“I’m Chuchu. Care to get acquainted?”
The gorgeous lady lifted off her sunglasses.
She had a pair of orange-red eyes, like the lingering glow of a setting sun.
“So pretty…”
Bai Long couldn’t help the remark.
Hearing it, Chuchu’s warm eyes crinkled up into a smile. “You say the sweetest things.”
Only then did Bai Long realize she’d said it out loud.
But she didn’t fluster in the slightest. Calm as ever, she faced Chuchu. “I know.”
Chuchu let out another soft laugh. “Let’s exchange contact info.”
Fang Ling, inexplicably wary, hid behind Bai Long and tugged at her clothes. “Why do we need to exchange contact info? There’s no need, is there?”
Bai Long really struggled to predict when his social anxiety would flare up.
“You were just talking to them a second ago. Why are you hiding now?”
Fang Ling answered with righteous conviction. “That was because the lights were dim and nobody could see anybody’s face clearly.”
The corner of Bai Long’s mouth twitched, but she still shielded Fang Ling from view.
“Why are you helping us?”
She didn’t understand the point of what Chuchu was doing.
The main thing was, the item she’d casually pulled out to trade with was a human arm. Anyone could tell at a glance that something was off about that!
Chuchu was still smiling. “Maybe it’s because… I like you?”
As she spoke, she leaned in a little closer.
Strands of brown hair slipped down as she bent forward, brushing against Bai Long’s face with a faint, ticklish sensation.
Bai Long could even catch the faint fragrance on her now.
It wasn’t a heavy perfume, more of an elegant, delicate gardenia scent.
The little red bird perched on Bai Long’s shoulder hissed, every feather puffing out.
The whole bird looked even fluffier.
Like a red dandelion puff that had exploded.
“Just kidding.”
Chuchu shot the little red bird a thoughtful glance and straightened up. “You’re espers, right? There’s something I’ll need your help with later.”
Hearing that, both Bai Long and Fang Ling let out a breath of relief.
There’s no such thing as a free lunch. Her bringing up a request actually made things easier.
“Go ahead, say it.”
Bai Long got straight to the point.
“Now’s not the time yet. Let’s just exchange contact info. I’ll reach out when I need you.”
The star-ring on Chuchu’s wrist lit up.
This time Bai Long didn’t agonize over it, she swapped contact info with her cleanly and without fuss.
Chuchu looked at the newly added contact on her star-ring and smiled. “Good night. Looking forward to our next meeting.”
Bai Long watched her disappear into the shop, then headed back with Fang Ling.
…
The chip slid into the reader, and the information Bai Long wanted came up at a glance.
“Two C-ranks, one B-rank, and one A-rank in the team, huh…”
“Jin Xiao. A-rank esper. Power: Thorn Jungle.”
Bai Long frowned.
Not only was his esper rank two levels above hers, his power’s element was a natural counter to hers.
Among the nature-type powers, wood naturally countered water.
Taking them down would be no easy task.
The chip also listed the routes Jin Xiao’s team frequently took.
“Aside from always returning to the inn, there’s no real pattern to their movements. They’re probably all just commissions they’ve picked up.”
Bai Long finished reading it through quickly.
Fang Ling pulled up a map of Songdu and the surrounding area and marked out their team’s movement routes one by one.
The most heavily marked spot was an inn near Songdu’s city wall.
That had to be their base.
“So? Do we just storm in and kill them?”
Fang Ling blinked, then mimed a chopping motion, blade coming down.
“I’m starting to think the Great Emperor exists for a reason.”
Bai Long tapped her fingers on the table.
“But I don’t hate it.”
She smiled.
Still, expecting just the two of them to go head-to-head with a four-person squad that had an A-rank esper was clearly unrealistic.
So Bai Long decided to take a different route.
“The commission they’re working on right now is still clearing out zombies…”
Bai Long tapped the words “Outer City” on the screen.
…
“Tch, this one’s got nothing either.”
Dino flung the zombie in his hand away in frustration.
The zombie hit the ground, its head smashed to pulp, brains splattering everywhere.
“Ever since that last crystal, we haven’t found a single one in all these days.”
“Damn it all. Don’t let me find out who busted the lock on that place, or I’ll make them sorry!”
Ai’er yanked his hand out of a zombie’s skull, fingers still slick with bloody, fleshy gobs of human tissue.
“Quit bickering. You’ve got time to argue, you could kill a few more zombies.”
Jin Xiao’s expression was grim.
A flick of his fingers, and a great swath of thorns ripped up by the roots, crushing more than a dozen zombie heads in one go.
Still nothing.
Jin Xiao grew more agitated, his movements turning increasingly savage.
The short man trailing behind him poked his head out, a faint glint flickering in his eyes.
