“Granger down, Granger down after taking out four people! At long last Scott Park hits him with ebublio, Granger’s head locked in a bubble of water, the boy can’t do anything anymore, unbelievable it took so long!” a commentator girl was screaming to a squealing in red-hot fervor audience watching the last match of the season where Luca’s team decided to forfeit and let him go at it alone as a prank devised by Makris brothers. Confused boy, audience, opposing team, and referee all watched the nine young men jump down from their brooms after flying as high as they could screaming as they passed the circling around them Luca: “You got this!”, “Good luck!”, “Go do it, we believe!” before bouncing happily on the grass, the boy realized this was his time to shine and make it to the annals of history at his last official game. Delusion that he could do it shattered fifteen minutes later when water poured into his mouth, the boy helpless to do anything about the lucky shot eventually connecting with his body, the one versus ten dream ultimately coming to naught.
“At last, at last, the Bringer of Suffering got done! Mob him, don’t let him land, repay grievances of the three houses!!!” the girl shouted for Thunderbirds to quickly follow up and make the boy into a walking abomination in revenge for the inhuman torture players opposite him had to endure, many flinching whenever they passed their abuser on the narrow corridors of the castle, shadow set to accompany them for life.
“Don’t go that far…” Juno added weakly from the side, she also thought the vile enhanced curses in this year’s battle quidditch suffered by the houses other than Wampus were a tad too much. Everyone counted Luca out, not expecting a kid could silent cast or even know the countercurse for the slightly obscure spell.
The one now observed by his fans and detractors closely as he choked on water felt the wand in his hand flinch despite the boy grasping it tightly, the first lesson of battle quidditch on how to ensure the wand always stays in position. A special connection with his tentacle invigorated Luca that had already given up, the boy sent his magic in and put the wand into the bubble, the black wand sucking out the water covering his head immediately, letting the boy breathe the sweetest mouthful of air in his life, the panic of drowning that almost got to the point of flashing the entire memory before his eyes went down suddenly to a pleasure that made him moan a second before the boy’s feet hit the rooftop of the audience tower that awoke him to the reality of still flying out the stadium, he needed to go back within ten seconds or get disqualified, the tiles bouncing him off just like grass proved that student’s safety was taken extra seriously around these parts, the anti-collision enchantment extending to the buildings too. With a sharp turn in the air, the boy went back into the game, Thunderbirds had six players left for him to defeat.
Sadly, he flew right into the beams of light coming for him, the enemy team predicting the path he would have to take back, the rollercoaster of emotions completely collapsing Luca’s spirit, his body while he fell down taken good care of by six sniped curses added on top of those he ate while trying to go back to the stadium, Thunderbirds possessed by the essence of Simo Häyhä this day.
“Ahahaha, rewind that, rewind! Stop at his face illuminated by the rainbow light of spells right in front of it!” the commentator bellowed in laughter along the audience when the hovering screens showed Luca’s expression going from an intoxicated and determined one, his eyes shining with confidence, arms and shoulders uplifted, daredevil half-smile, to utter despair and resignation permeating his silhouette, downturned corners of his mouth in a reverse smile, less than a blink after he saw the beams coming right at his forehead, the effect of which was planned in the locker room, to interfere with his ability to pronounce spells, a full set of tongue, teeth and nostril hair growth made his handsome face capable of being stuff of nightmares, a vomited out snails falling down at the same velocity as the boy bounced and slipped away from his pathetic carcass mutated unrecognizably mid-air.
The mask change performance captured by the cameras got printed and laughed at by soon the whole wizarding world thanks to the narration of ‘Daily Seer’, made even Miranda that didn’t smile since her father’s disappearance laugh hysterically whenever she saw it, thousands cutting the photo off the newspaper as a family heirloom for future generations to ridicule. Later that day, Luca had to be carried because of his unwillingness to move after seeing his reputation go up in flames by Alexander and Leonidas to receive the cup in another ceremony wasting the educational funds the school received on rewarding the four winning teams, boy’s Pukwudgies and Wampus, girl’s Horned Serpents and Thunderbirds, won the junior and battle variants respectively, making all houses have a reason to celebrate and be happy, rivals witnessing Luca’s downfall smiling ear to ear, even wider than the Wampus members getting the highest desired trophy.
The team wanted to give him the entire thousand of their price money as an apology for ditching him to get epically destroyed, but Luca argued against it adamantly, coming out of his unlovable state at the mere mention of it, the team effort and covering his antics why they won the first place, the boy genuinely convinced that Knight’s would achieve victory even without him with players clearly a cut above the rest. Eventually, he got carried to the last Club gathering before the week of exams and graduation for the seventh classes, taking place at the site of the fairy village where a party took place, gathering the seven hundred Wampus students on a picnic in the sea of flowers where cats that they brought from the common room got ridden by the wingless fairies, including the one-winged Daisy that Luca named after her little nest decorated with the plant. She rode Ringo around giggling, Luca whispered long ago to his pet at length that he wanted him to cheer the fairy up, the boy thought himself responsible for especially her misery and went frequently to visit whenever he had some free time.
