Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems - Chapter 736

Chapter 733 Welcome to the World of the Second Ring Road

Golden Crown Mountain, the sun seemed like a golden-red crown over this mountain range of three smaller peaks.

At this moment, treants were relaying messages throughout the main mountain.

The Demon Realm War had ended; Golden Crown Mountain had won. The ‘Gates of Hell’ on Little Peach Mountain would close again. Military merits accumulated during the war would be converted into points on a one-to-one basis and reported to the White Wizard Association of Cloud Swamp Wetlands.

Secondly, the Three Kings Tournament concluded, with the Golden Crown Mountain team winning the final championship.

Finally, the Silent Holy Grail Tournament concluded, with Locke Augustine’s team winning the championship. Golden Crown Mountain gained 50% of the enrollment quota for the unclaimed lands of the three [Natural Barriers] bordering Cloud Swamp Wetlands for the next ten years, along with priority selection for outstanding students.

Quinnjoll, as the runner-up, only received 30% of the enrollment quota.

The last-place team only received 5% of the enrollment quota.

Inside the castle of True Knowledge, the witch Catherine naturally heard the results of the competition, as a second-circle level Tree King, a Treeman of the Peach Tree race, walked through the mountains of Golden Crown Mountain, proclaiming the outcome.

The victories in two top-level competitions in Cloud Marsh Wetlands and a Demon Realm war signified that Golden Crown Mountain’s position for the next decade was unshakeable, and it had gained abundant resources.

The Silent Holy Grail determined the allocation of students, priority selection of talent, and the construction of the academy system in the three unclaimed

territories. The Three Kings Tournament decided the large number of cheap, high-quality wizards in that long, narrow wizarding territory along the Tianjiang River in the Eastern Boundary for the next decade, as well as the market ownership of that wizarding territory.

It was a competition between Golden Crown Mountain, the Rose Council, and Boniface University.

The Three Kings Tournament was divided into second-circle, first-circle, and apprentice-level competitions.

Therefore, the school teams participating in this competition consisted of three parts. Currently, aside from the apprentice-level competition where they lost to Boniface University, Golden Crown Mountain has won both the first and second rounds. The Academic

Committee is responsible for this part.

However, since the witch Catherine took over as vice-chairperson of the Academic Committee, her position has risen steadily, making her in charge of this Three Kings Tournament.

In the office, Wizard Jack, upon hearing this news, revealed a confident smile. “It seems my choice was correct. For the next ten years, Golden Crown Mountain will hold a dominant position in Cloud Marsh Wetlands.”

“With a wise witch like you in Golden Crown Mountain, it will have a very active performance in the coming years.”

Catherine smiled. “It’s just about gaining resources through the competition; whether those resources can be transformed into strength and improve academic ranking is another matter.”

“Ultimately, academic ranking is the most important thing.”

Catherine looked out the window, unusually surprised that Locke had won the Silent Grail.

In fact, her arrangement for Locke was that third place in the Silent Grail War would be considered passing, and second place would be excellent.

Since Golden Crown Mountain only came in third in the previous Silent Grail War, only 15% of the students from the three unclaimed territories were represented.

Golden Crown Mountain could accept the defeat in the Silent Grail War.

At least the Academic Committee didn’t really care that much about the Silent Grail War; it was the Senate and the Deacon Group who cared about the outcome.

They had greater interests in the unclaimed territories.

Meanwhile, along the Tianjiang River, the wizarding land needed a large number of magical plants, requiring the two breeding-related disciplines from Golden Crown Mountain.

The first discipline was Golden Crown Mountain’s traditional strength: a subfield of breeding science called high-efficiency agriculture.

The second discipline was Golden Crown Mountain’s second strongest subfield of breeding science: water conservancy agriculture.

Both of these disciplines were under the Academic Committee.

Therefore, the Academic Committee valued the Three Kings Tournament most, not the Silent Grail War; in fact, the Silent Grail War could be traded for the sake of the Three Kings Tournament.

By proactively conceding on the Silent Grail, she ensured that Bonifacius University wouldn’t become an obstacle in the Three Kings Tournament.

However, what the witch Ekaterina hadn’t expected was that Bonifacius University would lose again.

This surprised her, unusually, with a hint of astonishment at Locke’s growth. Locke’s ability to achieve this meant that some of his development had exceeded her expectations.

This didn’t align with her plans.

Ekaterina looked at the Water Hyacinth System and saw that the throne wizard from Bonifacius was indeed contacting her, asking why she had gone back on her word.

