Chapter 163: Phase Two Begins!

“Never had an opening this glorious, cheer for me, applaud me!”

A blonde girl in a black trench coat looked out over the pitch-black Beihai, spreading her arms with some pride.

The city-wide white mist intoxicated her utterly!

“Haha, that Jialan fellow even made me wait for the Magical Girl to make her move!”

The gale howled, pressing the coat tight against her body, which actually accentuated a nice figure.

Classic blonde hair and blue eyes, she looked like a young miss, except for the heavy dark circles under her eyes.

“Like I said, for me the Magical Girl Hunter, I don’t need any helpers!”

“Taking Beihai is as simple as eating or drinking!”

The vine captain sneered beside her. “Then why didn’t you come to Beihai to gorge yourself before you stole me from Twins?”

“At that time I had anorexia.”

The captain could only roll his eyes at Helen, the Magical Girl Hunter’s, reply.

The Witch Association’s cooperation with the Mirror Kingdom to attack Beihai really had one core player.

The legendary Magical Girl Killer.

As the ultimate weapon against Magical Girls, everything else—Mirror Beasts, Magical Girl Hunters—were basically supporting acts, or just simple distractions.

The core plan was to let the Magical Girl Killer strike.

But for this Magical Girl Hunter in the Witch Association, it was a humiliation.

Although titled Magical Girl Hunter, Helen’s label did not mean she had personally captured many Magical Girls.

It referred to the various patent technologies she developed that helped the Witch Association defeat many Magical Girls.

Hence the title Magical Girl Hunter.

Yet Helen had her pride;

everyone treated her like a supporting act to the Magical Girl Killer, a hunter reduced to a toy—how could she accept that!

The white mist blanketing Beihai came from Helen.

Originally the captain had exchanged for the white mist from Helen and spent three full years preparing Beihai’s layout before it was barely complete.

But Helen, in just a few days, using Mirror Beasts scattered everywhere, silently spread the white mist to every corner of Beihai.

Not even the captain, who always stayed by her side, noticed!

Even the usually arrogant captain admitted with a sigh that technically he was slightly inferior.

Still, it didn’t matter;

he had plenty of places he could win!

“Hah, thinking you can take Beihai with this little tech is wishful thinking.” The captain said coolly. “Even I needed to avoid direct confrontation with Azure Cloud Sect back then, let alone you, little girl.”

“Hah, old man, don’t lump me with you. Since I came, I’ve come fully prepared.”

Helen raised her chin slightly and said proudly, “I will prove on this Beihai stage who the real enemy of Magical Girls is! Some flashy Magical Girl Killer—how could it beat a Magical Girl Hunter like me who advances step by step!”

Once, there was only one Magical Girl Hunter in this world: Helen.

Not to mention others, even the captain had to buy from her.

With numerous patents that countered Magical Girls, Helen’s profits were overflowing—she was upper-class within the Witch Association, a middle-class elite.

At her peak she even had followers begging for scraps of her technological authorization.

Back then her anti-Magical Girl tech was called divine talent;

a single patent was rumored to be worth buying the entire Witch Association!

She was unrivaled until the captain’s Waterloo and the Mirror Kingdom’s arrival.

Her patents rapidly lost value inside the Witch Association, and her income plunged!

Not only that, but the captain’s reputation in the Witch Association meant his repeated humiliating victories using her patents became a weapon for detractors to attack her, causing her prestige to collapse.

Moreover, with the Mirror Kingdom’s technologies entering, her tech was directly trampled—though not entirely ignored, price wars forced her to lower prices, halving her income.

Property tax, vehicle tax, R&

D tax, a slew of high-interest loans drained her savings.

She fell into the Witch Association’s kill zone—everyone knew Beihai was Azure Cloud Sect’s turf, a den of demons;

if she didn’t fight, she’d live worse than dead!

The Witch Association’s business was more developed than capitalism!

“Damn the Witch Association’s system.” Helen muttered angrily. “It leaves no way to live!”

“You can’t only blame the system when you’re down on your luck.”

“If Teddy were still the president, the Witch Association wouldn’t be like this!” Helen recalled the old chairman with nostalgia and sighs. “Back then President Teddy protected the living standards of our base members!”

The captain was speechless. “Wait, before you went bankrupt you were a small capitalist too. Teddy’s taxes were over ninety percent on capitalists—are you sure you could have handled that?”

