Chapter 29: S and B

Abandoned girls' washroom, the innermost stall.

Back on home turf, Allen quickly tossed his bag onto the toilet and, unable to hold back, began his experiment.

But his excitement kept him from focusing, and he failed to cast a spell several times in a row, so he had to stop and calm himself down.

Once his mood had settled, Allen focused his attention. In his mind he pictured a ball of light tracing an "S" shape through the air, with the loop count set to 1, then decisively waved his wand and steadily uttered the incantation. He watched the tip of his wand full of expectation, but things did not go as he wished — only a familiar ball of light appeared at the wand tip, motionless.

WTF???

Allen instantly began to question his life: Why? Where did my reasoning go wrong?

Allen was deeply unwilling to accept it, and cast a spell again: "Lumos!" Another ball of light appeared, all alone, at the tip of his wand.

But the more it came to this point, the calmer Allen became. Something must have gone wrong somewhere — where could the problem be? The trajectory should be fine, so the problem must lie with the loop count parameter. Could there be a minimum value, below which it's treated as an invalid parameter? Allen's mind raced.

Enough thinking, let's just try it!

This time Allen cast a spell again, setting the loop count to 10 — failure! Allen recorded the parameter he had tried.

Loop count set to 100 — failure! Recorded again.

Loop count set to 1000 — failure! Recorded again.

Loop count set to 10000 — failure! Recorded again.

After trying this far, Allen felt something was off. The value was definitely too large — a spell couldn't possibly last that long. Hurriedly, he dialed the parameter back down...

Time ticked by, second by second. Allen sat weakly on the toilet, staring at the test parameters in his notebook, feeling a touch of despair. Where exactly had things gone wrong? But the notebook gave him no answer.

Allen listlessly counted the number of his attempts — 64.

"What a great number! Two to the sixth power!" Allen muttered, his eyes vacant.

Suddenly a flash of inspiration struck Allen. He swiftly drew his wand, and in his mind pictured a ball of light tracing an "S" shape through the air, with the loop count set to 64!

"Lumos!"

Then a ball of light appeared as promised. Without the slightest reluctance it left the wand tip, flew into the air, traced out an "S" trajectory, and then slowly began to repeat its path.

Allen's heart swelled with wild joy — just as he thought! Just as he thought! Allen could have slapped himself twice for his own stupidity. As a programmer, why had he limited himself to decimal? Binary is the absolute GOAT!

Allen's spirits soared, and he cast a spell again — this time with a loop count of 1024!

He succeeded once more, just as expected. A ball of light traced a "B" trajectory through the air. Combined with the earlier "S," it formed a classic word, as if mocking someone.

Yet that someone paid it no mind, and declared loudly: "Hahaha! I am an S-B!" Then burst into hearty laughter.

Allen pressed on, testing several more parameters. The result: the loop count had to be a power of 2, with a minimum value greater than or equal to 64 and a maximum value less than or equal to 1024.

Allen was instantly rendered a little speechless by this result — this parameter design was a bit anti-human!

Who could have imagined that Lumos had this thing called a loop count, and that it was tied to the trajectory parameter? Even if you thought of it, the numerical design was anti-human — it had to be a power of 2, with range limits. Who could possibly think of that? No wonder such a common spell hadn't been improved in over three hundred years.

It really was because this parameter design was just too damn flashy.

Allen watched the "little stars" dancing all over the sky with great delight, his heart full of satisfaction. But suddenly another thought popped into his head:

These balls of light are flying so slowly! Why can't they fly faster? Can they fly faster?

The moment this thought appeared in his head, another one jumped in too: "Rotation speed!"

Allen couldn't wait to draw his wand, imagined the ball of light spinning as it flew through the air, and then cast a spell again.

Sure enough, a ball of light shot rapidly from the wand and flew swiftly through the air.

"Just as I thought — all these parameters complement each other!" Allen said happily, like a child with a new toy.

Then he cast another spell. This time the ball of light spun even faster — the flight speed increased along with the rotation speed.

"There's still one more parameter. Once I add this one, Lumos will be a completely perfect spell!" Allen said, gazing at the flying ball of light with infatuation.

This time he vaguely felt that something was about to happen, but he still resolutely drew his wand. With all sorts of "parameters" for casting the spell running through his mind, he softly uttered the incantation:

"Lumos!"

Allen felt only a boom inside his head, as if his soul had instantly flown out of his body, met briefly with a vast will in the endless high sky, and then snapped right back — so fast that Allen felt he had just been hallucinating.

What Allen did not notice was that, in that instant, a symbol on his forehead flashed brightly, then quickly vanished...

When Allen came back to his senses, the balls of light on the ceiling had all disappeared, leaving only one ball of light flickering rapidly as it flew through the air. By now it was late, and the washroom was quite dim. Allen's face flickered in the light of the ball, and a familiar feeling welled up in him once more.

But even after the ball of light faded into the air, Allen still hadn't caught the inspiration in his mind.

He walked to the washroom door. The brilliant lights of Hogwarts outside came into view, and he suddenly understood.

Why did the ball of light have to be white? Just because the standard casting procedure for Lumos didn't say so? Allen thought mockingly to himself.

Allen had lost count of how many times today he had drawn his wand and uttered the same incantation, but his mind had been thoroughly opened up.

He summoned a red ball of light that flickered as it flew along its set trajectory through the air...

But Allen didn't stop. He summoned six more balls of light in every color, enough to make up the colors of the Calabash Brothers. During this process he was pleasantly surprised to discover that the flickering speed of the balls of light was also tied to the rotation speed, which meant the flickering speed could be controlled too...

The flickering balls of light filling the sky instantly changed the atmosphere. Allen stared blankly at the light and shadows playing across the floor and his body. A BGM automatically started playing in his head. He felt his legs begin to shake, felt his DNA begin to move, and his whole body filled with the urge to dance...

"So this is the correct way to use Lumos!" Allen said in a voice that was almost a moan.

So now — should I dance to "Wolf" or to "Pure Land of Bliss"?

Online and waiting, kinda urgent!