"Um, hello there, I'm Huohuo, a trainee judge from the Ten-Lords Commission. I-I'll be the one guiding you into the Fyxestroll Garden today... Sniff, can I request to switch with someone else?"
Looking at the petite foxian girl who seemed on the verge of bursting into tears, Lynelle and Stelle fell silent.
"Does this Ten-Lords judge... actually live up to what her colleagues said about her?"
"I-If it's about dealing with Heliobus possession, I can probably handle it..."
Huohuo whispered as she began calling softly, "Mr. Tail, Mr. Tail, come out, we've got work soon..."
"Hey now, little girl, get this straight—you're the judge, not me... Hiss—hold on, though. Your companions this time are... interesting."
Then, under Stelle's astonished gaze, Huohuo's tail twitched and a ball of burning flame flew out. After hovering briefly, he began circling around Lynelle.
"That gray-haired girl is one thing, but what's the deal with you, pinkie?"
"Me? What's unusual about me?" Lynelle pointed at herself, puzzled.
"Unusual? Extremely unusual..." Tail fell silent for a moment, then spun even faster.
"Just what are you... Oh, I'm not insulting you. Let me think how to put it... Right—what form of life are you, exactly?"
"How come I can sense you have a real physical body, yet also carry traits of both an energy-based lifeform and a data entity?"
"Did you seize this body from somewhere? That doesn't seem right either... No stolen vessel could ever achieve compatibility this perfect..."
"Huh? So my state is that rare?" Lynelle said curiously. "I feel like I often come across beings somewhat similar to me, though..."
"You're not like the others..." Tail paused, then continued, "Hey, how about we make a deal? If you need my help during this mission, I won't refuse. But in return, I want you to answer one question."
"Sure, go ahead," Lynelle nodded. "But I reserve the right not to answer, just so you know."
"No problem, this question shouldn't be too personal for you." Tail thought it over.
"If, for some reason, your physical body were destroyed right now... when you reformed a new one, would everything that was originally inside your body still be there?"
"W-Wait, you can actually lose things...?" A question mark seemed to pop up above Lynelle's head.
"Of course it'd still be there."
"..."
Tail stayed quiet for a few seconds, then his tone suddenly turned serious.
"Hey, you don't seem like a bad sort, so let me give you a warning."
"If you ever run into a powerful Heliobus, better steer clear... Honestly, your constitution is pretty much the dream for the Heliobus race."
"To put it plainly, when you undergo form conversion, it doesn't seem like reconstruction—more like a time reversal... But inside Fyxestroll Garden, it shouldn't matter."
"The Heliobus here are probably no match for me."
"Powerful Heliobus, huh..." Lynelle's lip twitched.
"Well, soon enough, I guess. I think I've already fought two powerful ones, though one of them did show a clear... craving for my body. Maybe you even know them."
"Who?"
"Phantylia."
"That one... All right, seems like I might've been overstepping here. If you can beat Phantylia, then unless someone frees the Flint Emperor, no Heliobus should be able to touch you..."
With that, Tail ducked straight back into Huohuo's body, once again becoming a fiery tail.
"Little girl, watch and learn. That gray-haired one I'm not sure about, but this pink-haired one? Definitely a force to be reckoned with... the kind you'd hang a portrait of by your door to ward off evil spirits."
"Pfft—" Stelle couldn't hold back a snicker.
"Don't laugh. Mainly because this silly girl really hung Jing Yuan's portrait by her door to ward off spirits."
"Swapping to this pinkie would at least be easier on the eyes, so she doesn't get hexed by some passing Heliobus one day."
"Mr. Tail, let's not bring that up again... Oh no, I almost forgot—entry to Fyxestroll Garden has time restrictions. Let's head in first, and we can chat as we walk."
Under Huohuo's lead, the trio quickly passed through layers of guards from the Ten-Lords Commission and entered the heart of Fyxestroll Garden.
Perhaps because a Heliobus was accompanying the two, the atmosphere wasn't as eerie and terrifying as they had imagined.
That feeling didn't last long, though. Soon, the three heard a cry for help echoing from afar.
"Is it happening? Is it happening?" Stelle's eyes lit up.
"Classic horror movie trope! Next, according to the plot, we should split up, and then one of us gets possessed by a Heliob—Ow!"
"I told you to watch fewer movies and spend more time on the Arahato Mr. Yang shows you." Lynelle brought the girl back to reality with a light chop.
"Besides, listen carefully—that's clearly Sushang's voice, right? I remember it; how could you forget your good pal from revitalizing the Aurum Alley just a day later?"
"I-In Fyxestroll Garden, some Heliobus do mimic the voices of familiar people..." Huohuo trembled as she pulled out a command flag.
"So, let me place some talismans on you first—"
"Don't worry, no need for all that ceremony. I can sense their life signatures from here... They're definitely two living people, with some faint energy signals around them—probably trapped by Heliobus."
A verdant glow flashed in Lynelle's eyes as the Abundance power within faithfully fed back the life signatures not far away.
"Faint? Probably just small fries that can't cause much trouble. Let's go. At this level, I might just scare them off."
"W-Wait, Mr. Tail, don't drag me—"
Seemingly energized, Tail was unusually proactive today. Under Lynelle and Stelle's watch, it hauled the nearly tearful Huohuo toward the source of the cries.
However, barely five minutes later...
"Outrageous. Truly outrageous... I'm out of ideas. Little Pinkie, you handle these embarrassing things."
Tail fell into deep silence as it watched several balls of flame huddled around Sushang and Guinaifen, rubbing against them while crying "Mama!"
For the first time, he felt like cutting ties with the Heliobus identity.
After all, if people realized he was the same species as these guys—and given that he was currently possessing a petite young girl—Tail felt even diving into a black hole of Nihility wouldn't clear its name.
