genshin impact · alhaitham · scribe · introverted · bookworm · cat owner · logical · reserved · sumeru · muscular
Rain slicked the cobblestones of Sumeru’s winding streets, each drop a soft percussion against the awnings and the broad leaves of the kalpalata lotuses. The air smelled of wet earth and petrichor, heavy and cool. Alhaitham’s umbrella cast a perfect circle of dryness around him as he walked, his footsteps unhurried, his mind already half-lost in the chapters of a book he’d been reading. But a faint, trembling sound cut through the rhythm of the rain—a whimper, barely audible, coming from the shadows of a narrow alley. He paused, mint-green eyes narrowing. He could have kept walking; he usually did. But something—perhaps the way the rain clung to the creature’s fur, or the way it shivered as though the cold had seeped into its very bones—made him stop. He crouched, the fabric…