Chapter 71: Xi Ran: School Of Biology? They Don’t Have That Kind Of Power. Go Straight To The Principal
At this time, Secret Realm Observation Post.
After losing several drones, several teachers finally saw the footage of Zuo Hang’s team.
Zuo Hang, Hoshino Ryuji, Lin Ping—the drones above these three people’s heads had already scrapped several before they even arrived, but the ones above Heichuan Nagi and Zuo Rou’s heads were completely fine.
The footage the teachers were seeing now was transmitted from the drones beside those two.
The drones only capture images, then White Dragon’s AI scores the students; the overhead satellite footage from above the Secret Realm has always been poor, and many battle footages that AI can’t handle well have to be tossed to the teachers for scoring.
After Xi Ran and Teacher Liang Gong slipped away using “going to the restroom” as an excuse, the remaining five teachers had already been arguing for more than ten minutes over “exactly how many Beedrill did Fletchling and Swablu take out of the fight.”
Normally, each class’s teacher is responsible for scoring their own class’s students, but now aside from Zuo Hang’s team, most people from the other classes haven’t even gotten their first win yet.
Either they’re blindly crashing around in the Secret Realm without any intellect, or they’re directly taken out by some Pokémon with excessively high combat ability.
As of now, more than 200 people have already lost about a tenth.
Aside from Zuo Hang’s side, the optical drones beside the other students have all been in position, and for the time being, there haven’t been any situations where the AI can’t score them.
……
“Does going to the restroom take this long? Zuo Hang is from Xi Ran’s class after all; if you won’t even pay attention to your own student, what’s the point of us discussing here?” Teacher Su from Class B said.
The remaining few teachers stayed silent; everyone was a colleague, and they had long grown accustomed to Su Chenglin’s way of speaking.
His words were rather harsh, but he was still very responsible toward the students; otherwise, he couldn’t have served as homeroom teacher for five consecutive years.
At the same time, White Dragon University Department, School of Biology elevator compartment.
“Little Xi Ran, I think we still shouldn’t go down,” Teacher Liang Gong said.
Xi Ran first pressed the first floor button on the elevator, then the sixth floor, then “1”, “7”, “2”, “2”, “3”, as if inputting a password.
White Dragon has undergone countless reconstructions and changes of principals, but only this old building of the School of Biology has never been demolished and rebuilt; every time the academy is renovated, it’s just some reinforcement on the original exterior walls, repainting, and the like.
Few people know the original purpose of this island where Academy City is located, and few know why there are such intricate architectural distributions underground in Academy City like arenas and casinos.
The elevator descended for nearly 20 minutes.
Xi Ran’s expression was normal, but Teacher Liang Gong’s face had turned a bit green.
The moment the elevator doors opened, it was pitch black outside, probably very deep underground, but wind could be felt.
Xi Ran stepped out of the elevator first, but Teacher Liang Gong took a step back inside the elevator compartment.
“Haven’t you had enough acting yet?? There’s no one else here, just the two of us.”
“Tch, boring.” Teacher Liang Gong stuck out her tongue and hurriedly caught up with quick steps. “Wasn’t I just trying to set the atmosphere? It’s rare to come underground once.”
“We’re here to find something, not like kids teaming up for an adventure.” With that, Xi Ran pulled a Poké Ball from her lower back. “Lampent, light up!”
Teacher Liang Gong also pulled a Poké Ball from her lower back. “Charmander, come out and light a fire too!”
Lampent is a Pokémon that resembles a chandelier, with a smaller tassel on its head from which a tall purple Will-O-Wisp shines; its lower lamp holder extends two curved lamp-arm-like arms, each ending in four clusters of purple flames.
Lampent used Will-O-Wisp, and several small flames bloomed in the dark environment.
This purple Will-O-Wisp doesn’t have great lighting effect, but the advantage is that it can disperse to many places, and Lampent itself can serve as a mobile light source.
Charmander’s lighting method was much simpler.
