Harry Potter and the Way of Reason

J.K. Rowling is 87% confident that you will burst into flames. [2]

Roger Bacon, who lived in the thirteenth century, is considered one of the earliest proponents of the scientific method.Giving a record of his experiments to a scientist is like giving a pen to an author, not Shakespeare's pen, but the pen of the man who had a hand in inventing writing itself.

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It's not every day that you see Harry Potter beseeching someone else.

"Please—you," pleaded Harry Potter.

Fred and George still smiled and shook their heads.

A pained expression appeared on Harry Potter's face. "But I told you how I worked out the Kevin Entwistle cat thing, and Hermione and Vanishing Soda, and I can't tell you about the Sorting Hat or Remembramble or Professor Snape... ..."

Fred and George shrugged and turned to leave.

"If you really want to know what's going on," said the Weasley twins, "don't forget to tell us."

"You are bad! Both of you are bad!"

Fred and George firmly closed the door to the empty classroom behind them, maintaining a smirk for a while, in case Harry Potter had the clairvoyance ability to see through the door.

As soon as they turned the corner, their faces drooped.

"Harry's guess is probably not—"

"—what hints for you?" they said to each other at the same time, and their shoulders slumped even lower.

Their last memory related to the incident was of Froome refusing to help, though they couldn't recall what they'd asked him to do...

...But they must have gone somewhere else, found someone else, done something illegal for them, or they wouldn't have agreed to be forgotten afterward.

How could they have done all that with a mere forty Galleons?

At first, they were worried that they might have faked the evidence too well so that Harry and Ginny were actually married... but it looks like they've thought about it.Minutes of the Wizengamot were changed back again, bogus engagement contracts disappeared from under the vaults of Gringotts, which had been guarded by dragons, and so on.Actually, it's scary.Now, the overwhelming consensus is that the Daily Prophet made up the whole story for some unknown reason, and the next day's headlines in The Quibbler were like rubbing salt in the wound, "Harry The Secret Marriage of Potter and Luna Lovegood.

They hope desperately that whoever they hire will speak for themselves when the constraints are over.Now they feel bad: they've pulled off the greatest prank ever, possibly the greatest prank ever, and can't remember how.It's crazy, if they figured it out in the first place, how come they can't when they know what they've done?

Their only consolation is that Harry Potter doesn't know that they don't.

Although it seemed that Weasley had something to do with it, not even Mom had asked them.Whoever did what was clearly beyond the capabilities of a Hogwarts student... except maybe someone.If some rumors are true, this so-and-so may have done it all with a snap of his fingers.After all, according to Harry, he was the one who was interrogated under Veritaserum... With Dumbledore present and staring at him with terrifying eyes, the Aurors only asked a few questions to confirm that Harry himself did not do it himself, nor did he. Get the hell out of Hogwarts without missing anyone.

Fred and George had considered whether to be insulted that Harry Potter had been interrogated by Aurors for their prank, but the look on Harry's face, perhaps for the same reason, made it all worth it.

As expected, both Rita Skeeter and the editor of the Daily Prophet have disappeared, presumably in some other country now.They want to be able to at least talk about that part with their families.Dad would congratulate them, but before then Mom would kill them and Ginny would burn the bodies to ashes.

But that's okay, they'll tell Dad someday.As for now...

…As for now, when Dumbledore passed them in the corridor, he happened to sneezed, and a small package happened to fall out of his pocket. Inside the package was a pair of anti-surveillance devices of astonishing quality. Monocle.The Weasley twins experiment with the new monocle in the "forbidden" third-floor corridor, making a quick trip back and forth to where the magic mirror was placed.They hadn't been able to see all of the surveillance grid clearly, but the monocle showed much more than they had seen the first time.

Of course, they will be very careful not to be found with the monocle in their hands, otherwise they will be scolded in the principal's office and may even be threatened with expulsion.

Not everyone who gets sorted into Gryffindor grows up to be Professor McGonagall, which is good to know.

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Harry sat at a table in a windowless, featureless white room, facing a deadpan man in an all-black dress robe.

The room has been shielded from monitoring, and the man cast a full 27 spells before saying the opening line, "Hello, Mr. Potter".