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“What were you thinking with such a valiant expression before getting hit?” Bennet asked munching on a chocolate dragon and throwing the card contained in its packaging to the middle of the blanket, Luca saw it to be the common one depicting Nicolas Flamel and lost interest, he started to collect his own full deck after eating the moving, sweet, magical menagerie received in the Tolls’ lodge as presents from literally everyone, a popular charmed snack hopping around whoever opens it, the rare cards worth hundreds Galleons a bonus gambling thrill, two-in-one hit of dopamine and serotonin.
“I will never let a soul know.” Luca put a lemon-flavoured Sour-Age lollipop in his mouth, suddenly gaining wrinkles like he aged to be hundred years old to a slight laugh from his friends.
“U’ look better now, can we get a fund goin’ to keep a supply of lolis’ nough’ to stay that way perma’?” Tolkien proposed juggling two Sickles with his hand.
“Only if half of it feeds you this.” Luca threw the package of black orbs nobody was touching so far, Tolkien with a face imitating Luca’s confident countenance ripped it open and ate one changing his demeanor to become slouched as it touched his tongue, accompanied by a night-black fur growing all over his bronze skin, the Fullnight Experience coffee drops only allowed him to sit still for ten seconds everyone spent awaiting the inevitable expectantly, Tolkien got up to run around the field howling to his friends’ joy, the drug-like candy’s burst of juice needed to be spent.
“Let’s see who can resist the longest.” Junfeng proposed as he took the orb for himself, a full fifteen seconds later he too sprinted off as a furry.
“But really, you had a chance if not for that accidental shot.” Winnetou patted Luca’s shoulder lamenting that he failed to achieve the sweep getting off to a good start and eliminating four opponents.
“Yeah, you could totally do it! So unfair that daft geezer, headmaster, banned you, we could win for a decade straight! Well, next year’s junior ladies' will start a winning streak with me as a batter.” Miranda swung a Sugar Quill like a bat to demonstrate how will she play. “Throw me a bludger.” she pointed it to the ball-like candy asking Luca to play with her, the boy pitched it perfectly, but the sugary bat broke instead of hurling the candy anywhere, it only fell down. Miranda pouted and took out her wand grabbing it by the wrong end, and nodded to Luca to try again. This time, the bludger did go far away, hitting the unsuspecting Daisy straight in her head, the fairy knocked down her steed like it was a cannonball.
“Oh Merlin, no, I’m sorry, so sorry!” the girl and Luca were first to run to the rescue, the little lady turned out to be fine sitting and massaging her head looking up to the sky puzzled, the boy put her gently on his palm and went back to feed her pieces of the broken Quill she seemed to love upon tasting and gently stroking her hair with a finger while looking at Miranda slightly accusingly for a minute interrupted by a familiar thundering baritone he received countless orders from this year while exercising, practicing sword fighting, preparing the next strategy for quidditch, or in competitions where it’s owner cheered for his housemates.
“Okay, everyone, please listen, I promise to be short.” Slate didn’t have to use the voice-enhancing spell to be heard all over the field, everyone looked at him holding a can of beer the adult wizards drank in their group. “First and foremost, I have to thank you for electing me president three years in a row.” a pause for whistles and applause as he bowed solemnly on four sides died down only after he waved his arms up and down a couple times. “Thank you, thank you. I think I did what I could do to the best of my ability, sorry if anyone feels left out. I won’t list all the accolades we got over the past years, I just want to say that I’m aiming to be an Auror and wish all of you to get your dream jobs in the future, don’t waste the time we all have to spend in Ilvermorny and learn as much as you can, even taking Wit-Sharpening Potions before reading your textbooks.” he took a sip reminiscing and continued. “I hope the next president will be better than me, whoever wants to run for it. What else, I’m happy to see newcomers much stronger than I was their age, Luca Granger and Winnetou Intschu, having the biggest drive to improve I saw yet, the boys encouraging each other and Luca helping other first years in his free time, we ought to have best first-year’s grades. Please, a round of applause for the Saviour of Fairies!” Slate clapped for Luca, the boy embarrassed more than having people laugh at his face hung his head low and blushed. “Take care.” Slate ended it like that, putting an end to his student career with a wave of his hand. The gathering lasted until a group of Pukwudgies came because of charms fired up in the night sky illuminating the entire Gardens area, and chased away the Wampus crowd all the way into the castle amidst laughter.
The end tests of no difficulty to Luca, he once again packed his bag when the last day they were allowed to remain in the castle came, thinking how fast it went while he spent four or more house daily in extracurricular training since the inspiration he took from philosophy, pushing himself to the limit for the self-satisfaction or perhaps as the only numbing mechanism he habitually engaged in, now engraved in his bones. On the closing banquet, the boy saw the long absent Geoffrey Roche sitting on his chair napping until a quick jab of Juno’s elbow, and two pages of text plastered on his nose finally made the old headmaster sigh from the bottom of his heart and stand up for closing remarks. He read the pages in a dry voice, the students in the meantime enjoyed even more chicken showed down their throats by Ilvermorny’s cooks, Luca seriously suspicious of their bird-hating agenda.
“You can put the cage in the briefcase, see around, nobody carries their pets.” Bryce remarked as they went up to the Floo Point, the boy looked around and indeed that was the case, so he asked the cat what would he want, Ringo pointed at the briefcase in a prospect of avoiding the dizziness he experienced rolling around in the chimney last time.
“Iverstead!” Luca shouted before ending his first year of being a wizard in a blaze of green flame.