Seventh-year students had to start worrying about where they were headed after graduation. There was also an important exam at the end of the school year, the N.E.W.T.s, the Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests. Many professions required high marks in specific N.E.W.T. subjects, though not every witch or wizard would sit these exams.
For one thing, a student could already find a decent job with only their O.W.L.s. For another, anyone who wanted to take the N.E.W.T. in a given subject had to earn high marks in that subject's earlier O.W.L. exam, or the professor would not allow them to continue. Most professors required at least an Exceeds Expectations at O.W.L. level. Snape only accepted students who had earned an Outstanding in Potions.
Skyl, having failed both Divination and Arithmancy, was not qualified to continue studying either subject.
He could have reversed the timeline and altered his marks, but Skyl did not mind taking two fewer exams. Besides, exams could not measure the strength of a wizard at his level. If the answers Skyl wrote down did not match the reference answers, then the reference answers were clearly the ones that were wrong.
In this final year at school, Skyl knew he would miss this life someday. Years from now, on some quiet, boring afternoon, sitting beside a sunlit desk, he might suddenly notice that the air felt exactly the same as it had when he took naps in Gryffindor Tower. Back then, he had never realized he was living in the good old days.
The completion of the new campus brought several new trends to Hogwarts. Professor Dumbledore was preparing to expand the school curriculum by adding Alchemy and Magical Engineering. The space was already available now, but the professors and textbooks still had to be chosen carefully, the Ministry of Magic had to be notified, qualifications had to be approved, and the corresponding exams and certificates had to be officially registered.
In short, it would probably take another six months to a year. If the Ministry of Magic dragged its feet, then it might take four or five years.
The alchemy workshops in the new campus were not sitting idle, either. Dumbledore generously assigned laboratories to professors and students who needed them. For example, the Weasley twins had always wanted to open a joke shop. Making magical toys by hand required both knowledge and practical experience, and now they had their own workbench. They even received a monthly reimbursable budget, which was a huge blessing for poor students.
In the future, Hogwarts would also cooperate with several alchemy workshops in Diagon Alley to push for industrial innovation in the wizarding world. This was Dumbledore's true goal. Britain had been the pioneer of the Industrial Revolution, and now, apparently, it was about to become the birthplace of a magical industrial revolution as well.
Every great era required the shared efforts of one generation, or even several generations. Dumbledore knew that trying to push the industrialization of magic forward all by himself would be beyond even him, so he chose to ask his old friend Grindelwald for help.
When they were young, these two great wizards had both been figures who could shake the world. They should have brought the wizarding world into a new age, but unfortunately, all sorts of conflicts and regrets had forced them onto separate paths. Now that they had reunited under a shared ideal, it seemed they intended to give the declining wizarding world a small taste of Dark Lord shock therapy.
Not long after term began, the newly arrived Professor Gellert demonstrated the practical uses of magical objects in Defense Against the Dark Arts. There were Sneakoscopes used to detect ill intent and Dark magic, fireproof cloaks used to resist flames, tambourines that could create shockwaves, and so on. Many magical tools were not complicated to make, but they produced unexpectedly impressive results.
"Many wizards believe that as long as they have a wand, they can fight their way through anything. Of course, that is not wrong. For powerful wizards, whether in daily life or in battle, magic can turn the ordinary into the miraculous. Most magical objects are used for pranks or household convenience," Professor Gellert told the younger students. "But the role of magical objects goes far beyond that. The wizarding world has underestimated the power of tools. Take the mighty Deathly Hallows, for example. Those are treasures even great wizards pursue. There are also certain dangerous magical objects that require the Ministry of Magic to establish dedicated departments for their collection and safekeeping."
Driven by Professor Gellert's influence, the Dueling Club became swept up in a craze for magical tools. Students from all four houses began showing off their own tricks. The Slytherin kids favored fog pouches, using them to create thick smoke on the field before launching curses from the shadows. Ravenclaw students were especially enthusiastic about setting up automatic traps, and once a fight started, the ground would be covered in bear traps chasing people around. Hufflepuff students were mostly honest and down-to-earth, so they liked piling on defenses. Once they wrapped themselves in all kinds of protective cloaks, they were even harder to crack than iron turtles. As for Gryffindor, they preferred high-powered weapons. Add a little extra gunpowder to magical fireworks, and they became alchemical bombs. Playing demolition expert was pure happiness.
