The Concept of Magic Cards

"Please, Siri!" Ron let out a shrill cry.

"No, Silde!" Harry shouted in despair.

Zhang San sheepishly tucked the Dungbomb back into Peeves's pocket and couldn't help muttering, "Oh dear... Peeves's soul was just too powerful. I nearly couldn't control him. Friends, what exactly happened just now? Why are you so scared?"

"Who gave the Dungbombs to Peeves?" Harry Potter asked, trembling.

Ron puffed up indignantly. "It had to be Fred and George! They're really close with Peeves. Whenever a new kind of Dungbomb comes out, they always give Peeves a few."

"Your brothers are creating terror in the school!" Harry Potter accused sternly.

The consequences of a Dungbomb exploding were nothing short of disastrous. Especially if it went off somewhere like the common room... the image was simply too horrible to imagine.

Zhang San said calmly, "I don't think ordinary cards can convey the excitement of Fight Tom at all. We need to add special effects."

Harry and Ron immediately became interested. "Tell us about it in detail."

"We could make a set of magical cards like Wizard's Chess. As long as you played a certain combination, it would produce corresponding magical special effects." Zhang San tentatively explained his idea while using Transfiguration to create models in his hands.

He waved his wand twice, turning the cups on the table into three little figures—one of them was a man in a black cloak, with a gaunt face, a skeletal frame, sickly pale blue skin, and no nose.

The moment Harry saw that little figure, the scar on his forehead immediately began to ache faintly with phantom pain.

"This is Voldemort?" Harry Potter murmured.

Zhang San nodded. "That's right. This guy learned magic and disfigured himself. The old bastard used to be pretty handsome, but unfortunately, his brain wasn't working right and he insisted on becoming some Dark Lord."

Facing off against the Voldemort figure were two other little figures. Zhang San had modeled them after Harry and Ron, dressed in crisp Auror uniforms and looking exceptionally dashing.

"Whoa, that's so cool!" Harry was stunned by Zhang San's Transfiguration.

How could someone from the same year be this outstanding?

Ever since Zhang San had gotten the hang of Transfiguration, his skill had improved at an astonishing pace. Though he had only studied it for half a year, his mastery was already comparable to that of a fifth-year student.

If he had a physical body, Zhang San could already be learning Animagus transformation. Even Professor McGonagall had been amazed by his Transfiguration abilities, repeatedly praising him as a once-in-a-century Transfiguration genius.

Even Professor Dumbledore had not possessed such skill in Transfiguration when he was eleven.

A simple Transfiguration like making little figures posed no challenge at all for Zhang San. The only rather frustrating part was that, because his realm as a ghost cultivator was too low and his total magic power was insufficient, the things he transfigured could only last for a very short time.

His mana pool had troubled Zhang San for a long time. At least during the Gathering Yin Realm, he had no way to solve his shortage of magic power. Only upon reaching the second realm of ghost cultivation, the Night Roaming Realm, would he possess a total amount of magic power comparable to wizards his own age.

Ghost cultivation was a class that only became powerful in the later stages. It was precisely because ghost cultivators were so weak in the early stages that this tradition had declined.

Because they were too weak early on, many ghost cultivators neglected the cultivation of their character in pursuit of leveling up quickly. After advancing, they could no longer restrain their wicked thoughts and brought calamity wherever they went. Their final fate was to become experience fodder for Daoists traveling the world.

Zhang San was a ghost cultivator, not an evil cultivator. He followed the most upright and balanced path of cultivation. Though his progress was not fast, his foundation was deep and his temperament steady. Even if he advanced to the Rakshasa Realm or even the Ghost King Realm in the future, he would not stray onto a crooked path.

Harry Potter played a straight onto the table. The little figure representing him immediately hurled a barrage of fireballs at Voldemort.

Flames burst in every direction as Voldemort's little figure Apparated away in a bedraggled scramble, barely avoiding the attack. Still, the hem of his robes was stained with quite a bit of dust.

With the broad framework established, all that remained was to fill in the details. Harry and Ron joined the design process as well, each offering their own ideas and opinions. Zhang San adjusted the appearances of the effects and the action models according to their suggestions, keeping the good ideas and passing on the ones that did not work.

More and more Gryffindor students noticed that Zhang San and the others were up to something, so they curiously gathered around to see what the fuss was about.

"I think magic arrows would look better than fireballs for chained spell attacks!"

"I support fireballs!"

"Don't wind blades deserve some respect?"

The students discussed it all at once while Zhang San created animated models according to their ideas. Everyone had different tastes, and in the end, the spectators started arguing among themselves first.

"Let's settle it with cards—Fight Tom!"

"Who's afraid of who? Get another person over here! I'll make him admit defeat!"

And so the Gryffindor common room turned into a Gryffindor community activity center, with students forming groups of three to play cards.

Although the magical cards had not yet been successfully developed, the original version of Fight Tom was already a very fun card game. People's standards for what was fun were universal. If a reskinned version of Fight the Landlord could spread widely throughout China, it would become popular at Hogwarts too.

"We need a set consisting of a card table and a deck of cards. The table will be the stage for displaying magical effects, while the cards will be the key to triggering those effects," Zhang San said.

His ghost cultivation technique also contained a section on artifact refinement. However, it taught methods for refining ghost artifacts, which were not suitable for the environment at Hogwarts.

Therefore, the main force behind the development was still the three Weasley brothers—George and Fred would research the materials, while Ron would enchant them.

Though it was only a seemingly simple set of magical cards, its technical difficulty truly did not fall short of a flying broom.

A broom had only one function: flight. All of its enchantments were developed around flying. Magical cards, however, had far more issues to consider—whether the magical effects should be physical or projected, whether they should manifest for real or be created through illusions, how to achieve those magical effects...

When Ron realized how difficult it all was, he felt terrible. He had only just crawled out of the massive pit of producing flying brooms, only to turn around and fall into a new pit Zhang San had dug for him.

"I'll write to George and Fred right away. How could they bear to leave us at school? The holiday is over—get back to school and start developing magical cards!" Zhang San said indignantly.

Christmas was already over. How could those two possibly keep staying at home?

Zhang San had a feeling that magical cards had even greater market potential than flying brooms. Wizards simply had too little entertainment—there were only the same old three: Quidditch, Wizard's Chess, and Gobstones.

The release of a new game would definitely trigger a buying frenzy among wizards. Although the British magical world's market was only so large, wizards around the world all had a need for games. With the Statute of Secrecy being strictly enforced, Muggle entertainment could barely penetrate wizarding life.

How could a fun and flashy magical card game fail to make people flock to it?