Ted's anti-death goggles shocked the group of friends.
"These goggles are actually pretty effective against magic attacks that target the eyes," Ted explained, adjusting them on his face.
"They've got some other cool functions too," he added, a little proudly. "Like 'super aiming.'"
"Super aiming?" Harley echoed, intrigued.
"Yeah," Ted nodded. "It eats up a ton of mana, though. The wearer needs a lot of magic power to keep it going. But the effect is incredible—it marks anything with magical energy. Whether it's a moving target or someone cloaked by magic, these goggles track them through a magical scope."
"It helps with wand aim too. And on top of that, it can detect the target's magic level."
Harley took the goggles from Ted, curiosity sparking in her green eyes. She slipped them on and turned to Ted. "Alright, let's see... Magic level: 530."
She turned the goggles toward the others.
"Neville: 330, Ron: 280, Jerry: 190, Hermione: 270," she read off, then turned to Ron. "How about me?"
Ron leaned over to peek through the scope. "Uh... 290!"
"What?! Why is Ted's level so high? He's nearly twice mine!" Ron exclaimed.
Ted waved off the reaction. "Don't trust these numbers too much. It's just surface-level detection. Real wizards know how to hide their magic. If you tested someone like Dumbledore, it might show a number lower than yours."
Hermione looked between the goggles and Ted, her brow furrowed. "That much difference?"
Neville tilted his head. "You can hide your magic power?"
"Yeah," Ted explained. "It's actually a technique. If you suppress your magical signature, you're less noticeable in magical detection or combat scenarios."
"Besides protection, aiming, and detection, the goggles also have night vision," Ted continued. "It's not perfect, and it still drains magic to use, but it's better than fumbling in the dark."
Hermione leaned in, examining the goggles closely. "Are these runes on the sides? They're so small, I can barely read them."
Ted nodded. "That's right. I inherited some knowledge from Ravenclaw's notes—just a fragment, really. I've been self-studying magical inscriptions. It's slow going, but I've made some progress."
"The runes are linked with silver-threaded magic pathways. Most of the functions are powered by advanced magical circuits inside—kind of inspired by dwarven magical tools."
Hermione's eyes lit up. If the runes were this powerful, and Ted only scratched the surface, she had to learn them. She made a mental note to ask him for lessons.
That reminded everyone—course selection was coming up after the holidays. They'd nearly forgotten, what with all the chaos from the public ascension of the Bloody Baron.
Ron sighed. "I feel like you can't do everything. Better to just focus, yeah?"
Neville scratched his head. "I definitely want to take Care of Magical Creatures. Hagrid mentioned in a letter that he might be the professor next year."
Jerry nodded and scribbled the subject onto a parchment. "Hagrid's the best. That's one for me. What else?"
Each student had to choose at least two electives, though there was no upper limit.
Neville looked toward Ted and Hermione, a bit shy. "I... I want to take Muggle Studies. I'm really curious about Muggle life. I want to understand what you guys knew before Hogwarts."
He hadn't forgotten the Ministry's upcoming plan to give wizard-born children some early Muggle education.
"I'm taking Divination!" Harley announced.
Ron gave her a look. "Do you actually believe in that stuff?"
"Nope! That's why I'm taking it. I want to see what all the fuss is about," Harley declared with determination.
Ron chuckled. "Alright, I'll join. I don't believe in it either, but I heard the O.W.Ls are easier if you take it. Honestly, I wish I didn't have to pick it."
Jerry nodded in agreement. "Same. Would be nice if we could drop one instead."
Ron grinned. "Time to say goodbye to Snape's class, then."
Hermione glanced at Ted, thinking about their previous conversation on course planning. "What about you, Ted?"
Ted scribbled on his parchment: Care of Magical Creatures, Ancient Runes, Divination.
"I'm definitely skipping Muggle Studies. Nothing new there for me. I am curious about Arithmancy too, but there's not enough time. It overlaps a bit with Divination anyway, so I'm choosing that."
"Sounds good to me," Harley nodded.
Neville chimed in, "Then I'll also take Divination with you all."
Though Ted didn't say it aloud, he had a deeper reason for his interest in Divination. His background in psionics gave him a natural talent—he already possessed basic divination skills as part of his psionic training.
He hadn't practiced it much yet, but he understood the theory and wanted to test if he could become a true Seer.
Professor Trelawney, who taught Divination, was considered a bit of an oddball by most students and staff.
She was known for making wild predictions, often dramatic and usually dismissed.
But Ted knew better. In the original book, she'd made some surprisingly accurate prophecies.
Like the one about Saturn ruling the sky the moment Harry was born. She described someone with dark hair, a thin build, and orphaned in infancy.
