In Hogsmeade, Felix appeared in the public fireplace, spun around, and brushed off the dust on his body. The sky was gray, and the red sunset glow could be vaguely seen through the clouds.

The ground was covered with a thick layer of snow, which made a "crunching" sound when stepped on. Felix walked along, and the wizards who returned in the evening kept greeting him. A skinny old wizard talked to him for a long time, discussing with him questions like "Do wizards nowadays lack some blood?", and finally realized that he had found the wrong person. His friend went home early to eat because he couldn't stand the nagging.

Mrs. Rosmerta of the Three Broomsticks was posting a discount poster. "Mr. Hep, you're out so late, would you like to come in for a drink?"

"Oh, no, I have something to deal with..."

"Are you going to inspect the branch? I bought a chair and I have to lie down for a while every night before going to bed."

Felix turned into a side street, and the light dimmed. This road was close to the Shrieking Shack, and there were not many people nearby. He stopped where he was, groping for a coin with his fingers. After a while, the sound of bouncing footsteps came from behind him.

"Mr. Hep."

The house-elf Bundy jumped out and saluted him. When he stood up, his nose rubbed against the snow on the ground. Then he took out a crumpled letter from his body and handed it to Felix respectfully.

Felix took it and asked casually, "Bundy, who is your master?"

The house-elf stiffened for a moment, lowered his head and said, "Bundy was given to Mr. Grindelwald by his master to take care of his daily life."

Is it a loyal believer?

"When did this happen?"

"Just in the past two years."

Felix glanced at him. "Mr. Grindelwald is in poor health?"

Bondi took a deep breath and said sharply, "The winter in Nurmengard Castle is very cold."

"What about his magic?"

"Since 1945, Mr. Grindelwald is no longer allowed to cast spells."

It must be some magic, Felix thought. He saw Bondi on October 27th, and he clearly had the will of another person. After his failure, Grindelwald must have some restrictions on him. It's not the wand. For wizards like Grindelwald, the wand is not necessary but a more severe restriction.

For example, the unbreakable oath.

This period of history is vague and there is no clear record. It's as if everyone has forgotten this hidden danger by coincidence, which leads to people like him always finding some obvious loopholes when interpreting it from the perspective of an observer.

Why did Grindelwald give up everything because of a duel? Are his 100,000 followers all fake? Even if only one-tenth of them are loyal, these people can smash any Ministry of Magic in the world.

Felix did not continue the question. He asked Bundy, "Do you usually live in Nurmengard?"

"Yes, sir.

" "Can you keep owls there?"

"What?" Bundy looked up in surprise.

"It's too troublesome to rely on you to send messages all the time. The protective magic of Hogwarts repels other house-elves, but there is no restriction on owls." Felix explained that it would be much more convenient to send messages through owls, saving him from running out every time. Bundy, the

house-elf, lowered his head deeply, "Oh, no, Nurmengard Castle is sealed by many spells, and no one can find it... Only the full-time staff of the International Confederation of Wizards have the authority to open it."

Felix was a little surprised. Grindelwald seemed to be subject to much greater restrictions than he had expected.

He opened the letter. The content on it was not long as usual. In summary, it agreed to "discuss certain issues" with him. Apart from that, there were only some sarcastic remarks, such as "I've read these books a long time ago, and the knowledge in them is very shallow", "Too negative, no courage, not even as good as Carlotta Pinkstone", or instructive suggestions to Felix to "read the three hundred years of magic history from the 14th to the 17th century carefully", etc.

At the end, he did not forget to ask for some parchment, ink and quill.

"I added a lot of snow water to the ink bottle to write this letter. Also, those people will check Bondi's brain every two or three months. You have to solve this problem."

Felix looked at the faint ink mark and laughed dumbly. He read some contradictions in the letter, but he would not think that Grindelwald was confused.

Grindelwald said that he had read the book he wrote. Who gave it to him?

