"Pass my order: tonight, tighten the cordon around the Sanctuary of Surasthana."
"You don't need to do anything else—just keep uninvited guests out, and make sure no one inside 'accidentally' slips away."
Idris penned a brief dispatch to General Mahamatra Cyno. For all that he doubted the Balladeer could escape from the caverns beneath the Sanctuary, preparation was a virtue—like having Cyno seal the outer routes in advance. In terms of sheer ability, Cyno was no slouch.
Scanning the message, Nahida wore an awkward look. This all traced back to the little misunderstanding ten-odd days ago—when she thought Idris had gone missing and sent Cyno to find him. With no quick reply, Cyno had actually swept the jungles outside Sumeru for an entire night. When the truth came out, he'd only cast a wounded glance toward the Sanctuary and—true to his taciturn way—said nothing.
To bury the incident, Idris had "invited" Cyno to tell cold jokes for a full hour during a city patrol. With explanations. For every punch line.
[Cyno's trust +10]
For the record, Idris had already swallowed a freshly refined Sense-Sealing Pill that day—one blissful hour of zero sound, zero sensation.
Preparations made, Idris stretched and readied himself for nightfall.
Right then, the system's sterile chime pinged through his mind. He blinked. He hadn't done anything lately—had he?
The answer arrived at once:
[The Traveler, protagonist of Teyvat, has been diverted by your actions from the original storyline.]
[Congratulations! You have earned another draw.]
[Reward: Experience of a Hundred-Year Sword Cultivator!]
[Purest insight has been instilled—absorb at will.]
A thousand keen lights seemed to lance through his skull—blades modeled and set loose. Then, as he faced them, nine hundred fifty streams of swordlight liquefied into power and poured into his body.
Memories not his own unfurled: a lone escarpment, a figure practicing beneath it, one hundred years of cut and breath. The memories were false. The sword arts were not.
An hour later he opened his eyes. For a heartbeat, a razor's glint flashed in his gaze—then vanished, suppressed with practiced ease. A true swordmaster knew how to sheathe more than steel.
Watching him sit in silence for so long, Nahida drifted close. "Grand Sage Idris, are you alright? You slept for a while. I didn't wake you—I was afraid to disturb you."
"I'm fine." He waved it off. "Been pushing a bit lately. Meant to rest my eyes and… actually dozed."
Nahida set a small hand on his shoulder, sending a ripple of gentle life-force through him. "I told you not to worry yourself sick over work. You're already doing so much. When we finish with the Withering, you must take a vacation with me. Or I'll be angry."
Idris: "…"
And what use would your anger be against me, exactly? Don't tell me you've mistaken me for your first sage. He let it pass. Her little massage was comfortable.
The quiet didn't last. A stormy pressure—like thunderheads stacking—rolled in from beyond the Akademiya.
"Come. Our guest has arrived."
He eased Nahida back. A moment later, an uninvited figure stepped into the office.
"You're even younger than I expected, Grand Sage Idris," the newcomer drawled. "If someone this green can sit the seat, I suppose Sumeru really has declined."
Barbed words echoed in the room. The Balladeer stood there, smile like a knife.
Idris couldn't be bothered to answer the jab. "What you want is under the Sanctuary. If you're ready, follow me."
"Straight to business? Suits me." The Balladeer's eyes slid to Nahida's faintly luminous form. "If I'm not mistaken, that little girl is the God of Wisdom. I won't ask why she's here. Are you bringing her along?"
Nahida hadn't hidden her presence. In this spiritual state, common folk wouldn't see her—but someone of the Balladeer's level could.
"Don't mind her," Idris said mildly. "Welcoming a new god—what could be more interesting than letting an old one witness it?"
Villains understood villains. The Balladeer's smile sharpened. "A fine idea. Your taste isn't bad, for someone so young."
"Then let's go. Bring her."
Nahida said nothing, face carefully blank—only the people closest to her still saw the child within.
They descended beneath the Sanctuary. Soldiers ringed the outer halls; the Balladeer didn't so much as glance at them.
The battlefield from ten days prior had been scrubbed spotless. Waiting in the center was the towering shell of Shouki no Kami. Its energy was fully topped off. In the "original" path, it wouldn't have been ready yet; the Akademiya would have commenced a cruel harvest of dream-power. But now—no such chapter.
