20 Things You Didn’t Know about Qiqi from Genshin Impact

Qiqi is a playable character from Genshin Impact. She looks like a living person. However, those who are familiar with Chinese culture will realize that she is undead in an instant. Regardless, Qiqi isn’t the most popular of the playable characters because of her hyper-focus on healing. Still, she has become more useful with recent releases.

1. She Is a Jiangshi

The English version of Genshin Impact calls Qiqi a zombie. This isn’t quite accurate because the character is a jiangshi. Zombie was presumably chosen as the English translation for the original jianshi for a couple of reasons. One, it is much more recognizable to English speakers. Two, it is close enough that it can be used to communicate the general gist of what she is supposed to be anyways. As for what a jiangshi is, well, chances are good that interested individuals can guess that it is a corpse that has been reanimated because of either magic, an unresolved grievance, or some other supernatural cause.

2. Her Appearance Was Based On a Jiangshi

Qiqi’s appearance took a lot of cues from a generic jiangshi’s appearance in pop culture. For example, her forehead has a paper talisman in portrait orientation, which is a common tool in Daoist mysticism as well as other Chinese magical traditions. Similarly, she has a round-topped, tall-rimmed hat that is very reminiscent of the hats of Qing dynasty officials, which makes sense because generic jiangshi are dressed like said individuals for various reasons. When it comes to the state of Qiqi’s body, she is neither particularly remarkable nor particularly unremarkable. This is because some generic jiangshi just look like the recently dead. In contrast, other generic jiangshi are much more horrific-looking because they have undergone either decay, monstrous transformation, or both. Qiqi is a jiangshi who looks like the recently dead.

3. Her Abilities Are Based On Those of a Jiangshi

As mentioned earlier, Qiqi is hyper-focused on healing. However, most of that healing doesn’t come from her just healing characters. Instead, most of that healing comes from either her attacking enemies while under the effect of Herald of Frost or any character attacking enemies while under the effect of Fortune-Preserving Talisman. This might be because generic jiangshi feed on the qi of the living to sustain themselves in much the same manner that generic vampires feed on the blood of the living to sustain themselves. Qi is a complicated topic that can be elaborated upon at length. Fortunately, it can be summed up as life-force in this context. In other words, Qiqi provides most of her healing through lifesteal.

4. She Is Named for a Number

By this point, some people will be wondering whether Qiqi was named for the aforementioned concept of qi or not. If so, they should know that isn’t the case. Instead, Qiqi is named for the number seven, with the result that her name means “Seven Seven.” There is speculation that her name is a reference to an East Asian Buddhist funeral ritual that lasts for 49 days when performed in full.

5. She Is Always Available In the Gacha

Qiqi is a five-star character in Genshin Impact. For those who are unfamiliar, the number of stars is used to indicate the rarity of a playable character in gacha games. Genshin Impact has just two rarities for playable characters, with one being four-star characters and the other being five-star characters. However, it is important to note that some of its five-star characters are more common than others, with Qiqi being an excellent example. This is because she is always available in the gacha. In contrast, most five-star characters are available for limited periods of time, which is a common practice meant to encourage interested individuals to pay money to pull for them.

6. She Is a Cryo Character

Element-wise, Qiqi is a Cryo character. She is somewhat unusual by being a Cryo healer, but she isn’t one-of-a-kind because there is another Cryo healer that has been released so far. Meanwhile, other Cryo characters tend to be very damage-focused in either a direct or an indirect sense, though they do have some crowd-control capabilities when they are teamed up with certain Hydro characters. Still, Qiqi does have strong themes of preservation, which are very much in-line with her element.

7. She Is a Liyue Character

Region-wise, Qiqi is a Liyue character, meaning that she is a Chinese-influenced character in a Chinese-influenced region. Within the story, she is working at the Bubu Pharmacy, which is supposed to be the best business of its kind that can be found in Liyue itself. This is supported by how it occupies a prime piece of real estate in a very commerce-focused city. Besides this, Qiqi is also associated with the Adepti because of how she became a jiangshi in the first place.

8. Her Abilities Might Be Too Focused On Healing

Qiqi isn’t the most popular of the playable characters in Genshin Impact. In considerable part, this is because her abilities might be too focused on healing. Essentially, high-level combat in the game emphasizes doing as much damage as possible as fast as possible, meaning that both dodges and shields are considered to be better than healing under most circumstances. However, the recent introduction of Corrosion has made healers more popular because it ignores shields while making any reliance on dodges extremely risky.

9. She Is Tougher Than She Looks

Speaking of which, Qiqi manages to stand out from a lot of other healers in that she is tougher than she looks. She isn’t as tough as what her story says she should be. However, Qiqi has surprisingly high defense, meaning that she can last longer than otherwise possible when the player is being hard-pressed. Something that can be very important for getting those heals in.

10. She Is Well-Suited for Ocean-Hued Clam

One of the other reasons that Qiqi has seen an increase in popularity is the recent introduction of the artifact set called Ocean-Hued Clam. It isn’t the first healing-focused artifact set. However, Ocean-Hued Clam is interesting in that it will create Sea-Dyed Foam whenever a character starts healing. After which, the effect will build up strength for three seconds based on the amount of healing in that time period before exploding to cause area-of-effect damage. High-level combat in Genshin Impact is very damage-focused, meaning that this artifact set makes healers much more practical.

11. She Can Be Used to Find Liyue Materials

Qiqi’s role at the Bubu Pharmacy is gathering herbs for medicinal use in the morning and then using those herbs to make medicine in the afternoon. She seems to be very good at gathering herbs, so much so that she actually has an ability that identifies Liyue materials on the mini-map. Something that can save the player a lot of time. There are some Liyue materials that are concentrated in very convenient locations. This is very much not true for others.

