Chapter 92 true dragon shedding and the Curly-Haired Assassin
Once the truth serum is brewed, we will naturally be able to ask and find out whether the noble families actually meddled in this matter.
Even though the Bai family had already lost an eldest son and thrown in quite a few men, Hodu still did not cross them off his list of suspects.
Who could guarantee that those noble families wouldn't actually go crazy?
If trading the life of an eldest son could exchange for his life, that would be an absolute blood-profit.
Furthermore, Hodu was not the only one suspecting the Bai family; other noble families were equally likely to be involved.
Compared to this troublesome matter, what he was currently more concerned about was that piece of true dragon shedding.
After changing hands several times, the item finally fell into his hands.
However, Hodu did not immediately use it for fusion; instead, he prepared to let the Dragon Turtle carefully examine it first to see whether this thing was truly real or fake.
For now, he could only suppress the thought and head out to class together with Harry and the others.
Having finally endured until the end of class, Hoducasually found an excuse to leave and hurriedly rushed back to the villa in the capital.
The moonlight outside was bright, and the lights were also turned on inside the villa.
The Dragon Turtle was lying on the sofa watching a melodramatic ethical drama, with a large stack of tissues piled up next to it.
As the plot of the TV series progressed just a little bit, a small transparent pearl would drop from its small eyes, crying with such utter devotion.
This scene made Hodu's worldview almost shatter, and for a moment he actually didn't know whether he should speak up to disturb it.
In the end, he simply sat directly on the sofa, and only then did the Dragon Turtle withdraw its mind from the plot, turn its head to look over, and realize at this moment that Hoduhad already arrived.
"Take a look, is this your dad's ashes?"
Hodu took the sandalwood box out of his money pouch and placed it on his lap.
After opening the box, he took out the porcelain bottle inside, unscrewed the cap, and revealed a bottle of white powder.
Calling it ashes was indeed not wrong at all.
Hearing these words, the Dragon Turtle's gaze looking toward Hodu instantly carried a bit of lingering resentment.
However, it still shifted its gaze to the porcelain bottle, leaned in to sniff it vigorously a few times, and its eyes instantly lit up, its expression even seeming to drift far away.
Hodu didn't rush it either, just waiting for the answer while casually watching television.
Come to think of it, this kind of ethical drama was truly suitable for all ages.
After watching for just a little while, he actually ended up getting fascinated by it as well.
It wasn't until a moment later that the Dragon Turtle finally spoke up, with a clear look of nostalgia on its face.
"It's the old man's scent... I really haven't smelled it in a long time."
Even if that old man ended up with only a handful of ashes in the end, the Dragon Turtle could never forget his aura.
After receiving confirmation, Hodu contentedly took back the porcelain bottle and solemnly stuffed it back into his money pouch.
Afterwards, he glanced at the watch on his wrist, unbuckled the metal strap, and raised his hand to throw the watch toward the ground.
Before the watch even touched the floor, its volume abruptly expanded.
In the blink of an eye, it had turned into a person.
That person tumbled and sat down on the ground in a sorry state, and the sudden change scared the Dragon Turtle next to him so much that it almost jumped up.
"What is this thing!"
The Dragon Turtle let out a startled cry, and the emotions it had felt from watching the drama just now vanished instantly.
The curly-haired young man on the ground finally waited for a chance to escape.
He didn't hesitate in the least, silently releasing a spell straight toward Hodu.
Just from the light burst forth by that spell, one could tell that it was by no means any kind of gentle white magic.
The spell landed solidly on Hodu, and the joy in the curly-haired man's eyes grew heavier accordingly, as if he had already seen himself successfully escaping.
But the next moment, his smile froze on his face.
That seemingly very young blue-eyed child still stood there steadily, with a calm expression, and even a faint, elusive sneer hanging at the corner of his mouth, as if mocking his overestimation of his own capabilities.
The curly-haired man could be certain that his spell had already hit the target, yet there were no changes whatsoever on the target's body.
That appearance was simply like a Dragon, allowing the spell to fall without harming him in the slightest.
His heart sank abruptly, and chills pressed up layer after layer.
It wasn't that he didn't know the target was special, which was why he had previously chosen a Muggle bomb instead of using magic.
With that kind of power, let alone a person, even if it were replaced by a Dragon, it would have to be blasted out with a bloody hole.
