"What do you mean there is nothing wrong with me?"
Quinn was stunned to hear Alan's statement. Here he had been having trouble controlling his magic. Whenever he set his magic free, it would go berserk and hurt him in the process.
Just so that his magic doesn't go out of control, he had tortured himself and detached his emotions from himself. He had learned the very first day he had read upon the emotional aspect of occlumency that blocking his emotions for long periods was harmful. But, he still did it because it was the only way he could think.
Now, the old man in front of him was telling Quinn that he had nothing wrong with him.
"What the hell do you mean by that?"
Alan sighed at his student and explained.
"Quinn, I diagnosed you while you slept. I didn't find anything wrong with you," Alan raised his hand when Quinn tried to speak up. "I know your magic isn't under your control. But, that isn't a disease or injury."
"Then why is acting out and rampaging?"
"Before I answer that, let's go back to the start," Alan suggested and put up his first question. "Tell me, what do you think happened to you?"
"I was clearly under the control of magic or curse. It all started when I fell unconscious in the vault," Quinn recalled the time when he returned to his dormitory. "It lowered my inhibitions. I did plenty of things that I wouldn't do. Plus, vault made it so that I won't return to it for exploration. I was planning to return to the vault but changed my mind and didn't visit. I was clearly under some kind of mental curse..."
Quinn trailed off at the end and then raised his voice at Alan.
"Why in the bloody name of magic didn't occlumency work?! I regularly spend time on that damn magic. Why didn't it work for months, months!"
"Hmm, tell me, Quinn, what is your current system of occlumency defense?" Alan asked a question from his student. He already knew the answer to the question. But was walking his student through the process so that he would arrive at the answer.
"It hasn't changed from the time we ended our lesson," said Quinn. He wondered why Alan was asking him the question. "A shield layer built under a defense layer, with another set of the same configuration following under the first set."
"Correct, and I have to say that you have made noteworthy progress in strengthening your shields. They have grown quite a bit since the time I taught you." Alan gave Quinn praise on his progress before asking. "Now, let me ask you this. Do you think that right now, I am inside your mind?"
"Definitely," Quinn replied almost immediately. He knew his teacher's personality. He had spent a couple of years under his tutelage, and he was sure that Alan was in his mind the entire time.
"Did you sense me entering? Or can you feel me operating legilimency right now?"
"... No, but where are you going with this," asked Quinn. He wasn't following whatever Alan was trying to show him.
Alan sighed before he said, "Quinn, with your current system of occlumency, you won't be able to detect anything as long as they get past your shield. If someone or in this case something passes through your defenses, you will have no idea that they are inside."
"Your defenses will tell you that there is an incoming attack if they are strong enough, but once the attack is inside, your defenses won't do squat." Alan folded his hands on his lap and continued, "Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with the system you are following. You can build your defenses until they are at my level. There is no limit there, but your system of occlumency defenses doesn't have any other feature beyond that. Your defenses won't do something that it wasn't designed for."
Alan pointed at himself and said, "If someone manages to break past my covering shields, that doesn't mean my defense is over. I have various fail-safes present beyond that to protect my mind." He pointed at Quinn and continued, "You, on the other hand, have nothing other than your detection layers and shields. You have the castle and the manor inside, and you have sorted the memories in a way that even if someone gets past your defenses, they would have a mighty difficult time to get to the memory they are looking."
"And, while I was teaching you, we never went over the possibility of something like this happening. We worked on legilimens breaking into your mind to get access to your memories. We never worked on something like this that would target you in such a way that would alter your personality." Alan paused and stated, "You don't have a way to protect your mind from being manipulated like this."
"B-But, I-I worked hard on t-this," Quinn was shocked to hear that his defenses were useless. He wasn't expecting to hear that after the time and effort he put on his occlumency.
"I know you worked hard. Your defense-aspect and your efficiency-aspect have grown beyond what I had thought you would be able to accomplish at your current age. I can assure you that your progress is quick, and other than myself and some select individuals, your speed of progress is second to none."
Then came the 'but' of the sentence.
"But... your progress in the emotional-aspect is lacking. While you are able to detach your emotions so that become nothing but a buzz at the back of your head, and that allowed you to keep your magic in check all this time..."
Alan had seen the memories, and with his level of legilimency, he didn't just watch the memories like a film and was able to feel what Quinn was feeling during his memories.
"...You have done nothing to make sure that your emotions won't be manipulated. The one to blame here is time. You just didn't have enough time to devote to the emotional-aspect while you learned other magic."
When Alan said Quinn's progress was below himself and some other individuals, he didn't consider that Quinn devoted time not just to occlumency but various other fields of magic.
Quinn had recovered from the reeling shock that his occlumency had failed him because he hadn't designed it sufficiently.
"...Shields."
Quinn said something that Alan wasn't able to hear, so he leaned forward and asked. "Pardon, I didn't get that."