The short man—Lufas, swept his gaze over the zombies Jin Xiao had just killed, one by one, and finally said with regret, “No crystals on any of them.”
Jin Xiao plopped down on the ground and stomped viciously on the zombie beneath his foot.
“Argh! Just one crystal short, and we can’t find it for the life of us!”
Just one crystal short, one more and he’d meet the requirement to move to the Middle Tier!
But of all things, it was this final one. The four of them had searched for days and turned up nothing.
Just as they were stewing in their frustration with nowhere to vent it, two voices suddenly drifted over to where they were.
“Oh my god, I’m so lucky! It’s a crystal!”
A woman’s voice, full of delighted surprise.
“R-really! Really, it’s, it’s a crystal!”
The other voice was stammering, sounding so overjoyed it could barely get the words out.
Jin Xiao and Lufas exchanged a look, both understanding the other’s meaning.
Just one last crystal to go.
Outside the city, people getting infected by zombies was perfectly common.
“If anyone’s to blame, it’s only themselves. Who told them to come out at this exact moment?”
Jin Xiao murmured, then stood up.
“Keep up.”
Lufas called Dino and Ai’er along.
“Can’t believe we’re this lucky, there was actually a crystal in this pile of zombies! Finally got a lucky find for once…”
Bai Long held up the crystal in her hand.
The pure white crystal glittered radiantly in the sunlight.
Like a fallen star.
“Y-yeah…”
Fang Ling was so nervous he couldn’t take it, his eyes darting around uncontrollably.
It wasn’t his fault, forcing a guy with social anxiety to put on an act in public was just too much for him.
Fortunately, all he had to do was play the straight-man sidekick.
No need for too many lines.
“My two friends, let me introduce myself. I’m Jin Xiao, an A-rank esper.”
Jin Xiao wore a friendly smile.
“Might I ask what to call you two? By the look of you, you’re espers as well. We’re all out here doing commissions, why not team up?”
Jin Xiao’s gaze swept past the crystal in Bai Long’s hand.
He’d just heard what Bai Long said.
Before coming over, he’d already shot Lufas a fierce glare.
“How did you handle it?! You actually missed a crystal that big!”
That should have been their crystal!
Just this one crystal short, and they’d meet the standard to enter the Middle Tier!
Lufas was bewildered too.
He’d checked, he was certain, there was no crystal in those zombies.
But these two had no reason to lie to them.
Fortunately there was still time to fix it. As long as they got this crystal back, they could still meet the standard.
“Yes, we’re espers. But teaming up… we’ll pass.”
Bai Long tucked the crystal into her pocket right in front of them.
Jin Xiao’s gaze instinctively followed her motion for a moment, then quickly returned to Bai Long.
Lufas, on the other hand, kept his eyes fixed on Bai Long’s pocket for a long while.
Hm, why can’t I get it?
Lufas frowned and kept ramping up his power, but still got no response.
He gave Jin Xiao a discreet shake of the head.
A flash of impatience crossed Jin Xiao’s eyes, but his smile didn’t waver.
“Is that so? All right then. Good luck to you both.”
With that, he turned and left with his three teammates.
“Captain, why didn’t we just snatch it from them?”
Dino was still looking over at Bai Long.
Bai Long and Fang Ling were still standing where they were.
One of them was skinny and small, the other couldn’t even string his words together properly.
They looked completely defenseless, he could take both of them out with a single punch!
“If your brain’s just for show, you should donate it to someone who’d use it.”
Before Jin Xiao could speak, Lufas beat him to the sarcasm.
The area around here was wide open. If those two bolted, they’d never find them.
“You—!”
Dino was furious, but mindful that Jin Xiao was still there, he could only swallow the anger.
That little punk Lufas, if his power weren’t useful, Dino would have offed him ages ago!
In a foul mood, Dino lagged behind the team. “I’m gonna go kill some zombies nearby.”
Jin Xiao shot him a glance but said nothing.
“Why didn’t it work just now?”
He asked Lufas in a low voice.
Lufas found it strange too. “My power got blocked. I’ll find another chance to try again later.”
He figured she was gripping it too tightly, so he couldn’t find an opening for his power to slip in.
His power had a condition for activating: the target had to have a certain amount of surface exposed to the air.
Jin Xiao’s expression darkened. “It has to work.”
Lately more and more esper teams were out hunting crystals.
Songdu wasn’t a big place. The Outer City had plenty of zombies, but combing through them with such a wide net was a heavy drain on their powers.
“Follow them. Act when the moment’s right.”
A vicious glint flickered through Jin Xiao’s eyes.
Meanwhile, Bai Long and Fang Ling had already wandered into a deserted building.
Bai Long conjured a stream of water from her fingertips.
