Ended up having to develop some ideas about Curse Breaking for the next scene of Fawkes' Gift/The One He Feared. Got a bit carried away and thought I'd share the resource. As always, you're welcome to use these ideas in your own fics (with citation, of course). Feel free to add any ideas of your own, either on Curse Breaking in general or techniques in specific.

I've deleted from this the ideas that are going to be used in the next scene of The One He Feared. I'll post them after the scene is done.

Some of this depends on a theory of spell geometry which I developed for Alexandra Potter. It can be found here.

Curse Breaking

Curse breaking is essentially the task of undoing spells. The name is derived from its most common application, but the same set of techniques can be used to undo charms and transfigurations.

It is not to be confused with healing, which undoes the effects of a spell on a living being, or blocking, which undoes a spell in its transition state.

Basic Process

The process of curse breaking at its most general is quite simple: identification, then cancellation.

Identification

There are a variety of ways to identify a spell:

- If the spell has visible or other sensible aspects it may be possible to identify it through the senses alone.
- A spell can also be identified by seeing its effects.
- Advanced practitioners may identify a spell by directly sensing the magic.
- If the above processes fail, one must a) reveal the magical structure and b) interpret the structure into a recognisable spell.

Revelation

Revelation involves gaining sensory access to spell structure. This sensory access may be visual, tactile, olfactory, auditory, or even through taste.

The revelation process typically involves spells (some of them proprietary), potions, or both.

Interpretation

Once revealed, the curse breaker can use arithmancy to formalise the information they have accessed. Once formalised, arithmetical, numerological, alchemical and other properties can be worked out, and from there the spell identified.

Cancellation

A spell can be cancelled in one of three ways:

- Overwhelming: The use of an appropriate reversal spell of equal or greater power to the target spell. The most basic reversal spell is Finite Incantatum.
- Satisfaction: combining the spell with its equal and opposite form. For example, a feather-light charm can be cancelled with a rock-heavy charm of the same magnitude. The two annihilate.
- Unravelling: direct manipulation of the internal (geometric/arithmetic/runic) structure of the spell to cause it to destabalise and collapse, or otherwise change form. This direct manipulation can be done through spells, potions, words (sometimes embedded deliberately into the spells as passwords), or other symbolic acts (such as the offering of blood).

Cancellation spells can be cast upon a spell directly, or upon a magical representation of the spell (sympathetic undoing).

Complicating factors

- Some spells can be cast upon other spells in order to strengthen them, protect them, hide them, or link them together in some way. This can create a compound spell structure, which is much more complex.

- Dark magic resists undoing magic above and beyond the perfection level of its casting. This must be compensated for when undoing.

- Dark magic can also be incredibly unpredictable, often utilising dynamic geometries.

- Location. You have to do your revealing from the right location or you might get it wrong. This position is called the mid-point -- generally, the point at the centre of the effected area. But some more complex spell systems have an abnormal mid-point. Some even have multiple mid-points, called loci. Other spell systems are abstract - i.e. not cast on a physical area - and for these a representation for the mid-point must be created.

Partial List of Specific Techniques

-Redacted technique featuring iron filings-

Bleeding solution: any potion that can work as a magic sink.

Bleeding: extremely slow process by which a spell can be drained of its power over time, eventually leading to collapse. -Redacted-

Enchanted maps: specially prepared maps can be used as a representation of the target area. They can be used in both identification and cancellation.

Mad McAllister’s Cauldron: the last resort of a desperate cursebreaker who doesn’t care much if the enchanted area is completely wrecked. A cauldron is set up at the midpoint and a deliberately unstable potion is brewed with magically powerful reagents. The cauldron explodes and, if you’re very lucky, the spell comes down.

The Battering Ram of Rome: -redacted-

Inebriation: using an inebriation charm to get a spell to act up, revealing details of its effects. Incantation: Inebrio.

