Golden Crown Mountain was a natural magical concentration site. It was fundamentally four volcanoes. The four volcanoes continuously emitted billowing smoke every moment. Magma rolled inside them. Some volcanoes were in dormancy, while others were still active.

Special underground magical tides could erupt from the volcanoes, elevating the magical tide concentration gradient around the four volcanoes by several levels.

Golden Crown Mountain's main peak connected heaven and earth. Its summit seemed to be beneath the sun, forever shrouded in golden radiance.

This mountain was indeed the greatest volcano among Cloud Marsh Wetland's nine mountains!

For some reason, Golden Crown Mountain actually wasn't very tall. The height between the sun and ground in all surrounding areas was normal.

But only at Golden Crown Mountain's summit did the sun seem to be above the peak, forming an absolutely beautiful scene.

That sun seemed to transform into a halo of light behind this great mountain of Golden Crown Mountain. The entire Golden Crown Mountain emitted sacred and majestic light and heat, radiating across the earth.

In other words, Golden Crown Mountain itself erupted geothermal energy. It wasn't an ordinary volcano but could erupt underground geothermal magical tides and also connect to solar fire.

Heavenly fire and earthly fire were connected by one mountain, transforming into pure magical power, nourishing all things around the mountain.

So the surroundings of Golden Crown Mountain were vast forest regions. Those forests were composed of magical plants piece by piece.

Locke had never seen such dense high-level magical plant forests. First Circle magical plants were everywhere. There were even Second Circle magical plants. In deeper parts of the forests, there were some terrifying presences, seemingly even higher-level magical plants.

"No wonder Golden Crown Mountain Academy is a top-tier academy in Cloud Marsh Wetland." Locke finally understood. The existence of Golden Crown Mountain itself was a great magical creation. Locke couldn't even understand why Golden Crown Mountain's spatial layout was like this.

When Locke used [Spiritual Vision] that all wizards knew, he could see that Golden Crown Mountain itself was a massive flame pillar connecting heaven and earth.

The surface of Golden Crown Mountain itself was a top-tier magical plant ecological forest. Its interior had twenty-two gardens, corresponding to twenty-two colleges at the main campus.

Inside the gardens were majestic ancient castles one after another.

Outside the twenty-two gardens were large numbers of plantations, bloodline processing factories, construction sites built by constructors, magical painting galleries, wizard commercial streets, wizard markets, and gyroscope kinetic power stations, and so on.

There were also wild magical plant forests.

What caught Locke's attention was that Golden Crown Mountain had entire sections of peach-type magical plant gardens. "Golden Crown Mountain's peach plant cultivation is famous throughout the Three Marsh Lands and even the Eastern Border Zone."

On the wizard floating vessel, Locke also saw many cultivation techniques he had never seen in the southeastern quadrant or Land of Six Towers—magical fields with soilless cultivation rivers, magical fields inside magma pools, and magical fields developed on rocks.

Even on clouds there were patches of magical fields. Even on the canopy top of a massive banyan tree with 10 acres of land in a forest, there could be magical fields. The most ordinary were actually soil magical fields.

Around Golden Crown Mountain, all natural things seemed could be magical fields!

This exquisitely brilliant cultivation technique made Locke's eyes wide open. These were all knowledge he couldn't access in other wizard lands without coming to Golden Crown Mountain.

A wizard beside Locke saw this scene and his eyes also flickered. "Worthy of being Golden Crown Mountain. This is too advanced."

"Look, those pumpkin heads floating above the magical fields and flying are actually light distribution systems that can absorb surrounding light and precisely allocate it to different magical fields. Wizards can freely control those glowing little sun pumpkins, placing them on their magical fields or swiping them away with their fingers."

"The surrounding clouds are all manually or automatically controllable. Those black rain clouds water the magical fields."

"Look, the tornadoes staying at the mountain foot and mountainside—aren't they frozen still? But as long as Golden Crown Mountain wizards swipe their fingers, those tornadoes will move."

"Besides tornadoes, hurricanes, breezes, strong winds, light winds—these are all solid-state weather that wizards can use freely."

