Chapter 25: Variant Development [Focus Mode]

“Next time, be careful.”
When the girls burst out of the Third Tier zone again, Mentor Vladimir happened to pass by. He quietly reminded them.

“We know already~ We’ll be more careful next time!”
Lina said brightly.

The other two kept their heads down, playing dead, and tugged the golden-haired girl away quickly.

They weren’t the first team to complete their mission. Setting aside that they spent an hour slaughtering in the Third Tier zone, given that there were only three of them in the squad, they weren’t the strongest team among all.

There were many genius students in Eslon Magic Academy. Even Lina and He Qin found it difficult to pull far ahead in a short time—much less Jiang Cha, a newbie who had joined less than three days ago.

“Here’s your share, Jiang Cha-chan; and Lina-chan, here’s yours.”
Back in the dorm and before dinner, He Qin divided the collected materials into three portions and handed them out.

“Too bad we can’t pull a stunt like this next time.”
The girl sounded disappointed.

Witch Gold had strong purchasing power. If she didn’t use it just for magical materials but for living expenses, that hundred‑plus Witch Gold would support her for over a year.

In other words, this also reveals how expensive tuition at Eslon Academy is.
Each year costs a full 3,000 Witch Gold.

“Don’t be too disappointed—there are other ways to earn.”
He Qin smiled and cheered her up.

Lina, munching an apple, looked puzzled: “So that was your motive—only that much…”

“I could go freelance and get a thousand in hiring pay, you know. Next time, Cha Bao, come with me? Starting a side profession is like a bottomless pit; the battle witch path makes money fast.”

Even a first-year student, if sufficiently strong in combat, might be recruited into a team. And Lina was already known in the dueling club. Upperclassmen were willing to mentor newcomers.

A thousand Witch Gold was a generous reward—but Jiang Cha shook her head, half resigned: “I don’t have gear as good as yours. If I go, I’ll just be a drag, right?”

Magical gear significantly boosts combat power. Lina had a full high-tier set—custom-made by a master, costing well into the millions of Witch Gold—and it matched her combat style perfectly. The fiery greatsword staff she used before was only one piece of it.

With that gear, the golden-haired girl’s full-out combat power rivaled even 4th–5th year upperclassmen.
She simply didn’t use it all the time. Otherwise, she alone could have purged the Third Tier zone.

“I’ll lend you a set. Rent is 100 Witch Gold.”
“Forget it~”
Witches had personalities like that. Even if they had known each other for centuries, they’d still keep accounts. At most, they might charge a “friendship price.”

Frankly, Lina’s offered price was already generous. After deducting expenses, following her might net a clean 500 Witch Gold—but Jiang Cha didn’t want to owe the favor. Not from Lina, nor from any upperclassmen mentoring her.

She also clearly understood her current goal:
Learning was more important. With knowledge, Witch Gold would just be something she could generate by crafting magical items.

—Just like the master who custom-made Lina’s gear; one such set could bring in millions.

“Hey—don’t forget tomorrow you go with me to the dueling match!”
“I know~”
Waving her hand, Jiang Cha turned and walked back to her room without looking back.

The knowledge of the various subsets of auxiliary professions (side jobs) was not easy to learn. Even baseline knowledge had high “infiltration concentration.” Even for Jiang Cha, she couldn’t read quickly.

By her calculation, finishing her current book Basic Alchemy would still take her three days. She was only one-third through. That didn’t count the time needed for practice. And resource acquisition was a bottomless pit.

So joining a club was a must. There, she would get monthly free quotas, discounts on materials, and established distribution channels—saving her tons of time. He Qin was in the Puppet Club; she taught the girl all those basics.

“Mind about to evolve next time. Should I… pull an all-nighter tonight?”
Reading, the girl muttered subconsciously.

Once that thought surfaced, it couldn’t be suppressed.

She also wanted to try a new application of her innate magic.

A faint blue glow flickered around her. The version of [Information Gathering: Full Power] she used before was more combat-oriented: it let her focus on battle without missing peripheral information, boosting her calculation ability to more precise spell support.

Now she wanted a mode focused on knowledge acquisition.

She didn’t know whether it would succeed.

“Principally it’s no different from [Information Gathering: Full Power], just a shift in emphasis… it should be fine, no?”

Both actively supply mana to her innate magic to maximize spell model efficiency. It is similar to extreme spellcasting. And her permanent innate magic could in theory also be reinforced by actively supplying mana.

The difference is full-power mode cares for combat; now she would shift focus to learning. Essentially a trade-off.

Then…

“Hey—Cha Bao! Didn’t you forget we have somewhere to go tonight?!”

