Before the two days reserved for midterm exams, the school announced an extra compulsory lesson: philosophy led by a wizard coming from no-maj society, a young man picked personally by Geoffrey Roche became the head of subject department to better connect with kids, Luca’s class was fortunate enough to have him teach. This policy headmaster and vice-headmaster jointly came up with to improve the odds of wizards growing up to be exemplary humans, or at least not graduating to participate in organized crime straight out of their castle. First-year’s job in light of only less than four months remaining in their schoolyear consisted of reading and listening to lectures on ‘The Nicomachean Ethics’, an explanation of morality written by a Greek no-maj Aristotle in the ancient era they thought best suited for the youngest age, the premise of the class moving forward would be two books scrutinized yearly. The announcement was also read in ‘Daily Seer’ as the Minister acknowledged Fontaine’s concerns eventually in a watered-down version and did pledge to take ‘immediate action’ curbing the birth of new dark wizards.
The students were given the books, and Luca spent the very same night reading his copy in its entirety, drawing parallels with himself in many places, a fragment of confusion and day-by-day monotony he lived in made bearable by philosophers from thousands of years past encouraging exactly the choices he makes. The Eastern theories Catherine spent time teaching him made little sense when he heard them, the boy simply thought of it as an attempt to control him, but now he had a flash of understanding: the basics are what matters, unimportant where or when in humanity’s history. Motivated to work harder for nobody but himself, he finally fell asleep without holding onto the pouch of vials hanging on his neck first time since receiving it.
In the morning, he run to his best ability in the daybreak exercise, leaving Winnetou stunned as so far they went side to side, Luca a good fifteen percent faster than him now. He ate more and was an active participant in his surrounding students' conversation concerning the upcoming practical tests, everyone worried if they learned to use their wands well enough to pass them, the boy free of such fear since his teacher came up with a way for Luca to work normally during one of their Sunday meetings. In practical lessons since then, he had prepared giant items to work with, the boy transforms a cup the size of a bathtub from a log while normal students work on a small block of wood, levitates gigantified rubber balls, and conjures a sheet instead of a handkerchief, his lecturers under pressure from Fontaine admitted his ease of casting and amplified abilities to be worthy of the highest grades, Luca on his way to snatch the ‘Perfect Score’ trophy for his first year as a wizard.
The examination timetable for the day consisting of Transfiguration, Charms, Offense, Flying, and No-maj Research made the class tangibly exhausted by the end of it, what was required for those courses varied tremendously. Transfiguration was graded based on material and beautiful patterns, if you could only make the block of wood into a similarly wooden cup, it became the bare minimum with the worst rating, luckily nobody Luca knew was that bad at it. He himself the best, making the golden chalice reach half his height and have Razor the late Chupacabra and Ringo’s reliefs adorning it, the worst Bennet making an iron beer mug and revealing one of his parents as an alcoholic inadvertently.
In charms, the students were expected to conjure a string of tied bandanas, graded on their varied colours and fabrics to hopefully be changed with each coming out, proving the control Ms. Fieldstein pushed on them. Nobody managed to reach her unrealistic standards, Luca the closest to them pulled off alternating black and white, satin and linen, but drowned the classroom under his yacht-sail-sized cloths. The older lady mildly disappointed, the ‘control’ theory she advocated and was hired to propagate had a long way to go.
Offense teachers had a prepared sliding shooting range like in no-maj amusement parks for students to aim at the moving smaller and bigger targets scoring points and timed for two minutes, everyone having three attempts. This test highly competitive, none of the boys wanted to be the last, but eventually, Junfeng ended on that disgraceful spot amid jeers from his roommates. He swore to have his glasses replaced during the summer vacation, having had enough of this. Luca predictably first as he could hit three or more targets with a single massive beam of light, Winnetou snatching the second, and a girl from Pukwudgie’s closing the podium.
At flying Luca was in a league of his own so the instructor sent the rest of the class on a ten laps obstacle course race and discussed tactics with him while they watched the kids hitting the slowing light barriers hung up in the air along a road marked by two wisps of grey smoke that made them funnily make annoyed expressions from focused ones in four-times slow motion. Nathaniel won the race due to his jittery handling of the broom, the Asian teacher commented he could be a good player in both normal and battle quidditch in the future, the proud boy stated that he will surely qualify for the Wampus team next season.
At the site of Research, students were asked to hold a ten-minute conversation without outing themselves as wizards, which to Luca’s surprise seemed hard as more than half participants failed to do so. Professor Biely spent the two hours sitting and gossiping with Luca while others were graded talking to the available portrait-assistants, the no-maj kids all exempt from the test for obvious reasons.
