From Wizard Apprentice to Conqueror of Myriad Worlds

First Level Wizard Terry opened the first page of the paper, his pupils vibrating rapidly.

The strangest part was that each pupil vibrated at a different frequency and had a different focal point.

His eyes locked onto different sections of text. They were like two precision instruments operating independently, processing two separate streams of information at the same time.

This was a constant First Level Witchcraft—the Pulsating Demon Eye.

Besides being a powerful aid in combat—enabling him to track the movements of multiple targets and predict his opponent’s next attack—it also functioned as a reading assistant.

With each eye reading different content, his reading speed was effectively doubled.

Half a second later, Terry finished reading the incredibly concise yet elegant abstract, dozens of times faster than Roy had.

’The abstract is actually decent,’ he muttered to himself, a hint of confusion in his voice. ’Why was this paper rejected?’

For a Wizard to describe an Apprentice’s paper as "decent" was exceptionally high praise.

Terry changed his mind instantly.

He had originally intended to just skim through it, see why the paper was rejected, and get a general sense of the current apprentices’ standards.

But now, he decided to read on and find the real reason for its rejection.

Even then, the Wizard still trusted Roy’s judgment, believing the paper must have some sort of flaw.

Terry flipped with astonishing speed to the section where the data was processed using the Kado Flow Change Set Calculation Formula.

His gaze fell upon the few lines of Divination Formulas, and his brow furrowed slightly.

Unlike Roy, Terry didn’t think this calculation formula was inherently unsuitable for Spiritual Flow Transformation data.

However, processing it properly and smoothing out the "sharpness" of the errors required an extremely high level of skill.

He believed one would need the Divination skills of at least a Third Level Apprentice to master such a technique.

Terry gave a slight nod. ’The problem must be here, then.’

To confirm his judgment, the Wizard turned to the second page, intending to see the supposedly terrible results of the data processing.

The Pulsating Demon Eye flickered a few times, and his pupils abruptly dilated.

The content on the scale pattern paper was completely different from what he had anticipated.

The processed data formed curves that were smooth, stable, and clearly patterned. Every inflection point fell exactly where it should, and every fluctuation followed a certain rhythm.

It wasn’t the "sharp" and "chaotic" mess he had imagined, but rather a meticulously carved, almost perfect order.

Surprise was evident on Terry’s face. "’Maddy’s First Smooth Curve Paradigm’ can be used here?"

It wasn’t at all strange for a Wizard to be unaware that the Smooth Curve Paradigm could be used in this way.

Secret Divination and Divination had developed for tens of thousands of years, and the number of Divination Formulas created was incalculably vast.

Take one of the most classic examples.

A formula originally used for Magic Power control was introduced into the Spirit Ring Domain, resulting in a marvelous qualitative change.

This occurred within the first millennium of the Era of Divination—in the year 658 of the New Era, to be precise.

This accidental discovery ultimately led to the birth of the seventh Spirit Ring.

The event was so famous that history books named it the "Spirit Ring Ascension."

Before this, the highest rank for a Wizard practicing Secret Divination and Divination was only Third Level Wizard.

A mere 11 years later, in 669 of the New Era, the first Fourth Level Wizard of the Era of Secret Divination was born.

A Wizard of this level was also known as a Grand Divination Master.

Terry’s heart began to beat a little faster than usual, completely unconsciously.

It wasn’t out of nervousness, but excitement—the kind of excitement that comes from realizing, ’So it can be done like this!’

He immediately cast the Magic Pen Technique, summoning an illusory Magic Pen, and began to verify the paper’s derivation process.

Due to length constraints, the paper couldn’t possibly detail every step of the derivation.

Desperate to understand every detail of the Smooth Curve Paradigm’s application, Terry had no choice but to perform the derivations himself.

The Magic Pen moved frantically across the scale pattern paper, so fast that it left afterimages. Every second, dozens of Divination Formulas poured from its tip.

In just three short seconds, an entire sheet of scale pattern paper was filled.

Terry waved his hand, and a second sheet of scale pattern paper flew from the corner of the desk, landing steadily beside the first.

The Magic Pen seamlessly continued, beginning to dance across the second sheet.

Ten seconds later, the Magic Pen stopped.

The result was in—it was identical to the paper’s.

But Terry didn’t stop there.

A new stack of scale pattern paper flew from the corner of the desk, arranging itself neatly on the tabletop.

The Magic Pen activated again and began to frantically output Divination derivation formulas.

This time, he used the traditional Beixi Flow Disturbance Processing Technique to preprocess the same flow data.

He was doing this primarily for the sake of comparison.

