An evil wizard's manuscript

[May 8, 1660.]

[I finally killed my teacher. The damned old bastard had used me as a test subject for so many years. Perhaps I should have gone to that Durmstrang place back then instead of studying under this old wizard.]

[Testing potions has taken a terrible toll on me. The damned old bastard made me drink too much Forgetfulness Potion. My body and memory are both beginning to fail, so I have to write down everything that happens to me.]

[The damned old bastard made me drink too much Forgetfulness Potion. I feel as though I keep forgetting something important.]

[August 11, 1660.]

[I met a wizard in Gwerolog Village. He said he was an old friend of mine, but I truly couldn't remember him. He was very friendly, and I admitted that something was wrong with my memory. He asked whether someone had used Obliviate on me. I was very curious about what Obliviate was.]

[Hog said he had already graduated from Durmstrang. It sounded familiar, but I really didn't know where I had heard the word Durmstrang before. I need to look through my diary. Ah, I found it.]

[Hog said his professor was a master healer who might be able to restore some of the memories affected by Obliviate, or at least make me less forgetful.]

[September 7, 1660.]

[I followed Hog to Durmstrang. His professor was also certain that I had been affected by Obliviate. Is that really true? According to my diary, it was because I drank too much Forgetfulness Potion.]

[September 19, 1660.]

[My treatment has begun.]

The next section detailed how a seventeenth-century Durmstrang professor treated the memory loss of this man named Ethan Abdullah. Will had never even heard of many of the spells and treatments involved.

He could still understand the most conventional methods, such as using powerful Legilimency. But brewing strange potions from ingredients he had never heard of, and using the Cruciatus Curse to stimulate Ethan's brain into recalling memories—these "treatments" left Will dumbfounded.

The professor even opened Ethan Abdullah's skull to examine his brain directly for any problems.

Seventeenth-century brain surgery gave Will quite a shock.

In the end, though, whatever part of the treatment had worked, Ethan Abdullah's memory improved, and he even recovered some of his lost memories.

[February 11, 1661.]

[My memory is beginning to improve, all thanks to Hog, my best childhood friend. It seems saving his life back then really was the right choice.]

[February 28, 1661.]

[I remember now. The old bastard didn't know Obliviate at all. He knew no spells other than the Fire-Making Spell, Lumos, and the Levitation Charm. That old bastard kept feeding me all sorts of potions, especially Forgetfulness Potion. Thankfully, I began planning to kill him before I started drinking Forgetfulness Potion. Otherwise, I would probably be an idiot by now.]

[This Durmstrang professor is truly remarkable. I bitterly regret letting that old wizard talk me into becoming his apprentice and giving up on Durmstrang.]

[According to Hog, my potion-brewing techniques are exquisite, but I really want to learn spells. I bought a wand and spellbooks and began learning other kinds of magic.]

The next section was almost entirely about his study of Dark Magic at Durmstrang. Seventeenth-century Durmstrang was even more hardcore than it was now, and the study of Dark Magic was the norm there.

Ethan learned to brew every potion his teacher—the "old bastard" mentioned in the manuscript—had known, and found corresponding spells for a substantial number of them.

These included the Memory Charm and Forgetfulness Potion, the Beauty Charm and Beauty Potion, Sonorus and Loudvoice Potion, the Hair-Regrowth Charm and Hair-Growth Potion, and so on...

After studying Dark Magic for several years, he returned to England and began his own magical research. The subject that consumed him, and the only one he researched, was [potions are spells].

[Many spells and potions have almost identical effects. For instance, the Memory Charm and Forgetfulness Potion, which have caused me the most trouble, affect wizards in almost exactly the same way. Why does this happen?]

[I bought two Muggle slaves and began experimenting on them. The Hair-Growth Charm worked just as I expected, with almost no difference, though that was only what I could see on the surface. Puzzled, I peeled a piece of scalp off one of the slaves. After he drank Hair-Growth Potion, his hair follicles changed, stimulating hair growth.]

[Two days later, the effects of the Hair-Growth Potion had worn off completely. I used the Hair-Growth Charm and peeled off his scalp again.]

[My God, exactly the same effect. Why do spells and potions have exactly the same effect?]

[Spells clearly involve wizards using magic to affect reality directly, whereas potions produce specific effects through their ingredients. What connection is there between the two?]

[I must conduct more experiments...]

What followed was chilling. He used every potion and spell he could match up on the slaves he had bought. Both slaves died within a month, and Ethan Abdullah meticulously recorded the entire course of every experiment.

[The connection between particular spells and potions is very strange. It is a process involving changes in magic. I can hardly imagine how such changes could be observed, so I have no choice but to conduct a large number of experiments...]

As Will read this, something suddenly struck him. If this kind of research requires observing changes in magic... then my Wizard's Eye could easily do that. Doesn't that mean I'm naturally suited to studying magic?

Will drifted into thought for a moment, then continued reading.

[I am increasingly convinced that potions are spells, but I still cannot prove it unless I can convert a potion into a spell, or a spell into a potion.]

[I need to buy some more test subjects...]

Will saw the spell Ethan wanted to "convert": the Flesh-Stitching Curse, a twisted Dark Magic variant of the Healing Charm. The original Healing Charm was a spell invented by ancient wizards to treat external injuries, while the Flesh-Stitching Curse was commonly used by evil wizards to create grotesque creatures.

Many bizarre creatures had been created by wizards, including the most famous example, Dementors.

The Flesh-Stitching Curse was a form of Dark Magic Ethan Abdullah had learned at Durmstrang. Since his teacher had known how to brew Healing Potion, his goal was to turn Healing Potion into Flesh-Stitching Potion.

[If I can successfully modify it, that will show that my research is heading in the right direction...]

The experiments that followed were utterly inhuman.

[Healing Potion and Flesh-Stitching Potion are two completely different things. Developing and inventing this potion is truly difficult. Simply replacing ingredients based on their medicinal properties has already left me at my wits' end.]

[Today I stitched that Muggle and a wolf together. While casting the Flesh-Stitching Curse, I seemed to find a little inspiration...]