Not quite understanding?
Just asking because you happened to come across it?
Hmph╭(╯^╰)╮ This question isn't asked casually.
Whether it's the Diagon Alley apothecary's "testimony" or the thick and heavy *Beginner's Potion Compendium*, these aren't things you can easily find just by browsing around. At least, Erina is sure that Flourish and Blotts doesn't have that book on its shelves.
Looks like this little beaver came prepared.
Erina's gaze collided with Hermione's challenging eyes, and she raised her eyebrows in understanding.
So, the little beaver has been brewing a counterattack all vacation, waiting for her here?
Because of her existence, Hermione Granger wasn't as isolated as she was in the original story, but she also didn't experience the life-or-death escape from a troll with a club in the girls' bathroom.
Perhaps influenced by her, Hermione's sharpness at school isn't as piercing as it once was.
But on the other hand, this little beaver's stubbornness and refusal to admit defeat haven't disappeared. Instead, they've gradually converged and solidified into a beam, shifting from being aggressive towards everyone to a fixation targeted solely at Erina.
When leaving the Hogwarts Express last semester, the white-haired ball and the little beaver, witnessed by Hannah and Luna, re-signed the "New One Hundred Times" betting agreement for the next school year—as long as Hermione can win first place in more than a third of the courses, the little wing will have successfully challenged the white-haired Dark Lord.
"Tsk, it's surprising, she hasn't given up on potions?"
A hint of surprise flashed in Erina's eyes. She originally thought the little beaver wouldn't challenge her in the field of potions.
After all, compared to other subjects, potions is probably her most solid territory. The gap between an ordinary student and a potions teaching assistant is too great. The difference in bonus points and final exams is almost despairing.
People's energy is limited, and even a genius witch like Hermione can't "go to war" in every field.
In Erina's previous judgment, Hermione's wisest approach should be to avoid her strong subjects and attack in the subjects where Erina is relatively weaker—avoiding the sharpest point, that's the most successful tactical choice.
Therefore, encountering a backstab from the little beaver in potions class caught Erina off guard for a moment.
Obviously, those "one hundred times" punishment games didn't allow Erina to capture the little beaver as she wished. Instead, they stimulated Hermione Granger's desire to win to some extent—compared to the other two girls with softer personalities, this future Minister of Magic's refusal to admit defeat hasn't changed at all due to the butterfly effect.
And the most crucial thing is—
As a goblin queen who juggles countless tasks and deals with hundreds of millions every minute, Erina didn't invest too much energy in potions preparation during the recent summer vacation. She focused more on the more important areas of "importing talent from the former Soviet Union," "operating the SCP Foundation," and "building the Hogwarts academy city."
Compared to Hermione Granger, the bookworm and calculating machine, she's really a bit weak in the subdivided field of potions.
She was careless this time; Hermione's competitiveness is even stronger than she imagined.
But...
Erina secretly shook her head in her heart. This kind of petty cleverness isn't being used at the right time.
You see, she's not fighting alone right now.
If it were in Professor Snape's potions class, with that cold-faced, arrogant character, he would probably leave her hanging alone, and let her feel a little setback along the way, but Horace Slughorn isn't that kind of "bad guy."
Slughorn would almost never refuse opportunities like this to boost face in front of the children, as long as someone asks.
"Oh? Fresh nettles might be better? I'm not too sure about that."
Glancing at Hermione, Erina didn't hesitate to turn her head and ask the old wizard standing by the teacher's desk for help.
"Professor Slughorn, this doesn't seem to be written in *Magical Drafts and Potions*? Is there some wonderful potions principle involved, or is it a limitation in the actual operation of society?"
Anyway, according to the previous agreement, the two of them weren't competing for dominance in the classroom.
Even if Erina can't maintain dominance in a certain class temporarily, as long as Hermione doesn't successfully replace her, then according to that contract full of loopholes, the cunning Third Generation Dark Lord can still easily reap the spoils of war.
"Well... in theory, fresh nettles can improve the effect of swelling solution a little bit."
Slughorn naturally took over the conversation, wagged his finger, and explained with a smile.
