"Your Excellency, Sangonomiya! The commission you paid isn't nearly enough!"
Beidou's greatsword, wreathed in lightning, sliced the charging Blazing Axe Mitachurl in half at the waist.
Purple blood splattered onto her bronze skin, instantly Vaporizing into pungent mist by the Electro element.
Kokomi's slender, pale fingers glowed with a light blue radiance as she healed Gorou's chest wound, which was deep enough to expose bone: "My apologies! The intelligence I received didn't mention these mutated Hilichurls at all!"
A rare trace of panic entered her voice.
"These guys' armor is covered in Abyssal runes!"
"Roar—!"
When the five-meter-tall Hilichurl Chieftain swung its spiked mace, Beidou charged forward instead of retreating.
The veins on her muscular arms bulged, and her greatsword collided with the spiked mace, sparking brilliantly.
The sand on the beach beneath her feet exploded, creating a three-meter-wide crater from the immense force.
"Interesting!"
Beidou bared her blood-stained teeth, then suddenly ducked low.
Her right leg, wreathed in lightning, swept towards the Hilichurl Chieftain's knee joint—but it felt like kicking a giant rock wall.
"Click!"
A bone-cracking sound that set teeth on edge.
"Damn it... is this leg armor made of Starsilver ore?!"
Beidou's vision went black from the pain, but then she saw the Hilichurl Chieftain crash to the ground, unbalanced.
Without hesitation, she gripped her sword with both hands and plunged it fiercely into a gap in its mask.
"Guaaahhh—!"
The Hilichurl Chieftain let out an inhuman shriek.
Dark red blood gushed from the wound, so corrosive that it sizzled and scorched the blade.
Beidou had just pulled out her greatsword when she suddenly felt a chill down her spine.
She rolled to the side abruptly; a two-meter-deep crater appeared where she had been standing, struck by a meteor hammer.
Looking up, two better-equipped Hilichurl Chieftains were closing in, one from the left and one from the right.
"Ha! Come to avenge your brother?"
Beidou spat out the blood foam in her mouth, Electro element wildly surging on her blade.
"Just in time for this old lady to stretch her muscles!"
"Big Sister! I'm here to help you!"
Kaedehara Kazuha's figure swept across the battlefield like a gale, his katana carving a cyan trajectory in the air.
The Meteor Hammer Moe Churl King swung its weapon fiercely, the hundred-pound iron ball whistling as it smashed towards the young man.
"Wind's Breath—"
Kazuha lightly tapped his toes, his body leaping as gracefully as a falling leaf.
"—Surge!"
His katana accurately thrust towards the Hilichurl Chieftain's crimson single eye, but was blocked by a metal wrist guard at the last moment.
As sparks flew, the Hilichurl Chieftain's huge hand suddenly lashed out, grabbing Kazuha mid-air.
"Cough!"
The crisp sound of breaking ribs was clearly audible.
Kazuha's katana furiously hacked at the wrist guard, but only left a few white marks on the tempered steel.
Blood seeped from the corner of his mouth, and his vision began to blur... "Swish!"
Purple lightning tore through the sky.
The Hilichurl Chieftain's wrist was severed at the root, the cross section exhibiting a strange Crystalization.
Kazuha fell before a figure wearing a wide-brimmed hat, beneath which a pair of cold purple eyes were revealed.
"You all... are disturbing me."
The lightning on Balladeer's fingertips had not yet dissipated, and three Hilichurl Chieftain corpses already lay behind him.
Each had been precisely pierced through the Delusion in their chest, killed with a single strike.
"Fatui... Harbinger..."
Kazuha struggled to prop himself up.
——————
Before the board game
"Balladeer has entered the game."
Jesse whistled, looking at the purple chess piece that suddenly appeared on the board.
Zane calmly took a sip of tea: "Within the plan. This guy has been fighting the Abyss for hundreds of years, so it's normal for him to show up when he smells it."
Matt's eyes flickered with admiration: "To deal with three Hilichurl Chieftains so quickly, truly worthy of a Fatui Harbinger..."
Elliot suddenly showed a cunning smile: "But we can't let him have it too easy."
Saying this, he slapped a special Hydro Hilichurl Ranger chess piece onto the board.
The moment the piece landed, eerie Abyssal runes appeared on its surface.
——————
On the battlefield
"Hilichurls can actually use Delusions too..."
Balladeer was about to crush the Delusion of a fourth Hilichurl Chieftain when he suddenly felt a bone-chilling coldness from behind.
