The Wind and the Wings of Hogwarts

“Unfortunately, we’re still broke,” George shrugged. “We’ve spent all the prize money; our whole family went to Egypt over the summer.”

"Egypt? Did you go on an adventure inside the pyramids with Bill?" Scott asked immediately, curious.

Scott and Bill exchanged several letters discussing their ideas on combining transfiguration with runes and spells, and Bill's suggestions gave Scott a lot of inspiration and experience.

Because Bill, as a Gringotts unraveler, often had to risk entering the pyramids to unravel ancient magical artifacts, their communication was infrequent.

"We really want to go."

“But everyone except us opposed the decision, including Bill.”

The twins said with great regret.

George pulled a crumpled letter from his pocket. "This is your letter. Bill asked me to give it to you."

"Thank you." Scott reached out and took it.

“Bill said he’s very impressed with your ideas and research, and he’s also surprised by your progress,” Fred said. “These are some of his new discoveries.”

“Of course, from inside the pyramid,” George said mysteriously.

Scott squeezed the excessively thick letter in his hand and laughed.

It seems Bill's new discovery might surprise him.

Fred then said to Scott, "Mom was amazed when she heard that you could communicate with Bill about magic. She thinks you're more than you ever imagined!"

“Mom wants us to learn from you,” George said, pursing his lips. “She thinks we didn’t get enough O’s on our tests last year.”

"After listening to her, we've decided to carefully consider whether or not we should continue being friends with you!"

"goodbye!"

As they talked, the two of them snatched the bread from in front of Scott, got up, and ran away.

Chapter 278 A Generous Gift from Bill

After a Transfiguration class and a History of Magic class in the morning, Scott waited until after lunch to return to his dormitory before opening the letter from Bill.

The envelope contained only a single sheet of parchment that was actually part of the letter; the rest of the thick stack consisted of Bill's meticulously drawn drawings and some photographs.

Scott quickly finished reading the letter.

Bill, as Gringotts' unraveler, is actually serving the goblins who control Gringotts.

Fairies are inherently greedy and never satisfied, and they always manage to acquire some strange and wonderful magical items. Bill's daily job is to remove the dangerous spells from these magical items.

Egypt has a long history, and the pyramid ruins standing on that land are far more numerous than those discovered by Muggles.

As the tombs of the pharaohs of ancient Egypt, the pyramids were built during a historical period when wizards and Muggles lived together and even served the royal power.

Therefore, ancient shamans must have been involved in the construction of the Egyptian pyramids.

Modern Egyptian sorcerers have discovered that many pyramid ruins contain well-preserved crystallizations of ancient magic, and the greedy fairies, of course, would not let these go to waste.

Of course, compared to fairies, wizards are the rulers of the magical world. Fairies could not bypass the Egyptian wizards to obtain the rights to develop the pyramid ruins.

But the clever fairies chose to cooperate with the Egyptian Ministry of Magic to develop it together.

Leaving aside the complex distribution of interests between the fairies and Egyptian wizards, in short, it is against this backdrop that Bill, as a Gringotts anti-curse breaker, is able to frequently venture deep into the pyramid ruins for exploration.

He witnessed the appearance of many ancient magical artifacts when they were unearthed, and he could also study them for his work.

In this letter, Bill mentioned that the wizards of the Egyptian Ministry of Magic had recently collaborated with Gringotts to open a large pyramid ruin, and he had made quite a few gains from the ruin.

Of course, this gain is not in terms of material wealth, but rather in terms of knowledge and experience.

Those drawings were part of Bill's research material that he generously shared with Scott.

This includes dissected diagrams of some ancient magical artifacts, ancient Egyptian runes hidden in some murals, and even specimens of some unique Egyptian magical animals, all accompanied by photographs of the actual items.

Scott flipped through the drawings and found that they were all drawn in great detail; Bill had even carefully written down his own research findings on the drawings.

This is indeed a great gift.

Scott flipped through the pages with some excitement.

He understood that if he hadn't done the Weasleys a great favor in the Voldemort Diary and Peter Pettigrew incidents, he wouldn't have received such a generous gift from Bill.

Due to time constraints, he only skimmed through the materials, but he still felt that they would be very helpful to him.

He put all the documents into a sturdy file bag, then placed it inside a lizard skin bag and kept it close to his body.

Afterward, he packed up the textbooks and notes he would need for his Defense Against the Dark Arts class and left the dormitory.

But... the first thing Scott heard when he arrived at the common room was Eddie's voice.