Unbreakable charm: Corroborro. Can be used in unravelling to destablise a spell, or protect one part of a spell while another part is adjusted.

Prop charm: confirmo. Can be cast on spells to try to strengthen them. Works best in conjuction with a potion. Can be used in unravelling to destabalise a spell.

Paradoxing: -redacted-

Draught of Notre Dame: enables one to hear magic. Needs a lot of practice, but can be used by an expert to directly identify spells. In the hands of an amateur will just give you a headache.

Lockley’s parchment: a potion which, when poured onto a parchment resting at the mid-point of a spell, will write down the arithmetical structure of the spell onto the parchment.

Lockley’s charm: a charm cast upon other spells which cause the arithmetical properties of that spell to manifest in figures of fire scrolling through the air. Almost useless except to an expert arithmancer, as it goes by too quickly.

A Kronecker Kompass: a heavily enchanted compass, highly sensitive to spells around it, which draws the geometries of those spells.

Cannit Charm - weak charm that is occasionally useful. Example of use: wizard points wand at a broomstick. “Cannit fly?” Wand gives off a puff of smoke. Only works with very basic actions, can be protected against easily.

Runestone: enchanted stone tablet and chisel which writes out the runic representation of a spell it is tasked to determine. Only works on spells based on Scandinavian languages (i.e. not many in modern Europe).

Derrik’s Demented Dementor Technique: use the magic-suppressing effects of a Dementor to weaken a spell while you work to undo it with other techniques. Liable to get your soul sucked out.

Repellent Repellent: a potion which allows the drinker to bypass spells with distracting mental effects.

Substitution: using a switching spell and an enchanted object to swap enchantments between two objects.

Pulling the Rug: destroying the base of the spell aka the physical object that it is cast upon. Generally undesirable, as you want the object intact, but occasionally useful. Difficult to perform with abstract spells.

Oggbert’s Onion: -redacted-

Webbing: a spell cast upon a spider which causes it to map out the geometry of the surrounding area with webs. Slower than a Kronecker Kompass, but much cheaper and can be performed on the fly.

Shy Sand. Specially enchanted sand which will avoid magic. Throwing it towards the edge of the enchanted area will cause it to settle in a line marking the edge of the enchantment.

 

I want to see a fic where Bill licks the wall and can tell there's X number of curses, spells, etc. And as we continue reading we learn that's the only way he can physically sense the curses/wards and it's also how he got into Fleur's panties.

 

I also want to point out that if you tie it to smell you can make James, Sirius, and co. run around doing some Scooby Doo level cursebreaking using Sirius.

 

I want to point out that Taure obviously has way too much spare time on his hands but that's ok because it means we get threads like this.

 

I love how your world-building in magic always ends up with wonderfully quirky parts-- the Dementor technique and the Shy Sand are perfect examples of your originality while keeping in the HP canon tradition of strange things.

 

Do. Want.


That is all.

 

Done and done. And taken to its logical conclusion.

- - -o

"There's no such thing as a useless sense while cursebreaking," his mentor had always said. "You have to use them all. And if you wanna make it, you gotta lick a few walls in your time."

Licking the walls is what brought Bill and his mentor, a squat man named Johnson who only had love in his heart for his slick oily black-haired handlebar moustache, to an unbroken series of chambers in the upper floors of a pyramid built thousands of years ago to celebrate some wizard Pharaoh whose name Bill had forgotten. Cursebreaking teams had flocked to Egypt in the past few weeks since the discovery of The Seven Lost Pyramids, which had been hidden by enchantments this whole time and had needed magic long since thought lost to be found. Johnson's team - twelve cursebreakers from all over the world, with Bill as their apprentice - had nabbed the biggest of them all, affectionately designated in the files as Sloppy Hag, and with their claim staked and rendered official by sanction guidelines, they weren't going to be leaving anytime soon.

