Chapter Ten: Scabbers! What’s Wrong with You? Scabbers?

"Fear comes!" Ivan waved his wand and pointed it at Scabbers' head.

"Squeak! Squeak, squeak, squeak!"

As the spell took effect, the greyish-black rat immediately went into a frenzy, its tightly shut eyes widening in an instant, and it let out a high-pitched, ear-piercing scream. With a sudden push of its strong claws against the table, the rat shot off the surface, knocking over cups and decorations along the way as it scrambled around the dormitory.

Seeing the effect work so well, Ivan finally felt relieved. He hadn't realized that the Fear Charm and the Summoning Charm were based on opposite principles. The latter required the caster to recall pleasant and joyful thoughts, while the former required the caster to implant an imagined terrifying experience or fear into the mind of the victim. It was like a reverse soul-siphoning spell, or a more intense version of it.

When Ivan cast the spell on Scabbers, he visualized a scene of Scabbers being relentlessly chased by a black dog. Perhaps because Scabbers had been asleep before the spell, the combination of the Fear Charm and the dream made the dark magic's effect even stronger than Ivan had anticipated.

Just as Ivan was basking in the success of casting the Fear Charm, Ron and Harry, who had heard the commotion from the common room, burst into the dorm.

Seeing the chaos in the room, Harry almost wondered if he had walked into the wrong place. He was about to ask, but it was Ron who noticed the greyish-black rat darting around.

"Oh no! Scabbers! What's happened to you? Scabbers!" Ron cried out, rushing into the room and leaping onto Neville's bed, trying to catch the rat that had just scampered by.

However, Scabbers, terrified by Ivan's spell, mistook Ron for the black dog from its nightmare and dashed under the bed with a whoosh, making it impossible for Ron to catch it.

"Ivan, what's going on here?" Harry asked, looking at Ivan, who was standing at the table.

"I was just practicing a spell," Ivan shrugged, then spoke with a slight sense of guilt. "Just like you saw, there was a small accident, I guess."

Harry glanced at Ron, who was covered in dust and had failed to catch the rat despite his efforts. It didn't seem like a small accident at all, and Harry sighed in exasperation.

"Looks like we're going to be chasing mice all night."

Luckily, things didn't get as bad as Harry had imagined. After a while of frantic chasing, Ivan, remembering that he was a wizard, seized an opportunity and used the Levitation Charm to float both Scabbers and the book it was hiding under, finally calming the whole situation down.

In the following days, Ron stayed in a bit of a mood, and Ivan, feeling guilty, naturally apologized. He even bought some Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans as emergency rations for Scabbers. With Harry's persuasion, Ron eventually stopped obsessing over Scabbers' ordeal.

It's worth mentioning that when Hermione heard about the incident, she openly mocked Ron for caring more about a rat than his friends. This led to an argument, and Ron nearly lost his temper.

From then on, Ron became even more protective of Scabbers, sometimes taking the rat to class, feeling as though someone was always out to harm his pet.

As for Ivan, he continued his routine of going from class to library to dormitory, reading through some of the basic books. He had just about managed to earn another chance to use his "Top Student Experience Card." Plus, with all the accumulated knowledge from the past few days, his proficiency in spells had greatly improved.

This led to better grades in class!

Apart from Professor Binns, who always gave average feedback in History of Magic, Ivan received "Outstanding" marks in most other subjects, especially in Charms and Transfiguration. His Levitation and Transfiguration spells had reached level two proficiency. Once, during a Transfiguration lesson, Ivan transformed a piece of wood even faster than Hermione, which left both Harry and Ron in awe.

However, advancing further wasn't going to be easy. With each level a spell improved, the required proficiency for the next upgrade doubled.

Besides studying, Ivan was also searching for the location of the Room of Requirement, hoping to use it as a place for testing the power of his spells. The common room in Gryffindor Tower was simply not ideal.

Unfortunately, after reading the books and watching the events unfold over the years, Ivan had forgotten the exact location, only remembering it was somewhere across from a tapestry. He spent several days looking for it without success.

It wasn't until the second Friday of the term that Harry received an invitation from Hagrid, and Ivan's routine was finally interrupted.

Of course, where there's good news, there's also bad news.

The bad news was that on that Friday, they had to attend two Potions lessons with Slytherin.

"I wish we could skip this morning. Professor Snape's the head of Slytherin, and George told me we should be careful," Ron said, feeding Scabbers from his right hand while he and Ivan discussed some gossip he had overheard from his brothers.

"It's not that bad, is it? Professor McGonagall's the head of Gryffindor, but I've never seen her show favoritism," Hermione countered.

"But I'm not the only one who thinks so. Many of the older Gryffindors say the same!" Ron was dismissive of Hermione's argument, turning to Harry and Ivan.

"You think so too, right? Professor Snape is always so grim. There are even rumors that he used to be a Dark wizard," Ron lowered his voice, clearly worried someone might overhear.

"That's impossible. Professor Dumbledore wouldn't allow a Dark wizard in the school," Harry shook his head.

Although Harry had felt that Professor Snape didn't particularly like him since the welcome feast, he thought most of the teachers at the school were pretty decent. Even Snape couldn't be all that bad.

Hermione nodded in agreement, and Ron sighed, looking at Ivan.

At that moment, Ivan was teasing Scabbers with a Bertie Bott's Bean. Upon hearing their conversation, he glanced at Harry and said,

"I don't know if Snape has it in for Gryffindor, but I'm sure he's targeting us."

At this point, Ivan sighed, realizing that getting an "Outstanding" grade in Snape's class was probably out of the question.

After all, whether it's love or hate, Snape was a man who held grudges. Even if Snape gave him a bad grade, Ivan wouldn't be surprised.

Harry looked at Ivan, confused, unable to understand his reasoning.

"You mean, Snape hates Harry?" Hermione furrowed her brows, guessing Ivan's thoughts from the way he looked at Harry.

Ivan mentally praised Hermione for her sharpness, but he couldn't speak too frankly, so he shook his head. "I just suspect it. Don't you think Snape always looks at Harry strangely?"