The passage was long, with occasional collapses. Still, it was clear that at fixed intervals along the walls, there were strange markings—perhaps they signified something. Sadly, no one who could read them remained anymore.
After that great calamity, the surviving Khaenri'ahns either became Hilichurls or bore the curse of immortality. Without the ability to breathe underwater, they had long since drowned.
If one died under such desperate circumstances, where would the ley lines resurrect them? If… if they were placed back in the same spot, doomed to endure drowning forever… Hiss… that was a chilling thought. But since he hadn't encountered anyone else here, perhaps it wasn't the case.
As for the Ruin Guards lined up here, they appeared entirely undamaged on the surface. Who knew if they had shut down simply from being submerged.
Before long, branches appeared on either side of the passage. They were as wide as the main corridor, their black mouths stretching into unknown depths.
But with his goal so clear, Victor Wang did not waste time probing them, heading eastward without hesitation.
The distance was much longer than he had imagined. An hour later, by surface measure, he should have reached Windwail Highland. At last, the passage changed.
Ahead stretched a hall as vast as the plaza of Mondstadt City—perhaps it really was a plaza. At its center lay a mound of rubble piled like a hill. Within the wreckage were faint glimpses of autonomous mechanisms.
Khaenri'ah was buried deep underground, with little natural wildlife. Thus, its people created mechanical lifeforms modeled on surface creatures. Above ground, these constructs were war machines. Below ground, perhaps they were like animals in a zoo.
And here stood a massive Ruin Grader. From the chest down, its body had been crushed beneath by a fallen ceiling. Yet its arm stretched outward, as if desperately trying to keep its right hand away from danger. In its enormous metal palm, it cradled a flowerpot—a pot containing a flower.
A real flower. Yet it had long since ceased to grow… and ceased to wither.
It had five petals: four pale white, tinged faintly with violet, and one unusual petal tinged with blue. Despite sounding colorful, in truth the flower looked even plainer than a Sweet Flower—so plain as to be flawless.
But for it to bloom here, in Khaenri'ah where the sun does not shine, gave it extraordinary meaning.
"'Inteyvat'…"
Victor Wang approached the Ruin Grader's hand. Worried that the flower had lost its resilience over the ages, yet unable to resist, he reached out to touch it. It was still firm—firm like a false flower.
The national flower of Khaenri'ah, Inteyvat. Its natural bloom only lasts two weeks. But if plucked and taken beyond Khaenri'ah's soil, its petals would cease growing and become rigid—until returned to its homeland, where they would soften once more and finally dissolve into dust.
It symbolized the wanderer, embodying the gentleness of home.
This must have been a place for those far from home to rest and ease their hearts. Pity that beneath the rubble, there should have been many more Inteyvat.
After storing the pot—the flower that the Ruin Grader had given its life to protect—into the Inner Space, the sound of machinery stirred. But it was not the miracle of this Grader reviving after centuries only to entrust the flower to him before perishing.
Circling around, Victor Wang discovered two more Ruin Graders opposite the rubble—one intact, the other missing an arm. They were awakening.
Ruin Guards did not attack him. But with Ruin Graders, he could not be sure. Not waiting for them to fully revive, he hurried on, following the pull of his senses.
He passed rows of silent Ruin Guards, countless branching corridors, and empty rooms scattered with possessions—some ruined by centuries of flooding, others still intact. They all rushed past in his vision.
The closer he drew to the Abyss's power, the more severe the collapses became. After clearing one path that was completely blocked, a vast hall opened before him. Majestic as a palace, its walls were lined with towering statues. In their arms they held crystalline lights, illuminating both five centuries past and the present moment.
A massive door loomed ahead, adorned with golden tracery and intricate patterns, sealed for five hundred years, awaiting someone to open it. With his extensive experience solving Teyvat's puzzles, Victor Wang immediately set to work.
"Needs… three energy blocks?"
Thanks to the water's presence, no monsters had overrun this place. Thus, he avoided wasting time in battle. Remembering the rooms he had passed, Victor Wang quickly retrieved the energy blocks with little effort.
When he placed them into their slots, orange light traced glowing lines across the great door. Bubbles streamed from the cracks as the door slowly swung outward.
Inside was not a vault of precious relics, but something equally important—a command room, or control chamber. Consoles ringed the room. Three walls were covered in screens.
From the chairs facing different directions, the cups scattered at consoles, the multicolored buttons—one could almost glimpse the bustle of the past, when many people had worked here together. But now…
"Where's the thing I'm looking for!"
Within the entire chamber, the strongest pull of Abyssal power came not from artifacts, but from two statues—statues of Abyss Mages? No… of Abyss Lectors.
Careful sensing confirmed it: they were the source of the attraction.
