Chapter 184: Terrifying...
Chapter 184: Terrifying...
"You mean... a trick?" Albert deliberately drew out his words, feigning deep thought as if considering how to answer the question.
After a moment, he spoke, "The trick is... to approach it with the same fervor as you would for your final exams and diligently practice your spells."
Initially, Albert had wanted to mention his system, but after some thought, he decided against it, figuring that no one would understand what he meant by 'cheating'.
At that moment, the expressions on their faces froze, expecting to hear some useful trick only to be played by Albert once again.
Before they could voice their thoughts, Albert continued, "Well, to be honest, it's a variation of another spell, a derivative of the Wand-Lighting Charm. It's a bit like... hmm, the Leg-Locker Curse and the Full-Body Bind Curse combined. Of course, this spell is much harder to master than the Wand-Lighting Charm."
"So, you weren't just shaking your wand earlier?" Sandra finally understood what had happened.
It was just that casting a spell while the wand tip was glowing created the illusion that the ball of light was being shaken off the glowing wand.
"Of course not," Albert replied, exasperated that they would think that. Alright, he had to admit, it did look like he was randomly shaking his wand.
Their curiosity didn't last long. While they might be interested in the spell Albert was practicing, not many would want to learn it. For most students, between homework and practicing the spells taught in class, there was little time or energy left to devote to learning new and more complex spells.
Especially when it came to spells that they didn't fully understand and would require a significant amount of time to learn.
Undeniably, Sandra was the most efficient student in their year, aside from Albert. At least, this was true when it came to doing homework, which was influenced by her early muggle education.
After finishing her homework, Sandra began practicing the Replication Charm with a piece of parchment.
It was a spell she had learned from Albert, not too difficult to pick up, but it still required a significant amount of practice to gain a basic grasp of it.
Unlike Sandra, Albert was progressing at a rapid pace. The balls of light he produced were growing larger, and they didn't extinguish immediately; he could even make them fly forward for a short distance.
This visible progress was truly astonishing, and they all realized that it wouldn't be long before Albert fully mastered this spell.
Sandra lifted her head, staring dumbfounded at the ball of light floating above her head, her face filled with disbelief. "Is that it? He succeeded just like that?"
It had been less than half an hour since Albert started practicing! "There's no need to be surprised; it's a normal occurrence," Fred consoled, though his attention was elsewhere. "Albert must have practiced this secretly; you just didn't know about it."
Albert glanced at his skill panel. The skill was at 65 experience points and hadn't leveled up yet, but the amount of experience gained was already impressive.
"Looks like you forgot about the gathering," a voice interrupted their thoughts.
Katrina had somehow appeared behind Albert and was also looking up at the now-vanished ball of light, a thoughtful expression on her face.
"Speaking of which, I'm surprised you're here to remind me," Albert said, putting down his wand and pulling out his pocket watch. He opened the lid and checked the time. "We still have twenty minutes."
"Last time, you took me to Classroom 21. This time, let me take you to Classroom 17," Katrina turned and said, her back facing Albert. "Let's call it even."
They were, of course, talking about the Spell Club. They had both received invitations.
In fact, the day after Katrina mentioned that Albert hadn't been invited, he received an invitation from Professor Flitwick. Similar to last year's invitation to Professor McGonagall's Transfiguration Club, a task related to the Spell Club had appeared on his task panel, along with a reward of 2000 experience points.
After completing the task, Albert immediately upgraded his Spell Theory to Level 2. At least now, when attending the club, he wouldn't have to worry about not understanding Professor Flitwick's lectures. Moreover, the 2000 experience points reward wasn't completely spent; a third of it was still remaining.
George looked up at the departing figures and muttered, "Since when did their relationship become so good?"
"Well, a genius' friend is usually also a genius," Sandra replied with a twist of her lips.
"Then what does that make us?" Fred disagreed with her assessment. Their relationship was quite good, especially after Albert's daring adventure into the Forbidden Forest months ago to find them.
If Albert didn't consider them good friends, he wouldn't have taken such a huge risk.
"Roommates," Sandra replied without hesitation.
"No, no," George waved his index finger, not taking the suggestion seriously. "In fact, we're also geniuses!"
"What kind of genius?" Jordan interjected, "A genius in causing trouble, perhaps?"
"I think it's more like a genius in stirring up trouble," Sandra said, rolling her eyes at their antics as she continued to focus on practicing the Replication Charm. She intended to master this spell during this period of calm at the start of the school year.
"I actually feel sorry for Katrina," George said.
"Sorry?"
"She seems to enjoy competing with Albert. That's not a wise choice," Fred said, pulling out a deck of cards and waving them in front of Sandra. "Want to play a game?"
Without lifting her head, Sandra retorted, "Don't you have homework to do?"
"Never mind, forget I said anything," Fred replied.
Seeing Fred's dejected expression, George and Jordan burst out laughing.
In truth, they were also envious of Albert's talent, but as friends and roommates, the trio was well aware of Albert's situation. Perhaps he was a genius, but in places unseen, he put forth an unimaginable amount of effort that ordinary people couldn't fathom.
To master those spells, Albert also had to spend a considerable amount of time researching and practicing.
Especially with his so-called 'pen pals', where he would send thick stacks of letters at a time, and the thickness of these letters only seemed to be increasing—a serious violation of the statute of secrecy.
The trio had seen the contents before—that feeling of understanding each individual word but not the combination was truly awful.
Those letters were infinitely more difficult than their homework.
The fact that Albert could write several letters a week and receive the same number of replies was, in their opinion, terrifying.
Yet, despite all this, that guy still seemed more relaxed than they were.
Katrina was a genius, but in the eyes of the trio, she was just so-so. That was why Fred said that Katrina's competition with Albert would be a difficult path.
Sometimes, geniuses aren't terrifying. What's terrifying is when someone is more of a genius than you and works harder than you.
Having long been left in the dust, the trio didn't feel any jealousy. They were well aware that in certain aspects, they were no longer on the same level as Albert.
(End of Chapter)
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