Chapter 39: So, the Senior Loli’s Conversation Is Really Terrifying…

Bang.

The heavy car door slowly shut behind Lin Yu with a dull thud.

Yet that faint sound was like an invisible barrier, sealing off the world inside the car from the world outside.

Lin Yu swallowed hard and sat stiffly on the overly soft leather seat—wide enough for three people to lie side by side. His whole body instinctively tightened, like a delinquent being called into the principal’s office for the first time.

He didn’t dare move recklessly, didn’t even dare to breathe too loudly. The lingering stench of alcohol clinging to him made him terrified of sullying this “sacred domain,” crafted from premium leather and some unknown brand of incense.

All he could do was sneak a glance, from the corner of his eye, at the “Loli Queen” seated across from him.

Ye Yeying.

She didn’t so much as look his way. Instead, she lowered her head again, focused on polishing the dismantled pieces of a handgun with a spotless white silk handkerchief.

Her movements were slow, light, tinged with an almost pathological perfectionism. It was as if she weren’t polishing a mass-produced standard weapon, but some priceless treasure of immeasurable worth.

The soft interior lights outlined her delicate, doll-like profile, the silky fall of her shoulder-length black hair cascading down like a curtain.

She said nothing.

The driver said nothing either—he remained politely stationed outside the car, a loyal stone statue on guard.

The only sound in the sealed space was the faint swish, swish of Ye Yeying’s slender fingers as they brushed against the steel parts.

Time trickled by in that suffocating silence.

One minute.

Two minutes.

Five minutes…

Ye Yeying still hadn’t spoken, while Lin Yu felt as though he was about to go insane.

(…What the hell is she trying to do?!)

His mind screamed in frustration, cold sweat forming on his temples.

(Testing my patience?! Or… did she actually fall asleep?! No—her eyes are open! Tch, this junior—barely older than a kid, yet already a master at psychological games! No doubt she picked that up from Manager Qian, that sly old fox!)

In the silence, his own heartbeat grew louder and louder, like a war drum pounding against his eardrums, until the pain became unbearable.

The urge gnawed at him: to break the silence, to blurt out anything.

Something like, “Senior, nice car you’ve got here. What’s the mileage like per hundred kilometers?”

Or, “Senior, have you eaten yet? I just did. The grilled Australian lobster at that restaurant was divine—though pricey…”

But in the end, he bit down on his tongue and swallowed all those stupid, office-drone pleasantries back into his gut.

Because he knew—this was no colleague he needed to butter up with small talk.

This was an A-Rank elite. Someone who had clawed her way back from the edge of death and had personally witnessed every one of his humiliating failures.

Before such a person, cheap flattery would only appear all the more pathetic.

All he could do was wait.

Rely on what little willpower he had forged in hellish training to endure this silent scrutiny from someone far above him.

Time lost all meaning. Ten minutes? A century? He couldn’t tell.

At the very moment Lin Yu thought his nerves would snap in two—

Ye Yeying finally spoke.

She set down the gun parts and the handkerchief, lifting her head at last.

Her obsidian eyes, bottomless and sharp, met his directly for the first time.

The weakness and hollowness she had shown in the hospital was gone. What returned was the icy sharpness he remembered so well.

“I’ve gone over the aquarium report and the recordings these past few days.”

Her voice was like a scalpel fresh from the forge—cold, precise, cutting the suffocating silence to ribbons.

Her next words, however, were like a bucket of ice water, dousing the faint pride still flickering in Lin Yu’s chest after the celebration banquet.

“Your response under siege barely scraped a passing grade. That was only because Chen Bing had already eliminated most of the threats for you. The replay shows your biggest problem doesn’t lie in skill…”

She didn’t bother pointing out how many bullets he wasted or how sloppy his strikes had been.

She cut straight to the heart of his deadliest flaw as a magical girl.

“Your mental state before entering the battlefield was highly unstable. Contact with civilians generated negative emotions that directly impaired your battlefield perception. As a result, you went into the mission already mentally compromised…”

“You must understand—our power as magical girls is inseparable from our mental stability. An unstable magical girl cannot bring out the full strength of her Phase Soul. Worse, she risks contamination by the chaotic energies of the Subspace…”

“That is why something as trivial as the Mimic Jellyfish, a mere D-Class pollutant, was able to throw you into complete disarray.”

