Shrieking a shrill cry of defeat, the small band of Hilichurls turn tail and make a hasty break for it away from the nearby road, heading further out into the reclusive safety of Liyue's wet marshlands. You watch them go to make sure they won't try to regroup and come after you again before slowly relaxing out of your fighting stance. Well, that took care of that.
Straightening up, you sheathe your sword at your hip and breathe out a terse sigh. They were getting far too close to Wangshu Inn, the silhouette of the impressive monument looming up out the faint mist in the near distance. You could see it clearly from where you were standing which meant the Hilichurls in this area were starting to get braver.
But the road here was much too busy with an endless procession of traveling merchants and people making their way to or from Mondstadt for them to be left to their own devices for very long. They'd probably come back eventually, driven by hunger and the promise of easy targets, and they might even bring reinforcements with them the next time when you weren't here to deal with the problem. You should tell Xiao about this.
Your heart gives a dull throb inside your chest at the thought of the elusive Yaksha and you catch yourself starting to anxiously fiddle with the grip of your blade. It seemed that every time you were lucky enough to encounter him you walked away from it with a stronger sense of connection than before and it was starting to get a little embarrassing. Good thing you'd left Paimon back at the inn to await your return while you ran an errand for Verr Goldet, so at least she wouldn't be here to witness your steady descent into lovesickness. You'd never hear the end of it if she ever caught you making puppy eyes at him.
Feeling unusually self conscious, you walk across the grassy, sloping hill to step into the shade of a small copse of trees and underbrush where you could call upon him in relative privacy. You were sure he'd appreciate that too, though you didn't doubt he would heed your summons no matter where you were when you uttered his name. He'd already shown you multiple times now that he was always listening and that the unnamed bond between you two reached much farther than any mere stretch of land could hope to impede no matter its distance.
So you stand there under the rustling canopy of close cropped trees, feeling the wind in your hair as you draw a deep breath to ground yourself. It wasn't that the thought of seeing him made you nervous, per say, but the flutter of butterflies in your stomach was undeniable. You wanted to make sure you were ready.
Or as ready as you could be, anyway.
"Xiao, are you there?"
A single heartbeat passes before you feel the displacement in the air, the faint stirring of energy that momentarily spikes before receding back to nothing again. It seems to make the wind pick up just enough to tease at your hair a little more briskly than before but that too quickly settles back down. All at once you can feel his presence standing behind you and you turn to greet him with a smile only to come up short when you abruptly stop dead in your tracks.
Something wasn't right.
You innately understand that as soon as you set eyes on him and the once silly, romantic notions that had set you abuzz promptly morph into chilly uncertainty. His posture is stiff and visibly locked, as if he were physically holding himself in check, and the fact he does not look at you only further solidifies that impression. Rather he keeps his head down, attention focused on the ground while a faint shudder works through his slight frame.
Your pulse immediately starts to gallop out of control. What was going on here?
"Traveler." He grits out with no shortage of effort, and you quickly take an impulsive step towards him.
"Xiao? Are you alright?"
" Don't !"
Jolting to a sudden halt with your hand half of the way up to reach for him, you just stare at Xiao in wide eyed disbelief. You'd never seen him like this, had certainly never heard him raise his voice to snap at anyone quite like that before, and the fact he'd directed it at you? It almost breaks your heart.
"I'm sorry." You relent, keeping your voice soft and even so as not to spook him any more than you evidently already had. "I'm just worried about you, that's all. I didn't mean to overstep. Can you tell me what's wrong?"
He viciously seethes through his gnashing teeth, narrow shoulders hunching slightly with the apparent effort of keeping himself upright. You can see the vague tremble in his legs from where you're stood watching him, as if they were threatening to give out under his weight at any moment, and you start to wonder if he was hurt. But try as you might, your frantically searching gaze can't spot the tall tell signs of any wounds on him. No blood, either. Not even a smudge of dirt on his perfectly clean white shirt.
Groaning a tortured sound, Xiao abruptly pulls in on himself and hunches forward as his hand comes up to cup his face. It looks like he's about to either violently regurgitate everything in his stomach or pass out, possibly even both, and you almost steel your resolve to close the distance regardless of what he had to say about it. But then he finally manages to speak again.
