Felix and Dumbledore opened their eyes at the same time, and the professor in the room looked at them intensely.
"Are you guys whispering?" Sirius asked in an irritated tone, "We've been staring at you guys like idiots for five minutes."
This statement should be true, as they were in someone else's dream world, Felix didn't use thought acceleration, so the amount of time that passed in the dream world would be the same as the amount of time that passed in reality.
Snape waved his sleeve in distaste and walked further away.
"You could interpret that as two healers discussing a treatment plan and not wanting to be disturbed by a certain bloke making noise." Felix said teasingly, "Speaking of which, didn't taking your students to Apparite all day long drained your energy?"
Sirius smacked his lips and muttered, "I should have asked for a raise."
At that moment, Professor Burbage awoke from her bed, looking flustered at first, but when Dumbledore's bright azure eyes looked at her through the lenses, she quickly calmed down and looked at Felix with a smile.
"Charity, I don't want my words to sound like an accusation, but you really shouldn't be shouldering all these problems alone." Dumbledore said gently, "You can always ask for help at Hogwarts."
Professor Burbage took a deep shaky breath, tears welling up in her eyes as she covered her face and said, " I aam-am sooo sorry."
Madam Pomfrey stepped forward and handed her a steaming mug, "Dear, Drink this hot chocolate, it will make you feel better." She took it, and took a sip, as she whispered, "I was so silly ..."
"Charity, what's going on? I heard part of it from the students, but their claims are ridiculous... Squib? That is impossible." Flitwick said pointedly, "Maybe we can help."
"It's The Shadow." A low, slow voice echoed through the ward, "I saw a lot of wizards, shadows, but couldn't make out their faces ..."
"You mean the ancient runes exchange in Hogsmeade?" Professor McGonagall said nonchalantly, "Thank you, Sybill, but I can't pretend like I didn't see the news in the papers ... October 27th, three weeks from now."
"Of course not!" Trelawney exclaimed, glaring at Professor McGonagall as if she had insulted her, "I had predicted that there would be a twist in that exchange ... Fate warned me of a very different thing ... "
"Then can you explain it more clearly?" Professor McGonagall asked patiently, forcing a hum out of her nose.
"Well ... Inner eye are not allowed to be misused, but ... yes, I did see something," Trelawney struggled to keep her eyes open and tilted her head, her lenses flickered as she used a deliberately shaky voice, "It seems to be an island, no, maybe a castle ..."
The others weren't interested in hearing anymore, so they returned their attention to the person in the hospital bed.
Professor Burbage's lips quirked as she hesitated, unsure of how to speak. No one urged her, and then after a while, she finally opened her mouth, "It was my own fault - I learned something from the muggle world and ended up doubting myself ... and magic as well. Alas, I was a fool."
"I changed my mind a few times midway through." She said softly, " Probably about two years or so ago, I first came across a book titled 'The Biography of Mendel', which contained knowledge that is in line with me. Some of the ideas coincided with what I've long thought," she darted a glance at Dumbledore, "You know, I'm against 'pureblood supremacy' ... of course, Muggle books won't mention wizards, but the implication is pretty much similar."
Then she began to say unfamiliar terms like "Mendel", "pea experiment", "genes" and "cross-breeding" unconsciously to the bewilderment of those around her. They looked at Dumbledore and then at Felix.
"In a nutshell, it's a term coined by muggles when they study the grand subject of 'life'." Felix summarized it.
The realization dawned on a few professors, which made it much easier for them to understand.
Professor Sprout scrutinized Professor Burbage, "No wonder you've been frequently looking for me to talk to for a while, it's almost as if you were studying plants as if they are human beings."
"Plants? How can a human be the same as a plant?" Professor Sinistra shook her head for a moment.
" Not exactly," Professor Burbage retorted, "that book was only for enlightenment, their research methods were quite rudimentary back then and have been enriched in the last decade or so ... I mean, Mendel was a man from the nineteenth century ."
Felix blinked, speaking of which, when was Headmaster Dumbledore born? He found the thought somewhat offensive, so he sensibly refrained from uttering a word.
"You're way ahead of a lot of people if I had to judge, Charity." Dumbledore said gently, "But ... how did you get yourself into such a dangerous situation?"
"I, alas." She said with a sigh, "Two years ago, I attended a Muggle research conference which ended up being interrupted by an accident, which prevented me from presenting my hastily completed paper. Before that, Professor Hap had advised me that my research would attract collective opposition from pure-blooded wizards. I didn't listen much. ..."
She huffed, "I was optimistic that if I researched far enough I could prevail in the foreseeable disputes and silence them with irrefutable evidence."
Professor Burbage said, in a less polite tone.
"Then my research stalled, so I turned to the muggle books that had given me so much inspiration. I bought the most advanced professional books, magazines, and papers and stuffed my head with them, I was slow, there were too many out-of-the-box words and roundabout logical connections ... To be honest, at first, I didn't think muggles would do anything phenomenal ... I just wanted to find new ideas and refine my own theories from them. But as my research progressed, I discovered a terrible truth: muggle research into the nature of life had no magic in it, not a word ... but their theories are unexpectedly self-contained ... I was unconvinced and tried to find out the flaw, and alas, then the nightmares started to appear."
Her eyes filled with fear, she shivered and took a large sip of hot chocolate, the delicious liquid giving her courage as she began to tell the most crucial part of the story.
"Although my conscience was rejecting it, my subconscious had accepted the theories and my research shifted silently: I wanted to integrate the two perspectives. I mean, fusing them together ... it was truly out of my league ... as a result, my mind was completely messed up," Professor Burbage shuddered, a look of confusion flashed in her eyes again. "It was strange how amazingly similar they were in some points, but diametrically opposed in others ... I couldn't reconcile those contradictions, so I chose to visit the Muggle biologists over the summer, but this had brought even more terrible consequences, I actually started to doubt the magic ... eventually, finally ..."
