The next day, after Locke completed his day's meditation, he once again entered the special-grade laboratory to consult materials and use the mana resonance breeding method to induce directional mutations in the Chain Magic Vines, allowing them to acquire further abilities.

During this process, Locke answered questions from several students. To a student named Leopold who had just obtained his formal breeder certification this year and whose mana had reached 800 last month, currently one of the capable assistants in the laboratory, Locke said, "The question you raised about using grafting breeding methods to graft animals and plants together does indeed have meaning, because this is content that First Circle breeders need to research."

"Using First Circle level grafting healing technique, one can graft portions of animal bloodline essence onto plants, forming special plants."

Locke said, "But the side effects of doing this are also very severe."

After thinking for a moment, Locke decided to demonstrate for Leopold. Leopold's mana fluctuations had already reached 800, he was very capable and served as a group leader among the wizard apprentices. 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

Locke extended his hand, and an apprentice-level subspecies of Chain Magic Vine appeared in his palm. At the same time, Locke took out from his astral ring a glass bottle containing tarantula bloodline essence.

Then Locke cut off the subspecies magic vine, opened the tarantula essence glass bottle, and grafted the two together while using the First Circle level grafting healing technique.

Leopold watched this scene in astonishment. He had not expected that the First Circle level grafting healing technique could actually accomplish such a thing.

Soon, the subspecies magic vine absorbed the tarantula essence, and the entire plant underwent some morphological changes.

When Locke released the subspecies magic vine, the plant unexpectedly turned and attacked Leopold who was standing nearby. Enhanced by the tarantula, the magic vine's speed was so fast that Leopold had no time to react at all. Before he could recite any defensive incantations, the plant had already reached his face, about to bore a hole in his forehead.

Leopold's face turned pale with fright, but the next moment, Locke extended his left hand, grabbed the magic vine, and with a slight squeeze, the entire plant exploded.

Leopold gasped for breath. "Teacher Augustine, that magical plant... went berserk... it went berserk..."

Locke nodded slightly. "The bloodline essence of magical creatures differs too greatly from magical plants. Even forcibly using grafting healing is usually more difficult than grafting between plants."

"Moreover, when magical plants combine with bloodline essence, they easily exhibit the phenomenon of going berserk. This is because there are several special factors inside bloodline essence that plant essence lacks. These factors are originally used to stabilize the bodies of magical creatures and their intensely fluctuating magical energy. Magical plants that basically remain stationary don't need those special factors, but once the two are grafted, when the magical plant obtains those special factors, the berserk phenomenon that just occurred will happen."

"Once a magical plant goes berserk, it often displays power it originally didn't possess," Locke said. "But it also means that this magical plant is leading itself and everything around it toward destruction."

Leopold asked in confusion, "But Teacher Barbara and Teacher Montgomery are still grafting magical creatures with magical plants..."

Locke nodded, "Sometimes, in order to solve difficult problems, grafting magical plants with magical creatures may yield unexpected pleasant surprises. But this requires rich grafting experience, and Witch Barbara is also a wizard of bloodline studies. Only with her guidance can Wizard Montgomery perform such grafting."

"Alright, Leopold, that concludes today's answers to your questions."

Leopold bowed to Locke in salute. "Thank you for your guidance, Teacher Locke. Through your instruction, I understand grafting breeding methods much better. I hope I can help our research group in the future."

Locke nodded.

Leopold also came from a commoner wizard background. Before entering his research group, he had always been a ghostwriter for several first-class wizard apprentices from the direct lineage of the Plutarch family.

He had even reportedly ghostwritten essays for George Plutarch.

Since joining his research group, he had stopped such activities.

However, after Leopold's mana reached 800, his advancement potion went to his original wizard mentor, since Locke had no teaching position and was not his true wizard mentor.

And Leopold was working in his own group, currently having done no work at all for his original mentor's group.

But the problem was, if he wanted to obtain the advancement potion, even just the hope of obtaining it, he needed to work like a slave for his original wizard mentor, otherwise he absolutely couldn't get the advancement potion.

Locke didn't know what Leopold was thinking. Since reaching mana 800, he hadn't been meditating much these past few days, instead working diligently in his own group, not showing any anxiety about the advancement potion at all.

Leopold bowed to Locke, "Teacher Locke, I've finished today's experimental work. I'd like to return to my dormitory to consult materials."

