.The shrine of the Puppet.

Kabukimono

He was a nameless puppet with child-like wonder, created by Raiden Ei as a prototype who somehow managed to possess emotions. In The Shogun's desire to set him free, she left him in The Slumbering Court with little to no explaination.

He was later found by a samurai by the name of Yoriki Katsuragi, and he was brought back to his village, where a blacksmith by the name of Hisahide Niwa took him in.

The name Kabukimono came from Nagamasa's group, to mean "wandering eccentric". In real life, it was originally meant to refer to gangs of wandering samurai, who dressed flamboyantly, and often accessorized by wearing haori jackets with lead weight in the hems, wide obi-belts, and sometimes even women's clothing.

Kabukimono's design features clothing reminiscent of Shōzoku, the traditional clothing for Shinto male priests. Like the origins of his name suggests, he also wears clothing intended for women, such as his purple veil, that happens to share a similar flowery pattern to his mother's kimono. He also wears the golden feather Ei had given him as proof of identity, tied up by strings that are noteably in Red and Black, The Balladeer's main color scheme, it is also mentioned by fatuus that the strings also look like puppet strings, it is probable that these two pieces of string represent the first seeds of resentment and anger that began to take place in Kabukimono's "heart"

The Balladeer

After adopting the name of "Kunikuzushi" and leaving his village, he wandered across Inazuma. The Puppet was found by Pierro, or, "The Jester" who persuaded him to join the Fatui and its banquet against the divine, he joined as the sixth Harbinger, and the innate powers sealed within him by The Shogun was unlocked by Dottore.

He spent quite a long time in the fatui, having witnessed Arlecchino and Tartaglia get appointed their roles, and likely Pantalone and Sandrone's appointments as well. He spent that time leading expeditions into the abyss and being subjected to Dottore's experiments. Due to his design as an eternal puppet, he was able to handle these

The balladeer's design features the Tomoe symbol through out, a symbol associated with the deity Raijin, who beats his drums to create thunder, the Electro symbol seems to have drawn heavy inspirations from the Tomoe. He wears a veiled hat known as an ichimegasa in Ancient Japan, originated from China by the name of "mìlí", it serves a similar purpose to the veil from his previous incarnation, which was to be worn by noble women to preserve their anonimity and protect them from bugs and insects. There is a mask atop the hat resembles kumadori make-up used in Kabuki theaters, the colors of the make-up is meant to inform the audience about the character's nature, The Balladeer's mask is brown which is intended for monsters and non-human characters. On his shoulder he carries a bag tied up by a haori himo, which is a rope usually used to tie up a haori. He wears a short sleeved open-chested kimono, with a crest on his chest that resembles the Tomoe/electro symbol along with a one-pleated hakama.

His color scheme can take many meanings, in the previous section we mentioned that the red and black colorscheme can be used to represent his anger and resentment towards his betrayals, but black is also a dignified and masculine color in Japan, and is used for the robes of Buddhist monks, and in black belts in Karate and Judo. Red, too, has the different conintations of being associated with authority and wealth, samurai often wore red as a symbol of power and strength in battles. In many cultures, purple was associated with wealth and royalty, due to its expense and difficulty.

The "Wanderer"

He came into existence after his previous incarnation erased himself from Irminsul's history. After regaining his memories and becoming at peace with himself, he now chooses to go by "Wanderer", "Hat Guy", or the name the player provides him.

He is currently a Vahumana student in Sumeru's Akademiya, which studies mainly aetiology, the studies around the causes, origins, or reasons behind the way that things are, and how they function.

Previously, The Balladeer was distrustful of others, and a loner; his relationships were treated as an exchange rather than geniune connection. While initially, Wanderer seems to have been doing the same thing, it is now clear that he's been able to create genuine friendships (whether he admits it or not) especially with characters like The Traveller, Mini Durin, and Nahida, which goes to show the extent of his development.

Wanderer, like The Balladeer, wears an open-chested Kimono with what appears to be a sleeveless turtleneck bodysuit underneath it. He wears hakama shorts that are, unlike The Balladeer's, two pleated, they're tied up by an indigo obi-belt with tassels coming out of it. He wears a Kasa hat, usually worn by men during wars, and don't have a veil like his previous form's ichimegasa. The mask atop his hat has been replaced by a design of a lotus flower opening up. His vision is symbolically placed where his heart should be.

His color scheme has also changed drastically, even his hair was modified to be slightly cooler in color. Blue is typically associated with calmness and healing, likely symbolizes how his resentment and anger has calmed down since his journey of healing had started. The inclusion of both white and black in his design is a good call back to his two previous designs, and feels balanced enough to fit his personality, as he's not totally pure like Kabukimono, and is not a villain anymore like The Balladeer

Curiously, this is the only design of his that doesn't feature clothing pieces traditionally worn by women, even down to the collar of his kimono. Seeing as Wanderer is meant to be the incarnation where he's the most at peace with himself, and since he was originally created to be a prototype for The Raiden Shogun, one could make the case that Wanderer is transgender, or at least meant to be interperted as such by the queer community.

My thoughts

Wanderer is my favourite genshin character, if you couldn't tell. It wasn't exactly love at first sight, I actually made fun of his design when I first saw him in an Unreconciled Stars video, but I've been waiting to know more about him early on when I started genshin in 2.0. I enjoyed looking at theories and fanworks that included him, and that one audio of him saying "Barely two words in, and you already look like you want me dead" is ingraved in my mind from how many times I've watched edits using it.

He's probably one of the few reasons I still play Genshin Impact; Genshin is no longer the fantastical magical DnD-like game that I fell in love with when I first started playing, no shame to the people who like the direction Genshin is going in now, but it made me start losing motivation to play the game or even read the newer parts of the story. Despite that, I still logged on and played the story and events, just in case he shows up again in the future. I also started saving up for C6 Wanderer and hopefully Durin, Pretty difficult so far since I'm Free-2-play, but at least I've made it to C1 with him at the time of writing this.

Oh, Did you notice the photos in this section? They're all photos I took of him! Some of my friends already know this, but I didn't touch Imaginum Theater until the day I saw leaks that Wanderer would be getting a pose soon, I basically redownloaded Genshin that week specifically to get it, hehe... I didn't like taking photos in genshin before because they always looked pixelated and lame, but eversince playing on the PS4 I realized just how gorgeous the world of genshin is and started taking endless photos of my characters in different areas

I have a bunch of headcanons for him, as you can probably guess from the last section, Transmasc Scara is one of them! I also headcanon him to be demisexual/demiromantic, and to have ADHD because he's just like me fr. I also like to imagine that Kabukimono used to have long hair like his mother, that got cut by Niwa and never grew back.

I wanna write more about him, but I think I reached the point of liking him that I physically can't articulate how I feel about him without making velociraptor sounds or saying the word "pookie" like 70 times in a row, I'm just so aksnfdsad I just love him so much

All in all, I love Wanderer/Scaramouche/Kabukimono so much, and I think he deserves the world.