Mysterious Journey
Chapter 892: Ominous Clouds on the Horizon
If students in their fifth year and above were assumed to carry a layer of "irritability," then all the players on the Quidditch teams had the same condition, which was doubly amplified in Gryffindor.
After all, as the most active house in all of Hogwarts, they undoubtedly faced the greatest pressure before exams.
On the other hand, the new season's schedule had cast a layer of disorientation over the Gryffindors.
"We have our first game on Saturday!"
Before Percy Weasley could answer his twin brothers, the archway of the common room suddenly opened, and a burly young man walked in, his voice hoarse with fatigue.
"We need to ramp up our training, guys, if we can just win the first game..."
"...that means we're only one step away from the championship, we get it, Oliver. You've been repeating that to us so much it's practically an echo. But you also know that—"
Percy Weasley glanced at his two brothers, who were winking at him, and sighed helplessly.
He put down his book, walked over to Oliver Wood, and patted the shoulder of the current captain.
"With our current strength and level of coordination, it's highly unlikely that we'll beat the 'All-Star Team' in the opening game, unless we use Miss Kaslana's appearance quota. I know Charlie, he won't go easy on us in the game."
This year's Quidditch season would kick off with a match between Gryffindor and the "All-Star Team."
After witnessing the debut of the team composed of past champions, at least half of the students believed that they would win this year's championship with an overwhelming advantage. They didn't even need much sophisticated coordination; they could easily dominate every position with just muscle memory and individual skill.
In fact, the sheer difference in strength wasn't even the most despairing thing.
"Charlie knows the Gryffindor team too well; our current system is built around him..."
Percy Weasley pushed up his glasses, calmly and somewhat mercilessly analyzing, "While I'm not exactly a Quidditch expert, I do know that our chances of winning hinge on the Seeker—I'm not questioning your ability, I believe you'll be quite excellent in a few years, Harry—but not now. Wood, don't be too hasty..."
Percy glanced at the skinny, black-haired boy who looked like he'd been pulled out of the water behind Wood and shrugged.
"Harry is eight years younger than Charlie, that's not a gap that can be closed with just a few weeks of effort..."
The Hogwarts Quidditch Cup operates on a points system.
If Aelinore Kaslana's appearance guaranteed a win, then theoretically, the "Queen of the Sky's" appearances were almost fixed—she would appear in the finals to secure the Quidditch championship trophy for Gryffindor.
Even if something unexpected happened, they would have to wait until the semi-finals to ensure their qualification for the finals.
In other words, Gryffindor needed to be in the top three in the points standings.
Ignoring the insignificant freshman team, the remaining three teams—Hufflepuff, Slytherin, and the All-Star Team—were all tough nuts to crack for the current Gryffindor team.
This was especially evident when looking at the core players of each team:
Slytherin added three faster, younger, and more agile members of the former "Hogwarts Moonlight Team" to their championship-winning lineup from two years ago. On the Hufflepuff side, Cedric Diggory finally became the new captain, and they also had a fearsome "Aelinore Number Two," the newly appointed prefect Hannah Abbott.
In comparison, Gryffindor, who only added a head coach and a Seeker, seemed significantly inferior.
"I understand, but we can't just give up." Wood said painfully, "We've been trying to change our tactics, Miss Kaslana has given us a lot of advice. If we can win a game in the first round, at least the pressure won't be so great when we face the Hufflepuff team—we don't want to repeat last year's nightmare this year..."
Last year was arguably the darkest year in Hogwarts Quidditch history.
In Fred's words, they were up against a team led by Death himself, and besides Aelinore Kaslana as the main attacker, there was Hannah as the auxiliary attacker. Once they took to the skies, their lives were entirely at the mercy of those two she-devils.
Even the once invincible Slytherin Quidditch team was firmly nailed to the pillar of shame in the finals.
"Look on the bright side, Wood, no one can defeat the devil..."
George Weasley patted his shoulder sympathetically, clicking his tongue in slight fear.