Barely eighteen and far from home, Bill was more than excited for the trip. His apprenticeship before the pyramid had involved a lot of studying, swapping stories, and getting drunk with the rest of the team. The latter had been fun, especially when the local women apparently thought gingers were gods and treated Bill as one appropriately, but Bill was eager to get his serious cursebreaking skills developed some. Earn some gold, impress Johnson, get his official license, and then use that license to get him more women. Bill had conquered sixteen vaginas in his time, but he was just starting out. An official license would double that number within a day of having it. Bill couldn't wait for that day.

"Pay attention now," said Johnson, as they walked down the cramped halls. "You know how to do the basic visual curse detection spells, sure, but we're about to come to an area where you'll need to rely on other senses. First up, smell." He waved his wand in the air and pointed at the door at the end of the hall. "Nostrils."

Bill inhaled. All day all he could smell was sand and musty corpses, but suddenly that changed. It tingled at first, and his head hummed a little from the sensation. Mint. Spearmint, maybe. He could smell spearmint. He told Johnson as much.

"Good nose," said Johnson. He pointed at the stone door. "Your usual plague curse on that one. Kinda boring. But these chambers down here weren't for the pharaohs, so nothing complicated. Wait 'til we get to the gold vaults later on, that'll teach you a thing or two."

Johnson took Bill through the steps of breaking the curse, but since he was Bill Fucking Weasley it was nothing to him. This is what he was born to do. He could break a little plague curse in his sleep.

The next room they arrived in was small and circular, as sandy and dusty and covered in loose stones and cracks as all the others. The door to the next hallway awaited them, appearing all the world as but a harmless block of stone.

"Smell again," Johnson said, waving his wand to cast the same spell as before. Bill inhaled again, but all he got was the tingling, and nothing more. Once he shook his head, Johnson nodded. "They're getting more complicated now. Time to lick a wall. You up for it?"

Licking the door itself would've been tantamount to sticking your tongue in a Manticore's asshole, and Bill would've come away with no less than twelve different kinds of plagues and died very quickly and painfully. But the walls around the door were not similarly cursed, and with one of Johnson's many spells - one that Bill really wanted to learn soon - Bill could simply use his tongue the walls to get an idea of the kind of spellwork at hand.

And so he did. It might not have been the most dignified of things, and the wall tasted worse than his mother's infamous experimental casserole - that her children had told her was delicious so as not to hurt her feelings, even if Percy was dry heaving as he said it and George had already lost half his weight to diarrhoea there at the table - but that feeling went away quickly. It was replaced with something else, not quite bitter, not quite sweet, but still a taste. That he could identify spearmint smell earlier was a miracle; a direct translation of what he was sensing into words that could be the identifier of a certain known curse was rare, and it would take years of work to identify each component of the curse's structure and how to translate.

He told Johnson what he could, and Johnson nodded approvingly. "You're good, Weasley," he said. "Let's try a different sense, help align what I think this is, and then we'll give breaking it a shot. Got it?"

"Can't wait," said Bill.

The next steps of the process was an adventure, that's for sure. Bill ended up licking the wall three times, smelling the air twice, straining his ears six times, and internally high-fiving himself as he identified a curse path before Johnson did.

"Looks like we're all ready to do this," Johnson declared. "Okay, let's double check and -" He stopped. His gaze had turned to something on the other wall, the one Bill hadn't licked. "Well fuck. Looks like what's behind here is worth our while, rookie."

Bill looked at the wall Johnson was curiously. "I don't... What?"

"The hole," Johnson said, and he pointed to it. Sure enough, there was a hole in the wall, perfectly round and smooth enough for Bill to know it was carved there into the stone. "That hole means we missed something. Close one."

"Some sort of trap rune hidden in there?" Bill guessed. He raised his wand. "So do we -"

Johnson approached the hole and waved off Bill's concern with a hand. "No no, nothing like that. Put that wand away and get your other one."

Bill pocketed his wand before he realised. "Other one? I'm not carrying a second wand..."

