Harry Potter: Don't Touch the Badger's Plants

Soon, Ciel returned to the greenhouse once again. The moment he stepped inside, he felt something fundamentally different about his perception of the world around him.

It seemed like his awareness of the magical herbs' conditions in the greenhouse had become dramatically clearer. For magical herbs with relatively simple magical power like Lumos Shrooms, Ciel could even clearly sense the trajectory of magic flowing through their mycelium networks.

For instance, when he sensed that the magical power in a dozen or so mycelium threads of a Lumos Shroom was extremely weak, Ciel cast a Pruning Charm and cut off those poorly developed threads. The magical power in the remaining mycelium immediately became much more vigorous.

Compared to before, this efficiency was astounding!

Ciel took a deep breath, marveling at the transformation. "No wonder magical perception talent is crucial for herbologists, potions masters, and alchemists. High talent in this area makes the magical conditions of plants, potions, and alchemical circuits as clear as lines on one's palm. Any problems become immediately obvious."

He continued his internal analysis with growing excitement. "If talent is insufficient, everything looks like flowers in fog, requiring several times or even dozens of times more effort. With my initial level of magical perception talent, achieving any great accomplishments in herbology would have been simply impossible. Fortunately, I have the cultivation system. Someday, I'll be able to build this talent to levels that even herbology masters can't match."

Then Ciel strode past the experimental fields and entered the aquatic plant cultivation shed. Previously, his experiments with Piranha Algae had to be temporarily abandoned due to insufficient magical perception. Now, not only had his magical perception undergone qualitative change, but his mastery of the Frequency Charm had also risen dramatically, directly advancing to Gold Tier.

"This should be enough," he murmured with serious focus.

Ciel's entire being concentrated on the Frequency Charm he was about to use. The magical power flowing around his body appeared clearly in his mind. Magic gradually gathered toward his ash wood wand as his insights and mastery of the Frequency Charm flashed through his consciousness.

The next moment, Ciel waved his wand with practiced precision. A nearly perfect circle was traced by the wand tip. The instant the circle was completed, Ciel followed the trajectory of magical flow and suddenly flicked his wrist.

At the same time, he intoned the Frequency Charm incantation in a deep voice: "Lumos... Frequens!"

The ash wood wand provided feedback that the spell had succeeded. But strangely, no light could be seen at the wand tip.

Ciel let out a long breath, his eyes shimmering with excitement. "Success! The dual qualitative change in magical perception and spell mastery really allowed me to extend the Frequency Charm's light spectrum beyond visible light. The extension range is even farther than I estimated."

His voice carried barely contained anticipation. "If Piranha Algae, as I hypothesized, particularly favor light in this spectrum, then this time, they should have a completely different reaction."

Immediately after, Ciel took out another handful of Piranha Algae seeds and grouped them in gradients according to the Frequency Charm's light spectrum frequencies. After eliminating all interference, he waved his wand with scientific precision.

"Experiment begins!"

First was the Frequency Charm that initially exceeded the visible light spectrum. Under such magical illumination, the death rate of Piranha Algae obviously decreased significantly compared to before. More than half of the Piranha Algae survived under the light. However, their condition still wasn't as good as in the light-avoiding environment.

But next, Ciel's gaze fell on those experimental groups with frequencies moving increasingly farther away. He could clearly see that the death rate of Piranha Algae under illumination was getting lower and lower. The condition of their algae leaves was getting better and better.

Until at one frequency, the growth condition of Piranha Algae was already approximately equal to the completely light-avoiding control group.

"This frequency can be called the critical frequency of the Frequency Charm for Piranha Algae cultivation," Ciel noted with scientific precision. "If we continue moving away from this frequency..."

His heartbeat kept accelerating, eyes burning with anticipation. The current frequency hadn't yet exceeded the limit of what he could currently achieve with the Frequency Charm. Then let's continue. Let me see what changes would occur when Piranha Algae fully received the illumination they desired.

The next moment, frequencies continued moving away group by group. The condition of the Piranha Algae didn't seem to change much visually. But with Ciel's enhanced magical perception, he could detect that the magical aura within the Piranha Algae was gradually shifting bit by bit.

He could also see from the system's perspective that text kept appearing above these specimens:

[Piranha Algae Undergoing Unknown Mutation]

[...]

Finally, when the Frequency Charm's frequency moved away to a certain critical degree, the Piranha Algae in this group of test tubes suddenly underwent dramatic mutation. They were like wild beasts awakening from hibernation. Their magical aura clearly emanated one overwhelming feeling... hunger!

Their algae leaves began constantly unfurling, surpassing the maximum size limit of the control group's algae leaves in the blink of an eye. This was to obtain more of the illumination they favored. At the same time, the originally tiny serrated spines on the edges of their algae leaves also began growing larger at a visible speed. They became truly like piranha teeth!

On the system panel, a line of notification finally appeared:

[Piranha Algae Unknown Mutation Completed]

[Piranha Algae available rewards have changed...]

Wild joy began spreading through Ciel's heart. His hypothesis had been verified! Piranha Algae were indeed a special type of light-loving plant that needed to reach a critical frequency before being activated!

After the initial euphoria, Ciel's gaze fell toward the system panel. But before he could examine it closely, the mutated Piranha Algae in the test tubes took new, aggressive action.

It seemed they were extremely dissatisfied with having to share illumination. Each Piranha Algae wanted to monopolize the light as much as possible. So without any hesitation, their algae leaves began entangling and fighting each other with vicious intensity.

In just a moment, only one Piranha Algae remained in the test tube. Its size had expanded several times compared to before, occupying all positions that could receive illumination.

Seeing this scene, Ciel was stunned. He hadn't expected that Piranha Algae, which originally clustered peacefully in light-avoiding conditions, would undergo such dramatic behavioral changes after receiving their favored illumination. From clustering to winner-takes-all?

It could only be said that the habits of magical herbs were truly incredible. Muggle botanists probably couldn't dream of such peculiar plants.

But this also made Ciel feel somewhat conflicted. If this was their behavior pattern, then each water tank would probably end up with only one Piranha Algae, and only one reward orb. Compared to the previously dense reward orbs, the quantity was far too few.

Calculating this way, Ciel really didn't know if this was profit or loss.

"I still need to see what rewards this state of Piranha Algae can actually provide me," he murmured, turning his attention to the system notification.

First to catch his eye was a bronze luster:

[Cultivating mutated Piranha Algae to maturity grants a reward—Moderate Cutting Spell Enhancement (Bronze Tier)]

Ciel's eyes immediately lit up with excitement. The cutting spell enhancement had improved this dramatically? Directly jumping from barely Black Iron Tier to Bronze Tier!

Just this alone made Ciel feel it wasn't impossible to consider illuminating all the Piranha Algae in those water tanks with the Frequency Charm. After all, one Bronze-Tier reward could match many Black Iron Tier ones. Moreover, when trying to build an ability to extremely high levels, the further along, the weaker the effect of accumulating Black Iron Tier rewards became. The effect of accumulating Bronze-Tier rewards was much better.

While Ciel was still processing this revelation and feeling conflicted about the trade-offs, he saw another gleam catch his eye... a silver gleam.

Ciel's body suddenly tensed with shock.

"This is..." he whispered in disbelief. "There's also a Silver-Tier reward?!"

(End of Chapter)

***

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