There was no need to wait for Edward's return—or rather, Edward likely didn't even know there was such a law regarding owls.
Cohen had already found this passage in his newly purchased History of Magic.
Due to the prevalence and uncontrollability of owl communication, owls were classified as vulnerable magical creatures after the International Statute of Secrecy was enacted in 1692.
Simultaneously, the "Owl Purchase Contract" was introduced, requiring owl trainers and those involved in owl sales to ensure that every owl in circulation was bound by a spell to prevent erratic escape, disappearance, or betrayal.
Cohen's experiment was a resounding success. Simply by mentally "forbidding" the Count to speak, the Count was effectively unable to utter a single word.
"Congratulations, you may live to be my messenger,"
Cohen announced to the Count cheerfully, silently forbidding the Count to utter any words about Cohen being a Dementor.
Perhaps the Count had no such intentions, but Cohen chose to proceed cautiously. This way, he not only possessed a talking owl but also protected his identity from being inadvertently revealed.
In the days that followed, Cohen repeatedly asked the Cohen why the owl could speak.
But the Cohen always gave the same story.
In it, the owl lived in a dilapidated, attic-style lighthouse with an old man named John (the Cohen said: "There's an old man named John on every street"). Old John carved wooden sculptures year after year, while the Cohen would fly away with the sculptures, discarding them into the forest.
"John must have carved hundreds of them, and I had to fly out several times a day. Unfortunately, although I originally wanted to make a spacious nest, the sculptures were always found by people who got lost in the forest—and lost people always found the lighthouse."
The Cohen smacked his beak. The owl had just returned from the window, the bright moonlight shimmering on its wings.
It sounded like something out of a fairy tale: a lighthouse guiding those lost in the forest, a silent wooden carving of an old man, a talking owl...
"Am I some gullible-looking brat?" Cohen stared with dead eyes at the Cohen on the windowsill, feasting on a vole he'd snatched from nowhere.
"Isn't it—I mean, coo—the idea of birds talking is inherently fairy-tale-like, and this story fits the situation perfectly." The Count had smeared the windowsill with blood. "
Don't worry, there are plenty of talking things in the magical world,"
Cohen waved his wand.
"Clean it up."
"My midnight snack!" the Cohen let out an indescribable scream.
[Ding! Sin Points +1]
Looking at the clean windowsill and the Cohen, who had flown away again, deciding to eat his next midnight snack right there, Cohen climbed into bed contentedly.
Over a month before school, Cohen had already reviewed every spell in "The Standard Book of Spells, Elementary."
The spells these young wizards learned were mostly elementary ones like Fire, Slice, and Levitate. The more practical ones were Repair and Descaling.
These were relatively easy. Although the textbooks included digital models of the magic behind each spell, it was clear that this wasn't something a normal student would study. No eleven-year-old would learn about three-dimensional function models, not even Cohen.
"Imagine it this way: someone finally travels to the magical world, excitedly entering Hogwarts, and then a student passing by on the left says, 'Hey, did you follow the class today? I didn't quite understand the polynomial fitting.' The student passing by on the right replies, 'I understand this. Suppose your initial magic power usage is x, and the final step-by-step magic power output is y. Then, using y = a + bx + cx + dx...' How despairing would that traveler be..."
Cohen told himself a joke.
This was definitely not a reason to not study seriously. After all
, while the theory of these spells was scientific, the methods of execution were quite idealistic.
All he had to do was wave his wand according to the prescribed gestures in the textbook, chant the incantation, and mentally visualize the spell's effect—and boom! The spell was cast!
The only difficulty might be memorizing the spell and the corresponding gestures.
Perhaps, as he gained more experience casting spells, he could dispense with the spells and gestures altogether—even the wand.
But for now, the only book Cohen could legitimately study on his own was "The Standard Book of Spells, Elementary," because Edward and Rose had both emphasized that young wizards shouldn't learn too many spells too early. Without a teacher's guidance and supervision, young wizards could easily mess up a simple spell.
Even adult wizards could stumble, as happened to a wizard named Baruffio who pronounced an 'f' as an 's' and found himself lying on the floor with a bison standing on his chest.
So, during the day, Cohen practiced only this standard textbook, and at night...
