NEWT Transfiguration Class

NEWT classes were much nicer then Basic classes in Felix’s opinion. He couldn’t be stupid with this kids, because these were the ones who were serious about Transfiguration and wanted to learn about it. Of course, he had no idea where they were at in their education, so he planned a simple test to see how they were doing in Transfiguration. Standing in his office, Felix stood by his desk, going over his notes for the last time before he had to go out there in front of the students and teach. It wasn’t his first choice at career under Grindelwald, he’d much rather be up at the Ministry working there, but Grindelwald had given him a choice, and Felix had chosen working at Hogwarts, rather than die of course.

Felix stood in his office, and stared at the clock. Lunch time was nearing, and he was hungry, but this was the last class before he could go eat, and it was one of his more important ones. He’d been preparing for the class all day, rehearsing for the class, and hoping he could get through without being cursed first class. Hopefully the shock factor would be enough to pull him through without pain.

To be honest, the fact that people might not hate him seriously appealed to Felix. If he could get a favorite student, or have people ask him questions, and not be afraid for their lives… the fact of the matter was, he could go and not be hated. He liked doing bad things, but he hated being hated, so it was conflicted right in his head. These kids though, they only knew of him as bad, they didn’t know he could be… well nice, and he knew that for this class, he had to shock them into being unable to act upon impulses. So once classes started, he knew what to do. The bell rang for one minute to class, and he pointed his wand towards the door, it opened with a snap, and the class filed into the room.

He could hear them walking in and taking seats. Before they had had substitutes as their teachers, but as far as he knew, they hadn’t actually learned anything. So he had a plan to give them a simple test to see how much they remembered of the class from previous years. He heard the students sitting down, talking amongst themselves, and he flicked his wand again, the door to outside of the classroom shut with a rather loud bang, and at that noise, he opened his door and swept into the room.

Long dark cloak, looking rather intimidating, intimidating and pretty sexy if he had to say so himself. Though these kids would probably be more shocked at the fact that their teacher was a famous kidnapper who tortured his victims nearly to death, and had only recently been in the paper as being cleared of all charges. No mention of him being a professor at Hogwarts. He turned and looked at the class and stood staring for a long moment, until he broke into a grin. “Good morning Class, I know this class is usually the hardest to get through, because it’s nearly lunch, and you are starting to get hungry.” He said simply, and looked around the class, trying to have eye contact with everyone before he turned to the board and tapped it with his wand. “Professor Barker” appeared on the board with simple standard, easy to read handwriting.

“I know what you are all thinking, but before you open your mouths… Read these rules.” He said simply, and pointed at the board again.

1. You will address me by Professor Barker at all times
2. Any mention of past deeds will result in detention
3. Detention will be served with me.
4. No food in my class, at all
5. Keep wands away at all times, unless instructed to have them out.
6. Come everyday to class with required material, if you do not have your homework, you will have detention, if you are late, you have detention, you miss a detention, you will have another detention.

Felix looked around the room again and smiled at them. Knowing someone was going to speak out. And sure enough, someone at the back did in fact yell out at him. “You seriously expect us to just listen to you after what you’ve done?!” Felix felt his mind blank for a moment, before he smiled at the student, and leaned back against the desk. “I don’t expect it, your other teachers, headmaster, and fellow students expect it.” He said looking at the student and smiling at them. “If you feel you can’t stand to be in my class, feel free to go tell that to the headmaster… As you all know I was cleared of all charges, and I wish to make everyone see that I was wrongly accused under the last legislation..” He said simply, looking at the class before pushing away from the desk and looking around the room. “If there are any more objections, I do wish to continue the class.” He waited a moment before nodding and moving around his desk to pick up a stack of papers.

“I’m going to pass out these short quizzes to test your knowledge of Transfiguration. Please, don’t think of it as graded, I simply want to see your level of knowledge, I don’t expect a perfect score.” He said and waved his wand again, the papers flew across the room and landed in front of the students, a few questions were on them, and a spot for their name. “Take your time, when you’re done, you may hand in your papers and leave for the day.” He said and sat down behind his desk, pretending to work on a piece of paper.