"I'm sorry. I didn't want you to see me like this … the karmic debt — nghn! It's acting up again, Traveler. I don't know why. It was slowly getting better recently but now …"
Understanding washes over you and eases some of the anxiety riddled concern that grips you in a chokehold. You only knew a very small amount of the symptomatic pain Xiao had to live with as a result of his long life spent accumulating the karma of those he felled with his jade cut spear, but you were at least knowledgeable enough to grasp what was happening. Just an agonizing flare up, that's all. It was much preferable to him being injured and you unable to help him when he didn't want you getting any closer. This, at least, you should be able to handle.
"It's alright, Xiao. Please don't apologize for something you have no control over. I'm not going to hold it against you or let this change how I feel about you. You don't need to worry about me."
" But - -!" Snarling, he gives his head an aggressive shake as if to clear it of some great fog. "I'm dangerous like this, Traveler! I — I should go. You're not safe as long as I'm here."
"That's not true." You insist, gentle yet firm as you take a slow, cautious step forward. For better or worse he seems to be a bit too caught up in the attack plaguing his body and he doesn't appear to notice, so you make careful work of creeping closer to him one pace at a time. "I trust you, Xiao. I always have and I always will. Please don't go. I'd like to help you, if you'll let me."
" Help ? How do you expect to help someone like me?" The Yaksha croaks an awful sound as he yanks his hand away and snaps his head up to bark at you. "This is my punishment! I don't deserve your - -"
He cuts off with a sudden jerk, eyes going big and round when you slide your hands up to cup his cheeks between your palms. The two of you are almost perfectly level with one another, allowing you to unhesitatingly meet his gaze straight on and show him that you weren't afraid.
"That's not true and you know it. Or at least, I hope you do?"
Inquisitively tipping your head, you watch him rapidly search your face with quick, jerky eye movements — for what, you do not know — before hesitantly trying to shirk away. You hold fast though, squishing his soft cheeks to keep him in place. No way were you going to let him escape that easily.
"I'm sorry I called for you at such a bad time but please stay. I know it's hard, and I can tell you'd rather isolate yourself right now," You try again, hoping the sincerity of your pleas will get through to him. "At least let me try to help you through it though. I'll do whatever you need me to, Xiao. Just tell me how to make this better."
His mouth warbles open as if to speak again but nothing comes out. He just stares at you like he can't quite believe you're real, standing before him with your hands gently cradling his face. But this close proximity allows you to see exactly how much this is affecting him, from the visible tension that makes the skin around his eyes look taut and waxy, to the tortured line of his brows. He's covered in a fine sheet of sweat, too.
If you didn't know any better you'd think Xiao was actually sick and you have to remind yourself that this was not something a doctor could cure. What ailed him wasn't the sort of illness that would respond to medicines infused in herbal teas or even that of tightly packed pills, but rather it was something that likely only resided in his heart and on his soul. There was no miracle elixir for this sort of pain.
Shuddering fiercely, Xiao at last brings himself to stir out of his trance-like state and he weakly tips forward with a halting motion. You realize his mouth is slowly angling towards yours in a far off, dreamy sort of way but his gaze never so much as falters from your eyes while he does it. His haunted stare reads of desperate longing and unimaginable pain in equal parts, and you can't quite bring yourself to show your surprise when he was looking at you like that.
All you can do is accept the featherlight kiss he hesitantly places on your mouth even when your heart jackhammers up into your throat. He reminded you a bit too much of a skittish animal in that moment, something wounded and perhaps even a little scared, and that stops you from giving it a bigger reaction than the simple brush of your lips when you kiss him back. You were glad to accept him, all of him, both the good and the bad. The gentle side of him that you were most accustomed to seeing as well as the merciless avenger that stalks through the shadows of Liyue's nights, and you were determined to show him that.
And he seems to understand what you're trying to convey to him because he hisses a faltering groan into the scant space between you two. His lips tremble slightly when they work over yours as if he were trying to speak again but still nothing comes out. Encouragingly, you slide your hands down off his cheeks and reach back to pull Xiao further against you, hoping your welcoming body language might be enough to soothe some of the anguish he was enduring.
