Back home, suspicion nipped like a cold dog. Liu RuoYuan demanded to check Yekase’s photo album, and only calmed when dust finally settled.

“Honestly, with so much time in between, even a real sneak‑shot would’ve been transferred and stashed in the clouds by now…”

“I trust Sister Ye’s character, steady as an anchor.”

“If you really trust me, don’t check in the first place!” Her words flew like arrows.

Liu RuoYuan laughed, bright as a lantern. “Sharp clapback.”

Annoyance fizzled like soda. Your face didn’t say that; it sat stiff as clay.

Yekase tossed her bag into the corner like a stray leaf, collapsed on the floor, and started scrolling, thumb a small river.

Unease pricked like needles. Today the exogenous beings felt quiet, like ponds before dawn. Did those robots know to rest? Or did they move, and Ling Nuo Si shut himself in and missed it?

If it’s the latter, Yekase had to go out, sparrow‑like, and scout the gutters for clues.

“I’m going for a walk,” she said, voice light as wind.

“Mm‑hmm, be back before dinner…” Steam‑scented promise hung like mist.

“Yeah.”

The apartment was small; the unused kitchen ran along the entry hall like a narrow stream. Passing behind Liu RuoYuan, she saw a tablet propped by the stove, night news glowing like a moth to glass.

Night News: No incidents today.

She went downstairs, rolled out her e‑bike, and slapped the key onto the pad, the click like a pebble dropped into a pond.

[Credential acknowledged. Welcome, my lord!]

Optical camo on, like fog dressing a ghost. Roll out!

[Awning! Showing! Rolling! Going!]

Girl and bike bled from sight, melting into the city’s neon like rain.

She didn’t notice: Liu RuoYuan stood on the shared corridor by their door, a quiet night watch, looking down as she pushed the [Infiltrator] from the shed and vanished into light.

“You still... became a hero, didn’t you.” Her words fell like ash.

She wasn’t surprised by Yekase’s secrecy. In this era, heroes are loved like festival lanterns, but power sits elsewhere like a sealed vault. Self‑protection is a hero’s first rule.

Last night, she’d watched Yekase type in secret, cat‑silent in the dark.

Yekase favored the nine‑grid input, keeping finger travel short like stepping‑stones, avoiding mis‑taps.

Because of those clean pauses to choose words, you can reconstruct her finger trail with care, like tracking pollen drifting on air.

She tapped the most repeated trail on her own phone. The word she got was—

[Magical Girl].

Quickly, Liu RuoYuan pictured Yekase stepping forward to protect citizens, transforming into a Magical Girl under starlight. And her body changed because of it, like a river taking a new course.

So that’s why it’s hard to speak? The thought floated like a feather.

Perfectly reasonable. No problem, logic stacking like bricks.

Why a Magical Girl rides a motorcycle instead of a dreamlike broom, and why no mascot trails her, Liu RuoYuan couldn’t guess. Clouds keep their own secrets.

Maybe love of machines turned the broom into a transforming bike, and the mascot is invisible to ordinary eyes, like wind.

Convinced, she went back and continued cooking, steam curling like pale ghosts.

By then, Yekase had zipped several kilometers and hit the ring road, a comet on asphalt. She’d promised a dinner‑time return; a fast loop on the expressway was quickest.

Summer hadn’t fully left; the cool evening wind felt kind, like mint water. She’d rushed, helmetless; wind poured into her eyes, yet no sting. A thin energy film lay over them like glass. Again, she felt her body wasn’t ordinary anymore.

She wasn’t the type to mope about “must stay human” or “live plain.” If mechanical ascension stood before her like an open sky, she’d accept with a smile.

“All clear here, too…” Lights held steady like constellations.

She pulled over near an off‑ramp and stretched. A small rise gave height, letting her look down over the city lights, a sea of fireflies.

Yekase held the rail, savoring a brief rest, breath settling like dust.

A scene both noisy and still, like a river under the moon.

Hope flickered like a firefly. Did it really quiet down?

“Alidaus?” The name rose like a spark.

Detected an enemy intruding the differential‑closed universe. Annihilation commencing. The voice dropped like iron into a well.

Shock hit her like a drum. She snapped her gaze around, but found no source.

No—the source was... below, like thunder under floorboards!

[Celestial Speech], Levitation Spell!

Yekase vaulted the rail and dropped like a hawk.

Below lay a green path like a city park. She landed softly in the trees and looked up. Two figures faced off like chess pieces.

On the right stood Alidaus, rigid as steel.

On the left, a girl in a dress with sword and shield—familiar as a half‑remembered song, yet nameless.

“The long night draws near; the stars’ prayers will become a blade that cleaves the darkness—”

“Even alone, facing a night no bridge can span—”

Wait, aren’t your chants a bit too similar? Caution tightened like a sash. Yekase held back, watching them charge for a beam clash.

“—carve a path that blazes with light!”

“—light up hope for all sorrow!”

Golden and amber pillars rammed together mid‑air, like rams on a ridge.

Quickly, the left‑side Magical Girl faltered; her dimmer beam yielded, then broke. She was hurled away like a leaf.

“Ugh…”

She dropped to her knees and coughed blood, red as hibiscus.

It looked bad, clouds boiling on the horizon.

Should I help? That Magical Girl... feels like the third generation with a lost name. Even now, Yekase couldn’t recall her tag. Suspicious as fog.

