Chapter 203: Is It Really a Treasure?
"Then I'll put it in." Luna, wearing gloves, picked up the baking tray and placed their handmade cookies into the oven. Dylan nodded, observing Luna's actions from the side. The oven seemed like an ordinary oven—at least it appeared that way.
Luna squatted down and slid the baking tray into the oven. The oven didn't have many functions and was an older model. "Speaking of which, did ovens even exist in Hufflepuff's time?" Dylan genuinely didn't know this; the books he usually read didn't cover such details.
Luna turned the knob. As she turned it for the second time, a faint sound of gears turning came from inside the oven. "That should do it."
Luna stood up again and moved back to Dylan's side. "We won't be waiting long. Last time I baked a cake, this oven seemed to have a magical effect and could finish cooking food very quickly."
Dylan nodded, remaining silent, his gaze fixed on the inside of the oven. At this moment, the oven began to operate.
Dylan could clearly feel wisps of runic light spreading along the patterns on the oven's body. Those patterns represented the alchemical mastery involved in creating this oven.
Soon, the runic light gathered at the top of the oven, forming a flickering flame that enveloped the baking tray. However, the flame didn't directly touch the tray but surrounded it, roasting the cookie dough with heat and magic.
"This fire..." Dylan, who had mastered Fiendfyre and Goblin Fire, had extensive experience with flames but had never encountered this type of fire. Yet, Dylan felt a sense of familiarity with this flame—a familiarity in terms of power.
"Cooking Fire?" Dylan blinked. He suddenly realized that the flame inside this oven seemed to have some connection to the cooking spells he himself had mastered. This naturally led Dylan to associate it with the idea that this flame seemed to be specifically created for cooking. Dylan immediately became interested.
"Combining spells with fire?" This, in fact, had a similar ingenious quality to Goblin Fire. After all, Goblin Fire was fire, but it was also a spell. So this "Cooking Fire" must also be generated through some kind of spell or rune.
"If cooking can be combined with fire... then couldn't other spells also be copied and applied to certain objects?" Actually, upon closer thought, wasn't this just like alchemical array patterns? Etching the power of spells into array patterns to produce magical effects.
"So... fire is actually an array?" This analogy made Dylan understand many things in an instant. He thought of the jade artifacts he had previously made for the Weasley twins, and the life-saving gear he had made for his parents. —Wasn't that also an application of spells and array patterns?
"Actually, on closer inspection, Goblin Fire was also born in the same way." With magic as the foundation, and magical power as the thread, solidifying the flame was also solidifying the array pattern!
Just then, Luna suddenly pointed at the oven and said, "Look, they're changing." Dylan snapped back, looking again. Through the rectangular observation window, Dylan saw that the surface of the cookies he and Luna had made began to form bubbles.
The cookie in the upper left corner, its flat surface, swelled with pearl-like white granules, which then quickly formed a web-like pattern under the flame's scorching. Almost in the blink of an eye, it formed a translucent, crystalline structure—looking a bit like frozen honey bubbles.
A cookie on the right side mysteriously seeped a pale purple liquid, twisting into mushroom-like protrusions on the cookie. Dylan even saw these liquid aggregations, like real mushrooms, continuously emitting tiny glowing dots between their gills, as if fungi were releasing spores. Dylan stared at the changing cookies.
A row of cookies in the middle had several cracks. Silvery, thread-like fuzz emerged from the cracks. This fuzz didn't look disgusting; instead, it looked very appetizing, like a layer of powdered sugar.
"Each one is different?" Dylan blinked, stroking his chin, watching this secret Hufflepuff oven. It seemed that perhaps more than just the flames were at work inside the oven. Or rather, those flames had other functions that he hadn't discovered yet.
"It's not easy to combine multiple spells into a single alchemical creation." Dylan narrowed his eyes slightly. Not to mention, with such strange methods.
"This is truly odd. I don't feel the power of a Transfiguration Charm, so why are these cookies undergoing such peculiar changes?" Dylan's heart itched. He really wanted to just take this oven back to his own world.
