The third option was to kill a magical creature in ritual and absorb its power. The more powerful the creature, the more boost your magic would receive. It was the most complex of the three options, and only worked once. The Dark Lord was said to have sacrificed a dragon, though that was just a rumor. McNair had made the mistake of sacrificing a niffler. It had made no real difference to his magical power, and he remained a laughing stock even to this day.