Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems - Chapter 379

Chapter 377 ‘Zombie’ Project

Goyle’s expression changed again and again, but facing the gazes of the family wizards, he could only lower his head and say, “It is indeed the blood-transforming potion of the unicorn. However, in order to improve my physical strength, I have recently been looking for a bottle of unicorn blood-transforming potion prepared by a potion master in the Six Towers.”

“The other party is Aeolus Evans, a renowned alchemist throughout the Six Towers. Mr. Augustine, to say that his work lacks the accuracy to locate bloodlines is truly… audacious.”

Since Locke said it right away and Goyle deliberately made things difficult for him, Goyle was forced to admit Locke’s level in potions.

At this time, Wizard Anthony and many wizards from various major families clapped their hands softly. Wizard Anthony clapped his hands and said, “My junior brother’s potion skills are among the best even in the Southeast Region.”

“As everyone knows, the level of potions in the Southeast Corner Region is so high that he can be called a genius there and receive an honorary certification badge, which is enough to prove my junior brother’s level.”

“For the future of our Filaide family, I invited my junior fellow apprentice to come here specially, but I didn’t expect that some people would misunderstand something.”

Because of the Forbidden Forest in the southeast corner, potion science has always been strong.

At the round table, some family wizards nodded continuously. Locke quickly recognized the performance of the potion in Goyle’s hand, which undoubtedly made the wizards of the Filaid family confirm Locke’s level of alchemy.

Even, some are overestimated.

Amid the crowd’s praises, Goyle could only sit down helplessly. His failure caused the third branch of the original main line, as well as the heads of the middle-grade and low-grade wizard families of the related affiliated families, to shut up.

Wizard Anthony said softly to Locke, “Thank you very much, Junior Brother. The third brother’s branch has always been dissatisfied with us. He has decent talent and is one of the few young wizards in the Firaide family who has reached the Qi transformation stage. Therefore, he always tries to challenge my authority.”

“Your performance just now really helped me a lot. By the way, Junior Brother, I didn’t expect your Potions knowledge to be so advanced. I remember that you haven’t passed the exam to get the certification badge for a formal Potions Master yet, right?”

Locke nodded slightly.

Wizard Anthony whispered, “Brother, when you become big here, you will definitely not forget our fellow disciples. Don’t worry, you helped me a lot this time, I won’t let you suffer any loss.”

Wizard Anthony smiled mysteriously and whispered, “Do you know why I’m holding a banquet?”

At this time, the little incident in the banquet had passed, and the wizards at the round table began to clink glasses, exchange information, or keep in touch with each other, or secretly tell Goyle’s joke just now.

Wizard Anthony whispered, “The first purpose of my hosting this banquet is to welcome you and to establish the standard of treatment for our future fellow disciples who come to the Six Towers, the territory of the Firaide family, that is, the White Elephant Tower.”

“The second purpose is to establish authority.”

“The third purpose is for your benefit.”

Locke’s eyes showed doubt. “My interests?”

Anthony grabbed ten mosswood piths from the porcelain plate and handed them to Locke. “Well, what did you see at this banquet? Did you see many family wizards and the power center of the Six Towers? But besides that, I also saw many marginalized people who were frustrated.”

Locke looked up and saw that indeed, at the edge of the banquet, there were many first-ring wizards secretly looking at him, and in the golden cups in front of those first-ring wizards was a wizard drink, not wizard wine.

Wizard Anthony took a sip of wizard wine and said, “In the land of the Six Towers, there are many frustrated common wizards. Even if they rely on their talent, luck, and the few leftovers from the noble families to become first-ring wizards, they still cannot access higher-level resources and cannot obtain any teaching positions.”

“They usually remain ordinary wizards their entire lives because they lack the resources. Talented and ambitious people will try to escape, but there are always common wizards who possess some talent but lack the ability to leave. They have been suppressed by these famous wizards for too long. They have many interesting projects on hand. You can go and take a look. Those projects cannot obtain any association funds because their project applications cannot even be submitted to the Fund Committee of the White Wizard Association in the Six Towers and will be intercepted.”

“So, these people would hang around these banquets, trying their best to get in, trying to find noble people to support their research.”

“Junior brother, please choose carefully. Pick out a few project applications that interest you. These civilian wizards do have some talent, and their projects are actually quite good. They just don’t have the resources.”

Locke asked him in a low voice. “Is this the reason why Senior Brother Anthony was able to achieve so many results in such a short period of time in the Six Towers?”

Wizard Anthony nodded. “Yes. But that’s just one way. I can also look for projects that family wizards have halfway completed and then stop working on. I can select projects that already have the foundation, equipment, and talent, and then complete them. That way, I can achieve results quickly.”

“I call this kind of thing a zombie project. I want to use the excellent projects that civilian wizards can’t invest in, as well as the high-quality zombie projects that family wizards have half-finished, to create my own achievements.”

“It’s thanks to these two tricks that I was able to quickly gain the recognition of the wizards of the Firaide family.”

Locke had a strange expression on his face. “But, brother, discovering the trick shouldn’t be difficult for the wizards of the Firaide family, right? Didn’t they expect it?”

Wizard Anthony said, “Discovering these two tricks isn’t difficult. I think you’ll find them soon, so I’m telling you directly. This won’t be a secret to us, but it’s certainly difficult for wizards from the Firaide family.”

Seeing Locke’s strange expression, Wizard Anthony smiled and said, “The stupidity of the wizards here is far beyond your imagination. After all, the biggest problem of family wizards is not the instability of the talents inherited from their bloodline, but also various other drawbacks, such as a lack of competition, a lack of internal awareness from a young age, and… hostility towards excellence.”

