Ever since the development of the MC world found its stride, the dimensional portal had only ever shifted coordinates. It had never been shut down.
Today, it was severed completely.
The MC world had become an isolated island.
Just as Ryen expected, Ningguang and the women stood upon the plains holding Klee, watching the space where the gateway had hummed.
Seeing it dissolve into illusory bubbles and scatter into the wind, Ganyu could no longer maintain her composure. She turned away, quietly wiping the tears from her cheeks.
Ningguang and the rest felt a heavy weight pressing against their ribs.
Seven days.
A brutal, apocalyptic war raging for seven uninterrupted days.
They might not see Ryen for that entire week. Since weaving their lives together, they had never endured such a long separation.
Worse still, they were now completely cut off from any news.
Anxiety and heartache flooded their minds. As the sun sank toward the horizon, the crushing weight only grew heavier. They held absolute faith that Ryen would survive the trial, but logic rarely governed matters of the heart.
"Ryen... you have to stay safe. Take care of yourself. Do not let a single blade touch you..." Ganyu wrung her hands together, her knuckles turning stark white from the pressure.
"Sister Ningguang, Brother Ryen will be safe, right?" Klee looked up. Her large eyes were rimmed with red, and her usually cheerful voice carried a distinct, trembling quiver.
"Mama told me that good people always stay safe. Brother Ryen definitely won't get hurt. He promised Klee that when he comes back in seven days, he will take me fish blasting."
Ningguang gently stroked Klee's cheek, forcing a soft, steadying smile.
"Everything will be fine. Since Brother Ryen gave you his promise, he will undoubtedly keep it. You know better than anyone that Brother Ryen honors his word."
"Mhm! Klee will be a good girl and wait for him!" Klee rubbed her eyes furiously, forcing a bright, determined smile. "Klee won't go fish blasting at all these next few days! I will wait for Brother Ryen to come back so we can blast them together!"
"Sister Ningguang, you cannot be sad either, or you won't look pretty anymore!" Klee reached up with her small hands, carefully wiping a stray tear from the corner of Ningguang's eye.
"Alright. Let us head home for dinner, little Klee." Ningguang pushed her chaotic emotions down, exchanging a silent, resolute glance with the other women.
The connection was severed. The timeline for the portal's reactivation was entirely unknown.
Fretting upon the plains served zero purpose. They could only place their faith in Ryen and govern their domestic affairs with flawless precision.
When the seven days concluded, they would welcome Ryen and the vanguard home with a grand triumph.
...
Within the MC world.
Watching the portal scatter into the wind, Ryen let out a slow, heavy sigh.
"Our backs are truly against the river now. Call Dashi to the battlements."
At the perimeter of the former gateway, the newly arrived Millelith reinforcements watched the portal vanish without a trace of panic.
During the march, Dashi and Fengyan had delivered brutal, unvarnished briefings regarding the horrific nature of the impending siege.
In truth, the sheer scale of the nightmare was something they struggled to fully comprehend. Yet that very terror made sealing the portal an absolute necessity.
Every Millelith guardsman understood the reality of their deployment. They were permitted to die upon these cobblestones, but the mutant horde could not be allowed to cross that threshold into Teyvat.
A breach would mean an apocalyptic extinction event for their homeland.
Watching the portal seal shut actually brought them a collective sense of relief.
Receiving Ryen's summons, Dashi remained silent for a brief second before turning to his subordinate officers.
"Follow Commander Fengyan. Report to your designated defense sectors, requisition your strategic munitions, and upgrade your armor."
"Observe the veteran units and adhere strictly to the commands of your sector officers."
"I know your minds are overflowing with questions, but the hour for lectures has passed. The war begins the second the sun falls."
"We are out of time."
"This is a crusade to preserve our homeland. This siege dictates Liyue's sovereign right to exist within the MC world."
"As sworn guardsmen of the Millelith, you must anchor your hearts with the absolute resolve to die defending these walls!"
"It is highly probable that seven days from now, a vast number of you will be corpses. I may well be among them. But I ask you to engrave this truth into your souls."