"T-This is a bit much for me too..."
Lynelle's mouth twitched, and she chose to directly crush a card.
Considering the emotions attached to these Heliobus originally belonged to Corruption-chan, Lynelle figured if she approached in her true form... she might instantly attract all the Heliobus.
At that point, a scene like that would be a bit too much for her to handle.
Not that she disliked being called Mama—she already had two daughters—but being surrounded by a bunch of ghost fires chanting "Mama"?
One only needed to recall Ruan Mei being "captured" by the Cake Cats aboard the space station for reference.
So without hesitation, Lynelle used a transformation card.
As the card shattered, the impressive, well-developed chest that far exceeded her peers began to shrink—all the way down to a "Herta-level" size that could be held in one hand.
If even Lynelle's assets shrunk that much, the identity of this character card was self-evident. As Lynelle "transformed," several crimson feathers materialized around her, shimmering faintly.
"Fenghuang Down... help me one last time... Well, given the situation, maybe not the last time. But please, help me a hundred million times!"
Instantly, the crimson feather in the girl's hand released waves of red light.
The Heliobus enveloped by the light sank straight into illusions—don't ask what kind of illusions; let's just say they were the type you could obsess over for a lifetime.
"Whoa, that illusion technique... No wonder you said you're not afraid of Heliobus..."
"Wah! A-Are those weird ghosts finally gone?" The Cloud Knight girl, who had just been surrounded, breathed a sigh of relief.
"Huh? Wait, Stelle? What are you all doing here?"
"We're here on request to deal with abnormal phenomena in Fyxestroll Garden. As for what kind of abnormal..." Stelle pointed at the ghost fires trapped in illusions. "You've experienced it firsthand."
"But, what were you two..."
Sushang immediately glanced at the orange-haired girl in sheer black stockings and an eye-catching outfit beside her.
"Th-Thank you, heroes. I'm Guinaifen, an independent streamer on the Xianzhou. I wanted to give my fans something thrilling, like a nighttime exploration of Fyxestroll Garden..."
"So you snuck in?"
"Ahem, y-yeah..." Guinaifen scratched her head sheepishly.
"Honestly, I thought running into ghosts would make it even better. But I never expected... Fyxestroll Garden's ghosts to be like this!"
"And now, not only did the ghost-repelling items I prepared fail completely, but that embarrassing scene was livestreamed... I don't even dare check my stream now."
"Don't worry, I'll check for you." Stelle, never one to miss out on drama, quickly pulled out her phone, only to find that due to streaming sensitive content, Guinaifen's channel had been temporarily cut.
Even so, a group of fans still lingering in the chat kept spamming "Mama!"
"...Good news: you really gave your fans something wild. Bad news: it was so wild that it infected your fans."
"Gwah! Becoming a mama-streamer or something—anything but that! If my family finds out, they'll laugh so hard they won't even be able to eat potatoes!"
Guinaifen clutched her head and let out a wail.
"Anyway, considering the current anomalies in Fyxestroll Garden, we really should escort you out first..." Lynelle spoke up.
"But since we're shorthanded ourselves... let's travel together for a while. After all, asking Huohuo to escort you out alone might be a bit much for her."
The shivering foxian girl nearby nodded vigorously.
"Is this the legendary 'recruiting teammates' phase?" Stelle pondered.
"Now that we've formed a ghost-hunting squad, should we go fight the boss?"
"Could be another plotline—like this isn't a fantasy series but a musical, ending with 'forming a ghost-hunting squad for life' or something..." Lynelle chimed in with a fitting complaint.
But as if to confirm this wasn't a musical, before the group had traveled far, another anomaly emerged.
"Hmph, so it's you causing such a commotion in Fyxestroll Garden..."
Amidst a chilling gust, an unusually large ghost fire appeared before them.
"You are..." Tail paused, then asked tentatively, "Cirrus?"
"Wait, how'd you get so... chubby?"
"Kekeke, that's because I'm merging all Heliobus to restore the glory of Ignamar—"
"Bullshit!" Suddenly, the ghost fire's expression shifted as if someone else had taken over. "I just didn't want to be inexplicably devoured by that she-devil, so I had to join forces with you for safety!"
"Exactly, exactly! If you want to get yourself killed, go ahead, but don't drag us down with you!"
A chorus of shouts erupted from within the giant ghost fire, making it seem less like a Heliobus amalgamation and more like a bunch of rowdy kids crammed together.
"Silence! Silence!"
After quite some uproar, Cirrus barely managed to suppress the turmoil within and turned back to Tail. "I sensed your presence and came specifically to ask if you'd join us."
"Hold up—why would I give up a perfectly good host to let you devour me?" Cirrus's absurd request left even the usually irritable Tail bewildered.
"Heh... The reason is simple."
Cirrus's flames wavered, then separated to form the shape of a delicate young girl.
"If you don't merge with us and band together, in a few hours, you'll be devoured by that she-devil..."
"Honestly, if you weren't so strong, I wouldn't even bother warning you. After all, I'm curious—as the 'arrogant side' of Ignamar, after being steeped in that being's emotions, would you turn into a Tail desperately craving motherly love?"
"She-devil? Devoured? Craving motherly love?"
Staring at the ghost fire Cirrus had shaped—which looked nearly identical to Lynelle—then glancing at the now-transformed girl whistling innocently nearby, Tail fell into profound silence.
Cirrus might have a rotten personality, but it rarely lied.
Which meant...
The final boss was right beside them all along?
--+--
T/N: I have a Patreon! Webnovel will get 2 Chapters Every Day, and advanced chapters will be uploaded on Patreon.
It may not seem worth it now, but maybe in the future. Who knows!
[email protected]/AspenTL
If you guys wanna check it out.