Chapter 48: Chapter 48: Let's Play Quidditch (Edited)
After receiving his broom, Tom didn't have much time to test it out, he received it on Sunday, and the next Saturday, Tom would play in his first Quidditch match, Ravenclaw against Hufflepuff. It was also the first Quidditch match at Hogwarts this year, with the second being the following Saturday between Gryffindor and Slytherin.
Ravenclaw had the advantage of the tournament schedule, as a win against Hufflepuff would put them at the top of the standings, and Slytherin and Gryffindor, whoever won, would be in second place.
Although he didn't get used to the modified broom for a long time, Tom had been training with the Ravenclaw Quidditch team for a few weeks and had become adept at playing with the team. Captain Richie didn't use it as a secret weapon, just to keep him out of sight.
Making the Quidditch team as a first year was a shock, but there was someone even more shocking than him, and that was Harry. Tom's position as a Chaser, and Harry's position as a Seeker, deflected most of the attention away from Harry. After all, with two teams, one bringing in a talented midfielder and the other a talented understudy, it was the midfielder who was going to get the most attention.
Oliver Wood had tried to make Harry the "secret weapon" of the Gryffindor team, but the news had not been completely hidden, and rumors were flying around Hogwarts that Harry was playing superbly, and that Gryffindor had prepared a cushion to go underneath him to keep him from falling. Tom was very upset to hear that, is it really a wizard who says such things, Muggles don't even use this kind of rescue!
When falling from a height of fifteen meters, is there a difference between falling to the ground and falling on the mattress? Please open your Standard Spell - Beginners, go to the "Levitation Spell" page and review it.
To be honest, Quidditch training didn't really affect his daily life, Captain Richie was nicer and stuck to three practices a week, which was a decent amount of training, and Tom himself didn't worry too much about the homework left for him by his teachers, let alone Hermione's help, so life was pretty regular.
But he heard that the Gryffindor Quidditch team was a mess, with Wood forcing his team to train every minute. For example, if the Gryffindor team was training at South Korean levels, the Ravenclaw team was training at European and American levels. So Harry's life was miserable, trying to do a lot of homework and training for Quidditch. Tom had run into him a few times in the hallway, and he was much more haggard.
It was a cold Saturday morning, and the mountains surrounding the school looked gray and snow-covered at the top. Black Lake was frozen over and the windows were frosted. The dining room fireplace was burning brightly, the church-like Great Dining Hall was warm as a spring day, and there was a tantalizing smell of roasting sausages.
Every time Tom looked at the cold world outside, he thought: if this is the standard of living for young wizards at Hogwarts in the Middle Ages, then Hogwarts must be a mythical paradise, right?
If you think about it, the modern world, with all its powers in Europe, America and East Asia, is as big as the Promised Land of the Bible, isn't it? Is it more attractive to the modern world than the "land of milk and honey", which the Bible glorifies? Milk and honey are no longer a luxury.
Tom gobbled sausage, ham, bacon and toast.
"You should eat less, you have a game to play..." Hermione cajoled and coaxed.
Tom didn't want to, it would go in his mouth, but not in his stomach! The Occamy was getting so good at eating that if it hadn't been able to change size so freely, it would have been stuck in his molar.
So Tom had to eat three big bowls in tears. Roger and Cho Chang, standing on the sidelines, were amazed: the newcomer seemed to be in a good mood, eating so well. Roger Davies is also the team's Seeker, and the acknowledged successor to Alessandro Richie, who is about to graduate.
Cho Chang, the team's Seeker, was very pretty, the same height as Tom, with long, cascading black hair and freckles on her nose.
But Tom sensed something was wrong: if the Occamy would increase, when would it be his turn to eat? Now that there weren't many people in the Great Dining Room, Tom decided to let the Occamy out.
So Tom snuck an empty kettle in when they weren't looking and put a chicken wing in it. Then he opened his mouth and brought the mouth of the teapot closer and the Occamy slipped out of his mouth and into the teapot with a swoosh. Quick as lightning, Tom put the lid on the pot and stuffed it into his backpack.