Johnson turned, his eyebrows raised. "I didn't know you were a eunuch."

"I'm not?"

"Was that a question?"

"Sorry sir I'm kind of confused right now."

"About what?"

"If you mean my wand, yeah I have that." Bill looked down at his crotch area. "We have a mutually beneficial relationship. Not a eunuch."

Johnson sighed in exasperation. "Rookie, when I say you'll have to use all your senses as a cursebreaker, I mean all of them. The relationship between these old magics and sexual activity was also mutually beneficial. The pharaohs were into some fucked up shit, man. I've told you this before... did you not hear me this whole time? I said there's no such thing as useless sense when it comes to cursebreaking."

"You have to use them all. And if you wanna make it, you gotta lick a few walls in your time," Bill quoted, from memory.

"I didn't say lick," said Johnson. "I said fuck. You gotta fuck a few walls in your time. But you're right, that is kinda vague. You don't actually have to finish, though you're welcome to, whatever floats your boat. But you gotta achieve a state of arousal and utilise it as a sense unlike any other. That hole in the wall? It's built in for a reason. Like a keyhole. And your cock is the key. Only it's more like you stick it in, jerk around a bit, and then do the right spell. And, just as with the other spells we've used today, it'll help clear up the picture some."

Bill couldn't believe it. Johnson was screwing with him, right? No way was Bill Goddamn Weasley sticking his dick in a wall of some musty old pyramid. He had some class, dammit. And sixteen conquered vaginas under his belt. Classy as dicks.

"I'm not sticking my dick in a wall, sir," Bill said slowly.

Johnson threw up his hands. "Seriously? You don't, we try breaking that door's curse and find out the hard way that there was one we missed because you didn't? That means we die. Probably painfully."

"Why don't you do it?"

"I have done it. Did it yesterday, on the first floor. Done it more than a few times in my day. Like, what, nine hundred? I've lost count. And you think the rest of my team is above this kind of thing? They aren't. If they were, they'd be shitcanned faster than they could say, 'It's only a hole in the wall it's not that big of a deal'. It's reckless endangerment on your part if you ignore these holes, Weasley. It's not what a cursebreaker does."

"But we fuck walls?"

"Get over it. You said you wanted to learn and now you're gonna chicken out? There's gold on the other side of that door. Like five thrusts away from it, you are."

"Everyone on the team did this when they were starting out?" Bill asked, still in disbelief.

"We all have to, son. Cursebreakers all over. Why do you think witches can't be cursebreakers?"

Bill gaped at him like a fish. "But what about Janis?"

Johnson rolled his eyes. "Janis is pre-op, and if he/she/my one drunken regret wants to keep their job on my team, that cock better stay where it right fucking is."

"She used to be a man? Seriously?" Bill asked in disbelief. He'd considered going there once or twice over the past few long nights; Janis would make an admirable seventeenth conquerage, he'd reasoned. Welp, not anymore.

"Still a man where it counts," said Johnson, thrusting his crotch forward a bit. "More of a man than you, Weasley. By Merlin's beard, I thought you were a bit of a bad motherfucker. I thought you were worth my time. And here you are not wanting to stick your dick in a wall? I'm disappointed, young sir, just so disappointed. We could've had it all. But now..."

The implied ellipses in Johnson's tone sent Bill's mind racing. He may have been Bill "Sixteen And Counting" Weasley, but three out of the four cursebreaker positions he'd applied for apprenticeship had turned him down due to the belief that no Weasley can become a cursebreaking badass, a belief they'd conveyed through bursts of laughter. Bill had got them back by conquering their daughters - numbers nine, twelve and thirteen - but the rejection had still set him back. Getting on Johnson's team was pure luck - especially because Johnson only had a son - and if the man fired Bill less than two months into the apprenticeship, then Bill was utterly screwed.

