Chapter 439: Laboratory Girl

"Follow me." Liu Ziyi said this to him, and then he followed her down several levels below ground. Luo Qi looked back and thought that he must have been driven mad by the fact that the Profound Heaven Sect had taken his friend away, or he wouldn't be blindly following Liu Ziyi around like a fool.

"I'm not going any further," Luo Qi said suddenly, crossing his arms over his chest, refusing to continue following Liu Ziyi to find the Teleportation Point to the next level.

Liu Ziyi turned back in the darkness and looked at him in confusion. She was holding a burning Fireball in her hand, making her look very much like a genuine witch, leading him straight to hell.

"I heard Du Zhengyi say that the Highland Mages built their house on top of a cesspit filled with Curses," Luo Qi said.

"A... cesspit?" Liu Ziyi asked in surprise.

"Left behind by the Ancestor Mage," Luo Qi nodded and said.

Liu Ziyi pondered for a moment, and Luo Qi immediately added, "So there's no need for us to go down there and shovel shit. Let's go back. Do you eat pistachios?"

"Don't try to fool me." Liu Ziyi reacted, her expression looking a bit more refreshed, no longer so distracted. Luo Qi could now roughly guess Liu Ziyi's traits: she didn't really take communicating with people seriously, like a little bookworm, and most of her energy was spent pondering those experiments, so she always seemed a bit absent-minded. But now Luo Qi had aroused her alertness, and she focused her attention more on reality, looking at Luo Qi thoughtfully. "I thought you were a very honest person, which is why my senior brother treats you differently."

Bullshit, your senior brother is friends with me because I am particularly charming, a shining little sun. Luo Qi thought angrily, his anger endless and surging like a giant wave, almost enough to make him unable to tolerate even a little girl.

"Come down one more level with me, I promise that will be the last one." Liu Ziyi seemed to see his mood and seized the time to make amends.

"No." Luo Qi refused unceremoniously, saying irritably, "Unless you tell me, what exactly is it that you need my help with? I don't know what I can do. Unless it's because you have a boy you're in love with and want me to help you listen to his inner thoughts. I'll state in advance, as long as there is monetary compensation, I can help you do this, fifty yuan per time."

Liu Ziyi's usually dazed eyes were now staring brightly at Luo Qi. "You are really irritable. You were very cute when you appeared by my senior brother's side, showing your little white teeth when you smiled. Are you the kind of kid who pretends to be good in front of adults?"

Luo Qi's face became even gloomier. "I'm going back to sleep."

Liu Ziyi jumped lightly in front of him, blocking his path. "You know I'm very busy too, and I wouldn't bother you with boring trifles. You know I'm in charge of two experimental projects, right? One of them is the Anti-gravity Magic Experiment." She paused, leaving him a moment to react.

"So you want to try and see if you can make me float?" Luo Qi said in astonishment, "Specifically finding a pitch-black place so that if the experiment fails, you won't lose face?"

"No, what I want to talk about is the other experiment," Liu Ziyi said.

"..." Luo Qi pondered for a moment. "Then why did you mention this one first?" Liu Ziyi did not answer him, continuing along her own train of thought. "I am also responsible for monitoring Magic Waves. When I was at the Profound Heaven Sect, I was only responsible for a part of this major project. But here at the Highland Mages, I have redeployed a grid monitoring system, monitoring only the territory of the Highland Mages."

Following her words, countless bright golden grid lines appeared before them, illuminating a larger area. Dim metal walls appeared in Luo Qi's field of vision; this place really did look a bit like where the soul of that Ancestor Mage stayed. Liu Ziyi raised her hand, letting the cluster of flames she was holding float on its own, and she made a few complex gestures; many small dots began to appear on the grid. The new changes attracted Luo Qi's attention, allowing him to slightly control the associations that made him uncomfortable.

