Playing Tower Defense in Teyvat—Was Something Wrong Here? (Please Recommend, Please Vote, Please Follow)

Ying had already gotten used to Wang Lei knowing all sorts of strange information. Digging up wine beneath the great tree at Windrise could summon the Anemo Archon? Fine, she would remember that.

Wang Lei then formally bid Ying farewell. He found a corner, used a gap to return to the Statue of The Seven in Inazuma where he had first arrived, and placed his hand directly on it, linking himself to the Plane of Euthymia.

He then discovered that Ei was not in the Plane of Euthymia. Though Wang Lei found it somewhat strange, he did not immediately leave. Instead, he left behind a plate of Tricolor Dumplings, thoughtfully placing a thick sheet of cardboard beneath it.

This was actually the private method of contact Wang Lei and Ei had agreed upon in advance in the Super God World, allowing them to exchange information while avoiding the Heavenly Principles' surveillance.

Wang Lei's real message was inside the cardboard. This time, the contents were not particularly likely to provoke the Heavenly Principles. It merely stated that he had completed an experiment on mortals resisting erosion, and mentioned some things about Rosalyne. He wanted Ei to know about that person beforehand, lest Wang Lei be absent someday and she ended up getting struck down by the Raiden Shogun again.

After finishing all this, Wang Lei withdrew from the Plane of Euthymia. He used another gap to return to Mondstadt, then headed straight for Shimen.

After thinking it over, the only high-energy items in Mondstadt that Wang Lei could get his hands on were the Abyss gate on Musk Reef—assuming it even existed—and the two time sundials from the Time and Wind quest.

But Wang Lei felt that the prerequisite quests for those two things were too troublesome, and there was no guarantee they actually contained energy.

What, the light-guiding ritual formation and wind barrier at Stormterror's Lair? Come on, Dvalin had suffered enough already. He had only just cleansed the filthy blood from his body. There was no need to tear down his home too.

Wang Lei's objective was actually very clear. He would enter Liyue through Shimen and travel west, passing through Wuwang Slope and Qingce Village before crossing a great river. There, he would see a massive waterfall descending all the way from the direction of Mt. Aocang. Near the rock wall to the left of that waterfall was a path leading to a secret Abyss Order base.

If Wang Lei remembered correctly, deep within that base stood an upside-down Statue of The Seven. It was a Statue of The Seven belonging to the Anemo Archon, stolen from Mondstadt by the Abyss Order. They were using it to gather the power of the Abyss, and that power was Wang Lei's target this time.

As for the so-called power of the Abyss, Wang Lei had already experimented on wild Abyss Mages along the way. Abyss Mages could only use a negligible trace of that power in conjunction with their own elemental attributes to move through space.

But that was already enough for Wang Lei to analyze it. This so-called Abyssal power was something similar to the Dark Energy of the Super God Universe. It also came with all sorts of strange knowledge, somewhat like finding a fragment of the Dark Dimension system left behind after a god-level being's system had been destroyed in the Super God Universe.

This knowledge, which might or might not be useful, was what the Heavenly Principles had defined as Forbidden Knowledge. From her position as the ruler of the world, she had directly cursed this power.

That was why Teyvat's natives would either mutate or go mad after coming into contact with Abyssal power. Part of the reason was that the knowledge contained within this Abyssal energy was inherently chaotic, but the greater cause was the curse of the Heavenly Principles.

However, for the system, all that mattered was whether the energy was unowned. And no matter how powerful the Heavenly Principles' curse was, it remained confined to Teyvat. It could not affect the system at all.

Besides, Wang Lei himself was not going to absorb the energy. The power of the Stellaron within him was even more overbearing than so-called Abyssal power. He had no reason to fear Abyssal energy invading his body. So naturally, Wang Lei had set his sights on it.

After a day of travel, Wang Lei finally reached his destination. Though he had been in a hurry along the way, the scenery had been beautiful. It had been a rather pleasant outing—if one ignored the scenery-ruining Hilichurls.

Wang Lei himself had no idea how many of those things he had killed along the way. Perhaps they respawned on their own, but the Energy Points from killing an ordinary Hilichurl were not even worth as much as killing a chicken in the Super God Universe—and that was an immature chick.

