When we arrived at Mondstadt and approached the Adventures Guild we finally met the oh-so-elusive figure of Katheryne, the spokeswoman of the guild that typically handed out our quests and also had clones or something of herself spread out across Teyvat as every single guild in all the cities of Teyvat had one that knew of the traveler and their adventures which suggested they had some kind of hive mind or something.
"Ah, the new Honorary Knights of Favonius. What can the Adventures Guild do for you both." Katheryne asked bowing lightly in greeting.
Katheryne was a rather petite 'woman' with short black hair, and blue eyes and was wearing an honestly kind demeanor as she spoke with us.
The reason I wasn't sure if she was a woman, was supposedly in the game if you managed to glitch behind the stand she was stationed and looked at the back of her neck, they apparently all had a keyhole. Like she was some kind of wind-up automaton.
"Hello. We would like to accept the Ruin Guard elimination quest that's based over in the Dragonspine Mountains." Lumine answered and then we handed over our badges that we got on our last visit after Stormterror attacked Mondstadt where Katheryne was supposedly busy coordinating some adventures to clean up some of the damages so we didn't meet her.
Katheryne hummed in thought as she sorted through a couple of papers before she finally pulled out one. "Well, normally we don't allow new adventures to go on such dangerous adventures as typically only heavily experienced adventures in groups will dare to mess around with a Ruin Guard let alone several of them at once. But seeing as you both are Vision wielders and thus, are exempt from such rules you both can obviously take on a couple of such elite foes at a time."
With that said she put our badges next to a weird machine that had several crystals attached which lit up as our badges glowed lightly for a moment. "Here you two go!" She said cheerfully as she handed over our badges before clearing her throat. "Now those badges are attuned to you and will record you actually killing the Ruin Guards thus once you have completed the task there is no need to bring back cumbersome proof like a chunk of said Ruin Guard or Hilichurl weapons should you both take such missions," Katheryne explained and honestly, I kinda wanted to throw the badge back at her.
Basically, the badge would act as a recorder that would be watching every move and once, we completed our task we could go back to return the recording... I honestly would prefer to keep my privacy.
Before I could even ask or respond Lumine held the badge and asked Katheryne lightly. "And will they work within our space bag, so we don't need to worry about putting it on right before a fight?"
Katheryne firmly shook her head responding. "Oh, dear heavens no. The Adventures Guild doesn't want to step on the toes of adventures with Visions, but we also need proof of the commission being completed, for normal adventures, they can use the badges as proof of their efforts so if the team leader attempts to short someone their payment they can appeal to the guild for arbitration and more importantly we can watch their quests to see how they die should their badges be recovered."
Hmm, it's pretty smart to have those options and I honestly doubt they would be able to work being held within my space bag and I don't care even if the Fatui get news of my summons and skills as this world does have its own magic from Sumeru and if anything, I could claim to be half kitsune or something like part Adeptus similar to Yanfei from Liyue.
"What's the reward for the quest?" Paimon asked the pressing question as I imagine she was wondering how much food she was going to be able to weasel out of us from such a reward.
Katheryne briefly looked back down at the paper and then responded to Paimon. "Oh, Ruin Guards have a standing bounty for fifty thousand Mora for each one destroyed. They are extremely dangerous to the stability of humanity as should one wander across that bridge for example and get within the city... Many people would die to say the least." As she spoke, she pointed to the long bridge that separated the city from the surrounding land and I realized how the Knights Headquarters was all the way on the back half of the city so should an elite enemy managed to fight its way into the city the business district would be destroyed.
As I was thinking about the value of a Ruin Guard, I then asked a follow-up question to Paimons. "Are there bounties for Ruin Graders and Ruin Hunters?"
Katheryne nodded and explained how the Hunters were surprisingly worth the same amount as Ruin Graders at a solid million Mora as they were both at the same danger level as Ruin Graders, as they could and had flown over cities and bombarded the inhabitants with missiles and powerful beam weaponry until the cities defenders could take them down.
After a few more pleasantries with Katheryne we left Mondstadt and quickly made our way to the Dragonspine Mountains by riding upon my Anemo Elemental.
After we flew over the river separating the lands of Mondstadt from the mountain I could feel the temperature instantly drop to frigid levels that made Lumine shudder atop me and helplessly rub her hands over her bare legs to generate some friction warmth.
Even with the Anemo Elemental under my guidance encasing us in a barrier that kept out the stabbing winds, I could still feel the frigid windless surrounding us, so I looked up at the top of the massive central mountain where we could stop the rampaging winds and thus generally lower the temperature.
But that was a quest for another time.
"So where are we even going?" Paimon asked as we flew around the mountain range towards the back half of the central mountains as I recalled there was both a Cryo Lawachurl and a Ruin Grader that wasn't also surrounded by a half dozen Ruin Guards in a small arena that would all attempt to mob us.
"We are going to kill a Lawachurl I know of. At least I know where the camp is." I said after the wind barrier seemingly shrunk towards us momentarily as an especially powerful gust of wind literally froze the Anemo energy my elemental was outputting.
I frowned as I realized the constant outputting of Anemo energy was taking energy from my Aura and we had a solid few minutes before we needed to land and let my Aura regenerate lest our ride disappear right from beneath us as we were flying in the air.
But thankfully we saw the massive ten-meter blue-toned Hilichurl Chieftan as we crested over a small mountain as the Lawachurl was seemingly busy punching down some of the trees beside it with impunity in a small valley.
