Chapter Text
Prologue
In Teyvat, nestled in the region of Fontaine on the banks of the crystal clear Lake Majeur, sat the beloved kingdom of Petrichor. Petrichor was a prosperous and thriving city known for theatre, dance and the arts. Many from all across Teyvat would come every year for the annual Masq du Parade. A large masquerade ball that was celebrated throughout the entire kingdom. Street performers, theater goers and the like would dress in beautiful bright colors, covering their faces with masks and celebrate until the sun rose the next day.
The royal family of Petrichor was treasured by all its people and when the Queen gave birth to her first son, celebrations resounded through the kingdom. As the boy grew, the kingdom felt blessed. He had grown into a kind and caring young man with the people’s hopes and dreams etched deeply in his heart. The king and queen felt honored to have such a compassionate heir. However, in his fourteenth year, tragedy struck the kingdom.
One fateful day the prince vanished from the castle. They searched for three days and nights, despair filling their hearts as they could find not a single trace of the boy. When all hope seemed lost, the boy miraculously returned. The King and Queen were overjoyed until they saw him covered from head to toe in the deep, crimson color of blood. The light from his ocean blue eyes had sunk into a swirling black void, and the king and queen did not recognize their son.
The changes started off small, barely noticeable except by those who really knew him. The servants started complaining in hushed whispers about his behavior, and noticed how he would get violent at the smallest of things. As the months passed none of the staff wanted to attend to him, and his teachers and trainers refused to teach him. Many quit their posts, leaving the castle behind.
Knights who trained with him would describe his manner in a horrific way. His eyes were filled with bloodlust and his desires and ambitions grew until knights were killed in what was supposed to be simple training sessions. Slowly his younger siblings turned away from him, hiding themselves from his presence. The darkness inside of him grew and grew until the eighteenth year of his life. He went into an uncontrollable rage slaughtering hundreds in the castle. The King and Queen tried to plead with him but it was too late. All the love the young boy used to have had disappeared from his heart. All that was left was a deep dark void.
As the boy stood over the lifeless bodies of the King and Queen, something strange happened. Something no one could have predicted. Celestia, the land of the gods, sent an emissary to interfere. The emissary appeared in front of the boy, a look of sorrow on her face. The emissary from Celestia had long, soft white hair with eyes that glittered like emeralds. “My sweet Ajax”
The boy glared at the intruder, unable to see anything beyond his own destruction. “You have lost sight of everything, you have thrown your kingdom into despair and Celestia cannot ignore it any longer.” She said as she looked around at the massacre spread out in front of her, tears glistening in her emerald green eyes. “I will give you one chance… forgive and come back to the light. There are those who still love you if you would only open your eyes to see it.”
In an instant the boy lunged at her, his dagger flicking her neck and a tiny drop of blood dripped down, defiling her pure white skin. She didn’t retreat from him, instead she looked defeated and hopelessly at the boy. “You are intruding, if you don’t want to join them I suggest you leave.” He growled at her.
Her eyes looked heartbroken as she opened her mouth.
“Very well, I suppose you have given me your answer. I have no choice then. A monster you wish to be? Then I shall make your wish come true.”
“Then Ajax, no I suppose Ajax is no more” She corrected herself shaking her head. “Tartaglia.. you leave me no choice. I cannot let the force you carry inside of you wreak havoc on the world any more.” In that moment a golden light obscured the castle from the town below as she cast a spell turning the inhabitants of the castle and Tartaglia himself into monsters.
She held out in front of her a pure white rose that hovered above her hand. The golden light from the spell glistened off of it. “I will give you a chance, just one.” She said as the spell finished and in place of a man, a creature of the abyss stood before her. “You have until the time the last petal falls, if you are able to learn to love again and receive that love in return. I will release the curse. If not, then your whole family and everyone in the castle will remain monsters forever. You wanted power, and now you have it and nothing else. Exactly as you wished to be… a monster.”
As a result of the spell, the whole of Teyvat and the town of Petrichor surrounding the castle lost all memory of their beloved royal family and everyone else inside. Tartaglia was cursed to live the rest of his days alone, and unloved as a creature of the abyss. As a final curse, the entire castle sank into the abyss leaving a black void in its place. With it brought dark mud and creatures from the abyss, pouring into the land and surrounding the town of Petrichor. As the years passed, those inside the castle lost all hope and Tartaglia himself drowned in an endless void of despair. Until one day, a golden eyed star, in the most unlikely of ways and the most unlikely of chances crossed his path.