A Guide to Humanity’s Extinction

Three minutes ago, while Team Blue Pigeon and the Black Magician engaged in a battle royale.

The location was still Lijing Port No. 3, in the container terminal.

"A pleasure to meet you... Miss Ember."

A figure wrapped entirely in pitch-black bandages hung upside down beneath the steel frame of a crane. He raised his eyes, gazing faintly into the clear, aurora eyes of the magical girl, Ember.

"Get out of my way."

Ember lowered her face slightly, staring deep into him as she spoke, her cold voice emphasizing every single word.

The moment her voice fell, she drew her blade from beneath Cinderella. With her skirt billowing, she shot forward like a blooming rose.

She remained unsure of her opponent's exact abilities, so she did not recklessly close the distance.

Instead, the moment she drew near, she swung her blade through the empty air, sending a violent curtain of mana sweeping toward Bandage Man!

Ember's skirt brushed past the rusted steel frame as she pointed the tip of her umbrella straight at Bandage Man.

Bang! Carrying a streak of black and blue magical light, a bullet burst from the chamber.

Seeing this, Bandage Man quickly released his grip. With a backflip, he narrowly evaded the Magic Bullet, landing atop one of the shipping containers.

"That was close, so close."

Bandage Man muttered, looking up from the container to gaze at the magical girl. A wisp of white smoke still rose from the tip of Ember's umbrella.

The girl's gaze, however, bypassed Bandage Man, looking toward Team Blue Pigeon in the distance as they were chased by the Black Magician.

"Brother..."

She murmured softly, her trembling right hand unconsciously tightening around the umbrella handle. The girl's pitch-black skirt surged like the tide, and blue-black mana spilled out uncontrollably, rippling through the air.

"It's like this, Miss Ember. Even though I might look a little strange, I'm actually a good guy," Bandage Man rambled. "I like reading comics. When I have free time, I give kids hardcover comic books. I even bought the complete set of the Magical Girl Chronicles... Oh, right, if you have time, maybe I could ask you for an autograph."

He paused.

"As for where to sign... uh, how about on your corpse? It's fine. After I kill you, I'll use my bandages to control your hand and sign it for you using your own blood."

"I will say this one last time... step aside."

Ember lowered her head, her hair obscuring her eyes.

Almost all her attention was focused on Blue Pigeon, yet she was forced to deal with this freak. The split focus made her exceptionally irritable and anxious, as if she were being torn in half.

"And what if I don't, miss?" Bandage Man shrugged.

Ember stopped talking.

Suddenly, she raised Cinderella, aimed the tip at Bandage Man's head, and pulled the trigger. Bang! A faint mana ripple spread from the muzzle, and a magic missile burst from the chamber.

Watching the incoming bullet, Bandage Man spread the black bandages behind him like a bizarre black peacock fanning its tail.

In an instant, the bandages swallowed the bullet like a torrent, then poured toward Ember as if intending to devour her slender figure.

Ember furrowed her brow slightly. Retreating, she drew her blade and delivered a horizontal slash, swinging out a cold, sharp arc of light shaped like a full moon.

The bandages were completely sliced apart. Then, the gothic-skirted girl tightened her grip on the handle, raised the umbrella, and unreservedly poured her mana into Cinderella's tip.

Boom!!!

In a flash, a pitch-black magic beam shot out from the tip of the umbrella. It was magnificent, its deep black and blue hue almost dyeing the moonlight the exact same color.

Facing a magic beam capable of shattering a high-rise building, Bandage Man's body suddenly disassembled. Beneath the bandages was absolute nothingness.

Ember was slightly taken aback. "What?"

She watched as the torn bandages fluttered in all directions, evading the oncoming beam.

A moment later, just as the magical girl was looking around, those bandages reassembled into a human shape behind her.

The man opened his venomous, snake-like eyes and swung a wave of black bandages, sweeping forward like splashed ink to strike her back.

"Endless."

Ember spoke coldly without turning her head. She stomped on the empty air, and a ripple of mana immediately swept backward, deflecting the majority of the bandages.

The girl abruptly turned around, raising her blade to block the final bandage.

...

...

Over a hundred meters away, on the other side of the container terminal.

Guchen rode a phantom steed, galloping close to the ground. Leaning forward slightly on the horse's back, he pressed down the brim of his hat with one hand, raised a silver revolver with the other, and pulled the trigger in Little Red Riding Hood's direction.

The silvery-white bullet pierced the air, tearing upward and carrying a dazzling stream of light like a meteor.

Little Red Riding Hood reacted with godly speed, riding her Christmas Sleigh to constantly dodge the bullets. Two reindeer brayed vigorously, and the sudden snowfall almost dyed the containers along their path completely white.

