Chapter 838: The Connection Between Wild Surge and Special Virtual Roots!

"Hmm? Is one dose of the Zero Potion not enough?"

Locke was mildly surprised. He directly used the Lunar Cultivation Method to inject a second dose of moonlight essence, while the silver and gold enchanted blades continued orbiting the magical plant, making fine adjustments to its atavistic factors.

As the second dose of the Zero Potion entered the magical plant, Locke could sense a blank spirituality automatically filling in the gaps in its phytogen, like a cracked porcelain bowl being patched with another material, ensuring the magical plant could survive.

But as time passed, even two doses of the Zero Potion proved unable to sustain the plant, and Locke had no choice but to frown and add a third dose.

At the same time, he sensed something, extracted a virtual root from the Golden Peach Tree, and used the grafting cultivation method to graft it onto this unknown magical plant.

A primal and ancient aura, as if from a vast and untamed wilderness, rose up.

Locke even noticed that the virtual root grafted onto this unknown magical plant was undergoing a peculiar change, seeming to transform into some kind of special virtual root.

Despite three doses of the Zero Potion having been injected, the enormous energy required to trigger the mutation of the virtual root, along with the corresponding phytogen depletion it caused, meant that three doses were still not enough.

Locke was somewhat astonished at this. Ordinarily, evolving a Second Circle magical plant required only one dose of the Zero Potion, yet this Second Circle magical plant was consuming so many doses.

This indicated that the climbing fern's ancestor was extraordinarily remarkable, not only being a Second Circle magical plant but one that was highly exceptional at that.

Locke had a total of eight doses of the Zero Potion on hand. Five of those were respectively allocated to a pair of Great Blood Wave Bromeliad wizard shoes, one Second Circle climbing fern, and one Large Glazed Winter Green Plum. One dose had been used on the Super Jaeger Dream Blossom.

The remaining half dose was needed to sustain the treemen within his Forest Sanctuary. Once withdrawn, his ecological community would collapse by more than half, so that one could not be touched.

At that moment, in order to demonstrate atavistic evolution before two star ring and moon ring wizards from Little Repose Mountain, he thought it over and realized the only ones he could actually tap were the two Great Blood Wave Bromeliad wizard shoes.

Because of the Super Jaeger Dream Blossom, he only needed one Great Blood Wave Bromeliad at the level between Second Circle and First Circle, and by using the approach-grafting method to graft it onto a Shadow Fern, it would barely serve as a substitute for a pair of Second Circle wizard shoes.

So he had already used the cultivation method to obtain large quantities of viable seeds from these two magical plants through downgrade breeding.

This had consumed a certain amount of resources.

As a result, whether or not these two Second Circle magical plant wizard shoes remained was not much of a problem.

Locke directly extracted two doses of the Zero Potion from them and injected them into the unknown magical plant. Before the three of them, the magical plant gave off an ancient and primal aura.

Locke watched as the virtual root clearly transformed into a special variety. It became covered in scales, resembling the scales of a great dragon, and together with the aerial roots of this fern-type magical plant, they formed a pair of dragon claws.

Two virtual roots became one claw of the dragon claws, and six aerial roots formed the remaining three claws of the two dragon claws.

At the same time, the magical plant as a whole resembled an elongated divine dragon. The leafless climbing stems of the fern type became extraordinarily thick, and two tendrils appeared at the tip, like dragon horns, with fern leaves only on the tendrils.

The overall form was like a pale green divine dragon, with the plant roots as dragon claws, the leafless climbing stems of the naked fern as the dragon's body, and the tendril leaves as dragon horns.

What made all three of them take notice was that the special virtual roots of this magical plant, upon piercing into the imaginary sea, actually drew out from it a faint but unmistakably present energy.

Locke felt a jolt of alertness, because he had sensed this strange energy before.

This was not his first encounter with it.

He had first seen it in the Forbidden Forest, watching the treeman fight Gakula. The treeman had possessed that special form of energy.

