Wizards: Starting with Synthetic Gems

Chapter 538 Securing the First Student

Two weeks later, inside Locke's dormitory.

Locke's magic pressure was 9030 at this time. Using the compression method, coupled with the unique environment of Golden Crown Mountain and the backflow of the natural force plane, he was still able to maintain a strong upward trend of increasing his magic power by 1 point per day during the first crystallization stage.

At this moment, Locke was in the potion room in his dormitory. He used magical flames to transform eight times in a row. Suddenly, the liquid in the crucible exploded. A chain reaction occurred in the liquid in the crucible. Dozens of natural magical structural components clashed with each other and burst out as energy.

Locke promptly activated the Permanent Defense Force Field and used the Life Force Field to try and compress the explosion into the size of a basketball.

The next moment, the crystal barrier formed by the condensation of the life force field shattered, creating a gap, and almost went completely out of control.

Locke immediately retrieved the Hydra, which had been pre-stored with magical pressure, from his Astral Ring and used the power of Myster to forcibly suppress the terrifying explosive force.

This prevented the explosion from engulfing the entire potion room, but the cauldron enveloped by the power of Myster was completely twisted and melted by the force of the explosion.

Locke chanted the incantation, summoning the Black Hole Peach, which sucked the dangerous potion waste into the black hole deep within Mount Golden Crown.

"The consequences of failing to refine the Lucky Potion midway are truly terrifying." Locke ordered the wood elf maid to come in and clean up, his expression grim. "The Lucky Potion is extremely difficult to refine; it truly lives up to its reputation as the third round of the Feathered Serpent Pavilion's Heavenly Ladder."

"The essence of the Lucky Potion is to utilize the natural magical structure within a group of magical plants, concentrate the luck together, and have the wizard drink it. Within an hour of drinking the Lucky Potion, the wizard will possess the greatest luck generated during the preparation process. But conversely, it also means that if I fail to make it during the process, I will bring the greatest misfortune."

"Therefore, even a simple potion failure can cause a huge magical explosion."

"The power of the magical explosion was beyond the norm; even the permanent defensive field of an ordinary first-ring wizard could not defend against it. That means that an ordinary first-ring potion master has a chance of dying when concocting a lucky potion due to a failed potion concoction."

Locke exhaled a breath of stale air. "Not only that, but the process of concocting a lucky potion over a long period of time, whether successful or not, is very dangerous for the potion master."

"Under normal circumstances, a wizard cannot concoct lucky potions consecutively. Otherwise, he will bring misfortune upon himself."

The third round of ladder testing was indeed not easy to pass.

Now, because he has left the Land of the Six Towers, and because he and Alicia have no way to contact each other, they have lost the ability to communicate directly.

I don't have an external brain anymore.

However, given his current strange relationship with Alicia, he would not contact her unless absolutely necessary.

After all, in a sense, Alicia chose her family over herself, and he chose the Starry Sea over her.

"Yunze Wetland has a large number of books. I can make up for my lack of skills in concocting lucky potions by consulting those materials."

Locke reached out and summoned the Primal Flame, a flame formed from the primordial power left over from the beginning of the world, which lay quietly in his palm.

"Let's first use the Primal Flame to successfully concoct a Lucky Potion."

The Dragonblood Market has a very complete selection of materials, so I had already purchased the materials for a Lucky Potion from the Dragonblood Market, spending 70,000 magic stones.

My current savings amount to 300,000 Magic Stones.

The raw materials for Lucky Potions are extremely expensive, as it is the most difficult and powerful potion to refine at the first level.

If it weren't for the Heavenly Ladder test, I would have had a hard time even coming across the relevant potion recipes.

Locke smoothly processed the materials related to the Lucky Potion, adding its two most important main ingredients: the powder from crushed Granville Lucky Butterflies and the tail of Eris Rats. These two rare magical creatures were the culprits behind the cost of 70,000 magic stones to gather the raw materials for a set of Lucky Potion.

Meanwhile, Locke added a clover as an auxiliary material to remove the toxicity of the Eris rat's tail.

