Genshin Impact: I Opened Blind Boxes in Liyue

The morning mist over Aaru Village hadn't yet dissipated when Jeht kicked open the half-collapsed tent flap. Curses from Eremite mercenaries immediately flooded out of the camp. Five pack beasts were madly ramming wooden crates with their horns, the scattered desert-exclusive blind boxes gnawed into pieces, their wrappers stained with sticky saliva bearing King Deshret's emblem. 

"This is the third time this week!" Candace's spear stood planted in the sand, its tassel fluttering like dancing flames in the wind. "Since ordering those damned blind boxes, these beasts have been fasting—only eating blind boxes!" 

Jeht crouched and pried open a pack beast's mouth. Metallic saliva was corroding the sand. "Look at their teeth," she said, running her finger along the serrated molars. "That *Monster Hunter* nutrient supplement from last time definitely had issues." 

A mechanical hum suddenly emerged from the tent's shadows. The last untouched golden blind box was self-unsealing, revealing the angular silhouette of a *StarCraft* probe within the blue light. The crystal-and-alloy construct hovered mid-air, its polyhedral core suddenly projecting a holographic map of the Mausoleum of King Deshret. 

**"Warning: High-purity vespene geyser detected. Protocol Z-417 initiated. Automated harvesting mode activated."** 

When the first vespene mine exploded three kilometers west of Aaru Village, Ling Feng was being dragged across the desert by Lumine. The yellow sand melted into glassy pits under the probe's ion beams, purple gas erupting from the earth like colossal serpents. Sand foxes and scorpions fled madly across hundreds of miles. 

"I knew something was wrong when the Eremites doubled their orders!" Lumine's scholar wig blew askew in the gale. "Last week they ordered fifty 'Desert Revitalization Bags'..." 

Before she could finish, the probe's tractor beam swept over their heads. The rubbings of King Deshret's tomb in Ling Feng's backpack suddenly levitated, their hieroglyphs transforming into streams of light that poured into the probe. "It's using the rubbings as mining permits!" Ling Feng lunged for the parchments but was repelled by the probe's shield. 

Tremors surged from deep underground, sand dunes undulating like ocean waves. Candace stabilized herself by driving her spear into the ground, then pulled a wooden mallet adorned with a bull totem from her waist. "In the name of Aaru's protector!" The mallet struck the earth, summoning a *World of Warcraft*-style earth totem that resonated with the vespene veins. The collapsing quicksand instantly solidified into obsidian. 

"Three minutes," Candace muttered, sweat beading on her temple. "The totem's power won't last longer." 

The murals in the eastern secret passage of the Mausoleum were self-repairing. Faded creation myths were being replaced by probe-sprayed nano-alloy, transforming King Deshret's scepter-bearing figure into a sci-fi warrior clad in protoss armor. Lumine scanned the walls with elemental vision and gasped. "They're rebuilding the entire tomb's defense system!" 

Ling Feng studied the newly added laser emitters on the murals. "No wonder the Akademiya elders were desperate for desert blind boxes. King Deshret's tech combined with interstellar mining..." He was suddenly yanked behind a pillar by Lumine as two modified Ruin Guards flew overhead, their Chaos Cores replaced with the probe's eerie energon crystals. 

"The left guard's heat vent is at the third joint," Lumine pulled an *Assassin's Creed* Eagle Vision potion from her pack. "The right one's power conduit is exposed at..." 

"No need for that." Ling Feng suddenly produced a *Red Alert* Tesla Coil model. "Guess what 'confiscated items' I salvaged from Cyno's last raid?" 

When energon crystals met the electromagnetic field, the passage flooded with sinister crimson-purple light. The Ruin Guards performed a mechanical ballet of overload as the probe descended from the ceiling, sucking the wreckage into its matter decomposer. **"Alert: Superior combat templates detected. Reconfiguring tomb defense system requires 2 hours 35 minutes..."** 

As the last wisps of vespene gas were purified by the totem, Jeht pressed her scimitar against the probe's core. "Explain," she demanded, sparks flying as blade scraped alloy. "Do your protoss worship King Deshret too?" 

**"Logic conflict. Builder genetic sequence matches 99.7% with Tal'darim Highlord. Authority automatically inherited."** 

Candace suddenly snatched the rubbings from Ling Feng, pointing at a restored section. "This text says King Deshret made a covenant with 'celestial envoys'..." 

Lumine's pupils constricted. The protoss keystone from *StarCraft* in her Serenitea Pot began resonating. Ling Feng discreetly squeezed her trembling hand and turned to the probe with a merchant's smile. "Seems we should renegotiate our logistics contract. How about safe mining rights in exchange for decrypting King Deshret's technology?" 

The probe's polyhedral core rotated seven times, projecting dense contractual terms onto the sand—written in ancient Sumeru and protoss runes. In the moonlight, a seal labeled "Xel'Naga" briefly flashed where none could see. 

Night winds buried footprints in the sand as the Mausoleum echoed with the beautiful sound of ancient mechanisms reconfiguring—like a handshake between primordial civilization and star-borne visitors.