Locke nodded. "Mm, you may. That's up to you."

"Remember to organize a copy of the magical plant subspecies materials our group has recently produced and send it to all First Circle wizards including myself."

"Yes, Teacher Locke." Leopold then bowed again and left.

Locke looked up at Leopold's departing figure and frowned slightly. Students like Leopold, if they were in wizard lands outside, would have long ago obtained advancement potions, and their wizard mentors would urge them to quickly advance to First Circle wizard.

Every wizard mentor who guided a student to become a formal wizard received tremendous benefits.

Not only implicit benefits in connections, but also reputation, prestige, resource applications, and more student quotas, all of these would come.

Moreover, for each formal wizard they taught, the White Wizard Association would provide special rewards. These rewards were all tied to teaching positions. Originally, as long as the system remained effective, wizard mentors would hope to have several more formal wizard students under them.

But the reward system in the Land of Six Towers had completely collapsed, entirely controlled by family wizards, so naturally they no longer cared whether their students could actually become formal wizards.

Instead, they would actually suppress their own students, preventing them from losing control after becoming formal wizards and no longer working for them.

Locke frowned. Advancement potions were materials the White Wizard Association kept strictly confidential and prohibited from circulating on the market, so he couldn't possibly help Leopold obtain one.

And according to the rules, Leopold's potion would first be distributed to his teacher, so he truly had no solution for this.

Locke collected his thoughts and turned his attention to the small group on the gray stone tablet. Since joining the small group, he frequently checked the chat content within the group and discovered that the tenth-ranked research group was indeed on the verge of dissolution.

He was a wizard from Dragon Fall Land. Although that wizard land had a high rank, it had always been more skilled in the Alchemy School and Enchantment School, with absolutely no interest in breeding studies. So his wizard academy had no intention of supporting him from the beginning. After he actually entered the Cloud Marsh Cup, a whole group of people from the academy tried to stuff people into his research group.

This Wizard Marius Lawrence was also soft-eared. Back and forth, not only was his research group filled with people with connections, but those originally capable of doing work had all been squeezed out.

This led to the remaining people having scattered morale.

Today, Marius Lawrence spoke up in the group in the morning. As soon as he spoke, it was to blame the Mountain Shadow Council academy he was at for not valuing their breeding studies, not respecting their breeders, and now completely disrupting his project.

In short, Wizard Marius was full of grievances.

He didn't dare say these things within the Mountain Shadow Council, so he had to find a place to say them, and the Cloud Marsh Cup finals small group was a very good outlet for venting.

Through lurking and watching, Locke sighed, seeing that every competing research group had its own problems. Perhaps truly as Witch Barbara had previously said, the problems we encounter, our competitors will certainly encounter as well.

Whoever could be more patient had already seized the initiative.

Locke saw in the small group that Wizard Alaric from the Twilight Border consoled him with a few words, while the third-ranked Witch Yennefer rarely tagged him in the group, "You can't blame others for this. Who told you to be soft-eared? Your students are more wronged than you. They finally helped you win the competition, and you just entered the finals before replacing them with those people with connections."

Marius Lawrence seemed to be stunned for a moment, then tagged Yennefer from the Spiral Basin in the small group, "I can't be blamed for this either. Those newly arrived students, even those wizard mentors, which one doesn't have a better resume than the people in my original research group! I thought I should select the best from the good, so I temporarily changed people."

Yennefer sent him a cold laugh emoji.

And Wizard Alaric from the Twilight Border spoke up, "You can't say it like that. You can't just look at resumes for this kind of thing. Resumes can be inflated. Being able to do the work is what's real. Changing generals on the eve of battle is a major taboo."

"Speaking of which, does this mean your project can't continue? Then during our finals, won't there only be nine competitors?"

Wizard Alaric was undoubtedly probing for intelligence again, but Wizard Marius Lawrence was provoked, immediately stating that his project was still progressing, that he would work hard to complete the experiment within the specified time, and said a bunch of details that revealed his experimental progress.

Locke raised an eyebrow. "It seems I don't need to worry about this crystallization stage First Circle wizard from Dragon Fall Land anymore. He's no longer my competitor. From the details he revealed, his project has indeed progressed slowly, and the core personnel doing the work have basically all left."