12. She Is Upgraded Using Violetgrass

To name an example, Qiqi is upgraded using Violetgrass, which is one of the most inconvenient Liyue materials to collect. This is because of a couple of reasons. One, Violetgrass grows on cliffsides. Two, while multiple clumps of Violetgrass can be found in the same approximate area, each one is always separated from one another by some distance. Qiqi’s ability makes it a lot easier to figure out where the player should go next to collect this as well as other Liyue materials.

13. Might Be Related to Keqing

There is speculation that Qiqi is related to Keqing. The two characters do have similar-colored hair. However, that means very little on its own. Instead, the potential connection is that Qiqi uses Ancient Yunlai Swordsmanship while Keqing uses Yunlai Swordsmanship. It is possible that the two belong to the same school teaching the same style of swordsmanship. However, there is no evidence that Qiqi was ever associated with such an institution. If anything, there is evidence that she wasn’t because she was a child when she died. As a result, it seems more reasonable to speculate that this is something passed on through a family rather than a school.

14. Killed in the Crossfire of Adepti and Demons

Qiqi is associated with the Adepti because of how she died before being reanimated as a jiangshi. As the story goes, she was a herb-gatherer who sought shelter in a cave when she hurt herself in a fall. Unfortunately, Qiqi was killed when she was caught in the crossfire of the Adepti and their demonic adversaries. The Adepti felt very bad about the matter, with the result that they worked together to return her to life. They didn’t quite succeed in the matter, as shown by how Qiqi is a jiangshi.

15. Got Sealed in Amber

For that matter, Qiqi went berserk because she wasn’t capable of handling the Adepti’s energy, with the result that one of the Adepti named Mountain Shaper sealed her in amber to prevent her from doing more damage to everything around her. It isn’t clear why she went berserk. However, it is possible that this was once again inspired by the Chinese concept of qi. In short, qi is supposed to flow in a certain way in healthy individuals. When that flow gets blocked, disrupted, or otherwise affected for the worse, that can bring about both physical health issues and mental health issues. Mortals are very different from transcendent beings, meaning that Qiqi might have gone berserk because she just wasn’t capable of handling the energies that the Adepti used to reanimate her. This is presumably particularly true because she didn’t just receive energy from a single Adeptus. Instead, it is stated that she received energies from multiple Adepti.

16. Didn’t Get Released Until Recent Times

Qiqi isn’t one of those characters from anime and anime-adjacent media who look like a child but have lived for hundreds or even thousands of years. This is because she was sealed in amber just a short while after she was reanimated. There, Qiqi remained until just a short while before the start of Genshin Impact. Apparently, living humans found her while she was still sealed in amber, with the result that they started bringing her back to Liyue for burial. By that point, enough time had apparently passed for Qiqi to be more-or-less in control of herself when she woke up in the middle of the night. As a result, she just broke out of the amber on her own before heading into the hills out of habit.

17. Got Taken In By Baizhu

There, Qiqi chanced upon Baizhu, who would be the owner of Bubu Pharmacy. She wasn’t exactly taken in out of the goodness of the latter’s heart. Instead, the implication is that Baizhu is interested in the magic that keeps Qiqi animate because he is pursuing immortality. Something that seems to be motivated by some kind of health problem on his part. Qiqi is fully-aware that Baizhu doesn’t have much real affection for her. However, she sticks around anyways because Baizhu does have a pragmatic interest in her well-being, meaning that their interests align.

18. Doesn’t Get Along with Hu Tao

Other than this, Qiqi is notable relationship-wise in that she doesn’t get along with Hu Tao, the director of the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor. Apparently, she came very close to being laid to rest by said individual, meaning that she came very close to effectively being killed a second time. Having said that, Hu Tao has stopped trying to do this because of her newfound awareness of Qiqi’s own desire to stick around. For that matter, Hu Tao’s intention was very understandable considering the circumstances. As mentioned earlier, jiangshi do have some real similarities with zombies. In particular, they are often controlled by the magic users who reanimated them, which is why they are depicted with the paper talisman on their forehead. As such, a child jianshi is the kind of thing that should get someone treated with extreme suspicion, particularly since Baizhu apparently has a less than stellar reputation anyways.

19. Has a Problem Forming New Memories

Qiqi has a grudge against Hu Tao even though the latter is now trying to pamper her. In part, this is because of the nature of their previous interactions, which is very understandable. After all, most people wouldn’t get along very well with someone who tried to effectively kill them on multiple occasions no matter how good said individual’s intentions might have been. However, part of this also comes from the fact that Qiqi has a problem forming new memories. It isn’t outright impossible for her; it is just very difficult for her to do so. As a result, Qiqi keeps a notebook to remind herself of important things, though she sometimes forgets to consult the notebook. Poor recollection is just one of the issues that she faces because of her status as a jiangshi.

20. Her Constellation Is Pristina Nola

Every playable character in Genshin Impact has a constellation that is supposed to say something about who they are as well as what they will experience. Qiqi’s constellation is Pristina Nola, which means “Ancient Bell.” It isn’t quite clear what this means for her. However, it is worth mentioning that hand bells of the kind shown in her constellation are sometimes used in Chinese religious rituals as well as other ceremonies.

You can also read:

• 10 Things You Didn’t Know about Genshin Impact’s Yoimiya
• 10 Things You Didn’t Know about Genshin Impact’s Ganyu
• 20 Things You Didn’t Know about Lumine from Genshin Impact
• 20 Things You Didn’t Know about Genshin Impact’s Fischl