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na jaemin and the goblet of fire

Summary:

When 16-year old Na Jaemin drops his ballot into the Goblet of Fire, he's elated to later find out he's been chosen as the Hogwarts champion. Everything seems to be going well until the time for the second task rolls around, and Jaemin sees who he has to save from the bottom of the lake.

Hint: it's not one of his best friends, like he (and they) had expected.

Notes:

here is everyone's house and blood status for reference:

Hufflepuff Na Jaemin: Muggleborn
Slytherin Lee Donghyuck: Pureblood
Ravenclaw Xiao Dejun: Halfblood
Slytherin Liu Yangyang: Halfblood
Hufflepuff Zhong Chenle: Halfblood

Gryffindor Lee Jeno: Pureblood
Gryffindor Park Jisung: Muggleborn
Hufflepuff Osaki Shotaro: Halfblood
Slytherin Jung Sungchan: Halfblood
Gryffindor Wong Yukhei: Halfblood
Ravenclaw Huang Renjun: Pureblood

Beauxbatons Mark Lee: Pureblood
Durmstrang Wong Kunhang: Halfblood

 

spells used in this chapter:
muffliato - silencing charm
colloportus - locking charm

Chapter 1: the triwizard tournament

Chapter Text

It’s raining this morning, and it makes Jaemin want to hit Donghyuck. This wasn’t a normal response, of course, but something about the way Donghyuck is humming with his forehead resting against the car window makes Jaemin wonder if he should unlock the doors and watch him fall into oncoming traffic. 

But then Jaemin would be a murderer, and that wasn’t very desirable at all. 

And anyways, it was only five more minutes, he could deal with it. 

He hopes. 

He thinks, at least. 

And anyways, the way Chenle was snoring on Jaemin’s other side should’ve realistically made him want to unlock Chenle’s door, but he refrains. 

He’ll be nice, this time. And maybe the next, but that was up for interpretation. 

Also, Dejun might really hex him if he does something like that in his car, and Jaemin would hate to leave a bad impression on Dejun’s mother. She’s the sweetest, and the least he can do to repay her for housing them for the last week of summer vacation is not commit a crime in her backseat. 

He digresses.

Chenle also wakes up. 

“Finally!” is the first thing he exclaims when his eyes look outside. Jaemin doesn’t know why he looks so excited, because once again, it’s raining outside. It’s moments like these that Jaemin says Chenle is a right fool. “I’ve been craving chocolates from the trolly since we’ve left,” he groans, and Jaemin kind of sees his mouth start to water. 

Chenle was disgusting. Sometimes. 

“You could’ve bought some last week,” Dejun pipes up, and Jaemin is glad that Dejun voices what he’s been thinking. “When we went shopping for school supplies.”

“I got distracted,” Chenle mumbles, and he hears Donghyuck snort from his other side, as he finally stopped brooding while looking out of the window. Chenle only reddens when Donghyuck shows that he’s listening, and now Jaemin wants to know what happened in the thirty minutes he and Dejun had left them two to go look at broomsticks. 

He doesn’t have to wait too long though, as he never seems to have to when it comes to Donghyuck, his big mouth, and his need to blab all the information he has stored in his brain, someway, somehow. 

Sometimes, it comes in handy, like right now. Other times, Jaemin is on the short end of Donghyuck’s stick. But right now, he isn’t, so he relishes in the privilege. 

“When Chenle and I were looking for quills—” Donghyuck starts, but a very distressed looking and sounding Chenle reaches over Jaemin to try and cover Donghyuck’s mouth. Unsurprisingly, to no avail. “He almost knocked a shelf of ink pots over because that Park Jisung kid from Gryffindor helped him grab something from the top shelf!” he finishes, a self satisfied look on his face as he ignores Chenle’s screams of agony. 

Once more, Jaemin feels bad for Dejun’s mother. 

“Oh, is that what it is?” Dejun asks teasingly, looking at Chenle through the rearview mirror. “Clumsy?" 

“Can we not talk about this?” Chenle whines, and for once, Jaemin disagrees. He rather likes this. “I embarrassed myself enough as is in front of Jisung that day.”

