Chapter 27: First meeting Hermione, looking for materials
At this moment, Charles didn't care about the strange expressions of the little wizard's parents, and was concentrating on looking at the brick wall of Diagon Alley.
Every time he pulled a brick, the deep blue system in his mind would sound a prompt.
"Deduction points +2..."
"Deduction points +3..."
Even though the deduction points increased by a small amount each time, according to Charles' experience over the past ten years, this was already much more than ordinary food.
Just like the deluxe set menu at the Leaky Cauldron, the portion is huge, but it contains ordinary food. Even if you eat ten servings, you may not be able to increase your deduction points by two or three points!
In this comparison, the increase in deduction points brought by the brick wall is actually quite considerable.
The most important thing is that this brick wall is maintained and cleaned up by the Ministry of Magic. Today, all the magic inside has been drained away, and the Ministry of Magic will replenish it.
In the long run, this will be a steady source of income.
After passionately kissing every brick wall he could reach, the points in Ciel's mind increased by about a thousand points.
Feeling that the magic power inside seemed to be in danger, if he continued like this, he might not be able to open the door and enter Diagon Alley. Only then did Ciel reluctantly leave the brick wall.
Just at this moment, a doubtful voice came from beside Charles.
"Charles Evans?"
Charles turned around and saw that it was the little wizard who had been looking at him in amazement beside him who asked the question.
She has fluffy brown hair and slightly large front teeth, a bit like a little squirrel, and she exudes the aura of a top student.
When he saw this little wizard, Charles had a familiar feeling.
Could this be Hermione Granger, one of the Harry Potter triangle in the original book?
But how did she know my name? And I seemed to have seen her somewhere before?
Soon, Hermione took the initiative to reveal the answer.
She stared at Charles with wide eyes, her eyes revealing a keen desire to win.
"You actually received an acceptance letter from Hogwarts as well?"
"That's great. I've always wanted to beat you. I thought I'd never have that chance after coming to Hogwarts. I didn't expect you to go to Hogwarts, too!"
"Just wait, Charles Evans, I will never lose to you again in the wizarding world!"
Charles was stunned for a moment before he suddenly realized.
It turns out that when I was in the Muggle world, I participated in a competition with Hermione.
Even though Hermione is a top student, she can never be a match for a guy like me who has so many cheats, so she's always thinking about defeating me once?
At this time, Hermione's parents standing by also suddenly realized.
The strangely behaving child in front of him turned out to be the genius student Charles Evans that his daughter had been talking about all the time?
Oh, that makes sense. Geniuses always have some quirks.
They also extended an invitation to Charles.
"Ciel, I didn't expect it to be such a coincidence that you actually know Hermione."
"Would you like to walk around Diagon Alley together?"
When Hermione heard her parents' invitation to Ciel, her heartbeat quickened slightly and a blush appeared on her face.
She had been keeping an eye on Ciel ever since she was defeated by him for the first time in the competition.
As a top student, Hermione also has her own pride and wants to regain her status in the next competition.
However, there seems to be a huge gap between a top student and a genius. In every competition, Charles crushes all opponents with an absolutely overwhelming attitude.
Later on, the competitions that Ciel participated in were already at a level that Hermione could never reach.
From childhood to adulthood, this was the first time that Hermione was crushed by a peer like this, so she paid special attention to Ciel.
This time, meeting Ciel in front of the brick wall of Diagon Alley really gave her a feeling that it was destined.
Feeling Hermione's expectant and somewhat shy gaze, Charles smiled slightly and then refused decisively.
"Sorry, excuse me, I have some personal matters to attend to."
"Next time, definitely next time."
Then, Ciel waved goodbye to them, clicked the bricks, and quickly walked through the portal into Diagon Alley.
Seeing Charles leave, Hermione's eyes showed disappointment, but she still managed to comfort herself. "He must have something to do. Didn't he say that next time, I will definitely invite him to go shopping with me next time I see him."
Having said that, Hermione still felt depressed.
Even when she was about to enter Diagon Alley, she pressed harder on the tiles.
An idea came to her mind.
Maybe I'll run into Ciel in Diagon Alley later?
And the next moment, something happened that made Hermione even more depressed.
The portal that Charles had just passed through disappeared without a trace this time.
The brick wall seemed to have some problem. No matter how Hermione took out her wand and tapped the bricks, there was no response.
"Is there any mistake?"
"The last time the professor brought me here, he clearly told me that this brick wall was regularly maintained by the Ministry of Magic and there would be no problems. How come it went wrong now?"
"Is this the result of the Ministry of Magic's maintenance?!"
Hermione stared at the brick wall angrily, as if she had seen the epitome of the Ministry of Magic bureaucrats who were doing nothing and cutting corners.
At this moment, Hermione, who had suffered repeated setbacks, had an idea in her mind.
"If I become the Minister of Magic in the future, I will put an end to such things!"
……
At the same time, Ciel walked into Diagon Alley and had no idea that Hermione had such inner thoughts.
After getting rid of Hermione's family, Ciel breathed a sigh of relief.
"Fortunately I walked fast, otherwise I would have been entangled, and I would have been tied up and unable to do anything."
As for Hermione, Charles quite liked this female character when he watched the movie in his previous life.
But come on, no one would really bring their love for paper people into reality, right?
An 11-year-old kid, dating? What the hell!
Little kids of this age are full of trouble. Even Charles finds it annoying to be their friend. So which adult would like to take care of kids?
Even at his old age, Dumbledore still liked to play house with children, and even set up various games with great interest, but Charles had no such interest.
Walking quickly along Diagon Alley, Ciel soon arrived at his destination - Flourish and Blotts.
This place can handle Hogwarts textbooks. In the Muggle world, it is like Xinhua Bookstore. If you want to find any book, you can find a complete range of them.
It just so happens that Charles uses Deep Blue Deduction. If he has ready-made reference materials, he can reduce a lot of deduction points consumption.
That was why Ciel came here in the first place.
Before, with Professor McGonagall following him around, Ciel couldn't buy the advanced books he needed openly. Now he can do so freely.
After entering Flourish and Blotts, Charles quickly found the books he needed.
"Alchemy from Beginner to Die", "Potions from Beginner to Die", "Transfiguration from Beginner to Die"...
In addition, there are some papers published by well-known wizards.
For example, Dumbledore's "Twelve Uses of Dragon's Blood" and Severus Snape's "Wolfsbane Potion, a Potion for Suppressing Werewolf Impulses" for which he was awarded the Second Class Order of Merlin. The high-end achievements of the wizarding world in recent years have all been published in Flourish and Blotts.
However, this area is rarely visited, and many papers on the bookshelf have obviously not been opened for many years.
There was some trepidation in Charles' eyes.
He was also not sure whether these books and papers could really serve as material for Deep Blue.
If this works, his deduction points gap will be greatly alleviated!
After taking a deep breath, Charles carefully took out a copy of "The Twelve Uses of Dragon's Blood".
I flipped through it casually and saw Dumbledore's detailed explanation of the magic of dragon blood.
Then Deep Blue sounded one reminder after another.
"Obtaining materials related to dragon blood magic, the host's subsequent deduction points required for dragon-related knowledge will be greatly reduced."
"Obtaining dragon blood samples or even living dragons for verification can further reduce the number of deduction points required."
(End of this chapter)
