The Wangyue-Class Is Completely Wiped Out

Luo You leaned halfway out the window.

She, too, had smelled it—a ‘scent’ lingering in the air, both familiar and strange.

It was not a scent that could be detected physiologically, but rather a perception of the atmosphere.

People often say they ‘smell a hint of danger,’ and what Luo You was smelling now was something similar.

“It’s something I’m very familiar with… What is it…?”

Luo You lightly bit her thumbnail, but she couldn’t quite recall it.

It felt as though her contact with this thing was far too long ago, as if it were right in front of her, yet always just out of reach.

But it was undeniable, this scent—

“Is truly unpleasant.”

Luo You’s brows furrowed tightly.

She felt she couldn’t ignore it.

But if she wanted to intervene, she didn’t know where to start.

What on earth was happening?

Ten days ago—

The Sea of Realms Border frontline.

Trenches, fortified positions, troops, and strangely shaped weapons.

And a great number of magical girls.

Normally, a single district of the Sea of Realms Border would be assigned around seven or eight magical girls, but the number gathered here now far exceeded that.

Eighty-four.

Among them was Xingyu, one of the Ten Seats.

“The Magical Alliance has gathered us here in such a hurry. What on earth is going on?”

“The district I was originally responsible for is also under defensive pressure.”

“Something big must have happened.”

“Senior Xingyu, do you know anything?”

In the crowd, a magical girl acquainted with Xingyu, named Chaoyang, tried to pry some information from her.

Xingyu had indeed heard a few things and spoke without reservation, “It seems the garrison of the Sea of Realms Border has something to tell us.”

“The garrison? Is it a personnel transfer or something?”

“I’m not sure.”

Xingyu looked around.
Magical girls from all the nearby provinces had been summoned.
She could name many of them; they were all active on the front lines with rich combat experience.

Summoning so many magical girls likely meant something major had occurred.

Soon, a middle-aged man of about fifty or sixty, with half-gray hair and dressed in a dark green military uniform, stood at the lectern up front.

“Ahem. Thank you all for responding to the call and coming here despite your busy schedules. I’ll dispense with the pleasantries and get straight to the point.”

Upon seeing the half-gray-haired man, the expressions of most of the magical girls changed.

Even the usually worldly-wise Xingyu’s eyes widened in surprise.

The Supreme Commander of the Sea of Realms Border was here to deliver the notice in person?!

This man was the Supreme Commander of nearly one hundred districts and over 980,000 personnel at the Sea of Realms Border, in charge of all military deployments within it.
Even Xingyu had rarely seen him on a normal day.

The Supreme Commander on the stage wore a solemn expression and said, “Currently, three of our Wangyue-class super-large Star Rings have successively shut down—in Districts 11, 19, and 36. During this period, these three districts of the Sea of Realms Border will be unable to detect any Dimensional Beast invasions!”

“The Wangyue-class super-large Star Rings are down?!”

Without the super-large Star Rings, the defensive line of the Sea of Realms Border was as good as non-existent, a mere facade.

A Sea of Realms Border with super-large Star Rings was worthy of the name.
A Sea of Realms Border without them was just a training ground, completely useless.

After all, Dimensional Beasts operated in a different dimension.
Without the super-large Star Rings to force them out, what would the planes, cannons, and magical girls deployed at the border even fight?

They might as well be fighting the air.

In that case, wouldn’t they revert to the previous indefensible state?

“Why would the super-large Star Rings shut down… I won’t ask the reason. That’s not our job.”

Xingyu stepped forward from among the crowd of magical girls.

“Without the super-large Star Rings, we can’t even engage the Dimensional Beasts. I trust you’ve gathered us here because you have a countermeasure, correct?”

The Supreme Commander on the stage pushed up his glasses and said, “No, it is necessary to tell you the reason for the shutdown. This is also part of the solution.”

“…Don’t tell me it’s an equipment failure caused by corruption?” Xingyu asked.

“Unfortunately, I would be relieved if it were that simple.”
The Supreme Commander’s face was clouded with worry.
He turned to look behind the stage. “As for the technical aspects, it’s best if he explains.”

The Supreme Commander stepped aside, and a researcher in a white coat came up from below the stage.
He stood before the microphone and said:

“I am Zhao Haiping, one of the lead researchers of the Wangyue-class super-large Star Ring. I am ashamed to say that we are still conducting a more comprehensive investigation into the cause of the technical failure. What we know so far is that the core component of the Wangyue-class, the ‘Singularity Core,’ has malfunctioned and can no longer be used.”

“As I have been given permission, I will be direct. The Singularity Cores used by the Wangyue-class contain a substance collected from the Sea of Realms. You can think of it as a type of ‘energy source’. We extract this substance from the Sea of Realms at regular intervals to replenish the Singularity Cores.”

“However, after investigating the faulty Singularity Cores, we discovered that the cause of the failure is an unknown change within the Sea of Realms. The composition of this energy source has undergone an extremely subtle change, causing the Singularity Cores to age severely, to the point where they are now scrap.”

