The streamlined bottle was about the length of his finger, its golden cap tightly sealing pale blue liquid inside.
This was the calming draught that Professor McGonagall had left behind, with just a small amount remaining.
Sterling held it up to eye level, examining it carefully. The liquid was completely pure, crystal clear like water, yet quite viscous. When he removed the cap, there was a faint, barely noticeable sweetness in the aroma.
This was a potion from the magical world.
Sterling pressed his left hand against his chest. Thick mist rose where his fingers touched the fabric. He reached through the swirling vapor and withdrew another bottle entirely.
This second bottle was wider at the bottom and narrower at the top, sealed with a traditional cork stopper. The liquid inside was extremely thick, almost like porridge or yogurt. Its color was a deeply unsettling green, so dark it appeared nearly black.
When he carefully loosened the cork slightly, a pungent odor escaped. Sterling immediately pressed the stopper back down firmly.
This potion came directly from Lady Maleficent's vast treasury... a brew from the dream world.
Of course, there were countless varieties of potions, and these two served completely different purposes. One couldn't make fair comparisons blindly. A calming draught versus a curse potion that could turn a healthy adult to stone with a single drop? Absolutely incomparable.
Placing the two bottles side by side on his table, Sterling felt genuinely surprised. He found it strange that he hadn't noticed anything unusual while drinking the calming draught earlier.
His deep blue eyes focused intently on an almost invisible thread... a short gray strand no longer than half a fingernail, floating within the pale blue liquid.
This was "magical energy"... or rather, something Sterling believed represented "magical energy."
Honestly, before receiving his Hogwarts letter, he had never truly understood what his eyes could perceive. Those few people whose bodies contained visible threads had once been dismissed by him as simple hallucinations.
After all, he couldn't see such phenomena in the dream world, and objects brought from there to the waking world didn't display them either.
However, comparing the threads rising from buildings throughout Diagon Alley with the ones now visible in these potions, Sterling suspected he might have fundamentally misunderstood their nature.
This was probably not magical energy at all, but something else entirely.
Currently, available information was far too limited for Sterling to properly define his unusual ability. After all, threads in living beings clearly differentiated Muggles from wizards, but in inanimate objects, their presence seemed completely irregular.
Buildings, especially very ancient ones like Gringotts and Ollivander's wand shop, contained the most threads. Remarkably, Ollivander's shop alone accounted for nearly a third of all the threads visible throughout Diagon Alley, which was quite startling.
Other magical items displayed some threads. Potions showed a few, but he'd seen none on the flying broomsticks in the Quidditch supply shop, nor in any of the magical books. Wands represented a special case entirely.
Sterling withdrew his new wand and laid it carefully on the table. At the tip, he discovered a short, incredible thread... almost just a tiny dot of light.
He was absolutely certain that before purchasing this wand, it had contained no thread whatsoever. Only after casting his first spell had this minuscule thread appeared.
All the wands stored in Ollivander's shop boxes had been completely threadless.
Wands carried by various wizards throughout Diagon Alley displayed varying thread lengths and sizes, generally matching their owner's magical signature colors.
For example, Professor McGonagall's wand had displayed a very distinct orange thread.
Sterling sighed deeply.
He realized he had been far too impatient. This mystery was not something he could easily solve immediately. In other words, he had been reaching beyond his current capabilities.
In the waking world, he remained merely an unregistered magical novice.
Of course, once he accumulated sufficient magical knowledge and experience, he would return with determination to persistently investigate this fascinating matter.
Sterling gently pushed the dream world's potion back against his chest and threw it through the bursting mist into Lady Maleficent's distant treasury. He sincerely hoped the cork was secure enough not to pop loose, or she might greet him with a fireball during their next meeting.
His primary reason for retrieving it had been to test whether his unusual ability had changed in any way. The result remained identical. Dream world items brought to the waking world showed no threads, displaying only a faint, mysterious glow.
Sterling rummaged through the pile of new textbooks in his shopping bag...
Finally locating "Magical Drafts and Potions."
Upon seeing the complete book title, Sterling realized that in the magical world, drafts and potions were considered two distinctly different categories.
Since potions had sparked his curiosity, he decided to begin learning about magical world brewing techniques, conveniently getting an early start on first-year coursework.
But after reading just a few pages, his eyebrows nearly knitted together in complete frustration.
First, the potion liquid had to be heated until it turned blue? Add exactly six pieces of dried nettle... they even required precise measuring to ensure all six pieces weighed exactly the same, with strict requirements regarding stirring direction... even the specific crushed consistency of snake fangs affected the final results?
There were also rigorous heat control requirements and exact simmering durations...
This approach was entirely opposite to Sterling's previous understanding of potion brewing. He had personally witnessed his fairy godmother creating magical brews.
"First, we add a little bit of love!"
She had plucked a random wildflower from her hair and tossed it carelessly into the boiling water. Sterling remembered clearly that this was simply a common wildflower picked from the roadside with absolutely no actual connection to "love."
"Then add a spoonful of salt. Of course, apprentices need to measure properly with a spoon, but an experienced master like me... oh dear, I accidentally added too much."
Sterling had watched helplessly as the entire salt container lid fell directly into the pot, along with the jar's complete contents, swirling chaotically in the bubbling water.
"Then we kick it twice to distribute the heat evenly!"
With one powerful kick, she sent the entire cauldron flying off the fire and crashing into the wall with a tremendous bang. An old, damaged wooden board immediately fell from the ceiling, floating alongside the salt jar lid in the murky mixture.
"Oh no, I completely forgot to add water during the brewing process... Let me think, three times, three spoonfuls each time? Perfect, so here are nine spoonfuls all at once."
She conjured an enormous bucket the length of Sterling's entire forearm from a simple leaf, scooped it full directly from the nearby river, and poured everything in. Sterling could swear those qualified as "nine giant spoonfuls."
"Add dragon teeth..."
She casually pulled a tooth from a poor gecko that happened to be passing by.
"And phoenix fire... hmm? Why isn't this phoenix breathing flames? Never mind, I'll just add the whole phoenix. Probably achieves the same effect."
That unfortunate old hen certainly never imagined dying because she was mistakenly identified as a phoenix.
"Finally! Add the Archmage's blessing! There, an absolutely perfect pot of luck potion!"
She pulled a single hair from her own head and tossed it into the mixture. Sterling stared at the resulting "potion"... dried hair strands, a dead and completely featherless chicken that refused to sink, a clearly rotted wooden board, and sand carried in by the river water scooped directly from the source. Everything looked absolutely horrible, with the salt jar lid surprisingly representing the most acceptable ingredient.
The most terrifying part came later. After casually giving that dubious "potion" to a homeless man encountered by the roadside, the next time Sterling visited the dream world, he discovered that same homeless man had become the wealthiest person in the entire kingdom by discovering an ancient treasure... on the very day he drank the potion.
Since that remarkable demonstration, Sterling had learned this unconventional potion brewing method directly from his fairy godmother.
According to her explanation, she simply believed that her actions could bring people genuine good fortune, so she created luck potions accordingly.
If she truly wanted, she claimed she could brew a perfect healing elixir even by mixing the two most deadly poisons in the known world.
But it seemed this magical approach wouldn't work at all in the conventional wizarding world.
Looking at these incredibly complicated procedural steps, if he dared to magically spin his cauldron like a spinning top while stirring potions during actual Potions class, he would probably be expelled immediately... if the professor felt particularly merciful.
More likely, they would simply treat him exactly like a spinning top.
Sterling swallowed nervously, making a firm decision to carefully train his self-control. He absolutely could not rely on muscle memory from the dream world anymore.