After returning to the School from Lin Ling’s house with a few roommates, the others went straight back to the Dormitory, while Yu Hua stopped in front of the girls’ Dormitory Building and took out his Mobile Phone to send a message to Anpelin.
“Peilin, do you want to come out and hang out tonight?”
Yu Hua typed and sent.
Soon, Anpelin’s status changed to “typing.”
A few seconds later, a reply popped up:
“Humanity, wait beneath My Dormitory Palace. I shall descend at once.”
Seeing the familiar Chuunibyou tone in the reply, Yu Hua knew Anpelin wasn’t in her normal state and was currently in her Chuunibyou form.
However, since he had already made the date, he couldn’t just stand her up.
Yu Hua waited a short while downstairs at the Dormitory Building.
Soon, Anpelin, dressed in a long black gothic dress, walked down, pride in her red eyes.
“How have you been lately? Have you been eating on time? Have you been drinking your blood on time? Don’t always order takeout. When you have time, come downstairs more often to walk around and get some sun—cough, I mean, get some fresh air.”
Yu Hua stepped forward and naturally took her hand.
“Humanity, why do you sound just like Mother Superior? I already know all this. There is no need to speak of it further.”
Anpelin raised her chin, her expression a bit haughty, yet she obediently let Yu Hua hold her hand.
“I’m just worried about you.”
Yu Hua took Anpelin for a walk around the campus artificial lake.
The evening breeze was pleasant, carrying a slight chill.
Yu Hua held her small hand, feeling the only remaining sensations of how things used to be despite everything having changed.
“Peilin, your work at the Hero Department… have you been handling it lately?”
Yu Hua couldn’t help but ask, seeing that Anpelin seemed to have been cooped up in the Dormitory recently.
“What Hero work?”
Anpelin asked, tilting her head.
Yu Hua’s expression became subtle.
“So, you’ve been skipping work since the accident that day?”
“I am the Sixth Princess of the Bloodline. With such an extraordinary and noble body, I was born to be enshrined by ten thousand people. Why should I engage in such menial labor?”
Anpelin crossed her arms, turning her head to the side.
“Uh… alright… do your parents give you an allowance or anything? Do you have enough money?”
“Mother Superior? The last time I had an audience with Mother Superior was at the Hospital.”
Anpelin clearly misunderstood who Yu Hua was talking about.
“Not that mother. I mean the family who pays for your university tuition and living expenses.”
Yu Hua didn’t know how her mind was working for a moment, so he had to explain it in terms of reality.
“Oh~ you mean the Motherland?”
Anpelin realized.
“The Motherland has already provided me with thirty thousand in funds this year. There is still a surplus, the national treasury is abundant, so there is no need to worry.”
At this, Yu Hua’s heart suddenly skipped a beat, and an ominous premonition surfaced.
“Peilin, can you give me your Mobile Phone?”
“Do… do you want to pry into this princess’s privacy? Even though you are my boyfriend, that’s not allowed.”
Anpelin instinctively hid the hand holding the phone behind her back.
“If you’re willing to tell me honestly, that’s fine too, but you don’t look like someone who’s willing to be honest.”
As an exchange, Yu Hua had to hand his own Mobile Phone to her.
Curiosity indeed overcame her defensiveness.
Anpelin’s eyes lit up, and she quickly snatched Yu Hua’s Mobile Phone, starting to poke and prod at it like she’d received a new toy.
Yu Hua took her phone with the Blood Moon Pattern Phone Case and began searching through it.
Using her Fingerprint to open the phone, he was greeted by a screen full of mobile games.
Obviously, that wasn’t what Yu Hua cared about.
He opened the contacts to look for relevant numbers, but the registered notes for parents, relatives, and Yu Hua were there without even a single friend’s number.
Yu Hua’s heart sank.
He dialed the two numbers labeled as Father and Mother in turn, but the result was the same.
“Sorry, the user you have dialed is powered off…”
His premonition became reality.
Yu Hua opened the chat software again.
Aside from a few muted School notification groups and Hero work groups, there was only one pinned group chat called Happy Family.
Yu Hua clicked on it.
The last message was sent by Anpelin several months ago—a few official promotional photos and blurry candid shots of Magic Girl Shui Hua, captioned:
“My little girlfriend, cute, right?”
There weren’t many chat records, and they spanned a long time.
Every once in a while, Anpelin would post a lot of words accompanied by pictures.
Half were pictures of Shui Hua, and the other half were interspersed with pictures of her and Yu Hua on dates.
Anpelin’s face was brimming with passion, and Yu Hua cooperated with a sincere smile.
“He looks quite handsome this way, though not as good as his look during Transformation.”
Yu Hua felt a tightness in his chest.
He had already guessed what had happened.
The finger scrolling the screen became stiff as he read through them one by one from bottom to top.
“You guys must be curious why I say that, hee-hee. He’s actually a Magic Girl in secret. I’ll send you a few pictures to see; he’s super cute.”
“His name is Yu Hua. He has a super great personality. Even though he’s not a handsome guy, he’s a beauty.”
“Mom, Dad, I’ve got a boyfriend! Although I got him through trickery and deceit, your daughter earned it with her own skills.”
Further up, the span was even longer, tracing back to when Anpelin first became a Hero.
“I’ve become a Hero. Although I’m only an apprentice for now, it’s an honorable profession that protects everyone.”
“You don’t have to worry about me down there. The state provides subsidies, and I will definitely finish my studies properly.”
“Mom, Dad, I miss you so much.”
Yu Hua’s finger finally scrolled to the last message sent by Anpelin’s parents.
It was a voice message.
Yu Hua stared at the voice message, which was only a few seconds long, and didn’t have the courage to listen.
He clicked to translate it into text, and a sentence popped out bit by bit.
“Peilin, make sure you grow up well… Mama loves you.”
“Peilin, speaking of which, you’ve never mentioned your past…”
Yu Hua let out a long sigh, wishing he could slap himself.
He really hadn’t expected such a sunny and cute girl like Anpelin to have such a past.
Yu Hua looked at Anpelin, stroked her head, and then suddenly pulled her into a hug, resting his head on her shoulder.
“Keep looking at my phone. Even though it’s full of my dark history, at least it’s quite cheerful. It’s fine if you laugh at me.”
However, Anpelin seemed to have already flipped through several of Yu Hua’s chat apps.
Her finger swiped to another interface and soon clicked into a strange app.
“What software is this? Why is it asking if I am over eighteen?”
“No, no, no! Don’t click that! Children can’t look at this.”
The gentle smile on Yu Hua’s face instantly turned into a flustered mess as he hurriedly snatched the phone back.
Anpelin was stunned by his intense reaction, then puffed out her cheeks slightly, her red eyes filled with dissatisfaction:
“I am over a thousand years old! Why won’t you let me see? Hand it over immediately.”
“No, no way. This is a self-destruct button disguised on the phone. If you press it, it explodes. If you encounter anything similar in the future, don’t ever click it, okay?”
Yu Hua hurriedly used a certain person’s logic to make up this setting.