I don't want to conquer witches anymore.

Joan struggled to her feet, and despite her unhealed injuries, she still warned everyone in a shrill voice that the person in front of her, Kagetsu, was not their partner. In the first playthrough she had experienced, it was because they had not been wary of Kagetsu that they were seriously injured, which directly led to Joseph losing an arm.

She doesn't want this to happen again.

Not everyone believed her immediately. For example, Cecil looked back at Joan with some confusion, wondering why she would fight her own companion. Amber, who was holding Bane and trying to save him, had no interest in Joan and Kagetsu.

Regardless of what others thought, Joseph immediately believed his fiancée's words. Without hesitation, he raised his broadsword and slashed at Kazuki. Kazuki frowned, turned and swung her feet, and like an agile cheetah, she suddenly burst out with amazing speed and collided with Joseph.

"Chong-"

Swords clashed.

Joseph is definitely one of the top elite warriors. His level 13, combined with combat skills and intelligence that exceed his level, gives him combat power close to that of a hero. However, all of this seems ridiculous in front of Ge Yue.

A burst of sword light erupted.

She was a combat expert who surpassed Joseph, a true master of weapons. The longsword in her hands was like a living serpent, easily "entwining" Joseph, making him unable to advance or retreat!

A hero-level weapon master.

“Cecil!” Duke called out coldly, “Save Joseph, then test what level Geyue is at.”

"Huh? Oh."

Cecil was slightly taken aback at first, then quickly took action. She did not believe Joan's one-sided story, because she was not familiar enough with either Joan or Geyue. Under such circumstances, she would naturally not turn her sword against her companions.

But she trusts Duke.

The Radiant Witch raised her hand, and holy light condensed into several small beads in front of her. Then, several beams of holy light locked onto Kagetsu at different angles and erupted simultaneously! Faced with the sudden attack, Kagetsu could only abandon Joseph and retreat, allowing the latter to barely escape the battle with Kagetsu.

The next battle will be a clash of heroes.

Although Guangbao is often teased by those around him, and this kind of persecution has become a trend thanks to someone's efforts, no matter how many times he is deceived by swindlers in ordinary times, when it comes to battle, Lady Guangyao is always trustworthy.

Among the witches of the floating city, her regular combat strength must be in the top ten. She is a true war turret, an army in herself! If Cecil, who has devoted herself to the great cause of witches, were thrown onto the battlefield, she would be the most terrifying conventional weapon, capable of taking on an entire mage corps by herself.

Under Duke's command, Cecil quickly launched a carpet bombing campaign against Songyue!

But soon, Duke realized why Geyue was able to firmly hold the top spot on the rookie charts and was never threatened by anyone.

Because in the strategy team for this crown-level witch game, the strongest one is not the Radiant Witch, nor the Elf Prince Bain who is on the overall leaderboard, but the one in front of us, Kagetsu!

Geyue moved gracefully through the carpet bombardment of holy light, like a sharp sword easily piercing the tiny gaps between each beam of light. Even the previously renowned hero-level assassin, Bone Eight, hadn't displayed such composure when facing the irrational Cecil.

She wasn't moving fast, but she handled it with ease. On the contrary, Cecil's forehead was already beaded with sweat. She began to manipulate the Holy Light, breaking down the originally straight Holy Light cannon. What was originally a bowl-sized Holy Light cannon was broken down into ten finger-sized beams of light, which shot towards Songyue along ten different routes and angles.

This time, Ge Yue could no longer dodge, so she drew her longsword and cut the holy light in one stroke, and then continued to dodge with ease.

"What the hell?! Is this even reasonable?!"

When Guangbao saw this scene, she immediately panicked and raised her hand to increase the density of the holy light tenfold—if this guy could still dodge it, she would no longer be called Guangbao!

"Come on, Cecil." Duke's lips twitched slightly as he stopped Cecil from getting carried away, then turned to look at Joan, who was still clinging to Joseph's back. "How did we kill her in your playthrough?"

Joan: "...I don't know anymore."

But as Cecil stopped, Geyue also halted. She pursed her lips, pondered for a moment, and then vanished from Duke and the others' sight with a single step. She seemed to have no intention of attacking Duke and the others; upon closer inspection, the people she had attacked were Fairy and Bane—especially the latter, whose act of attacking actually saved Bane's life.

