Stacking Space Magic
After the afternoon classes ended, the four of them gathered again at the Room of Requirement.
Avery and Alex were sparring. Avery's Shield Charm could now last for about two minutes. The silver barrier rippled in the air, its edges still fluctuating, but it was generally taking shape.
Alex's Petrifying Spell struck it, exploding into white Spark Spell, and the barrier merely trembled.
"Again!" Avery shouted.
Alex repeated, "Petrificus Totalus."
This time, the spell's trajectory veered off course, grazing the edge of the barrier and striking the Wooden Dummy dummy behind it. The Wooden Dummy's chest turned gray, but quickly returned to normal.
Avery deactivated the Shield Charm and wiped the sweat from his brow. "See, I held them off."
"Hmm." Alex nodded, his expression serious. "But Hermes' Dark Arts..."
Last week Hermes tried it once with a weakened version of Blood Boil, and Avery's barrier shattered into Light Point in less than three seconds.
Avery looked to the other side of the room.
Hermes was sitting cross-legged on the ground, with an old book open in front of him, his fingers tracing some kind of intricate pattern on the pages.
He felt the gaze, looked up, and gave a slight twitch at the corner of his mouth.
"Want to try?" Hermes asked.
Avery shook his head. "Let me practice some more."
He knew the difference between himself and Hermes, and he also knew the difference between Hermes and Regulus.
The difference was so great that it was puzzling.
Are they really in the same school, taking the same courses?
Does the Black family possess some special bloodline power that allows first-graders to master Magic that even adult wizards struggle with?
Regulus ignored the conversation; he was instructing Alex on the Shield Charm.
"You must think about blocking it in your mind," Regulus said. "Simply chanting spells is useless; you must truly generate the thought of refusing to be harmed, and the Magic Power will follow your will."
Alex gripped his wand tightly, closed his eyes, and frowned.
He chanted an incantation, and a glimmer of Silver Light appeared at the tip of his staff, but the halo only lasted for two seconds before dissipating, without even forming the shape of a barrier.
"I... I've thought about it." Alex opened his eyes, his tone a little dejected.
"Think more specifically," Regulus continued, "Imagine a real spell Accio towards you, and you have to protect yourself; feel that sense of urgency."
Alex tried again, and this time the Silver Light lasted a second longer, expanding slightly at the edges, but quickly collapsed again.
Avery watched from the side without saying a word.
He knew he hadn't struggled this much when learning the Shield Charm; his father had forced him to practice for five days, eight hours a day, until his wrists swelled up.
But thankfully, the barrier formed on the fifth night.
The process was painful, but the result was clear: he was able to use it.
Alex's talent was somewhat lacking, or rather, something in his personality hindered the development of Magic.
He was too cautious and too prone to self-doubt. The thought that he might not be able to do it was like an impurity mixed into the Magic Power when Spellcasting, making the spell's structure fragile.
But Alex listened to Regulus, Regulus told him to keep practicing, so he raised his wand and chanted the spell over and over again, even though the result was always the same.
This kind of persistence is also a talent, but it's a personality trait and has nothing to do with the Shield Charm, though it might blossom in some spell.
Regulus arranged for them to practice individually, then walked to the other side of the room; it was time for him to practice his own.
After the Spatial Warp Charm was finalized, progress was faster than expected.
Regulus raised his wand and aimed it at the Stone Platform five meters away.
He didn't need to chant any spells; with a thought, Magic Power flowed from his wand.
The air around the Stone Platform began to distort, and the Spatial Structure changed.
In Spatial Perception, the space within a half-meter radius of the Stone Platform is as if being kneaded by an invisible hand, with the lines of latitude and longitude bending, folding, and then unfolding.
The process was extremely fast; in the blink of an eye, the Stone Platform had disappeared and reappeared at the corner of the wall twenty meters away.
The landing point was precise; the edge of the Stone Platform platform was exactly two inches from the wall gap. Any more and it would hit the wall; any less and the position wouldn't be straight.
Regulus went over to inspect it. The surface temperature of the Stone Platform was normal, there was no heat generated by friction, and there was no residual Magic Power commonly seen in spatial transfer.
This indicates that the Warp process is smooth enough that the object does not experience additional stress when traversing the folds in space.
He continued testing.
The distance increased to fifty meters; this time, the goal was to transport the thick book from the wooden table to the top shelf of the Weapon Rack at the other end of the Training Room.
The wand rose, then fell.
The book vanished from the tabletop and reappeared at the top of the Weapon Rack in the same instant, spine facing outwards, standing firmly.
One hundred meters, this time it's that table.
The Training Room wasn't long enough, so Regulus had the Room of Requirement expanded, moving the wall at the far end back fifty meters.
The table disappeared and reappeared on an open ground a hundred meters away, with all four legs touching the ground simultaneously, without even a wobbling.
The maximum size limit for objects has also been increased.
On larger scales, such as the human body, it is theoretically feasible, but Regulus has not yet tried it.