"Let my Ruin Grader start some fires and get its attention!" I yelled as Lumine threw herself off my lap and opened her wing glider with Paimon doing her disappearing act.
She sent me a thumbs up and as I flew a few hundred meters above the Lawachurl and he didn't even realize I was there with the howling winds covering any noises I could make. I for a moment considered having Lumine empty her space bag of all the wood she had randomly collected onto the head of the Lawachurl but then I remembered I could summon my familiars in midair.
My face couldn't help but break out into a grin as my Ruin Grader fell out of my hastily summoned Glyph and with a massive crashing noise my Ruin Grader collided with the Lawachurl legs firsts smashing into the Lawachurl's shoulders and starting a small avalanche of snow as the snow coating the valley walls all collapsed inwards towards the now violently wrestling forms of the Lawachurl and the Ruin Guard.
With a hearty roar the Lawachurl managed to cover itself in its Cryo Armor and with all the surrounding snow and Cryo energy surrounding it... It was able to easily grab the Ruin Guard by its foot and use it as a baseball bat as it smashed the Ruin Guard through several trees and even shattered portions of the rock walls of the valley before my Ruin Guard faded into motes of light from being destroyed.
Me and Lumine shared a look as we were gliding downwards after seeing the violent death of my Ruin Guard but with a shrug, I created a Glyph above me and flipped myself upwards with my wingsuit before disabling it then as I managed to get my feet above me and braced against my solid Glyph, I shot off my Glyph, throwing myself towards the ground with my saber drawn and covered with Anemo energy.
I was slightly off with my aim and instead of using my saber to slash into the head of the Lawachurl I only managed to cut a massive gash into its chest before I had to take a hand off my saber and send a blast of Anemo energy beneath me to cushion my fall as I landed in the compacted snow on the ground.
As I was attempting to get back to my feet in the unsettled ground the enraged Hilichurl Chieftain attempted to use one of the destroyed trees as a baseball bat to smash me, but Lumine sent a series of furious wind blades into the head and shoulders of the Lawachurl as she slowly drifted towards us.
When the Lawachurl focused on Lumine and fruitlessly attempted to throw rocks and other debris at Lumine I snuck up behind it and then I jumped off a rock, and with both arms, I stabbed my Anemo-coated Saber into the spine of the Lawachurl.
I could feel its spine shatter as the condensed tornado coating my Saber expanded violently within its body resulting in the Lawachurl freezing in place before collapsing to the ground dead.
As the Lawachurl began breaking down into smoky wisps of darkness I collapsed against one of the surrounding felled trees and began rubbing my bare hands against one another as the cold was getting to me.
"Can we get the hell out of here now!" Lumine cursed as she huddled up next to me and I hissed as she stuck her ice-cold hands under my jacket and against my stomach.
Honestly with how that Lawachurl was able to simply body my Ruin Guard and how fucking cold it was here. "I know where a Ruin Grader is in Liyue... Let's get the fuck out of here!" I normally actually enjoyed the cold as you could typically always simply wear another layer of clothes to dispel the cold, but here the winds were enhanced with Cryo energy that pulled all the warmth from you with no mercy.
"Paimon wants some fried Jueyun Chilies!" Paimon cried out as she flung herself against me and I cried out as the girls abused me with Paimon taking the opening Lumine created in my Jacket to climb into my Jacket despite me trying to push both of them away as I could feel my own chest break out into goosebumps from the cold.
-
We swiftly flew towards the country of Liyue as fast as the Anemo Elemental could carry us but as we crested over the final chunk of the Dragonspine mountains we saw our last quarry as it was seemingly chasing some Fatui agents into a large encampment of Sneznahyan forces.
Although the clearly refurbished old fortress was outfitted with similar cannons to the ones that were shooting at us when we raided that domain filled with Fatui agents, those cannons were doing jack other than staggering the Ruin Grader as the condensed Pyro explosive's exploded mightily against the metal frame of the Ruin Grader who would only stagger at the force of the explosion and not even take any damage.
"Brr." The Ruin Grader loudly drowned and then the large eye mounted on its head glowed and an eye blinding laser was shot at the fortress.
The cannons just like when Venti shot into them exploded as the Ruin Grader slowly and methodically dragged its vision across the top of the fortress it was almost a work of art as the Ruin Grader's laser did its job perfectly in eradicating what it considered an enemy.
"Paimon thinks that Ruin Guards are good enough..." Paimon said as she squeezed behind Lumine and in front of me as Lumine was sitting on my lap again.
"Do we really need to fight that walking apocalypse?" Lumine deadpanned as the Ruin Grader formed a shield of energy in front of itself as it ran forward, and I could feel in my chest as the Ruin Grader smashed through the front portion of the fortress and was engulfed in a massive explosion as it seemingly ran into the Fatui's munitions or something.
But as the Ruin Grader stood up with its energy shield flaring around it basically unharmed from the resulting explosion, I began considering whether we should say fuck it and leave.
"You bastard! You ruined our camp! Now we have to deal with the damned cold!" A woman's voice screamed almost hysterically and I had to blink heavily as a massive pillar of condensed ice smashed into the Ruin Grader and both smashed and pinned it to one of the surrounding cliff sides.
Out of the smoke of the building came someone I had no idea would be in the Dragonspine mountains as I thought she would be in some other Domain around Mondstadt.
Signora strutted confidently out of the smoke followed by several Cryo and Hydro Cicin Mages who arrayed themselves behind her and around the Ruin Grader.