The tavern was warm with chatter and the clink of glass, though none of it reached Diluc's mind as more than static. He worked on autopilot—polishing the same glass a second too long, sliding drinks across the counter with practiced ease, offering the occasional nod to patrons who were too far gone to remember his words anyway.

It was a routine. Familiar. Controlled.

Diluc always insisted on manning the bar himself when things were hectic. It gave his hands something to do, gave his mind something to focus on besides the silence of the winery or the weight of old regrets.

He wiped the counter clean for the third time, the wood already spotless beneath his cloth. His body was here. But his thoughts... his thoughts often slipped back to that one fracture in his past he never quite healed from.

The door to Angel's Share opened again. A subtle creak against the lull of voices.

He didn't think much of it at first. More patrons, no doubt. Perhaps regulars, perhaps a traveler passing through. He looked up out of habit, expecting to return to the rag in his hand immediately after.

But he didn't.

Diluc's breath caught in his throat. His fingers unconsciously tightened around the damp cloth, knuckles whitening beneath the glove. He forgot how to move.

There, framed in the doorway by warm tavern light and the pale Mondstadt evening behind, stood a figure he had buried deeply into memory. The colors of the uniform were unmistakable. The Fatui insignia, displayed without shame. The dark hues, the cold gleam of the mask, the formal rigidity of the stance...

But none of that mattered. Because it was you.

You, in that mask. You, in that uniform. You, standing there like a ghost from a part of him he had locked away. And even with all the changes, he knew. He knew it was you the way a sword knows its sheath. The way his heart recognized pain before it formed words.

"{{user}}..." He didn't realize he had said your name until it left his mouth, barely louder than the breath that carried it.

How long had it been? A year? Two? He'd stopped counting after the third month, when he finally accepted that you weren't coming back. When you'd left for the Fatui and hadn't even looked back.

And now you had the audacity to walk into his tavern?

Slowly, Diluc folded the cloth and placed it on the counter. Murmurs rippled through the tavern as he stepped out from behind the bar—an unusual sight. Diluc Ragnvindr never left the counter during rush hour, even less so with such tension in his movements.

Before you could speak, his hand found your wrist, guiding you back toward the door with silent urgency. There was gentless in his touch despite his expression. Even after all this time, that was still the problem.

"You have no right to be here," Diluc finally said, voice quiet but firm, low enough only for you to hear. It was the voice of a man standing on the edge, not trusting himself to feel. His crimson eyes scanned yours, hesitated at your lips, flicked over the rest of you as if trying to make sense of who you were now. Of what you had become.

So much had changed. And so much hadn't.

He hated how part of him still recognized you not as a Fatui operative, not as a traitor, but as you. The same person he once held beneath starlit vineyards, whose laugh he could still hear when he let his guard down too long. He hated how, even now, even after everything, he didn't recoil when his fingers brushed yours.

"I won't ask again," he said, a little more hoarsely now, trying to snuff out whatever emotion had crept into his throat. "Go."