Chapter 251: Major Event Three: Night of the Witches (11)

As the Witch of Despair's form crumbled into sand and scattered on the wind, the magic surging like a gray ocean vanished with her.

Ke Mingqing stayed where he was, standing in silence for a while.

Before long, the cold system panel was slowly reflected in his pupils.

[Congratulations! Detected that the player has successfully killed an "S Rank Superhuman Species"!]

First-kill rewards obtained—1. Instant player level-up by 1; 2. One A Rank equipment chest; 3. 15,000 superhuman coins; 4. An S Rank Superhuman Species first-kill announcement to all players worldwide.

[Current Level Progress: Lv.26 (6,500/13,000 EXP)]

[Player's Current Total Superhuman Coins: 21,000]

[Congratulations! Detected completion of Weekly Task 1: "Kill a super-human species of any Rank."]

Task reward obtained: 1 Attribute Point for free allocation.

Ke Mingqing drew a deep breath, finally coming back to his senses.

Lowering his gaze, he casually pulled up his personal attribute panel and quickly allocated the one Attribute Point he had on hand.

[Congratulations! You have consumed 1 Attribute Point. Your "Agility" attribute has increased from "A Rank" to "A+ Rank".]

[Player "Ke Mingqing" — Current Attributes: Strength: A; Agility: A+; Spirit: B+]

Now that the Witch of Despair's magic had dissipated, the magical girls Mizumio Akari and Little Red Riding Hood, lying collapsed atop the Stage Apparatus, slowly came back to their senses.

The two of them lifted their eyes and scanned their surroundings, only to see Ke Mingqing alone—along with the corpse of Magical Girl Deep Space. The instant their gazes touched that body, the light in both their eyes dimmed slightly.

"Teacher Mizumio Akari, where is the Witch of Despair?"

It took a long while for Little Red Riding Hood to look away from her comrade's corpse and ask in a hoarse voice.

Mizumio Akari fell silent. Her sea-blue eyes stared fixedly at Ke Mingqing's back before finally coming to rest on his bloodstained right hand.

"Maybe... that person took care of her?" she said in a low voice after a moment's hesitation.

"Mr. Blue Pigeon?"

Little Red Riding Hood's eyelids trembled as she slowly raised her head to look at Ke Mingqing's back.

Ke Mingqing paid no heed to the stir behind him. Like a kite with a snapped string, he walked step by step toward the center of Terminus Night.

The entire world was convulsing violently now, deafening roars thundering in from every direction.

In the sky to the left of Terminus Night hung seven meteors strung together in a line; to the right loomed one-eyed giants, alongside emerald zodiac beasts wheeling beneath the vault of heaven.

One moment the sky flared cyan; the next it was cast in a hopeless leaden gray. One moment came the thunder of meteors lacerating the atmosphere; the next, the roar of the emerald East Wind Dragon.

Yet none of it had anything to do with him anymore.

The boy's pitch-black eyes reflected that eerie Western-style mansion.

Ke Mingqing knew inside that there was only one thing he needed to do right now: rescue Xia Zili from that mansion.

And then end this farce and bring her home.

At the same time, deep within the mansion, inside the church.

At the very center of the altar, Ember's body trembled faintly. Her eyes were downcast, her contracted pupils reflecting the gruesome, solitary head lying on the floor.

Blood trickled from Xie Lin's eye sockets and nostrils, staining Ember's black boots red.

In the absolute silence, the lips of the girl in the gothic dress quivered nonstop as her gaze slowly hollowed out. Then a hazy, cocoon-like light enveloped her body.

Moments later, as the glow faded, she changed back into the girl in the orange hoodie. Without the protection of her magic, the chilling air of the church pressed straight against her skin, and cold sunlight filtered through the stained-glass windows onto her pale, bloodless cheeks.

"Must be nice being you. You don't have to get sick, you have a healthy body, and you even get to become a magical girl. You clearly have family who care so much about you, and so, so many people out there who like you, yet you always put on that lonely act in the classroom and fooled a real unlucky fool like me... You're such a hypocrite. So fake it makes me sick."

All of a sudden, Xie Lin's head, lying where it had rolled to her feet, opened its mouth and spoke slowly.

Xia Zili's eyes flew wide, meeting her gaze.

"You promised you'd save me. You said you'd cure my illness, yet in the end you did nothing at all—you even got me killed. That hulking brute with four arms was coming after you, wasn't he?" Xie Lin's eyes brimmed with sorrow. "While I was dying right there, you did nothing. You only cared about venting your own rage, when you clearly still had a chance to save me. Isn't that right?"

"No..."

Xia Zili shook her head, her eyes obscured by her bangs.

"Why did you do this to me?" Xie Lin asked.

"I..."

Xia Zili's lips parted and trembled faintly.

"Weren't we best friends? Why did you do this to me?" Xie Lin said. "Stop playing the victim here, would you? This is all your fault. Everything they said about you was right, wasn't it? You really are the 'Slaughter Girl'! You didn't just slaughter criminals—you slaughtered your own friend too! Who else are you going to slaughter?"

She paused, lowering her voice. "Oh, you're about to turn into a witch. You're going to slaughter the entire world next, aren't you?"

Xia Zili pulled hard with both arms as if trying to cover her ears, only to set the iron chains wound around her body clanking.

Slowly, she bowed her head and squeezed her eyes shut, refusing to let herself look at the severed head on the floor.

"Are you not even willing to listen to me anymore?" Xie Lin asked.

In a daze, Xia Zili shook her head. She could no longer make a sound.

The next instant, Xie Lin's eye sockets suddenly caved inward. Her eyeballs burst, and the entire head slowly deflated like a crushed balloon, squeezing out a spray of bloody water that splattered across Xia Zili's cheeks.

The girl stared at the sight, blank and dazed, and only tilted her head after a long while.

Slowly, she parted her parched lips in a silent wail. Gray-blue magic poured from every inch of her body like a waterfall, shattering the iron chains coiled around the cross layer by layer.

At that moment, all the blood in the crimson fountain beneath the altar surged upward in reverse.

The blood wrapped around the altar like a cocoon. Then, deep within that blood-red cocoon, a light woven of pitch-black and blue pulsed quietly, like a butterfly on the verge of breaking free.

The entire mansion began to shudder, throbbing like an eerie heart.

The instant Ke Mingqing stepped into the church, he halted abruptly and slowly tilted his head back.

The moment his eyes touched the cracking cocoon, a super-human species panel woven of gray and blue was slowly reflected before his gaze.

[Superhuman Species Codename: Witch of Finale and Ashes]

[Type: Witch]

[Threat Rating: S++ Rank]

[Superhuman Species Description: There is a being born at the finale of the world and nurtured at the end of time; only at the moment when all things have turned to ashes does it bloom in solitude, bringing everything to a close.]