11 Chapter 11: The Essence of Magic

After the conversation with William and Eleana on Christmas night, Bell stopped worrying about these things. He believed that his parents could handle them better than himself.

Bell devoted himself to spending time with his younger sister at home. As for William's requests to take Bell to attend banquets later, they were mostly rejected by Bell. Only for some important events where refusal was not possible, Bell would reluctantly attend, bringing Shanna along.

Unconsciously, more than half a year had passed since the Christmas banquet. Although Bell was busy playing with his sister every day, during his leisure time, he would diligently study magical knowledge and practice spell casting.

After such a long period of study and contemplation, Bell also developed his own understanding of magic and spells.

In many magical books, Bell had come across a question: "What is the essence of magic?"

Many powerful wizards had deeply pondered this question, yet no one had ever arrived at a clear answer.

Bell found this very puzzling. It seemed like such a simple question, so why did they make it so complicated? What else could the essence of magic be?

Suppose someone asked you, "What is the essence of humanity?"

Certainly, the answer could not be "repeating machine," much less "smells good."

To answer this question, you just need to hand the person a mirror, let them look at it themselves. What? They can't understand? Then there's no hope for them. The brain isn't really a good thing; once you give it up, you can be very happy!

So, the essence of magic is, of course, "magic"! Or to be more detailed: it is a kind of power called "magic."

And wizards are the humans who control this power.

In Bell's view, what is known as a wizard is not the same as the sorcerers described in novels and anime from his previous life. Likewise, magic is not the same as mana, spiritual power, elemental power, or arcane power used by sorcerers in the conventional sense.

If one were to find a similar force from Bell's memories, perhaps magic would be closer to... the Force?

When Bell uses magic, he doesn't need to construct any spell models, communicate with external elemental energies, or even consciously manipulate the magic within his body.

All he needs to do is to clarify his own thoughts, strengthen his beliefs, and convey them to the magic within his body. Then the magic will respond to his request and fulfill it.

This is why many spells require wizards to have strong emotions when casting them.

For example, Transfiguration, it can be said to be the simplest and most complex magic that wizards encounter. In the first chapter of the Transfiguration textbook for first-year students at Hogwarts, "A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration," the content discussed is how to turn a matchstick into a needle.

It is obviously unrealistic to expect a group of 11-year-old wizards to analyze the structure of wood, sulfur, metal, and perform transfiguration. So how is transfiguration achieved?

Bell didn't know. All he knew was that it just happened.

Casting Transfiguration is actually quite simple. As long as you have the concept of "needle" in your mind and recall this concept while casting Transfiguration, you can transfigure the matchstick into a needle.

But whether it succeeds or not is not guaranteed. And even if the transfiguration succeeds, the speed of the transfiguration will be very slow. As for the needle produced in the end, its material cannot be guaranteed, and even the needles transfigured twice may have different shapes and materials.

To increase the success rate of transfiguration and speed up the process, one must have a more detailed understanding of the concept of a "needle."

Just pick up a needle, touch it, lick it, look at it, poke yourself a few times.

As long as you poke deep enough, the success rate and speed of transfiguration will be greatly improved. This is because the ideas received by magic become more accurate.

Of course, the best way to improve transfiguration is to analyze the structure and properties of the "needle" with magic, and then imprint the results firmly in your mind. In that case, you can ensure that you can transfigure an identical needle in an instant.

However, this is not easy. At least with Bell's current level, even if it's just a small "needle," he cannot completely analyze it, and further strict training is needed.

In Bell's rudimentary understanding: "Learning Transfiguration is to analyze the world, while learning spells is to refer to the experiences and lessons summarized by predecessors." Therefore, if a wizard wants to become powerful, they must constantly use magic.

At the same time, Bell also discovered the reason why wizards must use wands to cast spells: "Magic can only receive the thoughts of wizards within the wizard's body."

For magic to fulfill a wizard's wish, it must undergo changes in form and nature. For example, if a wizard wants to summon flames, magic must change according to the wizard's understanding of the concept of "flames." And this process must take place within the wizard's body.

Wizards are not fire-breathing dragons, so flames appearing inside their bodies would obviously not be wonderful. Therefore, wizards need wands to help cast spells.

Wands can be seen as an extension of a wizard's body. Wizards can transfer the transformation process, which should have occurred inside the body, to the wand, so many spells can be successfully cast.

To perform wandless magic, at least one of the following two conditions must be met.

First, strong control over magic.

Even if magic undergoes transformation within the body, it can avoid harming the body through precise control over magic.

Second, a strong body.

Here, strength does not refer to physical strength or agility, but rather the tolerance and adaptability to magic.

As wizards continue to use magic, it will draw magic to flow continuously within the body. The flowing magic will passively strengthen the wizard's body. When this strengthening accumulates to a certain extent, even if magic undergoes transformation within the body, it will no longer harm the body.

Due to his experiences in the past few years, Bell's control over magic had surpassed that of most wizards. Next, he just needed to continue training every day. So, Bell focused on strengthening his body. Passive strengthening was too slow and too passive; he decided to actively promote the strengthening of magic to his body, and this would also be his main research direction in the future.

"Brother... Brother..."

Shanna's call interrupted Bell's thoughts.

The siblings were in Shanna's room. Bell was sitting on the floor reading a book, and Shanna was quietly leaning against Bell, playing with a stuffed bear. This had become their daily routine, everything seemed so warm.

"What's wrong, Shanna?"

Bell affectionately rubbed Shanna's head, completely unconcerned about being interrupted.

"The little bear's head came off."

Pouting, Shanna handed the stuffed bear to her brother.

Bell took the stuffed bear. It looked like the head of the stuffed bear had been accidentally twisted off.

Picking up his wand, Bell used the technique of non-verbal spellcasting to cast a repair spell, and after reattaching the head of the stuffed bear, he handed it back to Shanna.