Unlike the powerful, high-pressure water jet from before, the stream she conjured this time was feeble and trembling, dribbling like a faucet that had run dry.
The water smeared across the eyes of a zombie blocking their path.
Fang Ling raised his sword and followed up, struggling for a good while before finally dispatching the zombie.
Bai Long tossed the crystal in her hand and pulled back her pitiful trickle of power.
“Boss, did you really dig that crystal out of that pile of zombies?”
When there was nobody around, Fang Ling could talk more or less normally.
Putting on that act in front of Jin Xiao’s crew just now, he’d nearly given himself a heart attack from the nerves.
“Do I look like the kind of person who’d be that lucky?”
Bai Long shot back calmly.
Fang Ling fell silent.
After spending a few days together, he’d come to a deep appreciation of just how cursed with bad luck his boss was.
Sleeping in the middle of the night, the bed had suddenly collapsed, she’d just gotten up, dusted off her backside, and laid out a makeshift bed on the floor for the night.
“I got this back in District 64 earlier.”
It was Zhao Xin’s crystal, perfect for use as bait.
The words had barely left her mouth when she suddenly raised a hand, signaling Fang Ling to keep quiet.
The two of them hadn’t been speaking loudly to begin with, and there were zombies wheezing and rasping all around.
She wasn’t worried their earlier words would be overheard.
“They’re here,” she breathed.
Bai Long led Fang Ling to a dead-end corner.
Then the change struck.
Clusters of thorns sprouted from around the corner, baring their fangs and brandishing their claws as they lunged at Bai Long and the others.
Fang Ling raised his sword and hacked the thorns apart.
But those thorns seemed to have a mind of their own. After being severed and falling to the ground, they sprouted new joints, coiling loop after loop around the blade.
Fang Ling tried to swing the sword, but it was bound fast by the thorns, unable to move a hair’s width.
“Tap-tap, tap-tap…”
Slow footsteps came from behind the corner.
Jin Xiao and Lufas and the others stepped out from behind the corner, one step at a time.
“We meet again.”
Jin Xiao still had a smile on his face.
Thorns extended from his right hand, or rather, his entire right hand had transformed into thorns, his five fingers stretching out into the main stalks, which then branched off below into countless offshoots.
“What’s the meaning of this?”
Half of Bai Long’s body was hidden in the darkness, the expression on her face impossible to make out.
But Jin Xiao didn’t care.
They’d followed these two the whole way.
Outside the city there were plenty of other espers carrying out commissions.
He’d originally worried that with so many eyes around, if anyone else learned these two had a crystal, it would inevitably turn into a brawl.
He didn’t expect these two to walk right into a deserted, abandoned building all on their own.
That saved him the trouble nicely.
“Friend, the crystal in your hands was mine to begin with.”
Now that the moment had come, Jin Xiao was in no hurry at all.
There were only two of them, and he had four.
Jin Xiao had originally been concerned that, not knowing these two’s powers, things might go sideways once the fighting started.
But all along the way, these two had struggled to deal with even ordinary zombies. If they’d had any powerful abilities, they’d have handled it easily long ago.
He figured these two were C- or D-rank espers at the very most, and he was an A-rank.
“Your crystal? But this is clearly something we picked up off the ground.”
As Bai Long spoke, a faint glow flickered through her hand.
Lufas’s gaze instantly latched onto that flash of light.
He activated his power without hesitation.
Bai Long felt her hand suddenly lighten, the thing she’d been holding vanished in an instant.
With the object in hand, Lufas laughed twice. “It was ours from killing zombies to begin with, so no need for you to hold onto it for us, hahaha.”
Her item had been snatched away, yet Bai Long didn’t panic the way Lufas had expected.
“If you like playing with water, all you had to do was say so,” Bai Long said slowly.
“You want some? There’s plenty.”
She spread all ten fingers, a tiny water crystal pinched between each pair.
Wisps of white mist curled up from the water crystals, their sharp, angular shapes identical to the real thing.
Lufas’s smile vanished in an instant.
He looked down and saw that the thing in his hand was obviously nothing but a useless water crystal.
“Damn you! You’re playing me?!”
Lufas hurled the water crystal viciously to the ground, his face twisted with rage.
The crystal hit the floor and burst into a sparkling splash of water.
“Do I need to remind you? From start to finish, I never once said that thing was a crystal.”
Bai Long shrugged and laughed lightly.
The smile gradually faded from Jin Xiao’s face. “Looks like you still don’t grasp the situation you’re in.”
“If you know what’s good for you, hand over the crystal now, and I’ll spare your lives.”
As Jin Xiao spoke, his fingers twitched.
The spike-covered thorns shifted, their sharp barbs aiming straight at several of Bai Long and Fang Ling’s vital points.
“And if I said… no?”
