Chapter 293

“That’s a Talent, for sure.”

Felix thought as he watched Eddie Carmichael showing off his newly mastered rune on a Saturday morning.

Eddie held a small flame in his hand, as he is showing it to the others, he then dramatically closed his palm and slowly spread his hand open as the crowd gasped, as an orange rune glowed continuously.

“Look, this is the fire magic rune, want to learn it?” Then he mysteriously said to his companions in a low voice, “Just a two Silver-Sickles.”

…

Felix came out of the great hall, when Harry, Ron, and Hermione suddenly appeared out of nowhere, “Professor, we made an appointment–” Harry said with a gasp.

Felix looked at them: “I also wanted to inform you later with the Patronus, well, follow me.”

He led the trio onto the seventh floor of the castle and stood opposite a tapestry. Harry first shot a few glances at the intriguing image of ‘trolls chasing a ballet teacher’, then followed the professor and faced the blank wall.

“There are many hidden rooms in the castle, some of them magical enough to be unaffected by the Anti-Apparition Charm, the Chamber of Secrets is one, and so this place is,” Felix explained.

“Throughout the history of Hogwarts, many people have inadvertently used this room – when they needed it most, but afterward they found out how they couldn’t get in again, so they gave it a name, the Room of Requirement, or Come and Go Room.”

The trio mumbled the name.

“But in fact, it has always been here, or rather, this is one of its fixed entrances.” Speaking of which, Felix somewhat lost in thought, the Room of Requirement is embedded into the magical defense system of Hogwarts, and it has always relied on the magic of the castle to keep it running.

And as far as he knew, the door of the Room of Requirement could be opened from any location in the castle. If he could borrow this power, would he be able to bypass the restrictions of the Anti-Apparition Charm?

He suppressed this thought and continued, “The way to make the entrance appear is simple, concentrate on the desired place you need to be and pass over here three times, and a door will appear on the wall, just like …”

He paused as a silver and white door literally appeared on the wall, and when it opened, a drunken woman stepped out of the door – Sybill Trelawney.

Felix had to sigh at his luck; it seemed to be the second time the two had met in front of the Room of Requirement, the first time when Trelawney had come out of her office to hide a bottle of wine, and he had asked for some information about the Room of Requirement in passing, and the second time – which is now – they had run into each other face to face again.

“Felix … Hap?” Trelawney’s eyes were hazy, and she stared at him for a while before recognizing him, “You, uh … hiccup~”

Felix took two steps back, “Professor Trelawney, you’re drunk, and it’s morning.”

“What’s the point? Anyway – it’s not like I have class!” She took a couple of steps crookedly and her eyes fell on Hermione, ” Child, I see you again, I predicted that, er, you would leave, forever …”

Hermione said with a scowl, “You should have to state my name first, Professor Trelawney.”

Felix blinked, he happened to know about this a little while back, his own assistant had voluntarily quit the divination class, he guessed it might be because her grades in this class were not that great, not even good as those who made up some nonsense.

Trelawney seemed to have sobered up, and she pulled the scarf she is wearing up a bit, the glowing beads on it tinkling: “Inner Eye can be a burden at times, and I don’t want to sound that alien, you know …” then she left slowly.

“Oh, right.” Trelawney turned back, “Honey, what you’re worried about will happen in April.”

Harry and Ron looked at her with disbelief, Ron took a deep breath and asked briskly, “Who is she talking about?”

Hermione said pointedly, “There’s four of us, and whoever suffers a minor accident in April, we’ll know exactly who she’s talking about then.”

Felix said in a relaxed tone, “I would have been at the awarding ceremony for the Order of Merlin in early April, I wonder if Sybil was referring to that … frankly, I am not that worried.”

They entered the Room of Requirement, which is a large, spacious empty classroom, where the ceiling is fifty feet high and the floor is so clean that not even a single strand of hair is visible, coloured in different colours, like a colourful grid.

Each grid is marked with a number, from one to ten, repeating over and over again.

“Professor, what do I have to do?” When it finally came to it, Harry suddenly felt a little nervous, and he held his wand with a silly pose, which made Hermione and Ron glad that they did not need to try today.

“Use what you’ve learned in the nameless book.” Felix said, “I taught you everything you needed to be taught, and besides, you did a great job on your essay.”

“Did I?” Harry looked a little embarrassed, but he did feel a rush of relief and happiness, and he wondered whether the Professor was just reassuring him, but he decided to go with the feeling.

“Although Apparition becomes more difficult the further away you go, we don’t have to be concerned about a few feet,” Felix said, “so pick a number that you are interested in, Harry.”

“Uh, I’ll go with …,” he glanced uncertainly at the grid in front of him, “How about number seven?”

