Cloud Retainer, pastries in hand, made her way to the front door of Fang Qiu's home.
"Not bad at all."
Cloud Retainer nodded, then rapped on the gate.
It wasn't long before someone came to open it.
That someone was Shenhe.
The moment Shenhe saw Cloud Retainer, she froze.
"It is your master."
Cloud Retainer said evenly, "Moon Carver, Mountain Shaper and this immortal had business in Liyue Harbor, so this one borrowed your appearance, and Fang Qiu's as well."
"Master."
Hearing that familiar voice, Shenhe finally understood. She hurried through a bow and invited Cloud Retainer inside.
"Is there something you need from us, Master?" Shenhe asked.
"This one merely came to look in on you, since it was on the way."
Cloud Retainer followed Shenhe across the courtyard and into the main hall.
The hall was empty.
"Hm? Is Fang Qiu not home?" Cloud Retainer asked, brows drawing together slightly.
"She said just now she wanted a bath. She's probably gone back to her room for a change of clothes," Shenhe said.
The words had barely left her mouth when one of the bedroom doors swung open.
"Shenhe, I thought I heard someone knocking. Who is it?"
Fang Qiu came out of the doorway still talking, a bundle of fresh clothes in her arms.
Then she saw two Shenhes standing in the hall, and stopped dead. The clothes slipped out of her arms and scattered across the floor.
White lace underwear, tangled up with a white nightdress, lay against the spotless floorboards, impossible to miss.
"T-two Shenhes? The... the Real and Fake Monkey King?"
Fang Qiu had no attention left to spare for her fallen laundry. She stared at the two Shenhes, shock all over her face, and stumbled two steps back — only to lose her footing, her balance going out from under her as she toppled toward the floor.
"Careful!"
Shenhe's expression shifted and she moved to catch her, but Fang Qiu's body had already halted in midair, then slowly righted itself, until she was standing steady on the floor again. Only then did that mysterious force let go of her.
For one glorious instant, Fang Qiu thought she had mastered some supreme secret art.
Like Peter Parker awakening his Spider Powers.
Superpowers, out of nowhere.
"Two Shenhes, nonsense. It is this immortal."
Cloud Retainer's tone was distinctly unimpressed.
"You're Cloud Retainer?" Fang Qiu ventured, recognizing the voice.
"Correct. This immortal, none other," Cloud Retainer said evenly.
"What brings you here?"
Fang Qiu scrambled to gather the clothes off the floor, then hurried over. "Come, come, sit down, sit down."
"To see how the two of you are faring." Cloud Retainer handed over the paper bag she'd been carrying. "Some small pastries this one picked up in Liyue Harbor along the way. Try them. They are said to be a new flavor."
"Thank you, Adeptus."
Fang Qiu thanked her over and over and obediently opened the bag. The pattern printed on it belonged to the pastry shop she visited most often.
The lady who ran that shop was wonderful.
Ever since she'd adopted the principle that calling the cafeteria auntie "big sister" made the auntie's ladle shake a little less and got you a few extra pieces of meat,
she'd started calling that shop's owner "big sister" too.
After that, every time she went there for pastries, the woman gave her a discount.
Not just a discount, either. Now and then she'd slip a few extra pieces into the bag.
What puzzled Fang Qiu, though, was the weight of this bag. It felt about the same as when that big sister slipped her the extras.
Strange.
Fang Qiu took out a piece and put it in her mouth. Sweet, clear orange filling flooded out, mingling with the soft, flaky pastry, filling her whole mouth in an instant.
It really was good.
Just as Fang Qiu was enjoying herself, tongue slipping out to lick a smear of filling from her red lips, Cloud Retainer lifted the tea Shenhe had brewed for her, took a shallow sip, and looked at her. "By the way. Today this one went strolling through the picture studio with Mountain Shaper and Moon Carver."
"The picture studio, huh. Miss Ningguang plans to build that whole district into a new commercial quarter with the studio at its heart. I hear a lot of merchants are drawing up plans to open shops over there. I've got a friend who runs a tavern, and he's planning to open a second one near the studio."
Fang Qiu went on eating as she talked. "Oh, right — did you see a film while you were there? They've released a whole lot of new ones lately. I was planning to go see some myself tomorrow."
"This one did see a film."
Cloud Retainer looked at her, eyes narrowing slightly.
"Which one?" Fang Qiu asked, beaming.
"Splitting the Mountain to Save Mother."
The smile on Fang Qiu's face froze solid. The hand carrying pastry to her mouth stopped where it was.
"You... watched both parts?"