At that time, he had seen the bomb explode with his own eyes, unable to care about confirming other conditions, and only chased toward the sandalwood box that was blown away by the impact.
As soon as the item was in hand, he left immediately; as for whether Hodu was actually dead or alive, he had no idea at all.
It wasn't that he hadn't thought about Hodu being able to survive, nor had he imagined many possibilities, but he never expected that after he left with the item, the other party could still chase him all the way here. What was even more terrifying was that not the slightest injury could be seen on Hodu's body.
When he saw Hodu in that room prepared in advance, he knew matters had turned completely terrible to the extreme.
But before he had time to think deeply, Transfiguration had already been forcibly cast upon himself.
All his facial features vanished; he could neither hear sounds nor see the outside world, with only his consciousness remaining awake.
He knew what state he had turned into, so he kept enduring, waiting for an opportunity.
He had indeed waited for the opportunity.
The moment his body returned to its original state, he immediately cast a Dark Arts spell powerful enough to severely injure a person.
It wasn't that he didn't want to use the Killing Curse, it's just that he couldn't perform wandless casting; similarly, he was unable to use Apparition wandlessly.
Otherwise, he wouldn't have risked attacking Hodu at all, but would have fled directly.
Even if the person before him was not the target he had originally seen, but rather a child with deep blue eyes, he had no intention of stopping his hands.
"Impossible!"
The curly-haired man shouted out involuntarily.
That feeling of suddenly plunging from full of hope into desperate straits was like riding a roller coaster that plummeted abruptly; only by shouting the sound out could the fear in his heart dissipate slightly.
But after shouting, he still didn't get a shred of comfort; instead, his chest grew colder and colder.
Refusing to believe it, he continued to launch attacks toward Hodu.
Hodu was too lazy to even dodge, letting spell after spell smash onto his body, his body remaining completely motionless, while his gaze gradually turned dangerous bit by bit.
In his view, this man was already a dead man long ago.
First taking his life with a bomb, and now recklessly greeting him with powerful Dark Arts spells, he had already walked down the path of seeking his own death.
If it weren't for the other party still being somewhat useful, how could he still be alive until now...
The Dragon Turtle watched the whole show from the side, its eyes staring straight.
Sure enough, no matter how one looked at it, this kid didn't look like a Wizard, let alone a human.
It was a Dragon Turtle to begin with, thick-skinned and tough, and could withstand most ordinary spells.
But Hodu looked even more exaggerated than it did, how was it supposed to believe that the other party was truly a human?
The Dragon Turtle even began to doubt whether Hoduwas also transformed from some kind of animal, only using magic to turn into a human shape.
After all, it had recently seen similar plots on TV; perhaps some magical creatures really could do such things.
After a short while, the curly-haired man finally stopped.
He had completely given up, the despair on his face impossible to cover up no matter what, and when looking at Hodu, his gaze also gradually lost focus.
"Speak, who on earth sent you here to throw away your life?"
Hodu put on an indifferent expression, with no warmth in the depths of his eyes, as if what stood before him was merely a corpse.
The curly-haired man did not answer, as if he had already dazed out, not even hearing Hodu's words.
"What, do you have to taste the sensation of the Cruciofirst before you're willing to speak?"
Compared to truth serum, Crucio was indeed a simple and trouble-free interrogation method.
Although Hodu hadn't truly mastered this spell, who knew.
This time, the curly-haired man finally had a reaction.
His gaze regained emotions once more, and panic surfaced on his face again.
Until this very moment did he truly understand that he had already become a fish on the cutting board, at the mercy of Hodu for slaughter.
His lips trembled slightly, instinctively not doubting whether Hodu could actually use Crucio or not; after all, the other party was already strong to this extent.
Chapter 93: The Mastermind and the Power of the Dragon Scales
"Fine, I'll talk."
The curly-haired man finally gave in, but his voice was trembling violently.
Hodu stared into his brown eyes; the man spoke intermittently, his gaze constantly drifting to the side.
Before long, the curly-haired man's head drooped down, looking just like a defeated dog, not even daring to meet Hodu's eyes directly.
Hodu did manage to extract something from this mouth; it was hard to tell if it was true or false, but at least it provided a direction.
This man was called Kerry Marvin, coming from the Irish Magical World, and he was a registered Dark Wizard with the Ministry of Magic over there.
He himself was just an errand runner.
The person behind him was Guanshan Yun, the Dark Wizard who had tried to kill the Academy Dean a few years ago.
