Locke tapped the table with his finger, saying, "Both of you will participate in the competition."

Gregor wanted to say something, but under Locke's gaze, he couldn't say anything.

Locke softened his tone and said to Gregor, "Gregor, as long as you perform at your normal level, you'll discover those opponents aren't actually scary. Moreover, if you don't even dare participate in competitions, how will you dare to think about advancing to formal wizard?"

Locke's eyes were sharp. "Do you think breaking through limits the first time is such a simple matter? Even though wizard civilization already has a complete path arrangement for the first transcendence, the first transcendence still requires courage and wisdom to achieve."

"If you can't overcome your psychological fragility problem, then drop out early."

Gregor bowed to Locke. "Teacher, you're right. Psychological fragility has always been my shortcoming. Do you have any suggestions for my situation?"

Locke glanced at Gregor and, based on his understanding of his personality, said, "You're just afraid of failure. Lower your expectations. Lower your expectations of your goals."

"Don't think that participating in breeder competitions means you must rank among the top. Just think that you can learn things from it and be satisfied. Transform your desire to defeat others into a wish to defeat yourself, and you can overcome this problem."

Locke said, "Those who can frequently defeat others are victors, but those who can frequently defeat themselves are the strong. On the endless road of exploring truth, only the truly strong can keep walking forward."

Gregor's body shook. He murmured, "Only those who can defeat themselves are the strong..."

"Teacher, I understand. Thank you for your guidance."

"Becoming your student is truly my good fortune."

Locke glanced at Gregor. Through daily interactions, Locke had perceived Gregor's personality. He was extremely contradictory—arrogant and exceptional, yet felt inadequate due to failure.

He hoped to be outstanding, yet had experienced wizard mentors not caring about him and giving him low evaluations.

All this made it even harder for him to dare to challenge.

If he carried such a mentality to assault formal wizard status, the situation would be very bad. His outcome probably wouldn't be much better than Albert's.

Therefore, Locke hoped he could overcome this problem through participating in competitions.

If it were an ordinary mentor, they might directly ignore this wizard apprentice's psychological state, or even be unable to understand him.

But because Locke currently only had two students, Gregor was his first student, and the advanced Origin Academy's graduation conditions required him to teach two formal wizards, Locke could keenly perceive the jade radiance beneath Gregor's seemingly ordinary exterior.

Williams on the side showed a thoughtful expression. 'Those who frequently defeat themselves are the strong?'

'This mentor seems different from my previous wizard mentor. Moreover, he's very young, seemingly only one or two years older than me.'

Locke turned and exchanged a few words with Williams, roughly understanding Williams's situation.

Like Gregor, Williams was also a breeder and plant-type wizard, but Williams was simultaneously also a potion master.

A wood-fire dual-attribute Child of Elements.

Twenty years old this year.

Locke took another look at Williams. This student of his actually had wizard professions similar to him and Witch Sophia—all simultaneously potion master + breeder + plant-type wizard.

Unlike Gregor, Gregor only had a breeder assistant certificate, but Williams had formal breeder and potion master assistant certificates.

From this, it was evident that the level of students Golden Crown Mountain assigned him this time was really a rank higher.

Locke was actually only 22 years old.

Although he was their mentor, the three were similar in age, with not much difference.

But the status difference between the three was vast. To maintain a mentor's dignity, Locke naturally had no intention of becoming close with the two.

Locke said to them both, "I have deep research into banana-type flying magical plants. This time when you participate in the apprentice-level association breeder competition, use banana-type flying magical plants. What do you think?"

Gregor and Williams naturally had no objections.

Locke was their wizard mentor. The topic he chose for them, they naturally couldn't refuse. If they didn't know it, they had to learn it.

Moreover, with their level, they really weren't qualified to say what they were good at in front of Locke.

Locke nodded and tossed them a set of materials.

This material was from when he developed the Large Green Leaf Dragon Sparrow in the southeastern quadrant. At that time, he had spent over half a year on various apprentice-level Great Green Owl Banana variants, so naturally he had many banana-type magical plant variants on hand.

Gregor said in surprise, "Teacher, you have so much material."

Williams also said, "Really, there's so much. There are many banana-type flying magical plants here, all varieties I've never seen before."

"Did you breed all of these? Why breed so many?"

Locke knew he couldn't explain the finite element breeding method clearly to the two apprentices. He simply said, "Just making a 'sword tomb.'"

Gregor listened in confusion.

Williams spoke up and asked, "Teacher, is it finite element breeding? I've heard of this very advanced breeding method."

Locke glanced at her and nodded slightly. "You're a bit smarter than I thought, Williams."

