Chapter 10: Wake Me Up When September Ends

As the end of September loomed, the temperature began to fall steadily as the season was nearing its peak. People could see through the castle windows that the fog had thickened, the leaves had begun to fall, and the grass around the fields and roads had turned auburn, indicating the start of a wonderful time of the year.

It was meant to be one of the nicest times of the school year to go outside, enjoy the slightly mild sunlight, and take in the beauty of the fall season. Instead of doing so, however, I have locked myself in the Room of Requirement.

Why? Well, I have been given a literal farm of magical creatures; I even have the certificate that the protagonist in the pensieve mentioned in my pouch, safely stored, but that bloody Graphorn is blocking all of that, sinisterly guarding the entrance to the place.

I've attempted to enter the vivarium a few times in the last month, but the Graphorn family is still standing guard. It's as though they were compelled to protect the entryway. So I vowed that by the end of the month, I would subdue the damned beast so that I could see the rest of the place without being disturbed.

Right now, I am planting the seeds that the game's protagonist left. While some of them couldn't be used because of the time they had been here, a lot of them could still be planted, and I was able to get a lot of things from them. Mandrakes, Dittany, and the Chinese Chomping Cabbage (or CCC, as I prefer to call it).

With the Herbivicus charm, it was quite quick and easy to grow them; with the CCC, I would just give it a chew toy to stop it from biting anything; with the Dittany, I could store it for later to make Wiggenweld potion or just extract the essence out of it to get the Essence of Dittany, or just eat it raw; but the hardest one to store is the Mandrake, because their cries can cause literal death.

Even though I wore earmuffs to muffle the screams, they were ineffective against a fully grown Mandrake. Let's just say that dealing with them nearly killed me a couple of times.

As a result, I had to precisely time the Herbivicus charm so that the mandrakes only developed to the seedling stage, rendering everyone who heard their screams unconscious. I kept them while they were still in their pots so I wouldn't have to hear their screams every time I opened my pouch.

I actually adore doing herbology. The joy of witnessing plants grow in front of your eyes never gets old; it's like reading or watching one of those power fantasy characters evolve from a middling human to a literal god in the span of a single chapter or episode.

Suddenly, as I was harvesting the Dittanies that I had planted in the pots, the clock in the room rang loudly. When I turned towards it, the words "Appointment with Flitwick" appeared on it, reminding me that I had requested to meet with Professor Flitwick this evening to demonstrate the charms I had learned thus far.

So, I dropped what I was doing, washed my hands, and went out of the room with a bag full of mandrakes, chomping cabbages, and dittanies.

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"Glacius!"

A jet of icy cold wind blasted through from my wand, freezing the floor and the dummy in front of me. In an instant, the temperature around me dropped considerably, and my breath turned into thick white mist, a sign of how cold it is.

"Wonderful!" Professor Flitwick, who was standing beside me holding a board that has a grading paper on top of it, holding it by the pincer, beamed, his breath also turned into a thick white mist. "It's only been a month yet you've mastered all of third year's material, you truly are one of a kind, Ashworth."

"It's thanks to the book that you've given me, Professor." I answered. "It told me how to do it easily."

"Nonsense, all of the students learned from that book too." the professor shrugged it off. He then looked at the frozen dummy, seemingly inspecting it. "But I must say, your spells are certainly stronger than normal students, it's quite curious…"

"Professor?"

"I wonder if it had to do with the late-bloomer phenomena…" I could hear the professor whisper to himself. "Ah, I'm getting ahead of myself, do you wish to continue?"

"That's it professor." I shrugged.

"Well, with the progress you've shown me so far, I'm sure you will finish the fourth year material before October ends." the professor smiled.

I nodded at his words. "Thank you for today, sir."

"You can ask for a meeting anytime," he said. "Oh, help me clean this up, would you?"

The room was certainly a mess… burn marks are on the ground because of the Incendio Spell, benches are thrown everywhere because of the banishing charm, a chair was dancing on its own as I have cast a Dancing Charm towards it, a cage for an owl was shrunk, and a board has been enlarged.

"I'll clean my mess, professor…" I chuckled awkwardly.

I stayed in Charms classroom for about thirty minutes cleaning my mess. I had to cast the Finite spell to the things that I have charmed, the Reparo charm to the things that I have broken, and as for the burn marks, professor Flitwick cleaned it himself.

While I typically didn't like cleaning, this time of year was certainly my favourite, so I quite enjoyed looking through the window there and then. While it was night time, the full moon was shining brightly over the castle, illuminating the mysterious yet enchanting forest around it, with the occasional birds flying over the sky.

