"Did you just grab her real body? Didn't the files say her real body was inside the dream?" Li Xuan asked curiously.
"It's simple. The files said, 'Immediately activate ?????? to suppress her.' Based on my understanding of Sealing Type magic, those six censored characters should be 'Dual Prohibition Barrier.'
This kind of barrier can interfere with both the spiritual and material realms at once. As long as the timing is precise enough, it can catch the real body—though fundamentally, she was still inside the dream. What we saw just now was merely an overlap caused by the dual barrier," Li Sijie explained.
"I didn't understand any of that, but giving that bastard a taste of suffering is a good thing. Saves her from doing whatever she wants just because nobody can catch her." Li Xuan picked his ear, opened a portal, and sent Li Sijie back to reality.
While Li Xuan and Li Sijie were busy building outside, Alulu, lying in her mother's arms, poked her head out in confusion. "Mom, what's going on outside? Why is it so noisy? It sounds like a construction site."
"Who knows? This room has already been sealed off. I have no way of knowing what's happening outside," Lilika said helplessly.
"Mom, tell me the truth. You didn't stage this whole thing yourself just to make me do my homework, did you?" Alulu suddenly asked.
"How could that be? How big of a heart would Mom need to have to drag herself into this just for a performance?" Lilika said with a bitter smile.
Alulu thought about it and realized that was true. Thinking of how much her mother had suffered for her, she said guiltily, "Sorry, Mom. I shouldn't have doubted you. It was all your daughter's fault that made Mom..."
"It's alright, good girl. As long as you're safe and sound, nothing else matters. The owner of this place seems to treat you fairly well. In a while, Mom will look for an opportunity and see if I can ask him to let you go," Lilika said affectionately, pressing her daughter's head against her chest.
"Mom, don't use your chest as a pillow. It's kind of pokey..." Alulu felt her head bump against hard bone and quickly broke free from her mother's embrace. She then scooped up her much smaller mother in a chest-pillow hold.
"What a bad child, making fun of Mom..." Buried in her daughter's softness, Lilika could not help feeling both embarrassed and annoyed.
"You're no different. You already knew I was a magical girl, but you never exposed me. You even hid your own identity from me," Alulu said disdainfully.
"Wasn't that for your sake... I mean, although I said your safety was more important than anything, you still need to do your homework as usual. How are you doing with memorizing ancient poems? Classical Chinese has always been your weak point. Have you asked your teacher for any tips?" Lilika asked.
"Mom, you must be so worried about me that you've gotten confused. Hurry up and rest for a while. Don't talk for now." Seeing her mother bring up schoolwork, Alulu hurriedly used a face-washing treatment to stop her from continuing.
Happy Times Are About to Begin?
Early the next morning, Li Xuan went to the twelfth floor and politely sent Ms. Lilika home. He then gathered all the magical girls and instructed them not to go to the upper platform.
Though the magical girls were curious, since their master had spoken, they naturally did not dare disobey.
Thus, Li Xuan brought Li Sijie up there every day and worked his arms off. Whenever they got tired, they would return below to rest.
Whenever Li Sijie was absent, he would go down to play arcade games with Tan Xiang, visit Bing Rui and Tang Xi, or randomly pick one or several magical girls for a cheerful impromptu party. Life was wonderfully satisfying.
Happy days passed one by one. Alulu's homework dwindled day by day, Tang Xi miraculously found new inspiration for her novel, and even the introverted Tan Xiang gradually joined the little trio's circle through her relationship with Wu Yan. The four of them gathered to do homework together, and the scene was filled with warmth and harmony.
The only one who showed no change was Bing Rui. Ever since being captured, she had maintained an unyielding attitude. Even when Li Xuan threatened Tang Xi's life or forced Fallen Blood down her throat, she showed no intention of yielding.
"This is the first time I've seen such a tough magical girl. Even Fallen Blood doesn't work on her?" Looking at the Demonfall progress hovering around sixty percent, Li Xuan could not help admiring her.