Later, through his archaeology spell, he had summoned it using that special energy and simulated it with a negative energy particle field, but it had never really counted as truly possessing that strange energy.

Even so, he had managed to use this power to stump a large group of Second Circle wizard breeders from the Rose Academy.

And now, he had finally learned how this energy came about.

The Wild Surge energy was actually a special kind of Spirit Breath.

Locke understood in an instant what had happened.

'I used atavistic evolution and inadvertently obtained an ancient magical plant. This plant is a naked fern, an extremely ancient type of magical plant, generally encountered only as specimens in botanical studies, or in the early stages of a forming colonial world's soil.'

"I had once considered developing ancient magical plants, and who would have thought that in the course of forging a Grand Magic, I have now actually managed to revive an ancient plant. Of course, this magical plant is likely not a true ancient magical plant, only a plant into which I have revived certain key plant factors of an ancient magical plant."

"But this means that if I can use an archaeology model to reconstruct the prototype of ancient plants, combined with my atavistic evolution cultivation method, I can further improve the precision of atavistic evolution."

"Atavistic evolution is not exactly a niche research direction, but it is also not one that many people pursue."

Locke had come to understand what the strange Wild Surge energy actually was.

It turned out to be a special virtual root combined with fishing from the imaginary sea, which produced the strange energy.

With that in mind, the Forbidden Forest likely harbored many special virtual roots.

And the Edge of the World wizard territory probably also had many special virtual roots, since it was also famous for possessing numerous strange energies.

Locke's expression became thoughtful.

'I had previously wanted to look up information on these strange energies but could never find anything. Yet now, unexpectedly, I have found the answer myself.'

At that moment, although Locke was deeply shaken inwardly, his expression remained as calm as still water, as though everything that had happened was completely within his control.

Moreover, the atavistic reversal of the climbing fern this time had actually not been thorough.

If he were given enough resources and set up a proper project, he should be able to make the atavistic evolution considerably more complete.

'Teacher Sophia, I am truly grateful. The project you gave me has really proved to be an invaluable weapon.'

Locke finally understood why Witch Sophia had advanced so quickly.

The single project she had specifically given him had already brought him such enormous benefit.

He did not even know yet what innovations he could produce with atavistic evolution in the future.

Even though it required spending considerable resources.

Thinking it over carefully, back when Witch Sophia had given him the secondary verdant potion formula, it had opened up a great deal of insight for him in potion studies.

A teacher's brilliant thinking could often open up a whole new landscape and bring a cascade of subsequent benefits.

At that moment, Wizard Maupassant looked at the atavistically evolved climbing fern.

"I have only ever seen specimens before, but this truly does resemble the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern closely. All currently known naked ferns exist only as specimens."

Locke looked at Wizard Maupassant in surprise and said, "Are there none in colonial worlds? Early forming colonial worlds should have some, should they not?"

Wizard Maupassant smiled at Locke. At this point, in his eyes, Locke was a thoroughly and completely brilliant breeder.

Hearing is one thing, seeing is believing.

Wizard Maupassant said, "Naked ferns have so far only appeared in the wizard world. Naked fern-type magical plants once created many unique energies and substances for the wizard world. But later, as times changed and the environment shifted, naked ferns went collectively extinct. Only specimens can be found now."

"Complete specimens of naked ferns are rather rare. Only some scattered and fragmentary specimens exist."

Wizard Maupassant said, "This should be the legendary Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern. Who would have thought that such an ordinary magical plant as the climbing fern could carry the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern. Wait, there were indeed people who suspected that the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern was a type of golden magic magical plant. If that is the case, then the ancient climbing fern could very well have an evolutionary relationship with the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern."

"Why did I never think of this when I was young?"

"Congratulations, Locke. You have practically produced enough material to publish another Second Circle Tier 2 journal paper."

"Only the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern is not as significant as the Golden Spike Wheat, so Tier 1 would be difficult to reach."

