Wizards: Starting with Synthetic Gems

Chapter 287 Acting Alone
Amidst the unpleasant gazes of the wizards of the Secret Fire House, Locke slowly turned around and looked at them, the innate demonic eye on his forehead flickering.

Wayne Acosta, the wizard seed of the Secret Fire Institute, suddenly changed his expression. "Let's go, retreat quickly, and find another army ant colony."

"The Eye Demon Wizard lives up to his name; his combat power is too great."

At this moment, Wayne felt the enormous gap in combat power between him and Locke.

If he dares to make a move, Locke would never mind making them never leave the Forbidden Forest again, since there are so many dangers inside.

The five wizards of the Secret Fire Academy chanted incantations, transformed into flames, and fled into the distance.

Once Locke was sure they were far away, he deactivated his bloodline activation and said to the crowd, whose eyes were now filled with increasing respect, "I only need the queen ant's glands; the rest are yours to share. The remaining army ant materials will also be yours for the time being."

"Besides that, I will be leaving the group for a while. During this time, you will have to explore the Forbidden Forest on your own."

"As compensation, I will give you a magical map of the Forbidden Forest, which shows the key exploration areas and different regions within the Forbidden Forest, as well as the different types of materials you can obtain. This will help you explore the outer areas of the Forbidden Forest. Sebastian, you will serve as the temporary leader of this exploration team."

"The magic map must be returned to me afterward."

Locke is preparing to leave the group and go find that five-hundred-year-old top-tier research project.

Although Nixon and Sebastian did not understand why Locke did this, after their conflict with the people from the Secret Fire Institute, they were even more convinced of Locke's abilities.

Therefore, they did not dare to ask any more questions for the time being, and could only express their agreement with Locke and thank him for sharing the magic map with them.

This gave them even greater confidence that they would find the treasures they desired in the dense forest.

Moreover, Locke just killed the queen of the army ants, severely damaging the army ant colony. These army ants lost their leader and became very easy to kill, which is also a huge gain.

Not to mention Locke completely disregarded the corpse of the army ant queen, which was close to the first ring level.

Of course, this is also because Locke's main goal now is to become a formal wizard, and the biological materials on the queen army ant are of no use to him anymore.

The only exception was its glands, which could barely be considered a useful material at the first stage, which is why Locke took them.

After Sebastian and the others left, Locke snapped his fingers, and a 0.8 ring pointer made of rusty metal appeared in front of him.

Over the past year, Locke has fully mastered the three basic spells of an archaeologist: Summon Tomb Spirit, Historical Projection, and Ancient Pointer.

The ancient pointer spell is composed of the "Rust Particle" from among 210 types of negative energy particles.

This is because [Rust Death Particles] possess the characteristic of resonating with other [Rust Death Particles] over extremely long distances. Furthermore, [Rust Death Particles] only exist in very ancient places where metal is present; without a certain age, it is even impossible for such negative energy particles to appear.

These are dark energy particles, which have been contaminated by death, time, decay, and metal, resulting in a unique particle state.

Apprentice-level wizards generally do not use dark magic involving these particles. However, the [Rusty Particle] has a third characteristic: when combined with a special material aura, it will resonate with that specific material aura, thus producing a pointer-like property.

The Tombstone Codex once wrote that the existence of the [Rusty Death Particle] seems to prove that the spacetime of this world has some kind of universal resonance that has not yet been accurately proven.

It explains why ancient things naturally attract other ancient things.

The [Rust Particles] themselves are the culprits that can corrode magical alloys, making it impossible for them to exist for long.

Locke placed a wisp of energy he had obtained from Foucault's original manuscript in the Great Library onto the ancient pointer. Instantly, a special magical glow appeared on the rusty pointer, and the ancient pointer, which was suspended in mid-air, began to slowly rotate, turning in a certain direction.

“This magic is really useful for finding specific targets.” Locke’s eyes flashed with joy. “Of course, because of the special resonant properties of the [Rust Death Particles], it is very inconvenient to use it to find modern objects and living people.”

"The effect will be very poor. Although it can find them, the accuracy will be extremely low. This magic is best used to resonate with ancient objects."

"An item that's five hundred years old can barely be considered an ancient item, although it certainly won't automatically generate [Rust Death Particles]."

Locke used the Great Blue Owl Banana to fly into the air, passing over a group of Screaming Willows. Upon sensing a moving object flying overhead, the Screaming Willows immediately emitted a deafening scream.

But Locke had already picked a sound-absorbing mushroom and created a circle of silence around himself, blocking out all the screams from the screaming willows.

Locke looked at the ancient pointer in front of him and saw that it had wobbled slightly, indicating that the target was very close. Otherwise, the pointer would only point in a general direction; it would only wobble slightly when he was near the destination, signifying that he was in the vicinity of the target location.

Locke circled in the air; below him lay a swamp, with nothing unusual to be found.

But it didn't matter. Locke used the angle at which the pointer swung based on his different positions to calculate the exact location of his destination in the swamp.

"Hidden by the magic of the Illusion School?" Locke said, "Found it, it's there."

Locke descended from the sky and landed on a rock in the swamp. Instantly, after he stepped onto that rock, a research institute hidden by the Illusion School was exposed to Locke's eyes.

The illusion magic concealing this research institute appears to be a first-order spell, so unless one stands in this special position, it is impossible to see, touch, or perceive the research institute in any way.

However, as long as you stand in this position, the illusion magic of the hidden research institute will automatically become ineffective.

Locke was able to pinpoint the location of the research institute through the magic of archaeologists. If he hadn't possessed such magic, it would have taken him countless more years to find his target by relying on library records and fragmented information from Foucault's memories.

However, if something unexpected happens during this process, such as outsiders discovering one's intentions, it could easily lead to tragedy.

Or perhaps someone found the research institute beforehand... In any case, Locke is now very fortunate that he studied archaeology magic.

(End of this chapter)