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The magical part of King's Cross station greeted me, as always, with a crowd of parents and children. But if before they all happily showed a variety of emotions, openly or hiding, accompanied their beloved children to school, now... Now there was a noticeable heavy atmosphere here. Forced smiles, worried looks, and worried children were everywhere. After all, the children told their parents about what was happening at the school. Here and there were heard phrases from adults that it was a "stupid joke," "an unsuccessful prank," and so on. But did they themselves believe? Maybe. This is the world of magic!

At one of the cars stood Hermione in a winter black coat and hat. She carefully examined the platform as if looking for someone, but as soon as she saw me, she immediately waved her hand and smiled.

"Hi, Max!" as soon as I came up, the girl immediately hugged me. I answered symmetrically.

"Hi, Hermione. Shall we go to the compartment?"

"Yes! I have already taken our place," she cheerfully pulled me into the carriage and then into the compartment.

There she took off her coat and ... As always - already in school uniform. It was quite warm in the compartment, so there was no need for outerwear. Then I took off my coat, placing it on a hanger at the entrance. A scarf with a hat went there too. My bag I just put on the seat next to me. Hermione took a seat opposite.

"How did you spend Christmas?"

"Mediocre. Well, as always. We sat with relatives, ate, drank, went to a couple of places. The older brother came. I have never even seen him. He turned out to be an ordinary and good-natured guy. Lives and works in Germany. He plans to get married this year.

"Interesting. How did it happen that you didn't see him?"

"I was adopted. The couple is no longer young. They have their own children. They have grown up and left for a long time, living their own lives. They write, call, but everyone is at work, in business."

"Ohh, okay. Listen," Hermione looked apologetically. "I didn't send you a present, you said that you don't love all this ... But!"

She reached into her school bag rather briskly and pulled out a new book.

"The basics of artifacts. I found it very interesting, and there is very little information about it in the Hogwarts Library. Here, if you believe the annotations, you'll find a lot of material indicating other works on this topic, on arithmancy, runes, and so on. All this is interconnected. Generally…

"Yes?"

"You have no idea how hard it was to not read it without you! Let's explore together!" slightly blushing, she strictly expressed her opinion.

"Great plan," I couldn't help but smile. "It's even better than a gift."

The girl smiled and nodded, and I sat down next to her. Hermione pulled out her wand and transfigured a steel table with thin legs from a handkerchief. Simple and functional. After all, in a compartment, such benefits of civilization are not provided at all. What for? We are wizards! If we need something, we transfigure it.

All the way, we drove in a calm atmosphere, reading a book. Reading thoughtfully, not trying to remember. This raised several questions about magic, but they will have to be dealt with in a personal conversation with the teachers. Flitwick and McGonagall were on the "interrogation" list.

Got off the train, a ride in carriages, now a sleigh on a frozen lake, Hogwarts, a feast.

With the return to Hogwarts, life is back on track. Training, study, food. Professors McGonagall and Flitwick were interrogated by us and gave us the information we needed. We only needed to clarify one point - why? Quite long conversations can be boiled down to several things. Gesture, word, image, formula, control of currents of magic, visualization of output streams from the wand - everything is important. The formula in spells, for example, from the section of transfiguration, is really necessary but not mandatory. You can conjure in absolutely different ways - on images and with an incredible minimum of formulas or no imagination at all, but with a clear calculation and control of magic. Gestures and verbal formulas help to learn control, to develop imaginations - colorful and varied charms and no less colorful, literally vivid descriptions in books. The rest is transfiguration, and then numerology, runes, and so on. As a result, any wizard, regardless of the predisposition of thinking, becomes in one way or another able to reproduce the widest range of magical effects. From this, by the way, various stories are taken about "talent in charm," predispositions, and so on — way of thinking.

Hermione and I have never discussed such an approach. But now, the reason for Hermione's success in transfiguration has become clear - she is a walking calculator with perfect memory, just like McGonagall. From there, and mutual sympathy, even if it is expressed, extremely faded. On the other hand, I perform transfiguration, relying much more on imagination and visualization, clearly representing the process of transformation. In this regard, as McGonagall said, I'm more like Dumbledore. He is a master in the so-called free transfiguration, in which only thirty percent rests on formulas, and the rest is at the mercy of fantasy, imagination, and visualization. This also implies my superiority in enchantments and other abstract magic - we simply have not yet begun to study enchantments on the basis of formulas and calculations. Therefore, various simple household items, like simple conventional combat ones, work out better for me than Hermione's. She always had to strain for this. In general, both teachers were incredibly happy that two such successful students revealed their strengths and weaknesses, and therefore dictated to us a list of references in several feet. Individually for everyone. "Strictly not to the detriment of the main curriculum." Needless to say, after this, we literally settled in the library?

Surprisingly, after such a banal discovery, books on numerology, runes, and various charms ceased to occupy the shelf "Some weird heresy" in my head, instantly moving to "Vital important." It all stopped being just interesting information. Now you just need to figure it out. Along the way, the idea came up to make my gain from hemomancy, and initial occlumency skills work to increase brain activity and improve brain function. How is this done? Just by solving mathematical equations. Since I don't have a talent for instant calculations, then this skill must be obtained by myself.

In general, nothing in our routine has changed. Sometimes the girl's conscience woke up, and she wanted to go and report to the teachers about her discoveries - to tell about the basilisk. But she herself brushed aside this idea. Why?

"Why?" that was exactly the question I asked when we were sitting in the evening on the sofa in our inconspicuous corner of the House common room. Around, as always, the students were scurrying about, spreading violent activities - they played different games, recklessly, or maybe consciously, accepted the twins' treats, argued loudly, laughed. Where did the tense atmosphere that prevailed at the London train station go? Who knows…

"I've been thinking about it for a long time," Hermione replied, not taking her eyes off the little potions book. "Headmaster Dumbledore may be a politician, as you say, but he is also a great wizard. Well, I do not believe that he is more stupid than the two of us and in fifty years has not solved this riddle.

We returned to reading, listening to conversations along the way. It was funny and unpleasant to hear Dean and Seamus's quiet whispers that Harry really could be the Heir. It was nice to see Ginny Weasley, who finally lost her paleness, and she perceptibly perked up. Perceptibly perked up ?! Hmm, so she had already thrown away the diary, and the flood took place today — all in the same toilet of Moaning Myrtle. Well, let them have fun.