High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 2173: Chapter 394: Countermeasures

”Absolutely not!”

He seemed to be gathering courage from himself, murmuring in a firm voice.

”What?”

The fat wizard, just recovering from irritation, heard the young public student talking to himself. He first showed a bit of confusion, then his face gradually turned sour: ”Do you think that what I said is incorrect? Is ’Beta Town Post’ not vile?”

”Absolutely not!”

Zheng Qing hurriedly denied it, repeating those unfortunate words once more, and suddenly realized there seemed to be a bizarre misunderstanding in their conversation. He paused and then explained in a remedial tone: ”What I meant to say is that ’Beta Town Post’ is the most shameless scoundrel! ... I was referring to something else just now...”

The simple sketch behind the door timely called out, ’Old Yao has turned the corridor corner with his pipe,’ interrupting the fat wizard’s inquiry, allowing the young public student to exhale a worried sigh of relief.

Coming back to his senses, he realized that the first class on Monday was Old Yao’s Curse Course. His face lost blood once again, with the breath he just released being held back in an instant.

Bang!

The classroom door was pushed open with great force, and the Magic Curse Professor, as always, strode onto the podium. Below, the young public student couldn’t help but recall the overwhelming giant palm from his dream, shivering subconsciously.

”Class begins!”

The professor waved his forearm with vigor, throwing the lecture notes onto the lectern, and with a beckoning gesture, four or five pieces of chalk scrambled out from the paper box, joyfully realizing their value on the blackboard. In no time, the room was filled with the sound of chalk writing.

”’Belief’ is a concept in the field of mysticism, possessing powerful and magical power.”

Old Yao, with his arms crossed, began lecturing unhurriedly, though the content seemed to have little to do with curses, leaving a crowd of young wizards below with bewildered faces: ”...This power can render one blind and deaf to reality, twist reality, maintain a false yet reliable balance, and even alter history, obscuring the truth along the timeline. But at the same time, it’s a very fragile force. If you doubt it, it flickers; if you disbelieve it, it collapses.”

Not sure if it was an illusion, Zheng Qing felt that when saying these words, the professor on the stage covertly glanced at him, his gaze appearing somewhat meaningful.

He subconsciously linked this concept with his dream from last night. But before he could clear his thoughts, the professor on stage changed the subject, talking about the class meeting from last night:

”...In the class meeting last night, I reminded you all that January 4th is the end-of-semester exam, today is already November 30th, and there’s a neat five weeks till the exams. Is this a lot of time? Quite a lot, enough for you to thoroughly review all the textbooks from this semester; is it little? Also very little, since preparing for a slightly complex magic experiment might take more than five weeks.”

”What do I mean by this? I mean that regardless of your current grades, you should all believe in yourselves and your ability to create your own miracles. Upholding this firm belief will allow you to fully harness the power of magic. It’s a mutually inclusive and complementary relationship. Four years of college, eight end-of-semester exams, and the third one is upon us. Your college life is nearly halfway over, and I’m sure none of you want to receive a dropout certificate in the end...”

”Now, open your textbooks, turn to page eighty-seven of ’Standard Spells’, let’s continue discussing the nineteen summoning spells in the Enock Magic of the Solomon Magic System, and how to interpret the different reading of this system in Hebrew and Latin...”

Before the voice fell, the squeaking sound of writing on the blackboard came to an abrupt stop. The wide surface was densely covered with spell texts, spell formulas, and interpretation elements.

The nail-sized remaining chalk fell, covered with dust, sliding in an elegant arc mid-air, and contentedly returned to their paper box.

Listening to the professor’s incessant speech from the lectern, Zheng Qing flipped through the textbook in front of him somewhat irritably, his mind tumbling with various thoughts.

At one moment, he felt the professor on the lectern had a malicious gaze, maybe he had seen today’s ”Beta Town Post” and was waiting to settle scores; at other times, he found Old Yao’s so-called ’belief’ power made a lot of sense, perhaps if he just ’disbelieved’ in last night’s dream, he wouldn’t encounter any risk; on another flip of thinking, he felt he should ’believe’ in last night’s forewarning and shouldn’t classify it simply as an ordinary dream.

Several thoughts, of a common origin yet distinctly different, were like knights wearing various armors, wielding lances and halberds fighting fiercely on the battlefield, with no clear victor emerging.

Occasionally, when he glanced at the blackboard, it was filled with bewildering spell texts and spell formulas, compounded with the imminent end-of-semester exams, making it hard for anyone to catch their breath.

The only thing Zheng Qing could confirm was that he still had a chance to avoid last night’s suspected ’prescient dream’— halfway through the Curse Course, the young public student secretly released a paper mouse, delivering a note to a witch sitting in the front row, reminding her to keep a close eye on Li Meng today, not to let her run around, especially not to the Cat Fruit Tree this evening.

As for the reason, the warlock vaguely mentioned having a bad dream yesterday, but he didn’t elaborate on the dream’s content. This slight omission was enough to make the witch think Zheng Qing’s dream indicated Li Meng was in danger. Hopefully, this way, the likelihood of Li Meng appearing under the Cat Fruit Tree tonight was virtually nil.

As for Old Yao.

The young public student glanced at the eloquent Legendary Wizard on the stage, somewhat despairingly touching his ear. Besides hoping the Legendary Boss wouldn’t take things too seriously with him, his only reliance was on the Little Green Snake residing in his ear canal to resist Old Yao’s fierce palm.

Maybe because there were many eyes around during the day.

Zheng Qing eventually left the Curse Course classroom safely, not reduced to a pulp under everyone’s gaze. But the effect of that report gradually spread wide.

Before the afternoon.

The front-page headline of ”Beta Town Post” had stirred up a storm within the academy, quickly expanding what was originally a small-scale movement confined to a few academies to the entire Wizarding World.

Members of the Law Book Liberation Association gave up their lunch break, energetically distributing leaflets everywhere, hinting at Jiuyou Academy’s students that they should heed their dean’s words.

Surprisingly, this rhetoric succeeded in bewitching quite a few freshmen who were new to the world.

Just observing for a day, Zheng Qing noticed many wizards now leaned toward the ’Give Me A Frog’ movement. The market even experienced a temporary frog shortage, with many ’kind-hearted’ and ’enthusiastic’ individuals genuinely buying frogs and sending them to North Beta Town, supporting the North District Wizards’ reform movement with concrete actions.