“As for the civilian who triggered this instability… I trust you know exactly who I mean. I expect this sort of thing not to happen again.”

Each word was a bullet of ice, striking his every weakness with surgical precision.

Lin Yu had no defense.

Because she was right.

From the instant he had seen Luo Shaotian, his mind had unraveled.

Self-pity had coiled around his heart like a venomous snake, making him feel like nothing more than a sewer rat.

He hadn’t even realized the state he was in when he stumbled into that “Paradise Hell,” shrouded in psychic pollution—disoriented, fragile, and weak.

“Of course…”

Just as Lin Yu braced himself for another barrage of “incompetent” critiques, Ye Yeying shifted the blame to another target.

“Your mentor, Xuan Tie, made mistakes as well.”

“Eh?” Lin Yu blinked. “You mean Ice-Senior?”

“By all rights, a B-Rank magical girl should never have been so easily dominated by a mere D-Class pollutant.”

Ye Yeying’s expression grew solemn.

“She succumbed so quickly because her own mental barrier was already compromised.”

Lin Yu’s eyes went wide. He recalled Chen Bing’s sluggish reactions in battle, the strange self-murmurs, and blurted out:

“Compromised? But Ice-Senior’s so strong, how could—”

Ye Yeying’s gaze turned complicated: pity, warning, and even a trace of fear for her own future.

She revealed the cruelest secret that every magical girl knew but never spoke aloud.

“Because she’s nearing her expiration date.”

She said the word almost mockingly.

(Expiration date? Like food?! Like some sugar daddy’s kept girl? Magical girls… have an expiration date?!)

Seeing his bafflement, Ye Yeying spoke coldly:

“Rookie… you really thought the Persona Mask Protocol was perfect?”

“Uh… I mean, I thought so, but judging from what you’re saying, I guess not…” Lin Yu laughed weakly.

“Of course not.”

She leaned back slightly, arms folding, legs crossing beneath her skirt. She didn’t strike any deliberate pose, yet her aura radiated a quiet, chilly poise beyond her years.

Her deep blue eyes fixed calmly on him. Even in silence, her presence was overwhelming.

“It has a fatal flaw. We call it… a curse.”

“A curse?”

“Technically, I shouldn’t be telling you this so soon. But considering your situation—neither female, already past your prime…”

“Hey, what do you mean past my—”

“Quiet.”

She rapped him sharply on the forehead.

“Listen.”

“…Yes, ma’am.” Lin Yu raised both hands in surrender. “So… what exactly is this curse?”

“Ahem. You should’ve heard in orientation: before the age of eighteen, a human’s mental barrier is most malleable, best able to resist Subspace corrosion. And the female form has the highest affinity with positive psionic energy.”

“But after eighteen…”

She paused, as though reciting a clinical fact. Yet the way her small fist clenched betrayed her inner turmoil.

“Our minds grow more complex. The soul’s plasticity begins to irreversibly decline. The strength of that barrier steadily weakens year by year. That is the Curse of Age.”

“This decline directly affects the performance of the Phase Soul. Transformation success rates plummet. Psionic output becomes unstable, combat power falls off a cliff. Worst of all, psychic contamination accelerates—making it increasingly likely to collapse into monstrosity.”

“Most magical girls, once past eighteen, experience such a sharp decline that they’re forced to ‘graduate.’ The company calls it soft elimination.”

Her eyes drifted to the glowing factories of Sector C outside the window.

“Chen Bing… she’s nearly twenty. The curse is starting to take hold. That’s why she trains harder than anyone—trying to use muscle to make up for her soul’s decay. She’s not strict with herself out of discipline. She’s terrified of the inevitable future where she becomes useless.”

Her words thundered in Lin Yu’s skull.

The truth left him shaken to his core.

At last, he understood the real reason behind Chen Bing’s almost masochistic training.

And for the first time, he realized: the power of a magical girl had an expiration date, a cruel shelf life that no one could escape.

(So… that’s how it is…)

A deep, aching pity welled in his chest.

