11 Second Year Part 4

"Not bad, Mr. Lunar. But try to input less energy to the spell, and slowly heal the wound next time. Some patients might react badly to it. Normally, you'd do a thorough check first on the whole body, before casting any healing spells." the medi-witch patiently explained to him.

They were out in the woods with Hagrid and his dog, tending to the different magical species living under his wing. Hagrid liked to take care of them, and Madam Pomfrey helped him when she had free time. Today, she brought Kaiser with her to get practical experience.

He was mostly interested in the ability to heal small wounds, broken bones… an ability that may prove to be invaluable in battle. Because that's what he was doing, preparing for war. A war he knew would come.

He practiced on animals he could handle, while Madam Pomfrey would take care of the more complex situations, while explaining to him what she was doing and why. He absorbed everything she threw at him with ease.

Next he had a session with the dueling club, which he was looking forward to. Professor Flitwick took over the club, when Lockhart proved to be next to useless. The ex dueling champion was personally guiding the young ones in the way of dueling.

They were taught how to disarm their opponents first, then how to counter the disarming spell. Professor Flitwick's instruction were crystal clear, and always helped them perform better. Under his guidance, the vast majority of students could now perform a good disarming spell.

While the students disarmed each other by taking turns, some of the more advanced were practicing the counter spell at the same time. There are different ways to stop spells from affecting you. The most used are the shielding spell. But another known method, albeit more difficult is to perform a counter spell specific to the one shot at you. The advantage of this method is the energy cost.

He also showed them how to dodge effectively, and some tricks to get out of spells' way. Kaiser didn't forget to ask him questions whenever he could, to improve his skills. And he learned a lot from him. Professor Flitwick knew Kaiser was holding back, so he instructed him on more advanced techniques. How to use the shielding spell efficiently was an interesting one. Apparently, the best way to do so, was to be able to control the radius of the shield, and to know exactly how much time it takes to bring it up. When a spell is coming your way, you cast it momentarily, less than half a second, only to deflect the spell.

The dueling club also seemed to create problems for Kaiser, as it boost some people's confidence, more than it should have.

"Well, well… Look who's here, alone in the corridors. Aren't you afraid of being petrified, mud-blood?" asked a sneering Draco Malfoy, while his teammates were sniggering. He brought Crabbe and Goyle with him, along with Blaise Zabini, and a very nervous Theodore Nott. At least, Nott was smart. He knew there were too many unanswered questions about Kaiser, and he didn����t like that one bit. But Kaiser was apparently a big target for the Slytherins. Since they lost the first confrontation with him during their first year, they've been waiting for a chance to take revenge. Even some of the older years tried, but somehow have never been able to corner him.

'Why did he waste the element of surprise? He could've sent spells my way first, they'd have a better chance that way. Or perhaps villain brain lacks gray matter, after all?' Kaiser mused.

"No." Kaiser answered, not looking at Draco, but at Nott instead. And that infuriated Draco to no end, since he assumed he was their leader. "So this is the house of the 'cunning folks'? How pathetic."

"Shut up you mud-blood! What would you know about the noble house of Salazar Slytherin?!"

"Enough to know you don't belong there." Kaiser had his wand raised, reading to retaliate should they decide to send spells his way.

"Experlliarmus!" Zabini sent a disarming spell at him, while Kaiser moved out of the way. He sent a silent body binding hex at Nott.

"Experlliarmus!" Draco, Crabbe and Goyle sent a disarming spell each at him, but they were shocking seeing their own spells coming back towards them. Draco crouched, barely escaping he spell. One of them hit Goyle, as his wand escaped from his hand a dropped a few meters away.

Kaiser sent another body binding hex at Zabini, who managed to dodge it. And Malfoy, decided to use his most powerful spell. "Serpensortia!"

A long black snake shot out the tip of Draco's wand, and landed right in front of him.

'Let's see how much control you have over the snake.' Kaiser levitated the snake towards Zabini, who was now screaming in fear. Malfoy watched dumbstruck as his snake attacked his friend, before a body bind hit him. Kaiser repeated the same for the others, who were now sitting ducks, with Zabini occupied with the snake, before vanishing the snake.

'Idiots.' thought Kaiser, as he left them on the ground where they fought. A few minutes after he left, Professor Snape canceled his disillusionment and walked towards the body-bound students. They were very much conscious, but they couldn't move one muscle.

