Chapter 818: The Small Breath Cup, the Golden Cup, and a Trap

Wizard Trajan weighed his words and said, "You need to comprehensively consider the prestige of these competitions and their timing. If the holding date is too far off, then even participating would hold little significance for you."

"Because what you need right now is to obtain resources as quickly as possible."

"To properly set you on the path of a Second Circle wizard entering the Second Circle world. What you need right now is resources. Only with resources can you more quickly obtain a special-grade grant, complete the sub-plan of the key individual item, and successfully conclude your station."

"Time is life. You are working hard, and your rivals are also working hard, perhaps even harder than you. Because right now you can only work forty-eight hours a day, but your rivals may have already used special treasures to work seventy-two hours a day."

"And they have been working hard for many more years than you."

Wizard Trajan said, "Your rivals are all Second Circle wizards of the Origin Academy within the past five years, seven in total."

Locke was taken aback. That many?

It made sense though. Golden Crown Mountain probably produced about two senior researchers per year.

But Golden Crown Mountain's Origin Academy had dozens of ordinary researchers join each year, and any of them could become a Second Circle wizard over the course of their career in the Origin Academy.

Wizard Trajan said, "I have already sent you the information."

Wizard Trajan said, "Taking all of the above into consideration, I believe you can submit this project to the breeding studies section of the Small Breath Cup, which is hosted by Small Breath Mountain."

"Although Small Breath Mountain is only ranked second in the Quinn Jol region, its actual level has very likely already reached the level of Storm Tower, or possibly slightly exceeded it. Because Small Breath Mountain is very close to Quinn Jol and has placed considerable pressure on Quinn Jol. The Small Breath Cup is a competition trophy that Small Breath Mountain heavily promotes, and they currently have a very strong need for excellent projects to compete."

Wizard Trajan said, "The Small Breath Cup is a comprehensive competition with multiple events, but the one with the most prestige is the breeding studies section. Given the quality of the project your apprentice-stage teacher sent you, taking the Small Breath Cup honor would be like reaching into a bag to retrieve something."

"And if you enter this project in the Small Breath Cup, I can also help you request some grant funding. The chairman of the Small Breath Cup events committee is a friend of mine. I can have the Small Breath Cup events committee office staff provide you with some magic stones to complete the follow-up work on the project you currently have in hand."

"Apart from that, among the wizard-territory-level Second Circle competitions being held recently, the one most worth entering is probably the Golden Cup of the Twilight Border."

"Oh, and there is also the Crawler's Cup being held in the Rain Marsh Swamplands recently. The Crawler's Cup is primarily about using Second Circle magical plants to control magical creatures. Magical plant development projects that are not in that direction would essentially default to losing even if entered."

Locke nodded and asked, "One question, Senior Trajan. For these Second Circle-level competitions, if I win an award, can I receive a Tourmaline King Peach as a reward?"

Wizard Trajan said, "Of course. And the academy has special additional rewards for the advanced Origin Academy. Beyond receiving the fixed Tourmaline King Peach reward, you can also choose one of the six varieties of magical peach from Golden Crown Mountain's Twelve Peaches, including the Golden Cloud Peach."

"In essence, the academy naturally hopes you will participate in more competitions and win championships. This has considerable benefits for the academy. Only it is extremely difficult."

Wizard Trajan sighed, "When I was at the ordinary Second Circle stage, I also dreamed of quickly accumulating a large number of competition championships. But every competition has many Second Circle wizards participating. Every Second Circle wizard was once a genius at the First Circle stage."

"So when I was at your stage, I could only reluctantly abandon that idea."

"Later I found a better approach. Becoming a plant hunter, entering the void to explore valuable magical plants. Using that method, one can also complete Second Circle-level projects in an alternative way."

On the magical carriage, Locke's tiger's eye opened automatically and looked behind Trajan. "Senior, there appears to be something behind you."

Wizard Trajan's expression was calm. "I know."

Something in the darkness seemed to be wailing, then stumbled and staggered, retreating step by step until it disappeared into the darkness.

Wizard Trajan said, "The Dark Great World is very dangerous."

