Harry Evans Chapter 140: Do you mind if I watch, uwu ?

There was something about becoming the international enemy of the pure-blood agenda across all of Europe that really tended to light a fire under one’s ass.

And increase one’s anxiety. Couldn’t forget the anxiety.

One of the unexpected consequences of the newfound motivation, as if Harry hadn’t already been motivated enough, was that he’d finally finished understanding the enchantments on the vanishing cabinet. This meant that he could repair it, which he had.

The likely reason for the burst of energy was that the vanishing cabinet now represented a real escape option when other things failed.

After all, one day someone would realise that Harry used a house-elf to port himself around the country.

He’d learn to apparate soon, of course, but anti-apparition jinxes were the common accompaniment to any assassination attempt.

A serious assassin would also have a way to counter portkeys.

But, they would never expect Harry to simply pull out a miniature vanishing cabinet from his pocket, enlarge it and then slip through.

One bombarda on the other side would solve the issue of being followed.

Voila, one sure fire get out of jail free card. The thing even worked in Hogwarts!

In the future, Harry would also learn how to make a portkey.

The steps of any escape would be as follows. Try to apparate, try to portkey, try to house-elf, use the vanishing cabinet.

Maybe Harry was getting a bit paranoid, but it wasn’t paranoia when they were really out to get you.

The fact that Privet Drive had some swanky new wards to remind him of his mistakes didn’t help his mental state.

“Does the master wish to rest?” Dobby asked from beside Harry as the boy critically observed the two vanishing cabinets he owned.

A wave of the wand shrank one of them, and it was promptly slipped and spelt to remain around Harry’s neck in the form of a necklace right next to his bezoar.

“No rest for the wicked,” Harry said with a sigh.

“Dobby will remind the master once, as he was asked to, that the master has not rested in twelve hours and the transfiguration O.W.Ls are to occur tomorrow morning. Or rather, this morning, in five hours,” Dobby said perfunctorily. 

Instead of resting, Harry went over to the shelf on which he’d left the enchantment project he was planning on showing to Dumbledore.

The copy book. He’d gotten it to the point where it had an infinite number of pages before he’d stopped to work on the cabinet.

In his opinion, repairing the cabinet had been more complex than a book had any right to be. 

He took the hard-cover bound tome into his left hand and pressed his wand to the spine, hard. Were his wand not strengthened by my magic, it might have broken like any other twig.

Harry’s will manifested, and the enchantment version of the copy spell flashed through his mind. Latin fell from his tongue as if he were a native speaker.

The bare-bones cave flashed a bright white light.

The copy spell and the infinity enchantment would cohabitate inside the book. It wasn’t time and space magic. It wasn’t that complicated. 

The light dimmed, leaving behind the soft orange glow of the fairy lights attached to the ceiling of the cave.

Harry opened the tome and flipped through the pages. Nothing. He idly summoned a bottle of ink to his hands from where he’d previously been working on some arithmetic and logical systems.

He uncapped the bottle and spilt the ink on the pages.

The book greedily absorbed the black liquid, leaving behind pristine pages in under a minute.

“Good,” Harry muttered, turned the spine of the book outwards and tapped it into the closest book he could find. It ended up being the transfiguration textbook for the fifth year. Intermediate Transfiguration by Transfigurus Trollicus.

After a second of touching the spines together, Harry flipped open his notebook and grinned when he saw the contents of the transfiguration textbook reflected in his enchanted book.

“Good,” he said curtly, before snapping it shut.

“A name, master?” Dobby asked.

“It’s just a notebook,” Harry replied with a snort. “But if I would call it anything, perhaps aspirationally, I’d call it the book of Eibon.”

“A very awe-inspiring name,” Dobby replied.

“You don’t have to butter me up,” Harry said and extended a hand towards the house-elf. “Take me back to the house; it's better to sleep there for the last three nights.” 

The Dursleys had decided to move to Barcelona in early September, that way Harry and Dudley wouldn’t be disturbed by the move as they’d be away at their respective schools.

Harry reappeared in his childhood bedroom, which he guessed wouldn’t be his childhood bedroom much longer.

A minute later, he was out like a light.

-/-

“You’re already familiar with the process, I imagine,” Professor McGonagall said before taking a sip of tea from her seat in the living room of the Dursleys. 

“Marchbanks again?” Harry asked. He’d already met the ancient woman once back when she’d officiated his advancement in Charms and Arithmancy. 

He just hoped that there’d be no Umbridge this time.

That he could really do without.

