A certain Hogwarts professor of runes.

By now, the young wizards had fully grasped the rules of the game: correct answers earn points, incorrect answers deduct points, and the first to reach one hundred points wins.

"Harvest, crops, or the growth cycle..."

Warren quickly waved his wand...

"Correct, add one point."

"Next……"

“Very good, Miss Pete. Our match will be even more difficult from now on.”

The first dozen or so sets were all rather rudimentary magical runes, but soon, the difficulty increased at a visible rate.

The two players slowed down, having more and more time to think, and the score was narrowed to 73:71.

"To acquire skills or through random luck, to uncover hidden secrets, and to bring life into existence."

Pete bit her lip, while Warren kept fidgeting with his knuckles.

"It's Peorth, Peorth." One of the young wizards watching from the sidelines couldn't help but whisper the answer.

Pete's eyes lit up, and he tapped the correct answer with his wand.

Felix remained noncommittal; he neither stopped the young wizards from offering their advice nor awarded them any points.

He simply changed to another set of nine-square grids.

Then the two understood what the professor meant: Next, you will be competing with all the young wizards in the class.

The two looked at each other, both with bitter expressions.

But the young wizards below the stage got excited. In the next dozen or so sets of nine squares, they pooled their wisdom and chattered incessantly, while the two on stage each only managed to score one point.

The bell rang, but no one moved.

The score was 99-98.

The young wizards fell silent.

Felix said quickly, "The power of the sun will triumph over demons and darkness..."

“It’s Sigel.” Pete’s staff tip touched the center of the 3x3 grid, shimmering with golden light.

"I won! I won!"

Amid her screams, Professor Hyp waved his wand, causing dazzling fireworks to burst in the classroom.

"Thank you for the excellent performances of both students. Hufflepuff gets 10 points, and Ravenclaw gets 5 points."

"get out of class dismissed!"

Chapter 56 "Harry, show us what you've got!"

The young wizards were discussing excitedly. As fifth-graders, they rarely had access to such interesting courses—every professor was pushing them to their limits as much as possible.

Of course, to some extent, this is also a debt they incurred in the previous four years.

In the hallway, Warren Pardis said to his friend with some frustration, "I could have won, I just had bad luck."

“You’re too aggressive; you got at least ten questions wrong,” his friend replied.

The young wizards strolled out of the classroom, and Felix rubbed his slightly sore fingers.

The "stage effects" of this knowledge competition were all created by him, one magic trick at a time. From the nine-square grid to the score changes and the color feedback for correct and incorrect answers, he handled everything himself.

"That was a miscalculation. Next time, we'll use a ten-point system."

Felix tried it out in the second and third grades in the afternoon, with excellent results—even the "struggling students" with ancient runes remained alert in class.

This made his thoughts clearer.

"We can do more of these kinds of game-based teaching methods in the future, but the premise is to do a good job of preparation." In the evening cafeteria, Felix listlessly picked up a potato drizzled with black sauce. After a long day, he felt a little weak.

Little by little, the number of spells he cast today clearly exceeded the limit.

Public lounge.

The twins, Fred and George, are battling with magical golems; they have already learned the second and third sets of practical runes.

This made their battle extremely entertaining. With each punch, Fred's magical puppet would unleash a ring of electricity, making a crackling sound. Because he was so close, Li Jordan's hair stood on end.

On the other side, George was equally impressive. His magical puppet was the extremely popular "Fire Man," and every time he used his signature "big fireball," it would draw a chorus of praise.

Just then, Percy Weasley slipped in from outside the lounge, having just finished his rounds. Upon seeing him, Ron, who was in the corner, promptly turned his head away.

The two are still in a cold war.

"Ron, haven't you two made up yet?" Hermione asked worriedly.

“Unless he apologizes to me,” Ron insisted.

Harry sighed. He didn't say much, since Ron had essentially taken the blame for the three of them and lost face.

"Hey! Percy, I heard you got a perfect score from Professor Hyp today?" a Gryffindor asked.

Percy puffed out his chest with a touch of self-importance, making his prefect badge even more conspicuous. "Yes, Professor Hyp has tried new teaching methods, and I must admit, he is quite a wise man."

"You even defeated Slytherin!"

Percy said modestly, "It's just a competition. To be more precise, on a ten-point scale, I'm nine points ahead of my opponent."

The Gryffindors were full of praise again; Percy truly lived up to his reputation as a top student who had earned 12 certificates.

