Chapter 179: His Final Trick

If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr

I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.

I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.

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15 January 1994, Hogwarts

Susan Bones sat in the stands waiting for the finals for the first task of the tournament to begin, still shivering from her impromptu ice bath during her own task. The preliminaries were a lot more difficult than she thought they would be, but it wasn't really that bad. Susan had done her best to finish the task and ended up finishing seventh, one of the few rare ones who finished the race from her year, and the only one who finished from her house.

She did her best to get through the task and never gave up and it worked. She mainly relied on runes, and her knowledge of the subject was put to the test plenty of times. Honestly, if it wasn't for Harry's lessons during their group project sessions, she would have probably failed the task. She was slow, but she was able to carve runes on the wooden platform to move forward, another rune to make a basic protection against the weather, and a rune to not slip on the ice. She had barely gotten started with powering runes, but that and a few charms did the trick, and she finished her task with her head held high.

Her aunty Amelia swiped her up into the air, telling her how proud she was of Susan. Apparently, her performance was better than many of upper year students and that was more than enough to impress the spectators. Susan had no idea what they did and hoped that people had Omnioculars that recorded the event for sale.

Susan didn't come first, of course. That honour belonged to Harry who apparently just summoned a broom and flew to the finish line in less than two minutes. She wished that she would have thought of that. It seemed obvious now that she thought about it. His friends and housemates, Tracy Davis, Blaise Zabini, and Daphne Greengrass, had obviously also impressed everyone by literally breezing through the obstacles as if they weren't there. Harry did tell her that he had been helping them train ever since the task was announced, and it showed.

Susan wished that she would have asked him the same, but even after an entire semester working together, they were still not close enough for her to ask him for something like that. Of course, she lamented that fact, but she would not be deterred.

Speaking of Harry, she saw him, and the rest of the contestants stand in a circle around some raised platform. Each contestant looked like they had a designated platform. It took a couple of minutes for everyone to take their place and for Ludo Bagman to start speaking, "Ladies and Gentlemen, what an evening this was. We saw wonders of magic, feats of skill and athleticism that awed every single one of us. Yes, me included. And it all leads to this, the grand finale of this task. Who will be crowned as the champion of the school? Will it be a Gryffindor, a Slytherin, or perhaps even a Raven or a Badger might win? Will it be a NEWT student, or perhaps even an underdog? I don't know, but I'm eager to find out. We only have fifteen contestants remaining, three for each school year, ready to prove themselves as the best of this prestigious school."

The entire stadium roared in approval and Susan was swept up by the excitement as well. It was far better to see it from above than anything else. The head of the department of magical mages and sports continued, "I'm glad to see that you're all just as eager to see what will happen next, and the final task will not disappoint you. You see, the rules are simple. The first students to open a chest in the middle of the platform and grab the artefact inside will be crowned as the victor of the first task. The contestants are only allowed to have their wands on them and cannot summon anything from outside the arena."

The crowd burst into laughter, probably remembering Harry's trick in the preliminary task. The boy himself looked bored out of his mind and wasn't even looking up at the announcer. Susan suppressed the urge to giggle. This was typical Harry.

Her aunt seemed to have noticed where her eyes wandered and chuckled, "So, the Potter boy, huh?"

She blushed, "What are you talking about, Auntie?"

"I'm not judging; his father was a good catch back in the day. If he was a bit older, I might have tried him out a bit…"

The redhead's blush intensified, "I don't want to know about that. Let's just focus on the task."

"Whatever you say, Susie. Oh, you're growing up so fast…"

The young Hufflepuff did her best to ignore her aunt's teasing and focused on Bagman's voice once more, who had begun to explain the task, "Seems easy, doesn't it? Alas, if things were easy, then our champion wouldn't really feel deserving of the title. And after such an impressive showing on the obstacle course. So, of course, there must be obstacles in front of our dear contestants. They will first need to retrieve the key to open the chest, which will be in the possession of one of the obstacles."

And just like that, almost a hundred gigantic ice statues were conjured out of nowhere, each holding a giant weapon. They were over two stories tall, probably around the size of a giant, and wearing gladiator armour. Their presence was definitely intimidating. The crowd roared in excitement, but Susan couldn't help but feel fear towards her yearmates. They really weren't equipped to deal with things like that.

"Each statue will have a medallion. It can either be empty, or it can hold the key to the chest, the key to victory. Find the key, open the chest, and you will win. There will be no prizes from second place, only the winner, and you are allowed to duel your opponent, as long as no dark magic is used. Of course, there will be other obstacles in your way. But you didn't come here to listen to me talk, let's just get this task started."

And just like before, a cannon fired, and the contestants ran towards the giant ice soldiers. Cedric Diggory, a sixth year immediately stunned Zabini and Davis, who happened to be near the older Hufflepuff. He looked for Harry for a fraction of a second before running towards an ice statue. The older boy probably thought that he was being kind since other students wouldn't have been as nice as him about eliminating them. Losing to a third year would have been very shameful. A few upper-year Gryffindors or even Slytherins would have just blasted them away or maybe even cursed them.

