"Eh? No way."
Lin Xiaolu imdiately expressed her disdain, "I just did it yesterday, isn't it your turn today? Don't try to drag into this by switching concepts."
"Anyway, you're not doing anything, right?"
Xia Liang smiled slyly, "Consider it deepening the camaraderie between teammates."
"Who cares?"
Lin Xiaolu rolled her eyes at her, her whole body slumping into the backrest, and at the sa ti lifted her heels, showing her refusal to step down, "Instead of repeating aningless chores, I'd rather have a Remnant Beast pop up now for to fight."
"Fight a Remnant Beast?"
Xia Liang, as if hearing sothing amusing, revealed a cheerful smile mixed with innocence, "Without using white magic power, you wouldn't be able to beat even a slightly formidable Inchworm, right? After all, it's a seed-level creature."
"I, you!" Lin Xiaolu's heel, which had just been raised, slamd back onto the ground.
Just as the girls' everyday bickering was evolving into a aningless argunt, a noise from the entrance interrupted their conversation.
Bang!
The crisp sound of closing the door, like a signal, drew both girls' eyes toward the direction of the entrance.
If a person's ears could react to sounds, Lin Xiaolu's would have perked up by now. After all, she knew all too well what that sound of the door closing at this ti could an.
"Erald Sparrow, you're back..."
Jumping up amidst Xia Liang's resigned gaze, Lin Xiaolu scurried to the door in slippers, ready to warmly welco the other person, but upon seeing who was at the door, she closed her mouth with a perplexed expression.
Because standing there was not just Erald Sparrow, but another figure as well.
It was a Magical Girl in purple and red attire, looking sowhat familiar, yet not quite placeable. If she had to say where she had seen such a figure, it would have been only in a mobile ga she played recently.
But addressing soone she was seeing for the first ti by a mobile ga character's na sounded a bit like a child unable to distinguish fantasy from reality, so Lin Xiaolu wisely chose to stay silent.
This mixture of confusion, aloofness, and wariness was captured by Erald Sparrow. She glanced at the Magical Girl, her lips parting slightly as if to speak, then hesitated, eventually closing her eyes as if making so decision, and finally spoke:
"Call over Bo Xue and Xiao Jin, and Moko as well, I want to introduce the new mber to you all."
"...New mber?"
Lin Xiaolu scrutinized the girl in the red dress, swallowing the words "She looks older than all of us" back down. In the end, she just snorted softly through her nose, filled with surprise and confusion as she left.
Before long, all the mbers of the secret base had gathered together.
"Let introduce to you, this is a Magical Girl who has recently arrived in Fangting City. She will join our team as a non-resident mber, and participate in certain battles alongside us," Erald Sparrow declared, extending an arm toward the girl beside her, her face stern, her voice serious. "Compared to you all, she's sowhat of a senior, so you can ask her any questions you might have."
After speaking, seeing that no one else spoke up, she looked around at the girls' reactions, paused, and asked again, "Does anyone have any questions?"
Upon finishing her question, she saw Xia Liang raise her hand first, then nodded to allow her to ask.
"I don't get it! What does 'non-resident mber' an?"
After Erald Sparrow gestured, Xia Liang lowered her hand, her expression serious, as if she was a diligent student, "Does that an this senior won't be staying in Fangting City permanently?"
"No, she'll be in Fangting City, but not staying long at the secret base, nor will she join the regular patrols,"
Erald Sparrow explained earnestly, "In short, once she joins our team, she'll only help out with important battles and training sessions, and will have other tasks the rest of the ti."
"Is this senior from the Magic Kingdom?"
Bai Jingxuan followed up with her question, "She doesn't seem like a Magical Girl who was originally from Fangting City."
Erald Sparrow weighed her words carefully, responding thoughtfully, "That question... kind of, and not really. She's actually more like , originally a local from Fangting City, but then so things happened..."
"A friend of your mom?"
