In the Harry Potter Without Harry Potter

Chapter 29: Mrs Weasley's Gift Box

After Halloween had passed, the temperature in England had dropped significantly.

Hogwarts prepared winter coats for the students, and although the wagon is constantly moving around in exile, living supplies are not scarce.

The fireplaces in the common room were all warmed up too, and Jon and the class were working on their charms class homework there.

Well, to be precise, it was Neville and the three of them who were writing, while Jon was helping them by answering their doubts.

Ron gripped his quill and couldn't even able to put together a single sentence over half a day, he looked at the five or six inches of blank space remaining on the parchment to meet the requirements, and he couldn't help but look at Jon pleadingly.

"Show me your finished homework for reference, Jon, I'll just glance at it, without copying it as it is, it's simply to get some ideas."

To which Jon merely refused in a firm tone.

"Don't even think about it, don't forget what Professor Flitwick told you and me last time in private, you only used it as a model for the last homework too, but the professor still found out about it, if you get caught once more, both you and I will have to write the homework you copied ten times."

"You should better write it yourself, Ron, even if Jon could give you the homework to copy now, can you expect him to write it for you when you take the charms class exam?" Neville also quipped in a serious tone.

"Okay, okay, stop your lecturing, I'll write it myself."

Ron sighed and returned his attention to the parchment with a sad face.

It wasn't that he couldn't really write at all, there were no stupid people in the Weasley family, it was just that he just couldn't focus his mind on something like writing homework or studying.

As the new students spent more time together, they had become much closer than they had been at the beginning of the school year; after all, none of the five has any bad personality.

Although Jon didn't talk much at the beginning, he was always a reliable source of help to the others, both in their studies and in general, which led to him being at the centre of the circle, and even when Neville was unsure about something, he was always the one to help out.

Halloween is widely celebrated in the UK, but for safety reasons, the wagon did not stop at a fixed location for the Halloween feast, instead, the great hall was decorated, and a feast was served inside the wagon.

The passing of Halloween means the arrival of the Christmas season, the most important holiday for all Westerners, is just a month and a half away.

The mood inside Hogwarts became increasingly relaxed, with both the older and younger students looking forward to where Hagrid would take them for the Christmas feast this year.

The attack in September was rarely talked about by students or professors anymore, and it was clearly fading into oblivion for most in the wagon, with only a handful of people still remembering it all the time.

Jon's progress in learning the Occlumency under Slughorn was also steadily advancing forward.

He showed a high degree of talent and his progress was not slow, regardless of whether he was learning those basic magic spells and transfiguration in class or more advanced magic like Occlumency. Slughorn even deduced by his progress that he would be able to officially start teaching him about the spellcasting techniques associated with that ring before Christmas was over, and the year ended.

Just as Jon and the group were catching up on their homework, Filch, who always looked at everyone with a nasty look, came into the common room at some point and walked right up to the square table where Jon and the four of them were and placed a large brown cardboard box in front of Ron's body.

"Here's some stuff your family sent you, Professor McGonagall asked me to bring it over to you. Remember which things are not allowed to be carried around according to the school rules and if there's anything prohibited inside this box, hand it over to me immediately! Or I'll show you what you're made of!"

After saying these threatening words, he left with a stinky face, occasionally looking back towards the box in front of Ron as he walked away as if he wanted to see him open it and make sure there was nothing prohibited inside.

When Filch had completely left the common room, Ron made a face toward the door.

"'Or I'll show you what you're made of!'" He exaggeratedly mimicked the manner in which Filch had just spoken, "He's so annoying, isn't he?"

Justin nodded in agreement; he was just punished the other day for accidentally tripping and spilling ink all over the long corridor.

"He never failed to act according to the rules, despite the fact that he was indeed strict and vicious." Neville reassured.

Lavender, on the other hand, looked at the cardboard box in front of Ron with some anticipation.

"Come on, open it and see what your family has sent you!"

"It must just be some food Mum personally made along with letters telling me to do well in my studies at school, without fooling around like Fred and George, and to use Percy as a role model."

Ron muttered as he opened the cardboard box, and inside there was a large packet of homemade chocolates, and a box of brown fudge, with a letter on top of the fudge box.

He took the letter out and then unwrapped the sweets straight away ready to hand them out to Jon and the rest of the gang.

"Come on, try them all, my mum actually has always been a pretty good cook, although she doesn't get the chance to cook any extravagant feasts."

They were all quite ordinary, but there was a clear look of envy on Justine and Lavender's faces.

Even if it was simple, it was something made for Ron by his mother's own hands; the fact that one of their parents had fled to Iceland to escape the Ministry of Magic, and that the other's memory of even having a child like him had been erased, made them feel what considered as a trivial thing to Ron, a luxury to them.

The attentive Jon sensed the change of emotion in both of them and reached out to take the chocolate as well as the fudge to distribute.

"Both look good, so it ought to taste great."

With the tacit agreement, Neville also changed the subject to something else.

"I've been to Ron's house before and Mrs Weasley and Mr Weasley were both very nice people to be around."

"They just act all nice and easy around the other kids, just ask George and Fred, I don't know how many times both of them have been taught lessons by mum." Ron said as he looked at the letter, "Sure enough it's just as I guessed, Mum's once again telling me to learn from Percy properly."

While Jon was distributing the sweets, he suddenly noticed a thick layer of newspaper padded at the bottom of the cardboard box that Mrs Weasley had sent to Ron.

The front page photo of the newspaper showed people who could move around just like in the video, and a young man he knew very well, was smiling gently at him with a distinctive badge pinned on his chest.

With a slight gaze, Jon reached down and took the paper out of the cardboard box, and right above the photo was the headline of this front-page article.

[Professor of Hogwarts Charms Class, Special Inspector of the Ministry of Magic, and Outstanding Young Wizard of the Late Twentieth Century - Barty Crouch Awarded with Second Class of the Order of Merlin]

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