Chapter 14: Gilderoy Lockhart

Chapter 14: Gilderoy Lockhart

"Perhaps when you grow stronger and begin to develop your own fighting style, you can decide the placement of your wand, the way you hold it, and the fighting posture according to the magic you are good at. But now you have no practical experience, and you have only been exposed to magic for a few days..."

Professor Baker explained, "So today we are learning the most common and standard stance, which even many Aurors are willing to use, the 'Sword Holding Style'."

"Hold your wand with your thumb, bend your index finger, and place it in front of you, and hold the wand with the remaining three fingers. Relax your shoulders and lower your wrist..."

"Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent, weight shifted to your left leg, and your left palm relaxed against your waist, so you can do some assistive gestures."

"Put your chin in, look straight ahead, and slightly arch your back."

Professor Baker moved the podium aside and demonstrated a standard stance himself: "This posture can ensure that you can move flexibly at any time and control the distance between you and the opponent."

He made a few light jumps like a fencer. "It can also allow you to quickly release magic that does not require long preparations and gain the upper hand in battle. And when you master the spell deflection technique and the armor spell, the extended wand will also be your best shield, and you can effectively defend even if the opponent strikes first."

"So,"

He returned to his normal standing position and waved his wand, and all the tables in the classroom disappeared: "Now, everyone take out your wands, distance yourself from the people around you, and start practicing this posture!"

"I know this will be a bit boring compared to other courses, but it is indeed necessary to master the basics of the basics... Let me put it this way, if your performance in this class satisfies me, I can consider speeding up the teaching progress and share some simple but practical spells in advance..."

Professor Baker looked at the young wizards with anticipation and continued to tempt them with a smile, "Some of them even played a significant role in the battle just demonstrated."

Professor Baker didn't need to say anything; the little wizards scattered and stared at the posture diagram left by Professor Baker on the blackboard, and practiced carefully. Professor Baker also walked down from the podium and began to patrol the classroom, correcting some people's movements from time to time.

"You raised your hand too high. Now the entire right side of your body is exposed!"

"Relax your shoulders. This position is for you to move flexibly, not for you to move like a stone block!"

"You don't have to hold the wand so hard. The wand is your helper, not your enemy!"

"Don't twist your waist like that. It's easy to get a stitch in the side in actual combat!"

"You need to move your center of gravity to the back. Your current posture is like a horse stance!"

…

When it came to practice, Professor Baker became very strict all of a sudden. Any deviation from the standard would be discovered and corrected in time. Everyone, including Avada and Cho, who had outstanding athletic talent, was corrected several times.

After everyone was able to get into standard positions, Professor Baker began to lead them in practicing combat moves. Jumping forward, retreating, dodging, attacking, defending... After a series of action training, even the energetic young wizards could not help but sweat on their foreheads and pant.

Finally, with more than ten minutes left before the end of class, Professor Baker waved his wand, changed the tables back to their original shape, and signaled to stop practicing.

"Very good, everyone's progress has exceeded my expectations!"

After all the students were seated, Professor Baker clapped his hands in satisfaction and said with a smile, "I thought it would take at least a whole class for you to master this posture, but I didn't expect that you would have already achieved the requirement ten minutes before the end of class."

"There is definitely not enough time left to teach any new magic... Well, if you have any questions about Defense Against the Dark Arts, you can ask them now, and I will answer them."

As soon as he finished speaking, almost everyone in the classroom raised their hands with anticipation on their faces.

Professor Baker randomly pointed to a Hufflepuff near the first row and said, "Mr. Summers, what is your question?"

"Professor, I'm curious. As an adventurer and a director of the Dark Arts Defense League, you must have a job. Why did you come to Hogwarts to be a professor?"

He asked a little embarrassedly, after all, this was not a question related to Defense Against the Dark Arts.

Professor Baker did not blame him. He smiled and replied, "The main reason is that I feel that my improvement in strength has reached a bottleneck, so I am going to temporarily put aside my adventure and work as a professor to carefully summarize and sort out my magic foundation. The Defense Against the Dark Arts professor is undoubtedly the most suitable job for me during this period. Not only can I review my knowledge according to the textbook, but I can also contribute to education... How do you say that teaching and learning benefit each other? That's the truth."

"Will a wizard as powerful as you also encounter bottlenecks, Professor?" Summers asked again.

"Of course, everyone will encounter bottlenecks, even Dumbledore is no exception." Professor Baker smiled and asked Summers to sit down and called on another student: "Ms. Chang, what's your question?"

Cho stood up with a blush and asked, "Professor, do you know Mr. Gilderoy Lockhart?"

Professor Baker was stunned for a moment and replied, "I have never met him, but I have long heard of his name and have read many of his works. I have to say that they are quite wonderful, combining practicality with literary qualities. Many of the techniques mentioned in them have benefited me a lot."

"So who is better, you or Mr. Lockhart?"

"Um..."

Professor Baker hesitated for a while after hearing this question, then chose his words carefully and said, "He and I...we each have our own strengths."

"Although I have never seen him in person, I can infer from his books that Lockhart is the type of person who is knowledgeable, quick-witted, possesses a large amount of obscure but practical knowledge, and is good at using his brain to survive in various dangerous situations and wild magical creatures. In other words, he is a standard adventurer."

"Rather than an adventurer, I am more like a wild Auror, or an ancient dark wizard hunter. I specialize in going to dangerous areas to fight against dark wizards and dark creatures. Compared to adventures in the wild, I am better at fighting in various man-made dangers. Of course, I will occasionally go to some wild environments to relax and enjoy the natural scenery."

"Professor, do you have some wonderful adventure experiences?" another girl asked curiously.

"I?"

Professor Baker smiled bitterly"I can only say that if I write my experiences into a book and publish it, the sales volume may not even catch up with one-tenth of Lockhart's. Because the things I have to deal with require extremely high professional qualities, and outsiders simply cannot understand them. And the stories will not be so ups and downs, most of them are twists and turns, or bloody..."

"Take, for example, Lockhart's new book last year, 'A Year with the Tibetan Yeti.'"

"This book is about Lockhart, who accidentally fell into a glacier crevice while adventuring on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and came to a secret world under the ice. His wand was broken, and his supplies were running out. He relied on Transfiguration, simple potions, and extensive knowledge of magical creatures to disguise himself as a Tibetan snowman and joined a local tribe to survive and find a way to leave."

"In an accident, his identity was discovered by a Tibetan snowman, but he relied on his wisdom and experience to become friends with the snowman, asking it to help Lockhart conceal his identity, thus starting a wonderful process of getting along between man and snowman."

"But then, as the glaciers moved, the cracks in the glaciers began to close, and the yeti's habitat was about to collapse. Lockhart worked together with the yeti, using all kinds of knowledge and with the help of luck, he successfully escaped from the underwater world and returned to the surface. And Lockhart also said goodbye to the yeti and returned to human society. Is that right?"

Professor Baker paused again, choosing his words carefully, hoping not to give too much of a blow to the girls who were worshipping their idol: "If the same thing happened to me... uh..."

"I was able to climb out of the cracks on the first day. Casting spells without a wand is not a difficult task for me."

The classroom fell silent, and the students looked at each other, impressed by Professor Baker's understated yet remarkable abilities.

Cho couldn't help but ask, "Professor, have you read all of Mr. Lockhart's books?"

Professor Baker smiled, "Yes, I have. His books are very inspiring, and I have learned a lot from them. However, I must say that some of his experiences are quite... romanticized."