Full-Time Wizard: Starting with Harvesting Wheat

Inside the workshop of Gulimo Academy, copper and iron clashed, the gears of huge machines hummed and intertwined, and seven or eight figures performed their duties in an orderly manner.

Lyme is crafting a magical artifact called the "Sky-Breaking Whistle," which is engraved with a magical array that can manipulate wind elements. Once the whistle is blown, a gust of wind will rise behind the user, creating a propulsive effect.

At the level of a wizard apprentice, this is already the most advanced magical artifact for rapid movement.

He took out three Wind-Sounding Crystals from the box and carefully embedded them into the grooves of the whistle. The Wind-Sounding Crystals connected with the exquisite and delicate witch array engraved on the whistle.

The patterns of the magic array lit up, and once the energy of the Wind Crystal decreased, it would automatically draw wind energy from the air and transport it into the crystal.

Although the charging speed is certainly not as fast as the consumption speed, it ensures the long-term operation of the Sky-Piercing Whistle. As long as the witch array is not destroyed, this is a witch artifact that can be used multiple times.

Finally, he probed the brass whistle with his spiritual energy. This step of the alchemist, like forging and shaping in a blacksmith's work, is used to change the shape of the finished product.

Of course, it's not just about changing shapes; it has many other clever uses as well.

About three hours later, a bead of sweat rolled down Lyme's forehead. He finally stopped channeling his mental energy; the whistle's internal structure had been improved to make it as easy to blow as possible. This was essential because the strength of the wind generated by the whistle was related to the amplitude and loudness of the whistle's sound.

"It's done." He wiped his sweat, went to an open space outside the workshop, and blew his whistle.

There is a groove on the surface of the whistle. When you send your mental energy into it, the groove can determine where the wind is coming from based on the direction of the mental energy flow, and then concentrate the wind power at that location.

Lyme's mental energy flowed towards the lower end of the groove, so a strong gust of wind directly lifted the short jacket he was wearing, and his strong body flew straight into the air.

He continued to slowly channel his mental energy into the groove, while whistling. As expected, the howling wind arrived and carried him into the distance.

Out of a sense of rigor, he tested each direction to avoid errors, and the test lasted for ten minutes before he determined that the resulting Sky-Breaking Whistle was a passable product.

Neither good nor bad.

Lyme immediately found a secluded spot, and then, like a zombie, stood there motionless, falling into silence.

His soul, however, had already arrived in another realm—the Hall of the Magic Network.

The receptionist is a girl with pure white cat ears. Since more than 50% of wizards like cat ears, and 80% like girls, the receptionist here created such a virtual character.

Lyme felt that the mature woman was obviously better, but the other wizards, being too old, wanted to find a contrast and voted for the younger one.

Even the voting rate for images of children under 10 years old was higher than that for those over 25 years old.

Then a club at Gulimo Academy began to call for a rejection of childlike aesthetics.

Their slogans were so loud that Lyme was moved and donated more than a dozen magic stones to them. As a result, the front desk staff changed from half girls and half lolis to all girls.

How tragic and lamentable!

"Mr. Lem Stephenkin."

The cat-eared girl said in a sweet, coquettish voice.

The receptionist has access to most people's information. Except for a small number of high-ranking wizards, they are completely aware of the rest of the information.

Lyme was certainly not a high-ranking wizard.

So it's not surprising that the other party knew his name.

"Order number 1145 has been completed. Please arrange for a delivery person to come to 508 Senlan Street as soon as possible. The customer requested delivery service from Reverse Wind Company," Lyme told her.

The lovely receptionist simply nodded, gave Lyme a sweet smile, and made no move whatsoever.

However, it seems the magic network has already started working automatically.

Just a few years ago, a high-ranking alchemist, in collaboration with wizards from the Life Faction, created virtual entities called artificial intelligence. These entities could reside in physical bodies and assist wizards in completing their tasks with extremely high efficiency.

They can also easily obtain free materials from CNKI.

Initially, this half-life form called "artificial intelligence" was so prone to hallucinations that it would often give irrelevant answers and cause serious accidents, resulting in significant economic losses. Therefore, few wizards dared to use it.