The expressions on Roger and Cho Chang's faces showed that the match, which was due to start in an hour, was not too stressful for them either. As Tom and Hermione walked out of the Great Dining Hall together, they ran into Harry and Ron, followed by Neville Longbottom, and the three of them were discussing something seriously when Tom overheard a conversation between them.
"Snape still hasn't returned my book, but I saw him at Filch's to get a bandage put on it, and it looks like he's been bitten on the leg by some beast."
"Hey, remember the day Malfoy tricked us into a duel? Maybe it was in the corridor on the third floor..."
"Go back to Hagrid..., the last time Harry..., the big dog.... Dumbledore..., something at Gringotts..."
The three walked away, their conversation fading into silence. Tom and Hermione exchanged a glance. Tom realized that it seemed they weren't the only ones who had strayed into that corridor.
Hermione had noticed the trapdoor at the big dog's feet, but had no idea what was hidden under it, and now she had the key piece of information: there was something behind it that Dumbledore had hidden.
"So why did Professor Snape burst into that corridor, could this be related to the Troll on Halloween?" Hermione started to think, before she hadn't been able to reason well because she didn't have enough information, now she could make sense of the information she had.
"Maybe Professor Snape is testing the strength of the level for Dumbledore." Tom tried to alleviate some of the suspicion about Snape.
"Then why didn't you go to the school hospital when you were injured?" Hermione still couldn't make sense of it, "But yes, Professor Snape isn't very nice, but he would never steal something that Dumbledore guards so closely."
In Hermione's eyes, all the professors were nice people, even Snape. Of course, after a few lessons with Snape, you wouldn't feel one bit better about him, no matter how touching his story was.
"Come on, instead of thinking about that, let's focus on today's match," Tom rambled, "Hufflepuff is a soft team, but we're no slouches either..."
The Ravenclaw Quidditch team was, at best, second-rate at Hogwarts, and at worst, last-rate at Hogwarts. As things stood, Slytherin was first on paper, Gryffindor was a close second, and Ravenclaw was in last place along with Hufflepuff.
Hermione was intrigued by the topic, and started babbling about the strength of the Hufflepuff team to Tom.
"... So, overall, they have no strengths or weaknesses, they're a very strong team, so let's go guys!" Hermione was still analyzing the opposition for Tom until he made his way to the team's locker room, but they wouldn't let her in and she had to say goodbye to Tom with some reluctance: she had a feeling she hadn't said enough!
Chapter 49: Chapter 49: Ravenclaw's quick attack (Edited)
"Ha, he seems to care more about the team than I do!" Captain Richie joked with Tom as he leaned against the locker.
"How dare you say that, Captain!" Tom was speechless.
Richie waited for a while, and when everyone had gone inside, he pulled out a whiteboard and began going over the day's tactics for the team.
While Richie was going over the tactics, Hermione had made her way to the bleachers above the locker room. It was still a while before the game started, but the stands were already almost half full.
As soon as Hermione approached, she saw two red-haired teenage boys wandering around the Ravenclaw stands, surrounded by several Ravenclaw students. One of the red-haired boys was holding a book in his hand and talking to them, while the other was holding a box.
Hermione recognized them as the Weasley twins, Fred and George, both Gryffindors. Hermione was a little confused: what were they doing here?
"So why are you taking 5% of the profits?" A third year Ravenclaw was a bit annoyed, "It doesn't matter who wins or loses, you're always the winners."
"Because we organized it, and we need money for the fireworks we give you?" argued Fred.
The boy kept shaking his head, but ended up throwing a couple of sickles into the box. The inside of the chest was divided into two parts by a board, with a Ravenclaw flag on one side and Hufflepuff on the other, both containing a similar amount of coins.
George, for his part, wrote down in his book the boy's name and the amount of his bet. The next step was to do the same, and several of the young wizards gathered around placed their bets, and only after their names had been written down did they leave with a bouquet of fireworks. Some of the students would buy more than one if they didn't feel like it.
Hermione understood what the Weasley brothers were doing: betting, you could also bet on wrestling, which her father used to practice with his friends. But it was the first time she had seen such a thing in the magical world.
