High above the clouds, the dazzling PR girls were routed, scattered like fallen petals in a storm.
The peerless black-haired Empress, robed in dragon silks, sat enthroned at the center of Lingxiao Pavilion, surveying the wreckage of her defeated foes with a wicked, unrestrained smile curving at the corner of her lips:
"The Witch Coven gathering — not bad at all."
At her side, Bai Mengtian — the Empress's number-one scheming sycophant — kneaded her waist and pounded her back with fawning reverence:
"Waaah, bestie, teach me a move or two?"
"You — are not worthy."
The Empress shook her head with a mournful sigh, her gaze distant and lonely. "Unrivaled in all the world, and yet so utterly alone in it. The Golden Kumquat Tavern, for all its renown, couldn't produce a single soul capable of lasting one round against me…."
The dream dissolved.
Li Fei's complexion was ghastlier than a specter's — bloodless, utterly devoid of vitality, with the faint dried tracks of tears still marking her cheeks.
So thirsty…
She forced her eyes open, but the room immediately began to spin. With great effort she hauled herself out of bed, only for her legs to tremble uncontrollably beneath her.
Water. I need water…
Li Fei staggered forward, bracing herself against the wall, but her legs gave way entirely and she went down with a thud onto the carpet.
Driven by sheer force of will, the parched courtesan crawled on hands and knees toward the low tea table, straining to reach it with one trembling arm outstretched.
But in the end she could go no further. Her fingertips hovered at the table's edge, unable to close the final inch to the water pitcher standing tantalizingly within reach — like a desert wanderer on the verge of dying of thirst with a spring just one step away.
It was Eve who found the Mother of Fairies first. She came flying over at once and tipped a few sips of water past her lips.
Li Fei's lips were still dry and cracked, faintly pale. She spoke in a haggard, feeble voice:
"Help me up…"
A short while later, the ailing courtesan was draped limply across the sofa, the hand holding her cigarette trembling slightly.
She was thinking.
Just a few days ago, she had been a spotless, untouched courtesan — pure as a lotus rising from muddy water, a maiden unblemished in every sense.
How on earth had things escalated to this degree at lightning speed after her coming-of-age ceremony?
Li Fei quickly identified the culprit.
It's. All. Zhihua's. Fault.
The night Lady Zhihua entered seclusion, Li Fei had kept herself pure and chaste.
The second night, since Lady Zhihua's seclusion was dragging on too long, she had reluctantly cuddled with Eve.
The third night: cuddles with Ram and Eve.
The fourth night: pure and chaste.
The fifth day, daytime: cuddles with Grace.
The fifth night: cuddles with Honey and two other fairies.
Last night… she couldn't quite remember.
If Lady Zhihua hadn't gone into seclusion, perhaps — possibly — probably — this Li would have remained faithfully devoted to one person…
When Ram came in carrying a bowl of noodle soup fortified with triple the usual serpent-woman scale shavings, she found the barely-breathing Mother of Fairies muttering things like "setting aside the facts" and "even if 99%… surely the 1% counts for something" — words that made absolutely no sense.
"Take it away. Leave it for the others."
The hollow-cheeked Li Fei glanced at the soup, then at the sisters drifting out from various rooms on various floors in twos and threes, and declared with stubborn dignity: "I'm just a little tired. A nap on the Moon Pillow will sort me right out. I don't need that."
— A brief explanatory note: this being Li Fei's new home, the sisters had kept things tasteful. No communal activities in the living room — when meeting privately, they knew to find a room and close the door.
— Thanks to her exceptional Charisma Attribute, Witch bloodline, and Glass Cannon trait leveled up to Lv10, the little sisters never lasted more than a few rounds in her hands. By contrast, the self-spun, soap-bubble-fragile illusion she'd constructed for herself had yet to be punctured.
— Cuddling is an interactive activity. At least so far, Li Fei had yet to encounter anyone who was purely and absolutely one thing or the other.
In the end, under Ram's gentle but unyielding insistence, the courtesan obediently drank the soup before being helped back to her room.
But she woke up barely half an hour later, tossing and turning, unable to sleep.
Clearly, she had depleted her vital energy — not simply lost sleep.
