Earlier, probably after Night Owl finished his first class in the morning, he planned to skip the second flying class and ca to the library to look up so materials. But upon arrival, he found the library was under maintenance today.
Night Owl always felt that sothing was off. Yesterday, he checked the whereabouts of Primary Universe Batman and Arkham Batman, and then discovered that Primary Universe Batman had been at the library in recent days. Including yesterday, soone saw him entering the library and staying for a long ti.
When he wasn’t coming, the library was open to everyone; as soon as he wanted to co to check materials, the library suddenly closed for maintenance. Night Owl wasn’t stupid, naturally, he felt there was sothing wrong.
What’s more strange was that, according to the open hours posted outside the library, it was only closed for half a day each week, which happened to be this morning. As a result, Night Owl ca in the afternoon after finishing his morning class, yet the library was still not open.
This was actually because the book compiled by Primary Universe Batman had caused quite a stir among the crew. Considering the book wasn’t easy to read, Chris directly hosted a reading session at the library, so everyone could read together and share insights and experiences, with the prop team sketching model diagrams on site.
The crew had no qualms, after all, the conditions at school were much better than those at the filming base. It was midsumr now, and no matter how much air conditioning the filming base had, it was still hot, unlike the magical school, where magic adjusted the temperature to be warm in winter and cool in sumr, making working here a lot more comfortable than outside.
The crew stayed the whole day, making Night Owl very anxious, almost clawing at his ears. In his view, the library closing without reason was definitely a conspiracy by Primary Universe Batman targeting him, aid at preventing him from accessing information and gaining an intelligence advantage.
Thus, when the crew dispersed in the evening, Night Owl rushed into the library at the first opportunity.
He was a bit bewildered upon entry. Evil Batman was also a Batman, and a brilliant detective, quickly deducing that many people had gathered in the library previously.
The directorate wasn’t unkempt, but they weren’t professionals either, only cleaning superficially and leaving no garbage. Although the library had self-cleaning functions, it didn’t run constantly and only activated every few days, so traces of human activity weren’t completely cleared.
Night Owl was stunned by the scene he saw upon entering: could it be that hundreds of people had been active here throughout the day? A large school gathering was happening, yet he wasn’t inford?!
It wasn’t that he had an inflated sense of self-worth, expecting soone to inform him of every school event. The key issue was that he couldn’t remain unaware if several hundred people suddenly disappeared from the school.
This year’s intake was quite large, reaching over a thousand, but the other grades weren’t sizable, probably only around three or four thousand when combined. The school didn’t employ workers like janitors either, so with professors included, it was just about five thousand people. With such numbers, hundreds disappearing at once, and for an entire day, the Batn would definitely take notice.
Batman could morize faces and paid ticulous attention to details, rembering everyone he encountered. Missing so many faces during al tis at the dining hall would surely stand out.
Yet, Night Owl noticed no such phenonon, which proved that the hundreds who stayed in the library weren’t students or teachers. So who were they?
Night Owl couldn’t help but recall the anomaly found in the Magic Forest, confident that so unknown mysterious presence was active there. This was plausible, as even a Supre Magician might not cover every base. However, several hundred people seed implausible, right?
The Supre Magician wasn’t blind. If hundreds infiltrated the school and brazenly occupied the library for an entire day, he wouldn’t turn a blind eye. This left only one possibility: the Supre Magician was aware of and implicitly allowed their actions.
Considering Primary Universe Batman’s frequent visits here, there was definitely an issue, a conspiracy targeting him for sure. Standing at the library entrance, Night Owl took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. He had to figure out what was going on.
Suddenly, a thought struck him: could attending the Magic Academy to learn magic have been a trap from the start?
It must be said, paranoia when used correctly could be an art. Batman’s paranoia heightened his vigilance beyond the norm. Night Owl’s hunch hit the nail on the head, guessing Shiller and Primary Universe Batman’s intentions.
Though his guess skewed a bit. After seeing traces from those hundreds of unidentified individuals, he assud Shiller and Primary Universe Batman’s goal was an ambush, tricking him into the magical school to surround him with hundreds of ard n, ending him in this universe.
Anyone capable of dealing with him wasn’t ordinary, but this universe wasn’t short of talents either. Night Owl had encountered nurous Marvel individuals in the Battleworld. If Marvel superheroes gathered, they might actually take them all down in one fell swoop.
Night Owl thought harder and beca more convinced his assumption was correct: this was a trap from start to finish. After all, they truly seed to learn magic, specifically the ability to wield magic energy. How much energy one obtained depended on their own skills. It wasn’t achieved overnight, but at least there was hope.
How could such a fortune be shared with others? If he were Primary Universe Batman, he would keep it tightly under wraps, never letting anyone know, let alone his foes. Yet, the information reached him, indicating this could be their trap.
