The next morning, Maka was the first to wake.
He couldn't quite understand it himself. He'd only drifted off sometime after midnight, yet he'd still opened his eyes far too early. In the end, he decided it was probably Luna's fault.
Back when he'd been staying at her house, every morning came with a new method of "waking him up," and the dazed little girl had always seemed delighted by it. Without realizing it, Maka had developed the unfortunate habit of waking up the moment the hour arrived.
Classes began today.
Most of Hufflepuff's lessons were scheduled alongside Ravenclaw's. In the same way, Gryffindor's classes were paired with Slytherin's. There was at least one advantage to that arrangement: in a place without Harry Potter, Snape was—relatively speaking—slightly less volatile.
"Now… roll call."
Snape looked exactly as Maka had imagined: rigid, impenetrable, and permanently humorless. He read through the names on his list one by one with a flat voice, never once glancing up at his students. Only after finishing did he lift his head and let his cold, empty black eyes sweep across the classroom.
And in that gaze, Maka saw something uncomfortably familiar—something that reminded him of the drifters on the streets of Top Point, people who had lost their lives, lost their hopes, and forgotten what it meant to look forward.
No.
Maka corrected himself silently.
Compared to those drifters, Snape's eyes were… more complete. More final.
Dead eyes.
Cold. Hollow. Saturated with something that felt like death itself.
For a child to survive for so long in the darker corners of Britain, Maka had relied on disguise—and on reading people. He studied expressions, listened to silence, weighed the shape of a pause.
But now, standing under Snape's gaze, Maka realized he could read nothing at all.
And for the first time, he felt the instinctive urge to stay as far away from this man as possible.
Avoiding unknown danger is the most effective way to protect yourself.
That "truth" had always circulated in the world Maka knew.
"Mr. McLean," Snape said suddenly, his eyes locking onto Maka, "you appear to have a differing opinion about something I've said?"
Maka had been staring into those eyes without noticing. Snape had noticed.
"Oh—no," Maka said quickly. "I mean… I'm very fond of Potions as a subject, but the theory is extremely complex. I sincerely hope, Professor Snape, that you might help me resolve a few confusions I encountered while studying ahead."
It was not like Maka to fold so fast. He'd been hijacked by his own caution.
But it also wasn't a lie. He did have questions—real ones—and he wanted authoritative answers.
The night before, in the Hufflepuff common room, Maka had asked Darren about the professors. As for Snape… almost no student liked him, but his accomplishments in Potions—and even in spellwork—were not something anyone could honestly deny.
The mere fact that he carried an internationally recognized standing, and the title of "Potions Master" backed by official recognition, was enough to secure him a place in the wider wizarding world. And Advanced Potion-Making contained many improved brewing methods that Snape himself had refined—though at present, no one knew that.
Snape, however, showed no appreciation for Maka's careful politeness.
He gave a cold curl of his lip—if it could even be called a smile—and spoke in a voice steeped in contempt.
"Oh? Is that so? Then speak. But if your 'questions' are nothing more than pointless nonsense, Hufflepuff will lose points for it. And let me repeat myself: in my classroom, students are not welcome to ask questions."
Maka swallowed.
Around him, the other Hufflepuffs didn't seem nearly as worried about points as Maka had expected. Instead, several of them looked at him with open concern—as though, compared to House points, the safety of a classmate mattered far more.
Maka glanced around, exhaled quietly, and felt something shift inside him.
For the first time, he thought: Maybe being sorted into Hufflepuff isn't so bad.
He cleared his throat, steadied himself, and brought up the question that had bothered him most while reading Magical Drafts and Potions.
"Professor Snape," Maka said, and as he spoke his brows began to knit—his clearest sign that he was truly engaged. "While studying the section on the Sleeping Draught, I noticed that the formula includes a fixed constant, but the text never explains it clearly in practical terms. I can't make sense of it. I'm not sure whether I'm misunderstanding the method—or whether there's an omission."
When Maka talked about something he cared about, he had a bad habit of forgetting everything else—the room, the danger, the person he was speaking to.
This time, he was lucky.
Snape did not snap.
He stared at Maka for a long moment before answering.
"I will cover the Sleeping Draught later," Snape said coolly. "If you listen properly, you will not ask questions like this again."
