Chapter 35: B-Rank Concept Armament — [Great Wall]!

Lin Yu slowly opened her eyes.
She found herself kneeling on the cold marble floor, the surroundings swaying under the ghostly blue light refracted by the aquarium’s seawater.

She was still in the center of the exhibition hall.
All around, twelve “puppets” with blissful smiles etched onto their faces closed in on her, their steps slow but suffocating.

And ahead, within that towering cylindrical tank, the beautiful yet malevolent Siren Jellyfish remained.
Only, for some reason, it looked weaker now.

(Looks like… I’m back in reality.)
The thought was unnervingly calm.
No fear.
No panic.
Not even the marrow-deep self-loathing that had haunted her before.
Instead, there was clarity.

(There’s still a pile of trouble to deal with, but…)
Her gaze swept across the shambling “puppets,” then shifted to the giant jellyfish that feigned godhood.
(Compared to that suffocatingly perfect dream, this pain, this mess… this feels far more like actually being alive.)

For the first time, she placed herself not as a victim, but as a fighter.
Cold logic—something the old her would never have possessed—raced through her mind:

(Twelve puppets—already subdued once by Sister Chen Bing. Their joints and reaction speed are impaired. Lower threat.)

(One main body sits in the center of the tank, shielded by puppets and reinforced glass.)
(Communications are unstable—can’t call Red Fox.)

(Xuantie is corrupted by psychic pollution, down for now. Worse, might turn enemy.)

She listed every disadvantage, yet not a shred of despair touched her heart.
On the contrary—she felt a strange, liberating clarity.

(So it’s just me left?)
(Good. That actually makes things… simpler.)

Her eyes flicked to the faint reflection of the magical girl on the glass wall—graceful, radiant.
(I am a Magical Girl.)

She told herself once more, in a voice that belonged wholly to a girl.
Rising without hesitation, she lifted her right hand. The cold standard-issue psionic sidearm rested there, as though it were an extension of her body.

When she raised her head, the uncertainty and self-doubt of “Lin Yu” had already burned away.
Only Gray Crystal remained.
Only the absolute focus of a Magical Girl!

The barrel leveled forward.
“Huuh—!”
“Huuh—!”

The twelve puppets wheezed like broken bellows, bliss-filled eyes fixing on the lone anomaly in their midst.
The next moment, they lunged.

No tactics. No coordination.
Just pure, primal instinct—an overwhelming flood rushing from every side to eliminate the outsider.

The first to strike was the young man Lin Yu had once tripped with a sweep.
Still smiling in bliss, he charged like a mad bull, each thundering step stiff yet deadly. His massive fist, the size of a cooking pot, hurtled toward her face.

A blow that could split a skull.
Yet Lin Yu’s response was unnervingly calm.
Her emerald eyes, sharp as tactical sensors, instantly picked out every fatal flaw in his motion.

(A straight punch. No technique. He’s overcommitted, body weight pitched too far forward… riddled with openings.)

A breath before impact, she shifted.
Her body dipped left, a textbook sidestep so precise that the fist only brushed past her hair.

Pivoting on her left foot, she let his reckless momentum carry him forward. Like a feather on the wind, she slipped into the blind spot his overextension had created.

Her hand rose—not a fist, but two fingers pressed like a blade.
The most basic strike Chen Bing had drilled into her more than three thousand times.

Her wrist snapped, channeling her full weight into a merciless chop aimed at the vulnerable back of his neck!

Thud!
The young man’s blissful grin froze.
His charging frame collapsed, momentum vanishing in an instant. His legs buckled, and with a heavy crash he hit the ground face-first, unconscious.

Swift, fluid, surgical.
Lin Yu didn’t even spare him a glance.
The other eleven were already upon her.

A white-collar woman in a business suit lunged from the right, claws twisted out of once-delicate fingers.
A burly security guard thundered in from the left, his charge like an out-of-control truck.
An elderly man, face serene with reunion-joy, swept a cruel kick low from below.

(Surrounded on all sides.)
(But no coordination, no teamwork—just raw, chaotic aggression.)
(In that case…)

Her gaze sharpened, crystalline and lethal.
She pulled the trigger.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Gunfire cracked like lightning.

Each psionic round struck precisely—knees, elbows, joints.
Blue light blossomed on impact, rippling like shimmering waves.

(Not dead. I avoided vital points on purpose.)

Thud! Thud! Thud!
One after another, the puppets crumpled, their strings cut, motionless on the floor.

When Lin Yu’s feather-light frame touched ground again, silence had reclaimed the hall.
She froze, stunned.

(So this is… a Magical Girl’s power?)
A quiet voice echoed within her.
(No…)
Her answer followed immediately.
(This power was always mine. I just… refused to accept it before.)

Her chest surged with elation, but she tamped it down. No champagne victory laps.
She lifted her gaze.
Through the wreckage, her target glimmered.
The Siren Jellyfish.

Her legs carried her toward the narrow service tunnel below the tank.
She knew her shots had drained enormous energy—her magazine was nearly empty. The true body was still untouched behind its shell.
She needed to finish this, fast.