Fang Qiu turned her head with the stiffness of a badly oiled hinge, looking at Cloud Retainer, testing the waters.
"Both parts."
Cloud Retainer's eyes narrowed further, and a dangerous curve settled at the corner of her mouth. She laid a hand on Fang Qiu's slender shoulder. "Yang Jian is quite a fine character."
Fang Qiu looked at that smiling face.
Cold sweat broke out across her back.
More of it than this afternoon, out in the wilds, facing three Stonehide Lawachurls, three Abyss Mages, and that whole pack of Hilichurls steaming with black miasma.
Terrified.jpg.
"I'm glad you liked it, Adeptus," Fang Qiu said with a sheepish laugh.
Cloud Retainer smiled and said nothing, which sent Fang Qiu straight into full ingratiation mode. "Speaking of which, have you eaten dinner? How about I boil you a bowl of noodles?"
"No need. After watching Splitting the Mountain to Save Mother, this immortal finds her appetite somewhat diminished," Cloud Retainer said.
"Uh..."
For a moment Fang Qiu had no idea what to do with herself.
She knew Cloud Retainer wouldn't actually do anything terrible to her.
Probably...
She probably wouldn't hit her, right?
But she had zero doubt that Cloud Retainer would hand out some small punishment.
Something like...
tying her to the bed, rolling her up in the quilt, and tickling the soles of her feet with a feather.
Or forcing her to eat something unbearably bitter...
Or making her read horror novels.
Hsss...
Anything but that!
All at once the covers of those horror novels Thoma had given her came flooding back.
Blood-drenched ghost faces. Bodies twisted into eerie, skin-crawling poses. Grimy Inazuman dolls clutching knives.
Just thinking about it made Fang Qiu shiver.
She might not even dare sleep alone tonight...
"Oh — right, Adeptus, I've got some pastries here from Mondstadt and Inazuma. Would you like to try them?"
Inspiration struck, and Fang Qiu seized it.
"Hm?"
Cloud Retainer had been weighing whether to torment Fang Qiu just a little. At the mention of good food, one brow arched. "Bring them out and let this one see."
"Right away."
Fang Qiu got up, all smiles, and scurried off to the kitchen to haul out her entire stockpile.
Chilled cream cake.
Iced fruit juice.
And the Dango Milk, Tricolor Dango and Egg Roll she'd bought on the way home after dinner today.
"The presentation is respectable."
Cloud Retainer's brow lifted a fraction. She picked up a spoon, scooped up a bite of cream cake and put it in her mouth. Red lips flecked with cream pressed lightly together, and her eyes brightened.
"Sweet without being cloying. Smooth on the tongue, melts the instant it enters the mouth. A fine flavor — nearly the equal of the desserts this immortal invented herself."
Cloud Retainer nodded her approval.
When she'd finished, her gaze moved to the cup of Dango Milk. Fang Qiu punched a straw through the lid and handed it over.
Cloud Retainer lifted the cup and drew a light sip. Dango and milk came up the straw together into her mouth.
After that one mouthful, she found herself nodding again. "A most novel flavor. To think that in all these years without wandering Liyue, so many new confections have appeared. Whether imported from Inazuma and Mondstadt or made by Liyue's own hands, all of it has come so far. The times have changed indeed."
"If you've got free time, I could show you around tomorrow," Fang Qiu said with a smile.
"We shall speak of it when the time comes," Cloud Retainer said. "Enough. This one will not press you further. Go take your bath. This one will simply chat with Shenhe."
"Okay, thank you, Adeptus."
Fang Qiu nodded, quietly letting out the breath she'd been holding.
She gathered up the clothes she'd set aside and headed for the bathroom.
Behind her, Cloud Retainer began asking Shenhe how she had been keeping.
When Shenhe mentioned that Ganyu had found her a job, Cloud Retainer's interest sharpened at once.
Fang Qiu, meanwhile, made her way to the bath.
She ran the water, stripped bare, and lowered herself into the hot pool.
The warmth swallowed her body whole.
Ahh.
Feeling the ache drain out of her tired limbs, Fang Qiu let out a soft sigh of pleasure.
So good.
Her whole body felt like it had gone softer.
She sat in the pool, the steaming water rising just barely past her pale, pert chest.
Water beaded on her fair shoulders and arms. Her hair was bundled up in a towel, doing the work of a shower cap.
Going to bed with wet hair this late at night was a bad idea.
Snow-white hair coiled up, leaving her white neck and back bare.
It made for an unfairly tempting sight.
The rim of the pool was lined with padding of some composition she couldn't identify, so that leaning back against it didn't dig into you.
