Looking over the greenhouse sparkling with floating reward light orbs, Char's eyes shone with anticipation. He stretched a hand toward one bobbing just in front of him—but paused. Char's gaze drifted to the soil and the marigold branches in this batch of Margaret. His hand stopped, brow furrowing.
"So rough," he muttered.
"My work here before starting school seemed perfect back then. I spent day and night in the greenhouse, certain I'd gotten all the tiny details right. But looking now… It's just surface-level. No real depth." Char shook his head, even a little embarrassed by his earlier self. "My magical perception back then was terrible, and my spellwork, especially Soil-Loosening and Pruning, was weak at best. I didn't know how to properly loosen the soil or prune for magic flow."
He let out a low sigh.
"If only I'd developed my perception and my spells... I could have boosted the rewards for these Margaret plants by at least thirty percent!" But there was still hope, he realized. "If I act now, maybe I can bump the rewards up a good twenty percent."
Tempted to harvest instantly, Char forced himself to be patient. "Waiting a little longer for a bigger harvest is more than worth it." He calmed himself, lifted his wand, and with a flash of warm, earthy light, channeled a Soil-Loosening Charm into the greenhouse earth. The soil responded instantly, shifting and adjusting, now ideal for Margaret's magical needs.
Char watched with satisfaction as the glowing reward orbs over the Margaret plants, already at their limit, began to swell even more.
Next, he focused on pruning. With a gentle flick, the Pruning Charm hummed, slicing off branches that grew vigorously but contained almost no magic—along with a few side-boughs competing for energy. Now, the remaining branches would get stronger, and sometimes those cut bypasses would even become viable new Margaret plants.
Char's Pruning Spell glimmered faintly with platinum this time, a huge leap from its original strength. Where he used to require twenty tries to cut a healthy transplantable branch, now it happened on the first go. "Every extra healthy branch is another magic lightball!" And in this big family greenhouse, he had room to scale that benefit up—unlike Hogwarts' tiny plot.
Eyes glowing, Char lost all sense of time, focused fully on his cultivation work. It was deeply, quietly fun.
As he moved through the tasks, Char felt the change in his magic since before Hogwarts—his accomplishments filled him with new, vibrant energy. On his system panel, Loosening and Pruning Spells shone a little brighter, threads of platinum amongst the gold.
Elsewhere, Professor Sprout finally woke up from her "festive" Butterbeer slumber. Bleary-eyed, she spotted the lights beaming out from the greenhouse and shook her head, sighing fondly.
"That child… can't stop for even a day." Still, she smiled, feeling lighter than she had in years. In past Christmases, Sprout never came home—a single person in a cold house seemed sadder than staying at Hogwarts. The season always reminded her of old tragedies, but this year with Char home, it felt like she'd finally escaped from the worst kind of sorrow.
She focused, sitting at her writing desk and rustling out a fresh piece of parchment.
Disruptive Conclusions About Man-Eating Piranha Algae — and New Topics Derived Therefrom
It was the thesis she'd mentioned to Char earlier, on the verge of completion.
"If I can get this published…" she thought happily, "Char will become the talk of the academic herbology world."
While Sprout poured her heart into her thesis, days flew by.
Three days later, Char let out a long breath, stretching his sore arms. The Sprout greenhouse was huge, so reworking all the Margaret beds, even with much stronger magic, took him nonstop effort. But seeing the glowing sea of healthy Margaret filled him with satisfaction—the magic here was far richer and more harmonious, and the number of reward lights, thanks to his trimming, had shot up.
Some reward lights were smaller, true, but those extras meant more bonuses he wouldn't have gotten before. And as the plants matured in the improved soil, even the small ones still kept growing, shining brighter by the hour.
"Just another week," Char estimated. "Then these Margaret will be at their peak—twenty percent higher gains than before." Investing three days for a twenty percent boost was absolutely worth it to him.
The process had a bonus: casting Loosening and Pruning over and over leveled up his spell skills. His Loosening Spell had faint platinum highlights among the gold, on the verge of breaking through to platinum tier. Pruning progressed even faster, building on his improvement in the Shadowless Sword spell. Platinum light crept up the spell, covering almost half now.
"Just a little more," Char thought, "and I'll get a Pruning Spell breakthrough—a whole new, qualitative change. If I can keep developing my Shadowless Spell too, the pace should pick up even further." The progress in both rewards and ability made him downright giddy.