Locke looked at Wizard Maupassant in surprise and then suddenly realized that Wizard Maupassant was communicating with him through a video call, limited to visual observation only, with no other means of perception available. So he had not detected the presence of the strange energy.

If he had, he would not have thought this accidental discovery could only reach Tier 2.

This accidental, as-if-stumbled-upon discovery was actually more likely to reach Second Circle Tier 1 than the Golden Spike Wheat itself.

Because the Wild Surge energy had been discovered, and its origin had been found.

The Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern had of course created many unique energies for the wizard world, such as this special Spirit Breath fished out from the imaginary sea, which was the Wild Surge.

Wait.

Locke thought: once upon a time, naked ferns had been everywhere throughout the wizard world. If the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern had existed in great numbers back then, could that not suggest that the Wild Surge had once permeated the entire wizard world like air?

But the Wild Surge disrupted the stability of spell models. Did that not mean the wizard world of that time was entirely unsuitable for the development of magical civilization, or indeed any effective civilization at all?

What kind of world would that blanket of Wild Surge covering the entire world have created?

Locke did not stop at what was before him at that moment, but instead continued to think more deeply, beginning to hypothesize: if the entire world were filled with the Wild Surge, what would happen?

'Precise, transmissible energy systems would have been destroyed in an ancient era permeated by Wild Surge energy, making them impossible to invent. But Wild Surge could enhance the power of individuals. So would there have been a great many super-individuals who relied entirely on their own strength?'

'These super-individuals would have enhanced their own power through instinct alone, but would have been unable to pass it on or exchange it with one another. The entire world would have existed in an ancient and primordial age.'

Locke imagined that era. Following the wizard world's naming conventions, it seemed that era could be called the Ancient Age.

Did such an Ancient Age actually exist?

But all of this was premised on the assumption that the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern, or similar magical plants, had once existed in great numbers throughout the wizard world.

In reality, the surviving specimens of naked ferns were few in number, for reasons that remained unclear.

The widely accepted view in the wizard world was not that naked ferns had ever existed in small numbers, but rather that for some reason, a wizard civilization of some past era had once developed large quantities of the fossil energy converted from naked fern fossils, thereby destroying a considerable number of naked fern specimens.

This had left modern-era wizards unable to study them.

Of course, since the current Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern was not a true ancient Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern from the past, but merely a variant of a climbing fern he had revived through atavistic evolution, Locke could not be certain whether the true Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern of the past had possessed the special power of fishing from the imaginary sea to draw out the strange energy known as Wild Surge.

All of this could also simply be a new ability that emerged through the climbing fern's atavistic evolutionary mutation.

Wizard Maupassant examined the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern.

"No question about it. The form like a dragon of rock-beard moss, elegant and dignified, leafless climbing rock stems no longer seen in modern magical plants, these aerial false roots, and these virtual roots covered in scales. This looks like a type of early virtual root, does it not?"

"Good heavens, this really is an ancient plant."

"Hmm? No, I should say it is a modern magical plant with the aesthetic of an ancient plant."

Locke gave a slight nod.

Because this was only the atavistic evolution of a climbing fern, not a direct transformation of the climbing fern into a true Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern.

So this was still in fact a modern magical plant, because naked ferns have no true roots, whereas this mutated climbing fern did.

Wizard Maupassant's eyes glimmered. He had not expected that Locke had not merely performed atavistic regression on the Golden Foxtail Grass, but had established an entire complete and systematic atavistic evolution mechanism.

Right before his eyes, Locke had directly performed atavistic regression on a climbing fern to produce its direct ancestor, proving the evolutionary relationship between the climbing fern and the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern.

He thought of even more implications. A Locke with such abilities could simply spend his time proving the evolutionary relationships between various magical plants and early magical plants and publish Tier 2 papers until his hands went numb.

Wizard Maupassant sighed inwardly.

