The slacker professor at Hogwarts

Lockhart was actually a little embarrassed by the state of his office.

According to his agreement with Dumbledore, his position as the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was actually a one-year term, or rather, a one-year term.

In other words, he was only using the office temporarily for a year, but he had no way of restoring it to its original state.

This is not his property.

Fortunately, Professor McGonagall didn't seem to mind. She seemed to have something on her mind, but after looking at the young wizards beside her and hesitating for a moment, she said, "Perhaps I can talk to you after class?"

She didn't want her personal matters to affect the children's studies.

Lohat nodded. "Then please wait a moment. Today is a training session, and I only need to speak for a short while."

He clapped his hands, drawing the attention of the curious children to him. "Today we'll continue practicing the Disarming Charm. Oh, Harry, what's with that expression? Pride isn't a good thing."

"Harry, Draco, don't think you can satisfy me just because you've mastered the Disarming Charm, its countermeasures, and its counter-charm. In the next class, I'll have you two sit on flying broomsticks and do more agile combat drills. You're far from being good enough!"

In fact, Lockhart was secretly envious and jealous of the two young wizards' talent in spells. He had to criticize and suppress the children's arrogance to maintain the professor's authority and influence.

Training two dueling masters would be the perfect result of his year of teaching, and it would be enough to enhance his reputation in any situation.

Then he looked at Ron and Hermione, "You two will probably need to start learning from scratch, but don't worry about falling behind Harry and the others. You're both still second-year wizards, and you'll have plenty of time to improve yourselves in the future."

Lockhart has his own approach to teaching. Whether it's the "Duel Club," a regular class, or the NEWT class, he always likes to select a few outstanding students to train first, and then let them mentor the new students. This always makes things much easier for him.

Let's split into pairs.

"Mentoring new employees makes it easier to solidify knowledge and notice details that you may have previously overlooked."

"Alright, Harry, you teach Ron, and Draco, you teach Hermione."

Draco nearly jumped up, "Why were we grouped with her?!"

If it weren't for the professor's presence, the Mudblood would have unleashed a torrent of curses.

Lockhart looked at Draco with a puzzled expression and said quietly, "A truly shrewd Slytherin wouldn't make enemies on all sides and invite so many adversaries. Draco, you need to know how to maintain good relationships with even those who disagree with you."

Draco pursed his lips and remained silent for a long while before nodding solemnly.

Hermione also looked unhappy, but she clearly respected Professor Lockhart's arrangements and sullenly gripped her wand without saying a word.

"Very good." Lockhart smiled as he looked at the young wizards. "Now it's time for a question-and-answer session. You can ask any questions you have, and you can begin practicing after I've finished instructing you."

Hermione was the first to raise her hand, and after receiving his approval, she excitedly pointed to the trees in the office, "Professor, how did you do that?"

This was exactly what she longed for; she could feel the magic's unconventional and transformative effects.

Harry quietly tugged at her sleeve, whispering a reminder, "Hermione, at this point you can only ask about the Disarming Charm."

Hermione paused for a moment, then shrank back a little embarrassedly.

"It's alright, I can explain, but this is a one-time exception." Lockhart looked back at the surrounding trees, some of which seemed to have grown for decades and were incredibly thick. Even those who knew about them marveled at their size. It was natural for the young wizards to be curious, so he smiled and shook his head. "You could never do that."

"!!!"

The young wizards were stunned; they hadn't expected such an answer.

Even Professor McGonagall, who was quietly listening from the side, hesitated whether to interrupt and say something.

Lockhart smiled as he looked at the young wizards' discouraged expressions and explained, "Actually, the principle behind achieving this effect is very simple. It's the activating charm in the field of alchemy, the growth-inducing charm and the expansion charm in the field of home gardening. That's all; they're all very basic magic."

"It's like Transfiguration. The most basic principles are actually quite simple, but to truly understand them requires a lifetime of immersion."

"This doesn't mean you have to spend your whole life learning..."

Lockhart raised an eyebrow. "It means that it requires your life, your thoughts, your existence, and everything in your life to serve as nourishment for the growth of magic."

The Amazonian "Forest Witch" is a witch who was abandoned as an infant and raised by gray wolves. She spent most of her life in the forest before leaving the forest with a troll to live in Manhattan, America.

During her time living in the big city, when the forest witch encountered situations requiring battle, she did not choose to use the magic popular in modern wizarding society. Instead, she retained her original spellcasting habits, and would cast spells to modify the environment in this way whenever there was a battle.

She called it "returning to nature, where nature would give her power," but Lockhart preferred to describe it as "the battleground of the forest witch."

