When the invisible barrier was completely covered by platinum lustre and shattered, the world before Ciel's eyes began undergoing earth-shattering changes.
Now, without relying on his Platinum-level night vision ability, he could see magical particles of various colours and properties. These magical particles sometimes gathered, sometimes scattered. Sometimes they seemed to react to each other, falling silent after meeting or bursting into new life.
Every minute, every second, the magical world before his eyes became incredibly strange and wondrous. No amount of imagination could conceive the magnificent spectacle of magic before his eyes without experiencing it firsthand.
"This is the Platinum level magical perception enhancement. Finally allowing my magical perception to enter the microscopic level from the macroscopic."
He took a deep breath, feeling somewhat like the shock of starting university and suddenly discovering that all the science knowledge learnt in high school had been overturned and reconstructed. His previous perception of magic wasn't wrong, but without touching the microscopic level of magic, no matter how deep he thought his perception was, it was merely the tip of an iceberg above water.
No wonder his magical mastery had been stuck so rigidly. After all, from the Platinum level onwards, every spell would gradually touch the microscopic level of magic. If he couldn't perceive this level of magical states, no amount of practice would be more than blind men touching an elephant. Only by truly seeing could he find the correct direction.
However, this didn't mean his long-accumulated foundation was useless. On the contrary, it was like the transition from classical to quantum mechanics in his previous life; the masters of classical mechanics were basically still masters in quantum mechanics. After all, macroscopic and microscopic were two sides of the same coin; macroscopic was the collection of microscopic. Accumulation at the macroscopic level was extremely beneficial for the microscopic level.
He only needed to reorganise and reconstruct his understanding of magic according to his completely different perception of magic. His previous foundation would quickly transform into nourishment for magical improvement.
This could be seen from the flickering light on his system panel. Just like certain plants during metamorphosis, when reward orbs flickered bright and dim, his magical abilities, like Softening Charm, Pruning Charm, Lumos, etc., also flickered. At their brightest, even faint diamond radiance appeared within the platinum hue!
[Softening Charm (Platinum, diamond traces emerging)]
[Pruning Charm (Platinum, diamond traces emerging)]
[Lumos (Platinum, diamond traces emerging)]
This showed that once he completed this transition phase, his magical mastery would definitely advance by leaps and bounds.
Simultaneously, he increasingly understood why those outstanding talents in the magical world performed so incredibly. Like Snape, whose magical mastery surpassed seventh years upon enrolment, this was at least within "genius" range.
But Dumbledore, Voldemort, and Grindelwald were even more exaggerated, almost all having magical mastery during school that most geniuses couldn't touch in their lifetimes. This was probably inseparable from their innate superior magical perception.
He, relying on the system and spending so much time and energy, had finally managed to deepen his magical perception to the microscopic level. But maybe these true geniuses, from their first contact with magic, saw a world closer to magic's essence than his current view.
According to the system's evaluation, Snape's magical perception during school was probably at the Epic level. Dumbledore, Voldemort and others likely had Legendary level magical perception talent during school.
And just as he could previously rely on hard training to gradually improve his magical perception, these geniuses' magical perception could also improve through training, probably far exceeding his improvement rate. After years of accumulation, Snape probably had Legendary level magical perception. Dumbledore and other top wizards might be advancing toward the Mythical level in the system's evaluation!
Realising this, his excitement turned slightly bitter. An ordinary person's talent, after so much effort, still couldn't see the taillights of genius.
But moments later, he swallowed this slight bitterness. Perhaps these geniuses had talent currently far beyond his reach, but he also had unique advantages: the planting system. The Platinum level magical perception threshold had been broken. Continuing this improvement, someday he might be the first to touch the Mythical level that even Dumbledore hadn't reached.
But then, several more Goldfish Vines matured, their reward orbs merging into his body. For magical perception improvement, this was truly so weak he couldn't distinguish the difference. The system panel showed no changes at all.
This made him frown slightly. Admittedly, he had now gathered the Forbidden Forest troll tribe, relying on nearly a hundred trolls to dramatically increase Goldfish Vine production. But after magical perception broke through the Platinum level, the diminishing effect of Goldfish Vine reward orbs became increasingly obvious.
Large quantities of reward orbs could indeed still provide benefits, but advancing magical perception from Platinum to Diamond level would probably take several times more time and energy than advancing from Gold to Platinum. Unless troll numbers had another explosive growth in the next year, driving Goldfish Vine production up again, he wasn't sure whether his magical perception could touch Diamond level's threshold by the second year's end.