"Demon, kill me if you want, but if you want me to Demonfall, that will never happen!" Bing Rui glared fiercely at Li Xuan with bloodshot eyes.
Seeing Bing Rui's resolute attitude, Li Xuan could not help thinking of Xu Rou. Back then, she had also forcibly suppressed her body's Demonfall through sheer willpower after accidentally drinking Fallen Blood. Only after learning that she had been betrayed by her best friend did her psychological defenses completely collapse, sending her into the abyss.
However, Bing Rui did not have those conditions. Though she admired Tang Xi, the two were merely coworkers in a temporary partnership. They did not have the childhood-friend bond Xu Rou and Qi Mo shared.
So even if Li Xuan humiliated Tang Xi right in front of Bing Rui, he could not possibly create a mental blow stronger than the one Xu Rou had suffered back then.
Still, since she had already been captured, Li Xuan was not worried about where she could run. He merely instructed Tan Xiang to take good care of her daily needs.
Bing Rui's attitude toward Tan Xiang was far better than her attitude toward Li Xuan. She greatly respected this opponent with whom she had once fought to a draw, and she cooperated obediently whether it came to meals or cleaning.
After learning that Tan Xiang had once been a magical girl as well, Bing Rui even tried to persuade her to turn back from her ways—an offer Tan Xiang naturally rejected without hesitation.
A week passed quickly. Li Xuan excitedly prepared five exquisite wineglasses, poured the successfully brewed Wine of Ecstasy into them, released the well-behaved Tang Xi, and called the five magical girls who had already Demonfallen over to taste it together.
"Don't fight over it! One cup each! Everyone gets one!" Li Xuan built a long table and benches out of stone, seated the five magical girls in a row, and handed out the cups one by one.
"Master, this is..." Qi Mo raised her glass and looked at the pale blue liquid within it curiously.
"This is Wine of Ecstasy. Drinking it will make you stronger. Hurry and drink up~ Happy times are about to begin," Li Xuan said with a smile.
"Just drink it. Would Master really lie to us?" Wu Yan casually raised her glass, tilted back her head, and drained it in one gulp.
The other four magical girls followed suit. Before long, all five felt a powerful surge of Evil Energy racing through their bodies. Tang Xi and Tan Xi only felt slightly uncomfortable, but the little trio from Clear Lotus City were already clutching their stomachs and struggling on the floor.
"Ahhh, Master, this isn't good. My body feels swollen, like I'm about to explode... Energy keeps pouring out. I can't hold it in anymore... It's coming out!"
Wu Yan, who had drunk first, curled up on the ground with her arms wrapped around herself and wailed for a while. Then light suddenly burst from her entire body, and she transformed without even intending to.
Soon after, Xu Rou and Qi Mo transformed as well. Seeing this, Tang Xi stepped forward on her own initiative. "Master, it looks like they absorbed too much energy. I'll help suppress it."
Li Xuan nodded. It seemed the effects of this wine were indeed too powerful for Grade C magical girls. Just as people could get nosebleeds from taking too many tonics, the three magical girls were suffering similar side effects.
"You three, attack me now! Don't think. Pour out all your magic with your greatest force!" Tang Xi transformed as she spoke and created more than ten layers of defensive barriers in front of herself in one breath.
Hearing this, the three magical girls hurriedly attacked Tang Xi with all kinds of weapons and magic. Grade C attacks should have had little effect on Tang Xi's defensive barriers, yet after just one round of attacks, three or four layers were shattered outright.
"The energy in their bodies is rising rapidly. They're almost at Grade B already! That's terrifying, but I've grown much stronger too. I should still be able to hold on... right?" Tang Xi's tone gradually became uncertain, because Xu Rou, whose eyes had gone red with battle fury, split open two layers of barriers with a single axe swing.
