"Repair? Was it broken before?" Qi Ji thought about it and found that he had never heard the bell before.
"It was about three days ago, the day before you came to Stio." Lancey nodded, "I heard that something happened during the church service... It wasn't a big problem, no one was injured, but there was a problem with the clock in the tower, and the bell mechanism got stuck."
She paused for a moment, then complained with a hint of dissatisfaction:
"I don't know why it took so long to fix such a small problem. It's very troublesome for everyone without a big clock to calibrate the time."
Being interrupted by this incident, Qi Ji's anger subsided a lot, and his face became more serious:
"Won't your dad be angry if he finds out you're leaving without saying goodbye?"
The two entered the lawn through the bedroom window, and then climbed over the wall to leave Iris Manor. Lunxi didn't say hello to anyone, but just wrote a note and left it in a conspicuous place for the maid.
"Uh," his face darkened when he mentioned old Edward Runci, and he said vaguely, "No, he... probably won't come to see me today..."
Seeing that the other party was embarrassed, Qi Ji did not ask too much about this.
"By the way, I have some materials here." She took out an irregular piece of paper and a pencil from her cloak. "When you have time, please help me find out which channels in the city can get them."
The paper was torn from a booklet given by the Fearless Guild, and the pen was stolen from the guild.
...It's really not that she is trying to take advantage of others.
When she was doing the work at the guild and needed to sign, she subconsciously put the pen in her hand after signing, and no one reminded her. By the time she realized what was happening, she had already walked a long way away.
"Oh, no problem." Lun Xi agreed immediately, and then asked: "What is it? Is it important?"
"Didn't I tell you that the night before yesterday, Ghost Wolf's men came to my room and tried to drug me?" Qi Ji explained as he wrote, "I used some methods to analyze the composition of that drug, and thought that if I could find out its source, it might help advance the investigation."
She had just finished writing when she finished speaking, and handed over the piece of paper with the names of the materials listed.
"Eh?"
Lunxi took the list and glanced at it. Suddenly, he frowned slightly and made a sound with a little surprise.
"What's wrong? Did you find anything?"
"I'm not sure about the others," Lunxi pointed at a material with a complicated expression, "but this... I remember that there should be only one store in Stio that sells it."
Qi Ji took a closer look and realized that the material she was referring to was "Twilight Sea Seabed Sediment".
Although Lancy was very much loved before old Edward's temperament changed drastically, she was not a spoiled daughter who only cared about pleasure. She often took the initiative to handle some family affairs to ease her father's burden.
Therefore, she had access to a lot of first-hand information about Stio and had some understanding of various situations in the city.
"Who?" Looking at Lunxi's somewhat unexpected expression, Qi Ji felt that some things... seemed to be connected.
"It's Baron Lionsmith." Lunxi put down the paper and said seriously:
"This 'Twilight Seabed Sediment' can only be produced in the Empire's Sunset Port in the entire continent, and is usually used as the main ingredient of a powerful sedative. And the only person in Stio who has a long-term trade with Sunset Port is... Baron Lionsmith."
"Lancaster's father?" Qi Ji suddenly had an idea. "Wait, I want to ask, which districts do you nobles belong to in the city?"
Lunxi knows all about it:
"My father is in charge of the South District and part of the West District; Baron Hodge-Tonakabi is in charge of the rest of the West District; and Baron Lionsmith is in charge of the East District. The North District is governed by merchants and craftsmen, but the actual controller is the lord, Viscount Double-Headed Axe."
"Eastern District..."
Qi Ji recalled all the information and clues he had discovered in the past few days, as well as all the things he had experienced, and had a vague feeling that... he was one step closer to the truth.
Only the last few layers of fog are left. Once they are removed, all the tricks will be revealed.
"It's not that Baron Lionsmith has a problem," Lunxi rubbed his temple with his thumb. "He's just an importer. Who he sells to, who uses it, and how it's used. These links... he can't predict them, let alone control them."
"Anyway, there's one more clue, isn't there?" Qi Ji smiled inscrutablely. "Let's go to the North District first, the East Suburbs of the North District. Let's ask Friong and the others to see if we can get any information about the 'Saint Xudra Society'."