“First name basis, are we?” Jaemin teases, finally joining in and wiggling his eyebrows at a Chenle who only gives him a halfhearted glare. 

When Donghyuck starts making kissy noises and puckering his lips, Chenle groans and bangs his head against the window repeatedly, which only gets him scolded by Dejun’s mother. 

Thankfully, they’ve arrived at King’s Cross, and now all that’s left to do is board the train, ignore his friends, and sleep the whole ride there. 

But of course, things don’t go according to Jaemin’s plans, they never seem to. 

“Na Jaemin! I told you to write back!”

Internally, Jaemin groans. 

Externally, he holds his arms away from his body so that Yangyang can’t jump onto him. That doesn’t stop Yangyang though, it never does. 

So Jaemin has to try and not stumble under the weight of Yangyang throwing himself at him, and he ends up giving the latter an unwilling hug because of it. But he would’ve given Yangyang a hug after not seeing him the whole summer anyways, so he guesses it’s alright. 

Or at least, that’s what he thinks before Donghyuck throws his arms around them too, and now Jaemin can’t breathe and he’s back to wanting to murder Donghyuck. Maybe push him in front of a train, but then again, he’d become a murderer.

“At least Donghyuck wrote back,” Yangyang sniffs, and oh, Jaemin might stand trial at the Ministry for double homicide. “You’re a jerk.”

“Yes, I’m a jerk,” Jaemin agrees, letting go of them both and turning back to his things. He picks up his luggage in one hand and grabs the cage with his pretty blakc and white owl in the other. “Forgive me for not wanting to burn Manchu out because she’d have to have flown to Germany ,” he scoffs, walking with his back straight towards Dejun and Chenle, Donghyuck and Yanyang scrambling behind him. 

“It’s been three minutes and you’ve already annoyed Jaemin,” Dejun remarks, picking up his own luggages, as the group then proceeds to walk to platform 9¾. Jaemin is always a bit fascinated by the way they can simply run though the brick, but five years has given him some experience. “You’re lucky he’s too nice to hex you.”

Jaemin wants to say that he actually wouldn’t think twice about hexing Donghyuck and Yangyang, or even Dejun and Chenle now that he thinks about, but something in the corner of his eye catches his attention before he can. 

It’s nothing Jaemin looks at directly, but even simply seeing the boy in his peripheral is making him sweat a little.

Walking not too far away from them, is Lee Jeno from Gryffindor, walking with his friends as they also walk to the platform. 

Jaemin sets his sight straight only after watching Jeno laugh for two seconds (two seconds too long it seems, when the flush on the back of his neck heats his skin up annoyingly fast), and starts walking faster.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, why are we running?” Chenle asks as he quickened his pace to keep up, and Jaemin would feel bad for making him walk so fast if Chenle’s snoring in the car didn’t make him want to rip his hair out. 

“This is merely a brisk walk,” Donghyuck scoffs, easily keeping up with Jaemin because of his long strides, courtesy of his long legs. “But what is it?”

Jaemin doesn’t know if he should be proud of how quickly he’s able to come up with an excuse, but either way, he’s glad for it. He’s also glad they’ve made it to platform 9¾ before Jeno's friend group, because Jaemin doesn't think he can handle being in the same vicinity as him for more than five seconds at a time. 

“I just wanna get a good compartment,” he says, and although the statement only holds half of the truth, he’s impressed by how quickly everyone believes him. “And before someone loses their toad on the train- just why does that happen at least once a year?” 

Yangyang offers a whole list of reasons why that happens at least once a year, and Jaemin shouldn’t have expected anything else. Nonetheless, he tunes Yangyang’s voice out, as well as everyone else’s, and runs through the brick wall between platforms nine and ten with Dejun in tow, running into a bustling platform with a big, shiny, red steam engine. 

Everytime Jaemin sees the Hogwarts Express, he’s a bit taken back by its beauty. No one except for him, and occasionally Chenle, finds the train worth marvelling over but Jaemin still adores it. It’s been around for decades, perhaps even centuries, but somehow it still looks brand new. Jaemin knows it’s some type of magic, and seeing as he hadn’t even known of such a thing until six years ago, he’s still incredibly fascinated. 

