The Past

Ringing …

The doorbell rang pleasantly as Ivan entered,

In the Dark Arts shop, Alicia was sitting leisurely behind the counter with her hand on her cheek, reading a copy of the Codex. When she noticed Ivan's sour expression, she teased him.

"Well? You weren't frightened by the Dementors, were you?"

As Ivan was uninjured, and only a little dusty from climbing the stairs, Alicia did not notice anything amiss.

"No, I don't think so. I think it might have been scared of me…" Ivan rolled his eyes. A Dementor was hiding in a suitcase.

"Really? Just don't have nightmares at night." Alicia smiled. She didn't believe him. It would have been funny to think of Ivan's horrified face when he first saw the Dementor.

"By the way, Mother, do you know anything about Dean Dougett's past?" Yvonne asked, not bothering to dwell on the subject.

Although he had accepted the money and was hesitant to reveal his battle experience, it did not mean that he could not ask other questions.

"When did you get so interested in him? I thought you used to dislike Headmaster Dougett," said Alicia suspiciously, closing her notebook.

"I was just surprised when someone called him a mad dog," Ivan said.

"Did he seem upset?" Alicia asked, unsurprised.

"Something like that…" said Ivan, thinking of the old witch who had sold him the blood of thestrals.

Ivan didn't understand his subsequent conflict with the goblin. He knew too little, so he wasn't sure if it was because of his last comment about the goblin being a coward or because he had been tricked by the goblin while playing cards.

Alicia thought back for a moment before replying.

"I don't know much about it, except that he was sacked from St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries over a decade ago."

"When Doggett went into Knockturn Alley, he got into a lot of trouble for breaking a wizard's arm with a charm.

More than ten years ago…wasn't that the same woman who became the Deputy Head of St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries in her mid-thirties?

Yvonne was speechless, remembering the pictures and medals she had seen at the Daugats' house. It was hard to imagine how the man had ended up in his current predicament.

Yvonne then proceeded to knock on the door and ask for information about Doggett. Other than the fact that he seemed to be part of the same family as her, the rest of the questions were trivial.

Seeing that he could not get anything out of her, Ivan changed the topic and started gossiping.

"Mother, how did you meet Dean Dougett? I think he seemed to like you…"

"He likes himself more than he likes me!" Alicia snapped back, then eyed the bag of potions Ivan was clutching suspiciously.

"How much did you actually charge him today?"

Alicia's gaze grew more dangerous as she realised Ivan had not returned empty-handed.

"I borrowed a few dozen Galleons, that's all," Ivan said diffidently, then showed the bracelet on his left hand before Alicia could react.

"I thought it might be useful, so I bought it at the Wizarding Market for thirty-five Galleons. It also seems to have ancient runes on it. See if you can fix it or decipher them."

Alicia took the bracelet off Ivan's left hand and examined it for a while.

"What do you think? No loss?" Ivan had always been bitter about it, and he wondered if he'd been conned, as the short wizard had laughed happily when he left the stall.

"The bracelet will break if it is used one more time at most," Alicia said, quickly catching on.

"However, there are some of these runes that even I do not have a record of. They are of great research value. Perhaps I can repair them after I have deciphered what they represent."

"You must be very lucky to get one for thirty-five Galleons," praised Alicia.

"Writing? What's that?" Ivan asked, remembering the wand he was holding and the case containing the Dementors.

Alicia didn't try to hide anything and explained.

In general, a wizarding shop's heritage is the number of magical texts it analyzes and the number of formulas it knows.

The former was the foundation of everything, but to release the magic, one had to arrange it in a certain way.

Normally, magical objects were inscribed with magical runes, which could be damaged if someone attempted to decipher them.

Every new formula was, after all, painstakingly researched by its creator, and was very valuable.

However, there were always exceptions. Magical objects that had been processed in later stages would find it difficult to hide. For example, it would be impossible to disassemble a wand during a modification. The wand could only be engraved on the surface, and the most it could do was to encrypt the magical symbols to make them more difficult to decipher.

Acacia was in a good mood after getting some new runes, and did not mind Ivan borrowing money to buy a bunch of things.

After dinner, which was quite a feast, the first thing Alicia did was to return to the work area with the bracelet in order to analyse the meaning of the runes. She also wanted to inform Ivan that she would be able to learn the basics of the spell formation in two days.

Returning to his room alone, Ivan placed the potions he had purchased in place and then returned to practising the art of the Summoning Guard.

During the previous two battles, Ivan discovered that this blood magic consumed too much magic, especially when materialised and regenerated after a severe injury.

This resulted in a battle that could not be fought more than a few times, and Ivan could only hope that once the level of the Psalter increased, the consumption of magic would be reduced.

However, after practicing for a while, Ivan found that the increase in proficiency was so slow that it was almost stagnant. It seemed that he had to practice with Dementors.

It occurred to Ivan that there were also ancient runes on the Dementor case that Doggett had, which he could study.

At the same time, Ivan was torn as to whether he should tell Alicia about the Wizarding Market, as he thought Doggett was unreliable.

However, how should one put it?

Fortunately, Ivan soon got over it, as it only took a day or two for Doggett's exploits to spread through Knockturn Alley, even to Asia, who had been spending a lot of time in the workspace researching new runes…