My older sister is a villainous rich girl

Feeling somewhat guilty, Wayne could only awkwardly agree.

After exchanging a few pleasantries, the two walked together around the slightly overgrown path and arrived at Professor Conley's private research room.

Since the research lab was first established, it has simply been a piece of land that the chairman randomly carved out from a useless corner of the academy, and it has always seemed somewhat quiet and desolate.

“Ahem…” Wayne cleared his throat and defended Professor Conley: “My teacher is a scholar who is obsessed with invention and research and is not so particular about external requirements, so he has not taken care of it for a long time.”

"However, as a disciple, I will hire someone to clean it up again in the next few days."

Actually, it's just that Conley didn't want to pay for the school's staff, which is why it's been delayed until now.

But this is not entirely due to Conley's own stinginess.

On the one hand, the school stipulates that outsiders are not allowed to enter without special permission; on the other hand, it has also signed contracts with many well-paid school workers.

If you can't get the cheapest labor force—students—and don't want to condescend to do the chores yourself, then you can only entrust the school janitors to do the cleaning.

The advantage of this system is that the school staff are all formally employed, the procedures are standardized, they are experienced, and their methods are professional.

The downside is that the fees are very high, and the school staff have to pay a certain percentage of the commission to the school for each individual commission.

This can be considered a very uneconomical choice, and it is generally not within the scope of consideration for ordinary teachers, except for those from wealthy and powerful families.

When Wayne talked about his teacher, Tasia became somewhat interested.

"Wayne, what are the typical duties of a disciple?"

Although I already have a direct teacher, that gentleman almost only appears late at night on certain days, and I've never even seen his face...

Aside from this one regret, he can be said to have been dedicated to his studies and also cared a lot about his daily life.

Although the teacher made it clear from the beginning that she was only interested in her magical talent, she understood that such an opportunity was not something everyone could get.

Tasia was very grateful for this.

Therefore, she actually really wanted to do something for her teacher.

But when she brought this up intentionally or unintentionally, the teacher simply replied coldly, "You're still too weak. Talk about repaying kindness after you've graduated."

When will I be able to graduate?

Actually, what the teacher said wasn't wrong.

Tasia felt that she was still far from reaching a deeper level of magic.

However, she did not want to use such a vague "future" to appease her teacher's painstaking cultivation.

If you are truly grateful to the other person, you should let them feel it now.

When she asked that question, Wayne was speechless for a moment.

As a student, I usually just bring Professor Conley a chicken leg on his way or help him carry some materials.

I might help with cleaning when I'm in a good mood, but these are usually Olive's responsibilities.

Thinking about it carefully, isn't my disciple... a bit too despicable?

Well, never mind.

—At least I'll sponsor it.

Thinking of Professor Conley's pitiful state of scrimping and saving for his "new invention," Wayne suddenly felt much more justified.

"Of course, it's about helping the teacher when they encounter difficulties, comforting them when they feel sad... and so on." He said a series of vague and clichéd phrases.

"However, the most important thing is not to let the teacher down and to study hard!"

Tasia responded with an "Oh".

As soon as Tasia entered Professor Conley's research room, her eyes were drawn to the huge instrument in the middle.

The rectangular metal hull occupied a large open space, and its top was covered with flexible tubes of various colors, making it look rather eerie.

Out of politeness, she didn't make a sound, but instead looked at Wayne with a slightly helpless expression.

Wayne's lips twitched, and he tried hard to suppress the urge to complain.

"The appearance of this thing doesn't affect its performance much, and there should be room for improvement," he reassured.

Chapter 453 Can you help me with this?

"Teacher, teacher!"

Not seeing Professor Conley for a moment, Wayne called out a few times.

"Hey, I heard you, wait a minute!" His response came from the inner room of the research lab.

The two stood at the door for a while before Conley rushed out in a flustered manner.

"Teacher, what were you doing in there just now?" Wayne asked casually.

Some studies have certain requirements for the surrounding environment, so the research room is divided into many separate functional areas. Wayne didn't suspect that he was doing anything shady; he just mentioned it casually.

However, Conley's expression became somewhat unnatural.

"Ah...it's nothing really." He tried to cover up his blunder by forcibly changing the subject.

“This must be Tasia. I’ve heard of you before,” Conley said.

Upon hearing his words, Tasia smiled and bowed to him.

"Hello, Professor Conley."

"Yes, you too."

Looking at his affable smile when facing Tasia now, it's hard to imagine how arrogant he was when they first met.

Although... he soon started to give up in order to secure long-term sponsorship from the Winchester family.

Shaking his head helplessly, Wayne turned his attention back to the so-called "treatment pod".

"What are these newly added hoses?" he asked, puzzled. "They weren't here when I came to check before."

“Ha…you wouldn’t understand!” Conley said with a hint of pride when talking about the highlights of his design, “Don’t you think that adding these pipes to the hull creates a breathtaking effect?”

He looked at the long, rectangular metal hull with great satisfaction.

"Stunning... So, it only works on the surface?" Understanding his implication, Wayne expressed his speechless disbelief with his eyes.