"Plant hunting is not an easy business either. What competitions are you thinking of entering?"

Locke thought for a moment and said, "Senior, I want to grind several Second Circle-level projects to obtain the academy's rewards. Applying for grants is competitive, but in these competitions I have a great advantage. I want to participate in more of these Second Circle-level competitions."

Locke's thinking was very clear. The vertical Second Circle grant projects were in essence all basic research.

This kind of basic research had high prestige, was difficult to develop, and might not have much commercial value.

But the various competitions were different. Many of these competitions were not asking for deeper exploration of some fundamental research topic.

They were asking for the development of some kind of powerful magical plant.

And for this reason, his shared virtual root system and the developed wizard shoes could be entered in such competitions.

It was simply that the currently relevant wizard shoe competitions in the Cloud Marsh Wetlands were hosted by Solas Light Foot and Melechi Magic Step themselves, and there was no point in walking into that on his own. That was why he had not planned to use wizard shoes and the shared virtual root system for competition.

But if he went and entered competitions, he could use the Synthesis Cube and his Grand Magic system to quickly develop various powerful magical plants.

Not just magical plant competitions. Potion competitions were also something he could enter.

Locke said to Wizard Trajan, "Other than the Crawler's Cup, senior, I would like to enter all of the competitions."

Wizard Trajan was visibly taken aback.

"All of them?"

"It seems your ambitions are grand."

"Well, as long as your energy is sufficient, you can enter as many competitions as you like. Only that each competition requires paying an entry fee and undergoing qualification review, and some competitions require you to possess a Second Circle breeder certificate. The three competitions I just recommended to you do not require it. About half of the ordinary Second Circle competitions require a certificate, while the higher-level Second Circle competitions essentially all require a Second Circle breeder certificate."

Wizard Trajan said, "I have just contacted the Small Breath Cup events committee, and they have sent you a friend request on the water hyacinth system."

"The Small Breath Cup events committee office holds your project in very high regard. They are therefore willing to provide five million magic stones to sponsor you in completing the follow-up work, on the condition that you must use this project to enter the Small Breath Cup."

Locke was sitting on the magical carriage and was stunned for a moment, because he had not expected that one message from his senior would instantly bring him a sponsorship of five million magic stones.

He needed money badly right now.

Since all his money was tied up in production capital, he was indeed short of funds for developing other projects.

'Senior is truly extraordinary. A small move on his part and he can bring me a sponsorship.'

Locke opened the water hyacinth system and saw a star ring wizard requesting to add him as a friend, and also saw the detailed participation requirements for the Golden Cup that Wizard Trajan had sent him.

The Golden Cup had First Circle and Second Circle competition sections, and the two sections each had different events. For instance, the Second Circle section had three events, the Golden Cup Flying Breeding Magical Plant Competition, the Golden Cup Golden Magical Plant Breeding Competition, and the Golden Cup Golden Magical Spell Model Competition.

In principle, a wizard could only enter one of the events within the Golden Cup at a time, and one project could not be submitted to multiple events.

And Locke's target was the Flying Breeding Magical Plant Competition under the Golden Cup.

This was mainly because he actually had a raw material in hand that could be developed into a Second Circle flying magical plant, and that was the Magical Dragon Rose.

The Magical Dragon Rose as it currently stood was in essence a wild Second Circle magical plant, uncultivated and undeveloped.

And the companion that had been with him the longest was the Large Green Leaf Dragon Sparrow. Locke had long planned to combine the Magical Dragon Rose with the Large Green Leaf Dragon Sparrow to develop a Second Circle flying magical plant more suited to himself.

One that was also more powerful.

So his gaze was instantly fixed on the Flying Magical Plant Competition under the Golden Cup.

Wizard Trajan said, "Winning the championship brings a Tourmaline King Peach, and the top three finishes earn corresponding rewards from the academy."

Locke asked, "Senior, I wonder if you could ask the Golden Cup's events committee for some participation grant funding on my behalf."

