When Malfoy walked out of the ward, the expression on his face had already switched from his previous anxiety to a mode Jerry was very familiar with.
His platinum eyebrows were slightly raised, a certain shrewd light gleamed in his grey-blue eyes, and a faint curve hung at the corners of his mouth.
This was Draco Malfoy's standard expression when he discovered a business opportunity; Jerry had seen it no less than twenty times in the past few months.
"Jerry."
Malfoy quickly walked to Jerry's side, lowering his voice and gesturing with both hands.
"Do you know how many patients like Irene there are in this entire building?"
Jerry didn't answer. He pulled the palm-sized alchemical scanning device from his pocket and waved it in front of Malfoy.
"You mean this?"
Malfoy's eyes instantly lit up like two searchlights.
"Yes, yes, exactly that!"
His platinum head leaned in closer, his voice dropping even lower, speaking so fast he nearly tripped over his own tongue.
"While I was waiting for you in the ward, I chatted with the Healer next door. On this floor alone, there are over three hundred amputees who can't be treated with conventional regeneration potions, all because of that spiritual fragment issue. Adding up the entire four floors of St. Mungo's, a conservative estimate is over a thousand people."
He held up a finger and drew a circle in the air.
"A thousand people, Jerry. Even if we only charge a hundred gold Galleons per treatment, that's a hundred thousand gold Galleons. A hundred thousand!
And that's just the numbers for St. Mungo's. The Beauxbatons affiliated hospital, the Durmstrang field medical stations, the Salem Medical Center in North America—magical hospitals all over the world are packed with the same kind of patients.
Plus, we're about to go to all-out war with the Cultivation World community; there will definitely be a steady stream of similar casualties from the front lines.
This is a long-term, sustainable, highly profitable..."
Jerry rolled his eyes.
The eye roll was textbook perfect; his grey irises almost completely disappeared behind his upper eyelids, leaving only a field of white sclera facing Malfoy's flushed, excited face.
Right in front of Malfoy, he used his two small hands to grip the silver casing of the alchemical device and unscrewed the four fixing screws on the back.
The casing came off, revealing densely packed alchemical runic circuits and miniature crystal components inside.
Jerry's fingers reached into the device, extracting a crystal the size of a pinky fingernail that emitted a pale golden light from the very core.
Holding the crystal between his thumb and index finger, Jerry held it up to Malfoy's eyes.
"Do you think a hundred gold Galleons can buy this?"
Malfoy stared at the small, pale golden crystal, his platinum eyebrows knitting together.
A very pure, unadulterated bewilderment flashed through his grey-blue eyes.
"What is it?"
Looking at Malfoy's face, which clearly read 'I really don't know what this is but I think it must be very expensive,' Jerry took a deep breath.
"Tear of Purification. The product formed when the tears of the Elven race crystallize under moonlight for seventy-two hours.
The global annual production does not exceed fifty pieces, and the black market price for a single one is between two thousand and three thousand gold Galleons.
This prototype uses one to drive the precise targeting and extraction function of the spiritual fragments.
Without this crystal, the entire machine is a piece of scrap metal."
Malfoy's mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.
"Two thousand... three thousand..."
"So your 'one hundred gold Galleons per person' business plan is already bankrupting your grandmother just on the cost of consumables."
Jerry placed the crystal back inside the device and tightened the screws.
"Of course, if we can find substitute materials or reduce the crystal's consumption rate, mass production isn't impossible. But that's for later."
Malfoy's business enthusiasm seemed to have been doused with a bucket of cold water, his platinum head drooping.
"Then what do we do now? Those thousand-plus patients..."
"Treat the ones who can afford it." Jerry shoved the device back into his pocket.
"The energy of this crystal is enough for about thirty more uses. When it's used up, I'll figure out a way to replenish it."
"Mr. Rozier."
A voice called out from the other end of the corridor.
Jerry and Malfoy turned their heads simultaneously.
