Chapter 16: Can't Win Right Now
Harry realized this. His anger hadn't faded, but it had nowhere to go.
Ron didn't have as many twists and turns as Harry. His thinking pattern was straightforward—Malfoy Family were bad guys, bad guys should be scolded, and if scolding didn't work, you fight. He gripped his wand tighter; the Unicorn hair sticking out of the crack at the tip trembled slightly with the shaking of his wrist.
"Harry, don't be afraid of him." Ron found his voice. He waved his broken wand. "He doesn't even have a wand. What can he do empty-handed? He's probably just a poser—"
He didn't finish the last word.
Because the density of the air had changed.
Cassius didn't stand up. He didn't even change his sitting posture. He just did one thing—switched the output of the [Soul Furnace] from "Standby" to "Run."
About two percent.
The effect was immediate.
With his chest as the center, Cassius released a highly compressed magic pulse in a fan-shaped area in front of him. This wasn't gravity suppression—that move was too noisy and would have wrecked the carriage structure on the train.
This was a new move he had developed over the past month. The principle was simpler: compress a mass of high-density magic into a plane and push it out flat.
For example, imagine standing at the beach when a two-meter wave crashes into you. You can't fly. You won't die. But you will be knocked over.
Ron was standing at the compartment door.
He was still holding his wand, his words unfinished.
The next instant, his chest took a hit.
There was no visible light. No sound. He just felt an invisible wall slam into his sternum. The force wasn't lethal—Cassius had precisely controlled the output—but it was enough to turn an eleven-year-old boy weighing less than forty kilograms from a standing state into a flying state.
Ron's feet left the ground.
His body flew backward, across the width of the corridor, and his back slammed into the partition of the opposite compartment. The wooden partition made a muffled thud and dented slightly.
Ron slid down the partition to the floor.
His wand dropped beside him. The already cracked wand bounced twice on the ground, the crack widening, exposing more silver hair from the core.
Harry was pushed back several steps by the aftershock. He didn't fall—Cassius's pulse was directional, with the main force concentrated on Ron, so Harry only caught a bit of the edge overflow—but his feet slipped on the smooth floor, and he steadied himself by grabbing the doorframe.
The corridor went quiet.
Ron sat on the floor, clutching his chest. It didn't hurt much—the force had been controlled to the precision of "pushing you away without hurting internal organs"—but he was stunned. His brain was still processing the question of "what just happened."
He hadn't seen anything. No spells, no light, no waving of hands. The blonde boy had been sitting in his chair the whole time without moving, not even changing his posture.
And then he just flew.
Heads began to poke out from the compartments on both sides of the corridor.
One, two, five. A dozen pairs of eyes looked out from behind doors pulled open just a crack. They saw Ron lying in the corridor, saw Harry holding the doorframe, and then followed their line of sight into that compartment.
In the compartment, a blonde boy sat by the window. Hands crossed. Expression indifferent.
Sitting next to him was another blonde boy, mouth wide open, looking excited. Beside him were two chubby boys, their faces filled with fanatical worship for the blonde boy (the shorter one).
There was an indescribable oppression in the air, spreading outward from the direction of that compartment.
A third-year Ravenclaw girl had already pulled her door halfway open. After feeling that oppression, she silently closed the door and locked it.
Harry held onto the doorframe, looking at Cassius.
His lips were moving. He wanted to say something. He wanted to question, to be angry, to do what Hagrid had told him after the ice cream shop: "Don't get involved with Malfoy Family."
But he couldn't get a single word out.
It wasn't because his mouth was sealed by magic. It was because he saw that thing again in Cassius's eyes.
Not malice. Not hostility.
It was nothing.
A blank slate. Just like when you open an encyclopedia about ant behavior; the author has no love or hate for the ants. They are just recording.
Harry couldn't find his own weight in Cassius's eyes.
This was more uncomfortable than being punched.
"Help your friend up." Cassius spoke.
His tone was so flat it lacked any extra color. Not an order, not charity, just a statement. Like seeing someone fall on the road and casually saying, "Get up."
"Then close the door. From the outside."
Harry gritted his teeth.
He bent down and pulled Ron up from the floor. Ron's face flushed red and then turned white—the painful part had passed, and what remained was pure humiliation. He wanted to rush back. He wanted to pick up that broken wand and cast some spell—any spell—at that blonde bastard.
"Let's go, Ron." Harry grabbed him.
