Quickly, Murphy read from the opponent's mind a piece of rather unsettling news.
The magical research institute had fallen.
To be precise, it had been overtaken by a few undercover wizards.
Kingsley and Crouch had long suspected Murphy of having a secret lair, so when Murphy recruited wizards through the wizarding security store, they sent Auror trainees to infiltrate.
Their abilities were commendable, yet they had not registered as full Aurors, mostly being recent graduates, fitting Murphy's recruitment criteria.
Moreover, Kingsley learned from previous undercover failures, not only did he not assign any tasks to these undercover agents, nor did he allow them to report back, he even used a Memory Charm on them to seal away their memories of being undercover.
These undercover agents, unaware of their own roles, were hard to detect even with Mind Extraction.
Thus, they were absorbed into the magical research institute like any other excellent employees.
They served Murphy loyally until today.
To awaken these deeply undercover agents, Kingsley extracted their sealed memories and stored them in a small memory orb, which they carried with them.
The memory orb was linked to a triggering spell and a paired control device, allowing remote control of the orb's state to release the memories and awaken them at any time.
Such a sophisticated method of undercover operation was something even Murphy hadn't anticipated.
Upon awakening, they immediately received Auror's counterattack orders through the radio, instructing them to take over Murphy's lair and open the gates for the Aurors.
But... when they attempted to do so, they encountered a problem.
They seemed, somehow, unable to betray Murphy...
Any action of unauthorized disclosure of the magical research institute to others was instinctively opposed by them.
Even sending a message outside to inform the Aurors of the institute's location was impossible.
They quickly realized it was due to the agreement signed with Murphy.
Murphy had used some sort of spell of such powerful, irresistible force, it didn't even act like an Unbreakable Vow, which threatens death for violation—after all, an Unbreakable Vow could be broken if one were willing to sacrifice.
The terror of Murphy's spell lay in making the subjects wholeheartedly comply with the agreement.
Any act of betrayal would be thwarted by themselves.
No matter if you were an undercover agent or an enemy, once you signed the agreement, you became comrades.
Damn it...
The undercover agents were nearly driven to despair, but out of loyalty and justice, they followed the Aurors' initial command, took over the magical research institute.
After all, most within the institute were non-combative Muggles and house elves that couldn't harm wizards. With the element of surprise, the undercover agents quickly succeeded.
Then they encountered Murphy.
"What a masterful move," Murphy genuinely admired Kingsley's operation. "However... it's useless."
In the end, it's all about strength.
The memory sealed by the Memory Charm wasn't strong enough to break through the mental barrier.
And the combat strength of these undercover wizards was far from sufficient in front of him.
Hence, tactics or schemes only work within a certain range of power disparity. In front of absolute power, they're merely a joke.
Murphy then effortlessly subdued another two undercover agents guarding the remaining wizards in another conference room.
Thus, the crisis at the magical research institute was resolved.
It wasn't that the undercover wizards didn't want to do more to ensure victory; it's just that the agreement required them to care for the institute's property, to cooperate and respect the other Muggle researchers, etc. Gathering everyone in one place was already exploiting a loophole in the agreement to their fullest effort.
The damage caused by this farcical rebellion was even less than what Murphy had caused with his apparition earlier...
Murphy found the researchers responsible for treating Patrick and the others, discovering they were still working methodically at their posts, completely unaware that a rebellion had taken place.
Pitiful, truly pitiful...
Murphy was nearly moved to tears for the undercover agents.
"Boss, did you find the petrified lizard's venom?" Andrew Tuck asked upon seeing Murphy.
"No, but it's no longer needed."
The petrified lizard's head was smashed by the Thunderbird, its poison glands were burned to ash by the lightning, making the scattered venom difficult to collect, much of it lost to subsequent tornadoes.
He indeed hadn't obtained the petrified lizard's venom.
But having gained the animagus form of the petrified lizard, Murphy could, if he wished, secrete some venom himself, or use it to strengthen his petrification spell, turning it into true "petrification."
However, Murphy meant "it's not needed" in a different sense.
"Using Whitexin Promoter can speed up the preparation of the Animagus potion. Give me a piece of paper, and I'll write down the specific ratios and steps for you."
After defeating the Thunderbird, to survive, he had to decipher the anomalies occurring in his body. In those microseconds of light-speed thought, Murphy, through hundreds of thousands of comparisons and calculations, understood the process.
Its core mechanism was the accelerating effect of Whitexin Promoter on the Animagus potion.
On this, he had built a perfect theoretical model.
Taking the paper handed over by the intern healer, Valia, and borrowing her wand, Murphy used Total Recall on himself, transferring that knowledge onto the paper with a "Copy Spell."
He had known this trick since he completed the Raven Magus transformation; those scripts handed over to Pickett were created this way.
After handing the potion preparation steps to Andrew to prepare the antidote, Murphy convened the remaining medical experts for a comprehensive physical examination, undergoing various scans and biopsies.
However, due to his body's significant divergence from ordinary humans, the experts couldn't draw any conclusions, opting to research further.
Just off the MRI machine, Laura found him, "Director, we just received a call. The caller says they can provide the werewolf's location."
In fact, due to the high reward set by Murphy, they had received numerous similar calls, but this one was different, "He claims he's also a werewolf and saw the werewolf abducting a child. I think this message is credible."
"Oh? What's his name?"
"He calls himself Moonface. We don't know what that means."
Moonface? Remus Lupin? Murphy didn't hesitate, "Immediately dispatch the Watchers to rescue!"
"Director, we can't reach the Watchers... We suspect the Aurors might have taken control of the security store..."
Murphy frowned, damn, always causing trouble! "Forget it, I'll go myself. Where did he say the werewolf is?"
"London Docklands, Surrey Docks, but he lost track and doesn't know the exact location."
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