Behind the competition lay the power struggles of various academies; the participants were merely a group of low-ring wizards, subject to the arrangements of the academy’s higher-ups. Only by

standing high can one see far.

The perspective of a first-ring wizard is completely different from that of a wizarding apprentice, and the perspective of a second-ring wizard is completely different from that of a first-ring wizard.

And as third-ring wizards, as the backbone of the wizarding world, their perspective is naturally different as well.

Wizard Jack, seemingly having reached an agreement with Witch Catherine, spoke with a relaxed tone: “This time, Bonifacius University voluntarily withdrew from the Three Kings Tournament to go head-to-head with your strong second-ring participants.”

“So they bet on the Silent Grail. It seems Bonifacius University, through the Three Kings Tournament, formed an agreement with your Golden Crown Mountain. They also formed an agreement with Quinnjoll by giving up a market. But unexpectedly, they still came in third place in the Silent Grail.”

“I think Bonifacius must be furious,”

Witch Catherine said. “The deals made by the higher-ups are one thing, but for those low-ring wizards, the competition is another.”

“The deals only increase their academy’s chances of winning, nothing more. I think the main problem with Cloudswamp Wetlands is the difference in perception between high-ring and low-ring wizards, and many high-ring wizards haven’t realized this yet.”

“Admittedly, for high-ring wizards, the higher they stand, the farther they see. But one reason why low-ring wizards are still so important to us is that sometimes, standing too high makes it difficult to see things in detail. Also, some things become harder to do,”

said Ekaterina. “For high-ring wizards, these competitions may seem like just a transaction, but for low-ring wizards, this competition is a crucial opportunity to acquire resources for advancement.”

“Therefore, confirming a deal doesn’t determine who wins the competition. I think Bonifacius will soon realize this.”

Ekaterina smiled, thinking of Locke’s unexpected victory in the Silent Grail.

But she quickly remembered something less pleasant—the traitors under her command.

…

Beneath the Silent Throne, Locke stepped out of the Silent Plane, whereupon seven Sun Ring Wizards, the tournament committee, and wizard reporters from various newspapers in Cloudswamp Wetlands rushed to greet him.

These people were eager to welcome the champion, but they had another purpose.

One wizard reporter spoke directly to Locke: “Augustin Breeder, you were able to successfully prevent the apocalypse of the Silent Plane. Did you already know the truth about the Silent Plane?”

Locke felt his magic power had dropped back to 9999, and he had returned to the period of soul decay.

His soul aura was like a candle flickering in the wind, like a dying old man.

However, thinking of the World Tree Leaf, he wasn’t too worried.

At the same time, because he had won the championship, he could directly bring the Moon of Evolution and the world-class magic realm combined with the Moon of Evolution out of the Silent Plane, so he could sense the Moon of Evolution at this moment. However,

since the Moon of Evolution did not have the World Stone, it had exited the state of extreme magic and returned to the state of basic magic.

Meanwhile, the world-class magical realm, having lost the support of the Silent Plane, has shrunk further and further, now only about one-thirtieth of its original size.

Moreover, with the passage of time, it may even disappear entirely. One must reach the second ring as soon as possible to ensure the existence of the magical realm.

Restoring the magical realm to its original size requires creating an environment similar to the Silent Plane.

At this moment, before Locke could even speak to the wizard reporter’s question, the Sun Ring Wizard, Tatar, as the chairman of the competition committee, anxiously asked Locke, “Augustine, have you discovered the truth about the end of the world in the Silent Plane?”

“That’s a question left behind by the Silent Witch during her second ring stage. Although she is now a Wizard of Truth, her magical pressure far exceeds that of the Silent Plane, like a carriage unable to fit a snail’s shell, so she cannot enter it in her true form.”

Actually, she could enter with a clone.

But in reality, that’s impossible.

Because the wizard avatar of the Truth Wizard possesses the truth she represents, when she enters a plane where the total magical pressure is vastly different from her true form, her truth will corrupt that world.

Consequently, the appearance of that world will change.

Once this happens, she naturally cannot know what happened in the Silent Plane back then.

This doesn’t mean she can’t do certain things.

Rather, for her, the problems of that time were far too simple; her mere presence would automatically resolve them.

This is one of the reasons why high-ring wizards so desperately need their students.

Some things are actually easier for low-ring wizards to handle.

Wizard Tatar spoke with a sigh, saying to Locke, “If you could answer the Silent Witch’s questions, that would be wonderful.”

