#and venti was an equal in terms of being the bard's beloved friend

[vv-ispy]

nameless bard ameno archon au.............

[godoflazziness]

The Flowers, Birds, Grass And The Trees

venti was not a member of the family. stowaway turned into guest that may stay for a month or just a few days. the family was aware of his yearly slumber that could last for longer than just three months.

the longest winter slumber having lastest for five hundred years. with this in mind, sunday was able to keep venti's bank account active even during the times of the year where the wind spirit was inactive.

sunday is the head of the oak family who are the leaders of the five linages within the family and as venti had a good reputation among the alfalfa family who are in charge of economic matters on penacony and the market within the planet of festivites. it wasn't too hard to convince them to keep hold of venti's profits over the years.

if only a certain blockhead thought of doing such a thing back on teyvat but no, of course not- just let your friend suffer from poverty and homelessness. okay. perhaps poverty was bit of a stretch since monstadt had the knights of favnious working day and night to keep everything in order and venti wasn't exactly suffering either. each archon also tended to just look out for their own nation and their own issues. venti didn't exactly talk to them about how bad his life had gotten and they in turn usually didn't talk to him about anything serious.

the vessel known as venti was always meant to be the side of the god who had no serious problems. the regular human boy with regular human boy needs and wants. writing poetry and drinking wine yet everyone in monstadt had an idea that venti wasn't quite human based on how he behaved and the way he talked about life as if having more experience than them yet never judging them.

barbatos. the side of him who was the ruler of monstadt and had much wisdom from the many years they had lived only to find themself without a nation to look after and therefore that more serious side of our beloved bard had no reason to resurface since the fall of teyvat.

venti couldn't recall what barbatos has recently been up to- not entirely anyway. only remembering the term masked fool and vague images of people with masks in a tavern at the end of the cosmos.

venti wouldn't think too hard on it as that wasn't his purpose. merely shook his head and continued on as he headed to one of the many recording studios owned by the iris family. he was the closest to the iris family while not being an official member. barbatos kept reminding him of the monstadt clans and adviced him to not agree to joining the ranks of the family and venti listened as he had a lingering bad feeling about the faction that claims to be for the harmony.

barbatos had a bad experience with this kind of system and had became wary of any nobility or high statused individual while still fully believing in freedom. they wouldn't act against the family unless given proof or having seen for themself that the family was oppressing a group of people.

so far the family has treated everyone equally and barbatos remains satisfied for now. besides.. this wasn't their nation, it wasn't even their home world. barbatos was no ruler. not that they ever wanted to be one in the first place. both barbatos and venti were in agreement that ruling over others wasn't something that they would be so willing to do and that nobody in penacony would like the idea of it either.

these two only slightly different personalities residing within one body, one soul with venti currently in control of said body. the more venti acted dumb, the less people would look to him as a potential leader while that question barbatos asked the traveller so long ago still remained in his mind- what is freedom when demanded of you by a god? it surely wasn't true freedom at all.

venti had sent a text message to robin to talk about the idea of doing a colab for the upcoming charmony festival yet even after a couple of hours now, he hadn't gotten a response. he featured she must have simply been busy preparing for the charmony festival and therefore went to the studio to discuss it with her agents and nothing seemed to be amiss at first as they welcomed him in and told him that they would let robin know his interest in a collaboration while allowing the wind lifeform his time in one of the recording booths.

venti didn't have anything in mind planned and just decided to wait on robin's answer on the collaboration before writing anything just yet. walking into one of the booths, taking a sit in front of the mic and putting the headphones on. he took a breath and quietly hummed to himself for a second as that one song of robin's had been playing all throughout the golden hour and got struck in his head. recalling everything that happened that day and all the things he thought about.

