Miranda's Path

Next, the top scorers on the leaderboard for grades three and above all chose to forgo the challenge against students from higher grades.

The reason is that the third-year student who is ranked first on the leaderboard has fought against every other student ranked first on the leaderboard except for the first-year and seventh-year students. Through each of Xiwen's duels, these students who are ranked first on the leaderboard above the third year can see the gap between themselves and the student ranked first in the next level.

Besides, even third-year wizards were able to pull off such spectacular duels. If the older students couldn't, wouldn't they become a laughingstock? Even if they were already being laughed at for being defeated by third-year students, it wouldn't do!

Thus, the monthly duel ended with Xiwen acquiring many bottles of Professor Slughorn's Potions, some Fantastic Beasts materials from Professor Kettleburn, a dozen herbs from Professor Birley, and several library permits for the Restricted Section.

After the duels ended, the professors chanted spells and easily moved the seven dueling platforms beneath the Great Hall floor. Immediately afterwards, the four college tables that had been pushed against the wall quickly gathered back to the center of the Great Hall, each covered with a tablecloth representing one of the four colleges.

Then a group of House-Elf appeared in the Great Hall with a series of "bang" Apparition sounds, quickly cleaning up the cutlery and dishes that had been ruined by Xiwen's Transformation and replacing them with a brand new set of tableware.

When Xiwen saw that Budi House-Elf he knew best, was giving him a somewhat "resentful" look, he couldn't help but give a sheepish, awkward laugh to the group of House-Elf...

The Hogwarts dinner was as lavish as ever, but Xiwen had little appetite.

He really made a big splash in this duel.

Slytherin House students are likely to be egoistic by nature, and even if they aren't, they are rarely unaffected by their egoistic parents. Many of them view making friends as an investment and prefer to befriend junior wizards who are powerful, influential, or have potential.

Unfortunately, Xiwen, the heir to the Rosier family, possessed all three of these qualities...

So at the Slytherin table, there were many students trying to get close to him, each one coming over with a flimsy excuse to congratulate him on winning many duels. This scene made it impossible for Xiwen to concentrate on his dinner.

Even Dean Slughorn came over during this time, partly to congratulate Xiwen on his excellent results in the dueling competition, and partly to hand over the promised reward to him.

Among the Potions Professor Slughorn brought, Xiwen discovered quite a few mana-restoring potions, which improved his mood somewhat.

But after the professor left, the Slytherin students surrounded him again, which greatly annoyed him.

Just then, Miranda walked over from the Ravenclaw Table, looked at the students surrounding Xiwen who were trying to get close to him, and asked jokingly, "Did I come at the wrong time?"

"No, Miranda, you've come just in time!" Xiwen as if he had met a savior, quickly standing up from the Slytherin table and following Miranda out of the Great Hall.

The Slytherin students were somewhat unhappy about Miranda's hijacking of their spot, but she was the current Hogwarts Student Council President and also the top-ranked duelist in seventh year. They couldn't control her power within the school, nor could they match her dueling prowess, so they could only let it go...

The Entrance Courtyard of Hogwarts Castle was bathed in moonlight, with starlight like scattered snowflakes.

Just a few nights ago, the moon was a full, round moon. Tonight, it has gradually waned into a gibbous moon, but it still appears very bright.

The soft moonlight shone on the railings along the courtyard corridor, casting a silvery veil over Miranda's long, light gray hair.

"You seem a little disappointed that we didn't end up fighting?" Miranda asked with a slight smile, standing in the silvery moonlight.

"There's definitely a bit of disappointment, after all, the opportunity to receive guidance from the top duelist of the seventh year is quite rare." Xiwen chuckled, replying casually. "I never imagined I'd have a friend who would become the uncrowned king of Hogwarts dueling prowess!"

"What 'uncrowned king'? Where did you come up with such a strange term?" Miranda chuckled. "I'm already in seventh grade, so it's not surprising that I'm number one. But you, a third-year wizard, challenged your way up to sixth grade and almost came to the seventh-grade dueling arena to fight me!"

"I was worried for ages that you'd knock me out of office! If that happened, I'd lose all face as student council president!" she teased. "Don't you think you're more like the 'uncrowned king' of Hogwarts than I am?"

