High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 909: Chapter 257 Dimensional Wire Entanglement Syndrome

Zheng Qing’s first winter hunting activity at First University had ended abruptly and anticlimactically.

Due to the illegal invasion by the Dark Council, the three-day winter hunting event initially planned was cut short to just one day. First University wasn’t afraid of the Disciples of Darkness, but they wouldn’t gamble with the students’ lives by exposing them outside the school’s Protection Array.

So, early Saturday morning, the students of First University received a joint notice issued by the university professors’ council, the school works committee, and the student union, prohibiting them from leaving the campus without a professor’s permission.

And in order to obtain a professor’s approval, the most basic requirement was to have proficient mastery of the ”Yuan Chen Guardian Spell.”

Professor Yao had indeed taught this spell to the students long ago, but since the spell was not a compulsory subject in the curriculum, very few took practicing it seriously—more importantly, even with serious practice, very few could master it.

This new rule was a bolt from the blue for the young wizards of the Absolution Hunting Team.

They had just opened a new shop on Beta Town Pedestrian Street less than a month ago, and both the inside and outside of the store were still in a period of adjustment; if they, as the owners, could not be there, only God knew what would become of D&K in the end.

”Relax, don’t we also have a few ’employees’ in the store? Fox Five comes from a distinguished family, after all, surely he can keep an eye on a small shop,” said Zhang Ji Xin, biting the end of his brush, his face full of anguish. ”Compared to the little shop, what’s really deadly is Professor Li’s final exam... so much material, who could memorize it all!”

He was referring to the scope of the exam that Potion Making Professor Li had outlined for the first-year wizards days earlier. Unlike other subjects where professors mark key difficult points, Professor Li had marked it section by section.

According to him, Potion Making was a precise and no-nonsense subject. Every line in the textbook, every step of the operation, had been verified time and again by countless wizards over hundreds of years. Especially the first-year content, which was very basic and very important. To score well in his classes, one must master these fundamentals thoroughly.

And ’thorough mastery’ naturally meant memorizing everything completely.

This was incredibly difficult for Elder Zhang Da, whose brain was mostly turning to muscle.

”The exam points Professor Li marked are very basic,” said Xin Fat Man, who was proficient in Potion Making, scoffing at Elder Zhang Da’s worries. On the other hand, his concern about the shop differed sharply from Zhang Ji Xin’s: ”As for the employees you mentioned, please don’t tell me they’re those cats and mice... Are you sure those cats won’t choose our inventory for their midnight snack?”

What he referred to as ’cats and mice’ were the temporary animal employees in D&K—including three cats, four mice, and a male fox affectionately called Hank and formally known as Fox Five.

Apart from the Forest Cat and the Ragdoll Cat that couldn’t speak, the other six animals could converse fluently, more than capable of interacting with customers coming into the shop.

They were also the permanent employees arranged by the Absolution Hunting Team for their own shop.

However, since there were many mice among D&K’s goods and several cats among the employees, many, including Xin Fat Man, had expressed concerns about the safety of the store’s inventory to a lesser or greater degree.

”It’s not ’cats and mice’; it’s ’Cat Three, Mouse Four, Fox Five,’” corrected Zhang Ji Xin. ”Besides, neither the Ragdoll Cat nor the Forest Cat likes to eat mice... not to mention Brother Huang.”

”I’ve only seen Brother Huang eat dried little fish,” Zheng Qing finally perked up a bit when they discussed the Yellow Flowered Cat, interjecting, ”Also, don’t use the name Fox Five anymore, it sounds terrible... Call it Hank instead.”

”Yo, our dear fully-funded student is revived again,” Xin Fat Man said with a tone of mock amazement.

Ever since the winter hunt, Zheng Qing’s mood had been quite desolate. Even when the members of the Absolution Hunting Team got together for revision sessions, he seemed somewhat wilted.

So, naturally Xin Fat Man was a bit surprised when he suddenly heard him actively join the conversation.

”Ignorance is truly bliss,” Zheng Qing remarked somberly while looking at Fat Man’s radiant face.

In fact, to most students, the situation that day during the winter hunt wasn’t particularly horrible — the worst that happened was that some Black Wizards invaded a D-grade hunting area, creating a small Sandbox World, causing a bit of trouble for the Assistant Team and some obscure hunting team in that area.

Besides Zheng Qing, no one knew that on that day Su Shi Jun had shattered her fox tail, nor did anyone know that Bull Head had opened a portal and let in a giant hand with six fingers, and certainly no one knew that the timeline of this world had been tampered with by a finger, rewinding twenty minutes.

Because of those twenty minutes, Zheng Qing suddenly had many deeper and more bewildering perceptions of the existence of this world.

Sometimes, he would raise his hand, looking at the intersecting lines on his palm, and would unconsciously recall the scene that day when the universe’s timeline reversed follow the movement of a needle — this often filled him with a strong sense of unreality.

Su Shi Jun said that this reaction was a common symptom for low-level wizards after encountering high-dimensional magic, referred to in wizards’ terminology as Dimensional Wire Entanglement Syndrome.

”The treatment is simple, just two words, ’focus,’” Su Daxu advised while she was showing Poseidon a storybook, ”Use ’focus’ to anchor your mind, so your world won’t experience disturbances due to high-dimensional interference. You currently have a great opportunity... your final exams.”

Her meaning was for Zheng Qing to concentrate on facing the final exams, which could not only result in great scores but also relieve the condition of ’Dimensional Wire Entanglement Syndrome,’ killing two birds with one stone.

To help the young warlock to study more attentively, Su Daxu took Poseidon to Greenhill Mansion and confidently stated that the little fox’s interference would affect Zheng Qing’s study state.

To this, Zheng Qing neither agreed nor disagreed.

However, he had no objections to Su Daxu’s arrangements. Although many events that occurred inside the Sandbox Mini World had been erased from reality, they were still vividly preserved in Zheng Qing’s memory.

Especially now, as the school emanated a peculiar vibe, he increasingly felt that keeping the little fox in Greenhill Mansion was a good idea.

”To be all-knowing is boring, to be ignorant is tragic, to know only in part is painful.” Perhaps influenced by Zheng Qing’s previous comment, Xiao Xiao, who had been engrossed in revising his divination homework, suddenly lifted his head to express this sentiment out of nowhere.

Zheng Qing chewed on this phrase, finding much truth in it.