Jiang Bailu said the organizers wanted Yekase to carry a mini camera for aerial shots. Their leader claimed that young lady was great at high‑speed flight.

How would she know? Yekase couldn’t figure it out. She hadn’t thought a casual zip through the sky would be spotted by that madwoman. In truth, that afternoon almost every radar in East China pinged a fast‑moving object.

Then let’s film. The Gobi’s sky is wide like an ocean; I do want to try flying.

Yekase took the tiny camera from Jiang Bailu and strapped it to the head of the Polaris Staff, bright metal like a north star pinned to a spear.

They stood by the rally start, tents breathing like sleeping beasts, waiting for the official start time. Ling Yi couldn’t help herself and ran to ogle the cars. Staff bustled like ants under sun‑bleached canvas; the two idlers felt out of place.

Is flying really that fun? Jiang Bailu watched Yekase fish a yellow ski goggle from a small sling bag, the plastic shining like butter.

At least beats spinach.

Ahem, ahem.

It feels like slipping the leash of gravity, like dropping a stone thought. Better than street racing—three times… no, five.

Jiang shook her head. Last time you took me up, I only felt weightless terror, like falling through a hollow moon.

That’s because I was carrying you. You didn’t control your own body. Weightlessness is a playstyle, but it’s not flight’s essence.

With goggles oversized, Yekase looked a bit goofy and rakish, like a fox wearing glass. She pulled out the plastic mouth shield under the goggles—a guard so air doesn’t flood your mouth at high speed. Wearing it now looked silly, so she tucked it back, the clear piece glinting like ice.

Got a model number?

Bought it at Decathlon.

Yekase chuckled; eyes were crescent moons under the goggles, twin boats on a black lake.

Pretty slick, right? I got sets for you and Shen Shanshan. They’re at home. I’ll teach you flight; it’s easy.

…Sure.

Jiang didn’t really grasp “shedding gravity” or “body control,” mist and wind in her head, but sharing a thing with the Doctor made her happy.

But teach me alone.

Okay, okay.

Rice Rice unfurled from Yekase’s back, a shadow‑green vine wrapping her shoulders and arms into a thick windbreaking mantle, like a field cloak spun from stalks. Yekase flipped up the big hood and grinned.

Time to stack some buffs.

Right hand gripping the Polaris Staff, her short legs pumped like pistons and drumsticks, sprinting across the field.

At top speed she sprang forward, a deer over scrub. One step, one word, chanting in rhythm:

Celestial Speech, continuous, Flight Spell!

Then, like a kid pretending to ride a broom, she clamped the iron staff between her legs, a broomstick under a blood‑red cape.

Earth’s gravity stopped mattering; anchors cut, ropes free.

She slipped, soundless, into the night, a raven feather vanishing beyond the lights.

She wore no witch hat or robe, yet the black corseted dress was mystery enough, a midnight river at her waist. Her red cloak glinted in the dim beyond the spotlights like embers under ash.

Jiang Bailu watched her weave through the shafts of light, a dappled shadow in a forest of beams, a swallow threading lanterns.

She suddenly thought: if witches truly exist, one floats before her eyes, a flame moth in a windless cave.

She was joy itself, wind itself, free.

—Bailu!

That happy, free little witch (age twenty‑seven) reached a hand to Jiang Bailu, still shackled to the ground like a rock under moss.

Eh…

Jiang thought she wanted a passing high‑five, and blankly reached out. Then the earth peeled away from her feet like a raft cut loose.

Aaaaah—?!

Weightlessness scares you, yeah? Then you should adapt even more!

This is retaliation—petty revenge!!

She tried to struggle, but one glance down turned the staffers into ants marching on a gray plain. Her whole self shrank; frozen stiff, she dared not move, a rabbit under hawk shadow.

What are you two playing at?

Ling Yi appeared, wearing Gale, like a gust cutting through canvas and dust.

Whoa, hand‑in‑hand flight—romantic! Count me in!

Ling Yi grabbed Jiang’s free hand. Two cargo planes, left and right, escorted a shaking woman in a lab coat, frolicking above the rally camp like cranes over a river.

Jiang screamed herself hoarse. Put me down! Put me down! You maniacs, you creeps!

What? Wind’s too loud—I can’t hear you!

Yekase dug at her other ear and shouted, a sparrow yelling at a storm.

She says it’s not fast enough—!

Ling Yi kindly slid a floating shield in front of Jiang Bailu, glass‑smooth air easing the gale like a clear wall.

Why wait for some future chance? Learn flight now. Free lesson!

I d‑don’t—

Her terror‑clogged mind lurched, like gears catching; nothing actually broken. Her voice dropped by half, a reed in a pond.

…fine… I guess…

Ling Yi flashed a thumbs‑up behind her, a candle wick in the dark.

What do I do? Imagine a pair of wings…?

The woman who got more unhinged after Yekase retired turned back into the clueless assistant, meek as a sparrow on a wire.

Don’t make it complicated. Believe you can float. Spin three times up here. Swallow three mouthfuls of air. Then shout Flight Spell, and you’ll have it.