Locke closed the gray stone tablet and heard a knock at the door. He opened the laboratory door to discover it was a director from the Plutarch family's finance office, a liquefaction stage First Circle wizard.

His relationship with Eric's branch wasn't very good either. He belonged to the neutral faction of the Plutarch family.

The chief director of the finance office was Eric's relative, but under the finance office were a bunch of directors.

This liquefaction wizard, finding Locke at this moment, immediately brightened and handed Locke a bill to look at. "Wizard Augustine, I finally found you. Originally I wouldn't dare trouble you without something important."

"But look at this."

"Look at this bill. He wrote an extra zero when purchasing premium nutrient soil, ten thousand magic stones became one hundred thousand magic stones. The key is I even signed it, and the bill was already submitted."

Wizard Sphendis said, "This is a major error. The name of the student who submitted the bill is Leopold."

"He's a first-class wizard apprentice. You see, these commoner wizards are just so careless in their work. He actually carelessly created such a huge problem. This is a discrepancy of ninety thousand magic stones. This problem is quite serious. I manage the Plutarch family's assets and need to be responsible for the family's property."

Wizard Sphendis frowned with disgust, not concealing his hostility and loathing toward commoner wizards in front of Locke. "Those commoner wizards must be taking advantage because you treat them too well, so they dare make such huge mistakes."

"You'd better place some of our reliable family wizards in your research group. Perhaps these ninety thousand magic stones are what that first-class wizard apprentice wanted to embezzle into his own pocket, which is why he did this."

Locke frowned, glanced at Wizard Sphendis, then took the bill from his hand and found it was signed by Witch Barbara.

Locke called for Witch Barbara, and when the mud-covered Witch Barbara saw the bill, she was also startled. "What's going on? How did Leopold write an extra zero?"

Witch Barbara looked at the furious Wizard Sphendis, then guiltily at Locke, then said, "Maybe I usually trusted him too much, so when he gave it to me, I just signed it without looking carefully."

"This is nine magic crystal cards... the problem is serious."

Ninety thousand magic stones was actually not a small amount. It could purchase nine First Circle magical plants, nine medium-quality First Circle magical artifacts, or even seven to eight golems, and could purchase a large pile of meditation assistance resources.

Using this money for major projects would certainly be like a drop in the bucket, but for one wizard's cultivation, it would be more than sufficient.

Witch Barbara quickly realized that this mistake could very likely become an excuse for family wizards like Wizard Sphendis to attack. This matter could be big or small.

If made big, it would be attempting to falsify accounts and deceive the Plutarch family's family funds, a major crime. Not only would it be impossible to remain in Locke's research group, Wizard Sphendis would probably send Leopold to wizard prison.

Locke had an enormous headache. Although he had heard before that disputes between research groups and the finance office were very complex and the two were often in opposition, he hadn't expected things would develop this way.

This was also the first time he had encountered such a situation, so he had no precautions.

Witch Barbara said a few words for Leopold. "Boss Locke, Leopold doesn't have the guts to embezzle nine magic crystal cards. Even selling him wouldn't be enough to repay it."

"He was probably too busy with work, so he made a mistake. Some time ago, his wizard mentor took away his advancement potion. He was depressed for a while, and the work error should have occurred during that time."

Wizard Sphendis said coldly, "Commoner wizards haven't seen much money, so when they suddenly see such a large sum, it's normal for them to have crooked thoughts."

"I'm not here deliberately looking for trouble. I deeply respect Wizard Locke Augustine and recognize the leadership you and the young miss provide for our family."

"But I believe Wizard Augustine thinks too well of those commoner wizards. This time I discovered evidence of their embezzlement. How much more is there that I haven't discovered? When I return, I will thoroughly investigate all previous bills!"

Witch Barbara turned, "You..."

She felt somewhat powerless. During this period, the family wizards in the Plutarch family and within the White Dragon Tower seemed to have been stimulated, frequently targeting the commoner wizards in their research group.

The Land of Six Towers' hostility toward commoner wizards had reached an unbelievable level.

They could accept how outstanding outside commoner wizards were, even ruling here, but they absolutely could not accept commoner wizards from within the Land of Six Towers being excellent.

Locke thought for a moment, "Leopold is currently in his dormitory. Let's go find him. Witch Barbara, you go check the internal bills of our research group. If it's just a misunderstanding, return the excess money to the finance office."

Witch Barbara hurriedly said, "Yes."