"Just like Miss Kaslana introduced earlier, the stinging hairs on the stems and leaves of nettles cause an irritating reaction to the exposed skin of people or animals. If you have observed how swelling solution takes effect, you will find that there are actually very similar manifestations between the two—the only difference is that magic allows the potion to take effect the moment it touches the skin."
The old wizard paused slightly, looking around the classroom for a few seconds, and said meaningfully.
"However, fresh nettles are not suitable for teaching. Besides safety factors, it's actually more based on the differences in the final presentation and preparation of these two qualities of materials in the potion. So, I would like to ask you to guess, why are the more expensive dried nettles appearing in the classroom, instead of the theoretically faster-reacting fresh nettles."
Hermione was stunned for a moment and lowered her head to flip through her extracurricular books.
She hadn't thought about this at all. Whether it was in the words of that shopkeeper or in the *Beginner's Potion Compendium*, apart from mentioning the optimizing effect of fresh nettles in potion reactions, nothing else was written.
Undoubtedly, this is another knowledge blind spot not recorded in books.
"Oh, don't worry about answering incorrectly, everyone can boldly guess according to the principle of swelling solution."
Slughorn grinned and said, looking quite satisfied at the temporarily silent classroom.
It has to be admitted that Erina's way of lecturing had given him a new idea—anyway, there's still more than half an hour before the second potion reaction time, and it would be great if he could just pass the time until the end.
This kind of trade-off based on deeper potion principles can't be answered by just relying on luck or reading a few more potions-related books.
Even some potion geniuses with keen intuition mostly have to go through many trials and comparisons before they can vaguely understand the subtle differences between those potions.
And this has to be based on the fact that all the potions in the previous trials were perfectly formulated, and the changes in potion properties caused by small changes in potion materials can be accurately locked.
Just then, Harry suddenly raised his right hand cautiously.
"Because dried nettles make the potion react more stably?" he said. "Although fresh nettles make the potion take effect faster, because of the magic of the potion itself, the improvement it brings isn't that obvious?"
As he spoke, Harry Potter glanced at the old *Magical Drafts and Potions* beside him.
In the blank space on the page of description of swelling solution, now, like the place where the potion is printed, it's covered with black notes, and many places also evaluate and revise the content in the textbook.
At this time, a note is also written next to the words on the page of nettle pattern:
[Processed dried nettles can improve the stability of the potion, the reaction efficiency improved by fresh nettles is negligible]
This book isn't the new potions textbook that Harry Potter bought from Flourish and Blotts.
Yesterday afternoon, when Harry was having a routine remedial lesson in Snape's office, because of a sudden drowsiness, he accidentally knocked over the potion bottle on the professor's desk. Although Professor Snape controlled the potion's flow in time, Harry's newly bought textbook was also mostly damaged under the professor's spell, and it couldn't be used anymore.
Harry originally thought he would be scolded severely, but Professor Snape seemed to be in a good mood that day.
Besides slightly telling him to rest well, Severus Snape didn't scold him too much. Instead, he broke precedent and ended the remedial lesson early, letting Harry go back early to adjust his mental state.
On the other hand, to avoid affecting Harry's follow-up courses.
Before leaving the potions professor's office, Snape casually found a few old books left in the classroom by previous students from the pile of sundries, and let Harry choose one at random to temporarily cope with the upcoming potions class.
However, Harry didn't expect that the notes on it would happen to involve the question raised by Professor Slughorn.
"Absolutely correct, I couldn't have explained it more accurately myself!"
Slughorn blinked in surprise, looked at Harry with some surprise, and then said.
"As long as it is a qualified swelling solution, the onset time when it comes into contact with bare skin is mostly within one to two seconds. Fresh nettles do speed up the speed, but the practicality of this improvement isn't too high—besides, fresh nettles, apart from being cheap, the abundant juice also makes them more active in the potion brewing process."
"This also means," Slughorn said, his gaze sweeping over the childish faces in the classroom, "when we use nettles in teaching, the more fresh nettles there are, the more obvious the disadvantages are. Mr. Potter, I think you should understand the reason for this disadvantage, right?"
Hermione's eyes lit up, and she raised her hand again.
