"It really fused! The power in my body is flowing so smoothly, without that blocked, uncomfortable feeling from before!" Xiao Qin's eyes widened in surprise, her voice brimming with excitement.
"The elemental stability after fusion has also met the standard." Hydro Qin's voice replaced Xiao Qin's.
"This is so fun! I want to play too!" Clearly, this was Yunqin.
The three identical yet distinct voices intertwined, and Yunqin's body suddenly froze.
"But Osial and Beisht will harm the people of Liyue! We can't let them out!" The original Yunqin's voice protested.
"Gods strengthened by the Abyss replacing Morax to rule Liyue isn't necessarily a bad thing," Hydro Qin mused.
Xiao Qin sighed helplessly, "You two..."
The three personalities began fighting for control of the body, her hands flailing uncontrollably in the air.
One moment, she'd conjure half a Geo element; the next, she'd condense a few water droplets. Her expression rapidly shifted between a goofy grin, calm composure, and icy coldness, like a malfunctioning puppet.
"Stop!" Lu Qiuyun rushed forward, clamping a hand over Yunqin's mouth. She then closed her eyes, plugged her ears, and sighed in exasperation. "I'm really done with you three! If you keep fighting, forget advancing the plot—you'll tear yourselves into three pieces first!"
She released her hand and pulled a neatly folded piece of paper from her pocket. Unfolding it revealed dense handwriting covering the entire page, with even the notes clearly marked.
She handed the paper to Yunqin, her tone turning serious again. "Stop fighting. Here's my plan..."
Yunqin took the paper, her fingertip brushing across the dense script.
The paper instantly transformed into a stream of light and merged into her mind.
The three voices in her mind gradually quieted, slowly converging into a single thought.
Lu Qiuyun saw the determination in her eyes—a light born from the fusion of the original self's purity, Hydro Qin's calmness, and Xiao Qin's sharpness.
"That's more like it," Lu Qiuyun said, a long-absent smile appearing on her face. "Alright! It's about time. We should go."
"Remember, no matter what happens, you three are never separate 'personalities.' You are all the same Yunqin—the Yunqin who would do anything for Rex Lapis, for the safety of Liyue, and to protect her companions."
Yunqin nodded firmly. The moment her figure vanished, the three voices finally reached a consensus, merging into a single, resolute vow.
"This time, we're going to make a killing!"
-
Dark clouds, like cotton wool soaked in ink, hung heavily over Liyue Harbor, making even breathing feel suffocatingly damp.
Each clap of thunder was like a deep-sea leviathan roaring from its slumber, shaking the wooden beams of street-facing shops until they hummed, while the red paper lanterns on window lattices were torn to shreds by the fierce wind.
Sparks flashed and vanished in the rain-swept darkness, failing to cast even a final glimmer of warmth on the bluestone paths.
Raindrops the size of soybeans hammered down, splashing up half-inch-high sprays of water that flowed along the cracks in the stone slabs, forming muddy rivulets.
These streams, carrying silt and sand, surged toward low-lying areas, quickly submerging pedestrians' shoes.
In less than the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, all of Liyue plunged into a darkness so thick you couldn't see your hand in front of your face, with only an unnatural moon hanging over the center of the vortex above the sea.
That eerie moon was almost transgressively large, its silver glow tinged with an ominous blue, searing the word "Calamity" into the pupils of every Liyue resident.
The chaos in the harbor erupted the moment the waves crashed ashore.
The once-gentle waves had transformed completely; they were no longer the silk that fishermen's boats could glide across, no longer the delicate ripples children chased and played with.
Fang-like crests tore the horizon into ragged cloth, spitting white foam onto the shore with each surge, while the air itself reeked of salty, violent malice.
Fishing boats laden with fresh seafood couldn't retreat in time; their sails were torn to shreds by the gale, and the waves, like giant hands, violently capsized them.
Wooden planks spun in the Black Sea, and a fisherman's cry for help was swallowed by a clap of thunder the moment it left his lips.
In just a few breaths, even his shadow vanished into the deep sea.
The people's screams pierced the rain-swept darkness as they scattered like startled birds, fleeing into their homes.
Every household bolted its doors and windows; the door panels rattled violently under the wind's assault, as if monsters were trying to break in.
No one dared to look up. The melody drifting from beneath that moon was more terrifying than the thunder, repeatedly tearing at the Liyue locals' trust in their homeland.
Yunqin sat in the crescent moon's shadow, her skirt whipping loudly in the sea breeze.
She wasn't holding a zither; instead, she raised her hands, gathering the moonlight into visible silver threads and pulling them taut like strings.
Though there was no zither body to resonate, each "pull" and "vibration" birthed a new surge of furious tides.
The waves crested even higher than before, carrying the dark energy of the Abyss, and lunged toward the harbor like man-eating beasts.
The melody had no name, yet everyone knew it.
It was the nursery rhyme children sang while chasing each other in the Guili Plains, the tune tea farmers hummed while picking leaves in Qiaoying Village, the chant dockworkers shouted while unloading cargo...
She didn't even realize she was twisting the breath of all Liyue into a thin cord, then inch by inch tightening it around her homeland's throat.
A teardrop slid from the corner of the young woman's eye; it was her original self crying from the depths of her consciousness, but the moonlight instantly froze it into a tiny ice pellet.
The teardrop shattered into nothingness upon hitting the crescent moon, leaving not even a trace behind.
"Vwoom—"
A clear, resonant hum tore through the night sky. The Jade Chamber, gleaming coldly under the moon, slowly emerged from the clouds like an inverted jade mace, parting the thick night clouds.
Ningguang stood at the Chamber's forefront, her phoenix-like eyes fixed on the moon above the sea.
When she clearly saw the figure on the moon, her pupils contracted sharply, and she even missed half a breath: "Is... is that Yunqin?"
Her voice was so soft it seemed afraid to disturb something, trembling with disbelief. How could the young woman who once discussed Rex Lapis with Keqing in the Jade Chamber, earnestly saying, "I want to protect Liyue just like Rex Lapis," be there?
Keqing gripped her weapon, the Electro element crackling around her.
Upon hearing the name "Yunqin," the Electro element instantly faltered, and even her fingertips began to tremble.
She stumbled forward two steps in disbelief, staring intently at the figure, her hair whipped into disarray by the wind, her entire being starting to spiral into uncontrollable panic: "How could it be her? How could she... how could she be manipulating the waves to attack Liyue?"
She'd rather believe she was mistaken!
But that silhouette, that face... it was unmistakably Yunqin!
Ganyu stood beside the two, Amos' Bow floating at her side, an ice arrow on the string condensing and melting, melting and condensing.
The arrowhead remained aimed at the waves, never pointing at the figure on the moon, yet the arrow trembled violently, and even the bow itself quivered slightly.
"It's Junior Sister... How could she be summoning waves to attack Liyue?"
Ganyu's mind replayed scenes from the past: Yunqin holding a piece of Rock Jade, timidly asking her, "Sister Ganyu, look at the Rex Lapis statue I carved. Are the dragon horns too sharp?"
Yunqin, helping her pick Qingxin, had even offered to carry the basket of herbs, afraid Ganyu would get tired...
She had also said, "During the Lantern Rite, I'm going to carve lots of Rex Lapis statues and give them to everyone in Liyue..."