Wizard Trajan smiled ruefully. "Junior, that is a bit of wishful thinking. The reason I could get you grant funding from the Small Breath Cup is because of the quality of your project itself, as well as my deep personal connections with that office's wizard."

"But I have no connections with the Golden Cup events committee office."

Locke had no choice but to drop the matter.

Wizard Trajan suddenly said, "Locke, there is also something I actually need your help with."

Locke said, "Senior, go ahead."

"If I can be of any help, I will certainly help you."

Wizard Trajan said, "It will not be very troublesome. Only I need to enter the Dark King's chambers once more. There is something I need to confirm, which is whether this Dark King is the sole ruler of this great world. But for certain reasons, I cannot let the Dark King know my name. Once the Dark King learns my name, I will be unable to leave the Dark Great World for all eternity, and my name will fall into his hands."

"So I need you to act as my name keeper. I now need to place my name into your hands, and I need to perform a secrecy ritual using the power of the Black Hole Wizard Peach."

"You will be the keeper of my name. I will entrust my name to you for safekeeping. My name will be stored within the Black Hole Wizard Peach, but if I were to place the name directly into the Black Hole Wizard Peach myself, I would never be able to retrieve it again. My name would be permanently sealed within the Black Hole Wizard Peach like magical garbage. So I need a keeper who can retrieve the name when I have need of it."

"Would that be all right?"

On the magical carriage, Locke thought for a moment.

"If that is the case, would that Dark King come looking for me to demand the name?"

Wizard Trajan said, "I will do my best to avoid any contact with him."

"He should not find you. But even if he did, because of the void distance between you, he is a sun ring-level existence and cannot do anything to a Second Circle wizard like you."

"I had originally intended to find someone else, but you happened to contact me at this moment, so I thought I would ask you for help."

Locke smiled. "Of course. I am not afraid of any Dark King. I am only afraid of getting in the way of your affairs, senior."

"Senior, you can entrust your name to me for safekeeping."

Wizard Trajan said, "Raise your right hand."

"And recite this incantation."

Locke dutifully recited the incantation. Then on the inside of his right wrist, a rune pattern resembling a black peach appeared.

The sound of Trajan's and Locke's incantations rang out simultaneously. The power of the two incantations overlapped, the spell energy summoned the Black Hole Wizard Peach, and then the magical peach rune pattern on Locke's wrist dissolved as though soaked in water.

Black ink dripped from Locke's wrist, and then beneath the feet of both Locke and Wizard Trajan, a small black hole appeared.

Wizard Trajan recited a spell, removed his name from his own soul, and placed it into the small black hole.

Wizard Trajan said to Locke, "From this moment I am going to seal the Black Hole Wizard Peach. You are the only person who can retrieve my name from within it. Take note, once I seal the Black Hole Wizard Peach, you must never speak my name aloud. The moment you say it once, my name will emerge from the black hole and return to my hands."

Locke gave a slight nod.

'Senior Trajan is already this powerful, and yet he is still so wary of that Dark King.'

At this point, Wizard Trajan recited the incantation again, and the black hole beneath the two of them slowly closed.

In the instant the black hole fully closed, Locke forgot Wizard Trajan's name.

But very quickly, Locke recalled Wizard Trajan's name.

Wizard Trajan smiled. "I trust you to take care of things. Locke, guard my name well."

The next moment, he closed the video call.

Locke looked at the magical peach pattern on his right wrist.

"In this way, I am now senior's name keeper. I must be careful not to mention his name. I also forgot to ask just now, apart from not saying his name aloud, whether it also cannot be written in text. Never mind, I will simply treat it as meaning I cannot refer to his name at all."

Locke could sense the trust Wizard Trajan had in him.

As the name keeper, it could be said that he now fully held Trajan's name in his hands. Should he die, Trajan's name would be permanently lost within the Black Hole Wizard Peach.

Though he did not know what happened to a person who lost their own name.

And should he say Trajan's name at a critical moment, that name could be seized by the Dark King.

So this role of name keeper was something that could only be entrusted to someone one could trust absolutely.

Locke checked the pre-sale on the Arthas side and found that the pre-sale transactions were rising quickly. Twenty-five pairs had already sold.