"I'm only slightly better than them in practical application, it's nothing!" Xiwen said with a smile, shaking his head. "A massive calamity is about to strike the world, every bit of improvement in strength increases our ability to protect ourselves."

"Are you talking about the great war Grindelwald started?" Miranda, unaware of the Death Reaper, assumed Xiwen was referring to the recent conflict and asked softly. "Speaking of which, Headmaster Dippet has an idea for us seventh-year students at Hogwarts to join the Allied Forces of the International Confederation of Wizards."

"He felt that we were now adults and should shoulder the responsibility of protecting the Wizarding World."

"You're being asked to join the coalition against the Pure-blood Party?!" Xiwen's eyes widened, and he couldn't help but raise his voice to ask.

"Shh... keep your voice down!" Miranda glanced towards the Great Hall, making sure no one was paying attention, before continuing, "The headmaster knows this idea will be very controversial, so he's only told a few of us seventh-year Prefect so far, and hasn't informed the other seventh-year students yet."

"This decision will definitely provoke a lot of opposition from parents, especially those Pure-blood families of Slytherin House who have a lot of influence in society." She couldn't help but glance at Xiwen. "This will put a lot of pressure on Hogwarts, but our involvement will certainly add a lot of new strength to the International Confederation of Wizards."

Xiwen didn't react to the statement about Slytherin House Pure-blood families; he simply frowned silently.

"What are your thoughts on this plan?" he asked softly, looking into Miranda's beautiful blue eyes behind her glasses.

"Actually, I really want to go to the battlefield and see what it's like." Miranda's tone was soft, but very firm.

"Why is that?" Xiwen asked in surprise. "You should know that the battlefield is very dangerous, right?"

"Yes, I know," Miranda said. "But this kind of life-or-death danger doesn't come around every day, and I need to seize this opportunity!"

"The more knowledge one acquires in the study of magic, and the deeper one delves into different areas, the more one feels how insignificant one is, like an ant, in the face of the vastness of magic."

"I used to specialize in spells, but after learning more and more spells, I felt like I hit a bottleneck. No matter how many obscure spells I learned, I couldn't improve my skills to the next level."

"So later I scattered my energy and went on to study Transformation, Herbology, Care of Magical Creatures, and so on. I even studied Dark Magic for a while, and the Bat-Bogey Hex was created during that time. But I still felt that my magical path was getting narrower and narrower, as if there was an invisible wall blocking my way."

"But actually, your abilities far surpass those of ordinary wizards, Miranda," Xiwen said softly.

"But my goal is to be on Dumbledore's level, Xiwen," Miranda sighed, somewhat resentfully. "I hate magic, this thing that relies entirely on talent! It's as if not being born with the same talent as Dumbledore means you're destined never to become a top wizard like him."

To be fair, Miranda is indeed very smart and quite talented; otherwise, she wouldn't have been able to become the number one in the seventh-grade dueling tournament standings.

However, her talent was not quite as exceptional as that of Dumbledore, Grindelwald, or even Riddle. This inherent limitation restricted her development, a problem that has also hindered countless outstanding wizards throughout history.

Xiwen opened his mouth, but didn't know how to comfort her.

Should I tell her that she can increase the upper limit of her bloodline by fusing with Blood Curse? Don't be ridiculous, the risks of such bloodline fusion are far greater than going to the battlefield!

Or perhaps you could tell her, "You've already achieved so much, you don't need to work harder?" But with Miranda's pride, how could she possibly succumb to this innate barrier?

"Did I talk too much today?" Before Xiwen could comfort her, Miranda snapped out of her reverie, blinked, and seemed to regain her usual confident demeanor. "I was just speaking from the heart. Thank you for listening, Xiwen."

"Let's talk again another time. We should head back to the common room now."

Without waiting for Xiwen's reply, she walked straight onto the stone bridge leading from the Entrance Courtyard to the teaching area, heading towards Ravenclaw Tower.

"Wait a minute!" Xiwen gritted his teeth and finally called out.

Miranda turned to look at Xiwen, her eyes now red-rimmed.

Looking at Miranda's slightly reddened eyes, Xiwen made up his mind and shouted loudly:

"Miranda, if you ever want to learn Animagus, remember to tell me first!"