Honkai Impact: I, The Herrscher of Ice, Am Loved By Players

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In the real world, subsequent updates had little relevance to Ana or Bai Zhi.

This was inevitable, as Honkai Impact 3rd is inherently ensemble-driven. Similar to how Raiden Mei didn't appear in several versions, characters would naturally have their moments of obscurity over time.

During this period, Fu Hua's new armor—the Herrscher of Sentience—was introduced.

The emergence of the Herrscher of Sentience armor shook up the game environment significantly. With its exceptional physical amplification capabilities, it dominated the role of top-tier physical support for a long time. Compared to Miss Raven's armor, there was simply no contest.

Fortunately, Miss Raven's armor hadn't yet been released, temporarily sparing her from being overshadowed, but that future seemed imminent.

With the debut of the Herrscher of Sentience, physical teams underwent significant transformations and shifts. High-tier divisions like Red Lotus and Nirvana now required certain characters, indicative of numerical inflation.

However, there's little one can do about it; all we can hope for is that Herrscher of Sentience maintains its value for as long as possible, akin to Ana's Valkyrie Armors.

And indeed, MiHoYo delivered on this front. The Herrscher of Sentience's value preservation rivaled early armors like Lunar Eclipse and Whitenight. In terms of longevity, Fu Hua fans truly hit the jackpot.

As the story progressed, Ana's popularity began to wane since she was a deceased character, much like Himeko in the original world. It wasn't that Captains disliked Ana, but without further appearances or contributions, her relevance diminished.

Similar to controversial figures like Black*Star and toxic commenters, although despised, they inadvertently generate buzz for the game, which translates into increased traffic.

Consequently, as long as these individuals don't cross boundaries, developers often adopt a laissez-faire approach.

At first glance, popularity might seem insignificant, but in reality, it held great importance because—Ana's System relied on gaining popularity through her actions to provide rewards.

With Ana's declining popularity, the System fell into silence, which was not ideal for her situation.

However, within the game, Ana had limited options to address this issue.

As widely known, MiHoYo stands out among game developers for its independence, immune to pressures from capital investment. However, attempting such influence would be futile anyway. Nevertheless, Ana soon found an opportunity:

A collaboration event!

Meanwhile, within the Honkai World, before the Finality Cocoon, Ana opened her eyes, her gaze shimmering with stardust that reflected images from another realm—soaring great dragons, ancient city-states, wandering bards...

Indeed, this world was none other than the Teyvat Continent.

Just days earlier, Otto had observed the Teyvat Continent using Unnamed Locomotive. It is a separate realm located on the Imaginary Tree, quite distant from the Honkai World; these two worlds actually exist within different universes.

In the Present World, the Teyvat Continent represents MiHoYo's popular game, "Genshin Impact." At present, Genshin Impact was thriving, experiencing a surge in popularity and user traffic. Although due to the System's intervention, Honkai Impact 3 also maintained significant traction in this world.

However, comparatively, Genshin Impact's audience was more easily monetized, and the game had already expanded beyond its initial niche, making it MiHoYo's hottest title.

At this moment, Genshin Impact was nearing its Version 1.2 update, introducing the new Dragonspine Mountains map and character Abede. With elements like snow, ice, and Mondstadt coming together, the most fitting crossover from Honkai Impact 3 would naturally be Ana, the Herrscher of Winter.

This collaboration could truly be described as having favorable timing, resources, and support.

The only issue, ironically, was with Genshin Impact itself - well, it didn't need to collaborate with Honkai Impact 3.

As for Honkai Impact 3 collaborating with Genshin Impact, that was somewhat expected. As the Eldest Sister, Honkai Academy had a tradition of crossovers, so many Captains anticipated such a partnership between Honkai Impact 3 and Genshin Impact.

However, this particular timing came as a surprise, given that Genshin Impact indeed chose to collaborate with Honkai Impact 3.

In reality, at this juncture, a crossover wasn't ideal for Genshin Impact. The game found itself amidst heated controversy surrounding Zhongli's release.