“You know, my biggest feeling during the past few years here is that I discovered that the inner logic of these family wizards is actually hostile to progress. I couldn’t figure out why at first, but later I figured it out.”

“Because they know that progress is good, but it’s digging up their family’s roots. If they truly want to pursue progress, shouldn’t they free up resources and improve the selection system? An organization based on blood ties will never be able to match the performance of a wizarding organization based on a master-apprentice system or one that focuses on teaching.”

“So, being too good will destroy the family system. As a result, the family wizards in the Six Towers have all fallen into depravity. However, they also have the desire to develop their families. This gives wizards from outside us an opportunity.” Wizard Anthony said, “I felt like I was just an ordinary wizard in the Southeast Corner, but here, I can completely crush those local wizards.”

“However, the wizard tower technology and bloodline transformation technology of the Six Towers Land are indeed excellent. They have developed some very precious bloodline transformation technologies that can help wizards break through to the level of formal wizards. The price is to sacrifice future potential. After the breakthrough, they will forever remain at the ordinary formal wizard stage.”

Locke asked doubtfully, “What kind of bloodline transformation technology is this?”

Wizard Anthony hesitated for a moment and whispered, “Brother, I can tell you, but you’d better not tell anyone. This is a top secret in the land of the Six Towers.”

“It involves deeply studying the nature of elemental life and proactively transforming the wizard’s body into a semi-elemental form. This method reduces the difficulty of engraving a permanent defensive force field, and through semi-elementalization, strengthens mana, increasing the chances of advancing to a full-fledged wizard.”

“Many mediocre family wizards here have used this method to become official wizards. Although the qualification requirements are still very high, it does reduce the difficulty a lot. The price is that they will lose the opportunity to make further progress forever.”

Wizard Anthony said, “However, this method requires a treasure called the Tidal Orb. That magical gem is extremely rare in the Six Towers and is a strategic resource. Therefore, the Tidal Orbs in the Six Towers are only used by family wizards. Civilian wizards rarely use this method to ascend.”

Anthony clinked his glass against Locke’s, then stood up and said to Locke, “The second half of the banquet will be for everyone to communicate. Soon, some civilian wizards will find a way to come to you.”

“As long as you have a few more successful projects, it will benefit you, and it will benefit me as well. You will gain fame, funding resources, and a resume, and I will gain prestige.”

“Good junior brother, we have a pleasant cooperation.”

From the corner of his eye, Locke indeed saw a few down-and-out first-ring wizards, holding golden cups, wandering around him, seemingly hesitating.

Just a few steps after Anthony walked away, a first-ring wizard with mediocre appearance and wearing a dirty wizard robe came over. He was very enthusiastic towards Locke and handed him a project application.

“Augustine, the Alchemist, I have a very promising project proposal. If you are selected, it will definitely bring you huge benefits. In the Land of the Six Towers, articles can be signed by multiple authors.”

“I can give you both the first author and the corresponding author positions. I don’t even have to be the second or third author. All you have to do is give me the fourth author position.”

“Look, you’re a breeder. Here’s my project plan for systematically cultivating wild purple licorice. Here’s my budget. Here’s my data…”

Locke looked up at the wizard who seemed very anxious. It was obvious that the other party had investigated him in advance and might have mobilized all his energy.

The other party even knew that he was a breeder.

However, after reading the project application, Locke shook his head slightly. It was normal that this application would not pass the regional fund. The main reason was that the magical plant purple licorice did not have much cultivation value. It was only related to the food of several not very important herbivorous magical creatures.

Anyway, I’m not very interested in purple licorice.

Unless someone happens to have a magical creature that needs purple licorice feed and there is no substitute, basically no one is interested in purple licorice.

Locke declined, “I’m sorry, wizard, I think your project is indeed very feasible, but I’m not researching feed-type magical plants recently.”

“I don’t have any research basis or demand in this area.”

The First Ring wizard felt a little regretful and smiled awkwardly. “Is that so? I apologize for disturbing you.”

He left dejected.

Then, several first-ring wizards took advantage of Locke’s presence at the banquet and ran directly to them with the project book.

Locke was overwhelmed by the variety of projects he saw. Most of these project books were indeed of poor quality, but some of them could become high-quality projects after a slight modification.

Locke looked at it carelessly at first, but when he saw the seventh project application, he looked at a white-haired old man in surprise. There was obviously a hint of pleading and agonizing waiting in the other’s eyes.

Locke looked at the project and asked doubtfully, “The entire project is almost finished. Is it going to produce results? Is it still necessary to apply for funding?”

The white-haired old wizard, as if seeing some hope, showed a longing expression. “Master Augustine, this project was completed piece by piece by piece over a period of thirty-five years by me and several of my students. But I’m about to be expelled from the Magic Gem University.”

“And I’m short of funds. You might be my last hope. If there’s no new funding, my project won’t be able to proceed at all.”

Locke looked at him in some surprise. He had just read the other party’s data and experimental procedures and found that the other party had already made several prototypes of the product, but just needed to put the product into practical use.

I thought that the other party was only one step away from completion, but it turned out that the other party had relied on time to persevere to reach this step, and without resources, this last step could not be carried out at all.

Locke looked at the project application, which was an application to develop a grass called “Shadow Eye Grass”. Several prototypes of this special grass were discovered by the old wizard in the underground mine.

He encountered these grasses by chance when he was a miner in his youth. The prototypes of these grasses naturally have spell-like abilities to monitor the surroundings.

This old wizard tried to use these grasses to develop a reconnaissance-type magic plant called [Wandering Shadow Eye Grass].

(End of this chapter)