As I was still doing the cleaning and fixing, I stumbled upon a rather peculiar insignia. It was a medium-sized wall decoration, just placed at the corner of the room. The wall decoration was a simplified Hogwarts symbol, with two different-looking wands on top of it, crossing each other. I took it from the ground, inspecting it.

It was a certainly unique take on the Hogwarts symbol, and I've never seen it before honestly.

"What's this, professor?" I asked curiously, turning towards Flitwick.

"Hm? Oh, that." he hummed noncommittally. "It's a symbol for the Hogwarts duelling club."

"Duelling club?"

"Yes." he nodded. "It was created in the 80s after a student was caught duelling in the grounds by Professor Snape. The Headmaster decided that instead of continuing on banning duels on school grounds, the school should make a duelling club with the intent of giving students a supervised environment to practise duelling, to prevent unsupervised duelling from running rampant again."

"Why have I never heard of it?" I asked.

"Because I've disbanded it." he shrugged. "Overtime, the students became increasingly wild at using spells and were hard to control, they only wanted to enter the club just to fight each other instead of learning the intricacies of a duel, hence they would use anything in their arsenal. I myself could only do so much to stop them from conjuring highly volatile spells or even deadly curses, so the headmaster and I decided to stop the activities altogether before a tragedy happened. It restarted when Gilderoy Lockhart became a teacher, but that was unsuccessful, as he was a fraud."

"Well that's a pity." I murmured. "I probably would like the activities."

"I wouldn't doubt that." the professor smiled faintly. "I can finish it from here, Ashworth. you can go to the common room, the curfew is about to start."

Hearing his words, I nodded. "Alright, thanks professor, have a good night."

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"Stop. Your time has run out."

In the dim light of the school's dungeons, I stood in front of a cauldron filled with greenish liquid that bubbled intermittently, permeating its vapour throughout this damp and cold classroom. Behind me, is Snape. His black cloak hugged his figure loosely, his droopy eyes watched me like an eagle stalking its prey, and his greasy hair covered half of his face.

I raised my hand when Snape told me to stop, stepping away from the cauldron so that Snape could inspect it. Once the fire had been extinguished, the bubbling stopped, and Snape stirred the liquid a couple of times, seemingly inspecting it.

Without warning, Snape suddenly grabbed my hand and cast a silent spell that made a small wound open on the back of my hand, bleeding slowly. I tried to pull my hand away from him, but he was adamant as he continued to stare at my eyes, as if trying to see what was behind them. Thankfully, my skills in occlumency are becoming better, and while I do not have the capacity to completely block his attack, I can avoid eye contact the second I feel his influence brush my mind.

Obviously, he noticed, but he didn't stop; he kept holding my hand and poured the potion that I had made towards it, which is the Wiggenweld potion. As the potion touched the wound, the blood quickly formed a clot, slowly closing the opening, and healing the damage to the skin.

Snape was staring at the process and humming. "Passable."

I took my hand away from him, and he stopped fighting back.

"A bit much, don't you think, professor?" I narrowed my eyes, wiping the potion from my hand.

"A competent potioneer should use their own healing potions on themselves first before even thinking of giving them to others." He sneered, walking back to his desk and marking something on a piece of paper—probably my grades. "If you cannot even do that, then perhaps you should stop studying potions, as you can't even trust your own creation."

"You could've just told me to do so instead of forcing me." I pointed out.

"Stop whining, Ashworth," he warned, not even looking at me. "I do not tolerate immaturity in my classroom."

I just shook my head as I took my books and kit to put on my bag, intending to leave as soon as possible because I have another thing to do tonight, but then, as I was nearing the door, it closed abruptly, and when I turned around, I could see Snape raising his wand as he just used it to close said door.

"I have not said that you could leave yet," he said flatly, walking towards me, his robe fluttering. As he stood in front of me, he tried to look through my eyes again, seemingly trying to read my mind, but as I felt it, I avoided eye contact, stopping it.

"I've noticed you've learned something... unusual," he hummed, his eyes narrowing slowly. "I doubt you've obtained the information on how to use such knowledge through legal means... have you been sneaking to the restricted section?"

"No sir." I answered calmly.

"Don't lie to me, Ashworth," he hissed. "Even though I can't read your mind easily, that doesn't mean I can't. What are you hiding?"

"I have a right to protect my mind, unlike you, who have no right to read the minds of your students." I murmured.

Snape's frown deepened, and his expression became sour. He turned around, his robe hitting my face slightly, and he walked towards his desk.

"30 points from Ravenclaw," he said. "I will report this to the headmaster; believe me when I say I will find out how you get that knowledge and why you use it. Perhaps to protect your lie about being obliviated?"

