Witch's Kitchen.
In Private Room No. 3, Zach ordered two Tricolor Salt Grain Steaks, one Chilled Sea Cow Liver, two Lava Liquors, and one dish made from a potato-like Magic Plant.
Locke noticed that Zach actually possessed a membership badge from Witch's Kitchen, similar to the Lijin Secret Language Platinum Star Member badge—it was a Gourmet Badge issued by Witch's Kitchen.
The badge was shaped like a curled tongue.
With the Gourmet Medal, all expenses at Witch's Kitchen could be halved. However, it seemed one needed to spend an enormous amount there to obtain such a membership badge.
Locke guessed that as one of the procurement department heads at the academy, Zach must frequently bring his business partners to dine at Witch's Kitchen.
Zach was clearly very familiar with the Flavorists at Witch's Kitchen. The moment he arrived, the most skilled Flavorists would personally come out to prepare their meals.
At the table, Zach became even more enthusiastic toward Locke. "Locke, to be honest, procuring your Magic Plants initially put a lot of pressure on me."
"Because it was a gamble."
Locke raised an eyebrow in surprise. "But there's my teacher's certification."
Zach explained, "Yes, Magic Plants are much more lenient than Magic Potions. They don't require human trials—just a simple test is enough to issue a certification. But performance tests are often limited to just a few aspects, making them very restrictive."
"Many Magic Plants only reveal their flaws when used extensively. Many Breeders want their creations to be included in the Academy Centralized Procurement—partly to make money, but also to better test their Magic Plants."
Zach elaborated, "For example, I once procured a slightly modified Bellflower Magic Plant from a Breeder. On paper, its performance was slightly better than traditional Bellflowers. But when I distributed it to the academy's combat wizards, problems arose."
Zach raised his index finger and gestured in the air. "That variety of Bellflower Magic Plant was highly unstable. Its performance in a stable state appeared excellent, so it ranked at the top during the Senior Breeder's certification tests. But in combat, once it entered an unstable state, its power would drastically diminish."
Zach's expression darkened. "That mistake nearly bankrupted me."
"But there was nothing to be done. Magic Potions are ingested, so the review process is extremely strict. But for external items like Magic Plants, the review naturally isn't as rigorous."
"And it isn't necessary. After all, only large-scale practical testing can uncover issues—simple tests are too limited."
Zach raised a glass of Lava Liquor and said to Locke, "So when I procured your Crystal Palmfire Lotus, even though the certification showed outstanding performance, I still felt uneasy inside."
"However, the power of your Palm Fire Lotus has increased by a full two times, and I genuinely couldn't see any issues with it, which is why I took the risk and signed that order worth twenty thousand Magic Stones with you."
"But the outcome was unexpected," Zach chuckled. "Just three days ago, a group of battle wizards from the academy clashed fiercely with members of the Blood Curse Court in the capital of a mortal nation, right outside Lilith's Cottage's territory."
"That nation is a vassal state of the Blood Curse Court. In its capital, there's a Curse Formula Research Institute under the Blood Curse Court, where many vile curses are developed and deployed in their war against us."
"In response, we decided to implement a 'Scorched Earth Bomb' bombing strategy against that curse research institute, aiming to raze the place to the ground. At the time, due to insufficient Palm Fire Lotus stock, they accidentally used your Crystal Palmfire Lotus."
"Normally, according to unwritten rules, a new breed of Magic Plant like yours wouldn't be prioritized in critical battles. So this was purely coincidental."
Zach continued, "But the combat test results were outstanding. Using this new variant of Palm Fire Lotus, the actual power of the Scorched Earth Bomb was elevated to between 0.6 and 0.7 rings."
"A mere thousand Scorched Earth Bombs achieved the effect of at least two thousand, with each individual bomb's explosive force being significantly stronger, making it far harder for those Blood Curse Court vampires to survive the blasts."
"Not only that, but it also produced a unique effect in actual combat."
Zach handed Locke a set of documents—images rapidly drawn using magical techniques, nearly identical to the real scenes.
