[1989 Pt.11]

[Hogwarts Castle Grounds.]

Nathan had been back from Christmas vacation for two days, and he had already begun practising magic fervently again the day had returned. He was already starting to finish fourth-year material and develop magical niches for himself, mastering all sorts of intermediate transfiguration spells and charms.

Nathan shivered as he felt the cold winter winds even as he jogged in the early morning of December.

"Bloody hell, I didn't know that it would be this bloody cold in the morning," Alan had decided to join Nathan so that he could also get into better shape.

'Probably to impress Tonks,' Nathan thought in amusement as he recalled how Alan smiled bashfully with a red face whenever Tonks smiled at him. Nathan couldn't help but remember his own first crush as a teenager in his previous life with a wistful smile.

"Grey, do you take some sick pleasure from my pain? Slow down you discount-veela!" Alan's pale face looked like a tomato as he gasped to breathe in as much air as he could.

"W-what?!" Nathan was so dumbfounded by the statement that he couldn't even ask Alan to elaborate on the insult.

Alan shivered from the cold even as he answered, "W-what? You have the white hair, blue eyes and the good looks that Veela have."

Nathan deadpanned as he regulated his own breathing to slow down before saying, "Veela are a completely female race, you dimwit. There are no male veela, Waynewood."

Alan frowned before suddenly his gaze pointedly dropped down to look at Nathan's crotch making Nathan grit his teeth before saying, "I am not a girl either!"

Alan nodded before saying, "I believe you, Grey," even as he kept taking glances at Nathan's crotch.

Nathan took in a deep breath and decided that arguing with an eleven-year-old kid, no matter how perceptive the boy in question was, would only lead to Nathan ending up more annoyed than before.

"Let's run to the entrance hall."

Nathan smirked as he heard Alan scramble to catch up to him. Alan was very prideful and his pride pushed him to keep up with Nathan no matter how much he cursed.

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[Great Hall, Hogwarts.]

Jacob and Orion took the seats opposite to the ones occupied by Nathan and Alan before Jacob looked at Alan and said, "You look like you're about to faint."

Orion added, "Maybe you should see Madame Pomfrey. She can give you the Pepper-up potion the third years were talking about."

"I'm fine," Alan replied. "It's just my first day exercising heavily, so my body is aching."

Nathan grinned. "It's your fault for trying to keep up with me on the first day of your training."

Alan growled but kept his calm. The four boys ate in silence for a while.

Nathan stuck to his diet of high-fiber and high-protein foods, along with water. Alan skipped the meat and went for eggs and pumpkin juice. Jacob ate toast, and Orion focused on sandwiches.

"Hey, are you all done with your Transfiguration assignment?" Nathan asked.

They all nodded as they ate.

Orion swallowed his sandwich and asked, "What about you?"

"I finished it the day we got it."

"I never saw you in the common room. Did you finish it in the library?" Jacob asked.

Nathan nodded. "I like a quiet environment when I do assignments. It helps me focus."

Jacob sighed. "Transfiguration is so difficult. It takes me a day to get just one spell down. Charms are so much easier. I can learn two or even three spells in a single day."

"Why's that?" Alan asked in a confused tone.

"Everyone isn't good at everything," Orion replied to Alan, "I'm good at Transfiguration and Charms, but I can't brew potions to save my life. You're great at Potions."

"I thought it was because of Snape's presence," Alan fake-whispered to Nathan, "His fear of that bat makes him make mistakes."

Nathan smirked before saying, "Don't talk about a teacher like that at the house table. If you get caught, you'll lose points. And what about Herbology? You nearly got strangled by the Devil's Snare."

"It was one time," Alan growled.

"And what about the Burning Pepper that bit your finger because you weren't wearing your dragonhide gloves?"

Alan winced in phantom pain. Nathan felt a bit guilty for reminding him. A bite from the burning pepper felt like it was burning for quite some time.

Orion cut off the words Alan was about to say and said, "What about you? You don't seem to struggle in any class."

Nathan decided to test their ability to keep a secret. "Don't tell anyone else, but I got my wand when I was ten. I've been learning magic for the past year."

He wasn't worried about this secret hurting him. He was more interested in seeing how his friends would react.

Nathan's friends were stunned. They exchanged glances, then looked back at him with disbelief.

"You've been learning magic for a year?" Jacob asked looking surprised, "How?"

Nathan smirked before saying, "My parents trusted me to act responsibly."

Jacob deflated before saying, "I asked Dad to get me my wand early too but he said that I couldn't practise alone."

