Snape?
Threatening Quirrell?
Surely you've got something wrong.
"Harry, you need to take responsibility for what you say."
John's expression grew serious, making Harry realize he wasn't joking.
"You're accusing a Hogwarts professor, the head of Slytherin. If you don't have any evidence, you could be expelled."
Of course, John had made up the part about expulsion on the spot.
The school rules Harry had broken at Hogwarts could have filled the entire common room, yet Dumbledore had never seemed to punish him.
Harry didn't know that and looked a little uneasy. But he had seen it with his own eyes, so he nodded firmly and said, "I swear, John. I wouldn't lie to you."
Harry wasn't sure what had come over him, but he felt he ought to tell John.
John clearly respected Snape, yet Snape always seemed to dislike him. Harry felt he couldn't let John remain in the dark.
Seeing how adamant he was, John sighed. "All right, I believe you. But I'll have to investigate. Exams aren't far off, so you'd better do some revision first."
Harry was delighted that John believed him.
Feeling he had done a good deed, he shook off his earlier gloom and headed for the Gryffindor Common Room.
It never occurred to him to wonder why John was on the Seventh Floor, though. The Slytherin Common Room wasn't anywhere near there.
The Room of Requirement.
John carefully dipped his quill in ink and inscribed a rune on a Blast-Ended Skrewt's backside.
Only one final stroke remained. Even his eyebrows seemed to strain with the effort as he gently drew the quill across the Skrewt's surface.
An "F" shaped like a bent arm appeared on the Skrewt's backside.
"Just one more step."
Delight spread across John's face. He took out his wand, tapped it against the table, and cleared his throat.
He aimed his wand at the rune on the Skrewt's backside, sending magic into it through the wand's chopstick-like tip.
The "F" lit up. Just as John thought he had succeeded, the light turned into a cloud of black smoke, and the Skrewt's backside exploded, spraying fragments against the cauldron.
Prepared for this, John cast a Shield Charm on himself. Once he dispelled it, he looked rather dejected.
"Still no good. Looks like completing an enchantment at level 1 is just too difficult."
His attempt to transmute the Skrewt's backside had clearly failed.
John suspected the ink he used to write the rune might be the problem. Picking it up, he said reluctantly, "Do I really have to use magical creatures' blood?"
Alchemy and potions had always been inseparable. There were only two places where John could get good materials.
One was the Forbidden Forest, and the other was his head of house's office.
Weighing the difficulty of the two options, John decided to trouble Hagrid instead.
If he happened to walk into Snape's office while Snape was brewing Veritaserum, he might end up being one of the people who got to taste it.
That certainly wouldn't taste very good.
Before leaving, John returned the books he had finished to the library.
The library.
Their resident know-it-all, Hermione Granger, had entered Spartan mode. She had drawn up a long revision schedule, looking ready to work her classmates into the ground.
Harry and Ron didn't dare get on her bad side during this period. Hermione intended to end John's undefeated streak in the final exam week.
She buried herself in her studies, dragging Harry and Ron along as study companions and making their lives miserable. Even Neville hadn't escaped.
When John arrived, Harry and Ron looked as though they had spotted their savior.
"John, over here!"
Neville shouted excitedly, only to be chased and swatted by a floating feather duster.
"You're revising here?"
John was a little surprised. Hermione being here was no surprise, but the other three looked like little eunuchs forced to keep an emperor company while he studied.
"I haven't thanked you yet, John. Your present's really useful." Neville finally learned to keep his voice down so the duster would stop chasing him.
He meant the pet cage John had given him for Christmas. Ever since he put Trevor inside, Trevor had never gone missing again.
"As long as you like it." John put the books back and sat down in front of them, looking puzzled. "Haven't you already found out about Nicolas Flamel?"
"It's Hermione. She's drawn up this huge revision schedule. Honestly, I'd rather fight a troll." Ron's loud complaint earned him another round with the feather duster.
Harry nodded rapidly beside him. "We've still got decades until exams."
Hermione frowned and said indignantly, "Decades? We've got less than ten weeks!"
"Look, even John's started revising."
John felt a little embarrassed at being singled out. He really hadn't done any revision. All the books he had been reading concerned alchemy and were completely useless for his exams.
Still, that reminded him of his Top Student 2.0 task. He still had to keep Hermione from overtaking him for the remaining time.
Seeing her buried in a pile of books, John felt the pressure mounting.
"All right, I still need to see Hagrid. Carry on."
With the air of someone paying his respects to the queen of overachievers, John left them with those words and departed, ignoring the other three's pleading looks.
When he reached Hagrid's Hut, John felt the heat.
Summer was already in the air. Even someone sensitive to the cold wouldn't need to light the fireplace, surely?
"Hagrid, are you cooking?"
"Merlin's beard!"
Hagrid jumped as John pushed the door open and walked in.
His massive body blocked the fireplace, and he forced a smile onto his face, most of which was hidden beneath his shaggy beard.
"Oh, it's you, John."
"Who else were you expecting?"
With an odd expression, John walked over to a chair and looked toward the fireplace.
Hagrid casually shifted to block his view.
John shrugged and said, as though this were nothing unusual, "All right, looks like you've got hold of something strange again, Hagrid."
"Norbert isn't strange! He's a rare Norwegian Ridgeback."
Hagrid instinctively protested, then saw the knowing look on John's face.
Big-mouthed Hagrid couldn't keep a secret. Since John knew now, he resigned himself to it and stepped away from the fireplace.
John saw a kettle above the fire, with an egg about the size of an ostrich egg sitting beneath it.
"Is that a dragon egg? Are you sure you won't cook it?"
The dragon egg had been roasted black. John reckoned it might already be medium-rare.
"No. You have to keep the egg in the fire, because their mothers breathe on them."
Hagrid had done plenty of homework. When it came to knowledge of magical creatures, he was easily at a professor's level.
An idea stirred in John's mind. Wasn't he still struggling with his ink? Potent dragon blood might be a good choice.
A smile appeared on his face, and his expression made Hagrid uneasy.
His great beard twitched as he lowered his voice. "John, you have to promise me you won't tell anyone."
"Oh-?"
John drew out the sound, his cheerful smile leaving Hagrid anxious. Glancing at the dragon egg, he said, "Hagrid, you wouldn't want anyone else finding out about this, would you?"
"John, we're friends," Hagrid muttered.
John said, "Real friends correct your mistakes instead of making them along with you. Still..."
Hagrid looked at John hopefully, and John flashed him a brilliant smile. "Come on, we're close. Of course I wouldn't sell you out. After all, who wouldn't want a dragon?"
"That's wonderful, John! I knew you wouldn't betray me." Hagrid instantly became as happy as a half-ton child.
John put on a troubled expression and sighed. "Actually, I'd like a dragon too. The twelve uses of dragon blood on the exam are giving me a real headache. You know I don't have much money."
"Don't worry, John. Once Norbert grows up, you can have dragon blood for free."
Hagrid had always been generous to his friends.
John smiled. After asking Hagrid for a basketful of Blast-Ended Skrewt backsides, he left, thoroughly satisfied.
Not long after he left, Hagrid headed to the library to find more books about dragons and happened to run into the trio revising.
What happened next went without saying. Just like John, the trio discovered the dragon egg, but they kept their mouths shut for their friend's sake.
Before you continue