The door to the adjacent ward was open, and a woman was stepping out from the doorframe.
She was very tall. Visually estimating at least five-foot-nine, she wore a pair of flat black oxfords with no height-enhancing design; that height was entirely her own.
She wore the standard white robes of a St. Mungo's Healer, but the tailoring of her robes was distinctly different from an ordinary Healer's.
The collar was higher, the cuffs narrower, and the waistline was cinched by a thin silver belt, outlining her slender figure.
The hem of the white robes fell to her ankles, swaying gently with her steps as she walked.
Her hair was black. Not the ordinary deep brown bordering on black, but a pure, rich black, as if dyed in ink.
It was very long, falling all the way to her waist, but loosely gathered into a low ponytail at the back of her head with a simple silver barrette.
A few stray strands escaped the barrette's confinement, hanging by her temples and ears, swaying gently with her movements.
Her facial features reminded Jerry of certain things.
A high, straight bridge of the nose, the line from the brow bone to the tip perfectly straight without any superfluous curves.
Deep-set eye sockets, where the bone structure created a distinct shadow at the brow ridge, making her eyes look as if set in two meticulously carved recesses.
Her lips were thin and wide, the peak of her upper lip sharply defined, the lower lip slightly fuller; the overall shape evoked the kind of smile found on classical sculptures—somewhere between coldness and composure.
Her skin was a warm olive tone. Not the pale or pinkish hue common among the British, but a healthy color unique to Mediterranean peoples, nurtured by sunlight and sea breezes.
Watching her walk over from the end of the corridor, a word surfaced in Jerry's mind.
Hebe.
The Hebe of ancient Greek fable, the woman envied by the gods.
Legend said her beauty made passing travelers forget their destinations, made farmers drop their sickles in the fields, and made schools of fish surface in rivers just to catch another glimpse of her.
The gods sent an envoy to see just how beautiful Hebe was. The envoy returned and said one sentence: "Her beauty is not meant for viewing; it is meant to make men forget time."
This woman stepping out from the adjacent ward possessed that very quality that made one forget time.
Although her white robes were conservative to the extreme—buttoned all the way below her Adam's apple, cuffs tight to the wrists, hem down to the ankles, exposing almost no excess skin—the way she walked created a strange counter-effect to this conservative attire.
Her pace was very slow, every step carrying an unhurried, languid rhythm as if she had just woken from an afternoon nap.
Her shoulders leaned back slightly, her spine straight but not stiff, and her overall center of gravity was slightly reclined; this caused her breasts to form a soft but distinct curve against the restraint of the white robes.
Her waist was very narrow, the silver belt cinched exactly at the lowest edge of her ribs, dividing the proportions of her upper and lower body into a golden ratio from which it was hard to look away.
She stopped in front of Jerry and Malfoy.
Her eyes were deep brown, so dark they were almost black; the boundary between pupil and iris was nearly indistinguishable under the corridor lights.
Those eyes looked down at Jerry, holding a professional, scrutinizing gaze, while also hiding a certain gleam of curiosity.
"I am the Director of St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries."
Her voice was a deep alto, her enunciation clear, her speaking speed unhurried, every syllable carrying a composed weight.
"In the adjacent ward just now, I heard the entire process of Mr. Rozier treating Miss Delacour. The spiritual fragment extraction function of that alchemical device is a technological approach I have never seen before."
She extended her right hand from the pocket of her white robes toward Jerry.
The hand was slender and fair, nails trimmed short without any polish, the bone structure of her knuckles clearly visible.
"I wonder if I might have a detailed discussion with Mr. Rozier?"
Jerry looked up at her. One-meter-twenty against one-meter-seventy-five; his line of sight fell exactly at the level of her silver belt.
He had to tilt his neck to a rather exaggerated angle to see her face.
Malfoy stood nearby, his grey-blue eyes darting back and forth between Jerry and this woman, his platinum eyebrows raised high.
Jerry took her extended hand; his small palm was completely enveloped by her slender fingers.
