Winter edged in like a quiet tide. Cool wind slid under her hem like a sly cat, breath steaming like a small cloud. He—no, she—let out a thin sigh like frost leaving the lips.

Melancholy pooled around her like dusk fog, and it made strangers pause like moths around a cold lamp.

“Already... all these years?” she murmured, voice older than a spring-soft face, an echo like a bell under snow.

An icefield aura kept people a thousand li away, a chill veil like hoarfrost around her.

She held a secret like jade buried under snow: her soul hadn’t been born here.

In her last life she’d been he, an unremarkable otaku drifting like a leaf in a busy river.

Days were little hearth-fires: clicking through games, catching new episodes, trading barbs with unseen friends like swallows on a wire.

Back in daily life, he roughhoused with his buddies like sparrows pecking rice, extorting snacks without cracking the bond.

The iron furnace of exam-hell hammered him for three years, yet it forged his brightest youth like tempered steel.

College stayed neon-bright: brothers at his side, raiding net cafés like storming dungeons, then skipping class at dawn like foxes fading into mist.

His life was simple as warm soup: a whole family, friends worth keeping, no dark stains, and he was content as a rock by a clear stream.

Then he transmigrated, boat flipped by a sudden squall on a black lake.

Damn it, what cosmic debt did I owe, he cursed, a rumble like distant thunder.

After crossing, he woke as a girl, the mirror swapping rivers like a trick of moonlight.

Years later, that girl wore a boy’s shell, a pretty-boy mask over a girl’s body, silk hiding a blade.

Why play me like this, heavens, she groused, a cat drenched by rain.

Her face was a careful painting: delicate lines, blue eyes clear as lake water, cherry-soft lips, black hair coiled like ink with two strands falling like thin waterfalls.

First glance: what a cute girl, a spring bud in dew; second glance at the boy’s uniform: oh, a crossdresser—paper peeled from a lantern, disappointment drifting like smoke.

She could only shrug like bamboo in wind; out there her ID said male, and that suited her fine like a mask that fit.

An ex-otaku pretending to be a guy wasn’t heavy lifting, though her looks shoved her toward “effeminate” shadows like peach blossoms clinging to a sword.

Fourteen years had drifted by since rebirth, seasons stacking like rings in a tree.

Ahem—anyway, she’d grown up, the thought brushed aside like dust from a sill.

Still, she knew this world like a map of clouds: a different Earth, not the swords-and-spells of dime novels.

Magic? Qi? Take a rain check. This was Earth on a parallel track, she told herself twice like a bell chimed in fog.

Yet strange currents ran under the streetlights: abilities akin to magic, called Mystic Power, underground springs feeding dark roots.

In essence, Mystic Power wasn’t elemental fire or water; it was a pure knack, lightning in the bones like a sleeping storm.

You couldn’t cultivate it like terraced fields; only compatibility set the pattern, seeds meeting the right soil under rain.

Most folk knew nothing; the power lived in the shadows like owls, and those who touched it learned of the Underworld beneath daylight roads.

Those awakened wore a role like a seal-stamp: Witch.

She’d been a Witch for about a year, and the one who signed her—her Agent—hovered in hazy ambiguity like mist around a lantern.

Her chain of command led to the Magic Institution in London, a cradle beating steady like rain on old stone.

London was where the first Witch and the first Agent rose like twin stars over a gray sea.

Witches no longer had to be born there, but would-be Agents still trekked there to register, then to seek a destined partner like following a red thread.

Witches weren’t ageless myths; they bled and laughed like anyone, save for Mystic Power in their veins that let them break storms in battle.

In sum, “magical girl” still felt like the sticker that clung, a joke that wouldn’t wash off in the rain.

What gnawed at her was the world’s true shape; after so many years, life here felt like an anime she hadn’t watched, a two-dimensional mirage on a three-dimensional lake.

If that were true, who wore the protagonist’s halo like a sunrise crest?

Would he or she stand across from her someday like winter against spring?

If so, the wind would cut; if her faction clashed with the hero’s, she’d be the villain, a paper lantern set to burn.

“Xiao Yun—”

A weight slammed her back like a playful bear. She lurched, the ground rushing up like a cold mirror, until slender arms hooked her waist like climbing vines.

Tingling bloomed like static. She dropped her voice and hissed to the girl behind her, a whisper like a knife in silk. “Sham Einafel!”