When coming, Night Owl had considered this possibility, but he wasn’t without survival skills, and alongside him was Lucifer. Taking a risk for magic was worth a try.
Night Owl began to pace inside the library. Since he already knew the opponent planned to make a move, he had to co up with a way to break the situation; he needed to learn magic and retreat safely.
As he walked, he found himself standing in front of a row of bookshelves in the library. Turning his head, he saw that there were quite a few brightly colored books on this shelf because the other books were either black or gray, making these colorful books particularly eye-catching. Night Owl glanced and discovered the problem:
The colors of these books seed to match the lights hanging above the counter. How could there be such a coincidence? Could there be so kind of chanism here?
Actually, during the day, the props team discovered that the chanisms they had set up—the books serving as puzzles—had sohow been placed into obscure corners. However, they didn’t think much of it, assuming that soone borrowing the books had ssed things up. For the purpose of filming so still shots, they restored everything to its original state.
At this point, Night Owl could see that there was clearly sothing wrong. The puzzle wasn’t difficult; with a quick look, he solved it. As soon as he rearranged the books, he heard a rumbling sound coming from the direction of the counter.
Night Owl turned and walked over, seeing that a secret door had opened behind the counter. His eyes darted around, and cautiously peeked inside, seeing nothing unusual, so he stepped inside.
After entering, Night Owl slightly furrowed his brow at the sight of the old-fashioned decor. He walked to the table, where he saw Saphire’s notes.
To be exact, this was no longer the original version of the notes seen by the Primary Universe Batman and the others, but an upgraded version rewritten and annotated by the Primary Universe Batman himself.
Many of the items on it corresponded to what was in his compendium, forming a system. For example, there was a snippet of Saphire’s notes regarding the effects of Magic Fish sli, extracted from Batman’s compendium. These were seamlessly integrated by Batman into the original version.
Moreover, he had added a substantial amount of profound black magic notes, comprising not only genuine black magic knowledge inherited from Karmatiji found on the bookshelf behind but also supplented with rigorous deduction and theories he hypothesized, with a writing style consistent with the compendium.
Being a Batman himself, Night Owl could grasp this style much better than any fairy tales. Flipping through just a few pages, he concluded: this person was definitely a dark magic master.
"This is really interesting," Night Owl couldn’t help but smile, "Hidden right under the Supre Magician’s nose, there’s actually a black magician."
Suddenly, he realized the key to overcoming the situation:
The mages of their universe also had various bizarre enemies; he couldn’t believe this universe had none. Although the Supre Magician was powerful, he couldn’t be undefeated. On the contrary, the stronger he was, the more people would want to use sches to bring him down.
It seed that this Saphire was the archenemy of the Supre Magician. If that was the case, then this would be his best collaborator.
Night Owl surveyed the furnishings in the room, confirming recent activity here. He went out to the registration desk to get paper and pen, leaving a letter for the other party.
Though he thought collaboration was possible, after all, a black magician wasn’t soone to ss with lightly, so suddenly bumping into them would be too risky. He hurriedly left the secret room.
He didn’t forget that he ca to gather information, so he went to the popular science section, searched around, and eventually found the compendium authored by the Primary Universe Batman, taking it with him as he left the library.
Soon after he left, the Primary Universe Batman arrived. Entering the secret room and seeing the letter that Night Owl left behind, he lowered his eyes satisfied.
Opening the folded letter paper, Night Owl’s handwriting was slightly ssy, obviously rushed. But his words were very pointed, essentially discussing the benefits of collaboration, coupled with a mild threat to the other party.
The benefits of collaboration were just fluff; the crucial part was the threat. In the letter, Night Owl emphasized that the secret room had already been discovered by him, and if the two couldn’t collaborate, he would figure out a way to let the Supre Magician discover it and inform them of what was done in the Magic Forest.
Night Owl’s assessnt of the situation was very accurate; no matter how powerful a black magician was, it would be impossible to confront the Supre Magician directly; otherwise, they wouldn’t need to sneak around here. This was his strongest leverage.
The Primary Universe Batman knew that Night Owl, under imnse pressure and eager for success, hadn’t realized that the clumsy design of the secret room chanism restored to its original form by himself was overly simplistic, like a child’s toy. But upon calming down back in his dorm, he would soon realize sothing was wrong—noticing such a simplistic chanism couldn’t be the work of such a formidable black magician.
And to let him know of Saphire’s cleverness, Batman penned the following letter:
"I really didn’t expect that soone would fall for such a foolish trap. Do you think if I really wanted to hide the secret room from discovery, I would create such a childish chanism? Poor guy, you don’t even realize, the mont you opened my notes, you were already cursed..."
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