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The link is also in the synopsis.
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Abraham wondered why, that for some reason, Quinn West looked more similar to Alan D. Baddeley than he looked to his sister or grandfather. He looked between the young and the old and tried to see why was it so.
Then it dawned on him.
'Their smiles are the same,' thought Abraham, watching the two unfettered smiles.
"Here, I thought you forgot the poor old me," said Alan as he sat down in front of Quinn.
"How could I?" Quinn chuckled. "I'm not going to forget you, at least until the day when I'm able to break into that disgusting lockbox of a mind. When your defenses are in shambles, then you have my permission to die. So before that, don't kick the can, alright."
"That might be a problem, my dear student," Alan laughed with his eyes closing.
"Oh, why may I ask?"
"You'll be dead before you or anyone else is able to peak into the beautiful masterpiece what is unanimously considered to be the best mind in the world."
Quinn laughed, "Don't count on that, old man. I'm going to do that apprenticeship under you, learn everything you have to teach, learn about your mind inside-out, and before you know it, I would be looking at your most embarrassing of memories."
"You're welcome to try, but you're naive to think that I won't study your mind as you study mine— and unlike you, I'm spectacular at what I do. You will be attacking my mind without having a clue that I have been sitting in the core of your mind, seeing your moves before you know you're making them."
The master and student, both prideful about their abilities, neither willing to concede that they would be on the losing end. One was the premier mind specialist— the best of all time, as the man liked to declare about himself. While the other one was a rising star— the fastest-growing magical in the world, the strongest and most knowledgeable someone ever was when they were at his age.
"It's delightful meeting you after so long, Quinn," said Alan earnestly.
"I feel the same, Mr. Alan . . . though I have to say before you finally agreed to get a MagiFax last year, it was tough to get the hang of you— if you only listened to me and let me set up a WMF-id for you."
"I have already said this to you but, at that time, I didn't see any use for it. Even now, I don't use it as much as a lot of people I know do. Though I have to say, it is a very intriguing and useful implementation of magic— I have many a conversation with many magic researchers about how it works and the implications that MagiFax has in the world.
Your family did a good job creating MagiFax," said Alan.
Quinn smiled. He had created MagiFax in his earlier Hogwarts days, a couple years after he and Alan had parted. Then the last time both had met, Alan had restricted (quite in a bit in Alan's skewed standards) and didn't enter the part of Quinn's mind that he didn't want to be seen. Though Quinn was expecting that Alan would know about MagiFax's origins, seeing that he didn't was surprising.
'Oh, I'm thinking about it now; maybe he knows now,' Quinn thought, staring at Alan, who noticed his gaze and chuckled. Quinn tilted his head and asked, "What's funny?"
"Oh nothing," Alan chuckled more. "You were testing if I was reading your mind, weren't you."
"Are you?"
"No, I'm not. I will take residence in your mind when you come apprentice under me," said Alan, picking up his glass of seltzer. "Though I could be lying, and I'm already in your mind, which, for you, would mean that I'm still absolutely superior and you're still another lifetime or two behind before you finally catch up to me if that's even possible."
"How can you say that? You don't know what I have going on in my mind. I might have created something that even you would have a difficult time entering," Quinn crossed his arms.
"Should we try it then?" asked Alan.
". . . No."
Their meal soon started, and because of a multi-course meal, Quinn cast a sound spell of his own creation that would make him and Alan communicate even with the servers going in and out of the room. The spell ensured that Alan's words addressed to Quinn would only be audible to Quinn and vice-versa; the server would only hear their voice if Alan and Quinn said words addressing the server.
"Your skills with casting magic without a focus must have improved since the last time we met," said Alan when Quinn cast the sound magic. The last time Alan and Quinn had parted, Quinn had just finished rebuilding his natural focus ability back from scratch.
"It has gotten better. I mean, I'm still in the growth period, so even if I don't do anything, it would still improve," said Quinn followed by a sigh. "This is the last year of my growth period— after this, my progress would considerably."
