Hogwarts: Dumbledore reigned over the wizarding world

Chapter 87 Magic
The squeezing feeling of the "pipeline" becomes stronger and stronger as it rotates.

Perhaps only a second passed, or perhaps a long time passed. Time seemed to have lost its meaning here. When Vaughn felt that he could no longer resist the squeeze of the "pipeline" -

He was sprayed!

There was another "crackling" sound, as if something exploded.

Vaughn falls.

There was soft grass under his feet. He shook his head and his vision was dizzy for a few seconds before he could see clearly that he was next to Crouch.

He looked down and saw that he was standing in the circle!
"You succeeded...at once!"

Beside him, Crouch's eyes widened. Although his tone was still dry, the two slightly trembling mustaches on his upper lip revealed his shock.

Vaughn was in no mood to care about his thoughts.

The success of the Apparition certainly made him happy, but he was more worried about whether there would be other accidents. He quickly lowered his head to check his body and asked, "Barty, do I have a clone? Or something else?"

Crouch also hurried to check: "... all four limbs are there, no obvious bloodstains on the body... Oh, one of the shoes is missing..."

The two checked for a while and found that during this apparition, Vaughn had lost a shoe, a button, and a small piece of nail.

The nails were found where they had been standing, but the shoes and buttons were nowhere to be found.

Crouch said in his dry voice, as if wrung out of a rag, "This is quite normal. Or rather, your performance has exceeded my expectations... 99% of wizards fail to Apparate on their first try."

"Most people were defeated, standing there stupidly until they became dizzy from spinning and stumbled to the ground. A small number of people suffered even worse. I still remember Amelia's first time, one of her arms flew straight into the crowd... At that time, I had just started working and was assigned by the Ministry of Magic to supervise the exams at Hogwarts!"

He thought Vaughan was upset.

In reality, Vaughan was wondering where his shoes and buttons had gone.

But Crouch said he didn't know the answer to this question.

"Perhaps no one in the entire wizarding world knows about this. This is also the most terrifying aspect of Apparition errors and splitting accidents. No one knows where your thigh or arm has landed. Ideally, it would still be there."

Vaughn frowned. "No one's trying to solve this problem?"

"There's no way around it," Crouch explained. "There's no pattern to this. For example, you just Apparated over three meters, but your shoes and buttons could easily be thrown five or ten miles away, or even appear in the sea... It could be anywhere!"

He shrugged, "So all along, the Ministry of Magic has taught Apparition at Hogwarts. There's the most powerful anti-Apparition spell in the world, and it can even partially dispel it."

"Usually the Ministry of Magic would choose an empty classroom in Hogwarts and temporarily lift its restrictions. That way, when the young wizards practiced Apparition inside, even if they split into two, their bodies wouldn't appear outside the classroom—because the space outside the classroom was locked."

Listening to Crouch's words, Vaughan found that he had another area of ​​interest.

For example, what is the principle of Apparition?
Or to go deeper, what exactly is space in this world?
As he learned more about magic, Vaughn found that he encountered more unknowns. To be more precise, the magic system of this world was like a huge black box.

There's no principle behind learning and using magic. Everyone just knows that chanting spells, summoning emotions, and using magic power can make it happen, and so they can do it...

"What a world where you can do whatever you want..."

Vaughn sighed secretly and temporarily suppressed his curiosity. That was not what he should be thinking about now.

Next, under Crouch's care, Vaughan continued his studies.

There were several times when he failed, and Vaughn found that his emotions were fluctuating - long-term concentration was too exhausting, and fluctuations were inevitable - so he decisively withdrew his magic power.

It was successful at all other times, and there was not a single separation accident throughout the process.

Including the things he carried with him, nothing was lost. This speed of progress shocked Crouch.

This kind of shock is not due to Vaughn's learning ability. He has seen countless geniuses in his life, and his son Battie Jr. is a genius.

What shocked Crouch was Vaughan's self-control and character. In terms of the difficulty of the spell, Apparition was actually not that difficult. The difficulty lay only in "calmness". Maintaining calmness and stability, and maintaining stable emotions and magic power for a long time, was extremely exhausting.

Normally, a wizard who has just started Apparition will be most efficient during the first few practices.

Because this is the time when your mental state is the best.

Afterwards, as the spirit is exhausted, it is inevitable that attention will decrease, distraction, fatigue, etc. will appear, and efficiency will begin to drop sharply. Many split accidents occur at this time.

But throughout the night, until dawn, when the two finished their practice and returned, Crouch did not find any signs that Vaughn was unable to hold on.

He even improved with every practice.

"monster……"

Crouch quietly made this evaluation in his heart.

What comforted him was that Vaughn was not strong in every aspect. In the next few days, Vaughn, who gradually mastered the Apparition, began to try the Fiery Curse, which he had known before but had never practiced because it was relatively dangerous.

