Who let this Dementor into Hogwarts!

Chapter 324 Preparation before the game
Cohen returned to the castle with the box and Harry. There was less than a day left before the first event started. Sirius also agreed to let Harry practice with the dragon in advance to avoid making mistakes due to nervousness during the competition the next day.

But in reality, this exercise may not be very effective.

"Actually, Sirius is wrong."

After practicing his Eye-Blink Charm on Norbert all afternoon, Harry sighed.
"Even if I mastered the Eye Strike Charm on Norber, it wouldn't work, because I bet other dragons wouldn't wag their tails at me like that."

"Hoo hoo?" Norbert lowered his head and touched Harry's nose.

Harry spent the whole afternoon throwing blue light into its eyes, but nothing happened; it looked like some kind of game played by a bald monkey.

"At least you can see the dragon's eyes now," Cohen reassured him. "Didn't you miss seven times in a row at the beginning?"

"What are you planning to do with the dragon tomorrow?" Harry asked curiously. "Use the techniques you taught me before?"

“I thought about it later, and using Chimeramon was a bit too unfair.” Cohen shook his head. “Using Summoning Charm wouldn’t showcase my skill level either—it wouldn’t be exciting enough.”

"So what are you planning to do?" Harry asked, even more curious.

“Give the dragon a worthy opponent.” Cohen scratched Norber’s outstretched chin. “Nober hasn’t been eating at my place for nothing these past few years.”
-
That evening, Cohen spent a considerable amount of time testing whether the portal he built from his own box to the first competition venue would produce the correct effect.

Because of the restriction against Apparition within Hogwarts, Cohen's test was moved from inside the castle to Edward and Rose's tent outside the castle.

Edward and Rose went to Herbert's place to make room for Cohen to practice. Now, the tent only contained Cohen, his mentor Chimera, and a tightly sealed box.

Due to the size of the tent, the test target was temporarily changed from Norbert to a smaller basilisk.

"Portalium Evoco (The door is wide open)."

Cohen pointed his wand at the open space in the center of the tent and chanted.

A flash of white light appeared, and the air in front of them instantly twisted, opening an oval-shaped portal like a mirror. Through it, one could vaguely see the grassland and the indistinct forest inside Cohen's box.

【Quack! 】

As it crawled out of Cohen's portal for the third time, the little basilisk was still in high spirits, baring its fangs and letting out a roar.

“It’s not too difficult,” Cohen said.

"Are there any issues with controlling the size and distance of the portal?" the goat reminded him. "During the match, you'll need to build a portal that the little dragon can pass through, and you'll need to keep a distance between yourself and the box. Of course, you can also have your parents take the box to the stands."

“I didn’t feel any difficulty.” Cohen’s gaze lingered on the box. “Let’s leave the stands out. It would be suspicious for Edward and the others to bring a box to the match, especially when I’m going to summon a dragon in public—let’s just leave the box in the tent.”

"I want to bite the dragon too!" the little snake monster demanded of Cohen.

"That would be the end of it," Cohen said, refusing. "You can't even bite through Norber's skin; if you go on the field, you'll definitely get eaten like a snack by those female dragons."

The little snake monster slumped down in frustration.

"Little one, shall I find you a more challenging opponent?" the long-horned water snake comforted the little snake monster. "I'll take you for a stroll in the forest tomorrow."

"Great!" the little snake monster exclaimed happily.

"Not horse-eaters, are they?" Cohen frowned. "Just some spiders," the long-horned water snake assured Cohen. "Don't worry, we know what we're doing."

Cohen left the box there and returned to Hogwarts.

The Gryffindor common room was bustling with activity that evening. Although no one else knew the contents of the first project, everyone still gathered around Harry, offering him advice and encouragement.

However, this only made Harry more nervous—until Cohen entered and drew away a lot of attention from Harry, allowing him to quickly escape back to his dormitory.

"Ha~"

Cohen yawned as soon as he entered the room, looking like he was about to lie down and fall asleep at any moment, which saved him from being bothered for half the night.

“Don’t you guys ever sleep?” Fred asked Cohen with his eyes closed as he tried to stuff some canary cookies into Cohen’s hand and suggest eating them after the game to help promote their prank product. “I’m so sleepy—and this project is obviously more useful for promoting fake wands.”

"Great idea!" George shoved a handful of fake wands he had prepared beforehand into Cohen's hand. "Good luck!"

“Thank you, but good luck to Harry,” Cohen said.

It's just a matter of stealing a golden egg; even without Norbert, Cohen could easily get the egg from the nest.

Cohen put Norber on the field mainly to take advantage of the commotion caused by the two dragons fighting to break some dragon eggs and steal some real ones in the chaos.
-
From night to morning, Cohen felt that Harry in the next bed hadn't slept at all, and when he saw the dark circles under Harry's eyes when he got up the next day, this guess became even more certain.

“You should eat something, Harry.” Hermione placed a piece of bread covered in butter on Harry’s plate.

"It feels like nothing I eat will help," Harry said. "We'll probably just end up burning in the end—"

"Ahem." Cohen reminded Harry to avoid him uttering the word "dragon" in the Great Hall.

“But you can’t stay hungry until noon,” Hermione said worriedly. “If you don’t eat lunch, you’ll faint from hunger before you even get into the arena.”

Harry still couldn't eat breakfast, but it wasn't a big problem; there were only two History of Magic classes in the morning—which were basically for sleeping.

So this is roughly equivalent to Harry waking up at noon, which means he's already decades ahead of the modern young person's sleep schedule.

Just after lunch, Professor McGonagall hurried toward the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall and approached Cohen and Harry.

“Norton, Porter, now the warriors must go down to the field…” Professor McGonagall said to them, “You must be prepared to complete the first project.”

“Okay.” Cohen nodded, and Harry followed behind him and responded in kind.

"do not worry."

Professor McGonagall placed her hands anxiously on Cohen and Harry's shoulders.
"Keep your heads down... We've arranged for some wizards to protect you. If anything unexpected happens, they'll step in and take control... The most important thing is to use your own abilities..."

“Don’t be nervous, Professor McGonagall.” Cohen sensed that Professor McGonagall needed reassurance more than ever; he had never seen her so nervous before—but it was probably mainly because she was worried about Harry’s safety.

After traversing the grounds and bypassing the edge of the Forbidden Forest, Professor McGonagall led them to the outer perimeter of the newly constructed "Dragon Arena." The entrance was blocked by a huge tent, which conveniently concealed the fire dragons inside.

"Wish ya'll good luck."

(End of this chapter)