Clang!
At the sound of shovel clashing against guitar, Xinyan deftly avoided the kick aimed towards her before giving a wide horizontal wing with her weapon, conjuring red hot flames with similar trajectory towards the oncoming treasure hoarders.
Despite her lack of experience in fighting compared to Lumine, she managed to hold herself against a group just fine. It's no wonder that people generally are less inclined to mess with vision holders. The advantage they have over those who do not possess one cannot be understated.
'Though I've known that for quite some time, seeing a musician dispatching a group of criminals with ease really drives the point home.'
Having been used to playing a game where every character you control possess visions of different kinds, it's easy to forget that, in the grand scheme of things, vision holders only make up a very small percentage of a nation's population.
'A gift of the gods indeed.'
Successfully creating a breathing room for herself, Lumine, having dealt with her share of treasure hoarders, stomped her leg on the ground as she created multiple jutting rock fences from the ground, preventing them from escaping.
Seeing the opportunity given to her, Xinyan's vision lit up as she leaped towards her assailants before she suddenly strummed her guitar. The electric sound of the instrument caused a ripple on the pulsing shield surrounding her before sparks of flames appeared from behind her, not unlike a pyrotechnic you'd normally see at concerts.
Before the treasure hoarders could even scramble their way out of it, I made sure to restrict their movement on top of their cut off escape route just to be sure.
With their bodies held in place, the shower of pyro hit them directly, eliciting painful screams as they struggled harder against their invisible bind, trying desperately to put out the flames as it started to spread all over their clothes and body.
As Xinyan registered the screams of the treasure hoarders, the focused gaze she had suddenly disappeared as she realized what she'd done.
Thankfully, since I was holding onto them even beforehand, I quickly dunked them into the nearby lake, immediately putting out the fire before bringing them and dropping them in front of us.
"...whoops?"
"Whoops indeed." Jumping off of the ledge, I approached the half-charred bunch and flipped them over. "Well, they're breathing, so you can rest easy."
"That's good." Xinyan said as she sighed in relief.
"Don't worry, Xinyan." Jumping at the rockstar from behind, Lumine brought her into a hug as she laid her head on her stiff shoulders. "Besides, even if something did happen to them, it's okay. After all, your safety matters more to us than theirs. Isn't that right, Yuu?"
"Mhm." Cutting off a particularly long vine from above the cave's entrance, I divided the numerous treasure hoarders in two as well as the vine before tying them up. "Your own safety is always the priority, so no need to feel guilty about this."
"...thanks." Scratching her cheeks in visible embarrassment, Xinyan opted to reciprocate Lumine's gesture. "So, what now?"
"They mention something about a puzzle somewhere, and these towers seem like a good place to start."
Once Lumine called for Paimon and the little fairy materialized herself next to her head as per usual, I brought the now tied up band of criminals and put them towards the center of the ruin near the pedestal on which a strange device was erected.
"There's a tablet over here." Lumine said, as she crouched down to get a better look. Though it didn't take long for the blonde to beckon Xinyan who was standing behind her. "Can you read this, Xinyan?"
Crouching next to Lumine, Xinyan briefly examines the writing before nodding her head. "It's a bit hard to read, but yes, I can.
"Let's see… 'At Tianqiu Valley, the adepti's ancient trails grow cold, I fall down and weep at the ruins I see. Though defeated is mighty Azhdaha of old, there's no restoring this past land of beauty.'"
"Ugh… so complicated." Paimon quipped. "So the ruin must be this place, right? But it also says it's an adepti's trail, so which is it?"
"It doesn't really matter, does it?" Lumine said as she stood up, walking back towards the device in the middle before pointing towards one of the towers. "The treasure hoarders said that there are puzzles here, so all we have to do is solve them."
"Should we split up then, princess?"
"No, let's stick together for now."
"Then, which one do you think we should tackle first?"
"Which one do you think is best?" Lumine asked, throwing the question back to me.
"I don't know. That one, I guess? The north side one?"
"I see. In that case, we'll take the south!"
"Fuck you too, Lumine."
Crossing the broken stone path towards the tower using a wind platform, the four of us walked up the stairs towards the entrance, the iron gate that would've barred our entry already lifted up, with the lever located on the wall inside, right above a pile of bags and scattered papers.
Taking the bunched up papers, I nudged Xinyan's shoulder and gave it to her once I had her attention.
"This one's in the Teyvat script, you know?"
