HP: Spirit Talker

— Mr. Hoshino, it's your turn! — I nodded and jogged towards the entrance of the maze.

By the way, why am I going second? The thing is, the locals couldn't help but mess me up, especially since they were upset about the dragon episode, and the fact that I was working not only with Harry Potter but also with a foreigner also played a part, so they cut my grades wherever they could (after the main grades were announced, when people weren't listening, they added fictitious penalties). No, they could have cut everything to zero, but foreigners would not have understood them, and not all scores depend only on English.

As soon as I entered the archway of intertwined plants, the sound from outside was cut off, without magic, just the effect of this strange kind of ivy... or wild grapes or something — I don't know. I turned to look outside, but all I could see was a misty haze, and when I put my hand through it, I felt the leaves and vines of the plant. Nice.

 I shrugged my shoulders, turned around, and headed down the only passageway I could find at the moment. Nothing interesting happened for the first ten minutes: a constant translucent fog, the rustling of slightly moving shoots and vines of the magical plant, and the diffuse light of the moon — the only source of light until the moment I spit, caught in the loop of the root for the third time, creating two balls of light above my head a little behind me so as not to blind me. The fog had an interesting effect — from the magic light it began to glow slightly, as if it were an ionized gas, from which the effectiveness of the light balls fell to a circle with a diameter of seven meters.

When I reached the fork, I hesitated for a moment before choosing a path. No, the labyrinth is full of forks, turns and dead ends, all logical. Picking a leaf, drawing a simple puppet figure with my wand, casting a spell, and a primitive shikigami flies forward to show me that the left passage is a dead end. The magic has run out.

A new leaf, a procedure, and another shikigami is sent straight ahead, but literally falls to the ground a few steps later. A strange effect. The new shikigami repeats the fate of the first, and two more do the same. Now I was curious and decided to look at the problem through the spiritual world, but the use of this tool, for the first time in my practice, was about zero: the plants were saturated with magic, and in the spiritual plane everything around me was literally glowing with energy, drowning out any weavings or artifacts that might be hidden nearby.

I wondered if this was a coincidence, or if someone had sensed something. No, the latter was unlikely, more of a coincidence, but no less unpleasant. As expected, the jet of flame faded as soon as it crossed the invisible line, so it didn't even burn the leaves. The ivy itself turned out to be a chimera, absorbing the magic directed at it, so neither burning nor freezing it would work as well as washing it away, but I'm not familiar with the effects of earth, I only have a few techniques, but they are of no use now, or rather they would be, if I didn't want to hide those abilities for the time being.

Not entirely sure of my hunch, I decided to test it. I lowered my wand to the ground and gently released the freezing spell, listening to myself carefully. The patch of ice began to expand, obeying me; it didn't spread out in a circle, but moved in a beam toward the passageway. As soon as the spell crossed the line, I felt a serious strain in terms of magic consumption, and the further the ice progressed, the more power it required.

Half a meter past the line, I let go of the spell, as the progression of the consumption was geometric, and I had used a sixth of my power for this experience alone. I was even a little ashamed of my stupidity. But I will definitely not go there now: who knows if in this zone the magic is not only sucked out of spells, but also from mages? I don't want to test it on myself, so let's check the right passage.

Listik flew fifty meters forward without even a hint of danger. He checked three times, just in case, and only then did he move on by himself. At thirty meters, two long spikes, covered with a slightly phosphorescent slime with a strong and pungent smell, dug into my left arm, which I instinctively raised for protection. Before I realized it, several more spikes flew in my direction and hit my arm as well.

I wondered how I would have felt if I hadn't been wearing a leather cloak lined with thin chain mail (such protection is allowed by the rules as long as there is no magic in the means of defense). The thorns didn't even pierce my skin as they crumbled to the ground, and the barrage continued for a few more seconds before the plant aimed for my face. The beautiful scarlet-pink fleshy bud spat out literal lines of thorns until a wave of cold hit it. I thoroughly froze everything around this plant for a few feet in each direction, just in case, and then carefully bagged and sealed the interesting specimen for further study.

If anyone thought I was going to follow ALL the rules, they were mistaken. When it came to finding a way to sneak my treasures into the test, and one that no one would be sure to discover, I was at a loss. Even my artifacts are little more than "background" magic, and the locals have greatly improved the control of artifacts and talismans, so my stuff will be detected for sure (inside information from the Ministry).

Afiri helped me out — what a treasure girl! It turns out that her clan had a female craft called "Gold Embroidery", which was taught to all girls from the age of five, and every woman practiced this craft practically all her life, regardless of her status in the clan or tribe. Even though it is called "embroidery", this craft does not require you to pierce your fingers and plant your eyes to look at the small lines and patterns, here it is more important "gold", and you should also pay attention to the fact that the magicians are involved in this work.

When I saw the girl using her scepter to turn a piece of gold into weightless pollen, which then obediently laid down stunning patterns on the fabric or any other surface, I was, to say the least, amazed. But not at the external effects, but at the meaning of what was happening, for Afiri had easily and effortlessly created a full-fledged artifact out of a silk scarf and fifty grams of gold, an artifact-analog of the local bags with expanded space. As it turned out later, you can create any artifact not higher than the conventional "medium-medium" level this way, and that's why the Egyptians were so fond of gold — simply because gold is the basis of this magical craft, and no other metal is good for it.

It's a very interesting discovery, and I'll definitely look into it when I'm done here, but in the meantime I'm going to take care of my defense: there's some kind of suspension or pollen in the air, and I don't want to take any chances. That's why I cast the Head Bubble spell on myself and wrap a shield cocoon around my body so that nothing sticks to my clothes. I was afraid to burn the unknown substance, as it was not in my plans to create a volumetric detonating explosion.

A few times vines or roots tried to claw at me, and a few times elves flew out, which I carefully caught and sealed — just in case, they say, you can take some potions out of them, so that will be the test material. And so there's not even much to talk about — a simple walk under the moon... in a semi-abandoned park, or just a park in a very provincial town. As for me, the level of the test is not very high — with the same dragon was more difficult, and under water was not easy, especially if someone could not decipher the clue.

This is more a test of psychological strength, because the atmosphere of this place is more like a cheap horror movie, where the whole "scary" is based on the surprise around the corner, or something like that. Roots and vines can't be burned safely with a simple fire spell or enchantment, but you can use "Protego" effectively to shield yourself from attack until you pass the danger zone. Pixie? Seriously? Blast-Ended Skrewt.

Yes, this Chimera is quite dangerous, but only if the encounter was unexpected or you're not a mage. Otherwise, it's not too hard to deal with, even if the thing isn't very magical. I'm annoyed by the local system of separating creatures that have natural defenses against magic from those that don't, it's like people either refuse to think or are idiots. A troll is not affected by magic, i.e. the usual and so beloved by the locals, Petrificus, Reductor and Expulso spells? What if we do what the Golden Trio did, i.e. use magic to lift something heavy and hit the troll over the head? There's nothing stopping magic from using simple physics, right?

Blast-Ended Skrewt is magic resistant, has a chitinous shell, and shoots fire out of its ass? Stick a piece of dirt in its nozzle and the Chimera will explode. Or you can freeze it, or poison it, or drop something deadly heavy on it — you can think of a lot of ways to deal with it, but the main thing is ingenuity and the ability to act in emergency situations.

I froze the insides of my Blast-Ended Skrewt with a stream of ice that I aimed at the creature's face. But when I came to a place where there was a spider's web and something else besides spiders, only more dangerous, I had suspicions. Very bad suspicions.