Though rumors flew thick and fast, a few people did some investigating and found out that Violet was just a country girl who had recently arrived in the city with a large sum of money from some unknown source. (Which was, in a way, spot on.)
A gorgeous young beauty, rather naive, and filthy rich.
With these traits combined, certain factions began plotting behind the scenes.
What? You ask where Zhurong got the money to buy so many clothes?
Naturally, from the wartime currency of the Southern United Front looted from Leidenschaftlich soldiers. He simply recycled the banknotes back into the system and repurchased them. After all, they were just paper; a note with a face value of 1 cost 1 point, and a face value of 100 also cost 1 point. (One dollar had a purchasing power roughly equivalent to 9 yuan, similar to the current purchasing power of the euro.)
Moreover, none of these bills purchased from the system had consecutive serial numbers, with every single number differing significantly.
Living off a bit of cash would suffice; it wouldn't cause any ripples in the economy.
"A brightly lit night... so beautiful..."
Sitting by the window, Violet murmured to herself as she looked out at the city.
This was the best hotel in the entire city, and furthermore, the most expensive high-rise view room in this hotel.
After gazing out for a while, Violet began to feel a bit bored and opened the grimoire left behind by Zhurong.
Chapter 1: How to Channel Mana.
Well... she understood the words, but didn't quite understand the meaning.
"Feel the mana contained in the air, and then guide it into your body?"
Puzzled, Violet waved her hands through the air a few times, attempting to feel the mana. (Physically.)
"Feel the mana with your heart... um... how is one supposed to feel mana with their heart..."
Violet closed her eyes and began trying to sense if there was anything there.
*Huh? What is this...*
Countless glowing blue currents of water now appeared within Violet's field of vision, some thick and some thin, flowing in all directions.
*Is this mana?*
Violet reached out and touched one of the currents.
*Are these mana currents supposed to be guided into the body?*
Not understanding how to draw them into her body, Violet could only rely on her own interpretation and tried to drink this glowing blue current of water.
Before she could even bring her mouth close, that current suddenly split off a tributary and swiftly enveloped Violet!
*Ngh! Can't br... huh?*
Enveloped by the large mass of glowing blue liquid, Violet found that her breathing and movement were completely unaffected; these liquids seemed as though they didn't exist at all.
*Breathing isn't hampered at all... what a bizarre sensation.*
She gently opened her eyes and found that the blue liquid was still present within her field of vision.
"Is this mana?"
Violet felt that her own strength had increased, probably enough to take on two of her previous self.
She flipped to Chapter 2: Igniting Fire.
"Gather mana at your fingertips, and visualize the image of a flame..."
"Whoosh."
An egg-sized, pale blue flame appeared on Violet's fingertip.
"Is this igniting fire?"
She gently brought her other hand close to the flame, yet felt no temperature whatsoever.
Even when she thrust her hand straight into the flame, she felt nothing at all.
"How amazing."
To test the flame, Violet had no choice but to burn a hotel handkerchief to see.
The handkerchief began to show scorch marks when it was still two centimeters away from the blue flame, caught fire at one centimeter, and the part that touched the flame was instantly reduced to ash.
In just over three seconds, the handkerchief turned into a puddle of cinders.
(Handkerchief: I thank you oh so much!)
Having finished burning the handkerchief, Violet curiously burned her own cuff as well, only to find it still completely unaffected.
"However, how do I put this out..."
She tried smothering it with her hand, but it wouldn't go out.
She tried putting it in water, but the water evaporated first.
She tried covering it with a metal ashtray, and a large hole was melted right through the ashtray.
"Ugh... put it out put it out put it out..."
Violet closed her eyes, repeatedly chanting for the fire to go out.
"Huh? It went out."
The flame vanished.
"Light fire?"
The flame appeared again.
"Out?"
The flame vanished again.
"So much fun!"
Like a child who had discovered a new toy, Violet began playing with the flames to her heart's content.
Well, she practically *was* a child, so that was fine...
One flame, two flames, five flames, ten flames, twenty flames.
Moving them from her fingers to the top of her head, then shifting them to her toes, or igniting flames across her chest.
Violet gradually discovered that she could control the size and shape of the flames, and make them float in specific positions, and so...
A blue ring of fire formed by dozens of spinning flames hovered above her head, with a pair of wings composed of blue flames behind her.
Beneath the blue flames, her black Lolita dress looked exceptionally eerie.
"This must be what they call an angel, right?"
The quintessential angelic look. (A massive delusion.)
(What kind of angel are you, you're the Angel of Death from the Golden Throne!)
If Violet were to look in a mirror right now, she would find her irises glowing blue, as if she had installed blue LEDs in her eyes.
Having thoroughly played with the flames, Violet turned to Chapter 3.
Chapter 3: Fireball.
"Roll the flames into a ball, and then send it flying? The bigger the fireball, the more powerful it is?"
Violet looked at the blue flame in her hand that had been squeezed into the shape of an axe, and fell into deep thought...
"Next."
Chapter 4: Discharge.
"Gather mana in your hand, and conceive an electric arc like lightning..."
"Lightning..."
Violet recalled that prolonged rainstorm, and then remembered Zhurong falling amidst the artillery fire at that time...
In an instant, a massive amount of electric arcs erupted around Violet's entire body!
All the electric arcs converged into a single bolt of lightning, heading straight for the room's light switch.
"Click! Zap!"
In the blink of an eye, the lights across the entire city went out, plunging more than half the city into darkness.
Violet, who had just released the electric arcs, also snapped back to her senses and immediately realized what she had just done.
