News that the Blaze Bandit Crew had struck a deal with the Elven Kingdom spread like a pebble tossed into a storm-swept lake, ripples racing across the Chaoslands.
Adventurers cheered, smiles blooming like campfires at dusk; with a simple toll left behind, they could reach Rainbow Valley safe and sound.
Other crews soured, their envy gnawing like hungry wolves. Part of them admired the Blaze crew’s move—hooking a towering patron in the Elven Kingdom. Part of them choked on jealousy at the wealth that followed, while their own turf grew hard to plunder.
So several bandit chiefs whispered in the dark, plotting an alliance. While the Blaze Bandit Crew rose like a noon sun, they’d strike together and scrub them out of the Chaoslands.
Strangely, Crimson Paradise kept silent. The group that usually teemed with activity pulled every agent out of the Chaoslands, leaving the wind to rustle their absence.
The chiefs didn’t stop on account of Crimson Paradise. Even with daggers hidden behind smiles, they pushed a vanguard into the night. From four directions, shadows poured toward the Blaze crew’s domain.
But whether it was Skull Blade or the Bloodhand Syndicate, their night-raiders vanished the instant they stepped across the line.
By dawn, when the follow-up squads arrived, they faced a sight that made hearts stumble.
Morning light bled with the rosy breath of the east, and shadows stretched long across a valley once ruled by chaos. Not only branches cast lines—there stood ranks of statues, chiseled clean from stone.
Each carving was lifelike, preserving the last flicker of shock on “living” faces as if time itself had frozen mid-gasp. Familiar features. Those statues were their missing night raiders, sealed in silence.
All of it was Breeze’s handiwork.
Wan Han had stripped away part of her power, so Breeze’s petrification wasn’t permanent anymore. Even so, turning brigands to stone for a few months was child’s play for the World Tree Maiden.
To make an example and cow the pack—without spooking the little monkey—Breeze followed Yue Liuyi’s orders. She petrified only bodies, leaving clothes and weapons untouched.
It worked like a charm. Faced with their petrified vanguard, the raiders didn’t rush to rescue—they stripped their “comrades” first.
Gemmed necklaces, gold watches, enchanted blades—bright spoils winked like lures in a river. The reinforcements came from different crews, and greed broke like a fever. The mission to assault the Blaze Bandit Crew vanished in a heartbeat. Money was right there, gleaming. What bandit could pretend not to see?
The alliance hadn’t even begun its purge of the Blaze crew before it imploded from within. Those who grabbed loot smiled like cats with cream, eager to stash their winnings. Those who didn’t felt the cold creep in; they feared turning to stone next, feared becoming a shame carved in granite.
The “united” bandit army dissolved like mist in sunlight.
By noon, the valley bristled with statues—men frozen in all sorts of poses. Dark stone flashed in the sun like scales on a serpent; a grim “philosophical” chill seeped through the forest, making even men feel their skin crawl.
Crueler than death, this was. No one dared stir the Blaze Bandit Crew again. Bandits were never the most united; now they scattered like leaves in a storm.
And so the Blaze Bandit Crew secured its hold on the Chaoslands’ patchwork turf.
“I didn’t expect my little Yue to be this sharp!”
Dixue scooped Yue Liuyi up and set her on her lap, arms curling from the side to gather the blue-haired girl whole. The silver-haired girl pressed her cheek to Yue’s forehead, nuzzling and swaying, happiness fluttering like a tame dove.
“Of course. I worked on this plan for a long time.”
Ever since the World Tree’s secret realm, Yue Liuyi had sketched this out in her heart. Seeing it succeed, joy rose inside her like spring water.
“Looks like little Yue’s the type who shines when it counts.”
“I shine on ordinary days too.”
“Huh? On ordinary days as well…?”
“Shine… doing what?”
“Pushing little Yue down?”
“How did we get to pushing me down!”
“Didn’t you say you’re capable on ordinary days too?”
“That’s not what I meant!!!!”
With the plan humming along, the girls on the Skyship let out long breaths and loosened their shoulders.
Especially Ailuna. The heavy cast on the pink-haired girl’s face thinned like fog in the sun. If the Chaoslands could drift toward legal, ordered trade, a World Tree Maiden like her would carry much less weight.
Maybe one day, Ailuna could move freely without cuffs biting her wrists.
Only Xiang Xiaoyan looked the slightest bit sour. To reach Rainbow Valley, the black-haired girl had already transformed, itching for a grand, clean slaughter. Passing through the Chaoslands without a fight left her unsatisfied, like a blade denied its whetstone.
Yet San Hua Zhi, her ally, knew Xiaoyan’s restless heart and read what she wanted today.
“Lady Xiaoyan, let’s spar again tonight.”
“Oh… little Zhi, you want to be roughed up by me again?”
“This time… I won’t lose.”
And so the big bedroom’s wrestling slot—actual grappling, no yuri shenanigans—was booked by Xiang Xiaoyan and San Hua Zhi.
Sikong Qinhui still hadn’t woken, not only from wounds to her body but blows to her spirit. Maria said the girl carried old injuries and had pushed power far beyond what her frame could bear more than once.
It’s a miracle she’s breathing now.
With the Skyship’s advanced medical gear, Maria was mending the redhead’s lingering damage bit by bit. The pace was slow, but the tide had turned toward good.
Dixue kept Sikong Qinhui’s identity from the Blaze Bandit Crew. Those knots couldn’t be untied in a few words.
Xia Jiajun could finally get out of bed and walk. The black-haired girl clearly wasn’t used to her body; her steps wobbled like a foal’s. If not for Zero Wei’s arm, she’d have eaten the floor a dozen times.
A life never lived, an identity never worn. To guide the lost girl, the one who came was the catkin with a boy’s gender lens inside a girl’s body—Zaocun.
Zaocun took up the role of soul mentor with a grin. “A girl hugging left and right isn’t wrong!” “Girls should be the bold ones!” “A girl who flirts blooms with charm!”
Her words were a jumble, but that catkin spark and open laughter seeped in. The black-haired girl’s hard-set face softened; a smile finally perched at the corner of her mouth.
Watching, Yue Liuyi nodded to herself, quiet as dew.
Back on the Sky Voyager, it was Xia Jiajun who locked Zaocun away to chase the Rainbow Spell-Bullet, setting off everything that followed.
Now it had become this.
Barely two months had passed, yet it felt like years slipping through an old pine’s needles.
And I… I’m finally—almost—at my destination…
Outside the window ahead, beyond a tree-shouldered ridge, a meadow emerald with dew unfurled into the blue-haired girl’s sight.
The breath of life there was different from the Chaoslands, green rising like a tide.
“Rainbow Valley… we’re here.”
Smiling toward the distance, Yue Liuyi spoke, her voice light as a breeze.
