High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 600: Chapter 269: The Head of the Sheep Tomb, The Three Stars in Lu_1

Zheng Qing looked toward the sound.

The main hunter of the Absolution team was half squatting in front of the gas root infested with fireflies, resting on his knees, with a puzzled face.

”Do these insects seem unfit for this environment? Such as the atmospheric pressure, humidity, or temperature?” He picked up a bug with his fingertip, turned his head, and looked at Zheng Qing in surprise: ”Why do they keep twinkling on and off!”

Indeed, the fireflies laying on the gas root sucking tree sap had lanterns on their bellies that flickered on and off, like unstable light bulbs.

Zheng Qing approached, reached out to lift a bug, and tore it off the gas root.

”Probably not.” He frowned, looking closely at the sap remaining on the insect’s mouth, and murmured: ”According to the teaching assistant, this kind of simple structure of small insects can adapt to all known worlds... As for this brightness.”

He reached into his grey cloth bag and took out an instruction manual.

This was the user manual provided by the school laboratory when he received the insects from Assistant Hilda. The contents were detailed, with comprehensive instructions, and there were explanations of many special cases.

Soon, he found a relevant explanation from the manual.

”...To enhance the detection effect, the experimental subject DHC-3-5.cov has lowered the demon energy threshold. Even a very subtle demon energy fluctuation will cause an abnormal reaction in the experimental subject... such as group collapse syndromes (such as large-scale experimenter exhaustion), group function disorders (such as unstable light status, reduced wing flapping rate) and so on... However, the lowered threshold also makes the experimental subjects overly sensitive, even a demon’s residual hair, or even blood, can cause related abnormal phenomena (for specific data comparison, see attachment three)...”

Before Zheng Qing had time to turn to Attachment Three, he saw a bright light from the corner of his eye as the firefly on Zhang Ji Xin’s fingertip suddenly swelled and bursts into intense white light.

Following that, a sharp explosion sounded in his ear.

”Pop!”

The bright light in that moment made him dizzy, but it also pierced the fog in his mind.

”Attack!” He steadied himself against a tree, reached out and took out a deck of talisman paper, and shouted at the same time: ”There’s a demon!!”

”Triangle Defense Array! Prepare for battle!!” Zhang Ji Xin’s hoarse shout broke the tranquility of the dense forest: ”Doctor in the middle! Mister, Fat Man form the perimeter defensive formation with me!”

The few male wizards dropped the miscellanea in their hands, and in the blink of an eye they stood at their designated positions according to the main hunter’s coordination—thanks to the Judgement hunting team, they had reinforced this emergency response ability in previous training.

The strong light dissipated, and the surroundings were quiet.

The Absolution team’s Triangle Defense Array was emitting a faint white light in the dark forest, illuminating the surrounding area within tens of meters.

But they didn’t see any demons.

It was as if the bug that had just exploded was everyone’s collective illusion.

No one relaxed their vigilance.

”Doctor, call the swordsman back immediately!” Zheng Qing, with his back to Xiao Xiao, shouted in a sharp and hushed tone.

As the tracker of the Absolution team, the Blue Bird had just left the camp a few minutes ago following Zheng Qing’s instructions to explore the surroundings. But now, Zheng Qing felt he had probably made a terrible decision.

”I hope he hasn’t gone too far.” Xiao Xiao rustled through the law book in his hand, quickly found the contact spell, and murmured the spell: ”Bird’s chirping...”

An intangible fluctuation, with Xiao Xiao at the center, swept in all directions.

”I never understood why these bugs have to emit such strong light when they explode!” Fat Man’s grumble finally echoes behind Zheng Qing, ”Who on earth are they causing trouble for!”

Zheng Qing couldn’t help but chuckle softly.

”Originally, they should’ve been causing trouble for the demons,” he whispered, ”Usually, these bugs should be scouting outside our defense circle, or even farther away. So when they encounter a demon, the strong light and noise can not only disrupt the demon’s senses but also effectively alert hunters far away.”

”But our guests didn’t wait for us to release these little guys, and they eagerly set them off.” Zhang Ji Xin muttered grudgingly, ”It feels like a low-quality explosive charm just exploded in your hand.”

”How did those beasts break through the charm arrays outside?!” Fat Man leaned at an angle of 120 degrees from Zheng Qing, with one hand holding a law book, allowing a faint halo to flow between the pages, and at the same time mumbling under his breath, his tone filled with doubts.

He was talking about the Five Elements Bagua Formation that Zheng Qing set up around the campsite not long ago. This formation contains effects such as hiding tracks, blocking the aura, confusing demon perception, and isolating most curses. Even in official hunting competitions, it’s often used by hunting teams as a temporary camp guard method.

Fat Man’s question is also the greatest doubt at the bottom of everyone’s heart —— as a conventional defensive formation with a long history, the effectiveness of the Five Elements Bagua Formation is unquestionable. It’s not an exaggeration to say that as long as there are enough charms, this formation can last until the end of the hunt.

But the attackers apparently had no intention of letting the young wizards figure out their secret.

”Pop!”

”Pop pop!”

”Pop! Pop pop!”

One after another, explosions sounded on the roots not far away, the fireflies that were originally sucking on tree sap, exploded one after another like a string of firecrackers, blossoming with brilliant light and fierce sound, using their lives.

The originally dark forest was suddenly filled with blinding white light, almost blinding several hunters.

”Zang sheep is at the first grave, with three stars in Liu!”

Xiao Xiao’s slightly sharp voice echoed within the defense formation. Then, a cold feeling surged from behind, as if wrapped in a water balloon, tightly enveloping Zheng Qing.

This is a very rare spell, often used by wizards to protect fragile porcelain magic items. The effect of this spell is like ’flowers in a mirror’, strengthens the concept of ’emptiness’. It’s all about things that look good but are useless, stuff that you can see but not touch.

Xiao Xiao used this spell, probably to deter the unidentified demon’s attack on the hunting team.

Admittedly, his idea makes sense, and the choice and use of spells are also very clever —— yet, it’s not the spell that Zheng Qing needs. Because under this spell, although the demon can’t attack the hunting team, he also can’t attack the demon.

The young scholarship student furrowed his brows slightly, felt his slightly ethereal body, shook his head, and ultimately didn’t speak.

In Zheng Qing’s view, dealing with people who young wizards are avoiding there shouldn’t be much danger. At most they have some certain concealing specialties. Even if his eyes are dazzled by the strong light just now, he still has enough confidence to suppress them with the law books and spells in his hands.

”Whew! Whew!”

Several whip-like things swept by from afar, going through several hunter’s defense arrays and their bodies, and then swiftly retreated.

”A snake demon?” Fat Man shook his head forcefully, still in shock.

His eyes hadn’t recovered from the brilliant explosion just now.

”It could also be a toad demon... or a lizard type, their tongues often evolve into the kind of attack method we just saw.” Xiao Xiao added his analysis —— because he was wearing glasses, maybe the scholar was the only one in the absolution hunting team who wasn’t affected by the fireflies’ explosion.

Zheng Qing believed that a lot of small magic must have been applied to his black-framed glasses.