Bai Long acted as if she couldn’t see the thorns at all, every word she spoke dancing right on Jin Xiao’s last nerve.
“Then I’ll just have to kill you and take the crystal.”
The smile vanished entirely from Jin Xiao’s face.
The thorns lashed out abruptly, stabbing toward Bai Long and Fang Ling.
The barbed tips of the thorns felt the sensation of breaking through, but there was no smell of blood, no sound of skin and flesh being pierced.
Jin Xiao’s senses were linked to the thorns.
In other words, the thorns were like an extension of himself, transmitting whatever they touched directly back to him.
This didn’t feel like human flesh and blood.
Jin Xiao had used these thorns to deal with plenty of trouble—zombies among them, but also living people.
He knew what it felt like for the thorns to pierce through a living body.
Something cold and soft enveloped the leading tips of the thorns.
Bai Long had activated her power, a water shield blocking the incoming thorns.
“Water-type power. You’ve got a little something after all.”
Jin Xiao chuckled.
But so what?
“Are you trying to water my thorns?”
Wood-type powers naturally countered water-type powers.
Not to mention water as harmless and feeble as this.
There were differences in strength between powers, too.
Not just gaps in rank, but gaps in type as well.
Water-type powers were inherently representative of weak, soft offense.
Pliant, easily scattered… utterly unthreatening.
With that, Jin Xiao let go of his last shred of caution, throwing his power wide open, ready to end this quickly.
In the blink of an eye, the thorns absorbed the water shield in front of them, swelling to twice the size, attacking with even more abandon.
The thorns at the edges whipped through the air, shattering chunks of rubble in the walls.
If they’d struck a person, that person would surely have dropped dead on the spot.
Lufas, meanwhile, kept his eyes glued on Bai Long this whole time.
He had to find out where exactly she’d put the crystal.
With Jin Xiao up front holding them down, Lufas didn’t have to worry about his own safety in the slightest.
Especially against two minor espers.
As long as he could spot where the crystal was, he could just—
But he never got the chance.
“Hngh…”
Lufas’s chest abruptly seized with searing pain.
He felt something warm spurting out of his chest, utterly unstoppable…
“Is your power something like telekinetic retrieval?”
Bai Long’s voice even sounded somewhat unhurried, fully in control.
Impossible…
How could she possibly have dodged… Jin Xiao’s attack?!
Lufas looked down and saw a long water crystal protruding from his chest, piercing his heart like a spear of ice.
Perhaps because the crystal was so large, it had momentarily plugged the breach in his heart.
Lufas didn’t die immediately, he could even feel, with perfect clarity, the knife-like agony in his chest.
“You… how could you…”
Lufas collapsed to the ground, barely clinging to life.
He no longer had the wherewithal to be shocked that Bai Long knew his power.
His heart throbbed with pain, then numbed with cold.
The icy water crystal was nearly freezing his whole body from the inside out.
Under the sting of that cold, the blood at the wound throbbed all the more unbearably.
And yet he still retained consciousness, forced to endure the pain with nothing he could do.
“So you’re the one who used this power to take Doctor Sun’s crystal?”
Now Bai Long understood why they’d been able to extract the crystal from inside Sun Shijing’s body without ever showing themselves.
Jin Xiao and Ai’er and Dino behind him didn’t expect Lufas to be ambushed so suddenly.
And killed in a single blow, no less.
From the bowl-sized wound in his chest, there was clearly no chance of treatment.
He was as good as dead.
“Was this you?!”
Jin Xiao abruptly realized something was wrong with Bai Long.
He tried to intensify his attack, but the thorns had stretched dozens of meters outward, long past the length of the corridor itself, and yet there was no sensation of them touching any walls.
What was going on?!
Jin Xiao’s heart lurched. He immediately realized things were about to go off the rails and tried to retract the thorns.
“Trying to leave? Don’t you want the crystal?”
Bai Long raised her hand. In it was a genuine crystal.
Jin Xiao gritted his teeth, deeply unwilling to retreat just like that.
He was only one crystal short of making it to the Middle Tier!
The next second, the thorns suddenly multiplied and swelled, sweeping up the scattered rubble all around and hurling it at Bai Long.
“What are you all standing around for?! Get over here!”
Jin Xiao roared.
Dino and Ai’er exchanged a glance, then gritted their teeth and launched their attack on Bai Long and Fang Ling.
They had to deal with these two!
Both Dino and Ai’er were close-combat espers, and they bounded toward Bai Long in a few leaping strides.
The interior of the building was dim, and they could only just make out Bai Long hidden behind the shadows.
Bai Long’s figure was right before their eyes.
But the next second, Dino and Ai’er felt the scene before them shift, in the span of a single blink it had transformed into an entirely different view.
