Chapter 55

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As Snyde finished telling the tale of the Destined Prince, Helene, who had been looking at the walls, said, "No wonder it took you so long to find the way in, it's pretty elaborate."

Snyde's brain seemed to lag for a moment as she asked, "W-what?"

Helene knocked on the wall, repeating, "The seal. It's strong, and very well hidden. Discovering it must have been no easy task."

Snyde blinked rapidly, confusion and shock etched on her face, "Are you saying you found it?"

Helene looked back at her, and seeing her shocked face, she tried to reassure her, "Oh, I don't mean to diminish your work, finding it was impressive. I knew what I was looking for, so it made my job easier."

That did not seem to help Snyde much as she asked in a dry voice, "Do you know how to open it then?"

Helene shrugged, looking back at the wall, "Sure, not that hard. I suppose the other temple has a few triggers as well, and activating them in the correct sequence and with the precise timing while doing the same here would open the seal. I could also brute force my way through it, but that would lead to some serious damage. I am unfortunately not skilled enough to trick the enchantment into opening normally with only one side of it."

"N-not skilled enough. Sure." Snyde looked lost as if her whole world had been shattered.

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Snyde asked, "I trust you have found all the triggers and the correct combination then?"

Helene looked at her weirdly and said, "How would that even work? The combination is changing randomly every second."

Only then did Helene realize that maybe the team of Curse Breakers did not know as much about the seal as she thought Snyde's eyes widened in shock as she exclaimed, "What?! What are you talking about?"

Helene had her hands on her hips as if she was about to reprimand a child, and she explained, "Only the first trigger doesn't change. Once it is activated, the combination will be locked in, and both sides of the temple will have to complete the sequence to open the seal."

Snyde shared a troubled look with Bilaal, who closed his eyes, concentrating on his link with his brother. Several seconds later, he said, "This is an unexpected hiccup. Our information told us of a set combination, not an ever-shifting one. Prof- I mean, Rakepick is going to need some time to analyze it."

Helene frowned and said, "Once the first trigger has been activated, we only have ten seconds to complete the sequence. She needs to be fast. How is her ability to control her magic?"

Snyde looked a little panicked while Bilaal was hard at work communicating with his brother.

While Helene spoke with Rakepick through the twins, Ethan asked Snyde, "That slip up. You were about to call Rakepick something else."

Snyde, who was looking stressed, eyed Ethan with a strange emotion, before releasing a breath, "It's just a habit I never lost. She used to be my Professor at Hogwarts, and I sometimes still call her Professor. Habits die hard."

Ethan wasn't surprised she had gone to Hogwarts, she looked British, and unlike in some other corners of the world, Hogwarts was the only school in the British Isles. The only official one, at least.

It was an interesting titbit that might suggest at a closer relationship between the two Curse Breakers than he thought. Maybe with Bill Weasley as well, since he seemed to be around the same age as her.

While Bilaal was relaying some information to his brother, Helene took a look at her son and said, "Ethan, try to find the seal."

Although surprised by the sudden exercise, Ethan shrugged before approaching one of the walls, brushing his palm against it as he extended his magical sense.

The magical sense was not a widely known concept, although everyone technically had it. Ethan believed it had three layers, or he had reached the third at least.

The first layer was instinctive. A magical object might not show any signs of being magical, but any wizard would be able to tell it was magical unless it had an enchantment that helped it hide its true nature.

But this was not a real sense, because the wizards couldn't consciously sense this magic, they would simply have a feeling in the back of their head.

The second layer was to become capable of harnessing this instinct turn it into a real sense, and develop a real magical sense. This started with sensing the magic within oneself.

As surprising as it might sound, many wizards were completely incapable of sensing their magic and were thus only capable of manipulating it through external means, be it incantations, sheer will, or others. One had to try to reach this layer, and since most forms of magic, including nearly all charms, did not require it, most people remained on the first layer.

This second layer was also the first step towards controlled wandless magic and generally made using magic easier. Ethan achieved it when he was four years old.

The third layer, the one Ethan was on, came after years of meditation and constant training in his ability to manipulate his magic, and that was to extend his magical sense outwards.

It was easy to sense the magic within oneself because it was part of themselves. Extending that magical sense outwards, however, was very hard.

Ethan was capable of it, and it mainly took two forms. One was passive, and it was his instinct for magic that had been strengthened. Essentially, it was still the same magical instinct as in the first layer but sharpened.

The other form, the active form, was the ability to extend the magical sense of the second layer out of his body. Ethan was getting pretty good with it, so much so that he did not even need to be in contact with an object to sense it. As long as it was within a meter of his body, he could extend his magical sense to it and sense it.

This third layer, Ethan believed very few people in the world possessed it. One person he knew for sure had it was his mother, but it was hard to tell because it wasn't a systemized practice. Ethan had systemized it by breaking it down into layers, but to most people, the notion of magical sense was completely foreign.

Ethan was pretty sure he was onto something though, and that mainly stemmed from his mother, whom he thought might be on the fourth layer, or the verge of it, and that would be omnidirectional sensing.

When he used his magical sense, Ethan had to consciously manipulate this sense and extend it in one direction. The logical next step would thus be to extend that distance, and following that, make it omnidirectional.

Extending the distance of his magical sense came with practice, it was a matter of quantity, but turning the sense into an omnidirectional one was a quality problem, which was why he deemed it to be the fourth layer.

And from his observations, his mother had reached it. He also believed that it was one of the requirements to reach her level in Runes.

As for the fifth layer… well, Ethan did have an idea of what it could be, but it was futile to think about it before even knowing whether the fourth one was even possible. Still, whether it was for the future fifth layer, the fourth layer, or even to simply improve onto the third layer, he would need to do some research.

Meaning he would have to read books, something that never failed to dampen his enthusiasm. Fortunately, he wasn't a child, and he might not like it, but he would still do it. It was just like his school books. He didn't like to do so, but he still read them all during his first year, including those from the subjects he did not like, and he well intended to do the same for his other years.

Tangents aside, Ethan stopped in his tracks as his magical sense bumped into something. Something his instinct had failed to pick up before, and which had escaped Curse Breakers and historians for so many years.

The seal.