Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems

The Rose Witch and her entourage walked toward the front of the wizard town. She wore a pink wizard robe, had her hair up in twin tails, and topped it all with a pink wizard hat. Beside her, a white-bearded old Third Circle wizard proactively held up a Third Circle magical artifact umbrella, a Rose Council product, for her.

The Rose Witch treated this wizard umbrella as though it were an ordinary sun parasol.

Behind her walked five students, all of them her personal disciples. On her left side, a young witch walked alongside her, Rose Tacitus.

Today, Rose Tacitus was still dressed in her black wizard robe that looked as dangerous as it was beautiful. At her shoulder was a Black Demon God Rose, but her skirt had taken on a change, appearing to have a kind of naturally plant-like coloration.

It was clearly a special material woven by a magical weaver, and yet it carried the color of a plant, the fragrance of roses, and even a special fruity scent.

Locke paused for a moment, because as he came out of the room and stood on the street of the wizard town alongside his senior fellows, looking over at this Witch Rose, three words immediately surfaced in his mind, "Plastic flowers."

Locke quickly used the water hyacinth system to look up the publicly available articles written by mainstream Second Circle wizards of the Rose Council. He now had this access as a Second Circle wizard.

And it was then that he noticed what he had never discovered before regarding the three pillar disciplines of the Rose Council, rose floriography, botanical magic, and textile studies.

Among these, botanical magic and textile studies were secondary disciplines, while rose floriography was a tertiary discipline, meaning rose floriography had not even produced a Root Field.

But from their publicly available literature, Locke noticed a blind spot he had consistently missed up until now.

Yes. The Rose Council had developed something seven hundred years ago, something similar to the end-of-days flowers that had destroyed King Otto's Heliothos Imperial Court.

Plastic flowers.

He should have thought of this long ago.

Locke looked at an article he had pulled up, written by a Second Circle floriographer of the Rose Council, titled "Constructing the Microstructure of Rosaceae Magical Plants Using Shuttleless Spinning: Realizing an Eternally Undying Fural Form."

Locke said, "This makes complete sense. The Rose Council has a large number of textile-oriented alchemists, along with many breeders and botanical wizards. Combined with floriography, which centers on flower arrangement, using textile studies to create artificial flowers, or some kind of woven artificial bloom, was virtually inevitable."

"And what could be more in line with a floriographer's love for flower-type magical plants than an artificial flower that never changes its form and requires no mastery of extensive specialized breeding knowledge?"

Locke came back to himself and looked at Witch Rose again, though this direction appeared to be something the Rose Council was still exploring at a fairly cutting-edge stage, feeling out whether it was a viable path of development.

At this moment, Locke noticed that as he was examining Witch Rose, she was examining him in return, her beautiful face carrying a dangerous expression.

Witch Rose said to the Rose Witch beside her, "Is that my opponent, Great-grandmother?"

"He looks rather handsome."

The Rose Witch smiled. "I suppose so. This is my first time seeing him as well. Hmm, there is a familiar quality to him."

A trace of contemplation appeared in her eyes, as though she were thinking of something.

"This air about him, I feel I have encountered it somewhere before."

The Rose Witch walked forward normally, but was blocked by an invisible barrier.

She immediately set aside all stray thoughts, her eyes sharpening as she looked toward the edges of the wizard town, where one after another peach trees had suddenly grown up from the ground along the perimeter.

Because of these sparsely arranged peach trees, the Rose Witch and her students were unable to advance.

The Rose Witch's gaze moved.

"Katya, today is a wonderful occasion to celebrate your student becoming a Second Circle wizard. You and I are friends. And so although you did not invite me, I still came uninvited."

"After all, you invited half the great figures of the Cloud Marsh Wetlands. How could you not invite me?"

"Only for you to place me on the Peach Grove Curse's blacklist. What is the meaning of this?"

The Rose Witch stood across the wizard town's entire central street, looking toward Witch Yekaterina from afar. "Are we enemies?"

Witch Yekaterina sat in the central square of the wizard town, at a long table surrounded by the Cloud Marsh Wetlands' most influential people, from bureau directors of the White Wizard Association to key laboratory directors and administrative leaders of major academies.

Even those at the far end of the table were principals of medium-to-large-scale academies.

At this moment, those present all showed awkward expressions, or expressions of curiosity.

These two had been rivals from the very first moment they met as ordinary Third Circle wizards.

They had competed extensively over projects for many years, and it was said their Ten-Person Plan projects were in direct competition with each other, with key individual plans also in rivalry.

Although this competition was not a fight to the death, whoever lost the competitive edge would suffer a relative loss of support.

