The Rune Mage Starting at Hogwarts

Ryze paused for a moment before asking, "You mean ancient magic... no, most ancient magic also requires a medium. It should be the magic that the earliest wizards released instinctively before ancient magic?"

The earliest wizards relied on instinct to cast spells, and then they gradually refined and organized them, which eventually became ancient magic that could be taught to others.

Then, because ancient magic required too much talent, it was difficult to find successors. So, ancient wizards began to look for tools to lower the threshold of magic, so that those with less talent could also master the power of magic.

As a result, the number of wizards began to increase, and with the help of these tools, they developed more magic, eventually evolving into the wizarding world we know today.

“The earliest wizards were indeed more perceptive,” Ronan said slowly. “In that era, they weren’t using magic; rather, they understood the deepest laws of the world.”

"They don't need spells to command the flames and the wind, because they can feel the pulse of the flames and hear the call of the air currents."

"As you said, such a talent is so rare for you humans that wands and spells slowly came into being... These things have indeed made magic teachable and widely used."

"But this also dulls your senses. Modern wizards have learned to use magic, but they also have a harder time understanding the laws of this world."

Chapter 166: Listening and Feeling

"Because wands are so useful, they actually limit the future of wizards?" Ryze looked at Ronan and asked curiously.

“You can think of it this way: wands make you ‘deaf’ to some extent, but deaf people can also possess power that normal people can hardly imagine, just like the wizards of Vargado. They are indeed inferior to those wizards who use wands in combat, but can you say that they are not good enough... it’s just a different comparison.”

“While the wizards of Vagado still need gestures and spells to assist them, they are indeed closer to a natural state than you are. Those with the aptitude are also more likely to perceive the laws of the world in that situation.”

Ryze said thoughtfully, "So, the centaur's astrological divination can help me regain that ability to sense patterns?"

“Yes, this is the most primitive magic that the centaurs have passed down for thousands of years, and it will continue to be passed down, and when necessary... it will be taught to some qualified beings,” Ronan said in a deep voice. “It doesn’t require you to swing a stick or chant complicated syllables. It only requires you to be quiet and observe those things that are eternally unchanging yet constantly changing.”

Ryze knew he was the one with the qualifications, and he needed to gain the other party's approval within three days in order to have a chance to receive the Prism Reward three days later.

"So, where should I begin?"

"Release the warmth spell on you, put away your wand and your ring, put down everything that can help you, stop thinking with your brain, strip away your desires, and simply use your six senses to experience this world."

Rizz did not refute, but reached out and took off the ring engraved with Ravenclaw's mark, put away his wand, and then sat down cross-legged on the stone slab.

However, for someone like him, emptying his mind is not an easy thing.

It wasn't until ten minutes later, seeing that Ryze was making no progress, that Ronan issued another reminder.

“You have too many desires, Rhett,” Ronan said quietly, standing to the side. “You’ve only been in the wizarding world for less than a year. You haven’t fully gotten used to the convenience these tools bring you. Theoretically, you should be able to easily enter that state.”

"But you want too much. If you can't let go of these things, even if you have more talent than us, it will be difficult to enter that state."

Ronan was telling the truth.

His head is stuffed with too much stuff.

Driven by the rapid thinking of a mad scientist, his mind was filled with all sorts of magical knowledge, the development of light magic and even lightning magic, the improvement of wolfsbane potion, the balance adjustment of wizard chess, the instinctive premonition of divination... When he sat down to try to clear his mind, these things would unconsciously flood his mind.

Sometimes he feels like he has emptied his mind, but when he realizes this, his brain has already started to think.

He instinctively wanted to close his eyes to allow himself to perceive the surrounding sounds more quietly, but Ronan warned him the moment he closed his eyes.

"Open your eyes, Reese. And don't try to defocus your vision. Closing your eyes might make it easier to clear your mind, but if you can't even look directly at the world in front of you, how can you experience the whole world?"

Ryze opened her eyes and met Ronan's deep gaze.

“See, hear, touch, smell, taste...use your five senses to experience it all,” Ronan pointed to the starry sky above and the surrounding environment. “Don’t think about what you see or analyze what you hear. Just use your body to feel it all.”

As a knowledge-hungry Ravenclaw, thinking was already an instinct for Rizz. To ask him to observe the world without any thought, like a newborn baby... to be honest, that was much harder than he imagined.

Looking at the starry sky, one might ponder which constellation the star being observed belongs to.

He would analyze the sounds of the animals around him to determine what kind of animals they might be.

Even when the stone slab beneath his buttocks felt cold, he would want to adjust his posture to make himself more comfortable.

However, astrological divination is not only related to quarterly bonuses, but also a path that allows him to better understand the nature of the world.