He stumbles into you with the motion, slight though it had been, and his stiffly poised hands come up to grab onto your waist, squeezing you hard enough to bruise. You don't give this a reaction either, merely wincing at the pain while you hold him tight and murmur gentle nothings against his ear. Issuing a low, rumbling growl in response, Xiao digs his fingers into the soft give of your middle and leans his weight further into you until you have no choice but to stumble back a step.
" Traveler … you don't understand how — nghn, how dangerous this is. I could hurt you."
"But you won't. I know you won't, Xiao."
Another rumbling snarl rises in his chest, bleeding into you where you're pressed right up against him to set your nerves vibrating. You aren't sure what to make of it or how to convince him that you could handle whatever he threw at you if he'd just allow himself to let go instead of holding onto it so tightly.
But then he suddenly drags his shaking hands lower to latch onto your hips and he lifts you so abruptly you can't quite stop the gasp that rattles out of you. Your feet barely have enough time to leave the ground before he's stumbling forward to shove you back into the sturdy trunk of a tree, the rough bark scratching and digging into your spine. You barely even notice it though as he presses himself flush to you and settles his hips between your legs to pin you there.
Panting even harder than before, Xiao turns his face and hurriedly finds your lips to kiss you again, except this time it's much less hesitant. There's a voracious hunger in him now that he seems to think can be sated if he just feasts from your mouth enough. You aren't so sure that's true or that it will fix anything, but you don't hesitate to throw your arms around his neck as you kiss him back with abandon. If this had even an infinitesimally small chance of easing some of the pain he was forced to suffer you were happy to do it.
Responding with a haggard sound of relief, Xiao fully sinks into you until your back starts to ache in protest where it's forced to bend against the contours of the tree. It didn't exactly bode well for how the rest of this encounter was going to play out if you were already getting banged up this much, but you pay it little mind in the heat of the moment. You'd figure out how to explain all the scrapes and bruises you were sure to walk away from this with later. For now you just focus on the frantic push and pull of his mouth, and the groping squeezes he gives your hips while your own excitement steadily builds, meeting him head on.
It takes you a prolonged moment to realize he's trying to hike your dress up, fumbling with the material as if he wasn't quite sure if he should be doing that or not. One moment his fingers are impatiently tugging at it to get the skirt out of the way and the next he's roughly smoothing it back down to clutch it in a death grip instead. You quickly grow tired of his polite indecision though and, still kissing him, you reach down to squeeze a hand between your body's.
Blindly snagging at the fabric, you yank it up in a single motion and rip one side of it right out of his grip. With nowhere else to go now, his palm possessively curls around your bare waist to give it a tight, pinching squeeze that makes you start to feel lightheaded. Groaning softly against his lips, you struggle to pull back so you can knock your head against the tree, panting up at the dancing leaves overhead.
"Xiao - -!"
"I'm sorry." He rushes to say even as his mouth descends upon the vulnerable line of your throat to kiss and nip at the skin there. "I'm sorry, Traveler. I shouldn't — be doing this."
You take a breath to tell him that was a ridiculous and unnecessary thing to say, but before you can get the words out the hand not currently pulling on your bloomers flies up to grab at your top. One good yank is all it takes for one side of the bodice to come down, spilling your breast out into the open, and you choke on a haggard sound of pleasure.
The nipple was already tentatively pebbled with excitement but it just stiffens into an even tighter bud when it hits the cool air full on. And Xiao barely even gives you enough time to register that sensation before he curls himself down over your chest so he can catch that straining peak in his mouth. No warning, no questions asked. You just suddenly feel a quick, sharp suck at the tit and you shudder fiercely as you writhe back against the tree.
Ever conscious of the fact that this was happening outside where someone could happen upon the scene at any given moment when you were only just concealed within the copse, you turn your head to look back at the road. You can see it clearly from where you were standing but you hoped anyone who might happen to pass by wouldn't be able to see through the tightly cloistered branches, at least not enough to tell what was happening.
But you trusted Xiao even in this state to be aware of any approaching interlopers, and you quickly turn your attention back around to him. His svelte frame continues to tremble and heave against yours even while he's burying his face in your chest, as if the roiling pangs of agony were still gripping him tight, but now that he had something else to focus on it seemed to be a little bit more bearable for him. You were exceedingly grateful for that, seething softly through your teeth when you reach down to tenderly cradle his head against your breast.
