Fischl's doppelganger stood unflinching against her army of Vision wielders, whose numbers could conquer a small country. The Kaiserin's power radiated in waves of electrified air and washed over all who refused to prostrate themselves. In a strange way, Fischl believed in the Kaiserin's confidence, so full of majesty and power as to resemble a god.
"Ah, yes… You've done me well, Doctor, to help me attain Wesensverwandlung."
Geo constructs were summoned beside the Kaiserin, infusing themselves with Electro to be molded into fantastic and impossible shapes. They settled into vicious spears, and Fischl had the mind to duck under their piercing flight towards them. The vitrified spears crashing into the ground and walls snapped Fischl out of the vain hope that such impossibilities were but illusions.
"Don't die too soon, let me test this out." The Kaiserin grinned in a way that still radiated her usual dourness. "Overgrow." Slapping her palm on the ground, a violent overgrowth cracked open the earth and tore across the battlefield in twisting vines.
"With sword comes shadow!"
"By ordinance divine!"
"Freeze to the core!"
"Pyre, pyre, pants on fire!"
It took four Elemental Bursts to slice, freeze and burn these plants away. Not even in her wildest imagination would Fischl think beyond her world's laws to imagine these new Elemental Reactions. She glanced at the Kaiserin's necklace and its glowing stone pieces.
But Fischl's army was not made up of cowards, her own doppelgangers least of all as 02 called out with a hand on her own chest.
"Towering vessel of ruinous salvation, heed this Prinzessin's call!"
And something began to materialize.
Fischl made out vague limbs, fingers and a torso, but the sizes involved caused it to eclipse the sun and cast its terrific shadow upon the battlefield. This giant robot had the shape of a human several dozen meters tall. But its proportions were anorexic and exaggerated, discomfiting all who laid eyes upon its inhuman form. Still, Fischl's heart leapt as it manhandled the Kaiserin's spaceship, whose roar of particle beams crashed upon the robot's shimmering field.
So long as the Immernachtreich was occupied, they didn't need to worry about the Kaiserin's forces except those already in the City. And judging from the distant gunfire, those city forces were too occupied by the desert folk's uprising to aid the Kaiserin. Not that she needed it.
Fischl found strange comfort in the fact whatever plan they concocted would've fallen apart with these Elemental Reactions. Electro ionized Anemo to blast their ranks while Anemo-Dendro created a chain of leaves to tear into concrete in a slicing flit.
As 02's robot raised its foot in a stomping pose, the Kaiserin threw her arms up in a cross, a dramatic pose Fischl would make.
And everything went from bad to worse.
Geo constructs combined with Electro and Anemo to create a gigantic arm, whose veined lines glowed purple. Its punch met 02's stomp in a thunderous crack, knocked the giant robot off-balance and sent it crashing into Sumeru City. The fall must've been heard across the nation, and the land shook with such ferocity it almost threw Fischl into the air.
"That was Magnetize," the Kaiserin crossed her arms, "and I name this Hallow." Anemo infused Geo and Dendro's Overgrowth with such vigor as to gather around herself in a bud. It blossomed to reveal the Kaiserin's next form. Gathered branches grew into angel wings, her halo's weave veined by light so bright it came as a blow to Fischl's eye.
"Hléradr Auk Foldardróttinn." The Kaiserin's halo lowered over her forehead to fire a crash of energy into the crowd. Ningguang's Elemental Skill halted the beam. Cracks spread across the Geo wall before it shattered. But it had bought time for them to evade and pick themselves off the floor.
Just in time to meet the Kaiserin's next attack: a flap of her angel wings.
The Electro and Anemo within her divine wings gusted up ionizing tornadoes. Against such terrific gales, it took Venti, Kazuha and Traveler's combined powers to create a counter-spinning gale. Tornado crashed upon tornado to unleash surges of Electro residue that Fischl and company dodged.
Fischl's mind raced. It was the pose that stuck in her mind, and coming from her no-nonsense doppelganger, it had to have meant something. Fischl mentally fished for that spark of revelation, since the tide of battle hinged on it. Only when the Kaiserin crossed her arms again did it strike her.