Questions:
1. What is an Animagus?
2. Explain the spell Avifors
3. What is the difference between an Animagus and a Metamorphamagus?
4. Describe one law in Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration
5. What does the spell Fera Verto do?

[OOC: Okay.. here’s the deal guys, I do my classes differently, as you can see. I use NPCs in my posts to answer questions. Please, post in this class and respond as your character saw the action taking place. ONE person may play the NPC if they so choose, but if someone else has already played the NPC, please don’t replay them. In order to get attendance in my class, please write at the top of each class post the following:

Name:
Year:
House:

That will get you your attendance, after that simply post your reaction. Homework is due in class, though not as long as he makes it sound to be.

Homework: No Homework, simply answer questions: All homework may be posted at the end of each post. All answers may be found online, mostly by Harry Potter Wiki. Please do not copy homework, unless you want your grade docked.

Posts should have this format:
Name:
Year:
House:
[reaction towards thread]
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[homework]

If your character has any specific questions, you may post in My office, which can be found in this thread… if the question is needed in the post, feel free to ask, and I will answer it later if I feel it needs answered, other than that, feel free to have Felix ignore your hand
Future classes will not have this much explanation in OOC, they will simply have homework in them, and that is it.]

Name: Darius Flint
Year: Seventh
House: Slytherin

Transfiguration class was interesting for one reason: it afforded Darius the opportunity to ‘accidentally’ alter his classmates or parts of his classmates into things they ought not be. The mayhem that ensued whenever Darius got bored enough to attempt one of these little ‘alteration experiments’ was enough to keep Darius showing up for class, which is why he was already in the room when the professor entered to begin the class.

Darius hadn’t been looking up when the professor entered, but it was pretty obvious from the sudden hush that fell over the room, immediately followed by a few gasps and whispered comments. Looking up from the Dark Mark he had been carving into the surface of the desk – not because he actually cared about furthering the Death Eater cause, but because it would piss off the Gryffindors in the next class – Darius’s eyes fell upon something that would certainly make the class interesting enough for him.

Felix Barker.

You would have had to have been living under a rock for the last two years not to know the face and reputation of Felix Barker. Mass murderer, known for torturing his victims, unrepentant… basically, what Darius would be doing now if he wasn’t so set on actually having some kind of social life. The whole shameless killing thing probably wouldn’t do well for him getting laid, either.

But for once, there was a professor at this school that Darius could respect. Well, at least to the point that Darius respected anyway. The Slytherin boy had so many questions for the professor, about how he had done it, what tools he had used, how he had managed to escape capture for so long. These would all come in handy if Darius ever decided to abandon his whole ‘let’s at least pretend we’re normal’ persona in favor of his darker self. But the professor quickly put a stop to that with his list of rules, which included never to mention past offenses.

What a pity… Darius thought, understanding Barker’s motivation, but disappointed. Perhaps he would welcome an after-class conversation…

But then he would know what you are, Darius told himself, killing his own ambitions to find out more. He had worked hard enough to disguise psychopathy as mere asshole-tendencies, he really shouldn’t blow it just to find out how to effectively become a serial killer, no matter how tempting the idea.

Of course, some idiot Gryffindor in the back of the class had to run his mouth, saying what the rest of the class was probably thinking, but was smart enough to keep to themselves. Darius was surprised – and a little disappointed – when Barker didn’t curse the kid into oblivion, but instead calmly addressed the boy and told him to go tell Grindelwald if he had a problem with Barker. Fat chance of that. But despite the fact that Darius wouldn’t get to see anyone killed today – always a downer – Barker had still come up with a ready, scathing response that Darius could approve of.