Considering that the man in the black robe was about to attempt to read Harry's mind, the atmosphere was fitting.

"Get ready," he said in a flat tone.

In the human mind, Harry's Occlumency book says, only the surface can be seen by the Legilimency.If you don't protect the surface of yourself, Legilimators can go through and reach any part their mind can comprehend...

...that's actually not much.The human mind seems incomprehensible to humans at all but the most superficial levels.Harry had wondered if his familiarity with cognitive science would make him a super-powerful Legiliminator, but repeated experience had taught him a lesson: he couldn't get too excited about estimating such things .After all, cognitive scientists don't know enough about humans to create a new one.

In order to learn the counter-curse of Legilimency—Occlumency, the first step is to imagine yourself as another person, perfect the disguise as much as possible, and completely integrate yourself into another personality.You don't need to do this step every time, but in the beginning, it will give you a sense of the whole surface of yourself.Legilimensers will try to read you, and if you pay attention enough, you'll notice—feel like they're trying to get in.And it's your job to make sure they only get access to the imagined personality, not the real one.

When you've gotten good enough at this step, imagine yourself as a very simple person, pretending to be a rock, and then make it a habit to leave that pretense on all surfaces.This is a standard Occlumency barrier.Pretending to be a rock is hard to learn, but easy to do once you learn it.At this time, the level of thought exposed in the brain is much shallower than its content, so after enough practice, you can maintain this state unconsciously.

If you are a perfect Occlumencyist, you can respond to all questions immediately, faster than any temptation.That way, when Legilimency walks through your surface, they'll only see the person you're trying to impersonate.

Even the best Legilimency master can be fooled by this method.Even if a perfect Occlumency practitioner claims to have removed the Occlumency Barrier, there is no way to verify that they are not lying.Worse, you might not even know if the other person is the perfect Occlumency practitioner.They are rare, but exist.Therefore, one cannot blindly believe in the Legilimency cast on anyone.

You can fool the best Legilimency by pretending to be someone else.This sadly illustrates how little humans know about each other, and how little wizards understand beneath the surface of thought.

But humans originally rely on camouflage to understand each other.We don't predict other people's behavior by simulating the trillions and billions of neuron synapses in the brain.Even the most manipulative people on the planet will struggle to build artificial intelligence.We predict by ordering the brain to imitate the thinking of the other's brain, that is, empathy.If you want to know what an angry person will do, you activate the anger circuit in your brain, and the output of that circuit is your prediction.What does the neural circuit of anger look like from the inside?Who knows.The most mind-boggling people on the planet don't necessarily know what a neuron is.The best Legilimency probably doesn't know either.

Occlumency can disguise anything a Legilimency can understand.It's the same technique—probably processed by the same set of neural circuits, retooling your own brain to look like someone else's.

Therefore, the winner of the mind-reading battle is destined to be the defender.Otherwise, the entire wizarding world—perhaps the entire earth—would be completely different...

Harry took a deep breath and focused.There was a slight smile on his face.

Only once, and this time, did Harry not skimp on mystical abilities.

After almost a month of trying, Harry decided on a whim rather than a sudden decision to let himself go coldly into a rage and do the Occlumency exercises from the book all over again.He had almost given up by then, but it wouldn't take much effort to try—

He solved all the hardest exercises in the book in two hours, and the next day, he went to tell Professor Quirrell that he was ready.

As it turns out, his dark side is very, very good at pretending to be someone else.

Harry thought of the standard trigger memory that brought him fully into his dark side for the first time...

Severus paused, looking rather smug. "Is that...five points? No, it's better to take Ravenclaw off for talking back to you."

Harry's smile hardened a bit as he stared at the man in black who thought he was about to read Harry's thoughts.

And then Harry was a whole other person, someone who seemed to fit the occasion.

… He was sitting at a table in a windowless, featureless white room, facing a deadpan man in an all-black dress robe.

Kimber Gennison watched the black-robed man who thought he was about to read the mind of a Lensman from Phase 3 of the Galactic Patrol. [[-]]

Kimber Gennison is confident in the outcome, even if it's an understatement.He was trained by the most powerful minded being in this universe, or any universe, the Minta of Alicia. [4] The one sitting across from him was just a wizard, and the Gray Lens Man let him see whatever he wanted to see...

