Chapter 11: Let’s All Become Good Friends!

“Jingzhe?”

Mangzhong had questions for her, but she hadn’t expected her to show up on her own. Or perhaps she was just nearby? Seeing that the two-headed wolf had already disappeared, she sighed and asked:

“Why were you absent from yesterday’s memorial service? Even the three sisters, Xiaoshu, Dashu, and Chushu from Xiaguan District, were there.”

“I overslept.”

“?”

“Hehe~ Sorry about that.” Jingzhe stuck out her tongue playfully and vaulted over the railing, jumping down from the third floor.

“Just now…”

“It’s not like you don’t know how destructive your ultimate move is. The last time you used it in the city, President Hua Hua had to apologize to Officer Si for you. And that was on the street; this is indoors.”

Jingzhe, wearing a brown wide-brimmed hat and dressed like a cowgirl, raised her eyebrows in a provocative, troublemaking expression. Yet, the words coming out of her mouth were perfectly reasonable, and she even invoked The Flower Arranger’s name, which immediately made Mangzhong unable to hold her head high.

“I… I’m sorry. I was rash.”

Mangzhong dejectedly extinguished the flames on her sword and shield.

“It will probably lie low for a while, retract its Anti-Civilization Field, and hide in the mountains and forests around Nancheng… It will be hard to track.”

“Are you planning to set the mountain on fire too?”

“No! Sigh…”

Jingzhe didn’t draw her own Magical Hunting Gear—the jet-powered greatsword on her back. The lightning strike just now was fired from her fingertips, which she had shaped into a gun gesture. Now, her scorched fingertips were still smoking slightly.

Jingzhe hid her hand behind her back and tilted her head, asking, “So, what got our new president so worked up?”

“That Nightmare just now was the only one that The Flower Arranger failed to defeat.”

“…I see.”

“During the fight, I had an auditory hallucination, as if she were still teaching me… Therefore, I want to avenge her, and also let her rest in peace.”

As for her suspicion that “this Nightmare seems to have been artificially modified,” Mangzhong did not say it out loud.

First, the amount of information this matter could potentially involve was too great, and there was no evidence; it was just her suspicion.

Second, apart from those three delinquents from Gulou, the magical girls of Nancheng were mere acquaintances who had fought together only a few times. There was no need to drag Jingzhe into this…

“Alright, I understand.”

Jingzhe suddenly leaned in and wrapped her arm around Mangzhong’s shoulders.

“The Flower Arranger wasn’t just your senior; I also have a duty to be involved in this matter. Let’s team up, work hard, and uncover the truth!”

Mangzhong, who had no friends in her daily life, was a bit unaccustomed to such intimate gestures, and her body immediately became very stiff.

“Hmm, like a puzzle game, right? Just relax, let’s have a fun time getting revenge together.”

Jingzhe giggled and let go of Mangzhong.

“I didn’t expect to prevent an arson case just by coming to do some shopping. My good deed for the day is done. Well then, I’ll be taking my leave~”

“Goodbye…”

Jingzhe waved to Mangzhong with her back turned and slipped out of the mall’s other exit in the blink of an eye.

Having dispelled her transformation, Xia Kong also bent down to compose herself and pack up her sword and shield.

Most of Sunday was already gone, and she had to go back to school tomorrow. She could only entrust the investigation of the two-headed wolf to the Doctor.

Hoisting the cello case, which was even larger than her, back onto her back, Xia Kong walked towards the exit where the two-headed wolf had fled…

And then she saw a sneaky figure hiding behind the little yellow duck statue. The body was well-hidden, but the fluffy golden hair peeking out from behind the duck’s butt was a dead giveaway, caught by the sharp-eyed Xia Kong.

“Who’s over there? Didn’t you evacuate just now?”

“…!”

Ren Huazhi, with her hands behind her back, strolled out whistling, feigning nonchalance. “I’m just passing by, passing by.”

Her voice was muffled inside the helmet.

She looked like a girl of the same age—though it was unclear why she was wearing a massive metal motorcycle helmet that covered her entire face except for her eyes. Perhaps she was afraid of getting hit by the Nightmare.

Xia Kong let down her guard. “Nightmares are no joke. Be careful next time.”

“Yes, yes.”

Ren Huazhi was wearing a helmet she had picked up from a repair shop on the outskirts of the mall that had forgotten to lock its doors (she had paid for it properly), with the newly repaired transformation belt in her pocket.

When she proposed to Meng Qiuxu her plan to set up a safe house in Mason’s Village, the other party surprisingly didn’t ask many questions.

Perhaps she thought Ren Huazhi’s choice of location was as good as her own, and readily agreed not to extend the camera coverage to the other side of the river where the cellar was, giving Ren Huazhi her privacy.

As for the belt, it had been dispatched to the city in a transport drone with the highest priority while they were still on the phone. It took about ten minutes to fly across half of Nancheng and be delivered into Ren Huazhi’s hands. When she received the delivery box, the sense of sanctity and salvation was like receiving an acceptance letter from a magic academy on her windowsill.

Then, she didn’t immediately transform to provide support, but just squatted aside and watched Mangzhong struggle with the two-headed dog.

Because there was very little material on magical girls making a comeback from a disadvantage. She herself usually just went in and started sawing, which the Nightmares couldn’t handle. She had never personally experienced such a classic, hot-blooded scene.

But she would not apologize.

Ren Huazhi turned her head, not daring to look at Xia Kong’s face, and chuckled awkwardly. “Since the great magical girl has already driven the Nightmare away, I’ll be going now. I won’t disturb you…”

At that moment, Xia Kong looked at the side of Ren Huazhi’s face visible through the helmet’s opening and suddenly felt a sense of déjà vu.

She subconsciously let out a questioning hum.

Ren Huazhi turned and ran.

“W-Wait! You look like an old friend of mine—”

“That pick-up line is out of style!”

“What’s your name?!”

But in the blink of an eye, Ren Huazhi was gone.

She used the superhuman speed honed from her time as a magical girl, not even afraid that Xia Kong would notice something was off, because if she were asked to take off her helmet to confirm her appearance, it would be far worse than just “something being off”!

“There’s a flaw in the setup…!”

There was a slight problem with her identity management.

In those “behind-the-scenes manipulator” or “multiple identities” novels that Ren Huazhi had referred to, the protagonist’s true self, the anchor for all the fabricated identities, usually occupied a rather inconspicuous role. Even if there was something special about them, they had to at least ensure that the main characters had a cognitive dissonance, otherwise, the biggest reveal in the mid-game, the “identity reveal,” would be hard to establish.

‘I thought he was just an ordinary person, but after his identity was revealed, he turned out to be some big shot.’ This would allow him to logically take over the status and resources of the fabricated identity, eliminate the dissonance, and build a bridge between the two identities. On the surface, it’s an identity reveal, but in reality, it’s putting on a new mask!

But this operation wouldn’t work for Ren Huazhi.

Because she couldn’t take off her mask…

And in the face of the great visage of The Flower Arranger, the white knight, who was originally supposed to draw fire and was tied to her long-gone male body, had instead become the inconspicuous “true self”