"Whether making wind or rain, as long as the wizards here move their hands slightly, they can immediately control it, as simple as drawing on white paper."

"This is the work of Cloud Marsh Wetland's Second Circle weather mages—the all-weather weather control system!"

This wizard's tone was excited, as if on a pilgrimage. "This is paradise for agricultural and pastoral breeders—Golden Crown Mountain."

"See those gyroscopes as large as houses?"

The floating vessel Locke was riding wasn't a direct vessel. There were some stopping points and stations in between.

Because artificial network paths with cross-spacetime structures covered Cloud Marsh lands, transportation here was convenient, so this floating vessel stopped at quite a few wizard lands along the way.

Locke remembered the wizard sitting beside him seemed to come from [Fission Mausoleum Plains] wizard land.

He just didn't know what he came for.

At this time, this wizard looked at Golden Crown Mountain's gyroscope power station with glowing eyes. "I'd heard before that Cloud Marsh Wetland's Force School was formidable. I didn't expect it to be true."

"Look at that large gyroscope. Every time it rotates, all vibration energy is recovered and transformed into magical energy, then distributed to the light system, irrigation system, and formation workshop circles in alchemy workshops."

Locke saw him chattering on and was talking to him, so he said, "This wizard from Fission Mausoleum Plains, you came to Cloud Marsh Wetland to...?"

This wizard turned to look at Locke and smiled embarrassedly. "Ah, sorry. I'm a bit excited. After all, as a weather mage, I can't access these things in Fission Mausoleum Plains. Cloud Marsh Wetland's weather studies field is the best."

"I'm Daniel Brook. From Fission Mausoleum Plains' [Teal Mountain Cult]. However, that's just a local medium-scale wizard organization. You definitely haven't heard of it."

"I came to Golden Crown Mountain in Cloud Marsh Wetland to join Golden Crown Mountain's Advanced Origin Academy." Daniel smiled confidently, showing white teeth. "I'm the [Three Marsh Cup] champion of Cloud Marsh Wetland."

"As a competition reward, I joined Golden Crown Mountain's Advanced Origin Academy."

Locke asked with confusion, "Three Marsh Cup?"

Daniel nodded. "Yeah, the Three Marsh Cup is the Eastern Border Zone's largest First Circle level weather mage competition. The scene is very grand. I won the championship."

"There were six rounds of competition total, each round more competitive than the last. The final round even required reforming a half-plane whose ecological climate had been completely destroyed. The final round was really too difficult. However, even our works aren't as good as Golden Crown Mountain's weather control system. This system is truly too exquisite."

"As a weather mage, seeing this system, my mood is like being on a pilgrimage."

Seeing the floating vessel about to arrive at Golden Crown Mountain, Daniel put down his book and began actively conversing with Locke. He was enthusiastic and very talkative, but spoke steadily. Each time before speaking, he thought a while, confirming what he said was correct before speaking again.

He was cheerful yet steady—a wizard personality type Locke hadn't encountered before. He carried the unique style and aesthetics of wizards from Fission Mausoleum Plains.

Indeed, as Witch Sophia said, every wizard land had its own style and aesthetics.

The southeastern quadrant was balance. The Land of Six Towers was extremely conservative. The Three Marsh Lands pursued exquisite beauty. The Star Domain Sea was inclusive of everything. Spiral Basin was extremely aggressive and would seize every opportunity.

Fission Mausoleum Plains also had its own collective aesthetic style. This would more or less influence wizards from this wizard land.

Through chatting with Daniel, from his description of Fission Mausoleum Plains, Locke learned it was a wizard land with 8,000 years of magical copper ore mining history.

Most magical copper ore came from Fission Mausoleum Plains.

Fission Mausoleum Plains' research in raw materials in the alchemy field was very formidable.

This was actually different from Dragon Fall Lands, the source of most high-quality magic artifacts, and the alchemy field they excelled at.

Fission Mausoleum Plains excelled at material development, plus bronze magic artifact, brass magic artifact, and copper magic artifact manufacturing. Dragon Fall Lands excelled at developing golem studies and magic artifact studies.

