Chapter 463: Ruins 7

In the true Underground Laboratory, before the light suddenly dimmed, Experimental Mages were busily shuttling through the main hall, adjusting complex Magic parameters, collecting data, and rapidly forming reports. Calculators from the Investigation Team had also descended into the underground hall, occupying a corner to perform calculations based on the data submitted by the Experimental Mages. Most Mind Mages sat on chairs in the core area of the hall, observing the three-dimensional Magic images in the central display area from various angles; those images were of a boy and a girl. A small portion of the Mind Mages had no interest in the images, their attention focused on the analysis reports that Calculation Mages were constantly transmitting to them.

Liu Li walked coldly through the Magic images, not caring in the slightest whose line of sight she was blocking, and finally stopped beside the girl in the image who was speaking. "Am I seeing this right? Is that the student I admire most next to Luo Qi?" she said sternly with a strange expression, turning back to glare at the Experimental Mages behind her.

No one dared to be the first to answer her question, and she continued sarcastically, "Don't you realize that compared to you, Liu Ziyi is the only one who would be harmed by Luo Qi? Because the rest of your brains are so small that Luo Qi couldn't even find where they are; it's just too safe."

Someone wanted to laugh, but in the end, no one dared to make a sound, nor did anyone dare to move.

"Zhou Quan!" Liu Li called out sternly; her patience had always been extremely limited.

"Yes, yes." The male Mage whose name was called immediately squeezed forward from behind the crowd; he had not been standing far away, but had been stuck in a blind spot, hiding well until Mage Liu Li called him out directly.

"Who was originally responsible for drawing Luo Qi away?" Liu Li asked.

Zhou Quan laughed out loud, and Liu Li stared at him unhappily, not understanding what he found so funny. She had never liked this slick Mage; Mages were rarely slick, but he was just that way. She had long wanted to kick him out of Qionglin, but had no presentable reason. Pei Shu, who had always been the wisest, insisted on keeping Zhou Quan, and had a very good reason. That reason was particularly applicable to the current situation—if Qionglin were in a complete mess, the first person who could figure out the ins and outs would definitely be Zhou Quan.

"It happened like this." Zhou Quan did not put away his smile at all. He was not much of a capable Mage, but he was simply not afraid of the stern female Mage, who narrowed her eyes, knowing this full well. Zhou Quan continued, "It was supposed to be the Experimental Mage Ji Mingrui who invited Luo Qi to the garden and then found a chance to leave on her own, but the person conveying the message got it wrong and called Ming Rui instead. The thing is, Ji Mingrui has some rapport with Luo Qi in the laboratory, so Luo Qi might believe Ji Mingrui if she called him for something. But Ming Rui is not familiar with Luo Qi at all, and Luo Qi would not pay her any mind. She is also naturally afraid of Mind Mages and didn't know why she was asked to take Luo Qi to the garden, so she was uneasy and even more afraid to go talk to Luo Qi. Ming Rui felt that Battle Mages are not afraid of Mind Mages, so she went to find a Battle Mage she knew and begged him to complete the task for her."

At this point, Zhou Quan laughed even harder, his eyes shining, "This Battle Mage was Chi Yu, and I don't need to tell you what happened after that. Ming Rui probably didn't know that Chi Yu would want to kill Luo Qi; Chi Yu did indeed chase Luo Qi to the dunes, and as a result, Luo Qi used a massive temperature drop to destroy the plants, which summoned the Highland Mages. Things got chaotic there; Luo Qi was lucky enough to run back to the hall, and the hall at that time was as chaotic as a livestock pen, with people coming and going at all Teleportation Points, and the Experimental Mages couldn't execute any operations. Luo Qi met Liu Ziyi in the hall; I don't know why Liu Ziyi took Luo Qi underground, maybe it was a date, but that's not important. The Experimental Mages responsible for monitoring Luo Qi were delayed for a while by the Highland Mages' boundary-closing Magic, but they didn't know it was the Highland Mages who did it at the time, thinking it was caused by their own operational errors. So, when they anxiously confirmed the boundary was stable, they checked and found that Luo Qi was indeed underground, effectively alone. Because they were too afraid of being punished and didn't want to take responsibility, they hurriedly returned to the original plan and changed the Teleportation interface Luo Qi was to return to, connecting it to the Test Sandbox instead. Honestly, I was the last person to see Luo Qi normally, and yet no one told me about this test event. Otherwise, I might have been able to bridge things together; it goes to show that excessive secrecy is not the best policy."

"You already know enough, Mage Zhou. Even things you weren't supposed to know, you eventually find out anyway; it seems there's no need to notify you separately," Liu Li said indignantly.

Zhou Quan just shrugged, his face still wearing a grin.

Liu Li had nothing to say to all this; she didn't know what had happened—these Mages were all excellent talents, but together they had turned into a brainless behemoth.

She turned her head, wanting to put her attention back on the Magic images; she needed to follow the progress to make a judgment. She had missed quite a bit of progress while talking to Zhou Quan just now, and as she fixed her gaze on her favorite student, she recognized with panic the gestures she was making. This child was a genius Mage, but geniuses always had some strange shortcomings; for instance, she had very poor expressive ability when she was young, which even affected her chanting of Spells. When Liu Li helped Pei Shu teach her, she had used gestures to help her maintain the fluidity of her Magic; she overcame her expressive barrier after growing up, but had never broken the habit of using gestures.

