In the Room of Requirement, under Harry's envious gaze and Cedric's admiring look, Sherlock seemed like a magnet.
All the various items used for practicing the Summoning Charm whooshed toward him.
Sherlock's performance also gave Harry the motivation to continue working hard.
So in the afternoon, Sherlock and Harry unhesitatingly skipped Divination class to continue practicing in the Room of Requirement.
Cedric was also quite decent about it.
However, he didn't skip class but asked the professor for leave to continue practicing with them.
Through their tireless efforts, they were finally rewarded.
By evening, Harry had truly mastered the Summoning Charm.
"Harry, you've really made great progress!" Cedric looked somewhat tired, but he was genuinely happy for Harry. "Having just started learning not long ago, you've mastered the Summoning Charm so quickly—you're much better than I was at that time."
"Yeah, now I know what to do next time I can't learn a spell," Harry said with a bitter smile, tossing a dictionary to Sherlock so he could try again. "You just threaten me with a dragon, exactly like now..."
He raised his wand again. "Accio dictionary!"
The heavy dictionary rose from Sherlock's hand, flew to the other side of the room, and Harry caught it firmly.
Seeing this, Sherlock couldn't help but smile.
Cedric also said happily. "Harry, I think you've truly mastered it!"
"I hope it still works tomorrow," Harry said with some worry. "The Firebolt is much farther than the things here, tomorrow it'll be in the castle while I'm on the field outside..."
"It'll be fine," Cedric encouraged Harry. "Believe in yourself, you've completely mastered the Summoning Charm. As long as you concentrate fully tomorrow like you are now, it will fly into your hand."
Seeing Harry's somewhat unconfident appearance, Cedric added.
"If something really goes wrong, we can help you."
Harry's eyes lit up at these words.
Right, I still have teammates!
"It's best not to do that."
However, Sherlock interjected at this point.
"Don't forget, Mr. Karkaroff and Madame Maxime are also members of the judging panel. We'd best eliminate any reason that might give them cause to deduct points—of course, saying this is somewhat disrespectful to them.
But based on my deductions, the probability of such an event occurring is not small. So, it's best if we each cast our own Summoning Charm to summon our broomsticks into our own hands."
"Alright, I'll do my best," Harry reluctantly nodded, then remembered something. "Sherlock, when did you buy a broomstick?"
"The morning after learning the first task was dragons," Sherlock explained. "I think by tomorrow morning, they should have the delivery ready."
Hearing this, Cedric admired him even more: what excellent foresight!
He then asked.
"Sherlock, what should we do next?"
"Simple team coordination," Sherlock explained, then waved his wand and recited the spell.
A broomstick immediately flew over from a corner of the room.
Both Cedric and Harry's eyes widened in surprise.
"Sherlock, how did you do that?"
"Didn't I just explain?" Sherlock smiled slightly. "When I was pacing back and forth at the door, what I was thinking was to provide a large room for practicing Quidditch and the Summoning Charm. Obviously, it understood what I meant and executed it well. Didn't you notice this room is quite large?"
"I thought it was just this big naturally," Cedric admitted honestly.
"I thought it was prepared for practicing the Summoning Charm," Harry also felt somewhat embarrassed.
"Its name really lives up to expectations—truly the Room of Requirement!" Cedric exclaimed again. "Everything we need is here."
Next, Harry and Cedric also imitated Sherlock, using the Summoning Charm to get two broomsticks, then began riding them to simulate dodging and attracting the dragon.
Harry was responsible for high-speed penetration and simulating breakthrough paths. His task was singular. accelerate, accelerate, and accelerate again.
Cedric practiced casting Transfiguration spells as precisely as possible while in high-speed flight.
He tried transforming objects into rocks that made huge noises, or simply transforming them into dogs to attract the dragon's attention.
Sherlock acted like a free agent, moving between the two.
At his suggestion, during their flight they especially focused on coordinating their small three-person team.
A large portion of time was spent on mutual understanding of hand signals and instantaneous positioning.
Throughout this process, Harry and Cedric performed excellently.
Both were ace players on their respective house Quidditch teams. Although they had previously been opponents when meeting on the field, once fighting side by side, they coordinated remarkably well.
This feeling was simply too wonderful.
