Bab 92: Chapter 92
After a fruitful first Transfiguration Class, Ethan was on his way out of the class with his friends when McGonagall asked him to stay back. Surprisingly, as Ethan was about to go, Daphne stopped him and asked, "Can you tell Professor McGonagall I want to speak to her when you two are done? Tell her it won't be long."
Although surprised, Ethan nodded, and approached his professor alone. She started, "You have had quite the busy summer, if the Daily Prophet is to be trusted."
Ethan grinned cheekily, "But it would never be as great as my time here."
McGonagall snorted softly, before crossing her legs and saying, "I won't be taking much of your time. I simply wanted to make sure you would not be getting detentions on purpose, now that a new school year has started and your extra classes have ended."
"No need to worry about that, I believe that I am starting to carve out my own path of magic, so I intended to implement a lot of self-study in my schedule anyway."
Surprisingly, McGonagall smiled at that, and replied, "Good for you, Mr. Grindelwald. Now go, I have another class to teach."
Ethan nodded respectfully, but before scurrying off said, "Actually, I think Daphne Greengrass wants to speak with you. She said it wouldn't be long."
McGonagall glanced toward the half-opened door, where Daphne was waiting. She pushed up her glasses and said, "Fine. You may tell the professor of your next class that I wished to speak to Miss Greengrass and not take away any points from her."
Ethan smiled at the professor's words. Her tone may be strict, but Ethan knew that among all of their teachers, she might have the brightest heart. Outside the Quidditch pitch, she hardly ever saw houses, and considered every student hers, no matter the colours.
Smiling cheekily at the woman, Ethan said, "It's fine, our next class is History of Magic. Binns won't even notice she's late."
McGonagall's face turned severe as she reprimanded loudly, seeing Ethan running away quickly, "It is Professor Binns! Have some respect, Mr. Grindelwald!"
He did not answer her, and walked out of the classroom merrily, making McGonagall sigh. The witch quickly regained her composure however as Daphne entered the room.
Meanwhile, outside, Ethan noticed a large group coming his way. Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs, second years.
His eyes quickly set on the group at the forefront, the 'Golden Squad'. Calling them the Golden Trio had lost any meaning as they were far more than three now.
There was Harry and Cassia Potter, Hermione Granger, Ronald Weasley, Neville Longbottom and Sophia Highburn. That doubled the size of the original group. And seeing him, they shared rather similar expressions.
Although there were variations, their faces were all marred with some amount of guilt, no doubt because of the events from a few months before. Seeing them like this showed Ethan that forgiving them instead of lashing out had been a far more effective punishment.
So, as their gazes crossed, Ethan smiled and nodded politely at them, not exchanging a word as he headed for his own class.
His next class was History of Magic with Binns, which Ethan and all other Slytherins expected to be a dreadfully boring class.
Somehow, Binns managed to surprise as he opened his class in a soft voice, "Welcome back to Hogwarts. I am sure you had a great summer, so let us start without any further ado. For this year, we will be expending on a subject we approached last year, and that is the influence of dark magic and dark wizards over the world at large through the ages."
Some other professor would have probably asked the students a question at this point, but Binns' class was the least interactive of all. A consequence of this was that it also was the class in which students scored the least points.
Binns tended to go on and on with his classes, turning them more into lectures than anything. There were some exceptions, but they were very rare. The silver lining was that Binns took points away just as often.
In all of their classes, failing to hand over homework on time, or doing very badly on them, would result in a loss of points. With Binns though, unless a student did not hand in any work at all, the old ghost would treat them like air.
Putting all of this together resulted in most students sleeping their way through his lessons, or busying themselves with other things. Ethan himself had already prepared for this lesson. Yet now, he listened curiously as Binns continued his lecture.
"Last year, we saw how the resentment of the countless wars between England and France led to the creation and use of some of the darkest spells in the world. Today, we will be examining one particular incident that it forever changed Europe. And they all stemmed from one dark witch."
Ethan could see the interest of his classmates had already dwindled drastically. Theodore was napping, Tracey was playing with a golden galleon, shifting it between her fingers. Ethan was not sure where she had gotten it. As for Daphne, she had still not arrived. And the rest of the class were not better.
So, Ethan was the only one to listen as Binns talked about one of the founding events of their current society.
"France and England had already been embroiled in war for centuries, especially the magical communities. But the French managed to put one of their own on the Papal seat. His name was Guy Foucois, though he became known as Clement IV as the pope."
Foucois, that was a name Ethan recognized. They were one of the ancient aristocratic families in France, the equivalents of the Sacred 28 in Britain. They were one of the strongest ones as well.
"With the power of Roman Church, France gained the clear advantage, and although no war was being waged between the two countries at the time, everyone knew it was only a matter of time before the French families went for a full attack on England. The English knew they had to do something."
Binns looked around the room. Although most believed him to be nothing but a listless robot who only acted mechanically everyday, he did still have some agency left. It was not much, he was already very old when he died, and existing as a ghost for several centuries had not helped either.
But in that moment, a hint of clarity returned to him as he slightly raised his voice and continued his lecture with a slightly proud tone.
"Cygnus Black, one of the most prominent English wizards of his time, successfully infiltrated the Vatican and assassinated not only Pope Clement IV, but he also performed a dark ritual to curse the position of pope. The curse was especially potent, and anyone who tried to take up the position would be killed by it."
Naturally, the moment Binns had spoken of the Black family, many heads had risen in the class. After all, the House of Black was legendary in Slytherin. They were an ancient house that had survived for more than a century, and persevered as one of, if not the strongest house in England.
It was only recently that it had fallen. And despite that being the case, in reality there existed many descendants of the House of Black left, spread among the other Sacred 28. It was nearly impossible for the House of Black to truly perish, unless all of the Sacred 28 were to die. And so was the case for the others, because they had intermarried for centuries.
"It caused a large panic throughout Europe, as the pope represented a figure of the highest authority, both within the magical and the muggle world. After all, every pope was a mighty wizard in his own right."
Religion was a complicated matter within the wizarding community. One that would take more than a few lectures to address.
"For a time, Cygnus Black's actions had accomplished his goal, as without the pope, France lost a lot of their support. Cursing the papal seat had been too much however as the families of France managed to reach an accord with the Italian and Spanish families, to make an alliance to invade Britain and erase the threat."
Binns looked like he was reminiscing happy memories as he said, "House Black's response? Assassinate the King of France."
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone