Who let this Dementor into Hogwarts!

Chapter 297 Where does this unfounded competitive mentality between schools come from?

Unable to discern whether Cohen's last words were a warning or a threat, Hopkins, under the pressure of "Voldemort will kill your whole family if the mission fails," still chose to stay in Cohen's box. This way, he could save on a batch of Polyjuice Potion—because while in the box, he wouldn't have to continue taking the potion to maintain his student appearance.

Over the next two weeks, the difficulty of Hogwarts' courses suddenly increased from "ordinary" at the beginning of the semester to "intense and exciting".

First, there's Professor McGonagall, who started increasing the amount and difficulty of assignments.

"You are entering an important phase of your academic career," Professor McGonagall said sternly when the students complained about the excessive amount of Transfiguration homework. "Your OWL exams are approaching—"

"We don't take the OWL exam until fifth grade!" Dean said angrily.

“Perhaps so, Thomas.” Professor McGonagall’s glasses gleamed in the torchlight on the wall. “But believe me, you need to be well prepared! In this class, only Miss Granger can turn a hedgehog into a satisfactory pincushion—and you, don’t chuckle to yourself, Mr. Norton. I must remind you, your pincushion always starts to run away along the table when you get close to it. You won’t pass the OWL exam that way.”

“I promise this won’t happen again after this semester,” Cohen vowed.

Transforming living beings was indeed a difficult task for Cohen. Who knows why, after Cohen used the Transfiguration Charm to turn the hedgehog into a pincushion, it wasn't afraid of needles at all, yet it used its soul to drag its "pincushion body" away at lightning speed when Cohen approached.

However, this problem can be solved once Cohen obtains the next Animagus form.

Unless these timid little animals are afraid of Cohen's soul, not his body...

Besides Transfiguration, the assignments for History of Magic and Potions classes also became quite demanding.

"How can a ghost grade homework?" Ron said sadly. "Five pages—could an eighteenth-century goblin rebellion really have that much to write?"

“You just need to calm down and write; there’s a lot to cover,” Hermione said earnestly. “For example, the subversive motives of the goblin Lanlock, and the role Victor Lukewood played in it…”

"Isn't that Lukewood a clown?" Cohen asked with interest. "He got solo-killed by a fifth grader—"

“But if you submit another paper that mocks Lukewood, Professor Binns might really fail you,” Hermione said, pursing her lips.

"It's alright, he won't remember it the next day." Cohen waved his hand dismissively.

Professor Binns was known for his poor memory; as long as he wasn't constantly reminded of it afterward, he would quickly and completely forget that his student had made a mistake.

Professor Moody also began a week-long "Imperius Curse training," and after various applications and promises, he was permitted to use the Imperius Curse on the students to train their resistance. ("But I think maybe only Dumbledore agreed to this," Hermione said uncertainly.)
Aside from Cohen, who was completely unaffected, Harry was the first person to successfully resist the Imperius Curse.

On one hand, Harry had a natural resistance to dark magic, and on the other hand, Lily's spells provided some protection.

Of course, Moody held back with his students; otherwise, the training would have been meaningless—such young wizards would be no match for a high-level Auror's Imperius Curse.

In addition to these courses, even Hagrid added a lot of burden to them.

Hagrid finally figured out what the Bombtail snails liked to eat, and just as Hermione had predicted, the snails grew to the size of a hound in just a few days. They rampaged through Hagrid's vegetable garden, leaving sparks and flashes in their wake—Hagrid was very pleased with their impressive growth and began an advanced course.

He wanted the students to come to the cabin every other day to observe the habits of the tadpole snails and record their unusual behaviors.

But the results were not satisfactory, because the blasting snails began to fight each other. If they got even a little closer, the sparks spewed out from their tails would burn through the parchment they used for recording.

A busy atmosphere permeated the entire month of September and October.

However, all of this came to an end at the end of October, as the three-way battle for supremacy was about to begin.

“Representatives from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang will arrive at 6 p.m. on Friday, October 30. Afternoon classes will end half an hour early…” Ron read the notice on the bulletin board, sentence by sentence.

"Friday afternoon is Potions class!" Harry exclaimed happily. "Snape won't be able to poison us!"

“But he might administer the poison earlier,” Cohen cautioned. “Having the antidote on hand is essential.”

Snape had told them a week earlier that he would poison a random student to test whether their antidote had been successfully prepared.

"Students, please return your bags and textbooks to your dormitories and gather in front of the castle to welcome our guests and then attend the welcome banquet," Ron said, finishing his last few sentences.

This notice had a significant impact on all teachers and students in the school.

The students were always enthusiastically discussing the Triwizard Tournament and the students from the other two schools, and the portraits and armor in the castle had been cleaned and made to look brand new.

The two suits of armor that Cohen used to see fighting each other when he passed by the first-floor corridor have been quiet lately. The one that liked to hum annoying little tunes was as if it had been muted—Cohen later discovered that its helmet was stuffed with a bunch of soundproofing cotton.

The administrator, Filch, became increasingly hysterical. If he found the ground or a student unclean, he would immediately fly into a rage and threaten to lock the student in the dungeon and gut them.

The pressure on other faculty and staff was no less than his – no teacher wanted to be embarrassed in front of people from other schools because their students' academic performance was not up to standard.

"Longbottom, have some mercy, don't let your guard down in front of Durmstrang's men and let them see that you haven't even mastered a simple conversion charm!" Professor McGonagall said sternly.

Neville didn't even complete a preliminary attempt at the Transformation Charm in one class, and he even grafted his ear onto a cactus.

"Where does this unfounded competitive mentality come from?" Cohen shook his head as he returned to his dorm.

“Everyone wants to appear more accomplished in the eyes of other schools,” Hermione said. “At least not on the surface—especially since Durmstrang often compares itself to Hogwarts internationally…”

(End of this chapter)