I Became A Hilichurl

It was a bright and sunny day when Victor Wang and Lumine met in a dim little grove.

"Let me see what you can do first."

Victor Wang extended his right hand toward a tree's leaves. Whoosh—a breeze rustled through them.

"Is that all?"

"Yup. I think my offensive power isn't strong enough. May I ask how I can improve it?"

"Hmm..." Lumine rested her chin on one hand, thinking. This wasn't just a lack of power—it was no power at all.

Then she raised her right hand and shot a wind blade at the same leaves Victor Wang had stirred. The leaves were sliced clean in half.

"This is the most basic form of Anemo attack. Master this first."

Lumine beckoned Victor Wang closer to observe her hand, and he obediently complied.

What kind of hand is this... One-third of her palm and thumb were wrapped in a black glove. The four fingers exposed were slender, long, and alabaster white. Her nails were neatly trimmed, no polish, just naturally cute.

Victor Wang, single for over twenty years, couldn't help but imagine: This hand must feel so soft and comfortable to hold... Thinking that, he rubbed his chin and nodded seriously. "So beautiful."

Paimon immediately darted over to interrupt. "Pfft, Dust, what are you doing?!"

Lumine's face also flushed slightly. "I didn't mean for you to look at my hand. You're supposed to watch the wind I'm producing."

"Oh, oh, sorry..." Victor Wang scratched his head awkwardly.

To make the wind in her hand more visible, Lumine increased its power. A pale cyan breeze swept toward the leaves.

"Watch closely."

The wind in Lumine's hand compressed tighter and tighter until it shot out like a razor-thin blade. The leaves and branches it touched were silently severed and dropped to the ground.

"If you want wind to have strong offensive power, you need to apply pressure to it."

Victor Wang understood. It was like the waterjet cutting machines in his previous life—high-pressure streams of water could slice through rock and steel.

He had thought that simply shaping the wind and increasing its power would create a blade like that. Now, that idea seemed laughably naïve.

With Lumine's patient guidance, in just one day, Victor Wang had learned to produce small wind blades, regular wind blades, and even large wind blades.

A single wind blade could now leave axe-like marks on a tree trunk.

The next day, training continued.

"Watch the wind in my hand." Lumine clarified this time, to keep Victor Wang from ogling her hand again.

A breeze began spinning in her palm. Then two streams. Then three. Eventually, the swirling wind generated suction. Lumine pushed it toward a cluster of leaves. In an instant, many leaves were drawn in and shredded.

"This move is called Palm Vortex. Paimon and I came up with it after discussing how to grasp intangible wind."

"Hehehe, I helped too!" Paimon chimed in proudly.

"To create a true vacuum vortex with three winds, you have to increase wind speed to make up for the low density. When you scale to five winds, the elemental energy input reaches a kind of equilibrium. So ideally, Palm Vortex is performed with five streams of wind. But that's quite difficult—you should try handling three streams for now."

"Just three? I'll nail it today!"

As it turned out, Victor Wang barely managed to control three wind streams by dinnertime.

"Don't feel bad. I originally thought you'd only be able to control two. Each stream spins in a different direction—adding one more doesn't just double the difficulty."

Lumine's praise was genuine. She had only suggested three streams to push him a little—but he'd actually pulled it off.

"Really? Yeah, it was tough... C'mon, dinner's on me again."

As payment for her guidance, Victor Wang covered all meals for Lumine and Paimon. At the Good Hunter, they ordered freely.

On the road back to Mondstadt, Victor Wang and Lumine engaged in speed training.

Sprint Technique—a skill Victor Wang learned on their return yesterday.

Unlike the vacuum vortex of Palm Vortex, most of Paimon's long-winded explanations exceeded scientific comprehension.

What Victor Wang did understand was that by wrapping elemental energy around his feet and legs, he could enhance push-off strength, adjust his stride frequency and length, reduce stamina use, and ultimately increase speed.

A simple sprinting technique boosted Victor Wang's top speed from 15 km/h to 40 km/h. His average pace was 25 km/h—without even tiring.

When he first learned it, Victor Wang exclaimed, 'Why didn't I know this sooner?' But even with this, he couldn't outrun Lumine.

Paimon, soaring overhead, was actually the fastest. Outside the Mondstadt gate, she shook her head at Victor Wang and said, "Still lots of room for improvement!"