In the dream he had when he returned from winter break, Rowena Ravenclaw mentioned the centaurs' astrological divination to him.

This knowledge is of little use to wizards today, but if they want to see fate more clearly, they need to learn it.

Rowena Ravenclaw, who lived a thousand years ago, could not foresee the changes in the star charts that would occur a thousand years later due to his arrival.

Therefore, he had to come to the centaurs to learn astrology. Even without this special raven quest, he would have come to the Forbidden Forest no later than after the Wizarding Duel Tournament.

Thinking this, Ryze exhaled a puff of white breath, first closing his eyes to adjust his state, then opening them and staring directly at the area in front of him shrouded in darkness.

This time, he spent more time calming his thoughts and accepting everything he felt.

Five minutes...ten minutes...thirty minutes...

Time passed silently, second by second.

Ryze's body stiffened slightly from the cold wind, and he gradually began to feel mentally exhausted.

However, in this state, he felt that his brain was also slowing down a lot.

He looked at his own breath, at Ronan who was silently observing the stars, at the centaur tribe whose fires were flickering in the distance, and at the stars that appeared and disappeared in the sky.

At one point, he seemed to sense a unique rhythm.

That wasn't a heartbeat, nor was it breathing; it was a more grand and slow rhythm.

The entire forbidden forest and even the starry sky seemed to undulate slightly in sync with this rhythm.

The howling wind and the sound of the stream perfectly complement this unique rhythm.

Rizz felt as if he had finally grasped that transparent string.

But the next moment, when he realized this, his mind started working again.

That unique rhythm, indescribable in words, vanished instantly, as if a string had been suddenly snapped.

Ryze gasped for breath, swayed, and was then supported by Ronan.

It was only then that Ryze realized his body was frozen stiff.

“That’s enough for today,” Ronan said, looking at Reiz. “You’ve touched the threshold, even if only for a moment, but it’s a good start.”

Chapter 167: The Difference Between Regular Divination and Astrological Divination

Progress on the first night was so-so, but Ryze wasn't discouraged.

After spending an entire night, he finally got into the zone and sensed the threshold. The next step was to steadily and quickly cross that threshold.

He now understands the difference between ordinary divination and astrological divination.

Ordinary divination relies on the wizard's divination talent and their own magic power, consuming more of the wizard's own strength.

Astrological divination, however, requires a higher level of divination talent, but consumes far less magic power than ordinary divination.

Because it allows users to perceive the magic that permeates the entire world and the direction of its flow through their five senses, and then let this enormous magic influence their sixth sense.

To put it simply, ordinary divination is like lighting a candle in a dark room; the wizard can see the things around him illuminated by the candlelight.

The range of light depends on the strength of the wizard's magic, and once the candle burns out, the line of sight is cut off.

The advantage of this divination method is that the shaman can freely choose which room he wants to light up and see what he wants to know up close—although there are many shadows in the room that the light cannot reach, and what is hidden in these shadows may mislead the diviner to make wrong judgments, but with these lights, the diviner can at least avoid the dangers around him.

Astrological divination is like the daily sunrise and sunset.

When the sun rises, the whole world becomes clearly visible in a grand flow of magic.

Even at night, moonlight and stars still illuminate the outline of the earth.

This kind of divination does not require much of the wizard's power, because it simply involves sensing the flow of all things in the world.

But precisely because it is so vast, the power of astrological divination cannot be precise enough to apply to an individual.

Astrology can reveal the turmoil of an era or the rise and fall of a family, but it's difficult to predict what a person will eat for breakfast tomorrow or who they will meet around the corner in the hallway.

Unless that one person has the ability to change the whole world.

Ronan said this before.

From the centaur's perspective, most wizards are merely ants crawling on the earth, and their lives, deaths, and choices have no impact on the world.

Only figures like Dumbledore or Voldemort, and the forces behind them, leave a small mark on the world, but that's still far from changing the entire world.

Ryze pondered this all night, and the next morning his roommate was somewhat surprised to see the exhaustion on Ryze's face.

"Ryze, what's wrong? You don't look too good today?" Terry asked curiously. "You didn't use the Psychic Charm and the Energy Tonic on yourself again last night to practice, did you?"

It was only at times like this that they could see the fatigue on Rezs's face.

“I didn’t use the Extrasensory Charm on myself… It’s something I’m currently learning that’s very troublesome. I can’t use my brain; I have to rely entirely on my instincts to master it,” Ryze explained simply, while rubbing his temples.

"It's a bit difficult for me to stop thinking, so I need to expend some energy first and rely more on my body's instincts to act."

Last night, he not only thought about astrology and divination, but also spent a lot of time on other mentally taxing things.

"Can't use your brain, relying on instinct?" Terry thought for a moment, wondering what new thing Ryze had started researching again. "It sounds like a lot of trouble."

