Chapter 36: Friendly Exchange With Quirrell【please Keep Reading】
The former Professor of Muggle Studies Quirinus Quirrell stood by the corridor, hands clasped together, as if he had been waiting for a long time. Upon seeing him, he immediately squeezed out an awkward smile: “Professor Levent, are you heading to the Great Hall or back to the office? I have some questions about Muggles I want to ask you about, specifically the psychology knowledge you mentioned before.”
“……”
“Professor Levent?”
“Professor Quirrell, I remember you are also a Professor of Muggle Studies class.”
“I have some Muggle relatives and know some superficial Muggle knowledge, but not in depth. After graduation, I’ve been mixing in the Wizarding World, so I’m not well-versed in deep Muggle knowledge and customs.”
Quirinus Quirrell, hearing him willing to talk, became excited with a trembling voice, no longer stammering.
He had waited several days for this perfect opportunity. Today, that bat had several classes in a row with no time to pester him, and he had swapped a class with Trelawney to carve out this free time.
To smoothly strike up a conversation with Levent, he had specially changed his headscarf before going out today, replacing the herbs inside the headscarf.
Yes, herbs.
The Dark Lord was not an Irish pixie but a wraith constantly emanating an aura of death. With the hope of reviving the Dark Lord to gain power, he offered his body and soul, but unexpectedly, the evil parasitism brought not gold coins and good fortune, but weakness and withering.
The wraith resided in the back of his head, constantly draining the living flesh and magic power. To sustain the wraith, this body had reached the edge of decay, starting to rot and stink; the suppurating pus at the back of the head had to be alleviated with powerful potions.
Quirinus Quirrell could not brew potions and could only apply herbal ingredients, mixing in large amounts of garlic and onion to mask the smell.
The foul odor could be endured, but the sensation of the body continuously decaying could not be ignored. He could clearly feel his skin gradually softening and ulcerating. At night, hiding in the bathroom to clean his body, the blackened, stinking pus made him feel terrified.
Things had developed to this point; the Dark Lord had already taken control of his soul. Quirinus Quirrell didn’t even dare to entertain a thought of regret.
He could only be continuously driven by that voice in his mind.
Quirinus Quirrell followed Melvin upstairs, no longer stammering as much: “I’m very interested in psychology. Last time you talked about some knowledge on fear. I want to overcome my own timidity and cowardice. I want to know how this knowledge can be applied in practice… For example, the theory you used when arranging the room last time, could you explain it to me?”
“Oh, the room arrangement can’t be revealed; that’s something Dumbledore specially instructed…” Melvin wore the smile of a friendly colleague, his gaze lingering on Quirinus Quirrell’s expression and headscarf. “I do have a few books I can recommend to you, just for leisure. You know, psychology knowledge is interesting, but it’s all theoretical and hard to apply in practice.”
Quirinus Quirrell barely squeezed out a smile.
“Look! Just like now!” Melvin stared at his face and said, “Your eyebrows are pressed down, upper eyelids slightly raised, corners of the mouth pulled down. According to psychology, this indicates you feel annoyed and resentful toward me.”
“……”
Quirinus Quirrell’s face instantly stiffened; he neither smiled nor cried, his expression extremely ugly.
“Now avoiding my gaze is a sign of embarrassment and guilt, indicating you’re covering up and evading. Slightly turning your body with stiff arms shows you’re guarding against me…”
Melvin’s string of analyses made Quirinus Quirrell’s expression increasingly ugly. Suddenly, he changed his tone: “But how could that be? We’re just colleagues, and I just started onboarding this year. What is there about me worth your vigilance and wariness?”
“That’s right, that’s right!” Quirinus Quirrell let out a sigh of relief.
“Psychology is like that; much of the knowledge stays at the theoretical stage and lacks practical value.” Melvin said casually, “Muggles can’t do Legilimency anyway, so how would they know others’ true thoughts? By the way, do you know about Legilimency?”
“I… I know.”
Quirinus Quirrell met those pitch-black, profound eyes, a chill rising from his back, his heart trembling.
