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[Sirius]: [Potentia Animarum] [Sirius]: [I've honestly never seen Professor Slughorn look like that before. He was sweating, terrified, nervous, deeply uneasy. Very.]
Staring intently at Sirius's familiar, scrawled handwriting glowing softly on the developing paper in front of him, Regulus heavily pinched the bridge of his nose. He took a long, deep breath, holding it until the golden writing gradually faded and completely disappeared into the parchment...
What on earth could have possibly happened recently that violently forced the lazy, comfort-loving Professor Slughorn to desperately, secretly "borrow" a restricted book in the dead of night? Regulus thought, his mind racing with terrifying canonical implications.
Hogwarts, which currently seemed so relatively peaceful and academically focused on the surface, was actually violently churning with deadly, historical undercurrents.
Regulus lowered his head and quickly picked up his silver quill:
[Regulus]: [...Are you three alright?] [Sirius]: [We're completely alright. Although there was a massive, highly terrifying small slip-up with my camouflage charm fading, the Professor was entirely too focused on the book. He didn't see us.] [Regulus]: [Thank sweet Merlin for that. Let's formally talk about the details tomorrow in the Room. Goodnight, brother!] [Sirius]: [Goodnight.]
Regulus lay flat on his back on his comfortable four-poster bed, staring blankly up at the dark green velvet canopy above him, deeply lost in highly paranoid thought—
With his slightly advanced knowledge of formal Latin, he completely couldn't help but endlessly ponder the highly concise, terrifying book title Sirius had sent him via text—
Potentia Animarum.
What specific, terrifying historical event could have possibly compelled the cowardly Head of Slytherin to aggressively sneak around in the Restricted Section in the middle of the night, specifically to violently tear out permanent pages from an ancient book?
What kind of overwhelming, suffocating sense of mortal crisis made him, a highly dignified, comfortable Professor, act so desperately secretly and furtively?
Soul Power.
Judging purely by the direct Latin translation of the name, it should logically be a highly advanced, deeply theoretical book aggressively studying the profound, biological connection between the human soul and raw magic. And since Professor Slughorn had explicitly, fearfully mentioned the phrase "evil magic," and the book was locked deep in the Restricted Section... it absolutely must contain highly detailed instructions regarding some of the most unforgivable, forbidden knowledge in the world.
Regulus had a very, very bold canonical guess regarding exactly what that torn-out appendix contained...
(And the readers reading this webnovel all undeniably have the exact same bold guess: Horcruxes.)
Soul Power—throughout the entirety of human history, regardless of the specific time period or geographic location, the concept of the 'soul' has absolutely always been a profoundly deep, highly debated core topic of existence.
Whether discussed in ancient theology, complex philosophy, cheap deceptionology, modern Muggle science, or the later, highly popular internet joke of "when in scientific doubt, just blame quantum mechanics," there are thousands of various, conflicting explanations and answers regarding the soul.
And Regulus, a modern, cynical soul who had literally, miraculously transmigrated through time and space to arrive in the United Kingdom in the 1970s, deeply, absolutely believed one fundamental truth—the physical, tangible existence of the human soul is utterly beyond any scientific doubt.
And the raw, terrifying magical power it inherently contains is even more worthy of absolute awe!
He firmly believed—
In this specific magical world, raw thought is actual, physical substance.
The deepest, most profound thoughts of the human soul are actively, violently brought into physical reality entirely through the sheer force of absolute belief and raw willpower.
Absolute belief possesses terrifyingly great power. Unbreakable will possesses terrifyingly great power.
Fortunately for humanity—these immensely powerful, world-breaking forces naturally exist dormant within every single person's heart and soul, simply, quietly waiting to be aggressively discovered and weaponized.
This is exactly what Regulus believed, and this is exactly the ruthless philosophy he was actively practicing every single day—
Day and exhausting night, holding onto a firm, unshakeable goal and absolute belief. Constantly improving his physical body, aggressively learning, ruthlessly practicing... constantly, violently exploring the absolute outer boundaries of his own magical cognition... deeply knowing himself, intimately knowing his own innate power... perfectly merging his raw magic with his absolute belief in his own survival...
And his constantly, terrifyingly rising magic level, which genuinely seemed to surge forward impossibly fast in the shocked eyes of everyone else around him, was the absolute, clear, biological proof of this highly philosophical concept.
So—
Logically speaking, exactly how big is the actual, raw power gap between himself and the Dark Lord, Tom Riddle, right now?
