Abyss of Tao Guide: He Xi Boss Phases and Scoring

How Abyss of Tao scoring works

Abyss of Tao (道冲之渊) is a single-player boss rush. You enter with exactly one Outcast and up to three doppelgangers; there is no second character to swap in and no healer to cover a mistake. The run is scored on clear time and difficulty, and your leaderboard position is the sum of your best three characters' scores.

That last rule changes how you should approach the mode. A single excellent run is only one third of a score. The efficient path is to pick three characters you can play to roughly the same standard, then improve each one's route instead of chasing a perfect run on a single favorite.

Because time is a scoring input, every defensive detour has a cost. The goal is not a no-hit run; it is a run where you never stop attacking for long. Learn the two or three moments where patience is mandatory, and spend the rest of the fight pressing the boss.

The biggest gains come from cutting dead time rather than from squeezing one more combo into a damage window. A run that spends ten seconds walking back into position after every dodge loses to a run with weaker gear and a tighter loop. Watch a replay and count the seconds where you are neither attacking nor forced to move; those are the seconds to remove first.

Bring one character, not the roster

The most common mistake is treating Abyss of Tao as a showcase for every character you own. It rewards the opposite: pick the character whose combo you can execute under pressure, not the one with the highest tier-list placement. A clean route on a familiar kit beats a flashy route you drop halfway through.

The mode also pairs well with the early resource advice elsewhere on the site. Take your main three through the basic mechanics of the multi-floor secret realms first, then bring them here one at a time. Familiarity with a boss pattern transfers; a new character does not.

If you are still deciding who deserves the investment, read the tier list for the role labels rather than for a single answer. A character who needs a full team to function is a poor Abyss pick even if they are strong in group content.

He Xi's two cheap threats

He Xi's damage is not the problem; the problem is that both of his dangerous tools punish standing still. Everything else in the fight is readable once these two habits are gone.

The poison matters because it keeps ticking while you are trying to dodge the next pattern. If your character has no cleanse, treat the debuff as a timer that forces you to play safer until it falls off. Zhang Lingyu's water techniques remove it outright, which is a large part of why he is a recommended pick.

The dart pattern is two volleys with a short gap between them. Moving laterally through the first set and continuing in the same direction through the second is more reliable than stopping after the first, because stopping puts you back in the firing line for the follow-up. If the poison lands anyway, keep playing the pattern instead of trying to outrun the debuff; the damage ticks regardless of distance.

The backstab is the real skill check. Its wind-up is short enough that reacting is unreliable, so the answer is prevention: end your combos early, keep a lateral angle, and never commit to a long string while the boss is off-screen or behind you.

Phase one: above 70% HP

Above 70% HP, He Xi fights with a dash slash and a sweeping kick. Both have comparatively long wind-ups. The tell for the dash is his body leaning forward; dodge diagonally backward rather than straight back, then punish with a 4A high kick.

The phase is a loop, not a race. Land the kick, convert into your short string, then stop and watch where he lands. He has about half a second of recovery on landing, which is enough to start the next sequence but not enough to greed a full combo. Keeping continuous pressure also denies him the space to set up his wider attacks.

Phase two: below 30% HP

Below 30% HP he adds a whirlwind. The instinct is to keep hitting through it; that is how the phase kills you. Wait for the spin to finish before closing, then take your window. The added red attack is unblockable, so guarding is not an answer.

This is where super armor earns its place. A super-armor skill or effect lets you absorb one hit while you press the ultimate to interrupt his cast. A successful interrupt leaves him briefly staggered, which is the largest damage window in the fight. If the interrupt fails, leave immediately instead of trying to salvage the string.

The enraged phase

At low health He Xi enters an enraged state with 50% cooldown reduction. That single change compresses every pattern: the darts come back sooner, the dash recharges faster and the whirlwind arrives before you have finished recovering from the last exchange.

Two adjustments carry the phase. First, lean on perfect parries: his basic attacks are frequent enough that guarding into a counter is more reliable than trying to outrun everything. Second, treat the whirlwind as a chain. It becomes a three-stage sequence, so start side-dodging from the first rotation and keep going until the third ends, then counter.

Defensive resources are the limiting factor, not damage. Spend stamina on lateral dodges, not backward ones, and avoid panic Break Away on light hits. If you reach the enraged phase with a full stamina bar, the fight is usually already won.

Furnace peanuts and arena space

He Xi also deploys furnace peanuts, small adds that drift toward the middle of the arena. Clear the left group first: those are the ones that close in on your working space, and ignoring them slowly takes the arena away from you. The right-hand group can wait.

Use an area skill rather than single-target attacks so the whole left cluster dies at once. This is one of the few places where spending a cooldown purely on adds is correct, because the alternative is losing the room you need for the phase-two dodge patterns.

Counters and a repeatable practice plan

Feng Baobao is the cleanest counter. Open with 4A into the high kick, then use the second segment of her skill on the knockdown; the super armor on that segment stands her up through the wake-up attack. When He Xi dashes, answer with 5A, 4A, then the invincible Wind and Fire Wheels, chaining fast enough that he cannot leave the string.

Zhang Lingyu is the safer pick for players still learning the patterns. His water techniques cleanse the poison, which removes one entire failure state from the run, and his simple strings leave more attention for the backstab tell.

A practical progression looks like this: run the fight once, dodging only, with no intention of a fast clear; run it a second time adding the P1 punish; then add the phase-two interrupt and the enraged side-dodge chain. Once all three are automatic, start trimming time. The Feng Baobao combo guide covers the exact strings, the combat system page explains the parry and dodge timing this fight assumes, and the Biyou Village guide is the next step if you want group content that uses the same habits.