After the Regret

"Sigh..." Jiu Ming sighed, put away the card in his hand, and sprawled out on the sofa. He glanced at his watch. It seemed less than three hours had passed since he left...

Of course, it could have been the next day, or even the day after.

He'd rest for a while, then go out and take a look. Jiu Ming yawned and closed his eyes. He'd never been this weak before. His Soul Body had grown so dim that, unless you looked closely, you'd never notice a ghost was lying on the sofa.

No matter what, this experience was sure to leave him feeling awful for a long time.

Damn it... If only I'd had five more seconds! No, three!

The next day.

"So it really has only been three hours." Jiu Ming checked the time on his watch and finally confirmed how much time had passed in this world. He'd have to get an electronic watch that could keep track of the date from the Mysterious Shop.

He glanced at the many Red Dots on the watch and shook his head. It hadn't been long at all, and several of the little red dots had already disappeared.

The students' internship area was limited. Even if it was a huge place, the watch had been specially made to locate them, so there was no way they'd run into some ridiculous "out of service area" problem.

"What the hell!? What's going on!?" Jiu Ming's eyes widened as a whole patch of Red Dots suddenly vanished from one part of the watch!

There had to be dozens of them, at the very least. And that was only the signal captured by his watch; students from the other academies weren't included. What had happened!?

At the same time, the other Hidden Support personnel frowned. The signals had disappeared far too strangely—and a huge number had vanished all at once. What kind of being could take out so many students in an instant, without making any noticeable noise?

"What the hell!" Wang Hai's eyes bulged. The teachers from the other academies looked just as stunned. They'd never heard of anything like this. Such a huge cluster of signal sources had been wiped out in an instant... If they were all dead, the death toll would be at least five hundred...

Who could take responsibility for that? Even if this year's internship was much harder, if the death toll got that high, everyone present would have to answer for it.

"Don't panic. It's probably some kind of interference..." Li Rui Ming wiped away the cold sweat that had broken out when the emergency first came up. "The affected area is too large. Even a nuclear strike would make a huge commotion, but this happened without a sound."

His words helped everyone breathe a little easier. A moment ago, almost all of them had been panicking.

The disappearance of so many students' signals was quickly reported to the Camp Commander in the temporary camp. He acted decisively, ordering an immediate suspension of the internship and a full-scale search for the students whose signals had vanished.

"Enough. We'll deal with the rest later. Get in touch with any Hidden Support personnel you've recruited and have them mobilize too. The internship is suspended for now."

The Camp Commander furrowed his brows. He knew the internship had become more difficult. In recent years, the strength of the Exotic Beasts had grown much more than before. Humanity couldn't afford to fall behind in cultivating its own strength, or the already unstable balance would tip even further. That was why the internship had suddenly become much harder. It wasn't just this year; every year from now on would be the same.

This was happening here, and the same was true elsewhere.

Damn it, what rotten luck. Why did this have to happen in the area under his command!? The Camp Commander's expression was awful. No one present wanted to draw his ire, and they understood how he felt. Finding the students was what mattered now.

"What is this...?" Jiu Ming rushed to the area where the Red Dots had vanished in large numbers. The moment he arrived, he felt his Soul Body being squeezed, like the pressure of deep water. The display on his watch began to flicker violently, then flashed erratically a few times before going dark.

Uh, it seemed to have broken...

Jiu Ming wasn't the only one. The other Hidden Support personnel who entered the area noticed it too. Some immediately tossed away their broken, useless watches and continued deeper to look for people, while others hesitated and decided to wait and see.

Jiu Ming backed away a little and confirmed that it really was broken. The watch was useless even after he left the area.

He tossed it aside and headed straight into the area without hesitation. There were no signs of major destruction, and the watch's malfunction proved that the vanished Red Dots were only lost signals.

It was probably some kind of extremely powerful electromagnetic interference.

A very powerful kind. Even moving around in the area felt unnatural to Jiu Ming's Soul Body. Unlike the others, who had physical bodies to shield their souls, he felt the effects of the area most directly.

A crackle of electricity sounded, and a faint current spread over Jiu Ming's body. The Sealed Card between his fingers slowly faded and disappeared. With that layer of protection blocking the interference, the discomfort he'd felt began to fade.

