Snowman 8 (Patreon)

Legend of the Snowman-Mancer 8

Euri Lawrence

Eula, Venti, Lumine, Paimon, and I sat around at the Cat’s Tail bar. Paimon lived up to her reputation. The little gremlin was scarfing down her body weight in waffles, mostly because the Cat’s Tail was running a “breakfast for dinner” deal. Or maybe because Lumine was fattening up her emergency food supply.

As for the illustrious Traveler herself, she had a far more modest portion of blueberry waffles, topped with a mixed berry preserve I knew my sister also adored. They were already bonding over their shared love of sweets.

Venti, Eula, and I were each nursing glasses of Diona’s finest, much to the miffed midget mixologist’s ire. The mixture involved mulberries, mangoes, mustard, muddled morning glory, and martini mix, capped off with sprigs of mint and dusted with dried, powdered mussels. The dearly beloved mix-master was on a “random letters” kick.

Yes, it was fantastic. No, I didn’t know how. For that matter, neither did she.

“Explain one more time. Why do we need the holiest relic in Mondstadt’s history? If it’s such a vital need, why are we not trying to acquire it through legitimate means? And are we really going to entrust said precious relic to the resident drunkard?” Eula asked, brow arched skeptically. To be fair to her, this went against everything she valued as a knight.

I chuckled and began to tick down my fingers. “One, we need the relic because the Holy Lyre der Himmel can be used to purify Dvalin’s corruption. Two, you know that it takes the signatures of the community representative, knight grandmaster, and the seneschal of the church to take the lyre normally. The civvie can’t be trusted and Jean’s dad is off with Grandmaster Varka, which means we need to steal it. Three, I told you already; Venti is Barbatos.”

“Yes, it's the claims of godhood I find unbelievable. Not that I quest your foresight, brother, but…”

“Well, believe it. Or go threaten to pee on his statue. He’ll come running then.”

“You… Never mind, I don’t want to know.”

“Your brother is quite the character,” Venti chuckled goodnaturedly. “Now that we’re caught up, we need to decide how we want to do this.”

“We stick to the plan,” I told them. Well, I told Lumine and Paimon. Eula and Venti had been filled in on the script, so to speak. “Lumine and Eula do their best ninja impression while I provide a distraction.”

“Wouldn’t it make more sense for only one of us to go? Two people means we’re twice as likely to get caught,” Lumine pointed out.

“Nope. And we’re going early. I suspect the Fatui know what the lyre can do and might try to steal it to keep it out of our hands.”

“Wait, what? The Fatui?”

I waved the question aside. “Agents from the frozen asscrack of Teyvat.”

“Snezhnaya, brother,” Eula said.

“Yeah, that’s what I said. They are looking for something and want to expand their influence in Mondstadt,” I replied, making my twin roll her eyes with fond exasperation. “They didn’t cause the Stormterror affair, but they’re willing to exacerbate this mess to get what they want. Essentially, they’re trying to prove that the Knights of Favonius are insufficient for the security of Mondstadt, and so the Fatui deserve more authority and autonomy in our country.”

Lumine frowned, making her nose scrunch up cutely. “That’s messed up. People might die.”

“And they don’t care. Signora, the harbinger leading them, is an arrogant, petty bitch who still can’t get over herself after five hundred years. She’d be a tragic heroine if she wasn’t such a homicidal bitch. Just know that you’re on a deadline and you’re likely to meet a Fatui cicin mage at the cathedral. The mage will be able to teleport over short distances.”

“Cicins? They’re the elemental insects, right? How short is the range?”

“A small area around her, probably fifty feet or so. Not much more than that. Either that, or she’s way better at it than I am.”

“Okay, we’ll do it your way.”

“Then there’s only one last thing to settle,” I said. I turned to Eula, my dearly beloved sister. “Maximum distraction?”

“Against my better judgment,” she sighed, defeated.

“Yes! Operation: Snowpocalypse is a go!” I cheered, pumping my fist in the air.

“Please don’t tell me you named your nonsense plans, brother.”

“Of course I did. You know I did. You’ve seen my journal entries and emergency contingency plans.”

