All sorts of strange instruments in the office clicked and clacked, and Sean could only listen to the sounds they made.
Professor Tayra had done something—some spell—to blindfold him.
That way he couldn't see the alchemy professor's eyes, and oddly enough, he regained a bit of strength.
"For now, don't make eye contact with anyone, my dear apprentice…
But it's always been like this—groping forward in blindness, carving a path through ignorance. That's the duty of an alchemy master.
The magic we touch will be stronger than any other magic. The knowledge we pass down will be harder than any other knowledge, because we face the heaviest parts of the magical arts head-on.
Have I ever told you the story about how Uagadou got flipped over by a paper airplane?"
Professor Tayra spoke with unhurried composure.
"No, Professor," Sean said, intrigued.
A paper airplane? A seven-second paper airplane?
He'd seen them ignore distance and deliver information at incredible speed, but toppling a whole school sounded absurd.
"It's a fun story. I was expelled from Uagadou for half a year. If my teacher hadn't fought tooth and nail to pull strings, I might've ended up in prison.
That's what teachers are for, child."
Tayra's voice floated, light and distant.
"To clean up a student's mess?" Sean asked.
"Why would you think that? A mess? No—preserving a rare seed in the alchemy world.
In alchemy, most wizards are just padding the numbers. Only three percent are even decent.
And within that three percent, only one in ten has any chance of changing the magical world.
So the few, the truly scarce, get the privilege of looking up at real alchemy masters.
Like me. And like you."
Sean couldn't see her eyes, but he could practically hear the teasing ambition in them.
"Righting a tilted school isn't hard. Threaten—persuade—the professors into cooperating isn't hard either.
What's precious is the magic that can create an artifact capable of flipping a castle.
Now tell me—what did you add to the kneazle-cat cookie to make it produce that kind of effect?"
Tayra leaned in closer.
"Partial animal transformation is possible," Sean said. "I adjusted some of the magical circuitry and redesigned the ritual.
That way, a wizard can transform just a part of a magical creature.
But the hard part is that wizard magic and magical-creature magic don't actually connect. That makes it impossible for a wizard to use those transformed parts naturally.
Only wizards whose souls align with the magical creature can truly control it."
Sean frowned. That problem had been bothering him for a long time.
Fairytale cookies seemed to give a wizard two options:
Use the creature's magic, or use wizard magic.
But in reality, the relationship was more like "either/or." They couldn't really be used together.
"A castle wasn't built in a day," Tayra said, as if nodding. "You've already made a historic breakthrough."
"You put protective magic on me?" Sean suddenly asked.
Otherwise there was no way to explain how she'd arrived so fast.
The instruments in the entire alchemy office seemed to pause.
"I only set a few small alchemical devices in place. You'll have to get used to it, my dear apprentice.
Besides—it wasn't just me…"
Sean still couldn't see her face, but her tone was pure amusement.
"Alright. Now let's talk about something more important.
Are you ready to open Fairytale Shop across the entire magical world?"
Her tone sharpened.
"What?" Sean said, completely lost.
"My dear apprentice—you're about to change how the magical world communicates, and you don't even realize it?"
Professor Tayra braced one hand on an old magical gramophone and stood in front of him.
"Remember what I told you? Only the rarest alchemists have the right to define this world.
Now I'm telling you: you are about to define how wizards communicate.
The Magic Hand Mirror is about to revolutionize magical communications."
She stood by the window. Outside, snow-melted mountains stretched into the distance.
"But Professor… the materials for the Magic Hand Mirror are still expensive, and—"
Sean's mind raced.
He knew perfectly well that the Magic Hand Mirror could transform wizard communications.
Right now, the magical world mostly relied on fireplaces and owls.
A few places—like the Ministry—used paper airplanes.
But not every household was connected to the Floo Network. And a fireplace, being immovable, was basically a landline.
Sean understood the difference between a landline and a mobile phone all too well.
A mobile phone was destined to outcompete most landlines.
So why did wizards keep owls if they already had fireplaces?
One: fireplaces couldn't reliably send physical items.
Two: fireplaces were inconvenient.
Owls were more convenient—but they had plenty of drawbacks too:
They were slow, prone to mistakes, and could be intercepted.
Now imagine a magical artifact that enabled real-time communication, rapid response, and the ability to transmit crucial information in emergencies.
Would wizards really not want it?
Sean suspected the Order of the Phoenix and the Death Eaters alone would buy them out instantly.
In the original story, Voldemort had used false information; a desperate Harry paid the price for Gryffindor's headlong "act first" instincts.
That only highlighted how valuable "fast, reliable information in an emergency" really was.
"Expensive?" Tayra said, the corners of her mouth lifting. "There is no absolute 'expensive' or 'cheap' in this world—only whether the value matches the price."
She then waved her hand lightly.
Sean's sight returned.
At the same time, a cold object dropped into his palm.
He looked down at the Magic Hand Mirror Tayra had handed him. It seemed to have been modified again.
"Based on your original draft, I found some suppliers," Tayra said, eyes narrowing slightly. "They were very willing to offer us the lowest acquisition prices."
Sean instantly understood: the professor's "big hand" had done its work.
"A pair of Magic Hand Mirrors," Tayra said evenly, "can have its cost brought down to seven Galleons."
Sean jerked his head up.
He remembered the original cost: dozens of Galleons per pair—even after he'd optimized away the rarest materials.
To crush the price this hard, Sean could think of only two possibilities:
One: Professor Tayra had had a "friendly conversation" with the merchants.
Two: the merchants' prices had been inflated to begin with.
Or both.
"Easter break is coming," Tayra said, smiling. "It's time to contact your agent, my dear apprentice.
On that day, we make Fairytale Shop spread across the entire magical world."
~~~
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