Hearing the old officer’s words, the young officer went quiet, like wind knocked out of a paper lantern. The old man wasn’t wrong. They had nothing real to do. Sometimes rich families called them to find cats and dogs—hours of blind searching, while a Magic Maiden could do it in minutes, as if plucking threads from a loom.
It was the same with fighting crime. They needed teams, budgets, and favors, grinding gears like a waterwheel. A stronger Magic Maiden was an army of one, cutting through trouble like a sharp crescent moon. In every way, they couldn’t compete.
There was a cyborg policy now, sure, but the cost was a viper on the wallet. A single arm could run tens or hundreds of thousands. Monthly maintenance chewed a salary like a leech.
The trend was clear: Magic Maidens and cyborgs swept in like a spring flood, and ordinary people were left standing on mud. Even if you stayed put, you saw immortals duel across sky and ground. When disaster struck, a commoner was just straw in the storm. Meet Monsters, and you couldn’t fight or flee—like feet stuck in clay.
The young officer felt the cold first, then doubt, like frost creeping over a window. He watched the old officer, forty and already mapping the next twenty years, and wondered at twenty-five if he had chosen right. This path had no future and no fortune, like a road that met the sea and stopped.
Night Frost pricked up her ears, curiosity flickering like a moth. Bold talk. Weren’t they afraid the District Twenty One branch would hear? Say too much against Magic Maidens in public and you’d be dragged in for a few days, cooled like tea left out.
That officer was clearly part of a patrol under a Magic Maiden’s banner, and here he was picking at that banner like a loose thread.
The forty-year-old was a child of the old policy, a livelihood built like a bowl that didn’t break. Live long, and the title grew with you like moss on stone. The young one had also followed family hands onto the path, but this age turned the sky, and ordinary folks struggled to move even an inch.
Maybe that was the sorrow of this era’s common folk, a drizzle that never stopped.
Night Frost ate her fried skewers in quiet, oil shining like little suns. She glanced at Zhao Qingsnow and the Old Woman. They knew the tide was inevitable. The Twelfth District wasn’t growing as fast as District Twenty One, but the same swell seemed to be forming.
To grow power, they made policies to cultivate Magic Maidens, raising more, folding them into factions till the pot boiled over. The surplus could only go freelance, and the market flooded like a river in autumn rain.
The Twelfth District was trying to fix it, but leave external problems untended, and internal demand would snowball, rolling bigger with every turn. In time, it would become that kind of region that drove out the so-called waste and kept only high-grade talent, like sorting grain under a ruthless sieve.
Those driven out gathered like fallen leaves, forming new outside forces and border groups. External pressure pressed harder, and internal demand for Magic Maidens rose like a fever. The vicious cycle spun without end.
Right then, a breeze slipped through the street, and a girl in a pale pink dress appeared by the two officers, light as a petal. She tilted her face and squinted her pale pink eyes, heart-shaped pupils shaded like clouds crossing the moon, upper and lower lashes kissing, her gaze slightly misted.
She watched them in silence, a still lake under dawn. The officers didn’t dare meet her eyes. No doubt—she was their superior. She happened to be patrolling, and, just as neatly, had heard every word.
“I’ll let you off this time. But… as for you, will you walk to the cell, or shall I?” Her voice fell soft as silk and cut just as clean.
She looked at the young officer, deciding he was fresh enough to spare like new rice in the pot. The old officer, though—she had no intention of going easy. He wouldn’t see the street again for days, maybe half a month, like a door closed and latched.
Night Frost—and half the street—aimed their eyes at the officers’ table, pretending to be stars that noticed nothing. She chewed skewers and sipped her drink, comfort blooming like steam. This place grilled well; the skewers and melon were both sweet. She’d come again.
The girl let her gaze drift around, a slow river finding banks. It touched Night Frost and lingered, feeling the air about her like a scent caught on wind. Then she pulled it back and smiled at everyone, words falling easy as rain.
“Official business. If you don’t want to go in too, look away.”
Her eyes brightened, lanterns lit. People, Night Frost included, pulled their gaze back, like curtains drawn. She’d used magic. Her spirit was strong, guiding attention with invisible lines. She hadn’t really touched Night Frost, but Night Frost played along like a reed in the breeze.
Seeing nothing amiss, the girl nodded and moved on, steps quiet as silk.
Originally, the youth palace promised a lovely holiday, a sun that should have rested at home. Then her superior sent an urgent message—sharp as a bell.
A group of highly dangerous Magic Maidens might have entered District Twenty One carrying a Key whose energy rivaled Cantata Three. All Order Keepers were to tighten the net.
There wasn’t much detail. The Key-bearer was an Old Woman over sixty, adept with earth element, and she had companions. District Twenty One’s Magic Maidens would focus on unknown, outsider Magic Maidens, as clouds watch for strange winds.
Upper levels weren’t even sure they were in District Twenty One—“suspected” was all they could say. One could imagine the disaster a Key holding Cantata Three Mana might bring to the district, like thunder bottled wrong.