“Hrgh… hrgh…”
“Hrgh hrgh hrgh hrgh…”
They had no idea where they were, only that all around them were zombies with gaping mouths, waiting to receive the feast that had dropped from the heavens.
“Aaahh!”
Shrill screams echoed through the room.
They didn’t even get a chance to resist before being utterly reduced to a meal on the zombies’ plates.
Jin Xiao watched his two teammates vanish into thin air and finally realized that something was seriously wrong.
“It’s your power?”
He looked toward Fang Ling, who had been gripping his sword and standing quietly off to the side this whole time.
“That sword isn’t your power?! You tricked me!”
Only then did Jin Xiao realize he’d been played.
Among espers, there were also those whose powers weren’t body enhancement or transformation, but the ability to conjure enhanced weapons for their own use.
Such weapons were generally different from ordinary ones, not only far more lethal, but also not easily damaged.
The thorns Jin Xiao had wrapped around Fang Ling’s sword had been quietly straining all this while, yet they’d done almost no damage to it, only managing to pin it in place.
“This sword is the other half of my being. Naturally, it is not something mere mortals such as you could easily damage.”
At some point, Fang Ling had pulled on his black cloth, switching into chuunibyou mode.
Jin Xiao: …
Jin Xiao fumed. “This was a trap you set!”
Bai Long nodded. “Congratulations, you only just figured that out.”
Her tone couldn’t have been more punchable.
“Then let me give you another friendly reminder. You’re really puzzled about why you can’t destroy his sword, right?”
Bai Long drew out the last syllable.
Jin Xiao did indeed want to know.
He was an A-rank esper. The lethality of his thorns’ spikes already far surpassed the range of ordinary plants, even the massive stone blocks around them could be easily ground into powder.
Yet Fang Ling’s sword could withstand his power.
This was precisely why Jin Xiao had mistakenly assumed Fang Ling’s power was the sword.
After all, an ordinary weapon couldn’t possibly hold up against his assault!
“Ever heard of money powers?”
Bai Long’s voice slowly drew closer to Jin Xiao, then, a moment later, grew distant again.
Now far, now near. Jin Xiao couldn’t pin down her location.
And with Fang Ling’s bizarre power right beside her, Jin Xiao didn’t dare make any rash moves for the moment.
“That sword was custom-made for him, a high-end piece worth ten thousand credits.”
Bai Long’s voice finally came to rest right in front of Jin Xiao.
Jin Xiao’s expression twisted at hearing this.
Who in the world would spend that much money on a single sword?! And he even had such a powerful ability on top of that!
With that kind of money, what couldn’t you buy!
“Does this place look familiar to you?”
Jin Xiao found her words utterly baffling.
But Lufas, lying on the ground, seemed to realize something, his eyes slowly going wide.
This place… wasn’t this the very building where they’d gotten the crystal from that idiot zombie?!
Jin Xiao slowly noticed it too.
But he didn’t understand what Bai Long meant by bringing it up.
Suddenly, his expression changed drastically. He tried to move at once, but it was already too late.
An airtight curtain of water enveloped him. His entire body was submerged in a sphere of water as tall as a person.
The water seeped into his nose and mouth. The intense suffocation and burning pain instantly flushed his face crimson.
The near-death panic of drowning left him utterly unable to control his power any longer.
The thorns fell into the water and instinctively absorbed the water around them, drinking in more and more, swelling larger and larger.
Jin Xiao’s hands and feet were all sliced open by his own thorns, his blood staining the water sphere red, but the sphere didn’t shrink in the slightest.
The spot they were in was a dead-end corner of the corridor to begin with, and the water sphere filled the entire space.
No matter which way Jin Xiao went, he was surrounded by water.
“H-help! Help me!”
Jin Xiao begged for mercy with great difficulty within the water. But the moment he opened his mouth, a huge gulp of water choked down his throat.
The suffocation grew even more intense.
Terrifying red veins had already crept into his eyes.
“You want me to let you go?”
Bai Long leaned in close to the water sphere.
Jin Xiao tried hard to nod, but the prolonged lack of oxygen had already left his brain swollen and woozy.
He thought his movements were big, but in truth they were only the faintest ripple.
The terror of death made him completely forget the arrogance of being an A-rank esper from earlier. His blood-veined eyes looked at her pleadingly.
“That works too.”
Bai Long stood up, gave her fingers a slight twitch, and a black iron arrow appeared in her hand.
“This is yours, isn’t it?”
The moment Jin Xiao saw the arrow, his eyes snapped wide. He instinctively tried to open his mouth to speak, but swallowed another mouthful of water.
Seeing his reaction, Bai Long had her answer.
Before Jin Xiao could react, an enormous black mist suddenly engulfed both him and the unconscious Lufas on the ground.
