Transfiguration

"Move it, you two! If you don't hurry up, we're going to be late!"

Draco Malfoy impatiently urged Crabbe and Goyle, who were sleeping like the dead.

Because of yesterday's storytelling session, none of the young wizards had slept particularly well.

Draco and the other two had lain in bed reliving the Great Sage, Heaven's Equal's heroic bearing, too excited to fall asleep for a long time.

Eli, meanwhile, had tossed and turned, thinking, Were that old man's eyes even dry?

One thing led to another, and they nearly overslept.

Especially those two idiots. No matter how Eli and Draco called them, they would not wake up.

In a fit of fury, Draco grabbed a cup of cold water and dumped it over the two idiots' faces, finally waking them.

The group hurried along at a half-run and finally reached the classroom.

There were not many people in the classroom. It seemed they had arrived fairly early.

Goyle and Crabbe nearly collapsed at the door. Making them run all the way there with their bulky bodies had truly been difficult for them.

Eli and Draco entered the classroom. A tabby cat was crouching on the lectern, and upon closer inspection, there seemed to be markings around its eyes that resembled spectacles.

"Even the professor isn't here. Looks like we got here early enough."

Draco stood in the aisle as though no one else existed, looking thoroughly pleased with himself.

He must have noticed that Harry Potter and Ron Weasley had not arrived yet.

Eli, however, stood to one side with a solemn expression, facing the tabby cat.

Without drawing attention to it, he jabbed Draco, who was grinning like an idiot, with his elbow.

"What is it? Do you have to look so serious? It's just class. The professor isn't even here yet!"

Draco's inexplicable sense of superiority flared up again.

By now, Eli no longer wanted to bother with this fool.

Draco saw Eli respectfully facing the tabby cat on the desk and was deeply puzzled.

"Why are you being so respectful to a cat? It's obviously Professor McGonagall's pet, just as skinny and old as its owner."

It's over. This kid's done for.

Eli began observing a moment of silence for Draco. The look in his eyes seemed to say, As expected, young and reckless, with no idea what he's doing.

Eli suddenly gave the cat a standard ninety-degree bow, then quietly found a seat and sat down.

Draco looked utterly baffled. Had this guy gone crazy again?

Unable to make sense of the situation, Draco sat beside Eli and nudged him with his elbow again.

"Hey, what's going on?"

To his surprise, Eli suddenly shifted away. "Draco, if you want to die, don't drag me down with you."

Just as Draco was feeling baffled again, the tabby cat suddenly leaped up and transformed into a human in midair.

Her hair was tightly bound in a bun, she wore emerald-green robes, and spectacles rested on her stern face.

Who else could it be but Professor McGonagall?

Professor McGonagall slowly walked up to Draco and simply stared at him.

The instant Draco saw the tabby cat turn into a professor, his face visibly turned even paler.

By the time Professor McGonagall stared at him, not a trace of color remained in his face.

"Mr. Malfoy, I hope that next time, you will show a little more respect to an old and skinny professor. Twenty points from Slytherin!"

Oh no!

That was the wail of Eli and the other Slytherin students. On the first day of school, they had lost a full twenty points.

To the little snakes, who held an almost magical obsession with the House Cup, it was a devastating blow.

Everyone glared at Draco with barely concealed hostility.

As for Draco himself, his mind had already gone completely blank.

On the first day of school, he had insulted a professor right in front of her, and in front of so many people.

Instant social death!

Professor McGonagall turned around, transformed back into the tabby cat, and crouched in her original spot.

Eli looked pityingly at Draco beside him, whose face had begun changing colors again, and let out a sigh.

The effect of making an example out of someone was enormous.

Having witnessed that terrifying moment, all the students obediently lowered their heads and looked at their textbooks.

Who cared whether they were actually reading? Looking was enough.

Especially Draco, the person involved. His young heart had suffered a tremendous blow.

The young wizards who arrived later saw everyone in the classroom studying diligently, so they sensibly found their seats without making a fuss.

Of course, there were exceptions to everything. Draco was not the only unlucky one.

"Oh, Merlin, if we'd been any later, her expression would've been terrifying!"

Eli looked over with pity in his eyes.

Another kid was about to gain a childhood trauma.

The moment Draco saw that someone else was in trouble, and that it was Potter and that Weasley, he began laughing like an idiot in sheer delight.

Watching Draco gloat, Eli could only sigh. This kid really has a big heart.

It was the same familiar entrance.

The tabby cat suddenly transformed into Professor McGonagall.

Ron stared blankly at the professor who had suddenly appeared and instinctively said, "Nice move."

Professor McGonagall spoke with apparent politeness.

"Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Weasley. However, I think perhaps I should turn one of you into a pocket watch. At least then the other one would not be late."

"Professor, we got lost," Harry argued.

"Then perhaps you should become a map. You don't need a map to find your seats, do you?"

The two of them sheepishly found their seats.

Draco's face fell. Why had they not lost points?

Once all the students had arrived, Professor McGonagall stopped wasting words.

She tapped the blackboard with her wand, and dense lines of writing immediately appeared across it.

