Let alone the future, in the upcoming classes, what could possibly be more suitable as teaching assistants than these two little fellows? Whenever a spellcasting scenario was needed, he would just trot these two out and let them handle it, without even needing to cast a spell himself.
Two children with such potential, given a little cultivation, could achieve impressive strength. By then, even if no one had ever seen him cast a spell, no one would doubt the identity of a Master of Magic who could mentor such outstanding students.
Utterly perfection!
014 Lockhart's Desire
It had to be said that Harry Potter had a certain talent for capturing the attention of others.
For once, Lockhart was walking through the school castle without being surrounded by a crowd of fanatical fans; the students he met politely greeted him before quickly scurrying into corners to point and whisper at Harry.
This made Harry feel terrible.
Lockhart cheerfully patted him on the shoulder and motioned for him to keep up.
"Outstanding people are often prone to attracting the jealousy and gazes of others, and bearing the finger-pointing of others. I have the most experience in this regard," he said, gesturing slightly toward Draco. "I think our Mr. Malfoy feels the same way."
Facing Harry's startled expression, Draco merely lifted his chin proudly and gave a soft huff.
"Obviously, Parseltongue is an exceptionally fine talent. I imagine our Mr. Malfoy, like me, feels a sense of envy toward you."
Lockhart's words made it hard for Draco to maintain his pride. He opened his mouth, but ultimately just pressed his lips together and remained silent.
At that, Lockhart winked at Harry, as if to say: *See? I told you so.*
Harry instantly felt much better.
The three of them finally reached Lockhart's office. Inviting the two little fellows to sit, Lockhart looked at them with a beaming smile and continued.
"In fact, Parseltongue does not mean evil. Many people like to use abilities to divide people into good and bad—it's full of prejudiced stereotypes."
"But we have no way to change these stereotypes, so clever people know how to use them to their advantage."
Draco had initially lacked any enthusiasm for being called over by Lockhart, but upon hearing these words, he froze abruptly.
His father, Lucius, had once taught him that breaking rules did not signify true strength; on the contrary, following the rules and then utilizing them was the symbol of wisdom.
Perhaps Professor Lockhart would have a lot of common ground with his father.
"What should I do, Professor?" Harry Potter was hooked by Lockhart's words.
Lockhart merely looked at him with a smiling gaze. "Do what? Prove you aren't a Dark wizard? Prove you aren't evil?"
Harry nodded earnestly.
"Sometimes life is truly pathetic; we are always running ourselves ragged just trying to prove ourselves," Lockhart sighed. He pulled a quill from his desk holder, rapidly scribbled on a piece of parchment, and then slid it across the desk toward Harry.
"There is a book in the Restricted Section of the library called *Moste Potente Potions*—wait, no—*Ancient Spells*. It records several powerful and ancient spells, one of which is called the 'Patronus Charm'."
"Those who cannot feel true happiness and beauty within their hearts cannot cast it. Look, people like to label such people as evil, the exact same prejudice as assuming someone with Parseltongue is bad."
He shrugged, looking at Harry with keen interest. "Countless people holding stereotypes can attest that Dark wizards are completely incapable of casting the 'Patronus Charm'. This is the simplest way to prove you are a good person, even when facing a trial before the Wizengamot of the Ministry of Magic."
"It's just that it is very difficult, Harry. Do you have the confidence to learn it?"
Harry gripped the slip of parchment granting him permission to borrow books from the Restricted Section tightly, his resolute expression saying everything.
"The vast majority of wizards in this world can only release a puff of silver smoke when casting this spell; only a very few wizards can summon a fully corporeal Patronus. Harry, my expectations for you are high."
This boy was the type who lacked self-driven study habits; now that he had the motivation to prove himself, Lockhart eagerly anticipated the wonderful scene of a second-year young wizard successfully casting the Patronus Charm.
By then, he could probably publish another book titled *My Teaching Career, and the Untold Story of the Savior Harry Potter*, and who knows, make a killing in royalties all over again.
The most interesting part was that the general framework and partial details of this book had already been conceived by the original Lockhart after receiving Dumbledore's invitation, and the initial content was already there.
With just a minor tweak, the book could be published directly.
Tsk, nice~
Next up was our dear student, Draco Malfoy.
Lockhart was equally attentive to this child. He knew far too well how to hook the other's interest, brandishing his quill and pantomiming the motion of the Disarming Charm, which made Draco's pupils contract.
