"The Headmaster agreed, Percy. You just need to wait for the owl."
Voldemort smiled. "Come to my office tonight. I need to hold a meeting with you all."
"Thank you very much, Professor. What time should I be there?"
"Eight. The meeting won't take long." After saying that, Voldemort waved him off to dinner.
Once Percy had left, he got himself some pumpkin soup and a meat pie, then began to eat as he read.
[Origin of Magic]. He was reading this book because he wanted to investigate the roots of magic—he supposed every outsider had the same thought.
Unfortunately, the book offered no clear answer. In fact, according to its contents, the precise origins of magic had never appeared in the historical record.
Much of the book was devoted to speculation about why the origins of magic had been lost. Voldemort could recall most of the more convincing theories:
The first theory: Magic originated before the invention of writing, so there had been no means of recording its origins.
The second theory: The long-standing traditions of family inheritance and master-apprentice lineages had allowed the origins of magic to vanish into the river of history as one family and faction after another died out.
The third theory: The witch hunts of the Middle Ages had created a huge rupture in the history of the Wizarding World. Wizards had been afraid to hide these forbidden items, causing a gap in their history.
The fourth theory: During the long ages in which the origins of magic had been passed down, people hadn't thought they needed to be recorded. By the time anyone tried to find the answer, it had already been buried by the river of history.
Besides these, there were plenty of conspiracy theories, such as schemes by the Pure-blood families or the Ministry of Magic up to no good. But the book only mentioned these less credible claims in passing.
Voldemort didn't think any one theory was more correct than the others. He couldn't be bothered to investigate the question, because he considered it meaningless.
Instead, he was very interested in the theories about how magic had originated. Most of the book's contents dealt with them:
The first theory: Bloodline Theory.
Bloodlines gave rise to wizards. Squibs were rare among the Pure-bloods, while Muggle-born wizards' children had a high chance of lacking magical talent. This suggested that wizards originated from bloodlines.
The second theory: Destiny Theory.
Squibs existed among the Pure-bloods, and Muggles could have children with magical talent. This suggested that a child's magical talent was bestowed by destiny.
The third theory: Mutation Theory.
Wizards were mutated humans, and this mutation could be inherited through bloodlines. This explained Muggle-born wizards and Squibs among the Pure-bloods, since both involved mutations.
The fourth theory: Ancients' Creation Theory.
Wizards had many unusual Bloodline Traits, such as being a Metamorphmagus, a Blood Curse, or a Veela Constitution. Perhaps people in ancient times had stolen the blood of Magical Creatures and gained abilities from it.
The fifth theory: Magical Creature Theory.
Wizards weren't human, but a kind of Magical Creature distinct from humans. After a long process of mating and evolution, they had eventually taken on human form.
The sixth theory: God of Magic Theory.
An invisible God of Magic existed, manipulating everything behind the scenes and deciding who was human and who was a wizard.
There were many more theories after these. Some seemed quite reasonable, but most were utterly absurd.
The book provided evidence to support all these theories, but also pointed out their flaws.
Take Ancients' Creation Theory, for example. According to this theory, wizards had been created by humans, who had made people into wizards by consuming, applying, or injecting the blood of Magical Creatures.
One powerful rebuttal to this theory read:
To the gentlemen who came up with this theory: where did the Magical Creatures come from?
That simple question had the theory tottering on the brink. The book then listed some counterarguments from wizards, but none of them made sense.
Voldemort, too, found himself lost among these theories. Each seemed to make some sense, yet none could explain everything.
"Page 236. Let's see what Dumbledore wrote..."
Voldemort murmured to himself and turned to page 236.
Sure enough, the margins on that page were covered in dense writing. He'd only skimmed the book earlier and skipped over a lot, so he hadn't noticed these handwritten notes.
First, he turned his eyes to the main text on the page:
Does it truly exist?
If so, how does it make its decisions?
Some have speculated that it might decide the children's fates by rolling dice. Let's set aside for now the question of whether this theory is true.
If it truly exists—let us make that assumption for now—then if it is the God of Magic, might it also be the god of Muggles?
This is a bold speculation, but if so, then the Vampire, Werewolf, Veela, Goblin... so many races may all share the same god.
Then does it truly possess life?
The whole passage had been circled, with an arrow pointing to the margin. There was Dumbledore's note, and Voldemort eagerly began to read:
Does it truly possess life?
A question that shook me to my core. In ten years, I've never read anything more astonishing, or anything that opened my mind so completely.
For a long time, I've focused on researching the origins of magic and explored countless possibilities, but none of the answers has satisfied me.
Until this question appeared. I couldn't help wondering: what if the God of Magic isn't a living being, but a Magic Origin?
Like magic, it is wondrous and impossible to grasp.
We can suppose it has several traits:
Bloodline Trait: Passed down through bloodlines, but with a certain chance of being lost.
Random Trait: Bestowed at random on a person, such as a Muggle's child.
Hidden Trait: Many Squibs showed magical talent as children, yet couldn't use magic once they were grown. Perhaps the talent remained, but was merely hidden.
We could imagine many more traits for it, enough to satisfy every theory. But the same question still troubles me:
Does it truly exist?
I don't know, but I want to try—to seek out this lifeless source of magic.
Here, I've written down my thoughts on how to search, so that those who read this may continue exploring along this path or another.
I'll choose the magic I know best, and which is sufficiently wondrous, and try to find the root of magic within it.
We must pick fruit from the tree itself, not from its reflection beneath it.
I hope this is the right direction, though I've already lost much of my hope. I am too old.
Those who come after me, please continue to explore the mysteries of magic. They are magnificent.
The writing ended there. There was no signature below it. If Dumbledore hadn't mentioned that he'd written those words, Voldemort might not have paid them much attention.
But once he'd read the passage carefully, his heart began to race with uncontrollable excitement.
"A source of magic hidden within magic... It sounds a lot like the Cosmic Constant proposed by Einstein. This might be a great conjecture, but there's only one way to find out..."
Voldemort excitedly ate three meat pies, far more than he usually had. But only that much food could settle the excitement in his heart.
As for what he had to do...
At nine o'clock, he had to go to the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom on the second floor and teach the sixth- and seventh-year Ravenclaws. It was his first class since joining Hogwarts.
He couldn't find any excuse to get out of it. Not a single one.
Before you continue