Of all the people present, Yilan knew the Doctor best.
So when the Doctor showed a strange expression, he realized something was wrong and immediately flew forward.
However, although he stood in front of the Scaramouche in the very first moment and used mechanical techniques and barriers to shield him, the barrier was still pierced by the Doctor's Thunder-elemental sword and stabbed into Yilan's chest without any loss of force.
"Hoooooooooooooooooooooooo——!!"
The "God of Righteousness," now controlled by Scaramouche, let out a mad roar and struggled violently like an enraged tiger, violent Electro energy erupting from his body.
The sudden burst of power allowed him to break free from the Doctor's restraints, and he caught Yilan's body and retreated rapidly.
After reaching a safe distance, he immediately shouted at the top of his lungs:
"Little Lucky Grass King! Little Lucky Grass King! You're the Dendro Archon of Sumeru, right? You're a genuine god, right? Hurry up and heal him!"
"I—I understand, but this wound…"
Even without the soldier's shouting, Nahida had already rushed over. However, after seeing Yilan's terrible injury—with a large hole in his abdomen—she couldn't help but reveal a deeply worried expression.
An ordinary person would have already died from such a wound. It was only because Yilan had modified his body that he could still hold on a little longer.
"Ahem!"
Yilan coughed up a mouthful of blood, looked at the panicked soldier and asked, "Are you calm now?"
"Why… why would you do that for me—"
"Tsk, I'm not dead yet, why do you look like someone's already mourning me? I don't remember you being this sentimental."
Seeing the usually arrogant Scaramouche showing such a miserable expression, Yilan couldn't help but shudder and said quickly:
"In this battle, you're our strongest fighter, so you have to survive. As long as you can kill the Doctor quickly, I still have a chance to live. Got it?"
"Foolish."
Upon hearing Yilan's words, the Doctor couldn't help but frown.
"I'm truly disappointed. I used to admire you. Even though you betrayed me, I still didn't intend to eliminate you. I was even considering ways to win you back. I never imagined you'd do something so senseless as taking a fatal blow for someone else."
"Hmph, but this works too. Even if I didn't kill Scaramouche, I've now eliminated the greatest threat to me—you."
To the Doctor, neither the newly god-empowered Scaramouche nor Nahida, who had only just escaped captivity, posed any real threat.
Only Yilan—cunning, strategic, and possessing a mind rivaling his own—was his true enemy.
"After I kill the puppet and the Little Grass God, I'll take your body back to Snezhnaya and make you into a puppet. Even I must admit that your intellect is invaluable… Oh, and this formation beneath our feet—was that also your handiwork?"
The Doctor stroked his chin. "Quite clever. It suppresses Delusion power. I can feel about a 10% reduction in my strength. If that fool Scaramouche were smart enough to cooperate with it, you might have actually posed a serious threat. But…"
As he spoke, two thread-like tendrils emerged from the roulette wheel behind him, extending into the formation.
"Did you forget that most of your knowledge came from me? Everything about Delusions—I taught you."
"Showing off in front of your master is laughable."
With a cold snort from the Doctor, the entire formation buzzed and trembled. Cracks formed beneath their feet as the supporting platform began to collapse. A sound like the end of the world echoed through the square.
"Damn it, he's destroying the formation!"
"Little Lucky Grass King, keep treating Yilan—I'll handle him!"
This time, the soldier had learned from his mistake. He didn't give the Doctor a chance to restrain him again. He gathered terrifying Electro energy between his hands and fired a bolt of lightning from afar.
"Get lost, insect!"
But it was useless.
The Doctor casually constructed a Geo-elemental barrier in front of himself, blocking the mountain-splitting strike with ease.
"Insect?"
The Doctor chuckled.
"Scaramouche, oh, Scaramouche. You think you've become a god? Look at your past."
"This body of yours was just a puppet made by the Electro Archon."
"The seal she placed on you was removed only after you joined the Fatui."
