Chapter 458: Ruins 2

Luo Qi suddenly realized that an outsider was standing beside him; he could not let an outsider discover that his mental state was unstable, not to mention that their environment was full of uncertainty, and danger could occur at any moment. He glanced at Liu Ziyi vigilantly, observing her secretly, hoping she had not noticed his abnormality.

She had not noticed at all.

She was absent-mindedly fiddling with the crystal hanging around her neck, her gaze unfocused as she searched the surroundings, scanning everything in a recording manner as an observer, but she was the only one who did not scan the living person beside her.

Luo Qi breathed a sigh of relief inwardly; he had repeatedly conducted shallow tests on Liu Ziyi, and she was truly uninterested in people and not very vigilant. He gradually became convinced that Liu Ziyi was completely innocent; they might have wanted to find an opportunity to target him, but she was an unplanned variable. Thinking back, she was always tinkering with experimental projects she was interested in alone; others might not be very clear about her monitoring the clownfish, nor would they think about what she was going to do underground.

He fell into deep thought, trying his best to reconstruct the sequence of events. Perhaps according to their original plan, someone else should have been responsible for luring him away; they probably did not expect Liu Ziyi to grab him first for her own affairs, coincidentally bringing him to the deserted underground. If they just wanted to sift him out like a big bean, then things had just logically been completed; no matter who it was, as long as they dragged Luo Qi away, they could normally start the next step of the procedure.

If that was the case, he might be safe now. Liu Ziyi and Du Zhengyi were both high-end products from the same series in Qionglin; they would not scrap Liu Ziyi just like that. This confirmed what Du Zhengyi told him to do: control his own abilities, do not over-express himself, and as long as he brought a bit of courage, everything would be fine.

Luo Qi turned his head, folded his arms across his chest, and looked at the unplanned Liu Ziyi calculatingly. The person who had bad luck following her was Liu Ziyi; his luck was really not bad. He watched the busy and muddled Liu Ziyi and revealed a trace of a smile, "Hey, do some work."

Liu Ziyi looked at him blankly, "Hmm?"

"It's like this." Luo Qi walked closer to her and said in an inducing tone, "Do you think our current situation is like mice in a maze? Do you believe that in this empty and deserted ruin, there is really no one monitoring us?"

"Mm." Liu Ziyi did not need to be persuaded at all; she only needed to be reminded. What Luo Qi said was not a lie. "Indeed."

"So, you must have magic for monitoring sensors." Luo Qi asked hopefully. Liu Ziyi was a Technical mage; that could be a huge treasure.

But Liu Ziyi pondered for a moment and was obviously hesitant. Luo Qi was a bit anxious, hesitating whether he should push Liu Ziyi's consciousness again. But Du Zhengyi had told him to try not to use his power, and besides, Liu Ziyi was very smart; his methods were not yet mature, and she might discover it afterward.

Luo Qi sighed in his Consciousness World, feeling as if he were swaying on a dividing line—on one side was the principle he had set for himself before not to violate others at will, and on the other was the constant pressure of this world. Finally, he remembered that Liu Ziyi was Du Zhengyi's junior sister, someone willing to carry Du Zhengyi's label, and he also remembered that in a chaos where he could not distinguish the direction, he could only build his conscience on Du Zhengyi's judgment. He swallowed and silently retracted the Slime's tentacles.

"You should know that pure sensor crystals are very difficult to detect directly." Liu Ziyi said while pondering.

So it was a technical problem. Luo Qi felt relieved in his heart, feeling a bit ashamed, and was glad that he still had patience just now.

"Can't you detect energy?" he said casually.

"Me? Can? You know we have entered another space, and I have completely cut off contact with the laboratory Monitoring Magic Array, right?" Liu Ziyi raised her eyebrows at him.

Luo Qi said "Oh," "But Du Zhengyi..."

"Can detect all kinds of magic traces?" Liu Ziyi interrupted, "Yes, he can, but I don't know exactly how he achieves it."

"Isn't there a ready-made Spell? Just chant it, use some magic power, and then the monitoring crystal will reveal itself." Luo Qi asked.

"You sound like a village illiterate spreading superstition when you say that." Liu Ziyi said in surprise.

"What? We are superstition itself, because we are Mages, using Magic." Luo Qi muttered.

"But we are still different from humans who offer incense!" Liu Ziyi said loudly, a bit irritated, "Your request is like hoping I kneel on the ground and burn some incense, and then I can naturally get the desired result."

"But you don't know how Du Zhengyi does it at all, do you? Maybe he just knows some Spell that even you don't know." Luo Qi debated with her persuasively, a cunning light flashing in his eyes.

"I don't know? I am a member of the Experimental Spell Committee; there might be Magic I don't use, but there will never be Magic I don't know!" Liu Ziyi was so angry that her face turned red, glaring at the young man in front of her.

Luo Qi narrowed his eyes, "Obviously your senior brother is a counterexample."

"What? Damn!" Liu Ziyi said "Damn" loudly, "Fine, theoretically I can guess how he does it!"

"Then tell me how the Qionglin War God miraculously creates superstition." Luo Qi said leisurely, "I always hear him say himself that he measures energy residue."

"Some energy residue can indeed be measured, for example, large-scale Magic involving many people, heavy Offensive Magic, and some special types of Magic such as Medical Magic. But sensor crystals used to record the environment are a completely different matter. First of all, it has its own crystal, right? I mean, this kind of Magic is attached to a Magic Artifact, not directly from a Mage. Secondly, the energy released after it is activated is very small, almost untraceable. These things are supposed to work quietly; they are designed not to be noticed." Liu Ziyi said.

Luo Qi did not refute her, waiting expectantly for her to continue.

Liu Ziyi glared at him angrily, her gaze drifting, and a muddled look appeared on her face again; Luo Qi could now distinguish that it was the look of her thinking. She bit her lower lip and muttered, "Cannot be measured directly... unless measured indirectly. Sensor crystals, besides needing to record, also need to communicate to transmit the collected data back. There is some Synchronous Magic between the crystal responsible for collecting information and the background crystal, and both sides use a specific Secret Language as a Magic Protocol."

Luo Qi blinked, completely unable to understand this level of magic theory. "What does that mean?"

"It means that..." Liu Ziyi's face lit up, and Luo Qi knew she had found the answer. "Actually, there is no need to measure the energy of the sensor crystal itself, nor is there a need to measure the Magic that collects information; it is enough to test whether there is Magic transmitting information in the space. The types of transmission Magic Protocols are very limited, and there are only a few common Secret Languages for transmitting information. As long as I can formalize the Secret Language from the space, I can locate the sensor crystal."

"Truly a genius." Luo Qi praised sincerely, "So Du Zhengyi also solves impossible problems in such a roundabout way, right? You geniuses from the gifted class are really amazing; you have raised the level of the entire Mage community."

"You only studied until the fourth grade, yet you can understand this theory; you are also very talented." Liu Ziyi said modestly.

"To be honest, I didn't understand anything." Luo Qi said sincerely and unhurriedly, "I just understood that you can solve the problem."

Liu Ziyi stared at him with a complex expression, but in the end, she conceded, "Fine, I'll try. Fortunately, the types of such Spells are limited, totaling only nine; if I know the range, it's easy to test, and I should be able to find it."