That was one of the perks of being the shopkeeper. When he used the Sealed Card for 'Defective Electricity,' it only loaded the ability onto him temporarily. For other people, once they used it, it wouldn't turn back into a card unless it was stripped away through a 'trade' with Jiu Ming.

The rules governing Sealed Cards were unrestricted in Jiu Ming's hands, but one-use-only in the hands of others. That was the difference between the shopkeeper and his customers. So there was no need for Jiu Ming to permanently grant himself the ability of a Sealed Card.

There was no need at all. As long as he had the card, it was the same as having permanent access to the ability. Trying to take on too many abilities would only make a mess of things. Jiu Ming was already satisfied with his combat ability, and otherworldly abilities didn't come as naturally to him as his own. He treated them as extra support.

"Ignorance is bliss." After spotting a group of students, Jiu Ming felt a lot more at ease. As expected, only their signals had vanished; they were fine—or at least most of them were. The students were standing at a distance, unsure what to do. The powerful interference had been enough to disable their watches, but that didn't mean they wouldn't notice.

"Yang Zhi Yu, should we leave?" One student in the group turned to the boy beside him.

"...It's just some unusual interference. For all we know, a Mysterious Object might have been born here." Yang Zhi Yu hesitated. What he said made sense. Mysterious Objects sometimes formed naturally, especially inside High-Energy Crystal mines. Besides ordinary High-Energy Crystals, a 'Mutated' variety could also appear. They could still be used as High-Energy Crystals, but only an idiot would use them that way!

Mutated High-Energy Crystals could enhance an Ability User's powers. Who would waste one as a consumable!?

Even a spendthrift wouldn't do that!

"A Mysterious Object!?" Yang Zhi Yu's words stirred the other students' interest too.

"..." Hidden nearby, Jiu Ming scratched his cheek. Were they really planning to set off on a treasure hunt? But considering who he was, he couldn't just step out and join them.

"But what if we run into danger..." Someone in the group was worried about the idea. Usually, even if a rare treasure came into existence, there'd be some powerful guardian nearby, and most of the time it would be an Exotic Beast.

"Danger? The internship is dangerous too. How can you become strong if you're afraid of everything?" Yang Zhi Yu glanced at him disdainfully. "Don't forget, things will be even tougher once we finish the internship and go to college. We might as well earn more credits now so we can get better treatment after enrollment!"

Good students, of course, got more privileges than ordinary students. That was true everywhere, so Yang Zhi Yu wasn't just making things up.

Everything they experienced during the internship would affect their graduation credits to some extent.

As for the danger, he was a little worried, sure. But he also knew a bit of insider information about the Hidden Support personnel. For all he knew, some unknown person was already crouching nearby...

In fact, he'd guessed right. Jiu Ming was crouching right there.

"If you're scared, you can leave now." Yang Zhi Yu didn't say anything more. The longer they waited, the more likely someone else would get to the 'Mysterious Object' first, so he wouldn't wait any longer. He simply split the group apart.

You don't want to go? Fine. I won't force you. If you don't want to go, leave.

They were students, and they'd feel awkward backing out after something like this. Seeing that most of the group had no intention of leaving, the few who had considered it gave up on the idea. Treasure hunting was dangerous, but so was the internship, wasn't it?

"Maybe there really is a treasure?" Jiu Ming scratched his head. Watching the group set off, he quietly followed them. Wealth tempted people, and if there really was a treasure, all it would take was one or two shameless Hidden Support personnel to show up for these students to be in trouble.

Jiu Ming still didn't know a lot about this world. Hmm... treasure, huh? Whatever was causing interference over such a wide area had to be something powerful... Though if it was an Exotic Beast, well, well.

Risk and opportunity went hand in hand.

As a highly principled Mysterious Merchant, Jiu Ming would never stoop to outright robbery. But if some students really found something, he'd see what happened. If it wasn't his, he wouldn't force the issue. But if they found that whatever-it-was, assuming it even existed, and then ended up in mortal danger—if he saved their lives, what would they have to give him in return?

For some reason, everyone in Yang Zhi Yu's group shivered.

The people outside the Death Forest acted quickly too. Before long, news about the situation in the area came back. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, but at the same time, they picked up the pace.

With something like this, either a rare treasure had appeared or a powerful Exotic Beast had somehow wandered into the area. Neither possibility was good news for the students there.