yours truly (part one). / sincerely (part two).

premise: your diligent efforts to uncover the identity of your secret admirer had ultimately amounted to nothing. in fact, your investigations only raised more questions — your companions' strange behaviors and shifty-eyed gazes hadn't completely escaped from your awareness, not to mention you've become... privy to some of their affections...

and what is the last thing you need while trying to search for one person who liked you? more people to like you, of course!

but that is exactly what you receive. (goddamn it all.)

includes: zhongli, kaeya, scaramouche, itto & the real secret admirer !

note: oh god i have done it. it's even longer than the other one but since this is the 10k celebration fic, it's only rightfully so! i hope you enjoy this... likes and reblogs are appreciated <33 please read the first part if you haven't already!

• all things considered, zhongli is an unrelated figure to your personal issues, not particularly concerned with such trifling matters. you lived worlds apart, and he's generally preoccupied by his own studies anyway, too absorbed in his thesis to mind who has a crush on who and whatnot.
• yet it seems as if fate is intent on pulling you two together whether you like it or not.
• you belong in different majors, your lecture halls on opposite sides of campus, and he's an upperclassman. not to mention the upperclassman everyone looks up to, the senior equivalent of albedo. though he holds an air of benevolence and warmth, he's unapproachable in the way nobody would dare impose themselves in fear of bothering him with their presence.
• professors only speak of his name in accordance with endless words of praise, and legend has it that any paper he proofreads is guaranteed to receive a high grade... not that anyone could confirm it, since nobody has been gifted that luxury.
• except for you, of course, living the y/n life — you'd been slaving away on your assignments per usual at diluc's cafe when, in a moment of misfortune, zhongli had crashed into a waiter and spilled his coffee on your papers, soaking pale sheets in brown splatters and smudging the inked sentences you'd painstakingly written for the past hour.
• if only your laptop hadn't run out of battery, you wouldn't have resorted to drafting with pen and paper. or you could have done your work in a later date instead of being productive for nothing. fuck.
• witnessing your expression crumpled to disbelief and misery, zhongli apologized through offering his assistance in doing your assignment with you. and oh boy, he did it well. it was better than what you could've ever done, the insight he provided beyond profound. he was humble even as you showered him with compliments, still looking quite apologetic for the fiasco he caused.
• and. right. it could've ended there. after that occasion, you would wave at him if you passed by each other at the hallways, but that's where the extent of your relationship ended, a pair of underclassman and upperclassman who'd known each other once.
• but of course it's never that easy.
• he pops up when you least expect it, running into you frequently even though the rumors articulated “you'd hardly get a glimpse of him since he's busy all the time” clearly. and he's acquainted with people you know well, just that you never paid attention to it; keqing seems to respect him a lot, so does xiao, ganyu perks up whenever he's brought up in conversations, and childe sticks to him when given the opportunity. perhaps it was only a matter of time that you begin a friendship with him as well...
• but what's up with these horribly timed drama tropes you keep experiencing with him?!
• bumping into him and dropping your books to the floor so he offers to walk you to the library, locked into a room when a professor asks you to collect materials for class with him and the door has a faulty knob, getting photographed by a student while you study in the same table and everyone assumes you're dating,,
• you've been seeing far too much of him.
• everyone's patience has been wearing thin. xiao tries his best to keep his annoyance at bay but fails. childe has resorted to bribing zhongli for free lunch to lead him away from you. albedo straight up drags you to the opposite direction whenever he spots zhongli within vicinity.
• but it's like there's a force of nature compelling you to stick right back to him.
• hosting events for college fests had never been your kind of thing, but attention follows you if you're acquainted with famous people, and keqing was unwilling to be an emcee if she didn't have a friend alongside her to act as a second host. of course, that meant everyone was deadset on dragging you with her.
• you're not very keen on standing on a stage to face the whole school like a kid participating in a talent show, but you've never been good at saying “no” to your friends.
• hence why you find yourself clutching on a microphone now, blinded by bright stage lights. you would much prefer if you were part of the audience. or if you were in ayaka's place instead, holding up cue cards behind the curtains.
• there's some kind of beauty pageant going on, a popularity contest for the prettiest people in uni. votes are collected via online polls, and you're tasked to reveal the top 10. you don't doubt for a second your friends will all join you on stage eventually, and you've already asked ganyu to drag xiao up the platform if he tries to escape. sweeping off a piece of confetti by your shoulder, you flip open the folden paper in your hand and announce the winning names.
• zhongli steps up as one of the candidates for first place and you faintly hear gasps of awe and high pitched squeals.
• you nod at him in acknowledgement, and he returns the gesture in kind. you head on over to hand him a mic of his own, keqing busying herself by doing the same job for other contestants, and...
• in your carelessness, distracted by fumbling with the paper in your hand to hide it back inside your pocket, you trip over an electrical cord.
• you've been waiting the entire night for the time where you'll eventually embarrass yourself in front of a crowd. perhaps a voice crack in what's supposed to be a tense situation, a stutter in your words, falling off a stage even, but here it is, even more horrifying than what you could've imagined.
• squeezing your eyes shut instinctively, you brace yourself for the hard surface to tumble onto. instead, what meets you is something squishy, someone's hands gripping around your shoulders, and-
• FUCK. you banged your knees on the ground.
• the first thing to pop in your mind is a myriad of swears that could stun a sailor.
• the second is the oddly plush surface your lips had landed on.
• the third is the sight of widened golden eyes. they look very familiar. but you'd rather not think about who they belong to.
• the ugly screech of the microphone dropping to the floor is drowned out by gasps, yelling, and the scandalized choke of keqing behind you. xiao — who did end up being a contender for the stupid popularity contest and is standing only a few meters away, makes an alarming noise that could trigger a person's fight or flight reaction.
• you hastily attempt to rise to your feet, but the floor is slippery what the actual fuck, and zhongli, oh for fuck's sake, innocent and oblivious zhongli grabs your hips to keep you steady.
• .....of course the accidental kiss and caught in a compromising position tropes were going to happen eventually.

