Come On! Experience Speed and Passion!

Chu Yao, Harry, Ron, and a few other first-years greeted Hagrid, who was carrying a lantern and looked like a small mountain, then boarded a boat that looked rather old.

Each boat could hold about three to five people. Surprisingly, there were no oars aboard.

"Everyone aboard?" Hagrid called. He had a boat all to himself. "All right then... forward!"

As though they had heard the command, all the boats glided away from shore at once, smoothly and silently, without anyone rowing, and headed toward the castle across the lake.

Oh? Automatic navigation? So it really was the power of magic.

Let her see how it worked.

Chu Yao's curiosity was piqued.

She quietly extended a strand of her divine sense, enveloping the boat beneath her.

She sensed that the inside of the hull was engraved with extremely faint but smoothly functioning magic patterns. Like intricate circuitry, they absorbed some kind of energy from the lake water to propel the boat forward.

The design was clever enough, but the efficiency... was a little low.

How was this speed any different from a swan boat in a park?

She thought the pace was far too "leisurely."

How could it be worthy of her, a sword cultivator?

A mischievous thought stirred. She reached out her index finger and lightly tapped the gunwale beneath her, as if by accident. A wisp of exceptionally pure, gentle spiritual power flowed from her fingertip into the magic patterns in the hull. Rather than damaging them, it was like filling an old engine with high-efficiency fuel and optimizing the paths along which the energy flowed.

The next second.

"Whoosh—!"

The boat they were riding in seemed to sprout a rocket booster in an instant. Its bow jerked upward, and then, like an arrow loosed from a bow, it cut through the pitch-black water and raced toward the castle on the far shore at a wild speed utterly unlike that of the other boats!

A trail of white spray even rose behind the stern!

Come on! Experience speed and passion!

"Waaah!"

"What's happening?!"

"Merlin!"

The other young wizards in the boat shrieked at the sudden acceleration and clung to the gunwales for dear life.

Harry and Ron also looked stunned. Only Chu Yao, the one responsible, remained seated steadily, gazing at the rapidly approaching castle with a touch of innocence and curiosity on her face, as though marveling at how fast the boat was.

(The young wizards' inner thoughts: Has this boat gone mad?!)

(Harry's inner thoughts: Chu Yao again? It must be her!)

(Ron's inner thoughts: I'm never riding in the same boat as her again! This is way too intense!)

While the other boats were still slowly "admiring" the castle's reflection in the night from the middle of the lake, Chu Yao's "express train" had already bumped lightly into the lakeside dock with a clunk, becoming the first and only boat to arrive so far ahead of the others.

Still shaken, the young wizards aboard climbed out on unsteady limbs. When they looked at the other boats still drifting slowly along behind them, and at Professor McGonagall standing before them, her expression stern and her lips pressed into a thin line, they were all dumbfounded.

Professor McGonagall had evidently noticed something was amiss and hurried out of the castle.

Her sharp gaze swept swiftly over the students who had arrived early, finally settling on Chu Yao, the only one who was perfectly composed, as though she had just taken a ride on a merry-go-round.

That Eastern girl again!

She'd heard on the train that the girl had used some strange Eastern magic. This had to be her doing too!

She immediately stepped forward and carefully examined the boat, which was still rocking slightly. She tapped it repeatedly with her wand and even bent down to inspect the part beneath the water.

However, the magic patterns in the hull were intact and functioning normally, with no sign of forcible alteration or damage.

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