If not for this, Bill'd probably have to join his father working for the Muggle junk Ministry office place. And there were no good looking witches in that office. And no way that job would lead Bill to his dream of becoming the cursebreaker who broke that Swedish Veela clan's chastity curse and then getting rewarded justly for it.

Bill couldn't risk losing this apprenticeship. And if that meant he had to stick his dick in a wall... he would.

With a sigh, he said to Johnson as much, and the other man nodded. "Well go on then," he said, gesturing to the pyramid wall.

The entry slot wasn't exactly giving Bill a come hither look but at least it was clean shaven. Bill took a tentative step towards it. He considered a pick-up line, so he could at least pretend this was a regular conquering. "Hey baby you come here often?" he'd probably end saying... to a hole in a pyramid that hasn't moved for three thousand years. "Did it hurt when you fell down from Heaven baby?" or "I'm Bill Fucking Weasley. Nine inches. Let's go." probably wouldn't fly either.

Bill unzipped the fly of his trousers. Johnson stood nearby, arms crossed.

"Haven't got all day here," said Johnson. "Whip it and stick it. The Sloppy Hag awaits you."

"Do you have to be, uh, be here?" Bill asked. "Or could you maybe just turn around?"

"Am I supposed to trust that you'll actually do it?" Johnson said incredulously. "Come on Weasley we're all men here. If you're feeling small I'll show you a picture of Janis's. See that thing and you'll realise why he decided being a girl might've been the better option."

Bill just sighed again. And, without any more hesitation, whipped it out. For the job, for the Veela coven...

"Carpet matches the drapes, huh," was all Johnson said. "I just lost twenty Sickles."

Bill ignored him. He wasn't ready, not even close, but a few moments of awkwardly tugging at it in the middle of an ancient pyramid in a foreign country with his mentor nodding nearby while thinking about the Great Squid And Those Seventh Year Girls Incident in his fourth year remedied the situation. Bill's Johnson was saluting the other Johnson in no time.

Focus turned to the hole in the wall and nothing else. It was wide enough, thank Merlin, and a quick peering into it confirmed there were no scorpions or anything waiting for him. It looking far less dangerous than Bill's fourth vagina conquerage, at least. They were all warm holes in the end, and Bill's speciality was in warm holes. He had this shit handled.

"I'm coming for you, Swedish Veela coven," Bill whispered, and realised that first part was about to become very literal as he entered.

And so there he stood with his dick in the hole. It was not a smooth entry, not in the least, rock dust and sand rubbing against foreskin and him awkwardly pressing his cheek and forearms against the wall. He grunted, too. It was weird. So, so, weird.

But a more business-like sense overtook Bill. He had curses to find, after all. He'd be laughing about this by the fifth or sixth time, no doubt. A funny story to tell his kids, surely.

"How long do I have to do this before I figure out if there's any curses?" Bill asked, panting in between thrusts.

"As long as it takes me to remember which button takes the picture," said Johnson, chortling.

Bill, turned, startled, pulling his dick out of the wall, just in time for the flash bulb on Johnson's camera to go off. The brilliant light blinded him and he stumbled almost drunkenly, erect penis wilting as he swung it about the place, and by the time his eyes had recovered he saw Johnson pocketing the camera and smirking.

"Every time," he said. "Rookies fall for it every time. Sticking your cock in a wall, I mean, come on."

"Give me that fucking camera," Bill spat out, scrambling to stuff his dick back in his trousers.

"Nah," said Johnson. "It's going on the wall with all the others. I'll show you it when we get back to the camp. We all have a good laugh over it. Well, Janis won't, but Janis isn't much fun since the hormone treatments and their family disowned shim. But anyway, we hide the wall until the rookie gets initiated, but not anymore! Congrats!"

Bill said nothing. He just stared.

"Let's get moving," Johnson declared with another chortle. "We find any gold today you get half... Why aren't you moving? Don't be like that Weasley, where's your sense of humour? Be happy you're not being initiated into the Aurors, because I hear those buttplugs really hurt after the third year. Buddy of mine named Dawlish still has his in, and Mad-Eye Moody's nickname didn't come from the fake eye, trust me."