He wanted to leave them there, as a punishment for their incompetence first, then for attacking a fellow student. But he knew it was a bad idea, with an unknown monster roaming the corridors. He canceled the spells cast on them, before handing them detentions as a punishment after hearing them out.

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Kaiser entered the Great Hall for lunch after class with his friends, but they noticed a few Slytherins were giving them, or more precisely Kaiser, death glares. If looks could kill, he'd be dead ten times over. That attracted their curiosity. While they were always hostile towards him, considering his imaginary blood status, this was another level of hate.

After they sat down, Tracey asked the question with a teasing grin: "So, are you going to tell us why they're looking at you like you murdered their families?"

"Murdered their families? Hmm, now that you mention it, I might have…" Kaiser had a thoughtful expression. "Meh, I don't remember unimportant details." He waved his hand dismissively.

The others merely shook their heads at his antics. They've gotten used to him by now.

Kaiser noticed a certain blond haired girl sitting alone at the end of the Ravenclaw table and frowned. She looked like an outcast. She was Luna Lovegood, a girl who always wore a dreamy expression. As she was a year younger than Kaiser, he never got the chance to speak with her. He knew her from the books, of course, but all his knowledge about her might prove to be useless. There were a lot of people who didn't behave like he expected them to. He tried his best to draw his own conclusions about people.

"Why is she sitting alone?" Kaiser pointed at her.

Another first year was apparently paying attention to their conversation, and answered: "Oh. You're talking about Loony? Don't mind her, she's a bit weird and likes to be alone."

Kaiser turned to him. "Loony? Why are you calling her that? Her name is Luna Lovegood."

"Well.. It's a fitting name for her, is it not? Besides, she doesn't seem to mind it." He answered dismissively.

Kaiser shook his head. They were kids. This was quite normal, actually. Kids bullying other kids, without thinking of the consequences their bullying might have. Especially in a magical world, they don't realize that their actions have consequences, and they may accidentally create a monster.

Kaiser stood from his seat, and walked towards Luna. "Hello, you are Luna Lovegood, correct?"

Luna answered with a dreamy smile. "Yes, I am. And you are Kaiser Lunar."

"I am." Kaiser smiled. "Why are you sitting here alone?"

"The others don't seem to like me and call me names. I blame the Wrackspurts" Luna shrugged.

"You're always welcome to sit next to me, if you want." Kaiser offered. "I'd like to hear more about the Wreackspurts."

"Really?" asked Luna with puppy eyes.

"Of course." he smiled.

After she joined him with the other second year students, Kaiser asked: "So, tell me a bit about Wrackspurts. I don't have much knowledge about magical creatures, to be honest."

"Something you don't know about? Horay!" Tracey said cheerfully.

"They're invisible. They float through your ears and make your brain go fuzzy." Luna said.

"They seem dangerous." Kaiser replied.

"You don't have to worry about them. They seem unable to affect you."

Kaiser looked her in the eye. "You can see them?"

"Sometimes."

"You don't really believe her, do you?" whispered Michael, who was sitting next to him.

"Why? In a world where you wave around a wooden stick, say silly magical words, and so supernatural feats. Where phoenixes and unicorns are real. How far-fetched is it for a tiny invisible magical creature to exist? If anything, the probability should be quite high. Especially when she claims she saw them." Kaiser said matter-of-factly.

"She could be seeing things. She could be lying. There are a lot more possibilities than that, and you know it." Michael answer back.

"Of course. You are correct. But that is not what I'm trying to say. It would be foolish of us to simply discard the idea of their existence, without investigating. If you tell the No-Majs that you can see Dementors, even when they are right next to one, you'd be sent to the mental hospital in a heart beat." Kaiser reasoned.

"That doesn't count. The mug- No-Majs aren't a good example." Daphne said. It was clear that she didn't think much of them.

Kaiser remained silent. It was difficult to convince her otherwise, because she was prejudiced against them, and has probably never seen a 'No-Maj' before.

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"That was unlike you." Daphne stated, while they were making their way to the potion class.

"What?" asked Kaiser with a raised eye-brow.

"What you did for Luna. It was unlike you." Daphne explained. "You've seen bullying before. You never stopped it. I don't understand why you would help this time." Despite being thirteen, Daphne was a very calm and observant person. She probably received training to be this way.