He instinctively wanted to turn his head away but remembered the earlier analysis, so he tried his best to restrain himself. “I… I have something to do… I’ll go first. We’ll… talk later.”
“Alright, Professor Quirrell. Goodbye, Professor Quirrell.”
“Goodbye.”
Watching his back hurriedly depart, Melvin smiled friendly.
The Philosopher’s Stone…
……
Hogwarts Castle third floor.
Muggle Studies office wooden door locked.
“Hoo…”
A faint sound of wind came from the room.
Fine dust puffed out and scattered from the strip gap at the bottom of the brown wooden door, settling on the ground in front of the office door, forming a layer of floating dust.
Faint silver light flickered through the gap.
This bottle of silver substance was prepared by Wright, referencing the silver mist formula in the Pensieve. It was adjusted according to Melvin’s needs, but without the rune magic circle engraved on the container stone basin, it couldn’t allow entry into memory scenes or vividly experience the sights at the time—though this was exactly what they needed.
In Wright’s letter, he mentioned he was trying to create a mist container, similar to the screen in Muggle terms.
Melvin observed the floating silver mist in the bottle and pulled out the rubber stopper from the bottle mouth.
Tiny light particles drifted out from the glass bottle. Ethereal silvery white mist filled and permeated the entire room, in a state between gas and liquid—light and weightless, flowing almost like liquid, like the mist floating in the Forbidden Forest at dawn.
Drawing out a strand of memory to touch the silvery white mist, silver fluorescence spread like ripples. These formless mists soon displayed the scenes from the memory: Mount Greylock on a midsummer afternoon, with clear, translucent flowing water and tree shades connecting to tree shades, perfectly replicating the memory’s appearance.
However, it couldn’t replicate experiences beyond sight and sound. The picture showed a midsummer afternoon, with the mountain heat dispelled by tree shades and spring water, but in reality, it was early autumn in the Scottish Highlands, already with a touch of coolness.
The subjective recollection in his mind seemed to still feel the coolness of the spring water, somewhat blurred and not very real. Memories are like that—the longer the time, the more hazy they become; images, sounds, tactile sensations all blur, leaving only an emotional perception.
Important, profound memories ferment with time, growing more intense, while some evaporate until nothingness.
Melvin sat behind the desk, quietly pondering.
As a professor at Hogwarts, after three weeks of teaching, his unique Muggle teaching had almost influenced the entire school’s students. Even little wizards who hadn’t taken Muggle Studies class were indirectly affected by classmates or roommates. The seeds planted by Professor Levent had taken root.
He could feel his magic power growing noticeably every moment, weakly but steadily.
Currently, this influence was only spreading among Hogwarts students. Once Wright’s screen design was complete and the plan proceeded as envisioned, the effect achieved might be completely different.
“……”
Melvin came back to his senses and looked at the memory phantom in the room. He reached in to immerse his hand in the spring water, cupping his hands together to carefully scoop a handful of clear water from the memory.
The memory mist was just an image; the mid-air in the real office held only air. Touching the water in the memory was seeking reality in a void illusion—something doomed to have no result even for a wizard.
Yet Melvin did it with particular seriousness, meticulously, the entire process extremely slow, making the action seem somewhat difficult.
It was clearly a simple action any child could do, but he made it seem very strenuous.
“Splash…”
The instant his hands lifted out of the water surface, water splashed, and a faint but real sound rang in the room.
Melvin looked down at his hands. There was no water in his palms, but the backs of his hands were wet, a few water droplets sliding down the back of his hands, cool and a bit itchy.
Water droplets fell on the desk, wetting Wright’s letter paper.
There were many spells that could conjure water out of thin air, but these few drops were not water condensed like clear spring water, nor water created by Transfiguration, but genuine, real water droplets.
Turning false illusions into reality, reaching the deepest mystery of magic’s essence…
Melvin couldn’t help but reveal a smile.
He didn’t need the Philosopher’s Stone; he himself was the Philosopher’s Stone.