Some of the anger dissipated. It was just another step on his way to becoming a cursebreaker, and at least he wouldn't have to do it again. And the promise of gold and becoming one of the team for good, all on the path to get to that ultimate goal in life, tempered Bill's fire for the time being. He'd be all right, he knew.

Well, except for that one thing.

"You're still not moving," said Johnson.

"I would be happy to," Bill said through gritted teeth. "But some sand got in and it's settled."

"Got in?" Johnson's eyebrows raised. "You mean... In the tip?"

Bill nodded slowly. "It... stings. If I move it stings more. Oh god I hate this feeling." He shifted slightly, and winced. "Fuuuuccccccckkkkk..."

Johnson's ensuing laughter would've awakened the pharaohs.

- - - o

MANY YEARS LATER.

"Dad."

"Anyways, I did get Johnson back last year when his daughter - to his second wife he got a few years after that incident, lovely bird, Polish I think - turned eighteen. Ask your mother about that story, she had this idea with making her think she was a lesbian at first to make it even better when I..." Bill's eyes glazed over in remembrance. "Long story short, your mother is amazing."

"Dad," Louis said, annoyed. Bill's only son - so far - had his father's hair but none of the freckles or other regular Weasley deformities. He was twelve and well on his way to living up to the Bill Weasley legacy, although that legacy was still being written.

"Yes son?" Bill asked, reclining back in his chair and wondering why his son wasn't laughing. It had been a funny story in hindsight, and a good warning for when Louis himself became a cursebreaker. That story had also gotten Bill number twenty-four, forty-two and seventy-six conqeuered, the latter two times in the same week without Bill remembering he'd been there before. Also Fleur - a hundred and sixty nine - had responded to that story with a sympathy blowjob on their second date. A funny and useful story.

"You remember that part of the story you just told me where you thought it'd be a funny story to tell your kids?"

"Yep."

Louis shook his head vehemently. "No. No it was not. In fact, I'm scarred now. For life."

Bill, who had actually been scarred for life and got all kinds of action because of it, rolled his eyes. Kids these days. "Come on kid, you can't take on my mantle without a few incidents like that under your belt. The important thing is to make it your own story." No, Louis didn't need to know that Bill ejaculated into the wall before Johnson revealed it was a prank. That would've been too much. "I thought you said you wanted to be like me when you grew up. This is how you become me. Through learning my ways."

"I said that when I was five, Dad." Louis's eye rolling matched Bill's own. Little shit. "That same year I said I wanted to marry cousin Lily for making me those cookies."

"Dude we're purebloods," Bill said. "If you want to bang your cousin Lily I will set it up and tell Harry to go to hell with his silly Muggle-raised incest notions. Because that's what a good father does."

Louis fell silent for a moment. He looked at the ground. He took in a breath. He looked back at his father. "Can I just, I don't know, go? Please. Outside. To play. And maybe hit my head and forget this whole conversation."

With a sigh, Bill waved him on. Kids these days. "When do you and your sisters go back to Hogwarts again?" he asked before Louis could leave the room.

"Two weeks," said Louis.

"And you're sure you don't want to be a cursebreaker?"

"Not anymore."

"Positive?"

"Not sticking my dick in any walls, Dad. Promise."

"I understand, then. You will forge your own legacy... We don't have to compete."

"Compete?"

Bill stood from his chair. "I was going to wait 'til you were a licensed cursebreaker, give you a fair shot. Your mother and I have been talking about getting this done for years, but have left the research side of things alone, just to give you a leg up. But if you don't want in for the legacy, makes it easier for us. And hell, two weeks? Plenty of time to prepare."

"Prepare for what?" Louis asked worriedly.

"Sweden, son," declared Bill. "Your mother and I have a coven of virgin Veelas to liberate from their thousand-year curse. Because I'm Bill Fucking Weasley. Accept no substitutes."

