It may take... a while, before Xichen can believe that this time, now, he is followed like this. After all this time, all his attempts to make a difference and the crushing awareness that he didn't, or rather, he made things worse, so easy to exploit and use...

He shakes his head a little. "I don't have much appetite." And... "yes, I can feel my core once again." He couldn't, when Meng Yao had blocked it for him. So from his point of view, the last days have been its comfort flickering off and on.

Questions, on the other hand. Xichen looks down at the back of his palms, settled habitually, properly, on top of his thighs.

"If you had managed to run. Would you have found a way to be... happy?"

He doesn't know where to start. So there is one place.