“Sorry, sorry—it’s because Yun-Yun is too cute,” Sham sang, sweetness like sunlight on mochi.

“Baka! Cut the pet names; you know my status. Hands off,” she snapped, frost first, words later, a gust off a snowy ridge.

Hearing a half-hearted apology, she shook off Sham’s hands like water and slipped free; Sham only smiled, used to squalls like a duck on rain.

“Honestly, I throw myself into your arms and you turn cold, Xiao Yun,” she sighed, theatrics drifting like petals.

“Save it,” Yun Shi answered, voice flat as a still pond under moonlight.

Before her stood a charming girl with mid-length white-violet hair and foreign-cut features, smiling with eyes full of mischief like foxfire in reeds.

“Hey, Sham,” she said, voice soft as felt laid over ice.

“What is it, Xiao Yun?” Sham smiled elegantly, a lady’s fan opening like moonlight, but Yun Shi knew the silk hid thorns like roses.

“Right now I’m... a boy,” she breathed, worry rising like smoke; “at least watch it in public. People will suspect like crows circling.”

Outwardly a boy, inwardly a secret, she had to tread lightly like a cat on new snow.

As a former shut-in, she could play the role, but she wouldn’t let Sham’s antics tear the veil; exposure here wasn’t a headache, it was a blade—people could die like moths in a flame.

“True enough,” Sham murmured, eyes skimming the crowd like swallows skirting eaves.

Girls nearby sparkled starry-eyed like summer skies, and boys glared with “burn the heretic” fire like torches at a gate.

“Then will you take responsibility for me?” Sham asked, smiling like honey with a buried sting.

Yun Shi almost spat old blood like a wounded hero; if Sham weren’t a girl, she’d have decked her flat like a falling tree.

“Quit joking; take responsibility for yourself,” she said, voice hard as pebble and cold as rain.

“So cruel,” Sham pouted, wiping imaginary tears with slim fingers like willow leaves over a stream.

“You did this and that to me...” she added, voice wobbling like a thin bridge in wind.

“That was what? What did I do?” Yun Shi shot back, thunder wrapped in silk, lightning under clouds.

“You clearly stepped with me onto the stairs of adulthood, and now you won’t admit it,” Sham said, sorrow pouring like summer rain.

“Nothing like that happened!”

“Heartless cad, you took my first time and threw me away, boo-hoo,” Sham wailed, tears like pearls that weren’t there.

“That never happened! What are you spinning?”

“We even shared a bed; you can’t deny it,” she pressed, words soft as fur but sharp as needles.

...

“So mean, Yunshi Bianqi, you’re a villain, boo-hoo-hoo,” she cried, real tears finally strung like broken beads, a look no one could resist.

Students around them stirred like reeds in wind and turned like sunflowers to gossip.

“Isn’t that Bianqi from Class A? What’s happening?” one asked, curiosity fluttering like a sparrow.

“I heard he wronged our goddess, Lady Sham—unforgivable,” another hissed, sparks in his eyes like flint.

“What scum,” someone spat, stones skipping on water.

“Agreed,” a chorus rose like a tide slapping piers.

“We thought that pretty, girlish face meant harmless herbivore, but he’s a beast,” another sneered, smoke in his words.

“Give back Lady Sham’s purity,” a girl cried, cheeks flaring like sunset.

“Burn the heretic! Yunshi Bianqi, you’ll pay for making the goddess cry!” a boy shouted, rage flaring like dry straw.

Dozens of eyes pinned Yun Shi like knives; her scalp prickled and her face darkened like a stormfront rolling in.

That damned Sham hid a laugh behind her hand, shoulders trembling like leaves in a breeze she’d made.

“What now, Mister Magical Girl...” Sham whispered, a needle of sound meant only for her, gleaming like a fishhook.

“Shut up!” she snapped, heat popping like a spark in dry grass.

I’m from the magical girl—no, wait, she stumbled, thoughts tripping like feet on stairs. I’m a Witch, not a magical girl, dammit!

—

After ignoring those murderous stares like arrows, Yun Shi finally reached her classroom, each step heavy as wet sand.

Sham had wrecked her day; rumors would run like wildfire through dry fields.

Thinking of the days ahead made her want to cry without tears, a dry well under a rainless sky.

No helping it; Sham knew her secret and was her Agent, so there was no winning that tug-of-war, the rope burning like hemp in her palms.

