13 The First Task. Jake's Struggles part 1
POV: A Sad Goblin...
Grok Bonecrusher, a goblin representative at the Triwizard Tournament for Gringotts, knew he was in trouble. He was in a lot of trouble! He was absolutely going to be killed if Jake Gremory lived! When Gringotts had found out some suicidal American kid who didn't even have a wand was somehow picked as the Hogwarts champion, the bank representatives knew they were looking at a guaranteed suckers bet for some easy money. Therefore, they were going to set his survival odds to 1 in 10 to draw desperate people in, and then they would rig the monster drawing so Jake would end up facing the most dangerous beast in the tournament—the Hungarian Horntail. He was sure to die, and they'd take in some easy money!
What was truly surprising, or rather unsurprising, was that the amount of people and the money bet on Jake was simply staggering! Gringotts thought that maybe a hundred or so people would throw away some money on some desperate odds, but in reality, there were thousands of people who bet on Jake surviving! And it was all Grok's fault! Grok had gotten a tad bit drunk the night before and made a small accounting error when he was writing up the betting odds for the six competitors. Jake Gremory was supposed to be 1 to 10 odds that he survived; instead, a drunken Grok had accidentally added an extra zero, making the odds 1 in 100. And people weren't just betting 1 or 2 galleons as a laugh—there were some real degenerate gamblers betting hundreds and even thousands of galleons on Jake! The winning payouts were going to be so insane, and it seemed like everyone in the whole stadium wanted to get in on it! If the kid survived, then Gringotts, a bank that had stood proud for hundreds of years, would be financially ruined!
There was only one solution—Jake Gremory had to die! And Grok needed a special potion to make it happen...
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"...AND HARRY POTTER SUCCESSFULLY DRIVES OFF THE THREE DEMENTORS WITH HIS MASTERFUL USE OF THE PATRONUS CHARM. THIS SURPRISING VICTORY MAKES HARRY NOT ONLY THE FASTEST CHAMPION SO FAR TO SUCCEED BUT ALSO THE ONLY ONE TO EMERGE UNSCATHED!" The announcer's voice rang throughout the tent.
'It seemed that Harry had fended off those Dementors easily,' Jake thought with some surprise. That was seriously fast! Harry's name was called, and he was finished with his fight within a five-minute period!
Jake exited the waiting tent as its final occupant and headed for the arena. As he was walking, he spotted Luna holding his familiar, Blaze.
*Chirp chirp!* Blaze, who was sitting happily in Luna's cozy arms, chirped happily at seeing his master, Jake!
Jake waved at the Ravenclaw girl as he approached the duo. "Hey Luna, I just want to say thanks for watching Blaze for me these past few days while I prepare for the tournament," Jake said sincerely. As psyched as he'd been initially to get a familiar, Blaze, who was still a baby bird, wasn't exactly old enough to take care of itself and hunt for food yet. He required a surprising amount of care, which was sort of a big job for Jake who was preparing for the tournament. At least it was according to Luna. Jake had learned not to question her wisdom though. Luna, who turned out to be an awesome friend for Jake, was happy enough to volunteer and care for Blaze for Jake until his familiar was old enough to hunt on his own.
With a dreamy smile, Luna just told him that it was fine. She herself didn't really have any friends in Ravenclaw, sadly, so Blaze was apparently a welcome reprieve from spending her time alone in the common room. Jake had asked her before why she didn't have a familiar of her own, and she simply told him that her destined partner hadn't been born yet...
Luna, with Blaze in her arms, walked with Jake to the arena entrance. Jake turned to Luna and smiled cockily. "Well, this here is my stop, Luna. Make sure you and Blaze get a good view from the front row. I'm about to go whoop a dragon's ass!" Jake declared as he marched into the arena, with all the spectators cheering for him.
Luna merely watched Jake's back until he rounded a corner. When he disappeared from her view, a somber expression appeared on her face. "I'm sorry, Jake, but this experience is just one of many that will be necessary for you to reach your full potential," she whispered to herself and Blaze in her arms.
*Chirp... chirp...* Blaze's chirps also held a melancholy tone.
Luna hugged the baby phoenix tightly to her chest. "He's going to truly need you today, Blaze," she said...
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-20 minutes into the fight-
…As Jake lay on the ground bleeding out from a gaping wound in his torso, he had finally realized something about how he'd been acting ever since he'd arrived at Hogwarts and found out he could do magic. Something most teenagers don't realize until later in life. Something none of the other champions (except Harry) hadn't realized either until they'd faced the first task themselves. Jake had been acting way too arrogant and cocky. And now here he was on the verge of death at only 16 years old...
"Roooooooaaaar!" And there was the dragon Jake was facing a couple dozen meters away from where Jake lay. Roaring in victory for having defeated the annoying red-haired man whose spells had injured it!
*cough* "Man, what a lame way to die." Jake mumbled from the dirt where he lay collapsed and near bleeding out.
*Chirp chirp!!*
"..."
—
20 minutes earlier...
Jake entered the arena to the roaring applause of all the people enthusiastically cheering him on to see him succeed... mainly because they had all bet on him.
"You can do it, Jake!" Harry, who was sitting with Ron and Hermione in the stands, cheered.
