Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems - Chapter 423

Chapter 421 Topic Selection and Rule Making

After the old wizard from the Plutarch family left, the three first-ring wizards in the research group all breathed a sigh of relief.

Locke’s tough attitude is the only umbrella that can protect their research team, which does not have any senior teaching titles.

After Locke’s firm rejection just now, it is estimated that no wizard mentor who had previously negotiated with the forty-five wizard apprentices would dare to come again and try to shirk, break the contract, and take their students away.

Wizard Montgomery said, “Lord Locke, for the wizard apprentices that are now in our hands, we will provide a living allowance of 300 magic stones per month for first-class wizard apprentices and 50 magic stones per month for second-class wizard apprentices.”

“That is to say, our research team not only needs to negotiate with the wizard instructors behind them during the initial stage, but also needs to bear the responsibility of distributing funds to each student every month thereafter. In other words, our research team will pay a total of 21,000 magic stones to the wizards every month.”

Locke nodded slightly to show that he understood.

Wizard Tacitus said, “It doesn’t necessarily have to be 21,000 magic stones. There are more issues to consider. If students get sick or injured, and they’re responsible for some critical data work, it wouldn’t be a good idea to ask them to take out loans and repay the money themselves, leaving them as debt slaves, right?”

“If we were in a team with senior professional titles, it would be easy to swap students, but none of us four have the authority to bring in students, so students are extremely valuable to us. Also, what if a first-class wizard apprentice wants to break through to become a full-fledged wizard during this period?”

Wizard Tacitus looked at Locke and said, “Lord Locke, you should consider formulating some rules for our research group. Many research groups have restrictions on what students can do, such as not allowing them to work part-time while working in the research group, not allowing them to be promoted to official wizards for a period of time, or requiring them to hand in sacrificial potions to our research group after their magic power reaches 800…”

Although Wizard Tacitus was also a common wizard, he was more realistic than all the wizards present because of his older age.

What’s more, these requirements are not excessive at all in the land of the Six Towers.

Barbara slammed the table in anger and stood up. “I hate family wizards like this the most. If we do this, aren’t we exploiting students just like those family wizards in the Six Towers?”

Tacitus said calmly, “First of all, you think too highly of your students, Witch Barbara. Not every student is a docile little lamb. It’s certainly good for them to obey our commands. It will benefit both of us.”

“But in the land of the Six Towers, too many students are short-sighted. It is necessary to establish rules within the research group. Without rules, there is no order.”

Even Montgomery fell into deep thought at this point, and remained silent, which was rare. It seemed that he was somewhat biased in his heart and wanted to limit the time it took for students to break through to become formal wizards.

Wizard Tacitus said, “If students arbitrarily break through to the first level of wizardry, the chances of injury and death will be extremely high. And once they succeed, they may not stay in our research group. In other words, if students try to break through to the full level of wizardry while they are in our research group, it will do us no good at all.”

“It is obviously necessary to restrict them from attempting to break through to the official wizard level during the Yunze Cup.”

“Lord Locke, it all depends on your choice.”

Locke nodded slightly. He didn’t expect that when setting up a research team, he needed to consider so many issues. The students’ future needed to be considered, the funding needed to be considered, the attitude of the collaborators needed to be considered, and then even the rules of the research team needed to be established by themselves.

There are many rules that seem unreasonable to wizard apprentices, but are actually beneficial to themselves and the research team.

The choice between the two is a very difficult one.

This is also a problem that every new wizard mentor who has just become a mentor will encounter.

New wizard mentors are generally regular wizards who have just become first-ring wizards. They lack resources, articles, and teaching positions. Lacking these three things, they inevitably lack students, equipment, and venues, as well as the access to the wizarding secret realm that is strongly linked to teaching positions.

However, this period is exactly when new wizard mentors want to make some achievements in order to obtain certain magical resources.

Therefore, the new mentors at this stage have a very difficult life.

It’s easy to cause mental problems.

They have to compete for resources, study themselves and guide students, go out to get projects and funds, and strive to meet various KPIs for teaching promotion.

Therefore, many official wizards start to play badly at this stage. After all, first-ring wizards are high-quality assets in many wizarding lands.

Barbara was extremely dissatisfied with Montgomery and Tacitus. “You two, only those who have experienced the rain know the importance of having someone hold an umbrella for you. You two don’t need to be so extreme about this.”

Painful memories flashed across Barbara Witch’s face.

She was one of the countless civilian wizards who were forbidden from breaking through to become official wizards due to the abnormal requirements of the research team, and therefore worked hard without sleep, squeezing every drop of labor out of themselves.

This is who she used to be.

It was also the past of Montgomery and Tacitus.