His voice was very low. Low enough that only Ron could hear.
"Not now."
Ron looked into Harry's eyes. In those green eyes, there was anger and unwillingness, but more than that, it was a very practical judgment: we can't beat him.
At least not right now.
Ron's shoulders slumped. He picked up his broken wand and looked at it—the crack was even bigger.
The two walked away without a word.
The heads poking out in the corridor retracted one by one. The sound of doors closing echoed one after another.
The compartment returned to silence.
Draco's excitement hadn't faded. He sprang up from his chair, rushed to the corridor to take a look—Harry and Ron's backs were already far away—then came back, his face flushed.
"Did you see that? When that Weasley flew out? His face! That expression!" Draco's voice trembled with excitement, "Cassius, you didn't even lift a hand! You blasted him out just by sitting there!"
"Sit down."
Draco sat down.
Cassius closed his eyes again.
Before he closed his eyes, he noticed one thing.
Among the heads that had retracted in the corridor, there was a girl with bushy brown hair. She didn't retract immediately. She watched for two more seconds.
Her expression wasn't fear.
It was confusion.
The kind of confusion that says, "I haven't read about this kind of magic in any book."
Hermione Granger.
She would come. Cassius thought. That kind of person wouldn't let a question without an answer slide. She would come back.
Sure enough.
Five minutes later.
The compartment door was pulled open again.
Chapter 17: Draco's Sharp Tongue
This time, it wasn't Harry or Ron who pushed the door open. It was a girl.
Her brown hair was bushy and voluminous, impossible to tie back. Her front teeth were a bit larger than average, but not enough to detract from her overall appearance. Her school robes were worn meticulously, buttoned all the way to the top, with the creases on her cuffs ironed flat—this way of dressing stood out starkly among the compartment full of crumpled-looking first-years.
She held a wand in her hand.
It wasn't a combat stance. The tip pointed downward, held at her right side. But her fingers were gripped tightly, her knuckles white.
Hermione Granger.
She stood at the doorway, her gaze sweeping over the interior of the compartment first—Draco was leaning back against the seat, Crabbe and Goyle sat on either side, and Cassius was in the seat by the window opposite. Then she spoke.
"What did you do to that red-haired boy just now?"
Her voice was steadier than Ron's. No bluster, no accusation, just a very clear tone of questioning. The kind that addresses the issue rather than the person.
Draco rolled his eyes.
"Another one," he said, leaning back against the seat. "Who are you?"
Hermione ignored him. Her gaze was locked onto Cassius.
"I saw it," she said. "You didn't cast a spell, didn't wave a wand, and didn't even move. But that boy was sent flying. This isn't the effect of any standard spell I've read about in the textbooks."
She paused.
"Using violent magic against a fellow student on the train is against school rules. It's explicitly stated in Chapter 7, Section 3 of Hogwarts: A History—"
"Who are you talking to?" Draco interrupted. "We haven't even been sorted yet and you're already throwing school rules around? Are you a prefect? Are you a Professor?"
Hermione's lips pursed. She shifted her gaze from Cassiusto Draco, lingering for only a second.
"I am speaking to the one who cast the spell." She moved her gaze back.
Cassius had been keeping his eyes closed.
From the moment Hermione pushed the door open until now, he hadn't opened them.
He was listening.
Hermione Granger. Muggle-born. Eleven years old. She had memorized all the textbooks before starting school. Smart, diligent, with strong logical abilities, but she had a fatal weakness—she treated books as the only rules by which the world operated.
If the books said magic required spells and wands, then it must. If the books said school rules could constrain everyone, then they could.
Now she had encountered something that wasn't in the books.
So she came.
It wasn't out of a sense of justice—though that was the superficial reason for her standing there. What truly drove her was confusion.
An eleven-year-old boy who could send someone flying without spells or a wand was outside her framework of knowledge. This made her uncomfortable. She needed an explanation.
Cassius opened his eyes.
The movement was as slow as the last time. His eyelids lifted halfway, and his grey-blue irises shifted through the slits.
He looked at Hermione.
"What is your name?"
Hermione didn't expect him to ask that. She was stunned for less than a second.
"Hermione Granger."
"Granger." Cassius repeated the surname. A Muggle name. "You said just now that you hadn't read about the magic I used in books?"