"Don't hold back, Xiao. It's okay. I'm here for you, I promise. Just let it out."
Issuing a vibrating growl around your nipple, he gives his head a brief shake and shoves his mouth deeper into the plushy give. He harmlessly gums at your teat for a brief moment but then his teeth come down around the areola in a quick bite, sinking into the flesh to draw it towards the back of his throat, and you let out a startled yelp. It does more to excite you than deter you though, and you fitfully squirm in place where he's got you pinned against the unmoving trunk while he works to suckle your breast to straining sensitivity.
The building tension in your loins steadily mounts with his ministrations until you finally can't take it anymore, reaching up to tug the other half of your dress down. Your neglected tit hits the air with the same rush of sensation as the first, making you squeeze your thighs together in a blithe attempt to lessen some of the sticky discomfort there.
Luckily Xiao isn't so far gone not to notice though, and he finally pulls off your now aching, spit coated teat so he can redirect his mouth to the other. A sudden 'oh !' bursts out of you when he latches on, nipping at the fleshy bud, and you slowly tip your chin down to look at your chest. You're immediately wracked by a sharp tremor when you see how puffy and flushed the abandoned nipple has become, the lingering indent from his teeth still marring the skin.
Gods, he was going to have you all marked up by the time he was finished.
But that thought doesn't alarm you half as much as it probably should, and you groan softly into the static charged air as you needily grind your cunt against the front of his pants. The rigid bulge there is unmistakable when it twitches against you, straining out as if with a mind of its own to seek the entrance of your body.
That seems to be what finally makes him stir from your breast, and he slowly lets the swollen bud slip past his lips as he pulls back to look at you. Neither of you says a word while you stand there, panting heavily against one another, but the message is still heard loud and clear.
All at once both of you are moving, and Xiao roughly spins you around to face the tree as you fumble to get your dress pulled up around your waist. He only stops long enough to yank your bloomers down around your knees and then he's grabbing hold of your hips so he can pull you back against him, shoving his cock up against your cunt from behind. You let out a frazzled, eager moan at the pressure, mindlessly pushing back on him to drag your pussy across his pants and the stiff outline of him within while he hurriedly fumbles with the sash around his waist.
The noisy clatter of various accouterments falling to the ground sounds deafening in your ringing ears and it's quickly followed by your sword when he rips it off you to toss it aside. Both of you are in such a rush that you're only vaguely aware of him slipping a hand between you to free himself and then he's suddenly pushing into you with his cock. Your body initially tries to fight it, not quite fully prepped for the spear of his unrelentingly hard length, but Xiao just leans his weight into your back to aid the process.
And he fully slides into you with a sharp little snap of his narrow hips, forcing your inner sleeve to accept him in a sudden rush of fleshy traction. You jolt at the abrupt glide of him into your body, the blinding starburst of friction that comes with it, eyes rolling back as you outright groan in pleasure.
Either spurred on by the sound or too lost in the hazy relief that comes with having your hot, wet guts squeezing him tight, Xiao doesn't even give you a moment to adjust. He's just immediately driving into you, slamming in and out to make your ass clap against the flat planes of his pelvis, and the force of it pushes you forward to lean heavily against the tree.
Gripping the rough bark hard enough to make your fingers hurt, you blearily glance down to watch your tits heavily bounce with each and every thrust of his cock while it carves out a space within you deep inside your cunt. It's an almost obscene sight, especially when the nipples were so fat and puffy after the attention he'd shown them with his mouth, but it's also indescribably arousing in that moment.
You clench around him, struggling to keep your voice down when he was threatening to knock loose a myriad of delighted wails and screams. Viciously seething in response, Xiao locks his arms around your middle to hold you tight against him as he curls his chin over your shoulder, growling a faint sound of pleasure against your cheek.
"T - Traveler …!"
"It's okay, Xiao. Nghnn! Just, ahhn … let it all out. I - I've got you!"