"Hmm? What is happening? It is this popular?"

Locke was a little taken aback, because this was the Augustus Wizard Shoe Store Alliance's first Second Circle wizard shoe. He had originally expected the sales to be modest, but they were already nearly approaching the limit of his pre-sale allocation.

If things continued this way, he could only truly take out a bank loan and try to raise the first batch of shoe sales to a hundred pairs.

In terms of the Second Circle wizard supply market, a hundred was already quite a high number.

Since this was his first Second Circle wizard shoe and his level was still limited, he had not set the price too high. Each pair of shoes would only earn him five hundred thousand magic stones, and after splitting the revenue with the platform, he would only net two hundred and fifty thousand per pair.

But the reason Locke had priced things this way was, first, that his only current advantage was a low price.

Second, there was no need to price the basic model too high.

Subsequent upgrade models could be priced higher.

And by going through Arthas's production line, he only needed to provide the seeds to Arthas.

"Although I do not control the production line, and there may be some issues down the road, those are problems that only arise once the business has grown."

Locke thought, "I can persist in the light-asset approach and build my wizard shoe store alliance into a brand."

"The production line can use Arthas's for now."

At least until he became a Third Circle wizard, Arthas would always be his friend.

Locke went on the water hyacinth system and began looking for wizards to contact, booking an appointment with the five major banks for the loan process.

At the same time, he also noticed that the Cloud Marsh Council's vote had concluded.

The White Wizard Association of the Cloud Marsh Council had maintained the tax exemption for First Circle wizards.

"Hmm? The Cloud Marsh Council has started pressing me for taxes."

Locke realized that he had been putting it off for a long time and had yet to pay his taxes.

In essence, he still owed the White Wizard Association three million magic stones in taxes.

On the water hyacinth system, the White Wizard Association's official account sent him a message.

'Wizard Locke Augustine, the following are void exploration tasks suitable for you. If you do not wish to pay taxes this year, you may accept any one of the following void exploration tasks.'

Locke scanned the list and found the tasks were mostly exploration missions to mid-scale or mid-to-large-scale worlds, with a small number being planar conquest tasks.

For example, in the Saxon Purgatory World, a demon grand duke who had pledged allegiance to the wizard world had recently issued a declaration of resistance against the White Wizard Association and refused to accept the association's rule.

Second Circle wizards were being recruited to go and fight. Participation would waive this year's tax.

Locke frowned.

"Doing these tasks to waive three million in taxes is not a bad deal in itself. But for an individual Second Circle wizard, it is an enormous waste of time. One trip could burn through an entire year."

"For me right now, the time cost and opportunity cost far exceed the financial cost. There is obviously no way I would go on a void exploration task to waive the White Wizard Association's taxes."

Locke closed the water hyacinth system and at the same time noticed that the pre-sale quota of thirty pairs of Great Blood Wave Bromeliad wizard shoes he had opened was now completely sold out.

There were even messages asking him to sell more.

Locke looked at these messages and frowned, because he had not expected his Second Circle wizard shoes to be this popular.

What had happened?

...

At Quinn Jol University, Wizard Edgar addressed the Second Circle wizards in his laboratory, "This time we are going to the Gardner Great World. It is a world where fire elements occupy thirty percent of the entire world. Even ordinary people of Gardner have extraordinarily powerful fire element affinity."

"The earth of Gardner, if stood on for too long, will cause our shoes to spontaneously combust. So we need a decent pair of wizard shoes."

A star ring wizard standing before him nodded. "Indeed."

"If one enters Gardner's soil without wizard shoes, it will be impossible to take a single step. Never mind doing research. Just the time we would spend every day changing shoes and treating our own feet would be enough to leave us unable to do anything at all."

"However, wizard shoes in the Cloud Marsh Wetlands are very expensive. The cheapest Second Circle wizard shoes start at two to three million."

"The magic weaver association's surveillance of the wizard shoe secondary market is very strict and almost never allows prices to drop much, while quality drops severely."

Wizard Edgar said, "Then let us purchase these pure magical plant wizard shoes."