Darius’s interest in Barker personally was probably the only reason why, when the quizzes were handed out, he did not comment or complain but merely pulled out a quill and, after one more intrigued glance up at the pardoned mass-murderer, began writing his answers to the questions. And he didn’t even write sarcastic ones. His mother would be so proud.

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1) An Animagus is a wizard or witch who has trained enough to give themselves the ability to transform at will into an animal of their original choice.
2) Avifors transfigues an object or animal into a bird or many birds.
3) A metamorphmagus is born with the ability to change their physical features at will whereas an Animagus has taught themselves to transform into one animalistic shape.
4) Food cannot be conjured using magic, the first of Gamp's Laws. To circumvent this, it is possible to multiplyor enlarge food to make more of it, or summon it if you know where it is when casting a spell.
5) Fera Verto turns animals into water goblets are varying forms.

Name: James Wake
Year: 7th
House: Ravenclaw

James Wake generally prided himself with being the first and most attentive student in a class such as this. But with his assignment as Head Boy, and the recent correspondence with his uncle, James was finding it... difficult to maintain such a record. Being late to his first lesson in transfiguarion, however, would not do. Not at all. James Wake was promptly in the classroom and in the second row before the teacher finished writing his rules on the board. It did not surprise him to see the mass-murderer at the head of the class. Rather, he had been alerted and was quite accepting of the present situation. He was a... unique addition to the motley crew of professors that taught the course in the past few years.

James Wake patiently waited for the other students to act surprised, appalled or even disgusted with the personnel decision. This had already been declared by the man's presence at the Welcoming Feast. Anyone that was protesting at this point was only pretending. Not that James minded. His quill scritched and scratched as it did nothing but copy the words on the board. James watched the others, as the paper landed in front. He smirked at the simple questions, but he knew why it was necessary. After a year of professors that just wandered in and out, it only made sense that he would be uncertain on the student's full understanding of the subject.

He picked up his quill, penned in his name quietly and calmly, and quickly answered the questions to the best of his ability.

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1. What is an Animagus?
2. Explain the spell Avifors
3. What is the difference between an Animagus and a Metamorphamagus?
4. Describe one law in Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration
5. What does the spell Fera Verto do?

1. An Animagus is a person who optionally chooses to take advantage of a specific process to transform themselves into an animal of their choosing. This creature, generally, is based off the user's Patronus. Key indicators that a creature is in fact an animagus can be found riddled throughout the subject's behavior, namely an understanding of human tongue. Keen intelligence, particularly in the case where such sentience is unexpected of the creature in question, is a tell-tale sign. Animagi can only transform into one creature in particular, though research is currently being conducted on the possibility of further abilities.

2. Avifors is a spell that, when cast upon an object with a list of specific propertires, will transform said object into a flock of birds, generally members of Aves Columbiformes Columbidae family. Generally referred to as the "Dove" spell, this charm is generally used to remove objects from the user's path, or as a decorative addition to various functions.

3. An Animagus, as stated above, is a Witch or Wizard that opts to utilize a specific and difficult process to transfigure themselves into a specific animal. A Metamorphamagus, on the other hand, is a person, be it magical or otherwise, that can willingly transform their appearance, though in most cases, not completely. The range of transformations, however, is not limited, providing such individuals with a particular amount of unique recognition. Most do not receive training, and the innate ability of each Metamorphamagi varies, leading to a number of misconceptions concerning their abilities and magic.

4. Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration is a set of limitations on what can be transfigured, and the limitations of such magic. The law outlines five principle exceptions to the art of transfiguration: food, money, time, spatial distortions and Dark Magic. The law of Food, considered to be the most relateable of the laws, explicitly states that Food cannot be formed from transfiguration. This limits the availability of food to Witches and Wizards, and serves as a major limiting factor on most magic-based societies.

5. Fera Verto is a transfiguration spell that can be used to transfigure an animal into a drinking implement, generally a goblet. In a sense, it serves as the antithesis to the spell Avifors.