"Li Fei, oh Li Fei, you really cannot keep sinking into this kind of Depravity."
The courtesan sat before the mirror, gazing at her wan, sickly reflection with a grave expression as she admonished herself:
"Otherwise sooner or later you'll be hollowed out by wine and debauchery!"
"What are you muttering about?"
Bai Mengtian sauntered in through the door and plopped herself down beside Li Fei.
"I examine myself on three counts each day," Li Fei said with conviction.
"I am engaging in self-reflection."
"Oh really?" Bai Mengtian made a skeptical sound through her nose, eyeing her with amusement. "Come to any grand conclusions?"
"I've been a little lax these past few days."
Li Fei's expression turned solemn, her tone brooking no argument. "Starting from this very second, this Li will not touch a single drop of alcohol!"
At the same time, she plucked a hair from Bai Mengtian's head — this was in emulation of the ancient sages who cut their hair to make a vow. It absolutely was not petty revenge for the time Bai Mengtian had pulled her own hair during their horseplay and fought dirty.
"Ow——"
Bai Mengtian clapped a hand to her head and yelped, then toppled off her chair — and without a shred of mercy, landed squarely on Li Fei's stomach, clawing at her with both hands. "You're dead!"
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it tickles…"
In this round of sisterly civil war, the courtesan was utterly routed — reduced to tears and pleas for mercy under a relentless tickling assault.
Though she did have in her possession the incantation Lady Kalida had handed her last night — the one that could activate the collar — Li Fei's current condition was far from ideal, and this was not the moment to reveal her hand. She chose to bide her time and play the weakling.
"Are you really… going to be all right?"
Outside the gates of the Magic Academy, Sofia studied her mother-in-law's terrible complexion with genuine concern. "Maybe you should take the day off."
She herself had spent last night well-behaved and proper, sleeping curled up with Eve without setting so much as a foot outside their excellently soundproofed room.
Though the scattered, affectionate guests drifting about in the morning had given her a vague inkling of what had transpired, she hadn't pieced it together fully — after all, it was perfectly normal for beautiful older and younger sisters to fall for each other at a party and be swept away by their feelings. Sofia, who had only attended the first half before being drunk into oblivion by Isabella, never connected the dots that most of the guests were Isabella's colleagues, and so had no way to deduce what the second half of the evening's program had involved.
This meant the young vampire constable had simply assumed her mother-in-law was suffering a flare-up of soul-injury aftereffects.
"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step," Li Fei said with a gentle smile. "If I skip class over every little ailment, everyone will leave me far behind."
Under Sofia's worried gaze, the special-admission student walked toward the Academy with weak but resolute strides.
The moment she stepped through the main gates, Li Fei was enveloped in an atmosphere of tranquil harmony and teeming life.
She walked along the long cobblestone corridor, greeted on all sides by birdsong and fragrant blossoms. Ancient trees grew tall and lush on either side of the path — far older and more verdant than the oak in front of Li Fei's new home.
Bathed in that living atmosphere, Li Fei felt something in her heart ease, and her expression softened.
But gradually, a small frown formed between her brows. The smile faded from her face, little by little.
At last, Li Fei came to a cold-faced standstill before the Lucky Fountain. Its sourceless waters bubbled and surged, ceaselessly bestowing good fortune, yet never overflowing.
Li Fei filled her flask from it out of habit, her movements a touch distracted — so distracted that she didn't even notice when the splash dampened her sleeve.
Something was off.
— Very off.
According to the script Li Fei had written in her head, the Female Lead — the poker-faced young miss, given her personality — should have been waiting anxiously for her at the school gate every single morning and afternoon these past few days, expressing her apologies with earnest, unwavering sincerity.
And in the end, the taciturn but blazingly passionate poker-faced girl would crack under the courtesan's cold indifference, throwing all caution to the wind to comply with that unreasonable and mortifying demand.
And yet here Li Fei was, nearly at the headmistress's office, and still not a glimpse of her!
As a female instructor well-versed in human nature — expert at making women spend money on her, while just as readily losing her own heart and soul in the process — Li Fei stood on her tiptoes and scanned the area. Finding no trace of the girl she'd been pining over for all of five whole minutes, her face fell completely.