As the Keeper, Oliver Wood undoubtedly suffered the most damage. Whenever Aelinore and Hannah got the Quaffle, it was practically a deadly multiple-choice question:
If he stood in front of the goal, he might have a chance to defend against the attack, but he would definitely be struck down once.
Or he could simply leave the goal wide open and choose to give up, placing his hopes on their accuracy.
Obviously, Oliver Wood's pride wouldn't allow him to abandon his goal.
In last year's game against the freshman team, Fred couldn't even remember how many times Wood had been knocked down—even though Aelinore would kindly heal their injuries every time, the pain couldn't be erased—but the information on the scoreboard didn't lie. In that hellish game, Gryffindor still maintained the lowest goal conceded rate in the school.
"That's right, this year is different; the big devil is on our side!"
Fred said excitedly, suddenly grinning foolishly.
"And we also have a champion player, right, Harry... All in all, George and I will protect you. If we can make it to the final four in our first year in the Gryffindor team, that's a success—the rest is an internal war among the devils..."
"Uh, I think... It might not be appropriate to call Coach Kaslana that..."
Wood blinked, slowly speaking, as if his gears were stuck.
"What? Coach Kaslana? The silver-haired big devil and the round-faced little devil, wasn't that what you said in the beginning?"
Fred said, waving his hand dismissively, "She's indeed very good at Quidditch, but I don't think her tactical arrangements will be of any use... For decades, we Gryffindors have been playing around the Seeker. If we really play the game the way she says, our backcourt will definitely be riddled with holes."
"Fred, behind you, behind you—" Percy twitched his lips, mouthing silently.
"...but facts have proven that I was too superficial!"
Fred Weasley paused for half a second, then quickly changed his tune, "High-frequency passing, high-speed movement, one-on-one full-court press in defense, using time to create offensive opportunities, it's simply fiery art that only angels could come up with..."
As he spoke, Fred slowly turned around, his face full of heartfelt surprise and sincerity.
"Oh, Coach Kaslana, when did you get back!"
Aelinore smiled slightly, tiptoed, and gently patted the boy's shoulder.
"If you act on your own accord in Saturday's game, then you'll have the opportunity to recall what devils look like—do you remember when you broke an entire box of Beater bats in five minutes during training last semester?"
As a little angel with knowledge of later generations, Aelinore had many training methods to draw from.
A fully accelerated Bludger could easily break an adult's arm, which meant that its speed was close to the critical force of a shot in a soccer match, and the Beater's job was to hit it towards the opposing players with a bat. Therefore, standing in place and enduring the attack at a high frequency was obviously a good way to form muscle memory.
Anyway, with healing magic, even a broken sternum could be healed, let alone an arm or something.
"Uh, actually, I'm not Fred, I'm George..."
Fred scratched his cheeks, saying cautiously, trying to save himself one last time.
"Hmm, I believe you, George—"
Aelinore nodded dismissively, pointing to the girls who were looking at star charts by the fireplace, "Then go over there and say to Angelina that you like Miss Strip, the Ravenclaw Head Girl, the most."
"...This... Uh... Aba aba..."
Fred Weasley froze in place like a statue, helplessly appealing to his brothers for help with his eyes.
There weren't many people at Hogwarts who could tell him and George apart, even Percy sometimes got them mixed up, but Angelina and Merula would never mistake their boyfriends. If he really went over and said that, he might be able to avoid hellish training, but it would also mean that he would become a single dog like Charlie and Bill again.
"Fred, I told you, falling in love too early will give you loopholes..."
Wood grinned, patted Fred's shoulder, then turned to look at Aelinore, asking seriously.
"What's our win rate if we use the old tactics? What about the new tactics? Charlie Weasley is probably the most outstanding Seeker at Hogwarts in the last decade! If we want to win the championship, we have to beat them at least once."
"If we continue to use Gryffindor's previous 'protect-one' tactic, the win rate is almost zero."
