Minerva squeaks in alarm as a mound of acceptance letters appear, not only on her desk, but also spilling over into her lap and on the floor. Picking a letter at random, the return address is Willow Creak; Another one is a place called Batuu. A quick swish of her wand gives her an estimated 150 letters to go through. Another three swishes conjures a nice looking in-tray, and an out-tray, along with stacking all the letters into the in tray.
An hour later, she's just about finished going through the last letter when another 200 letters appear on her desk, and spills over onto the floor, along with pushing all the letters in her out-tray out of the out-tray.
Muttering a curse, she swipes her wand to put all the letters into her in-tray again, and starts to sort through them yet again. With the already open letters going straight into her out-tray. It's almost lunchtime when she's about to put the last letter into her out-tray, when L appears in her office and drops a letter onto her desk with a smirk before disappearing again.
With great trepidation, Minerva opens the letter and is pleasantly surprised when nothing happens.
Dear Deputy Headmistress,
I have just received a notification that Veronica has been enrolled in Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. I am slightly confused by this notification as it has some requirements in it that I don't recognise. Though I do recognise the worlds that are mentioned, as they came up in the recent patch notes.
What is a boarding school?
Why can't we buy the wands from the realm of magic?
Why can't Veronica use a familiar from the world of magic?
Why can't we order Veronica's books from the bookcase like we do with Brigham's school books.
How will you cater for Veronica's dietary requirements, as she's taken after her father, who is a vampire.
What is the Hogwarts Express and how do we get to it, as it's not in the patch notes.
The Patch notes state that you need to have a connection to the Realm of Magic in order to return from the group of worlds that London and Hogsmeade are in. As Veronica can't get this connection due to her Vampire heritage, what is the process for getting her home? Or are we expected to move to London or Hogsmeade?
Sorry if these questions are obvious, but I only practiced magic to the Neophyte level for access to the scrubroo and repairo spells, and the potions of Plentiful Needs, and Emotional Stability.
Kind regards,
Valentina Rasmussen
Variatis
Frejan
As Minerva finishes reading the letter for a second time, she doesn't even swear as another 150 letters appears on her desk, throwing all of her work into disarray yet again.
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Albus looks up with a broad smile on his face as Minerva opens his office door with her hip. In her hands is a large stack of parchment and muggle paper, and the harried expression on her face suggests there's a problem.
"Good evening Minerva, have you seen this fascinating muggle toy. Look, if you knock its head, it wobbles and it has an absolutely fascinating aura."
Minerva's lips twitch involuntarily towards a smile, before she looks back at the paperwork in her hands, "Albus, I don't have time for your distractions, this is important. I received this stack of acceptance letters this morning." She puts the larger of the sorted stacks of paper on Albus' desk, "Since lunchtime, L has been dropping by with these letters from the parents."
"Pish posh, it's just a few more students. I'm sure that we can handle that. After all, when I was a student there were 150 students in each year."
"Albus, will you please stop playing with that toy, and pay attention. There are 517 new acceptance letters here, on top of the 60 students we already had down."
Albus continues without any indication that he's heard her, "Oh, those were good times. The school could afford to include electives like Alchemy, Duelling, and Etiquette. Why, it was the second Transfiguration teacher, Professor Stipple that got me so interested in the subject that I became a teacher."
"Albus!"
Albus shakes his head, "I'm right here Minerva, there's no need to shout."
"Then you should be paying attention to this. We have 517 new students on top of the 60 we've already accepted into first year. How are we going to manage it?"
Albus shakes his head, "Really Minerva? We deal with it the same way we used to, by only sending out the letters to the best families."
Minerva growls, "Albus, these, are, not, invitations, they, are, acceptance, letters."
Albus waves his hand before going back to playing with the toy, "They can't be acceptance letters, as we'd have needed to send out that many invitations first. Just reject the ones that are in excess of 150."
"Albus, they are acceptance letters. Listen.