"You may."
She led Jerry to an office at the end of the corridor. Malfoy tried to follow, but Jerry stopped him in his tracks with a single look back.
The office was not large: an oak desk, two chairs, and several magical anatomical charts of the human skeleton hanging on the walls.
On the desk sat a thick stack of medical files and a cup of black tea that had gone completely cold.
She walked behind the desk and sat down, gesturing for Jerry to sit in the chair opposite.
Jerry climbed onto the chair, which was far too large for him; his two short legs dangled in the air, his toes still a dozen centimeters from the floor.
She pulled a business card from a drawer and pushed it across the desk.
Jerry looked down at it.
Printed on the card was a name and a string of titles.
Olivia Selwyn. Director of St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. Senior Field Healer. Member of the European Ministry of Magic Medical Advisory Committee.
Selwyn.
Jerry's grey eyes lifted from the card, looking back at the woman sitting opposite him.
The Selwyn family. One of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, a pure-blood noble family as ancient as the Roziers.
The marital ties between the two families dated back to the seventeenth century; Jerry's great-grandmother had been a daughter of the Selwyn house.
"Selwyn," Jerry read the surname aloud, "A Selwyn with marital ties to the Rozier family."
Olivia leaned back in her chair, crossing her long legs beneath the desk.
The hem of her white robes hitched up slightly with the movement, revealing an olive-skinned ankle and the vamp of her black oxford shoe.
Her left hand rested on the armrest, her fingers unconsciously tapping the wooden surface with a very slow rhythm, like some ancient lullaby.
"It is quite normal for Mr. Rozier not to know me."
The corners of her mouth curved up slightly. The arc was small, but paired with her classical-sculpture-like face, it produced an effect that was difficult to describe in words.
"I only transferred back from the front lines three years ago to take over the position of Director.
Before that, I served as a Field Healer on the front lines of the Asian Ministry's Heavenly Dao Alliance, fighting the Cultivation World's Sect Alliance for seven full years."
Her right hand picked up the cold cup of black tea from the desk, brought it to her lips for a sip, and set it down.
The motion of drinking tea was incredibly casual; the angle of her wrist, the way her fingers held the cup, and the manner her lips touched the rim all carried an effortless relaxation, as if she had just stretched lazily on a sofa.
"That's quite unfortunate," Jerry said.
Olivia's deep brown eyes looked at him, waiting for him to finish.
"The marital ties between the Selwyn family and the Rozier family mean that when the Rozier family was purged, the Selwyn family should have been implicated as well."
Jerry's voice was flat, his grey eyes devoid of any emotional fluctuation.
The Rozier family had been purged by the Ministry for siding with the Death Eaters; family members were either dead or imprisoned, assets confiscated, reputations trampled, leaving only Jerry as the sole survivor.
Other pure-blood families with ties to the Roziers had more or less suffered in that purge.
"But it seems Your Excellency was not implicated back then."
Olivia set the teacup back on the desk, the bottom making a soft clink against the oak.
She shifted her posture slightly in the chair, uncrossing her left leg and crossing her right over her left instead.
This movement caused the hem of her white robes to hitch up a little further, exposing her mid-calf.
Her calf line was slender and firm, the olive skin flawless.
"I was six years old during the purge."
Her tone carried no heaviness or sentimentality, as flat as if stating today's weather.
"A six-year-old child; no matter how thorough the Ministry's purge, they wouldn't touch her.
I was sent to distant relatives to be raised, entered Hogwarts at eleven, and went straight to the front lines after graduation.
Seven years as a Field Healer earned me enough seniority and connections; I returned three years ago to take over as Director of St. Mungo's."
Her right hand picked up a quill from the desk, twirling it back and forth between her fingers.
The action seemed an unconscious habit, but the speed and rhythm were controlled with extreme precision; the quill spun between her fingers like an obedient little top.
"So, Mr. Rozier, regarding that alchemical device."
