Further away, several Slytherins who had been practicing saw the scene and immediately gathered around—three people, five people, more and more…
Alphard's expression changed, and his two friends, Colin and Gareth, exchanged nervous glances.
Just then, Regulus—with his back to all his Slytherin classmates—slowly raised his left hand.
His palm was upright, fingers together—a crystal-clear stop gesture.
Avery froze for a moment; his raised wand lowered, though he did not put it away.
Hermes narrowed his eyes, staring intently at Regulus's back; his wand remained raised, though the tip gradually drifted off-target.
Alex let out a sigh of relief.
The Slytherins who had gathered hesitated; their brooms hovered in mid-air, and they did not advance further.
Regulus did not look back, a faint, obscure smile appearing at the corner of his mouth.
*An obedience test.*
These Slytherin students—proud, gloomy, timid, and prone to following the crowd—were now stopping according to Regulus's instructions.
It wasn't easy to get them to obey collectively, but as long as one person stopped, the others would naturally follow.
This stemmed from the absolute crushing of the fifth-year Travers on the first night of school; authority had been preliminarily established.
The Gryffindors, who had also gathered on the opposite side, stopped advancing upon seeing this, everyone exchanging obscure glances.
"What is it, Black?" Alphard forced himself to remain calm. "Afraid your helpers will embarrass you?"
"Quite the opposite," Regulus said in a puzzled tone. "I'm afraid they'd act too fast, and you wouldn't have a chance to show your… courage?"
"Expelliarmus!" Alphard shouted, incensed, as a red light shot out again.
This time, Regulus didn't even utter an incantation; with a light flick of his wand, a faint glow hit the strap at the front of Alphard's broom.
That was the Reparo Spell, part of the first-year curriculum, used for fixing chair legs or patching robes.
*Click.* The strap suddenly tightened, and the front of the broom jerked downward.
Alphard's Expelliarmus shot into the ground because of the broom's sudden dip, blasting a small pit in the sand; he himself cried out as he hugged the broom handle to keep from being thrown off.
"A Reparo Spell… on the strap?!" a Gryffindor exclaimed.
"Exquisite!" a Slytherin praised loudly.
Seeing this, Colin rushed to support: "Jinx spell!"
A silver light shot toward Regulus's side.
Without even looking, Regulus pointed his wand toward the lower left: "Aguamenti."
A stream of water shot onto the ground beneath Colin's broom, splashing water everywhere and turning the ground muddy.
The old Cleansweep still had a wheel carriage; the wheels of Colin's broom sank into the mud, the entire broom jerking to a halt, and his spell also went wide.
Gareth tried to sneak an attack from the other side: "Stupefy!"
This time, Regulus finally glanced at him, but only for a second.
He tapped his wand on the ground by Gareth's feet: "Incendio."
A small cluster of flames ignited on the dry turf.
Gareth's broom had a wicker base, which feared fire most; he hurriedly pulled up in a panic, and his spell missed again.
Three directions, three attacks—Regulus had used three of the most basic spells, all targeting the environment and the brooms, causing his opponents to lose balance and their spells to miss.
Once is a coincidence, twice is luck, but three times is a crushing gap in skill.
Alphard's face was pale; he had just barely stabilized his broom when Regulus's voice drifted over: "Shall we continue? Or do you have something else to show?"
The surrounding Slytherin students were already dazed.
"He didn't attack the person even once…" a Slytherin girl whispered.
"It was all targeting the brooms and the ground," another boy murmured, "but this is more humiliating than hitting them directly."
"The key is, he used everything from the first thirty pages of *The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1*!"
"I don't believe for a second that he doesn't know anything else."
Avery stared at Regulus's back with a complex expression; he knew every one of those spells, but he couldn't produce that kind of effect.
Hermes silently put away his wand, looking thoughtfully at the spots that had been precisely hit; every choice maximized the effect while minimizing the effort.
"What are you doing?!" Madam Hooch's roar finally came.
She rushed onto the field like a whirlwind, scanning the area with a grim face: "Put down your wands! Immediately!"
Alphard and the other two hurriedly put away their wands and jumped down from their brooms, their faces drenched in sweat.
