From Hogwarts to Strixhaven.

Chapter 183 Gilderoy Lockhart and the Chamber of Secrets

"I knew Professor Lockhart lived up to his reputation!" Hermione said to Ron domineeringly.

After the students in the hall hurriedly sent Lockhart to the school hospital, Hermione's mood became unstable.

Because Lockhart claimed that he had solved the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, and there would be no more bloodshed related to the Chamber of Secrets in Hogwarts.

However, when people asked what the monster in the Chamber of Secrets was, Lockhart remained silent.

If people asked too much, he would say, "If you want to know what the monster in the Chamber of Secrets is and how I defeated it, please look forward to my new book, Gilderoy Lockhart and the Chamber of Secrets! You will definitely have a lot of fun reading it!"

"Could it be that Lockhart..." Ron began hesitantly.

"Professor!" Hermione corrected.

"Okay... I see. Was Professor Lockhart's previous poor performance all a disguise?" Ron tried not to look into Hermione's eyes, as if that would stop her from getting angry. "But he really didn't teach us anything, did he?"

"Look at the wounds on his body, Ron! Do you think those are fake too?" Hermione said loudly, "He is just testing us in his own way!"

"I'm kind of looking forward to his Dueling Club now..." Harry had completely stopped caring about the Chamber of Secrets and the monster in it.

Hermione gave him a look that Harry took to mean 'good riddance'.

The three of them did their homework in the common room for a while. Before Harry and Ron's brains were gradually filled with anticipation for the Christmas holidays, Hermione suddenly stood up and said, "You should go and apologize to him!"

"Apologize? To whom?" Ron seemed to have just woken up from a sweet dream and had no idea of the current situation.

"To Professor Lockhart, of course!" Hermione threatened.

"Why? I'm not the only one who thinks he's a fool!" Ron excused himself.

"So that I can learn something real in the Defense Against the Dark Arts class!" Hermione's reason was very convincing.

But Harry thought that things were not that simple: "I think you just want to visit him in the school hospital. I saw you write a greeting card to him before."

"You have to apologize to him too! Harry." The mother bird left the Gryffindor common room with a haughty look on her face.

Outside Madam Pomfrey's office, Hermione was asking for visitation permission.

"No." Madam Pomfrey sorted through the medical files in her hands. "You are already the third group of people to visit him today."

"He's our professor!" said Hermione eagerly.

"From what I understand, Miss Granger, he is the professor of all students in the school." Madam Pomfrey glared at her and tapped a dozen parchments in her hands.

"Just five minutes!"

"no!"

"three minutes!"

"no!"

"Poppy!" Lockhart's cheerful voice came from the ward. It seemed that he had heard the argument outside the door. "Don't argue because of me. Let them in! Miss Granger is my best student!"

Harry and Ron watched as a blush crept up Hermione's cheeks.

"Alas..." Madam Pomfrey sighed and opened the door of the ward for the three of them. "Well, if you insist. Please, all of you. Remember before you go in, no loud noises are allowed."

Lockhart was lying on the hospital bed in hospital gown, the smile on his face still bright, no trace of the miserable look he had in the past few days.

"Professor Lockhart! I...we're here to visit you!" Hermione said in a very sticky voice.

"I saw your greeting card, Miss Granger. You are such a thoughtful person." Lockhart showed his eight shining teeth. It seemed that even when he was lying in bed, he did not forget to take care of his teeth. "And of course you, Harry!"

"You are the one who deserves praise, Professor." Hermione looked at Lockhart with admiration, "You single-handedly solved the monster in the Chamber of Secrets and protected everyone in Hogwarts!"

Lockhart's expression told everyone that he was extremely pleased, but he still evaded the question: "These are just trivial matters. I don't use a smile to fight against the dark arts."

"You're very modest," Hermione complimented. "I suppose you won't tell us what the monster in the Chamber of Secrets is?"