"That triple Elemental Reaction… She needs to cross her arms to initiate it!"
It was not Fischl but Amy who yelled that, concerned with getting this revelation across at any cost. She recoiled from the Kaiserin's sour scowl directed at her. No human could rely on thought alone to unleash such power. What better than an action or pose to focus the mind?
The Kaiserin crossed her arms again. "Dynamize. Come forth, my Nimbus turrets." She conjured Geo turrets, whose blades spun with Anemo to spit out Electro bolts. "Magnetize." Metal crates levitated around her, crushed and molded into fantastic shapes. "Splinter." Dendro and Geo erupted in Overgrowth, their pods infused with Electro to explode in lethal fragmentation.
But before Fischl's heart could sink so much deeper it'd burrow straight through Teyvat, down came a miracle.
A miracle that descended upon wings of destruction.
The angel.
Its beam tore through the HEV Immernachtreich and crashed upon the Kaiserin's force field. Fischl threw up her arms to shield against the shockwave, but Ningguang's Geo wall and Zhongli's forest of pillars walled off its brunt.
"Oh shit," whoever said that echoed everyone's sentiment. Despite attacking the Kaiserin with enough firepower to recreate the Cataclysm, the destruction it wrought had no consideration for their survival. Unfettered, with a singular zeal that embodied divine wrath, the angel was on nobody's side, and Fischl couldn't be bothered to parse its motivations while the Kaiserin's spaceship fell in flaming detritus.
And this wasn't the first complication thrown their way.
Paimon called out, "La Strega?! And Childe? Why're you two here?"
True to her word, the two Fatui agents emerged. "We received word the Doctor screwed us over by working with the Kaiserin, so consider this just desserts by screwing the Kaiserin over in kind! Foul Legacy - The Devouring Deep!"
"The End of All Songs - Vollständig." La Strega's calm transformation belied her scowl at the Kaiserin, barely sparing Fischl a second glance. Relief washed over Fischl at escaping her doppelganger's wrath, even if the alternative was facing down a god.
Paimon asked, "Err, can we trust them?"
"Do we have a choice?" Traveler answered.
The Fatui agents' wrath now tore into the Kaiserin, and while they did not compare to the angel, the Kaiserin could not afford to ignore their might.
What remained of Sumeru City was demolished beyond all hope of recovery, the land lacerated by the majesty of several unnatural disasters. Fire and fury raged all around Fischl, and she recognized this as a battle of myth, celebrated by tales.
And Fischl's heart burned with ire at being sold a lie.
War called forth blasphemous impulses from beneath the conscious mind, calling them to violence and frenzy that broke through all physical limiters. All to brutalize, kill and push death away by force of will. The fear within their hearts was barely cowed by the vague pretense of strategy.
In the instant between shots, Fischl thought of the OSF, likely sneaking about and sabotaging the Kaiserin's forces to enable the desert folks' advance.
Was this what she had to deal with daily?
Standing amidst such destruction didn't make her feel big, with the weight of destiny on her shoulders. She was instead the small ant scurrying around the feet of heavenly agents. The fear of being crushed hung over her as she braved asteroids, tornadoes, fissures and infernos.
How did they do it? Those heroes of old? Did they feel as she did right now, seized by terror she never thought she'd bear as a country girl? Did those heroes likewise falter in reality, despairing at the might of such impassable darkness and danger?
Here Fischl stood with a puny bow and summon, facing off against the powers that be in such a mismatch that almost choked out of her in dizzying laughter. How else could she react to all these actions that had done her as much as she had done them, bringing her to fight and die. To slaughter, that rhymed with laughter…
This was…
This was madness.
In that instant, Fischl's spiraling line of thought was broken by the Kaiserin doubling over. She tore off her earpieces and threw up walls upon walls of wood and steel to shield herself.
Alhaitham rejoined them. "I knew it. I boarded that downed ship where the Terminal was located. I found this one in a cell," he revealed a little girl by his side, about as old as Klee. "She taught me how to destroy the Terminal."
