838: Completing the Ancestral Evolution Experiment, the golden ear wheat Fields Reappear!
At Golden Crown Mountain, Dragon Blood Market, Locke first rented a single room for each of the two men at a hotel in the Dragon Blood Market at a price of one hundred thousand magic stones per month. Since he only needed to pay for half a month, he spent a total of one hundred thousand magic stones.
It couldn't be helped; although there were rooms for ten thousand magic stones a month, the problem was that those houses were either shared with other wizards or were so small they were almost just a single room, lacking attached laboratories and other rooms for placing equipment.
Hussein and Old Pirate Henry were, after all, Second Ring Wizards. One was a genius lawyer, and the other was an old hand, a Poison Blade Wizard who had killed countless people.
Naturally, he couldn't be so stingy as to make them stay in that kind of room.
So, he chose a middle-of-the-road treatment for the two of them.
The two of them looked at the hotel in the Dragon Blood Market and seemed quite satisfied.
If nothing else, this living environment was certainly not bad.
The inheritance wizard formation of Golden Crown Mountain was constantly harvesting solar fire from the sky, transforming it into a special magic tide that descended. Doing experiments here was much better than at the foot of the mountain.
It could be said that every time Hussein came over, he felt that the magic tide in the air of Golden Crown Mountain alone was much stronger than in other regions.
If Locke hadn't provided documentation for the Old Pirate and asked the Demon Hunter Troops of Golden Crown Mountain to turn a blind eye, given his status, he would normally never have been able to set foot on Golden Crown Mountain in his life.
Therefore, Old Henry's eyes darted around; he wished Locke would invite him to stay here for a year.
Of course, this was actually impossible.
Because he was a void pirate, and void pirates would have no money if they didn't commit robberies; he had no concept of savings.
Locke looked at Old Henry and asked, "This should be the first time the Poison Blade Wizard has come to our Golden Crown Mountain, right? Are you used to living here? If you have any needs, you can tell me."
The Poison Blade Wizard Old Henry had been strong-willed all his life; he turned his head away, snorted, and said, "It's... it's alright."
"There are many alchemy shops on this street."
His eyes were shining.
It was his first time encountering so many shops opened by Alchemists of the White Wizard Society; it was truly a magnificent sight.
The shops at the Pirate Mothership port were practically half-robbery and half-selling; they acted as merchants when facing the strong, but turned directly into bandits when facing the weak.
So, it was his first time immersing himself in the logic of such a powerful commercial society within the White Wizard Society.
Locke looked at the two of them and said, "I've discussed it with the hotel owner. For the next few days, I will use this hotel room as an interview site to recruit about ten Official Wizards."
Henry thought for a moment. To explore an undeveloped medium-scale Plane, according to the level Locke had described to him earlier, ten One-Ring Wizards and three Second Ring Wizards were actually a bit too few.
There were enough Second Ring Wizards, but it would be more appropriate to double the number of One-Ring Wizards.
The current ten One-Ring Wizards could only be said to be barely enough.
Henry said, "Other things can be cut, but three candidates cannot be skimped on. The first is a Diviner; on our pirate ships, there are Alchemists who specifically refine divination-type Magic items and magic-eye types."
"There should be many Diviners in your White Wizard Society who have experience in void navigation. Diviners are necessary for void exploration and Plane exploration. Even when we lose our sense of direction in the void, they can often... save the lives of everyone on the ship!"
"The second candidate is a Potion Master, specifically one focused on healing. Oh, this one can be skipped."
Old Henry glanced at Locke.
He just remembered that Locke himself was an excellent Potion Master, though he didn't know if his level had reached the Second Ring.
"The third is an Alchemist who can repair a void battleship. But I can handle that; when I'm on a ship, repairing it is always my job."
Locke nodded.
Then he only needed to focus on recruiting one more wizard specialized in divination.
Locke thought of Witch Georgina.
But that wouldn't work. Witch Georgina was different from Hussein; Hussein owed him a huge favor, whereas if Witch Georgina came, he would have to share the profits with her.
The most reasonable thing was to interview an outstanding First Ring Crystallization Wizard and hire them via a contract.
In any case, with his strength, he could keep these One-Ring Wizards in check.
Locke said to the two of them, "If you two have any students you trust, you can bring them over as well."
The two didn't respond.
One was just a pirate, and the other didn't have anyone he truly trusted in the Mithril Law Firm.
Locke glanced over them; alright, it seemed there was no hope of relying on these two to help him pull people in.
He had originally hoped that the two Second Ring Great Wizards would bring their students along.
Locke then explained to them the information he currently knew about the Three Caves World.
After he finished, both were stunned.
A look of doubt appeared in Hussein's eyes.
"How can there be so many Second Ring-level existences in the Three Caves World? Gods? Are those giants living on the Ring Mountain really pseudo-gods?"
The Old Pirate said, "Even in an ordinary medium-to-large scale world, it's usually at this level. And exploring medium-to-large scale worlds carries a significant risk of death for Second Ring Wizards."
"The Endless Void is full of extremely vicious worlds."
Locke nodded.
