Zhongli didn’t lose his Gnosis. He got rid of it on purpose and nobody can tell me otherwise
The “Zhongli got played by the Fatui” reading has always felt wrong to me and I think the lore backs this up pretty clearly.
He is literally the God of Contracts. He has been writing airtight agreements for over 6000 years. The idea that he accidentally signed a bad deal with the Tsaritsa is insane.
He handed the Gnosis over voluntarily after staging his own death specifically to test whether Liyue could survive without him. That was the whole point of the Archon Quest. He already knew what he was doing.
What nobody seems to focus on is what the Tsaritsa gave HIM. The game explicitly leaves this blank. Zhongli tells the Traveler to figure it out themselves, which is a weird thing to say if the answer is just “nothing, he got scammed.” The most plausible reading is that she promised Liyue wouldn’t be touched when her rebellion against Celestia kicks off.
The Sovereign angle is where I think a lot of theories go wrong though. Neuvillette confirmed in 4.1 that no Dragon Sovereign had recovered their authority at that point, which basically kills the idea of Zhongli being the Geo Sovereign, since he held the Gnosis and never reclaimed any sovereign authority during that time. Azhdaha is actually the stronger candidate there.
What I keep coming back to is the chessboard scene from Lazzo. Removing the King from the board doesn’t end the game. He’s the only one who remembers Teyvat before the Irminsul tampering. That’s not retirement, that’s positioning.
So what did the Tsaritsa actually promise him? And is he genuinely done or is Hoyo saving him for something later?