These were the works of a Speed Painter, a branch of the Illusion School.
As Locke flipped through the images one by one, he noticed that the land of the enemy capital bombed by the Scorched Earth Bombs wasn't the charred black described in textbooks, but rather a sea of rolling magma.
In other words, parts of the enemy capital had been blasted into a small-scale magma ocean.
The scorching magma continued to flow across the ground, inflicting secondary damage on the surviving defensive spell formations of the Blood Curse Court's ground facilities and collectively destroying the hidden Rune arrays of various cursed magical traps buried underground.
Locke's expression grew serious, as this was an effect impossible to achieve with individual Crystal Palmfire Lotuses paired with Scorched Earth Bombs.
"The standard transformation of land after a Scorched Earth Bomb explosion is to turn it charred black. Even with concentrated large-scale explosions, the most that happens is the land turning completely black. This spell outcome couldn't possibly be the intended effect of the Scorched Earth Bomb's spell model."
Locke, being a wizard specialized in life Magical Plant studies, as well as a Breeder and Potionology Master, immediately thought of another possibility.
"Wait a minute—the biggest difference between the Crystal Palmfire Lotus and the ordinary Palm Fire Lotus is that the former exhibits the phenomenon of Wood Element Fiber Crystallization."
"The ordinary Palm Fire Lotus only contains Wood Element fibers. However, crystallized Wood Element fibers can accommodate more individual units of fire elements. Moreover, these crystallized fibers are extremely hard—even during an explosion, they don't ignite instantly but instead shatter into countless tiny fragments scattered in midair."
"So during large-scale concentrated explosions..." Locke suddenly realized he'd overlooked something crucial.
"We can't just consider the eruption of fire elements stored within a single Palm Fire Lotus or the energy conversion from Wood Elements being ignited by fire elements."
"We must also account for the crystallized Wood Element fibers within those thousand Palm Fire Lotuses. Even if these crystallized fibers are torn apart by the explosion..."
"Because their concentration remains too high within a short timeframe, they'll still attempt to converge the flame energy among themselves. This creates a [compression effect], causing the flame energy to maintain its explosive force while being gathered after the initial detonation, forming molten lava."
Locke's eyes brightened slightly. "That lava isn't ordinary—it's a concentrated result of high-density Spell flames, dealing secondary lethal damage to enemy territory."
"At the very least, it provides significant advantages when clearing survivors or destroying enemy magical traps hidden underground."
Locke pondered further. "But if that's the case, the Scorched Earth Bomb wouldn't fully utilize the Crystal Palmfire Lotus's potential. The academy needs to develop a new spell model as a complementary Spell for it."
"Given we've identified the direction now, the development should be relatively straightforward."
Zach couldn't help but applaud. "As expected from the developer of the Crystal Palmfire Lotus. You grasped it immediately after my hint. Later, when the academy dispatched First Class Wizard Apprentices from both the fire magic and plant magic branches of the Shaping School to analyze this, they reached similar conclusions."
"They termed this phenomenon the [Lava Conduit] effect. Based on the unique structure of your Crystal Palmfire Lotus—the Wood Element Fiber Crystallization—they've planned a series of follow-up complementary Spell developments."
Zach summarized briefly: "Essentially, they're treating your creation as a Trick Model Development Platform."
"In the future, the academy will develop a chain of subsequent cantrip models around this work, just like how magic vines have Vine Hand, Vine Frenzy, and other series of Spells."
"Though it's unfortunate that the breeding competition committee couldn't have known about this. Otherwise, you might not have placed fifth in the preliminaries—you could have been first."
Locke replied modestly, "It was just luck."
He genuinely hadn't anticipated this outcome.
It seems there are times when Magic Plants need to be supplied in large quantities to the wizards in the war department. Perhaps they can discover things that remain hidden during individual Spell usage.
Zach thought for a moment. "By the way, the academy leadership also wants you to join this development team. Of course, the decision is entirely yours."
"With your assistance, our progress would likely accelerate significantly. What do you think?"
(End of chapter)