Otherworld Advance Team
Chapter 96 - 92: Planning

Chapter 96: Chapter 92: Planning

"Mm." Tangmo did not speak but nodded behind him.

"If I have a chance tomorrow, I will infiltrate for further reconnaissance. If anything happens to me, you wait for Cheng Ziang to come and leave the academy together." Luo’er instructed.

"Luo’er!" Tangmo called out, frowning.

"I said if!" Luo’er explained.

"Mm!" Tangmo reluctantly nodded.

Time quickly moved to the day of the party. In the afternoon, Luo’er came to the dormitory to help Tangmo change into the dress prepared for her. Tangmo was not tall and had a baby face, so when she introduced herself as Kali’s little sister, no one would doubt her.

The dress brought out her sexy side, making her look much more mature. Luo’er stared at her delicate makeup, finding it hard to look away.

"Do I look good?" Seeing Luo’er staring at her blankly, Tangmo smiled happily and asked.

"Mm." Luo’er nodded honestly.

Hearing Luo’er’s affirmation, Tangmo smiled, her eyes filled with gentle affection and a smile hinting at the subtlety characteristic of a southern girl. The Otherworld style dress she was wearing contrasted greatly with her demeanor.

While she was smiling, a thought suddenly struck her and she stopped, saying sincerely, "I wish Luo’er could accompany me."

"In that case, the other men at the party would surely envy me." Out of nowhere, Luo’er said these words.

He quickly coughed and then said seriously, "The defenses are relatively lax now, I’ll take the opportunity to do some reconnaissance. Remember to cover for me if anyone mentions me."

"Be careful!" Tangmo urged again.

Luo’er nodded, then turned around and left the dormitory. But once he got to the kitchen, he was kept busy and had virtually no opportunity to rest.

"Let me help you!" Seeing Luo’er busy, Daier offered her help.

"Thank you for your kindness!" Luo’er instinctively declined.

"You helped me last time, let me share some of your workload this time." Daier insisted.

"Thank you then!" Luo’er nodded and welcomed her to join the duties with him.

With Daier’s help, they were finally able to finish their work by the time the party started. Daier was thinking of taking Luo’er to rest, but when she turned around, she saw that Luo’er was no longer there.

Thanks to Daier’s help, Luo’er finally got some rest. He took advantage of the dark and went to his hiding place. He retrieved a set of crude but fitting clothes, a cloak, and a hood, which were all sneakily brought in by Cheng Ziang.

The cloak could hide his form and also cover his ears well. As for his green eyes, Cheng Ziang had brought him contact lenses, specially prepared by the headquarters. Once the contact lenses were put on, his green pupils turned into a common light brown, making it impossible to identify him.

After dressing, Luo’er blindfolded his eyes and moved slowly in the shadows of the academy. Most of the students and teachers were gathered in the large hall for the party, leaving the rest of the academy empty, with only a few hurried servants and training guards passing by. The winter was approaching and the cold wind whipped through from time to time, making Luo’er rub his hands together.

Following Cheng Ziang’s tips, he hid and fled eastward, finally reaching the core area of the academy. The towering building in front of him looked somewhat eerie in the darkness.

Luo’er silently sneaked into the building. The corridors were lit with faint lights from magic crystals. He followed the route Cheng Ziang had told him, and finally reached the library without any danger.

There was no one in the library, even the lights were off. The wind howled in the corridors from time to time, giving one goosebumps, but Luo’er didn’t feel any discomfort. For him, the darkness was rather comforting. He even enjoyed hiding in the dark corners to avoid potential threats.

He walked through the tall bookshelves in the library and finally reached the archive room in the interior corridor. According to Cheng Ziang, a fight had occurred here, but it seemed that the academy had already cleaned it up.

After checking that there was no one around, he walked towards the door. The wooden door of the archive room was engraved with intricate runes. Luo’er took out a magic crystal from his pocket and using the faint moonlight, he ran his fingers over the runes on the door, looking for a breakthrough point.

There were two ways to open this door, both involving the use of spells. The first way was to mutter the spell, which would drive the surrounding magic power to activate the runes and thus open the door. The drawback was that it would cause magical disturbances, if there were mages nearby, they would sense him.

The other way was to use the power of the magic crystal to activate the runes. While this method also required a spell, if he directly drove the magic power in the magic crystal to activate the runes, he wouldn’t need to use the magic power in the air and hence would not cause magical disturbances.

The runes engraved on the magic crystal Luo’er held were output runes, the most basic style of rune for unleashing the magic power of a magic crystal. What he was now looking for was the magic input point on the door. Whether it was the magic power in the air or in the magic crystal, both required an input point to activate the whole rune system. As long as he could find the magic input point, and then align the output rune of the magic crystal, and then drive the spell, the magic power in the magic crystal could be directly guided into the rune.

