April 25th, Sunday.

Early morning.

The two squads protecting Zheng Qing completed their shift transfer according to protocol. The outgoing squad was Qian Doudou’s squad from the Professor Joint Meeting Office, and the incoming squad was Ernest’s squad from the School Works Committee.

As an old school worker, Master Ernest possessed the typical cautious habits of an old-school wizard and the usual rigidity of the School Works Committee. Upon hearing that the protection target had changed his previous habits to spend the night in the teaching assistant’s office, he frowned immediately.

"Which office did you just say it was?" The Elder Wizard took off the pointed wizard hat from his head, carefully smoothing the brim with his fingers, and looked towards the office building with an inquisitive gaze.

"Thomas from the assistant team, who is also a member of the Guard Squad."

Qian Doudou handed his detailed guard report to the elderly man and added, "—according to the plan, his duty time is at eight in the morning..."

"Students staying out at night is against school rules, are you aware of this rule?" Old Ernest interrupted the explanation of the tall, thin warlock in front of him, his expression displeased.

As expected, young people are not reliable, he shook his head.

Upon hearing the old school worker refer to the "Campus Management Regulations," Qian Doudou fell silent immediately—since graduation, he hadn’t heard this term for a long time, and given his status and level of task execution, he rarely paid attention to small issues like ’students staying out at night’.

"Who is on duty near the office building tonight?" The Elder Wizard turned to look at another gray robe beside him.

"Master Ferna."

"Hmm, he has had interactions with the target, familiar to a suitable degree... notify Ferna that there is a student staying out at night in the office building, have him go over and investigate."

"Yes."

A streak of light disappeared into the deep night.

Soon, an elderly wizard, tall and holding a long wooden magic wand, appeared within the surveillance range of the Guard Squad. The faint green Deadly Wind Lamp flickered at the top of the wand in the night, like a sneaky one-eyed ghost.

Qian Doudou remained silent throughout, offering no defense for his ’presumptuous’ handling method. Nor did he leave immediately after the shift ended.

Fortunately, he didn’t leave.

Not long after Old Verne’s figure disappeared into the office building, the lights in the office where the target was located turned on, and the watchers easily saw the tall figure who knocked on the door and entered.

"What is he doing?"

The witch behind Qian Doudou spoke with a touch of unease: "I mean, isn’t the distance between Master Ferna and the target too close?"

Through the window, the watchers could see clearly that the old school worker holding the long magic wand seemed to have his face pressed against the target, which from any angle did not meet the standard of ’checking’.

Old Ernest raised his hand, somewhat hesitant.

Just at this moment.

A green flame suddenly appeared before the watchers, and amidst the swirling fire tongues, it quickly outlined a small green bird, which flapped its wings and opened its mouth, emitting an old and solemn voice.

"Ernest, you’re in trouble."

Old Verne’s voice rang out from the bird’s mouth, clearly reaching the ears of all the guards present: "Though I don’t know why you’re looking for Zheng, I’m sure the one you’re asking me to look after isn’t an alchemy puppet, right?"

The faces of the six guards changed drastically in unison.

...

...

"Emergency state, code 02-10-65!"

"Repeat, emergency state, code 02-10-65!"

Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!

The brief, sharp buzzing sound accompanied by strong flashes echoed repeatedly in the small lounge, as Hilda shielded his eyes, struggling to wake from sleep, only to find his mouth somewhat bitter.

Having worked hard all day, he had just closed his eyes—he wasn’t even sure if he had actually fallen asleep—when he was startled by the unsettling sharp buzz in his ears.

After the mind processed a few thoughts with difficulty and reacted to the emergency code, Hilda felt as if he had been doused with a bucket of cold water, snapping him quickly awake.

In the assistant team’s current task list sequence, code 01 was the super project of Edge Academy, and code 02 was Zheng Qing’s guard task.

And ’10-65’ meant ’target missing’ or ’fire’.

Outside was quiet; at this hour, if a fire had broken out in the office building, the school’s Protect Legal Formation would definitely respond. So only one other possibility remained.

A possibility that Hilda found extremely absurd.

Student missing?

In one of the safest places in the First University?

Such a thing hadn’t happened in hundreds of years!

With a head full of questions, Hilda reached into the nearby lantern, grabbed a small cluster of flames, brought it to his mouth, and responded in a low voice: "Affirmative on emergency state 02-10-65! Heading to your location! Repeat, heading to your location!"

With that, he released his grip, and the flame vanished into the air with a ’whoosh’.

...

...

The office building was covered by a pale red, translucent ’giant bowl’.

Inside the bowl, the summoned patrol team from the School Works Committee and the investigation team from the assistant team were searching inch by inch over the empty ground and the diviners holding crystal balls were circling nearby, hoping to find the missing boy before dawn to prevent further escalation.

After undergoing three repetitive inspections, Hilda finally made it to the familiar office on the third floor of the office building—Thomas’s office—though the process irked him.

The target was already lost, what’s the point of this complicated procedure? Where were they earlier? The more professional their current state, the more responsible their performance, the stricter the procedure, the more ridiculous it all seemed.

By now, he had a simple understanding of the incident through others’ accounts, yet found it hard to believe—Zheng Qing disappeared from Thomas’s office, and the three responsible wizards guarding weren’t even sure when the target disappeared; they could only speculate that Thomas had taken him away.

Thomas?

Kidnap Zheng Qing?

Right under everyone’s eyes?

Impossible, absolutely impossible!

He wore a grim expression, squeezing through the crowd—at this point, the small office was already packed with wizards from three sides, with the assistant team and the wizards from the Professor Joint Meeting Office pointing accusingly at each other with intense language and gestures.

The Professor Joint Meeting people argued that the assistant team had chosen the wrong person, letting a dangerous person serve as the target’s guardian, was the biggest responsibility for this incident; the assistant team argued that the target disappeared during Qian Doudou’s squad’s guard, so they should be responsible.

Of course, both sides remained very restrained, with their voices not too loud.

"Hilda! Hilda! You’re finally here! I was doing homework when these people suddenly barged in... can you tell them to let me go back to the dorm to sleep?"

Zheng Qing’s familiar voice reached Hilda’s ears, but looking at the scene before him, the practice teacher only felt a chill on his back, his face growing darker.

Because the ’Zheng Qing’ who was speaking was just a head—its body was sitting behind the desk on the edge of the crowd, gesturing happily towards his practice teacher as it spoke, still seemingly unaware of its missing head.

A series of uneven magic circuits were exposed from its neck, intermittently sparking magical sparks in the air, intertwining with the suppressed and intense arguments among the crowd, making it hard to breathe.