The problem was that Kerry's rank was too low; the one who assigned tasks to him was merely a confidant of Guanshan Yun, and his knowledge was limited. When Hodu asked him if the Bai family was involved, he couldn't answer.
All Kerry could confess were some matters concerning Guanshan Yun, such as how his subordinates gathered a bunch of Dark Wizards from all over the world, and several Magical Worlds in Southeast Asia were held in their grip.
Hodu wasn't very interested in these things, letting them go in one ear and out the other.
"What was your task?"
"Find an opportunity to get the True Dragon remains."
"Whose idea was the explosives?"
"Suus."
Kerry's Adam's apple rolled. "He also gave me the explosives."
Suus was Kerry's superior, the confidant of Guanshan Yun.
"How to hand it over after getting the item?"
Hodu's tone hadn't changed, still terrifyingly cold.
Coveting him as a person was unacceptable, and coveting the things in his hands was even more so.
But the answer left him stunned for a moment.
"Contact by phone, wait for Suus to call."
Hodu truly hadn't expected this group of people to use such modern methods, not touching a trace of magic at all and directly taking the Muggle path.
Come to think of it, doing this was the only way to avoid magic tracking.
The phone was the landline in the house Suus rented.
Hodu's brow furrowed.
He couldn't possibly squat by the phone guarding it every day.
Pondering for two seconds, Hodu grabbed Kerry from the ground and directly Apparated back to the house where he had captured him just now.
He dragged Kerry to the living room telephone; he was a bit short in height, but dragging a person was like child's play.
Kerry's arm was pinched so hard it hurt; that hand was like an iron clamp, and he didn't even have the strength to struggle.
He stood honestly to the side, watching Hodu press the keys on the phone.
Hodu's fingers were a bit clumsy, pressing stumbling block by stumbling block; after all, this thing wasn't a mobile phone.
After flipping through for a while, he found two missed calls, both from a few hours ago.
Hodu's eyes flickered.
A few hours ago, that was not long after he took Kerry away.
The numbers of the two missed calls were even different.
He turned his head to look at Kerry.
"It should be Suus."
Kerry was a hundred times unwilling to admit it; every time Suus called, the number was different.
Neither of the two phone calls was answered, and the other side probably already knew something happened on his end; the possibility of calling back again was pitifully low.
But he couldn't say these words out loud.
If he said it, he would be useless.
Hodu also figured this out, but he couldn't figure out how things were handled internally among these people; perhaps they would make another call to confirm.
However, that was just a thought.
Hodu had already seen clearly what weight Kerry carried in this group, at best an abandoned chess piece that could be thrown away at any time, otherwise he wouldn't even lack the qualification to actively contact his superiors, only able to wait blankly.
Of course, it was also possible that there weren't many truthful words in Kerry's mouth.
Expecting the other side to take risks for a minor pawn was quite unrealistic.
Besides, he couldn't possibly keep wasting time here.
Hodu looked sideways at Kerry; the plan to follow the vine to catch the melon was afraid it would fall through.
These people acted too cautiously.
But it didn't matter; knowing who it was was enough.
As long as the person was still on the Blue Star, they couldn't run away.
Hodu suddenly reached out and grabbed towards Kerry.
Kerry was startled, instinctively wanting to dodge, and just as he was about to beg for mercy, that hand had already landed on him.
The next second, Kerry's body tightened like a spring, turning into a silver watch in the blink of an eye.
Hodu casually fastened it on his wrist, and then Apparated back to the Beijing villa, appearing directly in the second-floor bedroom.
The sound of the television downstairs drifted up intermittently.
He sat down on the single sofa, felt out a porcelain bottle from his money pouch, and placed it on the small table in front of him.
The bottle cap was unscrewed, and seeing the white powder inside, Hodu's eyes obviously lit up.
Finally got it.
Unable to suppress the excitement in his heart, this was a True Dragon.
According to Xuanwu's saying, that was the source of all magic, and what traits could be obtained after fusion, no one knew.
Hodu couldn't wait any longer, and two fingers pinched a little powder.
"Fuse."
[ Fusible item detected, starting analysis task. ]
[ Current fusion item: Dragon ]
[ Analysis difficulty: S-grade ]
[ Analysis progress: 1 / 100000 ]
[ Current extracted trait: 1. Water Control ]
[ Water Control: Possess extreme control over water sources ]
[ Note: The degree of this trait is linked to the analysis progress. When the analysis is completed, ten thousand times the trait can be obtained. ]
[ Current analysis efficiency: increases by 1 point per day, analysis progress can be improved through related tasks. ]
"Water Control."
