Chapter 8 Revisiting Diagon Alley
Diagon Alley is a great place.
A month after his first visit, Andrew finally scraped together enough money for a round trip to London and spending money in Diagon Alley.
As a price, his research on textbooks and experiments on magic were not as fast as he imagined, but this was necessary.
When he got off the bus at King's Cross Station, he was even interested in taking a look at the stop sign - according to Professor McGonagall's account, he would have to get off at platform 9 3/4 to go to Hogwarts, but at this point he could I'm not interested in using my head to test whether the platform is open.
The train transferred to the subway, and around noon, he successfully arrived at the entrance to Diagon Alley, the Leaky Cauldron.
“What a great place.”
He looked at the door of the bar and let out a sound of admiration, then took off his backpack from his back, took out his cloak and covered himself, and took out a glass of ice cubes from his backpack and put it in his pocket.
There was nothing he could do when Professor McGonagall brought him here last time, but this time he would not conspicuously wear a set of unsociable clothes and wander around this wizard-infested place - he suspected that most of the wizards who walked around had mastered how to let wizards wander around. A spell to lower the temperature in the wizard's robe, but he couldn't find a similar spell in the first-grade textbooks.
Due to the special circumstances brought by Professor McGonagall last time, he has not yet mastered the skills of greeting ordinary wizards, but it is not a big problem - before the start of Hogwarts, there are many people in and out of Diagon Alley, and he only needs to Just keep the hood on.
Everything went well except for the stuffiness and heat.
Therefore, after leaving the Leaky Cauldron, he decisively took off his hood, gave up his stupid plan of disguise, bought a large ice cream, and then walked quickly towards the second-hand bookstore.
After a simple negotiation with his boss, he got the right to browse all the books except the fine second-hand book section for a price of one pike per hour - he could even bring his unfinished ice cream.
But more things are gone. The discrimination caused by age can only be erased with time. At his age, only adults at his age are willing to communicate seriously with him without meeting him.
"This is why I chose manuscript editing as the first pot of gold..."
Andrew quickly finished his ice cream, put on his mask, and then began to look through old books.
Unlike the last time when he came to select books, he mainly chose teaching books. The books he mainly searched for this time were entertainment books.
Entertainment is human nature, whether muggle or wizard.
To put it bluntly, everyone is a fun-loving person, it’s just that they have different ways of having fun.
He didn't dare to say a model that would guide everyone to have fun, but he was sure that after figuring out what wizards liked, he could create something that would be popular in the wizarding world.
There is a flaw in investigating this in a second-hand bookstore - the boss will not accept time-sensitive reading materials, nor can he accept second-hand books in the wizarding world that are suitable for adult wizards to read, but in other aspects it should be enough.
Fairy tale collections and bedtime stories are all very good. The Ruined Childhood series is considered a classic of hidden reading. As long as it doesn’t deviate from the original work, readers will be very happy to read it...
"Seriously, Andrew...you thought before you came here that as your grammar improves, you will write some books for a wider audience."
He reminded himself to change his waistcoat, and then flipped through biographies.
Biographies that can be acquired and resold by second-hand bookstores are generally widely circulated, and a different manuscript development mode is also highly acceptable - changing it to an adventure story series is a good choice.
Then insert a little fantasy magic version and exaggerate the magic effects. As long as there is no negative image of the characters, you can get extremely high evaluations. After roughly investigating the popular magazine series, understanding the types of fairy tale books that wizards often read, and then learning about the biographies of some famous wizards, Andrew felt that he was getting started. He picked out the books that he liked and touched his pockets. Only then did he realize that he didn't even have time to go to Gringotts to change money.
After paying for reading the books, he asked the boss to keep the books for him, and immediately rushed to Gringotts to exchange them for Galleons (because he chose the day well, Gringotts' business was processed very quickly) .
"Actually, there are many storybooks in the Hogwarts library."
Probably seeing how hurried he was running back and forth, the store owner kindly reminded him that his main profit was from second-hand textbooks, which he could get at a much cheaper price every year during the end of Hogwarts Owls or during graduation.
"That's what I want, sir," Andrew nodded. "Can I go to the boutique section to look for second-hand copies of the most popular books at the moment?"
"Then I really don't have any," the store manager spread his hands, "Lockhart's books are in hot demand. His second-hand books are hard to get, and they are very popular. Many people have reserved them."
"Lockhart?"
"Of course, the most famous adventurer, his stories are so lifelike."
The boss marveled - he also had an adventurous heart, but the Galleons he earned from buying second-hand books at Hogwarts held him back.
‘Well, it seems that I have to do a series of Lockhart books...Fortunately, the financial pressure is not that great. ’ Andrew was thinking while packing the selected classic books, “In addition, I need an owl, an ordinary and most common owl.”
About ten minutes later, he arrived at the famous Eela Owl store.
After another ten minutes, he left the store carrying a grass owl - according to the books he read, this type of owl is the most common owl in the entire magical world, and even most of the owls in the school are grass owls. .
"However," he glanced at his owl, "I always feel like the clerk is lying to me. You are so ugly but have a lot of personality... Oh, don't!"
The owl's beak had already reached his finger. Although it only took a small peck, the warning in its eyes was very serious. It was obvious that if Andrew said another bold word, it was planning to take a serious bite.
This incident made Andrew understand one thing at once. The fact that the clerk said it was smart was definitely not a bragging to increase his worth.
"So, the magic spell in the birdcage that reduces the sense of presence is also real?" Andrew looked at the owl, "Well, since your mouth is not heavy, I decided to give you a nice name, but not Now, we have to go back."
It nodded slightly, which surprised Andrew, who originally thought he had adapted to the existence of magic.
"The right books, the right goals, and the right owl..."
Andrew nodded. This action was perfect. The next thing he had to do was to find a hotel with a reasonable price to stay for one night, and then set off the next day to return to the orphanage from London.
"Hey man, I got a great idea."
Andrew said to his owl, "How about the Leaky Cauldron? It's just the right time for us to find out information about the magical world."
"Gu."
(End of chapter)