"And your current divine strength came from experiments—conducted by me and Yilan."
"In your entire life, nothing has ever belonged to you. Everything was handed to you by others. You are a test subject, a puppet whose life was never your own."
"And now, a mere subject dares to defy me, the one who ran the experiment?"
"Shut up!!!"
The soldier roared and gathered all his power. A brilliant long sword formed from Electro energy in his hand, and he slashed at the Doctor.
——But it didn't land.
The five evil eyes on the roulette wheel behind the Doctor glowed. Several elements fused together into a black beam of light.
The dark beam collided with the purple sword. Despite Scaramouche's full power, the sword didn't move forward. Instead, it was slowly forced back.
"——!"
Even Scaramouche, usually arrogant and dismissive, felt deeply powerless in the face of the Doctor's full strength.
"Take a good look—see clearly who is the ant, and who is the god!"
With a thunderous crash, the Doctor's calculations succeeded. The entire formation-supporting platform shattered!
As rubble crumbled around them, Nahida hugged Yilan tightly.
"Oh no—the formation is completely destroyed!"
"Damn it!"
The soldier rushed toward them, ready to shield them from falling debris.
——But the fall didn't come.
The first to sense something was wrong was the Doctor. He frowned and looked down.
The entire square had been destroyed, revealing the void below—
But the formation still existed.
They were all still standing on it.
And…
"The formation turned gold?" Nahida murmured, gently touching the glowing sigils beneath her feet.
She could still understand the previous formation's structure—but now, this golden array was something even she, the God of Wisdom, could not decipher.
"Hahahahaha—cough! cough!"
Yilan burst out laughing, hard enough to cough up blood.
"What did you do?" the Doctor asked, his voice darkening. He hated this feeling—of the situation slipping out of his control.
Now that everything was proceeding as planned, Yilan no longer had to pretend to be subservient—though, to be fair, he was seriously wounded.
So he laid naturally in Nahida's arms, enjoying the comfort of the Dendro Archon, and said:
"Do you remember the 'Canned Knowledge of the Gods' that we collected?"
"Of course. But I remember you saying those weren't actually divine knowledge, but forbidden knowledge. My tests confirmed that, so we didn't inject it into Scaramouche's body."
In fact, in the original story, Scaramouche was never injected with "canned knowledge of the gods."
Despite how important the item seemed throughout Sumeru's arc, it ultimately served no direct role.
One could even think it was a plot device created purely to move the story forward.
But now, this seemingly useless relic had become Yilan's trump card.
"I used it as the foundation and embedded it into this formation. Then, just as I anticipated, you poured Delusion energy into it to try and destroy it."
"So what?" The Doctor's frown deepened.
"Doctor, you're too arrogant." Yilan shook his head. "Yes, I studied under you from the age of eleven. Most of my knowledge comes from you."
"But what truly sustains me, what grounds me in this world—comes from another."
In the mysticism of the world Yilan came from before transmigrating, there was a phenomenon:
The goddess Isis and Demeter—two names, same archetype.
This fusion of myth and meaning created a concept in Yilan's past life's occultism and comparative religion:
A confusion of divinity.
In that world, it was just an idea.
But in Teyvat, where divine forces actually existed, Yilan gave it form—with his mind as the vessel.
This is—
"Godly Confusion!!!"
As his words echoed through the chamber, the entire formation changed.
The golden circle—symbolizing supreme wisdom—rose into the air like a dome, sealing off the area. A majestic power surged, enveloping them all.
"In this formation, forbidden knowledge and Delusion energy are conceptually confused!"
"In this formation, using Delusion power is the same as invoking forbidden knowledge!"
Yilan couldn't complete this formation alone.
But he had predicted that the Doctor would try to destroy it—so he used that very action to complete it.
He looked at the Doctor, now no longer calm, and shouted:
"Doctor! You who dare to challenge the gods—
Fall today before the power of true wisdom!"