Lobotomy Corporation E.G.O::Sunshower - Heathcliff

Wei Zhenzu took the ticket, his mouth twitching uncontrollably.

He raised his head and gazed resentfully at Mondstadt's night sky, as if his eyes had pierced the fourth wall and landed on some guy tapping away at a keyboard.

"This forced plot progression, this way of getting an item with absolutely no buildup, like a pie falling out of the sky...

"The author was too lazy to come up with a complicated plot for me to get Lunacy, so he just shoved a ticket at me to force the battle along, right?!"

Wei Zhenzu pointed at the sky and cursed at the top of his lungs.

"Author, could you show a little professionalism?! What kind of Anemo Archon just finds a gacha ticket from another world lying on the ground?!"

(Shut up, Liangzi. Curse me again and I'll stew you into menzi and eat you. I've been drinking salty noodles for three days straight, and even in my dreams I'm eating feasts. Argh, argh, argh, I want meat! Could big sis Pierre come over and stir-fry my brother for me...)

"Ehe~ Who knows? The guidance of fate is always full of surprises."

Venti spread his hands innocently and even stuck out his tongue, looking infuriatingly smug.

Across the bridge, Timmie had already begun to go berserk.

The enormous ruby core in his chest began flashing wildly. The mechanical pigeons around him let out a piercing screech of metal scraping against metal, and their gear-shaped wings began spinning at high speed.

"You... you scared them away again! And this time... you didn't even leave them a single feather! I'm going to turn you all into fowl meat!"

Timmie let out a heart-rending cry.

"There's no time. Whatever I draw, I'll transform first!"

With nothing else to try, Wei Zhenzu crushed the guaranteed ticket in his hand.

"Shing-!"

Wei Zhenzu took a deep breath, and the system panel popped open on his retina.

Facing the strange gear pigeons and the twisted Timmie on the bridge, he pressed the faintly glowing extraction button.

The air around him suddenly became unbearably damp and oppressive.

The cool night breeze outside the City of Mondstadt vanished without a trace.

In its place came a musty stench, as if it had fermented in a sewer for ages, mixed with the lingering smell of mud and stagnant water, drilling straight into his nostrils.

"If the sun isn't out, I can't tell what time it is at all..."

A man's voice, lifeless and steeped in endless dejection and depression, suddenly echoed faintly in Wei Zhenzu's mind.

"...Hey, is it morning now?"

Along with that listless murmur, a cold stream of data washed silently over him like a downpour.

[Identity overwrite successful: Lobotomy Corporation E.G.O::Sunshower - Heathcliff]

The clothes Wei Zhenzu wore instantly lost their color and began to reform.

They were replaced by a tattered gray raincoat that looked as if it had been soaking in a filthy ditch for three days.

His hair became as messy as a bird's nest, and his back hunched over beyond his control.

In his right hand, a battered, broken umbrella dripping with an unknown liquid slowly solidified into shape.

Wei Zhenzu slowly raised his head and looked at Mondstadt's cold moonlight.

His eyes had lost their former sharpness, replaced by a clear stupidity and bottomless depression.

These utterly depressing lines... this sewer-dwelling hobo look... and this iconic, leaky, broken umbrella...

Wei Zhenzu's original consciousness, buried deep within this shell, froze for a full three seconds before a despairing wail erupted in his mind, loud enough to blow the top of his skull off:

"Holy shit! Wow! I actually overwrote myself with one of the strongest god-of-war Identities in Limbus Bus... [Sunshower - Heathcliff]!!"

With a god-of-war Identity of this caliber in hand, he could turn all those damn birds on the bridge into a KFC family bucket right then and there!

Deep in his consciousness, Wei Zhenzu trembled all over with excitement.

This was Sunshower Heathcliff!

"Wow! Look at those gorgeous stats! Look at that high clash power! Most terrifying of all, he can even apply 'Sinking' and 'Rupture' buffs to the enemy! A dual-system Identity-this is practically a dimensionality reduction strike. He's seriously too strong!"

Wei Zhenzu was frantically praising this god-tier Identity in his heart... Like hell he was!!!

This guy was an inhumane "negative coin Identity." Only when his mind had completely collapsed, all hope was lost, and he was depressed enough to want to start over could he flip "tails" and unleash world-destroying power. (Probably...)

But the problem was... Wei Zhenzu had just escaped death, gotten a free ticket, and even pulled a three-star in a single try.

Not only had his sanity not dropped, it was actually in the sunny positives thanks to his burst of gacha luck.

Wei Zhenzu roared madly inside, wanting to cry but unable to shed a tear.

"Coo coo coo coo!!!"

Timmie let out an angry shriek from across the bridge.

The eyes of the dozens of mechanical pigeons around him glowed bright red. The feather launchers beneath their wings snapped open in unison, and countless steel feathers, sharp as arrows, filled the sky as they shot toward Wei Zhenzu with whistling rushes of air.

Reality left him no room to back down.

"Stay away from me! This umbrella of mine can barely even keep the rain off right now!"

Watching the feathers fill the sky, Wei Zhenzu had no choice but to steel himself and open the broken umbrella.

"It's over, it's over, it's over... Skill one, [Umbrella Thwack], base power 6, coin power -2... Please, heaven, anything but heads. Give me a tails, I'm begging you."

With a mournful expression and his eyes squeezed shut, Wei Zhenzu swung the umbrella in his hand to meet the attack.

[Skill 1: Umbrella Thwack]

[Base power: 6]

[Coin count: 3]

[Coin power: -2]

On Wei Zhenzu's retina, three golden coins were tossed high into the air, flipping crisply as they spun.

"Ding!"

"Ding!"

"Ding!"

The coins landed, revealing three glittering golden symbols of gacha luck-heads, heads, heads.

B. M. Time...

"Fuck your mother!" Wei Zhenzu broke down on the spot.

He watched helplessly as the moment the coins landed on heads, his already pitiful base power of "6" on the system panel mercilessly triggered the "-2-2-2" penalty.

Final clash power: a pitiful 0.

"Clang!"

Wei Zhenzu's power-0 butter umbrella tapped weakly against a mechanical pigeon's steel head, making a sound even duller than a wooden fish being struck.

The mechanical pigeon didn't even tilt its head. It simply stared at the big fool holding a broken umbrella before it with its bright red electronic eyes.

"Uh..."

Wei Zhenzu held up his umbrella awkwardly, a drop of cold sweat appearing on his forehead.

The next second, the mechanical pigeon suddenly opened its steel beak and pecked Wei Zhenzu hard on the knee.

"Awooo!"

A piercing scream rang out across the Mondstadt bridgehead.