Just as Xiao Xiao had predicted, before the Spring Equinox, Meteorological Supervision's cold air balloons seemed to cost nothing. They released seventeen or eighteen in a single night, only for it to grow strangely hot again during the day, sometimes creating a temperature difference of more than ten degrees between day and night.
Though it had not yet reached the point of "fur coats in the morning, gauze in the afternoon," it still threw the campus's fashion into complete chaos. Some people remained wrapped in heavy winter coats, while others had already changed into thin summer shirts. Others were thickly bundled on top but unusually bare below, making for quite a spectacle.
Matching this volatile weather was the strange atmosphere on campus.
Jiuyou Academy, Alpha Castle, the Merfolk Tribe, Sacred Will, the Blood Kin Society, and so on—countless complicated relationships had become tangled together, turning public opinion on campus into a complete mess.
Some elders of the Merfolk Tribe called for the tribe to be moved away from Linzhong Lake and relocated to that picturesque stretch of water outside Alpha Castle, where a new merfolk reserve better suited to Alpha Castle's free-spirited atmosphere could be established.
Alpha Academy gave an evasive response, offering no clear answer. Instead, it repeatedly reiterated the Wizard Alliance's various opinions regarding merfolk reserves, along with such empty nonsense as respecting Jiuyou Academy's ownership of Linzhong Lake.
In response to the above verbal sparring, Jiuyou Academy not only issued a solemn statement, but also announced that it would further strengthen nighttime patrols around Linzhong Lake. It stated that patrol officers would be permitted to carry powerful magical equipment such as spellbooks and talismans, and that Patrol Team members would be authorized to prevent possible acts of terror in advance.
Compared with those semi-official statements, Sacred Will