Then, his practice efficiency dropped rapidly.

In the early morning of five days later, still on that remote and flat lawn, Vaughn chanted the Fiery Curse. His wand-swinging movements, magic power, and emotions were all impeccable.

But as the spell was completed, only a streak of sparks shot out from the tip of his wand...

Crouch's lips curled up into a slight smile, trying not to appear too gloating.

Vaughan swung his wand again, but the fierce fire that was said to burn everything did not form at the tip of his wand, and the sparks quickly dissipated.

But he was in a good mood and just rolled his eyes at Crouch: "Laugh if you want to!"

Just ignore him.

"system!"

Vaughn silently summoned the system panel:

[Host: Vaughn Weasley]

[Magic Scale: 463 (500 for an ordinary adult wizard)]

【天赋：魔咒学7、黑魔法6、变形术8、魔药学10、草药学6、占卜学2 (满值为10)】

【魔咒：大脑封闭术LV5(MAX)、铁甲咒LV5(MAX)、缴械咒LV5(MAX)、飞走咒LV4（11/16）、漂浮咒LV4（10/16）……摄神取念LV3(1/32)、幻身咒LV2（4/8）、神锋无影LV2（4/12）、粉碎咒LV2（0/8）、消失咒LV2（0/12）……新增：幻影移（显）形LV0（2/3）】

[Potions: "Vaughn Beauty" series, Wolfsbane Potion, etc....]

【Reputation Points: 0】

Looking at his talent column, Vaughn pondered:
"Dark magic talent is 6. This value is even worse than I expected. It seems that 6 to 7 is a watershed. If a value of 7 is considered excellent, then 6 is at most just above passing. There is a huge difference in the learning of magic!"

Of course, the reason why Vaughn was in a good mood was that according to the agreement between him and Dumbledore, Dumbledore was no longer shameless and gave Gryffindor a lot of extra points. So, he would most likely complete the main task and get a talent point by the end of the semester.

At that time, you can choose either the spell talent or the black magic talent.

That is his confidence.

Besides, judging from the current needs, black magic is not urgent.

Putting aside his talent for the moment, Vaughn glanced at the column of his spells, which was a densely packed list.

For more than a month, he still did not relax his practice of spells. Except for a few spells, he had made some progress, but some spells were obviously starting to slow down.

For example, the flying spell and the floating spell, these spells that have reached LV4, have not made any progress in the past half month.

Nor could Vaughan place his precious reputation on them.

Fortunately, these spells are enough for now.

"Hmm? My magic scale... Last month, it was still 456. Based on the normal monthly increase of 6 points, it should be 462 now. How come it's 1 point more..."

As he thought about it, Vaughn's eyes accidentally swept across his sleeves, and when he saw his wrists exposed, he suddenly realized:
"I'm starting to develop..."

He had previously speculated that the growth of magic power was related to talent and the body's development cycle, but due to a lack of samples and statistical data (others didn't have a system and couldn't quantify it), it was difficult to accurately calculate its growth trend.

Now, the change in the magic scale undoubtedly confirmed Vaughn's guess.

"I'll be 12 next month. Calculating the time, I'm indeed entering a period of rapid development... This is the period in a person's life when the biggest changes occur. According to Muggle biology, various trophic hormones and target gland hormones that have been nearly dormant since birth begin to activate in a pulsed manner during this period..."

"The growth of bones, muscles, and internal organs is merely an external manifestation. The essence of puberty is the activation of internal hormones. Is the growth of magical power also related to these factors?"

Vaughan was intrigued.

Although magic power cannot be observed, every wizard can sense it. It determines the power of a wizard's spells and the number of times he can cast spells. It is the energy source of the magic system.

If anyone can crack its secret or summarize the law of growth, then that person will have mastered the most convenient path to strength.

The reason for saying this is not because of how strong the effect is after the magic power is increased, but because it is most likely to grow explosively.

This involves a special phenomenon in this world that every little wizard must experience before the age of 10 - magic awakening, or magic riot!

Before this special phenomenon occurred, young wizards had no magical abilities, and at that time, they were no different from Muggles or Squibs.

It was not until the awakening of magic that a clear line was drawn between the extraordinary and mortals, wizards and Muggles.

From a biological perspective, the awakening of magic is like the beginning of the evolution of the essence and level of life!

Generally speaking, every young wizard will only experience one magic awakening, and it is this time that helps them break away from their original life class. Even the subsequent growth of magic power is just the "afterglow" of that awakening!

If... one could experience magical awakenings multiple times... This tempting thought popped into Vaughn's mind, and he quickly opened his satchel, took out his notebook, and wrote down his thoughts.

