Inside Ashgra City, Locke and Gabby Montoya came together to a group of dust-covered houses.
These houses had been without human presence for a long time.
The residents of Ashgra City didn't dare approach this area, since the owners of these houses had all contracted diseases they couldn't understand.
Locke looked at the house made of red and white bricks in front of him. The entire house resembled a small villa. He brought Gabby Montoya to briefly inspect three houses in this vicinity.
It had to be said that the living standards of mortals in the wizard world were on average better than the commoners of Corfu Continent.
The commoners on Corfu Island lived in thatched huts without floors, and some even lived in cattle sheds together with livestock, without even a bed.
But in the wizard world, the commoners of the southeastern quadrant each had at least one small, simple yet independent house.
After inspection, Gabby Montoya shook her head and said to Locke, "Senior Locke, I still don't see what the problem is."
"These houses aren't connected, and we've inspected three of them. Each one is separated by five or six individual house, so why did the civilians living in these three houses all contract that strange disease, while the owners of the dozen or so houses in between are perfectly fine?"
Seeing himself and Gabby approaching, they would only slightly open their doors to observe the situation, and upon seeing wizards coming, they appeared very excited.
They were obviously living in constant fear, afraid they too would contract that strange disease. Since mortal doctors had no solutions, they were in helpless situations. Seeing him was naturally like seeing a great savior.
Locke shook his head slightly at Gabby's question, "Haven't you noticed that these houses actually have a common characteristic?"
Gabby Montoya, in her early thirties, was stunned.
Locke pointed to a house in front of them, "Haven't you discovered that these three diseased mortals' residences have a common feature: they're particularly dirty?"
"The walls of the houses are very filthy, and the areas in front of the houses don't look like they've been carefully cleaned. The hygiene awareness of these house owners is extremely poor."
Locke's gaze swept over a short-tailed mouse rapidly running through the gap between the bottom of the house and the ground, that is, the elevated moisture-proof layer.
This mouse ran out from the elevated layer and ran to the shadow under a tree, where it hid. Dıscover more novels at novel⦿fire.net
Gabby Montoya was somewhat puzzled. "Senior Locke, are you saying that the residences of those sick people are all dirty? But several in between aren't very clean either."
Locke said, "That's because they keep cats and dogs."
Locke quickly moved forward, catching up to the mouse hiding behind the tree shadow.
Gabby Montoya looked at Locke, "Senior Locke... wait for me..."
But Locke couldn't be bothered with her anymore, muttering to himself in a low voice, "That mouse has a big problem."
He had keenly discovered the issue. "Ordinary mice, upon seeing humanoid creatures larger than themselves, would immediately hide. But that mouse, seeing us approach, actually deliberately ran out from its hiding place."
Locke caught up to the mouse and stood in front of it, carefully observing its body.
The magical world was full of mysteries. Even though he was a second-class wizard apprentice, he had to be extremely careful.
Teacher Sophia had said that in complex magical plant environments, it wasn't unheard of for wizard apprentices to die in the wild due to carelessness.
"Indeed, this mouse's consciousness is very sluggish. Upon seeing me approach, its first reaction wasn't even to flee." Locke took out a bottle from his waist pouch, a universal simple antidote he had bought for 1 magic stone from Chimera Market: Daffodil Detox Water. Only then did he hold his breath and look down at the mouse.
"Indeed, just as I suspected, those mortals weren't the first batch of creatures to be affected. The first batch of affected creatures were these rodents." Locke discovered some extremely tiny, nearly transparent thin mycelia on this mouse's neck.
Moreover, its neck had some hidden rotting flesh.
When Locke got extremely close to it, he smelled a faint fragrance. This fragrance was extremely difficult to describe and very special, but in any case, it was a scent that once smelled, would never be forgotten.
This fragrance was between foul and fragrant, extremely unique.
Locke felt some substance entering his body along with this fragrance. His hands became slightly numb, but due to the medicinal properties of the Daffodil Detox Water and the ancient creature bloodline in his body, this minor toxicity soon completely disappeared.
Locke said, "Found it. This is the source causing those civilians to fall ill."
Gabby Montoya stood behind Locke, looking at that unremarkable little mouse, slightly astonished. She had been searching here for almost half a month, constantly trying to find that pathogenic magical plant. Who would have thought the culprit wasn't a plant at all, but a running mouse!
No wonder she had searched for over half a month without finding anything at all.
Because she had been looking in completely the wrong direction.
Gabby Montoya's gaze toward Locke became filled with respect. This breeder assistant who was so much younger than her indeed had greater abilities than she did.
Having just arrived half a day ago, he had already locked onto the target.
This made Gabby Montoya feel the gap between herself and Locke.
Gabby Montoya said, "Senior Locke, so what should we do next? Should we write a report to the academy and let others handle it, or should we solve it ourselves?"
Locke's mind went through several types of magical plants, finally locking onto the most suspicious category. 'These mice are essentially all controlled by that magical plant.'
'The fungus produced by that magical plant has parasitized them, making them no longer fear humans and slowing their reactions.'
'Its purpose should be to make humans approach them, creating large-scale plagues. The result of this plague would be massive human deaths.'
'This is a reproduction mechanism. The most likely candidate for this reproduction mechanism is the Corrupt Soil Taro.'
'The seeds of this magical plant can only reproduce on large quantities of human bones, and even then might fail. It's a magical plant with particularly harsh growing conditions, which is why it's very rarely seen in the wild.'
'Without special cultivation, it's difficult to grow.'
Locke's thoughts moved quickly. 'So if it really is Corrupt Soil Taro, there must be a corpse with high energy density around this magical plant.'
'Corrupt Soil Taro is a very rare magical plant that would be quite valuable even to first-class wizard apprentices. Moreover, Corrupt Soil Taro rarely appears in natural environments. If I don't record and study this abnormal situation, it would be too much of a waste.'
Locke looked at Gabby Montoya, "We can handle this matter ourselves. There's no need to make several trips to notify the academy."
"I remember you're a wizard apprentice specializing in transformation magic. I need you to transform into a cat to search for these mice's gathering place."
Gabby Montoya didn't hesitate and nodded, "Alright, Senior Locke."