Just like he had hopes, and had convinced everyone else of, they did find a good compartment with a nice window near the middle of the train. Jaemin closes the door behind them once they’re all inside, and casts a quick Muffliato so that how boisterous they’re about to get (always courtesy of Donghyuck, Chenle, and Yangyang) falls deaf to anyone who passes by. 

“Ah, it feels great to be back,” Donghyuck hums, stretching his arms over his head as he avoids Dejun’s fingers poking him in the ribs by just a hair. “I can’t wait to fill the prefect’s bathroom with stink bombs again.”

“Y’know, if you’re caught, you can’t ever be a prefect, right? And if you can’t ever be a prefect, you can’t be a head boy,” Chenle says seriously, and looks a bit offended when Yangyang snorts at him. 

Donghyuck? Head boy? What alternate reality is this?” Yangyang jokes, and Donghyuck laughs with him about it. 

Jaemin sees that Dejun simply rolls his eyes as he pulls out a book from underneath his cloak, and Jaemin kind of wishes he brought a book too. But then he remembers he had wanted to sleep the whole ride there, so instead he decides to get comfortable on Chenle’s shoulder, ready to close his eyes and drift off. 

But of course, that couldn’t happen smoothly, without something or the other disrupting him. 

Jaemin feels like he really can’t control his urge to hex whoever had just opened the door to their compartment, and he opens his eyes just to glare right at whoever was standing by their, now open, compartment door. 

But the snarky ‘ How can we help you? ’ on the tip of his tongue falls short when he sees just who it is that’s standing by their door. 

“Oh, I thought it’d have been empty,” Jeno explains, smiling apologetically at them all. “Have a nice trip, see you at the castle!”

Just like that, Jeno is gone as quickly as he had appeared, and his words make Jaemin wonder if Jeno even knows any of them, let alone has seen any of them around the castle. 

This time though, when the door closes, Jaemin casts a quick and mumbled Colloportus, and ignoring Chenle’s whines about how the law for underaged magic was unfair. 

 

 

Jaemin opens his eyes again when Donghyuck shakes his shoulders, and he’s delighted to hear that all the usual exciting bustling has come to a stop now that they’ve been travelling for a few hours. 

He sees that Yangyang, Dejun, and Donghyuck himself are already dressed in their robes, and he guesses that’s what Donghyuck is waking him up for. 

“We’ll be at school in around thirty minutes,” he explains, handing Jaemin his robes himself. “Chenle couldn’t change because he didn’t want to wake you to move, so he waited to change with you,” he continues, and Jaemin throws Chenle a grateful and tired smile. 

He moves a bit slowly at first, but then he and Chenle are heading to change into their school robes. 

Jaemin has grown just a bit over the summer, and his old robes are now too short on the arms, and end too high above his ankles. But the ones he changes into now fit around him nicely, and they’re comfortable. He puts his wand away in his pockets before putting his tie on, looking into the mirror next to Chenle. 

“Hyung, how were your O.W.L.S? I’m a bit nervous for mine,” Chenle asks, and Jaemin can see him worrying his bottom lip in the mirror. Jaemin almost always forgets that Chenle is in fact younger than the rest of his friends, the same way he always forgets that Dejun is a year older. Bow is a good example of that. 

Chenle is in his fifth year, while Jaemin, Donghyuck, and Yangyang are in their sixth. Dejun is in his seventh, but they try to avoid that topic as much as possible. It was never fun, thinking about your friends leaving. 

Jaemin feels a bit relieved he doesn’t have to worry about heavy examinations like Chenle and Dejun do, their O.W.L.S and N.E.W.T.S respectively, which means he’s more than glad to help Chenle with his studying. 

“They weren’t all too bad,” he settles on saying, not wanting to psych Chenle out. And they truly weren’t that terrible, and he knows they especially won’t be for Chenle, who is very studious. “Just stay on top of things so that studying at the end of the year will be easier.”

Chenle hums at his answer, and it’s then that Jaemin finishes tying his tie, and they both make their way back to their compartment. 