"Shields, you said my shields are strong. Why didn't they stop the magic from entering my mind? Even if my emotional-aspect occlumency was lacking, my defense-aspect was strong enough to block out an attack."
Alan nodded to that question and gathered his thoughts to answer. "Friar? was that his name. Yes, Friar. The ghost who gave you the riddle said that another ghost had ceased to exist because of that vault. What did you think about that?"
"That the vault was harmful to ghosts, what about it? I am not a ghost," said Quinn. He would have answered better if he was in another time, but right now, Quinn was defending his occlumency.
"Alright, what are ghosts?" asked Alan.
"A ghost is the imprint of the soul of a once-living magical, and as such, a type of spirit. These fleshless spirits are either afraid of death or have some extremely potent connection to the locations they haunt." Quinn gave him the textbook definition of a ghost.
Alan smiled as the words were right there. "Exactly, they are imprints of souls. Imprints of souls have similar properties as actual souls. You get what I am talking, right?"
Quinn gave it a thought, and after some time, he exhaled.
"The curse was soul-based. Is that what you are talking about?"
Alan made a face that said, 'kind of, but not really.'
"The curse was emotion-based, but I can safely conclude that the curse definitely had a soul aspect. It might as well have been the entry point as after that your neither your mind nor soul had no defense for your emotions."
Alan gazed at Quinn as he thought about how to explain it to his student.
"Emotions are connected to both mind and soul. Some believe that it might even be connected to the body as negative emotional states can affect physical output. But, emotions are definitely connected to mind and soul. Mind connection, you already know, and the existence of ghosts show conclusive proof of the soul connection."
They remained in the mortal world because they had unfinished business, whether in the form of fear, guilt, regrets, or overt attachment to the material world who refuse to move on to the next dimension. The choice to come back as a ghost was emotionally based.
"You never noticed something was wrong with you the entire time the curse was active. You made decisions and acted in ways that you wouldn't have. A lot of things should have triggered some suspicion inside you, but it never did. Not once did you think that there was something wrong with you. All of this was because the curse was acting on your emotions and, in turn, your personality. It attacked from two sources, both closely connected to magic; Mind and Soul."
Quinn just grabbed his head and groaned. He was regretting the decision to dive into the second vault.
"What about my magic rampaging out," Quinn questioned. "How is that connected to my magic? What about the changes the curse bought to my magic before it broke?"
"About that, I have no idea how did the curse, if we can even call it that at this point, increased the capacity of your magic, but I can tell you that the increase in control was because emotion and will is an essential aspect to magic. The curse definitely brought your emotions close to your magic. Your magic responded to your emotions better than ever while you were under its influence."
A magical's emotional state can affect their inherent abilities. For instance, an agent of the Statute of Secrecy Task Force was said to have produced better results with their Inn Charm after channeling the goodwill they received from inn-keepers they met on their travels into their spell-casting.
While in service, Gareth Greengrass, a senior researcher in the Department of Mysteries, at one point, documented over seven hundred instances of spells being cast in anger. He found they were all more powerful than even the casters themselves had thought themselves capable of producing.
"The curse targeted your emotions with cardinal sins, or the capital vices, or the seven deadly sins."
Quinn collapsed back into his bed, and while gazing at the ceiling, he asked, "Do continue."
"It triggered your emotions when you felt things that were even remotely in connection to the cardinal sins," Alan listed all the seven sins. "Pride. Greed. Envy. Sloth. Wrath. Gluttony. Lust."
"Let's talk some examples of how the curse affected you," spoke Alan as he got up from his chair and walked around Quinn's bed.
"First, let's take an example of how it amplified your emotions from something small to an exaggerated state. Your first duel in that dueling club of yours."
The mention of the event bought Quinn's memory of the duel against Miles Bletchley to the surface.
"You felt a little insulted by the way he looked at you. Tell me, what would you have done if you had another chance and weren't influenced by the curse."
Quinn didn't have to think much about it, and he answered, "A single Disarming spell and end the duel within seconds. I would have ended the duel so fast that he wouldn't have a chance to even twitch a muscle, but I wouldn't have humiliated him by not even drawing my wand. That was too flashy for me."
Quinn could hear Alan's footsteps as he walked around, "That was wrath. He insulted you, and that triggered wrath. Your opponent just looked at you funny, and I think you decided to humiliate him even before the nasty spells he shot."
"I guess you are right," Quinn thought about the times he had been angry in the last few months. Some regrettable decisions flashed through his mind.
"Next, let's move on to the times where the curse took advantage of your body to take effect," Alan spoke, moving on to the next observation. If Quinn could see his teacher's face, he would have found a huge shit-eating grin on the old man's face.
"Body? When did the curse affect my body?" Quinn wasn't sure there were changes to his body. Quinn was sure that his body wasn't touched by the curse.
"I am talking about puberty, Quinn."
Quinn froze in his bed, and he immediately knew Alan was talking about lust.
