Chapter 196 Communication
Kissing the back of the hand is an ancient etiquette, whether in the material world or the magical kingdom.
This etiquette, known as "kissing hands" in the material world, is often used in very formal occasions, and is either used to express respect to a respected lady or for subordinates to show loyalty to those in higher positions. However, with the changes of the times, the material world as a whole has become more technological, and such etiquette has faded away in people's lives over time.
Today, the hand-kissing gift mostly appears in various film and television and literary works, and has become a very romantic behavior. Therefore, in the perception of young people, it is a relatively intimate and romantic practice. Regardless of what Aso Yuanxiang herself thought about using this kind of etiquette to greet people, at least the young magical girls from Fangting City and Baian City were all excited and exclaimed in high and low pitches at the same time.
And if the people in Bai'an City were simply gossiping, the people in Fangting City, especially Lin Xiaolu, looked at Aso Yuanxiang as if they wanted to eat her. He rushed out in almost two steps and asked seriously, "What are you doing?"
"It's just a friendly greeting, Xiaolu." This was Aso Yuanxiang's answer at the time.
"To show intimacy, you can just shake hands or hug. How can you do this... like you..."
Lin Xiaolu hesitated for a long time and couldn't figure out how to summarize the other party's behavior. After she gradually digested the other party's words, she soon discovered another question: "Wait, why do you know my name?"
"I used to be the magical girl of this city, and naturally I am also a friend of your mother."
Aso Yuanxiang remained calm, glanced at the jadeite beside her, and after seeing that she had no reaction, she said quite calmly: "Although you may not remember it, I even held you in my arms not long after you were born."
"Huh? With my own hands? What?" This statement, which was almost like directly declaring "I am your elder", immediately suppressed Lin Xiaolu's momentum. Although she was still quite dissatisfied, the confidence in her words suddenly weakened. "Are you lying? How come I don't know..."
"You can confirm with Delphinium, or go back and ask your father."
With a gentle smile, Aso Yuanxiang looked at Lin Xiaolu with interest: "Although neither they nor your mother have ever mentioned me to you, we had a very good relationship back then. Even the name 'Xiaolu' was decided under my witness."
Lin Xiaolu opened her mouth speechlessly. What the other party said sounded true, but she still couldn't believe it. She could only look at Delphinium beside her.
Delphinium, who had been silent for a moment because of the abrupt hand kiss, came back to her senses at this moment. She first looked at Aso Yuanxiang with a complicated expression, then sighed, looked at her daughter, and nodded: "Yes, except Hong Siyu, when you were born, the magical girls of Fangting City and your mother's teammates were actually all there. From this perspective, you are a child who has been watched since birth."
"Just look." Aso Yuanxiang smiled and spread her hands.
"Well... since Delphinium has admitted it, then... let's just take it as the truth."
Reluctantly accepting the fact that she had suddenly been called a few more "aunties", Lin Xiaolu pursed her lips and nodded, but soon continued with a glare: "But then, what did you mean by kissing Kuiqi's hand? In such public!"
"There's nothing wrong with kissing hands between adults."
Aso Yuanxiang continued gently: "It's just a kiss on the hand, not a kiss on the mouth, but you kids should not imitate it casually."
As soon as the word "kiss" came out, Xia Liang, Bai Jingxuan, and the blonde girl's eyes lit up with interest in the gossip, while Lin Xiaolu's ears became hot and she couldn't help but point at the other party: "How can you say such a word here? You are just being a hooligan!"
When Aso Yuanxiang heard this, she stood there in silence at first. After staring at Lin Xiaolu for a while, she suddenly couldn't help laughing and burst out laughing.
“Hahaha, this is so funny!”
She exclaimed a little loudly, then bent down slightly and whispered in Kuei-Chi's ear, "Your daughter is so cute. Did you really not teach her anything before?"
"Is it weird? She's only 14."
Delphinium glared at her and said, "Don't teach her anything nonsense. Be serious."
"Okay, I know my limits."