Hodu's eyelids twitched.
At this instant, he seemed to feel somewhere was different, like something had taken root in his body.
He closed his eyes.
The world did not turn dark, but instead flooded with overwhelming water light.
He sensed all the water in this world.
As small as the tap water flowing in the pipes, as large as the surging underground rivers, and then to the oceans occupying most of the Blue Star.
He seemed to have become the master of the oceans; every sea area was responding to him, waves surging and crashing together, raising towering walls of water, as if paying tribute to him.
Opening his eyes, that kind of induction was still hanging on him, without fading away.
The corners of Hodu's mouth couldn't help curling upward, and he walked quickly to the balcony, looking down at the swimming pool below.
The water surface rippled with moonlight.
With a thought in his mind, the entire pool of water immediately rippled, swaying gently.
Within a few seconds, the water surface churned violently, fiercely crashing against the pool walls, splashing up a patch of white foam.
"Snap."
The pool water was like going crazy, desperately slapping against the edge of the pool wall, the splashes flying three to four meters high, and a few drops even flew to the balcony where he was standing.
Hodu's mouth split even wider.
Moving his thoughts again, the water surface slowly calmed down.
He didn't stop, instead staring in front of him.
A tiny, invisible water droplet floated up out of thin air, expanding in the blink of an eye into a water ball the size of a fist, and looking up again, it had expanded to the size of a basketball.
This mass of water was like plasticine in his hands, changing according to his wishes, letting him knead it round and flatten it however he pleased.
Having played enough, the water ball stretched into a long spear, shooting out fiercely and exploding on the water surface.
The calm water surface directly exploded with a loud bang, and the cars parked nearby were shaken one after another, blaring.
Chapter 94: Rain-making Progress, Ten Thousand Clouds in a Single Night
Hodu himself found it novel; this was the first time he had ever encountered such a thing.
He had just acquired the Water Control trait, and its power was already this immense.
Normally, this kind of ability would require completely fusing the trait and stacking it up to ten thousand times before it could support such a scale.
Yet, without even touching the edge of fusion, he had already produced a thousandfold or ten-thousandfold effect.
The True Dragon was truly extraordinary.
A thought couldn't help but pop into his mind: what would it look like if the trait were truly stacked to ten thousand times?
Just thinking about it made one a bit restless.
Hodu turned his gaze back to the system panel, his eyes slightly brightening.
The True Dragon was indeed an S-rank life form. As long as he completely mastered it, the system mission would be considered complete, and by then, even non-living objects could be fused.
However, that string of zeros on the progress bar, when counted, totaled a full one hundred thousand, exactly ten times higher than an A-rank mission.
At that snail's pace of daily growth, he would have to endure over two hundred and seventy years to finish the fusion.
Just thinking about this time span made even Hodu's teeth ache.
He casually clicked on the description of this exclusive mission.
[Exclusive Mission: Rain-making]
[Every time rain-making is completed, the analysis progress increases by 1. This mission can be repeated.]
[Note: This mission is exclusive to True Dragon fusion.]
After reading this line of text, the heavy stone in Hodu's heart fell to the ground.
This mission was unexpectedly simple.
Before the fusion, he had been pondering that, given the system's nature, an exclusive mission for an S-rank task should at least be tricky enough to give someone a headache.
He had even guessed whether, due to the dragon's licentious nature, it would suddenly throw some bizarre task at him.
As a result, it was just an ordinary rain-making task, which held zero difficulty for him.
Standing on the balcony and looking up, the moon hung very high, and the star beside it was so overshadowed that its light was barely visible.
The entire night sky was lonely, with only a few white clouds drifting lazily; illuminated by the moonlight, their edges shone with a layer of light.
With a thought from Hodu, the moisture in the high altitude quickly gathered and collided with the fine dust in the air.
Before long, a black cloud hung directly above the villa's roof, which not even the moonlight could illuminate.
A moment later, the first drop of rain fell, striking the roof, immediately followed by dense streaks of rain pouring down diagonally from the sky with a rushing sound.
The rain came fast and left fast.
Glancing at the system panel, the True Dragon's analysis progress jumped from one to two.
