Wizards Can't Eat Chocolate Frogs

Everyone had a wonderful time on the long journey, apart from Fred and the poor Niffler.

To celebrate Gryffindor's great victory over Slytherin, as Lee Jordan put it, George decided to spend some of the ill-gotten gains on snacks.

In William's words: Young Master Zhao was picking up the tab for everyone tonight!

Though "everyone" only meant the six people in the compartment, a rabbit and a Niffler, and the tab consisted of nothing but snacks.

Bobocha didn't count. She was a very picky eater and ate almost nothing but the expensive cat food and assorted canned treats William bought her.

It was easy to feel a sense of injustice when a person ate less well than a cat.

"Let her go hungry for a few days and she'll be fine!" Cho suggested again.

Bobocha narrowed her eyes and gave Cho's little white rabbit an icy stare. Her claws sprang from her paw pads, and the girl's face went pale with fright. She immediately changed her tune.

The table was covered with all kinds of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, Chocolate Frogs, Pumpkin Pasties, Cauldron Cakes, Licorice Wands, and other strange foods William had never seen before.

George had really splashed out today, buying some of everything without leaving a single thing out.

Before long, Cho had grown much closer to the others, which made Cedric extremely happy.

Sometimes, a simp's happiness was just that simple and dull.

Fred handed William a Chocolate Frog, but William looked at the chocolate and hesitated for a moment before deciding not to eat it.

As a wizard, how could he restore his strength by eating Chocolate Frogs? Wasn't that just asking to die?

Seeing that William wasn't eating it, Fred unwrapped it himself and took out the card.

The card showed an old man wearing a round hat and black-framed glasses, with silver hair and a beard hanging down. The name beneath the picture was Nicolas Flamel.

William looked at the writing on the back of the card: Nicolas Flamel was now widely recognized as the greatest alchemist of all time.

His widely known contributions included creating the only Philosopher's Stone, establishing the system of alchemy used from the Middle Ages through modern times, and starting a trend of keeping toads as pets that had lasted six hundred years without fading!

?

"Oh, it's Nicolas Flamel! Brilliant, I've collected a complete set of cards!" Fred announced excitedly.

A complete set of Chocolate Frog Cards contained several hundred cards and was generally difficult to collect, so it was worth a considerable sum.

Fred didn't collect them because he particularly liked them, but because he planned to sell them to other wizards at a high price.

Seeing that Fred had completed his collection, George, Cedric and Lee Jordan joined the frenzy of unwrapping Chocolate Frogs.

As they madly ate their frogs, time passed especially quickly, as though some unseen force had spirited it away. Before long, evening arrived.

William glanced out the window. It was already dark, and mountains and woods stretched beneath a deep purple sky. The train was slowing down, too.

"We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes. Please leave your luggage on the train, and we will have it sent up to the school for you."

The announcement echoed through the train. Everyone got up and joined the stream of people in the corridor, surging forward.

The train slowed and finally came to a stop. The students jostled and pushed toward the doors, stepping out onto a small, dark platform.

Then a lamp bobbed over the students' heads, and William heard a familiar voice calling, "First years! First years over here!"

Above the sea of bobbing heads, Hagrid stood out, nearly five meters tall.

He smiled and said, "Come on, follow me. Any more first years? Watch your step, now! First years, follow me."

After parting from Cedric and the others, William and Cho stumbled toward Hagrid.

Led by Hagrid, the first years broke away from the main crowd and descended a steep, narrow path. The ground was slippery, and vines kept tripping them up.

It was pitch-dark all around, with only Hagrid's dim yellow oil lamp to guide them.

William sighed. Hogwarts really was backward; they hadn't even bothered to put in a streetlight or anything.

William raised his wand, waved it and murmured, "Lumos."

A soft white light hovered at the tip of his wand. Then it burst forth like fireworks, lighting up nearly fifty meters of the path.

Hagrid's hearty laugh came from a distance. "Thanks, William. You know I can't use magic!"

Cho stared at William's face as though she had only just met him.

"You can already cast spells?"

Earlier, when William had been reading a second-year spellbook, Cho had thought he was only putting on a show. Now it seemed that wasn't the case...

William shrugged. "Isn't it easy?"

Huh? William froze as the words came out.

In his previous life, when he had asked the top students about difficult math problems, they had smiled faintly and said with an air of ease, looking at him as though he were an idiot, "Isn't it easy?"

Merlin's beard! William could actually say something like that without a qualm now. Was this the legendary realm of the top student?

But William soon regretted it. After he used his wand to cast the light, the first-year witches and wizards seemed to have found someone to rely on and crowded toward him.

William once again experienced the crush of traveling during the Spring Festival rush. He roared, "Stop pushing... hey! Whose wandering hands are those? Stop groping me!"

Hagrid called cheerfully, "You'll get your first sight of Hogwarts in a moment, just around this bend."

Sure enough, after a chorus of loud gasps, a black lake suddenly opened up at the end of the narrow path.

On a high hillside across the lake stood a magnificent castle, its many turrets rising above windows that glittered beneath the starry sky.

"No more than four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats moored by the shore, as though they would sink if more than four people got in.

More pushing broke out. Everyone wanted to ride in the same boat as William.

One look at those little boats was enough to tell they weren't safe, and they had to cross a great lake in them. What if they fell in?

William could do magic, so being in the same boat as him would at least give them some sense of security.

"Line up!" Hagrid used his broad frame to block the wall of people and motioned for William and Cho to get into a boat quickly.

He then picked two young witches or wizards at random from the crowd and tossed them in as well. Only then did the clamor gradually die down.

"Everyone aboard?" Hagrid called. He had a boat to himself.

"Then let's go!"

The fleet of boats began to move without wind, gliding forward across the mirror-smooth surface of the lake.

Everyone fell silent, gazing at the enormous castle that rose into the clouds.

As they drew near the cliff on which the castle stood, it seemed to tower over their heads.

"Heads down!" Hagrid shouted as the first boats approached the cliff.

Everyone ducked, and the boats carried them through a curtain of ivy covering the face of the cliff and into a hidden, open entrance.

They followed a pitch-dark tunnel, seemingly arriving beneath the castle, and finally reached a place resembling an underground harbor. Then they climbed onto ground covered with gravel and small pebbles.

By the light of Hagrid's lamp, they climbed through a tunnel in the rock and finally reached a flat, damp stretch of grass in the shadow of the castle.

Everyone climbed a flight of stone steps and gathered before a huge oak door.

Hagrid raised an enormous fist and knocked three times on the castle door.

Bang, bang, bang!

The door opened, and a wizard stepped out.