“Yo, it really is you, Bron.”
While Neo was sitting in the lobby waiting for news, a familiar voice rang out.
Neo immediately turned his head and, sure enough, saw a young man wearing gray-white clothes, with orange short hair and a red mask hanging on one side of his head.
“Ajax, you’re here… And, I’m not Bron. I’m Neo.”
Neo raised his hand in greeting.
The orange-haired young man in front of him was none other than [Childe] Tartaglia, who had recently become a Harbinger.
He was one year older than Neo, making him around nineteen years old.
He was the youngest Harbinger of the Fatui.
The two had met when they had just joined the Fatui and were still new recruits.
However, Tartaglia’s talent was outstanding, and his promotion speed was astonishing.
He had already been promoted to Harbinger ahead of schedule.
“Is that so? But I heard that whenever you stood in front of your teammates, you would shout, ‘Stand behind Bron.’ I thought that was the Snezhnayan name you gave yourself.”
Tartaglia brought up the matter with amusement.
He himself hadn’t actually seen it with his own eyes.
After Neo joined Columbina’s command, the two had much less time to meet.
“I wasn’t promoted ahead of schedule to become a Harbinger like you. I don’t have a new name.”
Neo could only spread his hands.
Tartaglia’s real name was “Ajax.” The name Tartaglia was the title given to him by the Tsaritsa after he became a Harbinger.
“That’s why I said you shouldn’t have joined under that girl back then. After going over there, you barely had any missions. Where would the military merits and chances for promotion come from?”
“You may look like you’re only a lieutenant, but you’ve actually been stuck in that position for several years, right? You and I were promoted pretty quickly at first.”
“If you had gone over there, you probably would have been promoted ahead of schedule to become a Harbinger too.”, Tartaglia spoke to Neo with some regret.
Of course, he didn’t just keep Neo standing in the lobby of Northland Bank and talk.
Instead, he brought him to the reception room in the back to sit down and had his subordinates serve tea.
“It’s fine. I’m not really interested in military rank anyway.”
Neo shook his head.
If he hadn’t stayed by Columbina’s side, then all his efforts would have been meaningless.
Besides, it didn’t affect his becoming stronger.
It had only greatly reduced his chances to go out on missions.
However, when he had just awakened the system, Neo would often take the initiative to join other teams on missions, much like when he went to help out at Sandrone’s mechanical research institute.
Although no one ordered him to do so, as long as he didn’t leave Snezhnaya, he could still arrange some things for himself.
It wasn’t as if he could only stay by Columbina’s side and sing boring songs in the courtyard.
“Fine, fine… Speaking of which, why did you come to Liyue? As the Damselette’s subordinate, I heard she has never been assigned any missions by Her Majesty the Tsaritsa?”, Tartaglia could only nod, then asked curiously.
“No. I came back to find my family. Actually, I’ve already retired early. I’m no longer a member of the Fatui.”
Judging from its clear, lingering fragrance, it should be a type of tea that was quite expensive in Liyue.
Its quality was much better than the tea Neo could buy in Snezhnaya, so he didn’t hold back.
“Early… retirement? Hey, hey, I know working under that kind of girl would be uncomfortable, but you’re a lieutenant. Is that even a position where you can apply for early retirement? There’s no way it would be approved, right?”
Tartaglia followed his example and picked up his teacup.
Just as he was about to imitate Neo and drink his tea, Neo’s answer startled him.
He was still quite familiar with the situation inside the Fatui.
They were known for their strict military discipline.
Leaving easily while neither injured nor ill was no simple matter, and one could easily be classified as a deserter.
“Yeah. When I first applied, someone reported it to Lady Columbina, but she still approved it…”
“Afterward, apart from this Vision and the commemorative medal and certificate that were issued to me, everything I had from the Fatui was taken back.”
Neo explained what had happened to Tartaglia, then took out an ice-blue Vision hidden beneath his clothes and let it hang over his chest.
Apart from this Vision, things such as the high-tech weapons issued to Fatui elites had all been reclaimed.
Neo hadn’t needed those things anyway.
