The Start of Term Approaches

"What a beautiful spell. How did you make its effects last so long?"

Professor McGonagall asked Quirrell as she built the training ground's outer wall with the Hardening Charm.

The other professors also looked at Quirrell curiously, hoping he could explain.

"Talent."

Quirrell could only say, "In the Forbidden Forest, I needed to use the Illumination Charm for long periods. Gradually, my spell developed this curious effect, though it only works sometimes."

It doesn't work when I'm not using [Lin Zuo Moment]... Voldemort thought.

He had already discovered how to dispel [Lin Zuo Moment]: he just needed to break through the skill's restraints with desire. In this case, the desire to examine the Magic Book was enough.

"This spell is perfect for dueling," Professor Flitwick said, his eyes wide. "If you cast three Armor Charms in a row in front of you, you hardly need to worry about defense."

Voldemort nodded. He had already tried it, and it worked well.

"If you can discover the reason behind it and publish your findings in a paper, I believe you'll earn the Order of Merlin, First Class," said the plump Professor Sprout.

"I tried to break it down, but I couldn't do it at all."

As Voldemort spoke, he looked toward Professor Flitwick. "Head of House, I hope you'll help me investigate how this magical effect comes about."

Professor Filius Flitwick, who had a little Goblin ancestry, taught Charms and was also the Head of Ravenclaw House, where Quirrell belonged. He had even won a dueling championship once.

He was Hogwarts' undisputed master of Charms.

"I'd be happy to, but I can't imagine what causes it. Perhaps it really is a talent, as you suspect," Flitwick agreed, though he was pessimistic about the outcome.

Voldemort nodded without offering his own opinion, and the others moved on from the brief digression.

It was the tenth day after the Gringotts heist, and on that day, the outer walls of Maple Training Ground were finally complete.

Next came the construction of the training ground's interior.

Professor Kettleburn, who taught Care of Magical Creatures, and Professor Sprout, who taught Herbology, contributed the most to that effort.

Most of the time, Voldemort simply provided his ideas and some combat scenarios. For instance, he suggested setting up dueling checkpoints in the training ground.

A dueling checkpoint was an intersection in the passageways that appeared as several teams entered the training ground at once and made their way deeper inside, due to the ground's limited capacity.

At each checkpoint, two teams of four had to duel. The winners could continue farther into the training ground, while the losers forfeited their chance to train and had to leave the way they came.

There was also a first-aid station. Besides some emergency medicine—provided with Madam Poppy Pomfrey's help—it would have a few brooms.

The medicine was for treating injuries, while the brooms were for escaping the training ground. Students could get them by walking into the station or using the Accio Charm.

Planning the training ground's exit gave Voldemort more free time. Unfortunately, Madam Pince, the librarian, still hadn't returned, so he couldn't pursue his plan to enter the Restricted Section.

Fortunately, he could study how magical spatiotemporal properties could be combined with alchemy. After all, as far as he knew, that was the only way to undo the curse.

He already had an idea, but the fragment of Voldemort's soul contained too little knowledge of alchemy, forcing him to seek help.

Dumbledore was the obvious choice for Hogwarts' foremost alchemy expert, but he was busy lately and wasn't at the school at all—and even if he had been, Voldemort wouldn't have dared approach him.

As for the Headmaster, Professor McGonagall was said to be good at alchemy too. But Voldemort decided to ask around to see if anyone else was skilled in it. He didn't want to seek advice from the stern Professor McGonagall.

In the end, Professor Sprout told him that Professor Flitwick was skilled in the subject as well—Goblins were said to have a knack for it—so he began asking Flitwick for guidance.

"Alchemy?" Professor Flitwick said in surprise. "You never showed the slightest interest in it before."

"I want to store magic inside objects. My magical nature is what gave me the idea."

Voldemort offered the explanation he had prepared, and Professor Flitwick's eyes lit up.

"You're right," Professor Flitwick said, nodding emphatically. "Your magical nature does resemble alchemy. We can start from there."

So, beginning that day, Voldemort studied alchemy under Professor Flitwick. They also worked together to investigate the spatiotemporal properties of magic.

It was bound to be a long process. Even if Voldemort immersed himself in it day and night, he couldn't master everything overnight.

Fortunately, he had a clear goal, so he expected to make the magical object he needed before the start of term.

"Although I'm well versed in the theory, my craftsmanship isn't very good. If you want to work with wood, why not ask Ollivander in Diagon Alley?" Professor Flitwick suggested when they came to the practical side of things.

So Voldemort went to Diagon Alley again to seek Ollivander's advice. Thanks to the care he took of his Alder wand, Ollivander liked him very much and shared a great deal of knowledge with him.

And in the gaps between his trips to Hogwarts and Diagon Alley, Voldemort made a special visit to Old Trafford Stadium in mid-August to watch a match.

After the game, he used magic to enter the stadium, hugged the Old Gentleman, who was chewing gum, and slapped him on the back as he shouted, "Brilliant work, Sir! You played a fantastic game in the European Cup Winners' Cup!"

Old Sir was a little bewildered. He hadn't been knighted yet, but he assumed this was just an overexcited fan. So he shouted into Voldemort's ear, "That was last season, young man! We need to look ahead and win more games in the present and the future."

"Yes, you can do it, because you're Old Sir!" Voldemort yelled excitedly, as if he'd become a crazed Manchester United fan.

After that, he made a point of finding Ryan Giggs, the seventeen-year-old winger whom Old Sir had promoted from the youth team just last season. Giggs was one of his favorite players too.

With [Lin Zuo Moment] in effect, Lin Zuo's consciousness took the lead, and his love of football was magnified beyond measure.

As a result, he appeared on live television for the first time.

"Oh, what a crazy fan! He's rushed down from the stands and hugged Coach Ferguson. They're saying something to each other. You can tell this fan is thrilled," the commentator observed.

That was one of the few leisure moments Voldemort had enjoyed lately. To deal with the curse as quickly as possible, he had even turned down Danylis's invitation.

In her letter, she had mentioned Modric and revealed that she was thinking of taking in Modric's family.

Voldemort wrote back specifically to ask her not to do that. He told her to give them some financial support, but not to change the course of Modric's life.

Voldemort didn't want his arrival to alter Modric's fate.

Modric was a player he liked, and especially when Lin Zuo's consciousness was in control, Voldemort wouldn't allow anything of the sort to happen.

Aside from those diversions, he had also gone to a bar with the professors. But under [Lin Zuo Moment], he found Rosmerta uninteresting.

That confirmed his suspicion: his attraction to older women came from the influence of Voldemort's Soul Fragment.

Of course, those were just occasional distractions. Most of his energy still went into crafting magical objects.

And on the day before Hogwarts' opening day, Voldemort finally made his first complex magical object:

The Magic Bead Bracelet. That was the name he gave it.