Green vines burst forth from the void, instantly swarming over the entire serpent-fang statue.
Mason then thrust the pointed tip of his Elder Staff forward, piercing through the greenery and striking the stone statue without a hint of resistance.
[Entangling Roots] could originally target only living creatures, but by applying a technique similar to how he manipulated his mana shield, Mason had temporarily modified some of the spell’s restrictions.
He could likewise adjust the speed and radius of the vines; at minimum, they could wrap around just one of his feet, while at maximum, binding a troll would pose no issue.
The only trade-off was a longer spell cooldown.
At present, Mason faced two primary problems: his mana capacity and his lack of a new offensive spell.
After crafting the spell scroll and casting Entangling Roots once, Mason’s mana had hit rock bottom.
He had to find a way to raise his maximum mana pool to handle back-to-back combat scenarios.
As for a new offensive spell, it was mainly needed to complete the task Anna had assigned him.
A combination of Entangling Roots and a shield spell could knock out most lower-year students in an ambush, but upper-year students were a different story.
If they reacted in time to dodge the initial assault or shattered his mana shield with a curse, Mason would be turned into a sitting duck for the rest of the fight.
Besides, even a pig in Hogwarts knew by now that the Shield Spell was Mason’s signature magic.
It would hardly achieve the intimidating effect Anna wanted and would only invite a whole slew of trouble for Mason himself.
He had two approaches for a new spell.
First, learn standard charms or curses.
The Body-Bind Curse, Disarming Charm, and Stunning Spell were all well-suited for initiating a surprise attack, leaving the victim with nothing more than the sound of Mason’s voice.
The downside was that they lacked sufficient shock value.
It would only make the Slytherins more eager to threaten Anna into surrendering control of the Great Hall to humiliate Gryffindor.
As for the second approach…
Mason looked down at the Codex of All Magic.
Three spells had crossed sixty percent in unlock progress, and the fastest among them, [Animate Dead], was on the verge of lighting up completely.
“Was it this high before?” Mason hadn’t unlocked this spell prior to the Starlight Enchantment ritual.
Could it be because he had possessed Perseus during battle?
“I gained the method for refining Crimson Essence when I unlocked [Life Drain Beam].
It isn’t much different from the original Iron Magic technique of setting up a cauldron to boil oneself, except it requires a massive quantity of blood.
Although Medusa’s blood can miraculously yield Crimson Essence as well, that would be far too wasteful.”
Mason decided to craft a spell scroll for Life Drain Beam first to see if the Codex of All Magic would grant him extra knowledge from the Crimson School, before attempting to craft an Animate Dead scroll.
Lacking genuine superior-quality mana ink, he had to gamble that this method of binding and driving the souls and flesh of the dead would benefit from the amplification of Medusa’s blood.
Planning to visit Hagrid tomorrow to buy a few buckets of chicken or pig blood, Mason returned to his dormitory.
Harry, Seamus, and Ron were hunched over the desk writing furiously, while only Elaine leaned lazily against his headboard with an unbothered air. Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
As Mason pushed open the door, Elaine’s nose twitched slightly.
“Where did you go to slaughter snakes?”
Elaine strolled over with curiosity.
He was intimately familiar with the scent of magical snake blood, yet he couldn’t identify the one lingering on Mason—a faint aroma that was potent enough to make ordinary beasts freeze in their tracks.
“Ancient Greece,” Mason confessed candidly with a shrug.
“Fought Medusa.”
“Is she pretty?” Seamus asked without looking up.
Mason had caught a few glimpses of the Gorgon’s face via the reflection on his mirror shield.
Truth be told, when that madwoman stayed still, she actually looked quite sweet.
“If you ignore the dense mass of squirming snake heads making up her hair, yes.”
“Doesn’t that mean she was ganking you?” The three rushing their homework laughed along with Mason, but Elaine sniffed a few times in startled uncertainty.
His innate beast-like senses were telling him that Mason might…
perhaps…
actually…
not be lying?