"Now that's just conclusion jumping." I shrugged.

Snape raised his brow at my comment. "Another 10 points from Ravenclaw. Dismissed."

God, I hate this git. Experiencing it myself is wholly different from reading about his behaviour in a book.

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I entered the vivarium, walking slowly through the pool of water, intending to make no noise whatsoever. I was wearing earmuffs, and my pouch was placed comfortably on my right hip, so that I could access it easily.

The place was a bit rough, courtesy of the Graphorn horns slamming towards the entrance. While it is not destroyed and crumbling yet, I could see cracks starting to form on the wall of the cave, which is a bit alarming, so I noted to myself that I should avoid making the Graphorn hit the entrance again.

I walked through the entrance and stepped onto the sands of the beach. The artificial wind passed through my body, making my body shiver from the cold, and the smell of the sea entered my nostrils. It's still hard to believe that all of this was inside a small vivarium inside another room, but that's magic, I guess.

When I had walked away from the entrance, reaching a couple of feet through the beach, I could hear the piercing roar of the Graphorn at the edge of the location. There, I saw the enormous beasts and their family nesting on the rocky side of the place, seemingly alert. The biggest of the Graphorn was already lowering its horn, and finally, it charged towards me.

Without a second thought, I quickly took out a pot from my pouch, and pulled the plant from its soil. It was a seedling mandrake, its cries echoed throughout the vast and empty beach, and even if I was wearing earmuffs, I still needed to turn my ears away from it to minimise the damage.

The Graphorn staggered, stumbling through the sand, trying to cover its ears from the mandrake. I dropped the plant on the ground, continuing to let it cry for the rest of the subjugation. The beast quickly stood up, its ears still ringing, and it was shaking its head erratically, but it still stood on the ground, barely holding on.

I pulled my wand, running away from the mandrake as far as possible, trying to subtly approach Graphorn's family. Seeing that I moved, the beast grumbled and charged towards me once again, its golden horns glimmering under the artificial light in the sky.

It was definitely faster than me, so when it was near me, I quickly rolled on the sand, dodging its charge, and the Graphorn slammed its head on the rocky side of the beach, cracking the stone and making itself dazed.

"Glacius!"

A sharp and cold blast of wind streamed from the tip of my wand, enveloping the side of the Graphorn. The beast was not fully frozen, as the range of the spell was too small for its size. I took a step back, separating myself from the beast as the tip of my wand glows silvery blue, gathering some ancient magic from within myself in preparation for the next attack.

"Diffindo!"

After gathering enough magic, I slashed the air using my wand, and a spinning blade was conjured. The blade had a curved trajectory, and it spun in the air like a boomerang, generating more cutting power. Magical dust spread widely in the air like sands being thrown around, the blade was bright, and coupled with the fact that it was spinning, it created these dizzying flashes of light that hurt my eyes quite a bit.

I had used ancient magic to power up a spell, like the Mastery book had said. It was simply my talent to use a little bit of ancient magic in me and gather it at the tip of my wand as I was casting a normal spell.

As the spinning blade hit the frozen scale of the graphorn, it exploded. The blade cuts deeply into the skin of the graphorn, and the ice scatters, further damaging the beast. The Graphorn collapsed to its side, groaning in pain and flailing its legs.

Seeing this, I took a Wiggenweld potion from my pouch and approached the beast slowly, wand still in my left hand. The Graphorn is still moaning in pain, but I gave it some pats and caresses around its neck and poured the potion towards the wound, healing it quickly.

"I'm not your enemy here." I whispered to the beast. "I'm here to take care of you."

The Graphorn just groaned in understanding, seemingly pushing its head towards my hand as if wanting to be caressed more. I just chuckled and pointed my wand in the direction of the crying mandrake, using the summoning charm on it. As the mandrake was on my hand, I put it on the pot again and chucked it inside my pouch. As the cries stopped, the Graphorn family quickly gathered around me, no longer disturbed by the screams of the plant.

The graphorn younglings were as tall as my chest, while the adults towered over me, but they all seemed to act the opposite of what they had done before; they seemed much friendlier, almost too friendly...

"Alright, alright, settle down." I chuckled as one of the younglings knocked me down to the ground. Its tentacles in front of its mouth were quite ticklish, grazing themselves around my face as if licking me.

As those two younglings were playing towards me, I stared at the artificial sun above. What do they eat? Should I just let them loose or cage them? How do I travel around this fucking massive place?

So many questions, so much to do...

Anyway, it's the end of the month, so I'll just lay here for a bit.

Finally, I sighed at the younglings. "Boys, wake me up when September ends."

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A/N: Updates will be random, at least once a week.