Forget it. The enemy of my enemy is my ally! Resolve snapped like flint.

After a heartbeat of weighing, Yekase sprang from the brush and stood between them, a line drawn across the road.

Alidaus showed no surprise. Her right hand clenched air; four floating cannons regrouped at her sides like stern satellites.

Her face stayed robotic and stiff, a mask carved from stone—

“Prison of Time.”

Yekase took it as a cue to attack and darted forward, but felt no pressure approaching, like wind missing the sail.

Then she remembered the fallen girl. She turned. A huge golden birdcage dropped from the sky, swallowing the girl whole like dusk falling.

“So the target is still her!”

This cut‑throat way of fighting— A guess took shape in Yekase’s mind like frost on glass.

Gold flickered on the cage. Chains bloomed from air around it, coiling the bars—then vanished.

Chains, cage, girl—gone, candle snuffed.

…!

Hostage taken... I could barely win before; with a hostage, what now? Dread pressed like a storm front.

At this point, there’s only one way, a single bridge across deep water.

Use the ultimate move—Yekase’s home turf. Talk, tongue as blade.

“Alidaus, let’s talk,” her voice went out like a soft rain.

A laser answered, skimming her ear. Yekase tilted her head by a hair and stayed steady, bamboo in wind.

“Do we really need to fight? Tell me why you hate me—hate the Twenty Second Squad—this much. Maybe it’s a misunderstanding.” Her words spread like olive branches.

She kept trying. She spread her hands, showing no weapon, palms open like white sails.

“….”

“That’s a shame. Then I’ll lay out my guess,” she said, calm as water.

Yekase raised one finger, like a lit match.

“Until now, besides skill chants, you’ve only said one thing—”

“When asked, you instantly stated your codename. Oz Floating Disc. Five times.”

She hopped onto the Oz Floating Disc, evading the laser stream like a silver fish, and kept talking:

“I think it mirrors my weight on names. You show traits of me, Ivaris, and Ling Nuo Si. All obvious, all on the surface, like stamped sigils.”

“So who are you—no, what are you?”

“….”

The float cannons locked onto Yekase mid‑air, weaving a net to leave her nowhere to run, spiders stitching sky.

“Alidaus. You’re the product of exogenous beings wandering the void, observing us, aren’t you?”

...The cannons paused for a heartbeat, birds mid‑wing.

A cerulean curtain of fire swept around Yekase, shearing off the lasers like rain. She landed safe.

“I’m late.” The voice came cool as a cloud.

Ling Nuo Si stepped to Yekase’s side, presence like shade under pines.

“Can you still fight? Aren’t you afraid Ling Yi will forget you, too?”

“Afraid. Terribly. But…” Courage kindled like embers.

She adjusted her combat gloves, flexed her fingers, then set her stance like a rooted pine.

“Power that isn’t used when it’s needed has no meaning, like a sealed blade.”

“Then pray it’s me who forgets you this time,” he murmured, smoke losing its trail.

With Ling Nuo Si beside her, confidence rekindled like a campfire. She had nothing to transform; mask and jacket didn’t matter. She just weighed her dagger like a feather.

“Right. Before we start, one last question.”

Yekase smiled, tilted her head, and asked, voice clear as a bell:

“Alidaus, tell me. That kidnapped girl—what’s her codename?”

“…Codename, ‘Lalabel.’”

Snap!

Yekase snapped her fingers, sound crisp as ice.

Ling Nuo Si didn’t know why. If the enemy held a hostage, you beat her and save the hostage; what’s a name for here? The question fluttered like a moth.

“Lalabel—‘The Eternal Cradle.’”

“I don’t know how she survived... but now, the Magical Girls are complete.” The circle closed like a ring of gold.

In that instant, her aura changed, weather turning on a dime.

Skilled in Mind Energy, Ling Nuo Si caught it at once. He looked in surprise. A scarf had coiled around her slender neck.

Not fabric, but living Flash Energy, rippling and burning in the dark—a vivid red scarf!

Its two long tails moved without wind, snapping in the air behind her like twin tails.

Yekase’s lips moved, whispering a string of names like beads through fingers.

Ivaris... Winter Moon... Aura... Rainbow... Shanon... No. 1... Super No. 1... V2...

So, you never left, footprints kept beneath new snow.

“I feel you by my side.”

A red‑and‑silver vortex wrapped her. When she showed again, she wore a sailor uniform white as snow, white ankle boots, black stockings up to mid‑thigh.

“Same as the one opposite... except the scarf... exactly the same?” Ling Nuo Si gasped, shock cracking like lightning.

Under cold moonlight, Yekase’s face wore a thin glaze of frost, calm and solemn.

Even her expression mirrored the other, twins in a pond.

Her presence, her inner flow of energy—she felt reborn in a blink. In the whole year of war, Ling Nuo Si had never seen twin Magical Girls like these.

“I witnessed the war’s dawn and dusk, every fight and every sacrifice. I’m the creator, the refiner, the watcher of Magical Girls.”

“I am... the Magical Girl Chronicle.”

Alidaus still attacked. Four floating cannons fired lasers in unison, spears rushing like hail.

Yekase folded her arms. From the void beside her, four counter‑lasers fired with millimeter precision. Gold and red—eight lines met mid‑air like colliding tides and vanished.

“Face the originals, impostor,” she said, her voice tolling like a bell.