Flying Class

After carefully scrubbing the Trophy Room, he returned to the dormitory exhausted. Finally, another day had passed.

On the morning of the third day of term, the first-years had no classes, so Li Mu did not have to rush off for breakfast. He still got up early and stayed in Hufflepuff's Common Room, reading a book called "The Rise and Fall of Dark Magic" in the morning light—Hermione had recommended it and lent it to him earlier.

Hufflepuff's Common Room was filled with the fragrance of flowers and plants. It was not like the towers, where fierce winds howled, nor like the Slytherin common room deeper underground, gloomy and dark. Reading in such an environment was a pleasure, as if he were in a gentle forest, surrounded by free thought and tranquil nature. Li Mu quickly lost himself in the book and read through more than half of the thick volume in one go, until sudden footsteps pulled his attention back.

He turned toward the sound. The round earthen door leading to the Boys' Dormitory opened, and two figures crawled out: Ernie Macmillan and Justin Finch-Fletchley.

To be fair, these two roommates were among the earlier risers in Hufflepuff. Their laziness was only relative to Li Mu, or perhaps Hermione—Harry and Ron had both been dragged out of bed by a certain formidable young woman these past two days... Ron had even muttered complaints about Hogwarts' unreasonable rules.

At the dinner table last night, without Hermione present, he had said, "Why are boys forbidden from entering the girls' dormitory, while girls can just barge in whenever they want? Someone really did come charging in without a care!"

Now, Li Mu looked at his two roommates, while Ernie and Justin stared blankly back at him. Their eyes met. Li Mu closed his book and smiled. "We don't have class this morning, so I didn't leave early either. Want to eat together?"

Ernie's expression wavered, and he even felt a surge of shame. He stood there dazed for a long while before Justin answered for him. Justin smiled. "Li Mu, you get up so early every day. Come on, let's go to the Great Hall."

A friendship crisis between roommates was thus resolved, at least on the surface. Simple, immature students were like that. They could grow resentful for inexplicable reasons, yet become close again because of a single sentence or a single smile.

They arrived at the Great Hall and had only just sat down at the Hufflepuff table when they were startled by the flock of birds pouring into the hall. Every morning at breakfast, a great number of owls and other birds flew in to deliver newspapers, letters, and all sorts of things to the teachers and students. Li Mu and the others had rushed off to class early during the previous two days, so they had not witnessed the spectacular sight of this delivery rush.

Once the birds had flapped away, Li Mu and the other two began eating properly. Then someone suddenly called out to him. It was Harry Potter. Alone, he had taken the initiative to run over to the Hufflepuff table, waving a letter in his hand.

He called happily to Li Mu, "It's Hagrid! Hagrid wants us to visit him on Friday! Oh, right, we don't have class on Friday afternoon either."

The news made Li Mu happy as well. He had long wanted to see Hagrid's hut for himself.

Wednesday afternoon was Herbology, taught by Professor Sprout, the head of Hufflepuff. She was a gentle, kind, short, plump woman with the typical Hufflepuff temperament. Her face always bore a warm smile that made people like her at first sight. First-years from all four houses attended the class together, and they were surprised to discover that Neville Longbottom—the unlucky boy already famous throughout the year—still covered in medicine and wrapped in bandages, possessed a natural affinity with plants and astonishing talent in Herbology. Professor Sprout praised him loudly in front of all the students, making Harry and the others see him in a new light.

"He's really amazing with herbs. He should've come to our house," even Ernie Macmillan remarked to Li Mu.

In the class taught by his own head of house, Li Mu naturally remained with the Hufflepuff students. In fact, he knew that during the first week of term, every subject only introduced basic knowledge, which was why students from all four houses attended together. Once the week was over, Hogwarts would return to England's traditional small-class system, with one house—or at most two houses—studying together.

He would still have to spend most of his class time with the Hufflepuff students from then on.

Late Wednesday night, Li Mu attended his favorite class: Astronomy. After dinner and a short rest, the students climbed from the Great Hall on the first floor all the way to the ninth floor of the castle, arriving at the freezing Astronomy Tower. Under Aurora Sinistra's guidance, they would use telescopes to observe the night sky and learn the names of different stars and the orbital paths of the planets.

Li Mu particularly loved this. Back when he had been in the remote mountain forests of Shushan in China, he had especially enjoyed looking at the stars. It was a sight that had been difficult to catch in his previous life. Looking upon the vast river of stars made his heart feel deeper and broader as well.

Harry and Ron were also thrilled about the class. Since they had a lesson that night, they did not have to clean the Trophy Room again.

The bad luck from the first day of term gradually faded away. Everything seemed to be getting better.

On Thursday, the first-years were even more excited, because that afternoon would be their first Flying Class—an entire afternoon!

All morning, Malfoy bragged everywhere about how incredible he was at Quidditch. He told everyone how he had ridden a broom and narrowly dodged helicopters again and again, as if every helicopter in the world had been made by his family.

Of course, every house had its share of braggarts. Ernie Macmillan kept talking about how he had overtaken a car on a broom when he was little. He told the story no fewer than five times, until Li Mu and Justin's ears were practically growing calluses. So at lunchtime, Li Mu winked at Justin and decisively chose to seek refuge with his old friends in Gryffindor again.

Then he discovered that Ron was bragging too. "I could ride around on Charlie—you know, the second son in our family—on his lousy broom ages ago. The farthest I ever flew was over a hundred kilometers!..."

Halfway through lunch, Ron even got into a fierce argument with the Muggle-born Dean Thomas over whether Quidditch or football was more fun.

During the argument, Ron complained gloomily to Li Mu, who had once again come to Gryffindor to mooch a meal. "What's so exciting about football? More than twenty people, one ball, and you're not even allowed to fly. How boring!"

Unfortunately, he discovered to his dismay that Li Mu was also very interested in football. Li Mu liked Liverpool in the Premier League, just like Dean. The two happily began discussing it and even agreed to go watch a match together if they had time during the holidays.

Beside them, Hermione was also talking nonstop. Nervously clutching a thick copy of "Quidditch Through the Ages," she chattered away to the others—mainly Neville Longbottom—about the Quidditch secrets she had "discovered" in the book. Her voice could be heard through nearly the entire lunch period—but clearly, she had never flown before and was terrified herself.

No matter what, Flying Class was clearly the major lesson everyone had been looking forward to.

End of Chapter