บท 22: Chapter 20

"Sev….will it really work?" Lily asked with a nervous expression on her face.

"Don't worry it will as long you utter the incantation perfectly." I reassured her.

"Okay...here goes." she pulled her wand out and pointed it at a rock on the ground.

She gave her wand a twirl and uttered the magic words, "Wingardium Leviosa."

The rock started floating in the air gently.

"It worked Sev! I did it on my first try!" Lily said and waved her wand around and the rock moved along with it before dropping to the ground.

"Yes...you did good." I praised her.

It seemed that Lily had some talent in charms just like canon. I wasn't gifted in all fields of magic so having Lily who was good at charms by my side would prove helpful in the future.

I had gotten close to her these few months. It was a bit annoying to deal with her initially as I was still an adult inside a young body but over time I had relaxed a little and I could tolerate her.

Things had settled down and I wasn't under any pressure. I still have some nightmares about the void but Occlumency helped me get dreamless sleep.

"How long did it take you to do this Sev?" she asked me. She had started calling me by this shortened name recently and I had gotten used to it.

"Well...I started without a wand so I took far longer than you did. Maybe around a week or two?" I replied recalling the duration it took for Severus to learn this.

It was only a few weeks ago that Lily had asked me if I could teach her and I had agreed.She was sad that I was going to move but after I showed her the floo powder, she was happy.

Speaking of the floo powder, it was another mystery of the wizarding world. I tried looking for information about its composition but in the end, I found very little.

The Floo powder was invented somewhere in the 13th century by a witch named Ignatia Wildsmith. Its manufacture to this date is regulated and the only licensed producer in Britain was the Floo-pow company.

It was located in the Diagon Alley but no one ever answered the door. No shortage of Floo powder had ever been reported. No one even knows who makes it.

The price has remained constant for the past two hundred years at 2 sickles a scoop. No wonder even the Weasleys used it.

The main ingredient was Floo but the precise composition of it was unknown. Many had tried to make their own Floo but no one had succeeded yet.

It would be a lie to say I wasn't fascinated by this mystery. This was basically the coke of the wizarding world. I wanted to study it when I was older. Who knew what else it could do?

Coming back to the networking of it, the Ministry regulated it again and made sure that no muggle fireplaces were joined up. They even had a department dedicated to it called the Floo Network Authority.

Eileen registered our soon to be shop for the Floo network and even helped the Evans set up theirs. Since Lily was a witch, it made their muggle house eligible for the Floo.

She got the hang of it after the first few uses. Their parents were a bit wary about me appearing in their fireplace but they got used to it and even kept it empty and clean.

We used the head only transport to check on each other and if convenient, we would visit the house.

I did meet Petunia a few times and she was unpleasant to say the least. I just did my best to ignore her and it infuriated her. I didn't want to interact with her, she just seemed too annoying to deal with.

She freaked out because of the Floo powder transport and complained to her parents but fortunately they didn't listen to her. Rose didn't listen at all as she had become quite close to Eileen and wanted to keep in touch with her.

Eileen had gotten her some beauty potions and Rose taught her cooking. Rose had convinced Eileen to make these and after she learnt that we were gonna open a shop, she suggested selling Muggle cosmetics too and wanted to see if they could be modified to be better by magic.

I was intrigued by this idea and decided to give it a try. There were not many shops that catered to this and most of the ones that did usually only sold magical potions and whatnot which took effect immediately but would wear off in a short time.

Well there were permanent ones like the cure for boils which removed boils from one's body but they don't prevent more boils from popping up. Moreover potions were not so cheap that everyone could afford them so selling cheaper alternatives would sell well.

So I discussed with Eileen about this and in the end decided to start a small cosmetics section where we would sell muggle cosmetics but in a different packaging and see how it went.

Using the same packaging meant it was only a matter of time before some muggleborn noticed it and then it might turn messy and they might even try to copy us.

That said I wanted to increase their potency with magic and see if they could be made more efficient and maybe even reduce the time they took to change the face. I could see those at a higher price by making them 'premium'.

I got more ideas of selling Muggle items in the wizarding world but first I would wait and see how these did and then if it was a success as I hoped, I could bring in more things.

Like pencils for example, I could even add self sharpening charms with unbreakable lead. A pencil was something simple and was not electronic so charms would work easily on them.

Not only pencil I could think of so many other things like it. I jotted them all down and made some plans on the charms and enchantments used on them.

I felt giddy thinking about exploiting this empty market with no competition. Sure some people might catch onto it and try copying me but they won't be able to as I could go get a patent and then have complete monopoly.

It won't be illegal as well since we are modifying it and not selling them raw and besides half the companies and stores that have stood for centuries all did the same.

Diagon Alley is filled with such shops which enables them to have near monopoly in Britain.

Muggleborns who get this idea in the future might despise me but they will be helpless to do anything about it. Maybe if Hermione became Minister again and made better laws for Muggleborns but with me here, canon is pretty much fucked.

As for the ones who might have had this idea before me, they probably didn't succeed as starting a business as muggleborn was hard. I hadn't seen a single shop run by a muggleborn till now.

The only jobs they got was either in the Ministry or they worked for other businesses.

Lily's dad Harold basically accepted me with open arms after I showed him a magic camera. He took a lot of pictures and seemed pleased with the magic equivalent of a gif.

I did have some ideas about upgrading the outdated cameras the wizarding world used and even get teles in there but that would have to wait for a while since I had to figure out how to make it work with the electric parts or make it work without them.