#142 - Incapacitating Spell

“I must say, truly worthy of Slytherin? You should be happy, he's a credit to your house.” After Dumbledore made a joke, he added, “This also proves that he at least knows what he can and cannot do, which is a commendable quality.”

“I can't stand talents like that, as long as he doesn't cause me any trouble.” Snape retorted insincerely, but the faint joy that flashed in his eyes was still caught by Dumbledore.

“Anyway, try to keep an eye on Anduin. After what happened to Lily and the Longbottoms, who are very close to him, I've been a little worried that he might lose control. But it seems that Anduin can still control his emotions.” Dumbledore, with his many years of magical experience, knew how much of an impact drastic emotional changes could have on a wizard.

Hearing Dumbledore mention Lily's name, Snape's face immediately darkened. He responded with a perfunctory 'hmph' and turned to leave the office.

Dumbledore could only shake his head helplessly at the sight.

The next month passed peacefully.

Since those pure-blood wizards had yielded, and Yaxley, the seventh-year prefect and head boy, had run away, the atmosphere in Slytherin had also changed greatly. In addition, Velen had a good reputation among most of the half-blood wizards, and under his initiation, the Pure-Blood Committee was abolished, and the confiscated Muggle items were returned.

Those pure-blood wizards didn't dare to have any objections at this time. After all, the leader was gone, and Anduin was suppressing them from the side. Now, the original pure-blood little wizards basically went around Anduin when they saw him, even Travers, who was originally the most eager.

Without anyone to cause trouble, the academy returned to its former calm, and Vivian's mahjong club reopened, with everyone having a blast in the common room every day.

However, although the internal academy was calm, external conflicts were still fierce. In the most recent Quidditch match, Gryffindor and Slytherin turned it into an armed brawl again, and the animosity between the two houses was very strong. Those pure-blood little wizards vented the suffering they endured from Anduin on Gryffindor, and the prank incidents between the two houses were almost constant.

But none of this concerned Anduin. He was recently troubled by a newly developed charm. The freezing charm he used during the battle in Hogsmeade gave him a lot of inspiration, so he used this as a basis, combined with the knowledge accumulated from studying temperature magic and magic-driven magic, to develop a new charm with a special function.

He named this new charm the 'Disabling Charm'.

He integrated the principles of hypothermia and magic flow, and reconstructed a charm that could actively cause people to lose their magic.

In his vision, wizards or magical items that were subjected to this charm would gradually lose their magic over time, until they completely lost their physical and magical power.

In fact, his initial idea was to develop an 'Energy Absorption Charm' that could absorb the magic of others for his own use, but this seemed to involve a lot of knowledge of bloodline magic, which was currently a blind spot in his knowledge. The information submitted by those little wizards did contain a lot of content about bloodline magic, but the accumulation was still insufficient, so he first created a simplified version.

But now the trouble is that this charm is difficult to test and experiment with, mainly because there is no test subject. He has already done charm tests on magical items, and now he is only lacking the living part. Since it is disabling, he must find an object with magic. Ordinary small animals are not suitable, and as for magical animals, the smaller ones don't have enough magic reserves to be easily observed, and he can't find the larger ones. There are many magical creature populations on the periphery of the Forbidden Forest, but Hagrid is responsible for guarding them, and he doesn't want to embarrass Hagrid.

In fact, the ideal test subject is a wizard, but it's okay to use acquaintances for training-related research experiments. Even if it's not successful, it can at least strengthen the body. Testing charms is risky, and he's a little hesitant. It's even more impossible to test it on himself. The scene of him testing the infrasound curse before is still vivid in his mind. He has learned his lesson.

Just as he was in trouble, someone knocked on the door of the dormitory. Anduin retracted his thoughts and opened the door, only to find Velen.

“Anduin, don't stay cooped up in your room all day. Today is the weekend. Vivian and I have agreed to go to Hogsmeade to relax. Why don't you come with us?” Velen was in a good mood recently. With the pure-bloods gone, he could go back to being a Seeker on the Quidditch team.

Anduin pondered for a while, thinking that it would be good to relax and change his mood, so he nodded in agreement.

Since resolving the Yaxley issue, Anduin could move around outside the school relatively safely, but he was used to locking himself up and doing research, so he hadn't really visited Hogsmeade.

After the three of them gathered, they walked out of Hogwarts. The weather was still cold at this time. Stepping on the heavy snow, the cold wind whistled against their faces, invigorating their spirits.

Along the way, Vivian chattered and introduced Hogsmeade to Anduin, listing every shop like a treasure, which annoyed Anduin. This even made him miss the taciturn Vivian that Millie had disguised as. And after arriving in Hogsmeade, Vivian started introducing everything again like a broken record.

“Look, that's Zonko's Joke Shop. Last time I bought a dozen burping sweets for Charles. I should have let you see him embarrass himself. And there's Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop. Although the decorations inside are a bit tacky, the drinks are very good.” Vivian almost repeated what she had said on the way.

While strolling around with Vivian, Anduin seemed to have discovered something and walked straight in one direction. Vivian and Velen were a little confused and followed after exchanging glances.

Anduin walked to the corner of a road in Hogsmeade. In front of him was a dilapidated house that looked like a bar.

“What's wrong? What are you doing here? You don't want to go in, do you?” Vivian looked at the broken bar with a look of disgust, and then explained, “This is the Hog's Head Inn. The owner inside is a weirdo, and it's dirty and smelly. Everyone inside is mysteriously covering their faces. I'm telling you, I'm not going in.”

Anduin came to this bar not to spend money, but because he felt that the bar looked very familiar, and it also evoked his past memories. He remembered that before Christmas in his first year, he and Sirius had attended a secret meeting of the Order of the Phoenix, which was in a dilapidated storage room, and the style of that place was very similar to this bar.