Conjuring up such a sudden rainstorm was indeed effortless for him.
Hodu didn't stop; continuing to stare at the sky, he started entertaining the idea of doing an experiment.
A few more black clouds appeared in the sky; they weren't very large, but they looked heavy.
These clouds were scattered across various corners of the capital. At his command, heavy rain began to fall everywhere. The coverage area wasn't wide, only enveloping small patches of ground, but they were spread out sporadically here and there.
The numbers on the panel jumped, and Hodu couldn't help but curl the corners of his mouth upwards.
Indeed!
Even though he condensed clouds and made it rain in various parts of the capital simultaneously, it wasn't counted as just a single time.
One rain cloud meant one mission.
And how could he possibly only gather these few clouds?
If he utilized the moisture already present locally, condensing rain clouds would be much less trouble.
Even if he were to truly cover the entire capital, it wouldn't be much of a difficult task.
Even if the local moisture were completely drained, he could create water out of thin air, making it rain whenever he said so.
The terrifying thing about the Water Control trait was right here—it didn't pick its environment at all.
Of course, having ready-made moisture available would save some effort overall.
He didn't stop there and wanted to continue testing.
Time passed bit by bit, and there were still some people wandering the streets of the capital.
As long as anyone looked up, they could see the moon tightly covered by layers of thick clouds.
Looking out, the entire sky was filled with dark clouds, and the shadow of the moon could no longer be found.
By this time, Hodu had spread hundreds of rain clouds over the capital, and even the visible air was drying up.
Most of the moisture was drawn away by him, hovering in the upper air to become rain clouds.
Of course, he also added a lot of water into it himself; relying solely on the capital's existing moisture alone could never support a scattered rainfall covering the entire city.
A gust of wind swept past, and rain followed, scattering down, causing a roaring sound all over the capital.
Quite a few people were jolted awake from their sleep, whispering curses at the damned weather forecast—it was clearly promised to be sunny for several days, so why was there a torrential downpour in the middle of the night?
By the time people stumbled outside to take in their clothes before their beds had even warmed up, the sound of rain outside had already quieted down.
This rain came fast and left fast.
Hodu, the culprit behind it all, stood on the balcony, his eyes much brighter than usual.
He reached out to rest on the railing, letting the raindrops hit his body.
The surging feeling in his heart still hadn't subsided; this sensation of being able to control nature was truly addictive.
Back in ancient times, who among those capable of summoning wind and rain wasn't revered and worshipped as a national preceptor?
Rain-making, when all was said and done, was merely one application of the Water Control trait.
There were plenty more things he could do.
Taking another look at the system, the True Dragon's fusion progress had surged to over two hundred, on the verge of touching the threshold of three hundred.
Hodu grinned, his eyes flashing.
At this rate, completing the exclusive mission didn't seem very strenuous.
What surprised him even more was another matter.
With the progress rising to over two hundred, it was equivalent to him having stacked the Water Control trait more than twenty times.
Placed on other abilities, twenty-plus times might just be a quantitative change, still some distance away from qualitative change.
But Water Control itself was already out of specification, let alone originating from the True Dragon.
Stacked over twenty times, it was so powerful that it couldn't be measured by conventional logic anymore.
Even the speed at which he mobilized moisture to condense into rain clouds was shooting upward.
Not just the speed; the entire operation had become much smoother.
The rain clouds he could manage at the same time had increased, and the coverage range was even broader.
He didn't even need to move his place; standing right here, he could remotely control the rain clouds of surrounding towns and cities.
In other words, his speed at farming missions was getting faster and faster, and the more missions he farmed, the higher this speed would continue to soar.
Hodu pondered that at this rate, completing the True Dragon's fusion probably wouldn't take much time.
However, he didn't single-mindedly hole up in the capital to make rain.
If the rainfall in the capital went overboard, the impact on the ecology wouldn't be child's play.
He simply went to a neighboring city and directly borrowed the moisture there to condense clouds.
In no time at all, he created hundreds more rain clouds.
This time the cloud layer was spread wider, densely covering half the sky, and rain fell everywhere across this vast city.
The fusion progress skyrocketed to eight hundred on the spot.
Placed in front of that behemoth of one hundred thousand, eight hundred looked a bit shabby.
Yet Hodu smacked his lips, inexplicably feeling that eight hundred wasn't that far off from one hundred thousand.