"To keep things fresh until the next book comes out, of course." Lockhart laughed again.

"What about the heir?" Ron suddenly interrupted.

"What heir?" The look on Lockhart's face suggested that it was the first time he had heard the word.

"Ron!" Hermione gritted her teeth to stop Ron.

"The heir of Slytherin!" Ron was completely unmoved. "By the way, Hermione, your voice is much better now. I thought you had phlegm stuck in your throat just now."

Hermione stared at Ron so fiercely that Harry felt she would blow his brains out in the next second.

In order to prevent his good brother from joining the "Headless Hunter", Harry quickly said: "People say that only the heir can open the Chamber of Secrets. If you... you really defeated the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, then you must have seen the heir, right?"

"Oh! You mean the heir..." Lockhart's face showed a look of sudden enlightenment. He rolled his eyes and said, "I promised to keep it a secret for him because he cried bitterly in front of me and told me that he was just temporarily confused by the dark magic."

"You're willing to give him a chance to reform?" Hermione seemed to have forgotten all the unpleasantness before. "How noble!"

"Yes, after all, he is just a student with a bright future." Lockhart let his face show a compassionate feeling.

"It doesn't look like Ivy. I don't know how Slytherin chooses its heir." Ron muttered. "Who is Ivy?" Lockhart asked, "I don't think I've seen him in Defense Against the Dark Arts?"

"Ivy Doom, a Slytherin student, is a very powerful wizard. According to him, he was a fifth-year student from Hogwarts more than a hundred years ago. He entered school with us last year." Ron introduced enthusiastically, "He was a head shorter than me at that time! Only one summer vacation has passed, but he is almost catching up with Professor Dumbledore. This year he is preparing for OWLs, and the headmaster specially gave him the right to study on his own. I envy him so much."

"How interesting. This is the first time I hear someone talking about his story. He must be very famous in school, right?" Lockhart showed a thoughtful expression.

"On the contrary, people rarely talk about him. Because every Slytherin will glare at students who talk about Ivy, and over time, people stop talking about him. Sometimes, I feel like I've become friends with a ghost in Hogwarts." Harry explained, "But he's a good guy, and he can do some very powerful ancient magic."

"Ancient magic?" Lockhart swore that this was the first time he had heard the term.

"Yeah, summon some lightning or something, we've only seen it a few times," said Harry.

Lockhart was about to ask more questions when he heard Professor McGonagall's voice outside the door.

"Is Professor Lockhart in there?" asked Professor McGonagall.

"Of course." This was Madam Pomfrey's voice. "There are still a few students visiting. You should really persuade him to leave earlier. I have to organize at least four or five groups of students to visit him every day, and they are all chattering little witches. His staying here will only affect the rest of other patients."

"That's exactly what I was going to do, Poppy."

Then Professor McGonagall pushed the door open and walked in.

"How's your recovery, Professor Lockhart?" Professor McGonagall asked in a routine tone.

"Thanks to you, it's not bad." Lockhart once again showed off his shining white teeth, but it seemed to have little effect.

Professor McGonagall's expression did not waver at all. "Great, can we start the class today? Although Severus would be happy to help, he is busy enough himself."

"What - I thought -" Lockhart's face showed a look of surprise. He thought Professor McGonagall would at least say a few polite words to him.

"Poppy told me everything. The wounds on your body were just superficial ones. They almost healed on the first day you were admitted." Professor McGonagall glanced at Hermione who was about to say something, and made her swallow her words back. "However, only someone like you who is good at dealing with dark magic can only suffer minor injuries from the attack of the Monster in the Chamber of Secrets. The students all want to see the hero who conquered the Monster in the Chamber of Secrets."

Lockhart immediately laughed: "You are right, you are right! I will be back to class soon!"

After saying that, he threw back the quilt, jumped off the bed, and did a few stretching movements.

"Very good," Professor McGonagall nodded with satisfaction, "Don't forget your afternoon class, Professor Lockhart."

