"Mr. Xarion! You must cease your exuberant use of house points at once! Slytherin house has leapt so far into the lead that no other house has any hope of-"
"If any members of the other houses impress me as much as the student who caused me to allot those points, I will gladly give them the same amount. There seems to be something about this whole situation you don't understand, Mr. Flitwick. I. Do. Not. Care. About. House points. I think they are stupid and serve no purpose other than to create pointless divides between classes for no benefit other than bragging rights. However, if I can abuse a stupid system and pull something good out of it, you better believe I will." I said as Flitwick scurried after me, having ambushed me in the hall between classes. "Now, I'd say this has been fun, but it really hasn't. Bye!" I disappeared under an invisibility spell and walked away, leaving Flitwick to spin around in a circle pointlessly searching for me.
I was really starting to dislike that man.
X
"It is adequate." Snape said as he looked over the potion I'd made. "You lost a large amount of the potency in the distillation."
"Yeah, I had a feeling I was screwing that up. I will get it next time though."
Snape huffed. "Very well, we will meet again next week." He walked back to his desk and sat down. With a wave of his hand, a spell circle appeared before his hand and all of the equipment in the room started putting itself away.
The Potion Master had yet to learn how to translate one of his own spells into a circle, but he was more than capable of utilizing any that I gave him. He was a pretty smart guy.
"Then until we meet next week." I said as I walked from the room, smiling to myself as the door closed itself behind me.
X
"Could you please pass the hash browns?" I said politely.
"Oh, Professor Xarion, sir, you needn't be so nice to us, sir." the shy house elf said as she held up the bowl, not quite meeting my eyes.
"Pinky, we've been over this, just call me Xarion. I'm eating all of your food and barging in on your meals, so you don't-"
"Professor Xarion isn't barging in! He is most welcome!" another house elf cried as he stood up from his chair. Several others started to enthusiastically bob their heads in agreement.
I opened my mouth to reply, but was cut off by a shrill whistling sound.
"The tea!" yet another house elf said in alarm, and the entire area seemed to turn into a New York City street during rush hour as all the house elves leapt to their feet and scurried about.
I just idly sipped my own tea as I watched them all work, noting with a small amount of smugness as several spell circles appeared before a few of them.
I'd been eating here ever since my first night in the castle. I only went to the main hall when I was required to, and even then I tried to skip out on it. The house elves were great company, and while they were a little formal, I enjoyed every moment I spent talking to them.
I learned that they turned down just about any form of compensation for their work in a discussion with Dumbleore, wherein he assured me he left more than enough to compensate their time in their personal belongings and had accidentally created the legend of the 'Fairy Elf Gifter', so I decided to take advantage by dropping some books on spell circles in with the rest of their stuff.
People may say I was cheating Snape out of his exclusivity, but that was never part of the deal. He taught potions to others, so why couldn't I teach spell circles?
I took yet another sip of my tea as the house elves solved the crisis of the tea and the meal resumed. This was the life.
X
I breathed in the fiery air as I brought my hammer down once more, shaping the small hunk of metal before me into my desired shape.
I had missed this a lot. The heat of the forge, the feel of the hammer, the way you could create anything you wanted given enough patience - there was just something about it that couldn't be replicated through any other experience.
One of my spirits had finally found a location that looked like it held the Room of Requirement, and once I checked it for myself, I was ecstatic to see the door appear. Then I walked inside and…. I had a bit of an episode.
The lab I was working in was an exact replica of the one I'd had while I still worked for the Grigori. Of course the first thing I noticed when I walked in was how true to the original it was; including the indent in my chair where Vali had worn it down after sitting in it for hours on end every day.
I still missed my friend.
Logically I knew he wasn't coming back, but I still found myself looking over my shoulder to check the chair from time to time as I was working, hoping he'd randomly appear with a cup of instant noodles in his hand that he'd spill all over my chair and my floor. But he never showed up.
I worked through the weekend as I started work on two separate projects. The usual smile that was immovable from my face while I was working was replaced by a solemn frown as I hammered away.
X
"Huh, well if I'd known this many of you would show up, I would have started doing this earlier." I idly said as I looked over the large group that had turned out to subject themselves to what most in the school considered poorly disguised torture. There were just under a dozen students from most years of Hogwarts including a few whose names I had actually managed to learn by this point such as Daphne Greengrass, Harry Potter, and Cedric diggory, a skilled sixth year with a penchant for blowing up everything around him during my little 'tests'. I could respect that.