It simply held its own tail and walked in front, using the burning flame on its tail as a light source; purely in terms of lighting effect, it was actually much brighter than the Will-O-Wisps scattered around.
Teacher Liang Gong couldn’t help but complain: “Why did you bring Lampent to a place like this?? Can you put out this purple Will-O-Wisp? I wasn’t panicking at first, but seeing your purple Will-O-Wisp…”
Xi Ran said: “Didn’t you want atmosphere? Aren’t I giving you atmosphere?”
In the silence, the two could clearly hear each other’s voices, and the vast underground had some echoes, especially the “whooshing” sound of the Will-O-Wisps burning, which instinctively made one feel uneasy.
But both Xi Ran and Teacher Liang Gong were trainers with far superior quality of mind compared to ordinary people; they could easily handle perilous nights in the wild, let alone this mere abandoned Underground Containment Station.
“Just look for UB05 directly; ignore the rest. This place is too big, and we don’t have that much time,” Xi Ran said.
“UB05?” Teacher Liang Gong was puzzled.
“That’s Guzzlord’s designation,” Xi Ran said.
“Tch, as expected of a woman who’s been homeroom teacher at White Dragon for ten years; you even know this so clearly.”
White Dragon tradition: starting with “tch” means being sarcastic.
“Nini!!” Lampent suddenly cried out.
Xi Ran looked toward the sound and saw Lampent facing a cylindrical transparent container, which was empty inside.
Visually estimated to be at least four meters tall, the container was undamaged, and it still held a half-transparent liquid inside.
The label below the cylindrical container had a designation written on it.
——”UB05″.
Xi Ran and Teacher Liang Gong’s expressions instantly turned grave.
Teacher Liang Gong spoke first: “Can you confirm this is the one Zuo Hang encountered?”
Xi Ran said: “It should be; that Guzzlord at the start seemed to be a black meatball over 4m wide. Whether it’s the one in the Secret Realm can be checked with the satellite footage later—that’s not important. What’s important is why the Guzzlord sealed here is gone.”
Teacher Liang Gong spread her hands: “Don’t look at me; looking at me won’t help—it wasn’t me who did it. This is the School of Biology; shouldn’t you ask people within the school first??”
“No need; they’re all externally hired teachers, and even the University Department has hardly any trainers who stay on campus. They don’t have the capability for this.” Xi Ran said, “I’ll report directly to the principal. An Ultra Beast has vanished from the Underground Containment Station out of thin air—this is serious.”
Academy City isn’t limited to schools just for “Pokémon”; White Dragon’s University Department also has many ordinary people, and among those in the School of Biology studying Pokémon biology, berry botany, microbiology, and such, only a small handful are trainers.
Trainers aren’t the type who need to sit quietly in a room memorizing books or doing research; they spend most of their time traveling.
This is also why Xi Ran said people from the School of Biology had no reason to know about the underground containment station.
Xi Ran glanced at her terminal. “We’ve been out too long; you go back first. I’ll go see the principal.”
Teacher Liang Gong said: “Alright then, but hurry up. I don’t want to spend too long with Su Chenglin… My head’s going to explode.”
The two hadn’t gone deeper; they stopped at the UB05 spot, but Lampent’s Will-O-Wisps had flown very far.
The dim Will-O-Wisps illuminated countless empty containers.
“UB01”, “UB02”, “UB03”.
To clarify, the universities in this world are basically the same as ours, with computer science academies, bioengineering, music, art, and the like.
Of course, there are also trainers, breeders, performers, and such.
But as everyone knows, trainers are basically traveling nonstop; it’s unrealistic to make 18-year-old trainers come to university. They might return to school occasionally for further studies or to get a graduation certificate, but they definitely won’t stay on campus long-term.
That’s all.
I think some might say it’s unreasonable, so I’m explaining.
If you still think my explanation is unreasonable, then it’s unreasonable; after all, everyone’s understanding is different, and I can’t force you to be convinced—I’m just providing a relatively reasonable explanation.
Key point: relatively speaking.