“Yes, but I didn’t think any of those ideas would come to fruition.”

“Say it.”

“No.”

“Say it, you who holds the keys to the kingdom. I bestowed upon you the nuclear football.” I gave her a football made of boar hide for our fourteenth birthday. It had the word “NUCLEAR” stamped on the side in bold. “Only you can authorize Operation: Snowpocalypse.”

“Wasn’t that a joke gift you gave me? It’s just a lumpy ball. I don’t see what it has to do with anything. It wasn’t even round and didn’t bounce right,” Eula huffed. “I still don’t know what ‘nuclear’ means in this context.”

“It is a type of weapon of mass destruction. A ‘nuclear football’ is a series of authorization codes possessed by the commander-in-chief to deploy said weapon,” Lumine said. Then, she stared at me with narrowed eyes. “Is Teyvat that advanced? Do nuclear weapons exist here?”

“Nope. I mean, there are some pretty impressive pieces of magitech here, but I don’t think nuclear fission in particular has ever been explored,” I shook my head, bemused. That she understood what I was talking about said so much about the places she’d been. I wondered how many other references she’d understand. “‘Nuclear’ usually means ‘centrally oriented,’ as in ‘the nuclear family’ here. We’ve never needed to go down the Oppenheimer route; we’re perfectly good at map-redrawing destruction without it.”

“Is that really something to brag about? Wait, then how do you know what that word means?” she asked, no doubt baffled at encountering a literally out-of-world metaphor.

I smirked smugly. “Not important. Eula? Say it.”

Eula slumped in her seat. Then, with a resigned acceptance I could only imagine had been shared by President Truman, she said, “Operation: Snowpocalypse is a go. Mission green light. May the Archons rest our souls.”

“Master has gifted Dobby the football!” I gasped and leapt to my feet. Then, hollering at the top of my lungs, I dashed out of the Cat’s Tail. “DOBBY IS FREE!!!”

I heard Lumine bolt out of her chair. “Wait! How do you know Dobby?”

X

Strictly speaking, Operation: Snowpocalypse did not involve Durin in its original conception. In fact, it was penned before I’d ever exiled myself to Dragonspine and was meant to be a large-scale prank I’d devised shortly after I received my Vision.

I’d initially planned this for the final day of that year’s Ludi Harpastum, Mondstadt’s biggest annual festival. The plan was to drown the city in three feet of snow, then introduce my fair city to the wonders of Christmas carols via singing ice sculptures on every rooftop.

All day. All night.

Unending Christmas songs.

At the top of our lungs. Or, as loud as my magic could manage.

More Whitney Houston and Carrie Underwood and Mariah Carey than even the most insufferably festive grandma in my old world could bear.

I would hold the city hostage in a prison of holiday spirit, until Grandmaster Varka agreed to give me what I wanted. As for what I wanted… I’d have had plenty of time to figure out a proper ransom, damnit…

Alas, it was not to be. Eula read my journal and decided that as the only sane Lawrence, it was her Archon-given duty to protect the city from the rest of our family’s madness. Which, in this case, meant bonking me with a stick until I conceded.

That was how the nuclear football came to exist on Teyvat. It was the physical sign of my oath to never initiate Operation: Snowpocalypse without her express authorization. It was, in essence, me granting her the ultimate authority, the power to freeze the city in its tracks and hold the nexus of our society for ransom.

Father wished he had the kind of power represented by the nuclear football. It may not be literally divine, but it was as close as a manmade object could possibly get.

And she had the nerve to call it a “lumpy ball that doesn’t even bounce right.”

My beloved sister’s irreverence for historical references she lacked the context to understand aside, there was once again peace in the Lawrence household. Mondstadt never knew the devastation it had been delivered from.

Until now.

 "▂▂▃▃▄▄▄▃▃▅▅▅▅!!!" Durin roared.

No, he didn’t so much as roar as declare his dominance to the heavens. It was a roar of freedom, a primal shout of defiance against Celestia itself. And unlike before, it was right above the skies of Mondstadt. For the second time today, the city went into a panic, like a beehive someone drip-fed Tabasco into.

