Chapter Sixty-Three
Baiting the Snare
With the start of the second term, it became obvious that Dumbledore and Sinistra had made good on their promise to relay Sunset's offer to Professor Flitwick and the two of them spent a few weeks of their comparative magic sessions discussing gravity spells with the assistance and expertise of Madam Hooch and, once they were satisfied with the results, delved into other spells altering the fundamental properties of reality.
This was the first time they had been discussing purely theoretical magic. Both worlds had magical theory that suggested that a spell to alter an object's mass was possible, but neither had actually managed to create one. But, by relying on the magical knowledge of both worlds, they were able to turn the theories into reality.
For now, outside of a mass-independent, if far more complicated, levitation charm they hadn't found much in ways of applying their discoveries so far, but they were certain that they would think of something sooner or later.
Still in the first week of term, Sunset was also called to the medical wing where Madam Pomfrey showed her several books on medical spells and asked her to translate them and send them to Equestria. Upon further prompting, she revealed that the headmaster had gotten word from Sirius and learned that medical spellcraft was nowhere near as far advanced in Equestria that it was on Earth.
Sunset could understand why. Ponies were a lot more durable than humans were, even wizards and witches. Injuries occurred far less often, as such there was far less incentive to develop methods to heal them.
It was fascinating. Equestria had potions that could heal a simple fracture in days. More complicated ones, like wing injuries, could take a week or longer. There were spells that could lock the parts of a broken bone in position, but even those required a thorough knowledge of anatomy. From the books she had learned a spell that could heal simple fractures in seconds and even complicated ones in minutes. Regardless of anatomical knowledge.
It was an immensely complex spell, of course, but it was still a remarkable piece of magic and immensely useful for those willing to learn it. She had never actually given much thought to it, but now that she thought about it, it had seemed odd that Neville had been able to return to the flying lesson after half an hour as though his wrist had never been broken in the first place.
Once she had the translated copies, she returned to the common room where Ron seemed very interested in what she had gotten. Uncharacteristically so, considering she had brought back books of all things. She did remember, however, what Mr. Ollivander had said about Ron's wand and the accidental magic he had cast with it when they were matched.
Ron wasn't usually particularly diligent, but his brothers had set the bar high and if there was one thing he was truly willing to work for, save Quidditch, of course, it was distinguishing himself from them. In that light, she supposed, his sudden interest made a certain amount of sense.
She made copies of each of the books for him and then another set for herself, her bag had plenty of room, after all, before sending the stack off to Princess Celestia along with a message asking whether the princess had any idea what could have caused Sirius to inquire after human healing spells all of a sudden.
As the snow started to thaw and give way to rather heavy rain, Harry was once more busy many a morning and evening as Oliver Wood was roping him and the rest of the team into Quidditch training. Gryffindor wouldn't be playing in another match until March, but Wood seemed to have the same attitude concerning training Hermione and Twilight had to studying.
Sunset was careful to observe Malfoy and Goyle whenever they ran into them. She noted that they were slowly starting to look a bit put out rather than openly hostile more often than not. It seemed that the seeds of doubt Crabbe had planted were sprouting nicely.
Speaking of Crabbe, he and Sunset were continuing their training and he was quickly improving. At the same time they also often took the opportunity to discuss news or the general situation in wizarding Britain as a whole. It was remarkable how often he said something only to, moments later, reconsider and discover that he had come across yet another idea he only held because it had been told to him by his parents and their friends.
All in all, Sunset was quite happy with the way things were going. Even Quirrell hadn't made a move so far. Then, in the third week of February, on the evening after they had watched the Quidditch match between Slytherin and Ravenclaw, Sunset got word from the princess. After some covert research hadn't uncovered anything, it seemed the Princess had paid Sirius as visit and simply asked him directly. That was how she had found out about his actions in defending the Apple Family and their orchard.
Her friends, especially Harry, quite enjoyed her retelling of the tale, especially since the Princess had apparently been interested in the story herself and gotten a full report from the guard in charge and Granny Smith. It also served well to distract her friends from the second part of the message.
The trap was ready.
She would have to inform the headmaster that the Princess would be coming by later that evening to set up the trap.
A knock on the door prompted the headmaster to turn to the door. "Come in," he called before his other guests could react. The newly upgraded wards had been correct and the door opened to reveal Miss Shimmer and Princess Celestia. "Welcome. I've been told your project is complete. Is it truly ready?"
