The shirt's price was ( )
"...Wait, you're actually the Hydro Archon!"
Xingsu, whom Furina had brought to the Palais Mermonia, saw how respectfully the staff on duty treated the girl before him. His dazed expression turned to utter shock.
Was there really a timeline where the adviser had been eating hot pot and singing, only to end up paired with Master Huang???
Who could have imagined that the panicked girl in the alley, bluffing and making threats, really was Focalors, the Hydro Archon who ruled Fontaine?
Furina paused and turned her head slightly, a faint blush creeping over the tips of her ears. She instinctively raised a hand to adjust her exquisite top hat, then habitually adopted a little of her divine bearing, though her voice still sounded somewhat unnatural:
"O-of course! When have I ever lied to you? Everything I said earlier was true!"
Despite saying that, she felt a little unsure of herself. Remembering how she had panicked and shrunk back, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face, all under this foreign scholar's gaze, she could not help feeling embarrassed that an outsider had seen the mighty Hydro Archon in such a sorry state.
"I thought you were... uh, just saying that," Xingsu murmured, his thoughts in turmoil.
A god, wandering alone through the alleys on the outskirts of the city, shedding helpless tears after a fright, and looking utterly apologetic toward a traveler she had met by chance.
Furina cleared her throat, trying to steady her expression. "All right, there's no need to dwell on it. The Palais Mermonia has spare guest rooms. You may rest here tonight. As for your missing luggage, I'll immediately arrange for people to do everything they can to find it.
"Oh, r-right, you must keep what happened tonight a secret!"
Yet as she said this, she did not dare meet Xingsu's eyes.
The marble corridor stretched ahead, gleaming as though new, with light spilling down from crystal chandeliers. As the two continued forward, a figure approached them at an unhurried pace.
Clorinde's sword hung at her side, her sharp attire accentuating the cold, stern presence unique to a Champion Duelist. Her eyes were calm, her gaze naturally falling on the unfamiliar young man beside Furina.
Xingsu likewise noticed Clorinde approaching.
Acting on his scholarly instincts, Xingsu very seriously performed a force analysis on the buttons of Clorinde's shirt.
He concluded that the shirt was of excellent quality and probably cost more than nine pounds and fifteen pence.
Faced with Xingsu's crosshair placement squarely down the middle, Clorinde upheld her professional standards admirably, greeting the Hydro Archon beside him first.
"Good evening, Lady Furina. May I ask who this gentleman beside you is?"
Furina's steps faltered slightly. She immediately turned sideways and ushered Xingsu a step forward. "Clorinde, just the person I needed. This kind gentleman is Xingsu, a scholar from Sumeru. Just now, on the road, he, ummm, helped me with something. But he lost his luggage because of it and currently has nowhere to stay. I'll leave the arrangements to you."
Clorinde studied Xingsu with a calm gaze and said evenly, "Come with me. There are some necessary questions I need to verify with you."
The two went to a quiet side reception room off the corridor, where Clorinde questioned him in detail, asking in turn why he had left Sumeru, how he had come to Fontaine, and everything that had happened when he met Furina.
"Also, please look me in the eye when I ask you questions." That was the sternest thing Clorinde said during the questioning.
After hearing his entire account, Clorinde considered it silently for a moment. Housing a foreign scholar of unknown identity in the Palais Mermonia long-term posed too great a risk; handing him straight over to the patrol, however, would require evidence that Xingsu had broken Fontaine's laws, which she lacked.
"I have a general understanding of your situation now." Clorinde slowly rose, and a tiny gap opened in her shirt.
"The Palais Mermonia cannot accommodate you long-term. But I can find somewhere for you to go. You can stay in Poisson. Its main administrator is an organization called the Spina di Rosula. They can provide temporary shelter, and it will also be convenient for you to look for your missing luggage while finding a way forward."
Xingsu was briefly taken aback, then nodded in thanks. "Thank you."
"No need to thank me yet," Clorinde said coolly. "Tomorrow morning, I'll personally introduce you to Mr. Callas and Navia and give them an honest account of your background. But whether you can stay for long will ultimately depend on your actions. Remember, in Fontaine, keeping yourself out of trouble means behaving yourself."
Xingsu settled into a guest room in the Palais Mermonia.
The soft, clean bedding was the first security he had touched in his months on the run.
"Sigh..."
The effort of holding himself together throughout the day fell away completely. The quiet of the late night was the most wearing of all.
Lin's teasing voice rang out in his head at an inopportune moment.
"So you lost the results of a year's hard work. Look on the bright side. Sure, your research results are gone, but at least you wore yourself out."
"..."
"Sure, you didn't accomplish anything in Sumeru, but at least you're wanted there now."
"..."
"Sure..."
"Stop, stop, stop! Do you still want me to find your memories for you or not?!"
"Oh my, you've even learned to threaten me. You've broken your big sister's heart~"
"...Enough. Stop making fun of me. Anyway, I met a woman earlier... Seeing her from behind felt incredibly familiar. My heart has never pounded like that before. It was as if..."
"Love at first sight?! Is our little Xingsu about to fall in love? Your big sister just loves this kind of plot!"
"Cut it out. I just feel like I've seen her before. It probably has something to do with my previous life, too. And the feeling was incredibly strong... What on earth did I go through in my previous life?!"
"Hehe, what if she was your sweetheart in your previous life~?"
"...Forget it. Judging by her skills and strength, it's more likely I owed her a few hundred million in my previous life."
"Oh, come on~ If you like her, be brave and pursue her~ What if women like her are all tough on the outside but terribly empty inside?"
"..."
"And then! You'll shine into her life like a ray of light! You'll move her completely, and then you'll live shamelessly ever after and have 108 children."
"..."
"Xingsu? Xingsu? Are you listening?"
The soft bed eased the exhaustion built up over days of crossing the desert. His tangled thoughts slowly settled, and Lin's voice by his ear gradually grew indistinct. Worn out from days of travel, Xingsu soon drifted into sleep.
In his dreams, piles of books in the House of Daena alternated with the cold gazes of the Akademiya's sages and yellow sand sweeping across the sky outside the Mausoleum of King Deshret.
The scene abruptly shifted, plunging into a gloomy courtyard. A blurred figure stood amid the wind and rain, so familiar that his chest tightened, yet no matter how hard he tried, he could not make out the figure's face.
He unconsciously furrowed his brow in his sleep, his fingertips curling slightly as though instinctively trying to grasp something, only to clutch empty air in the end.
Outside the window, Fontaine's gentle night enveloped the room. No one knew that those fragmented images in the sleeper's dreams were his erased past.