Speaking of this Jiang Yan, even Zhongli would call him "a remarkable man."
During the first mountain-opening ceremony, he hadn't even shown up. It wasn't until Liyue's martial path spread outward that he slowly wandered over from Wangshu Inn.
His weapon of choice was… a fishing rod.
But once he attacked, that fishing rod became a sword.
Relying on the internal art Zhongli had given him, he even developed his own strange yet exquisite sword techniques—
The very picture of a hidden master, a Liyue version of "Dugu Seeking Defeat."
One time, when Mooncarver descended the mountain for a mission, he ran into Jiang Yan. Seeing such talent, he couldn't help cherishing it and offered to recommend him to Mount Shu.
But Jiang Yan refused.
He said he would only convert to the immortal path after he'd pushed martial arts to its absolute limit.
At the time, Mooncarver couldn't quite understand.
No matter how strong the martial path was, it still had a ceiling.
Jiang Yan was very strong—Mooncarver guessed he was already close to the Landed Immortal realm.
But even then, facing a cultivator in the very first stage of Refining Essence into Qi, victory would be uncertain.
Who in their right mind would deliberately choose the martial path first, then move to immortal cultivation?
But martial arts was Jiang Yan's obsession, so Mooncarver had simply kept his thoughts to himself and said only:
"If you ever want to switch to the immortal path, just come find me."
He'd inspected Jiang Yan's aptitude before. At bare minimum, the man had an upper-grade spiritual root.
He was absolutely qualified to enter the inner sect.
On the way back, Mooncarver had sighed over the waste.
Jiang Yan, however, had only worn that mysterious little smile of his and said:
"With martial arts as the gateway to Dao… Teyvat truly doesn't lack in eccentrics."
Mooncarver had let the matter go after that.
The road Jiang Yan wanted to walk was the one most suited to him—
A road that could be called: Martial Immortal.
Most cultivators used spells and Dao arts as their main methods. That was the mainstream of the immortal path.
But martial immortals… were terrifying in their own way.
For example, Beidou's Divine Elephant Hell-Suppressing Force came from a certain martial immortal's inheritance.
If Jiang Yan really managed to punch through the martial path, surpassing the Landed Immortal realm, then switched to immortal cultivation…
He would already be standing firmly on his own Dao.
At that point, talent would actually be secondary.
What mattered most would be comprehension.
In that regard, Jiang Yan felt extremely optimistic.
He still had a lot of faith in the Jiang clan.
Most of the time, Jiang Yan didn't move around much. He stayed by some small lake, quietly fishing.
But every gesture he made had traces of the martial path in it—
Subtle, profound, unfathomable.
No one knew exactly what realm he'd reached.
All they knew was that the last time he took action, he had displayed the strength of a grandmaster.
Jiang Yan kept to himself; he had almost no social life.
The only indulgence he had was good food—Mount Shu Village's restaurant saw him often.
Everything else in his life…
Was fishing.
As for Ying'er…
She was Ningguang's right hand and extremely important to her. To put it simply, she had helped Ningguang earn a lot of mora in the old days.
Her strength had been piled up with pills.
Among grandmasters, she was the weakest.
But even the weakest grandmaster… was still a grandmaster.
One person was enough to single-handedly beat down every expert below that level in Mount Shu Village.
Beyond the grandmaster realm, more mysterious factors came into play.
Their control over spiritual energy became even more refined.
Mount Shu Village covered a vast area—probably larger than the whole of Liyue Harbor.
Yet fewer than fifty thousand people lived here.
Aside from those selected to come in the beginning, the rest were mostly families of disciples.
The village felt very spacious, but not at all desolate.
More like… a hidden utopia.
A peach-blossom spring cut off from the world.
As a matter of fact, Mount Shu Village really was encircled by peach groves and bamboo forests.
The place was enormous, yet it still felt like a simple village.
Himeko found she was growing rather fond of it.
"Speaking of the origin of the martial path, it actually has a very close connection to Mount Shu," Ying'er said as they walked.
