"What are you doing?! Get your hands off him!"
Seeing Vane suddenly pounce on Wentworth, Cedric finally snapped out of it. He hurried forward, furious, and shoved Vane off Wentworth.
At the same time, everyone finally saw who had stopped Vane earlier. It was none other than this year's new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Professor Ilona.
Professor Ilona strode over, blazing with anger. She glared at Vane and asked coldly:
"What were you trying to do just now?"
Vane hurriedly tried to explain, but before he could get a word out, Ilona said viciously:
"Slytherin, thirty points deducted!"
That was too much for Vane. He protested indignantly:
"Professor Ilona, you can't only take points from Slytherin! What about them?!"
Vane pointed at the Hufflepuff and Gryffindor students nearby, but Ilona didn't even glance at them. Instead, she continued:
"Questioning a professor? Slytherin, ten more points deducted!"
At that, Vane and the other Slytherin students finally understood how the other houses usually felt when they were dealing with Professor Snape.
Just then, Professors Snape, McGonagall, and the others finally arrived. It wasn't only the professors who had been alerted; even Hogwarts Headmaster Dumbledore had been roused. After all, nothing like this had happened at Hogwarts in many years.
Seeing his Head of House arrive, Vane immediately went to complain:
"Professor Snape, Hufflepuff and Gryffindor teamed up to bully us Slytherins! You have to stand up for us!"
At Vane's words, Coke, the Weasley twins, and the others all stepped forward and shouted:
"Bullshit!"
Then everyone crowded around their respective Heads of House and began talking over one another, each airing their grievances. It was a complete case of conflicting accounts.
Only the Ravenclaw students gathered around Professor Flitwick, happily watching the spectacle.
Seeing the scene descend into chaos, with matters only getting worse, Dumbledore raised his voice:
"Silence! Don't any of you have classes to attend? If I remember correctly, this morning's lessons are about to begin!"
"Now, those whose names I call will come with me to the Headmaster's Office. Everyone else, return to class at once!"
Dumbledore then called out the names of Vane and Coke, the two Prefects, along with the Weasley twins from Gryffindor, and led them away.
"All right, since you're all here, that saves me the trouble. Everyone, follow me. Let's go!"
Professor Ilona saw that the Hufflepuff and Slytherin first-years were all present, so she directed them toward Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Cassandra hadn't forgotten Wentworth. She hurried ahead and followed Ilona toward the classroom, shooting Wentworth a vicious glare as she passed.
When they reached the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, everyone was surprised to find that all the desks and chairs had been cleared out.
As everyone looked around in confusion, Ilona said:
"This is my first time teaching, so I'm not sure how to conduct a lesson. But I believe one thing: practice is the key to learning Defense Against the Dark Arts! I believe that practical experience is a student's best teacher!"
At Professor Ilona's words, some people exchanged looks, while others grew eager to try. Wentworth, meanwhile, looked thrilled!
After all, he'd been looking forward to learning magic for ages! Just then, Wentworth felt someone staring intensely at him. He followed the gaze and saw Cassandra watching him closely.
Thinking back to Ilona's words about practical experience, Wentworth suddenly had a bad feeling.
While Wentworth and the others were heading to the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, Dumbledore was leading Coke and the others to his office. Professor McGonagall, Hogwarts' deputy headmistress, was also with them, as she had no classes that morning.
Along the way, Coke kept complaining about how awful Vane's behavior had been when he led Slytherin in surrounding the Hufflepuff first-years.
Vane, meanwhile, kept denouncing how shameless Hufflepuff and Gryffindor had been to team up against Slytherin.
The Weasley twins, for their part, said excitedly that it had been brilliant fun!
But Dumbledore remained silent the entire way.
Once they entered the Headmaster's Office, Dumbledore led everyone straight to the Pensieve. He took out his wand and asked expressionlessly:
"Who wants to go first?"
The students exchanged glances.
After extracting everyone's memories, Dumbledore let them leave!
As the greatest white wizard of all time, Dumbledore had already outlasted two Dark Lords. He wasn't about to take anyone's word at face value.
His method was simple and effective: extract their memories and judge for himself.
After watching the memories of all four, Dumbledore fell into thought and remained silent.
"Dumbledore? What is it? What actually happened?"
At last, Professor McGonagall, who had been waiting nearby, lost patience and asked.
Dumbledore stepped aside, inviting Professor McGonagall to watch for herself.
After viewing the four students' memories, Professor McGonagall frowned and said:
"It looks like the Slytherins really were the ones who started it. Professor Ilona was right to take points from them."
Dumbledore slowly shook his head and replied:
"That's not what concerns me."
Hearing Dumbledore's words, Professor McGonagall, his longtime friend and colleague, quickly understood what he meant. She ventured:
"You're concerned about Wentworth?"
Dumbledore slowly nodded. Seeing this, Professor McGonagall sighed in agreement:
"That's right. I'd already seen his gift for speaking at the Sorting Ceremony, and this astonishing ability to sway people is just like the Gellert of the rumors!"
"I never imagined that in just a few days, Wentworth would have changed Hufflepuff's style so completely. Hufflepuffs in the past would never have done anything like this! I suppose it's only natural, given the blood of the Grindelwald Family."
But Professor McGonagall's words drew no response. Dumbledore seemed lost in thought.
"What? Was I wrong?"
Seeing this, Professor McGonagall asked curiously.
Dumbledore slowly nodded and said:
"You're right about all of that, but it was to be expected, wasn't it? What really concerns me is how Wentworth differs from Gellert!"
"If most of the people who gathered around Gellert back then were elite Pure-blood wizards, then Wentworth is already consciously placing himself among the much larger group of Half-blood wizards!"
"Wentworth is making the Acolytes more inclusive! And that means they'll surely become even stronger than before!"
Before you continue