Draco had just experienced the ultimate humiliation—being directly blasted away by Harry Potter's Disarming Charm in front of the entire school, landing on the ground in a thoroughly disheveled state.
"The Disarming Charm is a spell with exceptionally broad application prospects."
Lockhart spoke eloquently, instantly drawing the attention of both young wizards. "In the three major application areas of Defense Against the Dark Arts—against Dark wizards, in duels, and even against Dark magical creatures—it can play a role."
"Not only that, when facing the threat of magical creatures, the Disarming Charm is equally effective."
In the original story, Harry Potter had used the Disarming Charm to make the Acromantulas release him.
"Many people know the function of the Disarming Charm, and how vital it is to a wizard who relies on a wand. Therefore, not only must you know how to use the Disarming Charm better, but you must also master its counter-curse proficiently."
"Yes, aside from the Unforgivable Curses, all spells have corresponding counter-curse methods."
He demonstrated the casting motion for the counter-curse. It was actually very simple: a flick of the wrist, swung upward diagonally like drawing a checkmark.
A gentle lift instantly shattered an opponent's attack.
"This is actually not difficult. Many adult wizards are proficient in the non-verbal casting of this counter-curse."
"Of course, you can start learning from the most basic ways of dealing with the Disarming Charm, so that when you learn the counter-curse later, you will naturally be able to cast it with ease."
"When facing an enemy's Disarming Charm, even at the critical moment when you feel your wand is about to be knocked out of your hand by the impact, combining this casting technique with the wizard's instinctive action to grip the wand tightly will allow you to quickly recover from a missed opportunity."
This was his reward tailored specifically for these two.
Draco's eyes lit up; he listened with utmost earnestness. He never wanted to be sent flying onto his backside in public by Har-ry Pot-ter's Disarming Charm ever again.
As for Harry, once he found that his Disarming Charm had no effect against his arch-nemesis Draco, he would have the drive to learn other magic.
Just as planned!
Lockhart could proudly claim that probably no one in this world understood the Disarming Charm better than he did, not even Dumbledore.
After all, Old Dumbledore was too overpowered; almost no one could successfully disarm him, so he had no need to specifically study every subtle operational technique of the Disarming Charm.
Meanwhile, those dozen or so powerful wizards in Lockhart's memories who had faced all kinds of dangers year-round each possessed a wealth of rich experience.
Right now, Lockhart could practically be said to be imparting everything without reservation to these two.
This portion of content could even be published as a book directly, detailing down to every possible angle from which an adversary might fire a Disarming Charm, categorizing various counter-strategies and little tips for casting the Disarming Charm.
It even included different wand-holding techniques for facing enemies of varying tiers.
"Pay attention to my hand gestures. When facing stronger enemies, you cannot grip your wand too tightly; this prevents you from being dragged along as your wand flies away..."
"As long as your state isn't completely compromised, you can draw a backup wand at this moment, unleashing the decisive blow just when the enemy thinks you've lost all ability to resist!"
"And when facing weaker enemies—pay attention—their Disarming Charm will still take effect if it hits you, but it will by no means send us flying directly backward. So at this moment, we need to strike this pose."
"Does it feel familiar? Hahaha, this is the iconic posture for maneuvering a broomstick to evade enemies at high speed and maintain the ability to counterattack at any moment. This is its application right here."
"You will find that after striking this posture, the disarmed wand will fly right toward your own embrace. If you just reach out and scoop it smoothly like this, you'll even find the wand stays right in the palm of your hand, just like catching the Golden Snitch in a Quidditch match."
"..."
Lockhart hadn't noticed that several figures were already standing at the doorway of the office at some point.
Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape—they didn't know when they had arrived, yet they were now actually listening with rapt attention.
The most comprehensive, detailed, and combat-applicable techniques, analyzed with such profound erudition down to every tactical detail—even these three heavyweights who had experienced countless wizarding battles found themselves listening in continuous, awestruck wonder.
Professor Snape had to admit: perhaps his judgment had been flawed? Was the Lockhart before him a fraud in any way?
Those boastful remarks of the past suddenly seemed to have truly become the best self-endorsement of Lockhart's capabilities.
Of course, Snape wouldn't know that Lockhart, who was deliberately gesturing with his quill over there, was actually feeling immensely envious as he looked at these two young wizards.
Damn it!
He desperately longed to possess the ability to cast spells himself, too!
