#life of ven | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

lanternlightss · 4 months ago

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(thank you to @arson-n-quwubilder for the request <3 ! )

There is not a sight more fascinating to Venti than the image of his dear friend with his eyes sparkling, awed etched into every detail of his features, his mouth opened in a small “o,” as he takes in what lies before him—the food of the one, the only, Good Hunter!

Cecil’s fingers dig into the cuffs of his top. Points, to where Sara sets a Mint Jelly plate and an Apple Roly Poly onto the counter, turning to face Venti. He had done the same to the last few foods that have been taken away to those who had ordered them (a Satisfying Salad, Venison Steak, Moon Pie, and Crab, Ham & Veggie Bake, thus far.) He seems to be particularly intrigued about the Apple Roly Poly, now, though, asking Venti, “What is that?”

His eyes pull up, delighted to share—the food his children think of and create are extraordinary! “An Apple Roly Poly! It is made with apples, of course, and eggs, butter, flour, all coiled into one. A delicacy, for sure.”

“And—the green?”

“Mint Jelly,” and how, briefly, he wishes that those in Old Mondstadt could have eaten jelly, he thinks that Amos would have liked it. “it is made with those mints you keep seeing, and sugar. A very squishy, sweet food!”

“Squishy ….”

Cecil falls into a contemplative silence. Frets with Venti’s ruffles, and the buttons on his sleeve, his expression becoming something akin to a stilted wariness, determination the longer he thinks on his words. Venti, deliberately, pretends not to notice, casually humming a short tune to himself in the wait, and lightly tapping his foot against the legs of the wooden chair he sits on.

“Are there any other foods made of apples?”

Venti grins. “My friend, there are many. Northern Apple Stew, Apple Fritters, ehe, it is not a food, but Apple Ciders, and Candy Apples, Apple Cake, Apple Pie—”

“Apple Pie!?”

“Apple Pie!!!!!!”

“How is it made?”

“Oh, apples, sugar, flour, cinnamon, mmm.. butter too, and—” and they … they have everything they need to make it … right here, oh goodness, Venti from three days past thank you for not spending a drop of your mora! He stands from his chair (Cecil jumping, hand darting from his sleeve), it scraping across the stones, tittering just that slightest bit at the end. “One moment, beloved!”

“What—” He, too, stands, one knee placed onto the seat, his head swiveling to follow after Venti bursting into a run to the general goods shop, “What are you—??”

“One moment, cherished, one moment!!”

He is certain there are teal feathers and puffs of Anemo trailing after him in his sprint, hoping those are overlooked by the Vision hung at his belt, too caught in his excitement to get the ingredients needed to tweak that little quirk. It is normal to have feathers. Glowing feathers. Very normal, everyday thing that people have and do. Pay no mind to the fact that his Vision is not also glowing as brightly as the feathers are, it happens, you see.

Sliding up to the counter, bracing his hands on it, he pants: “Miss Blanche! Miss Blanche, good lady, do you happen to have flour, milk, eggs and cinnamon?”

Blanche, the lovely shopkeeper she is, is holding a hand to her mouth, attempting to hide a laugh. Venti considers this a success.

“Of—snrk—Of course.” She pivots on her heel, rummaging through the shelves positioned around her, meticulously and gingerly adding each item grabbed to the crook of her elbow. She sets them down just as gently. “That’ll be two hundred and forty mora!”

Venti has already brought out and dug through his pouch of the currency. Pokes at the pile, as he counts it in his head, and puts the needed amount into her outstretched palm, scooping the ingredients into his arms with his other hand (and, for fun, tips his hat very gentlemanly at her in a swish of Anemo—fun party trick, he should add, being able to concentrate it to a single point as so.)

“Thank you, Miss Blanche! Good day!”

“Good day to you, too!”

He waves to her, walking backwards, as he hurries to where an awfully confused Cecil continues to half-stand, half-sit. That confusion is merely amplified by Venti arranging the flour, milk, eggs and cinnamon on the table, tapping at the cork of the cinnamon when it is to his liking. Skips over to Good Hunter immediately after, his dearest spluttering, looking between the objects and him, scrutinizing both in a manner similar to that of when he is solving a problem.

