Chapter 549: Hurricane

"Child, you haven't even spared a single moment for this place."

The Old Mage in the crimson robe opened his eyes and spoke. He sat cross-legged on a thick, soft felt rug, while the space on the rug surrounded by candles opposite him was completely empty. The Old Mage paused slightly, then realized and looked behind him.

Luo Qi was leaning against the corner of the wall behind him, pushing most of his body weight against the tapestry-covered corner. His eyes were dull and listless, and his fingers were slowly picking at a small hole in the tapestry.

"Child, your thoughts are like a hurricane in a valley," Mage Hashi said patiently.

Luo Qi reluctantly withdrew his focus and said, neither soft nor hard, "Then let it be with the wind; I was just sent here to serve my sentence."

Not long after returning from outside, he had been shoved by Du Zhengyi into the Highland Mage's classroom; Du Zhengyi felt this was a good place to cage him. He clearly accepted this fate; if he didn't let Du Zhengyi cage him for a while, he wouldn't be able to go anywhere.

It was a pity that Du Zhengyi didn't understand the Highland Mages that well; they never forced anyone, nor did they block anyone's path. Luo Qi silently calculated the time, not taking Mage Hashi's words to heart.

"You still haven't cleared your mind. Your brain is filled with too many things that don't belong to you—stolen, snatched, sent by others. I can see that they all carry different traces," Mage Hashi suddenly said.

Luo Qi turned his gaze to stare at him, guessing whether the Highland Mage was getting angry.

The Old Mage shook his head and said in oddly pronounced Chinese, "We do not judge right or wrong; even the gods are not qualified to judge. You must practice Meditation, starting from your Anchor Point to slowly unfold everything in your mind, finding the connections between them, and letting them be as harmonious as nature. You will slowly weave the connections between all existences until you weave an orderly network in your spiritual world, an all-encompassing connection; at that time, the Anchor Point will naturally degenerate into an ordinary point. We believe this is the only path you can take."

A diagram formed before Luo Qi's eyes. At first, all the strangely shaped points were connected to a central node, and he understood the fragility of this structure. Once the central node was destroyed, everything else would fall apart, and he would be drowned in this world of Chaos. Then, countless edges appeared between any two points, and all the nodes connected into a complex network, as stable as a drawn chemical structure.

The initial point disappeared into the stable and complex network structure, and Luo Qi could no longer distinguish it.

A surge of intense anger welled up from his chest, and the hurricane turned into a raging flame that swept through his entire body.

"Calm down, child!" Mage Hashi roared from the distant horizon. The scent of incense suddenly grew strong, like a guiding Ghost. Luo Qi smelled this scent and suddenly snapped back to his senses, abruptly leaving the corner of the wall and standing up straight.

"Meditation," Mage Hashi said persistently.

Luo Qi said nothing, turned, and left the room.

He walked down the corridor and stopped for a moment in the middle, looking for a room full of people but with silent souls. High-level Archmages could tightly hide their souls behind high-walled Shields, and the places where they gathered were just like that; if one probed shallowly, it really was a bit like a pile of puppets.

Outside the room door, it was silent; one couldn't tell there was anyone inside at all. Luo Qi stood at the door with great patience. Ten minutes later, the door was suddenly opened from the inside, and the noisy sounds in the room poured out with a boom. A middle-aged Mage appeared at the door in a rage and froze when he saw Luo Qi.

Liu Xiuyun.

Luo Qi took a step back, taking the opportunity to peer into the room behind Liu Xiuyun. They had expanded the space in the room a little, squeezing in a conference table and more than twenty Mages.

He didn't see Du Zhengyi, which was a bit strange; if there was investigation work tomorrow, he would definitely participate. Pei Shu was inside, sitting in the middle of a long table, listening thoughtfully to the arguments of the Mages on his left and right. It looked a bit like a human oil painting, that "The Last Supper."

Just before the door closed completely, Pei Shu suddenly raised his head. Across the table and several heads, his deep gaze landed on Luo Qi outside the door. Luo Qi's gaze met his. Pei Shu was thoughtful, his gaze deep; Luo Qi was expressionless, not mixing any innocence into his expression to lower his threat level. But in an instant, the door panels closed, and the old man with tattoos disappeared behind the door.

"Luo Qi." Liu Xiuyun uttered his name from the depths of his throat, as if it were a Spell; he was cursing.

Luo Qi had a premonition that perhaps years later, Mages would all utter his name in this low, deep tone. It didn't matter.

He opened his mouth and asked bluntly, "What was the result of the meeting?"

Liu Xiuyun only hesitated slightly before saying, "No progress yet. You saw just now, they are arguing."

Luo Qi felt a wave of irritation in his heart, but his face remained expressionless as countless guesses rolled through his mind. Just as he had turned over three thoughts, Liu Xiuyun said it himself, "The engineering volume for setting up monitoring Magic on Kongsang Mountain is too large, and various departments are shirking responsibility. The monitoring Crystals also need to be allocated temporarily; perhaps the Society's inventory is insufficient, so they need to borrow from jewelers. Several big merchants are quibbling, all saying their own inventory is insufficient."

Luo Qi was stunned. It turned out that great goals were easy to establish, and principles could convince people, but when things had to be put into practice, it was actually so difficult. It was no wonder Du Zhengyi wasn't here; he must have been too lazy to attend such meetings long ago.

Liu Xiuyun grabbed his hair in exhaustion and irritation, and as if afraid Luo Qi wouldn't be satisfied, he hurriedly added a piece of news, "Regardless, some excellent Battle Mages will be sent over tomorrow."

Luo Qi asked instead, "Why send people over tomorrow? In such a hurry?"

Liu Xiuyun looked at him a few times; Luo Qi saw that there were already some bloodshot eyes. He was observing whether Luo Qi was trying to trick him; he viewed Luo Qi as too cunning and lacked the necessary sense of security. He hesitated for a longer moment this time, and finally said in a low voice, "The Lotus Burners appeared in that area; a Mage of ours working over there died today."

Luo Qi turned his head to stare at him.

On the first floor underground, in a corner of the temporary laboratory, Maji finally found Du Zhengyi, who was busy with a pile of data.

"What's going on?" Maji lowered the Soundproofing Magic around Du Zhengyi and pointed at him, asking in astonishment, "You have so many messages?"

Two Mages nearby sent over sneaky glances; they had been curious for an hour, but it was hard to come and ask.

Du Zhengyi was focused on finding connections and comparing data in the floating materials. Dozens of transparent bubbles floated around him, and from time to time, bubbles would tremblingly brush against his hair.

Maji stared blankly, "Don't you know you're surrounded by bubbles? Honestly, if you were a beautiful girl, this scene would be quite pretty, especially fitting for a twelve-year-old girl's mermaid fantasy."

Du Zhengyi looked up and stared at him coldly, "How about I let you listen to them?"

Maji didn't understand and didn't dare to nod rashly.

But just at this moment, Du Zhengyi looked at him maliciously and raised his right hand to snap his fingers.

Dozens of bubbles burst simultaneously, and dozens of identical voices shouted in unison with high and low pitches: "Brother!!!!!"

Maji was pushed back a step by the sound wave, looking in shock at the gloating Du Zhengyi. All work in the laboratory stopped, and everyone looked toward them. Maji touched his ears in embarrassment and finally covered his eyes.

"Luo Qi knows how to use Communication Magic? Are you f***ing bored enough to teach him this?"

"He's actually quite smart; he learned it after one lesson," Du Zhengyi said with a dark face.

(End of chapter)