"After the Sect Master took in the Geo Lord—Zhongli—as his disciple, he guided the Lord to create the martial path."
"So that ordinary humans could also make use of spiritual energy."
"And with Mount Shu's descent, Teyvat's spiritual energy began to revive."
"Now the entire nation of Liyue is cultivating the martial path—but the cultivation environment in Teyvat can't compare to Mount Shu's."
"Over there, from what I know, there are only a dozen or so grandmasters altogether. Still, there are quite a few Acquired and Innate experts."
"In Liyue alone, we have nearly a hundred thousand martial-soldiers."
Himeko nodded thoughtfully.
"And what about Mount Shu Village?"
"Mount Shu Village?" Ying'er smiled.
"Most of the martial artists here are above the seventh level of the Acquired realm, with Innate experts as the majority."
"There are hundreds of grandmasters, and three great grandmasters… hmm…"
"Of course, whether Jiang Yan is still 'just' a great grandmaster is another matter. Some suspect he's already set foot into the Landed Immortal realm."
"I see…" Himeko smiled.
"Then Miss Ying'er must be one of those three great grandmasters, right?"
"All thanks to Lady Ningguang's support—not worth mentioning. I'm the weakest of the three," Ying'er said casually with a wave.
"But even the weakest great grandmaster… is still a great grandmaster, no?"
Himeko's counter landed squarely.
Ying'er just laughed and didn't argue.
"In the end, the martial path is still the martial path. Not everyone has Jiang Yan's kind of ambition."
"In the long run, immortal cultivation is still more important."
As she spoke, the two of them came to a stop at the edge of a huge open plaza.
Ying'er pointed ahead.
"We're here—the public training grounds for Mount Shu Village."
"See that blond man in armor? That's a vice-captain of Mondstadt's cavalry, deputy to Inner Disciple Kaeya."
"He's the second-ranked great grandmaster in the village—Draymond."
Himeko followed her gaze.
A young-looking man stood in the center of a training ground, overseeing drills.
He looked much more serious than the average Knight of Favonius.
Sensing their eyes on him, he glanced over, gave them a polite nod, then focused back on his men.
"Those over there are the Knights of Favonius," Ying'er continued. "Next to them are Liyue's Millelith, and on the other side—those used to be Snezhnaya's Fatui."
"Now, they're the Empress's Guard."
"As for the Tsaritsa herself—she's currently Elder Barnabas of Mount Shu."
"Sumeru and Fontaine didn't send many troops. Inazuma and Natlan are busy with civil wars, so no one came from those nations either."
"For now, the security of Mount Shu Village basically rests on these forces."
"Every soldier you see is at least Innate. Squad leaders are all grandmasters."
Himeko nodded again, letting her gaze drift to a pair of sparring warriors on another side of the grounds.
A casual palm strike from them carried a weight that made the air quake.
A single leap sent them soaring over a hundred meters into the air, where they hovered for a moment before dropping back down.
Then their weapons came out.
Both wielded long spears. Each thrust gleamed with a cold light, dragon-roars echoing faintly in the air—
Yet when the spearheads struck the ground, not even the surface dirt cracked.
Himeko knew immediately this was no showy performance.
Yesterday she'd tested her own strength here—
Even fully driving the Plague Gem, punching with blazing fire, she'd barely managed to smash a single boulder.
Everything in this world was absurdly tough.
Probably what Alice had called "world strength."
By her estimation, the physical conditioning of those two, plus their internal energy, would put them among the top A-rank Valkyries under Schicksal.
Seeing her interest, Ying'er explained:
"They're both at the peak of the Innate realm—just one step away from breaking through to grandmaster."
Himeko understood at once.
In her mind, she quickly drew comparisons.
If Innate peak equaled the apex of A-rank, then a grandmaster was at least on par with weaker S-rank Valkyries.
Of course, strength scaling for Valkyries was famously weird.
Kiana and Mei, for example—whose official ratings weren't high—had Herrscher-level power.
