over the wall, which would take him near the cathedral? Or should he backtrack and go through the front gate (and past the annoying, inefficient knights), which might conserve more of his energy? Oh who was he kidding, the first choice was the only option.

Diluc got up and raced to the wall.

He just placed his hand on the stone when he heard a loud thud.

Diluc turned his head towards the sound as a feeling of dread and foreboding washed over him. He didn't see anything out of the ordinary, but his instincts were telling him that it wasn't good.

Then he heard an unfamiliar voice coming from around the bend in the wall. While the words were incoherent, the tone was definitely not friendly.

Could it-

Diluc turned away from the wall and sprinted towards the voice, his heart beating rapidly more out of frantic urgency than exertion. After what felt like forever, Diluc turned around the bend.

What he saw made his heart skip a beat in horror.

Kaeya was lying on the ground, defenseless as a treasure hoarder brought down his pickaxe, which was coated with swirling Anemo energy.

Jurian was aiming for his brother's neck.

"Nooo!" Diluc screamed in both desperate terror and fiery rage as he enveloped his claymore with Pyro and threw it straight at Jurian. The treasure hoarder raised his head and with terrified eyes, picked his pickaxe just in time to block the claymore, though the action made him stumble several steps backwards. Diluc, who hadn't stopped running, caught his claymore before it could land on Kaeya and quickly brought on the offensive against Jurian.

Jurian managed to block the first two blows with his pickaxe, though it was only because of his Delusion. And even then it was by the skin of Jurian's teeth. Diluc put even more of his strength into the third blow, his claymore still coated with Pyro. This time Jurian was forced to drop his weapon, screaming in agony as the burning metal both cut and seared an ugly gash that ran down his whole bicep. Diluc raised his claymore, more than ready to deal the finishing blow.

However, just as Diluc brought down his claymore, Jurian suddenly jumped backwards. This caused Diluc to hit the muddy ground instead.

"That's enough!" Jurian yelled as a whirlwind of Anemo surrounded him. Diluc dug his burning claymore out of the steaming mud to silently glare at Jurian through the many raindrops. As he stared, Diluc finally noticed how Jurian's right hand was black, eerily similar to the color of frostbite, and had gouges in it, much like a drought-afflicted ground. Three of the fingers were gone, and the index finger was slowly crumbling away as well, the bits of dark ash becoming a part of the whirlwind.

Served him right.

"I am not going to let you stop me," Jurian angrily declared, the whirlwind surrounding him growing and getting faster in speed. "Not when-"

Diluc had enough. He summoned a fiery phoenix, the biggest one he had ever conquered, and sent it straight at Jurian. The phoenix burst through the whirlwind like it was just a small breeze and exploded when it came in contact with Jurian. The whirlwind immediately dispersed as Jurian howled in pain with his hands covering his face, giving Diluc the opening he needed.

Jurian uncovered his eyes just in time to see Diluc plunge his burning claymore right through his torso.

"Burn," Diluc coldly said as he increased his flames. Jurian's eyes rolled to the back of his head as his mouth opened in silent agony while Diluc's flames covered his entire being. A mere second later, the black decay spread from Jurian's right hand to the rest of his body. A second after that, Jurian's corpse broke apart into a pile of black ash, leaving Diluc with the remains of Jurian's shirt still on his claymore.

Diluc just silently burned the rest of the shirt into ashes as he stared down at the remains of the man who had dared to try to kill his little brother.

The rain quickly began to wash away Jurian's remains, as if trying to erase the fact that a person like Jurian had ever existed. However, as it did so, a bright teal light made itself known.

The Delusion. Diluc couldn't leave it there but his brother-

A voice broke him out of his train of thought.

"Diluc?"

GI

Kaeya kneeled there, shaking from both the rain and the strain to sit up, as he stared at Diluc's back, his breathing more or less under control now. Diluc seemed to breathing somewhat heavily himself as he stared down at Jurian's remains, though considering he just killed the treasure hoarder without holding anything back, Kaeya wasn't surprised. However, he was surprised that Diluc was here, on tonight of all nights. It was even raining like that night.

And the scream Diluc made when he saved Kaeya...was that...did...did he actually detect terror in his brother's voice? Over him?

"Diluc?" he asked without thinking. Diluc went completely still, like hearing Kaeya's quiet voice shocked him. As Diluc slowly began to turn around, Kaeya braced himself for the reprimand his older brother was sure to give him. After all, the Calvary Captain almost got himself killed by a treasure hoarder, extenuating circumstances aside. That was plenty of material for Diluc, known hater of the Knights of Favonius, to work with.

But then Diluc completely turned around. And despite the night, the rain, and the residual steam from Diluc's Pyro, Kaeya caught the emotion on Diluc's face perfectly. Diluc looked...Kaeya didn't know how to explain it other than...vulnerable.

Something Kaeya once thought Diluc would never let himself be again, much less around him.

