Genshin crackpot theory

The Twins are the last survivors of a planet that was destroyed by the abyss. They were sent off as babies and with technology aboard their ship capable of terraforming a new home

During hibernation they were fed knowledge as they grew up. The ship also implants false memories of them spending time in a variety of worlds, in the form of fairy tales, to create a bond between them. The Gnostic Chorus story is one such tale

First the ship (Heavenly Principles) passes by Teyvat and sees a viable location to create their new home. It kills the dragons and uses phlogiston's power to store data to create Irminsul as a central computer. It then leaves and allows the world to develop based on the "rules" it set up

But creating a new world isn't enough: the twins must truly feel that this world is their home

After a thousand years the ship returns, but Khaenri'ah has become too advanced and they're able to "summon" one of the twins right as the ship lands. This puts a break into its systems as something outside of its control has happened. But the ship still had one more thing to do, which is to connect to Irminsul and make the Twins compatible with their new home. So the Traveler becomes perfectly compatible with the world, able to use the elements, cleanse abyssal power and avoid Irminsul effects, but the Twin never receives such benefit

Some years pass and the Abyss Twin learns of Traveler and goes to get them to escape during the cataclysm

But Asmoday is sent to stop them. They can't escape because there is nowhere for them to go. Her instruction is to take them to the Temple of Space to erase their memories

She successfully takes the Twin

When she tries taking the Traveler, something unexpected happens. For a moment, they resist her power*. When the Traveler was made compatible with Teyvat, they also receive some power over space (such as using the Teleport Waypoints) and time (avoiding Dottore's time freeze). So instead she simply sends them away

But the Heavenly Principles's plan was to have the Twins explore the world so it would become their home. They see how the Twin traveled with Dain and chose Khaenri'ah to be their home, so their new plan is to give the Traveler a traveling companion that can steer them in the right direction

So when we get to the end, the Twins will be truly at home, with no wishes to leave again



*So this is entirely based on something strange I noticed in the intro cutscene. After Asmoday cubes the Twin, Traveler attacks her which causes an explosion, then she turns the explosion back and creates a cube on the Traveler's hand. Then we can see a bunch of cubes around the hand and THEY START TO DISAPPEAR, like the Traveler is absorbing them. Then for only a couple frames Asmoday's expression changes. She opens her mouth slightly and her eyes widen. I take that as her being taken aback or putting more effort into what she's doing. Which in my theory is her changing the settings of the teleportation

PS: there's also another aspect I didn't really know where to put, which is that Teyvat is supposed to feel like a magical place. Like the AI purposefully called itself "Heavenly Principles" and made Irminsul look like a tree and created the elements from phlogiston, etc, to create a fantasy world that the Travelers would enjoy exploring