#I like nothing about this game except for the characters and Khaenri'ah

[slothcapsule]

Kaeya's design pt.2 (updated until 5.1 because yes, more stuff gets added with updates, his design is that thought ahead)

or maybe im delusional and looking into things way too much! heyy, Me again!! this is gonna be a master post of all the things ive noticed about kaeya's design, ive made one like it before but since then there's been a bunch of new stuff so i decided to make a new post that has everything i have to note. this is complied of things i myself have noticed and things that others have. this post will not include anything about his skin other than noting a couple of significant differences since the outfit wasn't made specifically for him in the scope of the story, but i might cover it in a separate post

kaeya's design mostly consists of "two sides" in a way, his "mondstat" side and his "khaenri'ah" side.

his mondstadt side includes his vision, the full side of his cape in the back, the earring he wears and his rat tail, all this represents the freedom he has in mondstat and the person he grew to be there, a vision bearing knight of favonius.

the khaenri'ah side includes his eyepatch, the wisp of lighter hair in his bang, a clipped cape ("wing") and the majority of the fur coating. i believe this goes to represent that he's still tied to khaenri'ah despite all the time he's spent in mondstadt, and that he's quite aware of it. Also, the glove on that side has a kind of buckle that kind of reminds me of a shackle or a handcuff, as well as this thing with a bunch of eight pointed stars that are not apparent on the mondstadt

all across his design (the boots, corset belt, gloves, little things on the ends of the cape thing he has, his left sleeve) there are bunch of "eight pointed" stars we see associated with khaenri'ah, one being in his pupil which was a confirmed trait to khaenri'ahn people ever since we saw dainsleif.

id like to note that kaeya's eyepatch is stressed on a lot in game. its constantly referred back to most of the time when kaeya is brought up. he has a voiceline about it (that has been changed once in the english version to to a mistranslation i believe, ill include both versions) the first is the current version.

traveler has a voiceline about it where paimon makes fun of it but i think its notable there's a voiceline specifically about it at all.

its mentioned right when we start the world quest "Bough Keeper" where we meet dainsleif. he doesn't even have an eyepatch half of his face is just black it was a stretch in the first place.

kaeya himself dismisses it as nothing unusual.

in his story quest he says he inherited it from his grandfather, which is solid proof that they're related by blood. (his story quest has some crazy foreshadowing btw that predicted that him and the abyss twin are possibly related in some way or another by extensions but i wont get into it here)

there isnt really a solid idea attached to any of this, other than the fact that kaeya's eyepatch is stressed on as a point of intrigue, its pretty implied to be related to his origin of khaenri'ah, and we often see khaenri'hn people with their right eye covered in some way. and to those of you that think that he wears the eyepatch because diluc injured his eye during his fight, no he isnt. it might've been scarred by him yes but he isnt blind in that eye, and in the webcomic it shows kaeya wearing an eyepatch on the day crepus died, before the fight with diluc.

while we're on the subject of his eyes, he's somewhat of an abnormality amongst Khaenri'ahn people. every other khaenri'ahn person we know have teal eyes with their pupil being a bold black star outline, kaeya's on the other hand are a darker blue with a more faded filled in star. i wont include the eyes of every single character to prove my point but trust me i looked at them all. the only exception seems to be pierro but since he doesnt have an in-game model yet and he wasnt shown super clearly in the trailer im unsure what to make of it for now so i wont include it.

one of the first things generally noticed about kaeya's design once you look into it a little is that he somewhat resembles cryo abyss mages, most notably the fur coat he keeps thrown over his shoulder, the "bunny ears" in his hair (ahoge?) but most of the resemblance comes from playstyle.

in playstyle he's similar in the sense that he teleports on his fifth attack, his ult is similar to the icicles they produce after their shield is broken, he produces his own shield at c4 etc.

(EDIT: i somehow forgot including abyss heralds here, which is insane of me considering that i was always under the impression that if kaeya does turn out to be an abyss monster its definitely more likely to be a herald/lector. i dont necessarily think that he is but there are similarities!)