To simplify, the Zhongli controversy arose due to players' overly high expectations clashing with the development team's intended role for the character. It should also be noted that within the development team, there seemed to be confusion regarding Zhongli's positioning; otherwise, the perplexing dedicated weapon, Spear of Rainstorms, wouldn't have emerged.

Within Genshin Impact, Spear of Rainstorms stands out as uniquely abstract.

At this juncture, with Zhongli's controversy unresolved, choosing to collaborate with Honkai Impact 3 inevitably risks involving it negatively. The only advantage is that during this period, the player bases of Captains and Travelers significantly overlap, with high mutual interest.

Typically, most Captains also serve as part-time Travelers. However, for both games to collaborate, there will be numerous pure Travelers unfamiliar with Honkai Impact 3 on the Genshin side. Harnessing this wave of traffic without causing adverse effects presents a significant challenge.

Perhaps this explains why, in the original world, only collaborations from Honkai Impact 3 to Genshin Impact occurred, but not vice versa. Considering their respective sizes and player demographics, any collaboration would generally benefit Genshin Impact minimally.

Of course, as previously mentioned, this timing coincides with severe controversies surrounding Zhongli, creating a unique opportunity for potential success.

However, such detailed analysis and discussions hold no relevance to Ana.

Her immediate task now is to utilize Finality's Authority, send a clone to Teyvat Continent, gain popularity within the Present World, and sustain her existence.

The Imaginary Tree—this was Ana's first visit here, and upon arrival, she realized just how insignificant Cocoon of Finality truly seemed.

The Cocoon of Finality unified the principles of Virtual Being and Quantum, exerting its influence within the Imaginary Tree. However, its control and impact were limited to the "Tree Sea" universe of Honkai Impact 3. In contrast, the true Imaginary Tree encompassed numerous similar Tree Sea universes.

Otto had observed Teyvat Continent, which belongs to a neighboring Tree Sea universe, closely related to that of Honkai Impact 3. Although these worlds aren't directly connected, under specific circumstances, the universes can intersect, allowing for interaction between them.

This intersection serves as the basis for the subsequent crossover event between Honkai Impact 3 and Genshin Impact within this Honkai World. If we consider both the Present World and the Honkai World as genuine realities,

then the games Honkai Impact 3 and Genshin Impact could essentially be seen as projections from these real-world counterparts.

To elaborate on the relationship between the Honkai World and Teyvat, it's akin to two adjacent neighborhoods with buildings very close to each other, separated only by a single wall. Consequently, one can observe the building in Teyvat from the Honkai Impact 3 side. Under certain conditions, such as deterioration over time causing damage to the wall, an opportunity arises for the two worlds to become interconnected.

Of course, since this collaboration event never originally existed, it was actually Ana utilizing Finality's Authority to locate a weak spot and forcefully breach through.

To avoid attracting attention from Teyvat's overseers, Ana's avatar here is not particularly powerful, just at the standard Herrscher level. In terms of Teyvat's scale, she would roughly be equivalent to Heavenly Principles.

At such strength, Ana wouldn't raise alarms from entities like Heavenly Principles on the Teyvat Continent. In reality, world interactions are not uncommon; consider Eloy's connection or even the conspicuous visits by the Traveler twins. Similarly, Klee's mother had once ventured beyond their world.

One could say that as long as beings do not threaten the rule of the Throne and the status of First Gods, the so-called Heavenly Principles tend to turn a blind eye.

Moreover, whether the Heavenly Principles can effectively wield their authority at this time remains uncertain.

For Ana, coming here is also an experiment. Eventually, she must leave the Honkai World, and gaining early exposure to other worlds is beneficial.

Among various realms, the Teyvat Continent is considered one of the most hospitable. Although seven sovereigns with immense power exist in this world, due to the influence of the First Gods, Teyvat is largely isolated from external influences.

In simpler terms, disregarding aspects like narrative impact and combat power, just from a world scale perspective, the Teyvat Continent poses no threat to the Honkai universe within the Tree Sea. However, this world serves as a representative of many others.