"Correct." Locke tossed her a bottle of advanced Weeping Blood Nightshade potion. "Drink it. Consider it your reward for answering correctly."

Williams had just seen Gregor drink this type of potion, so at this moment she didn't doubt at all. She opened the bottle cap and drank it down.

"My affinity for wood elements and fire elements actually rose a level." This young witch Williams's small face flushed red, like a rosy apple. "Teacher, you're truly amazing."

"Gregor, you've been drinking such amazing things all along."

Williams seemed to already know Gregor. Locke wasn't surprised by this. Speaking of which, these two wizard apprentices had come to Golden Crown Mountain several years before him.

Speaking of which, he was actually the wizard who had just arrived at Golden Crown Mountain.

Locke said to them both, "I have all the banana-type magical plants recorded in the materials. If you need them, you can ask me for them. Take those materials and go research on your own."

"If there's anything you don't understand, you can ask me. Participating in competitions can gain you magical resources, and your characters can also be tempered. So-called competitions are teaching through competition, letting you learn things from the matches."

Back then, when he built the Forest Sanctuary, he had moved three apprentice-level banana forests into his Forest Sanctuary as green manure magical plants and wind element-fixing magical plants.

Therefore, his Druid’s Ring still contained complete banana forests.

Moreover, because they reproduced in his forest, the scale was actually even larger than before.

Locke said, "However, you need to come with me now. I'm going to an Arthas industrial park."

Williams didn't know about previous events, so she looked at Gregor, using her eyes to ask why they needed to go there.

...

At the Arthas industrial park, Locke was led by an Arthas Shop Alliance wizard into a plantation.

This crystallization stage wizard named Cassius said to Locke, "These ten acres of magical fields in this plantation, you can use freely."

"The manager already instructed me in advance."

"By the way." Wizard Cassius looked at Locke, hesitated, then inquired, "What is life like in Golden Crown Mountain's Origin Academy?"

Locke knew what the other party really wanted to ask was actually how the path of choosing the Origin Academy route was.

After all, the other party wasn't very old either, but had chosen the shop alliance career advancement route, advancing through shop alliance careers to indirectly climb toward faculty positions.

Locke thought for a moment, "It's alright. I also just entered the Origin Academy four months ago."

Wizard Cassius sighed, "Faculty positions are hard to find. Our Cloud Marsh Wetland has large numbers of formal wizards with no way to find faculty positions. So they can only come to shop alliances."

"I came to Arthas from the First Circle vaporization stage. But sometimes, I still wonder, if I had continued staying at the wizard academy back then, would I have had a different life?"

Locke said, "All roads lead to the same destination. It's all just pursuing truth."

Wizard Cassius smiled, "True too."

"Then please, feel free."

Locke nodded slightly. This plantation had roughly a total of one thousand acres of soil. Each plot of land had a barrier.

That is to say, the ten acres of magical fields he was using could raise a linked barrier. This way, his magical fields could be protected.

Locke needed to self-cross the Hydra here, cross it for several generations. Through this method, he would stabilize the offspring traits of the Hydra magical plant, completing the final trait stabilization work.

Then came mass production.

The Hydra magical plant's original reproduction ability wasn't too weak. Therefore, there was no need to enhance it to support mass production.

Locke looked up at the dragon crystal ecological dome at the top of the plantation and nodded slightly. With the dragon crystal ecological dome plus Golden Crown Mountain's naturally advantageous resources.

He didn't even need to spend any additional magical resources. He could accelerate the Hydra magical plant's growth here. At most, he'd just sprinkle some insect-repelling potions or add trace element nutrient solutions.

However, Locke didn't just plan to use these ten acres of magical fields for backcrossing the Hydra. He also planned to use these ten acres for Hydra simplification experiments—he had an idea to create a Three-Headed Snake, lowering the difficulty of using the originally tactical-level magical plant Hydra.

This way, he could solve the problem of being unable to use Myst's Power for extended periods.

At the same time, after making preparations, Locke also wanted to plant the Ancient Life Tree seed into his Forest Sanctuary!

If his Forest Sanctuary obtained the Ancient Life Tree seed, it could be improved to the maximum degree.

Of course, the Ancient Life Tree's growth required exaggeratedly enormous magical resources.

This point could be seen from how the life nightmare absorbed large amounts of energy in the Emerald Dream but still hadn't advanced to Second Circle.

Moreover, this way, he would definitely need to obtain the wind, water, fire, and earth four elemental rings to bless the Druid’s Ring. Otherwise, relying on just the Druid’s Ring alone, he likely couldn't provide conditions for the Ancient Life Tree seed to grow.

He had to use the wind, water, fire, and earth four elemental rings to create a true energy cycle.