...his current disguised mind is that of an innocent child named Harry Potter.

"I'm ready," Kimber Gennison said with just the right nervousness for an 11-year-old boy.

"Legiliency." The black-robed wizard said.

Then there was a pause.

The black-robed wizard blinked, as if what he saw could make his eyelids move involuntarily.As he spoke, there was an ups and downs in his voice: "Has a mysterious dark side to the Boy Who Lived?"

Harry's cheeks began to warm slowly.

"Well," said the man.His face was now perfectly calm. "I'm sorry. Mr. Potter, it's good to know your strengths, but it's not the same as being overconfident. You might actually be able to learn Occlumency at 11. I'm surprised. I thought Mr. Dumbledore was in Playing crazy. Your dissociative talents are really powerful,[6] so I was surprised to find no signs of your childhood abuse. You may end up being a perfect Occlumencyist. But expect It's a whole other thing to be able to successfully create an Occlumency barrier yourself for the first time, and you're just kidding. Did you feel anything when I read your mind?"

Harry shook his head, his face flushed.

"Then pay more attention next time. The goal is not to create an illusion of perfection on your first day of class. The goal is to learn where the surface of you is. Be prepared."

Harry tried to pretend he was Kimber Gennison again, tried to pay more attention, but his mind was a little scattered, and he was suddenly thinking of things he shouldn't be thinking...

Oh, this is downright bad.

Harry gritted his teeth.At least the teacher will be forgotten afterwards.

" Legilimency."

There was a pause—

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… He was sitting at a table in a windowless, featureless white room, facing a deadpan man in an all-black dress robe.

It was their fourth day of classes, and it was Sunday night.After paying so much money, you can take classes whenever you want, regardless of whether he is on weekends or not.

"Hello, Mr. Potter," said the Legilimency without hesitation after casting a full set of Privacy Charms.

"Hello, Mr. Best," said Harry wearily, "you don't have to be surprised every time you start, okay?"

"You surprised me?" the man said, sounding a little interested. "Okay." He raised his wand to meet Harry's eyes. "Legiliency."

There was a pause, and then the black-robed wizard raised his head sharply as if he had been stabbed by a bull spur.

"The Dark Lord is alive?" He choked, his eyes wide. "Dumbledore sneaked into the girls' dormitory after being invisible?"

Harry sighed, looking down at his watch.After about three seconds...

"So," said the man.He hadn't quite recovered his flat voice yet. "You really believe that you'll discover the secret rules of magic and become omnipotent."

"Yeah," Harry said quietly, still looking at his watch. "I'm just that conceited."

"I doubt it. It looks like the Sorting Hat thinks you'll be the next Dark Lord."

"And you know I'm trying not to go down that path, and you can see through Legilimency that we had a long discussion about whether you would teach me Occlumency, and you decided to do it, so we can end Has this been discussed?"

"Okay," he said after a full six seconds, exactly the same as last time. "Get ready." He paused, then said wistfully, "I wish I remembered that trick about gold and silver."

Harry found himself quite distraught at how reproducible the human mind is when you put people back into the same initial conditions and give them the same stimuli.A good reductionist should not have expected otherwise. [5]

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The next Monday morning, Harry stomped out of herbalism class in a bad mood.

Hermione was by his side, equally furious.

The rest of the kids were still inside, a little slow to pack, because they were chattering away at each other, excitedly discussing Ravenclaw's victory at the second Quidditch match of the school year.

It appears that after dinner last night, one of the girls rode the broom for three 10 minutes and caught some kind of giant mosquito.Nothing else that happened in that game seemed to matter.

Harry missed the exciting game because he had an Occlumency class and his life was full.

He also avoided all chatter in the Ravenclaw dormitory afterwards, the Silencing Charms and Magic Chests were so useful.He ate breakfast at the Gryffindor table.