The main purpose of adding auxiliary materials to the pharmaceutical formula is to neutralize the toxicity of the core materials and secondary materials.

At the same time, Locke skillfully manipulated the primordial fire, switching between fire and water elements, and between ice and flame elements.

By using a variety of flames with different polarities, the aim is to neutralize the two core materials with opposite properties and to fuse their natural magical structural components.

Previously, Locke had always failed because he was stuck on this step and could never switch between the two sets of magical flames with opposite properties in time.

This step can also stump countless first-level potion masters.

This step requires an extremely high degree of accuracy in mana manipulation; even the slightest error will cause a magical explosion, and the entire process of creating the lucky potion will fail.

Three hours later, Locke's face was slightly pale. He drank a bottle of Holy Spring Dew potion to recover and picked up the Lucky Potion in his hand.

"Using the Primal Flame, it can be successfully refined... With the experience of successfully refining the Lucky Potion, everything will be much easier."

Locke carefully placed the Lucky Potion into his Astral Ring, preparing to drink it at a certain time and experience its effects.

Locke then left the dormitory and headed to the Breeders' Public Laboratory at the True Knowledge Institute.

He walked to his small workbench in the laboratory. The work of mapping the new natural magical structure and components using the three magic mirrors was half completed. After using them twice more, the mapping of the new natural magical structure and components would be finished.

I have already figured out the symbiotic relationship between the other four types of pineapples and magical creatures because the Rubik's Cube gave me the direction, and I have written the final report. In another half month to a month, I will be able to complete my first grant at the True Knowledge Institute.

Meanwhile, within the past two weeks, I have also completed preliminary experimental data on three types of pineapples—Black Tearstone Pineapple, Snow Wave Pineapple, and Yellow Amber Pineapple—and their correlation with the reproductive abilities of three specific magical creatures.

Locke prepared to continue writing the final report and at the same time write the project application for a second-class grant.

When Locke returned to his workstation, he frowned slightly because a first-class wizard apprentice dressed in a gray robe was standing next to him, looking very nervous and uneasy.

When it saw me walking over, it immediately looked at me nervously.

Mason, the witch who was working on data at her lab workstation, whispered to him, "Your teacher is here."

At that moment, Locke looked at the first-class wizard apprentice, who was about 1.7 meters tall, with a rather youthful face, and was about 20 years old.

Actually, he's only two years younger than me.

But his magic pressure had already reached 700, which was very close to 800.

Locke looked at the witch Mason and said, "These are the students the academy assigned to me? Their magic pressure is so high, almost 800. I saw that the students the academy assigned to you all seem to have magic pressure between 400 and 600."

At the workstation next to Mason Witch, Freya Witch sat and shrugged. "Locke, that's because the academy's higher-ups treat us differently. The standard for students assigned to us ordinary researchers in the True Knowledge Academy is 400-600 magic pressure, but for you advanced True Knowledge Academy students, it's over 600." Mason Witch waved her hand and laughed, "Students who can enter the True Knowledge Academy and be jointly trained must all be quite outstanding students."

“Even if he is not a candidate for wizard in this generation of Golden Crown Mountain, he is very close.”

So, they're all pretty much the same.

Freya muttered, "The difference is huge. If I had a student with a magic pressure of 700, I could get so much more work done. I would be so happy. Sometimes I get really annoyed looking at the students under my command."

Mason Witch coughed once or twice to show that she was mindful of the occasion.

Locke then called the student out of that workstation area in the laboratory.

The two walked to the edge of a magical field.

Locke asked him, "What's your name? Introduce yourself. Are you a candidate for wizard of Golden Crown Mountain?"

Gregor Robinson swallowed hard, feeling a little nervous. Locke's magical pressure seemed as heavy as a mountain to him, towering and seemingly endless.

The terrifying demonic pressure enveloped Locke, refined and perfected through countless trials.

This made Gregor very nervous.

At this moment, when Locke asked him if he was a candidate for wizard of Mount Golden Crown, Gregor blushed and his mind raced, afraid that this would displease Locke.

