The shockwave of the celestial duel washed over them, a physical, gut-wrenching reminder of the immense, terrifying power being unleashed above their heads. There was no more time for reunions. There was only the mission: to protect the city.
The group of heroes, a strange, impromptu alliance of Liyue's finest and Inazuma's champions, spread out, each falling into their natural roles. Ayato, the brilliant strategist, began to direct the flow of civilians, his calm, authoritative voice a beacon of order in the chaos. Ayaka and Thoma, their own powers a dance of ice and fire, created barriers to shield the fleeing citizens from the falling, super-heated debris that rained down from the sky-borne battle.
Ganyu, was a silent, graceful force of nature. A single, perfectly aimed frost-flake arrow would create a massive, crystalline wall, blocking an entire street from a particularly violent shockwave.
Ren, at her side, was the mobile, reactive shield. He would dart forward, his hoverboard now a vital, life-saving tool, zipping to a spot where a building's roof was about to collapse and erecting a thick, angled dome of ice, giving the people trapped inside precious, crucial seconds to escape.
As they worked, a strange, wonderful, and utterly unprecedented sight began to unfold around them. The city of Inazuma, a nation torn apart by civil war, by a divine, unyielding decree, was, under the shared, existential threat of a raging god, beginning to unite.
They saw Kujou Sara, the stern, loyal general of the Shogun, not hunting rebels, but leading her Tenryou Commission soldiers in a desperate, heroic effort to protect the very citizens her Vision Hunt Decree had oppressed. She was a blur of black feathers and crackling Electro, her bow flashing as she shot down a massive, falling chunk of debris before it could crash into a crowded shelter.
And then, Ren saw a familiar, towering figure with crimson horns. Arataki Itto and his gang, their usual boisterous, troublemaking energy now channeled into a furious, protective force, were bodily lifting a massive, fallen temple bell that had trapped an old man. "Heeeeave!" Itto roared, his muscles straining, a grin of pure, heroic determination on his face. Kuki Shinobu was at his side, calmly, efficiently, directing their efforts and tending to the wounded.
But it was the next sight that truly made Ren's heart swell with a profound, almost overwhelming, sense of hope.
He saw a group of men and women, their clothes a mixture of commoner's garb and simple, practical armor, working with a quiet, disciplined efficiency. And on their belts, on their chests, were the familiar, glowing forms of his own, man-made Visions. One was using a burst of Geo to reinforce a crumbling wall, another was using a wisp of Anemo to clear a path of smoke.
Paimon, zipping over to him and Lumine, pointed them out. "Look! It's them! People from the resistance!" she squeaked. "Gorou and Kokomi must have sent them to help!"
And leading one of the small platoons, a young man with a bright, enthusiastic, and wonderfully healthy face was directing his troops with a confident, cheerful authority. He wore a slightly more ornate version of the resistance uniform, a symbol of his new, hard-earned rank.
Lumine's face broke into a warm, proud smile. "Teppei!" she called out.
The young man turned, and his own face lit up. "Lumine!" he shouted back, giving a sharp, enthusiastic salute. He was alive. He was healthy. He was a leader.
The sight was a beautiful, chaotic, and utterly miraculous tapestry of unity. In the streets of Inazuma City, under the wrathful, dueling gods in the sky, the soldiers of the Shogunate were now working side-by-side with the rebels of Watatsumi Island. Their civil war, their bitter, ideological conflict, had been momentarily, blessedly, forgotten, replaced by a single, shared purpose: to protect their home, their people.
And in some places, their alliance was even more direct. Ren saw a small squad of Kujou Sara's samurai and a platoon of Teppei's resistance soldiers fighting back-to-back, not against each other, but against a group of Fatui skirmishers who were, in the midst of the divine chaos, trying to take advantage of the situation to loot and cause more destruction.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. In this moment of supreme crisis, the true, common enemy of all of Inazuma had been revealed. It was not the Shogun, and it was not the resistance. It was the insidious, manipulative, and parasitic presence of the Fatui, who had profited from their division and their pain.
Ren watched it all, his heart a mixture of terror at the battle raging above, and a deep, profound hope at the unity being forged below. The god of Eternity, in her divine, righteous fury, was trying to erase a single, hateful variable. But in doing so, she had, completely by accident, created a new, beautiful, and far more powerful, equation: a united Inazuma.