Chapter 108

"I want to borrow the book 'Mastering Memory'!" Tom Yoder said to the librarian.

"This book is from the Restricted Section. Do you have a professor’s signature?" The librarian spoke to Yoder with great courtesy.

"I do—I have Professor Slughorn’s own handwritten signature!" Yoder handed the librarian a piece of parchment.

The librarian glanced at the parchment, then entered the Restricted Section and soon returned with a book, which he handed to Yoder.

Yoder took the book, thanked him, and found an empty table, opening it to begin reading; Allen hurried over to see the content.

Yoder acted as if he couldn’t see Allen, showing no reaction to his approach, entirely absorbed in the book.

Just as Allen finished reading the first page, his split consciousness suddenly felt the world spin wildly—when it regained awareness, it had already returned to Allen’s body, merging with his main consciousness...

Allen shot to his feet; this time, he truly understood how Yoder had led him to experience memory magic! This method was indeed far more direct and effective than any other.

The next moment, he angrily snatched up a quill and quickly wrote in his journal: "Why stop? I’ve only just begun!"

Slowly, a line appeared on the journal: "Everything comes at a cost."

"Didn’t you say these memories meant nothing to you?" Allen wrote again.

The journal immediately replied: "These memories mean nothing to me—but they mean everything to you. So I’d like to trade for something more valuable to me."

Allen leaned back in his chair, thought for a moment, then wrote: "What do you want?"

For an awareness isolated for decades, the most important thing is news from the outside world. I want to know what happened during the years I was cut off! The notebook revealed its condition.

Allen instantly relaxed; this demand was easy to fulfill, and Yoder’s request was reasonable and logical, further increasing Allen’s trust in him.

But then Allen remembered something else and wrote: "Just now, I heard someone call you Tom Riddle? What’s your real name?"

The journal instantly displayed text: "That was the witch’s accent issue—she was Indian..."

Allen tried to recall, but found he could no longer remember the girl’s face—or her accent...

Hesitantly, he wrote in the journal: "Actually... there was a hint of curry..."

The journal drew a puzzled expression—clearly, Yoder didn’t get Allen’s joke.

Then the journal continued: "I don’t just have memories of reading books on memory magic—I also have memories of practicing it."

Allen’s eyes widened; he and Yoder quickly reached an agreement: Allen would keep Yoder company, chat with him, and periodically share news from the outside world, while Yoder would provide memories related to memory magic.

The appearance of the journal and the ancient magical script notebook drastically changed Allen’s holiday life; since the wand shop had few customers, Allen napped at the counter every day.

In fact, part of Allen’s consciousness had already been pulled into the journal.

Recently, Allen had devoted almost all his energy to studying memory magic; practicing it produced no noise or damage, making it perfect for solitary nighttime practice at home.

He was currently practicing "Stretching"—extracting his own memories from his mind.

His remaining energy went into the ancient magical script notebook, through which he learned many new interpretations of ancient runes.

He began revisiting the hidden parameters he’d recorded in earlier spells, testing whether the newly learned runes could decode them.

He actually made a discovery.

The spell he uncovered a hidden parameter for was the Clear Spring Charm—the hidden parameter was temperature. This puzzled Allen.

Temperature is a common research direction; the Clear Spring Charm had existed for over a thousand years, surely countless wizards had imagined summoning springs at different temperatures—so why had this hidden parameter never been documented? The Standard Spellbook, Level One, made no mention of it at all.

But when Allen tried it himself, he understood why.

The Clear Spring Charm summons water that is always at a fixed temperature—harmless and unremarkable.

When Allen tried imagining the summoned spring at different temperatures during casting, the temperature of the water never changed...

But Allen believed that if the parameter existed, it must have a purpose.

All the spells he was studying had been invented long ago—some for over a millennium—and generation after generation of wizards had researched and refined them; every obvious hidden parameter should have been found by now.

Based on his prior experience decoding hidden spell parameters:

Either the parameter was counterintuitive—like the "destination" in the Cleaning Charm;

Or absurd—like the "return" toggle in the Unlocking Charm;

Or required bizarre numerical constraints—like the Lighting Charm’s cycle count, which must be a power of two between 64 and 1024;

Armed with these insights, Allen patiently continued his trials.

He tested from -100 degrees to +100 degrees—the temperature of the summoned spring remained unchanged.

But he didn’t give up; he kept increasing the value—and at 105 degrees, the summoned spring boiled.

This result didn’t stop him—he continued testing and discovered that only when the temperature parameter was exactly 105 degrees did the spring’s temperature change.

Yet this discovery left Allen speechless: what use was a 105-degree spring? Was it supposed to be pure distilled water?

Though the hidden parameter gave the Clear Spring Charm slight offensive potential, the damage was negligible.

Still, Allen wasn’t too disappointed; he’d never expected much from this spell. His patience stemmed only from wanting to publish another paper on spell improvement and claim another Ministry reward to reduce his debt further...

As long as he kept publishing papers, his debt would eventually be paid off...

Once his debt was cleared, he could publish similar papers to fleece the Ministry.

But the Ministry still hadn’t replied to his last paper on the Lighting Charm! Allen drifted off in thought.

He imagined his discoveries would gradually transform magical society: the improved Lighting Charm could revolutionize magical lighting and entertainment.

As for the improved Clear Spring Charm—it might just get wizards to drink more hot water.

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