If Rowena had known Helga's plan, her eyes would have gone wide, and Rhys would have called her insane—trying to help a child who had just begun learning about magical flow awaken a domain was sheer madness.
But that was exactly what Hufflepuff decided to do.
After sitting down across from Cedric, the ground beneath Helga soon began to pulse with rhythm. At first, the two rhythms—hers and Cedric's—interfered with each other, producing chaotic "noise." Cedric frowned deeply, even showing signs of waking up.
But Helga quickly adjusted, shifting her own state to match his rhythm.
Harmony was restored. The pulses beneath the two of them merged into one unified rhythm, and Cedric once again calmed down.
Once their synchronization succeeded, Hufflepuff began gently guiding him—this time, letting him follow her lead.
Among the four founders, each had their own strengths, but Helga Hufflepuff was by far the most gifted teacher. If Rhys and Rowena had witnessed this scene, they would have been astonished—and would likely have gone back to test the method on their own students.
After guiding Cedric onto the correct path, Helga stopped leading and turned her focus toward observing the changes within him.
The two of them, like twin transmitters of a single signal, caused tremors to ripple through the entire underground sanctuary. Everywhere the earth reached began to rise and fall in slow, rhythmic motion.
It was as though the underground castle itself had come to life.
After a while, Helga noticed that the parts of Cedric's body touching the ground had already begun to turn into soil. Her heart leapt with joy. Good, keep going—intensify it!
Under Helga's guidance, the soil beneath Cedric slowly crept up his body, gradually covering him until he became an earthen figure.
If Helga were to close her domain at this moment, the transformation would become irreversible—Cedric would remain a clay statue forever. But of course, she would never do that.
Several hours later, Cedric's body gradually returned to flesh and blood, with only a thin layer of soil remaining on his skin.
Sensing his stabilized state, Helga slowly drew her domain back until it fully receded.
Cedric shivered, awakening abruptly. Feeling confused, he brushed off the dirt covering him—then saw Professor Hufflepuff sitting calmly across from him.
At that instant, he remembered the dream he'd just had. He felt an overwhelming urge to share it with his teacher.
"Professor, it was incredible! I had the most extraordinary dream!" Cedric's eyes gleamed with excitement as he spoke, his voice brimming with wonder. "I dreamed that I turned into a patch of land—it sounds strange, I know—but I truly became part of the earth, like I had merged with it completely!"
"Oh?" A joyful light flickered deep in Helga's eyes. "What a marvelous dream. Would you share with me what you saw and felt in it?"
Of course Cedric didn't hold anything back. He eagerly described to Helga how it felt to become one with the earth—how no detail, above or below the ground, could escape his perception.
He could sense the worms burrowing through the soil and the roots of plants spreading and drawing nourishment as they grew.
"That's because you've established a connection with the earth," Helga explained, giving Cedric an answer for why he'd had such a dream—though she conveniently left out the part where she had intervened midway.
"How amazing…" Cedric murmured. He felt the same sense of wonder as when he had gotten his wand for the first time. Helga Hufflepuff had opened a door for him—a gateway to an entirely new world.
He stood up and brushed the dust from his clothes.
"Oh, right. Why don't you try making a little clay figure?" Helga suggested casually beside him.
"Oh, sure." Cedric instinctively reached for the wand in his pocket, but Helga stopped him.
"Don't use magic. Just look at the ground—try to move the soil in the field with your will."
Cedric: ???
That sounded utterly absurd. How could soil move just because he looked at it—?
But it really did!
As Cedric stared at the earth, imagining it forming into the shape of a clay figure, a chubby little mud doll actually rose up from the ground.
Cedric: ???
After that, he was astonished to discover that he seemed to have formed some kind of special connection with the soil around him—he could freely manipulate it in countless ways.
He could shape it into various forms, extract information through it, and even make it carry him forward.
"Professor, this…"
"It's perfectly normal," Helga explained calmly. "You've established resonance with this place. However, your control is limited to the soil here. Once you leave, your influence over the earth will weaken considerably."
She continued to explain what had just happened and part of the reason behind it—but, as before, she omitted the most crucial detail.
Cedric hadn't awakened a domain as Helga had originally hoped—that was far too ambitious—but with her help, he had achieved the prerequisite for doing so: forming resonance with something. He had successfully resonated with the soil of Hufflepuff's underground domain.
If he had realized this entirely on his own, then even after leaving the underground sanctuary, he would have been able to extend that resonance to other types of earth.
That was what Helga herself could do—whether it was the soil of the Scottish Highlands, the frozen ground of the North, or even the divinely infused earth of Asgard, she could commune with all of them.
Cedric, however, was not yet capable of that.
The more a piece of soil had been influenced by others, the harder it was for him to control it. For instance, the soil Rhys and Helga had once used to seal away the Dementors—he couldn't manipulate that at all.
At present, Cedric could be said to possess a fragment of a domain's authority. But the difference between his so-called "domain" and Helga's was as vast as that between an observer nation and a permanent member of the council.
Within Helga's underground castle, he could be said to hold half a domain. Outside of it, however, he could only be described as someone skilled at controlling soil.
Even so, it was an astonishing improvement—enough to make Helga grin from ear to ear with satisfaction.
"Come on, that's enough practice for today. Let's head up for dinner!" she said cheerfully, leading Cedric out of the chamber. Neither of them remembered that their original goal had simply been for him to use magic to make himself float.
While Helga was giving Cedric special tutoring, Rhys was not idle either—Harry, looking pale and uneasy, came to find him, asking to speak privately.
Curious, Rhys agreed to Harry's request, silently praying it wouldn't turn out to be a matter of emotional counseling.
However, after they found an empty classroom and spent a short time alone together, Rhys quickly noticed something unusual about Harry—his soul seemed… unstable.
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