King unknowingly fell asleep on the lounge chair.
The tension of the day, the realization and fear that had repeatedly washed over his soul like a tide, had long since exhausted him.
The King Engine stopped, leaving only his steady, deep breathing in the room.
Opera Epiclese was silent in the dead of night, with only the faint footsteps of the Fontaine patrol team outside the window and the distant sound of waves gently caressing the shore.
Moonlight streamed through the glass window, casting cold light spots on the room's floor.
Time passed quietly.
On the bed, the small figure stirred.
Paimon's long eyelashes trembled, and she slowly opened her eyes.
Those large eyes, which should have been filled with innocence, were now unusually empty. Then, a profound golden light ignited from the deepest part of her pupils.
That light was full of divinity, cold and distant, carrying an indifference that judged all things, penetrating infinite time and space, reflecting the trajectory of the universe's creation and destruction, as if a slumbering supreme deity had briefly awakened.
Paimon, or rather, "She," sat up. The chains binding Paimon instantly shattered, and the blanket slid off her body.
Her gaze fell on the blanket; the soft touch seemed to linger on her fingertips.
Giving warmth to a "criminal" for no reason, was it a pointless disguise, or a deeper conspiracy?
For thousands, no, tens of thousands of years, the instincts formed by maintaining the "rules" of this world made Her mind incredibly cold.
Outsiders, especially powerful and uncontrollable ones, usually meant trouble, a deviation from the established trajectory, and an acceleration of Teyvat's erode.
"She" turned her head, her golden eyes calmly looking at King on the lounge chair.
This Descenders.
This variable, outside the plan and outside the system.
This monster actually emitted an aura that made "Her" feel a little uneasy.
Eliminate.
Must eliminate.
This was the most correct choice.
Her eyes were terrifyingly cold, and she slowly raised her small right hand, palm upward.
Silently, an angular, dark red cube began to condense.
Each facet of the cube glowed with an eerie luster that defied Teyvat's physical laws, as if "space" itself had been cut out and held in Her hand.
This was the clearance standing at the apex of Teyvat!
The cube rotated silently, emitting a heart-pounding aura of annihilation.
Space twisted and collapsed around the cube, even the moonlight was swallowed.
The red cube's rotation speed slightly increased, aiming at King's forehead.
In just an instant, this soul from beyond the world and this body would be erased from their very roots, leaving no trace, as if they had never existed.
However, just as the cube was about to touch Chu Ze, Her movement paused slightly.
The red cube hovered in the air, mere inches from King's forehead.
The supreme clearance remained unreleased.
In Her golden eyes, the indifferent expression showed an extremely subtle fluctuation, like the still surface of an ancient well, stirred by an insignificant speck of dust into an almost imperceptible ripple.
"Teyvat's fate is already riddled with holes; the framework of order creaks under the corrosion of the Abyss."
"More variables, while certainly meaning greater risk, also signify hope unexpectedly emerging in a world already plunged into despair."
After much thought, She finally gently closed her palms.
The red cube, capable of obliterating gods, silently shattered and dissipated, turning into specks of dark red dust that vanished into the air without a trace.
The golden light in Paimon's eyes receded like a tide, returning to her clear, starry pupils.
Her small body swayed, as if all her strength was spent, and she lightly fell back onto the bed, curling up again in the blanket.
Before Her consciousness completely sank into the depths of Paimon's soul, She seemed to let out an almost imperceptible sigh, or perhaps it was just the illusion of the night wind rustling through the room from outside the window.
"Outsider, please save this world on the brink of collapse..."
[Ding! Detected extreme scrutiny, extreme killing intent, extreme anticipation, and other emotions from Asmodeus. Emotion Points +1,000,000!]
King frowned in his sleep, turned over, and his breathing became steady and long again.
The moonlight remained.
The room was quiet.
Only the seven-figure Emotion Points balance on the system panel silently told of what had happened in that brief moment.
The night was still long. The story of Fontaine had just begun... The next morning.
Sunlight streamed into Opera Epiclese.
King woke up to a series of "crunching" sounds.
The sound was very light, like a small rodent secretly nibbling on a biscuit, and in the quiet morning room, it was particularly clear and grating.
He groggily opened his eyes, his vision still a bit blurry, and instinctively looked towards the sound.
Then, he saw it: on the exquisite small round table in the center of the room, the Macaron Tower, which he had painstakingly stacked to a hundred layers yesterday and was truly a work of art, was disappearing from the top at an astonishing speed.
A small white head was perched at the edge of the table, her back to him, her shoulders shrugging.
"Crunch... crunch..."
"Mmm... this strawberry one is so delicious..."
"Crunch..."
"The Chocolate one is amazing too! As expected of that man's breakfast!"
"Crunch, crunch..."
Paimon was eating happily, both her short little hands working in tandem, grabbing one in each, taking a bite here and a lick there, her cheeks stuffed full, her eyes narrowed into crescent moons with happiness.
As she ate, she mumbled to herself, trying to convince herself:
"I'll just eat a little, there's still so much anyway!"
"He definitely won't notice if a dozen layers... no, fifty or sixty layers are gone!"
"Right?"
"Mmm! There are too many macarons here, Paimon is just helping him deal with potentially wasted food!"
"This is the virtue of frugality!"
The more Paimon spoke, the more justified she felt, and her actions became even more self-assured, even starting to get picky.
"Hmm? This lemon one is a bit sour, Paimon doesn't like it."
"Put it back? That wouldn't be good, I can't put it back after biting it... then Paimon will reluctantly eat it!"
Thus, the "crunching" sounds were incessant.
King watched silently.
Watching his Macaron Tower, a symbol of "art," collapse in the glutton's mouth like a sand sculpture corroded by termites.
Ten layers.
Twenty layers.
Fifty layers.
Paimon even started trying to dig holes in the middle, choosing her favorite flavors, making the tower's structure even more precarious.
"…"
An emotion called admiration slowly welled up in King's heart.
He didn't feel bad about the desserts at all.
Opera Epiclese's kitchen delivered fresh, exquisite pastries every day, and Furina often personally fed him, so he had long grown tired of them; otherwise, he wouldn't have used them to stack a tall tower.
However,
Paimon's first act upon waking up was to steal desserts?
Should he say she was carefree, or that her obsession with food had surpassed her survival instincts?
And judging by her mumbling, she thought he wouldn't notice?