Chapter 26

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nProfessor Hap had a different attitude towards the fifth and seventh-year students.

nHe waved his wand and handed out a sheet of tests papers to the students, which were from their last year.

nFelix stood on the stage without speaking, but a low pressure had been placed over the young wizards.

nThe seventh-year students are the ones who had been a “schoolmate” of the professor for three years, especially when they had first enrolled here and Felix was in his fifth year.

nWhat did he do in his fifth year?

nWell, he invited a certain Shafiq family to a duel, so these students were all badly shaken by the fact that they had witnessed the most vicious side of this man right from the start.

nIn the eyes of the young, naive first years, is that an invitation to a duel? It’s a death notice! And the kind that a whole family would send together.

nFelix fiddled with his wand, seeing that the atmosphere was pretty much set, and finally spoke up, “Here are your results from last session’s test, and to be honest, I’m a little disappointed, quite disappointed …”

n“Marcus!”

nMarcus Flint shivered and stood up, “Senio … Professor.” Felix might not remember him, but he remembered Felix clearly because one of the “Shafiq” was seated next to him in the great hall during mealtime.

nAs a pureblood, his father had asked that senior to look after him, and he had just started school when he ran into a major storm.

nHe still couldn’t forget the way that spirited senior had fallen to the ground.

nFelix walked up to him and patted him on the shoulder, “The grades are a bit poor, do well from now on, I have my eye on you.”

n“Yes … Professor.”

nWhat else could Marcus say, go back and study like hell!

nFelix very satisfied with this Slytherin’s attitude, after all, it was his own house, which is still very powerful.

n“Let’s start the lesson, there’s a little too much to cover today, so I’ll make it quick and you guys do these three sets of papers when you go back.”

n“After all, your NEWTs exams are right around the corner this year …”

n…

nSaturday, Gryffindor common room.

nPercy looked exhausted, he had just finished his twelve-inch History of Magic thesis on the History of the Development of the Crucible and the History of Revolution, but there were six more subject assignments waiting for him – he had chosen far too many courses on his plate.

nDamn it, if this keeps up, there won’t even be a time for a date!

nHermione walked out of the girls’ dormitory clutching a large volume of books and saw Harry and Ron gathered around a table with seven or eight other young wizards at one side, seemingly looking at something amusing.

nShe walked over there and the Weasley twins were there, in fact, they were dancing with their wands guiding two golems together.

nShe recognized these two golems, which happened to be the ones that Professor Hap had shown in the open class.

nTo the silent music (that is, no music), a pair of half-foot-tall men and women embraced each other, dancing and wandering across the tabletop with lightning-fast steps – making it their dance floor.

nLee Jordan is narrating the ‘plot’: “And so, Fireboy and Icegirl fall in love, and the young couple become the envy of all. But it doesn’t last long, and their philosophies clash so badly that they simply fought!”

nAnd Fred and George matched his narration, with Fred waving his wand first and Ice Girl kicked the Fireboy in his face.

n“Oh! Ice Girl steals the lead and kicks her former lover a solid two ft. Is this how a once monolithic vow dissipates?” Lee Jordan cried out in pain.

nNot to be outdone, George flicked his wand one after the other, and Fireboy jumped up and landed a hard punch to Ice Girl’s gut, followed by a kick that sent her flying far away.

n“At last, Fireboy isn’t seem concerned, love is no match for a battle of philosophies! He had to strike, he moved, he moved, he finally kicked! Beautiful!”

nA little witch on the sidelines, “Boo!” booed.

nHermione looked around in amazement, you guys are excellent in this, and with drama too.

nAfter a few more minutes, Fireboy used a wave of quick punches to gain the upper hand and then took off with a kick, although he dropped in midair.

nNext, Ice Girl stood still for a moment in the process as well.

n” Out of power, out of power!” Ryan Thomas, who had grown up in the Muggle world, spoke in uncertain words.

nFred and George grabbed the golem and ran to the corner and began re-inscribing with the ancient magic runes.

n“Professor Hap is so harsh, only half an hour of activity for a single copy of the magic rune is allowed to be supplied.” Many of the young wizards vocalized about a certain professor.

nThe crowd dispersed and the trio re-found their seats.

nHermione glanced at the twins who were in the distance, “They can do that already?”

n“It’s nothing, quite a few wizards have spent a lot of time on it.” Ron explained, “Fred said that Cedric, from Hufflepuff, used to get up in the middle of the night and secretly practice in order to win the pre-Halloween exams and get the mysterious prize.”

n“There are also quite a few witches that don’t move an inch without hugging their golem all day.”

nHermione nodded, it’s true that she had seen little witches hugging magic golems everywhere this week, “But that’s not Fred’s magic golem, is it?”

nRon said casually, “He borrowed it from Angelina, to create a remix of that classic battle in the great hall. But they’re still pretty close if you ask me, I mean, they’ve only just finished learning their first set of magic runes, and they need to master four more, it’s like collecting chocolate frog cards and putting all the pieces together to form a set …”

n“Harry, you didn’t train today?”

nHarry grimaced, “Training is in the afternoon.” It had just been two weeks, but he is already a bit overwhelmed.

nRon suddenly “snorted” as he looked at Harry and Hermione and whispered, “I’m told that Wood has been having a headache with his Ancient Rune homework, and thanks to Professor Hap, Harry was able to have an easy day.”

n“Difficult homework?” Hermione speculated.

n“No,” Ron’s holding back his laughter, ” The professor’s sixth-year homework isn’t translation though, instead it’s about writing a thousand-word essay called ‘My Summer Holiday Life’.”

nHermione had an inexplicable sense of familiarity.

nThis style seemed to be common when she was in elementary school …

nProfessor Hap is also from a muggle background and did have a lot of life experience there, Hermione thought to herself.

nThe three were chatting when Percy suddenly stood up, packed his things quickly, and left without looking back, carrying his school bag.

nIt is time for his date!

nWatching Percy’s back, Harry looked at him thoughtfully, “He looks a bit irritated.”

nRon shrugged, “Percy’s taken too many classes, he passed 12 OWLs and tried to continue taking 12 courses this year, but Professor McGonagall persuaded him to drop part of them.”

nThe two lamented a little and then looked at Hermione in unison, would this be what Hermione’s future looked like?

nHermione ignored the two and settled down to read her book.

nHarry looked at the Ancient History of Runes book in Hermione’s hand and couldn’t help but ask her, “Didn’t you pass the test, why are you still reading this book?”

nHermione turned the page, “Professor Hap wrote a bunch of annotations on my thesis, all of which were things I had to pay attention to, and besides, I found the Ancient Magic Runes to be quite interesting.”

n“Quite interesting …”

nThe two academic scums looked at each other, every time they talked to Hermione about their studies, they felt like they were wearing the contraption around their necks that Hagrid had used to plant the pumpkins in the field.

nSo they played wizard’s chess on their own.

nBy the afternoon, Wood leads the team out of the common room, and Harry had thought about asking what he is going to do about his ancient magic rune homework, but eventually kept his mouth shut when he thought that even the end of the world wouldn’t stop him from training.

nOn the way, he ran into Colin Creevy, who once again greeted him with a warm “Hello! Harry”, to which Harry returned a feeble “Hello to you too, Colin”.

nHe had anticipated that the rest of the training session would be accompanied by numerous flashes and shutter clicks.

nInside the castle, Ron is bored, and he had to do his homework.

nHe glared at the blank parchment for a while and finally folded a paper aeroplane with it, which ended up hitting Neville on the nose, causing him to let out a cry of pain.

nIn the evening, after dinner, Hermione arrived at Felix’s office to report for duty.

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