Chapter Text
It’s all gone.
Lesser Lord Kusanali held the gnosis in her tiny hands, and Scaramouche no longer had a heart. He froze. Staring at the gnosis in her hands in disbelief, he lost it all. It all happened so fast, but it felt like an eternity for Scaramouche. The mechanical tubes snapped only mere seconds after the Dendro Archon obtained the gnosis, making the puppet fall out of the head of the Shouki no Kami.
As he fell, he thought about all that had happened, and how nothing seemed to work for him. Everything, everyone, seems to be just out of reach for him.
He was supposed to serve as a vessel for the Electro Archon, but he shed tears upon his creation.
——
“He’s too gentle for such a task.”
“How so?” Miko asked, looking the puppet up and down.
“I created this puppet to replace me as Inazuma’s Archon, and yet he cries.”
“What will you do with it?”
The Electro Archon paused, carefully thinking of what her next move will be. But she couldn’t think of one, she had no use for this failed puppet.
“What do you think, Miko?” She asks, looking at the puppet with an unreadable expression.
“Oh, what do I think?” Miko chuckled. She stepped closer to the puppet and grabbed its face harshly, making it wince. She studied the face that very closely resembled Ei’s and stared deeply into its indigo eyes. With her other hand she lightly traced the tear marks on its face. She smiled and let go of its face, looking the puppet up and down once more before backing away.
“Kill it.”
The kitsune’s words echoed throughout the silent building. The puppet looked at her with a shocked expression, then changed its expression to one that is scared.
“Wh- No!” The puppet shook its head, staring at its creator. “Please don’t kill me, mother!”
The use of the word ‘mother’ threw both of the women off, they stared at it for a moment before Ei remembered Miko’s statement. Shaking her head, she finally spoke.
“I don’t wish to kill him.”
The puppet calmed down immensely, and Miko scowled.
“What other option is there?” She asked.
Ei paused for a long moment to think. Her eyes sparked as she thought of the easiest thing to do. The Electro Archon walked forward and placed her hands on the puppet’s chest, a gentle purple light flowed out of her pale hands. The puppet gasped as the magic seeped into its fake skin, the sensation felt unusual but it didn’t hurt. She kept her hand firmly on its chest, using more of her power to finish what she was doing. The puppet felt as its power diminished, until it felt no divinity coursing through its body.
“You sealed its power.” Miko said, crossing her arms and looking at the Electro Archon.
“I’ll create a better version of him. It’ll have no emotion, and will run Inazuma flawlessly for eternity.”
“What about this one?” Miko asked, gesturing towards the puppet.
The puppet looked weakly up at Ei, and she felt a tinge of guilt in her chest. The room was silent, both Miko and the puppet eagerly waiting for her answer, but both had different desires.
“Just leave him.” She finally said. The puppet looked at his mother with a shocked expression while Miko only smiled.
The women both started to walk towards the exit of Shakkei Pavilion, leaving behind the failed puppet.
“No!”
“Don’t leave me, please!” The puppet screamed after Ei and Miko, trying to chase after them on weak legs, but his legs gave out after a few steps. He sobbed, realizing how little he worthed to his own mother.
Ei looked back at her son while Miko left the building.
“Be free of your own life, Kunikuzushi.” She told him, and shut the big doors as she finally turned and left.
“Be free..?” Kunikuzushi whispered, staring at the doors.
“Be free?” Kunikuzushi screamed in anguish, hitting the hard floor with all his might.
“Does this look free to you, mother!?” He yelled, his voice echoing off the Pavilion’s empty walls. The feeling of abandonment swelled in his chest. He felt a wetness start to form in his indigo eyes, quickly realizing that he was crying.
“No…” He said weakly, hitting the ground once more. He started sobbing loudly, feeling lost, sad, and especially angry. “How dare you…”
“Come back.. Please, I’ll be the perfect puppet just please-“ He begged for his mother, curling in on himself on the floor.
——
He hit the ground with a large thud, barely conscious. He could hear the Lesser Lord speaking in her usual gentle tone, something about Irminsul and Greater Lord Rukkhadevata. He also heard the Traveler’s stupid pixie saying something, but then all the voices stopped. He was too weak to move to see why, reminding him of the majority of the days at Shakkei Pavilion.
It was quiet for a while, making Scaramouche believe he was dead. But the pain was too unbearable for that. He tried to move again, but he just couldn’t. It was like he was paralyzed. He was tired and in so much pain.
They just left him to die. It’s not like this didn’t happen before, but it was still painful nonetheless. It didn’t matter. Scaramouche dying is for the better anyways, because maybe the afterlife was easier. No one would miss him anyways.
Scaramouche started thinking about Niwa, and how kind he was. He took great care of him, he would even go as far and say that he was his family. He sighed, things were so much simpler back then.
——
The Kabukimono left the furnace covered in ash and soot, he was exhausted from absorbing all the filth. He held the strange device the mechanic gave him close to his chest, untouched by the furnace’s filth.
The mechanic looked at him and gave him a small smile.
“How’d it go?” He asked, looking at him with an unusual expression.
“This device seems to have protected me.” The Kabukimono said, looking at it with wide eyes. “What’s in it?”
The mechanic gave him a sinister smile and took the device from the Kabukimono’s smaller hands.