But Harry couldn't avoid herbalism class, and the Ravenclaws talked before class, after class, and even during class, until Harry looked up from his job changing diapers for Fawkert babies,[7] Shout out that there are people out there who want to learn about plants, and the Snitch didn't grow out of nowhere, so please stop talking about Quidditch.Everyone else in the room looked at him in shock, with the exception of Hermione, who looked like she wanted to applaud, and Professor Sprout, who awarded him a Ravenclaw House point.

One point for Ravenclaw.

one cent.

Seven idiots playing stupid games on stupid broomsticks earned 190 points for Ravenclaw.

It appears that the Quidditch points are added directly to the house total.

In other words, catching a golden mosquito is worth 150 house points.

Harry couldn't even imagine what he would have to do to earn 150 house points.

Well, maybe save 150 Hufflepuffs, or come up with fifteen ideas comparable to "shielding a time machine", or invent fifteen hundred creative ways to kill people, or be a Hermione Granger all year.

"We should kill them," Harry said to Hermione.Hermione walked beside him, as annoyed as he was.

"Who?" Hermione asked. "The Quidditch team?"

"I'm thinking of anyone involved in Quidditch anywhere, in any way, but yes, starting with the Ravenclaw team."

Hermione pouted disapprovingly. "Do you really know it's wrong to kill, Harry?"

"Yes," Harry replied.

"Well, just to make sure," said Hermione, "let's start with the Seeker. I've read some Agatha Christie detective stories, do you know how we can get her on the train?"[8 ]

"Two students are plotting murder," came a dry voice. "What a shock."

From behind a nearby corner stepped a man in a slightly speckled robe, his hair greasy and unkempt, hanging around his shoulders.He seemed to be exuding mortal danger, filling the corridor with the aura of potion failures, accidental falls, and natural deaths that Auror judged to have happened on the bed.

Without thinking, Harry stood in front of Hermione.

There was a gasp behind him, and a moment later, Hermione stepped past him and stood in front of him. "Run, Harry!" she said, "Don't put boys in danger."

Severus Snape smiled darkly. "Interesting. I want to take a moment of your time, Potter, and hope you can get away from your flirting with Miss Granger."

Hermione's expression suddenly became very worried.She turned to Harry, opened her mouth, then paused, looking disturbed.

"Oh, don't worry, Miss Granger," Severus said in a silky voice, "I promise to return your lover whole." His smile faded away. "Now Potter and I are leaving for a private conversation, just the two of us. I hope I've made it clear that you're not invited, but just in case, please take it as a Hogwarts The professor's orders. I'm sure a good little girl like you wouldn't disobey the professor's orders."'

Severus turned and walked back to the corner. "Come on, Potter?" came his voice.

"Well," Harry said to Hermione, "can I just follow him away and let you figure out what I should say without making you very worried and angry?"

"No," said Hermione, her voice shaking slightly.

Severus' laughter echoed around the corner.

Harry looked down. "I'm sorry," he whispered, "really," and he followed the Potions Master away.

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"So," said Harry.Apart from the sound of two pairs of legs, one long and one short, passing through an unknown stone corridor, there was no other sound.The Potions professor was striding forward, but not so fast that Harry couldn't keep up. In Harry Potter's understanding of the concept of directionality within Hogwarts, they were gradually moving away from places where people came and went. "What's up?"

"Can I ask you to explain," Severus said dryly, "why the two of you conspired to murder Cho Chang?"

"Can I ask you to explain," said Harry dryly, "why, in your capacity as a senior member of the Hogwarts school system, catching a golden mosquito is considered a 150 Academic achievement by college points?"

A smile flicked across Severus' lips. "Geez, I thought you were supposed to be sharp. Do you really not understand your classmates, Potter? Or do you hate them so much that you don't even try? If your Quidditch points don't count towards the House If it were the House Cup, then no one would care about house points. The House Cup would become a niche competition, held only for students like you and Miss Granger."

This answer is surprisingly good.

The answer sent Harry's mind completely clear.

In retrospect, it shouldn't have been a surprise, Severus knew his students, very well.

He's been reading their heads.

and……

…The book says that successful Legilimency is extremely rare, even rarer than perfect Occlumency, because almost no one has enough mental self-control.

Mental self-control?

Harry once collected the story of a man who often lost control of his emotions in class, throwing tantrums at young children.

