Baelon returned to his small room upstairs and gently closed the wooden door behind him.
The rooms upstairs at the Leaky Cauldron weren’t large and were simply furnished, containing only a small bed, a wooden table, and a small window facing the Muggle street.
He leaned against the table, quietly recalling his conversation with Hannah Abbott downstairs earlier.
His purple eyes were calm, without a single ripple of emotion.
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He knew very well that Hannah’s frequent glances, her sudden blushing, and the thoughts captured by his Mental Perception were merely the innocent goodwill of a young girl stunned by a first impression, pure and straightforward.
But from beginning to end, no such feelings had arisen in his heart, let alone anything like liking or attraction.
In his eyes, Hannah was just a fellow new student of the same age about to enter Hogwarts with him—a well-behaved, somewhat shy, ordinary girl.
His casual chat with her and his use of humor to dissolve the awkwardness were merely out of politeness and amiability, treating her as a perfectly normal person without any ulterior motives.
The experiences of his past life had long since made his state of mind steady and indifferent; the girl’s budding affection could not stir any ripples in his heart, like a wisp of smoke drifting through the Leaky Cauldron, so faint it left almost no trace.
Baelon shook his head slightly and thought no more of it.
He walked to the re-lit candelabra and casually spread the magic textbooks he had purchased today across the wooden table.
As his fingers lightly brushed them, the pages made a soft rustling sound in the evening breeze.
The first book was “The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1,” with diagrams of over a dozen basic spells printed on the title page.
His fingertip traced across the page, his gaze falling on the annotation for “Wingardium Leviosa,” and his fingers unconsciously mimicked a flick of the wand in the air.
The movement was fluid, yet devoid of any emotional fluctuation.
He flipped through the pages quickly, as if he were rapidly scanning a manual or a blueprint rather than simply studying.
Every spell parameter and every line of casting precautions were not isolated words in his eyes, but clear logical lines.
He looked very closely but was not in a hurry, only silently constructing a framework in his mind: basic spells were the skeleton, Transformation Spells were the muscles, and Charms were the neural network connecting them.
Occasionally, he would stop and frown slightly at a small note in the book regarding “wand-waving angles.”
It wasn’t because he didn’t understand, but out of a sense of rigor; he was used to calibrating every executable detail to its most precise state.
Before he knew it, the candlelight had flickered several times, and a corner of a page had become worn from turning.
Baelon gently closed the book, placed “The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1” back on the table, and his gaze unconsciously swept over the old clothes he had changed out of earlier.
The fabric wasn’t precious, but it was clean; having sat in the Leaky Cauldron for a while, it had picked up a bit of the smell of alcohol and dust, but not to the point where it needed immediate attention.
But that drive for logical research in his mind rose again.
Since he had just entered the Wizarding World and hadn’t even tried basic magic spells, he might as well start by practicing the most mundane Cleaning Charm, treating these trivial items at hand as the best testing ground.
He stood up, walked to the old clothes, and picked up his wand.
“Scourgify.”
His voice was calm, and his tone was steady without a single tremor.
A very thin white light suddenly lit up at the tip of the wand, like a gentle breeze wrapping through the creases of the fabric.
A few seconds later, the faint light dissipated, and the dusty hem of the clothes instantly became smooth, the faint smell of alcohol washed away cleanly along with it.
Baelon’s fingers moved slightly as he tried it again.
This time, he deliberately adjusted the wand-waving angle and the rhythm of force, his mental energy gently guiding it so that the faint light stayed on the fabric for a shorter time and covered it more evenly.
When the second spell took effect, even the texture of the fabric was undisturbed; only fine dust quietly settled within the light.
He practiced several times, going from slightly stiff at the beginning to moving smoothly and naturally, his actions becoming increasingly precise and fluid.
The Cleaning Charm was the most basic of daily spells, but to him, it was like calibrating a set of precision tools.
Every successful casting felt like laying a solid cornerstone for his upcoming Hogwarts life.
After finishing the last practice, he casually folded the clothes and tossed them back into the wardrobe.
The candlelight still flickered, and the textbooks on the table remained spread open quietly.
He didn’t immediately continue reading, but simply held his wand and stood still for a moment.