Remembering the day she signed with Sham as partner made regret bite like frost at dawn.

Why am I the one being eaten by her, she sighed, the double meaning stinging like pepper on the tongue.

She exhaled slowly, sweeping clutter from her head like leaves off a path in wind.

Deep breath, calm the heart like still water, slide the classroom door open like a paper screen at dawn.

Born and raised in Japan this life, her school looked like the ones from island-nation anime, cherry trees and clean lines; nothing to fear but echoes.

But thanks to Sham’s little storm, she feared what might roll in like black clouds over a bay.

A scene from old harem shows flickered up: the guy hounded for flirting, the whole school staring like judges, the dreaded brigade calling for a stake-burning.

She shivered, hoping that kind of melodrama wouldn’t crash down like a bucket of cold water.

Inside, classmates didn’t riot at her entrance; they chatted in low waves with friends, and after one glance at her, their eyes slipped away like fish in shade.

Yun Shi finally let out a breath, a pale mist slipping from her lips like dawn leaving a pond. Thinking it through, it was normal: in this school, the only person she could really talk to was Sham. To everyone else, her presence was a pebble in a fast river—barely a ripple.

The loneliness stung, like a branch in winter stripped of leaves. In her past life, just an ordinary person, she’d had friends and family, and that simple warmth was enough. In this life, she had none. The white bandages binding her chest were frost over a locked lake; she’d sealed her heart the same way.

Of course it’s lonely—friends and all that, she thought, and her sigh drifted like smoke from a blown-out candle. Don’t overthink; it only breeds gnats of trouble. Better to pass three years of high school quietly, like rain that doesn’t ask for thunder, then find a girl and bend her toward her own spring. In her last life she’d been a boy; in this life she still loved girls. Boys? No romance there, at most the easy shade of friendship.

“Hey, Little Yun, still mad?”

Sham’s punchable smirk slid into view, smooth as oil on water. Yun Shi’s face twitched; after a long beat she squeezed out, voice wrapped in velvet:

“Sham Einafel, your class isn’t here, right—?”

She made “gentle” sound like silk hiding a blade.

“Oh my, you don’t welcome me, Yunshi Bianqi?”

“Not at all. Could you please leave, Ms. Einafel?”

“Hey now, say it that blunt and girls will hate you, Yunshi.”

Sham drew out the last syllable like a cat stretching in sun, half warning, half tease, a play of light in her eyes as she tossed flirtation like petals. Yun Shi didn’t buy it; she’d long grown used to that perfumed act. She smiled, sweet as snow with grit beneath:

“At least I don’t want your welcome, right—?”

Little show-off. Think I can’t outplay you? Hmph. Give me a moment and I’ll sweep you out of the classroom like dust.

She braced to keep sparring—then a hard shock hit her back like a kicked door. A heartbeat later she flew, a streak of motion, and slammed into the wall with a dull thud.

“Ow—dammit, who kicked me?”

She rubbed the bump blooming on her skull, anger rising like storm heat. The culprit, a wine-red-haired girl, showed no remorse. She flicked her braid like a whip and looked at Yun Shi as if she were a worm dug from wet earth.

“I did, I’m the class rep. How is it, you worm!”

“Maya Hanazaka…”

Yun Shi spoke the name, and her face smoothed like wind over a pond.

Maya’s expression turned from sneer to steel. “What, getting cozy with Einafel again, Yunshi Bianqi?”

“Doesn’t seem like your business, Maya Hanazaka.”

Maya didn’t waste another word on her. She flipped her tone like a fan and faced Sham with sudden warmth.

“Are you okay, Einafel? That scum didn’t do anything to you, right?”

Women changing faces faster than pages—today drove it home. Watching Maya’s act, Yun Shi felt veins rise like vines.

“Thanks, Hanazaka. You came just in time.”

This one’s wicked too.

“It’s nothing. It’s my job. As long as you’re fine, Einafel.”

“Just call me Sham.”

“Alright then, Sham.”

Seeing them get friendly in a snap, Yun Shi glared, heat shimmering off asphalt. Fine, pull each other close—but why use me as the sacrifice?

“What are you staring at, worm! Want me to do you in?”

Maya’s glare had teeth. Yun Shi’s whole face went dark, her voice dropping like a low drum.

