Mondstadt—the nation carried upon the wind.
The moment Diluc Ragnvindr set foot on its soil again, he finally understood something his father used to say.
“Only those who have wandered far from home for many years can truly understand the gentleness of Mondstadt’s wind.”
At least, that was how it felt now.
The breeze passed over Diluc’s forehead, brushed his cheeks, and slipped beneath the weight that had settled across his shoulders during his imprisonment.
It carried the scent of grass, grapes, distant flowers, and a freedom so familiar that he had once taken it for granted.
With every breath, the last traces of unease left his heart.
He was back.
Back in Mondstadt.
Back in his homeland.
Emotion surged through him with embarrassing force.
He had spent days inside a frozen prison, watched death approach far too closely, and been dragged through a Fatui facility filled with horrors that would haunt him for years.
Now the open sky stretched above him, and the wind welcomed him home as though he had never left.
Really, truly—
“Hey.
Hey!
Save the heartfelt reunion for later.”
Lucian Vale stamped one foot against the ground in impatience.
“I still don’t know where I’m sleeping tonight.”
Diluc’s expression stiffened.
He turned slowly toward the man who had rescued him.
“I already told you.
Dawn Winery has several unused guest rooms.
I can have one prepared for you.”
“I’m not staying there.”
Lucian dismissed the offer with a wave.
“I travelled all the way to Mondstadt, so naturally I’m staying inside the city.
It will be easier to send messages, collect information, find food, and spend money.
Besides, I’m already tired of living in the countryside.”
“The countryside?”
Diluc stared at him.
Lucian pointed toward the distant estate as though presenting evidence in court.
“Dawn Winery is absurdly remote.
It sits near Wolvendom, and there’s barely another soul around for miles.”
He gave the manor another critical look.
“Calling it a winery doesn’t change what it is.
It’s a noble estate hidden in the wilderness.”
In Lucian’s opinion, the location probably had something to do with the history of Mondstadt’s aristocracy.
After the Lawrence Clan’s tyranny, any wealthy family building an enormous manor beside the city would attract endless suspicion and criticism.
Better to keep it far away, surround it with vineyards, and call it a winery.
Technically accurate.
Politically convenient.
Diluc remained silent.
He had never imagined that anyone would look upon the luxurious Ragnvindr estate and describe it as rural housing.
That was not isolation.
It was peace.
Privacy.
A refined natural environment.
You uncultured drifter.
Diluc resisted the urge to say any of that aloud.
“Very well,” he said at last.
“Do you have enough Mora?
You may collect some from the manor before entering the city.”
Lucian drew himself up with wounded dignity.
“Of course I have enough.
How could a respectable Descender be unable to afford a room?”
The fact that he had just attempted to charge Diluc an additional ten million Mora did not weaken his dignity in the slightest.
The two parted ways soon afterward.
Diluc headed toward Dawn Winery, while Lucian turned toward the City of Mondstadt.
He had already wasted enough time crossing the continent.
If he delayed much longer, he might miss lunch.
That was unacceptable.
Earth Song changed abilities.
The World.
Time stopped.
Lucian crossed a considerable distance while everything around him remained frozen, allowed the flow of time to resume, then repeated the process.
To an outside observer, his presence would have appeared and vanished in disconnected intervals, skipping across the land without ever travelling through the space between.
The method was efficient.
It was also irritating someone far above him.
In Celestia, Istaroth sensed another unauthorized disturbance in the flow of time.
A resentful gaze descended from the heavens.
Lucian did not notice—or perhaps simply did not care.
At Windrise, beneath the shade of the enormous oak, a green-clad bard sat enjoying a drink.
Venti had been pleasantly relaxed only moments earlier.
Then he sensed the gaze from Celestia.
His posture changed.
The faint haze of alcohol vanished from his eyes, and the carefree air surrounding him sharpened into something ancient.
He looked upward.
The presence above did not linger upon him.
It swept across Mondstadt, paused elsewhere for a moment, and then withdrew as casually as it had arrived.
Venti blinked.
What was that supposed to mean?
If the attention from Celestia had not been directed at him, what within Mondstadt had attracted it?
Had that human child awakened earlier than expected?
No.
That should not happen for roughly another year.
Venti had been keeping watch over that matter carefully.
He was lazy about many things, but not careless enough to misjudge something so important.
Then there had to be another reason.
The wind answered his curiosity.
It travelled across the grasslands, tasted the scents carried from the road, and returned with news.
Venti’s nose twitched slightly.
“Diluc…”
He recognized the familiar presence immediately.
Then came another scent.
Unknown.
Foreign.
Not merely from another nation, but from beyond the world itself.
“A Descender,” Venti murmured.
“And not the one I was expecting.”
The unfamiliar presence appeared intermittently, vanishing and returning in a rhythm that felt deeply unnatural.
Twined around it was the unmistakable disturbance of time.
Venti’s eyes brightened.
The stranger could manipulate time.