"You're the man, new guy! You're going to make me rich, just don't die, okay?" A random student shouted out. Many more cheers like that came from all around.
"I hope you get maimed, you ginger yank! I bet a thousand galleons on seeing you fail! I don't care that the payout would only be 10 galleons!" That last one came from Malfoy. He was still pissed off that Jake had cost him 40 house points that had earned him the ire of his housemates. Let it not be said that Malfoys do not hold grudges, no matter how petty.
Jake simply ignored that final taunt from Malfoy, the jealous little weasel that he was. Jake simply stood proud in the arena, waiting for the dragon to come through those large doors at the opposite end.
"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, I GIVE YOU OUR FINAL CHALLENGER, JAKE GREMORY, AND NOW IT'S THE MOMENT WE'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR! THE FINAL BATTLE WILL NOW BEGIN. RELEASE THE DRAGON!" The booming voice of the announcer washed over the arena.
The large gate doors on the other side of the arena slowly opened, and out came a fierce brown dragon absolutely covered in white horns from head to tail, spikes absolutely all over its scales.
*THUD THUD THUD*
Jake had never actually really thought about how big a dragon in real life would be. The arena floor actually shook with each step the dragon took. It was a lot bigger than Jake thought it would be. Dragons in Skyrim always look so much smaller on a tiny screen after all...somewhere in his mind he'd sorta foolishly figured it wouldn't be any bigger than them. How wrong he was! This thing, however, looked like walking death, and it was the size of a small house!
The dragon fully entered the arena, and as it turned to face Jake, its spiked tail switched to the side and absolutely shattered a 10-ft wide boulder that was nearby in a single blow. A casual display of the devastating consequences of being hit by its spiked tail. The Horntail let out a ferocious roar at Jake, and he could actually see that its throat was glowing slightly orange, probably from the fire that it was going to breathe at him any second now…
For the first time that Jake had entered Hogwarts and started learning magic, he felt apprehension... Maybe he should have had some second thoughts about entering a death tournament that he'd never even heard of before just because there was some money to be won…
But it was too late for any regrets! Jake was here in the arena, and so was the dragon, and now he had to fight. Jake raised his palm towards the dragon and fired off a Bombarda right at its torso.
"Wow, that's amazing! He just used a wandless Bombarda!"
"I didn't even know that was possible!"
The spectators were shocked at such a display of wandless magic, something that they'd never seen before. Let it be known that as far as they knew, only the strongest wizards could even do wandless magic, and even then, they could only do parlor tricks such as simple levitation or conjuring small flames in their hands. A powerful spell like Bombarda was absolutely out of the question.
As the spell approached the Horntail, it didn't even bother trying to dodge. It had numerous spells cast at it pretty much its entire life living in the sanctuary, and none of them ever so much as scratched its scales. So why would the Horntail even bother dodging something that wouldn't be able to hurt it? Or at least, that's what its tiny brain thought.
Jake's Bombarda connected right on the torso of the Horntail, and immediately there was a loud explosion. The scales all around where the spell connected shattered, and the protruding bone spikes crumbled under the force of the blast. A bleeding wound about a foot wide was left on the chest of the Horntail as it let out a roar of pain and shock.
As Jake witnessed the damage his Bombarda caused, his hesitation slightly lessened. That was still the strongest spell that he knew, and it was able to cause a decent wound on the monstrously sized beast. All he had to do was hit it with a couple dozen more, or maybe even just a few headshots, and he would win. Jake let out a small smile at that thought as he prepared to fire another Bombarda.
However, before he could fire another one from his hand, the dragon let out another roar, this time towards Jake. And as it opened its jaws, a torrent of incredibly hot, rock-melting fire blazed right towards him. That fire was moving a lot faster than he thought it would. There was no time for him to dodge, so the only thing he could do was throw up a Protego shield and hold it off.
The audience held their breath as the dragon's torrent of fire connected with yet another of Jake's wandless spells. Surprisingly, Jake's shield held strong against the onslaught of flames. After 10 seconds, the dragon's flames slowly petered out and dissipated, and Jake dropped his magical shield, slightly panting from the magic he had exerted. Protego was a shield spell that was only meant to block smaller-level spells. It was never meant to block anything like dragon's fire, and the only way it accomplished that was with Jake throwing an absolutely tremendous amount of magic behind his shield spell to sustain it!
Jake threw another Bombarda, this time aiming for the dragon's head, hoping to land a devastating wound. Unfortunately, this time the dragon knew it could actually be injured by Jake, and despite its massive size, it dodged out of the way of his spell before it connected! As it moved across the terrain quickly, the sheer weight of the dragon shattered rocks and boulders all around it. Jake mentally cursed that his spell missed. He should have learned more AOE spells, but he figured his Incendio was good enough. Too bad that was completely useless in this situation. Everybody knows you can't use fire against a dragon...
It looked like Jake's only option was to rapid-fire spam Bombardas and hope his magic didn't give out before the dragon did. Feeling that the pressure was now on, Jake rapidly began casting...
-end chapter-
The MC thought he was gonna get an easy W…well he thought wrong Xd.
And a Special Thank You!! To my Hero Team Patron(s): William G.
If you'd like to read (5 or more) chapters ahead of time visit me @ p.a.t.r.e.o.n.c.o.m/ FiveStarTomato