Cyno asked, "You destroyed Akasha?" His tone held no malice, merely questioning the extremes taken.
The little one piped up, "If we're to stand a chance, we can't risk the Kaiserin using any of Akasha's computation to stabilize her output. Although," their gazes returned to the Kaiserin, "I'm afraid this might hurt a little for us."
While they conversed, Fischl trembled at the thoughts that nearly consumed her moments prior, threatening to beat her down into a bawling wreck. No words could describe her relief at being pulled back from this cliff edge that fell into black despair. Relief, bolstered by the sight of desert folk marching in with rifles that likely belonged to the Kaiserin's forces. They were headed by the one called Dehya, followed by the OSF.
Fischl was warmed by how many of these desert folk poured into the City, all for this battle over their nation and perhaps all of Teyvat.
Fischl stood with her army of Vision bearers, two Fatui agents, a giant robot, a veteran, an entire legion of Eremites and arguably the angel. All united against one Kaiserin, whose mutation drew their attention with its hideous beauty.
The Kaiserin's flesh had fused into the wood of her wings and halo, forming not-flesh lashed together in the vague shape of a human. The power within this newborn god now flowed from her clothes and lashed at the air as tongues of crackling power. Her doppelganger's face was beautified beyond any mortal capacity, yet Fischl was awash in revulsion at such an inhuman portrait circling back into hideousness.
Looking back, Fischl would never know where she found the courage to fire a shot at the face of danger. But she was followed by a roaring horde, every one of them ready to do and die as they unleashed everything upon their foe: the Kaiserin.
For all their fervor, any chance of approach was shut down by the Nimbus turrets, whose thunderbolts fell in an epileptic shower. Only the angel and giant robot could bull through them and tear into the Kaiserin. It chafed to be left by the wayside and left facing this Overgrowth, snaking and rolling over each other towards them. This feral growth passed under the turrets on its way to engulf them, and -
Wait.
Fischl was struck by a recollection. She'd read about a seemingly unstoppable attack in a tale. And when revisited, another character stated thus: every technique had a weakness.
This Overgrowth was a plant, in the end. And didn't trees wither in winter?
"Megistus! Esteemed samurai!" Mona and Kazuha turned to her. "Cast thy skills upon the field in a rapturous swirl! You, you and you!" She shoved her finger at the three Liyue Cryo users. "Plunge this damp land into the dawn of a new ice age, may this flood of plants be encased and extinguished in a wintry embrace!"
Nobody had the temerity to argue. The Overgrowth that slithered over the Hydro-Swirled region slowed to a freezing halt. More Overgrowth crashed into this frozen forefront from behind, attempting to crack the ice from the pressure of their furious overgrowth.
It had bought the team time to reposition, and in came the Eremites with blazing firearms. That they had poor aim and posture didn't matter, so long as shooting at the ice shattered it. Once their guns clicked empty, they retreated so the Vision bearers could swap back in to repeat the Swirl-Freeze reaction.
This spark of innovation spread around Fischl as inspiration, for the weak sharpened their wit to match the strong who sharpened their fangs.
"To ashes!"
"Feel the beat!"
Xinyan's fingers strummed her guitar and threw a Pyro shield around Beidou, and in return received a snappish Electro ring. They stood their ground against an incoming Slice swarm.
"Back off!"
"Amp it up!"
Their Elemental Skill and Burst caused a double Overload which exploded upon contact with the leaves and blew it all away.
Was this actually working?
Strega glanced at Childe, who chafed at not being able to close the distance. Their transformations ran on a timer. And as much as it irked Strega to see her idiot self command others, it gave Strega the inklings of an idea.
She turned to Childe. "Do you trust me?"
"Er… no."
"Too bad," her palm crackled with lightning. It shot at Childe, who threw up his arms at the friendly fire.
"What're you - ?!" He braced himself in vain, since Strega's lightning electrified not him but his badge, the one thing he treasured above all else.