As for abyss heralds, he does also have a similar design element with the Frost Fall one! Despite being a minor similarity i think its worth pointing out , but they do have kind of similar lapel things, the herald has those wing like things both in the front and back , similar to kaeya's "clipped" wings, that appear under the full wing and in the front of his outfit as well

(fun fact, when i found out they're going to release a cryo abyss herald i was so excited and kept prolonging the fight with it in the quest so i can see if it has similar attack patterns to kaeya) (it does, he does a couple slash attacks that look like kaeya's normal attacks)

one crazy thing also is his cape looks a lot like the top part of the celestial nails and the bottom part of the statues of the seven, and weirdly enough parts of paimons outfits.

a lot of people theorize the log in screen is the enterance to celestia, and that the nails in dragonspine and the chasm are fallen pillars from there. for someone from a godless nation its sort of weird that he seems to have that connection to something celestial huh? this part of the design is also included in his special dish in the skewer itself. (he also marks the mushroom with an eight pointed star as opposed to the x on the regular one)

other than celestian, mondstadtian, khaenri'ahn themes in his outfit, he also has fatui ones! on the front side of the cape we can see that it attaches to a fur thing that covers kaeya's lapels. i have no idea how this attaches or if its just thrown on top, but this design choice is distinctly fatui, weirdly enough. specifically in the style of the attire of the fatui harbingers coats or official ware when they're gathered. i related it distinctly to pierro before but after getting a good look at capitano's model its more fatui, though there's some things that are similar distinctly between kaeya and pierro.

most distinctly, the fur and the lapels being in a very similar shape which is the part that's distinctly fatui, the mask/eyepatch over the right eye as well a strikingly differently colored strand of hair being distinct to pierro and kaeya.

there's a kind of gap in the middle of pierro's chest part of the outfit that somewhat resembles the one kaeya has as well. i saw someone point this out on reddit but i cant find the post because it was a while ago but regardless, they brought up the point of it being exactly in the place and shape of where abyss heralds/black serprent knights have an eight-pointed star, which could be a subtle nudge at khaenri'ah as well.

now, i have two ideas of what those similarities could be hinting at.

kaeya is actually a fatui member (which i believe has some sort of merit because of the recent appearances of capitano and some similarties between them in attire and playstyle weirdly enough, as well as a theory ive been getting behind that states that capitano could be/is related to anfortas alberich)

the fatui harbinger design choices are actually inspired by khaenri'ah, which isnt a stretch given that pierro is the founder and director of the fatui harbingers. thus making them look similar to kaeya rather than vice versa.

panning back up a little bit, regarding the silver hair in kaeya, it seems to be expanding to the rest of his hair, in his skin it goes down the length of his braid.

in the webcomic where we flash back to the past a bit, we see kaeya actually doesnt have the little strand of silver over his left ear, as well as when we return to the normal time setting of the comic, its also not included in his icy featherflight splash art (this 100% could be a stretch on my part they could've just forgot about it its a small strand) (while we're talking about stretches, my biggest one is that childe has a similar streak in his hair lol but that might be going toooo far)

last but not least, his vision, one of the most interesting things about his whole characters. a person from a nation that actively defied the gods recieving a sign of their recognition seems like kind of a threat doesnt it? and its all the more ominous that his vision casing is different from every other mondstadt casing!

this is the back of kaeya's vision next to the back of diluc's vision for comparison, the only notable things are the lack of a third wing probably signifying he's sort of out of place, and the swirl? wave? whatever you wanna call it is on the wrong side. every other character with a double sided vision has the swirl on the other side like jean, diluc, mona, eula, lisa (etc..? i havent seen anyone else with a double sided vision which is also interesting, at least from mond)

however!! weirdly enough, in the 3.8 summer event where kaeya gets his skin, his vision actually gets a different casing, as you can see he gets his full three wings, as well as an extra spike! but not really an extra spike because the vision is just on top of another thing that makes it look like it has a third spike, but the wing is actually there. the genshin fashion archive isnt updated with kaeya's skin so i cant check if there's a swirl, even though the vision isnt even double sided in the skin which is also really weird to me.

im pretty sure ive covered most things, if anyone has any additions please let me know! id love to look into them.

i think kaeya is a really interesting character who's incredibly centered around foreshadowing in the way he carries himself and his backstory, so to think that they managed to extend the foreshadowing bit into even his design is a little bit insane imo.