"I know. Still can't read them though. Haven't gotten past anything other than the barebones drilled in."
"You really should study up then."
"That'll depend on whether Paimon feels like teaching me or not."
"Paimon?"
"Mhm. Both Lumine and I were taught by Paimon." Giving a quick glance at the person in question as she inspected a floating red symbol in the shape of a sword, I continued. "It hasn't been long, but she's the one that has made the most progress from the few times we've studied, albeit not quite fluent yet. Compared to me she's a lot more… what's the word? Adept?"
"Really?" Xinyan said as she too looked towards the blonde who was now talking to Paimon, their muffled voices suggest they were discussing whether or not to touch the mechanism in front of them. "Doesn't look like it for someone that seems so carefree."
"Appearance can be deceiving, can't they?"
While I left Xinyan to examine the contents of the papers, I looked around the small room we were in.
Stone walls, stone floors, stone ceiling, stone everything. Aside from some torches hanging off the wall, there are two mechanisms in the room, a closed node of sorts that emits purple lightning, while the other one is the one Lumine's currently hovering over.
'Ugh, I hate those things. Reminds me of the Spiral Abyss.'
"What does it say, Xinyan?"
"Those guys mentioned something about hints right?" She asked, to which I nodded in confirmation. "Well, what's written here is basically that. Says here that some monsters started appearing, and that this boss person told them to defeat every single one of them for the treasure to appear."
"Hmm, sounds about right."
"I don't see any monsters here though?"
"That's what that thing over there is for." Lumine, who was now listening to our discussion, perked up at my pointing towards the mark in front of her. "Just activate that, and the monsters will appear."
"Couldn't you have said that sooner, Yuu?"
"Well, you didn't ask."
Though visibly annoyed, Lumine chose to ignore my response. "So how do you activate this?"
"No idea."
'Can't exactly press the F button in real life now, can I?'
"You're supposed to be the knowledgeable one, you know?"
"Hey, just because I know a lot of things doesn't mean I know everything there is to know." I said, as I approached the glowing red sword, with Xinyan following close behind. "Have you tried reaching into it?"
"No. Besides, I'm not stupid enough to just activate something I didn't know the effect of."
"Good. You're learning." Not giving her a chance to speak, I turn towards the white fairy. "You know the drill, Paimon."
"Mhm! Don't forget to call Paimon after you're done, alright? Paimon wants to be there when you open the treasure!"
"Don't worry, we will." Lumine replied, as she brought out her sword. Following her lead, Xinyan swung her guitar once before nodding in satisfaction.
Once Paimon disappeared, I reached out towards the red sword.
Instead of the crystal-like texture I was expecting, my hand instead went right through it, causing it to dissolve into small particles.
At the same time, black smoke started to materialize from all corners of the room, and from within, hilichurls and slimes of the electro variety started to form.
The electro node in the middle of the room opened, creating a pulsing ring similar to Xinyan's shield that stretched to the edge of the small room, causing a purple hue to coat the entirety of the hilichurls body.
"Let's get this over with."
___________________________________
A sudden chill enveloped the entirety of the top floor once Lumine's hand went through the holographic sword mark.
Just like the previous floors, the node in the center of the final chamber opened, releasing a white misty pulse of cryo energy, causing the temperature within to noticeably drop. Not quite freezing, yet cold enough to bring shivers to someone that dresses lightly.
"Just like before, Xinyan."
"You got it, leader!"
With a strum of her guitar, Xinyan created a single, much larger pyro shield that surrounded the three of us, with a range of roughly half of the room. Driving most of the cold away, we each kept an eye on our own side of the battlefield, awaiting for the inevitable spawn of enemies of similar elements.
This time around, slimes covered with armor-like carapace made out of condensed cryo energy alongside their hydro counterpart appear, alongside several samachurls dressed in white and blue.
'Freeze, huh? Looks like it's finally Xinyan's time to shine.'
Thankfully, the pulsing ring of Xinyan's shield counteracts the cryo energy that would've otherwise infused themselves into our opponents, rendering whatever effect it had on them useless.
On the previous floor, having consisted mostly of pyro slimes, though the pyro shield Xinyan created helped immensely in blocking their attacks, she didn't get to do much other than the occasional swing.
Given that she serves as the epicenter of the shield, her moving around would've made things a bit more difficult for the rest of us since we have to move alongside her. Though since I am more of a ranged combatant, it really only affects Lumine.
"Yuu."