And both of their research had already reached the stage where the daily expenditure was an astronomical sum that would terrify any ordinary wizard to hear.

Therefore, whether they could receive the full support of the Cloud Marsh Council was already a matter of enormous importance.

Faced with the Rose Witch's question, Witch Yekaterina was unperturbed.

"Are we not enemies?"

At these words, every high-circle wizard and person of standing at the banquet immediately fell silent, afraid to make even a sound, lest they say something wrong and somehow find themselves entangled in an academic conflict.

The Director of the Organization Bureau of the White Wizard Association, a Fourth Circle wizard, wore a smile on his face.

The two other Bureau Directors who had come from the White Wizard Association, the Director of the Sacred Bureau and the Director of the Demon Hunter Bureau, also regarded the situation with quiet satisfaction.

The directors of a single wizard land's branches generally numbered between nine and fifteen.

The three bureaus that had come here were among the most important bureaus of the White Wizard Association.

But the Cloud Marsh Wetlands' values championed performance, championed the overturning of hierarchy by the lower tiers, and championed mutual competition. And so the three bureau directors had absolutely no intention of mediating the minor conflict between the chief wizard instructors of two premier wizard academies.

On the contrary, the more intense their competition, the better.

A single wizard land's White Wizard Association branch had limited finances, and a large portion of the Cloud Marsh Wetlands' budget had to be submitted directly to the Star Domain Sea for the Eastern Border Region-level White Wizard Association to coordinate. And so they could not simultaneously pour their full support behind two Throne wizards both attempting to become Fourth Circle wizards.

They could only select the better candidate.

Of course, the other candidate could not be entirely abandoned either, because once a Throne wizard left a wizard land, it was an enormous loss for that land.

A Throne wizard commanded wisdom and power and shouldered countless responsibilities. Once departed, the ramifications would be severe.

At the Throne wizard level, one's movements could no longer be considered merely personal movements. They were the movements of an entire academic lineage.

And so the White Wizard Association would still offer support to the Throne who lost the competition, only it could not be the same wholehearted effort as before.

At this moment, the Rose Witch outside the wizard town furrowed her brow. She had clearly not expected Witch Yekaterina to publicly admit outright that they were enemies, leaving herself not even a shred of face-saving cloth.

In the next moment, Witch Yekaterina said, "I was joking, Anna. Who else would know better than I do? You and I have always been the closest of friends, now, before, and in the future."

The Rose Witch gave a cold snort. "Then remove the Peach Grove Curse."

Witch Yekaterina said, "I cannot. The Peach Grove Curse is Golden Crown Mountain's protective formation array, passed down for a thousand years."

"The Peach Grove Curse prevents disagreeable wizards from drawing close. So it is not something I can remove."

A cold gleam flashed in the Rose Witch's eyes, and in an instant a rain of rose petals began falling from the sky over the wizard town.

The Rose Witch's slender hands moved as though she were doing cuttings, and the rain of rose petals falling from the sky began to flow in accordance with some kind of rhythm.

Locke looked up and found that the rose-petal rain that Witch Rose had summoned, as a Third Circle wizard combining textile and botanical magic, was no ordinary thing. Even the direction in which the petals flowed seemed to trace the pattern of needle and thread.

"It resembles the new textile school."

Locke suddenly realized.

"Of course. The two textile schools only recently parted ways. There was originally a huge amount of overlapping content. As a Third Circle Throne wizard, when the Rose Witch combines textile magic and botanical magic, the resulting spells would naturally carry characteristics of the new textile school."

"Which is why it feels familiar to me. And is also considerably more powerful."

The rose-petal rain that fell from the sky resembled the steady falling of actual rain. The interweaving of the raindrops was the interweaving of planar force. Countless petals fell, as though an entire world came down with them.

The falling rain within that world continued to shuttle back and forth, like a flying shuttle weaving through a loom, borrowing petals to perform textile magic.

One after another peach tree withered and fell. One after another peach tree at the edge of the wizard town automatically drew aside.

At this point, not wanting to give the Rose Witch any opportunity to show off the Rose Council's magic before everyone, Witch Yekaterina waved her hand. At the very moment when the Peach Grove Curse and the Rose Witch's spell were about to enter their most intense clash, she suddenly dissolved the Peach Grove Curse.

In an instant, every piece of peach wood covering this wizard town transformed from a fully grown tree back into a seedling, then into a seed. Those seeds automatically buried themselves in the earth and vanished.

The Rose Witch, seeing Witch Yekaterina choose to dissolve the Peach Grove Curse without ever activating its true formidable power, was so furious she ground her teeth and stood frozen where she was for a long moment.