Then he turned away as though Maka had ceased to exist. He tapped the board with his wand, and lines of text and formulas appeared at once.
"Sit down," Ernie whispered urgently, tugging Maka's sleeve. "You can sit—sit! I can't believe it. I heard Professor Snape is the strictest professor at Hogwarts. When he says he'll take points, he never just… lets it go!"
Maka didn't feel relieved.
He still cared about the question.
Two Potions lessons later, cold and miserable in the underground dungeon classroom, the moment Snape said the word dismissed, students practically fled the room. Between the shelves of preserved organs and the ever-present figure of Snape himself—dark, severe, joyless—the place felt soaked in unpleasantness.
As Maka passed the doorway, a voice stopped him.
"The constant is meaningless," Snape said from the corridor outside, standing there like a shadow. "A historical error that was never corrected."
And with that, he swept away in long strides, his cloak spreading in the air behind him.
Maka watched his retreating back and couldn't help a quiet laugh. With the way the cape opened and billowed, Snape looked like a walking bat.
He's not as impossible to talk to as I thought, Maka considered.
Of course, the truth was not that simple.
Snape had waited there and offered that answer because Maka's question struck a nerve. It was one of the very things that had once hooked Snape into Potions in the first place—because he'd had the same doubt when he was a student.
Maka, naturally, had no way of knowing that.
After Potions came Defense Against the Dark Arts with Professor Quirrell—the man with strange folds at the back of his head.
But that class was hardly worth describing.
Between the heavy stink of garlic clinging to Quirrell and his constant stuttering, the lesson felt hollow and bleak. Maka couldn't understand how anyone could tell a story about dealing with Inferi in such a broken, hesitant, suspicious way.
He'd heard Quirrell had been an excellent student once.
Looking at him now, Maka found it hard to believe.
Setting aside Potions and the nearly useless Defense class, the lesson that fascinated Maka most was Charms with Professor Flitwick—said to have goblin ancestry.
Flitwick was small because of his bloodline, but he was the kind of professor everyone respected.
His classroom wasn't strict. Students could move freely. They could even joke with him, and he never took offense.
And when Flitwick patiently explained the maddening problems Maka had encountered in Magic Theory, Maka's respect for him turned instantly into genuine admiration.
A former dueling champion truly was something else.
Flitwick's insights—his applications of technique—gave Maka an entirely different understanding of foundational magic. After only a few explanations, it felt as though someone had opened a door in Maka's mind and shown him a room he hadn't known existed.
"Thank you, Professor Flitwick," Maka said sincerely. He always respected anyone who taught him something real.
Flitwick smiled and patted Maka's arm—clearly he couldn't easily reach anyone's shoulder—and said kindly, "No need to be so formal. Theory is dull; only practical use gives it depth. Still… you are the first-year with the deepest grasp of Charmwork I've seen so far."
"And just like Miss Granger of Gryffindor," he added, "you're very talented."
After that, Maka learned a little more about Hermione from Flitwick himself. When he heard how wide Hermione's studying ranged, Maka could only shake his head and smile bitterly.
She read too much.
And in Maka's view, that wasn't always helpful for understanding and application.
If you wanted to go further, you had to truly digest the fundamentals first—build the strongest base possible. Even a genius had to move step by step.
And Maka knew perfectly well: he wasn't a genius.
Hermione probably wasn't either.
Of the remaining subjects, the one Maka hated most wasn't even History of Magic—the class most students complained about endlessly.
It was Astronomy observation on Wednesday nights, the routine of Astronomy class.
In Maka's opinion, if you stripped away the magical elements, the observation methods, recording habits, and calculations in the wizarding world were laughably behind what Muggles had developed.
Worse still, in modern wizarding society, the subject didn't even have much practical use anymore.
For a hard pragmatist like Maka, it was misery.
"Hey—listen," Ron said, edging closer during Herbology while everyone fertilized the harmless, gentle health-plants in Greenhouse One. His voice was full of curiosity. "I heard you contradicted Snape's theory right in his class. Is that true?"
Maka noticed that not far away, Hermione—holding a small trowel—had also turned her attention toward them, as though she cared very much about the answer.