Reminded by Veratia, Poppy finally recalled her identity as a school governor.
Right, I am a school governor!
As a school governor, my power is unlimited!
Wouldn't letting a student transfer into Hogwarts be a piece of cake?
"Then it's decided!" Poppy puffed out her chest, causing Cassandra to grit her teeth as she watched. "I, the great Governor Poppy Sweating, have decided to admit Anne Sallow as a transfer student into the fifth year at Hogwarts!"
"You make it sound so easy," Cassandra sighed faintly. "I'm just wondering how the Sorting Hat will react when it sees Anne in the new term?"
Harry only had to think about it for a moment before he felt like he couldn't keep a straight face.
Sorting Hat: Are you taking this old hat for a fool?
"Hahaha..." Veratia laughed until she trembled, recounting that the Sorting Hat had complained quite a bit in her mind back then.
Starting from Harry—yes, the Sorting Hat had told Veratia that initially, it wondered if there was something wrong with Hogwarts, questioning why it had to sort the same person twice.
After receiving a denial from Dumbledore, the Hat had suspected several times that its own mind was broken.
Anyway...
Quite a pitiful hat.
"Well then..." Veratia stood up and said, "I'm going to take a shower first—do you want to join?"
"I—I want to join too!" Poppy raised her hand.
"Aren't you going back to sleep?" Veratia asked, raising an eyebrow.
Poppy mustered her courage, shaking her head. "I'm not going back. You two are too cunning—I want to enter the adult world too, I don't care!"
Veratia didn't speak; instead, she glanced at Cassandra.
The meaning was simple: whether Poppy stays or goes, you decide.
Actually, Cassandra initially didn't want Poppy to stay either, but that look from Veratia instantly triggered her rebellious streak.
Fine, you want to shift the blame to me, right? You want me to be the bad guy and reject Poppy, don't you?
Well, I won't give you the satisfaction!
I insist on letting Poppy stay here with us!
"Stay, then," Cassandra said, crossing her arms. "Anyway, it's spacious enough here to accommodate one Poppy... Of course, if anyone else wants to come in, that's impossible."
Her words were very clear: at most, she would accept one Poppy. If it were Anne...
Absolutely not!
"Yay!" Poppy cheered, stretching her little head to look at the bathroom inside. "So what do we do? Do I wash with you? Veratia?"
"Oh, Poppy." Veratia shook her head with a beaming smile. "No, you join the three of us."
"The... the three of us?" Although Poppy had prepared herself, she still hadn't processed what Veratia was referring to.
But Harry was already forcibly biting his lip, trying to hold back a triumphant grin.
"If you want to laugh, just laugh, you little rascal," Veratia rolled her eyes. "I can already see the corners of your mouth lifting to the sky!"
"Eh? Really?" Harry relaxed his mouth, but it was too late; the moment he let go, he couldn't hold it back.
That grin was blooming like a damn lotus.
It should be said that Harry, with the seal on the Philosopher's Stone lifted, had not only reached a new level in magical attainment—of course, "magical attainment" is the polite way to put it; to put it bluntly, it was purely "brute force working miracles"—but his physical constitution was also incredibly fierce.
Fighting one against three, he still held the upper hand. Even the usually tough Veratia couldn't help but cry and beg for mercy.
"You little rascal..."
Weak and powerless, Veratia reached out and lightly hammered Harry's chest.
"I still prefer hearing you call me Daddy." Harry grinned wickedly and pinched Veratia's cheek. Truth be told, this feeling wasn't bad at all.
"Alright, Daddy~" Veratia said in a sugary, tired voice. "Go to sleep, I'm dying of exhaustion..."
"Sleep, sleep." Harry lay on the bed. To his left was Cassandra, already asleep; to his right was Veratia, eyes full of love; and above him was Poppy, sleeping in a sprawl.
Drip.
Poppy's drool landed on Harry's face.
"Can't you lie down and sleep properly!" Harry couldn't take it anymore and reached out, delivering a firm smack to Poppy's bottom.
"Ow!" Poppy cried out in pain. "Okay, okay, I'll lie down—I'm really scared of you."