"Why not ask your mother to help you learn?" Alan's question made Jacob's face darken, before he said, "My mother was murdered by death eaters during one of their terrorist attacks."

Nathan, despite his mental age, twitched at the sheer venom that Jacob's voice held as he spat the last words out. He couldn't help but feel sorry for the boy.

Alan winced as in the past two months even he had heard about the Civil War and the Dark Lord.

"Sorry Jacob," Alan really looked sorry for bringing the topic up and Jacob seemed to pick up on the genuine intent behind the apology as he nodded.

Nathan kept quiet even as he realised that Jacob would be the easiest person to turn to his side in the event of the return of Voldemort.

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[Hogwarts Castle Grounds.]

Nathan found himself walking towards the cliff he had marked for enchantments and warding.

He could see the sun over the horizon of the murky waters of the black lake that slowly hit the bottom of the cliffs in small waves. He checked the Map and was happy to see that he did not have any unwanted spectators for what he was about to do.

He turned around before estimating the area he planned on enchanting and pulled out his Aspen-Spruce wand before making a measured slash from it and incanting, "Defodio Vulnura."

A yellow beam of magic erupted from his wand, arcing through the air and striking the ground a few meters in front of him. The beam gouged a perfect arc into the soil, creating a boundary between the cliff and the Hogwarts grounds.

"That should do it," Nathan said to himself. He walked over to the arc and pulled a small pouch from his robe pocket. Inside the pouch were tiny aspen seeds.

Nathan slowly scattered the seeds over the upturned soil, so that they would grow into a thick boundary of trees between the cliff and anyone who might approach it from land.

He had chosen to plant aspen trees for the boundary of his sanctuary for four specific reasons. First, they had magical properties. Second, their smooth trunks were perfect for engraving runes, without the need for magic or harming the trees themselves. Third, Nathan's wand was made of aspen wood, and the trees held a symbolic meaning for him. And fourth, the eye-catching yellow colour of the aspen trees would stand out in stark contrast to the deep green, almost black trees that were typical of the cold Scottish landscape.

Nathan then pointed at the arc again and started incanting other charms that would help the trees sustain themselves without much provision of nutrition on Nathan's part and also so that they grow faster than they normally would.

Once he was done with casting botanical charms, Nathan fished out another small pouch and opened it to pull out one of the many small gems it held.

The gem was nothing more than a diamond taken from the ROR on which Nathan had performed two basic alchemical bestowals and another basic blood ritual.

Nathan did not like alchemy or rituals due to their primal and unpredictable nature which used intent engraved in alchemical symbols and nature, respectively. Spellcasting and runes, on the other hand, used intent engraved in languages to enact magic.

Alchemy was the use of alchemical circles and bestowals to add an aspect of an alchemical symbol into an object. Nathan was surprised to learn from 'Theophrastus' Guide To Modern Alchemy' that he and Paracelsus Von Hohenheim agreed that the wand spellcasting system could be very limiting despite the Emrys Method allowing for the creation of new intent. However, they had taken very different approaches to solving the same problem.

Nathan wanted wand magic to be more flexible and smoother so that he could use it for combat, while Paracelsus wanted his magical system to be more uniform and systematic so that it could be used and learned more easily.

Paracelsus was an unparalleled genius when it came to magic, who used his knowledge to engrave special runic symbols that he termed Alchemical Symbols and then somehow engraved their intent on nature itself allowing them to do things that no runic language could achieve. There are even conspiracy theories that Paracelsus was so gifted in Modern Alchemy that he created a Philosopher's Stone using Modern Alchemy solely.

Similarly, Ritualistic magic was powerful, but it was dangerous due to the disastrous consequences of failed rituals. Modern alchemy was much safer, although more rigid to use.

Modern alchemy is considered the most uniform system of magic in the world, surpassing its precursor, pure alchemy, and rituals when it comes to adding permanent magical properties into non-magical objects and materials safely and consistently. Pure alchemy was the use of runes and rituals to bind the properties of magical beings and spells onto objects in a way that made those properties intrinsic to the object's existence. Goblins and Dwarves are the foremost non-human experts of Pure Alchemy while Nicolas Flamel is the best human expert that is alive. Dumbledore was supposedly more skilled in Modern Alchemy in comparison to Older Counterpart.

The diamond Nathan had pulled out was something akin to a wardstone he had created after drawing inspiration from popular fiction and media since the wizarding world did not use stones to anchor wards to a place and rather enchanted a place itself.

"Let's start with connecting the gem to the boundary."

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A|N: Some of you have asked who is the female main character, it is Fleur Delacour.

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