Chapter 58

"Alright then, Everyone settle down, it's time to get on with the class. Now as I was saying, there are a lot of gaps in your earlier years Dada subject knowledge, as such the material I will be teaching will be as per my own discretion. As such, we won't have the time to study the newly prescribed DADA book in the classroom, but I will expect each and every one of you to read it on your own as homework. Now let's start with—"

*Hem hem*

Now I was getting really annoyed.

"What is it Madam Umbridge?"

"Professor Canis, I am afraid this is not acceptable. You must teach from the book provided by the ministry."

"High Inquisitor Umbridge, As the professor of Dada subject, what I teach in my class is my business and mine alone and ministry has no say in it. If you have any problem with it, you are most welcome to bring the matter to the school board and DOME. Now, I have had enough of your interruptions, you can either sit down quietly for the rest of the class or get out."

She looked shocked at this but soon shock transformed into anger. Guess, she didn't expect for me to disagree with her. But she still sat down as I was right.

After I was done with her, I took out my wand and casted space extension charms on the classroom. After that, I rearranged the desks with students still sitting on them and soon enough the classroom was as big as the Great Hall and there was free space in the front of the classroom and desks were on the back. I Warded the front area for safety and conjured some practice dummies. Soon enough there was a practice range set up in the front of the classroom.

"Alright everyone, stand up and come inside the practice range."

Every one of them was confused but they still obeyed my instructions nonetheless. After everyone was inside the range I said, "As the subject name implies, I will teach you how to defend yourselves in dangerous situations from your enemies. But for that, before we go further with new spells, first of all, every one of you must know to effectively dodge the attacks and accurately hit your enemies. Now some of you might think that dodging is unnecessary and might think that defending using a shield charm would be better. But that thinking is absolutely wrong and might get you killed in a real fight. Aside from the fact that there are spells that can completely ignore the shield and hit you, like the unforgivables, casting shield charm would waste your magic and you might get exhausted magically before your opponent does. Not to mention that even overpowered standard cutter and blasting charm can easily shatter your shield not to mention advanced spells. So, unless it is absolutely necessary, dodging is almost always the better choice. Also, no matter how knowledgeable and magically stronger you are than your opponent, if you can't aim your spells correctly and hit your opponents, everything is pointless. So, you all will be doing a simple exercise to improve both your aiming and dodging capabilities. For that I want each of you to pair up with a student of different house and stand opposite to each other."

To save time, I announced the Slytherin-Gryffindor pairs myself. Just for the shits and giggles, I paired up Harry and Draco Malfoy together. I mean, they fight regularly enough, why not give them the chance to do it properly. Not to mention, as they hate one another's guts, they will be pushing each other harder.

After they were done, I continued, "Now I want one from each pair to attack their partner with a stinging hex and the other to dodge and alternate after every five minutes. Also, if any of you don't have good aim, I want them to start practicing on the dummies to improve their aim. But, be warned, if I catch anyone of you casting any other spell then stinging hex, they will be punished very harshly."

The class went unexpectedly smoothly after that, well other than the fact that I stopped Ronald Weasley when he tried to cast another spell on his opponent, who even tried to justify it by saying that 'slimy snake deserved it', when his opponent hit him with many stinging hexes because he was not fast enough to dodge. Well since I didn't want to spend any more time I had to with him, I promptly assigned him one month of detention with caretaker Filch as his punishment.

Days went by smoothly and quietly and soon enough it was the weekend once again. I was sitting in my office when the door was knocked. After I gave my permission, Harry entered my office and greeted me.

"Hello, professor."

"Hello, Mr. Potter. Here to serve your detention, I presume."

"Yes, and thank you for defending me back then. I don't think I would have liked to serve my detention with her."

"No, problem. Have a seat, then. Now, I don't like wasting time so I think it would serve both of us better if we use the time productively instead of having you do some pointless chore. So, you can study on your own or ask for my help if you need my help with something."

"Umm…Professor, actually there is something. Do you know how to use Occlumency? Professor Snape is tutoring me on it but I am having trouble learning it."

"Well, I am actually a master occlumens and am very proficient in mind arts. But why do you need to learn Occlumency so urgently? Mind arts are complex pieces of magic and it would be better for you to take your time to slowly learn Occlumency."

"Actually, I am having these nightmares from some time and when I told professor Dumbledore about it, he had professor Snape tutor me privately but I am not having any progress at all. Everything I have to show for it is the blinding headaches I get after my tutoring session with him."