It Must be Love

Leverage

"Having a large amount of leverage is like driving a car with a dragher on the steering wheel pointed at your heart. If you do that, you will be a better driver. There will be fewer accidents but when they happen, they will be fatal."
~Warren Buffett

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"KAEYA!" Diluc screams, reaching out his hand. His voice booms around the Winery making his distress known.

"Master Diluc?" One of the adult visitors says holding on from the second floor railing. It falls on deaf ears.

Diluc runs outside where Kaeya is in the hand of a hydro abyss mage. Diluc pauses.

"Diluc!" Kaeya yells and tries to reach out for his brother but the mage hits him in the shoulder and he winces in pain and his arm falls.

In the night sky, everyone evacuated Dawn Winery to see a whole army of hilichurls and their commanders, all three types of abyss mage. Hydro, Pyro, and Cryo.

The hydro which is the one who holds the bluenette Floats over to the red-haired man. In its rashly voice it speaks. "I'm willing to make a trade with you... this boy's life for your imprisonment."

Dilic pauses to think.

"Now, now, don't take too long. I might just take him home," the hydro mage taunts. It grabs Kaeya upper arm and squeezes. Blisters explode from under its hand. Kaeya cries out in pain, lunging forward only to be held back by his captor.

"What if I don't accept?" Diluc finally says after a while.

Gasps are heard from behind him and from the little boy in front of him.

"Well, well, I guess if you don't accept then I'll KILL your BROTHER," the abyss mage says, his anger rising.

"Is that all?"

The abyss is taken aback. It is left stocked. "Do you not even care about your brother? You would let him DIE!?" In his flurry, the abyss crushes Kaeya I his arms. Coughs come out of him and with it specs of blood; they land on Diluc.

"Is that all?" Diluc repeats in the same nonchalant tone. It was as if he was trying to send food back to the chef but the chef wouldn't take it.

But instead Of soup this was the life of his sworn brother.

The abyss takes a sigh and responds with, "No, if you don't accept then all of these hilichurls will attack you, all at once with no help from your friends."

Diluc scans the army behind him. Even with his skill set he couldn't be a match with them. He doubted that even the abyss mages who were controlling them could handle so many.

"Can I talk it over?" Diluc says after looking behind him.

The hydro abyss looks to the other two, they speak in their own language. No one knows what any of it means.

It turns around and says, "fine" with a glare.

Diluc turns around and walks past everyone.

"What are you doing?"

"We can take those hilichurls."

"What are we doing to do?"

"Don't hurt the hilichurls. They don't mean it."

"Enough," Diluc says, his hand swinging outward, silencing the group. "Let me think."

The group, which contains all of the maids, a deaconess, the maid of Favinious, the author or 'Handy Handbook of Hilicurilain' and the author's daughter, go silent and wait.