"Everyone has their own magical path to walk." He patted the large tree trunk beside him, his expression full of meaning. "Sometimes we are moved by some wonderful magic, but please remember, this is someone else's magic, someone else's life, someone else's soul, not yours."

"We can never become someone else; we can only be ourselves."

Such profound truths were too early for the few clueless second-year wizards; they couldn't understand them.

Professor McGonagall, who was standing to the side with her lips pursed, seemed to have a deep understanding of the situation.

As an internationally renowned Transfiguration master, he has worked so hard every year to cultivate and teach one class of students after another. He has taught Transfiguration from the first grade to the seventh grade without interruption. But how many of them have actually become Transfiguration masters?

At least in the last few years, none of them have been anything to boast about.

Going back a decade or two, there was a group of promising talents. Sirius Black and his friends learned advanced Transfiguration techniques like Animagus early in their school years, but unfortunately, due to the impact of the war, they never got to become Transfiguration masters.

Lockhart stroked the tree for a long time without saying a word.

Because what he just said doesn't actually apply to himself.

He has already digested a small portion of the 'Forest Witch's' memories. Will he be able to truly digest all the memories and completely devour the Forest Witch's adventurous life? It's uncertain, but the future is promising.

If the original Lockhart was a "memory thief," then he might go a step further and become a "life thief."

He could never become a saint, indifferent to the precious memories and even the lives of these powerful wizards. He had no desire to travel to this magical world only to remain a Muggle who couldn't use magic.

Without these memories, he would be a Muggle; since he has chosen to retain these memories, he should know how to make good use of them.

Stealing other people's lives, consuming other people's adventures!

"Alright, that's enough of that. You can start practicing now."

Practical exercises are the easiest way to observe whether students have mastered the knowledge, whether it is Harry and Draco who are in charge of teaching, or Hermione and Ron who are learning.

Lockhart could gauge the progress of the group simply by observing them from the sidelines.

After all, he was far too knowledgeable about disarming spells.

While he couldn't use magic in the three main areas of Defense Against Dark Arts—facing dark wizards, facing dark magical creatures, and facing duels—his insight was absolutely sharp.

However, he didn't focus all his energy on the young wizard today. Instead, he invited Professor McGonagall to sit down at his desk behind a few large trees and asked why he had come to see him.

"Here's the situation." Professor McGonagall pulled a letter from her wizarding robes. "A strange incident has occurred at the Urquhart family's castle. After their request for help from the Ministry of Magic was unsuccessful, they wrote to me asking if I could offer any assistance."

She sighed. "This problem has been confirmed to be caused by dark magic creatures, but no one can solve it."

The proud woman rarely offered a compliment, "Professor Lockhart, you are the most insightful person I have ever met in this field. Perhaps you have a solution."

The Urquhart family?

Lockhart raised an eyebrow and quickly searched through his memories, finding the answer in the recollections of a powerful wizard.

Professor McGonagall's husband's family, the powerful wizard in her memory, had attended the funeral of Professor McGonagall's husband, Elphinstone Urquhart, as a close friend of the Urquhart family.

This family is typically from Durmstrang Academy, is pure-blooded, traditional, and has a great influence in the Ministry of Magic in their home country and in the Ministries of Magic in various European countries.

If even such a powerful force can't handle it, it can only mean that it's a very troublesome situation.

Lockhart took the letter and began to read it. The writer affectionately addressed Professor McGonagall as "Aunt Minerva," and began with a string of flattering words before recounting the problems that had occurred in the castle.

The content described is almost a standard castle horror story.

Overnight, the entire castle was covered in blood, and all sorts of venomous snakes and spiders crawled everywhere. The house-elves in the castle died mysteriously, and faint female voices could be heard singing in the middle of the night.

After ruling out the possibility of a malicious curse and confirming that it is the work of dark magic creatures, such a castle can basically be deemed to be discarded.

Although dark magic creatures may appear to have 'biological' characteristics, they are essentially 'phenomena' and cannot be killed without targeted methods.

The wizarding world is full of such eerie places where humans have to move away because of the presence or occupation of dark magic creatures.

Coincidentally, Lockhart searched through his memories and actually found the answer.

And there were two of them.

He handed the letter back to Professor McGonagall, pondered for a moment, and then replied, "It could be either 'cellar decay' or 'the fairy who died unjustly'."

Professor McGonagall was taken aback. When she received Urquhart's letter, filled with despair, she had almost given up hope of solving the problem. She had only tried it out of a sense of "Lockhart seems to have some ability, so why not ask him?" and to her surprise, she actually got an answer.