A duel?

Jake and Serafall eventually made it to the Gryffindor table and plopped themselves down to eat. However, they noticed they were getting a bunch of cheeky stares from all the guys at the table.

"Well, now look who's decided to join us tonight," a redhead who was either George or Fred said cheekily.

"Indeed, my brother, it seems Jake the stud and his lovely beau have decided to grace us with their company," he grinned.

Jake sighed, "What are you guys talking about?"

"Well, you see", one twin started, "a little birdy told us that you and Sera went on a date today," the other continued. ""And it's almost been 6 hours since the two of you hid yourselves away, apparently."" They both finished together simultaneously.

Jake just sighed, "Nothing happened, we were just walking around." He wasn't going to tell them that he was secretly spilling his life story and then spent the rest of the time learning ice magic by being turned into a popsicle by Serafall for hours…

The twins just grinned, "Walking around for 6 hours?" They asked coyly while wiggling their eyebrows.

"Even if we were just walking around for six hours," Serafall cut in, "that just shows how much energy Jake has. Don't be jealous now, you two…" She purred out. The orange-haired twins sputtered at her innuendo. She smiled slyly as they, along with all the girls at the table secretly listening in, started blushing. Some of them even gave envious looks at Serafall…

"On another note," Jake asked, "Did you guys end up getting paid from all your bets yet?" Jake asked curiously. He figured with how many people had bet on him, there would have been a lot more celebrating in the castle.

Ron looked down dejected, "No, and you're not gonna believe why, Jake! Gringotts actually went broke!" he said.

"Wait, what!?" Jake exclaimed. What do you know? He actually broke the bank… Hopefully they wouldn't hold a grudge against him over that. He was never planning on opening an account there anyway…

"Apparently, some people bet so much money that Gringotts literally could not pay everyone their winnings at once," Harry said, trying to avoid eye contact with Ron. Harry felt bad for Ron since it was people like him who caused the bank to crash. Harry knew Ron had bet his entire life savings… 5 whole Galleons. That 500-Galleon winning payment would have been life-changing for Ron and his family. Meanwhile, Harry just went and nonchalantly bet 1000 Galleons… only a small amount of the massive pile of gold his parents left him. Gringotts would be paying him back that 100k for a long time…

"That sucks." Jake shrugged and, noticing Serafall was already eating next to him, decided to join her. He started eating himself, tuning out other conversations.

—-------------------------------------

After noticing Jake finished his meal, Ron spoke up to him. "So mate, the next task in the Triwizard Tournament, do you know what it is yet?" he asked in excitement. The other students nearby also looked at him curiously.

Jake shook his head no at Ron. "Sorry, I don't. Apparently, we were supposed to do something in the Black Lake with mermaids, at least according to McGonagall. But apparently, according to her, some hooligans set off a massive explosion on the lake and made the mermaids so angry that they aren't allowing us to go there for the tournament anymore." As he said that, he looked straight at Harry, Ron, and Hermione. The other students at the table looked at the trio as well and insinuated from Jake's look that those three were the 'hooligans'.

"Really, you three!?" An older Gryffindor girl called out. "Can't you three go a single year without getting into some kind of massive trouble!" Everyone there nodded along with her. It was always the Golden Trio causing problems...

Hermione sputtered in indignation. "You know darn well that isn't what happened!" She shouted as she pointed a finger at Jake. Ron and Harry were also nodding rapidly along with her.

"Oh please, Hermione, don't try and pin your mischief off on me!" Jake declared as he lied to the faces of everyone there. "Everyone here isn't dumb enough to believe such an obvious lie."

"I can't believe you!" Hermione yelled at him in betrayal. Was she really going to take the blame for this!?

"Give it a rest, Hermione!"

"Yeah, we all know it's always you three causing problems."

"You guys are the ones who even got Professor Lupin fired last year by trying to see him transform into a werewolf! He was our best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher ever! Now we're stuck with that nutcase Moody!"

Harry, Ron, and Hermione just sunk down in their seats in defeat. Nobody believed them... Was this their karma for all the shenanigans they got up to every year? It wasn't their fault!