Aelinore looked Harry up and down for a while, saying calmly.
Harry had just entered his second year, and most boys were just entering puberty at this time, not to mention that Harry's physical development was even slower than other students due to living in the cupboard under the stairs and not getting enough nutrition.
No matter how outstanding Harry's Quidditch talent was, his physical disadvantages were too great.
Especially when his style was so similar to Charlie's, it was even more of a disaster for Gryffindor.
"Whether it's arm length, experience, or endurance... Harry will be completely crushed in the matchup with Charlie. Even if Harry sees the Golden Snitch first, unless it's very close, Charlie can still catch up and get it first with his skill. As for the new tactics, the win rate is also almost zero—we've only been working on them for less than a month, it will conservatively take at least another half a month to see the effect."
Aelinore said, narrowing her eyes thoughtfully and speaking softly.
"Actually, there is another way, but there's definitely no time now..."
Just like playing games, in some cases, the gap in strength and level can be compensated by equipment, and the current Gringotts Wizarding Bank and Destiny Group are about to become the world's top broom manufacturers.
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It's just that most of those samples haven't been fully adjusted yet.
That batch of epoch-making flying broomsticks is expected to be transported to the research institute outside the school after Christmas, where the researchers from the Sukhoi Design Bureau will conduct the final flight tests and fine-tuning... Speaking of which, the little lions of Gryffindor seem to be very suitable for part-time jobs, at least Quidditch fanatics like Oliver Wood certainly wouldn't refuse... would they?
Of course, as the most conscientious big capitalist in the magical world, Aelinore wouldn't over-exploit the value of her classmates.
According to the design plan she had roughly looked at before, those new "high-energy high-speed" brooms were all designed with the theoretical data of supersonic flight in mind, and if they were to control brooms of that specification, in addition to flying skills and magical abilities, the requirements in terms of physical fitness might be slightly higher than the standards of fighter pilots.
Fortunately, in the magical world, physical fitness is still very easy to strengthen—as long as you're willing to spend money.
…………
Meanwhile, at the Quidditch pitch.
The first Quidditch match was gradually approaching, but the weather was getting worse and worse.
In addition to the Gryffindor team and the freshman team, the number of training ground applications from the other teams has obviously decreased a lot, which has finally allowed the members of the All-Star Team to find free time to train alone.
As the oldest students in the school, they had mostly given the opportunities to those little ones before.
Of course, in addition to modesty, another aspect was that they felt there was no need.
If it weren't for the fact that the formal match was about to start this Saturday and Captain Charlie Weasley insisted on running the plays, they wouldn't have even come to this solo training—and the facts had also proven that training wasn't of much use.
As star players who had led their respective houses to victory in the past, everyone knew what they should do.
As for deeper cooperation, some disdained it, while others were not allowed to by their tasks...
"I told you, this is a complete waste of time!"
Gerald complained impatiently, arms crossed.
"I've already asked Professor Snape; that girl named Aelinore Kaslana won't be playing in the opening game. If you want Gryffindor to lose less, try to catch the Golden Snitch as quickly as possible."
"It's a big mistake to underestimate Gryffindor. Miss Kaslana is now Gryffindor's head coach."
Charlie Weasley said seriously. He had disliked Gerald ever since they were students.
"A big mistake? Ha! We defeated the Gryffindor team when you were on it, let alone these little guys now—"
Gerald shook his head, a hint of disdain flashing in his eyes.
"I heard that this time Gryffindor's Seeker is that 'Boy Who Lived, Harry Potter'. Weasley, you're not going to lose to a second-year student, are you? Or are you planning to throw the game? Oh, that would be a little difficult..."
"As for the head coach? How many Quidditch teams have you heard of that win because of the coach?"
"Don't worry, as an old opponent, I'll help you face reality in the game on Saturday... The current Gryffindor team is just a third-rate team at the bottom of the barrel, just like—" Gerald grinned, "After you left, I led the team to slaughter Gryffindor for several consecutive seasons."
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