Wizards: Starting with Synthetic Gems

Chapter 146, Grade B article, 50 contribution points.
The next day, Lilith's Hut was located in the Central Academy Library on the west side of the port city. It was a huge building, not an alchemy hut.

The entire building is antique and is not a stone building in the southeast corner area, but a seven-story wooden building that is stacked like a tower.

Its core is a high-level magical plant, the Babel Tree, which supports it.

The canopy of the Babel tree supports the various auxiliary rooms of the library, making the Lilith Cottage public library quite unique.

The first floor of the library.

A dwarf scholar sat in a chair, exuding a tranquil aura completely different from that of an alchemist. He wore a pair of non-prescription glasses and was flipping through a book thicker than a brick. His fingers were thin and bony, with the knuckles clearly visible.

Besides the dwarf scholar, there were many other staff members in the library, all of whom appeared to be rather quiet.

There was even a halfling-born, formally trained wizard specializing in general studies, leading his students on the first floor of the library, learning and recounting the history of the library.

Locke entered the library, bowed to the halfling wizard in the distance, and then quickly walked toward the person in charge of the first floor of the library, who was the dwarf scholar.

The public library is a public building in Lilith House, and also the headquarters for general scholars in Lilith House—a teaching and research base.

The so-called general studies are the general knowledge of wizards in the prophetic school.

The ultimate certification goals for wizards studying this category of magic are twofold: one is to obtain a Doctor of General Studies degree and become a learned and versatile scholar working in the library system.

The second option is to give up the general education doctoral certification exam and instead become an appraiser, following the path of appraiser assistant – appraiser – senior appraiser.

However, this meant leaving the library system, distancing themselves from the subsidies provided by the college leadership and associations, and embarking on a path of self-reliance.

General education, to some extent, is a highly specialized category of magic with a very narrow range of applications.

Therefore, they can only be found in the larger wizarding academies in the southeastern corner of the region, and the job opportunities available to them are very limited. Most of them live off subsidies from the White Wizarding Association.

However, some senior appraisers live very comfortably.

Locke walked up to Orl, a first-class wizard apprentice, and asked, "Scholar Orl, what score did you give to the article I submitted six days ago?"

The dwarf Orl's eyes lit up slightly when he saw Locke approaching. "Augustin, the potion master, you've come. I was going to send you a letter if you hadn't come."

"Potion Master Augustine, the article you sent six days ago has been cross-reviewed by three Doctors of General Studies (First-Class Wizard Apprentices), and its evaluation score is 71 points. The classification level is B."

You can earn 50 contribution points.

The dwarf Orl handed Locke a yellow envelope with his slender, bony fingers. “You don’t need to come in person anymore. You potion makers are very busy. I’ll arrange for the library’s servants to deliver the letter.”

"You've only recently been promoted to a first-class wizard apprentice, haven't you? I didn't expect you to publish an article with a score of over 70 so quickly."

The dwarf Orl's eyes gleamed, revealing a cunning glint. "And you should have a high-level vampire captive in your hands, otherwise you wouldn't have been able to publish that article."

"I'm so envious. You should be able to write five or six more articles related to that vampire. As long as you can get a score of 60 or above, which is grade C, you can get 20 contribution points."

"Even if you just accumulate them and publish a few more articles, you can exchange them for a lot of resources."

The dwarf scholar Or gave Locke a friendly smile. "Your article is very interesting. I enjoy reading articles about vampires, but unfortunately, there are very few of them, and they are not studied much."

"I hope you can post a few more articles. Oh, by the way, did the academy know you captured a vampire?"

Locke nodded slightly in thanks. "Thank you. I'll try to be as quick as possible. Scholar Orl, that vampire, I've placed it in my wizard mentor's magical creature incubation room."

The dwarf scholar Or nodded knowingly. "A formal wizard's collection, then that makes sense."

"You can keep that vampire and do your own research."

Within the library system, first-class wizard apprentices don't need to rely too much on their wizard mentors to publish articles, since the library system has a large number of generalist PhDs and wizard apprentices specializing in general studies. General studies means learning a little bit about everything; they can't do the actual writing, but their evaluations and appreciations are highly professional.

The greatest value of these general education scholars lies in preserving knowledge and traditions for the college, recording the various achievements within the college, reviewing these achievements, and classifying them into different categories.

Furthermore, these generalist wizards can use the spells of the prophetic school.

They are needed to record things inside the library or to look up certain knowledge.

The library contains a vast amount of information; without using divination spells, it's really difficult to find the knowledge you need.

The college's article grading system is divided into four levels: S (90-100 points), A (80-89 points), B (70-79 points), C (60-69 points), and D (less than 60 points).

The contribution points that can be obtained among those of the same level are roughly the same. The score classification within the same level is only to make it easier for wizards who come to inquire to understand the reliability of these data and the quality of the research methods.

Therefore, the score is just for your own reference. If you care about the magical resources and seniority gained from it, then the level of the article is the most important thing.

S-class achievements are groundbreaking, possess innovative potential, and have a very high citation rate. These are basically irrelevant to me now, as they are all things at the formal wizard level.

Level A represents significant research achievements that represent substantial breakthroughs in existing theories and technologies.

If Locke dared to reveal his memory ointment formula and the cultivation methods for several magical plants, then his articles would all be at this level. It's just that they are all at the apprentice level, so the scores aren't high enough.

Grade B articles used qualified research methods but had limited innovation, with only some highlights; they were still relatively useful as reference materials.

Locke initially thought that his article would not be graded as a B, but to his surprise, it was graded as a B.

This is probably because the academy is currently engaged in a wizarding war with the Blood Curse Tribunal.

Level C refers to relatively basic research, articles that have a little practical value but are not very impactful.

As for D-level articles, these are articles that don't receive any rewards and only serve to enrich the library, without much other benefit. These are also the most numerous articles in the library.

Because many first-class wizard apprentices cannot guarantee the quality of their articles when they are constantly publishing them, and sometimes they rely entirely on luck, their articles will be identified by wizards with general knowledge as being of poor quality.

Then it became something to fill the number of books in the library.

This classification is roughly the same across all the college libraries in the Southeastern region, as well as the association library of the White Wizarding Association.

However, the association library is stricter than the college library. Basically, the materials in the association library are automatically upgraded by one level when they are brought to the college library.

For example, a B-level article in the association library would generally be half a level higher in a better college library, but in a less desirable college library it would be an A-level article.

Locke opened the envelope and saw the scholars from the college library congratulating him, as well as a reward of 50 contribution points.

Locke was momentarily stunned. 'Yuri went to the mortal realm and worked hard for months, only earning 20 contribution points, while I casually published an article and earned 50 contribution points.'

'Dean Tunguska and the others spent their entire lives there, and they only earned 15 contribution points in my class with Patty and Codd…'

'It turns out that publishing articles is the fastest way to earn contribution points.'

Locke sighed in amazement.

However, he then thought that was not right. Publishing articles was the fastest way to earn contribution points, as everyone knew.

The problem is that not everyone has the ability to publish high-scoring articles; most people can only publish low-quality articles with scores below 60.

(End of this chapter)