“Which one was the hardest subject? When I asked Donghyuck hyung he said it was Transfiguration, but he’s just always been bad at Transfiguration.”

Jaemin laughs at Chenle’s words, and he’s glad Donghyuck isn’t around to be mad at them for that. 

“Well, personally DADA was pretty-”

Jaemin cuts himself off with a gasp when he almost loses his footing, but instead of landing on the ground like he thought he would have, Jaemin feels himself held upright by two hands on his arms. When he opens his eyes, it’s to two concerned eyes looking into his. 

“Are you alright?” the person who’s holding onto his arms asks, and Jaemin knows he should’ve been able to recognize how it was by the voice, but he doesn’t. He only knows who’s talking to him when he looks down and makes out other features which aren’t the stranger’s eyes, and finds the back of his neck flushing annoyingly fast, once again. 

“I’m fine,” Jaemin squeaks out, stepping back and making Jeno let go of his arms. Jaemin straightens his back and clears his throat, unable to meet Jeno’s eyes as he continues and walks past him. “Come on Chenle, the others will start wondering why we’re taking so long,” he says, and can only hope his voice doesn’t actually sound as high as it did to his own ears. 

Thankfully, he hears Chenle’s footsteps behind him fairly soon, and he’s glad he doesn’t have to look at Jeno’s face anymore. 

“Be careful, alright?” Jeno’s voice calls, and Jaemin almost trips again , despite what Jeno had just said. 

Jaemin shows no signs of acknowledging what Jeno had said as he fastens his pace, hoping to make it back into the safety of their compartment without embarrassing himself any further. 

However, it seems like Chenle isn’t one to easily brush away everything that he just saw. 

“What was that?” Chenle asks, and Jaemin is very tempted to respond with ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, but they both know neither of them are that stupid. 

“Nothing,” he settles on saying, and it isn’t any better, but at least Jaemin doesn’t have to explain himself. 

Or so he thinks. 

‘Nothing’ my ass,” Chenle scoffs. Jaemin kind of wants to scold him for language, but he ends up letting Chenle get away with way too much for his own good. And way much more than he’s comfortable with sending Chenle back home with at the end of the year, but that was something else entirely. Chenle’s parents still like him anyways. “Explain please.”

They’re getting dangerously close to their compartment now, and knowing Chenle, he wasn’t going to let this go any time soon. Worst case scenario, Donghyuck pieces together that Jaemin isn’t telling them something, wrings Jaemin dry for information, and then his big mouth ends up letting the whole castle (portraits and ghosts included) about Jaemin’s secret. 

Which is why he seizes the opportunity he had now, noticing the empty train corridor and stopping Chenle from walking any further with a hand on his arm. 

“Not a word about this to any of them, understand?” Jaemin hisses, and feels dread wash over him when Chenle’s eyes sparkle at the prospect of getting to know a secret. But he trusts Chenle, despite Chenle having a mouth equally as big as Donghyuck. But Chenle listens more than he blabs, so he hopes he’s in the right as he gets ready to tell Chenle just why Jeno makes the back of his neck sweat. 

“I promise,” Chenle nods, nodding excitedly. 

Jaemin sighs. 

“I will hex your balls off, you know that don’t you?” Chenle nods, and Jaemin is left with no choice now. “I may have a tiny, very little, like the tiniest… crush onLeeJenofromGryffindor.”

Jaemin regrets letting the words spill immediately after they’ve left his mouth, even more so when he sees Chenle’s eyes widen, and the most when he sees Chenle’s mouth open. 

“No!” he hisses, quickly clamping a hand over the younger’s mouth and making sure no one has eavesdropped as he checks their surroundings. “You keep your mouth shut, I swear to Merlin, Zhong Chenle, I will beat your ass-”

“Okay!” Chenle gasps when he finally manages to wrench Jaemin’s hand away from his mouth, looking at the latter like he was crazy. “You need to relax… want some Calming Draught?” he asks sarcastically, and Jaemin only huffs. 

He’s kept this a secret since third year, he didn’t need Chenle ruining all of his hard work in a moment of weakness. 

“This is classified, Chenle, don’t tell a single soul,” Jaemin iterates again, just for good measure, and almost wants to put Chenle in a full body lock when he sees the younger roll his eyes. 

