Harry Potter and the Great Old Ones

Chapter 466 Mathematics
Just as Neville's grandmother was recounting the glorious deeds of her son and daughter-in-law, a pale, almost bloodless hand reached out from the sickbed behind Mrs. Longbottom, interrupting her long-winded speech.

"Oh, Alice, what is it?" Mrs. Longbottom asked gently.

Neville's mother walked slowly in, wearing pajamas.

She no longer had the round, happy face that Moody had in the earliest group photo of the Order of the Phoenix. Her face was now thin and haggard, her eyes were particularly large, and her hair was white, messy and dry. She seemed unwilling or unable to speak, but she timidly gestured to Neville, clutching something in her hand.

“Another one?” Mrs. Longbottom said wearily. “Very good, Alice, very good… Neville, take it, whatever it is.”

Neville had already reached out his hand, and his mother tossed him a piece of Blow-a-Bubble Super Bubble Gum wrapper.

“Very good, dear.” Neville’s grandmother patted her on the shoulder, feigning happiness.

But Neville whispered, "Thank you, Mom."

His mother walked back unsteadily, humming a song.

Neville looked at everyone defiantly, as if prepared to accept their ridicule, but Harry felt he had never encountered anything more unfunny.

“Well, we should head back now.” Mrs. Longbottom sighed, putting on her long green gloves. “It was nice to see you all. Well then, Neville, throw that candy wrapper in the trash. She’s given you enough to cover your bedroom, hasn’t she?”

But as the grandfather and grandson left, Harry believed he saw Neville put the candy wrapper into his pocket.

The door was closed gently.

“I never knew,” Hermione said, her eyes brimming with tears.

“I don’t know either,” Ron said hoarsely. “If I had known, I would never have asked that question.”

“After Christmas…” Harry said quietly, “After Christmas… I want to ask Tyrell… see if he has any way to cure Neville’s parents.”

“Yes,” Hermione agreed. “Tierra is so smart, he’ll definitely find a way to cure Neville’s parents.”

In Harry and Hermione's minds now, Tyella is practically omnipotent—

After all, what can't a genius little wizard who can even avoid death do?
Time always flies when you're away from Hogwarts. Despite the reluctance of Harry, Ron, and Hermione, they had to pack their bags and return to Hogwarts on January 8th.

Life after returning to Hogwarts wasn't so easy either—

First, there was Tiera, who also disappeared.

Harry, upon returning from Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, had hoped to immediately begin the next phase of Dumbledore's Army training, but Tyrell immediately poured cold water on his hopes—

"Finished?" Harry exclaimed in surprise. "What do you mean 'finished'?"

"I've basically taught all the knowledge points I can," Tierra said calmly.

That's true. The three-dimensional theory of magic itself doesn't have many knowledge points. Tiera broke it down and explained it in detail, applying it to other situations, and adding a little of her own personal interpretation, barely managing to complete a semester. If the rest of them want to continue improving, they'll need to improve their own mathematical skills.

When Tiera first transmigrated, she was six years old. Until she entered school at the age of eleven, Tiera had been picking up the advanced mathematics she had learned when preparing for her postgraduate entrance exam, apart from the three-dimensional theory of magic and some other necessary knowledge.

So even though he kept causing trouble, planning trouble, and doing big things after he enrolled, he did not neglect his studies. With the dual learning of new mathematical magic and old-fashioned spell magic, his magical literacy continued to improve rapidly.

To put it bluntly, the crux of the problem for Hogwarts students lies in their underlying mathematical calculation abilities.

As the saying goes, the economic base determines the superstructure.

The students at Hogwarts are not well-off, so it's no wonder that the superstructure is crooked and distorted.

“The rest is up to you to practice,” Tierra said. “Besides practical exercises, you also need to improve your math skills—oh, Hermione, by the way.”

“Hmm?” Hermione asked.

"If it's convenient, you can ask your parents to buy you some Muggle math workbooks, mainly on algebra, solid geometry, plane analytic geometry, and modeling theory, and then work through them with everyone."

“Okay,” Hermione replied firmly.

“Wait a minute, Tyella!” Harry suddenly called out. “Well… it’s like this… Tyella… I think… I think practicing Muggle math… is it really necessary? Although the method you taught us to use math to construct spells instead of ancient runes and Latin is indeed convenient, is it really necessary for us to abandon the method we’ve always been familiar with and switch to another unfamiliar one in this situation?”

“What I mean is that, at this stage... practicing ancient runes and Latin spells will enhance our abilities more,” Hermione quickly added. “I mean, I’ve decided that I feel more comfortable using ancient runes or Latin spells than using mathematical model spells…”

“No, Harry,” Tyella said with a smile, “Continuing to use and learn ancient runes and Latin spells will not increase our strength. To be precise, continuing to learn spells in this way will only make our learning efficiency the same as when we are in class. If you learn ancient runes and Latin spells in my class, you are simply making up for your missing Defense Against the Dark Arts classes. This will not make you stronger, but will only make the talented among you more talented and the mediocre more mediocre.”

“You are a talented wizard,” Tiera said, “so you can easily learn some spells that are difficult for others to learn, but you alone are not enough.”

“Our goal is to enhance the strength of all of Dumbledore’s Army,” Tierra said, “not you, no, not just you, but everyone.”

“However, your question has reminded me,” Tiera said. “I don’t think I’ve made it clear how important it is to use purely mathematical methods to construct magical constructs.”

“Whether it’s ancient runes, Latin, or mathematical methods, they are all essentially descriptive magic,” Tiera explained. “That is to say, whether we use ancient runes, Latin, or even English, Japanese, Chinese, oracle bone script, or mathematical formulas, we are describing a certain rule, a certain type of phenomenon, or even a certain deity in the universe. This description, combined with the power of the spiritual dimension, constitutes magic.”

“English and Japanese descriptions are not precise enough, so Hogwarts learns ancient runes and Latin. But compared to mathematical models, Latin and ancient runes are not precise enough,” Tyella paused, then continued, “To be precise, no language in the world can compare to mathematics. No language can describe these rules and phenomena more accurately and aptly than mathematics.”

"Admittedly, we can describe a levitation, a spring turning into water, a match turning into a needle, and a mouse turning into a goblet in Latin and ancient runes, but—"

"Can we use them to describe the sun? Can we use them to describe the moon?" Tierra pressed, her voice scathing. "Can we use them to describe the falling of stars? Can we use them to describe a divided lake? Can we use them to describe death and rebirth?"

“No, and we cannot,” Tiera said firmly. “When faced with such power of nature, any language we know seems far too inadequate and naive.”

"Only mathematics, only pure mathematics, is our only tool when we are learning, or even when we are facing rules or even the truths of the universe that are far beyond our imagination. Only mathematics is our tool."

(End of this chapter)