"No." There was something very subtle in Hermione's tone—not entirely accusation, nor entirely curiosity. It was half and half. "There is no spell in the standard book of spellsthat can produce physical force without incantations or a wand. Either you used some kind of advanced magic I don't understand, or—"
"Or what?"
"Or you used Dark Arts."
When Hermione said the words "Dark Arts," her hand rose slightly of its own accord. Her wand moved from her right side to in front of her, the tip tilted slightly upward.
This was a defensive stance. It wasn't a provocation, but it was enough to show she was on guard.
Draco couldn't help himself.
He stood up from his chair and walked over to Hermione—he was half a head taller than her—and held his chin high.
"Shut up, Mudblood."
Draco said the two words quite smoothly.
At the dinner table at Malfoy Manor, "Mudblood" was as common a term as "Weasley." He didn't even pause when he said the word, as natural as saying "Hello."
Hermione clearly didn't know the meaning of the word. But she heard the malice. Her nostrils flared, and she swallowed hard.
"You—"
"Draco."
Draco's mouth shut.
Cassius's voice came from the chair. It wasn't heavy, but Draco's body had developed a conditioned reflex—when his brother called his name, he just had to shut up.
"I've taught you," Cassius said.
Draco turned his head to look at his brother.
"When dealing with someone weaker than you, there's no need to use your mouth to insult them. You either beat them into submission, or treat them as if they don't exist. Standing there hurling insults has no value other than drawing hatred toward yourself."
This was said to Draco.
But Hermione heard it all.
"Someone weaker than you."
Her face flushed red instantly.
It wasn't because of the word "Mudblood," which she didn't yet understand. It was because of what was revealed in Cassius's words—he wasn't belittling her; he wasn't even looking at her. He was just educating his brother. And the content of his education was: "She isn't worth you opening your mouth."
This was more stinging than any insult.
Hermione Granger was a girl who had relied on being "smarter than others" to gain a sense of existence since she was little. In Muggle school, she was first in every subject. After receiving her Hogwarts acceptance letter, she spent three months memorizing all the textbooks. She had grown accustomed to the equation "knowledge is power."
Now, this equation was broken.
All the books she had read could not explain the boy in front of her. And this boy was telling her in a way she had never experienced: your knowledge is worthless here.
Hermione's hand trembled.
Then she did something very Hermione.
She raised her wand, the tip pointing at Cassius.
It wasn't to attack. Her posture was the textbook standard "defensive alert" stance—right foot pulled back half a step, wand arm slightly bent, wand tip level with her line of sight. Textbook standard.
"You have no right to treat others this way." Her voice was shaking, but she didn't back down. "No matter how strong your magic is, school rules are there to protect all students—"
Cassius snapped his fingers.
Right hand. Thumb and middle finger. The sound was very light, a "snap."
The wand in Hermione's hand became hot.
Not the kind of hot that is "a bit warm." It was the kind of hot that is "fingers touching a red-hot iron rod."
Her fingers instinctively recoiled.
The wand slipped from her hand and fell onto the floor of the compartment. The vine wood wand body bounced once on the wooden floor, and then—it didn't bounce a second time.
It was as if the wand was being held down by an invisible hand, pressed tightly against the floor, motionless. The wand body vibrated slightly. A buzzing sound came from inside the wood, like a wasp trapped in a bottle. That was the wand core trying to respond to its master's call, but it was being forcibly suppressed by an external force.
Chapter 18: The Non-Existent School Rules
Hermione looked down at the wand on the floor.
She crouched down and reached out to pick it up.
The moment her fingers touched the wand, a repulsive force came from its surface, like two magnets of the same pole pushing against each other. Her hand was repelled.
It wasn't that her wand was rejecting her. It was the layer of external force covering the surface of the wand that wouldn't allow her to touch it.
Hermione tried again.
She was repelled again.
Her breathing quickened. In her eleven years of life—whether in the Muggle world or the magic world she had just encountered—she had never encountered a situation where "her own things didn't listen to her".
Her pens listened to her. Her textbooks listened to her. Her report cards listened to her.
Now, her wand wasn't listening.
Hermione raised her head and looked at Cassius.
Cassius was sitting there. There was no difference from before. His hands were crossed, leaning against the back of the chair, and his expression hadn't changed from start to finish.
He didn't even look at Hermione.
He was looking out the window. Outside the window was a rapidly receding green field, with a few cows grazing.
The action of snapping his fingers took less than 0.3 seconds. Making Hermione's wand heat up until it couldn't be held, and then pinning it to the floor and locking it—these two things together consumed about one ten-thousandth of his magic reserves.
