"Where can I find a training ground to practice combat magic? Where can I find a training ground to practice combat magic?" I chased the thought in my head like a mantra, walking in circles on the eighth floor of the Astronomy Tower... And to be honest, I began to doubt the reliability of the knowledge I had.
I've been wandering around the three highest towers in Hogwarts for the third day now, fully training in mental magic, because I simply don't want to call my attempts to hold a single thought in my mind for long hours any other way... For my success in finding the coveted room is so far tending towards zero.
And I even had to give up part of my morning workouts to increase my free time to search for the Room of Requirement... I didn't want to disappoint my buddies with my inability to find a suitable place to train.
But I wanted to just occupy one of the abandoned classrooms even less. Mainly because there are only formally "abandoned" classrooms in the castle. Actually, someone uses these classrooms anyway. All sorts of unregistered clubs also need to gather somewhere, and couples in love like to re-equip some remote corner of Hogwarts for themselves.
"Damn it, where can I find a place to practice combat magic?" on a wave of not very positive emotions, I voiced the thought I had been diligently turning over in my head up to this moment... And, surprisingly, it worked!
Something rustled behind my back, the air currents changed a little, and I almost flew to the ceiling, so unexpected were the extraneous sounds behind my back... The source of which turned out to be a solid oak door, to which I immediately ran, instantly tumbling inside.
"Well, thank Merlin! I found you, Room of Requirement," I laughed contentedly, casting a critical eye over the training arenas and platforms that took up most of the space in the spacious room, which looked as if it had been recreated based on ancient paintings and chronicles. The room created by the Room of Requirement looked so atmospheric and ancient even against the background of the rest of the castle.
Here, by the way, besides the platforms, there were both quite ordinary dummies for practicing spells and some strange pseudo-golems, whose appearance resembled knights of the early Middle Ages. I think they even had spears, shields, and axes in their hands.
"It seems that practicing combat magic used to also imply confronting armed opponents... Or are these golems for training close combat skills?" I asked the room not very confidently, completely not knowing how to use such gadgets.
"However, I will deal with this in the evening, in the company of the rest of the Marauders. Right now I need to repeat the success with summoning the Room of Requirement," I quickly decided everything for myself, first leaving the training ground recreated by the Room of Requirement, and then trying to beg exactly the same room from the room again.
Fortunately, I had no problems with this at least. Three attempts out of three were crowned with absolute success. I didn't even have to ask the room aloud; it really reacted to thoughts directed outwards... Which, by the way, could be the reason why I couldn't summon the room earlier. Actually, this is far from the first time I've been strolling through the Astronomy Tower in search of the Room of Requirement.
It's just that in my normal state, even while chasing the necessary thoughts in my mind, I could far from always "direct them outwards." This requires a certain level of concentration or, alternatively, a strong emotional coloring of desires... With which I had some problems due to spinning the same thought in my head for too long.
But at the moment when I was just starting to boil over, and my thoughts were particularly bright, the legendary Room of Requirement finally manifested itself. With which, by the way, I was lucky again. For at the moment when I already started shouting with indignation, I had made exactly three circles around the place I needed...
"Well, even if thanks to luck, I achieved my goal," I shook my head, rushing towards my native common room. A whole school day was still waiting for me, because even the Marauders and I wouldn't risk skipping classes without a really good reason. The most terrible punishments in the school are precisely for skipping classes without a valid reason.
And a valid reason can only be an official conclusion from our mediwitch, without which it is better not to catch the eye of the teaching staff after skipping... It's better to break both your legs first, justifying the missed classes by a purely physical inability to attend them. There were precedents, by the way...
"Hey, guys! Let's not disperse after Potions today, I found us a gorgeous place to train in combat magic!" having returned to the room, I warned the guys, who were only just beginning to come to life after a recent wake-up call.
"Umm, Moony, don't make noise... we're not going to run away anywhere after your Potions," Black brushed me off somewhat sluggishly, his crow's nest on his head looking particularly picturesque this morning. "You're right on time with this, by the way. My cousin wrote back to me yesterday, promised to send some reference books on combat magic that we need by the weekend. And she also promised to send something about the concentration of power in spells."
"Great news. And how are things with this for you, James?" I asked the slightly more cheerful Potter, who had also already managed to send a message to his father.
"Nothing so far," the guy simply shrugged. "My father has some important business with the family company, so he'll deal with my problem sometime later."
"Understood, so for now we'll train the techniques we already know and study Sirius's manuals," I easily accepted such an alignment, still being in high spirits. Finding the Room of Requirement had an extremely positive effect on my mood.
And even the hardest school day of the week couldn't spoil my mood, which, however, I shared with the rest of the Marauders, spurring their curiosity about the place I had prepared for our training...
The guys, after all, are also quite the lovers of exploring the old castle. We had already even compiled a whole map of secret passages and hiding places of Hogwarts... This is not yet the Marauder's Map familiar to me from the movies, but practically an ordinary parchment with a drawing, but even so, the surprise and delight of the guys when I showed them the Room of Requirement was hard to overestimate.
"Remus, werewolves take you?! This room will easily take first place in the list of our findings in Hogwarts!" Sirius almost shouted, literally running around one of the training platforms. "And is this miracle capable of creating other rooms?"
"I suggest checking," I smiled easily, enjoying the reaction of my comrades.
"But didn't we come here to train?" Peter asked cautiously, however, burning with no less enthusiasm at the thought of the possibilities of such a wonderful find.
