"Nya! It's Minerva!"

∑(●ΦДΦ●)

Fish was startled when he saw Professor McGonagall.

The other students were also silent, looking at each other.

The main reason was that the combination on stage was very strange.

If it had only been Lockhart, the group would have been disappointed, but with the addition of Professor McGonagall and Professor Snape, the two deans, things changed.

The abilities of the two are obvious to all students, and they are not the same as the vain Lockhart.

But watching the three of them on stage, it seemed that Lockhart was the main initiator, and the events that followed proved it.

"Gather round! Gather round! Can you all see me? Can you all hear me? Great!"

Lockhart waved his hands, calling loudly for the students to come to him, while Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall stood back without saying a word, and let Lockhart do his thing.

This strange situation caused the students to unconsciously follow Lockhart's order and move towards one side of the stage.

"Here's the thing," Lockhart explained with a big smile on his face as he waited for everyone to gather around, "To avoid another situation like Mrs. Norris, I thought they should learn a little more about self-defense, so I proposed to Dumbledore to create this little dueling club."

Lockhart cleared the case and first tried to win Fish's goodwill.

And it worked on the simple kitten, as Fish, who had some issues with Lockhart, thought he was actually quite nice after hearing this, just not a very good talker at times.

"So Dumbledore has allowed me to found this little dueling club, to train you all properly in case you ever need to defend yourselves in the manner I have used on countless occasions; for more information on this, please consult my published works."

After a couple of sentences, Lockhart returned to his own work, still very much in the business of selling books.

Seamus grimaced from underneath, "What can I learn from this guy? I wonder what the hell Dumbledore was thinking...and Professor McGonagall, how come they let him run the Dueling Club?"

At this point, Fish, who had regained his affection for Lockhart, defended him, "Gilderoy's spell that vanished Harry's bones is still pretty powerful, and if Fish was hit by that spell, he'd be a pain in the nya's head too."

Those next to him thought it made sense, after all, if their bones faded, it would be hard to keep fighting.

So.

Lockhart still has some skills?

The Gryffindor students were suddenly stunned.

The point was that Professor McGonagall and Snape were willing to work as Lockhart's assistants, which confused everyone.

The reality was that Dumbledore had asked Snape to cooperate with Lockhart to appear here and, incidentally, wanted to take the opportunity to see if he could get Harry Potter in trouble.

And Professor McGonagall will appear here just to prevent a certain little cat from causing another tragedy and sending a teacher or other students to the infirmary. As for who will host the dueling club, Professor McGonagall doesn't care at all.

But the students didn't know and, fooled by the two deans, were eagerly awaiting the next lesson.

After Lockhart introduced the two (self-appointed) assistants to the class, he invited Snape to join him for a short demonstration before the lesson.

Lockhart and Snape stood on either side of the stage, while Professor McGonagall took center stage as judge.

"Bow!"

At the sound of Professor McGonagall's voice, Lockhart and Snape faced and bowed to each other....

At least, Lockhart bowed, and then twirled his wand with both hands in the same manner as he had against Fish.

Snape, for his part, shook his head impatiently, and though he had promised Dumbledore that he would not embarrass Lockhart too much, he had little patience for this fool's antics.

"Raise your wands and prepare to..."

They each held their wands to their chests, and then Lockhart hastily took over Professor McGonagall's job as referee, explaining to the students on stage, "As you can see, we will hold our wands in the usual dueling position, and when Professor McGonagall counts to three, we will cast our first spell. Of course, neither of us will take the life of the other."

With that, Lockhart turned to Professor McGonagall with a cheerful smile, and then gave her a "go ahead" gesture.

Professor McGonagall pursed her lips, feeling very displeased with what Lockhart had just done, while Snape, across the room, began to grimace, showing his white teeth.

Seeing Snape's appearance, Professor McGonagall twisted the corner of her mouth secretly and then said, "One, two, three..."

As soon as Professor McGonagall said "three," Lockhart and Snape raised their wands over their shoulders at almost the same time, but in Fish's eyes, it was Snape who was faster.

And so it was, before Lockhart could cast his spell, Snape had already pointed his wand at his opponent and shouted, "Expelliarmus!".

A blinding red light shot out from Snape's wand and struck Lockhart's body.

As a result, not only did his wand fall out of his hand due to the spell, but he also flew backwards, flew straight off the stage and hit the wall, then slid down and curled up on the floor.

The Gryffindor and Hufflepuff sophomores looked at each other feeling they had seen the situation before.

But, fortunately, Lockhart was soon on his feet, unharmed except for his slightly battered appearance.

Well, in Snape's opinion, he was being merciful by not beating Lockhart in the infirmary as Fish had done.

Lockhart seemed not to have recovered from the impact of the spell, staggered back to the stage as if drunk, shook his head, sobered up a bit and wore his perfect smile as if nothing had happened.

But with his messy curly hair, he looked hilarious.

"It's okay, you've all seen it!" Lockhart explained happily, not at all embarrassed by the defeat, "It's a disarming spell; as you can see, I've lost my wand.... Ah, has anyone found my wand? Please return it to me, thank you."

A nine-inch cherry wood wand came out of the crowd, and Lockhart couldn't see who had taken it, tossing it nonchalantly across the stage and two or three meters away from him.

There was a flash of anger on Lockhart's handsome face, which had a big smile on it, but he quickly repressed it, knowing that his performance had shaken his already meager credibility among the students.

Walking silently over to the fallen wand and bending down to pick it up, Lockhart continued with a smile, "Thanks to the unknown student, but it would be best not to be so rough with the wand."

"Back to the disarming spell," Lockhart turned sideways, looking away, "Yes, Professor Snape, it was a brilliant idea to show you that trick, but I don't mind my saying so, it was too obvious I was going to do it just now. If I had wanted to stop you, I would have done it without much difficulty. I think, in order to increase their knowledge, you had better let them see..."

It wasn't the first time he'd been in this awkward situation, and Lockhart had plenty of experience in making excuses, and it wasn't up to him whether others believed him or not, as long as his fans did... though he didn't seem to have any fans at Hogwarts.

Probably sensing the murderous aura coming from Snape, Lockhart decisively changed the subject after stammering for a while, "This is the end of the demonstration! Now I'm going to stand between you and divide you into groups of two. Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall, if you'll help me..."

Professor McGonagall, though very critical of Lockhart, did not refuse to teach her students something new, but ignored Lockhart's greeting and walked straight off the stage with Snape.

The three teachers made their way through the crowd, pairing everyone off and moving on to explain to the younger students what to do when casting a disarming spell.... As ignorant as Lockhart was, he still knew how to cast a disarming spell, it wasn't too complicated a spell after all.

Just as Professor McGonagall approached the Gryffindor students, Fish, who had no longer been able to contain herself, jumped up.

"Minerva! Fish wants a duel with you nya!"

?(●ΦωΦ●)?