Early the next morning.
Because of the flying car incident the night before, Ron received a Howler from Mrs. Weasley.
He made a complete fool of himself in the Great Hall and fled with a red face before he could even eat breakfast.
Even after their first Transfiguration class ended and they arrived at the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, he was still in a foul mood.
Harry looked worried. "Ron, are you alright?"
"Terrible!" Ron sprawled across the desk, burying his face in his arms, his voice low. "I feel like everyone's laughing at me!"
"That's entirely your own fault," Hermione snorted. "Flying to school in a car—I honestly don't know what you were thinking.
You should be grateful the Ministry didn't throw you into Azkaban for violating the Statute of Secrecy."
Harry hurried to smooth things over. "Hermione, it's not Ron's fault! We were blocked—we couldn't get through to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters."
"Blocked? If you were blocked, couldn't you have looked for an adult?" Hermione shot back.
"That's not an excuse at all. I think he just wanted to feel special and never considered the consequences!"
Ron was so angry he felt steam rising from his head. He lifted his head and shouted, "This has nothing to do with you!"
"Nothing to do with me?" Hermione snapped, equally furious. "Because of the two of you, Gryffindor is at the bottom of the House Cup again!"
But it wasn't only the points that upset her. She was also angry that they'd ignored their own safety and done something so reckless.
"You—you!" Ron stammered, too angry to finish.
Seeing this, Harry quickly changed the subject.
"Hermione, the professor should be here any moment. Let's keep our voices down. If he hears us, we might lose more points."
Hermione turned her head away with a huff, but said nothing more.
Harry glanced at his sulking friends on both sides and shifted in his seat, feeling increasingly uneasy.
He couldn't stand the atmosphere and grabbed at a random topic. "What do you think the new professor will be like?"
Hermione hadn't wanted to speak, but this was something she was curious about too. "I don't know, but I think he might be a very cold person."
She thought of the textbook she'd tried to preview over the summer.
"Have you read Blood and Tears: On Magical Injuries? Merlin's beard, it felt like it was teaching me how to become a murderer!"
She couldn't help complaining. It was the first textbook she hadn't managed to finish studying during the holidays—the descriptions were simply too much.
Harry nodded in deep agreement. After reading it, he finally understood why Mrs. Weasley had complained nonstop about the new professor.
Still, despite agreeing with Hermione, he felt a strange sense of anticipation about this class.
Maybe children just liked things that felt more adult.
In sharp contrast to Harry's anticipation was Neville, sitting in the back row, pale-faced and visibly anxious about the lesson.
At that moment—Malfoy arrived as usual with his two cronies, swaggering in.
Hearing their conversation, he seized the chance to sneer loudly. "Hah, no surprise a Muggle-born wizard would be such a coward."
Harry bristled. "Malfoy! We're talking. What does it have to do with you?"
He still remembered the house-elf who had caused chaos at his aunt's house, and the more he thought about it, the more certain he became that Malfoy was behind it.
The two locked eyes and exchanged a few sharp remarks, the tension thickening by the second.
Then—
Click.
The door suddenly opened.
"I think I heard people arguing in here. That's not very nice. Why not just have a fight instead?"
The classroom instantly fell silent.
Harry looked up and saw a young man with flaxen hair and grey eyes.
"That's Professor Hickman," Hermione whispered, reminding Harry, who hadn't attended the feast the night before.
Dawn Richter, dressed in a plain black robe and carrying a suitcase, walked into the classroom. The moment he entered, he saw two people arguing, exactly as he'd expected.
He set the suitcase down on the lectern.
Looking at the suddenly quiet classroom and the gazes filled with awe, Dawn felt a subtle thrill rise within him.
He narrowed his eyes and tapped the desk lightly. "If you don't intend to come to blows, Mr. Malfoy, would you kindly return to your seat?"
"…Yes, Professor."
Draco immediately lowered his head and hurried back to his seat with his two followers.
Harry guiltily avoided the professor's gaze.
So this was the happiness Snape enjoyed every day?
For a fleeting moment, Dawn truly experienced the pleasure of authority and status, and couldn't help curling his lips into a grin.
With a casual swipe of his finger through the air, glowing letters appeared.
"First, introductions. My name is Leia Hickman, and I will be your Defence Against the Dark Arts professor this year."
He continued, "To be clear, I allow quiet discussion during class. However, if anyone disrupts order excessively, I will ask them to leave."
He swept his gaze from left to right across the students. Seeing that they'd taken it in, he nodded slightly.
"Alright. Enough chatter. Let's begin our first lesson of the term. Oh—no need for that. Gentlemen, please put your books away."
He stopped them from instinctively reaching for their textbooks.
"They are useful, but in this first lesson, rather than cramming in a bit more knowledge, I believe it's more important that you understand why Defence Against the Dark Arts matters."
As he spoke, he opened the clasps on his suitcase and lifted the lid. Because of the angle, the students below couldn't see what was inside.
Dawn smiled faintly.
"I have a question for you all. How much value do you think you have? Or rather, how much value does a young wizard have?"