"You are the only person who doesn't deserve to say that with a sigh," Alan said, looking at his student incredulously. "I reckon you have more magic than any human on the planet, Quinn. People don't spend their teenage years exhausting their magic every day— they go out and play with their friends have fun with their lives. I don't believe that there are many people who followed a milder version of what you did, much less the intensity you follow.
And even those who did spend magic daily, most of them didn't do it voluntarily . . . a child doing what their parents force them to do doesn't make for fantastic motivation after all," said Alan, laying a napkin on his lap.
"Still, you know . . . I end up feeling like I could've done else I could've done to supplement my growth— that there was a method other than magical exhaustion every day that could've yielded more results," said Quinn, wiping the silver soup spoon with a napkin cloth.
"You're overthinking this matter," Alan waved his hand in dismissal. "Sure, there are potions you can take and rituals one can undergo, but you know how they can turn out. If you don't know exactly what you're trying to do, messing with your natural physique can end up doing more harm than good, especially in the long run."
Quinn conceded the point. Rituals were high-risk magic without knowledge, which Quinn didn't have, at least not yet. Potions were temporary and were a viable option to supplement their growth, but the returns weren't worth it with what was put in. Finally, there was the option of body magic— what he did currently was a temporary boost, but as one dove deeper into body magic, permanent, and more importantly, stable augmentations were possible.
But those weren't in the near future, at least not for another nine years to a decade.
"So, tell me, what have you been for the past few years?" asked Alan. "You're young, you must've gotten a girlfriend or two by now— what about the girls I saw in your memories— what was their names . . . Daphne, Tracey, Luna, Hermione, Ivy— or was there was someone else that came along? Come on, tell me~."
Quinn suddenly slammed his palm lightly on the table. "You dare ask me that after sending me that sort of gift on birthday?!"
"What are you talking about? I think it was a great gift!"
"You gave me a book on Kamasutra, for crying out loud!" Quinn said loud;y, recalling the morning of his birthday last year when he found a package from Alan in the lounge. He was excited when he saw that the package was clearly in the shape of a book— thinking that maybe it was a new version of Alan's books, but when Quinn opened it in the lounge, with George, Lia, Ms. Rosey, and Elliot, all sitting nearby, he found the book titled — Kamasutra — he had never mended anything faster than he did the ripped up wrapping paper.
"Yeah, and that's what makes it such a great gift," Alan said proudly. "And it was the real deal, you know, it's one the good versions that I got straight from India with all the right spells and magic to elevate the experience . . . you didn't throw it away, did you? Did you?!"
Quinn picked up some of the soup in his spoon but couldn't bring it to his mouth under the intense gaze of Alan. "Alright! Alright! I still have it; I didn't throw it away. It's somewhere in my library."
"Did you read it?"
"No."
"So you did read it, nice!" Alan clapped happily.
Quinn groaned. He had read the book . . . professional curiosity— 'It was a type of body magic, after all. . . yeah.'
"Did you read about the chapter on first times," said Alan, enthusiastically, "because if you use the magic, they can make it painless—"
"Alright, stop with that already!"
Alan laughed at the sight of Quinn groaning.
"It was surprising that you caught when I was in America," said Alan, spooning some of the soup in front of him. "I'm here for another week before going back home to New Zealand for a year. If you called me after another week or so, you could've been able to see my house by the beach at Piha.
But I guess it can't be helped; from what I can recall, this is the time when your school goes into Easter break."
Quinn didn't comment on Alan's perfect memory.
"I will see your home when I apprentice under you," he said.
Alan looked up from his code and said, "It seems you have made your mind about apprentice under me."
"Yeah, I think starting it off with mind magic under you is going to be a good starting point. I plan to learn from you and devote a majority of my time to what you're going to teach me. I won't be stopping my other pursuits— however, I will be going back to the basics and fundamentals, understanding them at a much deeper level, so that when I leave you and start with others, I would have a base of knowledge acting as a springboard for me to start on."
