The iron hooves of Takeda Shingen, Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi trample over Liyue Harbor.

A brutal massacre reduces the prosperous port into a living hell.

One hundred and eighty thousand civilians dye the harbor red with their blood, with barely any survivors left.

 

While fleeing, Aether is slashed across his left shoulder by enemy soldiers.

When he and his companions reach the side peak of Mt. Tianheng and look back——

The entire Liyue Harbor has fallen into a slaughterhouse.

Yet the enemy generals drink and laugh atop the city tower,

vying to see who has slain more of these "foreign barbarians"...

 

 

 

Fire is the first thing that catches the eye.

 

Thick smoke, like splattered filthy ink, stains Liyue Harbor’s azure sky into a despairing ash-black. The once row upon row of upturned eaves and vermilion beams now lie mostly in ruins, twisting and collapsing in agony amid raging flames. The harbor, once crowded with thousands of ships, now floats with broken planks and unrecognizable debris. The seawater is dyed an ominous ochre-brown, lapping time and again at the piles of... bodies along the shore.

 

The air reeks of a grotesque, horrid stench. The pungent smell of gunpowder and burnt timber cannot overpower the nauseating metallic reek of blood—blood that streams into rivers and soaks the earth. Mixed within it is the putrid stench of scorched flesh, along with distant, inhuman howls and wails echoing faintly.

 

Aether grits his teeth hard, a tearing pain searing through his left shoulder. The strike came out of nowhere: a warrior in full armor charged out of a burning alley, his face twisted by greed and slaughter beneath his helmet, roaring words in an incomprehensible tongue. He narrowly dodged a fatal blow, yet the blade still cuts deep into his flesh. Warm blood soaks his sleeve at once, oozing stickily through his clamped fingers with every passing second. Each breath tugs at the wound, throbbing with dull agony.

 

"Aether! Hold on a little longer!" Yun Jin’s voice rings out beside him, breathless and trembling with undisguised terror. Her gorgeous opera costume is now covered in soot and flecks of stray blood, with a long tear along the cuff. Supporting Aether’s right arm with one hand, she grips a long spear wrested from a fallen soldier with the other. The spear tip trembles faintly, its tassel matted solid with grime and blood.

 

Yae Miko walks a pace ahead. Her always immaculate miko robes are dust-streaked and torn in several places along the hem. She is uncharacteristically silent; her amethyst eyes, always glinting with playful mockery, are now cold as ice, sharply scanning every corner ahead for hidden danger. A faintly glowing talisman rests in her grasp, ready to be unleashed at any moment. Xinyan covers their rear. Her beloved instrument is nowhere to be found, replaced by a heavy broadsword, clearly plundered from the enemy. Scrapes mark her face, and the rock singer’s signature defiance is replaced by a heavy, simmering rage on the verge of erupting. She glances back repeatedly at the hellish harbor, grinding her teeth audibly.

 

The four of them blend in with scattered fellow refugees, all worn with panic and despair, climbing a steep, rugged path beside Mt. Tianheng. The trail is rarely trodden, overgrown with brambles and littered with loose stones. Every step sends a piercing jolt through Aether’s left shoulder; cold sweat dampens his hair, and his vision blurs intermittently.

 

Behind them, the clamor of Liyue Harbor lingers close by. The clang of clashing steel, the thunder of collapsing buildings, and the bestial, triumphant howls of the victors mingle with the wails of the dying. Together they weave a suffocating net, tightening around the heart of every fleeing soul.

 

They pass through a charred bamboo grove, blackened stalks rising like desperate fingers pointing to the sky. A woman’s shrill cry drifts on the wind, only to cut short in an instant, replaced by wilder laughter. Xinyan freezes rigidly, her knuckles whitening as she tightens her grip on the sword hilt. She nearly spins around to charge back, only for Yae Miko to grip her wrist firmly. Miko says nothing, merely shaking her head, her gaze heavier than ever before.

 

They pass the mouth of an unassuming cave, where muffled sobs of a child echo faintly from within. An elderly man curls in the shadow of the entrance, a ghastly gash torn open in his chest, already lifeless. His clouded eyes stare blankly up at the gloomy sky. Yun Jin turns her head away, her shoulders trembling slightly.

 

Aether’s foot slips suddenly, sending pebbles clattering down the mountainside. The jolt wrenches his shoulder wound brutally. He lets out a muffled groan, his vision darkening as he staggers, nearly collapsing. Yun Jin and Xinyan brace him up at once.

 

"We’re... almost at the summit." Yun Jin gasps, her voice thick with tears she struggles to hold back.

 

After what feels like an eternity of scrambling upward, the path finally levels out. They break through a thicket of low shrubs, and the view opens up abruptly—they have reached the top of Mt. Tianheng’s side peak, a massive jutting rocky platform overlooking the land below.

