Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems - Chapter 822

Chapter 819 Payment and Seeking Trajan’s Advice

At this time, at the Meloch technical seminar, their original target was also Solas’s Barefoot, and someone at the seminar even suggested hiring a famous Void Explorer or a wizarding tutor from the Wizarding University to endorse and advertise.

They could create an advertisement featuring a wizard who had saved up magic stones for a long time, sold all their Solas’s Barefoot wizarding shoes, and finally bought a pair of Meloch’s Magic Step second-circle wizarding shoes.

At the technical seminar, Meloch’s second-circle wizards were also preparing to launch a large-scale wizarding sports competition specifically for Solas’s Barefoot.

But soon, someone at the Meloch technical seminar discovered that the Augustus Wizarding Shoes Alliance had listed a pair of wizarding shoes worth one million magic stones.

Meloch’s Moon Ring manager showed a strange expression.

“How did they do that? The cost is way too low!”

he pondered.

“But the most troublesome one right now should be Solas’s Barefoot.”

“Unexpectedly, the battle between our two shop alliances has been disrupted by a rat suddenly barging in. This rat is getting stronger every day. From initially being completely indifferent, it has become someone we need to pay attention to, and then it even managed to break into the second-circle market.”

“Let’s see how many people will buy these second-circle wizard shoes.”

“Hopefully, the number will be small, otherwise it will be troublesome. Golden Crown Mountain, tsk, if it weren’t for Golden Crown Mountain behind him, dealing with him would be much easier. Damn it, this person is no small fry after all, but someone from the Red Dragon Throne lineage. Sigh.”

…

Back on the magic carriage of Golden Crown Mountain, Locke was thinking: ‘With the reputation I gained from the Silent Grail, the initial sales should have a certain foundation.’ ‘

Let’s test the waters in the second-circle wizard shoe market first. If we can taste success, we can release the second and third wizard shoe products.’ Locke

said, “I can gradually improve the quality of my pure magic plant wizard shoes during the product launch process. This way, with the acquisition of funding, the quality of my products will gradually iterate to the level expected of ordinary second-ring wizard shoes from Cloudze Wetlands, and may even surpass it in the end. Then I can enter the Star Ring market.”

“As long as I become a Star Ring wizard, I can enter the Star Ring market.”

The difference between second-ring wizards is enormous; the gap between a Star Ring wizard and an ordinary second-ring wizard is only slightly smaller than the difference between a second-ring wizard and a first-ring wizard.

The entire second-ring stage is essentially the ultimate height that most civilizations in the endless void can reach.

Many civilizations’ so-called pioneering levels are merely pioneering within the second-ring range,

forever remaining within the second-ring framework.

After all, if it’s just about increasing power, no matter how much it increases, the second-ring framework can accommodate it.

This also leads to extremely large differences between the four major levels within the second ring.

Inside the magic carriage, Locke took out a glass bottle containing the fragrance of roses, the “Flower of Dreams,” its pale pink scent ethereal and dreamlike.

He opened the bottle, releasing some of the fragrance, which, within the magical model of the “Ephemeral Dream,” merged with an ordinary sea holly fern before him.

Locke closed his eyes, and within this dream space, grafted the sea holly onto the Netherworld Iron Tree.

The next moment, the wizard driver of the magic carriage looked curiously at the hellish warhorse pulling the carriage.

“Strange, why won’t the carriage move?”

He frowned, using a magical whip to lash the warhorse’s back, but no matter how much the warhorse neighed, it wouldn’t move an inch.

The wizard frowned, chanting a beast-taming incantation; the hellish warhorse was now controlled by a soul pact, but still couldn’t move forward.

“There’s a second-ring archmage inside the carriage, why aren’t you moving forward?” The wizard was sweating profusely, frantically switching between three summoning spell models.

Each spell model struck the back of the hellhorse, and three soul contracts enveloped it, but nothing could make it move an inch.

A moment later, Locke’s voice came from inside the magic carriage.

“It’s alright, just proceed normally.”

The next instant, the hellhorse actually took a step forward.

The wizard servant driving the magic carriage glanced at Locke inside with astonishment and awe, then turned and continued driving the hellhorse forward.

Inside the carriage, Locke looked at an ordinary first-ring sea gold sand fern in his hand.

