Chapter 600

"Kingsley, the Portkey is ready," Vivi said into the phone. "Make your preparations and set out for Nevada. Pick your two best Aurors to go with you. Also, if there's any new information from Mexico, notify me at once."

"Understood," Kingsley's voice came through. "One more thing. I found the person who injected the guided directional magic into the man who rescued Graves."

"Who?"

"His name is Ezekiel Cohen. Thirty-nine years old, born in Salem, Massachusetts. Graduated from Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Horned Serpent Academy, with highest honors in both Charms and Alchemy. After graduation, he joined the Auror Office of the American Ministry of Magic, specializing in cracking and counter-cracking magical artifacts. He left the Auror Office twelve years ago. After that, his record was blank. Not deleted—never there to begin with. He entered a department that doesn't exist in any official files."

"What department?"

"There's no such department in the official structure of the American Ministry of Magic, but I dug up a fragment through Ilvermorny's alumni network. After Cohen left, someone saw him on the thirteenth underground floor of the American Ministry of Magic headquarters. The thirteenth underground floor isn't on any map, the elevators don't reach it, and the stairs don't lead there. That place was called the Bureau of Artifact Research and Application."

Vivi's eyes narrowed slightly.

"Artifact research and application. What they studied was cracking. What they applied was modification. The modification technology behind the Pseudo-Ashwinder Eggs, the technology that cracked the Confederation's three-layer prison doors, that dagger capable of absorbing magic—all of them were products of that department."

"Yes," Kingsley said. "And not only that. I followed this line of inquiry and found that over the past ten years, there have been at least thirty unsolved magical artifact thefts worldwide. The