HP North Star's Radiance

Ginny, who was standing nearby, was taken aback when she heard this. She thought Harry was following some mysterious instructions from a book—she had a phobia of that.

Hermione had also thought of this, and even cast a revealing spell on the book.

This infuriated Harry: "Now look what happened! There's nothing here!"

“Even if it has nothing!” Hermione said angrily. “It’s not fair to Pratt-Prince either; you didn’t win against her in a fair way!”

Ginny looked at Hermione with some suspicion and whispered to Ron, "Hermione is defending Slytherin?"

Ron shrank back: "She's Hermione! Always so righteous."

Ron thought to himself that even though the house-elves like Kreacher treated Hermione so badly, Hermione always fought for their liberation.

Hermione has thought since first year that Snape wasn't a bad person!

“Are you saying I used underhanded methods?” Harry said to Hermione, embarrassed and annoyed. “Didn’t she learn any tricks for making potions from Snape? I just tried the method written in the textbook—didn’t I brew my own potions?”

“That’s different!” Hermione argued.

Harry stubbornly insisted, "I don't see any difference. We both learned some skills, just from different people!"

After saying that, he snatched the textbook from the table.

The textbook rolled to the ground, and he picked it up again.

No one saw that at the bottom of the textbook was a line of small, densely packed words:

This book belongs to the Half-Blood Prince.

Hermione looked towards Slytherin from afar. Prader was nowhere to be seen, neither near Parkinson and Burstdle, nor near Malfoy.

Millison, sitting at the table, had a finger biscuit in his mouth and was wrapping several slices of bread and bacon in parchment paper.

Pansy muttered to herself, "Should we put the biscuits in or not?"

"Waaah..." Milison wriggled the finger biscuits into his mouth and chewed them up. "Play can't usually eat that many, can he?"

“I bet Potter cheated!” Pansy said openly. “He got a zero in class last year, how come he’s ahead of Prayer this year? I just don’t believe it!”

Daphne leaned closer: "Did Play get agitated?"

Pansy nodded: "Draco said that Pray ignored him and went off to brew the Living Hell Potion by himself."

The three girls packed a large bag of food for Praris—two or three times her usual portion—and then they all slipped away to the underground classroom.

Pansy was holding food, Millison was standing on tiptoe looking into the classroom, and Daphne was standing to the side with her arms crossed.

"What is she doing?" Daphne said disdainfully. "Mirison, your posture is so lewd!"

Millison turned around and said, "Brewing potions!"

“Of course I know it’s about brewing potions!” Daphne exclaimed again, disdainful of Milison’s bluntness. “Does she seem to have succeeded?”

Milison scratched his head in confusion: "But I don't know what a successful Living Hell Soup looks like!"

Daphne, exasperated, retorted, "With your abilities, would I let you watch potions? I'd let you watch something else—"

boom!

The classroom door suddenly opened from the inside.

Praris glanced around, finally settling on Pansy's hand: "For me? Why aren't you coming in?"

Millison replied without hesitation, "They were afraid you'd cry, waah!"

Before she could finish speaking, Daphne covered her mouth: "It's nothing!"

Praris smiled helplessly: "My three young ladies, I'm not crying! Come in!"

Inside the classroom, Praris's crucible was empty, while a lot of materials were piled upside down on the table.

“Why would you think I’d be upset about this?” Praris said calmly. “On the contrary, it’s a good thing for me.”

"Good news?" Milison asked, puzzled.

Praris nodded, picked up a potion bottle from the table, and turned to the page on the Living Hell Potion in his textbook.

Pointing to the description of the Living Hell Potion in the textbook, she said, "This bottle is the same potion that Potter taught in class."

All three heads crowded together to look.

Praris propped himself up with both hands and sat lightly on the desk behind him: "Potter's approach has given me some inspiration. I think I can improve my methods of handling some herbs and potions using the same approach."

“That way, your potion-making skills will also improve,” Pansy said hesitantly. “But—”

“But there’s a saying,” Praris said slowly, “Those who learn from me live, those who imitate me die. If I merely improve my potion-making techniques according to Potter’s methods—”

Praris sighed, "Then in potion making, I can only be Potter's shadow. At best, I can keep up with Potter, but I can never truly surpass him."

This is something Praris cannot tolerate.

It's worth noting that before this, she had never paid much attention to Harry's potions studies.

At this point, she had only reached the same level as Harry in terms of the Living Hell Soup.

Even if she fully understands the improved ideas in the Living Hell Soup now, does that mean Potter will stop making progress and have no more new and better ideas?

Potter can come up with a better way to make the Living Hell Potion than the one in the textbook today, and he can come up with ways to improve other potions tomorrow.

She can't keep waiting for Porter to give her ideas and then slowly replicate and learn from them.

Praris sighed deeply, realizing that she had either become complacent or blinded by arrogance.

She thought Professor Snape was right to be stingy with the extra points he gave her. She had actually let a student personally taught by Professor Snape lose to someone else!