Waving her hands to show that she knew, and ignoring Lin Xiaolu's dissatisfied snort, Aso Yuanxiang stood up, walked straight to Lin Xiaolu, and then extended her hand to her gracefully, "I'm sorry, if my words made you feel uncomfortable, then I take it back. I hope you can accept my apology, Xiaolu."
"I just saw that my teammates' children have grown so big, so I couldn't help but want to tease you a little. I hope you don't mind."
Seeing that Lin Xiaolu not only had no intention of shaking hands with her, but instead shrank back a little warily, Aso Yuanxiang's smile became even wider, and then she withdrew her hand without feeling embarrassed at all: "Anyway, I hope we can get along well for the next period of time."
"What's next?" Xia Liang, who had been watching the show, keenly caught the key words in her words and repeated them immediately.
"Yes, next, we may stay in Fangting City for a while."
Aso Yuanxiang nodded and said, "Let me introduce myself to you all again. I am the captain of the Magical Girl Team of Baian City, the alternate inspector of the Investigation Institute, and the Magical Girl Margaret. Because Fangting City is suspected to have become a high-frequency activity area for Claw Scar and Black Dawn recently, the security situation is poor. After consultation with the director of the Investigation Institute, we will temporarily station in Fangting City to provide military support."
"At the same time, considering that the new year's qualification certification exam will be held in less than half a year, the new magical girl of our Baian City team also came to Fangting City to apply for cross-city learning exchanges."
"Learning... communication?"
Sensing something from the other party's words, Lin Xiaolu raised her head slightly, first looking at Aso Yuanxiang, and then looked at the magical girls from Baian City beside her with some confusion.
There was no doubt that the Baian City team was also looking at her, or rather, at the girls from Fangting City.
——"As the instructor said, the purpose of our coming to Fangting City is to learn and communicate."
The girl codenamed Bai Ji took a step forward, took over Aso Yuanxiang's words, and continued: "In other words, we are here to help, but also to challenge. According to the instructor's expectations, she wants to see what kind of strength the magical girls in Fangting City have now, and she also hopes that we can use this to verify the results of our learning. Confirm whether we can achieve the goal of surpassing the new magical girl in the place where she was born."
"Kick the door..."
Lin Xiaolu blinked, gradually came to her senses, and realized what the other party was saying: "What are you talking about studying? Aren't you here to fight with us?"
“Hehe, are you scared?” The blonde girl standing slightly behind laughed, “I saw it before. You can’t even beat a remnant of the Snake Rank Beast?”
"What do you mean I can't even beat a caterpillar? It was obviously you who took my head by force!" Lin Xiaolu was immediately unhappy.
"Why are you grabbing the kill? I didn't even get the echo, right?"
"Isn't that because you were covered in the slime of the remaining beast and ran away without even having time to take it off?"
"I told you not to mention this again!"
When Lin Xiaolu mentioned the matter of the residual beast slime, the blonde girl immediately covered her mouth with a sullen look on her face: "You, are you deliberately provoking me?"
"Hehe, it's not certain who provokes whom first!" Lin Xiaolu retorted with her hands on her hips.
Seeing that the two were about to quarrel before they had even said a few words, Xia Liang quickly acted as a peacemaker and pulled Lin Xiaolu back. At the same time, he turned his head and looked at Bai Ji: "Anyway, you guys are here to communicate with us... or to exchange ideas, right?"
"This is what the mentor meant."
Bai Ji nodded: "Of course, it's just a competition of strength. We don't have any hostility. Mu Baihe just said something a little harsh, but she has no intention of making things difficult for you."
"Who is Mu Lily?" Xia Liang looked at the blonde girl and the taciturn girl behind her.
"It's me. It's me."
After staring at each other with Lin Xiaolu, the blonde girl crossed her arms and said proudly, "My code name is Mu Baihe. Although I don't know your strength yet, I am somewhat disappointed that the guy over there couldn't beat the Suojie, but since you were taught by the inspector, don't make me feel helpless... cough cough!"
She spoke in a rather flamboyant tone, but before she could finish, Aso Yuanxiang patted her on the back.