One high and one low, the two of them flew among the shipping containers, staging a deadly pursuit.

"Miss, we truly are fated. It's just that one of us rides a horse, and the other rides deer," Guchen said as he chased her.

"A middle-aged man's pick-up lines are still way too early for the brilliant and cute Little Red Riding Hood. Even if I were a little girl from the countryside who grew up eating garbage, I wouldn't be interested in you." Little Red Riding Hood remained expressionless as she spoke, summoning her Magic Card binder.

The girl's blonde hair fluttered. Raising her fair right hand, she drew the Magic Card 'Fireball Rain' from the binder and crushed it. With a sharp crack, the card shattered.

Immediately after, a torrential downpour of fireballs rained down.

"Is that so? What a pity." Guchen smiled faintly. Riding his flaming steed, he transformed into a black phantom and sprinted forward, evading the storm of fireballs falling from the sky.

But right at that moment, he felt a sudden chill above his head and looked up.

He saw that Little Red Riding Hood had stopped fleeing. Instead, she lowered her blue eyes from the sleigh, looking down at him from above.

Suddenly, the two reindeer pulling the sleigh began to trot in place.

With every step the reindeer took against the empty sky, they accumulated a terrifying storm of wind and snow. After repeating this for a moment, the storm grew stronger—or rather, the sleigh itself had transformed into a blizzard.

"Little Red Riding Hood's grand fortune has arrived," the girl said calmly.

In a flash, she descended from the sky on her sleigh, plummeting straight down like an avalanche of snow.

In the next second, however, Guchen whistled.

The old man fired several shots overhead, canceling out the force of her impact. He then loaded a special red bullet into the chamber, covered his left ear, and pulled the trigger upward once again.

Bang! The red bullet shot out of the barrel.

The casing shattered, and flames swept upward like fiery snakes, dissolving a portion of the blizzard that shrouded the reindeer and the sleigh.

The very next moment, Guchen pulled back the corners of his mouth into a grin and fiercely yanked up the head of his phantom horse. The horse kicked off the ground and charged straight up, crashing into the sleigh and whipping up a howling gale.

...

...

While the two were locked in a stalemate, in another corner of the container terminal, Death Crow's Sorakagehime and Sakurahime were also locked in a white-hot struggle.

"So annoying..."

Hovering in mid-air, the magical girl Sakurahime, dressed in a pure white miko outfit, raised her brow slightly, observing the scene below with curiosity.

Sorakagehime continuously emerged from the surfaces of the containers, sometimes from the shadows of the steel frames, and other times from the shadows cast onto the containers by the cranes.

The girl in the black kimono wielded a silver blade that gleamed like moonlight, ricocheting and crisscrossing back and forth among the massive containers and cranes.

Sakurahime's speed couldn't match her opponent's, so she was forced to maintain a defensive stance. Waving her folding fan, she swept out flurries of falling cherry blossoms. The petals spun and morphed into the shape of blades, clashing with Sorakagehime's silver sword.

Sorakagehime was sent bouncing backward.

She stomped down on the top of a container, crushing a spiderweb-shaped crater into it. Bending her knees slightly, she gathered her strength once again and shot toward Sakurahime in mid-air like a cannonball.

Sorakagehime swung her long blade, its length wrapped in a tide-like layer of shadows.

Every swing of her sword resembled splashing ink, while Sakurahime seemed to condense the endlessly drifting cherry blossoms into sharp blades.

In just a few short seconds, the two exchanged dozens of blows in mid-air. Their figures were invisible; only pitch-black shadows and crimson, falling cherry blossoms could be seen drifting about.

For a time, the six people in the container terminal actually fought to a draw.

If this stalemate continued, it would be hard to determine a victor within ten minutes. The situation would only degenerate into a sheer contest of stamina—garbage time.

However, right at this moment, two brand new figures arrived at the port's container terminal.

One of them wore a red pirate outfit and a pitch-black eyepatch over her left eye. The other wore a black hoodie, the top of its hood featuring two protrusions like cat ears.

It was none other than Captain Red and Heimeng, who had just finished off Team Diamond Man and come to provide support.

"I'm amazed they can fight for this long," Heimeng said mildly.

"The opponents over here seem to be a bit tougher." Captain Red stretched her back.

The next moment, waves upon waves of pirate phantoms suddenly appeared behind her.

"Get to work, grunts," the red-haired girl said, resting one hand on her hip.

With the arrival of these two, the balance of combat power between both sides completely shattered.

Little Red Riding Hood had been intently facing off against Guchen, but as she suddenly turned her head, she saw a massive pirate ship.

The ship slowly rose into the night sky. Immediately following that, its naval cannons took aim at her in unison.

