“Nothing.” Bo Qing replied stiffly, then led Luo Shuangyue as they flew toward the Headquarters’ inner compound.
The Magic Department Headquarters was like a city unto itself, divided into several zones such as the Research Zone and the Combat Zone.
Right now, the two of them were heading for the Research Zone.
After flying for about twenty minutes, they landed at the entrance of a large complex of buildings.
“Someone else will guide you from here. I’m leaving.” Bo Qing more or less tossed Luo Shuangyue toward the main gate, then made a hasty escape.
Luo Shuangyue was left completely baffled. Was her affinity really that low?
With confusion lingering in her mind, Luo Shuangyue entered the main doors.
A white security robot rolled up to her, scanned her, and the yellow face on its display instantly turned into a green smiling face.
“Miss Dark Moth, I will be guiding you the rest of the way.”
Each area really does have its own unique style…
Following the robot deeper inside, Luo Shuangyue found the place to be quite crowded.
There were guards posted almost every few steps, and occasionally a few Magical Girls wandered the hallways.
People in white coats and masks strode briskly past, as if countless urgent matters awaited them.
This only added to Luo Shuangyue’s confusion.
Something about this place doesn’t feel quite right…
Why did Monice want her to come here?
After winding through the maze-like building for a few minutes, the robot finally stopped outside a room and indicated this was Luo Shuangyue’s destination.
And with that, it simply left her there without a backward glance.
These things really don’t understand human customs at all. Couldn’t it at least wait for me to knock on the door before leaving?
With this thought, Luo Shuangyue reached out and gently pressed the “door” button on the touch screen beside the entrance.
The next second, the door slid open with a hiss, and a wave of heated argument washed over her ears from within.
“What’s the point of pushing me? This is all the resources we have, and I’ve been training people back to back for twenty-four hours straight! Some things can’t be rushed!”
“What do you mean you can’t hold people? You’re the Magic Department, not a mascot. Let those who dare try you see what you’re made of!”
“I don’t want excuses, only results!”
Monice’s voice brimmed with passion, and it wasn’t until Luo Shuangyue quietly approached her desk that she snapped out of the pleasure of “debating with people.”
Cutting off the display in front of her, Monice looked up at Luo Shuangyue, surprise flickering in her eyes.
She could instantly tell that Luo Shuangyue was different from a few days ago.
Training up in the sky really had paid off.
The aura surrounding the girl was nearly overflowing now; just a little more and her Heart’s Flower would fully bloom.
She was only a step away from the Full Bloom Class.
“What did you call me here for? I was busy in the sky, you know.” Luo Shuangyue seized the initiative.
“Called you back to help me handle a few chores.” Monice drew a tablet from her side and handed it to Luo Shuangyue.
Taking the tablet, Luo Shuangyue scanned it and showed a puzzled expression.
“This is… Yi’s magic?”
“Yes. From the beginning I noticed her magic was special, so I had her do some tests, and sure enough.” Monice nodded, pointing at the content on the tablet as she explained.
After becoming a Magical Girl, Yi had been questioned thoroughly by the Magic Department and had revealed nearly everything she knew.
Her magic development only started later.
Back then, Yi was still over on the Polar Night side, so Monice herself led the development of her magic.
But she was distracted for many days by transhuman modification matters.
When she finally got around to checking on Yi again,
She was startled to find Yi’s magic had developed in a rather odd direction.
Yi still had no combat ability at all—her magic could only be used in some very peculiar ways.
“Portal Creation. That’s her magic.”
Put simply, Yi’s ability was to create a pair of portals.
Once both doors were set up, anyone could travel through them.
“Isn’t that amazing!” Luo Shuangyue’s first thought after hearing Monice’s explanation was excitement.
Portals!
Just think about it: even now, putting a portal on the moon would massively strengthen the connection between the moon and the homeworld, and allow Magical Girls who had fought all day to instantly return to the homeworld to rest at night.
