Hogwarts: Dumbledore reigned over the wizarding world

Chapter 57: "Cultivating" Harry (Part )
Harry suspected that he had been deceived... This was the thought that arose in his mind after several days of practicing "brain occlumency" and all his memories, including dreams, had been stripped clean by Vaughn, but he still had not made any progress.

Ron agreed seriously: "Listen, Harry, based on my 11 years of experience of being bullied, Vaughn definitely sees you as a target for his magic practice. He would take the initiative to help others? Ha! Hilarious!"

Then he laughed so hard that his big teeth actually fell out...

Vaughn, who was passing by, put away his wand as if nothing had happened.

Ron had to run to the school hospital and drink a large glass of medicine to make the big tooth grow back.

Hermione had a different opinion on this. She asked Harry seriously, "How can you be sure that idea is really yours?"

It sounds like nonsense, but it really makes sense...

Harry held his head in his hands and fell into fear of the Dark Arts and philosophical thinking.

After thinking about it for a whole day, he went to the Room of Requirement at night and let Vaughn use Legilimency on him with a passionate look.

Compared to his almost imperceptible progress in Occlumency, Vaughan's Legilimency seemed to Harry to be progressing at an incredible rate.

This made Harry a little depressed.

In the second week of November, Harry once again came to the Room of Requirement and asked Vaughan dejectedly, "Am I stupid?"

Vaughn, immersed in the joy of learning magic, casually asked, "Why do you think so?"

Harry sighed, but his lips moved a few times, but in the end he said nothing. He lay straight on the carpet like a salted fish and sighed, "Come on! Let's finish it soon."

Vaughan: "..."

Only then did he realize that something was wrong. It seemed that he had played the savior badly. How could it be possible for the target to completely give up resistance?

Of course, the more intense the target's resistance is, the more effective the magic of Legilimency will be.

Vaughan flipped through the book in agony for a while before finally finding a solution.

"Harry, if you cooperate with me actively, I will cast a dream spell on you after we finish practicing. How about that?"

Salted Fish Harry had a blank expression: "What's the use?"

Vaughan smiled seductively: "It can make you have a beautiful dream, in which you can achieve anything. For example, you want to hold hands with a girl..."

Harry sat up suddenly, his face flushed, and he stammered, "I told you it wasn't what I thought. I was just dreaming. Maybe..."

Looking at Vaughn's half-smile, Harry lowered his voice. After a moment, he asked in an inaudible voice, "Is this really a beautiful dream?"

Vaughan nodded.

Harry hesitated, "It's not impossible. At least I can have a good dream and sleep well, right?"

The next day, Vaughan happily saw a new dream in Harry's memory. It was still dreamy and hazy, as if it was a pink dream. The little boy and the girl who was half a head taller than him were walking side by side.

It looks wonderful.

Harry's consciousness fought back desperately in the memory, but as Vaughn's mastery of Legilimency grew, it became increasingly difficult for him to expel Vaughn from his mind as he had done at the beginning.

Another day of study ended, and Harry, still resisting in vain, could only stare at Vaughn and emphasize again: "You promised me not to tell anyone about my dream."

He didn't care about anything else. During his years living with the Dursleys, his most vivid memories were of the cupboard under the stairs, and the rest of Hogwarts. "Don't worry, I'll keep my mouth shut."

Only after getting Vaughn's assurance did Harry feel at ease to go back and rest. Vaughn, who stayed in the Room of Requirement, put his wand against his forehead and slowly pulled out a strand of silver thread.

That was his memory, containing everything he saw after invading Harry's mind.

Vaughan hummed a leisurely tune and put the silver thread into a small empty bottle.

Seal it and take it to the principal's office on the eighth floor.

"Hey, Albus, Harry's freshly baked love, want to come and see it?"

"Don't talk like we're peeping... Oh—the little boy has already had an ignorant love, really..."

In the memory world manifested by the Pensieve, Dumbledore wiped his eyes sentimentally.

But beautiful dreams are always short-lived. The pink picture quickly jumped past, and some fragmented, dark, depressing and helpless memories of the boy's ten years living at Number 4 Privet Drive flowed past them like the scenery outside a train going backwards.

After a long while, Dumbledore sighed: "He has too little happiness..."

"Yes, apart from Hogwarts, there are only a few. These are all the nodes I have summarized these days."

Vaughn waved his hand. He became more and more proficient in operating the Pensieve. A series of smoke wrapped with memory images rose up, passing in front of the two people and then into the sky.

It was so densely packed, like a Muggle surveillance screen.

From this perspective, we can see that the dark and negative images in Harry's memory account for the vast majority. The first bright moment in his life was the day when Hagrid gave him the admission notice.

When I read the original novel in my previous life, there was only a very short description of Harry's childhood. The fairy-tale-like text could hardly describe clearly what kind of life a child who was rejected and hated by the whole family lived.

Look at Harry, who has been wearing torn and small clothes since he was very young and has to live in a cupboard.

Vaughan said with a hint of sarcasm, "You should be thankful, Albus, it's a miracle Harry hasn't turned into another Tom."

"Please forgive an old man's anxiety about gains and losses."

Dumbledore sighed, "Lily, Harry's mother, left him a protective spell with her life. This requires a blood bond to be effective. I'm also afraid that if he grows up in the wizarding world, listening to the flattery and admiration of others all day long, he will indulge in false glory..."

Vaughn remained noncommittal, saying that no one knew how things would develop if they hadn't happened yet.

He wasn't here to seek justice for Harry. He looked at all the nodes he had sorted out and said, "So far, there's been no evidence of tampering with Harry's memory. It seems Tom really hasn't noticed the connection between him and Harry."

"Don't jump to conclusions, Vaughn. Tom is a master of memory magic. His greatest skill was getting into other people's minds, burying his malice deep within their memories, disguising it as dissatisfaction and anger towards life or others, constantly connecting and amplifying it... until his malice overwhelmed his rationality. Those poor people had no idea they had been twisted and manipulated by him."

Vaughan listened intently.

He had never been one to be arrogant. He knew that Dumbledore was more experienced than him, and he also knew that his Legilimency skills were still very rudimentary.

"Okay, I'll keep paying attention!"

Harry could continue to be his target for magic practice.

This is really good news.

(End of this chapter)