The moment Thoma vanished into the chaotic, surging crowd with the unconscious Lumine, the brief, fragile window of opportunity slammed shut. A new, sharp, and authoritative voice cut through the panicked noise.
"Hold your positions! Form a perimeter! Do not let them escape!"
A woman with short, dark hair and the piercing, golden eyes of a raptor descended upon the plaza, an air of military authority aura around her. It was Kujou Sara, the loyal, formidable general of the Tenryou Commission.
Her soldiers, their discipline reasserting itself under her commanding presence, moved with a swift, brutal efficiency. They formed a tight, impenetrable circle, not around the space where Thoma had escaped, but around the very center of the disturbance: Ren.
Spears were leveled, their sharp, gleaming points all aimed at the small, defiant child and at Ganyu, who had rushed to his side, her gentle face now a mask of cold, furious, adeptal power, a shimmering aura of Cryo beginning to form around her.
The guards were hesitating. They were soldiers, sworn to obey, but the sight before them was a deeply unsettling one. They were a phalanx of trained, armored warriors, pointing their weapons at a small, beautiful child who had done nothing but try to protect his friend, and at a woman who radiated an aura of power so immense it made their very souls feel cold. Several of the younger guards could be seen visibly trembling, their knuckles white on their spear shafts, their eyes full of a deep, profound conflict.
Kujou Sara strode forward, her expression a mask of stern, unyielding duty. She looked at the scene, her sharp, tactical mind processing the impossible, politically catastrophic situation. She then bowed her head to the one authority she held above all others.
"Shogun-sama," she said, her voice a clear, formal report. "Your orders?"
The Raiden Shogun, who had remained perfectly, unnervingly still throughout the entire ordeal, slowly lowered her sword. The Musou no Hitotachi dissolved into harmless, violet particles. Her cold, amethyst gaze fell upon Ren, who stood his ground, his small form a defiant shield in front of Ganyu.
She looked at him, and for a long, silent moment, the entire world seemed to hold its breath. Kujou Sara waited for the command. Ganyu prepared for a battle she knew she could not win, but would fight to her last breath.
The Shogun's gaze was long, unreadable, a silent, divine contemplation. Ren met her gaze without flinching, a quiet, desperate hope in his heart, a trust in the friend he had shared dango with.
Finally, the Shogun turned away, her back to them all, a gesture of final, absolute dismissal.
"Issue an arrest warrant for the exception," she commanded, her voice the cold, emotionless tone of a god issuing a decree. "The Traveler is now an enemy of the state."
Kujou Sara's eyes narrowed. "And the Liyue child, Shogun-sama?" she asked, her voice tight. "He interfered. He aided the fugitive. What are your orders for him?"
The Shogun paused, her back still to them, and uttered words that would echo in the minds of everyone present.
"Leave him be. He is no threat."
And with that, she vanished in a flash of lightning, her judgment delivered, her strange, incomprehensible mercy granted.
Kujou Sara was left standing in the silent, tense plaza, the divine, and utterly baffling, order still ringing in her ears. Leave him be.
She hesitated for a fraction of a second, her disciplined, military mind struggling to reconcile the boy's clear act of sedition with her god's direct command to ignore it. But orders were orders. Her loyalty was absolute.
She turned to her still-tense, still-conflicted soldiers. "You heard her," she barked, her voice a sharp, authoritative crack of a whip. "Lower your weapons! All of you! The boy is not to be touched!"
The relief that washed through the ranks of the guards was a visible, palpable thing. Spears were lowered with a clatter of metal on stone.
Kujou Sara gave Ren and the still-wary Ganyu one last, long, and deeply confused look. She did not understand. She could not comprehend the strange, special status this child held in the eyes of her god. But her duty was not to understand; it was to obey.
With a final, sharp gesture, she commanded her troops. "Disperse. Search for the fugitives."
She turned, her sharp, decisive movement evident, and strode away, leaving Ren and Ganyu standing alone in the now-empty, silent plaza, under the watchful, stone gaze of the Omnipresent God. The crisis, for them, was over. Ren had stood between a god and her victim, and for reasons no one but he could truly understand, the god had been the one to blink.