Durin was in his full size now, as large as the city’s iconic cathedral. I stood on his back, a guitar made of ice in my hand. There was plenty of room on his back so I sculpted a few bandmates for myself. Together, we began to play the opening riff of “Through the Fire and Flames.”

Was Dragonforce’s most famous song a bit on the nose? Yes.

Was it equally impossible to ignore when being played from dragonback? Also yes.

The Cryo Vision in my hand glowed with a pale-blue light. Rhinedottir may have formed Durin’s soul, but his body was my magnum opus, the culmination of nine years of painstaking work. His body was, quite literally, made to respond to my magic. Each flap of his gigantic wings sent a flurry of snow blowing across the entirety of Cider Lake. 

I’d grown much, much stronger in these nine years. I’d done nothing but practice in the most inhospitable, yet Cryo-friendly environment on Teyvat, after all.

Crystals of ice grew along Durin’s back. When they were as large as grown men, they launched themselves, morphing into yet more musicians as they fell towards the city. It was an invasion of snowmen paratroopers, each armed with guitars, basses, keyboards, and drums.

It was maddening. The sheer bedlam caused by dozens of snowmen, each playing one of the most iconic metal songs in perfect harmony, was a sight to behold. And the knights, they could only pray for salvation from a cruel, uncaring Celestia.

Save for a handful of elites like Jean and Kaeya, they were the dregs of our order. Grandmaster Varka had decided he’d take eighty percent of the Knights of Favonius on a globetrotting expedition to Natlan. Mondstadt could, quite literally, lose the vast majority of our fighting strength and still expect complete security within our territory.

And why wouldn’t we? Not only was Modstadt on friendly terms with our neighbors, Cider Lake was a natural fortress. Invasion was not only unlikely, it was practically impossible. At least, that was the common sentiment. I was happy to prove them wrong.

The knights, those poor, underpaid knights, ran around like headless chickens. Were they being attacked? What kind of lunatic attacked to theme music, anyway?

I saw the doors of the Knights of Favonius headquarters burst open. Jean, our very own acting grandmaster, dashed out, sword in hand and some of our finest at her back. A snowman landed near her and began to belt out the lyrics to the song, only for her to chop its head off.

A miniature tornado of jade-green Anemo swirled around her sword. She picked up the head and, with a murderous glare towards us, launched the snowball like a cannonball towards us. It didn’t do anything to Durin’s scales, of course, but her sheer annoyance could be felt in every snowflake.

As more snowmen descended to serenade Mondstadt with the glory of ZP Theart’s iconic vocals, I could practically feel her mounting irritation. She summoned a massive updraft before hopping towards us, face stormy and livid.

“Euri! What the hell are you doing?” she demanded, the very winds howling with her wrath. She didn’t inherit the legendary saint-knight’s title for nothing.

Down below, the knights tried to kill off my snowmen, but they could not silence my iceborn constructs. The vast majority did not have Visions of their own so they were left hacking and slashing ineffectually. Turned out, good ol’ “sword ‘n’ board” was an awful choice to wield against snowmen.

Barring a few exceptions such as Lisa and Kaeya, they weren’t much more competent than the average city watchman. They were climbing rooftops and chasing down my snowmen even as my familiars ran away from them while singing at the top of their nonexistent lungs. 

I offloaded my music to another snowman. It was an odd feeling, being sorta-but-not-really conscious of so many snowmen at once, but one I’d long since mastered. I had to build Durin’s body somehow, and making him with my own two hands alone would have been impossible even with nine years.

“Jean! How’s it going?” I asked, arms spread wide for a hug. “Like the music? I hear Xinyan in Liyue’s trying out something similar.”

“No! Shut this down, Euri!” she demanded. Her gorgeous face was flushed pink from the frosty gale. “Do you have any idea how much work this is going to give me?”

I smiled sheepishly. I did feel a little sorry; she worked really, really hard to keep a severely understaffed knight order functioning. “In my defense…”

“What? What could possibly justify this madness?”

“God told me to do it.”