*Violet, are you alright!*
Zhurong poked his head up from the floorboards, seeing Violet with electric arcs still flashing across her body from time to time, and then seeing the light switch blasted to smithereens...
"T, that... I..." Violet looked remarkably like a child caught by their parents in the middle of a prank. (Which she practically was.)
*Come on, explain what just happened...*
......
*So, this is why you ended up blowing up the power plant?*
Zhurong wore an expression that screamed "WTF".
"Mm..."
Violet looked aggrieved.
*Wait, wait, let me process this.*
*First, the mana you sensed directly enveloped you?*
"Yes, it wrapped around me like water, forming an ellipsoidal sphere."
*Then the flame you produced was pale blue, capable of melting metal instantly?*
"Mm..."
*Not only is the flame's temperature extremely high, but you can also control the fire to deform and move however you please?*
"Right..."
*And then you tried to discharge electricity, which directly produced an exceptionally thick bolt of lightning?*
"Mm-hm."
*Hah...*
Zhurong rubbed the bridge of his nose.
Although his current spiritual state required no sleep, felt no pain, and could not sense temperature, this time he genuinely felt a faint headache coming on.
*First off, mages can only sense mana roughly, such as its concentration and direction of flow. There has never been anyone who could clearly see the flow of mana, let alone touch and utilize it.*
*Your aptitude for mana is probably off the charts, to an incomprehensible degree. You must never mention this to anyone; keep it a secret for the rest of your life.*
"Mm."
Violet's expression turned serious.
*Secondly, blue flames have never been recorded anywhere, and nobody can manifest a fireball on their very first attempt at igniting fire, let alone freely mold its shape. That's equally absurd.*
*Lastly, the electric discharge—strictly speaking, this is a weakened version of a mid-level spell called Lightning Strike, yet its training difficulty is also very high.*
*Normally, discharging electricity simply generates enough arc on the hand to stun a person, akin to a human stun baton. But yours...*
"Was enough to overload the city's power plant..."
Violet had already realized just how absurd of a stunt she had pulled.
Both of them fell silent.
*Let's leave this matter at that for now. Be careful not to use magic casually in front of people in the future. Of course, your own safety remains top priority.*
*Also, read fully next time. All these common sense details are written in the introduction and the detailed explanations that follow.*
"Mm!"
Violet nodded, picked up the grimoire, and began reading it patiently.
Zhurong, meanwhile, began organizing the massive amount of intelligence he had just "acquired."
Well, he had seen it openly and aboveboard in someone else's office, so it shouldn't count as stealing, right...
Piles of scratch paper and sketch photographs covered the writing desk, containing quite a few classified intelligence reports from the Southern United Front.
"Good grief..."
Looking at the desk full of intelligence, Zhurong felt his scalp tingle.
"Huh? Did Violet fall asleep?"
Hugging the book, Violet leaned gently against the back of her chair, drool practically threatening to drip onto her clothes.
"She's sleeping so soundly..."
Zhurong pulled the book from her hands, placed it on the tea table nearby, and draped a blanket over her.
"You just be a good little angel, leave the rest to me."
Zhurong returned to the desk full of intelligence and "picked up" one of the sketch photographs.
"To think there's actually an intelligence agency branch hidden in this city..."
Looking at the "photograph" he had drawn, the one that gave him the most headache was the aircraft right in the middle.
"Never expected the Germanania Empire to have even researched jet fighters..."
Judging from its outline, that aircraft had a jet engine mounted beneath each of its two wings.
"This looks every bit like an Me-262... except the tail fin position is a bit different."
Other intelligence included ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, multiple rocket launchers, and the like.
These had already entered service with the Germanania Empire's military, forming a formidable combat capability. However, the accuracy of both types of missiles remained quite worrisome.
The Soviets had already developed their own multiple rocket launcher systems, whereas rocket research on the United Front's side yielded almost no results.
Soviet jet engines had also entered the testing phase, and they would probably be cleared for flight testing before long. As for the United Front... they hadn't even figured out monoplanes yet, so they might as well just wash up and go to bed.
The gap in ground forces was smaller.
There was virtually no difference between the Soviet and German mechanized infantry and armored units.
However, these tanks...
The Soviet tanks looked like the drunken offspring of a T-34-85 and an M4A3E2... the hull design of a T-34, the suspension of an M4A3, the turret design of a T-34-85, and the turret layout of an M4A3. In short, thoroughly bizarre.
The Germanania side was better off; their tanks looked like a teenage version of the Panther Ausf. G, with the hull scaled down a notch.
"This... is this a T-34 referencing the late-model M4 to improve performance, and a Panther G shrinking its hull to cut costs and target area?"
As for the United Front's tanks...
Ah, with things that looked like giant vagrants going toe-to-toe with that group of monster tanks, they'd probably be factory-reset by a single cannon shell before even entering firing range.
(Suddenly feeling like making a rant. Warhammer 40K, humanity's 40th millennium (crossed out). WWI 40K, meaning a World War I that lasted forty thousand years (confirmed).)
Aside from military might, industrial strength and economic power were also vital intelligence.
Yet this aspect was even more lethal...
Currently, Germanania's northeastern industrial zone had not suffered any blows whatsoever, and all factories were maintaining full production capacity.
Although the Soviet Union had one coastal industrial zone destroyed by the Germanania main force's surprise attack, its primary industrial zones were basically located in the northwestern coastal cities. Its industrial might was virtually unaffected.
The naval forces of both sides frequently fought to a standstill, with neither able to directly threaten the other's main industrial zone from the sea.
The air forces had devolved into an absolute melee, with each side repeatedly attempting to raid industrial zones using long-range bomber fleets, yet all ending in failure.