"Value?" Hermione raised her hand. "Professor, do you mean contributions to the wizarding world?"
"No. I'm not talking about abstract value. I mean something more concrete. Something tied to money."
Seeing their confusion, Dawn paused. "Alright. Maybe words aren't enough. Let me show you something real."
He reached into the suitcase and pulled out a jar filled with clear liquid.
The students leaned forward, curious.
The next instant—
Boom!
It was like a silent thunderclap.
The classroom erupted.
Because inside the jar—
A bright red heart was beating up and down.
For eleven- and twelve-year-olds, the impact was overwhelming.
"Th-this… this is fake, right?" Ron murmured, no longer thinking about the Howler, his eyes glued to the heart.
"It has to be fake!" Hermione stiffened, trying to reason it out.
"Maybe it's a model made with Transfiguration—think about it, no professor would bring something like that into a classroom!"
Harry's mouth opened and closed, but no words came out. Draco stared in shock, while Neville covered his eyes in terror.
Dawn spoke calmly. "This is the heart of a ten-year-old wizard. I bought it in Egypt some time ago.
During a magical surge, the child was discovered by Dark wizards and dismembered into materials."
"Now, I'd like you to guess. How much do you think this heart is worth?"
The noise in the classroom gradually faded.
The students instinctively pressed hands to their chests. The idea that a beating heart could be tied to money sent a chill through them.
"You don't know? Then I'll tell you. Thirteen hundred Galleons."
Dawn's voice was soft. "In other words, killing a young wizard guarantees at least thirteen hundred Galleons. If you include the other parts, it's worth even more."
Thirteen hundred Galleons.
Hermione swallowed. After a year in the wizarding world, she had a rough sense of prices. She knew just how enormous that sum was.
She couldn't accept it. "Professor… why? Why would a wizard's heart be worth so much?"
"Because of the Life Draught."
Life Draught?
The students looked at one another. No one had ever heard of it.
"It's a potion primarily used for treatment.
It can't cure conditions completely, but whether the damage comes from curses or Dark magic, it can greatly alleviate the effects."
Dawn explained, then reached into the suitcase again and placed a crystal vial filled with liquid on the lectern.
He didn't say it outright, but everyone knew what it was.
The pale red potion was clear and beautiful, like a ruby.
Paired with Dawn's explanation, several students clapped hands over their mouths, on the verge of retching.
A potion made from a wizard's heart.
"When you brew potions in class using herbs and magical creature parts, perhaps you've never considered that wizards themselves are also materials."
"Gentlemen, wizards are very useful."
Dawn didn't give them time to recover and continued.
"A wizard's blood promotes the growth of most magical plants.
A wizard's bones are excellent magical conduits in alchemy. They're not as effective as mithril, but they're far cheaper.
There are even rumors that if a wizard uses their own bones as a wand core, the resulting wand will be more compatible with them."
"As for eyes, their uses are numerous—potion brewing, alchemical materials, and many other applications.
In certain curse rituals, they are absolutely indispensable."
Like a dissection, Dawn described wizards as materials, detailing the uses of each part.
The students sat stiffly, unsure how to react, feeling phantom pains all over their bodies.
Hermione kept muttering under her breath, "This is too much… too much… how can a professor talk about things like this in class?"
Dawn tapped the desk again, drawing their attention back.
"Before this course truly begins, you need to understand something. Danger is never far from you. Many people covet what you are.
Knockturn Alley has existed for a very long time, and the Ministry has never successfully eradicated it.
Dark wizards who enjoy experimenting on Muggles and their own kind live right among you."
Harry swallowed, recalling the heads and bones he'd seen when he'd wandered into Knockturn Alley.
"Of course, Britain is relatively safer.
Because of the Book of Admittance, every child's name is recorded after their first magical surge.
The risk of acting is much higher.
So persecution of young wizards here isn't too severe. But in backward or war-torn regions, the bodies of young wizards already have fixed prices."
Dawn paused.
"I've studied British history. You may believe that after the fall of the Dark Lord, everything became peaceful.
But danger doesn't come only from war.
Once you graduate and enter society, as you deal with more people, you'll encounter danger—and ill intent—more and more often."
"Take curse-breakers in Egypt. Do you know why they're always recruiting? Because every year, at least twenty percent of them die."
Ron's face suddenly went pale. He thought of his brother who worked as a curse-breaker at Gringotts.
"Even pure-blood families that control vast resources can be pushed to the brink of collapse if they lack the strength to deal with danger.
An eleven-year-old wizard alone can be enough to doom them."
Malfoy's face twitched as he recalled what his father had said about the Avery family.
"Gentlemen! The wizarding world has never known absolute peace.
How long you survive in this dangerous world depends on how much you gain from Defence Against the Dark Arts."
After a round of dire warnings, Dawn looked at their frightened yet attentive faces and nodded in satisfaction.
He would never admit he was inferior to anyone—especially when it came to motivating students.
With that thought, he delivered his closing statement.
"This year, in addition to teaching you how to defend yourselves against magical creatures and plants, I will also teach you truly lethal spells—and how to deal with them."
___________
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