• “it's from me.”
• your gaze travels from the fresh, new bouquet of flowers emitting a sweet fragrance lying in your arms, and the face of the man currently standing before you, lips curled in what seems to be a supposedly reassuring smile.
• “you mean... this and the carnations last time?”
• his lips are still firmly quirking upwards, admirably patient in spite of reiterating the same phrase over and over again whenever probed with your repetitive questions.
• still, he doesn't quite give off the impression of someone deeply infatuated.

premise: as a friend of the most attractive students in school, you're more than used to acting as the middleman between them and the people vying for their affection, often tasked with delivering presents or handing out their love letters. however, when you chance upon a small bouquet of flowers on your desk without a note indicating the sender or who you're meant to give it to, you start to wonder if this one's supposed to be yours.

includes: childe, xiao, diluc, kazuha, albedo, thoma & gorou !

a/n: hahaha why is this so long... anyways this is a college au + reverse harem of some sorts. enjoy. i really don't want this one to flop so likes and reblogs are appreciated thx

• in all honesty, he's your first guess.
• not because you think he likes you or anything! he's just a huge flirt.
• at the beginning of the school year, you hardly got along. you know he's a friendly guy, but it's in the way that... intimidated you. he's part of the “mood maker” clique, attracting attention wherever he goes, and you're not sure if you could handle his energy...
• you preferred to stay away from the spotlight though that's a bit hypocritical considering you're friends with the prettiest group of girls in your year, and he relished in it. you didn't know if you could get along.
• you didn't become friends until you were assigned partners for a project that meant a lot for your grade, and you vowed to yourself if you couldn't be close to him, you should at least be close enough to work together without trouble.
• in the end, you surprisingly hit it off, childe easing the awkward air between you with jokes and random stories to tell about his weird friends. your friendship didn't end when the project did, and you continued to hang out outside of school. you're sure he didn't approach you to get closer to your friends, either; though you had some doubts at first, he was nothing alike with the jerks who tried to use you.
• you're no stranger to the pranks he pulled, nor were you unaware of his flirty nature; he occasionally entertained the lot who fancied him when he attended drinking parties. so it made perfect sense if it was childe who gave those flowers, along with the gifts that followed after. it would just be him messing around again, right? oh, definitely! it wouldn't be the first time he spent his money in reckless abandon, bragging that he has the cash to spare for it.
• but unexpectedly when you bring up the topic, his expression darkens, showing no sign of joking around. he looks a little shocked, too, to know someone was pursuing you.
• “it's not from me,” he admits, gently taking your hand. “but it's true that i like you.”