"Nine points ahead!" Ron repeated dismissively.

Harry quickly changed the subject, "Hermione, did you ask Professor Hyp about the Basilisk?"

Hermione shook her head. "I rarely see the professor from Monday to Friday." Unless there are papers that need her to grade.

“But it’ll be too late by the weekend!” Harry said reluctantly. “What if an attack happens in the meantime…”

He slammed his fist on the table, startling two young wizards who were passing by. They glanced at Harry fearfully and quickly walked past him.

"Look, they all think I'm the murderer!"

“Harry, shall we go find Professor Hyp now?” Hermione glanced at him cautiously.

Harry glanced at the wall clock; it was already past nine o'clock at night. "Tomorrow," he said, slumping dejectedly into his chair like a deflated balloon.

They were pretty much certain that the monster in the Chamber of Secrets was the Basilisk, and regarding Hermione's confusion—the Basilisk's gaze was deadly, yet the two attacks had only resulted in petrification—Harry had his own speculation: the victims hadn't made direct eye contact with the Basilisk; Mrs. Norris had seen it through reflections in the water, while Colin Creevey had seen it through the camera lens.

However, whether this is correct remains to be confirmed, given the small sample size.

At this moment, Ron said to him, "Harry, is the magical puppet that Professor Hyp gave you in your backpack?"

"Yes," Harry replied listlessly.

He practiced a few times in private, but he was still lacking in skill and could only barely control the puppet to walk normally.

"How about we give it a try?" Ron glanced at Percy in the crowd.

"Here?" Harry was unsure.

Hermione's eyes lit up. She had wanted to try this look for a long time, and she had fallen in love with it during the open class at the beginning of the semester.

Ice-blue hair and a delicate, lovely face perfectly captured her heart.

“Perhaps…this isn’t a good choice…” Hermione said, though she didn’t mean it, but she did nothing to stop Harry from taking the magical puppet out of his bag.

"Hey! What are you doing?" Fred walked over with his arm around George's shoulder.

“Oh, just a magical puppet,” Ron said, trying to sound nonchalant.

Fred was surprised when he saw the puppet in Harry's hand. "This is no ordinary puppet." Judging from appearance alone, the two are completely incomparable.

“Professor Hyp gave it to me,” Ron said.

Fred picked up the magical puppet. “This thing…” He glanced at George, “I can barely sense any magical energy in it. It’s more exquisite than Diggory’s ghost dolls—and completely different from the ones we’ve dismantled.”

"You even demolished it—"

"Shh!" Fred held up a finger. "Keep your voice down, this is our little secret with Professor Hyp..."

George took the puppet and casually remarked, "We once broke the magic puppet we had."

“It was ‘accidentally’ broken, and we were terrified at the time,” Fred said.

"Worried about getting points deducted or being put in solitary confinement—"

"Or hang him up and whip him with a whip dipped in cold water—"

"So we went to apologize with trepidation—"

"And then? What punishment did you receive?" Ron asked.

“No, little Ronnie,” Fred winked, a mischievous grin spreading across his face, “the professor said we have a real talent for alchemy, and he gave us each a ten-point bonus, but—”

George sighed. "He barely managed to hold back from deducting points from us when we put the second damaged puppet part in front of him."

Hermione rolled her eyes.

George examined the exceptionally exquisite magical puppet, occasionally expressing his admiration. Finally, he handed it to Harry: "It's amazing! What did you guys do?"

“Yes—” Ron was about to speak when Hermione stomped on his foot hard.

The twins exchanged a glance and shrugged.

Fred said, "Would you like us to demonstrate it for you? This puppet must have a lot of new features that I don't think you're very familiar with yet."

"Who said that! Harry, show us what you've got!"

Harry drew his wand, and at his command, the magical puppet swayed and stood up.

Several young wizards looked over from afar.

Harry tried his best to control the magical puppet, but unfortunately, it could only produce a few specks of icy blue snowflakes at best.

“Harry, you don’t have enough self-control,” Fred said, explaining the reason.

Ha pointed his wand at the magical puppet, feeling as if he had touched its core. He then focused all his attention, trying to awaken the dormant magical circuits.

His magic touched a world of ice and snow, the sharpness and cold making him feel as if he had eaten ten popsicles in one go, his consciousness seemingly frozen.

Harry's face was purple from the cold, and he exhaled a breath of cold air.

"Harry, what's wrong?" Ron stood up in a panic, and anyone could tell that something was wrong with him.