What Is a Surprise?

Cho racked his brains but still couldn't figure out what kind of Charms he was good at.

However, after thinking for a long time, she still couldn't come up with any Charms that she was good at.

"I'm sorry," Cho said with a wry smile, "I really don't know what I'm good at."

"That's alright, Zhang," Harry said with a smile. "We can find the right Charms for you as we practice Charms."

"Is that so?" Cho asked hesitantly.

"Don't worry, Qiu." Cedric stepped forward at the right moment, hugged Cho from behind, and whispered in her ear, "Although we don't have innate Charms, we can make up for it through hard work."

"That's true," Harry agreed. "Like Dumbledore, his Charms was Transfiguration, but we can't deny his mastery of other Charms, can we?"

"Dumbledore's specialty is Transfiguration?" Cho asked in surprise. "I always thought he was a jack-of-all-trades."

"Oh, no," Harry said with a chuckle. "That's exactly it. Dumbledore's most famous Charms."

"I can vouch for Transfiguration, and Veratia can too, since I witnessed one of Veratia duels with Dumbledore."

"Miss Grindelwald, you actually managed to duel with Professor Dumbledore?"

Upon hearing this, everyone agreed.

They only knew that Miss Grindelwald was also highly skilled in Charms, but no one thought that she could compete with Dumbledore.

"So who won in the end?" As a fan of Veratia, Hermione was still very concerned about the result.

"Oh, I used a little trick," Veratia said with a grin. "I won that match using some underhanded methods. Of course, Professor Dumbledore wasn't someone I could have defeated back then."

"That's amazing!" Hermione's eyes sparkled. "My goodness, Veratia, you actually won your duel against Professor Dumbledore!"

Veratia didn't argue, in fact, both Harry and Veratia could win a duel against Dumbledore.

Especially Harry Dumbledore, who had fully activated the Philosopher's Stone: Me?

A duel with Harry?

Oh, my poor old bones still want to eat candy for a few more years.

"Of course, that's not your focus right now, Hermione." Veratia suddenly flashed a mischievous smile. "In the days to come, you won't be facing each other, nor training dummies, but an arena tailor-made for you."

"Arena?" The members of the Dueling Club were all taken aback.

No, what?

You didn't tell us about this either?

Harry knew about this, of course. He had heard Veratia talk about it while he was sleeping yesterday. It was Veratia's sudden idea.

However, they will still need to work hard to go to the Forbidden Forest or other places to find some sparring partners.

"Is he Dark Wizard?" Cedric asked fearfully.

He was a little traumatized, after all, during the last real duel, he was hit squarely by Harry's "Avada Kedavra" card's Lumos.

For a moment, he really felt like he was dying.

After all, the Lumos was so vibrant green that it was almost indistinguishable from the real thing.

"No, they're just some common Magical Creatures," Veratia said with a smile. "Of course, you'll need to Magical Creatures together to defeat them—."

"Defeat through cooperation?"

Upon hearing that it wasn't a solo victory, everyone's eyes lit up.

Only Cedric felt that it wasn't that simple, at least not as simple as Miss Grindelwald made it out to be.

"Of course, you have a week to prepare. Today—" Harry glanced at the time, "Since you're all arriving today, shouldn't you at least experience the Isle of Wight's local scenery?"

"That's wonderful." Cedric breathed a sigh of relief. For some reason, the Grim premonition in his heart grew stronger and stronger.

What kind of work will they give us this time?

Sometimes Cedric would dream of that Lumos that seemed to come flying through the air.

It's easy to imagine how much psychological trauma this thing caused him.

Do you know how much harm such a green Lumos can cause to a teenager?

However, the others didn't share this awareness; they simply thought it was fantastic to have a few days to have fun.

Ron organized a group of people to go surfing on the beach. Hermione tried to stop him several times, but she held back.

Oh well, it's not a bad thing to take advantage of the holiday and play a little longer.

"So, you've already prepared the Troll?"

On the mountaintop not far away, Pabbie watched Ron and his friends playing freely on the beach and asked Veratia without turning his head.

"Oh, we've been prepared all along," Cassandra said. "Look, don't we have a silly little Troll right here beside us?"

"Talk? Where?" Pabbie looked around at the constables.

"Behind you," Harry sighed, "You should know that this is the nickname Cassandra gave me. At the time, I always thought she was verbally bullying me."

"Oh, she's so mean," Pabbie said with a chuckle. "But—I think it's probably a nickname she gave you, if only you'd realized it sooner—"

"That won't help either." Veratia lifted her glass full of juice. "Given Cassandra's arrogant personality, I don't think she'd accept Harry —or rather, I think she'd say, 'Oh, it seems you really don't know yourself, Potter.'"

Upon hearing Veratia's words, Pabbie chuckled.

"Well, I think that's what Cassandra would say, don't I?" she said with a smile.

Cassandra stood there with her arms crossed, gazing at the azure sea, her pretty face covered in frost.

She couldn't quite remain indifferent to her two sisters' verbal teasing, but she could always suppress the urge to retort.

But then again, even if she argued back, she couldn't refute those two people.

"Regarding your question," Veratia spoke again, "the Ministry of Magic has recently captured quite a few illegally Troll Troll, just like the ones we encountered in the wild. I suspect that besides Voldemort, a new evil force is rising."

Upon hearing about the illegally modified Troll, Cassandra's little ears perked up.

"Could it be—" she squinted, "That it's Runcorn?"

"I don't know," Veratia said bluntly. "We only saw Runcorn fall, but we didn't have a chance to confirm whether he was dead because he disappeared with Harry."

