"Twenty-eight... twenty-nine..."
Only four days left until Halloween.
Leaning against his pillows, Charlie meticulously planned out his schedule for the coming days.
Snore~
Anthony let out a loud snore. It was the very first time Charlie had ever heard him make that noise. A moment later, the boy shifted and rolled over in the bed ahead of him.
Looks like he's sleeping brilliantly. Wonder if the Dream Chocolate had anything to do with it, Charlie thought.
He watched the faint, ethereal wisps of golden sand drifting through the dormitory. After a moment of thought, he raised a hand, caught a wisp of the sand, and absorbed it into his own body.
A few moments later, his breathing leveled out into a steady, peaceful rhythm.
---
The next morning, Charlie had just returned from the washroom.
"Brilliant, brilliant, absolutely—"
Anthony was currently howling with excitement in the middle of the dormitory. Seeing Charlie return, his face lit up with pure joy, showing absolutely zero signs of morning grogginess.
"Absolutely spectacular!"
"What on earth are you on about?" Charlie asked, looking completely bewildered as Anthony grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him aggressively.
"The chocolate! The new Dream Chocolate! You cannot even begin to imagine the dream I just had. It was absolutely beautiful!"
"The dream was beautiful?"
"Oh, more than that. The girl was beautiful," Anthony sighed, a dopey, infatuated grin plastered across his face. He was clearly still reliving it.
"We were holding hands, strolling down Diagon Alley. We stopped by a chocolate shop—oh, and you were the one who owned it, by the way. It was gorgeous inside. The girl absolutely loved it, and I was giving her this grand tour, explaining all the different chocolates. She just looked at me with pure, unadulterated adoration."
"Heh... heh..."
Hector reached out and waved a hand in front of Anthony's face. "Reel it in, mate. You're practically drooling."
"You're maturing terrifyingly early," Charlie laughed.
"It's perfectly natural, mate. I'm nearly twelve," Anthony declared shamelessly.
Hector smirked. "Like something straight out of Malèna?"
"What the bloody hell is that?"
"Oh, right. He doesn't know. Charlie, do you?"
"I do, yeah. Exactly like that," Charlie grinned, shooting Anthony a teasing look.
"Right, you two are using your bizarre Muggle slang again."
"Relax, mate. It's just a film," Hector explained.
"Another word I've literally never heard of."
"We'll have to give you a proper cultural education later," Hector said, patting Anthony on the shoulder. "Anyway, back to the topic at hand. What did you dream about?"
"Me? I dreamt I was competing in the OLM tournament, absolutely destroying everyone in my path. Undisputed champion," Hector stated.
Anthony gave him a deeply weirded-out look, then turned to Charlie.
"I dreamt I was lying peacefully in a sea of clouds, just soaking in the wind and the sunlight."
"You're even weirder," Anthony deadpanned. "Do neither of you have even the slightest interest in girls?"
Hector walked toward the dormitory door, brushing past Anthony. He turned slightly, gently stroking his chin. "I'm going to win the championship. I'll become a massive legend. And then... the girls will admire me."
With that, he strutted out of the room.
Anthony watched him go, shaking his head helplessly before tapping his temple while looking at Charlie.
"And to think, I actually thought he was the quiet one. Turns out he's the most shameless out of all of us."
Charlie laughed. He had to admit, Hector definitely had a hidden flair for the dramatic. He would never dare say something like that if anyone else was in the room.
"Right, go wash up."
Anthony nodded and followed Hector's path out of the dormitory.
---
That afternoon, Charlie headed to his Alchemy audit exactly as planned.
The lesson was incredibly unique today. Professor Chambers had placed a single pumpkin on every desk in the room. He tasked the young wizards with using everything they had learned to design a custom Halloween-themed artifact.
"Using only the pumpkin, Professor?" a girl asked.
Professor Chambers stood with his left hand resting behind his back. He gently raised a finger on his right hand, his tone elegant and smooth.
