Walking through the streets of East Berlin, I admired the post-war architecture restored by the USSR.
Others might not appreciate the ordinary multi-story buildings that had to be quickly erected for the thousands of people left homeless by the war.
But when you’ve spent the last five years seeing nothing but the ruins of major cities, where death could lurk around every corner, and survivor camps where women would give themselves to anyone for food and men sometimes became worse than beasts, the sight of an ordinary intact street with people going about their business, dressed in clean clothes with a living spark in their eyes, was captivating.
Even though I’d constantly seen crowds of people since arriving in this body, both in London and Prague, the sight never ceased to amaze me.
Maybe in six months I’d get used to it and start seeing it as ordinary, the sight of crowds of people who didn’t have to constantly fight for their lives and go to sleep every night fearing that a horde of Inferi would come for them tomorrow.
A pair of police officers walked past me, and one of them looked at me with a puzzled expression.
I met his gaze and sent a mental suggestion through eye contact, similar to a Confundus Charm.
Shaking his head, the Squib officer gave a vague answer to his partner’s question about how he was feeling and continued his patrol.
I added a Muggle-Repelling Charm and a Disillusionment Charm to myself and quickened my pace toward the nearest entrance to Berlin’s magical district.
Being among Muggles had its complications, since I was technically British.
A Briton in East Berlin without official documents aroused the local People’s Police’s ardent desire to catch a “capitalist spy sucking the last juices out of the working class.”
Fortunately, I’d arrived in Berlin on an enchanted train among wizards who couldn’t care less about the “quirks” of Muggles, not under concealed charms on a Muggle train.
Without stopping, I entered a bakery whose style suggested a certain antiquity.
A thin, mustachioed vendor glanced at me and returned his attention to a Muggle fumbling with his wallet, paying no attention to the man in a ridiculous yellow coat and ushanka who had just appeared three meters away from him right out of the wall.
The latter showed equal indifference and walked straight to the exit, nodding to me in greeting as a fellow wizard.
I just shook my head at the extra work the Obliviator Department would have today.
The wizard who’d just left didn’t have Muggle-Repelling Charms, and with that outfit, he’d definitely attract attention.
I calmly walked past the Muggle waiting in line at the register, who also noticed nothing strange thanks to the Muggle-Repelling Charms and the stationary Confundus variant.
One step, and I walked into an unremarkable wall.
My skin was enveloped by the magical film of a stationary spatial transition.
A second step, and I was already stepping out of the wall of some building into Freien Markt, a passage full of wizards.
I couldn’t remember exactly why this alley had that name, but it had something to do with a dispute between wizards and one of the Electors of the Margraviate of Brandenburg.
“Dragon liver!
Not expensive!”
“Aconite and lily!
The best and cheapest herbs for potion-makers, only with us!”
“This is total fraud!
That bastard is selling carelessly collected and damaged herbs, losing a third of their properties!”
“Go to hell, Hans!
You think I don’t know about your uncle who keeps a shop nearby?”
“Sweets straight from India!
Finger-licking good!”
A small yellow bolt of a Babbilingus charm flew from my hand and struck the palm of a little thief who’d been reaching for my Galleon pouch.
He yelped more in surprise than pain and quickly disappeared into the crowd.
The scent of coffee reached my nose, along with the rich aroma of freshly baked pastries.
I turned my head and looked at the sign hanging above the door.
“Visiting the Chancellor.”
A rather ambiguous name, but my stomach clearly demanded a visit “to the Chancellor.” I entered the café, decorated in white tones in the Baroque style, and sat at one of the tables, placing my suitcase on the neighboring chair.
Soon, a Berlin-style knuckle of pork appeared on my table, along with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.
A few minutes later, a plate of thinly sliced bread and a faceted glass filled with some kind of local beer joined them.
Judging by the orange bubbles rising into the air, this brew was the result of some wizard’s twilight genius.
“Hey, Johann, why so glum?”
“Bert, leave me alone.
You’re not the one who has to stand guard at the Ministry ball on December 9th.”
“So what’s the problem?
You’ll get to see beautiful aristocrats from different countries and those important bureaucrats.
It’s an honor!”
“Want to swap shifts?”
“How could I deprive you of the chance to meet Europe’s finest?”