“Yes, I get it hyung. Now will you calm down? You’re gonna scare the first years if you look like that.”




☍☍☍




After making the murky, dark, and cold (it seems like the rain has decided to follow him all day), Jaemin finds himself sitting at the Hufflepuff table with Chenle, and a few other acquaintances he isn’t too close with, as they watch the Sorting. 

The Sorting Hat sings another wretched rendition of its song, and Jaemin doesn’t know how, but it somehow manages to get worse each year. At this point, he thinks it’s a skill. 

He doesn’t pay too much attention to the sorting, it’s not like it concerns him, and focuses instead on making sure his stomach doesn’t growl too loudly as he waits for this all to be done so that they can eat. He had slept through eating anything on the train, and while Dejun did offer some sandwiches his mother had packed, Jaemin declined since he figured he could wait. 

He was absolutely wrong, and now, starving. 

“Why the long face, deary?” someone asks from Jaemin’s right, and he startles for a bit before he sees that it’s just the ghost of Hufflepuff house, the Fat Friar. Jaemin had asked if he’s really okay with being addressed as the Fat Friar, and when he has explained that too many centuries have passed for him to start caring now, Jaemin has relented. “A bit peckish, are you?” he asks again when Jaemin’s stomach makes a sound. 

Peckish would be an understatement, but he guesses the Fat Friar had forgotten all about what hunger feels like it. He settles on only nodding his head as an attempt to end the conversation before the inevitable he knows is about to happen, happens , but ghosts always do seem to have a mind of their own. 

“I remember when I could eat,” the Fat Friar reminisces longingly, and Jaemin tries to look nice as he smiles and nods. “I’d sit at this table for hours, you know? How can you not? Everything is just so lovely, and it’s never ending! Those house elves, they’re truly a blessing, I’m telling you. Always making food for us, so much that it just keeps coming and coming-”

“Now that all of our new students have been sorted,” the headmaster’s voice, Headmaster Qian, cuts in, effectively shutting the Fat Friar, and everyone else, up. Jaemin has never been more grateful than now, to hear the familiar, quiet, slow, and calming drawl of the Headmaster’s voice. “It is with great pleasure that I welcome you all back for another exciting year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!”

Jaemin looks around slightly to see the reactions of all the first years, mainly keeping his eyes on the ones sitting at their tables, and finds the looks of intrigue and terrified familiar. He had been the same, thrust into a school where apparently practicing magic was normal, when he had lived eleven years not knowing it even existed. 

And while it did explain all the weird things he was able to do, Jaemin was still extremely overwhelmed. Even to this day, some things about the wizarding world surprise him, so he can only imagine how frightened the first years are. 

But it’s nothing. They’ll all get used to it in no time, like everyone else who had been apprehensive and weary. 

Jaemin zones in and out Headmaster Qian’s welcome back speech, like he’s been doing since third year. It’s always the same anyways; welcoming all the students back, addressing any concerns or new developments which have taken place over the summer, and going over the rules, old and new alike. 

And if Jaemin was correct, Headmaster Qian should be finishing his speech any time now, and the food would appear along the tables, and Jaemin has been dreaming of eating a turkey leg for the past three hours-

“I have one more announcement to make, if you will all be so kind,” he grins, and Jaemin wants to groan, but that would be terribly rude. So he tries to hide his annoyance, but when Yangyang catches his eyes across the Great Hall, they share a look of irritation. “I have some very exciting news to bring to Hogwarts this year.”

“I feel like he says this every year,” Chenle whispers to him, one voice amongst many that start speculating about what they think the news could be about. “And it just gets less and less exciting.”

Jaemin stifles his laugh at this, but nods his head in agreement. Nothing against Headmaster Qian of course, he was just… a little old, if Jaemin put it nicely. 

“Some of you may be familiar with the Triwizard Tournament,” Headmaster Qian starts once the hushes whispers have died down, only for them to start up again frantically as they hear what leaves his mouth. Jaemin is simply confused, he’s never heard of the Triwizard Tournament before. “Now now, as exciting as the name is, I’m going to need everyone’s full attention.”