It wasn't worth mentioning.
But for Hermione, this was the first "feeling of powerlessness" in the true sense of her life.
She crouched on the floor, her hand hovering above the wand, unable to reach it.
Her eyes turned red.
Not because of pain. It was because the knowledge system she took pride in had been completely denied in this compartment. "The Standard Book of Spells" couldn't explain this. "A History of Hogwarts" couldn't explain this. All the books she had read, all the theories she had memorized, were nothing in front of this boy who didn't need a wand, didn't chant spells, and could make her completely lose her ability to act just by snapping his fingers while sitting in a chair.
People in the corridor were watching.
At least seven or eight heads poked out from the cracks of their respective compartment doors. They saw Hermionecrouching on the floor, saw her unable to reach her own wand.
Not a single person came in to help.
It wasn't that they didn't want to help. It was because the image of Ron being pushed away just now was still imprinted in their minds. Before that memory faded, no one would step into this compartment.
"I did not use Dark Arts."
Cassius spoke.
He was still looking out the window.
"I also did not violate any school rules—because we haven't arrived at school yet, and the school rules haven't taken effect. If you want to cite regulations, you must first understand their scope of application."
Hermione's lips moved.
She wanted to retort. Her brain was rapidly flipping through every page of "A History of Hogwarts," trying to find a rule that "also applied on the Hogwarts Express".
Did she find it?
No.
"A History of Hogwarts" did mention the express train, but the wording regarding disciplinary jurisdiction on the train was vague. Prefects could perform patrol duties, but the authority for "deducting points" and "punishment" only officially took effect after the Sorting.
Hermione's knowledge hadn't betrayed her. But her knowledge told her: the other party was right.
This made her feel even worse.
"Give her wand back."
Another person appeared at the door.
Harry.
He was back.
His right hand was holding his wand—holly, Phoenixfeather, eleven inches. The tip of the wand was pointing in the direction of Cassius.
His hand was shaking. It was shaking more violently than Hermione's just now. But he didn't leave. He stood there, his legs straight and taut.
Ron didn't come with him. He was probably still catching his breath in another compartment.
Harry had come back alone.
This was very Harry.
Cassius finally withdrew his gaze from the window.
He looked at Harry Potter standing at the door.
Lightning scar. Round glasses. The hand holding the wand was shaking, but he didn't lower it.
The protagonist of the original work. The Boy Who Lived. The most important pawn in Dumbledore's hand. The Child of Prophecy.
Now just a skinny boy wearing an old sweater, who hadn't even learned "Expelliarmus" yet.
But he had returned.
After seeing Ron being pushed away with his own eyes, and after personally experiencing the magical pressure in Diagon Alley, he had returned.
For a girl he had met only five minutes ago.
"Interesting," Cassius said in his heart.
The Gryffindor spirit from the original work—foolish, but it really had guts.
Cassius didn't answer Harry. He just waved his left hand.
A very casual gesture, as if swatting a fly.
Hermione's wand on the floor bounced up. It didn't fly towards Cassius, but towards Hermione. The vine wood wand body flipped half a turn in the air, handle forward, and stopped steadily in front of Hermione.
The external force covering it dissipated. The humming stopped.
Hermione reached out and caught the wand. The wand had returned to normal temperature.
She stood up.
Cassius glanced at Harry.
Then he did something no one expected.
He picked up the cup of pumpkin juice he had only taken one sip of from the table and casually shook the water droplets off his hand.
"Your courage is bigger than your strength," he said. This sentence was directed at Harry. The tone was still that flat, emotionless one.
"This is not necessarily a bad thing."
He paused.
"But courage cannot be used as a shield. Before you rush over again next time, learn at least one usable spell."
Harry's lips trembled.
There was no mockery in these words.
This was the part he couldn't stand the most—if Cassiusmocked him, he could use anger to resist. But Cassiusdidn't. Cassius was just stating a fact.
You are weak.
Your courage has no meaning in front of me.
Not because courage itself has no meaning—but because you don't have the strength to match your courage.
Harry swallowed his saliva. He reached out and grabbed Hermione's arm, pulling her out of the compartment.
Hermione looked back once while following him.
She looked at Cassius.
Her eyes were still red. But the red component had turned into something else from grievance.
Something very complex, something she couldn't even explain herself.
The compartment door was closed.
