Chapter 121: Beneath the Light Column

In the city center of Fang Ting, beneath a purple-black light curtain, the battle among the magic girls had been raging for a long time, entering a phase of intense confrontation.

A massive, silkworm-cocoon-like flesh mass floated within the light curtain, with a huge, mangled beast head protruding from its top, continuously spewing purple-black magical breath toward the surrounding ground.

This magic possessed extreme corrosiveness, causing any surface it touched to corrode; the city center's districts had become a complete mess, utterly unrecognizable from their former prosperity.

The only thing worth being grateful for was that on the night of the Full Moon Festival, the commercial district in the city center had not gathered many people; the very few pedestrians present had chosen to flee upon sensing danger, so few civilians were caught up in the scene.

Above the district turned into scorched earth, light blue, magenta-purple, and light green magic were entangled with that mangled beast.

"Xiaolu, this mangled beast is on a completely different level from previous opponents; it is an enemy none of you have encountered until now. Its evolution tier should have already reached the Pupa Stage!"

Perched on Lin Xiaolu's shoulder, Moke raised his voice over the wind pressure:

"The Pupa Stage is different from the ordinary mangled beasts we usually encounter; their bodies have a structure called a pupal shell. If the magic output cannot exceed its tolerance limit, you will never be able to damage it!"

"You also know knowledge about mangled beasts?" Lin Xiaolu narrowly dodged a streak of purple-black magic, yet her face showed no sign of tension.

"Now you're questioning that?" Moke raised his voice.

"No, how should I put it, I just feel... a bit surprised?"

"Now is not the time to talk about such things! If this continues, even if your magic is completely exhausted, you still won't be able to hurt it!"

"Okay, okay, I know, I know!"

Lin Xiaolu responded loudly while flying at high speed in the air: "Anyway, we just need to blast the shell on its surface, right? Just like that annoying uncle we met at Fuli Academy before!"

"This guy is much stronger than that barbaric thug!" Moke corrected.

"Whatever, the us of now is far different from before! We've thought carefully about the relevant plans during normal times!"

Lin Xiaolu raised her hand and signaled to Xia Liang: "Xia Liang!"

"I know!"

Following Lin Xiaolu's call and Xia Liang's response, several mirror surfaces shimmered with light, rotating and moving to surround the mangled beast in the center. Magic of different colors converged from the hands of the three magic girls onto the mirror surfaces. After a brief circulation, they focused and aimed directly at the mangled beast's head.

"Bai Jingxuan!"

"Okay!"

The magic girl with a green single ponytail spread her arms, and the small box she had been clutching suddenly opened. A light and agile melody rang out, causing the magic streams being transmitted to the mirror surfaces, which were already quite powerful, to instantly become even more surging.

This was Bai Jingxuan's magic armor, named Heavenly Sound.

Its ability is to play different melodies through resonance control of magic, and depending on differences in the melody's rhythm, tune, and timbre, it will produce different effects on surrounding things.

Because the time since awakening and development was still short, Bai Jingxuan had only developed two uses for it: activating limbs and activating magic.

The former could accelerate the body's self-healing and recovery abilities, or consume a certain amount of energy to improve a person's physical performance; the latter, just as she was doing now, could activate magic by driving the magic armor to play music in the most unadorned way, making the magic more active and restless.

Precisely because of this, she could make the magic originally gathered at Xia Liang's magic armor mirror surface become even more surging.

One week ago, under the joint guidance of Hong Siyu and Xia Liang, Bai Jingxuan completed the blooming of her Bud-level ability and obtained her magic armor.

At that time, she neither fully understood her magic armor's abilities nor mastered the method of using it, so she kept a little trick up her sleeve, putting this matter aside and not telling Senior Cuique.

According to her original thought, she actually wanted to wait until Senior Cuique returned to tell her this face-to-face, giving Senior Cuique a surprise while letting the other person praise her properly.

The others had also guessed Bai Jingxuan's little trick, so they deliberately did not expose it, unanimously refraining from mentioning this matter to Senior Cuique.

However, no one expected that before Senior Cuique could return, the ability of this magic armor would be used on the battlefield first.

Surging magic beams were unleashed from the surface of Xia Liang's magic armor; light blue, magenta-purple, and light green magic converged together, jointly blasting toward the distant mangled beast.

The torrent of magic arrived in an instant, concentrated on one point, and exploded with a boom at the mangled beast's head. Initially, on the surface of the mangled beast's body, some structure resembling skin layered and wrinkled, blocking the impact of the magic. But very quickly, this structure was broken open under the combined attack of the three, then suddenly cracked into a huge gash.