To be frank, Felix never mentioned his plans and expectations for the wizarding world in the book, so in the eyes of some people, he was just pro-Muggle and sympathetic to Muggles; or, he was an opportunistic businessman who made a fortune by copying the novel ideas of Muggle society. But truly knowledgeable people, such as Dumbledore or Grindelwald, can see his unfinished meaning from these books. That is:

Felix Hepp believes that the integration of wizards and Muggles is inevitable, but he is a moderate, or at least pretends to be a moderate, relying on subtle influence to guide wizards to accept this concept and prepare in advance.

If this theory is shown to ordinary wizards, they will probably frown. They are accustomed to the existence of the Statute of Secrecy. If you tell these people that the Statute of Secrecy will eventually be broken, it is like telling them that one day they will walk naked into the snow.

And if it is given to radicals, they will also look down on this view, perhaps because they think it is too weak and not decisive enough. For example, the witch Carlotta Pinkstone mentioned in the letter is a social activist born in 1922. She is famous for advocating the abolition of the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy and has been imprisoned many times for openly and deliberately using magic in public.

By the way, she will be released from prison next year, and it is estimated that there will be another storm at that time.

Grindelwald was also a radical, but he was different because he was a loser. Giving Felix's work to him was tantamount to telling Grindelwald that there was an idea similar to yours but more moderate, and that some achievements had been made. You can take a look...

Felix read a strong sense of preaching from this approach.

He guessed that this person was Dumbledore.

If it was really Dumbledore, then the restrictions of the International Confederation of Wizards would not be a problem at all. He had many ways to bypass the restrictions of Nurmengard Castle. The simplest one was to send a message through the Phoenix Fawkes.

Felix gave Bundy some stationery. As for how to bypass the inspection... Felix didn't respond. Grindelwald could attach himself to Bundy to watch the battle, which at least showed that he could use some memory magic. He was probably testing him.

Felix didn't take the bait.

...

In the next few days, Felix spent some time reviewing the history from the fourteenth to the seventeenth century. The Hogwarts Library provided a lot of information, including magic notebooks and travel diaries of that period. In particular, he found several books in the forbidden area that did not contain any bewitching curses. They simply recorded history. Under normal circumstances, he would not read such books.

Felix read with cold sweat.

That was a more real and bloody truth.

During this period, he began to receive more letters, and various invitations to join came in like raindrops. Felix didn't know there were so many magic organizations before. There were more than thirty various alchemy groups and ancient character associations alone.

There were also many letters from individuals, the most representative of which was Uriah Edmund of Ilvermorny. His description in the letter fully reflected the mentality of young people in the current American magic world:

"…

The performance of the Magic Congress is disappointing. Those officials don't seem to realize the seriousness of the problem.

I talked to some old people in the school, and they told me that in the 1960s, a group of people recruited members under the guise of 'pure blood' and 'honor', but these ideas had no market in the United States at the time. According to the standards of the British wizarding world, except for a few families that migrated here, no one was qualified to call themselves pure blood.

So the group's goal failed. I believe that similar things may have happened in other countries, but because they had just experienced the painful lesson brought by Grindelwald, people were strictly guarding against such ideas and instinctively rejected them, and new cults never developed.

Now, almost another 30 years have passed, and a new one has emerged. As the next generation of wizards grows up, new dissatisfaction begins to accumulate. Our biggest contradiction is caused by the forced separation of wizarding and No-Maj societies. Although there has been some improvement in the past two years, it is still not satisfactory. Sooner or later, the false illusion of peace that we cherish will explode.

The death of Principal Fontana touched me deeply. He was the one who protected me, but now he is gone.

So, Mr. Hep, I have left Ilvermorny.

I decided to go into politics. The Magical Congress plans to form an emergency team. In my opinion, it is just a show, but I still decided to sign up. I am still active in China, but there may be a chance to meet in the UK in the future.

Wish us all the best. "

Felix closed the letter, thought for a long time, took out parchment and wrote a reply.

"Dear Uriah,

I see in you the hope of the new generation of the American wizarding world. Some problems are difficult to deal with, but we will encounter them sooner or later, so we cannot turn a blind eye to them.