Anthony, however, seemed to have thought of something: "I've heard of this kind of training, but it seems to be a meditation training in Africa. Because their wizards don't use wands, they need a higher level of magical control to cast spells. In order to cast spells faster and to prevent their spells from being affected by emotions, they need to train their body's instincts in this way."

He paused for a moment before asking Ryze, "Ryze, are you practicing wandless spellcasting?"

Ryze shook his head first, then nodded: "I'm studying another, more ancient method of divination, but it is indeed somewhat similar to the early stages of wandless spellcasting in the beginner phase. If I can master that divination technique, it should provide a lot of convenience for my future practice of wandless spellcasting."

“Stop thinking…this process sounds like deliberately making yourself stupid, especially stopping your brain from thinking, which is the biggest loss for Ravenclaw,” Terry muttered. “Look at our Ravenclaw hourglass, you alone have added more than a hundred points to it.”

Anthony didn't think there was any problem, since Ravenclaw's score advantage was still quite obvious, and Rez's training was more important in comparison.

If Ryze can truly complete this training, not only will his divination abilities improve, but he will also likely learn many spells without a wand.

Ryze waved his hand: "It shouldn't take too long. I spent more than an hour last night and barely got to the point. There are still two days left this month, and I should be able to get started within those two days."

“To master an ancient divination technique in three days…only you could say that so easily,” Terry sighed, then picked up several heavy books. “But I must remind you, today is Friday. Although you are practicing clearing your mind, Snape has Potions class this afternoon. Seeing you like this, I think Snape would love for you to run into some trouble while brewing the potion.”

Ryze shrugged. "I know, but I can now brew those low-level potions by instinct, and Snape has been more tolerant of me lately, so I don't think he'll cause me any trouble at this time."

The key here is, of course, honey fruit.

For the first half of February, Snape would still make sarcastic remarks about Rhett in the Potions classroom, saying that he was more like a cook than a wizard.

Even when Ritz was processing herbs, he would sometimes deliberately stop and comment that Ritz's movements looked like he was cutting potatoes.

However, with the appearance of the Honey Fruit and Snape's realization of its immense medicinal value, Snape's attitude towards Rizzi reverted to its previous indifference in the latter half of February.

After all, before honeyfruit could be widely cultivated, Snape needed Rizzi's approval to obtain more honeyfruit for research.

Chapter 168: The Unlucky Malfoy

Ryze was clearly out of sorts today.

Even on the way to the auditorium, the students who passed by could see how tired Reese was.

Along the way, many people greeted Ryze and told him to go and rest for a while.

Several of Ravenclaw's older female students even tried to drag him directly to the school hospital.

In response to their kindness, Ryze thanked them and explained that he was undergoing special magical training, which was why he needed to maintain this state.

"Does magic training really need to go this far?" When Ron saw Rhett at the dining table in the Great Hall, he also looked completely bewildered.

On the other side of the long table, Hermione also expressed great curiosity, wanting to know what new tricks Ryze, whose face looked rather pale, was up to now.

Rizzi briefly mentioned that it was an ancient school of divination, and Hermione sighed somewhat dejectedly.

The talent for divination is something that cannot be compensated for by hard work, which made Hermes, who always believed that knowledge could solve everything, feel very frustrated.

Her only thought now is that when she takes her elective courses in her third year, she must go and see what this so-called divination class is all about.

After all, dozens of people enroll in that divination class every year, but she felt that Hogwarts couldn't possibly have that many people with a talent for divination each year.

She thought of it as going there to broaden her horizons.

However, Hermione softened her tone in the end: "Does practicing this school of divination require maintaining such a listless state... I mean, won't this way of overdrawing your energy have any negative effects on your body?"

Rez ate his breakfast at a leisurely pace and then replied, "Normally it's not necessary, but my brain usually works too fast."

"Because my mind is too active, my brain always unconsciously analyzes everything around me. In order to prevent this thinking ability from affecting my instinctive perception, I must first consume most of my energy and find a way to slow down its thinking speed."

"However, it won't last too long. Once I get the hang of it and become proficient, I shouldn't have to stay in this state anymore."

Hermione's teeth itched upon hearing this answer.

In order to learn as much as possible and not fall too far behind Ryze, she wished she could split every minute in half, and even in her dreams she wanted her brain to work faster.

Ryze's current problem is that he feels his brain is working too fast, and he even wants to deliberately slow it down.

“If the upperclassmen in your house heard you complaining, they’d throw you off Ravenclaw Tower,” Hermione said through gritted teeth, before finally turning away from him.

After having breakfast, Reese adjusted herself a bit and then went to the greenhouse with her roommates.

The weather in late February was better than in January, but it was still cold outdoors.