Finals week at Hogwarts was just a few days away.
On a rare, sunny afternoon, Neville found Lynn.
"What's up, Neville?"
Lynn, having finally treated himself to a day off, wasn't working on his cards or wand research for once. A work-life balance was essential. He might be energetic, but he wasn't a machine; rest was mandatory.
"Gran wrote me a letter."
Neville smiled a bit sheepishly. "Honestly, I really want to thank you. If it weren't for your help, I'd probably still be that kid who forgets everything and messes everything up."
"Gran knows about what happened. I told her over Christmas, so..."
"She wants to know if you can come over to my place during the holidays. She really wants to meet you and thank you in person."
"I was going to wait until after exams to ask, but you always seem so busy—last one back to the dorms, first one out in the morning. I was worried if I waited too long, you'd already have plans, so I thought I'd ask early."
"I'd be honored, Neville. There's nothing more satisfying than helping a diamond in the rough finally shine. We're friends, and that's what friends do. Besides, you put in the hard work yourself."
"Just look at that certificate. If you didn't have the grit to stick with it, you probably would have ended up like Ron."
"Ron..." Neville sighed softly. "I think he just focused his efforts in the wrong direction. Like... he wasn't just trying to be a praiseworthy student; he was also trying really hard to slack off..."
"I only found out recently that he was borrowing homework from students in other dorms to copy. He was just terrified we'd catch him. Once the pressure wore off, he just gave up entirely."
"Finals will teach him that actually studying is kind of necessary."
Lynn shrugged, unbothered. Without Hermione there to nag Ron into cramming at the last minute, and with no one making a study plan or forcing him to open a book, he was on his own. Hogwarts had a bit of a "happy education" vibe—it was fine for the first two years, but once third-year electives started, the academic tracking would begin.
Despite the school only having eight or nine hundred students, the faculty couldn't run on just one teacher per subject, especially after third year. Unless the professors were using Time-Turners to work like dogs, the curriculum would collapse. Assistant professors were a must to handle the workload.
"Maybe in two years, Ron won't even be in the same classes as us. Anyway, his dad works at the Ministry, so it's not like he'll starve after graduation."
"Enough about him. How's your training going, Neville?"
"Professor Flitwick said I could join his Dueling Club soon. He wants to wait a few years before entering me in competitions, though. The sword-and-wand combo is allowed in formal dueling—it's a European tradition from a thousand years ago. It never technically got banned, just... nobody really uses swords anymore."
Neville beamed. "The Youth Dueling Championship is held every three years, with students from all the magic schools participating. The next one is next year. Flitwick said if I do well, he'll take me to watch so I can get a feel for it."
"Want to spar right now?"
"You bet!"
Neville nodded, drawing his wand and his Lightning Blade. Neville knew Lynn struggled a bit with Charms, but he didn't underestimate him. From what they'd seen in class, even if Lynn's natural talent for casting was lower, his grades were top-tier—especially in theory. Professor Flitwick had even exempted him from homework.
The two took their stances, separated by fourteen paces—the traditional dueling distance. Though, with modern dueling evolving, the rectangular arena style was becoming less common.
Back in the day, wizards carried swords. Once you got close, it was a chaotic clash of spells and steel—super intense. But as magical theory improved, that style fell out of sync with the rhythm of modern duels.
Unless, of course, you could use a sword to slice through spells and use it as a shield. That saved time on casting defensive charms and put massive pressure on the opponent.
"I'll only use first-year spells. Ready, Neville?"
"Ready!"
The moment the match started, Lynn flicked his wand, shooting a jet of red light. For this simple probe, Neville just twitched his left hand. The Lightning Blade sliced right through the incoming spell. The futuristic gadget was a bit scientifically impossible; usually, only specific alchemy tools—like the goblin-made swords of old—could physically block magic like that.
After deflecting the spell, Neville muttered an incantation and sprinted forward. He fired a disruption hex while closing the distance rapidly—a tactic Flitwick had taught him. With his limited spell arsenal, closing the gap was his biggest advantage.
Anyone else might have panicked seeing Neville charging with a sword.
But Lynn wasn't nervous. The Lightning Blade's tutorial mode was better than the world's best fencing master; it forced your body to move correctly. It was like having a grandmaster possess you. If you paid attention, you actually learned real combat skills.
