"This is... Dvalin, he... These are the tears Stormterror shed because of his pain..."
"Tears...?" Paimon tilted her head in confusion.
"He used to be a gentle, kind child, but now he's so sad and full of anger." Venti turned to the two girls and held out his hand. "I have two Tear Crystals here, too. Could you try purifying them?"
Gabrielina froze briefly, her gaze settling on the boy's open palm. In the end, she took the crystal with a pout.
As Lumine slowly closed her eyes, a strange power gradually enveloped the entire crystal. The impurities within were steadily expelled, restoring its original, crystal-clear appearance.
The crystal in Gabrielina's hand, however, might not have been so fortunate.
Under everyone's gaze, the crystal trembled incessantly, showing no signs of being purified. Instead, it gradually warped and fractured. Crack after crack opened across its surface before it finally burst into fragments, turning into black mist that vanished between the girl's fingers.
"Ah... It seems this young lady doesn't have that power~"
Gabrielina shrugged, looking utterly unconcerned.
Of course she couldn't purify the crystal the way Lumine had.
The instant she touched the crystal, the Corridor within her began operating. Once it had drained the already scant remnants of Anemo, all that remained was worthless residue, doomed to crumble.
System: Like throwing a meat bun to a dog-you're never getting it back.
"Achoo!" Gabrielina had the distinct feeling that someone was bad-mouthing her and shot a certain someone a surreptitious glare.
Venti pretended not to notice and took the crystal from Lumine. "Traveler, you really do possess an incredible power!"
"People like you two are destined to appear in the verses we Bards sing..."
"Stand in the sunlight, and you are sure to become a hero. Stand in the shadows, and you may instead usher in disaster."
"Ah, but I don't have time to compose a new song for you right now." Venti looked regretful. "Even if no one hunts Dvalin down, his life force will still drain away rapidly... He'll burn himself out in his rage."
The boy lowered his head, his glistening eyes like those of a soaking-wet little seal, stirring pity in anyone who saw him.
"Is there anything we can do to help?" Lumine was the first to speak, her voice gentle.
"It's all right, it's all right. Purifying the tears was already a huge help. I'm very grateful! But..."
"But?"
The boy blinked, looking as though he had tried and failed to give an "ehe." "But seeing these tears seems to have reminded me of an old friend, and now I have a plan of my own... So I'll excuse myself!"
Seeing Venti turn to run off, Paimon shouted anxiously, "Hey! Where are you going?"
"To [Mondstadt's Heroic Symbol]!" Venti waved without looking back.
A gust of wind swept past, and his figure vanished into the distance, disappearing into the crowd.
"Mondstadt's Heroic Symbol... Do you know where that is, Gabrielina?" Lumine cast an expectant look at the girl beside her.
"No idea~" the angel answered without batting an eye.
What a cool, collected lie, Lady Flügel.
"Isn't it that tree-the super huge one?" Paimon spread her arms in an exaggerated gesture. "Lumine, you must remember it, right? We saw it on our way here!"
"Yes, I remember." Lumine nodded. "Then let's hurry over!"
Gabrielina looked toward Windrise. Beneath the sky, now clear of dark clouds, the wilderness stretched to the horizon like a green carpet.
With half-lidded eyes, she tapped her chin with a fingertip and murmured, seemingly offhandedly, "But don't you think... that poet's voice sounds very familiar?"
The response she had expected never came. Behind her, there was only silence.
Puzzled, the girl turned around, only to meet two pairs of sparkling eyes. She involuntarily backed away a little.
"Wh-what is it?"
Lumine and Paimon exchanged a glance, then reached toward her with smiles.
A few days earlier, when Venti ran into Gabrielina outside the city, he had thought it was no big deal.
After all, hadn't she just blasted a little crater? Mondstadt already had someone who played with explosions. One more wouldn't interfere with his slacking off.
Last night, when that strange sense of familiarity surfaced, he had still thought it was no big deal.
After all, he was so well-liked... It was perfectly normal to have lots of old friends... Yes, perfectly normal. He could drink himself senseless first and worry about it later!
But now, something even more outrageous had happened. Her strange ability had manifested right before his eyes, forcing him to take notice.
How should he describe that power?
If Lumine selflessly purified every impurity, leaving only the purest Anemo, then Gabrielina sucked away all the elemental energy and "hid" it somewhere he couldn't see, leaving the lethally poisonous, pitch-dark abyssal power outside her body.
Venti felt that, if he compared them to filters, the current situation was roughly that one of the machines had developed self-awareness and was preparing to punch the whole damn world.
Hidden among the thousands of currents blowing toward the great tree, he felt around his head for a while, then dejectedly knocked on his skull.
She really did seem to have intended to kill Dvalin yesterday.
"What a headache... I haven't done anything to offend her, have I?"
Venti muttered to himself, though his face showed no sign of panic. Just then, the thoughts flashing through his mind came to an abrupt halt.
Not far away, beneath [Mondstadt's Heroic Symbol], two girls were chatting leisurely. Gabrielina seemed to be holding something up.
Venti: "..." I must have been under too much stress lately. Look, I'm so exhausted I'm hallucinating.
With that self-mocking thought, he gathered his wandering attention and re-formed his body from the wind.
The information on Windrise available in the Adventurer Handbook consisted only of photos with adult-video picture quality and a brief introduction. All one could learn was that there was a Statue of The Seven and a very large tree here. It hardly conveyed the place.
Only upon coming here in person could people truly feel its grandeur, and even develop a little reverence for everything around them.
"I think it's fine."
Lumine looked worried as she tugged on Gabrielina's hem. "Maybe we should leave it? What if it's expired..."
Gabrielina leaned against the tree and raised the wine bottle in her hand, which still had a little dirt clinging to it.
"If you don't like it, Lumine, you can just watch from the sidelines. I won't force you to do anything you don't want to," the girl declared with righteous conviction.
"This is a gift from nature. How could we waste it..."
"You just dug that up, didn't you? Come to think of it, how did you know there was wine here? Hey!" Paimon poked half her head out from behind Lumine.
"No idea. To the Anemo Archon!"
"Eh~ How did you-"
As their gazes met, the smile on Venti's face gradually disappeared and slowly migrated to Gabrielina's.
Terrifying...
This isn't good.
This girl... is seriously frightening!
How does she know where I buried my wine!? This is a full-blown crisis for Mondstadt! Aaaaaah!
"Venti, you're here!" Paimon waved enthusiastically, greeting him.
"Ahaha... How did you get here so quickly? I thought you wouldn't follow me, or at least that you'd take a while to find the way."
With every ounce of willpower he had, Venti finally dragged his gaze away from the bottle of aged wine swaying temptingly before him.
"Heehee, never seen that before, have you?" Paimon lifted her chin and patted the girl beside her on the shoulder. "This is Gabrielina's specialty. Whoosh, and she can bring us here from waaay over there, all in the blink of an eye!"
Gabrielina: Yes, I did all the work.
Lumine's attention was clearly elsewhere. "Since you know so much about Stormterror, I was thinking that perhaps I could learn more about the Anemo Archon from you."
Truthfully, Lumine already had an idea in mind: the Venti standing before her... might be the Anemo Archon himself.
Yes, she felt certain Gabrielina was thinking the same thing.
"The Anemo Archon, Barbatos? That guy disappeared from Mondstadt long ago," Venti said dismissively.
"The Geo Archon of neighboring Liyue and the Electro Archon of Inazuma are still around, but the people of Mondstadt haven't seen their god in a very long time."
Before you continue