At once, everyone quiets down, now very eager to hear what Headmaster Qian has to say. Even Jaemin finds himself pushing his hunger to the side for a few minutes just to understand what the Headmaster is talking about. 

“As some of you may know, the last Triwizard Tournament had been last held in 1792, when three unfortunate judges were injured by one of the tasks. The tradition of hosting the Tournament every five years has been put to a half after this incident. However, after very careful precautions, and keeping the safety of our students in the forefront of our minds, Hogwarts is proud to announce that it will be hosting the Triwizard Tournament this year!”

The Great Hall bursts into applause, some students cheering. But Jaemin is still a bit confused on what the tournament is exactly, and how dangerous it is, if it had been postponed since 1792. 

“What is the Triwizard Tournament?” Jaemin asks Chenle, who leans over to talk in his ear so that he can actually be heard. 

“It’s normally between three wizarding schools. Each school has a champion chosen, and the three champions compete through various magical, and normally very dangerous, tasks to see who wins. You win the Triwizard cup and a shit ton of money. It’s a really coveted title to win, you’re kind of like… magical royalty.”

Jaemin is more than intrigued now that Chenle has explained what it is, wondering if he had a chance to enter the tournament? How did they even choose the champion from each school? And who were the other schools competing?

Jaemin has a lot of questions, but it seems like Headmaster Qian has all the answers, as he continues to speak, once again effortlessly bringing everyone’s attention to him. 

“As eager as I know you all must be, the heads of the other two competing schools and I have decided to impose an age restriction on those wishing to participate-” many groans ring from around the hall, and Jaemin is growing a bit worried he also may not be able to compete. “Restricted by an age line I will be drawing myself , students under the age of sixteen will not be allowed to partake in the Triwizard Tournament.”

While students around the Great Hall groan, Jaemin feels excitement bubble back into him at full force. He’s allowed to participate, it seems, and he knows without a shadow of doubt that he will be entering to be the Hogwarts champion.

“Looking eager, are you?” Chenle asks when he turns to look at Jaemin, and he grins when he sees Jaemin’s own grin on his face. “Are you thinking of entering?”

“I know I will be entering,” Jaemin corrects, looking back up to where Headmaster Qian lets them all gossip amongst themselves for a while. He looks like he still has something to say. “I just need to know how.”

“The Goblet of Fire will be placed in the Great Hall until the end of this week, for students wishing to drop their ballots in. Your full name, year, and school on a piece of parchment will be enough.”

At this, Jaemin learns how to enter, and sees the supposed ‘Goblet of Fire’ come into the Great Hall. It’s a rather large goblet, and it glows blue with matching blue flames coming out of the top. Jaemin assumes that’s where the ballots go, and he’s once again baffled by the power of magic. 

That night, Chenle entertains Jaemin with stories of the previous Triwizard Tournament all while they’re getting ready for bed and falling asleep, and Jaemin dreams of his name getting read out in front of the school- successfully chosen as the Hogwarts champion. 




☍☍☍




“Right at dinner! And we’re to miss last period!” 

“I think the only person who has a problem with this is you,” Yangyang snickers from Dejun’s side, where the latter is complaining as they read a notice hung up outside of the Great Hall. “And we have potions last, don’t we Hyuck? We’re not missing out on anything,” he cheers, and Jaemin wishes he could say the same.

He was missing out on Ancient Runes, and he rather liked the class. Even if sometimes if made want to rip his hair off and maybe light his homework on fire. It was entertaining, to say the least. 

“Yep, potions ,” Donghyuck hums, scrunching his face in distaste as he starts walking away from the Great Hall, everyone else following. “I’m sure Professor Seo has a stick up his ass again -”

“Have you ever entertained the thought that maybe Professor Seo just doesn’t like you?” Chenle asks, and he only narrowly dodges the wand Donghyuck pokes to his chest. “I mean, you do sleep in almost every one of his classes.”

“Listen, that has nothing to do with me, that’s just the school’s fault for imploring so much homework!” Donghyuck argues, but this time Dejun is the one who looks unimpressed as he fixes Donghyuck with a look. 

