Chapter 3012 - 25: Long Time No See

Chapter 3012: Chapter 25: Long Time No See

"—The plaque on the main gate just broke recently and hasn’t been replaced yet, right?"

Coming out of the Xuanhuang Wood Small World, Yellow Flowered Cat suddenly looked at Zheng Qing and very solemnly brought up this little matter: "While it’s still early, do you want to go see what plaque they hung up?"

Still early?

Zheng Qing looked up at the hazy moon hanging half-high in the sky and the heavy night, feeling a bit speechless.

"Maybe to cat eyes, night and day look about the same, but to us Humans, the difference is still pretty obvious." The young dean grumbled, but he didn’t reject the Flower Cat’s suggestion, and turned to walk toward where the main gate was.

Yellow Flowered Cat narrowed its eyes with a grin, tail cocked up, walking lightly at his side.

Zheng Qing caught that scene out of the corner of his eye.

"Why did you suddenly start smiling?" He slowed his pace suspiciously.

"...I thought of something happy." Flower Cat gave a dry cough, whiskers twitching slightly.

"What happy thing?" On a sudden Caprice, Zheng Qing just felt a weird vibe in the air, and cautiously rubbed the ring on his hand.

"...Once the Xuanhuang Fruit is ripe in the future, I can eat one and toss one!" Yellow Flowered Cat thought for a few seconds, then gave a very solid reason.

That really did sound like something that would make it happy.

Zheng Qing let out a short breathy laugh.

"I don’t even know how often the Xuanhuang Fruit ripens..." The Young Wizard shook his head slightly.

Before the words fell.

Boom!

Not far away, that main gate he had just repaired not long ago collapsed with a thunderous crash. With dust billowing up, a tall figure strode over the threshold, shouting, "—Monster, hand over your life!"

Hearing that familiar voice, Zheng Qing’s eyelid twitched a little.

The muzzle of the Charm Gun in his hand shifted slightly to the side, but his finger still stayed hooked on the trigger.

The dust settled.

Revealing the gate-crasher’s sauce-red big face.

It was Zhang Ji Xin.

He was wearing leather Hunting Clothes, gloves on his hands, a Law book hanging at his waist, and a brass shield-shaped badge pinned to his chest, with the small seal script "Absolution" on it. His forearms and other spots were plastered with yellow Talisman paper, and his whole body radiated a kind of savage hunting aura.

Elder Zhang Da had clearly seen Zheng Qing not far away holding the Charm Gun. He froze for a moment, then flew into a rage: "Bold monster, you actually dare use Illusion Technique in front of your lord? Today I’ll let you taste what a bowl-sized fist feels like!"

No doubt it was that reckless idiot.

Zheng Qing, feeling a bit speechless, stowed away the Charm Gun.

"—What are you doing here?" Yellow Flowered Cat suddenly cut in, glaring at the Red-faced Male Wizard.

Just about to charge forward, Zhang Ji Xin slammed to a stop when he saw the Flower Cat. His gaze wavered between it and Zheng Qing for a few seconds, his expression somewhat bewildered and unsure.

"Not Illusion Technique, one hundred percent genuine." Zheng Qing guessed what he was thinking and couldn’t help finding it funny: "We came today to check out the site. What are you here for... how did you end up here?"

Those last two sentences might sound like just a swap in word order, but they were actually two different questions.

Because Zheng Qing suddenly felt something was off.

So much so that all the things that had rushed to his lips after not seeing him for so long—like Absolution, like Astronomy Class 08-1, like Xin Fat Man and Xiao Xiao and so on—were all swallowed back down together, replaced by that final question.

As he spoke, he even lowered his head to glance at the Flower Cat by his feet.

Only Yellow Flowered Cat was sitting there with its tail neatly curled, looking all well-behaved—that in itself was the biggest anomaly.

Zhang Ji Xin stared blankly at the young Warlock in Black Robe standing before him.

"Scum..."

He opened his mouth automatically; after blurting out the first syllable, he seemed to realize it wasn’t appropriate, and in a very short span of time corrected himself four times in a row: "—Qing... Zheng... Dean?"

At the same time, his expression shifted from stunned, to delighted, finally settling into a thoroughly respectful look.

Zheng Qing felt a bit of a toothache coming on.

Maybe for Wizards born into noble clans, respect for those above them is an instinct, but to Zheng Qing, this kind of put-on performance only made his skin crawl.

"Speak properly!" He walked up a few steps and slapped the Red-faced Male Wizard on the shoulder, saying irritably, "You still haven’t explained—how did you end up here? And why did you smash my gate?"

"This courtyard is yours?" Zhang Ji Xin let out a dry laugh.

Zheng Qing’s gaze fell to the badge on his chest, and a guess formed in his heart: "—The Hunting team is doing night training?"

"You could say that."

The Red-faced Male Wizard mumbled, his eyes suddenly going a bit shifty: "We were just tracking a Shu Deer. It ran and ran, and we chased and chased... then it disappeared somewhere around here... uh, everyone suspected it might have gotten lost and slipped into this courtyard, so we decided to come in and search..."

"—If your prey gets away, it gets away. What do you mean your prey might have gotten lost?"

Zheng Qing felt that phrasing was a bit weird and couldn’t help chuckling, but halfway through the laugh his expression abruptly froze, a twinge of bad premonition rising in his heart: "Wait, you just said ’everyone’? Who else? Where are the others?"

His voice tightened slightly.

"Uh, to keep that Shu Deer from bolting out another gate, the others went around along the walls to check the other directions."

When he got to this part, Zhang Ji Xin deliberately emphasized his earlier "mistake": "—Me kicking the gate was ’scaring the snake out of the grass’, see, to drive the prey toward the other directions."

Zheng Qing was silent for a few seconds.

"This courtyard doesn’t have any other gates." He explained dryly.

Zhang Ji Xin’s eyes held a hint of sympathy: "—Oh, then the others will probably get here any minute."

Zheng Qing suddenly felt his scalp prickle.

A surge of impulse to turn and run.

But rationality told him that running wouldn’t fix anything; it would only make things worse. If he’d pulled a disappearing act before the gate got kicked in, he’d have a hundred excuses ready to defend himself; but running off after bumping into Zhang Ji Xin would be straight-up courting death.

As his reason settled back in—

He finally realized what had been off about the Flower Cat earlier, and shot it a vicious glare. Then another thought struck him, and he couldn’t help glancing at the Red-faced Male Wizard: "—How did you guys find this place?"

"We followed that Shu Deer, obviously?"

Zhang Ji Xin shrugged, craning his neck to look back, his tone carrying a trace of impatience: "And don’t ask me why we’re chasing that Shu Deer tonight... if you must ask, it’s just ’luck’. Probably that guy smelled Soul Light’s aura."

In the end, he did manage to recover the mindset he’d had when he used to hang around Zheng Qing.

But Zheng Qing didn’t feel even a bit happy.

Because right as Zhang Ji Xin was explaining, a flurry of hurried, rustling footsteps sounded outside the courtyard wall. In the blink of an eye, those footsteps had spread to the gate.

A standard Five-pointed star formation squeezed through the door frame and unfolded in front of Zheng Qing. Within the blooming array light, a few startled exclamations could be faintly heard, then they vanished without a trace.

Zheng Qing knew why they’d shut up.

Because the Witch leading the Battle Array was striding toward him with a cold face, Law book in hand.

The familiar corner of that copperplate book cover shimmered with a chilling glint under the moonlight.