Hermione's little face was drawn tight. Right now, she had plenty of complaints about Professor Quirrell.
Back in the library, she had read the same book on the Swamp Spell that Kane had been studying.
The entire book was nothing but theory. There wasn't a single practical instruction for actually casting the spell.
And what Professor Quirrell had just taught them was essentially that same theory broken down and explained in detail. The knowledge certainly went into her head, but it was like being told one plus one without ever being given the equals sign.
There was simply no way to arrive at two.
If Hermione hadn't already read that book, Professor Quirrell probably would have fooled her completely.
Still, now that Kane had been called up too, this worked out rather nicely.
Once he failed to cast the spell, he could go complain to Dumbledore or that absurdly powerful backer of his. Then Professor Quirrell's disgusting habit of only teaching half the material would naturally be dealt with.
Thinking like that was admittedly a tiny bit mean-spirited, but she really didn't have any other options.
Sob, sob...
Kane himself, meanwhile, was wearing an expression of pure suffering.
He didn't care at all about going up and demonstrating the spell.
What bothered him was the utterly indescribable smell coming from Professor Quirrell.
Still, if Quirrell could maintain this level of teaching every lesson, Kane would be willing to put up with it a little.
Kane stepped onto the platform, instinctively keeping a healthy distance between himself and Professor Quirrell.
A gray-white glow spread from his wand.
Almost instantly, a patch of strange dark-gray swamp appeared across the platform, covered in eerie patterns and bubbling ominously.
Quirrell stared at it in surprise.
To complete his master's task, he had deliberately shown off his expertise while withholding the spell's most crucial details. The whole point was to make sure Kane couldn't actually learn it, so that after class he would come ask Quirrell for private instruction.
And yet now...
Was this how the script was supposed to go?
*Master, why don't I simply ask Kane to stay after class?* Quirrell quietly asked Voldemort in his mind.
*Find another opportunity. If you deliberately keep Kane behind, you may attract Dumbledore's attention too soon.*
And so Professor Quirrell wept bitterly on the inside while forcing a delighted expression onto his face.
He led the whole classroom in applauding Kane and awarded him five points.
Hermione's clapping came half a beat late.
Hermione: ???
Hermione fell silent.
Hermione thought.
Hermione understood.
Hermione accepted reality.
She suddenly felt as though she had uncovered several truths that were difficult to accept.
For example, perhaps Professor Quirrell only teaching half the material wasn't because he lacked ability or had terrible professional ethics.
Perhaps he had been instructed to do so.
Artificially creating a gap between ordinary young wizards and young wizard "Celestial Dragons"...
Hiss.
So this was how the game of social class could be played?
Kane scratched his head strangely as he returned to his seat.
Why did Hermione's eyes look red?
Had she been secretly crying?
That didn't seem likely.
Maybe she really just had pink eye.
Before long, the bell rang.
Kane told Harry and Ron to grab him some food when dinner came around, then headed straight for the eighth floor. He planned to ask Dumbledore for a Mandrake.
After knocking, Kane pushed open the door to Dumbledore's office and caught him awkwardly slipping a crystal ball beneath his desk.
Dumbledore looked up at him.
"Is there a problem?"
"Not really. It's about the Mandrakes. Didn't you ask me to transform fifteen of them for you every month? I want one extra."
"Of course. That won't be a problem, provided you don't use that Pan Flute you mentioned, the one capable of putting creatures to sleep, for anything improper."
Dumbledore led Kane out onto the balcony of his office, where fifteen pots of Mandrakes were waiting.
"You may simply take one when you're finished. To tell the truth, insomnia isn't always entirely unpleasant. It gives me time to think through many things."
Dumbledore smiled.
"Thanks."
Kane got to work transforming the Mandrakes with his shadows.
Before long, all fifteen were finished.
Without the slightest hesitation, he yanked one straight out of its pot.
The Mandrake kicked its legs twice in midair and promptly died.
Kane stuffed it into his pocket.
He was still wondering how to bring up the next subject when Dumbledore beat him to it.
"What do you think of Professor Quirrell?"
"He smells pretty bad, listening to him talk feels like chewing something that sticks to your teeth, and I don't understand why his first lesson was so sloppy when the one we just had suddenly became so much better. Even then, it felt like he was still holding something back. Honestly, I feel like he isn't earning the salary Hogwarts pays him."
Kane dumped out everything he thought in one breath.
"Ah. That is quite simple." Dumbledore looked thoughtful. "When explaining the Swamp Spell, he gave you a great deal of broad theory, but withheld its true essence. Perhaps he hoped some young wizard might approach him afterward and ask questions."