"Oh, my dear, you also have Transfiguration and Charms at your disposal. You all know what a [Stabilizing] rune is, correct?"
The [Stabilizing] rune had been last week's topic—a short but incredibly common runic circuit. Its sole purpose was to lock an object into its current physical or magical state. According to Professor Chambers, [Stabilizing] runes were practically ubiquitous in modern alchemy.
"We have exactly four days until Halloween. I will be displaying your finished artifacts in the Great Hall.
"If anyone's [Stabilizing] rune fails, the entire school will be treated to the sight of a completely mundane, rotting pumpkin with your name attached to it.
"So, do give it your best effort, my dear friends."
Hearing this, the entire classroom instantly shifted into high gear. Absolutely no one wanted a rotting, stinking pumpkin publicly humiliating them in the Great Hall.
"Oh, one more thing," Professor Chambers' voice broke through their frantic planning.
"The creator of the most popular artifact will receive a small prize from my personal collection. I will be grading the sixth and seventh years separately. That hardly counts as bullying you, does it?" he chuckled.
"Of course not," a Hufflepuff boy called out. "If anyone's getting bullied here, it's our resident first-year."
At his words, every head in the room turned to look at Charlie.
Technically, he was right. It was a massive disadvantage for Charlie. At least, that was the general consensus.
But Charlie didn't see it that way. He was just an auditor; being allowed to participate in the upperclassmen's practical exercises was already a massive win in his book.
Besides...
He spread his hands and offered a confident, easygoing smile. "Then you lot had better bring your A-game. As long as I don't come in dead last, I consider that an absolute victory."
Professor Chambers leaned against his desk, resting a hand on his hip.
"Did you hear that? If any of your creations are less popular than Charlie's, you will never live it down. Get to work!"
That immediately ratcheted up the tension in the room. They hadn't been studying alchemy that much longer than Charlie, and their main advantage lay entirely in their advanced Charms and Transfiguration repertoire.
But if they couldn't turn those advanced spells into a genuinely clever, engaging concept, they might actually lose to him.
In the back row, Charlie was already brainstorming how to genuinely win this thing.
He wasn't about to just roll over and accept defeat. He had to at least try.
I need an idea that is incredibly simple, but massively engaging.
His first thought was Cinderella's pumpkin carriage. That would definitely be a massive crowd-pleaser.
But he immediately scrapped the idea. He simply didn't have the magical arsenal for it yet; he didn't even know the basic Enlargement Charm.
Next, he considered a terrifying, animated pumpkin-headed scarecrow. It would definitely draw attention and fit the Halloween aesthetic perfectly, but executing the complex animation would be an absolute nightmare.
Right. Keep it simple, mate.
His mind drifted to Tim Burton, to The Addams Family, to those brilliantly morbid, delightfully macabre dark comedies.
Divination...
For some reason, the word suddenly flashed in his mind.
And just like that, the inspiration clicked into place.
Yes. Instead of relying on overly complex, delicate magical engineering, creating something that offered simple, direct interaction with the other students was definitely the smarter play.
The class flew by.
Charlie looked up and scanned the room. One student had created a rigged pumpkin bomb that violently feigned self-destruction whenever someone stepped too close.
Another had carved a miniature pumpkin cottage that released a swarm of tiny, glowing fairies.
Someone else had actually built a miniature pumpkin carriage. Clearly, Charlie wasn't the only one who knew the Cinderella fairy tale. Her carriage actually hovered in the air, leaving a trailing path of glittering pixie dust in its wake.
Of course, the dust was just a localized illusion and wouldn't physically stick to anyone's hair...
Charlie looked down at his own pumpkin, then back at the highly intricate, complex artifacts around him.
Professor Chambers strolled down the aisle and paused by Charlie's desk, eyeing his work. "Well? Feeling confident in your ability to match their creations?"
"I'm going to win," Charlie said confidently.