Quinn had been juggling numerous things for the past couple of years that it had got hectic for him, and it was becoming difficult for him to juggle all those things as the complexity of things started to ramp up. So he decided that he would be going back to the gold ol' basics while following whatever Alan wanted him to do.
"Are you sure?" asked Alan. "Your apprenticeship under me might go on for five years or even longer."
"That's a long time, Mr. Alan," said Quinn, chuckling. "I speculate, I would be out after year three . . . and even if it does take five years, I'm fine with it, I'm in no hurry— I have a lot of time on my hands."
"I see . . . so, what do you want to talk to me about," asked Alan. "I'm quite certain that you didn't call me all of a sudden to catch up, did you?
So tell me, what is today's agenda?"
Quinn let the soup spoon sit in the bowl and gazed up at Alan, who sat up a straighter, seeing the expression on Quinn's face.
"Do you remember what I told you about the curse that took away my natural ability to focus magic?" Quinn asked.
Yes, of course, obviously," said Alan, "you called it the Sin curse."
"Yes . . . the Sin curse . . . ."
Alan gazed at Quinn, waiting for him to continue, but Quinn looked up at him with pursed lips . . . and then shrugged. Alan's eyes widened as it dawned on him.
"You . . . you caught it again?!" Alan leaned forward and spoke with shock in his voice.
"Well, technically—"
"Quinn."
Quinn sighed and then nodded, "Yes, I got it again," his face scrunched up, "and Mr. Alan, you have got to help me out."
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Alan D. Baddeley - Master - I have excellent choice in gifts.
Quinn West - MC - Second again?! You got to be kidding me!
FictionOnlyReader - Author - When the students is ready, the master appears.
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If you want to read ahead, you can check out my Patreón @
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The link is also in the synopsis.
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"!! What were you thinking. . . ?!"
Quinn pursed his lips and held back the groan. Alan wasn't the scolding type and preferred to mock instead to get his point across, so seeing him raise his voice made Quinn squirmy. He didn't dare meet eyes with Alan, choosing to maintain eye contact and instead focus on Alan's hands.
"Why in the name of basic sanity would you go back there," Alan chastised. "Did you forget what you went through the last time— you lost control over your magic! If you did somehow forget, if you hadn't been able to regain the focus back, we would've to seal your magic so that it wouldn't kill you! Sealing your magic, Quinn! Do you know what that entails? It's not natural— your body would reject the procedure done to seal the magic, and in the history of sealing magic, every single case, without exception, had seen complications with health for the rest of their lives, and that's when the procedure is successful— the abominable procedure has a high mortality rate and someone like you with so much magic might just have died because of it!"
Quinn chose not to reply to that; more like he couldn't respond to that.
Described as a "dark" and "parasitic" force, an Obscurus was created when the wizard child in question consciously attempted to repress their magical abilities or were forced to do so through physical or psychological abuse. This energy could manifest itself as a separate entity erupting in violent, destructive fury. — The point to notice about Obscurus was the repression of magic. The medical procedure Alan talked about held a similar danger to the mysterious Obscurus as in undergoing the procedure meant unnaturally repressing — or sealing — magic, which while didn't result in the patient becoming Obscurus, did hold other complications like a life long degradation of health and a high chance of death while undergoing the procedure.
All those years ago, if Quinn hadn't regained his magic, he would have to go under the procedure to give himself a living chance against his own constantly rampaging magic. The magic sealing procedure was one of the primary motivations for him to regain his focus as soon as possible— the desperation pushing him harder and harder to achieve more in lesser time.
"I thought I would be able to handle it this time around," said Quinn, massaging his temple. Obviously, it hadn't gone as he wished it would've been— things rarely went his way when it came to the Cursed Vaults.
"And do tell what made you think that you would be able to handle a curse with a design that targets the Soul," Alan said in a rare no-nonsense tone.
