From Azkaban to Hogwarts.

Since they were all failed, unfinished products that needed to be destroyed anyway, Harry didn't care how many he wanted to dismantle.

"It just looks like ordinary grass..."

Harry carefully tore off a voodoo doll and examined the stuffing inside—only grass and a little bit of rope, it looked like something out of a Muggle doll.

He thought for a moment, picked up his wand, and gently chanted a test spell.

'There seems to be a slight reaction—is it true?'

He tried again, attempting to cut it with magic, but again felt some resistance; it wasn't as easy to separate as ordinary grass.

Harry thoughtfully put down the mangled voodoo doll he was holding, then reached out directly to Ron's latest creation. "Can this be destroyed too?"

"Of course, randomness—it's also a failure."

Ron casually spread his hands, not caring that even though his pockets were empty, he didn't think there was anything precious about the food on the table. With just these raw materials, his family was quite wealthy—as long as they were careful not to get bitten on the fingers by those guys in the garden, they could have as much of this stuff as they wanted.

“Hmm,” Harry said without hesitation, picking up his wand and starting to cut—which was rather difficult, as if he were trying to cut something magical material rather than some dried grass.

"You're almost there, Ron?"

Harry put down the cut scarecrow, his tone very happy—although he didn't know why he hadn't learned these things, judging from the test just now, Ron seemed to have learned an interesting spell, and he was very interested in it.

"Ah, that's about it. I estimate that one more day of practice will be enough."

Ron muttered to himself as he took out the materials Professor William had given him from his bag and shared them with his two friends.

"According to the information, I'm almost there, but I still don't know what it can actually do—the professor said it's the foundation of curses and spellcasting, but..."

He poked his failed creation, "This thing is so ugly..."

“Go ahead and study,” Harry grinned. “At first, the professor made me run every day, which I didn’t understand at the time, but it turned out he was right.”

He happily explained to Ron, then remembered Hermione, turned around, and found Hermione struggling to look at the document, her face full of distress.

Hermione?

"what?"

Hermione snapped out of her daze. "No way, how could it be like this? How could it possibly do this?"

She shook her head—no wonder, her theoretical system was far more extensive than Harry and Ron combined, but it was all built upon the wand spellcasting system. That's precisely why she found it so difficult to accept this completely new system that bordered on dark magic.

Unlike Harry, who possessed an extraordinary understanding of combat-related magic, she was not like Ron, who was almost a blank slate, extremely easy to draw upon, and thus slowest to grasp these unconventional aspects.

"That's normal... Using a voodoo doll is like—well, casting spells with hand gestures—using other methods to release magic?"

As Harry spoke, he pointed to Ron's product with his left hand, making it fly up and perform a series of disjointed movements in the air before placing it back on the table.

"That's it. It's just that the hand gestures have been replaced with voodoo dolls, or rather, the wands have been replaced with voodoo dolls. The process of making them should be similar to how we become familiar with wands, and then we can easily cast spells with them. That should be it, right?"

Harry pulled over a voodoo doll. "Didn't the professor say that before reaching a certain level, all the magic of spellcasting comes from the wizard, and wands, gestures, spells, or even wandless spellcasting that abandons gestures are just means to achieve magic?"

Harry felt he had explained things clearly enough, but both Ron and Hermione stared at him with wide eyes.

Is there anything wrong with what I said?

"The professor never said that!"

Hermione said firmly—she swore she had never heard such a statement in class; it was simply absurd.

"Didn't you say that?"

Harry felt a little guilty under Hermione's gaze, and to be honest, he wavered.

So he looked at Ron, intending to ask Ron for confirmation.

“That sounds amazing, but…” Ron looked at Harry, “So, it is—you know, that voodoo doll, isn’t it amazing…”

"Probably... since the professor taught you this..."

Harry was also a little unsure. "How about we try to make it first?"

-

"It should be finished, right?"

Ron looked at the little ugly creature in his hand, somewhat uncertain.

Harry's suggestion was unanimously agreed upon by the three of them, and they simply tried making these ugly grass dolls together—both Harry and Hermione were somewhat interested in this new thing.

More importantly, both Harry and Hermione had some free time – they finished their homework quickly, giving them a little extra time to explore what they liked.

But to their surprise, Harry was the best at knitting.

It's not that Harry succeeded immediately—but rather that when it comes to knitting, Harry was far more skillful than the other two. Following Harry was Ron, who had tried many times, while Hermione's clumsiness was simply horribly bad…

In other words, the doll Hermione created has transcended the concept of ugliness.

