After Sherlock's guidance, Hermione began using her own approach to change her circumstances.
In every class, she participated even more actively than before, striving to earn house points.
This strategy showed obvious results.
In just one month, all professors except Snape had awarded Gryffindor quite a few points.
However.
Even though Hermione single-handedly scored nearly thirty points this season, becoming the first-year scoring champion, her treatment within Gryffindor remained unchanged.
This wasn't surprising.
Because in some sense, everything she was doing was futile.
In the students' eyes, Hermione Granger was certainly excellent at studying, but she constantly nagged whenever classmates made mistakes, always prevented them from copying each other's homework, and liked to tattle to teachers...
How to put it?
Everyone knew she was right, but nobody liked her.
Sherlock was helpless about this situation.
He had given his advice, but she wouldn't listen.
This kind of one-sided "doing what's best for you" naturally wouldn't be appreciated by others.
Moreover, others didn't need her to do these things—in the view of Gryffindor's little lions, Hermione was purely meddling.
When you focus intently on doing something, time seems to fly by particularly quickly.
Before they knew it, they had been at school for exactly two months.
The school's atmosphere had also become more cheerful.
The first-years were about to experience their first school holiday.
Halloween.
After lengthy evolution over time, this holiday had long since shed its original religious coloring, becoming primarily a celebration.
Halloween actually spans two days.
October 31st in the Gregorian calendar is called Halloween Eve.
November 1st is called All Saints' Day.
Halloween in the popular sense refers to October 31st, which was when the first-years would hold their celebration feast.
As for Halloween night, it's often called All Saints' Day or All Hallows' Day.
When Halloween arrives, children dress up as various cute ghosts and goblins, going door to door demanding candy, threatening mischief otherwise.
Legend says that various spirits also mingle among the crowds that night, so adults often dress up as demons and monsters too.
Additionally, there are holiday customs like carving pumpkin lanterns, playing pranks, and bobbing for apples.
In the Muggle world, Halloween is an important holiday.
For example, Yorkshire, where Sherlock had originally planned to attend school, has Halloween celebrations famous throughout Britain.
Originally, Sherlock thought the magical world wouldn't celebrate this holiday.
But now it seemed his view had been narrow.
The magical world celebrates four holidays: Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day, and Easter.
Valentine's Day is the most out of place among these four, giving the impression of having quietly snuck in. At Hogwarts, only upper-year students enjoy it.
Christmas and Easter involve holidays, which is somewhat awkward—considering how many wizards the Church had killed in the past.
On Halloween morning, Sherlock woke to the smell of roasted pumpkin wafting through the corridors.
The holiday atmosphere was already in full swing from that moment.
The last class before the celebration was Charms, where first-year wizards encountered new teaching content—the Levitation Charm.
Everyone was very interested in this.
Professor Flitwick had used Neville's pet Trevor—who always liked to abandon his owner for solo adventures—as a demonstration. Under the Levitation Charm's effect, it achieved wingless flight around the classroom ceiling.
However.
The spell's difficulty quickly dampened their enthusiasm.
Compared to previously learned charms, the Levitation Charm had a full eight syllables.
Not only did the pronunciation need to be accurate, but the casting gestures were also very demanding.
The difficulty had truly skyrocketed.
In the practical portion, following tradition, students still practiced in pairs.
Sherlock's partner was Harry, which made the latter very happy.
Seamus Finnigan had been trying to get his attention.
Compared to him, Harry would rather team up with Neville.
It wasn't that Harry looked down on Seamus; it was mainly that Seamus had a miraculous talent.
Harmless spells that worked fine for others would mysteriously cause explosions when he cast them.
This was particularly obvious in Transfiguration and Charms classes.
According to Sherlock's scientific analysis, this might be hereditary.
Seamus Finnigan had been one of his deduction subjects while waiting for the train at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters before school started.
At that time, Sherlock's analysis had been: [New student, wizard mother, Muggle father working in explosives, only learned about his wife's identity after marriage]
After school began, this deduction was confirmed.
So, except for teachers, only extremely few students like Sherlock could cover for him.
Harry clearly didn't possess this ability.
As for poor Neville, who was stuck partnering with Seamus, he could only pray for divine protection.
Some were happy, others worried.
Harry was pleased to be matched with Sherlock, while Hermione was somewhat dejected at not being teamed with him.
Her partner was Ron.
Ron was equally unwilling about this arrangement.
He had disliked her since they first met.
Although there had been a brief improvement in his opinion when Hermione spoke up for Sherlock and Harry, her subsequent actions quickly brought his favorable impression crashing down.
This situation peaked after Hermione lectured them about not dueling Malfoy and came to catch them in the act late at night.
Even though Hermione later tried to change the status quo using her own methods after Sherlock's guidance, it still had no effect.
Recently, aside from Sherlock and Neville, only Harry could manage a few words with Hermione.
And that was only Harry giving face to Sherlock.
Neville had an introverted, timid personality, so in truth, only Sherlock genuinely didn't reject Hermione.
Yet she hadn't been paired with Sherlock—clearly, Professor Flitwick wasn't particularly observant.
"Wingardium Leviosa!"
Ron waved his arms like a windmill while shouting the incantation.
Partly this was channeling his annoyance with Hermione into practice, and partly he hoped this approach would make the feather sense his determination.
He had heard from Harry about the flying lesson experience—broomsticks could see through your inner cowardice.
Be confident!
However, his current roaring made him look not confident but threatening.
So, it didn't work.
Though light, the feather wasn't afraid of threats.
"It's Wing-GAR-dium Levi-O-sa, make the 'gar' nice and long."
After watching Ron fail attempt after attempt, Hermione finally couldn't help herself and switched to lecture mode.
"You try it then!"
Ron was already frustrated, so he immediately redirected his roaring toward Hermione.
Without another word, Hermione waved her wand and pronounced the spell in perfect London accent.
"Wing-GAR-dium Levi-O-sa!"
The feather very cooperatively rose up, floating directly above the desk.
"Well done!"
Professor Flitwick looked excited. "Everyone look, Miss Granger has succeeded as well! One point to Gryffindor!"
He said "as well" because Sherlock had already succeeded before Hermione.
This wasn't difficult for him.
Even Harry, being with him, had been encouraged.
After several failures, Harry had also managed to make his feather float.
So, both had earned points before Hermione.
However.
When Sherlock earned points, he naturally received applause.
Harry's success was even more celebrated—the cheers when he earned points far exceeded Sherlock's.
Such was the magical world's recognition of their savior.
Only Hermione.
No one paid attention.
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