Crouch had a strange expression on his face. He saw Vaughn was in a daze for a while (looking at the system panel), and then suddenly took out a notebook and started writing furiously with an excited look on his face.

I couldn't help but worry that this confident and proud child might have suffered too severe a blow and developed some mental problems.
Fortunately, his worries did not come true.

Crouch only saw that after Vaughan wrote something in his notebook, his mood suddenly became very good. He was smiling until dawn and the end of practice.

And today seems to be his lucky day.

In the afternoon, Vaughan, who was searching for memories of Barty Crouch Jr. in the basement, was called out by Crouch, who handed him an invitation.

"The Wizengamot has initiated the voting process and decided to hold a resolution vote tonight. Amelia Burns asked me to bring this to you. You must attend tonight."

Vaughn took it, flipped through it a few times, and then put it away. He casually asked, "Did you vote for or against?"

Crouch said sternly, "Do I have a choice?"

"Tsk, be cheerful. We are partners. The establishment of the Werewolf Affairs Committee will only benefit you. Barty, are you really willing to spend the rest of your life just messing around at the International Magic Exchange and Cooperation Department?"

"Are you really willing to be suppressed by an idiot like Fudge? He's not a very kind person. Look, he dared to kick you to the Cooperation Department last year. Maybe in two years, he'll even force you to retire!"

Vaughan tried to pat Crouch's shoulder, but found he couldn't reach it, so he patted his arm and beckoned.

Crouch's face twitched, and he said dryly, "There's nothing wrong with life now..."

"But I'm very dissatisfied, Barty!" Vaughn's expression turned into a half-smile. "As a partner, I think it would be more in my best interest if you became Minister of Magic in the future, don't you agree?"

Crouch was silent.

Vaughn didn't push him and resumed his smiling face. "You have to be more proactive, Barty. All the votes today were sent by owl, right? You have to use your connections and ask your old friends. If there are any who didn't vote in favor, ask them to send a new one. I don't think Amelia will mind!"

Crouch: "...You are so shameless..."

"Thank you for the compliment. This is a necessary quality in politics!"

……

Ministry of Magic, Office of the Minister.

When Umbridge came running in breathlessly, the respected Minister Fudge was just gulping down a glass of sherry.

Seeing his expression, Umbridge quickly slowed down her movements to prevent the minister, who was in a bad mood, from taking his anger out on her.

"Your Excellency, I've heard that the Wizengamot will be voting tonight. When I arrived, owls carrying the votes had already begun arriving at the Ministry."

Fudge drank another glass of sherry. Although the alcohol content was not high, he was still a little drunk.

He sneered and said, "What other bad news is there? Tell me all at once!"

Umbridge was silent for a moment before she said tactfully, "I heard that Dumbledore, who hasn't been around lately, started visiting Wizengamot members more frequently yesterday."

"Amelia Burns wrote letters to at least ten wizards, and... and Barty Crouch..."

She paused, and Fudge, who was drinking, immediately glared at her with eyes that were cold yet seemed to contain fire.

She quickly said, "Barty Crouch left for a while and just returned. He publicly announced that some of his old friends had sent the wrong tickets and asked Amelia to review them... Amelia agreed..."

boom!
A wine glass fell at her feet, and she quickly covered her mouth in fright, listening to the respected Minister Fudge cursing: "That stinky woman! And that old dog Crouch! Did you see it? Umbridge, they are so arrogant now that they want to ride on my head and piss... Old dog! I should have finished him off last year!"

It's not that Fudge didn't try.

He scolded Dumbledore, Amelia and Barty Crouch for their arrogance, and in the days after the inquiry, he did not hide his arrogance when he frequently contacted the representatives of the pure-blood families in the Wizengamot.

The outside world believes that his counterattack is likely to be after the establishment of the Werewolf Affairs Committee.

In fact, those people don't understand politics very well, and Fudge doesn't want the Werewolf Affairs Committee to be established smoothly.

This has nothing to do with personal likes or dislikes, but the fact that this institution, from its concept to its entity, is a challenge to his authority.

The most correct approach is to prevent the Werewolf Affairs Committee from having any chance of being established and to kill it directly, so as to maintain his face and the position under his butt.

Unfortunately, Fudge couldn't do it.

Fudge was able to sit on the high position of Minister of Magic because he was elected by the Wizengamot. It was the Wizengamot that gave him the legitimacy to inherit the highest power in the wizarding world.

Any Minister of Magic, including him, who dared to deny the Wizengamot would be denying the legitimacy of his own power.

If the situation really develops to that point, the Wizengamot will be fine, but it is hard to say what will happen to the Minister who has lost the protection of magical laws.

Therefore, Fudge can only play the string game within the rules.

According to the original development, Fudge felt that he still had some hope. No matter how powerful Dumbledore was, he could only make people fear him, not obey him.