One month later, Hogwarts's entire style had started drifting toward that of a wartime magic academy. Madam Pomfrey in the hospital wing flew into a rage, because her workload had exploded exponentially. The beds had never been this full before. Nothing like this had happened since Hogwarts was founded.
If the new campus had not expanded the hospital wing, it would not have been able to fit so many injured young wizards. Faced with Madam Pomfrey's complaints, Dumbledore always smiled cheerfully, hired more Healers and nurses from St Mungo's Hospital, reminded the students to be careful, and showed not the slightest intention of stopping it.
With the headmaster personally encouraging this unhealthy trend, many star figures emerged from the four houses. They did not attract attention through outstanding grades, but by inventing entirely new fighting styles.
For example, Draco of Slytherin relied on summoning swarms of snakes, combining them with thick fog to block vision and slime potions to restrict movement, turning the dueling arena into a mist-covered marshland where he held every advantage.
Then there was Penelope of Ravenclaw, who worked with her classmates to invent a kind of bouncing ball of yarn. It could track enemies and bind them up, making it extremely troublesome to deal with.
The most outstanding figure in Gryffindor was definitely Seamus. He was a born explosives expert. Any alchemical bomb that passed through his hands always had exactly the right yield. It had a certain degree of destructive power, but not so much that it would blow classmates or buildings sky-high. He was a dependable arms dealer, field-tested and trusted by the people.
Professor Gellert was encouraging the students to invest more attention into alchemy. With the older students, he was even more direct. He said that his alchemy workshop was still short on staff, and anyone interested could come work as an apprentice during their spare time. They would not only learn, they would also be paid, with a job waiting for them after graduation.
As a result, many students who had originally been uninterested were also drawn in. This was especially true for witches who disliked fighting, as well as seventh-years who were frantic about finding work.
Such intense and fresh changes did not affect Skyl's rhythm of life.
Recently, he had mainly been worrying about one thing, turning a Celestial brain into the book-indexing server for The Tower of Tomes, making it easier for members to find the materials they needed from the vast ocean of magical texts. In a way, this meant The Tower of Tomes was also about to enter the age of modern management.
Skyl planned to issue every member of the Tower Covenant a copy of Practical Guide. The experiment he had run on Harry had been a great success. Having such a portable cheat really did help improve learning speed. The reason he had not popularized it earlier was that Harry's situation had been special. His soul contained a fragment of Voldemort, so Practical Guide could extract Voldemort's memories and use them as teaching materials.
Once the book retrieval system was complete, Practical Guide would be able to connect to The Tower of Tomes' internet. With that enormous reserve of knowledge, and with an artificial intelligence tuned to serve as a learning assistant, every member would effectively have their own cheat. Struggling students would never again have to suffer because they had no idea how to approach their studies.
One week after term began, Skyl stood inside The Tower of Tomes and looked at the three-ton mass of brain tissue soaking in nutrient solution. A satisfied smile appeared on his face. What he was doing would benefit generations to come. If it could be popularized on a large scale, it would surely usher in a new age of magic.
"Not bad. The tissue integrity is very high, and the directed differentiation of the cerebral cortex is one hundred percent accurate," he murmured. "Next, I need to stuff all of The Tower of Tomes' materials into this brain."
The Celestial brain pulsed slightly under Skyl's deep gaze. Its dangling nerve cords also twitched like the tentacles of a soft-bodied creature, as though it had suffered an enormous fright.
Skyl raised an eyebrow slightly. "Hmm, is a consciousness already about to be born? Then we'd better hurry. Mora, I'll leave this brain to you."
The Book of Mora let out the wicked chuckle of a creepy old man. "Heh, heh, heh. My lord, rest assured. I will make sure it behaves."
A pitch-black vortex appeared above the cultivation tank. Then, one tentacle after another descended and connected to the cortex of the Celestial brain. The small-house-sized mass of brain tissue began flashing with colorful pulses, and before long, even the nutrient solution started boiling...
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