If Ron hadn't told them he was finished after knitting five, Harry would have even considered slowing down to make his dolls even uglier...

He had considered the reason—this thing was somewhat similar to some of the work he had done at the Dursleys' house, and after arriving at Hogwarts, thanks to Snape's care and some special circumstances, he had honed his skills in confinement.

Ron was a bit less skilled; coming from a magical family, he was somewhat clumsy when put in solitary confinement.

As for Hermione—Harry finds it hard to imagine a bright student like Hermione playing those knitting games. Her family wouldn't make her do those kinds of chores, and even at Hogwarts, not Snape would put Hermione in solitary confinement…

All things considered, it's perfectly normal that Hermione's knitting was a complete mess.

But there's no need for his comfort now; Ron's successful voodoo doll has already captured everyone's attention.

"It looks much smaller than a regular knitted one."

Harry put down his unsuccessful creations and gathered around to observe—frankly, he wanted to test it himself, preferably take it apart, to see if the voodoo doll had changed anything besides shrinking in size.

But this won't do—Ron spent ages making one, and if Harry dismantles it, Ron will sulk for at least three or four days and won't speak to him.

"Try again, make one more, Ron!"

So Harry encouraged Ron—since this thing wasn't dangerous, one more would make it a perfectly legitimate destructive experiment.

"no problem!"

After making his first voodoo doll, Ron was full of enthusiasm and immediately picked up a small pile of grass and rope and began to weave.

Harry and Hermione gave up on trying it themselves and began to watch Ron's manufacturing process from start to finish.

Ten minutes later, Ron carefully tied the last rope—and then, he failed.

The sudden defeat left all three of them stunned.

“Think about it again, Ron,” Harry quickly encouraged Ron. “Maybe something’s wrong over there—this could be a delicate task!”

The third attempt began soon after Ron carefully began weaving a voodoo doll, recalling his previous successes.

Thirteen minutes later, Ron's expression turned grim.

Harry and Hermione were also a little nervous—mainly because they were infected by Ron.

Harry started to worry because he knew Ron had a few minor issues, and he knew very well... when Ron got nervous, he would...

Sure enough—what followed was a nightmare. Ron stopped knitting carefully and finished his fourth attempt in just seven minutes.

But it didn't work, which made Ron start the fifth attempt without saying a word.

Then came the sixth time, with a blank expression.

The seventh time, her face turned bright red.

And—"I've had enough! It was an accident, I simply couldn't have done it!"

In a fit of despair, Ron slammed the half-finished voodoo doll onto the table and then haphazardly tied on the last rope.

"I knew it! I—"

He complained, then his eyes widened—this haphazard creation had actually succeeded.

Harry and Hermione had intended to dissuade him, but they were both stunned by the sudden success.

How could that be?

Ron looked at his hand, then at the shrunken voodoo doll that looked like a success no matter how you looked at it, and was dumbfounded—how could it have succeeded?

"Did I drop it when I first made it?"

Ron looked at Harry, then at Hermione, his face full of confusion—but there was no answer to the question. The other two were trying to do their own thing, and no one knew what was going on.

"How about we smash it again this time?"

Ron looked at Harry and Hermione, puzzled, and repeated the steps from last time, throwing the voodoo doll out before the final step and then tying it up—and this time it worked again.

"Does it really mean I have to fall?"

Ron stared blankly at Harry and Hermione, then tried to make it again while talking—and failed.

Failure, and more failure...

But after three successful attempts, Ron became less anxious. After several failures, he tried again without falling, and this time he miraculously succeeded.

The three of them were dumbfounded—what was going on?

-

Good afternoon, Professor.

Harry took the lead and knocked on William's office door—this was his first time in William's office since he had been training with Moody all semester.

After waiting for a while, Harry passed William's routine check as usual and appeared in William's office at the same time as Ron and Hermione.

"Good afternoon, Harry, and you too, Hermione and Ron."

William nodded, gesturing for them to sit down, then brought out some snacks. "Is there a problem?"

"It's—Professor, that voodoo doll."

Harry spoke first, but then hesitated—neither of them actually had permission to study.

“A voodoo doll, hmm,” William glanced at Harry, then at the bag Ron was carrying. “Ron, have you finished making the first voodoo doll?”

"Yes, Professor."

“Very good, a little faster than I expected. You do have an extraordinary talent in this area.”

As William spoke, he put on gloves, using them to protect himself, and took the voodoo doll from Ron.

"Wow—so many? Your success rate looks pretty high."

William saw the four voodoo dolls. "Generally speaking, even if a beginner follows all the steps correctly, it will take about seven to ten tries to succeed once."