With so much magical knowledge locked in his mind, yet unable to successfully execute a single spell, it was practically a form of torture for him.
014 The Pensieve, Wands, and Slugs
Having the entire school take classes together was by no means the norm, but keeping Defense Against the Dark Arts classes combined for all four houses of the same year had been firmly established.
Because the "fairy-tale romance" demonstration method required a relatively long time, the two previously scheduled lessons for second through fifth years were directly merged into a single double period.
This way, all seven years only needed to attend one class each, plus the N.E.W.T. classes which roughly counted as one double period's worth of time, meaning he only needed to teach eight classes a week in total.
Going from the busiest professor at Hogwarts to the most leisurely one—Lockhart had merely made a slight move, and it was already the limit of what the professors could handle.
"Perfect!"
"I am simply a genius!"
Inside his office, Lockhart put his hands on his hips and laughed swaggeringly. He laughed until his shoulders shook, laughed with exceptional charm, and then, mid-laugh, his expression abruptly turned serious.
Damn it!
He suddenly realized that acting so full of himself was practically identical to the Lockhart in his memories!
"Am I turning into Lockhart just by acting like him? Or was this genuinely my nature all along deep down?"
"Or is it a problem caused by having too many scrambled memories crammed into my brain?"
He furrowed his brow, realizing the severity of the issue.
You had to know that the original Lockhart ultimately ended up a complete fool!
Let me ask you: has anyone ever been turned into a fool by a Memory Charm?
If Memory Charms truly had such terrifying effects, the Aurors of various national ministries of magic wouldn't casually use them on Muggles so freely.
In the original story, he had simply been struck by a rebound of his own Memory Charm; a simple counter-curse could have resolved it, yet the latter half of Lockhart's life was spent entirely as a mental patient in a magical hospital.
Hsss~~~
He drew a sharp breath, rubbed his face hard, and told himself not to panic—panicking was completely useless.
Little Goldie acutely sensed its master's emotional fluctuations, dropped the jewel-embedded shoe it had been curiously toying with, climbed up his trouser leg onto his shoulder, and tilted its head, looking at him with a puzzled expression.
"Guji?"
Lockhart reached out, lifted it down from his shoulder, placed it in his lap, and absentmindedly stroked its cold, fluffy little head while deep in thought.
"It looks like I can't wait anymore. I need to find a Pensieve as soon as possible to sort out my memories!"
Many people feared using a Pensieve because once it held memories, it would record all the memories ever placed within it.
No one wanted others to see those embarrassing, shameful, and unknown secrets buried deep within their hearts.
In the wizarding world, a wizard's Pensieve was generally buried along with its owner, as it was an extremely private item.
The only Pensieve Lockhart knew of that was somewhat special was the one at Hogwarts.
That Pensieve was used by successive headmasters and headmasters of Hogwarts, and they had also left behind their life experiences in the form of memories, making it a precious library providing various reference data for the current headmaster or headmistress.
This thing wasn't something the current Lockhart could casually borrow from Dumbledore.
After pondering for a moment, he sat down at his desk and wrote a letter to Caractacus Burke, the owner of Borgin and Burkes, hoping the man could help find an unused Pensieve.
Whenever Lockhart had hunted for the memories of powerful wizards in the past, he could always manage to acquire some pricey items along the way, and on many occasions, he fenced the stolen goods through this very shopkeeper.
This shopkeeper possessed extremely powerful connections, hailing from one of the so-called "Sacred Twenty-Eight" pure-blood families, the Burke family. His grandmother was Bellvina Black, the daughter of Phineas Nigellus Black, a former headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He operated the largest shop in Knockturn Alley and held enormous influence among the community of Dark wizards.
In the original story, the Burke family also managed one of the Hogwarts secret passages, the Vanishing Cabinet, allowing free entry and exit to this supposedly heavily guarded magical school. It was just that the Vanishing Cabinet had later been damaged, and descendants had forgotten about this information, leading to such a valuable family heirloom being put out for sale directly.
Voldemort had even worked for this shopkeeper when he was young, and after becoming the Dark Lord, he hadn't thought of coming back to bump off his former boss—which went to show that Mr. Borgin certainly had his own ways of dealing with people and the world.
If he needed a Pensieve, looking for him was definitely the right move.
Over the next period of time...
Lockhart appeared exceptionally active around the school, causing a sensation wherever he went, but upon closer inspection, people would find that aside from teaching classes, he actually hadn't done a single thing.