With a boom, the cannonballs blasted forth. They detonated in a flash, forming a barrage of artillery fire that blanketed a full hundred meters, burning the shipping containers along their path to ashes.

Little Red Riding Hood was knocked off her sleigh, blasted a hundred meters away. She smashed into the top of one of the containers, cratering it into a deep, spiderweb-like pit.

The blonde girl's body sank into the crater and slowly ceased moving.

The moment he saw the phantom ship, Guchen immediately reined in his phantom horse and galloped in the opposite direction without looking back. Only because of this did he avoid being caught in the sea of fire.

Now, the man slightly lowered his hat brim, looking up at the red-haired girl standing atop the container, bathed in moonlight. He couldn't help but exhale, complaining with a wry smile:

"Could you not be so reckless? Sister Scarlett, my fragile little heart can't handle it."

"Is that so?" Captain Red's lips curled up as she looked down at him. "I thought you cowboys loved a little thrill."

"I'm old now, not as tough as I used to be."

Guchen shook his head, pulled a bottle of red wine from the carriage, and began gulping it down.

...

...

On the other side of the port, the duel between Sakurahime and Sorakagehime was also drawing to a close.

"I've finally caught you. Ninjas really are a pain." Sakurahime transformed her folding fan into a long blade. Wrapped in thousands of falling cherry blossoms, she descended from the sky and slashed at Sorakagehime.

But at that moment, her opponent's figure rippled outward like water. The cherry blossoms and the gleam of the blade slipped right through it, as if slicing through thin air.

"What?"

Sakurahime froze for a second.

[Prompt: Your Attack Miss.]

The instant the electronic prompt triggered a Pop-up before Sakurahime's eyes, Sorakagehime seized the opportunity, piercing her blade straight through Sakurahime's abdomen. She then unleashed a kick that sent her flying dozens of meters away.

Sakurahime collapsed against the side of a shipping container, her body dragging across the ground and kicking up a cloud of dust. Her pure white miko outfit was stained with a layer of blood.

"You're welcome." Heimeng walked out of the shadows, toying with a handheld game console.

"Mind your own business." Sorakagehime flicked the blood drops off her blade.

"I know that you knew I was here, which is why you intentionally left an opening for her," Heimeng said. "It's rare for you to coordinate with others. That's a good thing."

Suddenly, a deafening sound of piercing the air came from the distance.

Sorakagehime raised her slender, elegant brows. Holding her scabbard, she and Heimeng looked over at the same time.

The two looked toward the final battlefield in the container terminal, where the outcome was still undecided.

At that moment, a magic beam shattered the canopy of the sky, dispersing patches of scale-like clouds. As the cloud layer receded, a streak of moonlight spilled down from a hole in the sky that was as clear and round as a lake.

"Is it still not resolved over there?" Sorakagehime sheathed her blade and asked expressionlessly.

"I don't know." Heimeng shook her head. "But I just hope they end it quickly. Otherwise, if one or two witches actually spawn, it'll be a massive headache."

Not far away, the magical girl Ember stood tall atop a massive shipping container.

She raised a hand to cover the wound on her shoulder. Her gothic skirt was torn in multiple places, exposing a mixture of bloody wounds and snow-white skin to the moonlight.

She looked up, and all she could see was a densely packed horde of pirates rolling in like a tide.

The girl shifted her gaze and turned her head—still pirates. Endless pirates. Their shadowy figures emerged one after another, endlessly pouring forth as they spat curses or belted out pirate shanties.

For a time, hoarse shouts and high-pitched singing drowned out the entire container terminal.

Bandage Man's figure had vanished. It was as if he were hiding among the crowd of pirates, biding his time, waiting for the perfect moment to end the battle.

Ember's nerves grew even more taut; she didn't dare to relax in the slightest.

Yet, amidst the utter quiet in her mind, a thought suddenly surfaced—a thought that made her nerves tremble:

'What about my brother? He's still waiting for me to save him. I can't waste any more time here.'

The moment this thought struck, a wisp of faint blue flame flickered past the corner of Ember's eyes. The flame gradually rose, transforming into a radiant blazing fire.

The gothic-skirted girl lowered her head and slightly raised her hand.

As if ignoring the knife-twisting pain in her shoulder, she lashed out with several continuous slashes at the figures converging around her, moving at an unimaginable speed.

At that moment, blue-black mana erupted like a tsunami.

The girl's expression was cold, her skirt and the gleam of her blade swaying like chaotic blossoms.

Beneath her magnificent posture, the pirates' figures immediately shattered under a curtain of mana, bursting into a splatter of blood.

Then she leaped, sliding to the edge of the container. Her body tumbled toward the port's ground like a falling leaf, her feet landing steadily on the earth.