"...So if you need anything, feel free to come to me. Here, take this product catalog!"

Eddie was standing in front of several first-year students, handing them booklets one by one.

“Remember, my name is Eddie Cammitchell, a fourth-year Ravenclaw student, and Hogwarts’ most reliable underground merchant!”

Scott tucked his textbook and notebook under his arm, tiptoed behind Eddie, and reached into Eddie's hand to take a booklet and start flipping through it.

The first-year students seemed a little scared when they saw Scott, and quickly turned and ran away.

Scott ignored them and continued flipping through the booklet in his hand.

The booklet's cover only features the Hogwarts crest and contains no text, but the contents inside are quite rich.

The first few pages featured a simple map of Hogwarts, highlighting the routes between the common rooms of the various houses, the Great Hall, and the main classrooms.

Following the map is a school life guide, which thoughtfully summarizes several pages of tips that freshmen might not know.

And then comes the so-called product catalog.

It includes prank gadgets invented by the Weasley twins, potions concocted by Eddie, and even most of the goods from Hogsmeade Village.

"Are you trying to smuggle this?" Scott asked Eddie with a smile.

"Is this smuggling?" Eddie shook his head disapprovingly. "This is clearly personal shopping!"

He said matter-of-factly, "First and second year students can't go to Hogsmeade Village to play, so we, as older students, are thoughtfully providing them with a shopping service!"

"Um……"

Scott smiled noncommittally and flipped to the last page of the booklet.

"What's this."

He looked at that page in the booklet.

[Mysterious arithmetic divination, a service provided by a genius divination master from Ravenclaw!]

[With unparalleled accuracy, he used arithmetic divination to find the Ravenclaw tiara, lost for a thousand years!]

[100% satisfaction rate! To book an arithmetic reading, please contact service agents Eddie Cammitchell, Fred Weasley, or George Weasley.]

"How about it?" Eddie asked Scott smugly. "This is something I came up with with those two Weasleys, though of course, most of it was my idea!"

"..."

Scott glanced at the arithmetic divination ad again and suddenly felt his sophistication had been diminished.

"Is this also your idea?" He shook the booklet in his hand.

"Of course!"

Eddie raised his head, looking like he wanted praise.

“The content up to this point is fine,” Scott said, handing him the booklet with a hint of annoyance. “But I don’t think arithmetic divination services need advertising.”

Eddie looked somewhat surprised.

Scott glanced at him. "I never intended to do fortune telling for too many people, and..."

He lowered his voice, "Most importantly, this destroys the mystery of divination. Haven't I told you all? You can't treat this as a business!"

"Don't worry," Eddie quickly said, "This is our advertisement, it won't involve you. We'll be very strict in vetting it, and we won't grant just anyone's fortune-telling request!"

Scott shook his head. "Too late. Once arithmetic divination was printed in pamphlets, it had already become a commodity."

“That’s alright.” Eddie smiled ingratiatingly, rubbing his hands together. “As long as we can make money, right?”

"What you say makes a lot of sense, but I don't accept it."

Scott gave him a fake smile.

"I have decided to cancel the arithmetic divination service."

Eddie stared at him, dumbfounded. "Oh! You can't do this, Scott. What will we do if you stop offering arithmetic readings?"

Scott smiled. "Of course, you are my friends. If you ask me for help for your 'friends,' especially those 'old friends' who have spent a lot of money here, maybe I'll soften my heart?"

“Oh…” Eddie’s eyes lit up, and he murmured, “Good idea.”

Seeing him deep in thought, Scott patted him on the shoulder and turned to walk into the college library.

Chapter 279 Blake's Teaching Experience

Scott found Helena in the college library, greeted her, and chatted for a few minutes.

After not seeing her for a while, Helena's changes were even more thorough.

She was no longer the cold, unapproachable person she used to be; she was much more friendly towards others.

Since it was already Thursday, Scott and she agreed to meet on Saturday to see the Ravenclaw portrait together.

The House of Requirement has a unique structure, making it impossible for Helena, as a ghost, to enter alone.

Of course, she could ask other students for help, but Helena probably wouldn't be so willing to share her former study.

After saying goodbye to Helena, Scott left the Ravenclaw Tower and arrived at the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom ahead of schedule.

He pushed open the door and found Blake standing alone by the podium.

“Professor Blake,” Scott greeted.

"Hello, you must be Scott Trollope!"

Blake smiled immediately upon seeing Scott and walked up to him, extending his hand.

“At the dinner party last night, I asked Professor McGonagall which one of you was you.”