#‘This power has no relation to his Delusion’ shut the FUCK up wikipedia

[m1d-45]

duality of man

summary: foul legacy only bends to childe’s will, he isn’t fully controlled by him.

a/n: foul legacy speaks in bold, childe speaks italicized. internal/mental speech is quoted ‘like this’ rather than simply italicized for the sake of childe, as tumblr does not have underline capabilities :/

word count: ~2.1k

-> warnings: spoilers for childe lore / liyue archon quest, childe is his own warning (and is frequently bloodthirsty and strange), violence and gore, it/it’s pronouns for foul legacy because it’s childe’s pov and also i said so, imposter sagau things. technically isn’t 100% canon compliant according to wikipedia.

-> lowercase intended!

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky

childe stalked through the forest, the foliage tinted by foul legacy’s vision. this form wasn’t the best for stealth, but it would help him find you faster.

he could hear your heavy breathing from the corner you backed yourself into, and grinned.

“surrender is a valid option,” he purred, voice warped and distorted through the heavy mask. your breath hitched, and his smile only grew. he had you. all he had to do was reach, reach with the clawed hands of his abyssal form and drag you out of wherever you’d hidden and he’d earn his place at his gods side. to be the one to find and kill you was an honor, one he was not keen on giving up.

he could imagine it now. dragging you along with his claws sunk deep into your neck, whatever blood left in your body staining his hands. your corpse would fall, lifeless, at his god’s feet, and he’d be the one to reap the rewards of their love.

you would not escape. he would not leave empty-handed.

he couldn’t.

childe tried to reach for the bush you were hiding behind, but his arm wouldn’t move.

no, not his arm, he realized. it was disobeying.

‘what are you doing?’ he hissed into his mind, pushing with all his might. still, the arm of foul legacy wouldn’t move. it was strange; it had never disobeyed before, and aside from the initial period to get used to piloting a body, he’s never had any issues.

‘i cannot allow you to kill them.’

‘what? why? if you want to have a hand in it, i’ll let you have a while to-‘

‘no. they are not to die.’

his arms moved of their own will, moving aside the branches much slower than he would have.

‘i refuse to allow the death of the one who made me.’

what?

the leaves eventually reveal you, tucked in as small a space as you can manage, holding a broken-off spearhead. your clothes are tattered, leaves caught within the creases. your hand is shaking so badly childe doubts you could hurt anybody but yourself with it.

your mouth opens like you want to say something, but nothing comes out. a thrill runs down childe’s spine at the fact that they’ve scared you from words, but it’s quickly overrun by the concern coming from foul legacy.

wait… concern?

“your grace… how ruined you have become.”

your eyes flick between the pearl of its eye and the hand, likely trying to decide which is a better target, and childe wants to laugh. he wants to urge you to strike, to watch as you fruitlessly spend your energy bashing that spearhead into foul legacy’s armor, blunting the steel against it.

the devouring deep doesn’t let him speak.

“please… i’m sorry.”

normally, hearing somebody beg for their life would make childe’s day, week if they do it prettily enough, but this… some part of his heart, as beaten and rotted it is, hurts.

whatever sadness he feels quickly burns into rage. what right did foul legacy have over his emotions? making him pity this imposter, as if you weren’t fit to die the moment your treacherous tongue claimed you were somebody you weren’t.

“i know, i know.” legacy’s claw extends and you flinch, feet kicking up dirt as you press yourself further against whatever rock you’re against.

“stay away from me!”

foul legacy hums a low note, and childe wants to scream as his hand falls to the dirt. what power did you have over it? why didn’t it just take whatever it was it wanted from you?

‘why are you hesitating?’

‘you wouldn’t understand.’

the first sensible thing it’s said. he didn’t understand.

“it is alright. i am not the one you fear.“

“yes you are! i… i know you, childe.”

childe allowed himself a smile. no matter how much foul legacy pushed aside his commands, it would always have to deal with his reputation. the fact that he disrupted its plans just as it did his brought him a little joy from the situation.

“i am not him, leading light. please… do not be afraid.”

‘leading light’?

childe had heard many names and titles for the divine creator in his time, and knew that that one in particular was favored by abyssal creatures. he’d heard it shouted and screamed, people slaughtered in the name of the light that they claim leads them from the abyss. he even adopted it himself, at one point, for the first few years after he was freed from it himself. he’d killed with the title on his tongue, and ripped out others’ that dared to dirty it.

all of this to say that foul legacy was claiming you were the divine creator.

you. you.

you, who dared to walk with a face that wasn’t yours, to gaze with eyes that didn’t belong to you. you.

he could admit that he didn’t sense the aura of the creator—with a bitter, sour tongue, but admitted nonetheless—due to his time spent in the abyss. his soul was too rotten to resonate with theirs, only able to find solidarity in their violent retribution cast down on those that dared cross them. he acknowledged that he was beyond saving, that even the highest of the high could barely begin to fill the gaping maw of the abyss inside of him. he’d… not accepted, but come to terms with it.

but even he did not dare to call another by their name.

