Officially Certified Magical Girl

Liang Bing stared at the magazine without saying a word for a long time.

She had watched them stamp it with the red seal. She had proofread the article herself at three in the morning. Now he had slapped it down in front of her, and it had become a brick to shut her up.

Her expression shifted several times.

Su Bai stood with his arms folded, leaning against the back of the old sofa, looking every bit like an overworked employee at the end of his rope.

"Officer, are we done here? My boxed dinner's getting cold."

"Bro! I'm hungry too!" Su Xiaoxiao wailed from behind the door.

"Stay hungry!"

Liang Bing ignored that. She exchanged a glance with Han Dong, and he nodded.

There were limits a field commander had the authority to judge for herself.

She raised a hand and switched the Holographic Terminal back on. Light and shadow spread across the center of the living room.

A mass of purple-gold light crashed into the Monster horde. The Great Scythe swept through them, and the lightning storm died.

The person swinging the scythe in the footage was now standing three meters from the image, arms folded, yawning.

"Master, you look like a completely different person when you yawn than when you swing that scythe," Kabi muttered against his spine.

Shut up.

"Mr. Su Bai, I'll be honest with you."

Liang Bing pointed at the blurred afterimage.

"The truth is, the bureau came up with that story to keep the public from panicking. The new exoskeleton armor in the magazine was made up. The Seventh Research Institute never even approved a project for it."

"But that purple-gold Magical Girl..."

She paused.

"She's a Savior who truly appeared."

The living room fell silent for two seconds.

"People online say the Magical Girl is an idol your Monster Hunting Bureau put forward to stage shows for the public." Su Bai raised an eyebrow. "Now you're telling me the armor's fake, but she's real?"

"Yes," Liang Bing answered crisply. "She isn't a puppet the bureau created. To this day, no one at the bureau has even seen her face."

"Officially confirmed!!!"

Someone pounded on the bedroom door hard enough to shake it.

"Hear that, Hajige? Officially confirmed! Savior! Lady Ziwei really exists!!"

Su Bai smacked the doorframe behind him, making it hum.

"Do your homework! One more word and you lose all of next month's allowance!"

The door went quiet at once.

Su Bai turned back and studied Liang Bing as if she were a patient.

"Officer, can I ask you something?"

"Ask."

"Has everyone at your bureau been working so much overtime they've lost their minds?"

Han Dong coughed beside her.

"Or did you watch some over-the-top anime and never get over it?" Su Bai was on a roll. "A Magical Girl? A Savior? Officer, I'm eighteen. I stopped believing in that stuff when I was eight. I only believe in monster hunters who can prove themselves with strength!"

"Mr. Su Bai," Liang Bing said evenly, "there were over two hundred witnesses in the West District that night. You were at the supermarket yourself."

"I was there. I saw a ball of light with a shadow inside it." Su Bai spread his hands. "Even my sister's cardboard standee lights up these days. What's so hard about projecting a silhouette?"

"Then how do you explain your sister drawing a sigil and chanting a spell to 'summon' her?"

"Coincidence," Su Bai replied without batting an eye. "Last year she said she was a demon princess and conned two hundred yuan out of me for a black cloak."

A muffled whimper came from behind the door. Someone clearly wanted to argue but didn't dare.

Liang Bing looked at him, then suddenly asked, "Aren't you curious, though? If Magical Girls are real, where do they come from?"

That was exactly what Su Bai had been waiting for.

He sank into the sofa and put on a mercenary look.

"Fine, I'll cooperate with the authorities. So let me ask—"

He started counting on his fingers.

"Can you train someone to become one?"

"Say you lock a grown man away for three months of intensive training. Could he become a Magical Girl?"

Han Dong's mouth twitched.

"And what about"—Su Bai jerked his chin toward the bedroom—"a high school girl like my sister? Do you have a crash course? How much is tuition? Job placement included?"

"Master," Kabi whispered, "you're fishing for information."

Obviously.

Kabi had only given him a vague explanation about "resonance" for why his body could transform. The authorities had been investigating for months; surely they had found something solid.

Liang Bing and Han Dong exchanged a glance.

There was a lot in that look. After three months of investigation, interviews with over a hundred witnesses, and frame-by-frame analysis of every recording, their understanding of how Magical Girls awakened was on the same level as this kid's nonsense—

Zero.

"To be honest," Liang Bing said, looking back at him, "the authorities still don't know how Magical Girls awaken."

"No crash course?"

"No."

"Not even anywhere to pay tuition?"

"No."

"Then what's the point of certifying them?" Su Bai looked disappointed. "I was hoping to send my sister off for Magical Girl training so she'd have an easier time finding a job."

Another whimper came from behind the door.

"Hajige, you jerk! Who wants you finding me a job?"

"Su Xiaoxiao!"

Liang Bing raised a hand, stopping the sibling war.

Her expression turned solemn.

"Mr. Su Bai, what I've told you tonight already goes beyond what I'm supposed to share."

"Sensitive matters concerning Magical Girls currently fall under Federation secrecy regulations. Once you walk out that door, you cannot tell anyone. No posts, no group chats, no bragging to your classmates."

"Violations will be treated as disclosure of Federation secrets, starting with seven days' detention."

Su Bai nodded rapidly.

"Got it, got it. Don't worry, Officer. I'm great at keeping my mouth shut."

"I just want to get my degree in peace and find a job after graduation. Whoever the Magical Girl is, she's got nothing to do with me."

Liang Bing watched him for two seconds.

Then she gave the living room one last look.

On the shoe rack sat a pair of rubber shoes with split seams held together by wire. On the dining table, a delivery helmet had lost a large patch of paint, exposing the white plastic beneath. Half an old magazine still propped up a coffee-table leg; after one had been pulled out earlier, the remaining half had been shifted to a different angle.

Everywhere she looked, she saw signs of a life lived on too little money.

And nothing that raised the slightest suspicion.

A college student with student loans, a sister obsessed with fantasy, a forty-square-meter old apartment, half-price boxed dinners, and late-night delivery shifts.

There were hundreds of thousands of families like that in Xinghai City.

Liang Bing looked away and drew a card from inside her trench coat.

The card was thin, with a silver chip embedded in it and the Monster Hunting Bureau's insignia pressed into one corner.

"Take it."

Su Bai took it and turned it over a few times.

"A meal card?"

"A direct contact card for the Action Team," Liang Bing said. "The chip connects straight to my terminal. Someone will answer twenty-four hours a day."

"Why give it to me?"

"Your sister heads a fan club with over three hundred members. They may hear things before we do. You make deliveries all over the city, and you live in the Affected Zone."

"People like you are the most likely to stumble across a lead."

Su Bai's heart gave a jolt.

Outwardly, he curled his lip. "Officer, I'm busy. I don't have time to be your informant."