The main reason was that both had spent effort understanding the other's team.
Harry and Cedric, as Seekers, were especially key subjects of study.
This way, they discovered with surprise that their understanding of each other was quite substantial.
Often one action could already predict what the next would be.
At the same time, they also discovered that Sherlock's flying ability was in no way inferior to theirs.
Things were becoming more and more interesting.
"Sherlock, it's really Gryffindor's loss that you didn't play Quidditch," Cedric said, casting magic again to create a cloud of smoke, unable to help sighing. "If Gryffindor had both you and Harry, they'd probably win the championship every year."
"They could do it without me," Sherlock said, returning after passing between the two, while objectively offering his assessment. "From the moment Harry joined, Gryffindor already had championship-level strength, though their luck was truly rather poor the past few years..."
Harry, who had just successfully tried a Wronski Feint, felt somewhat embarrassed at these words.
After all, every incident was connected to him in some way.
Just like that, the three maintained high-intensity practice until nearly dawn before stopping.
"What's wrong?"
Cedric and Harry both looked at Sherlock, who had suddenly landed on the ground.
They were still immersed in the flight process.
"That's enough. Continuing to practice won't bring much more progress," Sherlock checked the time. "All three of us need rest. If it affects tomorrow's competition, that would be putting the cart before the horse."
Cedric and Harry immediately nodded. "Sherlock, you're right."
They had been too absorbed in practice and accidentally forgot about the time.
After leaving the Room of Requirement, watching the door turn back into stone, Cedric couldn't help but exclaim again.
"Hogwarts is truly amazing! I've been studying here for six years and didn't know the castle had such a place. So, Sherlock, how exactly did you discover this? Like in first and second year?"
The so-called first and second years referred to the publicly released story about the Philosopher's Stone and the Chamber of Secrets.
The Lion King and the Savior stopped the dark Professor Quirrell and killed the basilisk.
Neither the room where the Philosopher's Stone was kept nor Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets could be found by ordinary people.
So here Cedric couldn't help but assume that Sherlock had once again relied on his keen observation to discover this Room of Requirement.
"No," Sherlock shook his head, his gaze showing a trace of nostalgia. "I have a friend."
Cedric didn't realize what this sentence meant.
But Harry understood.
The friend Sherlock mentioned was most likely Gemma Farley.
Thinking that after tomorrow's competition she would officially meet Sherlock, Harry couldn't help but observe a minute of silence in his heart for Hermione.
However, very quickly, his attention was completely focused back on the Summoning Charm.
That night, Harry even practiced in his dreams.
Only one phrase filled his mind.
"Accio Firebolt!"
The next morning, Sherlock didn't take Harry and Neville out for morning training as usual.
However, he still went to the field alone for a run.
When he returned to the dormitory, he happened to see Harry just waking up.
Seeing Sherlock fully dressed, Harry also mistakenly thought he had just gotten up, so asked groggily.
"Sherlock, are we going for morning training?"
"Not today," Sherlock looked at Harry with some surprise, clearly not expecting his good friend to be so proactive.
He shared the news he had received upon returning with the others in the dormitory.
"The school has announced that there are only morning classes today."
"This morning seems to be History of Magic?" Dean also woke up at this point. Hearing Sherlock and Harry's conversation, he couldn't help but interject.
"That's right, so if you haven't woken up yet, you can rest a bit more in class."
"Sherlock, aren't you nervous at all?" Hearing Sherlock's words, Dean couldn't help but ask.
"Dear Dean, if being nervous could solve problems, I'd absolutely be nervous ten or eight times a day," Sherlock said in a joking tone. "Unfortunately, this emotion doesn't help at all with the problems we're currently facing—so of course I have to abandon this unfavorable emotion."
"That kind of thing isn't something you can just abandon when you say so..."
"Just throw it outside the mind attic."
"Sorry, I can't do that."
Dean shook his head, then looked at Ron, who was still sleeping soundly with his head covered, and shook him awake directly. "Stop sleeping, Ron!"
"Hey—what are you doing!"
"Time to get up, stop sleeping!"
"Let me sleep a bit more, just a bit longer!"
"Sleep, sleep, sleep—all you know is sleep! How can you sleep at your age?"
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