Her mouth clamped shut and the ward fell silent.
Every professor fell into contemplation. Snape looked at Felix with eerie eyes, his face calm as a rock or a plant growing in the dark, but his mind is fluctuating violently.
The boy had almost screwed him up.
The Christmas present he had given him! Those chemistry books! Although Felix had only gifted him the Middle School Experiment Guidebook, but he had stumbled past a bookshop in Muggle Alley during the summer holidays and purchased a few chemistry books on a whim, which he had found beneficial after a careful reading ...
Snape's expression looked condescending, he leaned against the wall with his shoulders hugged, and no one could guess what he was thinking. He did see a lot of inconsistencies in the chemistry book compared to the wizard's perceptions, but he didn't take the bull by the horns, because he had known one thing early on, that muggles didn't have magic powers, and even if the recipe for the potion is given to those people, and they follow the same steps all over again, the best they will get is a stinking pot of pus.
Thinking of this, he glanced coldly at Professor Burbage, who doubted her wizard blood, no wonder she was betrayed by her own magic.
At that moment, Sirius broke the silence in the room.
"Why do we have to dwell on these questions?" He spread his hands, "I modified a motorbike with James ... I mean, an adventure to a muggle shop, ahem, to investigate Death Eaters! That's right, that's when ... we couldn't even figure out what was the purpose of the spark plug back then, but it didn't stop us from keeping it, and we didn't find it much of an eyesore when we sat on it."
"That's a different thing." Snape said.
"I'd say it's the same thing," Sirius retorted subconsciously like always, " Or maybe do you think you can master all the knowledge? That nothing is impossible?"
Snape glanced at him coldly and ignored him altogether, "Headmaster Dumbledore, if there is no further problem, I will take my leave." With that, he walked out of the ward and after a few seconds, his very energetic voice rang out from the entrance.
"No spells in the corridors! Twenty points off for Gryffindor!"
Sirius couldn't sit still, he made a lame excuse to leave, and soon there was a heated argument sounded from the corridor.
"Severus Snape! Don't you try to deduce points for nonsense again!"
"Ah," Dumbledore snapped out of his deep thoughts and turned his head to Professor McGonagall, "Minerva, you'd better go out and check it out and separate them before they cause any more trouble, I don't want to see news about Hogwarts professors fighting in the headlines." After Professor McGonagall left, the others left one by one.
When the ward was left only with Dumbledore, Charity Burbage, Felix, and Madam Pomfrey, Dumbledore explained the two most viable treatments to Professor Burbage and, as expected, she did not choose the seemingly easy method.
"I don't want to forget that knowledge," Professor Burbage said after a moment of hesitation, "I'll be more careful later!"
"If you insist." Dumbledore respected her choice, but he still warned her, "But you can't do any more research like that for a short term."
Professor Burbage nodded heavily.
"It would be best to bring Charity to St. Mungo's for a period of recuperation; the conditions here are too rudimentary to deal with this kind of problem." Madam Pomfrey suggested.
"But I don't want to be absent ... I, alas, all right." Professor Burbage agreed.
Dumbledore stood up with relief, "That's settled then, please wait, I will need a few minutes to explain to the students, their little minds are always full of all sorts of strange notions, and it is best not to leave them to their own devices ..."
He walked out of the ward and his soft voice was faintly heard from outside:
"... I am happy to announce that ... there will be no long-term effects ... too much strain and need to rest for a few days... . It won't be long before I will return you an intact professor ..."
In the ward, Felix also prepared to take his leave.
"Professor Hap," Professor Burbage called out to him after a moment's hesitation, "I'm sorry I didn't follow your advice."
"It was something no one expected," Felix said calmly, "I understand what you did: it's hard for a normal person not to be tempted by the discovery of a treasure on the side of the road." He expressed his empathy for what had happened to Burbage, but more than that, he started to self-reflect.
He considered another issue in his mind if one day wizards made their identity public, a place where wizards and muggles could coexist would have to be established in order to facilitate communication between the two sides. It would be like a testing ground where all ideas, both mature and immature, could be put into practice ...
It would not be a good idea to build this place either in Diagon Alley, or Hogsmeade, there are more realistic factors to consider - such as the attitude of the Muggle government. But Trelawney's words had given him some inspiration, an island ...
Felix thought about it, and wondered if he could build it in the future?
...
Professor Charity Burbage did not stay at St. Mungo's for long, she returned from the hospital after only two days of absence, which kept the rumours going among the student group from making any waves, and with her return to teaching, especially after demonstrating the levitation charm in class, the rumours that originally seemed flimsy fell apart even faster.
Peace returned to Hogwarts Castle, and as the 27th of October drew nearer, the newspapers began to report lengthy articles about ancient rune exchange, with a steady stream of photographs of the Hogsmeade venue.
One student flipped through the latest newspaper, which showed a picture of the incomplete venue, with dozens of staff standing in a small clearing in the middle of Hogsmeade village, directing blocks of planks to appear in the right place.
"It looks like a huge open-air auditorium." The student reading the paper said.
"Rather like a dueling ring." His friend corrected.
Their views represented most of the students. The Hogwarts students had their own separate emphases regarding the exchange, and they had automatically divided into two factions, one focusing on the exchange itself, discussing who would be there and what the event would result in, while the other firmly focused on the interlude of the exchange - the challenge section.
Coincidentally, the latter view prevailed mostly in Gryffindor and Slytherin House.
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