“She approved it for you… That makes sense. That girl is the Third Seat, after all. She should still have the authority she needs.”
Tartaglia nodded.
Although he wasn’t very familiar with [Damselette].
“But now that I think about it, I guess I only left one step ahead of you. If I had found out later that you were coming to Liyue, I could have taken the same ship here with you.”
Tartaglia, who had only recently arrived in Liyue, sounded regretful.
“Don’t think that way. The ship I took sank halfway here. I drifted all the way to shore…”
Hearing that Tartaglia was actually regretting something like this, Neo speechlessly reminded him.
If it weren’t for his strong ability to survive, and the fact that he wouldn’t die from suffocating after drowning, he didn’t even know whether he could have drifted as far as Mondstadt.
“It sank? My god, good thing you’re lucky enough to survive, Neo.”
After learning that the ship Neo had taken had actually sunk, Tartaglia couldn’t help being shocked after taking a sip of tea.
“Pfft… How long have you even been in Liyue? You’ve already learned to use idioms?”
Neo couldn’t help laughing at the idiom that came out of his mouth.
Afterward, Neo and Tartaglia drank tea together and chatted and laughed, talking about everything from Snezhnaya to Liyue, and from the Eleven Harbingers to the Liyue Qixing.
During this time, Tartaglia also asked Neo, a Liyue native, about how to meet the Geo Archon, Morax.
Neo could only answer that he could be seen during the “Rite of Descension,” but there were still half a month before the Rite of Descension.
Tartaglia was somewhat disappointed by this, but didn’t say anything.
He knew that Neo had always lived in Snezhnaya.
“But like I mentioned just now, my luggage sank with the ship. My cash Mora and account certificate are gone too, so I’ll have to trouble you to sort something out for me.”
After drinking several rounds of tea, Neo finally remembered the important matter.
Previously, he had relied entirely on Mora borrowed from the Traveler to get by in Mondstadt.
Now, getting some Mora out of Northland Bank was the most important thing.
“Heh, small matter. I’ll have them issue you a new account certificate. If you run short of Mora, just tell me anytime. I’ll take some out of the vault for you.”
Tartaglia waved his hand dismissively.
Not to mention that he was now a Harbinger, his own family was quite wealthy as well.
Matters concerning Mora were trivial.
“That’s great. I’m sure Lord Pantalone won’t mind.”
Neo happily rubbed his hands together when he heard this.
When he was in the Fatui, he usually addressed Harbingers he was fairly familiar with as their name plus “Lord,” while unfamiliar ones were addressed by their codename plus “Lord.”
Of course, someone as close to him as Tartaglia was an exception.
He didn’t mind whether Neo called him “Lord” or not.
Tartaglia then called over the client manager of Northland Bank’s Liyue branch and told him to handle things according to what he had just said.
Thus, Neo quickly received a new account certificate.
This certificate was equivalent to a “bank card account.” With it, Neo could withdraw or deposit money at any Northland Bank in Teyvat.
There was also 10.62 million Mora in it.
Of that, 620,000 Mora was the Mora originally in Neo’s account.
The new certificate had merely helped Neo recover his original account after confirming his identity, rather than creating a new one.
The other ten million Mora had been arranged by Tartaglia.
Although it wasn’t much, he felt it should be enough for Neo to use for a while.
If it wasn’t enough, he could simply come back and take more.
“This should be enough, right? Since you just came back, you probably don’t have a place to stay yet. If you run into any trouble, you can come to me for help anytime.”
“But, well, as thanks, how about you come outside and spar with me when the time comes? It’s been a long time since I’ve fought you!”
“I kind of miss the feeling of landing a solid punch on your chest muscles!”
After reminding Neo, Tartaglia spoke with anticipation.
Before obtaining his Vision and the system, Neo’s body had already been very tough.
This was the “exceptional talent” that had caught the Fatui’s attention when he was recruited back then.
Later, when Tartaglia fought Neo, he discovered that his body was unusually sturdy.
Even in close-quarters combat, Neo could hold his own against him, and the solid feel of hitting him with each punch was exceptionally satisfying.
That was why Tartaglia liked fighting Neo.