It seed to take a mont for Bai Jingxuan to understand, then she nodded obediently, "Then I have nothing more to ask."
——"I have an objection! As a Seeder, I have an objection!"
However, it was at this mont that Moke spoke up, "Even though this is the Inspector's wish, the replacent of a Magical Girl in a city is supposed to be my task! I've never known about such a Magical Girl in Fangting City, and I haven't sensed her presence before! Suddenly, this person pops up and then claims to join our team or sothing, I just learned about this, it's against the rules!"
"I know this is sudden, but we can discuss the related procedures later."
Erald Sparrow held her arms with a slightly helpless expression, "Anyway, today is just to introduce everyone and get to know each other, we'll discuss the specifics of the activities later."
"But we still have to know her background, right?"
Lin Xiaolu was the last one to speak, but her attitude was the sharpest and most direct: "Even if Erald Sparrow introduced her, even if she's a senior, a stranger suddenly joining the team or sothing..."
Her voice beca softer towards the end, but actually, everyone understood what she wanted to express.
In fact, the questions raised by Xia Liang and Bai Jingxuan earlier were also subtly revealing this aning.
Realizing this, even Erald Sparrow could no longer maintain her stern expression and showed an "I knew this would happen" look of resignation, glancing at the girl beside her.
Their eyes t, seemingly completing so sort of communication incomprehensible to the girls, and after a mont, the unfamiliar girl spoke sowhat awkwardly:
"Um, because I was originally the Magical Girl of Fangting City... I just ca back recently, no, I should say, returned to duty?"
"Originally from Fangting City?" Xia Liang seed to understand sowhat, "Are you the senior who left Fangting City two years ago?"
"No, not that either..."
"Then which senior from when? Even earlier? Doesn't that an you've already retired?"
Xia Liang tilted her head, "So, you an to say, like the little senior, you ca from Fangting but joined the Magic Kingdom and only recently ca back due to a mission?"
"I didn't join the Magic Kingdom either."
Despite being questioned by a girl who seed younger, she couldn't put on any airs of being older: "I actually retired before..."
"Retired!"
This ti, it was everyone apart from Erald Sparrow, including the Fairies, who let out exclamations of surprise.
Because everyone, even the Fairies, knew that Magical Girls who retire lose their powers and can no longer transform. The girl's statent was undeniably challenging their common sense and knowledge.
"You an, you retired before but can now co back as a Magical Girl?"
Even the normally rational Xia Liang was taken aback for a mont: "How did you manage that? Are there so rules and regulations we haven't learned about? Or does the Magic Kingdom have so kind of privilege? No, why does it feel sowhat familiar..."
——"Stop guessing."
In the end, it was Erald Sparrow who interrupted the girls' clamor, slightly resignedly saying: "Actually, you all know her. She's my junior, Magical Girl codenad Chaoyan."
With these words, the clamor in the living room ceased instantly. The doubt among the girls was completely dispelled.
Then, as this doubt was resolved, what burst forth was an even more intense series of shocked exclamations.
"Is it Auntie Hong?" Bai Jingxuan's cry was the most direct.
"Ah, it's actually Hong... Sister." Xia Liang covered her mouth slightly but still rembered to use the proper form of address.
"It's that weird woman?" Moke said the most bluntly at this ti.
The girls and the Fairies shouted out together, each expressing their surprise, yet, there was only one person who didn't speak.
That was Lin Xiaolu.
It was not because she was too shocked, or because she had an inkling of the truth beforehand, but because her focus had already drifted to sothing peculiar.
She noticed the cautious smile tinged with a certain emotion that Hong Siyu gave to Erald Sparrow, and the helpless yet gentle look from Erald Sparrow in return.
What is their relationship?
More than the truth about Hong Siyu's identity, this question had firmly occupied her mind from the mont it arose, triggering an alarm bell in Lin Xiaolu's thoughts.
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