“When the internet hype gets loud enough… people actually start believing you’re a magical girl. Your existence has become a large-scale urban legend. Even the Magical Girl Association bought it—lately, they’ve been conducting secret investigations, trying to figure out if there really is a magical girl named Grey Ivy who holds a grudge against the Association.”
Chang Hansui’s eyes widened.
“Wait… what does that have to do with me? Isn’t that just those people spreading nonsense? Is the Magical Girl Association going to off me or something?”
The glow traced the fluffy outline of a small sheep.
It spoke in the most harmless voice, delivering the most spine-chilling threat.
“In short, you have no choice. I suggest you become a magical girl.”
The corner of Chang Hansui’s eye twitched, “Why?”
“Because if you don’t, I’ll go tattle to the Magical Girl Association. Including, but not limited to, the fact that you—the ‘biggest magical girl forum moderator’—are who you really are, and the truth that ‘Grey Ivy’ is actually a construction-working dude who picks his feet in real life.”
Chang Hansui stopped leaning back.
His body shifted slightly forward, his gaze locked unblinkingly on the blue-white creature before him.
It really hasn’t tattled?
“You sure?”
“Of course. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be me knocking on your door—it’d be other magical girls. As long as you become a magical girl, everything’s easy. Even if you’re registered under the Magical Girl Association’s name, your true identity won’t be detected.”
“Why me?”
“I need results. My power is closely tied to the concept of the internet, and a human whose wavelength perfectly matches my strength isn’t easy to come by. You’re the chosen one. I’ll ask you one thing: are you in or not? If you agree, I can also use my abilities to help hide your identity in the future.”
Chang Hansui reached over and grabbed the takeout that had just arrived on his desk.
He inserted the straw and took a big gulp of the iced mango pomelo sago.
The rich aroma of mango and the slightly astringent bitterness of pomelo pulp spread across his tongue.
Using that chill, he tried to suppress the overwhelming flood of information threatening to overload his brain.
“I… I don’t know, man.”
The moment those words left his mouth, a smart bracelet glowing with silver-blue light materialized out of thin air on his cluttered computer desk.
“In any case, once you put on this bracelet, you’ll be able to transform. You can think it over. By the way, my name is Ice. Hope to see you again. But I’d advise you to consider carefully… If you contract with me, I can help hide you. Otherwise, with the current hype on the internet, it’s only a matter of time before some rabid fan or hacker doxxes you.”
It drifted toward the window, turning back to deliver the final blow: “Of course, if you absolutely refuse, I’ll personally expose your secrets to the public! Baa baa baa—”
Chang Hansui frowned.
“This isn’t irreversible, is it? I… I’m a guy.”
“Of course. Everything has its price… but you don’t have a choice anyway.”
With that, it dissolved into specks of blue-white light, leaping out the window like motes merging into the air, and vanished.
Chang Hansui squinted thoughtfully.
He didn’t touch the bracelet that radiated an ominous “sign a contract and become a magical girl” vibe.
Instead, he turned his gaze back to the computer screen, deciding to keep reading those so-called comprehensive forum shitposts to see exactly how they’d mangled his identity.
The mouse wheel scrolled, and a long-winded hot post caught his eye.
<Grey Ivy in adversity is pitiable; Grey Ivy in prosperity reeks. Today, let’s understand the moment that makes a big heart cry>
People in the Magical Girl forum always say Grey Ivy tastes the best when she’s in dire straits, but once she’s riding high, she turns sour and makes people snap out of their delusions hard.
So today, the OP will give a detailed analysis of our Goddess Grey’s life full of push and pull.
As everyone knows, Grey Ivy actually lived with relatives in a big city for training during her childhood, only returning to her rural home during summer vacation.
This experience of being from a rural family but living long-term in a big city left her in a constant state of tearing between two worlds, never quite landing on either side.
Living under someone else’s roof means no tantrums, no freely showing emotions, and on top of that, magical girl training itself is incredibly high-pressure.
This dual pressure forced her to develop the ability to read the room, empathize and soothe, and accommodate others far too early—which is exactly the gentleness she displays to the outside world now.
But folks, the essence of this gentleness is a survival skill she desperately honed in her youth to protect herself.
And when she returned to her rural home during summer break, the massive gap between her big-city experiences and the backward countryside would involuntarily give her a fleeting sense of superiority from above.
This superiority balanced out her inferiority in the city, but it also added a fatal contradiction to her personality.
Switching back and forth between two environments left her without a stable sense of self, constantly oscillating between inferiority and arrogance.
All I can say is, this fractured upbringing of shuttling between city and country makes it hard for her to accept a complete version of herself.
Deep down, she knows sincerity is the foundation of being, yet she can’t help but use forum hype and shitposting to fill the inferiority of her early years.
These two impulses tear at each other, creating the erratic, unpredictable impression she gives now.
In conclusion, we can derive the following: Grey Ivy is essentially a very kind little girl who craves love. It’s just that the long-term tug-of-war prevents her from maintaining a pure state.
Whether in adversity or prosperity, she’s always struggling to be herself, trying to be the Grey Ivy everyone loves yet can never reach.
She might be the budget-friendly pudding, the pricey Chicecream, or the familiar Qiaolezi. But no matter how the shell changes, she’s always that Grey Ivy who makes people’s hearts ache.
Chang Hansui stared at that long wall of text.
‘Wait… did you even ask me before writing all this nonsense? Is there even a single punctuation mark in there that’s true?! Forget it. Not reading anymore.’
Chang Hansui decided to head back to his home turf and post a rumor-dispelling announcement in the Magical Girl General Section first.
He typed the familiar domain into the address bar and hit Enter.
The loading circle on the screen spun twice.
Then, the page instantly turned into a blank white.
[502 Bad Gateway]
[Error 521: Web server is down]
‘What’s going on?’
Chang Hansui froze for a moment.
This wasn’t a DNS resolution issue.
DNS was running normally and pointing to the target address, but this obvious error response meant… the physical server hosting all the forum data had crashed.
Or rather, gone on strike.
He quickly tried to open the cloud server provider’s official website.
Enter.
Loading failed.
Page inaccessible.
Chang Hansui felt something was wrong, his posture instantly straightened.
He immediately opened his usual email inbox, planning to send a support ticket to ask what was going on.
The page refreshed, and an unread new email sat quietly in his inbox.
The sender was exactly that cloud server provider.
Chang Hansui clicked open the email…