Chapter 53 Basic Elementary Spells
After hailing a hired carriage, since the driver was unwilling to leave the city, the two asked him to take them to the city boundary, and they would walk the rest of the way by themselves after getting off the carriage.
The carriage rumbled on and soon approached the eastern border of the North District. The spiritual fluctuations of the three members of Frion's team gradually appeared in Qi Ji's inspiration.
Fortunately, they are all here.
"What's going on over there? Why is it so lively?" Qi Ji frowned, feeling something was a little unusual.
The spiritual fluctuations of the three people...especially the two mages Lina and Io, were vibrating at a high intensity at this time.
This phenomenon will only occur when a supernatural being uses his supernatural powers at a high frequency.
"They're casting spells like crazy? What are they doing, fighting?!"
As soon as this thought came to mind, the carriage stopped with a neigh. The driver turned around in a panic and shouted to the two through the small window:
"Ladies, there seems to be some problems ahead... The horse refuses to move. Please get off the carriage. I can refund some of the fare."
After saying that, he began to rummage through his worn-out purse.
"Is that so?" Lun Xi glanced at Qi Ji, and seeing that she didn't say anything, he stood up and prepared to get off the car, "No need, you can keep the money for yourself."
"Oh, OK! Thank you! Miss is such a kind person!"
Qi Ji got off the car behind Lun Xi. As soon as he turned his head to the east, he saw a mess on the vast plain in the distance.
"Northern District Eastern Suburbs" is not a real district, but a general term for the large plain east of the Northern District and west of the Eastern Border Forest.
Frion and his caravan temporarily camped on this plain.
It was quite large, with eight large-sized carriages, covered with cloth, which looked like military trucks on Earth from a distance. Six of them were filled with various goods, and the remaining two were probably used to carry people.
According to a simple estimate, it can carry at most thirty people.
However, the caravan was already in danger at this time. Scattered items were scattered on the ground, and the caravan members were running around frantically. There were also several people lying motionless on the ground, and it was unknown whether they were dead or alive.
What caused this situation was a ghostly shadow flying among the crowd.
It was a mass of translucent film without a fixed shape, about the size of two or three people, emitting a strange green fluorescence.
The green ghost shadow floated in mid-air, moving with unimaginable mobility and ignoring any obstacles, passing through heavy piles of cargo, tents, and carriages as if passing through the air.
Once someone is touched by it, they will fall to the ground immediately and lose all breath of life, as if their soul has been sucked out.
Lina, Io and several other lower-level mages in the caravan were struggling with it.
Fireballs, ice cones, wind blades, light beams... all kinds of long-range offensive spells were thrown at it, but most of them were avoided by the green ghost.
There is no way. Its movements are so flexible that they are unreasonable and completely ignore the basic principles of mechanics. It suddenly accelerates, brakes, and turns at sharp angles as if it has no inertia.
The attacks released by the mages are not very intelligent. Most of them can only fly in a straight line. The mages also have to dodge the green ghosts that ignore the collision with cover. It is very difficult to hit them.
As for Frion and other warriors, they did not participate in the battle, but rescued people in the caravan and moved the survivors near the green ghost to a farther place.
"The pursuit of light!"
Lina quickly completed a rather long chant, and a ball of light suddenly rose from the tip of the staff she held high and shot straight into the sky.
Then, it drew an arc at the highest point, turned back 180 degrees, and smashed to the ground with the force of a falling star!
The green ghost was rushing forward at this moment, and according to this trend, it would be hit by the falling light spot.
However, it retreated without any warning a second before being hit!
Without any deceleration or turning, it reversed its direction while maintaining its original speed, as if someone had added a minus sign to its velocity vector!
"Correction!"
The light spot missed, but when it was about to hit the ground, Lina's staff flashed again, and the light spot simultaneously bent at a 90-degree angle and stabbed towards the rapidly retreating green ghost!
"Oh!"
This time the green ghost was unable to dodge and was shot directly. The misty orange-yellow aura exploded, and the green ghost's body trembled violently, and a faint green light flashed.