A flash of uncertain doubt crossed the star ring wizard's eyes.

"Pure magical plant wizard shoes? Augustus? That is a brand none of us have heard of."

"Will this be adequate?"

"The Gardner Great World is very dangerous. Even the mortality rate of sun ring wizards there is quite high. We cannot threaten our lives just to save money."

Inside the laboratory, an alarm sounded, and distress calls from Quinn Jol's wizards came through the sound transmission magical formation.

"A native group in Gardner is attacking our Number One Research Station in Gardner. We need reinforcements. Quinn Jol University, please dispatch support as soon as possible."

The star ring wizard's expression turned grim.

Wizard Edgar said, "It appears the situation is very urgent, and our laboratory's budget is also limited. Rather than spending a great deal on Solas Light Foot or Melechi shoes, or purchasing the even more expensive wizard battle armor, let us buy the shoes from this Augustus Wizard Shoe Store Alliance."

"The designer of this store alliance is a good friend of mine."

Wizard Edgar paid no attention to the questioning look from the team leader before him and said straightforwardly, "He is a powerful friend. I have absolute confidence in his level. Those of you who will not wear them, I will wear. Myself."

The star ring wizard's expression softened. He knew Edgar's character. Anyone who could earn Edgar's endorsement had quality assured.

"No, I trust your judgment. Edgar, then let us purchase his wizard shoes. The estimate is thirty pairs needed."

Wizard Edgar was startled.

"Thirty pairs, that is thirty million magic stones."

"Are we sending that many people?"

The star ring wizard nodded.

"The Gardner Great World is a large-scale world. Were it not for the development of wizard shoe and wizard battle armor technology, we would have great difficulty conducting operations in the Gardner Great World. It is not that Gardner Great World's power is very strong, but that the world's environment is very special. One must have wizard shoes or wizard battle armor for protection in order to walk normally on its surface."

"It was Quinn Jol, the Rose Council, Golden Crown Mountain, and Storm Tower that jointly invaded the Gardner Great World for us to be able to enter it. Inside the Gardner Great World there are large numbers of native groups still existing in primitive societies. They have very strong development potential."

Wizard Edgar was somewhat surprised.

"Even at the primitive society stage they are that powerful?"

The star ring wizard said, "Mainly it is a matter of distance. The Gardner World is very far from the wizard world and the power we can project there is limited. And a primitive society is only a stage of civilization's development, but it does not mean there are no powerful beings at that stage."

"The Gardner World is a world with a great many false gods. Almost every native tribe has its own tribal deity. This time I am bringing you there, first because I want you to broaden your experience. Second, there is a tree god in Gardner, and our teacher wants me to bring you to see it. It may help with your All Things Return to the Tree."

"Oh right, Edgar, have you signed up for the Golden Cup? Are you entering the flying magical plant competition or the golden magical plant competition?"

Wizard Edgar said, "I have entered the Golden Magical Plant Competition under the Golden Cup. I am not skilled in flying magical plant competitions. And right now I need a great deal of resources, and I estimate that a certain person will be entering the Golden Cup's Flying Magical Plant Competition. So I specifically avoided that one."

The star ring wizard senior looked at him with an odd expression.

"How strange. You would actually specifically avoid someone. Who is that?"

...

In the Cloud Marsh Wetlands and Golden Crown Mountain region, the magical carriage Locke was riding suddenly came to a stop.

The vapor-phase wizard driving the magical carriage hesitated for a moment, then spoke toward the inside of the carriage, "Lord Locke, ahead there are several sick individuals who have suddenly blocked our path."

"They seem to have some kind of plague and are calling out for help. They want to invite us somewhere."

"Should we stop?"

Inside the carriage, Locke frowned, lifted the curtain of the carriage window, and looked outside.

Outside was a remote wilderness. This appeared to be the territory of a mundane empire.

One could say there were almost no wizards here.

And the several wizards blocking the road ahead were all first-class wizard apprentices.

Locke sneered. This was obviously a trap. He just did not know who was behind it.

Locke said, "Do not mind them. Drive straight ahead."