From the outside.
All those people peeking in the corridor had disappeared. All the compartment doors were shut tight. Whispered discussions even came from behind a few doors.
"Did you see... that Malfoy..."
"He snapped his fingers and her wand just..."
"He didn't even move and that Weasley just flew out..."
"What exactly is he..."
The discussions were very quiet. So quiet that they thought no one could hear them.
But the [Soul Furnace] perception radius covered the three carriages in front and behind. Every syllable was clearly transmitted into Cassius's ears.
He didn't care.
Draco was trying hard to hold back his laughter next to him. He held it for about five seconds before he couldn't hold it anymore.
Chapter 19: Oliver Bole
"Did you see that curly-haired girl's face? The way she crouched on the floor to pick up her wand?"
Draco's tone was full of schadenfreude, "Serves her right, who told her to use school rules to pressure—"
"Draco."
"...Yeah."
"She was right about one thing."
Draco paused. "What?"
"Once we get to school, the school rules will indeed take effect." Cassius closed his eyes again. "I can disregard them, but you can't. You don't have my ability; losing points and getting detention are real, tangible trouble for you."
Draco opened his mouth.
"So," Cassius said, "once we get to school, say 'Mudblood' less. Not because the word absolutely cannot be said, but because after you say it, you don't have the ability to bear the consequences."
Draco closed his mouth.
The principle was simple and cruel: You can insult people, but you must first ensure that you can beat the other party after insulting them.
Draco couldn't beat them.
So he shouldn't insult them.
At least not to their face.
Crabbe silently finished his third Chocolate Frog. Goylewas chewing on Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans next to him, taking small bites. He chewed on a vomit-flavored one but didn't dare spit it out—afraid of making a sound and disturbing the young master.
The compartment returned to silence.
The scenery outside the window had changed from fields to rolling hills. A dark cloud was gathering in the distance; it would probably rain by nightfall.
Cassius remained with his eyes closed, resting.
His mind was not idle.
The three small-scale "confrontations" just now had confirmed a few things for him.
First, Ron Weasley. Fast mouth. Slow hands. His wand is broken, and even if it weren't, he poses no threat. This person's value doesn't lie in combat ability, but in the fact that he is Harry Potter's best friend. Touching him means touching Harry. Touching Harry means touching Dumbledore. If you want to touch him, you must hit him to the point where he can't resist.
Second, Hermione Granger. Smart. Too smart. This kind of person won't be beaten into submission—if you beat her once, she will go back and scour the library to find a way to defeat you. In the long run, she is the most troublesome one in the Gryffindor camp.
Third, Harry Potter. Weak. Very weak. But his behavior pattern has a kind of unpredictability—he will still charge forward when reason tells him "don't go." This kind of person cannot be judged by common sense.
However—that's all for the future.
Cassius had no interest in dealing with these three people right now. They were too weak and not worth the effort.
He was waiting for a more interesting trouble.
Based on the speed at which the Diagon Alley incident spread and the efficiency of news circulation on the Hogwarts Express, he estimated—
"Within three minutes." Cassius calculated in his heart.
The upperclassmen would come.
Less than two minutes.
The compartment door was pulled open for the fourth time.
The force pulling the door this time was greater than the previous three times. The sound of the door sliding along the track was aggressive, with a sharp metallic scrape.
Three people stood at the doorway.
The leader was over 1.8 meters tall. He looked about fifteen or sixteen. His face was long, with uneven, buck teeth sticking out. He was wearing school robes with the Slytherin crest—green and silver trim, with a snake emblem embroidered on the chest.
He leaned against the doorframe, one hand in his pocket, the other resting above the doorframe. He was putting on a very strong condescending posture.
Oliver Bole. Fifth year. Slytherin Quidditch team captain.
Two people stood behind him. Both were wearing Slytherin robes, shorter than Bole, but at least two heads taller than the first-year freshmen. Fourth or fifth years.
Bole's gaze swept across the compartment. First, he saw Draco—recognized him, Lucius's eldest son. Then Crabbeand Goyle—also recognized them, Malfoy's lackeys.
Finally, he saw Cassius.
By the window. Eyes closed. Hands crossed. Exactly the same as when the previous groups came in.
Bole had heard about the incident in the corridor. The whole train was talking about it. A first-year freshman from Malfoy Family, without using a wand, sitting in a chair and blasting a peer out of the compartment.