Suddenly, a wall of earth shot up. The grass, manipulated by Transfiguration, became an obstacle. Transfiguration was a branch of Charms permitted in dueling. Even Animagi were allowed—a skilled Animagus was a terrifying opponent in the ring.
Whether it was the strength of a bear, the speed of a leopard, or the sight of an eagle, they far exceeded human limits. Even "ordinary" animal transformations weren't to be trifled with.
Neville stumbled, losing his center of gravity. Crap, he thought. At that exact moment, a tricky spell hit him square in the thigh. He was sent spinning into the air, doing two and a half rotations before landing, his brain rattled.
"Repel the enemy three feet, huh?"
Neville picked himself up, scratching his head with a goofy grin. "I guess I still have a long way to go."
"Don't wor—"
Lynn started to speak but suddenly dropped into a crouch with lightning speed. His free left hand shot up and grabbed a wrist that had appeared out of thin air.
"Hallie..."
Lynn spun around, gripping the pale arm, and sneered at the empty air. "You seriously tried to jump-attack me?"
"I was wearing the Invisibility Cloak! How did you know?"
As Hallie's voice rang out, the air rippled, and she pulled off the cloak, pursing her lips in annoyance.
"Cho, why are you letting her play these childish games? You're the older sister, be more mature."
"Don't look at me." Cho's lips curled into a smile. "Next time, I'll tell her to swap the wand for a hammer. Bonk-bonk, two hits."
"A hammer is a bit much!"
"Well, jump scares don't end well either."
Lynn shoved his wand into his pocket, freed up his right hand, and blew on his knuckles.
"Take this!"
Thwack. A crisp flick to the forehead instantly cleared Hallie's vision. Her head snapped back, she let out a "Ow!", and squatted down clutching her forehead, wearing a mask of pure agony.
"Hahahaha!"
Lynn, the ruthless flower-destroyer, didn't feel the slightest bit of guilt. He actually laughed out loud.
"Spill it. Sneaking up on me like this... what kind of trouble are you trying to drag me into today?"
"I'm not..." Hallie wiped away the physiological tears caused by the pain. "Cho and I just came back from Hagrid's. We found out something huge!"
"Oh?"
"Lynn, do you remember Nimue?"
"Yeah, the little golden unicorn. I remember."
"Nimue's mom was attacked. When we found Hagrid, he had just come back from the forest. He was covered in silver blood."
"So?"
Lynn looked at Hallie, thinking: Is this reckless bravery from her mom's side or her dad's?
"You're not just going to ignore it, are you?" Hallie put her hands on her hips, angry. "There's a bad guy in the school hurting unicorns! Can't you guess who it is?"
"Quirrell?"
Neville leaned in, too. "Quirrell has been acting really shady lately. And that disgusting smell on him is getting worse."
"Confronting a Dark Wizard head-on isn't exactly a smart move," Lynn warned them. Even at Hogwarts, you couldn't just go running into danger.
"That's why I got this from Professor Snape."
Hallie pulled a vial of potion from her robe. "Top-grade Draught of Living Death. One whiff knocks you out. One drop puts you in a death-like coma for a whole day."
"I got the antidote, too. As long as we hold the antidote in our mouths beforehand, we can breathe it or drink it and be fine."
"We can use the Invisibility Cloak..." Hallie hesitated. "Neville, do you want to come?"
"Can I?" Neville looked surprised, but there was an eager spark in his eyes.
"Four people is a tight squeeze... Lynn, do you have a plan?"
"The Universal Tent, I guess. It has an invisibility function. We can drape the Cloak over the tent for double protection."
"But how do we move if we're in a tent? We can't just squat in one spot; that's stupid."
"I move, the tent moves. Or, if that doesn't work, I'll just stuff you guys in my pocket. It's actually safer. I'll wear the Cloak, you three poke your heads out to peek, and if there's danger, I can just bail."
"That... actually sounds pretty good."
"Let's test it out. We're heading out tonight, so we have some time."
Hallie was obviously thrilled about this "Grand Adventure." Even though she was a pretty girl, her interests were definitely more tomboyish. You wouldn't find cute plushies on her bed, but look under her pillow and you'd find two racy comic books she'd confiscated from Lynn.
Action followed thought. With teleportation as a safety net, Lynn felt confident.