Cohen, of course, practiced the "Complete Collection of Positive Spells," which he'd bought from the Goodwill Store for 250 Goodwill points.
The first three chapters of the spell book were manageable for Cohen, but when it came to the advanced spells like the Existential Curse and the Bubblehead Curse at the beginning of Chapter 4, Cohen was completely stumped.
Perhaps because they required a higher level of magical proficiency, Cohen's attempts were limited to a superficial exploration, limited to just flipping through the book for visual enjoyment. (To help young wizards more intuitively understand the effects of spells, the textbooks included animated illustrations next to the spells, with the spell tester repeatedly casting or being cast upon the corresponding spell.)
Over the next month, Cohen had planned to reveal to Harry that he was also a new student at Hogwarts, to please him.
However, Harry hadn't visited Cohen since moving back from the island with the Dursleys. Even the one time he ran into Cohen, he'd only awkwardly greeted him and fled in panic.
Cohen almost thought Harry had discovered he was a Dementor.
And so, the holiday passed in a flash, and Cohen was woken up early in the morning by Rose.
"Today is your first day of school, and Mommy must dress you up beautifully--"
Rose lovingly fixed Cohen's hair and clothes.
"Mom, this is what you say when you dress up a girl."
Cohen said embarrassedly, but he did not break free from Rose's hand, even though Rose tried to pin a pink bow tie on Cohen's collar.
"It doesn't look good with your hair..."
Rose threw the pink bow tie aside in disappointment.
"These things will have to be changed into school uniforms when Cohen arrives at school." Edward leaned against the door and said in a wise tone.
"Huh?" Rose only used a look to make Edward shut up and go downstairs to prepare breakfast.
The entire journey, Cohen felt the discomfort of her corseted dress. He watched Rose, in the passenger seat, occasionally wiping tears with a handkerchief as her child left her for at least a semester.
"Hogwarts will take good care of the child. Didn't we get through it that way?" Edward consoled her. For
a moment, the sight made Cohen feel like she wasn't going to school, but getting married.
Arriving at King's Cross Station, Cohen followed Edward and Rose through the wall separating platforms nine and ten, arriving at platform nine and three-quarters.
The scarlet steam train stopped at the platform, surrounded by a dreamy mist. Amid the bustling crowd, the noise of children and the shouts of some imprudent parents could be heard everywhere.
"When you go to school, you must abide by the school rules. Don't go to dangerous places, don't go against professors, study hard, eat more, drink more water, write to us once a week with the Earl, and you must be sorted into Gryffindor. If you dare to go to Slytherin, I will put your-" "
Okay, Rose, aren't you afraid that Cohen will jump out of the car and escape halfway - it doesn't matter which college he goes to, right?" Edward hurriedly stopped Rose, who was talking without restraint due to anxiety.
Edward then knelt down and rubbed Cohen's head.
"Cohen, just enjoy school and don't put too much pressure on yourself. Hogwarts classes are pretty easy—at least easier than Smelting."
"Got it. I can dress, go to the bathroom, eat, and glue myself. Don't worry, Mom and Dad."
Cohen quietly tugged at his collar, which was almost choking, and quickly fled onto the train.
Outside, Rose leaned on Edward's shoulder, watching Cohen speed through the train window with a look of relief and tears in her eyes.
"Edward, remember when we first met on the train?"
"Yes," Edward froze. "I was being bullied by some bad kids."
"Those were just wimps," Rose said nostalgically.
"You chased them away and then beat me up," Edward said with a twitch of his lips.
"It's because you were a sniveling wimp, and I can't stand wimps." Rose leaned closer to Edward's face. "But... there's something different about you."
"Hmm?"
"You're the wimp who dared to raise a Dementor with me." Rose kissed Edward. "Cohen's going to be okay, right?"
"Of course not. He's a good kid." Edward's face flushed red where he'd been kissed. "Hogwarts has Dumbledore, and... when we went to buy school supplies, he told me I was a good dad."
"Evil Dementors can't have 'love,' right?" Rose said worriedly. "Cohen loves us, which means..."
"It means he's more of a human being." Edward patted Rose's back.
Meanwhile
, Harry wanted Uncle Vernon to wait a moment before leaving.
