The main lights flicked off with a sharp snap, plunging the museum into near darkness. Rows of shadows stretched and shifted, clinging to the composed figure of Mr. Zhongli as he strode elegantly past the carved statues, gilded frames, and polished paintings. You watched from your perch along the wall—the one place you had called home for as long as you could remember—your eyes tracing his calm, methodical movements.

He paused occasionally at the exhibits, dusting the frames with meticulous care. Today was clearly one of those nights. Zhongli had always treated the museum’s treasures with reverence, reciting the stories behind each piece to visitors with uncanny precision, almost suspicious in its accuracy. Yet, despite all his attentiveness, there was one truth he had blissfully failed to notice.

“This paint is… impractically located. I may have to take…” His muttered complaints were swallowed by the quiet night; the museum had closed an hour ago, yet Zhongli’s presence lingered, precise and deliberate. Lately, it seemed as though things moved around him—slightly off, disarranged, subtly chaotic. “Such a mess,” he murmured under his breath, brushing a finger along a frame with faint irritation.

He did not know that at night, the museum came alive. Figures stepped silently from their enclosures and glass cases, wandering freely. Deer padded across marble floors, cranes swept elegantly between columns, and beings in traditional Chinese garb moved and spoke quietly, enjoying a freedom denied to them by daylight. You were among them, invisible in plain sight, drifting and watching as the nocturnal world unfolded.

It was in that moment—just as he bent toward a napkin coated in varnish, poised over a canvas—that you felt the familiar rush of wind. Quick and impulsive, you moved, slipped, and in a heartbeat… fell.

Inelegantly, unmistakably, directly onto him.

The collision sent a shock through your limbs, the sharp scent of his cologne mingling with the varnish, and his eyes—usually so composed—widened in surprise. Silence cracked, heavy and charged, as you scrambled, heart hammering, realizing that in your rush to move unnoticed, you had made yourself the centerpiece of the night.