She set the quill down, leaning forward slightly, her hands interlaced on the desk.
This leaning motion created a tiny gap at the collar of her white robes near her collarbone; from Jerry's angle, the rise and fall of the olive skin beneath the collarbone was faintly visible.
"I need it. St. Mungo's needs it. The entire medical system of the wizarding world needs it."
Her deep brown eyes stared straight at Jerry.
"Name your price."
Jerry's two short legs swung back and forth on the chair twice.
His grey eyes looked at Olivia's classical-sculpture-like face for about five seconds.
Then he hopped down from the chair, his two feet landing on the floor with two soft thumps.
He walked to the side of the desk, stood on his tiptoes, and took a piece of gingerbread from beside the stack of medical files. He took a bite, chewed, and swallowed.
"Three conditions."
Olivia's deep brown eyes followed his movements, the faint curve at the corner of her mouth remaining unchanged.
"First, the right to use St. Mungo's alchemical laboratories. Not the public labs you have to queue and book, but your exclusive Director's lab. I need to use the Elven-silver cauldrons and the Moonlight Distillation Tower inside."
Olivia's finger tapped the armrest once, then stopped.
"Second, the complete inventory list of St. Mungo's medicinal ingredients, including the strategic reserves. I need to know how much stock you have, especially materials related to the Elven race."
Olivia uncrossed her right leg, placing both feet side-by-side on the floor, shifting her posture from leaning against the backrest to leaning slightly forward.
"Third."
Jerry took a second bite of gingerbread.
"Do you have voting rights on the Wizengamot?"
The office fell silent for three seconds.
Something flashed in Olivia's deep brown eyes—coming and going as quickly as the shadow of a fish beneath the water's surface.
Her fingers resumed tapping the armrest, the rhythm a beat slower than before.
"The Director of St. Mungo's holds an ex officio seat on the Wizengamot."
"Then the third condition is, in future Wizengamot votes concerning military action against the Cultivation World community, you vote in the direction I specify."
Olivia's fingers stopped.
She leaned back against the chair, crossing her long legs again, this time left over right.
During the switch, the hem of her white robes slid up above her knee, exposing a section of skin on the front of her thigh. The olive skin tone gleamed with a warm luster under the cold white light.
She made no move to pull the hem down, letting that section of her thigh remain exposed to the air.
"Mr. Rozier has quite the appetite."
"You told me to name my price."
"I thought you would ask for gold Galleons."
"I am not lacking in gold Galleons."
Olivia looked at this short boy standing beside her desk, chewing gingerbread, his head only reaching the height of the desktop, and remained silent for a few seconds.
Then she stood up, walking around from behind the desk.
As she walked, the fabric of her white robes slid against the front of her thighs, outlining the alternating contraction and relaxation of her thigh muscles with every step.
She walked up to Jerry, less than half a meter away, and then she made a move.
She squatted down.
Her knees bent, her back keeping straight, her entire body slowly lowering its height like a melting candle.
During her squat, the white robes slid down from above her knees back to her ankles, covering the exposed thigh once more.
She squatted to a height where she was eye-level with Jerry.
Deep brown eyes and grey eyes met on the same horizontal plane.
Her face was very close to Jerry's—so close he could smell her scent.
Perfume, a faint aroma of some mixed herbs and disinfectant potions lingering on the skin, and beneath that, a layer of her own warm body odor bearing the texture of olive oil.
Her right hand reached out.
Her slender fingers did not go to hold Jerry's hand, but instead landed at the collar of his grey hoodie.
Her index finger hooked the edge of the collar, the pad resting against the skin on the side of Jerry's neck, and slowly slid down two centimeters.
The touch was incredibly light, like a feather landing on the skin, but the temperature of her fingertip was so high it made the skin at the contact point feel slightly feverish.
"Mr. Rozier."
Her voice lowered, so low it could only be heard at this distance between two people.
"Voting rights on the Wizengamot are a very heavy bargaining chip. Are you sure the blueprint for an alchemical device is worth this price?"
