69novels Chapter 281 The Challenge of the Spell Club and the New Test of the Quill Pen
Chapter 281 The Challenge of the Spell Club and the New Test of the Quill Pen
Chapter 281 The Challenge of the Spell Club and the New Test of the Quill Pen
Wednesday evening was the time for the Spells Club event. Professor Flitwick stood on a stack of thick books, with two exquisite brass oil lamps on the long table in front of him, one with a blue lampshade and the other with a red one.
"Good evening, my little geniuses!" Professor Flitwick's high-pitched voice was filled with excitement. "Tonight, we will have a small practical challenge designed to hone your finesse in controlling magic and your multitasking abilities, which are crucial in casting advanced spells and dueling! Of course, I know this will be easy for some of you, but I still hope to see something different." As he spoke, Professor Flitwick's gaze swept over Karen and the other two students, seemingly casually.
The students sitting below instantly understood Professor Flitwick's meaning and began to whisper among themselves, guessing who it was. Karen was also somewhat surprised that there were other people in the school whose magic control had reached this level.
Professor Flitwick waved his wand, signaling for silence: "The challenge is simple: See these two lamps? They're enchanted and can't be lit with ordinary flame. Your task is to find a way to light both lamps simultaneously, and make them emit a light that matches the color of their shades:"
Blue, and red.
A murmur rippled through the classroom. Doing two things at once is difficult enough for a wizard, let alone precisely controlling the effects and properties of magic.
"Collaboration is allowed, and innovation is encouraged!" Professor Flitwick added. "I will base my decisions on the efficiency of completion..."
The scoring will be based on the ingenuity of the magic and the creativity of the solution. Now, let's begin!
The students immediately gathered in twos and threes to discuss the matter. Some tried to use the Levitation Charm to control two matches to rub against the wicks at the same time, but failed; some tried to split a simple "Blazing Flame" Charm in two, but could only make both lamps emit unstable orange flames; others frantically calculated the possibilities of compound runes on parchment; however, there was only one who could achieve the effect by directly controlling it with his own magic, just as Professor Flitwick had just said.
Karen stared at the two lamps, lost in thought. It was simple for him, but Karen wanted to try something different. However, could this anti-flame spell defend against Fiendfire? With Karen's current skill level, he could light both lamps simultaneously with Fiendfire, and the Fiendfire could be different colors—blue and red—both of which Karen could use. But wouldn't that frighten the professor? Karen suddenly had a mischievous thought.
"Any ideas, Karen?" asked a sixth-year Ravenclaw girl. She was one of the top students in the sixth year of Ravenclaw and, after trying a few times, was now finding it a bit tricky.
Karen snapped out of her reverie, glanced at her classmates who were deep in thought, and a thought flashed through her mind. Perhaps—this was a good opportunity to test her ideas.
"Professor Flitwick," Karen raised her hand, "if the effect of 'simultaneous' and 'distinct' is achieved not through a single spell, but through a magical contraption, would that comply with the rules?"
"Of course, Karen!" Professor Flitwick's eyes lit up. "Alchemical creations are also an extension of magic, and I wholeheartedly welcome this line of thinking!"
Karen took out his communication quill case from his pocket. Inside were four of his latest optimized quills, each with tiny crystals embedded in the barrel and engraved with more complex "true name inscriptions".
"This is a little gadget that my friends and I have been working on recently for instant messaging," Karen explained, pulling out two quills. "They are essentially a miniature magical network, with each quill imbued with a unique magical identifier that can receive and transmit specific streams of information."
He walked to one end of the long table and pointed two quill pens at the blue and red lights in the distance, respectively.
"Theoretically, if I could send two different commands simultaneously to the two pens through a temporary central processing core: 'Apply blue cold flame to the target object' and 'Apply red cold flame to the target object,' the runes inside the quills would recognize and execute the corresponding commands because they were told that 'the information to be processed is different and specifically targeted.'"
The club members gathered around curiously.
"But that requires your central processing unit to be able to process and distribute two messages instantly," the sixth-grade girl pointed out the key point, "and can your quill be used for spellcasting?"
“Yes, that’s the challenge.” Karen nodded. “The first problem is that, unlike directly controlling two spells with our brains, this core can be a pre-set, simple magical program that only handles the most basic distribution work. As for the second one, I can modify it now so that the specific magical effects are generated by the rune array at the end of the quill pen. When I made it before, I designed the rune circuit that can execute some simple spells.”
This explanation made sense to some people. Professor Flitwick clapped his hands excitedly: "Brilliant idea, Karen! Break down complex tasks and divide the work among ourselves! Quick, give it a try!"
After receiving the professor's permission, Karen immediately took out his tools and made some simple adjustments to the two quills. Then he raised his wand and slowly and clearly traced several glowing ancient runes in the air, representing "instruction," "distribution," "target A," and "target B." These runes floated in the air, trembling slightly, waiting to be infused with magic and specific information.