On the third day of training, after going over some more points about Wind Vortex Blade, Lumine stepped away again to complete her daily commissions.

When she returned, she found spirals of elemental wind forming a true vacuum vortex in Victor Wang's palms.

He pushed the force toward a tree, gouging a massive hole in its trunk.

Paimon clapped enthusiastically. "You've really got talent!"

Lumine gave him a thumbs-up too.

"It's all thanks to your great teaching, Lumine."

Clearing his throat, Victor Wang solemnly said, "Calling you shifu is too familiar. Calling you teacher is too distant. Lumine, we may not have a formal teacher-student bond, but in truth we already do. Please accept this student's bow."

Lumine's mouth fell open in shock. "I thought we were friends, but you think of me as a teacher?!"

"&#!^@) Isn't that fine too?" Paimon muttered, clearly confused by the conversation.

With Lumine's three-day training concluded, Victor Wang returned to practicing alone.

With experience from Palm Vortex, he began increasing his elemental output, aiming to turn it into the Wind's Grand Ode of the Anemo Archon. But he failed.

"So hard... I can't control it at all."

He recalled a section from Understanding Elemental Power, Part II, about Elemental Power—Skills.

"Vision bearers can draw elemental energy through their Vision, but every person has a limited capacity to store elemental energy.

If a skill consumes energy more slowly than it can be drawn, it's an Elemental Skill. If it consumes energy faster, it's an Elemental Burst.

Therefore, using an Elemental Burst requires either tapping into one's own reserves or borrowing energy from the Vision's reserve pool."

Victor Wang realized this was completely beyond his current capability. Not enough energy stored, and no Vision. What now?

The book said normal Vision bearers could gradually increase their elemental storage through repeated use.

But not Victor Wang.

He knew his own body. According to Venti's "blank slate" theory, his body was already saturated with the seven elements. There was no room left to "dye" it further—in other words, he couldn't expand his energy reserves.

"Only Elemental Skills for me, huh?"

Victor Wang wasn't willing to accept that. He stubbornly attempted to unleash an expanded Palm Vortex again and again. Failure after failure drained him until he collapsed.

"Why can't I just draw elemental energy straight from nature?"

As he felt his depleted energy slowly regenerate, Victor Wang—well-read in fantasy and cultivation novels—had a sudden wild idea.

Vision holders must use their Vision to manipulate and draw elemental energy. But I don't have a Vision. Doesn't that make my body the Vision? And a Vision can draw elemental power directly, right?

With that thought, Victor Wang changed the energy source for creating Palm Vortex—no longer from within, but drawn from the world around him.

In that moment, Victor Wang opened the door to a new world.

It turned out that while the idea was unorthodox, it wasn't wrong.

The wind energy he summoned—chaotic, patchy, and far harder to control than internal energy—formed a massive Palm Vortex. But with only five streams of wind, its large size couldn't generate a true vacuum vortex. All it did was neatly trim the top off a tree.

This sparked new thoughts in Victor Wang. Perhaps the true strength of the Archons and the Primordial One lies in their unlimited access to elemental energy. Do Vision bearers evolve toward becoming elemental beings? Could they eventually cast off their Visions entirely?

There were far too many questions about this world. Thinking alone wouldn't lead to the answers. If Venti wouldn't explain, then maybe Zhongli would next time.

Victor Wang pulled his thoughts back to the present. He wanted to realize Venti's Wind's Grand Ode. Though he hadn't asked the bard directly, the skill description said it was formed by the gathering of a thousand winds.

Right now, he could control only five. But Victor Wang believed that with enough training, he'd one day command a thousand.

And the true Wind's Grand Ode surely wouldn't be as weak as in the game. Based on his current understanding, a vortex blade made of dozens of wind streams might already replicate the in-game effect. The power of a thousand winds was simply unimaginable.

When the massive vortex blade finally dissipated, Victor Wang tried drawing other elements from nature. As expected, nothing responded. Even a real Vision couldn't channel elements outside its type.

But that was enough. Ever since Venti cleansed his body, gaining access to elemental energy—and even pulling it directly from the world—had been an unexpected blessing. A huge one.

No cheat system? Once I return to my human form, this body itself will be the greatest cheat there is!