"I've magnetized your badge, that lightning can't touch you now." Understanding passed between them. There was no time to second-guess each other. Childe whipped around and charged headfirst, and again, he braced himself in vain as the lightning that tried to smite him instead curved and struck the earth. His realization was overcome by the eagerness of a child in a sweets store, lunging at the Kaiserin while a sighing Strega provided cover fire for him.
He fought with a ferocity buried deep within Childe, more lethal than a mere berserker rage since his wrath was guided by battle senses. Charging into Ionize beams while refusing to get in the way of Strega's shots, Childe crashed into and wrestled the Kaiserin to a standstill, allowing the angel's beam to crash into the Kaiserin's back.
Despite it all, it was not enough.
The Kaiserin shoved him at a wall. Childe's retaliatory charge was halted as he turned back to the wall. This distraction allowed the Kaiserin to charge up Ionize to shoot him at point-blank range.
Strega's flaring temper was extinguished by the realization that Childe's magnetized badge had stuck to the hull. It was a testament to Strega's experience to be able to remain cool even now, nailing the Kaiserin square in her shoulder.
Bingo.
The Kaiserin's shot sent Childe flying, a metallic shriek following his crash into a wall. Injured but alive. Both of them were running on fumes by now, but despite powering down, he'd walk it off and get back in the fight eventually.
It was up to Strega to cover him until then.
Fischl glanced around her.
It was working.
In their own small way, they were subverting the Kaiserin's power. While the angel, Fatui and giant robot fought with brute force, these new Reactions were the Kaiserin's cornerstone of godhood. But Fischl and company weren't powerless despite being underpowered.
Yelan and Ganyu alone couldn't have safely defused the Splinter reactions. But together, their Hydro and Cryo arrows froze the pods alive.
And beside Fischl stood the bard, the Liyue gentleman and little Sumeru girl.
"Share in my knowledge!"
"Time for takeoff!"
"I will have order!"
Despite their elements not working with each other, they fought together in such concerted aggression that hinted at familiarity. It would've earned Fischl's curiosity were she not occupied with shooting the Kaiserin alongside Oz and Mona.
The OSF sprinted up to them, the din of battle forcing them to all but yell at each other.
The veteran yelled at her mage, "Short-circuit the dynamos!"
Mona yelled back, "What does that even mean?!"
Irritation washed over the OSF, but she put a lid on it. "Use your water!" She raised a flat palm and traced a circle over it. "Make them electrocute each other!"
"Of course," Mona's gaze lit up. She conjured a water wheel to connect the turrets. Electro bolts danced across this water wheel to supercharge each other. "Decided by Destiny!" Mona's Elemental Burst did the trick, as the Nimbuses shocked each other. They smoked, cracked and finally shattered in an explosive storm. Fischl threw her arms up, but there was no need. 02's robot arm fell and blocked off the explosive brunt.
Raising it, the Kaiserin was revealed to be even deeper into her transformation into something most assuredly not human.
"Don't let her cross her arms!"
The angel unleashed screams of angelfire, all while 02's robot feet stomped on the Kaiserin. These bought time for Eula, Shenhe and Beidou to close the distance.
Their combined physical prowess overpowered the petite Kaiserin and wrestled her into a standstill.
And they all got electrocuted for their troubles.
The screams…
Fischl flinched at their pain in their visceral screams. Their muscles seized in unnatural convulsions that would strike anyone ill. Still they clung on, either unable or unwilling to dodge the red-hot, Vitrifying spears above them.
Alhaitham called out, "Time for your lesson! Chemistry 101: What happens when you rapidly cool hot Geo?" A torrent of Hydro Bursts followed. Was it planned or improvised, Fischl would never know. She only cared that they were unleashed when it mattered: right now.
"Raincutter!"
"Things are about to get dicey."
"Riptide!"
"Decided by Destiny!"
These Hydro bursts poured upon the Vitrifying constructs, which cracked from the thermal strain.
Cyno and Xiao leapt.
"Through me, justice is served!"
"Evil conquering!"
Their blows shattered the Kaiserin's embrittled constructs.
