To be honest, if not for the significant side effects of the Mind Seed, Murph wasn't sure if he had the willpower to refrain from frequently using it.
If it merely made people obey unconditionally, who could resist using it? Imagine the scenario.
Casting a Mind Seed on someone from the Ministry of Magic, on the heads of Muggle governments, wouldn't he instantly rule the world? Wouldn't he be able to do whatever he wanted?
Making the whole world work for his dream, supported by the effort of billions, wouldn't becoming a god be much faster and more comfortable than sneaking around as he was now?
This was probably why the Heron family was hunted to extinction; nobody wanted a new master to suddenly appear out of nowhere.
In terms of effect, the Mind Seed is far more powerful than the Killing Curse, which only permanently removes an opponent. But the Mind Seed can turn an opponent into a loyal fan.
Such a powerful tool is irresistible to anyone.
Celica found the spell terrifying mainly because she witnessed the harm it caused, driving people or animals mad.
But in reality, a Mind Seed without such negative effects is the most terrifying magic.
"Celica, if you could use this spell now, would you become dependent on it? For example, using it on them to prevent them from harming animals, or on me to keep me away from dark magic?"
"Of course not! Controlling others like that is too evil!" Celica responded without hesitation.
She now regretted helping Murph find this spell. Initially, she thought it could help Murph keep secrets, replacing the punitive Thorn Oath. Eager to assist, she didn't consider the potential harm the spell might cause.
But after experiencing the events in the village and reading Joachim's diary, she became wary of the spell.
"Hmm," Murph nodded. "But perhaps that's because those targets are of little significance to you."
He thought for a moment, "What if you used the Mind Seed on me, making me fall in love with you?"
Celica was shocked; she hadn't considered this aspect.
Then her face turned red quickly. By mentioning this in front of others, wasn't he implying she liked him? She was a bit angry, but Murph's words scared her. Making someone fall in love with her seemed appealing, but then the images of animals tortured to death by the Mind Seed flashed through her mind.
"No! I would never use this spell on you!"
Love potions are better! And since Murph could say such things, it meant he really didn't consider her a potential love interest.
This left Celica somewhat disappointed and a bit defiant.
Murph smiled, "See, you've used that magic so many times and it hasn't corrupted your soul. Why worry about me being corrupted?"
"..." Celica was left speechless.
"But it's... it's too evil..."
"So, isn't that why I'm researching ways to make it gentler?"
"..."
That made sense?
Celica was confused again. Why could she never win an argument with him? "Then, if it becomes gentler, you'd still use it, right? You'd still be accustomed to enslaving others, as you said!" Celica finally found the focal point again.
"This..."
Murph was at a loss for words. He wanted to say he would only use the spell "when necessary," but what defines "necessary" was still up to him. At that moment, Omid Abbott, who had been silent, suddenly spoke up, offering him an out.
"Director, Miss Celica, actually, this spell might not be as powerful as we thought."
"Oh?" Murph was taken aback and quickly followed up, "What do you mean?"
"We've discovered some patterns through recent research," Omid said.
"The spell isn't guaranteed to succeed."
"First, most animals lack logical cognitive ability, so commands related to abstract concepts are incomprehensible and unexecutable for them, rendering the spell ineffective."
"Second, for animals with basic cognitive abilities, like crows and monkeys, we found they could resist commands that strongly contradict their desires."
"For example, if we starve a monkey for several days and then offer it food, using the spell to command it not to eat has less than a 20% success rate."
"We analyzed the data and found that in successful cases, either the monkey wasn't very hungry, or it was near death from starvation. However, when the monkey was extremely hungry but not yet weak after one or two days, the spell never succeeded."
"This suggests the spell can be resisted! Perhaps the reason the spell succeeds in some cases is that the subject didn't strongly resist the spell or was in a very low mental state, unable to resist the spell's control."
"Huh?" Murph was stunned. "The Mind Seed can be resisted?"
Then what's the point?
"We're not sure about this yet, but we studied Joachim's diary and found that his success in using the spell on the villagers and himself might be because they were willing."
"The villagers wanted to get better and believed Joachim could heal them. Joachim also wanted to believe this, so his spell met no resistance."
"We suspect the mechanism of this spell is very different from the Dementor's Kiss."
"The Dementor's Kiss can be used on unwilling targets and is hard to resist. But once the Dementor's Kiss wears off, the subject's thoughts return to freedom. The Mind Seed, however, is hard to use on targets with strong wills, but once successful, it's permanent until the spell's conditions are met, continuously effective."
"Of course, we don't have enough evidence to support this theory yet."
"We wanted Miss Celica to use some non-dangerous commands on me and Phineas, like writing a thousand words or completely obeying commands within an hour. These restrictive spells have been proven not to have long-term effects in our experiments, but... Miss Celica refuses to use the spell on us..."
Celica: "They ask me every day, begging me dozens of times... I think they've gone mad... or they're just perverts..."
Murph imagined the scene, two grown men chasing after Celica shouting "Enslave me, enslave me..."
It was indeed perverse.
"Director, we've done many animal experiments, but animals' brains are far from human. More importantly, we have self-awareness and logical thinking, and our thinking and psychological patterns are different from animals. This spell clearly relies on such mechanisms, so we request permission to conduct human experiments."
"Of course, starting with ourselves is fine..."
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