On Monday morning, sunlight streamed through the towering arched windows of the Hogwarts Great Hall, forming countless soft golden shafts that illuminated floating dust motes in the air. The enchanted ceiling reflected a clear autumn sky, with a few harmless white clouds drifting lazily by.
At the long tables, the aroma of toasted bread, the sizzle of frying bacon, and the sweet scent of pumpkin juice mingled together, composing the overture to the new week.
Alan Scott methodically cut the sausages on his plate. His movements were precise and elegant, standing in stark contrast to the other Gryffindor students, who were devouring their breakfast in a frenzy. Beside his plate lay a letter delivered by an owl, lying quietly.
He unrolled the parchment.
On it, his younger sister Lilia had drawn a picture in her childish, crooked handwriting. The drawing depicted a little girl hugging a softly glowing patch of moss, her face peaceful and satisfied as if asleep. Next to it, in equally uneven letters, she had written: "Thank you, big brother. This is the best gift I've ever received~"
A small smile curved Alan's lips, unnoticed even by himself. His usually deep and calm eyes softened, radiating a warm, gentle light. The happiness of his family was the most direct and pure emotional feedback, and it eased the tension of his tightly wound mind.
At that moment, a tall figure approached, exuding a heavy, oppressive aura.
It was Charlie Weasley, captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team.
His plate was full of food, untouched. Long-term sleep deprivation had left faint bluish shadows under his eyes, and the cheerful smile he usually wore was gone, replaced by taut seriousness. His gaze locked onto Alan, emotions swirling within—anxious, struggling, ultimately settling into a near-desperate plea for help.
"Alan."
Charlie's voice was hoarse. He got straight to the point without any small talk and sat down heavily beside Alan, making the bench groan slightly under his weight.
He didn't bring up the impossible idea of inviting Alan to play Quidditch. He knew it would be pointless.
Instead, he slammed his bag onto the table and pulled out a thick stack of parchment—easily hundreds of sheets, edges curled and worn from repeated handling. The smell of old paper and dried ink wafted from them.
"These are the detailed records of every official match our Gryffindor Quidditch team has played over the past three years."
Charlie's voice carried the exhaustion of someone completely drained.
"Every game's score, conceded points, fouls. Every player's passing route, shooting angle, even every target of the seeker's pursuit… I've collected everything I could find or remember, but…"
He ran his hands through his fiery red hair in frustration, as if trying to claw the confusion out of his mind.
"But when I look at these damned numbers, I just can't figure it out! I know we lost badly last year, and for reasons I don't understand! I can't tell what exactly went wrong!"
His voice brimmed with helplessness—the true predicament of a diligent, responsible leader facing incomprehensible failure. He had a wealth of data, yet was drowning in it, unable to extract anything useful.
Alan put down his knife and fork with a crisp sound.
He had no interest in Quidditch itself. A sport dependent on brute force and supposed flying talent seemed too uncertain to him.
But "data analysis"—that ignited an almost instinctual, intense interest.
It was a perfect intellectual puzzle. A challenge from another world, filled with raw data and unknown variables, waiting to be deciphered.
He reached for the thick stack of parchment.
The sheets were rough and heavy in his hands, each covered in dense numbers and simple diagrams. Charlie's handwriting was powerful but slightly chaotic.
Alan didn't start reading them one by one as Charlie had. He simply sat quietly, laying the parchments flat before him.
A faint light seemed to flicker deep in his pupils. All the noise of the world—classmates chatting, cutlery clinking, whispers of passing ghosts—was instantly blocked from his consciousness.
His Mind Palace activated.
It was a grand, cold hall constructed entirely from pure logic. In the center, a new blank area was instantly created, labeled: "Sports Competition Data Analysis Model."
All the knowledge he had acquired in his previous life, long integrated into his soul, became the foundation for building the model.
The logical chain of regression analysis began to extend, seeking hidden correlations between variables.
Clustering algorithms kicked in, grouping thousands of seemingly isolated data points based on their intrinsic properties.
Markov chain probability models were activated, simulating potential chain reactions and final outcomes for every tactical move.
These advanced mathematical models from another world were now being applied, in an incredible way, to these ancient, magic-infused parchments.
At the Gryffindor table, an extraordinary scene unfolded.
On one side, students continued their breakfast in noisy normalcy.
On the other, Alan Scott sat silently. The thick stack of parchment in front of him, without any external force or even a breeze, began flipping rapidly on its own, at a dizzying speed.
Flap… flap… flap…
The sound was subtle but rhythmic, as if an invisible hand were sorting, categorizing, and analyzing everything faster than any human could.
A few nearby students noticed the strange sight. They stopped talking, eyes wide in confusion. Even the Weasley twins paused their mischievous attempt to add extra ingredients to Percy's porridge, temporarily captivated by the spectacle.
Charlie Weasley was utterly dumbfounded. He could not comprehend what he was witnessing. This was unlike any spell he had ever known. It was a pure, awe-inspiring display of intellectual dominance.
Time ticked by, second by second.
Just half an hour later, while Charlie was still immersed in the shock of his now-cold bowl of porridge, the flipping of the parchment suddenly stopped.
Alan had finished his "scan."
His eyes returned to their usual clarity, as if he had just completed ten effortless readings in a row.
He drew a fresh, blank sheet of parchment, picked up a quill, and dipped it in ink. The tip scratched across the page with a soft rustle, leaving three neat, precise lines of writing, each letter exuding undeniable accuracy.
"All right, Charlie."
Alan gently pushed the parchment toward him.
"I've identified the three core issues in your team."
Charlie's breath caught. He lowered his head, staring at the sheet in front of him.
On it were three diagnoses, precise as a surgeon's scalpel, cold and directly hitting the heart of the problem.
"First: Your three Chasers' success rate for long passes under headwind conditions drops by 37% compared to tailwind conditions. This indicates a serious deficiency in your passing power training."
"Second: Your Keeper, Oliver Wood, has an average reaction time to Bludgers coming from the left side of the goal nearly 0.2 seconds slower than those coming from the right. This is a critical, habitual defensive weakness."
"Third: Your two Beaters, when performing cross-position defense, create a conspicuous, roughly three-second triangular blind spot on the left rear of the pitch due to coordination issues. In the matches you lost last year, twice the opponents captured the Golden Snitch precisely because the Beaters failed to cover this area."
Each word struck Charlie like a bullet, hitting the most vulnerable, most perplexing parts of his mind.
He didn't need to verify the truth of these conclusions. The moments of lost points that had repeatedly haunted him, the match scenarios that had woken him from nightmares—at the instant he read these three lines, all became clear, irrefutable, and unmistakable.
For three years, he had been like a blind man groping in a pitch-black cave. Driven by passion and responsibility, he had stumbled blindly, bumping into walls, bleeding, yet never finding the way out.
Alan, in less than an hour, without leaving this table, had drawn a crystal-clear map leading to victory.
The shock coursed through Charlie's entire body like electricity. He leapt from the bench, the chair legs scraping the stone floor with a sharp screech. The surrounding noise seemed to recede into the distance.
In his eyes, there was no longer a trace of doubt—only a near-reverential light.
He looked at this composed first-year student before him and, in a tone solemn to the utmost degree, issued a formal invitation:
"Alan Scott.
Charlie's voice was clear and loud, cutting through all surrounding sounds.
"I, Charlie Weasley, in the name of the Gryffindor Quidditch team captain, officially invite you to serve as our team's—chief tactical consultant."
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