*Ding, ding, ding*

The table's minor comedy skit was interrupted by none other than Dumbledore at the head table, who was tapping his cup with a fork.

"May I have everyone's attention, please," he called out. "It has come to all the professors' attention that an honorable wizard's duel has been called between two students. Draco Malfoy of House Slytherin has claimed to have been wronged thrice by Jake Gremory of Gryffindor and has therefore demanded a duel!"

All students in the Great Hall started whispering amongst each other excitedly. An honorable wizard's duel was super rare because it could only be invoked by one wizard wronging another three times, after all!

"You've got to be shitting me," Jake muttered to himself. Serafall, meanwhile, was just cackling next to him. She found it hilarious that the inbred blond near-squib actually thought he was going to beat Jake in a magic duel. Was he retarded?

"Are you guys crazy?" Harry shouted out for everyone to hear. "They can't have a duel; he'll kill him!" Harry said with concern.

"Yeah, he's going to die for sure. This is gonna be really one-sided," a boy from Hufflepuff said.

Malfoy, meanwhile, was sitting at the Slytherin table, looking absolutely smug. He had never been more proud of himself than at that moment. Finally, everyone, even Potter himself, was recognizing his superiority!

...Malfoy was under the delusion that everyone was concerned for Jake. They were not. Pretty much everyone in the hall knew the blond snake was about to be destroyed, except him and his delusional band of minions.

"You got this, Draco," Crabbe said.

"That's right, time to show them all the true power of the purebloods," Goyle added on.

Malfoy nodded to himself sagely. These were what true friends were! Not only did they listen to absolutely everything he said, no questions asked, but they also always believed in him too!

Dumbledore asked all the students to either move to the left or right sides of the hall so that they wouldn't be in the line of any spellfire. Once all the students moved out of the way, Dumbledore waved his wand, and all the tables vanished from the room. "Alright then, the center of the hall is now clear. It's time to commence the duel. Are you both 100% sure you want to go through with this?" Dumbledore asked, staring directly at Malfoy as he asked that.

"Hah! You can't deny me this, old man. I'm about to put this bastard in his place!" Malfoy shouted out smugly.

"And you, Jake?" Dumbledore asked, hoping that maybe one of these two would see that violence wasn't the answer.

Jake shrugged. "I mean, I guess we don't have to fi-oooof!" Serafall slugged Jake in the gut before he could finish saying no. "What the hell, Sera?"

"Jake," Serafall said seriously, "my mission to investigate you is now pretty much over, which means I'm going to be called back to the Underworld soon." She whispered to him.

Jake looked a little sad about that revelation. "Okay, but what does that have to do with this?" He asked.

"Since this may be my last night of vacation from work, then I demand a good show!" She said smugly. "Therefore, I demand you go beat the crap out of the inbred ferret. But don't end it too quickly," she added. "That's no fun for the spectators!"

"Fine," Jake said to her. He turned back to Dumbledore. "I guess I'll fight," he said.

Dumbledore sighed. Violence had won out oce again…"So be it then. Both duelists, please meet at the center of the room."

Jake Gremory and Draco Malfoy moved to the center of the room. Malfoy drew his wand from his sleeve, while Jake formed the Gremory magic circle above his hand.

"Whoa, what's that? It looks so cool." Someone called out.

"That's like a real magic circle straight from Dungeons and Dragons!"

Malfoy sneered at Jake. "It doesn't matter if you've learned some new wandless paltry tricks! In the end, before the power of a noble wizard's wand, it's worthless."

From the magic circle in his hand, Jake cast his ice magic and formed an ice baseball bat. He gripped it with both hands and took a batter's stance, facing Draco. "Okay, bring it on!" He said smugly. Malfoy, who obviously had never seen baseball before, just sneered at Jake's stupid pose.

He fired a Depulso right at Jake, who in turn swung his icy bat right at the incoming magic. The spell connected to the bat and was flung right back at Malfoy!

"Oh shit!" Malfoy yelled as he leapt out of the way of his own reflected spell.

"Whoa, that was cool," a girl shouted out.