“You’re a wizard, dumbass, don’t know if you noticed. There’s potions you can take for drowsiness,”

Donghyuck simply chooses to ignore Dejun, and Jaemin doesn’t expect anything else. 

“Anyways, I heard most of Beauxbatons students are Veelas, or at least half Veelas,” Yangyang chirps up, casting one last glance back at the sign which lets students know that they will be expecting the arrival of the other two schools (Beauxbatons and Durmstrang) tonight at dinner. “Do you think I’ll finally find a girlfriend?”

“No,” Dejun and Chenle chorus, instantly deflating Yangyang’s mood and making his shoulders drop. 

Jaemin sighs, and throws an arm around him comfortingly. 

“It’s okay Yangie,” he assures, patting his shoulders as they walk out to the Great Lake. They might as well enjoy the weather while it’s still nice, because the snow makes it a nightmare to go anywhere outside of the castle. “Even if you fell in love with a Beauxbatons Veela, you’d have to say goodbye at the end of the year. That’s no fun.”

“You’re right,” Yangyang mutters, straightening up just the littlest bit. Jaemin guesses Yangyang was cute like that, always remaining optimistic, even after getting his spirits crushed. “But they’re really pretty.” And there goes everything Jaemin had just said, out the damn window.

“Are you trying out for Quidditch, Jaemin?” Donghyuck asks as they make it to the lake, and to Chenle’s delight, the Giant Squid is peeking out a bit from the water. Jaemin doesn’t know how he likes that thing, it was slimy and big, and looked really weird if you really thought about it. But Jaemin doesn’t say anything, because Chenle treats the Giant Squid like a best friend. His favourite subject was Care of Magical Creatures anyways. 

“I want to play the tournament,” Jaemin says mindlessly, probably for the nth time this week. He still hasn’t gone to drop his name in the goblet, just because he’s been swamped with all of the ‘welcome back’ assignments. But tonight should be the perfect time, and Jaemin is already buzzing with nerves by just thinking about it. “And I don’t think I can play Quidditch if I play the tournament.”

“But you don’t even know if you’ll be chosen,” Dejun points out, and it reminds Jaemin once again, that he’s competing at random with the names of everyone else in that goblet. It makes him a bit nervous, but it’s not like it’ll be the end of the world if he isn’t chosen. He’ll just probably sulk for a day or two, but then things will be back to normal. “And you love Quidditch.”

Dejun wasn’t wrong, but Jaemin thinks he’ll be okay. 

“I’ll see,” he ends up saying, and everyone drops the subject after that, moving on to talk about what other classes they have this year.

Before they know it, their free period has run out, and they’re off their separate ways to go to their last class of the day, since last period has been cancelled.

Jaemin makes his way up to the Astronomy Tower, just a little winded when he reaches the top of the stairs. He loves Astronomy, but he seriously finds himself considering how much it’s worth when he has to climb up those stairs everyday. 

Either way, he heads to his seat, waiting for Professor Kim to come in. He always looked like he had stars in his eyes, so Jaemin guesses his teaching position is really fitting. 

It’s only one period of Astronomy with the Gryffindors, and Jaemin mindlessly doodles on his piece of parchment as he waits for the last remaining students to come into class. He doesn’t pay too much attention to them, not really bothering on figuring out who it is that’s in the class. Jaemin knows he doesn’t have any friends from Gryffindor anyways, so there wasn’t a point. 

However, when he lifts his eyes just a bit to look at the clock which is hung above the doorway at the front of the class, Jaemin’s quill freezes on his parchment, creating a large blotch of balc ink which is sure to soak through the parchment. 

But he can’t help but freeze up, when he sees Lee Jeno and one of his other Gryffindor friends come into the classroom. 

Thankfully, Jeno doesn’t catch Jaemin staring, but he still feels like he’s burning all over, especially when Jeno takes a seat somewhere in front of Jaemin. 

Just how the hell was he supposed to concentrate in this class? 

Jaemin is more than glad when Professor Kim walks in, as it silences everyone and forces Jaemin to look at the front of the classroom and pay attention. He takes a new piece of parchment out and frustratedly crumples the soiled one to toss into his bookbag, and gets ready to take notes as he listens to Professor Kim. 