“Yes, she is the governor of the Wizarding Examinations Authority. If there is one event other than the O.W.Ls and the N.E.W.Ts she has to be personally present for, it would be this.” McGonagall paused, a small smirk spreading across her face. “Also, she’s likely curious enough to have come even if it hadn’t been necessary.”

“I guess also Penny will meet her two years early then,” Harry said.

“It’s very nice to see pupils applying themselves more seriously these past few years,” the professor said, finishing her tea. “You certainly had a good influence on your friends. Even if Mr. Diggory’s belief that he could easily skip a year in transfiguration is a tad ill-informed.”

“I guess he’ll just have to stick to beating Gryffindor in Quidditch every time they play,” Harry remarked, at which McGonagall grew a tad red in the face and scowled.

“Perhaps I will encourage him more in class once the year starts,” she decided spontaneously, before standing up. “Let us be off!” she exclaimed happily, clapping her hands once. 

Harry also stood up from the sofa he’d been lounging on and quickly went to the dining room to say goodbye to his family, collecting the well-wishes of people who’d long since grown numb to his constant overachieving. 

“We’ll wait with Penny and Professor Slughorn, right?” Harry asked as he and McGonagall exited the house. He gave the woman his elbow, which she promptly gripped and sent the two of them careening through time and space towards the ministry.

“Yes, you’ll be able to wish your friend good luck,” McGonagall said without breaking her stride as the two of them appeared inside the ministry atrium in the designated arrival spots. “Terrific student, that girl.”

Harry stumbled after the woman and glanced to the left and right at the other arriving witches and wizards of Britain.

The ministry was as busy as always, and there were constantly pops of apparition shredding through the air to add to the already very generous noise of dozens of conversations occurring in a large marble hall that tended to echo.

Flashes of green fire whooshed in the background from the line of fireplaces, which people used to floo to and from the ministry.

A few seconds after Harry’s arrival, a cacophony of whispers and glances suddenly added themselves to the chaos. 

“Is that him?”

“Is Britain truly not capable of producing an honourable duellist?”

“Good on him, showing those continental fops their place on the pecking order.”

“I wonder what he’s here for, another advancement probably. Show off.”

Harry blended out the voices and the stares. He’d already experienced something similar on his visit to Diagon Alley when he’d purchased his school supplies.

He was famous now, for better or worse. It didn’t help that he’d been forced to continue replying to the letters of those that bothered to write to him, as it was still somewhat unclear if he would need public support one of these days. 

Skeeter’s series of articles had also been relatively popular, swinging the British public’s opinion more in his favour rather than not.

Dumbledore and Snape had meanwhile taken care of broader Europe.

That still left the consequences, however.

Anonymity was now more impossible than ever.

Harry presented his wand at the security counter and passed through a crowd to get into one of the elevators.

“I’d shake your hand, but I’m still scared of the professor accompanying you,” a grey-haired red-robed auror told Harry jokingly when he and McGonagall had finally managed to squeeze inside one of the golden boxes alongside twenty or so other people.

“Adrian, please, you graduated more than twenty years ago,” the professor said in a joking tone of voice, causing the auror to defensively raise his palms in the air and smile sheepishly.

“Some scars remain for life, I’m afraid!” he joked before getting out on the floor of the department of magical law enforcement. 

“I see that I am being accompanied by someone with a reputation,” Harry joked to lighten the mood, which had been somewhat disturbed ever since he’d received so many scrutinous gazes back in the atrium.

“You’re still a student for now, Mr. Evans, so I suggest you guard your tongue,” the professor replied lightly. “You’ll call me Minerva and make jokes with me in public when you become an alumnus.”

“Perhaps I should simply do all my O.W.Ls today and graduate to become the beneficiary of such a privilege sooner,” Harry said with a laugh as the two of them got off at the Department of Magical Education.

“Ha, as if the staff would ever let you,” the woman harrumphed as they traversed the more empty halls of the education department towards the testing room. “There’s still a lot of knowledge that needs to be hammered into your head before you’ll be allowed to call yourself a full-fledged wizard.” 

“My head is empty and ready to receive thy wisdom,” Harry said as the two of them arrived in front of testing room 1, right next to testing room 2, in front of which Penny and Slughorn were already waiting.

“Harry,” the girl said excitedly and went in for a hug, shaking all over.

“Penny, good to see you,” Harry replied, returning the hug and sneezing only once from all the blonde hair the girl shoved into his nose. She’d grown taller again, which was weird since he only hadn’t seen her for a week.

“Don’t be nervous,” he told her with a pat on the shoulder. “You’re the most overprepared poitoneer in the country.”

Penny gave a watery smile. 