He had no intention of stopping to rest and continued to bury himself in cloud-making.
The reason wasn't all that noble; it was simply that the feeling of farming missions while watching the Water Control trait rapidly grow stronger made people fall into it.
When the morning light of the Eastern continent spread across most places, Hodu finally withdrew his hands.
After the whole night, the Water Control trait had grown to the point where even he was a bit stunned.
In the end, the moment a thought stirred, ten thousand rain clouds could gather with a whoosh.
Even if the Dragon Turtle, that True Dragon father of his, personally stepped forward to compete with him in Water Control, it might not be enough.
Talking about showing off proficiency before an expert—he probably wouldn't even be fit to carry the other's shoes.
To put it bluntly, Hodu at this moment was strong to a somewhat ridiculous degree.
He pulled an all-nighter in the East, but over at Hogwarts, curfew had only just passed a short while ago.
When he returned to the Gryffindor Common Room, the dormitory had just turned off its lights.
Harry and the others were not asleep yet, chatting while lying in bed.
As the door clicked, several people sat up to look, and seeing it was Hodu, they all flopped back down in unison.
Everyone was already long used to his late returns.
In the past they would ask a couple of questions, but now they couldn't even be bothered to ask, just greeting him and continuing their chat.
Hodu took off his robe, draped it by the bedside, and collapsed entirely onto the bed.
Continuously gathering clouds and making rain for six or seven hours straight was considered a rather draining chore for him.
The moment his head touched the pillow, light snoring sounded.
Hearing it, Harry proactively stopped talking and turned his head to gesture a "shh" sign at Ron.
The dormitory quickly quieted down.
This sleep was sound and solid; when he opened his eyes, it was already close to eight o'clock.
Hodu stretched lazily, his energy exceptionally full.
Seeing that the others were still tucked inside their quilts, he didn't call them and went straight to the communal washroom by himself.
At this hour, other Gryffindor students could already be seen.
He turned on a tap, and water gushed out with a rushing sound.
Looking at the flowing water, he was slightly startled, and the corners of his mouth curled up accordingly.
Cupping both hands with somewhat cool water, he splashed it onto his face.
Not knowing if the force was just right, not a single droplet splashed outward, and not even the ends of his hair got damp.
The clothes on his chest were bone dry, and the water hitting his face obediently gathered into a stream, sliding down his chin.
After washing his face, he grabbed a towel and gave a wipe, finishing up.
He didn't even need a toothbrush; holding a mouthful of water, the water automatically drilled back and forth between his teeth like a front-loading washing machine, scrubbing every single tooth of his over and over again.
When he returned to the dormitory, Harry and the others had just climbed out of bed, walking squinting toward the washroom with "not enough sleep" written all over their faces.
After these fellows finished dawdling, the group went together into the Great Hall for breakfast.
Hermione raised her head, her gaze falling on Hodu's face, her brows knitting gently together.
"Hodu, why do you look a bit different today compared to yesterday?"
She couldn't pinpoint exactly what was wrong, but this feeling was too obvious, obvious to the point of being impossible to ignore.
"Is that so? You must have slept well last night."
Hodu smiled, the trace of a smile on his face completely uncontrollable.
Just looking at his expression, anyone could guess that he was in a good mood today.
How could his mood not be good?
After pulling an all-nighter, the harvest was shockingly massive.
When happiness comes, the spirit thrives—this saying fit him to a T.
Chapter 95: The Third Trait: Spellcasting Talent
In the Transfiguration Class classroom, Professor McGonagall walked back and forth, her voice sounding sometimes near and sometimes far.
Hodu's mind wasn't on the class at all; of course, it was usually about the same.
Today was a bit different.
His mind was full of matters concerning the system; that frightening fusion progress bar had been stubbornly pushed through by him pulling an all-nighter last night.
One hundred thousand exclusive quests, translated down, were roughly one hundred thousand rainclouds.
Rainclouds came in all sizes, and last night, as the trait stacking multiplier skyrocketed all the way, his water-controlling ability became more and more outrageous.
At the very beginning, he could only condense about two hundred rainclouds at a time, but later on, he could gather thousands, several thousand, or even tens of thousands at once.
Naturally, the exclusive quests were done faster and faster, so the number one hundred thousand wasn't that out of reach anymore.
By this time, he had completely fused with the True Dragon, stacking his water-controlling ability up to a ten-thousand-fold multiplier.