Then she turned and left, leaving only four people in the ward staring at each other.

"Alas - it seems I must get back to work," sighed Lockhart.

Before Hermione could speak to comfort him, Lockhart laughed again. "It's a great experience for me to see young faces. By the way, Miss Granger, Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley."

"I noticed you seemed quite interested in the Chamber of Secrets," said Lockhart. "Would you be interested in doing an extra assignment?"

"Of course!" Hermione eagerly agreed on behalf of her two poor students. "What's the topic?"

"An essay on the Chamber of Secrets, whether it's its location, the monster inside, or the Heir of Slytherin, anything." For the first time, the smile on Lockhart's face was no longer annoying in Harry and Ron's eyes, because he said, "This is a long-term assignment. Until this essay is handed in, you don't have to do the other homework I assign in class. How about it?"

Harry and Ron looked at each other. They had never heard of such a generous request, so they answered happily, "Of course!"

Maybe Lockhart is not a qualified wizard, nor a qualified professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, but he is definitely a qualified best-selling author.

Therefore, he knew very well what a best-selling book needed: detailed information, ups and downs of the plot, plus a gimmick and a perfect smile - especially the smile of Gilderoy Lockhart, who won the Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award five times.

The story can be someone else's, the gimmick can be fabricated, but the smile and fame must be Lockhart's own.

As for the information? Lockhart didn't see any difference between handing this job over to three second-year students and handing it over to a publisher's editor.

So he returned to his office with peace of mind and admired the portrait he had not seen for several days.

----

"Magic is the power of belief, which means that you must not only remain confident when chanting the spell, but also believe in your own magic from the bottom of your heart. Only in this way will magic trust you as well." Ivy is teaching his contracted magician.

Ever since she had the spell tattooed on Cassandra, Ivy had seen the possibility of wizards taking up other D&D spellcasting professions, so she paid more attention to her own warlock and would come to the Slytherin common room from time to time to answer some of her questions.

And what they were discussing was Transfiguration.

"However, Transfiguration is a very special magic that requires more precise thinking and rigorous logic. You need to fully understand the objects before and after the transformation. Only by truly doing this can you ensure the accuracy of the effect of Transfiguration." Before obtaining the Philosopher's Stone to enhance his Transfiguration talent, Ivy's Transfiguration skills were already at a good level. He often used Transfiguration to add some furniture to the Room of Requirement or turn some enemies into powder kegs.

But compared to the simple and brainless chain melon chewing, the complexity of transfiguration is still a little higher, so he doesn't use it very often, at least not as often as chewing a big melon.

"For the second grade content, Professor McGonagall has arranged it very well. It started with the conversion between similar objects, and then expanded to turning living things into less complex dead objects. As for the third grade content, it should be turning dead objects into living things." Ivy tapped the cup on the table with his wand, and it and the drink inside turned into a chubby penguin.

"It is important to learn Transfiguration well. I also know a lot of magic that has common theories with Transfiguration. If you can get an O in OWLs, I will consider teaching you something more interesting." There is also a school of transformation in the DND spell school. From the simplest object transformation to material transformation, from the 6th-ring creation of artificial life to the 9th-ring complete Transfiguration, the spells of this school cover a lot of powerful effects.

The most cost-effective of these is undoubtedly the 4th-level spell, Divine Craftsmanship, because it can turn unprocessed raw materials into finished products made of the same materials.

Although it doesn't sound like a big deal, the effect is actually amazing. It's not an exaggeration to say that it's an industrialized spell.

The magic of nature can turn cotton into cotton cloth, flax leaves into linen cloth, and even unpurified sulfur, saltpeter and wood directly into gunpowder.

If Ivy owned a piece of land that could produce raw materials, he alone could provide a processing method that was more efficient, energy-efficient, and environmentally friendly than a modern factory.

(End of this chapter)