After dinner I boldly went to the DADA classroom, passed an empty class and knocked on the door of Umbridge's office.
"Not locked, come in," she answered with her not the most pleasant voice.
Stepping inside, I almost lost the gift of speech—she even repainted the gray stone walls pink. Here everything generally was one way or another in shades of pink, and only furniture and an absurd number of plates with magical images of kittens retained the right to stay in original color. Well, and a few more decor elements that could not be pink by definition.
Professor Umbridge sat at her desk, filling out some forms and documents, deftly wielding a pink quill.
"Mr. Granger, is it?" she asked half-affirmatively, looking up at me and putting her quill aside. "Must admit, I expected a student who was assigned detention."
"Oh, Professor, I won't keep you long," I smiled and approached the desk, holding out a stack of parchments.
"May I inquire," Umbridge didn't even look at them, continuing to smile cloyingly. "What is this?"
"Lists of clubs, circles, teams and other organizations within the house to pass your certification and obtain approval for conducting activities."
"Very good," Umbridge nodded satisfied. "Must note, you are the first of all who came, and even prepared so thoroughly. I already thought that I would have to work with each club individually."
"I understand that you already have a lot of work," I nodded, without twisting the soul. But how I relate to this work—is a completely different question.
"You are absolutely right, Mr. Granger. The Ministry will have to carry out really serious work to restore order at Hogwarts. By the way, Mr. Granger," this pink misunderstanding smiled more than before. "Information reached me that inside Hogwarts some... illegal group of students is being organized."
"Even so?"
"They are going to not only neglect all norms, but also ignore the decrees and prescriptions of the Ministry of Magic and the Minister himself, Cornelius Fudge..."
Out of the corner of my eye I noticed on the desk a frame with a portrait magical photo of Fudge.
"...I have suspicions that this group of students is going to conduct subversive activities directed against the Ministry and its policy."
"This is very serious, Professor," I nodded. "The Ministry is making a lot of efforts to normalize the life of our country, and such a thing, of course, will interfere."
I myself laughed at such a formulation, because neither by word nor by meaning did I lie, speaking the pure truth—the only question is how to perceive this or that word, phrase, their essence.
"It is gratifying to see such understanding," Umbridge returned the quill to a special stand. "Would like to know from you, Mr. Granger, as a house prefect—do you know anything about this group?"
"You know, rumors about something like this circulate around the school, but no specifics. If there is such a group, then they will surely take measures not to be spotted."
"All correct, and therefore I need people, conscious, responsible, promising. Capable of understanding all the danger of such activities, and who will immediately help me save these young talents from such ill-considered actions leading, undoubtedly, to a terrible future for them."
"I understand, Professor. But I cannot keep track of the whole school, so I will prefer to observe the normal moral appearance of students in my house."
"Gratifying, Mr. Granger. You may be free."
Turning around, I left Umbridge's office. Amusing. Still recruits supporters for herself, acting on elements of pride, using general words. But I answered the same. I understood this, she understood this... Or maybe didn't understand, because it is easy to hear in words only what you want to hear in them.
On the way to the common room I decided to look into the castle kitchen. The reason for that was simple and obvious—I can break my whole brain in attempts to make a well-hidden classroom for classes, or two, or three, it doesn't matter, but there are house-elves! Yes, many wizards completely ignore the fact of their existence, but I perfectly understand that magical creatures who are servants in such a large castle, one way or another know about all interesting rooms here. Yes, they may not have the opportunity to get into this or that place of the castle, but to know about the existence of a "place"—they are obliged.
Reaching the large still life, I tickled the pear, and it, giggling, opened the passage to the kitchen for me. Here, as before, a real chaos reigned from house-elves rushing back and forth, and practically everyone was busy with some of their own business—washing dishes, doing laundry, dragging firewood for hearths, darning some things. But my appearance immediately forced everyone to almost synchronously turn in my direction, which, undoubtedly, scared.
"My dear house-elves..."
From the beginning of my speech a couple of house-elves almost fainted from an overabundance of feelings, but nevertheless, they were ready to listen.
"...Hard times have come at Hogwarts," I continued to speak. "There are many reasons for this, but the result is one—students have nowhere to practice magic."
Even house-elves had enough brains to understand the unacceptability of such an attitude to the educational process—they began to whisper among themselves, and in their words I heard censure and surprise at such an approach, like: "Cannot conjure in the school of sorcery?".