"Can people who speak in riddles please stop becoming headmasters?"
Kane stared at Dumbledore speechlessly.
"Would it kill you to just say what you mean?"
The world progressed so slowly, and in such ridiculous spirals, precisely because people like Dumbledore insisted on speaking in riddles.
"All right, all right. Personally, I currently have very little trust in Professor Quirrell. I do not believe he is a good man, and therefore I believe it would be prudent to keep him under appropriate observation."
As Dumbledore spoke, he pulled a fiery red feather from his desk.
"Find a way to leave this feather in his office. I imagine Professor Quirrell would be quite pleased to receive a gift from such a remarkably talented young wizard."
He handed the feather to Kane.
Kane accepted it.
"This has that surveillance magic of yours on it, right? If I use my shadows to change its form, will the magic remain?"
"Why not try?"
Kane nodded.
As his shadows seeped into the feather, its form gradually changed into that of a Crimson Feather from the Constant.
Dumbledore nodded.
"The magic remains."
"Then there's no problem."
Kane stuffed the feather back into his pocket.
"I need another red feather like that one, three black feathers, and a real swamp."
Dumbledore handed him the additional feathers while thinking.
Before long, a place came to mind.
"There actually is a swamp inside the Forbidden Forest."
He extended a hand toward Kane.
"Prepare yourself. Apparition, you know the routine."
The instant Kane placed his hand on Dumbledore's, the two of them appeared deep inside the Forbidden Forest.
One more step forward and Kane would have been standing in the swamp.
He stomped his foot.
Shadows spread forward, and before long the swamp had transformed into a strange gray-white expanse covered in bubbling pools.
Kane stepped onto it.
Almost immediately, a horrifying tentacle erupted from the swamp.
Just as it was about to lash him, a shadow tentacle shot out and wrapped itself around it.
The two tentacles twisted around each other like strands of rope, locked in a stalemate.
"Oh, so that is how it works." Dumbledore studied the swamp with fascination. "I imagine the swamp you conjure yourself can behave the same way? Hmm. Creating an area that indiscriminately attacks anything within it..."
Dumbledore gazed at the swamp in admiration.
What remarkable magic.
"Yep."
Kane withdrew his shadows, allowing the swamp to return to normal.
He now held two Tentacle Spots in his hand.
Combining them with the five feathers he had just acquired, he quickly crafted a Feather Hat that wrapped all the way around his head in an exaggerated tribal style.
To be perfectly honest, aside from restoring a pitiful amount of Sanity and attracting more birds to come crap on the wearer's head, the thing had almost no practical use.
"Professor Quirrell has spent so long pretending to be Indian, maybe he'll want to try a Native American look for a change."
Kane stuffed the Feather Hat into his pocket, planning to deliver it to Quirrell later.
"Now that I've helped you with something, if I ask you for a favor, you'd feel bad refusing me, right?"
Kane looked at Dumbledore.
"Of course."
"Do you have any Purple Gems? Red Gems or Blue Gems would work too."
"Quite an appetite." Dumbledore chuckled. "Unfortunately, that truly is beyond my ability. I could even give you the key to my vault and let you look for yourself."
As he spoke, Dumbledore actually pulled out a key and offered it to Kane.
"Forget it. You probably really don't have any."
Kane sighed.
After a moment of silence, he spoke again.
"Then do you know where there are any graves? The nearest ones?"
Dumbledore froze.
"Kane, grave robbing is illegal."
"I know. But as far as I'm aware, robbery is illegal too, so... do you know where there are any graves?"
Kane simply repeated the question.
"...Wizard graves or Muggle graves?"
In the end, Dumbledore decided to bend his principles just a little.
"Either is fine, but there need to be a lot of them. My luck isn't very good. If there aren't enough graves, I might not dig up any gems at all."
The moment Kane realized Dumbledore was actually entertaining the idea, he hurriedly added his requirements.
"The churchyard at Little Hangleton. It has been abandoned for a long time, and there are many graves there. You could take a look during the Christmas holidays."
Dumbledore paused.
He still wanted to ask what possible connection there could be between digging up graves and finding gemstones.
After thinking about it, however, he decided against it.
After all, Kane's shadows could make a lifeless swamp suddenly sprout an entire mass of tentacles.
Why couldn't they make a gemstone appear in a grave?
It was magic.
Perfectly reasonable.
Kane memorized the location and decided he would make himself a shovel and head over during the Christmas holidays.
A moment later, the two of them were back inside the castle.
Kane stood outside Professor Quirrell's office with the Feather Hat in his hands.
"He'll probably like this gift...
"And while I'm here, I can ask him about some magic too."