The Shopkeeper of All Worlds in the British Wizarding World

Chapter 268 Registration
"Every student who wishes to be a champion must write his name and school name on a piece of parchment and drop it into this goblet," said Dumbledore. "Aspirants have twenty-four hours to register. Tomorrow evening, Halloween night, the goblet will choose the names of three students who it thinks best represent the three schools. Tonight, the goblet will be placed in the entrance hall, where all students who wish to run can touch it."

Dumbledore's voice was still floating above, but Ryan didn't want to listen to it for the time being. At this moment, he was thinking back to the various plans he had prepared before to pass the age circle.

"To prevent students who are underage from being tempted," said Dumbledore, "I will draw an age line around the goblet once it is in the entrance hall. No one under the age of seventeen will be able to cross it."

"Finally, I would like to remind every student who is going to participate in the election that this competition is not a joke and you must not participate rashly. Once a warrior is selected by the Goblet of Fire, he must persist in the competition to the end. Whoever casts his name into the cup actually forms a magical contract that must be observed. Once you become a warrior, you are not allowed to change your mind. Therefore, please think twice and make sure that you really want to participate in the competition before casting your name into the cup. Well, I think it's time for everyone to go to bed. Good night, everyone."

As Ryan waited anxiously, Dumbledore finally finished his speech, which meant that people in the hall could finally leave their seats and move freely. At this time, Dumbledore had already drawn the golden age circle with his wand, and Ryan took this opportunity to get together with a group of classmates to observe this thing carefully.

"Sure enough, this is an alchemical technique." Ryan confirmed after observing with the magic eagle eyes. Although he didn't know exactly how this age circle worked, as long as he knew the direction, he would be prepared to deal with it.

Of course, it was within his expectations that Professor Dumbledore would use alchemy on the age circle. After all, it was absolutely impossible for a person who could discover the twelve uses of dragon's blood and had a very good relationship with Nicolas Flamel to know nothing about alchemy.

"Have you thought of a way to pass the age circle?" Hermione asked Ryan in a low voice on the way back to Gryffindor Tower.

"I've thought of a way." Ryan also replied in a low voice. "Whether it will work or not depends on the results of tomorrow's test. But even if it doesn't work, it won't kill anyone. It's much safer than being chased by a group of mummies."

Returning to the common room, Ryan found the Weasley twins peddling their aging potion.

"Hey, Ryan, do you want some?" Fred shouted to Ryan after seeing him.

"No, I have other ways." Ryan smiled mysteriously and went straight back to the dormitory.

"What a nonsense! Can't you just say it directly?" George muttered and started selling their aging products again.

A little tired, this is how Ryan felt when he woke up the next morning. Because at night, Ryan took advantage of everyone's sleep to go to the World Grocery Store and Rose Crystal and worked for more than an hour to complete the preparations. Dumbledore's alchemy level is indeed very high. In order to deal with the age limit, Ryan spent a lot of effort to make the current product that he is satisfied with.

Yawning, Ryan slowly walked towards the auditorium. He decided to finish his breakfast first before dealing with the registration matters.

When he entered the hallway, he saw more than twenty people gathered there, with only a few people wolfing down their food at the dining table - it was obvious that they wanted to finish their meal quickly and then go watch.

Everyone was looking at the Goblet of Fire carefully. The Goblet was placed in the middle of the hall, on the bench where the Sorting Hat usually was. A thin golden line was drawn on the floor, each side was ten feet long, surrounding the Goblet in the middle. Ten feet was equivalent to three meters, and Ryan thought that it should be easy for a normal person to throw a piece of paper into the Goblet at this distance. But the strange thing was that although the people around were eager to try, no one did it.

Ryan asked this question curiously to the onlookers next to him. Hannah Abbott said with a smile, "Justin tried it this way, and his paper ball bounced back onto his head, turning his hair pink. Colin from your college tried to use a stick to hold the paper ball and throw it into the Goblet of Fire, but the stick and his entire arm turned green. The worst was a Slytherin who wanted a senior classmate to help carry it over. As a result, his paper ball was burned to ashes as soon as it crossed the age line, and it also burned a big hole in the trouser pocket of that senior classmate--"

After listening to the previous series of pioneers' failures, Ryan was once again certain that some of his comrades in the previous life were cheating him. As the greatest white wizard in Europe and a centenarian with rich experience, it would be a bit of an underestimation of Dumbledore if he could break through the age circle he drew with simple Muggle tricks.

But Ryan decided to eat first. When he was about to finish eating, he saw the famous scene: the Weasley twins tried to break through the age circle after drinking the aging potion, but they were bounced out and grew long white beards.

"Hey, I told you that the aging agent is useless." Ryan shouted happily to the twins after seeing this scene. The twins immediately walked towards Ryan after hearing it.

"Didn't you say you had a solution? Then go up and try it." The two men stood beside Ryan, one on each side, and then motioned Ryan to go up as well, laughing. It seemed that they thought that if they were going to have bad luck, they should all have it together. Dumbledore had also finished eating and was about to leave the hall. When he saw Ryan and the other three, he not only did not stop them, but also stroked his beard and watched with interest.

"Okay, I'm here." Ryan swallowed the last sip of milk in the bowl, then walked to the edge of the age circle with his head held high and escorted by the twins. At this time, many people around came to watch the fun, including the students from Durmstrang who had just voted. After all, Ryan was well-known in the school as a top three student in the grade and a winner of the second-level Order of Merlin. Many people were interested in seeing what Ryan would do.

Ryan took out a beautiful amethyst crystal ball from the space bag on his waist under the watchful eyes of a crowd. The twins saw it and joked, "Are you going to use your third eye to divine how to break through?"

"Of course not, look carefully." Ryan said and placed the amethyst ball on the golden age line, then took out his magic wand and drew runes in the air.

Silver runes slowly floated out from the wand and sank into the amethyst ball. When the runes covered the surface of the crystal ball, Ryan stopped drawing the runes and gently tapped the crystal ball with his wand.

Instantly, the crystal ball emitted a lavender light, and then quickly rolled along the age line. When the crystal ball returned to its original point, the runes on it completely disappeared.

"Look, the light on the age circle has changed." A sharp-eyed Ravenclaw senior girl shouted, and sure enough, the golden light on the age circle was now mixed with a faint purple light.

At this time, Ryan had crossed the age limit, and everyone was looking at him. But he was not ejected as most people expected, but he put in his note normally and walked out.

"Boom—" There was a commotion around, even mixed with applause and whistles. The clearest one was the cheers of the Weasley twins: "Success! Oh my God! Ryan voted his name into the Goblet of Fire."

(End of this chapter)