When Axel finally returned, the game was going full on and the noise was everywhere.
"So, what was it about?" Asked Daphne, not looking away from the game.
Axel scoffed,
"Just a waste of time really," he said exasperatedly.
"But…" a smirk came to his face as he recalled the red face of the thoroughly embarrassed Martina. "It was also worth it,"
Martina Valentino. To everyone else at Hogwarts, she was this genius beauty who was perfect in every aspect. She would always give out this elegant and unapproachable feeling, as if she was above everyone else without even trying.
At least that's what everyone thinks and that's what she wants everyone to think. In fact, she even had him fooled! He was terrified of the girl who even the system wanted him to be careful of.
That was until he easily tripped her and ran away. He thought it might be a fluke, but the next day, she couldn't even handle his memories and got scared. Though, it was still alright. Her image was still mighty in his impression.
But, on Halloween, she ended up tripping due to a minor lubrication charm and falling in an embarrassing position with her underwear exposed to him.
Then when the Dementors came, she screamed so loud that even he got scared due to her reaction. She was no help despite being perfectly capable of handling the Dementors. And today, it turned out that she was just a little girl who is doted on by her family.
So, it was quite amusing to slowly unmask the girl whom everyone thought of as a high, mighty, and aloof existence.
"It was a waste of time, but also worth it? How's that possible?" How is that possible, asked Daphne, offering him popcorn.
"Go, Rose!" She called as Rose passed by them.
Axel shook his head,
"Never mind, what about the game?" He asked as he too looked at the field.
Daphne frowned in distaste,
"It's not looking good. The Slytherins are playing very Slytherin way, those bastards!" She exclaimed, but then she realized something, "No offense," Axel was also a Slytherin after all.
Axel wanted to laugh,
"None taken. But what exactly is happening? Your friends were saying that Gryffindor has better players," he asked, recalling the conversation of Rose, Susan, and Neville from earlier.
Daphne sighed,
"It's all because of that guy," she said, pointing at a Slytherin flying by the goal hoops.
Axel narrowed his eyes,
"Alaric Malcolm, the Head Boy. What about him?" He asked, though he already somewhat knew what this was about.
"That guy has trained the team to play very Slytherin. All the strategies are borderline dirty and he's leading them quite well too. He might not be as good a Keeper as Woods, but he's a better strategist," she explained.
Axel looked at the scoreboard to find Slytherin leading by 30 points.
"So, it looks like Gryffindor will lose, huh?"
"Not yet," said Daphne while munching her popcorns, "If Rose catches the snitch we can get the lead,"
'We? Did she forget she's talking to a Slytherin?' He wondered as he gave her a peculiar look.
She noticed his glance and misunderstood,
"Hmm? You want some?" She asked, once again offering him Popcorn.
Axel looked at the popcorn dripping with butter and sighed,
"No thanks," he denied once again. He was now completely following the system's diet, not eating anything else.
"So, if the snitch can get the victory then why isn't Rose going after it?" He asked.
Daphne laughed,
"If only it was that easy. The snitch is crazy difficult to find," she said with certainty.
Axel knitted his eyebrows. It couldn't have been that difficult, could it?
"What does it look like?" He asked.
"Wow, you haven't seen it? Small, golden ball with silver wings attached to it that flap like a dragonfly..." she began describing.
"It's quite shiny and it would sometimes hover in the same place while other times, it would—"
"Does it look like that? Near the Hoops?" Asked Axel, pointing at a Golden ball with flapping wings, hovering near the goal hoops.
Daphne was unimpressed.
"Yeah, not falling for that one. At least point somewhere nearer so that it would seem plausible," she said in a deadpan. The place where he pointed out was too far to spot a tiny ball hovering in the sky.
"I wasn't joking but, never mind," Axel shrugged. He couldn't bring himself to give a damn.
Daphne looked at him for a moment then sighed.
"... Alright, I'll bite," she muttered before she put the omni-occulars to her eyes.
"??!!! That's… the Snitch! I see it! That's the Snitch! And… oh no… it moved away," she quickly turned to him in astonishment.
"How'd you find it?! Scratch that, how did you even see it from such a distance?"
Axel smirk,
"Because it was golden and shiny," he answered. It was one of the reasons. He was a goddamn thief, of course, his eyes would catch sight of gold like a hawk sighting its prey. After years of experience, his brain was programmed to naturally spot gold first.
