Sai's Gamble

While going through all of the documents, Sai found out many things. For instance, it had been 15 days since the traveler got the initial team, evidenced by the partial destruction of the city during the attack.

On that same page, Sai realized that something weird was at play when he thought about the destruction. In the game, nothing seemed to have happened to the city, but in reality, portions of the walls were broken and streets and houses were hit by debris alike.

He had two hypotheses for this. The first was that this was a censorship, made by the system who built the game in order to decrease app or content size (similar to shrinking distances and the size of the city). The second was that the moment he got into the game, everything became real all of a sudden, which would explain to some degree Noelle's disappearance.

He leaned a bit more on the first hypothesis, due to the strangeness of the second. But neither the first nor the second could accurately answer whether things could go differently from the storyline, which was his main concern.

But that would possibly be solved by the end of the day: depending on whether Noelle came back before of after she was summoned again, and what she has to say about it. "Best" case scenario would be if she died and never came back, but he truly didn't want such a thing to happen to a young girl like Noelle. Sai was aware of her story to an extent, and he knew the incident wasn't registered anywhere in the game, but that was not conclusive enough evidence that the storyline could be altered.

Right now, he wanted to both find out if the story could be changed on its own and if he could change it voluntarily. His plan was to actually help them not find Noelle. That's right. Misguide them under the guise of a wrong guess.

It was a gamble, really. If Noelle came back today, nothing could be proven, only that he was not very capable. But if she didn't, he could later find out if he had a hand in it or not, solving both of his questions to some extent. Therefore, his objective was to send a rescue party to a place he was sure Noelle wouldn't be at, and then wait until after the player joined again (in a couple of days or less) to actually find her.

The problem was that his reputation and relationship with the knights was on the table, and if everything went accordingly they would probably not trust him again. Nevertheless, he could make the consequences milder if he played his cards right.

From Liyue's records, he found out that the Rite of Descension had just happened a couple of days earlier, and the big headline "Rex Lapis is Dead!" gave away at what point in time the player was at.

'Despite being a two-day journey they already had that knowledge… it seemed like they had something close to a spy network that quickly delivered information… how interesting…'

'After finding out that Zhongli was dead, the Traveler gets into contact with the adepti, and then with the Qixing…' He only remembered so much after reading through most of the journals.

It was either them, or the Fatui that held onto her. Since Sai didn't know how strong Noelle was (compared to them), he couldn't know which ones to cross out. It could also have been a different party altogether… but to stop Noelle?

Another question filled his mind as he thought about that. No matter how strong one was, would he be able to stop someone from literally teleporting away? Probably not, unless there was a method to stop the teleportation altogether.

"Let me first ask you this: is there a way to stop or delay a teleportation?" Sai was serious as he looked at Jean.

"Yes, there are some ways. I've personally met one, one time. If it weren't for the Grand Master, I would probably have perished there. But I don't know exactly how it works. You should ask Lisa if you want more details." She was somber at the thought.

"Understood. That took out the rest of my doubts. The only reason why she hasn't come back is because she couldn't. But who would have the power to stop her? It would have to be a strong elemental user. There are not that many who fit the criteria."

"Indeed." Jean nodded.

Kaeya was simply observing from the side.

"The answer I came to after seeing the news, was that the Liyue Qixing took hold of her. More accurately, the Tianquan Ningguang."

"Why do you think so?" Jean asked as she pondered.

"I saw on the documents that they were after everyone who was present at the Rite of Descension, and there are not many who could escape their surveillance. If the Traveler were to witness the death of their god, wouldn't they try to hold onto him? Especially since he comes from another world, they would try everything they could to arrest him, justifying Ningguang's intervention." Sai explained his reasoning.

Although everything he said was logical, it wasn't true. According to the game, she was an extremely busy person, Ningguang had more things to do than to go after a mere aspiring knight. Her secretary and Keqing aside, who else could have stopped someone's teleportation? More importantly, Rex Lapis wasn't actually dead, so their troops were only putting up a show of investigating.

Both Kaeya and Jean fell into thought, seriously considering the possibility that the Traveler was indeed involved in the Rite.

"Kaeya, investigate whether the Traveler was in Liyue at the time of the Rite of Descension. I shall send word to the Qixing." She immediately sent her orders and started writing a letter once she made up her mind.

Sai secretly sighed in relief that it worked without a hitch. His plan actually lay entirely on the fact that Noelle was captured in Liyue Harbor, which was weird, given how Kaeya and Amber woke up in Minlin.

"Wait, Master Jean." Sai intervened once Kaeya was gone.

"What is it?" She looked distressed.

"I think that maybe showing our cards like this is a mistake. You are going to ask Ningguang about Noelle, right? What if they say they don't know a thing, while actually imprisoning her… or torturing her?" Sai tried to appear fearful as he warned Jean.

What he actually wanted was to make her think they were hiding Noelle, just in case she received a reply in ignorance. This would delay her next actions even more, which would be good for him. If Ningguang has, in fact, possession of Noelle, his reputation in the knights would soar, which wasn't a bad outcome at all.

'This is what I call a perfect plan— ahem.'