Only part of the Forbidden Forest was covered by Hogwarts' protective wards. Unicorns didn't live in the deep forest; that area was for massive, territorial magical beasts. The forest had expanded significantly over the last century. The further you got from the castle, the more dangerous the creatures became.
This was partly for student safety and partly to deter poachers.
The beasts were top-tier guard dogs. Without a dozen wizards working together, you couldn't take them down, and the noise would be deafening—enough for Hagrid to grab his massive crossbow and come running. He could snipe a poacher from hundreds of yards away. His arrows were thick as Hallie's forearm, tipped with unicorn horn material. Not even a giant or a dragon could shrug off a hit from those armor-piercing bolts.
Shield Charms? Useless paper against Hagrid's handheld ballista. The supersonic arrows gave you zero reaction time.
Covering the tent with the Cloak proved impractical; the Cloak was human-sized, and the tent, while small, couldn't be fully covered. Lynn didn't trust the tent's optical camouflage against magic, so he scrapped that idea.
Instead, Lynn opened his Fourth-Dimensional Pocket and stuffed the three of them inside.
In anyone else's hands, the pocket was useless, but it worked perfectly for Lynn. It was like it had a biometric lock, though the gadgets inside didn't—if you took them out, anyone could use them.
The inside of the pocket was dimly lit and undecorated. Just a dark void. If you got locked in there, it would be pretty terrifying.
"Whoa! Lynn!"
As soon as Lynn climbed in, Hallie came running up, shouting.
"You have so many gadgets?!"
Her eyes were sparkling with curiosity. "Is there anything we can use for tonight?"
"I don't know, maybe... honestly, I got some of this stuff years ago. I never know when it'll come in handy. A lot of it is broken, too—DOA. Completely unusable."
"Can't you fix them?"
"I tried the Repairing Charm, didn't do anything. Maybe my magic isn't strong enough?"
Lynn wasn't sure if his lack of Charms talent was the issue, but he didn't trust anyone else to fix them. Some of the broken items were dangerously overpowered. He couldn't risk someone fixing them and deciding not to give them back.
"What's this? A toy gun?"
Hallie pointed to an orange device that looked like a cross between a hairdryer and a ray gun.
"That... that thing is intense. Actually, it's terrifyingly powerful."
If everything in there worked, the most broken item wouldn't be the Adaptation Light, but the hairdryer in Hallie's hand.
[Evolution/Devolution Ray]
"That gadget can make any living thing evolve or devolve. For example, chickens evolved from dinosaurs. If you use the Devolution setting on a chicken, it turns back into its ancestor—a dinosaur."
"And if you use the Evolution setting, even a pig, dog, or cat could evolve into a being with human-level intelligence."
"It manipulates the hierarchy of life, breaking genetic limits. Too bad it's busted. Stone dead."
The three kids stared at the hairdryer in Hallie's hand, slack-jawed, struggling to process the information.
"So... so... what if you use it on a person?" Hallie looked at Lynn with puppy-dog eyes. She really wanted to pull that trigger.
"Then they become a Superman. You know, Superman! Flight, invincible skin, laser eyes, freezing breath."
"Whoa! I want to try it so bad!"
Hallie excitedly grabbed Lynn's arm and started rubbing her cheek against it like a clingy koala.
"Stop rubbing on me like a bear on a tree. If you're going to beg, at least offer some actual benefits."
Lynn pulled his arm away with a look of distaste and put his hand on Hallie's head to hold her back.
"If you fix it, the first time I use it, I'll let you— Mmph mmph!"
Cho clamped her hand over Hallie's mouth and dragged her away before she could finish that wildly inappropriate sentence.
"What about this? What does the belt do?"
Neville was eyeing a belt on the shelf. After Hallie was hauled off, he asked Lynn.
[Transformation Belt]
"Put that on, shout 'Transform!', and you'll be suited up in tight spandex with the ability to use a Ultimate Move."
"As for the move... see that piece of paper inside the buckle? You can pull it out."
Neville did so, but he couldn't read the text.
"What does it say?"
"It's the move name. You write a move on it, shout the name, and it happens. When I got the belt, I didn't have any spare paper, just the one inside."
"So... it works?"
Neville got excited. He looked ready to try it on.
"If you knew what was written on that paper, you might change your mind."
