A Busy Life

As the new day dawned, Fran, having stayed up all night, stopped what she was doing when she saw the faint sunlight through the curtains.

"Philly, why are you asleep?"

Philly was leaning against the doorframe, fast asleep, and Fran's soft calls did not wake her.

Fran wasn't surprised, because she had stayed up for three nights with Philly.

On the first day, she taught Philly the basics of mathematics.

Then she was immediately put in charge of assisting Fran's experiments.

Fran conducted some alchemical experiments, requiring Philly to constantly monitor the condition of various instruments and keep a close eye on the time.

This prevented Philly's brain from resting, thus multiplying the opponent's physical strength.

On the third day, Fran and Philly began to organize the things to be done for the next phase of the Mana Communication System project.

Finally, on the morning of the fourth day, Philly could no longer hold on.

Even First Order Profession can go a day or two without sleep without any problems, but under the intense mental activity, Philly finally couldn't hold on any longer.

She probably never stayed up late while living with the Felistin Family, because such families considered following the normal routine of ordinary people to be the norm.

Fran was used to going two or three days without sleeping when she was at First Order, but Philly obviously wasn't used to it.

Fran gazed at Philly, whose chest was rising and falling slightly, and slowly stepped forward, taking out a sticky material that had been prepared in the alchemical experiments.

To prevent Philly from waking up suddenly, she spoke softly, and a faint singing voice filled the room, making Philly's breathing even more stable.

Fran pressed the grayish-green sticky substance onto Philly's body, waited a few seconds, and then removed it.

The sticky substance that was removed had the same texture as Philly's skin.

Fran didn't apply any sticky substance to Philly's entire body; it was pointless, and no one would be able to see if there was anything wrong with the texture under her clothes.

She collected the textures of her palms, neck, and facial features, and that was enough.

Next, Fran began searching Philly's body. She removed the Felistin Family seal from her index finger and found a seal engraved with the four elements in a small pocket on her chest.

Fran guessed that it was the seal of the Yobner Society.

"Not on my person..."

Fran turned her gaze to the side; there was a package that Philly had brought from her family.

She unfolded it, searched it briefly, and finally found what she was looking for—an identity document bearing the Alliance's seal.

"Okay, Philly, you can go back to sleep now."

She intensified her singing, which sounded like waves crashing on the shore, lulling Philly into a deep sleep from which she remained asleep for almost a day.

Fran took the document, walked out the door, flew directly into the sky, and swallowed the sticky substance in small gulps, altering her appearance.

She glanced at Panel Panel again, and saw that the physical attribute had experienced the largest drop.

[Attributes: Constitution 35.9, Spirit 60.0]

"It dropped by a full five points. This kind of targeted appearance modification really drains your constitution attribute."

Fran frowned. The last time she used the Magic Creature's blood, her appearance was completely changed randomly.

This time, she not only needs to acquire Philly's appearance, but also needs to be able to switch between the two appearances. She also needs to shrink her body to match Felicity's height.

This major change, coupled with the fact that she was using an alchemical substance, led to a significant decrease in her physical attributes.

However, this is only temporary, and it should take about a month and a half to recover.

Fran thought that after obtaining her identity, she would be able to participate in the Preliminaries of the Champion Mage Challenge.

However, after carefully understanding the specifics, Fran realized that she had misunderstood; in addition to paying money, there were actually other requirements for participating in this Preliminaries.

"Sorry, you need to finish in the top eight of these basic events to participate in the Preliminaries. This is to prevent people from racking up points in the Preliminaries."

The Champion Mage Challenge has been held in the Alliance's Floating City for nearly several thousand years, and its rules and regulations are quite well-established.

For example, to prevent people from spending money to send people in and boost their scores, a preliminary selection process is specifically set up before the Preliminaries.

This part wasn't particularly difficult; it consisted of hundreds of small competitions with virtually no participants, some of which didn't even have eight people registered...

This includes almost all the smaller competitions on Number Nine Floating City.

But this wasn't good news for Fran, because she was really short of time.

When will the Preliminaries end?

The staff member hesitated for a moment before replying.

"There are 69 days left until the end."

Fran frowned. She still had to participate in these small competitions to qualify for the Preliminaries, and then use less than sixty-nine days to beat through the Preliminaries and qualify for the Main Tournament.

She now has to race against time.

It's a bit strange that a mage only signed up when a Preliminaries was almost over.

But is this mage not allowed to participate in a Preliminaries to practice?