"Of course," Veratia said again, "I will have someone investigate this matter, so you can rest assured."

"So now we're facing more than just that grotesque Voldemort, right?" Harry asked. "There's also an unknown enemy—so, could these two factions join forces?"

"That's beyond our knowledge, but Runcorn and Voldemort are essentially the same kind of people," Veratia said, nodding. "They foolishly pursued powers that weren't theirs—"

After spending the afternoon on the mountaintop, Harry returned to the hotel with his three girlfriends.

Veratia returned to Vienna, partly to retrieve the Troll, and partly to deal with some backlogged matters.

Meanwhile, Harry and the others, together with Sirius and his friends, marked out a piece of land in the mountains and set up Muggle Repelling Charm to prepare it as a temporary arena.

A week later, Veratia returned to Isle of Wight as promised, and the trials for the young members of the Dueling Club officially began.

"I suggest you prepare yourselves." Sirius, who already knew the details of their trial, stood on a makeshift blew-out stand not far away.

Behind him sat the parents of the Dueling Club members, some looking worried, others smiling expectantly. "I'm talking about you, Mr. Weasley."

"Don't worry, Sirius," Ron gave two thumbs up, "We've already prepared for the impending danger!"

"Good, very energetic!" Mr. Bagman, who had somehow arrived, began to act as host. "So—"—Alright, alright, let's all gather together to enjoy a wild revelry—they come from Hogwarts, mysterious and dangerous.

They were still a bit immature—oh, they were a group of students!

At this point, Mr. Bagman turned around and nodded to Sirius.

"Now entering the arena," he said reassuredly, turning back after seeing Sirius give him a thumbs-up, "Is... remarkable... amazing... spectacular...? What is this?"

Mr. Bagman looked down in surprise and found that instead of a Troll emerging from the doorway, a pig was running out.

The pig was shiny with oil, and it looked so tempting that I almost wanted some bacon.

"An greased pig? I'm starting to doubt the professionalism of this trial," Mr. Bagman exclaimed. "Well then—whoever catches this pig wins the first round!"

The students in the Dueling Club were all astonished to see the Pigwidgeon running around everywhere. No one knew why the first trial would be this thing.

"I bet Harry wants to test our improvisation skills," Hermione guessed, then reached for her wand and pointed it at the Pigwidgeon: "Accio!"

However, just as the Charms was about to reach the Pigwidgeon, a sudden flash of light appeared on the pig's body, and the Charms flew past it and went to the side.

It felt like I had actually hit something slippery.

"Looks like this is going to be tough." Ron pulled out his wand and turned to the others, saying, "Let's all attack together! I refuse to believe we can't catch this pig!"

Everyone drew their wands, and colorful Charms shot towards the pig.

It seems that the oil on the pig's body has an inhibitory effect on the Charms. After absorbing more than ten Charms, the oil on its body finally disappeared.

Cedric seized the opportunity and struck the Pigwidgeon with a Levitation Charm.

"Winguardium Leviosa!"

After being struck by the Levitation Charm, the Pigwidgeon floated up into the air, its four hooves kicking weakly in mid-air, trying to touch the ground but unable to do so.

"It seems the Potions the R&D department has been researching lately is indeed working," Veratia whispered to Harry. "It's just that this Potions —it makes you feel greasy when you apply it. I think it should be improved, so that it won't be so sticky."

"I think it works well, so that's fine." Harry wasn't too concerned about what it would feel like to apply the stuff to his body.

"Let's make some improvements," Veratia said softly. She put away the Crystal Ball and made a couple of gestures on the light screen.

"Hmm—" she said, "I've already sent the video back to Miss Farley, and I hope they can make improvements based on my suggestions."

"Well done, Cedric!" Ron clapped and praised Cedric loudly, not holding back his praise.

"Haha, I think it's because everyone used up the oil on it that could block Charms, which gave me the opportunity," Cedric said, scratching his head sheepishly. "But this thing is really amazing; it can actually block Charms..."

"I think our Charms isn't strong enough," Hermione said, offering a different perspective. "If it were Dumbledore or the Dark Lord, they could definitely penetrate this oil and hit the pig's body."

"We'd better not compare ourselves to those two," Ron said helplessly, spreading his hands. "One of them is the Dark Lord, and the other is the only wizard the Dark Lord fears—we are completely incomparable to them."

"That's true," Hermione nodded. "That's why we need to practice diligently."

"Alright."

Mr. Bagman's voice rang out at the opportune moment. "Our students have now completed the first trial. Next,..."

They're about to face—well, I think we should maintain some mystery, since you're about to meet them, it's better to give you a surprise.

"Mr. Bagman!" Seamus shouted, "What's the surprise?"

No sooner had he finished speaking than the door swung open again with a bang.

A series of heavy footsteps sounded, and it seemed as if the whole earth was trembling along with them.

"No?" Ron asked in alarm, pulling everyone to his side. "What is this thing? It sounds huge. Could it be Fire Dragon?" Hermione asked hesitantly.

"No," Ron said confidently. "I know Fire Dragon; they don't usually make that much noise when they walk."

They will soon no longer need to guess.

Because the owner of that voice had already reached the front door.

It was a Troll, its body covered in a layer of Red Metal Armor that completely concealed its vitals; in its hand it held a huge spiked club, and there was no doubt what kind of damage it would cause if it struck someone.

"My God, hell on earth!" Ron cried out in terror, "Troll! Troll!"

(Still feeling a bit dizzy... Ah, the pain.)