“Better than dying if I don’t risk everything, right?” Helen stared at the pitch-black Beihai falling into the white mist. “How many bottom-tier Witch Association members died because of the current system when they fought the Disaster Control Bureau? This system killed so many ambitious capable members—absurd!”

“I’ll say this: Chairman Teddy led our system down a crooked path.” The captain shook his head. “Luckily we got strong enough to return. Otherwise how could we let base members with no surplus value survive? How would the Witch Association prosper? Being able to eliminate people like you is the Witch Association’s advantage—it’s our capital to win!”

Helen was momentarily silenced by the captain’s words.

She had to admit—there was some truth to it.

But she quickly shook her head. “Even if you’re right, if it’s bad for me it’s wrong! If I can’t win, then we all lose!”

The captain’s face turned solemn.

They’d met a real opponent.

“I didn’t bring you here to reminisce, Captain.”

They threaded between buildings until Helen stopped beside a residential block, looking far at one apartment.

They had driven Mirror Beasts all over these days and finally pinpointed the location.

The girl who slept quietly in that apartment.

The captain had told her it was the perfect specimen.

But looking at the silly smile on the girl’s sleeping face, she looked so dumb it hurt.

“You sure that little girl can really become the strongest Complete Witch?”

“Of course. As Beihai’s first Magical Girl, her talent is exceptional, one in ten thousand. You think I’ve seen so many Magical Girls? None are at Jiang Keke’s level—perfect control of Pure Mana and Polluted Magic…”

The captain drew a deep breath. “Once Jiang Keke becomes a Complete Witch, she could even tread the Full Bloom domain like a Magical Girl without paying Full Bloom’s cost!”

The captain and Helen’s ultimate experiment.

A true Complete Witch that could rival Magical Girls.

Complete Witches traditionally lacked growth potential and were often single-minded—one of the Witch Association’s pains.

As the cutting-edge researchers of witchification, both the captain and Helen knew what this meant.

If they had a stable Complete Witch at Full Bloom level, the Witch Association would no longer have to grovel before the Disaster Control Bureau.

“Truly perfect, complete, transcending all current concepts of Full Bloom—no, we shouldn’t call it Full Bloom. For the Witch Association, this will be a historic, glorious moment! We should name it in our own way—”

“True-Jie Witch!”

“Wait.” Helen frowned and interrupted the vine captain’s boast. “What kind of nonsense is ‘True-Jie Witch’? Since when does the Witch Association use that name?”

“Old ways get beaten;

that’s why the Witch Association kept suffering. Even the power ranking for Complete Witches uses the enemy’s cultivation names—‘matches Sprout’, ‘shocks Blooming’—don’t you think it sounds cowardly? It sounds like some illegal folk gang!

“So to beat Beihai’s demonic sects and the Disaster Control Bureau, I innovated a new Complete Witch rank system, graded by combat capability and mastery of Polluted Magic: Initial-Jie, Correct-Jie, High-Jie and True-Jie!”

“For example, a High-Jie Witch must single-handedly defeat a Blooming Magical Girl. If she later loses to a Seedling Magical Girl, she’s a High-Shame Witch. If she can beat a Blooming with a Mental Landscape, she’s High-Middle Witch. Each major domain splits into Shame, Lower, Middle, Upper, and Peak sub-levels…”

This was the last hope and Helen’s trump card to surpass the so-called Magical Girl Killer.

She dared to storm this demon den with the captain because if they seized Keke, everything would be solved!

To hold destiny in their hands…

Petals across the sky turned into razor-edged blades and suddenly fell before Helen, blocking her advance.

A petite pink Magical Girl drifted down and sat on Keke’s windowsill;

the fluttering petals obscured both of them.

“What do you intend to do to my friend?”

Helen froze for a moment and turned to the vine captain. “Wasn’t the white mist supposed to work?”

“Just because I used it effectively doesn’t mean you do.” The captain smiled faintly. “I win, Helen.”

“You’re insane! If I lose, we’re all done!”

The Magical Girl Hunter drew a deep breath;

her earlier frantic face immediately grew grim.

“You wheelchair-dependent Magical Girls will never know how much effort we non-wheelchair people put in!”

...

Jiang Si stood on a half-destroyed Disaster Beast and glanced at the ice crystals above.

The same move, if it failed twice, Azure Cloud Sect really didn’t need to bother pretending.

