Victory Banquet

"Ms. Yaohua..."

Feiyan, whose joy had been written all over her face, immediately became like a damp firecracker as she timidly called out to the magical girl beside the table.

Having yet to fully graduate from Magical Girl Academy, she felt a bone-deep fear whenever she saw Yaohua.

The pressure of real-world school was nowhere near as great as the pressure Magical Girl Academy had given her.

Seeing a teacher similar to a homeroom teacher made her instinctively afraid.

Forget students seeing their teachers—even after starting work, people might still subconsciously fear their teachers. It was practically postwar stress syndrome.

"Why do you look like you've seen a ghost whenever you see me? Am I that scary?" Yaohua asked with a laugh.

Yuyan and Yalin appeared exceptionally calm.

Well-behaved, obedient students and invisible students with little presence naturally had nothing to worry about.

Students like Feiyan, who ranked above average and often caused trouble, were the ones most afraid of teachers.

"Don't be so scared of me. I'm not going to eat you. Sit down." Yaohua gestured for Feiyan to sit beside her.

Just as extroverts liked teasing introverts, and puppies would chase the person in a crowd most afraid of dogs.

When introverted Yaohua encountered Feiyan, who feared her, her playful side instantly surfaced.

"Chicken soup's here~"

Youyue emerged from the kitchen carrying a soup pot and looked at Yuyan and Yalin, who were still standing where they were.

"What are you standing around for? Pick somewhere you like and try your Sister Youyue's cooking. I'm a pretty great cook—you're in for a treat today."

With that, Youyue returned to the kitchen and brought out dish after dish, placing the colorful, fragrant, delicious food on the table.

The fresh-cooked food gave off an irresistible aroma, and Feiyan and Yalin, who had long been starving, kept swallowing their saliva.

Adolescence was when students were at their greediest.

Since they could not enjoy much entertainment to begin with, their "entertainment" after leaving school was destined to be tied to eating.

Chopsticks were already in their hands, yet no one moved, waiting for the people and dishes to all be in place.

When Qingyin followed Youyue out of the kitchen, it meant all the dishes had been served, and the table was packed full of lavish food.

There were also plenty of drinks the girls would enjoy, along with alcohol specially prepared by Youyue.

Qingyin gave the room a quick glance and discovered that, besides the familiar magical girls, there were several unexpected little guests.

Qiubo, Wazi, and Shita, the magical girls' mascots, were sitting at the edge of the table.

Yalin was teasing Shita, while Wazi seemed to be bragging to Yuyan about something.

Only her mascot, Qiubo, was staring longingly at the food.

It was exactly like that red-haired magical girl—Feiyan was only short of drooling. Her eager expression was a little funny and a little cute.

In a good mood, Qingyin passed the edge of the table, freed her right hand, and poked Qiubo on the head with her index finger.

"Hey?" Qiubo tilted its head, seeming to ask what was wrong.

Without answering its question, Qingyin placed the dish in her hands onto the table. As the host, she said,

"No need to stand on ceremony. Everyone must be hungry. Dig in first."

As soon as she finished speaking, the first to make a move was not Feiyan, but Youyue, who had just taken her seat.

Having helped in the kitchen, she had been eyeing the food for a long time. She had to see just how delicious that dish she had been anticipating was.

"Qingyin's cooking is amazing." Youyue immediately praised her after taking a bite.

Only blushing furiously and having her clothes explode could have better expressed how delicious it was.

"Uh... Sister Youyue, didn't you say you made it?" Feiyan mercilessly exposed her.

"I put in effort, so of course I made it too." Youyue smiled shamelessly.

After all, she had helped prepare the ingredients.

"It really is delicious." Yaohua nodded in agreement after trying it.

"It smells so good, so good..." Yalin spoke indistinctly as she chewed, unable to resist using her hands on the ribs.

"Delicious." Yuyan's eyes lit up as well, and her chopsticks moved rapidly.

"Let me try, let me try." Feiyan, who had fallen behind everyone else, anxiously picked up a dish she liked and popped it into her mouth.

"It's even more delicious than what my parents make. Sister Qingyin is amazing."

The girls' clear, sweet voices rang out with endless praise, common and uncommon alike.

A whole bunch of praise addicts had even made Qingyin, with her normally calm mind, feel a little embarrassed.

Fortunately, a voice appeared that let Qingyin settle herself and return to normal.

"Goo goo gaga! This is so good, bro!" Qiubo threw back its head and shouted.

"How did you end up contracted to a magical girl like Qingyin?" Wazi bit into the chunk of meat in its hand, looking as though tears might fall at any moment.

"Powerful magical girls can have multiple Contract Beasts." Shita, Youyue's personal mascot, seemed about to be won over by a single meal.

Still, it did not seem to matter much.

Because that meal was also about to "win over" its owner, Youyue, along with it.

"It's not as exaggerated as you're making it sound. It's just ordinary home cooking." Qingyin gently shook her head.

It was not as if she had never eaten her own cooking before.

Could it be that, as a magical girl, her hands had somehow become more skillful?

Perhaps everyone was simply using unspoken flattery to please the cook.

With doubt in her mind, Qingyin tried the food she had made herself. The flavor and texture made her expression turn strange.

One dish, then another...

After sampling several dishes, Chef Qingyin understood where the problem lay.

Setting aside the influence of the ingredients, the main thing was that the flavor and texture of every dish were perfectly balanced.

The saltiness was just right, and the sweetness was just right.

It was not skillful hands—it was intuition at work.

When it came to adding the right amount of seasoning, she had far surpassed Ye Qing's cooking ability.

Having understood the situation, Qingyin stopped dwelling on it and instead immersed herself in the atmosphere, enjoying her own cooking.

With the cheerful mood and delicious food, this celebration banquet, held both to break in the new home and celebrate their success, was exceptionally successful.

Yaohua became more animated the more she drank and talked, until...

"Ms. Yaohua, our team completed Blood Purity Court's mission brilliantly. Do you think we're strong enough now?" Feiyan asked expectantly.

For Feiyan, receiving recognition from the academy teacher she both feared and admired was an enormous source of satisfaction.

"Strong? You're only so-so. Now, I was truly strong back then." Drunken Yaohua boasted.

"At the academy tournament a few years ago, who didn't know me, the Light Knight? With one sword... I opened heaven's gate!"

"Geez, Ms. Yaohua, you really know how to brag." Feiyan replied disdainfully.

"I've never heard of any achievement like that."

"What do you know? Watch closely, little brat!"

Provoked, Yaohua summoned her Magic Weapon, a gleaming longsword, determined to put on a show.

But drunk and lacking both direction and control, Yaohua had not even risen from her chair before her powerless swing cut through the wall and split the table in two.

In an instant, a terrifying pressure made her spine turn cold, and sweat streamed down her back.

She carefully raised her head for a furtive glance. Qingyin, expressionless, was staring at her with killing intent.

She was clearly a junior magical girl, clearly someone of the same generation—so why did she feel the pressure of an elder?

Thus, driven by instinct, Yaohua lightly dropped to her knees on the chair and lowered her head like a quail.

Feiyan had long since dragged her companions away from the heart of the conflict, afraid the fury would spread to them.

The three little mascots clung tightly to one another, huddling in a circle in an attempt to find some sense of safety.

And there was one more magical girl who was laughing so freely that she nearly passed out.