A Bite of Hogwarts - Chapter 28

After paying two fifty-pound notes as a question fee, Alina’s exchange for Galleons went surprisingly smoothly.

Less than fifteen minutes later, the goblin Serkis had helped Alina register her information, open an account, exchange for money, and taken care of a host of other tedious tasks, upon which he placed a bag full of money in front of the silver-haired girl.

While the majority of the money was in Galleons, Serkis had considerately provided some of the money in silver Sickles and bronze Knuts, which would make things easier for her coming shopping trip.

“So this is a Galleon. The craftsmanship is surprisingly good.”

Alina curiously gripped the golden coin as she carefully examined. From the point of standard dimensions, it wasn’t that large, a bit less than double the size of a one yuan coin from her last life.

On the front side of the coin was an abstract representation of a dragon, and a circle of numbers was inscribed on the edge. This was a serial number engraved on the coin by Gringotts and was also the serial number of the specific goblin who had cast the coin.

“But this weight and texture…don’t seem right?”

The girl weighed the coin in her hand, her fingernails exerting a little pressure as they scratched the surface. The surface of the light gold coin remained glossy, with no depressions or scratch marks.

Alina raised an eyebrow. There was no question that this gleaming Galleon, whether it was in weight or texture, was not a coin cast directly from gold mined from the earth.

As a Harry Potter fan in her last life, as well as the holder of a master’s in economics, Alina had once discussed a very interesting question with fellow fans in a message board called ‘A Bite of Hogwarts’ with the serial number [862-074-819]1.

As Great Britain was the first country to implement the gold standard, even in this era of fiat currency (which is paper money), gold still had an influential status in its monetary system.

And the Galleons of the Magic World were undoubtedly the greatest challenge to the new system of fiat currency.

This challenge was that if Galleons lost their value as a currency and their intrinsic value was greater than their exchange value, a catastrophic economic crash would take place in both worlds.

Alina was currently in the year 1991. An ounce of gold was 360.75 US dollars, putting a gram of gold at 8.68 British pounds apiece.

Now, a steel-core one yuan coin was around six grams. If the same coin was made of pure gold, it would weigh 15.7 grams for a value of 136 British pounds.

But the exchange rate used by the goblins of Gringotts was 1 Galleon for 5 British pounds!

To put it bluntly, if a Galleon was melted down into gold, it could go for a much higher price than its face value. First, this would cause the gold reserves of the Magic World to nosedive, and then the exchanging of currency would be banned, and all exchange methods with the Muggle World would be locked down1.

In short, when the purchasing power and exchange rate are in contradiction, if the goblins and the Magic World wanted to maintain a normal financial system, they could only implement one solution: large-scale debasing.

Thus, golden Galleons were not gold coins. At most, they were magic coins that had a small amount of gold mixed with other, cheaper, metals.

This would perfectly explain how in ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire’, the then-Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge was able to singlehandedly throw the reward of one thousand Galleons to Harry Potter. This would normally be impossible. After all, such a bag would weigh nearly 80 kilograms!

“Might I ask…Miss Alina, is there a problem with this Galleon?”

Andy Serkis anxiously asked.

When this generous human girl took up this Galleon, she seemed to be seized by a spell. She had played around with and examined the coin for nearly five minutes. Not even the most obsessed with goblins acted like this.

“Oh, it’s nothing. I just suddenly thought of a few things.”

Alina shook her head and came back to her senses. With a flick of her finger, she skillfully returned the Galleon into the pouch on her waist and then turned around to look at Dumbledore.

“So, Professor Dumbledore, where are we going next?”

“Mm…of course, we’re going to Diagon Alley to get your school supplies. Let me take a look first.”

Dumbledore took out a somewhat ink-splattered parchment from his robe, pushed his glances, and began to softly list off the items: “Uniform, books, wand, supplies for class, and besides that, a student can bring…ahem, I’ve basically got it down.”

The old wizard strangely coughed while reading the list, and before Alina could see what was on the parchment, he folded it back up and hid it in his robe.

“Let’s buy your uniform first. From a personal standpoint, I prefer Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions.”

Dumbledore genially smiled as he grabbed Alina’s small hand and led her out through the main door of Gringotts.

For some reason, Dumbledore had suddenly felt an ill foreboding, as if he remained with Alina in Gringotts, something even more problematic would take place.

“Professor Dumbledore, hold on a second! Did you leave something out on purpose?”

As they stood in the sunny shopping street outside of Gringotts, Alina unhappily glared at Dumbledore.

If she remembered correctly, at the very end of the list of supplies a new student needed was a special note: Students may also bring, if they desire, an owl OR a cat OR a toad.

“Was there? Perhaps you heard wrong. As Headmaster of Hogwarts, I am confident that, Miss Alina, that these are all the things you need to study.”

Dumbledore blinked his eyes in confusion as he spoke in an earnest tone to the girl. If Alina hadn’t read the novels at least ten times, she might have even been fooled.

“A pet! Each witch or wizard can bring one pet to Hogwarts! Last night, I saw that note at the end of the list on the second page when I was with Father Benitez! Professor Dumbledore, how could you be like this!?”

Alina puffed her cheeks and threw away Dumbledore’s hand. She wasn’t a monster. Was there any need to even strip her of the right to get a pet?

“Oh…is that so? Ah, I see. This ink smudge happened to be blocking that part. Right, would you like to have some delicious ice cream?”

Dumbledore took out the parchment in astonishment and pretended to take a second look. After putting on a face of sudden realization, he suddenly attempted to change the topic.

Haha.

This trick again.

The silver-haired girl rolled her eyes and ignored Dumbledore, walking into Madam Malkin’s on her own.

If not for the vast discrepancy in fighting power, Alina would have tried to tear the beard of this heartless old wizard who didn’t even know how to find a good excuse.

The voice of a girl could be heard from within the store as the door swayed back and forth.

“…Chocolate flavor, and also strawberry flavor. And it would be great if there could be fruit bits sprinkled on top.”