Astronomy may be his favourite subject, but he doesn’t know if that’s enough to keep his focus on the Professor, and not the way Lee Jeno’s hair flops into his eyes as he takes notes. 




He is more than glad to escape that classroom and all but sprint down the stairs of the Astronomy Tower, heading straight to the Great Hall. He doesn’t even care if he looks crazy, being in that room had broken the rule he had about not being able to be in Jeno’s vicinity for more than twenty second. 

It was going to be absolute torture, getting through this course for the rest of the year, but Jaemin is already thinking of ways he can keep his cool in class. As much as he’d like nothing more than for Astronomy class to turn into hour long sessions where he can just stare at Lee Jeno, he was going to do terribly on his N.E.W.T.S the following year. 

He tells Chenle this much when the latter finally comes up to the Hufflepuff table, looking a bit confused since he’s usually the one here before Jaemin. 

Jaemin immediately explains his concerns over Astronomy class as everyone else filters into the Great Hall, and he’s never been more glad that he finally has someone to tell all of this to instead of using Manchu to owl his mother about every tiny thing that happens. He’s lucky she’s even as invested as she is. 

“Sounds like the universe’s sign to make a move,” Chenle says seriously, and Jaemin doesn’t have the energy to roll his eyes, not after using all of it to recount the story. “Seriously, if this isn’t wake up call, then you’re just a stupid,” he sighs. 

“You know, I think it’s just Hogwarts playing a sick joke on me,” Jaemin huffs, longingly looking down the length of the table. “Dinner’s gonna take a while tonight, won’t it?” 

“Well, we gotta welcome the other schools first, so yeah,” Chenle frowns, also seeming like he was hungrier than usual today. 

Thankfully though, it doesn’t take as long as Jaemin had expected. 

All the staff are standing up where their table is at the front of the Great Hall, and it’s with a flick of Headmaster Qian’s wand that the doors fly open, and a trail of blue, luminescent butterflies fly into the hall. 

They’re clearly a product of magic, but Jaemin still treats it as delicately as the one he’s seen in parks with his parents back home, holding his hand out and watching as the butterfly flies onto his fingers, fluttering its wings prettily. 

But they vanish without a sound, leaving behind shadows of glittery dust before disappearing all together. 

It’s only then that Jaemin hears the sound of footsteps coming nearer, and they sound heavy and in… unison?

Intrigued, Jaemin looks over to the doors, just in time to see a group of boys and girls decked out in blue from head to toe. They all have on the same hats, and the girls wear dresses which look as if they’re made of silk, while the boys wear trousers and blouses of the same blue material.

Compared to these uniforms, Hogwarts robes look pathetic. 

The group of boys and girls pause in the middle of the Great Hall, and Jaemin thinks they’re waiting for a meeting before they all break out of the stuff formation they were in, and start expelling the same blue luminescent butterflies out of their palms. 

It seems like this school was advanced, if their students could already do wandless magic. 

And when Jaemin catches a closer look at one of the girls who comes a bit close to him while dancing, he can’t help but notice her striking beauty.

“I heard most of Beauxbatons students are Veelas, or at least half Veelas,” Yangyang’s words from earlier today ring in his mind, and Jaemin realizes, just as the students go back into their formation, and their Headmistresses (who’s a giant, holy shit ), that these students belong to Beauxbatons. 

Beauxbatons’ Headmistress, Lady Maxime, as she introduces herself to Headmaster Qian as they shake hands, takes a seat at the end of the staff’s table at the front of the Great Hall, and her students line up against the sides of the wall, seeming to wait for further instruction. 

It’s then that Jaemin hears more footsteps, except this time it’s stomping , and he can only assume it’s the Durmstrang students. 

And he’s proven correct when he sees a group of boys walk in, all slamming their staffs down with each step they take. 

Jaemin is about to lean over and whisper in Chenle’s ear about how they didn’t need to be this terribly violent, but Chenle beats him to it by leaning into his ear and frantically whispering,

“That’s- that’s China’s Quidditch seeker. That's Wong Kunhang .”