"Yes Headmaster Dumbledore. I personally checked. It is ready."
"Albus, would you mind?"
"Oh, of course. My apologies, Minerva. May I introduce Princess Celestia of Equestria, the ruler of Miss Shimmer's homeland. Princess, allow me to introduce Minerva McGonagall, Filius Flitwick, Pomona Sprout and Severus Snape, our heads of house and professors for transfiguration, charms, herbology and potions. This struck me as the time to let the rest of the senior staff in on our plan. I assure you they all have my complete trust."
The princess looked at each of the Professors in turn, then nodded. "Very well, do you wish to inform them or shall I."
"Severus, would you like to inform your colleagues of what you've learned."
Snape nodded calmly. "Of course, director." He turned to the rest of the senior staff. "Quirinus has betrayed us. He is working for the Dark Lord."
Professor Sprout gasped. Professor Flitwick nearly fell of his much too large chair. Professor McGonagall managed to contain her reaction the best. Even so, she looked flabbergasted. "How?"
Albus leaned forward, clearing his throat quietly. "I did some research over the past months. It seems Quirinus' travels over the past year took him to Albania. The very country where Lord Voldemort was reportedly hiding after his downfall. I suspect that they met there."
"Months? Albus, you've known for that long and not told us? Why would you not act to remove him immediately?"
Snape's nod was barely noticeable, but his voice was as clear as ever. "That, director, is a very good question. One I've been asking myself for a while as well."
"The reason for that is in a discovery myself and Miss Shimmer here made independently not long after Halloween. It is also the reason for Princess Celestia's presence." He sighed. "Quirinus is not merely aiding or serving Lord Voldemort. He is hosting him. Willingly."
Once more the professors gasped in disbelief. Sprout was barely moving. Flitwick was barely holding onto his chair. McGonagall's reaction was the loudest this time. Snape, however, seemed outraged. "The dark lord has been in Hogwarts for months?!"
"I am afraid so, Severus. However, Princess Celestia suggested a superior method of dealing with our problem. Your highness, would you be so kind to explain?"
"Of course. Sunset?"
Miss Shimmer reached into her bag and pulled out an object, maybe the size of a bludger, that seemed to be a tetrahedron made of brown glass with golden trim. When she placed it on Albus' desk, a closer investigation revealed it to actually be made up four smaller tetrahedrons made of glass with complex pieces of metal inside them and connected by four hexagonal panes of brown glass, or at least some material resembling glass, he doubted it was actually glass, that connected the four.
The hexagonal panes each had three long sides, connecting to the three other panes and three short sides connecting to each of the smaller tetrahedral devices. Two sides of the trap had complex spell patterns inscribed on them. The patterns on one side were faintly glowing in the teal color he had come to connect with Miss Shimmer's magic. The second set of inscriptions was glowing a golden, sunny yellow. He didn't need to guess whose magic it was.
"This," the princess began to explain, "is a soul trap. A masterpiece of light magic that will free any living being caught within its grasp of any soul, or fragment thereof, that isn't their own. Each side of the trap is a spell matrix lock. Only when four key spells are cast upon the trap at the same time – each upon the correct face, of course – will it open and release whatever soul may be trapped within.
"As you can see, both Sunset and myself have already inscribed our key sequences. If two of you would do so as well, the trap would become operational."
"Thank you, your highness." Albus turned back to his professors. "Now, as you all know, the Philosopher's Stone is being kept at Hogwarts. Stealing it is, of course, his objective. The soul trap is our only chance of containing him so we intend to use the stone as bait to lure Him into it. Once the trap fulfills its purpose, we simply need to deal with Quirinus and recover it. I have personally ensured that neither Quirinus nor his new ... master will be able to recover the stone. I nearly prevented myself from recovering it in the process, but fortunately Miss Shimmer managed to catch a detail I overlooked."
He gave his heads of house some time to discuss amongst themselves while he quietly spoke with the princess. "Does this spell matrix lock require a specific key?"
She nodded. "It has a predetermined form. Sunset?"
