The wood flea is also called a stinkbug.

Arthropoda, insect class, Hemiptera, a type of oval flat bug belonging to the stinkbug genus, lives by sucking blood. Its body contains stink glands that can excrete a foul odor, which is ejected in a mist form when threatened. Adults are generally over five millimeters in length, but the one Zheng Qing squashed now is nearly one centimeter, far exceeding the normal size of a wood flea.

"Indeed, it’s a bit peculiar."

Xin Fat Man pinched his nose and leaned closer to Zheng Qing’s opened palm, speaking in a muffled voice: "It’s not just the size... Generally speaking, this type of bug wouldn’t boldly crawl onto someone during the day, especially here in the classroom of the First University. Besides the protective array, sprites clean daily... Moreover, Brother Qing doesn’t seem like the kind of person who attracts stinkbugs."

"Additionally, it doesn’t seem to smell that bad." Zhang Ji Xin sniffed, adding.

"Where’s your dust-repelling talisman? Didn’t you wear it?" Xiao Xiao spread out the bamboo slip law book, quickly copying a cleaning spell and an expelling spell, tossing them to Zheng Qing.

The friends’ chatter and analysis pulled the young teaching assistant’s attention away from the squabbles among several colleges, finally noticing the peculiarities of the bug in his palm.

"I did wear the dust-repelling talisman."

He reached his left hand into his belt, touched around, pulled out a square-folded talisman paper, and threw it on the table, pointing at the weak green glow emanating from its crease: "It’s still active, theoretically any gu worms shouldn’t be able to come near me..."

"If theory were effective, there wouldn’t be so many accidents in the world." Xiao Xiao shook his head, picked up the talisman paper, and helped Zheng Qing tuck it back into his belt: "Besides, this bug is so large, it probably exceeds the range the ’dust-repelling talisman’ can expel."

"Never heard of anyone refining a stinkbug into a gu worm... the cost-effectiveness is too low." Xin Fat Man also loosened his hand from pinching his nose, sniffed, and raised his eyebrows: "Oh, it really doesn’t stink!"

While speaking, he took out a ceramic plate, a monocle, and a series of examination tools like small tweezers, a scalpel, slides, fixatives, etc., from his watch.

"There’s still three minutes before class, enough time to dissect this little bug!" The Fat Wizard held tweezers in his left hand, a knife in his right, the knife and tweezers crossing with a crisp collision sound, exuding confidence: "...The first time I dissected a corpse-eating beetle, it took only thirty seconds to peel its skin completely!"

"Impressive." Zheng Qing tossed the bug into the dish in front of the Fat Wizard, nodding dismissively, while his mind envisioned the somewhat dim conference room of the Seven Sins.

He wasn’t the only one thinking of those devils.

"The devils didn’t find you for a meeting last Friday, right?" Xiao Xiao calculated the time, asking Zheng Qing while helping Xin clip the monocle on his left eye.

Zheng Qing shook his head.

"Three people said they couldn’t make it... The remaining four said they hadn’t collected biological samples of the target individuals." Upon mentioning this, he couldn’t help but twitch his lips: "Every time I hear these words from them, it always seems a bit ridiculous." 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

"If your blood or hair were really collected, after having nightmares at night or lying in the school hospital, you wouldn’t find it so ridiculous." Xiao Xiao warned with a glance, then shifted his focus back to the slightly glowing crystal ball in front.

Zhang Ji Xin gently coughed.

"Is it possible,"

The red-faced male wizard’s expression was serious, rubbing the buttons on his gloves, deep in thought: "I mean, could this bug just be a coincidence? Because the awakening of insects after the awakening thunder often causes some degree of mutation... This stinkbug is just a bit larger, the mutation extent is still within theoretical permissible range..."

The awakening is March 6th.

Today is already March 15th.

Xiao Xiao shook his head but didn’t have time to speak before the Fat Wizard’s voice reached his ears: "Mutation is mutation, there’s no such thing as a mutation within the theoretical permissible range... Just like this stinkbug, even though it seems only slightly larger to us, its mutated mouthparts are sharp enough to pierce most dragon skin!"

Saying this, he raised the smallest pair of tweezers in his hand, showing the stinkbug’s mouthparts to everyone. However, for a bug that is only a centimeter long even after mutation, its mouthparts are hard to distinguish without tools by Zheng Qing and others.

"Yet it still couldn’t pierce Brother Qing’s skin, right." Zhang Ji Xin sighed with envy.

This winter break, because he had to go home, he didn’t participate in the Atonement Hunting Team’s designated hunting mission, missing the celebration afterward. But during this time, the fact that Zheng Qing accidentally consumed a copper bean at the celebration, causing his physical fitness to surge, was known to all hunters of the Atonement Hunting Team.

Unlike the caution and uneasiness of others, the red-faced male wizard didn’t see this as a bad thing. He believes that any acquisition of power comes with certain risks—magic experiments might encounter accidents, spells might backfire, body training could lead to disability, etc.—when factoring in time cost, the copper bean Zheng Qing consumed is practically a miracle drug.

Just like now, while others speculated about the bug’s origin, he expressed regret: "Two months ago, a small knife could cut Brother Qing’s skin, now even a bug that can bite through dragon skin can’t pierce his hide... sigh... I wonder if those ravens have any leftover lab materials, I’d like to eat a copper bean too!!"

"You’ve really trained your muscles into your brain." Zheng Qing mocked lightly, simultaneously asking: "How much longer until class? Should we show this bug to Old Yao?"

He believed Old Yao would recognize the evil spirits behind the bug at a glance.

A gasp was heard.

"It’s class time already?" Xiao Xiao adjusted his glasses, rarely showing a trace of astonishment: "Where’s the professor? Isn’t Old Yao’s curse studies class supposed to be the first one? Today is Monday, right!"

He even began doubting today’s date.

Just like the saying that circulates in the wizard world—if a legendary wizard conflicts with time, don’t doubt, the wrong one is definitely time.

"It’s Monday." Zheng Qing confirmed, while looking around.

Only then did he realize Tang Dun had disappeared from the classroom unnoticed, Liu Fei Fei was maintaining class discipline with Jiang Yu’s assistance, more and more students began anxiously looking at the door, although the professor hadn’t arrived, surprisingly, few were making noise or disturbing, even the stick figure puppet behind the door sat seriously on the blank paper, arms crossed, silent.

An oppressive and uneasy atmosphere permeated the classroom.

This wait lasted for half a class period.