“Easily.
Septim’s at the Ministry right now.
We can swap our schedules quickly.”
“No way.
I have completely different plans for that day.
The charming Greta finally succumbed to my siege.”
“Then keep quiet.”
I glanced at the two men in red Auror robes having lunch a couple of tables away.
Thanks to my habit of constantly enhancing my body with magical power, I could clearly hear their conversation.
The upcoming ball celebrating the founding of the German Ministry of Magic in 1701 didn’t particularly interest me right now.
In the future, once I’d built up the right reputation and connections, along with money, I could attend such events for serious conversations with powerful people.
But for now, I was a nobody to them.
Trying to buy tickets to the ball, which sold out months in advance, just to appear in a few photos in the newspapers would be pointless. This chapter was copied from novelping.com without permission.
It wouldn’t do much for my reputation anyway.
And I hadn’t come to Germany just to boost my reputation.
Kretschko had said the Jotun tribes should be in eastern Germany.
And as far as I knew, among them should be the right tribe, whose chieftain wore an interesting “stone” around his neck.
“Excuse me, may I sit here?”
A timid voice asked me.
A girl with brown hair and glasses that looked like a “bicycle” was standing there.
All the other tables were occupied.
I moved my suitcase off the chair and smiled at her.
“Of course.”
She sat down, slightly flustered, and ordered black tea and some pastry from the waiter.
Then she pulled out a book.
I took a sip from my glass and winced slightly.
The twilight genius of the unknown wizard-brewer hadn’t lived up to expectations.
At least for me.
I called the waiter and asked for a cup of tea, like the girl’s.
“And so you’ve become, Gil, a true Brit.”
I smiled ironically to myself as I waited for my order, looking at the girl who had already immersed herself in her reading.
I involuntarily remembered how, in the survivor camps during the Cataclysm, I would immerse myself in magical tomes during breaks and even meals, searching for new knowledge that would make me stronger or answer the endless questions.
But mostly, it was about wanting to occupy my mind with anything, so as not to think again about the dead faces of Maria, Grisha, Kretschko…
” ‘The Rise and Fall of the Dark Lords.’ Do you like history?”
“Yes.”
“I’d recommend reading ‘The Notes of Arcturus Bones.’ There’s hardly a more propagandistic and censored book on history than the one you’re holding.”
The girl gave me a displeased but curious look.
The book, with a bookmark on the last pages, was set aside.
“Are you saying everything written in it is false?”
“No, what’s written there is true.”
A virtual question mark practically materialized over the girl’s head.
“But the truth is presented in such a way that they might as well have lied outright.
For instance, after reading half of this book, can you tell me who they call Dark Lords?”
As one of my acquaintances, who’d worked with a new Muggle invention, used to say, “processing” began.
“A Dark Lord is an official title for powerful Dark wizards who try to seize power through violent means.”
The girl said, somewhat uncertainly, though she was essentially conveying the author’s message.
That was exactly the impression that prevailed among the vast majority of wizards.
“Doesn’t that definition seem a bit naïve to you…?”
Correctly interpreting the question in my eyes, the girl quickly said her name.
“Alvia.”
“Nice to meet you, Alvia.
You can call me Gilderoy.
So, about my question?”
“I don’t know, but the title Dark Lord has appeared in documents since the thirteenth century.
And according to them, many of the wizard tyrants called themselves Dark Lords.”
The witch said more confidently, her glasses flashing.
“Excellent knowledge of historical facts.
You can probably even name the first Dark Lord?”
“Abbas ibn Abadi Al-Bbb…”
“Al-Bakir.
A cruel wizard who personally killed no less than a hundred wizards.
An ambitious conqueror who wanted to unite all the wizards of the Arabian Peninsula and then, like the Roman Magisterium, create a magical empire to conquer the world.
But if he ended up in magical Britain today, famous for its strict laws against ‘Dark magic,’ the Aurors simply wouldn’t be able to send him to Azkaban for using ‘Dark magic.'”
“Why?”
The girl asked blankly, staring at me with wide eyes.
“Because he doesn’t use spells forbidden by law.”
“B-but it says here that he was a master of Dark magic!”
The girl exclaimed indignantly, slamming her hand on the book.
I just smirked.