The risks of living beings traversing space are far greater than those of inanimate objects. If the spatial folds fluctuate even slightly during the Warp, what might be transmitted is a pile of minced meat.
He stood in the center of the Training Room, looking at the table in the distance, and a new idea popped into his mind.
Can the Spatial Anchor Charm be combined with Spatial Warp?
Currently, Spatial Warp has a significant drawback: it can only teleport objects that are not Magic connected.
He tried teleportation spells, such as a Disarming Charm.
As the spell beam passes through the Spatial Channel created by the Warp, the internal Magic Power structure and spatial folds interfere with each other, causing a collision between two different types of Magic Power.
The result was that the spell exploded in mid-air, turning into a cloud of meaningless Magic Power fragments.
Regulus wondered, what if the Spatial Structure of that area were fixed in place by Spatial Anchor Charm the instant the Warp tunnel was formed?
The essence of the Spatial Anchor Charm is stability. It can drive Magic Power nails into a selected area, pinning space in place and resisting external distortion and tearing.
This stability typically applies to static spaces, such as preventing enemies from Apparition and escaping, or protecting an area from Space Magic.
But what if we anchor ourselves in a space that is constantly changing?
For example, the brief passage generated by Spatial Warp exists for an extremely short time, perhaps only 0.1 seconds, but within that 0.1 seconds, the Spatial Structure is in a highly unstable state.
At this point, inserting anchor points to forcibly fix the shape of the passage might allow the spell to pass safely.
The theory holds true, but practice is another matter.
Regulus spent two days trying, and the first day was a complete failure.
He first used Spatial Warp to fill in the Spatial Anchor the instant the passage was formed, but the Magic Power of the two spells clashed, and the passage collapsed as soon as the anchor point was inserted, causing the Warp to fail as well.
The teleported object got stuck halfway, half in the real world and half trapped in a spatial rift. He had to use a lot of effort to retrieve it.
The next day, the sequence was adjusted: first, anchor points were pre-buried, and then the Warp was initiated within the anchor point range.
The passage stabilized this time, but the anchor point's stability was too dominant, locking down the flexible folds needed for Warp as well.
The passage was opened, but objects couldn't pass through; the Spatial Structure was as rigid as a steel plate, and things bounced back when they hit it.
On the third day, he found a compromise. He simultaneously manipulated two spells, ensuring that the stabilizing effect of the anchor point only applied to the inner wall of the passage, leaving a flexible path in the center.
This requires splitting the Magic Power into two streams: one to maintain the generation of the Warp folds, and the other to control the range of the anchor point, while ensuring that the two streams do not interfere with each other.
On the seventeenth attempt, finally, a red light from a Disarming Charm pierced through the passage and landed on the Wooden Dummy dummy opposite.
But the results were very poor.
After the spell passes through the passage, its power is reduced to only one-tenth of its original strength.
The red light thinned, leaving only a shallow mark on the Wooden Dummy's chest, without even splintering any wood chips.
Using Magic Perception analysis, it was discovered that the spell was diluted during the journey.
While the stabilizing effect of the Spatial Anchor protected the passage, it also filtered out most of the Magic Power in the spell, leaving only a gentle light that did not cause any actual harm.
However, compared to the previous method of simply blowing everything apart, this is already an improvement.
Regulus continues to be optimized.
He discovered the problem lay in the strength of the anchor points.
If the anchor point is too strong, it will also destabilize the spell's Magic Power, resulting in meaningless light being transmitted.
The anchor point was too weak to stabilize the passage, and the spell exploded halfway through.
We need to find a critical point that just stabilizes the space without interfering with the Magic Power.
This requires extremely precise control.
Regulus had to determine the stability threshold of the channel the instant he Spellcasting, and then fine-tune the Magic Power output of the anchor point.
Not a point more, not a point less.
On the fourth night, he finally managed to get an Slowing Charm through the passage completely.
The spell landed at the feet of the Wooden Dummy, causing a small bump to rise on the stone slab; the effect was essentially the same as casting it directly.
But Regulus paid the price of mental exhaustion.
Simultaneously controlling two high-level Space Magic and adjusting parameters in real time is more exhausting than simply suppressing the Fiendfyre Curse.
Suppressing the Fiendfyre is a form of resistance. When facing a berserk energy entity with its Main Consciousness, you must use your will to keep it in place. The process is full of struggle and counterattacks.
That kind of exhaustion is physical, it's Magic Power, it's like wrestling with an invisible opponent.
The superposition of Space Magic is like weaving; it involves twisting two different, even conflicting, Magic Power into one, allowing them to work together without canceling each other out.
This requires playing two roles simultaneously, with the brain divided into two independent computational areas.
One component calculates the fold curvature of the Warp, another monitors the stable output of the anchor point, and both need to exchange data in real time and adjust for deviations.
That kind of exhaustion is on Mental Layer.
But the direction is correct.