"I didn't know you could reflect spells back at people without a wand!" Another added.

"You got lucky there," Malfoy glared, "but how about this? Depulso, Expelliarmus, Stupefy!" He rapidly cast three spells in succession. Draco didn't believe there was any way that Jake could swing his bat fast enough three times in a row... and he was technically right.

As the three spells headed in Jake's direction, he just stood there unmoving. Initially shocking the spectators. That is until the first spell approached him... and veered off by a few feet towards his side. The other two spells also flew in random directions, completely missing Jake, who hadn't moved at all.

Jake just turned his head and watched the spells sail by him and eventually hit a wall. He turned back to Malfoy. "Dude, that was sad," Jake said with some pity. Everyone watching nodded along in agreement. Even Snape, who was Draco's godfather, could only shake his head in secondhand embarrassment.

Malfoy's face turned beet red in embarrassment. "How dare you make a fool of me once again, Jake!" He screamed. "Let's see if you're good enough to dodge this!" He shouted out, "Serptorsia!" As he cast his spell, a king cobra suddenly sprang from his wand and landed a few feet in front of Draco!

The poor snake was extremely confused. One moment it was about to catch a nice mouse in the fields of India when suddenly everything went black and spinny, and suddenly it was surrounded by all these two-legged giants!

"Attack him, cobra! Go and bite Jake right over there!" Malfoy pointed at Jake as he screamed at the snake. Said snake was only summoned a few feet in front of Malfoy, meanwhile Jake was all the way across the hall…What happened next was not unexpected for anyone watching. And unfortunately for Draco, he was not a Parselmouth, so the snake not only didn't understand him, but it also didn't have any reason to obey him!

From the poor snake's perspective, this two-legged giant was yelling at it. 'Was the two-leg going to attack it? It needed to bite it first!' The cobra rushed towards Draco, who was yelling at it that it was going the wrong way. It didn't stop as it leapt up and bit him.

"Aaaaaahhh!" Malfoy screamed in pain as the cobra clamped onto his leg and pumped him full of venom. "Get this fucking snake off me!"

"Wow, this is just sad," Harry said to Ron. Both of them were observing this absolute travesty of a duel and actually starting to feel a bit bad for Draco.

"I can't believe we've been seeing this guy as our rival for the past four years," Ron said. "Now I feel kind of embarrassed for us."

"Jesus Christ, this guy's a moron," Jake said to himself as he watched Draco get attacked by his own snake.

"Ow, Jake!" Serafall yelled from the audience.

"Sorry," he called back to her. He had forgotten that the Lord's name hurts devils...

At this point, Draco had completely forgotten about the duel. He had already dropped his wand on the ground and was using both hands to try and tug the snake, which was thoroughly latched onto his leg, off of him. Throughout all this, he was also bawling his eyes out, with tears running down his face.

Jake just looked at the ice bat in his hand before looking back at Draco. He shrugged to himself and then reeled his arm back and hurled his bat forward. With a mighty thunk, the end of his bat slammed right into Draco's forehead and immediately knocked him out as he collapsed to the floor. The cobra, which was still latched onto him, noticed that its enemy had stopped moving. Assuming that it had succeeded in killing him, it released its fangs from his leg and let out a mighty hiss in triumph over its defeated foe's corpse.

While all this was going on, the members of the Slytherin house kept their heads down in shame. They were extremely sad and ashamed that Draco was a member of their house at this point. They didn't know if he could bring them any lower.

Professor McGonagall walked over to Malfoy's body on the ground and waved her wand, vanishing the poor Cobra back where it came from. "And that'll be minus 50 points from Slytherin for his language during that whole duel!" She declared loudly. Draco's housemates just glared at his unmoving body in response to that. He had pretty much sunk any chances they had of winning the house Cup this year…again. When he regained consciousness and made it back to his common room, he was not in for a good time...

Jake, figuring that his duel was over, just headed towards Serafall. They might not be dating for a few more years, but if she was leaving that night, then he wanted to spend some more time with her before she left. "Wanna go for another walk?" He asked. Serafall nodded and they left the great hall together.

-chapter end-

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