"Currently, the void cube has only provided this much information. We'll have to wait until we get there to see."
"I hope we can recruit an excellent Diviner."
Hussein said, "It's best if we can recruit someone from Quinn Joel's. If Quinn Joel's won't do, then recruit from Little Breath Mountain. They are the best Diviner wizard universities in the Yunze Wetland."
"Whatever you do, don't look for a Diviner from a small wizard university. I don't want to encounter unnecessary danger during void navigation just to save money."
The Old Pirate said, "Don't worry, my ability to identify the direction of Astral Light is top-notch. As long as we don't encounter any special circumstances, there won't be any problems."
...
Half a month later.
Golden Crown Mountain, Dune Plane, in the tenth-floor underground laboratory of Group 2.
Locke looked at the thirty mu of golden foxtail grass in front of him. During this time, he had burned through over four million magic stones and used various equipment from Group 2; for anything Group 2 didn't have, he went outside to borrow it.
At this moment, Locke was wearing his sunlight magic mirror monocle, looking at a stalk of golden foxtail grass. He saw that this stalk of golden foxtail grass was being parasitized by a golden lamp vine. As a dodder-like Magic Plant, the golden lamp vine was no longer a self-sustaining plant.
Its chloroplasts were almost completely gone, its stem surface was bumpy with papillary organs, and it had differentiated into penetrating pillars. These thin stems would break through the epidermis of the parasitized Magic Plant, and then it would use specialized haustoria to dig beneath the epidermis of the parasitized Magic Plant and begin absorbing its nutrients.
In addition to the penetrating thin stems and haustoria, the golden lamp vine also had fruits that looked like small golden lamps.
Therefore, its appearance was actually quite pleasing to the eye.
Locke used the Moon of Evolution to reduce the Magic Plant's growth cycle and accelerate the experiment, and then went through continuous testing.
He repeatedly let the golden lamp vine parasitize the golden foxtail grass, constantly purchased seedlings and seeds of golden foxtail grass, and spent resources using the Moon of Evolution to accelerate its growth and maturation.
Without regard for resources, Locke found that most golden foxtail grass seeds would directly become unable to reproduce after being parasitized.
golden foxtail grass is a second ring magic plant, but before completing its development—that is, during the seedling stage—it is only at the level of a First Ring or even Apprentice-level Magic Plant's magic pressure.
During the seed stage, once parasitized, the golden lamp vine would directly suck it dry until it died.
However, the seedlings of golden foxtail grass had a chance to survive after being parasitized and would not wither away.
Under these circumstances, because the seedling of the golden foxtail grass was too small and its total magic pressure was too low, the golden lamp vine might unintentionally suck away the vast majority of its nutrients, and even absorb a portion of its plant essence.
"When parasitizing non-tree Magic Plants, the golden lamp vine will unintentionally absorb a portion of the other party's plant essence because the parasitized Magic Plant's volume is too small."
Locke noticed this scene. "What's more interesting is that the golden lamp vine is one of the few parasitic Magic Plants that actively finds ways to keep its host Magic Plant alive."
"Therefore, after the golden lamp vine takes half of the plant essence from its host, turning the host into a haploid, it actively gifts half of its own plant essence to the golden foxtail grass."
Locke finally understood what Wizard Russell meant.
Because after this relationship occurred, the golden foxtail grass before him clearly underwent Ancestral Evolution, showing some of the original Magic Plant traits of the golden ear wheat.
The golden ear wheat he had once seen in the Historical Reproduction Spell Model seemed to appear before him once again.
It couldn't be said to be exactly the same, but it was at least seventy percent similar.
Locke looked at the plant before him; its stem was like gold, and the edges of its three long, narrow leaves were as thin as cicada wings yet shone with brilliant golden light. When the wind blew gently, the leaves would resonate with a clear sound like chime bells.
It was as if the golden wheat fields that once covered the mountains and plains of the Hui Ming Borderland had come back to life.
Most striking of all were the awns hanging from the tips of the ears; they were not ordinary wheat awns, but three hundred and sixty slender solar golden needles. They automatically adjusted their direction according to the angle of the Sun Ring, absorbing sunlight and converting energy.
Locke thought to himself, "A golden lamp vine accidentally parasitized a green foxtail grass in its seedling stage, absorbing a full set of its plant essence and turning it into a haploid Magic Plant. Then, before the green foxtail grass could collapse because of it, the golden lamp vine shared a set of its own plant essence with it."
"Because the green foxtail grass lost a set of plant essence, the concentration of plant factors shaped by the special Necromancy Magic that caused its degradation naturally dropped by half. When the set of plant essence shared by the golden lamp vine combined with the set the green foxtail grass already possessed, it naturally allowed the green foxtail grass to recover more of its historical traits."
"Due to the miraculous power of nature, a single act of Magic Plant parasitism allowed the green foxtail grass to restart its evolutionary path, eventually becoming golden foxtail grass years later. The power of nature has surpassed the magic of those necromancers from thousands of years ago."
"According to Wizard Russell's ideas and my repeated experiments, this is likely why the golden foxtail grass was able to evolve again."