"Mnh."
Fang Qiu stretched, then settled lightly against the edge and tipped her head back to look at the sky.
It was still winter, but the sky was perfectly clear.
Stars blazed overhead, and the moonlight was lovely.
Sure enough, after a day of exhaustion, nothing beat soaking in an open-air bath.
There couldn't be anything finer in all of life.
"Come to think of it, I never expected I'd get this strong."
Fang Qiu looked at her own hands under the water, a little incredulous.
Thinking it over, the only thing she'd beaten before was a small Slime, and back in her rented apartment she'd never dared cut loose at full strength.
No wonder her self-assessment had been off.
Now, at least, she had a clear picture of where she stood.
Which was: still no match for a Stonehide Hilichurl.
That tier of enemy had to be left to people with omni-directional mobility gear, people prepared to offer up their hearts.
Room to grow.
Never mind the Conqueror of Demons, who'd wiped out a Stonehide Lawachurl and a whole mob of Hilichurls in a single pass today.
She wasn't even close to Shenhe's level yet...
All she could say was that the future looked promising.
Slow progress was fine.
As long as there was progress.
After a couple of days off, she'd start prepping her next book.
But what should the new one be about?
There was still plenty she could write. The problem was that there was far too much she could write.
The snow had stopped at just the right moment. She'd spend the next few days wandering around.
See what suited the mood.
Do some shopping while she was at it, buy clothes, buy pastries, drop by Qiqi's place for a bit, and swing past Sister Ying'er's to have her make two more sets of panda pajamas.
Sleeping in a nightdress was comfortable enough, sure, but every time she woke up the thing was a complete disaster.
Especially now that it lacked the cinching feature Sister Ying'er had built into the pajamas. These days her nightdress usually rode up above her chest by the time she woke.
Leaving her all but naked under the quilt.
And she was a restless sleeper on top of that — kicking the covers off, clamping them between her legs.
Hu Tao had gotten an eyeful this very morning.
Honestly, that part she could live with.
It was catching a chill that would really be trouble.
With her constitution, not falling ill today was a blessing from Rex Lapis, plain and simple.
Mm... except Rex Lapis had already kicked the bucket and gone off to meet Yama, apparently...
So a blessing from the Anemo Archon, then? Or the Raiden Shogun?
Either way, that sort of luck held once or twice at most.
Better to switch back to the pajamas sooner rather than later.
The only catch was that going to Sister Ying'er's meant getting teased half to death again.
All Tingyu's fault.
Whether that creature had some personal grudge against black-and-white sleepwear or not, she'd shredded both sets of pajamas using them as a scratching post.
This time she'd have to keep the new ones well out of that little menace's reach.
After soaking a while longer, her head started to swim a little, and Fang Qiu climbed straight out of the pool.
Letting out a breath, she walked through to the changing room and studied herself in the full-length mirror, water still beading all over her.
Her fair, pretty face had flushed a faint pink from staying in too long.
Speaking of which, had she put on weight lately?
Looking at the flat stomach and slender, graceful figure of the girl in the mirror, that was the thought that crossed Fang Qiu's mind.
She'd weigh herself when she got back to her room.
She picked up the towel she'd left to one side, dried herself off, then looked at the nightdress and fell into deep contemplation.
She seemed to have forgotten to swap the nightdress out for something presentable to guests...
Worse, her earlier clothes had gotten filthy in that fight, so not changing would be even less acceptable.
Feeling the leftover warmth of the bath being stripped away by the cold air, Fang Qiu shivered, hurried into her underwear, pulled the nightdress on over it, and tossed the dirty clothes into the laundry basket.
When she got back to the main hall, though, Shenhe and Cloud Retainer were nowhere to be seen.
From the sound of it, they'd moved to the inner hall.
Shenhe seemed to be introducing her books.
Fang Qiu smiled and made her way through to the inner hall.
Tingyu was sprawled in the blanket on the couch, sound asleep.
Lazy cat...
Shenhe was working her way along the shelves, telling Cloud Retainer about the books she usually read.
Fang Qiu was still smiling, about to step forward and join the conversation, when she realized Shenhe had arrived at precisely the volume titled Junior Sister, Go Easy, Senior Sister's Hurting.
The smile on her pretty face went rigid.
That book... why was it still on the shelf?!
Shenhe caught sight of it too and stalled mid-sentence, words dying in her throat.
Cloud Retainer only blinked, glancing in puzzlement from Shenhe to the frozen Fang Qiu behind her. "Why have you stopped? What is the matter with this book?"
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