Inside the Eighteenth Hall—
More than a hundred team members had already set out.
Jiang Lin sat at his desk, writing something.
Beside him, Xu Nan and the Mechanical Ball were also engrossed in their homework.
The campus was on holiday today, but there was no shortage of assignments.
The Mechanical Ball would write for a bit, then glance at Xu Nan next to it.
It would scratch its head like a human, then continue writing a couple of characters.
This wasn't a holiday at all; it was clearly a day specifically set aside for them to do homework.
"The school's tactics are deep..." It thought about going to find its senior egg.
The Mechanical Ball muttered to itself, poked at its notebook, and still had to continue its homework.
For a time, the hall was extremely quiet.
On the pillars, some cleaning ghosts quietly emerged.
They scrubbed up and down.
Rubbing vigorously.
Some bolder ones even sneaked over to Jiang Lin.
They wanted to crawl into the palm-sized transparent bottle placed in the corner of the desk.
Just as it was about to stretch its body inside, a hand pressed it down.
Jiang Lin tossed the cleaning ghost aside, then re-rolled the paper he had just copied and put it back into the drift bottle.
That's right, this seemingly ordinary transparent bottle was actually a reward obtained after returning from the mission to the Third Hall.
Since he hadn't figured out how to use it, Jiang Lin had casually placed it aside.
Until one day, he suddenly discovered that writing had appeared on the paper in the drift bottle.
Those writings didn't always exist; they would disappear after a day.
Then, after some time, new writings would appear on it again.
The paper was also strange, with all sorts of content potentially appearing on it.
Such as: 'Didn't get to eat it again today, sigh...'
'I'll pick a star and give it to her, she should like it, right?'
'Ahhh! So annoying! I've said it before, adding one-third milk when cooking curry is the best!'
'Where is this?'
...
They looked like mere daily mutterings, with no great use.
But Jiang Lin felt that the system wouldn't give useless things.
So, no matter how busy he was, he had to take a little time each time to record the content of these randomly appearing notes.
Perhaps one day, these pieces of information could be connected.
After putting away the drift bottle and the notebook, Jiang Lin glanced at the live stream screen in the upper right corner.
Since the source of infection began to appear, he had instructed the team members to go out in teams, and had the small live stream ball and paper figures follow from a distance.
This was to ensure that if any situation arose, they could discover it and react as quickly as possible.
In addition, he had also released many paper figures for patrolling.
Once they discovered anything unusual, they would immediately provide feedback.
However,
What puzzled Jiang Lin the most was the Underworld's attitude towards this source of infection.
Since the first incident of the infection source appeared, the entire Underworld had been on alert.
It was as if they had known what it was for a long time.
They had even directly defined its nature as 'invasion'.
"What is it, where does it come from, and why does it want to invade?"
"Is there really no way to isolate it?"
Jiang Lin browsed the system store, trying to find items that could be used for hunting or isolation.
Suddenly,
His gaze paused, and he glanced towards the entrance of the Eighteenth Hall.
Soon, a familiar figure appeared there.
Two balls of bright yellow light in its eyes, its entire body was white, composed of bones.
"Senior?"
"Senior?"
Xu Nan and the Mechanical Ball also noticed the figure and put down their pens.
They stood up in surprise and looked over.
Didn't they say he would stay at the Dragon Palace for a long time?
"..."
The Seven-Colored Egg stared fixedly at the white figure sitting quietly at the desk inside the Eighteenth Hall.
It was somewhat disbelieving, somewhat surprised, and somewhat afraid.
Afraid that all of this was just a dream.
Afraid of waking up to find that everything was still a hundred years later.
A world without a live stream, without the Eighteenth Hall, and without its master.
Jiang Lin raised an eyebrow and asked, "Why are you back?"
The Seven-Colored Egg finally snapped back to reality and stammered, "I, I just came back to see you."
"Is the baptism over?"
"Yes, it just finished. I asked the old Dragon King for leave to come back; I didn't run around."
The Seven-Colored Egg replied nervously.
Sensing that the Seven-Colored Egg's emotions were a little off, Jiang Lin asked directly, "Are you not doing well at the Dragon Palace?"
The Seven-Colored Egg nodded, then quickly shook its head.
"No, it's very good there. All the good things are prioritized for me."
In those hundred-plus years of dreams, the Dragon Palace had indeed never mistreated it.
It's just that...
The master was not there.
Jiang Lin nodded and didn't ask further, continuing to browse the store.
Meanwhile, the Seven-Colored Egg began to crowd closer.
It kept circling Jiang Lin, looking at him.
Looking up, looking down, looking left, looking right.
Occasionally, it would even try to burrow into Jiang Lin's sleeve.
As if playing.
Completely ignoring Xu Nan and the Mechanical Ball beside them.
Jiang Lin, who was looking at the store: "..."
After enduring for a while, he found it unbearable.
He picked up the Seven-Colored Egg, which was doing somersaults on his clothes.
The Seven-Colored Egg was obediently lifted, tilted its head to look at Jiang Lin, its body dangling towards the ground.
With an innocent expression.
Jiang Lin stared at it for a moment, then placed it on the desk.
The Seven-Colored Egg rolled on the table, its bright yellow eyes fixed on Jiang Lin.
As if acting cute, or as if afraid he would disappear.
Jiang Lin frowned, "Do you have something to say?"
Why did it seem to have regressed after a year?
The Seven-Colored Egg subconsciously shook its head, but after thinking about it, it nodded again.
Then it sat up properly and looked at Jiang Lin.
Tentatively, it asked, "Master, I heard... there's been a troublesome fellow recently?"
"Mm."
Jiang Lin wasn't surprised it knew; the current atmosphere in the Underworld made it obvious.
The Seven-Colored Egg deliberated and said slowly, "If, I'm just saying if..."
"If you encounter a large number of unresisted sources of infection, what will you do?"
Recalling the abandoned Eighteenth Hall in its dream, and what Qin Zhouzhou had said.
The Seven-Colored Egg felt a piercing pain.
Even though it knew the answer, it still wanted to confirm it again.
It still wanted to try and change the master's mind.
What if...
What if it worked?
Jiang Lin looked at it strangely. Did it come back just to ask this?
"Since it cannot be resisted, then run, and notify the Underworld to request reinforcements."
The Seven-Colored Egg: "But, what if there are many living beings behind you?"
"Then bring them and run together."
"Eh?"