With Slughorn's reminder, she finally figured out the key.
However, under the current circumstances, the poor calculating machine wants to get a chance to speak, and she has to wait for Harry to be unable to continue answering the questions raised by Slughorn, which is obviously a bit... difficult.
"Um—because of stability, activity will shorten our reaction time and is not conducive to learning. Is that right?"
"Exactly."
Slughorn said happily, and Hermione put down her hand, looking a little disappointed.
"In the entry stage of potions, the most important thing is to reduce accidents. The rarer the element, the easier it is for you to control and understand, and the easier it is to discover problems. And when you grow to a certain stage, you can start trying to sacrifice stability in pursuit of efficiency, and look for some surprises outside the given results."
"So, the role of nettles in this potion is actually to give it a way to take effect?"
Erina tapped her lips thoughtfully, and murmured softly.
Compared to the other subjects, potions was the most difficult subject for her to understand before, because strictly speaking, it's not alchemy—it doesn't follow the equivalent exchange of matter, nor does it follow chemical reactions.
But, Severus Snape is obviously more suitable as a researcher than a pure teacher.
Professional strength and teaching ability are two different dimensions of evaluation standards—in the integration of civilization between the non-magical world and the magical world, Horace Slughorn is more suitable in terms of knowledge reserve and ease of understanding.
"It can be understood that way, Miss Kaslana. But this also involves some magic—"
Hearing Erina's soft murmur, a look of surprise flashed in Slughorn's eyes, and he nodded uncertainly.
If Harry Potter's answer is still in the category of potion genius, then the guess of the silver-haired witch next to him has begun to touch the deeper core, some discussions about the essence of potions.
Only wizards who have reached this step are qualified to be recognized by the field of potions, the real "potion master".
And at this moment, in front of Slughorn, a little witch who is less than twelve years old seems to be breaking into the door that ordinary potion geniuses may have to wander for decades at a speed he can't understand, because of some extremely basic knowledge and discussions.
"Then, by analogy, the role of pufferfish eyes should be the core efficacy of swelling solution?"
Erina narrowed her eyes and her mind worked quickly.
When threatened, wild pufferfish can quickly suck water or air into their highly elastic stomachs, swelling to two to three times their original size in a short period of time, and pupils are also the easiest organs to enlarge in living things.
You know, when normal humans are excited, the first organ to enlarge is the pupil.
Most creatures' pupils will dilate when they are excited, or excited, and this amplitude can usually reach five to ten times, which means that... pufferfish eyes are equivalent to "expansion" in a sense.
Erina carefully looked at the writing on the blackboard, and paused for a moment on "pufferfish eyes".
Pufferfish is a generic term, which includes more than 200 species of fish belonging to various genera of Tetraodontiformes, Tetraodontidae, which covers an even wider range than the Strigiformes represented by "round-faced fat chicken".
"In other words, the reason for choosing pufferfish eyes without specifying the species is because it refers to the species that will self-expand, rather than some more detailed, specific classifications, and uses the organ with the most obvious stretching effect and ratio in its body, rather than considering it from a biological or chemical point of view..."
And following this rule to deduce, if the role of pufferfish eyes is to give the entry "expansion".
Then…
"Bat... liver? What does this represent?"
Erina's gaze stayed on the last ingredient of swelling solution for a few seconds.
According to the classic inference hypothesis model, any hypothesis, when established, must have three related "coincidences", and now she is missing the last crucial piece to glimpse the mysterious origin of potions.
"Could it be, a mysterious potion secret recipe of unknown meaning? No, not just that—"
You know, unlike other ingredients, bat liver is one of the most frequently used in potion preparation.
In many non-magical legends, bats are even directly equated with wizards.
Bats, internal organs, toxins...
Potions... potions that can be used for the human body...
Multiple magical materials mixed... final presentation... non-toxic...
In an instant, Erina's eyes suddenly lit up.
"I understand everything, so that's how it is—"
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Yay! A Certain Scientific Hogwarts has finally started~
Releasing a big move~ This is definitely the most interesting, and somewhat reasonable, exclusive explanation!~
Fat chicken expansion! Cluck cluck cluck!!