Yi Sang - Index Proselyte Lioen

The wind died down, but the aura of death lingered over the ruined platform.

Dvalin lay helplessly in a crater of shattered stone, his cyan scales heaving with each heavy breath.

The Holy Lyre der Himmel's pure Anemo had indeed dispelled the Abyssal barrier surrounding him, but the clot of poisonous Abyssal blood embedded in his back still gave off a nauseating stench.

"Roar!"

After a brief respite, the great dragon of this world abruptly raised his massive head.

The confusion in his slitted eyes gave way to a deeper madness.

"...Knights... who raise your swords... would you... slay... your former... shield...?"

The Abyssal poison had seeped into his very marrow. He opened his enormous, fang-filled maw, and a cloud of pitch-black poisonous mist rapidly gathered deep in his throat.

Varka stepped forward, crossing his swords before him as cyan Anemo gathered on their blades once more.

"Wait, Grand Master." Wei Zhenzu reached out to stop the Knight of Boreas, who was preparing to stake his life in battle.

"Leave the rest to me." Wei Zhenzu took a deep breath and pressed the extraction button.

There was no warm, sacred light.

The light around them dimmed, as though some vast shadow had forcibly swallowed this part of the world.

The chill that had filled the air of Stormterror's Lair vanished, replaced by a strange odor of aged parchment mixed with an overpowering smell of blood that stung the nose.

Wei Zhenzu felt his breath catch, as though he were standing in a library piled high with ancient corpses.

"Rather than choosing one's own life, it is better to be chosen by life..."

A man's hoarse, weary, almost neurotic voice suddenly echoed faintly in Wei Zhenzu's mind.

It seemed to come from deep underground, carrying a morbid piety that made his skin crawl.

Along with the voice came intermittent electronic beeps, jarringly shrill in the silent darkness.

"Beep*beep*... Haa. I hope my daughter... may also taste the joys of such a life."

The voice ended with a dry, distorted chuckle, its madness enough to send a chill down one's spine.

[Identity Extraction successful: Yi Sang - Index Proselyte Lioen]

A cold stream of data washed silently over him.

The red coat on Wei Zhenzu's body instantly lost its color.

The fabric reassembled into a sharp, dark suit, without a single wrinkle.

A metallic mask gleaming with cold light covered half his face, sealing away every trace of emotion.

A heavy shackle silently clasped his soul: an absolute order built from countless Prescripts over hundreds and thousands of years.

A ball of constantly flowing liquid metal hovered above his right palm, cold light gliding across its surface. This was the Oracle Terminal, Caduceus.

Several clusters of ghostly blue garbled characters appeared in midair without warning.

"Beep*beep*..." The mechanical electronic tones sounded intermittently.

"Target confirmed." The man's voice from beneath the mask was utterly flat, tinged with morbid piety.

"For the Prescripts, for that painting. Let us begin."

Behind him, Kaeya managed to prop up his upper body with his sword. He stared at the unfamiliar figure in the suit, his single eye wide with astonishment.

"What kind of outfit is that?"

The pressure he gave off even eclipsed that of the demonic dragon in the sky for a moment.

"Prescripts," Wei Zhenzu said coldly.

An intricate golden halo spread beneath his feet, and several Prescript petals resembling holograms drifted down out of thin air.

High in the air, Dvalin let out a thunderous roar. The pitch-black poisonous mist transformed into several enormous wind blades that swept across the ruined ground, sweeping rubble into the air and grinding it to powder in an instant.

Facing the storm, Wei Zhenzu calmly took a step forward.

"Wrap the frozen blood three hundred and thirty times."

The Oracle Terminal let out a piercing buzz. The liquid metal above his palm elongated and solidified within milliseconds.

A flash of silver, and a massive iron spike attached to a length of sharp piano wire took shape in an instant.

[Blind Faith's Spindle].

His eyes sharpened beneath the mask. Wei Zhenzu flicked his wrist, and the iron spike tore through the air.

At the same time, he became an afterimage, slipping straight through a blind spot between two blades of poisonous wind with perfectly measured steps.

In the blink of an eye, he had closed in on Dvalin's flank.

The heavy iron spike drove precisely into a gap between the dragon's scales, and black blood splashed out.

Wei Zhenzu yanked his right hand back. The piano wire attached to the end of the spike instantly spread apart, the fine metal strands forming a net of death that bound the wind dragon's raised left claw tight.

The sharp wires cut into flesh. Dvalin roared in fury, instinctively beating his wings and struggling.

A pulling force powerful enough to overturn city walls surged back along the piano wire.

Wei Zhenzu's black leather shoes remained planted on the ground, his suit immaculate and his body unmoving.

"One."

With his left claw bound, Dvalin went completely berserk. He slammed down his right wing, whipping up a turbid elemental storm that crashed down with a hail of rubble.

Wei Zhenzu raised his head slightly, and the Oracle Terminal simultaneously received a new killing Prescript.

"Crush the sound, trample the mind."

He decisively released his grip on the piano wire.

Light blazed from his palm. The massive iron spike in the distance instantly broke apart into liquid metal, which raced back along the wires in midair.

Metal clicked crisply into place as the liquid solidified again above his palm. A heavy iron hammer shaped like a giant stamp formed in an instant, the Prescript text engraved in reverse on its face glowing a dim crimson.

[Hammer of Atonement].

Wei Zhenzu raised the heavy hammer high in one hand and launched a second execution charge against Dvalin's right wing, which blotted out the sky.