For once, he saw her not as a superior to envy, but as a comrade bound to the same tragic fate.

Chen Bing… so hardworking, so devoted, so passionate.

And yet—

“But,”

Ye Yeying’s tone suddenly shifted, and her deep blue eyes flicked toward him with a touch of sardonic disdain.

“This has nothing to do with you.”

“After all, when you signed the contract you were already well past your teens. Your so-called barrier was full of holes from the start. With your Void constitution, you reject nothing, accept everything—and you’ll never suffer this particular curse.”

Her words were half fact, half razor-edged mockery.

Lin Yu choked, the pity in his heart instantly smothered by embarrassment.

(What do you mean past my prime?! Twenty-six is peak age, dammit!)

He wanted to shout, but didn’t dare raise his voice in front of her.

(Forget it… compared to her, I guess I really am old…)

“…In the end, this fate awaits every magical girl  including myself.”

Ye Yeying spoke with a chilling calm, as though she had long since accepted it.

“But let’s return to the main point. Today, I called you here to… praise you.”

“Eh?” Lin Yu’s jaw dropped.

(Praise?!)

“Your last move surprised me.”

She tilted her head slightly, resting her chin on her hand, leaning forward just a little.

From his angle, the small movement radiated a strange, magnetic charm.

Her black hair swayed gently, a few strands brushing her cheek, accentuating her doll-like face.

“To discard common sense in despair, and force your will onto the weapon’s psionic structure… that ability, known as Will Overwrite, belongs only to the very best. You managed the dumbest move in the most dazzling way.”

“It proves your Void constitution isn’t just a passive container. It can shift the tide of battle.”

For once, her delicate face softened into the faintest of smiles. To Lin Yu, it was like a crack in the glacier, a signal of thaw.

“Rookie. Looks like Manager Qian was right—you are… a surprise.”

From her lips, the word “surprise” carried enough weight to leave Lin Yu speechless.

For the first time, he had heard from her mouth something other than “useless” or “deadweight.”

A rush of mixed emotions overwhelmed him, his heart thudding uncontrollably.

(She… she’s praising me?)

He glanced at her side profile under the warm yellow light. Her sharp contours seemed softened, her silky black hair haloed with gentle radiance.

His pulse quickened.

(…Damn it.)

His cheeks flushed hot, a shiver running through him.

Was it embarrassing from her praise? Or just nervousness?

Whatever it was, in that moment, the icy junior Senior appeared almost… cute.

Though her way of mixing whips with sugarcubes was unbearable, Lin Yu realized he almost liked being praised by her.

Liked it enough that he wanted to work harder, just to hear it again.

(Crap… am I a masochist?)

He groaned inwardly.

(Whatever! Me or not, who wouldn’t fight for the chance to be this girl’s dog?!)

“T-then, Senior!”

Like a student desperate to know his exam results, he straightened his back, voice trembling with expectation:

“Our agreement… the two months… Does this mean… I’ve passed?”

Hopeful eyes fixed on her, he waited for her answer.

But Ye Yeying merely lifted her eyelids and gave him a look.

The look one gives a fool asking the dumbest question imaginable.

“You’ve still got a long way to go.”

Her voice was crisp and fluent in Japanese. Lin Yu, of course, didn’t understand a word.

So she translated—into perfectly enunciated Mandarin, each word a stone smashing into the fragile flame of hope in his chest.

“—Not even close.”

“You think one lucky, one-in-a-million idealist strike makes up for your disaster-tier fundamentals?”

Her cold arrogance returned in full force.

“Your physique is still bottom-tier D-Rank. Your martial skills are still full of holes. Your unstable emotions are still the battlefield’s biggest time bomb.”

“Right now, you’re nothing more than a whiteboard weapon: base stats trash, but with a slim chance of landing an S-Rank crit.”

“If you truly want to be my partner, then you…”

Her hand reached out.

Slender, pale, perfectly shaped, her fingers pinched his chin and forced his downcast head back up.

Their eyes locked.

In her obsidian gaze, he saw his own reflection—shocked, flustered, utterly pathetic.

And on her eternally frozen face, for the first time, curved the wicked smile of a little devil.

“Better keep pushing yourself~”