With just a thought, dense, pitch-black clouds could gather all over the sky above Britain, and endless torrential rain could be poured down.
Not just Britain, he could even instantly cover an entire continent with rainclouds.
Making rain, to put it bluntly, was just a small branch of his water-controlling ability; in fact, he had already mastered all bodies of water.
Seventy percent of the Blue Star's surface was ocean, and looking at it from another angle, saying that he controlled the Blue Star wasn't an exaggeration.
It was still a ten-thousand-fold trait, but this time it felt completely different from before.
Previously, his strongest skill was digging soil and rocks, which could make him a local land deity, but that was the limit.
Relying solely on a ten-thousand-fold soil and rock control, he couldn't move the entire crust; at most, he could move away a mountain peak or cause a tract of land to collapse.
That could also be considered strong, stronger than ordinary people, but that kind of strength wasn't truly strong; it was just that others' limits were too low, making him look quite strong by comparison.
This time it was different; the ten-thousand-fold trait fished out from the True Dragon let him taste the feeling of becoming a deity for the first time.
If he pleased, directly controlling seawater to flood a continent and stirring up a world-destroying disaster wasn't out of the question either.
The most crucial part was that the traits extracted when fusing with the True Dragon were more than just one.
Yesterday he was too busy grinding exclusive quests; although he knew new traits had been extracted, he wasn't in a hurry to look at them.
After the complete fusion, he was so sleepy that he didn't even get a chance to check them.
Waking up in the morning, he forcibly suppressed the surprise of opening the box, waiting until class to open the system and take a look.
It was certainly surprising enough.
The second trait was soaring through the air.
Without relying on wings, he could fly directly.
Hodu sat in his chair and secretly tried it out.
Under the blessing of the ten-thousand-fold trait, he didn't abruptly shoot up to the classroom ceiling.
The higher the multiplier, the steadier his control over the trait became instead.
His buttocks left the chair slightly, his feet also left the ground, and his whole person was just suspended like that.
Blocked by his Wizard robes, even Neville, who was sitting next to him, didn't notice.
Even if someone stared specifically at him, they would at most think he was straightening his waist.
The corners of Hodu's mouth split open, his face filled with smiles, his eye corners curved down, and those azure eyes were full of joy.
His heart was itching unbearably, wishing he could immediately rush out into the boundless sky to frolic.
This feeling wasn't the same thing as sword-flying at all.
Sword-flying's speed wasn't slow, but it always had to rely on external objects, which after all wasn't crisp and refreshing enough, falling far short compared to flying by oneself.
While Hodu was letting his imagination run wild, Professor McGonagall's gaze swept over, catching sight of the unconcealable smile on his face at a glance.
That look was staring straight ahead, not landing on the blackboard or on her at all, clearly showing that he was absent-minded with full self-righteousness.
"Mr. Hodu..." Professor McGonagall called out with a straight face.
Everyone's gazes gathered on Hodu.
Hodu didn't react much; he was simply too deep in his daydream.
"Hodu!" Professor McGonagall's expression grew even stricter, wrinkles squeezing out at the corners of her eyes, and her voice pressed lower and heavier.
Neville hurriedly reached out and shook Hodu's arm, which finally shook him awake.
"Professor McGonagall is calling you!" Neville's voice was as small as a mosquito's, his head almost buried in his textbook, using it to block his mouth.
Hodu gave a start and hurriedly stood up.
Professor McGonagall walked over slowly and placed a button on Hodu's desk.
"Then please demonstrate how to turn this button into a snuffbox." Her strict gaze scrutinized Hodu.
This was the test she gave; if Hodu could complete it, she could let the matter of his daydreaming slide.
Hodu's gaze fell on that button.
Turning a button into a similarly inanimate snuffbox wasn't too difficult; it belonged to first-year lessons, essentially not much different from turning a match into a silver needle, just a bit more difficult since a snuffbox was more complex than a silver needle.
A snuffbox was a container for snuff, a palm-sized box with various styles and exquisite appearances.
The more exquisite the item, the more it tested the level of Transfiguration.
In fact, Hodu only needed to place his hand on the button to directly turn it into a snuffbox, as exquisite as it could possibly be.
But this was obviously unrealistic; he couldn't very well tell Professor McGonagall that he had already mastered wandless Transfiguration.