“Cough, cough…”
Abruptly released from the suffocating water pressure, Jin Xiao crumpled to the ground, all his strength gone.
His crimson eyes were full of venom.
Since they’d let him out, then they could forget about ever leaving!
Jin Xiao’s fingers twitched, and massive thorns burst into growth.
The thorns kicked up a howling wind as they moved, slamming against the ground with a thunderous crash.
He was aiming to whip those two to death in a single strike.
But he didn’t see Bai Long and Fang Ling anywhere.
Jin Xiao’s expression froze.
He and Lufas were inside a windowless room.
Lufas lay collapsed on the ground, alive or dead, he couldn’t tell.
Jin Xiao saw Dino and Ai’er, both missing half their bodies, along with a dense throng of zombies.
He instantly activated his power, and a great swath of zombies toppled, but another great swath quickly surged in to replace them.
Jin Xiao had no choice but to give it everything against the zombies pressing in from all sides.
Just then, Bai Long’s voice came from outside.
“I’ll let you go… if you can still make it out, that is.”
Bai Long’s voice was soft, but in Jin Xiao’s ears it sounded like the death sentence of a reaper.
“Wait! You wait!”
Jin Xiao was so frantic his voice cracked, but there was no longer a single sound from outside.
He fought his way through the zombie horde with great effort to reach the door, trying to smash open the lock with his thorns, only to find the entire door had been welded shut.
No matter how many dents he gouged into it, there wasn’t the slightest crack of an opening.
And the time he had to attack the lock was short, because the next wave of zombies was already lunging at him.
Among them were the now-zombified Dino and Ai’er.
There was no food in the room, no light.
Only zombies, packed full.
Jin Xiao couldn’t even sleep, because the moment he let his guard down, there was every chance of being swallowed up by the zombies again.
This was the gift Bai Long gave him.
“Boss, are you okay?”
Fang Ling took off the black cloth, his face a little pale.
Using his power twice in one go had taken a heavy toll on him as well.
In the fight with Jin Xiao just now, Bai Long had blocked with her water shield at first, which was what got Jin Xiao to drop his guard.
Seizing that chance, Fang Ling released his power from behind, opening a portal between the area in front of Bai Long and the open ground outside.
At first, all of Jin Xiao’s thorns were flying through open air, so naturally they couldn’t have hit any obstacle.
Then, the instant Ai’er and Dino charged in, Fang Ling switched the portal, teleporting them into the sealed chamber he’d prepared long ago.
As for Lufas…
That water crystal was the trigger Bai Long used to activate her power.
The water that belonged to Bai Long’s power had been right by his feet. While she drew their attention, she focused her mind on condensing the liquid.
Through that tiny puddle of water, she condensed a crystal spike and drove it straight into Lufas’s chest.
The big water sphere she later used against Jin Xiao was likewise prepared specifically for him.
It hadn’t been easy on Bai Long either.
He was an A-rank esper, after all. Bai Long knew that attacking head-on would be hard to break through.
So she and Fang Ling had worked out this plan.
Wait until Jin Xiao and his crew let their guard down, then catch them off guard and trap them outright.
That big water sphere and the water crystal had consumed nearly all of her power.
The nourishment she’d worked so hard to recover these past few days seemed to have all been used up again in one fell swoop.
“Let’s go.”
Bai Long glanced at the room rumbling and roaring next door.
Right next to Jin Xiao and his crew’s room was the room where Sun Shijing was being held.
Fang Ling supported Bai Long.
The two of them helped each other along as they made their way out.
Suddenly, Fang Ling felt a sharp pain at the back of his head.
He turned to see the little red bird clutching a bag in its talons, glaring at him with round, furious eyes.
Fang Ling: ?
He began to seriously reflect on whether he was just unlikable to birds.
The little red bird ignored him and flew over to Bai Long, handing the bag to her.
Bai Long opened the bag.
Inside were several glittering crystals.
These were Jin Xiao and his crew’s crystals.
Bai Long’s eyes lit up the instant she looked at the little red bird.
She felt as if even the pain throughout her body had eased.
Bai Long carefully counted them, exactly nine.
Counting the one she already had, that made ten.
That meant the goal of reaching the Middle Tier was now half complete.
Next was the matter of her esper rank.
Bai Long stashed the crystals away and headed with Fang Ling toward the city gate.
This battle had killed two birds with one stone.
But by the time they reached the city gate, they discovered something seemed to have gone wrong in Songdu.
Songdu’s city gate was sealed tight, and there were more armed personnel on the wall than ever before.
They hurried back and forth, footsteps rushed, anxiety written all over their faces.
Fang Ling had already used the portal twice today.
They could only get in through the gate.
