Chapter 34

"Uh..."

Harry found his brains short circuiting as he tried to come up with a suitable excuse as to why he was wearing expensive clothing he had clearly not possessed yesterday. Really, he probably should have thought things through more when he decided to wear his new clothes.

"Um... my parents left me a lot of money, remember?" It wasn't the best excuse he had ever come up with, but at least the statement was true. Why was it so much harder to lie to this girl than it was to lie to an adult? "I just... I thought it would be nice if I had some, well, some nice clothes. You know?"

Harry began to get increasingly nervous as Lisa continued to stare at him, her expression surprisingly blank. Just where had she learned to stare down someone like that anyways?

"You," she determined after an intermittent amount of time, her grip tightening on his arm as she gave him a chilling smile. "Are you going to take me shopping."

Yes, he definitely had not thought everything through when he had decided to wear these clothes.

He could already feel his wallet getting lighter.

XoX

Alchemy was a lot harder than Harry thought it would be. No. That wasn't quite accurate. Harry knew that alchemy would be hard from just listening to Nicolas Flamel's lectures. He just hadn't realized how hard it truly was.

Some things about alchemy were easier than others. For example, Harry had already memorized all of the laws and rules that went into transmutation. He also had the entire periodic table already memorized and could recite the chemicals listed in it, their atomic number, electron configuration, and the recurring chemical properties found within each one.

However, merely understanding the sequence of transmutation and the limitations of Equivalent Exchange was not enough. Just as the processes of "Comprehension, Deconstruction, Reconstruction" and "In order to gain, something of equal value must be lost in return" are cyclical concepts, and the periodic table is simply knowledge, the foundation upon which alchemy was built are none of those. They are simply the laws by which alchemy must abide by.

The real difficulty with alchemical transmutation lay in the creation of symbols known as a Transmutation Circle. A Transmutation Circle could either be drawn on the spot when a transmutation is necessary (in chalk, pencil, ink, paint, blood or even traced in dirt) or permanently etched or inscribed beforehand, but without it, transmutation is generally impossible and all Transmutation Circles are made up of two parts:

The circle itself was a conduit which focused and dictated the flow of magic, allowing an Alchemist to distribute their magic and the matter they wanted to transmute in order to create a transmutation. It represented the cyclical flow of the bodies magical core and turned that power to manipulable ends.

Inside the circle were specific alchemical runes. These runes could vary widely based on ancient alchemical studies, texts and experimentation, but corresponded to a different form of energy, allowing the energy that was focused within the circle to be released in the way most conducive to the alchemist's desired effect. In basic alchemy, these runes would often take the form of triangles (which, when positioned differently, can represent the elements of either water, earth, fire or air), but would often be composed of varying polygons built from different triangles.

For example: the hexagram is a commonly used base rune in Transmutation Circles because it created eight multi-directional triangles when inscribed and can therefore represent all four classical elements at once. Other, more esoteric runes (including astrological symbols, symbolic images and varying lines of text) are prevalent and represent a multitude of other, specific functions for the alchemical energy that was released.

It was incredibly difficult, learning and experimenting with all of the complex and varying differences that can make up a Transmutation Circle. Harry had already made a number of failed attempts at creating a basic alchemical circle.

The reason for this was because Nicolas Flamel would not let him copy the work of others. He wanted Harry's Transmutation Circle to be completely original, using only ideas and concepts from other people's work in his own.

Of course, this was only because there were only so many ideas that could be used when creating what amounted to a basic Transmutation Circle. There were only so many circles that could be created to transmute a specific material.

Flamel had given Harry the knowledge on how to create a Transmutation Circle, but that was all. Now he wanted Harry to put that knowledge to good use under his guidance. He would not help Harry, merely observe and make sure the boy didn't blow himself up.

So far, the only Transmutation Circle Harry had been able to create that was up to par and original was a circle that transmuted wood into a wooden figurine of a bird. A Japanese Wagtail to be precise. The circle itself was basically a large circle with a smaller circle inside of it with a five centimeter radial difference exactly, a square that touched the outer circle, followed by a another square that ran perpendicular to the larger square and touched the smaller circle on four opposite points.

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