Regulus of Hogwarts: Lord of the Stars

Regulus didn't take Professor Vance's step back seriously; it was just a theatrical duel.

He didn't use any advanced spells; it was all the stuff he learned in second grade.

Professor Vance was in the same boat; he couldn't very well use his full strength against a second-year wizard.

Moreover, aside from the basic spells, none of the more efficient and deadly techniques honed in actual combat were used.

For Professor Vance, the follow-up to this matter was probably something he said to Professor Flitwick during a casual lunch chat.

"That second-year student from the Black family is pretty good; he lets me use the Ironclad Charm."

Professor Flitwick would probably nod and say, "He is indeed very talented."

Professor Slughorn, if he heard this, might come over and add with a smile, "That child has always been outstanding."

If Professor McGonagall were present, she would probably just grunt in response.

That's about it.

Of course, for lower-grade students, it's quite exaggerated that the professor could use the Ironclad Charm and even back down.

This story will definitely spread among the young wizards. The younger ones will tell it as a legend, but the older ones will just listen and let it go.

The professor played an exhibition match against the second-year students, and the professor let them win; it's nothing special.

Is Blake strong?

It's strong, that's universally acknowledged.

But by the time this news spreads from lower grades to higher grades, it may have already taken on a different meaning.

When this reached the ears of upperclassmen in other houses, it probably meant that Black from Slytherin was stealing the spotlight again.

Nobody will really use this to measure anything.

So this matter is over and done with. Apart from a few more comments from the younger students and a slight boost to his reputation, nothing more will happen.

Regulus didn't take it to heart, but there was one thing that bothered him.

In Defense Against the Dark Arts class last semester, Professor Melis taught the Flash Charm, which makes wands shoot out red and green orbs of light.

At that moment, Regulus stared at the ball of light, and several thoughts popped into his mind.

Can light carry information? Can information itself be used as a weapon?

Or give light a physical form, imbue it with energy, and then let it explode.

Or, give it symbolic meaning.

Light is warmth, a force that wards off darkness; it can illuminate, dispel fear, and bring hope.

If magic can do these things, then light is not just light, but something more essential.

Where it shines, darkness naturally recedes.

Just like Dumbledore did at the Astronomy Tower, a beam of white light dispersed the gray fog.

Regulus even felt that it might be the meaning of light itself, and that there was nothing else in it.

Going further up, the light can also be the light of civilization.

Humans learned to make fire in the dark; with light, civilization arose.

Wizards should be the same.

The earliest wizards probably figured out their first spells by the fire.

Light itself is wisdom, it is enlightenment.

If a magic spell can incorporate all the meanings of light, then it is not just about illuminating, but about awakening.

It awakens what's been suppressed in people's hearts.

At that point, it might be more than just magic.

Later, atop the astronomical tower, gazing at the moon, he contemplated things further afield.

Compress light into ultraviolet rays, into X-rays, into gamma rays.

When that thing hits a person, it doesn't hurt or itch, but the atoms in the cells will be knocked out of electrons, the DNA strands will break, and a few days later the skin will start to ulcerate, the internal organs will bleed, and the person will die silently.

Regulus knew this was called radiation, but in the magical world, it was a curse.

There's also the option of causing light interference to cancel each other out, making oneself disappear into the light.

Alternatively, light itself could be transformed into an energy source, allowing atomic nuclei to fuse under high temperature and pressure, releasing light that carries destructive power; wherever it hits, matter simply vanishes.

These ideas were too big, so big that he couldn't see the boundaries, and wasn't even sure if magic could go that far.

But the initial idea of ​​using light to carry information is something worth trying.

Physically, light can carry information.

Light is a wave, and waves have three variable aspects: height, density, and initial position.

By adjusting these three, you can insert information into the light.

Muggles use optical fibers to transmit signals and electromagnetic waves to transmit images. Essentially, they are both encoding information into optical signals, sending them out, receiving them back, and then decoding and restoring them.

A thin glass filament can transmit more in a second than all the books in the Hogwarts Library combined.

This logic makes sense.

But magic is not physics. Light can carry information, which is one thing, but getting that information into the target's consciousness is another.

You can't expect a beam of light to automatically conjure up the image or thought the other person wants to convey in their mind.

There's a crucial missing link: the information input port.

A wizard's brain has natural defenses, confusion, ego, and an instinctive rejection of external information.

To convey a specific, complex, or even coercive message, a more direct approach is needed.

He thought of Legilimency.

In the forbidden book section late at night, Regulus stood in front of the bookshelf against the wall.

With fingers hovering an inch above the spine of the book and eyes closed, magic, like invisible tentacles, reaches out and gently touches the imprints of thought solidified by magic.

Records of the act of capturing the mind are scattered across several different books.

He quickly skimmed over the lengthy historical narratives and moral controversies, capturing the core descriptions.

"Capturing the Mind" is a profound form of mental magic, essentially involving extracting stored information from the target's memory.

It's like a precise key that can unlock the drawer of memories and let you browse through its contents.

However, there is a problem: it is only responsible for extracting data and cannot write data out of thin air.

Regulus withdrew his magic and opened his eyes.

The act of "seizing the mind and grasping thoughts" is about taking things outwards, while what he needs to do is to send them inwards. They are two directions, but the underlying logic is the same.