The Balladeer tilted his head back, laughter bubbling up as he beheld the imposing frame—the perfect eight-head proportions he fancied. "Hah! Beelzebul! With this power, I can truly become a god! Hahahaha!"
Idris let the grating laugh run its course before cutting in. "Balladeer, before you get carried away—"
"Heh. Since you lot worked so diligently to build my ascension cradle, I'll overlook the interruption," the Balladeer said lazily. "Speak."
"Once you mount Shouki no Kami," Idris said, "you'll, in effect, be Sumeru's new god."
"Of course," he replied airily. "You've spent five centuries on this. We agreed from the start: in return, I become the deity of this land. As for your original god—if you don't trust her, kill her or keep her caged. It makes no difference."
"Is that so?"
"It—wait. What do you mean?" Something in Idris's smile needled him. Nahida was no longer near the core. When had she drifted that far back? And apart from Idris… he stood alone.
Idris's tone was almost cheerful. "If Sumeru must have a god, better one entirely under Sumeru's hand."
"Cut."
Frostmourne sang. A cataract of swordlight tore toward the Balladeer.
He wasn't famed for nothing. Lightning lattice bloomed over his skin, a net of thunder swallowing the blow. Idris didn't blink at the failed opener; he slid to a safer angle, ready for the counter-burst.
"An Electro Delusion, then," Idris observed. In the game's path, the Balladeer—after his "whitewash"—wielded Anemo. Here, his force leaned fully into thunder—apt for piloting Shouki no Kami.
The Balladeer bared his teeth. "Grand Sage Idris! Excellent—very excellent!" His rage crackled. "To betray me—to betray five centuries of accord with Sumeru? You wretch!"
"Correction," Idris said, blade level, cold light riding the edge. "They promised you things. Previous Grand Sages. I never did."
Snapping the last word, he surged in again, sword aura cresting.
The Balladeer trembled—not with fear but fury. "Then feel the price of crossing me! I'll kill as many Sumeru folk as there are to kill! Die!"
Thunder gathered over both his fists. He struck. Idris twisted; steel met storm. Current howled around them, exploding brighter with each clash until arcs wrapped Idris's frame.
But dragon-blood tempering had remade his flesh. Once the Delusion's power lost the puppet's direct momentum, the loose current did little more than frizz his hair.
"At this heat you couldn't even roast chicken."
"You dare mock me, insect?!"
The Balladeer's punches came faster, heavier. For all his lack of a weapon, the puppet's body was a perfect murder-engine—elbows and limbs hard as forged blades.
They tangled through the air—Frostmourne and burgeoning Dendro force pitted against thunder. Each collision outstripped the brawls from ten nights prior.
Hundreds of exchanges flashed by. Neither yielded an inch.
Idris, however, had a different edge: his tongue.
"Tell me—why build the mech so big? I wondered at first. Then I looked at you—five hundred years old and still barely taller than the Little Grass God. Now it makes sense."
"I've told you I never betrayed you. And if we're already trading blows, why obsess over betrayal? Been betrayed before, have you?"
"…Shut up."
"Touch a sore spot?"
"Shut up!"
Provoked past prudence, the Balladeer dropped his guard and lunged.
Idris took the opening. Frostmourne punched through his chest—clean, right where a heart should be.
A mortal would have dropped. The Balladeer did not. He was a puppet. He had no heart.
"Die—Annihilating Thunder!"
A titanic orb of lightning swelled between his palms. He hammered it forward, twin fists driving the storm into Idris's chest.
Boom.
A radiant gold flicker—Divine Shield whispering to life for a breath—then Idris's body was hurled across the chamber, smashing a vast crater into the floor in a billow of dust.
"Idris!"
Nahida took an involuntary step—then stopped herself. Charging in now only made her a hostage. She hovered near an easy line of retreat, gaze locked on the smoking pit.
"Heh… well, Grand Sage Idris?" The Balladeer's laugh rasped. "You didn't expect your so-called 'do-or-die strike' to be useless against me, did you?"
"After all—I'm a puppet. Puppets don't have hearts."
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