While it was stunned, other mages also rained down their attacks. However, the green ghost's reaction was incredibly fast, and it turned at a few sharp angles to avoid more than 90% of the spells.
The remaining attacks happened to hit, but the damage didn't seem to have much effect on it.
"Damn it! Such a small number of people is useless!" Lina saw another member of the caravan being pierced to death by the green ghost, and she was so anxious that her heart was burning. "When the people from the church come, we will all be dead!"
"Is this... an alien species?"
Qi Ji took a quick glance and discovered that this thing was actually made up purely of spirituality!
No wonder it can pass through walls, and warriors don't fight. Because pure spiritual entities are not affected by most physical effects, only spirituality can have an effect on them.
To put it simply, this green ghost is immune to physical damage and only takes damage from spells.
"Xiao Qiji, did you see anything?" Lunxi asked when he saw Qiji looking into the distance.
Her eyesight was not as good as Qi Ji's. At this distance, everything that happened in the camp was just a bunch of blurry black dots and blocks in her eyes.
"They are in trouble, I'm going to help them."
Qi Ji said this and ran. This green ghost was too difficult for the caravan to deal with. Even if the mage in the team could kill it with the scraping tactic, the other ordinary people would be almost dead.
She has some friendship with Friant and the others, so it would be better for her to go and provide them with support.
With Qi Ji's speed, he ran like flying. In less than ten seconds, he reached the center of the camp and stopped right in the middle of the battle between the green ghost and the mages.
"Little Sharon!" Lina instantly recognized Qi Ji by his cloak and shouted excitedly, "Great! Help us kill this 'swamp monster'! Please!"
"Warrior!?"
The other mages saw a short cloaked figure suddenly barging in. They were startled at first, then shouted anxiously:
"Run! The swamp monster is a spirit. Fists, kicks, swords, and guns are useless to it!"
"Don't worry," Io said, putting down his staff. "Ms. Sharon is a psychic warrior, so she can easily deal with the swamp monster."
"A psychic warrior?"
"Canyang, there is actually a psychic warrior in Stio?!"
"We are saved!"
Listening to the cheers of the crowd, Qi Ji looked at the green ghost that was wreaking havoc in the camp.
The exempt unit...
Judging from the reactions of these mages, true psychic warriors are able to harm "spirits".
But she wasn't a psychic warrior, not even a warrior, so she wasn't sure if hitting it with her fist would be effective.
"Tsk, I can't try it leisurely now."
If she waited one more second, one more person might be killed by the green ghost. She had no time to test and make mistakes. To be on the safe side, she decided to temporarily reverse an offensive spell!
"Just use the fireballs they shot just now..."
When the mages were fighting before, Qi Ji had already captured and recorded the rhythm of their spiritual fluctuations when they cast spells.
With the experience from last time, this time she integrated the spells cast by several wizards in just a moment and designed a new offensive spell on the spot.
The green ghost figure paused, as if it had sensed something, and then it made a sharp angle of thirty degrees and rushed straight towards Qi Ji!
"Okay, that saves me the trouble of aiming."
She laughed, stretched out her slender and delicate finger, and pointed -
"Basic Elementary Spell 1."
Chapter 54 Black Flame
"Boom!——"
I saw a purple-black flame burst out from the void at Qi Ji's fingertips! The size was thicker than the green train, and it hit the green ghost head-on in an instant.
As if it was crushed head-on by a high-speed train, its figure disappeared in an instant.
“BOOM BOOM BOOM!!!—”
Qi Ji realized that the noise seemed a bit too loud, and immediately forcibly interrupted the release of the spell.
"Uh, is this... too much?"
The black flames dissipated, and she looked at the scene in front of her with some embarrassment.
The originally flat plain was plowed into a gully three or four meters wide, extending hundreds of meters long. The gully was completely empty, without any ashes, not even sparks or residual heat.
This is a trace that can only be left by extremely high temperatures that far exceed the boiling point of any substance.
Rather than "burning", it's more like "erasing".
As for the green ghost, it had already been roasted to 700% done, with not even a trace left.