“Miss Sara—”

“Let me guess: butter and sugar?”

“Heehee, caught! Yes, ma’am, if I could have those, pretty please!!”

She smiles at him, eyes softening. Ducks down to the cabinets, opening them, the hinges creaking softly. He thumps his fingers on the counter (in a pattern he remembers from the “drumming contest” that Bennett and Amber had him supervise), listening to the clink of the bottles.

“Here you are,” she sets them beside his hand. “Six-hundred-forty five mora!”

“Ooohhhh..” He tries his best not to visibly show his surprise, the pouch being rifled through again. “Six-hundred-forty five… ?”

“Six-hundred-forty five!”

That certainly is an amount for this all…

He hands over what is needed, snatching the butter and sugar, and shoving the marginally lighter feeling pouch into the hole of his shorts, for the meanwhile. He waves bye to Sara, as well, skipping over to Cecil—who is looming above the previous ingredients, hands to the sides of them, his face drawn into a slanted frown—and proudly presenting what he has. Cecil blinks at him, his expression transforming to a wide-eyed one, then scrunches his brows into a furrow, his lips thinning.

“Venti,” flops onto the seat, “my little song, my darling, my angel. Why did you gather this? Are we, by chance...?”

He shakes the sugar, the tiny specks bobbing in the bottle, swaying back and forth while he does. “Mhm! We can make Apple Pie!!”

That has Cecil shift to bewilderment, rising from the chair, swinging his gaze back to the table. “And everything is this… leisurely, to gather? All of it, in the market—“ he falters, going over each item once more, finding one, strangely, missing, “—all… well, almost everything.”

An eyebrow is cocked at Venti, Cecil placing his hands on his (also cocked to the side) hips, trying for a “disappointed” stance. A stance that is betrayed by the mirth in his eyes, simply bemused wondering behind it. “Are we to make Apple Pie without the Apples?”

Venti giggles.

“Do not fret, they are taken care of!!” His cape makes a satisfying swoosh sound, as he bounds toward his precious, clutching his butter and sugar close (it will not be spilling on his watch!) “And I know a spot where we will be able to put everything together, just the two of us”—he winks, braids and eyes flickering in their glowing—“if you could, the other..?”

Cecil moves a hand closer to the ingredients. “On it.”

First, the milk is placed under his right arm. Then, the eggs are gathered next to it, followed by balancing the flour and cinnamon on them. He continues to maneuver them, walking up to Venti, his arms crossed tightly, a part of his cloak draping over his left bicep.

Hooking a hand on that bicep, Venti urges Cecil to one of the alleyways. And, once it seems that no one is giving them attention, allows the swirling of Anemo to swathe them; looping strings of teal round and round, pressing into the skin and leaving them with fleeting prickles of buzzing. His braids lift into the air, the wind zipping past, accelerating, and he clings to Cecil as it all brings itself into, well, itself. Raising them and streaming them through the many, many winds of Mondstadt.

They whip by buildings and fields, fields and buildings. Ending pushed inside a door to a nice, little area in between, the enticing smell of the latest batch of pastries wafting throughout the room.

Cecil stumbles, slightly, knocking one foot into the other, when the Anemo dissipates. Venti keeps his grip on his bicep, stepping back the moment his friend is steady, and spins to walk by, carrying his items at an arm’s length while he proceeds towards the kitchen island, located dab in the middle of the room.

Footsteps edge closer to the archway of the kitchen, where it splits into two hallways—ones that Venti merely glances towards, noting Cecil with his hand braced on that archway, as he leans out to look down the corridors. He directs his attention to the items, then the drawers of the countertops, and the cabinets. The pie plate and bowls should be in the bottom ones, the measuring spoons should be in the far left drawer, and the measuring cups should be above them… hm…..

With a snap of his fingers, the cabinets and drawers are pulled open in a tug of Anemo. Meticulously, he grabs each one needed (medium sized bowl, colored blue, same with the measuring spoons, and the glass plate and cups—and, for extra, a rolling pin.) He sets these next to the butter and sugar, hands on his hips as he inspects everything.