He hadn't seen Miss Shimmer walk over until she stepped out next to the princess and pulled a scroll of parchment out of her bag. Actually, it wasn't parchment at all, it was much smoother. The 'paper' material the muggles seemed to prefer. As she placed it on his desk, her hand lit up with her teal magic for a split second and a fine line of magic cut the ribbon holding it closed. She then unfurled it and used what he recognized as a weak, transient sticking charm to keep it from rolling back up. When she lifted her arm aside, he saw that the scroll held a complex spell scheme drawn partially in red ink and partially in blue ink. He noted that only some of the actual inscriptions were blue, all vital parts of the spell structure were red.
The princess confirmed his suspicions a moment later. "The red sections are integral components of the spell. The blue areas are placeholders. Feel free to change them as you see fit. Just make sure to memorize them well."
Albus looked at the spell for a good while, memorizing every detail first of the required portions, then of his own version of the spell. Finally, he lit his eyes with an aura sight charm and cast the spell. A bead of light red appeared at the tip of his wand. After confirming that each of the patterns of the spell had formed correctly, something only he was capable of as the spell cleverly used his own signature to mask its matrices, he tapped his wand against the center of one of the unoccupied sides of the trap.
When he lifted it away, he watched as the small bead of light that had jumped off of his wand slowly crept a few fractions of an inch over until it was perfectly centered. From there it extended into three lines, quickly running towards the three points of the triangular surface. From there, each turned to the right, running along the edge. Before they could reach the corner, however, they passed the middle and curved inwards, forming a circle that matched the central glass pane in size. At the point they touched the smaller triangles they turned outwards forming three smaller circles on them.
Once they had finished their smaller circles, they returned back onto the original circle and continued until they had finished a third of a turn and returned back to the outline, continuing on where the previous line had left off until they reached a point again. Once the basic framework had formed, further circles subdivided the large areas, filling with fanciful characters to quickly form a dizzying array of glowing symbols.
It remained there, glowing, for a few seconds before the symbols faded, leaving only the outline of the spell, now glowing much dimmer, just like on the other sides of the trap that were already keyed.
Once he had finished watching the spell matrix lock do its work, he turned to his professors. "So which of you want's to do the honours?"
After some back and forth, it was decided that Minerva should be the final key bearer. All seven of them were now in the chamber where the Mirror of Erised was kept, and, with it, the Stone.
Princess Celestia held out the trap in one hand, her own side facing down against her palm. When her hand lit up with her golden magic, the other three key bearers drew their wands and tapped them against their respective sides.
Within moments, the locks once more filled with symbols and lit up. The hexagonal panes vanished leaving only the smaller tetragons behind. The top one dropped into the princess' palm where another already lay. The other two were easily caught in her magic.
"Very well. Now we simply need to place them in the correct positions. Sunset."
Albus and his professors watched as Miss Shimmer and the princess walked around the room placing three of the small glass objects in a triangle pointing away from the entrance and centered around the spot in front of the mirror. When they were done, Miss Shimmer stepped in front of the mirror, looked into it for a moment, nodded, and threw the final piece into the air above her.
None of them were particularly surprised when it suddenly stopped in mid-air, twin lines matching the colors of magic keyed to the lock outlining a much larger tetrahedron momentarily flashing up before they vanished and the smaller objects vanished.
It took a quite impressive effort on Albus' and Filius' behalf to pierce through the extensive suite of concealment charms and momentarily render them visible. They would have never found them, had they not known to look for them.
Albus was beginning to understand why it had taken the Equestrians two months to make the artifact.
This might need some clarification on what they are actually trying to accomplish as the wizards already have spells and potions that let them shrink and grow things which would alter the object's mass. Also the feather-light charm.
The scene with the discussion amongst the staff could probably use some cleaning up. I don't think Snape calls anyone director in the books, ever, so I'm really not sure who he's talking to, and then there's this scene.
If Snape is the one who's dialog we actually read, how is Minerva the loudest? The loudest one would logically be the one we read, since it would be heard over the others. It just doesn't make much sense to me. The whole scene in this particular part (both shortly before and shortly after) should probably be cleaned up a bit.
Out of interest who is the director they are talking about,Amelia Bones is not mentioned and the person who replied was Albus so the title would be Headmaster or Professor yes no?
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That's actually pretty simple. Minerva's response might have been loudest, but Severus' was the most articulate.
his sudden interest mad a certain amount of sense.
mad or made
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9683050
The resizing spells work with a form of spacial compression, similar to equestrian spacial expansion (but different, obviously). And it's the featherweight charm which, as the name implies, affects weight, not mass. It just interferes with gravity for that particular object.
