So watching this again you get to the part where they talk about Mora. Now I'm sure everybody has already drawn this conclusion: Zhongli gave up his Gnosis so he can't make Mora anymore.
Here's the thing. That's not what he says. At best it's just an assumption. When I heard that conversation this time I noticed Zhongli doesn't ever say he can't make Mora anymore. He just says because he chose to live as a normal human he won't make Mora again because he will abide by human rules. And this is why he is penniless now. Paimon is the only one to talk about it in terms of the Gnosis but even then Zhongli doesn't answer her in those terms. His response is that the Qixing will have to deal with it because there is no minting Mora with "the power of the Geo Archon." Is the Gnosis required to be the Geo Archon? Of course not. Until Zhongli clarifies Azhdaha still refers to him by his Archon name and even after he admits he notices the difference it's not so much of a difference so he still wants to call him Morax. And even more so Venti is still the Anemo Archon dealing with Mondstadt's problems from behind the scenes.
On top of that if we look at his voicelines Zhongli sans Gnosis is still more than confident enough that he could wipe the floor with Childe and again with Azhdaha he doesn't even think twice before answering his challenge even after saying he must be weaker without his Gnosis. And if we look at his final Ascension voiceline he claims that just ascending him is returning his power and by the end he's returned to power levels equal to the Gnosis. (and immediately wants to make contracts again....)
Of course knowing how the English dub works I decided to look over the Chinese version.
Wow that's alot. [emoji]Ok somewhere here is where he says that he's chosen to live as Zhongli now so he will follow normal human rules. He doesn't say he can't make Mora just that he has chosen not to.
Here is his answer to Paimon and as you can see he uses the term 岩之神 which means Geo Archon and doesn't mention his Gnosis. It's Paimon that asks if the Mora will disappear because he doesn't have his Gnosis.
If this is actually the case and he can totally still make Mora and just chooses not to it really helps my theory about why. Also even though he's saying all this it could still be likely that the Gnosis gives him unlimited power to keep making Mora and without it he could still do it just with limits. For example he's responsible for making all of the Mora on Teyvat including all the pieces already used in alchemy and upgrades. It could be that the Gnosis lets him do that but without it he could only make a fraction of the amount at a time or it would drain him to make that much something like what happened to Marchosius.
On the other hand we now know about Phanes and his defeat of the Seven Sovereigns. I have a feeling these sovereigns are just the Archons because where we get this information from isn't a solid source. They don't even confirm if Phanes is Celestia or not. So it could even be that Gnoses were things each of the Archons had to take when Phanes defeated them and forced them under his rule. This kind of Gnosis could work in 2 ways too. It could be that the Archons had to funnel their power into the Gnosis so without it they are weaker than normal. But that doesn't really fit with Venti's story where the Gnosis is how he became powerful. So the other thing could be that the Gnosis is just a chain binding the Archons to Celestia. For Phanes this gives him some control and surveillance over the Archons but for the Archons it might allow them to siphon his power for their own purposes. Venti reshaped the land to create new Mondstadt and Zhongli makes unlimited Mora.
Anyway it's definitely been a good idea to upload these older quests so late because looking over them now after learning a year's worth of Genshin's story (including stuff like We Will Be Reunited) really gives you a new perspective on what you saw and what to look for.
Tips and Tricks from a Super Casual Genshin f2p
