Chapter 22 Opening Pandora’s Spell Box for the First Time

Although the plan to visit was temporarily terminated, this matter was nevertheless kept in Andy's mind.

From this book, it could be seen that Pandora Lovegood is an expert in spells, and she studied spells in depth.

Her ideas seemed to be a bit fanciful compared to others, but they fit Andy's understanding of magic extremely well.

If he could get the research materials she left behind, he believed that it would be of great help to him.

After finishing (sleeping through) a History of Magic class, that day's classes ended for the Ravenclaw.

From now on, until lights out at 8:00 pm, all the time is free to move around.

"Andy, want to go to the library?" Hermione suggested as she gathered her notes.

There were so many books in the library waiting for her to indulge in, it would be rude not to go and read them.

"Let's go tonight!"

"I'm going to write home and then find an unoccupied classroom to practice spells." Andy organized his textbooks, waved his wand to shrink them with a Shrinking Charm, and put them in the pocket of his wizarding robe.

Hermione was silent for a moment.

She had wanted to go straight to the library, but after seeing Andy skilfully casting spells, she suddenly realized that practising magic is clearly necessary as well.

However, the young witch was a bit thin-skinned and wasn't quite comfortable taking the initiative to ask.

"Want to come together?" Andy invited.

"Yeah!" Hermione made a reluctant expression and nodded after a moment of hesitation.

After writing a letter home, Andy brought Hermione to an abandoned classroom on the fifth floor of the castle.

"How are we going to practice?" Hermione looked around and took out her wand, but wasn't sure what she should do next.

Although she had used spells at home, they were basically superficial, not studied in depth or practised deliberately.

"Practicing magic is certainly not about waving your wand around foolishly."

Andy was very experienced in this area, "First you need to be skilled in using magic, then you should aim and hit a fixed target, next is a moving target, and lastly, you should improve the proficiency of your spells."

"Proficiency?" The first few parts of training were understandable, but improving proficiency in spells...Hermione didn't quite understand.

"Hmm...how do I explain this?"

Andy thought for a moment and waved his wand and softly recited, "Incendio!"

A fire burst forth from the tip of the wand, which formed a ball of fire, and it flew around the classroom under Andy's control before eventually losing its magical support and extinguishing in the air.

"Is this what you call proficiency?"

Hermione was able to use this magic as well, but she could only send a fire sprouting from her wand, and if she couldn't attach it to an object, the fire would soon die out.

"Hm!"

Andy explained, "It's not just the Fire-Making Charm, other magic spells can actually be controlled with our thoughts as well."

"When I was a kid, I followed my parents to see wizard duelling competitions, and those powerful wizards would often use some kind of combined magic spells - such as using Transfiguration to make the flames take on a certain form."

Hermione was clearly interested, "So what should I do now?"

"Let's start with the simplest Wand-Lighting Charm, you'll have to try and throw the light from the tip of your wand."

Andy said, "If you can do that, the later exercises will be much easier."

"I see."

Hermione nodded and then asked, "So what do you want to practice?"

"I want to try to incorporate emotions into magic, like this..."

Andy said as he waved his wand.

"Petrificus Totalus!"

"It's a normal Full Body-Bind Curse," Andy explained.

Calming down a bit, Andy tried to fantasize that there was someone really annoying in front of him.

"Petrificus Totalus!" Andy recited the incantation.   

Hermione facepalmed, "It doesn't seem to make a difference."

"Of course, it's very difficult, or maybe I'm not using the right emotion."

After saying that, Andy fell into deep thought.

Seeing this, Hermione didn't disturb Andy and ran alone to the corner of the classroom to practice the technique of throwing the Wand-Lighting Charm out.

The Full Body-Bind Curse is the simplest attack-type magic spell that even first-year wizards, uh... a first-year wizard of Hermione's calibre, can master.

The Full Body-Bind Curse is white magic, and using the Full Body-Bind Curse requires a desire to attack besides the incantation and gestures for it to be effective.

'Is it because my emotions aren't strong enough?'

'But it's really hard to control something like emotions, fake is fake and can never be real.'

Andy recalled the contents of the book.

The book, Modern Spell Theory, mentioned that wizards could boost the power of their spells under extreme emotions.

So...was it the extreme emotions that mattered, or the unstable magic power that came with the extreme emotions?

Just like how a little wizard can do what his heart desires when his magic power flares up.

Perhaps both were equally important!

Andy tried to understand magic from the perspective of the world.

There is no doubt that Harry Potter is a children's book, which is all about love and friendship.

The only reason Harry survives Voldemort's killing curse is because of his mom's love for him.

And love itself is an emotion, a power that belongs to the mind.

Putting aside the fairy tale attributes of the story itself, let's go back to reality.

Harry's mom is obviously a great mother, in the face of the powerful and unstoppable Voldemort, in desperation, she turned her love for her son into a powerful protective magic and eventually succeeded in rebounding Voldemort's killing curse.

But casting magic always requires magic power.

Not only that, in that situation, Harry's mom obviously couldn't have been holding a wand and reciting some kind of protective spell on Harry.

She was casting without a wand!

'Perhaps it was love underneath the despair that caused some unknown change in her magic.'

It was like an Obscurial born out of extreme negativity from the little wizard.

Of course, it was difficult to pull off!

No one can make themselves produce some kind of extreme emotion without going through all of this.

But Andy happened to be an exception.

Because Andy had actually died once.

Not only had Andy died once, but he had also experienced what it was like to lose the world, to lose his loved ones, and to lose his friends.

Andy recalled those memories that he had forced himself to forget.

"Petrificus Totalus!"

Whoosh!

The magic power in Andy's body seemed to sense Andy's mood, and the magic power that had gradually stabilized began to boil.

A beam of magical light shot out from the tip of the wand, hitting a table within the abandoned classroom at an extremely fast speed.

The table was visibly petrified by Andy's spell.

"You did it?" Hermione looked at Andy with a face full of surprise, as if she had discovered a new continent.

She originally didn't believe in Andy's bullshit.

Saying something about incorporating emotions into magic - it wasn't even written that way in the book.

But the Full Body-Bind Curse Andy had just used was clearly much more powerful than before.

----

Thanks for all your love and support.

Read advance chapters on P@treon. If you have some extra pocket money, Support me at P@treon: www.p@treon.com/Crazy_Cat.

Happy Reading!!!