"Judgment!" With Wu Yan's all-out strike, the remaining seven or eight layers of barriers were broken through in one go. Seeing the situation turn bad, Li Xuan hurriedly intervened, blocked the blow with Evil Energy, and pulled Tang Xi behind him.
"They're way too good at fighting..." Tang Xi said, still shaken as she rubbed her chest.
By then, after venting a large amount of Evil Energy, the little trio had finally calmed down. When Li Xuan examined the Evil Energy in their bodies again, it had already reached Grade B, on par with his own.
The Evil Energy in Tang Xi and Tan Xiang had also increased significantly, but it was still nowhere near enough to take another step forward. It seemed that even Advanced Wine of Ecstasy could not easily erase the gap between Grade B and Grade A.
"Master, we feel much better now—thank you, Sister Tang Xi." Returning to normal, the little trio saw how badly Tang Xi had been frightened and hurried over to thank her.
"With this, we have a full five Grade B combatants on our side. Including me, that makes six." Li Xuan rejoiced inwardly. This gave him far more confidence for any future action against the Church and Guardian Abbey.
"As expected of Master. I spent so many years in Guardian Abbey, yet I've never seen anyone's strength rise so quickly," Tang Xi said in amazement.
"Of course. Otherwise, how could I be your master?" Li Xuan said smugly.
"But this wine works so well. Why did you only prepare five cups? Isn't Master going to drink any?" Tang Xi asked curiously.
"Hm? What's wrong with five? Five isn't enough?" Li Xuan froze for a moment, then quickly realized that when he had counted heads, he had only thought of the five people under him and completely forgotten that he counted as a person too. The first batch of upgrade wine did not even include a share for himself!
"What nonsense are you talking about? Master naturally drank his long ago! Master is wise and mighty. How could he possibly fail at addition and subtraction within ten?"
Before Li Xuan could speak, Xu Rou answered Tang Xi's question for him. The other magical girls immediately showed expressions of sudden understanding.
"Cough, cough... Exactly. Did I need you to remind me? Go write for me!" Seeing that the atmosphere left no room for him to admit his mistake, Li Xuan could only smack Tang Xi's butt hard and send her off to the wine cellar to write.
Happy Times Have Already Ended!
"Damn, if you'd written like this earlier, wouldn't you have become popular already?" After finishing Tang Xi's update for the day, Li Xuan slapped his thigh and only regretted not capturing her sooner.
During this period, he had taken control of Tang Xi's account and announced that the original work would be cut short and continued anew. Although it had caused a huge uproar at first, readers who saw the recent updates all declared that it was amazing. The bold decision to axe the original even sent the work trending, drawing in a massive wave of traffic.
"Hurry up and work. Your desk will go here. The desk needs to be big, and there has to be enough space underneath to fit a person," Li Sijie urged from beside him when she saw him absorbed in reading.
"Why leave so much space under the desk? Enough room for two legs should be fine, right?" Li Xuan put away his phone and asked in confusion.
"How could that work? You need to reserve enough space under an office desk in advance. It's the classic secretary-under-the-desk position." After saying that, Li Sijie suddenly remembered that she had recently been appointed the principal's secretary. Her face immediately reddened, and she stopped speaking.
"Right, right, right. How could I forget such basic common sense? The partitions should also use double-sided glass. That way, if we capture magical girls close to each other, we can put one in the partition and make her watch as I press the other one onto the office desk..." Li Xuan continued along her train of thought, adding more details.
The pleasant summer vacation was nearing its end, and Phase One Project of Li Xuan's Delusive Badlands was gradually approaching completion. Only some tedious interior decoration work remained. Space authority could not handle that part, and the construction waste he had scavenged could not meet such refined needs.
Therefore, Li Xuan planned to design only his own office and the hall for meetings. He would leave the other places unfinished for now and decorate them gradually according to need in the future.
After settling on the office design, Li Xuan checked the time and opened a portal to send Li Sijie back.