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Generally, the practicals opened Luca’s eyes to how advanced he was compared to his peers, Miranda eating dinner pissed off and getting consoled by Nadine because she couldn’t transfigure materials to this day despite trying her hardest and having a ghost aide. The Voraci girl that Luca now looked seriously at from up close and without makeup, straight black hair, and slightly tanned healthy skin without blemishes along the purple eyes made her the prettiest little witch he saw so far, asked him.
“Any guidance from our special Tentacle Charmer on how to become a darling of magic?” she inquired, the whole school now roughly knowing of Luca’s excellence since his and Fontaine’s names kept being brought up in ‘Daily Seer’ when they had nothing to write, the boy observed with interest as all the ‘fourfold chosen’ by Ilvermorny houses before him.
“Visualize and wave the wand?” Luca after thinking hard came up with such a piece of wisdom.
“You imply I am incapable of thinking or what?! Everyone knows that.” Miranda got agitated for a moment and stabbed the last baby tomato off her plate.
“Do you also imagine the different texture, weight, colour, and even smell or taste of the object? I do, although now talking about it feels weird…” Luca frowned in doubt of himself, instinctively encompassing a lot of additionals to his spells since day one could be a reason some go out of whack and some he only amplifies.
“That's excessive…” Nadine wondered as she didn’t go so fancy, but her casting was still above average. Miranda’s eyes lit up, eager to perform she waved her wand at her empty plate turning it silvery but with patches of wood like a dairy cow’s hide.
“Calm down and prepare before, don’t be impatient.” Luca instructed peacefully, his friend’s second try after she closed her eyes and wrinkled her forehead for a couple of deep breaths went to transfigure the plate into steel smoothly. Miranda hugged her left and right and jumped lightly in joy but then sulked again in a flash.
“You should tell me sooner, sis won’t let me see the end of it after that D grade...” she collapsed on the table anticipating the letter filled with mockery.
“Mmm, there are a lot of people having trouble like that… Would you be interested in helping those with bad grades? Self-study group for first years?” Nadine waited for the outburst to end before asking Luca, impressed with his reasoning much more than Abigail’s chaotic ‘just do it!’ and ‘read-a-book!’ attitude. In the end, Luca agreed to have his Sundays from lunch to dinner filled with trying to improve whoever would she get to join the mini-group as a part-time lecturer with Abigail as a partner.
On the next day’s written exams Luca didn’t have the same lead over his classmates, Tolkien a surprise history buff tied with him in perfect answers, and many of Horned Serpent’s students maxed out their written scores alongside them to the half-smile and commendation from their dean that Bryce couldn’t stop being thrilled about for a long time.
In Identification, the class went up in groups of six behind the curtain where presented leaves, roots, teeth, small pebbles, and other raw materials were laid in order to prevent cheating and discussions, tasked with describing their use and from what or where those bits and pieces came from. Crafting similar, except a pile of seemingly random junk and vials in questionable shapes littered the table there, groups of six in silence under supervision were allowed to touch and smell them, but not activate or drink, before sitting down and writing anything they could remember of their use facing away from the table and each other, the day less stressful for little wizards with a functioning long-term memory.
Kids now knowing where they stand were inspired to compete by a public commendation and award ceremony headed by Juno, a hundred Galleons for all first places in the school cost the Ilvermorny a pretty penny in exchange for a full library and training halls during the entire month of March. It allowed Luca to order small presents and candy for his friends and Club members as a small gesture of gratitude, soothing his worry about a lack of repayment for them having his back in the incident. The self-study group was a hit, although Luca felt something fishy being the only male member and the occasional giggle the girls he tried his best to educate seriously exchanged, Abigail was of ‘help’ in recommending outdated textbooks written in ancient English from 19th or 18th century even Luca had trouble understanding, not to mention a bunch of lively twelve-year-old girls that don’t like reading as in the tradition of Wampus house. The ghost girl stumped by her uselessness, had to be comforted by the group that pretended to listen to her attentively before asking Luca to explain in private.
Easter only symbolically highlighted by an abundance of chocolate on the menu and a heap of sweet figurines depicting their patrons left by the cooking staff in every house’s common room wasn’t a wizarding holiday at all, so there were no days off, the lessons going on as usual. Luca provoked his cat by showing Ringo a chocolate cat most resembling the pet and bit its head off in one mouthful, earning him a wet and smelly pillow every night for a month.
“What!!!” a piercing cry of shock coming from his left startled the boy eating a bowl of cereal one day in April, Luca grabbed his wand and jumped away while spraying milk out of his nostrils, only to see Miranda’s face in shock while she read a letter that just got delivered to her. The attention of the whole dining hall earned easily, Luca coughed for a while awaiting any sort of follow-up. Miranda's eyes rapidly became moist, and as she finished reading her tears fell freely, the girl announced in a broken voice: “My dad disappeared!”.