This matter reached the upperclassman circles of Slytherin.
In Slytherin, there was an unwritten rule: on the first day of freshmen enrollment, upperclassmen had the right to "entertain" them. The content of this entertainment varied from mockery to casting minor hexes, essentially a confirmation of the power structure—letting the freshmen know who the boss was.
Bole had been doing this for three years.
But he didn't come today entirely to establish authority. He was more curious—whether the rumors were true or not.
"You're that little son of Lucius?" Bole spoke. His voice was hoarse, with a lazy quality as if he were speaking from the back of his throat. "Quite a temper you have."
Draco saw it was a senior from his own house—Bole's Slytherin robes were easy to recognize—and his arrogance subsided a little. He subconsciously glanced at Cassius.
Cassius didn't move.
He didn't even lift an eyelid. He was flipping through a book in his hands—that copy of "Ancient Runes and Magic Guidance" he had brought on the train, covered with a generic textbook cover, looking like a "History of Magic" on the outside.
Bole waited for three seconds.
He didn't get a response.
His eyebrows twisted. In the ecology of Slytherin, a lower-year student ignoring the existence of an upper-year student was a very serious offense. More serious than cursing.
"I'm talking to you, brat." Bole's tone was heavier.
Cassius turned a page.
"Close the door on your way out."
His voice was about as loud as the sound of turning the page. Flat.
"Don't come out and wander around if you're that ugly."
Silence for a second.
Crabbe's Chocolate Frog fell. The second time today.
Bole's face twisted.
His facial muscles performed a complex movement—first the corners of his mouth pulled down, then the flesh on his cheeks pushed up, and finally his buck teeth were fully exposed from behind his lips. This expression is called "hideous" on a normal person's face, but on Bole's face, which was already somewhat asymmetrical, it looked more like some component had malfunctioned.
The two seniors behind him looked at each other.
They didn't know Cassius. They only knew that Bole said he was coming to "see that unruly first-year," so they followed. Now they were a bit regretful.
Not because they were scared.
Because the sentence "Don't come out and wander around if you're that ugly" echoed twice in the confined compartment, and the more they heard it, the more they wanted to laugh. But Bole was standing right in front. They didn't dare laugh.
"You're courting death." Bole's voice squeezed out from between his teeth.
Chapter 20: Beating Up the Fifth Years
The speed at which he drew his wand was not slow. In the Slytherin Dueling Club, Bole was considered a veteran member, and with his fifth-year level combined with the reflexes honed from years of playing Quidditch, he was much stronger than the average student.
The tip of his wand began to glow the moment he drew it—an orange light, the precursor to "Tarantallegra."
This hex would cause the victim to dance uncontrollably, and using it in public was far more humiliating than it was damaging. It was a classic trick used by upperclassmen to mess with first-years.
The light of the spell had just formed at the tip of his wand.
Cassius moved.
His movements were faster than Bole's spellcasting.
Not just by a little bit. It was a difference in speed on an entirely different level.
Cassius's right hand lifted from the book. While Bole's wand was still in the "startup" phase, Cassius had already completed the entire process of "judgment—reaction—execution."
But he did not cast a spell.
He grabbed something from the table.
Half a bottle of pumpkin juice.
A glass bottle with a third of the orange liquid left inside. Draco had drunk half of it and left it there earlier.
The instant Cassius's fingers gripped the bottle, the [Soul Furnace] channeled a precisely measured amount of magic into his fingertips and arm. Not too much, not too little—just enough to give the glass bottle the muzzle velocity of a low-speed rifle bullet once released.
He threw it.
With a flick of his wrist, the pumpkin juice bottle left his hand.
Bole's "Tarantallegra" was half a second away from firing. But his eyes caught a high-speed projectile—
The glass bottle slammed into his face.
To be precise, it slammed into his mouth.
Bole's mouth was the most prominent feature on his face—his buck teeth stuck out, and his lips couldn't cover them. The bottom of the pumpkin juice bottle struck this most prominent point with high precision and high velocity.
The sound was not a "bang."
It was a "crack."
The sound of shattering glass and breaking teeth mingled together. It was impossible to tell which was which.
Then came the sound of liquid—the remaining pumpkin juice sprayed out the moment the bottle shattered, mixed with glass shards and something else red, covering Bole's entire face.
Bole's wand spell was terminated.
His body toppled backward. Not slowly—he was knocked backward rapidly after his center of gravity shifted.