Early the next morning, Harry got out of bed feeling refreshed.
The Philosopher's Stone is truly a good thing, he thought to himself. He looked back at the three beauties still sleeping on the bed, stretched his back, and walked out of the room.
"Morning," Harry greeted his friends.
"Morning, Harry," Ron and Hermione waved together.
Ron added, "By the way, Harry, Seamus and Neville sent me letters. They said they can set off anytime. What do you think?"
"Let them come to the Isle of Wight," Harry said, digging his finger into his ear. "It's not like there isn't transport to the Isle of Wight in the wizarding world. Just let them take the Knight Bus here... Though I need to remind you, that bus is... a bit..."
As he spoke, Harry tapped his head with his finger.
Ron understood what Harry meant; he had taken that bus before as well.
"Right, I'll write back to them now," Ron said. "Let me think... how should I write it? Invite them to come to the Isle of Wight together... Yeah, just like that."
Ron's letter received a reply very quickly. That afternoon, Seamus and Neville arrived at the Isle of Wight via the Knight Bus.
"I think this is definitely a brilliant summer vacation," Seamus said excitedly. "Coming to a place with such beautiful scenery, it's truly worth the trip."
"I think so too," Neville agreed, "Though my gran says she's coming tomorrow to supervise me, to see if I'm slacking off..."
He looked a bit dejected; it seemed he really didn't want his grandmother to come and supervise him.
Harry knew that Neville's grandmother, Madam Augusta, was a very strict woman.
Moreover, her skill with charms was very high, not the least bit inferior to Professor McGonagall.
Normally at home, she disciplined Neville very strictly. Or one could say, half of Neville's initial cowardly personality had been suppressed into existence by Madam Augusta.
"It's always good to have someone who cares," Harry could only comfort Neville this way, as he couldn't possibly chase Madam Augusta back. "Don't worry, we'll just try not to appear in front of her."
"Alright," Neville said, pulling several pots of Chinese Chomping Cabbages out of the wallet Harry had given him previously. "Harry, look, I grew these... Not just Chinese Chomping Cabbages, I also planted some Devil's Snare and some other offensive plants. These things can definitely assist us in battle."
The Chinese Chomping Cabbages grinned, laughing maliciously at their surroundings.
"They look quite lively," Harry affirmed highly. "If you can cultivate an entire army of Chinese Chomping Cabbages, the average Dark Wizard wouldn't stand a chance against you."
"Really?" Neville grinned and asked.
"There are no lousy plants, only wizards who can't utilize them," Harry said, spreading his hands.
The members of the Dueling Club had basically all arrived. Hufflepuff's Megan and Ravenclaw's Cho Chang had also come to the Isle of Wight.
In Harry's view, Megan didn't seem to have those kinds of feelings for Cedric, or at least she and Cho Chang chatted happily, not looking like love rivals meeting at all.
This made him sigh in relief; Hermione had been worrying about this matter earlier.
"Are you a Seres?" Veratia asked, looking at Cho.
"How did you know I am a Seres?" Cho asked curiously.
"Because of your appearance, and... well, your demeanor," Veratia waved her hand and said. "If it were the Japanese, they prioritize minor details over righteousness, so their overall temperament appears gloomy; if it is the Seres, you prioritize righteousness over minor details, so you appear more stout and sincere."
"What about Koreans?" Harry interjected from the side.
"Koreans have neither righteousness nor attention to detail, so their overall temperament appears manic," Veratia evaluated objectively.
Whether this counted as discrimination or not, Veratia certainly didn't think so.
"Do you know about Seres too, Miss Grindelwald?" Cho came to Veratia's side. "I can tell you seem to know Asia very well?"
"Where are you from?" Veratia opened her mouth, speaking in a genuine Beijing dialect.
Harry didn't understand Chinese, but he could hear that Veratia seemed to be asking Cho something.
"Henan," Cho replied.
"Eh? You're from Henan?" Veratia switched to an authentic Henan dialect.
"You speak the Henan dialect too?!" Cho's eyes filled with little stars; she hadn't heard an authentic hometown accent for a long time.
"I speak a little of everything," Veratia replied with a beaming smile.