Believing I can float is way harder than imagining wings!

You’ve never dreamed of flying? Sim it! We’re letting go!

Wait! I’m not ready—

—Let go.

AaaaAAAAAA—?!

A tsunami of weightlessness swallowed Jiang Bailu in an instant, a black wave over a beach. She felt herself drop into the maw of an ancient beast; her body no longer hers, like a dropped puppet. Cold fear scoured her thoughts clean, winter water through reeds.

Turn! Bailu! Turn!

You got this!

Ah… Eh…

Luckily, when they tossed her, they gave her an initial spin, a coin flicked skyward. Even frozen, her body traced a slow pirouette, a leaf caught in an eddy. One turn, two… three.

Good, start swallowing!

Doctor, wording!

Ling Yi griped, a laugh in the wind. Seeing Jiang still locked in free‑fall panic, her thrusters spat two red spears of light, boosting to swing below and catch her, a crane scooping a falling chick.

If this were a cartoon, Jiang’s eyes would be spirals. Her mouth hung open like a fish’s.

Swallow… swallow what?

From very far away the Doctor’s voice floated over like a buoy bell on fog water. Right—she said…

Gulp.

She forced down one mouthful of air, cold as pond glass.

Then a second, rough as sand.

Her throat burned; nausea rose like a tide over rocks.

The third—

—Flight Spell aaaaaah!!

Her scream hadn’t even finished; the furious spin of the world had already stopped, a top stilled by a finger.

Everything felt like someone pressed pause. As if it had always been this way—suddenly, it was still, like snow under moon.

She felt the night breeze on her face, edged with early‑winter chill, a blade of frost.

Mountains, tents, lamp posts…

Were upside down, stars under feet.

…

Eh?

Congrats. You can fly now.

Yekase drifted up from below… no, from above? She was a lantern fish in black water.

Congrats. You nailed it first try.

Ling Yi floated in from above… no, that side was below, a kite crossing lines.

Congratulations!

Clap clap clap clap! They applauded, hands like little wings, sound like rain on tin.

Oh, so I’m inverted…

She breathed out; logic returned like a sunrise and found the right answer. Next heartbeat, she realized she wasn’t touching anything—no wall, no ground, not even their hands. Air held her like a quiet lake.

In that instant, there was only her between heaven and earth, a single reed in wind.

…I can fly?

Longest reflex arc ever.

Yekase laughed, caught her hand, and whipped her a clean 180 in midair—back to head‑up, feet‑down, a compass needle snapping north.

How’s it feel?

Jiang kicked her legs. They met nothing, strokes in empty sea.

Light… my body’s light. Like I could go anywhere.

Then good. Now, drop back down, grab a Coke from the tent, cool your heart. Carve this feeling into the deepest groove of memory. In every day or night stolen by the exploiters, let it prove you’re still you.

Yekase left Jiang Bailu hanging, mounted the Polaris Staff—no joke, like a witch from a real story, not a lab‑coat researcher zigzagging the sky—and arrowed off toward the Gobi’s depths, a red comet over black dunes.

She just had to show off… Ling muttered, a grin under breath. I don’t understand magic at all. Your blue bar okay? If you drop halfway, that’s scary.

Mm… I’ve got a faint sense telling me how much endurance I’ve got left, a wick’s length in the dark.

You really do? The Doctor once told me there’s no warning when your blue runs dry. I thought the magic system was cruel. Turns out her spirit‑sight’s low. Same as me.

They looked at the figure who’d somehow hung a Dancing Light on herself, scattering like a firefly in the night, sparks on velvet.

Both Sorcery and Mind Energy aptitude that bad…?

Jiang had asked Yekase why not learn more magic, especially those quick, convenient evocations for attack, lightning in a fist. Yekase always brushed it off with “mechanic’s pride,” “I’m clerical”—excuses thin as rice paper. She learned only a Flame Burst Spell, and rarely showed it—the true reason was this, huh?

A superlong blue bar converted from Flash Energy can’t make up for poor efficiency. Pile numbers to the limit to match someone else’s single shot—wasted motion, sand poured into wind. And the world isn’t only magic. So she settled for a few cantrips, and turned to Ancient Alchemy, the craft that doesn’t eat talent, mortar and flame.

When talent shuts a door, a window opens. If two doors slam, you can pry loose a whole wall—and become a genius in something else, river finding a new bed.

Sorcery and Mind Energy, the wills of “struggle” and “survival,” Western and Eastern public Infinite Power, two currents in one sea.

If not for meeting Flash Energy, Yekase might have been just a normal, ill‑suited person, living a mostly failed life under oppression, a kite with no wind.

…Possibility.

Probability, observation, possibility—words that come up all the time in Flash Energy research, dice under lamps.

Only now does Jiang Bailu, with her own eyes, see possibility given a body, an idea wearing wings.

Under a galaxy untouched by light pollution, that silhouette outshone anyone, anything, a bright stroke on black silk. So beautiful it almost brought her to tears, salt on a cold night.