I have also thought deeply about the issues you mentioned in your letter, and my thoughts are as follows:

You are facing two problems. One is the public outcry and social unrest caused by the death of Principal Fontana, as well as the potential threat of Voldemort's forces; the other is the dissatisfaction of you, the Reform Society, and all visionary people with the negative attitude of the Magic Congress due to the outbreak of this incident.

The former is an emergency and the focus of everyone's attention at this stage, while the latter is more far-reaching and seems less urgent, but it is more difficult to deal with.

I fully agree with your decision to join the Magic Congress. It will allow you to actually experience the difficulties and moral dilemmas faced by the rulers. If you cannot be confident, If we do better than them, the result will inevitably be negative and passive, and its harm will be no less than the chaos caused by the death of Principal Fontana.

I also saw that you proposed some other solutions, such as cooperating with the "Future World" company to replicate some of the measures we proposed when we communicated last year, but I must point out that the situation you and I are facing is not exactly the same.

It has been nearly three hundred years since the birth of the Statute of Secrecy. In other words, no one alive now has seen what a completely undisturbed scene looks like. The results of rash changes are bound to be both good and bad. People will cheer for the wonderful world that opens the door, but they will inevitably be hurt by the thorns outside the door, resulting in hatred.

If you want to list the contradictions between wizards and ordinary people, it is by no means a one-word summary.

The collection of books at Hogwarts includes It contains a large amount of relevant documents and materials, from the beginning of witch hunts in the 14th century to a few years before the birth of the Statute of Secrecy in the 17th century, when the relationship between the two reached a freezing point.

During these three hundred years, wizards were almost semi-public in the early days, and the best among them (or ambitious wizards) could often become guests of the king and nobles.

But the lower-class wizard families still led a double life. Public opinion at the time was controlled by the secular and religious circles. Wizards and magic were still mysterious, cunning, and evil. Witch hunting was considered a legitimate act, and the idea of ​​excluding dissidents flourished under the propaganda of some people, resulting in an extremely obvious split between the top and the bottom. During this period, there were many cases worthy of deep thought. There were kind and enthusiastic wizards who helped their neighbors but were betrayed, and naturally there were many who were loved sincerely; not to mention, there were also wizards who Bad guys, those widely circulated horror legends are inseparable from them.

Various diametrically opposed views and thoughts collided fiercely, and The Tales of Beedle the Bard was created in this context.

If you ask me what my opinion is, I would say that any attempt to characterize a large group of people through a small group of people is undoubtedly bad. Especially when you have already chosen your side in advance.

But it must be admitted that the number of ordinary people far exceeds that of wizards, with a ratio of nearly 3000:1. This means that even if only a small proportion of ordinary people have a more intense attitude towards wizards, the consequences are disastrous.

At that time, wizard families were particularly likely to lose their children, because children could not control their magic and often attracted the attention of Muggles who were hunting wizards, and they were powerless to resist. We are used to seeing mature and self-protective wizards treat pitchforks, hoes and crosses as nothing, but the real history is not beautiful. The

newly established British Ministry of Magic (formerly the Wizards' Council) once sent a special delegation to contact the Muggle monarchs William III and Mary II, hoping that Muggle law would recognize and protect wizards. When this attempt to gain official recognition and protection failed, it forced wizards to voluntarily go the opposite way, go underground and keep secrets.

The Statute of Secrecy was born.

This law effectively divides wizard society and Muggle society, and after a long period of practice, some consensus has been formed. For example: the parents of little wizards from Muggle families are not subject to confidentiality. This approach undoubtedly eases the conflict, especially compared to the harsh laws of the Magical Congress of the United States. As

far as I know, the American wizarding world and the non-magical government have always been in a state of hostility, and there is no cooperative relationship between the two. There is a dark and bloody game hidden in it. At that time, some people in power authorized attempts to crack the secrets of wizards, resulting in fierce confrontations and the relocation of the headquarters of the Magical Congress many times.

These need to be considered in advance..."