Thursday.
April 1st, April Fools' Day, the seventeenth day of the second lunar month.
Auspicious for engagements, prayers for blessings, and coming-of-age ceremonies.
Inauspicious for burials and travel.
As he flipped through the old almanac that morning, Zheng Qing vaguely remembered that last year's April Fools' Day had also forbidden burials. It struck him as particularly amusing. Was Death God unwilling to be fooled, or was death itself taboo to profane?
It had been two days since the incident in Beta Town on Monday, during the Magic Ban Festival.
As more and more information leaked through different channels, the entire Wizarding World gained a clearer understanding of what had happened on Puji Island that day—from First University's Guardian Formation briefly operating at full power, to the eruption of an unfamiliar Qi Mechanism in Beta Town North District that was suspected to be of Legendary Rank, to the school's brief and unconvincing announcement. Every detail told any wizard with even a little knowledge of divination that there was more to the matter.
But remarkably enough—
The more people acknowledged that there was something behind it, the fewer people discussed it in public.
As a result, the public uproar Zheng Qing had expected to last ten days or half a month showed signs of dying down after only two or three days. In the words of a certain professional in Dormitory 403, it was a textbook dimensionality-reduction strike.
"Facts have repeatedly proven that a wizard's rank is the greatest variable in public opinion."
During the practical portion of Thursday morning's Potion Class, Fatty Xin said this while waiting for his saffron to soak. "...Every time a wizard's rank rises by one tier, public opinion reflects reality one degree less clearly. In other words, ordinary wizards don't dare discuss matters involving High-level Wizards