Next, he needed to infuse two different magical commands into this nexus. He closed his eyes, concentrated, and faint blue and red lights emerged from the tip of his wand, merging into the rune array.
The final and most crucial step: he needs to connect this hub, which carries two commands, to the "true name inscriptions" of both quill pens to complete the instantaneous distribution of information.
"Command Distribute!" Karen whispered the specific spell he had just devised, pointing his wand at the floating runic hub.
The hub suddenly lit up, splitting into two subtle streams of magic that precisely struck their respective quills. The crystals on the quills instantly lit up, one glowing with an icy blue light, the other surging with a warm red aura.
Immediately afterwards, the tips of the two quill pens simultaneously shot out a thin beam of light, one ice blue and one warm red, which accurately hit their respective oil lamps.
puff!puff!
The two oil lamps were lit almost simultaneously. The blue lamp emitted a cool, pale blue glow, while the red lamp radiated a warm, intense light, the difference between them distinct and without any blurring.
"Merlin's Beard! He did it!" The classroom was silent for a second, then erupted in exclamations and applause.
Professor Flitwick was so excited he almost fell off his book: "Excellent, Karen! Mr. Hawthorne! It's not just a success, you've shown us a completely new approach!"
Karen breathed a sigh of relief, a smile spreading across his face. Success was certainly gratifying, but what excited him even more was verifying the feasibility of the "centralized command distribution, terminal execution" architecture for general magic missions.
"Professor, this is actually just a simple application of this idea," Karen pressed on. "While my quill network can already achieve multi-person communication within a small area, its range is limited by the perception strength of the True Name Inscription and the stability of the magic field, currently unable to extend beyond the castle's boundaries. I've been thinking that if we could expand this 'distribution-execution' model and find a way to enhance the range of magical connections, perhaps we could not only achieve simultaneous communication among groups over long distances, but even build a much larger network, allowing magical items to work collaboratively over even greater distances—"
He briefly described the concept: a stronger, perhaps fixed, central hub device responsible for amplifying signals, receiving all information, and distributing it to all terminals within the network, which would identify and execute instructions or display information through their unique "true name inscriptions".
"Imagine, Professor Flitwick," Karen said, growing more excited, "if it weren't just limited to communication, but instead, if various simple magical tasks were distributed through such a network, even over long distances, as long as they were within the Hub's enhanced range—"
Professor Flitwick's small eyes gleamed with excitement: "A brilliant idea, Karen! This goes far beyond the scope of ordinary communication toys! It involves information confirmation, magic distribution, and strengthening of remote magic links—oh! There are so many topics worth studying! First, we need to solve the scope problem you mentioned! But once successful, it will be a much more practical structure than a customized network like FiluNet."
He circled Karen, examining the two still-glowing quill pens: "What's the core reason for the limitations you've encountered?"
"The main issues are magic decay and interference, Professor," Karen explained. "The strength of the connection between 'True Name Inscriptions' decreases sharply with distance, making them easily susceptible to interference or even interruption from other magical fluctuations in the environment. Currently, the small network can only be maintained thanks to the relatively stable magical environment of the castle itself. Once outside this environment, or if the distance becomes too great, the connection becomes unstable, reverting to the most basic point-to-one mode, which requires even more magic to maintain."
"A challenge! I've decided this is one of the best long-term challenges for our club!" Professor Flitwick exclaimed. "We will assist you, Cullen, in exploring how to break through this limitation! We need more powerful signal enhancement runes, more stable magic carriers, and even research how to utilize Hogwarts' own magical network—oh! This is incredibly exciting!"
The other members of the club, especially the older students, also showed great interest. Participating in a truly groundbreaking magical project was far more appealing than simply practicing spells.
At Professor Flitwick's suggestion, everyone conducted a small-scale "stress test" on the spot. Karen did not test the communication, but tried to use the same "command distribution" approach to simultaneously control the four pens to perform different simple magical effects, such as making the pen tips emit different colors of light or vibrate slightly.
The test began. Initially, the four pens responded correctly when Karen sent four commands simultaneously. However, problems arose when he deliberately reduced the magic output and added simple distraction spells to simulate "distance increasing."
"The blue one is slow to react!"
"The red light is flashing very brightly!"
"Why isn't this one working?"
"The commands seem to be mixed up! This pen is executing the command for the green light!"
Control became extremely unstable, with effects fluctuating wildly and even command errors occurring. Once a stable and sufficiently strong magical connection was lost, the entire system became unreliable.
The classroom was filled with good-natured laughter and lively discussion. Although the test revealed problems, the atmosphere was exceptionally enthusiastic. Everyone gathered together to analyze the reasons for the failure: the stability of the remote magic connection, its anti-interference capabilities, the energy replenishment method, and the error verification mechanism—
"Look, we've immediately discovered some new problems with remote applications!" Professor Flitwick wasn't discouraged at all; on the contrary, he was even more delighted. "That's the joy of research, children! Karen, you've pointed us in a challenging yet extremely valuable direction!"