Locke spent one magic stone in the port city to hire a carriage operated by three centaur brothers.
The purchasing power of magic stones was very high in mortal society.
Since he needed to leave the port city and head to a city called Ashgra City located deep in the mountains and forests within Lilith's Cottage's domain, Locke needed some reliable coachmen.
The three centaurs each put a harness over their shoulders, then exerted their full horsepower to pull the carriage along country roads toward Ashgra City.
On the carriage, Locke sat reading the task materials the academy had given him for this mission.
First, within Lilith's Cottage's domain, there were quite a few kingdoms and even empires. Additionally, there were many lords who didn't belong to any country and only pledged allegiance to Lilith's Cottage alone. Nᴇw novel chapters are publɪshed on novel•fire.net
Ashgra City was such a city.
Ashgra City was located within the Ashgra Mountains.
The mountains had many naturally growing rare magical plants, as well as three magical mineral veins, the most important being the Resonant Gold Crystal mine.
At the same time, this ore was also key auxiliary material for the First Circle spell Echo Barrier. At least during initial construction, dozens of kilograms of this ore were needed.
In other words, Ashgra City was a resource point that was quite important to Lilith's Cottage.
But recently, the lord of this city had reported to Lilith's Cottage headquarters that large numbers of residents in the city had developed special symptoms of limb paralysis and facial deformity, which were completely ineffective after using mortal world treatment methods.
Therefore, Lilith's Cottage believed this might be caused by some wild magical plant in the Ashgra Mountains invading the city and causing a plague outbreak.
This was why they had sent him as a breeder assistant to investigate.
To prevent Ashgra City from further losing control, which would make the mortals who entered the mountains to gather magical plants and collect magical ore unable to continue maintaining their original work.
Resonant Gold Crystal was relatively important for Lilith's Cottage, which was currently in a wizard war.
After all, Blood Curse Court had large numbers of wizard apprentices who had already transformed their bloodlines into vampires, and the cantrip model Flash Burst happened to be their nemesis.
Locke glanced over the investigation results of an ordinary second-class wizard apprentice that Lilith's Cottage had previously sent out. The other party initially suspected that the magical plant causing this situation might be one of two types:
One was Rotface Fern, the other was Parasitic Cockspur Vine.
In the carriage, Locke flipped through the other party's report full of errors and omissions, shaking his head slightly. "This second-class wizard apprentice followed the transformation school's body transformation magic sub-direction. She completely doesn't understand magical plant studies, and possibly never took Universal Studies courses with general education nature, so her report isn't very valuable to me."
Locke thought, "Rotface Fern was already completely extinct in the wild fifty years ago, and although Rotface Fern would cause mortals' faces to be parasitized by spores, leading to deformity, it wouldn't cause limb paralysis."
"As for Parasitic Cockspur Vine, that's even more nonsensical. That magical plant has limited reproductive ability and limited parasitic ability. Although it indeed parasitizes mortal bodies, gradually replacing mortals' spines and causing limb paralysis and facial deformity, the identification method is too simple, and at most only a few cases would appear."
As a breeder assistant, Locke's mind instantly flashed through several judgments, matching the two main symptoms currently appearing with magical plants in his memory.
"No wonder the academy assigned this task to me." Locke thought, "Ordinary second-class wizard apprentices lack relevant knowledge. Even if they went, they would only add to the chaos."
Locke's eyes flashed with red light. Due to vampire syndrome, his pupils had completely turned red, and his sense of smell and taste had become abnormal, completely different from ordinary humans.
But this was only temporary.
After all, he hadn't really become a vampire.
It was just that due to the medicinal properties of the Crimson Echo potion, his mental strength seemed to be growing in fluctuating waves, sometimes at 195, sometimes about to break through and reach 200.
During this process, Locke felt his mental strength and mana continuously compressing inward, surrounding his soul to form something like a shell.
In other words, when his mental strength was about to reach 200, changes in mental strength physiological structure appeared.
This change put considerable pressure on him, making his mana very chaotic.
"The biggest difference between first-class wizard apprentices and other levels of wizard apprentices is that first-class wizard apprentices possess magical pressure." Locke felt his current changes. That boiling mental strength, like waves with nowhere to vent, was seeking a direction to release that enormous power, and that direction was to make his soul produce a magical pressure structure.
"To become a first-class wizard apprentice, one must endure this kind of mental strength change. If I fail, I'll need to break through again."
"Many second-class wizard apprentices fail repeatedly in such breakthroughs and ultimately fail." Locke thought, "But with the teacher's Crimson Echo potion, my mental strength can increase by at least 15%, so forming the soul structure for magical pressure is inevitable. It's just that I have to suffer a bit during this process."
After all, it was reconstructing soul structure to form a completely different soul structure from mortals.
Two days later, Locke arrived at his destination.
He looked at a city located in the mountains and forests. The city's core was several connected blue fortress complexes, with numerous streets and residential areas surrounding those fortress complexes.
Ashgra City had over ten mountain roads connecting inside and outside the city.
At that time, the lord of this city, Lord Ashgra, had already held a welcoming ceremony one thousand meters outside the city to greet him.
The ceremony was quite grand.
There were soldiers lining the road in welcome. Lord Ashgra bowed to Locke's carriage and said, "Respected Lord Wizard, Ashgra City has prepared to welcome you. A grand banquet has been held in the city as preparation for welcoming your arrival."
But Locke indifferently stepped down from the carriage and said to the middle-aged man Lord Ashgra, who was wearing formal attire, "Immediately take me to the plague area. Skip all other ceremonies."
"I came here only to investigate clearly what happened in your city and to solve the problems occurring in your city on behalf of the academy."
Lord Ashgra looked at Locke with awe. Hearing that Locke would solve his city's problems, hope flashed in his eyes. "Thank you, respected Lord Wizard."
"Over a thousand people in the city have already developed those... terrible symptoms, as if it were divine punishment upon us."
"We seem to have suffered divine retribution. During this time, people from other cities have stopped coming to our Ashgra. The life of Ashgra as a commercial city seems to have been cut off."
"Fortunately, you have come."
Lord Ashgra said somewhat excitedly, "Lord Wizard, please help us."
Locke remained sitting in the carriage, somewhat impatiently saying, "Immediately take me to the plague area."
Lord Ashgra immediately arranged for soldiers to lead Locke to the quarantine area within Ashgra City.
Locke sat in the carriage and opened the curtain. What met his eyes were dozens of wild semi-magical plants hidden among ordinary wild plants.
"Worthy of being the Ashgra Mountains, there are indeed many wild magical plants. Perhaps I can gain something from this journey here."
"It can't be any divine punishment. This is Lilith's Cottage's territory. There's nothing that wizards cannot research and solve."