- - - -o

BUT BILL WEASLEY WILL RETURN IN... THE SWEDISH CONNECTION.

/casually hijacks serious thread with nice things in it and ruins it.

 

I would image the length of time the spell has been active, also has an effect. I do not know if there are any canon events to back up magic radiating, but it would add a greater level of complication to the Egyptian curses on tombs as they would be quite old. They could interact differently due to the deterioration of the magic or just straight up collapse.

 

You and I have very different definitions of "ruining" things, Matt.

 

I was going to edit the OP but the edit button seems to have disappeared on me, so here are the redacted parts:

Privet Drive

Layer One = deepest layer.

Free radical: the Bond of Blood. Extremely powerful protection charm which turns those with violent intent into crumbling stone. Powered by the blood of those related to Lily Potter, who imbued her blood with incredible magical powers in 1981. Will automatically break when Harry turns 17. Basically impossible to overcome: the spell is too simple to unravel, too powerful to overwhelm. The charm is placed not on Privet Drive but on Harry. Its protection extends to any home that Harry resides in which is also the home of someone of Lily’s blood.

Layer one: Dumbledore’s spell system, cast upon Privet Drive. Anti-apparition, anti-portkey, anti-stealth, unplottable, pacification, uninvited guest and alarm charms. The seven spells have been combined into one heptagonal geometry. The spell system was created seven times and the seven geometries animated to form a three dimensional dynamic spell geometry. Upon that geometry is an unbreakable charm and a disillusionment charm. The spell system is incredibly strong, but has one unique weakness: it is able to draw power from the Bond of Blood when Harry is in residence. If that connection could be subverted the whole thing could come down. Cast with a traditional property line.

Layer two: Ministry VIW Protection Suite. Ideal enchantments with anchors in various locations. Anti-apparition and anti-disapparition on the windows. Fire dampening on the oven. Pacification on the master bed. Monitoring charm on the TV. Conspiracy charm on the bathroom keyhole. Emergency alarm on the telephone. Uninvited guest charm (barrier against entry unless invited) on the front door. Aggressive aggression curse (banishes those with violent intent) on Dudley’s punching bag. A prop charm is on the fuse box, strengthening all the other spells. The spells aren’t connected to each other, only to the prop charm.

Without the prop charm, the quickest way to get out would be to smash every window in the house. But the prop charm prevents that. To disable the prop charm you’d need to cut the power lines, but the conspiracy charm would prevent it. And the conspiracy charm itself, like the anti-apparition charms, is strengthened by the prop charm. So the conspiracy charm needs to be tricked or unravelled somehow, then the prop charm can be disabled, then the anti-disapparition can have the rug pulled.

To paradox a conspiracy charm, you would have to get the charm to do something sneaky.

Redacted Techniques

Confirmation/finding of mid-point: iron fillings (or suitable replacement) charmed to follow magical flows. Can also be used to find weak and strong points.

Bleeding solution: any potion that can work as a magic sink.

Bleeding: extremely slow process by which a spell can be drained of its power over time, eventually leading to collapse. A flow of iron filings is set up, and the iron picks up minute traces of magic as it circulates. The filings pass into a bleeding solution where the magic is absorbed. Geometry of the setup is important.

The Battering Ram of Rome: a powerful spell designed to collapse other spells with sheer force. Incantation: profligo. Most effective when cast on a weak point. Has no effect on people or physical objects except those tied to the spells it attacks.

Paradoxing: working a spell into a state such that it attacks itself. Often uses spell transfiguration of spell representations. E.g. construct a sympathetic representation of a blood-boiling curse then transfigure it into blood.

Oggbert’s Onion: a spell which conjures an onion, used to map layered spells. Each layer of the onion has a smell corresponding to the type of spell constituting that layer of the target enchantment. They should then be undone in reverse order. The onion itself is poisonous.