“you’re… you’re what?”

“i can hear him.” foul legacy’s hand extended once more, slower, gentler, with much more care than any other action childe had seen from it. “he is in my mind, but we are not the same. i can promise, while i am here, no harm will come to you.”

you didn’t trust it. good, as childe was starting to distrust foul legacy as well.

“you… you’re saying you’re…?” the spearhead in your hand lowered, some of the fear—regrettably—fading from your eyes. recognition flooded instead, and childe was confused as to how you found comfort in a creature of the abyss. he knew he had a reputation, one stained with violence and blood, and surely that would extend to it as well, right? foul legacy… it couldn’t be more trustworthy than him.

“i am his foul legacy. i am the devouring deep.”

its clawed hand finally reached yours, and you let it close around your wrist even as hesitation shone in your eyes. your lips parted, but whatever you had to say died before it spoke again. “please… can you find it in your heart to trust once more? if only for me, if only for a moment?”

childe tried once more to take over the form, and was again met with the stone of foul legacy’s will. he huffed; it shouldn’t be getting this close to you, and he shouldn’t have to watch as it did. it shouldn’t have even disobeyed in the first place.

“why don’t you hate me?”

foul legacy sighed, the sound warped and roughened by its mask. “this world- no, these people are fools. do not hold the mistakes of the many in your heart. they do not understand the weight of their actions. they are being pushed, puppetted by another.”

‘what are you talking about?’

‘hold your tongue.’

childe was in shock. first it went against him by taking over his actions, then it claimed you were the sacred creator, then told him to shut up?

you were sitting up, carefully daring to come closer, and childe beat at the boundaries of his will with all his strength. he couldn’t let this go on any longer. he could take being disobeyed, he could take his anger out on some innocents with its hand once it was tired enough to give him control, but for it to disrespect his god?

he could not- he would not let that go so easily.

childe pushed at his arm with all his might as foul legacy sat itself on the floor, tugging you closer. he sent the command to move at least a thousand times, begging his own hand to squeeze, to snap the bones in your wrist, to show any sign that he still had control in this body.

the most he got was a twitch of the ring finger.

he refused to allow foul legacy to take him over like this. he could not let it shatter his reputation and attack his beliefs like this. it could not say that you were his god, it could not say that it was in control, it could not say that childe was wrong. it should not hold you will claws that should kill, and you should not gaze so deeply into the pearl of a monster’s eye.

it was almost as if you could see him within it, your searching eyes piercing right into his. he hoped you could, that you could see how much he hated the situation he found himself in. how much he hated you, you for warping his foul legacy’s mind, you for making it think you were it’s god.

“how long do i have?”

“hm?”

“before he comes back.”

childe tried again to assert his presence. he failed.

you shifted closer to foul legacy, sitting against its side. part of childe wanted to laugh at you, at the fact that you dared to lean on a creature of the abyss. part of him wanted to sneer and call you pathetic for it.

the same part that knew it was fruitless even as he tried to follow through on it.

foul legacy put its arm around you, pulling you into its side. the glass of its eye bumped against the top of your head, words of reassurance buzzing in its head.

childe huffed to himself, feeling his anger start to bubble again. there was no reason for this behavior. there was no reason for foul legacy to try and influence him by bleeding their thoughts together, nor for it to subject him to this. even it should recognize the creator, even if by context clues from the people around it.

and if this was all a trick, childe could accept it. if foul legacy had whispered into his mind, told him that yes, it knew, it believed, then he could tolerate the attacks against his god. he could bite back his words and let legacy do what he did best: follow orders.

if this was a ploy, childe would be fine. but foul legacy’s claws never dug into your side, and the whispers it spoke were not of retribution, but of reverence. how he wished it would just obey, even if not his orders but theirs.

follow the orders of the true god, who was in their palace, waiting for their trusted followers to capture and kill you. sitting, waiting for your corpse to be tossed at their feet, waiting for their loyal followers to carry out their word. the true creator, their god, not you. not you, not any other fake that dared to imitate them, and not those that behaved as foul legacy did here, following the impersonators and claiming they were real.

foul legacy hissed in his mind. ‘still your traitorous tongue.’

‘i won’t! if you took a moment to even think-’

‘and if you paused to allow yourself to do the same, you would agree.’

he did think, he had plenty of time to think when foul legacy was- was almost cuddling you, the warp of its voice doing nothing to mask the affection within it. he can’t move, he cant take control, and it has the gall to say he should think? all he’s able to do is think! he could sit here for an eternity, listening to the quiet rumble of legacy’s voice, mulling over every action he has or could taken, and he still wouldn’t be convinced. he wouldn’t agree. all he would be is sore, tired, and angry.

and of all the ways he could spend his time… he could fight for eternity, he could hit at the boundary between their brains with mental fists that never tired, he could give himself a headache with how hard he tried to dig his hand into your side. he could plan out his revenge against foul legacy, he could start to draft the prayer of repentance he’d surely have to raise to his god, he could do so much and yet precious little.

and that beast wanted him to think?

inside a body that wasn’t his, childe screamed.