In fact, he had noticed Azure Cloud Sect’s reaction the moment the white mist began to spread.

Overall he was satisfied.

It was clear Four Leaf and Six Leaf had prepared thoroughly;

the moment the white mist spread, clover growth throughout the city began to purge and absorb certain properties from the mist.

After the last time’s setback, Azure Cloud Sect researched the white mist and found a solution.

Some concepts forming the white mist’s components made excellent nourishment—or ritual material—for upgrading the Two-Leaf spell Unclear Confusion to higher subtlety.

Moreover, according to Susan, even the Disaster Control Bureau had found countermeasures.

Though he didn’t know who it was, they attacked Beihai using the captain’s method and even saved simulated data for Jiang Keke…

Overall, compared to last time, the crisis was not catastrophic.

“Four Leaf and Six Leaf have locked the enemy positions. The attackers spreading white mist and Mirror Beasts are heading to your home. Target seems to be Keke. Need backup?”

“No.”

Jiang Si listened to Bingtang’s question through his phone and denied help without hesitation. “Last time the captain intervened and Keke gained witchification ability. This time it’s clearly the captain’s backup—maybe Keke will gain even more power.”

Bingtang didn’t know how to respond.

Is she treating the Witch Association like a money-making fairy godmother?

This attitude of treating the Witch Association as Keke’s tutoring service left Bingtang amused yet finding it reasonable.

After agreeing, Bingtang still notified Li Yi in advance. You can’t truly let my sister face danger alone.

Watching Beihai, she noticed that aside from the blonde girl who slipped in, the city’s perimeter was sealed off.

Completely undetected.

“Four Leaf, Six Leaf, why is Beihai sealed off?”

The two girls, using this time to fully ponder their next magical development, looked up and blinked in confusion. “Sealed off?”

Bingtang’s heart skipped;

she immediately expanded her power range to break the blockade and check above.

She then felt the external mana abruptly stall.

The ice-crystal mana that covered Beihai vanished in an instant!

“Yumo!”

Yumo, patrolling the outskirts, whipped up a gale that lifted the white mist into the sky, gathering it above.

But when the mist touched a barrier a hundred meters up, the gale dissipated and the mist began to descend again.

Yumo summoned another gale, and as the mist-carrying wind was about to reach the barrier it vanished abruptly—not dispersed like before, but instantly transformed into extreme cold.

A change in mana properties only seen from Shion’s usage—this time performed by Yumo!

The True-Transmission girl in white Magical Outfit had far better precision in mana control, finally catching up to Shion upon promotion to Blooming and perfectly merging two mana types, achieving a property transformation.

Wind and ice changed;

under precise mana manipulation, the mysterious wind-cold didn’t touch the barrier but physically cooled the mist into invisible ice-needle explosions.

Storming Pear-Blossom Needles · Simulation!

Under countless strikes, the white mist was actually pushed piece by piece beyond the barrier. If continued, in minutes the mist and the barrier would annihilate each other.

But Yumo sensed something off.

“Mana consumption’s too fast?” Bingtang frowned and called Yumo to stop, insisting Yumo conserve energy for now.

“Hmm, seems like a rule-based force.”

Yumo felt her mana canceling against the barrier, but more like the barrier fundamentally removed the mana.

Such power should only belong to a Full Bloom level.

Could it be, as the Sect Master said, that Full Bloom level beings were roaming?

Realizing something, Bingtang immediately contacted Jiang Si. “Sect Master—there’s a Full Bloom level in Beihai…”

But the phone had no signal.

In fact Jiang Si had heard Bingtang’s voice until the last moment, when the signal cut off.

Walking the quiet street, Jiang Si stopped and looked up.

The mist Yumo had blown aloft was falling again, and most importantly, Bingtang’s ice crystals were gone.

This was the first time he’d seen such a thing.

Ice crystals capable of covering whole Beihai should be more covert and harder to destroy after Bingtang reached Blooming.

Such silent changes—he knew even he would find them hard to execute so smoothly.

The road was dead silent;

houses had their lights off, residents asleep beneath the white mist.

Jiang Si walked alone in the dark street, only his footsteps echoing.

Occasional insect rustles made the silence feel deeper.

Nearby streetlights flickered on with a crackle;

insects fluttered, then the light snapped off.

Then it lit again;

after flickering for a while, Jiang Si stopped and looked ahead.

Where the road had been empty stood a gray-white girl.