Praris looked at her three friends and said solemnly, "From now on, I plan to spend more time improving my potions skills, so please help me bring some bread again!"

Pansy, Milison, and Daphne exchanged glances, all thinking the same thing:

Merlin! Thank goodness we didn't choose Potions as an elective!

The girls left soon after, leaving Praris to fight on his own.

Praris stared blankly at the crucible, mechanically chewing on a piece of buttered bread.

Prarese knew that she actually had a shortcut to quickly defeat Harry Potter.

If she tells Professor Snape about this and asks for his help, he would be happy to guide her in defeating Harry—but she would certainly get a scolding in return.

As Slytherins, most people probably think that as long as they can win, that's enough. They think that having Professor Snape as an outside helper will guarantee a win, right?

Indeed, Praris was certain that no matter how powerful Harry was now, he was no match for Professor Snape, the universally acknowledged Potions Master.

But from the moment he started following Professor Snape, he never directly told Prarese what to do, never thought for Prarese, but instead let Prarese do it himself.

He has always followed this teaching method: only when Prares thinks and completes things on his own can he truly learn.

Praris stuffed the bread into his mouth, jumped off the desk, and walked toward the crucible.

Therefore, in her eyes, this was a war between her and Potter. Only by defeating Potter herself could she achieve true victory and live up to Professor Snape's expectations.

She also believed that she could do it.

Chapter 149 Not Very Good to Drink

This semester, many courses have begun to require the study of silent spells, such as Defense Against the Dark Arts, Charms, and Transfiguration.

There is no doubt that Praris is skilled in these things; she can even cast spells without a staff or a sound.

However, she consciously concealed the fact that she could do both of these things at the same time.

Praris believed that silent, wandless spellcasting would be a crucial and unexpected advantage in battle, and should not be used in this situation. Therefore, she simply followed her teachers' instructions and used silent spells.

Even with just that, Praris had already earned the professors' praise.

"A truly brilliant silent spell!" Professor Flitwick clapped his hands in delight. "Slytherin, ten points! May I hear your interpretation of the silent spell?"

Praris explained clearly, “I believe that to learn silent spells, we need to understand why we need to chant spells aloud. When we first started learning spells, you always asked us to chant spells aloud and clearly. I believe that chanting spells aloud increases our confidence in their success and strengthens our inner conviction.”

"On the contrary, if we cannot hear ourselves casting the spell, we will doubt whether we can succeed. This is the difficulty of silent spells."

"Therefore, learning silent spells requires strong focus and willpower. And repeated practice is the process of fighting against doubt."

Practice makes perfect.

Generally speaking, learning is a process of repetition. The more you repeat it, the more familiar you become, and the more familiar you become, the less you doubt yourself and the more confident you are in your ability to do it.

Of course, simply repeating things won't make you do well, but repetition is indeed an important and effective method.

Hearing Prares's explanation, Professor Flitwick's small eyes brightened, and he happily told the students present, "Yes, yes, that's right! Even I couldn't have explained it better! Slytherin, add ten points!"

Hermione stopped clapping and whispered to Harry, "She's absolutely right, isn't she?"

Harry said, "I knew that last semester."

Harry believed that Prader was a better teacher than Snape—at least that's what he thought, having been taught by Occlumency.

Even so, Harry and Prader's lessons could not continue, and now Dumbledore was tutoring them.

Harry was happy to be taught by Dumbledore. He couldn't imagine how he would face Prader in Potions class if Prader were still teaching him Occlumency.

As soon as get out of class ended, Praris hurriedly walked out with his textbooks in his arms.

Hermione's face was devoid of any smile as she told Harry, "Prince hasn't eaten in the Great Hall many times. I've seen Millison Burst and Pansy Parkinson bring her bread."

"Is that so?" Harry said casually. "What's she busy with? Dating Malfoy?"

Hermione glared at him: "She's researching potions in the underground classroom—don't you understand? She's very bothered by being defeated by you, and she's putting in more time and effort than ever before."

Ron tried to smooth things over again: "I don't think it's a bad thing. Harry learned something from that book, and Prince gained a formidable opponent, didn't he?"

Ron remembered that Prince used to refer to Hermione as "a respectable adversary."

“But she didn’t know she was facing the Half-Blood Prince, not Harry!” Hermione exclaimed urgently. “That’s not fair!”

“It’s not unfair,” Harry said, downplaying the issue. “It’s just a clearer and more straightforward book than Bilibashi Pozzella’s textbook. I learn from it like I’m receiving guidance from a teacher.”

Harry felt from the bottom of his heart that the Half-Blood Prince was a genius teacher, much better than Snape.

Sirius Black doesn't regret going to the Department of Mysteries to save Harry, but he does regret that his arrogance led to Winnie's serious injury.

Ms. Priscilla cried for a long time because of this.

After talking with Sirius, Dumbledore realized his mistake and became even more depressed.

Harry couldn't help but defend Sirius, feeling that Sirius's impulsiveness was also related to Snape's provocations, as he always mocked Sirius for being a useless shut-in.