 

Aether pulls free from Yun Jin and Xinyan’s support, staggering forward to stand at the cliff’s edge.

 

And then he sees it.

 

The entirety of Liyue Harbor stretches unobscured beneath his feet.

 

The once prosperous, glittering port, a city that never sleeps thronged with merchants from all seven nations, filled with boatmen’s chants and the bustle of street life, has now devolved entirely into a hellish scroll of fire and blood.

 

Nearly every inch of the harbor burns, thick black smoke billowing upward as walls of flame rage through streets, devouring everything combustible. Familiar landmarks—Yujing Terrace, Chihu Rock, Feiyun Slope—are barely recognizable now, only broken silhouettes swaying amid the blaze. At the docks, where he once fed seagulls alongside Paimon, countless bodies lie piled high. Discarded like unwanted cargo, they stack layer upon layer, filling alleyways and choking the waterways.

 

Countless soldiers clad in three distinct sets of armor swarm like ants across the city’s ruins. Wielding katanas, lances and harquebus spears, they hunt down every surviving Liyue native still able to run. Where blade light flashes, lives fall like weeds. He watches a silk-robed merchant flee a burning shop with his head in his hands, only to be surrounded by foot soldiers and pierced through from all sides by spears. He sees soldiers batter down the door of a home, dragging out a screaming young woman and tearing at her clothes...

 

Looting unfolds in broad daylight. Crates of Mora, gold and silver vessels, fine porcelain, antiques and calligraphy are hauled from shops and residences, piled in the streets and sealed with marked plaques. Relics embodying Liyue’s millennial heritage, artworks forged with artisans’ devotion, are all crudely branded as spoils of war.

 

Yet the most harrowing sight of all looms atop the still grand, though damaged, Tenshukaku Tower.

 

Once the council hall of the Liyue Qixing, the seat of Liyue’s highest authority, the tower now glows with lamplight, shadowy figures pacing within. Several imposing generals in ornate full armor lean against the railings, gazing down upon the bloodbath below and chatting casually. Worse still—glinting wine cups rise to their lips.

 

A mountain wind laden with smoke and blood gusts over the cliff, carrying fragmented, mocking words torn by the breeze:

 

"...Lord Shingen... one hundred and seventy-three slain..."

 

"Haha... Lord Nobunaga... one hundred and eighty-nine... even that old man counts..."

 

"...Lord Hideyoshi... just now... those two children... make it a full two hundred..."

 

A killing... contest?

 

Aether’s stomach lurches violently—not from his shoulder wound, but from an icy chill surging from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head. His blood seems to freeze in his veins. One hundred and eighty thousand Liyue civilians... barely a hundred left alive. These cold numbers collide brutally with the mountain of corpses before his eyes and the demons’ tally ringing in his ears.

 

"They’re... they’re..." Yun Jin has heard it too. All color drains from her face, her lips trembling too much to form a complete sentence. She staggers backward, unsteady on her feet, the light in her eyes snuffed out by overwhelming horror and disbelief. The long spear she has clutched tightly clatters to the rock ground.

 

Xinyan lets out a low growl like a wounded beast, slamming her broadsword savagely against the nearby cliff face, sending sparks flying. "Beasts! All of you beasts!" Her roar echoes across the mountains, raw with helpless grief and fury.

 

Yae Miko stands silently as mountain wind stirs her dust-laced hair and tattered robes. She turns her gaze away from the hell below, tilting her head to stare at the smoke-shrouded, leaden sky. Her jaw is set tight, every emotion fading from her violet eyes, leaving only a hollow coldness brimming with an unleased storm. She speaks softly, her voice low and calm, yet colder than any shout could ever be:

 

"It seems... the Archons have been gone far too long. Some have forgotten what power once guarded this land of Liyue."

 

Aether stares fixedly downward, at the city wailing amid flame and blood, at the loathsome blurry figures atop Tenshukaku Tower. The pain in his shoulder lingers, yet it is overshadowed, swallowed by something deeper, hotter burning within him.

 

It is not sorrow, nor fear, nor even mere rage.

 

It is a brand seared into his soul.

 

A brand that demands retribution in blood, repayment in fire.

 

He slowly lifts his uninjured right hand, clenching it tight into a fist. His nails dig deep into his palm, piercing skin and drawing blood, yet he feels nothing.

 

Flames dance wildly within his golden pupils, reflecting the land that raised him—the land now dying before his eyes.

 

The wind wails once more over the hilltop, swirling up ashes like countless restless spirits lingering and weeping all around them.

This chapter is based on real historical events. It takes place after the Japanese army captured Nanjing in 1937. After entering the city, the Japanese troops committed arson, mass murder and looting on a large scale. More than 300,000 Chinese people were killed. The Japanese army showed no mercy even to the elderly and children.