But... the same man, when Harry said that the Dark Lord was alive, responded instantly and perfectly - exactly as someone who knew nothing about it.

This man strutted about in Hogwarts, with the air of an assassin, radiating a dangerous aura...

...that's not what a true assassin should do at all.A real assassin should look like a wimpy little accountant until he kills you.

He was the head of Slytherin, a house full of pride and aristocrats, but he wore robes stained with stains of potions and potion ingredients, and 2 minutes of magic might be able to remove those stains.

Harry noticed he was confused.

His threat assessment of the head of Slytherin had risen to astronomical levels.

Dumbledore seems to think Severus is his man, and he has no evidence to refute that; the Potions professor has been as "scary, but not abusive" as he promised so far. .So, Harry had previously deduced, it was the same as The Fellowship of the Ring. [9] If Severus really planned to hurt him, he certainly wouldn't have come to Harry in front of Hermione - the witness - and he could have waited until Harry was alone...

Harry bit his lip quietly.

"I once knew a boy who really admired Quidditch," said Severus Snape, "and he was a complete jerk. As you and I, expected."

"What's the matter?" Harry said slowly.

"Don't worry, Potter."

Severus turned his head, and sneaked assassin-like into an opening in the wall of a nearby corridor, which led to a smaller, narrower corridor.

Harry followed him, wondering if it would have been wiser to just run away.

They turned one corner after another until they came to a dead-end alley with a simple blank wall at the end.If Hogwarts had been built instead of being magically conjured, or conjured, or born, or whatever, Harry would have paid someone to build something that didn't lead anywhere The corridor of the corridor has a good theory with the designer.

"Soundless," Severus said, and some other spell.

Harry leaned back, folded his arms over his chest, and stared into Severus' face.

"Potter, dare you look me in the eye?" said Severus Snape. "Your Occlumency lessons are unlikely to have progressed enough to allow you to block Legilimency. But perhaps the lessons have advanced to the point where you To be able to detect the extent of Legilimency intrusion. Since I can't be sure that's not the case, I won't take the risk." He smiled faintly, "I think Dumbledore is the same. That's why we're having this little talk now."

Harry's eyes widened involuntarily.

"First," said Severus, eyes sparkling, "I hope you promise not to tell anyone about our conversation. For the school, we're discussing your Potions homework. Believe it or not, it doesn't matter. Important. As far as Dumbledore and McGonagall were concerned, I was violating Draco Malfoy's trust in me, and neither of us felt that any further details should be discussed."

Harry's brain ran out of cache space trying to calculate the consequences and implications of the whole thing.

"How?" asked the Potions teacher.

"Okay," Harry said slowly.It's hard to imagine that talking and not being able to tell anyone is more constraining than having this conversation without talking.After all, you can't tell anyone about the conversation in the latter case either. "I promise."

Severus stared at Harry intently. "You once said in the headmaster's office that you would not tolerate bullying or abuse. So I want to know, Harry Potter. How much like your father really are?"

"If we're not talking about Michael Verres-Evans," said Harry, "I can only tell you that I know very little about James Potter."

Severus seemed to be nodding to himself. "There was a fifth-year Slytherin. A boy called Lysas Lestrange. He was being bullied by Gryffindors. I'm... restricted from dealing with situations like this. Maybe you Help him, if you want. I'm not asking for a favor, and I don't owe you a favor for it. It's just an opportunity for you to do what you want."

Harry stared at Severus, thinking.

"Want to know if this is a trap?" Severus said, a slight smile flickering on his lips. "It's not. It's a test. Consider it my curiosity. The trouble is real, and it's also true that I can't interfere with it myself."

That's the trouble with letting other people know you're a good person.Even if you know they do, you still can't sit idly by.

And if his father had protected the students from bullying...it didn't matter whether Harry knew why Severus had told him.His heart was warm and proud, and it made it impossible for him to just walk away.

"Okay," said Harry, "tell me about Lysas. Why is he being bullied?"

The thin smile on Severus' face disappeared. "Do you think there is a reason, Potter?"

"Probably not," said Harry quietly, "but it just crossed my mind that he might have pushed some unimportant Mudblood girl down the stairs."

