Chapter 357: Improving the Companion Ledger
Chapter 357: Improving the Companion Ledger
Voldemort hadn't seen Dumbledore during the morning or at noon, and he assumed that the headmaster would return to the school before dinner. However, when dinner time came, Dumbledore's seat at the staff table remained empty.
Voldemort sent a message through the Companion Ledger but received no response, and he began to worry.
Logically, the four vampires shouldn't pose any threat to Dumbledore, but what if something unexpected happened? They had the means to force a werewolf's transformation, and who knew what other weapons they might possess.
Voldemort's mind was elsewhere for the rest of the time until Harry found him.
On Saturday morning, during breakfast, Harry approached Voldemort and whispered, "Voldemort, I want to use the Vanishing Cabinet to go back to Hogsmeade later."
Harry knew the Vanishing Cabinet was kept in the Room of Requirement, where Voldemort had hidden many secrets.
Even if Voldemort didn't use the Room of Requirement, there was at least one house-elf present to perform simple tasks and ensure the room remained 'online.'
This significantly reduced the chances of someone accidentally stumbling upon it, and even if someone guessed the correct password, the house-elf would immediately notify Voldemort.
So far, this situation hadn't occurred.
When Harry wanted to use the Vanishing Cabinet, he had to inform Voldemort first. Voldemort would then notify the house-elf to leave the room, allowing Harry to enter the room where the Vanishing Cabinet was hidden.
"Go back?" Voldemort asked, surprised, then his expression changed slightly as he thought of something.
As expected, Harry continued with concern, "Lupin hasn't responded to my messages, and Sirius says they've lost contact as well."
"I'm worried... Do you think something happened to Lupin? Could it be the Ministry causing trouble for him again?"
"Even though Sirius said he'd come back to check, I still want to go and see for myself..."
"Sorry..." Voldemort apologized, "I know what happened to Lupin, but I forgot to tell you..."
Although only a day and a half had passed, Voldemort had used the Time Turner several times, and in his perception, Lupin's transformation into a werewolf felt like it had happened several days ago.
Preoccupied with Dumbledore's return, he completely forgot to inform Harry and Sirius.
Harry was taken aback, "Did something really happen to Lupin?"
"A bit..." Voldemort glanced at the students walking back and forth near the long table and whispered, "It's not convenient to talk here. Let's finish our meal and discuss it outside."
Harry, distracted, nodded and grabbed a pie, taking a few bites before declaring he was full.
"No, you're not full," Hermione said seriously from a short distance away. "Don't forget you have Quidditch practice today, and it's not pleasant to train on an empty stomach."
It was the weekend, and Hermione could finally enjoy her breakfast at a leisurely pace.
Even so, her school bag was packed full, making it look heavy.
Harry picked up the pie again and took a few more bites.
Voldemort knew Harry was anxious, so he quickly finished his breakfast, and the two of them left together. As they reached the entrance hall, a student ran up to them, out of breath.
"Harry... Mr. Harry Potter!" The student looked at the young savior with admiration and stammered, "Professor McGonagall wants to see you in her office."
"Now?" Harry asked, troubled. "I have something important to do..."
"The younger student seemed hesitant, "But... but Professor McGonagall said..."
"Go on, Harry," Vold said. "You can find me in the library later, I'll be free all day."
"Alright," Harry nodded and finally left with the student.
Vold turned and headed towards the library.
In truth, he didn't have any pending assignments for twelve of his classes—
In Transfiguration, Charms, and Defense Against the Dark Arts, Vold's learning progress far surpassed his peers, and several professors had granted him special permission to forgo homework.
The remaining classes, including Arithmancy and Divination, were relatively easy for Vold, as he had already mastered most of the knowledge, making homework a breeze.
History of Magic, Divination, and Muggle Studies were the classes he used for completing assignments. If it weren't for the sparse attendance in each class, one missing person would quickly be noticed, and he would have considered skipping them altogether.
To keep the Time Turner, Vold maintained perfect attendance like Hermione, ensuring he didn't miss a single class.
Among his friends, Harry and Neville were always puzzled about how they managed it, while the others had their suspicions.
Recently, Vold had begun researching ways to improve the Companion Ledger.
Adding more functions to a small piece of parchment was far more challenging than enchanting an entire house.
After all, its capacity was limited, and any slight miscalculation could easily damage it.
Even a minor enhancement would lead to a significant increase in cost, while the selling price couldn't rise proportionally, or consumers wouldn't be willing to pay for it.
Vold didn't expect the parchment to become as multifunctional as a smartphone. For now, he only wanted to enhance its information storage capacity.
Originally, messages in the Companion Ledger would disappear after a while if not checked in time.
Trivial group chats could vanish, but if important messages also disappeared, it would cause many inconveniences.
Moreover, Vold wanted to change the notification function of the Companion Ledger.
For someone like him who didn't enjoy chatting, the ledger often felt warm during the day, sometimes even staying warm all day long.
Upon opening it, he would often find house-elves discussing their daily tasks or members of the SSC strategizing about maze tactics and homework priorities.
So, when the Companion Ledger heated up, Vold would hesitate—to open it meant potentially wasting time on meaningless chats; to ignore it meant risking missing important messages.
He decided to improve the repetitive notifications for group chats and differentiate notifications based on the importance of messages. The highest-level urgent messages would sound like a shrill police siren.
Finally, Vold planned to add a new feature to the Companion Ledger—image transmission.
Previously, the ledger could only transmit hand-drawn pictures, but now, he intended to modify it so that by placing an image between two pages of parchment, the content would be imprinted and transmitted within seconds.
This was a feature that some students had secretly requested from Vold.
There was no ulterior motive; they simply wanted to use the Companion Ledger to copy each other's homework during the holidays, and those who had already completed their assignments didn't want to bother copying it into the ledger.
Vold thought about it and felt that this feature wasn't too troublesome and could also be used to send photos to his parents in the future, so he decided to add it.
(End of Chapter)
Chapter end
Report
