Hogwarts: From Selling White Peppers to Becoming a God

Chapter 124 Love Potion Work Injury

In addition to headaches, Murphy also experienced various symptoms over the next few days, including excessive sleepiness, slowed reaction time, and cravings for sweets.

He felt like The Lion King was playing in his head every day. Now it wasn't just the lines anymore; he felt like if he had a pen, he could draw The Lion King from beginning to end.

"In short, these are all consequences of increased neural connectivity," Omid Abbott explained.

"I just recalled a movie I'd seen in the past, and that adds so many neural connections?" Murphy was a little skeptical. "Then your brains must be bursting from reading papers all day!"

Murphy didn't mention The Lion King, but only gave a general explanation of what he had encountered.

Omid thought for a moment and said, "I can explain this from two perspectives."

"On the one hand, the amount of information you gain from a comprehensive recall may be much greater than that from several papers."

"How so?"

"Our brains are incredibly intelligent. The amount of information we are exposed to every day is unimaginable. For example, our eyes have extremely high resolution, which translates to hundreds of millions of pixels. Our ability to recognize dynamic visual information is close to 30 frames per second. In terms of bytes, visual information alone sends more than 15 gigabytes of information into our brains every second."

"A single day generates over 600 petabytes of data."

"With such a large amount of information, our brains don't actually process it all. Instead, based on their attention mechanisms, they only select some parts that require special attention for calculation, and the vast majority of the information is not processed. By associating some useful information with known information, we form memories, but the amount of information that is ultimately remembered is much smaller."

"Because this method of memorization is mostly an index and association of past memories, even certain images and scenes will be simplified into some elements and features. Therefore, when converted into words, it is actually not much, not even comparable to a paper of tens of thousands of words."

"But according to you, a full recall allows you to clearly remember almost every detail of that scene, so the amount of information it contains is probably quite large."

"On the other hand, you may have some misconceptions about how the brain works."

"In fact, the human brain is working all the time. What ordinary people perceive as 'playing' time is still a continuous learning and training process for the brain. This kind of learning and training is not fundamentally different from studying a paper."

"The reason why our brains don't grow bigger despite constantly learning is that we forget things as we learn. A large number of neural synapses are being built and degenerated every moment."

"This is how we keep our brains constantly updated and focus our energy on the problems we are facing now."

"Our understanding is that during the process of using Seeking Mind on yourself, a large number of 'dormant synapses' are awakened and a large number of new neural connections are formed. The overall amount of information may be equivalent to the amount of information that an ordinary person's brain should increase in four or five days or even one or two weeks."

"With such a short period of time, such a large amount of information is added, and there is no forgetting mechanism to reduce the burden, your brain will naturally need some time to adapt."

Murphy understood, but still asked, "Any ideas for improvement? I mean, something that doesn't require an external Pensieve."

To be honest, the feeling of having a clear view of one's own memories is quite nice, as if he could replay every second of his life from childhood to adulthood if he wanted to.

Putting aside how many treasures he could unearth from it, the sheer significance of gaining further control over his own body and mind made him unwilling to give up this spell.

"Perhaps enhancing the brain's capabilities could help improve these symptoms," Omid said, "but our brains are already the most efficient and powerful computing tool in nature, and I find it hard to imagine how we could enhance them further."

Murphy thought for a moment, then suddenly clapped his hands. "You know what, there really are ways to enhance intelligence in the wizarding world."

He led Omid to the potion laboratory on the eighth floor.

Compared to the Spells Research Lab and the Magical Creatures Lab, which is occupied by various magical creatures and the Transformation Research Group, this place is much quieter.

Currently, there are only three research groups, with a total of about twenty people working here.

Their main task is to analyze the Beauty Potion and the Love Potion in order to find a way to make these two potions in a Muggle-like manner instead of wizards—or at least a way to replace some of the steps involved.

Comparatively, the analysis of the Beauty Potion is progressing faster. For example, they have already produced an intermediate potion that does not contain fairy wings or unicorn hair, reducing the steps for wizards to make the Beauty Potion from seven to three.

The analysis of aphrodisiacs, however, has progressed more slowly.

On the one hand, the process of making love potion is indeed much more complicated than that of beauty potion.

On the other hand... Murphy had heard quite a few reports of chaotic relationships between men and women in this group...

It is said that the love potion research group, consisting of nine people (five men and four women), actually managed to develop more than a dozen couples, including all sorts of mind-blowing combinations such as male-male, female-female, male-female-male, female-female-female, male-female-female, and so on.

Laura reported that the messy relationships between men and women were delaying the research on the aphrodisiac and suggested that the research team members be rotated regularly, but Murphy refused.

Goodness, they even rotate them? Doesn't that turn the entire research institute into a dating testing ground?

I specifically invited you here to conduct research, not to create "the most powerful and ancient magic."

Moreover, Murphy felt that the researchers couldn't be blamed for this.

This might even qualify as a work-related injury.

Working in an environment filled with aphrodisiacs all day long, the fact that they don't have group parties all the time and can still focus on research shows a high level of professionalism.

Aside from Beauty Potions and Aphrodisiacs, the research on other potions is mostly driven by the researchers' personal interests. Some are researching Bone Spirits, others are researching Energy Potions, and still others are researching magical materials such as Moonfox dung, Motra Rat Juice, and Dragon Blood.

Because these types of research are relatively niche and far removed from Murphy's overall goal of "enhancing wizarding abilities," they are not taken seriously by most people. Therefore, each type of research is usually conducted by only one researcher.

Compared to members of large research groups who work together, they appear rather isolated, hence their self-deprecating nickname "lone wolf researchers."

Murphy is looking for a lone wolf researcher today.

"Pex Morey," Murphy found the tall Slavic man with gold-rimmed glasses, "his research topic is..."

"A brain-enhancing potion," Pex offered. "I believe it can make a person's mind more agile."

(End of this chapter)