Without the Abyss Mages' control, the monsters no longer surged toward Mondstadt. After clearing out half the remaining enemies, the rest scattered and fled on instinct.
Everyone finally breathed a sigh of relief—the crisis had, for now, been averted.
What they didn't notice was that, farther from the city gates on a small hill, an Abyss Herald stood watching Mondstadt in silence. After a moment, it tore open a space rift and disappeared.
"An interesting weapon. If only we had one too…"
The voice drifted into the air, unheard by anyone except some frightened animals that didn't dare approach.
The battlefield near the city gate was handed over to other knights for cleanup. Key members of the Knights of Favonius returned to the city to begin post-disaster rebuilding. Shen Qin, meanwhile, brought Sucrose and Klee toward the Cathedral of Favonius to see if they could help.
As they walked, they passed buildings mostly intact, though some areas looked like the earth had been plowed—collapsed homes, piles of debris, and wind-blown trash covered the ground. The scene was chaotic.
People on the streets wore heavy expressions. For them, this dragon disaster was a sudden and utterly unavoidable calamity. Their peaceful lives had been upended in an instant.
"How… how could it be like this…" Sucrose looked at the mess, heartbroken.
Shen Qin's face darkened too. He overheard some Mondstadters muttering the term "Stormterror" through clenched teeth, full of resentment.
Before this, no one had used that specific name for Dvalin. And yet, just as the crisis ended, many citizens across the city began calling him that—was this really just coincidence?
No—it was obvious. Someone was deliberately spreading slander against Dvalin. Their goal was also clear:
They wanted to label Dvalin as Stormterror and incite public hatred, pressuring the Knights to take down the former East Wind Guardian. In the chaos, someone could seize the wind elemental aura from Dvalin—Barbatos's chosen—and thereby track down the Anemo Archon and steal his Gnosis.
The culprit? The Fatui from Snezhnaya.
"Rosalyne, bet you didn't see this coming. I'm a player with plot armor."
Shen Qin asked Sucrose to take Klee ahead to the cathedral while he detoured to the Knights' headquarters and told Jean what he'd discovered.
"So you suspect the Fatui too," Jean said with a pained expression as she rubbed her temples. "During the dragon disaster, Kaeya noticed some suspicious activity in the city. He just reported back that several Fatui agents are behaving oddly."
Trouble with the Abyss Order wasn't even resolved yet, and now the Fatui were stirring up more—her headache was real.
"I don't think they're targeting Mondstadt directly," Shen Qin said, "just Dvalin."
The rest of the sentence—and Barbatos—he left unsaid.
But did Venti really not know the Fatui was targeting him too? Even in the game, the Seven weren't so easily stripped of their Gnosis by just one Fatui Harbinger. (T/N: Think he ignore it, and let them take it.)
"That's not acceptable either!" Jean shook her head firmly. "Dvalin is a part of Mondstadt, just like its people. This is our internal matter. It's not the place of the Snezhnayans to meddle. I'll have someone negotiate with the Snezhnayan envoy—"
"That won't help," Shen Qin interrupted. "Unless you expel all the Fatui, they'll just keep working in the shadows. And that would mean openly declaring a break with Snezhnaya, which isn't necessary yet."
Jean fell silent. She knew he was right. Even after diplomatic talks, the Fatui would likely just ignore them and keep scheming.
"How about this?" Shen Qin said with a grin, offering a plan before turning to leave.
Half an hour later, across the city—in plazas, streets, and taverns—every bard suddenly began telling the same story: of a dragon who suffered a five-hundred-year curse for Mondstadt's sake.
In front of the cathedral, Venti strummed his lyre and, in his rich, magnetic voice, told the tale of how Dvalin was manipulated and turned into a war machine after enduring centuries of torment. His words stirred sympathy in the hearts of the people.
They might not be ready to forgive what Dvalin did to Mondstadt, but their hatred eased.
Watching Shen Qin walk away from the cathedral deep in thought, Venti smiled. "Looks like I owe you one this time…"
But Shen Qin wasn't paying attention to that irresponsible bard. He was busy buffing his luck for a pull.
System, look at Mondstadt. It just went through a huge disaster. Thousands are injured. But the cathedral only has, what, twenty healers? Even if you count the Adventurers' Guild and the prosthetics lab staff, you might get fifty medical personnel total.
That's nowhere near enough to treat thousands of wounded. Even without eating or sleeping, it'd take a week. And some are too gravely injured to wait that long.
Plus, Teyvat's medical tech is way behind Earth's. Don't you think it's time we brought in something that could revolutionize healthcare here? You know, save some lives?
So please… let me pull a gold!
Shen Qin used one pull on the gacha—and the system actually gave him a gold legendary!
『 Random blueprint being chosen…. 』
『 COMPLETE 』
『 Congratulations, Traveler! You have received the knowledge ─ Emergency Healing Spray 』(T/N: So like the pokemon's potion)
System, you absolute W! Shen Qin practically jumped for joy. He grabbed Sucrose's hand and pulled her toward the alchemy workshop. "I've got an idea to save tons of injured people—help me out!"
"Eh? But Klee—" Sucrose didn't even finish her sentence before being whisked away.
Half a minute later, Klee emerged from the cathedral a step behind, blinking at the empty doorway. 'Where did those two big grownups go...?'
But Shen Qin couldn't worry about her now. Mondstadt's medical system had completely broken down—he had to make the healing spray ASAP. Every second saved could be another life preserved.
"Haro, go to Angel's Share and find Diluc. Tell him to prepare several production lines for the healing spray. Then go to the Adventurers' Guild and get Katheryne or Cyrus to gather as much Windwheel Aster and Wind Mushroom as possible.
"Ms. Butterfly, find Albedo at the Knights' Headquarters. If he's free, we need him now!"
The healing spray's main ingredients—Windwheel Aster and Philanemo Mushroom—were rich in Anemo energy. After grinding, heating, filtering, and extracting, they became a thin, pale-white liquid. Upon contact with human skin, it reacted with the ambient wind element to generate healing factors that closed wounds.
Thanks to Shen Qin's blueprint and the biological alchemy expertise of Sucrose and Albedo, they completed the first spray prototype within two hours.
Together with the just-arrived Diluc, the three of them headed straight to the cathedral.