But now, these two people are asking the same of the students in their research group, which is really too much.

Witch Barbara sneered, “Every student whose Spiritual Power reaches 800 will be given a bottle of Sacrificial Potion according to regulations. But are you two still planning to follow the example of other research groups in the Six Towers and covet the Sacrificial Potion in the hands of students, selling it at a high price?”

“Or perhaps we are taking the potions that should belong to them, luring them, and exploiting their labor. But the two wizards probably forgot that we are not the wizard mentors of those students, and we do not hold the position of lecturer.”

“According to convention, the promotion potion should also belong to their original wizard mentor.”

Locke glanced at the three people who were already arguing and frowned.

He needs to balance interests and ethics, and most importantly, control the hearts of the people in the research team.

There was no benefit in continuing to let them conflict. Locke glanced at Witch Barbara, weighed the pros and cons, and chose the path with the least chance of going wrong.

Locke said, “Alright, let’s stop discussing this. Witch Barbara, don’t get so excited. The two wizards are just giving me a reasonable suggestion.”

“I’m holding a group meeting.”

Locke tapped the table with his fingers to emphasize his authority, and used his eyes to signal Barbara the witch to calm down.

Witch Barbara immediately felt apologetic. She was still quite impressed with Locke. After all, Locke could protect her in the Plutarch family.

This is something that no other wizard can do, or is unwilling to do.

Witch Barbara saluted Locke and said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Locke. I shouldn’t be so emotional, especially in front of you.”

Locke nodded slightly. “We need to be calm when discussing issues from now on. We are not enemies.”

“We’re all… comrades who cooperate with each other. Competition is like a battlefield. Only if we work together can we win. Otherwise, we’ve already lost at the starting line.”

Locke looked at the three wizards and said, “I’ve thought about it carefully and decided not to restrict the students from breaking through to the first level while they are working in my research group.”

“As long as the handover system is well established, it’s only at the wizard apprentice level, and it hasn’t reached the point of being irreplaceable. Secondly, we and those students have a mutual growth relationship. If we blindly exploit them, I think it will only make them slack off.”

Locke said, “I think it would be better to establish a reasonable system with a reward mechanism. We can let students develop the habit of backing up and organizing their information. I thought of this a long time ago, so I found an outstanding wizard apprentice with a general education degree in advance to join our team and have him record our team’s information.”

“This way, if someone has problems, we can immediately find a replacement. This can avoid many problems that are prone to collapse in our research group in the future. Secondly, we will establish a reward system. I will set up one or two outstanding students in the research group and use my own money to subsidize them.”

“I think it’s far more appropriate to use this kind of positive incentive to encourage students to work hard rather than using punishment and restrictions to exploit their labor,” Locke said.

Locke himself was a little unconfident. After all, this was just a guess, and the details of the research group system also needed to be considered.

In short, these were questions that I didn’t have to think about when I was a wizard apprentice.

These systems of his were also developed with reference to Lilith’s Hut.

The Healing Hands Clinic in Lilith’s Cottage offers a few reward spots, which allows a group of potion masters to start treating wizards seriously, just to compete for four year-end reward spots.

However, this system has been completely abolished in the land of the Six Towers, and almost all honorary titles have become tools for family wizards to cheat and make deals.

As a result, the positive incentive system of the Six Towers had long since collapsed. As a result, the wizard instructors of the Six Towers could only use the various powers at their disposal to intimidate and exploit their students.

If a student does not want to be exploited at will and resists a little, he will immediately be marked as a low-quality asset by the wizard mentor here, and then these low-quality asset students will be traded with other wizard mentors, and students will be seconded to reach a certain exchange of interests with each other.

After Locke said this, Tacitus and others immediately nodded.

Barbara’s eyes lit up. “It’s a good idea to store and categorize the documents in advance. It’s much more effective than simply exploiting students.”

Tacitus and Montgomery also nodded.

Tacitus said, “That’s not bad. Perhaps it’s better than my suggestion. After all, you can always adjust it later.”

However, Tacitus and Witch Barbara seemed to have started to have some conflicts. One felt that the other’s ideas were too emotional and a little idealistic, while the other felt that the other had character problems and might betray them one day, so she was not worthy of trust.

Locke coughed and said to the crowd, “There is another crucial issue at the moment, which is the topic selection.”

“We need to choose which tactical-level magical plant type to develop. Common tactical-level magical plant types include multi-person controlled tree people, multi-person controlled mushroom heads, and large magical vine platforms…”

“We have to choose at least one category and develop it.”

“Topic selection is extremely important. If you make the wrong choice at the outset, the value of all subsequent efforts will be greatly reduced. Therefore, we must choose topics carefully. Do you three have any good ideas?”

(End of this chapter)