Curious, she talked to the Weasley brothers to learn about the game. She soon understood the rules, which were much simpler than in the Muggle world: it was a simple bet on the winner, with those who got it right splitting the bets of those who got it wrong in proportion to their money; of course, Fred and George would take 5% of the winnings.
And for every person who bet, Fred and George would give them a bunch of fireworks of their own. What's the point of a bunch of fireworks? Lots of little wizards bought them more.
Hermione thought about it and bet five sickles on Ravenclaw, taking a bunch of fireworks with her. After the deal, Hermione found a good spot to watch and sat down to wait for the match to start, while the Weasley brothers went back to look for more customers.
The start of the match was at eleven o'clock, and almost all the students and teachers were on the Quidditch pitch, many of them prepared, carrying snacks, banners and fireworks in hands. Once everyone took their seats, the stands were automatically raised in the air so that everyone could see the match clearly.
The two teams had already entered.
The atmosphere wasn't particularly tense, after all it was Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, if it had been Gryffindor against Slytherin there would have been a million fireworks in the sky by now.
"Contestants on brooms!"
At Mrs. Hooch's whistle, the game began.
Tom had his eyes on the Quaffle, and when he heard the whistle, he immediately rose into the air and flew towards the thrown Quaffle. His reaction was extremely quick, so several of the Hufflepuff Chasers were a little slower.
The first few seconds of the match were a great opportunity to score, as the Batters had not yet had time to interfere with the Hunters with Bludgers and the keeper was not in good shape.
Tom grabbed the Quaffle and immediately accelerated, the broom shot out and the distance between the Hufflepuff Chaser and Tom, who had been behind his broom or at the same pace as him, suddenly widened.
This second of acceleration gave him a positional advantage.
By this time, the two remaining Chasers were heading towards the goal, and the two Beaters had already taken up a favorable position and launched Bludgers towards the Hufflepuff Chasers, trying to interfere with them, only to be stopped by their Beaters.
In an instant, Tom was in front of the Hufflepuff Keeper, Kettle Byrne, and threw a strong shot, and Kettle Byrne, with a jolt, turned his body towards where he had thrown the Quaffle, but immediately froze as he realized that the Quaffle was not coming towards the goal, but towards Roger, who was a little further away.
Roger caught the Quaffle firmly and threw it in the opposite direction to Kettle Byrne, and it went in with ease.
Less than ten seconds passed before Mrs. Hooch's whistle blew.
The commentator for the Hogwarts quidditch match was Lee Jordan, from Gryffindor, a classmate and friend of Fred's. He was a standing commentator, which meant that when there was a Gryffindor match, he was unabashedly rooting for Gryffindor. But when there were no Gryffindors or Slytherins playing, he was still fairly objective, neutral and professional.
At this point, he had just stood in front of the microphone and hadn't finished his opening remarks.
"... Hufflepuff versus Ravenclaw, and this year Ravenclaw has - What? Tom Yodel, good shot, throw.... no, it's a pass! It went in! Oh my God, Ravenclaw's attack was like lightning! Hufflepuff was taken by surprise! Oh my God, that's the fastest goal I've seen since I started school!"
Jordan was about to introduce this year's record-breaking freshman, Tom, when Ravenclaw scored against Hufflepuff with a fast forward. The little wizards in the crowd didn't even react. Oliver Wood sat in the stands with a frown on his face, wondering if he would have been able to fend off the attack had he been on the pitch. The final verdict: barely.
"So, maybe it really is up to Porter." Wood rubbed his forehead.
At that moment, Ravenclaw went on the attack again and, after a series of dazzling maneuvers, drilled the Hedgehog goal again.
"There's something weird about Tom's broom..." Jordan noticed something, did Tom seem to be able to suddenly accelerate and throw the Guardian off every time?
As this sentence was spoken, more and more people discovered this feature, and the Hufflepuff side called for a pause, but in the end, Mrs. Hooch determined that this modification was not a foul.
As the match progressed, Tom was being watched more and more closely, but this also meant that the rest of the Ravenclaw Hunters had more opportunities. So Ravenclaw scored goal after goal, and by the quarter hour mark of the match the score was 80-0.
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