Fischl jumped at the bark of a gunshot, and triggered the shimmer of a force field over the Kaiserin's bosom. "…should've killed…" was all Fischl heard the OSF mutter before yelling. "The necklace! Tear it off her!"
Fischl lunged. Slapping their hands on the necklace, she was joined by the Outworlder, Traveler and Paimon as they dug in and pulled. Fischl forced herself to tune out the Kaiserin's heart-rending screams, writhing and jerking as though in the throes of childbirth. The OSF's gunshot must've weakened its supernatural adhesion, as it pried off the Kaiserin's skin. More hands clapped onto Fischl's shoulders, joining her as she heaved.
Heaved.
Heaved, and then tumbled back into someone who'd likewise tripped.
Fischl's arms burned, her vigor fizzled out and was replaced by throbbing fatigue. But she found the broken necklace in Traveler's hands. The Kaiserin's radiance shut off at once, her transformation reverting due to having lost access to her power.
Paimon asked, "Uh… did we just win?"
Apparently, they did.
What struck Fischl most was the silence. The destruction had scoured the land of all life, and without the din of battle violating their senses, they were left in this silence of everything that could never be. Broken dreams, lost futures and a long road of recovery that promised to last generations, there was nothing to be 'won' except a field of ashes.
Relief passed through the team, all tension exorcised by an exhalation that would've driven them to collapse under normal circumstances. Fischl empathized; she wanted nothing more than to just curl up and rest forever.
But there was still an intervention to attend.
The Kaiserin knelt with her head hung in defeat, surrounded by Vision bearers who refused to let this wannabe god leave their sight. Fischl stumbled through the crowd, mildly delirious from victory's high, but the angel's descent caused gasps to ripple throughout the scurrying crowd. Without the battle to unify them, a shadow of uncertainty loomed between them, not helped by the angel's lack of humanity.
The angel psychically tore the necklace from Traveler's hand, and Paimon huffed. "Rude! We all fought for that necklace and now she's just stealing it from Paimon!"
Fischl recoiled from the angel as it turned towards her, it blank face forming a strange and hollow glare. Fischl was inwardly grateful to her friends for forming a wall between them. but there was no need. Its attention turned to Childe and Strega, who openly disdained the thought of losing that necklace.
They could only swallow their frustrations, since they were in no position to steal it back. The angel then turned towards Venti, Zhongli and the girl, and Fischl was too fatigued to chase that thread of curiosity regarding them.
In the end, the angel faced the Kaiserin, whose slouch was now punctuated by a defiance Fischl couldn't place.
"Do you expect me to beg? Just get it over with."
The angel obliged.
Fischl dreaded this outcome the most, for nothing could prepare her for this. One white flash later, the Kaiserin had been so thoroughly annihilated not even ashes remained.
Fischl's revulsion crested into heaving ill, regurgitating as vomit that stung her throat and poured all over the floor. Terror fell upon Fischl in a chill, cutting all sensation to her limbs from the sight of herself don'tthinkaboutitdon'tthinkaboutit. The Outworlder had likewise keeled over and introduced the floor to her half-digested lunch.
The angel floated off with the necklace, leaving them to pick up the pieces.
That wasn't the only death, from the looks of Diluc's prodigal return.
Diluc's claymore and clothes were stained in blood unlikely to be his own, and her suspicions were all but confirmed by Strega and Childe's glares towards Diluc. Fischl's stomach churned, though fatigue discouraged her from chasing questions she didn't want answers to.
It was over.
Fischl was a barely coherent wreck, and her team had been put through a wringer that felt like the Cataclysm itself, but it was over.
"Hm, it's almost time," the Voice hummed. It had enjoyed watching the Kaiserin attempt to achieve transcendence. The Vision bearers' ingenuity was a treat to witness and contributed to the Kaiserin's defeat in their own way.
With the angel around, the Kaiserin was never going to succeed, hence why the Voice summoned it to this dimension in the first place. But with the Kaiserin dead, so long as the Voice undid the angel's summon, nothing else could stand in her way.