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Hogwarts: Charlie's Chocolate Factory
A relentless stream of owls flew through the Great Hall's towering doors.
It was Saturday at noon.
A dusty grey owl swooped directly toward Charlie, descending slowly with a greaseproof paper parcel clutched securely in its thick talons.
"Thanks, mate." Charlie took the parcel, grabbed a chicken leg from his plate, and placed it on the floor behind him before lifting the owl off the table.
"Looks like your order arrived," Anthony noted.
Hector was busy studying the bird. A moment later, he turned to Charlie. "That owl looks different from the one yesterday."
"Does it?" Charlie hadn't really paid much attention. To him, all these barn owls were just the same dusty shade of grey.
"The coloring is slightly off."
Charlie unwrapped the greaseproof paper. Inside sat three solid blocks of dark chocolate, along with a small slip of parchment.
It didn't take him long to realize this owl belonged to the shop. It wasn't just here to deliver the goods; it was here to collect payment.
"What happens if I just don't pay?"
"Whatever you're planning sounds incredibly evil."
"No, no, I'm genuinely curious. Say I was out in the wilderness, the owl delivered the parcel, and I just shooed it away without paying. How exactly would the shop track me down afterward?" Charlie mused thoughtfully.
He poured himself a glass of water and rinsed the lingering taste of greasy food from his mouth. Only then did he peel back the wrapper on one of the chocolate blocks, break off a small corner, and pop it into his mouth.
The second it hit his tongue, a cloying, artificial sweetness flooded his mouth. It melted agonizingly slowly, leaving a distinctly waxy, almost grainy texture behind.
He grimaced, his eyes dropping back to the shop's invoice.
Three Sickles in total.
It was genuinely hard to believe that chocolate this expensive could taste this vile. The overpowering flavor of cheap cocoa butter substitutes was impossible to ignore.
If there was a silver lining, it was that Charlie only had to pay for the block he had broken open to taste. He had zero intention of paying for the other two. The owl could take them right back.
"What's wrong? I take it they aren't up to standard?"
Charlie pulled out a napkin, wiped his mouth, and pushed the block of chocolate toward his two friends.
"Right now, the only method I have is melting down pre-made chocolate so I can incorporate it into my own recipes."
"But there is absolutely no way I'm using this rubbish as my base ingredient."
Hearing his harsh critique, Anthony and Hector each broke off a piece and tasted it themselves.
"I don't see the issue. Tastes perfectly fine to me," Anthony said.
Hector shot him a look of absolute disbelief before shaking his head. "If you're judging this by the standard of actual dark chocolate, it's genuinely awful."
"It tastes like the cheap, bulk chocolate you'd buy out of a plastic tub on a street corner."
Anthony frowned. "Really? But this is what all the other chocolate I eat tastes like."
He hesitated for a second before adding, "Well, except for Charlie's. Charlie's is definitely different. A lot more bitter."
"Charlie uses premium Cadbury dark chocolate. It's a very expensive ingredient," Hector pointed out.
That was exactly why Hector had asked Charlie how much he planned on charging for a single piece the other day.
There was something else Hector hadn't mentioned: he profoundly respected Charlie's uncompromising standards for his raw ingredients, especially knowing the boy wasn't exactly wealthy.
"Looks like Diagon Alley is a dead end. Maybe Honeydukes will have better options." Charlie clung to a tiny shred of hope. And it really was just a tiny shred.
After all, if a massive wizarding phenomenon like Chocolate Frogs used aggressively mediocre chocolate, finding premium dark chocolate in the magical world was going to be an uphill battle.
Just look at Anthony. He couldn't even tell the difference between quality cocoa and cheap wax.
"That's actually brilliant news. If your products ever hit the magical market, Charlie, I guarantee you'll be an overnight success," Hector smiled.
Charlie gave Hector a strange look. "What exactly does your family do? I feel like you know a little bit about everything."
"I just eat a lot of chocolate. And my parents are in business. That's the only reason they had enough disposable income to hire me a chess tutor."
"Fair enough. A family of businessmen," Charlie nodded.
He figured that was the end of the matter. But the very next afternoon at dinner, Anthony and Hector's family owls returned.
Hector opened his parcel to reveal exactly ten familiar, premium blocks of Cadbury dark chocolate.
"These are for you, mate," Hector said.
"For me?" Charlie stared at him in surprise.
"Yeah. I just had a feeling you were going to need them. So when I wrote my letter the other day, I asked my parents to send some over."
"Brilliant. Thank you so much. How much do I owe—"
"No, no, no, Charlie. We're mates, alright?"
"Look, you didn't hesitate to share your secret magic tricks with us. You showed us your chocolate workshop, and you brought us to the Room of Requirement. How could I possibly ask you for money?"
"Besides, if you really feel bad about it, just let me sample more of your new batches."
Hearing that, Charlie nodded. He wasn't the type to waste time with polite haggling over small favors.
"I accept, then. But if I need more in the future, you have to let me pay you for it."
"Absolutely. Anytime you're short on chocolate, just let me know," Hector nodded, turning his attention back to his dinner.
Back in the common room, Charlie stared down at the massive pile of chocolate. Rolling up his sleeves, he prepared to get to work.
Today's experiment: blending sun-dew and lightning essence.
He stuck to his usual method, but this time, he scrapped the liquid center. The pure lightning essence was clearly better suited to being blended directly into the chocolate shell.
As for the dosage, he split it into several different batches.
This addressed the trickiest problem Charlie was currently facing: the lightning series didn't seem to possess any genuine commercial viability.
If the dosage was too high, the side effects were violent the second it hit the tongue. Those sparks of lightning were entirely untamed.
But if the dosage was too low, the lightning's actual effects were completely negligible.
Still, he had to keep testing.
Mixing the yellow sun-dew with the purple lightning essence resulted in a murky grey color. Honestly, it didn't look appetizing in the slightest, but thankfully, he was mixing it into dark chocolate.
About half an hour later, the first batch of sun-lightning chocolate was complete.
"Actually, 'Sun-Lightning Chocolate' has a nice ring to it."
Before popping a piece into his mouth, he cast a preemptive Softening Charm on the training dummy, just in case.
As the Sun-Lightning chocolate melted on his tongue, an incredibly violent burst of electricity crackled and exploded in his mouth.
Following his throat downward, the raw lightning surged outward, flooding through his entire body. From his shoulders, down his arms, straight to his palms and into his very fingertips—he could physically feel the electricity rampaging violently through his muscles.
"Damn it!"
Villie, watching from her frame on the desk, looked at him in alarm. "Mr. Wonka, what's wrong?"
"I'm fine," Charlie shook his head.
Honestly, he had no idea what was happening. He took a step toward the dormitory door, planning to find Anthony and Hector.
He turned his head to check on his terrified rabbit. "It's alright, mate. Just get back to your bed."
The very next fraction of a second, Charlie slammed face-first into the heavy dormitory door.
Rubbing his throbbing forehead, he stared back at his desk in absolute shock. All he had done was turn his head—and somehow, he had crossed the entire room.
"What the hell? Did my brain turn to mush? I can't even tell how many steps I'm taking anymore?"
Logically, this was his own dorm room. He should have been able to walk to the door with his eyes closed.
But it only took a moment for the realization to hit him.
He was moving faster.
But only his physical body had sped up. His brain hadn't been enhanced with the processing power required to handle that extreme physical speed.
"Brilliant!" Charlie yelled in excitement.
"Physical Overload!"
"The sun-dew perfectly acts as the bridge connecting the raw lightning to the physical body!"