The magician in the city

Chapter 680 The Gift of Our Ancestors (70)

With no new members joining Qionglin's prison, Du Zhengyi was momentarily lost. Then, a directional magic within Qionglin transmitted a signal to him, which he instinctively picked up, recognizing Liu Ziyu's magical emblem.

When he returned to the ground of Qionglin, the air already carried a faint smell of burning. He quickened his pace toward the Fifth Laboratory and saw Liu Ziyu talking intensely with several experimental mages he didn't recognize.

When she saw him approaching, she quickly finished speaking, and the group of people walked away dejectedly.

"What happened?" Du Zhengyi asked.

“A few idiots caused trouble. We’re short-staffed, and Professor Zuo is sending all sorts of people into the lab, which only makes things worse. Not everyone is suited to making up for their lack of talent through hard work, and not everyone is really that diligent…” Liu Ziyu complained, her temper flaring.

Du Zhengyi had never seen her so agitated; she seemed more like someone going through a period of mental distress following the deletion of her memories. The logic was inconsistent, observations and inferences didn't match, and the more intelligent a person was, the stronger their reaction to this. The spellcaster suppressed her direct anger at the memory loss, but couldn't control her indirect emotions. Intelligent people could suffer greatly as a result, even developing depression.

"Do you need my help?" Du Zhengyi asked.

"Senior, I asked you to come help out in the lab." Liu Ziyu grabbed Du Zhengyi's sleeve and irritably pulled him aside, continuing to complain along the way.

The complaints stopped abruptly after they reached a cluster of experimental equipment. Du Zhengyi realized that the sound and observation isolation magic was working in the area. He understood that she didn't really want him to come to the lab to help.

“Senior Brother.” Liu Ziyu released his sleeve, and a string of characters spun from her open palm, forming a list in front of Du Zhengyi. “Zhou Quan gave me this. When he forwarded and organized documents intended only for Venerable Masters, he left this behind. Oh, he said a bad pen is worse than a good memory. He saw ‘his past self’ in his work log reminding ‘his future self’, and if he sees this kind of document, he can give it to me. He privately authorized me to show this to you and… Luo Qi.”

Du Zhengyi was somewhat shocked. He had never known that his subordinates could do things this way. Writing down important information about the magical world, not to mention that an insignificant scribe not only peeked at the confidential documents of the Venerable Mages but could even authorize them. "What kind of magic did he use to endorse these private authorizations?"

"Huh? Oh, there's no magic, it's all based on personal credit," Liu Ziyu said.

Du Zhengyi couldn't say anything more. These system loopholes didn't seem like a big deal anymore; Qionglin and the magical world themselves were already riddled with problems. His attention was focused on the list, the first name being "Xiang Qian." He remembered the old mage, who was Liu Li's good friend.

“This is the death list,” Liu Ziyu suddenly said softly.

Du Zhengyi was stunned. A suppressed pain slowly rose to the surface, and his chest felt heavy. "This list is too long."

"Yes, the battle mages suffered the most losses. If this continues, we'll run out of manpower. Wenlin is alright, but everyone else in her group is dead. Senior brother, what exactly happened to us? Why did so many people die?"

Du Zhengyi's gaze lingered on Xiang Qian's name. The one-way magical barrier allowed him to hear the sounds of experimental mages bustling about outside, and he suddenly felt that all this busyness was meaningless. The magical world was slowly and heavily sliding towards its end, and all efforts seemed futile.

"Senior brother," Liu Ziyu urged him anxiously.

“The situation is complicated. First, the Lotus Burners infiltrated Qionglin, and you were transferred to the Highland Mage's place. Then, we encountered the Lotus Burners in a high-risk sealed area,” Du Zhengyi said briefly. “Don’t worry about this anymore. You may have already reached the edge of danger.”

“They can’t bear to kill me,” Liu Ziyu said with certainty. Du Zhengyi suddenly felt that he couldn’t be sure about this. The clownfish didn’t care about the life or death of any mage, and Pei Shu… might not care so much about the death of an individual either, although their reasons might be completely different.

“The Lotus Burner…” Liu Ziyu lowered his head and searched through a pile of flowing symbols. “I saw the work order for monitoring the Lotus Burner today. The work order was sent to many people. All the battle mages have been summoned these past few days, and the reason for sending them out again is almost the same: to monitor the Lotus Burner’s unusual movements.”

"Has Teacher Pei not returned yet? I want to see him," Du Zhengyi suddenly asked.

“He’s not here.” Liu Ziyu frowned slightly. “I guess he won’t see you either. There aren’t even any Venerable Masters on duty in Qionglin right now. Either they’re really busy, or he doesn’t want to see us for a while after erasing our memories. And I have a feeling that even if he hasn’t erased your memories, he’ll avoid you. Senior brother, he’s already made his decision, and there’s no point in saying anything more. Teacher Pei really likes you, but this is Qionglin, senior brother. Pleading and protesting are useless. They only require everyone to understand, and if you can’t understand automatically, you’ll be forced to understand.”

After a moment's thought, Du Zhengyi said, "I will authorize an increase in Qionglin's defense level."

"Huh? How long will it last?" Liu Ziyu asked. She never knew exactly how high Du Zhengyi's authority was; in short, it wasn't proportional to his age.

"Continue until the very end."

"What does 'finally' mean?" Liu Ziyu asked, unusually encountering something she didn't understand.

"If our world reaches its final stage, the last thing we need to guard against is internal strife among the mages and opportunistic exploitation. If Qionglin ceases to exist, the mages will be unsupervised, and some will have their own ulterior motives. Qionglin and... are the last and most dangerous sealed lands." Du Zhengyi didn't utter the name of Lonely Mountain; he had a vague premonition of something bad.

Liu Ziyu listened calmly, showing no sign of worry. "It's alright. I've heard that every few hundred years, the mage world seems to come to an end. The trouble will always pass. Senior brother, are you going to stay in Qionglin forever?"

“I want to see the Highland Mage,” Du Zhengyi said, noticing Liu Ziyu’s questioning look, but he didn’t explain. He wanted to see the Hashi Mage again, though he felt it was just a last resort and might not be of much use. But the Highland Mage was the only hope for solving Roach’s problem; he couldn’t find any other way to keep Roach alive.

"I wonder what Teacher Pei and the others are doing right now? I don't agree with some of his methods, but sometimes I really hope he can solve problems." Liu Ziyu suddenly jumped up as if startled before finishing his sentence, then pulled out a new bundle from the spinning characters. "It's from Zhou Quan again, a new death list."

Du Zheng felt a momentary lapse in concentration. His desire to see the Highland Mage suddenly faded, replaced by an inexplicable urge to go to another location. This feeling usually stemmed from a magical constraint he was increasingly unwilling to abide by: the constraint imposed upon him by Lonely Mountain.

The list that Liu Ziyu received was unfolded in front of him, and more battle mages appeared on the death list. Du Zhengyi recognized the names of two Lonely Mountain Guards who were also on it.

"When did this happen?" he asked.

"It's probably within the last two days," Liu Ziyu said, searching for the magical symbols on the characters.

It must have been before he woke up.

"I need to go out for a bit," Du Zhengyi said.

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