“Niwa fled this place for fear of punishment, but he left you a gift.” The mechanic said, opening the device up slowly as he spoke. “He said it’s the one thing that you’ve been looking for…” He removed a weird object from the device, making sure that the Kabukimono couldn’t see it just yet.
“..He took it straight from the chest of one of his innocent servants.” The mechanic said, finally showing the Kabukimono the object.
It was a withered heart.
The Kabukimono was stunned. Niwa murdered an innocent person in cold blood and gave him the heart. The innocent person’s heart protected him from the filth.
Consumed by anger and grief, the Kabukimono dropped the decayed heart to the ground and left, never to come back.
——
Scaramouche would have never thought that Niwa could do such a thing. But it didn’t matter anymore. The puppet felt his eyes start to drop from the pure exhaustion. Was it finally his time?
He closed his eyes and darkness was the only thing he saw for a while. The long silence and the darkness could’ve been enough to drive a human crazy, but Scaramouche was not human. He only thought. Thought about the world, his past, and present.
He never opened his eyes once.
He saw a silhouette of a familiar little boy. The one that was abandoned, just as he was.
He also considered the young boy a part of his family. When he passed away, Scaramouche was even more distraught than when Niwa disappeared. Because he didn’t see Niwa’s dead body.
——
He knew it was going to happen. So why is he still sitting here?
Kabukimono sat inside the burning building, waiting for the fire to turn his body to ash just as it did to the child with no name. He held the doll close to his chest, wailing into the flames about another one of his betrayals.
“It’s just ashes..” He thought, having no more energy to speak out loud.
No…
He wasn’t going to sit here and cry. Crying was the only reason he was abandoned in the first place.
Kabukimono stood up from the ground and threw the doll into the raging fire. He wasn’t going to show weakness any longer.
He’ll make humans and gods alike pay for his suffering. Then he will never again be defiled by worldly filth. He will be even more powerful than his mother, who only valued strength and eternity.
He’ll be powerful and devine. No matter what it takes.
Several years went by, and Kabukimono joined an organization called the fatui. He trained and did the dirtiest of work until he was finally an official Fatui Harbinger. He was number 6 out of 11 Harbingers, making him the 6th most powerful Harbinger, but he needed more.
One of his fellow Harbingers, The Doctor, wanted to experiment on Kabukimono, with the promise that he would turn him into a god. And how could he say no?
The Doctor, also known as Dottore, was elated when Kabukimono said that he would be his little test subject. Dottore gave him the name Scaramouche.
The experiments were the most painful, grueling things that Scaramouche had ever gone through. Dottore injected strange fluids into him, used all kinds of elements and elemental reactions, and said strange things to him all to document his reactions. And the best thing about this for Dottore was that Scaramouche didn’t die. All his human subjects did.
After years of these experiments, Dottore finally found out how to make Scaramouche a god. By injecting archon residue inside of him. Scaramouche didn’t know much about archon residue except that it could make him powerful, giving him the idea that using a gnosis with the archon residue would make him the most powerful god. Meaning he could wipe out the whole of Teyvat.
He just needed to find a gnosis. But as he was about to set out and get one, he got an order to accompany La Signora, the 8th Harbinger, to Inazuma. He really didn’t want to go back to his home land, especially with his mother as the Electro Archon, but he had to take the orders.
While he was in the delusion factory, he came across the traveler. He was all worked up over a puny human dying from a delusion. Scaramouche didn’t run the factory, but it was interesting to see the traveler reacting to the archon residue inside the building. But he was interrupted by none other than Yae Miko, the same kitsune that wanted him dead all those centuries ago.
Scaramouche was embarrassed to talk about it, but during that exchange with Miko she handed him the electro gnosis. So now he has it, the same gnosis he was supposed to be a vessel for so long ago. And now, he can use it to become all powerful.
All that there was to do now was to let Dottore do his work.
He would have never thought that turning into a god would be so painful. Dottore created holes in Scaramouche’s back so he could inject the archon residue inside of him easily, but god did it hurt. But it was going smoothly, they got scholars from the Akademiya in Sumeru to build the Shouki no Kami so Scaramouche can be even more powerful. It was perfect.
All Scaramouche needed to do now was to wait until his whole body was filled with archon residue. But before he could finish, the traveler and Lesser Lord Kusanali showed up and ruined it all. The Lesser Lord took his gnosis and ruined all of his progress. As he fell to the ground, he only thought about his mother.
——
Scaramouche woke up to a surging pain all over his body. He groaned, squirming on the soft material below him. There was a wetness on his face, but he didn’t care until he realized that he was alive.
He opened his eyes and saw Lesser Lord Kusanali looking down at him with her big green eyes.
“A puppet that’s angry at the world and wanted to become a god just to destroy mankind, and yet you cry.” She observed. The last part of that sentence took him all the way back to when he was first created, his mother said the same thing.
He quickly wiped the tears from his face and turned away from the God of Wisdom.
“Why am I here?” Scaramouche asked, deciding to ignore the Lesser Lord’s observation.
“You were in a coma-like state for a few days since the battle between you and the traveler, I decided to take care of you here in the Sanctuary of Surasthana until you awoke.” The God of Wisdom explained, urging the puppet to lay back down with his small hands. He did as she wanted, but only because he was too exhausted and in pain to argue.
She hummed a soft tune as she used her godly powers to soothe the ache in his artificial body. He let out a sigh as he relaxed.
This was nice, but judging by the look on Lesser Lord Kusanali’s face, his suffering was only to continue.