"Lyza Lestrange's mother," said Severus, his voice icy, "is Bellatrix Black, the Dark Lord's most fanatical and wicked servant. Lysa Rabastan Lestrange's acknowledged illegitimate son. Shortly after the Dark Lord's death, Bellatrix, Rabastan, and Rabastan's brother Rudolphs were all arrested for torturing Alice and Frank Longbottom. The three were imprisoned for life in Azkaban. The Longbottoms were tortured to the point of losing their minds by repeated Cruciatus and kept in St. Mungo's long-term ward. Is this a reason to bully him, Potter? "

"None of these are excuses," said Harry, his voice still calm. "As far as you know, Lysas himself has done anything bad?"

A faint smile crossed Severus' lips again. "He's no more a saint than anyone else. But he didn't push a Mudblood girl down the stairs, at least I haven't heard of it."

"Not in his head either," Harry said.

Severus looked serious. "I'm not invading his privacy, Potter. On the contrary, I'm looking at the minds of Gryffindors. To the group, he's just a convenient diversion."

Cold anger ran down Harry's spine, and he had to remind himself that Severus might not be a reliable source of information.

"And you think," said Harry, "that an intervention from Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, might work."

"Indeed," said Severus Snape, before telling Harry when and where Gryffindor was planning to play their next mini-game.

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There is a main corridor across the north-south axis of the third floor of Hogwarts. Near the center of this corridor, there is an opening leading to a short corridor. Make an L-shaped turn, and then walk a dozen or so steps to the end. There is a bright, wide window. Looking out from the window, it is the East Lawn of Hogwarts three floors below, where it is raining lightly.You can't hear anything from the main hallway while standing by the window, and no one in the main hallway can hear what's going on by the window.If this seems odd to you, you haven't been at Hogwarts long enough.

Four boys in red-trimmed robes are laughing and one boy in green-trimmed robes is screaming and frantically trying to grab the edge of the open window with his hands as if to push him out like.Of course, this was only a joke; besides, a fall from such a height would not kill a wizard.It's just for fun.If there's anything weird about this--

"What are you doing??" Boy No.6's voice sounded from the corridor.

The four boys in the red-trimmed robes turned around suddenly, and the boy in the green-trimmed robe frantically pushed himself away from the window before falling to the ground, his face covered with tears.

"Oh," said the most handsome boy in the red-trimmed robe, sounding relieved, "it's you. Hey Lacey, do you know who this is?"

The boy on the floor didn't answer, he was trying to control his sobs, the boy in the red-trimmed robe was about to lift his leg up and kick down—

"Stop!" Boy No.6 yelled.

The boy in the red-trimmed robe stopped, shaking slightly. "Well," he said, "do you know who this is?"

No.6 boy's breathing sounded strange. "Lesas Lestrange," he gasped, "and he didn't do anything to my parents, and he was five years old."

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Neville Longbottom stared at the four tall fifth-year bullies in front of him, struggling to control his tremors.

He should have just told Harry Potter he couldn't.

"Why are you protecting him?" the handsome one said slowly, sounding confused and starting to feel a little upset. "He's a Slytherin. And he's Lestrange."

"He's just a boy who lost his parents," said Neville. "I know what it's like." He didn't know where the words came from.That sounds so cool, like something Harry Potter would say.

But he was still shaking.

"Who do you think you are?" said the handsome boy, sounding annoyed.

I am Neville, last heir to the ancient and noble House of Longbottom—

Neville couldn't tell.

"I think he's a traitor," said the other Gryffindor, and Neville's stomach suddenly sank.

He knows, he already knew.Harry Potter was wrong after all.Bullies weren't going to stop just because Neville Longbottom told them to.

The handsome boy took a step forward, followed by the other three.

"So you think so," Neville said in a steady voice that surprised even himself, "to you, it doesn't matter whether it's Lysas Lestrange or Neville Longbottom. "

Lysas Lestrange who was lying on the floor suddenly let out an exclamation.

"Evil is evil," snapped the boy who had spoken before, "and if you befriend evil, you are evil."

The four of them took another step forward.

Lesas staggered to his feet.He turned gray and walked forward