"We have time until curfew! We'll still have time to wave our wands!" sharing Sirius's enthusiasm, Potter remarked cheerfully.
"No-no-no, I'm not going to train until curfew! They are still waiting for us at dinner," I immediately put my two cents in, moving away from the dueling hall together with everyone.
"Who is waiting for us?" Peter didn't understand right away, looking at me with surprise.
"Food and evening tea, naturally," I snorted mockingly, not hiding my love for the cooking of the local house-elves at all.
"Who talks about what, but Moony just wants to eat," Sirius laughed with a barking laugh, clapping me on the shoulder. Which was just an excellent demonstration of our high spirits, with which we set about exploring the Room of Requirement, deciding to first comprehend the limits of the possibilities of this masterpiece of magical thought...
And the Room of Requirement really did have its limits. So, this room coped perfectly with the creation of a library, living quarters, spacious halls, and training rooms. But when it came to something larger and more complex... Well, the room couldn't create a Quidditch pitch, and the swimming pool I ordered appeared without water and a drainage system.
The same problem arose when creating shower cabins. And the Room of Requirement also couldn't copy our house's common room, instead opening a direct passage into one of the hidden niches located right opposite the largest fireplace in the common room... The same story repeated itself several times with the Potions classroom, in which a secret passage was also found...
"Amazing bullshit!" Sirius summed up at the end of all our experiments. "We even managed to create a Potions master's laboratory in the end!"
"Yeah... We'll just need to make sure later that this laboratory is part of the Room of Requirement, and not someone's laboratory hidden somewhere in a secret corner of the castle," I snorted, due to some haste not having had time to check all the details of the place offered to us by the Room of Requirement.
"Ooh, Remus, what are you doing, are you going to additionally study potions too?" Black frowned, considering that lately I've been spending too much time on my training and sitting in the library.
"Not now," I shook my head. "I don't have extra consumables for full-fledged potions classes yet. But I will solve this issue in the future."
"Mmm, just don't turn into a second Snivellus, or I'll have to order a full check for you for all sorts of curses in St. Mungo's," the heir to the House of Black poked me jokingly in the shoulder.
"Yeah, so that the healers would immediately cut me up for ingredients, having recognized a real werewolf in a Hogwarts student?" I snorted, not at all frightened by someone else's threats. "Okay, jokes aside. I suggest we start training already. There are only a couple of hours left until dinner, and it wouldn't hurt us to check each other's abilities."
"I fully support it... At the same time, we'll finally find out which of us Marauders is the most skillful duelist!" Potter enthusiastically supported the idea, being the first to catch a not deadly, but not very pleasant curse from Black.
After which, however, I also had to experience Sirius's not very pleasant tricks on my own skin, but he still couldn't win our fight. Shoelaces tied together prevented the guy from dodging my Depulso, after which Black flew off the dueling platform.
And onto this platform, with truly deer-like stubbornness, climbed Potter, who managed to catch me at the moment of attack, almost scratching my eyes out with transfigured glass shards... Somehow it turned out that Black lost to me, Potter lost to Black, and I lost to Potter. Peter lost to all of us, ultimately getting off with the least damage.
Well, and our brave company had to go to the hospital wing, treat "combat wounds," and then endure long lectures from Madam Pomfrey on the topic of how such training without the supervision of an experienced and competent mentor can end...
Whom we still had nowhere to find, and no one even thought about stopping training after the very first session. Everyone liked hitting each other with magic and practicing spells in practically real combat... And in general, such duels, which are actually a banal one-on-one fight, turned out to be just a super interesting and fun thing!
At the same time, it was fun both for the participant of the fight, because the excitement of the skirmish turned out to be close to all four of us, and for the spectators, rooting for one or the other side...
"True, it wouldn't hurt us to stock up on a set of potions for first aid. Because going to the hospital wing every time after training is a below-average idea," Potter remarked, fully sharing Sirius's and my excitement and anticipation of the next training session.
"Yeah, I would also learn a couple of healing spells. Well, just in case of completely unforeseen circumstances," I supplemented someone else's idea, perfectly understanding that practically all medical charms belong to quite advanced magic.
"Well, Sirius and I will order potions calmly... But medical spells..." Potter stumbled a little, apparently completely unwilling to take on the study of such complex things.
"Yes, yes, I suggested it, so I have to implement this idea," I sighed heavily, adding to myself that extra medical spells in my arsenal definitely wouldn't be superfluous.
"Who the hell knows what other side life will turn to me. Always relying on werewolf regeneration is also not an option. Especially since it's undesirable for me to show up at St. Mungo's. They won't cut me up for ingredients, of course, but they are unlikely to treat me either," I reasoned in exactly this vein, deciding to take on the duties of the main "healer" in our team.
"Are you sure you can handle such charms?" James looked at me attentively, receiving in response an unsure, but still agreeing nod.
"It's worth a try in any case," I simply smiled, immediately adding a few more important points to my schedule... Because of which free time once again waved goodbye to me, promising even greater busyness and load on my poor head in the future.
Fortunately, in mental magic there are disciplines and individual spells that make it easier to cope with processing large amounts of information. Sirius just brought back a few books on this topic from the holidays, which are still almost in my personal use. Because the rest of the Marauders are somehow not very eager to dive into mental magic.
"And in vain! Look, my advanced-level mental shields are already more or less starting to work out," I mentally shook my head, at the same time rejoicing at my own progress. "And even if it most likely sounds somewhat arrogant, it seems I still have some talent for this type of magic... It must be the experience of a past life taking its toll!"