A soft, frilly fabric is pressed to his cheek. He turns to see Cecil offering him a green, pinstripe cooking apron (a white bow wrapped at the middle), oh!! In a swift whoosh, both his corset and cape vanish, as he takes the apron into his hands and sets to tying it around his waist, exclaiming: “You found them!”—Cecil snorting at his eagerness, placing the ingredients he had held in his arm next to Venti’s, and undoing his belt, then vest, and snapping open the clasp of his cloak, to put on his matching blue, pinstripe apron as well.

“Alright!” Venti says, clapping his hands, “Let us get to work, yes?”

Cecil, eyeing the bowl, hums. “The Apples?”

“Of course, of course,” Giggling, he reaches to his beret, and, with a flutter of his hand, taps at the very top of it (the Cecilia and leaves bouncing.) His fingers dig under it, and flings it to the side; falling into a bow to catch it, thus revealing the six red apples that laid underneath it.

There is a pause. The Apples are plucked from his hair, being replaced by a hand, of which ruffles there til it is a disheveled jumble of strands—Venti leaning into each pat that passes with a grin.

“I should have known,” Cecil huffs, amusement laced in his voice. Venti is sure that when his beloved steps around him to get to the sink, his expression can best be summarized as “cat that caught the canary,” just about as pleased as punch at this outcome. Another “party trick” of his, one that never gets old in seeing everyone’s reaction to it!

A bit aways from him, water rushes from the faucet, spilling over the apples held under it.

Busying himself whilst Cecil does that, he arranges each ingredient from largest to smallest, and once that is done, picks up the bottle of sugar to regard how much is inside. From what he recalls of the recipe for this, it should be.. half cup sugar, two tablespoons flour, one teaspoon cinnamon, one egg, and all of the apples are accounted for already…. hm, hm, hm!

The apples are gently rolled into the flour bag, Cecil stopping them from going further with a gentle touch to their stems. Bumps his hip againsts Venti’s, passing by, to settle beside the right of him.

One hand going behind his back, the other gesturing towards what sits in front of them both, Cecil clears his throat, lowering his voice to a comical degree, “Shall we?”

Barking a laugh into his fist, Venti stands straight, rolling his shoulders back, clasping his hands at the waist. Lowering his voice, too, and nodding hard enough that it has his braids flailing into the air, “We shall.” (He will say, though, that they lasted a solid minute without breaking their characters—only breaking when Cecil had looked to Venti, whom was deepening his frown, and burst into cackles.)

And so they do. And so it becomes a mess halfway in (he is mildly surprised it had not when he had swirled the bowl of sugar, flour, and butter with Anemo, and had it spring out everywhere at the end—he had sighed when making the whipped cream, too, as Kaeya would have been a fantastic helper), when Venti, after rolling the dough, tucking it into the pie plate, and having wiped a quick streak of the apple juices on his hands across Cecil’s nose. Which had lead to Cecil mock gasping, running his hands through the leftovers of the ingredients and cupping Venti’s cheeks with them, which then to Venti dusting the bottoms of Cecil’s braids with sugar, which then lead to Cecil packing up flour into a shape of a ball and mushing it against him, and—

The kitchen will need … cleaning, most certainly. As will they, the two of them sat on the floor, snickering and chortling, nearly covered head to toe in contents and components.

Despite this, the pie tastes delicious, Venti thinks to himself, offering another piece of the pie pierced through a fork to Cecil, for him to bite and eat.

#IVE FINISHED ITTT #offers you the Bards gently #genshin impact #venti #nameless bard #also. tried to. combine genshin logic with real life logic #which is why. there are measurements but not the full set of what would be needed to make something like this #<- guy who has done nothing but stare at pages for apple pie recipes and the amount of money needed to buy the items in genshin #and how much is needed to make certain foods #sorry for only #mentionin mr kaeyaa 😔 …. i couldnt figure out a way to include him without breaking the pace #he’s here. in spirit #and so is vens pretty please ?? please please ??? <- same face he makes in windblume #also included some bard trying to be more vocal of what’s and desires. for fun #lantern’s writing corner

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