Early the next morning, Ronava slowly opened her eyes.
Her long, silky white hair lay scattered in disarray. Her head rested on Linaya's smooth belly.
She remembered little of what had happened the night before. All Ronava could recall was that after their "pillow fight," Linaya had suddenly asked her, "May I touch you?"
After that... she remembered nothing.
"Good morning, Ronava." Shortly after Ronava moved her head, Linaya's sweet voice rang out cheerfully. "Did you sleep well last night? Did you have any nightmares?"
"...Probably not," she answered honestly.
"Mm, that's good." Linaya propped herself up from her back into a half-sitting position. "When we used to adventure together, Tang Wang always had nightmares."
"I mean, if he didn't hold something, he'd always have nightmares after falling asleep. Strange, right?"
"So, you two..." Ronava's voice was a little low.
"Mm." She nodded slightly. "So whenever we went adventuring together, he usually slept holding Lumi."
"Yoo-hoo!" Hearing her words, Lumi, who had been sleeping at the head of the bed, floated up and bobbed up and down.
"All right, Lumi, let's get ready to go!"
Then, in front of the bathroom mirror, Linaya used a damp comb to help Ronava comb her long, silky hair.
"What kind of hairstyle do you like?"
"...Does that sort of thing matter?"
"Then I'll put it in a high ponytail for you."
Some time later, Ronava pushed open the door and stepped out of the room, her hair tied in a high ponytail.
Danika and Tang Wang, who had risen early, greeted them.
"Ah, Miss Ronava, your hairstyle looks quite striking today."
"It looks lovely! Lili, you're getting better and better at this."
At the sight of her, both offered their compliments. As Ronava listened, a feeling she could not understand welled up inside her.
"All right, let's report to the Knights of Favonius first." With that, Tang Wang led them to the Knights' headquarters.
Their main reason for coming was to gather information about the Abyss Lector.
"Its recent activity has been around Starsnatch Cliff..." a somewhat shy blond youth said rapidly. "When it's active, it's often accompanied by Rifthounds and other monsters."
"This expedition will be extremely dangerous," the tall, blue-haired woman standing beside the youth said with a snort. "So I, Eula, the Spindrift Knight, will be going as well."
"No, no, that won't be necessary." Tang Wang hurriedly waved his hand. "Honored Spindrift Knight, your Vision is Cryo, right?"
"Given the nature of the Abyss Lector, even if you went, you wouldn't be able to help at all..."
He made his tone as tactful as possible, but unfortunately, no one could have remained calm after hearing that.
"Hmph, how dare you look down on me!" She snorted and turned her head away. "Vengeance will be mine."
"I didn't mean it that way, but our party really is well-rounded already." With that, Tang Wang led his teammates toward Starsnatch Cliff without looking back.
Watching them leave, Eula wanted to say something, but in the end she gritted her teeth and swallowed her words.
For she had recently discovered that the elders in her family were plotting something.
"Just up ahead, alone." A short while later, the four of them and one Frost Spirit arrived at Starsnatch Cliff in Mondstadt. Someone should have been keeping watch on the platform here, guarding against storms sweeping in from afar.
But now, monsters were ravaging all of Mondstadt, and the platform was deserted.
Not far in front of the platform, a robed monster covered in frost was muttering in an obscure language to a large group of Hilichurls.
"Danika, do you know about monster taxonomy?" After observing for a while, Tang Wang suddenly asked a baffling question.
"What do you mean?" she asked in return.
"He means that the Adventurers' Guild has different official names for different monsters," Linaya immediately explained. "Take Abyss Heralds, for example. The melee units that wield blades are called Heralds, while the ranged units with spellbooks are generally called Abyss Lectors."
"Right. As I recall, there should only be Cryo Abyss Heralds." He looked at the figure in the distance. "But this thing really does seem to be an Abyss Lector."
"What the... hell."
"Ronava, get ready to fight."
At Tang Wang's command, Ronava unleashed her Elemental Skill at the large group of Hilichurls in the distance.
A twisted mass of feathers flew out swiftly, sprouting countless arms after it struck the ground.
"O flock of crows." She pressed her hands together, and the arms condensed into the shapes of birds, forming a tornado.
More than half the surrounding Hilichurls had already been killed or injured by her first strike. The tornado she now summoned continued to wear away at the lives of the surviving Hilichurls and the enormous Mitachurls.
"Foolish mortals!" The Abyss Lector, alerted by the attack, immediately roared in fury.
It raised both hands, and a magic circle appeared above it and Tang Wang's group. A massive icicle crashed down, but the place where it landed was already empty.
"Too slow!" Danika and Tang Wang charged at the Abyss Lector from the left and right.
Linaya, armed with a bow and arrows, took Ronava farther away. On the battlefield, the fire tornado Ronava had created continued to roar, and nearly every remaining Hilichurl and Mitachurl had Pyro applied to them.
"The bitter cold is ordained!" With its roar, waves of enormous, terrifying ice spears shot from before it toward the two rapidly moving figures.
However, Tang Wang and Danika seemed to have no intention of closing in on the Abyss Lector immediately. They ran a circle around the area before beginning to approach the Lector.
In the process, all the surviving Hilichurls were wiped out by the melt reactions triggered by the Abyss Lector.
"Ronava's skill can apply Pyro over a wide area." This was how they had planned it at the tavern the previous day. "So, in this fight, you and Danika will be our main force and the absolute core of the team."
"The first step is naturally to clear out the other monsters that might get in our way. For that, we can make use of elemental reactions."
"Does this thing really have no brain?" Danika asked mockingly.
"Hard to say. I suppose spending too much time soaking in the Abyss really might rot your brain." With that, the two closed in on the Abyss Lector, one faster than the other.
Tang Wang was a little faster, so the Lector first gathered Elemental Power and raised a shield in the direction of his attack.
But it had not expected the spear, wreathed in dazzling golden light, to pierce straight through the shield. It could only retreat while increasing its output of Elemental Power.
However, the real threat came from its unguarded side-
"Zap!" A muffled thunderclap exploded against the Lector's body. A field filled with starlight formed instantly, and Tang Wang felt a little Gang Qi flow into his body.
"So all aberrant reactions can provide me with Gang Qi!"
Before he could secretly rejoice at this discovery, the Abyss Lector sensed the threat and immediately activated its elemental shield.
But this time, a film of light was not the only thing that appeared around it. Covering the backs of its hands was... a pair of long blades.
"All things," the Abyss Lector began, brandishing the twin blades and transforming directly into an Abyss Herald, "cease!"
It twisted and slashed fiercely. Danika only had time to shift her stance before her right arm, which held her greatsword, was severed at the shoulder.
"There's no such monster!" Tang Wang immediately activated the Gang Qi in his body, scooped the injured Danika up at his side with astonishing speed, and put some distance between them and the Abyss Herald.
And in a distant corner, a pair of watching eyes seemed quite pleased with the result.