Seeking Guidance

No matter how much Harry hated Snape, Potions Class was not over yet, so he still had to sit through it...

Snape had the students pair up to brew a simple potion for treating boils.

Before Gemini could say he could work alone, Draco approached him eagerly.

Well, what else could he say? He could hardly chase him away, could he?

"Dried nettles... crushed snake fangs..."

To Gemini's surprise, Draco did not make any mistakes. He was quite sharp.

Not a bad kid. Too bad his family upbringing had led him astray.

"Leave the rest to me."

Draco said confidently, "I actually made this once at home before school started, though my mother guided me. My mother is quite skilled at potions too."

"Ah, thanks. We might be a little short on porcupine quills, so I'll get some more." Gemini nodded and turned toward the potion cabinet.

Snape, having just berated everyone except Gemini and Draco, walked over to Draco's side. Seeing the perfectly standard potion over the flame and the slugs Malfoy had just boiled, he nodded in satisfaction.

"You should all watch how Malfoy boils slugs, so there might be something to fill those worthless brains of yours."

That was such a Snape thing to say...

Gemini smiled after taking out the porcupine quills and headed back toward his seat.

Hiss—

Just as Gemini passed Neville, a potion carrying a strong, pungent odor shot into the air.

A fierce warning blared at the back of Gemini's head. He spun around sharply. On the table beside him, Neville's cauldron had melted into a twisted lump of metal, and green potion was about to splash all over Neville and him.

Swish—

In an instant, white spider silk stuck to Neville's back. Gemini yanked Neville behind him and flung out his black cloak, placing it before the spraying potion.

But it was useless. The black cloak was burned through with several holes in a second.

Gemini leaped up and hung from the ceiling, shooting spider silk at the cauldron with one hand while firing silk from the other, stringing up all the nearby students beside him in rapid succession.

"Damn it... were you brewing aqua regia?"

Seeing the spider silk he had fired dissolve continuously in the potion, Gemini could not help drawing in a cold breath.

He remembered there being a scene like this, but he had not expected it to be this intense.

That potion was fucking erupting everywhere!

"Idiot!"

Noticing the commotion, Snape roared and flicked his wand, sweeping the potion and spider silk off the floor in one stroke.

"I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire, didn't you?"

Snape roared up at Neville, who was hanging from the ceiling. The scene was strangely comical.

"Potter, why didn't you tell him not to add the porcupine quills? Did you think his mistake would make you look better? Gryffindor loses another five points because of you."

Harry could only think, This is such bullshit.

As he spoke, Snape looked up at Gemini on the ceiling and softened his tone slightly. "Very good. You stepped forward at a critical moment. Slytherin gets another five points."

Judging by Neville's expression, he would rather have been splashed by the potion and sent to the hospital wing than remain in this terrifying classroom.

At last, the two Potions Class periods, steeped in Snape's love and hate, favoritism and prejudice, came to an end.

The little lions of Gryffindor flooded out of the Potions Class dungeon as if fleeing a famine.

"Fawkes."

Snape expressionlessly called out to Gemini, who was preparing to pack up and leave.

"Is there anything else, Professor?" Gemini asked.

"Why didn't you use your wand just now?"

"Reaction time, Professor. I didn't have enough time to react." Gemini smiled. "A wand is a wizard's companion, but fundamentally, it is only an extension of a wizard's magical will, not part of the wizard himself. Drawing a wand takes time."

"You think I didn't see your reaction speed?"

"Another reason is that I was taught to put people first. Life is what matters most. With my reflexes, I could certainly have drawn my wand in that situation, but the price would have been for the people beside me to be drenched in that potion. So I believed the first thing I should do was save people, even if I had no real dealings with them."

Snape stared steadily at Gemini. "You do not seem like the sort of person who would do such a thing."

"Yes, I think so too." Gemini smiled gently. "But Professor, bodily instinct is the truest reflection of the heart. For instance, you shielded Harry immediately just now, even though you really seem to hate him."

At that, Snape narrowed his eyes.

"What... are you trying to say?"

"I just find it interesting." Gemini looked at Snape curiously. "Modern Wizarding World history records both Harry and Voldemort, and the book includes a quote from Professor Dumbledore: love is the greatest magic in the world."

"So, Professor, what does it feel like to love someone?"

Gemini looked down at his pale hands and murmured, "Without question, I have emotions. But perhaps I have ignored them for too long. It is hard to imagine what kind of emotion it is, this feeling that blooms in the form of the strongest magic."

"So, as my Head of House, can you teach me?"

That magic did not exist in the Arms Dealer.

It was the first thing the Arms Dealer did not have, but Dumbledore had not lied about it, because the Arms Dealer acknowledged that such a weapon did exist.

Snape stared blankly at Gemini for a long while.

There was none of the fury Gemini had imagined, nor did Snape use Legilimency on him for seeing through his secret.

Because he was the Head of Slytherin, and standing before him was a student seeking his guidance.

He simply stood there, still without the slightest expression on his face. Yet his unfocused eyes were hollow, filled with incomparable tenderness and pain.

"It is... pain..."

After a long time, Snape finally spoke slowly, fixing his gaze on Gemini's face once more.

"It is regret... it is despair! It is agony beyond bearing..."

"Yet even knowing it is pain, regret, despair, agony beyond bearing, you are still willing to endure it."

Snape's voice was low. "I do not know what love is in Dumbledore's words, nor do I know what kind of love you seek. This is merely my understanding of that magic. Now, you have asked your question. Get—out..."

Gemini vanished from before Snape with a Soru, his legs moving at a blur as he disappeared around the end of the corridor.

There would be plenty of time to think over questions later. Right now, Snape's mood was probably highly combustible, and a wise man did not stand beneath a crumbling wall.

When Gemini arrived at the Great Hall, he was immediately stopped by a group of Gryffindor little lions.

"Gemini, just now... thank you."

Neville said it with a red face, stammering.

"If it hadn't been for you, we probably would've been splattered all over." Harry still felt lingering fear. He swore that he would never partner with Neville in Potions Class again.

After Harry spoke, several other little lions Gemini had just pulled away all began thanking him at once.

"No need to thank me." Gemini waved a hand gently.