"And now, in these hard times..."
House-elves began to pull closer to me, and I, using knowledge of their needs, spilled neutral energy around without any messages. Just a little so that it would not cause a spontaneous magical phenomenon, but this was enough for house-elves—they swam like fish for bait.
"...A group of students who want to get knowledge needs a place secret from everyone, in which can train in sorcery, learn theory and apply practice. Does anyone know such a place?"
"We know, how not to know?" answered for everyone one very old house-elf who managed to be closest to me. "Come and Go Room, it is called."
"Dobby knows!" cheerfully galloped the local revolutionary house-elf, about whose existence I heard a couple of times out of the corner of my ear in Potter's conversations. "Dobby knows everything!"
This ridiculous house-elf in strange clothes, in different socks, bright shorts, a vest and with a festive cap on his head, almost pushed everyone, finding himself next to me together with that old very old representative of the local community. Others looked at him with slight dislike, and generally, why is he jumping the gun?
"This is the Room of Requirement, sir," Dobby nodded his head, and the old house-elf just waved his hand at him, but I transferred a little magic to the old man so that he cheered up.
"Will you tell?"
"Of course," he actively nodded his head, from which the cap almost flew off, but was caught in time by the house-elf. "All house-elves know about it. On the eighth floor, opposite the portrait with trolls in strange skirts. Once Dobby really needed..."
The house-elf broke through, and he began to talk about his misadventures, but exposed them as the charms of the life of a "free elf". It seems to me that his roof leaked a little, but who am I to judge the interests and delusions of a house-elf? Maybe it was extremely bad for him in the house where he served? Most likely, he was already somewhat crazy then, which is why his past masters did not treat him very well? In general, it's none of my business. The main thing that I understood from his story is the location of this Room of Requirement and the fact that the House-elf is attached to Harry Potter. Maybe the house-elf himself considers himself free through some rituals and the like, but he still has an attachment to the "master", as well as dependence on him, even if neither the house-elf himself nor the master admit this. Such matters...
"I understood you, Dobby, a free elf," I smiled, which caused great joy for this house-elf. Of course, I flavored my praise with neutral energy, magic, and the house-elf became even happier, although it seemed that there was nowhere further. "But you know, Harry Potter also belongs to us, students who want to practice sorcery."
"Really?"
"Of course. I think that Harry Potter will be very glad if you tell him about this room. Because then Harry Potter will be able to help many students, and this will make him a little happier."
"Yes, Harry Potter, sir, great wizard! Dobby did not know that Harry Potter, sir, had such problems! Dobby will immediately go and tell everything about this room to Harry Potter, sir."
Dobby disappeared instantly. Cute.
Finally throwing a little neutral magic into space as a gratitude to house-elves for attention, I left the kitchen and even managed to do it faster than a couple of proactive creatures collected a basket of food for me on the road. Where did I go? Oh, obviously, to the eighth floor to verify the information from the house-elves.
Reaching the target, I found myself in an empty corridor, where there were only a few tapestries and paintings. One of them depicted a wizard surrounded by trolls in ballet tutus, and they intended to beat the man with clubs in dance. Considering that the picture was animated, it's even scary for me to imagine how long this improvised ballet continues.
What did Dobby say? Walk back and forth three times, thinking about the room you need. Hmm... But Dumbledore last year at the Yule Ball somehow mentioned that, being filled with the desire to visit the restroom, he came across a most amusing room, the door to which appeared by itself, and everything around was filled with chamber pots. Considering that modern sewerage in Hogwarts was carried out almost immediately from the moment of its creation, gradually upgrading in accordance with technical innovations, can say that the room is very old.
"I need a room for training in magic in general, and Defense Against the Dark Arts in particular".
Having twisted this thought in my head exactly three times, generously flavoring it with a volitional message into nowhere, I stopped to look at the contour of large double doors slowly emerging in the stone wall. Monogram after monogram a drawing emerged, turning in the end into full-fledged wooden doors with beautiful black iron trim. Pushing the sash, I got into a huge quite well-lit room. Where is the light from? Unclear. But my attention was attracted by bookcases with a lot of books, sofas, armchairs, tables, pillows, and a large free space, clearly implying the presence of wizards who would throw various spells at each other.