In addition to the admittedly small delegation from Hogwarts, there were seven ladies from Beauxbatons in the crowd, and almost every single Durmstrang I had seen in my class before. They were the reason the classroom was almost full.
Greengrass's request to have extra lessons got me thinking, and after discussing it with the headmaster, I'd found that instead of spending all day everyday sitting around waiting for students to maybe show up for extra lessons, I could just start a club. All that was needed was the approval of the headmaster and the approval of the professor in charge of the topic related to the club's activities.
I, obviously, was on board and when I took the suggestion to Dumbledore he gave me his Santa Clause smile and wished me luck, even going so far as to laugh when I named the club, 'How Not to Die like an Idiot'. I got the sense he was popping some popcorn right now in preparation for when the other teachers inevitably heard of this and went nuclear on me for the third time this week.
Looking out over the nearly filled room of people here to join the club, I said, "Okay, you all do know you're here to willingly subject yourself to more of the insanity that is causing me to receive a boatload of cursed letters from your parents every single day, correct?"
"Yes, professor." one of the many Durmstrang students to show up said with a hard accent and determined eyes. "I wish to have every advantage when the champions are named."
Blinking, I said, "Wow, I'd totally forgotten there was a tournament going on. Am I really that out of it? No, I probably just screwed up disabling one of those cursed letters and got hit with a memory thing or something. No, that's even less like me. I probably just forgot." The Goblet wasn't in my classroom, and I rarely ate in the hall with everyone else. It was much more rewarding to eat down with the house elves. They were rather kind and made for great company.
Leaving my thoughts behind, I looked up to see the entire room looking at me as if they'd made a terrible mistake trusting a guy who had dementia with their well being. I chose to ignore those looks and just continue.
"Alright then. Today is going to be a test to see how you all work together and how you perform individually so I can develop a plan for how to help you improve which we will be doing starting next time. Does everyone understand?"
A chorus of, "Yes, professor." rose up from the assembled students.
"Then follow me to adventure!" I cried dramatically as I ran out the door with my arm raised above my head.
X
"How are there so many?" a girl from Beuaxbatons cried as she went back to back with another Beauxbatons girl who looked like a smaller version of herself.
"They're too mobile. We need to find a way to take away that advantage!" Greengrass called out to everyone as she ducked another claw swipe from a passing harpy, turning to blast it in the back the moment it tried to get away.
"Protect me!" a Durmstrang cried as he knelt down, almost everyone from his school moving to do as he bade. He flipped his wand around until it was facing the ground, then slammed the little stick into the ground with a force that should have snapped it. Instead, a titanic half-circle of pressurized air expanded out from him in all directions, knocking all of his allies off their feet, but simultaneously sending all of the harpies in the area shrieking to the ground.
As the students recovered and started to lay into the struggling harpies, I made some invisible notes on my invisible clipboard. It turned out that when the majority of the class didn't run away and instead focused on protecting those around them, the monsters were nowhere near as frightening. Who'd have thought?
The harpies all extricated themselves from the various spells holding them in place and flew off into the sky, heading for the Forbidden Forest. Once they disappeared into the trees, I let the illusion go.
"Well that was just too easy for you." I said, surprising several students as I randomly appeared behind them. "Don't worry, I'll figure out a more...appropriate challenge for next time." Rather than the usual groans of loathing and despair I received when making such comments, all students present just grinned in excitement.
I liked these kids.
X
This was pointless. Why was I here again?
I felt a smack against my shoulder, and Hooch followed up her strike by whispering, "Be more professional! Sit up!"
"I'm good." I said from the rather comfortable plate I was using as a pillow while Dumbledore droned on about how great it was to choose champions and whatnot.
"You're embarrassing Hogwarts!" she spoke in a slightly louder, chiding voice.
Snorting, I said, "Hogwarts does that just fine on its own with no help at all from me. I'm only embarrassing myself, and given that I don't care at all about decorum or what any of you think of me, I don't really care that I'm embarrassing myself." I then lifted my head up and put it back down on the table facing away from Hooch. I was trying to sleep.
Thunderous applause broke out, and I tilted my head back slightly to see the first champion, the Durmstrang guy who'd made the pressure wave, shaking Dumbledore's hand with a cocky grin on his face.
"What's his name?" I asked Hooch.
"Dumbledore just said it! And he is in your class! It's Victor Krum, you insufferabl-"
"Thanks." I said, putting my head back down but listening for the names of the other two. I didn't want anyone to die in this stupid tournament, so I'd be sure to give the champions some extra attention during my little tests.
