Chapter 104: Decrypted Document

"Du Zhengyi has absolutely nothing to do with bloodthirst or altitude sickness," Luo Qi said, "He even saved someone as irrelevant as Chen Ritian?"

"Who?" Majiang asked in surprise, thinking through a circle of people but still failing to recall anyone by that name.

"The one who went to your house to snoop and was so scared by me he wanted to jump off the building," Luo Qi said with a serious face to Du Zhengyi, because Du Zhengyi was also looking at him in astonishment.

"Oh." Du Zhengyi could barely remember that human.

"You even know his name; you looked too deeply into their consciousnesses at the time," Majiang said. "Are you alright? Human nature cannot withstand excavation; the more you dig, the darker it feels. A Mind Mage needs great wisdom to balance themselves, otherwise, they're bound to collapse."

"Mm," Luo Qi responded casually, recalling the attitude Du Zhengyi had shown toward his buddy today, and suddenly said happily, "Du Zhengyi is my conscience."

Majiang's expression stiffened, and he subconsciously looked up at Du Zhengyi, catching a crack in Du Zhengyi's usually impeccable mask, which was no surprise. Luo Qi was in the midst of self-satisfaction, his fingers tapping lively on the table, completely unaware of their exchange of glances.

"Someone would actually be named Chen Ritian?" Guan Xinyue didn't see anything at all; she was still busy picking faults with Luo Qi. "Could you be making it up?"

Luo Qi scoffed at her questioning and didn't answer.

"It's Chen Hao, isn't it?" Du Zhengyi suddenly asked.

Luo Qi laughed and dodged Du Zhengyi's glare.

"This little brat is becoming more and more uninhibited," Majiang said with disdain. "Zhengyi, what are your plans now? Do you still want to know the encrypted information from Guan Yushan? If you want to take a vacation, now is a good time. It would be best if you took this little brat and this girl with you to some remote place to enjoy a three-month holiday. Everything else can be arranged after the Teacher comes out."

Du Zhengyi did not speak immediately. Luo Qi and Guan Xinyue both turned their heads to look at him, one on the left and one on the right, waiting for him to make a decision. For the first time in his life, he felt a bit of pressure, and this moment did not occur when facing a great enemy. The eyes of Luo Qi and Guan Xinyue as they looked at him were filled with innocent, total trust; they seemed to have no objections to any decision he made, and no matter what he decided or where he wanted to go, the two of them would follow immediately. He was a lone traveler, and for the first time being relied upon by others like this, he momentarily forgot how he usually managed his decisiveness.

Majiang added, "I suggest you do this."

Perhaps out of habit from going against the Doctor, Majiang expressed his view, and Du Zhengyi finally found his familiar feeling again. "Let's look at the file you decrypted first."

Majiang silently took out Guan Yushan's Crystal and projected a cluster of golden characters into the air. Luo Qi scanned the circle between them, scratched his head, and looked at Guan Xinyue. Guan Xinyue did not notice him; she was looking at those golden characters with a depressed face.

Majiang smiled and regained some of his spirit. "The girl is unhappy; she's practically spilled all her privacy over the last two days. There was no other way, as I didn't know exactly what her grandfather would use as the key for the decryption algorithm. Later, I roughly figured out that this is a chain-encryption method, which means we must decrypt it in order. I don't understand why Guan Yushan did this; if it were just to emphasize the time factor, adding a note would have sufficed."

Having said this, he suddenly scrutinized Du Zhengyi for a few moments, his expression showing some realization. He stroked his chin and pondered, "Perhaps Guan Yushan did this out of distrust for the Qionglin; sequential unlocking will extend the unlocking time, and they would have to protect Guan Xinyue for a while longer."

Luo Qi exaggeratedly made a gesture of wanting to vomit.

Du Zhengyi only asked, "What is the plaintext after decryption?"

Majiang let the characters before decoding flow and expand rapidly in the air; for a moment, the air in front of them was full of floating characters, like fireflies filling the sky. "Do you see the scale of the information before decoding?"

Du Zhengyi nodded.

The characters exploded instantly, leaving behind only the shadows of six characters.

Luo Qi's curiosity was piqued; one had to know that this change in information volume was like a digital movie shrinking down to a kernel of six characters—a massive change from several gigabytes of information to a few digits. The plaintext protected by such a cumbersome encryption algorithm was only six characters: "Xizhou Sanfu Department Store?"

"Xizhou is an ancient place name; only we would call a modern city that," Luo Qi said in surprise. "But the part after that is... is it a local department store?"

"Yes, it is a famous local department store," Majiang said.

"Is there nothing else?" Luo Qi said in surprise. "Does this mean we have to go there to investigate for clues? Since Mage Guan has already found the problem, why didn't he write down what the situation is?"

Majiang shook his head. "I am only responsible for decoding."

Luo Qi immediately looked at Du Zhengyi impatiently, wishing Du Zhengyi could give him an answer right away.

Du Zhengyi pondered for a moment and only shook his head. "The amount of information is too small. I can only think of the geographical situation; there are many Mages in Xizhou. It is a second-tier human city, and it can be considered a prosperous modern city, but for Mages, it is also an ancient settlement."

"Then we're done for," Luo Qi said disappointedly. "There are many Mages, and trying to find a Lotus Burner among them makes the screening work even more difficult."

"Regardless, since Mage Guan pointed out the location, I want to go there and take a look; I will surely be able to get more revelations," Du Zhengyi said.

Luo Qi lost even more interest, laying his entire upper body on the round table and rambling, "Fine, don't forget to help me buy some new clothes when you go to the mall."

"Aren't you coming with me?" Du Zhengyi said. "After all, Mage Guan was a Telepath; perhaps the answer to this riddle also requires a Telepath to see it clearly."

"What?" Luo Qi jumped up as if there were springs under his butt. "Are you taking me with you?"

"I don't see any problem with you being in a crowd," Du Zhengyi said.

Guan Xinyue raised her hand to speak. "Can I go too? —I just want to go shopping."

"You should just shop online," Majiang snorted.

"When the package arrived yesterday, the delivery guy almost died of fright in the empty town," Guan Xinyue said gloomily. "I think he kept sneaking looks to see if I had a shadow."

Luo Qi laughed heartlessly.

Du Zhengyi said to her, "You should stay here for now. If you really want to go shopping, you can have Majiang take you to other malls in the vicinity."

Majiang glared at him immediately, but Du Zhengyi ignored him.

"Fine," Guan Xinyue said with satisfaction, then made another request. "But I don't want to spend other people's money. My grandfather once said he left a portion of property for my sister and me respectively—of course, in Mage currency. How can I get this money?"

"That's easy," Luo Qi said. "When I have time, I'll take you to exchange it. It's just converting credit points into money; credit points are calculated uniformly by the Qionglin Calculators based on a Mage's contribution."

He paused here and turned to stare at Du Zhengyi. "Your work content is so dangerous; you must be very rich."

"What, do you want to adopt me as your godfather and inherit my property?" Du Zhengyi said.

Majiang laughed. "In your dreams; your assets have already been 100% frozen by the Committee."

Du Zhengyi's face darkened, and he turned to see that Luo Qi actually still wanted to laugh, and anger instantly welled up in his heart. "Damn it, it was said your L-Value was high, so where exactly is it high? You unlucky ball!"

Luo Qi's laugh was scared back, and he started biting his fingers.