Chapter 202: This Bloke is Up to Something
Professor Lockhart's Care of Magical Creatures class was an elective.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry offered a total of six elective subjects.
The most demanding of these, 'Alchemy,' could only be chosen by sixth or seventh-year students.
The other five electives were 'Arithmancy,' 'Divination,' 'Ancient Runes,' 'Care of Magical Creatures,' and 'Muggle Studies.'
Students had to choose at least two electives starting in their third year and could switch their choices in subsequent years.
At the beginning of their fifth year, students would receive 'career advice' from their Head of House to help them decide on their future path. They would then finalize their two elective choices to ensure they received the basic certificates required for their future careers after taking their Ordinary Wizarding Level (O.W.L.) exams.
Students with the ability to continue their magical education would also, during this career advice session, determine their path for the sixth and seventh-year N.E.W.T. (Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Test) classes, so they could aim for the higher-level certificates required for better jobs.
For example, those who aspired to become employees of the Ministry of Magic absolutely had to get certificates in both 'Muggle Studies' and 'Ancient Runes.'
Or for Potioneers, the mandatory choices were 'Care of Magical Creatures' and 'Ancient Runes.'
Of course, third-year students didn't need to think about such distant matters yet.
Many of them were willing to sign up for more than two electives to explore their own possibilities, while others were simply invited by friends to take a class together.
This led to an interesting situation.
Lockhart noticed that his Care of Magical Creatures class was most popular with the third-years, dropping by a quarter in the fourth year, a further two-thirds in the fifth, and leaving only a handful of students in the sixth and seventh years.
Care of Magical Creatures was a subject that required talent.
Some people were naturally gifted with a way of getting animals to like them, while others would inexplicably be chased and even attacked by wild dogs just walking down the street.
The older students had begun thinking about their future careers and had to give up what seemed like the most interesting elective, Care of Magical Creatures.
Such was reality.
Defense Against the Dark Arts and Care of Magical Creatures, while both subjects had their own difficulties and requirements, were a compulsory and an elective course, respectively. The social impact of mastering the knowledge and skills of each was completely different.
"The principle is quite simple, really," Grindelwald said dismissively. "Even when a wizard is attacked by the most terrifying magical creature, in the worst-case scenario, they can just kill it with the Killing Curse. But that doesn't work on Dark magical creatures; the Killing Curse can't even get rid of a Boggart."
"Merlin's beard!" exclaimed Professor Kettleburn, puffing out his own beard and glaring at Grindelwald in annoyance. "How can you start by thinking about using the Killing Curse against magical creatures! Our focus is the protection of magical creatures, not the defense against them!"
Grindelwald sneered. "Because we are wizards, we are humans, and they are just beasts!"
This was the trouble with four men living together; there was no end to their daily debates.
Lockhart and Lupin didn't want to get involved in such a topic. Lupin was mild-mannered and disliked arguments, while Lockhart knew all too well that no matter what they argued about, Grindelwald would eventually twist the conversation to his own political ideologies and quickly win them over.
For example, he and Lupin had been discussing the existence of "Centaurs."
Centaurs were not classified as magical creatures. Yes, to treat these beings, who were nearly as intelligent as humans, as mere magical creatures was an insult—something humans couldn't get away with.
But they weren't considered Dark magical creatures either.
This raised a question—there was no place to teach wizards how to deal with Centaurs?
Not just Centaurs, but many other intelligent beings with powerful magic, such as house-elves and goblins, were not specifically taught about in magical schools.
This was a massive problem.
Just think, if a house-elf were to betray a wizard, with their ability to freely travel between wizarding families and Hogwarts, who could stop the harm they might cause?
The answer was a special department in the Ministry of Magic.
And so, Grindelwald quickly took over the topic, giving a lengthy speech about the Ministry's sinister purpose of using this to control the pure-blood families and the magical schools, which made the other three feel a sense of alarm.
