allendalepharm Chapter 160 Smoke Dissipates and Sunshine Shines Brightly
Chapter 160 Smoke Dissipates and Sunshine Shines Brightly
Chapter 160 Smoke Dissipates and Sunshine Shines Brightly
Lockhart has actually faced three dilemmas since his time travel.
The hidden dangers of the original body's sins, the tug-of-war of Dumbledore's narrative, and standing on the opposite side of Voldemort.
Now, all of this has come to an end.
In an instant, I felt a great weight lifted off my shoulders, as if the haze had dissipated.
The next day in class, everyone could feel the ease and languor emanating from him, like a cat dozing in the sun, its tail swishing back and forth.
But actually, the weather at Hogwarts is not good today. It's been raining continuously, and this long rainy season seems to never stop, affecting the entire school year at Hogwarts.
When Lockhart arrived at the edge of the Forbidden Forest on his flying broomstick to teach his sixth-year students, Professor Kettleburn was discussing something with Percy, who was standing nearby, looking quite troubled.
"Professor Lockhart, it's wonderful to see you here."
Professor Kettleburn exclaimed in surprise, pointing to the location of the Chamber of Secrets adventure, "Today's lesson requires the young wizards to learn how to deal with fire. I prepared some ash snakes, but as you can see, it's raining non-stop, and everything is wet. The ash snakes died quickly and were of no use at all."
Lockhart didn't say anything directly, but looked at Percy beside him and asked, "What are your thoughts?"
Compared to Harry, the "savior," Hermione, the academic genius, or the highly creative twins, Percy was actually the child who was always praised by the professors.
This is an exceptionally talented young wizard. His straight-A grades do not mean he lacks special skills, but rather that the standards set by Hogwarts and the Examinations Authority for assessing young wizards are no longer applicable to Percy.
There have been students like this before: Albus Dumbledore, Tom Riddle, Barty Crouch Jr., Bill Weasley, but the only one among the current students who can be this outstanding is Percy Weasley.
Speaking of this, we must mention the importance of Lockhart's "fairytale romantic adventures." The Weasleys produced two top geniuses, but because they did not participate in the legendary events, they ultimately faded into obscurity and never reached the level of magical masters.
The gap between Bill and Percy and Barty Jr. is simply too great; it's a huge waste of their talent.
Bill has already graduated and is working as a spellbreaker at Gringotts, so Lockhart can't influence him anymore, but Percy still has some hope.
The kid he valued most in the NEWT advanced class was Percy.
"I tried using the Dry Charm," Percy replied respectfully, standing up straight as soon as he heard the professor's question. "But it didn't work well; the area got wet again in a little while."
Professor Kettleburn looked somewhat disgusted. "That won't work at all. If you ask me, we should cast a giant bubble head spell on the entire area to cover everything!"
"Finding solutions based on specific characteristics is the approach I taught you," Lockhart commented on Percy's solution, then asked, "But as you've also noticed, what you need to address isn't the dryness of the site, but rather the rain from above."
"Exactly!" Professor Kettleburn muttered, "We need to solve the problem of rain from the sky."
"But……"
Percy frowned. "The Bubble Charm is meant to be placed on the head; theoretically, there's no way to create bubbles that big. I also tried the Weather Charm, but it didn't work."
In fact, even if Professor Kettleburn could solve it himself, he wouldn't be standing around spouting nonsense.
"His desires weren't strong enough, so his will wasn't firm enough," Lockhart commented.
"?" Percy looked somewhat bewildered.
"The essence of weather spells lies in individual intervention in nature. It requires extremely strong self-will, and this self-will comes from an intense desire that cannot be suppressed within."
Lockhart gently drew his wand, gracefully pointing it to the sky. "You must be strong enough, a strength that far surpasses that of an individual against an individual, far surpasses that of an individual against society, a strength that defies fate, a strength that makes nature submit to its feet!"
That's why everyone says Dumbledore is great.
To reach the pinnacle of magic requires an extremely strong will and an overwhelming dominance to allow everything to be changed at will. With such a mindset, Old Deng can still show enough gentleness, kindness to everyone around him, and pity and tolerance for those who have made mistakes. That truly shows that his character is great enough.
Lockhart's approach to using the Weather Charm differs somewhat from Dumbledore's.
Old Deng's words carried immense power, acting as law; he was using a form of metamorphosis.
Lockhart places more emphasis on the interaction between heaven and man, erosion, influence, balance, bearing, and game theory... following the path of defense against black magic.
When he was instructing the young wizards, he didn't go into too much depth on this topic. He peeled back some differences in their paths and only talked about the most fundamental thing: strength, an extremely strong will of self.
"Disappeared without a trace~"
He waved his wand lightly, and the thick clouds in the sky surged and tore apart rapidly in all directions. The dark clouds burst and expanded like corn in a pressure cooker, blooming like black petals, before finally dissipating completely.
"Bright sunshine!"
Swish!
The warm sunlight streamed down, spreading a golden glow across the entire world. The Hogwarts castle complex and the endless Forbidden Forest seemed to come alive in an instant.
Birds howled and beasts roared, and the crowd screamed in alarm.
At the edge of the Forbidden Forest, in a secluded adventure area, the young wizards around stared in amazement at the scene before them, unable to shake off their shock for a long time.