Elaine climbed off his bed, tiptoed over to Mason—who stood behind the trio—and whispered,
“Do you really know alchemy?”
Mason pulled out a vial of Medusa’s blood.
He had swiped the test tube from Snape’s office; its volume was roughly three ounces.
“???!!!”
Elaine took the vial, uncorked it, and took a whiff.
He immediately leaped back like a startled creature, though he didn’t forget to jam the stopper back in.
“You…
I…
this is…” He stammered frantically, barely able to keep his voice down, looking for all the world like an agitated blond gorilla red-faced with constipation.
“Hagrid said this stuff is pretty valuable, so I thought I’d ask you for a price check.”
“Is this a matter of ‘valuable’ or not???” Elaine dragged Mason out of the dormitory into a quiet corner of the common room.
Mason glanced around and, sure enough, spotted Miss Beaver flipping through a book in her usual seat.
Elaine reluctantly pressed the vial back into Mason’s hands, grabbed his left wrist tightly, and hissed in the fiercest tone he could muster,
“I’m begging you, sell this vial of blood to me.”
“It’s actually a form of mana ink.” Mason unstoppered the tube himself and held it up close to Elaine, allowing him to thoroughly inspect the product’s quality.
The blond gorilla took a deep breath, suppressing his instinctual fear to wear a look of pure bliss.
Their bizarre behavior frightened off several young wizards nearby. Visit g.com for the full chapter.
“That’s no problem!
Aside from Nicolas Flamel, I doubt anyone in the wizarding world today has seen real Medusa’s blood.
You’re going to be rich, my friend!”
“I can help you contact a few local alchemists to certify the purity of this blood ink, then spread the report to every corner of Continental Europe.
As long as your supply keeps up, you’ll be able to buy Diagon Alley this time next year!”
“The production cost isn’t low, and it carries a fair amount of danger…” Mason said slowly.
Becoming famous overnight was far too risky unless he planned to hole up at Hogwarts forever until he was an unkillable god before setting foot in the outside world.
Elaine caught the resistance in Mason’s tone toward hyper-inflating hype.
However, his family’s business in Italy had hit an awkward bottleneck: forward, they couldn’t break Beauxbatons’ monopoly on alchemical materials; backward, they couldn’t downsize.
Dealing in magical creatures relied heavily on legal leniency, which meant having enough profit to entice Ministry officials into backing them.
Aside from seeking refuge, Elaine had come to Britain with his mother for another purpose.
But right now, a flagship product capable of helping the Rossi family break into the local market had appeared.
He had to tie Mason to his side before local wizards discovered the value of this material.
“If you don’t want to step into the spotlight yourself, my shop and I can act as your agents.”
“A shop?”
“Yeah, in Diagon Alley, three doors down diagonally from Gringotts Wizarding Bank.
It’s called ‘Elaine’s Magical Parts Shop.'”
Magical creature parts, huh?
Doesn’t the British Ministry of Magic keep a pretty tight leash on that?
Mason was short on cash, and Elaine was short on liquid capital.
Elaine promised that any Medusa’s blood consigned to his shop would give Mason an eighty-five percent cut of the retail price.
That meant if one ounce of blood ink sold for 10 Gold Galleons, a profit of 8 Gold Galleons, 8 Silver Sickles, and 15 Bronze Knuts would belong to Mason.
Still, the exact price could only be determined after Elaine had an alchemist evaluate it.
The first few batches of Medusa’s blood would undoubtedly be hyped to sky-high prices—considering an ounce of dragon liver was only 16 Silver Sickles, and an equal weight in gold was worth around 40 Gold Galleons—though Elaine estimated the blood ink’s price would eventually settle around 13 Gold Galleons.
“I’ll write a letter right now and have my family send over a contract as soon as possible.
Lord as my witness, I will never deceive you.”
Mason was writing a letter as well—requesting Headmaster Dumbledore to serve as the witness to this contract.
It definitely wasn’t to secure legitimate permission for night wandering.
Or anything like that.