High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 793: Chapter 141: Beta Town West District, Courtyard Number 54_1

After rushing out of the office, the paper crane flapped its wings and waveringly took to the cold wind, flying against it.

Along the way, it encountered several twin-tailed squirrels, familiar troublemaking rodents. Armed with their ability to glide from tree to tree with their tails, they attempted to capture the paper crane.

However, the paper crane was personally folded by the Dean of Jiuyou Academy. As a result, with just a few more flaps of its wings, it easily escaped the squirrels’ grasp.

It flew out of the office building, across the small plaza, through the long forest road, and instead of flying directly over Lin Zhong Lake, it made a large detour along the lakefront corridor heading out of the academy. Despite the lake’s icy narrows, the dangerous aura from the lake had not diminished.

Its destination was a large mansion in the west district of Beta Town.

Unlike the north district of Beta Town, filled with lowly tricksters, or the south district, home to impoverished low-ranking wizards, the west district of Beta Town has always been considered a privileged neighborhood in the wizarding world. Many wizard clans, including the O’Briens, Tabbots, Karens, the Zhongshan Zhang family, the Tang family of Shu, the Metropolitan Blair family, and many others possess properties in this neighborhood.

Naturally, the Qingqiu Su family was no exception.

Located in the 54th courtyard of the western district of Beta Town was a mansion with a beautiful garden. A residence of such scale is exceptionally rare in the valuable land of Beta town.

Compared to its neighbors on either side, the 54th courtyard appears quite approachable. There are no towering, ashen walls surrounding the property, no terrifying gargoyles with dark, ghastly faces watching passersby. There isn’t even a ’private property’ sign standing ten meters from the gate.

The entire courtyard has an open layout.

The fence, made of forearm-thick log poles, is only about a meter high, and the gaps between the poles are enough for an adult to put a fist through.

Outside the fence is a shallow stream only ankle-deep. The bottom is filled with multicolored pebbles, and occasionally, one can see several small golden-red fish wiggling their way through the stones. The stream, even in deep winter, never freezes but continues to flow steadily.

On the outside of the small stream, a few large gray-white stones sit securely against the water, at the farthest end of the garden. Unlike the affluent residences in the neighborhood, the markers here have not been decorated with any magical inscriptions. They resemble simple ’chairs’ — a naturally charming reprieve for weary passersby.

Within the fence lies a splendid garden. The roses hanging on the fence, the pliable branches, rounded flowers, layers of petals: purple, pink, white, all piled in shades of green bring an air of dignified liveliness. Amongst them are roses, azaleas, chrysanthemums, orchids, and even the humble foxtail grass. A few bright green bamboo shoots lean sideways against the garden rocks.

Small trees border the flower beds — there are no common magnolias or ginkgo biloba trees often found in wizard homes, nor are there eerie comfrey or locust trees. Instead, neatly arranged poplars and empress trees surround the area. These young trees have clean and tender white bark which, paired with the colorful flowers in the gardens, provide a striking contrast.

Surrounding this garden is a white-walled, red-tiled pavilion with upturned eaves.

At eleven in the morning, at the height of the sun’s liveliness, the mansion’s housekeeper, Su Man, was directing several little blue elves to catch flower sprites and grass sprites hidden amongst the flowers — a task she now carries out every morning.

During the summer, these little creatures did not require daily supervision. But when winter arrived, perhaps only in this mansion in all of Beta Town did there still exist a world of greenery. Naturally, it attracted a significant number of unexpected visitors from all directions.

This year, the hibernation season arrived earlier than expected. The fervorous beasts had decimated many forest elves, leaving those that had escaped unable to secure enough food to last the winter. Therefore, this flourishing garden was the only chance of survival for these elves.

Taking care of Greenhill mansion were mostly young girls, and a few older nannies, who were not fond of the vibrant outdoors. The girls had an abundance of compassion. They weren’t allowed to explicitly take care of these creatures due to their duties but found time throughout the day to feed these creatures. They allowed the elves to gather nectar, fruits, and other nourishments from the gardens, early in the morning and late in the evenings.

Of course, these designated times were before the mansion’s gates were unlocked and after they were closed. For instance, if a guest were to stroll through during the afternoon and come across a group of elves clad in tattered leaf clothes squealing and scampering about, it would be most uncouth.

So, Su Man’s job was to tidy up the garden before the mansion’s owner stepped out.

”It’s past ten o’clock! The sun is almost overhead! If you keep dawdling here, we won’t be able to answer for it!” The head housekeeper crouched in front of a cluster of azalea flowers, looking at a few flower sprites burying their heads in the petals, savoring the nectar. She pleaded earnestly, ”How about coming back later? After the mansion has locked its gates in the evening, I’ll prepare a bowl of flower nectar for you... undiluted!”

The flower sprites didn’t seem to hear her. They stubbornly buried their heads in the centers of the flowers.

It was getting later, and keeping her calm, Su Man winked at a few blue elves. They grabbed the flower sprites by their necks and threw them out of the fence — while flower and grass sprites didn’t like winter, it didn’t mean they feared the cold. Quite the contrary, many flower sprites enjoyed dancing in the snow when the winter plum blossoms bloomed. However, they hibernated during winter due to the scarcity of food and high energy requirements of their bodies, resulting in their scarce appearances.

After tidying up the ’pests’ in the garden, Su Man stood up, stretched, and yawned contentedly in the brilliant sunlight. She contemplated whether it was time to wake the young lady.

Just then, she saw a paper crane flapping unsteadily through the large willow tree at the entrance of the courtyard; it hit the doorplate with a faint thud.