"Kaeya," Diluc said softly, almost reverently. He took a step forward and looked like he was about to take another before he stopped himself. "Are...are you alright?"

"I'm...I think so," Kaeya answered, confused and taken aback by Diluc's strange behavior. A stubborn hope that Kaeya thought he had extinguished long ago began to grow but he ignored it. Because...because Diluc couldn't….he just couldn't. "I mean considering-"

Kaeya's nonchalant remark about his back and his exhausted body went unsaid when Diluc suddenly rushed towards him. Memories of their fight long ago raced through his mind as Kaeya instinctively closed his eye, bracing for whatever was to come.

Imagine his surprise when instead of a strike of some kind, Kaeya felt arms wrapped around him tightly. Even though the action caused the cuts on his back to sting terribly, Kaeya didn't dare to wince or cry out as he opened his eye.

Diluc was hugging him. His older brother was kneeling in front of him and hugging him.

And...and he was crying.

"I-I'm...I'm sorry!" Diluc sobbed as he tenderly cupped the back of Kaeya's head with one hand. "For e-everything! I-I shouldn't have fought you that night! I had no reason to fight you that night! To hurt you! You...you were never gonna betray Mondstadt! I...deep down I knew that...I knew that! But I still fought you! What kind of brother was I?!"

Kaeya's eye widened as something inside of him, a piece of him that had been broken for years, slowly began to fix itself.

"But...I told you...I told you the day Dad died…" Kaeya reasoned as he desperately fought to keep control of his own emotions. "And...I was always snarky with you afterwards-"

"Oh, like you weren't ever snarky before," Diluc rebutted with a tearful scoff. "And it's not like I was any better. I knew I was wrong for hurting you that night, despite your awful timing. I always knew I was...just too prideful to admit it. I'm sorry...I'm sorry that it took me believing you were dead till I realized just how much I needed to apologize!"

"What?" Kaeya said, shocked. How could have Diluc thought that he had really died? He should have been traveling around Mondstadt, far away from the city….oh. "Did you run into Fynn?"

Diluc only whimpered in response.

"Darn it Fynn."

"I need you Kaeya. I need my little brother," Diluc said, his voice full of sadness, guilt, and vulnerability. So much that merely hearing his broken voice threatened to break Kaeya's heart. "I-If...you don't want a-anything to do with me, I get it but...can I at least try to be your older brother again? Can I?"

The piece of him that had been broken for so long finally snapped back into place. The result caused such overwhelming relief that Kaeya couldn't the tears from escaping from both of his eyes.

"T-Try? What's this about t-trying?" Kaeya said as he finally wrapped his arms around Diluc, as fast as his weak arms would allow him. His hold tightened as he forced the rest of his words out through his sobs. "I...this is what I wanted for so...don't leave me again! Please, for the love of Barbatos, try as much as you want, just don't leave me again!"

"I won't," Diluc responded tearfully as he also tightened his hold on Kaeya. "I promise. I promise."

Kaeya's response was to dig his face into Diluc's shoulder and sob. Because despite all the abuse he had seen and been through today, Kaeya finally felt whole again.

GI

As soon as Jurian took Kaeya with him through the window, Jean followed them. She didn't wait to bark some kind of order to the knight who had slowly picked himself up by the wall. Jean didn't even wait to relay the news to the knights who had been slow in following her. She just ran after them, berating herself for not killing Jurian when she had the chance, for not having the skill to fly like Jurian.

Wishing, hoping, and praying that she would get to her best friend in time, Jean headed straight for the wall and when she finally reached it, she climbed it without hesitation. When she made it to the top, the sounds of fighting made her heart jump to her throat. Jean remembered feeling both relieved that Kaeya somehow still had the energy to fight and afraid that he was losing terribly as she raced to the edge. Her sword was already in her hand again by the time she looked over the wall. She arrived just in time to see Diluc brutally, but satisfactorily, kill Jurian.

Jean, while surprised by Diluc's appearance, was too relieved to care as she fought off the urge to fall to her knees. She was seconds away from joining her friends when Diluc turned to face Kaeya. While she couldn't hear their words, Jean had the feeling that she shouldn't intrude. Her intuition turned out to be correct when Diluc suddenly hugged Kaeya.

The Acting-Grand Master smiled in pure happiness as her years-long dream of seeing the brothers reconcile finally came true in front of her eyes. She always knew that they still cared about each other. Jean saw how Kaeya always tried to go to Angel's Share whenever Diluc had a shift and how Diluc always gave Kaeya a simple glance up and down whenever he saw him as if checking for injuries.

They just needed time and the chance to actually talk. And thank Barbatos they had that.

Just as Jean was about to thank Venti verbally, she noticed something was different. She looked up at the sky and saw that the clouds were dispersing.

The rain had finally stopped.

And there we have it! Well, we do have one more chapter to go but the brothers are literally and figuratively back together now. And they aren't leaving each other any time soon.

I will update shortly and until then, leave behind a review and have a good day/night!