“Teacher, my name is Gregor Robinson, and I am a wizarding apprentice studying botany.” Gregor said in a low voice, “Teacher, I am not yet a wizarding candidate seed, but I can strive to become one of the wizarding candidates of Golden Crown Mountain.”

"The candidates for the Golden Crown Mountain Wizard are only the top three in one school, and their magic power is generally over 800. Teacher, I will try my best."

Locke nodded slightly.

He had anticipated this; Mount Golden Crown would place a group of its best wizard apprentices into the Academy of Truth, for joint training, or as the lowest-level labor force within the Academy.

Therefore, the best and brightest wizarding apprentices who are about to become official wizards will not be placed in the Institute of True Knowledge.

However, having a student whose magic pressure has reached 700 will be of great benefit to me.

That would make it much easier to help him become a full-fledged wizard.

Next, Locke exchanged a few words with Gregor and learned that his learning experience was actually quite simple.

First, he is a native of Yunze Wetland. Second, he is a child of the Wood element. After entering Jinmian Mountain at the age of 16, he studied step by step.

The apprentice-level plant magic he learned was the [Unstoppable Force] series of magic unique to Yunze Wetland, and the matching magical plant used was the apprentice-level magical plant: Iron Bamboo.

Locke glanced at Gregor, who looked very nervous. This was his top-ranked student.

Students within the academic system.

According to the contract, I need to bring out two formal wizard-level students from the Institute of True Knowledge in order to obtain the exit certificate.

Locke wondered if he had been just as nervous when he first met Sophia the Witch.

Locke smiled and asked Gregor for his iron bamboo. It was clear that the iron bamboo had been carefully nurtured by him and was therefore growing very well.

Locke said, "Starting today, you'll work with me and help me organize the data. Begin by learning how to organize my data, and then help me with some other tasks."

In this way, someone else took over the odd jobs that had been bothering Locke, such as submitting financial reports and purchasing various miscellaneous items.

Moreover, besides discovering those unknown natural magical structures and some more advanced experiments within his own project, which this apprentice couldn't help him with, he could do all the other trivial experiments.

It saved me a lot of trouble.

Gregor bowed to Locke and said, "Yes, teacher."

Locke said to him, "By the way, since this is our first meeting, let me give you a better apprentice-level magical plant."

Locke gave Albert the Black Lock Bamboo that Albert had given him. This rare magical plant had been damaged in the battle, but Locke had already repaired it himself, after all, he was a first-level breeder.

"Thank you, teacher." Gregor took the Black Lock Sword Bamboo from his hands, and the next moment, the Black Lock Sword Bamboo was burst forth by the magical pressure infused by Locke.

“This…” Gregor swallowed hard. “Teacher, this is too precious. It contains your magical pressure.”

"I……"

Locke shook his head slightly. "You are my first student, so it's only right that I treat you well."

Locke rubbed his nose. As he said this, the image of another witch kept appearing in his mind.

He couldn't help but smile bitterly.

Is the image that Gregor currently sees in himself the same image that he saw in the eyes of the Witch of Sophia?
Gregor stroked the high-quality magical pressure transmitted to him from the Black Lock Bamboo Sword, and his own magical pressure stirred and merged with it, which even brought him some benefits.

Gregor said to Locke, "Thank you, teacher."

“My original wizarding mentor was very strict with me. He had many, many students, and I hardly ever saw him all year round. Even when we did meet, I couldn’t talk to him, and he still can’t remember my name. But you seem to be different from him.”

Gregor seemed to have been opened up by Locke's kindness. "I originally thought you would be a stern person as well."

"No, no, what I mean is that you still seem very dignified to me, but I didn't expect you to be so kind to us."

Locke laughed and said, "Your original mentor must have been the wizard mentor of Golden Crown Mountain... He had many students, but you were my first student."

"Let's go. I'm going to the Ice Mirror Room today. Could you help me organize the documents at my workstation?"

Gregor quickly caught up with Locke. "Yes, teacher."

(End of this chapter)