"Boy, I don't have time for your nonsense," Uncle Vernon said grumpily, waiting by the car. "Dally has to go to the hospital. You only have two minutes—"
Harry, having received permission, had already rushed to the Cohens' door and knocked hastily.
A few days ago, Harry had longed to share all these new things with Coin: the owls and letters, the giants, the wondrous magic…
all the magical things that had suddenly come to mind on his birthday.
But Hagrid had told Harry not to tell any Muggles about magic—not even his closest friends.
So Harry had been avoiding Coin, fearing he'd burst out in a fit of rage if he asked.
Furthermore, Harry couldn't bear to think about the pain of knowing his friends were magical and he wasn't.
But before leaving Privet Drive, Harry finally decided to say goodbye to Coin.
"Coin, I'm going to another school, but I'll definitely come back. We'll always be good friends, right?"
Harry repeated his prepared farewell speech as he waited for Coin to open the door.
Sadly, no one opened the door.
"Ha, boy, do you think the Norton kid will be waiting for you to say goodbye at the start of school? No one wants to hang out with someone like you," Uncle Vernon sarcastically said from a distance, venting his anger at Harry. "If it weren't for that damn pigtail, Dudley wouldn't have needed to delay his enrollment—"
Harry ignored Uncle Vernon's words. He sullenly got into the car, glancing towards Coin's bedroom one last time. He felt the joy of starting school couldn't overcome the feeling of a missing piece in his heart.
Meanwhile
, Coin, having found an empty compartment at the rear of the car, impatiently shoved his suitcase next to the seat, slammed the door shut, and began to laboriously unbutton his taut collar.
My god, a mother's love was suffocating.
And why did a species like him, clearly labeled a Dementor, even have to breathe? Was it because his flesh and blood were so weak?
"You look like a werewolf in heat, about to invade me."
The Count tilted his head, watching Coin undress.
"You're like a perverted alchemist peeping at children,"
Cohen retorted mercilessly.
Finally, Cohen changed into his school robes ahead of time, determined to cast a subtle swelling charm on the tight dress before returning to school, lest he be murdered by a garment and enduring infamy.
Rose had handed him a jingling bag of pocket money before leaving, because the train had a small cart selling snacks, and children often preferred these magically processed treats to the dry lunch boxes their parents left in their boxes.
However, Cohen figured there was no need to spend his allowance today, as a wealthy man with a wave of his hand, who offered "I want it all," was about to arrive in the carriage at the end of the train.
"Hello, can I sit—Cohen?!"
Harry pushed open the door to the carriage, and after seeing who was sitting there, he froze in the aisle.
"Excuse me, we need to go over," a student in the opposite carriage, about to relieve himself, reluctantly warned Harry when he saw him blocking the way.
"Oh—ok—sorry..." Harry turned around and apologized quickly, dragging his trunk into the carriage. His movements were so rough that Hedwig in the cage on top of the trunk let out a protest cry.
Coin noticed that after Hedwig appeared, the Earl's eyes never left the pure white snowy owl.
"Don't even think about it. I don't even have a heroine yet, why are you trying to snatch her away!" Coin whispered a threat to the Earl.
The Earl glanced at Cohen with contempt, as if to say, "What can you do to me if I go to the owl shed to have an affair with other birds at night?"
"Coin! I thought you—no, I thought—" Harry felt that he was even stumbling over his words.
"Wow—what a coincidence, Harry, you are also coming to Hogwarts to study." Coin said seriously.
"You're a little slow on your feet..." Harry felt his expression gradually froze. "I've been sitting in my seat for thirty seconds."
"I'm really not very good at sentimentalizing," Cohen sighed. "You haven't come to see me for the past month, and I was thinking of telling you a little bit about the wizarding world—" "
But Hagrid said not to tell Muggles—you didn't know I was a wizard back then, did you?" Harry asked anxiously and confusedly.
"Who is Hagrid?" Cohen asked decisively.
Harry, opening the conversation, launched into a long, rambling account of his own birthday adventures.
Eleven-year-olds are so easy to manipulate; a little bit of enticement will make them forget their original goal.
As expected, Cohen didn't have to say anything himself. Listening was more effective than talking, especially when the snack cart hadn't arrived yet.
Support me for my semester fee....
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(End of this chapter)