"From the second you crossed that threshold and stepped onto this killing field, you became the heroes of Liyue."
"Rex Lapis and the sovereign lords bleed upon the vanguard without taking a single step backward. We are the Millelith. We do not retreat!"
"Advance! We have no direction but forward! If we fail to seize victory, we embrace total annihilation!"
"For the glorious future of Liyue Harbor, for the prosperity of our families, and to secure boundless living space for our nation..."
"Fight until your last drop of blood!"
"Brothers... survive."
"I pray that seven days from now, every single one of you will stand safely upon these walls to claim the glory you have earned!"
Dashi possessed no natural talent for soaring rhetoric. His speech was raw, forged purely from his own grim convictions.
Yet that unvarnished honesty resonated flawlessly with the infantry.
In the blink of an eye, the martial spirit of the vanguard ignited into a roaring inferno.
These fresh recruits understood the gravity of the slaughter awaiting them. They required no further coddling.
This war would not be decided by the heavens, but by the iron will of mortals.
Dashi turned away with a heavy sigh, breaking into a brisk sprint toward the primary battlements.
The sky was bruising into darker shades of violet and gray. The Blood Moon was preparing to ascend.
The war was mere minutes away. Every passing second was critical.
Moments later, Dashi arrived upon the high obsidian wall.
"Rex Lapis, Ryen, esteemed lords. The Liyue Harbor Millelith garrison, totaling twenty-two thousand men, stands fully assembled and deployed!"
"Twenty-two thousand?!"
Makoto gasped, her violet eyes widening as she stared at Dashi in pure astonishment.
"You drafted your entire reserve force? Who remains to garrison your capital?"
As allied sovereigns, the Archons possessed a fairly accurate understanding of one another's military logistics.
At the very least, Makoto possessed the keen intellect to estimate the troop counts of her peers based on minor logistical details.
Excluding the Grand Master's expeditionary force, Mondstadt retained roughly twelve thousand knights.
Snezhnaya held the smallest footprint. The Tsaritsa had deployed barely two thousand loyalists.
Sumeru mirrored Mondstadt, varying by perhaps two or three thousand.
As for Liyue, Makoto merely had to observe the encampments around Mt. Tianheng to reach a highly accurate conclusion.
Approximately twenty-five thousand troops. The margin of error was negligible.
Which meant Liyue had retained a token force of three thousand men to police their entire nation, committing twenty-two thousand to the siege.
While three thousand seasoned guardsmen were technically sufficient to maintain civil order given Liyue's raw martial strength, completely emptying the strategic rear was a breathtaking gamble.
Even among close allies, maintaining a robust home defense was fundamental statecraft. Furthermore, if those twenty-two thousand men perished within the MC world, the resulting military collapse would inflict unprecedented trauma upon Liyue.
Would a cautious, calculating merchant state like Liyue, famous for never placing all its eggs in a single basket, truly authorize such a reckless gamble?
It was a staggering display of absolute, unshakeable faith in Ryen's leadership.
Hearing Makoto's shock, Dashi scratched the back of his neck, his tone dropping into a grave, respectful register.
"Lady Ningguang issued explicit orders. Regardless of the circumstances, this is Liyue's siege. The allied nations offer their aid out of profound goodwill, but Liyue must shoulder the absolute brunt of the slaughter."
"The sovereign authority over Redstone Tech City cannot be compromised. Therefore, we must expend every ounce of our national strength to hold the walls."
"Ah, Ryen, Lady Ningguang also asked me to pass along a personal message..."
"She maintains absolute faith that you will secure total victory in this war. Therefore, she is willing to wager the entire foundation of Liyue upon your command."
Ryen's gaze softened into a complicated, profound warmth. He turned his eyes back toward the empty plaza where the portal had once stood.
It felt as though his gaze pierced the veil of space and time, resting upon the gentle, amber-eyed woman waiting for him on the other side.
"Such terrifying trust..."
Ryen shook his head with a soft, affectionate laugh before turning back to Dashi.