"Transfiguration will be the most rigorous and most dangerous subject you encounter. If I find anyone waving their wand around carelessly, they will be asked to leave the classroom!"

With another flick of her wand, a match appeared on every student's desk.

"Today's task is to turn the match in front of you into a needle. Remember to apply the principles I have taught you!"

Having received the professor's instructions, the young wizards began attempting the spell according to the writing on the blackboard.

Yet every match remained perfectly still, without the slightest sign of changing.

Eli, on the other hand, was in no hurry. Transfiguration was as easy as breathing to him.

Transfiguration primarily relied on a wizard's will to transform inanimate objects or living creatures into whatever form they desired.

To successfully complete a transformation, a wizard had to understand the form they wished to create well enough.

If one wanted to turn a table into a pig, one might need to perform several dissections first to understand a pig's structure.

Magic that forcibly altered the shape of matter through a wizard's will placed immense demands on the wizard's soul power.

Thus, for Eli's extraordinary soul, Transfiguration could not have been simpler.

Perhaps because of the fusion of souls, his memory had now nearly reached the level of photographic recall.

He could remember the appearance of a needle down to the tiniest detail.

He lightly tapped the match with his wand, and water-like magic flowed over it.

Under the alteration of the magic, the match swiftly turned into a silver needle, complete with an eye for threading.

Although his current control over magic was not enough to add patterns to the needle, achieving this much was already remarkable for a young wizard.

Professor McGonagall strode quickly over to Eli's side and looked at the gleaming silver needle in delighted surprise.

"Oh! Mr. Hall has successfully turned his match into a silver needle!"

The other students stared at Eli in disbelief.

Hermione Granger looked at the silver needle on his desk as though she had seen a ghost, then turned back and began pointing her wand repeatedly at the match in front of her.

Draco looked at Eli enviously.

Feeling the gazes around him, Eli secretly felt immensely pleased.

Snap!

A faint sound rang out.

Eli looked in surprise at the silver needle on the desk, which had broken into several pieces.

Professor McGonagall was first surprised, then regretful. "What a pity, Mr. Hall. You should control your magic better. But since you have achieved this much, I believe you already understand the key to Transfiguration. Therefore, five points to Slytherin!"

The little snakes beside him immediately beamed with joy.

Only Eli wore a grave expression.

Draco patted Eli. "Don't be like that. You already succeeded."

Eli smiled at Draco.

Yet the worry in his heart remained.

It was not as though he had never tried Transfiguration before. After he had basically mastered control over his magic, he had never again experienced a surge of magic beyond his control!

Yet the broken silver needle on the desk clearly showed that his magic had once again exceeded his control!

He had actually been able to feel his magic growing during this time, but he had not expected it to have reached such a level already.

At this rate, losing control of his magic was only a matter of time, and his life was in danger!

He did not even know how the lesson ended. He walked out of the classroom with a face full of worries.

Harry and Ron suddenly ran over.

"Eli!"

Eli emerged from his thoughts, looked at the two of them, and greeted them.

They looked rather serious, however.

Draco had been about to call Eli over, but when he saw Harry and Ron talking to him, his face darkened and he walked away.

"Eli, I think we should go find Professor Dumbledore together. The Sorting Hat must have made a mistake!"

Ron said earnestly, and Harry nodded beside him.

The two of them even wanted to drag Eli away directly, but Eli stopped them.

"Wait, I think we should calm down first!"

Ron and Harry looked at Eli.

Eli shrugged and smiled at them. "The Sorting Hat has been around for so many years. It probably wouldn't make a mistake. Maybe I really am suited for Slytherin!"

"But..."

Ron grew anxious.

Eli was such a friendly, wonderful person. How could he possibly go to a House of dark wizards?

He did not want Eli to go to a House rumored to produce dark wizards in abundance.

Eli patted Ron's shoulder. "Ron, Harry, I think we may have misunderstood Slytherin before. Maybe it isn't as bad as we thought?"

"But even You-Know-Who was said to have come from Slytherin!"

Eli smiled indifferently. "Bad people have their own reasons for being bad. We can't suspect everyone else of being bad just because of one person, can we? If Slytherin were really that terrible, I don't think Dumbledore would allow it to continue existing."

Perhaps because of his trust in Dumbledore, or perhaps because of his trust in Eli, Ron fell silent.

"We just wanted to be in the same House as you."

Harry quietly said this.

He did not really know how bad Slytherin was. He simply wanted to be in the same place as Eli.

Eli was the first person willing to stand up for him, and the first person willing to be his friend.

He regarded Eli as his best friend!

Eli looked at Harry, momentarily unsure what to say.

He placed a hand on each of their shoulders. "Are we still friends?"

"Of course!" they answered in unison.

"Trust me. As long as we're still friends, what does it matter whether we're in the same House? We all belong to Hogwarts! Besides, we can still attend classes together, play together after class, and even during holidays, I'd like to invite you to my Household as guests!"

After hearing Eli's words, Harry and Ron finally let go of their misgivings about Slytherin.

They no longer insisted on changing Houses.

Their knot had finally been untied.

But Eli still had his own knot, one that threatened his life.