Inside the demon classroom, which had devolved into a banquet of slaughter, time seemed stretched thin, every passing second growing agonizingly long and fraught with torment.
The candlelight from the sconces on the wall flickered faintly, brightening and dimming in rhythm, like a countdown ticking toward the exam's end amidst encroaching death.
Sitting in the back row, Hyperion had simply given up on thinking.
She could not fathom what Lanqi was trying to achieve.
Yet her past experience in dealing and cooperating with him had taught her that failing to keep up with his train of thought was entirely normal—at the very least, it proved she was still sane.
All she needed to do was keep an eye on him.
Her role was less of a partner and more of a babysitter responsible for cleaning up his messes.
Under Hyperion's quiet observation, Lanqi refrained from reporting any more examinees for a short while. Instead, he kept his head down, scribbling something across his parchment exam paper.
He seemed to be waiting for an opportune moment.
After several dozen seconds passed, Lanqi set down his pen, crossed his arms, and leaned casually against the back of his chair.
Once again, he had assumed the persona of Proctor Number Three.
Before long, Lanqi spotted a student in the middle of cheating and immediately raised his hand to report him.
Hyperion silently kept her head lowered beside him.
Though she had no idea what Lanqi had been waiting for, she had a strong premonition that something thoroughly unhinged was about to happen.
***
This time, the dragon demon was once again closer to the reported examinee.
He strode forward, eager to execute the cheating student with sadistic delight.
Lanqi watched the entire room at his ease, yet his gaze remained sharply fixed on both demon proctors without the slightest lapse in attention.
*Right now.*
A brief window was opening—
The dragon demon, indulging his base desires, was entirely focused on the thrill of the kill and paid no heed to any other student, while the owl demon, constrained by his single field of vision, was about to enter a blind spot.
This was the longest dual-proctor blind spot that Lanqi could artificially engineer.
And this window of time was just enough.
Counting the seconds in his head, Lanqi summoned a magic card into the palm concealed against his chest.
Certain the moment had arrived, Lanqi activated Basic Etiquette, targeting a demon student sitting diagonally in front of him and compelling the examinee to kneel before him!
*Thud!*
The demon student's body twisted uncontrollably, dropping onto his knees atop the seat to face Lanqi.
Lanqi promptly raised his hand again and shouted, "Teacher! He turned around to copy my answers!"
Both the patrolling owl demon and the dragon demon, who was still savoring the lingering afterglow of his kill, snapped their attention toward the demon student who had abruptly turned around and knelt on his chair to look backward.
The unfortunate demon student, who had green scales lining his neck, stared with wide, tear-filled eyes, his lips trembling for several seconds without being able to utter a word.
He had no idea what kind of spell had possessed him to suddenly whip around and face the back, only to be reported the very next second.
Yet with such an overt movement, there was no room for excuses.
And so, as the demon student mentally unraveled, both proctors quickened their pace and marched toward him!
This was unlike any of the previous incidents.
Before, only one of the two—either the dragon demon or the owl demon—would take action.
They had seemed to abide by an unspoken rule, quickly discerning who could reach the cheating examinee faster while the other continued patrolling the hall.
Except this time.
As if by sheer coincidence, both believed they would be the first to reach the cheating student and carry out the execution.
Consequently, the owl demon and the dragon demon sprang forward simultaneously, each trying to beat the other to the kill.
"..."
In the back row, Lanqi lowered his head and lightly tapped his elbow with his index finger.
He continued calculating in his mind.
So far, everything had unfolded exactly according to his plan.
He had long since clocked the movement patterns of both proctors and calculated their respective speeds.
From that, it was easy to deduce a specific window of time—
If he reported an examinee at a predetermined location during those exact intervals, and both proctors set out at the same time, they would arrive at the reported student's desk at the exact same moment!
Given their blatant bloodlust, neither proctor would willingly surrender the kill.
And now, Lanqi had successfully engineered that very scenario.
***
In the aisle two rows ahead and to the right of Lanqi's seat.
Just as the dragon demon raised his hand to execute the cheating examinee, his wrist was seized by the owl demon.
"I was here first."
"Don't get greedy."
"Let go."
"You're the one who should withdraw your hand."
The owl demon's tone was icy, carrying a profound, long-festering resentment toward the dragon demon.
As their anger flared, the bloodlust of the two high-tier demons visibly shifted, refocusing squarely onto each other.
"..."
Although Hyperion did not turn her head toward the aisle two rows ahead, her heart was hammering wildly in her chest!
She was beginning to grasp what Lanqi was trying to do.
She could only conclude that Lanqi had lost his mind!
Even so, Hyperion could not be certain that summoning his trump card, Poet of Great Love, would be enough to fully ignite their fury and drive them completely insane.
No matter how ravenous their bloodlust, the two high-tier demons remained fundamentally rational, strictly adhering to the examination rules without ever coming to blows.
And yet...
Hyperion thought she felt Lanqi suppress a chuckle.
None of the demons in the hall noticed an imperceptible little flying insect creeping along the tip of the dragon demon's shoe, secretly climbing up the fabric of his suit.
[Long Live Friendship Bug]
[Category: Summon Card]
[Grade: Blue Precious]
[Tier: 1]
[Effect: Can learn to mimic the target's voice upon hearing it, then vocalize speech according to the summoner's intent.]
[Note: Since you don't know how to speak, allow me to speak for you.]
Aside from Basic Etiquette and Friendly Communication, this was one of the few finished cards Lanqi had crafted.
The two demon proctors continued trading threats, their gazes chillingly harsh, plunging the exam hall into a suffocatingly tense atmosphere.
Just as the tension threatened to freeze over entirely...
"You half-witted slowpoke bird, go eat sh*t! If you don't get the f*** out of my face right now, I'm going to rip the feathers off your head and shove them up your a**, just like that godd*** cult of yours—you're only fit to pick up and eat a pile of f***ing sh*t!"
The dragon demon's voice suddenly erupted from his own body, booming directly at the owl demon.
"Roar...!"
The dragon demon parted his lips to say something, but a sharp agony in his throat reduced his words to a raspy, garbled snarl.
He had no idea where the voice had come from; all he could feel was the owl demon's grip on his wrist tightening with bone-crushing force!
And the dragon demon's wide-eyed, flabbergasted expression looked, to the owl demon, entirely like a brazen, arrogant glare of provocation.
***
Long Live Friendship Bug was a magic card Lanqi had designed specifically to complement Friendly Communication.
In direct combat, aside from buzzing around and acting as an obnoxious troll to rattle an opponent's composure, the insect possessed little practical utility.
A minor area-of-effect spell could easily squash it.
During the third round of the entrance assessment against a single proctor, Lanqi had cautiously packed his deck with flawed healing spell cards that stacked rage most efficiently, tailoring his build purely for dueling a mage.
This time, however, entering a genuine Shadow World meant contending with all manner of complex situations. Thus, he had brought along every single Tier 1 Blue Precious card bearing the "Lan-Mark Quality" seal.
"When friction arises between colleagues, one shouldn't simply suffer in silence. Only by venting pent-up grievances can they ever hope to find an opportunity for reconciliation."
Lanqi rested his chin on his hand in the back row, calmly watching the dragon demon and the owl demon on the verge of tearing into each other.
He knew that now was the time for the two of them to have a truly open, heart-to-heart talk.
Chapter 50