"I'll still call him my sage, and he can be this nation's king. I don't see a problem at all."
"On the contrary, there is a problem," Zhongli said, uncharacteristically serious. "If Idris truly becomes Sumeru's king, then from that day on you'll no longer draw faith from this nation. Even a trickle of belief has immense effect—as you can see in us."
He let a breath of geo-lit devotion ripple around him; Venti answered with a wisp of wind-sweet worship. One was officially "dead," the other had set his people free to chase liberty—yet both still held faint streams of faith.
"But in Sumeru," Zhongli continued, "if Idris takes the crown, you may not receive any."
Nahida only smiled. "That's fine. I've already made my choice."
Venti and Zhongli traded a look; with the little god resolved, the elders had nothing more to say. They sighed inwardly at how many gods were crammed into Sumeru today—add Focalors to the trio and only the reclusive Inazuman shut-in was missing. Perhaps for the best; the Prime Machine God likely bore some residue of the Raiden Shogun's power.
Speculation could wait. The battlefield before them belonged to Sumeru.
On the front line, the Prime Machine God and Marana's colossal avatar slammed into each other with brutal simplicity: fist for fist. The Withering colossus' sheer mass gave every blow crushing weight; the machine's paired thunder-fists sparked back, searing rot-black bark with violet brands that healed almost as fast as they formed.
Marana lashed out with swarms of thorned tendrils, a tangle of deathly vines writhing to ensnare the mech. Idris's blade flashed again and again, each cut steeped in chill necrotic aura, hacking the grasping bramble to pulp. Without him, the Prime Machine God would have been trussed in seconds.
The monster adapted. A seam tore open at its chest; a medusa's mane of thorns geysered out, spearing straight for Idris. If those got through, the mech would be bound and the road to the city blown wide open. Even Idris at full burst couldn't block a clear path for that thing.
Then he chose multiplicity.
"One Qi Splits into Three—Divide!"
Two gleaming doppelgängers—one ink-dark, one and pale as bone—blurred into being at his shoulders, stepping onto the machine's other two collar-plates. They lacked only the ability to turn into weapons; in all else they mirrored him: Vision, tempered dragon-blood body, a century-honed sword intent—everything.
Together, the trio braced, cutting down the converging thorns and buying the Prime Machine God space to trade haymakers.
"What a marvelous divine art," murmured more than one spectator in the city. "Where did he learn that?"
In Liyue's delegation, Keqing couldn't help but applaud. A man who could field a god-tier war engine—and have it kneel to his command—made her wonder: if Liyue could, one day, direct adepti and other godlike powers with human will… would that not mark the dawn of a true age of men?
Hidden in the crowd, the Doctor frowned. A clone technique? He'd taught Idris about splicing "slices," true—but his own copies had independent minds and varied strength. This? Call, and three Idriss appeared—each with a Vision. Ridiculous.
"Heh. Beyond that '360 Security System' of theirs, Sumeru's riddled with curiosities," he mused. "The real puzzle is how to study them without that wretched king of men sniffing me out…"
On every front, seeing the Grand Sage unfurl his might sent morale surging. If they lived to see sunset, who would balk at calling him king?
After a dozen brutal exchanges, Idris accepted the obvious: even stripped of distractions, the Prime Machine God couldn't seriously wound Marana in a straight slugfest. The mech was too cumbersome; the enemy, too vast. In truth, he already knew the weak point—from the story written into the World Tree: that great eye crowning the Withering colossus.
He'd tried to drive the mech's strike there several times. No good. Which left only one option:
He would strike it himself.
"Prime Machine God—hold it. Black and White—buy me time. The killing blow is mine."
He unfurled the Senluo Sword Domain; vines coiled up Frostmourne's length as he began a relentless charge-up. Living cords lashed his boots to the machine's brow so a wild hit wouldn't fling him into the abyss.
Marana felt the storm gathering. Fists thundered; the mech caught them, plating shrieking. Chest-thorns stormed; the black clone carved them apart. From the eye, a beam of starless night lanced toward Idris—so the white clone stepped in and took it.
He held. Barely.
Even as a pure energy form, the white body's core was almost wrung dry resisting a ray that, in the original tale, had taken the Forest King's inherited might to block. The beam faltered at last; the clone flickered, hanging on by threads.
It was enough.
"Take this—TENFOLD CRIT! Senluo Sword Domain!"
Frostmourne's malice, the charged Critical Smash, the roiling domain layered as one. A sky-splitting phantom blade coalesced above him and fell for the eye.
The Withering godling ducked. The eye sank like a periscope into its own crown.
Idris didn't hesitate. He rode his vine-lines forward and swung for the torso. A gouge dozens of meters long ripped across the titan; black deathflame raced along the wound. The city roared—then stilled as the eye slid back up, glaring down at him, hatred distilled.
Its tolerance for damage was obscene.
"So—external strikes barely matter," Idris thought, breath steady. "After five hundred years of drinking in hate, the eye's grown a little cunning. It even dodges. Which means there's one path left."
He tilted Frostmourne toward that abyssal pupil, vines bunching like a drawn bowstring.
"We go inside."
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