NOVEL NEXT Ch 41: The Library
*Anos's POV*
"Wow, I need one of those." Hermione was comparing her notes with Lan Zhan.
"I would try my best to get you a vermillion feather but I'm told by my elders that they're hard to find in the wild anymore." Lan Zhan promised.
His quill feather apparently was a Vermillion Bird Feather that could change color based on the user's intent. Hermione herself had used a whole lot of pens on her notebook. Alucard had written a lot more elegantly than us in bright red while Draco and Harriet being normal had written using black and blue inks.
"So first day is over huh. Well, I'm beat let's go to the common room to sleep." Simon said as we all exited the classroom.
"New species that doesn't require much sleep," I said with a raised hand.
"Nocturnal creature that gets stronger as the night rises," Alucard said nonchalantly.
" We still have homework that needs to be done and there's a lot of time till dinner. Why don't we finish the Potions assignment in the library." Hermione suggested.
" I'll rather take a nap," Draco said in a lazy drawl.
" I'll take you up on the sleep offer Whiplash." Lan Zhan said as his shoulders suddenly slumped.
" Did he just?"
" No, he did not!"
" Holy shit he went to sleep standing up. And what did he call you Simon?" I said giggling.
" Your ears are ringing," Simon said panicking.
"It was Whiplash. It's a shame that throughout the centuries my ancestors never came up with that one." Alucard said with the faintest trace of a smile.
" Now oh noble Whiplash let's carry this tortured soul to the common room. I'll meet the rest of you in the library." I said and picked up Lan Zhan carrying him off to the common room.
After that, I dropped off Lan Zhan on the common room couch.
"Well, my work's done here," I said dusting off my hands.
I walked through the castle towards the library located on the fourth-floor. It was fun to see the castle awake. Most second years were doing homework on the benches, the third years were tearing their hair off.
The fourth and sixth years were still not done with lessons and most of the fifth years were looking for someone to match pincers with.
As I walked through the halls I finally came upon the Hogwarts library. A vast room with a space charm that housed tens of thousands of books on thousands of bookshelves. It housed books ranging from the Salem Witch Trials to the Crusades to King Solomon's reign.
"Woah." I ducked under a particularly fast-winged book. A neat trick of the library was that the books had wings and were almost sentient.
In the words of Odin himself "Gather enough knowledge at a single place and it either becomes a haven for the wise or it blows up in your face."
The books mostly flew inside the library and only Professors were allowed to call a book from the library. The books in the restricted section were of course not allowed to move an inch from their place.
" Anos! Here!" Harriet called and immediately half of the library look over at her table.
"Wow, with all these feathers you would expect people to be less prone to noise from others," I said as I took a seat.
" Oh, they usually don't. There are these cuboid rooms scattered around that isolate all noise but they're only available from the third year onwards." Hermione explained as she scribbled on a piece of parchment.
" Did they give you a brochure or something? My Dad works at the freaking castle but even I don't know so many details."
" Oh, they did give me one. I think it's protocol for every child from a Muggle family to receive one." Hermione looked up and explained.
" So were the floating stairs of death and the lake of Kraken mentioned in vivid details?" I asked sarcastically.
"Uh that wasn't mentioned but it's not all bad. Most accidents are easily avoidable here." Hermione defended.
'Just wait till the later years.'
" With how abysmal security and safety is here this place would've never stood a single term in Neverwinter." Alucard said as he looked up from a book named 'A Goons Night under the Moon (How the Crusades changed the concept of Shelter)'.
"I mean two of us wear blindfolds and nothing has happened till now," Hermione said as she went back to scribbling.
"Fair enough," Alucard replied as I started on my homework.
"But Draco did tell us about the three-headed Dog." Harriet chirped in.
'Oh God, she's already making conspiracy theories.' I groaned mentally.
'Well, I didn't expect her to not be curious. Whatever, seeing as how Voldemort has always been considerate of the academic year and always acts towards its end this is a problem for a future me since it's the first day and I don't feel motivated to tackle the problem at the moment.' I mulled the thought over and finished with the first ingredient.
I already knew all of them by heart so it was just practice to write them down though I was considerate enough to write them on parchment.
"Well, whatever it is we have no business with it," Hermione said as she rolled up her parchment already done with the assignment.
"I agree with Granger," Alucard said as he started on the assignment going over the material and copying it down.
Harriet expectantly looked at me but I just covered my mouth and yawned.
"Unless that three-headed Dog is a dimensional warping shadow soldier who was originally one of the Fae Dukes then I'm not interested," I said and started on the third ingredient.
"You're all so boring," Harriet said as she let adjusted her glasses.
"All of us are anything But that Harriet," I said and all of us returned to our work.
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Ch 58 is already out on Patreon!