Harry didn’t know what she was so stressed about. She’d been making N.E.W.T. level potions for a while now, and unlike other forms of magic, you couldn’t force out a good potion on willpower and talent alone. You had to understand the underlying theory.

She had the theoretical and practical portion in the bag; it seemed like she just struggled believing it.

“Good, you’re all here,” an old female voice suddenly said from behind the group, causing them to collectively turn around and meet the eyes of the rather prune-like but very energetic Griselda Marchbanks.

“Good to see you again, Mr. Evans,” Marchbanks said with a nod towards him. “You already did your arithmancy O.W.L., but since it is a theory-only exam, we just missed each other. Regardless, I did have the feeling we’d see each other again ahead of schedule.”

Harry inclined his head and jubilated inwardly that Umbridge was not present this time.

“We’ll hold the theoretical exam in the same room, after which you’ll split up,” Marchbanks told the group, before unceremoniously opening the door to testing room 2, in which two tables and two chairs were already prepared in front of a longer table for the governor and the two professors. 

Marchbanks took two exam papers from what seemed to be an extended pocket and put them face down on each table, before adding a quill and an inkpot each.

“I’m not really worried about the cheating, so let’s just get this over with as fast as possible. This year’s practicals were a bit lacking on the O.W.L. level, so I’m looking forward to seeing something interesting,” she said as everyone sat down in their designated seats.

“This year's O.W.L. were a bit underwhelming, sans one or two counter-examples.” Harry heard Slughorn agree before a veil of silence descended on the large marble room, and a blue hourglass was projected into the hour, showing that they had exactly one hour to answer all the questions on the exam.

Quite informal, Harry determined, before flipping the parchment.

Also, he determined after taking a cursory glance through the paper that it was quite easy.

He was done in 45 minutes. The closer he got to the N.E.W.T., the less extra time he finished his exams with these days, but using only 75% of the allotted time was still a solid performance. 

Fifteen more minutes passed in silence as Penny scribbled wildly at her fourth-year potions exam, chewing herself halfway through the quill and scratching out and rewriting her answers several times.

Going by the messy and completely covered sheets of parchment in front of her, Harry could only wish good luck to whoever had to correct that mess.

“Time’s up,” Marchbanks said and took Harry's parchments and ripped out Penny’s from right underneath her quill.

Penny gave an odd sound, like an errant dog struck by a thrown brick, before leaning back in her chair, seemingly exhausted.

“Let’s quickly correct this,” Marchbanks said before making a copy of each exam while giving the original to the respective teachers.

She flashed through both, likely due to her experience before quietly conferring with Slughorn and McGonagall, who’d taken a bit longer.

“Alright, without any preamble,” Marchbanks said, clapping her hands. “Harry Evans, transfiguration O.W.L. theory section, Outstanding. Penny Haywood, fourth year potions exam, theory section, Outstanding.” She turned to Slughorn. “You can go to the other room and prepare the ingredients with my assistant. He’s waiting at the door. The transfiguration practicals shouldn’t take longer than five minutes.”

“I’m getting all excited!” The Potions professor said jovially before hefting himself to his feet and taking the still shaking Penny to the door.

“You’ll do great!” Harry shouted after the girl, in a good mood now that everything was already halfway done. Then his smile turned into a frown as a figure slipped into the examination room while Penny and Slughorn exited.

A slightly roundish pin-striped robe-wearing man with a forgettable moustache and a bowler hat.

“Hope I didn’t miss the event of the season,” Minister Fudge said loudly before swaggering to the examination podium and sitting down next to McGonagall and Marchbanks, who were each giving them their own surprised looks. “Just checking up on the department of education today,” the man waved off. “You know how it is, newly elected and no clue what’s going on! I’m sure you don’t mind.”

“It’s highly irregular, Cornelius,” Marchbanks commented.

“Well, that’s good! I think this place needs a change in pace after all that stuffiness Crouch left lying around on his way out,” the minister exclaimed happily, a practised smile splitting his round face.

“Mr. Evans, don’t let me disrupt you; you’re likely much better at transfiguration than I am at this point, so just imagine I’m air,” the man then said, turning to Harry.

Harry and the minister had, in fact, exchanged letters most recently, so it would be a bit too soon to say anything negative. The man had also been vocal in his support for Harry’s actions at the tournament.

“It would be a pleasure to showcase my capabilities, minister,” Harry thus said demurely while inclining his head.

The gesture seemed to please the man, and he waved a hand in the air.

Marchbanks coughed once, exchanged a glance with McGonagall, and then shrugged.

“Well, Mr. Evans, let’s proceed with the practical then.”