Chapter 8

"The four temples coincide with the four great divine beasts that followed Barbatos during his reign. Dragon of the East, Lion of the South, Wolf of the North, and finally the Falcon of the West." Lisa explained, telling me about the Adeptus beings that wandered Mondstadt under Barbatos's banner.

"The Dragon of the East Stormterror, its true name is Dvalin." Lisa sighed with a bit of a wry smile as she continued. "Though most of Mondstadt has truly forgotten its name in all of this Stormterror's business."

"Should Dvalin be calmed down, will people accept that and move on?" I asked curiously and Lisa snickered in response.

"Hmph, Master Varka took the majority of the skilled knights with him when he went on that stupid expedition of his, leaving only the dregs for Jean to train up and the competent knights are swamped just doing the paperwork that the newbies are not allowed to touch due to security and experience concerns." Lisa groaned and I realized as the 'Librarian' of the Knights of Favonius she likely had to categorize a lot of paperwork and not just laze around reading her smutty books.

"So that's why Hilichurls are everywhere?"

Lisa shook her head frowning. "No... The Hilichurl problem isn't a Mondstadt problem, literally, every nation on Teyvat has been assailed by Hilichurls and their masters the Abyss Order. Except for the nation of Sneznayah which boasts by far the most powerful Military with how they augment some of their soldiers into Super Soldiers capable of using some Elemental energy at the cost of their lives" Lisa looked to me. "You know of the Abyss Order, correct?"

I solemnly nodded as despite understanding/respecting the Abyss's prince/princesses' goal of returning all the people of Khaenri'ah back into human forms, it still didn't change the fact that they were willing to burn the rest of the world to ashes in doing so... They should just fade into the darkness like the rest of the abominations sealed within the Chasm under Liyue.

"Abominations of darkness that desire to control or harm the living people of the world," I said shortly as the group gave me some conflicting feelings.

"Well... Thats a fair viewpoint." Lisa muttered before she stood up with a groan. "Well let's get going back to Mondstadt. The others are probably done by now."

"Alright, Lisa." I agreed following Lisa and we were able to quickly make our way out of the temple and I pulled the horses over from the tree they were tied to as Lisa quickly resealed the temple with some sort of magical barrier.

"Lisa, what is the difference between magic and the elemental abilities that vision users have?" I asked curiously as Lisa explained the barrier she was creating with numerous blue and purple glyphs that came into being before being pushed against the temple making a sort of electric fence that would send increasingly powerful shocks into anything touching the barrier.

"Hoh boy you don't ask the easy questions, do you... Well to put it most simply the Archons and gods of old very firmly locked down the concept of elemental magic to the point that they supposedly needed to send visions to humans in order to channel the excess power of their concept lest they explode, turn insane, or be eroded to the point of fading." Lisa explained as we began our trek back to Mondstadt.

"Now as for the warding magic I used and several other branches of magic, such as alchemy, divination, teleportation, and others well... Supposedly the gods violently took their powers wrenching them from the core of Teyvat to make the concept their dominion and when normal humans tried to match their betters in reaching to the heavens, they were struck down which is the tale of Khaenri'ah."

Lisa shrugged as she took a drink from a canteen we brought before speaking more. "Now that is a common superstition but the fate of Khaenri'ah has been forever debated heatedly by all scholars, we shall likely never know as the Heavens destroyed Khaenri'ah in its entirety, but not only did they literally ripped the country from the earth, shattered the pieces and then threw said pieces all over Teyvat. The heavens also killed every single person that was born of and visited Khaenri'ah which obviously severed most if not all knowledge of the land as even the gods who invaded the land during the previous Archon War either died to the purge or faded from the Heavens decree."

I couldn't help but swallow at how petty Celestia was and wonder the true reason why Khaenri'ah was punished to such an extent... Well, I will be able to corner Dainself and Aether at some point to get answers.

"So, the Heavens have blocked other gods from taking dominion over other forms of magic, I guess?" I asked rounding back as to why there wasn't an Alchemy God or whatever though I believe Albedo would have things to say about that...

Lisa nodded as she gave me a grin of elation. "Yes, Jake! That is the great question that Lord Kusanali the Dendro Goddess of Sumeru has been researching the past few centuries as other than the seats of Archon's changing no others have become deities in any form."

Lisa pulled the horse up beside mine as she hummed in thought before speaking. "Jake, you seem to be quite erudite in your thinking... Maybe I can be persuaded to teach you some magic if you do me a tiny little favor." She said flirtatiously but her watery eyes and open offer was cut down as she revealed the favor. "I have a list of books that are overdue and with you, as an apprentice, I can simply send you to retrieve the books Hehe."

I gave her a look of disdain snorting and pushing my horse into a light trot with a squeeze of my legs. "I can already see you dumping all your responsibilities onto me and just napping in the library with books. Making excuses to push off teaching me until I do all your job's work!"

Lisa cried out from behind me desperately. "Wait, Jake!!! I would only make you do half my work! Ok I lied I will only make you do a quarter!" I wordlessly ignored Lisa just focusing on keeping my balance on the trotting horse trying to get to Mondstadt so I could just relax and maybe get some sleep.