‘Lina?’
With a muddled brain, she heard the knocking and instinctively blinked. After a moment, she cut off her mana supply and slowly began to regain clarity.

Her biological clock signaled precisely.

9:22 AM.

‘Crap!!!’
Fully awake, the girl instantly felt her head splitting. Thirty-four innate thought circuits, fifty-four temporary ones—all overloaded to near crash. Her mental energy was nearly exhausted, leaving just scraps. Her mana reserves had nearly bottomed out, from over sixty thousand units down to only a few thousand.

‘What the heck is this!’
Even control over her body had weakened. If her brain hadn’t unconsciously completed its eighth evolution, thinking itself would have become difficult. She might’ve fainted on the spot.

“Cha Bao?”
Lina’s voice grew anxious.

She was sure Jiang Cha hadn’t left the dorm early. A witch’s senses were sharp: she couldn’t sleep so soundly as to not hear the knocking…

“Cha Bao, are you in trouble?!”
Lina quickly activated her communicator: “Request emergency room unlock permission.”

“Permission granted. In emergencies, please notify the academy mentor.”
A mechanical female voice sounded. The magic mainframe of the academy’s great library accepted Lina’s request—confirming her suspicions. Emergency unlock rights were held only by those mentors responsible for rescue and discipline. To grant it to others, the room’s occupant must be incapable of movement.

“So something really happened!? Qin Bao, Qin Bao~ come here~!”
Lina giggled and hurried to call He Qin to see what was wrong.

If there had been genuine mortal danger, the mainframe would have auto-alarmed already—and it hadn’t.

“Good morning…”
He Qin appeared, obviously tired, still half-dazed. Her signature bun wasn’t even tied—after all, it was Friday night. All-nighters studying were too normal.

“Jiang Cha-chan, did you overdo it—reading too long straight on—entering an infiltration state with no mobility?”
He Qin’s tone was full of feigned fatigue.

“Infiltration state”—usually only study maniacs or frail witches would fall into it. In short: absorbing too much knowledge at once, the brain shuts down to prevent “infiltration.” Some mischievous upperclassmen occasionally use this trick to prank younger witches into tofu-eating—or whatever. (Yes, I explained that joke earlier.)

“Hehehe, I don’t know what Cha Bao was doing last night—her mental coefficient actually crashed into infiltration mode? This is prime black history material! Next time she messes with me, I’ll post it on the Magic Net.”
“Lina-chan, you really are…”
He Qin turned and tried to leave the scene of their quarrel. She yawned. As Lina tried to open Jiang Cha’s door, she turned to He Qin: “Don’t be so loud. Estelle-chan should still be asleep. Remind me later to call her for breakfast… Wait, she is asleep?”

Before she could finish speaking, they saw the white-haired loli, dressed in a bear-print pajama, sleeping soundly on the living room sofa. He Qin sighed, picked her up, and carried her back to her room.

On the other side, Lina pushed open Jiang Cha’s door with a mischievous grin—and nearly flew backward at the sight of Jiang Cha, staring at her with deep red eyes.

“Ch‑Cha Bao? Um… He Qin‑Mama called us to breakfast!”
The hearing of a witch is very sharp. If Jiang Cha had already awakened, she would have heard Lina’s words clearly—even through a floor.

“Don’t call me Mother!”
“…I’ll rest a bit. You two go ahead and eat.”
Jiang Cha, just barely revived from infiltration mode, looked at Lina’s panicked face. Even without hearing the earlier conversation, she could guess some of what had happened. But she had no strength left to argue—she only said in a daze.

“Then I’ll go first! Remember: you have to go to the dueling club! Mentor Carol hates being stood up.”
“I know…”

She mentally gave this dangerous state a name: [Focus Mode].

The risk was enormous. In this state, she neither felt fatigue nor danger. She could even bypass the brain’s self-protection mechanisms—entering a state of single-minded learning. While her study efficiency was indeed very high (she finished all the knowledge of low-tier alchemy in a single night), a single mistake could lead to brain death. This mode definitely required refinement.

She already had a plan.
Scheduled mana cutoff, preset learning speeds, lowered magic power.
Any one (or combination) of the three could avoid today’s risk. It was quite manageable.

Strictly speaking, [Focus Mode] was just a variant of her innate magic [Information Gathering].

“Let’s do all three strategies at once. We must leave some mana and cognitive capacity for daytime activities.”
“Then I’ll study Potionology next—I want a mental-power elixir…”
The girl—her head throbbing, tears threatening—pouted and rested her chin on the desk, murmuring faintly.