Nick Flamel felt powerless at the thought.
The existence of wizards may be a secret to the average Muggle, but the Muggle establishment knows about it.
It is common for the two sides to have a working relationship, and whether or not they are equal depends on the balance of power between the Muggle government and the wizarding world.
In France, for example, the Muggle government has less control over the wizarding world, and the Ministry of Magic is nominally a department of the state, but has a high degree of freedom and tends to be complementary, with seats in the Muggle Parliament.
In addition, the Muggle government helped to cover up the existence of the wizarding world, allowing the Academy of Magic to recruit students in the area… It can be said that the Muggle higher-ups were instrumental in keeping the wizarding world under wraps as technology advanced.
In exchange, the Ministry oversees wizards and witches within the country, regulating their activities, and dispatching powerful Aurors to protect the President and important officials and prevent Muggle heads from being taken over by malicious wizards or even spy wizards from other countries.
Occasionally, he dealt with matters that the Muggle government was not comfortable with.
Therefore, the attitudes of the various countries towards wizards were very contradictory. To put it simply, they wanted to rope in and guard against them!
It was done to defend against foreign wizards and protect the country's interests.
On the other hand, they were wary of wizards' ability to alter memories, read minds, and teleport!
No one in power wanted to one day become someone else's puppet.
The two worlds have maintained a delicate balance in this contradictory relationship!
The International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy, which was signed in 1689 and officially enacted in 1692, played a major role in keeping the peace!
The law was based on the rise of witch hunts by Muggles in the fifteenth century.
The persecution of witches and wizards by Muggles at the time was extreme.
Wizards were born with magical abilities, but there were too few of them.
There were probably less than 10,000 wizards in Europe at that time, and they were scattered across various countries and territories. Most of them had not been systematically trained and could only cast weak spells on instinct, making them very weak and vulnerable to Muggle persecution!
The International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy created many sanctuaries for wizards and witches, isolating the wizarding world from the Muggle one, uniting their scattered brethren and gathering their strength to learn magic.
Arguably, this law greatly alleviated the worst of the underlying conflicts between wizards and Muggles, transforming them into high-level communication.
However, this also created a great deal of trouble, forcing most wizards and witches out of step with the times.
Since then, the Muggle world's anti-wizarding practices have become increasingly rare, with the Industrial Revolution turning to the gentle side.
Because the Muggle elite knew who would benefit if this went on, this method of boiling a frog in warm water avoided a war between wizards and Muggles.
The wizards who actively went into hiding found themselves in trouble and were unable to speak.
Who would have thought that the Muggle world would change so dramatically in just a few hundred years!
By contrast, the rate at which magic changes is far slower than technology, and wizards are trapped in small circles with outdated ideas that lead to widening gaps.
When they finally made up their minds to change, they found out that they had been in this state for centuries, and that it had become the consensus of the world.
Not everyone has the courage and will to face the consequences!
Turning a blind eye and maintaining the status quo while waiting for a successor to deal with it has become the preferred option for most powers in the wizarding world!
With a slow sigh, Nick Flamel opened the book again, this time to the New Age's Declaration, which contained a beautiful vision of wizard-Muggle communication and integration, which he found increasingly naive.
But there was also a slight yearning…
"Peace, exchange… a new era…" Nick Flamel muttered to himself. Could such a vision really come true?
Nick Flamel vaguely recalled his conversation with Dumbledore, and suddenly felt that Dumbledore was probably right. This was probably the best opportunity!
Nick Flamel flipped through the pages of the book, reliving the contents of the New Age Manifesto, and smiling as he read the end of the book, which called for change.
"Ah, well written!"
Ivan's ideas, while idealistic, were often the purest of the most appealing and infectious.
If it could be released on a large scale in the wizarding world, Nicolas Flamel was confident that the New Age Declaration would be well received by young wizards and witches alike!
'So you're not going to help the boy?'
A faint voice broke the silence of the living room.
"I'm too old. Two hundred years earlier, my old bones might have wanted to move…" Nick Flamel shook his head and looked at the empty space beside him.
An elderly witch in loose robes stood there, her face peaceful and lined with age. More crucially, her body was incorporeal, spreading a faint mist, like a ghost.
The old witch looked at Nick Flamel with love in her eyes, but then a hint of blame appeared on her face, and she pointed to Nick Flamel's left hand and said something.