"My god." Liu Li saw her gestures clearly and cried out in horror, "Change the Communication Magic type, change it immediately."

Several Experimental Mages started running, but were quickly stopped; the Great Mage in charge of Communication Magic demanded to know exactly what the change in type was, so as to avoid taking responsibility.

"Then shut it down, pause the Monitoring Crystal immediately." It was too late, Liu Li shouted; even a temporary shutdown would be better than having the Monitoring Crystal destroyed.

But it was already too late; everyone had seen the scene of the Magic materializing, and some gasped. Liu Li cursed their lack of experience. That materialized chain pointed out the location of the Transmission Crystal; even if they shut it down now, it was already too late. They at least knew the general direction, and she knew clearly that it wouldn't take long for Liu Ziyi to pinpoint it accurately.

"Are there any other backup nodes?" Liu Li asked anxiously.

The Experimental Mages became flustered, and amidst the sound of a Crystal shattering, a sweat-drenched Mage said, "This Sandbox hasn't been used for a long time, and for a long time there hasn't been a Mind Archmage... I can't remember... wait a moment, let me check..."

"Hurry up!" Liu Li urged unceremoniously, "Once this connection is broken, even if there is still a Transmission Crystal in the Sandbox, it won't be able to connect!"

"Yes, yes." The person muttered a reply, and information was extracted without interruption. Five minutes passed, and apart from the constantly jumping information, there was nothing else.

"Wei Zhen!" Liu Li called the person's name indignantly.

"I'm looking, I'm looking," the Experimental Mage replied anxiously, their voice becoming increasingly impatient.

Zhou Quan pondered and interjected from the side, "The Mind Mages haven't used it, have the Battle Mages not used this Sandbox either? Have you checked the records of the Battle Mage sequence?"

The Experimental Mage was startled, looked up, and said blankly, "The records show that this Sandbox was indeed taken from the Battle Mages; the Magic parameters might be on the Battle Mages' side, and we might not have brought the Recording Crystal over. My god, at the time we thought we definitely had the Recording Crystal for the Mind Mage Sandbox; ac... according to logic we should have had it, but..."

Liu Li breathed heavily in frustration and turned back to watch Liu Ziyi and Luo Qi getting closer and closer to the Transmission Crystal.

Zhou Quan summarized at the right moment, "But, the mistake lies in the fact that no true Mind Archmage has appeared for a long time, so it's normal for everyone to have forgotten the specific situation of this Sandbox. Ultimately, the biggest mistake is that poor Luo Qi shouldn't have been born; he was really too ill-timed when he crawled out of the womb."

Someone finally couldn't help but laugh out loud, and just as Zhou Quan was about to make a few more jokes with a grin, a cold, hard voice sounded behind him, "Shut your mouth."

Zhou Quan turned his head and saw the Doctor standing in the shadows; his expression was quite ugly. Zhou Quan wanted to say that the Doctor had no sense of humor, but after thinking about it, he closed his mouth; no one should offend the Doctor.

Liu Li ignored them and gave orders to the Experimental Mages, "Continue to find a way, go extract the Battle Mages' information as soon as possible; I give you this authorization, ten minutes."

But she knew it was useless; the only person who could possibly find a way to connect to the Qionglin Battle Mage database thousands of miles away within ten minutes was Liu Ziyi! The very person who was currently inside breaking the Communication Magic!

Time flew by. In the remaining time, the opportunity was completely lost, and Liu Li watched helplessly as her most beloved student, with a speed that made her proud, dismantled the energy crystal of the transmission node. She watched in frustration as the high-brightness Magic image flickered in despair and finally disappeared completely; all the Experimental Mages stopped their work, and they all fell into dimness, able to do nothing but look at each other.

Liu Li took a few deep breaths, turned around calmly, faced the highest-level expert member of the Investigation Team who was conducting the assessment, and said in a low voice, "We must make a decision."

The transmission in the underground hall buzzed and opened again. Liu Li wanted to ignore the person coming in, but when she caught a glimpse of that familiar figure, she could only sigh in frustration once more. Great, Du Zhengyi had arrived at just the right time, as if things weren't chaotic enough.

She watched the young man; there was no expression on his face, but no one could ignore the alertness in those eyes. He was slender, his gait steady and vigorous, approaching neither too fast nor too slow, like a leopard gradually closing in. So far, he had not said any superfluous words, silently accepting all of Qionglin's arrangements, almost submissively. But Liu Li felt more and more that it was hard to say; everything was spiraling out of control, and even this most stable constant of Qionglin was changing.

Du Zhengyi approached slowly, carrying a faint predatory posture; as he drew near, the threat pierced everyone's Yajian like static electricity. He walked into the core circle of the underground hall and looked at the Black Hole-like center they were gathered around, his pupils changing slightly. He tilted his head and pointed his chin at the Black Hole, "What happened here?"