He also talked about how many political groups were pushing for the certification of "werewolves" as "human beings," which would only lead to the removal of werewolf defense classes from Defense Against the Dark Arts, leaving only the Ministry of Magic able to deal with werewolves. And so on.
Truly, sometimes spending time with this wise old man gave the other three a deeper and broader way of thinking about many things.
Lockhart quickly got into the rhythm of teaching.
He "invited" a few neighbors from beside the mushroom house—a Devil-bird and a Streeler—to serve as teaching aids and began his first lesson.
Grindelwald hadn't come along to assist; he had been wandering around the school as if he couldn't be bothered with Lockhart. But later, for some unknown reason, he came strolling over for the second class and began to show up in Lockhart's classroom.
"The Ancient Rune '4', represented by the Devil-bird, also has another symbolic meaning."
"It represents the four relationships that ancient wizards had with magical creatures!"
Lockhart waved his wand, and the words "For Food (including potions), For Entertainment, For Clothing, and For Companionship" quickly appeared on the blackboard behind him.
"Today, due to the reduction of magical creatures' habitats, many are endangered, or wizards have found substitutes for magical creature ingredients and don't need to harm these beings anymore. As a result, the Ministry of Magic has issued laws to prohibit the use of many magical creatures."
"The most common example is the Unicorn, which often appears in fairy tales and represents purity."
And so on.
Grindelwald listened to these words from the side, feeling a great deal of discomfort.
He had a rebuttal for almost every single sentence, but he noticed a figure peering into the classroom from the doorway and was forced to keep his mouth shut.
Oh, the agony.
Unicorns were such a useful magical creature. Instead of finding a way to breed them in large numbers and better develop their uses, wizards were engaging in "protection"—it was an absolute waste of precious resources!
He was on pins and needles, feeling that sitting in this foolish classroom was worse than being imprisoned in Nurmengard.
Fortunately, he realized that this young man, Gilderoy Lockhart, was not as meek as he appeared to be, much like himself.
Heh heh.
The lesson quickly became interesting.
"So, is there a way to circumvent these laws? How can we both abide by the law and further expand the fields of wizarding application for magical creatures?"
Lockhart tapped the blackboard again, and another word appeared.
"Breeding! The field of magical creature breeding, especially cross-breeding. The new species that appear from this are neither on the Ministry of Magic's Magical Creature Protection lists nor subject to the resistance of other wizards."
The word "Breeding" quickly branched out into the phrase "Wizarding Life," which then branched out into "Wizarding Aesthetics."
"When we breed animals to be more in line with wizarding aesthetics, or even the broader human sense of beauty, they will have great potential for development in the three areas of entertainment, clothing, and companionship."
"Conversely, when we breed animals to be uglier, people will naturally feel that there's no problem with killing them. Everyone will accept this kind of action."
"If there were a magical creature that had all the magical abilities of a Unicorn, and its parts could be used in potions, alchemy, magical artifacts, and wands with the same effect, but it was extremely ugly and disgusting, do you think wizards would still create laws to protect it?"
After saying this, Lockhart gazed deeply at the students before him, the corners of his mouth curving slightly. "So, is this statement correct? To use beauty and ugliness to decide whether or not to kill a magical creature? Or, to think more deeply, to use beauty and ugliness to define a wizard's good or evil?"
"I want you to think about this."
"There will never be a standard answer to this question."
"I can only leave you with one hint." He gently tapped the blackboard with his wand. The words disappeared one by one, leaving only "Wizarding Life." "Wizarding Life, or rather, magical life—what kind of impact does it truly have?"
Damn it!
Grindelwald saw through it!
This cunning Lockhart was teaching a lesson with a certain bias!
This bloke was secretly guiding something.
"Wizarding Life? Magical life?" Grindelwald stared at the word on the blackboard, then looked at the articulate Lockhart, his expression slowly growing peculiar.
(End of Chapter)
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