This was a strategic-level magic, much stronger than Luo Shuangxing’s Magic Card Transport!
“But!” Monice coughed loudly, signaling she wasn’t finished.
“She needs to expend a huge amount of magic power to create portals.
Right now, she can at most make a portal from one end of Headquarters to the other.”
After all, Yi had only just gained her powers as a Magical Girl a few days ago.
Expecting her to instantly create gates spanning the stars was still too much.
“And she also says she can sense fluctuations from deep in the starry sky. Her magic seems to resonate with that Royal-Class Magic Beast.”
“Isn’t that a good thing? We can tell where the Royal-Class Magic Beast is, right?” Luo Shuangyue tilted her head.
“But she’s too weak. The Royal-Class Magic Beast hasn’t even really arrived, and she can only vaguely sense its location. When the beast truly appears, I’m worried she’ll be terrified out of her mind.” Monice shook her head, implying Luo Shuangyue was oversimplifying the situation.
Yi was just too weak.
If the Royal-Class Magic Beast even glanced at her, her spirit would be shattered.
And yet the power she held was so important.
The Magic Department desperately needed this kind of ability to bridge the stars.
But magic is different for everyone; you can’t just hand off Yi’s power to someone else.
While the Magic Department was at a loss, Monice, who had been busy with transhuman-related matters, happened to overhear the debate.
She’d found it laughable: who said Yi’s magic couldn’t be given to others?
She had General Ming Die, after all.
With the ability to devour magic power and gain the abilities of Magical Girls and magical creatures, if you just had Dark Moth come back and consume some of Yi’s magic, couldn’t Dark Moth then use Yi’s power?
Yi wasn’t strong enough, but Dark Moth, the leader among Initial Bloom-class Magical Girls, was certainly strong enough.
Headquarters thought this made sense, quickly wrote up a report, and within half a day got approval.
And so, Luo Shuangyue, who had been happily slaying magical creatures in the sky, was summoned back.
“Ah?” Having heard the whole story, Luo Shuangyue was a bit stunned.
How did they end up thinking of calling me in for this? Sure, I can consume the magic power of Magical Girls and gain some of their abilities, but the effect is pretty random…
How was Luo Shuangyue supposed to know how much magic power she had to absorb to get little Yi’s magic?
“This is all we can do for now. No one else has this ability.” Monice shrugged.
Luo Shuangyue’s power was one of a kind—better to take a gamble than not.
Besides, the situation above wasn’t so dire that they couldn’t spare Luo Shuangyue.
If they didn’t call her down now, should they wait until a real fight broke out to do it?
What a joke!
“Yi is waiting for you in that area. I’ve already notified them of your arrival, so just head over directly. I’m really busy here, no time to chat.”
Luo Shuangyue could tell, Monice was absolutely the workaholic type right now.
“So how many transhumans have been successfully modified at Headquarters now?” Luo Shuangyue asked curiously.
“Quite a few, but most are still adapting to their new bodies and abilities, and haven’t been assigned missions yet.
Mentioning this finally brought a hint of happiness to Monice’s face, as if she could see her dream slowly becoming reality.
A future where everyone could use magic, where no one had to cower before magical creatures awaiting a hero to rescue them—was waving at her from the distant horizon.
As long as she continued on this path, Monice believed she would achieve her dream someday.
“I think the young lady who brought me here is adapting pretty well.”
“Well, there are many aspects to adaptation.” Monice’s expression grew a little complicated, since she knew the situation of the transhuman who had guided Luo Shuangyue from the Combat Zone.
Currently, most of those who accepted the transformation from the Combat Zone were elite soldiers, and those elites were mostly male.
So, you get it.
“My procedure has some side effects; you’ll see for yourself soon enough.” Monice waved her hand, shooing
Luo Shuangyue out of her office.
As for the tablet, Monice let her take it along.
With Headquarters so vast, Luo Shuangyue would need something to guide her.