Taking things out means forcibly rummaging through the other person's memories to find the information they need.

If you send it in, does that mean you have to disguise your information as something that already exists in the other person's memory and mix it in?

Use light to deliver the message to the other party, allowing them to receive it themselves.

There needs to be a transformation process, turning information into something that the brain can recognize.

The fact that the information retrieved through mind control can be understood by one's own brain indicates that the information has been translated into a format that the brain can read during the retrieval process.

Conversely, if he could translate the message he wanted to send into that format, and then let the light carry it to the recipient's eyes—

When the other person's brain processes visual signals, will it treat them as its own thoughts?

Then we need two things.

First, it can encode information into light; second, it can trigger a kind of "this is my own idea" illusion when light is received.

Regulus stood in a corner of the forbidden book section, thinking for a long time.

He has a good idea about coding.

Control the color, brightness, and rhythm of the light, and break the information down into segments and insert them.

The receiving process must be completed by the other party's brain itself.

He doesn't need to force information into the other person's mind; he just needs to let the other person's brain automatically process the information in the light into a certain thought when they see that beam of light.

This was the inspiration he received from the act of mind control.

The ability to extract thoughts from another person's mind stems from its understanding of the brain's information processing rules.

Conversely, if you can figure out those rules, you can make your brain fool itself.

Thinking of this, Regulus felt a familiar sense of peace.

The problem was broken down into specific steps, the goal became clear, and all that was left to do was solve it step by step.

He left the restricted book section, his entire body enveloped in a Disillusionment spell, like a wisp of night breeze gliding through the empty corridor.

The corridor was quiet, with only the shadows of torches flickering on the walls.

What he needs to do now is to prove that light can bring information to other people's eyes.

We'll take it slow on the rest.

......

Friday night, The Room of Requirement.

Outside, the sounds of Avery and Alex practicing spells could be heard, occasionally punctuated by the sound of Hermes' dark magic cutting through the air.

Regulus sat in his private little room, with a ball of light hanging in front of him.

The fluorescent light flickered.

Over the past two days, he has completed the groundwork for both the first and second phases.

The first stage was to identify the carrier, and he chose the Fluorescent Spell as the base spell for modification.

It's not because it's powerful; it has nothing to do with being powerful.

Simply because it is the simplest, most stable, with a clearly visible magical structure, and the easiest to modify.

Regulus needed a spell that could reliably emit visible light, and the frequency, intensity, and flashing rhythm of the light waves had to be precisely controlled.

He spent an afternoon disassembling, reconstructing, and testing, and finally came up with an improved version.

It no longer emits a constant sphere of light, but can make light flicker, change color, and flow according to its will in a specific pattern.

In this way, he can weave information into light.

Different colors correspond to different emotions, different brightness corresponds to different intensities, and different rhythms correspond to different logical sequences.

Light became the carrier.

The second stage is preparing the information source; he needs the information itself that can be accessed at any time.

The initial idea was to convey a simple visual image or text instruction, but this involved converting abstract concepts into light signals, which was too complex.

Regulus changed his approach and decided to start with emotions and mental tendencies.

These things are closer to the objects of mind control operations, and their effects are easier to perceive and verify.

He recalled the containment room he had constructed deep within his consciousness when dealing with the Dark Awakening.

There lies a virtual personality, shrouded in darkness and corruption, used as a minefield for mental defense.

Now his spirit is stronger than before, so he opened up a new isolation zone.

In this area, he stored some extreme and pure emotional samples in different categories.

These emotions do not originate from him personally, but are precisely synthesized through his powerful mental simulation abilities.

There is unfounded arrogance, contempt for specific individuals, a magnified lack of caution, and also pure curiosity and fear.

Each emotion has been stripped of its specific event context, leaving only the core inclination itself.

He used his spirit and will to solidify these emotions into a stable structure, like pressing a cloud of fog into a stone, leaving it there, it won't dissipate, change, or run away, and you can just take a piece when you need it.

The first two stages are complete. Now, what he needs to do is put them together and figure out how to make the other person's brain deceive itself.

Regulus began to ponder the principles of Legilimency.

The mechanism of mind capture is that the caster probes into the target's consciousness along a magically constructed mental channel, locates and seizes memory information.

What he needs to do is the opposite.

He also needs to build a one-way channel from himself to the target, but the channel does not need the magic of flowing exploration, it only needs to carry the light of a specific emotional tendency.

This beam of light cannot simply shine in the past; it must act like a probe that captures the mind and spirit, able to identify mental boundaries, establish temporary connections, and break through superficial defenses.

Finally, the emotions contained within are released or absorbed onto the surface of the target consciousness.

The initial version he's working on doesn't require deep integration or long-term impact.

Success is achieved if it can be proven that the target experiences a corresponding brief emotional fluctuation or thought pattern the moment they come into contact with this specific beam of light.

This requires extracting the parts about mental positioning and connection from the Mind Capture and then nesting and integrating them with the improved Fluorescent Mantra.

How do magic nodes correspond? How can two different types of magic coexist without mutual exclusion? How is the integrity of information transmission guaranteed the instant the connection is established?

One problem after another.

Then he got stuck.