dijun | ... OF DUST

You meet her at night, in a field of blooming Glaze Lilies.

You say goodbye to her in the same field, thousands of years later.

She is nearly as vibrant as the flowers that she holds dear, hiding a smile behind her overlong sleeves as she laughs, teasing you. She calls you the brawn to her brains, and you find yourselves gravitating around each other, so much like the celestial bodies in the skies above Teyvat. With every clever puzzle she throws your way, every invention, every challenge - you feel like she makes you better, showing you a different way of looking at the world.

"This is the mark of our pledge, and it is also my challenge to you," she boasts, holding up the kongming puzzle so that it floats above her hand. You watch it with mild amusement, letting the wind billow through her sleeves, your hair, the Glaze Lilies surrounding you. She continues, "All my wisdom is hidden within this stone dumbbell."

It seems silly to you, you think, for her to offer this, as if you have a formal contract. She is the one person that you've never thought to forge one with, have seen no reason to - you walk side-by-side, you and Guizhong. She calls you by every name that you decide to go by, laughing with joy but walking with a solemn serenity with you as the two of you establish the Guili Assembly, the foundation that would become the Liyue that you walk alone thousands of years later. A character from her name, a character from yours - the rest is history, as she writes the commandments for your people.

You let her, because she is the brains to your brawn. And they are commandments that you hope to live by for as many millennia as you can.

"To unite in ambition is to be steadfast and immovable for all time."
"Wisdom is like water, it nourishes all those who receive it and in it is a reflection of the truth."
"Fortify the bones, that movement be supple when the time comes."
"Virtue grows tall like a tree, though there be shade it will flourish forever"

And it prospers. Your home becomes a trading hub, boats ferrying up and down rivers. The civilization spreads across plains and mountains, diving into the depths of mining underground and spanning beautiful fields of agriculture. With these commandments, Guizhong's clever mind, and your power and protection... you almost feel unstoppable.

You know that you feel content.

You fetch her things from the nation of Khaenri'ah, when you happen upon them, or lead her to the automatons that make their way to the surface world over time. You listen as she and Streetward Rambler bicker and argue over the merits of technology creating music. You listen to her tease Cloud Retainer, joyous laughter filling the domain as Cloud Retainer's feathers are ruffled - and they all turn to you, to settle the score, to mediate disputes, no matter how joking or serious.

For all that you love Guizhong, in a way that perhaps you have never loved another being before in all the hundreds and thousands of years you have been alive, you don't let that bias your decisions. All of the adepti, in their myriad of personalities and appearances, trust you to be impartial, even when you judge with levity.

(Especially then, given the rigorous competitions between Guizhong and Cloud Retainer in regards to whose invention is superior, more viable, more ready for the world to see.)

But levity will only last for so long, in a world like Teyvat.

The Archon War begins, and it lasts for centuries, for an era, for thousands of years, and you lose so many friends and allies. So many gods go mad in their conquest for power, to attain a divine seat and become Archons; so many other beings, human and not alike, seek to take advantage of the strife and chaos to their own gains. You and Guizhong, you only want to protect your nation as best you can.

You've no interest in the divine seat. If it comes about because you are the strongest god standing, then so be it.

The two of you have worked so hard to protect your people, to build a civilization and nation with them, that you will not let it fall, you will not fail them. It is a contract that you forge with blood and stone and wrath.

And so, so much loss.

You say goodbye to her in the same field of Glaze Lilies that you met her in, and you can only hold her for so long as she dies in your arms.

Even as a weaker god that relied on her mind and her inventions, she is still a god. The adeptal energy that would be cast off of her, in her death, will destroy everything around you. The Glaze Lilies she adores. The people that she has loved with every fiber of her being. Your friends, those that you have had meals with for hundreds of years with her by your side.

Guizhong looks up at you, and she smiles through the pain even as your hold on her tightens. As if you cold hold the specks of dust that make up her whole together.

"Those little people are as small and fragile as dust."
"Because they are so small, they know not when they will lose their lives to disaster or strife, and so they are afraid."
"Because they are afraid, they try so hard to become more intelligent. This I understand."
"So I thought that since there is such a gulf between us in strength, I should use technique and wisdom instead."
"With your brawn and my brains, this city would surely become a great one."

You have to let go. You have to, much as it pains you. Because her body is turning to stone in your hands, and you can feel the roiling waves of power beneath the surface. You have to let the yaksha do their duty and contain her power until it fades, where it will no longer be a danger to the lands that the God of Dust has loved with her whole heart.

"It seems that our journey together has come to an end. As for that stone dumbbell, forget about it, would you?"

But you can't make this promise to forget. Even if your last image of her is a sad smile, so lonely -

"This is the mark of our pledge, and it is also my challenge to you."
"All my wisdom is hidden within this stone dumbbell."
"If you can unlock it—"

The Glaze Lilies dwindle, to this day, fickle things that never do well in a pot now so scarce in the wild you have to travel miles upon miles upon miles to see enough that would allow them to be called a field.

You never knew what she was going to say, in the end.

You never were able to unlock her puzzle.