If he could directly extract the flames from it and then make some slight adjustments, he might be able to create a Gourmet Flame that could cook food without even needing physical ingredients.
"Wouldn't that be like creating a house-elf myself?" Dylan thought of some of the experiments he had been conducting, and his excitement grew stronger. He hadn't expected that a seemingly ordinary Hufflepuff oven could give him so many new ideas! He dared not imagine how many more surprises awaited him to unearth in the rest of Hogwarts!
"Gryffindor only left a broken sword? There should be other legacies, right? And Slytherin, just a rotten snake? Impossible, impossible..." Dylan continuously pondered in his mind. Luna, meanwhile, silently watched the oven, waiting for the cookies to finish baking. For a moment, both fell silent, but neither felt awkward.
Time trickled by. The two sat on a bench opposite the oven. Luna counted the faint hums of the oven as it operated, occasionally reaching up to brush away strands of hair that hung in front of her face—hair tips still adorned with a bit of flour.
The air carried a faint sweet aroma, mixed with the warmth emanating from the oven, making their corner especially quiet. Neither spoke. Dylan gradually reined in his thoughts, listening to his own breathing.
He suddenly noticed Luna's shoulders gently rising and falling, as if swaying to a rhythm only she could hear. The oven's glow imprinted on her cheeks, casting shadows of her eyelashes on her pale face, flickering gently with the firelight.
Just as Luna had said, the oven was magical, so the cookies baked quickly.
"Ding." With a soft chime from the oven, Luna slowly reached out and grasped the oven door handle. Pausing for an instant, she turned to look at Dylan. Warm yellow firelight spilled from the oven's crack, outlining Luna's soft jawline.
Her pale golden hair was illuminated, appearing bright. Bits of unbrushed flour still clung to her hair, reflecting the oven light like scattered moonlight. Luna's eye corners curved slightly, and a faint, gentle smile touched her lips.
At this moment, she was entirely bathed in soft light, emanating an indescribable sense of clarity. Dylan found himself staring, a little dazed.
This girl, why does she look so much like an angel? Is this the beauty of backlighting? Looks like I need to take pictures like this next time. Dylan's fingertips unconsciously rubbed together.
Luna tilted her face, her eyes reflecting the flickering firelight, like two small pools of melted amber. The faint freckles on her nose were clearly visible in the light, yet instead of detracting from her beauty, they added a sense of purity and innocence.
At this moment, Dylan felt that she was like a painting, imbued with the oven's warm glow, carrying a lightness not of this world. —It wasn't a stunning beauty, but one that simply felt comforting to behold. Like the first tender buds emerging on branches during early spring thaw, hard to pinpoint what made it special, yet it stirred the heart without reason.
"What are you looking at?" Luna tilted her head, her voice drifting lightly.
Dylan startled, shivered slightly, blinked, then shook his head in response. "Nothing, I just think you're very beautiful."
Luna: ('-')* "Am I... beautiful?"
Dylan nodded earnestly. "Yes." He pointed at Luna and gave a thumbs up. "You are beautiful."
A moment later, Luna pursed her lips, and then a gentle arc curved at her lips. "Thank you. Besides my family, you're the first person to ever compliment me like that."
"You're welcome. I'm just stating a fact," Dylan replied dryly. His usual eloquence seemed to abandon him at this moment.
"The cookies are ready, you know." Luna's voice was light as a feather. She opened the oven door. Instantly, a rush of warm, caramel-scented air wafted out. Luna's gaze swept over the variously shaped cookies on the baking tray. She reached up to brush back the hair ruffled by the heat, a faint blush appearing on the tips of her ears.
"Which one do you... want to try first?" Dylan realized he had been staring for too long. It was practically a sin. His Adam's apple bobbed lightly, and Dylan coughed, looking down. "Any is fine." He waved his wand, pulling the baking tray from the oven to avoid burning Luna. He placed it on the table behind them. Luna left the oven door ajar to let out the heat, then turned and walked over.