"Tsk, you don't understand!" Conley adopted an air of "no one understands better than me."

“Humans are not just external bodies, but also have extremely complex souls.” He said with unwavering conviction, “If you really want to heal a person’s body… then you must first heal their soul.”

"And a professional treatment device that could intimidate him was the beginning of it all."

Hmm, that sounds reasonable.

However, this has absolutely nothing to do with you deliberately adding decorations that have absolutely no practical use.

"So, teacher, you're actually saying that you hope to increase the added value of products through this approach, thereby influencing consumers' spending psychology?" Wayne filtered out the meaning of his words and repeated them.

"—Okay, I understand."

For example, products that look better are often priced higher than other products in the same category, in order to differentiate the target consumer group. This is indeed a very common marketing tactic.

Or it could be those milk teas where only ingredients costing a few cents are added, yet the price increases by two or three yuan, and customers still feel like they've made a profit.

“Hey, that’s not what I said!” Conley glared at him.

Wayne didn't care about his reaction at all, but looked at Tasia and said, "Although the appearance has been modified to some extent, I have tested the reaction of the core components, and it does feel much more comfortable to the body."

"However... since there's no specific reference or numerical calculation for the treatment effects, the results might vary," he said sincerely. "That's why I hope you can give it a try."

Tasia was stunned. "This device... could it be... something you, Wayne...?"

But she was interrupted by Wayne before she could finish speaking.

"No, this is the direction my teacher is currently researching."

Wayne appeared quite composed. "When I saw the half-finished product, I thought that perhaps Tasia could help us perfect it."

"If it's useful, that would be great; even if it's not, it's just another failed work by Professor Conley that has no practical use."

There seemed to be differing opinions, and Professor Conley stood to the side, seemingly wanting to speak but holding back.

Seeing that Tasia was still somewhat hesitant, Wayne laughed.

"Don't worry too much. Teacher's inventions aren't always successful. If Tasia can help us verify them, that will already be a great help."

Thinking that she might have some reservations, Wayne added, "Of course, based on my own experience, this device will not harm the user's body; at most, it will just not work."

"Tasia...can you do me this favor?" he asked earnestly.

Tasia couldn't bring herself to refuse such a earnest request from her good friend who had always helped her so much.

But she knew that this was probably not as Wayne had said, that she had to provide the experimental data.

It's probably because, in his judgment, he believed this instrument might be able to help him, which is why he used such a roundabout method to deliver it to him...

Why are all the people I meet such gentle people?

"Ah."

She lowered her head and agreed in a very soft voice.

— You passed the test.

Wayne breathed a slight sigh of relief.

He was afraid that Tasia might suddenly become stubborn and refuse to accept his good intentions when the time came.

It seems that real life is indeed different from what's portrayed in melodramatic TV dramas. I shouldn't have compared Tasia to those idol drama heroines with serious illnesses.

Wayne paused for a second to reflect.

“…Wayne, thank you.” She raised her eyes and looked deeply at Wayne, then glanced at Professor Conley, who seemed to want to say something.

"And Professor Conley too, I'm very grateful."

Seeing that she wanted to continue thanking him, Wayne quickly stopped her: "Let's hurry up and try it out! Don't waste any more time standing there."

then--

After explaining the basic functions of the instrument and how to use it, Wayne and Professor Conley were politely asked to leave the research room by Tasia.

"Uh..." Wayne felt a little awkward as he and his teacher stood staring at each other outside the door.

To be precise, it was already quite awkward when he told her directly that he needed her to take a bath inside the machine.

Although the inside of the instrument was very clean, Tasia was, after all, a girl, and it was already quite good of her temper that she didn't get angry or embarrassed about it.

But—would Tasia really take off her clothes and use it to take a bath in the lab?

Wayne felt that his mind was somewhat restless.

Just imagining what Tasia must be like right now... makes one's imagination run wild.

Chapter 454 Why don't you just rob it?

After a very short time, the tightly closed door reopened.

Then, Tasia, looking almost exactly the same as before, came out from inside.

"I... have already verified it."

That's incredibly fast!

Under Wayne's slightly surprised gaze, Tasia's expression began to falter. "I just put my hand in and felt around for a while, and I found that my magic did become a little more active under its influence, so I think it should work."

Goodness, how come I didn't think of using this method to verify it?

Before Wayne could even process the other possibility, Conley excitedly interjected, "Really?"

He even shoved Wayne, who was blocking his view, aside and forced his way in front of Tasia, asking with a beaming smile, "Can you increase the strength of your magic or make the magic flow faster within your body?"

Tasia felt slightly embarrassed under Conley's overly enthusiastic gaze.

"Hmm... I just feel that the element response is a little faster, but it's hard to describe the specifics..." She tried her best to describe her experience, but it still sounded very abstract.

Seeing this, Wayne quickly pushed Conley back in: "Tasia, don't worry too much. If you feel there's anything you're not happy about, just tell us. It's no big deal."

Judging from her evasive manner, it was clear that she had reservations about Conley's ideas.

With Wayne's guarantee, Tasia relaxed a little.