“That’s what we all hope for.”

“Locke, you’ve already obtained the truth about the Silent Plane, haven’t you?”

The six Sun-ring wizard judges’ gazes became very subtle.

Locke glanced at the seven wizards, each radiating powerful magical pressure. His weakened soul was so vulnerable before them that he was almost delirious, causing him to hesitate for a moment, nearly blurting out that he already knew the truth due to his weakened state.

But he quickly regained his senses.

Locke shook his head slightly under the expectant gazes of the crowd.

“I’m sorry, Chairman Tatar. I’ve disappointed you all, but I haven’t found any reason why the Silent Plane is destined to perish.”

The eyes of the seven Sun Ring Wizards brightened slightly for a moment.

Immediately, the Tatar wizard’s eyes lit up with satisfaction, then he said with a regretful expression, “What? Why is that? We all saw you solve the apocalypse.”

Locke thought for a moment and said, “Well, actually, it’s like this. I discovered that the disc-shaped creatures could descend into that plane mainly because, although the total number of life forms in that plane was large, the composition of that total number of life forms was entirely humans, with no plants. I descended into the Dharma Realm and summoned a large number of plants to make up for the lack of plants in that plane.”

“At the same time, I used my Evolution Moon to cause those magical plants to undergo a phenomenon called Surging Evolution.”

“Furthermore, after the Surging Evolution, I caused the collective magical plants to undergo a second collective evolution, allowing the magical plants to collectively acquire the earth element. The attribute changes of these magical plants triggered attribute changes in the plane’s magical tides. The magical tide attributes of the two worlds clashed, causing a series of changes, and the magical tides with water and earth attribute biases caused a large amount of wood element particles to be produced…”

Locke directly made up a bunch of nonsense. “This led to the forced departure of the Fallen Rain Realm.”

This was possible.

Because Locke obtained a World Leaf, and if that World Leaf could be extracted from the Second Ring Sea Gold Sand and placed on the Moon Plant on the Dark Side of the Moon, Locke could use the Evolution Moon to grant the magical plants in his ecosystem a set of [Earth Plant Essence] inherent within the World Leaf.

This was something Locke realized after obtaining the World Primal Magical Plant; the World Primal Magical Plant itself, because of the World Leaf, had the special ability to spread its own plant essence to other magical plants.

The seven Sun Ring Wizards, along with the wizard reporters from other newspapers, all wore thoughtful expressions.

Even the seven Sun Ring Wizards, who knew Locke was seriously fabricating

a story, began to ponder it. Because what Locke was saying seemed to be a line of thought.

It was potentially achievable.

However, to realize it, a large amount of data monitoring and repeated experiments were needed, and Locke’s current idea was only at the stage of thought experimentation.

It had not been truly verified.

And to verify it, tens of millions of magic stones would be needed, and the number of formal wizards required would likely be in the double digits.

In other words, Locke could absolutely not realize this idea in a single competition.

The seven Sun Ring wizard judges, though knowing Locke was talking nonsense, continued to smile and nodded in agreement.

They knew it was an excuse.

But at this moment, Locke had given them face, and they were naturally extremely satisfied.

This kid really knows how to handle people.

No wonder even the Silent Witch thinks highly of him. He

‘s truly a good kid!

Locke looked at Wizard Tatar and said, “This time, I was able to successfully prevent the two planes from colliding because I used the [Evolutionary Leap] mechanism between plants to change the magical tide attribute, thereby changing the attribute of the plane’s power. Through the special relationship between the attributes of the two plane’s powers, I caused the apocalypse to disappear.”

“This provides strong proof of the evolutionary leap relationship and also proves the importance of plant ecology to the plane. Perhaps, I can write two articles for a second-ring zone one or two journal?”

The smiles on the seven Sun Ring wizards’ faces immediately froze.

The seven exchanged glances.

Good heavens, this guy is incredibly audacious! He actually dared to openly make a deal with seven Sun Ring wizards in public.

The wizard Tatar’s lips twitched. He had just thought Locke was good at handling people, but wasn’t he being a little too good at it?!

Locke had no chance of completing his project—which required tens of millions of magic stones, a double-digit number of official wizards, and over ten years—during a competition within a single plane.

But these seven, as the committee of the Silent Grail tournament, didn’t want Locke to reveal his discovery of why the Silent Plane was destined for destruction.

Therefore, Locke wanted to use their approval to forcibly obtain strong academic support, or evidence, so that after becoming a second-ring wizard, he could quickly use this support to publish one or two related second-ring journal articles.