'To Deputy Headmistress McGonagall,
This letter is to confirm that Veronica Rasmussen will be attending your school on the 1st September 1992.
Regards,
Valentina Rasmussen.'" She puts the letter back on Albus' desk, "Does that sound like an invitation?"
Albus snatches up the letter, "What on earth?" After a few minutes of grabbing random letters and quickly scanning them, he exclaims, "We need to cancel these acceptances."
From the shelf, the sorting hat comes to life and looks down at the two of them, "That is quite impossible, as the charter clearly states that Hogwarts will teach all students that seek an education in magic. While there may not be much that could be done to stop you from destroying the invitations, Hogwarts can reject you as her headmaster if you attempt to expel a student before they have even started at the school, and without following the processes in place for it."
"Fine, what about the fact that this Veronica is a vampire?"
"Is it illegal to be a vampire in her home country?"
"What about this one, a mermaid, or a werewolf, or how about the alien? What the hell is an alien anyway?"
"Did you forget about young Remus Lupin?"
Albus growls, "He was a special case."
"You mean he was accepted before he was bitten, through his mother as I recall."
Minerva coughs loudly, "Regardless! The fact is we have an additional 500 odd students attending in September, and it is now July. As a Professor of Transfiguration who cares about her students, I refuse to teach more than 30 students at a time, and that's 10 more than I think should be in a class. Fortunately, hiring and firing is your job rather than mine. So I will leave you to it. Oh, and you may want to also consider just how we're going to house that many students, and how long it's going to take to sort them too."
Albus scoffs, "We'll just do it at the feast like always, I remember the sortings used to take an hour when I was a student here."
Minerva smiles sweetly, "And how many students did you say were in your year again?"
"150, it's not that many more."
"So it took an hour to sort 150 students. That means it will take three and a half hours to sort this years first years. Assuming the train arrives at half past seven, and we start the sorting at eight pm, we should be ready to eat before midnight. Oh, and you may want to talk with the sorting hat about how in Merlin's name we're going to house them all."
Albus reaches for a lemon drop, and then flicks the head of the statute again.
The sorting hat chuckles, "We just open up the secondary dorms for the older students. Of course, you'll need a second head of house for each house."
Albus abruptly inhales and then starts to choke on the lemon drop, once he's recovered he exclaims, "What!"
"Well yes, each dorm can house up to 200 students, and you need to have a professor to oversee each dorm, so obviously you need a second head of house for each of the four houses."
Minerva smiles, "I'll leave you to it then, I need to get to Gringotts to withdraw some gold, then I need to talk to Pomona or Andromeda about something."
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When the Floo activates, Tom looks up from cleaning the bar in the Leaky Cauldron, "Good afternoon Professor, I don't normally see you here this early in the holidays."
Minerva smiles politely, "Afternoon Tom. Just heading through to Gringotts to grab some gold. If you see Andromeda or Pomona while I'm gone, could you ask them to stop here until I get back please?"
Tom waves at her in acknowledgement while he goes back to cleaning.
A short while later Minerva comes back and heads over to the Floo, "Tom, would you mind if I made a call?"
Tom looks up again, "As long as you're quick, you know it's the public floo for the Alley."
"I should be quick, I need to make sure Andromeda is at home." Taking a pinch of floo powder, Minerva throws it in the fire, "Tonks' Townhouse."
It takes almost a minute for the fire to change from emerald green to the pale green needed for communication, at which point Minerva pushes her head into the fire.
"Andromeda, sorry to bother you during your holiday, but I need to get to the Realm of Magic… Yes, yes I am… 573 new first years… 517 of them from there, one is in a place called Batuu and we have a special request for transportation from them… Yes, I've already informed Albus and he knows he needs to find new staff… Yes, if you have any recommendations I'm sure he'll be ecstatic to hear them… The sorting hat seems to have a good idea of what to do… Tom's looking at me funny, so could you arrange transport for me?... Thanks, I'll grab a drink in the leaky while I'm waiting."
