The “secret base” Tang Xiaolu mentioned was a small room about 30 square meters in size.
The four walls of the small room didn’t seem to be ordinary tiles or concrete, but a hard material clearly different from normal man-made substances, shimmering with a beautiful metallic luster.
It looked a lot like the sci-fi walls from anime or games like “Future City” or “Night City 2077.”
Walking into the small room, I noticed that where the fluorescent light should have been, a string of beautiful crystal glass decorations hung.
This string of crystal gems seemed to have a glowing property, lighting up the surroundings.
In the center of the room, a huge circular carpet printed with a five-pointed star magic pattern slowly rotated under the glow of the night-light stones.
Around the carpet, four bean bag chairs of different colors and styles were placed in the four corners of the room—a cat one, a clover-shaped one, a rabbit-themed one, and a black-and-white bear-themed one.
Besides that, I saw a cute bookshelf and a storage cabinet not far away.
Next to the desk was an oversized princess bed, and there was also a pink vanity table.
“The reason I applied to Black River City No.3 Middle School was because it was the closest school to here.”
Tang Xiaolu walked over to the black-and-white bear bean bag chair, looking a bit dazed.
“I didn’t expect three years to have passed in the blink of an eye.”
“Them.”
My gaze fell on the strange conical black-gray stones in the center of the three sofas.
After hesitating, I asked,
“They were the magical girls who lived here with Lulu back then, right?”
“Huh?”
Tang Xiaolu was startled, then following my gaze, she noticed the strange conical stones placed in the center of the sofas.
She became flustered.
“Ah… I took them out last time and forgot to put them back. Sorry, sorry.”
In the room, Tang Xiaolu in her nightgown was flustered.
I didn’t know if she was apologizing to me or to her former companions.
“I’ve been so forgetful lately. I even forgot to put away the things I took out.”
As she spoke, Tang Xiaolu walked over to the clover bean bag chair closest to her, picked up the gray-black stone in the middle of the chair, fell silent for a few seconds, then turned to me.
“Do you know what this is, Xiao Yao?”
The conical gray-black stone had a faint clover pattern printed on it, like a dead leaf butterfly sealed in a forest.
“I’ve never seen an item like this before, but I can probably guess.”
Looking at the gray-black stone in Lulu’s hand, I tried to use a gentle tone.
“It’s a ‘Grief Seed,’ the one you mentioned before, right?”
Grief Seed—an item that can purify the taint of a magical girl’s Soul Gem.
It drops only when a fully formed “Witch” is defeated.
And a “Witch” is the final form of a magical girl who has been completely eroded by taint due to overuse of magic or excessive sadness.
In other words, this “Grief Seed” Tang Xiaolu was holding now was probably…
“She was the kindest child among us.”
Speaking of the origin of this Grief Seed, Lulu’s tone became noticeably sadder.
“Xiao Xin usually loved using her magical girl powers to help others. She never complained about being tired, and never said she felt unwell anywhere… The night before she became a Witch, she was still gossiping with everyone. I didn’t even notice anything was wrong.”
“That day, the three of us defeated the Witch that Xiao Xin had become and brought this back.”
“For the whole week after that, none of us brought up what happened to Xiao Xin. Every time we came to the secret base, we just quietly played on our phones, and then we’d start crying.”
Tang Xiaolu walked over to the little rabbit bean bag chair and picked up a second “Grief Seed.”
“Jia Jia was the most timid one in our team. She never acted alone. She was very well-behaved and had excellent grades at school. It’s just that… her family wasn’t very good. Her parents divorced early on, and she lived with her mother. Then her mother was laid off and couldn’t find work. Jia Jia couldn’t even afford draft paper at school.”
“Back then, Jia Jia tried to earn money by writing novels online. Many classmates had read her stories, but… an author can never satisfy everyone. You know how the internet is now. Some people would silently leave if they didn’t like the plot, but others would directly message Jia Jia to attack her personally, or even insult her parents.”
“Although Jia Jia said she didn’t care, we could all see that her mood was getting worse day by day, and her Soul Gem was tainting faster and faster. We told Jia Jia to stop writing, bought her nice clothes and good food, but she always said she didn’t want to be a burden and rarely accepted our gifts.”
“In the end, Jia Jia still became a Witch…”
“Jia Jia’s Witch Barrier was the darkest and most torturous place I’ve ever seen. It was filled with harsh sounds of abuse and insults. I can’t imagine what Jia Jia went through in those two years.”
Finally, Tang Xiaolu walked to the cat-shaped bean bag chair.
She picked up the Grief Seed with a cat paw pattern and gripped it tightly in her palm.
“I once made a promise with her… no matter what happened, we must never keep it bottled up. If something was wrong, we’d talk about it. We also promised to live well and apply to Heijiang No.3 Middle School together, so we could come to the secret base after school and play.”
“I never thought she’d be just as much of a complete idiot as Xiao Xin and Jia Jia. She’d rather become a Witch than use…”
At this point, Tang Xiaolu suddenly stopped.
The hand holding the Grief Seed trembled.
“Sorry you had to see that.”
After calming down a bit, Tang Xiaolu put the three Grief Seeds into the storage cabinet next to the small bed.
She took out another Grief Seed that looked somewhat darkened.
“Since you’re here, let me show you how to use this.”
In front of me, Tang Xiaolu displayed her Soul Gem, then pressed the Grief Seed she had taken from the storage cabinet against it.
“Just now we transformed into magical girls and used magic, so our Soul Gems will have some taint. At times like this, you need to use a Grief Seed like this…”
As the Grief Seed and Soul Gem touched, a wisp of black air slowly emerged from inside Tang Xiaolu’s Soul Gem and was absorbed by the Grief Seed.
“That way, our gems become clear again.”
“A Grief Seed can be used repeatedly until it absorbs enough energy and becomes completely tainted. At that point, you need to call Qiu Bi to recycle the fully tainted Grief Seed, or else there’s a chance it will hatch into a Witch again.”
After speaking, Tang Xiaolu looked at me.
“Xiao Yao, has your Soul Gem turned black? Bring it here, I’ll help you purify it.”
“Huh? Turned black?”
I took my Soul Gem out of my skirt pocket.
“But… my gem has been black from the start, right? You saw it at the fast food restaurant earlier, Lulu?”
“No?”
Tang Xiaolu was also stunned.
Clearly, she hadn’t realized before what it meant for a “Soul Gem to be black.”
“That’s not right. Let me see your gem.”
After a brief silence, Tang Xiaolu reached her hand out to me.
“In theory, you just transformed and used magic, so the gem should have produced at least some taint.”
I handed the Soul Gem over, and she touched it with the Grief Seed in her hand.
No reaction.
“No taint at all?”
Tang Xiaolu was dumbfounded.
“You… Xiao Yao, do you have infinite magic power?”
“I don’t know.”
I was also confused.
“At least I don’t feel any discomfort in my body right now.”
“Uh…”
Tang Xiaolu put the Grief Seed away and stared at my completely black Soul Gem for a long time.
She let out a soft sigh.
“Xiao Yao, you might…”
“Really be a very special magical girl.”