But as her foot crossed into shadow—
A black blur exploded from the side, crushing into her with brutal force!

Too fast—faster than even her sharpened reflexes could process!
“Guh—!”
Bile surged up her throat, splattering the marble like vomit.

Her body arced through the air, slamming into an artificial coral reef with a bone-jarring crash.

(Hurts…)
Her mind blanked, back searing like hot iron pressed to flesh.
(Like getting mowed down by a speeding scooter… Did my spine shatter? Am I bleeding out?)

“Cough—cough—!”
She hacked up blood-flecked phlegm, forcing her trembling arms to push her body upright.
Through blood-blurred vision, she lifted her head—

And saw the figure blocking the service passage.
Chen Bing.

She smiled faintly.
But her body stood in the stance of military close combat—exactly as she had taught Lin Yu.
Only now, it carried killing intent.

At her neck shimmered a tiny, translucent jellyfish, pulsing with unnatural rainbow light like a parasitic tumor.

(Damn… so it’s come to this.)

Lin Yu slid down the fake reef, half-kneeling, chest heaving.
This enemy was worse than all twelve puppets combined—
A perfect killing doll: a B-rank Magical Girl body, master of every martial art, tireless, painless, shielded by absolute defense.

“Sister Chen Bing…”
Her voice was fragile hope.
Useless.
The only reply was an attack.

Whoosh—!
Chen Bing vanished, reappearing before her like black lightning, spanning meters in an instant.
No weapon—just a savage side-kick aimed at her temple.

Air split with a crack, sharp wind exploding like firecrackers in her ear.

(Too fast!)
Lin Yu’s pupils shrank to pinpoints.
Now she truly understood a B-rank Magical Girl’s monstrous speed.
Beyond human.
No time to think, no time to flinch—death was already upon her.

(I’m dead—!)

But the body reacted before the mind.
Pavlovian reflex—etched into her soul by countless takedowns, chokeholds, throws.
No thought. No hesitation.
Her body snapped backward into a clumsy “limbo bridge,” dodging by the narrowest margin.

So close—
She felt the killing wind skim her nose, the skin of her cheek stinging.

“Oh?”
For the first time, the bliss-frozen mask on Chen Bing’s face cracked, showing faint intrigue.
But her attacks didn’t stop.

Her leg, still arcing, curved down into an axe-like stomp.

(Shit!)
Every alarm blared in Lin Yu’s skull.
If that hit landed, she’d be nothing but meat paste scraped off the floor.

She rolled aside—
BOOM!
The floor where she’d been erupted, cracks spiderwebbing out, rubble flying.

(Holy shit—what is she, a monster?! What the hell did she eat growing up?)

Cold sweat drenched her.
Scrambling away, every breath tore her chest with agony.

Chen Bing stood calmly amid the ruin, retracting her leg in an elegant motion.
Like a Valkyrie descended.
Lin Yu felt the chill of that gaze pierce her spine.

“Tch…”
Her heart sank.
The gulf between them was hopeless.
Hand-to-hand, she had no chance.

(If that’s the case…)

(I’m sorry, Master…)

(Before it’s too late…)

Her hand jerked up the psionic pistol, muzzle aimed squarely at the one who had once broken her down and rebuilt her.
(Let me stop you.)

But the Chen Bing bound by “Happiness” didn’t flinch.
Instead, she looked… amused. Expectant.
She halted her offense, standing perfectly still.

Lin Yu frowned—
Then Chen Bing’s lips began to move.

A string of syllables spilled forth—simple, plain. Yet they carried weight like mountains, the authority of an ancient oath, reverberating through the blue-lit hall.

“In the name of Black Iron, I forge the body unbreakable.”

At the first phrase, her soldier’s combat skirt began to transform.
Dark, metallic petals shimmered into existence, as though cut from midnight sky.
Pure psionic metal, sharp as blades, coiled around her feet, carving gouges into marble.
They swirled, spun, and danced.
The ground shook.

“I am the shield, sworn to guard this realm.”

The second phrase, as though spoken by a queen.
The petals obeyed, slotting together with impossible precision, assembling a titanic barrier.

Lin Yu’s eyes widened.
Before her, petals fused faster than sight could follow, becoming a massive, translucent wall of dark iron-gray.
The wall stretched outward, expanding like an unyielding bastion.

The pressure alone crushed the air from her lungs.
She wasn’t facing a person. She was facing a mythic wall of steel.

(Damn! A Concept Armament—the ultimate power of a Magical Girl!)

(Against a rookie like me… did she really need to bust out the big guns?!)

(How the hell do I fight this?! I’m not even B-rank yet—I don’t know how to trigger phase two!)

(Manager Qian, if you’re listening—special authorization, please?)

Too late for regrets.
She knew she could not—must not—let the chant finish.
Like every anime villain, she had to stop the transformation!

(I have to stop her—before she completes it!)

Her eyes hardened, razor-sharp.
Despite the trembling in her arms, she locked the sight steady, aligning with the gaps between the petals.
She squeezed the trigger.

Bang! Bang! Bang!
Three azure bolts streaked forth, her last hope riding the trail of blue light—

Straight toward the wall being born.