Chapter 19: Gryffindor's Class Representative
Douglas moved on without pause.
"I have an announcement to make."
The classroom quieted at once.
"First, I am appointing Miss Granger as the second-year Gryffindor Defense Against the Dark Arts class representative."
He briefly explained the responsibilities of the position again.
Then he looked at the students, whose expressions now ranged from alarm to resentment.
"You are all expected to cooperate actively with Miss Granger's work."
He pointed lightly toward Hermione.
"If any of you know a particular section of the material, you may ask Miss Granger to test you on it."
Then his tone sharpened.
"And do not assume that simply memorizing it once will be enough."
He turned back to Hermione.
"Miss Granger, before class ends, I would like you to tell me who has recited which material."
The room went still.
"Then," Douglas continued pleasantly, "I will assign them corresponding homework."
A collective look of horror spread across several faces.
"Of course," he added, "you are all free to be lazy if you wish."
He folded his arms.
"If you would prefer to spend the entire term buried in your textbooks, that is also an option."
That ended the debate before it began.
"So apart from Miss Granger," Douglas said, sweeping his gaze across the room, "all of you will also supervise one another."
He instructed them to work by grouping the material according to dark creatures rather than breaking it down into separate points, and told them to begin from the first page of the textbook.
Once the arrangements had been made, Douglas ignored the pale faces staring back at him.
He called Hermione to the front and asked her to monitor the class.
Then he pulled out the test papers from the previous lesson and began marking them at his desk.
This was not because Douglas was lazy.
It was simply because there was very little practical content in first- and second-year Defense Against the Dark Arts.
The essential knowledge was already laid out clearly in the textbook, and Douglas intended to supplement the missing parts while discussing homework later.
More importantly, he had no desire to follow the example of some of his former teachers, who had spent most of their class time telling stories to first- and second-years.
A Hogwarts professor had to learn when to conserve energy.
There were seven classes a day.
Homework still needed marking after that.
Douglas had no intention of weeping himself dry in this post.
The lesson passed quickly.
The students clearly had not yet adjusted to the pace of his class.
By the time there were only five minutes left, not a single student had managed to recite the entire section on Banshees.
This left Hermione visibly frustrated.
Nothing tormented a top student more than finishing the material while everyone else was still floundering.
With five minutes remaining, Douglas finally stopped the recitations.
The students below let out a near-unified sigh of relief.
Douglas, naturally, was not about to let them off so easily.
"Very good. I saw that everyone was reciting actively."
He paused just long enough to give them hope.
"But you are still too slow."
The hope vanished.
"If I remember correctly, Gryffindor second-year has its next Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson this Friday."
He let that sink in.
"Before then, I expect every one of you to have memorized all the material on Banshees and to recite it to Miss Granger."
His voice remained perfectly calm.
"In addition, each of you will complete a related essay of no fewer than fifteen inches."
A groan rippled through the room.
"And once again, I do not wish to see plagiarized work."
Then he looked at Hermione.
"Miss Granger, from now on, if you do not have class at seven in the evening, come to my office every day and give me the list of those who have recited their material."
Hermione rose and nodded with effort.
As far as she could tell, there was nothing wrong with Douglas's method.
Maintaining an atmosphere of constant study was, in her opinion, entirely reasonable.
Chapter 20: Seven Classes a Day Is Exhausting
Apart from Hermione, the rest of the Gryffindors looked thoroughly miserable.
The moment Douglas dismissed the class, Harry saw several classmates already turning toward him and Ron.
He immediately put on an apologetic smile, grabbed Ron by the sleeve, and hurried out before anyone could surround them.
As they left the room, they nearly collided with the next class waiting at the door: third-year Hufflepuffs.
The young badgers had already heard enough to be nervous.
Now they saw their legendary senior—one of Hufflepuff's most infamous former students—inside the classroom, and in front of him a stream of grim-faced Gryffindors stumbling out as though they had survived an interrogation.
The sight filled them with dread.
How terrifying did a professor have to be to reduce Gryffindors to this state?
Still, since he was a senior from their own house, surely they ought to receive some special treatment.
That was the hope.
Unfortunately, no matter how they pressed the departing Gryffindors, they received only sighs and miserable headshakes.
No one wanted to talk about class.
That made the waiting Hufflepuffs even more uneasy.
During the short break, Douglas checked the system again.
[Student Development System]
[Student satisfaction for this class: 5 points.]
Student assignment completion: 0 points.
Average student progress score: 9.
Classroom activity score: 9 points.
…
Douglas smiled to himself.
So there really was a loophole in the system.
