Seeing Klee's cautious expression, Jean softened slightly:
"Klee, don't be nervous. There's a big sister here who wants to ask you something."
"Hmm, a big sister wants to ask Klee something?"
Klee tilted her head.
Seeing that innocent look, Ji An and the others felt their resolve waver a little.
Ji An looked at Klee, feeling something warm and involuntary spread across his face.
So cute.
It would be nice to have a daughter like this someday.
He turned and gave Mona a sideways look.
His expression said it plainly: are you sure you haven't made a mistake? The great rival you've been building up is this harmless little girl?
Lumine: "It's definitely a mistake."
Paimon: "Paimon said it. Mona's astrology really is unreliable."
Jean and Lisa, oddly, said nothing at all. Both seemed to be quietly thinking something over.
"I have not made a mistake!"
Mona drew herself up and pointed at Klee with full conviction:
"It's her! The successor of great knowledge!"
"Successor...?"
Klee pressed a finger to her lips, looking puzzled.
"That's right."
Mona placed her right hand on her hip with a trace of pride: "I am the astrologer who has read the secrets written in the sea of stars. You must have anticipated my arrival, surely?"
Klee scratched her hair: "Sea of stars? What's that? Are there fish in the sea of stars?"
"Fish...?"
Mona looked indignant: "No, stop pretending to be confused. Are you afraid of my challenge?"
Klee stared at her: "Big sister, I really don't know what you're talking about!"
Lumine: "So it is definitely a mistake..."
Faced with Klee's utterly guileless expression, a flicker of doubt crossed Mona's face.
After all, even the most accomplished actor couldn't pull off innocence this complete, least of all a child this young.
"But my astrology is never wrong. Just to be sure, let me ask: your mother is Alice, isn't she?"
Klee nodded eagerly: "Yes! Oh! So big sister is mom's friend. But mom has gone somewhere very far away now..."
Her voice grew quieter as she said it.
"Klee..."
Jean and Lisa exchanged a look, both sighing slightly.
Mona: "I know. Astrology has already told me that much. But before she left, she should have passed on all the mystical knowledge she possessed to you, yes?"
Klee bit her finger, thinking: "Mystical... knowledge... Klee doesn't really understand. Mom only taught Klee how to make Jumpy Dumpties."
The two had been talking past each other for some time, but after listening, the others had gradually pieced it together.
Ji An chuckled and said to Mona: "So Klee's mother was your master's friend and lifelong rival?"
"Disciple!"
Mona stepped closer and lowered her voice:
"What do you mean 'your master'? You should say 'grandmaster'! Don't forget your promise, Ji An. You agreed to play the role of my disciple once we reached Mondstadt."
Ji An murmured back: "But your so-called great rival is, as you can see, a completely harmless little girl. Do we still need to keep up the original plan?"
Mona hesitated briefly, then pouted: "I don't care. You're playing my disciple regardless, or those three requests I agreed to are void."
Ji An: "Alright, alright. I'll keep it in mind."
Klee watched the two whisper back and forth and tilted her head: "Big sister?"
Mona cleared her throat and composed herself: "Ahem. Yes. My master, though highly skilled in astrology, is rather narrow in her expertise. Alice is different. She is a polymath, accomplished across many fields of the mystical arts."
Paimon pinched her chin: "But Mona... Klee is so young. Even if she heard that kind of advanced knowledge, she probably wouldn't understand it, right?"
"Hmm..."
Mona bowed her head in thought: "So it seems she inherited the bloodline but not the knowledge. What a miscalculation. There's no way to have a proper contest like this..."
The elaborate competition she had been preparing for had dissolved entirely.
She felt a little deflated, but she hadn't forgotten the other purpose of her visit.
Mona looked at Klee, her voice gentler now: "One more thing, little one. Before Alice left, did she tell you about the fifty-year agreement and the box that goes with it?"
Klee's face lit up in recognition: "Oh! I know about that! So big sister came for that box. Let me look for it, just a moment!"
She swung her backpack to the ground and began rummaging through it.