This was something every meticulous Wizard would do.

Eighteen seconds later, the Magic Pen had filled nine sheets of scale pattern paper.

Each of Terry’s eyes focused on a different result: his left on the derivation from the Kado formula, and his right on the derivation from the Beixi technique.

He immediately reached a conclusion. ’The similarity between the two data sets is 99.5%.’

The existence of an error margin was normal.

After all, the processing methods were different.

Terry had a gut feeling. ’The accuracy of the Kado Flow Change Set Calculation Formula combined with the Smooth Curve Paradigm should be higher.’

But a gut feeling wasn’t enough. It needed to be verified.

He began to control the Magic Pen for a third round of calculations.

This time, he used a Program Group.

The so-called "Program Group" was a specialized Divination tool exclusive to the Wizard level.

For an Apprentice, it was far, far too difficult—just understanding its basic principles could take months or even years.

But its advantage lay in its extremely high precision.

Even with Terry’s level of skill in Divination, it still took him over a minute to complete the Program Group’s calculation.

The result—was exactly the same as the paper’s.

Terry’s expression grew even more astonished. ’By introducing the Smooth Curve Paradigm into the Kado Flow Change Set Calculation Formula, the result is completely consistent with the Program Group’s. The error has been almost completely eliminated.’

Not only that, but the computational difficulty and time were also drastically reduced.

The Wizard reread the paper carefully, muttering to himself, ’This data processing method isn’t just for Spiritual Flow Transformation at the peripheral layer... It seems it could be applied in many high-level fields of research.’

He recalled the projects he had participated in. At least twenty of them could have used this processing method, which would have significantly reduced the amount of calculation required.

Terry couldn’t help but marvel, ’This is a flash of true genius.’

A data processing method created by a First Level Apprentice that could even be used in an Official Wizard’s research—if that wasn’t genius, what was?

But he hadn’t finished the paper yet.

’I should read it to the end,’ Terry thought.

Soon, he had turned to the last page.

To the Wizard’s slight disappointment, he found no more surprises.

The subsequent Divination derivations and their explanations from a Divination perspective were logically rigorous. For a Second Level Apprentice’s paper, it was absolutely top-tier work.

It wouldn’t even be out of place when compared to many papers from Third Level Apprentices.

In the eyes of a Wizard, however, it was still nothing remarkable.

But considering this was the paper of a First Level Apprentice, it had already far exceeded expectations.

Terry gazed at the Divination Formulas Roy had scribbled on the paper’s cover and shook his head slightly. ’This is a spark of brilliant insight. It shouldn’t be treated like this.’

He extended a finger, the tip of which emitted a faint glow.

With just a swipe through the air, the dense black ink marks vanished, as if they were snow and ice melting under the sun.

This was the Level Zero Witchcraft—the Ink Trace Erasure Technique.

Terry had no intention of blaming Junior Reviewer Roy, nor would he punish him in any way.

After all, you couldn’t expect an Apprentice with mediocre talent and mediocre abilities to have the foresight to find a pearl buried in a pile of gravel.

Besides, what Apprentice doesn’t make mistakes?

’One should have a forgiving heart,’ Terry thought.

He looked down at the paper’s cover and read the pen name aloud in a low voice. "’The River Flows Eastward?’ An interesting pen name."

「Five minutes later.」

Roy sat at his desk, deep in thought as he studied the Wizard’s manuscript.

A brilliantly colored bird suddenly materialized out of thin air, entering his peripheral vision.

It had an exceptionally beautiful crest of feathers on its head, like a rainbow compressed to its very essence.

First, its outline was sketched into existence, including a slender beak, a rounded head, and long tail feathers.

Then, a variety of colors rushed in to fill the outline, as if being poured into a mold.

The entire process took less than half a second, yet it left a remarkably deep impression.

Roy froze for a moment, then quickly asked, "Does Lord Terry have any instructions?"

He naturally knew that this bird was Terry’s messenger from the Spirit Realm—an Illusion Spirit Bird.

To "sign" a messenger partner from the mysterious Spirit Realm was an ability typically possessed only by Wizards.

Among Apprentices, only a handful of exceptionally talented Third Level Apprentices, or those with special bloodlines, could communicate with the Spirit Realm to find a messenger partner.

A Second Level Apprentice like him was far from qualified.

The Illusion Spirit Bird let out a CHIRP CHIRP and spat out a slip of paper.

Before the note could even hit the ground, the Spirit Realm messenger vanished.

Roy reached out and caught the slip of paper. His eyes fell upon the few lines of text, and he was utterly dumbfounded.