16 Chapter 16

To read up to 15 chapters ahead: https://www.patréon.com/SlyOW

-------------

"Mr Grindelwald, I will have you know that using your magic against another student is strictly forbidden. As this is your first class, I won't be taking any House Points from you, but you will serve a detention with me tonight. Now, lower your wand."

Ethan was still angry, but he knew it was unwise to argue against his teacher. Besides, he knew he had messed up, he shouldn't have lost control over his emotions. He would have to meditate some more it seemed. With a quiet grunt, he holstered his wand back, and the ground turned back into it's natural form, the damage gone.

However, the old lady who had changed it wasn't. Her hawk like eyes turning toward Malfoy, she said in an even more severe voice, "Mr Malfoy, Blood Purity is a foolish, old fashioned tradition that doesn't have its place in Hogwarts. That will be minus 10 points for Slytherin, as well as detention with Mr Filch. Am I understood?"

Malfoy looked like he wanted to spit something back, but McGonagall's stare was more than enough to shut him up. However, as he moved to his seat, he still whispered towards Ethan, "Psycho."

This time, Ethan did not react, he pretended not to hear as he turned to Sophia, who looked scared. With a sigh, he whispered, "If he ever bullies you, tell me, alright? I'll take care of him."

Sophia whispered back, "I-I don't want you to be punished because of me."

Ethan snorted, "What do you know, foolish girl?"

He winked, and clicked his tongue as he said, "I'm a bad boy!"

Sophia chuckled softly, while feeling grateful inside. She also was a bit curious about Ethan's last name, from the way Malfoy spoke of it, Ethan's family seemed important, but she never heard of it because of her lacking knowledge.

Before long, the rest of the students arrived and filled the room. When the school's bell rang, McGonagall did not waste time as she started, "Transfiguration is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts. Anyone messing around in my class will leave and not come back. You have been warned."

Sophia inwardly exclaimed at the introduction, which had been quite similar to Ethan's. This raised his status as a wizard in her heart. McGonagall held a special place to her, as the first wizard she ever met.

Then, McGonagall showed another feat of transfiguration magic for those who recently arrived, turning her desk into a pig and back. This amazed the entirety of the class, including Ethan as this was an impressive feat.

The pig was given a conscience, or a semblance of it at least, and although Ethan honestly had no idea how it worked, he could guess how it hard it had to be to pull off, especially with such ease.

Unfortunately for the class, they were far from learning to turn furnitures into animals. Instead, they all were given a matchstick, and McGonagall made a demonstration.

With a swipe of her wand, the matchstick's wood suddenly turned into silver as the object was turned into a sharp silvery needle.

The teacher asked, "May anyone tell me what are the most important steps in transfiguration?"

A single hand shot up, so McGonagall nodded, and Hermione recited, "We need to learn the circuits to transform the basic elements, which would allow us to expend on other materials."

McGonagall mused, "Indeed, those are important, but…"

Ethan raised his hand at McGonagall's unfinished phrase, and at her nod he continued, "But the most important remains our will. With a strong enough will, we can transfigure even with a rough manipulation of our magic."

McGonagall nodded, and explained, "Indeed. However, the influence your will shall have over your magic is not something that can be built overnight, it demands years of experience, so for now, you will focus on learning the circuits. For your first year, you will learn some of the most basic circuits, and only in later years will you be asked to draw patterns for more complicated transfigurations…"

While McGonagall talked, a chalk was floating behind her, and had started writing on the black board. Not even casting a glance at what the chalk was writing, McGonagall finished, "For today, you will need to visualize the pattern on the board, and execute your magic. If done well enough, you will turn your matchstick into a needle. You can begin."

Everyone took out their wands, and some of the more impatient students already started waving their wands at their matchsticks, having looked at the circuit on the board only once.

For the moment, most students had trouble deciphering the circuit that had been drawn on the board because it looked cryptic to the untrained eye, and didn't seem to make much sense. However, a few quickly managed to understand the circuit, and those were the ones who had bothered to read the Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration.

Actually, the first few pages were about those circuits, and how to decipher them. One would only need to simply open the book to know what it talked about. However, Ethan reasoned that McGonagall did not tell the students about that to both see who had opened the book, or even read it, and to teach the students a lesson.

As expected, very few took out their books to read about the circuits, and even less managed to read the circuits accurately. Actually, Ethan believed he was alone in that.

As for the children of magical families, Transfiguration wasn't really something taught to children as many disliked it, and it carried over even as adults.

If Transfiguration had to be associated to a muggle subject, then it would be Maths. Not many people liked maths, especially children.

Seeing his neighbour was neither taking out her book and was frowning so hard her brows were merging with her eyes, Ethan whispered, "The answer is in the first few pages of your book."

Sophia gasped in realization before taking out her book. Turning around, Ethan spotted that more and more people realized that everyone around them had taken out their books and decided to do the same.

He also spotted his two friends, Daphne and Theodore, who had taken out their books too.

Since his friends had already understood what they were supposed to do, Ethan turned back to his matchstick, ready to transform it.

The circuit still in mind, Ethan visualized it as well as he could before flicking his wand, activating his magic while doing so.

The matchstick turned all silver in in an instant, and the squarish form of the matchstick started thinning. However, only the tip ended become thin enough to be considered a needle.

Next to Ethan, Sophia, who was still opening her book, saw the transformation, and gasped loudly, gathering the attention of a few, including McGonagall.

She approached Ethan's table, and took the transformed matchstick. Analysing it for a while, she eventually showed a rare smile as she praised, "Excellent for a first try, Mr Grindelwald. Ten points to Slytherin."

But to everyone's shock, McGonagall broke the needle in two, and said, "The change was only superficial, unfortunately. I suppose you've read the second chapter too, Mr Grindelwald?"

Ethan, who knew where she was going, nodded with a smile, so McGonagall gave him back the broken needle, which had turned back into a matchstick, a broken one, and he began thinking.

This wasn't just McGonagall being mean to him, on the contrary, Ethan felt good because of her gesture. As it turned out, the second chapter of their book was about repairing broken objects. Through transfiguration, one could not only transform objects, but also repair them.

McGonagall was also testing Ethan's capabilities as she did not give him any circuit, so Ethan could only rely on the ones he had already read about to conjure a suitable circuit to repair the matchstick.

However, about ten minutes into the class, Ethan heard a loud cracking sound, and like everyone else in the class, turned to see what had happened.

Seamus Finnigan, a Gryffindor sitting next to Ronald Weasley, had managed to break his matchstick while trying to transfigure it.

In this world, Harry and Ron were not best friends. It seemed that Neville had instead taken Ron's place, as the red haired boy was always seen hanging around with Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas.

McGonagall approached their table silently, and repaired the matchstick easily. Ethan, who was watching, felt great shock as he saw the way McGonagall waved her wand.

Wand movement was something mostly used by students as it supplemented oral incantations, but someone of McGonagall's standard definitely did not need any particular wand movement to do something as simple as repair a matchstick.

However, right now, her wand movement had been quite elaborate, and Ethan understood it was for him.

With a new clue to follow, Ethan dived back into his research as McGonagall smiled ever so slightly.