Locke knew what this represented.
"Now, under my repeated operations, this golden foxtail grass has once again shown ancestral characteristics."
"But in fact, I only need to optimize two steps to perform a perfect artificial Ancestral Evolution."
"Step one: use yellow robe mushroom toxin mixed in a 7:1 ratio, soaking the semi-mature golden foxtail grass seven times."
Locke didn't use a cauldron or direct soaking. Instead, he used the Fire Tree Silver Flower Spell. An enchanted blade appeared in his hand and absorbed the yellow robe mushroom toxin. Then, the Fire Tree Silver Flower enchanted blade flew toward the golden foxtail grass and injected it into the Magic Plant.
Next, he used powerful accelerated growth to speed up the golden foxtail grass's development. Then, when abnormal ancestral factors appeared in the plant, he used a magical magnetic field to excise them in advance.
After seven injections of yellow robe mushroom toxin, Locke obtained a golden foxtail grass that had undergone further Ancestral Evolution.
The golden foxtail grass had already begun to possess the key plant factors of golden ear wheat and started absorbing the surrounding light.
"Step two: excise the parasitic behavior."
Locke used the Fire Tree Silver Flower Spell to excise the golden lamp vine.
Instantly, the parasitic relationship between the golden foxtail grass and the golden lamp vine was severed.
At this point, the golden foxtail grass clearly possessed at least one key plant factor from the essential golden plant essence of the golden ear wheat.
Under Locke's infusion of magic resources, the application of various nutrient soils, and even the effect of [verdant spirit breath]—which could increase the growth speed and quality of a second ring magic plant—the Magic Plant grew rapidly into maturity.
Locke established a mana grafting relationship with the Magic Plant. With a wave of his hand, it flew into his palm.
Locke looked at the Magic Plant before him, which was snatching away his magical radiance, and knew its Ancestral Evolution had reached a certain level.
"The Ancestral Evolution is complete."
"By pouring the yellow robe mushroom toxin into my Moon of Evolution like a zero potion, I can use the Fire Tree Silver Flower Spell to send it into a Magic Plant's body. First, I use the golden lamp vine to turn the plant intended for Ancestral Evolution into a haploid, then let the golden lamp vine share a set of plant essence with it before proceeding with the evolution. Both the success rate and the degree of reversion after success will be improved."
Most importantly, this mechanism bypassed the Necromancy Magic that triggered the plant essence of the foxtail grass family.
It seemed that the process of extracting plant essence to become a haploid and then sharing plant essence to become a diploid weakened the effect of that Necromancy Magic, or perhaps it made the foxtail grass no longer purely foxtail grass.
Locke mused, "This combination of methods will also be useful for other Magic Plants. Because the golden lamp vine's behavior of absorbing and then sharing plant essence happens to increase the possibility of Ancestral Evolution under natural conditions."
Essentially, the golden lamp vine's own plant essence is very short; it is a typical Magic Plant with very few plant factors.
Its plant essence contains very little information.
Yet, it can share plant essence with a Magic Plant to form a normal diploid.
In other words, once a Magic Plant becomes a diploid, the set of plant essence that actually functions is its own original set, while the golden lamp vine's plant essence is basically in a state of slacking off.
It's like a duo where only one person does all the work while the other just plays around.
This causes a Magic Plant to display more of the traits contained within its own plant essence during development. Coupled with Locke's yellow robe mushroom toxin, it can directly destroy the mechanism that inhibits factor expression, triggering Ancestral Evolution.
While a complete reversion is impossible, judging by the current progress, it can at least reach seventy or eighty percent.
Of course, this was also because there was sufficient research data on the golden foxtail grass.
Locke thought, "The precision of the Ancestral Evolution can still be improved. The golden lamp vine's parasitic mechanism can be optimized, and the ratio of yellow robe mushroom toxin to white jade aloe can still be adjusted."
"However, for now, the Ancestral Evolution has been successfully completed. Furthermore, I can proceed with my experiments on the flying magic plant."
Holding the Magic Plant, Locke initiated a video call to the Xiao Xi Cup competition committee office.
Although the deadline for the Xiao Xi Cup was still six months away and the competition wouldn't be held for over half a year.
But he didn't have that much time to waste.
He would just submit his entry and end the competition right now.
He was very satisfied with the completion of this project. If the Xiao Xi Cup side was also satisfied, he could pretty much secure the championship in advance.
In any case, he would let the Xiao Xi Cup studio judge the specific solution for themselves.
He could then focus on the Golden Cup and Plane exploration.
This way, his progress among the special grant competitors would likely be considered quite fast.
Having just acquired a large amount of funds, he could directly develop his entry for the Golden Cup and the second model of Wizard Shoes.
'If the Xiao Xi Cup can settle my results early, I can immediately obtain a tourmaline king peach.'
Locke thought, 'Right, I should look into other markets over at the Rose Throne. Since there's the backdrop of the Academic Lineage struggle, whatever I do will be credited to my teacher. I can actually touch some markets that were originally off-limits.'
'It's time to see what other markets can bring in more money.'