Quinn looked at Alan. He slipped his hand into the breast pocket of his coat, where he usually fixed his expanded pockets and took a hardback book.
"What is this?" Alan asked as he looked at the book that Quinn had handed him. "The Tales of Beedle the Bard," he gazed at the cover art painted in shades and hues of green and black, "what is this. . . a fairy tail collection? What does a children's fiction have to do with any of this."
"Read the work titled, The Tale of Three Brothers," said Quinn. It wasn't surprising that Alan didn't know of the book— it was a British special while Alan was a New Zealander.
Alan furrowed his brows and peered at Quinn, asking for a direct answer, but Quinn pointed at the book. Alan glanced down and opened the book with scepticism. He flipped through the pages, looking for the story; he found and started reading the semi-poetic words written between illustrations depicting the story; the art moved — the robes of three brothers fluttered in the wind while Death's robe remained still like death itself.
By the time Alan was done, the course on the table had changed. Gone was the soup, replaced by a tantalizing appetizer— only neither were particularly in the mood of enjoying it.
"I read it," said Alan, closing the book, "now what; I still don't see how any of this related to your current situation."
Quinn snapped his fingers, and the wisp of flame appeared on the top of his index fingertip. "As you can see, I am still able to use magic, and I'm not using Occlumency to hold it back," said Quinn. "The situation isn't as dire as it was the last time."
Alan blinked. It seemed that he had missed that Quinn could still use his magic and, from the looks of it, without any difficulty.
"What do you think of the three artifacts in the tale, the Deathly Hallows," he asked.
"What do I think of them? I think nothing of them— they're fictional. Where are you going with this; come to the point."
Quinn stared at Alan for a while before he raised a finger on the hand that rested palm flat on the table. The platinum chain around Quinn's neck wiggled out from within his collar and levitated out with the pendant piece acting as the flying anchor. Quinn grabbed the pendant piece, and when he opened his fist, a black stone set on his palm.
"See this and tell me if it reminds you of something," said Quinn as he removed his palm beneath the Stone, leaving it suspended in the air. He touched it with his finger and slowly drifted to Alan.
Alan observed the black gemstone as it came to a stop in front of him. It slowly gyrated, showing its different polyhedral sides.
"Hmm?"
As the Stone gyrated, Alan caught the sight of something, and he squinted his eyes, waiting for it to return to the front, and when it did, his eyes went wide.
"Th-This . . . This!"
Alan immediately waved his bracelet styled magical focus laden hand, sending the pages flipping over till the book was opened to the last page of the Tales of Three Brother story and saw the sign made up from a triangle, circle, and a line . . . .
"Is this real?"
Quinn nodded. "That's the Ressurection Stone mentioned in the story— the real deal."
Alan stared at the stone, his face painted in shock. He reached out to the Stone and clasped the stone between his fingers. He raised it above to his eyes and peered at it.
"This Stone can summon soul?"
"It can," said Quinn, "but don't try to use it."
Alan frowned and looked up at Quinn. "Why?"
"It's calling a dead soul back into the world of the living; that's unnatural. I don't know if there's a cost to the summoning of a dead soul. Cadmus, in the story, was driven mad."
"Then how do you know if it works?"
"Try channelling some magic into it; you'll get the feel of it, and know that just with one more step, a soul of your choice will descend into the mortal world."
Alan looked at the Stone, and the magic flowed into his bracelet focus and then into the Stone. "Ah . . . yes, it seems you're right . . . I can feel it, one command, and I'll have soul here in this room."
Quinn snapped his finger, and the stone wiggled out of Alan's hand and zoomed back into Quinn's. "Yeah, and that is why I dared to go back and give the Sin Vault another try. I studied the Stone for a while before I went diving back into the Vault . . . . alas," Quinn sighed, "it didn't work as I expected it to."
Alan nodded, but Quinn could see from his face that Alan was thinking about something else.
"What?" he asked.