The three-colored magic beams passed through the gash in its skin and struck the mangled beast's head solidly.

"Aaaargh!"

A deafening roar sounded above the city center. The mangled beast, in pain, writhed its body within its flesh cocoon, emitting a cry of unknown meaning. Then, it increased its attack frequency and spewed corrosive magic breath at the magic girls once again.

The three Newcomer magic girls, or rather, the three new-generation magic girls, were already prepared; the moment the mangled beast exhaled, they had already dodged away, and the mangled beast's attack produced no effect whatsoever.

"It worked!"

Seeing that this attack's effect reached, or even exceeded, her imagination, Xia Liang couldn't help but clench her fist and cheer softly.

"The Pupa Stage is nothing special after all!"

Lin Xiaolu retreated to her side, wearing a proud expression: "As long as we can break through the defense once, we can definitely break through it a second time. Wearing down this big guy is absolutely no problem!"

"That has nothing to do with you at all, right?"

Moke, perched on her shoulder, couldn't help but pour cold water on her: "Clearly, it's the other two people's magic armor at work; how can a Seed-level here make such empty boasts?"

"Hah? Even a fairy who can't keep up with flight speed and can only cling to someone else's back has the qualification to talk to me?"

Lin Xiaolu glared at it indignantly: "The progress of ability blooming doesn't explain everything, okay? My magic has been increasing non-stop for these few months; now I am definitely much stronger than an ordinary Seed-level!"

"But you're still Seed-level..."

Moke muttered softly, but did not refute Lin Xiaolu's statement.

Because what Lin Xiaolu said was the truth. During these few months, although she had never touched the boundary of ability blooming, her magic growth had never stopped.

At the very beginning, her magic quantity was not much different from an ordinary Seed-level, but with subsequent growth, especially after the battle at Fuli Academy, it had now reached a level far exceeding Seed-level.

If it weren't that Lin Xiaolu had not yet completed blooming and obtained her own magic armor, no one would think she was merely a Seed-level.

"You two, don't argue at a time like this."

Xia Liang smiled helplessly from the side, reactivating her magic armor: "Let's focus now and take down this big guy, shall we?"

"... You're right."

Lin Xiaolu, who had originally wanted to argue a few more words with Moke, immediately dropped the thought of arguing. Looking at the increasingly frenzied mangled beast not far away, she tightened her grip on her magic wand: "The battle isn't won yet; celebrating now is a bit too early." Bai Jingxuan, standing nearby, did not interject but silently released magic to play the music box melody.

The battle resumed from there.

Compared to low-tier mangled beasts, the greatest advantage of a Pupa Stage mangled beast lies in possessing its own nest and having a naturally high-defense pupal shell.

Yet this pupa, for some unknown reason, appeared alone in the city center, with no nest space around it. This also meant there were absolutely no eggs or caterpillars nearby for it to command and direct, weakening its combat capability by an unknown degree.

Once the magic girls found a way to break the mangled beast's defense, they had found the key to defeating it, sufficient to neutralize all advantages this mangled beast held in its evolution tier. Therefore, the battle inevitably developed a trend of one-sidedness.

With Xia Liang as the leader, Bai Jingxuan providing amplification, and Lin Xiaolu providing magic, the three worked together to shoot beam after beam of magic through the transformation of their magic armor—such a powerful impact could no longer be called a magic beam; calling it a bombardment would be more appropriate.

The relentless bombardment forced the cocoon in the sky to retreat step by step, constantly emitting wails and roars; its wounds multiplied, and its movements grew increasingly weak.

Clearly, it could not hold out much longer.

"Moko! Take my phone!"

After another round of bombardment ended, Lin Xiaolu pulled her phone from the pocket of her apron and handed it to Moko: "Once we deal with this big guy, remember to take a photo and show it to Senior Cuique!"

"... You're too excited, aren't you?"

Moko took the phone with some helplessness: "Treating battle so lightly, be careful you don't get criticized after showing the photos to my lord the Patrol Envoy."

"Senior Cuique wouldn't do that." Lin Xiaolu remained noncommittal.

"I think we should tell the Junior Senior the whole story first?"

Xia Liang suggested from the side: "Although we rashly challenged a cocoon-stage remnant beast and won by seizing favorable timing and terrain, she will still worry if she finds out immediately."

"It's better not to scare the teacher." Bai Jingxuan added quietly.

"Hmm... that does make sense."

Lin Xiaolu hovered in mid-air, thinking for a moment, then raised her wand again: "Then, regarding what comes next, let's discuss how to report it later; for now, let's first..."