How had Golden Crown Mountain come to possess such talent, while his Little Repose Mountain had no Second Circle wizard of this caliber?

Golden Crown Mountain overflowed with talent. The breeder Zeno alone was not enough for them, and now, at the ordinary Second Circle wizard stage, a Locke Augustine had appeared as well.

Was every advantage in the world going to be taken by Golden Crown Mountain?

However, Wizard Maupassant's mood brightened quickly.

Not every advantage had gone to Golden Crown Mountain after all.

Because Locke was going to participate in the Small Breath Cup.

He had to bind Locke to the Small Breath Cup's cause immediately.

Wizard Maupassant looked at Locke and, under Wizard Nycrus's astonished gaze, said, "Very well. We will designate your Golden Spike Wheat as the champion of the Fifth Small Breath Cup in advance. As the champion reward, you will receive one right to soak in the Spring of Vitality, or you may exchange it for the life Spirit Breath corresponding to one soaking session."

"The choice is entirely yours, Locke."

"Our dear champion of the Fifth Small Breath Cup."

Wizard Nycrus blinked, because Wizard Maupassant had told him earlier that they could not break the Small Breath Cup's rules for the sake of any individual genius, lest it make Little Repose Mountain look to outsiders like a place with no integrity, handing out awards the moment they spotted a talented person.

Yet now, Director Maupassant had directly agreed to award Locke the Small Breath Cup championship half a year in advance.

He blinked again and looked with renewed surprise at the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern.

Locke performing atavistic evolution on a second magical plant before their eyes was remarkable enough.

It seemed the director was betting that Locke would, very soon at the ordinary Second Circle wizard stage, rise to fame just as he had at the crystallization wizard stage.

Locke said to Director Maupassant, "Thank you for your accommodation, Director Maupassant."

Wizard Maupassant broke into a pleased smile.

"So, what would you like?"

Locke said, "I would like the life Spirit Breath."

Director Maupassant said, "Of course. I will have the life Spirit Breath delivered to you as soon as possible. Keep in mind it is an exceptionally high-grade Spirit Breath. Take great care to store it safely, and try not to let others see it. Life Spirit Breath holds a fatally irresistible appeal for every breeder."

"Do not show your wealth."

Locke nodded.

He recalled that life Spirit Breath was one of the finest cultivation resources for the Ancient Life Tree.

That was why he had asked for the life Spirit Breath.

He had heard that the soaking effect of the Spring of Vitality was simply to heal all of a wizard's hidden wounds completely, but he had no need for that at the moment.

Of course, for many wizards who did have such needs, it was indeed a deeply coveted effect.

Wizard Maupassant said to Locke, "Then please submit your project entry application as soon as possible. We will approve it immediately and publicly announce the award results, and present you with the medal and prize. Additionally, our competition does not prohibit entry projects from being published in journals, so you may go ahead and write the relevant papers and submit them to journals."

"Locke, our champion of the Fifth Small Breath Cup, today's exchange with you has been a great pleasure."

Locke gave this moon ring wizard a bow, and at the same time nodded to Wizard Nycrus. Then Wizard Maupassant and Wizard Nycrus exchanged a brief farewell with Locke, and the video call was ended.

Locke looked at the mutated climbing fern before him, and only now did the composed expression on his face fade, replaced by surprise.

"Who would have thought that the climbing fern once had a prosperous ancestry, and was actually a Second Circle magical plant."

"A naked fern."

"My deepest respects."

Locke noticed that the edges of the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern's leaves were beginning to curl, and the edges of the roots were faintly turning black.

"Can the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern not survive in this era?"

"But this is not a true Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern."

Locke observed the planar force and found that certain special planar forces were damaging the magical plant, though these planar forces were so chaotic and varied that he could not immediately identify which specific ones they were.

However, the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern itself, by drawing Wild Surge Spirit Breath through its special dragon-scale virtual roots and coating itself with it, appeared able to block those special planar forces.