As one of the Thousand Winds, Venti understood better than most how closely wind and time could intertwine.
The strange, broken trail left behind by Lucian made the answer easy to guess.
“Interesting,” he said, finishing the last of his wine.
“So it’s the same type of Stand as mine.”
The joke pleased him even though no one was there to appreciate it.
A breeze swept beneath the oak.
Venti vanished with it.
A moment later, he reappeared inside a narrow alley in the City of Mondstadt.
“Long, long ago, before Mondstadt became the city of freedom, the land lay beneath the rule of the King of Gales…”
Lucian entered the city and immediately heard music.
Near the fountain in the central square, a bard dressed in green sat with a lyre in his hands.
Behind him towered the enormous statue of the Anemo Archon, its stone wings spread over the plaza.
Venti played while recounting the ancient history of Old Mondstadt.
Most of his audience consisted of children.
They sat near the fountain, listening with open fascination as the bard filled the story with storms, rebellion, courage, and loss.
A handful of adults lingered nearby as well.
Some listened only for amusement.
Others had heard the tale so many times that they no longer considered it history.
Thousands of years had passed, and every retelling had added embellishments, forgotten details, or transformed fact into legend.
The ordinary people of Mondstadt had no way of knowing that the bard before them was not repeating secondhand folklore.
He had been there.
Lucian recognized him immediately.
Venti.
Barbatos.
The Anemo Archon himself sat beneath his own statue, telling stories about his glorious past while pretending to be an ordinary wandering bard.
Lucian almost admired the shamelessness.
Barbatos, do you genuinely have nothing better to do?
Do you spend your days drinking and boasting about yourself to children?
The answer was obviously yes.
Morax possessed a similar habit, though expressed in the opposite direction.
Venti enjoyed recounting his own legends.
Zhongli preferred sitting quietly while other people told stories about the Geo Archon, occasionally correcting them with suspiciously precise details.
A bard’s performance differed from ordinary storytelling.
The lyre supplied its own background music.
Gentle notes accompanied peaceful passages; rapid chords sharpened moments of danger; softer melodies made farewells feel painfully intimate.
Venti’s skill was exceptional.
When the story became thrilling, the children leaned forward.
When the rebels faced disaster, the crowd held its breath.
When sacrifice entered the tale, even adults who claimed not to care grew quiet.
More people gradually stopped to listen.
Some were longtime admirers of Venti’s performances.
Most of those admirers also had no intention of paying him.
The story approached its familiar conclusion.
The nameless wind spirit gathered the hopes and faith of Mondstadt’s people, rose as Barbatos, defeated the tyrant Decarabian, reshaped the land, and blew away the endless blizzards.
Mountains were cut down, valleys opened, and Mondstadt became the free city-state known in the present age.
Then an untimely voice rose from the crowd.
“What nonsense!
A gentle breeze should have been enough.
Why would anyone need to split mountains?”
Every head turned.
Lucian stood with his arms folded, wearing an expression of sincere criticism.
He had spoken deliberately.
His real objective was to attract Venti’s attention and force the Anemo Archon into a private conversation.
Publicly challenging the bard’s version of history seemed faster than waiting politely.
Venti’s smile became awkward.
To be fair, “splitting mountains” was a slight exaggeration.
The wind had torn openings through them, shaved away enormous sections, and flattened much of the landscape—but that was not exactly the same thing.
Before Venti could defend his artistic license, the crowd erupted.
Mondstadt was the nation of freedom.
That did not mean the citizens would calmly tolerate someone publicly insulting their god.
At the front of the defenders stood Barbara Pegg.
The deaconess had been listening nearby, and her devotion to Barbatos left no room for such disrespect.
Venti saw her and immediately recognized danger.
Not for Lucian.
For himself.
Barbara clasped the sides of her skirt, stepped forward, and glared at the stranger.
“How dare you!
I won’t allow you to slander Lord Barbatos!”
Lucian looked at her.
Then he glanced toward Venti.
The bard had already begun packing away his lyre.
Lucian understood at once.
Trouble.
“Barbatos?” he said.
“I thought you said ‘barbecued toast.'”
The square fell silent.
Several of Barbara’s most devoted fans stepped forward, ready to defend both their idol and the Anemo Archon.
Then they took a proper look at Lucian.
He stood nearly a head taller than most of them, with broad shoulders and a physique that made street fighting seem like a deeply unwise hobby.
The would-be heroes reconsidered.
Life was difficult enough already.
There was no need to make it shorter.
Venti used the distraction to slip away.
Lucian saw him move.
“Don’t run!”
Venti bolted into the street.
Lucian immediately chased him.
Behind them, Barbara lifted her voice.
“You don’t run either!”
The strange procession tore through Mondstadt: the Anemo Archon fleeing first, a Descender racing after him, and the Church of Favonius’s most devoted deaconess pursuing them both.
For one perfect, ridiculous moment, the scene seemed to freeze like the final frame of a comedy.
Then all three disappeared around the corner.
🕷️ End of Chapter
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