Chapter 23: Mind arts
It had been a week since the not-so-smooth meeting between Lucifer and Godric, and it had been a week of Salazar intensely tutoring his student in the Mind arts.
The first day had almost exclusively been Salazar trying his very best not to bash his head against the stone walls of the chamber, as Lucifer truly was the best and worst student he ever could have asked for.
The best due to his unparalleled talent, something which very obviously showed itself as Lucifer mastered the first stage of Oclumency by completely voiding his mind after a single day.
The worst due to the frustrating lack of information he had regarding his apprentice, and worst of all was the frustrating pride his student seemingly emanated. And he knew better than anyone else that pride comes before the fall.
The next six days of their week in seclusion were spent with Salazar explaining the different benefits an Occlumens enjoys, as well as the risks that may occur if he by accident occluded his sense of self, losing himself in the control given by such a sacrifice.
There were many horror stories of kind wizards and witches who lost themselves in the mind arts, in the best case they became a vegetable that operated purely on instinct as the poor practitioner observed it all while being completely locked into their own mind.
Worst case scenario?
The Legends of Herpo The Foul still rang true to this day.
The man in question started off as a brilliant young man who worked for a pharaoh of old, his future seemingly limitless as he curried more and more favor with the pharaoh for every year that passed by. Being gifted with more and more magical knowledge from the royal library, nurtured his brilliance until he reached the very peak of Egypt´s Magisters.
But the turning point that turned Herpo the favored master of the god-king into one of the blackest wizards in recorded history happened when the now middle-aged magister started to feel the starting symptoms of Dementia.
He noticed his sharp mind dulling more and more for every day that passed by, and Herpo as any brilliant man couldn't accept the harsh reality that not even geniuses were spared from the cruel effects of time.
So he started researching ways to counter time, reading tome after tome left by Royal Embalmers, Healers, and previous Magisters life work in the subject of duat and the possibilities of delaying the inevitable grasp of Anubis.
As he spent more and more time desperately searching for the answer to his predicament, his mind kept deteriorating, slowly becoming a shadow of what it once was. Essential information slipping him by as he started to either forget or dismiss the dangers of the mind arts.
Pushing the limits of Occlumency to try and retain his edge slowly made him occlude the taboo, Herpo occluded his humanity.
The once brilliant man eventually sealed away from everything that he could, becoming a machine fueled by the desire for immortality, which eventually leads him to develop one of the blackest abominations of magic ever created.
The Horcrux, A way to brutally tear a part of your soul and store it in an item. Serving as a way to halt aging and permanent death as long as the Horcrux stays intact.
But what makes the Horcrux such an abomination of magic was the sick requirements that needed to be met for its creation.
The sacrifice of a Tabula Rasa, an innocent blank soul that only a newly born baby could hold.
The willpower and intent needed to rip off a part of your very own soul alone were enough to be classified as a Monster among Monsters.
Magic was never meant to cheat death, and therefore many claim that being forced to commit such acts of unnatural magic is punished by Lady Magic herself, and in the case of Horcruxes the punishment was a constant feeling of emptiness, and a soul damaged beyond repair that guarantees that upon your death you will not be able to peacefully move on.
Herpo found this out soon after the completion of his horcrux, and tried absolutely everything to fill the void in his being.
The only thing that somewhat dulled the agony was the seducing numbness of Dark magic, and so he steeped deeper in it than any wizard before him.
But it was never enough, so 300 years after achieving the Cadmean Victory in his battle against time, after thousands of unspeakable acts and leaving loss and misery wherever he went.
Herpo the Foul destroyed his own Horcrux and committed suicide, leaving behind a legacy not of the brilliant young man he once was. But that of the Darkest Lord known in wizardingkinds history.
The mind arts were the foundation of any wizard or witch of note, and if done wrong could lead to terrible results indeed.
Salazar sighed as he looked at Lucifer sitting cross-legged before him, his ethereal face soft in relaxation as he weaved the first layer of his occlumecy shields.
Salazar´s eyes steeled as his thoughts moved from the past to the present, more specifically to his Diciple´s strange temperament.
Lucifer had a calm almost aloof attitude to most things happening around him, but Salazar had seen firsthand what his apprentice was capable of when slighted. recalling what happened with Godric worried him, Lucifer had thrown away any sense of self control and threatened an unknown assailant without knowing what he was dealing with as soon as he felt slighted.
Because the harsh truth was that Lucifer got lucky, as not only had Godric been distracted and calmed down by Salazar. But Godric had not had his wand with him, something that would have drastically changed the situation as even Salazar feared his fellow founder´s skill with a wand in battle.
At the end of the day Lucifer was a well of untapped potential and raw power, and what he truly needed was discipline and training to excavate that potential safely and refine that power into a finely honed edge.
