[Kasenhis: Regarding the end of the previous chapter..... Please temporarily suffer a bout of amnesia, everyone.]
Many thanks...
.....
By evening, the four members of the little drinking group clearly had no appetite left.
An entire afternoon of drinking had been more than enough for them.
As a result, dinner consisted of nothing more than some of Kasenhis's universal milk.
The milk could remove the negative effects of drunkenness, but it couldn't solve the problem of having drunk so much that they no longer felt like eating.
That was beyond the scope of milk's responsibilities.
The group only picked at a few vegetables before dragging their exhausted bodies back to their respective rooms to sleep, preparing to greet a new day tomorrow.
The next day, Kasenhis still didn't have much of an appetite.
Looking across the table at the Weasley twins sitting opposite him, he couldn't help feeling a little impressed.
Originally, the two had planned to temporarily leave school midway through their seventh year and head out to make money.
The awkward part was that they turned out to be exceptionally talented at learning enchanting techniques.
As a result, they had remained at Hogwarts all the way through the final exams.
Even during the half month Kasenhis had been trapped by Voldemort, the twins had not secretly pulled off some grand stunt and dropped out.
Thinking of this, Kasenhis leisurely asked,
"By the way, you two have graduated now. Do you have any dreams you'd like to pursue in the future?"
Hearing Professor Kasenhis bring this up, the Weasley twins immediately realized he was setting them up for a coordinated exchange and eagerly played along.
"We're planning to open a shop. It might be a combination of a joke shop and a custom enchanting business."
Mrs. Weasley frowned.
"Custom enchanting sounds reasonable enough, but a joke shop... does that really have a future?"
Kasenhis immediately spoke up in support of the twins.
"Actually, it's not a bad idea at all. The joke shops in Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade have always done very good business."
"That's exactly it. I'm not really worried about the joke shop itself. What I'm concerned about is whether they're cut out for business. Do they have what it takes to compete with other joke shops? And..."
Mrs. Weasley looked at the twins.
"Where exactly are you planning to open this shop? Some random remote corner?"
Kasenhis shook his head.
"Because of Voldemort, shops in Diagon Alley actually aren't that expensive right now. At least, when I was walking around there recently, I saw a shop sell for only three digits. I think it was just a little over six hundred Galleons. Buying an entire storefront for that amount is a pretty good deal."
Mr. and Mrs. Weasley exchanged a glance before sighing helplessly.
"If we'd known that, we should've saved more money earlier."
"Then we wouldn't be in a situation where we can't come up with any money now..."
The couple's expressions were filled with helplessness and regret, mixed with a trace of guilt.
"This time, Mum and Dad have let you down."
It was the first time the twins had ever seen such emotions on their parents' faces, and they immediately became flustered.
Without thinking, they pulled out all the money they had earned through their various business ventures over the past seven years.
"No, no, that's not necessary. We actually have a little money of our own."
"This should be... around four hundred Galleons. We can also sell our old textbooks to a bookshop. After all, we're outstanding Hogwarts students. Getting twenty Galleons for them shouldn't be a problem."
"Let me see... This watch was a bribe given to me by an alchemist before. The materials are extremely valuable, with plenty of gemstones and gold inside. You can take it to Gringotts and exchange it for some money."
Seeing that the twins had already managed to save up four hundred Galleons on their own, Mr. Weasley suddenly saw a glimmer of hope.
As for the remaining two hundred Galleons, surely a family as large as theirs could scrape that together somehow.
Without hesitation, he removed the watch from his wrist.
"Oh, and we still have two rolls of very fine enchanted Moonstar silk in the cupboard. We should be able to sell those to Twilfitt and Tatting's for a decent price."
Mrs. Weasley quickly added her support.
The other Weasley family members seated at the table also began contributing.
Charlie, Bill, and Percy all pulled out their wallets.
Between the various adults, another hundred or so Galleons were quickly gathered together.
"With this many Galleons, we should be close. Once we sell the watch and the silk, it ought to be enough."
Mr. Weasley said with a relieved sigh.
"Perhaps... it should be enough."
The Weasley twins stared at the small mountain of Galleons before them.
In all their lives, this was the first time they had ever seen so much money...
The gold they had seen in Kasenhis's office didn't count.
In any case, their startup capital had suddenly been assembled.
Although this method could fairly be described as emptying the entire family's wallets...
Including the twins' own contributions, that made six wallets in total.
Throughout the entire process, none of the other people seated at the table—Kasenhis, Sirius, Harry, Dumbledore, Grindelwald, the Longbottom family, the Diggory family, or the other members of the Order of the Phoenix—were socially oblivious enough to pull out a handful of Galleons and throw them onto the pile.
This was entirely an internal Weasley family effort.
A collective family investment.
The moment an outsider contributed money, the entire gesture would lose its meaning.
Embarrassing the Weasleys would be the lesser problem.
If it provoked the twins into rejecting all the money outright, then a well-intentioned act would truly become a disaster.
Perhaps because of their difficult financial circumstances, every member of the Weasley family valued their self-respect tremendously.
Ron was like that.
Percy was like that.
Ginny was like that.
And the twins were no different.
Kasenhis, however, was feeling somewhat helpless.
He clearly remembered asking the twins to help destroy the gold molds made from his bones.
Those gold molds should have weighed more than the two of them combined.
Yet now, he was extremely curious...
How had they only managed to save four hundred Galleons?
Where had all the other gold gone?
Had those two actually obediently destroyed the gold?
That didn't seem right.
That wasn't in character at all.
Had he misjudged those two troublemakers?
Were they secretly honest people?
Should he perhaps never have tried any clever methods to give them gold in the first place?
Should he instead have drunk an Invisibility Potion and secretly stuck a few Galleons to the soles of their shoes every day?
Then continued doing that for an entire semester?
Was that actually the correct way to support the Weasley twins?
____
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