However, this time, Li Sijie did not leave right away. Instead, she took Li Xuan's hand and said, "President Li, summer vacation ends next week. I'm planning to return to school early and preview my junior-year courses. As for the work here..."
"It's fine. I can handle the remaining finishing touches myself. As for the coffee shop, I'll have the manager settle your pay as soon as possible. You can just wear the maid outfit home too." As he spoke, Li Xuan suddenly thought of something. He teleported to the wine cellar, kicked Tang Xi, who was slacking off, then brought back two newly brewed cups of Wine of Ecstasy.
"This is wine that can increase your energy limit. The effect probably won't be huge for you, but let's use it for a toast anyway, to celebrate our cooperation." Li Xuan handed one cup to Li Sijie.
"President Li, I want the cup in your hand." Li Sijie looked at the color of the wine and suddenly smiled slyly.
"What? You think I drugged it?" Li Xuan laughed.
"You never know. I've always trusted your character: it has always been utterly vile." Li Sijie raised her middle finger.
"Then what if I do the opposite and predict that you'll want to swap, so I drugged the cup in my hand?"
"That makes sense. Then we'll each drink half, then exchange cups. That way, the drug will be evenly distributed." Li Sijie smiled, tipped back her head, drank half her cup, and handed the remaining half to Li Xuan.
"Whatever you say. Let's have a cross-cup toast, then." Li Xuan thought this girl was being far too wary of him, but drinking half a leftover cup was no big deal. He drank half of his own cup and handed it to Li Sijie, then raised his head and drank the half cup she had passed him.
However, after drinking, Li Xuan was the one who felt uncomfortable. His body suddenly felt terribly swollen, and he instinctively clutched his stomach. "...Ugh, something's wrong. Did you drug me?"
Before he could finish speaking, Li Xuan felt a powerful force erupt from within his body and get absorbed by the seal around his arm. However, this time, the seal only absorbed part of the energy before going on strike. It even fed the energy it had already absorbed back into his body. Attacked from both inside and out, Li Xuan felt as though Tang Xi's legs were crushing him again that day—except this time, his entire body was being squeezed.
"The seal is saturated! President Li, try releasing your animal instincts! You might be able to learn Self-Release that way!" Li Sijie hurriedly reminded him.
"Aaaaah!!!" Li Xuan tore open his shirt and roared. Evil Energy erupted from his entire body like a volcanic explosion, shaking the whole platform.
Li Xuan recalled what the little trio had done when they leveled up that day. He frantically created Fallen Blood to consume the Evil Energy, finally allowing his body, which was on the verge of exploding, to vent it.
Yet this surge of Evil Energy was all thunder and no rain. After a burst of frenzied eruption, Li Xuan's body did not undergo any significant changes.
"Did this... fail?" Li Xuan looked at the basketball-sized blood sphere above his head.
"It looks like it did, but you needn't be discouraged. Using this shortcut method had a ninety percent chance of failing to begin with. Even with your talent, it would still be around seventy percent," Li Sijie said, patting his shoulder comfortingly.
"Why is it only seventy percent?" Li Xuan asked unhappily.
"Seventy percent is the failure rate. The reason it's only seventy percent is because you're exceptionally gifted, and your animal instincts are several times stronger than other people's." Li Sijie pursed her lips.
"Fine. Looks like I saved all that energy for nothing. Can I try again?" Li Xuan looked at the shredded fragments of socks scattered across the ground from the energy impact.
"Of course. As long as I'm here, I can continuously produce materials for seals." Li Sijie smiled, took off one white thigh-high stocking on the spot, and tied a new seal around Li Xuan's arm.
"Since the success rate is thirty percent, it should usually take only three or four tries. I may not have time when I'm at school, but if you need me, you can come find me on the weekends. Well then, see you later." After tightening the stocking, Li Sijie left the Delusive Badlands with a reluctant look in her eyes.
