Chapter 34: Qionglin

When the torrent ended, Luo Qi tumbled onto a solid floor, and the surrounding clamor was instantly hit with a pause button. He lay on the ground, seeing many pairs of slender legs through a wave of dizziness; that moment seemed frozen in time, a stack of handwritten documents scattered everywhere, and a cup of tea spilled across the floor.

Luo Qi endured the churning in his stomach, used all four limbs to push himself up from the ground in a most ungraceful manner, and raised his head to survey his surroundings. He was in a great hall; one of the four walls was a massive glass partition, the vaulted ceiling stood five or six meters high, and the area of the hall was roughly equivalent to the waiting room of a train station in an ordinary city. Based on the placement of the workbenches, it was invisibly divided into about ten work zones, where those people must have been working before he suddenly dropped in and interrupted them. Now, the few Mages closest to him were doing their best to feign indifference while seizing the moment to size him up.

Luo Qi saw countless symbols flickering in the mid-air of the hall, and not far away, three young Mages were working together to manipulate a complex equation. A girl with short hair, perhaps around the same age as Du Zhengyi, floated nimbly in the air, polishing a complex piece of equipment at a tricky angle; Luo Qi did not even know what that thing was.

If he was not mistaken, liquid nitrogen was churning constantly in one corner of the hall, an invisible barrier constraining its range. A Mage had created all of that with their bare hands; they were cooling a device.

He withdrew his gaze, scrambled up from the ground in a disheveled state, and looked sourly at these Mages who seemed like the chosen ones. Some quickly lost interest, withdrew their gazes from him, and returned to their focused state of work.

A male Mage with a stern expression walked over, drawing Luo Qi's attention. He pointed a finger at the ground, and the scattered paper drafts stacked themselves neatly back onto a table, the teacup flew back into the hands of an Old Mage who was still in a daze, and the tea on the floor vanished completely.

"You lot!" the Mage said with anger on his face. "I have said it many times: you Execution Mages are not allowed to teleport directly into the hall."

The two Mages who had brought Luo Qi back immediately began to argue with him—it was an emergency, and to save time, they had chosen the room with the largest floor plan in the entire building as their transit target, which could reduce the time needed to calculate the Beacon.

Luo Qi looked around himself; the two people Li Xu had brought had teleported him, the monk, and that bag of a corpse over, but the others were nowhere to be seen. This must have been arranged by Li Xu: to seize the physical evidence and the witness immediately, while simultaneously separating the duo of Luo Qi and Du Zhengyi. Li Xu was not here; at best, he must be pacifying Du Zhengyi right now.

Luo Qi subconsciously glanced at that strange monk and immediately turned his gaze away in disgust. The monk cowered behind him, staring straight at him, trembling all over, as terrified as if he had seen a ghost. This, of course, also attracted the attention of the managing Mage, who looked at Luo Qi suspiciously.

Luo Qi avoided his gaze, avoided everyone else in the hall, and looked out the window. In the distance was a snow-capped mountain peak, like a mirage suspended above the low mountain ranges; the massive mountain body was perfectly symmetrical, yet existed abruptly. He was secretly startled, took a few steps forward abruptly, and looked down through the glass wall.

A frozen river reflected light like diamonds under the sun; the river turned a corner beneath his feet, flowing eastward in a solidified posture. On the river bend, a forest of silver pines covered the entire valley floor, and as a long wind blew past, the ice dust kicked up among the woods shimmered in the sunlight.

Luo Qi knew what place this was, even though he had never been here. The name "Qionglin" was known to everyone in every corner of this continent where Magic still spread. That isolated mountain in the distance was the legendary Holy Mountain, and every child in the Magic World had heard the stories of the Holy Mountain Temple.

He never imagined that the reason for his first time entering Qionglin would be like this.

"Hey!" someone called him.

He turned his head back; a short-haired girl stood before him. The girl's eyes were large, her face petite, and she wore the slight daze regarding the real world that was unique to a Scholar. He remembered that she was the girl who had been floating in the air polishing equipment earlier.

He looked at the girl with little spirit, silently asking her what was the matter.

"Are you a friend of Majiang?" the girl asked him kindly, looking as if she had just come over for a chat.

He looked at the girl suspiciously; the girl reached out and pointed at the little frog sewn onto the chest of his shirt. He understood; he was wearing a newly bought thick coat on the outside, but he hadn't changed the shirt underneath, which was still his work uniform from Majiang Clinic.

"You know Majiang?" Luo Qi asked subconsciously.

"He is my senior fellow apprentice," the girl answered briefly.

Luo Qi suddenly remembered the speculations Zhao Zhiyan had about where Du Zhengyi ranked sixth.

"Were you also transferred to work at headquarters?" the girl asked him. "Graduating this year? You look quite young."

Luo Qi felt a wave of embarrassment; the girl had no idea what was going on. He looked back vigilantly; the two Mages who had escorted him had already noticed he was talking to someone, and one of the particularly rude ones was already walking toward them.

"I hope to meet your teacher," Luo Qi said, seizing the time. "I have met him once."

"Teacher Pei?" the girl was made somewhat uneasy by his tense expression.

He had no time to answer; the Execution Mage grabbed his shoulder and dragged him away roughly, "Talking is prohibited."

Luo Qi looked back at the girl; she had only just realized what was going on, looked at Luo Qi in surprise, and her expression was somewhat flustered.

