Please Welcome the Next Contestant

Just as the ring had said, after Halloween, Quirrell's face grew paler and paler, and his body would occasionally twitch.

But this fit Professor Quirrell's established persona perfectly, so aside from someone deliberately watching him like Tver, none of the other students noticed.

Tver, meanwhile, had also become busy with teaching. At Hogwarts, courses combining theory and practice were particularly suitable.

Especially after the students discovered that studying theory could also improve their practical ability, they began placing much greater importance on the knowledge in their textbooks.

Of course, more of his attention was focused on his own affairs—

Digesting his duel with Professor Flitwick (completed; he had experienced the unique charm of white magic and shifted part of his attention toward this area);

His weekly Transfiguration research with Dumbledore (tremendous gains; it had even caused a reaction from the badge, so he could not miss a session);

Daily private lessons for Percy and the other four (until he found his next opponent, he could treat it as lesson preparation);

Researching the essence and instincts of wizards through Neville (progress was slow, but he had already seen benefits and needed to continue);

Exploring the four elements (almost no progress; he had only found three relevant books in the Restricted Section—one he could not understand, and the other two were useless);

Research into the Unforgivable Curses (shelved!);

Wizard chess practice (he had completely surpassed Percy and could now last for over half an hour on the board);

The Magic Dot Map (the results were as expected; he needed to improve his alchemy and the map's completeness, further resolving the issue of magical flow interruptions);

Training dummies (the upper limit was obvious; without improvements, fighting those five would more or less be the limit of their strength. Shelved for now until his own understanding improved further);

Imp magic (a product of imitating ghosts; freed from the shell of the body, it seemed to possess a higher upper limit than the training dummies, so its priority had been raised);

The Philosopher's Stone theft plan (Quirrell had shifted his focus onto Snape, slowing progress once more. However, wizard chess was progressing well, so Tver could urge Quirrell along a little—lest he die before accomplishing anything. If he was going to die, he had to finish the job first).

In a little over two months, Tver had already done so many things.

Though he had grown used to this kind of busy study and research, he still felt a trace of fatigue.

Of course, that was also because the school held too many secrets, making it impossible for him to bear resting.

There was still plenty of time, and things were proceeding according to plan, so he decided to take things slowly, one step at a time.

First was the Magic Dot Map.

The map's crudity left him somewhat dissatisfied. The secret passages marked on it were only the few he had discovered himself. If Harry and the others hid in one of those passages, he would have no way of finding them.

But creating a detailed map would require spending a great deal of time investigating every detail of the castle, which was not quite worth the effort for him.

The best method was to obtain the original Marauder's Map and merge the two maps. By taking the strengths of both and making up for their weaknesses, he would naturally end up with the map that suited him best.

"Knock, knock, knock."

The knocking pulled him from his thoughts.

"Come in."

When the door opened automatically, it revealed five figures jostling one another outside.

They were Percy and the other four, here for their evening private lesson.

In the end, Percy entered first with his head held high and chest puffed out, his prefect badge gleaming brightly on his chest. Only then did the other four follow behind him on tiptoe.

Tver poured them five cups of tea. This was all he had in his office now; he had finished the pumpkin juice last night.

"I recall that the private lesson hasn't started yet. What did you come to see me about?"

George gave Percy a push from behind, making him sit down in front of Tver.

Percy took a sip of tea and said, "Since your wizard chess skills are now even better than mine, we discussed it and decided to find you a stronger opponent."

It was now approaching mid-November, and the training dummies were once again facing the risk of expiring. So they were eager to find the next useful pawn to play chess with the professor.

Tver folded the parchment in his hands.

"There's no need. That would make it seem as though I'm only giving you private lessons because of wizard chess."

Cedric and the others exchanged relieved looks.

"By the way, who did you find?"

"...Ron," Percy said helplessly after a moment of silence.

This was great!

Tver had been wondering what excuse he could use to play wizard chess with Ron legitimately.

Now Ron had practically delivered himself to his door. Wasn't that perfect?

Seeing the obvious smile on Tver's face, Percy became even more convinced of one thing—learning wizard chess well was definitely the right way to curry favor with the professor!

"Then bring Ron along with you when you come tonight."

George became anxious at that point and took a large step forward.

"Professor, what about the training dummies?"

Over the past two months, they had learned quite a few practical combat techniques from the training dummies.

Though they had all been forced to learn them, and every session ended with them being hung from the ceiling, it was still learning!

Their improvement had been extremely obvious. Among the top ten at Halloween, all four of them had made the list, firmly occupying the leading positions on the third-year light-orb game rankings.

Tver waved a hand. "Then add another month. But that's the longest it can be extended. If you keep fighting any longer, that dummy is going to break down."

Besides, in another month, he would not need this lot to play chess with him anymore.

The five of them immediately broke into delighted smiles.

A month was already enough. They had more or less found the limits of the training dummy, and another month would not make much difference to its training effect. They were satisfied with that.

With their goal achieved, they prepared to leave.

But at that moment, Tver called out to the Weasley Twins.

"George, Fred, do you have your badges with you?"

The twins turned back in confusion. "The Halloween ones? We've been carrying them the whole time."

As they spoke, they took them out of their pockets.

"Give them to me for now. Don't worry, I'm only making a few improvements. I'll return them to you afterward."

The twins were a little reluctant. Those badges were far too useful—they could replenish magical power and be used repeatedly.

But the badges had been given to them by their professor, and they would get them back afterward, so they left without further concern.

Tver examined the two badges in his hands, considering how to improve them.

He did not have time to explore the details of the castle himself, but the Weasley Twins did!

All he needed was to add a detection spell to their badges, automatically map the terrain they passed through, and feed it back onto the map.

Of course, easy as that sounded, there were quite a few problems involved.

The biggest was magical power storage.

A single badge could only hold enough magical power for a few Shield Charms. Once it was used up, it would stop working and need to be recharged.

If he added a continuously active detection spell now, it would probably need recharging every few hours.

Never mind whether the twins would be willing—the frequent recharging alone would be enough to make the other students notice something unusual.

So he still needed to increase their magical energy storage.