The Three Marsh Lands excelled at the small field of textile studies within alchemy. Many magical robes and magical cloaks came from the Three Marsh Lands.

Besides alchemy flourishing in Fission Mausoleum Plains, the Mentalism School also flourished.

Specifically, aphorism studies within the Mentalism School flourished.

And coincidentally, Wizard Daniel's main profession was weather mage. His secondary profession was aphorist.

Wizard Daniel, hearing Locke say he was also coming to join Golden Crown Mountain's Advanced Origin Academy, showed surprised eyes. He looked Locke up and down and said, "There are only two wizards who can enter Golden Crown Mountain's Advanced Origin Academy this year. So you're one of them. What a coincidence—we actually got on the same floating vessel."

"Your cooperative mentor is Witch Yekaterina, while my cooperative mentor is Wizard Feodor. He's a Third Circle wizard and also a Throne Wizard in the weather studies field."

"Then we're colleagues." Wizard Daniel said with a smile, "Golden Crown Mountain land is expensive. Outside wizards have difficulty finding cheap rentals in wizard activity areas, so I estimate the dormitories the academy arranged for us are probably together."

"I didn't expect it to be such a coincidence."

"However..." Wizard Daniel's expression was strange. He directly stated his view, not wanting to hide his thoughts. "Although entering Origin Academy only requires reaching liquefaction stage before age fifty. But even ordinary Origin Academies basically require reaching First Circle crystallization stage before joining, let alone an Advanced Origin Academy in Cloud Marsh lands. I didn't expect you're a First Circle liquefaction stage wizard yet could join."

"I remember this year there was a First Circle crystallization wizard from their own school who wanted to join Golden Crown Mountain's Advanced Origin Academy but was directly rejected. His quota was probably squeezed out by you."

Wizard Daniel looked at Locke with appreciation. "I estimate you must be very excellent. Otherwise, you absolutely couldn't accomplish this."

Locke said, "I suppose so."

Locke said, "I'm very curious about your aphorists' methods. I haven't encountered Mentalism School wizards before."

Wizard Daniel summoned a brass iron book. Lines of text floated on it.

This brass book seemed to be the mainstream communication method in Fission Mausoleum Plains.

After replying to messages, Wizard Daniel snapped his fingers, concealing the brass book, then smiled apologetically at Locke. "It's a wizard seed student from my Teal Mountain Cult contacting me."

"I previously gave him special permissions letting him use our wizard land's communication system to contact me and ask me questions."

"He and I have a good relationship, so I spent some extra thought on him." Wizard Daniel looked at Locke and said, "Back to the topic, Colleague Locke, you haven't witnessed aphorists' methods before?"

"As colleagues who just met, I can demonstrate aphorism studies' spell models for you."

Wizard Daniel smiled and took out a magical quill from his astral ring. What caught Locke's attention was that this quill wasn't an ordinary goose quill.

The quill's main body emitted a faint reddish glow, like a mass of misty flames with electric light flashing in the flames.

Locke was slightly surprised. "This is... made from a Thunderfire Griffin's tail feather?"

Thunderfire Griffins were masterpieces of the Summoning School's breeding creatures sub-direction. They were created by crossbreeding thunderbirds with griffins and fire cats—a super magical creature, only without reproductive ability. Experienced magical creature breed cultivators had to continuously crossbreed and create them to produce corresponding First Circle magical creatures, Thunderfire Griffins, on the market.

But Thunderfire Griffins were First Circle crystallization stage magical creatures. Since this quill was made from its tail feather, it was worth a fortune.

Ten thousand magic stones definitely couldn't buy it. This quill's price was probably around fifty thousand magic stones.

For First Circle wizards, it was a genuine light luxury item.

Wizard Daniel nodded. "Good eye, colleague."

"This is made from a Thunderfire Griffin's tail feather."

Wizard Daniel took out a First-Class Apprentice level Snake-Tailed Yellow Lion from his astral ring. As soon as the lion was taken out, it roared and wanted to flee with its tail tucked. But Wizard Daniel pinched the magical quill with his thumb and middle finger, chanted an incantation, then wrote a [Stop] character on that Snake-Tailed Yellow Lion's forehead with special azure blue ink.