“She’s not in this class. You don’t kick her out—yet you kick me. What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What a petty man. How could I lay hands on a cute girl? Use your brain, sissy.”

Maya wore the look of someone who couldn’t stand the smell of smoke. She stared at Yun Shi like refuse in the gutter. The hit landed; the retort faltered. She’s got logic like a cold knife—I’m speechless. And Yun Shi, aren’t you forgetting your current body’s a girl too…

“That’s why men are disgusting.”

Maya pulled away from Yun Shi by a clean ten meters, space stretching like a dry field.

Yun Shi knew this class rep well. Maya Hanazaka was cute and capable, sure—but she was a yuri girl, pure as cherry blossoms that refuse autumn. She hated men, and any boy who confessed got flayed by her venomous tongue. The only reason Yun Shi had words for this pervert at all was Sham. Because Sham needed chaos like wind needs leaves, Yun Shi was often tangled in rumors with her—cohabiting lovers, callous playthings, daily forced shame-play. Yun Shi was innocent as rain. She hadn’t done any of it, yet the storm kept circling back.

Thanks to that, Yun Shi had become a campus “celebrity”—a thorough scumbag. Maya’s cold gaze tracked her every day like winter shadow. It left her ill at ease, and so the daily stare-down became routine. High school life wasn’t easy; the hallway felt like a tightrope over gray water.

“Sham, we’ll welcome you any time, no matter how many visits. If you like, transfer to our class.”

Maya’s eyes lit with a fever like midsummer. For a cute girl, she’d pour out spring water without stopping. It had to be those crooked genes pushing her to collect sweet faces.

Yun Shi had no strength to argue. At least this way, someone still talked to her. How pitiful do you have to be for only people who hate you to speak to you…

“By the way, Sham, why are you here again?”

Another girl walked over, asking as if this was sunrise she’d seen a hundred times. Yun Shi turned. The newcomer had a soft blue side ponytail, like a river tied at one bank, and rose-colored eyes that held the scene with gentle resignation.

“Even if we’re used to you dropping by, Sham, you don’t have to show up like clockwork every day. Mizuki doesn’t go this far.”

Her complaint floated light, like a breeze through paper doors.

The other three girls—to outsiders, two girls and one boy—fell silent as if the air had shifted. Her presence pressed like snow: quiet, but it covered everything.

“Miyuki Kiseki.”

Current vice president of the Student Council; her aura wasn’t something a yuri class rep could match. It felt like deep winter—cold, orderly, and clean.

Yun Shi held her tongue and watched with a calm face, a lake without ripples.

“Eh? You’re… Yunshi, right?”

Miyuki looked at her with polite surprise, like finding a stray feather on the path.

“Is there something urgent, Kiseki?” Sham asked first, smiling with tea-house warmth.

“Miyuki, I’m just disciplining a wolf in heat, don’t mind us.”

Maya’s smile was bright as polished glass; she clearly adored Miyuki. Fine, adore her—but why describe me like gutter sludge? Yun Shi’s forehead bloomed with veins; her face went black as rain clouds. Only this one could make her boil that fast.

“You again, Maya. I told you—this causes trouble.”

Miyuki tapped Maya’s head lightly, a bell on a branch. Maya looked dazed with pleasure. Miyuki ignored her and turned back, apology gentle as snowflakes:

“Sorry, Yunshi. Maya’s made trouble for you.”

Her cute face wore honest remorse, and Yun Shi’s mood brightened like morning light on water. She would never say she’d been charmed.

In an anime, with that personality and setting, she’d make a solid protagonist, Yun Shi thought, amused.

“It’s fine. Nothing big.”

Her voice came out casual, but forcing it low was tiring, like holding a pose too long.

“You ape—no, sissy! How dare you make my Miyuki apologize to you!”

Maya pointed at Yun Shi, outrage flaring like a tossed match. Sham watched with amusement, a spectator on a hill.

“So cruel, Yunshi. Isn’t having me enough?”

Meeting these two was the biggest mistake of my life, Yun Shi thought, a sigh dropping like a stone. Mm. The Student Council vice president is the only balm here…

“What are you even saying, honestly.”

Miyuki rubbed her temple; her friends loved trouble like moths love lamps.

“I wanted to remind you, Sham. I don’t mind you visiting, but campus security’s bad lately. Trouble keeps popping up. If something happens to you, it’ll be a headache.”