He covered his face with his hands. Broken glass embedded into the skin of his palms, but he couldn't care about that—the excruciating pain from his front teeth overshadowed everything else.
His mouth was bleeding. His two front teeth—the ones that were already bucked—at least one of them had broken. The other was loose, wobbling in his gums when pushed by his tongue.
Bole let out a muffled scream. Blood, pumpkin juice, and broken glass all dripped down from between the fingers covering his face.
The two upperclassmen behind him froze for half a second.
Then they reacted.
Both of them drew their wands at the same time.
Their movements were standard—at least more standard than Bole's had been. They were upperclassmen with actual combat experience, and in a situation where one of their own had been struck, their conditioned reflex was to raise their wands and counterattack.
The tip of the one on the right glowed with red light—the precursor to Stupefy. The one on the left glowed with blue light—probably the Leg-Locker Curse or some other type of restriction magic.
Two beams of light lit up simultaneously, both aimed at Cassius.
In their minds, this was a reasonable reaction: a first-year student had hit their leader with a pumpkin juice bottle, so it was only natural for the two of them, both fifth years, to join forces and strike back.
But their framework of understanding was missing a key variable.
Cassius did not need "startup time."
His logic for casting magic was different from every Wizardwho had received a formal education at Hogwarts. He did not have the four steps of "grip wand—aim—incant—release." He only had two steps: "think" and "release."
His two hands were aimed in two different directions.
His left hand at the one on the left. His right hand at the one on the right.
Two pulses of magic left his body simultaneously.
Silent. No light—no, wait, there was a tiny bit of light. A very faint blue, lasting for such a short duration that the human eye could only catch a blurry flicker.
The two pulses struck the chests of the two upperclassmen, respectively.
The effect was identical to the standard "Stupefy." But the execution method was completely different—no incantation of "Stupefy," no iconic red flash, no arc of a wand movement.
It was just a "pushing force" appearing in two directions. The frequency and amplitude of this force were precisely calibrated, just enough to overload the human central nervous system the moment of contact, causing it to shut down.
The one on the right fell first. His knees buckled, and then he lunged forward, slamming face-first onto the floor.
The one on the left was a fraction of a second later. His body stiffened for an instant after the magic pulse hit his chest, his wand sliding out of his hand and rolling twice on the ground. Then his eyes rolled back, he fell straight backward, and the back of his head slammed onto Bole's calves.
The two were piled on top of each other.
Bole was still covering his face and screaming. But his scream turned into a different sound after his two companions' bodies slammed onto his legs—a whimper mixed with pain and terror.
The entire process.
From the moment Bole drew his wand to all three fifth-year students falling to the ground.
Cassius counted.
Less than three seconds.
The compartment was filled with the sweet, cloying smell of pumpkin juice, mixed with a hint of rust—the blood from Bole's mouth.
Cassius stood up.
He walked over to Bole.
Bole was half-lying on the floor, with his two companions pressing down on his legs. His face was covered in pumpkin juice and blood, his eyes peering out from between his fingers, his pupils shrunk to the size of pinpricks from pain and fear.
Cassius lifted his right foot.
The sole of his shoe stepped onto the back of Bole's right hand, the one holding his wand.
It wasn't just stepping on it and leaving it at that. It was stepping on it and then applying a bit of pressure downward.
A very small amount of pressure. Roughly equivalent to one-third of Cassius's body weight.
But the bones on the back of the hand couldn't withstand too much point pressure. Bole's finger bones made a faint grinding sound under the sole—not breaking, but a warning before deformation. If he added just a little more force, the metacarpals would shatter.
"Ah—ah—!" Bole's scream changed pitch. He released his left hand from his face and turned to push at Cassius's ankle.
He couldn't push it.
Cassius had a melee magic armor draped over his legs. That layer of high-density magic film clinging to his skin made his lower limbs as stable as if they were welded to the ground. The combined strength of both of Bole's hands couldn't make that foot move even a millimeter.
"Fifth year." Cassius looked down at him. "Slytherin."
His voice was flat, as if he were reading a resume.
"Is this all the skill you have, and you dare to come and teach me a lesson?"
Tears streamed down Bole's face. Not because of grievance—he was in pain. The bones in his hand were creaking.
"Le... let... go..." His mouth was full of blood, his speech slurred.
"Let me go... I know I was wrong..."
Cassius looked at him for two seconds.
Then he pulled his foot back.