34 Chapter 34

"Up." Harry stated calmly against the loud bellows of his peers, and a small bit of magic travelled from his hand to the broom, forming a connection. The next instant his broom leapt into his hand, and his palm closed along it's glinting wood tightly.

Though he could see many students hadn't managed to do the same. Hermione's broom kept rolling over the ground, almost like a dying fish. And as she became more irritated by the second, the broom started jerking more wildly—left and right but never up. Neville's broom, on the other hand, didn't move at all.

And the poor boy glanced around nervously, stark despair in his eyes as he kept saying 'Up! Up!', his tone changing to desperate pleading.

Madam Hooch then taught them how to mount their brooms without sliding off of the end, and went from student to student either correcting their position or teaching them how to get the broom in their hands. Ron clutched his stomach in laughter beside him when she told Malfoy that he's been doing it wrong for years.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard!" Madam Hooch instructed. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle — three — two—One!"

The whistle blew with a mean shrill and they all kicked off from the ground. The moment his feet were hanging in the air he found that familiar sense of freedom slam into him again. He may just be 6-7 feet in the air, but even that was better than being on ground.

Free, independent, ready to soar through the skies to achieve ultimate release...

"Ahhhh!" A terror filled scream came out from the side. His eyes snapped open—only then realizing they'd been closed—and he turned to look at a rapidly flying Neville rising to the sky like a cork shot up from a champagne bottle.

"Get down now, boy!" Madam Hooch screamed but Neville looked to be in no control of his broom whatsoever.

At almost 25 feet in the air the boy's broom started jerking like a possessed horse, and it wasn't long before the boy started tipping off of his broom. Harry didn't waste anymore time and shot off after him, his heart soaring anew.

Fly in the air, and get paid in XP for it? Yep, he now knew what his dream job will look like.

Still closing the gap, the first thing Harry tried was grasping Neville with strings of his Wandless telekinesis to hold him onto the broom until his arrival. But the boy was too wild, and his broom too powerful to control, tearing off from his magic's grasp without too much trouble.

He willed, and his wand materialled in his palm.

First, he needed to calm the boy down. Easy.

"Stupefy." He whispered under his breath with a single slash. At level 37, the spell didn't need to be bellowed out loud. Neither did it need precise wand movements. Meaning he could cast the spell in but a second.

The spell took him in the chest and the boy stopped flailing, his body losing strength as if a puppet with its strings cut. As if in acknowledgement of its rider, the broom became lifeless as well, stilling completely. Then the gravity registered and the broom started falling to the ground rapidly.

Harry sped through the air like a rocket, adjusting his broom to catch Neville right off the air, along with his calmed broom. His enhanced strength enabling him to carry both the lumps safely to the ground without any trouble, laying the both down upon the ground.

Quest [Saving Neville III] completed!

Save Neville's life (X)

With Health above 90% (X)

With Health 100% (X)

Reward: 300 XP

"Reckless!" Madam Hooch yelled out, quickly running to the duo. "That was reckless Mr. Potter!"

She knelt down beside them, her short grey wand casting the reviving spell.

Harry searched for an excuse before simply giving a light shrug. "He's my friend."

The newly revived Neville, who was looking numbly ahead in shock, gave a jerk at his words and turned to him gratefully. But Harry quickly backed away when he saw the boy's face changing to nauseated. And a good thing too, cause the next moment Neville vomited all over the grass, turning the green ground to milky white and yellow.

"Just some nausea, dear." Madam Hooch said, walking over to hold Neville up. "Come on, I'll take you to the hospital."

She then turned to them. "None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch'. And Mr. Potter..."

She seemed to hesitate a quick second before a small smile cracked her stern visage "That was the best piece of flight I've seen in a long while. Take twenty points for Gryffindor."

The Gryffindor side cheered loudly, some coming to shake his hand or thump his back.

"Blimey mate!" Ron exclaimed. "Didn't know you were that good. There's no way you don't make the quidditch team this year."

"Brother!" His sister came jumping happily. "I knew you'd save him!"

"Did you see his face? The great lump." Malfoy loudly cut in with laughter. Then he scrunched up his face in a mimicry of Neville's terror. "Quick! Quick! Potter save me! My prince!"

The boy swooned mockingly, and his batch of children gave a reluctant chuckle.

Harry glanced at the boy irritably. Another thing he was coming to realise was that children can be needlessly petty when they feel they have something to prove. Especially, as it seemed, when they want to recover their broken reputation as the 'Big Bad Bully'.