And the other reason was,
[Arcane Eyes: Progress 10%]
[An Arcane Thief's eyes need to be special. To search treasure, to detect traps, to see through the enchantments, to see in the dark, and so on… eyes are as important a tool for a thief as any and more]
Yep, a new skill. In the beginning, he had attributed it to be just another common skill, but it was not. That's why it took so long to unlock. Axel was looking forward to abusing this skill after his proficiency increases.
Daphne gave him a deep look,
"You would have made a fantastic seeker if you were more...dexterous," she muttered before she checked her Magi-mirror yet again. She'd been doing this since the morning.
'Dextrous?' Axel shook his head ruefully at the irony. He probably used to be the most dextrous person you can find in the whole of Britain. And here she is, talking about dexterity.
"OH! Looks like the Gryffindor Seeker, Rose Potter has found the Snitch! She's flying full throttle! Is this a feint? Or is she really onto something?! And the Slytherin seeker Terence is on the chase! Rose makes a dive— AND SHE'S GOT IT! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! 30 MINUTES INTO THE MATCH, AND SHE'S CAPTURED THE SNITCH! THE GRY…"
The commentator and the crowd were going mad and even Axel nodded in acknowledgment at the nice catch. But, with the absence of the expected cheering from beside him, he turned his head to look at Daphne.
"What's up?" He asked in confusion. Daphne was looking at her Magi-mirror and a curtain of her blond hair was obscuring her face. But he could see that her hands were gripping the Magi-mirror very tightly with her fingers digging into it.
*Sniff* "Nothing," Daphne shook her head as she wiped her eyes. Her face was pale and she did not seem happy at all.
"Hey, you can enjoy the match. I remembered I had something urgent to do," she said as she stood up and started to leave.
"What the heck?" Murmured Axel. Is she seriously going to ditch him like this after dragging him into this place?
Axel also stood up. The deal was to accompany her for the day. What the hell is he going to do wasting time here? And, was she actually crying? That seemed quite impossible. She's the type to make others cry. Thus he decided to follow her.
But before he could leave, he found someone standing in his way, blocking his path.
"Axel…"
Axel clenched his weak hands into fists.
"Mrs. Tonks, excuse me," he said as he began to walk by her.
"No, please wait! I need to talk to you!" she said with a bit of desperation in her voice, putting up her hands in front of her in a stopping gesture.
She had only been able to gather her courage to approach him now. And she didn't want him to brush her off without even hearing her out.
Axel looked past her to see Daphne disappearing from his view.
"Look, I really don't have the time right now. And I don't think I can do anything else for you. You've already taken the memories and my body reports. Just give up or find someone else to experiment on, please," saying so, he quickly went past her, leaving Andromeda too stunned to do anything.
...
He found Daphne sitting under a huge tree just a little bit into the forbidden forest. It wasn't far from the stadium. As he had expected, something was indeed wrong since she was actually crying. Daphne wasn't really the type of girl who'd cry.
Sitting under the tree, with her knees tucked to her chest, she cried silently with streams of tears falling down her cheeks. Her nose was red and the soft sound of sobs would faintly echo in the clearing as she cried freely.
"...."
Axel didn't know what to do. He couldn't even remember the last time he had cried like that. Probably never. Because he never actually cared so much about anything that he'd cry over it so badly. He always thought of how to make things better instead of hopelessly crying like this.
He couldn't help but wonder if he was wrong to come here and witness her in such a private moment.
But then he thought,
'Fuck it,'
She shouldn't be crying so pathetically no matter what the case. Whatever her problem is, she should either be able to do something about it, or she can't do anything about it. Either way, crying seems quite meaningless, right?
At least that's what he thought.
Thus, no longer hiding his presence, he freely walked into the clearing.
"So, this is the important thing you forgot to do, huh?"
"???!!!"
Daphne seemed to almost jump out of her skin when she saw him.
"What the fuck, Axel?! What are you doing here?!" She asked, quickly wiping her tears.
Axel stood there with his hands in his pockets,
"Well, I wasn't going to just stay in there with the rich assholes. The deal was to accompany you, so here I am," he said with a shrug.
"Now, are you going to tell me why you are crying?" He asked.
Daphne quickly dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief,
"Who said I was crying?! It's just that… something got in my eyes…" she said very truthfully.
Axel nodded in understanding,
"You do realize that you're not fooling anyone, right? But I'll buy it if you insist."
"Anyways, if you want to talk about it, I still have to accompany you for about one and a half hours for the favor. And if you don't, I'm walking away," he said as he started to leave.