Relying on the Transfiguration spell learned in Transfiguration Class, his level could only be said to be average, but having attended so many classes after all, even with occasional daydreams, he could now successfully turn a match into a silver needle.
Hodu touched his hand toward his waist, and when he was about to draw it out, his expression stiffened, almost pulling out the magic fan.
Under Professor McGonagall's gaze, he moved his hand back to his left waist and drew his wand from there.
Hodu chanted the spell, waved his wand, and pointed it at the button from a distance.
The button twisted for a moment and directly turned into an exquisite green snuffbox, inlaid with pieces of gems and covered with delicate patterns.
Professor McGonagall's strict expression relaxed slightly, she nodded slightly, and her gaze looking at Hodu was no longer so harsh.
"Not bad, it seems your talent in Transfiguration is passable, but even so, you cannot daydream in class. Gryffindor gets two points." McGonagall's tone relaxed a bit.
Although this was just a very simple Transfiguration, it could reveal something; judging by the completeness, Hodu's Transfiguration wasn't bad, and was even better than upperclassmen.
Of course, it didn't mean Hodu's Transfiguration could already rival upperclassmen, but rather in the fineness of this kind of Transfiguration.
Upperclassmen could certainly easily do this kind of simple Transfiguration without any problems in completeness, but the finer details would be a bit worse than Hodu's, which really tested a Wizard's talent in Transfiguration.
Hermione looked at Hodu with a furrowed brow and a face full of puzzlement.
She was very clear about Hodu's level of Transfiguration; after all, they always stayed together and their classroom seats were close, so Hodu's progress was truly exaggerated.
If it were her, she could at most achieve this level, and might even lose a bit on the fineness.
She couldn't help but suspect whether Hodu had secretly practiced again behind her back, just like when Hodumastered the Disillusionment Charm—looking like he ran off to play in Hogsmeade Village every day, but actually secretly finding a place to grind hard.
At this moment, she felt a sense of crisis.
Hodu sat down with a full smile on his face; of course he hadn't secretly grinded behind anyone's back, and he wasn't that kind of person.
In fact, he himself was quite surprised; that feeling just now was unprecedented, without a single trace of blockage, and he cast it effortlessly.
Knowing his own level best, back then he definitely wouldn't have been able to do this, at most turning out a snuffbox with a rough shape.
This change had to be credited to the third trait he extracted from the True Dragon.
Spellcasting Talent.
This so-called True Dragon was a bit different from those ancient legends in Hodu's past life; although somewhat similar, legends were legends, and this True Dragon truly existed.
This Dragon was the origin of all magic; in other words, it was a magical Dragon.
That could be seen from the extracted trait.
Hodu looked at the system's introduction regarding the third trait.
Spellcasting Talent: Born with the ability to cast magic.
Combining his own feelings, Hodu could understand this trait more deeply.
The True Dragon possessed the ability to cast magic from birth; without needing to learn, it knew how to use magicthe moment it was born.
To it, magic was just like crawling, breathing, and chewing for humans—entirely instinctual, needing no learning at all.
Hodu's eyes flickered slightly as he pondered inwardly.
What is magic?
This was a cognitive question, and he wasn't very clear either.
But how to use magic—he now knew it crystal clear.
Now that he had mastered the Spellcasting Talent trait, he could easily find that method.
Just like the relationship between cognition and method, he didn't need to care about cognition; he directly mastered the method.
For example, with Transfiguration, he didn't need to know what Transfiguration included, what its principles were, or even learn the method, yet he could directly master it.
Creatures that learned magic postnatally needed to go through the trouble of chewing on the experience and knowledge summarized by predecessors, whereas creatures that could do magic innately directly bypassed this step of learning.
In Hodu's view, this was a top-tier magical talent, but this talent wasn't omnipotent.
magic also had distinctions of simple and difficult; of course, most of the Wizard's magic was considered simple in the eyes of creatures like the True Dragon.
The True Dragon's Spellcasting Talent simply allowed them to bypass a huge stretch of road compared to humans.
If human Wizards used knowledge and wisdom to develop magic that was considered difficult even for the True Dragon, while the True Dragon only cast simple magicrelying on instinct, the True Dragon might just lose to human Wizards.
Spellcasting Talent made the True Dragon powerful from birth, but human wisdom was not incapable of surpassing this innate power.
Weren't there ready-made examples? In terms of talent and strength, Dragons far surpassed Wizards, yet today in the Magical World, Wizards still had the final say.