HP North Star's Radiance

In fact, Milison had always known that Pansy cared a lot about her friends. Whenever they said something wrong, Pansy would frantically try to stop them. Even when they were dating, if Jacob came from another country for a date, he would bring them a share of the snacks to avoid getting scolded.

Everyone knew Pansy loved them, but no one expected her to love them this much.

Praris blinked, her eyes slightly red. She regretted saying those words. It was just a small excuse to lure Draco out of the cave, but it had tricked Pansy into revealing her trump card.

Praris reached out and hugged Pansy, saying in a hoarse voice, "No, I care about what you think, Pansy."

Praris wrapped her arms around Pansy's back, rested her chin on Pansy's shoulder, and pressed her cheeks and neck close together.

At such close range, they could even feel the vibrations of each other's vocal cords and skin.

Praris said emotionally:

"Love...is very important."

"But I love you too, Pansy."

"So, you are important too."

From mutual dislike to picking fights in the hallway, from barely becoming friends to embracing each other with genuine affection at this moment.

Prarese then vaguely remembered that their relationship had been so tumultuous, no less so than Prarese's love with Draco.

All Prarese wanted to do right now was hold Pansy tightly.

As for Draco?

The importance of this event will be temporarily deferred.

Chapter 172 Difficulty

Fluttering, fluttering—

At 8 p.m., close to curfew, Prass's owl flapped its wings at the Gryffindor windows, demanding that the people inside open them.

Hermione immediately stood up, opened the window, and called its name: "Sage!"

Saiqi dropped a thick envelope and flew away without a second thought.

Harry's head turned with the owl Sage, then turned back as Sage flew away, and he made conversation: "Her name is Sage? That's a very Prases-like name."

Indeed! Besides sage, the name Sage also signifies a wise person. Sage plays a unique role in potions and divination.

Hermione ignored Harry's chirping of Miss Owl and said seriously, "Harry, forget about the owl! It's time to decide whether you can keep your textbooks."

The envelope that Sage brought didn't look like it contained only a single sheet of paper. It was so thick that Harry suspected Prarese had also written a lengthy saga—to criticize him.

Harry shuddered at the thought of Praris's mouth.

These past few days, Harry has been hoping Prares would agree, otherwise his painstakingly crafted apology letter would be wasted.

But he didn't want Praris to agree—it was too difficult! Praris hadn't slapped him or called him "shameless," which showed she was well-mannered.

"Huh?" Hermione exclaimed in surprise.

Hermione opened the envelope, and inside wasn't a parchment letter, but a thick notebook. The real envelope was tucked inside the notebook.

So Hermione took the opportunity to open the small envelope and quickly scanned it.

"What did she say?" Harry couldn't help but stand up and crane his neck to see.

Hermione suddenly put down the envelope and said to Harry solemnly, "Harry, if you don't study Potions properly, I really will side with Talia and teach you a lesson."

Harry and Hermione had only two options: Praris would agree to renew the loan for "Advanced Potions Making," or he would disagree.

However, Praris's decision lay somewhere in between. Unexpectedly, she hand-copied her own notes to replace the Half-Blood Prince's!

This notebook covers every knowledge point, key points of every experiment, and improvements in "Advanced Potion Making"—Plares even copied it with his left hand!

As everyone knows, during the "Revival and Awakening" class, Prarese subtly surpassed the Half-Blood Prince's notes from back then for the first time.

When Harry and Hermione turned to that chapter, they found that Prader's notes contained the exact methods she had used in that class. This meant that Prader had shared her latest findings without reservation!

Upon hearing Hermione's explanation, Harry's first reaction was not surprise, but genuine shame.

Because of Snape and Malfoy, Harry doubted Prader's intentions more than once. Although Prader always dispelled Harry's thoughts with his actions, Harry's suspicions always resurfaced.

However, despite Harry's repeated changes of heart, Praris always prioritized the greater good and did not dwell on trivial personal grudges.

Only at this moment did Harry truly confront his mistakes and realize his wrongdoing.

Harry said dejectedly, "I remember Prarese telling me that Dumbledore was not only a strong man, but also a respectable leader. The difference lies in trust."

Prareas told Harry that Muggles call this the Pygmalion effect, also known as the Rosenthal effect.

Dumbledore placed his trust in his followers after careful consideration, and as a result, his followers became increasingly loyal to his ideals. Voldemort, on the other hand, always harbored suspicion and vigilance towards his subordinates, causing them to live in constant fear and develop inner turmoil.

The more a leader "expects" his subordinates to behave, the more likely the subordinates are to develop in that direction.

Harry thought that if he continued to doubt Praris like this, sooner or later Praris would be pushed further and further away by them.

Something Harry had almost forgotten was brought to light—Plares was a DA too! She even protected the DA list, preventing them from being forced to break up.

Seeing Harry's dejected look, Hermione said to him, "Harry, this is a good thing!"

“Listen, Harry,” Hermione said eloquently. “Without deep self-reflection, there is no significant progress. When you first came to Hogwarts, I completely trusted the school rules and prevented you from going out at night. In fact, you protected the Philosopher's Stone in the process.”

“Later, I started to think about my relationship with the rules. I learned to achieve our goals while trying not to break the rules. Or…” Hermione smiled slightly, “If you’re not caught, it’s not a violation.”

“Then Umbridge came up with so many ridiculous rules. And who cares?” Hermione shrugged. “Gradually, I stopped just following the rules of the outside world. I had my own set of rules in my heart, and those were called principles.”