9683333
Okay but then you also have transfiguration which can take something big and turn it into something small and vice versa as well as Animagus transformations where a grown man can turn into a small rat. These things wouldn't be possible without the ability to alter mass.
9683340
Perhaps so, but in those cases, the alteration of mass is a side effect of the transformation. It isn't something they could do in its own. Or it wasn't until now.
9683343
This is why I say it's unclear. There are already plenty of ways to alter mass with magic to accomplish something so I'm not sure what they are actually trying to accomplish by altering mass alone or why they act like altering mass is some new thing that's never been done before.
It can't be theoretical if wizards already have ways to alter mass. Altering mass is clearly possible so it must be something else that was thought to be impossible.
Whereas some comments are about why the magic users haven't got a mass removal spell, I'm can't stop thinking about the truly staggering amount of energy required to do even the slightest amount of the featherweight charms. If it's messing with gravity, removing mass or simply buoying the object up by some means, all require monumental power. Removing 67kg of material (by turning it into energy very inefficiently) created a blast equal to 15 thousand tonnes of TNT. To "simply" hold something up, you have to deal with momentum, leverage and a thousand different vector calculations. And the less said about altering a fundamental force in such a way that doesn't obliterate the object the better.
Magic, gotta love it!
Is the Island of Death from Pirates of the Caribbean an Equestrian Soul Trap? ‘Can not be found except by those who know where it is’ sounds like the kind of concealment that was described at the end there. I jest of course, but that was the first thing to come to mind.
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Interesting concept, go write a story with it!
9683614
Twilight is twelve. She'll be 17 by the time NMM comes around.
I think the important question is: Does magic work in space?
A related question is: Does magic depend on some property of the Earth?
Also… What are the limits of the mass altering spell?
I'm guessing that your aiming to make space travel a part of the story, much later on. I know that the biggest reason that sending things into space is so expensive is related to how Delta-V and the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation interact with the planet's gravity. If we had a proper space elevator, getting into space would be much cheaper, too. But the ability to remove mass, without removing material, would make space travel much faster. Not to mention that with the ability to alter mass in one direction, it's not unreasonable to assume it's possible to alter it in the other direction. And with the ability to increase mass, depending on the upper limits, you might be able to create an Alcubierre drive, by increasing the mass of something enough that you create a gravity field. Although I'm not an expert on how those drives would work, so I couldn't be sure that's all that's needed, or what problems you might encounter. But there is a very interest article on Wikipedia about various Spacecraft Propulsion methods ⌈here⌋, and at the bottom, it lists speculative methods.
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Well I did basically just add magical Mass Effect fields to the setting so there is that ...
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I know that; that's why I didn't specify the fanfic or the fanfic's author, but just left it general.
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But that's a the thing. If it was real life, the dark wizards wouldn't make a spell that'd take long to cast, they'd try to make it as useful as possible.
The cost? Power. They can't cast it too many times. They may open with it, try to take someone out in 1 hit, but if it misses then that's it, they have to use other spells. Or they may use it to finish someone off.
There's always a downside.
It's like how you could throw a really strong punch at someone, try to knock them out in one blow, but now you're off balance, vulnerable, and if you hit something else, hurt. It's a downside for if you miss.
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I mean.... could you give examples of this? Only one Death Eater has cast a spell offensively that is not the Killing Curse. It was in the Department of Mysteries on Hermione. Whether he was a less skilled wizard, or had recently joined and just didn't know is up for debate, but all the other times? Flash of green light. Flash of green light.
No sign of tiring or immense effort.
I would have liked it if it was as you say. But I have seen no signs of it in the actual story.
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The thing is I don't think the Killing Curse gets used all that often in the books. If the spell's name its self isn't mentioned then its silly to assume that every curse thrown around or every flash of green light is the killing curse.
I mean think about it they can't just cast it willy nilly during a battle, that's a really good way to accidentally kill your allies.
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Your points about the Canon Gender Roles (or rather the general lack thereof) tends to actually be one of my main peeves about RGRE in general. It works as a specialized narrative device in a specific genre of story, but as a generalized portrayal of Equestria it doesn't quite pass the litmus test...