Ten thousand things won’t frighten you; it’s the one mischance that does. With that in mind, everyone mobilized, a forest of spears lifting.
But District Twenty One was vast—more than twice the Twelfth District—searching for two or three people was a needle lost in the sea. Magic Maiden Mana was hard to hide, but Magic Tools and devices existed that masked it, smoke over water.
Officially, District Twenty One had only two more Cantata Two Magic Maidens than the Twelfth District, yet the work was twice as heavy, a load on a single cart.
The girl swept with her senses. Everyone looked normal, a field of regular crops. Except that table—something there tugged at her, a fish biting line. She’d ask, use her ability, and she wouldn’t be the one to lose.
She walked toward Night Frost, pink eyes narrowing like blades. Night Frost felt a chill run her spine, frost along bark. She stuffed her mouth with skewers. Someone had put a mark on her.
Night Frost feigned calm, then hid the mana-masking device deeper in her pocket, buried under her decoy wallet, like a pebble under sand.
Zhao Qingsnow and the Old Woman were talking shop. Seeing the girl approach, they clipped the topic, switching to small talk—what they’d done, what they’d eaten, how they’d been—leaves over stone.
But Night Frost felt the knot first, then fear, a tightening string. She couldn’t be exposed on the first day here, over a meal—the smuggled life would be too bitter, like tea boiled dry.
A long pale arm pressed lightly onto Night Frost’s shoulder, skin bare under a strap dress, warmth laid on her like a hand over a stove. Her heart thumped, a drum caught by surprise. She steadied, letting a thread of fear show on her face, and turned toward the pink-eyed girl’s gaze.
“Excuse me… is there something? And please don’t do that.”
Night Frost leaned back and deliberately knocked over the plate behind her. Grilled eggplant flipped, glass noodles raining onto the floor like silver rain.
“Look at me, honestly.”
The girl narrowed her eyes, watching Night Frost wipe thin strands from her skirt, patience curling like smoke. Her voice came slow, and faint Mana rose off her like mist. Spirit Threads slipped out, and inside Night Frost’s open channels they wove a gorgeous picture, a tapestry shown to a mind.
Night Frost’s raised arm froze midair, a kite caught without wind.
At the next table, Zhao Qingsnow and the Old Woman felt their hearts climb into their throats, deer at the edge of a field. They could sense the girl was a deft hand in the mental domain. If Night Frost started to spill, they’d move, grab Night Frost and Kaneko, and run.
If they couldn’t run… then may she find her own blessing, like a traveler asking the road for mercy.
Deep in Night Frost’s mind, a blaze of Crimson Gold Flame flared, a sun struck from iron. As Spirit Threads entered, the fire grew, licking higher.
Night Frost’s condensed spirit figure crawled out of the flame, a tiny self lit by embers. The Spirit Threads saw it and swarmed, a flock toward a target. That was Night Frost’s spirit body, and their mark.
She’d already learned the Crimson Gold Flame’s trait: extra harm to soul and spirit, a lesson won in the Human Secret Realm. She’d never taken a mental hit till now; she hadn’t expected the flame to change like this, letting her see her own spirit body, bright as a moth in light.
The threads aimed to touch her spirit body. Night Frost could steer it away, a fish dodging nets. But that couldn’t last. The pink-eyed girl would sense something off, a ripple against calm water.
Let the threads touch, and Night Frost felt ripping pain, cloth torn across the grain. A bit of spirit leaked out, dust on wind. That was bad for the spirit body. Worse, the threads tried to puppet her spirit. The spirit body must never be caught.
Run and you were found. Stay and you were seized. In her tightness she caught a notion, a spark in the dark—lead the threads deeper, into the soul’s depth. There, a sleeping soul lay, just a small smear, yet stronger than Night Frost’s soul by far.
Be discovered, or be controlled. She chose a third path, even if it woke the Black Dragon’s soul. Sometimes, too much thinking knots the rope. You pick a road and walk.
Her spirit pushed through layers of soul like mist through pines, and she saw a vast fissure, a canyon inside night. She tugged the threads and drew them into it, a tide sliding into a trench.
Then Night Frost’s soul returned to its place, a moon back to center.
The pink-eyed girl spoke, her voice soft as velvet. People around her grew drowsy, guards dropping like leaves.
“What’s your name?”
“Ling Shuang.”
Night Frost’s pupils dimmed, a shade under shallow brown lenses. You couldn’t see it, but the girl felt the tug—Night Frost’s spirit had been caught by her pull like fish on line. A normal person wouldn’t resist her question. Even a Magic Maiden, once caught on purpose, could only speak truth.
“Why did you come to District Twenty One?”
Zhao Qingsnow and the others felt their hearts rise again, hands ready, blades in sleeves.
“To travel. To see what District Twenty One is like. I heard it’s nice, with the largest artificial lake on the surface. They say the scenery’s good…”