"I hate bullies." Kaiser answered. "I don't stop it because everyone, at some point in their life, will have to deal with it. Better learn now. I would only intervene if it becomes extreme."

"But that was not the case."

"Maybe not right now. But it would have become extreme given enough time."

Daphne knew he was correct. If Luna isolates herself, she would have became an easy target.

After potions class, Kaiser went back to the Room of Requirement. He had been practicing Runes, something he'd fell in love with at first sight. It was very much like Programming, but with more possibilities. Runes are an area of studies that expand over multiples areas of magic. For example, spells that come out of one's wand can actually be translated to Runes. Inscribing Runes is imbuing an object with magical effects. To do so, an extensive knowledge of Runes and their inner-working, along with the necessary equipment is needed.

There are various ways to inscribe runes. They can be done manually, with a wand. But, not only is that exceedingly difficult to pull off, its effects also pale in comparison to properly inscribed runes. 'Charming' is an area that specialize with giving objects temporary effects. It is, indirectly, inscribing runes to an object, though it takes less effort.

One might think that runes just exist in nature. They do not. There are spells to view them, and that's how the first runes came to existence. The process is a very complex one. Let's take the Lumos spell for example. If you want to convert it to a rune, you'd need specific equipment to view the runes, or if you are crazy enough, to do it manually with your wand, by casting spells on your eye.

The runes you get, then need to be dissected, and then, you extract the specific set of runes, responsible for the 'illuminating' effect. For a simple Lumos spell, it wasn't very difficult. The more complex the spell, the more time it would take for someone to analyze it. Not even counting the risks involved in failed experiments.

Thankfully, Kaiser already had a set of basic runes he could work with. They include logical runes (to create the program's logic, shall we say), time runes (to make delays…)….

Not everyone share their discoveries of Runes, as they are most of the time commercialized. Brooms are such an example of advanced runic application. While they may seem trivial items, their inner logic is quite fascinating. Though, people never bothered to change broom's logical runes, as all brooms work the same way, from the first time they've been created. They only improve speed, stability and comfort.

Kaiser has been practicing Rune Inscribing since he came to Hogwarts. They aren't just some symbols you draw. You also need specific intent, in each specific part of the symbol, while doing so, using an inscribing quill. Thankfully, the RoR could provide all he needed to practice. It appears Rowena herself was an accomplished Enchanter, as she had a lot of books on the subject, some written by her.

He was now working on a special project: a magical watch. The inner logic is not that complicated. It only took time to get right. He always separated his project into different parts. The command center, where the actual logic is done, completely separated from the power source, as all things should be. The 'controller', he calls it, doesn't need much energy. Sensors, parts that collect information. In his case, it was a 'time sensor': it sends a signal every second. Then comes the most difficult part: the 'display screen'. He didn't want to hard-code a lot of Lumos spells, to get something similar to the LCD display. It would take a lot more power than just modifying the shape of the Lumos spell itself. Now, that was a different story. Kaiser had been practicing how to manipulate the simplest spells: the Lumos charm for over a month. Changing the size, the color, the shape, the light's propagation direction. Any aspect of the spell he could think of, he wanted to manipulate. And it helped greatly that he already understood how 'light' works.

One would think that, to get a desired effect, all you had to do was 'think of it, and voila'. Well, apparently not. Some times, you need a lot more details while imaging. For example, if you just think of a light orb, a light orb you'll get. But, if you think of a light orb with a different color, it wouldn't work the same. Kaiser, after much experimenting, found out that, he needed to think of light as an electromagnetic wave, rather than just 'light'. And then manipulate the frequency, to get a different color. He only needed to do it the first time, before it became natural for him. Which made him draw an interesting conclusion: "What you understand about the universe, dictates how much you can bend it to your will.". The statement was correct, even without magic in the equation. But, he'd need further research before he could draw a definitive conclusion.

So, he used used only eight modified Lumos Runes, instead of who knew how much, saving him time and energy in the carving process.

It was April, and he was still experimenting with his project, when he was interrupted with another petrification. This time, it seemed to be Hermione Granger, who was found petrified in the library.

He visited her in the hospital, with Harry and Ron, where she was lying motionless. 'It seems this farce is going to end soon.'

And sure enough, two weeks later, the big event event happened.

A message in blood was found written on a wall.

'Her skeleton will lie in the Chamber forever.'