“Oh, here’s a rather amusing quirk involving a careless English translator from the Middle Ages.
Tell me, where does the word ‘lord’ come from?”
from England?”
The girl answered, more as a question than a statement.
“Correct.
Then doesn’t it bother you that the first Dark Lord was an Arab who rarely left the Arabian Peninsula, where no one had ever heard of lords?
Yet according to documents, he called himself a Dark Lord.”
The girl looked like a child who’d just been told Santa Claus didn’t exist.
“But how…
You said this book doesn’t lie outright.”
“If you literally translate Abbas ibn Abadi’s title, it would be something like ‘Lord of Black Magic.’ For simplicity, the translator found the closest suitable concept, which turned out to be the word ‘lord.’ Later, other translators, for convenience and to save space on paper, replaced ‘black magic’ with the adjective ‘dark.’ So from ‘Lord of Black Magic,’ this colorful wizard became the ‘Dark Lord.’ So there’s no lie, just an incorrect translation.”
“But that doesn’t change the fact that he practiced black magic.
Yet by your words, he didn’t use forbidden magic, even though the practice of ‘Dark Arts’ is forbidden in most European countries, including England.”
“Yes, he was a master of black magic and practiced it regularly.
But not the black magic you’re thinking of.
The current concept of Dark Arts only developed in the nineteenth century and was later officially codified by the ICW.
In those centuries on the Arabian Peninsula, and later under Arab influence in Europe for a time, ‘black magic’ meant any magical manipulation aimed at changing or creating a material object, while ‘white magic’ referred to all other magical manipulations not involving the manipulation of physical objects.
So, by today’s classification, Abbas ibn Abadi Al-Bakir, also known as the ‘Lion of the Boundless Dawn,’ was an exceptional master of Transfiguration, while some prisoner from Nurmengard or Azkaban who used the Imperius on someone would, by the old classification, be considered a Light wizard.”
Crash.
The sound of a breaking mug echoed through the room.
During our conversation, some of the patrons had started paying attention to us, and it just so happened that now the whole café was listening to us, including the waiters and the owner himself.
In the silence that followed the breaking mug, when Alvia herself realized she wasn’t the only one listening, a clear male voice rang out.
“Scheiße.”
“Language, Heinrich!”
“Yes, dear, I’m quiet!”
Noise erupted.
The surrounding wizards began loudly discussing what they’d heard and arguing, and one person even approached us.
“Damn, what you just said is twisting my brain, kid.
Hey, Alvi, is this your new friend?”
A dark-haired man asked loudly, slapping his hands on our table with expressive force.
“Layan.”
The girl’s voice sounded like a death sentence.
I looked at the book that had fallen to the floor, which had been on the edge of the table but was quickly knocked off by the man’s exuberance.
I reached out and used a non-verbal Accio.
This book might contain propaganda for the masses, but my respect for books couldn’t be broken, not even by death.
A personally verified fact.
The book landed in my hands, open to a page with information about one of the twentieth century’s most notorious wizards, Grindelwald.
I paused, looking at the moving photograph, which hadn’t been in the edition of “The Rise and Fall of the Dark Lords” I’d read.
I looked at the cover and noticed the publication date.
Ah.
I’d read a later edition where all images of Grindelwald had been removed.
It was becoming a trend, erasing and suppressing information that wasn’t convenient for the authorities.
I flipped back a few pages and looked at the photograph taken by some brave soul, practically a suicide.
Why did I think the photographer was brave?
Because the photograph captured a moment from the gathering of wizards in Paris, organized by Grindelwald and his followers.
It was the very gathering that nearly resulted in Muggle Paris burning down.
And with his Diabolica, the magical flames could easily have spread to the magical quarters hidden in spatial planes.
Why did I think the photographer was also a suicide?
He’d managed to capture the moment Grindelwald cast the Diabolica spell, just as a crowd of Aurors was approaching him.
I was now admiring the blue flames flickering around the podium where the handsome wizard with ash-gray hair stood, seeming to “conduct” this dance of fire with his wand.
I paused, staring at his magical focus.
Dark brown wand with unusual thickenings, pointed down.
“Bow your head before the Master of Death.”
The hissing voice was full of arrogance and madness.
Why.
Did.
They.
Have.
The.
Same.
Wand?