Her words stopped halfway.

Not only her, but Bai Jingxuan and Xia Liang beside her also suddenly stopped. The three of them, without agreement, turned their gazes toward the ground not far away.

The purple-black light pillar in the center of the district emitted a dazzling light; this light naturally cast shadows of the objects in the air, projecting them onto the ground and stretching them infinitely long.

And at this moment, at some unknown time, a shadow suddenly appeared before the three of them.

It was an incredibly slender shadow, projected from the sky; at first it was faint, but after spreading to the feet of the magical girls, it revealed a deep, ink-black darkness.

Judging by its shape and outline, that shadow looked like an immensely huge moth.

At this very moment, the master of the shadow floated silently before the remnant beast. Its form was insignificant compared to the giant remnant beast, as tiny as an ant compared to an elephant. Yet the shadow beneath its feet covered almost an entire block in front of it, far exceeding the size of that cocoon-stage remnant beast.

Standing within the black shadow beneath it, a huge sense of oppression and crisis eroded the nerves of the several magical girls; without doubt, everyone could feel the newcomer bore ill intent.

Merely facing the master of the shadow from afar, Lin Xiaolu felt her breathing become difficult, the magic around her body slowed to an incredible degree, and even her heartbeat began to accelerate; her body tensed as if encountering a natural predator.

She widened her eyes slightly, increased the frequency of her breathing, stared at the figure in the distance, and silently tightened her grip on the wand in her hand.

This tension and sense of oppression felt incredibly familiar to her; in fact, she had experienced such a feeling more than once, so she could easily state its essence: it was the premonition of death when facing a lethal threat.

The master of the shadow made no move, as if observing the several magical girls in the distance, floating motionless like a statue.

After a brief stalemate, that unknown existence flickered slightly.

When its figure reappeared after the flicker, it was already less than a few meters away from the several magical girls. This startled the several magical girls who were already on high alert; Lin Xiaolu, reacting like a stress response, raised her hand and fired a magic bullet.

But this magic bullet had no effect whatsoever; it did not even reach the mysterious figure before it, and when it was about to approach the opponent, it inexplicably dissolved.

The girls then clearly saw the face of the newcomer—it was a person in black robes.

The opponent had a slender, thin build, completely concealed within black robes, revealing not a single facial feature. And that black robe was familiar to the magical girls present—the last time they had seen clothing of this style was on the man called "Bing Chu San" at Fuli Academy.

"... Black Ash Dawn."

Lin Xiaolu spoke the name she had heard back then.

And the black-robed figure before her was very different from that man at the time.

The surface of the opponent's black robe bore more complex and intricate dark-gold patterns; the images formed were still sinister, but their outlines could be clearly identified: it was a golden moth with spread wings.

The top of the opponent's black robe was also tied with a tall hat, replacing the hood of the robe; the long brim was pressed very low, covering the face below and hiding the features.

"You have truly exceeded my expectations."

The black-robed person suddenly spoke; from beneath the hat came a somewhat hoarse female voice: "To grow to this level in merely five months, even able to suppress a cocoon-stage remnant beast, is extremely rare among magical girls."

Her words seemed like praise, but not a single magical girl believed she was praising them.

"... Who are you?"

As the first among them to regain composure, Xia Liang reached out to stop the somewhat nervous Lin Xiaolu and spoke first: "Hiding your head and showing your tail, afraid to reveal your true form even when doing evil?"

She was actually very nervous too, so her voice was inevitably somewhat dry. But in this situation, she did not forget to provoke, attempting to extract information from the opponent.

She thought very clearly: this mysterious black-robed person before her was probably an enemy the three of them could not handle; if something unexpected happened next, at least they must find out the enemy's identity and report it.

"Such obvious little schemes, truly a cute child."

Xia Liang's crude provocation obviously could not fool the black-robed person, but the opponent did not seem angry; instead, a hint of amusement entered her tone: "Very well. As supporters of the Lord, we have always disdained hiding our names."

She reached out, grabbed the hat on her head, then yanked it off with a sudden pull. A somewhat aged, elderly face thus appeared before the several of them.

She was a blonde, somewhat elderly woman, wearing a peaceful smile on her face. Kan Shu La

"Nice to meet you, children of Fang Ting City. I am called Mous."

Saying this, she bowed slightly, as if performing a salute: "Or you can translate my name from the Western Regions language, describe it in the language of your Eastern Hua region, and address me as, Moth (oth)."

(End of this chapter) The recent encoding is severe, giving us more motivation and faster updates; please move your little hands to exit reading mode. Thank you.