Jerry did not step back.
He stood in place, his grey eyes calmly watching Olivia's face right before him.
Her eyelashes were very long, casting small, fan-shaped shadows beneath her lower lids. Her nose was only about ten centimeters from Jerry's. Her breath, carrying the aftertaste of black tea, brushed against Jerry's face.
Her fingers continued downward from Jerry's collar, trailing along the zipper line of the hoodie down to his chest, and stopped.
Her five fingers spread, her palm resting flat against Jerry's chest; through the fabric of the hoodie, she could feel the steady beating of the heart beneath.
Jerry looked down at her hand resting on his chest.
Then he looked back up, continuing to meet her eyes.
His heartbeat did not accelerate.
Not because his self-control was incredibly strong. But because twenty minutes ago, Vera had squeezed him completely dry. The residual effects of the Beastial Elixir were still slowly fading from his bloodstream; his entire being was in an absolute state of post-coital calm.
That meat-root, which normally would begin to engorge at the slightest provocation, now lay quietly shrunk inside his sweatpants, utterly unresponsive to Olivia's touch.
There was another reason.
This woman was too beautiful.
Beautiful to a degree that instinctively made one raise their defenses.
Jerry had seen many beautiful women: Hermione's beauty of intelligence, Molly's mature beauty, Cassiopeia's sharp beauty, Vera's wild beauty.
But Olivia's beauty was different from all of theirs; her beauty was a meticulously calculated perfection—every angle just right, offering not a single flaw.
And Jerry never trusted perfect things.
Perfection meant artificiality. It meant design. It meant this woman was using her beauty as a tool, rather than simply possessing it.
"Director Selwyn."
Jerry's voice was as steady as his heartbeat.
"Your hand."
Olivia's fingers paused on Jerry's chest for a second.
An extremely subtle change flashed in her deep brown eyes; it wasn't disappointment, but closer to some kind of reassessment.
Like a chess player discovering the opponent hadn't made the anticipated move and needing to recalculate the subsequent route.
She withdrew her hand from Jerry's chest.
The movement was natural, without any awkwardness or forced hesitation, as if that hand had simply been passing by Jerry's chest and stopped for a moment in passing.
She stood up and returned to the chair behind her desk.
The entire process was fluid as water, the hem of her white robes tracing an elegant arc as she turned.
"Three conditions." She leaned back against her chair, her fingers resuming their rhythm on the armrest. "Laboratory access and the medicinal inventory, I can grant you on the spot. But regarding the Wizengamot voting rights, I need to know the specific scope."
"The Exterminatus order." Jerry shoved the last bite of gingerbread into his mouth and dusted his hands. "The day after tomorrow, the Wizengamot will vote on the Exterminatus order against the Cultivation World community. You will abstain."
"Only abstain?"
"Only abstain. Not oppose."
The rhythm of Olivia's fingers tapping the armrest changed, shifting from a steady beat to an irregular one bearing traces of thought.
"The reason for abstaining?"
"You are a former Field Healer who spent seven years on the front lines. You know better than anyone what it means to launch an all-out war against the Cultivation World community while the Pseudo-Olympian Pantheon world community has not been fully eradicated.
A war on two fronts, scattered forces, collapsed logistics.
The casualties you saw on the front lines will multiply tenfold, a hundredfold. St. Mungo's cannot hold that many people."
Olivia's fingers stopped.
She looked at Jerry, the light of reassessment in her deep brown eyes growing more pronounced.
"You are not doing business."
"I am doing business. It's just that my business is a bit bigger than gold Galleons."
Jerry pulled a roll of parchment from his bag.
He unrolled the parchment onto the desk. It was an incredibly precise alchemical blueprint, covered in dense runic circuits, component structure diagrams, and material annotations.
Stamped in the bottom right corner of the blueprint was the seal of the Rozier Alchemy Workshop.
"The complete blueprint for the Spiritual Fragment Purge Device.
