The second-year started quite nicely, except for the Harry and Ron appearing on the flying car. Because I knew that the entrance to the station will be enchanted, I entered earlier and came to school normally, by train. Thanks to that, I was able to witness how Ginny and Luna were sorted into Gryffindor and Ravenclaw respectively.
We had a nice feast. For the first time in three months, I ate food that I didn't cook, and it was delicious!
In the first month at school.
As usual, we had tons of lessons. On the second day already, we had herbology with mandrakes and transfiguration with how to turn bird in cups.
'Who even come up with such a stupid spell? Why would you need a cup from a bird? You can make a cup from any random non-living substance with transfiguration…'
Anyway, I was busy with lessons and self-studying. As before, I wanted to quickly learn the curriculum and do my own thing.
By the end of the first month, I already finished all the courses for the first half-a-year. With my unbelievable abilities from studying skill, it was… well, I can't say easy, but bearable.
After that, I concentrated on how to stay safe against the snake. I also decided to save every 30 minutes in the same save slot. So, whenever I feel danger, hear strange hissing or see huge shadows, I can return to previous save.
In the second month.
One of the things I came up with was an artifact that will sense the closest heartbeats nearby. So, I started working on it in my free time. Due to that I couldn't work out and raise training. As a result, training and dancing skills started to decline.
After that, I and the system had a good talk about skills decline. The system explained to me the intricacies of how skills can decline. Thankfully, my knowledge skills will decline slower, due to all the abilities that help me with my memory, however, training and other similar skills are about body memory. So, if my body will continue losing fitness and won't practice, my skills' level will follow.
'And of course, that decline will take experience from the main level away as well. Annoying! At least, I can ignore dancing skill. It was level 1 anyway. Not a big loss.'
Also, surprisingly system told me that if I will keep my training in check, my physical activities skill won't decline as well. Strange, but I'll take it.
Thanks to that, I had to find some time for running or some other work out activity. Due to that, I started to understand why I would want to invest in stamina. I can sleep less and work more. Surely it is a dream come true! (sarcasm)
Other than that, my skills' growth sped up because I was reading books with insane speed. Plus, I didn't even need to read books more than once, because I improved my comprehension ability as soon as my studying skill was raised. And after finishing a book I was 'Using' it via my inventory.
Every book was equivalent to 2 skill levels. Although there were good and bad books. Some gave more knowledge, while others gave less.
Funny thing is that I didn't even try to grind skills. The amount of knowledge I had to learn to make the artifact, I had in mind, was mindboggling. Plus, due to all the experiments, I was conducting, I was using the save (the one I was making every 30 minutes) quite often. After all, those experiments were dangerous. Once I even accidentally blew up my hand.
Thankfully, after a few such experiments, we reached a consensus with the system that she will automate the process of saving every 30 minutes and returning in case of damage. It does not make me immortal or invulnerable, because one-shot spells will still perma-kill me.
So, unfortunately, the system only automates, what I myself can accomplish. So, if I receive physical damage and system will notice it, it will return me back to the auto-save. So, I don't need to strain myself to think about saves or returns.
Although, I still have to be on the lookout for strange hisses and huge shadows. Because when I tried to automate that as well, the system started returning me back in time, every few minutes. Every big shadow or loud wind howl and system activates an auto-load.
Moreover, it was useless to explain anything to it. It just said that it does not understand where its mistake was. Anyway, for now, automation still has some limitations.
In the third month.
In the first 2 months, I had little to no results from my research, except for raising skills and gaining levels. However, I also understand that the artifact that I want to create is first of its kind. It combines knowledge of both science and magic inside. I was mostly inspired by owls to make the artifact, which can visualize heartbeats.
In my previous life, I remember somebody saying that owls have such a good hearing, that their brain actually visualizes sounds. They can literally see sounds, their direction, and distance. So, I thought what if I can make something similar and connect it to my brain via magic to see sounds.
However, it only sounded easy. Sound is a hard thing to collect or even more to perceive. Sound is vibration. And I am conducting it through something else entirely, before sending it to the brain. This led to damaging the brain most of the time. Sound perception is a very fragile mechanism and apparently not all perceiving mechanisms are the same. Moreover, the sound has to go through a lot of modifications via a human's auditory system before reaching the brain.
