The blades hovered between them.
Crackling with power.
Humming with prophecy.
Poised for divine annihilation.
Then—simultaneously—
They let go.
Both weapons dropped, falling through the air like discarded crowns.
Silence.
Not just quiet—cosmic stillness.
Even the wind paused in confusion.
Raiclaus tilted her head. "I thought you'd parry."
Rosen blinked slowly. "I thought you'd pierce."
Neither moved to pick up their blades.
Instead—
They stepped forward.
One step. Then another.
Tension collapsed in on itself like a dying star.
Lightning still licked at Raiclaus's shoulders, curling down her arms like impatient snakes. Frost coiled around Rosen's fingertips, dripping into the air like starlight turned to ice.
But they didn't strike.
Not this time.
They stood face to face, breaths mingling in the cold, high air.
"You know," Raiclaus murmured, voice thick with the aftershock of adrenaline, "you always did fight like someone who knew me too well."
Rosen didn't answer.
She reached out, fingers brushing against Raiclaus's jaw.
And then—
It happened.
No warning. No hesitation.
Just collision.
Of lips. Of history. Of fire and frost.
It wasn't gentle.
It wasn't soft.
It was a kiss like two empires declaring peace with teeth bared.
A kiss that tasted like thunder and snowfall.
The sky trembled.
Somewhere, a Ley Line short-circuited.
A seer in Liyue fainted on the spot.
A Vision cracked in someone's pocket and no one knows why.
---
Above them, the Emblems lost all ability to function.
Kaelya's jaw hit the metaphorical floor.
"…I—I don't—I need someone to explain if I'm hallucinating or if the gods are making out mid-battle."
Morven rubbed his temples like this was not his first divine gay emergency. "They are not 'making out,' they are exchanging spiritual combat through ritual convergence of breath—"
"They're kissing, Morven."
"I am in denial, let me have this."
It was the kiss of two forces who had known each other longer than stars had names.
A clash of cold and current. Of past and promise. Of everything unsaid.
Then—separation.
Not rejection.
Recoil.
They tore away from each other like magnets flipped mid-embrace.
Raiclaus spun mid-air, blade ripping itself from the sky and into her hand. Lightning surged in her wake like a thunderstorm in ecstasy.
Rosen rose, her sword reforming with a crack of ancient ice, her eyes glazed with both tenderness... and judgment.
"You always did kiss like you fight," Rosen said quietly.
Raiclaus grinned, licking a crack in her lip. "And you always fight like you're still trying to teach me a lesson."
"Maybe I am."
Then they moved.
---
The second act began.
Faster. Meaner. Intimate.
They no longer danced for their audience.
This was personal.
Roselight Hollow
The sky above the village was no longer sky.
It had become a battlefield.
Colors no mortal had names for bloomed and bled through the clouds. Shapes twisted in and out of perception—lightning striking ice, stars screaming through frost.
The townsfolk had no words for it.
So they did the only thing they could.
They watched.
And trembled.
Little Nyra, the girl with the dragon plushie, stood on her cottage's roof, clutching her toy tight as sparks fell like snow.
"Are we gonna die?" she asked.
The old woman beside her—her wrinkled hands still dusted in flour from a forgotten pie—didn't answer at first.
She looked up at the sky, where gods danced in fury and intimacy, where lightning kissed frost and thunder howled with longing.
"No, little one," she finally whispered. "Not today."
Beneath the twilight-drenched sky of Fontaine, just beyond the grandeur of its bustling court, Orion had pitched his makeshift camp near the edge of a crystalline stream. The waters whispered with a gentle hush, flowing over smooth stones like a lullaby only the land could hear.
Felix, the frost dragon no larger than a carriage—small by his kind's standards but no less majestic—lay coiled upon a bed of soft grass. His scales shimmered in pale hues of glacial blue, catching the last golden rays of sunlight like a creature born of moonlight and winter's breath. He had tucked his long tail beneath his chin, his silver lashes fluttering as sleep tugged at him.
Orion, ever-determined and slightly too proud for his own good, struggled with a bundle of tent poles and a stubborn knot of rope. He grunted as the canvas collapsed again in defiance.
From within his shared mind, Frieda's voice emerged, sharp with irritation.
"Why are we doing this again? We could just rent a room like civilized people."
Orion snorted, brushing a stray lock of hair from his face as he gathered kindling and dry leaves into a crude firepit.
"Because, my dear critic, I've always wanted to go proper camping. You can't hear these waters from an inn bed. They soothe the soul. You should try listening for once."
"I'd rather listen to a bath filling with hot water." Frieda muttered.
Ignoring her protest, Orion turned to the slumbering dragon and offered a hopeful grin.
"Felix, would you mind giving us a spark? Just a little puff—tiny one."
The dragon cracked open a single eye, glowing faintly like a dying star.
"I wield Cryo, not Pyro," he groaned, voice thick with sleep. "I am a frost dragon, not your personal fireplace..." And with that, he nestled deeper into his coils, drifting off.
Orion sighed dramatically, rising to his feet.
"Fine. Guess we're doing it the old-fashioned way."
He turned toward the edge of camp, searching for flint among the stones. Yet, by the time he returned, the dry leaves had already ignited, and a cheerful fire crackled in the pit, dancing merrily in the evening light.
He blinked.
"...Huh?"
He turned toward Felix, now snoring softly, frost curling from his nostrils.
"Hey!" Orion whispered accusingly. "You said you couldn't do it!"
No response.
"Then how the hell did it catch fire...?" he muttered, eyes narrowing at the dragon—or perhaps at the stars, which had begun to blink awake above him.
With the fire crackling at last—mysteriously, of course—Orion wasted no time setting a small iron pot above the flames. He rummaged through his pack, pulling out some chopped vegetables, dried herbs, and a suspiciously gray lump that was allegedly meat. The whole thing sloshed into the pot with a rather unappetizing glorp.
Felix stirred but remained asleep, clearly choosing unconsciousness over culinary trauma.
Orion stirred the contents with a stick he'd confidently claimed was "rustic cooking tradition." As steam began to rise, so did the scent—a confusing blend of scorched onion, swamp water, and regret.
Frieda's voice rang out inside his skull like a gong.
"Is that... a flavor or a crime scene?"
Orion scowled, aggressively poking the bubbling mess.
"It's rustic! You have to let the flavors... mature."
"They're not maturing, they're suffering."
She paused.
"Did you just put mint leaves in a stew with garlic and dried fish?!"
"It's called fusion cuisine, Frieda. I'm innovating."
"You're violating the Geneva Convention."
The pot began to bubble with a foreboding hiss, and a thick plume of smoke billowed upward. Orion leaned in to sniff, immediately recoiling with a cough.
"Oh Archons, my eyes—why is it spicy?!" he wheezed, fanning the smoke with his sleeve.
The stew gurgled in protest, then let out a sound that was unmistakably wet and angry. It spat a glob of molten goop directly at him, smacking onto his cheek with sizzling authority.
"IT BURNS!" he screamed, falling back with all the grace of a drunk goose.
Felix cracked open an eye again, gave one unimpressed huff, and promptly returned to sleep.
"You've lost control of the pot," Frieda deadpanned. "We have to put it down. Mercy-kill it."
Orion groaned, staring at the bubbling disaster like it had personally betrayed him.
"...So maybe room service isn't the worst idea."