Salazar cast one last look at his meditating apprentice as he exited the chamber, heading towards the project he had been ardously working at since his return to Hogwarts and seeing Godric´s reaction to Lucifer´s appearance.
He had at first stupidly ignored the bias some of the more ignorant wizards and witches most certainly would reserve towards Lucifer due to what Godric later explained to him was Lucifer´s Devilish features.
Due to this the two brother´s in arms had come up with a plan to deal with the issue before the return of their female founders at the beginning of the new term, and the the inevitable rush of Wizards and Witches with Christian bias.
Salazar entered the bathroom deep in thought as he approached one of the sinks, the sink shifted into the entrance of his Secret Chamber with a hissed command, and the slippery slope morphed into stairs with another.
The echoes of his footsteps rang in the tunnel as he descended, and finally reached the chamber he used not only to host the newly hatched basilisk, but also as his most private workplace where he could work on projects either requiring extreme discretion, intense uninterrupted focus or as he often used it for, Rituals.
As the chamber was located right at three interconnecting Leylines that powered the wards of the castle, making it the ideal place to brew, enchant and power the more demanding rituals he knew.
He reached the center of the chamber as his eyes fell upon the fruits of his week of labor, a beautiful headband made from one of the rarest things found in the magical world, Ebony Mithril.
Mithril alone was an indestructible metal that conducted magic like no other metal out there, making it extremely desirable for any wizard or witch with the means to acquire it, but the Ebony Mithril before him was one of a kind.
As it was the Magnus Opus of his alchemical achievements, the results of transmuting Mithril with the heart of an ancient eastern dragon.
He had bribed one of the greatest craftsmen from the dwarves to forge him the headband before him as a gift to his sister, but she unfortunately passed away before he got the chance.
So it had stayed in the chamber for a years, soaking in the ambient magic until it had formed a curious emerald in its center.
His eyes stayed on the Black headband with the single beautiful emerald laying in the middle of the last ritual he would ever put it through, his heart steeling in determination as he pulled out a vial of Lucifer´s uniquely coloured gold blood.
Lucifer floated in his inner world observing the new addition to his innerworld, as his innerworld had the new addition of another planet.
Salazar had explained to him that he had to envision a physical manifiestion of his mind, and he had initially thought of creating a computer as his mind with countless files as his memories. but after recalling the cautionary tale of Herpo that his master seemed intent on drilling into him, he had refrained from that action in slight fear of the manifestation influencing him into becoming some sort of detached robot.
So he had eventually decided upon adding another planet to his inner world, its design that of a supersized earth with his memories being scattered all over the world.
The first defense he had decided upon was demonic runes of detection and repelling weaving around the planet encasing it in a dome of the familiar multicoloured runes.
And he was now creating a continental sized library that spanned the entirety of what would have been Africa, his intention was to store such an incessant large amount of information that any legilemns would have to dedicate hours to find what they wish to see, giving him ample amount of time to fight back and neutralize the threat.
His focus was so intense on his task of compiling book upon book of memories of his birth in his first life, the loving childhood he had and all the mischief he committed as a teen. that he never noticed the shelved filling up with thousands of his processed memories, sorting themselves into categories of age, importance and relevance.
He had just finished compiling the last memory of him grooming Shiro this morning when his eyes opened and he took in the grand library filled with tens of thousands of books that consisted of all his memories.
He smiled in satisfaction as he had now completed all the catching up needed and officially completing the first stage of occlumency, his pride in his task was interrupted as his senses told him that his master had reentered the room.
He exited his innerworld and got up from his lotus position, stretching out his body in a catlike manner. His eyes fell upon his master in curiosity as he observed the small black chest in Salazar´s hands, pushing away the curiosity for now he greeted his master "I have finally completed the first stage you were talking about"
Salazar met his apprentice´s crimson eyes with his own critical emerald eyes, and with a gentle probe instantly felt himself be repelled from his mind!
His eyes widened in slight shock at how effective his apprentice´s first shield was as even though he had put barely any effort into the probe the simple fact that he was so effortlessly ejected spoke volumes of the quality of Lucifers´s shield!
He shook his head in a mixture of pride and amazement at his aprentices seemingly unparalleled talent, but it all washed away as he felt the weight in his hands.
The weight of the chest in his hands filled him with a familiar melancholy, the bittersweet feeling of his greatest achievement that he could never share with his most beloved person was something he felt everytime he had laid eyes on the diadem, but now that he had truly completed the artifact and bloodbonded it to his apprentice he could feel a new sense of hope for the future, and perhaps he was delusional due to the emotion clouding his mind but he could almost swear that he smelt his sisters familiar lavender perfume and a calm feeling spread through his body.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
xSaintPablo
xSaintPablo Sorry for the late chapter, been some issues with my drafts getting lost so I had to write it all over again haha.
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