It must be mentioned that this method couldn’t entirely avoid the intervention of the ambient magic power, thus it would cause some magic power disturbances. However, such disturbances could only be detected by senior mages.

Following the pattern of the runes, Luo’er finally found the input point of the runes on the door. He placed the side of the magic crystal with the output rune against it and began to mutter the spell Cheng Ziang had taught him.

"Click!"

As he began reciting the spells, the door made a soft noise and then was opened by him. Luo’er gently pushed the door open and stepped into the archive room.

Inside the archive room, Luo’er took out a soft metallic bag that he carried with him, from which he took out a glow stick. He twisted it with force and the glow stick immediately emitted a faint glow. It wasn’t very bright, but it was enough for him to find what he was looking for.

Unlike Cheng Ziang, who was clueless, Luo’er quickly found what he wanted in the archive room, the graduation list of the Sacred Heart Magic Academy.

The list showed every student who graduated from the academy, but Luo’er was not interested in this. He cared about the average number of graduates in the academy, and calculated the size of the Mage corps from it.

According to the list, the Magic Academy recruits once every five years, conducts closed training, and the students graduate and are re-recruited again after five years. Thus, every time the Magic Academy recruits, the entire academy becomes bustling.

The number of graduates this year is around seven or eight hundred, which is already the optimal number. Considering the number of dropouts in five years, as well as the number of those who applied. It’s fair to say that the graduates of the Magic Academy are one in a hundred.

Luo’er kept searching for useful clues, but suddenly, he perceptively noticed the disturbance of magic in the air, hurriedly stuffed the glow stick into the metallic bag, and hid in the dark corner.

The door was opened, and a pitch-black figure walked in. Luo’er slowed his breathing to avoid disturbing this guy in such a quiet environment.

In the moonlight filtering in through the window, Luo’er could see that the person was dressed in a mage robe. He wore a deep hood which covered his entire face in darkness.

The figure walked to a table and muttered a spell, which then made the table slowly move, revealing an opening from which another figure emerged.

Luo’er, shocked, covered his mouth. He had not noticed that there was a secret passage under the table, let alone that someone was hiding inside. He didn’t know whether they had discovered him. If they had, there would be no advantage for him in a close-range fight against two of them considering their sizes.

With these thoughts, Luo’er subconsciously gripped the magic wand he had gotten from Tangmo. If the person noticed him, he would act first and take them both out to avoid discovery.

Luckily the person who had come out from under the table seemed to have not noticed Luo’er. As soon as he came out, he started conversing with the man in the hood. They were speaking in Tasta-language, and because the room was so quiet, Luo’er could clearly hear their conversation.

"Xiluo has been killed, right outside the archive room!" The man in the hood said in a deep voice.

"What happened? When did he die?" The voice of the man from under the table sounded very young.

"On admission day, he had just met with you." The hooded man responded.

"Did the academy discover us?" The young man queried.

"It should not be," the man in the hood muttered, "the academy seems to not know who did it, they also didn’t figure out Xiluo’s true identity."

"He was a relative of the higher-up, in that case..." the young man hesitated.

"The higher-ups don’t care about his death," the man in the hood said coldly, "As long as his death does not disrupt the plan, the higher-ups wouldn’t shed a single tear for him."

"Is the plan proceeding as usual?" the young man asked.

"Yes, we need to speed up the progress. I fear what might come with the night." The hooded man announced, "Recently, I noticed that some force seemed to be trying to get involved in the academy’s affairs."

"Could it be the Manikens?" the young man questioned.

"No, they don’t stand to benefit from playing such games," said the hooded man can muttered quietly, "It could also be the Shani people."

"The stuff has been arranged, the team is ready, everything is waiting for your signal." the young man updated.

"Be careful, if the academy finds out about it, the whole plan is finished. It’s better to move in on the day of action," the hooded man cautioned.

"I understand!" the young man nodded.

"How’s their Ingri-language learning?" the hooded man checked.

"Don’t worry, these old farts at the academy will never figure it out," the young man said confidently.

"All right then," the man in the hood acknowledged, relieved. "Then you all wait for our signal in the academy. As soon as the signal comes, act immediately!"

"Okay, then I’ll go first!" the young man confirmed.

"Go ahead!"

The hooded man waved his hand. The young man entered the passage under the table, and the hood man recited the spell, causing the table to move back to its original position. Everything done, the hooded man headed straight to the door, muttered a spell to open the door, and left.