If he spent the whole lesson lecturing from the front, the students would grow sleepy, and the class activity score would naturally be low.
But if he forced them all to participate actively—reciting aloud, responding, engaging directly with the material—
then the system interpreted that as strong classroom involvement.
As for the unusually high average progress score, Douglas strongly suspected Hermione Granger had single-handedly dragged the average upward.
The satisfaction score, on the other hand, was obviously based on the students' emotional reactions.
After these two lessons, Douglas already had a much clearer idea of how he should handle the rest of his classes.
When the third-year Hufflepuffs had all settled into their seats, he arrived precisely on time.
This time he entered smiling.
The smile immediately dispelled some of the shadow cast by the fleeing Gryffindors.
Perhaps it would not be so bad after all.
That comforting thought lasted only until they heard him say they would begin by memorizing the textbook.
Then the little badgers looked stricken.
To many Hufflepuffs, the idea of being told to memorize an entire book sounded less like education and more like punishment—unless the book happened to be a cookbook.
Fortunately for them, Douglas had been a Hufflepuff himself.
Naturally, he would extend certain… adjustments to his younger housemates.
And so, instead of simply ordering them to study harder, he began ladling out a great quantity of motivational wisdom.
"Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration."
"Learning is labor—labor full of thought. And if it is labor, it will be rewarded."
"The decisive factor in the formation of genius is diligence."
Douglas's years of effort had not been wasted.
After drinking in enough of that encouragement, the young badgers below looked as though they had seen the light.
If working hard guaranteed results, then perhaps one day their learning would not fall behind Ravenclaw's after all.
Compared with relying on talent or brilliance, Hufflepuffs had never feared hard work.
In fact, they preferred a method where effort led directly to reward.
Douglas was very satisfied with this example of teaching students according to their nature.
More importantly, he was quite pleased with the score the system gave him afterward.
By lunchtime, the entire Great Hall was thick with tension.
News had spread through Ravenclaw and Gryffindor already.
The new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was absolutely inhuman.
In the first lesson he had made people sit a test.
Then he had made them memorize the textbook.
And worse—memorizing in class was not enough. They were expected to continue after class.
He had even created a system of class representatives for every house and year to supervise studying outside lessons.
His homework assignments were heavier than Professor McGonagall's.
The second-year Gryffindors had even been burdened with an extra ten inches because of Harry and Ron.
Ron was now so traumatized that he never again felt tempted to boast about how he and Harry had driven a car across England.
Meanwhile, the Hufflepuffs were busily repeating Douglas's motivational sayings to one another.
A few students had apparently even considered carving them into their bedposts so they could see them every morning.
Douglas had foreseen this sort of atmosphere in advance.
Very wisely, he chose not to appear in the Great Hall at all.
Instead, he had a house-elf bring his lunch directly to his office.
His first class of the afternoon was fourth-year Gryffindor.
From fourth year onward, Defense Against the Dark Arts shifted more toward spells.
Dark magic, broadly speaking, could be divided into three categories: jinxes, hexes, and curses.
For each sort of attack there were corresponding counter-curses and defensive methods.
If the Dark Arts were the spear, then Defense Against the Dark Arts was the shield.
And to master the shield properly, one needed at least some understanding of the spear.
That meant the coming years would focus increasingly on helping students understand what dark magic really was.
Of course, Douglas was not referring to the sort of illegal, truly dangerous dark magic that students below sixth year had no business learning about.
Still, for the very first lesson, Douglas had decided to begin with a baseline test again.
He took the fifth-year test paper, removed the sections on countering curses and undoing dark magic, and turned it into a fourth-year version.
With the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor changing every year, the students' foundations were too uneven to assume anything.
There was not enough time in fifth year to rebuild those basics properly.
Fourth year, however, was ideal.
There was still time to repair the gaps and prepare early for the O.W.L.s.
So when Douglas entered the classroom holding a thick stack of parchment, Fred and George Weasley let out two loud, despairing groans.
The other fourth-year Gryffindors joined them in misery.
Douglas stood at the front of the room and looked at them coolly.
"I'm glad you already know what I'm about to do."
He set the parchments down.
"Good. Since class time is limited, I won't waste any of it on unnecessary speeches."
Then he looked directly at the twins.
"From now on, the two Mr. Weasleys will serve as your class representatives."
That wiped the remaining expression off Fred and George's faces at once.
Douglas continued calmly.
"They are incapable of completing their own homework properly, which means they will be very useful to me in identifying where the problems lie."
He picked up the stack.
"So. Let us begin the test."
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