Image: Image: "Night Market Food Stall at Davao City" by PAULIX04, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Genshin Impact has a group of shopkeepers who never show up as shop icons on your map. The ones most worth tracking down are the artifact merchants, who sell cheap 2-star sets like the Adventurer set (restocking every 7 days). Next come roaming or time-limited sellers like Flora and Chloris in Mondstadt and Linlang in Liyue Harbor. A few food and ingredient sellers also stock items that restock every 3 days. Most of them are easy to miss because they only appear at certain hours or walk around instead of standing still. This guide covers where to look, when to look, and what is actually useful to buy.
A quick word on scope. Hidden vendors are a small convenience, not a main source of upgrades. Your real ascension and talent materials still come from bosses, domains and the open world. Think of these shops as a cheap top-up you visit when you pass by.
Why some vendors are not on the map
Genshin marks the obvious shops, such as general goods stores, restaurants and blacksmiths. Other merchants have to be found on foot. According to this vendor overview on wotpack.ru, artifact vendors in particular are not marked on the map at all. Others only appear at certain times of day. Players have been asking about this since launch. An Arqade thread from October 2020 asked how many hidden vendors exist and where they are, and the question still comes up with every new region.
Three things make a vendor hard to find:
- Time of day. Some are only there in daylight, others only at night.
- Movement. A few walk a route instead of standing in one spot.
- Quest gates. Some only appear after you finish a specific story quest.
Mondstadt: Flora and Chloris
Flora
Flora runs a small flower stall in Mondstadt city. The catch is timing. GameWith's hidden shop list notes she can only be seen during daylight and is gone at night. If you walk past her spot after dark and see nothing, that is why. Wait until morning or skip time using the in-game clock.
Chloris
Chloris is the classic "where did she go" vendor. She is always on the move, so you may not find her at the exact spot a guide shows. GameWith's advice is to walk the path near Windrise until you run into her. She deals in local plants. That makes her handy when you are a few Mondstadt specialties short of a character ascension and do not want to run a full gathering loop.
Tips for finding Chloris:
- Teleport to the Statue of the Seven or waypoint closest to Windrise.
- Walk the roads around it slowly instead of gliding over them.
- If she is not on one stretch, follow the path in the other direction. She does not teleport, she walks.
Liyue: Linlang and the night shift
Linlang is a Liyue Harbor merchant who sells artifacts, and she works the opposite hours to Flora. GameWith notes she can only be seen at night and is not at her shop during the day. If you are hunting her, set the clock to evening first and save yourself a confused lap of the harbor.
What she sells is the main reason to visit. Per the wotpack.ru guide, artifact vendors only sell 2-star artifact sets, and the Adventurer set restocks every 7 days. That sounds modest, and it is, but low-star artifacts still have uses:
- Feeding other artifacts. They work as cheap XP fodder for the artifacts you actually use.
- New or low-level accounts. A full early set is better than an empty slot in the first hours.
- Collection and achievements. Some players just want the full set in their archive.
If you are past the early game, buy them when you are already nearby. Do not plan a trip around them.
Liyue book vendor
Liyue also has a seller with in-game lore books. GameWith's list includes titles like Records of Jueyun: Hidden Jade, Legend of the Lone Sword (IV) and several volumes of Legend of the Shattered Halberd. These do not power up characters. They do fill gaps in your book collection, which some achievements and completionists care about.
Ingredient sellers with 3-day restocks
These merchants are not secret in the strict sense, but they are easy to overlook. Some of their stock does not refresh daily like everything else. The wotpack.ru guide lists a few examples:
- Li Cai at Liuli Pavilion (Liyue): Tianshu Meat, restocks every 3 days.
- Yue Shu at Xinyue Kiosk (Liyue): Golden Crab, restocks every 3 days.
- Naku Weed from an Inazuma seller, restocks every 3 days.
Most general ingredient stock, such as meat, milk, cabbage, carrots and rice, refreshes daily at sellers like Blanche at Mondstadt General Goods. Chef Mao at Wanmin Restaurant and other restaurant vendors sell recipes and prepared dishes too.
In Inazuma, a merchant in Bourou Village on Watatsumi Island only appears after you complete Raiden Shogun's Story Quest. If a guide says someone should be there and they are not, check your quest log first.
The guide also notes that prices may vary based on your progress. Treat any price you see in a guide as approximate.
What about ores and upgrade materials?
This is where expectations need adjusting. Nothing in the sources used here shows hidden vendors selling ores. What they do say is that blacksmiths:
- sell weapons rated 2 stars or lower,
- let you forge 4-star weapons at their workshops, and
- can point you toward rich ore deposits.
So for ore, the blacksmith is your best shop-based help, and only as a guide to where to mine. For character ascension, the useful vendor buys are local specialties from sellers like Chloris. Boss drops, gems and talent books still come from combat and domains.
Newer regions
Sumeru, Fontaine, Natlan, Nod-Krai and Snezhnaya all have their own shops, and wotpack.ru covers them in separate regional guides. Regional vendors that take sigils instead of Mora are also covered separately there. Exact stock in newer regions changes with updates, so check a recently updated list before you go. The GameWith list and the Gamepur round-up are good places to start.
A simple route for checking hidden vendors
- Set the clock to daytime and visit Flora in Mondstadt city.
- Walk the Windrise roads until you find Chloris.
- Switch to night, teleport to Liyue Harbor and visit Linlang for artifacts.
- While in Liyue, check Li Cai and Yue Shu if your 3-day items have restocked.
- Once a week, plan your stops around the 7-day artifact restock.
Pin each vendor on the HoYoLAB interactive map. It lets you mark and save locations, and you can import your in-game pins. That saves a lot of wandering later.
When a vendor will not show up
- Wrong time of day. Flora is daytime only, Linlang is night only. Change the clock and come back.
- She walked off. Chloris roams. Follow the road around Windrise in both directions.
- Quest not done. Some sellers, like the one on Watatsumi Island, need a story quest finished first.
- Stock is empty. You may have bought it out. Check the restock timer, whether daily, 3 days or 7 days.
- Outdated guide. Locations and stock can shift after updates. Compare with a list showing a recent update date.
A note for anyone shopping outside the game
Items from these vendors stay in your account. Genshin has no player-to-player trading, so nobody can sell you a vendor item directly. If someone offers to "deliver" in-game shop items, they are really asking for access to your account. That is a common way accounts get lost. Hand out login details only if you fully understand the risk, and keep two-factor protection on. If you buy or sell game keys, gift cards or accounts on a marketplace like stockr.org, use the platform's own payment and dispute process. Never move the deal to private messages.
FAQ
Are hidden vendors worth the time? For new accounts, yes. For late-game players, they are a small convenience, best checked when you happen to pass by.
Do hidden vendors sell 4-star or 5-star artifacts? No. According to the sources here, artifact vendors only sell 2-star sets.
Can I buy ore from a vendor? The sources here do not show any vendor selling ore. Blacksmiths can point you to rich ore deposits, and you mine it yourself.
Why can't I find Chloris? She walks a route near Windrise. Walk the road slowly, in both directions.
Do prices change? The wotpack.ru guide says prices may vary with your progress, so expect small differences from what guides list.