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

in jadeite do the characters still have the same eyes? like hutao with her flowery eyes and zhongli with his....serpent-like? ones

genuinely good question, i haven't really stopped to think about it? because in genshin as far as i know, the only eyes that really matter in terms of- what they look like? are the khaenri'ah star eyes. so like- we have people with wild-ass eyes but they never seem to factor in to the overarching lore of the game. with the exception of childe i guess? but his' are more like- they matter because he's an outlier (doesn't have the little anime shine), not because he has a particular shape in them.

also ngl i think you might be missremembering zhongli's eyes thanks in no small part i assume to fanon, bc i would not describe that man's eyes as serpent-like. neuvillette's? i can get behind. baizhu's and chongyun's? even more than neuvillette's. maybe even shinobu's but given her mask i guess hers are supposed to be more cat-like. but zhongli's...? like yes they're among the more non-normal eyes of the cast, but like- these:

next to these:

you see what i mean?

like not to get tinfoil hat on you but if i had to pick another character with eyes like zhongli's i would not pick the serpent men, but rather

you know? like they're the same shape, the colors are just inverted in the sense that her eyes are lighter with darker marks while zhongli's are darker with lighter marks, but other than that: rhombus in the middle with a ring around it. not sure there's any other character with eyes like those. xiao's look the most similar but on closer inspection he just has a semi-circle, not a full ring. so uh 🤷‍♂️

anyway- sorry about the tangent. i guess my answer to the actual question would be- maybe? i guess we can keep the eyes as they are, but just treat them the same way genshin seems to treat them. as in- most eye shapes are nothing more than a nod to the character's unique quirks rather than teyvat lore-relevant. again, teyvat lore-relevant i think is only the khaenri'ah star, maybe childe's eyes, and i guess baizhu's technically? and maybe neuvillette's. oh and arlecchino's of course. and i guess alhaitham can sit on the ?????? corner. but other than that hu tao having flowers isn't because of some long lost bloodline, but because she has plum (?) flower motifs. i think (inb4 it is about some long-lost bloodline lmao). you get what i mean? same goes for other characters with unique eyes. nahida has the four-leaf sigil bc she's connected to sumeru and the akasha and all that. kokomi has weird eyes because she's a fish. dori has an X in her eyes because money shines. like their eyes are unique but they don't have worldwide lore connotations the way the others seem to do. faruzan maybe has her eyes like that because she was stuck in some ruins for 100 years. i haven't read candace's lore but her golden eye can see stuff?? maybe she's lore-relevant too idk

so i guess bottom line is the people in this reality just have wild-ass eyes sometimes and it's no different than finding someone with albinism 🤷‍♂️ like you just go huh. neat. you're a genetic minority. anyway, and move on.

TL;DR: yeah the eyes are the same bc the only wacky eye-shapes that seem to REALLY matter in genshin's overarching lore are the khaenri'ah star ones, so i'm just not gonna bother w it.

if that bothers you we can also just say that they all have normal human-shaped eyes and keep the same color. like i guess what i'm trying to say is that only the khaenri'ah star will matter in the fic? and even then i'm unsure if it will matter all that much. so really whether hu tao has flowers in her eyes or not is irrelevant (using her as an example, but this applies to the others)

[nya-vivi]

in the end im replying to the oc ask in. another ask lol because 1. replying in comments is a pain 2. tumblr dms don't have the option to reply to a particular message and an ask will probably look more organized and better for you to read/reply because i got carried away and it's LONG (also i feel like we're gonna ping pong those long ass answers back and forth nehdhdhs not that i complain) but anyway,,

okokok im finally making a proper reply.

and im connecting in academical pain 🤝

about fandoms i'm interested in, my main ones at the moment are orv and honkai and afaik you're in neither so genshin is a perfect choice BUT im also kinda interested in the non fandom ones 👀 so if you'd like to talk about these ones too im all ears

for Lore:

ok so i had to point this out:

i suppose lore's lore really needs to be as correct as possible jdhdhd (i already love her name it's perfect for a travelersona 11/10)

anyway. so the whole idea is that what if there was another pair of siblings from which one was lost and another searching for them, yes? that's actually really cool, common goal, common adventure, like a better travel companion (sorry paimon). also aether mains unite and pretty boys so true

she honestly sounds like such a fun and positive person, i mean,, running around the teyvat, swinging the claymore back and forth, climbing to random places only to suddenly jump from them giving a heart attack the companions who only a second later notice that shes already gliding and laughing. like a chaotic moving source of serotonin a rey of sunshine etc etc, i think she would get along with amber!