As for Epic and Legendary levels, the time span would naturally be longer. Without pressure, he could slowly wait for Goldfish Vine harvests. But in the fifth year, he'd likely face Antonin Dolohov. The magical world's war would gradually unfold thereafter. Moreover, in the temple, a suspected "god" was lurking.
He naturally hoped to control the initiative in this series of events.
"If I could obtain higher-level, mass-producible plant seeds for improving magical perception, that would be perfect. Even Bronze level would significantly reduce the diminishing effect."
Such thoughts surfaced in his mind. Unfortunately, though he had never given up searching for such plant seeds, Goldfish Vine remained the only mass-producible magical perception-improving plant he could find. If they weren't in Aunt Sprout's collection, finding them elsewhere would be very slim.
They might only be found in certain ancient plants, but their cultivation difficulty went without saying. After brief thought, he felt a more feasible solution might be breeding Goldfish Vine.
If he could obtain Goldfish Vine with dramatically optimised traits, perhaps the reward level would advance from Iron to Bronze. To achieve this goal, he had Demeter's Chalice with plant seed blessing ability, but its coverage was limited, at most a few dozen seeds.
Using this to update so many Goldfish Vines would take considerable time. Besides this, like he did with Margaritas, he could see if he could find magical means to induce Goldfish Vine mutations into superior varieties.
Compared to Christmas holidays, he now had two additional methods, Dark Arts Transfiguration and Curse Studies.
"Combining three methods should make inducing new varieties more likely than using single methods before."
The thought process became clearer. He had some experience using the Levitation Charm and Dark Arts Transfiguration to induce plants. Only with Curse Studies did he currently lack experience and reference cases. How exactly to proceed felt overwhelming now.
But this matter definitely needed early planning to see results sooner, even applying achievements to other plant breeding. Concerning his future planting plans, he didn't want to delay a moment.
"Go to the Restricted Section of the library. It even has Horcrux creation methods. Maybe I can find research notes and documents on object cursing in Curse Studies."
Then he returned to Hogwarts, obtained another Restricted Section pass from Professor Sprout, and headed straight to the library. He entered the Restricted Section with practised ease.
Upon entering the Restricted Section's range, books on surrounding shelves immediately emanated malevolent magic. Some covers' text began bleeding; others made alluring sounds, tempting him to open them. But these couldn't affect him when he hadn't learnt Occlumency, much less now.
He moved between bookshelves, completely ignoring these Dark Arts books' temptations, searching only for Curse Studies-related books. Time passed minute by minute until the sky changed from dark to bright, with sunlight streaming through library windows and footsteps echoing in the empty library. Only then did he stop searching the Restricted Section.
His expression showed surprise. After searching all night, Curse Studies-related books were truly scarce. The few he found were all extremely bloody, evil "traditional" curses. As for object-cursing content he hoped to find, several books combined couldn't produce two pages, all superficial material.
Clearly, even Dark wizards weren't very interested in Curse Studies, much less the niche within niches, object cursing. That wasn't strange. Dark wizards pursued Horcruxes for real benefits like immortality. They pursued Dark Arts Transfiguration for powerful combat abilities.
But curses weren't very direct. Object cursing was the most useless of the useless. A cursed object often needed centuries of circulation to gain lethal magical power. Which Dark wizards would bother with such things?
Not finding such books even in Hogwarts' Restricted Section was quite normal. But this left him sighing. Without documentary references, he could only explore himself. Even with his Curse Studies at the Platinum level with considerable mastery, starting from scratch on an unfamiliar topic wasn't simple. The time spent alone would increase geometrically.
"Forget it. Search two more days; maybe I missed some bookshelf. If I really can't find references, I'll start my own research."
Then he left the Restricted Section. Unexpectedly, someone was waiting for him outside the Restricted Section: Hermione Granger.
When their eyes met, Hermione's face showed complete shock, like a long, unwilling suspicion had finally come true. She strode toward him: "Ciel, I can't believe it. You really went to the Restricted Section. Do you know what's in there? These are the most advanced Dark Arts, extremely dangerous. Students entering rashly will be expelled!"
He paused, frowning slightly. Though he wouldn't stoop to the trio's level over their previous report, it didn't mean he'd be pleasant to them.
Facing Hermione's chatter, he said coldly: "What books I read seems unrelated to you, Hermione. Besides, I went through proper procedures with permission. If you have issues, talk to the professors. I'm busy; if there's nothing else, I'll go first."
Then he walked around Hermione, leaving without looking back. Seeing this, Hermione's expression paled. In her view, he was clearly refusing to turn back from Dark Arts' wrong path. If this continued, maybe he would be sent directly to Azkaban!
Thinking this, Hermione ignored his cold attitude and hurried after him, trying to continue persuading him to reform. "But when she rushed out of the library, she saw a scene that made her hold her breath.
