"How was I supposed to know he didn't bring any Mora? Who treats people and shows up penniless? That fellow…"
Zhongli could only sigh. For the sake of an old friend, he'd chosen to trust Venti.
And Venti? After eating and drinking his fill, the bard had collapsed on the table and blacked out—leaving Zhongli, the Geo Lord who could barter with knowledge itself in Liyue, to face Mondstadt's very simple rule: no Mora, no tab.
The one who'd bragged beforehand that he could settle any bill by busking now lay dozing in the Knights' new detention center. Rowan had redeemed Zhongli and walked him out; as for Venti, Rowan had no intention of bailing him out yet.
"Old man, let's not point fingers. Don't you have the same problem?" Rowan asked dryly. "Do you have Mora on you right now?"
Zhongli paused, speechless. If he had, would things have ended like this?
A tiger fallen to the flats—snarled by dogs.
"In any case, thank you for today," Zhongli said at last. "I won't linger. When next you visit Liyue, I shall host you properly."
Mondstadt, for him, had become a place of small embarrassments. He turned and departed.
Rowan didn't mind. As for Venti—let him reflect in custody for a while. No Mora, yet pretending to be a big spender.
And so, days began to pass.
The day after Rowan and Liyue sealed their cooperation, Istaroth returned from Celestia. Then Rowan learned why she'd gone: she had fetched all her belongings, moved fully into Mondstadt, and taken up residence in the Tian Palace—openly cementing her status as the Knight-King's queen.
Yet something about her left Rowan puzzled. Istaroth was… overly reserved. Kisses she accepted, but the moment Rowan pressed further, she would flee like a startled rabbit. Beyond that one "mana-replenishment" night, there had been no further progress.
Had that night not been Istaroth?
A modern transmigrator could imagine any melodrama. From Istaroth's behavior, she truly seemed never to have gone further with him; otherwise she wouldn't be this shy and guarded. So… was that night someone else?
Unbeknownst to Rowan, Jean flushed red whenever she saw him, never daring to meet his eyes—for that gaze brought the entire memory back in a rush. Jealousy simmered in her, too, at Istaroth's arrival, though she hid it well. Until she found the courage to confess, she would not show it.
Her condition fooled the straightforward Seamus, but not her mother, Frederica. Pressed by her mother's questions, Jean confessed the truth. Frederica was startled—and then amused. So the King's first woman wasn't the queen, nor Eula, but her own daughter. A fine twist indeed. If it ever came to light, a concubine's title would hardly be out of reach.
As for Jean's fretting, Frederica waved it off. Men are greedy by nature. The queen might be beautiful, but so was Jean. And once rice is cooked to a meal—if it was exposed, so what? A king without the courage to own his deeds would earn the scorn of Mondstadt and all Teyvat.
With her mother's counsel, Jean's heart eased. Yet during reports, she still found herself staring at Rowan in a daze.
Thus time hurried on.
In a month, Mondstadt's road network was fully opened. Why so fast? Because Rowan made Venti work. Yes, the bard was in custody—but to get out, he'd signed a stack of unequal terms with Rowan. One clause: whenever a road section was laid, Venti would speed-dry the cement with Anemo.
What should have taken a week to cure was pared down to a single day. Soon, all of Mondstadt shone with new cement roads. The Knights' training grounds—once bloated—were freed up; half the force was reassigned to field evaluations. The city hummed with purpose.
At Dawn Winery, Diluc perfected a distilled spirit. Its debut set off a sensation—particularly in Liyue and Snezhnaya. Liyue's roadside stalls already traded in strong grain liquor; as for the frozen north, spirits were a way of life. With the new roads, merchants flowed faster than ever, and Dawn's orders more than doubled. Diluc, never stingy, signed a long-term agreement with Mondstadt's government, pledging twenty percent of annual revenue in return for Rowan's recipe—a shareholder's gratitude from the Darknight Hero himself.
Rowan did not idle. He signed a non-aggression pact with Andrius, the North Wind Wolf, then persuaded him to place Wolvendom's pack under the Knights' training regimen. Andrius balked at first—but faced with an avalanche of binding contracts and the Victory at Rowan's side, even at his peak he would have had to yield. He agreed at last, with one small request: let Razor lead the cavalry.
Rowan, naturally, consented with a smile.
On that day, Amber—now a training officer with the Reconnaissance Corps—was on leave when she spotted two foreigners, one tall and one small, near the Whispering Woods. She approached on high alert, only to learn after a round of questions that, like their King, they were travelers from another world, searching for lost kin with no idea where to go.
Warm-hearted as ever, Amber invited them to Mondstadt.
"City of Wind and Dandelions, capital of freedom—welcome to Mondstadt, travelers from afar."
(End of Chapter)
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