OMG GOLD LORE TIED TO HER i love you for that this is literally my favorite piece of genshin lore. artifical heart is an interesting one i don't think ive seen this one that often actually, so more lifespan in exchange for altered body hmm does it affect her daily life in a way? or does it work the exact same way like a regular one but only works for a longer time?

omg omg so. lore and aether traveling together and at the same time lumi and lorena's sis ended up in the same place AND together together? now that's an interesting coincidence i wonder what lore and aether's reaction would be to finding out

the recent quest. did give us a lot of info about khaenri'ah indeed jdhdhd but that's good! you have now more insight into it

for Qinxi:

ok so this one thing is making me curious, how difficult was it to get a name for her? you listed the symbols that are part of it and was it that you first thought about words/meanings you want to include and then constructed a name, or firstly came up with a name and the symbols alongside it?

oOOoooooOo make up maker, i know absolutely nothing about make up HOWEVER it doesn't stop me from thinking that it's cool! and expensive one? so she's probably on her way to start a very lucrative business

it's nice she managed to combine the two without giving up on one another (if she had to then i hope she'd decide to follow the artist dream) and getting the best outcome. so: effective work ✔️ doing something she likes ✔️ man i wish that was me

omg so even the tianquan of the liyue qixing orders her products? damnnn so she's basically set for life jdhdhd im really curious how you're going to develop her further!!

for Vivi:

she's named like you!! i guess the reason is being self insert right? FAVONIUS LIBRARIAN OMG shes living the best life fr

owow the story has angsty parts im now really curious jdjdjd also a self insert not being involved in the plot has a vibe like when a player does everything in the game - all side quests missions etc EXCEPT the main story (like my friend tends to lol) ndhdhd. also #2: reincarnated villainess in a way she was one but died and now is just a girl or she reincarnated into a villainess character or something? because i read one (technically two if we count a guy version or three if we also count an anime) comic about the latter and that's what my brain associates with that trope jdhdh

geo catalyst so like ningguang, that's really cool of her

jshdhdhs you're also studying languages, right? im starting to see the self insert-ness.

oOOoO irminsul thingies, i must admit i really like the magic time/memory tree stuff in all hoyo games. also ok so this kinda answers my previous question, she was a villainess in a past life but now she's someone else yes? AND got enlightened about all the stuff from previous life when she touched the tree?

ah damn you student debt, but graduating also has its merits so ig it's not the worst scenario's especially that she managed to transfer to mond (truly ms worldwide, from fontaine to sumeru to mond)

honestly being afraid of celestia doesn't surprise me the slightest, everything regarding it is sus as hell. also getting a vision despite not wanting it is in a way suffering from success, she could bond with keqing over that ndhdhd

and mannn, living under celestia's watch sure must be stressful, especially considering all the irminsul and past life things. springvale in this situation you described made me think about the shire from middle-earth jshdhd a peaceful piece of land in a huge fantasy word and its schemes and secrets

please tell me when you come up with next events of her story because this does indeed sound intriguing! i wonder if nahida knows about vivi's past, now that you mentioned her

also #number idk which, we'll be getting fontaine soon, will you be adding more details to vivi's backstory now that we'll have more insight to how exactly life there looks like? or will you just focus on her in the current place and time meaning sumeru - > mond with celestia kiiinda involved?

and ok that's all thank you so much for sharing these with me!! you weren't bothering me at all i asked about that myself after all and to be fair im actually pretty interested in the creation process, because when i have an oc it's really chaotic and random but yours seem so well thought!

also, you know what. reading about your ocs and especially vivi since she's like your own special genshinsona made me think about what would mine be and. now im flooded with thoughts but. here it's not a place for that ksjdjd

also also, if you dont mind could i make a doodle of one of them for you maybe 👉👈 they seem cool and recently i got a sudden boost of motivation and have been practicing digital art so. yeah

Len my beloved I was smiling kicking and giggling silly at the ask fr ♡♡♡

Thank you for the sweet words! I'm not used to sharing original characters, since they tend to be personal and, well, I understand it's not everyone's cup of tea hearing about a random OC that doesn't have even a proper story yet hahah (not me tho, I'm not sane when ocs are involved,,, I love how creative everyone gets about them ♡) so it really made my day!!