"Not this..."
"Not this either..."
"No, this isn't it..."
Klee suddenly stood up straight: "Ah! I remember now! I buried it with my new treasure at Windrise!"
Lumine: "You buried something important out in the wilderness...?"
Klee looked at Mona expectantly: "Big sister, come with Klee to go get the treasure back!"
"Me?"
Faced with the little girl's hopeful eyes, Mona hesitated for a moment, then nodded: "Alright. Disciple, you..."
Ji An shook his head with a smile: "It's just picking something up. No need for all of us. Go on ahead."
"Fine then. Klee, let's go."
Mona took Klee's hand and headed for the door.
After they left, Ji An turned to Jean and the others: "Grand Master Jean, I'll take my leave as well."
Jean nodded: "For now, please remain in Mondstadt. Once the Stormterror situation is resolved, the Knights will be better positioned to assist you."
"Thank you, Grand Master Jean."
Ji An walked out the door.
Lumine watched him go: "Then we'll be in the Knights' care."
She turned to follow.
Paimon stomped her feet: "Hey! Don't go slacking off, Traveler! We should be doing our part too!"
"Right, of course... Kaeya, explain the operation plan." Jean paused. "Kaeya? What are you looking at?"
She had noticed that Kaeya was staring absently in the direction Ji An had just gone.
"Oh. My apologies. I drifted off for a moment."
Kaeya snapped back and offered an easy smile.
Jean said: "Stormterror's attack on Mondstadt has, in a way, given us an opening to trace the source of the disaster."
"Under Lisa's magical detection, the source of the hurricane engulfing Mondstadt has been identified."
Kaeya laced his fingers: "Oh? And the answer is...?"
Lisa smiled lightly: "The abandoned temples of the Four Winds. Stormterror is able to summon storms of this scale by drawing on the residual power stored within them."
Jean nodded: "Our target is three of those four abandoned temples. As for why only three, I trust everyone understands the reason."
Listening to the plan take shape, a faint uncertainty settled over Lumine's face.
She spoke up: "Is Stormterror really only borrowing the residual power from those guardian temples?"
Jean looked at her, slightly puzzled: "Traveler, what are you getting at?"
Lumine didn't answer immediately.
A scene replayed in her mind: Stormterror's horn suddenly blazing with a dark, heavy light; the dragon, which had been steadily weakening with the mysterious person's help, abruptly regaining full command of the wind, becoming even more powerful than before. They had nearly been killed in the counterattack.
And that dark power radiating from the horn had carried a strangely familiar feeling.
---
After leaving the Knights of Favonius headquarters, Ji An followed Grand Master Jean's directions and made his way to a residential house in Mondstadt.
Knock, knock, knock.
He stepped up and knocked.
A short wait, then movement from inside, followed by a somewhat hoarse male voice: "Who's there?"
Ji An spoke up quickly: "Excuse me, are you Mr. Saeed?"
"I am... one moment."
Footsteps behind the door.
A moment later it opened, revealing a man in a dark blue robe.
He appeared to be around thirty, with jet-black hair neatly combed and a pair of round-framed glasses. He had the same foreign features as Seymour, though with slightly fuller lips and considerably fairer skin, and carried himself with a composed, scholarly air.
Saeed looked at Ji An's face, confirmed he didn't recognize him, and showed a mildly puzzled expression: "You are...?"
Ji An said promptly: "My name is Ji An. I'm a friend of Mr. Seymour. He asked me to visit you after I arrived in Mondstadt."
"Seymour sent you."
Understanding crossed Saeed's face immediately, and his manner warmed: "Haha, come in, come in. Any friend of that fellow needs no formality with me."
Ji An stepped inside and looked around.
It was unmistakably a scholar's home. Two bookshelves were packed to capacity, and every table was buried under stacked materials and handwritten notes. It was clear that before Ji An's knock, Saeed had been deep in the middle of his work.
Ji An smiled: "From the sound of it, you and Mr. Seymour are quite close?"
