Hi guys! I am Inotia King a youtuber, redditor and gamer who likes theorizing about the story. I actually cobbled together a list of some of my more important theories with respect to the game Genshin Impact and Star Rail that I have been basing all of my newer theories on. I'll be putting more of those up on Hive along with new stuff but if you're impatient I also archived all my theories here. I hope some of you guys are game theorists too. Let's try to figure out these great games together!
IWinToLose is a popular gameplay Genshintuber. Recently as a result of the new Hexerei he decided to really think about what miHoYo might do for the next region with really old characters. He came up with just the best Liyue version of the Hexerei stuff. I can't believe I didn't think of it myself but the Chinese philosophy of the Yinyang is perfect for this. These buffs require a team to have two characters from the upgraded group right? The Yinyang philosophy is literally about two halves completing a whole. On top of that, we have the perfect Liyue character for something like this, Mr. I'm-too-full-of-yang-energy-so-I-can't-find-any-monsters-to-fight Chongyun! And that boy needs some buffs pronto. IWTL didn't actually include Chongyun in his video sadly but he was also more interested in the gameplay side of it so let me fill in the lore side with this topic.
This "adepti" buff in order to "prepare Liyue for the impending incursion of Abyssal forces" just like Venti has now done for Mondstadt would be a really cool story arc and story direction for the game while giving us much needed upgrades to some more old characters. Using the Yinyang would also make it a possible return to form for this game since it has strayed so far from its roots, that being the use of real world references to create the game's unique story. (Find me one other game that's managed to combine several world religions from all corners of the world and explain cultural interactions and correlations between multiple regions of the world through their singular and coherent plot.) That's where we're going with this today.
So first, the way the Hexerei thing worked was that we got a random quest to help organize books at the Mondstadt library. This was actually Alice's plot and then she had us go find certain characters the Hexenzirkel had selected to train in this new power. And Venti. Venti's thing was just that the Hexenzirkel knew he'd want to upgrade himself as well so Barbeloth was spying on him. There were a total of eight characters that were upgraded including the Archon and a brand new character, Durin. We'll use the same basic structure.
Ok so the first question then is who should the new character be? Year after year since the second Lantern Rite we've gotten new 4* characters but on top of that, every other Lantern Rite we also get a new 5* character. The most recent one was Xianyun during the Fontaine era meaning we're due another new one this year. IWTL was talking about upgrading Yelan into a Moon Wheel Nod-Krai character and a Yinyang Liyue character because she's a spy who has now been seen in both regions. (I think IWTL forgot she was also in Fontaine. In fact, she debuted the same outfit she's been wearing in Nod-Krai in that Fontaine event.) I think I can do one better.
This is Symeon Du, a Russo-Chinese Bishop of Shanghai. If you guys didn't know, miHoYo is a Shanghai company. However, Dawei isn't Shanghainese. In fact, none of the founders of the company are which is just like Symeon Du who was of Russian Cossack descent and born in Beijing. The Cossacks were the main drivers of why Russia is as big as it is today and this could be adapted as part of Snezhnaya's history, maybe leaving the Genshin Symeon as a descendent of a sect of Snowland Fae who fled Snezhnaya following the death of the Belyi Tsar. This plot might even expand on the region's lore moving forward as my rewrite of the Version 6.0 era already briefly touched upon. Introducing a character like this to the game would both be a shoutout to the founders themselves while also connecting a real world Russo-Chinese person into the game as a Nod-Krai/Liyue character, connected to both nations. This isn't unprecedented either as Fontaine's Oceanids have the same story. Genshin's Symeon could have gotten a Moon Wheel during his time in Nod-Krai before moving to Liyue. Furthermore, as Symeon was a bishop - as in Christian - it isn't too much of a stretch to make the character a Frostmoon Scion who ultimately left the order after seeing the virtues of the principles. That could make him controversial which would make him interesting. After abandoning moon worship, he moved to Liyue where he picked up some Taoist education and that links us to the Yinyang idea IWTL came up with. Therefore through him we can get lore reconciling this Taoist concept of duality first elaborated upon in the Perilous Trail Archon Quest with the moon worship of the scions. This worship is related to kuuvahki which is based on magnetism, specifically opposing magnetic charges just like yin and yang are opposing sides of a person's nature. (If this idea was proposed to the old devs I have no doubt we'd get something really cool from it. Maybe he could even be a linchpin between the two groups so if you had both a Nod-Krai character and a Liyue Yinyang character, this Symeon character would have yet another effect on top of both group abilities. Just to outdo IWTL's Yelan idea haha)