I will be answering your questions (and some corrections because I did not express myself correctly ajbsiask English my beloathed) below the read more as last time, not to clog the dash ♡

Uhm, spoilers from Caribert & Act IV of Sumeru's archon quest??

So! Part by part:

About my other non-fandom ocs » so I once (a lot of years ago) made a story (a teeny beety dark) about a girl who could see ghosts and supernatural creatures and she could see her dead friend. In the end I made her friend, Anna, pass away, and I don't like killing my ocs ngl.

So I revived Anna and made her part of a blog idea I had, which was kinda restaurant-like thematic, so there would be a few ocs who worked as servers and the owner was a cat... That was before I found I was not meant to get into the spotlight LOL, but I still keep her in my head as part of the staff and occasionally play with her HAHA I quite like her, she's nice and I learned better of plot devices (so I try to kill my darlings the least I can).

About Lore, the idea at first was that both Lore and her sis were from another city but ended up in Khaenri'ah for one thing or another. Since Lore was the eldest of the two, she was the one to 'get to work' for both of them, but she was sick with a rare heart problem and it was difficult to work.

That's when Gold enters and makes the deal with Lore: Gold gets to experiment on her about artificial hearts (since it is before Albedo and, in my own supposition, she was perfectioning the art of artificial life) and she gets a good heart and money for her and her sister. In the end, the heart is perfectioned just before whatever happened in Khaenri'ah and Lore is sealed away to avoid her heart to be damaged.

That's when the timeline in my own story gets fuzzy, but roughly her sis ends up meeting Lumine and since she's alone (for Lore is asleep and secure), she leaves with Lumine and Dain.

The thing is, that in the Caribert quest they said everyone residing in Khaenri'ah that wasn't part of the nobles ended up turned into hilichurls, so I had to discard that idea </3

Most of the story is adaptable, but I have to get the most important thing very well thought before anything (I kinda need a bit more lore, ah the irony).

Her heart works like a motor: it works like a normal heart but it doesn't beat. It can stop if it is not properly maintained (and after 500 years, it needs revision) so as she's going to look for her sis, she's also looking for Gold (and Albedo) so they can revise her.

In an AU ending, Aether and Lore end up as in-laws LMAO they are friends but the surprise is there.

About Qinxi, the name was hard, because I don't know Chinese Hanzi (the logograms), but I usually use one website where you can see Hanzi combinations for actual names (I cannot quite find the website rn, but I will send it to you if you are interested) and found first the Qin logogram and then the Xi logogram with other combinations. Then, I copied the two and pasted them in yabla and liked how they sounded together. The name was primarily phonetic, then the meaning went along well and left it at that.

My main inspiration for her is the Song Dynasty, specially the make up (you can find there pretty designs of huadian) and also they seem to have pants? Pretty cool imho. But make up making is difficult to find ajdgajdja so I'm still searching for that 👀 (Edit 1: I did in fact find a bit on how chinese people used to do make up, so I have that more covered than before).

About Vivi, okay this is a bit difficult to explain: what I meant with the 'villainess' part was that Vivienne existed as a person before my self-insert inhibited her body.

Basically she died and was transmigrated to a body whose soul died at the same time (that's the mechanic, but it will not be explained tbh). So Vivienne (original) became Vivi. She is not a villainess nor was the previous host a villainess but that is what I informally call a 'villainess reincarnation' lol she still has her memories but they are fuzzy.