In other words, he wanted them to hold their noses and pretend to accept Locke’s conclusions, tacitly acknowledging that Locke had completed the aforementioned project.

The wizard Tatar was somewhat amused and exasperated.

He truly lived up to his reputation as an Eye Wizard.

However, he didn’t have any complaints about Locke. Seizing every opportunity and pursuing performance was the way the wizards of Yunze Wetlands did things.

Locke’s actions didn’t provoke his dislike; he just found it somewhat amusing.

Wizard Tatar chuckled, “The logic of publishing a second-ring journal is completely different from that of publishing a first-ring journal.”

“Publishing a second-ring journal is more difficult than you imagine, Locke. So, this is open to discussion. Even if we agree with your conclusion…”

Chairman Tatar stopped abruptly, leaving it at that.

“But I think that publishing two articles in ‘Green Grass Yunze’ would be more than enough.”

The other six Sun Ring Wizards nodded in agreement.

“Yes, I think so too. Even if you become a second-ring wizard, you can still publish in first-ring journals. Most first-ring journals don’t prohibit second-ring wizards from submitting articles.”

“Exactly. Especially Green Grass Clouds, even if you don’t need it yourself, your students and friends definitely will. Once you become a second-ring wizard, you’ll find that first-ring journals are so easy to get published in. After all, for first-ring journals, creating atmosphere and playing house are far more important than their actual meaning.”

Locke frowned slightly.

For some reason, at the second-ring stage, journal publication seemed to become more stringent, to the point that, despite the Silent Holy Grail Tournament being a major event, none of the seven Sun-ring wizards on the tournament committee dared to promise to help him publish in a journal. Originally,

his plan was that he definitely wouldn’t get into a first-ring journal, but maybe he could manage to get a couple of second-ring, second-ring articles.

But judging from the current situation, there must be something he didn’t understand.

So the seven Sun-ring wizards in front of him were completely unwilling to make that promise, and could only promise to help him publish in Green Grass Clouds.

Locke had no choice but to give up.

He spoke for a while more with the seven Sun Ring Wizards of the tournament committee, who congratulated him on winning the championship and achieving final victory, followed by a series of polite exchanges.

Then, they stepped aside.

Next, it was time for the four contestants to ascend the awards stage.

Of course, there were three contestants now.

Locke, Edgar, and the witch Georgina ascended the stage and, amidst the applause of the many wizards, each received a medal representing the competition.

The medal of the Silent Grail was also a second-circle enchanted artifact badge.

The badge was shaped like the Silent Throne, and this enchanted artifact was imbued with a second-circle spell, [Silence].

Once activated, this spell could create a completely silent zone within a kilometer radius of the user.

This would render many illusions that relied on air vibrations to attack enemies, or those that relied on sound as a medium, completely ineffective.

The enchanted spells on all three badges were the same, except that Locke’s badge had a gold number 1, Edgar’s badge had a silver number 2, and Georgina’s badge had a bronze number 3.

On the awards stage, just as the champion’s speech was about to begin, the wizard Chad muttered to Locke behind his back, urging him, as the champion, to give a proper speech to make up for the regret he had felt ten years ago when he hadn’t had this opportunity.

Locke, though, had no idea what this had to do with making up for his regret.

The witch Preston was also extremely excited, wishing she could be on stage to speak herself.

But suddenly, the crowd fell silent. The wizards spontaneously made way and bowed to the silent figure.

The Silent Witch descended from her heavenly seat, walking silently through the crowd and standing before Locke and Edgar.

Locke and Edgar were startled for a moment, then bowed to the Silent Witch.

Two ink canisters floated before the Silent Witch, then each floated down to Locke and Edgar.

“Welcome to the world of second-circle wizards.”

“You remind me of my early days as a second-circle wizard. That time seems so far away, how nostalgic. Youth…it’s wonderful.”

“This is a gift for you. Inside is a resource perfectly suited to you.”

“I’ve enjoyed watching this competition.”

The Silent Witch vanished in the next moment.

The wizards whispered amongst themselves; the Silent Witch had actually given two contestants an extra gift, though they wondered what it might be.

Unfortunately, Locke and Edgar wouldn’t be here to openly reveal it.

The seven Sun-circle wizard judges were also quite surprised.

Meanwhile, the wizard reporters from the wizarding newspapers frantically photographed the scene using their True Sight Crystals, and had their students quickly scribble a script.

(End of Chapter)