That didn't seem entirely accurate when you were completely at his mercy like this, but he rumbles a soft groan anyway as he nuzzles his nose against your wildly pounding pulse. It's only when his quick paced, pistoning thrusts seem to knock something loose within you, making your cunt positively flood and your knees threaten to buckle, do you realize how animalistic this really is. It was like he'd completely detached from his higher functioning mind and now the only thing he could focus on was the need to fuck you, claim you, possibly even breed you. It was hard not to feel a little in over your head in that sense but he felt far too good slamming into your squelching cunt for you to second guess any of it.
You were going to cum soon if he kept it up for much longer and that alone was more than enough incentive for you to disregard that this was perhaps not an ideal situation to be in.
"Ohh! God !" Sensitively wheezing, you drop your head between your outstretched arms to watch your tits bounce and observe the wide, somewhat awkward spread of your legs.
Xiao was forcing you up onto the tips of your toes with the sheer power behind his thrusts, and you had no way of escaping it even if you'd wanted to when he had you locked against the front of him like this. He was mindless with it, a wild, growling beast that showed no signs of reaching his limit anytime soon.
But then you hear it. The soft whiny of a horse not very far off in the distance, and your attention snaps up with a jolt. Craning your neck around, you can just make out a small procession of merchant carts pulled by stock horses coming up on the road and your entire body seizes at the threat of being noticed by them. Xiao groans heavily at the new tension running through you but he doesn't stop. It's as if he can't , and you squeak a nervous little sound as you reach back to smack at his hunching shoulder.
You'd hoped to get his attention but he just snarls a bestial sound before sliding his arm up and across your neck to lock you in place. The following rush of movement that happens is such a blur you can barely process it. All you know is that he bodily yanks you back from the tree and twists, half lifting you so he can then drop you down onto the ground.
Hitting the grass with an undignified 'oof!', you don't even get a chance to protest what he's doing before Xiao is on top of you, planting himself across your back. Keeping his forearm wrapped around your throat, not tight enough to choke you but just to keep you prone and still, he quickly finds the necessary position so he can push inside you again and he does so with a vigorous snap of his hips. The sudden, forceful stretch of your cunt brings you up on your hands with a harried gasp but he's quick to slide his other hand around to cover your mouth.
Full on wailing into his gloved palm when he starts to pound into you again, you disorientedly force your gaze to look out through the entanglement of underbrush and branches to glance at the road again. It's only a small window which makes it hard to see, but you can just make out the passing merchants. That they seem totally oblivious to your presence in the trees only comes as a small relief when Xiao was wildly pounding you into the dirt only some few paces away and the slightest slip of your voice could have alerted them. The chance of discovery was much too great, especially when the vigorous plap, plap, plap, plap of his lower stomach smacking into your upturned ass sounded so incredibly loud.
But it's like he either doesn't notice or he simply doesn't care, and he fiercely hunches over you in a possessive gesture while he fucks you silly. Valiantly squirming under his slight weight, you desperately dig your nails into the ground until you feel the dirt and grass start to come up under them. It was hard to breathe with his hand over your mouth but there was nothing you could do about it except take it.
And he snarls over you the whole time while he bites at your exposed shoulders to leave you covered in marks that you weren't sure how to explain to Paimon later. Even the soaring rush of endorphins pumping through your system isn't enough to fully ease your mind, and you wince every time he takes another nip at you. This would look really bad if you were caught now, when he looked like an insatiable maniac heaving on top of you like this.
And yet by some stroke of luck the small party of merchants passes by your little hiding spot seemingly unaware of what was taking place just off the road. It takes them a long stretch of minutes to fully come and go, but at last Xiao finally lets up his hold on your face so you can suck in a much needed, faltering breath of fresh air. You feel dizzy with it, swaying unsteadily there on the ground as he gingerly untangles himself from you so he can push up to hover over your prone form.
The fact that he still doesn't cease his constant thrusting into your wetly clicking cunt makes you groan a deeply frazzled sound against the grass, struggling to keep your head on straight. It felt like you were right on the edge of oblivion, so close to cumming you could practically taste it on the back of your tongue, but it had quickly receded like low tide at the first sight of those traveling merchants.
Now that the danger has passed, though, it seems to roar back to life with a vengeance, and you squeal a delirious sound when Xiao hooks his fingers in the bend of your elbow so he can yank it back behind you. He quickly repeats the process on the other side, using a potent combination of his sheer strength and the firm pressure of his cock where it's wedged deep inside you to pull your upper body off the ground.