Some of the shining small dots between the grid lines were very dim, while others were exceptionally clear. In a position near the upper right, there were some intense small dots flickering frantically. Luo Qi suddenly understood that he could read it; he raised his finger and pointed there. "Does this represent that Chi Yu is making an arrest? They have mobilized quite a bit of the magic power of our world." "Mobilized? Mobilized power?" Liu Ziyi said, slightly raising her eyebrows, looking at Luo Qi with interest. "You are very accurate. Few Mages speak like this; the Third Grade classes haven't taught this yet, yet you know it. In fact, even graduated Mages rarely truly understand this point. Where did you learn this?"

Luo Qi glanced at her and avoided the question. "How old are you this year?" "Twenty." Liu Ziyi announced her age with some pride.

"You're that young too?" Luo Qi said in surprise; he had always felt she was very young, but he hadn't expected her to be this young.

"The Profound Heaven Sect likes to cultivate genius children early; I knew Du Zhengyi when I was very young. I entered the Profound Heaven Sect at fifteen and graduated at nineteen," Liu Ziyi said proudly.

Yeah, compared to her, he was just a silly kid.

"If Du Zhengyi hadn't delayed his studies because he was too busy, he would definitely have graduated before he was twenty," Liu Ziyi said again, looking at Luo Qi with a strange expression. Luo Qi didn't know what she meant; it seemed to emphasize that he wasn't qualified to hang out with them. But he didn't want to overthink it; Liu Ziyi had always been very friendly, helped them a lot, and was definitely on Du Zhengyi's side. No matter what he had babbled about earlier, if Liu Ziyi needed his help, he would definitely lend a hand.

She shook her hair and began to adjust the model she had built. "They might be fighting for a while longer. But, this is not what I want to show you."

The two-dimensional grid lines suddenly unfolded in front of Luo Qi, expanding into a three-dimensional model at a rapid, swelling speed. Luo Qi was surprised to find that there were ten levels underground here, while the Highland Mages used at most the first two underground levels. What kind of building was this? The building on the ground was just the tip of the iceberg; the roots underground were always more vast than the branches and leaves above. Liu Ziyi was very familiar with these, as nonchalant as an ordinary girl fiddling with an eyeshadow palette. "Do you see it?"

He saw a dim point of light on the fifth underground level of the model; that was them, very eco-friendly, low energy consumption.

Just as he was about to speak, he was horrified to see a fairly bright point one level below them. Luo Qi opened his mouth in surprise, unable to help but look up at the bright, flickering cluster of light in the second quadrant; the brightness on the sixth underground level was almost half as bright as the combat area above.

"Who is it?" Luo Qi swallowed and asked again, "Or what is it?"

"I don't know," Liu Ziyi said, frustrated and confused. "I've been watching it for a long time. Sometimes it appears for a few hours, sometimes it doesn't appear for a whole day. And once it appears, it is fluid and elusive. I don't know what it is, but it is consuming energy. I have tracked it many times; once it should have been right in front of me, but I saw nothing. It's like a Ghost of energy, just drifting past me. I once thought that this thing might be a Magic Wave left over from the era of ancient Mages. In other words, it's nothing, just an empty magic command, idling and consuming energy. However, just now, after you caused trouble and the Highland Mages sealed this place, it went straight down, as if it were an intelligent entity that knew it was now in a state of emergency. Also, one can go down to the tenth underground level here, but the Highland Mages have always warned us not to go down. I have observed it and know that it often wanders underground, but it only goes down to the sixth underground level at most. If we assume it is a person, then based on its range of activity, I speculate that the sixth underground level is the last safe zone. But to prove that there really is an invisible person, I need a powerful Mind Mage."

Luo Qi's hands trembled slightly; he knew who that was. Du Zhengyi had told him, and he hadn't thought he was still here. Now the two of them, far from the crowd, were standing underground, separated from the Lotus Burner's clownfish by only one floor. He didn't know what the clownfish that could use Invisibility was wandering here to find, but the last time he wandered like this, he encountered Du Zhengyi blocking the way, and the result was that tragic. Luo Qi couldn't help but grab Liu Ziyi's wrist. "Doing this is too dangerous. You are a laboratory girl; you should stay in the laboratory and leave this work to others. You've gone too far. Come back with me, now."