I work as an editor at Marvel.

"Haha, just kidding, just kidding," Zhao Li chuckled and said casually.

Heimerdinger, who also returned empty-handed, was quite carefree, skipping and hopping to the front of the group. "Everyone, stand still. We're about to head to the next location for a break. Please say goodbye to our guide for today, Shiho Miyano, and thank the person in charge who made time for our visit."

Person in charge: ...Don't hold a grudge like that, at least tell me my name.

"Thank you, Miyano-sensei. Goodbye, Miyano-sensei."

Shiho Miyano waved, "Goodbye, everyone."

"Thank you, teacher in charge. Goodbye, teacher in charge."

"...Goodbye, goodbye." The person in charge replied somewhat helplessly. Goodness, his name really had become the person in charge.

Chapter 241 Balance Exists Among All Things (Part 2)

"Hello, do you need some water? Or do you need some cleaning? Or perhaps some food?" A teapot looked at Li Shiyao expectantly, as if waiting for Li Shiyao's command was its only purpose.

"Um...no need, you've already asked three times, thank you." Li Shiyao was a little incoherent, his words were all jumbled up.

This is the room the Clock Tower assigned to Li Shiyao for today. He's been here for almost an hour, but he still hasn't gotten used to it. This somewhat medieval-style house is quite nice, better than many hotels, and the service is excellent—almost too good.

"Oh, I see." The teapot jumped away from the table in front of Li Shiyao in disappointment. It always did this every time it was rejected by Li Shiyao.

“Um…” Li Shiyao suddenly spoke up, and the teapot turned its head sharply, looking at him expectantly.

"If you really want to do something, could you please clean my room and prepare a glass of milk for me? Just one glass will do," Li Shiyao said cautiously.

"No problem, your command is supreme." The teapot spout nodded slightly twice, as if in agreement.

After politely replying to Li Shiyao, the teapot suddenly looked around the rest of the room. "Everyone, get to work in accordance with our guest's orders!"

"No problem!" The candlestick, which had been silent all along, suddenly spoke, and the candle flame above its head suddenly became more intense, illuminating the entire room and making the already bright room even brighter.

"I'll clean!" The broom jumped over and, under the influence of magic, quickly swept the ground, even though there was only a little bit of freshly fallen dust.

"I'll prepare the milk!" the teapot said, and it floated over the campfire in a flash. The lid was opened, and the milky white milk was poured into the teapot by two forks.

Looking at the bustling scene, Li Shiyao swallowed hard, then took out his notebook. He felt it was necessary to record what happened tonight. This was completely different from the services of some smart furniture; it had a retro feel to it.

The next morning, when Li Shiyao woke up, his clothes had been washed and breakfast was on the table. Everything in the room had returned to normal, and the slightly noisy tea set seemed to be just a dream.

Sitting down at the table, Li Shiyao picked up a fork, then paused for a moment. The way he had used the fork yesterday flashed through his mind. After a second of hesitation, Li Shiyao decisively switched to using his hands. After all, it was just a small sandwich and a glass of milk, so why bother with a knife and fork?

After finishing breakfast, Li Shiyao walked out of the room, still feeling a bit dizzy from eating Yunnan mushrooms, but this feeling disappeared immediately when he saw his classmate.

In the hall, Chen Xiaohu and Cheng Xiaoyu started competing again. The two had a good relationship, but they seemed to be vying for the title of "Big Sister/Big Brother," though of course, this title was just something he made up himself.

“Um…” Li Shiyao walked over to a classmate, recalling the name, “Peter Parker?”

"It's me. What's up?" Peter turned to look at Li Shiyao, stopping what he was doing as he was tidying up the web-shooter.

"Um, it's almost time to assemble. Do you know where we're going or are we just going to wait here for instructions?" Li Shiyao asked. Before they rested yesterday, Zhao Li only assigned them rooms and didn't say anything else.