I'm thinking of making her transmigrate when Vivienne (og) was already into the Akademiya, simply because I'm not masochistic enough to go through college again HAHAH

I thought about making her catalyst because I detest combat aksboad but at some point I thought about making her ability/ultimate another weapon (since it has been increasing with more charas) but I'm debating, because it was when originally I thought of making her go through adolescence again. As I didn't like the idea of that, I think I might just scratch that out.

The geo part was because I got both geo/dendro elements/characteristics, but I really don't want to go through the academic system again (and honestly, I would be both curious but terribly afraid of finding something I weren't supposed to so a big nono) kavdoadb

To go through the last part of your ask: I didn't remember Celestia has in fact not appeared in 500 years, but because she ends up in the same timeline as the Traveler, she's still afraid xd I was thinking of making her a descendant, as she isn't quite of this world, and her information doesn't really appear in the Irminsul until she actually gets into the body (and thinking over a 'corrupted file' in the Irminsul 👀🤭), so Nahida knows something is up with her but Vivi really doesn't want to say anything important enough to change the plot, so in the end they get into a deal.

We will have to see what is cooking in Fontaine, but I already have a bit of a subplot (Vivi is going to become a wanted woman at some point HAHAH) the only thing left is to see if it isn't discordant with the world quest 👀 I also plan to include some info about her family! She has a brother and a father in-game, so both of them will appear, as she has a good relationship with them.

My goal is make her life difficult but not a disaster jagskadh my poor baby.

I would be SUPER excited if you decide to make art of Vivi 🤭🤭🤭 I have Vivi's info in my pinned post, but I have changed her design a bit 🤡 let me present the bust of her that I changed:

I changed a bit her hair and made her skin complexion darker, because the idea is that her mother was from Sumeru and her body got all the melatonin and I didn't quite knew what ✨color theory✨ was at the time because her base skin color is way lighter than it seems aksbaoxb

I want to change her outfit too, the idea of a sash tied around her waist as corsette type but not as rigid as one is still in my mind. I want her have something flowy (and ribbon-y) to match with both Sumeru's and Fontaine's clothing designs, but at the same time comfortable enough to be in the library or taking a stroll or fishing (because I haven't forgot about it. I have been making rounds and getting the fishing rods and I want her to have it as a hobby lolol). I'm looking for historical references (since it is theorized Fontaine is around the 1700/1800s France) but nothing concrete yet.

The reality of the well thought character (even if I feel she's still way underdeveloped for what I want) is my hyperfixation qjsnsoxb idk if that's good or not, but writing about her makes me think of her more solidly if it makes sense? More tangible than only a concept. Do you want to get mentioned if I ever decide her clothes?? (It's ok to say not don't worry fufu 🤭)

I am very excited for Fontaine (next month??) the only thing I know rn is what the npcs have told us but I'm super excited to see it (and the level of mechanical advancement, which I am obsessed with in genshin) to see what I can work with 👀

Oh! Don't forget to tell me if you ever think more things about your genshinsona 👀 you know I am very interested 👀👀 I feel like mr engineer and Vivi would get along as she's kinda of a mechanic and kind of a nerd about it too <3

[cluescorner]

The three types of Genshin Impact Siblings

1. We are/were literally the only people each other have, we probably had/have codependency issues but we’re working on it through becoming friends with the other main characters, we are very different in some ways but at our cores we are the same, we have faced a lot of grief and expectations in our lives, and our bond is incredibly strong. 

2. Fuck you, bitchass. You think I give a shit about you? You’re right but I’m fucking mad about it. Cain instinct bitch, there can only be fucking one. We are literally so distinct from each other that we share maybe like 2 personality traits and maybe loyalty to our designated region but even that’s debatable. Some people don’t consider us siblings. Sibling rivalry. I do not trust you even a little, but you need to tell me everything that you’ve been up to or I’m going to scream. I am going to kill you but if anybody else tries I’m probably gonna lose my mind. I will kill every archon for you. I hate you. Get out of my sight you punk ass loser. Also you owe me 200 mora from when I bought you that toy when we were too young to understand the meaning of money, pay up asshole. No wait don’t pay up I need to hold that over your head the next time we have an argument so that I don’t lose ground when you bring up something I did that was WAY WORSE THAN THAT.  

3. A weird mix of Types 1 and 2, but give them a height difference.