He abruptly turned sideways, and a faint blue water blade grazed his hat, silently slicing a distant reef in half.
"Oh?"
Balladeer narrowed his eyes.
The Hydro Hilichurl Ranger slowly emerged from the waves, its armor flowing with dark purple patterns distinctly different from other Hilichurls.
The twin blades it wielded continuously dripped corrosive liquid, and with each step, the seawater beneath its feet boiled and Vaporized.
"A creation of the Abyss..."
Balladeer's fingertips condensed a more intense lightning.
"Interesting."
The Hydro Hilichurl Ranger suddenly accelerated, moving so fast it left afterimages.
Balladeer had just raised his hand to block, but found that the opponent's figure transformed into a puddle of seawater upon contact—at the same time, the true killing blow came from behind!
"Clang!"
In the nick of time, Balladeer blocked the backstab with a Lightning Wedge.
The shockwave generated by the collision of the two forces sent all soldiers within ten meters flying.
"Big Sister! What's the situation now?"
Kazuha clutched his chest and retreated to Beidou's side.
Beidou's greatsword cleaved an ambushing Blazing Axe Mitachurl, grinning: "It's a situation of watching gods fight."
"Pfft!"
Balladeer was thrown like a ragdoll, landing at Beidou's feet, his hat spinning and embedding itself in the sand.
Beidou's eyes widened, even forgetting to wipe the blood foam from her mouth: "Huh? Little brother, are you already done for?"
"Who's done for!"
Balladeer roared in fury, leaping up, countless lightning bolts erupting from the hem of his purple clothes.
He was about to charge out when a two-meter-diameter spiral water column suddenly slammed into him from the side, sending him flying over thirty meters away.
The Hydro Hilichurl Ranger's figure flickered in and out of the water column, and in the next second, it transformed into flowing water, seeping into the center of the Fatui formation.
(They were all chess pieces, discovered by Balladeer as he passed by, and Balladeer thought he was dealing with the Abyss)
When it re-formed its body, the formation of three hundred vanguard soldiers had already surrounded it.
"It's in our midst!"
An Electro Cicin Mage's scream cut through the battlefield.
What awaited them was—
"Abyss: Vortex Dance!"
The Hydro Hilichurl Ranger spread its arms, its body spinning rapidly like a top.
Two high-pressure water blades carved perfect arcs of death as it spun, tearing through metal armor like paper in their wake.
The Cryo Cicin Mage's shield had just lit up before it was shredded into ice shards, the thunder hammer of the Electro Hammer Vanguard broke into three pieces, and the Anemo Boxer's arm was still spinning in the air, its owner already scattered into chunks of flesh.
Within a fifty-meter radius, a rain of blood instantly fell.
"Scum! Look here!"
Balladeer descended from the sky, a sphere of condensed lightning in his palm illuminating the entire battlefield.
Just as the destructive lightning was about to strike—
The Hydro Hilichurl Ranger vanished.
No, it was close to vanishing.
When Balladeer realized a lightness in his chest, the Abyssal monster was already hovering before him, playfully toying with his Delusion between its fingertips.
The dark purple Delusion shimmered with a dangerous light in its palm.
"Wh—"
The crushed Delusion erupted with a final thunderous blast, and using the explosion as cover, the Hydro Hilichurl Ranger's pincer-like hand had already clamped onto Balladeer's throat.
The next second, a hundred-meter-long gully appeared on Nazuchi Beach—carved out by Balladeer's body being dragged across it.
"Bastard! How dare you..."
Balladeer coughed up blood foam, trying to get up, only to be met by an infinitely expanding Hydro elemental heavy punch.
"Bang!"
The punch was so heavy that everyone on the battlefield saw the purple meteor flying across the entire battlefield.
When Balladeer crashed at Beidou's feet again, the sand beneath him had already vitrified from the high temperature.
Beidou, carrying her greatsword, looked down at the smoking Balladeer embedded in the sand pit, then looked up at the Hydro Hilichurl Ranger in the distance, slaughtering the remaining Fatui.
She opened her mouth, and finally only managed to squeeze out one sentence:
"...Do you need me to call a doctor?"
Balladeer's trembling fingers dug deep into the sand, and he squeezed out a few words through gritted teeth: "I... will... slaughter... that... scum..."
At the same time, Elliot, in front of the board game, was triumphantly sticking an "MVP" label on the Hydro Hilichurl Ranger chess piece.