“It failed.”

“The Netherworld Iron Tree – Dream Flower shared imaginary root system I established can only provide virtual imaginary roots to the Wizard Shoes magical plant.”

“After all, I don’t fully possess the power of the Netherworld Iron Tree; I only grafted a Shadow Fern and fished out a portion of its energy. And this portion of energy has an upper limit. Because of the Shadow Fern’s imaginary root grade, the energy fished out at any given moment is maintained at the level of a regular fourth-grade imaginary root.”

“Therefore, the shared imaginary root is actually only at the level of a regular imaginary root, and cannot be shared with the Star Ring magical plant.”

“That’s not all. Because the energy fished out by my Shadow Fern is adapted to be converted into the energy of the Great Blood Wave Pineapple Wizard Shoes, once I transfer the energy to other types of magical plants, it will cause energy chaos, and the botanical root realm will become disordered. The infinite downward force of the Netherworld Iron Tree will cause the magical plants using its energy to continuously descend.”

“That’s why the magic carriage couldn’t move forward just now, and the hellish warhorse was terrified and dared not move forward.”

Locke sighed.

“I thought I could use this shared imaginary root system when cultivating other magical plants, but it doesn’t work. Oh well, this is good enough. I should be content.”

“This system can be used on wizard shoes. There are still many secrets about the Netherworld Iron Tree. I’ll study them slowly in the future. Maybe I can fish out more energy to provide for more magical plants.”

Locke calculated his recent expenses. His major expenses were seven million magic stones spent externally, and some minor expenses added up, which just used up his income for the past few months.

But he still had 15 million magic stones left from the 22 million he earned from selling two batches of first-ring wizard shoes.

“This 15 million will be used as payment for my second-ring wizard shoes.”

Locke had calculated before that the cost of a pair of second-ring wizard shoes was about 500,000 magic stones. So the 15 million magic stones he had were only enough to produce 30 pairs of wizard shoes.

That is, 60 second-ring Bloodwave Pineapple Wizard Shoes.

“Let’s try pre-selling thirty pairs first,” Locke thought. “I don’t have enough funds for the goods right now.”

“Hmm, if sales are really too good, we can try taking out a loan of 15 million magic stones first, and then pre-sell 30 pairs.”

The cost for a pair of first-ring wizards is about 6,000 magic stones, so 200 pairs would be over a million magic stones.

Therefore, a large portion of the previous payments was an advance Scarlett the witch had borrowed from Arthas for herself.

But it’s different when it comes to second-ring wizards!

The cost of a pair of wizard shoes, even with Locke’s cost-cutting measures, reaches 500,000 magic stones. Such a large sum is hard to come by without a loan; otherwise, it’s difficult for anyone to pre-pay for it.

Locke now understood why so many second-ring wizards went bankrupt so easily.

The bigger the business, the easier it is to go bankrupt.

The costs of being a second-circle wizard are simply too high. Although prices are high and profits are also large, the turnover is extremely high.

This leads a second-circle wizard to rely heavily on bank loans and market financing. And if a second-circle wizard makes a mistake in judgment, or is controlled by greed and makes a risky, ill-advised investment, then trouble ensues.

They can easily lose everything.

Locke pondered this for a moment.

“This is my current situation. I still need to be as cautious as possible.”

“Don’t take out loans.”

“Because I have three other places where I need money. The first is to complete the Golden Wheat Project that Teacher Sophia gave me, which granted me the powerful magic [Ancestral Evolution].

The second place I need money is to organize a group of people to explore different planes and conduct wedding ring tests. The third place I need money is to find projects that can apply for special funding.”

Locke thought for a moment, “Perhaps I can contact my senior brothers. As an ordinary second-ring wizard, my knowledge of these things is limited, but Senior Brother Trajan and Sith Group Leader might be able to give me better advice.”

“Moreover, I need to complete some second-ring level projects as soon as possible to obtain the Tourmaline King Peach, rapidly increase my magic pressure, and get closer to the Star Ring. Everything is difficult at the beginning. I think as long as I complete the first second-ring project, the subsequent second-ring projects will come to me one after another.”

Locke first contacted Wizard Trajan, and soon, Wizard Trajan accepted his video chat request.

Locke paused, for Trajan’s location was shrouded in darkness, utterly silent, as if eternal.