Locke thought, "It is probably not a single special planar force damaging the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern, but a combination of multiple planar forces acting together. Simply put, the wizard world does not want this type of fern to reappear on a large scale in the wizard world again. So this magical plant currently cannot exist or reproduce in the wild on a large scale outside a laboratory."

Too many of these magical plants would easily cause Wild Surge energy to pervade the wizard world once again.

And the wizard world clearly had no need for that anymore.

Like a fickle person who once cherished naked ferns as a beloved magical plant, the wizard world had now discarded them like worn-out shoes.

The influence of Spirit Breath on the world was even more powerful than he had imagined.

The discovery he had stumbled upon today had allowed him to perceive that Spirit Breath had once influenced the world's evolution and development, and continued to do so even now.

No wonder breeders could find their path in Second Circle breeding studies through the study of Spirit Breath.

Locke tidied up the entire laboratory. The negotiation with Little Repose Mountain had been a complete success, and he had essentially already secured the Small Breath Cup championship.

And he had unexpectedly made a new discovery on top of that.

He placed the Mountain-Crossing Dragon Naked Fern inside his half-plane and found that the plant was fine there, no longer showing signs of gradual withering.

This meant the half-plane did not contain the planar forces that caused naked ferns to go extinct en masse.

He then tidied up and contacted Witch Mason, asking her to come handle the aftermath.

Witch Mason said to Locke, "Locke, Team Leader. The Blood Dragon Assembly's social club is extending a special invitation for you to visit. We are blood dragon wizards, and you are also Teacher Yekaterina's most trusted student, as well as a Golden Crown Mountain genius. The club holds your visit in high regard."

"The time is the day after tomorrow, and the location is..."

Locke nodded and said, "Understood."

"By the way, Mason, do you know where Douglas is right now? I have something to look into with him lately."

Witch Mason gave a strange expression. She could not understand why Locke would want to look for such a minor crystallization wizard.

She shrugged at Locke and said, "I am not sure either, Team Leader."

"That person was constantly asking me about you for a while. But you were so busy that I just gave him vague answers. After that, he went off to curry favor with another wizard."

Locke asked, puzzled, "Who?"

Witch Mason said, "I think it was someone called Wizard Brandy."

Locke furrowed his brow.

What was Douglas doing messing around with Wizard Brandy for no reason?

Was that someone he could afford to mess with?

That fellow was deeply devious.

Last time, Locke had only met him once privately, and yet the man had already been spreading rumors everywhere that Locke had no ideas, to the point that even Antoine was half-convinced.

Locke said to Witch Mason, "Mason, do me a favor. Go to Group Three and call Douglas back."

He had been entrusted by his teacher to monitor this fellow and investigate the identity of the ancient soul on him.

And Locke thought of an even worse scenario.

'That fellow Brandy would not do anything without a benefit in it for him. Under normal circumstances, Douglas should not have been able to ingratiate himself with Brandy. So for Brandy to keep Douglas by his side, there is only one possible explanation.'

'This fellow has also noticed the anomaly on Douglas. That is entirely normal, since he is a Second Circle wizard. He can directly observe planar force with the naked eye. Douglas is just an ordinary First Circle wizard with no real insight. Even with the help of an ancient soul, he would likely be seen through at a glance.'

High-circle wizards had an absolute edge over low-circle wizards in terms of perspective, not only in experience, knowledge, and intelligence, but also in their means of perceiving the world.

Second Circle wizards could directly observe planar force with the naked eye.

It would be easy to detect the ancient soul on him through anomalies in the planar force.

Locke's expression shifted slightly, because given Wizard Brandy's temperament, he very likely had some scheme in mind for Douglas. And his teacher had asked him to investigate the identity of that ancient soul without revealing himself.

If Wizard Brandy acted without restraint and killed the ancient soul, or caused it to leap out and escape, that would be a serious problem.

Locke said, "Never mind, I will go to Group Three myself."