"I am sure that you wouldn't have included those memories in the memory package, but you were working with logical thinking that spanned for days on end. So, a lot of those ended up in there."
Alan laughed for a while before continuing.
"Lust triggered in short, but many bursts, and that was because of your hormones. You were so affected by it because you started to feel attracted to the fairer sex." Alan chuckled at the embarrassment his student was feeling. "Lust just took over from that point on. I really saw youth in there."
Quinn had spanked the monkey, jacked the beanstalk, auditioned with his hand puppet, charmed the snake, took the dog out for a walk, or wanked... twice a day without fail.
Now laying in his bed, Quinn remembered the times he had been doing something and just ended up staring at the passing by girls. Then there was the incident with Daphne.
'Dammit, why did I have to say that Daphne,' Quinn mushed his face into the pillow. Lust might have been the most enjoyable, but just like others. It made him do things he regretted.
"Let's move on, please."
A muffled shout from Quinn made Alan laugh.
"Alright, let's move on to the case where curse made sure that you won't go back to the antechamber. Only one sin kept you away from the vault."
Quinn gritted his teeth and almost snarled, "Sloth."
"Yes, sloth." Alan had gone through Quinn's memories, and the one sin that was as far away from Quinn was the sin of sloth.
Quinn West was a busy person. He had magic to learn, and Quinn made sure to spend every productive minute of his time learning magic. So, Sloth was Quinn's mortal enemy.
"Surprisingly, it didn't affect you that much, didn't it? Except making sure that you didn't go to the antechamber, skipping your morning runs, and the frequent short flashes of zoning out, all you got was becoming extremely rowdy if you were awake past your bedtime."
Quinn didn't say anything because it was true. The reason sloth didn't take root inside Quinn was because...
"Greed didn't let me be lazy," said Quinn as he stood up from the bed. The talk about sloth made him want to get away from the bed.
"Right, about that. I never understood why you spent that much time in the library? I know you like to learn, but the time you spent in the library was unusually lengthy. I, for a fact, know that you like to use magic as much as you like to read about it," asked Alan as he watched Quinn stand up from the bed and stretch.
Quinn spoke while he stretched his body.
"I had tricked a professor into signing a pass to the Restricted Section of the library. The problem was that there is a curse on the position of the Defense Against Dark Arts position. No professor lasts more than a year. I think it has been going on for decades. The teacher I tricked was the Defense Against Dark Arts professor."
A strange flash passed through Alan's eyes as Quinn mentioned the Defense Against Dark Arts professor.
"I was sure that the professor would be gone by the end of the year, which meant that pass would only last for a year. So, I had to make sure to squeeze the maximum out of the one school year I had," Quinn made eye contact with Alan and continued, "My magic was increasing by the day, and my control was getting better, so the decision I made was to spend all my time in the library."
"Now that you mentioned the sins, I think greed was the most prominent sin out of all seven. It was always present in the back of my head. Guiding me to learn more and more," Quinn sighed as he leaned against a wall with his hands behind his back.
"Sitting in that library made you happy, and that was because greed made it such. Your greed for knowledge was fulfilled while you stayed in the library, and it affected your emotions, making you happy," Alan made some conclusions out from the knowledge he had.
Quinn nodded, but then he pushed away from the wall and point-blank asked.
"Enough of this. Tell me what had happened to my magic?"
Alan stopped his walk and turned to face Quinn. The two stared at each other for a moment before Alan spoke up.
"Your mind, soul, and magic are fine. They don't have anything wrong with them. The problem is that while the curse was active, it increased your capacity and focus, but the way it was achieved was not natural, or should I say the process was artificial."
Quinn felt his heart beat faster as Alan continued to speak.
"I don't think that curse was supposed to break down. I don't know what it was designed to achieve, but it wasn't meant to break down in the middle like it did in your case. With my knowledge, it was meant to go until the end, whatever the end was."
All of this was what Alan had been able to find out from Quinn's memories and an entire night of diagnostics on Quinn while he slept.
"The curse had total control over your focus abilities as it was raising it artificially. So when it came undone, your bond to your magic which was being raised artificially broke down and with it everything you had worked hard to established."
Alan pursed his lips when he saw the despair on Quinn's face. He knew that Quinn had worked hard to build his control since he was five years old. But now, it was all gone.
"O-Okay... Mr. Alan, this isn't helping me," Quinn's voice had a shakiness and desperation in his voice. "W-What does this mean?"
Alan knew what was coming, but he had to continue,
"Your focus ability is gone completely, Quinn, and the reason your magic is lashing out is that it was had been artificially raised. You weren't meant to gain that much magic in that short amount of time. Your own magic is rejecting itself and is trying to get out."
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Quinn West - MC - No control over his magic.
Alan D. Baddeley - Teacher - Breaker of bad news.
FictionOnlyReader - Author - Don't worry, things will be fixed in the . (I hope nobody reads this because I am kind of building tension here, but... I know what happens when I do it.)
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