Two Hufflepuff girls were in a corner practising turning teacups into rabbits. They had managed to produce a rabbit, but its coat was covered in blue-and-white teacup patterns, making it look like a walking piece of porcelain.
Several students nearby burst out laughing at the teacup rabbit, and one of the Hufflepuff girls blushed and covered it with the sleeve of her school robes.
"Gerald!" a familiar voice called from outside the door.
Cedric stood outside, carrying a cloth-covered cage. Strange crunching sounds came from inside, as though something were chewing on bones.
"You're here." Gerald walked over, his eyes fixed on the cage.
"How could I not come?" Cedric lifted a corner of the cloth, revealing two cabbages biting at each other inside. "I brought my Biting Cabbages for Professor McGonagall to look at, and to ask whether I could experiment with enlarging them in the classroom. Do you think she'll agree?"
"She'll probably tell you to try it in the Forbidden Forest." Gerald smiled.
The Engorgement Charm and Shrinking Charm were essentially forms of Transfiguration too, but Gerald genuinely hadn't expected Cedric to think of enlarging Biting Cabbages. After all, he usually seemed so well-behaved.
In his mind, Cedric had always been a model student with excellent grades and character, never breaking school rules or causing trouble for professors.
Even when he was assigned to fight a Slytherin in the Defence Against Dark Magic exam, he would politely shake his opponent's hand.
And now this model student was carrying a cage full of cabbages biting each other, earnestly planning how to turn them into more lethal versions.
"That would be no fun. There are so many things in the Forbidden Forest. What would Biting Cabbages amount to there?" Cedric lowered the cloth with some regret. "By the way,