Eleven o'clock in the morning.
Lumine finally finished the Traveler's chapter "Caribert."
The story left her deeply shaken.
"The curse laid down by Celestia is way too cruel!" Lumine muttered. "Not even children were spared. Just what did Khaenri'ah do to deserve such terrifying punishment?"
"That's something we'll only uncover little by little," Paimon sighed.
Mentioning it made Lumine grit her teeth. She slammed the table. "Why is everyone in Teyvat such a riddle-spouting weirdo? Can't a single person just speak clearly for once?!"
The Anemo Archon talks in riddles, the Geo Archon hides behind contracts, the Electro Archon's a shut-in who probably doesn't even know, and the Dendro Archon… let's not even go there. Now there's this 'Sinner' character too. Ridiculous!
"Teyvat should just be renamed the Continent of Riddlers!" Lumine groaned.
"Lumine, with your brilliant mind, why don't you try to unravel those riddles?" Paimon teased.
"Don't even start," Lumine snapped. "If I could figure them out, would I be banging my head over it right now? Forget it! I'll just go with the flow. Why waste brain cells? Better to wait until the story reveals the truth on its own. That's way easier."
"You're right," Paimon agreed with relief. Thinking too hard only made her head spin anyway.
"Let's drop the topic," Lumine said, her tone softening. "I wonder how Caribert's doing now. They called him the Loom of Fate. What's that supposed to mean?"
"From what they showed, it weaves destiny," Paimon said, rubbing her chin. Then her eyes widened. "Wait, does that mean it can rewrite someone's fate?!"
"Seems like it." Lumine nodded, but doubt clouded her expression. "But could it really be that simple? Just from the power Caribert unleashed in his grief?"
"No clue." Paimon shrugged. Changing fate sounded far too grand to be so easy.
"The Loom of Fate…" Lumine murmured. "Its effects must be huge, otherwise the Abyss Order wouldn't pour so much into creating it."
"Let me ask my brother." She pulled out her phone and sent a message.
A reply soon came.
Aether: Caribert's fine. The Order's plans have already been abandoned thanks to you, including the Loom of Fate.
Lumine thought for a moment. It made sense. At least this meant the Abyss Order wouldn't be piling on more hatred from the world. Her brother might still carry a heavy burden, but at least people wouldn't try to kill him outright. And if someone did… well, they'd have to get her permission first.
"At least Caribert's safe," she said. "But do you think purification could cleanse the curse Celestia laid down?"
"If it's conceptual purification, why not?" Paimon replied. "Erosion is also a curse from Celestia, and even that can be purified. So why not this?"
"Good point." Lumine relaxed a little. "I'm sure my brother's already working on it. No need for us to stress."
"Next stop is Fontaine, right?" Paimon asked eagerly.
"Yeah." Lumine nodded. "Everyone online's been talking about the prophecy crisis there. But no one seems to know exactly what it means."
"With your protagonist luck, something's bound to happen the second we arrive!" Paimon laughed.
"Of course." Lumine smirked.
And that's exactly why Aether or Lumine always end up in the middle of everything—because the world itself seems to drag them into every mess.
"All right, time for lunch. Let's order something." Lumine tapped her phone and placed an order with Wanmin Restaurant.
—
After lunch, Lu Heng headed to work. Raiden Ei and the puppet Shogun were busy in Tenshukaku, while Yae Miko had plans to stop by the Yae Publishing House. She even brought Hanachirusato along, insisting she still had lessons to teach the girl before handing her back to Lu Heng.
He didn't complain. Who could refuse an even better-trained maid?
Though Hanachirusato couldn't compare to Noelle in skill, in every other aspect Lu Heng could only admire his own craftsmanship.
From Inazuma to Mondstadt, then to Fontaine, and finally to Liyue Harbor—Lu Heng made his rounds before returning to his shop.
"Where's Shenhe?" he asked after searching and finding no trace of her.
She soon messaged back.
Shenhe: Big Sister Furina took me to Fontaine. [Photo]
Lu Heng opened the photo, zoomed in, and saved it with a faint smile. Shenhe was slowly learning emotions, but still clung to her reserved habits. With Furina showing her around, things would be fine. His wives never quarreled, after all.
Of course, he understood Furina's motive—recruiting allies to challenge him, the so-called big boss.
"Naïve," Lu Heng chuckled. No matter how many opponents lined up against him, he feared nothing. His breathing technique alone was enough to outlast them all.
—
Back at the shop, he pulled up his exclusive card pool.
The only region without a branch store was Sumeru. Time to see if he could draw a card to expand his reach there. With nearly ten million pulls saved up, he began.
Ten thousand draws—start!
Golden light flashed.
[Appraisal]
Rank: Tier Five – Gold
Type: Skill Card
Effect: Grants the ability to identify stones, weapons, artifacts, and more with perfect accuracy.
Useful, but not for him. Better suited for Hanachirusato, who had already fallen naturally into her role as his personal maid. He could assign her appraisal duties to save himself time.
He set that card aside and drew again.
Four more Tier Five cards appeared. A couple were decent, but nothing remarkable. He equipped them anyway for the minor boosts.
Then came the eight-hundred-thousandth pull.
Red light blazed.
Lu Heng's eyes sharpened. A Tier Six Red card. For him, that was as game-changing as a Tier Five Gold was for anyone else.
The card landed in his hand. A smooth, black-and-white sphere filled the artwork, a tiny spaceship nearby for scale.
"What is this… a planet?" He frowned. It looked like a perfectly polished marble.
He activated his appraisal skill.
The sphere shimmered into a brilliant golden star.
[Golden Core]
Rank: Tier Six – Red
Type: Cultivation Card
Effect: Grants the path of the Golden Core, a cultivation realm of immense power.
"…Huh?"
His expression froze.
"You're telling me this star-sized thing is supposed to be a cultivator's golden core?"
Was he drunk, or still dreaming?
In traditional cultivation, a golden core was thumb-sized at most—tiny, like a marble. But this? This was a literal sun. Toss it at Teyvat and it would crush the world like an egg.
And if it advanced to the Nascent Soul stage… what, the planet would look like a toy ball in comparison?
"This is insane," Lu Heng muttered, half in awe. "This isn't just 'eyes like the sun and moon'—this is an actual cosmic giant."
Still, he equipped it.
At once, his inner vision erupted.
Within his dantian, a singularity burst into existence. Space unfolded. A golden star was born at the center, swelling larger and larger.
Even without enhancements, it was the size of the sun. With his Tier Nine equipment boosting it, the golden core expanded to nearly eight million kilometers across—outshining his homeworld's star by far.
When the cosmic tremors finally stilled, Lu Heng realized his strength had doubled.
His mana was now endless, self-renewing with every breath, just like his regenerative technique. He could fight without pause, forever.
He clenched his fist. With this power… even a weaker Astral God might fall into my hand.
"Satisfying," he said, grinning ear to ear. Power was like Mora—there could never be too much.
But as he kept drawing, no more Red cards appeared. Pull after pull, up to two million, only yielded Tier Five Golds—minor boosts, nothing more.
"Come on, if you won't give me another Red, at least give me a shop expansion card," he muttered with a sigh.
Just then, a cheerful voice rang out.
"Lu Heng!"
He looked up.
Paimon flew into the shop, Lumine right behind her.
"We're here!" Paimon beamed.
Lu Heng set aside his frustration. Maybe it was just bad timing. He could try again later when luck shifted. For now, it was time to welcome his customers.
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T/N:
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