Saeed laughed: "Close is an understatement. We were classmates at the Sumeru Akademiya and shared a room. We ate together, bathed together, went everywhere together."
Ji An: "Ah... I see. What an enviable bond."
He subtly moved half a step to the side.
"The place is a bit of a mess, don't mind it."
Saeed settled at his desk and patted the chair beside him: "Sit down."
Ji An nodded, sat, and said directly: "Mr. Saeed, beyond visiting on Seymour's behalf, I actually need your help with some things."
"Figured as much."
Saeed wasn't surprised. He smiled: "The time Seymour wrote to me asking about Mondstadt's history, that was for you, wasn't it?"
Ji An nodded with a slightly apologetic look: "We troubled you back then, asking you to compile all of that."
Saeed waved his hand: "Trouble? That's my research. I didn't need to compile anything; I just made a copy of what I already had."
He looked at Ji An curiously: "Was there something in those materials you couldn't make sense of? Is that why you came all the way from Liyue?"
Ji An shook his head: "No. Mr. Saeed, the reason I came this time is Dragonspine."
Saeed's expression shifted. He was quiet for a moment: "Dragonspine. You want to know more about Sal Vindagnyr? To be honest, I don't know much beyond what I already wrote. If those materials couldn't answer your questions, I'm afraid I wouldn't be of much further help on that front."
Ji An said: "Grand Master Jean mentioned that the information on Sal Vindagnyr came from inscriptions you personally recorded from the ruins inside the mountain. Is that right?"
"Correct. At the time, my research had hit a wall and I was at a loss. I heard an archaeological team was preparing to explore the snowy mountain, so I steeled myself and went along with them."
Saeed nodded, and something in his expression tightened at the memory: "We had prepared for the worst going in. But the reality inside the mountain was far more dangerous than any of us had imagined. The team started with over thirty people. Less than half made it back."
"I hope their souls have found rest."
His voice had gone quiet and heavy.
Ji An observed a moment of silence with him.
Though he knew, given what he now understood about Dragonspine, that rest was likely beyond reach for those people. With the ley line power suppressed, the wishes and memories of those who died there could not re-enter the cycle.
That was not something to say out loud right now.
Ji An asked: "Mr. Saeed, you mentioned the mountain has a strange kind of cold, the sort that deepens the longer you're exposed to it?"
Saeed nodded: "That's right. Which is why at the time, we relied on a particular method."
Ji An's attention sharpened: "Could you tell me what it was?"
Saeed paused and studied him: "When you say that... you're not thinking of going into the mountain yourself, are you?"
Ji An nodded: "I won't pretend otherwise. Dragonspine is the reason I came from Liyue to Mondstadt."
Saeed's face grew very serious: "Brother Ji An, listen to what I'm telling you. You're young. There's no reason to take a risk like this."
"There's more to the danger in that mountain than just the cold. If there's any way to avoid going, you should. People have died there."
"Mr. Saeed, I have reasons I can't get around."
Ji An met his gaze steadily: "Please, tell me how you dealt with the cold."
Saeed held his look for a moment, then sighed.
"Alright. It's not much of a secret in any case. Do you know about Seelies? The creatures found on the continent."
Ji An nodded.
"When we entered the mountain's range, torches went out immediately. Even Pyro elemental crystals couldn't produce warmth. The cold simply swallowed everything."
"But then, by chance, someone discovered a special variety of Seelie capable of storing Pyro elemental power and converting it into a source of sustained warmth. It was those Seelies that lit our way through the ice and snow."
Ji An leaned forward slightly: "Where can those Seelies be found?"
"Before Stormterror's attack on Mondstadt, I could have told you exactly. But the destruction has disrupted the flow of Anemo energy throughout the surrounding area, and those Seelies drifted from their usual locations along with it."
Saeed thought for a moment: "Now, the only place I can say with any confidence might still have them is one particular site."
Ji An couldn't help but ask: "Which one?"
Saeed said slowly: "The former seat of the God of Storms, Decarabian. What the people of Mondstadt now call Stormterror's Lair: the shattered spire."
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