Tonight’s attempt was just a small trial of his skills, but it gave him a more intuitive understanding of the Wizarding World’s magic system.
It was logically clear with explicit rules; compared to the various complex systems he had encountered in his past life, although the forms were different, the core shared a common structural logic.
As the night deepened, the noise downstairs at the Leaky Cauldron gradually subsided.
Baelon gently put away his wand, sat back at the table, and flipped to the next page of the textbook.
Since he had already started practicing, he intended to strike while the iron was hot and try all the simplest, most practical, and non-dangerous basic spells in the textbooks.
He didn’t aim too high by touching offensive spells, choosing only the most mundane small spells: Lumos, Wingardium Leviosa, Silencio, and Reparo.
First, he whispered toward the candelabra at the corner of the table: “Lumos.”
A soft ball of white light immediately lit up at the tip of the wand, with moderate brightness, stable and unwavering.
He slightly adjusted his magic output, allowing the brightness to fluctuate at will; after a few times, he was already proficient.
Next was the Levitation Charm.
He picked up the parchment he bought today, tapped it with his wand, and said, “Wingardium Leviosa.”
The parchment rose gently into the air, hovering steadily in mid-air.
Baelon controlled it to move up, down, left, and right until the magic flowed smoothly without any obstruction before gently letting it fall back to the table.
Afterward, he practiced Silencio and Reparo, stopping once he reached a level of stability, precision, and zero errors, without any fancy showing off.
His practice was quiet, restrained, and methodical, like completing a rigorous homework assignment, without the slightest impatience or extra emotion.
Not until the bright moon rose high outside the window and the sounds from the bar downstairs faded away did Baelon put away his wand and close his magic books.
Tonight’s practice was enough.
He knew in his heart that basic spells were about being solid, not about greedily learning too many.
As for Hannah Abbott’s innocent gazes and attraction, they had long been completely forgotten during his focused practice of spells.
In his eyes, the most important thing right now was always becoming stronger and adapting to this entirely new world of magic.
Perhaps it was the continuous spellcasting that allowed the magic within his body to complete its first true cycle and resonance, or perhaps the magical particles agitating in the air touched some dormant switch deep within his soul, but he felt the originally chaotic Mental Sea in his mind suddenly become clear, like a stone being thrown into it.
He closed his eyes, held his breath, and concentrated, allowing that immense, almost terrifying mental power to flow and explore along the pathways of his consciousness.
Deep within that bottomless abyss of consciousness, he precisely captured an extremely faint but exceptionally solid point of light.
That was a Mental Anchor, a “past tense” that his subconscious had never dared to truly touch since his transmigration.
Baelon’s mental tentacles gently reached toward it.
In the next instant, everything in his surroundings seemed to be stripped away, and a unique sight suddenly unfolded before his eyes.
It was the continent of Westeros, King’s Landing, deep within The Red Keep.
There was no smoke, no war, only that familiar, towering dome built of dark brown marble.
The scene before him was not an illusory projection, but a manifestation of consciousness that transcended time and space.
It was his bedroom in The Red Keep, both lonely and majestic, from when he was a member of the Targaryen family before his transmigration.
The damaged wooden bed still leaned against the wall, the faded Targaryen Three-Headed Dragon Tapestry hung on the wall, and the embers in the fireplace had not yet completely died out.
Even the faint scent mixed with the smells of King’s Landing in the air was so real it felt within reach.
This place was his “coordinate origin” across time and space.
Baelon stood in this mental illusion, his fingertips lightly brushing across that familiar wooden table.
“So that’s how it is…”
Baelon murmured to himself, a flash of realization instantly crossing his eyes.
This mark was not just a memory duplicate; it was a spacetime locator.
magic gave him the ability to mobilize magic power, and this room in The Red Keep, as his most spiritually belonging stronghold before his transmigration, had now become the most stable stabilizing anchor in his Mental Sea.
No matter where he was, no matter how this body’s magic power grew, as long as he was willing, he could anchor this point at any time to construct a cross-dimensional channel.
This meant he possessed a double sense of security!
Baelon slowly opened his eyes, a faint light swirling within his purple eyes.