"Where did you get this?" Alan asked.
"Ah, about that . . . let's just say I stole . . . borrowed it from a man, who didn't need it— did him a favor by taking it out his hand . . . yeah, totally," said Quinn.
"What about the other two Deathly Hallows, was it? The Wand and the Cloak. Do you know where they are; I mean, if you were able to find the Stone, then . . ."
"The other two Hallows are in possession of other people," said Quinn. "You know Albus Dumbledore?"
"Dumbledore? Your Headmaster, correct? Hmm, ah, I remember him— he was Flamel's apprentice, wasn't he? I think I met him once when I was helping Flamel's with some of his memory problems— The Alchemist and wife's minds were fascinating ones; both of them had been alive for so long that their minds were all cluttered— it is good that they called me in, or they might have had problems in the seventies.
Ah, that was a good time— not only did I get to study two unique minds being held up by the Elixir of Life, I also got a consume a dose of the infamous Elixir."
"Wait, seriously! You drank the Elixir of Life?!"
"I did," Alan said proudly. "Felt really young for a month— hadn't felt like that in a century."
"Wow, so lucky!"
"I sure was," Alan nodded. "So what about Dumbledore?"
"Ah yes, Dumbledore— he has the Elder Wand, the Death Stick."
"Oh? Another Deathly Hallow so close to you, now that's lucky."
Quinn chuckled, "The Cloak of Invisibility resides in the hands of the Potter family— they're the descendants of Ignotus Peverell— it's a Potter family heirloom." Just like Dumbledore, Quinn knew that Alan would know the Potter from his memories.
"Oh my, all three so near to each other," said Alan with surprise, "it must be fate."
Quinn made a scrunched-up face.
"What? Why is your face doing that?" asked Alan.
"I don't like that word," said Quinn.
"What word?"
"Fate," Quinn spat. "Come on, let's get back to the matter at hand."
"Ah, yes, the curse . . . . so you decided to give the Sin Vault another try because you had the Resurrection Stone with you, which is clearly a Soul artifact, giving you an insight into the soul," Alan then stared deeply at Quinn, "which also means that you have started Soul magic . . . . You have used magic on your soul."
Quinn nodded, understanding the severity of Alan's gaze. Soul magic was one of the most dangerous, if not THE most dangerous magic to its user. One mistake was all it took for one to bring ruin to the user's Soul and . . . soul magic was a mythical level practice on Earth— meaning there weren't many who dwelled into soul magic, which made it difficult to cure any damage to the Soul. Quinn was lucky that the Sin curse hadn't done any damage to his Soul in the original cursing and had only manipulated it while keeping pristine.
After all, as far as Quinn and Alan could tell, the Sin Vault was an experiment to push the limits of magic in humans through soul manipulation.
"Be careful, Quinn," said Alan. "Soul magic is perilous. Any mistake, and you'll be in deep trouble. It took me a long time to even start contemplating about diving into soul magic. I was already much-much older than you when I started— you . . . I don't even think you should be going into soul magic so young."
Quinn shrugged. He had started and was already deep because of Sin Vault and curse. Also . . . the Ressurection Stone in his grasp was too much of a temptation for him let go.
"You seem to be able to use magic without any problems," said Alan. "Which means that there must be something different this time around— your work with soul magic must've done some good."
"Yes . . . something is very different. Last time, all you were able to work with was the aftermath— the curse was already out of me before you examined me," Quinn chuckled as he pointed at himself. "This time around . . . I brought the actual curse along with me."
Alan's eyes widened as he looked at Quinn's chest, his eyes turning gold.
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Alan D. Baddeley - Master - I have met some interesting people in my life.
Quinn West - MC - " . . . . . "
FictionOnlyReader - MC - Now we see what Alan tells Quinn.
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If you have any ideas regarding the magic you want to see in this fiction or want to offer some ideas regarding the progression. Move onto the DISCORD Server and blast those ideas.
The link is in the synopsis!
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