"This… am I supposed to carry you away? Something's wrong. I came here for an artifact… unless, there really isn't one here?"
"Think carefully. Diergis only gave a suggestion—his guess. He even said he couldn't reach things of this level."
"No… when I fought Diergis, I never once felt this kind of Abyssal pull from him. Are these statues simply on another scale… or something else entirely?"
"Forget it. Move them first."
With a thought, Victor Wang tried to store the statues in Inner Space. He failed. That proved they possessed a spirit.
"Alive?"
"Then at least say something! Even attacking me would be better than this silence…"
"Tch. Should I just blow you up? Strike while you're weak."
The two Abyss Lector statues remained motionless. Only Little Wen cast him a strange glance. Empty-handed and frustrated, Victor Wang paced circles around them.
"Do you know how much time I've wasted to get here?"
He sank his mind into Inner Space and checked his pocket watch—uncertain if it was waterproof. "I went underwater at eight o'clock. Now it's already six… Hiss."
Glancing again, he saw its hands frozen at six o'clock. Not moving. Broken, perhaps.
"Something's wrong. 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM—that's ten hours. But last I checked, time was still normal. Something is affecting it."
The most suspicious things here were those two statues. Suspecting their trickery, Victor Wang hardened his resolve and struck them with Erosion Blast.
As expected—yet still unsettling—the shattered fragments flew back instantly, perfectly retracing their paths, as though time reversed, or a recording was played backward. Nothing had changed.
"As I thought. Time. Time itself…"
Victor Wang pressed his knuckles to his forehead. He had faced enemies who controlled time before. With his pocket watch's anomaly, he could be sure—time here was distorted. But how to catch the one responsible…
Seconds slipped by—or perhaps none did at all.
After what felt like a long time, Victor Wang's gaze fell upon another pocket watch, left behind on a console.
Since coming here, he had become far more sensitive to time. Perhaps the answer was to find the correct time, to restore this place.
If so, the question became—which time was correct? The watch on the console was frozen at 7:22:23. His own showed 6:53:17. And earlier, he had passed other watches and clocks in those rooms.
Carrying the console watch, Victor Wang retraced his path, searching. In the end, he found twelve watches in total—each stopped at a different hour. Including his own, there were thirteen. And his time, 6:53:17, matched one of them exactly.
It was no coincidence. Someone had tampered with these watches.
Then… was 6:53:17 the correct time?
With that thought, he set all the watches to 6:53:17. A strange feeling flickered, then vanished. Nothing else happened.
Eleven of the twelve lost their original times, but Victor Wang had memorized them all. This time, including his own, he set all thirteen to 7:22:23. Again, a flicker—yet no further response.
8:15:45… 9:43:21… 10:55:12…
At twelve o'clock, there was finally movement. The two Abyss Lector statues began to shed their petrification—though not fully.
At three o'clock, the twelve watches triggered a mechanism. They merged into a stream of light, fusing into a black-glowing hourglass.
Before Victor Wang could study it, time rewound. The two Abyss Lectors were freed from stone, while the hourglass floated above them.
"Seeker of power, this place is not for you to trespass."
"Forbidden strength is not for mere mortals to seize."
Victor Wang's heart dropped. These two were Hydro Abyss Lectors.
That hourglass—it was unmistakably a Sands of Eon. Its silhouette matched perfectly with the black-shadowed relic he carried. Without doubt, it was the Khaenri'ahn artifact he sought.
But unless he could drain the lake and destroy their Hydro shields before the waters returned, how could he fight?
How could anyone break Hydro Lectors' shields underwater?
Wasn't that just… invincible?
Shameless. Truly shameless!
He was forced to think of retreat. Once he acquired Electro power, he wouldn't need the portable elemental particle generator to discharge electricity underwater. Then, maybe he could try. For now, he had to set it aside.
"Wait. He… seems to be…?"
The two Hydro Abyss Lectors had just awoken from stone. They exchanged glances. One asked, uncertain: "The Envoy?"
"It's his aura. Without a doubt!"
"At last—you've come! We thought we were abandoned!"
Both grew excited, one after the other. Victor Wang's mind spun, but he took a deep breath and bluffed: "That's right. It's me. I've come."
"As expected—it is the Envoy!"
"This treasure has remained unharmed under our guard. Please, accept it."
One Lector raised his arm high, guiding the black-glowing hourglass toward Victor Wang.
So easy?
Happiness came too suddenly.
As he reached for it, information flooded his mind—the name of this sands: The Two Ends of Beginning and End.
"You've done well."
"Our mission is complete. May all go smoothly for you, great Envoy!"
"Ahh… finally… it's over…"
The two Hydro Abyss Lectors, utterly trusting of that aura, did not question further. With sighs of relief, they dissolved into elemental particles on the spot.