Protect the Hilichurl at All Costs

A throwaway quest in Genshin Impact adds depth to the game's entry-level monsters.

Like most of you, I’m having a grand time with Genshin Impact. It borrows enough of the good qualities I love about open-world action games: an untamed but picture-perfect setting that rewards players for venturing off the beaten path. There’s always something to find just over the next hill, whether it’s a small enemy outpost, a spirit waiting to lead adventurers to a treasure, or an artifact only accessible with a bit of deft wind-gliding. Combat is thrilling and strategic, thanks to the element-based attacks you can combine for added damage and stat effects. 

It also shamelessly apes many aspects of Breath of the Wild, particularly its monster design. As you adventure on the plains outside your first city, you’ll encounter Bokoblin-likes, ChuChu clones, Wizzrobe wannabes, and the occasional imitation Octorok populating the vast world of Teyvat. I personally don’t find them offensive, but it’s impossible to deny the glaring similarities, all the way down to their programmed behavior and attack patterns. However, there’s something I learned about one of these monsters that I can’t quite get over. It’s keeping me from immediately bearing down on them and hacking them apart for the XP with nary a thought. In fact, I might actually spare them if I can.

Mild quest spoilers ahead.

About five hours into your adventure, you gain access to commissions—what are essentially daily quests handed out by the Adventurers’ Guild. These are garden variety missions designed like mini goalposts on your way to your actual quest: collecting crafting materials, clearing a nearby enemy camp, cooking a certain dish.

I picked up a particular commission titled Language Exchange, which instructed me to head to the fields just outside the city of Monstadt and meet with a certain Ella Musk. (A little too on the nose, but OK.) She turns out to be a child who also happens to be a professional linguist in need of an escort. Our destination? A small encampment of Hilichurl, the low-level grunts of Teyvat. See, Ella is a scholar of Hilichurlian Linguistics and is on a mission to conduct a brief “cultural exchange” with one of the creatures.

I’ve played enough video games to imagine what happens next. As we make our way to the camp, I switch to Sera, my wind swordsman. He could make short work of the beasts once the encounter inevitably goes south. Once we arrive, Ella approaches the nearest Hilichurl with a firm greeting in what I can only assume is…Hilichurlese?

As their incomprehensible exchange spells itself out on my TV screen, I’m left wondering. Are these monsters I’ve been so mindlessly hacking apart actually a civilized race capable of rational thought? A complex language system is one of the cornerstones of organized society, after all. In addition, this particular Hilichurl was no filthy-mouthed Tolkien orc with only bloody murder on its mind—it seemed to be engaged in polite conversation with Ella.

I was taken aback by this bit of world building. Genshin Impact was supposed to be this free-to-play gacha game with a bad case of asset theft. Instead, here I was enjoying this thoughtfully crafted open world populated by colorful characters, fun combat encounters, and apparently, intelligent monsters. Later on, I came across a slightly bigger Hilichurl settlement and found further signs of refined living: architecturally distinct dwellings, oversized cooking implements, and finely carved totems. Totems. These things have a spiritual belief system, for crying out loud.

The Bokoblins in Breath of the Wild (after which the Hilichurl were clearly modeled) also display signs of intelligence, but not at this level. They signal to each other with pig-like grunts and squeals. They ride horses and wield crudely fashioned weapons. Unlike the Chilicurl who cook with pots and large vats, Bokoblins simply grill their meat over an open fire. They’re smart enough to build wooden platforms on treetops and over water, but they’re easily confounded by Link wearing a Bokoblin mask. The one fatally stupid thing these two creatures share is their fondness for explosive barrels.

Further evidence of the Hilichurl’s cultural expression can be found in a lore book given by Ella if you visit her in her library. The book records a “tradition of exchanging songs around bonfires in the moonlight,” including pious odes that they perform in honor of the same god worshipped by the humans of the city of Monstadt. Ella even suggests that some songs bear special philosophical meaning to these creatures, although exactly what that is seems to escape the scholar as of writing.

At the same time, their comparatively limited intelligence is enough to affect their sense of time and history. From the lore book titled Hilichurl Cultural Customs Vol. 1, it’s said that “the Hilichurl possess no concept of either the past or future, living only in the present.” This curtails their ability to plan ahead or remember their dead, but if you ask me, I could take this huge pandemic-sized weight off my chest if I only learned to “live only in the present.” It appears there’s something to be learned from monsters after all.

If there’s one thing Undertale taught me, it’s that a monster is only ever seen as monstrous by a human. They can be reasoned with—understood, even—if only we can remember to put our weapon down. Most monsters in video games are just canonically vicious, unless a game like Genshin Impact takes time out to suggest otherwise. And if the signs aren’t explicit, a glimpse at their behavior in the absence of human invaders might point to the existence of society, no matter how foreign the trappings.

Ella soon ends her conversation with the friendly Hilichurl. My sword sits untouched on my back. She thanks me for accompanying her and hints at a similar expedition in the future. Perhaps this forthcoming quest might actually run afoul and clear my conscience. As I walk away myself, the monsters pay me no mind. Two of them have actually been sleeping peacefully the whole time.

After my encounter with Ella and her scholarly pursuits, I’ve been selective about the enemy camps I raze. If it isn’t in my way or if they don’t attack first, I leave them alone. I’ll try to protect them from myself for as long as the game allows. As a member of a species who benefits mentally and emotionally from sincere, civil interactions with others of my kind, I have to respect a monster’s ability to want the same. I mean, who knows what life-changing conversations they might be having? When left alone long enough, perhaps they’ll find time to be in communion with their god, praying for some measure of peace in a world overtaken by selfish and violent humans. To which I say, same, Hilichurl. Same.