At the very least—violently, permanently splitting one's own soul to achieve immortality is a horrific, highly complex dark magic that Regulus is currently completely, fundamentally unable to even attempt to do, and he honestly has absolutely no theoretical clue about the actual mathematical principles behind casting it.
And what about the other titans? Dumbledore? Grindelwald? The immortal Nicolas Flamel? Those true, terrifyingly powerful Legendary Wizards?
Not even mentioning the absolute apex predators above, just comparing himself to his own teachers... Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Professor Slughorn... exactly how far is the raw combat gap between him and them?
Allies are naturally, vastly better and more useful the overwhelmingly stronger they are, Regulus reasoned coldly.
As for his enemies—
The old, psychopathic Voldemort currently absolutely controls the terrifying, unnatural power of soul fission (splitting).
But he—Regulus Arcturus Fourteen Xuanyuan Black—may absolutely not be without the terrifying, overpowered modern capability of "soul fusion"!
Nuclear fusion is mathematically, physically vastly stronger and more destructive than nuclear fission!
Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west of the river! The tables will eventually turn!
Thinking of this highly arrogant, incredibly chuunibyou webnovel logic, Regulus couldn't help but chuckle softly into his pillow.
Endlessly overthinking the power scaling of the universe in the middle of the night is ultimately useless.
As for accurately judging the exact combat level gap between himself and the apex predators... wouldn't it logically be easy enough to just casually test it by asking someone to fight?
In this very Castle, there is the ultimate, undisputed Legendary Wizard, Albus Dumbledore, just sitting in his office, completely ready for you to aggressively catch him off guard.
Hehe.
Regulus closed his dark eyes, his mind spinning with violent, highly ambitious plans, and finally fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
The next day. The highly secure Room of Requirement.
After the illegal Alchemy group was officially, formally established at the pub, Regulus had finally, safely introduced the existence of this miraculous secret room to the young Gryffindor lions to use as their primary base of operations.
The highly virtuous, deeply exhausted Remus Lupin was currently standing by the wall, heavily utilizing the massive, highly complex magical photocopier machine that Regulus had brilliantly, aggressively "thought" up into physical existence using the room's sentient magic. Remus was meticulously, rapidly copying the highly restricted, stolen book, Strongly Protective Enchantments and Shifting Forms, page by agonizing page.
"Honestly, how on earth did you even manage to think of creating something like that, Regulus?" James Potter asked, crossing his arms and deeply admiring the brilliant, flashing mechanics of the magical photocopier. "I completely, miserably thought we were actually going to have to physically, painfully hand-copy the entire massive book with quills..."
"Haha," Regulus couldn't help but laugh out loud, leaning back on the sofa. "Well, that certainly explains exactly why you looked so incredibly, deeply miserable when you first walked into the room today..."
"As the boss always says: Technology actively changes life for the better," Sirius couldn't help but smugly quote Regulus's favorite corporate catchphrase, continuing to read the copied pages:
"Yesterday, I already aggressively flipped through the specific theoretical part about the Animagus transformation a bit. The required physical and magical steps are indeed—terrifyingly, insanely complicated. And the mandated magical materials required for the potion are some incredibly rare, highly uncommon, and strictly regulated things."
"Then we'd absolutely better aggressively find other, highly advanced Transfiguration materials to cross-verify the instructions," Regulus said highly cautiously, his CEO paranoia flaring. "We absolutely cannot completely, blindly rely on exactly what one single, ancient book says. If the translation is wrong, we could permanently mutate ourselves."
"If only we could just normally, safely ask Professor McGonagall for academic advice," Remus sighed wistfully, pulling another copied page from the machine.
"Mate, if we ask her about this, we might as well just march straight up to the Professor and boldly tell her—we desperately want to be permanently expelled and sent to Azkaban," James shrugged highly exaggeratedly, and Sirius nodded vigorously in absolute agreement.
Doing the research this highly secretive, entirely self-taught way was indeed incredibly, agonizingly slow—it would honestly be absolutely great if they actually personally knew any other older wizards who could already flawlessly become Animagi to tutor them.
Huh?! A massive, brilliant flash of canonical inspiration suddenly struck Regulus like a physical blow.
If the highly unethical, annoying tabloid journalist "Beetle" Rita Skeeter had historically, aggressively reported on the high-profile criminal trials of the captured Death Eaters immediately following the First Wizarding War...
Then she should logically already be a young adult right now, actively starting to aggressively work as a ruthless junior reporter, right?