Locke asked, “Brother Trajan, is that the Dark World over there? Perhaps my timing in contacting you was inappropriate?”

Trajan replied, “Yes, this is the Dark World. This is my fourth time entering. It’s alright, I’m currently in a safe zone within the Dark World.”

Locke frowned, because from the video call, he could only see complete darkness on Trajan’s end.

Trajan explained, “The Dark World possesses over ten thousand different shades of darkness. Some are dangerous, some are safe. I’m currently in a safe zone.”

Locke was speechless.

“Over ten thousand different colors of darkness?”

“Alright.”

Locke quickly explained the problem he was facing.

Trajan, the wizard, said cautiously, “I didn’t expect you to actually succeed in reducing the cost of the imaginary root. It gave me quite a shock.”

“Listen to me, you’re indeed in great danger right now. One wrong step and you’ll be shattered to pieces; one right step and you’ll win everything.”

“First, let’s talk about your wizard shoes. Your wizard shoes are indeed uniquely creative, opening up a new market—the second-circle pure magic plant wizard shoe market. But you can’t apply for a second-circle grant project.”

Locke’s heart sank, and he asked, “Senior brother, why?”

Is the second-circle grant really that difficult?

Trajan said, “I know what you’re thinking. However, when a second-circle wizard applies for their first second-circle grant, they receive a corresponding weighting bonus, so even if your project application is slightly inferior, there’s still a chance it will pass.”

“But the problem is, the achievements your wizard shoes have made so far can hardly be called innovation, or even technical innovation, or combinatorial innovation.”

Locke immediately understood Trajan’s meaning.

His shared imaginary root was only possible because of a fortuitous encounter with a Netherworld Iron Tree.

He didn’t hold back in telling Wizard Trajan.

After all, there were too many secrets on the River Styx; who knew what lay beneath its surface?

He had no need to keep this secret.

As long as he didn’t tell Wizard Trajan the exact location of the Underworld Iron Tree in the River Styx, that was enough.

Locke said in a deep voice, “Indeed, this is more like a commercial development. Horizontal expansion is possible, but vertical expansion would indeed be difficult to get project approval.”

Wizard Trajan comforted him, “Even so, the horizontal project you’ve done is something many second-ring wizards, and even some poorer star-ring wizards, would envy.” “

Even if the Pure Magic Plant Wizard Shoes only capture a small portion of the original wizard shoe market, you could make a fortune.”

“But your teacher from your apprenticeship went to the Star Sea, right? She’s quite impressive. I didn’t expect her to be able to go to the Star Sea.”

Wizard Trajan couldn’t help but admire her.

“The project she gave you is indeed worthy of top-tier funding.”

“It’s a very well-developed project; I think the preliminary experimental data alone would be quite impressive.”

Wizard Trajan coughed.

“I didn’t expect you, Locke, to maintain such a good relationship with your apprenticeship mentor. She’s almost completed 80% of the project and then dumped it on you.”

“This… I really can’t imagine.”

Wizard Trajan admitted, “My apprenticeship mentor and I have been at odds for a long time.”

“It’s rare for a wizard to maintain such a good relationship with their apprenticeship mentor like you do.”

“However, I suggest you don’t use this project to apply for top-tier funding.”

Locke looked at Wizard Trajan with suspicion.

Trajan the Wizard said, “Your project is already too complete; using it for top-tier funding is a waste.”

“Moreover, it won’t allow you to grow. Even if you used that project to apply for a second-ring grant, you’d likely get approved since it’s your first time. It’s that powerful, after all, it involves using potion-making techniques to induce specific atavistic evolution in magical plants.”

“But I think that taking a project that’s almost finished and doesn’t require much investment to apply for top-tier and second-ring grants is a complete waste. It will reduce your growth opportunities and deprive you of an easily obtainable project.”

Locke nodded repeatedly.

Trajan the Wizard, as expected of a Sun Ring Wizard, analyzed Locke’s current situation meticulously.

Locke asked, “Then, Brother Trajan, how should I make good use of this project?”

Trajan the Wizard smiled, “It’s simple. Enter it in a competition! As long as you complete the remaining 20% or so, I think that’s enough to enter a high-quality competition and win an award.”

(End of Chapter)