Afraid that others would notice she had lost her composure.

"Wretched Yekaterina."

The Rose Witch thought to herself, "She has been like this since the very beginning. Always this cunning, never giving me a single opportunity to display my magic before an audience."

On the other side, Witch Yekaterina smiled to herself.

"Anna wants to come cause trouble at my banquet and show off in front of everyone. I will not let her manage it."

"Guests are guests. There is no need for me to compare magic with her."

"Though I must say, Anna has been integrating textile and botanical magic increasingly well. That spell just now was quite good."

The Rose Witch brought her six students directly into the wizard town's central square, sitting down across the long table and having her students take whatever empty seats they could find.

At that moment, Great Senior Brother Georuta said to Locke and the others, "Come, the Rose Witch has come looking for trouble again. Let us hurry back. We should not leave Teacher facing them alone."

They all quickly returned to the central square of the wizard town.

At this moment, Witch Yekaterina's side was actually surrounded by many Golden Crown Mountain wizards, some from the Academic Committee and some from the students she had cultivated within Golden Crown Mountain's teaching system.

Witch Yekaterina and the Rose Witch faced each other with swords drawn, and the moment old rivals met, the looks in their eyes immediately changed.

When the Rose Witch thought of how many projects this person had stolen from her, and how many projects she had taken from her students, her eyes were ready to shoot fire.

And when Witch Yekaterina thought of how many good things this person had sabotaged for her, her heart also burned with annoyance.

Yet neither of them allowed any anger to show on their faces. They simply looked at each other, their eyes holding smiles, giving nothing away in their expressions.

Witch Yekaterina said to her Group One leader beside her, Wizard Commodus, "Have your student pour the eleventh-generation Rose Witch of the Rose Council a cup of our Golden Crown Mountain specialty, Cloud Lake Biluochun."

The Rose Witch smiled.

"No need. I brought better tea myself this time. Have you forgotten? Our Rose Council also produces tea, and better tea at that. We produce floral tea."

Bringing this up made the atmosphere at the long table grow even more peculiar.

Wizard Fischer, an Council of Elders wizard who had been invited, could not keep his composure the moment he heard this.

"Rose Throne, the Rose Council in the past stole a large amount of mature tea-making technology from our Golden Crown Mountain and Landbridge. Although this was nothing to do with you personally."

"That was the doing of the seventh-generation Rose Witch. But our Golden Crown Mountain has never forgotten this deep wound. Some people conduct plant hunting and end up doing it into a different wizard university in the same wizard land. That is truly a strange tale."

"Eleventh-generation Rose Witch, your university's plant hunters have a notorious reputation. But I hear that you yourself are hardly any different, having recently stolen one of our sun ring wizards."

"Hahaha... ladies and gentlemen, do be careful in the future. When recruiting wizard instructors, make sure to conduct proper background checks. Do be sure not to hire any more of the Rose Throne's disciples."

The Rose Witch herself showed not the slightest sign of anger, only a smile. She shook her head, twin tails swaying.

But her senior disciple's face showed fury, and he was just about to speak.

The Rose Witch suddenly raised her right hand.

"Enough needless words. Katya, I hear that your most treasured disciple has become a Second Circle wizard, and is the same age as my Tacitus family granddaughter."

"And so I specifically brought this granddaughter of mine to exchange ideas with your student."

Witch Yekaterina immediately understood her intent.

"What kind of exchange?"

The Rose Witch said, "Rose."

Witch Rose stepped out from the Rose Witch's side, gave Witch Yekaterina a respectful bow, and then looked toward Locke. "Our two teachers are friends with each other. You and I are about the same age and can be considered of the same generation."

"And so I would like to have an exchange with you. I have recently woven a piece of cloth. I hear that you received the Sacred Dragon's magical inheritance, and the Peach Bow Thorn Arrow is one of the Red Dragon Throne's research directions."

"I want you to shoot down this piece of cloth I have woven. If you can do it, then I have lost. If not..."

Locke looked toward Witch Yekaterina, and Witch Yekaterina gave a slight nod.

Under Witch Rose's expectant gaze, Locke stepped forward and said, "An exchange? I am open to it. Only this is too dull with nothing at stake. We white wizards do not do things that are not profitable. So if there is nothing to be gained, I have no interest."

Witch Yekaterina showed a faint smile.

The Rose Witch paused slightly. Within the Rose Council, she could not tolerate a student with such distinctive personality.

After all, she had just seen Witch Yekaterina nod, allowing Locke to accept the challenge.

Yet Locke had not immediately accepted it. Instead, he had put forward a demand for stakes before he would agree to any exchange.

And what if her side refused?

Interesting.

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