Her warning was kind, a lantern held high.

“Miyuki, that thing still isn’t solved?” Maya asked, her pervert-glitter settling for once.

“No. The cases keep going up. It’s giving me a migraine.”

Miyuki’s cute face scrunched like paper. Yun Shi felt a tug of curiosity.

“Cases meaning what?”

“Oh, that. Lately, outsiders keep slipping onto campus—apparently delinquents. Some students end up in the infirmary, most of them dazed, minds fogged like a river at dawn. I can’t figure how they’re getting in or why they’re targeting students. The Student Council’s stressed; security’s partly on us. So, Sham, please don’t wander. If something happens, it’s a mess. Same for you, Yunshi—don’t head to the old building or the storage rooms. Until the investigation’s done, those places are off limits.”

Her kindness wrapped around them like a shawl, warm in a cold hall.

“That is weird. Delinquents infiltrating… feels like they’ve got a purpose.”

For once, Sham bowed her head and thought, the playfulness blown out like a candle.

Seeing her change, Yun Shi felt a line draw straight in her mind. The only people who could swagger onto campus like midnight wind—their footprints smelled of the Underworld.

If it really was the Underworld, trouble would walk in like a tide. Aside from her and Sham, the girls here lived under the sun of the Outer World. If they were dragged into the world’s other face…

They were ordinary high school girls, not meant to glimpse the night behind the mirror—unless one of them was this world’s true protagonist.

As if that kind of nonsense would happen. Even if this were two-dimensional, what are the odds I’d bump into the protagonist? I’m thinking too much.

“Ah. Is that so…”

She acted indifferent, a stone under rain, but inside was a tangle of wires. She felt a large trouble coiling toward them. Since becoming a Witch half a year ago, that deep, cool sense of crisis had returned, like ice forming under the skin.

“Anyway, be careful. Don’t wander the school alone.”

Not quite reassured, Miyuki Kiseki offered a careful warning, unease pooling in her chest like cold river water; she didn’t know why, but her gut said this wouldn’t be simple.

“Mizuki’s worrying about me—I’m so moved~” Her voice fluttered like a ribbon in the breeze.

The yuri class rep, Maya Hanazaka, shot forward like an arrow and dove into Miyuki’s arms, nuzzling her like a kitten seeking warmth; was this really the sharp-tongued girl from a moment ago?

“Because we’re friends~ Sham and Bianqi too...” Her words floated like soft lanterns across a night pond.

Miyuki Kiseki managed a wry smile, soothing the Maya bundled in her embrace like a clinging vine; it looked like she’d gotten used to this.

“I’m not your friend.” The reply fell like a pebble breaking a still mirror.

“Uh... really...” Miyuki scratched her cheek, embarrassment prickling like nettles.

“You hateful sissy! How dare you act so brazen toward Mizuki!” Her shout cracked like a whip in the air.

Maya’s glare pinned Yun Shi like twin knives, a killing light as sharp as frost; inside, Yun Shi chuckled, a cool ripple under the surface.

I’ve tasted murder-beams from whole torch-and-pitchfork crowds, so this weak laser’s nothing; back home, my face would be pure “Challenge Accepted,” and on a girl it suddenly felt kind of cute.

“Damn, damn, even a mere sissy dares look at me like that!” Her fury sputtered like sparks from dry tinder.

Maya burned with shame into anger, stamping hard, each step a drumbeat on the floor; she looked ready to slay the “boy” wearing that scornful mask.

“All right, all right, Maya—enough.” Miyuki Kiseki forced a dry laugh, trying to calm the room like rain on hot stone; today was anything but peaceful.

Yun Shi had been about to suggest tossing the pest named Sham out like a noisy cicada, but the next moment snuffed that thought like wind dousing a candle.

“Vice President! Something’s happened!” The shout burst in like a gust through an open door.

A boy from another class rushed in, urgency clinging to him like sweat; unlike Sham, a casual door-hopper, this random student looked panicked, afraid to miss a heartbeat.

“Another student’s in trouble?!” Miyuki’s warmth hardened into steel, her question slicing clean like a blade.

“Yes. The President asks you to come at once. The victim is First-Year, Class B—Ryubendo Mizuki!” His words rang like a bell in a quiet hall.

Ryubendo Mizuki?... Sham’s friend!! The realization struck like lightning splitting a dark sky.