I Have a Wish!

"Training?" Su Bai raised an eyebrow.

He looked Ye Qingqing up and down. Did she want to train with him in her ordinary state?

She was so slight he could circle one of her arms with a single hand. Train with him?

"My training is all brute force. You wouldn't be able to learn it," Su Bai said, brushing her off.

"What wouldn't she be able to learn?" Su Xiaoxiao came over.

"With a genius president like me looking out for you, you don't need to train!"

Su Bai laughed too. "Forget training. Let's eat."

Ye Qingqing stood where she was, the light in her eyes dimming before it quickly brightened again. If he refused to teach her, that meant he had real skills. What true master took a disciple without being asked three times?

She made a mental note: starting tomorrow, she would bring Su Bai breakfast every day.

The barbecue restaurant stood around the corner from the apartment building. Its storefront was small, but the words "Snowflake Wagyu" gleamed on its sign.

Su Bai usually walked past without a second glance. A place that cost over two hundred per person had nothing to do with someone who bought half-price boxed meals.

Today was different. The five-thousand-yuan allowance Liang Bing had approved was burning a hole in his pocket.

"This, this, and this." Seated in a booth by the window, he ran his finger down the menu. "Three orders of beef belly, two of chuck, two of tongue, and two of short ribs."

The server's pen paused. "Sir, there are only three of you..."

"We'll finish it."

Clutching her menu, Su Xiaoxiao swallowed and leaned toward Ye Qingqing. "My brother is definitely possessed today. Last month, I bought a milk tea and he lectured me about it for three days."

Ye Qingqing said nothing. She had noticed something else: while Su Bai ordered, his gaze swept outside, taking in the street corner, the alley entrance, and the rooftop. He hadn't missed a single blind spot.

That was the look of someone checking a perimeter. It was a habit a Night Watchers captain would have when entering unfamiliar surroundings.

So cool and stern. She held her teacup, her heart beating a little faster.

Su Bai grabbed the tongs and started grilling. He cooked the meat until its edges were lightly charred while the center stayed pink.

"Bro, when did you learn to do that?" Su Xiaoxiao stared.

"What's there to learn about grilling meat?" Su Bai said without looking up. "Turn it when the heat's right. It's like saving money: timing matters most."

Kabi huddled inside the back of his collar, whimpering at the smell of meat. "Master, I want some too..."

"You don't eat."

"Can't I at least smell it?"

Su Bai ignored Kabi. With a flick of his tongs, he sent a perfectly grilled slice of beef belly into Su Xiaoxiao's bowl, then another into Ye Qingqing's.

"Thank you..." Ye Qingqing held her bowl in both hands.

She watched Su Bai's hand as he turned the meat. Steady, precise—every slice cooked for exactly the right amount of time. This was no barbecue. It was a master at work, every strike landing in the same spot.

He makes me feel so safe. She lowered her head and took a bite, her cheeks growing hot.

Su Xiaoxiao, meanwhile, ate without a care, her cheeks stuffed full. "Mmm! So good! Bro, you should've treated us sooner!"

"Just eat." Su Bai turned another batch of meat.

The charcoal burned bright, and the aroma of meat filled the air. He picked up a perfectly grilled slice of premium beef belly, its fat glistening under the lights, and brought it toward his mouth.

At that very instant.

He sensed it without Kabi's warning. Within a hundred-meter radius, the concentration of free-floating dimensional particles was shooting up—tenfold, thirtyfold, and still climbing.

"Master!" Kabi's voice went shrill. "A Rift! Right above us!"

Su Bai cursed inwardly.

Unbelievable. What kind of disaster magnet am I? Trouble follows me everywhere. And whenever Xiaoxiao's around, I can never avoid it.

Worse, there was another problem. To evade the Monster Hunting Bureau's magic detectors all over town, he had locked his vast Purple-Gold Magic Power in the deepest part of his Source Core before leaving home, sealing it beneath layer after layer. Forcing it open now would take at least three seconds.

Three seconds. Normally, that was nothing.

But he didn't have three seconds.

Crack!

