The fragments of the gown in his hand were still just as sparkling and radiant, but the text recorded on them clearly carried a sort of evil aura; Ian could sense the malicious humor of that wicked witch in every word and sentence.
"Who says you can offend anyone but never offend an old witch..." Ian tried to recall his own words and deeds, but couldn't figure out where he'd possibly offended Witch Morgan. Now he finally understood why Morgan had altered the recipe—she must have really wanted to see him obliviously brew a cauldron of Amortentia.
What kind of international joke is this!
He's only eleven!
Just a kid!
How could he possibly ever need something like that! No—actually, even once he's older, he still wouldn't need it! Just like that sharp-eyed young man had said earlier: with his outstanding looks and abilities far beyond his peers, if Ian wanted to have a sweet, innocent romance, why on earth would he need a potion for help?
"I'd really love to know what life was like for those apprentices of Teacher Morgan back in the day, living on eggshells around her all the time. Take your eyes off her for a moment and she'd definitely play some sneaky trick."
Ian couldn't help glancing at the distant castle. He only dared to mutter and grumble in his heart, since he was very well aware that his teacher had a habit of spying on people.
The Magic Mirror originally belonged to her, and she once eavesdropped on his random chat with Ariana—who knew if right at this moment the Old Witch wasn't hiding inside the castle and spying on him?
At this thought—
Ian's eyelid twitched.
"Oh, gratitude to my ancestors, gratitude to my teacher Lady Morgan! She's just too considerate of me, and those evil bystanders obviously don't understand the true kind intention behind her recipe!"
"No wonder that guy left with no friends seeing him off, only a bird willing to play with him..." After making sure the young man had walked away, Ian performed to the air at the top of his lungs.
He'd been about to make a Christian prayer gesture, but then suddenly remembered that Christianity used to persecute wizards quite a bit, so in the end he just waved his fingers randomly over his chest.
The air was still fragrant.
The birds and insects continued to chirp busily.
No one at all responded to Ian, but he couldn't take it lightly. The fate of that beautiful senior girl stuck deep in his mind—when a vindictive, wicked witch decided to mess with someone, her tricks were downright nasty.
Even Voldemort handing out cigarettes probably couldn't match that level. Ian was certain this wasn't some misunderstanding on Morgan the Witch's part; after all, anyone normal could tell the difference between a Joy Potion and a pleasure potion.
The Joy Potion he'd pictured—Joy Planet.
And yet, the reality of his Joy Potion was—Night Duty Ward.
You couldn't even say the two were a little similar; they had absolutely nothing in common. Ian didn't even dare to imagine what would have happened if he'd brewed up a batch and given some to Aurora. And just now, he'd even been considering cooking up a batch for open sale—the idea that Azkaban would simply beckon him over for this was honestly putting it far too kindly.
"Hiss—empty Amortentia bottles everywhere, a whole room full of Amortentia victims... Even Durmstrang probably couldn't top this level of chaos!"
Ian felt utterly spooked.
If he'd really brewed up a giant cauldron and sold it off, just imagining the scene was unreasonably wild—Hogwarts history books would probably end up recording it. As in, a black mark in the records: the evil King of Enchantment strikes again; that night, the whole castle was a raging storm of passion.
"..."
Ian felt he should thank that unknown young man who just passed by—it was him who saved Hogwarts. He was definitely the real Savior, every bit as worthy as Harry Potter.
"If I'm not mistaken, the one that flew over at the end was a Phoenix. I can't believe a Phoenix actually has the ability to come here... Did it borrow a brief moment during its Nirvana Rebirth?" Ian wasn't blind or farsighted, so he had every reason to suspect that young man just now was also a member of the Dumbledore family.
There really was a resemblance; maybe he was Albus Dumbledore's seed, or maybe Abeforth Dumbledore's son. Ian was leaning toward the former. Don't tell him the old headmaster lived more than a hundred years and never had any romance—he definitely didn't believe anyone could so thoroughly renounce mortal desire.
The supposed "aunt" must be Ariana. Come to think of it, if you calculated by Earth years, Ariana would actually count as a very old girl now.
"I should've taken a photo of that guy—what a pity." Ian pulled out the old camera he'd borrowed. Even now, in the early 1990s, this camera was a fossil.
Not only was it super heavy,
it was huge.
There was even some "pot lid" kind of thing on the top left, maybe for exposure. Ian didn't know much about cameras—only that this one was a pretty common kind of magical modification in the Wizarding World.
It worked a bit like a Polaroid—the photo would print automatically after you took it. But if you wanted it to move, you had to drip some special Magic Potion on it. No one knew the recipe, and the price was outrageously high—just like the Potter family's shampoo, it was a monopoly product.
Of course,
Ian definitely didn't need to buy something like that. After all, helping out with a photo was the full extent of his heroic spirit. Dumbledore had been headmaster for so many years, so he obviously wouldn't be short on money to buy Polyjuice Potion. If it weren't for the fact that the headmaster's authority utterly trumped any student's, Ian might even have tried to get Dumbledore to top up his account before he'd develop any pictures for him.