Surely Miss Grace wouldn't just love 'em and leave 'em?
No — think positively. What if something had just come up at home?
She'd have to ask around…
Li Fei puffed out her cheeks, feeling thoroughly put out, and walked sulkily into the headmistress's office.
The silver-haired beauty was enjoying the headmistress's private-reserve dragon-milk pudding, her expression as lively and animated as ever, every little smile and pout irresistibly cute.
The mature, exquisitely beautiful silver-haired woman was bathed in the golden morning light streaming through the window, quietly sipping red tea, radiating a graceful and refined elegance.
The poker-faced girl she'd been pining over was instantly forgotten.
Grace who?
Never heard of her. Don't know her at all.
My heart belongs entirely to Nicole and Irena!
Li Fei stepped forward and pinched Irena's cheek in accusation:
"How dare you not wait for me at the school gate and eat delicious food all by yourself!"
There was an element of manufacturing drama for its own sake, but occasionally throwing a small tantrum and acting a little spoiled is a beautiful girl's prerogative — and the prettier she is, the more others will indulge it.
And a delicate, pallid beauty who looked like she might faint at any moment could be perfectly adorable even at her most willful.
"I'll definitely wait for you next time."
Irena laughed sheepishly and surrendered, raising both hands in a French military salute.
"Hmph."
Li Fei gave a smug little hum, then turned to greet Lady Nicole: "Good morning."
"Don't overindulge yourself."
The soul-injury aftereffects might fool others, but they couldn't fool the headmistress. One look at Li Fei's complexion told her exactly what had happened, and she pressed a finger to her adopted daughter's forehead with a hint of reproach.
"Hey."
Li Fei tilted her head, loosely curled her fingers into a fist, gave her own temple a light tap, and stuck out her tongue in a playful gesture.
Having gotten in her moment of coquetry, she made herself entirely at home on the nearby sofa, exactly as if she were in her own living room.
Others might enter the headmistress's office trembling with anxiety and not knowing where to put themselves — Li Fei had long since come to treat it as her personal dining hall… and perhaps, in time, something even more intimate.
"Gneia came by to see me yesterday."
Nicole snapped her fingers, and a bulging burlap sack appeared before Li Fei. "Your and Grace's academic credits have been distributed, and Gneia took away the other batch of supplies. These are Wisdom Fruits — forty-seven in total."
"Gimme some, gimme some."
Irena's eyes lit up like twin stars at the sight of the stuffed sack. She scooted close to Li Fei, radiating the unmistakable energy of "I'm adorable, please give me money."
Birds of a feather flock together — aside from their beauty and their shared hobby of trash-talking the headmistress behind her back, Irena's obsession with money was every bit a match for the courtesan's.
"Da~me~"
Li Fei laced her fingers together and breathed out a soft "no" to Irena, then looked over her generous haul, her smile growing radiant enough to outshine the golden morning light itself.
In that moment, the memory of going one against a hundred inside the Folded Space — weaving alliances and playing all sides, ultimately sweeping up nearly every resource, experience point, and teammate the little world had to offer — surfaced vividly in her mind.
It left Li Fei feeling, just a tiny bit, full of herself.
So she feigned wide-eyed surprise and covered her mouth:
"Only this many?"
The moment the words left her mouth, the silver-haired beauty's lips formed a perfect "O," apparently stunned by her dear friend's audacity.
The outrageously bold special-admission student was, in plain daylight, heavily implying that the headmistress had been lining her own pockets.
One had to admit — that took nerve.
Like patting a tiger's backside. Like yanking a feather from an angel's wing. Like flaunting your gold hoard in front of a greedy dragon.
Li Fei's heart was pounding, a flicker of guilty conscience mixing with a giddy thrill of excitement.
— Surely Mama Nicole spoils me too much to actually punish me, right?
"The rest of the Wisdom Fruits haven't ripened yet, you know," Nicole said with a gracious smile, as though she hadn't heard the implication at all.
"Thank you, Mama Nicole."
Li Fei smiled sweetly, privately savoring the delicious irony:
Headmistress? That's all you've got?