Sitting back next to Dylan, Luna poked a cookie with her fingertip—a cookie with crispy edges and several round, pebbly particles on its surface. "This looks a lot like a cookie that grew peas."
Dylan turned his head, his peripheral vision unconsciously glancing at Luna. Her hair fell, obscuring half of her eye. Dylan suddenly realized that her expression held a strangely earnest cuteness, focused as if studying a rare beetle.
"Yeah, let's try that one first then." Dylan picked up the cookie and took a bite. The sweetness of caramel mixed with a hint of cool mint spread across his tongue. Due to the secret oven's effect, the spherical particles on the cookie's surface had a very crispy texture when eaten.
Especially after Dylan swallowed the cookie, he suddenly noticed that the magical power within him seemed to fluctuate.
"Hmm?" Dylan paused, raising an eyebrow at Luna, who was, however, tilting her head and examining a cookie with transparent tendrils, not noticing him. Dylan stared at the cookie in his hand for a moment, then directly threw the remaining half into his mouth.
Again, a strange sensation emerged. Aside from the caramel sweetness, the bitter freshness of mint and pine needles spread through his throat.
At the same time, a sense of lightness from running in the corridor that morning flashed through his mind—not physical energy, but a certain clarity on a spiritual level.
It was like a mirror wiped clean with water. Even the distant sound of dripping water was exceptionally clear. Dylan closed his eyes, sensing the magic slowly flowing within him. He found that the magic flowed even more smoothly than before.
"This..." Dylan opened his eyes, surprised, looking at the fresh batch of cookies in front of him.
"What's wrong?" Luna turned her head, looking at Dylan's strange expression, growing a little curious.
"Didn't you say you made a cake with this oven last time? Did you eat the cake in the end?"
Luna nodded. "I ate a little, and I shared the rest with everyone."
Dylan pursed his lips slightly. "Then when you ate the cake, did you feel any difference? I mean, physically and mentally."
Luna tilted her head. "Difference? No, not really. I just thought the cake was delicious; after one bite, it made you want to eat more." She suddenly smiled. "But since this is Hufflepuff's kitchen, and I'm using their utensils, the food I make should still be shared with everyone."
Dylan was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Did you discover something?"
"Yes, just now when I ate that cookie, I felt my mind being soothed, and even my magical power fluctuated, flowing more smoothly."
"Oh? This cookie has that effect?" Luna also picked up a cookie with white frosting on its surface, examined it for a moment, then put it in her mouth and took a small bite.
Instantly, a cool sweetness spread in her mouth. Then, Luna felt her temples warm slightly. A certain blurry spell she had previously seen now became clear in her mind. Luna opened her eyes in surprise. "It's true!"
Dylan turned his head, staring at the ordinary-looking, even somewhat dilapidated oven in the corner. "It really is no ordinary oven."
Luna's eyelashes fluttered slightly. "When I found it, it had just reappeared from being invisible."
Dylan narrowed his eyes. "If that's the case, there's another possibility... perhaps it just Apparated here?"
"Apparated?" Luna looked at him. "Do you mean Disapparition?"
"Not sure. I feel a lot of alchemical runes on this oven. Even if it involved Apparition, it wouldn't be incomprehensible."
"This..." Luna paused. "But this is Hufflepuff's oven. If it's always existed, it's impossible that no one would have found it, right?"
Dylan nodded. "It seems we'll have to ask others." —At this moment, the urge to sneak this secret oven into my own world suddenly became more urgent.
"I'll take some of the cookies; you can have the rest." Dylan divided the cookies on the tray into two portions. Luna nodded, not refusing. After magically cleaning the baking tray, Dylan turned to look at the secret oven. "Hufflepuff's treasure... could it be this thing?"
Luna saw Dylan's interest in the oven and couldn't help but ask, "Do you want to take it away?"
"Uh? What?"
....
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