"Descent into Fear!" Ivan flicked his wand, tapping it lightly against Scabbers’ head.

  Squeak! Squeak squeak squeak—!

  The moment the spell took effect, the grayish-bck rat went absolutely berserk. Its previously shut eyes flew open in terror, bulging to an almost comical degree. A piercing, ear-splitting shriek escaped its tiny mouth.

  Then, with an instinctive kick of its powerful hind legs, the rat unched itself off the table, knocking over cups and decorations in its frantic scramble. It darted across the dormitory in a chaotic blur.

  Seeing how effective the spell was, Ivan finally let out a breath of relief.

  As it turned out, the Fear Charm was essentially the opposite of the Patronus Charm. The tter required the caster to summon memories of joy and happiness, while the former forced terrifying imagery or traumatic experiences directly into the victim’s mind.

  Like a reverse Legilimency attack—only with an extra dose of horror.

  When casting the spell on Scabbers, Ivan had vividly imagined the rat being relentlessly chased by a massive bck dog.

  And perhaps because Scabbers had been peacefully asleep before the spell took effect, the combination of dream and nightmare had made the magic even more potent than Ivan had expected.

  Just as Ivan was silently celebrating his successful spellwork, a sudden commotion from the common room made his heart skip a beat.

  Ron and Harry burst into the dormitory.

  Harry froze in the doorway, staring at the utter disaster in the room. For a moment, he genuinely thought they had walked into the wrong pce. Before he could ask what had happened, Ron’s eyes locked onto the frenzied, darting blur of gray fur.

  "Oh no! Scabbers! What’s wrong? Scabbers!"

  Ron practically screamed as he charged forward, scrambling onto Neville’s bed in a desperate attempt to catch his beloved pet.

  But at this moment, Scabbers was too far gone. Utterly terrified by Ivan’s magic, the rat mistook Ron for the monstrous bck dog in his nightmares. With a terrified squeak, it shot under the bed like a bolt of lightning, leaving Ron fumbling in frustration.

  "Ivan, what the hell happened in here?" Harry demanded, his gaze flicking between the wrecked dormitory and Ivan, who was still standing by the table.

  "I was just… practicing a charm," Ivan shrugged, feigning innocence before quickly adding, "You know, like you saw… just a minor accident."

  Harry gnced at Ron—who was now covered in dust, still fumbling blindly under the bed for his traumatized pet—and let out a deep sigh.

  "Yeah, doesn’t seem so minor to me," he muttered. "Looks like we’re going to spend the rest of the night catching a rat."

  Fortunately, things didn’t get quite that bad.

  After what felt like ages of chasing Scabbers around, Ivan finally remembered that he was, in fact, a wizard. Timing his spell just right, he used a Levitation Charm to lift both a stack of books and the petrified rat hiding underneath.

  And so, the chaos was brought to an end.

  For the next several days, Ron remained sulky and irritable. Feeling guilty, Ivan had no choice but to apologize profusely and even bought a handful of Bertie Bott’s Every Fvor Beans for Scabbers as a peace offering.

  With Harry’s help in smoothing things over, Ron finally—albeit reluctantly—let the whole incident go.

  That wasn’t the end of the drama, though.

  When Hermione heard about what had happened, she didn’t hesitate to mock Ron for caring more about a rat than his own friends. This, of course, led to yet another argument—one that very nearly ended with Ron losing his mind completely.

  After that, Ron became even more protective of Scabbers. He started carrying him to css every day, constantly paranoid that someone was out to get his beloved pet.

  Meanwhile, Ivan continued his cycle of moving between the cssroom, library, and dormitory, consuming book after book to expand his magical knowledge.

  All this studying paid off.

  By the time he had accumuted enough knowledge to use another "Schor’s Experience Card," his overall spell proficiency had improved significantly.

  His cssroom performance saw noticeable improvements as well.

  Most professors began grading him higher than before, except for Binns, who remained as indifferent as ever.

  Particurly in Charms and Transfiguration, Ivan’s rapid progress became evident. His Levitation Charm and Transfiguration Spells had both advanced to Level 2.

  At one point, he even managed to complete a transformation faster than Hermione, leaving both Harry and Ron completely stunned.

  But leveling up spells wasn’t so easy.

  With each level gained, the required practice and proficiency for the next became twice as demanding.

  Beyond studying, Ivan had also begun searching for the Room of Requirement—a potential secret training ground for testing spells.

  Practicing magic in the Gryffindor common room just wasn’t practical.

  Unfortunately, despite having read Harry Potter years ago, Ivan’s memory was foggy. He vaguely recalled that the room was opposite some tapestry, but no matter how many hallways he explored, he just couldn’t find it.

  It wasn’t until the second Friday of the term that his usual routine was disrupted—when Harry received an invitation from Hagrid.

  Of course, with good news came bad news.

  The bad news?

  That Friday, they had double Potions with Slytherin.

  "If only we could skip this morning’s css," Ron groaned as they walked through the corridor. "Snape’s the Head of Slytherin. George told me we should be extra careful."

  "That’s ridiculous," Hermione scoffed. "Professor McGonagall is a Head of House too, and she’s never been unfair."

  "Oh, come on, Hermione! It’s not just me—loads of older Gryffindors say the same thing!" Ron retorted, turning to Harry and Ivan for backup.

  "You guys agree, right? Snape’s always so creepy. There are even rumors he used to be a Dark wizard!"

  His voice dropped to a whisper as he spoke, wary of being overheard.

  "That’s nonsense," Harry shook his head. "Dumbledore would never let a Dark wizard teach at Hogwarts."

  Even though Snape had seemed oddly hostile toward him since the start of term, Harry still doubted the man was as bad as the rumors cimed.

  Hermione nodded in agreement.

  Frustrated, Ron turned to Ivan as his st hope.

  At that moment, Ivan was absentmindedly teasing Scabbers with a Bertie Bott’s bean. He gnced up at the group before casually remarking, "I don’t know about Gryffindor as a whole, but I do know one thing—Snape is definitely biased against us."

  His tone was unusually serious.

  "And by ‘us,’ you mean…?" Harry frowned, confused.

  "You," Hermione guessed, narrowing her eyes.

  Ivan smiled to himself. Smart girl.

  But, of course, he couldn’t just confirm it outright. Instead, he shook his head and said lightly, "I’m just saying—it’s a little odd, isn’t it? The way Snape always looks at Harry…"

  50 Advanced Chapters Now Avaible on Patreon!

  https://p-atreon.com/kakaty2077

  (Just remove the hyphen to access Patreon normally.)

  <><><><><>

  ~ If you like the story, please leave a review.