"I don't know, Professor Heimerdinger just told us to rest easy yesterday," Peter replied, then enthusiastically started chatting with Li Shiyao, "You know what? There were some super powerful... characters in my room yesterday? Anyway, that Needle grandma helped me adjust the ratio of the web-shooting fluid, and that Magic Book grandpa helped me find optimized routes for several launchers..."

Li Shiyao listened with a touch of envy. Why were other people's rooms completely different from his own? His own room was filled with items from doing housework that made him a little obsessed.

Suddenly, the whole house began to shake.

Li Shiyao wasn't afraid. With Heimerdinger's surprise as a backup, these things wouldn't alarm him anymore. Besides, this was inside the Clock Tower, so there was no way there could be any danger.

"Children, your teacher has left early. Please proceed to the archives on your own. The relevant maps and necessary identification information have been entered into your personal terminals."

Suddenly, two eyes and a mouth opened on the ceiling of the house, and the voice that came out sounded a bit like a middle-aged man.

"Okay." Everyone present looked at the extremely anthropomorphic ceiling with curious eyes, and it took a few seconds before someone finally responded.

With a sizzle, the door opened, and artificial sunlight streamed in. A magical marker appeared on the ground—a signpost leading to the archives.

Following the road sign and the map on his personal terminal, Li Shiyao walked quickly toward the archives. After leaving the hotel, Li Shiyao found that the place was more medieval than he had imagined, at least in terms of appearance.

However, after reading some of the introductions on the personal terminals, Li Shiyao immediately put that idea out of the question. Every seemingly ordinary stone brick on the road was highly integrated with various machines, which could be turned into a fast conveyor belt at any time if desired. Moreover, the circuit network within them formed a space stabilizer, stabilizing the space of this layer of the clock tower.

The technology involved is far beyond what medieval technology on Earth could achieve. This is perhaps a low-key demonstration of technology, the kind that most people wouldn't understand.

A dozen minutes later, Li Shiyao arrived at the archives, where there were already many people.

After waiting at the entrance for almost half an hour, Zhao Li hurriedly landed from the air and looked at the non-Chinese students, saying, "Professor Heimerdinger has something to attend to, so I will take care of the rest."

As Zhao Li spoke, he glanced at the crowd in front of him. Everyone was present, without any missing anyone. Even Cheng Xiaoyu, who was always causing trouble, was obediently staying in the line. After confirming this, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Last night, all the students got a good rest. Zhao Li and Heimerdinger were almost frantic with work. A strange object resembling a spaceship's black box appeared at the multiverse portal. The two of them were responsible for finding out if this object was related to the visiting students. After all, the biggest change in Ouroboros during this period was the addition of a group of visiting students.

Fortunately, it was preliminarily ruled out that the item might be connected to the students; otherwise, the visit might have had to be postponed.

All the students seemed to realize that Zhao Li wasn't in a good state, and they all obediently followed the procedure.

The archives don't have much for these students to see; most of it is information about the current state of the mystical world, such as various factions, mainstream schools of thought, and so on.

The speaker at the archives is Shen, the Eye of Twilight from the Ouroboros-Orthodox Order.

"The most important point in time for distinguishing between history and the present, backwardness and progress, is five hundred years ago. At that time, the sorcerer Kiran built the current Clock Tower to be responsible for exploring the multiverse, the Heavenly Emperor built the current Heavenly Court to be responsible for protecting our planet and this starry sky, and the Ancient One built the Order of the Wizards to be responsible for the peace of the planet and the balance between the two sides."

"After the Ancient One's unexpected death and the disintegration of the Order of the Ancients, the Ouroboros took over and officially became an important force in maintaining the balance. If this is difficult to understand, you can think of Ouroboros as an organization that specializes in handling a certain type of event."

"The only criterion for such an event is that it is neither significantly related to the multiverse nor related to the continuation of the diverse human civilizations in this cosmos."

Li Shiyao blinked. To put it bluntly, it's something that neither the Heavenly Court nor the Clock Tower cares about, yet the Ouroboros is taking care of it. Hmm, it just feels a little pathetic.