“Lord Barbatos did not tell you to start Operation: Snowpocalypse!”

“Woah, you know its na–”

She landed on Durin’s back just so she could stamp her feet in frustration. She grabbed me by the collar and shook. “Yes! Yes, I know its name! Eula told me about your dumb journal!”

“Well, I’m serious. He gave me tacit permission. Like, he was there when Eula gave me authorization and didn’t object. In fact, he said I should be as distracting as possible.”

“Why? What have I done? How have I sinned?” she moaned. I considered it a personal victory that at this point, she didn’t even question a conversation with divinity as a distinct possibility where I was concerned.

I could see actual tears welling up in the corners of her eyes now. Everyone said Jean was doing a great job as acting grandmaster, but few realized how much work she really put into her job. She tried so desperately to fill Grandmaster Varka’s shoes that she’d not had time for herself in years.

I felt bad. Jean was one of the few people I genuinely loved here, and not just because she was gorgeous and made funny faces when she got mad. First the Stormterror mess. Then, there was the Fatui, here to pressure Mondstadt while the bulk of our defenders were away. And here I was, adding to her already heavy workload. The poor girl was about to break.

I gave her a hug and whispered, “I’m sorry. I really am, but this is necessary.”

“Why? Help me understand, Euri,” she pleaded.

“We need to do this to free Dvalin. Would Eula ever let me get away with this otherwise?”

“You promise?”

I leaned back so I could look into her eyes. I gently cupped her cheek. “I do. This will solve the Stormterror mess. It’ll all be over soon, I swear.”

She took a fortifying breath. “Okay. I… I needed that. Thank you, Euri.”

“You’re welcome, Jean.”

“I want in. Whatever you’re planning, I need to see this through, as the acting grandmaster if nothing else. I need to see for myself that Mondstadt is safe.”

I smiled. “Of course. Welcome to the team, Lionfang Knight.”

“And, Euri?”

“Yes?”

“Please stop bullying my knights.”

I glanced down, just in time to see one try and fail to vault over a flowerbed in pursuit of one of my snowmen. “They’ve been slacking on their physicals.”

She winced. “They… They have.”

This was a world in which regular, Visionless men could defeat monsters and shatter boulders with their bare hands given enough training. Compared to those unnamed warriors who stood by Bosacius’ side as he held back the Abyss, the performance below was… pathetic. There was no excuse for their inability to destroy my snowmen.

I had that particular snowman turn around. Its arm expanded into a giant mallet even as the rest of it lost mass. It beaned the lazy bastard straight on his breastplate, sending him sailing into a fountain. Maybe that’d teach him to work out more. A knight who couldn’t even beat a fragment of my consciousness was worth less than the plate he wore. Calling him a knight was honestly a little insulting.

“They deserve this,” I said matter-of-factly. “This should be a wakeup call.”

“How many snowmen are you going to make?” Jean asked, now morbidly curious.

I tapped my gnosis. Sure, it was the Anemo gnosis, but Anemo was all about Swirling other elements and amplifying their effectiveness. By the way her eyes widened, she knew exactly what it was. I shot her a devious smirk. “As many as I can manage. After all, I am but one man. Surely, the glorious Knights of Favonius can stop a single ice mage.”

“You’re a cruel, cruel man, Euri Lawrence,” she replied, shaking her head with resigned acceptance.

“You’re too soft on them. Say, why not send them up to Dragonspine for a few weeks of remedial training? I’ll write up a few survival tips. Eula can beat them into shape.”

“That sounds like cruel and unusual punishment.”

“Maybe, but I bet none of those fuckers will slack off ever again.”

Below, we watched another knight get beaned by a snowball. Rather than destroy my snowmen, he was being chased across the main square of the city by five of my familiars, each launching bits of their bodies as ammunition.

“...”

“...”

“I’ll think about it,” Jean said with a sigh.

Author’s Note

It feels weird not updating anything… So much for a rest month.

Lumine is the Traveler because she’s been to different worlds before arriving in Teyvat. The idea that Euri makes references to things only Lumine understands makes me giggle.