Draco Malfoy was in this corridor. Upon seeing him, his eyes showed a strange expression, and his usually proud head immediately lowered, seeming extremely humble.
Draco Malfoy's words left Hermione's mind blank: "Ciel, thanks to you. As you said, the Flint family truly disappeared. Father says this time our Malfoy family profited greatly; we got the best portion of the Flint family's quality assets."
Speaking excitedly, Draco continued: "Father told me to express gratitude to you. Also, whenever you need anything, the Malfoy family will do everything to help you."
Hearing this, his eyes brightened slightly. He realised he had overlooked something. Object-cursing products were mostly very exquisite jewellery. After centuries of circulation, the curse power on these jewels became increasingly dense.
But pure-blood nobles had a fashion for collecting such jewellery, considering these cursed jewels' beauty incomparable to ordinary jewellery, dangerous and charming, and truly symbolic of pure-blood noble taste.
In the original story, when Malfoy received the mission to assassinate Dumbledore, Death Eaters prepared an exquisite cursed jewel to kill Dumbledore. This showed such items should be concentrated in pure-blood noble hands rather than stored much in Hogwarts' Restricted Section.
Thinking this, his previously dim hopes rekindled with anticipation. He asked Draco Malfoy: "Does your Malfoy family have books about cursed jewellery and such objects? Preferably with actual cursed jewellery."
Hearing his question, Draco first paused, then immediately said: "Cursed jewellery? Let me ask my father..."
Speaking, Malfoy took out a crystal ball, prepared by Lucius Malfoy for communication with another crystal ball, much more convenient and timely than owl post. But the cost was expensive, extremely expensive. This crystal ball alone was worth over two hundred Galleons and required regular maintenance. The key was limited production.
Lucius provided this because the Flint family incident had truly shocked him, dramatically raising his evaluation of Ciel's importance, so he gave Draco a crystal ball for convenient transmission of his messages.
Now, as the crystal ball lit up, Lucius Malfoy at Malfoy Manor received Draco's message. "Ciel needs cursed jewellery?"
This made Lucius pause, not because it was difficult, but because it was too simple. Pure-blood nobles all collected cursed jewellery to show their status and taste. The Malfoy family naturally had plenty, at least dozens of cursed jewels stored in jewellery cabinets, rarely even looked at.
He just hadn't expected his request to be for these things. "What does he want these for?"
Lucius directly dismissed the idea that he wanted them for showing off; this little badger definitely wasn't so shallow. Suddenly, a guess formed in Lucius's mind. He had never known how the Flint family was destroyed or what methods Ciel used.
But now, a chilling thought emerged: "Could it be... curses?!"
The more he thought, the more certain Lucius became. Besides strange, vicious curses, what could make Bacon Flint and the wizards the Flint family kept disappear so quickly without a trace? Ciel hadn't even contacted them except for sending a letter. Perhaps that letter carried a powerful curse!
Thinking this, Lucius was even more horrified. How deep must his curse mastery be? A first-year student normally showing exceptional Herbology, but secretly, quietly possessing such mastery in this obscure Dark Arts field – what kind of scheming was this?
"This little badger, deep scheming, his disguise even Dumbledore hasn't noticed. Maybe even being sorted into Hufflepuff was intentional to lower Dumbledore's guard. Otherwise, with such performance in Slytherin or Gryffindor, Dumbledore would have noticed long ago."
The more Lucius thought, the more his heart pounded. But then his eyes burst with bright light: "This child has Dark Lord potential! The Malfoy family absolutely cannot miss this investment opportunity."
Some cursed jewellery compared to befriending Ciel and maintaining relations – what did it matter?
Soon after, Lucius gave his reply. In less than two minutes, with the pop of house-elf Apparition, a large chest appeared before him.
Opening the chest, he was greeted by brilliant, dazzling jewels, dozens of exquisite pieces gleaming magnificently. Many were world famous: the Heart of the Ocean and the Bloody Crown, now packed in the chest like common items.
What caught his attention more was the dense curse aura these objects emanated. These cursed jewels, passed down for centuries, had killed countless owners. The curse magic on them had extreme research value – all excellent materials for studying Curse Studies.
Besides these cursed jewels, the chest contained an unexpected small booklet. Seeing it, he frowned with surprise: "This material is... human skin?!"
But compared to its material, the writing was most surprising to him. The booklet had no cover title, only an ancient Greek signature, not some formal text, but handwritten notes.
But this ancient Greek name was famous throughout magical history: "Herpo, creator of the Basilisk, history's most famous Dark wizard, Herpo the Foul?!"