If we were talking about the more "normal" S-ranks, someone like Rita could probably trade blows with a grandmaster.
Beating one would come down to luck.
As for great grandmasters…
Himeko hadn't fought one yet, but just from the power she sensed in Ying'er's body, she was sure:
Rita would be outmatched.
Against someone like Durandal—
Ying'er wouldn't even be able to force out her second form.
Even without armor, Durandal could probably beat her bare-handed.
Granted, Durandal didn't really fit standard metrics.
She was an entire tier of her own—
A Durandal-class Valkyrie.
Still, based on Himeko's rough mental math, Siegfried in his prime, even without using the full might of Twilight Judgment, should be able to defeat Ying'er—
But not Draymond.
With Twilight Judgment fully unleashed once…
Ten Draymonds wouldn't be enough to block a single real strike.
From that perspective, the power scale in the Honkai world really did stretch ridiculously far from bottom to top.
But that wasn't quite fair either.
Twilight Judgment was a Divine Key—
And not just any, but the most destructive of the thirteen.
A weapon like that belonged in a different category.
Bringing a god-slaying weapon to beat up bare-handed martial artists was, frankly, bullying.
If equipment counted, a single proper flying sword or magical treasure from the immortal path could happily smash Siegfried flat.
Even yesterday, the gourd at Wendy's waist had felt more terrifying to Himeko than Durandal at full power.
At least, that was what her instincts screamed.
Still, she'd drawn one clear conclusion.
A normal S-rank Valkyrie going head-to-head with a great grandmaster would be a toss-up—
Victory depending on timing, terrain, maybe even mood.
A Durandal-class Valkyrie exceeded great grandmasters—
Whether she surpassed a Landed Immortal, though, was still an open question.
But the vast majority of Valkyries relied on their armor.
Cases like Durandal and Siegfried were rare, almost freakish.
Strip away the mechs and exoskeletons.
Pure hand-to-hand, no power systems, no Divine Keys—
Rita versus a grandmaster? Rita loses.
The martial path and the immortal path both belonged to the mystic side.
They were all about personal power, spirit refined into flesh and bone.
Valkyries against seasoned martial artists had no inherent advantage.
A cultivator or martial expert could break through in the middle of a fight, spiral upward in battle after battle—
Just like in those old novels:
"He grasped the Dao at the edge of life and death."
For tech-side people, that was flat-out cheating.
You couldn't exactly expect a mech suit to suddenly awaken as a silicon-based lifeform and descend as a mechanical god in the middle of a duel.
It wasn't like every armor came pre-installed with an AllSpark.
On the other hand, from the mystic side's point of view—
"I trained for centuries for this strength, and you just put on a suit and become a powerhouse overnight?"
That was cheating too.
So, mystic and tech had always rubbed each other the wrong way.
But that wasn't what Himeko needed to worry about.
The martial path…
Was a way to evolve human life.
To push the physical body beyond its normal limits.
If Valkyries could cultivate martial arts first, then put on their armor…
Even an A-rank Valkyrie might be able to go toe-to-toe with a Herrscher.
At the very least, against a Herrscher on the level of that "Wendy" from the bubble universe, she'd be able to beat her senseless.
Immortal cultivation was indeed terrifying, on a scale Himeko hadn't dared imagine before.
With the martial path to lay the foundation, Honkai really was nothing more than a jumped-up pest.
"Civilization grows, Honkai grows stronger," that whole narrative—
Would become a joke.
If the mystic side grew stronger, what did that have to do with the tech side's "Honkai reaction curve"?
Even if Honkai tried to target mystic systems specifically, that meant targeting cultivators—
And cultivators, especially those from Mount Shu, were petty and fiercely protective.
If Honkai really dared to do that—
Jiang Yan would probably march up to the Imaginary Tree himself and uproot its branches just to make a point.
In a technological world, killing someone's parents was a blood feud.
In the mystic side…
Killing someone's parents and slapping them in the face in front of everyone?
That was a blood feud carved into the bones.
Cultivators were proud.
And very, very petty.
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