"Teacher, to which side do the Knights of the Round Table belong? The book says that King Arthur, the leader of the Knights of the Round Table, has not accepted the Clock Tower's invitation, nor does he have a deep connection with the Heavenly Court." A student raised his hand and asked.

Shen nodded. "Yes, things are pretty much as you thought but didn't say. King Arthur Artoria has a nominal position in Ouroboros, but due to some historical issues, she doesn't participate in Ouroboros's various decisions. You will learn the specifics in your upcoming studies."

"Teacher, won't you tell us about the Balance Sect you belong to? The doctrines described in the introduction are a bit vague and difficult to understand."

The speaker was a student at Hogwarts Preparatory School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Li Shiyao could guess without even looking. After all, people who grew up in China would easily associate the doctrines of the Balance Sect with the Yin-Yang balance theory, and the symbol of the Balance Sect was also somewhat similar to the Yin-Yang symbol of Tai Chi.

Based on the establishment time and initial location of the Balance Sect, it is not inappropriate to say that the Balance Sect originated from Taoism.

Shen, who had been listening to the question without changing his posture since the student entered, finally changed his posture slightly. He raised his head slightly and glanced at the student who asked the question, the light in his eyes seeming to see through people's hearts.

“I would love to teach you about the doctrine of balance after you graduate, but not now,” Shen said in a low voice.

"Because I haven't found the meaning of absolute equilibrium either. What I can see is only a relatively balanced world, which is useless to you now."

Zhao Li leaned against the wall and remained silent. It was better that Shen didn't speak; if he did, it might spark a debate. He couldn't possibly let Shen teach his ideas to these students who had just started their studies.

Because Shen's philosophy doesn't find many like-minded people even among those in Taoism who share some similarities. For example, Lin Zhengying's teacher once commented on Shen, and his evaluation wasn't very good. He compared Shen to a practitioner who had become numb from studying, had misunderstood, and turned into a stone.

Compared to Shen's Kinkou Order, Zed's Shadow Order, which originated from the Kinkou Order, is more in line with the current moral values ​​of the general public. Zed's ideology is rather crude, summed up in one sentence: good deeds are rewarded and evil deeds are punished!

Of course, due to certain events, Zed, like Shen, is considered by many cultivators to be mentally challenged. For example, Zed once tried to kill his own master, who had already laid down his weapons.

In the eyes of many practitioners like Master Lam Ching-ying, Shen and Jie were truly two people who went to extremes.

When faced with foreign invasion, Shen Hui believed it was part of the world's balance and ignored the enemy's slaughter in order to maintain that illusory equilibrium, doing nothing.

Jie, on the other hand, is the complete opposite. He uses killing to stop killing, violence to control violence, and any means necessary to achieve his goals. He is willing to give up everything to achieve his objectives.

It's only because this is a time of peace, and because they have many older and more influential schools of thought above them that they are being suppressed; otherwise, these two sects would most likely be locked in a fierce battle.

Don't be fooled by Shen's indifference to Zed killing his own father, who was also Zed's master. As long as Zed continues, he and his Shadow Order will eventually become enemies who disrupt the balance in Shen's eyes, and will be part of the group that must be eliminated.

After explaining one sentence, Shen continued to introduce the text. To be fair, although he spoke without any emotion, what he said was indeed very clear.

This behavior, which students perceive as a loss of emotion, is one of the reasons why Ouroboros and the Clock Tower chose him as the archives manager. He would never arbitrarily change a single word in the archives because of his own emotions.

"Today's guide was much more assertive than yesterday's, but if I had to choose, I'd still prefer Shiho Miyano to continue as our guide."

At the end of his visit to the archives, Li Shiyao took out his notebook and jotted down a sentence. Before he could close the notebook, he bumped into the back of the student in front of him.

Is there a traffic jam?

Li Shiyao looked at the stopped line, stood on tiptoe to look at the front, where Shen, who had led everyone out, was standing there, facing a person shrouded in shadow.

Swish!