Has she really lost her mind?

Duke glanced at Joan; the blank look on her face didn't seem feigned. In other words, in her time loop, when Kagetsu attacked them out of sanity, she didn't display such dominance. Otherwise, without Cecil's support, even if they could have killed Kagetsu, the price they paid would definitely not have been just Joseph's arm.

Or is this really a second playthrough?

“At least we don’t have to try to save Natasha anymore…” he muttered to himself, then shook his head: “It’s just a pity that the fairy is dead, so we can’t get any more information from her.”

"Duke, what else do you want to know?" Duke was slightly taken aback and looked down at the fairy whose head had been chopped off by Ge Yue—she was sitting on the ground, holding her severed head in her hands, and said to Duke in this eerie way, "I will tell you everything I know."

"Damn, Durarara!!?"

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but…”

Before the fairy could finish speaking, a figure rushed towards Duke and the others again. It turned out that Ge Yue, who had already left, had turned back. Cecil reacted quickly this time, immediately conjuring holy light to instinctively protect all her companions. But Ge Yue's target was not Duke and the others, but the fairy who was holding her head in her hands.

She snatched the fairy's head in one swift motion, then turned and ran.

Fairy: "?"

She turned to give chase, but Ge Yue was faster. In the blink of an eye, she had disappeared from everyone's sight, and the headless body could only stop helplessly.

"Goodness, now he's really become Celty."

Chapter 71 I suddenly had a bold idea

The headless fairy wore a yellow cat-ear-shaped motorcycle helmet and held a writing tablet in her hand. Her clothes had changed from the previous starry dress to a tight black motorcycle suit. These were all wishes made by Duke, and no one in this other world could understand his wicked sense of humor.

She looked at the writing tablet in her hand with some resentment. Now, this was the only way she could communicate with others—if she didn't have a body, she could speak directly into the minds of Duke and the others, but now that she had a body, she couldn't use this convenient ability.

If I had known, I would have preferred to have died... No, no, no, I've finally got a physical body, I absolutely can't let go of such a good opportunity.

Damn it, this cunning human kept making wishes but didn't leave me any clues.

The little fairy's evil thoughts were churning in her heart, but she didn't show it on the surface. Instead, she kept drawing all kinds of cute emoticons on her handwriting tablet, trying to confuse people with this malicious cuteness.

"Fairy, I'm a little thirsty, could you pour my uncle a cappuccino?"

"Okay(??▽?)ノ."

Duke took the steaming cappuccino from the fairy, squinted his eyes, took a sip, and casually glanced at the others before saying as if suddenly realizing something, "Ah, aren't you thirsty? Let the fairy get you some too."

"I want orange juice."

"A glass of hot milk, please."

"Seriously, okay? We're having a crown-level witch game." Joan stared wide-eyed at Cecil and Amber, who had actually made the request, and said irritably, "Are you here for a picnic?"

"I'll just have a beer." But to her surprise, her fiancé didn't side with her this time. Joseph even asked, somewhat surprised, "Hey, Joan, don't you want any?"

It was clear that the Dream Witch had forgotten that she and Joseph had a pleasant picnic before meeting up with Duke and Amber, but she quickly remembered, after being reminded by Joseph, that she wasn't such a serious person after all.

"...Give me a beer too."

Okay.

The fairy suppressed her anger and prepared the drinks that everyone had ordered.

Duke sat down, holding his cappuccino. He slowly exhaled a breath of hot air, looking like a leisurely old man enjoying his tea. He said slowly, "Geyue's antics just now disrupted some of our plans. Let's continue with our previous topic."

The headless fairy nodded frantically.

"So here's the question: what is that big tree?" Duke pointed to the fake Tree of Life. "Since Bain and Amber both say it's not the real Tree of Life, then it's probably not the real Tree of Life, either in appearance or in essence... So what is it?"

"Wishing Tree".

The headless fairy slowly wrote these three words. Although Duke couldn't see her expression, he could tell from the words she wrote that her feelings for the tree were very complicated.

"But the wishing tree and the fairy godmother? Plus the crucial midnight hour... the story of Cinderella?"