Now I wouldn't introduce this upgrade in Lantern Rite like IWTL is suggesting. Why steal Columbina's thunder? Sadly unlike last year, there's no perfect setting to combine the Archon Quest's ending with a New Year's celebration so that ship has sailed and miHoYo definitely dropped that ball. However, I would introduce Symeon and call back to the Taoist stuff from Perilous during Lantern Rite. Then in v6.4 we'd get a World Quest like the Witch's Homework. Let's say we visit Liyue and see Symeon talking to Zhongli. We go to chat with them and are stunned when Zhongli brings up Archon and false sky stuff right in front of the man. To calm us, Symeon explains that he isn't just from Nod-Krai and he isn't just a former Frostmoon Scion. Actually, he's a mortal adepti who has lived "a long time" thanks to his training in their arts. (maybe the training activated the traces of his Snowland Fae heritage) We're reminded of Shenhe and are interested to know just how far adepti training can go. (maybe even briefly diving into the fact that humanity itself used to be elemental as revealed by Lingyuan in the Chenyu Vale World Quest Series) Therefore Zhongli explains to us that he has a scroll detailing the "most hidden of the adeptal arts." If we're interested, we should go to Wangsheng Funeral Parlor to take it. After that they both take their leave. We go off to find it and run into Hu Tao who tells us that they've been curating the items Zhongli bought because the man randomly buys so many things. If we'd like to take this scroll of his we're welcome to but we'll need to help them sort through the collection first just to find it. After we do, the World Quest ends and it's then that we find out the "scroll" is just a bunch of notes left by the Geo Archon for certain people he wants to train in custom tailored adeptal arts, nothing quite so hidden just only available to specific people. We've become a gopher for him again. So we go find them and since the messages are from "Morax" they all take the task seriously. Meanwhile when we go to confront Symeon and Zhongli and call them out on their deception, they just have a chuckle but go on to explain that these missions are actually serious. Just like how Venti's was more profound than the others as he was preparing for the upcoming dangers posed by the Abyss, Zhongli's will be as well. As for Symeon, maybe we'd even head to Nod-Krai with him, learn about his practice of both arts and this leads to his bridging of the two systems. That way if you have both a Liyue Yinyang character and a Nod-Krai Moon Wheel character on the team, he'll be able to provide both the Ascendant Gleam Moon Sign as well as whatever buffs come from the Yinyang system and uniquely a tertiary effect from having both systems active.
As for who the other six characters are, well we had one 5* Standard Character, three 4* characters and then two very old Mondstadt Limited Banner Characters who received the Hexerei buffs. Therefore I'd agree with IWTL on including Beidou and Ningguang as the 4*s and I'd raise him a Keqing. It would make sense for Zhongli to want to get the leaders of Liyue ready for the future dangers and Keqing is being groomed to take over for Ningguang one day. She also doubles as the Standard 5* for this list. Chongyun would round out the 4*s because again, Yinyang so who better to include? We could even suggest Chongyun is to Liyue what Razor was to Mondstadt, a Claymore Character that was once used but faded as soon as better options arrived. Finally just like how Klee and Albedo were the first two limited Mondstadt characters to release, I'd include IWTL's Xiao and then add in the previous Liyue character to release Ganyu. Xiao may even work out as the yin to Chongyun's overpowering yang, given his muted personality and depressing background drowned in the blood of evil gods and monsters. He's seen more than enough demons for both of them. As for what buffs they'd actually get, that's not my department.
IWTL brought up a wonderful idea for the Hexerei buff for Liyue but I was also playing with ideas about incremental buffs for each region. Inazuma's might be really fun given that unlike Zhongli and Venti, Ei's never really had much of a handle on her Archon duties. Most of the important stuff usually falls on Yae's shoulders and I don't see why it wouldn't apply again this time. In this case, I'd go with Shintoism and the shamanistic aspect to Japanese culture, maybe even the dual nature of their kami and youkai. As Yae's managed to get Ei to loosen up and even reintroduce youkai back into Inazuma, it would work out for the story to have Yae push it even further, setting Ei on yet another journey of self discovery where she might unify the two races living in her nation by embracing both. As an Archon, she's technically a supernatural being as well which likens her to the youkai as a kami while having ascended to that Archonhood, she started life out as a human thus putting her into this unique position. Then Yae herself would be upgraded according to the same Archon method of drawing in more of her innate power which could hint at her true self. I'm going to leave that there because again, I'm not the gameplay guy so I don't know who should or shouldn't get buffed. Mizuki is the only Inazuma Standard Character but she's very new and the first two Inazuman characters would be Kazuha and Ayaka who are both already extremely good.
This of course extends to the next regions too as while Sumeru has Tighnari and Dehya who are in desperate need of buffs, (maybe even full mechanic revisions in the case of Dehya) we do not have a Fontaine or Natlan Standard Character and their regions released so much later that it may be a little early to be buffing them. Also besides Sumeru which could derive its lore from the dev in a Zoroastrian take to the Inazuman Shinto approach, I have no clue what Fontaine might do and even less of a clue when it comes to the nonsensical culture of Natlan.
Topic originally created on December 14th, 2025.