Daphne looked lost for a moment. But then, she sat back down under the tree.
"It's about Astoria," she said quietly.
Axel turned around and came to sit beside her,
"What about her? I thought she and your mother were out of country today?"
Daphne nodded,
"It's for Astoria. She…" Daphne choked a sob, "She isn't expected to live a long life. She has a blood malediction," she said as tears once again began to pool in her eyes.
Axel nodded in understanding,
"So, I take it your mother took her out for treatment?"
Daphne nodded,
"The asshole didn't want to spend money on her. Now that he's dead, my mother has been taking my sister to other magically advanced civilizations. Today, she went to to Atlantis, the most developed magical civilization,"
Axel recalled what Professor Gorski had said about Atlantis. The civilization had reached its peak between 1,000,000 and 900,000 years ago but most of it was destroyed due to internal warfare. It decided to relocate underwater around 9000 years ago. So, it's still much older than Britain's Magical Civilization which only started with Merlin.
"But… isn't it closed to the outside world?"
Daphne nodded,
"Yes, that's the problem. All the other communities either rejected or couldn't cure her. And Atlantis, the last hope, didn't work out as well. Now my sister can't be saved," she said hopelessly.
Axel listened attentively to her problem. Then,
"hahahaha...," he began to chuckle lightly in response. He couldn't help it since it was funny.
"..??..." Daphne looked at him, completely discombobulated.
"Sorry… hah… sorry, I couldn't help it—Hey wait!" before he could even finish speaking, Daphne had gotten up, about to leave. So he grabbed her hand to stop her.
But Daphne wasn't listening. She was feeling very furious, betrayed, and dumb right now, due to his reaction. She shook his weak crippled hand off with ease but his other hand took its place in stopping her.
"Wait!"
"No!"
"You won't be able to do magic!" He yelled.
That stopped her,
"...What?" She asked in confusion.
Axel let go of her hand,
"You won't be able to do magic — That's...
That's what they said to me 3 months ago when I woke up in Saint Mungo's," he said, looking up at her.
Daphne once again sat down beside him. Axel had always avoided this topic and was only bringing it up today. So, she wasn't going to miss it now.
"What happened?"
Axel shook his head,
"Can't tell you exactly how it happened, but most of the nerves in my body were fried off. And the Master healer said I won't be able to do magic normally again and my hands and body might not ever heal," he said, looking at his trembling hands.
Daphne didn't interrupt him as she listened with more attention than she ever paid to anything else.
"I was unconscious the first two or three days as they healed whatever they could. On the third day, I woke up to find that I had lost most of the control over my hands and every movement of my body was painful,"
Daphne looked at him differently. Axel had told everyone with certainty that his injuries were minor and temporary and it'll heal. She never expected that they were permanent.
"I only moved using the pain-relieving potion for the first two days. And I ran out of it on the fourth day. When I first tried magic, even the Lumos charm didn't work for hours. But I refused to accept any of the words the Healer said. And when it finally worked, it was so weak that you'd hardly see even in the dark. And it was so painful that I passed out," he said, smiling at the recollection.
Turning to face her, he said,
"So, take it from someone who's already defied what others say, and don't lose hope. It's your sister's life, not theirs. They won't try their absolute best no matter what you offer them. So, don't give up until you've tried everything. It's not over until it's over."
Daphne's eyes slowly widened as she heard his words. They hit her like a bludger to the stomach and made her wake up to reality.
That's right. Why did she lose hope just because the others said so? She still hasn't done anything yet. The future had infinite possibilities and she can't lose hope just because someone else said it.
Now that she thought back to it, her worries did indeed seem laughable when compared to what Axel has gone through. And he never gave up. She couldn't even imagine him sitting under a tree and crying helplessly. He'd rather do something about it instead.
She turned to look at him deeply,
"You're right. I'm so sorry for displaying such a pathetic side," she said in mortification.
"But… Why did you help me?" She asked suddenly, realizing that there could only be one answer, right? Because... they were friends!
Axel nodded his head,
"Well, I need to submit two homeworks tomorrow which you still haven't done, and I didn't want tears on my notebook. So—hey! What the— why are you attacking me?!"
They began messing around as Daphne tried to assault him while he defended and laughed. But, all of a sudden, his eyes widened and he made both of them roll over.
Not even a second later, a spell hit right where he was present a moment ago.
***
A.N.: title: Danger and New Feature Unlocked.
It was a very satisfying chapter... before the end ?! Look forward to what happens next!
POWERSTONES!!!
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