"The best assignment this time goes to... Draco Malfoy. Everyone, give Draco a round of applause!"
At the end of class, Kayson announced the name of the young wizard with the best-completed assignment and took the lead in applauding.
This assignment also made Kayson discover that Draco possessed another talent besides Quidditch.
The boy's talent for alchemy seemed almost absurdly strong.
Leaving aside the ordinary overachievers like Hermione and the vast sea of Ravenclaws, even Neville, who had taken alchemy for half a term ahead of everyone else, had not done his assignment as well as Draco.
His alchemy skill even rivaled that of young wizards at the beginning of their fourth year.
The classroom soon filled with halfhearted applause, and Kayson pressed both hands down in the air.
The applause immediately stopped. Kayson rubbed his fingers together. From his place at the podium, he had seen the applause just now perfectly clearly.
All the Slytherins had applauded. That was within his expectations. The Hufflepuffs and the Ravenclaws, who did not like offending people, had applauded normally too. That was still reasonable. But Gryffindor...
There was no need for any uncertain wording. There had been none. Not a single one.
Somewhat helpless, he clapped his hands and called out, "All right, young wizards, please be rational. This isn't the House Cup, nor is it the Great Hall, so could you please set aside the prejudices between your houses for now and take off your house robes?"
The young wizards looked at one another. In the end, a group of Hufflepuffs and the four Gryffindor youngsters took the lead in removing their house robes.
"All right, what about the rest of you? Is it very cold in here?"
The remaining young wizards quickly took off their house robes as well, albeit