"Already on it."
Keeping my eyes on the enemies, I created a small while infusing them with the pyro energy that was periodically released through pulsing rings similar to the node before sucking in even more anemo and making the fire tornado large enough to cover the entire room.
Realizing the danger coming their way, the slimes started condensing their respective elements on top of their head, while the samachurls started to wildly swing their staff as they desperately tried to conjure the elements before it's too late.
With the sound of her heels clicking hard against the stone floor, a sudden appearance of a structure made out of geo surrounded us, blocking our line of sight towards the enemy.
"Just in case."
As the amber lines running through the rocks pulsated, the sound of something cutting through the air was heard before it clashed against the invisible shield.
"Should I use this again?" I asked, as I pulled out a glass vial of concentrated cryo energy from one of the pouches I carried, showing it towards Lumine.
"Sure. On my signal."
Once the sound of the attacks started to lessen, Lumine gave me the go ahead.
Opening the vial, a burst of cold air came out of it, causing the ever changing temperature inside the small room to lean towards zero.
Throwing the contents upwards, I swirled the liquid towards the dwindling tornado, gradually erasing the pyro within before it gradually turned white as the room became much colder than before.
The moment the attacks died down, the sound of a puffing smoke followed by a faint chime serves as a signal for Lumine to lower the construct, to which we were greeted to the sight of an empty room, not much different than before save for the bits of rocks and chunks of crystalized cryo scattered across the room.
"What was that sound?"
"Something to do with that pedestal back there probably?"
"Hmm… we should check it out once we're out."
Sat within the edge of the center towards the wall is a metal chest identical to the one we've dug out before.
"That's all for this tower then."
"Looks like it. The coast is clear, Paimon, you can get out now."
Bursting out of the broken constellations in the air is a visibly excited Paimon who, once her eyes registered the treasure chest, immediately flew towards it, reaching her tiny hands towards the handle as she opened the lid with a bit of struggle.
"Paimon's really impatient huh, leader?" Xinyan said with stifled laughter.
"She can be. Especially when it comes to food and this as of recently."
This time around, there's nothing inside of the chest other than stack upon stacks of Mora, which isn't really much of a disappointment considering how much is actually inside.
After storing everything inside, the four of us began our descent towards the next tower.
"Oho, found something interesting?"
With Xinyan once again busy writing her inspiration into her notebook, Lumine wrapped her arm around her shoulder as she made sure the rockstar wouldn't be stumbling down the stairs.
"Yep." Xinyan replied, as the piece of charcoal in her hand continued scratching against the paper furiously. "Man, being with you guys gave me so much inspiration I'm tempted to just follow you three wherever you go."
"You're welcome to, you know?"
"I just might. I've been performing a lot in Liyue Harbor, so maybe it's time to stage my performance elsewhere."
"Up for a world tour, then?"
"Haha, why not? Sounds like a lot of fun to me!"
"Oh! Will Xinyan be traveling with us then?!"
"Yep!" Xinyan said happily, storing her notebook as she ruffled Paimon's hair. "Are you excited?"
"Of course!" She said, as she twirls in excitement. "Paimon can't wait to hear your music on the road! Things would be a lot more exciting!"
"Ahaha, I'm happy to hear that."
Watching the three of them happily discussing our resident rockstar's future performance, I hung back as I listened to their conversation, occasionally chipping in when I felt like it.
Once we're outside the tower, we walked down the steps and crossed the broken path the same way we did before.
Looking up, the once bright skies seem muted as patches of gray stains the clear blue canvas.
As we approached the pedestal in the middle, a third of its marking is now glowing, clearly indicating the progress we've made so far.
"One down, two to go."
"Mhm. Next up, the north tower!" She exclaimed as she raised her arm, to which the other two shouted 'oh!' in response as they too raised their arms high.
"Uh… oh… I guess."
"Come on, Yuu," noticing my lackluster response, Xinyan grabbed my hand and pulled me closer towards the excited trio, "I know you have a fire burning in you," she said as she slapped my shoulders repeatedly, "Live up a little."
"That sounds awfully familiar."
"I know right?" Lumine, who was standing to the side, chipped in with a smug smile on her face. "I wonder where you've heard that before?"
"Ha-fucking-ha."
Snickering in response, the blonde began to lead the way towards our next puzzle, while I followed a few steps behind, next to a skipping Xinyan who was currently humming a song.
A serene melody fills the air as the dark skies loom over the horizon.