Elite Mages' Academy

Chapter 678: Trapped In The Grave

“No, there’s still no reaction,” Gu Xiaoyue shook her head and said. Her furrowed brows revealed her exhaustion. Her mental strength was exceptional, and she was the support, so the task of scouting had naturally been assigned to her.

“Something’s wrong.” Cheng Ming was worried as well. “With Gu Xiaoyue’s perception, it’s impossible for us to not have found anything after walking around for so long.”

“Could the opponent have some special skill to avoid her perception?” An Luo said with some apprehension. Even though they were all monitors, An Luo was obviously the weakest among them. However, An Luo knew very well that he had been chosen by Xiao Lin because he was the only one specialized in archery among the monitors, so he rarely interfered in group decisions.

“Who cares what tricks they have. We will be the ones to win!” Chen Dao said, too lazy to think too much. In truth, after entering the grave, most of the undead spirits had been killed by Chen Dao. As a mage with an incredibly high talent for fire magic, his skills had not been affected at all in such a dark and sinister place filled with death energy.

“Gu Xiaoyue, do you have any ideas? Why don’t you share it with us?” Xiao Lin said encouragingly. He was the leader, but most of his focus was still on Gu Xiaoyue, so he could tell that the reserved woman seemed to have something she was refraining from talking about.

Gu Xiaoyue shrugged at Xiao Lin’s encouragement, pushing up her glasses as she said, “With my current level of perception, it’s not impossible to avoid it completely, but that would only be possible for someone at the level of a professor or at least an upper-year student. I don’t believe that anyone can do that from our year, no matter what academy they’re from.

“What about it?”

Gu Xiaoyue glared at Xiao Lin as if he was an idiot, continuing, “So, after eliminating all other possibilities, the remaining possibility, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”

“Hey, can the two of you stop with the lovers’ quarreling and get to the point?” Chen Dao said, obviously having some trouble comprehending it. At the same time, he shot another fire spell at an undead beast, burning it to a crisp.

Xiao Lin nodded, bitterly smiling as he said, “I understand what Gu Xiaoyue is saying. However, it’s really hard to believe what you’re saying. Since the opponents can’t possibly completely avoid your perception, and we haven’t met them, there are only two possibilities. Either they’ve left the graveyard, or they’ve all already died.”

Xiao Lin hesitated before saying those last words. Other than Gu Xiaoyue, the others were taken aback by the probability of it all.

“We might not know the representatives from the Royal British Academy, but the fact that they’ve made it to the top four means their skills are exceptional. It’s too impossible for them to have been easily killed off by the spirits in the graveyard,” Cheng Ming said. His assessment was also agreed upon by Chen Dao and An Luo, and it was quite a reasonable view.

Gu Xiaoyue remained silent. She merely voiced out the possibilities. As for how they would assess it and if they would believe it, that was Xiao Lin’s responsibility. She would not interfere.

Xiao Lin frowned as he fell silent. He had obviously thought of Gu Xiaoyue’s suspicions as well. He did not think that the Royal British Academy would have been killed off by merely undead spirits. Even if they did not place much importance on the tournament, it would be too much of a joke for them to be eliminated so easily after making the top four.

“What reason would they have to resign from the competition? Could they be sick or unwell? Maybe they’ve been poisoned somehow. However, based on the rules of the tournament, once a side gives up, the other side would obviously win, so we should have received a notification of our win,” An Luo said again.

Normally there would be some professors with high levels of perception stationed outside the tournament venue who would be in charge of communication. They would usually have some sort of skill that enables long-distance communication in order to make sure they could contact the students if there were any unexpected circumstances. However, it was obvious that Xiao Lin and the others had not received any orders from the start.

Xiao Lin and the others had ugly expressions on their faces. Even the intellectually stunted Chen Dao realized that the situation might not be as simple as they thought.

“I think we should retrace our original route,” Xiao Lin finally decided, looking at Gu Xiaoyue as he said so. Seeing her not react at all, he continued, “We can’t take any risks. I think this tournament might have some circumstances outside of our levels.”

Since the leader had made a decision, the others naturally had nothing to voice against it.

The route back was much easier. The graveyard had been the location of a battle between the orcs and Dawn Academy a long time ago. When they came to it, they had already eliminated most of the spirits, so the speed of which they returned had increased by quite a lot.

However, for safety’s sake, Xiao Lin still asked for the team to move while maintaining the state of alertness they had before. Cheng Ming was in charge of staying up front in order to protect An Luo, Gu Xiaoyue, and Chen Dao. Meanwhile Xiao Lin stayed at the back. No matter what happened, they would have enough time to react.

Time passed by the way it always did.

“This isn’t right.” Cheng Ming suddenly stopped as he turned around with some suspicion. Looking at the others, he said, “Have I gotten the route wrong?”

There were no watches allowed there, but everyone could already grasp the time somewhat. They took about half an hour to enter, but their way back had already taken an hour, and yet they still had not seen the gate.

Cheng Ming felt a bit ashamed and upset, as he was the one leading the way; he naturally felt that it was his mistake. The graveyard had formerly been an orc weapon depot, so its construction was very crude, and there were not many detours. They had made plenty of marks as they passed by key roads in order to prevent themselves from being lost. Furthermore, everyone had a map.

“No, you did not.” Xiao Lin, who had been walking behind, sighed before pointing not too far away. In a corner that was filled with spiderwebs, a few white bones were still lit with fire.

“That was a mark I made before this, and I’ve already seen it three times.” Xiao Lin’s words caused everyone to reveal curious expressions.

“Do you mean we’ve encountered a ghostly wall?” Chen Dao said with a strange expression.

Xiao Lin glared at that dumb guy, but thinking about it in detail, the graveyard was indeed filled with ghosts from a foreign world. Could they really have been toyed with by ghosts?

It was only that they were not sure if it was the work of the British or something inherent to the graveyard.

Suddenly, Gu Xiaoyue’s voice was heard again. “Have all of you felt like, from earlier on, our connection with the resurrection towers has been disrupted?”

Her words shocked everyone!

All of them felt like cold water had been splashed on them!