• xiao is one of the people you deliver presents to lol
• due to his intimidating disposition (and the endless amount of nasty rumors swirling about him, thanks to said intimidating disposition), hardly anybody would dare to approach him, daunted by the perpetual scowl etched on his face. he remains as eye candy, but an entity no one could reach.
• you avoided him at first, too. his face is admirable, you can say that much, but you've become somewhat desensitized from having been surrounded by pretty faces 24/7 so you can't really say it's anything new... and yes, you are scared of him to a certain degree. you could never guess what he's thinking.
• you weren't sure if he's as scary as people make him out to be though, since people tend to exaggerate gossip for the sake of shock value. he once defended a middle schooler from high school delinquents (through persuasion and not with fists), but the story somehow twisted into another tale entirely detailing how xiao had brutally wiped the floor with their faces and painted the concrete floor with blood...
• but as intimidating as he might seem, you don't think he's that kind of character. if you overlook his piercing glare and sharp tongue, he's quite decent.
• ... you thought that way until you caught him tailing you on your way home.
• he crept up behind you, maintaining a natural distance, but after numerous twists and turns in hopes of leading him away, he had yet to cease heading towards your direction. you wouldn't be so suspicious if you hadn't purposely gone in circles around town, leading back to where you came from — which meant he didn't have a particular destination in mind, and fully intended on being hot on your tail.
• tired of having bated breath waiting for his next move, you gathered all your courage and confronted him directly, cornering him to the nearest wall to assert dominance. xiao seemed startled by your forwardness, and you took his moment of vulnerability as an opportunity to interrogate him.
• unexpectedly, he sheepishly confesses, “i'm not a stalker, i got worried since you're going home this late. haven't you heard about the crime rate these days...”
• from there on, you suppose you could say you understood him better. though he's snappy and stern, he's not that terrifying, even sweet at times. when you become proper friends (and you stop suspecting him as your stalker), he saves you a seat next to him, or brings you coffee that you like when he notices you're sleepy in class.
• it wasn't long until everybody came to know you were friends and a girl finally — you guessed it — asked you to send a love letter to xiao in her stead.
• when you gave it to xiao, he was unusually flustered, flushed pink to the tips of his ears. his expression falls flat once you tell him it's from someone else, badly containing the disappointment to show on his face.
• nevertheless, you continue to be friends, and xiao has learned not to expect much from you.
• he's the earliest to arrive in class, so you ask him if he'd seen the person who gave you flowers. with a cold, hard look, he says no.
• he's acting kind of weird, isn't he...

• the barista in the coffee shop near your university that has to put up with so much bullshit flirting everyday.
• he has to reject people in a roundabout way, and you know he hates it, but of course he has to provide great customer service if he still wants customers right... directly breaking their hearts would only make problems.
• but he takes no shit from rude customers.
• no, you weren't one of them. in fact, diluc quite liked you a bit. first of all, you don't have any romantic interest for the staff, you genuinely enjoy his drinks (he knows because your face is like an open book), and you mind your own business. he tolerates you enough that he can make small talk with you and it doesn't upset him in the slightest.
• so it really ticked him off when some idiot was bothering you in the cafe, starting an argument over a trivial matter that shouldn't be fussed over.
• in normal circumstances, diluc would've done the usual protocol — reason with the angry customer, offer free products, and let them leave the premises peacefully. but the moment he saw the man grab your shoulders and you winced in pain as a result, he didn't even have to think of what to do next.
• cold coffee rained down on the ill-mannered man's head, evoking a surprised scream out of him. his fingers left your body in favor of patting away the sticky liquid from his clothes, and you stared blankly at the seething figure behind him.
• “your order,” diluc announced, his voice tinted with rage. then he pretended to remember something, looking at the empty cup in his hand. “oh, i apologize. you ordered it hot, didn't you?” he forced a smile on his face. “would you like me to brew another one for you?”
• the man erupted to a new screaming fit, but he was promptly dragged aside. diluc immediately questioned if you were hurt anywhere, his voice a total 180 from before and turning into a soft tone you nearly didn't recognize.
• “that stunt you pulled...” you nervously said. “will you be okay...? won't you get, er, dismissed because of it?”
• “...you don't know i own this place?”
• “???”
• in any case, you've become good friends ever since that incident. so when your secret admirer gives you your customized drink from diluc's shop (that even xiao doesn't know the recipe of!), you ask him if there's a customer who ordered your exact drink that morning.
• strangely enough, he changes the subject.
• “he only gave you coffee?” diluc wrinkles his nose. “he's not fit for you.”
• he proceeds to shove you a plate of pancakes for breakfast and won't let you talk about that topic again.