Normally Harry found the best answer to them was ignorance. They wished for attention, reveled in it, and did the same thing again and again just for a flicker of it. Deny them that, and they will splutter away.

But today was different. Harry found himself wanting to experience the recent joy of flying again, that was so abruptly denied. The rush, the freedom, a constant feeling of power and control...

Thankfully, flying wasn't the only way to get it. It was simply the most efficient one.

"Today's been a great day." Harry musingly stated. "It may be even better with a bloodied ferret."

"Oh brother, just ignore him." His midget twin shook her head. "He just wants attention. That's all he cares about. Ignore him and he will see how stupid he is acting."

Harry turned to his sister, an eyebrow raised and a knowing smirk on his face. "And when did you get a degree in psychology?"

The girl blushed, bumping into him with a whine. "Shut up, you meanie."

"Look, what's this!" Malfoy suddenly yelled in excited contempt. "That stupid lump's remembering aid."

The boy held a small curvy ball with misty smoke inside. He remembered Neville showing it to them in break earlier today.

"Well, Sister," He turned to rose. "Surely a small lesson at humility is my right to deliver now."

Rose sighed sadly. "He just never learns."

His wand snapped at the boy, simply pointing straight without any elaborate wand movements. "Leviosa."

At lvl 41, the levitation charm was his highest leveled spell apart from the unforgivables. He didn't even need to say the complete incantation, just a quick Leviosa was enough for the job.

And the next moment, the ferret boy started levitating in the air with a panicked cry. "Wha–!? Put me down! Who...how dare you!"

For some reason the boy's eyes snapped to him first and his cries started anew. "Potter! Put me down now!"

Harry directed the spell to turn the boy's feet up, and in no time Draco Malfoy was dangling in the air upside-down.

"MY FATHER WILL HEAR ABOUT THIS!" The boy bellowed as his pants started getting lose.

Harry subtlety directed his Wandless magic to the boy, keeping Malfoy afloat and freeing his wand to cast another spell.

He swished his Holly wand to perform accurate wand movements and stressed the word, "Diffindo!"

A small flash of light hit Malfoy's waist and his pants were torn open from his body. Harry directed his magic to only hold onto his pants and the boy hilariously flopped to the ground with nothing covering him past his waist.

Roaring laughter boomed throughout the grounds as Draco Malfoy's thin, shaking, pale legs came into full view of everyone present. The boy screamed, looking ready to cry . His screams were cut short when his pants dropped directly on his face. The boy stood up quickly, using his two stooges to hide behind, though not without flashing the crowd with his dark green undies.

"My father will have your hide for this!" The boy screamed as he scrambled his legs inside the pants. "All of you! You will pay for this!"

"Shut up, Malfoy. You're all piss and wind!" Andrea taunted the boy through her laughter.

"Malfoy got pantsed!" Someone yelled from the crowd, and a small silly chant arose with over a dozen kids repeating the words, 'Malfoy' and 'pantsed'.

Through this all, harry discretely dragged back Neville's Remembrall with his own brand of telekinesis. He knew there was some spell to summon an object to the user, but he hadn't learned it yet. It wasn't in the first or second year syllabus anyway.

In any case, he was more than satisfied with his performance. Though a large amount of credit undoubtedly went to his wand. Using magic had never been so easy before. The ease with which his magic flowed through the holly wand was simply incomparable to his first one. And the power...yeah, there's no way he could've done all this magic with the beech wand without getting exhausted. Neither would he have ever been able to fine tune a spell to turn someone upside-down.

All in all, he would count this as a successful experimentation.

Madam Hooch soon arrived after that, though Malfoy didn't complain to her. He just stared at his feet in shame, righteous rage brewing behind those eyes. Harry was sure the boy will try something stupid, and he couldn't help but look forward to it. He was slowly but surely coming to love embarrassing the boy. Especially when he was the one to start shit.

They were soon sent back to their rooms, though Hooch informed him that she will be submitting his name for the Gryffindor try-outs that will be taking place on Monday. With or without his permission.

The last lesson of that week ended with a nice stress relief, and Harry was fully looking forward to enjoying his second weekend in Hogwarts.

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Sunday found Harry relaxing in the Gryffindor's common room, playing chess with Ron. After another failed attempt to find one of the dungeons, Harry was now simply waiting for James to reply back. He had sent a letter on Friday night, asking for any clue about a room related to the founders. Unfortunately his father was quite busy with their renewed Auror training.

Andrea was gone looking for Dorea, while Hermione was giving extra lessons to Neville on transfigurations.