After improvements by several more advanced wizards, the artificial intelligence reached near perfection, with the error rate reduced to 0.0001%, less than the errors made by the wizards themselves.

Therefore, the receptionists, who used to have to contact the company directly, can now entrust the entire process to artificial intelligence. They are only responsible for some complex tasks that require a one-time handover of multiple aspects of business, because artificial intelligence cannot yet do that.

This type of business actually accounts for a very small percentage, which means that the front desk staff can still receive their original salary, but their workload is less than half of what it used to be.

That's so enviable.

Lyme shed a tear.

"After receiving the finished product and leaving feedback, the customer will pay the balance. Please wait a moment," the catgirl receptionist said in a sweet tone.

"Oh, right," Lyme suddenly remembered something, "Did you settle the balance on my last order? What was the customer's feedback?"

The final evaluation determines how much the customer pays in the balance and their rating—which in turn determines the business's future popularity.

"Your last order was from Ms. Soraya, who gave it a five-star rating. The final payment has already been transferred to your account."

Relief was in his eyes. Soraya had indeed gotten a five-star rating.

If you give him a bad review, he'll really start to doubt the relationship between the two of you.

"Any new assignment orders?" Lyme asked again.

"No..." The receptionist was about to answer when suddenly something popped up in front of her, a radiant smile on her face.

"You've come at the right time. Miss Soraya has assigned you a new order, with a reward of 1000 magic stones."

"Let me see." As soon as Lem finished speaking, a screen appeared in front of him, displaying information shared by the front desk, which was clearly the interface for assigning orders.

"Another Demon Tower?"

Lyme paused for a moment when he saw the order requirements.

That only means that the lab rat that Soraya was testing successfully passed the last Magic Tower test.

"Shouldn't we celebrate with her?" Lem scratched his head. "Never mind, it's just an experiment on lab rats."

He didn't even look at the specific order details.

After all, Soraya was his friend.

"I'll take this order."

"The order has been transferred to your name. You have 15 days to complete the order within this period."

As the girl's voice faded into the distance, outside, Lyme, who had been lying limp on the ground, slowly got up, a piece of paper in his hand.

That's the order details.

Even though the wizarding world has now entered the digital age, wizards still have an unimaginable dependence on paper.

Words must be printed on paper to be considered words!

As he walked toward the workshop, he examined the contents of the paper.

My first impression was that the drawing skills in this design were much worse; it was barely readable.

"Soraya had someone else write it?" Lem was completely bewildered.

"The first layer, drawn in one stroke?"

I have no recollection of this game, but the rules are so simple—just one sentence—and quite easy to understand.

"I see. This is a pretty good game. When building the magic tower, you have to consider that you can't step on the same tiles again, except for returning the way you came..."

"To be honest, it's still a bit challenging."

He continued looking down.

"The second level, Huarong Road?"

"What's that name?"

The rules of the game are still very simple: just move the center block around the game so that it can leave through the exit.

It sounds simple, but the amount of content that can be expanded upon in this game is countless.

"That's pretty impressive..." He thought these puzzle games were much better than the design Soraya had given him last time.

"That white mouse, does it really know how to do these things?" He was somewhat skeptical.

However, since it couldn't even stump the number array from last time, perhaps it really can.

"So... why is it called Huarong Road?"

Filled with questions, Lem continued looking down at the third floor's blueprints, which depicted a game called the Tower of Hanoi.

After thoroughly understanding the rules of the game, Lem clapped his hands suddenly.

"Brilliant!"

"As long as you find the right method, you can pass the game no matter how many rings there are, it's just a matter of time. It's very suitable for measuring the intelligence of white mice."

He realized that the person who designed the game might be a genius.

"If these three games were indeed designed by one person, then he must be very talented."

The talent Lem refers to is imagination. Soraya also said that the most important thing for a wizard's training is not talent, but imagination.

Lyme didn't really feel anything about the fourth level of spot the difference. This game had been around in the Wizarding World for a long time, and it was only so-so for testing purposes.

"The second, third, and fourth layers are easy to make; they might even be less strenuous than the first layer combined." He silently calculated in his mind, then looked at the design drawings for the fifth layer.

"A moving maze?"

Upon seeing the title, he was somewhat surprised, not by the creativity of the test, but rather...