Tits swaying heavily from the top of your dress, you have no choice but to get your knees braced underneath you to accommodate the new position he pulls you into, feeling your bloomers stretch out between your ankles. And he immediately picks right back up where he'd left off, mercilessly snapping his hips to drive his length in and out of you again. It sends you lurching in his hold, mewling a high strung sound of ecstasy into the air while he uses his hold to yank you back against him. It felt like he was going to break you in half like this.
" Sssh - Xiao ! Ohh ! I - I'm getting close … don't stop!"
The only response you get from him is a vicious, throaty growl, his fingers tightening around your elbows. You're sure you'll find splotchy bruises blooming there later, but you hardly care about that right now. It was almost impossible to be concerned about anything at all when your cunt was gradually tightening around him, the thrumming tension in your body giving way to a warning tremor so fierce it would have bowled you over if he hadn't been keeping you upright.
And then he abruptly yanks you further back, forcing your spine into an even more dramatic arch as you're made to straighten up. The shift makes your breasts bounce even harder, and you're keenly aware of how stiff and aching the nipples are as they cut through the air. The internal pressure doubles and then triples alarmingly fast, almost making you feel sick with it when your orgasm starts to bear down on you.
But you hang there in the balance, precariously toeing the edge in a blinding surge of cramping muscles and vibrating nerves until Xiao suddenly sinks his teeth into your shoulder. That sharp burst of pain sends you careening over the edge and you jerk against his hold, wailing up at the sky as you shake and judder through your release. You hear him seethe right next to your ear, the sound muffled by your flesh where he's still got his teeth in you, but there's no mistaking the tense recoil that works through him only a second later.
All at once your squeezing cunt is flooded with hot, sticky warmth that seems to seep deep into your very bones. You're vaguely aware of his cock flexing inside you, painting your guts creamy and white, but you're a little too far gone in your own pleasure to worry about that right now. The crashing waves of fast pumping ecstasy just keep slamming into you, again and again to pull his thick spend even further into your body until your eyes start to roll back in doped out bliss.
When you finally start to come down from it with a stretched thin, warbling moan another moment later you find him hunched right up against you while he tenderly licks at the fresh bite mark on your shoulder. Whether to clean or to soothe, you're not sure which, but you lean back into him with a deeply gratified sigh all the same.
"Do you feel any better now?" You whisper into the heavy silence as you kneel there in the dirt with him, feeling the sticky ooze of his load slowly dribbling out of you. You'd have to clean up soon, and probably find someone who could sell you a contraceptive herb but … for right now you were content just to stay there with him like that.
"I am. Thank you, Traveler." He murmurs, lips brushing against your skin when he speaks. Placing his mouth on the pulsing wound he'd left you with, Xiao gently kisses it as if in apology before speaking again in a cautiously slow tone. "I probably shouldn't have done that."
"Which part?"
" All of it, but … but especially this." Sighing a terse breath, he slides his hand down your front to dip between your legs and run a finger through your sticky slit. You can tell just as he can by the consistency alone that it's not merely your own arousal coating you, and you grimace at the sensation.
"Probably not, but what's done is already done. Don't worry, Xiao. I'll take care of it."
You start to pull away from him but he holds you fast, arms tightening around you to keep you in place. "That doesn't seem fair to you though. Can I at least help you? Like you helped me."
Turning your head, you pin him with a playfully rueful look. "And how do you think you can do that?"
Momentarily dropping his gaze, Xiao seems to think about that for a moment before slowly untangling his limbs from yours so he can ease back on his haunches. You're just curious enough to find out what he's thinking that you let him get you turned around and seated on the grass, watching him carefully while he tugs your bloomers the rest of the way off.
Golden eyes briefly lift to regard you for a moment and then he's leaning down to bend over your cunt, mouth falling open while he does it to let his tongue unfurl. And as he takes a first hungry swipe through your cunt, licking up a sticky glob of his own spend where it was beading along the crease of your body, you find that you really don't have the heart to tell him that that wasn't going to suffice.
Instead you tip your head back with a low, softly faltering moan and jut your pussy out to better offer it up to his mouth. You'd get this sorted out in due time but you were keen to enjoy it for just a little bit longer first.