Chapter 21

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The room turned completely silent as every pair of eyes turned toward Ronald Weasley, who had just yelled.

Even Neville, whom Ron was 'defending', was looking at him in shock.

"Weasley! No cursing in my class. 2 points from Gryffindor." Snape coldly said.

Ethan looked at Ron in derision, who now was glaring at him with clenched fists, his face turning red. Ethan couldn't understand the hatred the boy had for Slytherins, especially him.

He had met his brothers, the twins Fred and George, already, and Ethan had to say they were quite funny, and pleasant to talk to. And more importantly, they had none of this judgement for Slytherin, or his name for that matters. Or if they did, they weren't showing it.

Ethan decided to ignore the boy since he was being more of a waste of time and space than anything, so he led Neville to a table where a cauldron rested.

The little incident aside, the students quickly got to their places, and Snape pointed at the blackboard, "Here are all the ingredients you will need. You will choose your own ingredients."

Ethan sent a look at the table where all the ingredients were, before looking back at the blackboard with a small smile. Snape had put around 12 different kinds of ingredients on the ingredients table, while only three were needed.

Without waiting for the rest of the class, Ethan got up and nudged Neville on the shoulder, who flinched before quietly following him to the ingredients table.

Hermione, who had been paired up with Harry, was quick to follow him, and the rest of the class quickly got up too, making a lot of noise.

Ethan could see the irritation on Snape's face, once again making him smile, before he turned to his partner for today, and said, "Pick our ingredients."

Neville looked shocked at the order, and tried to say something in protest, but what came out was only babble. Ethan knocked his shoulder, this time with more force than before, and pressed on, "I heard you were good in Herbology. Although those aren't all plants, you should still be able to find good ingredients. Decide now, before the others take the best ingredients."

Neville gulped, sending a nervous glance at the nearby Harry, who was waiting for Hermione to pick the ingredients, but seeing his friend shrug, Neville sighed and approached the ingredients table.

Ethan saw him whisper to Hermione, asking her what were the ingredients they were supposed to pick, making Ethan click his tongue.

"We've never had the chance to really talk to each other. I'm Harry."

Ethan turned to look at the Boy-Who-Lived in surprise, the green eyed boy was smiling while extending his hand. The smile was genuine, Ethan could tell.

Ethan took his hand, surprised an eleven year old took the initiative to shake hands, and said, "I'm Ethan, as you may know. How do you find Hogwarts?"

A small smile made its way to Harry's face, "Great, I guess. Both my parents told my sister and I a lot about this place, but it still feels magical seeing it, you know?"

Ethan shrugged and replied, "My mother went to Durmstrang, and my father to Ilvermorny, so neither told me anything about Hogwarts. But yes, I get it. Hogwarts has something special about it."

Harry nodded, and after a couple of seconds of silence, he asked, "You didn't bring your fox today?"

Ethan chuckled, "She's a Kitsune, and do you think it would be a good idea to bring a pet to a Potions Class? Even if Snape accepted, there wouldn't be much of a point."

"I guess…"

The silence after that was quite awkward, but thankfully Hermione and Neville quickly came back. Ethan analysed the ingredients Neville had picked, and found that he had at least found the right ones.

As for their quality, they looked good to him, so he decided to trust the boy's judgement. He didn't send him to annoy him, it was simply that Ethan didn't know how to differentiate between the different ingredients. Not efficiently at least.

However, as he turned around he was startled to find a person standing right behind him. What he first saw was long red hair as the person, a she, was about half a head smaller than him.

Then, he looked slightly lower, and set his gaze into the vibrant emerald eyes. This was none other than Cassia Potter.

Before he could ask her why she was standing so close though, Ethan felt someone trying to invade his mind. Someone standing right in front of him.

The mental probe could actually be considered more than decent, it could even be called good… for someone her age. If he had to rate the probe, Ethan would say an inexperienced person wouldn't even feel the probe, and the attack would overwhelm a beginner's defence with relative ease.

However, Ethan was far from a beginner, and today, he intended to show the girl that it was rude to take a peek into people's minds without their consent.

Ethan himself generally avoided peeking into people's mind, despite being able to do so, not out of fear of the reaction they would have if they caught him, as very few even had the ability, but more because it was simply a rude thing to do.

But since Cassia Potter seemingly did not abide to this rule, then Ethan didn't mind teaching her a lesson.

Ethan showed no subtlety in his attack as he used his stronger mind to create an imaginary battle ram, which he rammed through the mental defences of Cassia. The red haired girl's defences were broken with a single blow as Ethan was given access to her mind.

In an instant, Ethan read her thoughts and her emotions, she was feeling panic mostly, and was shaken at how easily Ethan had broken through her defences.

Since he didn't have much time, Ethan went to her recent memories to find out why she tried to do what she did.

What he found actually made him smile. First, just from the way she had attacked, Ethan had to admit it was clever. By standing right behind him, she had surprised him, which would usually reflect into a weakening of one's mental defences, or even a breach if they were already unstable.

Unfortunately for her, while Ethan was indeed surprised, he had long learned not to let such things stun him.

At the same time, Ethan was a little surprised by the reason behind her attack. While it was partly due to curiosity, her main reason to read his mind was actually to find out whether he was the one who tried to steal what was hidden in Gringotts.

Ethan had no idea the stone had also almost been stolen in this timeline, nor how she was even aware it had almost been stolen since Hagrid shouldn't have taken them to grab the stone.

He was curious about this, and so he searched for the specific memory. Usually, finding one specific memory in someone's mind was a rather difficult thing to do, and it took time. However, since he already had a memory associated to it, then it took only a second for Ethan to find it.

While he did, he also felt Cassia's desperate tries at evicting him out of her mind, but Ethan forcefully stunned her with a blast of mental energy before grabbing onto the memory he was searching for.

However, the moment he did, Ethan felt something crash into his mind, forcing it back home as Ethan was forced back to reality. Immediately, he noticed Cassia's face had turned pale despite the exchange only lasting for a few seconds.

Tracing the mental energy that had attacked him, Ethan spotted Snape, who was looking straight at him with an… angry stare?

Ethan was shocked, to say the least, that he had managed to anger his Potions teacher so much that it showed on his face. Snape seemed to realize his own situation though as he quickly ruled his emotions in, but his stare remained a warning one.

Although no words were said, Ethan could understand the message very clearly: Assault the mind of another student… no, assault her mind again, and you will be in a world of pain.