Chapter 036: The Poise of the Harem's True Queen

"I get it, you're in a hurry—but slow down, okay? Start from the beginning. What happened?"

Gong Qu gently flicked Lumine on the forehead, pushing her back with an exasperated but familiar gesture.

Lumine wiped the soot off her face, flashing a toothy grin."Well, we ran into a fire dragon out in the wild. Figured we'd try to tame it as a mount. But that big lizard was sneakier than it looked. We fought it for nearly two hours, and it spent most of the time hovering in the air, spewing dragonfire at us."

"Keqing and I don't really have any anti-air moves, and neither of us have the ice or water elements to counter its fire. Plus, we were short a healer. We had no choice but to retreat and regroup."

A dragon? Just like that?

Gong Qu raised an eyebrow, surprised.

He and Keqing had scoured the land for a dragon nest with no luck—yet Lumine stumbles into one her first day out? It made him wonder if she was born with the fabled "protagonist aura," the kind that draws chaos wherever she goes.

Good thing he'd been playing it safe, prepping to become the "Sword Saint of Ten-Mile Slope" in peace mode.

Otherwise, even on easy difficulty, with Lumine's luck she might've spawned a three-star demigod-level zombie just for him.

And no, a "three-star demigod" didn't mean the creature had actually ascended to godhood. It was just a difficulty rating, drawn from the localized version of the Champions Mod in the Dragon's Adventure expansion.

Under the influence of the Champions/Strong Enemies mod, even basic monsters could randomly receive buffs and transform into elite mobs, dropping high-tier enchanted books. The rankings went like this:★ Demon,★★ Malice,★★★ Demigod,★★★★ Eldritch Horror.

Boss-level creatures were always enhanced, with stats scaling based on storyline progression.

Dragons, as growth-based monsters, had their own tiers aligned with these star levels. In other words, the one Lumine and Keqing had encountered wasn't your average 300-HP fire dragon from the base Ice and Fire mod—it was a souped-up Dragon Plus, with thousands of HP.

"Alright, I get the picture. Did you leave a marker?"

"We dropped an anchor point on the south slope of the nest, near the mountain. We took a longer route while escaping—it shouldn't have spotted us yet," Keqing said, gently holding a fainted Paimon, who was foaming at the mouth from shock.

Gong Qu stepped up, letting his Dendro powers pass over Keqing in a diagnostic sweep.

"Good, no injuries. Next time I'm not around, don't let Lumine drag you into one of her reckless charges, okay?"

"What do you mean 'reckless'? I had the potion you gave me! When the dragon tail-swiped Lumine into the cliffs, that stuff saved her life!"

Lumine's face turned crimson. "Keqing! Why'd you have to bring that up? I-I just let my guard down for a moment!"

"Really? And what about that time you charged headfirst at Osial's wife, Bache? Are we pretending that never happened? Same move, same mistake. Again?"

"You're bullying me, Ah-Qu! I'm not talking to you anymore!"

BOOM!

A thunderous explosion echoed in the distance.

Lumine leapt up as if struck by lightning, grabbing Gong Qu's arm and glancing nervously toward the waterfall.

"Oh, that's Klee. I promised she could go wild with her fish-blasting today."

Lumine let out a long sigh of relief. "Geez, I thought that dumb lizard followed us here! But Klee too? First you roped in Lisa, now you're corrupting Klee? Aren't you afraid Alice will chase you across all of Teyvat?"

Gong Qu flicked her forehead with a practiced snap.

"What's going on in that brain of yours all day? Klee's just visiting her big brother. What's wrong with that?"

"Ow! You broke my genius brain! Now I'm gonna flick you back!"

"Alright, alright, go ahead. You're acting like a little kid."

Gong Qu let Lumine pull him away, the two of them leaving Keqing and Lisa behind.

Paimon, still KO'd, didn't count as being "in the scene."

"They're really close, huh~" Lisa remarked, watching the two break into an impromptu arm-wrestling match in the distance.

"Annoyingly so. When we reunited, they gave me quite the surprise. Sometimes I wonder if they're the actual siblings here."

Thinking back, Keqing couldn't help but feel a lingering urge to slam her Mistcutter into both their heads.

"Haha, I get that. Some of the stuff they pull really does make you want to scream."

"You're Lisa, right? From the Knights of Favonius. I've heard of you."

"And you must be Keqing, the Yuheng of the Liyue Qixing. The pleasure's mine."

"That's all in the past... Judging by your expression, I assume you already know about me and Ah-Qu."

"I do."

"You don't feel... resentful? Sharing a lover like this, especially when you're a young woman in your prime?"

"Do you?"

"Resentful...? Maybe. But to meet him, to love him, to be loved in return—even sharing doesn't seem so important anymore."

Keqing looked at Gong Qu with a mix of resignation and affection as he celebrated his arm-wrestling victory by standing triumphantly on a bench.

Only at times like this did he show his childish side.

But whether it was his calm, his immaturity, or his... more assertive tendencies in bed—Keqing loved every version of him.

Such grace, such poise!Lisa was stunned by her response.

She doubted she'd be so composed if she were in Keqing's shoes. With other women constantly orbiting Gong Qu? That'd be thunder and lightning, not tea and sympathy.

No doubt about it—Keqing was the true queen of this harem, and Lisa had to give her credit.

Still, Gong Qu... what a bastard. And Lisa wasn't above electrocuting some sense into him if needed.

"So, Miss Lisa, have you made peace with it?" Keqing asked calmly.

Lisa smiled slyly. "Heh... We witches are cursed with misfortune. Once we've chosen someone, that choice lasts a lifetime—even beyond death."

"I won't let you hurt him," Keqing said, her brow furrowing.

"Oh, relax. So long as he doesn't die, we're good, right?"

"Still, don't go overboard. And between you and me—Ah-Qu's pretty tough to injure. You'd have to strip off his diamond armor first."

Keqing's voice was deadly serious as she launched into a detailed explanation of Minecraft armor mechanics.

Lisa stared at her, utterly lost.

She couldn't decide if Keqing was a natural airhead with a dark streak or just hopelessly earnest.

Either way, it was good news. As long as Gong Qu could be hurt, there was hope.

Later that night.

In the cozy woodland cabin, the family gathered around the dining table for a war council.

"The dragon Lumine encountered is probably a stage-3 adolescent from an open-air nest. If it was just me and Keqing, we'd have to mark it and run."

"But now, with a full party—tank, healer, and mage—plus a solid potion stockpile, we've got a decent shot at taking down a young fire dragon head-on."

Gong Qu laid out twelve red and twelve blue potions—support-grade elixirs painstakingly rolled from dozens of randomized vendor resets.

General stores didn't stock consumables, and the first time he found them, he didn't have the currency to buy in bulk. Thankfully, he'd kept his hoarding habits.

Now with some World Coins on hand, it wasn't an issue.

Once his villagers expanded the farmland, even without using glitches to exploit game rules, he'd reach financial freedom.

Then? He could pull the gacha lottery eight hundred times a day if he wanted.

"Also, here's a scroll. Lisa, see if you can use it."

He passed her an unexpected drop from his potion-farming run:

[Caster's Codex]Type: UtilityInscribed Runes: Shield — Amplify — Shield — Amplify

It was a tool from the Neo Arcanum mod, allowing any magic-capable user to cast pre-inscribed rune spells.

Gong Qu hadn't started consuming runes to learn magic yet—he lacked the mana—but luckily, he had two bona fide witches ready to roll.