Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 113 Saving the Wizard Ravenclaw

"What was that you just imagined? A blue cloud?" Daphne was very curious after seeing what Rice had imagined. She reached out her finger and poked the cloud.

Rice watched coldly, offering no intervention.

"Ouch!" Daphne cried out as a drop of bright red blood oozed from her fingertip. Just as her finger touched the mist, she felt a sharp, needle-like pain. She immediately withdrew her hand and discovered that the spot where she had touched the mist had been cut in several tiny ways.

The cloud of mist seemed to be composed of countless tiny blades; just a touch would cut the skin.

"Why didn't the Sorting Hat sort you into Gryffindor? Didn't I tell you to be wary of the unknown?" Rice pointed out Daphne's mistake without any mercy.

"This is something you conjured up, how could I have imagined it?" Daphne said, looking aggrieved.

Rice paused for a moment, then sighed.

"Be careful in the future, don't touch things you don't recognize." He added, "This is the manifestation of that person's magic. I can find that person's presence by observing the movement of this cloud."

He had just imagined the characteristics of Ravenclaw's magic in his mind, and with the help of the thought-to-be-made-up potion, he simulated a physical form of Ravenclaw's magic—this sky-blue, extremely sharp cloud of energy was the physical form of Ravenclaw's magic.

It will instinctively drift towards the direction where Ravenclaw's magic is most concentrated, so it will bring them to Ravenclaw's front.

After explaining to Daphne what the fog was, he slightly relaxed his control over the fog, letting it drift on its own.

It drifted deeper into the dungeon, with Rice and Daphne close behind. This time, the two were lucky; they didn't encounter any monsters along the way, and their progress was very rapid.

The cloud led them through the dungeon, turning left and right, until they finally arrived at the cave where Rice had previously encountered Ravenclaw. However, apart from the cutting marks all over the floor and walls, there was nothing there.

These traces still retained a strong fluctuation of Ravenclaw's magic, and when Rice stepped into this place, he felt a stinging sensation on his face. Daphne, who was following behind him, was also shocked by these traces when she first saw this cavern—the marks on the walls made her hair stand on end, and she felt that any one of them could cut her in two.

"Is this... formed naturally?"

Rice glanced back at her and told her it was a spell.

"That's the spell." Rice casually waved his wand, and the air in front of him distorted, leaving a shallow scratch on the ground.

"The simplest and most unadorned spell, but when its power reaches a certain level, it undergoes a qualitative change."

Listening to Rice's words and looking at the dense cutting marks on the stone wall, Daphne suddenly gained a deeper understanding of magic. A thought flashed through her mind: Could the spell that "Big Rice" used to drain all the moisture from Quirrell's body that day be the same spell Rice used to dry her hair on the first day of school?

She couldn't help but bring up the question.

Rice blinked. "That spell, if you understand it well enough and the magic is powerful enough, can indeed evaporate the water in a person's body—but based on your description, it's not the same spell."

"What spell is that?"

"I don't know, I wasn't there." Rice wasn't falling for it and ended the conversation abruptly.

The Ravenclaw magic malfunctioned after entering the cave; the remaining magic was too strong and interfered with it, rendering it unable to continue guiding the way.

However, it's not like there's no way out.

Since the Ravenclaw magic here is too concentrated, why not just erase the magic left by Ravenclaw? Besides, I can take a shortcut; this task isn't as difficult as I imagined.

Rice took several small bottles from his pouch, uncorked them one by one, and used his magic to sprinkle the potions, ointments, and medicinal mists inside the cave. At the same time, he also used his own magic to gradually eliminate the "echoes" left by Ravenclaw in the cave.

While cleaning, Rice also explained to Daphne his reasons for doing so.

However, when he encountered the second battlefield ruins, Rice dismissed the idea—this was going to be a never-ending process. In the past thousand years, Ravenclaw's footprints had covered the entire dungeon, and he had fought countless battles with the monsters sealed within. Even if he cleared them away bit by bit, he might not find Ravenclaw by the start of the second school year!

He then switched to the second option.

Puff puff puff!

Thousands of bats appeared in the underground cavern, and with a wave of his wand, they flew out through several exits of the cavern.

Some of these bats were preyed upon by carnivores in the dungeon, while others fell victim to monsters that broke free of their seals. When the number of bats that had been released dropped to a certain level, Rice would replenish them with another batch.

Shortly after the third batch of bats was released, he suddenly sensed a familiar fluctuation, and in the next moment he locked onto Ravenclaw's location.

Unsurprisingly, she was once again exterminating monsters when Rice's little bat was accidentally caught in the battle and turned to dust.

He hurried toward the place where the bat had last sent the message, but when he was almost there, he stopped and continued to take out various kinds of potions from his pocket.

"Apply all of these, don't leave any out." Rice gestured for Daphne to follow his instructions.

"Odor-eliminating potion, which can eliminate the smell on a person; heat-insulating potion, which will cover the heat emitted by the body after drinking; magic-containing potion, which can help to contain magic power, which can effectively prevent others from observing your existence through magic..." Rice took out five or six kinds of magic potions and had Daphne take them one by one.

He himself doesn't need that many; for example, he doesn't need the potion that helps him conceal his magic power. He has strong control over his magic power and can perfectly disguise himself. Daphne, on the other hand, is still a bit lacking; she's easily detected by powerful beings like Ravenclaw when she's in motion.

After disguising themselves, Rice cast an illusion spell on himself and Daphne before continuing their journey.

Soon, they reached the end of the corridor in front of them. Here, they could sense Ravenclaw's presence without needing any detection methods—because she was fighting a monster that had broken free of its seal.

However, once they got here, Rice refused to let Daphne follow.

He handed a crystal ball to Daphne, fiddled with it for a moment, and the crystal ball displayed the scene he had seen.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

This is the second update. Goodnight everyone! The next update will still be at midnight.

(End of this chapter)