“Hmmph…”
In the early morning, sunlight streamed through the top of the window, landing on Jiang Lingwei’s drum, finally rousing her from the big bed.
“I’m awake, I’m awake, General, don’t shine on me, don’t shine on me.”
Waving her hand as if to chase away the sunlight, Jiang Lingwei scratched lightly and pulled the quilt over herself.
Yesterday, she had witnessed the battle victory and the dissolution of the Demon Domain, so she hurried home before her daughter even realized what had happened.
Otherwise, if Jiang Yao came home and found her missing too, she wouldn’t even know how to explain it.
To be honest, even if she really said to her daughter, “Mom is actually a magical girl,” it wouldn’t feel like a big deal.
But that scene would be far too awkward!
So she decided to postpone that indefinitely. Besides, Jiang Yao still had a bit of restraint around her mom… even though from a memory standpoint, she was also a young girl in her prime now.
If she took on the identity of Aurora, she could probably get closer to Jiang Yao and develop a more intimate relationship. Her mom identity was better limited to daily use.
After getting home yesterday, she even pretended to go to bed early. Having been closely watched all night before, she was smarter this time and went straight to her room to sleep.
Though her daughter didn’t come in to disturb her yesterday either, probably too exhausted.
To reward her daughter’s hard work staying up half the night, she had set the alarm earlier this morning and prepared a much more elaborate breakfast.
So now, taking a little extra sleep was no problem!
“Hehe… ehehehe…”
Lying in bed with her eyes half-closed, Jiang Lingwei let out a laugh that was sweet yet carried a certain historic weight, as if she had returned to the prosperous Tang Dynasty.
Her daughter absolutely deserved a reward—she had single-handedly taken down a Dark Fairy! A Dark Fairy!
At the time, Jiang Lingwei had only thought it was some kind of giant magical puppet, which was why she felt safe letting her daughter take the front line, while she rushed over to save people.
If she had known it was a Dark Fairy, she wouldn’t have let her daughter face it alone no matter what.
This whole thing was strange—previous Dark Fairies always just burst out into battle. They never locked themselves inside a composite body. Though intimidating to look at, none of those native wizards from the Demon Realm were as powerful as the ones who came out directly.
Locking themselves up was just binding their own hands and feet!
Why would it do that?
Even in the human world, those wizards’ power wasn’t diminished at all.
Jiang Lingwei couldn’t figure it out, so she decided not to think about it. If that Dark Fairy just liked doing things this way, and was “willing,” then she had nothing to say.
At least her daughter’s achievements were solid!
Even if the North Wind came, she would still have to praise her as an “excellent magical girl.”
And her kid’s father, when he found out about this, would definitely also…
“Bang! Bang! Bang!”
Banging her head against the pillow, Jiang Lingwei opened her eyes, grumbling as she ruffled her slightly messy hair.
“Why do I keep thinking… no, can’t sleep anymore.”
She felt around the pillow, turned over, took out her phone, opened the browser, and quickly found the website that was essential both past and present—
Sure enough, the local news was flooded with reports of the tragic incident at the commercial street last night.
Fortunately, after detailed statistics, the casualties weren’t as high as she had imagined.
In the corner of the report, it mentioned that a large supermarket had many survivors whose bodies were initially healed. Their families tearfully expressed gratitude to the magical girl who had saved them on TV.
Jiang Lingwei couldn’t help but smile at the sight. Being a magical girl meant witnessing moments where everyone gained happiness!
(Sigh… it’s a pity a few people still couldn’t be saved. If only my magic were whole…)
Putting away her smile, Jiang Lingwei continued scrolling through the webpage. She noticed many residents who originally thought Mudong City would be peaceful were now wavering.
That was normal. Moreover, anyone who had been inside the Demon Domain at the time had experienced terrifying nightmares.
It wasn’t quite the same as facing darkness head-on, but it was still pretty horrifying.
Everyone needed time to heal their wounded hearts.
Just then, a message popped up in the school parent group chat. The homeroom teacher was starting to handle leave requests, so quite a few kids were affected.
“Let me see…”
Scrolling further, Jiang Lingwei said with some surprise, “Huh? The reaction doesn’t seem that big after all…”
That was unexpected.
She poked the screen with her slender fingers and saw most comments were like “What to do now,” “Hold on!” “I believe in the magical girl,” “She tried her best.” Judging by this, people today really had a surprisingly high level of acceptance for these matters.
Curious, Jiang Lingwei browsed the comments further and soon found the answer.
Two key reasons stood out: national-level promotion of magical girls, and an overall improvement in netizens’ awareness.
Especially the older generation, survivors of the unspeakable Dark Cataclysm, were now deeply satisfied with the comparatively peaceful world.
People are good at compromise. Imagine being transported to a world with superheroes—maybe one day you’d be snapped into dust by Thanos or blown up by a villain’s fallout, and could only ever be an ordinary person in that world. Nobody would want that.
But if the alternative was being stuck in a zombie nuclear wasteland, still just an ordinary person, then as long as you didn’t go to “key cities” like New York, the superhero world wouldn’t be so bad.
So although the recent dark invasion had a huge impact and a few people died, it was still better than the past when whole cities died one by one and everyone thought humanity was doomed.
Compared to that, living in today’s world was pretty good.
Another important factor was that dark forces invaded everywhere, not just Mudong City. In fact, Mudong was relatively lucky.
Magical girls could only cover certain areas; many places had completely fallen into the hands of Dark Fairies.
Places like parts of Africa, the Arctic and Antarctic wastelands were all Dark Fairy strongholds.
Light Fairies and magical girls had limited numbers; their strengths lay in superior individual ability, stronger spirit, and sharper minds.
Meanwhile, Dark Fairies could corrupt anything—people, beasts, even stones, trees, and the weather itself.
There had even been storms composed of dark magic that wrecked human cities.
Forget whether single combat ability or mental faculties were affected—just think about how effective they were.
Even if people left Mudong City, similar incidents could happen elsewhere.
The result was that dark invasions were like car accidents, diseases, or natural disasters: unless they happened to you, no one feared them too much.
At least in this country, most people could live fairly peacefully, and that was enough.
“…This.”
After figuring all this out, Jiang Lingwei’s previously good mood grew heavy.
If only back then… if only they had succeeded, perhaps none of this would have happened.
Facing the sunlight, Jiang Lingwei held up her transformation device.
As always, the pink heart-shaped gem reflected the light, blooming with beautiful colors.
But the cracks on it were impossible to ignore.
What exactly happened back then…
“Magic is a symbol of the soul.”
Jiang Lingwei murmured, as if she had grasped a thought, or rather, an “inspiration.”
“Is it because my soul still has cracks…”