Percy Weasley, a seventh-year, defeated the first statue, by sending some kind of enchanted fire at their legs, melting through the charms and keeping the statues together. Alas, the whole thing seemed to tire him immensely since he was heaving, and he barely reacted when Gemma Farley stunned him from the back, only to frown when she noticed that the statue didn't have a key. The Slytherin girl dodged a curse from the redhead's girlfriend, Penelope Clearwater from Ravenclaw, who seemed angry at the attack. 

Farley was able to quickly counter the attack and said some cheeky reply that seemed to incense the Ravenclaw even further. The duel that followed was obviously in the Slytherin's favour; Clearwater was not that experienced in wizarding fights, at least not like Farley was. Perhaps the rumours were true; Slytherin did have an underground duelling ring for just the members of their house.

Everyone was watching the duel with fascination, but were distracted once more by Bagman's booming voice, "Merlin's beard! Potter's got it. Potter's got the key!"

Susan could feel that everyone's neck turned at the exact same time to see Harry who had used the remains of a downed statue to trip another one and steal the necklace. He was holding a glowing gold key in his hand, while gliding through the ice, with the grace of a figure skater.

On the other side, Farley used the distraction to knock out the Ravenclaw Head Girl before quickly running towards the gliding third year. Harry was smiling unconcerned and dodged two hexes with an acrobatic move in the middle of the air, landing like a gymnast. The Weasley twins were the first to reach him and sent some of their infamous prank spells at the Potter scion.

Harry, though, just ducked, while still gliding, and turned sharply to the left. The twins lost their balance slightly and did not see, Cho Chang, a very pretty fourth-year, just behind them. The girl was able to quickly take out the twins, meaning that every Weasley was officially out of the race. The Asian girl ran towards Harry who had an infuriating smile on his face as he dodged every single attack.

Susan heard her aunt Amelia snickering slightly and murmur, "Impressive."

"I didn't know he could dodge spells like that…"

The head of the DMLE shook her head, "That's not it. I won't spoil the surprise after all."

Susan suppressed the urge to pout and turned back to the competition, only to see Harry turn sharply, leading the Chang girl into the path of a still intact Ice statue, which was swinging a mace at Harry. The Ravenclaw took the damage head-on and flew away, knocked out, probably with a trip to the hospital wing. Still, the girl was a Quidditch player; she must have been used to getting injured. 

Harry bowed to the audience, only to be attacked in the back by Cedric Diggory, who sent him flying back. The crowd booed and cheered. Cedric was the pride of Hufflepuff House. He was by far one of the most talented students in the school, definitely the most popular with the ladies. He was very helpful whenever anyone asked anything of him. He liked to tutor firsties in his free time and was adored by everyone in the House of Badgers. Yet, at this moment, Susan was furious at him. Still, while Harry was good, he was probably not powerful enough to handle a NEWT student in a straight fight. It was not logical to think that her crush had a chance at winning.

The sixth year said something to the downed Harry before stunning him and taking the key. The Hufflepuffs in the stands roared in approval. He was immediately attacked by Gemma Farley, who had just eliminated the remaining sixth years with ease. There were just two students standing: Gemma Farley and Cedric Diggory, who were by far the students who showed the most talent during the whole competition.

The duel that followed was fierce. Cedric seemed to favour transfiguration, conjuring animals to attack his opponent. Farley favoured charms and curses. The duel took a lot longer than anyone expected it would; both students were evenly matched. It ended with Cedric gaining the upper hand when a very strong gust of air sent both of them flying away. Farley was unlucky enough to land near one of the animated statues and used a shield charm by reflex, which Cedric took advantage of and stunned her in the back.

A limping Cedric Diggory dispelled the storm with a wave of his wand and transfigured some snow into a sleigh which he charmed to move forward. It was then that eight gigantic ice tentacles spawned from the ground and tried to attack him.

The Hufflepuff dodged the first one and made some very quick work of the tentacles by conjuring chains that started to bind the tentacles together. In the end, an exhausted Cedric Diggory limped victoriously to the middle platform which held a giant chest. He raised the glowing key up into the air, in a dramatic way, and tried to open the chest.

The entire stadium was silent, waiting for the boy to finally reveal the prize within. Only to see the boy frowning as the key wasn't opening the chest. He had a confused expression on his face as the ice gave out from under him and he fell into the frozen lake.

No one seemed to know what was happening. Ludo Bagman was speechless for the first time since the task began.

Of course, that's when a bored Harry Potter revealed himself from underneath a pilar of snow, which hid his form. The body where the boy was supposed to be stunned was deformed, showing a rock in a humanoid shape, with a rune matrix glowing in the middle.

It was an illusion all this time! No wonder Harry was able to make impossible dodges. The Slytherin must have been controlling it from afar and got caught on purpose, to make whoever won drop his guard.

She turned towards her aunt who was visibly giggling, with an accusive tone, "You knew!"

"Of course, I knew. The shadow didn't match the illusion. You'd have needed to be looking for it to notice. More than a few criminals tried to pull this off in front of me, so I'm always looking for illusions. The boy must have transfigured a fake key and charmed it to glow as a distraction too. Very impressive…"

Susan looked flabbergasted as Harry Potter walked slowly towards the platform, holding the real key in his hand. He bowed to the audience once more, this time with his real body.

He put the key in the chest and opened it, releasing a golden trophy from inside, which he raised up into the air. The crowd roared in approval and still confusion.

What a way to end the task.

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If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr

I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.

Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.