"Indeed, I need to take this opportunity to look for it,"
Xia Liang nodded lightly, suddenly turned her face toward Lin Xiaolu beside her, slightly opened her mouth with a nearly imperceptible motion, silently conveying something. Then, as if nothing had happened, she took the hands of the other two girls: "Okay, then we won't bother these two sisters anymore. I'll take you guys somewhere else to have fun."
After saying that, she led the girls away, disappearing from Jiang Yuan's sight, leaving Lin Xiaolu all alone there.
"...So what's this all about?"
Once Xia Liang was gone, Jiang Yuan turned to Lin Xiaolu with a somewhat puzzled look: "Seeing so many of you come over with such determination, I thought you were all together. Did you just happen to be on the same path?"
"Ah... yes, that's right."
It probably took her half a day to come to terms with the fake back story Xia Liang had concocted, and Lin Xiaolu's bewildered expression was tinged with annoyance, as if she had swallowed a fly. But she still nodded and said: "I ran into Xia Liang on the road, and she... just had to talk to me, so she stubbornly followed along."
"Haha, that's so her style."
Because the "strangers" were gone, Jiang Yuan's tone also became more lively: "So those two really are her relatives? Why is there a foreigner among them? Is she some kind of cousin?"
Lin Xiaolu replied, somewhat displeased: "Anyway, it's none of our business, right?"
"That's true, we might as well hurry to check our tickets. If we wait any longer, our spots might get taken."
Jiang Yuan pointed toward the entrance of the venue but before moving, she glanced in the direction where Xia Liang and the girls had left, her voice tinged with emotion: "But, blue hair... it looks really beautiful, shining and glittering, just like a magical girl. Is that girl from a foreign land?"
"...Are you interested?" For some reason, Lin Xiaolu's tone sounded a bit odd when she uttered those words.
"Interested is a strong word, it's more like a simple appreciation of beauty."
Jiang Yuan grabbed her own hair and shook it in front of her eyes: "Do you think I should dye my hair too? The effect of colored hair seems pretty good in real life."
"Just interested in the hair... I see."
Lin Xiaolu also glanced in the direction Xia Liang had left, briefly clenched her fist, but ultimately let go, sighing in slight resignation: "Come on, let's go check our tickets."
"Are you feeling down?"
"What's wrong all of a sudden? You seemed pretty happy when you just arrived."
"Your friends are planning to go play together, but they've kicked you aside... Forget it, that comparison isn't quite right, just pretend I didn't say anything."
"Forget I said anything, let's go, let's go." Waving toward the entrance, Lin Xiaolu clearly didn't want to continue the topic and started walking toward the venue not far away.
This brief interlude obviously wasn't going to occupy much of Jiang Yuan's attention. Since Lin Xiaolu didn't want to continue the conversation, she didn't bother to pursue it further. Thus, she easily cast the matter aside, immersing herself in the excitement of the concert by Emerald Sparrow.
Therefore, she was never meant to know how Xia Liang and those two girls, the three "fans", actually got here.
In fact, up until several days ago, right on the night Lin Xiaolu confessed she was going to the concert to Emerald Sparrow, these three had no intention of coming to the venue.
It was only after Lin Xiaolu mentioned the name "Asou Haruka" that Emerald Sparrow's usually placid heart stirred with tumult.
Because that name wasn't just any ordinary Dongying State name, but rather one she was incredibly familiar with, perhaps the most familiar name of anyone from Dongying State.
It was the name of the magical girl code-named "Margaret," one of the original quartet of the Fangting City team twenty years ago.
Asou Haruka, or Margaret, initially appeared in the lives of Lin Yun and An Ya as a transfer student.
This transfer student from Dongying State, because of her fluent Donghua State language from the start, quickly became popular among her classmates and swiftly established good relations with her peers at the time. Combined with her outstanding appearance, she soon won considerable admiration from both male and female students.
At the time, Lin Yun, still a middle school student and preoccupied with significant changes in his life, was indifferent to academia and didn't care much about school affairs. Even though the transfer student sat right behind him, he didn't remember her name.
This resulted in him maintaining an unusual silence throughout their after-school cleaning duty because he couldn't recall her name, even though she sat next to him.
This abnormal silence continued over several cleaning duties, eventually catching her attention, and it was actually Asou Haruka who took the initiative to talk to him, leading to minimal interaction between the two.
If that was all there was to it, then their relationship would have been nothing more than that of typical male and female classmates, perhaps with no further intersection in their lives beyond this cleaning duty experience. However, matters took a fortuitous turn several days later when Lin Yun, transformed into a magical girl, encountered a Remnant Beast that he struggled to handle on his own, and An Ya wasn't present at the time, leaving him to fight a tough battle alone.
It was at that moment that a magical girl, like a comet adorned with orange light, burst onto the battlefield.
This magical girl seemed to have more mature battle experience. After she joined the fray, the pressure of the fight dropped significantly, allowing Lin Yun to turn the tables and defeat the Remnant Beast along with this new ally.