Wizard: Starting With Synthesized Gems-Chapter 173: Practical Combat Testing

Evening.
Locke went to Witch Sophia's magical creature breeding room, where the vampire Howard he had previously captured was imprisoned by Witch Sophia.
The Perseus Eye Lichen had to undergo real practical combat testing before he could produce a detailed and participate in the custom magical plant competition hosted by the academy's combat department to achieve victory in one stroke.
Otherwise, no matter how good the paper data looked, others would still question it.
At this time, the value of high-level experimental subjects became apparent.
Locke had this captured black wizard first-class wizard apprentice from Blood Curse Court as a prisoner. If he used him for experiments, he could obtain high-quality practical combat test data.
The only prerequisite was that he needed to convince him.
In the magical creature breeding room, vampire Howard's body had already recovered, but his mana had not returned and remained in a weakened state.
In the darkness, Howard suddenly raised his head, his eyes flashing with dangerous red light, "Who's there?"
After Howard saw who it was, fear appeared in his eyes. "It's you, white wizard!"
"Your magical pressure has improved again. Your progress speed is truly fast."
Howard had been traumatized by Locke ever since their last battle.
At this moment, sensing that Locke's mana had obviously improved again within this past month, progressing far faster than ordinary first-class wizard apprentices, he was even more horrified.
Locke's mana improvement speed, while relatively slow compared to his own progress during the second-class wizard apprentice stage, was only because first-class wizard apprentice mana quality was extremely high, and every bit of improvement was hard-won.
Compared to ordinary first-class wizard apprentices, his monthly mana improvement speed was already very fast, especially after using Beholder Potion.
Now, Locke's mana had reached 462.
In vampire Howard's eyes, Locke seemed to change every month.
Locke looked coldly at vampire Howard. "Howard, I'll give you a chance. I'll help restore you to your peak condition, open the restraint cage, and let you escape."
"If you can get away, I'll consider it your good luck."
Howard was stunned. He gripped the iron cage and said, "White wizard, are you crazy? You'll help me recover, open the restraint cage, and let me escape?"
"You're being so kind? Didn't you spend considerable effort capturing me in the first place?"
"What are you planning to do now?"
Locke sneered without speaking, instead ordering the gray dwarf servant who had followed him in to push the restraint cage holding Howard out of the breeding room and toward his laboratory.
Meanwhile, Locke had previously spent an hour quickly mastering an ordinary 0.3-circle plant magic spell called Green Moss Shield.
This level of cantrip model was too simple for the current Locke to master.
Of course, the supporting magical plants for this type of plant magic were generally mid-to-low level magical plants, so this spell model couldn't unleash the true power of his Perseus Eye Lichen.
This was like a small car with a large engine, the small car couldn't unleash the full power of the large engine.
Using just this spell with Perseus Eye to deal with the Blood Curse Court first-class wizard apprentice before him would maximize the demonstration of Perseus Eye's powerful broad-spectrum magical resistance.
Whether one could use magical plants mainly depended on whether one could magically graft with the plant, and magical grafting ability depended on one's own mana.
A magical plant of Perseus Eye's level required first-class wizard apprentice mana to control, and even ordinary first-class wizard apprentices needed time to learn to control this level of magical plant.
However, with Locke's current deep mana reserves, controlling this Perseus Eye wouldn't be much trouble.
In Locke's laboratory, he opened the iron door of the restraint cage and threw Howard a bottle of magical creature blood.
Vampire Howard couldn't believe for a moment that Locke was serious.
He hesitated fearfully for a moment, and after waiting thirty seconds and finding that Locke didn't stop his actions, he frantically reached out, grabbed the bottle of magical creature blood, and drank it down.
The terrifying vampire curse transformed the blood curse power, rapidly helping him obtain energy from this bottle of magical creature blood, then quickly healing his body's hidden injuries and restoring his original mana.
A bloodthirsty evil gaze emerged from vampire Howard's eyes.
Vampire Howard curled up the corners of his mouth, "You'll regret this."
"During my imprisonment, I constantly reviewed every fragment of our battle, analyzing why I failed. Now, in such a confined space where you have nowhere to hide, my vampire constitution can be used to its strongest effect."
Locke ignored him and activated the recording function of the True Vision Crystal in his palm, speaking to the crystal ball, "This is the first battle between Perseus Eye Lichen and first-class wizard apprentice vampire baron Howard. Before the battle, vampire Howard's condition has been restored to peak state."
Vampire Howard immediately became furious. "You're indeed using me for experiments, white wizard. You'll regret releasing me."
The next moment, vampire Howard began chanting an incantation, this was a Paralysis Curse.
Howard had constantly reflected during his captivity, believing he was captured because he hadn't utilized Blood Curse Court's curse magic system to its fullest. Originally, Blood Curse Court was supposed to use curses to weaken enemies, then use vampire constitution for melee combat victory.