Underwhelming.
"Oh, by the way — your application has been approved. Those three half-orcs have been released."
Nicole's tone pivoted abruptly. She set down her teacup, rose gracefully to her feet, and made her unhurried way toward Li Fei:
"However, I've temporarily kept them within the Academy grounds — and reached a certain arrangement with them."
"What kind of arrangement?"
Li Fei's heart sank with suspicion. Why can't that old thing stay out of trouble wherever it goes…?
"Sparring partners."
Nicole settled herself beside Li Fei, the two of them close enough to touch, her refined fragrance drifting right to the special-admission student's nose. "As you know, the exchange event with the War Academy is coming up soon. I noticed Yusura and Kenan have quite impressive close-combat skills, so I invited them to stay and sharpen the practical combat techniques of the lower-year students."
A sense of dread welled up in Li Fei's heart.
She was already quietly regretting her little act of cheekiness in front of the headmistress just moments ago.
So she broke into a chorus of lavish praise, hoping to course-correct: "Mama Nicole, you are truly wise and far-sighted… How fortunate we are to have a headmistress like you."
At the same time, she quietly inched away, putting a little distance between herself and Nicole. "Ah, class is about to start, I should be going—"
Thwap.
Nicole's hand came down firmly on Li Fei's shoulder. The same cultivated, dignified smile remained on her face; her tone remained gentle as ever. The words that followed, however, sent a chill straight down Li Fei's spine:
"Since we're doing practical training, shouldn't the star student, as a role model for the new intake, lead by example?"
"Ah ha, an opportunity this precious really ought to go to another classmate — it would be terribly wasteful on me," Li Fei ventured, clinging to her last shred of hope and mounting a desperate final stand. "The gap between their strength and mine is simply too vast—"
"That's fine."
Nicole pinned the would-be escapee firmly to the sofa and said at her leisure: "The Academy has a ritual for exactly that purpose — it can suppress both parties' speed, strength, reaction time, mana, and all other attributes to an identical level."
"Equipment will also be standardized across the board, to ensure fairness and impartiality."
"With that in mind — might this give you a little something to work for? Special-admission student."
In that moment, Li Fei's mind conjured the image of Kenan taking on ten opponents at once — the numbers inflated, but the raw force still undeniable.
And Yusura's viciously precise strike — the one delivered with an almost paternal tenderness, and absolutely zero consideration for his own son's marital happiness.
A cold sweat trickled down her back.
"Mama Nicole… I won't lie to you. These past couple of days, my soul-injury aftereffects have been acting up…"
Her survival instincts surging in full force, Li Fei bit her lip and deployed every last Art of Tea technique at her disposal. She clasped the headmistress's hands in both of hers and gazed up with an expression of such pitiful, heart-rending fragility that it could make anyone melt:
"I'm afraid I'll need a good long rest to recover properly."
She had apparently forgotten that the headmistress's office, as a key and restricted area of the Magic Academy, was layered with airtight rituals to prevent intruders from slipping in undetected.
Such as the [Recall Ritual] — functioning similarly to surveillance equipment, yet capturing footage with clarity on par with a high-end camera and audio quality rivaling a recording studio.
And the reason Li Fei had submitted to enter Folded Space D-07 with Grace was, as it happened…
Lady Nicole lightly snapped her fingers, and a mirror-like surface shimmered into existence.
In it appeared a scene from several days prior.
Li Fei, hand in hand with Grace, declared with spirited confidence:
"As they say — a sword's edge is honed through grinding, and plum blossoms bloom all the sweeter for the bitter cold."
"Without true trials, how can one ever push one's potential to its very limits?"
"Besides — in real combat, enemies will not stop to consider my condition."
"Therefore, even with a soul injury, as a student of the Magic Academy, I will only press forward and never yield."
The present Li Fei: "..."
Silence was tonight's River Cam — and her profound, bitter regret for ever having talked such a big game.
Beside her, Irena bent double, pressing both hands hard against her stomach, her silver hair quivering with the effort of suppressing her laughter.
"Here you go — the trials you asked for," Nicole said, gently smoothing Li Fei's long hair, her gracious smile entirely unchanged.
____
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