Cinderella is the same as Cinderella.

The fairy tales that circulated extremely widely in Duke's previous life, similar fairy tales and myths that are widely circulated around the world, even in ancient China there are stories like "Ye Xian" that are considered one of the possible origins of "Cinderella". Among them, the most widely circulated are the versions written by French writer Charles Perrault and the versions written by the Brothers Grimm.

In these two versions, Cinderella's wish comes to different people. In Perrault's version, it is a fairy who helps Cinderella, while in the Grimm's Fairy Tale, the power of the miracle comes from the wishing tree on Cinderella's mother's grave.

These elements reminded Duke of the fairy tale Cinderella, but so far their experience had no connection to the story; the only relevant elements were the wish and midnight. He couldn't definitively say that this witch's game was connected to Cinderella in any way.

"So what is your relationship with the wishing tree?"

"It's a useless tree. If you want to make a wish, just make your wish to me."

The fairy wrote furiously, lamenting the sins of her fellow wishing trees. In her writing, the sins of the wishing tree were countless. It seemed to never properly grant wishes, and those who made wishes to it were destined for misfortune. Even if it occasionally helped someone fulfill their wish, it was always through some unethical means.

For example, if you wish to improve your relationship with your arguing best friend, it will pull out an M1917 American-made Smith & Wesson and hand it to you.

Of course, that's not what the fairy originally said; this is Duke's own translation.

I understand now. It's all the evil in this world.

Duke didn't believe the fairy's words at all. Of course, the wishing tree might really grant people's wishes in a twisted way, just as she said, but was this wishing fairy really so harmless? Not necessarily. For one thing, Bane was still unconscious at the moment!

Duke began to ponder.

This world has a certain degree of "wish fulfillment" and "words becoming law," and both of these ways of making wishes come true tend to work more often than good ones. For example, if Duke shouts, "I'm running super fast, meteors are going to fall from the sky!" then a meteor shower will immediately fall. But if Duke shouts, "It's raining gold coins!" then... well, a gold coin rain will activate its lock-on feature and accurately headshot them one by one.

It now seems that these two methods of making wishes might be the Wishing Fairy and the Wishing Tree, respectively. The former possesses the power to make one's words come true, while the latter directly controls the power to make one's wishes come true (Murphy's Law version). As midnight approaches, their powers will become increasingly stronger, at which point a single syllable or thought could have incredibly serious consequences.

If that's the case, what should we do to help everyone clear the game?

Duke looked at the others and suddenly had a bold idea:

Why don't we just knock everyone out and let them all remain unconscious until midnight? Wouldn't that make us safe?

……

Kagetsu held the fairy's head in her arms and walked quickly through the forest. The fairy's head was constantly insulting her, but Kagetsu's expression remained unchanged.

Seeing that this guy was stubborn and wouldn't budge, the fairy finally gave in and started to tempt him: "Is there anything you want to do? Just make a wish and I can help you."

Geyue glanced at her, but remained silent.

"I'm honest with everyone, young and old."

Ge Yue... Ge Yue suddenly stopped, slammed the head in her arms to the ground, stomped on it twice, picked it up again, and continued forward.

"You...you fucking bastard!"

The fairy's head finally snapped.

Chapter 72 Operation Split "Heads" 3/10

Having Geyue look after the fairy's head is a pretty good idea.

The Wishing Fairy's power only works when someone speaks, but Kazuki is a typical emotionless girl, so as long as she doesn't speak, the Wishing Fairy can't use her words to do anything.

She grabbed the fairy's head and traversed through the forest of Saint Ipugil. Soon, she rushed out of the forest and arrived at a world made of lava and fire. She was extremely familiar with this place. This world was created based on her memories. This hellish world was not from the main world... It was taken from a certain layer of the bottomless hell.

It is also Natasha's hometown.

Soon, Ge Yue stopped in her tracks, casually tossed the head she was holding onto the ground, and uttered her first words of the day:

"Natasha!"

"Are you back, Kazuki?"

Hearing Kagetsu's call, the succubus witch immediately appeared. Natasha didn't come to Kagetsu's side, but stayed at a distance, communicating with Kagetsu by shouting at the top of her lungs.