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Neville and his grandmother, Augusta Longbottom, lived in the old Longbottom manor, a house every bit as old as the old Potter house. But unlike the Potter house, which had gone years without proper upkeep, the Longbottom manor was spotless inside.
Unlike the Potter family, with Harry as its only remaining direct heir, the Longbottoms still had quite a few members. Neville, for example, still had an uncle and a great-uncle...
It was just that none of them lived in the manor anymore. Once they became adults, they gradually moved out one after another.
Only Neville and his grandmother still lived in the old house.
Augusta was a witch with a very stern appearance, but she treated Dudley and Hermione with great warmth.
"So you're Mr. Dursley and Miss Granger, aren't you? Neville talks about you a lot."
Dudley answered respectfully,
"It's an honor to meet you, Mrs. Augusta."
Faced with such a stern-looking elderly lady, Dudley felt genuine respect.
Neville's parents...
Because they had stood against the Death Eaters and Voldemort, they had been tortured into insanity by Bellatrix's Cruciatus Curse and had been receiving treatment at St. Mungo's for eleven years now.
For all those years, Augusta had taken on the roles of both father and mother at once, raising Neville by herself, holding that household together, and carrying the entire Longbottom family on her shoulders.
"You're the first friends Neville has ever invited to our home. When he told me he wanted to invite you, I was astonished..."
"I'm very happy he managed to make friends at Hogwarts."
It was easy to see that Augusta was sincerely pleased.
"Neville is a very timid child. I was always worried he would be bullied at Hogwarts. He learns slowly, so I was worried he might not be able to keep up with his studies as well..."
Augusta said quite a lot.
In every word, it was obvious how much she cared for Neville and how much hope she had placed in him.
"Grandma!"
Neville's face turned red all the way to his ears.
It was hard to tell whether it was embarrassment or simple shyness.
"Neville is excellent."
Dudley said it with complete seriousness.
"He's very brave, and he has a great deal of willpower. He's a true Gryffindor."
Augusta clearly had not expected Dudley to think so highly of Neville.
At the same time, Neville's face turned even redder.
In the end, Dudley added one more thing:
"And on top of that, he ranked sixth in the year this year."
"Yes, yes, Neville told me."
Augusta let out another emotional sigh.
"He said it was thanks to the help of Mr. Dursley and Miss Granger."
"After a year of studying, he's changed a great deal. Especially physically... he's gotten much stronger."
When she said "stronger," Augusta's gaze fell unconsciously on Dudley.
At first, she had thought her grandson was exaggerating.
Now she could see he had not exaggerated in the slightest.
Was this really a first-year child?
Even a half-giant wouldn't look much more imposing.
Dudley shook his head.
"That was all the result of his own effort. If someone doesn't work hard on their own, then no matter how much help they get, it won't amount to anything."
Just a few simple words were enough to make her beam.
The truth was, very few elderly people disliked hearing someone praise their grandchild.
A lot of the time, they enjoyed it even more than praise directed at themselves.
And Augusta truly was grateful to Dudley and Hermione.
After all, no one knew better than she did what Neville had been like a year ago.
Now he already looked like a little man.
After arranging rooms for Dudley and Hermione and telling Neville to learn properly from the two of them, Augusta left and gave the young people space to themselves.
She was the head of the Longbottom family.
She still had a great deal to take care of.
And so Dudley and Hermione settled into the old Longbottom manor.
...
Life returned to what it had been before: training, practice, and study.
A simple three-point routine.
Only now Hermione had also started seeking advice from Augusta, while Dudley had gained another goal... figuring out how to combine alchemy with Magic Armor Modification.
Augusta was an extremely powerful witch.
In terms of ability, she was no weaker than Professor McGonagall of Gryffindor.
Especially that almost supernatural Transfiguration of hers.
Hermione was utterly fascinated.
Unfortunately, despite her mastery of Transfiguration, Augusta was much weaker when it came to Charms. That was because back in her O.W.L. days, she had failed Charms and had held a grudge against the subject ever since, deciding that it was not worth studying.
The Longbottom family might never have produced any great historical figures, but their bloodline had never been broken, and because of that, they had preserved many rare magical books. They could not directly increase Dudley's strength, but quite a few of them gave him valuable ideas.
And so many peaceful days passed.
Over the course of those days, Dudley had two new "accessories" on his hands.
A ring with a red gem, the Philosopher's Stone.
And a ring with a blue gem, the Magic Crystal.
"If I get eight more rings, I'll be able to cosplay some Marvel villain before long."
That was Dudley's comment.
Then three owls arrived at once and broke the peace.
They brought the list of required books for second year at Hogwarts.
"Break with a Banshee, Gadding with Ghouls, Holidays with Hags, Travels with Trolls, Voyages with Vampires, Wanderings with Werewolves, Year with the XZ Snowman..."
"Defense Against the Dark Arts books? A set of seven novels?"
Hermione stared at the list on the parchment with a strange expression. The most eye-catching part was, without question, the Defense Against the Dark Arts section. That one subject alone required nearly as many books as all the others put together.
And worse, those were not even proper textbooks.
They were novels.
The most absurd part was that, as novels, they weren't even as interesting as the ones Dudley wrote.
Hermione had already read The Lord of the Rings and Dragonlance Chronicles, both written by Dudley, more than once. She had even turned into his most dedicated chapter pest, showing up from time to time to demand he let her see the rest of the story.
"Looks like our Defense Against the Dark Arts professor in second year is going to be this Lockhart fellow."
Dudley lightly tapped the name Lockhart on the parchment with his knuckle.
All ten books had been written by the same person.
If the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was not Lockhart himself, then he could only be some crazed fan of his.
Hearing that, Hermione let out a groan.
"I hope he won't be like Quirrell last year... and teach us nothing at all."
Maybe it would not be just "teaching us nothing"...
Dudley thought in silence.
Out of all the subjects the year before, the one that had disappointed her most had been Quirrell. His classes had been a complete waste.
The only genuinely useful thing they had learned was how to deal with a troll.
If she did not learn anything, how was she supposed to help Dudley?
Hermione pulled out her quill and started scribbling on the parchment herself.
She intended to buy Defense Against the Dark Arts books based on past years' book lists and study on her own.
Back when she was still in Muggle school, whenever she ran into a bad teacher, that was exactly what she did.
She studied by herself.
Clearly, she had already lost all hope in this so-called Professor Lockhart.
Typical Hermione.
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