But when Char glanced at [Magic Perception Enhancement] on his system panel, his mood dropped. Since reaching gold level, further improvement had all but stopped, even as he poured energy into spells and monitored Margaret's magic for three days. Progress now was negligible.
He thought it over.
"I've probably hit my body's talent limit for magical perception. Without the system's rewards, I'd never improve from here, no matter how hard I try." Maybe that's why Hogwarts professors sometimes looked at him with a hint of regret.
"Talent is a real barrier sometimes," Char admitted. But for him, thanks to the planting system, that ceiling was just an illusion—no real cage at all.
With that sorted in his mind, Char started thinking ahead. "Once Christmas is over, we should get access to new greenhouse plots. Quirrell's been trying to probe me and failing; he'll probably move to getting information from Hagrid soon, just like the story. Which means the dragon egg phase isn't far off." Char's eyes lit up.
Blood Jade was a silver-level plant that required magically potent blood. "With my silver-level blood-forming ability, maybe I'll finally unlock legendary lifeforce growth, edging a step closer to true mythical power." Plus, there was the Whomping Willow plan to think about—he needed to decide which subproject to tackle first.
Filled with ideas, Char stepped outside, craving fresh air. When he re-entered the house, he spotted Liz the house-elf nodding off while standing at attention by the spotless dinnerware cabinet. As soon as Char's footsteps sounded out, Liz jerked awake with a gasp.
"Liz is asleep?!" Liz wailed, mortified.
"The master hasn't slept, the young master hasn't slept, but Liz fell asleep! Bad Liz, lazy Liz!" In a panic, Liz began to bash her head against the floor in shame.
Char winced—self-punishing house-elves always made him uneasy. "If I don't give Liz something to do, she'll knock herself out!" he realized.
Quickly, Char intervened. "Liz, make me a bed. And please heat up some bath water—I need a bath and some rest."
Liz immediately brightened.
"Liz has work! I'm on it—right away!" And with a pop, she darted off to her tasks.
Not long after, Char soaked in a steaming hot bath, relaxing fully for the first time in days. Warmed by the water and the boost to his water-magic, his mind worked quickly, planning.
"Aunt Sprout gave three options to start with for the Whomping Willow project: Light-Eating Vine, Shadow Thorn, and Devil's Snare." She knew about his work with the guardian tree, but she still thought these projects would be tougher. That meant even the lowest reward here would probably be silver-level, maybe even a hint of gold.
He pulled out Sprout's letter, reading about the three plants.
The Light-Eating Vine was a magical plant drawn to darkness, always shrouded by a shadow so thick that no light spell could pierce it. In the darkness, it struck silently—predatory and deadly.
As Char's knowledge grew, a blinking line appeared before his eyes:
Graft Light-Eating Vine roots: Concealed Breath (Bronze Level)
Grow to maturity: Aura Concealment (Silver), Assassination Skill Boost (Black Iron)
...
But Char shook his head. "Concealment and assassination? Not my style."
Next, he considered Shadow Thorn. These almost blended with the shadows, and their attacks left wounds that were hard to heal.
Transplant Shadow Thorn roots: Shadow Enhancement (Bronze), Ripped Wound (Iron)
Grow to maturity: Shadow Increase (Silver), Torn Wound (Bronze)
...
Shadow enhancement piqued Char's interest—it sounded like an upgrade to his water-hold ability, and stacking two such traits could give him a real edge. The torn wound effect also appealed to him—a bonus effect for all attacks, like his Shadowless Sword spell.
Still, growing Shadow Thorn wasn't easy. It required constant casting of the Disillusionment Charm, a spell related to advanced Transfiguration—most students didn't learn it until sixth year at Hogwarts. Char was still a long way from mastering that spell.
He sighed. "It'll have to wait. I'll try again in a few years."
Now only Devil's Snare remained. In his previous life, he remembered its traits from the story: afraid of light and fire, it strangled anything unfortunate enough to fall in. Combining Sprout's notes with his memories, he analyzed all its properties.
He gazed at the Devil's Snare root, thinking,
"Please let the rewards for this be at least halfway decent. Otherwise, I'll be stuck with the Light-Eating Vine."
As lines of system text from Devil's Snare appeared before Char's eyes, a tiny chime sounded.
"Hm?"
"What's this?"