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I leaned back in my chair and stared up at the overcast sky. It was the middle of July. What to do? Trying to make sense of what I'd learned in the Forbidden Section was still somewhat useless, even if not in all areas. Potions are not bad, the basis of the literature on which is a variety of recipes halfway through with a history of origin, the potion maker, rare lines explaining the unique reactions and interactions of ingredients difficult to compute from the compatibility tables. It's digestible, yes, albeit not quickly. But it wastes no time - a kind of passive mode.

The various charms and spells in the closed literature are very difficult to comprehend and master. Repetition is not a problem. But to understand, change something, control streaming spells like the FiendFyre - no. Not at all! In general, to be more than just an automated wand appendage that casts everyday Stupefy and other things according to a ready-made template, I must know the runes and arithmetic. No, not that priority - arithmetics, and runes. Absolutely everything, without exception, uses these sciences to one degree or another. Arithmetic, as I suppose due to the lack of educational literature for primary and secondary levels, is far from just an analog of mathematics. It takes into account the esoteric meanings of numbers, their numerical combinations, their dependence on the order in which they are arranged, and so on. In addition, I noticed unusual and new signs of operations on numbers, the meaning of which has so far eluded me, as well as abbreviations like cosine and so on. But this is not the end.

This or that numerological formula can have variants of "interpretation" depending on the runes assigned in those or other places. That is, if it takes one series of magical manipulation without runes and point changes in it in some places will lead to one consequence. In the presence of any runes in the beginning - the result is different. By how much? I don't know. In this case, the runes can stand anywhere in the formula, distorting, in the end, the whole spell and the method of its creation beyond recognition. The interesting thing was that apparently, it wasn't enough just to know what changes the runes made to the arithmetic formula. You had to have a clear idea of what the runes meant, their combinations, how they were combined with the numbers, and so on.

I found these points out by a trivial comparison of Bombarda and Bombarda Maxima formulas. Just one rune in front of the fourth of five parts of the formula forces you to add one basic gesture, changing the flow of magic into the wand as well.

Of course, all this crazy amount of information is not necessary to perform a spell. It is necessary if you are performing the spell for the first time on your own, and imagination, fantasy, and spatial thinking are lacking as a class. When learning magic with a tutor, sometimes a few demonstrations, a very fuzzy idea of the formulas, and finding the right gesture and key-word or phrase for you are enough. This is most likely due to the fact that wizards subconsciously sense magic, its changes, and so forth. Therefore, just by looking, imagining, wishing, and by trial and error, choosing the range of wand sweeps for yourself, the wizard is able to more or less repeat the spell, charms, and so on.

So it turns out that my concept of a "cool wizard" ultimately requires a sea of knowledge and a super-brain to quickly calculate all these data arrays.

While I was thinking about it, I remembered the magic in the grimoire. Most of the spells there have a different structure. They are two-dimensional graphical schemes that are a subset of rituals. Again, I have no idea how or why I should visualize such diagrams of such dimensions, and the lines in them should run at such an angle or curve. The only reason I can repeat them is that the visual result of their applications and the feeling of magic when using them, along with the schemes themselves, are permanently imprinted in my memory.

So, there's still work to be done. Also, I can clean up the house a little more with magic. Kreacher just grumbles, wanting to seem super-helpful to Walburga - he even cooks by hand and cleans. Everything with his hands. He doesn't even apparate unnecessarily. And I'm a little annoyed by the dust and cobwebs in the hallway, even though they don't look like dirt at all. It looks more like an entourage.

***

Just before August, an owl brought me a magical newspaper. Not the first, and hopefully not the last. On the front page was a wizarding photo of Sirius Black at the time of the arrest. Insane, scary, crazy-eyed, holding up a license plate and yelling to the camera.

After reading the article about the horrible supporter, almost Voldemort's right-hand man, I almost rushed to Privet Drive, but then I thought better of it. Who said he'd be there? How long would I wait there? What should I do when I find him? Where's the guarantee that I won't waste my time? Plus, let's not forget that Potter's house could very well be under much more professional surveillance than just an old granny squib with a horde of magical cats? There are no guarantees, which means the best place to catch him is at Hogwarts while breaking into our living room.

On top of that, I also need to figure out if there's any way to find the ring with magic. It's just, well... If I catch Black, and I ask him, "Where's the ring, Padfoot?" and he spits in my face and says nothing. I don't know Legilimency. And if I did, I wouldn't get in the head of a madman. I don't doubt for a second that he's insane.

I went to the Black's house almost every day, and there was only one reason: magic. There was a small spell-fortified room where you could cast spells on funny barrel-like dummies on wheels. They could hold a wand, move, and bounce around with simple stupefy of fixed power but high fire density. In addition, I noticed that frequent and powerful witchcraft in a house is almost invisible but improves its energy. It was not for nothing that Walburga had said that the house had absorbed the witchcraft of many generations of Blacks. Now, after the stagnation, this very "absorption," as well as the consequences of it, are felt, albeit very faintly. I can't tell you exactly what these improvements, sensations, and so on are. I just feel it...