The Alliance welcomes mages like this, since they'll still pay the 500 Gold Coin; if they want to participate again in the future, they'll have to pay an extra fee.

So the staff member handed Fran a slightly yellowed sheet of paper, which contained the list of all the approved minor competitions.

In the two years following each Preliminaries, the number of participants was so high that printing the lists for these smaller competitions was purely for convenience.

Now, no monks want this piece of paper anymore; it was printed two years ago.

Fran walked down the street, intently looking at the list in her hand, trying to find out exactly when these competitions started and ended.

She needs to choose a small competition with a short timeframe that she can participate in as soon as possible.

Fortunately, there were many licensed competitions, Fran easily found three small ones.

"One individual competition and one team competition, ending in twenty-nine days."

Although the Champion Mage Challenge is purely an individual competition, that doesn't mean it doesn't recognize team performance.

Because team performance is recognized, these competitions offer enough slots, so there's no need to fight for them.

"But twenty-nine days is too long, isn't it? There's no guarantee we'll get the certificate within twenty-nine days..."

Fran sighed in frustration, then looked at the match closest to hers, which would end in about ten days. It seemed to be her best option.

However, the name of this competition is the [Alchemy School Hourglass Cup Youth Competition], a large-scale academic competition organized by the Alchemy School.

Simply put, it's a competition to see who publishes the best Paper within a given timeframe, targeting monks under the age of forty.

Fran had no idea how an academic competition had gotten into the realm of Magic Duel, but the list clearly indicated which rankings were eligible to participate in the Preliminaries.

" Those at the Bronze Hourglass level or above can participate in the Preliminaries, and Preliminaries initial scores will be assigned according to their specific level."

"The Bronze Hourglass is initially assigned 10 points, the Silver Hourglass 30 points, and the Gold Hourglass 50 points."

These initial scores are intended to initially categorize the contestants; a higher score equates to a better starting line.

The Hourglass Cup seems to receive the highest score, on par with the [Number Nine Floating City Annual Duelist Cup].

Fran stopped in her tracks, knowing this was her best chance.

"If we list Philly as the second author, she will also be eligible to participate..."

"I need to reach the Gold Hourglass Grade. Time is running out, and every point is precious..."

"The Alchemy School achievement I currently possess is the law of conservation of energy, but it may not be accepted by the judges..."

"And then there's Aether, which is what the Alchemy School are most interested in, but I haven't found enough Deep Sea Golden Dragon to obtain sufficient experimental evidence."

"But I can now use Aether to work backward from the result... using the mathematical methods I've written to prove the existence of ' Aether '."

"Using mathematical calculations and quantification to derive new theories is a field that no mage has yet conceived of."

After a moment's thought, Fran decided to submit both Paper as a precaution, including Philly's name on each one.

She felt that although these two Paper were theoretical and some reviewers might not like them, she should still give herself a Gold Hourglass in consideration of these two achievements.

"That's enough for now. I still need to find Iris to get ' Lai ' legal status and finish the manuscript in a few days."

When Philly woke up the next day, she heard a rhythmic clicking sound. Upon closer inspection, she realized it sounded like a pen writing and drawing on paper.

She looked up and realized she was still in the place where she had lost consciousness.

Turning to look around, I saw Fran holding a strangely shaped pen, scribbling on a piece of paper, leaving behind a long string of words.

"Um, Mr. Lai ..."

Before Philly could finish speaking, Fran immediately stopped writing, her eyes gleaming.

"You're finally awake! You've been sleeping all day. Come on over, I still have an experiment that I need your help with."

In a daze, Philly picked up a large stack of papers and began to record the mental fluctuations Fran when casting spells and Miracle Alchemy, converting them into specific numerical values.

Fran then asked Philly to think about what was unusual about these numbers, but Philly didn't have Fran's perspective, and she couldn't figure it out no matter how hard she tried.

Having no other option, Fran could only point out the differences to Philly and then have Philly start calculating the numbers using an extremely strange ratio.

Finally, Philly stared blankly at the unknown that had been proven to be greater than zero; she still didn't realize what she had just been calculating.

"Well done, Philly. I'll put your name second in the Paper."

Philly's mind was still a mess; right now, she only had one thought in her mind:

Am I not a member of the Elemental School? Master Lai is from the Alchemy School, so how can I publish Paper from the Alchemy School?

When Philly wanted to ask a question, she found that the place where Fran had been was now empty. She then remembered that Fran had just said she was going to submit her Paper.

Never mind, let's go to sleep!

Exhausted, Philly followed her heart's choice.