The students at the back of the classroom, being farther away, hadn't initially seen what was inside Lucian Thornwick's cauldron.
They only sensed the strange shift in atmosphere at the front—first the suffocating silence, then the collective gasps. And finally, they witnessed something utterly unbelievable: Professor Snape, infamous for his cold severity, had rushed forward like a gust of wind… and lost his composure?
"What happened? What's going on up there?"
"No idea. Professor Snape looks terrifying. Did Lucian blow up his cauldron?"
"Doesn't seem like it. There was no explosion… and no bad smell either. Actually—do you smell that? It's… nice."
Whispers spread like ripples through the back rows.
A Ravenclaw student near the front, who had caught part of the truth, turned and explained in a dazed tone:
"Lucian… he altered the Cure for Boils recipe on his own…"
That immediately drew soft gasps—and a few schadenfreude-filled glances.
"I knew it! He's done for."
"First Potions class and he pulls something like that? Has he lost his mind?"
But the Ravenclaw's next words silenced them all.
"…Except he didn't fail."
"Not only did he not fail—he brewed a potion… that glows."
"That's why Professor Snape lost it."
What?
The sentence struck like lightning.
Shock.
After a brief stillness, an even stronger wave of agitation broke out.
"That's impossible!"
"You must've imagined it! Altering a recipe and succeeding? And it glows? What is this, Transfiguration?"
"Is it true?"
Doubt, amazement, confusion, curiosity—all tangled together.
Every student, front and back alike, craned their necks. Some even dared to stand, trying desperately to glimpse the corner where something extraordinary had clearly occurred.
Order in the Potions classroom teetered on the brink of collapse.
At the center of everyone's attention, Snape finally forced himself to recover a sliver of composure from the overwhelming shock.
He took a deep breath. The crisp fragrance steadied his wildly pounding heart.
He turned his stiff neck toward Lucian, his dark eyes filled with a complex expression—hoarse, probing, almost hungry.
"Tell me," he demanded, his voice stripped of its usual oily sarcasm. "What exactly is going on here?"
Before the Potions Master's interrogation, before the gazes of the entire class, Lucian showed neither nervousness nor pride.
He met Snape's stare calmly and spoke in a level tone, as if stating an obvious fact:
"Professor, the Cure for Boils recipe in the textbook contains several clear logical errors."
Boom.
If the glowing potion had been a visual shockwave, then this sentence was a detonation at the level of the soul.
Snape staggered slightly.
For a fleeting moment, he wondered if years of brewing had caused him to hallucinate.
A first-year—who had barely warmed up his wand—was declaring, to his face, that a standard textbook used across the wizarding world for over a century… was wrong?
Absurd.
Arrogant.
That was Snape's first instinct.
Yet when he looked into Lucian's clear, steady eyes—eyes that seemed to hold unshakable certainty—his rebuke died in his throat.
Because reason told him that the miracle in the cauldron was undeniable proof.
"…What errors?" Snape forced the words through clenched teeth.
Lucian answered without hesitation.
"For example, the porcupine quills should not be added first. Their magical properties lean toward stabilization and solidification, which severely disrupt the neutralization reaction between dried nettles and crushed snake fangs. At least thirty percent of the magical energy is lost in meaningless conflict."
"The correct sequence is to complete the neutralization first, then use powdered porcupine quill to solidify and finalize the structure."
"Another example: powdered horn of bicorn should be pretreated over low heat before adding shriveled fig juice, to activate its latent fusion properties. Mixing it directly, as the book suggests, wastes much of its potential."
His voice was calm, methodical, precise.
With each point Lucian made, Snape's complexion grew paler.
Because as a Potions Master, the moment Lucian identified a flaw, Snape's mind automatically ran the theoretical simulation—
And reached a terrifying conclusion.
Lucian was right.
Every single point.
Steps that Snape himself had never questioned—steps the entire wizarding world treated as sacred doctrine—did indeed contain critical inefficiencies.
And this boy—an eleven-year-old boy—had dissected them effortlessly in his first lesson.
"Monster. He's a monster."
The thought screamed through Snape's mind.
A successful brew might have been luck.
But this clarity? This systematic overturning of established theory?
That was no coincidence.
Snape couldn't accept it.
Couldn't believe it.
Abruptly, he turned, snatching up a copy of Magical Drafts and Potions from the desk. His fingers whitened with the force of his grip.
He flipped through the pages rapidly, eyes scanning the contents. At last, he jabbed a finger at a specific entry.
"Here," he said sharply. "'Swelling Solution.' A completely harmless potion."
His tone bordered on command.
"Now. Brew it here. Using your theory."
"I want to see it."
He had to see it with his own eyes.
He had to confirm whether this was a fleeting miracle—
Or the arrival of something that would overturn the entire wizarding world.