Huali's First Battle

Fu You had chosen the hospital's rear courtyard as their meeting place because he was thoroughly familiar with the Witches' Society's habits.

If they fought here, the Abyss Witch would have plenty of ways to escape openly, while the Magical Girls, wary of damaging the hospital, would have no choice but to stop and watch her leave.

When the two were nearly at the hospital's rear courtyard, they could already hear waves of commotion coming from within.

"It's Magical Girls! We're saved!"

"There's a Fierce Beast inside! Hurry, go save them!!"

The panicked people fleeing the area pointed Fu You and Huali in the right direction.

Fu You was slightly taken aback and hesitated briefly. Yet during that hesitation, Huali rushed ahead of him.

Moving against the crowd, the two quickly charged into the hospital's rear courtyard.

"Quack quack quack, human flesh! Delicious!!"

A nauseating stench of blood filled the air. The Fierce Beast, over five meters tall and possessing six arms, continuously scooped people up with its claws and stuffed them into its enormous mouth, over two meters long.

The Fierce Beast resembled a gigantic crab, yet it lacked a crab's hard shell. Wildly proliferating flesh had swollen its body into an almost spherical shape, riddled with holes. Some holes contained eyes, while others sprouted long black hairs, seemingly nostrils.

"So disgusting..." Huali pinched her nose.

Fu You nodded and rubbed his own nose as well.

Several of the Fierce Beast's eyeballs turned at once, locking onto the two intruders.

"Hee... girls... smell so good, want to eat..."

Without hesitation, one arm covered in slick flesh, ending in a hooked claw, suddenly swept toward Huali.

Huali hurriedly took a step back.

But Fu You noticed that the two people who had previously been stuffed into the Fierce Beast's huge mouth seemed to still be struggling faintly.

The Fierce Beast's mouth was enormous. Though it could swallow several people at once, its teeth were not sharp enough to quickly chew up and swallow those it had taken into its mouth.

Fu You usually had little interest in saving people, but since he was bringing along a junior—and a healing-type junior at that—he should at least help her establish some proper values as a Magical Girl.

So Fu You grabbed the bow on Huali's back and, ignoring her cry of surprise, lifted her up with both hands.

"Senior, do you have some kind of strategy?" Huali asked as she was raised into the air.

"No."

Fu You wasted no words. Like he was throwing a sack of explosives, he viciously hurled Huali toward the beast's mouth.

Seeing the Magical Girl flying through the air, the Fierce Beast cooperatively opened its mouth wide.

"Ah!?"

Huali's cry cut off halfway through. Seeing the Fierce Beast tilt its head back and open its enormous maw wide, the panic on her face was swiftly replaced by focus.

She had also noticed the two people inside the Fierce Beast's mouth, their lives and deaths unknown. In midair, she sharply twisted her waist and adjusted her posture, extending one leg forward and bending the other back. Her pink skirt and the white safety shorts beneath it rustled in the air.

Using the momentum of her spin, she precisely planted one foot against the slick fleshy inner wall at the edge of the Fierce Beast's mouth, bent her knee to absorb the impact, and landed steadily in a crouch atop its tongue.

The Fierce Beast immediately shut its mouth.

Huali did not hesitate. A soft pink glow lit up around the small pink wand in her palm, flowing into both her hands. She pressed her palms against the chests of the two unconscious people, and the glow seeped into them. Then she clenched their collars, braced her back and waist, pushed off the monster's upper jaw with her feet, and yanked outward with all her strength!

"Urgh—ah!!"

The monster's mouth muscles contracted, and its huge jaws pressed down. Huali's arm muscles tightened, her cheeks twisting slightly from the strain. The petite body of a Magical Girl held strength beyond that of an ordinary person; even with two adult men weighing over eighty kilograms each at her sides, she could still lift them slightly from the slick surface of its tongue.

Just a little more, and I can save them!

This was her first battle as a Magical Girl!

Her small feet stepped on the gigantic beast's slippery tongue, trying to borrow its support and leap out. But at the instant she exerted herself, her foot suddenly slipped—the beast seemed to sense her intentions, and its thick tongue abruptly retracted inward!

"Ah!"

Having lost her balance, Huali fell forward without any defense, crashing heavily against the foul-smelling, slick flesh of its mouth. The instant her chest touched that writhing soft meat, a chill shot through her heart.

Then she felt a rough, warm, enormous thing touch her legs and the side of her waist—it was a tongue, another tongue.

This monster actually had two tongues?!

The force was astonishing. Even with a Magical Girl's physique, under such overwhelming raw strength, she was still as powerless as an infant. With just a gentle press, the tongue firmly pinned her, along with the two unconscious patients, against the edge of the jagged teeth at the back.

It was as though she and the two patients were merely three stalks of garlic sprouts in the beast's mouth.

The Fierce Beast's upper jaw began to descend, shadows engulfing them. Huali hurriedly tried to get up, but the tongue suddenly secreted a large amount of liquid, wet and sticky, leaving her unable to find any leverage. Naturally, she could not stand.

The Fierce Beast's upper jaw was covered in countless spikes, along with steaming saliva that made her nauseous. The surrounding flesh walls squeezed and contracted, while the light was swallowed by the narrowing gap.

Huali was only a healing-type Magical Girl. She had no combat skills to begin with, and now that she was trapped in this desperate situation, escaping through her own strength was nearly impossible.

But she had seen what Fu You could do and knew how strong her senior was.

The Fierce Beast's mouth reeked nauseatingly, its scorching breath constantly washing over her body. Though fear filled her heart, she knew that Fu You was outside. Fu You would definitely help her...

She anxiously peered through the narrowing gap between its lips and teeth, only to see Fu You standing motionless where he was, merely watching everything from afar with a cold gaze. Until the giant beast's dark purple, thick lips finally closed, completely cutting off the last trace of light and her sight.

—Senior... isn't he going to come over?

Stunned disbelief rose in her heart.