On the way to where Yi was, Luo Shuangyue skimmed through Monice’s modification procedure.
She skipped over the parts she couldn’t understand and quickly found the “side effects” Monice had mentioned.
After reading, Luo Shuangyue was silent.
How to put it—this was just too hard to describe.
No wonder Bo Qing had that look just now; now she truly understood.
To gain power at the cost of turning into a beautiful girl—maybe that was a bit too stimulating for all those hot-blooded men in the Magic Department.
Turning off the surgical notes, Luo Shuangyue glanced discreetly at the pretty girls in Headquarters, feeling that maybe not all of them were as innocent as they appeared.
Of course, in a way, she and those transhuman ladies might actually have a lot in common.
After all, they were in the same boat.
With these complicated feelings, Luo Shuangyue arrived at the institute where Yi was located.
Under the guidance of staff, she came to the door of Yi’s room.
Yi’s assigned quarters were downright luxurious, covering a huge area and equipped with all sorts of high-tech devices—hard to imagine it was just a single room.
She opened the door and entered.
The first thing she saw was a grand, sky-piercing giant tree.
The tree was so immense that even from a distance, its presence was overwhelming.
Yi sat on the edge of a nearby cliff, her hair gently ruffled by the breeze.
Her emerald eyes gazed deeply at the giant tree, an undercurrent of sorrow in her look.
Of course, this scene wasn’t real—it was a projection created by technology.
As Luo Shuangyue and the researcher in charge of caring for Yi entered the room, the scene shifted to a normal
setting.
And Yi was not really sitting on a cliff, but on an extremely comfortable-looking sofa.
“Holographic Projection Technology, combined with a little magic. Makes for a good camouflage.” The research lady explained quietly to Luo Shuangyue.
“Miss Dark Moth, Miss Luo Lan, good afternoon to you both.”
Yi stood from the sofa and politely greeted the two of them.
The last time Luo Shuangyue had seen Yi, this pitiful alien girl had just lost her sister, full of deathly gloom and hatred for magical creatures.
But now, after some time, there was no more trace of death in Yi’s eyes; her hatred had been well buried in her heart.
She looked like a noble young lady, radiating elegance with every gesture.
Her clothes were especially unique—completely unlike anything human.
Though her skin was quite exposed, it did not provoke any disrespectful thoughts.
The decor of the room was the same—full of natural ambiance, remarkably similar to what people imagined Elves to be like.
“This was recreated from her memories,” Miss Luo Lan continued explaining.
At that time, the Magic Department had dug through all of Yi’s memories, extracting every bit of useful and useless information.
Anything valuable to humans was quickly put to use, and the leftovers went into this place.
They crafted a room full of elven style for Yi, with ultra-advanced projection devices so lifelike it was hard to tell they were fake, all to help Yi feel better about living here.
And it clearly worked—just look at Yi’s expression now.
She seemed to be in good spirits.
“Ahem, Miss Yi, about the plan we mentioned to you earlier—you still have one last chance to back out.”
Having finished explaining the room, Luo Lan gently reminded Yi.
In that moment, this lady radiated such maternal warmth that even Luo Shuangyue had to take notice.
My goodness, the Magic Department really is full of hidden talents.
With someone as gentle as a saint personally caring for her, it’s no wonder Yi’s mental state had improved so much.
“I won’t back out. It’s only letting Miss Dark Moth consume some of my magic power—how could I possibly object to that?”
Yi shook her head firmly, showing she wasn’t petty.
Twin swirls of starlight appeared in her palms. Merging the two together, she tightly clasped a beautiful, deep Starlight Gem in her hand.
Then she softly called out, “Transform.”
There’s actually no rule that says Magical Girls have to shout a transformation phrase, but most do, because a Magical Girl’s fighting strength comes from her heart.
And loudly calling out a phrase during transformation can really boost morale and make their power surge.
To put it another way, shouting the phrase—