Lockhart turned to Percy. "Do you understand? You need to have enough desire, otherwise you simply won't have enough willpower. Percy..."
"Yes, Professor," Percy replied quickly.
"You should think carefully about what you really desire," Professor Lockhart's voice was gentle, yet it struck Percy's heart like a heavy drum. "If you just live a life of conformity, without knowing why you live, your wand will not know what to respond to, and magic will never be able to bloom in your hands."
Percy stood there, stunned, but his eyes were filled with confusion.
"Oh, Merlin's big nostrils!" Professor Kettleburn excitedly gave Lockhart a thumbs-up. "A truly powerful weather charm!"
This complex spell is no simple magical trick. He could clearly sense that this weather spell contained a simple defensive spell called "Smoke Dissipates and Ascends" that Lockhart had been promoting among the younger wizards, yet its effect was so outstanding.
He could sense even more clearly the strong personal essence of Lockhart within this magic, a kind of light and joyful relief from all ailments, so much so that even nature was happy to shower it with sunlight.
He couldn't do it himself, but he had enough insight to appreciate the beauty of this magic.
Yes, wonderful.
It's not that just any little wizard can pull out a wand and unleash some magic to make people feel wonderful.
Interestingly, Professor Lockhart seemed to imbue each spell with this delightful beauty.
Perhaps this is why Professor Lockhart was able to embark on the path of a magic master at such a young age.
"Kids, get moving!"
Professor Kettleburn turned to the students and said, "Today's lesson is about fire adventures. If you don't want to end up in the school infirmary with burns all over your bodies, you'd better be on your guard!"
A short while later, Professor Snape also arrived.
He also expressed his amazement at Lockhart's weather spell, and then threw himself into the fiery adventure.
This is a combined course of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Magical Creatures Protection, and Potions. They have designed many adventure levels for young wizards to collect potion ingredients such as burn ointment and fireproof potion.
P.S.: The Fireproof Potion is the same potion Harry Potter drank in his first year that allowed him to pass through magical flames and enter the Chamber of Secrets at the Philosopher's Stone. Its effect is to protect wizards from being burned by magical flames.
It must be said that Lockhart is quietly bringing some interesting changes to Hogwarts. These irregular, combined courses greatly shorten the professors' teaching time, but greatly improve the young wizards' practical skills.
Lockhart watched over the situation for a while, and seeing that the experienced Professor Kettleburn was capable of handling everything, he quietly left.
He was now the most relaxed professor at Hogwarts. He returned to his office, tidied up the last of his manuscripts, and then took them to the headmaster's office.
When they arrived, Dumbledore was deep in thought, looking at two items on the table.
—The Hufflepuff Cup.
—The Ravenclaw crown.
Clearly, on the night of the full moon, Lao Deng also had a good harvest.
"I've always lived here, worked, lived, conducted magical experiments..." Dumbledore's expression was somewhat strange. He gestured to Ravenclaw's crown, somewhat amused. "I never imagined that he would place a Horcrux in the Room of Requirement next to the Headmaster's office, right under my nose."
"Without casting any protective magic, without specifically finding a secluded corner, it was just carelessly tossed into a pile of random things, thinking that no one would notice."
Lockhart picked it up curiously and examined it. It was said that this thing contained the wisdom of Ravenclaw. Ravenclaw's daughter Helena (now the ghost Grey) stole this thing in the hope of becoming smarter and stronger, but it seems that she did not succeed. She was accidentally killed by Barrow, who wanted to take her back (now the ghost Bloodman Barrow, the only ghost in Hogwarts with the ability to become invisible).
"Its wisdom was stolen by Tom," Dumbledore explained, seeing Lockhart's curiosity. "It did indeed once contain the wisdom of Ravenclaw; you can think of it as a more sophisticated meditation bowl, though of course, its function is not limited to that."
He gestured to the Sorting Hat, which was snoring and sleeping on a shelf nearby. "Ravenclaw's crown and Gryffindor's hat are based on similar magical ideas, the only difference being their application in the different fields of alchemy and magical creation. But unfortunately, it has been tainted, and now only a filthy soul remains inside."
Lockhart felt it was a bit of a waste and put it back on the table.
"I don't actually agree with this practice of crudely and simply stuffing other people's wisdom into our own brains. It only creates a cognitive bias in us." Dumbledore looked meaningfully at Lockhart. "It only makes us unknowingly bear a fate we shouldn't have, and cause us to lose ourselves in the process."
Lockhart smiled slightly, leaning lazily back in his high-backed chair, basking in the sunlight streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows, his smile radiant. "So we must put it into practice, digest it, and then discard it while returning it to our former self."
Dumbledore pursed his lips and pointed with his long, slender fingers to the report in the Daily Prophet that was spread out beside him. "Yes, I saw it. People are praising Gilderoy Lockhart for helping Lady Mary."
Lockhart shifted in his chair, as if trying to immerse himself in the sunlight. "Yes, sometimes things just go wrong like that. It always takes a lot to make amends, but thankfully, the ending is beautiful, isn't it?"
Dumbledore's expression was somewhat wistful.
He lifted his eyelids to look at Lockhart in the sunlight, and finally nodded. "Yes, I can feel it. You are always moving towards a better future, which is truly enviable."
(End of this chapter)