When Minerva pulls her head out of the fire, Tom takes great care to look as though he hadn't been listening in. At the same time, he finishes cleaning and pulls out his 'reading' glasses, and a copy of the prophet before sitting on a stall behind the bar to read. He's not disappointed when there's a pair fulgent flashes of light and the pub is once again empty.
With no more customers, Tom summons his endless pad of parchment and writes out a note for all of the major shopkeepers in the Alley.
Urgent news about Hogwarts students, meeting at 8, room 3a.
Tom.
As he finishes each one, he taps it with his wand to turn it into a paper bird that flies off to one of the shop keepers.
When 8pm comes around, and Tom is happy that Anna and Stewart are handling the evening rush, he heads back to the private room where the finger food and drinks have been dug into with abandon.
"Good evening everyone, sorry for calling the meeting at such short notice. However this couldn't wait until our normal meeting."
Ollivander looks over with his milky gaze, "I have to wonder what could be so urgent that you called this meeting."
Malkin raises her glass, "Hear, Hear!"
Tom perches against one of the benches while he pours himself a drink, "I had Professor McGonagall here earlier, wearing her school wear."
Malkin frowns, "Not her tartans?"
"Exactly, she had to get some gold from the goblins. When she got back she made a floo call using the public floo." The frowns that were starting to form around the room all vanish into beaming smiles, as everyone leans closer, "Anyway, the important part of the conversation is that they are expecting an influx of students this year. Far more than normal, and by the sounds of things they're all foreign."
Scribbler, the owner of Flourish and Blotts, shakes his head, "Yes, yes, we all like the juicy gossip, but you had important news."
Tom raises his glass towards the wizard, "Indeed, it wasn't the fact that they're foreign that caused me to almost fall over. It's the fact that there's 517 of them, for a grand total of 573 students starting at Hogwarts this year."
At those words, there's absolute silence around the room until Scribbler drops his glass, and it shatters on the floor.
"Morgana's saggy tits, I don't have that much stock made. I don't think I have the materials to make that much stock." The trunk maker shakes his head in despair.
At the same time Malkin starts doing calculations in her head before swearing, loudly, once she's finished turning the air blue she pulls out a book and quill, "I'm going to need to find some help, and quick." Then she grimaces, "I'm also going to need to talk to the girls in Gladrags about where they buy their fabric in the muggle world, as there's no way my supplier can provide that much black woollen cloth."
Ollivander just stares sightlessly into the room as he does whatever he does to know what wands he needs to make.
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Minerva appears by the portal in the realm of magic and just stops to look at the sky line, along with the fact that this is obviously just a floating island in the middle of nothing. The squeeze of claws on her shoulder brings her out of her wool gathering as she looks up at the phoenix that brought her to the realm.
"Thank you, I will find you a rabbit when I return to Hogwarts."
The phoenix nods before taking off and disappearing in a flash of fire that seems strangely muted against the background. Squaring her shoulders, she heads towards the only building she can see from her current position.
As she enters the Library, she's surprised to see just how spacious the place is. Shaking her head in admonishment, she castigates herself for assuming that it would be like the Hogwarts Library, with it's myriad of shelves and nooks for studying. Instead from where she is, she can already see the edges of book cases in a couple of side rooms. Looking around, she sees someone come in from one of the other rooms, and walks over to them.
"Excuse me, but would you happen to know where L is?"
The man looks up in surprise, before his eyes widen even more, "Uh, yes, she's upstairs teaching an apprentice class on mischief magic."
With that said, the man hurries off towards a door in the back of the room. Shaking her head, Minerva makes her way up the stairs to the first floor, and easily finds L teaching in an open area to the right of the building. Softly, she makes her way around the balcony overlooking the ground floor until she's standing behind L.
