Chapter 25: The Terrifying Support

Words : 1211 Updated : Sep 17th, 2025

After reaching a certain level of understanding with Ningguang, Lumine followed the clues she received and headed to the Fatui's secret base. There, she discovered that the Fatui were researching the Sigil of Permission, which made her even more wary of Childe. Later, she reunited with Zhongli to make the final preparations for the Rite of Parting. Then, as she watched Ganyu mourn the death of Rex Lapis in front of Zhongli, Axue's livestream chat exploded with comments: 「Those who've finished the story are just laughing silently.」「Ganyu is so naive.」「Poor Childe, getting played like a fiddle (lol).」「I feel worse for Astrea.」「Can we not talk about that? I'm about ready to make Zhongli's health bar appear.」「I know everything, but I'm not saying a word.」 Axue glanced at the chat and smirked. "Do I really need you guys to tell me? Or to finish the story? It's so obvious—Zhongli's true identity is Rex Lapis, right? But why are you saying you feel bad for Astrea? What did Zhongli do to her?" 「Wait, how do you know that, Axue?」「Did you secretly finish the story before streaming?」「Huh? Zhongli is really Rex Lapis?」「No way! He doesn't even have a single Mora. How could he be Morax?」「Why not? Morax has Mora, but he's Zhongli!」「?????」「Let's not spoil why we feel bad for Astrea. You'll find out soon enough, Axue.」 Axue rolled her eyes and decided not to dwell on it. "It's pretty easy to guess that Zhongli is Rex Lapis. The hints are everywhere." After finishing the story, Axue followed the quest markers while explaining: "In the second episode of Reporting to Lady Furina, we learned that Rex Lapis isn't actually dead. While we don't know how the Hydro Archon and the Supreme Bishop came to that conclusion, they definitely understand Morax better than we do. So, there's no reason to doubt the official info. And once you know that, doesn't Zhongli's story just scream hints at you?" 「True. Even before the PV dropped, some big brains had already figured out Zhongli was Rex Lapis.」「It's not just his views on Mora. Zhongli's design, outfit, and even his name are all deeply rooted in Chinese culture.」「So much effort went into him—more than Ningguang and Keqing. Who wouldn't believe he's the Geo Archon?」 As Axue chatted with her viewers, she continued progressing through the story. After parting ways with Zhongli and Astrea, Lumine soon arrived at the Golden House, where she encountered Childe, Tartaglia. As for why Astrea also left—Zhongli said he had something important to discuss with her. Although Axue felt a bit uneasy after seeing the viewers' comments, she had no choice but to push forward with the story. "I always knew this guy was shady. Of course he's the boss." Axue sneered as she looked at Childe. "Good. Even if it's not Signora, he's still a Harbinger. Now that his health bar's up, let's see how I'm gonna wreck him." Axue's team consisted of Xiangling, Klee, Astrea, and Barbara. Double Pyro, Double Hydro. This was one of the most popular team compositions at the time. Astrea's Elemental Skill continuously attacked surrounding enemies and applied Hydro frequently, while also increasing the attack speed and fluidity of the active character's normal and charged attacks. This also affected abilities like Xiangling's Elemental Burst (spin-to-win), Kaeya's Elemental Burst (spin-to-win), and Venti's Elemental Burst (spin-to-win). Of course, Fischl's Elemental Skill (Oz) and Xiangling's Elemental Skill (Guoba) also benefited from the increased attack speed. What's particularly broken is that while the attack speed buff applies to the active character, if Fischl summons Oz and then switches out, Oz's attack speed remains at the buffed level Astrea provided when Fischl was on the field. When Astrea activates her Elemental Skill, she consumes her own HP over time. For every 1,000 HP consumed, the active character's attack speed increases by 1%. At Elemental Skill level 10, Astrea instantly consumes 30% of her current HP upon activation, followed by 10% of her current HP every 0.3 seconds for 15 seconds. The cooldown is 19 seconds. If you add her signature weapon, Scales of Justice, the HP consumption doubles to 20% every 0.3 seconds, making it one of the most terrifying HP-draining mechanics in the game. That's why Barbara is essential—not just for the Double Hydro HP boost, but also for her ability to quickly heal Astrea and boost energy recharge efficiency. For Astrea, the more HP she recovers during her Elemental Skill's duration, the stronger her skill becomes. For example, if Astrea has 40,000 HP, using her Elemental Skill instantly consumes 30% of her max HP, increasing attack speed by 12%. If she then uses her Elemental Burst to fully heal herself, the skill will immediately consume another 10% of her max HP (not counting the weapon), increasing attack speed by another 4%. Switching to Barbara and using her Elemental Burst to heal Astrea again will trigger another 4% HP consumption and attack speed increase. At this point, switching to Xiangling and using her Elemental Burst will result in at least a 20% attack speed increase—though in practice, it's often higher due to the time taken for character switching and burst animations. A 40-50% attack speed increase is pretty common. If Xiangling stays on the field, the attack speed will continue to increase. Consuming 10,000 HP increases attack speed by 10%, and consuming 40,000 HP increases it by 40%. If Xiangling switches out, that's even better. Switch to Klee and start vaporizing enemies with Astrea's frequent Hydro application. Perfect. —And this is just Astrea at C0, without her signature weapon. Her signature weapon boosts her capabilities beyond imagination, and her constellations are game-changing. At C1, her Elemental Skill's attack speed increase doubles to 2% per 1,000 HP consumed. At C2, she becomes a healer, with her Elemental Burst instantly healing the entire team. At C4, she becomes a sub-DPS, with her Elemental Skill's damage significantly increased. And at C6, she can even become a main DPS. Unlike other standard 5-star characters, Astrea is designed to tempt whales to spend heavily in the standard banner, as her signature weapon can only be obtained there. Axue isn't a whale. She stopped after spending enough to reach the 300-pull guarantee and selected Astrea. But even at C0 with no signature weapon, Astrea is more than enough. Although the chat was filled with complaints about how hard Childe was, Axue didn't take long to drain his HP and force him into his third phase. Of course, in the cutscene, Lumine got beaten up a bit. Childe overpowered Lumine, forcing her to unlock her second Elemental power and enter her second phase. In the end, Lumine's second phase triumphed over Childe's third phase, securing her victory. Then, the story transitioned into another cutscene.

Chapter 25: The Terrifying Support

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