Immediately, that Snake-Tailed Yellow Lion crouched in place and stopped moving.

Seeing this scene, Locke immediately understood. That lion's mind had already been suppressed by the [Stop] character on its forehead, so it completely couldn't move.

Wizard Daniel said, "Look, this is our Mentalism School branch aphorists' methods. We can use written characters to influence others' minds and shock others' minds. Of course, these characters have actually been specially modified. See the edges of this Stop character—aren't there many extra patterns? Those are actually the spell model of this mentalism spell of mine."

"Mentalism School spells are relatively special. Using them requires transforming mana into specific forms and mixing in certain mental power."

Locke nodded slightly. Psionic energy and dragon's awe were actually different proportional mixtures of mana and mental power.

Both were power branches of the Mentalism School.

Wizard Daniel said, "Aphorists need to first mix mana and mental power in proportion, transforming it into [Psychic Energy], so before using aphorism techniques, one must first possess [Psychic Energy]..."

Wizard Daniel used white ink to erase the [Stop] character on that lion's forehead, then dipped the magical quill in azure blue ink and wrote [Fear]. Immediately, that Snake-Tailed Yellow Lion collapsed limply on the ground, unable to move again.

Locke nodded slightly. He had really broadened his horizons this time.

Worthy of Golden Crown Mountain. Before even entering, he had already encountered things he'd never encountered before.

Locke used spiritual vision to observe that lion's spiritual changes, indirectly understanding its mental condition.

Undoubtedly, as magical sub-directions of the same Mentalism School, aphorism studies spell models were more refined than his Mentalism School's dragon's awe, but it also meant its range wasn't as powerful as his dragon's awe.

Moreover, Locke noticed these aphorism studies spell models were extremely exquisite. In same-level combat, they would be difficult to deploy. Against wizards with stronger mana than oneself, they probably would have difficulty taking effect.

But against wizards with weaker mana than oneself, the restraining effect was extremely great.

It was a noob-crushing divine weapon.

This point was actually different from his dragon's awe. Even facing existences with stronger mana than himself, his dragon's awe could still function, weakening the opponent's power performance.

Of course, this was just relatively speaking.

Locke predicted that if one's mind was influenced by this aphorism studies spell once, it would be very troublesome. There would probably be a series of follow-up combo moves. It was the type where if you couldn't break defense, but once defense was broken, it would be very troublesome.

This point was different from curse mages' curse magic. Curse magic was also a noob-crushing divine weapon, but as long as a wizard wasn't at the end of their rope, they couldn't have all their magic resistance lowered due to one curse. But mental resistance was something that could easily result in losing everything from one misstep.

The working principle of this aphorism technique spell model was different from the working principle of Enchantment School's Powerful Human Charm-type spells that changed others' cognitive states to indirectly affect others' minds.

Aphorism technique spell models influenced minds more directly, more effectively, more dominantly. Enchantment School spells could only leverage others' minds when the gap was extremely large. Otherwise, they could only make slight changes.

Mentalism School spell models had effects on minds at the same level.

But thinking about it, as Witch Sophia said, all Mentalism School magic was fundamentally the same—basically all centered on mental consciousness as the core research object.

For the Enchantment School, the mind was just an unimportant field. The Enchantment School wouldn't fall into idealistic research, only studying consciousness as a derivative of humans as material bodies.

The Enchantment School studied how to change the state of things through incantations, formations, rituals, and magical runes, and use runes to inscribe implements to assist in creating magic artifacts.

Locke thought, "From this perspective, the Enchantment School's influence on consciousness is external, while the Mentalism School's influence on minds is internal."

"The two look similar but are vastly different due to internal principles, and their applicable ranges are also different."

Wizard Daniel put away the magical quill and Snake-Tailed Yellow Lion and smiled at Locke. "I've made a fool of myself. How was it? Our Fission Mausoleum Plains' mentalism magic is still quite interesting, right?"

"By the way, where are you from? Hmm? The floating vessel has landed."

"I need to hurry and report. Next time, if there's a chance, we'll chat again."