Bai Long forced out the last dregs of her power, conjuring a water rope to fly up toward the wall.
The water rope was very thin and seemed on the verge of snapping at any second, reaching the top of the wall would be tough.
Bai Long missed on the first try, and swung her arm again, hurling the water rope toward the wall.
This time, a gust of wind blew in from somewhere and gave the water rope a push from behind.
The grappling hook at the rope’s tip successfully latched onto the gate.
Bai Long carried Fang Ling and leaped up onto the gate.
Seeing the two of them suddenly appear atop the gate, a few of the armed personnel instinctively went on guard.
But once they saw it was Bai Long, they lowered their weapons again.
Over these past days, for the sake of the Jin Xiao matter, Bai Long had often been running in and out of Songdu, and quite a few of the armed personnel had come to recognize her.
“What’s happening?”
Bai Long coughed a few times.
Strange, she’d clearly calculated the amount of power she needed just now. Why did it feel like she’d used a bit too much?
“A zombie tide’s broken out.”
The armed man tossed out the words hurriedly, then dashed off toward the city.
They had to rush to provide backup.
These past days, because Sinai had developed a zombie-suppression inhibitor, everyone had grown a little lax about zombies.
Now that the zombie tide had suddenly erupted, many people had been caught off guard and attacked.
By the time Bai Long and the others returned to the city, they’d grasped the general situation.
Somewhere within Songdu, nobody knew exactly where, a huge wave of zombies had been hiding, and they’d suddenly surged out all at once, attacking the civilians inside the city directly.
Now Sinai Hospital was packed to bursting, all of them people desperate to find a doctor to save their lives.
When Bai Long and Fang Ling passed by Sinai, they saw the entrance jammed with people.
“Back up! Back up! No more pushing inside!”
“Crowding in here right now will only make it easier to get infected! There’s no more room in the hospital!”
A few armed personnel gripped the iron railing for dear life, refusing to let more people push in.
They were clad head to toe in protective suits, with steel helmets on their heads to boot, guarding against attack from zombifying civilians.
“Let me in! I’ve been infected! I don’t want to turn into a zombie! I don’t want to die!”
“Why won’t you let us in?! Is this how doctors stand by and let people die?! What kind of doctors are these?! I’ve been bitten, why can’t I go in?!”
“Didn’t they say the hospital had medicine?! Give me the medicine! Give me the medicine!!”
Shrill, screaming voices surrounded the entire hospital, everyone trying to push their way inside.
As long as they got into the hospital, they’d be saved!
The armed personnel held back the maddened crowd for dear life, shouting at the top of their lungs. “The doctors will come deal with it later! Stop pushing inside!”
The scene was utter chaos.
Bai Long and Fang Ling were squeezed out to the edge by the panic-stricken crowd, unable to get anywhere near the hospital entrance.
There was nothing they could help with here, so they decided to head back and rest first, and see if they could dig up any more information along the way.
After Bai Long got back, she lay down right beside the wreckage of her bed and fell asleep on the spot.
Fang Ling still had a little energy left.
He’d already ordered a new bed for Bai Long. It was supposed to arrive within the next few days, but given the state of the city now, that was looking iffy.
Fang Ling could only take out a thick quilt and mattress, so Bai Long could sleep a bit more comfortably even on the floor.
Just like a tatami mat.
Bai Long sank into the soft bedding, letting her consciousness drift up and down.
It was the same golden light again, but this time, the golden light seemed to have grown larger and brighter.
Bai Long tried to see it clearly, but failed again.
In her hazy state, she seemed to feel a warm body of water wrap around her, along with gentle gusts of wind.
She felt as if she were lying in a cradle made of water.
More relaxed than she’d ever been.
…
When Bai Long woke up, the moment she turned her head she got a faceful of red fluff.
The little red bird, warm as a little stove, was sleeping on her pillow.
A tiny little ball, like a yarn pom-pom.
Bai Long got up and stretched her arms and legs, getting ready to head out.
The little red ball, still fast asleep, was blown straight to the floor by a gust of wind that came from who knows where.
It opened its eyes groggily, saw that Bai Long had already opened the door, and hurriedly flapped its wings to catch up.
The little red bird silently despised itself for sleeping so deeply.
For some reason, just before falling asleep it had only felt a very comfortable, very rich and powerful force.
Without even realizing it, it had drifted off surrounded by that force.
When Bai Long came out, Fang Ling was already sitting outside.
He saw the bird on Bai Long’s shoulder and visibly froze.
“Boss, this bird of yours is growing crazy fast.”
Fang Ling raised his hand and gestured.
Bai Long looked down.
She hadn’t noticed it from seeing it every day, but now that Fang Ling mentioned it, she suddenly felt it too, this bird seemed to have gotten quite a bit bigger?