Moving mazes have long been overused in intelligence tests for lower organisms.

Well, the fact that it's been overused proves its dominant position, doesn't it? As the saying goes, there's a reason why something becomes popular.

However, Lyme soon discovered that the blueprints contained more than just a moving maze.

"You have to step on all the floor tiles to open the door and pass through?" Lyme had a strange expression. This was basically taking the first floor's one-stroke drawing and reusing it in a different form.

"The floor tiles are embedded in the walls, and the walls can only be lowered by pulling a lever... Is this just increasing the difficulty? It's already a moving maze, isn't this a bit too challenging?"

Just as he was frowning, a new idea emerged from the design drawings.

"Neon powder? This design is nice." He nodded to himself.

Generally speaking, even if a low-level creature like a white mouse has high intelligence, its memory is still not very good. And even if the maze is moving, the fluorescent powder on the path can still serve as a guide, which reduces the difficulty to a certain extent.

However, building this magic tower is quite complicated, and the reward is only 1000 magic stones.

Even at a friendly price, we'd still lose a lot of money.

Just as Lym was about to unleash a torrent of curses, he suddenly saw at the end of the order that it would send back the five-story magic tower from last time to be used as materials for this time, with Soraya covering the delivery fee.

His open mouth immediately closed.

He still remembered the last finished product. There were many reusable items, especially the floor tiles made of special materials on the fifth layer, which could be used as the first and fifth layers of this design.

From this perspective, a significant amount of material costs were saved.

If an order is completed within ten days, the company can break even. However, if the timeframe is shortened further, then the company will profit.

Given Lyme's skill level, ten days would be more than enough.

"Perhaps we could apply for patents for these games with Soraya, especially Huarong Road and Tower of Hanoi... those are really tongue-twisting names. Although they have nothing to do with supernatural powers, they could be listed on CNKI as 'test games'."

"In that case, if these games become popular, I, as one of the first creators, will also gain some fame."

CNKI (China National Knowledge Infrastructure) is all-encompassing; even if what you upload has nothing to do with wizards, as long as it catches their attention, it can be published on CNKI. I remember an apprentice once brought back a game from a remote plane, something like… Monopoly?

While ordinary wizards wouldn't care about such games, it was different for the long-lived high wizards. When they were bored, they started playing Monopoly, and the game spread throughout the wizarding community.

Even today, wizards are still exploring new ways to play Monopoly. Yes, wizards.

An incredibly idle wizard.

……

"Raise your elbow slightly." Roy moved the elbow of the knight's squire in front of him to a certain angle, and only moved his hand away after the suggestion to remove it was made in the Eye of True Sight's revision.

"Keep--"

The attendant looked nervous, but fortunately, at their level, they had excellent physical coordination and kept his posture firmly in the position Roy had just adjusted.

"Draw your sword!"

With a whoosh, he unleashed a streak of white light, like a waning moon amidst the desolate autumn night, silently emanating a chilling aura.

"It's...it's done!?"

He anticipated this spinning slash the moment he used it, and his body swayed naturally and smoothly to the extreme. That white light was like a watercolor painting drawn with a single stroke.

"This is a master-level spinning slash!"

"Congratulations, Walter!"

The servants and friends nearby came up in surprise to congratulate him, putting their arms around each other's shoulders and chatting in a warm atmosphere.

"Teacher," Walter said with a smile, inviting Roy, "would you please join me for dinner tonight? Please don't refuse, so I can express my gratitude."

"Hmm? Are there any restaurants nearby?"

Roy was puzzled.

The manor is quite a distance from the nearest village or town, so special people go there to purchase supplies, and they bring back several truckloads at a time.

“There are no restaurants nearby, instructor,” another servant announced loudly. “However, Walter’s culinary skills are no joke. He can prepare a sumptuous meal for you himself, no less than that of chefs in restaurants.”

"Really?" Roy thought that he didn't need to go to Soraya's place tonight, and since the other person meant well, he nodded in agreement.

Suddenly, the sound of urgent hoofbeats rushed into the manor.

"They're back! They're all back!"

A boy ran back from the manor gate, excitedly delivering the message.

"The hunting party is back!"

"They brought back... two Lothar lions!"