Du Zhengyi actually did not lack patience. He methodically constructed all his defensive systems in his mind before reaching out to shake hands with Li Xu, who had been waiting for him; in an instant, Li Xu's information entered his cognitive space. The information Li Xu displayed to him was very limited, merely the verification Secret Language for his name and position. Since the Secret Language could be corroborated, Li Xu's official identity was beyond doubt. Li Xu's rank was also far above his own; he had no way to interfere with him taking away the evidence, but...

"But, there was no need to take Luo Qi away right off the bat, was there?" Du Zhengyi said, frowning, as he diverted a portion of his energy to race against time to probe Li Xu's energy.

"According to the Committee's standards, Luo Qi is not yet an adult," Li Xu said affably, his brows and eyes filled with the gentle kindness of an elder. "I know Brother Pei likely took a fancy to some extraordinary talent in this child; Brother Pei has always been unconventional in his employment. But for me, rules are rules. In our world, every child is a Magic spark full of hope and should be protected. This is a supreme principle that cannot be distorted; no matter the circumstances, children should not be used."

"Does Mr. Li mean that taking Luo Qi away is to protect a minor?" Du Zhengyi asked coldly. "I will follow the procedure to notify his parents; perhaps you have already investigated his file and know that his parents are also somewhat well-known. They should have the qualifications to enter Qionglin, and will likely go to pick him up soon. I believe it will go very smoothly then, right?"

Zhao Zhiyan, who was to the side, said, "Luo Qi isn't entirely innocent, is he..."

Li Xu reached out a hand to stop his words, and said to Du Zhengyi sincerely and with a hint of reproach, "That goes without saying; we all act according to the rules, so how could it not go smoothly?"

Du Zhengyi nodded slightly.

Li Xu turned to the girl hiding in the distance and looked her over carefully. "Is this Guan Yushan's little granddaughter? She's grown so big. The last time I saw you, you were still holding a Mickey Mouse, only this big. Are you doing well?"

Guan Xinyue cowered slightly and nodded at his question with a slight, trembling motion.

"Poor little girl," Li Xu sighed once. "Don't worry, we will definitely find your sister."

Guan Xinyue remained indifferent to his words; he waited for a while and had no choice but to give up.

Zhao Zhiyan laughed from the side, "Is my ring on Luo Qi?"

"It's with me," Guan Xinyue said, reaching into her pocket to take out the jade thumb ring.

Zhao Zhiyan walked a few steps closer to her to reach out and take it; she glanced at Zhao Zhiyan and abruptly tossed the thumb ring into the air. Zhao Zhiyan was startled; at any rate, the physical reaction speed of a Mage was still present in him, so he stepped forward to catch his ring in mid-air, then turned back to stare at Guan Xinyue threateningly.

Li Xu smiled generously and glanced at Zhao Zhiyan, as if reminding him of something. Zhao Zhiyan moved his gaze away from the little girl, looked at Du Zhengyi who was observing him, and then began to laugh in a malicious and cynical manner.

Li Xu's arrival was sudden, but his exit was quite polite; he asked Du Zhengyi to convey his greetings to his teacher on his behalf, gave a few more instructions to Guan Xinyue, and then left with Zhao Zhiyan.

The two figures disappeared completely, but Guan Xinyue still stood there in silence; it was not until Du Zhengyi suddenly kicked away the shovel on the ground that she could be certain they had really left.

"When will Luo Qi be able to come back?" She walked to Du Zhengyi's side and reached out to grab his forearm. The sudden turn of events made the person she had originally been somewhat afraid of seem close and reliable.

Du Zhengyi looked at the now-empty corpse pit, "After experiencing this, aren't you afraid of him?"

Guan Xinyue shook her head, "He is not a bad person."

"Intuition?" Du Zhengyi looked at her and thought for a while, unable to think of any other reason.

"Let's call it that," Guan Xinyue said.

"I don't know if he can still return to this matter," Du Zhengyi said. "If he can return to his parents, that might be a better outcome."

"He..." Guan Xinyue said, "Are the things that man said true? Did he take Luo Qi away because Luo Qi is not yet an adult according to your algorithms?"

"Taking him away with a corpse to protect a child?" A hint of a sarcastic smile appeared on Du Zhengyi's face, "How is that possible?"

Guan Xinyue's complexion turned even worse, and she became even more anxious, "But you will help him, right? You are friends, aren't you?"

"I will notify his parents, and I will notify my teachers," Du Zhengyi said. "But we are not friends; that is as far as I can go for him."

Guan Xinyue's expression looked as if she wanted to vomit; she looked at Du Zhengyi with anxious uncertainty, "But he... he has been helping you all along."

Du Zhengyi was silent for a while, then asked reluctantly, "What did he find out?"

"He suspects that my grandfather was the Mind Mage sent to investigate the Lu Jinfeng incident," Guan Xinyue said hurriedly. "It is possible my grandfather found something. Looking at it this way, perhaps Qi Yue has the same problem as the person who killed Lu Jinfeng, so Luo Qi wanted to come here to try his luck. But he didn't expect..."

Du Zhengyi's gaze fell onto the corpse pit again without realizing it; was this what Luo Qi meant by asking him to question Guan Xinyue before he left? Luo Qi was able to find the corpse because he had approached the truth of the matter.

If the corpse had not been wrapped in a woven bag, had not died with steel nails driven through its eyes, and if Luo Qi had not described such a scene several days ago, everything would have been perfect.