Almost suffocated by the slap, the girl codenamed Mu Lily coughed several times in succession, looked at the other party with a somewhat aggrieved look, and reluctantly spoke again, "I hope you can let me see the strength of Fangting City... Anyway, please give me more advice."
After she finished speaking, she turned her gaze to the taciturn girl next to her.
The girl, who had not said more than five words since they met, shrugged her shoulders when she was looked at. She lowered her head, letting her bangs cover her eyes, and said in an extremely small voice: "...I am Mimosa."
Then, he couldn't help but take a few steps back, with half of his body hiding behind Bai Ji.
"...The name suits the person." Seeing this, Xia Liang commented.
"Indeed, the name suits the person." Mu Baihe on the side also nodded seriously.
After the magical girls from Baian City introduced their code names, the girls from Fangting City also told each other their code names, just as a way of getting to know each other. Then, Bai Ji turned around and looked at Aso Yuanxiang beside him, indicating that he had finished what he was saying.
"——Very good, White Thistle. That's pretty much what I wanted to say before."
Aso Yuanxiang nodded, her eyes swept across the newcomers present, and finally looked at Delphinium again: "What do you think of my suggestion?"
"Let's learn from each other..."
Narrowing her eyes slightly, Delphinium did not give an answer immediately, but this was not because she had any concerns, but because she was still weighing and judging.
After hearing the word "learning and exchange", she already knew what the other party was up to, so she first estimated the strength of the magical girls in Baian City in her impression, and then looked at Lin Xiaolu and the others, secretly comparing the strength gap between them.
After comparing them, based on her previous impressions, she had to come to a slightly pessimistic conclusion - she might not be able to win.
She knew very well the strength of the girls in her team: when Lin Xiaolu didn't use the strange white magic, she could probably only defeat a remnant of the Caterpillar stage on her own; Xia Liang made faster progress and had already been promoted to the Leaf stage, but she hadn't even started learning the techniques yet, so she was basically only slightly stronger than the Bud stage; Bai Jingxuan's strength was improving rapidly, and she was even able to defeat the Pupa stage on her own when she revealed the remnant beast magic... but to be honest, it was completely impossible for her to use this power in competition.
In other words, whether it is Lin Xiaolu, Xia Liang, or Bai Jingxuan, under normal circumstances, they are only at the bud level, or slightly stronger than the bud level.
And what about the three magical girls in Baian City? First up is White Thistle, which is undoubtedly a leaf-level. This was something that Delphinium had confirmed during her stay in Baian City, as Baiji had used the technique more than once and had apparently acquired considerable proficiency in it.
The second is Mu Baili. Regardless of whether this child has reached the leaf level or not, at least she has a very strong talent in magic perception. In terms of perception range alone, she can even be compared to myself at that time in Baian City.
Finally, there is Mimosa. Although she has never shown any strength from beginning to end, and has even been vaguely under the protection of White Thistle, both the magic power she occasionally displayed and Aso Yuuka's attitude show that things are not that simple.
Although it sounds pessimistic, if a competition really started on the spot now, the Fangting City team's chance of winning would not be higher than 20% - this 20% chance is assuming that Lin Xiaolu and Bai Jingxuan can both perform exceptionally well, otherwise Xia Liang alone will not be able to handle it.
Is it necessary to agree to a competition that is bound to be lost at this stage? Will this inspire children's competitive spirit or dampen their enthusiasm?
This is what Delphinium needs to weigh.
However, before she could come up with a specific conclusion, Aso Yuanxiang, who was not far away, spoke again.
"Oh, by the way, Delphinium, there's actually no point in just sparring. I have another proposal."
She clapped her hands as if she suddenly remembered something, then looked at Delphinium, the smile on her face faded slightly, and she became much more serious without knowing when: - "If you lose this competition, I hope that the Fangting City team will not participate in this year's qualification certification exam."
I have delayed it for several more days and I would like to continue to apologize to you all. Next time, I will never make promises in advance about things that I cannot do. I feel like I am lying and I feel very guilty. Next time I will honestly admit that I can’t write it. I’m sorry.
(End of this chapter)
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