A shadow flashed past from behind the group, and Zhao Li directly stepped between Shen and Jie, his hands clasped together, a dark lotus platform slowly rotating beside him.

"I'm reminding you to pay attention to the current situation," Zhao Li said sternly.

If Zed and Shen were to fight here, Zhao Li would have no choice but to suppress them first, regardless of the consequences. As a veteran high-level professional, with the advantage of his dual cultivation of Buddhism and Ghost, he could easily defeat Shen and Zed by himself.

"I won't bother with a stone." Jie sneered, a dart spinning between his fingers. "I'm just here to deliver a message."

With a whoosh, Zed's dart shot directly towards Shen.

With a snap, Zhao Li pressed down with both hands, and an invisible palm crushed the dart in mid-air. "After I take the student away, you can send the letter however you want. But for now, please do not do anything that might make me misunderstand. This is the last warning."

Hearing Zhao Li's words, Jie finally looked at the students behind Shen. He only had eyes for Shen and hadn't paid attention to the people behind him.

With a bang, the robber exploded into a shadow and disappeared before everyone's eyes.

"What a jerk!" Zhao Li cursed inwardly. If it weren't for the students being there, he would have taught this guy a lesson.

Chapter 242 The Cruel Alien Race - Otsutsuki

Inside the Clock Tower's inspection room, Heimerdinger stared into deep thought at the analyzed data before him, his face occasionally showing signs of frustration as he pondered.

"Professor Heimerdinger, how's the analysis going? Is this an object from our world, or did it drift over from a spatial gap near the multiverse portal?" Karma asked.

The thing that Heimerdinger analyzed was discovered by Karma during her patrol. The energy fluctuations related to the black box were very small. If it weren't for Karma's keen perception, this thing might have been discovered much closer to the clock tower.

"The information has been mostly read and the analysis is almost complete. The security technology on this is very crude, not at all like a civilization that has developed normally to the interstellar age. And the information in it has also verified my conjecture." Heimerdinger clasped his hands together in front of him with a serious expression.

One after another, successfully deciphered messages floated in the room along with Heimerdinger's voice. These were messages that had undergone multiple transformations to prevent any special curses hidden in the original messages.

“I will temporarily call this race the Otsutsuki race, because according to the information carried in the black box, all individuals of this race who have entered interstellar space share the same surname,” Heimerdinger continued.

"You mean this is an extremely xenophobic race?" Karma asked, frowning. She herself had a very bad impression of this race. When she encountered this black box, Karma sensed a deep sense of evil and indiscriminate aggression emanating from it.

“That’s one way to put it. Also, there’s a serious lack of information about the origin of this black box, so I can’t determine for the time being whether it comes from another universe or simply from a corner of our universe.” Heimerdinger jumped off the floating chair. “However, I’ve found some more important information.”

As they spoke, a projection generated through system reconstruction appeared in front of them. Many parts of the person in the projection were automatically generated by the system, but with the current technical support of the Clock Tower system, its credibility was still relatively high.

“Don’t look at the other places yet, look here.” Heimerdinger pointed to the eye area of ​​the projection.

The projection of the Otsutsuki race on their eyes is somewhat similar to Yang Jian of the Heavenly Court. They have three eyes, consisting of two white eyes and one blood-red eye. The blood-red eye has black tomoe arranged in a circle. The overall shape is somewhat like the orbit of a planet in a galaxy.

"This thing seems to be a manifestation of the power of the Otsutsuki clan, and it is also an important characteristic of them. However, the black box mentions very little about their power. After all, such a description is not important to them, and reducing the description can also reduce the leakage of information to non-Otsutsuki clans."

With a wave of his hand, Heimerdinger displayed various photos of the Otsutsuki Eye from different angles around the projection.

“This thing looks a bit like the Mystic Eye,” Merlin, who was following behind Karma, suddenly said. “However, there are no existing Mystic Eyes anymore because they have too many side effects and too obvious weaknesses, so they have been eliminated for many years. But if you need, I can give you information on various Mystic Eyes from the past few thousand years.”