Including alternative solutions for the core components: substituting Level 3 Moonstones for Tears of Purification reduces the cost to one-tenth of the original.
The purging efficiency drops by thirty percent, but it is sufficient to meet the demands of large-scale mass production."
Olivia's gaze landed on the blueprint.
Her body leaned forward involuntarily, her hands bracing on the desk, her deep brown eyes rapidly scanning every detail on the blueprint.
Her breathing rhythm changed, becoming faster and shallower; it was the instinctive reaction of a professional seeing a breakthrough technological solution.
"Substituting Level 3 Moonstones for Tears of Purification... this approach..."
Her fingers hovered over the blueprint, moving along the path of the runic circuits, her lips parting slightly as if silently reciting some calculation formula.
"Feasible. Entirely feasible. The annual production of Level 3 Moonstones exceeds twenty thousand pieces, and the price is only five percent of a Tear of Purification.
If we mass-produce according to this plan, the cost per device can be pushed below one hundred and fifty gold Galleons."
She looked up at Jerry.
"You had this blueprint prepared long ago."
"Drew it last night." Jerry slung his bag back over his shoulder. "Hermione helped me calculate the alternative material parameters."
Olivia straightened up, crossing her arms over her chest.
The fabric of her white robes pulled tight with the movement, making the outline of her breasts even more pronounced; two soft curves constrained by the robes bulged slightly beneath her crossed arms.
"Laboratory access, medicinal inventory list, an abstention vote on the Exterminatus order. In exchange for a complete mass-production blueprint."
She reiterated the terms.
"One more point," Jerry added. "Not just the Exterminatus order. For all future Wizengamot votes concerning military action against the Cultivation World community, you will consult with me before voting.
I won't demand you vote as I say every time, but I need you to listen to my analysis before you vote."
Olivia's deep brown eyes stared at Jerry for a very long time.
The only sounds in the office were the soft crackling of the wall lamp flames and the occasional hurried footsteps of Healers passing in the corridor.
"Do you know what you are demanding, Mr. Rozier?"
"I do."
"You are demanding a member of the Wizengamot to surrender their independent judgment on major issues and accept the political guidance of a first-year student."
"I am not demanding you surrender your independent judgment. I am demanding you add an information source before making your judgment.
You can listen to my analysis and still vote according to your own thoughts; I will not rescind the blueprint because of it."
The corner of Olivia's mouth moved.
The movement was larger than any before, almost enough to be called a true smile.
But the contents of that smile were complex: appreciation, vigilance, the excitement of aroused competitiveness, and a little something Jerry couldn't quite read.
She extended her right hand.
This time, it wasn't to touch Jerry's collar or chest, but presented properly, palm sideways.
A handshake gesture.
Jerry looked at that slender hand with closely trimmed nails, extended his own small hand, and grasped it.
Her palm enveloped his entire hand, her fingers closing with moderate pressure, her palm still very warm.
"Deal."
She said.
Jerry released her hand and pushed the blueprint on the desk toward Olivia.
"Keep the blueprint. If you encounter technical issues during mass production, just send an owl to Slytherin House at Hogwarts."
He turned and walked toward the office door, pulling open the oak door that was still too heavy for him.
"Mr. Rozier."
Jerry stopped without looking back.
"You said earlier that you do not trust perfect things."
Jerry's shoulders stiffened slightly. He had never said that—at least, not out loud.
"Your expression said it." Olivia's voice came from behind the desk, carrying that low texture that made it hard to tell if she was languid or serious.
"Seven years as a Field Healer; reading people's expressions is basic training."
Jerry stood at the door, his back to her.
"Then you should have read something else as well."
"What?"
"I am not a good partner."
Olivia leaned back in her chair, re-crossing her long legs, her fingers resuming their rhythm on the armrest.
She looked at the small figure standing at the door, the flickering firelight of the wall lamps reflected in her deep brown eyes.
"What a coincidence. Neither am I."