Being scrutinized so seriously by Bai Long, the little red bird actually got shy.
Bashful and timid, it covered its face with its wings, turning completely into a fluffy ball… a big fluffy ball squatting on Bai Long’s shoulder.
Bai Long: …Why is this bird being so weird all day long?
She raised a hand to smooth out her sleep-rumpled clothes, and Fang Ling suddenly felt a gust of wind blowing toward his face.
Fang Ling: “Huh? Where’s that wind coming from? Is the window not shut properly?”
He looked all around.
Finally, he made the bizarre discovery that the wind seemed to be coming from Bai Long’s hand.
Fang Ling was stumped for a moment.
Wasn’t the boss a water-type esper? Where was the wind coming from?
“Boss, you’re a water-type esper, right?”
Fang Ling scratched his head.
Bai Long, a big meat bun clamped in her mouth, nodded.
“Yeah, didn’t you already know that?”
She remembered telling Fang Ling about it before.
“Then what was that wind just now?”
Fang Ling asked, puzzled.
“Wind?”
Bai Long had already polished off one bun in two or three bites and was reaching for another.
But as she raised her hand, the bowl of congee in front of her rippled, a smooth furrow blown straight across its surface.
Bai Long: ?
Now she realized something was off too.
Under the probing gazes of Fang Ling and the little red bird, she looked down at her own hand.
What’s going on here?
She could leak air too?
And this was clearly way beyond the kind of hissing an ordinary snake puffs out.
Could it be she wasn’t an ordinary water-snake spirit, but an inflatable snake spirit?
“Fang Ling, do you think any snake can puff out this much air?”
Bai Long asked gravely.
Fang Ling already knew his boss was a snake spirit.
Hearing this, he too answered solemnly. “Boss, maybe you’re not a snake?”
Bai Long lifted her eyes to look at him.
“Maybe you’re a chicken spirit. An air-puffing chicken.”
Fang Ling enunciated each word.
After a moment of silence, Bai Long beat him to a pulp.
Fang Ling, nose bruised and face swollen, fell back into line.
“I’ll make a trip to the Esper Center in a bit and check it out.”
Bai Long felt that after one good sleep, the power inside her body was more abundant than before.
With that thought, after she’d dealt with breakfast, she went to the bathroom to test out her power.
When Fang Ling went in, he saw the entire bathroom filled with water.
Just like the water sphere that had trapped Jin Xiao before, except now it was the upgraded version.
“Boss, are you on drugs?”
Fang Ling blurted out instinctively after his shock.
Bai Long raised her hand.
“Sorry, Boss!”
Fang Ling dropped to his knees in an instant.
“Boss, putting out this much power, won’t your body not be able to handle it?”
Fang Ling sobered up and asked seriously.
He was worried Bai Long would overexert herself again.
“No.”
A bright light flickered in Bai Long’s eyes.
She’d just released twice the power she’d used to trap Jin Xiao, yet she could clearly feel she didn’t have that same strained, exhausted feeling as back then.
Her power capacity had increased!
If her power before had only amounted to a bathtub’s worth of water, then now she should have a whole bathroom’s worth!
And indeed, it really was enough to fill an entire bathroom.
“Oh, right.”
Bai Long pulled something out of her pocket and handed it to Fang Ling.
“You worked hard this time, too.”
Fang Ling took the thing Bai Long handed him.
It was the bag holding the crystals.
“Haven’t you always wanted something to decorate your sword? Pick whichever one you like.”
Set off by the shimmering water-light, the crystals gave off a glittering glow.
Bai Long knew that Fang Ling had taken a fancy to that octopus crystal at Hemu earlier, but that one had already been promised to Liang Qiu and the others.
So this time, since she’d gotten a whole pouch of crystals, she could let him pick the one he liked.
The crystals weren’t all the exact same shape, just like natural ore comes in all kinds of shapes.
Bai Long didn’t know which one Fang Ling liked, so she just let him choose for himself.
Holding the pouch of crystals, Fang Ling suddenly fell silent.
“What? None you like?”
Bai Long withdrew her power, restoring the bathroom to its previous clean, dry state.
“Then you might have to wait a bit. I’ll let you pick again next time I get some.”
As she spoke, Bai Long started thinking about where to go find crystals.
With the zombie tide breaking out lately, there might just be a chance to come across some crystals.
“Thank you, Boss.”
Fang Ling suddenly spoke up, lifting his head.
On his exquisite, sea-siren-like face was a great big smile.
A sincere smile.
“I really like it.”
Fang Ling thought to himself that he would follow Bai Long for the rest of his life.
This was the first time he’d ever received a gift someone had prepared with his preferences in mind.
Bai Long had never once mocked his chuunibyou personality. She was the first person to take every part of him seriously.