In the Harry Potter Without Harry Potter

Chapter 315: Nick's Show-off

"So if Gabrielle goes to a magic school in the future, will the entrance be based on the age of her soul or the age of her body?"

Lily gave no clear answer to this question of his, shaking her head.

"There's no precedent for this, but if we were to go by the normal Hogwarts admissions criteria of recruiting students at the age of eleven, it would depend on her mental age."

Just as they were talking, Nick's body, which had taken on a greyish shade of white, began to lighten up noticeably.

The effect of the potion Lily had prepared was immediate and the petrification was being successively reversed.

As she waited for Nick to recover, Lily did not forget to look at the leaf of mandrake in Jon's hand and cautioned.

"If you are going to try to learn Animagus, you better do it under the guidance of Professor McGonagall, this type of magic is dangerous and there are many kinds of failures in history."

"Don't worry, I'll take care of myself, Professor."

Although Jon's words were laced with assurance, he had no real intention of going to McGonagall.

After all, the Animagus form he was about to complete was different from a normal wizard's, and there was no way to offer much help unless it was from someone who knew about this ring he held.

Soon the changes in Nick's body became more and more apparent, the greyish-white hue had completely faded from his body and the expression of horror that had been on his face gradually began to loosen as his mind regained control of his soul.

The first thing Nick did after recovering from his petrified state was to float up from his hospital bed.

He looked at Jon with a smug look on his face.

"Seventeen shots! I've been counting all along! That's 17 in total!"

Even in his petrification, he still maintained his awareness of the outside world, knowing full well what both he and Jon had been through.

Lily gathered the materials on the table, a little confused by the number Nick had uttered.

"Seventeen shots of what?"

Jon covered his forehead.

"Seventeen killing curses."

Hearing his words, Lily guessed what it meant with just a brief thought.

"You used the petrified Nick as a shield?"

"Hey! Jon was a genius! We both worked so well together, I helped him to form an absolute defence and he did the attacking! We beat countless adversaries in that labyrinth!"

Nick was clearly excited.

He didn't mind the fact that he was being used as a shield against a killing curse, ghosts were in such a state that they couldn't die again no matter what happened to them, but following Jon on this adventure was definitely exciting, enough for him to use as capital to brag about later in front of the other young wizards.

Lily seemed to have a strong desire to gush out at Jon for his whimsy.

"That's really something you wouldn't normally think of."

A newly recovered Nick was visibly a little agitated; according to his description, being petrified felt like being shoved into an extremely confined space, unable to budge his entire body or move a single muscle, and it was unbearable.

Once recovered, he couldn't stop floating around in mid-air for a while, which was followed by leaving Lily's office and going on a tour around this makeshift school.

Jon also said goodbye to Lily and waited until nightfall, and after seeing a full moon rise in the sky, he put the piece of mandrake leaf in his mouth and put it under his tongue to prevent it from being inadvertently swallowed.

Yet Jon still underestimated the difficulty of learning the Animagus.

The leaf remained in his mouth for less than three days before it was accidentally swallowed with milk in the middle of breakfast.

After finishing the milk, Jon was frozen, clearly aware of the sensation of the leaf that he had been holding for three whole days sliding down his throat.

Hermione, who was sitting right next to him, saw the look on his face and couldn't help but ask curiously.

"What's wrong?"

Jon wasn't much discouraged, it was only the first step, and there was nothing toxic about the mandrake leaves, so even if he ate them it wouldn't be a big deal.

"Nothing. By the way, what were you guys talking about yesterday." He changed the subject.

Ron raised a copy of the Starlight newspaper in his hand.

"The Quidditch World Cup that was originally scheduled for this year has been postponed, supposedly the final of the game was initially going to be held in Britain, but apparently the current circumstances aren't suitable. So they've postponed the game to next summer, and if there are any more surprises, they'll probably have to change the venue."

Jon took the newspaper from him and sure enough saw the news on it about the Quidditch World Cup being postponed.

It couldn't be helped, given the current situation in Europe, the Quidditch tournament couldn't be held even if it wasn't in Britain, for one thing, the teams from two countries, Britain and France, couldn't take part, and that included their nearby countries such as Ireland, Spain, Switzerland and so on, who were also affected.

It would be safest to wait until next year, when that bet on the outcome of the Triwizard Tournament would be available, which all of Europe is paying attention to, before considering whether to still hold the competition.

Hanton said with some regret.

"I was looking forward to seeing the teams showing their superior skills at the World Cup, but it seems we'll have to wait until next year."

He had been a little envious of the Quidditch games played by the purebloods when he was at Hogwarts Castle before, and some time ago at Durmstrang Hanton finally got the chance to actually get his hands on a flying broomstick for once.

And Ron, being an avid fan, who had been secretly taken to some Quidditch League games by Arthur with some of his brothers when there was a chance, had told Hanton quite a bit about the team and some of the expert technical moves on the pitch.

Jon had little interest in Quidditch as a sport.

Since he would have been able to fly straight up without relying on a flying broom in the first year, his wishes to attempt to ride a broom were cut off from the very start.

"Nick has been bragging about his experience with you at the North Pole to everyone he meets for the past two days."

Ron said with a look of envy.

"It's a shame we didn't tag along on that last trip."

"There was nothing to feel pity about, it was really too dangerous there." Jon said shaking his head, "It involved more element of luck to get out of there in the end, if Nick hadn't happened to be petrified and could be able to block the killing curse, then I might have given up and taken Gabrielle to return earlier."

Jon was telling the truth, that cramped space was too restrictive for him, if it wasn't for Nick he would have probably been killed by the killing curse.

After breakfast was over Jon made another trip to Lily's office and asked for a fresh blade of mandrake from her and put it back in his mouth.

This time he paid more attention to it, deliberately suppressing the blade whenever he happened to use his mouth, and these days Hermione and the others didn't fail to be surprised by the fact that his accent had become slurred when he spoke.

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