And to get those highly illegal, exclusive scoops... maybe she has absolutely already successfully learned exactly how to become an unregistered Animagus?!
Although the vile Rita Skeeter was completely, fundamentally unreliable as an honest reporter, her terrifying, highly manipulative ability to aggressively incite the public and gather illegal intelligence was undoubtedly, phenomenally valuable to a growing syndicate. I need to find her, Regulus noted mentally.
"So, what exactly happened to you guys last night in the library?" Regulus asked, shifting the topic back to the heist.
"Last night—mate, that was really, genuinely super thrilling!" James's hazel eyes lit up at once, and he absolutely couldn't wait to loudly share the story, completely lacking any lingering, rational fear of expulsion.
"As soon as Professor Slughorn suddenly appeared out of thin air, he really, genuinely scared me half to death—but honestly, he looked even vastly more nervous and terrified than we were! He was heavily sweating profusely, completely panting, and clearly, physically not good at late-night adventuring."
There was a highly distinct, arrogant hint of Gryffindor pride in James's mocking tone.
"His physical body is also deeply, terribly neglected in terms of basic cardiovascular exercise," Sirius added with a highly critical nod, remembering Regulus's lectures. "It's blatantly obvious. He could barely breathe."
"He simply eats far, far too many crystallized pineapples in his office," Regulus shook his head in deep disappointment.
"Anyway, after he aggressively pulled out that massive, creepy black book," James continued animatedly, using his hands to gesture. "He kept holding his glowing wand directly at it, standing in a highly defensive combat stance—looking exactly as if he fully expected the bloody book to suddenly jump up and physically eat his face..."
"And that cursed book actually violently struggled a lot when he opened it! It made quite a loud, tearing noise! The Professor had to aggressively cast several, seemingly very powerful, highly complex containment spells before finally, violently tearing off the pages from the back."
"But the best part is, Filch absolutely didn't come to investigate the noise at all!"
"My Disillusionment Charm completely failed and couldn't be maintained anymore by the end of it; if Slughorn had just looked closely at the shelf, he could have easily seen my physical outline shivering in the dark," Sirius said, shaking his head.
"Fortunately, while the Professor was completely, entirely focused on magically dealing with the screaming book, Remus brilliantly signaled me to quickly, silently move back under the safety of the Invisibility Cloak," Sirius explained.
"None of us dared to breathe heavily for twenty minutes. After the sweating Professor had finally been gone for a long while, we literally had to awkwardly shuffle out of the aisle sideways, exactly like a giant, invisible crab."
"Looking closely from the side angle, the specific section he violently tore off should have been a few pages located entirely in the dark appendix at the very end of the book," Sirius said with absolute, analytical certainty.
"Did you guys actually manage to flip through the rest of the book yourselves after he left?" Regulus asked intently.
"I desperately wanted to open it and look at the dark magic, but Remus absolutely wouldn't let me," Potter complained highly dejectedly, crossing his arms.
"James, be logical. Even Professor Slughorn—a highly experienced Potions Master—was completely terrified and so incredibly cautious with this cursed book—if we reckless idiots opened it rashly without proper containment spells, we might have accidentally triggered a sonic ward and woken up absolutely everyone in the entire Castle," Remus said calmly, acting as the voice of absolute reason from the side.
"Ah..." James said highly sullenly, kicking the table leg. "I understand the logical reasoning, Remus, but I still hate it..."
"Regardless, we absolutely need to securely return the physical book to the exact same spot on the shelf as soon as possible tonight before Madam Pince notices it's missing," Lupin commanded. He placed the heavy, fully copied stack of the Strongly Protective Enchantments manuscript onto the table and scanned the few people in the room.
"I'll do it. Tonight, I'll personally sneak in and return it," Regulus said simply, volunteering for the stealth mission.
"Alright. It's vastly easier and much quieter for you to act entirely alone under the cloak than all three of us," Remus looked at James and breathed a massive, highly visible sigh of profound relief that he didn't have to go back to the Restricted Section.
Sirius also nodded in immediate, highly pragmatic agreement.
James, who had actually been highly looking forward to another thrilling, illegal midnight library heist, instantly became deeply, visibly dejected. He pulled out the shimmering, priceless Invisibility Cloak from deep under his robes and handed it over highly casually to the Slytherin—
"Fine. But Regulus, if you happen to find out exactly what evil magic Slughorn was looking for in that book, be absolutely sure to tell us!"