That evening, Glenn and Hermione finished their day of studying and visited Dumbledore again, presenting their proposal.
Faced with the two youngsters' request to take their final exams early, Dumbledore didn't ask why they wanted to do this. He immediately agreed to the matter.
"I'll inform the other professors of your selected courses about this. There's still nearly half a month before you depart for the Dragon Kingdom. You can arrange your exam schedule yourselves—just give the corresponding subject professors advance notice."
Those were Dumbledore's exact words. He gave Glenn and Hermione considerable freedom to manage their own exam timing. Clearly, Dumbledore was quite confident in them.
Because if nothing went wrong, these two young wizards' subject scores would probably all fall between full marks and one or two points deducted, and that one or two point margin might even be due to uncertainty factors in subjective questions.
Facing such conscientious and diligent good students, Dumbledore didn't think they'd pull any strange stunts during exams.
Having received Dumbledore's permission, Glenn and Hermione discussed briefly and settled on their final exam schedule.
They'd never been ones to procrastinate. The sooner they finished necessary tasks, the more comfortable they'd feel. So Glenn and Hermione decided to start taking exams directly from tomorrow.
"Right, tomorrow happens to be the weekend, so let's finish all the written exams for every course tomorrow, then tackle all the practical courses together the day after."
Hermione snapped her fingers, announcing a schedule that would sound incredible to other students their age. Normally, Hogwarts' exam week lasted a full five days for testing. With a grand wave of her hand, Hermione decided to compress it all into two days.
If not for the fact that magic wasn't allowed during written exams—preventing multitasking—and that handwriting was far slower than using magic to control quill pens, Hermione would even have wanted to compress these two days into morning written exams and afternoon practicals.
After all, both of them had completely mastered everything they needed to know this semester. Whether written or practical exams, it was just a matter of processing the knowledge in their heads and reproducing it on paper or casting magic.
If these words accidentally got out, the young wizards of Hogwarts would probably be moved to tears of sorrow.
"Fine by me. Let's go tell the professors right now."
Glenn had no objections to Hermione's arrangement. Since it was still early, the two immediately began visiting various professors to inform them of the situation.
Quite a few professors broke out in cold sweats when the two came calling.
They'd just received notification from Dumbledore, and the two young wizards related to that notification had already come knocking. The thing was, they hadn't even had time to start writing exam papers yet.
However, regarding these two "star students" who were quite famous within the professors' social circle, Glenn and Hermione's various subject teachers were extremely fond of the pair.
After all, students who were smart and studious, polite and modest, and could help liven up classroom atmosphere—that last part applied only to Hermione—were incredibly hard to find.
Sigh, there was no helping it. By the looks of things, they'd have to work overtime tonight.
After Glenn left, several professors began working overtime to prepare final exam papers in advance.
However, a few professors didn't seem too flustered by the sudden development.
For instance, Professor Flitwick, Professor McGonagall, or Professor Snape.
The first two were people who habitually prepared things in advance. Flitwick and McGonagall had long ago designed exam papers for all grade levels' final exams. If not for Hermione insisting on taking all exams together tomorrow for the sense of ceremony, these two professors who were familiar with the pair might have pulled out exam papers on the spot and had Glenn and Hermione solve them then and there.
Snape was rather excessive though. When the two arrived, he was too busy with too many things on hand and hadn't started preparing final exam papers yet. So he grabbed Glenn and Hermione as laborers to help him handle lesson plans for classes.
"Finish this portion of lesson plans within two hours—that's your written exam content for Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts."
Pressing the two onto the sofa, Snape tossed a thick stack of parchment and several notebooks onto the coffee table. Under Hermione's incredulous gaze, he bared his teeth in a not-quite-smile and said this.
"...And what about you, Professor? If we do the lesson plans, what are you going to do now?"
Hermione's lips trembled as white light emanated from her body. It took tremendous effort for her not to curse aloud while maintaining respectful address toward Snape. She asked through gritted teeth.
"Take a walk, rest, breathe fresh air."
As if deliberately—well, he was deliberately provoking Hermione—Snape ruthlessly dropped this line and turned to leave. Just before exiting, he left one final comment:
"Oh, and you might as well handle your Potions practical exam content too. Over there on the work station, there are several batches of potions that haven't finished brewing. After you finish the lesson plans, complete that remaining work before curfew, or both your grades will be D."
"Enjoy your private time together. I won't disturb you. Heh heh."
"SLAM!"
Snape slammed the office door shut, and the clear, undisguised sound of locking came from outside.
"That's too much, Professor Snape!!!!!!"
Hermione shot to her feet, her hair completely frazzled. She vaulted over the sofa in one motion, rushed to the office door in two quick steps, and yanked hard.
"Click"
The door was indeed locked. Hermione furiously pulled out her wand and unleashed a barrage on the door lock, but immediately discovered that Snape had actually changed the arrangement and combination of locking spells. To forcibly break through these spells would probably take several hours.
In that time, the work Snape had assigned them would long be finished.
The only quick and convenient method would be to violently break down the door, but Snape had seen right through that Hermione would absolutely never do such a thing, which was why he'd set up this blockade.
One could only say the young girl's psychology had been completely grasped by that cunning old bat Snape.
This was an open conspiracy in the wizarding world. As they say, ginger gets spicier with age.
"Argh, I'm so angry! How can Snape do this!"
Hermione stamped her feet forcefully and pulled at her hair. This time she really couldn't be bothered with respectful language toward Snape. She unleashed a civilized person's tirade of abuse at the locked office door.
Meanwhile, Glenn had already begun working, secretly planning to take some of Snape's precious potion ingredients as compensation later.
Hermione had morals. He didn't.
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