Lynn spread his hands helplessly. " Roughly translated, it says: 'Darker than twilight, more red than blood, that which flows in the stream of time... I call upon thee in the name of the great one... Destroy all the fools who stand in our way with power equal to my own! — DRAGON SLAVE!!'"
"It's super cringey. Reading it out loud is humiliating."
"That is so cool!"
Neville's eyes shone even brighter. Lynn paused, stunned... then realized Neville was at that age. The age where overly dramatic, edgy stuff was the coolest thing in the world.
"If you like it, borrow it. I haven't used it, but... it might look pretty cool, I guess."
"Lynn!"
A teary-eyed Hallie broke free from Cho and tackled Lynn, hanging off him like a sloth.
"I want one too! I want to play!"
"Your chest is crushing my ribs! It's like a steel plate!"
Lynn, face contorted, tried to push her off but couldn't dislodge her. Since when did she get so strong?
"Will you lend me something or not?"
Hallie gripped his shoulders, getting right in his face.
"Let Neville have a turn, then you can try. I only have one belt."
"But you must have other cool stuff!"
"It's mostly junk in here," Lynn sighed, finally peeling Hallie off him. "Look around. Working stuff on the left shelf, broken stuff on the right."
"Is this bread a gadget?"
Cho pointed to a stack of bread slices in a sealed bag.
"Yeah, Memory Bread. You press it onto a page of text, eat it, and you memorize the content. But when I got it, it looked expired. It's a bit green. Could be matcha flavor, but I haven't risked it. It's just sitting there."
"Oh." Cho nodded, losing interest.
"What about this? This?!"
Hallie bounced back, holding a small tube about the size of a thumb.
[Air Pistol]
"Slip it over your finger and say 'Bang.' It fires like a gun, but it shoots compressed air. Not super powerful—mostly knocks people down. A headshot might knock them out."
"I used to use it for self-defense. Dealt with a few punks back in the day."
Before he mastered telekinesis, Lynn had run into trouble a few times. Being good-looking was sometimes a burden. Without the air gun, he would have taken a beating.
"You can have it for protection. During the summer, you can't use magic. If a bad guy comes at you, aim for the liver. One shot will have them rolling on the ground in agony. If you miss, just spam it a few dozen times. As long as you don't hit an eyeball, it won't kill anyone."
Bang~
Hallie put the air gun on her finger and fired at empty space. Her finger twitched slightly as an invisible shockwave shot from the tip.
"This seems fun!" She blew on her finger like a cowboy in a western movie.
"What about you, Cho? Anything you want to try?"
None of the current items were particularly rare, so Lynn didn't mind handing them out.
"I'm kind of curious what this rope does."
Cho pointed to a coil of straw rope on the shelf.
"Don't let the looks fool you. If I didn't have the Universal Tent, this would be my favorite thing here."
[Instant Hot Spring Rope]
"Any area you outline with this rope turns into a hot spring. The temperature is perfect, you can use it anywhere, and it never gets dirty—the water stays crystal clear."
"That's amazing!"
Before Cho could speak, Hallie cheered again. "Let's go on a trip this summer, Cho! We can soak in the hot springs!"
"Sounds great."
Cho smiled and nodded. "My dad has a small vacation cottage in the Hebrides. We can go there for a few days. The scenery is beautiful."
"The Hebrides?" Neville seemed to be recalling something. "Isn't there a reserve there? The Hebridean Black Dragon lives there. They can grow up to thirty feet long."
"That makes it even better!"
"The reserve isn't open to the public," Cho shook her head. "But I can ask my dad to get us visitor passes. The wizards who manage the park can give us a tour."
"Cho, you're the best!"
After raiding Lynn's pocket for a while, the three of them climbed out in high spirits. The sky outside had started to darken; it was almost dinner time.
"Let's go to the Great Hall, then we'll head to the forest tonight."
"Here, take this, Lynn."
Hallie shoved the Invisibility Cloak into Lynn's hands. "Professor Dumbledore sent it to me for Christmas. He said it was my dad's. It's really powerful."
"I bet he used it to sneak out at night when he was in school, too. But you can't do that, Lynn. You need to sleep early or you won't grow tall."
" pretty sure that applies to you."
Lynn ruffled Hallie's hair. "I grew almost five inches this year. You, on the other hand... haven't changed a bit."
"I did too grow!"
Hallie hopped in place. "I'm gonna have long legs any day now!"