School life
“Human Language/speech”
“Parseltongue/Spells”
(Start of chapter):
It was only the second day of classes and Hardym already had a reputation for blacking out, the constant stream of rumors that -one way or another- reached his ears ranged from plausible -allergies, a curse from a dark wizard(who wouldn’t want the glory of avenging Voldemort after all?) or just a vitamin deficiency- to outright absurd, there was no way that a Dementor was in Hogwarts, much less that it could sneak up on him without anyone noticing, the sense of dread they emitted was not something one doesn’t notice. It did however help Hardym narrow down the heritage of some of his peers and older students. Those who didn’t know who he was were most likely muggle-born, those that didn’t know what a dementor was either half-blood or muggleborn and the ones reasoning against the more absurd claims, pure- or half-blood. It wasn’t perfect by any means but it had to do. Muggle-borns made up about a third, maybe a fourth of the first years, most of those in either Hufflepuff or Gryffindor and the ones in Slytherin, he could count on half a hand.
History of Magic, a subject taught by the least lively professor ever -literally, he was a ghost- was the perfect opportunity to look for promising wizards and witches in his year. The class was massive as all houses had it at once -sitting from left to right: Slytherin, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, Gryffindor, with a few exceptions- and -due to the professor not actually reacting to what happened in the room unless he was directly addressed- was used by a couple of students from all houses except ravenclaw, as practicing sessions. There were a few interesting ones who had a quite good grip on some slightly beyond beginner level spell but he paid not much mind to those, the ones that really stuck out to him were those that cast spells of second year niveau, only three did so.
A hufflepuff boy was using a simple plant growth charm on a small bamboo plant repeatedly, the rate at which it grew slowly increasing every 10 or 20 casts, it was clearly not the third year spell ‘Crescere parva’ for the growth didn’t last and the plant returned to its original height after a few minute.
The second and third were both Slytherin girls, the first being Sue Li and the second a blonde girl with high cheekbones, both were turning beetles into buttons, a second year transfiguration that was even beyond Hardym. There were others with great potential as well, he could feel it but who exactly, he couldn’t pinpoint.
“Hey Potter, what was with you in DADA?”, the drawled out voice of Theodore Nott asked, the boy didn’t hold any obvious ill intent in his voice or face, even if he looked as if he was constantly sucking away at a lemon.
“I am not sure”, Hardym sighed,”It was as if… it was like the time I accidentally summoned a tiger into my living room, there was a high of magic and then I felt… exhausted I guess… whatever It was, I will find out”, that was still bugging him, why did he pass out? And why does he pass out after using a lot of magic when no one else seems to do so? It doesn’t make any sense, how is he different? Was it the same thing that allowed him to survive the Killing curse? Not knowing the answer was truly frustrating.
“If you want I could look into it? Tour common room has some books about curse scars that are only in the forbidden section otherwise”
“You know, my envy of you grows each passing hour”, Hardym half-joked
“You, envious of me?”
“Of course, do you know how hard it is to sleep or concentrate when everything around you is colored red? If you knew how our common room looked, you would understand me, truly that and my ‘Mates’ as weasley likes to call us, he is so annoying and he doesn’t get any quieter when he sleeps”, Ronald weasley's snores were already infamous, an urban legend of sorts, that boy couldn’t be silent if his life depended on it,”Have you seen him eat? It's horrible!”
Weasley, who sat nearby, scoffed and muttered something about ‘falling in his back’ and ‘great mate you are’, as if they were friends, before turning back to his -surely way more interesting- conversation with a Hufflepuff boy.
Transfiguration was next for that day, Hardym was excited, turning things into other things did sound very interesting and McGonnagall did a fantastic job waking their excitement by transforming into a cat, first thing. It got him really riled up.
“Now that I have your attention”, the stern cat-women lectured,”Welcome to your first lesson in transfiguration. First, before I say anything else, I want to warn you, Transfiguration is one of the most dangerous and delicate branches of magic taught at hogwarts -perhaps second to potions but that it up for debate- one mistake, a tiny flaw in either pronunciation, visualizing or wand movement can turn the simplest of spells into a life threatening experience and I am not even talking about human transfiguration yet. If I ever catch any of you fooling around in my class, carelessly playing with spells or whatnot, you will be banned from attending faster than you can say Animagus. If any of you feel yourself incapable of restraining yourself, the door is right there, leave before I make you”, she waited a few seconds, as if expecting someone to actually leave,”Good, now what is Transfiguration? Transfiguration is the art of changing one thing into another on an existential level, if you transfigure a rat into a goblet, then -for the duration of the spell- that rat is fully and completely a goblet, down its core. Why though -you might ask- do we transfigure certain things into each other when we can change anything into anything? The reason is simple: energy. The more similar two things are, the less energy they take to transfigure. The witch or Wizard casting the spell must internally see similarities for a transfiguration to work, the more similarities they see, the easier the transfiguration. A wall and a sword are both hard but a sword and an ax are both sharp, hard, used for cutting, used for combat, shiny and dangerous, therefore it is way easier to transfigure a sword into an ax than a wall into a sword”
Stepping through the room, McGonaggal transfigured some of the students desks, parchments and or books into various animals,”Now that is exactly why transfiguring something dead into something alive is difficult, not only have you know how the living thing functions, how it eats, sleeps and moves but you also have to find similarities between two things that are -on that front- opposite of one another. Therefore, Animal transfiguration will only begin in the second year, once you have the basics down and I know you won’t kill whatever animal I give you. Today, as well as next lesson will be theoretical, now don’t give me that look, as much as I know you want to start casting, doing so without understanding what you are doing can lead to death and I would like to continue my two year, zero casualty streak”
After Transfiguration, they had the rest of the day off, only Astronomy was still scheduled for that day and that was in the middle of the night. Right now, Hardym was at Lunch, a small book in his left hand whilst he ate with his right, a creamy soup was in front of him, it was apparently of Polish origin -each week, he was told, there would be dishes from another piece of the world at lunch and or dinner, this week it was polish cuisine- which he really enjoyed. The soup, holding a distinct smokey flavor, had pieces of polish sausage -apparently summoned directly from a polish butcher- and chunks of hard boiled potatoes, the soup was delivered together with a pitcher of liquid cream, which did enhance the flavor quite nicely.
“Whatcha eatin’?”, asked Oliver Wood -the gryffindor quidditch captain- from his left side.
“Just this polish soup, it is pretty nice, if lacking a bit of spice”, Hardym mused before taking another spoonful, regretting his words near immediately, as he bit on a Pepper kernel”*Cough* scratch *cough* scratch that, apparently *cough* there is *cough* quite a bit of pepper”
“Sure, sure, I stay away from that cuisine of the week stuff, prefer good old, English dishes. Is nice, I guess”, Wood intoned,”say, do you have a favorite quidditch team?”
“I can’t say I do, never was the sporty type as you may have gathered from my -less than athletic- physique. Still, perhaps one day, I may find a team that interests me, ask again in a couple of years and there may be a chance I have a more… Interesting answer”
“Sure, sure, have you had potions yet?”
“I can’t say I have”
“Oof, better watch out then, Snape hates us Gryffindors and you even more so if his reaction to your name being said in his class is any indicator”, he warned,”I suggest you stick your nose into your potions book, he lickes to do a quizz, first-thing with the gryffindor first years, I was the unlucky one to get picked in my year and let me tell you, it ain’t pretty”
“Thank you for warning me”, Hardym hummed as he continued to eat, this was getting more complicated…