A stronger Samachurl could provide as many Energy Points as an adult chicken, while a Lawachurl was roughly equivalent to a large duck. A Mitachurl, meanwhile, was worth a goose.

Still, just because Hilichurl-type monsters provided few Energy Points did not mean they were weak. Ordinary Hilichurls had combat strength comparable to ordinary adult humans. Lawachurls were already on par with special forces soldiers. As for Mitachurls, their combat strength took a direct leap forward. That Taotie at Feiliu District Airport would probably have been pinned to the ground and hammered by a Mitachurl if it had lost its guns and its ability to fly.

Thus, killing Hilichurls had an extremely poor cost-performance ratio, and Wang Lei had no interest in doing so. Unless there was an Abyss Mage around. Abyss Mages gave quite a lot—more than forty Energy Points each. Most of the time now, Wang Lei only cleared out the Hilichurls around them while killing Abyss Mages.

As for wild Hilichurl settlements, he simply used visual invisibility and passed straight through.

After reaching the waterfall, Wang Lei initially thought he would have to search around. To his surprise, after just a few steps, he found traces of the Treasure Hoarders. They were excavating ruins.

Then, once he reached the ruins, Wang Lei knew this was his destination.

The Abyssal power within these ruins was practically overflowing from the ground.

So Wang Lei used visual invisibility again to evade the Treasure Hoarders.

These people were the perfect scapegoats. If anything really happened inside later and the Liyue authorities came, they could take the blame.

The story would be that the Treasure Hoarders had violently excavated the ruins, awakening dangerous monsters sealed within them and causing such a huge disturbance.

As for the monsters, Wang Lei could just pull out a few Rift Creatures and have them impersonate them.

Wang Lei infiltrated the depths of the ruins like that. This time, he wiped out every Abyss Mage and monster he encountered along the way, so they would not interfere when he absorbed the energy later.

Finally, after entering the deepest part of the ruins, Wang Lei saw the upside-down Statue of The Seven.

At this moment, the orb that had once rested in the hands of this Anemo Archon Statue of The Seven was gone. In its place was an energy sphere formed from Abyssal power, constantly collapsing inward.

Wang Lei tested it and found that the energy could be absorbed, and that its quality was quite good. Delighted, he had the system conjure a phone. Using the same old trick, he slipped a ring over the phone, hooked it onto the wrists of the statue's upturned hands, and had the system begin crazily absorbing the Abyssal energy in its grasp.

Wang Lei did not remain idle either. This was an Abyss Order base, yet he had not encountered an Abyss Apostle on his way in. It had probably just happened to leave. Once it returned, it would definitely bring troops to counterattack.

So Wang Lei directly turned the Stellaron interference inside his body up to its maximum, preventing the Abyss Apostle from teleporting directly in front of him.

Then, outside the chamber holding the inverted Statue of The Seven, he opened a rift and summoned Rift Creatures to help defend the area.

Since the opponent was the Abyss Order, Wang Lei simply stopped caring about how many Rift Creatures he could control. He summoned as many as he could. Even if he could not control them, he could at least keep them from entering his room. These rift monsters were his best barrier.

Sure enough, it did not take long for the Abyss Apostle to notice the changes in the base. It had never expected the Abyss Order's base to be occupied by monsters it did not recognize at all. Worse still, its spatial movement ability had been completely disabled.

Faced with monsters that refused to reason with it in the slightest, he could only fight. Soon after, he fled with grievous injuries, exactly as expected.

There was no helping it. Wang Lei had disabled spatial teleportation. How could a single Abyss Apostle fight more than a hundred rift monsters here? These rift monsters had, at minimum, the offensive and defensive capabilities of a First Generation Super Soldier.

But the Abyss Apostle was not stupid. If it could not handle things alone, it would call for reinforcements. If the Abyss Order lacked manpower, it would seize Hilichurls from outside to supplement its forces. It even brought over the Treasure Hoarders excavating the ruins above to serve as the vanguard.

While waiting for the system to absorb the energy, Wang Lei controlled the Rift Creatures against wave after wave of monsters sent by the Abyss Apostle. It gave him the feeling of playing a tower defense game.