“Very good.” Felix said encouragingly, “You can close your eyes and listen to my guidance: Imagine you are in the warm sunshine … you hear the birds singing… smell the flowers… You are now very relaxed. Stay in this state… imagine the number seven grid, think as clearly as possible, what does it look like? Now begin to mobilize the magic, a sudden strong desire welled up in you to allow yourself to occupy the empty space in front of you, you can’t wait … right now!”

“Bang!”

There is a popping sound in the air, like lighting a firework, when Ron and Hermione discovered to their surprise that Harry had disappeared and appeared right at the edge of the red grid with the number seven.

Harry lost his balance and fell forward, he hurriedly reached out to hold the ground, to avoid making a fool of himself. He gasped excitedly and looked down at his feet, “I, I did it-”

“Very good.” Felix said, “Next, let’s try it again. This time, no guidance, you should do it by yourself.”

Harry is bursting with confidence, he gazed at his original position – the white grid with the number one written on it, the destination, the determination, the deliberation…

He closed his eyes, feeling light and fluffy, did he succeed? He didn’t hear any sound, so he opened his eyes and found himself still in the same place.

“Try again, Harry, it’s the feeling that counts.”

The third time still failed, he became a little anxious, a fourth, a fifth time –

“Bang!”

Hermione let out a scream, Harry opened his eyes, he found himself in grid number one, the only problem – his right leg remained in the same place.

He expected that he would panic and faint with fear, But he didn’t, apart from the fact that Professor Hap is here, the other reason is that he has experienced the splinching in the nameless book too many times.

“Splinching, a very normal phenomenon.” Felix walked unhurriedly over to Harry and waved his wand, and after a puff of purple smoke dissipated, Harry sat on the floor out of breath, his face dripping with sweat.

“Are you going to rest, or do you want to continue?” Felix asked.

“Continue,” Harry grinned, “Professor, I’m starting to feel a little bit of the same taste as the special training.”

“Bang!”

“Bang!”

“Bang!”

“Still splinched, this time your ear, can you hear it – sure, let’s continue.”

“Bang!”

“Poof!”

“Nice, you’re getting good at it, notice how the sound diminishes when you cast the spell, we’re on the right path!”

Ron and Hermione went as quiet as a pair of quails, when Hermione whispered, “Is this the special training Harry mentioned? It’s like, it’s like …”

“It’s like self-abuse, isn’t it?” Ron described how he felt, “but the effect is very good, in addition to the need of overcoming the psychological discomfort, oops, splinching again, this time an arm …”

Half an hour passed, “Let’s take a break for a while and eat something.” Felix stopped Harry from continuing his practice of Apparition, he looked at the empty room and said precisely and clearly, “I need a table, four chairs.”

The Room of Requirement met his needs, a small brown square table and four sofa chairs appeared before him.

Felix winked at them, “I am showing you, so you can possibly use it later, in fact, you can just mentally meditate the request.” He waved his hand and out of the ring in his left hand flew several plates of snacks and chocolates, and a large jug of fresh orange juice.

Harry walked over lightly, both of his legs went floppy, as if he is stepping on cotton. He slumped in the sofa chair, his whole body felt empty.

Felix conjured up a straw and let a glass of orange juice float in front of him, Harry lowered his head, and bit on the straw and “gulp”.

“Professor, if I want to practice the Apparition, do I have to go through the same thing?” Hermione asked timidly.

“You’re not like Harry,” Felix said: “He prefers feeling. You prefer reason. So it’s better for you to think and practice, summarizing the gains and losses of each spell you cast.”

“Hermione is the smartest witch I know.” Harry looked up as he said, and Ron also looked at him with approval.

“It’s not about being smart or not, Harry.” Felix said mildly, “Everyone is good at different things, some people just rely more on their intuition to learn magic, like you, you can think of it as a gift.”

Ron said thoughtfully, “I think I rely on my intuition too, no, on experience. I learned a lot of my magic by experiencing it first hand, like the Incarcerous Spell, the stunning spell, and the Disarming Charm …”

Felix looked at Ron oddly, he heard Hermione mentioning that Ron created a “learning by experience” method, using his own body to experience the effect of the spell, and then learning the spell much faster.

The most outrageous occasion is when he’s learning the Incarcerous Spell. He let Harry tie him more than twenty times in a row, in the end of that day’s duel self-study, he succeeded in releasing the finger-thick magic rope.

I heard that a number of people had tried to imitate it, but no one had managed to replicate Ron’s feat.

Felix guessed that either Ron really had the gift of ‘masochism to grow’ or he had more potential than that, but just couldn’t show it on a regular basis, so he subconsciously found such an outrageous excuse for himself.

———-

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