"Prepare the men. Ensure every fresh recruit is equipped with a Totem of Undying, enchanted armor, and modern firearms. Utilize this brief lull to aggressively brief them on the tactical realities of the horde."
"Focus purely on the lethal details. Highlight the specific behavioral quirks of the mutants."
"Furthermore, audit the munitions stockpiles immediately. Ensure sufficient explosive payloads are distributed across all defense sectors to maintain a continuous, seven-day bombardment."
"The internal city guard will operate strictly under the command of Ei and the Shogun. They are to utilize the rail network to rapidly deploy to any breached sector."
Having issued his directives, Ryen turned toward Zhongli, his voice dropping slightly.
"Do you require any final tactical adjustments?"
Zhongli pondered the board for a quiet moment before shaking his head.
"The hour for sweeping strategic adjustments has passed. For our final preparations..."
"Order the engineers to seal every automated trap corridor we constructed in the earlier phases. Those kill zones have lost their utility. Leaving them open merely provides the horde with pre-dug breach points."
"Before abandoning the corridors, flood the entire subterranean space with lava."
"Do any of you have further refinements to offer?" Zhongli asked the group.
Venti scratched his head, offering a helpless, breezy shrug.
"Old man, there is no need to solicit my opinion on this. You are the undisputed master of warfare."
"Just point me in a direction, and I will execute the order."
Zhongli frowned slightly, his tone carrying a heavy, stern reprimand.
"War is not a theatrical performance. This siege dictates the survival of every soul in this city. Shoving the entirety of tactical responsibility and your own personal safety onto the shoulders of another is a profound failure of duty to yourself and to the men."
Hearing the genuine frustration in Zhongli's voice over his flippant attitude, Venti offered a sheepish, apologetic laugh.
"Do not be angry, old man. I understand the pressure you are under. It isn't that I refuse to contribute. It is simply that you have already executed every viable defensive protocol to perfection."
"I genuinely cannot conceive of a single additional fortification that would improve our odds."
Zhongli sighed heavily, withdrawing his stern gaze. He turned to look at the final, fading sliver of the sun sinking beneath the western horizon.
"If that is the case... prepare your weapons for the final stand."
An immediate, suffocating aura of lethal tension clamped down over Redstone Tech City.
The newly arrived Millelith recruits had barely processed the sheer scale of the MC world.
Yet with the apocalypse mere minutes away, the luxury of contemplation was violently stripped from them.
In this dark hour, they relied entirely upon the core doctrine of the Millelith: absolute obedience. Whatever their commanders ordered, they executed.
They discarded all individual thought. Even if Dashi ordered them to march into a suicide charge, they would do so without a heartbeat of hesitation.
That unyielding discipline was the true terror of the Millelith vanguard.
The frantic, roaring chaos that had consumed Redstone Tech City throughout the day suddenly vanished. A profound, terrifying stillness took its place.
Even the collective breathing of the garrison grew impossibly shallow.
Every eye on the battlements locked fiercely upon the horizon.
Time lost all meaning. Eventually, the final, lingering hues of the twilight dissolved like a shattered illusion.
On the eastern horizon, a sickly, terrifyingly crimson crescent clawed its way over the hills.
A thin, suffocating mist of blood began to roll across the earth.
This Blood Moon was not full. It was shaped like a jagged, merciless sickle.
A naked, overwhelming aura of slaughter descended upon the hearts of every living soul in the city.
Zhongli drew a deep breath, his knuckles popping as he gripped the haft of his trident with bone-crushing force.
From the unseen edges of the world, following the ascent of the Blood Moon, a wave of crimson light swept across the plains like a tidal wave.
Until...
It swallowed Redstone Tech City entirely.
The ultimate Blood Moon had arrived.
Ryen closed his eyes. The smiling faces of Ganyu, Ningguang, and Klee flickered through his mind one final time.
A second later, his eyes snapped open. Raising his sniper rifle, he drew a bead on the first grotesque, mutated zombie clawing its way out of the dirt below the walls.
"The war begins now!"