Glancing into the corridor and making sure there was no one, went inside, closed the door, and a small key appeared on the bedside table next to the entrance, matching the keyhole in these doors in shape. Using this simple device, I felt a wave of magic pass over the doors. I am ready to bet that outside the door disappeared.
Chuckling, I went with a slow step along the bookcases, with a quick glance examining the spines for something new for myself, or at least what I had not seen in the Hogwarts library.
"Saw... saw... read. Saw... saw..."
Yes, I whispered these words aloud, because the situation was unusual, and in the depths of consciousness I cherished the hope that I would find some really interesting book here. Unseen, unusual.
Unfortunately, a bypass of the room did not reveal anything that I had not seen in the library, and even more—nothing from the Restricted Section. Undoubtedly, even the presence of such material—is very much. Because in fact here is structured knowledge on request—Defense Against the Dark Arts. I am sure that with the same success can get a classroom in which bookcases will be filled with knowledge in another discipline—whichever you request. For verification I even left the room, the door to which immediately disappeared, and wished the same, but "for transfiguration". Of course, going inside, I got approximately the same classroom, except there were no pillows, but there was a whole pile of various objects of different sizes, but without any logical connection with each other. There were slightly fewer bookcases, but the books themselves were larger.
For the sake of interest having summoned a room for practicing Dark Magic, I got approximately the same room, only there were few bookcases. How many? One bookcase, and even then not full. Having run my eyes over the spines of books, I understood that my opinion regarding Dark Magic in this world is correct. But, on the other hand, it may turn out that this whole magic room simply reads my understanding of the request from me, and if some suspicious student asks for such a room—for practice in Dark Magic—he may well be provided with a room with a much larger volume of information. Just he will consider this information Dark, that's the whole story.
Stopping experiments on the Room of Requirement, I went to the common room.
There, in the common room, discussion of the current innovation from Umbridge was already in full swing, and my appearance, of course, attracted attention. Judging by how the rest pressed on Hannah and my other classmates, they wanted to get an answer to the question in a soft and polite form: "What to do next?".
"Ladies and gentlemen," I began to speak with a smile, looking around those present. "Tomorrow I will be able to secure one room. The unused classroom closest to our common room. In your interests will be to regulate the class schedule in it. Can recommend a quite simple and understandable scheme. Classes once a week. On Monday—first years. On Tuesday—second. And so on. But for now, go about your business and put excitement aside."
The students seemed to listen and dispersed on their business, and I took my place on the armchair next to the table at which my classmates sat, and at the same time various privacy charms hung around our patch.
"And you will be able to?" Justin asked immediately.
"Yes, my friend, I will be able to," I nodded affirmatively. "Today in the room I will do preparation. Fortunately our nooks are soundproofed, and I will not bother anyone."
"Good," almost everyone nodded.
"And now?"
"And now, Hannah, I will do homework. You, by the way, have already done something?"
"Started working with Potions, but we have some strange hitch," Hannah pushed her notebook with notes to me.
"Well... Let's figure it out..."
"And what about the room for DADA?" Zacharias could not restrain his curiosity.
"Potter will show us one of these days."
"Potter?" an exclamation of surprise came from each of my classmates.
"Hmm," I smirked. "Yes, Potter."
"Come on, unlikely," Ernie didn't believe. "How would he know? Although... Anything can happen."
"Yes most likely," Hannah looked at the guys with slight superiority, but such is she and her facial expressions. "Hector found everything, but somehow leaked the information to Potter. You noticed that our dear prefect does not really like to shine without a reason?"
"Indeed! You found it?" Susan was immediately inspired along with the rest.
"Yes, there is a room. Good one. Think Potter already knows about it at this moment, and I will not be surprised if tomorrow we will already go to study it. Let's, after all, go over homework already..."
At night I spent practically two hours preparing everything necessary to ensure security in the nearest unused classroom. In fact, I did not do anything unusual for myself—just calculated a couple of simple schemes, prepared interchangeable nozzles for the hammer, and that's it. The idea itself is simple—tomorrow I will go into that class and begin to "forge" the walls. The main thing is that "cracks do not go"... So where is this phrase from? Although, I have not cared for a long time, even if it confuses a little that I should have understood the phrase, apparently, and even smile, but no. Neither understanding nor smile.
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