For the younger young wizards, he began universally popularizing and teaching simple spells that leaned more toward practical combat applications, such as "Vanish 'em to the Heavens", to enhance their actual combat capabilities.
*(PS: In the original work, besides Lockhart using this move rather clumsily on the small snake conjured by Draco Malfoy's Serpensortia, Dumbledore also used it during his duel with Voldemort at the Ministry of Magic. Original text: Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 36)*
Whenever a spell demonstration was needed, he would call outstanding young wizards up on stage to perform. There were plenty of students eager to show off—such as Miss Hermione, the Weasley twins, Cedric, Percy...
For the middle and upper-year students, it was even simpler: the fifth years had their O.W.L.s (Ordinary Wizarding Levels) coming up at the end of the term, and the seventh years had their N.E.W.T.s (Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests) at term's end. He rolled out a full suite of exam-prep drills.
Training them according to testing requirements, patching up missing foundations, teaching students in accordance with their aptitude, and finding top-tier areas to push—he tried his absolute best to ensure every young wizard could pass, and then picked out the elite students to sprint for all-Exceeds.
This task was a breeze for Lockhart.
He had far too many things he could teach the young students, such as how to sort the knowledge structures in their minds so they became mutually reinforcing systems of knowledge.
In this regard, even the original Lockhart didn't understand as much as he did.
During this time, the young wizards familiar with Professor Lockhart knew that whenever he had free time, Professor Lockhart would be reading in the library—a wise man who still insisted on reading despite already being so erudite.
Even Professor McGonagall praised him for setting a wonderful example for the young wizards, truly living up to being a Ravenclaw.
But in reality, Lockhart was searching for other solutions.
The results weren't great; there were far too many books in the Hogwarts library, and he had to sift through them volume by volume like looking for a needle in a haystack.
Perhaps he would also need to find a way to get a bottle of Felix Felicis, a potion that brought good fortune, to help him out.
Fortunately, it wasn't a total loss.
He found a bit of inspiration from an eclectic book titled *You and I Under Emotional Trauma*.
The book told the adventure story of a witch who had lost love and was self-healing through a journey.
It mentioned a crucial piece of information right inside—*"When she realized she could never go back, that she was no longer the person she used to be, and that she was a completely new version of herself, she finally discovered the reason why her spellcasting had become so clumsy—her wand no longer suited her..."*
However, this was slightly different.
The witch described in the book had her spellcasting become clumsy, rather than being completely unable to cast spells like Lockhart.
But this was clearly a good train of thought.
Changing to a wand that suited his current self might yield some results, at least to a certain extent.
And so, the weekend finally arrived. Before the sun reached its highest point in the morning, Lockhart hurried and bustled until he finally finished grading all the essays handed in by the students.
Such a damned sense of responsibility—even though he was already feeling somewhat anxious inside, he still patiently handled all of these tasks.
Stretching lazily, Lockhart packed his things and prepared to head out.
The items he needed to prepare were actually not many: Galleons had to be packed fully, and additionally, the small vanity case containing the Boggart needed to be stuffed into his dragon-hide robe pocket. This thing could be tossed out to buy him some time if he encountered any hostile wizards.
He hesitated for a moment, thought about it, and looked back at Little Goldie, who was squatting on the windowsill basking in the sun and gnawing on nuts.
"Can you promise not to attack anyone else without my command?"
Little Goldie understood him; it simply lacked the ability to speak. It tilted its tiny head, blinking its shattered-gold eyes, looking like a fluffy ball of yarn in the sunlight.
It nodded.
"I'm taking you out."
Lockhart scooped it up with cupped hands and shoved it into his robes, preparing to go look for Senior Brother Snape.
From Hogwarts to other places, there were three proper methods: one was to take the train at the Hogsmeade station outside the woods near the Black Lake, but that was too slow. The second was to use Apparition near the pedestrian bridge of the castle buildings, but Lockhart couldn't cast it.
The final method was using fireplaces, which were located in the Headmaster's office and the offices of the four Heads of House.
Lockhart knew how to socialize; by constantly seeking out others to ask for help with minor troubles that could be easily resolved, the other party would develop a sense of closeness toward you because you owed them a favor.
Unfortunately, Lockhart met with a closed door. He knocked on the door for a long time with no response, and after asking a passing student, he learned that today Snape had taken the upper-year students to Hogsmeade Village.