In this case, eyesight is far easier. You collect light and transfer it as information to a specific region. Next magic takes place. I need to enchant it properly with proper intent (magical intent makes life so much easier.) and voile! Done. Next, your brain does all the work.
Although, it has its own problems with how it divides light waves and process them, but to me from magical perspective sight looks simpler than hearing.
Of course, some may say that I should then just collect sounds, then manually map them on sight and send it as visual information. However, I tried. Too many calculations for a small hard-to-notice artifact.
Somewhere, during the research, I had a stray idea about why the heck I am even doing all that, but it was soon drowned by enthusiasm to try and build things. My passion for building and creating some interesting stuff is truly undying. Even in the new world it followed me.
After the second month of research, I was enlightened. Why should I be limited by sound? The problem with basilisk is that it can kill if you look in his eyes. What if I can see but not through eyes? I can make an artifact that collects light the same way eye does and just sends it directly to the brain for further processing.
This way I should escape basilisk glare.
However, there was a problem. What exactly about basilisk glare kills you? Seeing his eyes with your own, or your brain perceiving his eyes? Because if it's second, I won't be able to escape death with such an instrument.
However, after struggling over the problem for a few days, I was enlightened once more. No matter what, basilisk glare is a magical attack. So, all I need to do is to filter magic and leave only light waves. Both magic and light should be energy, so I should be able to make a device that will collect light and only light, to be further processed, and sent to the brain.
Then I remembered something. There should be a boy who will be petrified via camera. What I can do is to put a prototype of this artifact that only filters magic into his camera. This way if the guy won't get petrified - artifact works.
However, I was low on time. I know that it will happen soon - after Harry's quidditch match, which is in a few days. So, I must hurry. Thankfully I don't need to build the whole artifact, only the magic filtering part to test my theory.
In the fourth month.
Good news. My theory was true. Bad news… well, there a few of those. First of all, modifying this boy's, Colin, the camera was one hell of a task. Moreover, after modification, he can't see ghosts through the camera, which became another problem, because he created a commotion because of this.
Fortunately, I am not a complete idiot (hopefully), so I made a save before going after that boy's camera. I had to return a few times to do everything perfectly but, in the end, my theory has proven to be true.
Although, that's where the second half of bad news comes in. He kinda… well… died, because after not being petrified, he got scared and looked from his camera and directly at the snake. Anyway, I returned to the save once more, happy that my theory proved to be true.
One demerit was the fact that I had to be present in the quidditch match I saw 5 to 6 times already, but whatever. I am strong and mighty, as one dragon used to say.
That was all I was doing throughout the past three months. Going to lessons, research, helping our golden trio, or to be more precise a stupid duo with their lessons and working out when I can.
'Is that a school or a freaking survival camp? I don't know rest in this bullshit place. I want to just chill and calmly learn magic…'
Hopefully, this month I can peacefully continue my work on the artifact. Plus, Christmas is near.
'I need a vacation…'
*Progress*
『 Level 15 ➔ 16 ➣ Not enough experience 』
『 Magicka ➣ Improvement : 14 ➔ 15 (talent = 2.0789) 』
『 Number of skill points: 1 (one was spent to upgrade studying ability and this one is from level up to 16) 』
*Skills*
『 Alchemy 27 ➔ 30 | Sneak 25 』
『 Speech 28 | Studying 29 ➔ 33 』
『 Wand Making 26 | Herbology 24 ➔ 28 』
『 Magic Channeling 27 ➔ 29 | Magic Chanting 25 ➔ 27 』
『 Magic Gesturing 25 ➔ 27 | Magic Theory 32 ➔ 36 』
『 Astronomy 24 ➔ 26 | Riding Expertise 21 』
『 Crafting 21 | Playing Games 17 』
『 Enchanting 17 ➔ 26 | Cooking 27 』
『 Training 22 | Physical Activities 17 』
『 Programming 28 | Dancing 0 』
*Ability*
Remarkable Comprehension ➔ Unmatched Comprehension