"Fleur Delacour!" Dumbledore called, and I saw one of the young women who'd joined my club strut towards him, trying and failing to control the pleased smile spreading across her face.
I tuned everything else out until Dumbledore said the name, "Cedric Diggory!"
Cheers rose up from the Hogwarts tables as one of the few students I'd taken a strange liking to shook Dumbledore's hand before striding off into the broom closet or whatever else that door led to.
"Well this has been fun, but I've got other things I need to be doing." I said as I stood from the table, walking right down the center of the hall towards the exit, drawing a lot of hate-filled gazes from the teachers as I left early. I'd already eaten and I knew who the champions were, there was no reason for me to stick around when I could be working on my sword or my necklace.
The students started cheering when Dumbledore said something in relation to someone winning the cup, but I wasn't interested. There was nothing else here to-
I felt a truly absurd explosion of magic behind me and whipped my head backwards to see the Goblet of Fire starting to spew azure flames all over the place.
"All students back!" I bellowed, thrusting my arms forward to summon two spell circles in front of me. A shimmering dome surrounded the volatile artifact as students tripped over themselves to get away from it.
With one final explosion of fire, a piece of paper was launched directly into the top of my domed-energy barrier, splatting against its surface.
"Huh. I was sure that it was about to explode." I said, puzzled as I dropped the barrier and Dumbledore rushed forward to retrieve the paper.
"Harry Potter?" I heard him mumble to himself, and I wasn't the only one if the surprised whispering that immediately broke out was any indication.
I walked up behind him and peeked at the paper over his shoulder. "Well isn't that interesting?"
Dumbledore yelled the boy's name, and I had never heard him so furious. I couldn't tell if he was mad at Potter or whoever had shoved his name in the cup.
Harry looked like a frightened deer as he stumbled past Dumbledore and towards the broom closet door, disappearing through it.
Almost instantly, Dumbledore, the other headmasters, and the guy from the government all charged after him.
Sensing a good show, I followed after them, throwing a suspicious look over my shoulder at the Goblet of Fire as I did.
Summoning a spell circle back to my hand, the dome of energy reappeared. "I don't think it's going to blow up anymore, but better safe than sorry, right?" I said to the room, jolting them all from the shock of hearing a fourth champion called.
I noticed some students shuffle further away from the cup as I turned to follow the precession downstairs.
There was a lot of screaming as I stopped at the bottom of the stairs, leaning against the wall with a smile on my face.
"Professor? What's going on?" Diggory asked as he and the champions from the other schools saw me and walked over.
"They didn't tell you? Mr. Potter's name was just shot out of the Goblet of Fire. It's rather interesting, don't you think?"
Their eyes widened as they shot Potter suspicious looks, wondering what he was playing at.
"And I suppose you had nothing to do with this?" The hulking behemoth of a woman Beauxbatons had for a headmistress asked as she stomped towards me.
I raised an eyebrow as I looked up at her. "Are you seriously blaming me? I had honestly forgotten there was even a tournament this year until one of my students reminded me."
All three of the champions next to me visibly cringed.
"That is true, madam." Fleur Delacour said, coming to my defense.
The head mistress's eyes went bug-eyed. "Albus!" she shrieked as she whipped around to face the old man who looked like he could use a stiff drink. "How could you tolerate such incompetence on your staff! My students deserve better than to be-"
"Did you put your name in?" I said to Potter, having walked across the room while the giant woman was ranting.
He shook his head feverishly as he said, "No, sir. I didn't."
"Please don't call me sir. Now are you sure?" I said as I leaned forward, bearing down on the boy.
"No, professor. I swear I didn't." he was visibly shaking as he answered the question.
"Well, that's that then." I said, spinning around and heading back up the stairs.
"Obviously he is lying!" the large woman called to the room.
"He's telling the truth." I said as I paused at the door at the top of the stairs. "I don't know how his name got in there, but he didn't put it in. Use that information how you will." I closed the door behind me, walking back out into the hall. Everyone was still seated at their tables staring at me like I held the secrets of the universe.
With a cheeky grin, I said, "Since I have your attention, make sure to drink lots of water before next class! There's this creature that…. Well, let's just say you should drink a lot of water. Have a nice night!" I walked right down the middle of the hall and out the door, strengthening the barrier over the Goblet as I did. I didn't think it would blow up, but I was ready in case it did.