Spiderweb cracks spread across the tempered-glass exterior wall without warning, and the entire wall bulged outward. Blood-red clouds tore savagely through the night sky, which had been clear a moment ago. A sickly sweet stench of deep-sea rot poured through the opening and flooded the entire shopping street.

"Wh-what is that—" A customer at the next table had just stood up.

The lights went out.

An enormous, mountain-like shadow of flesh squeezed out of the blood clouds, blotting out half the sky above the street. Pustules, pallid tentacles, and crisscrossing scars like stitches covered it. Before the thing even landed, glass shattered all along the street.

Su Bai's pupils contracted.

C-class. Abyssal Sea Tier. Its Magic Power Scale reading was conservatively over ten thousand. It was on par with a Sun Herald—the kind of monster the Monster Hunting Bureau would need a full battle group to confront.

And something of that level had been dropped straight into a busy commercial district.

What was the Ashen Defense Line on the outskirts even doing?

There was no time to curse. The impact from the falling monster struck first. The barbecue restaurant's foundations lurched, and the whole building tilted toward the middle of the street. A concrete load-bearing pillar overhead snapped and hurtled straight at their table, jagged rebar jutting from it.

Su Bai moved.

He kicked Su Xiaoxiao and Ye Qingqing, chairs and all, into the corner. It was the only protected spot against the wall, where the triangular structure would keep falling debris from crushing them completely.

The two girls tumbled together, still unaware of what had happened.

"Bro—!"

Boom.

The entire ceiling came down. Dust billowed skyward. The table, the charcoal grill, the plate of freshly grilled premium beef belly, and Su Bai himself were buried under tons of rubble.

Not even a scrap of his clothing showed.

Screams, cries, and shattering glass mingled across the street. People fled in both directions. Some fell and were trampled; others knelt by the roadside clutching their children. The blood clouds sank lower, and the stench of rot grew overpowering.

"Cough... cough..."

Su Xiaoxiao crawled out of the corner, her face and hair covered in dust. Ignoring the pain, she turned, saw the heap of rubble, and felt her mind go blank.

"Bro?"

No answer.

"Bro—!"

She threw herself onto the rubble and dug into it with all ten fingers, pulling out broken stones one by one. Shattered glass sliced her palms, but she didn't stop. A fingernail tore off; blood mixed with dust, but she kept digging.

"Su Bai! Come out! Don't scare me!"

Ye Qingqing crawled over and tried to pull her away, but Su Xiaoxiao shook her off.

"Dig!" Su Xiaoxiao's voice cracked. "Help me dig!"

Cries of agony filled the street.

The colossal creature finally emerged completely from the blood clouds. Hundreds of tons of flesh slammed into the center of the shopping street, caving in the asphalt inch by inch. The shock wave ripped shop signs from both sides of the road. Pustules burst, spilling foul-smelling slime everywhere, while dozens of barbed, pallid tentacles extended from the mound of flesh toward the fleeing crowds.

"No... please..."

"Bro—don't die!"

Su Xiaoxiao knelt beside the rubble. All her fingernails had been torn back, and her blood had stained a patch of broken stone red.

Then she heard something behind her and turned.

A barbed tentacle was reaching across the sunken road toward her. It drew closer and closer, its suckers opening and closing.

She couldn't escape. She knew it. She got winded after eight hundred meters; she couldn't outrun that thing.

Strangely, she wasn't afraid.

She was only unwilling to give up. Her brother was still buried down there, and she hadn't dug him out.

Su Xiaoxiao wiped her face, pulled something from inside her clothes, and gripped it tight.

It was her pocket edition of the Magical Girl Super Transformation Manual. Blood had soaked through its plastic-covered front, and the gold-foil stars glimmered faintly beneath the blood clouds.

"Didn't you say..." Staring at the manual, she recited each word. Her voice shook, but every syllable was clear. "A girl with a pure wish will be heard by the Will of the World..."

"I have a wish right now! A really, really pure wish!"

High above, the blood clouds were pierced through completely.

The C-class, Abyssal Sea Tier monster—the Bloodthirsty Stitching Beast—had arrived.