"Know a bit more, and life's a bit more exciting," Harry chimed in from the side. "By the way, we plan to stay here until the end of August, then take the Knight Bus from the Isle of Wight to King's Cross Station. What about you guys?"
"We have no problem," Megan raised her hand and said. "I've already told my mum that I want to stay on the Isle of Wight for a few more days... Mum is very relieved; she knows you are all here."
"Me too," Seamus added. "Me mam didn't object to me coming to the Isle of Wight. She also thinks I really need some special training... She saw the news, but she thinks Dumbledore's concerns might be right. She actually doesn't quite trust the Ministry's ghost talk."
"Unfortunately," Megan sighed, "my mum is hesitant about the matter. After all, that was news released by the Ministry... She also thinks Dumbledore might just be getting too old, but she still insists that even if Voldemort hasn't returned, learning some advanced application techniques for spells is sufficient and necessary."
"It seems your mother is a person of foresight," Harry praised.
"My gran believes Dumbledore," Neville said concisely. "She doesn't believe a word the Ministry says. She thinks—er, whatever the Ministry says, you should interpret it as the opposite."
"She's right; that is the First Law of Politics," Hermione said from the side.
"First Law of Politics?" Megan and Cho looked at Hermione together, not knowing what she meant.
"Oh." Hermione lowered her hand. "Only the news that is officially denied is credible."
Two owls seemed to fly across Megan and Cho's minds in confusion.
Wait, what kind of law is that?
However, they didn't dwell on it deeply and followed Harry to the second floor of the hotel.
The second floor of the wizarding side of the hotel had been completely booked out by them. Inside the side door of the conference room, there was a room that looked just like the training grounds in the Room of Requirement.
But having said that, since it wasn't the actual Room of Requirement, this training ground appeared relatively simple.
"Actually, there aren't any spells particularly worth learning from scratch right now. What we need to do is to master the spells we already have," Harry gave a simple opening speech. "Finding the spell you excel at and practicing it to the extreme—that is what we need to do."
"So, what are the spells we excel at?" Cho raised her hand and asked. This was her first time participating in the Dueling Club.
Because the Triwizard Tournament had taken place last year, the Dueling Club had temporarily stopped recruiting new members.
And since Cho had only started dating Cedric this year, Cedric had only just managed to introduce her.
"That's a good question." Harry clapped his hands. "However, only the person themselves knows which spell they are most proficient in. On this point, others cannot give you any help."
He changed the subject.
"Perhaps we can use an example. For instance, everyone knows Seamus is particularly good at explosion-type spells. Even in his first year, using the Levitation Charm would cause an explosion... Therefore, we initially determined that Seamus's area of expertise is the Explosion element."
"The tests were just as we predicted. Seamus—show everyone your latest training results."
The meaning was very clear.
Seamus, give them a show!
Hearing this, Seamus raised his wand. A Blasting Curse shot from the tip of his wand, heading straight for a training dummy not far away.
"Confringo!"
A boom of earth-shattering noise accompanied a blinding flash of light; the training dummy was blasted into flying ash by Seamus's spell.
Fortunately, within the magical side of the hotel, common dampening spells were in place, so the sound of the explosion couldn't be detected from the outside at all, avoiding any chaos.
Perhaps "chaos" isn't the right word; if Muggles were truly alerted, Seamus would definitely be in deep trouble and would have to be taken back by the Ministry for a "chat."
"It seems your spellwork has improved significantly again, Seamus," Hermione said with some envy from the back.
For such a long time, Hermione had never been able to find a spell that suited her as well as the Blasting Curse suited Seamus.
But then again, Hermione belonged to the category of being pretty good at everything; she didn't have a specific spell she could show off as a signature move, but she knew a little bit of everything.
It was just that her combat level was beyond lackluster; even Ron could easily press her to the ground and pummel her.
"Cool!" Cho looked at the training dummy that had turned to powder and couldn't help but marvel. "Is this the power of a talent spell? Truly impressive..."
"So," Harry signaled for Seamus to put away his wand and turned his head to ask, "Miss Chang, do you have a spell you excel at?"
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