Zhao Haiping’s words caused an uproar among the crowd below.
They never imagined that the technology of the super-large Star Rings was connected to the Sea of Realms!

“In that case, why are you only telling us about such a serious problem now? It should have been discovered and resolved in its initial stages. It’s clearly much harder to control now, isn’t it?”

Xingyu asked with suspicion.

If they had been able to detect it at the earliest moment and deploy resources in time, they wouldn’t be in such a frantic mess.

“Regrettably, the Wangyue-class is not some small civilian facility that can be disassembled for inspection at any time. It is far too massive. We conduct inspections once every two years. The last inspection was half a year ago, the failure occurred a month ago, and the specific cause was only discovered half a month ago. We immediately began a full investigation after that, and only in the last two days did we discover the problem lay with the substance used to replenish the Singularity Cores. But by now, it is too late.”

“Are there no spare Singularity Cores?”

“There are, but only five. In fact, it’s not just these three that have shut down, but eight. Those five Singularity Cores have already been used to patch up the other five. But even those five probably won’t last long.”

At this, Xingyu realized an even more serious problem.

“You said three Wangyue-class rings have shut down so far. That means more Wangyue-class super-large Star Rings have problems, correct?”

“That’s right,” Zhao Haiping said in a heavy tone. “Currently, twenty-seven districts of the Sea of Realms Border have been upgraded to the Wangyue-class. In other words, if we don’t find a solution quickly, one-third of the border’s defensive line will be rendered useless.”

One-third of the Sea of Realms Border being useless… the consequences were too severe.
The casualties would be incalculable.
If the ‘Sea of Realms Tide’ were to suddenly arrive, the death toll would be astronomical!

“What if we decommission the Wangyue-class and replace them with the previous Equator-class? Would that method work?” someone asked.

“No. As I said, the super-large Star Rings are too massive, with a diameter of 10km alone. There isn’t enough space to store over twenty decommissioned Equator-class rings. Most have already been dismantled. It would take a great deal of time to reassemble them.”

“Then why did you call us here? What is your solution? Don’t tell me you’re just going to tell us the truth and let us figure it out ourselves?”

“Magic,” Zhao Haiping answered seriously. “The Singularity Core of the Wangyue-class super-large Star Ring has a new improvement over the Equator-class. It can use magic as a backup energy source.”

“Magic?”

Xingyu frowned.

Magic was a special power that only magical girls could use, a medium through which many unique spells could be cast.

However, because magical girls belonged to the Magical Alliance, it was difficult for human governments to have access to magic.
Thus, even though the higher-ups coveted this power, they had made little progress in developing it.

And now he was suddenly saying that humans could already apply magic to the super-large Star Rings?

Xingyu remained skeptical.

“Forgive me for being blunt, but as far as I know, no country in the world seems to have made any developmental research on magic, correct? How has it been applied to the Wangyue-class?”

Zhao Haiping pushed up his glasses. “That is classified. Please forgive me for not being able to elaborate.”

“…So you want us to act as ‘generators’ to maintain the operation of the Singularity Cores?”

“That’s right. Please rest assured, this poses no harm to your bodies whatsoever. You only need to be on the super-large Star Rings and inject your magic into the Singularity Cores. You can think of yourselves as working on an assembly line, without any burden.”

“…”

Now that it had come to this, it seemed there were no other options.

This was the only way.
If they didn’t cooperate, a large-scale invasion of Dimensional Beasts would lead to an unknown number of deaths.

Their original purpose as magical girls was to protect human society and fight against Dimensional Beasts.
There was no reason to refuse.

But Xingyu still needed one last confirmation.

“Has the Magical Alliance approved this?”

“Yes. In fact, it was the Magical Alliance that summoned you all here.”

Xingyu tried to contact Xingyue but received no response.
As the First Seat, she seemed to be busy hunting down the Dragon-class Dimensional Beast that had broken through the Sea of Realms Border.

With no other choice, Xingyu contacted Manjushaka.
Only after receiving a definite answer were all her doubts cleared.

“We will cooperate with you. But how long will this have to continue?”

Zhao Haiping was silent for a moment.

“…Under ideal circumstances, at least a month, and it could very well last for several months. After all, we need to find a way to reconfigure the energy source and then refill the Singularity Cores. During this time, reactivating the Equator-class will be put on the agenda. We can only wait patiently.”

After all this was said, a massive project mobilizing hundreds of thousands of people went online.

In ten days, over a hundred magical girls had already participated.
Since the frontline magical girls still had to maintain basic defenses, the Sea of Realms Border gradually began to call upon inland magical girls to come and replenish the magic.

And on the same day that Luo You smelled an abnormal scent—

“Zhao Haiping, you are a suspect in a classified information leak case. Please come with us.”

“What?! Are you mistaken?”

Zhao Haiping looked at the two people in military uniforms before him and said, “…I’m busy with something very important right now. Taking me away at a time like this is not a good idea, is it?”

“It’s not just you. Other researchers involved with the Wangyue-class super-large Star Ring will also be taken in for investigation. This is an arrest warrant. Please cooperate.”

“…”