Three Sentences to Make Neville Plow Two Acres of Land for Me

"All right, Brother Prewett. I can't wait to get back and study this Dungbomb Hammer."

"Wait for our good news! I have a feeling this will be our best prank yet!"

Seeing the Weasley twins' excited faces, Silan knew he had found the right people.

Seeing how eager they were to leave, Silan hurriedly asked, "Oh, right. Do you know where I can buy parchment?"

He needed parchment to make a stripped-down version of the Marauder's Map.

But what gave Silan a headache was that huge as Hogwarts was, it did not even have a single shop!

He had money, yet had no idea where to buy parchment.

Besides finding it absurd, he mostly found it a pity.

After all, opening a shop at school, with its irreplaceable advantages, could easily create a monopoly.

Then he could steadily fleece... ahem... make money.

Actually, some upper-year students at Hogwarts took advantage of being able to visit Hogsmeade to sell things to first- and second-years, or shop on their behalf.

Unfortunately, Silan had never dealt with them, so he did not know.

"Parchment?" Fred pulled out several sheets from his robes and handed them to Silan. "I have some here. If you want to buy it, you'll probably have to go to Hogsmeade."

"I have some too. Take these and use them first." George also took out several sheets of parchment.

At Hogwarts, parchment and ink were necessities, so many students carried some with them.

Since he had not had enough money, Silan had not bought much parchment before, and his supply had nearly run out over the past few days.

Silan took the parchment and counted it. There were roughly a dozen sheets.

He could make a batch of maps first.

"Thanks for the parchment."

"You're welcome."

After the three returned to the castle together, they went their separate ways.

The Weasley twins went to study their prank props, while Silan hurried toward the Room of Requirement.

When he returned to the Room of Requirement, he found Neville using a hoe to till the soil.

"Oh, Silan, you're here." Neville stopped working and wiped away his sweat. "I was just about to prepare this plot for planting Dittany."

The soft, black soil Neville had turned over gave off a faint earthy smell.

The packet of Dittany seeds brought from the greenhouse had been carefully sorted by Neville and set aside.

These were the good seeds he had specifically selected.

"You've worked hard, Neville." Silan gave him an encouraging look. "I have a gift for you later."

"A gift?"

Neville was curious. Aside from a stack of parchment, Silan did not seem to have anything in his hands.

But he did not ask further. Instead, he continued swinging his hoe and worked even harder at tilling the land.

Silan walked to an empty patch nearby and had the Room of Requirement produce a set of tables and chairs.

He placed the Marauder's Map on the table and tapped it lightly with his wand.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

As soon as the words left his mouth, countless lines emerged across the Marauder's Map.

Silan continued waving his wand. "Copying Charm!"

Once the spell was complete, another Marauder's Map instantly appeared on the tabletop. But the lines on it were blurry, and it disappeared almost in the blink of an eye.

Clearly, the copying had failed.

This was within Silan's expectations.

Although the Copying Charm could duplicate almost anything in the world, it had many limitations.

Simply put, the more intricate an object was and the more complex its magical structure, the harder it was to copy and the shorter it lasted.

For an alchemical item like the Marauder's Map, layered with complex magic, directly copying it was truly as difficult as reaching the heavens at Silan's current level of spellcasting.

Since direct copying would not work, Silan tried using parchment as the spell's material and copying only the lines on the Marauder's Map.

He tried to transfer a copy of the Marauder's Map onto another sheet of parchment.

But he still failed in the end.

"Looks like the magic placed on this thing is anything but simple."

Silan murmured as he watched the lines on the parchment gradually fade.

He leaned back in his chair, raised his head to look at the glass dome covered in intricate patterns, and fell into thought.

Both copying attempts had failed just now.

That was because the Marauder's Map was an exquisite magical creation, and directly copying the map's magical structure was indeed difficult.

Even if he succeeded, its duration would be greatly reduced.

That would not meet Silan's needs.

After thinking for a while, Silan adopted the clumsiest but most practical method.

He was going to copy the map by hand.

He would turn the magical map into an ordinary one.

Silan tapped a quill with his wand and controlled it as it began transcribing the routes on the Marauder's Map.

Using the Gryffindor common room as the center, he copied down the routes to every classroom, the library, the headmaster's office, and even the Hospital Wing, carefully marking the patterns of the staircases' movements.

He erased all the secret passages and the routes to the other houses' common rooms.

After dipping itself in ink, the quill hopped across the parchment. Very soon, it copied out a map according to Silan's wishes.

Silan picked up his wand again and used a blank sheet of parchment as the spell's material.

"Copying Charm!"

Once the spell was complete, an identical map instantly appeared before Silan.

"Not bad. The magic is stable. It should last around three weeks, which is enough."

Silan held the copied map in his hand and examined it carefully.

He found that the duplicate was almost identical to the sample map, and it would last long enough.

For something like a map, if the most complicated part—the parchment itself—was removed and only the lines were copied, it was easy to succeed.

And the duplicate would last much longer as well.

That was why he needed parchment.

Although it added a small cost, a few Knuts' worth of parchment could be exchanged for several Sickles after changing hands.

That cost was hardly worth mentioning.

Silan laid out the blank sheets of parchment one by one and began copying maps in succession.

"Neville, your gift is ready."

Silan walked over to Neville and handed him a map transcribed with a quill.

It had been copied onto the last blank sheet of parchment, so it would not disappear.

"This is... a map?" Neville took it, his face full of surprise. "This is really a wonderful thing."

His memory was not very good. Nearly two weeks into the school term, he still could not remember how those staircases changed. To avoid being late for class, he always got up and left early, which greatly reduced his sleep time.

"How did you think to give me this?"

"Didn't you say your memory wasn't very good? Those staircases really are hard to remember. With this, you won't have to get up so early anymore. You can sleep a little longer."

Neville never expected that Silan had not only remembered his casual remark, but had also helped him solve such a huge problem.

He was deeply moved, and at the same time, he felt filled with strength.

"I'll clear another plot of land!"

"I'll plant all the remaining seeds!"

"Very good. That's the spirit. Go on." Silan nodded in satisfaction.

Three sentences, and Neville was plowing two acres of land for him.

Aside from the quill-transcribed sample, Silan now had more than a dozen maps in hand.

The target customers for this batch were Gryffindor students.

He had considered having Neville or Hermione sell them, but given their personalities, they were clearly not suitable.

This sort of thing needed someone with broad connections.

For example, the two cousins he had just picked up today.

Silan checked their location on the Marauder's Map, then left the Room of Requirement.