Darkness clung to her so thickly she seemed inseparable from it;

the gray-white Magical Outfit seemed to melt into the environment, giving an eerie transparency.

The streetlight flickered once more.

The gray-white girl, originally a hundred meters away, closed to under ten meters in that flicker.

Jiang Si turned off his phone and pocketed it, watching the ghostlike girl coldly.

“Ghost stories are out of fashion—now it’s the age of scavengers.”

Saying that, he spun and delivered a side kick to a nearby lamppost!

The toppling lamp tore the overhead power line, sparks bursting in the dark as it fell toward the eerie girl!

But the lamppost just passed through her.

Even Jiang Si was a little surprised.

So ghosts aren’t outdated after all.

The gray-white girl took one step forward. Jiang Si snorted, unafraid.

He instantly triggered the spatial Mental Landscape gifted by Mùjǐn inside him.

His right hand plunged into a space rift and ripped hard!

Though half his palm was almost shredded, a space tear opened wide enough to rip the opponent apart!

As he expected, although the girl could pass through power lines, faced with a space tear she chose to dodge.

Not a ghost—so why pretend?

The phantom gray-white girl’s right arm was torn off by the space rift;

what fell wasn’t blood or mana.

It was a crumbled debris like concrete.

Without hesitation Jiang Si followed with a kick focused on tearing space again, but the gray-white girl phased through his legs first and walked into his arms.

From the outside it looked surprisingly intimate—as if a lovestruck girl had flung herself into a boy’s embrace.

His heart sank slightly;

Jiang Si tried to retreat forcefully!

But the gray-white girl gently pressed his forehead.

The next second he was blasted away like a cannonball!

“You lot who rely on Magical Girl wheelchairs will never know how much we who don’t have wheelchairs sacrificed!”

Helen, chased and battered by petals, had been using various gadgets to disperse petals and trying to stop the pink Magical Girl’s mana spread;

she was still struggling.

Her summoned Mirror Beasts were all submerged by the opponent’s cherry blossoms.

More importantly, it strengthened the approaching Magical Girl!

Helen didn’t back down;

she stared calmly at the approaching Magical Girl and said slowly and clearly:

“If you’ve got the guts, don’t transform—let’s fight fair!”

Silver Lotus chuckled at the girl’s antics and didn’t deny the point. “Indeed, Magical Girl power is like a wheelchair;

once you transform you skip a lot of effort.”

“You’re shameless! Using a Magical Girl posture to bully people?”

“You drool too.”

“That’s not wrong... no, I don’t need a Magical Girl’s external power.” Helen inhaled sharply, turning one arm into Disaster Beast form. “I’ll stand as a mortal against Magical Girls!”

The opponent spread petals over the area, leaving Helen with no chance to approach Keke.

Not even Mirror Beasts could get close.

She had to go all out—this might be her only chance.

Just as she lowered her posture and prepared to rush, a sharp tearing roar sounded above!

A meteor-like figure streaked through the sky and slammed into a twenty-plus-story building like a cannonball!

The top of the building instantly collapsed and fell!

The impact cut through the building and continued falling back, finally stopping only when it hit another nearby tower.

The huge shock and dust almost knocked Helen off her feet;

she stared stunned at the impossible destruction—the smashed building still collapsing—stones and appliances drifting in the air carried by a blast.

“What happened?”

Helen and Silver Lotus both flew up and watched the meteor’s impact point.

After the meteor hit, it was buried in the rubble and went quiet.

Silver Lotus was about to inspect when a gray-white girl rose from the debris.

Helen’s face went pale, but she forced a smile. “Hmph! The Magical Girl Killer is here—you’re dead! Those who like wheelchairs will fail because of them!”

Magical Girl Killer?

The gray-white girl’s gaze quickly locked onto her.

Silver Lotus felt an indescribable sense of crisis rise in her chest.

It was like the powerless terror she’d felt when facing Disaster Beasts as an ordinary person.

The gray-white girl just warned her with a glance, then shifted her view to the ruins.

Silver Lotus also sensed something wrong there.

A horrifying surge of Polluted Magic poured from the rubble, causing large chunks of debris to lift...

“When Yin and Yang are reversed and in chaos.”

A faint dragon roar came from within.

“Demonic Blood Liang Qingtian!”

The raging Calamity Dragon burst from the ruins, roaring and spewing dragon breath at the gray-white girl!