As far as he knew, among the more than 50 seats in the Wizengamot, only about a dozen wizards such as Amelia and Mrs. Marchbank were Dumbledore's die-hard fans, and they would support Dumbledore unconditionally.

The rest of the people can only be considered neutral. Politically, they have no unified demands and their stances and starting points are different. They are objects that anyone can win over.

During the previous questioning meeting, Vaughan attended the entire meeting and answered questions patiently in order to win the votes of these neutral parties.

It was precisely because Fudge noticed this that he visited them frequently after the questioning meeting, hoping to win them over to his side and turn the tables in the final decision-making process.

Originally, he was progressing smoothly...

"The day before yesterday, Alred Travers secretly wrote me a letter. He told me that Fudge was contacting the pure-blood families, trying to get them to vote against it. Many families have wavered..."

In the evening, Vaughan and Crouch rushed to the Ministry of Magic to wait for the Wizengamot to vote.

Amelia said to Vaughn when she saw him.

She was still a little dissatisfied: "I wanted to contact you and Dumbledore at that time, but there was no news from both of you. It was not until today that I found out that Dumbledore secretly went to visit his 'old friends', and you also had the full support of Mr. Crouch - if Barty hadn't told me that you were with him, I wouldn't have known!"

Her dissatisfaction naturally came from the fact that neither of them had discussed it with her.

"Sorry, Amelia." Vaughn calmly made up a story: "Actually, I've been staying at Mr. Crouch's house these days, trying to persuade him. I finally convinced him today, so I really didn't have time to inform you..."

Crouch's cheeks twitched beside him, and he almost couldn't help but open his mouth to expose him - where was the soft and hard coaxing? Vaughn was clearly sure he would cooperate. He hadn't mentioned it in the past few days, causing him to rush to write letters to the pure-blood families this afternoon.

But Amelia obviously believed it.

Her expression softened until Vaughan spoke harshly of Dumbledore: "... Dumbledore must have forgotten you. Look, he didn't even send a message with his Patronus..."

Amelia took a deep breath and couldn't help looking to the side.

The air there fluctuated a few times, and Dumbledore with a white beard appeared, looking at Vaughan with a smile.

This was undoubtedly an embarrassing scene.

But Vaughan remained calm, not even pausing for a moment. "...But I believe that as soon as Dumbledore's old, muddled head comes to his senses, he will inform you personally, Albus, am I right?"

"My dear, you really understand me."

"No, no, you haven't been wandering around the wilderness lately. The professor mentioned to me last time that you might die out there someday. Rather than not being able to find you then, he might as well give you a bottle of poison now. He's holding his temper every day, so you'd better be careful!"

"Alas, Severus is not very open-minded and is obsessed with some trivial things in the past. Unlike me, when others slander me in front of me, I just smile and don't take it to heart. At most, I will hold a grudge for a while."

When the two met, they started to exchange sharp words and smile with hidden daggers.

This peculiar way of getting along surprised Amelia and Crouch.

Although everyone knew that Dumbledore supported Vaughan, they thought that the relationship between the two should be more like that of an elder and a younger generation, or in other words, Vaughan should obey Dumbledore.

But now it seems that the relationship between the two seems to be very equal!
Vaughan and Dumbledore exchanged a few words on an equal and "friendly" basis. It was getting late, so Amelia said goodbye first as she still had to go and set up the venue.

Not all Wizengamot members need to be present today, probably only about ten or so.

But because a new organization may be established, almost all departments of the Ministry of Magic will send one or two representatives to attend and observe the resolution.

This also includes wizarding residents, media reporters, etc. who are willing to come.

Amelia will have to count the votes and her job is not easy.

After she left, Crouch quickly made an excuse to leave as well, because he felt guilty and didn't dare to face Dumbledore in private.

As expected, just as Crouch's back disappeared out the door, Dumbledore retracted his gaze and looked at Vaughan. "Barty's support for you has exceeded many people's expectations. Everyone is wondering why he would rekindle his old connections because of you. Before today, he had long stopped contacting some pure-blood families."

During the questioning meeting, Vaughn, who often came to Amelia's office to play, found the drink familiarly, took a sip, and said, "We had an agreement and trusted each other!"

"Of course, I wasn't trying to question you." Dumbledore smiled. "It just suddenly occurred to me that a few years ago, Barty asked me if memory magic could reverse the corruption of a person by the Dark Arts."

"Oh, that's an interesting thought. How do you respond?"

"I told him it was impossible!"

Dumbledore looked at Vaughan, his azure eyes filled with mystery. "The effects of Dark Magic are irreversible. They only accumulate. Even I can only rely on Memory Magic to try to weaken the corruption caused by each use of Dark Magic and delay its effects."

Vaughan remained noncommittal: "Nothing in the world is absolute, Albus!"

(End of this chapter)