Im also with the 'paimon is sus' side of genshin. I read a theory where instead of concluding paimon as the unknown God, she was instead deduced as the '8th fallen archon' of khae'nriah.
( warning: very very long, slight spoilers, I'm so sorry)
they theorized that khae'nriah was once this advanced civilization (kind of subtly implied) with paimon as the 8th archon and as the 'good' counterpart of the unknown god. the unknown God, as she hates mortal arrogation, decided to give khae'nriah a 'honkai impact'. khae'nriah fell into destruction and paimon fell, lost her memories and yada yada. this prob explains her suspicious wide extensive knowledge about Teyvat, but can't recall anything about khae'nriah. it's actually kind of interesting bc in a mere glimpse of the destruction of the jade palace, you can see a few blocks that appeared (the same blocks that are present when the twins fought the unknown god). paimon prob subconsciously activated her powers to protect the traveler upon impact. upon inspection, the khae'nriah and the Abyss is basically obsessed with moon/star themes, and paimon has the same motif.
Iumine, the canon evil twin, saw the destruction of khae'nriah years ago and decided to form the Abyss (cursed and former citizens of khae'nriah) to bring back their former glory (this is prob why lumine and Dansleif, a survivor from khae'nriah, know each other). she tries to recruit dvalin for their plans to go against the unknown God. she didn't react the slightest to paimon so maybe lumine knows smth.
they also theorized that the unknown god was this big honka donker ceo of Celestia. she basically oversees the archons. this probably explains why the tsaritsa/Cryo Archon is planning a 'rebellion against the divine' by stealing the gnosis of the other archons. she was also prob horrified about the incident at khae'nriah as the 'God of Love'.
It was also kind of implied or theorized that the Dendro Archon/God of Wisdom is playing dumb to halt the advancement of Sumeru to avoid a 'Honkai Impact' (hence the desert of ignorance and how the God of wisdom's enemy is wisdom itself). The Hydro Archon/God of Justice even knows to 'not make an enemy of the divine.' Venti is uncomfortable when talking about Celestia and gives cryptic messages.
Frick I'm sorry for rambling. I'm a sucker for lores and theories. but their theory captivated me so much.
Oh my goodness, I almost forgot to publish this until I was reading about the timeline ahahaha.
Anon, you are a blessing, this list made me think better about Paimon. The ceo of Celestia is indeed a huge possibility, and Paimon's parallelism to the god is also a good notion that she may actually really be on our side. Now with the connection of Khaenri'ah to the other archons, the cataclysm happened 500 years ago of which a lot of things did happen:
- The Tsaritsa resigned herself and isolated her country to wage war with Celestia, therefore the connection to Khaenri'ah is not at all that impossible.
- It should also be noted that there is a great injustice that happened in Khaenri'ah that corrupted the people into monsters.
- During the cataclysm, the Dendro Archon died (The God of Woods). And the new Dendro Archon took position (God of Wisdom).
In this part of the game I'm not really well versed in Khaenri'ah and its denizens, there's even Kaeya's prophecy that seems so unclear to me and all. If the Abyss order hates mankind and are in connection with Khaenri'ah, their end goal may be to take over Teyvat and kill all humans? The Tsaritsa might have anticipated this and started forming the Fatui, delusions and the ultimate goal of collecting the gnosis.
With how occult related Khaenri'ah is, not relying on strength or brawn, as well as their knowledge on the Art of Kemia the cataclysm could actually be an effort to neutralize the threat that is Khaenri'ah, the threat is created or the threat it was turning to be. If by chance that Paimon really had a hand in handling that place or in working on it before 500 years ago, then the theory that she may be a baddy could once again count.
Thank you so much for showing me your TED talk tho, I haven't really done much background work on that region much because of its vagueness and twisting storyline, but this urged me to research and found so many information on world-building and the Teyvat storyline!