"It's about time I went back and checked on the business. I've left everything to the manager lately. I wonder how it's doing." Watching Li Sijie's departing figure, Li Xuan felt a little wistful. But he quickly pulled himself together, opened a portal, and arrived near the coffee shop.
The moment he returned to reality, Li Xuan's phone erupted with a flood of notifications. He thought he had been doxxed because he had axed Tang Xi's original work, but when he hurriedly opened them, he found they were all messages from Lilika.
Without thinking much about it, he immediately called the adorable loli mom. She picked up almost instantly.
"Run! Go as far away as you can. You can't stay in this area anymore."
Lilika's anxious voice came from the other end of the call.
"What happened?"
Hearing Lilika's frantic voice, Li Xuan could not help asking the same question as Masked Rider Jeanne during her transformation.
"This morning's news said that Guardian Abbey and the Church have reached a compromise. Neither side will interfere in the Magical Girl Disappearance Case in Clear Lotus and Flower River," Lilika said.
"Isn't that a good thing?" Li Xuan asked in confusion.
"It couldn't be worse. The condition for Guardian Abbey's compromise was for the Church to step in and hire the notorious mercenaries, the Witch Band, to settle your crimes. My advice is to leave immediately. That might give you a slim chance at survival."
On the other end of the phone, Lilika's tone sounded utterly sincere, with no hint of exaggeration.
Witch Band
"Witch Band? Is that the band I'm thinking of?" Li Xuan asked in confusion.
"That's right. They're a band, and also a mercenary squad made up of four Grade A magical girls," Lilika summarized.
"F-Four what??? Four Grade As?!" Li Xuan was so startled that he nearly dropped his phone.
"That's right, all four are Grade A. Not only that, their methods are extremely crazy. They have even leveled an entire city block just to hunt down a monster. It's said they do not even care about their companions' lives, so taking hostages probably won't work on them," Lilika warned.
Li Xuan's heart sank. From Lilika's anxious tone, he knew this time would not be as easy as before.
"Ms. Lilika, I heard that you were once a Grade A magical girl too. I'd like you to give me an intuitive description. Just how strong is Grade A?" After forcing himself to calm down, Li Xuan asked.
"That's hard to say. Magic power rank does not completely represent combat strength. For each individual, you also have to consider combat skill, the strength of their magic, and the differences between their upper and lower limits. The gap can be huge. For example, a Grade A Prayer Type magical girl might not even be able to defeat a Grade C Battle Type magical girl without special circumstances," Lilika said awkwardly.
"What about you at your peak?"
"At my peak... Going by my instincts, I could probably clear out the monster army you summoned that day within ten minutes," Lilika answered after thinking for a moment.
"Ten minutes... They were actually that strong?"
Li Xuan frowned. Back then, he had relied on Bing Rui replenishing his magic to cast Fallen Blood eleven times and create that monster army. Tang Xi had chosen to surrender after taking only one look at it. Though part of that was because she had given up on herself, she had still made that helpless choice only after concluding that she could not possibly win.
Yet in Lilika's eyes, such a large monster army was merely a group of fodder that could be dealt with in ten minutes?
Sensing Li Xuan's silence, Lilika continued, "I've been out of the front lines for more than a decade, so my judgment may not be accurate. But one very important point is this: I never mastered Awakening back then, while among the four witches in the band, at least one can use Awakening."
Li Xuan remained silent. Many plans had already appeared in his mind: ambushes, poison, traps, sowing discord...
Every one of them seemed possible, but because of the vast difference in strength, putting any of them into action would undoubtedly be like walking on thin ice. One careless mistake could lead to total defeat.
"I understand. Then please send me all the information you have about those four. I'll decide for myself how to deal with them," Li Xuan said after a long silence.
"I knew you would say that. I'll organize it for you now, but it probably won't be much. They never cooperate with anyone outside their band, so outsiders rarely know much about them."
Before you continue