Hermione stood up calmly, pacing back and forth while slightly opening her arms: "Harry, I will compare my principles with the rules we face, and then decide what I should do, what I can do, and what I cannot do."

“I have a goal in mind. I know that I will have to break some rules to truly achieve it.” Hermione’s eyes sparkled. “Over the years, I have lived with the rules by making mistakes, gradually understood them, and grown.”

“Making mistakes isn’t terrible, Harry,” Hermione said sincerely. “The important thing is whether you can turn your mistakes into a mirror, see your shortcomings, and complete your self-reconstruction through correction.”

“You see, you now understand one of the sources of Dumbledore’s respectability,” Hermione said with a smile. “That is trust. This is a lesson that Prader and Dumbledore taught you together. Can you put it into practice?”

Harry vaguely sensed that Hermione, Prader, and Dumbledore all shared a common trait, something that made them shine.

At that moment, Hermione radiated a light that Harry found somewhat dazzling, dispelling the fog of confusion in his heart.

Yes, now that he has realized where he went wrong, isn't this a good thing?

From this moment on, Harry began to learn to trust Praris, his special companion. From this moment on… Harry’s gaze slowly shifted to the thick notebook, a sense of unease settling in his heart.

Alright, alright, from this moment on, he has to seriously study potions so that Praris won't stab him in the heart again and identify him as Lockhart.

Harry picked up Praris's notebook and said weakly, "I can! But Potions might not be so easy..."

Hermione's usually gentle expression instantly turned serious upon hearing this: "No, you can!"

Think about it, Harry could quickly learn spells before the Triwizard Tournament, so why can't he quickly learn Potions now?

Hermione thought that Harry was actually intelligent. Although his talent for potions might not be as great as Prader's, he certainly had it.

Otherwise, if someone like Crabbe or Goyle found the Half-Blood Prince's book, they might not even be able to do it well by following the notes...

In class on the second day.

Praliss felt Draco's gaze occasionally fall on her. But the moment she moved, Draco would immediately look away.

As soon as get out of class ended, Draco hurriedly left the classroom as usual, only to hear familiar footsteps behind him.

Familiar... Yes, of course I'm familiar with it.

Draco wouldn't try to get rid of her. He knew that when Praris wanted to do something, nothing could stop her.

So he stopped.

The weather was still terrible; there was no rain, but the fog was very thick. Looking out, the distance appeared as a murky mixture of blue, green, and grayish-white, like a piece of jade with poor clarity and texture.

Those few patches of green were probably wild grasses in early spring, appearing weak and vulnerable in the mountains and fields.

"Why don't you get new clothes for Christmas?" Praris said softly. "These clothes look so empty."

Draco froze on the spot, his lowered eyes slowly lifting, his eyelids trembling.

On his two-minute walk to the terrace, he considered everything Praris might say. It would likely be something like urging him to mend his ways and not continue down that path.

But all his ideas became ink and color.

With the makeup on his face, he looked like a pathetic clown.

Praris didn't say a word of concern, but every word she uttered revealed her worry for him. She felt sorry for his thinness, worried that he hadn't had a good Christmas, concerned about whether something had happened to his family, and wondered why Narcissa hadn't noticed Draco's clothes didn't fit…

In an instant, all those words that had been sharpened into knives couldn't be uttered. Draco shoved them back down his throat, stabbing him so hard he couldn't say a word.

After a long pause, Draco finally said, "My mother... she's not in a good mood. She'd prefer me to stay home."

"I'm lying," Praris thought.

Draco's physical reactions told Praris that he was lying. Narcissa wasn't unaware of Draco's school uniform size issue because she was in a bad mood.

It seems Narcissa had a busy Christmas... busy figuring out a way for her son to kill Dumbledore, or to save him in this matter. The latter has already been handed over to Professor Snape, so it looks like it's the former.

Praris's mind started working on it instinctively, and he figured it out in just one second.

However, the thought of what Draco was facing made Pralis feel as if her heart was filled with cement, completely blocked. Her usually sharp mind became a mess, and she didn't know what to do.

Reason and emotion were locked in a fierce battle in her mind.

Reason told her that she had to stop Draco, otherwise what lay ahead would be an abyss for Draco.

Her emotions told her that even if this was an abyss, it was a path Draco had to walk. She herself was willing to risk everything for her family, so what right did she have to stop Draco from doing the same?

The saying "those involved are often blinded" doesn't just refer to their own position and their inability to see clearly. It also means that even if they do see things clearly, their actions are still constrained by emotions and their social status.

If Praliss were just any other person who had never loved Draco, she could go to the Room of Requirement right now and tear that broken cabinet down!

...Ah, yes, she knew perfectly well.

Draco discovered the Vanishing Cabinet through the same person as Praris—Monta.

As the Sorting Hat required, unity prevailed. Prader received information from both Slytherin and Gryffindor, thus glimpsing the truth of the matter.

Last year, she suspected that Apparate might be the cause of the problem, and Hermione had told her in detail about Harry's suspicions about Draco murdering Betty.

In this, Hermione mentions that Harry overheard Borgin Burke and Draco talking, confirming that Draco was indeed doing something that required his toolbox, just as she suspected.

Prareas initially envisioned two options: to make something or to repair something—Hermione let her know it was the latter, and Draco asked Borgin Burke, "How do you fix it?"

At first, Prareas fell into a misconception. She thought that Draco's object was meant to kill Dumbledore.

But that's not right. If fixing this thing could kill Dumbledore, then why would he need to use the necklace to kill Dumbledore? This suggests that the thing's purpose wasn't to kill Dumbledore, but rather to have other functions.