As she listens to L talking, it quickly becomes apparent that she can't understand her. As there's nothing else for her to do, she conjures a table and armchair along with a teapot and cups. As she sinks into the chair, she raises an eyebrow at the fact that her display didn't even garner a second glance from any of the students. With a shrug, she pulls out a pouch of tealeaves and sprinkles a pinch into the teapot before filling it with water and warming it.
It's about half hour later that L starts to demonstrate a spell, and Minerva smirks as she lifts her own wand and points it at the cauldron that could serve far better as a bath than a cooking implement. Forming the image firmly in her head, she silently point casts her transfiguration, causing the cauldron to turn into a ballet dancing elephant that's wearing a tutu. As it starts dancing L loses control of her own spell as she starts laughing in shock. Almost immediately, her students start to laugh as well, as the elephant does a pirouette. When the laughter doesn't stop for another 5 minutes, Minerva frowns before throwing a stunner at L, who collapses bonelessly to the floor. While this doesn't stop her laughing, it does allow the students to break out of their own laughter. Once L's laughter subsides, Minerva tosses an enervate at her to wake her up again.
As L comes around, she sees the Elephant dancing and feels the laughter start to bubble up again. Not taking the time to consider just why she's on the floor, L instead pulls a potion out of her inventory and chugs it down before she's laughing too hard to swallow. As the potion does it's work, she feels the laughter start to subside.
Now that she's no longer cursed, L takes the time to look around as she stands up. When she sees Minerva calmly sipping a cup of tea in an armchair that wasn't there before, she stumbles backwards in surprise, "Minerva, I didn't think dancing elephants was something a proper lady like yourself would do."
Minerva smirks, "Just because I'm a proper lady, and a Gryffindor to boot, doesn't mean I don't have a sense of humour, or ironic revenge. I believe that your students have some questions about the elephant that you created. Oh, and that's for creating that meal without explaining things to me."
L spins around and, indeed, she's bombarded by her students asking her how such a thing is even possible. As a result, her lesson overruns by 45 minutes, even if you discount the time she was unconscious. As the last of the students disperses into the library, L turns back to Minerva.
"Tell me, why shouldn't I just turn you into a statue?"
Minerva smiles, "Because you don't want to find out what life is like as a rabbit, especially when there are phoenixes around that are partial to rabbits."
L laughs, "Fair, you could at least provide another chair and cup."
Minerva smiles as she points her wand and conjures another chair and cup. Once L has had her cup of tea, she broaches the subject, "I have to ask, but why have you decided to visit my domain for once?"
Minerva shakes her head before pulling the stack of paper out of her bag, "This is 513 reasons why. I need to go through your rite of ascension, and find myself a phoenix or veild familiar."
L sighs as she casts the magic that will allow Minerva to see the motes of magic lying around, "Well, you need to find 7 motes of magic and return to me. I'll use those to provide the magic for the rite. Before you go, could you refill the teapot."
Minerva smiles as she taps the teapot with her wand, "You know, you could learn to do this too."
L shakes her head, "I know, but your students have made me so busy I just don't have time anymore…" She trails off as Minerva shrinks down into a cat before starting to yowl in pain, "No, no, no! Our purchasing ability just returned to normal. How could you do this to me."
After she's cast strangify on a dozen people that are lurking around the realm, she feels somewhat more centred and watches with a great deal of schadenfreude as Minerva's animal form changes rapidly from one animal to another, including animals that she recognises as different familiars.
Minerva comes to, to see a message floating in front of her vision.
Thank you for alpha testing the latest hotfix to the Hidden Communities expansion.
This hot fix includes the new aspiration "Master of Transfiguration" the reward for completing this aspiration is the Animagus form perk. As you already have this perk, it has been upgraded to the perk Many Forms. You may choose an additional form from the familiars available in the Realm of Magic expansion.
As part of alpha testing you have undergone the Rite of Ascension, if you no longer wish to be a sorcerer, see a sage of magic to undergo the rite of dissolution.