With invading Outer Gods, breached realms, world bubbles, and foreign Travelers, it closely mirrors common scenarios across various universes. For Ana, simply arriving here provides invaluable experiences.

Locating the Teyvat Continent did not prove challenging for Ana.

Previously, Otto's observations had effectively revealed its coordinates; however, only he and Ana, possessing the knowledge through The Cocoon of Finality, were aware of them in the Honkai World.

Frankly, the current state of the Teyvat Continent is exceedingly precarious, arguably always having been so.

From the Seven Sovereigns to the Seven Archons, the descent of Thrones to their subsequent shifts, and now with the introduction of Abyssal forces, the history of Teyvat essentially reads as one of continuous invasions.

In a sense, Ana's arrival as an entity of her magnitude can also be considered an invasion. Nevertheless, the primary native humans of Teyvat itself were created by usurping deities, making such concerns somewhat negligible.

Using coordinates, Ana searched along one of the Imaginary Tree's branches and swiftly located a wormhole connecting the two worlds. This wormhole was still forming; barring any unforeseen circumstances, it would fully materialize within several months, leading to the crossover storyline between Honkai Impact 3 and Genshin Impact.

The reason for its independence from the main plotline is simple: The connection established wasn't with Honkai Impact 3's intrinsic world, and similarly, what Ana had reached or found at that moment was not the intrinsic Teyvat Continent either.

However, if Ana chose to continue her investigation, it wouldn't take long for her to locate the true intrinsic Teyvat Continent. But there was no need for that.

As previously mentioned, Ana's primary objective on this journey was to boost her character's popularity, thereby generating System gold coins. Her secondary goal was merely to experience other worlds briefly, preparing for future endeavors.

After suppressing her power, Ana directly plunged into the Teyvat Continent. Since it wasn't the intrinsic world, the First Gods' seals were limited, and the Witch responsible for maintaining the boundary was neither as powerful nor diligent.

With minimal effort, Ana effortlessly entered the Teyvat Continent...

In the Present World, after several updates, it had reached version 4.5. Originally, this was supposed to be named "Blazing Hope." However, with the cross-over event between Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact, the corresponding versions underwent changes. The anticipated collaboration, "Honkai Impact 3rd x Genshin Impact" - Version 4.9 "Traveler from Another World," originally planned for release next year, debuted prematurely in Version 4.5.

Indeed, although on the surface, only Ana traversed through the wormhole into the Honkai World, her presence as a Divine Entity brought unforeseen consequences.

The wormhole, which typically takes months to form, rapidly materialized upon Ana's entry. Coincidentally, travelers from Teyvat could now also venture into the Honkai World. Nonetheless, due to Ana's influence, the flow of individuals from Teyvat was carefully controlled.

Ultimately, one of the countless affected parallel worlds became the basis for the collaborative storyline, leaving no significant impact on the intrinsic Honkai World itself.

Therefore, the true beneficiary and influencer of this crossover event was none other than Ana herself.

For Honkai Impact 3rd players, this collaboration event was enthusiastically welcomed. Since it involved parallel worlds, the deceased character Ana could reappear in Honkai Impact's storyline, albeit only for the duration of the event.

On the other side, Genshin Impact also created exclusive storylines and accompanying mini-events, but contrary to initial expectations, they did not consume too much narrative space.

In terms of rewards, unlike previous collaborations where Genshin Impact introduced a five-star character, this time they offered limited-time prizes such as Lindow Wings, a glider skin, some minor items, and a unique event-exclusive artifact - Frostbound Scroll.

Overall, for Honkai Impact Captains, this was a significant event, while for Genshin Impact, it served merely as a brief interlude. However, the exclusive rewards still made the event highly valued by players.

After all, it is well-known that Genshin Impact never brings back event-limited weapons, yet among the four-star weapons, there are several quite useful ones, such as the Sword of Decomposition, Dodo-Ka Storybook, and even a dedicated weapon certified by a certain unnamed artist.

For Ana, it confirmed some of her suspicions...