I also wouldn't go so far as to call them Egalitarian. There is a definitive societal hierarchy with the Princesses more or less undisputedlly at the top (when they decide to actually flex their political muscle at least), it's just that this hierarchy isn't based on gender expectations, but more on a strange combination of the systems of Nobility, Meritocracy and Elected Officials held over from Equestria's founding. That isn't to say that the General Pony Citizens don't enjoy certain basic rights, but when Neighsay (Probably an elected official based on his title of "Chancellor") can deny entry to schools based purely on an individual's Species and it takes a Decree from the Princesses to countermand that decision, then there clearly is a societal divide of some sort in place.
9685563
I mean.
Other people in this comment section have given this same argument. A flash of green light does not necessarily mean it was the killing curse. Did they shout the spell? Did it destroy things it hit?
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No I didn't. And I thought I fixed that hours ago ...
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Yes, I am reading that one :D
About the slice of life, I think that even there the characters face difficulties, if reduced in scope and danger. Here Sunset is radically changing two (three?) Worlds and solved like six books of trouble by just passing by. The events are too high stakes for me to consider them slice of life, but there is no challenge to see it as anything else...
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...I mean, when death eaters are involved, it happens all the time. I'm not talking about the movies.
Only duels between non-death eaters earlier on have more interesting spells.
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I think you're just misremembering it definitely gets used but its an exaggeration to say its the only spell the Death Eaters use. Like I said before if the spell isn't named you can't just assume its the killing curse.
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Theses are videos I watched within the last month, that you may be interested in.
Very interesting talk about brains adapting over time to new stimulus, to create new senses.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4c1lqFXHvqI
Overview about brain computer interfaces.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xMxJYhUg0pc
I believe that we already have the basic technology to create thought-based human-computer interface devices; someone just needs to put it all together. And it will likely be expensive and bulky to start with. But for example, I believe that using EEG to monitor brain activity, and an array of other sensors to monitor other cues from the body, like eye movement tracking cameras and electrical sensors in the voice box, diagram, tongue, and other muscle groups, you can collect data to train a convolutional neural network to read intentions, by collecting the data while performing activities, and appropriately labeling the data collected, so that the neural network can begin to be trained to start making guesses.
On the subject of animals possibly being able to sense fear… I'm thinking it's possible in a way, but not directly. Humans, and other animals, make motions with our bodies, that can have useful meaning extracted, based on context. And human can even share body language responses with other species, because we evolved, and live in, a similar enough environment, that our responses to situations tend to have similarities. For example: if you're passively listening for sounds that may indicate danger while your going about your business, and you think you may have heard something, you are likely to freeze, because making sound will not only make it harder to hear a creeping predator, it may also help a predator locate you faster. You share this behavior with many other creatures, and so, it's evolutionarily advantageous for a predator that has already spotted its prey, to respond to seeing its prey freeze, by freezing itself, and stop making noise, to allow the prey to lower its guard, and become less alert, allowing the predator to get closer, and increase its chance of catching its prey before it runs off. Some animals even have access to senses that are much more sensitive than ours, and may take cues from those senses, in combination with others, to read a situation.
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I mean, a flash of green light is pretty darn descriptive.
Okay, actually, let me put it this way. I want to be proven wrong. I want that spell to be better than I remember, and I want the fights to have been more interesting. Give me text.
Give me descriptions of real events from the books.
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During the Battle of the Department of Mysteries the Death Eaters are shown to be using a variety of spells, not just the killing curse:
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Cool. Glad I remembered it wrong.
I'd still maintain that the Killing Curse is one of the most boring spells, I concede. If they are using other spells, there obviously is some reason they aren't using it (though I wish those limitations were laid out a bit more clearly, perhaps when Barty Crouch talks about them in book four).
And I guess I'm not terribly surprised. The Department of Mysteries fight was one of the best written fights I have ever read, even though it has been a while.
That's kinda BS if a pony gets hurt then they still need to be healed
9694842
True, but what do people get hurt from? From making a mistake in everyday actions or by fighting each other. The ponies aren’t fighting each other all that much and they are more durable. They just don’t require a trip to the hospital as often. Because of that, I imagine that since there is less of an immediate need to build a big and expensive hospital there is less of an immediate need to develop the science. Still a need to, but less so.
Whoo!! Underrated country time!!