Tom landed steadily, with Neville lying in his arms.
Just before touching down, Tom had tossed Neville gently into the air once more and used the Floating Charm to slow their fall considerably.
Both of them were safe and sound.
"Energy dissipation! That was an incredibly refined technique!" Harry exclaimed, admiring his big brother. He wished he could reach the same level.
"Riddle! Harry! Are you both all right?!" Madam Hooch hurried over.
"We're fine, Madam Hooch." Neville wobbled as he slipped out of Tom's arms.
After taking several deep breaths and resting for a while, he turned and bowed his head slightly to Tom. "Thank you, Tom."
"It was nothing." Tom waved a hand.
As expected of the future Gryffindor Sword Saint. Though he looked like a clumsy little boy who lagged far behind his peers, he was in pretty good shape.
Even with the Floating Charm and energy dissipation to cushion the impact, they had fallen from more than ten meters up. Getting through it unharmed was no small feat.
Just then, the other students gathered around them, with the Gryffindors surrounding Tom.
They raised their hands and cheered together:
"Yeah! Let's hear it for the brave lion!"
"Tom, you're a truly brave lion! You're both capable and courageous!"
A Slytherin being surrounded and praised by Gryffindors was something that had never happened in Hogwarts history. If McGonagall and Snape had been there, they would surely have exclaimed, "What the hell?!"
"Sorry, everyone, but I'm afraid I have to rain on your parade." Madam Hooch's expression turned stern.
"You disobeyed my instructions and flew into the air, then used dangerous behavior to frighten a professor. I'm taking ten points from both Gryffindor and Slytherin." Madam Hooch put her hands on her hips.
Her heart was racing no less than Neville's had been moments ago. She had nearly lost her teaching credentials.
Though she had plenty of complaints about Hogwarts' reforms, it wasn't easy to find a job with such a generous salary these days.
"How could you~" The excited young Gryffindors let out a chorus of groans.
"Oh, no! Madam Hooch, I don't think we were to blame for this accident." Tom calmly straightened his rumpled wizard's robes, then turned to the incompetent professor.
"Let's hear your reason." Madam Hooch looked surprised. She hadn't expected a student to dare argue with a professor.
She wanted to see what excuse Tom could come up with to stop her from taking points.
"Neville took off not because he was fooling around or had lost control, but because his broom was too old. The internal flight magic malfunctioned."
"How could that be? The brooms are maintained by specialists every year. They couldn't possibly be broken. Lying to a professor isn't what a good student does." Madam Hooch's expression grew even sterner, and her opinion of Tom plummeted.
"Look. Here's the evidence." Tom said nothing more, simply pointing to the broom lying on the ground, snapped in two.
"If someone can break a broom in half with their bare hands, how could it possibly be in good condition? Even if brooms are repaired every year, their maximum durability still wears down."
"Is... is that so?" Madam Hooch froze.
Normally, that was true. But she had seen Tom training with boulders herself. It wasn't impossible that the boy could snap a broom in half with his bare hands.
"With more Flying Classes coming up, there'll surely be more accidents like this. I think you could suggest to the headmaster that the school buy a batch of new brooms."
"Well..." Madam Hooch looked tempted.
A flying broom was basically a Muggle car, and Madam Hooch was more or less a driving instructor.
What instructor didn't want to teach with good cars?
All the flying brooms the school provided were relics from a bygone era. You couldn't even find the same models in broom shops anymore.
But what kind of teaching equipment should they replace them with?
How about Nimbus 2000s?
With more Flying Classes coming up, a batch of top-of-the-line luxury brooms would make teaching more enjoyable—and give her more prestige among her colleagues.
No, a single Nimbus 2000 cost seventy-five Galleons, more than half her monthly salary. The headmaster would never agree.
Seeing that the professor was about to be convinced, Tom pressed his advantage. "Madam Hooch, you really need to think this through. Today, it was Neville who suffered a broom malfunction. Tomorrow, it could happen to a School Governor's child. If that happened, Hogwarts might lose its funding!"
The Muggle world had plenty of Commissioner Smiths. How could wizards, who shared ancestry with Muggles, have none?
As a Hogwarts professor, Madam Hooch wasn't as greedy as the real Commissioner Smiths, but she did have a few selfish motives.
"Good point. I think you're right." Madam Hooch suddenly had an idea.
That was right. The school might be short on money, but the School Governors had plenty.
The Pure-blood families, some of which had histories spanning who knew how many years, could each build a dozen Hogwarts schools with the Galleons in their vaults.
"I'm withdrawing my earlier penalty. Instead, I'm awarding ten points to the brave Slytherin. Let's give Tom a round of applause!"
The young wizards around them froze for a moment, exchanging looks. Then, one after another, they burst into cheers.
"All right, you're free to do as you like for the rest of class. And don't use your brooms for now. If I catch anyone flying without permission, I'll expel them when I get back. You'll never see Quidditch again."
After giving her instructions, Madam Hooch picked up the broken broom and hurried toward the Headmaster's Office.
She was about to become the first driving instructor in history whose students all had luxury cars, and she was understandably thrilled.
As the professor walked farther away, the young wizards grew bolder, their cheers for Tom growing more and more extravagant.
[Bravery] [Friendliness] [Innate Divine Strength]... The progress of a series of positive Personas was slowly increasing.
[Current Achievement Points: 8]
He was almost at ten. It wouldn't be long before he gained a new Persona.
Everything he'd done lately had been worth it.
"Hmph! A bunch of Mudbloods and Blood Traitors. You've never seen the world before. You're acting like fools over a few points." Draco stood apart from the crowd and let out a sour sneer.
As a Pure-blood, and a noble among Pure-bloods, he should have been the one everyone was fawning over.
Silence—
"Mudblood" and "Blood Traitor" were slurs in the wizarding world for Muggle-born wizards, Half-bloods, and wizards who were friendly toward Muggles. They were about as offensive as a broad-spectrum insult.
Except for some Slytherins, everyone clenched their fists. If fighting hadn't cost them points, the Gryffindors would have attacked him en masse.
"Pure-blood supremacy, huh..." Tom suddenly shrugged and smiled.
"What are you laughing at? I'm telling the truth. Most Half-blood and Muggle-born wizards are simply less magically gifted than Pure-bloods. Even Pure-bloods outside the Twenty-Eight Families can easily crush most Half-bloods and Muggle-born wizards!"
Draco seemed to have seized his chance and grew more confident with every word.
He folded his arms and stood in the middle of a group of Pure-bloods.
"Then... what was the price?" Tom asked slowly. "Have you forgotten what your Twenty-Eight Families sacrificed to maintain that insignificant advantage in magical talent?"
"As far as I know, the number of Pure-bloods—and even of their families—is dwindling. The Twenty-Eight Families are almost an urban legend now, aren't they? How many of them still exist? Ten?"
"Take your Malfoy family, for example. It was once a sprawling family. How many of you are still breathing now?"
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