"Hi, Harry!" Parvati Patil waved at him as she and her friend, Lavender Brown, passed by him.

He gave them an absent wave, his eyes looking for a possible fork on rook and king with his knight. If only he could remove that bishop on D6 defending the C7 square...Oh.

"Bishop move to A3." He commanded, and his dark bishop—which was resting on B2—moved up to target Ron's dark bishop. The best part? It wasn't even a sacrifice because his queen was valiantly standing on D3, now giving direct protection to his bishop. If Ron makes the bishop exchange, he stops protecting the C7 square, letting Harry take his rook with a check

Ron squinted down at the board, blinking owlishly. "You're barking mad, mate! There's no way you saw that move so fast."

Harry smiled. That's the advantage of being a gamer. His skills Leveled up at an inhumane pace. He was already level 24 in chess.

"Anyway, tomorrow's quidditch and dueling tryouts. You're going in right? Everyone was talking about you using the stunning spell. They say it's a very hard charm to master, and it's only taught in third years. You must be really powerful already to learn that, Mate."

"Power has little to do with learning." Harry dismissed. "Control is what matters. As for the tournament...Indeed, I will. I doubt anyone will miss this chance."

"Well...Granger's been going on about the dangers of fighting third years. So we can count her out, I guess. Good riddance really, I wouldn't want to hear tips from a book on how to fight."

Harry hummed absently, his eyes fixed upon the board.

A loud thump sounded from the opposite corner of the room, and they turned to see Hermione picking up her fallen books and coldly walk past Ron. Suddenly she came to a stop and whirled around with fury in her eyes.

"Instead of playing, I suggest you do your homework. Or don't, and keep losing us house points like you always do."

Then she stormed off to the girl's dormitory.

Ron turned back to him, bewildered and offended. "What's she talking about? You earn the most points for our house by far!"

Harry snorted. "I think she meant you, Ron. Only you."

The boy huffed and focused down on the game.

Harry snorted again. Ron can be so so stupid sometimes. He wasn't a slow-minded boy per se, but he did have a habit of running his mouth without looking around. And it usually came back to bite him.

Still, Harry had to admit, he was anticipant for tomorrow's coming tryouts.

He may know how to fight hand to hand, but everything he knew about wand fighting—before coming to Hogwarts—was things he made up by himself.

This tournament should give him the chance to gauge his magical skills, letting him know where he stood. He wasn't looking to win the tournament, 50 galleons just held no attraction for him. No, he simply wanted practice. Practice and experience with his magic. Which meant he will keep his physical advantage to a minimum while relying almost fully on his magic.

Of course, that didn't mean Harry would be happy with a loss. He was simply not accustomed to it. With Hydra, losing meant death most of the times, forcing him to always succeed. Now that he had the luxury of losing without any true consequences, he found himself disliking the idea of it either way.

Harry Potter had a habit of winning, and he was quite looking forward to maintaining it for a long long time to come.

Though only time will truly tell where he actually stood.

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AN: And that's done! How was the chapter? Enjoyed it? No?

I've been having this feeling lately that maybe choosing the 'slow and detailed' pace was a mistake. Cause then we have calm and relatively eventless chapters like this one. The past 3-4 chapters have only managed to cover a couple of weeks and I don't know if you lot are enjoying this style. If you are, I will definitely keep writing like this.

But if you aren't, then let me know. I will speed things up a little. Though as a point, we're soon going to get Dueling tournaments, Quidditch cup, and Dungeon hunting. So action should be aplenty even with our current pace.

Also, let me know how you feel about his progression and learning aspect. I didn't dive deep into magic lore and explanation yet cause Harry's just learning simple spells for now, but as he continues to leave canon-level of knowledge behind, I'll be introducing some new and detailed magic.

My discord: discord .gg/9wpfysDGsz to discuss fics and chill.

My Pat reon: www. Pat reon com/ Robs511 (No spaces and a dot before com) for anyone who wants to read upto the next three chaps of all my fics.

Well, that's all for now. Hope you enjoyed the chap. I'll see you all in the next one!

Stay safe and have fun!

P.S: After some more discussions with my patrons, I've decided to change the pace of the story. You'll see the effects after Ch.19 (the latest chap on Pat reon). One thing will be the next Marvel plot coming sooner, probably around Chapter 25ish or even earlier. So yeah, this year won't be as uneventful as I'd planned, and while the focus will still be Harry's progress, it will be mixed with new plots and missions.

I apologize in advance for the slow pace which will continue for the next couple of chapters (I literally wrote 6 chapters where the HP plot is still in September lol). Rest assured it will change soon