" crash land into the place- oh, what a fall from grace~" he soon started to sing with eye closed. a very pop inspired ballad style as he smiled to himself, " if you saw me now, would you even recognize my face?" he was playing around and having fun. humming to himself whenever he couldn't quite think of words yet. " hmmhmm!- warrior of the stars- hmmhmm! - don't you forget how far you've come-" a gentle breeze would pick up in the recording booth as he was just having a blast and slowly he himself was sitting on air instead of the chair that was placed there.

looking down at this and only giggling to himself before quickly noticing that the wind would not only affect his jacket, shirt and hair but also the skirt he now wore. this startled him as he hadn't thought to put anything between the skirt and his undergarments and quickly placed himself down on his feet while stopping the gust of wind from pulling at the skirt.

venti looked up and around to make sure nobody else had seen that. somehow it felt different than when he would walk around in a crop top and short shorts. like somehow his own wind had violated him. he let out a breath when he saw nobody yet pulled down the headphones to hang from his neck and listened out for anyone just in case. .. he should really start remembering to wear shorts underneath his skirt or maybe switch to skorts.

placing headphones back and walking over to the door that led into the space where tech would be, opening the door and peaking in to take a look around. still seeing and hearing no one, venti would go to find and grab his belongings, head into the nearest restrooms.

he looked between the male sign and female sign, debating on which he should use. probably the men's restroom because this body of his is biologically male but most male bathrooms are filthy and disgusting even in penacony. both would have stalls in them though and thus venti went into the women's bathroom, going into one of the stalls to put on shorts under his skirt though soon he would overhear someone enter the bathroom sounding like robin but he knew it wasn't. her voice isn't sound like it did last time venti saw her.

standing on top of the toilet and looking over the top of the stall door, he would see what looked like robin slowly swift into a much shorter girl with pig tails and dressed in red. instincts kicked in as venti recognized the girl, opening the stall door and running over to greet her.

" hu tao! is that you!?" he exclaimed excitedly only for the girl to turn around and definitely not be hu tao yet she did recognize him as well. " huh!? venti!! what are you doing in the ladies' washroom. and for the last time, my name is not 'hu tao'. I don't know hu told you tat but you should cut it taot!" she exclaimed acting as if offended yet somehow venti knew she was merely joking around even before seeing that devious smirk and hearing her laugh as she eaned against the sink counter while venti took a seat on it beside her.

" haha! where do you even come up a name like that? sounds very.. xianzhou and I know you're not one of them." not hu tao stated while venti continued to watch her while trying to recall what her actual name was again and soon she would look him over and giggle to herself, " ohhh.. I see what's happening. I get it. men's restrooms suck. I had to go into one this one time when I was shapeshifted into a man's body. not very nice I can tell you that." and even though she kept talking and joking around with him. laughing in response at the jokes she made, venti was no where close to figuring out who she was and how he knew her.

" probably wondering why your dear friend sparkle was disguised as robin just a second ago, hm?" 'sparkle' then asked upon noticing venti's confusion while she was in the middle of checking herself in the mirror. gotta make sure everything looked like her or at least every part of her body looked right at least. " I won't spoil much but it starts with ka and ends with boom. anyway! I am about to make my very first appearance in the game and soo.. back to sparkle it is! very sorry you won't get to play too."

oh yes. right. sparkle is one of the masked fools who are devoted to the path of the elation and worship the aeon, aha. it was coming back to venti now.. as he spent a great deal of time with the masked fools as barbatos to the point they started to view him as one of them.

venti has spent time with quite the few factions over the many years since the destruction of teyvat. it was hard to really keep track. from the xianzhou flag ships to the denizens of abundance, from the masked fools to the genius society. the only faction venti hadn't encountered yet was the nameless because somehow he managed to miss them at every turn but not today. today venti had been on penacony when the nameless decided to come back to visit their old friends. venti got to meet one of the current members of the astral express crew- march 7th.

venti knew sparkle's apology likely wasn't genuine and that she probably didn't actually care that the wind spirit would be missing out on all the fun thus the man only giggled in reply and stated, " oh, sparkles! wherever there are adventurers like the nameless, a bard like me simply must follow. I only just managed to catch up with them. you really think I would be out of the game so quickly, hm?"