She guessed Harry was born in winter, but that was wrong—Harry was born in July.
Yet the description wasn't off. It also matched Voldemort: black hair, thin, orphaned. Born in winter.
And later, when Harry charted his birth planet alignments, he found two Neptunes. Maybe a subtle hint—Harry wasn't the only soul within his body.
Trelawney once even predicted Harry's early death. In a way, that came true. The part of Voldemort's soul inside his was destroyed when he was seventeen.
At the third year's Christmas feast, Professor Trelawney hesitated to join Dumbledore's table for dinner.
She looked uneasy and said, "I cannot sit there. I see twelve people already at the table. When thirteen dine together, the first to rise will be the first to die."
To ease her worries, Dumbledore stood and offered his seat with a smile. "Then I shall fetch a plate elsewhere, Sybill."
But Trelawney had miscounted. Peter Pettigrew, disguised as Ron's pet rat Scabbers, was already present, making her the thirteenth. And Dumbledore, the first to rise, became the first of them to die.
A similar pattern followed: during a meeting at Grimmauld Place in Order of the Phoenix, Sirius dined with twelve others. He stood first—and later died.
In Deathly Hallows, during the Battle of the Seven Potters, thirteen people arrived at the Burrow last. Lupin was the first to rise, seeking Moody—and was the first among them to fall.
Sybill Trelawney may seem eccentric, but her darker prophecies have a way of coming true.
Good omens are often vague. Bad ones? Unerringly sharp.
The more you fight fate, the faster it catches you.
Ancient magic—particularly the study of runes—was both richer and more difficult than modern spellwork. It held more raw power, but was poorly documented and hard to grasp.
That didn't stop Hermione.
She was relentless, carrying around a Dictionary of Ancient Runes thicker than most textbooks.
She'd flip through it during breaks, scribble notes late into the night, and even read dusty academic journals most students had never heard of.
She and Ted often had long discussions over tiny etchings, debating meanings, tracing origin glyphs, and speculating on usage.
She loved every second.
Runes were difficult because they weren't designed—they were discovered.
Wizards of ancient times drew inspiration from nature, from cosmic patterns, from whispers of the divine.
Each symbol represented more than one thing: a concept, a direction, a magical effect.
One rune might mean "flow," but also "sunlight" or "judgment" depending on context.
To use them properly, you had to decode not just the meaning, but the intention. And then string those meanings into a coherent magical sentence—one that aligned both linguistically and magically.
It was like composing music with symbols that could explode.
Many researchers, most of them older wizards in cardigan robes and frayed hats, spent years bickering in magical journals. Some feuds got absurd—threatening to rip each other's beards off and shove them into cursed boots.
"Merlin, you're all worse than toddlers," Hermione once muttered while flipping through RuneCraft Weekly.
Still, Ted had a head start. Ravenclaw's lost notes had given him fragments of ancient theory, and he'd picked up more while studying enchantments like his anti-death goggles.
Application, Ted believed, was key. Just like learning a new language, the best results came from using it daily—not just reading.
One crisp morning, the group returned from the greenhouses, still buzzing from the sight of Neville's latest magical plants.
Neville and the others had cultivated something incredible—a giant puff mushroom nearly waist-high and wide as a dining table.
"If this thing's edible, we could feed half the school," Ron joked, poking it with his wand.
"This isn't just food," Neville grinned. "This version can tell friend from foe."
Ted blinked. "How?"
"Watch this."
Neville stepped back and conjured a mock target that gave off hostile magical energy.
The mushroom instantly puffed out a cloud of sparkling purple spores. They floated toward the target and began to corrode the magical dummy's outer layer.
"It's got reactive defense spores," Neville said proudly. "Stronger than anything the timid mushrooms ever made."
"That's not all, check this out," He guide them towards another plant—It was athe Peashooter.
"We bred it from a devil's snare hybrid and some enchanted thorn tentacles," she said, patting its leafy stalk. "This one's mobile."
"You mean it walks?" Harley asked.
"It can crawl," Neville said, wrapping its vines gently around his forearm. "And fire small magical peas at targets. It's not deadly, but it packs a punch—like chucking a rock at someone's head."
"Long range support, plant-style," Ted muttered, impressed.
Meanwhile, Ted had run into an issue.
He'd gone to Professor McGonagall earlier that week.
"Professor," he said, handing her his elective request form, "I'd like to take five electives."
She frowned as she scanned it. "Mr. Epifani, these course times overlap. You can't attend two places at once. You'll need to drop some."
Ted hesitated, then leaned forward. "Professor, my birds told me about this tiny little thing that turns, I was wondering if you can, you know..."
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Word count: 1696
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