Yet no matter where she fled, as long as she looked up, she would see a group of pirates brandishing scimitars, surrounding her. Every time she executed an Obliteration on a pirate phantom, another phantom would immediately take its place.

The girl turned her clear, cold face and looked at the massive pirate ship in the distant night sky. She finally understood the source of these pirates. That ship was like a factory.

If she didn't destroy the factory, the pirates would just keep spawning off the assembly line.

"Brother, hold on just a little longer... I'll come find you right away."

Ember's eyes shifted, her voice hoarse as she murmured. All the while, she slaughtered the pursuing pirates with her katana, sprinting toward the edge of the container terminal.

After a while, the girl knew that continuing like this was not a solution.

So, she violently raised her umbrella, firing three magic beams in three different directions in rapid succession. The blasts crushed the densely packed horde of figures into nothing but phantoms.

The path ahead was now completely empty; she had carved out a route for herself.

But right at this instant, Ember failed to notice that right above her head, the freak completely wrapped in bandages had revealed his figure.

Bandage Man had been hiding for a long time, as if melted into the night itself. Finding the moment she finally let her guard down, a bandage shot out from his palm, entangling the girl's wrist.

Ember froze. She abruptly raised her katana with her other hand.

But in this exact moment, in the distance, a cowboy sitting on horseback suddenly raised his revolver, aimed the muzzle at her, and pulled the trigger.

Bang!!!

The gunshot was deafening.

The silvery-white bullet transformed into a silver meteor, piercing through the air toward her.

Ember tilted her head slightly the moment she heard the gunshot, but it was already too late. Her right hand, still gripping the umbrella, was numb from the backlash of firing continuous magic beams, let alone capable of breaking free from the bandage's restraint.

Trying to block that bullet was pure nonsense.

The bullet was as magnificent as a cluster of stars, illuminating her pitch-black eyes. It was as if she were looking at the arctic sky; her mind instantly emptied.

'Am I... going to die?'

Time seemed to freeze at this moment. Ember's thoughts flashed by like a spinning lantern, cloaking her world in absolute silence.

'Did my stupid brother manage to get away? Is he safe...? I still have so many things I want to say to him.'

'When I left home this morning, if only I had greeted him properly... if I had known, I wouldn't have kept fighting with him all the time.'

Thinking of this, the girl's eyes suddenly dimmed. 'I'm so stupid,' she thought.

However, in that very instant, a deafening sound abruptly erupted from not far away.

—It was the roar of lightning.

Rumble!!

The crash of lightning shattered the absolute silence enveloping the port, drawing Ember's attention with it.

She couldn't see clearly, nor did she have time to see exactly what had happened. But in the final second before the bullet was about to hit her, she saw it...

—A bolt of deep blue lightning streaking violently toward her.

Amidst the blood spraying like a fountain, the teenage boy slowly collapsed to the ground like a puppet with cut strings. He had shoved Ember out of the way in a split second, using his own body to take Guchen's bullet head-on.

In the distance, Guchen raised a brow, watching this scene from beneath the brim of his cowboy hat as he blew the white smoke from his muzzle.

The gothic-skirted girl had been pushed far away, the bandage around her wrist completely shredded by the gale of the passing bullet.

She froze in shock. Only after a long moment did she slowly turn her head back, staring blankly at the blue electric arcs still lingering in the air.

In the girl's eyes, those wisps of electricity grew fainter and fainter, until finally they flickered and dissipated like dying fireflies.

It wasn't until this moment that Ember snapped out of her daze. "No... it's not you, right?"

As if unwilling to admit the reality of what she was seeing, it took a long time before Ember finally lowered her eyes. At this moment, she got a clear look at the figure slumped on the ground.

The person lay in a horrifying pool of blood, the metal armor he wore cracked open, revealing a ghastly, bloody hole in his back.

Before rushing here, during his clash with the Black Magician, Blue Pigeon's mask had already cracked in one corner.

So at this moment, through the shattered mask, Ember caught a glimpse of the boy's bloodstained lips and the gruesome gash torn across his cheek.

The world fell into absolute silence, and the girl's pupils contracted.

"...Bro...ther?"

After a long pause, the girl's lips parted. She murmured in a trembling voice, the blue flames at the corners of her eyes flickering unsteadily.

...

...

Meanwhile, behind one of the shipping containers in the distance.

A naked teenage boy stood with his head lowered, staring at his fingertips. His face slowly morphed into a bizarre visage—a split mouth, hollow eye sockets. At the same time, his skin was gradually dyed a ghastly, pure white.

"It's about time for Lord White Jack to make his grand entrance. Hmm... this should be the feeling."

The eccentric figure pulled the corners of his mouth into a grin, muttering to himself.

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