But last time, vampire Howard felt he had relied too heavily on the vampire baron's powerful constitution and forgotten about curse magic.
Therefore, this time, he started with his most familiar Paralysis Curse.
A blood-red light released from his hand, striking toward Locke. At the same time, he himself charged at Locke, while continuously chanting spells. His blood claws also carried four other curses:
Bleeding Curse, Thousand Sores Curse, Consciousness Splitting Curse, and Stupor Curse.
These four curses linked with the Paralysis Curse, forming a more powerful composite curse.
Obviously, this was a trump card that Howard hadn't had the chance to unleash before.
The blood claw struck toward Locke with a 'bang', hitting the jade-green circular shield magical plant lichen in front of Locke.
The next moment, the eye pattern in the center of the jade lichen lit up, curse energy flowed across Perseus Eye's surface, producing intense collision sounds.
The tearing sounds grew louder and louder.
Sparks from energy clashes erupted across the surface of the lichen shield.
Howard was extremely shocked as he looked at the magical plant shield that blocked his blood claw and the composite curse trump card wrapped around his blood claw. "You didn't have this thing last time... What is this? Why can't even my curses break through it? I..."
The next moment, under Locke's control using the Green Moss Shield cantrip model, the eye pattern area in the center of Perseus Eye flashed with emerald light, striking toward Howard's eyes.
"Ah! My curse was reflected!" Howard exclaimed in shock, and before he could dodge, his eyes were already destroyed by the reflected emerald light.
At the same time, the purifying magical resistance energy that completely reflected his composite curse rushed into his mana, actually purifying a large portion of the mana he had worked so hard to recover.
His entire body was sent flying, crashing into the laboratory wall, steaming white vapor rising from his whole body as he rolled on the ground in agony.
The composite curse he had unleashed was his trump card, his currently most powerful curse, yet this curse was sent back at him by Locke using Perseus Eye.
This caused the corresponding purifying energy to rampage through his soul, directly causing him to lose combat ability and the capacity to continue fighting.
Howard couldn't believe that just over a month ago, he could fight back and forth with Locke, but now he was defeated by Locke in a single exchange!
Locke watched this scene, nodded, then turned to the True Vision Crystal and said, "Vampire baron, first-class wizard apprentice Howard's curse was perfectly reflected by Perseus Eye, and the reflected purifying energy has additional damage against vampire undead bodies."
Locke glanced at Perseus Eye, whose surface was completely blackened.
"The conclusion is that Perseus Eye, even when driven by a 0.3-circle spell, still possesses the ability to reflect immature curse master curses, and its reflected energy can cause fatal damage to vampire undead bodies."
"Dispelling magic and holy magic have doubled damage effects against vampire constitution. Now Perseus Eye's magical reflection possesses a similar mechanism to dispelling magic and holy magic damage against vampires."
"However, Perseus Eye itself is severely damaged and should only be able to support 1 to 2 more uses. If enemies have experience dealing with Perseus Eye, they might be able to exploit this weakness to break through Perseus Eye."
"But if spells specifically designed to work with Perseus Eye Lichen could be developed, creating corresponding 0.5-circle and 0.8-circle versions, we could theoretically reflect back the curse magic of veteran Blood Curse Court first-class wizard apprentices and extend Perseus Eye shield usage as much as possible."
"It's estimated that usage could be extended to around 15 times, which would be sufficient for multiple fierce battles."
At this point, Locke thought of Sephilin and Hussein. As long as he could develop spell models compatible with Perseus Eye, he believed this magical plant work could even reflect back the curses of those two black wizards.
Locke continued speaking to the crystal ball, "This practical combat can prove that even using existing plant magic to drive Perseus Eye shield, it can still play a very important role in first-class wizard apprentice battles."
"Moreover, Perseus Eye Lichen has very powerful restraining effects against all magic of curse masters, and its magical reflection has powerful restraining effects against vampires and undead creatures."
"Perseus Eye Lichen also has certain physical defense capabilities, showing defensive effects under vampire blood claw attacks."
Locke continued, "This recording proves Perseus Eye Lichen's superiority in combat against curse masters."
"But conversely, I believe Perseus Eye has the following flaws: First, Perseus Eye only targets curse magic. If enemies are not curse masters, then Perseus Eye will be useless."
"Second, Perseus Eye has limited protective range and requires users to have certain operational abilities."
Locke closed the True Vision Crystal and evaluated fairly, "If I write another practical combat data article related to this, I should be able to write my third B-level article. Dwarven scholar Orr was right, capturing a vampire means I can produce many related articles."
Locke imprisoned the nearly unconscious Howard back in the restraint cage, then ordered the gray dwarf servant to push him back to Witch Sophia's breeding room.