"Prewett! Macmillan! Diggory!" Madam Hooch said sharply. "Using spells without permission during Flying Class! Against a classmate! Thirty points from Gryffindor! One week's detention for each of you!"
"But Professor!" Alphard said urgently. "He also used—"
"What did Black use?" Madam Hooch's sharp gaze turned to Regulus.
"The Reparo Spell, Professor." Regulus looked her in the eye, his gaze candid. "To reinforce the straps. The Water-Making Spell to reduce the dust on the ground, and the Fire-Making Spell to prevent the ground from being slippery."
Madam Hooch stared at Regulus for a few seconds, then looked at the marks on the ground; the strap was indeed tightened, the ground indeed had water, and the turf indeed had burn marks.
"Prewett," she said coldly, "are you going to accuse Black of attacking you with a Reparo Spell?"
A few suppressed snickers broke out around them.
Alphard opened his mouth, but couldn't say a single word.
"Another ten points from Gryffindor for falsely accusing a classmate," Madam Hooch said ruthlessly. "Now, everyone back to the castle!"
As the Slytherin students put away their brooms and left, almost everyone who passed by Regulus gave him an extra look.
In those eyes were surprise, awe, and recognition; Slytherin recognized power, and even more so, the wisdom to use that power.
That evening, in the Slytherin Common Room.
The emerald flames in the fireplace burned quietly, reflecting off the dark green hangings and silver decorations; the first-year students gathered in the lounge area, the center of conversation naturally being the afternoon's events.
"Why didn't you let us step in?" a boy couldn't help but ask Regulus. "We had the numbers; we could have completely—"
"Could have what?" Regulus interrupted, looking up at everyone. "Could have given Gryffindor a reason to complain?"
"Everyone gathering together to attack Gryffindors?"
He set down his quill, his voice not loud: "Slytherin has lost the House Cup for three consecutive years. Every ten points could determine the final outcome. Is it worth letting the house lose dozens of points?"
Several students fell silent.
House Points were a special weakness for Slytherins; the younger they were, the more they cared about them.
"Furthermore," Regulus continued, "if you had acted, it would have been a brawl. When Madam Hooch arrived, what she would have seen was Slytherins ganging up on three Gryffindors. But now—"
"What she saw was three Gryffindors ganging up on one Slytherin, and that Slytherin didn't even fight back—he was just repairing a broom, cleaning the ground, and drying the grass."
Someone let out a low laugh.
Regulus looked around and noticed some upper-year students were also looking over; he raised his voice slightly.
"And the result?" He stood up, facing the entire common room. "Gryffindor lost forty points, Slytherin didn't lose a single point, and Prewett and the other two are in detention until next week."
He tilted his chin up slightly, his voice a bit more stirring: "And we earned respect.
Madam Hooch saw Slytherin's restraint and discipline, and the other houses saw that provoking Slytherin comes with a price."
Prefect Lucretius Boke came over at this time, looking at all the lower-year students: "Impulsiveness, brawling, and losing points—those are Gryffindor ways.
Slytherin wants victory, profit, and glory. Black demonstrated today how to maximize the blow to an opponent within the rules while minimizing one's own losses."
He turned to Regulus and said formally: "You earned respect for the house and avoided a disastrous point deduction. Well done, Black."
Several upper-year students nodded in agreement, while the lower-years looked at Regulus with eyes full of a mixture of admiration and envy.
Not long after starting school, he had already gained public recognition from the prefect and the upper-years.
Regulus nodded slightly: "I only made the choice most beneficial to the house."
Back in the dormitory, Avery was writing an essay when he suddenly stopped his quill and asked Regulus: "You did it on purpose, didn't you?"
Regulus cast an interested glance: "On purpose with what?"
Avery was different from some pure-blood idiots; he could think.
Hermes also looked up from his book, both of them staring at Regulus; he too had noticed something was off about the situation during the day.
Regulus didn't wait for Avery's answer; he asked Hermes in a declarative tone: "You wanted to cast a spell on me?"
Hermes's eyes narrowed slightly; he indeed had that thought at the time, but only for an instant.
*He could even sense that? Is he bluffing me?*
He said nothing.
Avery narrowed his eyes, looking back and forth between Regulus and Hermes.
Alex held his breath, not daring to draw attention to himself.
*Can I change dorms?*
*It's so scary here!*
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